Apr 23 2016

Taking a break

It’s a strange time…coming to the end of the first draft of a novel; I don’t want to say ‘finishing’ because it’s very much an unfinished work.

For months I’ve been waking up and thinking about the next scene in the book, how to move the story forward, worrying about plot holes and whether or not the storyline as a whole hangs together.

Anyway, I reached an end point two weeks ago and the print out is sitting in a binder waiting for me to do another read through which is usually when I think – will anyone else really want to read this?

Taking advantage of this time when I’m not obsessing over characters and story developments, my wife suggested we take a trip to Liverpool. We decided to make it an overnight stay so we could have a relaxing evening. It’s about 55 miles from where we live and the driving time is about the same as taking the train, even with making a change at Manchester. So we took the train.

Sunny start from Mytholmroyd train station

The sunny day came with us and we walked through the shopping area of the city, passing a large Waterstones bookstore on the way. We knew if we went in there we would come out with books, so decided to save that for the next morning on our way back to the train station. Around the corner from Waterstones we came across a delightfully created seating area with shelving for book swapping.

Book swap seating area

We found the Albert Dock easily. Our main aim for the afternoon was to wander around there and visit the Merseyside Maritime Museum. Lots of fascinating stuff in the museum depicting stories of the Titanic, the Lusitania, plus World War II memorabilia – and lots of models of ships. We arrived at the same time as a school outing, a large group of eight year olds. Shades of Joyce Grenfell with the teacher constantly saying things like…”George, DON’T do that!”

At the Albert Dock

Our trips usually revolve around finding good eating places. And we succeeded for all three meals in Liverpool. Lunch was taken at the Salt House – a tapas restaurant that we had spotted on the way to the Dock.

My wife had done an extensive online search beforehand to seek out a restaurant for the evening meal. The one she settled on was called Puschka – an independent, family-owned restaurant. Finding our way there was a bit of an adventure as we hadn’t invested in a map of the city and only had a vague idea of where it was in relation to the hotel.

We were about to give up on our search for Puschka when we spotted a whisky bar. The restaurant was a few doors further down the street but it was too much to ask for me to resist going into the bar first. I sampled a Canadian rye called Whistle Pig…it would have been rude not to try one of the many whiskies available from all over the world. Unfortunately I could only manage one.

Enjoying a shot of the delightfully named Whistle Pig rye

The food at the restaurant was lovely and we had a Yealands wine with it. When the waitress told us the story about the short-legged sheep, we thought she was having us on. But it turns out to be true. The vineyard uses Babydoll sheep to keep the weeds down. The news item on YouTube explains what a wonderful environmentally friendly innovation this is.

We found a less roundabout way back to the hotel and met a friendly cat called ‘Scruff’ on the way.

A friendly Liverpudlian – Scruff

After a good night’s sleep, we had a relaxing morning…breakfast at Bill’s, a browse around Waterstones (yes, we did buy books) and a smooth train journey back home.

As often seems to be the case with short breaks like this, it feels like you’ve been away longer. And now I feel ready to take on the task of re-reading the first draft of the manuscript and see what needs more work.

Book links for The Circle Dance: Affinity eBooks/Amazon US / Amazon UK / Bella Books/ Smashwords / Apple iTunes

Ebook links for The Starling Hill Trilogy (still available on Kindle Unlimited):

Starting Over: Amazon US / Amazon UK

Arc Over Time: Amazon US / Amazon UK

Carved in Stone: Amazon US / Amazon UK

Apr 9 2016

Let’s get naked

At last year’s GCLS Conference I attended a number of panels and readings. From the sessions I attended this one line from Dorothy Allison stands out. She was talking about writing and said that writers need to have “the willingness to be naked on the page.”

Dorothy demonstrated through all her talks, including the emotive reading she did from Bastard Out of Carolina, and in her keynote speech, that she is willing to be naked in public as well (not literally, of course – maybe only for private readings).

I thought of this “nakedness” again over the past few weeks. I’ve been reading my way through J M Redmann’s Micky Knight series.

Redmann

I read the first in the series, Death by the Riverside, probably about twenty-five years ago, so it’s been fascinating to rediscover the books and see the stories from the perspective of my older self. (Also, the books are set in New Orleans and I can feel another level of connection from my brief time in the city last summer.)

The author doesn’t hold back when describing the awfulness of Micky’s early years. And her character’s way of dealing with the past isn’t particularly healthy as Micky loses herself in drink and random sex with just about any woman who crosses her path.

In the first book, Micky is well on the road to self-destruction. Her journey through the eight books is a massive roller coaster ride. Just when you think she’s moving towards a happy ever after, Hurricane Katrina arrives and knocks everything sideways.

