[Interview_2] Carol Thistlethwaite

Carol Thistlethwaite is a poet, a book reviewer and the author of three books for adults who are learning to read.

Her poems and reviews have been published in magazines that include Envoi, Orbis, Fire, Poetry Cornwall and The Journal.

Her latest collection of poems, from the field book, is going to be launched on March 20 and 21, to coincide with Earth Day, World Poetry Day, the First Day of Spring and World Forestry Day.

In this, the last of a two-part interview, Carol Thistlethwaite talks about how she got published.

How many books have you written so far?

I've had three books published by Avanti Press (2006) for adults who are learning to read. I wrote Red Paint, Painting the Bedroom and The Birthday Present for some of the adult learners I work with because I found there was a shortage of appropriate books for adults who are just learning to read.

The books appear simple but the writing of them is complex. Basically it's about creating adult stories from high frequency and phonetic words. Also the text (often one line) has to be written so that it can be illustrated. The repetition of key words and spelling patterns has to be considered and the subject matter should be relevant -- and preferably be fun.

Hannah Barton was the illustrator and I think we made an effective team.

Did you already have a publisher in mind when you were writing the books?

I looked at a selection of adult literacy books and picked Avanti as the most appropriate. I telephoned them, pitched the texts and was invited to submit them.

And how did you link up with the illustrator?

That was difficult and the budget made it more so. I kept mentioning to people that I was looking for an illustrator and found Hannah Barton via a friend.

I asked her to make the characters likable and to inject some humour into the illustrations. I negotiated a few changes and think Hannah did an excellent job. I think it's important that illustrator and writer work co-operatively in these kinds of books because the pictures are very much used as reading cues.

Do you write everyday?

No. As far poetry is concerned I write best when words and rhythms flow unhindered in my head -- which is usually when I'm out walking. Often I have a pencil and notebook with me so I scribble down phrases, images or whole poems. I edit them later. I sometimes think I should take a dictaphone so I can speak the word-flow as I walk.

How long did it take you to put the poetry collection together?

from the field book is a collection of poems about British bird species. The poems have been written over the last four years (2003 - 2007). I'd been sending poems out to small presses during this time, preferring to be published in print.

After attending a talk by Chris Hamilton-Emery (Salt Publishing), who said that writers need to develop an online presence, I realised I'd have to overcome my aversion to online publishing. So I sent some poems to Sam Smith's Select Six site and to my delight he accepted them and asked how many more I had... and recommended the collection to BeWrite Books who, I am pleased to say, accepted it for publication.

Sam recognised me from the small press world and at this point I’d like to say a huge thank you to the editors of small magazines who provide opportunities for writers to get their work and names out in the public domain -- to readers, writers and potential publishers.

What other advantages or disadvantages have arisen because of your association with this publisher?

Sam has an interest in bird watching and understands what many of these poems are doing: articulating the inexpressible jizz of different bird species. Having an editor who understands the concepts that underpin the collection has been an advantage.

Having a publisher (Cait Myers) whom I trust is also important. I’ve worked with Sam and Cait and contributed to decisions so I feel this is very much my collection.

Who is your target audience?

Initially from the field book began as my MA dissertation so the audience was me and whoever was grading it. After that I let the collection evolve to what it is today.

I hope that poetry readers will enjoy its use of language and that bird watchers will recognise the perceptions and think, 'Yes, it is like that, isn't it...?'

What did you find most difficult when you were writing the poems that make up from the field book?

I decided a long time ago that I didn't want to repeat myself across any of my poems. I didn't want to repeat images, metaphors or perceptions. Finding different ways of describing similar landscapes and presenting each encounter as a different perception can sometimes be challenging -- but it's one that I relish. Sometimes I have to let my mind go out of focus so I can move laterally and away from the obvious.

The most difficult species to write about are those that are very familiar. It is because I am no longer at the ‘learning to recognise’ stage so I don't now know the mental connections I made to aid recognition. I find that the best approach to these species is oblique such as focusing on an aspect of their behaviour or comparing them with other species.

What did you enjoy most?

I love being out in open spaces, wearing my scuffed and faithful boots, listening and watching out for wildlife, with binoculars round my neck, noticing something new, there’s always something new...

Related article:

Carol Thistlethwaite [Interview_1], Conversations with Writers, March 10, 2008

[Interview_1] Carol Thistlethwaite

Carol Thistlethwaite is a poet, a book reviewer and the author of Red Paint (Avanti Books, 2006), Painting the Bedroom (Avanti Books, 2006) and The Birthday Present (Avanti Books, 2006) which she wrote for adults who are learning to read.

Her latest book, from the field book, is a collection of poems about British bird species. The collection was written over a four year period and is going to be launched on March 20 and 21, to coincide with Earth Day, World Poetry Day, the First Day of Spring and World Forestry Day.

In this, the first of a two-part interview, Carol Thistlethwaite speaks, among other things, about the challenges she faces as a writer and about how she deals with those challenges.

When did you decide you wanted to be a writer?

It wasn't so much a decision as an epiphany. A college lecturer suggested that I should be doing Writing Studies. I instinctively knew I was hearing something important -- something I hadn’t previously considered. I'd just passed the second year of my BA and consequently changed course to include writing studies. I went on to gain an MA in Writing Studies. I began sending material out to magazines shortly after starting the Writing Studies modules encouraged by my tutor, Robert Sheppard, and other poets such as Alan Corkish.

I've been published in many small magazines such as Envoi and Orbis. I send different subject matters and styles to different editors depending on what I think their preferences are. Fire, Poetry Cornwall and The Journal have been supportive in publishing my bird poems.

How would you describe your writing?

It's in the style that best suits the purpose. from the field book, for example, is exploratory. I enjoy testing the boundaries of language to express the inexpressible -- and still be understood.

The mental leaps we make are accomplished without words but I try to represent them by ordering word-thoughts and by using lexical groupings and multi-layered vocabulary to represent concentric ideas. I position words on pages and use their sounds to represent sensory experiences such as physical and eye movements and the sounds the birds make.

Who has influenced you most?

Hopkins for the way he distorts words to bring out multiple meanings. Heaney for the way he creates layers of meaning by using lexical groupings. Hughes and Pound for selecting words for their associations. Cris Cheek and others for their positioning of words on the page. And Hughes (again) for remembering to place creatures in their habitats.

I admire Colin Simms for his precise images of wildlife movement, innovative use of language, his joy of sound and the sheer excitement and enthusiasm which pervades his work.

Also there's a host of contemporary women writers who are feeding into what I might do next.

How have your own personal experiences influenced your writing?

As a 3 year old, I used to fill pages of paper with lines of squiggles and ask what they said. Always the optimist, when told, 'Rubbish,' I excitedly asked, 'Which bit of it says "rubbish"?' I enjoyed learning to read and loved writing: stories, poems and later diaries and letters. It wasn't until I was a mature undergraduate that I began writing for a wider audience.

I have always lived in Lancashire (in fact I've always lived in the same village) and many of the poems are written from sightings in my local area. There's so much on our doorstep if we only look, listen and cherish it.

I have a deep appreciation for wildlife and wild places. I celebrate wildlife as something 'other' and at the same time part of the 'oneness' of the universe.

I don't consider myself a birding expert. I couldn't have written many of these poems if I was. Some of them articulate that rush of thoughts and mental leaps that occur in the instant between information-in and recognition. Others are about the bird watching experience: the thoughts I have and the imaginative leaps my mind makes.

As a learning support tutor, I'm interested in how people learn -- and that includes me. For example, the first time I saw a green woodpecker flying off I was struck by how colourful (bright yellow) it appears compared to when it's feeding on the ground. My memory scaffolded it to a cabinet unfolding (dark on the outside but still bright on the inside). Quite a lot of the poems share this personal journey as I anchor the unfamiliar to something familiar until it becomes a familiar.

What are the biggest challenges that you face?

Time management. Juggling work and family commitments with making time for walking, writing and keeping an eye on what's happening in the poetry world.

