Revising the Mary Ann Cotton Novel

Technorati Tags: Mary Ann Cotton,A woman Scorned,Justice,Murder

Revising this novel (A Woman Scorned) –first published in 2004 - has been fun!

I had forgotten how  significant this novel was and how much my outraged sense of justice is at its core. .  Interestingly in my new contemporary novel, Paulie’s Web also looks at justice and injustice in ordinary people’s lives. I had not made that connection until I started on the revision of this 2004 novel.

In my novel, I put the case for the defence of Mary Ann Cotton, who was alleged to have killed at least three and at most  eighteen people in the mid nineteenth century. Hanged for her ‘crime’ in Durham Goal, she has become a  dark legend in the north as their own female serial killer.

I kind of went along with this idea  but once – encouraged by my friend Gillian Wales - I had read all the sources I felt that  Mary Ann had been done a great injustice.   The novel – based strongly on the original  sources – came out in 2004 and I am now preparing a revised edition for the  Kindle publication.

To make my point on this revision I have given it a new subheading: A Woman Scorned: Serial Killer or Scandal Victim?

And I have eve designed a new cover to make my point more clear!

What do you think?

 

A little extract: (These extracts will follow the novel)

The story is told through the eyes of Victoria Kilburn, niece of Doctor Kilburn the doctor central to the story. She is visiting her uncle from London and is delighted and eventually horrified at what she witnesses in this small Durham village. Like Mary Ann (called Marian in my novel) she is an outsider and it is she who witnesses the runaway injustice visited on this unusal and charismatic woman.

 

Here she is having tea with a new acquaintance Kit Dawson:

… After the usual pleasantries about the weather (gloomy) and our own health (blooming), Kit Dawson tells me a tale about his day sitting at Mr Chapman’s elbow in the local magistrate’s court, making notes regarding a case about two women in West Auckland who came to blows over the abuse of a washing line, and renewed the battle again in court only to be fined five shillings each and bound over to keep the peace.

He thinks this is very funny, but I am concerned at the fine. ‘That would mean such a lot of money to these women. Two week’s wages for Lizzie, my aunt’s maid.’

Kit Dawson is entirely indifferent about this. ‘If they care about that, they shouldn’t start bashing each other. They’re barbarians, every last one of them.’

I shake my head. ‘Mr Dawson. To be poor is a misfortune, not a sign of barbarism.’ I regret the primness of my tone but mean what I say.

To my surprise he laughs. ‘Ah, you live a protected life, Miss Victoria. You should see what I see in court! Drunken miners, low women, thieves and vagabonds, wife-beating husbands, husband-beating wives. For me it’s like that first, most absurd circle of Hell in that courtroom...’

This is the world in which Victoria makes friends with Marian who ends up on the gallows, and shows us the injustice as it happens t0 her new friend.

Guest Writer Terry Ferdinand in France

Note from Wendy: Knowing I like all things French and am interested in his renovation of his French house Terry (my friend who also broadcasts on Bishop FM) sent me this lovely account of a day out in France. So I decided to make him my first guest writer. Whenever I talk to him I think of the Maison d’Estella  although I do not own it -  Thank you Terry

A Day Out

It was a Thursday and we had worked on and off for a fair amount of the week achieving a lot of home improvements in our French house and actually taught ourselves new French pointing skills. So and as the day was sunny, bright and cool, we decided we were in need of a break and a little bit of fun and some sightseeing.

To the east of us lies Aubusson, a beautiful medieval town steeped in antiquity, with narrow streets, ancient buildings, coffee shops, lots of round towers, the river Creuse and a huge cathedral which stands high above the town and has been designated a world heritage site because of its 600 year old unbroken tradition of tapestry weaving.

Into the car we clambered and headed off to Bourganeuf to fill up with petrol - a necessary evil if you want to get anywhere - and then we embarked upon the forty or so minute drive into the history of France.

From Bourganeuf we took the main road to Gueret and drove until we reached the lovely town of Pontarion. The drive into Pontarion town centre is a long downward gentle incline cluttered on either side by a mixture of old, ancient and occasional modern buildings. At the bottom you cross over the river Thauron via an old bridge and as we glance over the parapet to watch the water lazily bubble its way onward, we see the remains of the ford and in the calm still water we see the 16^th century fortress Galliard reflected back at us.

Leaving Pontarion by the right fork in the road sign posted to Aubusson, we meander down through the forest road twisting and turning and passing through St, Hilaire le Chateau - another small village which holds good memories for us. On the right we passed the Auberge where we spent our very fist “house hunting” night in the Creuse. I remember the quaint cosy room, the way they had blended very modern glass architecture with the 16^th century granite building, and served a sumptuous meal at a reasonable price.

The forty minutes drive passed quickly and very enjoyably, passing through many old hamlets and by verdant fields full of healthy Limousin beef cattle with their distinctive colouring. As we rounded a bend in the forest, there spread before us was the town of Aubusson. Parking was easy, as it is in all of the France that we have explored. You are encouraged to visit and spend money in the towns, and to help you do that, the town councils provides plenty of FREE and well maintained parking places.

Aubusson nestles at the bottom of a valley and straddles the majestic river Creuse. This town has been famous since the 16^th century for weaving tapestries and carpets, throughout the centuries. Tapestries have adorned many of the rich and famous chateaus of nobility and - of course - the palaces of the French kings. The town is clearlymedieval in construction, with very narrow streets and tall buildings towering over the passers-by. There are the traditional round towers to be seen everywhere, with roofs of amazing steep pitch covered with tiny tiles and proudly boasting the very French style dormer windows.

Shops and houses are built of granite and many of them are adorned with wonderfully carved lintels and intricate iron balconies over carved doors. The traffic system is one way and works very well with the 20^th century cars driving down the medieval narrow streets that have been recently cobbled to give the ancient feel to this modern town.

Aubusson is busy. The streets are hung about with multi coloured pennants and people throng through the narrow pathways and crowd the pavement cafes. There is a feeling of prosperity in the air, and everywhere there are signs of tapestry and antiques shops.

What dominates most is the 12^th century Cathedral. Signs tell you there are 50 parking spaces available at the cathedral, so we weaved and threaded our way by car, through really narrow streets, and climbed forever upwards, eventually ending up in the free car park. The views were magnificent, giving us an almost 360 degree panorama of the city spread out far below us. We could see the River Creuse meandering between the buildings below and the narrow streets swarming with tiny people.The new tapestry museum shone like a beacon to our left inviting us to visit and the cathedral, in its entire magnificence, rose up behind us.

