Writing has always been a solitary experience for me – part of my love for it in a way, even from being in my teens, sat gazing out of a window and scribbling down angst ridden words of unrequited love… that kind of nonsense… and until recently, I have continued to write in isolation, predominantly from my writing chair, or whichever room I happen to be in when an idea strikes, making handwritten notes before becoming insepearable from my laptop.

Bristol Temple Meads Station

However, my new WIP (work in progress) is asking for something else.  This manuscript involves a different way of writing, one that I find incredibly exciting and that impacts on the WIP at every turn and in the most amazing ways.  I hadn’t realised, initially, that this novel would need such a different approach, but it soon became clear just what the potential was for experimentation.  This novel won’t write itself from the confines of a house or the car when I’m waiting to pick the kids up.  This novel needs me to find my wings, and suddenly, and very surprisingly, I have gone from being a ‘stagnant’ solitary writer, to a ‘writer on the move’ with other people to bounce off.

Needless to say, I took a wee trip to Somerset a fortnight ago as part of this ‘adventure’. I

St Michael's Tower, Glastonbury Tor

wrote page after page on railway platforms, on the 6 trains I took in total for my journey there and back, which have now become the basis for one of the chapters.  I wrote a few lines in a wonderful cafe in Glastonbury, that I know will appear somewhere in the book, and I formulated a whole scene from a visit to Glastonbury Tor and the cathedral ruins.  It literally sprang up and blew across me like a cold north wind.  I took stacks of photos too, and used these later to weave other ideas into the scenes.  I’m going to put these in with the growing manuscript – it has its own folder now – along with other notes and bits and pieces I gather along the way.

On Saturday, I spent an hour and a half in a Morrisons’ cafe and filled 8 pages of my notebook while people-watching and listening to Lana Del Rey (wonderful cd by the way).  Strangely, a character from an early scene of the novel appeared, as if by magic, just as I’d visualised him, which was a tad disconcerting.

Very fishy!

Yesterday, I explored an area of Derbyshire, visited places I have never been, gathered fragments of history, imagined the past, moved my characters around it and put words into there mouths.  It was utterly inspiring.  There are many other scenes sparked by situations and settings… but I’m not going to spoil it by saying any more.

But I am finding, that for the first time of in my years of writing, this is a story which is really coming alive – filled with real people, real places, with photos as memory joggers - memories captured and held.  Already, 12,000 words in, it has become a living, breathing thing, more than anything else I’ve ever worked on.  To say I am exhilerated by this project – and it is a project – is an understatement.  I feel as if, after years of writing, I have discovered ‘the secret’, whispered to me quietly when I least expected it.  Whatever happens to this book, it is the biggest part of my journey yet, so liberating and so full of energy and wonderful memories that it’ll stay with me forever.

There will be more trips to more places, more trains… who knows where?  I may even find myself in another country.  I have found my wings!

What is your approach to writing? Do you prefer to write alone, from home, or spread your wings for inspiration?

I think it’s fair to say that there’s a strong feeling for most writers of wanting to be published… but perhaps ‘strong feeling’ isn’t strong enough - maybe ‘desperation’ is closer to the truth.   That’s certainly how I have felt at times.  Mostly, for me, it’s that feeling that I need confirmation that the hours I spend in my head and the stories I weave, will come to something, that the characters who I have worked on for so long that I can almost touch them, will leap off the paper and into other people’s minds.   So, initially, you don’t  see past the first book deal that you so desperately want.  You just want to be published, for someone to say YES!   And this sense of desperation intensifies the longer the wait goes on.  That’s how it was for me anyway.  But here’s the rub… what happens once you’ve been published?  Because, the thing is, you still want to write, there are still all those ideas and untold stories in your head… and there’s even more reason to want to be published now because you’ve been published before - after all, you’ve had the big green light, affirmation that, yes, you are publishable.  So if you’re publishable, publishers HAVE to want to publish you again… don’t they?