I've developed the habit of making little pockets of time for myself such as taking a couple of minutes to enjoy the flexing necks of the siskin on my bird feeders while I'm having my breakfast coffee or refusing to think about work as I enjoy listening to a song thrush on my way to college. I get up early at weekends to fit in local walks.

Being a reviewer helps because it makes me take time to read and re-read contemporary collections carefully.

What sort of material do you review?

I've been the resident reviewer for Carillon for three and a half years and review mainly poetry. The number of reviews varies depending on what Graham Rippon (the editor) receives and the space available. I reviewed eight books and booklets for the last issue.

The biggest challenge is setting aside the time required to read the books thoroughly -- which means several times. I set personal preferences aside and write a response that is both honest and fair. I do this by switching into analytical mode. That said, I still find humorous books difficult. (Maybe that's because I have a strange sense of humour!) I dislike reading reviews that promote the reviewer rather than the book, and consider it a betrayal of the trust that author and publisher invest in the reviewer. It's stealing someone else's space.

Related article:

Carol Thistlethwaite [Interview_2], Conversations with Writers, March 11, 2008

[Interview_2] Chris Hoare

Christopher Hoare is the author of a science fiction adventure series which revolves around the lives of the people of the stranded starship, Iskander.

The series is set in a 17th century alternate world and is made up of three books, so far: Deadly Enterprise (Double Dragon Publishing, 2007), The Wildcat’s Victory (Double Dragon Publishing, 2008) and Arrival (Double Dragon Publishing, 2008).

In this, the last of a two-part interview, Chris Hoare speaks about The Wildcat's Victory, the process behind its creation and publication as well as the advantages and disadvantages of publishing e-books.

How long did it take you to write The Wildcat’s Victory?

The Wildcat’s Victory is about war, loyalty, true love, greed, and ambition -- all the classic ingredients. The Iskander stories concern the forces one sets against one’s self by trying to change or create new things -- I just bring the pot to a boil by having this group of modern people attempt to run an Industrial Revolution in a world not ready for it.

I believe this novel took about a year to write and was accepted in 2006 by Double Dragon Publishing as the sequel to Deadly Enterprise, that they had already accepted.

What did you find most difficult when you were working on The Wildcat’s Victory?

The novel actually blends two simultaneous actions, a spy story and a military action.

I think the hardest part was to keep both parts progressing to a satisfactory conclusion while retaining some degree of unity. The two threads were not unique to this novel in the series, but grew from events set in motion by the previous novel, so I could not drop one in favour of the other. While I mostly followed my protagonist Gisel Matah, I also had to show people around her performing actions which she either guided or inspired to reach a closure in the action she initiated and was then called away from. I don't think the procedure is advised by any writing schools, but I think it works.

What did you enjoy most?

To tell you the truth, I found the military action -- dashing about in dangerous cavalry action -- much more fun than looking for the murderer of an agent and finding a replacement for him. I believe keeping that part of the novel going with proxies who were challenged was more interesting than having Gisel do it, and meanwhile I could indulge myself in the military what-if of using modern tactics against a huge enemy force trained and equipped as a 17th century army.

What sets The Wildcat’s Victory apart from the other things you've written?

It follows Deadly Enterprise, but where Gisel was a fugitive for much of that action, trying to evade enemies while accomplishing her mission, here she begins in a position of authority and encounters ever more dangerous situations to cap every success. The plot flows are reversed.

Arrival, the prequel, will have another different plot scheme -- this time the classic coming of age, when during the first hectic five months of the Iskanders' arrival on Gaia, she grows from a cheeky starship brat into a valued warrior. I'd hate to be expected to write novels to a constant plot structure.

In all my novels I prefer to set up my characters and the situation and let them resolve their problems in the way real life plays out, as the result of a mutual interplay between unpredictable forces.

How did you find a publisher for the book?

I had originally found the publisher while looking for a small, independent publisher who would consider handling novels that were significantly cross-genre. Double Dragon has the largest list of any e-publisher today, which draws more readers to its imprint, and its authors and publisher make a fine community of helpful and cooperative brothers and sisters.

E-publishing in itself has advantages and disadvantages. The biggest advantage is being able to maintain titles on sale to the reading public without running the gauntlet of the deadly ‘return’ syndrome of paper printing. I have a small interest in an indie publisher that was crippled by the cost of returns.

The only sensible way for a new author to establish a place in the writing world is by having a growing list of titles for the public to encounter, and this is only possible electronically.

The disadvantages are generally in the direction of having paper books available as well. While the quality of POD printing is the equal of anything in the marketplace, the books are derided as being some form of self-publishing -- implying lower quality. While I agree that most self-published fiction I've read fails through having no competent editing, those POD titles put out by royalty-paying publishers are very often of the same standard as anything from New York.

Which leaves the cost of moving a smaller quantity of print books for the author’s own readings and signings as the biggest financial disincentive for continuing to use dead trees to read on. I look forward to the day when reading from actual paper is regarded as being as out of step with the world as reading electronically is today. Meanwhile, I strive for the best in both worlds.

What will your next book be about?

The next novel in the Iskander series has Gisel married and expecting her first child, while simultaneously fulfilling the position of military governor of the most dangerous city in the world. This time, in a complete break from the classic plot, of character acting to solve a problem that hits them, Gisel is at ground zero with room to use only her wits and her integrity to defeat a host of different enemies. I think it's going to be difficult to hold it together, I'm barely beyond the first crisis, but am looking forward to the process of keeping the pace moving and bringing everything to a single, climactic, fitting conclusion.

What would you say has been your most significant achievement as a writer?

I think finding a way to write fiction from inside myself that touches others in a way that has them say, “I'd read another of these stories.”

The objective is not just to weave words together on the page, but to have them span the gap between one being and another.

How did you get there?

Via a few million words -- most tossed away as mere practice. Whole stories laboured over, loved, and then let go. Cherished opinions tested, found wanting and discarded. Being an author is not the ending of a process, it is the process -- every moment of it. Unless a writer writes to become, and becomes to write, the whole journey is wasted.

Related article:

Chris Hoare [Interview_1], Conversations with Writers, March 6, 2008

[Interview_1] Chris Hoare

Fantasy and science fiction author, Christopher Hoare’s three novels, Deadly Enterprise (Double Dragon Publishing, 2007), The Wildcat's Victory (Double Dragon Publishing, 2008) and Arrival (Double Dragon Publishing, 2008), are set in a 17th century alternative world and revolve around the lives of the people of the stranded starship, Iskander.

Currently he is working on another book in the the Iskander series.

In this, the first of a two-part interview, Chris Hoare speaks about his concerns as a writer.

How would you describe your writing?

While I also write fantasy and supernatural humour, most of my work now is on an Alternate History/Science Fiction adventure series about the people of the stranded starship Iskander on a 17th century alternate world. It combines sociology (the science) with some anachronistic additions to sword and gunpowder swashbuckling.

Since the early 1980s, I have never got far with any project that draws on my own experience in various areas of the oil business, including exploration in N. African desert and the Arctic. It seems that I've not yet managed to negotiate the narrow path between real events and fiction that Rudy Wiebe pointed out to me.

Who is your target audience?

I think I write primarily for women of active imagination. Since older women buy most of the fiction published today, I'm glad that my fascination with the daring and clever Security Officer, Gisel Matah (from the Iskander), ties in with their reading habits.

I am always torn between writing stories that appeal on a pleasure level and ones that point up the illusions of life.

I prefer to write the kinds of stories that I enjoy. On the other hand, I would hope to have some aspects buried in the writing that would one day be considered a contribution to literature.

I work on varied projects with the aim that every area of the craft I learn will add something to the next project I venture.

What are your main concerns as a writer?

I think a writer's greatest concern is securing a place in the crowd.

Today, the writing isn't enough. While we may have sweated blood over our portrayals of our fictional realities, no one will see them unless the finished novel reaches the attention of potential readers.

