Keeping the story warm – Lari Don

Many things get in the way of writing a book. (Over the last few years, I’ve struggled through moving house, teenagers with exam leave, and constant elections and referendums...) But one thing that regularly gets in the way writing a book, for me, is promoting the previous book.

It shouldn’t take me by surprise, but it seems to ambush me every single time.

Whenever I finish a novel, I allow myself to start investigating new ideas, I get excited about one particular idea, I ask deliciously intriguing questions about that story and begin to consider the answers, then just when I’m ready to start writing – boom! Suddenly the previous book - the book I’d already said good bye to – is published and I have to start promoting it. The time and energy required to launch a book means weeks or months when it's hard to find time to settle into writing the next book...

I’m not complaining. I’m really not. I love that I have a publisher, Floris Books, who care enough to host a launch party, and send me to Aberdeen, Newcastle, Wigtown, St Andrews and all sorts of other places to talk about my books. I love meeting librarians, teachers, parents, booksellers and READERS! I love that. But at the same time a small quiet part of me just wants to settle down into a new story.


So, despite the fact that I have been out and about for all of September and most of October telling people about the Spellchasers trilogy, I have been trying to keep the new story warm.

I knew that if I waited until everything calmed down, if I waited until I had perfect writing conditions, I might be waiting around for ever. And I might lose the ‘what if’ and ‘what happens next’ excitement that makes me want to write this new story. So I tried to keep the story momentum going, even if only a little bit a day...

notebooks, on a comfy bed

Therefore, while touring with the Spellchasers trilogy, I have been reading 18th century collections of folklore on trains, scribbling ideas in notebooks while teachers sat kids in front of me in neat lines, asking my characters vital questions in bookshop cafes. And I have been writing actual words in actual sentences in hotel rooms (never easy, with a comfy bed right there, just asking to be snoozed on...)

But I honestly, I didn’t think I was getting anywhere. I thought I was just making a token effort. I felt like I was only writing tiny slivers of story. Half a scene here. Half a scene there. A snippet of dialogue. A thought about the baddie. A hint of a character’s true voice.

I thought I was just trying to keep a foothold in the story’s world, so that when I finally got time to think about it in peace and quiet at home, I might still have a wee bit of momentum.

But last week, I finally got a chance to stand back and look at what I have. To see how (whether!) all the half-scenes and snippets of dialogue fit together. I was delighted to discover that I had written 10 chapters! They need a lot of tidying, but the characters and their problems are there, and I'm now ready to write forward...

So taking the time to promote the previous book hasn’t stopped me writing the next one at all! All I had to do was keep the story warm, and keep my notebooks close by as I travelled...

Lari Don is the award-winning author of more than 20 books for all ages, including fantasy novels for 8 – 12s, picture books, retellings of traditional tales, a teen thriller and novellas for reluctant readers. 

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Three Books, Three Balls In The Air - By Lari Don

I’ve learnt a lot about writing trilogies in the last three years, mostly things NOT to do. (For example, don’t start more subplots in the first two books than you can tie up in the third book. I spent a lot of last year slashing out minor plotlines.)

But I recently discovered something else about trilogies, especially trilogies that your publisher wants to publish in autumn, spring and autumn (ie 6 months apart).

Bringing three novels out in quick succession (even if they are all basically drafted before you start) can mean the writer is experiencing a different point in three different books’ life cycle at exactly the same time. This month, for example, I’ve been promoting Book 1 of the Spellchasers trilogy (The Beginner’s Guide to Curses), dealing with the final edits of Book 2 (The Shapeshifter’s Guide to Running Away) and tackling the first major redraft of Book 3 (The Witch’s Guide to Magical Combat).

This means I’ve been talking to kids about the decisions behind an action scene in one book, while perfecting the language in an action scene in the next book, and trying to decide whether I should radically rework an action scene in the final book.

So the opportunities for getting tangled up in timelines and for blurting out spoilers to classes of 10 year olds are vast and varied! Particularly given that that one of my characters is a different shape, with different powers, in each book...

