My Secret Double Life by Sophie Claire

I have a set of questions which I think of as my annual review:

            What did you embrace in 2015?

            What did you let go of?

            In 2016 where do you want to be? 
And so on...

I love these kind of questions. They’re useful for keeping me focused on my goals and reminding me of my achievements, and obviously this was a big year for me with the publication of my first novel. However, one of my answers stopped me in my tracks. I had completely forgotten that 2015 was also the year I came out and told everyone in the real world (as opposed to online) that I am a writer!

Until May, when Her Forget-Me-Not Ex was released, my writing life was a closely guarded secret known only to my close friends and family. Why?

Let me take you back a step. When I first began to write fifteen years ago, I treated it as a hobby. I wrote while my baby was napping and I mainly wrote short stories because that was all I had time for. After a few years, I plucked up the courage to start a novel. I worked on this for two years and by the time I’d finished it, the seed was sown: I knew I wanted to be a writer. So I tentatively told a few people about my hopes of one day being published.

I knew achieving publication would not be easy and I braced myself for rejection, but when I sent my first book to publishers and agents I was stunned by their response. My book was like a boomerang. It used to come back, sometimes by return of post. (With hindsight, I’m so glad – that first book was a learning experience!)

However, I wouldn’t give up. I wrote another novel. And another. I went on writing courses, and I constantly searched out books and articles to try and improve my craft. Gradually, the rejections became less standard and more encouraging, telling me I was nearly there. I saw this as progress (though it was incredibly frustrating too), but some people – non-writers – couldn’t understand my optimism. Their interest turned to sympathy and eventually to pity. So I decided to keep my writing dreams to myself.

Then we moved house. As far as my new neighbours and friends knew, I was a stay-at-home mum of two who did the school run and worked part-time proofreading academic papers. In reality, I proofread at night when the children were in bed, and wrote feverishly from 9 till 3 every day. Although I still hadn’t earned a penny from writing, I treated it as my job and that was all I wanted to do.

I would sometimes vanish for the weekend to attend a writing course, and when people asked where I’d been I kept my answers vague: ‘Oh, seeing friends’. Which was true. I didn’t want to give the game away, but I didn’t want to lie either. It was difficult keeping up the deception. So this year when my book came out and I could finally tell everyone the good news I was so relieved.

What’s your book about? friends asked; Where do you get your ideas? Why didn’t you tell us you were a writer?

The truthful answer is: because I needed the validation of being published to feel I really was a writer.

And how do people react now when I tell them what I do? They’re mostly intrigued. Writing, for whatever reason, is regarded as a fascinating career. I love that some people are bemused by imagination and the concept of making things up (Did you base your book on an ex-boyfriend? – er, no). I love that people want to give me ideas they’ve had for books they think should be written. I love that there is a general perception that writers are all as rich as J.K. Rowling (oh, that this were true!). I love the discussions I get drawn into about other authors and their books. It’s my favourite subject, my passion, and I’m thrilled that I can now openly share that passion.

I am Sophie Claire. And I am a writer.

Sophie.x

Q is for Quality. Or Quantity? by Annie Burrows

On the first Friday of every month, Novelista Annie Burrows has been sharing a very personal view of what it is like to be a writer.  And is dealing with themes in alphabetical order.  This month, she's reached Q which she says is for Quality.  Or Quantity?

Firstly, apologies to anyone who came looking for a blog post from me in August.  I took a month off blogging here, and went to the RWA conference in New York.

Which actually rather neatly leads me into this article.  Because one of the workshops I really wanted to attend was intriguingly called "Writing a novel in 30 days - tips tricks and cautions."  In 30 days?  I'd be thrilled if I could produce a book in less than 6 months.  Lots of other writers seem to be able to do it.  So why can't I?

One of the ladies giving the workshop opened by saying the fastest she had ever written a novel was 7 days.  When challenged as to its length, she told us it was 95,000 words.  There were gasps all round.  The second lady on the panel claimed 75,000 words in 3 weeks, and the third 60,000 in 6 weeks.  And they were all from start to submission.  They weren't talking about first drafts!

