Joined up writing...by Sheila Claydon

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In my last post I wrote about finding a story, and about the trigger that prompts my imagination sufficiently to write a book. It can be a picture in a magazine, or a holiday, or an article in a local newspaper for example. I also talked about my next book, due out in June 2022 which, while it still doesn't have a title, is the final story in my Mapleby Memories trilogy, and how this is proving more problematic because, whatever the trigger, it has to tie in with the first two books Remembering Rose and Loving Ellen. 

And that is the reason I have a collection of triggers on the back burner. Ideas and pictures that I save until the right story comes along, which in this case is a 600 year old water mill that I chanced upon hidden in woodland. If you have read either of the Mapleby books you will know that they are a mixture of romance, fantasy and history, so a very old mill seemed just the ticket. And when I started this was very definitely the case. The first couple of chapters came easily, as did the main characters, and I was very quickly able to introduce them to some of the characters from the earlier books. Then suddenly, out of nowhere, I was stuck.

I had the back story, the characters and the geography, and I knew how I wanted the story to develop, but I couldn't make it work. Because it was summer and because there was plenty of time before publication I stepped back for several weeks, hoping all would become clear when I started writing again. It didn't! So what to do?

Slowly a possible solution dawned. Instead of writing as I usually do, from the beginning of the book to the end, I was going to have to separate the plot into character led sections, write each one separately, and wait for the right time to join them up.

So right now I have Sophie, the main protagonist, in 3 separate places in 3 different time zones, interacting with 3 different groups of people, and somehow I have to make sense of all of it. Confusing? Maybe, but it has unblocked the writing process. The 'Sophie in the immediate past' section I'm working on at the moment is flowing easily, and because I am typing it up in red I won't confuse it with the 'Sophie in the here and now' section which is in black, or the 'Sophie in the distant past' section which is in blue.

Also I think the joining up process will be interesting and as I always like a challenge, satisfying, when it eventually works. I do think the book will require a bit more editing than usual though and I still have to find a way to link Sophie to the long ago people who worked in the mill. I can 'see' them and 'hear' them but to go back 600 years requires an enormous leap in culture, geography and social mores. Fortunately I have found some really interesting history about old water mills. For example, in medieval times in the UK many water mills belonged to the Lord of the Manor who hired a miller to operate it for him, and he also insisted that all his tenants used his mill and no other! I just know I'm going to enjoy finding out more, so watch this space.

October Surprise by Eileen Charbonneau

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Greetings, dear readers!

My October surprise is a sneak peek at my November 2021 release, Ursula's Inheritance. The third book in my American Civil War Brides series, it was a surprise to me, too! After publishing Book 2, Mercies of the Fallen, I thought I was finished with Ursula's story. But readers thought otherwise! 

Mercies took place between the Battles of Antietam and Gettysburg. It ended just after the infamous New York City draft riots of July 1863. Readers wanted to know what happened next in the lives of Ursula and her Union officer Captain Rowan Buckley. Does he survive the war? Can she come out of hiding and clear her name? Will their young marriage born of desperate circumstances become a lasting union of souls? And what about the secrets still between them?

Did you know that this is how Louisa May Alcott's Little Women got written too? The first volume (1868) was a great success. But readers were eager for more. Alcott quickly completed a second volume in 1869. The two volumes were issued in 1880 as a single novel that has become our cherished classic. 

I hope you'll enjoy what happens next in the story...The opening is from Rowan's viewpoint, and I hope you'll learn what a great dad he is becoming....

Chapter One, Ursula's Inheritance  

April 1864, Gramercy Park, Manhattan

Even with the one eye the war had left him, Rowan Buckley knew the wee one pilfering from the garden was a girl, despite her trousers. He frowned at the canvas bag at her feet.

“So it is not a squirrel with an interest in our angelica, then?” he asked quietly.

The urchin turned, startled eyes narrowing. “Better me than an Irish thug!” she spat out. 

The girl took advantage of his hesitation and his limited depth perception. She grabbed the sack and raced toward the iron garden gate. But after three hard years of soldiering, there was nothing wrong with Rowan’s reflexes. He caught up, took her wrist, and, when she resisted, her waist. She had a waist. So she was a little older than her small size had first impressed upon him.

“Please let me go, sir,” an even smaller voice came out of her.

“Am I ‘sir’ then, now that you’re caught?”

“You are a black Irish scoundrel to hold me against my will!”

She kicked him. Hard enough to throw off his stance. He maintained his temper and light grip as he steered her toward the tradesman’s door of Ursula’s house.

“You’ve nothing to fear from me, lass.” He sent her through the entrance with a nudge at her back. “Now hush up your caterwauling, the baby’s asleep.”

Jonathan was stretched out at the hearth, his stockinged foot rocking the cradle. His eyebrow arched.

“Company? The kettle’s on, my fine fellow.”

“Your fellow is a girl, and there’s nothing fine about her,” Rowan corrected, lifting the cap off his captive’s head. Fair-haired braids descended. “May I present our angelica and camomile thief?”

Jonathan smiled. “Ah. Mystery solved.”

The girl’s eyes fired. “I planted that garden!”

