Marilyn Chapman's Blog, page 15

Cliche, anyone? An egg-streme case of the bank holiday blues...

My heart-stopping breakfast egg  My heart was  in my mouth this morning when I shelled my breakfast egg, which appeared to be emblazoned with a token of love.  What a sight for sore eyes!  The carefully sculpted heart was in just  the right place. Love  is a many splendored thing, so they say, but we all know that  love is blind. Which brings me back to the reason for this post - have you noticed a sudden rash of clichés everywhere? If you think I'm one sandwich short of a picnic today, that's probably because I'm over-egging the pudding to make a very valid point. Listen to the news and almost every hour and you will hear about a 'war-torn' area that is trying to get back on its feet.

I don't want to beat around the bush so I'll say it like it is.  Try avoiding clichés for a few days and see how it fires your imagination.  These ubiquitous phrases tend to pop up in the most surprising places, usually without warning. However, you can take what I say with a pinch of salt because I'm guilty of a multitude of sins and using clichés is just one of them.

 No, I'm not cracking up. If I had my way, clichés would be banned from our televisions and newspapers for the duration of each and every bank holiday weekend. That's three days of plain speaking, three days of saying what we really mean.  Why not try it for yourself?  But don't shoot me, I'm just the messenger.

 Your comments are always welcome.

FROM TRIUMPH TO TRAGEDY - IS THERE A WAY BACK?

Fifteen months ago  I wrote here about widower Ben Brooks-Dutton  whose wife Desreen had been knocked down and killed by a car when their son was just two years old. His plight touched so many people around the world and now his emotive book 'IT'S NOT RAINING, DADDY, IT'S HAPPY, available on May 8, is being serialised in the Daily Mail. Ben's blog ' Life as a Widower' has helped thousands of bereaved parents to face up to their own grieF. So,  I've decided to repeat my original blog post today, in memory of Desreen.

Thursday, 31 January 2013 From triumphant to tragic - why do we blog? 'We lose ourselves in talking about happiness but we don't allow ourselves to talk about loss...'So says  Ben-Brooks Dutton whose wife Desreen was knocked down and killed two months ago. Ben's new blog 'Life as a Widower' is  featured in Today's 'Times 2' supplement giving an insight to the lives of young people who have turned to blogging   to deal with their grief.

A lot has been written about blogging in the last few months : Why do we do it? Why has it become so popular? Is it a form of journalism or just a waste of time? The answer to me is simple - if it's right for you, do it.

When I was in my twenties, I saw an old friend   standing on his own on the far side of the town square.  I deliberately crossed over to speak to him, for he and his wife had just suffered a terrible loss: their full-term baby had been born dead.  After I had offered my condolences he said: 'You're the first person who has had the courage to speak to me today - everyone else has looked the other way.'

I have never forgotten that conversation.  The truth is that in Britain we've never learnt how to openly discuss our grief. The Times  quotes  yet another heartbreaking story:  Alice Olins  started a blog after her son, Bear Hamilton Pullen, died in her womb. 'My body did the cruellest thing possible - it pulled the plug on my baby's life...' she says.

When the young Princes William and Harry were taken to matins on the morning after their mother died, the pain on their faces was palpable.  They should have been allowed to stay at home and sob, but the 'stiff upper lip' attitude of our royal family denied their expression of their grief.

My own blog, named after the island where I was born ( but sadly no longer live) reflects my  crazy sense of humour, but I've charted some personal tragedies, too.

 So my message today is - keep on blogging - you never know who you might  reach.
 
http://lifeasawidower.com/

Ben's book is published by Hodder and Stoughton at £16.99




 Your comments are always welcome.

When did you last hold a REAL photograph in your hand? (Every picture tells a story...)

