Help from the little people...by Sheila Claydon

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So here I am in Australia again, visiting family. We've spent so much time in Sydney over the past few years, and have so many Australian friends, that it's beginning to feel a bit like home. Visiting, socialising and taking care of our little granddaughter does interfere with the writing of course, but not as much as you might think. 

Take 'Remembering Rose,' Book 1 of Mapleby Memories. I started that while I was helping to care for my then 6 month old granddaughter, and finished it when I returned home. It's a time travel romance but guess who one of the main characters is? Yes, a small baby! It wasn't intentional, nor is the fact that  Book 2 (so far only half written) features that same baby starting school, something very integral to the plot. And what did I do today that might influence how I write about that? Well I took my now 3 year old granddaughter to breakfast at her daycare nursery to celebrate Mother's Day (Grannies and other women special to the children always included) and sat with what seemed like a hundred tinies on mini chairs at a mini table - so watch out for something similar down the line in one of my books, maybe Book 2!

Why do we write what we write. Well for me the idea for a book is usually prompted by a chance remark or a newspaper article, or even by noticing someone or something when I'm out and about. How I weave that into a story is an entirely different matter however, and my eldest granddaughter (now old enough to read all my books and be my number one fan) tells me that she can recognise herself and her sister in some of the earlier ones.  Well not them exactly, but their behaviours and comforters. She's absolutely right and yet none of it was intentional. 

It is true that whatever and wherever the setting for a story, we still include what we know and experience, although to allay any suspicions my husband might have if he reads this (unlikely) I hasten to add that the romance is all imaginary:) No experience there at all!!!!

Several of my other books feature children, including 'Empty Hearts' which will be published later this year. The only difference is that this one is a vintage, written and first published in the eighties, so the little boy in it must have been based on my own children!!! Sorry about that guys, but a writer does what she has to do:)

While I am editing that and finishing Book 2 of Mapleby Memories, there is always 'Double Fault' if you like family stories. That also has children at its centre, and how!!!

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CHARACTER OVERLOAD

I recently reviewed a book by an indie author who was a gifted natural story-teller. Her book centered upon a true, long-ago tragedy in a small, tight-knit backwoods town.  Unfortunately, I found the story difficult to follow, because of frequent POV shifts, sometimes as often as every few paragraphs.

 

There was usually a double drop between these shifts, but she also had a habit of changing voice. Sometimes the new POV was first person, sometimes third. Occasionally, I found myself stumbling from first person to third person subjective, followed by bursts of the venerable 18^th Century third person omnipresent. Many of her narrators were unreliable, and there were many, many characters, almost an entire town. Few were well fleshed out. However, each one, Rashomon-like, had a unique piece of information about the pivotal event.

 

As compelling as the story was, I’d have to say "thumbs down." Her tale was interesting and important—and probably remains inflammatory, even years later. People probably still remember where they were on the terrible day when a labor dispute went terribly wrong and police waded into strikers and killed someone.

 

POV shifts are tricky business, even in the hands of more more skillful writers. If I’d been her editor, I know our discussions would have been difficult, because she clearly had problems making a choice about who the main characters were. Although it might have created other difficulties in telling the story, the loss of focus that resulted from all that switching around made my job as a reader far more difficult than any author has a right to ask.  

 

My diagnosis? The story hadn’t jelled when she began to write. In her rush to get the inspiration down, to cover all the bases, she created a huge maze of information and very nearly couldn’t unravel it herself. A novel, (which is, after all, an artificial creation and not reality) needs a core character(s) and a core point of view, a place for a reader to stand among whatever whirligigs of narrative and event the author can contrive. 

 

So, if you are thinking of finally writing “that book,” definitely work out who/what/where/when before you get going. Laying the groundwork, pouring the foundation, you might say, is the place where a writer really ought to start.

 

 

 

 

 

Juliet Waldron

See all my historical novels:

 

http://www.julietwaldron.com

http://bookswelove.net/julietwaldron.php