START THE DAY WITH A POEM by Patricia Cleveland-Peck

 One morning not long ago a poem arrived in my inbox from a blog I enjoy* which I'd like to share with you. The poem Shinto, is by Borges and is a wonderful example of something I love in poetry - the use of lists. It also chimed with so many things I'd been feeling and thinking about both during and since lockdown.

I found myself saying yes, I have seen many unexpected faces from the past in dreams: yes, as a travel writer the yearning for for the compass has been intense at times; yes, if I find a book ( or anything ) I have lost I am almost euphoric and yes, yes, yes, yes, the smell of a library, the former name of as street, unforeseen etymologies and even the smoothness of a fingernail - these are things to which I completely relate.

Then, with the poem still in mind I set off on my late morning walk. Although it was definitely autumnal the sun was shining and as I made my way along the lane I suddenly noticed the most beautiful Red Admiral butterfly. It settled, wings spread wide basking in the sunshine for long enough for me to gaze at it for a long and happy moment.

A perfect 'windfall of mindfulness.'

Patricia Cleveland-Peck

Inspiration - Nick Garlick

Much of my inspiration for writing comes from books. Reading something I enjoy makes me want to write too.

But there are other sources too, and this is one of them: this photograph of former US President Jimmy Carter, at 95, sitting on his porch and holding a guitar.

 

It’s a guitar made from the wood of a tree he planted. I don’t know when he planted it; just that he did, when he was young. But every time I look at it I’m lifted up out of the rough times we’re currently living through, and reminded that it’s good to keep going, to persevere.

It's that simple really.

A picture of a man on a porch with a guitar, made from the wood of a tree he planted himself.

 

Folly Farm: Returning to Magical Places by Kelly McKain

This week I grabbed one of the final places at the SAS’s Folly Farm Winter Warmer retreat. I’m excited about the opportunity to connect and collaborate with old friends, and to meet new ones… And we certainly do collaborate and inspire one another! One year, Liz Kessler, with music playing in her headphones from the previous evening’s drinks, tunes and general vibe out, took an early morning walk with her camera… and came back with an entire novel fully formed, which had unfolded within her over the walk. I think it was the following year, or a couple of years after, she presented it to a very honoured June Crebbins, Elen Caldecott and I, dedicated to us with thanks for our little part in igniting the creation. The book? Haunt Me. If you haven’t read it, I highly recommend it. It’s got all the misty magic of that Folly Farm morning, and all of Liz’s breath-taking depth of spirit and breadth of heart held within it. And that’s just one Folly Farm creative story. I know there are many, many, many more! (If you have one, maybe add it in the comments!)

  

At Folly Farm (probably in about 2015), I began powerfully imagining and playing with a project of my own, Green Witch. I walked in the incredibly beautiful wild wood there and felt my characters come to life – Tol, the broody, beautiful, troubled young man who appears to be walking between worlds while in a coma, stalking terrified heroine Delilah in dreams and visions. I could almost see Delilah herself slipping between the trees ahead of me, a fragile, braced young woman with no confidence who then comes into her power as the next Green Witch in a long line, with a huge destiny and mission ahead of her. A bit slower off the mark than Liz (!) I wrote the book, and Green Witch is out next year. 

When I return to Folly Farm in January I’ll be walking in the same wild wood, soaking up the same magic, and closing some kind of circle with gratitude and appreciation as Green Witch is ushered out into the world on a wave of grace and magic (and like most of our beloved creations, probably a bit of a wing and a prayer!). I’ll be sitting by the fire with fellow writers - old friends and new – and all old souls for sure. We’ll be raising a glass to the beautiful, magical soul Kit Berry who very sadly passed away this year. Dear Kit, I will have a good roll round the floor to Wuthering Heights while screeching the lyrics at the top of my voice to properly honour you… 😉

Connection with nature is deeply sustaining, the friendship of warm, kind, funny people is deeply sustaining, writing and creativity is a deep, deep primal well of truth… Folly Farm has all of this, plus probably someone will bring a massive tub of Quality Street, and I cannot wait to find out what gifts are there for me in January…

Find Kelly at www.kellymckain.co.uk and www.soulsparks.space and out in the wild wood.

What Don't You Know? by Claire Fayers

This is another writing/piano crossover post.

In my weekly piano lesson last week, I was trying to explain why I was having trouble with a particular piece when my teacher interrupted. 

"Usually, when you're stuck, it's because there's something you don't know," he said. "What don't you know here?"

Essentially, I didn't know which fingers had to go on which notes, but in a mini lightbulb-going-off moment, I realised this could apply to far more things than just music.

My plot has stuck? What don't I know? What do I need to find out in order to fix it?

Sometimes it's a problem with the characters. What don't I know about them, their histories, their likes and dislikes? Maybe I need to spend some time with a notebook, asking my characters questions. When I get stuck I often find it's my villain's motivation which is lacking. I have a habit of starting to write without having a clear idea of who the villain is or what they're doing (which is fine as long as I remember to work it out before I do the second draft.)

Sometimes it's the setting. For someone who writes mainly fantasy, I do surprisingly little world-building up front. I start with the starting location and fill in my mental map of the world as my characters travel. It avoids vast info-dumps early on, but it also means I can get stuck because I haven't properly worked things out. What don't I know about this particular location? What are the obstacles? What are the people like here? How does this location link to the wider world of the book? 