We left the blazing sunlight behind us as we entered through a huge oak studded door into the cathedral. At first it appeared to be black and shadowy, but as our eyes became accustomed to the light, we were astounded by the size of the inner space. The roof curved and towered above us and still bore the signs of the medieval artisan paintings of intricate design, although faded and damaged by the centuries of wear and tear. You could still see and imagine very clearly that the entire ceiling, columns and arches were at one time covered with dazzling colour in a huge celebration of the religious beliefs of the people.

The light shone into the huge space in vibrant shafts of colour through beautiful hand crafted stained glass windows, casting a sparkling array of blues, greens, reds, golds, depicting scenes from the bible with an exquisite detail unequalled in today’s craftsmanship[. The space was vast and looked empty, but as our eyes were now accustomed to the inner half-light, we could observed that opon tha walls in this open and unguarded space there hung paintings of great size and antiquity and original tapestries more than three hundred years old.

We looked and marvelled at the lectern which was an oak carving of a griffon from solid oak which held a huge bible. We admired the simplicity of the main altar, the complexity and colourful private chapels, and the sea of chairs arranged in perfect rows telling us that this cathedral was still in use and indeed very well attended.

Inspired by the wall hanging inside the awesome place of worship, we walked out into a wall of heat and sunshine, drove back down through the winding narrow busy streets of Aubusson, and headed directly for the Tapestry Museum/

A little bit of the history.

Tapestry or weavings as they were once called, were used to warm the bare stone walls of the palaces and castles, and were first mentioned in 1601 when King Henry IV banned the importation of all foreign tapestries, especially those from England. Royal manufacturing patents were issued for Aubusson in 1665. Its twin manufacturing city of Felletin received the same patents in 1689.

Even at the beginning of the 20^th century some 2000 people were employed in the industry but since then the jobs have seriously dwindled to about 50 actual weavers. Shortly before the 2^nd world war the French government realised the seriousness of the problem and issued new commissions to leading artists of the day, one of them being the famous Spanish artist, Picasso.

Once inside the modern air conditioned building and having paid the 4 euros entry fee, I was surprised to read the sign allowing photography, but without the aid of flash, no doubt to preserve the integrity of the many original hangings. The rooms were large and dimly lit, creating the atmosphere and an image in our minds of a modern day cathedral; the walls were as expected, spacious and hung with weavings dating back to the 1600’s. It also included some modern the day weavings. Artefacts both ancient modern were dotted about on tables throughout the rooms. In one corner glowing in the dimness were two very colourful shelving units housing a myriad of colourful wools.

What did draw the eye and immediately grab your attention was the oasis of bright light in the centre of the room. This it was a modern weaving loom and operating it was an artisan working on a small tapestry. For a fascinating and informative 15 minutes we watched and understood the intricacies of the weaving with a loom, we saw the need for patience, and we learned an appreciation of the skills of hand, foot, and eye co-ordination needed by the operator.

An hour passed as we wandered around mesmerised looking at original antique tapestries from the 16^th, 17^th and 18^th centuries. We stared with astonishment at the details and shading created by genuine craftsmen with nothing more than a few coloured wools. Modern hangings were also displayed, and they ranged from traditional weaving, to paintings and stained glass. The trade had modernised and diversified and I suppose it had to stay alive, and grow.

The day at Aubusson was so interesting and informative. What was nice about it was the way it was easily available, almost hands-on. It was a welcomed relief from my own painting and decorating in my French House and well worth the visit.

On our way home we came across another hidden gem in the tiny but very pretty village of Moutier - d’Ahun and we were even more amazed at what we found there. But that’s another story.

Terry Ferdinand

October 1 2011

Spy Fiction at Sunday Noon 2nd October 2nd on Bishop FM

http://blogs.bishopfm.com/thewritinggame/2011/10/listen-to-spy-fiction/

The Writing Game1st Sunday of the month, at 12pm

- Afterwards on Podcast -

Join me and Writing Game regular Glynn Wales as we talk  about Spy fiction and the way it links with 20th C History. John Buchan to John LeCarre, Ian Fleming to Grahame Greene,  from (recently retired MI5 boss) Stella Rimington to ... well Stella Rimington!

Glynn is on very good form!  W e get to questions like                                                 Does spy fiction reflect 20th Century History?              Do you have to have been a spy to write spy fiction?               &     Is spying and spy fiction a men's game.? (That's where Stella Romington comes in.)

Next Month we are visiting Escomb Saxon Church for Historical insight and writing inspiration. If you have written about Escomb get in touch and hear your writing on the programme. If you live far away check it out on the web, be inspired and send us your poem.

See/hear you soon!

Wendy x

Escomb i

A dip in the hill

on the way to the river

- water makes a round pool

now called holy

and built upon

by no ordered hand -

just strong men adding

stone on stone

stolen from the military

-their tool marks tell us --

poled on rafts upriver

to build a church.

wr

This is Queenie…

From Paulie’s Web 

This is Queenie, whom Paulie  first meets in the white van on the way to prison…

…That time Queenie was sectioned and in the hospital they gave her the pills that took away her visions of the giant trees and stars and the Water Man.   She was meek, very good, in the hospital.   She helped with the tea rounds, taught a young girl to read, and stayed tucked up in her bed all night.

When they had a case conference the professionals decided that Queenie Pickering was a prime candidate for Care in the Community, now not only fashionable but compulsory.   Her house with its cocktail cabinet was sold.  In a rare soft moment she had signed the lot over to Janine, her niece.   Janine had sold it and gone off to build a new life for herself and her boyfriend Roger, in the depths of Canada.

But there was sheltered housing with a very kind warden.  Queenie - for everyone called her Queenie now - Queenie could live there and the nurse could call every week to see that she was taking her medication.   Everything would be Hunky Dory.   Wasn’t that how Care In The Community worked?

After a week Queenie walked out of the sheltered house.    She put on her hat - not so smart now - put all her most precious things in three carrier bags, and caught the long distance bus to the town where they would not find her.   Best to lie low, she thought.  Best to lie low.  The gleaming Water Man would be there.  He was everywhere, so he would be in the city.  And the sky in that place would be studded with the pearly moon, the golden sun and the silver stars.  And there again the trees would stride the earth.

‘…when bats fly at noon

and owls take refuge in darkness

frightened of solitude

proud to be independent

with silver shields

to hide their isolation…’

P.Smith

Picture this: Writing People

…Picture this Our writer goes on Monday morning to spend time with writers in Cramlington. Early start to drive there. She found the place after a few false starts. They  passed the library and the Pheonix pub, where she has given talks in previous years,  This time it was a church hall which she  found after circling quite a number of roundabout. (One lady, when she arrived ,was sympathetic. Cramlington is roundabout city, she said.)  …

We arrived just in time and a crowded room with a large circle eager faces met me . I had a little flutter with bags and books before I launched into my take on a wroiter’s life.