I’m having to think about each book in a different way. I’m thinking about Beginner’s Guide in terms of introducing the story, performing readings and discussing creative processes. I’m thinking about Shapeshifter’s Guide at a pernickety level, chewing on word choices and punctuation decisions. And I’m thinking about Witch’s Guide in a broad brush way, reducing wordcount and sewing up plotholes. This feels like slicing myself into three separate writers, each doing different things with the same overarching story at the same time...

But being three different writers at the same time is nothing compared to the challenges I regularly set my characters, so I can’t complain! Also, I love chatting to young readers about stories, and I love editing (yes, actually, I do love editing). So this month has contained many of my favourite things about being a writer!

I thought writing the trilogy was the hard bit. It turns out that promoting and editing a isn’t simple either. I’m juggling three books: each at a different stage in its life cycle, each a different weight and shape, each spinning and falling in a different way... I’m just waiting for one of them to bash me on the head!

But the joys of spending all this time with the characters, the magic and the story still outweighs the many challenges of writing a trilogy. (I suspect my next story idea wants to be a trilogy too. I’ll have to get used to keeping timelines untangled, stamping down on spoilers, and keeping all three books in the air!)

The first book in the Spellchasers trilogy, The Beginner’s Guide to Curses, is out now, the Shapeshifter’s Guide to Running Away will be out in spring 2017, and the Witch’s Guide to Magical Combat will be out in autumn 2017, all published by Floris Books.

Lari Don is the award-winning author of more than 20 books for all ages, including fantasy novels for 8 – 12s, picture books, retellings of traditional tales, a teen thriller and novellas for reluctant readers.
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Publishing is not a charity - Clémentine Beauvais

On November 14th, at the IBBY UK conference which took place at Roehampton University (see reports there), Nicky Singer gave a fantastic, passionate, moving talk about her struggle to get a 'quiet book', as she called it, published in the UK - a struggle which eventually led her to crowdfund her work, which worked beyond all expectations, ending up with Island, a novel with a cover designed by Chris Riddell.

Lest you should think that this was a fairy-taleish sort of talk, Nicky sternly reminded the audience at the end: "Crowdfunding is not a long-term solution. It worked this time but I won't be able to do it each time I want to publish a not-easily-marketable book. And it ate up nine months of my life. Nine months when I had to teach myself how to raise money, promote the book, reach out to people. I don't want to spend nine months of my life doing that; I'm a writer - if I don't write, I die."

She could barely finish her sentence as she was choking back tears - and then she actually started crying. Her emotion was extremely contagious, and I don't think I was the only one in the audience who welled up. It was extremely poignant, and indeed it should be extremely poignant, to hear about an enthusiastic, sensitive, committed writer having so much difficulty getting a good book out. The kind of book that many children will cherish and reread: the kind of book that was written with passion and talent. But the kind that isn't franchisable, and would not have sold in the tens of thousands.

The kind of book we're constantly told by the publishing industry is funded by the big bestsellers. You've heard this as much as I have. "We need the big bestsellers because they fund the quiet books". Thanks be to the big bestsellers! Glory be to thee, benevolent worldwide franchise! It's thanks to them that they exist, those authors whose books do not sell in the hundreds of thousands. They are constantly reminded that they're indebted to those big franchises.

But where are all these quiet/ politically committed/ socially aware/ aesthetically daring books that we are told get funded so generously by the big bestsellers? sure, there ARE some, but I'm not the only one who doesn't think there's enough of them. Julia Eccleshare, in an equally passionate talk at the International Research Society for Children's Literature conference in August, denounced the sameyness, indeed the copycattiness of much of children's literature production in the UK, and deplored the domination of a tiny number of authors, genres and types of books. And every single author I've talked to about this has had a similar experience: a manuscript or proposal rejected because it was too quiet, or too niche, or too different. Why is it so difficult for Nicky, in a world of publishing bountifully funded by bestsellers, to publish her book with a traditional publisher?

