Jaye Marie's Blog, page 1912

First guest post…

Reblogged from http://awomanswisdom.wordpress.com/

October 6, 2014

Guest Blog: A Swan Song or Just The Beginning? by author Jaye Marie

Funny how the mind likes to push things into dark corners to be forgotten, isn’t it?

The other day, I was listening to my sister-in-law, Anita talking to her son about his plan to change his job, after twenty years with the bank. He has decided to become a phlebotomist of all things, and we have no idea where this idea came from.

This sent my thoughts back to my childhood and all the ambitions I now remember having back then. Medicine, ballet, pianist or actor? There were so many careers that appealed to me and like most children; I wanted to do something exciting with my life.

But one by one, those childhood dreams came to nothing. I grew too tall for ballet, and the piano lessons were hopeless, as try as I may, my hands would not behave! Most of the other dreams fell by the wayside for various reasons and of course, life has the habit of getting in the way.

I love books and have read my way through stacks of them, so when Anita needed someone to edit and type up her manuscripts, I was happy to help and somewhere along the way, I discovered my vocation and my love-hate relationship with the world of computers. But I learned how to edit and proofread, taking over the job of getting Anita’s books ready for publication. I had wonderful compliments from one of the best literary agents in London for my editing of Anita’s book, Bad Moon and for the last ten years since my retirement, that’s what my life has been like.

Then everyone started talking about ‘Indie’ or self-publishing. I knew how hard it was to be published in the traditional way, so I became very excited at the prospect of being able to do it ourselves.

I started our website, and found that I enjoyed talking to people from all over the world and posting our thoughts on line. Then I concentrated on publishing Anita’s books. It wasn’t quite as easy as they made it sound, but with my usual stubbornness I kept at it, learning more and more as I went along.

Somewhere along the way, I started thinking about a story that had been nibbling away in the corner of my mind for months and before too long, it demanded to be written and I am very pleased with the outcome. Basically because the characters took charge and practically wrote it for me!

Book Blurb

Nine Lives is the story of ageing artist Kate Devereau, who has been plagued by a mysterious voice for most of her life.

This voice seems to think she has escaped death on far too many occasions for it to be normal, and her life spirals out of control as she tries to discover just how many lives she has left.

Lulu is Still Here…

It has been three weeks now, three weeks of suspecting that we have made a huge and sad mistake. Every time I look at Lulu, our rescued geriatric feline, I have worried about our decision to take her on. She was due to put to sleep, as her elderly owners were moving to cat-free sheltered accommodation, so our tender hearted, generous family insisted on rescuing her from the jaws of death.

I must admit, I didn’t initially think it was a very good idea. It wouldn’t be fair, I thought, to subject her to all that upheaval, not at her age. She would probably be very upset at leaving everything she knew and have expected to find her dead every morning since.

Every time I look at her, and she is so sweet, but her eyes betray her misery. She looks hopefully at me, wondering if I will put things right and take her back home. I know it is the worst feeling in the world to feel misplaced.

I spent most of my childhood feeling like this, always looking in other people’s windows, wondering where I belonged. But I suspect Lulu and I share more than this. Since my heart attacks three years ago, I have had to try very hard to stop feeling as if I might die at any minute. Every time I get out of breath or my chest tightens, I find myself worrying. It is hard not to.

But this worrying is not really me. I have lived my life as if I were invincible and would live forever. I was never going to grow old or feeble, not a chance. Life had other ideas and I seem to have aged more than three years since my heart rebelled and tried to quit on me.

I have been postponing the day when Lulu will have to see the vet. On a good day, she seems quite well and happy enough, but there are so many small signs to indicate she is not. She sleeps most of the time, moving only to eat. She doesn’t really eat much, just sucks the gravy and leaves the rest. Her eyes and ears are a mess, despite my attentions. The fact that her meow is broken and she sounds hoarse is a worry too.

I dread what will inevitably happen, but we did what we thought was best, even if it turned out not to be in the end, and although she has been with us for such a short time, we will miss her.

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I want to say a huge thankyou for all the positive comments and response from my appearance on A Woman’s Wisdom last Monday. It was amazing!

Publication Day…

When I awoke on Wednesday morning, it felt like any other late summer day. Autumn was fast approaching, but I hoped it would dawdle for a while longer.

As I sipped my first cup of tea, somewhere out in the garden a small bird was chirping in the bushes, and the pale morning sun was making the slowly changing trees glow.

Then I remembered what today was.

How could I not have known, the minute I opened my eyes? It was the publication day for Nine Lives, my very first book.

I had uploaded it on Amazon yesterday afternoon. Hard to do, by the way, with your fingers crossed.

It should be live that morning and I checked my emails to confirm this to be true. Not that I didn’t believe it, but had to see for myself and there it was. And I have to admit, it looked pretty good to me.

The actual uploading was a nightmare, for Amazon don’t make it easy for technophobes like me. Deciding what category you need to put it in, for instance.

I thought Nine Lives belonged in” mystery suspense” but there is no such category, not that I could find anyway.

Managed the rest of the details with no problem, then we were at the pricing. Again, so very confusing.

