Gill James's Blog, page 19

Writing about a Material World

 

This is an interesting debate. Is the world material? Is it just energy? Is it just a construct of our thoughts and imagination? How do things like The Secret work in a totally material world?   The video It's an Immaterial Worlddiscusses these ideas. 
But what about the writer? Do we live in our heads or are we engaged with the physical world? 
"Write what you know," the gurus tell us.  But if we wrote only what we knew, surely there would be no Star Wars, no Harry Potter, no Lord of the Rings. Neither probably would there be any historical fiction. However, we do write what we know in answering the question "What if?" What if there were a universe full of inhabited planets, at war with each other? What if there were a school for witches and wizards? What if there were some rings that had supernatural  powers? What if the only place for the poor were the workhouse? We work out how all of that would feel like from our experience of our physical world with a little emotion thrown in to salt it.  
"Write with your senses," I tell my students. This means being precise about what they see, hear, smell, taste and feel. Feel can be used in both senses. It always produces effective writing and helps them to "show not tell". This is so very much about the physical world. 
A writer may seem locked up in her head. But all of those ideas that buzz around in there relate to the physical world. We write about scenery, human beings, sounds, what people say and do. This is all physical. A film plays itself out in our heads and we write in order to create the same film in our readers' minds. 
Go to any beach or airport, and you will see many people sitting close to each other, all immersed in other worlds. What is going on in their heads? Ask them to define it and they come out with words which are physical entities: sounds in the head or little marks that mean something on a page.
Many texts, of course deal with the inner monologue of its characters. Even these characters always think in words and words have that physical presence described above. 
Many writers like to experience the physical world they write about. They notice more when they are in the park, the prison cell or the sailing boat than when they just rely on their memory or imagination.     
So how do affirmations and dream-confirming work? In a material world? Well, when we write we isolate certain details we deem important. We focus on them. When we make affirmations or reiterate our dreams we also bring a focus. The former is our creative act. The latter reminds us of what is important to us and is also a creative act.      
The beautiful irony is that matter is mainly empty space. What looks like real matter is actually energy.                              

Fellow Chapeltown author Mandy Huggins launches a new book

Today I interview Mandy on the release of her  new book Separated form the Sea 

 Northern Short Story Festival in Leeds on June 2nd
Tell me about your book and your inspirationSeparated From the Sea is my debut full length short story collection, and the first single author collection to be signed by Retreat West Books. Some of the stories have been written especially for the collection, and many others have won writing competitions or been published elsewhere in the last five years or so.




I love the short story form, the challenge of crafting a complete story in a few pages, and striving to make every word count. Capturing entire worlds, creating plots and characters, evoking a gamut of emotions in only a couple of thousand words, fully aware that you have to pull the reader in from the very first sentence. And you know you’ve got it right when people tell you that they were moved to tears by those words, or that they couldn’t stop laughing, or that they want to know ‘what happened to her next.’

Some of the stories from my flash collection, Brightly Coloured Horses, have developed into longer stories which appear in Separated From the Sea - because I had to find out what happened next as well!

Separated From the Sea:
Crossing oceans from Japan to New York and from England to Havana, these stories are filled with a sense of yearning, of loss, of not quite belonging, of not being sure that things are what you thought they were. They are stories imbued with pathos and irony, humour and hope.

Evie meets a past love but he's not the person she thinks he is; a visit to the most romantic city in the world reveals the truth about an affair; Satseko discovers an attentive neighbour is much more than that; Eleanor’s journey on the London Underground doesn't take her where she thought it would.

'This is a writer who knows her craft. Never a word out place, poignant, sometimes sad, sometimes startling, these stories fit worlds into small spaces. A long awaited debut.'
Angela Readman – author of Don’t Try This At Home

'If you want the perfect witness to a crime, Amanda Huggins is your woman. She notices everything about the people, places and the things around her. And she gets all this down in lovely little stories that spin around in the reader's head, dizzying us with her powerful images of loss, regret and yearning.'
David Gaffney – author of All The Places I’ve Ever Lived

'Amanda’s work is well crafted, subtle, and shows a deft hand. She delves into the secret wishes and desires of each character, giving us insights into how and why people act the way they do.' 
A M Howcroft – author of Nobody Will Ever Love You

'From the first to the last, the reader rejoices and grieves, empathises and identifies with a range of human emotions depicted with great skill and flair. The writing is flawless and carefully shaded, the layers of meaning unfolding elegantly.'                                                                                                                                                                 Joanna Campbell – author of When Planet Slip Their Tracks

What's Next? Do you have any events planned?A couple of months ago I started work on a poetry collection. A number of the poems are about growing up in a seaside town in the seventies, but others explore themes of grief and loss, and of yearning for a different life, closer to nature.
I have a busy time ahead promoting both of my collections, and I'm hoping to organise readings with another local author. I'm also the judge of this year's I Must Be Off Travel Writing Competition, so later this summer I'll be reading the shortlisted entries, which I'm looking forward to!
The official Blog Tour for Separated From the Sea carries on throughout the first week in June.


How can we get a copy of the book?Separated From the Sea
Published by Retreat West Books
2nd June 2018

Ebook                ISBN: 978-1-9997472-7-5
Paperback         ISBN: 978-1-9997472-6-8
The collection is currently in stock on Amazon:

 



Foyles: http://www.foyles.co.uk/witem/fiction-poetry/separated-from-the-sea,huggins-amanda-9781999747268
Waterstones: https://www.waterstones.com/book/separated-from-the-sea/huggins-amanda/9781999747268
Book Depository: https://www.bookdepository.com/Separated-from-the-Sea/9781999747268

