Writing Pocket Novels - Guest Post Margaret Mounsdon

Have you ever fancied writing a pocket novel? Well, if you have, this week's lovely guest, Margaret Mounsdon will help you on your way. Over to you, Margaret.

My Weekly and People’s Friend Pocket Novels are a wonderful way to get published. You do not need an agent and the staff at D C Thomson are incredibly helpful and will suggest changes if they like your story so I would tell anyone to give them a go.

They require a synopsis and the first three chapters to get a feel of the story then if they like it, they will ask to see the rest. All details of where to send them are on the website. They are published fortnightly.

I have been writing pocket novels since I gave up my ‘proper’ job and I have to say I now have what I consider to be one of the best jobs in the world. It takes me about three months to complete a pocket novel but I often put them to one side then tweak them a week or so later. When you look at them with a fresh eye it’s amazing what you can do to improve your work.

My pocket novels are contemporary and modern. I like strong females with professional careers. I also love eccentric characters. I usually include a wide range of ages and different social backgrounds as I feel they reflect modern life.

You cannot waste words in a pocket novel. You must keep the action moving. You need a strong story with a theme e.g. ambition; dedication; family loyalty and a problem that has to be resolved in 42,000 words approx for People’s Friend and 50,000 My Weekly. The requirements do change from time to time so it is important to check before you send your manuscript off.

I have had divorced heroes, a heroine’s father who was a gambler, another father who was involved in a financial scandal. I had a heroine’s mother who had a nervous breakdown and another was wheelchair bound. I have confronted modern issues of bullying, shoplifting and some of my eccentric characters have led ‘artistic’ lives.

I get ideas for my novels from life. It helps if you’re a bit nosy like me as I do eavesdrop on conversations on buses and trains and the shops - anywhere there are people. I look at the Sunday supplements and cut out pictures that appeal me to me. I write character sketches and give them a star sign and generally build them a life. I am not very good at writing a synopsis because I don’t seem to stick to it. The story evolves once my fingers start hitting the keyboard. I have a general idea where I’m going but how I get there is generally a bit of a mystery. I know that’s not very helpful advice but it’s the way I do it. I’m not suggesting you adopt my methods because everyone makes their own rules.

My advice is to study the current market by reading as many pocket novels as you can then have a go at one yourself. The stories must reflect the ethos of the magazines something you will get a feel of if you do your market research.

On a personal level I had a varied professional career before I took up writing. I worked for a barrister in London, then as a bi-lingual secretary in Switzerland, France and Belgium. I then worked as a customer relations officer at Gatwick Airport, a marvelous breeding ground for human stories. Then I wound up in a nursing home for the elderly (on the front desk I hasten to add). Everyone bends the receptionist’s ear from staff, to visitors, residents and their relations. We even had a ghost. The house was built in the 1890’s and was also full of mystery so by the time I gave up the day job, my mind was teeming with ideas.

Everybody has led an interesting and varied life so if you get stuck for ideas I suggest you think about your own life. It may seem dull to you but things happen to all of us and if you draw on your own personal reserves it’s surprising what you can come up with. When you go on holiday take pictures, listen to the chatter over the dinner table, take in what the guides are saying. It is all excellent resource material – and free.

Once D C Thomson have published your pocket novels you are free to sell other rights – large print, ebook etc, but I would suggest you check the situation with them first. I always do in case anything has changed.

The large print books go into the library and once they get an ISBN number you can apply for Public Lending Rights, so over the years they can be a source of regular income.

Writing pocket novels has given me confidence as a writer, when people ask me how many books I have had published, it always gives me a thrill when I say thirty.

Good luck.

Details of my books are on my blog margaretsromanceworld.blogspot.com and I can be found on twitter @SwwjMargaret

Hungry For Love is available on amazon http://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XWMNFCJ 

  

Festival Fever is out in large print on 1 April.

Happy 1st Birthday Dear Writing Blog

 

 

"Happy Birthday," said my husband.

 

"But it's not my birthday!" I said, surprised. It's usually me with the bad memory.

 

"No, but it's your blog's... It's one year old today."

 

 

It's official - Wendy's Writing Now is a year old!

 

I checked and realised that a year ago this week, I wrote my first blog post. I had just had my first magazine sale and was over the moon. I felt I needed to tell someone... someone who would understand why I was running round the kitchen island yelling with excitement. What I needed was the company of other writers.

 

A blog was the answer -  but how to do this when you are technologically inept? My usual course of action would have been to ask my husband to set up my blog for me but I was determined that it was to be my project. I decided to create the blog and have a few posts under my belt before showing him (when he eventually saw it, he thought it was great - bless him).

 

I was surprised at how easy it was to set up but what was harder was to think of what to write.

