AUTHOR'S CORNER;

THAT TIME OF LIFE...

Now it pains me to admit this, but admit it I simply must.  You see I am victim, as many of us are, to the delusional state of mind which makes one think that one is eternally young.  And just like a car crash, the realisation of reaching my middle years has hit me out of nowhere, leaving me quite shaken and in disbelief; it seemed like only yesterday that I was a willowy young thing with thick brown hair and chocolate eyes that would melt the hearts of a thousand sailors!  Laughter, love, life and dreamy nights have whizzed by in a haze, along with pregnancies and more nappies than I care to remember!  The whirlwind of life has swept me along nicely into my forties and I am left wondering, how did this happen?  The unmentionable middle ages? 

And why, I wonder, should life be so cruel as to only bring about retrospect when the best years of youth have flitted by?  Why only then do we look back and see clearly that we could have done a better job out of life and regret from a sorry distance the years of youthful splendour which we have squandered on idiosyncrasies and wasted opportunities.  Nothing (unless you are very lucky) has turned out how we had imagined it, and the Romeo you have hand picked and defied your parents over, turned out to be no Romeo at all, rather more like a sorry character out of Macbeth!  Your children are grown up strangers who Do Not think you are cool, and laugh at you when you recall your disco days!  The phrase 'I was once beautiful,' is met with a smirk on their behalf and heaven help you if you share with them your wilder days!  

According to your kids you are no more than this thing called mum, which is sort of a forty something entity and hardly woman at all!  And if memory permits and they do recall some earlier years, to them, it is like a fleeting image of something strict, tall and looming!  

The figure you once owned has diminished beneath a bubbling mound of excess fat and stretch marks.  In short - you can try to lose weight, but the belly and bottom are refusing to budge...size 8 seems like a dream you once dreamt!

Morning sun is no longer flattering upon your skin, and heaven help the postman if he should call before you have had your fifth cup of coffee!

Not to mention the sudden imbalance of hormones which lead to mood swings, hot flushes, nervous disposition and a sudden tendency for insanity!

Romantic talk with your Romeo is futile; you may think you've still got it, but don't forget, he's got eyes!

And your well meaning attempts at romance will be met with tactful avoidance and clever game playing!

 

                                                   


love will feel somewhat jaded and a little suspicious....

Marital bliss will start to take on the form of world war two, and before you know it military strategy will commence!

Let the battle commence....

Give it up...you are no longer a pretty young thing! face your demons.

Let's not kid ourselves....just make a brew, phone a friend and give into middle age, it makes life easier!

AUTHOR'S CORNER;

HELP, I THINK I'M SINKING!!

Now I'm not one to complain, and I know I've been away for quite some time, not my fault dear reader, life has been somewhat hectic!  It started on my birthday, and spiralled out of control.  Needless to say it has not been a picnic, and for those of you who are familiar with my blog would already be aware that I have been otherwise distracted by the sudden stroke that struck my poor father.  He is better now, and soon to be back home where he belongs.  I have learned many things during those last three months, and have surprised myself at how resilient I really am.  I have also been pleasantly and horridly surprised to learn that my kids can cope just fine without my constant presence in the house; they are after all young adults and teens.  So what's my beef? It is simply a falling off the step, so to speak, a losing of one's footing, a distant memory of something and nothing and a loss of direction!  I have emerged from three months of distraction and worry only to find that I have somehow forgotten how to be a writer!

Don't get me wrong, of course I can still write, of course I have what it takes - just.  But having dropped a novel midway to rush to my family's aide, I have somehow lost the thread of writing and am in a permanent state of writer's block. Perhaps it is sheer exhaustion that is making me feel this way, or second thoughts brought on by the sobering distance away from my desk and that panoramic view that has shed some light upon my delusional bubble state of contented writer's mind.  But for whatever reason, (or revelation) I seem to be unable to trust in the fact that I am a writer.  

And try as I might, I can't seem to pick up where I left off from.  My mind is fuzzy and my thoughts are talking at me at the speed of light! Though I don't have much spare time, the spare time I have is clouded with absolute dread and anxiety when I approach my desk.