I'm disappointed that the big corporate publishers are widely accepted to be the arbiters of quality when in reality they pander to every public whim and launch huge volumes of dross into the world in the hopes that some of it may return them a profit. I wish they really were purveyors of the very best quality and concentrated on that, but I realize that is foreign to everything our economic system stands for. I mourn for a better world where books were published because someone believed in their message or content.

Do you write everyday?

Before I became embroiled in weeks of promotion, I used to write most days. When revising chapters, I may write a paragraph or a couple of pages; when writing a first draft I might get 3,000 words down once I know where the scenes are going.

I generally start with some housekeeping, saving completed work to a storage site or into a thumb drive, making new notes in my scenario or plot files. Usually I write in complete scenes and only end when I reach the final actions. These may also require revising in order to keep up the pace and tension before I write on into the next scene.

Who would you say has influenced you most?

Most has been influence in a negative direction -- pointing out things I avoid. I find TV drama to be terribly flawed, and novelists who write from such a perspective to be mistaken. I avoid following all the writers who portray women in action roles as damsels in distress. The one that sticks in my craw most was a Brit TV series about a young woman bequeathed a detective agency, who, in peril, in a deserted summerhouse with an enemy possibly breaking in, walks around investigating with a revolver delicately held between thumb and forefinger as if it were a dead mouse. How patronizing!

Then there are the scads of 'funny face' science fiction. These green humans with pointed ears might be acceptable as fantasy, or if they were the product of a deeper exploration of a natural system that might logically produce them, but by and large they are simple parroting of what has been done before. I’d rather fill my writing with people like ourselves, instead of clichés.

How have your personal experiences influenced your writing?

I like to think that my own experience shapes the stories I tell without having myself intruding into them.

Throughout my life I have never fitted easily into the societies and positions I found myself in, and rather than change to conform, I have looked with outsider's eyes to see the cracks in the edifices. I like to think my novels take place within some of those cracks, and show readers something they might never have noticed.

When did you start writing?

I completed my first novel around 1974, a huge historical epic about the arrival of the Anglo Saxons in Roman Britain, entitled Wyrd's Harvest. I started it in 1967 in Libya, researched details in the British Museum Library, wrote the first attempt from a truck camper travelling across the States, and finished the last draft on night shifts at the old Calgary Refinery. It was never published.

How did you make the transition from wanting to write to becoming a published writer?

After finding out I could plug away through several hundred thousand words and keep my spirits up to complete a novel, I decided to learn more of the craft with short stories and eventually produce a publishable novel. I soon came to hate the short stories I worked on.

I started the next novel (about the workers trying to buy the Calgary Refinery) in the late 70s and took the first draft to Rudy Wiebe, then writer-in-residence at the University of Calgary. I found out that I needed to learn better control of my imagination and prose when he laughed through all the dramatic bits.

I have attended other writing functions, the last with Guy Vanderhaeghe who won the Governor General's prize for The Englishman's Boy, now a TV drama. He taught me the importance of every detail -- such as what would or would not be in the POV character's sight in every scene. After that I joined the best of the online writing groups, NovelPro, and have had every novel thoroughly critiqued until they were worthy of showing to the world. NovelPro is as valuable as most MFA programs.

How many books have you written so far?

The three Iskander novels published or contracted are Deadly Enterprise (July 2007), The Wildcat's Victory (January 2008), and Arrival (July 2008). They are all published by Double Dragon e-Books. They all feature my courageous and clever female Security Officer, Gisel Matah, who works to protect the interests of a group of modern people marooned on a 17th century world. When the moderns work to introduce technology we might relish, established power elites attack them to maintain the status quo.

My fantasy, Rast, is due out from Zumaya in January 2009. It takes the side of a small magical kingdom, Rast, invaded by an imperialist power whose mechanistic philosophy denies the existence of things that cannot be touched. Rast is maintained by the magic of its succession of sorcerer kings, who must eventually meet their end under the power of the forces they wield. The Prince must succeed his doomed father while fighting many enemies; meanwhile his sweetheart has her own struggles against a rule of succession that says she cannot bear his heirs.

Related article:

Chris Hoare [Interview_2], Conversations with Writers, March 7, 2008

[Interview] Dahlia Rose

Dahlia Rose made her debut as an author with the publication of Love and Lights (Mardi Gras Publishing, 2006).

Love and Lights was followed by The Soul Mate's Curse (Star Dust Press, 2007); When Angels Fall (Star Dust Press, 2007); Caribbean Blue (Phaze, 2007) and Velvet, Leather and Roses (Amira Press, 2007) and Paradise Found (Amira Press, 2008).

Dahlia Rose spoke about her writing:

When did you decide you wanted to be a writer?

I decided to be a writer when I was around eleven years old. By then I was already writing short stories and poems at school and a few on my poems won contests.

My mom always used to say I was blessed with a gift and that I could use words and make people want to read more.

Even though I wanted to take it up as a career, I had to put off writing because my kids and family came first. But the love of it always remained in my heart.

How would you describe the writing you are doing now?

I write multi-cultural, contemporary erotica and suspense. That is the only way I can explain it.

I take my characters, whether it is a soldier or a dancer or a werewolf or a vampire, and I set them in this time period.

I love the thought of magic and the what-ifs of life brought into the here-and-now. I mix suspense with romance and love and blend in some spicy erotica.

I try to mix in real life emotionalism into my books because I want the reader to feel the situation my characters are in... to be able to say, "Hey I can feel what [this character] is feeling!"

Have you ever listened to a song that gets to your heart every time you hear it? That’s what I want readers to feel when they look into one of my books.

What motivated you to start writing in this genre?

It was actually not by choice. I started writing one day and the characters and story just ended up in this genre. I found my niche in contemporary erotica/romance. Every time I sit down in front of my laptop to write, my stories just twist into this reality.

I generally don’t write out plots or outlines for a new book. I get up one morning and there is a new idea in my head and it runs from there. Those little characters in my head take over and tell me where they are going to be, not where I should put them. They are very outspoken when they get a voice.

What are your main concerns as a writer?

The work that I am doing is so very important to me and I know a lot of people do not consider romance a very big part of the writing world. But to me and all of us who write it, it is one of the most important things in our lives. We are not just for bored housewives and mothers. That is the biggest misconception out there we have to deal with. We give love a voice.

I am a true romantic at heart. I love the thought of being in love and all the challenges a relationship can face. We all know that it can’t be perfect all the time. And I let my books reflect that. They are not just sweet and happy from one chapter to the next. I try to put up some barriers and walls that my characters have to climb over before they can find true happiness.

I use a lot of my own emotions when I write and I draw on past experiences and conflicts to help me capture what I want to portray in a particular scene.

What are the biggest challenges that you face?

My biggest challenges are trying to balance everything in my life. I have four kids ranging from sixteen to four. From going to soccer practice or Gymboree or football practice plus my own kickboxing classes -- there never seems to be enough hours in the day. Focusing on my writing as a career now has become my goal. I quit my job so I could have more hours in the day to write. In the past, by the time I had a few hours at night to open up my laptop, I was so exhausted I fell asleep. I now have the schedule worked out and everyone in my family is so supportive it is going well.

My kids are great and so is my fiancée. They let mom have her peace and quiet -- so I can write. And when I have promotional items or contest items I need to get done, you can see them all sitting helping me get bookmarks and business cards made up. They all do their part to help and encourage me.

With the promise that when I get on the New York Times bestseller list I buy them a boat. (Laugh.)

Do you write everyday?

I try to at least spend three to six hours a day writing. I like to work on two books simultaneously and get at least two chapters done a day on each book. But there are some days when I tend to procrastinate and end up spending the day in the park with my kids.

The Lover’s Diary sounds intriguing. What is it about?

The Lover’s Diary is my baby. It was the first book that ever got accepted. It looks into the relationship of a pair of lovers who write their thoughts and feeling into the pages of a journal they share. Their love and sexuality is directly tied together. There is nothing they don't share because they are very open and honest. The heroine, however, has been hurt so badly that she has a hard time accepting that this relationship is real. The hero, who loves her deeply, sets out to prove to her he's not going anywhere and this is a forever deal with him.

