Tag Archives: indie author

WELSH WRITING WEDNESDAYS: INTRODUCING INDEPENDENT AUTHOR ALIENORA BROWNING

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Writing is, for me, like breathing: I feel oxygen-starved without it, and it has the same natural rhythms, dips and soaring highs. It is also my dominant ‘voice’ since I tend to be a listener, rather than a talker, in many situations.

I do not remember learning to write per se, but I do recall a wonderful ‘Aha!’ moment, when I was five or six, when I suddenly made the connection between the five letters which made up my nickname, its sound and the fact that it was part of me!

I wrote a play when I was eleven – and have it still, neatly written in a little blue exercise book. This was during the summer of 1969, just after my class watched the Moon Landing – and as I waited to start grammar school, having passed the 11+.

I can see that younger self, sitting in the hammock in the back garden, pen in hand, sun shining down on my hunched back, scribbling away – and feel the wave of creative excitement which lifted me up and suspended me, briefly, above the everyday world.

My now-nearly-fifty-year journal-writing habit started by accident (in the sense that I had never thought of such a way of expressing myself until then) in early January 1972.

Two days before my fourteenth birthday, a group of us from my school went to Glasbury, in Wales, for a fortnight of physical activity: climbing, canoeing, camping, gorge-walking and so forth. As part of the course, we were each given a pale green notebook – and asked to keep a diary account of our experiences.

I fell in love with this means of expression immediately – and, while most of the girls loathed having to do it every day, I relished the exercise and very much felt as if I had found my voice, as a girl and as a writer; in fact, so enamoured of it did I become that I ended up filling two green books!

I now have over a hundred volumes of the journal, currently stashed away in a safe space – and use it almost every day (though there are, inevitably, gaps over the years and decades), even writing in it whilst in labour and on the day my son was born!

The novel-writing came upon me towards the end of my time at Aberystwyth University – and early drafts of books won me an honourable mention, a third prize and a first prize in local South West Arts Writers in Progress awards.

Motherhood, marriage and full time teaching very much put the novel-writing side of things on the back burner – and it was only when I took early retirement in 2011 that I was able to complete previous books and write more.

I now have seven books published via Amazon and KDP (all available as both e-books and paperbacks) – and ideas for an eighth are bubbling excitedly away in my creative cauldron.

The truth is very simple: I absolutely love writing – and that intimate, joyous connection between mind, hand, pen and paper never fails to delight and inspire me.

 

 

MULTI-TALENTED WOMEN’S FICTION AUTHOR CAROLINE JAMES ON MENTORING

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I first started writing eight years ago and one of the biggest things that hit me was how lonely a business I’d chosen. Sitting on your own, hour after hour, day after day, was the most isolating thing I had ever done. I had a very busy time in my ‘other working life’ with lots of travel and constant client meetings. Motivating myself to work alone wasn’t easy, combined with internal fears that anything I wrote wouldn’t be good enough and no one would want to read it. It took me a year to write my first novel and as many authors know, the task of submitting with high hopes and expectation soon becomes humiliation. The manuscript was rejected by agents and publishers time after time.

In those days self-publishing was very new to me and I had to learn fast. It became the life-line that ultimately connected me to the publishing world. But I still found it a lonely experience in cyber space. How I longed to be part of publishing a team with meetings, mentoring and lunches and all the fun that other authors seemed to be experiencing once they’d signed that golden contract and committed to a book deal.

Sitting on your bum feeling sorry for yourself achieves nothing, as my mother always told me, so I decided to do something about it. My debut novel had done surprisingly well and reached #3 in women’s fiction on Amazon. This gave me confidence to contact other authors in my area via social media. We set up a group and met every month and the kindness and help I found there was like being wrapped in a warm writing blanket. My life changed and I moved away but I consider two of those authors as very close friends and we still meet to help each other.

The years have moved on and several novels later I am now both traditionally and self-published and during this time I have mentored other authors, who like me in the beginning, hadn’t a clue where to start. Little did I know the huge importance of for example, editing or of having a social media profile and the zillion things that a savvy author in 2020 needs to get a grip of.