However, one thing they all agreed on was that they do good first drafts, which don't need much re-writing. They didn't do a lot of plotting either, as they considered it a waste of time.  In short, they all just sat down and wrote.

By this time I was feeling very inadequate.  My first drafts are generally a total mess and need going over several times before I feel confident about sending them off to my editor.  I can sit down and write a story in 4/5 weeks, but it isn't fit for human consumption!  My revisions take ages and ages.  And ages.

I was starting to wonder if I'm being too pernickety.  Perhaps I should just bash out a draft and send it off...

But no.  I can't do it.  I can't let anyone see my work until I'm sure it's of a certain standard.  And my first drafts definitely aren't.

However, as the workshop progressed, and people started asking how exactly these three women managed to write so fast, and still have a life, it became apparent that actually, they didn't.  Have much of a life outside writing, when they were going at that pace, that is.  One started writing from 8am until 5 pm when she became an empty-nester.  One had a husband who worked in a high profile job which meant he wasn't home until 11 pm.  And all three admitted that their health suffered.  And that they have had to cut back a lot.

Their conclusion was that you have to write the best book you can and don't beat yourself up if it isn't done quickly.  In other words, go for Quality, not Quantity.  I'd been getting worked up over all the advice I keep reading lately, that I need to bring out books really frequently to keep readers coming back.  But they're not going to come back if my book isn't any good, are they, no matter how quickly I manage to get it out there?

I came away from that workshop with the feeling that it isn't just quality of writing that's important, either, but quality of life.

If I lived alone, and needed to fill up my hours with something, then maybe I too could write from 8 in the morning until 11 at night, and produce 4 books a year  I could be proud of instead of 2.

But I have a husband, two grown up children, and a borrowed dog to take into consideration.  And elderly parents who live at the far end of the country. And I don't want to turn into a heap of blancmange racked through with aching bones from sitting hunched over my computer all day and into the night.  I want to get outside with the borrowed dog and go for walks to keep myself relatively healthy.  Keep my house the sort of place my husband will look forward to coming home to every night, and for my kids to want to visit from their far-flung homes.

I want quality of life, as well as feeling I've written books I can be proud of.

So it looks as though I'm doomed to only ever turning out 2 books a year - 2 books I can get excited about, that is.

So bang goes my chances of making a ton of money!

This year Annie has produced just 2 books.  A mistress for Major Bartlett, which is available on Amazon,   

 ...and The Captains' Christmas bride which is out in December, but can be pre-ordered here:

She is hoping to produce 2 more books in 2016.

Two sides to every story - except when there isn't... by Valerie-Anne Baglietto

Earlier this year, I left the cosy confines of North Wales and headed down to London to take my daughter to see Wicked. We both love the Wizard of Oz, so we’d been dying to see this musical for ages. I expected to enjoy it, but what I didn’t expect was that it would ignite something in my Writer’s Brain that I’m now finding endlessly fascinating. I mean, I already knew about POV, of course I did. After nearly two decades in this business, I’m hardly a novice. But now I’m thinking much more deeply, not just about POV but about perception.

We’ve had a couple of great posts on Novelistas Ink already about this subject, and I don’t want to repeat what Juliet and Annie put so eloquently. They’re well worth a read or re-read.

This particular post is the one about my own point of view about point of view (yes, I was trying to be too clever there).

View on Amazon

By the time I saw Wicked, I’d already finished the first draft of my latest book Four Sides to Every Story.

POV was something that had been constantly on my mind for several months, since the title for the book first popped into my head while I was staring out of a window on a train one day. (Seriously, what is it about trains? Didn’t JK Rowling come up with the idea for Harry Potter on a train?) Anyway – my story, which has a grown-up fairy tale romance at its core, didn’t just have the hero’s and heroine’s sides to take into account, there was also the fairy godmother to consider, and the hero’s stepdaughter. Their roles in the story were crucial, and it was imperative they narrated their parts, too.

But just like Wicked, it wasn’t enough simply to get into each character’s head for a scene or two. How the characters perceived the same unfolding story, and how they were perceived as people within that tale, were paramount. I don’t want to give too much away of the plot of Wicked. After all, if you haven’t already had the pleasure, you might want to read the book or see the musical for yourself. But basically, it’s the Wizard of Oz from a different angle, so it helps if you’re familiar with the landscape of Oz. And it shows us, in such a fiendishly inspired way, how a different narrator can turn an entire story on its head. An exciting concept for a writer. I came away with my head BUZZING. (Maybe my life is very quiet and I’m easily pleased.)

