Fran Macilvey

October 13, 2017

Frankfurt Bookfair 2017

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Frankfurt Bookfair 2017

I’m just back from Frankfurt Book Fair 2017, a phenomenal achievement of organisation and planning, in vast spaces, in huge halls with enormous corridors on several levels….

So why did I go? I’ve not been especially well and have had a very sore foot, so going to a place where I knew I will have to walk for miles – kilometres, these days, I suppose – would seem to be the maddest, almost a masochistic ambition. Though I honestly can’t give you many practical reasons why I would choose to, I knew I had to go. And as it turned out, I went simply to be there, to listen, and absorb a frantic, noisy and almost overwhelming experience.

I stayed for two nights in a modest hotel in the suburbs, and, deciding what to wear each day, went with my papers and hopes. Nothing came of them at this particular event, but I have listened and learned, and I can now navigate my way independently around Frankfurt, with the help of taxi drivers. It has been very interesting to watch true professionals networking; to observe a stick-thin agent enjoying a glass of wine for lunch…and to notice how hard it is to climb onto any kind of ladder by the usual routes.

I met two author friends at my hotel, a chance encounter which proved rewarding and wonderful. Xaviera Hollander wrote a book which I read as a youngster and which I remember fondly, even after decades; she and Brenda Love made me feel enormously welcome. Thank you so much for your company!

Noticing how much the book promotion industry works for itself – ‘no entry except strictly by appointment‘ – (of course it does, how naive of me to suppose otherwise) – it would be so easy to simply give up and go home and give up trying. Okay, so I know when continuing with something becomes the equivalent of flogging a dead donkey. But even though I’m tired, I’m only momentarily deflated by the realisation that, on this occasion, perhaps, my dreams are not what I thought they would be.

I’m not giving up.

All set for the London Book Fair 2018! Watch this space.

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October 9, 2017

Are we ready to write?

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Are we ready to write

Let us assume that we have examined all our most pressing excuses for not writing and are finally prepared to face them down, ignore them, and get on.

We are prepared to hear, ‘Oh, I don’t see why you are wasting your time. Millions of books are published every year. What makes you think yours will have any chance?’ and blithely we can dismiss this and other discouragement because we are happy to undertake the pilgrimage. We have decided it is what we want to do, so that is that. Well done.

There is one more species of question to ask which only we can answer. Are we ready to write the story of our life? Is it interesting enough, thus far, to keep us busy and thinking and occupied for the next five years? Will it engage an average reader? Simply put, have we lived enough, done enough, do we have enough years under our belts or not?

This is not a trivial question. John Mortimer, whom I truly admire, lived a very long life, and wrote three main volumes of autobiography, because, I assume, stuff kept happening to him. Only problem now is, that if we hope to read all about him, it is best to read these volumes in sequence, though I suppose it is fine to read about his admission to the bar in one volume, and the problems encountered in being very old, in the next volume we retrieve, being read, haphazardly out of sequence.

And no-one wants to embark on a life-changing project feeling unsure about whether our work will be worth reading. If that kind of uncertainty is nipping our heels, the best thing to do is put aside the ambition – for now – and go and do some more interesting things. After a while, we can revisit our ambition and see how we feel about it. I have done that. The idea of writing has been with me for about thirty years. And I was lucky to spot a natural pause in my life that I could put to good use in starting to take writing seriously.

If the answer to questions such as these is, “Yes, I’ve certainly had an interesting life, and I laugh in the face of your skepticism!” then we are ready to write.

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October 2, 2017

How to write our memoirs

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How to write our memoirs

I may want to write my memoirs, but for some reason – maybe our curtains need washed, or maybe I need to have coffee with my friends – I constantly put it off. Which is interesting in itself, and worthy of a whole book alone. Why do we forever put off doing those things we really want to?

I’m forever making excuses not to write: I’m far too busy, I have to collect the kids in ten minutes, what do I know..? though I have found that as I get older, those excuses and many others like them – how dare they! – have abandoned me.

The kids grow up and make their own way, the busy jobs lose their appeal or are done by others – the jobs look after themselves, perhaps – so assuming I have finally run out of excuses, I am left with only question to stop me getting started, What do I know, anyway?

