Reality Award

Thank you to Hayley, who has nominated me for this gorgeous Reality Award. 

Here are my questions and answers:


If you could change one thing, what would it be?



I would bring back my daughter's horse, Stitch. He was a little mad. The moment he entered a field, he and my daughter became a joyful cloud of dust.

He was also a gentleman.

On a long family walk, with my daughter riding him, my elderly mother was tiring. She said we should all go on ahead and wait for her at the end.

But after a few minutes, Stitch stopped. He looked round at her. And refused to continue until he was satisfied she had caught up.

 If you could repeat an age, what would it be?   

I loved them all, although I wouldn't choose to be in my teens again. I think I was exceptionally selfish and pig-headed. Really rather horrible. So I'd quite like to repeat it, as long as I could change my ways!

I liked being newly-wed in my twenties. I loved having three children in my very late twenties/thirties, although I would have started younger and had four if I had my time again. I felt like the granny of the school playground, being almost fifty by the time my youngest daughter was leaving primary school.

I started writing seriously at forty-nine, so the last few years have been amazing too.

I like it all really. All the different decades have been incredible in their own way.

As Keith Richards said, It's good to be here. But it's good to be anywhere.

What one thing really scares you?

Becoming blind.

I'm not expecting to. But it's something I fear.

If you could be someone else for a day, who would it be?

Truly, nobody else at all. I'm the luckiest woman on earth. I just have to think of my three girls.


And now I'm getting all emotional.


Thank you for the lovely award, Hayley. x

The Night Rainbow - by Claire King

This week I went to Daunt's bookshop in Marylebone for the lovely launch of a wonderful novel, The Night Rainbow, by Claire King, who became a friend when we met at the 2010 Bristol Short Story Awards.

The story is beautifully narrated by Pea, aged five, and her little sister, Margot. It is set in a small village in rural France and takes place during a very hot summer. Pea and Margot's recently widowed mother, who also lost her baby the previous year, is grieving and pregnant. Withdrawn and depressed, she often leaves the little girls to their own devices. They meet a strange man in the meadows and are as drawn to him as he is to them.

Claire transported me straight back in time as she writes so well from within the scope of a small child's understanding and imagination. And her description of the French countryside is stunning. I felt the searing heat and saw the wonders of nature at the lower level from which children see their world. The scenes inside their rambling old house are lovely too. I was well entertained by the girls' resourcefulness when they need to eat or wash their clothes.

The girls set themselves the challenge of making their mother happy again. Their attempts to achieve this are desperately moving, especially as they find themselves in the position of having to trust a stranger to help them. The fact that such tiny children have a mission to win back their mother's love and help her smile again, a mission no child should ever have to endure, is such a poignant theme, perfectly handled by Claire. Pea grips the reader from the beginning. Her thoughts and ideas are irresistible and her voice carries beautifully throughout the novel, staying with the reader long afterwards.

As you know, it takes a lot to uproot me from my writing chair (which has almost fallen apart. Will I still be able to write sitting in a new chair? That's the worrying question bothering me this week), but I'm so glad I did. Claire is a lovely lady and The Night Rainbow is a gorgeous, gripping read. Highly recommended.

First Drafts

In response to the lovely awards from Rosemary and Wendy a while ago, for which I am very grateful, thank you, I thought I'd post my seven things about writing a first draft. I am interested in the different ways writers approach this.

1. I type the first draft on my laptop. It can take a week or so for a longish short story.

2. I don't read through it each morning. I just look at the last hundred or so words to check the sense and spot any errors, then carry on.

3. I can't leave spelling or grammar mistakes for the second draft. I have to correct as I go. 
    I always give it a title, but this will probably change, maybe several times, before submitting the story.
    I might also change the names of the characters if they don't feel right once I've become better acquainted.
    The only thing that never changes is the theme.

4. I break off to carry out any research required. I can't go on unless I know I've incorporated all the facts.

5. I don't read it until it's essentially finished. I print it out and take it somewhere I can read it out loud and make corrections in the margin in red and green pen. By the end, the sheets of paper are smothered in notes and crossings-out and asterisks and footnotes. It can take ages and at the end there is more pen than print.
    I have difficulty reading my scrawl, especially if I don't start the revisions straightaway. Sometimes it's a very simple word or two, but it can take an age to work out what it says. Yet when I have written myself a very cryptic message, hoping I'll understand myself when the time comes, I nearly always remember what I meant.

6. I transcribe all the changes onto the laptop, including further, spontaneous ones I might add to the ones already scribbled on the print-out.

7. The chances are high that by this stage, I've begun the first draft of another story. 

How do other writers approach the first draft?

Brazening It Out

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year and that all you hope for this year will happen.