“Did you?” Jonathan asked in his most charming southern tone. “Fetch the young horticulturist a chair, brother.”

“She kicks,” Rowan warned.

The girl’s light brown eyes narrowed as she looked from one to the other. “You’re not brothers.”

“And you neglected to pay for your trousers,” Rowan observed, yanking off and reading the dry goods store tag. “The proprietor might want a word with you about that.”

“The proprietor is my father. His name is Selby, see?”

A rustling of nightclothes and Ursula stood in the back doorway.  “Mr. Thomas Selby?”

Rowan saw something familiar in the girl’s trapped look, the tears stubbornly held back. 

“You are so confusing! All of you!” she shouted, loud enough to startle wee Henry to wailing. 

“Aw, there now then, fledgling,” Rowan soothed, lifting the baby from cradle and into his arms. “You’ve had enough of the lot of us, have you?”

Ursula kept her eyes fixed on the girl.

“What is your name?”

“Penina.”

She glanced in the sack, “Thank you, Penina. A little camomile is exactly what we need for our Henry’s teething gums. Take the rest home. Will you not join us for breakfast first?”

Rowan sighed. His wife had found another stray. He rubbed his sore shin, then fetched the frying pan. This little one might enjoy some of his oatcakes, he supposed.

Do You Need a Sensitivity Reader?

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A friend who read a draft of my new novel, Winter's Rage, suggested I ask someone experienced in transgender issues to read the manuscript. It hadn't occurred to me that I needed this. While one of my characters in the novel has sex change surgery, I considered it a minor point in the story. But I knew instantly this was sound advice, given current awareness of LGBTQ+ concerns. 

My friend offered to look for a sensitivity reader if I couldn't find one on my own. As it happened, several years earlier another friend had told me his sister had recently transitioned. I contacted my friend and asked if he could put me in touch with her. He gladly gave me her email address, although he didn't think she read mystery novels or fiction in general. 

His sister replied right away. She thanked me for making this effort with my book because she was constantly annoyed by people's thoughtless and cruel remarks and misused pronouns. I gave her the choice of reading the full manuscript of Winter's Rage or the relevant sections. When she chose the latter, I emailed her five pages with all the pertinent scenes. She came back with comments I wouldn't have thought of myself. In addition to these being useful for the book, I found it interesting to hear her perspectives. 

On the positive side, she liked that I'd had my protagonist observe my trans person's physique as not typical for her gender. My reader finds her height can be a problem--she's 6'3" in high heels--but she knows other transgender women who have it worse, with barrel shaped chests and very masculine features. She found it realistic that my trans character would be depressed and alcohol dependent before discovering who she was. It also sadly rang true for her that my character would experience abuse on social media and from unsympathetic relatives.    

But she questioned my trans character's close friend saying that she'd miss her as a man. My sensitivity reader had heard that type of remark too often. 

"Tough shit," she told the obtuse friend. "This isn't about you." 

I'd also had my trans character say she'd miss her former self. My sensitivity reader said most trans people she knows can't wait to shed their old selves. "We love them for getting us this far, but their job is done, and we're excited to move forward." I had thought, in that situation, I'd feel nostalgia for a large part of my life I was leaving behind, but bowed to her experience and tweaked my trans character's sentiments. In addition, my reader thought I'd made the process of changing ID and other documents too simple. I added an explanation that didn't impact the plot.      

My sensitivity reader found no fault with my use of pronouns, but later, during the proof read of the manuscript, it struck me that I might have used 'he' incorrectly in one instance. I asked my proof reader for her opinion. She replied that, in her view, 'he' was correct in the context. It can be tricky to get it totally right. We also shouldn't assume all transgender people think alike any more than all women think alike. There might be some who disagree with my decision to leave 'he' in that sentence.  

By definition, we fiction writers create characters and situations that go beyond our personal experience. The more feedback we get from readers who fill the gaps in our knowledge, the more true- to-life our stories will be. When we don't belong to a misunderstood and oppressed group, we're often unaware of its particular issues. A first step in deciding whether or not to seek out a sensitivity reader is knowing when you need one. 

Oreos are Kosher. Who Knew? by Karla Stover

 

I will read anything. I have a particular weakness for ads in the backs of magazines. The NRA has a cigar club. Who knew? However, it was a crossword puzzle question that taught me that in 1997 Oreos became a kosher food. Nor did it tell me that the cookie's designs incorporate the Cross of Lorraine (carried by Knights Templar during the Crusades) and the 12 Templar Cross Pattees.  Interesting, but not as interesting as when a man named Phil Sokolof "spent roughly $14 million campaigning against saturated foods, such as McDonald's French fries. Having survived a heart attack, he made it his life's mission to influence major food companies to remove saturated fats from popular foods." Imagine being part of a generation that never experienced the real deal.

