Imogen Clark's Blog, page 9

Starting a new book.

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}Starting a new book.

Today is an exciting day.

I plan to begin writing my 19th novel.

I say that, but it’s unlikely that I will commence right now. I’m writing this blog post for a start. A classic procrastination technique. After that I might do a bit more research for one of my characters or have a think about what might happen in the first couple of chapters.

Because even though the writing of the first draft is absolutely my favourite part of creating a new book, it also feels quite scary when I land on this 'okay -this is your moment - let’s crack on' square in the game. I get those little voices chatting to me in my head. 'You do know you can't do this, don't you?' they say. 'And the last eighteen were just flukes.' They can be hard to ignore.

It was the lauded novelist Iris Murdoch who said, ‘Every book is the wreck of a perfect idea’ and she wasn't wrong. When the idea for my new book is still in my head and I haven’t yet made the fatal mistake of trying to get it down on ‘paper’ then it might be brilliant, my best yet, with all its little sentences gleaming.

Of course, it’s only when I try to switch from nebulous concept as I imagine it to cold hard words on a page that the bubble is burst and I remember how difficult it is to actually get everything to come together.

As I have said in pretty much every interview I’ve ever given, I don’t plot my books out before I start. My process is organic and intuitive, which is a fancy way of saying that I make it up as I go along.

In practise, this means that in order to start writing all I need is a theme, a couple of characters and an idea of where the story opens.

And I have those for this new book.

Yet here I am writing a blog post instead. After that my pen drawer could do with a tidy, and I really fancy a brownie to go with my coffee so maybe I could make a quick batch.

And then we can see about starting the new book, if it’s not too late in the day . . .

Photo by Gia Oris on Unsplash

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

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Phew! What a Scorcher!

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}Phew! What a scorcher!

Phew but it’s hot! A proper scorcher. Again!

Which is great for me as I’m currently editing a book which opens in the English heatwave of 1976. I wrote the first draft in the midst of a damp and misty November and I had to wrack my brains not only to remember what it feels like to give birth but also how relentless heat affects the body. When it’s cold outside it’s hard to imagine that warmed-right-through-to-your-bones feeling that prolonged time in the sun gives you. Warmed-by-the-central-heating just isn’t the same.

I was ten in 1976. I as I remember things, the weather was glorious for the entire summer holiday and that the grown-ups made a lot of fuss about it. There was a hosepipe ban, of course, and my father rigged a Heath Robinson series of pipes and syphons to get the bathwater that we had shared from the bath, out of the bathroom window and all the way down the garden to the greenhouse where his tomatoes were wilting in the extreme temperatures. It was also the summer I first remember having sunburn!

But this brief snapshot wasn’t enough to base my book upon. I needed to do more research.

I’m not a huge researcher (my books don't require much) and what I do generally consists of a quick google search and a wander through a few pertinent sites. When I was looking for information about that heatwave, I found some news reports written in 1976, and a few retrospective ones where various hotter than normal years were compared for pieces to fill the newspapers during the dry journalistic period of August.

But I needed specifics. For example, l where I lived in Cheshire, we didn’t have standpipes in the street. I knew, however, that other places did. Specifically, I needed to know what happened in Lincoln where the book is set. So, I asked people who lived there back then, and they confirmed that they remembered standpipes. This is the joy of Facebook. All you have to do is ask.

And there were ladybirds! Lots of people mentioned the ladybirds. I have no recollection of them, but I learned that in rural areas where the crops were failing there was nothing for the ladybirds to eat, and so they swarmed and started biting humans in their search for food. I'm not surprised that people remembered that. It must have been horrid.

Luckily there are no biting ladybirds in this current heatwave – or not yet at least – but you won't be surprised to read they make a cameo appearance in the new book! The book, as yet untitled, is  due to be published in Autumn/Winter 2023 so if you're interested in the final version then watch this space.

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

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New Notebooks (and how to write in them.)

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}New notebooks (and how to write in them.)

Let’s talk stationery.

I knew that would get your attention.

More specifically, let’s talk notebooks.