Newsletter May 2018

I hope you've all been enjoying this amazing weather. It's been lovely working next to an open window and hearing the birds singing. I have a bird feeder actually attached to the window of my study and a lot of birds have been visiting. I think they're mainly youngsters. It's good, too, to be able to spend some time enjoying the garden.  I also find I have the strangest dreams when it's so warm like this. Some of them may turn into stories. Is it because we sleep more lightly?        News about my writing Our Daily Bread, my collection of short stories, is now out. Thanks to Allison and Paula for their reviews – and for spotting a few typos. I'll be getting it out on Amazon shortly. I can also still get review copies out to people. Just email me and specify if you would like a mobi file or a PDF.      I'm still making arrangements to have the play script of The House on Schellberg Street read out on 8 July. If you'd like to be involved and you live within commuting distance of Greater Manchester, let me know.  This will be at the Garrick Theatre, very close to the Metrolink in Whitefield. We shall start at 1.30 and finish at 6.00  p.m.  I'm hoping to have read through and a walk through. I hope to pre-cast it. I shall provide cake and other refreshments. The first draft of The House of Clementine is complete. I'm now about two thirds of the way through reading it. I'm aware that several threads aren't quite tying up and I'll be working on those over the coming weeks.   Clara's Story is now out. You can find it here.As usual reviews are welcome and I can provide the mobi file or a PDF. Here's the blurb: "Clara will not be daunted. Her life will not end when her beloved husband dies too young.  She will become a second mother to the children who live away from home at an early age in order to visit a rather special school.  When life becomes desperate for a particular class of disabled children growing up in Nazi Germany she takes a few risks. Is her ultimate faith in the goodness of human beings a fatal flaw that leads to her tragedy or is her story actually one of hope?  "Clara's Story is the second book in the Schellberg Cycle, a collection of novels inspired by a bunch of photocopied letters that arrived at a small cottage in Wales in 1979. Renate James, nee Edler, Clara's granddaughter, began to recognise the names of the girls she had been at school with.  "The letters give us some insights into what life was like growing up in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. Renate used to tell the story of a school for disabled children that defied the Nazi regime. "We have a few verifiable facts and research has uncovered a few more. Some repeated experience added more understanding.  But most of all that act of imagination that belongs to actors and writers enabled us to fill the gaps." I have actually now also started writing the fifth book in the cycle: The Round Robin. This looks more closely at the lives of some of the people who were involved in the class letter in The House on Schellberg Street: Anika who becomes an actor, Gerda who helps to run the family farm, Elsa, one of identical twins, who ends up running the family business and Hanna Braun, their former teacher who refuses to teach the Nazi doctrine and who knows more about what is going on than many other young women do.  I'm finding this much easier than my fourth Peace Child book            
 1940s Group This is a Facebook group for all people who write about the 1940s. Fiction and non-fiction, for young and old. Topics might then be: the Holocaust, World War II, Civilian Experience (all sides) and the battle front. We can exchange ideas about research and marketing. We may promote books and stories, - the last day of every month and on launch / release day. If you feel that is you, do join us: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2026868870924138/    Last weekend we went to the 1940s weekend on the East Lancs railway. There was a fantastic turn out and many people really got into the spirit of the occasion with some impressive costumes. However, I personally would welcome a more immersive experience. Something is bubbling at the back of my mind about creating that.
Nevertheless, it was all very interesting and entertaining. Get a flavour of it here: https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/gallery/east-lancashire-railway-1940s-weekend-14714639              Dreamteam The Dream Team continues to grow. Find members here.     This is a personal recommendation. Initially I intend to use my Dream Team a lot myself but gradually I would add in people that friends and friends of friends have recommended. What happens? You sign up to a mailing list and every time a request comes in we mail it out to you or the enquirer contacts you directly via my web site. The conversation then carries on between you and the person making the request. You may also have a page set up on my blog and you may update that once a year.  Interested? You may sign up for more than one category.  Beta readers sign up here.Reviewers sign up here. Editors sign up here.Illustrators sign up here.Designers sign up here.Proof-readers sing up here.    DO REMEMBER THAT AT ANY TIME YOU’RE APPROACHED AND YOU’RE BUSY IT’S PERFECTLY FINE TO SAY NO.    GDPRGeneral Data Protection Regulation. This newsletter is brought to you by MailChimp, which is compliant with the regulations, or is displayed on Blogger, where you watch us but we don't know who you are.  You can always opt to unsubscribe from the mailing list but we ask that you don't; this is the main means of communication between us and our writers and readers. It's very hard to get you back on the list if you remove yourself. We don't expect you to read everything every time, so your delete key can be handy.   In addition, we're destroying all submissions for books that are over a year old.  In future we'll no longer ask for your address on contracts or submissions. No photos will be kept on local computers / disks and at any time you may decline having a photo taken or ask for it to be removed from social media.
Update on Amazon It seems to be back to normal now, though "normal" isn't necessarily all that satisfactory for us small publishers. Amazon UK, as opposed to all of the other Amazon platforms and other online retailers, is cautious.  If it doesn't actually have your book in stock it will suggest an outrageous delivery time. It prefers to do this than promise one to two days and then let customers down.  On the other hand we've had an example recently of the Book Depository (ironically also owned by Amazon) promising a two day delivery and actually taking two weeks. The best way round this is to sell lots of books …. Then Amazon will keep a stock.  Of course, that may be easier said than done. However, here's a note of encouragement: A book I reviewed recently published by one of the Big Five has fewer reviews on Good Reads and Amazon and a lower sales ranking on Amazon than the average of all of Chapeltown's little square flash collections. There is another side to this that is worth looking out for. It's a bit of a negative, really, but you can change it into a positive.  Sometimes if your book is taking up shelf space and not moving, Amazon will sell it off at a loss to themselves. Often this will be below the price of an author copy. The trick is to order five – they may only have two or three at that price but this may trigger them to stock more.I'm a member of the Independent Publishers' Guild and shortly I'm going on their course about selling more books on Amazon. Watch this space and watch our sales on Amazon.                  Bridge House We are currently processing Crackers. In the end we had over 100 submissions.We've made the selection for the Waterloo festival. We have chosen sixteen stories / monologues coming to about 13,000. The Waterloo festival people have announced the winners I've also been in touch.   https://www.waterloofestival.com/winnersThe book has now been put together and proof copies will be to authors in the next few days. We have a tight turnaround on this. But it will be out as an e-book on 14 June. We're actually launching it on 14 June in London. Details here.     We’re still getting plenty of interest in our single-author collections. These are for authors we’ve published before and they may include stories we’ve already published, ones they’ve had published elsewhere and new ones. The description for this is now on the web site. We’ve already had some enquiries and we’re currently working on several anthologies. You may recycle stories we’ve already included in another anthology, and you may reedit these if you wish. You may also add in new stories. We’re aiming at a total word count of between 30,000 and 70,000 words. We have a huge backlog so please be patient. You can always check our progress at: http://apublishersperspective.blogspot.co.uk/p/work-flow.html
      CaféLit Stories are now all being posted at 4.00 p,m, Afternoon Teatime,  Kaffee and Kuchen time and it's also when the kids are home from school. Just the right time for a cuppa and a good story.
In May we had stories from Mehreen Ahmed, James Bates, Alan Cadman, David Deanshaw, Ann Dixon, Jesus C Deyquitez, William Edgar, Boris Glikman, Bren Gosling, Iris Green, Shawn Klimek, Dawn Knox, Clyde Liffey, Kim Martins, Thomas J Misuraca, Roger Noons, Wendy Ogilvie, Jenny Palmer, Marilyn Pemberton, John Riley, Karen Schauber, Allison Symes, Foster Trecost and Sandy Wilson. This includes several new writers. Our community is really growing. Here's a reminder of how we select stories: I open my inbox, I'll often see four or five submissions. I'll select the best of the bunch and schedule it for in a few days' time. I'll let you know. I may reject one or two but ones that are basically sound I'll keep forever or until they’re published.  Consequently if one you've submitted to us has not been rejected, and you find a home for it elsewhere, let us know the name of the story and the date you submitted and we'll remove it from the archive. Try to include the drink each time do put CafeLit in the subject line so we can identify your submission. Remember to include your bio (50-100 words including links for longer stories, just links for 100 words or less) each time. I haven't got time to look up an old one and in any case your bio is probably changing all the time. .           We're always open to submissions. Find out to submit here. Remember, this gives you some exposure, you can add in a short CV each time, and there's always the chance that your work might be accepted for the annual anthology.    I hope to get the Best of CaféLit 7 book out by the end of June. I've almost put the book together.     On offer for CaféLit authors is a page on our web site. See examples here.  The list is growing. Click on the names to find out more about the authors and to access their work. If you're a CaféLit author and would like a web page, use the ones there to get ideas. You need to send me between 250 and 350 words about yourself, an attractive image, a list of up to six publications, up to six awards and up to six links. I then also link the page to your stories on CaféLit. Send to gill at cafelit dot co dot uk.  Latest addition is Kim Martins. See her page here.
ChapeltownOur Chapeltown authors have been very proactive in promoting their work. They have managed to get their books into shops and libraries. They are also buying lots of author copies and being very proactive on getting on to blogs – mine included, of course. I'm always pleased to mention where Chapeltown authors have success elsewhere and must congratulate Amanda Huggins on the publication of Separated From the Sea by Retreat West Books. It has endorsements from Joanna Campbell, David Gaffney, A M Howcroft and Angela Readman.  Read more here.
I'm still trying to build up the Chapeltown readers list. I'm giving away a free copy of my January Stones 2013 to anyone who joins. See details here: http://www.chapeltownpublishing.uk/Spread the word.  Creative CaféI've added just one café added this month: The Belgrade Theatre Café. Coventry: http://www.creativecafeproject.org/2018/05/the-belgrade-theatre-coventry.htmlHowever, two more are waiting to be added in the wings.  
Keep sending suggestions and review them if you can.      I'm continuing my tour of creative cafés where I collect stories for an anthology. In some cases, writers may offer them and in others customers may tell me their story and I'll write it for them. Do you know of a café that might be interested in this? Let me know if you do.         Remember you can now buy merchandise for the Creative Café project. The profit on anything you buy here goes to the Creative Café Project. Check this out here.    We’re always looking for new cafés.  If you visit one of the cafés in the projectand would like to write a review of between 250 and 350 words – nice, too, to have a couple of pictures – send it to me here.Do the same if you find a new café.  The Red Telephone Our mentoring programme is now full. I’m working quite closely with three very different authors: Charlotte Comley, Dianne Stadhams, and Nina Wadcock. They are all presenting some fascinating material. University of Salford graduates Lauren Hopes and Christian Leah have also joined our happy band.        I was delighted to see Lauren at our recent Celebration Event in London. She read from her novel.  Facebook Group for the Imprints Scribblers Sans Frontières -  Here you can:·         Discuss all technical issues re our books·         Exchange marketing ideas·         Advertise and report on your events·         Promote any of your titles or successes ·         Share good practice and ideas·         Get help with writing problems ·         Anything else appropriate The page URL is https://www.facebook.com/groups/185719828704485/Please come and join us if you're eligible. Or you can ask me to sign you up.  
School Visits I’m proactively promoting my school visits associated with The House on Schellberg Street project. I’ve now developed a whole workshop for this. It starts off with a board game, includes some role play and creative writing and ends with a discussion. It is now possible to purchase the kit to work on on your own. Find details here.Costs for my workshops = travel expenses plus £400 for a full day and £200 for a half day. This includes all materials and some freebies. Two schools near to each other might consider splitting the day and halving the travel expenses and fees. This is open to negotiation in any case.        I also offer a free half day visit, though you pay my travel expenses, if you allow me to promote my books.       I’m continuously adding materials for schools to the site that are different from the ones I use for the workshops. I’ve recently added in resources and books to do with the topic. See them here:       Query for a school visit here.I’m also happy to tailor a visit for your agreed donation. This can be for either a Schellberg Cycle visit or a creative writing workshop. Any monies raised this way will go specifically to a project I have for a non-fiction book about a journey that will follow the footsteps of Clara Lehrs. I’m hoping to do the whole journey by train, including departing via my nearest Metrolink station. It’s important to feel the rails beneath my feet.       I offer as well standard author visits which include readings from my books, Q & A sessions and creative writing exercises. Please remember, with these as well, I’m open to negotiation if you can’t afford the full price. Free listing for our writers If you are one of our writers and would like to offer school visits, please contact me. I'm offering a free listing on the imprint pages. State: age groups you are prepared to work with, a definition of your work, distances you are prepared to travel. Appropriate links. Please provide an image.           Upcoming eventsI have two events to mention:Our Manchester celebration event: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/scribblers-sans-frontieres-celebration-tickets-450260852332 June at the International Burgess Foundation., 2.00 p.m. until 5. 00 p.m.  It follows the pattern of the London events.: general minglingcash baran opportunity to buy books at an advantageous rate    “speed-dating”  where you get to speak to as many people as possible in the room i.e. promote yourself to readers, swap tips with other writersauthor readingslatest news from me  collection for a local charitybig book swap (bring one of your other titles and take something else home – hopefully all will be reviewed. If you bring a non-writing friend they can just bring a book they love)  Flash Fiction Reading and Workshop at Buxton Fringe 19 July  https://www.buxtonfringe.org.uk/descriptions2018.html#2374  I'll be doing readings from January Stones 2013 and form my new collection 140 x 140. The ticket £7.00 or £5.00 includes a copy of one of the books and a workshop on writing Flash Fiction. Do come along if you can.         
More specific details of the following will be posted later of the following: I'm hoping to run a workshop on marketing for indie writers / publishers. This will be free of charge but you may make a donation if you wish. This will enable me to put on further events. A Pushing Boundaries, Flying Higher Master Class about writing the young adult novel.London event 1 December 2018 (Save the date!)       Writing opportunities Remember I keep a full list of vetted opportunities on my writing blog. See them here. New ones are added several times a day. Roughly once a month I go through it and take out all of the out of date ones. At that point I send it out to a list. If you would like to be on that list, sign up here.     Current reading recommendation Letters from the Lighthouse by Emma Carroll.Emma Carroll is a graduate from the MA in Writing for Young People at Bath Spa University. I personally champion the MA in Writing for Children at Winchester. But then I would do. That's where I got my MA. I have to admit though in Carroll's case they're on to a winner.

