F.G. Cottam's Blog
May 13, 2013
Those nice people publishing The Memory of Trees bought it on the strength of three chapters just before Christmas. That was less than a third of the novel which I subsequently finished in March.
In February my agent told me I needed to be thinking about the next book. I grumbled that Trees was occupying my mind pretty much full time.
But I woke up at 2 am one morning early in March and the basic theme of what became The Lazarus Prophecy was there,
fully-formed in my mind. Instead of going back to sleep, I wrote it down.
The day in late March when Trees got the thumbs up from the publisher was the day I started Prophecy. I finished it on Sunday, 96, 000 words in about seven weeks. I've never before written with such focus, energy and sheer enjoyment.
Trees is published at the end of June and is heavy on myth and atmosphere. But I think Prophecy features in Edmund Caul the most sinister character I have yet created.
Ultimately the judgment as to whether my books are any good comes from you, their readers. But I'm very happy with both of these stories.
In February my agent told me I needed to be thinking about the next book. I grumbled that Trees was occupying my mind pretty much full time.
But I woke up at 2 am one morning early in March and the basic theme of what became The Lazarus Prophecy was there,
fully-formed in my mind. Instead of going back to sleep, I wrote it down.
The day in late March when Trees got the thumbs up from the publisher was the day I started Prophecy. I finished it on Sunday, 96, 000 words in about seven weeks. I've never before written with such focus, energy and sheer enjoyment.
Trees is published at the end of June and is heavy on myth and atmosphere. But I think Prophecy features in Edmund Caul the most sinister character I have yet created.
Ultimately the judgment as to whether my books are any good comes from you, their readers. But I'm very happy with both of these stories.
April 6, 2013
My next published novel is The Memory of Trees, which comes out at the end of June and is largely located in a welsh coastal wilderness. The story involves the sinister repercussions of restoring an ancient and malevolent forest there and echoes the Arthurian legend with a strong nod to the evil enchantress Morgana le Fay.
It couldn't be a bigger contrast to the novel I'm working on now. That's set predominantly in London in the 1880s and the present day and involves a religious struggle against satanic powers secretly waged since the establishment of Christianity.
It's my belief that London can loom so large in a story set there it can have a presence as powerful as a principal character. Much of my story is set in North Lambeth, where I lived for 20 years and which still wears its Victorian history in buildings, lamp posts and railings on practically every street.
I've also been looking at Gustave Dore's London images, done in the 1860s, to get the minutiae right. Apparently he loved London, but you wouldn't know it. His images of the poor in the ramshackle slums of Whitechapel look like a vision of Hell.
The city really was like that; murky, teeming, ill-lit, bustling and filthy. It's a fascinating place in which to set a narrative. I'm really enjoying the writing. Living there would have been another matter entirely.
It couldn't be a bigger contrast to the novel I'm working on now. That's set predominantly in London in the 1880s and the present day and involves a religious struggle against satanic powers secretly waged since the establishment of Christianity.
It's my belief that London can loom so large in a story set there it can have a presence as powerful as a principal character. Much of my story is set in North Lambeth, where I lived for 20 years and which still wears its Victorian history in buildings, lamp posts and railings on practically every street.
I've also been looking at Gustave Dore's London images, done in the 1860s, to get the minutiae right. Apparently he loved London, but you wouldn't know it. His images of the poor in the ramshackle slums of Whitechapel look like a vision of Hell.
The city really was like that; murky, teeming, ill-lit, bustling and filthy. It's a fascinating place in which to set a narrative. I'm really enjoying the writing. Living there would have been another matter entirely.
February 21, 2013
I'm going to go back to Satanism. I don't mean personally, but plot-wise. Nothing scared me as a kid more than The Exorcist and The Omen did. And the reason was that there's something horribly plausible about the Devil and all his works...
My next novel has the working title of The Lazarus Prophecy. My premise is that Lazarus was a sinner, judged and found wanting and that the real miracle was Christ returning him not just from the dead, but from hell.
Lazarus learned something there of Satan's plans for mankind and returns with a dire warning that reverberates down the centuries to our own time.
I've just finished writing a novel (The Memory of Trees) and need a bit of a break before starting another. But I'm excited about the potential of Prophecy, some of which will be set in Victorian London. I'll start it just as soon as the cramp departs my two abused typing fingers and my sore back loosens up a bit.
My first two F.G. novels were satanically themed and I'm really looking forward to going back and getting very, very dark.
My next novel has the working title of The Lazarus Prophecy. My premise is that Lazarus was a sinner, judged and found wanting and that the real miracle was Christ returning him not just from the dead, but from hell.