I can't seem to reconnect with my characters, for they seem to not to want or need me any more!  And they have made an enemy out of me, or have I made an enemy out of them?



Where as before I was sure in my conviction as a writer and determined to make it big, I am not so sure about much! Perhaps it is guilt that is blocking me or despair or life has finally caught up with my subconscious; reality is not a free space of time in which we can simply indulge!  

I am simply in writer's hell! self doubt gnashing away at my heels and running is not an option!

I have a strange feeling of losing the grip, and the plot! As I wonder when my identity might be restored!

Perhaps I over estimated the size of my pedal stool; because I seem to be falling out of writer's circle and into a deep no can write abyss!

And I ask myself, could the angel of death have come for my pen?  Will I ever recapture my spark and write again?  Or will my fire be forever extinguished?



Maybe, perhaps, possibly, just possibly... I might be experiencing life and nothing more; once the experience has sunk in and I sober up from the shock of almost losing a parent, perhaps then I may write again, and write in a better way...I hope.  Perhaps every writer needs to stop occasionally and take a breath whilst life's lessons swoop over them and teach them something new; another prospective, a different angle, a new point of view with a new pair of eyes.  Perhaps fear is what propels us to fight our way through problems; fear of losing life, fear of losing love and fear of losing the talent that has defined us for most of our lives.  

Perhaps my characters in my novel needed me to stop for a while, perhaps they might re-emerge in a more knowledgeable manner, in better formed characters, in a more capable set of people....perhaps I am merely growing and a flower can never bloom until it is properly watered.

AUTHOR'S CORNER;

WHAT DOESN'T KILL ME...

Dear friends, readers and of course, fellow writers!  It may have come to your attention lately that I have not been blogging enough, and the blogs that I have endeavoured to post out have been somewhat depressing!  Yes it is true, I have been having a rough time lately!  Not only has a dear relative been taken ill, but the last two months have seen a conveyor belt of adorable rejections from literary agents; all professing that although my work is good and has qualities, (and I've already got two novels published) they would actually rather pass!  If the story is good and the quality of the writing is good and there is humour and sprite in the pace, then what could possibly be the problem???  Oh yeah, it's different to mainstream.....duh!  Of course the market could not possibly endure something different, entertaining and engaging, no, no, let's stick to the same old, same old!!!! I mean, why not add another romance, or thriller or vampire trilogy novel to the mix?  Nobody wants to see anything new, right?  Wrong!! 

OKAY, THAT'S MY RANT OUT OF THE WAY, LET ME TELL YOU WHAT I HAVE DECIDED!

After a lengthy period of tearful regression and soggy tissues, followed by nights of gorging on ice creams whilst watching repeats of Friends, I have decided to embrace my period of depression with a new found defiance.  

Because giving up would be a big mistake!  And letting somebody's opinion change mine would be a tragedy!  And sometimes a writer has to accept that although their writing may be good, unique even, it may not be the right time to write that best seller yet!  Here are a few pointers to help my fellow writers facing the rejection conveyor belt:

Don't despair, despair only brings about writer's block and that's not good my friends!  Remember even if they don't know it yet, you know you can write well!

It may sometimes feel like you are literally putting yourself through suicidal hoops trying to become a writer; the agent and publisher being the firing squad, don't think about it in those terms. One day someone will not shoot you down!

Sometimes rejections can make you feel small, idiotic and a bit of a clown.  Please don't doubt yourself; if you had the guts to think you can write, then you probably can, you just need to get someone's attention!

Keep sending manuscripts, keep banging at the literary doors!  Somebody is bound to open, even if it is out of curiosity!

And yes, you may get fobbed off with stupid letters which tell you that your story was just wonderful, but for some unknown reason they will pass! Look on the bright side, at least they thought your writing was good!

  

Remember, most literary agents are literally drowning in hopeful manuscripts and are actually more likely to decline anything different that lands on their desks!  They sort of want to make their jobs easier by having a sure bet!  

And you can get as angry as you like, it will be like pouring water into a sieve!  You need to keep your cool about you, shrug it off and send out more manuscripts!

And no, crying won't help you either!  There, there!

And if only all of us could reply to agents like this!  But seriously, no, don't try this!!

