What will Alix be like now? by Miriam Halahmy

This post explores a question which has recently begun to fascinate me.  Alix is the main character of my novel HIDDEN. The book is a stream of consciousness in the voice of a fourteen year old girl and is set in 2007. Alix has become a carer for her mum who has broken her leg and is quite depressed. Dad ran off two years ago with another woman and Grandpa has died. Alix is just about coping. She has a best friend Kim, a beloved dog called Trudy and a newspaper round. Then she befriends Samir at school, also fourteen, a refugee from Iraq and together they rescue a drowning asylum seeker and hide him to save him from being deported.

So who is Alix? Well, in my mind she represents your average, ordinary teenage girl. She is not the most beautiful or clever or sporty but the one thing Alix won't tolerate is injustice. It gets her into a lot of trouble as she has a very impetuous, passionate and generous personality. She wears white trainer socks, (I was always told you need to know everything about your characters, even the socks they wear)  trainers and running leggings ( she's in training for the Junior County Marathon) and she is tall and thin.

I am sure you know your characters as well as I do - maybe even better.
But have you ever wondered, where your characters are now and how they turned out?

Fascinating question, you must admit.

So I have been wondering about Alix who would be 21 years old now and in her final year at uni, I'm pretty sure she is studying to be a P.E. teacher. She still loves being in the outdoors and sporty activities.

Hold onto your hats - now I've started I'm off with the wind in my hair.

Kim, her best friend who is very musical, has gone to uni in Scotland and is studying music. Alix has stayed close to home and is at Portsmouth University. She and Samir had a boyfriend/ girlfriend relationship until Sixth Form and then agreed to call it a day.

Samir is realising his parents' dream of becoming a doctor and is studying medicine in London. His older brother, Naazim, is married with a couple of kids and has opened his own garage on Hayling Island.

I know - I've strayed from Alix - but this is such fun thinking about all my characters.

Alix continues her passion for justice and has been out to both Calais and Greece in her summer holidays, providing activities for children in refugee camps. She is a member of a refugee support group at uni and works with local groups supporting refugees and asylum seekers. She has had a series of boyfriends at uni but no-one special. She finds it difficult to make a permanent commitment because of the mess her parents made of their marriage. She wants to travel and work abroad before she takes up a teaching job but she loves Hayling Island and hopes to work at the school on the Island.

In many ways our characters remain frozen in time at the point where we have to reluctantly leave them behind at the end of the book. But just once in a while it is nice to imagine what they are like now.

www.miriamhalahmy.com

How was summer for you? by Miriam Halahmy

1. Weather..... plenty of that. I'm writing this on Tuesday September 13th and the temperature outside in my London garden is 32C. Since May we have had wet June, windy July, the hottest August on record and now another heatwave in September. I have not been short of weather this summer.

Writing at Selsey Bill in windy July

2. Health : without divulging much, this was a tricky summer with family health going up and down like a yoyo. The interface with the NHS was frankly scary - which the consultant finally admitted when presented with my timeline of ghastliness. The news on this front is not hopeful. Note to self - get even more canny.

3. The book festival : I was invited for the very first time to the Edinburgh Book Festival and nearly didn't make it ( see 2). In the end whizzed up for two nights, had a great event with 150 kids on The Emergency Zoo and the weather was boiling hot.

4, Amnesty International : I volunteered to read the work of an executed writer at the Book Festival. There were four readers and each one more poignant than the next. My writer, Delara Derabi, was only 22 when she was executed in Iran. Her poem began, 'Prison/ I want to give you a different name/ Who called you this the first time...There was hardly a dry eye - but most amazing was the audience were 40 or more people and these readings go on for every single night of the festival. A lot of people reached - wonderful initiative.

5. Writing : the summer is not a great time to write a book but I was in the middle of the WIP all summer as life veered to and fro like a storm-tossed boat. So whatever, I had to finish the book. I started on my beloved Hayling Island in windy July and at times it felt like I was walking through mud. Also, despite the wind, the sea and the beach kept beckoning me outside and away from my desk. Note to self - do not have a new novel on the go in summer time.

6. Writing - after Hayling all work ground to a complete halt c/o NHS. That was fun.

7. Then the book festival - still no writing.

8. Finally the last minute flight to a writing retreat in Greece! Yes, it was a bit far to go but I was on Methana in a centre on the side of the cliff and there was nowhere to go and nothing to do. Except write. I finished the WIP.

9. So to summarise - summer is not the best time for me to be writing a book. I like to be out of the city, travelling or by the sea or in the countryside. Beware the NHS - boy can it bite. And if you go to a book festival, be prepared to sing...???...I taught the kids a WW2 song. ( shrugs and grins). But now I'm ready to go back to school, settle down at my computer for the autumn writing projects, enjoy the world of writing and writers - well, anyway, when it cools down a bit.