Buying new notebooks is one of my favourite parts of being a writer. This makes no sense. I write all my books straight into my computer. There’s no scribbling away and then transferring to type afterwards. Apart from anything else, I’d never read my own handwriting. And I don’t plan my books out before I start either. So, why the fascination with notebooks?

Well, I have absolutely no idea, but that doesn’t stop me buying them.

My purchases tend to fall into two categories. Firstly, there are the Leuchtturm 2017 notebooks. (This is a small sample of my collection.)

I love them because they come in so many different colours, and I buy myself a fresh one each time I start a new book. This is horribly wasteful as I never use all the pages (see above about not planning etc.), but there is something very psychologically satisfying about a new notebook for a new project.

This leads neatly onto the second type of notebook. These are the truly beautiful ones. The ones with 160gsm paper so creamy that my pen almost seems to float over the surface. Notebooks with glorious covers, witty covers or covers that are themed to something relevant at that moment. There are notebooks that people buy me as gifts that have been carefully chosen to reflect something the person knows about me. And finally there are the ones that I buy myself because quite frankly, and notwithstanding the fact that I probably have enough notebooks to last me a lifetime, I just can’t resist.

But there’s a problem with this second type.

I can’t write in them.

I love to look at them all lined up on my shelf waiting for exactly the right project. Sometimes I take them down to admire the paper or the cover or the binding. Occasionally, I even get as far as planning what I might use them for.

But I never do. They remain clean, virgin, unsullied by my unworthy hand.

When I mentioned this reluctance on my Instagram account, I was inundated with messages from people all saying the same thing. Everyone appears to have notebooks that they can’t bring themselves to write in.

But why is that?

It seems to come down to one thing. We don’t feel that whatever we use it for will be important enough, and we’re scared of messing up, of making a mistake and spoiling its beauty. It's as if we invest every inch of our self-doubt into the first page of the new notebook. And because we can’t get beyond that fear, our notebooks sit, pristine on our shelves, just waiting.

But they’re just notebooks, right. It’s only paper. And surely, they belong to us and so whatever we choose to write in them will be worthy simply by virtue of the fact that it’s our work. Who is judging us except ourselves? Yet it seems that we are very stern critics.

One of my favourite ways of losing time is to look at #bulletjournal on instagram. Have a look: the standard of artwork for what is basically a glorified to do list is astounding. I’m sure this habit doesn’t help my new notebook phobia. I am not artistic in any way and I'm really quite appallingly bad with a pencil. So when I look at the journals created by all these talented people, it doesn't matter how much I long to make mine as beautiful. I just don’t have the skills. But it seems to colour my thought process. Maybe if I wait long enough I will be hit by a lightening bolt and develop new creative skills (or some such rot.)

There has to be a lesson in here somewhere. Either I stop buying beautiful notebooks (unlikely) or I stop comparing myself to others (tricky) or I stop worrying about messing up my notebook on the first page (most achievable?)

And in the meantime, the beautiful notebooks that I love to own keep stacking up, unmarked, on my shelf.

How about you? Do you have a beautiful notebook habit too? Do you actually use yours?

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

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How to declutter?

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}How to declutter? No, I really mean how?

More than a quarter of a century ago, my husband and I, with me proudly boasting a bump that would shortly become our firstborn, moved into what felt like a palatial, four bedroomed semi-detached house with a large garden, a garage and a shed!

We had moved from my tiny two up two down terraced house, and I remember that first night in the new pad, our few meagre possessions standing forlornly in just two of the rooms, wondering what on earth we were going to do with all that space.

Fast forward twenty six years, three more children and various pets and the house is now four rooms larger than it was when we bought it and a very great deal fuller. Whereas in the early days we had entire rooms with nothing in them at all, now I struggle to find space for a single new book on my shelves with having to jettison an old one.

But before I beat myself up too badly about this I have to be realistic. Accumulating stuff is just what happens as we tramp along life's highway. Clothes, books, no longer required but much-loved toys, endless mugs all with their own sentimental acquisition story, duplicated things, things that are too good to throw away but no longer in favour, things that well-meaning people gave but which never quite rang the right chord. My house, much like yours I hope, is full of it.