So my advice, be brave, be strong, be fearless!  Rejections will come, by the thousands and acceptance will also come, though maybe not by the thousands, maybe one or two!  But my point is, anyone who endeavours to become a successful writer will tell you that it is a very long road, a competitive one, a road which should only be travelled by the thick skinned!  And remember, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger!  

And if all else fails.....

AUTHOR'S CORNER;

QUESTION?

It only takes a minute to ask yourself and answer truthfully, the problem is, it can take a lifetime to get to that one minute!

The last month has been a shock wave of events and hurdles that have seemed to come out of nowhere!  It started with my father getting ill and ending up in hospital, where he currently resides due to a sudden stroke, dodgy ticker and other complications which have seemed to suddenly emerge out of the abyss!  This most unfortunate incident has left me somewhat bewildered and quite insecure. Watching, as I only can, my father in such a bad state, with not much that I can do to help, has shocked me to the core and put in my path a thousand questions.  Questions which I have been quietly asking myself for years, questions which have been tapping away at the doors of my mind; questions which I have put great effort into ignoring!  

We delude ourselves and walk through life happily ignoring that which disturbs us, thinking in our ignorance, that ignorance is a magic wand which will make issues disappear. Only things do not just disappear; thought is energy and energy is matter and matter never goes, it just changes form. It bends and twists and settles into where you can't get to it, and from time to time, it nudges you, pokes at you, stabs you right in the heart.  Thought is the dark shadow that follows you around, just above your head and slightly off centre.  It is your past, your present and most definitely your future; for once it has attached itself to you, it will never leave you, and it will slowly feed off you, until you end up in a hospital bed with numerous problems and a head full of questions.  

It occurred to me that thought can only be dissolved by answering its questions honestly.  Why am I so shy?  Why do I feel insecure?  Why am I so scared? Why do I feel so empty? Because that's what thought requires of you; it wants to know why you have put it there in the first place; it wants to know why you have made it your prisoner and entrapped it inside your mind.  And not meaning to sound 'New age' about it all, but if you do not heal your mind, heal your emotions, then how can you expect that your body will be healed?  If we reside inside our bodies, if our minds and emotions and spirit sit inside this living carcass, then surely if those rot, they will inevitably start to rot the carcass and decay the flesh!  

I see the questions I need to ask myself and know the answers, though I am scared to say them out loud, just in case I hear the truth, just in case I am compelled to stare at myself just a bit too long in the mirror.  I see the questions I need to ask myself, and I see the fear in my eyes and hear my heart beat just a little bit faster.  I see the questions in my father's eyes and wish to answer them for him, but I am wise enough to know that he needs to answer himself.

It only takes a minute to ask yourself and answer truthfully, but it can take a lifetime to get to that minute!

AUTHOR'S CORNER;

THE TRUE REALITY OF IT...

WARNING; THIS BLOG MAY BE SLIGHTLY DARK, QUITE DEEP AND AT BEST DEPRESSING.

I started off my birthday with a sudden and rude realisation of my own mortality.  It's personal, I can't really say, except that someone very close to me, someone whom I thought would always be there, always see me through life, always hold my hand and be my rock, has fallen very ill.  I am a writer and I can only write about things that touch me, and this my dear readers has hit the core of my very being.  You see that someone was the person who has always been there, the person who has always comforted me, held my hand, taught me how to ride my first bike and saw me through happy times and sad times.  This person was the guy who held me tight, wrapped up inside his 1970's fur coat as he sat me through my first Frankenstein movie at the tender age of six.  He was the guy who threw snowballs at me, chased me round the park, let me ride behind him on his moterbike and taught me how to fight like a boy! The person I loved, who loved me back, the person whose love was so strong that it was always easy to sometimes hate and know that he would never, ever hate you back!  My dad.

It is never easy seeing the rock in your life crumble, never easy to understand how someone so tall, so strong and so wise can be reduced down to a hospital bed and helpless expression on his face, tearful eyes and there is nothing you can do about it.  

It is life; I know it is inevitable for parents to get old, ill and perish, it's just we never really think they will!  They have always been there, strong, decisive and caring and it is difficult to imagine them any other way.  