She has a diverse portfolio of novels and I'll now try to read some more of them.

Letters from the Lighthouse is set in World War II. It touches also on the Holocaust. One of the main characters, Esther Jenkins, has come to England on the Kindertransport.

A little unusually for this age group – I would describe this as a fluent reader book, though it may cross over from late Key Stage 2 to early Key Stage 3 – it uses a first person narrative. However this gives Olive an authentic voice and shows us what it was like for a child in that era.

There is also a very good story, woven together via a carefully crafted plot. Not only is this story exciting and our attention is held but it explores the themes of prejudice and friendship in a sensitive way.

A lovely read.

No wonder it was nominated for the CILIP Carnegie Medal.
Read more here.  

Calling all writersI'm running an occasional series of interviews on my blog. If you would like to be on my blog just answer the questions below and send them with appropriate images to gill dot james at btinternet dot com. Please feel free to pick and choose which of these to answer.  1.      What do you write? Why this in particular?  2.      What got you started on writing in the first place?3.      Do you have a particular routine?  4.      Do you have a dedicated working space? 5.      When did you decide you could call yourself a writer? Do you do that in fact? 6.      How supportive are your friends and family? Do they understand what you're doing? 7.      What are you most proud of in your writing? 8.      How do you get on with editing and research?9.      Do you have any goals for the future? 10.  Which writers have inspired you?Please write as much or as little as you like for each section and supply as many pictures as you like. Also let me know your latest publication and supply me with a link if it's not on Amazon.  I 'm also happy to offer you a post whenever you have a new book come out, even if I'm not your publisher. In this case answer the following questions:Tell me about your book. Tell us about your research for this book. What inspired you to write this?What's next? How can we get a copy of the book?Do you have any events planned?Again write as much or as little as you please. Alter and add to the questions if you wish. Provide as many pictures as you wish. Send to: gill dot james at btinternet dot com Giveaway This month I'm giving away Babel.
You will also find in this dropbox:·         An extract from Clara’s Story·         Some seminars for schools about The House on Schellberg Street·         Some fiction writing exercises·         The opening chapters from my manual for writing the young adult novel   Note, that normally my books and the books supplied by the imprints I manage, sell for anything form £0.99 to £10.99, with most on Kindle being about £2.99 and the average price for paperback being £7.00. We have to allow our writers to make a living. But we’re offering these free samples so that you can try before you buy.   Naturally we welcome reviews.
Happy reading and writing.

Clara's Story

   This is my second book in the Schellberg Cycle. These stories are based on true events that took place in the late 1930s and 1940s, though this particular one goes back to 1883. Clara is actually my husband's great-grandmother. We didn't have a lot to go on but with the little we had of some very good primary resources, heaps of research and repeated experience plus some good old-fashioned writers' imagination I've managed to put together a story. 
I've described it as a Holocaust biography. It is written as a novel so I hope it engages that way. Here is the longer blurb: 
'Clara will not be daunted. Her life will not end when her beloved husband dies too young.  She will become a second mother to the children who live away from home at an early age in order to visit a rather special school.  When life becomes desperate for a particular class of disabled children growing up in Nazi Germany she takes a few risks. Is her ultimate faith in the goodness of human beings a fatal flaw that leads to her tragedy or is her story actually one of hope? 
Clara's Story is the second book in the Schellberg Cycle, a collection of novels inspired by a bunch of photocopied letters that arrived at a small cottage in Wales in 1979. Renate James, nee Edler, Clara's granddaughter, began to recognise the names of the girls she had been at school with. 
The letters give us some insights into what life was like growing up in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. Renate used to tell the story of a school for disabled children that defied the Nazi regime. We have a few verifiable facts and research has uncovered a few more. Some repeated experience added more understanding.  But most of all that act of imagination that belongs to actors and writers enabled us to fill the gaps.'
And the product description: 
'Clara's Story: a Holocaust Biography is the second story in the Schellberg Cycle. It might be described as a tragedy or it might be described as a story of survival. In the end it is up to the reader or even Clara herself to decide. 
It is labelled as fiction and it is labelled as biography. Holocaust biography. Historical fiction. It reads like fiction. It engages like fiction. It is written as a novel.  But Clara Lehrs really existed, as did many of the characters in the Schellberg Cycle. We have a few, a very few verifiable facts about them. The rest we have had to find out by repeating some of their experiences and by using the careful writer's imagination.
Certainly the Schellberg Cycle examines the stories of several German Jews. Ironically Clara does not consider herself to be Jewish and sees no danger. She possibly needs Holocaust education even more than her readers do.  Her dealings with Steiner Education help her to throw a little light on her situation and she becomes engaged in her own form of Holocaust resistance. So, we might even label this Holocaust fiction.'  
I first started working on the Schellberg Cycle as part of a sabbatical form the University of Salford in 2011. I've two more books in the pipe-line and I'm now working on book five.  I have at least one more planned.
As usual I'm keen to get reviews. If you'd like a free mobi file or a PDF, please contact me via the contact form on this page.       
You may also be interested in the web site that gives a lot of information about the books and the back ground to them.  There are also materials for teacher there and news about school visits.    
       

