Rewrite a Novel or let it Die? by Diane Scott Lewis

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Years ago I read a novel called Desiree and became interested in Napoleon, especially in his exile on the strange island of St. Helena. I started to research this exile and found numerous resources at the Library of Congress (in those Dark Ages days before the internet). One resource would lead me to another, one book published at the very time, 1817, Napoleon was on the island (1815-1821). The description of the odd landscape, flora and fauna of St. Helena, a remote volcanic atoll in the South Atlantic fascinated me.

Approach to St. Helena

I’d lived on Guam for a few years, so understood the isolation of an island in the middle of nowhere.

A story formed in my head, and my alternate-history novel began to take shape. What if Napoleon met a woman on St. Helena, and rallied to escape his exile?  I worked for years on this book, even corresponding with a Napoleonic scholar who had visited the island four times. I read dairies of Napoleon’s servants who’d accompanied him there, plus information from his English captors who held him prisoner under the strictest of circumstances.

I wanted to humanize this much-written about man, without bending the facts too far—other than the escape of course!

I finally sold the book to a small on-line press and was thrilled. Until I saw the price they put on my ebook. As an unknown author, few would pay that inflated price, so the book languished.

I was so enamored of my own research, that to salvage some of it, I wrote a short novel that took place on St. Helena, A Savage Exile, in which I added vampires to the mix.

Next year my contract with the other publisher will be up, and I’m dying to rewrite the original book and present it to my current publisher. But now my ideas have changed. I want to replace my heroine with another, older, smarter woman, change the dynamics, and shorten this very long book. I have misgivings about the rewrites. Should I forget about it? It seems I’m constantly rehashing this story, but then again all those years of research going to waste!

St. Helena map, 1815

We’ll see how the summer goes, as I’m working on a time-travel at the moment. I might electronically drag out that dusty tome and hack away and see what happens. (in fact, I’ve already started).



For more information about my books, please visit my website:
http://www.dianescottlewis.org

Part Two . . . To Quire by Victoria Chatham

  

In my last post I looked at the development of the fountain pen. In this post I’m addressing another part of the writing experience equation – paper. Where would we be without either?

We have the Chinese to thank for the art of paper making, possibly even 200 years earlier than the recorded 105 BC. Ts’ai Lun, an official at the Imperial Court so history tells us, became fascinated with the nests of wasps and bees. Inspired by their industry, he pounded mulberry bark into a sheet, let it dry and then wrote on it. This first experiment was improved with the addition of rags, hemp and old fishing nets a ll soaked together in water, the fibers then beaten into a pulp and strained through a cloth sieve onto a drying frame. Court officials were now able to discard the heavy and unwieldy bamboo strips or expensive silk previously used for writing. With the invention of woodblock printing circa 600 AD it was no wonder that by 740 AD China had its first printed newspaper.

Paper was used not only for writing, but also wrapping and padding, toilet paper and tea bags. Have you ever wondered how long paper money has been around?  The government of the Song Dynasty was the first to issue it. The earliest piece of paper, inscribed with a map and found at Fangmatan in Gansu province, dates from 179-41 BC while the earliest recorded woodblock printed book was the Diamond Sutra (Perfection of Wisdom) of 868 CE found at Dunhuang. The British Library states ‘it is the earliest complete survival of a dated printed book’.

The art of papermaking was a closely kept secret but it was inevitable that along with spices, jade, lapis lazuli and the lucrative silk that gave the route its name, knowledge of paper   made its way along the Silk Road. In 8^th century Samarkand a water-mill was first used in the paper making process, a process that was repeated across the Arabic world and then medieval Europe. Modern papermaking began in earnest in the 19^th century with the invention of the Fourdrinier machine, capable of producing rolls rather than sheets of paper. In 1844 inventors Charles Fenerty, a Canadian and F.G. Keller, a German, developed a machine that used wood pulp and forever changed the face of papermaking.

Paper is produced in many weights and sizes. We are all familiar with letter, legal, ledger and tabloid sizes. Some of these sizes have names such as Post, Crown and Double Demy. Imperial UK sizes include Antiquarian and Grand Eagle. The old adage ‘against the grain’ comes from the paper making industry for, if paper is folded against its grain, it can crack along the fold. The heavier the paper the more cracking will occur. A ream is 500 sheets of paper and a quire 1/20^th of that, or 25 sheets of paper.