It was interesting to note that half of the members of this group were men.  This is unusual as many groups entirely or almost entirely consist of women. There was definitely an energetic buzz  in this room.

I referred to my writer’s memoir The Romancer within the talk because this is my own  literary take on my writer’s life. I focused first on what I call ‘picture this’ – a piece of writing rendering in the third person.incidents which happened to me.

I read two extracts which begin…

Picture this. A little girl of three in a Fair Isle cardigan, playing outside a house in Lancaster. With her head of Shirley Temple curls she’s winsome, prettier than she’ll ever be in the many years to come. She’s chalking on the sill of the big bay window. She stands back. That looks right. Just like she has seen her mother do, when she writes her letters. But then the little girl frowns her characteristic…

and from much later in the book

Picture this: Our writer, now our young mother, is sitting with her back to the sea wall at Alnmouth on the Northumberland coast, surrounded by the detritus of a seaside picnic. The wind from the east is cutting and she wears two ponchos knitted for her in carpet wool - bought as a bargain - by her mother Barbara.   … Our girl has never liked the cold, suffering blue hands and feet as a child….

I read these extracts to show  that writing about your experience in the third person carries  a curious fictive liberation and allows you as the writer to get closer to the truth without the internal gag of reductive autobiography.

Then it was their turn. I challenged them to write their own ‘Picture this. Some people were unsure. One man said outright that he couldn’t or wouldn’t do it. But he was persuaded. In fact these writers  met the challenge wholeheartedly and the read-around revealed some genuine  talent and sensitivity among these writers.

The Picture This notion had sold itself and the writers showed both their talented response and their satisfaction in the process.

It was a very staisfying, busy and hectic morning and Avril and I found our way out of Cramlington more easily than we found out way in…

Footnote The discussion was very lively and interested and moved to the distraction of misleading covers and democratisation of publishing for writers through Kindle. More on both those subjects next time.

Take a look at my ebook Paulie’s Web ….

Paulie on her way…

  I have been thinking, as you know,(see last post) about books on Kindle.  Having done all the work putting  Paulie’s Web onto Kindle myself  I feel I know the whole seventy thousand words by heart! And I’m learning lots of new things about the Kindle process. By the time I get through all my novels I’ll be quite an expert.

Already lots of people are downloading Paulie. She seems to appeal to many readers for different reasons. If you are interested in the experiences of people on the margins of our comfortable lives, you will like Paulie! She is great - clever, resourceful and capable of surviving the hardest challenges that life throws up at her.

In the story Paulie is at the centre of a web five very different women whom she encounters in prison. Their charm, their pain and their humour affect  Paulie’s  life and she touches theirs, as we see when they meet again years later.  Paulie  also has an impact on her psychiatrist who has to change some of his preconceptions when he meets her.

Prisons can be hard places for anyone associated with them. My own experience as writer in residence  - for a total of five years - was challenging and life-changing. Interestingly when I was first interviewed for this role I asked the Governor what would surprise me about this experience on the margins of the prison world. He told me  I would be surprised how much laughter there was inside.

His words proved to be true.  I hope Paulie’s Web – as well as telling the truth about the desperate lives some women are forced to lead – reflects the laughter and the comradeship in that prison – as far away from ‘Bad Girls’ and Mars is from Venus,

Interestingly enough  it was after this prison experience – ten years ago -  I felt able to reflect on and write about the lives of women in internment in World War Two Singapore, in my novel Long Journey Home (click) which is still around on Amazon and in libraries. That will be on Kindle too whan I get faster at this game.

If you fancy meeting Paulie, Click  Paulie’s Web here  to download your Kindle  edition for the price of a glass of wine, quite a nice aftershave or a bargain lipstick! £3.44

(Stop press - My great discovery today  is that if you don’t yet have a Kindle reader there a lots of FREE applications you can download to read Amazon books  on your computer – including Paulie’s Web, and my collaborator Avril Joy’s Orchid House . You can get them on your computer, your phone or other convenient screens)

They are easy to read! I had a go. Just click here on stories on your screen and follow the trail.

 

Hooray! Paulie’s Web now on Kindle

With my friend and collaborator Avril Joy I have been experimenting with the process of publishing a novel on Amazon Kindle. Like many informed people I have moved from the notion that these E readers  might be a passing fancy towards  the new and important sense that novels in this new democratic form of publishing can give a public platform to many talented writers whose good novels  may never survive the thorny obstacle race that is present day market-driven publishing.

Avril and I are interested in this process for our own work, but also interested in making the process accessible  to new writers, particularly those who attend our Room To Write conferences – where many writers are working at publishable level.

So – what to put up on this new, magical system. My second short story collection? One of my early children’s novels? ‘The Romancer’, my memoir about writing?

I plumped for Paulie’s Web  which sprang out of my life-changing experience as a writer in residence in a woman’s prison.

This novel has been a long time a-coming. It has taken me ten years to digest the extremities of my experience in prison and write my novel as true fiction in a way that pays tribute to the many  women I met while working there. If, by the by, it goes some way to cracking the absurd stereotypes of women in prison it will be an extra delight.  While there are dark passages here I make no apologies for the ultimately optimistic tone of this story which is a true reflection of the humour, stoicism and kindness that I was witness to in my prison experience.

So, what is it about?

Paulie Smith, rebel, ex-teacher and emerging writer comes out of prison after six years, her conviction overturned. As she moves around in the next few days, struggling to readjust to the scary realities of life ‘on the out’, she reflects on her life in prison. She focuses particularly on her first few weeks inside, alongside the four very different women whom she first met in the white van on their way to their first remand prison.

Paulie’s thoughts move from Queenie, the old bag- lady who sees giants and angels, to Maritza who has disguised her pain with an ultra-conventional life, to Lilah, the spoiled apple of her mother’s eye,  to the tragedy of Christine - the one with the real scars.

And then there is Paulie herself, who ended up in prison through no fault of her own. Their unique stories, past and present, mingle as Paulie - free at last - goes looking for these unique women who have now been ‘on the out’ for some years and are, Paulie hopes,  remaking their lives.

Now  PAULIE’S WEB is on its way to being out there on Kindle! It is in the works. It should be up there tomorrow for readers to download. Fingers crossed.

 Avril’s clever, sensual novel THE ORCHID HOUSE is already out  there and she has posted some helpful tips on her blog for writers out there who want to have a go. Her book is downloadable, as she says, for the price of a decent cup of coffee. A new day dawns for all writers.

Pragmatic Angels

These days novels with overt or implicit supernatural themes are creating and increasingly popular field of fiction.  My own novel An Englishwoman in France has at its centre a modern woman who sees the dead and can slip through time. It was fun to write as somewhere in my subconscious I feel I can do just this.