As a writer of romance novels, I’m always hoping for the perfect HEA. This, however, is dangerous territory for Micky, especially in the beginning, when she doesn’t think she deserves to be loved.

Reaching the end of this series, I know I’m going to have withdrawal symptoms. For all her faults, Micky is a thoroughly believable character. I’d love to spend an evening sitting on a bar stool next to her, sipping Scotch and listening to her stories.

Other characters that come close to engendering the feelings I’ve experienced reading these books are Katherine V Forrest’s Kate Delafield and Jaye Maiman’s Robin Miller. Flawed and edgy; great at making the big decisions in order to catch criminals, but not so good at relationship choices.

Forrest

Maiman

With any genre, writers are putting themselves on the line. My romantic stories are softer in tone than the ones featuring toughened detectives. How hard is it to be completely “naked on the page” when writing a love story? However, I do at times wonder if I’m subconsciously censoring my own writing with the subliminal thought hovering in the background – “I can’t write that, my mother’s going to read this.”

I doubt that I will ever be able to create characters with as much depth as those created by the authors I’ve mentioned here. But I hope I have, so far, created characters and situations readers can recognise as real people. I may not be completely naked yet – maybe just down to my bra and panties.

I’ll leave you with that image (but no photo!).

Ebook links for The Circle Dance: Affinity eBooks/Amazon US / Amazon UK / Smashwords / Apple iTunes

And don’t forget to take a look at The Starling Hill Trilogy – still available on Kindle Unlimited:

Ebook links for The Starling Hill Trilogy:

Starting Over: Amazon US / Amazon UK

Arc Over Time: Amazon US / Amazon UK

Carved in Stone: Amazon US / Amazon UK

Jan 9 2016

Long nights and new covers

The nights are getting shorter, but slowly it seems. I always think that January feels like the longest month. There’s the come down after Christmas and New Year festivities, the weather is dismal and we’re still getting up in the dark and going to bed in the dark. Spring and summer are distant memories (for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, anyway).

I don’t think I would diagnose myself as a SAD person suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder (no surprise that the support organisation is based in the UK). But I do find myself looking forward to brighter days…and a holiday in Tenerife.

And I really don’t have anything to be sad about. I enjoyed a wonderful Christmas break with my wife and friends who we meet up with every year. Our home has survived the floods that have devastated homes and businesses in the area where we live. And I have two novels being published in February and March.

A happy dance is in order, I think.

The first book, due out on February 14, is the third and final installment of the Starling Hill Trilogy. As I have mentioned before I didn’t set out to write a trilogy. My first published novel, Starting Over, had a definite ending. Or so I thought at the time. But there were two characters in particular whose stories weren’t quite finished. Arc Over Time developed their relationship and it could all have ended with that book. But, no, someone else in the story felt they needed a resolution.

It was a matter of ‘if these bones could talk’…and talk they did. While I was mulling over this idea, there were discussions going on about where Richard III should be reburied. The discovery of his bones under a car park in Leicester was a media sensation, not just in the UK, but also around the world.

My royal personage, whose bones were uncovered in Starting Over and put on display at the British Museum in Arc Over Time, wanted a reburial as well. (As one of the characters in the story remarks – “Has she been watching the news?”)

Carved in Stone brings all this to the fore, along with further developments in the lives of the living characters.

All three books are being released on 14 February (re-releases of the first two) under the banner of ‘The Starling Hill Trilogy’. As Starling Hill is the name of the farm where it all started, it seemed an appropriate title for the series.

So, here it is – the big cover reveal – of not just one, but two books…the new one, Carved in Stone and Arc Over Time, which has had a makeover. (I like to think it’s a Hogwarts-type picture – one character has wandered off and another taken her place.)

Publications:

Arc Over Time – available from Affinity eBook Press /Amazon.com / Amazon.co.uk / Bella Books / Barnes & Noble / Smashwords / iTunes

Starting Over – available from Affinity eBook Press / Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Bella Books / Smashwords / iTunes.

Short Stories

There Was a Time and The Christmas Sweepstake – both available FREE on the Affinity website

Dec 2 2015

‘Left to our own devices’

I was pondering this phrase the other day. When I was a child being ‘left to our own devices’ meant we went off and did things that would have horrified our parents if they had known…balancing precariously on makeshift rafts so we could play at pirates in a murky frog-infested pond, crawling over deserted building sites, riding our bikes into deep gullies. We even played the dare game with knives.

But then we grew up reading books where kids did have adventures on their own…Swallows and Amazons, The Chronicles of Narnia, Enid Blyton’s Famous Five books. They had their adventures but were always home in time for tea. (For my American friends, tea is a snack type meal taken in late afternoon – in case one starved before dinner – usually consisting of sandwiches and cakes. Where I now live, in Northern Britain, it’s also what we call dinner. Just to confuse matters further…lunch here is called dinner.)