Sometimes it's a scene that causes me to stumble. I might have a great idea for a set piece - a tense conversation, a fight, an explosion or a dramatic encounter with a dragon - but I haven't thought through the implications. I write the scene and then I stop, wondering what should happen next. So, go back. What happened exactly? Who was involved and what were they trying to achieve? Was that scene part of some bigger plan that I need to work out?

Donald Rumsfeld famously said: 

"There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns – the ones we don't know we don't know. And... it is the latter category that tend to be the difficult ones."

What don't I know?

Claire Fayers

www.clairefayers.com

An addiction - by Holly Race

I have an addictive personality. It's something I realised quite early on, and as a result I chose to side-step the experimental phase some people go through in their teens and twenties, fearing that I wouldn't be able to regulate myself.

So it's been something of a shock to realise that I've inadvertently become addicted to something despite my best efforts... I've become addicted to writing groups.

It all started seven years ago, when an acquaintance offered to arrange a coffee between me and an agent friend of his. At that point, I had never shared my writing efforts with anyone, pressing them close to my chest, promising myself that by the time I showed them to someone else, they would be perfect. The agent read my work, and said, 'You can write, but for god's sake, join a feedback group. You'll improve so much faster.'

I took her words to heart, and applied to Faber Academy's Writing a Novel course. My first 'PP' (six years on and none of us can now remember what this stands for - personal project? peer presentation?) was terrifying. Fifteen near-strangers had read the opening 5000 words of my book, and were now discussing it around a table. Did I get criticism? Absolutely. Did I also get a confidence boost? Also absolutely. Where I learnt most of my craft, though, was in giving feedback, not receiving it. It's much easier to spot problems - and solutions - to someone else's book baby than it is your own, but once you've spotted them in someone else's work, it's easier to find and fix the same issues in your own. After the Faber course finished, many of us continued to meet on a monthly basis to read and discuss each other's writing. We took a few years off, but have recently started again on Zoom. My work in progress has been given a new direction and new energy as a result of my peers' constructive criticism.

As for my addiction? Well, my Faber peers aren't the only group I now belong to. There's also a 6am writers' Zoom, running every weekday for my fellow early birds. We gather in our pyjamas, tea in hand and bleary-eyed, chat for five minutes, write for fifty and then chat for another five. I've written and edited many thousands of words as a result, all before the sun is up. There's a group for screenwriters and actors, meeting monthly to read scripts out loud. And my fourth writing group is in person: a little gathering of Cambridge-based authors who meet up for coffee, gossip and the occasional writing sprint.

Each one is priceless in different ways. Each one provides companionship that can so often be lacking from the writing process, and a group of excellent minds to bounce ideas off. As addictions go, it could be worse.

Now, whenever aspiring writers ask me for advice, I parrot the words of that agent, without which I absolutely wouldn't be a published author today: 'Get thee to a writing group'.

How To Lose Friends, but Influence People by Steve Gladwin

 

 

 I am back in the world of paid work, but it's more than a little odd as I'm sitting in the meeting room of the Oriel Davies gallery in Newtown, Powys, where Rosie and I are based two days a week for the 'Hidden Voices' series of creative workshops we are doing for the entirely wonderful Credu Powys Carers. This space is the pretty big and the sort of multi-space room I would have killed for in my career as a further education drama teacher. There's only one problem! The voices we are talking about are so hidden that they have never actually turned up. The space which Rosie, (ill today, sadly) and I regularly post videos and her lovely poems on our facebook site Stories of Feeling and Being and try to get a certain amount of comedy gold about the large spider plant which is the only other inhabitant is starkly empty. The real problem of course is that in this area at least - where covid cases in schools are pretty rife - people are more likely to retreat back to safety than venture into possible adventure and enlightenment of spirit. I myself am hardly one to talk because there is an increasingly large hermit part of me at the moment.

Luckily I have a few things to work on, but at least one doesn't come naturally to me and never has. I am not great and now at the age of 62 am unlikely to ever be at self-promotion. Even the phrase makes me feel nervous. I have been, amongst other things, a confidence and assertiveness trainer, but I don't know how tele sales people ever do it. I spend almost as much of my time feeling sorry for them when they're trying to get me to commit to something, as being annoyed how they got hold on an ex-directory number.

But now, dear reader, the shoe is very much on the other foot. I was never any good at phoning schools to get bookings for my own theatre company, so how am I expected to raise the huge sum that's needed to fully fund my wonderful book  with 'Unbound', 'Land in Mind', which originated from these very pages. Today, the 22nd day of November, equidistant between my parents' birthdays it is a month since I began to get pledges. Here, then is not so much a list of impressions and advice about trying to do this, but more like what the Americans might call 'a mess of stuff.'

 

 

 

* Be prepared to lose your friends.

I'm not saying it's going to happen, but be prepared that it might. Your timing might be lousy when you approach your first 'victim'. They might be on their way to a funeral, or standing in the middle of a flooded kitchen. Not that you need to think of them like the priest in 'Father Ted', who Ted always phoned when he was on the verege of doing something tricky or dangerous, but you get my point!

* And don't think of people as victims.

No, these are your FRIENDS, and not just pledged in the form of variously shaped humans. Part of the appeal of your book is because it is yours, and people like you and want to support you! Right!

* Don't sell away your life and sanity for a pledgeometer.

