Last Saturday is a long time ago for a blogger - except for me, that is, who hasn’t blogged in yonks. But it was last Saturday that I was reading an excellent piece in the Telegraph by John Lanchester called ‘When Fiction Breaks Down’ in which he argues that ‘the world is full of interesting things that don’t fit inside traditional fictional forms.’ And of these interesting things, the first he discusses is ‘unlikeliness’. So far so good. Truth is stranger than fiction, or rather fiction can’t always accommodate things that can happen in our real lives. The only example I can dredge up is that while travelling in a remote part of Greece as a student, I coincidentally met up with a boy who turned out to be a school friend of my soon to be husband – both of them from a relatively obscure part of Wales. Imagine that!
But if my journey had been a fictional one, this wouldn’t have worked, because a) the conversation in which we discovered this connection was pretty dull and b) the meeting would have had to have had some wider significance in the story as a whole. For it to have been the least bit believable, I would also have had to prepare the reader for it in some way. Fiction frequently mirrors life but only in certan respects and within its own conventions.
I knew this before, but what sparked my interest was the observation that writing non-fiction absolves the writer from such ‘rules’ and we can tell it as it really is/was. Some of you may see where this is leading. In non-fiction the unlikely is allowed, and it is just this unlikeliness that makes the real life story so riveting. How likely was it that Crick and Watson would stumble on something missed by a fellow researcher and go on to reveal the amazing symmetry of the double helix? What was the likelihood in 1843 when an Edinburgh artist had only a few days in which to capture the likeness of over 100 men, that someone would turn up with a completely new invention that would do the job for him? It’s the power of this coincidence that makes the story. You couldn’t make it up. You don’t need to make it up.
So what is it with Twitter? Friends shake their heads in disbelief that I’m straying into such questionable territory and offspring couldn’t care less (too busy Facebooking). I guess quite a few readers of this blog are similarly disengaged.
I can only say, don’t knock it until you have tried it. It’s quick, it’s easy, it’s fun. For the solitary writer (is there any other kind?) it can be a heartwarming link to other souls.
It can also be useful. You can pick up Tweets about snow, transport or writing competitions.
I have a Twitter ‘gadget’ on my Dell desktop. While gazing out of the window sitting at my desk writing last week, a Tweet arrived from Bloomsbury Books saying ‘email now’ to win a free copy of The Calligrapher’s Daughter by Eugenia Kim. I did. I won. It arrived.
What’s in it for Bloomsbury? They get a mention here and eventually I’ll post a review – all grist to the marketing mill.
By the way, did I also say that Twitter is like TV? You only need to watch what or whom you want to. And you can always turn it off.
All of which reminds me I have been neglecting Library Thing and have at least three reads to post on there including Anita Shreve’s Testimony (not quite a freebie but almost, courtesy of a Telegraph Tesco voucher!)
This is a writer whom I admire more and more. But her website is another matter. Kill the music, please!
These writing obsessions take us to strange places.
I thought I’d missed my chance ever to see Sun Worshippers, shown on BBC Scotland in 2002, but in a moment of enthusiasm I contacted Caledonia films who still had it in their vaults and were able to send me a copy.
I watched it last night. Billed as a drama documentary it interspersed dramatised scenes from the Hill and Adamson partnership with comments from experts and cameos of contemporary photographers engaged in portraiture, art photography and documentary. Their work in many cases bore direct comparison to that of Hill and Adamson, proposing in a fascinating and insightful way that the pair really did lay the foundations of modern photography, unless you take Lord Snowdon’s view that photography has limitations as an art form, and that in any period its subjects will tend to be the same. Either way the factual side of the film far exceeded my expectations. Its experts included Sara Stevenson, the authority on photography of the period, and there were stunning shots – old and new – of Edinburgh, Fife and St. Andrews.
St. Andrews Cathedral by John and Robert Adamson
As to the drama, it had its moments. But after nearly a year of intermittent research,Ihave constructed my own mental pictures of Hill, Adamson and co. and, perhaps not surprisingly, neither the cast nor the costumes of this production did it for me. Today I find myself still trying to erase the memory of those hats and wigs (and some disturbingly coquettish behaviour from ‘the thrice worthy Miss Mann’)so as to get back to the comfort of my own constructs. They may of course be totally wrong, but I’m not ready to give them up just yet.
Still, I shall certainly keep the DVD among my souvenirs and hope it hasn’t been entirely pointless to review a production that none of you has ever seen. If you do feel like giving it a go, I can only urge you to offer £10 to Caledonia TV – or ask me very nicely!
I would never deny that A New History of Love is timeless, but I am suprised to find it prophetic.
How? The ‘Oxford Language Teaching Archive’, which I made up to suit the plot (you can read about it in chapter 1) is now a reality. So even if the archive doesn’t contain anything relating to De Scudery (too much to hope for I think) it’s thanks to Oxford University for shoring up the authenticity of my premise – and to Adrian Tinniswood for posting the link on the ever wonderful (did I say that?) Twitter.
What ’s more disturbing is that rereading the opening of the novel reminded me that it’s set in 2000. And that’s ten years ago.
For non-writers, that’s ‘work in progress’, by the way. And what better time than January to move on?
