So, it’s been a while.  The gap between updates unusually long.  In my defence, I have been away to a part of the world (Northumberland) void of 4G/3G or indeed any sort of ‘G’.  Mobile communications with the world, as normally enjoyed, denied.  Not that I’d been idle while away, I hadn’t.  We’ve moved forward to some 60,000 words, taken the tale of Amy (part 2) into a very dark place, witnessed some abject cruelty, and some redemption. 

People ask what are you typing, I tell them ‘a book’, they say great ‘what’s it about?’, I tell them, and then I am asked if there was any kind of connection between my state of mind, and my writing about suffering; am I writing from experience, or indeed from a desire to inflict such pain? 

Flip, that’s a weird one.   My answer was, and remains, that I have an imagination, nothing more, nothing less.  I imagine scenarios, and I describe them how I see them, not how I want them to be, or indeed out of some repressed memory bank – it is my imagination and nothing more.  

So, Amy has moved forward, the story has progressed, we have discussed (but not answered) the morality of prostitution, and we have explored the desires of majority of people for that simple life of happiness, the Eliza Dolittle (of Pygmalion fame) “room somewhere, far away from the cold night air…”

So, I haven’t been idle, the project is still live, we are moving forward, and copies will be sent to the usual suspects for review/critique in due course.

Oh, and I’ve had two rejections this week….  Bugger. 

The Gordian Knot, the unique selling point…

The ‘pick me’ enigma…

It’s a difficult thing to do (or its definitely one I’m struggling with).

How do you make your CV survive the 30-second scan, and how do you transfer that survival ability onto your synopsis?

How do you stand out from the hundreds of other hopeful scripts earnestly being promoted by their authors?

For whatever reason we have received positive reviews from the women who’ve read the book – is it a ‘woman’s’ book (whatever that is), I don’t know. It was never written with a specific audience in mind – although it is definitely an ‘Adult’ story, outside of that I think the parameters are very broad.

Yes, I think Amy Grace is a good character, yes I think that ‘Thomas Payne’ is a good story, but how do I make a good pitch?

We have a young Irish Woman who is a strong female character – that’s got to tick a box?

We have, with this tale, a very sympathetic story exploring the lasting legacy that sexual assault leaves.

We explore the emotional trauma that continues long after the bruises have faded from view; we travel in some desolate shoes, some depths of despair…

But, and it is a big BUT, but, we find strength, find courage, find inner power to overcome, to refuse to drowned by the enormity of the event.

We also have a rip roaring Victorian adventure, we have Amy in the Sudan, The North West Frontier and the Wild West. We have a flying machine that allows her to move from place to place, adventure to adventure.

She fights bad people, she takes on near impossible odds, she channels the Irish Warrior Priestess of Badb (Celtic mythology anyone?), she punches way above her (slight) weight – but we don’t have cartoon violence, we have realism, we have injuries, and we suffer for our victories.

But it’s not a book of doom and gloom. We have light moments, we have humour, we have hope.

We do have a very bad guy. We have Thomas Payne, we have a fully rounded bad guy, but even as evil as he can be (and he can) we also have a man of depth and feeling (all be it only about what he wants) who avoids the moustache twirling caricature of the villain, and presents the reader with a man capable of love and loss.

Is the above a good pitch?

I suppose until someone takes a punt and prints the book I’ll be forever refining and correcting my sales pitch, and forever looking to cleave that knot in two!

Oh, well, back to writing the story, to telling the tale.

Its job application time again.

Sitting down reading biographies, looking at what the agent specialises in, debating, cogitating, gambling – will they like my submission? 

Will they like it enough to call me back, to write back with an offer, or to write back with a polite rejection? 

Much like the empty room into which I’m currently speaking, so too is the whole application process a shot into the darkness. 

Although it is a shot, with an echo, that takes about eight weeks to reply! 