I don't make any special resolutions at this time of year, but that might be because I seem to make them every day. It's like a fast-flowing river of good intentions. The trouble is, the current sometimes rushes along while I'm gripping to a tree on the bank, listening to the roar of the water.
I've tried to avoid the despair that can result from my own plans leaving me stranded, with a greater degree of success in recent months.
I'm taking one project at a time and letting it reach a good point before turning to others. I'm learning to listen to my own stories and wait for them to be really finished before submitting them. I'm thinking about them hard before I let them go and have developed a warier eye for errors or dull sentences or lack of actual story. I've been reading more than ever and analysing sentences to find out why they are there and how they work. Mostly, I've been working out how to improve. And most important of all, I've remembered that it's all about loving the words.
My novel is with an agent now, after reaching the top ten of an independent publisher's competition. I was so relieved someone liked it and offered encouragement that I thought I'd give it a try.
Writing the covering letter and synopsis was harder than fiction, but in the end, I decided to just keep it brief and honest. Submitting it felt toe-curling, like dreams where everyone in the butcher's shop turns to look at you and you realise you're just wearing a vest. I felt exposed and silly, imagining that first chapter being glanced at with derision or, worse, boredom. But I should probably consign my over-excited imagination to writing, rather then manipulating real-life to suit the flagging ego.
And actually, I don't think we feel that much embarrassment in our dreams. There's a lot more brazening it out.

The Yellow Room

Some of you will be well acquainted with Jo Derrick's beautiful short story magazine, The Yellow Room, which is published twice a year. I just wanted to mention it for those who may not know it yet.

It has a lovely glossy cover displaying David Derrick's thoughtful and inspiring photography, sometimes black-and-white and often containing a glorious warm amber glow.
Inside is a wealth of literary stories of all kinds. Jo, who founded and edits the magazine, accepts submissions via email or post and is especially keen to receive stories up to 1600 words in length at present. However, stories up to 2500 words are eligible.
Flash fiction is also welcome.
Jo also runs a competition twice a year for stories up to 1500 words or flash pieces up to 300 words.

The magazine is of very high quality, both in terms of content and appearance. Jo is so enthusiastic about new and emerging writers, hoping to give an opportunity to those whose writing sparkles with originality, risk and that special magic. I always send her my best work! It's an honour to be part of such a vivid collection of stories in this neat A5 format, almost more of a book than a magazine, with its solid spine and crisp pages.

The previous issue, Number Seven, featured a story by Carys Bray, who has since had a wonderful collection, Sweet Home, published by Salt. I would highly recommend this book. I couldn't put it down. I was reading it while cooking, while Christmas shopping, while I supposed to be doing my own writing, hiding upstairs with it while the family were trying to find me. I read it until it was finished and then wished I still had it all to come.

One of my favourite short stories, At The Launderette, by Sarah Barr appeared in issue Two of The Yellow Room. I still read it as an example of the craft whenever I need a reminder of how an excellent story should be written.
Spare language, smooth development of the main character in a believable and careful progression throughout, a great stirring of emotion and a perfect ending. I won't say any more about it here, but will maybe devote the next post to why I think it's so compelling. It taught me a lot about taking care to pare a story down to the bone.

Issue Eight of The Yellow Room is available now.

Blogger Award

At the beginning of August, the lovely Teresa Ashby gave me a really gorgeous blogger award. Thank you, Teresa, for thinking of me and my blog and here are the five fabulous things about my life.

1. I have never felt bored. If I'm in a boring situation, my mind switches to imagination mode and I think all sorts of ridiculous things that keep me entertained. When my headmistress gave the sixth-form a long speech for our leaving day, I recall imagining her dancing the can-can. It was a complete contrast to her stiff and starchy image and when she appeared to look straight at me, I was convinced she could read my thoughts. About four years ago, I adapted my tendency to live in a dream-world to writing fiction. I love it more than I can say. The disadvantages of an over-active mind are that I never see anyone wave to me and I have to ask what happened when we've finished watching a film.

2. My father bought me a paperback every Saturday morning. Our day began at the kitchen table, where I would read Bunty or Mandy while he scanned the racing pages of his newspaper. We drank lots of tea and I ate lots of  those iced biscuits (like Party Rings, only square and with iced pictures on them. I think they were called Playbox) for breakfast. Then he took me into the town and deposited me in the miniature branch of WH Smith to browse while he visited the turf accountant. When he collected me (hours later) he bought me whichever book I'd chosen. They cost two-and-six then. If I couldn't choose between two, he might agree to buy both, depending on how the horses were running. No Saturday could have been more perfect than that.

3. I developed a horrendous kidney disease when I was five. My parents were told it might be leukaemia. I was covered in bruises and in terrible pain. Driving me to hospital, my father screeched to a stop outside the toyshop, ran in and came out with a huge box for me. It was the Playdoh factory I'd wanted for ages.
I'd only just started school then, but was at home recovering for over a month, during which the entire class sent me pictures and paintings and cards. I remember the package being delivered and sitting on the stairs to read them all, wishing I could go back to school soon and get to know them all. I did recover fully, I'm glad to say, and caught up with school life. But I was always the shyest girl in the class.