I have now redrafted eight chapters of TWE in first person and with a number of plot tweaks. I think I like it more than I did, but for now, (pacethe odd competition) I don’t think I’m going to take it any further. I will be posting it on Authonomy to get some critical feedback, and should an agent or publisher appear on the horizon I’ll be chaining myself to the desk to finish it, but unless that happens it will be on the back burner, a project to pick up when other writing stalls.
Meanwhile Julia McCutchen has been talking about an ‘emerging vision’ and that’s what I now need to tackle. I make no apologies for being coy myself, especially as I’m still not quite sure what ‘the vision’ is, or what it may turn into. But I’ve got to the point where even if my goal isn’t clear, some practical work has to be done or it might never emerge at all and just rattle around in my head annoying me.
What is it? It’s certainly not a novel, (not now, not yet?) and may not even be fiction. I have actually made a start at writing it as a film script, because this is how it makes sense to me. It also frees me from doing more research and allows me to concentrate on action and dialogue. Since I have never learned or even considered screenwriting, this is a huge leap in the dark, but one that feels right for now. I’m even happy to think of it as a precursor to something else, as an artist might do a preliminary sketch before starting on the main canvas.
In time I may add some W.I.P. pages to the site . Anyone who’s interested in the background will get some clues from the new links in Current Research.
Despite forecasts of evil weather and traffic mayhem we got to Angelsey for Christmas to find it bathed in sunlight. Being sans golf clubs we took the opportunity to walk on both Christmas Day and Boxing Day.
First stop was one of our favourite haunts: Penmon point with its fine view of Puffin Island.
On 26th and feeling in the mood for post-turkey exercise we decided to head for Parys Mountain, a spectacular landscape we visited two summers ago but without a camera. December proved a fine time to capture the rainbow colours of the defunct copper mine recently featured on Coast . This time we did the whole of the circular walk. Take a look.
Lots more photos on Flickr. But don’t think mine are too bad!
All over the world, bloggers, (with the exception of the indefatigable Bransford – but hey, he’s at least 7 hours behind) are shutting up shop and I should be too, but when writing gets pushed to one side a quick post reminds me I’m still a writer (and is a damned sight easier than a chapter of edits!)
It’s a bit early for New Year resolutions, but if there’s something you’ve decided to do, why wait for a particular moment to let it be known? On the desktop of my new(ish) laptop I’m actually provided with gadget that sits at the top of the screen which is probably the best aide memoir I have, so instead of any grand pronouncements here’s what’s on my writing to do list for the first month or so of 2010.
Finish off those edits and get v2 of The Water’s Edge ( first 20,000 on) up on to Authonomy and out to a few other critics who will tell me how they find Ailsa now told in the third person (and with a few significant plot tweaks).
Revamp an old piece of memoir (stripping it of self-conscious verbiage) for Leaf Books next competition
Find a home – any home – for a short short story completed months ago that’s still sitting around waiting to be read.
Lastly, but most excitingly, to send in an entry for the South West Writers Mentoring project run by Exeter Uni. Ten places are available to authors currently living permanently in the SW region who are writing ‘a novel, a collection of short stories, or a work of memoir, biography or autobiography’.
Why the excitement? It just feels like the right time to get going on the idea I’ve been researching and generally mulling over for quite some time. But there’s apprehension too. Aside from the ‘new book jitters’ I still have to decide which of these genres my new project falls into! Sorting that out by Feb 5th should be more than enough to see in the New Year.
It was only when I read Nathan Bransford’s post on writing competitions that I realised that the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award is still going strong and for a minute I was tempted to enter again for 2010. Then I remembered the whole agonising process. For those not already in the know, this is how it works.
1. Upload your entire novel, an extract of your novel and a 300 word pitch. Doing this successfully (while conforming to all formatting rules etc) is a feat in itself, but if nothing goes wrong , your book will be accepted and entered.
2. ‘Semifinalists’ are announced. This is not to be sniffed at, clearly some do get screened out at this point, but as a semi-finalist you will soon become aware that you are one of a not very select 500!
3. The next stage sees extracts (first 3- 5000 words) of these top 500 published on Amazon with ‘customers’ invited to review and rate the extracts. Naturally most reviewers are competition entrants and/or their associates (think the Authonomy swap read model).
4. These ratings, along with reviews by Publisher’s Weekly are the basis of determining who will reach the last 100, at which point the final three are chosen by the judges themselves.
When I entered (2007/8) it was the ‘ratings war’ that got everyone going. It turned out that ‘Amazon customers’ meant only customers of Amazon.com and not Amazon.uk or Amazon.any-where-else. Even although I had an Amazon account I couldn’t post a review unless I had bought something from the U.S. store. Even if I did this, I couldn’t lean on any friends or family to do so unless they had a U.S. account too … This caused a huge outcry (and feverish canvassing) amongst non- U.S. entrants, who felt they were unlikely to attract reviews and therefore competing on very unequal terms. Amazon, however, stood firm, and as far as I know the rules are still the same.
Will I do it again? I don’t know. All competitions are a bit of a lottery, but is there any point when the dice are loaded against?
But I have remembered one positive outcome. In order to review and to rant post on the competition forum, I made a hasty purchase from the US store. The album I bought is still a favourite. So here it is! Nothing ventured?
New pitch.
