Feeling crappy

I thought holidays were meant to make you feel better. I'd been feeling tired since we got home but thought it was just from travelling, then today it hit me. Cottonwool head, drippy nose, hot and cold temps and an irritating cough whenever I try to talk. I guess this is my immune systems way of making me slow up for a week. Since I don't want to spread this around I called in sick, something I hate doing, but since I've only had one day off sick in 2 and a half years then I guess I haven't done so badly. Better a few days now than giving it everyone else and spending more time off.
It doesn't help that workmen have arrived just down the lane and started to Jackhammer the tarmac up on the road. Don't know if it's my head pounding or the generator.

While I was gone

Well, the eldest belle managed to get 9 GCSE's A* to C grade and is enrolling in college this Tuesday. She's going to a local sixth form college and is really excited about starting her A level courses. The youngest belle is in France with her friend and is entertaining us with her daily texts. I'm busy ploughing through the laundry mountain. I had a lovely email from a reader telling me how much she loved Just look at me Know which made my day for me.
I also met some lovely people while I was away - a big Hi to Brix Books on the harbourside at Brixham and to Jill at Waterstones in Exeter. If you're quick both shops have a small amount of signed stock of my books but you need to be quick as they are going fast.
We had mixed weather while we were away but on the whole it was pretty good. All of us were sad to leave Devon, fingers crossed we'll be able to be back there again soon.

Waiting

posting this from the lovely Shoreline cafe in Paignton while we wait with eldest dd for her grandparents to call with her GCSE results.

Five go off to Devon

Hopefully this afternoon we're collecting the new to us towcar - a lovely Volvo XC90 in shiny metallic black - then we're finishing loading up the caravan and we're off tomorrow morning. Notes have been written for the house and fish sitters, Miss La's case is ready for when she comes back early to go to France with her friend's family. I still have my taxes to do but all the bits of paper are now in one pile in my office ready for me to check they've been entered in my notebook so I can fill out the forms.
I must remember to collect my holiday reading books from the boot of my car where I'd locked them to stop me reading them before I left. I've Veronica Henry's the beach hut and a collection of short stories from Maeve Binchy to look forward to. Should last me at least a day.
My Mum has her surgery this afternoon so all good thoughts for her are much appreciated

Paperwork

I seem to be swamped by paper at the moment. I'm getting euro's, sorting out all the stuff the youngest Belle needs for her French holiday with her friend. I'm gathering all the bits I need so I can do my tax return - shudder. We're changing our tow car so I'm chasing down all the documents for that as we'd like the new to us car before we go away on Thursday. I'm writing instructions for the house/fish sitters, supervising packing, finishing up my critiquing work and filling out my returns for Irish PLR which has to be in before the end of this month.
I thought this was supposed to be my holiday?
Still, on Thursday we're off to Devon to one of my favourite places, just outside Stoke Gabriel and I'll be surrounded by lovely rolling green hills and best of all I'll be by the sea. I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to it.

Fat fridges

Most of the appliances in my house are rather like me, a bit elderly, a little eccentric and inclined to work at their own pace. This week two of thenm decided to die. My microwave went first. It looked as if was cooking, the turntable went round, it made the right noises, the light was on but alas no cooking. Fortunately Sainsburys is having a sale so we picked up a lovely shiny silvery one for £50.
Next to go was the fridge freezer. I'd noticed for a while that the fridge was only slightly warmer than the freezer section and the light hasn't worked in it since 2004 but the final straw came when Mr Nell fetched his bottle of flavoured water out and discovered an iceberg the size of the one that sank the Titanic inside the bottle.
So, for the last few days we've been attempting to eat the contents of the freezer so we can get it all emptied out ready for the new one which is coming tomorrow.
It took quite a while to find a new fridge freezer because sometime in the last twenty years fridges have become fatter and of course we have fitted cupboards so fatter fridge freezer = not fitting in fridgefreezer sized gap. Luckily we managed to track one down that seemed like a good make.
I'm now eyeing the other kitchen appliances wondering which will be the third to go - or do you think the fridgefreezer counts as 2?

To tweet or not to tweet?

