Every artist - writer, painter, whatever - draws on his or her own experiences. I don't wholly buy the popular advice of write what you know, because if we all stuck to that there would be no sci-fi (who's ever really flown between stars?), no Fantasy, not even any Victorian Gothics. But the things we know and feel do find their way onto the pages, because they're what shaped us as people - we're each the sum of our own experiences.
The most important factor of all this is family. Nothing does as much to form our character as that. There are proverbs about it, such as give me the child until he is seven and I shall give you the man. Or as grows the sapling, so bends the tree. As children we can be conditioned to respond a certain way, and as adults we still do. Habits like that run very deep, and are fiercely hard to break.
Now, I don't have a great family. I knew it even as a small boy, the sort of age when most children accept their world almost without question. My parents made a bad marriage and I can't remember a time when they didn't hate each other. My elder brother was effectively a functioning sociopath, unable to feel or empathize as normal people do; he saw others as pieces to be moved, there for his own amusement but without valid lives or cares of their own. And my mother couldn't see that - wouldn't see it, in truth - because she'd invested such hopes in him she couldn't bear to see them crushed, or accept he wasn't capable of achieving the things she dreamed of.
(Incidentally, I think it's interesting that I saw this so young. Even aged 6, maybe before, I'd begun to stand aside from events and watch them. see how people behaved and how it differed from what they said. Any artist needs that distance, I think, while also being involved enough to empathize. It's a curious thing. Some people believe writers are born, not made; when I think about this I suspect they might be right).
Anyway.
All that conflict and chaos in my childhood affected me. Of course it did, it's inevitable. I'm sure there are people who suffered worse and dealt with it better; I know some of the wounds I carry are due, in part at least, to me not coping well. But I was a child, and it's hard to beat myself up. It was dreadful and too often there was nobody there who would protect me from the barrage, but I got through it and here I am, still standing. If we find a way to deal with our scars and move on, that's a win.
As a child, I used to think my friend Mark's family was perfect. I'd wish I'd been born there instead of to my own parents, but of course I hadn't been and I'd missed all the internal arguments, the shouting and tears, a thousand things that would be inconsequential to anyone else but are agony for a child living through them.
As an adult, I've discovered there are families much worse than mine was. Forget the child abuse cases on TV, these are just ordinary people who don't seem able to stop hurting each other, day after day. People for whom the love and bitterness have become so entwined they can't be separated anymore, so they twine around each other in spirals that go on and on and on... There might be no major events, nothing that would make it onto Jerry Springer, but there's a parade of little things, like the Death of a Thousand Cuts. And even in the good families there are still sore places, memories nobody speaks of at the Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner. Everyone's wounded. Nobody grows up unscarred.
Cheery thought, eh? Actually I think it is, in a crooked sort of way. Because scarred or not we do grow up, and we deal with the shit and move on - and that's a win.
Friday, 25 July 2014
Friday, 11 July 2014
Packed with Good Stuff
Well, there's been a bit of a change in my life this past fortnight. I'm now in a relationship with a woman named Caroline, who's clever and tough and brooks no nonsense from anyone. I've known Caz for some time, and liked her, but since she was seeing someone else I couldn't speak. However, we're together now, and I couldn't be happier.
But it's going to cut into my writing time....
The good news there is that TROY: Heirs of Immortality is finished. The first draft is, anyway, so now I'll leave it for a month and turn to other things, tinker with another story or start a new one, and then return to Troy II to edit. I loathe redrafting, it's just boring and technical most of the time, and has none of the creative spark that actual writing does. But it has to be done, in both online and traditional publishing, so there's no point complaining. I knew the deal when I signed up to it.
What I'll actually spend this month or so doing is a new version - the fourth - of a story called Starfire. There have been so many because I haven't been able to make the story work. It has masses of good ideas and elements; different magics and cultures, non-human creatures, ancient power struggles and a secretive group of archivists, to name only some. But the story won't let itself be told. The third effort failed because several people told me the opening sounded like an info dump, with too much information thrown at the reader too fast. Trouble is, avoiding that meant restructuring the story from top to bottom, and I didn't really know how to go about that, besides which Troy was under way by then.
This is a pain.