David Maybury, in his talk that same day, gave us a few clues: no book will be a bestseller if you don't invest at least £30,000 in its promotion. These days, he added (I think it was him, but I may be wrong), you can more or less buy your way into bestseller lists. And we authors all know, though we don't mention it very often in public, that publishers split books into two groups: those that will become bestsellers, and those that won't. Those that will are the ones for which there is fertile ground: they might be a bit like another recent bestseller, or very intense/ adventurous, or likely to be turned into a film, etc. They're 'hot' books. And they put their money and promotional push where the 'hot' book is. Some books, but very few, are surprise bestsellers. 

Well, in this context, it's not exactly shocking that bestsellers should 'fund' the quiet books. It's only fair, seeing as they'd had a head start the whole time.  No?

But perhaps that's not the right way to look at it. Perhaps those 'hot' books are just more funded and more pushed because that's what a majority of people want, so that's what brings in money. And UK/US publishers are very relaxed with the idea that publishing is mostly about the money. That's another oft-repeated mantra of publishing: 'Publishing isn't a charity'. We hear this over and over again. So quiet books which don't make money shouldn't actually expect to be funded, even by bestsellers. This is a business. Why would we make books that we know will not sell?

Because we will have made them. I think we really, really need to adopt a different attitude to failure and success. A quiet book, a politically committed book, a book about a slice of society or a theme that doesn't appeal to everyone, succeeds by the very fact of its existence. We need to be much more open to the possibility that a book might sell less than a thousand copies and still be a success, because that book exists.

This isn't just wishy-washy let-everyone-have-their-chance hippie dreaming. It's not like this initial openness to 'failure' would mean never making back that first investment. Because a thousand quiet books that sell a thousand copies each will be ten thousand quiet books spreading their quiet ideas and quiet tone, which gets readers, and, perhaps more importantly, the publishing industry itself, used to the idea that such books are not pointless luxuries or a waste of money, but an important slice of the market.

No one's asking publishing to be non-profit, but it's not true that it's simply enslaved to the market and condemned to producing 'what sells'. It can create its own readerly niches. It can foreground its values. It can pave the way for difference. Children's publishing needs to stop hiding behind the claim that it's 'not a charity'. It needs to accept the fact that it has social and a literary responsibility beyond money-making.

At the peak of the refugee 'crisis', for want of a better word, Fred Lavabre at Sarbacane, my French children's publisher, issued a rallying cry to the whole of children's publishing in France. Being children's publishers, 'We have a social responsibility', he said, 'to talk about this to children'. This launched a never-before-seen collaboration of 57 publishers (!), who published in just two months a picturebook promoting empathy, respect and welcome for refugees, Eux, c'est nous (They are us), written by Daniel Pennac and illustrated by Serge Bloch (two major figures in children's literature), with a lexicon by Jessie Magana and Carole Saturno. All proceeds to a refugee charity.

They were going to print 70,000 copies, they had to print 100, 000, by popular demand (especially from bookshops).

It's been top of the children's bestseller list since it came out.

EDIT: thank you to Pippa Goodhart for drawing my attention to Nosy Crow's similar initiative, with Refuge, written by Anne Booth and illustrated by Sam Usher. I should add that my point was not necessarily that everything's better in France, but that it is possible to act in a way that reflects one's awareness of the social responsibility of being a children's publisher. I'm not surprised Nosy Crow did this, by the way. Amazing.

_____________________________________

Clementine Beauvais writes in French and English. She blogs here about children's literature and academia.

The strange things children’s writers do – Lari Don

Yesterday, I helped dress a dragon in a car park.

The dragonmobile, at Pirniehall Primary in Edinburgh

But it’s not the strangest thing I’ve done as a children’s writer.

I've recce'd a castle, going in undercover as a tourist, to discover the best way to steal their most famous artefact.