In a fit of madness last week I joined Twitter. As you know I went to Liz and Kate's very helpful workshop while I was at the RNA conference and then after so many people there kept telling me how wonderful it was I thought I ought to give it a go.
I am not very technical as you know and I can only access Twitter from my desktop since I bought my mobile phone in 2003, it doesn't even have a camera on it and no, I don't want to change it. I use it to make phone calls and that's it - bear in mind that due to my dyscalculia I can't text.
Twitter was always going to be a leap of faith. Well, at the moment I seem to be following 95 people and 60 people are following me - some of them are people who don't know me and will probably stop following me when they discover how boring I really am. It's a weird place the twitterverse. The only way i can describe it is that it's like going to a party and being in a room full of people, some you know and others you don't. Everyone is chatting, some in groups and some one to one. Clutching your glass of wine you look around for a friendly face and every now and then you catch someones eye and can answer a question or join in. The rest of the time you eavesdrop or talk to yourself, a bit like Shirley Valentine talking to the kitchen wall.
Hopefully I'll get better at it and feel a bit less wallflowerish. I downloaded tweetdeck and frankly am not impressed so far. I'll press on though and let you know how it goes when I've had a bit more practice - maybe I need to be less shy and retiring - and yes, I heard you all snigger when I said that!
Oh, and if you're there and I haven't found you then come and find me - I promise to say hello and show you where the peanuts are.

What a week

Well, actually it's been a pretty crap fortnight. Major stress in the day job, the company that employs Mr Nell went into administration - hopefully that's now been resolved and his job is ok, eldest belle still hobbling around on crutches, fridge freezer is on the blink and my Mom has now had a malignant cancer confirmed again, this time on her nose.
On the upside, Just Look at Me Now is out and selling well, His Darling Nurse is on kindle in the UK now and at least Mom's tumour isn't connected to the retinal cancer she had a few years ago and it sounds as if it's fixable. Mr Nell is still gainfully employed and, provided I don't have a nervous breakdown from all the stuff I need to do this week, I'll be off on holiday soon to Devon.
I might even write something while I wait for the verdict on Me, You and Him. I may even get the pictures from Jess's wedding downloaded sometime this century - sigh.

It's out!

Just Look at Me Now is out today!
And in other news go HERE and congratulate my lovely and talented friend Judy Jarvie on her sale to Embrace Publishing! Judy, like me, is a former Moonlit author - there were some talented people writing for Moonlit and Judy is one of them!

Home again

I'm home from our short trip to Denham. We had a nice day out in London on Thursday - this was Miss La's reward for working hard at school so we spent the morning at Covent Garden browsing the shops, watching the street entertainers etc. Then in the afternoon we went to Hamley's. This was a curious mix of wow! and umm. The store is badly in need of a major refurbishment but the staff were nice and there is quite a good range although it wasn't as big or as varied as I'd expected. Didn't see any bikes, scooters, skateboards, very few board games although I could have missed them. Lots of TV themed stuff but disappointing range of Sylvanian family things and none of the bigger Barbie themed stuff. Didn't see very much in model trains or airfix either.
Friday we went to Henley on Thames where they were readying the town for today's regatta. It was interesting playing spot the yummy mummy.
Friday night was the big event - Jessica (my former cp) and Simon's wedding reception. Jess looked gorgeous in a white strapless classically styled dress with her three adult bridesmaids in an eau de nil shade of green. Very simple but very lovely. Little Charlie isn't so little any more - why do kids have to grow up so quickly? and we had a fabulous time. Once I can get hold of the camera cables I'll download some of the pictures.
The last week hasn't been great here for all kinds of reasons so it was nice to get away for a few days doing things that really matter, being with family and seeing friends. Here's hoping this next week gets even better.