Well, maybe  they do.  But does having been published once make it easier? And is the next book any more guaranteed?  I was thinking about this in relation to Buttercup Magic.  ‘Buttercup Magic: A Mystery for Megan’ is due for publication on 27th April this year – woohoo!  In fact, I have just read through the proofs – proofed the proofs if you like.  There was an erroneous ‘to’ and a couple of other inconsistencies, but other than that, we appear to be cooking on gas!  This will be my sixth book (pinch me!) but my first mid-grade novel, so quite a big deal for me… a lot of a big deal actually!  I planned the idea to span more than one book – three hopefully.  All the ground rules had to be set out in the first book.  The story involves a young girl, Megan, who moves into Buttercup House and befriends Freya, the girl next door.  It also involves a group of animals, The Protectors, who can communicate with the girls and who have special gifts and are able to help them when help is needed.  It took me seven drafts to get it right, because ‘the forensics’ (as my publisher, Piccadilly Press, call it) had to be right.  If there were any plot errors in this first one, everything would come tumbling down in the next one.  I suddenly realised the implications of writing a series of books that had more developed plot lines.  The Ruby and Grub series (for 2-6yrs) had been much more character based, with simpler plots appropriate to the age range.  But now I was writing for 6-9yr olds… very discerning 6-9yr olds!

So, thinking ahead, as you do, I have now completed the first draft of the second book in the series.  Was it easier than the first?  Yes, because the building blocks, the rules, the plotlines were all tight in the first book (we’re talking seven drafts later remember)…  and by the way, it may not have taken seven drafts had I plotted properly in the outset (see 6th January blog post on the Plot Planner!)  This time, I went into the second book knowing what the animals can do, how it all worked, why they disappeared and why they have returned.  But in another sense, writing this one was more difficult.  I had to work harder to build and sustain the energy of the first book.  Also, I have had to open the second book with the close of the first.  This can work both ways – it gives you a definite start, but doesn’t allow for the freedom of a brand new book.  You, as a writer, have to retain the spark and excitement you feel when you are working on a brand new idea or concept.  Then, of course, you have to make sure it’s at least as good as the last one… and everything has to tie in with the last book, so you may have an amazing idea, but you can’t use it because it doesn’t fit in with the ground rules you’ve established in the first book.

But, there’s more certainty that book two will be published, isn’t there?  Not necessarily.  In theory, yes.  But if the first book doesn’t sell as well as hoped, or if there’s no interest from abroad (those elusive overseas rights) then maybe not.  The world of publishing is a hard one – for publishers AND for writers.  Will it stop me writing?  Never.  If a hairdresser does a dodgy perm, does she walk out and threaten never to titivate someone’s locks again?  If a plumber bursts a pipe, does he stop being a plumber?  Erm, dubious analogy here because maybe he should… but you can see my point, I hope.

Writing’s a job, a wonderful job, and if I write something that doesn’t work, isn’t marketable or falls apart in the making, I shall get over it and move on… write something new that will blow people’s minds!

A short and sweet one from me today – and an early one – today I BLOT (Blog on Thursday) as opposed to BOG (Blog on Friday)!

This week, I have finished my first YA work in progress … well, I say ‘finished’ – first draft is completed and I’m having a few weeks break from it to work on an adult novel (see my 2 in the morning post from 20th January).  It’s a long way from being finished, and yet there is, I think, a feeling of satisfaction at having completed the cycle.  I think all writers must feel this.  But, there is an element of sadness too… saying goodbye to the characters whose skins you’ve crawled under, who wouldn’t exist if you hadn’t penned them.  So I have mixed emotions, and am especially sorry to say goodbye to my main protagonist, who is lovely!  However, I will see him again soon in draft 2… and 3… and 4… so it’s more of a ‘see ya later’ than a ‘goodbye’.

Those of you who read my post, ’The Plot Planner’, from 6th January, may remember that I was using this ‘creation’ to help with my writing – plotting not being one of my strong points.  So, you may be wondering how it’s gone… if not, just humour me!  I didn’t completely stick to it – I don’t think that was ever the idea anyway – but I did follow it mostly.  And yes, I would make one

Re-jigged Plot Planner

again – definitely!  It got me through the first quarter of the novel spectacularly well, and the first quarter of the middle bit.  But, I confess, I had mad frenzies in the the latter part of the middle bit, where I peeled off some of the strips and shuffled them about a bit and stuck them back on in other places, and sometimes didn’t stick them on – as you will see by the blank spaces in the pic opposite!  Sometimes I ripped them into pieces.  Sometimes I wrote a new idea on the other gunky gluey side of them and whacked that on somewhere.  It was a lot more random than I’d thought it would be, and once I was into the last few chapters of the endy bit, things got even more random… in fact, I forgot to look at it for a few days, and when I went back to it was surprised how much I’d veered off course.