Until very recently there were six adults living here, each with their own detritus. It doesn't take long to pile up. (This may sound like an excuse but it's also a fact.)

But no more.

For the sake of my own sanity, I need to address the issue and declutter.

So, as you might expect of a writer and an avid reader, first I bought a book about it. And before you start, I recognise the irony of that and so I bought it in digital rather than paper form. I felt like I needed some help with the hard bits, someone who could present me with a strategy that I could follow successfully.

'You do know it's ridiculous,' someone said to me. 'Wasting time reading a book on how to declutter when you could just spend the time decluttering.'

And they do have a point - kind of. But I've already done the easy bits. I've thrown away the Ikea plastic plates and the broken Barbie dolls, and the clothes that just weren't expensive enough to be saved as classics and the shoes that will always rub no matter how hard I wish that they didn't. That stuff is all gone. What is left is the hard part.

'And what is that?' I hear you cry. 'What is the hard part?'

Well, it falls into two categories.

The first is mainly about logistics, but to understand it you need to know about how I was brought up. I am the daughter of two war babies. They grew up with rationing and making good and mending. They didn't have the kind of disposable income that is almost seen as an entitlement these days. You saved for it, bought well, looked after it and fixed it if it broke. These are the values on which I was raised.

But I live in the 21st century where things are made with obsolescence built in and we are encouraged to change our soft furnishings almost as often as we change our knickers. As a result, I have lots of things that are perfectly serviceable but no longer required. I can't bring myself to just throw those away. But coordinating what to do with them when my life is already full to the gunwales seems to have found its way onto the 'too hard' square. And so the 'too good to throw away' stuff sits in cupboards and the roof space and the garage, just waiting for me to work out who it could be useful to. Another poor excuse I know, but no less true for that.

And finally there's the really hard stuff. First pairs of shoes. (And in some case second too because they were just so damn cute). Story books that we all enjoyed. (Not just a couple of them, but dozens and dozens because how are you supposed to choose?) School art projects that I've hung onto for so long that to throw them out now makes a mockery of all the years in which I have dusted them. Boxes of glitter, stick on goggly eyes, sugar paper. (Will I ever have arty grandchildren?) Music for countless musical instruments no longer played (but you never know when the urge might strike.) The instruments themselves.

It just goes on and on.

What do I do with the accumulated stuff of a quarter of a century of family life now that we're back down to two? The kids don't have room for it yet, but they pull a wistful face if I suggest it all goes to the tip. (So then you can add guilt to the emotional onslaught of dealing with it all.)

And so, faced with all these seemingly insurmountable problems, I continue to live in a house filled with too much stuff, and flounder about searching for solutions whilst doing pretty much nothing to make it better.

Answers on a postcard please!

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

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The business of being uplifting

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In my office I have a notice board on which I pin uplifting cards that people send me.

There are loads of them.

I don't mean that I'm constantly being sent uplifting things, nice though that might be. It's just that I seem to keep the ones I'm sent. Sometimes I even look at them! I read the messages emblazoned on their fronts and I get a little warm glow that someone has gone to the trouble of picking out that specific message just for me.

So that's good. Job done.

But it's not just on my noticeboard. We are totally surrounded by uplifting sentiment. There are whole accounts on Pinterest or Instagram entirely dedicated to producing beautiful little memes. Card racks are bursting with them, and don't get me started on gift shops. It seems that you can buy pretty much anything you might ever need with an added inspirational quote.

I once made myself a mousemat, back in the day when I used one of those. It said 'What would Maggie O'Farrell do?' on it. I loved it. It was before I was published so the cheek of it made me smile each time I saw it, but also it reminded me gently of what I was trying to do (be published) and what kind of books I wanted to write (ones like Maggie's!)

There's also an inspiring (albeit ironic) message on my coaster which I won't share with you for fear of embarrassing myself, and I could buy an uplifting mug to go with it if the mood took me. In fact, I could surround myself entirely by words designed to comfort, encourage, cherish or chastise me depending on my mood.

I don't, but I could.

