Miscellaneous writings 1

April 2016

At this age one's fantasies change.  I don't imagine having chance romantic encounters.  My fantasy is about driving to a pub that's off the beaten track and meeting by chance a long lost old friend, and having a long, warm, deep conversation with him (yes, it's a him); that middle-aged "What do you think of the show so far?" conversation.

Sadly this pub is bereft of such an encounter, but it has a lot of young couples having dinner together, well three.  It's a very nice pub, full of period charm and cream, verdigris and moss green paint; very Farrow and Ball.

I now realise that the glorious chords of harp music are actually someone's mobile.  It's very tasteful.

The food arrives and smells gorgeous, and this, with a glass of Chablis is not going to cost more than the cinema ticket, glass of wine and average sarni I would have had at the Gulbenkian.

As I sit here I think about the new novel idea.  I have three ideas on the go at the moment, and I have a lot of ideas for this one, The Dog-Walkers' Book Club.  I know too very angry and bitter women, both of whom are also intermittently charming and friendly.  Neither of them can stand too much kindness and need to be put into the book. Both of them sting like scorpions when they have had enough of your kindness and are capable of turning people against you.  I recently had a conversation with a man I know slightly, explaining why he had never been especially friendly to me.  I do wonder how many people are wandering around thinking I am a complete bitch.  I suppose when they meet me and find me agreeable, they have to downgrade their assessment from "utter bitch" to merely "two-faced".  

I have also been thinking about the saintly woman with the epileptic child - she could be inserted into this too.  Maybe I should write it as a series of stories from each character's POV.  No doubt there will be more thoughts to come on this.

What happened about that publisher?

Ah yes, there was the promise of a "strong recommendation" to a publisher.   Well, she backtracked, but for a good reason.  The publisher under discussion has a tricky habit of acquiring your world rights and then not exploiting them... so you could have a bestseller in Ireland, but the rest of the world would remain ignorant of you.  This happened to a friend of mine... so it was decided that I would try and get some other, more reasonable, publishers to take an interest.  There are several small Irish publishers that will look at unagented books, and there are only about six agents there, of which only one is really active, i.e. has a website and an email address, two of the others have email addresses, the rest are wedded to snail mail.   So much for the Celtic Tiger - more like the Celtic Carrier Pigeon.   Sorry, not being rude, perhaps all that sort of development got stalled in the crash of 2008.  The Irish were terribly stymied after that, and are really only just recovering.  Besides, that sort of personal, quite intimate business model works well in a small country where there are only a couple of degrees of separation between people.

Same old same old.

Yes, that's a really enticing title for a blog post isn't it, chums?

The results of my last batch of submissions are as follows  Answer pending: 3,  Rapid rejection: 1.  and one silent rejection.   The RR was welcome, "not for me... wish you well"... in other words the "Other Agents may think Differently" letter.  I also received a rejection from a November 2015 submission - which said  "it just wasn't exactly what I was looking for" which gives the comforting (or distressing) impression that if I'd moved the plot a couple of inches to the left I might have hooked her.

It is important to remember that the agents who spend the most time on social media are not necessarily the Best Agents - just the ones who are perhaps more egotistical... of course that could make them great agents if they have taken your MS to heart.   They are however, likely to be the agents who respond most slowly. I do appreciate the quick rejection, almost as much as a request for a full read.   No hanging around hoping.

Yesterday I sent out another batch, two to US agents, one to a UK agent.  I think the 6 week period of grace required by Mulcahy is a bit unrealistic in this world.  They had two weeks of near solitary enjoyment of my presence in their slush pile - (the other agent I sent it to did the silent rejection on me.) so now they are in fierce competition to ignore it with another UK agent, and there will be more.

Weirdly I was encouraged by this You Tube video - Piers Blofeld (related to Henry?) is an agent who makes occasional videos about publishing and agenting matters.  I saw them all, and particularly enjoyed this one, since it is germane to my situation.   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aduzco1VJZE   He goes through why he will reject a handful of MSS - and I realised why TRF probably didn't pass the "So what?" test with a lot of agents.  It's only a few minutes, but it's enlightening.

Progress

I have been feeling ebulliently cheerful today.  I have momentarily been convinced that The Malice of Fairies is going to really appeal to some of these publishers and agents.  I have sent it off to a UK publisher, a UK agent and two US agents today.  The UK agent would appreciate time to consider the book without feeling other agents are also in the race.  That is a charming idea, and if it means they will take it, then great.  However I suspect it will just mean their reader has a more leisurely period for dismissing it in.