But I was thinking about it the other day and I had an idea about an 'in'. Essentially it involves throwing away nearly everything I wrote, and coming at the story from a different angle. It should be more immediate and direct, so what I throw at the reader isn't dry info but a series of events that slowly come together to reveal what's going on. There's a good story somewhere inside Starfire, it's packed with good stuff, and despite all the problems I still believe in it. My job is to find that story and tease it out.
So... my To Do list now reads: redraft Troy II, write Troy III, redo Starfire, keep sending Black Lord of Eagles to conventional publishers, redraft volume one of Chained Dragon and then do volumes two and three, and proceed with The Playground of Fawns (set in an analogue of ancient China). Including all the sequels it adds up to ten volumes. That's five years work right there, minimum, and I somehow have to do this while also making Caz happy and taking her out now and then.
My life. Packed with good stuff.
But it's going to cut into my writing time....
The good news there is that TROY: Heirs of Immortality is finished. The first draft is, anyway, so now I'll leave it for a month and turn to other things, tinker with another story or start a new one, and then return to Troy II to edit. I loathe redrafting, it's just boring and technical most of the time, and has none of the creative spark that actual writing does. But it has to be done, in both online and traditional publishing, so there's no point complaining. I knew the deal when I signed up to it.
What I'll actually spend this month or so doing is a new version - the fourth - of a story called Starfire. There have been so many because I haven't been able to make the story work. It has masses of good ideas and elements; different magics and cultures, non-human creatures, ancient power struggles and a secretive group of archivists, to name only some. But the story won't let itself be told. The third effort failed because several people told me the opening sounded like an info dump, with too much information thrown at the reader too fast. Trouble is, avoiding that meant restructuring the story from top to bottom, and I didn't really know how to go about that, besides which Troy was under way by then.
This is a pain.
But I was thinking about it the other day and I had an idea about an 'in'. Essentially it involves throwing away nearly everything I wrote, and coming at the story from a different angle. It should be more immediate and direct, so what I throw at the reader isn't dry info but a series of events that slowly come together to reveal what's going on. There's a good story somewhere inside Starfire, it's packed with good stuff, and despite all the problems I still believe in it. My job is to find that story and tease it out.
So... my To Do list now reads: redraft Troy II, write Troy III, redo Starfire, keep sending Black Lord of Eagles to conventional publishers, redraft volume one of Chained Dragon and then do volumes two and three, and proceed with The Playground of Fawns (set in an analogue of ancient China). Including all the sequels it adds up to ten volumes. That's five years work right there, minimum, and I somehow have to do this while also making Caz happy and taking her out now and then.
My life. Packed with good stuff.
Thursday, 26 June 2014
A Leap of Courage
In a Fantasy novel there's going to be some fighting. Maybe a pitched battle, maybe a riot, but there's nearly always physical conflict of some sort. In my work I try to show it as an ugly thing, which means a degree of realism. I remember that I'm telling a story, people don't want to see anything too graphic, but I also think of Saving Private Ryan and know there's a place for a certain amount of gore.
In the real world we've come to disassociate war from its horror, to a large extent. We've all seen the images taken from cameras on aircraft, or tracking a missile to target, and they really do look like video games, all green flickers and numbers down the side of the display. It's the reverse of what the ancient Greeks did, in a world where warfare took place at a distance, in an exchange of arrows and stones. Greek warriors were farmers who couldn't be away from home for long, and their homeland was mostly mountains with few flat places, both of which factors contributed to their preference for close up, hand to hand fighting. This was a choice, not a last resort: it's how they wanted it. But it was a genuine transformation of warfare, because up close combat is visceral and personal, and it takes a leap of courage to brave it. An arrow is aimed at an area, but a swinging sword is meant to kill you, and you can see the eyes of the man who wields it. The awfulness of death is right in your face the whole time.
In truth, war is still like that. So is suffering, for people in pain or hunger. In the Western world we rarely come closer to such things than a picture on a TV. They're far-off events, made impersonal by distance. Yet hundreds of thousands of people have died in Iraq over the past eleven years, many of them killed with knives or marketplace bombs. Tens of thousands have died in Palestine over recent years, either at Israeli hands or one another's. Perhaps more than two million have been killed in DR Congo during its long civil war, often hacked to death with machetes in the bloodiest conflict since World War Two. In those countries, and many more, war isn't a distant or impersonal thing, it's a horror that walks at your shoulder every day.