Newsletter April 2018

April has flown by. It's been a mixture of working for the university, the usual writerly activities and doing battle with Amazon. More about the latter below.               News about my writing Our Daily Bread, my collection of short stories, is now available for pre-order. https://www.books2read.com/u/38gaJrNote, however, I've not been able to create a preorder on Amazon  though the mobi-file is ready.  If you'd like to review in advance, I can send you a PDF or the mobi file for your Kindle.       I'm still making arrangements to have the play script of The House on Schellberg Street read out on 8 July. If you'd like to be involved and you live within commuting distance of Greater Manchester, let me know.  This will be at the Garrick Theatre, very close to the Metrolink in Whitefield. We shall start at 1.30 and finish at 7.00  p.m.  I'm hoping to have read through and a walk through. I hope to pre-cast it. I shall provide cake and other refreshments. My book on marketing is also out there.  Find it here.   So Now You’re Published. What Next?: A marketing guide for self-published authors and those published by the small press  Remember this is free of charge for those of you published by one of our imprints. If you've lost the link, contact me and I'll resend it.        Amazon has approved our recording of January Stones and this is available as an audio book. You can find it here.   I notice you can take a free trial with audio books but I feel a little wary of this, though I am tempted. The audio book represents just one of my current experiments. I soldier on with The House of Clementine. It's still a struggle. Still, I always say that I write better when I struggle. But I have just one more chapter of the first draft to complete. So, about a week away. The big news is that Clara's Story is now out. You can find it here.As usual reviews are welcome and I can provide the mobi file or a PDF. Here's the blurb: "Clara will not be daunted. Her life will not end when her beloved husband dies too young.  She will become a second mother to the children who live away from home at an early age in order to visit a rather special school.  When life becomes desperate for a particular class of disabled children growing up in Nazi Germany she takes a few risks. Is her ultimate faith in the goodness of human beings a fatal flaw that leads to her tragedy or is her story actually one of hope?  "Clara's Story is the second book in the Schellberg Cycle, a collection of novels inspired by a bunch of photocopied letters that arrived at a small cottage in Wales in 1979. Renate James, nee Edler, Clara's granddaughter, began to recognise the names of the girls she had been at school with.  "The letters give us some insights into what life was like growing up in Germany in the 1930s and 1940s. Renate used to tell the story of a school for disabled children that defied the Nazi regime. "We have a few verifiable facts and research has uncovered a few more. Some repeated experience added more understanding.  But most of all that act of imagination that belongs to actors and writers enabled us to fill the gaps."
1940s Group I'm beginning to find out more and more about 1940s events up and down the country. I wish I could go to them all! I'm hoping though, that we might get a good representation of members at most of them and that we can share information that way.      Do join us if you think this is for you. Importantly, I'm happy for you to promote your books here on the last day of the month.         Here's the reminder of what it's all about: This is a Facebook group for all people who write about the 1940s. Fiction and non-fiction, for young and old. Topics might then be: the Holocaust, World War II, Civilian Experience (all sides) and the battle front. We can exchange ideas about research and marketing. We may promote books and stories, - the last day of every month and on launch / release day. If you feel that is you, do join us: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2026868870924138/         Dreamteam The Dream Team continues to grow. Find members here.     This is a personal recommendation. Initially I intend to use my Dream Team a lot myself but gradually I would add in people that friends and friends of friends have recommended. What happens? You sign up to a mailing list and every time a request comes in we mail it out to you or the enquirer contacts you directly via my web site. The conversation then carries on between you and the person making the request. You may also have a page set up on my blog and you may update that once a year.  Interested? You may sign up for more than one category.  Beta readers sign up here.Reviewers sign up here. Editors sign up here.Illustrators sign up here.Designers sign up here.Proof-readers sing up here.    DO REMEMBER THAT AT ANY TIME YOU’RE APPROACHED AND YOU’RE BUSY IT’S PERFECTLY FINE TO SAY NO.    GDPRGeneral Data Protection Regulation. This newsletter is brought to you by MailChimp, which is compliant with the regulations, or is displayed on Blogger, where you watch us but we don't know who you are.  You can always opt to unsubscribe from the mailing list but we ask that you don't; this is the main means of communication between us and our writers and readers. It's very hard to get you back on the list if you remove yourself. We don't expect you to read everything every time, so your delete key can be handy.   In addition, we're destroying all submissions for books that are over a year old.  In future we'll no longer ask for your address on contracts or submissions. No photos will be kept on local computers / disks and at any time you may decline having a photo taken or ask for it to be removed from social media. A full version of our compliance details will shortly be uploaded to the dropbox.               
Shenanigans with Amazon Amazon seems to have lost the plot a little. This is an issue that is affecting all small indie presses that use print on demand.  It seems that their ordering software is no longer talking to Ingrams, the biggest distributor. So they will say the book is difficult to find. This is nonsense.  The books are clearly listed on Nielsen's and as soon as they raise an order with Ingrams the book is printed and distributed. As a publisher we can do little to stop this. However, I have a strategy. Clearly the first in the chain is the customer. No way should our books be taking three or four  weeks to be despatched by Amazon. Even when they're out of stock they should only take a few days and normally have. However, the problem between Ingrams and Amazon makes the process grinds to a halt. They can by-pass this manually.So, if you get a message that the book is difficult to find, either point out that is not the case   or let me know and I'll do this. If you want to contact them yourself you have to do this by going to the book's page or just contacting them.  You can't do it through your order. If you want me to do this, please send me an email, short and to the point: which book, what they are saying, concise details of the order and "Amazon Fail" in the subject line of the email. I recently got The Book Depository back on board though I expect orders are still delayed: they are owned by Amazon.   This has of course been very time-consuming and will continue to be so. However, the better news is that Ingrams and Amazon are working to resolve this issue.                          Bridge House As you may know, Citizens of Nowhere was aired at an event about refugees. Here is some feedback about the event.   "It was a real mixture of performances from women's a cappella to a mini rock band. People seemed to really enjoy it ……and the readings from the blog ran a real thread through the evening. A quote from audience member

"I thought the experiences of refugees read out by various people was inspired and very sobering, and they were generous! We collected £800 to send to help refugees!

"Dave did a really good job, performing more than reading the 'Orwys Interfarian' report.' Several copies of the book were sold." Great news indeed!    
We are currently processing "Crackers". In the end we had over 100 submissions.
We've made the selection for the Waterloo festival. We have chosen sixteen stories / monologues coming to about 13,000 words which will go into an e-book due out 14 June. The Waterloo festival people will announce the winners and after they've done that I'll be in touch.   We’re still getting plenty of interest in our single-author collections. These are for authors we’ve published before and they may include stories we’ve already published, ones they’ve had published elsewhere and new ones. The description for this is now on the web site. We’ve already had some enquiries and we’re currently working on several anthologies. You may recycle stories we’ve already included in another anthology, and you may reedit these if you wish. You may also add in new stories. We’re aiming at a total word count of between 30,000 and 70,000 words. We have  a huge backlog so please be patient. You can always check our progress at: http://apublishersperspective.blogspot.co.uk/p/work-flow.html
      CaféLit Stories are now all being posted at 4.00 p,m, Afternoon Teatime,  Kaffee and Kuchen time and it's also when the kids are home from school. Just the right time for a cuppa and a good story. In April we've had stories from Riham Adly, Mehreen Ahmed, Charles Joseph Albert, James Bates, John T Biggs, Judy Cabito, Alan Cadman, Pat Gallagher, Valerie Griffin, Shawn Klimek, Roger Noons, Dawn Knox, Eliza Master, Kim Martins, Bronte Pearson, Marilyn Pemberton, Mari Phillips, Paula R C Readman, Rebecca Redshaw, Terry Sanville, Kathy Sharp, Paul Stansbury, Robin Wrigley and Maria Zach. This includes several new writers. Our community is really growing. I'm selecting stories in a slightly different way now. When I open my inbox, I'll often see four or five submissions. I'll select the best of the bunch and schedule it for in a few days' time. I'll let you know. I may reject one or two but ones that are basically sound I'll keep forever or until they’re published.  Consequently if one you've submitted to us has not been rejected, and you find a home for it elsewhere, let us know the name of the story and the date you submitted and we'll remove it from the archive. Try to include the drink each time and a CV and do put CafeLit in the subject line so we can identify your submission. Remember to include your bio (50-100 words including links for longer stories, just links for 100 words or less) each time. I haven't got time to look up an old one and in any case your bio is probably changing all the time. I 'm really pleased with how this is all going. It's the highlight of my day, making my CafeLit selection.           We're always open to submissions. Find out to submit here. Remember, this gives you some exposure, you can add in a short CV each time, and there's always the chance that your work might be accepted for the annual anthology.    Talking of which, the votes are in on what we should include in The Best of CafeLit 7:Reader' choice White Socks  - Gail Aldwin Safe -  Laura Gary Do Pigeons Ever get Bored - Robin Wrigley Murmuration - Fiona Mills Pistachio - Gail Aldwin Waiting for Pogo - Penny Rogers The First - Richard Hough  Bottled Christmas Spirit - Derek Corbett  Fennel Tea - Gail Aldwin The Bangkok Bash - Robin Wrigley The Janu Stone Paula R C Readman Bone Collectors - Wendy Ogilvie Egg Nog - Gail Aldwin Harry’s Going to Die Anyway- Robin Wrigley A Bridge Over troubled Waters – Robin Wrigley It's Never the Same -  Paula R C Readman Down by the River - Ann Goodwin Postcard Lady - Keith Havers Film Noir - Gill James Knit and Natter Dawn Knox
Most visited All timeMatthew  5.38 - Sophie Flynn Long Black Glen - Brisciani Burning tradition -  Roger Noons (It's never the Same Paula R C Readman )Workmates - Roger NoonsMost visited last year (White Socks Gail Aldwin)Crucifix - Gill James In Mary World - Dawn Knox
The Best of CafeLit books are generally between 30,000 and 45,000 words. If the above comes to fewer than that, I'll add in an "editor's choice" section. I'm thinking next year of asking those folk in 7 to select for 8.    I hope to get the book out by the end of June.    On offer for CaféLit authors is a page on our web site. See examples here.  The list is growing. Click on the names to find out more about the authors and to access their work. If you're a CaféLit author and would like a web page, use the ones there to get ideas. You need to send me between 250 and 350 words about yourself, an attractive image, a list of up to six publications, up to six awards and up to six links. I then also link the page to your stories on CaféLit. Send to gill at cafelit dot co dot uk.  Latest addition is Kim Martins. See her page here.
ChapeltownOur Chapeltown authors have been very proactive in promoting their work. They have managed to get their books into shops and libraries. They are also buying lots of author copies and being very proactive on getting on to blogs – mine included, of course. We're very pleased to see Gail Aldwin's Paisley Shirt in Waterstone's.           I'm now trying to build up the Chapeltown readers list. I'm giving away a free copy of my January Stones 2013 to anyone who joins. See details here: http://www.chapeltownpublishing.uk/Spread the word. The profit share of the audio book for this title will equal 10% of the cover price. If you read yourself you get 20%. I'm now rolling that out to other titles.       
Creative CaféJust one café added this month: The Happy Heart Café  in Solihulll: http://www.creativecafeproject.org/2018/04/the-happy-heart-cafe-solihull-b92.htmlWe do also have a review for that café: http://www.creativecafeproject.org/2018/04/the-happy-heart-cafe-solihull-review.html
Keep sending suggestions and review them if you can.      I'm continuing my tour of creative cafés where I collect stories for an anthology. In some cases, writers may offer them and in others customers may tell me their story and I'll write it for them. Do you know of a café that might be interested in this? Let me know if you do.         Remember you can now buy merchandise for the Creative Café project. The profit on anything you buy here goes to the Creative Café Project. Check this out here.    We’re always looking for new cafés.  If you visit one of the cafés in the projectand would like to write a review of between 250 and 350 words – nice, too, to have a couple of pictures – send it to me here.Do the same if you find a new café. I’m also now proactively encouraging cafes to stock The Best of CaféLit. Do you know anyone who might like to stock it? We can offer a 35% discount to retailers. Query gill at cafelit dot co dot uk.      The Red Telephone Our mentoring programme is now full. I’m working quite closely with three very different authors: Charlotte Comley, Dianne Stadhams, and Nina Wadcock. They are all presenting some fascinating material. University of Salford graduates Lauren Hopes and Christian Leah have also joined our happy band.        I was delighted to see Lauren at our recent Celebration Event in London. She read from her novel.  Facebook Group for the Imprints I've been toying with this for a while. One of our Chapeltown writers asked if we could form a group and this persuaded me that this was the right thing to do. Well, we've published Citizens of Nowhere, and we're pretty international. So, Sans Frontières sounds good. Martin, who does most of our design, came up with "Scribblers". Yes, it's a bit of a cliché but it alliterates nicely. So, that's what we've become.  Note this is a secret group. The public will not be able to see this. It is for writers published by one of the four imprints. Here you can:·         Discuss all technical issues re our books·         Exchange marketing ideas·         Advertise and report on your events·         Promote any of your titles or successes ·         Share good practice and ideas·         Get help with writing problems ·         Anything else appropriate The page URL is https://www.facebook.com/groups/185719828704485/Please come and join us if you're eligible. Or you can ask me to sign you up.   Facebook CaféLit PageI also invite you to engage with the CafeLit page. I'm widening the scope of this to include all of the imprints.  This is public facing and is more about promotion. Find it here: https://www.facebook.com/CaféLit-Writers-Creative-Café-Project-138022606266155