It began with a couple of authors, through Facebook, asking for advice. The hand-holding process began and it felt good to be able to give something back and watch the blossoming process develop as they realised their writing dream and ultimately produced their very own novel. Now, I have put together a group of other like-minded writing professionals who want to give something back and through a small business community we mentor, motivate and give of our time to help authors who are in the very same position that I naively found myself in when I first started writing. It does surprise me that with all the information freely available on the internet that this is something that is in demand. But I know how it feels to be on your own, wondering if you are good enough to write and if you can trust your instincts. Having a comforting virtual hand on your shoulder saying, ‘Yes, you can and this is how you can do it,’ is a very empowering process and I am hugely humbled to be in a position where I can offer help to anyone who asks and has the determination to achieve their writing dream.

 

Find out more about Caroline at https://www.carolinejamesauthor.co.uk/

 

 

SISTER SCRIBES GUEST: JESSIE CAHALIN ON LIVING THE DREAM

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I first became aware of Jessie when this amazing blog appeared, featuring books in handbags, but it was some time before we met, introduced by the lovely Angela Petch at an RNA conference. There is a certain symmetry between us; she is a Yorkshire author living in Cardiff, and I am a Cardiff author living in Cornwall. That, and the fact she is a wonderfully giving and collaborative person, makes me consider her a Sister Scribe.

 

When I reached my mid forties, I realised my career ambition had overshadowed my creativity.  Stuck on a treadmill of administration, I signed off educational action points for teachers but had not achieved any of my own goals.  Days started at 6am and ended at midnight.  Fuelled with coffee, I survived on very little sleep, but my life-long dream to write a novel haunted me.  A health scare prompted me to grab time for myself and take control of my destiny.

Characters hassled me for years and it was time to set them free in my novel, ‘You Can’t Go It Alone’.  I tapped away on my laptop keyboard for six months; it was fun to finally meet the characters. At times, their behaviour shocked me, but they showed me there is more to life than action planning and policy making. Sophie, a character in the novel, showed me the importance of the simple things in life.  She also made me smile again.

Writing improved my wellbeing, and I wanted to learn more about the craft.  I sought the advice of a professional editor and engaged in cutting, cutting and shaping. Novel completed, I closed my laptop, ticked off one point on my bucket list, and hopped back on to my life. I mused that I would re-read my words again one day.

Unbeknown to me, my husband read the manuscript of ‘You Can’t go It Alone’.  He published the novel, without my knowledge, as he knew I would dilly dally. He threw me into the world of indie publishing.  It shocked me, but I decided to grab the opportunity and make connections with the writing and reading community via a blog and social media.  Initially, the aim of my blog was to share book reviews of all the books that had resonated with me over the years. I named the blog Books in my Handbag as all my books are on the kindle, in my handbag.

Playing on the theme of handbags, I tweeted photos of my novel in my handbag. Overwhelmed with the positive comments about the photo, I realised it would be fun to ask authors to send their photos. I developed the Handbag Gallery to showcase the authors’ books and provide a unique boost to the marketing of hundreds of authors. I now have almost fourteen thousand followers on Twitter, and the photos of book in handbags are always a hit.

The Handbag Gallery connected me to lots of authors, and they have supported me with the writing process and promotion.  With pearls of wisdom from indie and traditionally published authors and hard work, I achieved bestseller rankings across UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.  I was third in contemporary women’s fiction in Canada. The day my book was placed beside Margaret Atwood, I felt as if the stars had aligned.

Last year, I moved beyond virtual connections with authors reached out to the Romance Novelists’ Association. It is wonderful to meet with authors in the local RNA chapter and became a member of the New Writers’ Scheme.  I don’t know what the future holds for ‘Loving You’ because I am exploring benefits of the traditional and indie publishing routes.  I have started my third novel and have been offered opportunities to write articles in magazines My experience shows you do have to speculate to accumulate.  I am celebrating three years of my blog and living the dream in writerly heaven. Moreover, I have taken control of my health and wellbeing.

Wishing everyone the strength to follow their dreams.

 

Visit Jessie’s website at http://www.JessieCahalin.com    or follow her on Twitter @BooksInHandbag

THE TRUTH ABOUT BULLYING – ALEXANDER WALLIS

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Jane Cable: Last week I received an email from an author I used to know when I lived in Chichester. I remembered him as a warm and principled man, a youth worker who’d written a fantasy book with a moral message. He’d contacted me to let me know he’d written a novel about bullying, aimed at teenagers and children. Not my normal read, but I clicked the link to I H8 Bullies anyway. Then I clicked on ‘look inside’. I read two pages and I was compelled, yes, compelled, to buy it.