I have an upcoming series called The Blessed Land, in which the battles are made very shocking. I do it deliberately, because part of the story addresses a group who trigger a war simply for their own interests, and I wanted to show what they caused as unflinchingly as I could. I'm also writing the TROY series, of course, which of necessity includes a lot of battle scenes; there's no way around that. But having written these stories, I want now to move away from it if I can. There are other ways to show conflict, other means of raising tension.
It's very hard to think of a Fantasy novel that doesn't include armies in battle though. Guy Gavriel Kay's The Sarantine Mosaic makes a stab at it but does have some scenes. Mark Chadbourne manages it sometimes, Storm Constantine goes through much of the Magravandias series without it, and there are Peake's Titus books, but for each of them, there are dozens which revel in it. Anything by David Gemmell or David Eddings, Jordan's Wheel of Time, Lord of the Rings, most of Terry Brooks' Shannara stories... the list just keeps going.
There's a place for battle in Fantasy, of course there is. I'm not saying I want to cut it out completely. But I want some of my books not to focus on it, or wallow in it. If I'm any good at all I ought to be able to create an intriguing plot through more subtle conflict. After all, as the countries I mentioned above show, there's quite enough war in the real world without us escaping to invented battles as well.
In the real world we've come to disassociate war from its horror, to a large extent. We've all seen the images taken from cameras on aircraft, or tracking a missile to target, and they really do look like video games, all green flickers and numbers down the side of the display. It's the reverse of what the ancient Greeks did, in a world where warfare took place at a distance, in an exchange of arrows and stones. Greek warriors were farmers who couldn't be away from home for long, and their homeland was mostly mountains with few flat places, both of which factors contributed to their preference for close up, hand to hand fighting. This was a choice, not a last resort: it's how they wanted it. But it was a genuine transformation of warfare, because up close combat is visceral and personal, and it takes a leap of courage to brave it. An arrow is aimed at an area, but a swinging sword is meant to kill you, and you can see the eyes of the man who wields it. The awfulness of death is right in your face the whole time.
In truth, war is still like that. So is suffering, for people in pain or hunger. In the Western world we rarely come closer to such things than a picture on a TV. They're far-off events, made impersonal by distance. Yet hundreds of thousands of people have died in Iraq over the past eleven years, many of them killed with knives or marketplace bombs. Tens of thousands have died in Palestine over recent years, either at Israeli hands or one another's. Perhaps more than two million have been killed in DR Congo during its long civil war, often hacked to death with machetes in the bloodiest conflict since World War Two. In those countries, and many more, war isn't a distant or impersonal thing, it's a horror that walks at your shoulder every day.
I have an upcoming series called The Blessed Land, in which the battles are made very shocking. I do it deliberately, because part of the story addresses a group who trigger a war simply for their own interests, and I wanted to show what they caused as unflinchingly as I could. I'm also writing the TROY series, of course, which of necessity includes a lot of battle scenes; there's no way around that. But having written these stories, I want now to move away from it if I can. There are other ways to show conflict, other means of raising tension.
It's very hard to think of a Fantasy novel that doesn't include armies in battle though. Guy Gavriel Kay's The Sarantine Mosaic makes a stab at it but does have some scenes. Mark Chadbourne manages it sometimes, Storm Constantine goes through much of the Magravandias series without it, and there are Peake's Titus books, but for each of them, there are dozens which revel in it. Anything by David Gemmell or David Eddings, Jordan's Wheel of Time, Lord of the Rings, most of Terry Brooks' Shannara stories... the list just keeps going.
There's a place for battle in Fantasy, of course there is. I'm not saying I want to cut it out completely. But I want some of my books not to focus on it, or wallow in it. If I'm any good at all I ought to be able to create an intriguing plot through more subtle conflict. After all, as the countries I mentioned above show, there's quite enough war in the real world without us escaping to invented battles as well.
Wednesday, 11 June 2014
Back on the Path
Hi everyone, and first of all an announcement. TROY: A Brand of Fire is now available via Smashwords, at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/446968. So now you can find it in pretty much all online book stores and almost all formats. Just $0.99, too.
OK, plug over, now onwards.
I read out a sample of my work at the monthly authors' meeting at Barnstaple Library last Saturday (the 7th). It's the first time I've read in that group, and I picked a new piece - the opening of Kaprikorn - because it's a first draft, and still pretty raw. I thought I'd be better able to make changes as suggested than with a more developed piece.