Paradise Found, on the other hand is a suspense thriller about a stalker who kills his victims to find immortality. It is my first full length novel and it takes you from North Carolina to the lush beauty of Barbados.

Which aspects of the work did you find most difficult?

I would have to say conflict or danger. I get so caught up in the fear or anger of the moment when I create it that sometimes I have to stop and just give myself a breather.

For instance, in Paradise Found, my killer scared the heck out of me when I came to writing his scenes and his victim's fear became my own for a little bit. There were certain parts in The Soul Mate’s Curse that are so sad I felt like crying myself.

Which parts of the novella did you enjoy writing most?

Love scenes. Well, who can blame me?

I think every writer has a fondness for the romance they can create between characters. For me, I love erotica and sensuality, in general, so it is very easy for me to write it in my books.

I wrote The Soul Mate’s Curse book in three weeks, around the Christmas holiday. I did it between shopping and other things. I started the editing process in January of 2007 so that it would be ready for release just before Valentines Day.

It's a Valentines story with a twist, with a werewolf, true love and a curse. How could I go wrong?

What sets the novella apart from the other things you've written?

It's the first book I've written which centres on a werewolf.

I knew I wanted the wolf to be scary, yes… but not like you see in the movies... where they are slimy and disgusting when they change. I wanted him to be actually a wolf and the whole concept of him being cursed to be a wolf and not bitten blended in very well with that idea.

The novella's similarity to my other books is that it is cantered around my belief in soul mates that last a life-time. I believe in happily-ever-after and even if one of my books does not have a happy ending, it will have a love that will last from one life to the next. That's one of my strongest beliefs... that even if a love is lost in this life, it will be found in another life.

What would you say has been your most significant achievement as a writer

You mean besides getting my foot in the door and being published? (Laugh.) I would say being nominated for a few awards in the Romance Erotica Connection awards. I was nominated Best New Author of 2006 for my book, Love and Light, and even though I did not win, I felt good knowing that at least a few people out there read my book and liked it. I did not even know I was nominated until I scheduled a chat with the owner/moderator of the group and she told me. Then a few other authors I know told me the same thing. I was pleasantly surprised.

[Interview_3] Jonathan Taylor

Jonathan Taylor's memoir, Take Me Home: Parkinson’s, My Father, Myself (Granta, 2007) has been described as a “a beautifully constructed and often profound piece of work” which “stands as a fine testimonial to man whose life was a mystery.”

Taylor has written two academic books, Science and Omniscience in Nineteenth-Century Literature (Sussex Academic Press, 2007) and Mastery and Slavery in Victorian Writing (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2003) and has co-edited the collection of essays, Figures of Heresy: Radical Theology in English and American Writing, 1800-2000 (Sussex Academic Press, 2005) with Dr. Andrew Dix.

In this, the last of a two-part interview, Taylor speaks about Take Me Home, how it got published and how has been received by readers.

Who is your target audience?

I would say my target audience has various layers.

Obviously, people who have experienced Parkinson's disease or dementia in their family (or in themselves) are central to who the book is for.

The book is also for carers, and intended as a way of encapsulating the experience of care in a realistic way; I don’t think there are many books of this kind which deal with the subject in an experiential and personal way.

In more general terms, the book is for people who enjoy reading literary memoirs and biographies. There are elements to stories like mine which everyone can associate with: family secrets, hidden histories, illness and mourning are, of course, universal concerns.

How did you choose a publisher for the book?

I chose the publisher, Granta, primarily because they published at least two of the books which influenced me the most: Linda Grant's Remind Me Who I Am Again?, and Blake Morrison's And When Did You Last See Your Father?

Granta specialise in this kind of work, and they were always my first choice. I was overjoyed when they accepted the book, and they have been great ever since really looking after me and the book. Ian Jack (ex-editor of Granta) went through my book word by word, editing it with me, making the book much better than the original manuscript.

How would you compare Take Me Home to the other books you have written?

Before Take Me Home -- up till now -- I've only written academic books -- works of literary criticism. These really helped in learning how to write in a flowing style. Writing formally is a really useful discipline -- it forces you to listen to every sentence and make sure everything links up "logically."

My next book is in very early stages at the moment, but I'm trying to write a novel which is partly based on my own experiences and partly fictional. Years ago, one night, I was rather, shall we say, drunk, and I invited a homeless person back to the house I was living in at the time -- to feed them everything in the fridge. On request, we then listened to some Debussy together. I never saw the person again, but the experience forms the basis of the novel I'm currently trying to write.

How did you go about writing Take Me Home?

I wrote Take Me Home over a number of years, constructing chapters out of fragmentary memories, and working out ways of turning isolated experiences into a narrative. At the same time, I was doing a lot of research -- interviewing relatives, contacting people who'd been "lost" for years, and searching for documents about some of his experiences.

There was so much that had been lost, hidden or forgotten -- a whole life in the Isle of Man, Oldham and afterwards which was shrouded by mystery. I really got caught up with the research. Then I suppose the majority of the actual writing was done in 2005.

Were you writing everyday?

When I was in full flow with Take Me Home, I was writing almost every day.

Coincidentally (and luckily), I got a sabbatical from my day job (lecturing) in 2005, so I had the chance to really get to grips with the book. I was sitting down at 8 am every morning and writing 1,000 words before lunch -- and then, after lunch, doing other jobs or editing what I'd done in the morning.

Although I'd written substantial amounts of the book before (and continued to redraft after) the sabbatical, those six or seven months of solid writing were essential. Otherwise, I don't think I'd ever have got it done.

I'd done a great deal of ground work before this period, so when it came to sitting down and writing, I found it relatively easy to write in quantity -- it flowed surprisingly easily, possibly also because I always felt there was something compelling me to write it. Somehow, I had to get it on the page. So, at that time, it wasn't hard to write at all.

Having said that, I never really believed I might finish the book: it felt like such an Everest. Even in the final rewrites, oddly enough, I felt utterly daunted by the magnitude of the task.

I suppose the problem here was the same thing that made it easy to write: I knew exactly what I wanted to get down, so I was daunted by getting to the end of a story I already knew.

My experience of writing in 2005 isn't representative -- normally, I find it very difficult to sit down and write at all. There are always other things to do: carpets to hoover; lopsided shelves to put up.

I think writing works best when I've got a substantial amount of time -- at least a week -- in which to sit down and write every day.

I do sometimes write in the evenings, or at times, around my job, but this is very difficult to do and often results in "bitty" work. It's suitable for short stories, but for longer work I really need proper periods of solid writing.

Generally speaking, I write all but the most first of first drafts on the computer. This isn't because I like computers(!), but because word processors are helpful for editing. I'm a very painstaking writer, and I like to edit the sentence I've just written over and over again -- and a word processor is useful for that.

How has the book been received so far?

I've been overjoyed how the memoir has been received. Most importantly, all members of my family and friends have loved it.

I've also had various letters and emails from carers who have associated with various elements of the book. Those reactions are clearly more precious than any formal reviews. But it has also received really good reviews in The Guardian, The Sunday Times and The Times Literary Supplement and on Oneword Radio.

I never expected to receive this kind of feedback, and have, of course, been overjoyed and surprised in equal measure.

All these people seem to understand what the book attempts to be: an honest literary memoir about my experiences and my father’s illness.

Inevitably, I’ve also received a few more negative reactions, for example, on amazon.co.uk. I expected this – I mean, if you write a book like this, then you're opening yourself up to criticism. I am myself more than aware of the ethical questions surrounding what I’ve done, and have wrestled with them continually. I believe, though that many of the negative reactions are because people have misunderstood the genre of the book, thinking its some kind of medical textbook rather than what it is: a literary memoir, an exploration of personal experiences.