Last night I went to Thornaby Library to take part in the Read Regional Campaign with two other authors Beda Higgins and Carolyn Jess-Cook    

Carolyn talked about her novel The Guardian Angel’s Journal which is the story of Margo, who dies at forty two and returns to earth as Ruth to be her own Guardian Angel  and  encounters the possibility of making crucial changes change. 

Carolyn’s reflections on her approach to writing this novel were satisfyingly pragmatic, not in the least airy-fairy or quasi religious; her affection for her her characters - Margo and her angelic alter ego Ruth - shines out in her discourse. making the supernatural  propositions in the novel seem believable, even rational. No wonder this novel is being praised across continents, although perhaps the Americans’ promotion of it as a ‘Christian Novel’ is a bit reductive. A must to read, I think.

Beda Higgins  the prizewinning North Eats writer read from her new collection Chameleon. The short story she read to us  reflect her insight into  a child’s point of view where reality and fantasy dissolve into each other and everyday playground experiences of a vulnerable little girl are processed in a dark surreal fashion that end up in near tragedy and what seems like a supernatural transformation of the little girl herself. Another ‘must’ to read.

There was a buzz in the room, and some interesting conversations. The people  asked questions about our writing processes. I seems that we all work in different fashions but agreed that it was most important to write consistently – many days in sequence , to write opportunistically when the time to write emerges, and to have the story in your head even when you are not writing. I advocated separating the writing and the editing processes entirely. Carolyn Told a fascinating story of writing this novel at astonishing speed when an agent had seen the first fifty pages and liked it.

The writers in the room asked for our recommendations for inspiring books. These emerged:

Dorothea Brande:  On Becoming a Writer

Walter Mosely: So This Is The Year You Write Your Novel

Stephen King: On Writing

A very good evening…

Beginnings: A Found Poem

 

 

A poem found in the big sort out

Beginning

To begin  a new thing

one has to bring about

the end of earlier things -

Conception is the end

of one affair

and the beginning

of another

Birth is the end

of a secret inner affair

and the beginning

of love out in the open -

lasting a lifetime

And so on, back to Eve

though even she engendered

the demise of Adam’s spare rib

wr

2002

Stan Barstow, My Dad, and Gregory Pack

BR’s calls to France were mostly about the ordinary business of being apart but he did mention Stan Barstow’s obituary and I asked him to clip  it for me.

Been back a fortnight and have just come across the clipping. I was instantly making connections  First to the astonishing resemblance of Barstow to the glamorous Gregory Peck – who was all over the screens in the years when Barstow was writing his groundbreaking novel A Kind of Loving in the time he could spare from his job as a draughtsman.

The writer mentions Barstow’s role in the rise of the regional literary novel in the late fifties and early sixties. Possibly to the detriment of his national standing, Barstow stayed in the north, asserting later, ‘To hoe one’s own row diligently, thus seeking out the universals in the particular, brings more worthwhile satisfaction than the frantic pursuit of the largely phoney jet age internationalism…’

A largely fair obituary is marred by the inclusion of one critic’s  comment that ‘At least you  know where you are in the company of Mr Barstow’s sentimentalised Tykes … there’s usually Trooble at t’Mill, the privy sits proudly at the end of the garden, and lives revolve round the family.’ 

Yaargh! These mean,  mistaken and ill conceived  phrases manage to combine the regional. literary, linguistic and class snobbery that still has a stranglehold on the British literary world. As a writer of some ‘regional literary novels’ myself  I too have encountered this same frustrating prejudice . American literature celebrates fiction from its non-metropolitan regions and is much more deep, rich and  substantial for it.

Back to the clipping. The other absolutely astonishing resemblance in the picture is to my own Dad, who would have been Barstow’s contemporary. The same sharp strong features, the same film star moustache and thick dark Brylcreemed hair, the same fierce direct look, neat suit and tight tie.

The same working class élan…

 Footnote; My dad died when I was nine and my mother was thirty six. (See my memoir The Romancer on the sidebar). She adored Gregory Peck ( the George Cloony of that era)and in her long years alone went to see every film he made. She went to see Captain Horatio Hornblower six time. Now I do rate G Peck myself but this seemed excessive.

Or it did. until my revelation today.

A Very Nice Review …

A very nice review – God bless America!

An Englishwoman in France.

Robertson, Wendy (author).

July 2011. 224p. Severn, hardcover, $28.95 (9780727880314).
REVIEW. First published July, 2011 (Booklist).

In this eerie, atmospheric paranormal novel, Robertson deftly intertwines two time periods, slowly absorbing one into the other through her remarkably likable protagonist. Although current-day syndicated British horoscope writer Stella sees dead people, she can’t see her young daughter, who was brutally murdered, and Stella desperately needs closure. In 301 CE, young Tib, a healer, and his Corinthian mentor, Modeste, spread their belief in the newly organizing Christian religion and become Roman targets in Gaul. When Stella’s long-suffering husband takes her to France and they rent what was Tib’s home, Stella sees the boy and Modeste around town. After Starr’s husband returns to Britain and his job, leaving Stella alone, she finds herself in Roman times, a companion to Tib and Modeste as they tangle with the emperor, his wife, and the old religion. Robertson’s meticulous details about the Roman era and early Christians come to life in this tale exploring time, souls, and love.

— Pat Henshaw

Restoring the little Writing Room

 

I came back after three weeks in France to find that GR had stripped my little writing room of the messy palimpsest of five years of writing – pictures on pictures, postcards on print-outs, three tattered dream-catchers, two computers, two printers, stacks of paper, piles of notes, hundreds of notebooks. Wires and cables. And books, books books.

I’d come to think this retreat  was picturesque, full of potential literary treasures, stacked with ideas. But truly,  truly, it was becoming an image of an overstuffed mind. clogged up with a plethora of spurious inspirations and notional ideas.

Much of this stuff had spilled off the shelves onto the floor. So I asked GR if he would kindly build me another long shelf while I was away.

Golly, had he done more than that! He’d stripped the room of its entire contents. Then he stripped the walls and painted them, refurbished the sash window so it works again. He stripped the floorboards and restored them to a gleaming, nut-brown Victorian patina.  Oh, and he built three new shelves: one very large, two smaller and narrower.

So, when I got back home there was my little writing room looking very empty and twice as large: an inspiration in itself.

So all I  had to do now was reintroduce all my stuff to this new, pregnant space. Of course this meant I had to sort it all and only allow back into the room things I really wanted around me.

This process involved several black sacks.

As I sorted I found two novels I had forgotten – one pretty good, actually. A whole collection of short stories written more than twenty years ago. A lever arch file with the complete contents of a book I had (have) in mind about writing – called, I see, The Determined Butterfly. I found two plays I had written from my novels .  I found numerous poems written in various notebooks. One (see below) from 2002 when I must have been in a scary state of mind.