Well, that was a good call. The other writers liked it, generally, and some parts they thought were very good. But I still came in for some criticism - all of it deserved, too. Some of the (justified) comments were that the story starts too slowly, that the 2nd passage ought to be 1st, and that it's not immediately clear that Mani is the main character. People liked my use of language and my characters, but not the structure of the story.
Someone once said that we write first drafts for ourselves, and only think of readers when we reach the second draft. Well, maybe. But I think writers often write for ourselves even when redrafting or editing. It's natural enough, since we spend so much time planning and writing on our own, that we'll listen to our inner voices more readily than we will to outsiders. Bit by bit other people's voices fade away, while our own remain clear. We end up losing sight of the goal.
That goal is, of course, to publish a book that will sell at least reasonably well. Structure is very important in achieving that. What galls me a little is that I know it: I critique others in the Library group (constructively, I hope) on the same grounds. Throw the reader into the story from the first line, set up the dramatic tension right away. Simple things, but critical too, as important as cutting out adverbs and keeping a limit on your metaphors. Writing isn't just about inspiration. It's about knowing how to put one word atop another and then another atop that, paragraph on paragraph, building the novel layer by layer.
It's also about support. I'm late coming to that realisation, perhaps, because I've tended to think of authors as solitary folk - and we are, that's still true. But we're not entirely solitary folk. It does us good to meet up and chat, exchange experiences and triumphs, and commiserate over setbacks. At the same time we help remind each other that the fundamental things apply, and we can nudge each other back onto the path when our feet stray a wee bit from it.
The guys at the Library are right, Kaprikorn needs to be reshaped. I can do it easily enough, I think I know how already (though TROY II has to be finished first). But without the honest advice of Rebecca, Michelle, Sue, Colin and all the others, I might not have seen it until so late that a total rewrite was needed. So thanks people, you saved me some work and you led me back out of some treacherous ground.
It's good to have friends.
OK, plug over, now onwards.
I read out a sample of my work at the monthly authors' meeting at Barnstaple Library last Saturday (the 7th). It's the first time I've read in that group, and I picked a new piece - the opening of Kaprikorn - because it's a first draft, and still pretty raw. I thought I'd be better able to make changes as suggested than with a more developed piece.
Well, that was a good call. The other writers liked it, generally, and some parts they thought were very good. But I still came in for some criticism - all of it deserved, too. Some of the (justified) comments were that the story starts too slowly, that the 2nd passage ought to be 1st, and that it's not immediately clear that Mani is the main character. People liked my use of language and my characters, but not the structure of the story.
Someone once said that we write first drafts for ourselves, and only think of readers when we reach the second draft. Well, maybe. But I think writers often write for ourselves even when redrafting or editing. It's natural enough, since we spend so much time planning and writing on our own, that we'll listen to our inner voices more readily than we will to outsiders. Bit by bit other people's voices fade away, while our own remain clear. We end up losing sight of the goal.
That goal is, of course, to publish a book that will sell at least reasonably well. Structure is very important in achieving that. What galls me a little is that I know it: I critique others in the Library group (constructively, I hope) on the same grounds. Throw the reader into the story from the first line, set up the dramatic tension right away. Simple things, but critical too, as important as cutting out adverbs and keeping a limit on your metaphors. Writing isn't just about inspiration. It's about knowing how to put one word atop another and then another atop that, paragraph on paragraph, building the novel layer by layer.
It's also about support. I'm late coming to that realisation, perhaps, because I've tended to think of authors as solitary folk - and we are, that's still true. But we're not entirely solitary folk. It does us good to meet up and chat, exchange experiences and triumphs, and commiserate over setbacks. At the same time we help remind each other that the fundamental things apply, and we can nudge each other back onto the path when our feet stray a wee bit from it.
The guys at the Library are right, Kaprikorn needs to be reshaped. I can do it easily enough, I think I know how already (though TROY II has to be finished first). But without the honest advice of Rebecca, Michelle, Sue, Colin and all the others, I might not have seen it until so late that a total rewrite was needed. So thanks people, you saved me some work and you led me back out of some treacherous ground.
It's good to have friends.
Friday, 30 May 2014
Busy Summer
Hello all, and welcome to my increasingly stressed life. I'm scrambling to finish Troy II as soon as I can, because there's a hectic summer ahead. It's not just the usual things - my nephew's birthday, bike rides in the sunshine, and hikes on Exmoor. (I probably won't be able to do that last, because the nail is about to fall off my bad toe, and hiking on that injury might not be too clever.) There's something else.