It was Alexander McCall Smith's book, The Revolving Door of Life that introduced me to the Queen's and lord treasurers remembrancer  (QLTR). In the book, one of the characters left a book in a railway locker and was told that in Scotland, at least, unclaimed items eventually will belong to the queen. I tried to research items the QLTR had 'inherited,' as it were, but the websites seemed only interested in Scottish estates. Nevermind. A friend gives me her old movie magazines and today I learned that Maybelline's Lash Sensational Sky High Waterproof Mascara contains bamboo fibers which are are supposed "to visibly lengthen fringe." I don't know what "lengthen fringe" means but bamboo in mascara seems a bit odd, not to mention dangerous if a flake gets in an eye. Half the ads on the same magazine page touted plant byproducts in their makeup: fruit enzymes, black vegan pigments, coconut, avocado or chia seed oils, etc. Do these horticultural claims really sell products?

And speaking of movie magazines. I now know Paris Hilton has a cooking show on Netflix. And here's an interesting quote: "Yacheron Constantin. The luxury Swiss watchmaker, worn by the late Princess Diana . . ." She wore an entire company? Who knew and, more importantly, how?

As I mentioned previously, I have been giving blood to replace units my brother needed for a cancer surgery. One of my pandemic book purchases was Roses of  No Man's Land. It's about nursing soldiers during World War 1 and one of the diary entries quotes is about how the Americans taught the British about blood transfusions. It sounded like the needles were enormous but transfusions (if you could find a healthy volunteer) saved lives.

Something I read that really caught me off guard was that the #MeeToo movement isn't all that popular in parts of Europe. For example, French actress Catherine Deneuve and more than 100 well-known Frenchwomen signed a letter and sent it to a newspaper saying the movement "hampers the fine art of seduction in the workplace and repressed the sexual freedom of men who only tried to touch a knee, steal a kiss, or speak about pornographic matters at a business dinner, as well as the sexual freedom of women who might like it." I have to say, I see no problem with a little workplace flirting.

The humorist Jeanne Robertson advocated looking for the humorous in your day. I agree but I also try to find funky new facts. They contribute to my spices of life. So much to read; we haven't watched any network TV, except the news, in years.

 

Ghosts

 

Ghosts

What else am I to write about in October? I watched “Casper” as a kid and the great TV show “Topper”. I loved “Medium” and “Ghost Whisperer”. If you bend the spectrum a little, shows like “Highlander” and “Forever”, which deal with immortals, could also be considered in this realm of otherworldliness.

I believe in ghosts and have gone on “haunted” cemetery tours, and “talked” with spirits on a Ouija Board. When I was maybe thirteen, I woke one night and swore I saw a ghost (or angel) at the foot of my bed. It may have been my sister, but considering I was on the top bunk, maybe not.

There was a favorite old road in Charleston, SC where we would go in high school to be on the lookout for ghosts said to haunt the swamps. (There were “sightings” which were probably just swamp gas.) I have come to realize that it was most likely a story invented by the guys because the area was very dark, very spooky and a very good place to take a girl on a Saturday night.

I’ve had ghosts appear in several of the books I’ve written, but they’re never malevolent or threatening because I don’t write horror. I can’t watch scary movies either, so my ghosts must be helpful in some way and not harmful.

My first pair of literary ghosts were Zeke and Lucky, two old prospectors in PROSPECTING FOR LOVE, a story that was such fun to write because in addition to the ghosts, the story is a time travel. That also puts it in another dimension, for who is to say whether the present as we know it is the only time plane currently evolving. In fact, perhaps our present is actually another person’s past, or future. Does that make us the ghosts to someone else’s existence? It can all get rather complicated.

Zeke and Lucky died in a mining accident 1870 and have been wandering around Peavine as ghosts until they can undo the accident that also killed their friend, Jesse Cole. When they spy Ellie, they realize the time has come because she looks exactly like Jesse’s girlfriend, Elizabeth. They can transport Ellie back to a time prior to the accident, but because she knows nothing of the 1870s, they must act as her guides and mentors to keep her out of trouble. PROSPECTING FOR LOVE is a light-hearted read and at times hilarious as Zeke and Lucky attempt to keep Ellie in line while trying to discover what went wrong the first time in history so they can prevent it from happening again.

I don’t always intentionally use ghosts as characters. In A GAME OF LOVE the ghost of an American Revolution era woman practically demanded that I tell her story. She made her presence known to my main character and no matter how much Megan didn’t want to believe in ghosts, and regardless of where I thought the story should go, Laurie McCluer was not about to be silenced. Megan leans more toward believing the ghost is trying to help her solve a mystery, but it creates friction between her and her childhood crush turned current love. Perhaps it’s because he’s a Boston detective who believes in physical evidence, not hazy green apparitions. Ghostly Laurie proved relentless and I finally had to let her story be told, which in the long run was really quite helpful.

If you like stories with ghosts but without the scares, I think you’ll enjoy A GAME OF LOVE (contemporary) and PROSPECTING FOR LOVE (historic time travel). They’re both available at https://bookswelove.net.

Also for the holiday season, Books We Love is having a give-away now through December 15. You can easily enter at https://bookswelove.net for a chance to win a free holiday eBook (my newest is included) and a chance to win an eBook reader. Books We Love knows how much you love books and we want to help spread the cheer.

Early Best Wishes,

Barb

http://www.authorsden.com/barbarajbaldwin

https://bookswelove.net/baldwin-barbara/