Related articles:

• Jonathan Taylor [Interview_2], Conversations with Writers, February 7, 2008
• Jonathan Taylor [Interview_1], Conversations with Writers, August 10, 2007

[Interview_2] Jonathan Taylor

Jonathan Taylor has written and published a memoir, Take Me Home: Parkinson’s, My Father, Myself (Granta, 2007).

In addition to Take Me Home, he has written two academic books, Science and Omniscience in Nineteenth-Century Literature (Sussex Academic Press, 2007) and Mastery and Slavery in Victorian Writing (Palgrave-Macmillan, 2003) and has co-edited the collection of essays, Figures of Heresy: Radical Theology in English and American Writing, 1800-2000 (Sussex Academic Press, 2005) with Dr. Andrew Dix.

Taylor is also co-founder and co-director of Crystal Clear Creators, an arts organisation and not-for-profit company, which records, publishes, produces and promotes new writing, particularly for radio.

Currently Taylor is a Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at De Montfort University in Leicester where he specialises in prose writing, memoir-writing, radio writing and literature of the nineteenth-century.

In this, the first of two interviews, Jonathan Taylor speaks about how the process of writing Take Me Home helped him understand his experiences as an informal carer as well as his relationship with his father.

What motivated you to start working on the memoir?

I always felt there was a real imperative behind my writing it -- when I was writing it, I just felt I had to do it.

I wanted to write something which could help me understand what had happened to my father and my relationship with him -- something that (retrospectively) would help me understand the "story" of his illness.

There were so many hidden complexities in his life and illness that I wanted to unravel them, and I thought writing the book would help me do that. I also wanted to write the kind of book which I would have liked to have read when I was caring for him -- the kind of book which would have helped me to understand my experience and conflicting emotions as a carer.

Did writing the book help you understand these emotions?

I think it helped by making sense of what had happened to us and what the illness meant.

If nothing else, I learnt that certain elements of his illness had names. Putting names to things sometimes helps, I suppose.

At the time it was happening, I just saw the symptoms and didn't understand -- or often thought he was being deliberately irritating. For example, he suffered from Capgras Syndrome, which means that the sufferer becomes convinced that a "significant other" isn't him or herself, but is a someone impersonating him or her.

My father became convinced for a long while that I wasn't me, but was being impersonated by an old colleague at work whom he hadn’t got on with. At the time, I just thought he was angry at me, and the disease had made him forget who I was. But retrospectively, I came across an academic research paper written about my relationship with my father, which said that he suffered from Capgras Syndrome. Being able to put a name to his inability to recognise me helped me to understand what had happened.

I suppose the difficulty is that it also made me feel bad for being so impatient with him; when I realise that so many of the things I got cross with him about (repeating things over and over, misrecognising me, repeating actions over and over) were real symptoms and recognised conditions, I can't help feeling guilt about my impatience with him at the time.

So, that understanding is a two-edged sword in some ways.

All carers, I think, have to deal with guilt over how they behaved, what they did.

Impossible standards for carers are set in the media and on television, and they suffer terribly from guilt when they're not always patient angels, but human beings who get cross, frustrated, impatient and so on. I wanted to show that that's normal -- that a carer can't be 100% happy and patient all the time.

The guilt is an inevitable part of the process, but it helps (hopefully) to know that other carers feel the same, that other carers get cross too.

Another way in which writing the book was both a positive and a "negative" experience in one was that a lot of what I uncovered didn’t really add up. I realised that my father would remain a bit of an enigma, however hard I tried to find more out. For example, the father that I knew and the father that my half-brother knew as a boy seem to be two wholly different people, and it’s impossible to reconcile our views of him as children. I had to come to accept that my father was a hugely complicated and contradictory person; that was the "conclusion" to the book -- that there was no conclusion, no simple way of understanding him.

How old were you when you started caring for your father?

I suppose it was round about when I was 17ish that I really started looking after him (in 1990).

What did your duties involve?

I used to take over from my mother (who was his full-time carer) for a few days at a time, when she went down to Torquay to visit her parents (who were themselves ill). The responsibilities and duties changed radically over time, but they obviously involved 24 hour care -- everything from feeding him, organising the medication, moving him about the house, putting him to bed, picking him up when he fell, toiletting and so on and so forth. Every single part of the day was devoted to a particular job or routine.

How did this affect you?

I think it had a deep effect on me as a person, though it’s hard to know what without having something to measure it against.

On the one hand, I felt proud to look after him -- I felt I was doing something important, something that needed to be done -- and I loved him very much. On the other hand, it exposed to me all the worst parts of my nature at the same time. I suppose care often does that.

All I can say is that, since his death, I have missed caring for him terribly -- because very few things feel as important or worthwhile, however well or badly I did it back then.

Do you feel you had adequate support?

The whole family supported each other -- we all took up different roles "round" my father, caring for him in different ways (for example, my sister is a doctor, so she dealt with many of the medical matters, and, indeed, saved his life on one or more occasions).

Outside the family, we saw the best and the worst of the modern health system. There were some wonderful individuals who helped, but the institutions (such as hospitals) were often very poor. They don’t cater well for Parkinsonians, or people suffering from degenerative disorders. On a simple level, for instance, Parkinson’s sufferers often have complicated pill regimes -- but the pill regimes often don’t fit into the hospital routines, and pills are forgotten or switched around for no good reason.

Hospitals, I think, deal well most of the time when things are at crisis point, but slow, degenerative disorders often meet with institutional neglect and a general malaise.

When did you decide you wanted to write about these experiences?

The very first inkling I had that I could write about my experience was way back, in 1998, when I discovered that I had a half-brother I'd never heard of. At the same time, I found out that my father had been married before.

As these revelations started, I remember my mother turning to me and saying, "Gosh, it'd make a good book, wouldn't it?" That was when I first thought about it.

Then I first started working on the memoir seriously in 2001, when my father died. In that sense, the memoir is a memorial to him.

How did you find out about your half-brother?

One Christmas (1998), my mother sat me down at the kitchen table and placed a series of letters in front of me. One of them was from the Salvation Army tracing service. Colin (my half-brother) had decided to trace my father after 30 years of not seeing him.

Did your mother know about his previous marriage?

Yes -- in fact, I’ve gradually realised that most people knew apart from us (his children from his second marriage)!

How did these revelations make you feel?

I wasn’t totally surprised, I suppose, in that we had always wondered where he’d been before he met my mother. There were years of his life he didn’t talk about, so (as an imaginative kid) I used to make up all sorts of fantasy stories about that time. It’s also possible that, because of the trauma of his first marriage and, indeed, because of the Electro-Convulsive Therapy (ECT) he may or may not have had after his first nervous breakdown, that it really was all blotted out.

I’ve got to know my half-brother well now, and that’s been a real delight -- he is the spitting image of my father, looks-wise. So it’s been a strange, but positive experience. I also understand why my father didn’t talk about these things, why these things were hidden. After all, we were young children and wouldn’t have understood -- and then, by the time we would in the 1990s, he was very ill, and probably couldn’t talk about them very easily.

Related articles:

• Jonathan Taylor [Interview_1], Conversations with Writers, August 10, 2007
• Jonathan Taylor [Interview_3], Conversations with Writers, February 11, 2008

[Interview_3] Brian Wainwright

Historical novelist Brian Wainwright is a full-time author.

So far he has published two novels, The Adventures of Alianore Audley (Bewrite Books, 2005; Jacobyte Books of Australia, 2002) and Within the Fetterlock (Trivium Publishing, 2004).

In this, the last of three interviews, Wainwright speaks about how his books evolved; how he got published and about his plans for the future.

How did The Adventures of Alianore Audley come about?

I wrote quite a lot of comedy when I was young. It got me into trouble at school where there was a lot to parody and ironise. It took me a long time before I realised there was no reason I couldn't put comedy and historical fiction together.

Believe it or not, Alianore was originally going to be a serious novel about Richard III. I did some calculations to see whether Constance of York could have had a (fictional) granddaughter active at the time of the Wars of the Roses. (I didn't want to use a real person for this one.) I found that by taking on a youngest daughter to the Audley family, it would work. I wrote about five lines, and they lay untouched on my computer for about four years, like a seed waiting in its packet.