The World Cup.
Yes, I know, England have no chance. They're not the Three Lions right now, more a sort of three-legged whippet. But this tournament is in Brazil, and my lord, I can't help but be excited. I want to see how Argentina play, and whether Ghana can deliver on their promise. Will Germany bounce back yet again? Will Belgium show why they're dark horses, and will Brazil themselves handle the immense pressure? Brazil are favourites, but if they crack the title is up for grabs, and any of six or eight nations could seize it.
But in this 25th anniversary year of the Hillsborough disaster, there are real dangers. Brazil was well behind its building schedule and has rushed to finish several stadia, some of which have seen workmen killed in a series of accidents. I wonder how many corners have been cut to get those places finished on time. There are too few hotels, too many appalling roads, and far too much rioting in the streets in protest at the cost of the tournament. It would be a surprise if there wasn't a serious problem at some stage this summer. I only hope it doesn't involve a lot of deaths - but it might.
That puts the football into perspective. Any sport is just entertainment in the end, no different from watching a film or yes, reading a book. The Liverpool manager Bill Shankly once said that football wasn't life and death, but "much, much more important than that." It isn't, as Hillsborough reminded Liverpool in 1989. Football is an escape; again, like a film or a book. It's life to many people, but it's not something we should have to dare death in order to enjoy.
In a way it ties into the question of how realistic fiction should be, doesn't it? But only to a point. If you're caught in a riot or a stadium collapse in Brazil then you're caught in it, but even the most realistic novel can be put down. The thrills are vicarious. Which is how it should be.
I'll be watching the England games with a pint in my hand, hooting at every misplaced pass and cheering every goal. I can't help it. And y'know, somewhere in the midst of it all I might, just might, start to hope for the extraordinary. Well, I do write Fantasy, after all. Though I probably won't write much on the days when England play.
I remember Istanbul 2005, when Liverpool came from 3-0 down to beat AC Milan and win the Champions' League. Sometimes fantasies come true. Just now and then.
The World Cup.
Yes, I know, England have no chance. They're not the Three Lions right now, more a sort of three-legged whippet. But this tournament is in Brazil, and my lord, I can't help but be excited. I want to see how Argentina play, and whether Ghana can deliver on their promise. Will Germany bounce back yet again? Will Belgium show why they're dark horses, and will Brazil themselves handle the immense pressure? Brazil are favourites, but if they crack the title is up for grabs, and any of six or eight nations could seize it.
But in this 25th anniversary year of the Hillsborough disaster, there are real dangers. Brazil was well behind its building schedule and has rushed to finish several stadia, some of which have seen workmen killed in a series of accidents. I wonder how many corners have been cut to get those places finished on time. There are too few hotels, too many appalling roads, and far too much rioting in the streets in protest at the cost of the tournament. It would be a surprise if there wasn't a serious problem at some stage this summer. I only hope it doesn't involve a lot of deaths - but it might.
That puts the football into perspective. Any sport is just entertainment in the end, no different from watching a film or yes, reading a book. The Liverpool manager Bill Shankly once said that football wasn't life and death, but "much, much more important than that." It isn't, as Hillsborough reminded Liverpool in 1989. Football is an escape; again, like a film or a book. It's life to many people, but it's not something we should have to dare death in order to enjoy.
In a way it ties into the question of how realistic fiction should be, doesn't it? But only to a point. If you're caught in a riot or a stadium collapse in Brazil then you're caught in it, but even the most realistic novel can be put down. The thrills are vicarious. Which is how it should be.
I'll be watching the England games with a pint in my hand, hooting at every misplaced pass and cheering every goal. I can't help it. And y'know, somewhere in the midst of it all I might, just might, start to hope for the extraordinary. Well, I do write Fantasy, after all. Though I probably won't write much on the days when England play.
I remember Istanbul 2005, when Liverpool came from 3-0 down to beat AC Milan and win the Champions' League. Sometimes fantasies come true. Just now and then.
Monday, 19 May 2014
Capricorn
I appear to have an infected toe. Sounds like a joke, doesn't it? Bit painful really though, so I'm spending a lot of time either a) sitting in the sunshine in the park, or b) sitting at my PC writing. And playing games, a bit. Not much, honest.