  The other day, while clearing out the attic, I found this collage of our family growing up. It was   made by my elder daughter, using home -made flour-and-water glue on cardboard,  when she was around seven years old and I remember wondering how long it would take for the whole thing to turn to pulp. Thirty years later it is still looking good ( though I'm sure I'll get some stick for reproducing it here)  and brings back all sorts of  memories. As an author I   use my own memories to portray the  recent past, and  spend months  researching historical events to ensure accuracy and authenticity.  But I never regard my research as complete until I find old photographs of the era -  images that, to me,  can often  say so much more than  the written word.  Holiday snapshots, formal portraits, family scenes from the turn of the century, all of these tell their own story. The words are unspoken but the images speak for themselves.  My Smartphone now holds hundreds of photographs of family and friends, of places I have visited and amusing moments captured in single moment, while  the internet is awash with shots of baby Prince George and the young royals' trip to Ayers rock. But I bet Kate would  swap them all for a family album. What do you think?




 http://www.amazon.co.uk/Baggy-Pants-Bootees-Marilyn-Chapman-ebook/dp/B00IG90U1Q/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1394320128&sr=1-1&keywords=marilyn+chapman+baggy+pants+and+booteesYour comments are always welcome.

Hello Dolly! The barmaid of the century...

Congratulations to the oldest barmaid in the world, 100-year-old Dolly Saville who still works three shifts a week at the Red Lion Hotel in Wendover, Buckinghamshire. Dolly, who has been serving drinks for almost 75 years, is someone I would really like to meet.

Why would any writer want to research the past on the internet when they could spend half an hour chatting to this wonderful lady over a gin and tonic?

Dolly started working at the hotel in 1940 when George V1 was on the throne, Churchill was Prime Minister and Britain was in the grip of the Second World War, according to articles in The Times and the Daily Mail recently.

'I love the work and I love the people,' she said. 'It keeps me going and it's better than sitting around.'

She has little time for sitting around, however, working three lunchtime shifts a week serving customers, polishing glasses and clearing tables.

Dolly gave up working full time six years ago when she reached the age of 94, and admits that her own two children are happily retired.

Over the last seven decades she has served many famous faces, including James Bond actor Pierce Brosnan, former Prime Minister Ted Heath, footballer Stanley Matthews, singer Vera Lynn, ballet dancer Margot Fonteyn and actress Elizabeth Taylor.

And in all that time she reckons she has served more than two million pints!

You can read more on: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2601755/She-definitely-deserves-tip-Worlds-oldest-barmaid-celebrating-100th-birthday-no-plans-retire-pub-started-working-1940.html#ixzz2ytsafHcC

And in the meantime - where's my satnav?  I might just take a trip down to Buckingham.
 Your comments are always welcome.

WHY I'LL NEVER SAY 'CURTAINS' TO THE PAST

Yes- it's those curtains again...
I've got a confession to make. I've just put  my  34-year-old daughter's  nursery curtains up in  the spare room. They are for my gorgeous granddaughters when they visit, I hasten to add, but why did  I do it?  Because I love the past. I love anything nostalgic, anything that evokes happy memories. And that includes furniture.

Furniture is often overlooked as a mundane feature of the home. But its resonance in our lives is much more profound, writes author Ian Sansom on the BBC website today. Furniture contains numerous traces of what we are and who we are and who we think we are.
 Cupboards, for example, contain our past - as well as our regrets and secrets. Keys which fit no locks, pieces of paper with obsolete phone numbers and pin numbers written on them, stray playing cards, inexplicable plastic things and old French francs. Why do we keep any of this stuff I do not know, except as something to hand on to our own children, to keep in cupboards of their own - our endless inheritance of waste....

Now this is where I have to disagree - how can our heritage be described as waste?  How can we not be interested in where we came from, and what the world was like when we were born? In my writing den I have a photograph of my grandfather's discharge papers from the 2nd Royal Guernsey  Light Infantry in 1919, plus a national newspaper cartoon of my father at the Café de Paris in the sixties  and a collage of my own daughters when they were growing up. The past influences my writing as it has with many authors, humble or famous.