School Visits I’m proactively promoting my school visits associated with The House on Schellberg Street project. I’ve now developed a whole workshop for this. It starts off with a board game, includes some role play and creative writing and ends with a discussion. It is now possible to purchase the kit to work on on your own. Find details here.I did a presentation about my work on this at the 2017 NAWE Conference.  It became apparent as I talked and partly from the reaction of one of the delegates that the workshop has more impact than the book. Mind you, that had partly been the intention. Costs for my workshops = travel expenses plus £400 for a full day and £200 for a half day. This includes all materials and some freebies. Two schools near to each other might consider splitting the day and halving the travel expenses and fees. This is open to negotiation in any case.        I also offer a free half day visit, though you pay my travel expenses, if you allow me to promote my books.       I’m continuously adding materials for schools to the site that are different from the ones I use for the workshops. I’ve recently added in resources and books to do with the topic. See them here:       Query for a school visit here.I’m also happy to tailor a visit for your agreed donation. This can be for either a Schellberg Cycle visit or a creative writing workshop. Any monies raised this way will go specifically to a project I have for a non-fiction book about a journey that will follow the footsteps of Clara Lehrs. I’m hoping to do the whole journey by train, including departing via my nearest Metrolink station. It’s important to feel the rails beneath my feet.       I offer as well standard author visits which include readings from my books, Q & A sessions and creative writing exercises. Please remember, with these as well, I’m open to negotiation if you can’t afford the full price. Free listing for our writers If you are one of our writers and would like to offer school visits, please contact me. I'm offering a free listing on the imprint pages. State: age groups you are prepared to work with, a definition of your work, distances you are prepared to travel. Appropriate links. Please provide an image.           Upcoming eventsI have two events to mention:Our Manchester celebration event: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/scribblers-sans-frontieres-celebration-tickets-45026085233This takes place on 2 June at the International Burgess Foundation., 2.00 p.m. until 5. 00 p.m.  It follows the pattern of the London events. There will be: general minglingcash baran opportunity to buy books at an advantageous rate    “speed-dating”  where you get to speak to as many people as possible in the room i.e. promote yourself to readers, swap tips with other writersauthor readingslatest news from me  collection for a local charitybig book swap (bring one of your other titles and take something else home – hopefully all will be reviewed. If you bring a non-writing friend they can just bring a book they love)  Flash Fiction Reading and Workshop at Buxton Fringe 19 July  https://www.buxtonfringe.org.uk/descriptions2018.html#2374  I'll be doing readings from January Stones 2013 and form my new collection 140 x 140. The ticket £7.00 or £5.00 includes a copy of one of the books and a workshop on writing Flash Fiction. Do come along if you can.         
More specific details of the following will be posted later of the following: I'm hoping to run a workshop on marketing for indie writers / publishers. This will be free of charge but you may make a donation if you wish. This will enable me to put on further events. A Pushing Boundaries, Flying Higher Master Class about writing the young adult novel.London event 1 December 2018 (Save the date!)       Writing opportunities Remember I keep a full list of vetted opportunities on my writing blog. See them here. New ones are added several times a day. Roughly once a month I go through it and take out all of the out of date ones. At that point I send it out to a list. If you would like to be on that list, sign up here.     Current reading recommendation Leaving Poppy by Kate CannI read a lot of young adult books and I write a few. Back at the turn of the century I pretty well knew every young adult book that was published and labelled as such as well as many that were clearly young adult but that didn't have the label. The new works then were fresh and experimental. The older, unlabelled ones, appealed to the young adult reader and those who like reading young adult books. Now, it has all become somewhat formulaic even though "high concepts" are continuously brought in.  There are also now so many that it's impossible to know them all.I've studied quite a few of Kate Cann's books. They border on what I call "chicklet-lit" but have a darker side and are fundamentally about relationships. I was expecting the same of this one. I found it refreshingly novel.  Yes, there is still quite a lot about relationships and as you might expect the main characters are a bunch of students sharing a flat. Protagonist Amber is on a gap year. In true Bildungsroman fashion she grows over the course of the story. She has two main challenges: disturbed younger sister Poppy and something creepy about the house. I'll say no more about the story and in fact I'm giving no more away here than in the book's blurb. I will say that this book is well written, the chapters are delightfully short, the characters are believable and that we are kept guessing right until the very end. It has an upbeat but open ending. The voice is pleasing.         Read more here.                   Calling all writersI'm running an occasional series of interviews on my blog. In April I interviewed Jenny Palmer.  If you would like to be on my blog just answer the questions below and send them with appropriate images to gill dot james at btinternet dot com. Please feel free to pick and choose which of these to answer.  1.      What do you write? Why this in particular?  2.      What got you started on writing in the first place?3.      Do you have a particular routine?  4.      Do you have a dedicated working space? 5.      When did you decide you could call yourself a writer? Do you do that in fact? 6.      How supportive are your friends and family? Do they understand what you're doing? 7.      What are you most proud of in your writing? 8.      How do you get on with editing and research?9.      Do you have any goals for the future? 10.  Which writers have inspired you?Please write as much or as little as you like for each section and supply as many pictures as you like. Also let me know your latest publication and supply me with a link if it's not on Amazon.  I 'm also happy to offer you a post whenever you have a new book come out, even if I'm not your publisher. In this case answer the following questions:Tell me about your book. Tell us about your research for this book. What inspired you to write this?What's next? How can we get a copy of the book?Do you have any events planned?Again write as much or as little as you please. Alter and add to the questions if you wish. Provide as many pictures as you wish. Send to: gill dot james at btinternet dot com Giveaway This month I'm giving away The Prophecy. You will also find in this dropbox:·         An extract from Clara’s Story·         Some seminars for schools about The House on Schellberg Street·         Some fiction writing exercises·         The opening chapters from my manual for writing the young adult novel   Note, that normally my books and the books supplied by the imprints I manage, sell for anything form £0.99 to £10.99, with most on Kindle being about £2.99 and the average price for paperback being £7.00. We have to allow our writers to make a living. But we’re offering these free samples so that you can try before you buy.   Naturally we welcome reviews.
Happy reading and writing.