But why is that, I wonder? It seems to me to be a relatively new phenomenon. When I was a girl we had a wooden plaque on the kitchen wall that I proudly brought back from a school trip to Windsor. 'You don't have to be mad to live here. But if you are, it helps!' A gentle attempt at humour 1970s style but with no hint at self-improvement.

Is it that we feel ourselves to be somehow lacking these days? Do we measure ourselves against an unwritten chart and find ourselves coming up so short that we have to constantly comfort ourselves that we can do whatever it is, remind ourselves that today we will live our best life and not waste a single second?

Because if that's right then it's quite sad.

I know that it's important to work hard and try our best. I get that time is constantly passing and that this is the only 22nd April 2022 that there'll ever be. But I also understand that some days it's harder to be my best self than others. Whole weeks and maybe months might go by without me getting as much as a glimpse of her (my best self, I mean.) I can't help but think that by surrounding ourselves with all these little nudges to remember to be more this and less that that we are just putting an even heavier burden on our shoulders.

Don't misunderstand me. I love my uplifting noticeboard and I'm endlessly grateful to all the lovely people in my life who send me cards that are well chosen enough for me to save them. But what if we just tried to do our best, without all those affirmations constantly snapping at our heels?

After all, "You are enough" all by yourself.

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:66.6666666667% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 20px;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 2.88%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 3.84%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:66.6666666667% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 2.88%;margin-left : 3.84%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-1{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 0px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 0px;} .fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;margin-top : 10px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 20px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 1.92%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 1.92%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-2{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 50px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 50px;}

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Music to concentrate to

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}Music to concentrate to.

Can you concentrate when you're listening to music?

I used to love being surrounded by music. When I was a girl, there was rarely a moment when I didn't have something playing in the background. I remember doing all my A level revision to the haunting sounds of the Cocteau Twins. When I was at university, there was invariable the sound of a mix tape floating out from under my bedroom door. These were usually compiled by my friends and sent to me as a gift. They were packed full of songs that I either had an emotional connection with . . or soon would have.

And then I had my children.

Suddenly any extraneous sound was unwelcome. There were enough shouts and cries in the house as it was. Either the walls shook with their musical choices - all at once, clashing violently with one another - or someone was practising a musical instrument. I defy anyone under the age of ten to make a pleasing sound on a plastic recorder!

I definitely didn't need to add to the cacophony. So when they all went out to school, instead of turning to my favourite music to sooth my fraying nerves, I resorted to silence. Eventually, this progressed to the spoken word, but my love of listening to music just never seemed to return.

Then at Christmas last year I read one of those 'How to improve yourself' pieces - I know! Stupid. Anyway, the article talked about how good listening to music was for your brain, how it aided concentration and inspired creativity. I felt I owed it to myself to at least try.

As I listen to audiobooks when I'm out walking, the most obvious places to rediscover my lost love of music was in my writing room. I bought myself a voice activated speaker with my Christmas money and began.

But what to listen to?

This turned out to be a huge problem. I couldn't play anything I already knew because either I ended up singing along to it or it brought back memories of the times when I'd listened to it in the past. . . and my concentration was broken.

So I tried new music that I hadn't heard before. But then I found myself listening to it, getting absorbed in the lyrics or the melody . . . and my concentration was broken.

Lyrics seemed to be troublesome. Maybe classical pieces were the way forward? And this worked for a while, but sooner or later a playlist would slide into a tune that had been used for an advert and, unable to bring it to mind I'd end up googling it  . . . and my concentration was broken.

Assuming that this was a problem that had been faced by plenty of other people, I searched for 'music to concentrate to' and tried some of the options that popped up. That worked for a bit but that type of music is so soulless. Without meaning to cause offence to the musicians involved, so much of it is s0 bland that I couldn't believe it was inspiring anything at all, let alone my creativity. I concluded that I would actually be better off in silence than listen to the kind of mush that was floating out of my speaker.

This week I've tried classical guitar music which seemed to work a little, the theme track of one of my favourite films, Gosford Park, which just had me running the scenes in my head and currently there is a world music playlist pulsing out which has pieces from Jamaica to Botswana and seemed to be hitting the right note, until someone began singing an African version of Sting's An Englishman in New York which catapulted me right back to 1985!