Life is so hard sometimes.
Anyway, I've had a crackerjack new idea, which all came from idly reading a history book while something boring was on the TV (I think it was Avatar - stunning effects, terrible derivative story. It wants to be Dances with Wolves when it grows up). The book mentioned in passing that the star sign Capricorn is the only one remaining of the original Sumerian zodiac, in which it was represented as a "Sea-Goat" - body of a man, tail of a fish and head of a goat. They called it Kaprikornus and thought the Sea-Goats were minor deities. At which the old brain went whiz-bang for a second and there was my idea.
This reading lark is terrific, isn't it? I don't really know why I had the TV on in the first place, books are way better than the average pap on telly. Except that I live alone, so sometimes I want to break the quiet with music, or some rubbishy program on the tube. Then as often as not I read a book while something warbles to itself in the background, and quite often I discover something fascinating or read a tremendous new novel, and all's well in the world for a bit.
(Speaking of which, I recently read Hugh Howey's Wool - an indie book, originally published online and now a big wow in the conventional publishing world. Good novel, too. It shows it can be done, people).
So I stopped writing Troy II for a couple of days while I jotted down some ideas for Kaprikorn, and now have a finished chapter. I can't do more because I'll come too far out of the Troy story, mentally: I need to stay immersed or I'll get my plot lines terribly tangled. I might post the opening of Kaprikorn on here later, when I get back to it, just to see what you all think. Meanwhile I'm now back in Troy II, where the Greeks are in deep trouble and looking for a hero to pull them out of it. I've got 50,000 words down now, so one more solid push should see me on the home straight.
I was asked recently if I'd help with another project, something that came from the local Library. There's a decent story in it, but I just have too much in my In-Tray already. My To-Do list includes Kaprikorn, a trilogy called Chained Dragon (one volume complete), a probable duology called The Playground of Fawns (3 chapters finished), and The Spirit Wood, which had half a volume done but which I need to rewrite. In short, if you want to add to my load then call me in about 5 years - by which time I'll have even more piled up, I expect, so if you ask, be prepared for some shouting.
And yet... someone emailed me recently to say he'd bought Risen King, enjoyed it, and given it to his son to read. The son has now bought both Songs of Sorrow books and is immersed in the first. Just one instance of that every few months is enough to lift my heart a little: I might not be changing the world, but somewhere in that In-Tray is a story that will touch someone, somehow, and that's a pretty encouraging thought.
Life is so hard sometimes.
Anyway, I've had a crackerjack new idea, which all came from idly reading a history book while something boring was on the TV (I think it was Avatar - stunning effects, terrible derivative story. It wants to be Dances with Wolves when it grows up). The book mentioned in passing that the star sign Capricorn is the only one remaining of the original Sumerian zodiac, in which it was represented as a "Sea-Goat" - body of a man, tail of a fish and head of a goat. They called it Kaprikornus and thought the Sea-Goats were minor deities. At which the old brain went whiz-bang for a second and there was my idea.
This reading lark is terrific, isn't it? I don't really know why I had the TV on in the first place, books are way better than the average pap on telly. Except that I live alone, so sometimes I want to break the quiet with music, or some rubbishy program on the tube. Then as often as not I read a book while something warbles to itself in the background, and quite often I discover something fascinating or read a tremendous new novel, and all's well in the world for a bit.
(Speaking of which, I recently read Hugh Howey's Wool - an indie book, originally published online and now a big wow in the conventional publishing world. Good novel, too. It shows it can be done, people).
So I stopped writing Troy II for a couple of days while I jotted down some ideas for Kaprikorn, and now have a finished chapter. I can't do more because I'll come too far out of the Troy story, mentally: I need to stay immersed or I'll get my plot lines terribly tangled. I might post the opening of Kaprikorn on here later, when I get back to it, just to see what you all think. Meanwhile I'm now back in Troy II, where the Greeks are in deep trouble and looking for a hero to pull them out of it. I've got 50,000 words down now, so one more solid push should see me on the home straight.
I was asked recently if I'd help with another project, something that came from the local Library. There's a decent story in it, but I just have too much in my In-Tray already. My To-Do list includes Kaprikorn, a trilogy called Chained Dragon (one volume complete), a probable duology called The Playground of Fawns (3 chapters finished), and The Spirit Wood, which had half a volume done but which I need to rewrite. In short, if you want to add to my load then call me in about 5 years - by which time I'll have even more piled up, I expect, so if you ask, be prepared for some shouting.