This was an opportunity too to assemble my notebooks (large and small) in some proper order. Ditto my diaries, my inspirational CDs, my archive of floppy disks containing all my early work, my workshop files. And my radio stuff - together at last in black boxes.And I could assemble my dictionaries (more to come…) and give each of my writing projects a plastic box of its own. Now all my work is accessible, all in order.

Then. last and possibly most important, I have re-done my inspiration board with new images. The last things I pinned up (again!) were the dream catchers…

 

 

The decks have been cleared so I can sail on with my next novel which is half-way there ,but was somehow stopped by… the stuff!

Oh – and here is the scary poem from 2002;

Dark Lady

Lady of shadows where do you walk?

Come into the light -

Let me see you more clearly

 

She  lingers now at the edge of the dark

Walking the streets with her diamond eye

Beating disks of glittering metal

Choosing the child for the next conflagration

 

Lady of shadows, where are you walking?

Come into the light -

Let me see you more clearly

 

She turns into an alley darker than Hades

Confronts a huge man whose eyes cannot see

Diamond gaze cuts the husk of his eyelids

Igniting his soul with the dark fires of hell

 

Lady of shadow, where are you walking?

Come into the light -

Let me see you more clearly

 

I’m running before you, fearing your gaze

Fearing your hands with their tin-drum beat

Fearing the reach of your long, thin arms

Fearing the high-heeled click of your feet

 

Lady of shadows why do you follow?

2002

Outsiders – Kitty Fitzgerald

Kitty Fitgerald on the June Programme of The Writing Game

Posted on June 4, 2011 by wendyrobertson

Tune into THE WRITING GAME on  Bishop FM  http://www.bishopfm.com/listen/

2pm Sunday 5^th June  ‘My Theme is  OUTSIDERS’

The Writing Game is a programme for readers and writers from the broader region,  and – through the magic of the internet –  much further afield, (latest response from Rhode Island New York…).

In this thirteenth episode Outsiders we consider looking at life from the outside and the role of writer as outsider. The programme features novelist and playwright Kitty Fitzgerald, a long term resident in the North-East who came originally from Ireland by way of Yorkshire. Kitty’s novels are peopled by outsiders – particularly Jack Plumb the disabled anti-hero of her nationally acclaimed novel – originally a radio play – the brilliantly inventive Pigtopia.

We also hear an extract from a novella by Avril Joy who evokes with great insight the lives of those ‘Outsiders Inside’- women in prison.

I hope you like it… wx

Catch this programme live at 2pm on June 5^th or afterwards on podcast -

http://blogs.bishopfm.com/thewritinggame/category/podcasts/

Don’t forget that all thirteen programmes are available  on these podcasts.   Listen to a wide range of writers talking. Try last month’s programme Words & Music which features composer musician Andy Jackson and poet Su Kane on their music/prose work Whispering Stones, inspired by Durham Cathedral.

‘This programme celebrates the breadth and depth of the talent of writers working and living in the North. The informality of the Writing Game allows writers to speak their mind and all the conversations are building into a significant archive of Northern writing talent.’

Wendy Robertson.

Every Picture Tells a Story

Everything comes together.

In the last year the writing has been  going well but I tend to take on too much and have got into the dangerous habit of catching up with my own shadow and forgetting how to relax.

Then I read a book* about the Haida Mythtellers of North America, which has made me think a lot about the ultimate  storytellers whom he compares with composers and artists rather than poets. He contemplates Valazquez’s painting Kitchen Maid With the Supper at Emmaus.

Bathhurst says, ‘Even for non-Christians (I am one) the young Valazquez’s painting opens a door; it confirms what every mythteller, physicist, biologist and hunter gatherer knows: that man is not the measure of all things.

In my workshops I often compare the writing of a novel with the process of painting a picture  – conceiving the idea, choosing your media, blocking in a large canvas, telling the story, trusting the hand and eye and the paint/pen, looking and looking until you think you’ve got it right…

In this month’s Writing Game I talk about this book and how stories emerge and are handed down through generations. How families and communities reflect the permanence of their identity with their myths. I also read an extract from The Romancer (see sidebar – one definition of Romancer is ‘mythteller’) about how stories have been handed down in my family and are integral to my novels which are – in the end -  ‘pure fiction’.

All this made me reflect on just how long it’s been since I painted. So I got out my paints and thought about the joy I had walking last week in the spring woodland among the bluebells.

And I set up on the big desk by the window, turned on Radio 4 Listen Again to the Desert Island Disc interview with consummate novelist Howard Jacobson, and began to paint. Then something else. Then music.

Three hours went by in a flash, and when I emerged with the half-finished picture I knew I had been relaxing, not working. I felt refreshed, stimulated. endorsed.

So now I’ve been rehearsing saying ‘No!’ to people and have put painting on my permanent ‘to do’ list.

For me relaxation means emotional survival.

wx

* Recommended to me by Kathleen Jones – A Story as Sharp as a Knife  by Robert Bringhurst

The Subtlety of Collaboration

 

by Wendy on May 9th, 2011

The Writing Game this month features Andy Jackson, composer,  and Su Kane, writer,  in conversation about their collaboration on a piece called Whispering Stones, about Durham Cathedral.

They express beautifully the nature of the project and the subtlety of artistic collaboration.  It’s now a podcast** and includes some thoughts on story making (me), and blogging for writers (Avril Joy).

This made me think about my own view of collaboration. The Writing Game is to some degree collaborative I suppose. And one of my novels Sandie Shaw and the Millionth Marvell Cooker started as an idea for a stage play but when I realised how much negotiation, collaboration and concession would be involved I rather retreated from the idea and seven years later wrote it as a novel.

Perhaps a novelist cultivates that element of total control: a writer is creator, location manager, actor(s) and director – only conceding the role of producer to the publishers.

However i do enjoy collaborating with my friends Avril Joy and Gillian Wales in Room To Write the  organisation to encourage and develop aspiring writers which also supports and inspires The Writing Game.

So I can’t be an entire megalomaniac…

**Listen to Writing Game podcast on story, on words & music collaboration, & blogging for writers http://blogs.bishopfm.com/thewritinggame/

PS As you see, I’ve been walking in bluebell woods. Perfect English spring. Very inspiring….

wx

From → Bluebells, Collaboration, Spring, Writing, Writing Game

One Comment →

1. 

   avril permalink

   I agree Wendy – as a novelist one is generally on one’s own and there is something very satisying about the control this brings

   But like you I enjoy collaboration. It is always inspiring in some way, it feeds into the writing -besides which it’s fun and very life enhancing to work with one’s friends in this way.

   Love the bluebells!!