But I persevered and my very first book was now out in the world and I hope it gets on okay. Like a proud parent, I waved it off to do its own thing, knowing my work was done, and whether it is any good will remain to be seen.

I am so proud of the characters, after all, they actually wrote the book. For some reason, all I have to do is hold the pencil!

I will try not to be a pain, talking endlessly about it or begging for reviews, but I would appreciate any feedback even if you think it is rubbish, for I want to be better!

Nine Lives is available here…

See you all soon…

The New Forest

It was a late summer day. The sky was an intense blue and large puffy white clouds sailed along towards the horizon as we set off on an adventure, satnav in hand.

The journey to the New Forest took just over an hour and was very pleasant. Lots of lovely scenery, especially as we got closer to the Forest.

You know when you are almost there, for you begin to see the wild ponies everywhere you look. They are allowed to roam freely, wherever the mood takes them and if you are lucky enough to live there, you must get used to them just turning up and being in the way. They are not that small, either. To call them ‘ponies’ would give you the wrong impression. Most of them are quite a size and can be quite formidable!

I am always surprised by the amount of people who are visibly frightened if a pony gets too close. One poor man had to give up his ice cream; it was either that or lose an arm.

As we made our way to the car park, there were several ponies standing around in the street and a few more in the car park. Nobody seems to mind, but it does tend to play havoc with the traffic. Most of the foreign tourists have no idea what’s going on, and I know from experience that it’s completely scary trying to steer a car around a completely oblivious animal that’s just standing in the middle of the road.

It was not our first visit. We were here about ten years ago and still remember one rather large and stroppy pony who was trying to break into some of the cars in the car park. He obviously thought he could smell food, and it was all very scary not to mention the damage he was causing!

We decide to have lunch, and look around afterwards, so we chose an eating-place with a good view of the road so we could watch the show. One pony in particular was standing in the middle of the road and didn’t look as though he had any intention of moving any time soon. He seemed to be hell-bent on causing as much disruption to the traffic flow as possible. Almost deliberately, I thought as I could swear I saw mischief in his eyes.

I heard some of the locals explaining to the tourists that the freedom the ponies enjoyed was theirs by right, as they were here first. The New Forest belongs to them and people take second place, as simple as that. Very strange goings on, if you ask me, but wonderful to see. This has been going on for centuries and I can see it going on for years to come.

I could live there for sure, to literally share your life with wild ponies seems like my idea of heaven. Quite apart from the fact that I have wanted to live in a forest for years…

God bless…

A glorious day!

I woke up this morning expecting another grey miserable day, mainly because that’s all we’ve been getting lately, and found the sun was shining! What a difference a little bit of sunshine makes to everything. Enthusiasm and optimism soar and instantly you want to do so much more than you did yesterday. Which to be fair wouldn’t be difficult. Yesterday turned out to be non-productive day, as I simply could not get going. Getting old is turning out to be a real pain!

I have been re-reading Elizabeth Sims book, ‘You’ve got a book in you’ http://www.elizabethsims.com/ as I felt the need for more inspiration. She has a way of making you feel so much more capable, not to mention competent. Her advice and helpful tips were what got me going in the first place, and I haven’t implemented them all yet.

Basically, I think her book managed to do something to my brain. You may remember that I have not written an entire book before, this is all new to me and I was finding it more than a little daunting. I can proof read and edit until the cows come home and I think I am quite good at it, but I was discovering that actually writing something is not as easy as I thought it might be. I’m sure that some writers do, but they are obviously very good at it!

Since reading this book, I have managed to sort out the plot for my book, plus ideas for subplots. And joy above all joys, I came up with several possible endings. And now it is finished. Nine Lives is born!

I shall finish the editing this week and will post the synopsis and opening chapters so you can tell me what you think!

God Bless…

Living or Dying… why can’t we choose?

The arrival of Lulu, our ancient feline visitor has resurrected all the thoughts I have struggled to suppress for the last three years.

After my first heart attack, I felt extremely lucky to be alive, but when it happened again, a month later, I began to have these doubts.

The first time it was an artery that was completely blocked; a stent was fitted to keep the artery open. The second time, another artery was clogged, but they managed to get it running again. Several potent drugs were prescribed, the side effects turning out to be worse than anything I have felt before or since.

So somewhere along the line, you start to wonder how much longer do you have? When every little twinge tries to start a major panic attack, you think, will it happen again and would I be lucky for a third time?

All this worry can be depressing, so you try to put it out of your head. Something I thought I had managed to do quite well, until Lulu arrived.

You are not supposed to think about dying, but somewhere along the way, while I worried about how she was still breathing, being as she was so frail and old, it seemed likely that every time she went to sleep it would be for the last time.

Had we brought her home to die, or to live?

Thinking about death is never a good idea at any time. We are supposed to think of the future and assume we really will have one, but being constantly faced with an inevitable conclusion, Lulu’s, not mine, does tend to dampen your expectations.