Re- entry

It's always weird when you finish a book. I've been so immersed in Kate and steve's life at Myrtle cottage that I've kind of lost touch with what's happening in the wider world. Today though, I cleaned my desk - hey, there was wood under all that paper - who knew?
I'm attempting to fill out passport applications for the belles. This is a challenge - they have the 'wrong' sort of birth certificates, and were entered on my old passport when they were babies something which appears to throw HM passports into a bit of a tizz over which bits of paper I need to submit. It's all very complicated and very expensive.
The eldest belle is still recouperating after her toe surgery - she has to go back on Wednesday to have the dressings changed and see if she can be a bit more mobile.
My former cp, the talented and lovely Jessica is getting married on Friday to Simon and we're heading off to the wedding! So excited and thrilled for them both.
I'm so looking forward to my holiday at the end of August - I really need to be by the sea now and to have a break - it's been a very busy year. Plus we have the eldest belle's GCSE results yet to come.
My advance copies of Just Look at Me Now are here and Amazon are shipping already! Plus, it's £2 cheaper on there than the shops!I hope people will like this one :)

Just pressed send

It's finished. Me, You and him is now in my lovely agents in-box to wait for her verdict. Now the nail-biting begins.

Endings

I've finally finished my first round of aditing on You, Me and Him. In the process I removed the epilogue and added over 7k to the main book. I changed around the order of events in the last two chapters so they made more sense and strengthened the ending. I layered in more emotion and upped the stakes in some key scenes. I smoothed some transitions and enlarged on the dialogue sequences.
My next round now is to seek and destroy the words I love a little too much and make sure the story is hanging together well. This bit is like sanding the whole thing down to get rid of any splinters or snags that might snare an unwary reader.

Does anyone like synopsis writing?

I suspect there is a resounding no echoing back towards me. I've come to regard them as a kind of necessary evil. I'm lucky in that most of the books I've sold I've sold on a blurb rather than having had to produce a proper grown up synopsis. Every now and then though marketing, or my editor needs me to be a bit more definite about what I intend to write. Then it's tricky. I started off writing synopsis after the book was done but that clearly is no good when you are hoping to sell on proposal. The problem I had was that once I'd written the outline or synopsis I felt like I'd told the story and the book was done. Then I tried writing just the first three chapters and then the synopsis. That worked better although I often find the finished book isn't quite the same as my original plan.
I struggled a lot with the format of synopsis writing. I went to lots of workshops including a wonderful one by Sarah Duncan, a few years ago at an RNA conference. Now I've evolved my own set of rules. I never write one thats longer than two pages - more than that is a novella and really - who needs that? I don't describe every little incident or character - I stick with the hero and heroine and any secondary character who is key to a turning point in the plot. I make sure the growth in the character arcs is clearly shown through the plot turning points. I make sure the resolution is clear and the conflicts are clear.
Here is my original synopsis for Animal Instincts - you'll see the ending is different in the book, but hopefully this shows what I mean:
Down-to-earth Clodagh Martin is quite fond of her glamorous actress step-sister Imogen, providing Imogen isn’t actually around her for very long. So when Imogen shows up drunk on her doorstep at two in the morning with a bottle of champagne announcing that she’s come to visit for a while, Clodagh isn’t very pleased.
Staying at the Rainbow’s End animal sanctuary with a disapproving Clodagh isn’t Imogen’s idea of fun either. She would have preferred somewhere less smelly and infinitely trendier to hide. Unfortunately, a combination of debt, a humiliating public scandal involving a live TV show and too much alcohol has left Imogen with very little choice but to throw herself on Clodagh’s mercy until everything blows over.
Clodagh has enough problems of her own to worry about. The sanctuary she loves is broke and the animals she has, a foul-mouthed parrot, two gay donkeys and a goat called Mr Sheen, aren’t enough to draw in visitors. Former bad-lad-made-good property magnate Jack Thatcher seems very keen to acquire the land. He also appears very keen to date Clodagh, but she’s not sure if he wants to get his hands on her or her property. A worrying string of arson attacks and vandalism have left the sanctuary in a perilous state and she’s not certain that Jack is as reformed a character as he’d have her believe. A disastrous relationship some years before had made Clodagh very wary of getting involved with anyone again.
Co-ordinator of the volunteer helpers, Susie, is another thorn in Clodagh’s side. While her help with the animals is invaluable, her fetish for all things ‘green’ and apparently irrational disapproval of Jack are driving Clodagh mad. Jade, her colleague is more amenable and friendly.
Imogen, however, is convinced she can turn around both her own and the sanctuary’s fortunes. She decides she can resurrect her acting career and save the sanctuary by proving to the public that she’s a reformed character. Much to Clodagh’s despair Imogen sets up a series of events designed to convince the world that she’s now a dedicated and sober animal activist.
Journalist Marcus Keyes is certain there’s a story behind the new Imogen and much to Clodagh’s dismay he begins to turn up like a bad penny every time something happens at the sanctuary, either planned or unplanned.
Imogen secures a television appearance for herself and Clodagh where she announces an open day at the sanctuary. Immi also begins to date Marcus. The ensuing publicity from the television appearance brings in more money but also more press attention and not all of it is positive.
Jack finally persuades Clodagh to trust him and she tells him about her past, including her previous abusive relationship with her university tutor. In turn he tells her the truth about his father and how he came to inherit his property business.
Things take a more serious turn back at the sanctuary when the entrance kiosk is targeted for the next arson attack. Clodagh and Jack discover the blaze as they return from an evening together. Clodagh becomes convinced that the attacks are linked to a bid to force her to sell the sanctuary’s lands. The prime suspect is a building company who have bought up the neighbouring ground and secured permission to develop it for housing.
Marcus does some investigating as Immi suspects that one of the volunteers may be the saboteur. Suspicion initially falls on Susie but it is her colleague, Jade, who turns out to be the prime suspect. Marcus discovers Jade’s father is a councillor with financial interests in the firm of house builders who acquired the fields.
With autumn approaching and the peak of the tourist season almost over, Clodagh and Imogen need a last push if they are to keep the sanctuary running through the winter.
Together with Marcus and Jack the girls press on with the last event, a barbeque, car-boot sale and open day at the sanctuary. At the same time they set a trap for Jade, knowing she will be unable to resist trying to sabotage the event.
When a firework goes off inside the donkey’s pen, setting fire to the stable, Imogen, for once, puts aside all thoughts of her appearance and helps Clodagh rescue the frightened animals. Marcus and Jack catch Susie red-handed as she leaves the scene.
The press coverage of the fire helps Imogen resurrect her career and offers of work for her flood in. With the both Immi’s career and the sanctuary both safe Clodagh is finally able to see her future with Jack.
So you can see - it's sort of the same but different. How do you find synopsis writing?