 You will be drawn to it constantly of course and if you are a dyspraxic worrier like me, far too often. But do try to get a life somewhere in between looks. Wars could happen, monsoons could overwhelm large areas of land, and regimes could fall, and you might not nudge up that extra per cent.

* Even though it is probably an act of madness to create an anthology which involves fifty plus people, stories and poems, features, articles and photographs, rather than something simple like say - a novel, you will automatically have that number of advocates for your (and their) book, to be drawn on in various ways.

NB You might also run a slight risk of losing their support if you approach them too many times, so that, like a grumpy sleeping animal, they just want to stick two metaphorical fingers up, and roll over in the straw.

* Use social media in a way in which you feel confident.

 In our first marketing seminar, Cassie, the head of marketing advised us to concentrate our focus mainly on one social media outlet. In my case that would be facebook, where I have had a presence for many years and already annoyed a great many people, (so they're used to it, presumably!) In my case, I have also reintroduced myself to twitter, for the short and snappy one-liner, which also sneakily adds a link to your book at every opportunity. And once people start posting about your book, post back a reply so that those of them who don't know you as some sixty two year old pot-bellied, grizzled old reprobate imagine that they must be talking to the very fount of wisdom itself, especially with a cerebral book like mine, which rather imagines some wise and benevelolent sage scratching away with a swan quill in hallowed cloisters.

* Be able to describe your book in a couple of sentences rather than waffling round the subject every time someone asks you. 

'Land in Mind', (it's surely about time I named it - what a lousy marketer I am!), is about recapturing the childhood landscapes that form us and reforming them in our memories so we can continually draw on them when we need them as a form of sanctuary. It's not about 'sort of' anything, and it has a definite absence of 'maybe'. It's a tough trick to learn, but well worth the mastery.

 

 

 

*Think of as many and as different ideas for both marketing and new pledges as you can.

Include copies of your one and only novel, or your partner's artistic talent, as part of a package. Ask contributors to do you an audio, or video, which you can either do in your official update on your 'Unbound' page, or on your own site/social media. Do a regular podcast and - in my case at least - persuade some of those lovely contributing friends to perform their audio or video in favourite landscape. I already have a lovely clip from Philippa Francis by the sea in Sussex, with the moon rising in the background, and another of John Matthews reading two of his Green Man poems, the second of which closes the book. Basically, keep the ideas coming.

 

* Be prepared for disappointments with contributors, or individual components. I came so close to getting TV explorer and historian Levison Wood, but in the end a quiet covid period for him gave way to a new adventure and we just couldn't fit in a chat first. Alan Lee continues to be elusive, although he has agreed to be involved, and Phil Rickman has provided a tantalising fragment of what could be!

 

* Try not to get overwhelmed or disheartened by what your running mates are doing.

I begun my pledging period with two other new Unbounders, Louisa and Tree. Because Louisa is better known by her twitter handle of 'Roadside Mum' and has a huge following on there and elsewhere, and because her book 'One in Five' is people talking about poverty through their own stories, she hit the ground running as a huge influx of people supported it in the first week. Now, she's heading steadily towards 50%, while Tree, who has written a fascinating but clearly niche book about the Rider Waite tarot, has made a slower start than me. I find myself willing Tree to get more when I look at her page, while being sort of relieved that Louisa has reduced her thundering pace a little. We still have five months to go.

* For as many pledge disappointments and bad responses you can have delightful ones. My first pledge was Jackie Morris, who is also one of my contributors, and, having announced that she was my first pledge, then told me how ******* hard the whole process would be.  (She's dead right!) Then, last week, I remembered I want to pledge for Elizabeth Garner's book of folktales. Having done this, I messaged her on facebook to tell her I'd done that, and to tell her about the book, whereupon she responded to tell me that she'd pledged £75 for the launch and then directed me to the event the evening after where she would be discussing her father's new book 'Treacle Walker', at the Yorkshire Festival of Story. The event was hosted by the festival's director Kevin Crossley Holland, who is also a generous contributor to 'Land in Mind'.

I immediately bought 'Treacle Walker', one of the finest stories of apprecticeship you will ever read, and was drawn back to 'First Light', the incredible collection of essays on Alan Garner and his work, which had been hiding low on my kindle list. The contributors to that anthology include Hugh Lupton, Ronald Hutton, Kath Langrish and Neil Philip, all of whom appear in 'Land in Mind'. It is - needless to say - an 'Unbound' book. Of course it is!

* Which brings me to the last and most important of my musings. I've got the chance to work with 'Unbound', which is turning out to be as unique, as warm and above all, as supportive an organisation as you might hope it to be. It is wonderful to be an 'Unbounder; and that's the case where you are near to the finishing line to a background flourish of trumpets, or just getting into your stride, while still hanging on to the rail a little. Masterminded by the wonderful John Mitchinson, who believed in the idea for 'Land in Mind' from the start, (thank you, Neil Philip) and looks like the rare sort of old testament prophet you can trust, his assistant Aliya Gulemani and Cassie Waters, head of marketing, (who missed our three launches through being in hospital), 'Unbound' is a family. And like all families it groans through the ups and downs of a book's family life, laughs politely at my bad jokes and allows for my dyspraxia. Having been supported a little on reins while you make your first tentative steps, they then allow you to stumble on until you can wander off on your own without going anywhere near traffic. And later, when it comes to your homework, the red pen is used very gently indeed!