Lazarus learned something there of Satan's plans for mankind and returns with a dire warning that reverberates down the centuries to our own time.
I've just finished writing a novel (The Memory of Trees) and need a bit of a break before starting another. But I'm excited about the potential of Prophecy, some of which will be set in Victorian London. I'll start it just as soon as the cramp departs my two abused typing fingers and my sore back loosens up a bit.
My first two F.G. novels were satanically themed and I'm really looking forward to going back and getting very, very dark.
January 9, 2013
The Black Death was not an accidental event. The virus responsible for killing half the world was genetically engineered. It was a deliberate attempt to undermine earth and its civilizations concocted in the laboratory of a fourteenth century alchemist.
No, I haven't turned into a conspiracy theorist. That's one of the revelations in my novel The Summoning, in which it's revealed that a world the mirror image of ours has been waging a clandestine war against us for centuries.
But they're different from us. While we had the Age of Enlightenment and rationality, they never differentiated between science and magic and their use of the latter is their great weapon in this secret struggle.
If that all sounds a bit young adult, then great. The Summoning has teen protagonists and is deliberately intended to appeal to younger readers. There's peril, darkness, courage and quite a lot of history. I like history, as readers of my fiction will already have gathered.
There's something incredibly liberating about seeing events through the eyes of someone young enough to have energy and hope and no fear of failure because that's something they've never experienced. And the characters in this story need courage.
They're not just witnessing history, they're trying alter the fate of our world.
If things go according to plan, The Summoning will be published later this year. Though some pretty horrific scenes occur in it, it's probably more fantasy than horror. And I'd be quite happy for my teenage son to read it.
No, I haven't turned into a conspiracy theorist. That's one of the revelations in my novel The Summoning, in which it's revealed that a world the mirror image of ours has been waging a clandestine war against us for centuries.
But they're different from us. While we had the Age of Enlightenment and rationality, they never differentiated between science and magic and their use of the latter is their great weapon in this secret struggle.
If that all sounds a bit young adult, then great. The Summoning has teen protagonists and is deliberately intended to appeal to younger readers. There's peril, darkness, courage and quite a lot of history. I like history, as readers of my fiction will already have gathered.
There's something incredibly liberating about seeing events through the eyes of someone young enough to have energy and hope and no fear of failure because that's something they've never experienced. And the characters in this story need courage.
They're not just witnessing history, they're trying alter the fate of our world.
If things go according to plan, The Summoning will be published later this year. Though some pretty horrific scenes occur in it, it's probably more fantasy than horror. And I'd be quite happy for my teenage son to read it.
December 18, 2012
Someone kind enough to give it a five star review on Amazon.com recently commented that for a Kindle novel, The Colony is quite long (he thought this was a good rather than a bad thing).
All my paranormal thrillers have been of a similar length. The Colony is just over 106, 000 words. I write 8, 000 word chapters, so it amounts to (gulp) 13 chapters altogether, as does its predecessor, Brodmaw Bay.
I'm quite superstitious about some things, such as single magpies and ladders, but have never thought the number 13 unlucky. Probably just as well.
I could argue The Colony is the length it is because it wasn't written specifically for Kindle. But even if it had been, it would have been the length it is.
Once a writer stops thinking about a story as a story and starts to regard it as a commodity, I suppose it's possible to start thinking about streamlining output to maximise yield.
Personally, I think this is not only a cynical approach, but one that sabotages any chance of the story achieving its full potential.
I write novels I would like to read. I hope they're never so long they outstay their welcome. They're the length they are because that's how long it's taken to tell the tale. That's the deal, folks, whatever format you choose to read them in.
All my paranormal thrillers have been of a similar length. The Colony is just over 106, 000 words. I write 8, 000 word chapters, so it amounts to (gulp) 13 chapters altogether, as does its predecessor, Brodmaw Bay.
I'm quite superstitious about some things, such as single magpies and ladders, but have never thought the number 13 unlucky. Probably just as well.
I could argue The Colony is the length it is because it wasn't written specifically for Kindle. But even if it had been, it would have been the length it is.
Once a writer stops thinking about a story as a story and starts to regard it as a commodity, I suppose it's possible to start thinking about streamlining output to maximise yield.
Personally, I think this is not only a cynical approach, but one that sabotages any chance of the story achieving its full potential.
I write novels I would like to read. I hope they're never so long they outstay their welcome. They're the length they are because that's how long it's taken to tell the tale. That's the deal, folks, whatever format you choose to read them in.