So, four ‘lucky’ prospective agents selected, we have pinged off our synopsis, chapters one-three and our snappy pitch as to why a book about a young woman who is viciously attacked and who wakes up in a brothel will sell, will make them money…    

So, here we are, again, plodding inexorably onwards, with our heroine Amy, towards a destination not yet confirmed (although we have written the final two pages). 

We’ve taken her through some abhorrent situations. Predicaments that would have kept the best of us sullen and broken.  She has been wounded, abused, beaten to within an inch of her young life, but never bettered, never conquered. 

We are now walking through the recovery phase from victim to survivor, with the heavy dark shadow of Thomas Payne being removed, she is moving forwards into the light. 

But, it being an adventure story, a tale of peril danger and adversity, some new challenge must appear. 

Enter stage left the “Colonel” and his human sacrifices, his love of black magic, his worship of the golden idol…  

Does this all join together with the fairies? 

Yeah it does – so hold on tight it’s going to be a heck of a ride ! 

And the reviews for [2.5] are back….

Broadly positive, a few spelling mistakes, some phrasing questions, but, the most important critique is that the story was enjoyed.

Yeah, go me!

So, telling tall tales #101; have a good story – achieved.

I need to review some gender neutral/ambiguity that I was attempting. But, that I will re-write, and hopefully clarify what I was attempting to portray.

We are currently running with version [2.8], so this will cascade out around September, with a view to have the whole project finished before year end.

I’m back in the saddle, got the bit between my teeth, the mojo is sparking and the absurdity of my imagination is running full and free.

Magic is a wonderful freedom to create a story around, and now I can see why it is such a popular genre – maybe I’ll write horror stories next? Can’t see me doing ‘coming of age’ wizard stories, but hey, mortgages are what mortgages are, and if it pays the bills…

But, first we need to finish our tale with young Amy, take her to an ending that is worthy of her journey; and magic or no magic, mojo, or no mojo, creating something worthy of her trials and tribulations, her pain and her suffering is the current challenge, the current focus.

Every now and again it goes, and no matter how much you want to find it, you can’t, you’ve lost your creative flow – your mojo, it has vanished.  You look, desolate, at the flickering cursor, it blinks back at you accusingly, daring you, taunting you, and you are lost, you have no flow to give!  It is a lonely place, writers block, is a cruel mistress, she lets the ideas race around your head, keeps you awake at night with phrases and moments just begging to be written, yet the cursor steadfastly just blinks back at you when you attempt to create those whiling scenarios. 

But, all dams must burst, all logjams must eventually give way to the pressure of the water.  What was held back, cannot forever be denied, and, just like that the blockage is gone, the cursor hungrily skirting across the screen, ideas taken flesh, perilous drama poised to be read, and you feel yourself breathe, air again flowing freely through your once trapped and tight lungs. 

The cursor no longer taunting, now waiting in expectation, pasting ideas on the screen at a speed that your hands are now too slow to type – oh, euphoria, to be prisoner of nothing more than slow hands is a joy, a blissful state of ecstasy as your imagination runs freely again across the screen and the little vertical line reveals line upon line of your minds free flow. 

We were once so bound, but now we are running free, and to paraphrase an oft abused cliché, freedom, it feels so good, so darn good!! 

So, it’s out there for review, the first 20,000 words of ‘Magic’ are out for critique and the infamous red pen!  We now wait judgement.  It’s a nervous time waiting for feedback.  Sending out a chunk of your thoughts and efforts for external ‘validation’ is a truly bizarre state.  You want honesty, you want constructive feedback, but secretly (or possibly not that well-hidden) you want confirmation that what you’ve produced, what you’ve given for review is of worth, that any errors are small, minor, inconsequential even.  But, as much as you want to be lauded, to be feted and praised as the next great thing, you want honesty more.  You wait and you hope that the red pen is minimal, that the mistakes that you’ve presented are redeemable. But that above it all the story was enjoyed – you can fix everything else, but, you can’t really recover if the tale isn’t worth telling, isn’t a compelling read.  So, you wait, you hope that they are kind, but most of all you hope that they are honest and despite any flaws, you hope that it was an enjoyable tale!    