I have just finished reading the best seller ‘The Fault in our Stars’ by John Green. Some would say it was a morbid choice for me, about someone dying, but it is an exceptionally bittersweet love story, not sad at all. They said I would weep, and I did, but the humour is brilliantly written and some of the phrasing echoes the way I have been feeling.

For example, “…that living is a kind of side effect to dying…” And someone was actually described as being …”no longer suffering from personhood…”

It does help to have a sense of humour…

Nearly finished editing #Nine Lives, won’t be long now…

Reflections of a Writer…

 

This week I have tried hard to reflect on what it means to me to be a writer, and it has been difficult. For a start, I don’t think that writing and families automatically go to together. Not in my house anyway.

There are times when I have absolutely no chance at all of picking up a pen and actually writing with it. Something always seems to happen, or go wrong, or need fixing, or finding.

Yes, I know there should be some ground rules, but somehow they don’t get enforced around here. So I try and write whenever I can and it isn’t always easy or convenient.

Just sometimes though, it is magical. I can forget who I am, where I am and all the things I could be doing instead.

I can feel in my bones that it will all get better, that the struggle will be worth it, because I can feel myself falling in love with what I am doing and beginning to believe I may just be creating something good, something infinitely readable!

Quite apart from this revelation, it has been an interesting week. Weather can’t make up its mind (that makes two of us!) But I have been enjoying the editing of Nine Lives, so not a complete waste of a week.

We are taking care of Lulu, a very old cat at the moment, 21 years old and extremely frail. She was scheduled to be put to sleep until Anita offered to take her. But having seen her and how miserable she is (not sure how much of this misery is due to how she is, or where she has ended up) it might have been a kindness.

I know all about living on borrowed time. Since my heart attacks three years ago, I often wonder how much longer I have and some days when it all becomes too much, I wish it could end. All completely wrong, I know, but now I am old, I can appreciate why some old people look as though they are only marking time. You can have enough, you know, of struggling with the pain and discomfort of a failing body. Of knowing it cannot get much better than it is now.

That’s what I see when I look at Lulu, I know she is suffering, but how much is too much?

Quite apart from my thoughts on the matter, Lulu seems to have her own agenda. I did think when she arrived that it might all be too much for her, but she is getting stronger every day and her determination puts mine to shame.

So, who knows, we might both be around for a long time yet. Just think how much more writing I can do…

See you soon…

Jaye

Now it begins…

Most people will know me as one half of the writing partnership Anita & Jaye Dawes, currently to be found at http://anitajaydawes.blogspot.com.

We decided to run separate blogs to avoid confusion, at least that was the theory…

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When I finished writing Nine Lives, my first ever novel a few weeks ago, I mistakenly thought the hard work was over.

Stupid thing to think, for I have spent the last ten years or so editing other people’s books and should have known better. Editing/proofing is something I have always enjoyed doing, and never considered it hard work.

Apparently, the fact that this book is mine has turned everything on its head. I don’t understand why it has suddenly become so hard, and can only assume that I must have come up with a lesser quality of book than I am used to working on. In other words, it was probably a pile of rubbish.

I can’t think otherwise, now can I?

In the past, I have written short stories and poetry, but reading has always been my favourite pastime. The thought of writing my own book always appealed to me, just never seemed to get around to it. Life has a way of getting in the way, doesn’t it?

Last summer, I was plagued by these characters. First one, then another and more of them talked to me (and each other) and I became fascinated and involved all at the same time. When I decided to write some of it down, these same characters went into overdrive. What I thought they should be doing was blatantly ignored, to be replaced with their own agenda. In the end it was as if they were writing the story and not I.

The ending was a bit tricky, as they wouldn’t let on what was going to happen and I worried constantly that it would all go pear shaped. Maybe they didn’t know, and then what was I supposed to do?

I didn’t think this was how you were supposed to write a book. Surely, you were supposed to have far more control than that?

The oddest thing that happened to the plot as it went along, totally beyond my control, was about one of the cast, the ex-husband of Kate, the main character. He started out as an ordinarily bitter man with a small axe to grind, suddenly turned into a vicious serial killer right before my eyes, taking me completely by surprise!

The other thing that surprised me was how hard it seemed to be, even with a very cooperative cast. Writing anything (other than a book) has always come easily to me, but creating a novel turned out to be so complicated. Continuity was a constant problem, as was remembering all of the characters history, their likes, dislikes and foibles. I learnt to keep a running timeline and a storyboard for the plot. This was necessary after the characters had decided whatever they would do next and was one of the ways I kept up with them.

In addition, I am ever thankful for all the attributes of Microsoft Word. Without their Find, Select and grammar checking facilities and all the other helpful tricks, I think I might have gone completely mad a long time ago.

Back to the editing.

It was always something I loved to do, so is it different now because this book is mine, or because I am a lot older now?

Maybe my brain has had enough and is starting to slow down and miss things all together? For instance, I don’t recall having this much trouble with ‘Passive sentences’ before. And the over use of certain words, like ‘that’.

I have nearly finished the first draft. I will leave it to settle for a few days, putting it out of my mind before I run through it again. I figure Nine Lives might be ready to publish by the beginning of October…

Bless you all for listening…