There is no hope, it seems!

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

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Chasing down rabbit holes

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-3{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-3 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-3{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-3 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-3{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-3 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}Chasing down rabbit holes.

Don't you love it when life sends you chasing down rabbit holes and you pop up somewhere totally unexpected?

Ten years ago, I was married to a sports-mad soccer and rugby player. I still am - but last night I sat in a packed theatre and watched a pantomime that he both co-wrote and directed, warmed by my pride in both him and everything that Upstagers Theatre Group achieves.

Goldilocks and the Three Bears

If you had told me that creating award-winning shows for young people would become my husband’s all-consuming passion, I would have laughed. Before all this, he didn’t even go to the theatre unless I suggested it. It wasn't that he was anti- the-arts or anything heinous like that. They just didn’t seem to be part of who he was.

Enter our children stage left. This is how it all began. One year, our eldest daughter auditioned for a part as a dancer in the pantomime and was lucky enough to get in. Her sisters and brother followed in her wake and soon there wasn’t a show that did have one or more of their names in the programme.

Joseph and the Amazon Technicolor Dreamcoat

And, as I’m sure you know, if you can be interested in your kids’ interests it makes for an easier life. So, my husband volunteered to help backstage. He didn’t really know what was involved but he was happy to learn, and he got to wear black clothing and a radio mic – who wouldn’t love that!

He kept showing up and learning and then before we knew it, he had gone from being a spare pair of hands in the wings to a trustee on the board. Now he is as heavily involved in the amateur theatrical world as I am in the publishing one.

Billy Elliot

I suppose there are two things that I really want to say about this. The first is to remind myself to embrace every opportunity that comes my way. The joy that performing has brought to my family is too enormous to be described by words alone. You have to see it in action to fully appreciate its impact. Also, the friendships that my children have made from those shared show experiences are heart-deep and lifelong. None of us had any idea how important the theatre company would have become to them.

Starlight Express

The second thing is to mention the importance of volunteers. Without those wonderful souls who are prepared to give up their own time to help others then many of these opportunities would just never be created in the first place. Each time a new production hits the stage I sit in the auditorium bursting with pride for every single member of cast and crew and all that they achieve.

So, let’s hear it for chasing down unexpected rabbit holes, and shooting your hand up to the sky to volunteer.

Legally Blonde

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-4{width:66.6666666667% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 20px;}.fusion-builder-column-4 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 2.88%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 3.84%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-4{width:66.6666666667% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-4 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 2.88%;margin-left : 3.84%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-4{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-4 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-3{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 0px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 0px;} .fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-5{width:100% !important;margin-top : 10px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-5 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 20px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 1.92%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 1.92%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-5{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-5 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-5{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-5 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-4{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 50px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 50px;}

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.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333...

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}Chasing down rabbit holes.

Don't you love it when life sends you chasing down rabbit holes and you pop up somewhere totally unexpected?

Ten years ago, I was married to a sports-mad soccer and rugby player. I still am - but last night I sat in a packed theatre and watched a pantomime that he both co-wrote and directed, warmed by my pride in both him and everything that Upstagers Theatre Group achieves.

Goldilocks and the Three Bears

If you had told me that creating award-winning shows for young people would become my husband’s all-consuming passion, I would have laughed. Before all this, he didn’t even go to the theatre unless I suggested it. It wasn't that he was anti- the-arts or anything heinous like that. They just didn’t seem to be part of who he was.

Enter our children stage left. This is how it all began. One year, our eldest daughter auditioned for a part as a dancer in the pantomime and was lucky enough to get in. Her sisters and brother followed in her wake and soon there wasn’t a show that did have one or more of their names in the programme.

Joseph and the Amazon Technicolor Dreamcoat

And, as I’m sure you know, if you can be interested in your kids’ interests it makes for an easier life. So, my husband volunteered to help backstage. He didn’t really know what was involved but he was happy to learn, and he got to wear black clothing and a radio mic – who wouldn’t love that!

He kept showing up and learning and then before we knew it, he had gone from being a spare pair of hands in the wings to a trustee on the board. Now he is as heavily involved in the amateur theatrical world as I am in the publishing one.