I've interviewed a vet about how to heal a fairy’s dislocated wing, and a boat builder about how to fit a centaur on a rowing boat.

I've lost half a dozen journalists in a maze. (I guided them out again eventually. Most of them.)

I've told Celtic legends on an iron age hillfort, fairytales in an inner city woodland, and Viking myths in a cave.

And all of these things have been an integral part of my job as a children’s writer. Because writing is not just sitting at a keyboard and tapping out chapters.

The research (chatting to vets about fairy injuries and sneaking about castles) is often as much fun as the writing. And the promotion (dragon dressing and outdoor storytelling) is almost as important as the sitting at my desk imagining.

I suspect that as a children’s writer, you have to be just as imaginative in your research methods and your promotion ideas as you do in your cliffhangers and your characterisations.

But I can’t take credit for the dragon in the carpark. I did create a shiny friendly blue dragon, as one of the main characters in my Fabled Beast series. However, I had moved onto creating other characters in other stories, when my publishers decided to give the Fabled Beasts Chronicles new covers, and announced that they were going to promote the covers with a dragonflight tour.

Then the very talented marketing executive at Floris Books designed a dragon costume for her own car. And she’ll be spending most of the next fortnight driving me round beautiful bits of Scotland and the north of England (yesterday Edinburgh, today Perth, then Aberdeenshire and Penrith, as we get more confident and stretch our wings!) in a car which we dress up as a dragon in the carpark of various primary schools, then invite the children out to ooh and aah at our shiny blue dragon and her shimmering flames, before I go inside to chat with the pupils about cliff-hangers and quests.

So, this week, I’ve already learnt how to put a dragon’s jaws on at speed. And I’ve discovered that if the engine hasn’t cooled down yet, those flames coming down from the bonnet are actually warm!

Very brave Forthview Primary pupils sitting on dragon's flames!

So, yes, I do strange things. But I have fun! And I hope that my enjoyment comes across in my books, and in my author events.

I don’t think the adventures I create would be nearly as interesting without the odd conversations I have while I’m researching them, or the weird things I do to promote them.

So – what do you think? Should I just be sensible and stay indoors writing? Or is a little bit of weird now and then an effective way to make books, reading and writing more exciting for children?
 

Lari Don is the award-winning author of 22 books for all ages, including a teen thriller, fantasy novels for 8 – 12s, picture books, retellings of traditional tales and novellas for reluctant readers. 

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No more postcards any more - Nicola Morgan

[After writing this, I saw Saviour Pirotta's post about school visits, in which he praises postcards. I don't disagree with him in that context but you'll see that I have come to a different conclusion, because I'm asking a different question.]

I recently conducted some modestly scientific research and I bring you the results: buying postcards in an attempt to support my books is a) far too expensive and b) utterly pointless if measured by ensuing book sales.

The only type of writer in a position to discover this is someone who has a self-published ebook-only books, because that is the only way precise, near-real-time sales can be monitored. With my ebook-only books, where I'm the publisher, I know for a fact whether I have sold an ebook in any given 24-hour period.

So, let me tell you two recent opportunities I had to test the value of giving away postcards to support a book.

TEST 1 - Mondays are Red
I do nothing to promote Mondays are Red and it sells the same (small!) number every week, with no variation other than an overall 10% decline in the last year. It is available only as an ebook and I will see every sale within a few hours.

Recently, I did a school event at a private school. 120 pupils in the audience, of the right age to enjoy Mondays are Red. Each pupil was allowed to pick up a Mondays are Red postcard, signed, on the way out. Each pupil did. So, 120 cards went into the world, carried home by a person who was a) fired up to enjoy a book (it was a very positive event) and b) almost certainly able to afford to pay under £3 for it.

Over the ensuing two weeks, how many extra copies of Mondays are Red were sold in the UK?

None. Zero. I know, someone might buy it later but I'd like to think at least one person was moved to buy it NOW.