The thing is, it was fine.  I knew where I needed to be at the end, and I was still heading there, albeit by a slightly more circuitous route.  But that’s good isn’t it?  When you get in the car, sometimes it’s nice to follow your nose – you can always get to wherever you want to be from wherever you are… a nice motto to have in life maybe.  Anything is possible!

Me as toast!

Speaking of which, this week I have been made into toast by a fellow tweep @darbythefirst surely proving that anything really is possible.

Do you find it difficult to let go of your characters?

Sometimes writing – what I think of as ‘proper writing’ goes a bit awol.  It happens to the best of us I think… life gets in the way, we’re tired, distracted, anxious, or all of these.  Sometimes we have to push through this and there’s no doubt in my mind that writing is a discipline that can do this.   That said, this week, I confess, I have struggled.  The YA is no closer to being finished than it was a week ago.  The new novel is shaping up nicely, piece by piece.  But concentrated writing has been difficult.  I’ve let my demons get on top of me and the evil Self Doubt has raised her very ugly head.  Even this post is being written on Thursday, 9.30pm… I never normally leave it this late!

Poetry always comes to my aid at times like this.  It’s how my writing life started and when all else fails, a poem comes.  Wrote this on Tuesday evening over a glass of wine.  I don’t normally air fresh poems, unedited, just written, as it was written then, knocked up in about ten minutes.  But sometimes poems seem to fall from a special place and hold everything that needs saying.  This was one of those.  I hope you like it, and I hope it makes you think a bit and furrow your brow.

Signs

A buzzard died in my dream last week,
floated, headless towards my less than perfect slabs.

I saw her the next day, head in the correct place,
sat atop a hedge, not a cracked slab in sight.

Three white doves flew, not in a dream,
out of a hedge, across my path, across my wide open gasp.

Is it time? I think.  Is this the time?  Now?
Is this when everything changes?

So I follow the signs and I link them with feathers
and I tie them with silk, loose so that they can still fly

and not for the first time I ask myself why
Why me? Why now?

And the answer is…
they come because they need me to listen.

So I take a trip across a field and gather mud
and thoughts, unzip my coat and leave it trailing on the floor.

Is there more?  Oh yes.  There’s always more,
until legs become so light you cannot feel them.

The wine is empty.  My tears are dry.
My path is as unclear as it has ever been.

Two arms held me in my dream last night,
held me so tight that when I woke I was clutching at my breath.

What do you do and where do you turn when life gets in the way of the words?

I remembered something this weekend, something I’d forgotten… how important it is to retain a sense of equilibrium in this rather surreal 21st century world that we live in.  As a writer, it is easy to become so involved in our stories, our creations, that we shut out everything else.  I know that when I am really immersed in a peice of writing, as I am now, I can find myself writing for hours on end – for many more hours than I would spend at a ‘normal’ job.  Working on two big projects at the moment means I am often ‘in the zone’, but being ‘in the zone’ takes me away from reality, and sometimes the balance can slip a little.

Of course, social media often interrupts this focus, allowing for a bit of light relief… but it is not always beneficial light relief is it?  It can be, but in order to interact, I find I am still sat looking at a screen, still typing words into it.  I felt the weight of this recently, and have put it right, in the best way I know how – going out for long walks with the hound across boggy fields.  I’ve taken my camera and stopped to take photos as I’ve gone along. I’ve watched the clouds flit across the sky, stared at the reflections in the babbling stream that skirts one of the fields, watched a beautiful grey heron take off with wings that caught at the air, and watched how the light played on the edges of branches.  It’s reminded me that there is a world ‘out there’ and that the one in my head isn’t always enough.  Sometimes I’ve had company and conversation.  I met a woman with two lovely lurchers one day, one of whom got very giddy over my hound, and she told me a doggie story, which I wouldn’t have heard if I’d been sat at my laptop.

On my first boggy walk I noticed that the gate I’ve used in the past was locked, so me and the hound had to find another way round, cutting across the back of a farm.  There’s something about slightly derelict places that has always fascinated me, and old broken things lying around in fields – its the contrasts that appeal I think.  If I hadn’t had to bypass the old route, I wouldn’t have noticed the reflections of this lorry in the puddles, which had me transfixed for quite a while – greyhounds are very patient beasts.