Then Alianore found her voice! A very unusual voice at that. Normally I write and rewrite, and then edit, but Alianore is pretty much an edited first draft. I'm not sure that I wrote the book at a conscious level. It seemed to stream out, page after page, day after day, until it was finished. If Alianore had been a real person I'd have suspected that her spirit was channelling through me, but as it is I must suppose it came from whatever deep crevice of the unconscious mind creates stories.

It was great fun playing around with the stereotypes of historical fiction, using whatever crazy idioms came into my head, and allowing Alianore to do what she liked, poking King Edward IV in the balls, dressing up as an archer, vaulting onto warhorses -- you name it.

How easy was it to find a publisher for the book?

Originally I self-published, because the book was for myself and a small group of friends who shared my weird sense of humour. I didn't expect it to have general appeal, but I got rid of the rest of the print run through an advert in the Richard III Society magazine, and was surprised when the odd enquiry arrived from booksellers when it was out of print.

After some prodding from people who had read it, I had an agent lined up for the book, but ultimately it wasn't taken any further. I suspect it was hard to place an eccentric novel by an eccentric and unknown writer. I decided to try again and submitted it to Jacobyte, who were inviting direct submissions. As it happened Meredith Whitford at Jacobyte was interested in Richard III (and indeed has written a Ricardian book of her own) so I suppose the seed fell on fertile ground.

How has Alianore Audley been received by readers?

I've seen the book categorised as everything from Historical Romance to Fantasy, but I suppose it's really a parody or spoof of historical fiction. I hope it's an affectionate parody of a genre I love.

I'm surprised it's sold so well, and obviously very pleased that it has. It's been quite a success in the USA, which I suppose nails the old English canard that Americans don't 'do' irony. Inevitably some people don't get the joke, and someone even asked me if it was a translation from a real chronicle! On the whole though people seem to love it, so maybe my humour isn't as weird and twisted as I thought.

Part of the success is probably down to Richard III -- people still want to read about the guy, and my version is very different from the rest.

The Adventures of Alianore Audley has been re-issued or re-published by BeWrite Books. How did this happen?

Bewrite took over from Jacobyte the titles it was most interested in, including mine. As a result, a completely new edition was prepared, with a new cover that was a great improvement on the old one.

Bewrite has certainly managed to achieve a greater level of publicity for the book, and they have a very effective marketing strategy, which means that it is available from a much wider range of outlets. This has led to far better sales, so the changeover has been very positive as far as I am concerned.

How did you choose a publisher for your second book?

My second book, Within the Fetterlock tells the story of Constance of York, an English princess who lived in the reigns of Richard II and Henry IV.

Constance is a relative unknown in English history but I found her fascinating and so I had to write about her. It took at least ten years to write, including research, though the truth is I re-wrote it several times and the published version is something like Mark VII.

The novel was released in 2004 by Trivium Publishing in the USA. The publisher chose me!

What challenges has this presented?

Trivium is a small outfit and the main problem is that they don’t have a massive advertising/publicity budget. I have had to learn to publicise myself to some extent, though it’s not an aspect of authorship with which I am particularly comfortable, being naturally reclusive.

What was the most difficult aspect of the work that went into Within the Fetterlock ?

The research for the book was simply huge. I probably did far too much, but I kept being intrigued by new snippets that came up. In fact I was still putting in new facts as the manuscript was being edited.

It was hard work to reduce this into a manageable novel that would be of reasonable length. I cut out massive chunks before submission and working with Tamara Mazzei at Trivium, there was some fairly drastic editing of what remained. All this made the work stronger, but to be honest, I think if I were doing the job again, I’d want to be even more drastic.

Paradoxically, I did enjoy the research. It almost became an end in itself, which is a danger for writers of historical fiction.

The greatest thrill, though, was seeing the book come to life, through the final editing process -- it was something I’d never experienced at that level of complexity, and it gave me a tremendous buzz.

In what way is Within the Fetterlock different from the other things you have written?

It’s very serious, very intense, with more tears than smiles.

It’s similar to the others in that, well, it’s historic, and I do try to research my novels, even the funny ones.

What will your next book be about?

I have got three projects in hand, as well as a couple of whimsies, and it very much depends on where my mood takes me as to which will be completed first. If someone comes along and says they want X, and here’s Y pounds as an advance, then that will get precedence. Otherwise, I’ll just go muddling along in my own merry way until something pops out.

The likely winner is a novel about Richard III, as quite a few people have said they want to see my take on him. The problem is that I want to come at the subject from a different angle to all the previous novels on this subject and because of my deep interest in Richard, I want the book to be worthy of him.

Related articles:

• Brian Wainwright [Interview_2], Conversations with Writers, February 4, 2008
• Brian Wainwright [Interview_1], Conversations with Writers, February 1, 2008

[Interview_2] Brian Wainwright

Novelist Brian Wainwright has a deep-seated interest in the middle ages, especially the 14th and 15th centuries; the House of York and the era of Richard II.

He has published two novels, The Adventures of Alianore Audley (Bewrite Books, 2005; Jacobyte Books of Australia, 2002) and Within the Fetterlock (Trivium Publishing, 2004).

Currently he is working on several other book-related projects.

In this, the second of three interviews, Wainwright speaks about the factors that pushed him towards becoming a writer.

When did you decide you wanted to write?

Very early in life; even as a young child I enjoyed making up stories and writing them down. However, it took me a long time before I thought of writing as something that could be done for an audience, as opposed to just for me. It was even longer before I plucked up the courage to submit something for publication. For many years the idea of doing so scared me stiff.

Who influenced you most?

A wide array of writers; if I wrote them all down it would be a very big paragraph. Among writers of the past, Robert Graves and Philip Lindsey spring to mind. Current writers I admire include Elizabeth Chadwick and Sharon K Penman.

What do you admire most about these writers?

I don’t think I have ever read anyone who could write first-person historical novels as well as Graves. He’s always absorbing, and he always convinces, introducing historical detail without making a tedious show of it. I Claudius and Wife to Mr Milton are probably my favourites.

Philip Lindsey always wrote with passion, and you could sense his love of history. He was a great inspiration to me when I started writing. I think his London Bridge is Burning is the one I remember best; it was rather a disjointed tale, but there were some wonderful characters in there, and some unusual aspects of medieval life.

I can bracket Elizabeth Chadwick and Sharon Penman together. First, they write beautifully, but also they go to a great deal of trouble with their research and it’s rare if ever that I’m hit with the shock of an anachronism. Penman’s The Reckoning is an incredibly powerful novel about the ending of the Welsh Wars of Independence. It’s not an easy read in some ways -- there’s a lot of tragedy in there -- but it grips all the way to the end.

Elizabeth Chadwick just goes from strength to strength. Her book about William Marshal, The Greatest Knight which came out a couple of years back, is simply one of the best historical novels I have ever read.

Have your personal experiences influenced your writing in any way?

Not consciously, but I suspect there must be some sub-conscious influences. For example, I worked in the Education side of Local Government for a long time, and that taught me everything I ever need to know about court intrigue, backstabbing and betrayal.

Do you write everyday?

No, I don’t write every day.

At present I am rather idle and intermittent in my work; downright unprofessional in fact. I write when I feel like it and go on until I’ve had enough. This could be ten minutes, or all day.

One of the things I am trying to persuade myself to do is work a little more regularly, establishing more of a routine. I haven’t quite got into the attitude of treating writing as a job (which it now is) rather than just a hobby.

What are the biggest challenges that you face?

My own nature -- my tendency to go haring off after interesting side lines in my research instead of sticking religiously to the task of writing and getting a project completed.

I deal with this by slapping myself mentally around the head, reflecting that it would be nice to have published more than two books, and that I ought to damn well get on with it!

Elsewhere you have said you think history has misjudged King Richard II. Why is this?