Propaganda is a powerful tool, not just in wars...

It can scramble our brains, make us forget to put ourselves in another person’s shoes. The same with gossip. How quickly we can think ill of someone, without knowing their side. And villains, after all, are the heroes of the stories we tell - in their own eyes. Recently, movies like Maleficent also help us to see a well-known tale from a different POV. I wanted to do something like that within Four Sides to Every Story. My fairy godmother is young, and not at all theatrical like the kind we’re used to. But we see the tale from her perspective too for once, as well as from the others involved. Although the plot of the book isn’t a modern retelling of an actual fairy tale, we all know the markers, the familiar thread, the way the story ought to unfold. But it doesn’t. It starts going very wrong. The path to true love becomes perilously rocky. And not everyone is telling the truth or letting us completely under their skin.

And that’s another thing. The trendy-but-not-new device of the "unreliable narrator". The omissions. The secrets they don’t share with the reader.

Ah, I learned to love that, too; although it wasn’t easy to begin with. It was too new to me - or so I thought. If you have more time to spare, make a large mug of tea or coffee and look the term up on Wikipedia. In essence, all fictional narrative is unreliable to an extent, because if we're using POV correctly then the story is filtered through the narrator's eyes, with his or her own life experience, prejudices, moral code, etc. But while I was working on Four Sides I hadn't researched the device, so failed to appreciate the history behind it, or the fact that I'd absorbed the subtleties of using it from many books I'd read in the past, including Agatha Christie.

Out of the four points of view in my story, there are various degrees of 'unreliability'. Ooh, the fun I had once I got into my stride. This was my Happy Book, as I nicknamed it. The one that was a joy to write after the torturous bit at the start when I couldn’t see beyond the first few chapters. I’m grateful to it for giving me those months of unadulterated pleasure. I’m indebted to the lessons it taught me.

Of course, in my earlier rom-coms, I tried to use POV as effectively as I could, too, but on the whole, the narrators were the ‘goodies’, even if they sometimes behaved badly. They always laid themselves bare to the reader. I received a tweet a couple of weeks ago which brightened up a rainy Sunday. It was from a fan of Fresh as a Daisy, which is over a decade old now, who said she still read it at least once a year. She liked the fact I had managed to make all the participants in a love triangle sympathetic. It got me thinking, and re-reading it myself. There were three ‘nice’ people involved, who made mistakes throughout the story, but none of them was out to hurt anyone. They were real and ordinary and exactly who they claimed to be, even if they didn't spill all their secrets out in one lump on the page; the idea being, the reader would perceive them as such and be sympathetic to their problems.

But that isn’t quite the case in Four Sides to Every Story. This is a modern fairy tale, with a twist.

I felt I had to go one step further than the way I normally approach the craft of writing POV. It reminded me of a still-life art class, with all the artists in a circle around a bowl of fruit. Each completed painting will look different, depending on the individual artist's perspective. And not just the image in their line of sight, but how they translate it in their heads, too, and how they choose to capture it pictorially. At the end of the day, though, it’s the same bowl of fruit.

So this is how I visualised the book in my head as I wrote it, with my storyline in the centre and my characters as the artists gathered around it. A floundering, surly hero. A heroine who isn’t just prickly with the other characters but with the reader as well. A fairy godmother who desperately needs things to play out the way the reader expects. And finally, a child, who perceives things as they truly are, without the complications, as only an innocent can.

One story. Four very different perspectives.

Wicked fun to write ;-)


Why not have a go playing around with POV, too, and take it a step further than you normally would? You never know, there might be a whole new chapter ahead of you. Just let me know how you get on! 

Valerie-Anne x

P is for...Point of View by Annie Burrows

On the first Friday of every month, Novelista Annie Burrows has been sharing a very personal view of what it is like to be a writer.  And is dealing with themes in alphabetical order.  This month, she's reached P...