Adds  Sansom:  In 1948 CS Lewis wrote to a friend that he was attempting to write a children's book "in the tradition of E Nesbit". The children's book he wrote was, of course, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, published in 1950, and one of the Nesbit traditions he borrowed was the magic wardrobe. Lewis uses his wardrobe to enter an entirely different realm - his destination is the Celestial City.
Like wardrobes, beds act as transports for the imagination also. Writers in particular love to work on the horizontal. Milton's Paradise Lost was mostly written in bed. As was much of Winston Churchill's history of World War Two.

Now this is where Mr Sansom and I begin to agree again.  I also find it very therapeutic to write from my bed. But that's another story.

Talking of bedrooms -  where have I seen that pine dressing table before? It definitely looks familiar...

 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26881731

You can download my debut novel here.  Baggy Pants and Bootees         Your comments are always welcome.

Everything is Rosie (Thomas) now...

I first read Rosie Thomas' Other People's Marriages in 1993 and have been hooked on her books ever since. Rosie gets into the thoughts of her characters and stays there with them in a way that no-one else quite can.  So, after twenty years, what a thrill it was to meet this brilliant author at Plackitt and Booth booksellers in Lytham, Lancashire, the other day.

  Rosie was there to talk about her new book, The Illusionists, which is already  immensely popular, but it's the story of how her writing has evolved over the years that  fascinated me most.  Rosie believes in writing what you know and  her career as a novelist began with every emotional drama  that she, her friends, family  and neighbours had experienced, crammed into her novels. Later she travelled the world, seeking out glamorous, dangerous and sometimes obscure destinationsfor inspiration. Her ambitious trip to Mount Everest base camp resulted in the beautifully  written novel 'White,'  published in 2000, an excerpt of which I've included here. 'You're scared, as well?''Yes, looking up there, how could anyone not be' She had been afraid ever since she had seen the mountain riding in its sea of cloud.  The scale of it was so fearsome.'Why are you doing this, Sam?''Because you won't have dinner with me without.' Born Janey Morris, Rosie took her authorial name from her late mother, Rose, who died when she was ten, and her sister's married name Thomas.  A successful journalist. she began writing novels in 1982. 'I believe that my writing now is very different from those days,' she explained. 'The novels reflect the different phases of my life.' Now the subject matter is deeper, and darker like herher latest novel, set in Victorian London:  London 1885 A shadowy an threatening place for a beautiful young woman of limited means.  Eliza's choice lie between marriage and stifling domesticity, or a downwards spiral to the streets.  But Eliza is modern before her time and she won't compromise... Rosie Thomas has written more than twenty novels including The Potter's House, Iris and Ruby ,Every Woman Knows a Secret, All My Sins  Remembered and The Kashmir Shawl.The Illusionists is available in hardback from Harper Collins as well as in digital format. Find out more on:             http://rosiethomasauthor.com/

Baggy Pants and Bootees by Marilyn Chapman # ebook # Kindle @ MarilynChapma77 http://wp.me/p3dVT7-1nV

 Your comments are always welcome.

SAVE OUR SCOTTISH PAPERBACKS

April 1 2014

STOP PRESS

SCOTLAND TO BAN PAPERBACK BOOKS

Do you live in Scotland? Do you, like me, have  a huge collection of paperback books?  Then buy while you can because, from September 2014 Scottish  residents will only be able to download e-books on to  kindles and iPads: the printed versions will banned.

In the capital  today crowds gathered in front of Edinburgh Castle where the Minister for Reading, Mr Carnt Wright gave a long, drawn out speech.

'The only way to make Scottish Independence work,' he declared, 'is to limit our spending.  I THERFORE HAVE NO CHOICE BUT TO BAN THE PRINTED WORD.'

Thousands have already signed a petition calling for the ban to be reversed.  Please download your copy and vote NOW
 Your comments are always welcome.