Simple! You know the most anyone will ever know, about your own life. That qualifies you, above all others, to write about it. The next question or stumbling block is, I don’t like to presume….but, if you will pardon me for saying so, that is rather putting the cart before the horse.

When we start writing memoir, we do this primarily for ourselves. Note, we are not writing for anyone else. We are writing for ourselves alone. So, of course, we can presume to do that, since we are not imposing our views or our undertaking on anyone else – unless we are also assuming that the time we take away from our normal day to write, is presumptuous in itself, and we are keeping our fingers and toes crossed that no-one will object. But that is like saying that we should not paint, or dance or sing, in case the neighbours, our friends our family take umbrage. (We often do think this kind of thing, believing that what our neighbours, friends, etc think about what we are doing, is more important than our doing it; which is rather nonsense, and a little sad.)

However, if we can’t get beyond these kinds of objections – if they keep their grip on us and stop us getting started – perhaps the best conclusion to draw is that we are ten or twenty years too early to get started: As we get older, believe me, other people’s opinions matter, of course, but we get impatient. Eyes on the clock, one day it dawns on us that if we don’t do this now – immediately make a start right now – we may never do it.

So, in considering how to write memoir, it might be an idea to take a quick gander through all the automatic excuses we come up with, and test their strength against that of our resolve. Because we are going to need all the resolve we can muster, to undertake the writing of memoir.

To be continued. Thanks for reading.

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September 29, 2017

Loneliness or being alone

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Loneliness or being alone.

I guess it is easy, being alone at home, to feel lonely.

Even so, most us us know, there is no guarantee that, even with a houseful of people, we won’t feel lonely; which is not a good feeling.

Miranda, The Tempest, by John W Waterhouse

 

I love sitting peacefully listening to silence. And when I sit quietly, that is when answers come and I feel less alone. It is part of a greater realisation that I am actually never alone. If I can only remember, on the days I feel hassled, to listen out for that awareness. Hard to put into writing, but true, even so.

How many of us say we are lonely? Yet, do we make enough good quality time to rest peacefully? Even when doing something relatively calming, like reading a book or listening to music, we fret about all the things we should be doing.

The long school holidays were an interesting time for me. Seldom alone, I decided to abandon all ideas of working, and in doing so, the stress melted away – so I really enjoyed the time off, though as time passed, I felt myself yearning for opportunities just to be alone. Even an hour was rare. There have been plenty of challenges, but staying with them made them easier to resolve easily.

I need a connection with silence, which, however it works, seems to offer lots of answers far more easily than if I decide I have to push and shove. How lovely when we can find answers by doing ‘nothing’ and discern a way forward; when we discover that all the things we create while resting are valuable and on point.

Why should work be a stress, or rest, a snatched, hurried interlude? That doesn’t seem to be a good way to live.

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September 26, 2017

Writing Update – works in progress

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Writing Update – Works in Progress

Okay, so perhaps three weeks ago, I completed what I thought was the ‘second full edit’ of my first novel, Lisa Somerville, and set it aside with a great sigh.

Then something rather strange happened. Quite apart from editing, I really itched to write again. And I discovered that I write best in silence. I have been listening and writing in the silence and what I have discovered quite surprises me. Perhaps you can recognise some of this.

I love, love, love!! to write. I really do enjoy giving voice to my characters, and in silence I can do this enthusiastically and with real joy.

Each character in every story has her or his own life and motivations. They each need to fully inhabit their own space. That’s to say, Susan, Sheila and Richard deserve to fully inhabit one novel; and Lisa, Simon and Chrissie to inhabit another. I humbly apologise for my failure to appreciate this sooner and beg their collective humble pardons for this oversight.

I now have to rewrite Lisa Somerville again, because when I read it afresh, I am itching to make changes and bring it to life in new ways. But before I can do that, I need a clean, clear outline for the second book of the series, Susan Scott. Because what happens in book 2 affects what happens in book 1, I must avoid repeating scenes where the lives of the characters intersect.