TEST 2 - Dear Agent, Write a Great Synopsis and Tweet Right (all on one postcard)
I do a bit to promote these books, because they are featured visually on my Help! I Need a Publisher! blog, which gets good traffic and has 1600+ registered readers. They sell steadily - and by steadily I mean that I sell uncannily the same number every week. The weekly figure does not vary unless something has spiked it. Again, they are available only as ebooks and I will see every sale within a few hours.

Recently, I was speaking at the York Festival of Writing. There were hundreds of people there but I decided not to leave piles of postcards because I wanted to know they'd been picked up. I did leave one small pile but I also properly handed out 110 over 24 hours.

Over the ensuing two weeks, how many extra copies of any of those books have been sold in the UK?

None. Zero. I know, someone might buy them later but...

And yes, of course, we don't know whether those cards will find their way into other hands and whether sales might ensure but I'm not anticipating a pre-Christmas rush, tbh.

So, let's look at the cost of this embarrassing failure
I buy my cards from Vistaprint. Maybe there's somewhere cheaper (though they aren't known for being high-end) but I like being able to design them easily and I do take advantage of the special offers. (For example, if I want 500, I know that I should just order 250, because, when I've clicked "buy" I'll be given the chance to buy another 250 for a far cheaper price.)

But the unit cost of a postcard is still pretty shocking, even when bought in bulk. I looked at my last order, in which I ordered 250 of Mondays are Red and 500 of the writing/publishing one. And I worked out that each card cost me just over 13p.

So, it cost me £30 to fail to sell a single copy of four books. And when I think how many postcards I've handed out over the years... Well, I'd rather not, to be honest.

And that's why I won't be buying postcards any more. (Oops - see PS...) I'll be signing jotters and arms and scraps of paper and punishment slips, but not postcards bought by me. I may order some business card sized things, but not postcards. I can't afford the waste, pretty as they are.

What about bookmarks? Don't get me started on bookmarks. I researched bookmarks years ago and decided that, as well as the greater cost (usually) they don't work well as marketing tools because people put hide them inside a book and they've already bought the book so it's unlikely to prompt a sale. Again, they're pretty and it's nice to give something to a reader, but...

You see, don't get me wrong: I'd love to be able to give pretty presents to everyone who smiles at me and asks for a signature and if money flowed from my pen I'd happily go back to buying postcards. But I can't afford it.

I'd love to know what everyone thinks. I am sure loads of you will disagree with me, and you might easily be right.
_____________

*cough* The books mentioned above are available on Amazon, but, apart from Tweet Right, they are also available on my own online shop, which is the cheapest place to buy them and you get all formats in one package... But no postcards!

PS Added later: Erm, I capitulated. I just ordered postcards again. One for all my books on one card, including the forthcoming ebook of The Passionflower Massacre and Sleepwalking. Why? Because I ordered 1000, making them cost just under 8p, and because I like pretty things. I am a fool! 

Fizzle and Pop (Author Talks)

By Ruth Symes / Megan Rix

Some authors love giving talks about their books and have a natural talent for it. Others find the whole thing terrifying. I think I’m in the middle, usually when I accept the invitation I like the idea, on the morning of the day I wonder why on earth I ever said yes, love doing the actual talk once I’ve started it, and am happy once it’s done.

There's thousands of horror stories of poor author's travelling for hours, through torrential rain and snow storms, only to find no one's coming to their event, or worse the event organiser has forgotten they were even coming. This did actually happen to me (minus the weather). I was invited back for a second visit to a bookstore at a shopping centre after the first had gone really well – you'd think you’d be safe on a second visit!!! But when I got there I was told sorry we don’t have you down as visiting us and the staff member who arranged it is not here today… Grrr… The only good thing was that when I went to buy a coffee in Debenhams to console myself I was served by the mother of a little boy who’d been very quiet at the previous event. She told me how once they’d got home (he was three) he went tearing round the house with his new book and proceeded to sing the song we’d sang and remembered all the dance moves and wanted to make a Harriet Dancing butterfly which he’d been too shy to do during the actual event.