Hope you had a good summer!

www,miriamhalahmy,com

Research in the Tea Shop! by Miriam Halahmy

I love doing research and in the past couple of years my focus has become the Second World War. I was inspired to write my latest novel, The Emergency Zoo, about the culling of the pets at the outbreak of war, from a newspaper article I came across in early 2014. The book came out in May 2016 and is getting a lot of good reviews, including one that  said it filled a gap in 'children's war literature.'  So now I'm writing a second book set in the Blitz, a story that has emerged from the research begun during the writing of The Emergency Zoo.

Most of my research consists of ploughing through handwritten copies of the Mass Observation Diaries in the British Library. Fascinating though this is and the source of wonderful snippets of information, such as war rumours....there's gas what kills you and leaves you standing upright in the street...not everyone has easy to read handwriting. I also consult books and watch endless newsreels to soak up atmosphere, language, clothing, etc.

The Blitz Cafe, Hebden Bridge.

But in addition I love being able to view artefacts. Imagine my delight therefore when I discovered a tea room this summer totally devoted to the 1940s : The 19Fourteas Room in Havant,on the mainland above Hayling Island, near Portsmouth. The tea room is set in a beautiful 16th century cottage, with low beams and a wonderful open fireplace. There is an upper floor and out in the garden they are constructing an original Anderson shelter which has been donated.

The entire building is crammed full of original items from the 1940s many of which have been donated by people,who then come to have tea and view their items. It was absolute paradise for me. Just sitting their having tea and staring at hundreds and hundreds of beautiful and fascinating objects felt like I was doing the best research possible.

Of course I told the owner and the staff about The Emergency Zoo and my current book set in the Blitz. They were very interested and have said they might see if local schools would like me to come down and give a talk about my writing. I donated a copy of the Zoo and a poster and they were delighted.

Owner JacquiUnal with Kerry Lewis

With such a great place to experience total immersion in the war era, research couldn't be more fun!

www.miriamhalahmy.com

Mud glorious mud... by Miriam Halahmy

I think I've had this blogpost in my heart and my mind for years, ever since I decided to set three novels on Hayling Island ( off the south coast of England, opposite the Isle of Wight.)
Mud is a major geographical feature of the Island and one of its greatest attractions. Which might sound a bit weird but bear with me.
Hayling Island is not much more than a sandbank or a 25 mile square mudflat itself. It is ruler flat, five miles in length and when the tide goes out it drains from the mainland to the Solent revealing the most marvellous terrain and providing food and sanctuary for thousands of birds. The mud for me is one of the greatest attractions and I never tire of the landscape.

I've been down on the mudflats at low tide at all sorts of different times of the year and of the day. This photo was taken at 7.00 am on an August morning this year, in the week of Hurricane Bertha. That was quite an exciting time to be down on the Island. At high tide the water flowed straight over the top of the quayside flooding the cars and benches. Our holiday let sprang a leak and I even wrote a poem about it. But despite the flooding, at low tide everything drained away completely to leave the mudflats bare, exposed and in all their glory.

That week in August was also the time when the moon was closest to the earth for 20 years. I went out to photograph it and nearly got blown down by a Force 4.8 gale.

The mudflats have their dangers too and I am very careful not to walk away from the pebbly edges. People have to be regularly rescued by coastguard as they can get stuck and it was this feature of the mud which became a focus in my second Hayling Cycle novel, ILLEGAL, which is hinted at in this extract :-

"If the boat goes to ground here we'll be stuck," said Jess.
"Don't be stupid," said Sean. "We can walk, it's not far."
"Too far in this mud. Once when I was little I walked away from my Dad and started to sink. Dad had to heave like mad to get me out. He sunk to the top of his gumboots. Hayling mud sucks you in and never lets you go."

It's like a prophecy of what is to come in the book.

Hayling Island didn't have a bridge until 1824 and it was a toll bridge. Before that the only way to reach the mainland was by ferry or by the Wadeway. This was a path built across the nudflats, marked by wooden posts and ensured that the traveller stayed out of the mud. I've walked on parts of it and it takes you right out into the middle of Chichester Harbour.

You can't walk right across to the Island anymore because they dug a deeper channel for the boats. It's a very slippery muddy walk, but quite safe because the water comes in so slowly you can easily avoid getting wet. Not like Morecombe Bay!

The mudflats change colour almost each time the tide changes. The birds swoop and settle, pecking in the mud, and out in the middle of the harbour there is a silence and a smell of wet and salt and seaweed which takes you back to another age, a time when life was slower and if you wanted to take your potatoes to market on the mainland, you loaded them on your cart and pushed them right down the Wadeway, timing your return with the tide.
I still return to Hayling several times a year despite finishing my Hayling cycle and I am never happier when messing about in the glorious mud.

