Category Archives: agents

Writing and shoplifting

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Been reading round a whole bunch of independent publishers, and having fun! What’s more, vicariously shoplifting. Must be something in the water, but two good 2019 reads feature shoplifting protagonists. Finer Things, by David Wharton, Sandstone Press — love that cover, takes me right back to the 1960s. That’s Delia, a real success at her career as a professional shoplifter, surviving the seedy underworld of London. We hope. Then there’s a cover with a green dress, Run, Alice, Run, by Lynn Michell, Linen Press. It’s our present times but ranges back to Alice’s first ever shoplift and the decades (and lovers) in between then and the mess of revived shoplifting she’s landed herself in.

So what is it about shoplifting? A tip I used when writing my novel now **agented**!! by InterSaga was: think of something your protagonist would NEVER do, totally out of character. Then have her do it. It wasn’t shoplifting. But… that tingle, that thumping heart, that daring to do something illicit.

It’s about doing it when events or emotions push you over the edge into what-the-hell.  Like writing.

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Writing in the liminal space

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doorway in a fieldI’m in a peculiar state these days, one familiar to writers and artists. Liminal space is a term I’ve just learned from the book Whatever Happened to Barry Chambers*. It is a time in between, a time of knowing and not-knowing. One door is firmly shut behind me. The next door is right there — but not yet open. Whether it’s my completed novel, now being pitched by my Yes! agent InterSaga. Or another life changing event (think of arriving to start uni, think of late pregnancy with your first baby). No amount of anxiety or imagination can change what lies ahead… but it’s definite and it will happen.

A strange state of forced patience, of trying to just value this in between, moment by moment. ‘Without any irritable reaching after fact’ said Keats, coining the term negative capability. Which is a positive thing. In fact it’s what writing the next novel is all about. A blind plunge into the unknown, the blank page.

PS — see my new crazy papiermache works here.  And a new haiku here.

PPS — *By Barry Kay, the book is a memoir of a truly remarkable split upbringing.

Writing in the negative upside

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Waiting waiting working waiting — negative capability Keats called it. While one book is out seeking an agent I thought I’d better start the next. You know, just in case a scary Yes email comes and among other things the question is: what-when is your next? I have the idea, I have the main storyline, I’m doing some (interesting!) research, but… I need the voice. And you know what? I am positive it will come. I have learned to trust. To keep working around the edges, and tolerate the creative state Keats identified: ‘when one is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts without any irritable reaching after fact & reason.’

Can I stretch it to tolerating rejections of A Body of Knowledge? Yes, that too — part of the game. Just send my adult contemporary novel about a fairytale-telling therapist out again again again. However, now it has a new title:  The Misper’s Tale. I like the first title, but perhaps it promised darkness and this is not a suspense-ridden crime story; it is gentle, thoughtful. Even if it does have police procedure in it.

A new winter haiku on my haiku page here.  Hmmm ‘punching the sky’ — a bit of irritability there?

Writing patterns

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Golden November. And it’s NANOWRIMO too. If you’ve never done it and you want a breakthrough in your writing, DO IT; guess I’d better put the link in here. Talk about patterns of writing, this go for broke method led me to the novel I completed in late spring. I am now submitting A Body of Knowledge to agents, a whole ‘nother adventure.

Of course once I had the breakthrough — after two agonising days of facing the blank page and writing rubbish, and only then finding a voice I didn’t know — I had to keep writing for the whole month. The flow was fantastic, and the freeeedom to write any old how. Besides that, there is no such thing as a novel in a month (but it’s fun to say). Once you get to the end of November you’ve got 10-20-30-50??000 words. Rest, recover, keep writing. And then edit-revise-rethink… a very different kind of pattern.

Patterns, seasons… time to add an autumn to my haiku page. Click here for a peek.

Writing: nailed it

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Six months later… she emerges from the intense re-writing of A Body of Knowledge. And the challenge of synopsis and letters-to-agents. I vowed to get my mystery about a therapist who tells fairytales off to six agents by end of July, and I’ve nailed it (just one week late).

Thanks to author Diane Chandler (Moondance, The Road to Donetsk – Blackbird Books )for being my Beta reader. To husband Michael for being my First reader. To Rachel Knightley and her Green Ink Writers Gym for incisive support on Chapter 1 and approaching agents. To Jericho Writers for their wonderful Agent Match and online tutorials.

UPDATE: I forgot to say big thanks to editor-tutor Jayne Watson and to all at Retreats for You in Sheepwash, Devon where a year ago this month I went to wrestle with the first rewriting, a wonderful writers’ haven.

And 6xmonths apologies to family, friends and followers whom I have had to abandon to get to this stage. Normal broadcasting will resume shortly… And thanks to the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition, full of colour and creativity, including this fierce and wonderful dog by T. Blewitt

 

Writing juice

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Scene of the crime… that is the Times Crime Club Masterclass last night held way up high. Besides top agent Jane Gregory, top Hodder editor Julia Wisdom, and three super-established authors (Sophie Hannah, Charles Cumming, Henry Sutton) they even arranged a glorious sunset. It’s always good to get a writing boost from those who know. The plot-comes-out-of-character v character-comes-out-of-plot is one to turn over in the mind. And this reminder gave me a huge clue on how to resolve my struggle with Chapter 6: ‘What does the character want? What is in the way?’

Writing v agent-search

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Ooooh, real hard-won advice from real helpful author Catherine Ryan Howard. I asked on hercatherineryanhowarddistress vlog and she answered me by name… How do you write your book and still do that big search for an agent? Tune into her blog Here for her reply. And loads of other good stuff on her blog, on all sorts of things. Thank you, Catherine — and here’s her exciting thriller!