Sorry sidetrack thought – but what is it with parents of toddlers being so competitive about who can do the best colouring-in and make the best craft flower and then say their child did it????

I've given talks for all different ages from 6 months old to 86 years young. Usually I love doing talks and events around my picture books – but then who wouldn’t like stamping about and growling with a Little Rex puppet at Narberth Festival or butterfly dancing with Dancing Harriet at Wytchwood and Bath Festivals?

This year I took part in ‘Scarefest’ organized by Formby Books to promote my Bella Donna stories and came on stage as an incompetent witch, complete with a broomstick full of fairy lights, who needed the children's help. I was also hobbling about as I’d sprained my ankle the day before.

There must be something in this
cauldron

 My alter ego, Megan Rix, has had more invitations to talk about The Great Escape than I can accept (have to get some writing done after all!) and so Puffin are kindly organizing a promotional tour for my second book in the series ‘Victory Dogs’ from the 29-April - 3 May 2013 with a book signing at my favourite Bedford Watersones on the 4^th, hopefully. They’re my favourite because they always welcome my golden retriever, Traffy, along too and make a big fuss of her. If I can take my dog along to an event I’m happy – she’s a Pets As Therapy dog who’s just about to start doing the Read2Dogs school scheme; a total softy who loves being fussed.  

The biggest and best difference between talks given by myself as Megan Rix and myself as Ruth Symes, from my POV, is that as Megan Rix I have Hannah from Puffin to organize things. With Hannah on board Megan Rix’s talks now come with power-point presentations and lovely photos of some of the amazing search and rescue dogs in WW2 that saved hundreds of lives.

Best of all I like having Hannah there (if I can’t have Traffy) because it means I have someone to laugh with when/if something goes wrong.

Talks by Megan can be arranged via  Hannah.McMillan@uk.penguingroup.com 

Megan's website is www.meganrix.com. Her latest book is The Great Escape

Ruth’s website is www.ruthsymes.com. Ruth’s latest book is Cat Magic reviewed by Ed's Reading Room as 'another magical tale by this fantastic writer.'

My other dog Bella wearing her Halloween wings

Preparing to Launch - Megan Rix

Some books appear with a whisper and others arrive with a fanfare - and it's not always easy to tell why. 'The Great Escape' has had much more pre-launching than I'm accustomed to. I've worked with an enthusiastic marketing and publicity team - and it's been fun and exciting.  

So far I've done features for National Newspapers including: My Top 10 Recommendations for Animal Books set during War Time with two books by members of the Scattered Authors Society on the list - plus heartfelt thanks to the members of Balaclava for their own recommendations of possibilities for me to read, as well as my local library's suggestions. I've also done  interviews on why I wrote the book with questions that have no easy answers - like why I thought the terrible pet massacre at the start of WW2 happened. (My animal heroes escape from this fate.)

I've been booked to chat on the Radio on May 17th: It's for the 'Barking at the Moon' with the lovely Jo Good and Anna Webb and their dogs, Matilda and Molly who I met when I was interviewed for my memoir 'The Puppy that Came for Christmas.  

National Competitions: Not one but TWO great competitions. Did you know that from 7th April - 7th May it's National Pet Month? 'The Great Escape' has been selected to be in the line up of  competitions to celebrate it:     
                 http://www.nationalpetmonth.org.uk/competition/greatescape

And the Young Times' is running a competition to win a prize that money can't buy called `My Pet My Hero': http://www.puffin.co.uk/thegreatescape

Libraries: It's been selected as part of 2012's Library summer Reading challenge.

Blogs: Lots of blogs! Not just this one, Girls Heart Books, the Puffin Blog – oh and something   for the Puffin Post and Writer's Digest in the USA. 