4. After living in Germany for almost a year when I was twenty, I discovered I should have applied for some sort of visa and had my passport stamped. I lived in fear after that, especially when I was caught without the correct ticket on a bus in Hamburg. I was asked to produce my passport, but I didn't have it with me. The inspector was terrifying and issued me with a large fine. A lovely lady in the seat in front of me turned round to ask him to be lenient and to bear in mind that I was English and would get a dreadful impression of the German people if he wasn't prepared to let me off with a warning. But he went ahead and gave me the fine. I sat there with tears rolling down my face at the lady's kindness and at the humiliation. I couldn't eat anything except cheap bread for a week to pay the fine. And I drowned my sorrows with a bottle of very cheap wine, scraping out the cork with a fork, which took a whole afternoon, but is possible.

5. I have the best life ever and hope it goes on for a very long time.

Thank you, Teresa. x

Summer Pursuits

It's been a trying time. We tried to be helpful by agreeing to open up the field we rent for our ponies as a temporary car-park. This was to help the owners of said field, who were celebrating a family wedding at their home. Could the overspill of guests use the field for their cars? Of course, we said. How lovely. But we didn't realise the guests would leave the field-gate open all night! From 5am, so we are told, our pony and another he egged on from a neighbouring field trotted gleefully around the village.
They found their way into a farmer's field and nibbled ten new bales of hay. The packaging was ruined and the damp getting in. The owner of the other pony was cross with ours, who was the certain ringleader. And the farmer was fed-up with everyone, understandably. As the ponies were too full of hay and high spirits to be chastened, the two men got cross with each other instead!
Hubby had to act as peacemaker while catching our (exceptionally pleased with himself) pony and mending fences in every sense of the word.
Middle daughter made a notice for the field-gate requesting any remaining wedding-guests to please not open it, walk in and excite the ponies any more. As she attached the notice, four adults strolled past her, went in and proceeded to do just that! Whatever happened to the Country Code? I remember in the sixties/seventies seeing the reminders on television about closing gates.
Meanwhile our neighbours are replacing a fence and the removal of the old one has caused the boldest of our chickens, improbably named Spiffy-Peaches, to get excited and venture through the resulting gaps. Our small kitten, recently allowed to begin exploring the great outdoors, is amazingly not fazed by the chicken, despite being a third of her size. She is thrilled at the hunting opportunity presented by a plump, but small-brained bird on the ground. Hubby had to canter down the garden and rescue Spiffy-Peaches twice yesterday while he was trying to work. Thankfully, Coop, Bernhardt and Kevin Kiev are less adventurous.
I have seen one beautiful daughter graduate - what a wonderful day that was; another beautiful daughter pass her driving test (waiting for her in the test centre with the real driving-instructors gave me a lot of short story ideas) and a third beautiful daughter go off to a week's residential novel-writing course for ages fourteen to sixteen. She has a story published in an anthology, Objection To Perfection, published by Gentlemen Press, and full of pieces by young writers aged thirteen to twenty-one. So, feeling proud of them all, I'm fluffing up my feathers in a style reminiscent of Spiffy before she encountered the kitten and started jogging back up the garden.
In between animal escapades and motherly pride, I have read The Colour Of Milk by Nell Leyshon. I really enjoyed this little novel. It's very quick to read if you don't have much time and is so moving. The language is spare and direct, which adds further shades of grey (I didn't mean to say that) to the bleakness of the narrator's life. I thought I would be annoyed by the lack of capitals at the beginning of sentences. But it was appropriate for the narrator to write in that way and not distracting after all. And for me it was a good lesson in pared-down writing and how effective and emotive that can be.
I'm also looking forward to reading The Lighthouse by Alison Moore, which is long-listed for the Man Booker Prize and published by saltpublishing.com. They are running some short story competitions at the moment, which I have been busy entering. I've read an excerpt of The Lighthouse and really enjoyed Alison's style and voice.
Tomorrow, all being quiet in the garden and field, I start the first read-through of my own novel. This will be the day I read it as a reader, a very critical one who is easily bored by unnecessary description, tedious dialogue, rambling plots that go nowhere, characters who don't leap from the page and repetition of ideas in case the reader didn't get it the first time a hint was dropped. I know I can be guilty of all these in a first draft and I don't want to let any of it slip through the net. Or through the fence. Or out of the gate.
So I shall be ruthless and harsh. I won't correct typos etc., since they might occur in parts that I'll delete eventually. I'll cringe at the silly mistakes, gritting my teeth as I leave them where they are for now, and just note where the massive, sweeping changes need to be made. And I'll let you know how it goes. By the end of the summer, I hope I'll have made some real progress with it.