While I was trying to get my first book published, I read a very helpful "how to" book called "The 1st 5 pages", by Noah Lukeman, which contained a piece of writing advice that stunned me.  It suggested that before I even started my story, I ought to decide from whose viewpoint I was going to tell it, and whether to do so in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd person.

Er...what?

What is a viewpoint character, I wondered, and what is the difference between first, second or third person narration?

In a nutshell, in case you didn't know either, the viewpoint character is the person through whose eyes a reader will experience the story.  The person whose story it is.  If it is written in 1st person, it will be "I" did this that or the other.  I'm currently reading a fabulous thriller by Dick Francis, who always seems to tell his story in the first person, and comes up with some amazing opening lines because of it.  Because he uses the first person, you always feel as if you are experiencing the story alongside someone who has only just gone through it themselves, and is telling you all about it.

2nd person is "you" did it.  Apparently this is the hardest of all to write and is rarely used.  I can't think of a single example to give you - sorry!  3rd person is "she/he" did this that or the other, and is the most commonly used.

I knew that writing a story is a kind of world-building exercise.  I'd always thought of it as painting a picture with words.  But this chapter likened it to playing a piece of music, in which any inconsistency with the viewpoint would sound like a clashing, crashing discord, shattering the harmony.

So I read the single chapter dealing with viewpoint very carefully, and then looked at my own current manuscript, as recommended.  Firstly, I discovered that I had been writing from my heroine's viewpoint (mostly) in 3rd person all along.  Which, coincidentally, turned out to be what Mills & Boon recommended in their guidelinesat the time.  And since Mills & Boon was the publisher I was targeting, it was a jolly good job too.

I also learnt about the various ways I could make mistakes with handling viewpoint.  I could change from the viewpoint of one character to another with bewildering rapidity, I could tell sections of the story from the viewpoint of characters who really didn't matter, and shouldn't have come to the fore, or I could fumble it altogether by having a character say or think something she couldn't possibly have known.

I'd thought my writing was pretty good, before then, but after reading the chapter on viewpoint, that story suddenly seemed full of discordant notes.  I had indeed switched viewpoint so quickly any reader would have had trouble keeping up with who was the main player in a scene.  I had also written substantial chunks from the point of view of characters who shouldn't have been speaking directly to my reader.

Those errors wouldn't have been errors at all if I was writing the kind of story where it is fine to have several people giving their account of the story.  In crime novels, for example, one incident can be related by several witnesses.  I've also read family sagas

where the thread gets taken up by someone from the next generation.  So long as the change from one character's viewpoint to another is made clear and doesn't confuse the reader, that method can suit certain types of story.

However, since I'm writing romance, and I want to create an intense emotional experience for my reader, it is far better to get right inside my heroine's head, and stay there (unless I need to let people know what the hero is thinking).  When the reader knows what my heroine knows, understand what motivates her to act the way she does, it creates empathy.  Even if the heroine acts badly, the readers should know why she did what she did, and will therefore still keep rooting for her.  Same goes for the hero.

But if I introduce scenes from anyone else's point of view, and take the focus off the main characters, it dilutes the intense emotion I want my reader to feel.  There was no need for the woman my heroine (Amity) met in the dressmaker to suddenly start talking to the reader.  It was Amity's story, not Mrs Kirkham's.  Similarly, I shouldn't have written anything from Amity's brother's point of view, particularly since he was going to die in chapter 4.

Nor should I have had Amity knowing exactly what her brother was thinking, no matter how close they'd been as children, except by reading his body language and taking her best guess.

In fact the only viewpoint mistake I hadn't made was switching from first (which I'd never used) to second or third.

So, once I'd learned about the various types of viewpoint, I then began to think a bit harder about whose viewpoint to use in any scene.  To create the most impact for the reader, it's best to think about which character will have the most invested at the time.  Who has the most to lose or gain?  Since I write romance, I really only have the choice between the hero or the heroine, but it is a point that still needs careful consideration.  Do I focus on the heroine's determination to resist the hero, whose rakish reputation has already made her turn down his proposal of marriage more than once, in spite of the almost overwhelming attraction she feels for him?  Or do I get inside the hero's head, and let the reader know that this time, he has really fallen in love, and his devil-may-care smile hides his fear of rejection?