Ink pens and Umbilical Cables

Apr 11 11

by Wendy

It could have been the two consecutive days of sunshine. It could have been a desperate need to escape from dark moments when the novel-in-waiting couldn’t hustle its place between meetings about the Divan writer’s celebration, about the radio programme. about a new publishing venture. It could have been because of promised evaluations for writers or the planning for this Wednesday’s launch of An Englishwoman in France 

Whatever it was, I simply couldn’t get on with my new novel. Now I have to tell you it’s my fine boast that I can usually do this among the sturm und drang of everyday life. I often tell new writers that the writing has to be the first thing you do, your prime project.

But the problem was that I’d actually resorted to thinking that, so save time, I could skip the hand- drafting and jump to working straight onto the machine. After all I wrote reams on the machine to service other aspects of my life. And I’d lost two ink-pens and the time to go and replace them was very fugitive.

So it was that my time to create was bundled up with all the other tasks (including blogging); tied by a kind of umbilical cable to the computer.

But my precious story – it seemed – was having none of that. She was sitting on the windowsill kicking her heels muttering, when-you’re-ready, when-you’re-ready.

Then one day my A4 drafting book fell off the table in the little study. I flicked through the pages and admired the inky flow of my own writing and the energy of those paragraphs before they were transcribed onto the computer.

In a second, it seems,  I was in Ryman’s choosing a new ink-pen and a fresh bottle of ink. Then the sun came out and when I got home my story was sitting on the garden table ready to flow out of the bottle onto the page of the A4 book.  All that day and the next and the next… Whoosh!  Talk about the genie springing out of the bottle! Pure magic.

wx

Portrait of a Town - the April Writing Game

The Writing Game on Local History

Sunday 10 April at 2pm on Bishop FM (105.9)

  

You’ll have noted that The Writing Game has strayed into the peaceful stretches of Sunday afternoon. I hope you enjoy it in this more leisurely space. And, as always, if you can’t make it then and there, you can download our podcast after the 10th April http://blogs.bishopfm.com/thewritinggame/category/podcasts/and listen in your own selected leisurely time where listening to writers and thinking about books could be a very good thing to be doing.

Commentators from outside say how much they like the way the Writing Game renders an image of a certain part of England. I think they and our local listebere will like today’s programme - on writing local history

Like so many Writing Games our April programme is grounded here South Durham – today specifically my own town of Bishop Auckland which is the home of Bishop FM . And always we place ourselves in the broader context of the nature of writing history.  The Writing Game is local in its focus, but never parochial in its attitudes

So today our main point of consideration is the local history of Bishop Auckland. Both  of my guests today talk about how a sense of local history fosters a particular, unique identity.

In pubs, cafes and shops on Newgate Street, our main shopping street - if you dig several feet down you will find Dere Street an important Roman Road - on Newgate Street in the pubs, cafes and shops, you can witness the habit of Bishop people of reflecting on their intricate, shared past. They talk of the people and the families they have known – names emerge like a biblical litany – his mother.. his grandmother .. his cousin – and so and so begat so and so –

You can her talk of the schools as they were, the celebrated football tam, the Thursday and Saturday markets, the choirs, the churches, the anniversaries, the Romany funerals, the old bishop with gaiters……

Stories sing in the air of Bishop Auckland  ringing with pride and a true sense of identity

My first guest for April,  Barbara Laurie has tried to capture all this in words, to nail it to the page in her local histories. As well as writing these histories. Barbara is a teacher from a family of Bishop Auckland teachers, has been Mayor of Bishop Auckland, a county councillor and is now a district councillor.  Peter Laurie her husband, will read a wonderful piece that he wrote about the traveller- hawker tradition in Bishop Auckland from their website www.bishopaucklandhistory.com

(Look it up! All the books we mention  are shown on the website.)

Then, to complement Barbara’s view of writing local history ,we have regular Writing Game contributor Glynn Wales reflecting on the way the historical idiosyncrasies of Bishop Auckland may or may not fit into the context of historical writing in general but how it may reinforce a sense of local identity in a national setting.

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I hope my regular listeners find me here on Sundays and continue to enjoy The Writing Game. I’ve had messages – word of mouth and email from listeners here in South Durham and – through the magic of the Internet – from much further afield -  as far away as Melbourne in Australia and Kentucky and New York in America.

Here is one from America

> “I enjoyed the podcast conversation with David Almond. I want to look for his books. These programs are wonderful. I loved listening to the children talk about the books they'd read (of course I adore their accents); and I closed my eyes listening to the Fireeater---my God the suspense in that and feelings it drew out. The reader is marvellous. You are so fortunate to be able to participate in such a great undertaking as The Writing Game programming. “

And another:

> “I listened to the podcast of The Writing Game with Wendy Robertson. The poet who spoke about basing much of her work on Horace sent me to my old school anthology, in repose right here beside me on the bookshelf, to read him again after 48 years. One of four included poems is Mortality---of course, why not. AND, it is an ODE--- Horace: Poetry 101. Love your comments.”

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NEXT MONTH – May Programme – Words and Music

The Writing Game talks to another couple who live at the heart of Bishop Auckland –               Andy Jackson and Su Kane. Andy is a composer and musician who is, among other things, the creative director of The Cobweb author which performs across the region hundreds of times a year. You will also remember Su, who ran The Evergreens and also gave poetry and drama workshops at Bishop Auckland Town Hall. They will be talking about their writer-musician collaborations, particularly their cantata Whispering Stones, about Durham Cathedral. We will hear the magical blends of their words and music. A treat in store for all of us..

Zurbarania

 

 

My house is close by  Auckland Castle – the home of the Bishop of Durham - which, in the  last thirty years. has been part of  our family experience.  I have have walked in the adjacent Bishop’s Park in all seasons.  The park and its Deer House feature in several of my novels. not least my latest An Englishwoman in France. My daughter was married  in the Bishop’s Chapel and after the wedding we emerged into the winter dusk to sparklers and mince pies. I have sent visitors there in Autumn to relish the wonderful autumn colour made so because of the inspired planting two hundred years ago. I have been to concerts and events there and walked off many a dark feeling  on its wandering pathways.

I admired a series of thirteen rather dark paintings in the dining room – the inspired purchase of a former bishop. These were eventually cleaned to reveal thirteen portraits of Sevillian citizens by the Spanish painter Zurbaran – to represent Jacob and his twelve sons – founding fathers of the twelve tribes of Israel. They were originally destined for South America but  by a series of coincidences - including piracy – became the property of this bishop.

In a recent example of what is a modern brand of piracy. the Church Commissioners attempted to sell the paintings, now valued at fifteen million pounds, to the highest bidder. A campaign began to swell among to local people, led by Dr Bob McManners  of the Civic Society. Then local and County councillors. the local MP  and many others swelled the ranks. The Northern Echo lived up to its own heritage as a campaigning newspaper and took up and endorsed the cause, providing the much needed oxygen of wider publicity.