The Imperfect Tense

I know my grammar. I was a language teacher for over twenty years and I learnt my first two languages via the "grammar grind" method.  Plus I did Latin in the first year of Grammar School.  Latin grammar is pretty comprehensive. I also argue fiercely that acquiring knowledge of the grammar of the language is a short cut to mastery of that language. Grammar is the backbone. It allows you to know who is doing what to whom, when and how. I'm with Naom Chomsky on there being a universal grammar. There are certain things we need to say in whichever language we're using and every language will have a way of doing that.     I'd like today to explore the imperfect tense. It seems to have gone out of fashion a little in English and is mistaken often for passive language. I argue there's still a difference between the imperfect, the past and the preterite though different languages allow an overlap of these three. The name says it all. We are talking about an unfinished or an imperfect action. There are two main uses for it. It can be used for a continuous action or a repeated action.  Continous action We often see it as "was …. ing" in English: He was sitting in the lounge, reading a book.They were playing badminton outside.It was raining heavily.This is the one that is frequently mistaken for passive language. Actually, though, there is a world of difference between "It was raining heavily" and "It rained heavily." The latter is a completed action. The former isn't.  Interrupted action "Was … ing" comes into its own for interrupted actions. He was eating his supper when the phone rang. She was loading the car when a cyclist stopped and asked for directions.He was just about to put the kettle on when lights went out.  Repeated action in the pastWe cheat here a little in English and don't use a verb form as such except "was" and "were". e.g.:He was a very rich man. They were poor. I was happy then. Otherwise we often use "used to" or "would" e.g.:He used to cycle to school every day. She used to live in a hovel. They would put the milk bottles out every night. Sometime we use the normal preterite with extra words to indicate that the action is repeated:He took her to school every day.In the summer he took two weeks off work.Every time they crossed the road he took hold of her hand. A couple of quirks in other languageFrench has a special form of the preterite it only uses in literature – the past historic. In conversation it uses the simple past – i.e. "I have seen" etc.In German the preterite and the imperfect are the same.
Why we should care The imperfect offers a nuance of meaning. We lose out if we dismiss this as "passive" language.          

 

Cover reveal - Our Daily Bread

So here it is, the cover of my experimental book of short stories.  Note it it the way of publishing that is experimental. The stories are conventionally me. The book isn't out until 15 May but I'm happy to let you have the PDF if you're willing to review.


  


You can preorder for formats other than Kindle at: https://www.books2read.com/u/38gaJr 



Our Daily Bread  includes stories of people striving to succeed, sometimes managing, sometimes not.  It is at the same time about daily lives and the bigger picture. There's the story of the young woman who struggles to come to terms with the death of her baby.  A music manager is near to despair but finds a way to carry on. An older citizen finds that miracle still do happen.  Even God, whoever she may be has her say and  gives us an interpretation of the Lord's Prayer.  

Interview with Jenny Palmer

 ISoon I will have published Jenny four times. One of her stories has appeared on the CafeLit web site, in the Best of CafeLit6, in Citizens of Nowhere, and it will be in her forthcoming single author collection.  So I'm very pleased to have her here on my blog today.     Jenny in front of a quilt she has just completed.
1.    What do you write? Why this in particular?I write short stories, local history, memoirs and poetry. Short stories because they further my imagination and help me deal with reality. Some of my stories explore contemporary issues; others delve into the historical past. Local history, because I spent forty years living away from home in London and travelling around the world. When I returned to the North in 2008 to live a stone’s throw away from where I was born, writing helped me settle back into the community and re-connect with my past. In 2014 I wrote and self-published a family history, going back 400 years, called Whipps, Watsons and Bulcocks: a Pendle family history,1560-1960  I have also written two memoirs: Nowhere better than home (2012) which covers my early childhood in rural Lancashire and a sequel called Pastures New (2016) which covers my world travels. All three books are available from the Pendle Heritage Centre, Barrowford at £4.99 or £5.99 each.Contact  info@pendleheritagecentre.co.uk  or me direct jenniferpalmer7@btinternet.com.



The cover of ‘Pastures New’. That is me in the middle, at Machu Pichu, 1984.
What got you started on writing in the first place?I first got started on writing in 1985, while I was still teaching. I had taken six months unpaid leave and gone off to travel and live in Peru and Bolivia. While I was there, I met and interviewed a group of Bolivian women who were on hunger strike. They were protesting about the rise in prices due to austerity measures introduced by the government at the instigation of the International Monetary Fund. I had previously written articles on the plight of Palestinians after a visit to Israel and had spent many years involved in other people’s political causes. I felt it was time to reflect on my life.  3.    Do you have a particular routine?
I like to write every day, usually in the mornings as soon as I get up. Ioften carry on into the afternoon and stop around tea-time.  Since I retired, I’ve got into the habit of treating my writing as a day’s work. I’m not rigid about it. I don’t try to force it, if isn’t happening or when life intervenes. Poetry tends to be more spasmodic. I write it when I am in the mood. 4.    Do you have a dedicated working space?Now that I’m living back in Lancashire again, I write in my upstairs’ room, which has a glorious view, looking across to the Big End of Pendle Hill. I have dedicated this room to my writing and have all my reference books around me. It also serves as a spare room for visitors. In winter, however, I transfer my laptop downstairs, as the temperature upstairs rarely gets above 13 degrees Centigrade and I don’t fancy working with gloves on. This is a snowscape from Feb 3rd 2018, just after the JCB digger had dug us out. 



.  5.    When did you decide to call yourself a writer? Do you do that in fact?Yes, I do call myself a writer. I called myself a writer even before I had published anything, because I write all the time. Initially, I was a teacher and a writer. Now I am just a writer. Having had some of my work published, either by myself or by other publishers, does help to make me feel more confident about my work.  6.    How supportive are your friends and family?My friends and family have always been very supportive. I must admit I didn’t publish my two memoirs until after my parents had died. I was worried it might upset them. The first thing I did when I started writing in London, was join a couple of writing groups.  That really helped me get going. When I moved back to Lancashire, I was glad to discover there were plenty of writing groups.  Currently I belong to Clitheroe Writers’ Group and Poetry Stanza. It has been a good way to make friends and I find the feedback invaluable. 7.    What are you most proud of in your writing?I am proud of my family history book. It was the one book I had always wanted to write. The research alone took ten years. It has sold well since it was published in 2014 and I still get people from all over the country, and from the United States and Australia, asking me to send them a copy. Our family home was the basis of the Whipp, Watson and Bulcock families, who started out as Quakers back in the seventeenth century. Many people migrated from this area and their descendants like to trace their roots back to it.  I am also proud of my short stories, which have been published in various anthologies. I am about to have my own collection published by Bridge House publications, called ‘Keepsake and other stories.’  These are stories I have written over the last thirty years. They deal with both historical and contemporary issues and are set in different locations, rural and urban.  The book will be available on Amazon shortly.
8.    How do you get on with editing and research?Having taught English for Academic Purposes in various London universities, I always enjoyed doing research. It was a natural transition for me to do family history research. While I was still living in London, I used to frequent the British Library, The National Archives at Kew, and the Friends’ Meeting House at Euston. I often called in at Lancashire Record Office in Preston on visits home. That was before the Internet got going. Nowadays I do most of the research for my writing online.In the 1990s, I co-edited four anthologies of short stories, published by the Women’s Press and Serpent’s Tail on the theme of Christmas. Four of us in our writing group had turned ourselves into freelance editors. We advertised nationally, received hundreds of stories in the post, which we then selected and edited for each anthology. Editing other people’s stories is different to editing your own. It is always good to have a fresh pair of eyes look at your work.
o Do you have any goals for the future?My next project is to publish my own collection of poetry. I first started writing poetry about ten years ago, when I came back to Lancashire.  The Poetry Stanza group in Clitheroe really helped me get started. Some of my poems have a political edge, for instance ‘The thwarted autodidact’ which is a satirical take on library closures. It was published in the Clitheroe Advertiser and Times. I have had poems published in Northern Life magazine and in various local poetry anthologies and was runner-up in a war poetry competition and in a U3A poetry competition.
   Which writers have inspired you?I read all the time and am a member of the U3A book club. When I was young, I studied French, German and Spanish literature. Kafka’s ‘Metamorphosis’ used to be a favourite and ‘A hundred years of solitude’ by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. When I started writing short stories, I read people like Jean Rhys, William Trevor, Anton Chekhov, Guy de Maupassant. Alice Munro, Raymond Carver, Elizabeth Taylor and loads more. Currently I’m into Sarah Hall.  When I started writing my memoir, I read ‘Cider with Rosie’ and ‘As I walked out one Midsummer Morning,’ by Laurie Lee, ’Forties’ child,’ by Tom Wakefield, ‘That’s how it was’ by Maureen Duffy, ‘The Road to Nab End’ by William Woodruff.  For my family history book, I attended a three-year, online, distance-learning course at Lancaster University in Local History and was inspired by a book, written by Hilda Kean of Ruskin College, called ‘London Stories,’ which gave me the confidence to write my family history book.