So, this is my chance to sell the book to you and encourage you all to pass all this on to like-minded friends. Although 'Land in Mind' was first conceived in a 2018 conversation between Kevin Crossley-Holland and I at Ty Newydd about his poem 'Lifelines', (which begins this anthology), and later almost accidentally provided with it's name and ethos by Catherine Fisher, (coincidentally Kevin's co-tutor on that course), the book really began with two years of interviews on this blog. That is why it seems so appropriate that Sue and Penny provide the introduction to 'Land in Mind' and Kevin's poem follows it.

Without you SASSIES there wouldn't have been a book, so here's me taking another opportunity to thank Sue and Penny, Jackie Marchant and John Dickinson, Kelly McKain and Mary Hoffman, Elen Caldecott and Sharon Tregenza, Lu Hersey and Jasbinder Bilar, Inbali Isserles and Kath Langrish, Malachy Doyle, Frances Thomas, anyone I might have briefly forgotten, and the much missed Kit Berry, to whom the book is dedicated and by whom all of these lovely photos were taken..

 

 

 

Thank you. And now a brief word from our sponsors.

 

 

https://unbound.com/books/land-in-mind/

On school visits....a school librarian's perspective from Dawn Finch

Recently, on Facebook, a new author was asking for advice about school visits. Dawn Finch, who has in the past been a prolific contributor to ABBA, put up a link to this post which she wrote on the subject in 2015, and it was full of so much good advice that I decided to hunt it out and re-publish it. So here it is! Sue Purkiss

Wednesday, 7 January 2015

On school visits....a school librarian's perspective from Dawn Finch

When I first started doing author visits as a published author, it wasn't really new to me. I’d been doing them for a very long time, but it had always been from the other side of the table (so to speak) as I spent ten years as a school librarian. During that time I’d learned a lot from the good visits, and even more from the bad ones. One day I'll blog about those, but only if I'm so rich and famous that the people concerned won't be able to afford to come after me!

 I’m the Vice President of CILIP, but was previously the vice-chair of the London and South East School Libraries Group committee, and early in 2014, we had our annual LibMeet. Part of this day was taken up with a workshop about author visits. Money is tight in schools and, even though librarians know how inspiring an author visit can be, they find it hard to convince their leadership team to stump up the costs. One of the key things that came out of this discussion is that whilst a freebie is great, it’s genuinely not the deciding factor. All of the librarians said that they had turned down free offers from authors that they felt had little or no merit or who looked “poor quality”. It was very reassuring to discover that they are looking for quality and will pay if they can convince their head teachers and business managers that it is worth it.

When librarians gather....not a "ssshh" in the house!

So, what are they looking for? All of the librarians agreed that they were looking for pretty much the same things from an author visit. Some of these points will probably seem completely obvious to you, but I hope that you find at least a couple of useful things!

Before the visit and from the first approach….

·         An author who knows the school and has taken the time to find out the librarian’s name.  

It sounds like a minor point but every librarian liked it when an author emailed them in person, and mentioned something about the school.

·         A package.

It sounds obvious but a clear package for your visits can make you stand out. School librarians get dozens of emails and flyers each year offering author visits and most are clearly sent out as a bulk email and are ignored. Please put the price on, and include your expenses in the amount. All of the librarians said that they prefer seeing a clear package and would be far less likely to follow up an author who is cagey about the price as it creates awkwardness all round!

·         An author who offers something to contribute to lesson plans.

Time is short in schools and they don’t know your books as well as you do. If you can offer some ideas for lessons relating to your books then they are more likely to invite you in. Think about the key curriculum areas and refer to them in your plans. If your books don’t tie in to specific curriculum areas then look at PSHE (personal, social, health and emotional) issues instead.

·         A pre-visit pack

Librarians are very keen to have the children prepared for author visits and appreciate linked materials in advance. If you can spring for a copy of your latest book as well as some publicity material that can often be the clincher for a booking. If you are not able to send a copy of your book, extracts are appreciated. (Don’t forget to check with the librarian which extract they have read so that you don’t repeat it on the day!) Offer this material in both disc and email format. Include a pre-order form for your books in this pack so that the librarian can tweak, add school branding, and send it straight out.

·         Competitions

As part of your visit offer a competition – a free signed copy of your book for a story competition is usually the favoured one among both children and teachers. Offer to host the winning story on your blog or website, and interview the winner. If you include the details of the competition as part of your package the librarian can start that off with the English department long before you arrive.

On the day…

Feel the fear...and do it anyway!

During the visit the librarians and literacy coordinators are looking for key things that will make them consider the visit useful and purposeful (“purposeful” being one of Ofsted’s favourite words!)

They are looking for an author who…

• ·         relates to students the importance of good and accurate research and how they accomplish it
• ·         communicates with the students well and in an unpatronising way
• ·         talks about the work of other authors, and about books that were an influence in their lives
• ·         is able to show that they got where they are by working hard, and that working hard is enjoyable and rewarding
• ·         is able to do a presentation with or without technology (not all schools can afford it)
• ·         gives a presentation that is lively, engaging and witty (even for more serious books they are still looking for lively performances)
• ·         shares the hardships of their lives with the pupils in an appropriate way (I won’t write here about the author I once booked who shared way too much….!)
• ·         talks about other media and not just books. They like you to talk about comics, movies, plays, blogs, social media – not all children want to talk about books
• ·         gives the same level of performance to ten children as to a hundred...or more.