‘Left to our own devices’ now has new meaning with the universal spread of smartphones, tablets…and this year’s must have Christmas present…a smartwatch.

I’ve found that my reading pattern has changed. If I’m reading a book on my device, how long before I’ll switch to playing a game, checking emails or Facebook? I love reading and still I find myself distracted by the device in my hands. What hope then for the younger generation now growing up with these devices. When will they experience the simple joys of playing outside? Parents keep them indoors for fear of what they will encounter when they step out the door. Even walking to and from school is seen as hazardous. When will they be given the chance to learn to cross the road safely?

I don’t have children and if I did maybe I would be over-protective as well. But I would want them to experience the simple of joys of childhood…building tree forts, making bows and arrows, riding bikes all day…letting the imagination roam free. And most importantly, reading books. Finding Narnia or Wild Cat Island or the Enchanted Forest…these are the building blocks for not just a happy childhood, but creating a reservoir of memories that can sustain you as an adult.

Some of the books in the photo I only discovered long after my childhood days were behind me. But I enjoyed them (and still do) because once you’ve found Narnia; the longing to return never really leaves you.

booksdec

Books:

Arc Over Time – available from Affinity eBook Press /Amazon.com / Amazon.co.uk / Bella Books / Barnes & Noble / Smashwords / iTunes

Starting Over – available from Affinity eBook Press / Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Bella Books / Smashwords / iTunes.

Short Stories

There Was a Time and The Christmas Sweepstake – both available FREE on the Affinity website

Oct 17 2015

Writing tools and NaNoWriMo

In last week’s blog I talked about how I use Scrivener – a software program designed for writers. This sparked some interest with comments from others who have wondered about trying it or whether it’s the right program for them. The makers of Scrivener, Literature and Latte, also provide a list of other options that might be useful if you’re looking for something to help your process along.

All I can say is, Scrivener works for me. I read an article in a writing magazine that listed what the writer considered to be ‘top tools’ and one that caught my eye was Zenwriter. This sounds great if you really can’t stop yourself from giving in to online distractions. (What’s happening on Facebook/I have three new emails!/A quick game of solitaire won’t hurt)

Zenwriter saves you from all such temptation by hiding your screen, replacing it with a lovely background image of your choice along with accompanying background music. And you can even apply the sound of an old-fashioned typewriter.

Sounds great. But I think I have enough self-discipline to be able to do this myself. I can ignore the little icons at the bottom of my screen, put some music on, concentrate on writing for more than half an hour. (Oh, excuse me, I have a notification on Twitter.)

How to increase your word count—or maybe not!

It’s coming up to November – which means NaNoWriMo for some folks. I’ve not tried this and I won’t be doing it this year either. But I know it can be a great motivator to get 50,000 words written in a month to maybe finish that novel you’ve been trying to write for ages. Anyway, another article I read recently gave tips on how to increase your word count to meet the daily quota. Some of the suggestions were useful, but others were just laughable and sounded like excellent ideas for making your work totally unreadable. For example: “add characters who tell long boring stories, starting again at the beginning if they get interrupted”. Another one was: “Don’t use hyphens. Make all compounds into separate words”. A sure fire way to piss off your editor! Or, how about: “Words such as ‘that’ and ‘some’ can be slipped in almost anywhere”. In my case it is usually “then”.

I’m guessing this article was written as a ‘tongue-in-cheek’ exercise. Although maybe there is some merit in this tip: “Introduce a child who has the irritating habit of repeating everything anyone says”. 1,667 words a day—no problem—make it 5,000!

For anyone taking part in NaNoWriMo, good luck! I will follow everyone’s posted struggles with interest…a bit like watching a marathon on TV…applauding the effort, but glad that I’m not taking part.

Well, that’s my word output for today. Time for a cup of tea and maybe a quick look at Facebook.

Happy writing…and reading!

Books:

Arc Over Time – available from Affinity eBook Press /Amazon.com / Amazon.co.uk / Bella Books / Barnes & Noble / Smashwords / iTunes

Starting Over – available from Affinity eBook Press / Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Bella Books / Smashwords / iTunes.

Short Stories

There Was a Time and The Christmas Sweepstake – both available FREE on the Affinity website

Oct 4 2015

October thoughts – a lot of firsts

I love this time of year with the change of seasons, as the trees start to change colour and we sometimes have crisp clear days as in this (yet another canal photo) picture I took during my walk on the first day of October.

A year has passed quickly with many personal milestones. On 1st October 2014, my debut novel was published. Along with the thrill of seeing my work in print, came a whole new set of things to worry about:

Would anyone buy my book?

Would readers like it?

Would reviewers like it?