Billy Elliot

I suppose there are two things that I really want to say about this. The first is to remind myself to embrace every opportunity that comes my way. The joy that performing has brought to my family is too enormous to be described by words alone. You have to see it in action to fully appreciate its impact. Also, the friendships that my children have made from those shared show experiences are heart-deep and lifelong. None of us had any idea how important the theatre company would have become to them.

Starlight Express

The second thing is to mention the importance of volunteers. Without those wonderful souls who are prepared to give up their own time to help others then many of these opportunities would just never be created in the first place. Each time a new production hits the stage I sit in the auditorium bursting with pride for every single member of cast and crew and all that they achieve.

So, let’s hear it for chasing down unexpected rabbit holes, and shooting your hand up to the sky to volunteer.

Legally Blonde

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:66.6666666667% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 20px;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 2.88%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 3.84%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:66.6666666667% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 2.88%;margin-left : 3.84%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-1{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 0px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 0px;} .fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;margin-top : 10px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 20px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 1.92%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 1.92%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-2{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 50px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 50px;}

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My Trip to York

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}My Trip to York People often ask me how I choose a setting for my books. Well, I'll let you into a secret . . .

where I set a book really depends on where I'd like to go. As I said in my For Writers post on Setting, there are lots of ways that writers approach picking a location for their books. For me, it's generally somewhere lovely that I'd like to spend a few days wandering around. Three of my novels are set by the sea, proof positive of this fact. Did I mention that I love the seaside?

My latest book, Impossible to Forget, is set in York, the county town of Yorkshire and about an hour from where I live. If you haven't been to York then I can thoroughly recommend it. It is a beautiful city and simply oozes history which, with all its interesting nooks and crannies, really lends itself to being a story location.

York has everything - Roman archaeology, medieval streets, modern shopping and the majestic Minster and the River Ouse winding through its heart. The ancient city wall is still intact and you can follow it pretty much all the way round, dropping down to street level as you wish. One of the key scenes in Impossible to Forget is set up on the walls. When I was writing it, I was struck by the idea of my characters beneath huge unbroken skies and with the city bustling beneath them as they unravel a secret from their past. It is is an important moment for them, changing what they thought they knew about the world and their place in it. But of course, these things are insignificant when compared with the two thousand years of history that York has seen. We are all merely passing through.

River Ouse at Twilight

When I go on a research trip, I generally travel on my own and without a plan. My aim is to just wander and absorb the feel of a place so that I can capture on the page the parts of it that speak to me. I have absolutely no sense of direction so, for the first day at least, I will be lost. As I spend so much of my life not knowing where I am this really doesn't bother me, and I do have google maps to bring me back to where I should be if I get really stuck.

But I think not knowing where you are brings with it a kind of freedom. I take each street as I find it, without any preconceived ideas, and so I see things I might otherwise have missed if I'd had a particular destination in mind.

As I wander, I take photos of places that catch my eye and these often prompt part of the story when I get back to my desk. When I was in York much of the city was underwater. York often floods following heavy rain and the river was just starting to recede as I arrived, although the flood barriers were still up around my hotel.

I stumbled across the Hospitium, a 14th century hall sitting in the Museum Gardens. The river had risen right up against its walls and I was amazed that such an old building should cope so well with the water. I spent some time in the wintery sunshine, watching the waves lapping onto the building and wondering. When I was back at my desk and looking for a venue to set a smart party, my memory took my back there and I was able to imagine it, not with the flood, but on a warm summer's evening with fairy lights and candles.

The Hospitium, York

Sometimes when I go on a research trip, I know that there are certain places that I have to find. For example, in Where the Story Starts I needed to choose the house that kicks the whole story off. For Impossible to Forget, I was more interested in the University than the houses. I had last visited the university campus in 1987, when the characters in my book would have been in their second year. Much has changed over the intervening years, but the parts that I remembered - the lake, the covered walkways between buildings etc, were all still there. A little online research and a chat with the friend I was visiting back then helped me with the details that I needed to bring those corridors to life.