It’s written from the point of view of a teenage lad in rich yet accessible language. The voice rings true. Alex’s blurb says it’s written for kids who don’t like books, and at only 66 pages short I can believe it. I also think it should be compulsory reading. Which is why I asked Alex to write this article for Frost.

 

The truth about bullying is that it can rarely be stopped.

The act of undermining others is a survival strategy – however maladaptive – which feeds vampiric ego at the target’s cost. Its excesses are applauded by those who don’t want to be next in the firing line and whose silence (or laughter) serve to timidly collude. Organisations enable rather than contain its flourishing, hierarchical lines supporting those who narcissistically abuse their power.

Nowhere can bullying be better studied than in a school, where adolescence stirs thicker the drama and thinner the consequences. A fully-stocked armoury is available to the teenager who bullies, from opportunity to physically aggress (within the relatively less punitive micro-society of the school discipline system), to ample places to regularly do it and the chance to capture and further torment on social media.

School anti-bullying programmes lean towards ‘awareness raising’, as if this phenomena is not already deeply understood. Since Goliath took up against David, humans have recognised that superior size, privilege or opportunity presents the risk of some throwing their weight around more than they should.

Interviewing students helped me to better understand the experience from the target’s view. Bullying somehow forces an intense self-examination, our own inner critic immediately jumping ship to add to the gang of detractors. Targeted students were not just conscious of the way they looked, but made to think deliberately of how they walked or talked. Thrown into a deep self-critique which often stemmed from an already sensitive and self-conscious life position.

When I began writing I H8 Bullies, my thoughts were initially on my own school experience, decades earlier. Old school bullying more often took the form of a thump to the ear, a pounding by some bigger boys (which we had sometimes provoked) and, at worst, the wave of a penknife.

Bullying feels more enduring and emotionally damaging now. Social media provides means to shame a person that is only limited by the imagination and which can endure long beyond the school bell. It can follow a person from place to place, preserving images better forgotten.

Sometimes the only factor under a target’s control is how they themselves react (or don’t). The quiet dignity of preserving your own values, even if you are still discovering for yourself what you think and feel. Bullying can rarely be stopped but it can be survived. It is about winning the battle within, and that is what the story of I H8 Bullies is all about.

Alexander Wallis is a youth worker for Sussex Against Bullying and the author of I H8 Bullies.

 

 

INTRODUCING SISTER SCRIBES: JANE CABLE

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This isn’t an easy post to write. If you’re a Frost regular, then you probably know who I am. On the other hand our readership is increasing all the time, so you could well never have heard of Jane Cable.

The first thing to say is I’ve recently been given the role of Contributing Editor at Frost and I’m feeling a bit of a fraud. If anything, having dragged my Sister Scribes on board (not that all of them were kicking and screaming) I’ll be ‘contributing’ even less this year. But it will allow me to spread my wings a little and write more about some of the other things I love… like history, travel, food and drink.

I’m also feeling a bit of a fraud about describing myself as a full time writer, because the reality is I generally spend about half the time writing (or marketing, or all the other bits and bobs associated with it) that I would do if I had a genuine full time job. But actually I want to enjoy life too.

I’m in my fifties (and proud of it… prouder than I am of the parentheses which are plaguing every paragraph) and my OH and I have worked really hard in the corporate world and in our own business since we graduated. Rather than continue at such a pace we decided to kick back and in 2017 we downsized to Cornwall and it was the best thing we ever did.

I’m a total advocate of the lifestyle down here. Not the part holidaymakers would necessarily see, but the everyday world of the everyday people. Very few live to work – most work about enough to live. Nobody’s bothered what you do or what sort of car you drive. As long as you say thank you when they give way to you. And once you sink back into the ‘manana with breaks for pasties’ timescale of anything getting done then it’s a dream.

So where am I in my writing career? I brought out two books independently with a reasonable degree of success, but after a false start with a publisher that went bust I now have a two book deal with Sapere. They are a joy to work with (saying that, I haven’t had my first edit notes yet so time will tell), collaborative and co-operative. They also do their best to bring their authors together, and I’m a great one for that.

Little did I know how influential attending the Romantic Novelists’ Association conference in 2017 would be in terms of finding writer friends. For me by far the most valuable part of the weekend was time spent with other authors and through social media we kept in touch. I was delighted to find that Kitty Wilson lived in Cornwall (although the rat bag has since moved to Bristol) and when Cassandra Grafton came here on a research trip we all met up.