I wanted the story to go in a certain direction, the story didn’t, and the story it won – I guess that’s ‘magic’ for you!

I have a loose idea of where I want to end up, but no real fixed and firm idea of how I’m going to get there – and this story not being the ‘chase’ that was/is ‘Thomas Payne’, I guess the fluidly to go where ever the mood takes me is that more open, less constricting. 

Amy is a wonderful character, one of warmth and failings, one of genuine depth, and I feel a certain duty upon me to give this young woman a fair and sympathetic telling of her tale.    

So, I started this book with an idea of what I wanted to tell, what concept I wanted to cover, what progress I wanted to make in the telling of her adventures, and where I am now is not where I thought I’d be – never thought the plot would be where it is now. 

The title and concept of magic only appeared after I’d written the first ten pages – then out of the blue it hit me, make it up, add magic to link whatever you want to wherever you want to go, and so more by accident than design we have a telling of a tale that revolves around ‘magic’. 

If you could go back in time, change one thing (butterfly effect notwithstanding) would you?  Would you go back to a pivotal moment in your life and turn left and, not right? 

What if you were pushed back to before you chose either left or right, what would you do?  And that is where young Amy Grace is, she is at that crossroad debating what to do next… 

The cursor is blinking… 

A statement that could be a great opening line, or the opening shot in a screenplay; the camera panning back slowly from that little flickering line on a screen revealing…  and your imagination fills in whatever you want to happen next!

And that is where we are, we took the flashing vertical line for a journey through our fertile imagination, rode lightning while summoning the gods ancient and new, took the little ‘vertical’ through the world of goblins (well one specific goblin) and several decapitated fairies.  

Now, having written those pages, we are sitting and re-reading the journey, looking at the tale to date, and asking ourselves if it works, does the latest outpouring of my imagination add/detract from the plot line? 

A goblin, who rides lightning, conjuring magic to rejuvenate the dead, does this fit in the story of our heroine coming to terms with what she has done, what she has become? 

I’m not too sure, but it’s there now, and whatever the original plot may have been, it now has a little goblin folding time, returning what is, to what was, and suffering immense pain to make it so. 

And, we love that little flashing line for allowing us to do such things, the little blinking line is liberating; empowering!

 The cursor is blinking… 

 

If somebody told you that the fruit of your labours, the prize for your hours of endeavour and inner torment would be a miserly 7% of the jacket price – would you bother? If you are looking at a nice £4.99 jacket price, keeping it price savvy, is the £0.35 really ample reward? Makes you think doesn’t it!? So, if not for the money, why are you doing it? Is it just vanity? You must be heavily egotistical when you think about it – can’t be for the money, the riches, the trappings of fame, not for 7% it can’t…

So, if I’m only going to get 35p, I’m going to dig my heals in, and keep everything as mine, I’m not going to change tack, alter or remove anything in a vain attempt to shift a few more copies – and that’s kinda rewarding. If you are not chasing the money, if it is all about you and your creation, then dam it, you can wrap yourself nice and snug in the art-for-arts sake blanket.

Although, for a 25% return, I would consider making Amy a mid-western American, traveling the world bringing truth justice and the American way – the ‘baddie’ wont’ need to change, he’s a Brit, but for some extra gold coins…

Yeah, as if!

7% though, what a tiny return for your labour! I’d have to sell over 350,000 copies just to make a reasonable attempt to pay of the average mortgage – and that would be a very lot of paper to shift! So, I’d have to shift as many copies as say American Sniper (which had a massive movie tie-in to boost sales) in order to make a living – daunting isn’t it!

And then when you think of true ‘mega-sales’, someone like J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, that has sales around 4.5m, or Dan Brown and The Da Vinci Code c5m, you can see sheer size of the task you face if all this typing is an attempt to make a living…

So, if you see a writer who “made it”, be nice to them, they worked very hard for that 7%!