My writing Process

Since I've had a few people asking me about my writing process I thought I'd talk about how I write. There is no right or wrong way to write, everyone develops their own way of working. I always find it interesting to hear how other writers work myself, and often I'll pick up a few tips or think 'yes, I do that'.
I think all of my stories come to me from the central character. I'll often have read something or watched a TV news programme or overheard something that sparks the idea but the important thing to recognise is those are often the triggers for the external aspects of the plot.
For instance, in Animal Instincts one of the catalysts was knowing about a local animal sanctuary that was always struggling for funds, did great work but needed a lot of help to keep going. Clodagh, in the story is faced with just that dilemna - she needs to raise money or she loses everything.
But although that features in my plot - the crux of her financial woes is that she has trust issues (internal conflict) So when Jack offers to help, is it because he has an ulterior motive? Will he try to take advantage of her weakness (as she sees it)?
The external plot alone wouldn't provide enough interest to drive the story and make it an engrossing read. The emotional journey between Jack and Clodagh around the issues of trust do make it sustainable over the course of the book.
The theme song for the book was the Sugababes - Because I know how I feel about you now.
So, I get the external aspect of the plot idea - then I usually hear the heroine's voice in my head and I'know' who she is and what her issues are - this tells me the course of the emotional journey she needs to make during the book.
At this point I usually write a blurb - this is a back of the book type paragraph that sums up the story - what will make it interesting - the hook for the book. I also do a lot of thinking at this point about the shape of the story and the elements I need to include.
My agent or my editor might ask me for a synopsis at this point and I'll talk about those tomorrow. For now I'm interested in your process? I write funny - how do you write?