Things that the librarians found helped the visit along…

A little bit of bribery helps! Authors who had badges, bookmarks or little treats as rewards for asking a “good” question, coaxed much better questions out of the pupils and were remembered for longer.

Bribes (ahem..sorry) incentives.

Repeat the question. Most children are a bit mumbly and confused when asking a question and often can’t be heard by the rest of the room. If you repeat their question loud enough for the other children to hear you can tidy it up a bit, and make sure that no one else is sitting with their hand up and the same question in their head!

Trying to be cool does not help at all! The “cringe factor” can be the death knell of an author visit. Children have an expectation of mild eccentricity (ahem – speak for yourselves!) with authors and the ones who are a little like that are generally better received.

Keep moving. Make use of the stage or the area that you are presenting in and keep moving about. Young people drift off easily and if you keep moving, you are more likely to keep them engaged. Nothing wrong with being a little bit of a windmill at times!

Involve the pupils. Get them up to demonstrate something, or to be dressed up, or to wear a hat or hold a sign – anything that makes them part of the show will get all of the others sitting up and paying close attention. (I have a monk’s habit and pick a child to dress up, they love it, even very surly teens)

It's a bad habit, and I've no one to blame but myself.

After the visit…

"sooooo excited!" I love this picture.

Stay engaged after the visit, offer to help with a short story competition, or be interviewed for the school website or magazine. A few days after the visit (or when you send your invoice in) email the head teacher and thank them for inviting you to the school. (You’d be amazed how few authors say thanks after an event. I know you were working, but if you enjoyed it, please say so!) This is also a good time to email the librarian and send them a “further reading” list of other authors who write in a similar field to you.  You might also like to create an A4 poster of the books that influenced you so that the librarian can print this and display it in the library. After a successful author visit the pupils want to know more about the author and a couple of posters of “what influenced me” and “my favourite books” always go down well.

If a visit doesn't go very well it can often be saved after the event by an author being lovely and by staying engaged. I remember one visit when the author was not very well and he was obviously exhausted and not properly engaged in the process, and the children just didn't click with him. After the event he apologised and we did some online interviews and he sent some hilarious photos of him reading the children’s stories and in the end it worked out rather well – despite a terribly awkward visit!

Now, I can hear some of you screaming from the back, “what?! I don’t have time for all that! You've lost your mind woman!” Well, that is your choice of course and, if you are getting masses of bookings and repeat visits, then clearly you are already giving what people want. If you are GREAT BIG NAME, then you will be booked anyway and are possibly drowning in offers, but not all of us can claim that.

The bottom line is that librarians talk to each other. Most school librarians work alone and so to survive (and stay sane!) they have an extensive virtual network. There are almost a thousand members of CILIP SLG, and that's only a fraction of the school librarians in the country – and they all connect through various closed forums. If you are giving a fun, engaging, lively and purposeful visit then it will come up on the networks – and the same goes for a visit that doesn't go as well! The forums are often buzzing with “I've had an email from Miss Doobery Whatsit, children’s and YA author, anyone know what she’s like before I book?”

If you pitch it well, and give the librarians and schools what they need then your ears will burn as the forums light up with positive comments about you, and your email will run hot with bookings, and everyone wants that!

Written by Dawn Finch - School Library Consultant and author of Brotherhood of Shades

www.dawnfinch.com or you can read my blog A Medley of Extemporanea  

A Town Called Solace, by Mary Lawson, reviewed by Pippa Goodhart

You might say that I’m cheating by reviewing a novel written for adults in a blog about literature for children. But I have my excuse ready!

 

Mary Lawson’s ‘A Town Called Solace’ begins with the viewpoint of Clara, a seven-year-old child. As the story opens, she’s standing vigil at her window, waiting and trusting that if she’s remains there, watching, her rebellious teenage sister Rose will come to home. Rose has run away and can’t be found. Clara’s distraught parents are not telling her the truth about things, so she’s alone in her anguish. 

 

Also emotionally alone are the two key adults in this story. The old lady next door is called Elizabeth. She has also disappeared from Clara’s life, taken off to hospital, leaving Clara to feed her cat. Elizabeth is in anguish over a secret from her past. And then there’s the middle generation represented by Liam, escaping an unhappy marriage, taking temporary refuge in Elizabeth’s house and working with the local builder, with no notion of what to do with his future.

 

So we have three lonely and upset people, beautifully brought to life for us in their small town setting where the winter is harsh and everybody knows everybody’s business. The story magically works those three unhappy lives until they triangulate to support each other, revealing surprises, and leaving us with hope. 

 

This is a brilliant book.

 

My excuse? Well, the child character, of course, but also a thought that’s come to me before, but which I’ve done anything about. With a story properly involving both child and adult characters, might there be a way to write a version of that same story for child readers, with another version for adults? I’m not patient or clever enough to apply myself to that, but I wonder if it could ever be done well? 

'Small Miracles' by Anne Booth - traffic, and other jams!

 

Last weekend my husband and I booked two nights away with our dog at this lovely Shepherd's Hut, so I could go to a 'Painting from Imagination' course run by the artist Nicola Slattery, a course which had been postponed in November 2020 because of the pandemic. 

