Monthly Archives: September 2016

Celebrating

25 Sunday Sep 2016

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Island Life, Word Birds & Process #21

Writers write every day? Kind of… Most of us write a line or two even if it’s only 140 characters (or less) on Twitter. We write letters & emails, make notes, do research & so forth. Some days we go to publisher parties (I know – cool huh?) or book fairs & frankly, that means NO WRITING OF ANY SORT WHATSOEVER. (Honno’s 30th birthday party is why there was no blog post last week.)

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Jane Aaron, Honno’s Classics Editor speaking with huge passion about the history of this invaluable imprint.

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Sister authors L-R: Me, Caroline Ross, Judith Barrow, Thorne Moore, Alison Layland & Juliet Greenwood.

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Today’s offering is brief because loads of people are posting about yesterday’s Book Fair in Tenby & who needs overload?

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Me & my book at Tenby

Mostly we do put in the hours & in between the high life I am editing – honestly. I’m scribbling like mad & loving it. After two weekends of ‘authorial’ fun & frolics, tomorrow I’m leaving birdseed on the windowsill, a tray of English Breakfast tea & buns for Mrs Woolf & turning back into a writer.

Onward & sideways.

In plain sight

11 Sunday Sep 2016

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Island Life, Word Birds & Process #20

One or two kind people, when reviewing Ghostbird, have commented on my portrayal of same-sex relationships.

‘…Lili falls in love with another woman … and that’s it: it isn’t swept under the carpet nor does it take over the narrative, it’s just one of the many elements in the novel’s tapestry, treated as completely normal, and it’s beautiful…’ Carolyn Percy

The fact that some reviewers have noted my handling of a lesbian relationship errs on the notional is gratifying. Equally, that so few have remarked on it at all is testament to my intention.

When I began writing the book, I hadn’t consciously decided Lili would be gay. I’m not sure when I did make the decision. Like so many women in my life, she just is. Lili is gay the same way some people are straight. Don’t quote me on this, but my guess is the world is teeming with lesbians. They’ve been around for as long as women’s stories have been told. Often hidden, invariably in plain sight.

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Lesbians, dear reader, are everywhere.

As I wrote the story, it occurred to me that unconscious or not, writing a gay character afforded me the opportunity to ‘normalise’ her. As in, not make a big thing about it. Rather than explain her, simply write her, the way I was writing my other characters. (I didn’t feel the need to explain how Violet or Mrs Guto-Evans  were heterosexual.)

I’m doing it again in my new story. And I’m not explaining it.

Murder on the dance floor

04 Sunday Sep 2016

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Island Life, Word Birds & Process #19

It’s less about having two left feet and more that I’m putting my dancing shoes on the wrong ones. (And me a trained ballerina … at least I know what bloodied toes feel like…)

In the aftermath of the excitement, the reality of this edit is setting in. I’m still committed and as excited as I was last week. The task is nonetheless daunting. That said, I stuck to the plan and at the crack of Thursday’s new moon, embarked on my new draft. I’ve abandoned an entire plot-line. (It ought never to have been there frankly, but at the time it seemed like a great idea.)  Huge chunks of backstory are being flung out or set aside to be rewritten as good old ‘show not tell.’

And my title has gone, largely because the story wasn’t about … well, it wasn’t… Knowing what it is about makes the possibility of whatever mayhem lies ahead less scary. (The new title is lush!)

My crow is back – it’s September and the leaves on the birch tree are beginning to shed. I can see her – my favourite word bird – on the topmost branch, a reminder that it’s up to me and any time I’m up for it, I can join in.

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In other news – later in the day, the divine Amanda Jennings – author of In Her Wake – messaged me to the effect she’d been featured on BBC Radio Berkshire recommending Ghostbird! She called it ‘poetic,’ ‘a beautifully written hug’ and ‘utterly haunting.’ Being discussed on the radio was a bit of thrill and no mistake.

But, like a ballerina, a writer is only as good as her newest dance. Pass me the plasters, Marjory; I can feel the old fouetté rond de jambe en tournant coming on…

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