The sales for Starting Over went well but I quickly got caught up in the newbie author habit of checking my Amazon ranking every day. I’ve now weaned myself off this – down to once a week. The book currently has 19 reviews on Amazon US and 11 on Amazon UK. I’m incredibly grateful to all who took the time to put reviews there and for the book to have a star rating of 4.8 and 4.4 respectively.

There were many ‘firsts’ for me during the months that followed publication. Having the book nominated in two Golden Crown Literary Award categories – Debut Author and Traditional Contemporary Romance; writing my first guest blogs for Women and Words and UK Lesfic websites with book giveaways, signing my first book, attending the GCLS Conference in New Orleans – meeting the Affinity team, including many of their other authors; two public readings, one at GCLS and one nearer home in Manchester; and taking part in a radio-style interview with Clare Lydon (which has had at the time of posting this, 727 plays).

My second book was published in May 2015 – Arc Over Time, a sequel to the first. Sales-wise it hasn’t been as successful as the first book, but all the reviewers and also readers who have contacted me via Facebook, have loved it. With a 4.8 star rating on both the US and UK Amazon sites, it seems to have hit the spot with those who have read it.

So, with the above questions answered, I have managed to keep writing – with two books scheduled to come out next year and the first draft of another book coming along nicely.

And I haven’t mentioned the two short stories that were published last year – another first was the publication of There Was A Time which came out a month before Starting Over, and then there was my contribution to the Affinity 2014 Christmas Collection – some fun in space with The Christmas Sweepstake –and possibly a third story coming up in the next Affinity anthology.

Along with these other firsts – the pleasure of seeing my book on the shelf of our local independent bookstore, The Book Case in Hebden Bridge. (And they’ve even sold a few copies!)

When I retired two years ago, I couldn’t have imagined any of this. I thought I would be spending most of my time playing golf, shooting arrows and going on holidays with my lovely wife. I am, just about, managing to fit these activities in as my writing life continues to expand. Retirement, it seems, it just another word for finally getting to do what I’ve always wanted to do – be a full time author.

I’ll keep writing – and I hope you will keep reading!

Books:

Arc Over Time – available from Affinity eBook Press /Amazon.com / Amazon.co.uk / Bella Books / Barnes & Noble / Smashwords / iTunes

Starting Over – available from Affinity eBook Press / Amazon / Barnes & Noble / Bella Books / Smashwords / iTunes.

Short Stories

There Was a Time and The Christmas Sweepstake – both available FREE on the Affinity website

Aug 28 2015

Talking about books

I was interviewed this week and one question – which tends to crop up in interviews – was: What books have most influenced your life?

If I’m calling myself a writer, I should probably answer this with – Stephen King’s ‘On Writing’ or Strunk & White’s ‘The Elements of Style’. Well, excellent as these are, they are reference books essential to the trade, such as a dictionary, thesaurus and manual of style…all of which are handily placed next to my desk.

The real story though lies on my bookshelves – books I have kept through the years and various house moves, sometimes country moves. These are books I reread or refer to for the reference points in my life.

The three books pictured here have travelled with me through several decades. ‘Le Morte d’Arthur’ was the book I wanted for my 10^th birthday. I had a picture book on King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table but the stories didn’t really grab me. My parents wouldn’t buy ‘Le Morte d’Arthur’ for my birthday as they, quite rightly, thought it contained too much adult content. Anyway, being a sneaky little git, I coerced my grandmother into getting it for me. And I devoured it. But re-reading it years later, I could see why my parents didn’t think it suitable reading for a ten year old. Apart from all the blood and gore described in the many fight and jousting scenes, there was incest, matricide, infanticide…and more. Well, all this passed over my head at the time. To me, at that time, it was the pageantry and tales of courage and heroism that caught my imagination.

‘The Hobbit’ was a sort of continuation of the Arthurian obsession. It wasn’t much of a leap to take in a world full of goblins and elves and dragons. Ursula K LeGuin’s book of essays, ‘The Language of the Night’, then helped to define and give credence to what is blindingly obvious to lovers of fantasy…this stuff is real; it lives in our heads.

My wife doesn’t read this stuff. When we first got together, I offered her The Hobbit. After page one she put it down and said, ‘this isn’t real. I’m not going to waste my time reading about a hobbit that doesn’t exist.’

We’ve been together for over twenty-eight years, and some of you might now be wondering how if we can’t share a love of imaginary worlds. Well they say opposites attract, so I guess that must be it. She has many other redeeming qualities.

Back to the interview question – I probably answer it slightly differently each time I’m asked – depending on the day of the week and whether or not I’ve had my second cup of coffee. So, a sample here of my bookshelves to remind myself mainly, of the wide range of books and authors I love. (And this isn’t even touching on the lesfic books!)