The journey there on Friday night was a disaster - we were on the road for two hours but didn't get very far as we got caught in endless traffic jams, and our dog, normally a great car traveller, was retching and barking, and in obvious distress,  so we eventually turned back home, which took another hour, and phoned the farmer who was renting out the shepherd's hut, to say we would be arriving the next day instead. It was all so disappointing.

Then everything suddenly went right, and there was a series of small miracles. The moment we started turning for home, our dog fell asleep and the traffic jams disappeared  We eventually  got home and our kind daughter had made us a delicious  meal, our dog was much happier, and we decided to start again the next day. Our son and daughter said they would look after our dog whilst we were away. We slept well and set off very early in the morning and the roads were so clear - our experience could not have been better. The Shepherd's Hut was lovely. I got to my course in time. My husband went running, which he could not have done if our dog had been there,  and watched the rugby (yes, the shepherd's hut had a TV!) whilst I had a lovely time starting again to try to paint, as I love doing it but never let myself. In the evening my husband cooked a meal, and we watched 'Strictly'. The bed was so comfortable. We had such a lovely break. The next day I did some more painting, and really enjoyed it, and we drove home, and again, the journey was great. Our dog and children had had a lovely time together. Everything worked out after all.

I hope this isn't a twee post. But I wanted to say, and remind myself as much as anyone else, that sometimes things go wrong, but the second, or third or even more times around, it can all work out. It was so disappointing when Nicola's course had to be cancelled in 2020, but her course in 2021 was wonderful. It was horrible trying to drive to the course on the Friday night, with a distressed dog, but it was wonderful driving there the next day. 

In terms of writing, I am just writing the acknowledgements for my debut adult novel : 'Small Miracles' - I started writing this in 2003, at the beginning of my part-time MA in Creative Writing at Canterbury Christ Church University. I have lost count of the  re-writes I did for that novel - the disappointments, the dashed hopes and rejections for years. But finally, after kind friends secretly booked the novelist Julie Cohen to mentor me (she told me an anonymous donor had given her funding to work with someone) I finally finished a version which worked, and 'Small Miracles' was taken on by the lovely agent, Jo Unwin, who then got me a publishing deal with Harvill Secker, and it will be published next year, in August 2022.

So I started working on  'Small Miracles' in 2003 - and it is eventually going to be published, nineteen years later in 2022!

If I had known it was going to take nineteen years for 'Small Miracles' to be published, I might have given up, so I am glad I didn't, as I am very excited now about the end result. It's a much better book now than it was when I started, and over the years my characters have changed just as I have. It makes me laugh that back in 2003 I described one of the characters, Sister Margaret, who is 58,  as one of three elderly nuns. Sister Margaret will be only one year older than me when the book is published, as I will be aged 57 by next August, when my book will be published, and I am definitely not going to describe Sister Margaret as elderly any more. 

I think that our careers, and our lives in general, can seem to stall or go nowhere at different times in our lives. In this time of pandemic there are so many people, including writers in this group,  struggling because of illness, for example, and that is so hard. Sometimes we feel stuck in personal traffic jams that last longer than one night, and sometimes we don't even have the luxury  to be able to turn off the road and go back home. Politically there are so many things to worry about in our nation and world. But I think it is good to remember that we mustn't lose hope, and that because something has gone wrong one day, it won't necessarily go wrong the next, and that sometimes we can look back on times we felt we had stalled, and realise it wasn't the end of the journey. I know now that because a novel has gone nowhere for nineteen years, it still might have a chance, and even improve. I hope that all those things we feel stuck in now, will change for the better one day (sooner rather than later, obviously!) 

If you would like to go on an Art course, here is the link. I totally recommend Nicola Slattery as a kind and encouraging and inspiring tutor and wonderful artist!

https://www.nicolaslattery.com/art-courses/

Here is where we stayed. I wish I had taken a picture inside - it is so lovely - and the bed was SO comfortable! You can see inside the huts on the website.

https://friendsfarm.co.uk

Little Nuggets of Wisdom or Delight - Joan Lennon

Whenever I decide to ditch social media - and, as we know, there are many excellent reasons to do so - I stumble across some little nugget of wisdom or delight that I wouldn't otherwise have known/seen/heard. Which is how I found the words below, on Facebook then through the comments to Instagram, to Aime McNee @inspiredtowrite. And now I'm sharing them with you.

Artists are not like athletes. We cannot win gold. We cannot 'beat' other creatives. We cannot come first. Sport is objective. Our craft is subjective. Creating to 'Be the Best' is a waste of energy. Instead, create to connect to the people who need you. Because they're out there. Create in your way, because there is no right way. Take the pressure off, and focus on your unique brand of magic.

Thank you, Aime - and thank you, social media.

Joan Lennon Instagram

Shifting the goalposts - by Lu Hersey

 I read a heartfelt twitter post by Stuart White of #WriteMentor fame recently. It was about having his hopes dashed over his latest submission. 

A ton of writers responded because so many of us can identify with that feeling. Nearly every writer, published or unpublished, knows all about the pain of rejection. My father once told me that I should give up writing and buy a Euro Millions ticket every week instead. I might actually achieve something. (Thanks, Dad...)