The Old Oyster Beds, Hayling Island by Miriam Halahmy

Each of my three novels set on Hayling Island features a different part of the Island.

HIDDEN is set on the south coast, facing the Isle of Wight, near the lifeboat station.

ILLEGAL is set in the north part of the Island in the little lanes near Northney,

STUFFED which is coming out Feb 24^th 2014 is partly set around the old oyster beds, looking out towards Portsmouth and across Langstone Harbour.

Hayling Island has a history which goes back to the Iron Age. The sea around Hayling is considered the warmest around the UK and it’s estimated 7/10 of the birds around Britain can be seen on Hayling.

Hayling had an oyster industry that dated back to the 14^th century but pollution and food poisoning at the end of the 19^th century put an end to the oyster beds.

In the 20^th century the oyster beds were transformed into bird sanctuaries and in STUFFED, the old oyster beds are the favourite place on the Island for fifteen year old Jess.

I get off the bus at the top of the Island. Nana Hat lives in a flat for old people near the oyster beds, my favourite place on the Island. When Nana could walk better we used to go and sit on a bench and she would name all the birds for me. The oyster beds don’t have any oysters now, they’re like nature reserves.

It has been a lot of fun setting three books on the Island because it has allowed me to choose my favourite places to set the books and of course have lots of reasons to go and visit the Island. I often go for walks around the oyster beds. The route of the old Hayling Billy, the train line which once ran onto the Island, runs alongside that part of the coast and you can walk the entire five mile length of the line between beautiful countryside and the beaches.

Hayling has the site of an old Iron Age fort, Hill Fort and down at the oyster beds, there are chalk and flint beds. This must have been where flints would have been harvested for tools and weapons. Jess’s boyfriend, Ryan, has a passion for tools and when they meet at the oyster beds he can’t help noticing the flint, even though he has a lot on his mind.

We wander off, not speaking, and turn onto one of the spits of land which goes out to sea. We walk all the way to the end, where the ground falls away into chalk beds. I’m kicking through the chalk, almost without thinking, looking for flints. I like looking for flints. They were the first proper tools. I watched someone make a flint knife on TV once – he sheared an entire fleece off a sheep with it. “Sharp as a surgeon’s knife,” he’d said.

The water’s lapping at our feet and the chalk goes right out to sea. It sparkles under the water, which is transparent, like there are no secrets here. But I’ve got a guilty secret and when I tell Jess she won’t want to go out with me anymore.

“I come here all the time,” she says.

 I wonder who she comes here with? There’s a burnt-out log on some blackened stones on the beach. People must come down here to party. I bet that Scott bloke brings girls here at night for bonfires, and to make out. Maybe that’s what Jess wanted.

Without realising it, I’ve let go of Jess’s hand and she’s fallen behind me. I walk further over the chalk. I’m standing there all on my own and I just want to howl and howl at the sea. Lee wants to meet up. I’ll have to drive to Portsmouth. What about me and Jess?

Me and Jess. What a joke.

Jess has come up behind me and she’s got her iPod out with the wire hanging in her hand. I turn and stare at her like we just met.

“Have you heard this track?” she asks. She hands me one earphone and puts the other one in her ear.

The oyster beds attract tens of thousands of wading birds providing the most spectacular sight on Hayling and the noise they make is so loud you can hardly hear yourself think. Ringed Plovers, Oystercatchers and Little Terns all use the long narrow islands created in the beds for breeding, hoping to keep themselves safe from foxes which are capable of crossing at low tide and consuming hundreds of eggs. The salt water lagoons also provide feeding grounds for Red-breasted Merganseres and Golden Eye. 

When you go down and visit Hayling Island, make sure you take a walk around the old oyster beds and see if you can name the birds. I'm still learning!!

www.miriamhalahmy.com

Return to Hayling Island by Miriam Halahmy

I set my cycle of three novels ( Hidden, 2011, Illegal 2012, Stuffed, yet to be published) on Hayling Island, off the south coast of England, opposite the Isle of Wight. My parents lived on the Island for 25 years and it always feels like going home, even though they passed away a long time ago. But once I finished the books and two came out, I felt my links to the Island began to wane and I wondered if I would continue visiting. For years I was coming down to the Island for weekends and day trips to do my research or just to write in all my favourite places. For three years running we rented an apartment on the beach and I wrote chapter after chapter. But this summer we had no plans to come for a week.

Then Whitsun weekend promised to be hot and sunny, family were planning visits and I felt the old pull of the Island and all its quiet and restful beauty. I booked a B&B, we packed up the boot and off we went. And do you know something? All those wonderful feelings about the Island came flooding back in! Never mind I wasn’t writing a novel in this setting anymore; never mind I didn’t have any reason to research; all my favourite places drew me back in and hugged me as if I had never been away.