November 20, 2012
I've been pondering on ghosts and worse. Child ghosts figured in my last two novels and I suppose they're disconcerting because they're sly and knowing in a way that children shouldn't be. Their behaviour is sinister and convincing but it contradicts the innocence of their appearance. They undermine our expectations and scare us in a subtly disturbing way.
Stephen King wrote that when the author is obliged to describe his monster, disappointment is the inevitable reaction experienced by the reader.
I wouldn't wish to contradict the great man, but think this can be allayed somewhat by providing a plausible explanation for how the monster - or demon - came to exist at all.
You can take the Lovecraft approach and insist these things are already lurking out there - in the depths of the ocean, on the edge of space, in the high mountains or even in the walls of a remote and solitary house.
Or you can have your characters deliberately bring the evil about; conjure it by indulging in practices they'd be far wiser to avoid.
I have to say that's the approach that works best for me.
Stephen King wrote that when the author is obliged to describe his monster, disappointment is the inevitable reaction experienced by the reader.
I wouldn't wish to contradict the great man, but think this can be allayed somewhat by providing a plausible explanation for how the monster - or demon - came to exist at all.
You can take the Lovecraft approach and insist these things are already lurking out there - in the depths of the ocean, on the edge of space, in the high mountains or even in the walls of a remote and solitary house.
Or you can have your characters deliberately bring the evil about; conjure it by indulging in practices they'd be far wiser to avoid.
I have to say that's the approach that works best for me.
November 5, 2012
When does a complaint become what's actually a kind of compliment?
I ask because some readers have complained about a scary episode in The Colony. It comes early on and involves a reel of cine film shot in 1934 and recovered and restored in the present day.
It was shot on New Hope Island. It might or might not be a clue as to the fate of the community that abruptly vanished from there.
The footage is black and white and dates from a period decades before CGI. It's the work of an amateur cameraman. How scary, by today's jaundiced standards, can it possibly be?
Well, it seems to have raised a few hackles. It's as far as some readers have been able to get. And not because they were bored by the story.
I have to say I take this as a tremendous compliment. I wasn't going for schlock or even shock when I wrote the section describing the film footage. I was going for sinister and disturbing and hoping that the somewhat frayed and ragged subject of the film would stay with the reader for a while.
Not forever, you understand. Just for one or two slightly nervy nights...
To those faint-hearted readers who have stopped, I'd say give it another go. It's just a story. And cine film images don't come to life. Do they?
I ask because some readers have complained about a scary episode in The Colony. It comes early on and involves a reel of cine film shot in 1934 and recovered and restored in the present day.
It was shot on New Hope Island. It might or might not be a clue as to the fate of the community that abruptly vanished from there.
The footage is black and white and dates from a period decades before CGI. It's the work of an amateur cameraman. How scary, by today's jaundiced standards, can it possibly be?
Well, it seems to have raised a few hackles. It's as far as some readers have been able to get. And not because they were bored by the story.
I have to say I take this as a tremendous compliment. I wasn't going for schlock or even shock when I wrote the section describing the film footage. I was going for sinister and disturbing and hoping that the somewhat frayed and ragged subject of the film would stay with the reader for a while.
Not forever, you understand. Just for one or two slightly nervy nights...
To those faint-hearted readers who have stopped, I'd say give it another go. It's just a story. And cine film images don't come to life. Do they?
October 24, 2012
A couple of years ago I was taken to lunch by an agent.The food was great, the conversation slightly awkward. He didn't think I was exercising my imagination to its full extent, he said. He didn't quite accuse me of coasting, but said I should think in terms of something really ambitious that involved more than a single book.
Ten weeks later I had written the first novel in a planned dystopian trilogy involving an enigmatic archaeologist, a medieval quest and a cast of central characters younger than I would usually create.
My logic was that the characters would age across the span of three books so needed to be quite young at the outset. They also needed the resilience and optimism that comes most naturally with youth. My problem was that the novel wasn't really typical of what readers have come to expect of me.
Does it matter? Two years on and I'm still prevaricating over it. Maybe I'll put it out as a download-only like I did with The Colony. I think it's a pretty good story with an intriguing premise and deserves to see the light of day. Or the bright, low-energy illumination of a Kindle, anyway ...
Ten weeks later I had written the first novel in a planned dystopian trilogy involving an enigmatic archaeologist, a medieval quest and a cast of central characters younger than I would usually create.
My logic was that the characters would age across the span of three books so needed to be quite young at the outset. They also needed the resilience and optimism that comes most naturally with youth. My problem was that the novel wasn't really typical of what readers have come to expect of me.
Does it matter? Two years on and I'm still prevaricating over it. Maybe I'll put it out as a download-only like I did with The Colony. I think it's a pretty good story with an intriguing premise and deserves to see the light of day. Or the bright, low-energy illumination of a Kindle, anyway ...