The word paper is commonly considered to derive from the papyrus plant, used by the Ancient Egyptians. The pith of the plant is processed quite differently and produces a heavier type of paper. Animal skins have been used throughout the centuries as a writing medium. Vellum is produced from calfskin, the very best being produced from unborn or stillborn animals. Today quality vellum is hard to find and expensive but is still produced in the UK by the family business of William Cowley of Newport Pagnell, Buckinghamshire. Established in 1870 they still use traditional methods passed down by word of mouth and use skills that are virtually unchanged for 2000 years. Parchment is a term for skins prepared from other animals such as horses, cows, deer and pigs. Today there is a form of vellum made from plasticized cotton.

One of the reasons I love old books is the paper they are printed on. As Helene Hanff writes in 84 Charing Cross Road, ‘I’m almost afraid to handle such soft vellum and heavy cream colored pages. Being used to the dead-white paper and stiff cardboardy covers of American books, I never knew a book could be such a joy to the touch’. The most expensive book I ever purchased for myself was an illustrated edition of Kenneth Grahame’s Wind in the Willows. The grain in the paper is definitely a joy to touch.

I still like to have quality writing paper to hand, for those occasions when I actually take pen to paper for a letter at Christmas or a thank-you note. At one time I had my own design embossed letterhead notepaper but that was before the advent of the computer when letter writing was still fashionable and mail arrived twice daily Monday to Friday and on Saturday mornings.

In spite of technology, paper is still a big part of our lives. From official documents to brown grocery bags and parking or speeding tickets, it is not likely to go away any time soon. How does paper feature in your life? Do you like your magazines from the store, or online? Or both? The next time you handle a piece of paper, give some thought as to how it reached you. You may be surprised.

For more about Victoria and her books go to:

www.bookswelove.com/chatham.php
www.victoriachatham.webs.com
www.amazon.com/author/victoriachatham
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I'm remembering Daddy On Father's Day By Sandy Semerad

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What do Dads want on Father’s Day?

The number one answer, according to a recent survey, is spending time with family and loved ones. Number two is clothing. Beer is number three.

This survey may not be scientific, but I agree with the number one answer. I wish I could have spent more time with my Dad.

As a child, I was afraid of monsters and would often sneak into my parents’ bed at night. After I fell asleep, Daddy would carry me back to my bed. One time he didn’t.

That was the night he died. I was seven.

The next morning, I found Mama crying in the living room. Our house was full of people. Many of them were crying also.

“Where’s Daddy,” I asked Mother.

“He’s gone away,” she said.

Daddy looked handsome in the shiny casket, but asleep. I didn’t understand he wouldn’t wake up. He died of a heart attack, I was told.

Before Daddy died, he’d complained of a backache, and I remember he came home early one afternoon to rest his back. Mama told me not to bother him.

But I couldn’t resist. I sat on his bed and chattered away, as he puffed on a cigarette. I can still see his pack of Camels on the bed stand.

Daddy rarely came home early. He worked most of the time. He wanted to give us the so-called finer things in life: a large brick home, a fishing pond, a swimming pool, tennis courts and our own merry-go-round.

Friends from Geneva, Alabama who knew Daddy, called him--Ira Hodges--an entrepreneur. He owned Hodges hardware in the heart of town, but before he married Mama and moved to Geneva, he was a Texas wildcatter--an oilman.

One of my Geneva friends, John Savage, who as a teen worked with Daddy, said he thought Daddy seemed too big for a small town.

But Daddy loved Geneva, Mama said. He’d often give credit on a handshake, and he helped many people in need.

Daddy once repaired the broken windows in a family’s house for free. “It was freezing and we couldn’t afford to pay,” the father of the family told me.

Many years after Daddy passed, I spotted a strange figure, wandering around our house. I froze in fear. Mama wasn’t home at the time.

I called police before I realized the man wasn’t a stranger at all. He used to work for Daddy, but had since moved away from the area. He didn’t know Daddy had died, he said.

“Whenever I needed work, Mr. Ira would always give me some,” the man said.

I’ve told my daughters and granddaughter this story and other stories about Daddy. I want them to know he was compassionate. He helped people and gave generously of his time and money. I only wish he could have shared more of his time with us.

I’ve missed not having him in our lives, and on this Father’s Day, I wanted to pay tribute to him. #Father’sDay.

To find out more, go here: www.sandysemerad.com

My novels: http://www.amazon.com/Sandy-Semerad/e/B003ONTN4Y/ref=sr_tc_2_0?qid=1434228601&sr=1-2-ent