News 1 April 2018

My biggest news this month I guess is that I am back at the University of Salford, as a senior lecturer again, on 0.5 FT temporary contract until 18 September 2018. It all started happening rather suddenly at the end of February when I got an email from the colleague who took over me as programme leader: would I be willing to take on the programmes again until the end of the semester? I was just contemplating this when another email came in: would I be willing to supervise three MA creative projects? Then it all sort of escalated – the end of the trimester became the end of July and is now 18 September. I started officially on 20 March –thus avoiding all the strikes that are going on in HE at the moment. I have five more weeks of teaching six hours a week, and all the marking that that produces then it will be mainly admin, attending meetings and supervising the MA students.   It is impinging a little on my own writing but I am getting some time from elsewhere to compensate for that.  I'm not letting it interfere with my publishing ventures.              News about my writing I've now started making arrangements to have the play script of The House on Schellberg Street read out on 8 July. If you'd like to be involved and you live within commuting distance of Greater Manchester, let me know.  This will be at the Garrick Theatre, very close to the Metrolink in Whitefield. We shall start at 1.30 and finish at 7.00  p.m.  I'm hoping to have read through and a walk through. I hope to pre-cast it. I shall provide cake and other refreshments. 
Remember, my book on marketing is out there.  I'm giving it away for free this month to anyone who would like to read it. See details in the "give away" section below.    Amazon has approved our recoding of January Stones and this is available as an audio book. You can find it here.   I notice you can take a free trial with audio books but I feel a little wary of this, though I am tempted. 
The audio book represents just one of my current experiments. I'm now loaded my short stories up to Draft to Digital. I've downloaded the Kindle version to my Kindle and it looks great. I've opted to sell it through all of the platforms.  If I'm pleased with the results I may roll this out to the imprints. This one isn't released until 31 May though I note that all of the platforms except Kindle will allow prelease sales.    
And I soldier on with The House of Clementine. It's still a struggle. Still, I always say that I write better when I struggle. I hope that is true this time.   
1940s Group I'm beginning to find out more and more about 1940s events up and down the country. I wish I could go to them all! I'm hoping though, that we might get a good representation of members at most of them and that we can share information that way.      Do join us if you think this is for you. Importantly, I'm happy for you to promote your books here on the last day of the month.         Here's the reminder of what it's all about: This is a Facebook group for all people who write about the 1940s. Fiction and non-fiction, for young and old. Topics might then be: the Holocaust, World War II, Civilian Experience (all sides) and the battle front. We can exchange ideas about research and marketing. We may promote books and stories, - the last day of every month and on launch / release day. If you feel that is you, do join us: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2026868870924138/         Dreamteam The Dream Team continues to grow. Find members here.     This is a personal recommendation. Initially I intend to use my Dream Team a lot myself but gradually I would add in people that friends and friends of friends have recommended. What happens? You sign up to a mailing list and every time a request comes in we mail it out to you or the enquirer contacts you directly via my web site. The conversation then carries on between you and the person making the request. You may also have a page set up on my blog and you may update that once a year.  Interested? You may sign up for more than one category.  Beta readers sign up here.Reviewers sign up here. Editors sign up here.Illustrators sign up here.Designers sign up here.Proof-readers sing up here.    DO REMEMBER THAT AT ANY TIME YOU’RE APPROACHED AND YOU’RE BUSY IT’S PERFECTLY FINE TO SAY NO.        Bridge House The theme of our 2018 is "Crackers". Submissions are closed now and I just have to process the last few that have come in. We have almost 100. 
We're also very privileged to be the publisher for the Waterloo festival. These entries are also closed. For this competition we have just over 100.  
We’re getting plenty of interest in our single-author collections. These are for authors we’ve published before and they may include stories we’ve already published, ones they’ve had published elsewhere and new ones. The description for this is now on the web site. We’ve already had some enquiries and we’re currently working on several anthologies.  You may recycle stories we’ve already included in another anthology, and you may reedit these if you wish. You may also add in new stories. We’re aiming at a total word count of between 30,000 and 70,000 words.  Dawn Knox's Extraordinary is now out. It is available here. 
If you’re interested in having a single author collection, contact me here.    Also in progress are collections by Paul Bradley, Phyllis Burton, Jeanne Davies, Jesse Falzoi, Jenny Palmer, Dianne Stadhams and Paul Williams. Several other Bridge House authors have applied and they're in a bit of a queue but I'm sure we'll accept them. After all we know them. Do be aware that we have a huge back list to look over. You can always check our progress at: http://apublishersperspective.blogspot.co.uk/p/work-flow.html
      CaféLit Stories are now all being posted at 4.00 p,m, Afternoon Teatime,  Kaffee and Kuchen time and it's also when the kids are home from school. Just the right time for a cuppa and a good story. We're getting quite a few submissions and are now on target of one a day. Sadly, of course, we have to reject some. Our next step is to have several to choose from each day. 
In March we've had stories from James Bates, Cath Barton, Mary Bevan, Ray Bradnock, Janet Bunce, David Deanshaw, Robert Ferguson, Patricia Gallagher, Dawn Knox, Helen Laycock, Kim Martins, Joy Mawby, Roger Noons, Martin Parker, Marilyn Pemberton, Paula R C Readman, Sarah Scanlan, Kathy Sharp, Neta Shlein, Allison Symes, Andrea Williams and  Robin Wrigley. A few new writers here. Do keep those stories coming.     