Sometimes, we forget to be spontaneous.  We forget to talk to people we don’t know.  We forget that if we lie down on the grass and look at the clouds, we might see one shaped like an elephant, or a wizard.  We forget what it is to be really alive.  This week, I have the evidence of life clinging to my footwear… I hate cleaning the mud off boots, so the result of all of this is that my walking boots have great clods of mud clinging to them and I have very artistic splatters on most of my jeans.  But I’m so glad!

What do you do to get out of the zone and back into the real world?

This wasn’t the post I had lined up for today, but sometimes stuff happens, and at 2am yesterday morning, I woke up with a bright new shiny idea in my head.  It was an idea for an adult novel, brought about by a sequence of events that have happened over the last week.  I grabbed my notepad and pen (always have these by my bed) and started to write the idea down in the dark.  Lay back down.  More ideas, like fireworks fizzing.  So turned the light on this time and wrote more.  I think I did this five times, writing the framework for a novel over the space of about 20 minutes – probably around 5 minutes writing, 15 minutes thinking.  Not only did I write the framework, but I saw the humour and a twist, the sting in the tail.

Lights out, I then lay awake for close to two hours.  I even considered submitting to the buzz and fizz completely, donning dressing gown and going downstairs to write on my laptop.   I convinced myself that this would be a bad idea – school run to do in the morning and all that.  But I kept diving at the notepad and adding to it as pieces fell together.

Later on yesterday, I wrote a two page synopsis for the novel, and was so excited (still am) by it, I actually felt quite sick.  I must add, the timing of this is a bit precarious.  I am mid-way through my first YA… but this new idea, this book, is beating like a blood red ruby in my heart, and I can’t ignore it, and I know I mustn’t ignore it.  And there are reasons that I know this…

A week ago, I started keeping a journal – a journal of unguarded writing, not aimed at an audience – thoughts, impressions, triggers – anything and everything that was prominent in my mind and that seemed significant.  I recorded conversations, dreams, observations, and suddenly became profoundly aware that these were all somehow connected.  I am currently reading ‘The Alchemist’ by Paulo Coelho so this has been buzzing around my head too – ideas of living out your dreams, destiny, ‘Maktub’ – what is written, and the significance of omens.  A sequence of dreams and sightings of specific birds, over the last couple of days, led me to do a Google search… the results were mildly spooky!

Then, at 2am, it all fell into place – the whole lot, tied in.  I am SO excited about the idea, which is like nothing I have ever read, or written, that I’m not sure how I’m going to sleep over the next few weeks / months.  But sleep I must.  And, I am still very enthused by TSP, my YA novel.  So, do I juggle?  Yes I do!  I can, actually, juggle three balls… and I have juggled stories before – lots of authors do.  So, the plan is to continue with around 1,000 words a day on TSP and make notes and collate bits and bobs for the new novel so that when the first draft of TSP is complete (in around a month hopefully) I can launch myself into this little gem… I wish I could tell you more, but at the moment, I can’t!  But I know that this is a story waiting to be written and it needs me to tell it.

Do your ideas come to you in the silence of the night… and do you embrace them, or push them away?

Last year, I was lucky enough to attend a poetry writing workshop hosted by Derbyshire County Council.  They do quite a lot of these types of workshops - always enjoyable and a great opportunity to meet fellow writers and have a good chin-wag about writerly kind of things.  This particular one was hosted by three wonderful poets: Jeremy Duffield, Cathy Grindrod and Wayne Burrows.

The workshop left a lasting impression on me for two reasons.  One, Wayne Burrows is the editor of a wonderful Nottingham based poetry magazine, ‘Staple’, and he gave me some really constructive feedback on my poems.  Secondly, I learnt something about the importance of perception and interpretation in writing, something I thought I knew, but I didn’t truly understand it.  It was one of those lightbulb moments, which is like the sun setting in your soul and coming to rest in a place it knows it belongs.

Anyway… let me explain.  Jeremy asked us all to write a poem, in 5 minutes, which should begin: ’Let me tell you about gates’ … yes, that’s what I thought too!  I’m not used to writing from another person’s idea, and within a certain time, so I was thrown into momentary panic, before realising that momentary panic would eat into my writing time… it was like school exams all over again.  But I dug deep (being given no other choice and not wanting to look like a fool) and wrote this:

Let me tell you about gates
because they won’t tell you about themselves.

They won’t tell you but they will show you
in oh, so many ways.

Open me up, this one says,
Come in, Come in.