 

Once I'd got the hang of considering point of view, it made a huge difference to my writing.  Once I stopped digressing into the mind of the heroine's brother, his commanding officer, a woman Amity met in the dressmaker, or anyone else, the story focussed more closely on my heroine, and her journey of discovery, and therefore became more interesting.

Amity still hasn't found a publisher - but I'm working on it!

 

 

 Annie's latest book is "A Mistress for Major Bartlett", 2nd in the "Brides of Waterloo" series from Harlequin.  Currently available from Amazon

O is for...Osmosis by Annie Burrows

On the first Friday of every month, Novelista Annie Burrows has been sharing a very personal view of what it is like to be a writer.  And is dealing with themes in alphabetical order.  This month, she's reached O...

I have to admit I was a bit stumped for an "O".  I have to thank fellow Novelista Johanna Grassick for coming up with the fabulous word "osmosis".

The dictionary definition is: "Tendency of solvent to diffuse through porous partition into more concentrated solution."

Or, "The process of gradual or unconscious assimilation of ideas, knowledge, etc."

In other words, "soaking stuff up".

I have to admit, when I first started writing, I did a lot of "soaking stuff up."  I'd studied literature at university, but not creative writing.  So that although I could write essays about style, metaphor, and subtext, I didn't have a clue about how to achieve any of those things in a work of fiction I'd written myself.

I've already mentioned in an earlier blog (M is for...Mills & Boon) about how I discovered that any writer who wants to submit to a publisher of genre fiction had better read a lot of them to get a "feel" for what they are looking for.  In other words, I needed to soak up the atmosphere of romance that Mills & Boon publish.  I've read, since then, all sorts of books which go into clinical detail about how to become a better writer, specifically of romance, but I still think the best way to get a real feel for the genre is to read lots and lots in the same line, and soak up the atmosphere.

I have shelves full of Georgette Heyer, and other Regency romances, so it's not surprising that the stories I've had published are also light-hearted Regency romances.

I'm not trying to write like Georgette Heyer, though.  I'm trying to be as original as I can be.  Which brings me to the slight drawback to learning to write by a process of osmosis.  And that is the danger that I might unconsciously soak up someone else's style.  That is why I steer clear of reading any kind of Regency romance at certain stages of writing my own books. I don't want to accidentally reproduce someone else's turns of phrase.

It isn't just the art of writing that I needed to "soak up", though.  In order to make a historical background convincing, I have needed to positively wallow in research books.  The only way I can confidently mention a mode of travel, a political undercurrent, or the cut of a gown is by reading as much as I can about the period.  The only way to get into the mindset of my characters, and make them come to life, is to understand the way people in that era would have thought and acted, which means reading biographies of eminent figures of the day.  And period newspapers.  Soaking up as much knowledge as I can makes it possible to bring the era to life on the page for my readers.  (hopefully!)

Going to museums and stately homes is also another way of soaking up atmosphere.  I can imagine myself as an aristocrat, strolling through the grounds in a full-length dress, or going for a ride in a carriage.  The view from a window, or the pattern of wear on a carpet can spark ideas, so that I often come home from trips to a stately home with inspiration for a new story.

A lot of writers will say that their mind is like a kind of compost heap.  All sorts of things go in, get absorbed, transformed, and produce a rich crop.

That's me.  A veritable compost heap!

Annie's latest release is "A Mistress for Major Bartlett" the second in the "Brides of Waterloo" trilogy from Harlequin Mills & Boon.

 Available from Amazon

Using Myths and Legends in Storytelling by Juliet Greenwood

There’s nothing like learning from past masters. When I was studying literature I read George Elliot, Charlotte Bronte and Dickens over and over again. The first piece of longer fiction I attempted to write myself was modeled on Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca: I had a structure to work on and to play with, which took the fear out of setting off into the complete unknown.

But like most of us, my first means of learning about storytelling came through myths and fairy stories. I didn’t realise just how much they had taught me about structure and plot development until I began to run storytelling workshops, mainly for children. The best one of all was based around the story of Gelert.