But that's not the point, is it? Writing is a different game, one which relies (to some degree at least) on talent. It's not even about the money (or if it is, I recommend you give up right now) - it's about recognition. It's about striving for a goal. Having our voices heard. We think we can up our chances of success if we keep trying, constantly improving, constantly coming up with yet another original idea. 

And we're not entirely wrong, either. The harder you try, the more likely you are to eventually succeed. Some of the replies Stuart got were extraordinary - writers who'd had literally hundreds of rejections over decades - AND STILL KEPT GOING! Awesome writers, who'd developed hides thicker than sequoia bark. Liz Hyder's reply is a good example.. and incidentally, Liz went on to win the Branford Boase award for her stunning debut, Bearmouth - which does help show that talent can (eventually) out. 

However, whatever stage you're at on the writing journey, you'll find your goalposts constantly shift. Very few of us get to the point where we don't have to worry about the next stage. 

Maybe you're still desperately trying to get an agent to take you on, writing book after book and being turned down. It's all very well JK Rowling sending HP out to all those publishers before finally getting in at Bloomsbury - that doesn't amount to a hill of beans to today's writers because it was a very different publishing era. A time before the rise of the internet and Amazon, when writers could send their work to publishers direct, and didn't need an agent to even be considered. When publishers still had a pricing agreement in place with bookshops that guaranteed everyone a fair income. But times have changed, and the majority of publishers will only accept submissions via an agent, so finding one is the first goal. 

But once you have an agent, your goalposts shift. Now you need a publisher. A commissioning editor who loves that submission via your agent so much, they're prepared to take your manuscript to acquisitions. Take a deep breath...

You've got that far? Well done! Next goal? To get through acquisitions, you need the publisher's sales and marketing team to love it as much as the commissioning editor. If they don't think your book is right for the current market, sadly you'll still be rejected. These are difficult times for publishers too, which explains the rise of the celebrity author - publishers need to bring in guaranteed income to keep going, and books written by someone who is already a household name are far more likely to achieve big sales figures. Fortunately you don't have to be a celebrity to get a publishing deal, but it certainly helps...

So you got through acquisitions and your book is going to be published! Hurrah! All goals achieved!!! ...or are they? Is it time to start worrying about your next book? Unless you have a great publishing contract for at least two more books, it can be far more difficult to get the next one published, as (five books later) I've discovered... ☺

OMG! You've reached that point where you have a supportive publisher, and guaranteed contracts in place to publish your next however many books? WELL DONE!! 

But watch out. Even at this point you might be on shaky ground if the last book you wrote didn't achieve the expected sales figures, or a new editor/sales and marketing team come on board. However successful you are, the goalposts will shift - it's the nature of the writing game. Writers who'll never need to worry are very few and far between.

I guess the real question is - do you really want to keep playing? Your answer is bound to be yes - because however bonkers it seems, writing is what writers do. And one thing's for sure - you'll have an amazingly sympathetic and supportive crowd of fellow writers to help you get over your next rejection. Because wherever you're at, we've all been there...

Lu Hersey

Licensed to thrill - Baddie confusion in No Time to Die - by Tracy Darnton

Spoiler alert* If you haven’t seen No Time to Die yet, be warned that I’m about to discuss the role of the baddies. You may wish to wait until you’ve seen the movie.

I watched the latest James Bond film No Time to Die recently and I want to talk about the baddies. Reader, I was CONFUSED. I’ve discussed with friends, read reviews, googled it and rewatched Spectre (previous movie) so I have tried – I’ve really tried - but I’m still hazy. Maybe the James Bond script needed the expert eye of a childrens’ author along with all the other script consultants like Phoebe Waller-Bridge who got involved. Kids’ books and films get the need for clear motivation for a clear baddie. Every dashing hero protagonist in an action plot needs a villainous antagonist.

First off, there are two main baddies in No Time to Die – Blofeld and Safin - never in the same scene. They both have major facial disfigurement – surely in 2021 we can dispense with that old trope? Plus there’s an evil baddie scientist who kills that nice Hugh Dennis off the telly, and the CIA guy Logan Ash. That’s a lot of baddies.

Blofeld is locked up in Hannibal Lecter fashion but has a roving bionic eye out in the world. He’s been imprisoned thanks to MI6 and James Bond, which I was meant to remember from the Spectre film in 2015 (six long years ago, people!).  You’ll remember Blofeld from other Bond movies – most memorably for me Donald Pleasance with the white cat in You Only Live Twice - but also Telly Savalas aka Kojak, Charles Gray and Max Von Sydow. And for some complicated legal reasons, Blofeld (and Spectre) ducked out of the Bond movies for a while before returning, played by Christoph Waltz. Is it any wonder I’m confused?

The other main baddie, Lyutsifer Safin, is played by Rami Malek, aka Freddie Mercury. 

He's possibly also the guy in the scary mask at the beginning of the movie at the house in Norway with the French-speaking mum and daughter. Safin’s demeanour is sulky adolescent rather than criminal mastermind.

We had the baddie accessories - a set piece extreme danger/torture scene (which I couldn’t watch), a white cat, and the evil lair nanobot factory island which had a dash of the Thunderbirds Tracy Island about it. 

Kalsoy

In fact, maybe I could justify a trip to the Faroes for research. Anyone else?: tour

I’m digressing, back to the baddies. What is their motivation? Why are they doing this?