Here's to The Queen Mother's memory... (and her fridge!)

What has the late Queen Mother's housekeeping got to do with my novel  Baggy Pants and Bootees?  The answer, it seems, is a 60-year-old fridge!

According to a report in The Times recently, 'A fridge that belonged to the late Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, is marking it's diamond jubilee. The Frigidaire, which was made by General Motors, was bought in 1954 for the Castle of Mey, the Queen Mother's home in Caithness.'

And now, the memory of this  household appliance has been brought to life by 24-year-old Sophie Wainwright, the 1960's cub reporter featured in my debut novel.
   
Frigidaire Appliance Company TypeDivision of ElectroluxIndustryMajor appliances, Small appliancesFounded1918HeadquartersCharlotte, NCProductsClothes washers and dryers, refrigerators, freezers, dishwashers, ranges, room air conditioners, dehumidifiers, microwaves ovens.Websitewww.frigidaire.comFrigidaire is an American brand of consumer and commercial appliances. Frigidaire was founded as the Guardian Frigerator Company in Fort Wayne, Indiana, and developed the first self-contained refrigerator (invented by Nathaniel B. Wales and Alfred Mellowes) in 1916.
My protagonist Sophie is  extremely wary of men. After witnessing her mother's disastrous relationships during the grim post-war era, she refuses to feel anything other than contempt for good looking office Romeo Steve Sibson. Keen to understand her, and determined to thaw out their relationship, Steve gives Sophie the nickname 'Frigidaire.'

'I love this nickname' says one reviewer. 'It really brings the romantic relationship to life.' Find out more at
Baggy Pants and Bootees




 Your comments are always welcome.

Was it Worth it?

The late Jennifer Worth (pictured above) is famous for Call the Midwife but little seems to have been known about her early life until now.  Writing in the Daily Mail recently, journalist Jo Knowsley  explained ' Call the Midwife is a charming   mix of gritty poverty  - a world where people know their place, where uniformed matrons can cycle safely through dimly-lit slums and where, for the midwives at least, regulations must be obeyed...

'It will come as a surprise to her millions of fans that Jennifer, whose bestselling books inspired the (tv) series, was seldom one to follow the rules herself.'

Jennifer's 80-year-old husband, Phillip, who still lives in their 18th century home in Hemel Hempstead, admits that she had a very colourful life - including a year-long affair with a married an when she was just 16.

'In an act of great generosity, Philip painted the mystery lover from a photograph kept my his late wife,' says Knowsley.

Jennifer's eldest daughter Suzannah, 49, and her sister Juliette, 47, say their mother was driven to experience 'almost everything life had to offer.' She adds 'But my mother was an incredibly loyal person. When she made friends they were friends for life...'

Nursing was, surprisingly, a relatively small part of Jennifer's life. After she finished her training she moved to Paris to perfect her French, visiting concerts and galleries in her pursuit of knowledge before  returning to London to study midwifery.

Sadly, Jennifer died before the TV version of her book reached our screens. One of her last wishes, however, was that actress and comedian Miranda Hart should play Chummy.

Says Miranda, who fell in love with the character as she read the script, 'I knew I had to play the part. Sadly, I never got to meet Jennifer to thank her....'Your comments are always welcome.

THE WRITE WAY TO BLOG?

My Writing Process – Blog TourMarch 5  · by Marilyn Chapman   · Bookmark the permalink. ·
The Valentine's Day publication of my debut novel Baggy Pants and Bootees marked the end - and the beginning - of a long-held dream. It also made me realise that the only thing I like better than writing is, well, talking about writing! So thanks go to fellow Safkhet Publishing author Suzie Tullet for asking me to join her in the  My Writing Process – Blog Tour #mywritingprocess  

Suzie, who writes fun-packed romantic fiction,  is the author of Going Underground and  Little White Lies and Butterflies which was short listed for the Guardian's Not the Booker Prize in 2013.  You can read all about Suzie here