By writing the second book before I complete the first, I am hoping to clinch that illusive requirement, internal consistency. (I used to complain about writing backwards, but honestly, I’d rather know this has to be done, than wait around wondering why my writing is stalled.)

Though I enjoy writing, and write better with a sense of urgency, there is no especial hurry. I can enjoy writing in my own time. But while I have the enthusiasm, I must write. No dawdling please. Keep going slow and steady.

It’s all about timing. Instead of worrying that I have to do a thing by next week, I’m beginning to notice that all things happen in perfect timing, and that there is no reason in the world of what we do, to make our doing of anything any more painful, stressful or worrisome than it already is. If we are not enjoying what we are doing, why are we doing it? What might seem like a hard knock, or a tall order, simply becomes fun again.

Happy writing!

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September 25, 2017

I work best in silence

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I work best in silence

A strange discovery, hardly worthy of a blog post, you might think.

But despite the joys of free music on the internet, and despite our obsession with free, instant, brilliant music available 24/7; despite knowing that some of my best musical discoveries – Take That, Bruckner’s seventh symphony, Frank Field – have been made while I was writing, I have also re-discovered that I work best in silence.

Yes, you might think, that was fairly obvious for the close-focus line-by-line editing. But it stands true also for the creative leaps that come out of no-where, the shape shifting uplifting ideas that simply pop up one day and refuse to lie down.

So I then have to re-write the whole book, again? Introducing a whole new theme bang in the middle, with a looming deadline? No problem. I best get on and do that, then. At least I know how to start again, whereas two weeks ago – hey, even last week – I would probably have panicked. I could panic, but what would that achieve? We have to accept the ideas when they arrive, and welcome them.

I listen for ideas, and I suspect that music and noise simply drown them out or drive them away. It might make my office space a bit too quiet, sometimes, but still, is such an enormous relief to get back to some kind of system that will allow me to work consistently, and produce work that begins to approximate to what I think is good. We are such harsh critics of our own writing, but I do know when my work is not at my best, and when my enthusiasm has fled. Lately – until I rediscovered the creative power of silence – my work felt lacklustre and my enthusiasm like a wilted summer lettuce.

Now I begin, at last, to discern a solution to that, in going back to good old fashioned silence.

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September 22, 2017

Doing something badly or not at all

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Doing something badly or not at all

Doing a thing badly or not at all, is a question that has rather haunted me.

When I was younger, I was a disciple of perfection, so tended not to do anything, unless I could do it perfectly. That, of course, is rather meaningless, and entails doing nothing for long periods of time – what a waste.

But rather like the drinker who crawls inside a bottle for twenty years to escape the pain and finds, on her re-emergence that all her lessons are still waiting to be tackled, doing nothing for fear of doing or saying the wrong thing, is only a stop-gap. Sooner or later, these same lessons will come knocking at the door, demanding admittance. And it’s not use, either, deciding flatly never to engage, because there is a strong likelihood that the same lessons will come back again in future lives. (This is a subject I write about in my next book, Making Miracles, set to be released next May – which is just my way of saying, as soon as I can find the time to do it.)

I now would much rather attempt a thing, than decide not to bother, so long as I consider it worth the attempt. I think, also, that as we get older, our fear of making a fool of ourselves diminishes. We get to thinking that it might be rather fun to take a chance on something, for a change, it might be rather fun to make a fool of ourselves. If we don’t do it soon, when will we? And who cares? Our time becomes very precious when we can feel its tangible quality.

Also, I admit, this particular lesson – that it is better to try and fail than not to try at all – has real resonance for me because, as a disabled youngster, I felt such intense pressure to pass myself as ‘normal’ – whatever that means! I would sooner have volunteered to fly to the moon, than single myself out for the intense ignominy of failure, no matter how unlikely that outcome, and no matter that most others would not be thinking about failure, while watching my attempt.

Strange, the things we torture ourselves with when we are young. Youth may have a blank canvas to work with but self-definition is often painful in the acquisition.

Thanks for reading!

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September 20, 2017

To do a thing badly or not at all

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Is it better to do a thing badly or not at all?