There are numerous examples in kids books and films – Cruella deVil wants a fur coat made from dalmations; Voldemort wants to kill Harry Potter as he thinks he can’t survive with him alive because of the prophecy; not unlike the White Witch in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe who fears the prophecy that sons of Adam and daughters of Eve will cause her downfall. The baddies’ actions make sense in the context of their motivation.

Let’s look at the first baddie I was properly scared of: the wicked Queen in Snow White. She made me afraid to eat a nice, juicy red apple for many years. All part of the evil stepmother stereotype but for me, aged 5, I clearly understood that the Mirror, Mirror on the Wall had told her that Snow White was the fairest of them all and the vain queen therefore wanted her dead. Easy. Extreme, sure, but understandable in fairy tale world.

The baddie is a worthy adversary for our hero – she looks like she will have the upper hand over Snow White. She moves the plot on with the instruction to the woodchopper guy to kill Snow White, and later with the poisoned apple. Something clearly happens as a result of her interventions – there are obstacles for Snow White to overcome to get the happy ending with the prince and to stop doing all the cleaning for Grumpy and his mates.

Back to the Bond film. Boy, is it a lot of effort setting up an evil lair, recruiting, training people to tend the poison garden, getting them into those red boiler suits and then defend the place to the death from incursion by James Bond. This baddie needs to be seriously wealthy already. Where did all this dosh come from? Has he managed to set up a cult-like ideology to keep the workers there rather than opting for the easier life of, say, a much-in-demand delivery driver? I’m literally wondering about their employment contracts while munching on my popcorn.

“Why? Why develop a lethal virus?” is one of the questions in the debrief as we blunder out into the daylight.  Maybe my friends and I are just too scarred by the last eighteen months on planet earth. Maybe we’re just too nice to be baddies.

“What was in it for him? Or for all the people on the island?”

My brain whirrs. “Because his dad, Mr Oberhauser, had taught James Bond how to ski one winter and he felt a bit jealous? Or was that Blofeld?”

I just don’t know anymore.

And what’s any of that to do with everyone else on the planet who might get hit with the virus? The evil queen, villain extraordinaire, wasn’t feeding poisoned apples to everyone.

As you can see, I’m still confused. But the point I want to make is that it shouldn’t be this difficult! Should it?

Anyway, can’t imagine why no one from my actual family agreed to watch the movie with me. Thank goodness for my similarly bewildered friends.

 

Tracy Darnton is the author of YA thrillers The Rules and The Truth About Lies. She likes a clear antagonist and has very patient friends. You can follow her on Twitter @TracyDarnton.

My setting and me

Ah, Setting – so often the poor cousin at the party next to Plot and Characterisation: a mere frame for prose; the humble stage for exciting drama. Yet, I find it’s regularly my starting point, even before my story has begun. 

For my first MG novel, The House on the Edge, I’d carried its setting – a house on a crumbling cliffside – in my head since visiting the clifftops of Whitby (many times) as a child. The story only began to grow later as an adult, when I embarked on a lone coastline walking trip (think mini Salt Path but with B&Bs). There, I became inspired by the many Dorset ghost stories, invented by smugglers to keep prying eyes away from their crimes; by Hallsands in Devon: an entire village that fell into the sea after its shingle was taken. 

In fact, the experience of such a solitary coastal walk became a metaphor for the whole novel. I was able to draw from it a sense of isolation that became the thematic backbone to the story and integral to my protagonist, Faith. I soon realised the setting connected with me as a writer, as much as my characters. Those original Whitby clifftops? Most likely they reflected my own anxiety as a child, constantly moving schools and leaving friends and homes.

Much more than a frame or a stage, then – my setting became integral to the whole experience of my story.

I recently made a trip to the setting of my second MG novel – the Lake District. Though this time, I had company: my daughter, Mae.

It's a story set within a fictional lakeside village that survives on tourism from its mythical (maybe sinister) freshwater mermaid. While it's an area I know well  – with half my family hailing from Lancashire – due to Covid, I'd not been able to visit while writing the first draft. And, oh, there’s nothing like experiencing first-hand the setting of your story. 

It means I can take silly photos searching for a Lake Mermaid (and embarrass my young companion) like this . . .

Lake Mermaid spotting

. . . and, more seriously, mull over some setting Qs:

• What are my senses experiencing, all five of them: sight, sound, smell, taste, touch?
• How might the setting have an effect on my character – internally as well as externally?
• How might the setting reflect what they are experiencing and feeling?
• What small details about the setting might cause conflict or collusion in their character arc?
• How can the setting relate to the story’s theme? Will it change and develop with the plot?

I find it helps to draw a map also, and to list particular observations; lots of photos, of course. I also like to explore its history, geography and local stories (local museums are always great for this). Even if I don’t use the information directly, it lends a backdrop of experience, like here: my (recently embarrassed) daughter at Beatrix Potter’s house.

Beatrix Potter's house

Finally, there’s a rainbow that plays a part in my story and, as Mae and I were walking, we saw this:

Rainbows over Derwentwater

Not one but two, and so close it felt we could almost touch them. I had already written the rainbow into my book – but seeing it, made it all the more possible, and just a bit magical too. 

Poor cousin? Pah. Rich aunty more like.

Alex Cotter’s middle-grade novel THE HOUSE ON THE EDGE came out in July 2021 with Nosy Crow. Find her at www.alexcotter.co.uk or on Twitter: @AlexFCotter