And yet... someone emailed me recently to say he'd bought Risen King, enjoyed it, and given it to his son to read. The son has now bought both Songs of Sorrow books and is immersed in the first. Just one instance of that every few months is enough to lift my heart a little: I might not be changing the world, but somewhere in that In-Tray is a story that will touch someone, somehow, and that's a pretty encouraging thought.
Saturday, 3 May 2014
A Proper Author
Yesterday I hosted my first author event - just a small one, a meet-and-greet and book signing at Barnstaple Library. For a couple of days beforehand I went through long periods of calm broken by sudden attacks of gibbering panic, but it turned out OK. Part of the reason why is that a good number of friends turned up to support me, some of them writers and others from my work. I'm really grateful to them, so big thanks for that to Ruth, Colin and Sue, Gill, the other Gill, and everyone else.
Thanks as well to Elliot Anderton, who's a reporter for the local paper and who took a couple of photos, which will be in the Gazette with a write-up next week (Me! In the paper!). I was invited to do another signing at Bideford Library in the summer as well, and most importantly of all I sold a few books, so today was a good day.
And you know, it wasn't half so scary as I was thought it might be. Once I was settled I found I could actually talk a bit of sense (don't tell my Mum, she'll never believe it). Writing is one thing, but as I've said before, speaking sensibly about it is quite another. Sitting at my desk I get distracted sometimes, my thoughts wander, or else I write a bit and then delete it, write another bit and scribble half of it out before rewriting, and so and so - none of which really works when you're talking face to face. You'd come across as a stuttering loon. Also I have a tendency when nervous to make silly jokes. I'd be hopeless as a hostage negotiator.
But people are generally willing to make allowances for nervousness. We're a good-hearted lot, most of us, and sometimes in the midst of worrying about something we lose sight of that. I think I did, in the run-up to this signing. I still half expect a day to come when everyone points at me and laughs, and someone says "You didn't really think we'd let you call yourself a proper author, did you?" Silly of me, that. The books are selling bit by bit and the reviews are all good. What more can I ask?
Well, yes, apart from sales in the thousands and a film deal...
It's amazing what this does for the confidence. If you're thinking about doing a first author event, my strong advice is to crack on and do it - at your local Library, at a school, in a nearby second-hand book store; wherever you can arrange it. It's not just for the sales, or the publicity, but for the feeling it gives, like breaking through ice to cool water beneath. Maybe this is just my relief talking, but you know, that itself shows how enjoyable I found this.
Go on, put yourselves out there. I bet people will be glad to see you.
Thanks as well to Elliot Anderton, who's a reporter for the local paper and who took a couple of photos, which will be in the Gazette with a write-up next week (Me! In the paper!). I was invited to do another signing at Bideford Library in the summer as well, and most importantly of all I sold a few books, so today was a good day.
And you know, it wasn't half so scary as I was thought it might be. Once I was settled I found I could actually talk a bit of sense (don't tell my Mum, she'll never believe it). Writing is one thing, but as I've said before, speaking sensibly about it is quite another. Sitting at my desk I get distracted sometimes, my thoughts wander, or else I write a bit and then delete it, write another bit and scribble half of it out before rewriting, and so and so - none of which really works when you're talking face to face. You'd come across as a stuttering loon. Also I have a tendency when nervous to make silly jokes. I'd be hopeless as a hostage negotiator.
But people are generally willing to make allowances for nervousness. We're a good-hearted lot, most of us, and sometimes in the midst of worrying about something we lose sight of that. I think I did, in the run-up to this signing. I still half expect a day to come when everyone points at me and laughs, and someone says "You didn't really think we'd let you call yourself a proper author, did you?" Silly of me, that. The books are selling bit by bit and the reviews are all good. What more can I ask?
Well, yes, apart from sales in the thousands and a film deal...
It's amazing what this does for the confidence. If you're thinking about doing a first author event, my strong advice is to crack on and do it - at your local Library, at a school, in a nearby second-hand book store; wherever you can arrange it. It's not just for the sales, or the publicity, but for the feeling it gives, like breaking through ice to cool water beneath. Maybe this is just my relief talking, but you know, that itself shows how enjoyable I found this.
Go on, put yourselves out there. I bet people will be glad to see you.
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