To answer the question, Is it better to do a thing badly or not at all? I take refuge with something I say a lot these days.

It depends.

We need both motivation and caution, bravery and guile. A tag team of two players works well if one has the courage, another focuses on detail.

As I get older and bolder, personally I tend to the view that it is better to do a thing than sit and think about it, or wish I had done it. I hate regrets. I hate saying, ‘If only I’d had the courage to get on with that ….’ and knowing I could have done something to help life turn out differently.

I would rather have a go at something, perhaps starting small until I gain the confidence to attempt something bigger. There is only one way we learn, after all, and that is by making mistakes; by realising that mistakes are only stepping stones, questions to answers we haven’t found yet.

Who would object to us getting a thing wrong? Authors and writers are not in the habit of creative catastrophe, are we? We’re unlikely to burst the dam, to send someone to their death or to motivate someone to evil… That being so, we really have to decide to go ahead one day, to live without having all our ducks in a row, before we know the answers, before we can be sure.

Unlike in real time, where we build a path, then walk along it, in creative attempts, our path – our luck, our outcomes  – are the result of a decision, a choice we make, to do something; at which point, the path comes to meet us as we walk along it. There are no guarantees with that process, except that there is a lot we can learn.

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September 18, 2017

Advantages to working from home

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Advantages to working from home

Harold Harvey, ‘The Letter’ 1937

Yes, there are advantages to working from home. I can work at six in the morning and eleven at night – though not in the same 24 hours. I can hang up wet washing and bring it in if it rains, as it has been doing all summer. TIP: during a long, wet Summer, we need only one clear hour to flap off the worst of the moisture from our clothes.

Working from home, we can also be available for Monday bank holidays when the schools are shut, without having to take a cut in pay, or ask the boss for yet another flexi day. We can make appointments with opticians, dentists and the like, and take delivery of parcels, packets, kitchen cabinets, beds and chairs from Ikea at strange hours. Instead of regretting the 7am – 7pm delivery window, now I just see that as an excuse to write non-stop all day at home. YAY!

We can start and stop when we like, and can do all sorts of things in between, to liven up the day. We can eat when we are hungry, rest when we are tired and take exercise… If I’m sounding a bit biblical, it’s because that’s how it sometimes feels. We can take holidays when we want, and decide to do nothing. Actually, doing nothing is one of the best ways to discover what to do next, and to clarify that we are still on track with our plans.

Would I go back to an office job? I could, probably, if I didn’t have so much to do here. But I’ve always relished my independence, so I prefer working this way.

Thanks for reading!

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September 15, 2017

Disadvantages to working from home

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Disadvantages to working from home

Okay, so we are here working at the computer, and the phone rings. Again. It is someone speaking indistinctly on the line from Delhi or Manila and asking for someone whose name we don’t recognise. Oh, that’s us, is it? Well, no, sorry, not this time.

There’s a knock at the door – would I mind taking this parcel for the bloke upstairs, whom I know is running a small garage on our communal parking lot? Actually, yes, I would mind. He leaves oily footprints on the carpet and there is the remains of an engine abandoned at the back of the downstairs cupboard. So, just occasionally, I send the delivery man on his way. He scowls, I scowl, and we are quits.

“That’s the phone for you, Mum…” Yes, and it’s the twelfth time in as many hours that I have been interrupted – Mum tends to be the first port of call for phones, for doorbells, for deliveries, even if she has something teasing in her head that she would love to write down before she forgets.

“Have you seen my socks? My phone? My charger?” Take the easy way out and ask Mum, she knows! Heavens, yes, I may well do, but does that mean I have to be interrupted? Again?

***

This is a tongue-in-cheek glance at the some of the challenges of working from home. But there is a serious point in it, too. Because, at the end of the day, when the chips hit the fan – that’s not quite the expression, but it will do for now  – only I can decide to put my foot down and say, “You do it / you get it / you phone, you sort it, tidy it, find it.”

And, amazingly, I do that quite often nowadays, when I need to. It’s a very liberating habit to cultivate. And hubby is pleased that I no longer take resort in my martyred dog expression.

What a relief.

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