Richard came to the throne at 10. That’s a bad start in itself, but the country was practically bankrupt, and engaged in what had become a losing war with the French. They were raiding the coast, and planning invasion. Even an adult taking over at such a point in history, even the greatest sovereign imaginable, might have struggled just a little.

Richard wanted peace with France, which was very much against the grain of the times. The trouble was that most of the nobles and gentry wanted war (they thought that they could profit personally from it) but at the same time they didn’t want to pay for it. There really was no way of squaring that circle. Effective wars cost big money – even back then. The English Crown was not rich, the government of Richard’s senile grandfather, Edward III, had run up massive debts, and Richard’s extended family were always looking to take more out of the pot for themselves.

Richard was only twenty when he faced an outright rebellion, led by his own disloyal relatives, the so-called Appellants, that almost deposed him and resulted in the judicial murder or exile of the majority of his advisers. From that point onward he slowly rebuilt the position of the Crown, trying to do what Tudor monarchs are praised for by historians, putting the nobility in its place. He at last achieved a 28-year truce with France, and he was also one of the very few Englishmen (and I think the only English sovereign) to fight a successful war in Ireland. His foreign policy was advanced, and praised even by historians who don’t otherwise rate him. Although not an intellectual himself he was a patron of the arts, and his court was possibly the most cultured in Europe. Although he is sometimes accused of ‘tyranny’ his political executions were few and far between, whether you compare him to the Appellants or to his successor, Henry IV (Bolingbroke).

Richard was once approached by a soothsayer, who predicted that unless he changed his ways he would be deposed. Richard laughed at him and sent him on his way. A few years later the same man approached Henry IV, and told him pretty much the same thing. Bolingbroke had him summarily executed on the spot. Nothing better defines the difference between the two cousins.

I’m not trying to suggest that Richard is up there with Elizabeth I. At the end of the day he was not a ‘great’ king, and he had many personal and political flaws. But I like him! And I think he’s underrated. Most of the things he was accused of at his deposition could have been said of his successor, or indeed of any English medieval king. I think it’s telling that within three years Henry was at least as unpopular as Richard had ever been, facing rebellion at home and with fighting going on in France, Scotland, Ireland and Wales all at the same time. It was not an easy business, running medieval England. The difference is, frankly, that Henry survived. With a great deal of luck along the way, he even managed to die in his bed.

Related articles:

• Brian Wainwright {Interview_3], Conversations with Writers, February 6, 2008
• Brian Wainwright [Interview_1], Conversations with Writers, February 1, 2008

[Interview_1] Brian Wainwright

Novelist Brian Wainwright made his debut as an author with the publication of The Adventures of Alianore Audley (Jacobyte Books of Australia, 2002), a humorous story about an intelligence agent in Yorkist England.

Alianore Audley was followed by Within the Fetterlock (Trivium Publishing, 2004), which tells the story of Constance of York, an English princess who lived in the reigns of her cousins, Richard II and Henry IV.

In the first of three interviews, Wainwright speaks about his writing.

How would you describe your work?

Historical fiction. Within that there are two strands, the serious HF and the comedy projects. My two published novels demonstrate these two sides to my writing.

My main focus so far has been England and Wales in the 14th and 15th centuries. I think this will always be my main area of interest, if only because I know the period so well and so don’t have to run around doing masses of new research every time I write a paragraph.

However, one of my current projects is set in 11th century Spain, and I don’t rule out the possibility of doing some contemporary writing in the future, especially if there’s demand for it.

Who is your target audience?

To be honest, anyone who’ll buy the books! Probably they will be people with quite a serious interest in history who don’t need everything spoon-fed to them.

From feed-back, I gather that the majority of my readers are women, so I do have to bear that in mind. Women tend to like strong heroines -- fortunately so do I. I try to make my leading medieval women strong (as they often were!) but without any anachronistic feminism.

How do you define feminism?

I would define feminism as a philosophy that believes in the complete equality of women in all spheres -- political, personal, economic, employment, education, whatever. This movement can be traced back to Mary Wollstonecraft, who wrote a seminal work, A Vindication of the Rights of Women, in the late 18th century.

In the middle ages, why would feminism have been anachronistic?

Medieval women did not have access to this philosophy, or indeed any other aspect of Enlightenment thinking, and lived in a society which, I think, it is fair to characterise as deeply conservative. I sometimes read historical novels where the characters seem to be much like modern people, with modern attitudes, in fancy clothes, and for me, at least, that does not work.

There was however an early ‘feminist’ writer, Christine de Pisan, who came from Italy but lived most of her life at the court of France. She was pretty much a contemporary of Constance of York, and the first woman, certainly in the West, to make a living from writing.

Christine’s works emphasise how women can do more within their particular sphere (she mentions various levels in society) to fulfil themselves and add more to the world. However what she never does is question the social hierarchy -- if anything she emphasises a woman’s duty to defer to and obey her husband. Had she done otherwise I suspect she might have been accused of heresy, since the whole social structure of the middle ages, including family relationships, was underpinned by the teaching of the Church.

However, this does not mean that medieval women were china dolls. Far from it. Depending on their position in society they influenced politics, managed great estates, ran convents, operated businesses -- sometimes on their own account -- or laboured endlessly, like many Third World women do today, to feed their families.

They nearly all ran a household of some type or other, a much more complex business than it is today. You couldn’t nip out to Tesco if you needed (for example) some extra salted fish to get you through Lent. You had to order it at the right time and in the necessary quantity.

Constance of York’s daughter, Isabelle Despenser, Countess of Warwick, ran her husband’s estates for years on end while he was away fighting in France. This would be the equivalent today of a woman in her twenties acting as Chief Executive of a major farming and property conglomerate. (And she wouldn’t have had the advantage of an MBA course before taking it on!)

What motivated you to start writing historical fiction?

A deep interest in the middle ages. Novels seemed the way to go, as I’m not qualified to write academic history. In addition, the beauty of novels is that they can ‘answer’ the unsolved questions that serious historians can’t.

An example, of one such question is: the fate of the Princes in the Tower. All the novels about Richard III have to answer that, one way or another. Sometimes Richard kills them, sometimes he puts them somewhere safe, sometimes they die naturally, and so on. No historian can tell you absolutely what happened to those boys, it’s just a matter of opinion. A novelist can ‘solve’ the mystery. Of course the reader may or may not be satisfied with the solution, but that’s another matter.

My spur to write about Constance of York was that she did something that was -- to say the least -- exceptional for a medieval princess. Basically she busted two noble boys out of royal captivity and tried to take them where the king couldn’t get them. I had to explore her motives for that, what led her to do it, to solve that riddle if only to my own satisfaction. That’s what lay beneath Within the Fetterlock.

I’m passionately interested in history, and I suppose one of the things I am trying to do is encourage similar interest in others. A lot of people come to history via fiction -- it’s a more accessible route than to dive straight into heavy textbooks, many of which are really aimed at post-graduates. I try to show the human side in my serious work; how events hit people, and impacted on their lives.

What drew you to the middle ages and to fiction about the middle ages?

You must remember that I grew up in an age when the children’s TV channels were dominated by things like William Tell, Richard the Lionheart, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Ivanhoe, and Knights of the Round Table, while cinema output included El Cid, The Vikings, Cleopatra, and The Fall of the Roman Empire.

History was also taken seriously at school, and along with English, was one of my favourite subjects.

When we went on holiday we often visited Wales, where I was fascinated by the castles. I started reading about history for pleasure, because I wanted to know more than school taught me. I think the very first historical novel I came across was The Wool-pack by Cynthia Hartnett, read to us at primary school by the best teacher I ever had, Miss Margaret Mackie. When I got a little older and found there were such things as adult historical fiction novels, I think I pretty much devoured the entire library offering!

The more I’ve learned about the middle ages there more fascinated I’ve become; and to be honest, there’s always more to learn. Some people think of me as an expert on the subject, but frankly I never cease to be amazed by my own ignorance of particular topics.