In case you don’t know it, Gelert was the faithful hound of a Welsh prince, who saved his master’s baby from a prowling wolf. Thinking Gelert had killed the baby, Prince Llewellyn stabbed the dog with his sword, only to realise his mistake, as the baby was found safe along with the body of the wolf. Poor Gelert licked his master’s hand in forgiveness with his last breath, and thousands of visitors still visit Gelert’s grave in Beddgelert, at the foot of Snowdon.

Even more shocking, dear reader, is the fact that it’s a load of baloney: a cynical ploy by a local hotelier to bring in the punters. So my storytelling lesson was based on making up another Gelert story set in another Welsh location. But there were certain rules. The first was that Gelert had to be another animal, chosen from folded up papers in a box. It was usually a group of boys who found themselves deprived of the bone-crunching joys of T-Rex/Orc/Godzilla to find themselves landed with Gelert-the-Budgie. The second rule was that Gelert had to save the baby and him/herself. And in case you think I’m a sentimental female who needs a happy ending, many of the children we worked with were survivors of abuse, sometimes having seen a real attempt of their father to kill their mother, and didn’t need any more heart-stings pulled. Always respect your storytellers as well as your readers. 

The resulting stories from this deconstructed myth were ingenious, heart-warming and at times - knowing the children’s past – both exhilarating and heartbreaking. Gelert the lamb/rabbit/cow/snake/gerbil created the most ingenious of solutions to the problem, all acted out with the help of puppets made by the storytellers themselves. Best of all was always Gelert-the-Budgie, using brain over brawn to save the day – and the initially grumbling boys loved it.

So when I get stuck with plotting, I still go back to my old favourite stories. I might not use them exactly, but it’s still where I learn how storytelling works.

And Gelert? Well Gelert-the-Budgie (or rabbit/cow/snake/gerbil) went on to have a career as a superhero, complete with cape, called up upon by those in need all over the universe - but that’s a story for another day...

Retelling myths via giant puppets at Penrhyn Castle

Write Foxy Day with Miranda Dickinson

by Johanna Grassick

A writers’ inspiration day. Sounds great, doesn’t it? 

When I saw this advertised, the question of whether to go or not was, frankly, a no brainer. With workshops led by some of my favourite authors – Rowan Coleman, Julie Cohen and, of course, Miranda Dickinson – how could I miss it?

Miranda opened the day by explaining that the aim was to encourage and inspire us, to rekindle the joy that started us writing. There were around 20 of us, a real mixture of published and unpublished writers including the guest authors who took it in turn to lead the workshops. Oh, and Cathy Bramley, who was live tweeting throughout the day (you can see a round-up of her tweets here). There was also a writing den available in case the inspiration became too much and we had the urge to just hide away and write! (Yes, some took advantage of this).

Our very serious workshop leaders: Julie Cohen, Rowan Coleman, Kate Harrison and Miranda Dickinson

First up was Julie Cohen who led us through a fantastic workshop on Creating a Character. This covered topics such as conflict, character arc and symbolism – the nuts and bolts of the writing craft. As with all Julie’s teaching, it was very much an interactive workshop and within ten minutes everyone in the room had created vibrant new characters who were moving around and walking and talking, with problems and conflicts ready to tell their own stories!

There were also workshops led by Rowan Coleman (finding your voice and developing it) and Kate Harrison who helped us to identify the emotional heart of our writing. I loved this exercise. There is so much written about craft and technique, but asking myself what emotions I hope to arouse in my readers really helped me to rediscover the core emotion of the novel I’m working on just now – that nugget of an idea which triggered me to write it in the first place. Hopefully I’ll be able to re-inject that same energy into my book during the next few weeks as I finish the final draft.

During the day we had lots of chances to mingle and meet new friends. We discussed pseudonyms (a hot subject for me at the moment but that’s for another blog post!) and agents and we got to sniff the delicious new fragrance which has been developed for Julie Cohen’s latest book, Where Love Lies.  

Dressed for the occasion

And then Miranda finished off the day with a session on Writing Against the Odds. She gave us tips and techniques for overcoming the fears that can hold us back when writing.

I came away reenergised and confident and full of cake and chocolate – not a bad feeling at all!