We started as we always do at Langstone High street and the Old Mill which is on the mainland, just past the bridge to the Island. This is one of my favourite walks of all time. Neville Shute wrote his novel Pied Piper in the Mill and the mill ponds behind the Mill feature in Illegal.

Then we walked round to the old smuggler path which led up from the beach.

I have been walking this path up to Pook Lane, where the smugglers took their contraband off the beach, since I was nineteen years old and it gives me just the same thrill all these decades later. Pook Lane is a wonderful green tunnel this time of the year, a sunken path between fields which probably goes back to medieval times.

Then we crossed the bridge to the Island  and over the weekend we visited all our favourite places again.

This is one of the sites left over from defences build on the Island for WW2. Nearby was a gun emplacement which was bombed and several soldiers killed in the aftermath of a bombing raid on nearby Portsmouth.

This is one of the houseboats on the Kench,which features in my novel, Illegal. Lindy and Karl spend a couple of nights in a houseboat like this one. This one is a converted D-Day Landing craft. Part of the Mulberry harbour which was towed over to the Normandy beaches was built around this part of the Island and there is still a piece of it sitting out at sea.

 As it was late May, it was poppy time on the Island.

Coming back to the Island made me realise that I still love being here, writing on the beaches and in the cafes and thinking about my next novel, even though it is nothing to do with the Island. I have found a lovely new place to stay, with a balcony, so I am already planning my next writing retreat down on the Island to whip the WIP into shape and of course, breathe in the wonderful inspiring sea air.

Othello and Hamlet on Hayling Island by Miriam Halahmy

 I must admit when I started to write my cycle of three novels set on Hayling Island ( off the south coast of England), Hidden, Illegal, Stuffed - I didn’t give a thought to Shakespeare, but somehow the Bard has presented himself on the Island in more ways than one. As a natural fan I have embraced it with open arms.

Hamlet appeared first. Perhaps I should say here that apart from being one of my favourite Shakespeare plays, as far as I’m concerned Hamlet is a teenager, about to be sent over to school in England and this is why he never really takes the plunge and avenges his father’s murder. When writing, Illegal, with the main character Lindy Bellows as a vulnerable lonely girl from a dysfunctional family, I decided that Hamlet is the play she’s studying in school. At the back of my mind I had a quote from an article written at the time Paul Schofield died, which described Hamlet as a ‘spiritual fugitive.’ But that altered in my mind to ‘spiritual refugee’ and my image was born. Lindy starts to think of herself as a spiritual refugee in the first chapter and this image continues throughout the book. When she teams up with fellow misfit Karl, who has been mute for two years, she tells him he’s also a spiritual refugee.

However, I am not keen on books which take  well known plays or books and put them centre stage. I kept a firm grip on the role of Hamlet  in Illegal. Lindy is not about to turn into a literary boffin. My point was that even the most unlikely of students can be captured by the greatest literature and find something which is significant to their own lives. This is what happens to Lindy. She doesn’t suddenly become an expert on Shakespeare, but throughout the novel there is a strand which moves to the foreground from time to time because Lindy has identified with this particular Shakespeare character in her own way.

Moving on and just as Illegal is published I am invited to come and speak to A Level students at the Haringey Sixth Form Centre for World Book Day 2012. They want me to talk about immigration, Othello and Hidden.

Yikes! I know almost nothing about Othello and have never given it a thought when writing Hidden, a novel about human rights, asylum seekers and immigration. I rush for Wikipedia and start to mug up some facts.

But in the end it worked out ok because of course Hidden deals with the Outsider in our society.  And you couldn’t get much more of an Outsider than Othello, a black man in seventeenth century Italy.

This what the English teacher, Krysta, gave me as feedback after the session.

It was wonderful to have Miriam in our A2 English Literature class to discuss themes in ‘Hidden’. We are studying Othello and talking to Miriam helped the class to explore the decisions the writer made in constructing the text. Students discussed why a writer might be interested in exploring the theme of immigration and a range of very different responses to this voiced by different characters. One student raised a question about whether genuine communication between two very different cultures was possible. Learning about the setting of ‘Hidden’ also helped students to re-evaluate the use of an island as a setting in ‘Othello’. The class explored different ways the writers had written about war and the difficulty of addressing such a complex subject in fiction. Students without a doubt benefited from having had contact with a writer who so bravely addresses a range of difficult issues young people of today experience.

Perhaps the lesson here is that we have to be prepared for just about anything on school visits – and Wikipedia might be part of the prep!

I have to say that I am very pleased that not one but two of Shakespeare’s plays have found a place in my Hayling cycle. But I do feel I need to get to a production of Othello a.s.a.p – just to be ready in case this comes up again!

 www.miriamhalahmy.com