From this meeting the idea of organising our own mini retreat/girls’ break was formed. We invited along Susanna Bavin and Kirsten Hesketh (who’d we also met at the RNA conference) and the rest, as they say, is history and after four days in Bath we’d become Sister Scribes.

There are probably a few other things you need to know about me that sometimes surprise people. I used to freelance as a cricket writer and I love the game. I’m Welsh by birth and fiercely proud of it. And if I couldn’t write it would feel as though my hands had been cut off. Actually, it would probably be because my hands had been cut off…

Follow Jane on Twitter @JaneCable

 

BUSINESS OF BOOKS: FIRST, LAST, EVERYTHING – FACT & FICTION AUTHOR ANYA ACRES

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What was the first piece of writing advice you were given?

Well, that’s a very interesting question really, as my writing style is kind of self-taught. I write because I enjoy it. My mum kept all my old school books from the age of five, believe you me, there are a lot, and there are so many stories! I used to write and write and write! Anything from diaries, letters, postcards, children’s stories and young adult stories. My stories are never planned, and they usually ‘pop’ into my head when I’m asleep. I made the mistake once, of turning over, thinking I’d remember my ideas in the morning – I didn’t! I never made that mistake again! I guess, in answer to your question, is what my son was told at school, ‘write what you know’.

 

What is the most recent advice you gave, or were given?

Since I self-published my first book, ‘Ollie Discovers the Planets’, I was told by a traditional-published author, to never pay a publisher, they should pay you! It was very wise advice, and I would never have entered into the world of self-publishing without it. It’s a wonderful world to be in, and I love marketing and promoting my own book. I have found within me, a confidence that I never knew I had! I provide author visits and Skype-chats to schools worldwide (Serbia, Australia and Qatar so far), and my book was only published in January of this year!

 

 

What piece of advice would you most like to pass on?

If you are a self-published author, I highly recommend that you market your book way in advance of its release date. Make a website (mine is www.olliediscovers.co.uk), enter the world of social media, approach bookshops and local newspapers, so even before the book is in your hand, people know about it, and are waiting to buy it. Approach book bloggers (some charge a small fee), asking if they’d mind reviewing your book. Don’t be afraid to give away free books, and I advise sending freebies to teachers & parents with lots of Twitter/Instagram/Facebook followers. It sounds a little contrived, but you are after all, giving away a free copy of your book! If people ‘like’ or ‘share’ your posts, be polite and thank them, as they’ll be more inclined to do it again! I could actually write a book on how to market your book on social media . . . maybe that should be my next book!!!!

 

Anya Acres is the author of ‘Ollie Discovers the Planets’. A book she scribbled down on paper 20 years ago, for a reception class during a teaching practice in Derbyshire. It is unique, as it is both ‘fact & fiction’, which is a great tool or ‘hook’ to start a curriculum topic with young children. After being made redundant from a teaching job she loved, in 2017, she hunted out her handwritten copy, and decided that it was a ‘now or never’ moment! With a huge amount of support from her husband and two young sons, Anya decided to pursue her dream; to be a children’s author.

‘Ollie Discovers the Dinosaurs’ will be released in the Autumn, and ‘Ollie Discovers the Arctic’ will be released in 2019.

 

 

BUSINESS OF BOOKS: FIRST, LAST, EVERYTHING – ROMANCE AUTHOR CASSANDRA GRAFTON

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What was the first writing advice you were ever given?

If I think back to when I started to seriously consider writing full-length stories, the first piece of advice I recall was ‘just keep putting the words on the page’. After all, you can’t polish and edit a blank page, can you?

At the time, I’d only ever completed short stories, mostly co-written, for online communities. A solo writing project was a challenge in itself, but I didn’t really think of it as ‘writing a novel’ because of the serial nature of posting online.

It was the encouragement (and above advice) from those communities that helped me to get started, and it’s down to their on-going support and feedback that I managed to keep going, no matter what life threw at me. I just kept putting one word after the other, until eventually I’d finished telling the story I wanted to share.

 

Photo copyright is Adrea Scheidler Photography

What was the most recent writing advice you were given?

I follow a lot of writing blogs on Twitter, and many of them have wonderful snippets of advice, one of the most practical of which in recent months was about removing redundant words from your manuscript.

I discovered there were plenty of lists out there, once I’d put ‘redundant words in your novel’ into Google, and soon I was working my way through my extremely long manuscript and culling them (thank you, Word, for the Search and Replace function). In the end, nearly 10,000 redundant words sailed off into the blue yonder; not one of them was missed!