Close me up, says another
as it nestles low beneath the long grass.

Chip, Chip, Chip, says another.
Caw, Caw, says another

or was that a crow flying overhead?

But the one near pebble beach
says none of these things.

She stands ajar, rope dangling
from her rusty shoulder, wrenched

into an inch of mud
and waits for someone to come and try

to slide her open a little more.

Then she will say, Hi, Hi and let you in,
across the dry sand, wind blown,

beyond the pebbles cranked together,
snuffled up against the wind,

past the tin can rattle
and out towards the waves,

towards the white frayed edge that says,
Come in, Come in, Come in.

So how did these words come about?  Why these?  They were inspired by the lasting impression of a deserted pebble beach, and the journey to it, that I made two or three times a day on a holiday in Wales the year before.   They came from a personal experience, one that was so strong, that under pressure, it was this that sprang to mind.  This brought home to me just how important it is to absorb what is around you, and how, as if by magic, these moments reappear when you most need them.  Our writing is not only what we create from our imaginations, but what we have experienced and stored away in the treasure chests of our minds, and in our hearts.  Because, most of all, I think it’s the feelings and sense of place or experience, that stick.  Also, on reflection , I realised that this poem could be read on many levels.  I have a real affinity with the sea, possibly as a water sign, and feel quite haunted by its rhythms, all of which I think are subconsciously reflected in this poem, even in its form – something I wasn’t conscious of at the time.

What I also found interesting, is that not one person in the room – I guess there were around 12 of us - dealt with this subject matter in the same way.  Some took it literally, to be about gates.  Some took a wider view of the historical nature of gates and architecture, others took gates to be ‘Gates’, a person.   Our differences in perception and interpretation hit home to me in a way they never had before – how we all carried our own voice, how we all spoke from somewhere deep within us, both consciously and subconsciously, and how that somewhere was so different for each ot us.  And yet, we were all able to step back and admire one another’s efforts.  It truly was a lightbulb moment for me.

But there was another thing too – I also learnt something about myself.  When I read my poem out to the group, Jeremy made a comment which stuck with me.  He said it was interesting that I had written about gates as a way of letting people in, when most people thought of gates as shutting something off, or keeping people out. It made me realise that it said a lot more about me than I had thought, and that maybe I had let people in even more than I intended… in a silly old poem about gates!

Have you ever had a similar experience through a writing workshop?  Or have you ever had a lightbulb moment about writing, or yourself, through your writing, that has stuck with you?

Unfinished Plot Planner

I’ve mentioned my plot planner in one or two posts now and it’s generated a bit of interest, curiosity and intrigue among other writers, and, apparently, some squinting as certain tweeps (you know who you are) have attempted to work out, from my last post, what the heck I was up to!  So I’m dedicating this post to you, and my plot planner.  I cannot take credit for the plot planner idea, which came to me via writer Liz Kessler @lizkesslerbooks (via writer Jenny Alexander @jennyalexander4) a few months ago.  Around the same time that I asked Liz about her plot planner, I also watched and listened to a set of plotting tutorials on Youtube, by Martha Alderson, known as The Plot Whisperer (@plotwhisperer).  You can view/listen to these here - start at step one and work your way through – I shut myself in the bedroom for a whole weekend to do this.   So huge credit and thanks to all of the above!

For me, the reason I felt I needed some assistance with plotting was that I wasn’t very good at it – in a nutshell – preferring to just go with the flow, using a few jotted down ideas as my guide.  However, the result of this was that I wrote an 80,000 word novel, which, despite publishers complimenting the writing, left a lot to be desired in the way of plot and pacing.  I wasn’t surprised by this.  So, having hit some initial plotting problems with Buttercup Magic too, I decided to ‘swat up’ a bit for writing my first YA, known as TSP!

I know there are ‘things’ – I.T. things – available to help you with plotting and the like, but

Stuff needed for Plot Planner

I really don’t want everything being too structured and being made too easy for me – after all, I’m a writer, I have imagination (don’t I?)  Anyway, this is a whole lot more fun – making a plot planner is a bit like a day in the Blue Peter studios.  You need: a large sheet of A3 paper (or 2 A4 sellotaped together); sellotape (possibly, if you are going down the A4 paper route); index cards; scissors for cutting up index cards; glue stick; pen – Voila!