Invitations:  Book shops inviting me to sign and schools inviting me to talk have been coming in thick and fast over the past month. The first one's on May 12th at Bedford Waterstones from l0-4 pm with future ones at Kettering on June 30th and Bury St Edmunds at the beginning of July. When I asked if my four year old golden retriever, Traffy, could attend as she came along to my previous book signings for The Puppy that Came for Christmas and loves meeting and greeting Bedford Waterstones remembered her (she's also a PAT dog) and said of course! They gave us this amazing write up:

  
             Waterstones invites the dynamic duo... Megan Rix and “Traffy Rix” 
 Bedford happily invites the fabulous Megan Rix and her loyal companion Traffy for a signing of Megan's new book 'The Great Escape.' It is a story of friendship, adventure and a bit of history thrown into the mix. Set in the Second world war an animal trio are trying to escape their fate. Will they succeed? Come and meet Megan & Traffy and find out.

It was all VERY EXCITING - until real life happened and we stopped being the dynamic duo: An ultrasound scan showed all was not right inside Traffy and on the 19th April the animal hospital found, during a four hour operation, that she had a cyst literally as big as a baby inside her that was attached to her womb and intestines and blocked her ureter to the single kidney she has (the other failed two years ago.) We were so happy when she was allowed home on the 24th April and started learning how to manage life with an initially doubly incontinent dog. But when I took her back for an ultrasound on the 27th there was more bad news - although she was incontinent her bladder wasn't emptying sufficiently and there was no way of clearing the urine infection she had with antibiotics so she'd need to have a cystostomy tube fitted. As I drove home, having left her to be operated on again, all I wanted was to be able stay at the hospital with her rather than remembering her, shaking and frightened, as they took her away. Life at our house felt all wrong without her there. Even her sister, golden retriever, Bella, went to bed and cried. 

Launching once started doesn't just stop - whatever's happening in real life:

Our weekly local paper arranged to visit us on Monday but then the hospital phoned to say Traffy could come home, so I phoned the paper only to find the reporter had broken her leg and wanted to do the interview over the phone - perfect! But they still wanted to take a photograph of me and Traffy and Bella the next day. Poor Traffy looked like she'd been in a war when I brought her home. Her fur was all chopped about and she had stitches along the length of her abdomen, tubes that needed to be syringed, and a Buster collar so she didn't scratch or dislodge the tube. Still, I thought we could manage a photo. I knew the photographer from previous shoots and trusted her. So, in between syringing off Traffy's urine from the cystostomy tube to make sure she was producing enough - needs to be done every 4-6 hours, I was sticking heated rollers in my hair and slapping on some make-up for the photo shoot. One hour to go and we all looked as ready as we were going to when there was a phone call to say the photographer was running late so they were going to use one of the photos they'd taken previously. I threw off my smart clothes and crawled into bed with the dogs (Traffy hadn't been able to sleep in the hard plastic buster collar she needs to wear during the night so I'd sat up with her so she could sleep while wearing a soft one) Bella snuggled up next to Traffy - she's hardly left her side since she came home. For not the first time I was very grateful to be a writer with my hours as flexible as they needed to be and able to work wherever I happened to be; the animal hospital saw a good few thousand words written on a visit whilst Traffy was being taken off for tests and my office became the laptop on our bed while she rested there. Thank goodness for phones and emails rather than proper human contact! And thank goodness for the animal hospital - Traffy's not out of the woods yet but Tuesday was better than Monday for her and yesterday she was demanding small walks with long sleeps afterwards. Next Monday we go back to the animal hospital and start working hopefully towards her not needing the tube long term. As pre-launch ends with the launch of The Great Escape today it seems like it'll be the beginning of fun times and walks down the river and a million treats to look forward to for Traffy and Bella. And hopefully Traffy'll make it to the book signing. I think she probably will but if I feel it'll be too much for her Bella could stand in for her for part or all of the time - although meeting and greeting isn't really quite her thing - she'd much rather be splashing in the river.

Ruth's website is www.ruthsymes.com. Megan Rix's website is www.meganrix.com.