But as I held his frail hand and looked into his eyes, I realised that life is but a short fuse that passes us by with no second chances; once the fuse blows, it blows!  I realised that time wasted is time never regained and there is never any going back.  The person I took for granted, loved for granted, is in trouble and all the times I promised to phone, visit, take him out, are no longer available within my grasp. The moments we spend being too busy, are the only moments we ever have, the rest... the rest never comes, because in reality there is always a tomorrow that will never come!

Guilty?  Yes, I am.  Sad, very.  Because I thought I had all the time in the world; that is what I was promised when I was born, or at least that's what it seemed like.  He is stable, but has a long road to recovery.  Suddenly that soap on t.v. isn't so important, the fact that it's cold outside or I have to write my next novel, all seem futile and stupid excuses made in a moment of selfishness.  

For each heartbeat, each beep from the monitor represents a memory, a moment spent in my childhood; the six foot Christmas tree, the broken bike he found and we fixed up together, the shopping trips down the market and the roller blading in Hyde Park!  Each beep from that monitor is a phone call missed. a promise broken, a "I'll come round soon" excuse I made, thinking that I had forever!  

It is a sad fact that each middle aged adult learns the hard way, parents will never ever be there forever...it could take only a breeze, a sullen southern wind, or a blink of an eye for the hands of fate to reach out and grab them away!  I pray he gets better, so that I could actually see through all those broken promises I once made!

AUTHOR'S CORNER;

HOW DO I LOVE THEE?

Guessing that tomorrow is Valentine's Day, and that one ought to pick up on one's pace and pluck up one's courage and engage in a let's say - more romantic setting, frankly fills my heart with dread!

You see, as a writer I am very adapt in the language of love, I can set the scene for a delightful rendezvous that could put Romeo to shame!  I can conjure up all sorts of saucy romantic scenarios that could make a stripper blush!  Yes I have that power....on paper!

But I am only a writer; which means I am shy, awkward, quirky and rather insular in my ways.  My fiction is great; I can do anything in fiction, unfortunately though - not in real life! There is a reason that I write, and it's not just because I am absurdly talented, (though I am a little talented) but it's because in being fragile and self conscious by nature, shy and retreating in the real world, writing has heightened and developed to an acute skill; rather like a blind person having a strong sense of smell.  I hide behind my fiction because it enables me to say and do the things I would otherwise find horribly embarrassing.  But needs must and I have a husband and it is Valentine's Day and he needs pampering!

The problem is, I am not very good at expressing myself in the real world; not when it comes to chat up lines!  I tend to get tongue-tied.

And though I would attempt to practice in the privacy of my own study, and try to come up with witty lines, outside the word processor, my lines sound quite corny!

It is a sad truth, that in the past my chat up techniques are, shall we say... a little cheesy at best!

Often, my past attempts at chatting up my poor husband have tended to sound like a bad script from a corny eighties movie!  It's a wonder he actually married me!

But tomorrow is the day of love, and love must be practised on such a day; otherwise, all the card companies will go out of business!  And although I know and he knows that I am as good at this romance stuff as a wet dishcloth, I felt that I must give it my best shot and attempt to bring about that magical feeling of love in the air. So I started as I meant to go on; I cooked breakfast today as a pre-warmer to the big day!  That did not go as well as I had expected; breakfast was burned whilst I was attempting to apply my lipstick on and the fire alarm sounded like a crazed mother in-law throughout the house. This only served to agitate poor hubby, as he had an early meeting to get to!

I tried to rectify the mistake by putting on a romantic CD and hoped that he would hear it as he marched out of the door, late for his meeting and smelling like burned toast!  I smiled sweetly at him as he declined to kiss me goodbye and pretended that the music was random and not deliberate.

optimism still gripping my fragile soul, I phoned him up an hour later and accidentally interrupted his very important meeting; it didn't go down too well when he discovered that I was only phoning to say hi!

Determined not to be defeated I turned up at his work to see if we could go to dinner, that went down like a lorry load of bricks; he was in another meeting!

A half hearted attempt accompanied by one of my classic corny chat up lines on his return home was met with a long stare on his part and a grunt in my direction!

That's when I snapped and my two sides split apart; the writer broke away from the shying nerd and my vocabulary made a full recovery!