So, to make your plot planner, you’ll divide the piece of paper into 4 equal sections – paper should be horizontal, lines vertical (I am soooooo enjoying this), then headings at the top of each section: Beginning, Middle, Middle, End.  If you listen to Martha Alderson’s wonderful videos, she explains in detail about the quarters involved in plotting.

Maurice Sendak: Where the Wild Things Are

For example, where the first major change should be – the protagonist moving into another world, changing goal or a major turning point - which should appear around the end of the first quarter.  She gives some wonderful examples of this from young children’s picture books to novels.  Maurice Sendak’s ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ is one example she cites.  She explains where the tension in your writing should build and where the crisis point and climax should be.  This immediately then gives you a sense of where you need to position these points on your plot planner.

I’ll give you an abridged version, as follows, but I do recommend you listening/watching Martha’s videos:
1st 1/4 – (Beginning) Hook; end of 1st 1/4 – turning point, goals may change.
1/4 – 3/4 – (Middle bits) Keep tension rising.  Crisis point (middle of middle). Different world / unique.
1/2 – 3/4 (2nd of Middle bits) Protagonist needs to be in a scene where he recommits to the journey.
Last 1/4 (End) Build towards climax, change/transformation of character/s. Climax – about 2 scenes or chapters from end, and before resolution at end.

This is the long bit – and it is a lengthy process, as Liz Kessler will verify.  Basically, you write down your scenes and action points – one per strip of index card, so only the basics – then cut these up and place them where you think they should go… so, if you know the

Completed TSP plot planner

end (hopefully you’ll have some idea of where you’re heading), you can write that on a bit of card and place it at the bottom of the End part of your planner.  I can’t be too specific here, but to give you a couple of examples from TSP: ‘Background on P, family, house’ is one of my Beginning section cards, as is ‘O & P go back to cliff top’ – a lot of this beginning section sets up the story and introduces the setting and characters.  In the Middle sections, the action builds.  To start with, it’ll look a bit bare – more paper than cards – but as the ideas come, it is SO satisfying to see it fill up.  Don’t glue them down straight away.  I found that the first 1/4 came quite quickly, with other odd bits in the other sections.  This is a personal thing, but I decided at this point to write the 1st quarter, see how that panned out, then went back to the plot planner to continue with planning.  This worked really well for me, as I couldn’t see the big picture until I had done some physical writing.  I then completed the planner in a few days.  I can’t tell you how exhilerating it was to see my novel laid out in this way.  You know those moments you frequently have as a writer, where you stare at the page and have no idea where you’re heading… or, you’re not sure if what you’ve just written ties in with what you said earlier… etc?  Solved!  I then stuck the bits of card down, but  was careful to leave a gap inbetween each strip of card, so I could add additional points and scenes if I needed to.

I am now writing the rest of TSP with plot planner by my side.  Of course, I still have to write the scenes, and I have already peeled off two or three of the stuck down bits of card and re-stuck them somewhere else, and added some new bits… but that doesn’t matter, that’s all part of the process.  It isn’t cast in stone.  The main thing is that the shape is there and I can see how it will work and how the subplots connect.  And perhaps, most importantly of all, I have faith in this story before it is written, and that really is something!

I can’t believe 2012 is almost here - where did 2011 go? I remember, as a child, my mum saying how time flew as you got older.  It seems such a bizarre concept when you’re young, that the speed of time could vary according to your age.  Those six week summers seemed more like six months than six weeks.  Each day felt like a week, and in my memory they were always long sunny days where we played in the garden from dawn until dusk.  No matter how little money we had, mum and dad always made sure we had a holiday, and it was nearly always a place where there was sand and sea.  It’s funny how things like this stick.  I still find myself longing for the sea.

Buttercup Magic: A Mystery for Megan

I’m not big on planning in my day to day life and tend to avoid it as much as possible, but with the end of one year and the beginning of another, I think it’s inevitable that we think about what has been and what we would like for the future.  And sometimes, if the current year has been a baddie, what we would like the new year NOT to be like!  There’s normally something in our minds, the most important thing that we want, that we hope for in the year to come.  Sometimes this can be an abstract thing, such as happiness, health, the well-being of the people we love, but quite often there is something more specific.  You could compare this to the main plot in a novel.  Then there are the other, less important things, the sub-plots if you like.  We have ideas for these but they are not as important.  My main plot in The Book of 2012 is to find an agent, a good agent.  Having made next to no effort to find an agent in the past, preferring to approach publishers direct, I now find myself latching on to this idea as if it’s one that I have just invented.  The manuscripts are written… approaches are to be made.