We're always open to submissions. Find out to submit here. Remember, this gives you some exposure, you can add in a short CV each time, and there's always the chance that your work might be accepted for the annual anthology.    
The Best of CaféLit 6 has been produced and copies are on sale. As usual we welcome reviews. I can let you have a PDF or an e-mobi copy if you're willing to review. You can also buy copies here.   I'll shortly be working on The Best of CaféLit 7. 
We're asking for readers' help in deciding what should go into this year's selection. If you'd like to be involved, follow these instructions: Please select your favourite five posts from 2017. Number them 1. for the best 2. for the second best etc. and email to gill at cafelit dot co dot uk. I'll award five points for a number one, four for two etc. You mustn't vote for yourself but you could ask your friends to look.
If that doesn't get us about 30,000 words I'll add in the most popular posts and then my own further selection.
Democracy rules okay?
End date: 30 April 2018. https://cafelitcreativecafe.blogspot.co.uk/   
On offer for CaféLit authors is a page on our web site. See examples here.  The list is growing. Click on the names to find out more about the authors and to access their work. If you're a CaféLit author and would like a web page, use the ones there to get ideas. You need to send me between 250 and 350 words about yourself, an attractive image, a list of up to six publications, up to six awards and up to six links. I then also link the page to your stories on CaféLit. Send to gill at cafelit dot co dot uk.  If you already have page here, this is the time of year you may ask me to update it. You may have a new publication, award, web site or image that you'd like posting. Remember we keep up to six awards and publications on display.     
ChapeltownOur Chapeltown authors have been very proactive in promoting their work. They have managed to get their books into shops and libraries. They are also buying lots of author copies and being very proactive on getting on to blogs – mine included, of course.          I'm now trying to build up the Chapeltown readers list. I'm giving away a free copy of my January Stones 2013 to anyone who joins. See details here: http://www.chapeltownpublishing.uk/Spread the word. 
The profit share of the audio book for this title will equal 10% of the cover price.  I'm now thinking of rolling that out to the other titles.       
Chapeltown is now publishing all of The Schellberg Cycle. A new version of The House on Schellberg Street is now available. Details are here. The second story in the series will be out very soon. We're just completing the final proof check.
Creative CaféTwo cafés have been added this month: ·         The Book Case at Hebden Bridge http://www.creativecafeproject.org/2018/03/the-book-case-hebden-bridge-hx7.html  Hebden Bridge is a place awash with writers and other creative practitioners anyway.  Well worth a visit. ·         The Galley Café at Lyme Regis  http://www.creativecafeproject.org/2018/03/the-galley-cafe-lyme-regis.html Keep sending suggestions and review them if you can.      I'm continuing my tour of creative cafés where I collect stories for an anthology. In some cases, writers may offer them and in others maybe customers may tell me their story and I'll write it for them. Do you know of a café that might be interested in this? Let me know if you do.         Remember you can now buy merchandise for the Creative Café project. The profit on anything you buy here goes to the Creative Café Project. Check this out here.    
We’re always looking for new cafés.  If you visit one of the cafés in the projectand would like to write a review of between 250 and 350 words – nice, too, to have a couple of pictures – send it to me here.Do the same if you find a new café. 
I’m also now proactively encouraging cafes to stock The Best of CaféLit. Do you know anyone who might like to stock it? We can offer a 35% discount to retailers. Query gill at cafelit dot co dot uk.      The Red Telephone Our mentoring programme is now full. I’m working quite closely with three very different authors: Charlotte Comley, Dianne Stadhams, and Nina Wadcock. They are all presenting some fascinating material. University of Salford graduates Lauren Hopes and Christian Leah have also joined our happy band.         I was delighted to see Lauren at our recent Celebration Event in London. She read from her novel.  Facebook Group for the Imprints I've been toying with this for a while. One of our Chapeltown writers asked if we could form a group and this persuaded me that this was the right thing to do. Well, we've published Citizens of Nowhere, and we're pretty international. So, Sans Frontières sounds good. Martin, who does most of our design, came up with "Scribblers". Yes, it's a bit of a cliché but it alliterates nicely. So, that's what we've become.  Note this is a secret group. The public will not be able to see this. It is for writers published by one of the four imprints. Here you can:·         Discuss all technical issues re our books·         Exchange marketing ideas·         Advertise and report on your events·         Promote any of your titles or successes ·         Share good practice and ideas·         Get help with writing problems ·         Anything else appropriate The page URL is https://www.facebook.com/groups/185719828704485/Please come and join us if you're eligible. Or you can ask me to sign you up.   Facebook CaféLit PageI also invite you to engage with the CafeLit page. I'm widening the scope of this to include all of the imprints.  This is public facing and is more about promotion. Find it here: https://www.facebook.com/CaféLit-Writers-Creative-Café-Project-138022606266155
Book tours If you’re a Bridge House / Red Telephone / CaféLit / Chapeltown author and you want to get serious about book tours, consider our author’s kit. We provide twenty or so books (exact number is up for negotiation) you take to the bookshop and the bookshop can put these through the till. We then invoice the bookshop, with a 35% discount for any sold and top up your supply to twenty. At the end of the tour you can either pay for the remaining books at cost + 10% or keep them until you’ve sold them and then pay the normal price of 75% of RRP. The latter can in any case be set against royalties. You need to allow at least ten days between events. We must be able to invoice a retailer later for this to work. Contact me here if you’re interested in this.    
I'm experimenting on an alternative version of this with one of our Chapeltown writers. She is persuading local bookshops to stock the book without her doing signings. If this works we'll roll it out to other authors.           
School Visits I’m proactively promoting my school visits associated with The House on Schellberg Street project. I’ve now developed a whole workshop for this. It starts off with a board game, includes some role play and creative writing and ends with a discussion. 
It is now possible to purchase the kit to work on on your own. Find details here.I did a presentation about my work on this at the 2017 NAWE Conference.  It became apparent as I talked and partly from the reaction of one of the delegates that the workshop has more impact than the book. Mind you, that had partly been the intention. Costs for my workshops = travel expenses plus £400 for a full day and £200 for a half day. This includes all materials and some freebies. Two schools near to each other might consider splitting the day and halving the travel expenses and fees. This is open to negotiation in any case.        I also offer a free half day visit, though you pay my travel expenses, if you allow me to promote my books.       
I’m continuously adding materials for schools to the site that are different from the ones I use for the workshops. I’ve recently added in resources and books to do with the topic. See them here:       Query for a school visit here.
I’m also happy to tailor a visit for your agreed donation. This can be for either a Schellberg Cycle visit or a creative writing workshop. Any monies raised this way will go specifically to a project I have for a non-fiction book about a journey that will follow the footsteps of Clara Lehrs. I’m hoping to do the whole journey by train, including departing via my nearest Metrolink station. It’s important to feel the rails beneath my feet.        I offer as well standard author visits which include readings from my books, Q & A sessions and creative writing exercises. 
Please remember, with these as well, I’m open to negotiation if you can’t afford the full price.  Upcoming eventsMore specific details of the following will be posted later.I'm hoping to run a workshop on marketing for indie writers / publishers. This will be free of charge but you may make a donation if you wish. This will enable me to put on further events. A Pushing Boundaries, Flying Higher Master Class about writing the young adult novel.Manchester event in the summer.London event 1 December 2018 (Save the date!) Past eventsOur event on 2 December at the Princess of Wales went well though twenty delegates had to pull out, all for good reasons: illness, awkward trains, family problems, job inductions etc. and I too suffered from "awkward trains". At least though, I got all of my fare back and quite promptly. 
Nevertheless, we all had a great time. We also sold half of our stock of books within the first five minutes and quite a bit more later on. I didn't have to bring all that much back home. 
I actually managed to join in the "speed-dating" this time. The little bell that I bought worked really hard. She is a young woman in a crinoline dress. Esmeralda. 
It was good to put names to faces. I read a little too from January Stones. We also had readings from Margaret Bulleyment, Penny Dale, Shanta Everington, Lauren Hopes, Dawn Knox, Paula Readman, Allison Symes and Robin Wrigley.              Writing opportunities Remember I keep a full list of vetted opportunities on my writing blog. See them here. New ones are added several times a day. Roughly once a month I go through it and take out all of the out of date ones. At that point I send it out to a list. If you would like to be on that list, sign up here.    I have recently revamped the way this works and made it much more user friendly. Let me know what you think.  Current reading recommendation This month I'm recommending Talking Theatre by Richard Eyre. This is a series of interviews with prominent figures in 20th and 21st century theatre. These interviews were filmed and are now also produced in the book. They collectively give a very good overview of theatre in the UK and to some extent in America. Very good for me as I return to being programme leader for English and Drama and Drama and Creative Writing.    
There are interviews with Alan, Ayckbourn, Frith Banbury, Alan Bennett, Steven Berkoff, Peter Brook, John Bury, William Dafoe, Judi Dench, John Gielgud, Peter Gill, Peter Hall, Christopher Hampton, David Hare, Margaret Harris, Jocelyn Herbert, Kim Hunter, John Johnston, Tony Kushner, Arthur Laurents, Robert Lepage,  Cameron Mackintosh, Simon McBurney, John McGarth, Ian McKellen, Arhtur Miller, Patcrik marber, Liam Neeson, Trevor Nunn, Harold Pinter, Stephen Rea, Luise Rainer, Vanessa Redgrave, Jason Robards, Peter Schaffer, Fiona Shaw, Stephen Sondheim, Tom Stoppard, Deborah Werner, Arnold Wesker and  August Wilson. 
Many of them discuss Brecht, Beckett, Chekov, the Method and Shakespeare. 
Richard Eyre himself is quite a prominent figure in theatre. 
So, this gives quite a good overview.  
More details here.         Calling all writersI'm running an occasional series of interviews on my blog. In March I interviewed Mandy Huggins, Linda Flynn  Helen Laycock and Anusha VR   If you would like to be on my blog just answer the questions below and send them with appropriate images to gill dot james at btinternet dot com. Please feel free to pick and choose which of these to answer.  1.      What do you write? Why this in particular?  2.      What got you started on writing in the first place?3.      Do you have a particular routine?  4.      Do you have a dedicated working space? 5.      When did you decide you could call yourself a writer? Do you do that in fact? 6.      How supportive are your friends and family? Do they understand what you're doing? 7.      What are you most proud of in your writing? 8.      How do you get on with editing and research?9.      Do you have any goals for the future? 1.  Which writers have inspired you?Please write as much or as little as you like for each section and supply as many pictures as you like. Also let me know your latest publication and supply me with a link if it's not on Amazon. 
I 'm also happy to offer you a post whenever you have a new book come out, even if I'm not your publisher. In this case answer the following questions:Tell me about your book. Tell us about your research for this book. What inspired you to write this? What's next? How can we get a copy of the book?Do you have any events planned?Again write as much or as little as you please. Alter and add to the questions if you wish. Provide as many pictures as you wish. Send to: gill dot james at btinternet dot com Giveaway This month I'm giving away Marketingfor Indies   You will also find in this dropbox:·         An extract from Clara’s Story·         Some seminars for schools about The House on Schellberg Street·         Some fiction writing exercises·         The opening chapters from my manual for writing the young adult novel   Note, that normally my books and the books supplied by the imprints I manage, sell for anything form £0.99 to £10.99, with most on Kindle being about £2.99 and the average price for paperback being £7.00. We have to allow our writers to make a living. But we’re offering these free samples so that you can try before you buy.   Naturally we welcome reviews.
Happy reading and writing.

Ludic Reading – and Writing

I once had an academic paper rejected because I had used the word "ludic".  The peer reviewer though it was a typo and should have said "lucid". No, actually. I mean "ludic". It literally means "playful". When we use the word in connection with reading, we mean something very specific. If someone is reading "ludically", they no longer see the marks on the paper and they are no longer aware that they are decoding those words. They simply see the story playing out as a film in their head.
I experience something similar when I write. I'm no longer aware that I'm typing the words but I'm just seeing the story unfold in front of me. In real time. It all happens as fast or as slowly as I'm typing. If anything, I get even more absorbed in the stories I write than in the ones I read.
Not everyone has this experience, and those that don't are often very competent readers and highly intelligent. Is it perhaps something genetic? However, my grandmother used to harangue me: "Why have you got that head of yours stuck in a book? You should do something useful with your hands."  I could see her point but reading was then and remains now my default activity. One of the great joys of sitting on the beach in the hot sun is that it gives me an opportunity to read. Holidays mean plenty of time for reading.
I was a high school teacher for 26 years. I encountered very few children who couldn't read but I also met only a few who actually enjoyed reading. Investigation revealed that they didn't get beyond the decoding.  They were still very conscious of the black marks on a white background.
I would imagine that everyone reading this blog is a ludic reader as they are interested in what I write and my observations on the writing process. Many may also be ludic writers.
I often discuss this with my students. They nod wisely. Yes, they are student of English, Drama and Creative Writing and they all read and write ludically.  
"Beware of your peers in Newton," I warn. "They are not all as fortunate as we are. They don't necessarily get those lovely pictures." Yes, that's right: Maths and Science are taught in our Newton building.
This was confirmed again when I shared a table with a scientist at our local village cinema club. This lady had nothing against story for she enjoyed the film. "I don't get what turns you readers on," she said. "All I see are black marks on white paper and holding a book hurts my arm. I have enough reading to do in the day job."
Victor Nell discusses this in detail in his text Lost in a Book; the psychology of reading for pleasure. 



Cornelia Funke gives us a fictional example in her Inkheart series; the protagonist's father is capable of reading characters into and out of books.  
Happy reading and writing – ludically if possible.