Tag: YA

FINISHED

This morning I finished my first ever draft of a novel. A WHOLE novel. What I wrote. Me.

Ahem.

I know that for real, proper authors this isn’t a big deal – and maybe it shouldn’t be such a big deal? But it really is. Not only am I a bit of a procrastinator, and have all the usual writerly hangups about fear of failure, etc etc, but I have genuinely struggled over the last year or so with life in general and self-doubt and all the rest of it. Anyway, no more, I have achieved my next writing goal and finished an entire novel, and I’m blooming proud of myself.

I’m not sure of the exact word count because a) it needs quite a lot of rewriting and knocking into shape and what have you. It is the epitome of Anne Lamott’s “s****y first draft” but it’s definitely got a decent novel in there. And b) because the last leg was all done longhand in my cheapy, scruffy, beloved reporter’s notebook, so I’m about to start typing it up ready to print out. And from there, I’ll leave it for a few days before attacking it with a pencil and red biro. In the meantime, donning a Real Writer’s mantle, I have a competition entry to write, a new ebook to plan (my first is HERE in case I haven’t mentioned it before…) and  my nearly-finished historical to get to the finishing line. And, by the way, this is HUGELY more likely having finished one first draft. So it’s more than likely that in a couple of months I will have TWO finished first drafts of novels and in six months I will hopefully have both rewritten, polished, and out on submission. Which will probably mean many, many anguished blog posts and practising gracious responses to rejection.

So, because I know EVERYONE is agog to know the details of my masterpiece, here you go…

It’s a YA thriller, aimed at the younger end of the age range (around 11-16), and the working title (thanks to the very brilliant MarshallBuckley) is SKIVE. The pitch, developed a little from the one I gave my twitter pals this morning (and, btw, trying to get across the point of book on twitter in as few tweets as possible is brilliant practice for pitching), is…

Nicky skives off the school trip to Newcastle & ends up on a quest for a mysterious artefact, involving supernatural villains & a ghost who can’t quite get over his death.

I have practiced my award acceptance speech and put the champagne in the fridge. All of which are, as well as this blog post, quite obviously new avoidance tactics for starting the revision…

 

Bloodstone

Bloodstone is the sequel to the acclaimed Firebrand by Gillian Philip, which I reviewed here last year alongside an interview with its simply fantastic hero, Seth MacGregor. Firebrand has shot up to become one of my favourite books, and being an impatient sort I kept nagging Gillian to find out when Bloodstone was coming out.

Imagine my delight when I received a proof copy of Bloodstone from the publishers, Strident! So here’s my completely honest review to give you an idea of what to expect when it’s released on 19th August.

Firebrand set a really high bar. The story of two Sithe (faeries, but not as Disney know ’em) half-brothers gripped me and it was always going to be hard to live up to that. Bloodstone more than meets the challenge. Seth and Conal’s story continues, 400 years on from the end of Firebrand, and new characters are introduced alongside familiar ones. In particular Finn MacAngus and the mortal Jed really make their mark here, and I clicked with them straightaway with all their flaws and strengths. Kate NicNiven, of course, is back as the charmingly deadly faerie queen and she in particular, I thought, came across even more strongly than in the first book. It took real effort for me as a reader to not be taken in by her again and again and I still don’t know if she’s as black as she’s painted…

Seth is the real star, obviously. If you read the first book you know him as a wild, damaged and passionate young man. Well, take that and imagine him with all those traits distilled and honed for 400 years. Yep. He’s mad, bad and dangerous to know in a way Byron could only dream of. Liable to go off like a crazy rocket at any time, you still can’t help falling in love with him all over again right to the end. Conal is as noble as ever although 400 years have taken their toll.

I say it again and again, but Gillian has a real knack of making a character jump off the page. Everyone is brilliantly drawn, but I can’t overlook the beautiful, crisp language and the plot, which cracks along with the occasional pause for breath and left me, literally, shaking for about an hour after I finished reading. I have to put in a personal note here – when I was at school I would read solidly for hours and a book like Bloodstone would have been finished in a couple of days. Maybe the same day if it was a weekend. I just don’t have that luxury anymore with children and husbands and such (pesky things) and a book has to be exceptionally gripping to let me switch off entirely from my surroundings. Bloodstone is one of those books.

Bloodstone will undoubtedly appeal to adults as much as teens although I think teens will identify strongly with Seth, Finn and Jed. I’d say it is much better to have read Firebrand first but I’m sure it could stand alone. I’d also like to point you to Lucy Coats’ blog at Scribble City Central where she interviews Conal.

Two questions remain: when oh when will a film production company steal the rights to this series? And is there any way Gillian can get the third book out in, ooh, say the next couple of weeks so I don’t have to wait another whole year to find out what happens?

Pre-order Bloodstone from amazon UK here.

Follow Gillian on twitter here or become a fan on Facebook here.

Visit Gillian’s website here.

And Seth MacGregor is on twitter here: be warned though, he’s mine…

Forcing the Issue

When I started taking writing seriously and thinking “I could actually, maybe, possibly, get something published”, my mind leapt ahead to all the deep and meaningful books I could write. Books that got reviews like “Profoundly moving” and “Speaks volumes about the human condition” and “The most important book you’ll read this year”.

I wanted to write books about Issues – the real important problems facing the world. Trafficking, drugs, debt, faith, parenting (trust me, this IS a problem!), world poverty, underage pregnancy, teen alcohol addiction, war… the list could go on and on and on.

The problem is that once you start thinking about what you could write about instead of what you want to write about, it’s kind of forcing it and it doesn’t feel natural. At least, that’s what I’ve found. And what I want to write about is people.

The best feedback I’ve had on my work is when I’ve started with a character and nothing else. Not a plot, not a problem, not an issue. I don’t know if it’s my particular wiring that makes me connect better to a character and their story this way, but it does seem to be how I work, and from chats with writerly friends I’m not alone.

That’s not, of course, to say that issues have been ruled out. No serious books here thank you very much. No, it just means that I have to approach my writing in a different way. Instead of thinking, ‘How can I write about bullying?’ I would write a much better book if the character I’m engaged with happens to be being bullied. Or even being a bully themselves. Kind of, if I end up dealing with a Serious Issue, it’s a bonus and a context, rather than the reason for the book. An effect rather than a cause.

Hopefully this will also mean that if and when I do write about Serious Issues, not having to force them into my work will mean that I can treat them sensitively and with much more depth. And maybe one day, someone will actually say “Profoundly moving” about a book that I’ve written.