I sensed a helplessness, a hopelessness here and there. After all where stood the needs and identity of people in a small town in opposition to the ravages of  asset stripping bureaucrats of  the institutional church? The campaign was well meaning but really a lost cause wasn’t it?

And Lo!  there was a miracle!

As Chris Lloyd reports in today’s Northern Echo:

‘Zurbarans saved - Auckland Castle to become major attraction

TWO wealthy financiers have teamed up to save the Zurbarans and potentially turn Auckland Castle into a major heritage tourist attraction, The Northern Echo can reveal.

Evangelical christian Jonathan Ruffer has agreed to buy the Zurbarans for Auckland Castle.

Mr Ruffer, 59, was born in Stokesley in North Yorkshire, believes the masterworks should be put on public display.

It is hoped that there were be several sources of money for the Auckland Castle project, including the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Art Fund and the Department for Culture, but £1m has already been pledged by the Rothschild Foundation, a philanthropic organisation chaired by Lord Jacob Rothschild.’

 

Halleluya! It seems Mr Ruffer is offering fifteen million pounds to buy the paintings for Bishop Auckland. And Mr Rothschild is offering one million pounds to support the development of this project.

So a stranger has intervened in the history of this town which will now be changed by his action. It’s an object lesson for all of us, in these times of powerlessness, to see what can be done when ordinary people get the bit between their teeth.

Today, splashed across the front of the Northern Echo  is the Good News. it’s time we had Good News don’t you think?

Launching An Englishwoman in France

Please join me 7pm in Ponteland Library on Wednesday 13 April     to celebrate my new novel —                   An Englishwoman in France— the first of a three novels set in the Languedoc—an atmospheric and strange part of France which I love. Share with me some of the story and the novel’s secrets over a glass of wine. I look forward to seeing you

Copies will be available

… Wendyx

If you fancy joining me ring the library to confirm numbers   01661 823 594

(If you can’t get there the novel is available on Amazon  or you can obtain a copy from me at wenrob73@hotmail.com)

…Stella is pretty relaxed about her gift of second sight, but . . . my partner Philip thinks I’m barmy. No, seriously, he thinks I’m mad! In fact I’m very normal – normal as any of us ever is. Me, I see the dead in the more ordinary way of things. I saw this woman standing behind the woman at the till in the Spar shop. She was very old and wore a red sari with gold edges. She was like smoke in the air . . .

Stella’s happy-go-lucky attitude to her gift screeches to a halt when Siri, her twelve-year-old daughter, is savagely murdered and Stella can find her daughter nowhere, in this world or the next. Then, in the old French town of Agde she meets Louis, a clever, mysterious man and a young boy who is always near him. These two lead her to a place and a time where her search for Siri takes on a new meaning.

From ‘The Romancer’, my book about the writing process:

This house is the inspiration, of course, for An Englishwoman in France. From the first time I saw it I had this weird feeling that I knew this place, that I’d been here before. And so the writing, the chapters, started to unfold in my head and find their way nto The Notebooks. I felt there had to be someone here who could see – even move through time into the layers of the old city. And so the astrologer Stella walks into the story, into this house, to regain her sanity after the insanity of the murder of her daughter. She drops through time to meet the boy who will eventually be martyred and become St Tibery, the patron saint of the mentally ill….’

New Blog Address for LTT...

Dear Friends

My blog, A Life Twice Tasted, is now integrated with my website at

www.wendyrobertson.com

Same blog, same person, different place ...

Please do come over. I've been missin' you!
wxxx

Editing The Writing Game With Terry Ferdinand

 

Tonight’s Writing Game is our poetry special.

Hosted by regular presenter Avril Joy This month’s Writing Game features Thornaby poet Maureen Almond who bases some of her poetry on the classical Odes of Horace. It’s fascinating to hear how she tells her tales of the shipyards and their people using this sophisticated form. She also talks about the way she started writing poetry in her forties, and how she sets about writing her new poems  - a great insight for new poets.

Then Glynn Wales tells of how he used poetry to inspire a boy in his Ferryhill school to read more deeply and widely. And he reads for us Wilfred Owen’s poem Disabled which has resonance today when are own young soldiers – some from our region - return injured from Afghanistan.

We also hear again from Kathleen Jones talking this time to Avril about her own ventures into poetry. (I’m looking forward to going to the launch of Kathleen’s book about Katherine Mansfield, The Storyteller at Foyles bookshop in London on 21st…)

My regular mentor James is away in London so I put together the final edit in my little cubbyhole studio with the help of my friend Terry Ferdinand who is a very good teacher. I learned lots. He says he’ll show me how to interleave music with the segments next time. I’m looking forward to that as it will make  the whole thing  much smoother. I’m still on my learning curve.

 

I’m also looking forward to listening to Terry’s programme on Bishop FM next Sunday at four o’clock. Check Terry F out on Bishop FM 

And I hope you’ll go to The Writing Game on Bishop FM 

to check out our poetry special

Tonight at 7pm Tuesday 11th January

You might like to know that Terry has made  the podcast

so those outside the area  of you might like to download it

after the broadcast,

A New Journey for The Romancer – she’s now available Online

They say learning new things keep you young. If that’s the case then I’m getting younger every day. On the inside anyway.

The latest is that after something of a journey of discovery i have created a way in which you can from from me in a collector’s  edition through Amazon. Click on One new 7.99 This means it will be available for friends at home and abroad so hooray for that. I’m dying now for someone to give it a try to see if it works, If it does I will do the same for all my books.

I’m just looking round now for something else I need to learn…

wx

First Reader for The Romancer

I was touched to hear from Anne Ousby, who brought a real smile to my face this morning. She’s just reading The Romancer.

‘I've started The Romancer and am finding it gripping. Obviously it's autobiographical but also written as a story - much like your other novels and it seems to me that there's enough distance between the you and 'the girl' to almost forget it's about you. I love the way you've introduced true stories that inspired your novels and woven them into the narrative…’ 

Anne is a playwright, short story writer and now a novelist. A member of our Room To Write conference, she has just brought out her intriguing novel Patterson’s Curse. Anne Ousby  RtW loved her novel and encouraged her in getting it out there, where it’s now selling well.

It’s so heartening for me to get a perceptive reader’s comment on my much loved  hybrid literary creation.

I hope other people out there are reading and enjoying it and would love to hear from them.

Stop Press

I see copies of The Romancer have not yet arrived at Amazon. (Can’t think why …) If you are in a hurry to get one for Christmas for your writer buddies you can get one directly from me (wenrob73@hotmail.com)  Email me with an address and I’ll invoice you and despatch it directly. I’m very keen for people to read it sooner rather than later . wxx

Books In The Snow

by Wendy on December 3rd, 2010

Nine days since the launch of The Romancer and the snow is still unremitting.  It closes in and fogs up the brain. I thought concentration would be easier confined as I am to the house. But no it’s curiously harder.