More aditing

This part of my writing process is always for me the most intensive part. I enjoy seeing the characters really round out and start to live rather than exist on the pages. I'm currently at chapter twenty-two and I've added 3.5k so far. This has been as tiny nuggets of backstory, extra lines of dialogue, small pieces of description to set the scene better, rephrasing of clumsy words and making sure I'm showing and not telling the story so that the pace continues to move on. When I reach the final part of the process - my backwards edit I'll ensure that each scene has moved the plot forward and that the end of the book is as strong - if not stronger than the beginning. It takes a long time and it's painstaking work but the results are very satisfying. I'm really excited about this story - it's a bit different and out there but still within the expectations I think from readers of the kind of story that I write. On to the next chapter!

Aditing

Sigh, so I axed the ending of the book. It wasn't the true ending, at least not for me and subconciously I think it was colouring the whole story. I chopped the last 1.5K and popped it into a separate file for now and I'll look at it again when I reach that point. I then started over with my revisions process at the beginning and now it's all flying again. The story is making sense and I think Kate and Steve's relationship is better, stronger and more believable. Even with losing 1.5k I'm still almost 1k up on where I started and I'm only on chapter seven. I should easily hit my target word count. I always adit rather than edit my work as I write really quite sparingly when I do the first draft. All the colour and emotion gets added later as I gradually layer in what I want. For me the process is like making a watercolour - you make a sketch then add softer colours and hues washing them in until you build a picture.For other writers I know it's more like working in oils where they build the first draft with a palette knife and then take off the layers of paint to reveal the details. Both ways work but I'm an aditer, a water colourist. Which one are you?

One home

Miss Boo is now back from Germany, complete with dirty washing, what looks like a whole new wardrobe and a new pair of shoes. The eldest belle is enjoying her tour of Scotland with Mr Nell. We get daily phonecalls plus we also got a video and a postcard. Miss La enjoyed being a lonely only but secretly I think she's glad to have her sister back.
I'm working my way through my adits. I'm undecided about the ending of the book but I think my thoughts are getting clearer the more I progress. I'm halfway through my first round of changes and I know I need to tinker with the first third a little tiny bit more once I've gone through once. Then will come my grammar and tightening edit where I lose all those words I love too much. Right now I've decided they spend far too much time drinking tea so I'm losing a few of those scenes so I can rework them and make them more interesting. A good few days should have the story where I want it and then I'll have to see what my agents verdict is - gulp!

What the postman delivered!

Yes, I have a copy of Just Look at Me Now in my hot little hands. It's a real book - all pink and girly and pretty. Sometimes pink, girly and pretty is good.

What I did in Greenwich - part Two

Workshops! The conference was opened by Katie Fforde and she was followed by the lovely Jan Jones with a celebration of members achievements. I love this part of the conference. As a unpublished writer I absolutely loved to hear who had made sales, got an agent, won a contest. It gave me hope that my name might be one of those read out one year. We then had a panel of members with one author representing each decade of membership from the sixties onwards. This was fun as we noted what had changed and what had remained the same.
On Saturday the first workshop I attened was Jay Dixon's Adding Colour to your novel. As someone who writes a rather sparse first draft I found this interesting especially when she discussed colour in the Middle Ages and the symbolism of colour.
Then I gave my own workshop on secondary characters.
Then it was the fabulous Kate Walker talking about conflict - a useful reminder to me on internal conflict and upping the stakes.
After lunch I played hooky for an hour and went for a wander around Greenwich so missing one of the workshops I'd planned to attend. I returned in time for Imogen Howson's talk on What Samhain are looking for. As a Samhain author I was interested to know if they were going to be interested in taking more romances at the heat level that I write at. A big factor in why I haven't sent them anything new for a long time. Immi is always a mine of information and I love working with Samhain so that was good.
Then I went to Liz Fenwick and Kate Johnson's Social Media workshop. I am very undecided about Twitter and I'm still undecided about it but at least now I know more information.
Sunday was a fab day - Two brilliant workshops.
Sarah Duncan - Mind the Gap crossing the publishing divide. Very useful tips and good practical advice as always from Sarah.
This was followed by HW Fisher Money Matters - financial advice for writers - very useful!
I wish I could have stayed longer but maybe next year...