 

You might be interested to read my very first blog post here

 

Of course, at first, it was like writing in a wilderness. I had no followers, knew no one in the writing world and for the first few posts, was lucky if I had one or two page views (a year on and I have nearly 20,000).

 

I am forever grateful to writer Marianne Wheelaghan for commenting on my first blog post and to fellow womag writer Linda Lewis who became my first follower. It made me realise that there were people out there who might be interested in what I had to say.

 

The best thing about writing my blog is that it has been a way of making on-line writing friends. I was going to list them but that would take way too long and anyway, you know who you are. I just want to thank you all for supporting me though my first year of blogging and writing - I have been made to feel very welcome here in blog land. I will, though, give a special mention to talented writer Tracy Fells who I might never have met without this blog (we live in villages next to each other) - just think I might never have got to see the very large rucksack otherwise!

 

Over the year, I have written about my writing successes and failures, my bad dog Bonnie and her step-brother Bobbie, my love of dancing and singing and other random stuff. It is not the most literary of writing blogs but I hope that there has been enough to keep my readers interested or entertained.

 

Someone asked me recently what my favourite blog posts have been so I shall list my personal favourites (excluding guest posts).

 

1. Don't Feel Rejected It's important to remember that we all have rejections... often!

 

2. Not Made in Chelsea Another chance to look at my mum's beautiful garden.

 

3. Big Bad Bonnie Trap Such a bad dog!

 

4. Wendy's Story Timeline I use this all the time.

 

5. Wendy's Writing at the Woman's Weekly Writing Workshop includes the infamous assassination attempt!  Part 2 is here.

 

6. First Story Published in Fiction Feast  Lest I forget that exciting moment.

 

7. Mind Mapping Your Stories Link to a fantastic writing app.

 

8. People's Friend a Friend Indeed  Why I love writing for this magazine.

 

Recently, I have written a series of posts showing the inspiration behind some of my published stories - these can be found here.

 

I have had wonderful guests on my blog: Della Galton, Douglas McPherson, Becca Puglisi (from the Bookshelf Muse) and My Mum!

 

I have also been lucky to have been a guest on the blogs of Marianne Wheelaghan and Womagwriter.

 

Since writing that first blog post one year (and a hundred posts) ago, I find it hard to believe that first sale, a year ago, has grown to over thirty with stories published in The People's Friend, Fiction Feast and Woman's Weekly. You can read my story 'Paint it With Passion, Claire', in this month's Fiction Feast.

 

I know how lucky I have been and, yes of course, there have been a lot of rejections along the way but through thick and thin my blog and I are still here.

 

So, Happy Birthday Blog and thank you to everyone who reads it. I hope there will be many happy returns.



Guest Post - Douglas McPherson

Today, I'd like to welcome special guest Douglas McPherson who has kindly agreed to answer some questions about his writing life.

I'm sure many of you will know Douglas from his brilliant articles in Writing Forum on a range of topics from writing a serial to how to get a feature published in a magazine. I know I've certainly found them useful and I'm sure there are many other writers out there who have too.

You may also have seen his stories and serials in My Weekly under his pen name Julia Douglas.

 

Hi Douglas and welcome to my blog. Could you tell my readers a little about how you started out writing fiction?
 

I've been a freelance journalist for many years and one of the magazines I wrote for was My Weekly. They used to send complimentary copies whenever they published one of my features and I'd always go through and read the stories, not least because I really liked the paintings that illustrated them. I decided to have a go at writing one and I was quite surprised when I got a copy of the guidelines and learned they were looking for crime stories and, at that time, sci-fi. I thought they might not get many sci-fi submissions, so I wrote one with a 1950s small town America setting called Somewhere Out There. That was my first published fiction.

 

That first sale must have been really exciting. Do you have a favourite place to write? Mine is the kitchen... living room... conservatory... garden... (I am a bit of a nomad).

I have an office in my house and do pretty much all my writing on a laptop at my desk. I don't really write anywhere else - except in my head, of course. Whether I'm in the car or at the supermarket, part of my mind is always turning over a tricky paragraph or thinking up ideas. That's probably why I always forget to buy one of the things I went out for.

Of course a lot of your readers will know you by another name, Julia Douglas. How did this name come about and why did you feel you needed a woman's pen name to write your stories under?

I used Julia Douglas for my first pocket novel, Nashville Cinderella, just as a brand thing, because I think a feminine name looks better on a romance. Also, in a magazine story, if it's a first person story, a reader might see a bloke's name at the top and start reading in the belief that the character is male before they read down a few paragraphs and realise she's a woman. If they see a female author name they're more likely to start reading in a female voice, so I don't have to worry so much about establishing the character's gender in the first paragraph.