Related articles:

• Brian Wainwright [Interview_2], Conversations with Writers, February 4, 2008
• Brian Wainwright [Interview_3], Conversations with Writers, February 6, 2008 

[Interview] Sean Parker

Sean Parker's debut novel, Junkyard Dog (BeWriteBooks, 2007) has been described as "an explosive mix of raw power and brutal energy."

The novel, which is set in Manchester, is the first of a trilogy of crime fiction thrillers exploring the city's mean streets.

In a recent interview, Sean Parker spoke about his writing.

When did you decide you wanted to be a writer?

My first job was as an engineer working in the nuclear power industry. At that time I used to read a lot of westerns, especially those by such quality authors as Paul Wellman, Will Henry and Louis L'Amour and, as time went on, I decided to write one of my own.

After completion, the manuscript went out to the genre publishers. I knew that very soon I would be taking up shelf space next to Louis.

The rejection slips began to land on the carpet with some regularity, accompanied by the words: "Unfortunately the manuscript is not suitable for our list, but you may well find another publisher who thinks differently, a list of whom you will find in the Writers' and Artists' Year Book."

Naively thinking that these letters were personal to me and me alone I persevered until finally, the penny dropped like a ship's anchor. Through the pain of realisation, I began to understand about indentation; justification; colons and semicolons et al.

At the same time, I was also writing some children's stories for my two daughters, which involved them and their pet rabbit Snowy. Fortunately, their school found them good enough to print for the other kids. Unfortunately, I overfed Snowy and one morning I found him dead in his cage. The hire of a JCB was necessary to get him out and give him a decent burial, under a rose bush in the back garden.

I then switched careers and went into financial services with a major U.K. life assurance company. I now began to take up the business of writing very seriously. A year later I sent a manuscript for a non-fiction book on training and fitness to the publishers Foulsham & Foulsham. It arrived on their desk on a Friday morning. On Monday morning the M.D. telephoned and within twenty minutes the deal was done.

I told my wife we were on our way up; a year later she died of cancer.

How would you describe your writing?

Peter Walsh, the best selling author of Gang War, a definitive non-fiction history of the Manchester gangs, has endorsed Junkyard Dog by saying: "The Junkyard Dog is as close to real life as it gets."

Manchester can be a scary place and I'd like to think that my novel depicts the urban brutality hidden under the surface. I see the 'Dog' as a Mancunian, Long Good Friday.

What motivated you to start writing in this genre?

Being very independent, I tend to do what I believe is right, instinctively, on occasions and on the assumption that if others are telling me what to do, then I am leading their life and not my own. So, influences are very few.

However, on the discovery of a novel by Tom Barling called The Smoke, I was instantly hooked on crime fiction.

I told Tom that I was going to write a novel about modern day criminals in London.

He replied: "Come on, Sean. Don't tell me that Manchester is so crime-free you have to invade my territory. Get lost."

I got the message.

Bernard Cornwell who, after learning about my writing ambitions, very kindly gave me the name of his agent. What a gentleman.

Another influence was the author Derek Raymond. We once went out for a drink, a fatal mistake on my part. I finished up plastered, chewing on a beer-stained carpet but still trying to pick his brains. Another gent.

Also, there is a club in Manchester, which, for the last fifty years, has been at the forefront in providing training facilities for those with an interest in amateur wrestling and boxing, along with the teaching of general fitness. The founder of this club was Max Shacklady. The place was, and still is, known as Shacklady's. Max was for nearly twenty years the coach to the Olympic boxing team. His son, Tony, won a silver medal in the wrestling event in the New Zealand Commonwealth Games. Word spread about the club and one day the famous Joe Louis turned up to meet Max.

Max was also a Magistrate and his idea of justice was to sentence all young offenders to attend his club for two months of intensive training. Not many dared re-offend.

Because of its growing reputation, Shacklady's had begun to attract many of Manchester's bouncers and doormen who realised that keeping fit was a big help in staving off a spell in traction. I got to know many of them and have used this 'inside' information as the basis for the 'Dog'. And no, I do not know where the bodies are buried, honest.

What are your main concerns as a writer, and how do you deal with them?

I don't have any. I just write, and then re-write until I'm happy with it.

As a writer there is, initially, only one challenge to overcome; that of getting the book published. If you are not able to produce the best you are capable of then you're never going to be in with a chance.

How many books have you written so far, and what writing plans do you have for the future?

The Complete Training Diary was a non-fiction book published by Foulsham. It was designed to help those who did some kind of exercise every day to accurately record it so as to keep an ongoing record and therefore assess one's progress along the way.

Junkyard Dog is a crime fiction thriller published by BeWrite Books. As for the future, the second novel, which is complete, involves the same characters and is called Clap Hands Here Comes Charlie.

The last in the trilogy is about a cousin of Charlie and Burnett. Jack Mitchell is another Gypsy head case that, on the odd occasion, enlists the help of the Manchester mob in sorting out the opposition. It's at the halfway stage so I don't have a clue about the ending, other than that it will be an intriguingly explosive one.

What would be your advice to aspiring authors?

If I can help anybody I will.

The first thing is to ask yourself the reason why you are writing. If the answer is not money, then you'll be forever seeking assurances from family and friends about your masterpiece. They will tell you it's fantastic, and your chest will still be puffed up with pride when you're six feet under.

So, you're writing for money. Now you have to do whatever it takes to get there. Learn your trade. Write to authors that have a similar style to that which you are trying to achieve. Many will not reply, but from those that do, take their advice on board. You don't have to use it, but somewhere along the line it will all begin to click into place.

Is it true that all publishers have readers who go through the slush pile?

If they don't like the first line, the MS is rejected. Same thing happens again if they don't like the first paragraph; first chapter; or first line of the second chapter. So what does that tell you?

Now have a look at the "The Ten Deadly Sins" from Elmore Leonard:

1. Never open a book with the weather. Unless it's needed to create atmosphere, and not a character's reaction to the weather. Don't go on too long because the reader is apt to leaf ahead looking for people.
   
2. Avoid prologues. They can be annoying, especially if they come after an introduction that comes after a foreword.
   
3. Never use a verb other than said to carry dialogue. The line of dialogue belongs to the character; the verb is the writer sticking his nose in. But said is far less intrusive than grumbled, gasped, cautioned, lied.
   
4. Never use an adverb to modify the verb said. Example, "He admonished gravely." To use an adverb this way (or almost any way) is a mortal sin. The writer is now exposing himself in earnest, using a word that distracts and can interrupt the rhythm of the exchange.
   
5. Keep your exclamation marks under control. You are not allowed more that two or three per 100,000 words of prose.
   
6. Never use the words suddenly or all hell broke loose. Writers who use suddenly tend to exercise less control in the application of exclamation marks.
   
7. Use regional dialects, patois, sparingly. Once you start spelling words in dialogue phonetically and loading the page with apostrophes, you won't be able to stop.
   
8. Avoid detailed descriptions of characters. A simple reference can tell the reader everything there is to know about the character.
   
9. Don't go into great detail describing places and things. Too much description can bring the action and the flow of the story to a standstill.
   
10. Try to leave out the part that readers tend to skip. Readers will skip thick paragraphs of prose, all the writer is doing is taking another shot at the weather, or going into the characters head. The reader either knows what the guy's thinking, or doesn't care.
    

The most important rule is one that sums up all ten. If it sounds like writing, rewrite it. Or, if proper usage gets in the way, it may have to go. You cannot allow what you learned in English composition to disrupt the sound and rhythm of the narrative.

I prefer to remain invisible, not to distract the reader from the story with obvious writing. Words can get in the way of what you want to say.

Write scenes from the point of view of character that has the best view to bring the scene to life, that way you are able to concentrate on the voices of the characters telling you who they are and how they feel about what they see and what's going on. You, should be nowhere in sight.

And finally, for now anyway, some advice from me. Never use a word that is not needed; or a sentence; or a paragraph or a chapter. Take it all in and turn out the best work you are capable of. Rewrite it, and then cut, cut and cut again.