What’s it about?

Amy’s tale starts in 1884 and is a fast-paced chase across the British Empire.  Her quarry is Thomas Payne, the man who sold her into a brothel.  We have spectacular fights, Celtic folklore, and a whiff of steampunk.  Vengeance runs hand in hand with the slow recovery from trauma.  Eventually we have our showdown, our meeting of victim and prey, and then for Amy everything goes so sadly wrong.  What she gets isn’t what she needed.  Shots ring out and a broken woman flies away…

Who’s she like, give me contemporary pointers!

If Sally Lockhart had the grit of Lisbeth Salander and was moving in the darkness of Caleb Carr’s New York, then I think we would have a taste of young Miss Amy Grace. 

Why this tall tale, what has Amy got that others haven’t?   

To start with she passes both Bechdel and Mako Mori, she is a truly rounded and independent character, not a facsimile, not a simpering damsel waiting to be rescued.  She has flaws, failings, depths of despair.  She has all of these, and she has triumphs too.  Amy is driven, focused and vulnerable. 

She can channel the battle calm and power of warrior priestesses from Irish legend, but she isn’t dependent or driven by this energy – it aids, it does not dominate or define her.  The violence isn’t without consequence, she is knocked down, she is cut, and she bleeds, she suffers for her trials. 

Amy isn’t some big-busted Amazonian caricature, she is a petite 5’2” woman with a tower of red hair, and a temper to match.  She drinks whiskey, smokes, and dabbles with drugs.  She seeks no male companion to complete her, instead her occasional itches are scratched by warm and obliging women.  Amy is the amalgam of many things, but above all she is an interesting character without current equal or comparative singular reference.  She has all the potential to carve a space for herself in the literary world – she just needs a helping hand to get started. 

Every teller of tall tales gets here.

Each and every scribbler of stories reaches this point.

Are we kidding ourselves?

Do these scribbles really have value?

Would anyone really pay good money to read your writing?

Introspection is a lonely place.

I feel my stories have merit, I am adamant that they are ripe for commercial exploitation.

If you print them, you WILL make money.

And therein lies the crux.

Nobody else believes me.

My path is lonely, is one of solitude, the loneliness of a long-distance runner…

To stop, or to make one last push?

We are at that tipping point.

To go on, or to stop.

The will once so resolute, this we are slowly losing.

Stay safe – remain sane!

Ever write anything so dark, so gruesome, that if it was ever to make it to celluloid, protests and riots would be a real possibility?

Did you ever scribble something that was so dark that Beta readers now avoid eye contact?

I have such a segment.

I’ve added it, taken it away, and then reinserted it.

It is cruel, on any objective measure it is indeed a dark collection of words.

But I wrote it.

I’m not a dark man, a sadistic or remotely cruel man, but write this thing indeed I did.

Writers somehow find those dark images and bring them into the light.

It is strange.

Quiet unassuming tea drinking man describes depravity…

I could delete it and many related passages.

I could paint it all magnolia sweetness and light with all the dramatic tension of an episode of the Brady Bunch.

I could, but I won’t.

Yin/Yang.

Darkness/Light.

Evil exists, glib euphemistic descriptors don’t do it, and especially for those who suffer and then survive, the truth of such events needs to be told. 

I’m not a bad/sad man hiding behind blue eyes.

Empathy is key.

Respect paramount.

Torture porn isn’t my thing.

Maybe folk will wince, feal uncomfortable and read on – I hope they do.

Stay safe – be kind to yourself and be kind to as many other people as you can!

It took me some time.

It’s taken me years, but she’s now very much dead.

We’ve written it, told that tale, scribbled those all-important lines.

Something I very much didn’t want to do; I have now done.

It’s no small thing, but at the same time it really is.

A character is the written word, not a beating heart – although as the writer it so much feels like the latter.

Amy had a beginning, and so too did she need an ending.

I think (I hope) that what I’ve written is in keeping with the life that she led.

I hope that I’ve done her justice, kept her true to herself and those that she loved.

Her tale isn’t over, legacies live on.

Stay safe and remain sane!

One of the oft quoted anecdotes about the American involvement in Vietnam, was the apparent unwillingness of a lot of soldiers to shoot and kill. 

Lots of shots would be fired, but the aim of most was more in the general area than aimed at a specific target. 

I’m not going to overuse this analogy, but it is relevant.  

I need to kill a loved character.

Yet I cannot.

I skirt the issue, find excuses, avoid the subject; start other projects…

She, like us all, must die, but I cannot pull that metaphorical trigger.

I cannot scribble those necessary words.

I’ve got the whole sorry scenario on my head, but the closer I come, the slower I type, the more I go back pages upon pages and titivate, anything other than kill her.

But she must die.

She must.

This is my struggle, but please feel no pity.

A cold heart is needed, a firm resolve required.

In this matter I have neither.

Stay safe – remain sane!

Never set out to write an honest to goodness Hallmark Christmas Movie styled tale of love and devotion. 

But indeed, here we are. 

I am by nature a chaotic/anarchic writer.

No real plan, no structure, I just throw words at the screen and by a combination of luck and a modicum of ability I end up with a tale.  

A beginning, a middle, and an end (of sorts).