Then the subplots… The Book of ’2012′ wouldn’t be very interesting without them.  Buttercup Magic: A Mystery for Megan, (for 6-9 year olds), comes out in paperback in April with Piccadilly Press.  I have a launch to plan, and, obviously, I want the book to do well.  I want to hold it in my hands and read it.  I want to see it on bookshelves and in libraries.  These things are all part of ‘the dream’, part of The Book of ’2012′.

Derbyshire has its wonderful literary festival in May and I have four slots to fill.  I missed the last festival (I was still nervously peeping out of my writers’ shell at that point) so, even though I’ve done school and library visits before, I’m still a bit nervous about it.  I’ve now written the 2nd book in the Buttercup Magic series.  It was interesting to see how the story moved in a different way to the first.  I don’t know whether it will be published.  There’s no certainty in these things.  A 2nd book depends so much on overseas interest and how well the 1st book has done, which makes it a bit of an unknown at the moment.

My plot planner, the first one I have ever done, for my YA novel currently known as

TSP Plot Planner

TSP (not TCP which is that vile anti-bacterial stuff we were made to gargle as kids when we had a sore throat) sits beside me on the floor as I write.  Two days before Christmas I completed this - at least, it is as finished as it can be for the moment.  I am eager now to write the book.  The first 1/4 of the book was written in the Autumn and then put to one side while I worked on the rest of the plot planner (more about plot planning, making and using a planner in next week’s Blog post.)

Crab on pebble beach

My Book of 2012 wouldn’t be complete without a holiday.  As I said earlier, I crave the sea!   In 2010 we went to Caernarfon in Wales.  I have three particular memories of this holiday that I am sure will last for ever.  The private beach five minutes from the converted barn we were staying in, and the subject of my poem, Traeth Cerrig, (click here to read the poem), the run away sheep who we tried to rescue, and the village of Beddgelert, approached by a windy road running through the most astonishing mountain scenery I have ever experienced.

Last year, we went to Anglesey and stayed in the most stunning old mill house on a hill

A boat trip for the hound

overlooking a valley, the sea just visible on two sides.  The approach was through woodland and fields of sheep – a walk I made numerous times a day with our greyhound.  We had a fantastic time running along nearly deserted beaches  and crab fishing in the rock pools.  Our hound had her first boat trip during a visit to Puffin Island, an event which inspired a book I have written for 6-9 year olds, and which I hope will find a publisher soon.  This year, we’ll be going back! We didn’t get to visit the RSPB place at South Stack last time, and would love to do that.  Also, the West of the island is only a stone’s throw from Dublin.  My great grandma, who I never knew, was Irish, and despite attempts to track down more details about her on the internet, I haven’t been able to.  I’d like to hop over to the main records office in Dublin and see if I can find anything out about her there.  This will also become part of another writing project I hope to work on for The Book of 2012.

It strikes me, as I write this, how much of the future is a pulling together of the past, how much of what we hope for is affected by what has been.  Life really is like a book – it’s our story.  We can plan it, but it can branch off in unknown directions, just like the plots in our stories.  You can only know what is in your mind to do, you cannot know the path it will take.

Last, but not least, some Thank yous!

A big thank you to all Tweeps who follow me and to those I follow, for making me feel so at home on Twitter after only 6 months, for brightening my days and making the spaces between writing so worth while.  Special thanks to The Awfully Big Blog @AwfullyBigBlog for welcoming me into the fold and to Jenny Alexander @jennyalexander4, We Love This Book @welovethisbook and Women Writers, Women Books @WomenWriters, for inviting me to guest blog for them this year.  Thanks also to everyone who has reviewed Grub’s Pubs, to everyone who takes the time to read these posts and to those of you who leave your comments – always appreciated, and like rose petals showing me the way.  Thank you xxx

Do you make plans with the start of a new year? Or do you prefer to go with the flow?