Meanwhile, I've been asked  some interesting questions as part of this blog tour, so here goes:
 1 What am I working on?As a former journalist my attitude to novel writing is rather unconventional; I work on instinct rather than planning before I begin the actual manuscript.Mystery, heartbreak, drama - all of these things describe my work in progress -  another time-slip novel.  Why do I favour time-slip? With two  separate stories going on at the same time –  beautifully demonstrated   in Rosamund Pilcher’s acclaimed novel The Shell Seekers – the reader can see how  the protagonist has been influenced by past events.I prefer not to give away the plot , partly because I’m superstitious, but also because it is  evolving - ie  the characters are still  deciding  what they want to do next!  2 How does my work differ from others of its genre? I still write my dialogue a bit like a journalist – it’s hard to break the habit – but then I love dialogue as it makes the story so much more realistic.  I want to make the reader laugh, even when I am ultimately telling a sad story, because I think we all need a sense of humour to survive.  In short, I like to face real issues.When my second daughter was born she had a port wine birthmark on her forehead.  Keen to make contact with others in the same situation, I wrote an article about how I dealt with this in Parents Magazine.  The magazine kindly sent on to me all the responses they received from readers and I was amazed how many people my story had touched.  3 Why do I write what I do? Over the years my tastes have changed a great deal; A level English literature taught me to appreciate J.D Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye and the books of Stan Barstow, George Orwell Later, my husband introduced me to the works of Ibsen, Dostoyevsky, Chekhov  etc and though I enjoyed these (particularly Ibsen’s the Master Builder) I could only stand back and admire the skill involved in such works. Later  I began to read  books such as Other People's Marriages by Rosie Thomas and Erin Pizey's The Watershed and  finally realised that these were the  kind of novels I wanted to write.As a reader I want a good plot, poignancy and realism,  but I want to learn something too -– it’s not enough for me to just be entertained.  I hope this comes over in my writing.How does my writing process work?  My writing begins with flashes of inspiration which can arrive at any time – even in the middle of the night.  I always have a pen with me to jot down my thoughts.  Sometimes an idea will come from a chance conversation.  For instance, I was talking to …..oh no, I can’t tell you that…there’s always the chance the lady in question will read my next book!For a time slip novel I write the two stories separately then integrate them at the end so there is a consistency and flow for the reader.  I much prefer to write the initial chapters by hand – this means I can do it whenever the mood takes me, but always transfer it to my laptop when it has begun to take shape.I write because I want to and, now that I’ve had my debut novel published, I hope that more people will continue to read what I write.  But if they didn’t, I would still write. It's a simple as that.And now I'd like to welcome my two guest bloggers - Peter Kenny and Jack Barrow. 
For Peter Kenny, variety is essential. He's written everything from TV ads, junk mail, journalism, poetry, plays, lyrics,  stories, libretti and more. His thought provoking blog peter kenny: the notebook can be found here: http://copywriter-freelance-peter-kenny.blogspot.co.uk  
Jack Barrow has this to  say:      

I live in Hertfordshire, England, where I write about popular philosophy in modern life. I have a particular interest in the way people are rejecting mainstream religion and creating their own philosophies from the bottom up. These ideas cannot really be described as theological in the way that western religions are and they seem closer to eastern mysticism, such as Buddhism or Zen, while being dressed up with symbolism drawn from folkloric sources.
My first novel, The Hidden Masters and the Unspeakable Evil is now available worldwide after receiving excellent reviews in the UK. I’m currently working on a travelogue, which is distracting me from working on the second novel about an end of the world religious cult, Morris Men practised in the martial arts and the accidental destruction of a literary festival.  Find out more about Jack on:http://jackbarrowuk.wordpress.com/about/
 Finally, if you want to see more about my debut novel, click here: Baggy Pants and Bootees  Your comments are always welcome.