York University Campus

I had visited York many many times before I went on this research trip, but going without a particular aim in mind allowed me to explore parts of the city that I had rushed past before. And that is what I'm looking for on these jaunts - the quiet corners of a place that make me ask questions. If I have whetted your appetite, then Impossible to Forget will be published on 3rd February 2022.

Want to know more? Then why not sign up for my Readers' Club? I'll send you a monthly newsletter to keep you up to date with all the inside information about life behind the scenes. You can also join me on my Imogen Clark Author Facebook page or Instagram where I post pictures most days.

I look forward to seeing you.

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:66.6666666667% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 20px;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 2.88%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 3.84%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:66.6666666667% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 2.88%;margin-left : 3.84%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-1{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-1 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-1{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 0px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 0px;} .fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;margin-top : 10px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 20px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 1.92%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 1.92%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-2{width:100% !important;order : 0;}.fusion-builder-column-2 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}.fusion-body .fusion-flex-container.fusion-builder-row-2{ padding-top : 0px;margin-top : 0px;padding-right : 50px;padding-bottom : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;padding-left : 50px;}

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Guardians

.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;margin-top : 0px;margin-bottom : 0px;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {padding-top : 0px !important;padding-right : 0px !important;margin-right : 3.84%;padding-bottom : 0px !important;padding-left : 0px !important;margin-left : 5.76%;}@media only screen and (max-width:1024px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:33.3333333333% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 3.84%;margin-left : 5.76%;}}@media only screen and (max-width:640px) {.fusion-body .fusion-builder-column-0{width:100% !important;}.fusion-builder-column-0 > .fusion-column-wrapper {margin-right : 1.92%;margin-left : 1.92%;}}What makes a great guardian?   

When our children were very small, my husband and I discussed at length what should happen to them if we died before they were old enough to look after themselves.

And we discovered that we didn’t have many options.

Both sets of parents were already quite elderly by the time the grandchildren came along. Making them guardians might work if we died when the eldest was young but not as time ticked on.

We thought about our friends and the people we had chosen as godparents. They all had children of their own, often a similar age to ours, so they were at least set up for childrearing. And we would have made provision for the costs of bringing up children in our will so we hoped they wouldn’t be out of pocket. I felt sure that many of them would have made brilliant parents to our brood as well as their own.

But at the end of the day, we didn’t feel we could ask friends to be guardians. It was just too big a favour. The stresses that it would place on their family went beyond what even the best friendships could stretch to.

So, in the end, the guardianship of our four children would have gone to their uncles and it would have been for them to decide at the point of our death which of them was best placed to take the children on. Not an ideal arrangement but the best we could come up with.

Luckily, my husband and I have managed to stay alive long enough to see the children through to legal adulthood, and so all that worrying turned out to be unnecessary.

But it must have left a mark on me because guardianship was at the front of my mind when I came to write Impossible to Forget. What if, I pondered, instead of having one guardian to bring up a child, you split the job up? Some people, I reasoned, are more suited to some parts of the job than others. We all, for example, have a character like Maggie in our lives. She is the organised kind of friend, the sort who never leaves bills unpaid, can be relied on to have saved everybody’s address somewhere sensible and not only remembers a birthday but generally has sent a card.

After  coming up with Maggie as a character, I had a little think. Each of us has experiences we want to pass onto our children, usually because they formed such a significant part of our own childhoods. Maybe it’s a weekly game of competitive Scrabble, an annual pilgrimage to a particular seaside town or snuggling down to read the same book on each Christmas Eve. And who could be trusted to not only make sure that these things happen, but would be interested enough to do as good, or maybe a better job than I would have done myself?

And things can get even more complicated. What if you love sport and would have spent lots of time as a family playing or following it? You would need guardians with similar interests so your child experienced the childhood you would have given them had you been around do it. If reading is your family’s thing, then you couldn’t entrust your child into a house with no books. If you are a Lancastrian, then a Yorkshire guardian might be totally out of the question!

I’m being flippant, of course, and actually, as my husband and I discovered, there really aren’t so many available candidates for the job so most people can’t afford to be that picky.

But that is the joy of writing fiction. I can ask myself the question ‘what if?’ and then I can answer myself.

And the result is a novel.

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