October 4, 2012
Can a place be contaminated by evil? Can a particular location be corrupted by the terrible things done there years ago? That’s a theme I have grappled with often in my fiction, probably because I believe the answer is yes.
I’ve been to locations haunted by their own past. Last year I spent six months living close enough to Stonehenge to have a good long look at the site. Just this last weekend I toured Arundel Castle. The oldest part of the castle was built 900 years ago and is as forbidding a rampart against attack now as it was when constructed. The stone circle on Salisbury Plain is so ancient you walk around it awed that anything could endure for that long. These are not evil places, though. They just seem alive, somehow, with events lost in time and particular to them.
So back to that original question and the take on it that has inspired the novel I’m working on now.
Imagine a vast, dense forest cleared long ago and so transformed over the centuries into a benign and featureless wilderness. It’s just grassland now, stretching to cliffs at the edge of the sea. It wouldn’t scare a rabbit or hurt a fly.
What would happen if someone deliberately restored it to how it was in the time of its own malevolent, woodland myths? Would the mischief return? I think it just might. After all, they weren’t called the Dark Ages for nothing, were they? Forests can be peculiar places. And if the worst happens and the mischief does return, it might have some catching up to do…
I had the idea for this one eleven years ago, which is a good five years before I wrote my debut paranormal thriller. It’s waited patiently in the queue for its turn. No complaints, foot-stamping or tantrums. Now, finally, its moment has come.
I’ve been to locations haunted by their own past. Last year I spent six months living close enough to Stonehenge to have a good long look at the site. Just this last weekend I toured Arundel Castle. The oldest part of the castle was built 900 years ago and is as forbidding a rampart against attack now as it was when constructed. The stone circle on Salisbury Plain is so ancient you walk around it awed that anything could endure for that long. These are not evil places, though. They just seem alive, somehow, with events lost in time and particular to them.
So back to that original question and the take on it that has inspired the novel I’m working on now.
Imagine a vast, dense forest cleared long ago and so transformed over the centuries into a benign and featureless wilderness. It’s just grassland now, stretching to cliffs at the edge of the sea. It wouldn’t scare a rabbit or hurt a fly.
What would happen if someone deliberately restored it to how it was in the time of its own malevolent, woodland myths? Would the mischief return? I think it just might. After all, they weren’t called the Dark Ages for nothing, were they? Forests can be peculiar places. And if the worst happens and the mischief does return, it might have some catching up to do…
I had the idea for this one eleven years ago, which is a good five years before I wrote my debut paranormal thriller. It’s waited patiently in the queue for its turn. No complaints, foot-stamping or tantrums. Now, finally, its moment has come.
September 21, 2012
Just because something is entertaining to write, doesn't automatically follow that it will be entertaining to read.
The Colony was nothing but fun to write, for two distinct reasons. Firstly I enjoyed viewing events in the story from the perspective of a range of contrasting characters. Secondly, it was rewarding to make the evil in the story manifest in a physical creature I think gruesome, formidable and quite plausible in the way it came to exist.
Early feedback suggests that readers here are enjoying the novel. That's gratifying, obviously.
But here's the real point of this blog post.
Anyone who likes it - anyone who doesn't, for that matter - would be doing me a huge favour if they could review the novel on Amazon.
I've never gone in for sock-puppetry (reviewing my own books under a pseudonym) and since The Colony is self-published, the only kind of publicity it's going to get comes from my readers. That can be word of mouth or it can be reader reviews and believe me, I'm genuinely grateful for either.
I deliberately made The Colony a relative bargain to buy as a download. Bringing it to the attention of the wider book-buying public, however, requires a bit of help...
The Colony was nothing but fun to write, for two distinct reasons. Firstly I enjoyed viewing events in the story from the perspective of a range of contrasting characters. Secondly, it was rewarding to make the evil in the story manifest in a physical creature I think gruesome, formidable and quite plausible in the way it came to exist.
Early feedback suggests that readers here are enjoying the novel. That's gratifying, obviously.
But here's the real point of this blog post.
Anyone who likes it - anyone who doesn't, for that matter - would be doing me a huge favour if they could review the novel on Amazon.
I've never gone in for sock-puppetry (reviewing my own books under a pseudonym) and since The Colony is self-published, the only kind of publicity it's going to get comes from my readers. That can be word of mouth or it can be reader reviews and believe me, I'm genuinely grateful for either.
I deliberately made The Colony a relative bargain to buy as a download. Bringing it to the attention of the wider book-buying public, however, requires a bit of help...