The Santa Box - from me to Julia

You know when you have an idea, and it grows, and then it becomes reality? (a bit like writing a book as it happens), well, that’s what happened with The Santa Box.  It started with a bit of crazy twitter chatter between myself and my lovely, now dear friend, Julia Martin http://twitter.com/wordsxo about the differences between American and British weather, phrases and sayings, and the words we use for everyday things… then, naturally, it progressed to food.  Before we knew it, The Santa Box idea happened.  So, we decided on an amount that we’d both spend, a book each, another couple of small gifts, and foody items that we didn’t have in our home countries.  What followed was weeks of hilarious “Do you have….. (no reason)” tweets as we tried to work out the best pressies to send.  Oh, and we were allowed Freebies too. I’m not going to say too much about mine to Julia, I’ll leave that to Julia (see link at the bottom of this post.)

Strangely, the day Julia’s Santa Box arrived with me, mine arrived with her! The fact that they arrived at all, we considered a minor miracle.  Finding out how to send the boxes and what we were allowed to include that wasn’t going to get us locked up for six months, was a bit of a learning curve.  Then we had to fill in customs forms and package the goods safely for their journey across the pond.  We both nearly fell through the floor when we heard how much it would cost to send the boxes… however, that didn’t matter; we were doing this whatever the cost.  As you can imagine, relief at their arrival was on a grand scale!

There was a lot of excitement the day the Santa Box arrived.  It sat in our hall for two days until I stowed it away under the bed for a couple of weeks, out of temptations way until THE BIG DAY.

Santa Box pressies

On Christmas eve, my Santa Box from Julia was put under the Christmas tree, with the rest of the pressies.  On the morning of THE BIG DAY, along with all the usual giddiness, there was all the extra giddiness over The Box!  We had decided to save it until last, so that we could all pour over the contents.  What an absolute treat!  Julia had wrapped each present individually and put little notes on some.

As I said earlier, we were already aware of our cultural differences which included language differences and food.  The array of American food in that box was incredible.  Of course, we were limited to certain items – snacks and sweets in the main, which was very

Candy 'Grab Bag'

handy as I’m a bit partial to snacky stuff!  Foody items included  Raspberry Zinger tea, Blue Corn, some very cute snowman shaped Peeps (apparently an American favourite), dried wild blueberries, known as ‘The Caviar of Maine’, white cheddar cheese flavour popcorn – which is absolutely delicious by the way - peppermint pretzel slims – c/o Trader Joe’s, Julia’s local store, which has cropped up many times in conversation, dark chocolate crisps – also c/o Trader Joe’s, and a candy ‘grab bag’ which Julia put together, full of wonderful American sweets and chocolate – fabulous – enough to keep a writer going for a good few weeks!

The Hound and Douglas

Also, in the Santa Box, were pressies for the family, including a Maine Moose (now called Douglas) for my daughter and a Mighty Moose t-shirt for my son.  The hound took a fancy to Douglas and ran off with him a few times – on one of these he’d been secreted in a bag, with his head poking out and the hound, seizing her moment, got her chompers around one of his antlers and disappeared! You’ll be pleased to hear that Douglas was rescued and was unharmed.

We each gifted a book to each other and Julia’s to me, ‘horoscopes for the dead,’ is by

Trader Joe's bag

American poet, Billy Collins, a past US Poet Laureate. I hadn’t heard of either poet or book, so am really excited about the prospect of reading this.  As a poetry lover, the discovery of a new poet is always something to get excited about, and what a wonderful present!  One of the other gifts was a fantastic cloth bag from good old Trader Joe’s, which is such a lovely momento of our food / supermarket chats.

Julia also enclosed a really special gift, a collection of seaglass, shells and rocks that she

Seaside gifts with Twitter bird!

collected from nearby beaches.  There couldn’t really be a more appropriate gift for me, as a person who loves the sea and has spent hours beach combing and building up quite a collection of pebbles, rocks and shells.  What is even more special is that Julia made the bag, which is beautiful, along with a twitter bird hanging from the ribbon – just gorgeous!

Reading Julia's letter

Last, but not least, was a lovely long letter – decorated with Julia’s emoticons – which I have now read three times.  There are details about all the gifts, which gives me an insight into Amercan life, and Julia’s life in Maine.  The letter is very special, perhaps even more so because we rarely write letters nowadays do we? The immediacy of twitter, email and facebook are great, but a handwritten letter is something to treasure and keep forever.

What began as a fun idea and stemmed from our twitter chats, progressing to longer emails, has become so much more than that.  We each have pieces of each other’s lives now, and this twitter friendship is becoming so much more – a long and lasting friendship, across the pond.

You can read Julia’s blog post on our Santa Box experience by following this link http://www.wordsxo.com/