Love Is All You Need: Ten Tales of Love from the Sophie King Prize

www.johannagrassick.com

Writing What You Know... by Annie Burrows

Continuing Novelista Annie Burrow's monthly alphabetical rambling though the writer's life.  This week, she's reached the letter K, which is for...Knowing.  (Or not)

"There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know." (Donald Rumsfeld)

When you first start writing people advise you to write what you know.  The argument goes that you cannot write a convincing story unless you know your subject inside out and upside down.  The trouble is, I wanted to write fiction set in Regency England, which is a place I have never been, and never can go to.  All my knowledge of the era comes from books.

However, when I started attempting to get a publishing deal, I felt fairly confident that I knew enough to be able to create a convincing fictional Regency world.  I've read stacks of Georgette Heyer, Jane Austen and the like.  And whatever I didn't know enough about, I could look up, right?

So I bought loads of books about every subject I thought I might need to know about - fashion, the army, the navy and biograpies of people who actually lived in the time which would hopefully give me an idea of the mindset of people living back then.

I even go round stately homes to get an extra "feel" for the era, especially ones where I can dress up in period costume, or have a ride in a carriage.

All the little details of dress, manners, and so forth, help to create a world that strikes a reader as "real".

For example, an author may set a scene by having the hero check his cravat in the mirror.  The heroine curtsies to him.  Instantly we're in an age where manners are more formal than today, and the costumes easily dateable.  The hero asks the lady to dance the waltz.  She refuses lest she be thought "fast".  We're very firmly in Regency territory.  So far, so good.

The trouble is, there are things about the Regency world that I never knew I didn't know.  I didn't know, for example - until it was mentioned on an author loop I belong to - that a girl couldn't waltz in public until she'd been granted permission, by one of the patronesses of Almack's, within those hallowed walls, to do so with an approved partner.  I'd had no idea how close I'd come to the brink of writing one of my heroines into committing such a social gaffe.

And a lot of authors fall into the same trap.  As a resident of the UK, I cringe whenever I read of Regency bucks going down to Dorsetshire to sample the local whiskey.  Or having to banish their dogs to the stables after an encounter with a skunk on the South Downs.  For me, such slips of the pen ruin my belief in the Regency world the author is trying to create.  Though I don't suppose it has any effect on readers who don't know that in Dorset the local brew would most likely be cider, and that the only way a skunk would wander onto the South Downs was if it had escaped from some local eccentric's private collection of rare species.

Which brings me back to the inimitable Donald Rumsfeld, who has been soundly mocked for warning the world about the danger of the "unknown unknowns".  As an author, I can vouch for the peril of those pesky facts that hamper us in our creative endeavours.  I have had my own heroes and heroines unwittingly do and say things that a person living in 1815 would not have done.  I have had them use the word "hello" - which was not in common use until the 1880's except on the hunting field.  I have also had them perform a twentieth century waltz, having had no idea that in the Regency era, the waltz was nothing like the rather tame dance performed today.

Only look at the way these couples are cavorting in each other's arms...

However, if I was now to describe the dance with complete accuracy, I suspect that editors and readers alike would find it hard to believe in it if my hero performed an acrobatic leap while the heroine hopped to one side.  It would strike them all as bizarre, and would ruin their belief in my Regency world just as surely as it would had they arrived at the ball in question in a porsche 911.

So - I'll probably need to disguise what I actually know, so that a reader will be convinced I do know what I'm talking about.

Donald Rumsfeld might have fared better with the world's press if he'd done the same.

Annie's next book, "A Mistress for Major Bartlett" which is part of a trilogy "The Brides of Waterloo", will be out in July 2015

The Child Behind Every (Grown-Up) Writer by Valerie-Anne Baglietto

The other day I shared a picture on Facebook, a selection of classic Ladybird children's stories. It prompted the sort of response that led me to think, Ah FB isn't so bad, after all. It isn't just a bunch of people shouting out random things and being ignored. I suppose I was becoming a bit too cynical. Anyway, it got me thinking about books and childhood and the stories that shape us as we grow up.

Here at Novelistas Ink we're a very diverse bunch of writers. 