Since it's nearly full moon, here's one I took in September

Agents are so different - there are clearly some who go through their own inboxes and answer rapidly, and others who farm everything out to readers, who may or may not reflect the agent's wishlist.  And then again, those wishlists, they are so full of things that ring a bell, that make one feel a common bond with the agent, which the agent doesn't really recognise when looking at your submission.  For some reason I don't have much hope of Head of Zeus, mostly because they seem to publish more thrillers than anything else.  They say they publish literary/commercial etc. so there's no reason why they shouldn't.  Especially a literary/commercial novel with magical elements that will appeal to everyone, and is set in Ireland - a place revered around the world for general magic and mystery.  There is another publisher called "& Other Stories" which sounds feasible - but might actually be too literary for me...  There's nothing very experimental about TMOF except the subject.

Damn it, someone out there must publish it sooner or later.  I really believe in it, but there's always the nagging voice that says "well no one's liked it so far".  Apparently one failure of human intellect is to assume the future will be like the past.  I have to assume, quite strongly, that it will not be. But I have always believed in the possibility of change and this is how I persist. 

The Cast List!

Today I am still slightly in Limbo... first I can't do submissions until I get the full text back, secondly I suddenly started doing a bit of a new novel - working title "An Instant Dislike".  My mojo went awol for a few days, for health reasons, but has mercifully returned  A sunny day works wonders.   So, having done 4,000 words of An Instant Dislike over two days, I went out this morning, to Spanish, then we went into town because it was a lovely sunny day and we had a couple of cheques to pay in.  And then it was nearly lunchtime - so we had a small lunch at  the Arches bar, and a small glass of rose (first of the season!).

Then we came home and walked up the dreaded Jacob's Ladder - it killed me, but I did it.  Then I felt inspired and gardened for about half an hour in the sunshine.  Feel much, much better.  Where is the writing coming in?   No, there was no writing today.  I got into a completely frivolous correspondence with my editor about who would play various parts in the film of TMoF - we have already cast Connor - Sylvain Dieuaide (left) and Tadgh - Theo Cholbi (below).

We have basically agreed that Olivia Coleman would be nice for Deirdre, although perhaps too nice?  And Jeremy Irons would be OK for Philopoemen.   Suddenly I realise that there are quite a lot of good meaty parts, and why the hell am I not (a) working on the script and (b) working on The Ash Grove or (c) writing another 2,000 words of An Instant Dislike (which doesn't get italicised because it is a whim rather than a book at present).  But today has just been one of those slightly larky, chatty self indulgent days that have to happen occasionally in one's life.  So I should just enjoy it, and I have, and try and do some serious work tomorrow.

Also, it is of course St. Patrick's day today, so I'm allowed to do something frivolously Irish.  It has just occurred to me, why did the Church chose 17th March to be St. Patrick's?  In the old calendar would it have fallen around the vernal equinox (which may have had pagan significance?).

katehamlyn.com

I have a website.  I took advice from Ruth Rollason of Marmalade Design who came and held my hand through the process, and I realised, yet again, how incredibly fortunate I am in my friends.

The website is chiefly to act as a calling card to agents and publishers, to show that I am serious!  

Thanks to Tara I had decent versions of 3 book covers (she smartened up the Blarney cover picture for me) and so on the whole, the whole thing looks pretty professional.  It is slightly marred by the photo of me, but photos of me are pretty grim on the whole (unless they show me under 25).

So, I need to Google myself and see if it comes up now.

"Serious interest"

After a very quiet time, during which "The Malice of Fairies" seemed stuck in agents' inboxes, I sent a plea to G. who edited "The Ash Grove" for me.  I only wanted her to say what I was doing wrong with the submission letter, had I taken the wrong approach and so on.  She went the next few miles as well, edited it, commented extensively, and best of all "adored" it.  She has said that once we have finished editing it, she will "strongly recommend" it to her publisher.  This is incredibly exciting, and is the beginning of a process which I hope will lead to greater things...

However, there is every chance that (a) publisher will still turn it down or (b) offer me a poor contract  or (c) not market it well.   So I am beginning to think about how to market it myself.  I just wrote a review on Amazon  ://www.amazon.co.uk/review/R2KFMJ1K4Y8MCD/ref=pe_1572281_66412651_cm_rv_eml_rv0_rv
and managed to insert a reference to The Malice of Fairies in it, I suppose that's allowed, although the book isn't out yet, I hope by the time someone reads that review it will be.

I need to do a website fairly urgently.  I really ought to get help and learn useful skills like Photoshop, but the question is, when?  I do need a website now though.  Have to get help!