Still, today I’ve laid down the tracks for the 6th December Writing Game for Bishop FM. It features the inimitable Pat Barker and a choice of Christmas books from friends of the programme.  (James suggests that Bishop FM may apply to put The Writing Game on itunes. A fine thought, just about compensating for the wall of snow – picturesque but imprisoning.)

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CHRISTMAS BOOK SUGGESTIONS FROM FRIENDS OF THE WRITING GAME

Christmas Books on Bishop FM

Recommended by, among others, Pat Barker, Kathleen Jones, Debora, Pat Kidd.  Wendy,and of course, our official reviewers Glynn and Gillian

Frank: The Making of a Legend – Hardcover (4 Nov 2010) by James Kaplan:  Frank Sinatra Lissten to what Glynn says on the programme

Howards End is on the Landing: A year of reading from home by Susan Hill (Paperback - 8 Jul 2010)  ­ Listen to Gillian’s recommendation on the programme

The Singapore Grip – Paperback (1 July 1996) by J.G. Farrell. Listen to lynn’s recommendation on the programme.

Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont (Virago Modern Classics) – Paperback (6 April 2006) by Elizabeth Taylor. Listen to Gillian’s recommendations on the programme.

Recommended separately by Debora in London  and Pat from Morpeth

Wait For Me: Memoirs of the Youngest Mitford Sister by Deborah Devonshire (Hardcover - 7 Sep 2010) The Duchess of Devonshire must be one of the last people alive who met both Adolf  Hitler and J.F.Kennedy. As the youngest of the legendary Mitford sisters, she has witnessed much of the history of the twentieth century from a ringside seat. Her humour shows here, as does her steely stickability; here is a unique patrician voice echiong down to us from the 20^th Century.

Chosen by Biographer Kathleen Jones’  who was featured in our November program. She would like to give:  The Still Point – Paperback (4 Feb 2010) by Amy Sackville  Kathleen  tells us  this  is a marvellous novel.  It’s the writer’s  first and … ‘ so beautifully written I’m in awe.  The way it’s narrated, the reader is like a ghost, haunting the characters, eavesdropping on their lives.  The story concerns a young woman, Julia, in a troubled marriage, whose ancestor was part of an ill-fated expedition to the North Pole leaving his very new wife behind.  The common factor between these two women, separated by time, is the house, which Julia has just inherited, full of artefacts, curiosities, diaries and letters and family history.  The narrative moves from the past to the present, weaving the stories of both relationships together until you come to a surprising, but very satisfactory conclusion.  It’s a marvellous blend of fact and fiction  and it deserved to be short-listed for Orange and Booker prizes, though it didn’t win.  I’m sure she will one day…’

And – to receive – Kathleen chooses -  ‘I would most like to receive Started Early, Took My Dog by Kate Atkinson (Hardcover - 19 Aug 2010)    Kathleen says, ‘Detective fiction is one of my addictions.  Most of it is quite badly written, relying on the strength of the plot to carry the story forward and you read it to solve the puzzles rather than for the beauty of the prose.  But Kate Atkinson is a seriously good writer and prize winner of fiction, so when she began to write detective novels I was in bliss!  The books are such a good read I am always sorry to get to the end.  A new one is a celebration.  So, yes, please, this is one for my Christmas stocking!

Pat Barker – from today’s programme – chooses  Heartstone (Matthew Shardlake 5) by C. J. Sansom (Hardcover - 2 Sep 2010) ‘ The most recent in a crime series set in the reign of Henry 8Th centring on a hunchback lawyer Matthew Shardlake The others are Dissolution, Dark Fire, Sovereign and Revelation. I can recommend all five books – to give and to get – with great enthusiasm. The in depth research never gets in the way of character and plot. Both the historical and invented characters are brilliantly drawn and the narrative pace never lets up. Even if you think you don’t like crime fiction or don’t like historical crime fiction please give this great series a try.

My own choice of  a book to receive is  Kathleen Jones’ Katherine Mansfield: The Story-Teller – Hardcover (30 Nov 2010) . If you remember Kathleen and I talked about this new book in the November Programme. Katherine Mansfield is a tragic and exciting figure – one of the three best ahort story writes of the first half of the 20^th century, As I am studying the short story for the March Room To Write Conference.  I am so  looking forward to reading this.

The book I’d like to give someone is  My Name is Mina by David Almond (Hardcover - 2 Sep 2010). Listeners will remember that David and I  discussed it at length on and early Writing Game. I am such a fan of good writing , in fact, that I would recommend any book by David Almond. Each one is a treasure in it own right. David’s books are marketed as children’s books but they read well at every level of age, sensibility and literary awareness.

And finally  – for Christmand cheer Debora in London Chooses to receive : Comfort and Joy by India Knight (Hardcover - 25 Nov 2010) The good, the bad and the funny sit alongside each other in this wonderful book about love family and Christmas.  This is a laugh out loud book –  enormous fun and perfect escape from  Christmas preparation. One reviewer says, ‘Yes there are stereotypes but they can be funny and comforting – I loved the characters such as Sophie – the mother who makes her own yoghurt, I loved Clara, I loved her funny rants about family, about Christmas, about stuffing the turkey and the ridiculous attempts we all go to to create ‘the perfect Christmas. It all rang horribly true, was laugh out loud funny, warm and somehow kind of glamorous.’ 

As you read through the joy and pain of her Christmas you can see elements of your own family Christmas.

I have to say that the range of books here demonstrate  just how much enjoyment, escapism and delight on offer from Books at Christmas. Even in the snow…

Edit

Snow Follies

I can't play bridge. I don't play tennis. All those things that people learn, and I admire, there hasn't seemed time for. But what there is time for is looking out the window. Alice Munro

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Gilly says she’ll close the cafe when we go.

The snow cranks itself up into a blizzard. People pass by - head down against the white onslaught, conscious of their hero-status. Girl sporting flat blonde hair and leopard spotted fur bustles by.

My  friend wraps up and braves the blizzard to plough her way to the park. Her mission is to take photos of trees  that have strutted their brilliant stuff in the snow for two hundred winters.

I – frightened of slipping - opt to stay by the window, drink a glass of chilled white wine and think about  my new novel which, thank the Lord, is set in sunny France. Nice to contemplate.

Gilly’s friend -  carrying a shovel, wearing work cap and fluorescent jacket  – makes his way to the door. ‘I’ll see youse!’ he says to Gilly.

I follow him through the door  and think of Gilly, clearing the tables and closing the cafe behind me.