And it wasn't pretty! There was no romance, there was no love, there was a lot of spoken word!!! In fact I might have composed the best rap song in the history of time!!  He stared at me blankly and quietly asked what I was on about.  

 

I yelled and shouted and stamped my feet!  I cried and screamed and threw a tantrum!  I listed all my failed, ignored attempts at romance! And he said, 'I don't understand?'

I stopped in my tracks, thought back to the events of the day; in my corny, shy, introverted way, I had assumed he would read my mind and follow the script.  Not his fault, entirely mine!  For as a writer, I have to learn that the theme playing out in my mind is exactly that; in my mind!  I am fiction and fiction has no place in the real world.  I was trying to be fictional, elaborate, great, fantastic, like a character in a novel.  So I took a deep breath and an idea popped in my mind.

So I took a deep breath, stopped thinking corny thoughts, forgot about the fiction and the storyline and simply said 'I love you!'  His anger melted away as his expression softened.  'Oh Sam,' he said, 'I love you too!'

The moral of the story, as writers we don't need the great storyline, we don't need the grand gestures, we don't need the magical setting.  As writers, sometimes all we have to do for the people we love, is simply be ourselves!  Because after all, books are made out of paper and words, love is made out of pure emotions!

Happy Valentine's Day!

AUTHOR'S CORNER;

SECRET OBSESSION

I have been often asked by friends and family, am I writing about things I myself have been through?  The answer I unreservedly give is no, of course I am not writing about myself! But if truth be told, this in itself is a half truth.  You see, the half truth of it is, unlike my novels, I have not done outrageous things such as kill somebody or scheme a tragedy or held someone up to ransom!  The half truth of it is, I have not cheated, nor did I lie to get someone into trouble nor have I ever been in trouble.  That's the half truth, the fictional part of my writing.   The half lie?  the half lie I tell is when I unreservedly give people the impression that all I write about is detached from anything that I am!

Let me explain; in my first Novel, for example The Misfortunes of Ellie May, where my main character is a young girl from a troubled family who finds herself trapped in a pimp gang and has to find a way of freeing herself, so she plots and schemes and lures members of the gang in with her beauty and charm, and turns them against each other, thus, mistrust seeps in as some believe that they are in love with her and fight for her amongst each other.  Where those who stood in her way were destroyed and met a fatal end.  

Of course, I have never been in a pimp gang, I have not plotted and schemed and lured pimps into my sordid web of lust and debauchery.  But amidst this cleverly written piece of fiction, there is a fair bit of me and, let's say, drawing on personal experience.  'The gang' was finding myself in a world of strangers, 'the plotting' was the inner struggle of survival, and the 'violence and pain' was my inner flitting self destroying thoughts, that passes through the mind in crisis! All combined, sieved and churned into a fictional plot.  

My second novel, The Devil's Truth, where Satan himself plays upon the lives of innocent, yet suggestive people, where there is emptiness in lives and a lusting for something more. Where the beaches of Marbella create an alluring setting for sin to take place.  Was I lured in?  Was I influenced by Satan himself....would I write about it if I was?  No!  But once again, emotions that characters felt were drawn upon from personal, deep seated, mind numbing trials.  'the Spanish seductress' secret desire, 'the poor fat woman who wanted to be loved' invisible moments.  I can go on, but you get the picture?  Have I been to Marbella and felt the Spanish sand beneath my feet? Yes.  Which character am I?  None of them and all of them!  

 As Virginia Woolf once said, every secret of a writer's soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind is written in his work! Which to me means, not just their experience, but their way of thinking!  In my first novel, my temptress prostitute was not a bad person, because if truth be told, I don't believe in an all bad person, just bad circumstances and bad actions!  Though status quo would not permit me to say so in real life!

Even those of us who write science fiction, or vampire novels or comedy or whatever!  We all have our secret opinions, experiences, beliefs firmly woven into the fabric of our work! That's what compels us to write and what allows us to be good writers; because you can only truly write well about what you believe in!  That is part of the reason we become so nervous when giving a public reading.... because unbeknown to the eager public, we are being asked to share a part of our inner deepest self!