It turns out, however, that my biggest overuse of anything is not a specific word, but a punctuation mark. It was pointed out to me at a writing retreat last year that I need to ‘kill the exclamation mark.’ When I looked into it, I was appalled by how often I used them. I did, indeed, have a bit of a fetish going on. Hopefully, I’ve managed to keep them to a minimum in this blog post!

 

What is the piece of advice you’d most like to pass on?

There are variations on these words, but it boils down “don’t wait for your boat to come in; row out to meet it”.

It’s something I wish I’d taken on-board (if you’ll excuse the pun) earlier in my life. It can, of course, relate to all aspects of life, but with regard to my writing, it translates into this: Don’t let time slip away from you.

I’d wanted to write all my life, but always I made excuses: “no time, children to look after, piles of marking to get through, got to work late, too tired”. Even when the children were teenagers and didn’t need the same level of attention, even when I had an unexpected year of not having to work full time, always I seemed to have an excuse for actually sitting down and doing it.

I was 50 before the realisation struck that I needed to heed this advice – when it almost felt too late. I’d had a recent run-in with cancer, which led to a couple of rather unpleasant years, and as my milestone birthday approached, I started to re-evaluate my life. If I didn’t get my act together and produce a book sometime soon, perhaps I would never fulfil my lifelong dream?

It would be another year (2013) before I finally took the plunge into publishing my first novel. The story had been seven years in the making, for all the aforementioned reasons, but I did it.

It had still been a challenge. I was working full time, long hours, and any writing time was limited to weekends and holidays (thankfully I have a very patient and supportive husband, who would hoover around my chair at weekends as I sat at the computer, or read the paper in a pub when we were on holiday as I scribbled away at scenes in my notebook).

In more recent years, having moved to Switzerland and no longer having a day job, I have had the time to write, but still I procrastinate. My New Year’s Resolution this year was to treat my writing like a job, not a hobby, and I’m improving, but there’s a way to go yet.

So please don’t do as I do, do as I say: don’t let the time slip away from you!

 

Cassandra has published two historical romances and has co-written and published a contemporary cosy mystery/romance. She is currently working on a series of contemporary feel-good romances set in Cornwall. She loves traveling, reading, cats and dry wine and splits her time between Switzerland, where she lives with her husband, and England, where she lives with her characters.

 

https://cassandragrafton.com

BUSINESS OF BOOKS: FIRST, LAST EVERYTHING – MENTOR AND NOVELIST CATHIE HARTIGAN

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What was the first piece of publishing advice you received?

The first piece of publishing advice I received wasn’t offered directly, but came in the form of a question. It was over ten years ago now and I was in my first one-to-one with an agent. After she set the timer ticking for ten minutes, and put it on the table between us, she said. ‘Tell me, when do you write?’ This took me completely by surprise; but I understood that she was looking for my commitment to being a professional author.

It also reinforced in my mind, that publishing is an industry, and unless you are that very rare literary writer who sells in large numbers, the commercial market is very likely to want you to write one, or even two books a year.

My answer to the agent by the way was all the time. Not that she took me on. I was disappointed at the time, but thankful now. I had yet to finish my first novel, and I’ve learned a great deal since.

 

What was the most recent publishing advice you gave or received?

Don’t be in a hurry to self-publish. I’m often approached for advice on the back of my own self-publishing success with my debut novel Secret of the Song. It’s impossible to predict how a book will fare once it’s out in the world. I was very fortunate, but I was also well connected within the writing community, as a creative writing teacher, co-author of a successful textbook, and organiser of the Exeter Novel, Story and Flash prizes. I feel sad for people who put so much effort into writing a novel, and then see it become plankton in the ocean of books available. Having said that, self-publishing can be a brilliant option for books that have a limited, but ready-made market, such as family memoirs or books about very niche subjects.

 

What is the piece of advice you’d most like to pass on?

If you’re going to self-publish, it’s important to go through the same steps as a mainstream publisher would prior to publication. Think carefully before using free resources unless you’re convinced about the result. It’s usually worth paying professionals for edits, proofing and cover design.

 

Cathie Hartigan is a novelist and founder of www.creativewritingmatters.co.uk which offers a range of services for writers, including competitions, mentoring and manuscript appraisals. Cathie’s novel, Secret of the Song, was recently shortlisted for the inaugural Hall & Woodhouse Dorchester Literary Festival Writing Prize.