As you can probably tell if you're a follower of our blog. We're all good friends, though, and our lunches are infamous throughout North Wales. OK, slight exaggeration, but then we do write fiction. The common thread we share is our passion and love of writing. We're besotted with it. Head over heels. Can't get enough of it (or perhaps we can when we've got a deadline looming, or edits-from-hell to wade through, but on the whole we enjoy it).

Our genres range from witty romantic comedies to moving war-time sagas. From atmospheric historical novels to sparkling Regency romances. From plot-twisting, cliff-hanging romantic suspense to modern, grown-up fairy tales. And all that wonderful stuff in between such as contemporary YA or straightforward novels about relationships and marriage. I'm not sure anyone's written a spy thriller yet, but give us time and we just might.

But what steered us to write in our favourite genres?

What made us the writers we all are today? Was it the books from our childhood or the books we've read as adults, or maybe a mixture of both? I believe it's a mixture, but I also think we can't deny the power of those stories we've carried with us most of our lives. Those treasured tales that lodged in our hearts and never left.

As a girl, I spent hours in my small local library...

It was just round the corner from our house, so I often hid away in there after school or during the holidays. Sometimes with similar minded friends, but often alone. If I wasn't reading I was writing or researching. I've written stories since I first learned to misspell words, aged four. There was also a bookshelf in our house full of novels that looked like this, no dust jackets or blurbs, just the bare bones of a cover:

As an only child, I spent hours entertaining myself reading. My parents still own most of those books, and my own children's shelves still hold the favourites I loved to read over and over again.

A beautifully written and illustrated anthology

This anthology of classic fairy tales from around the world (see photo) is probably mine and my daughter's current favourite. I owe a great deal to this huge collection of stories. It was given to me as a gift by a family friend. Little did they know how much it would shape me and nurture a love of fairy tales that's stronger than ever these days.

Of course, I loved Enid Blyton, too. I had all the Famous Five and Secret Seven books.

I think those taught me how to pace a plot and keep a reader turning the pages. Those were the ones I read under the covers with a torch. Come on, admit it, we all did that. Maybe some of us still do.

Now admittedly, if you write erotica, you probably didn't read it as a child. Or maybe you used to sneak down the more adult books from the shelves at home when your parents weren't looking, and thumb through them for those, er, interesting bits. As a teenager in the 80s, I can still recall all those mini-series on TV based on the doorstop sex-and-shopping novels that were so fashionable...

Lace, Mistral's Daughter, Princess Daisy, etc.

These are the books my friends and I consumed and tried to emulate in our stories (I wasn't the only one of my gang who wrote fiction back then). It was a glitzy world we knew nothing about apart from what we read or saw on TV, but boy did we have fun trying to write about it! Then there was Virginia Andrews and Danielle Steele and Barbara Taylor Bradford... The list is quite lengthy and I could probably rattle on all day, but then this post would be too long, and the whole point of it was to provoke a discussion.

Do you think the books you read as a child have influenced your writing as an adult?

If so, to what extent? I think it's a fascinating subject to consider, both for established or aspiring writers.

Every now and again it's good to examine why we write what we write. Because doing it for the market alone will never truly make us happy if we don't pen (or type) our words with love, honesty or joy. We need to find that balance in our work in order to be healthy and well-rounded. We owe it to our readers as well as ourselves. They can always tell if we're short-changing them.

Just a small selection...

So maybe, if you're stuck in a rut right now, and don't know where to turn or what genre to aim for, it might help to travel back in time and remember the tales that inspired you and made you want to be a writer in the first place.

I can tell you, hand on heart, a few short years ago this is precisely what helped me.

Please leave a comment if you have something to add, I'd love to hear your views on the subject.

All the best,
Valerie-Anne x

Valerie-Anne Baglietto's latest release is the full-length novel FOUR SIDES TO EVERY STORY.

Romance, magic and vintage fashion in the sleepy Cheshire village of Fools Castle, where a young fairy-godmother who normally gets things very right suddenly starts getting them disastrously wrong.

A modern, grown-up fairy tale perfect for fans of Sarah Addison Allen and Cecelia Ahern.

Amazon US - view here
Amazon UK - view here

www.valerie-annebaglietto.com
Twitter: @VABaglietto
Facebook: Valerie-Anne Baglietto Author