Yet, a love story, a romance novel, this must follow a formula.

This tale, this genre of all available artistic endeavours we are told MUST adhere to the agreed pacing and plot structure – mustn’t it?

We simply must have our voyage of tentative circling, the love that all but those involved can see.  We then have the mistaken interpretation  (hugging a friend) that almost scuppers the destined love affair; and then just as the pages run out, just before the credits run, they hug, all errors are corrected and love rules supreme.

So, if that’s the structure, can I write one?

Can my tale of love between a German Soldier and a Channel Island woman work?

It might, indeed it may not, but it I think will be a more than beneficial exercise.

So, grab the box of tissues and bottle of Prosecco, we are about to make you lick your finger, your heart race as we run out of pages…

Will they, or won’t they?

Stay safe and remain sane! 

Back in the summer of 2017, when initially musing about the whole blog concept I said that I saw this as akin to standing alone on-stage in some great palatial auditorium. 

I viewed myself as a one man show casting pearls into the dark, maybe folk are out there listening – maybe they were not.   

Does silence echo?   

Well, undeterred I’ve been speaking into the abyss ever since. 

Occasionally lost souls, looking for the dinosaur exhibition next door, wander in, look a little confused and then meekly shuffle back out.

Me, I persevere.  

This is my shop window, and it isn’t.

It is so many things, and it isn’t.

What it is, I’m still not too sure.

Does it have merit, not too sure of that either…

If this was a big hall in the centre of town, then maybe I’d have validated some parking tickets, or struck up a relationship with a few of the on-site staff – but it isn’t, and I haven’t.

It is easy to say what this hasn’t been, to look at the chances and opportunities imagined and then not delivered.  That bit is easy but offers no real benefit. 

We must look for the positives. 

What this has been, what this does deliver?

This project gives is a release valve, a venting mechanism, an empty room into which I can mutter consequence free!

Nobody corrects or criticises my mutterings, I stride as an unchallenged colossus in a fiefdom of my own creation!

So, part relief valve, part echo, and a little tiny bit of a shop window, I salute this blog.

Scribbles will continue, and you never know, one day a reply may come forth out of the darkness…

So, until the rapture – stay safe and remain sane!

Parting is indeed such sweet sorrow. 

Four complete tales, 500,000 words. 

An adventure that started in 1884, is now in 1891 offering Amy Elizabeth Grace a real chance of lasting peace and happiness.

Amy has circumnavigated the globe, rode lightning storms, fought enemies in the Khyber Pass, fought more in North America, fought Fairies too, so many battles that her body is a lattice work of scars…

Love was found and then cruelly taken from her, she has given birth to a daughter, but she too has been lost.

Vengeance has been enacted; slights corrected.

All this I have written, and now writing her swan song, the fifth (and final?) instalment I have hit a near insurmountable obstacle; I don’t want to say goodbye.

In 2015 I started telling her tall tale, and now in 2023 I think it’s the right time to let her go.

She is a mere figment of my imagination, and yet at the same time she isn’t.

The emotional investment of the writer shouldn’t be overplayed, but neither should it be ignored.

I hope that I can do justice to her, that I can give her the ending that she so richly deserves (even if I don’t want to).

So that boys and girls is my first world 2023 problem – whatever life brings you, I hope your struggles are as trivial and surmountable as mine. 

Stay safe – remain sane!

*Job opportunity exists for suitably qualified agent.

Okay, so you’ve drafted a book – kudos to you, well done, take well deserved pleasure in your achievement!

Now what?

You’ve browbeaten your friends/colleagues/neighbours/strangers on the train into reading it, and the replies have been favourable.

Next?

You write your one-page synopsis, polish the living daylights out of the first three chapters and scribble that all important cover letter.

Silence prevails, silence only broken by the occasional ‘thanks, but no thanks’ rejection.

Self-doubt and other monkeys climb on your back. 

Imposter syndrome takes up long term residence…

What now?

Is it your letter/synopsis/first three chapters?

Is it your entire project?

So, you edit, rewrite, titivate and do your absolute best to create a silk purse.

Is it your timing, is the publishing world focusing on werewolves and moody teenagers with identity issues?

Is it a timing issue, or does your work just lack merit?

The monkey is still on your shoulder, his extended family over to visit…

Maybe you need to self-publish?

It’s a credible option taken by many.

Okay, to go it alone you’ll obviously have to present the absolute best version of your project that you can – it is a crowded market – you will need to be polished – no half measures will succeed!

An editor, yes you will need one of those skilled practitioners – £0.01 per word (£1,200 for Amy Grace: Thomas Payne).

Artwork – most definitely gotta get some good graphics, despite the adage people do judge a book by its cover – okay £200.

So, to launch my project I’ll need a few coins over £1,500.

Do I have £1,500?

No and nope. 

Is it a lack of belief, or just an overriding necessity to pay the bills? 

Ah the mundane of life…

The piper needs to be paid. 

We chase rainbows, pick up pennies, and we debate the sustainability of our project that is doomed to be in perpetual ‘pause.’

Maybe it’s a cosmic statement – maybe it’s telling me to take up golf, or it’s telling me to persevere because nothing worthwhile is ever easy? 

I’m currently looking at option B.

Stay safe – remain sane!