That's interesting as I've just sold a first person story and the main character is a man... maybe I should have a pen name for these occasions... Clarke Wendson maybe? You seem to have a finger in a lot of pies... magazine stories, serials, articles and eBooks. Which would you say you enjoy writing the most?

Really, I enjoy all writing equally and I don't think the differences are as great as people sometimes think. The journalism I've always done isn't hard news or about running around chasing scoops, it's always been reviews, interviews and narrative non-fiction and those things use very similar techniques to fiction. It's all about telling a story, being descriptive and trying to entertain people. I also think journalism really helps with fiction, because you're constantly being exposed to new things, new people and the different ways they talk and so on.
 

Would you say your stories are mostly plot or character led?

The setting usually comes first with me. That's probably the journalist in me. I usually start from the point of view of 'Cor! that's an interesting world - let's write a story that shows people what it's like to work in a fairground or Buckingham palace or whatever.' Characters come next. Plots, and particularly a good ending, are the toughest part for me. It's like figuring out a puzzle, but it's immensely satisfying when you 'crack the case' as it were and it all falls into place. The answer usually comes from thinking about the characters: what would this person really do. So I suppose that's a long-winded way of saying character led!

Ok, I have to ask... you seem to have a thing for the circus - many of your stories and your eBook 'The Showman's Girl' have a circus theme. You even have a blog 'Circus Mania'... so Douglas - what is it with you and circuses?

Like a lot of people, I hadn't been to the circus since I was a kid. I couldn't even remember much about it. But, exactly ten years ago, The Stage asked me to review the 100th anniversary show at the Great Yarmouth Hippodrome, which is Britain's oldest circus building and doesn't seem to have changed much in the past century. It's incredibly atmospheric, but with a really modern show. I was totally blown away by the daredevilry of the performers and decided to interview one of them, Eva Garcia. She told me how she'd just broken up with a man who asked her to choose between him and the circus. She chose the life that had been in her family for generations. Then, a week later, the day after my article came out, she fell and died during her act. The tragedy made me want to find out all about people like Eva and why they take the risks they do and that eventually led to my non-fiction book Circus Mania and its tie-in blog. Years of writing about the circus also led me to write The Showman's Girl, which is fiction, but also another way of taking people into the world of the circus. 

A little bird told me that you - I mean Julia - have been honoured with a very special award... from none other than Princes Stephanie of Monaco. Blimey! How about you tell us a little bit about it - go on I know you're dying to!

Princess Stephanie is a huge circus fan and the patron of World Circus Day, which takes place in April each year. This year the day was celebrated by events in 47 countries from Afghanistan to Vietnam. I was proud to do my bit for the UK and marked the occasion by giving away a free download of The Showman's Girl on iTunes. So it was nice to get a signed certificate from Princess Stephanie for doing my bit to promote circus culture. One of the official aims of World Circus Day, by the way, is to "promote the art of happiness," which I think is a nice aspiration. If you missed the free download, you can still buy it from iTunes for only 49p!

 
 
 

To finish, Douglas, what exciting things do you have in the pipeline for the rest of the year?

I'm very excited about the latest Julia Douglas ebook, Polka Dot Dreams, which will go live any day now. The large print Linford paperback edition is already in libraries if anyone wants to borrow a copy. Polka Dot Dreams is my favourite of  the romances, I've written, not least because it's the first out-and-out comedy. It's set in the vintage clothes and rockabilly scene and is about a girl obsessed with 50s fashions, and her romance with the fabulously handsome but accident-prone owner of a rock'n'roll-themed ice-cream parlour. I had tremendous fun writing the heroine, Natty Smalls, and hope readers get a lift from her zest for life.


Thank you so much for visiting, Douglas. If you want to know more about all things circus, visit Douglas's blog Circus Mania or if you want to delve a little into his alter ego Julia Douglas, you can visit her blog Polka Dot Dreams, where you will find links to her other books.

Creating Small Things - Pocket Novels

What is a pocket novel?

This is a post in answer to Marianne's question about pocket novels. Marianne, by the way, is the author of two books The Blue Suitcase an historical novel set in Germany during World War 2 and Food of Ghosts, a crime novel with a feisty heroine set on the island of South Tarawa. She is also the owner of the excellent Writing Classes online writing course which set me on the road to writing!

In essence, a pocket novel is a novel that can be read in a day and is around 50,000 words. It is usually romantic and can include a range of genres. To quote form The Pocketeers they are 'a quick and satisfying read'.

As I do not write Pocket Novels myself, I am not an expert but there are other bloggers who are!

Sally Quilford offers excellent information regarding pocket novels on her blog. She is also a 'Pocketeer'.

The Pocketeers are a group of writers who specialise in the writing of pocket novels. Their website is a must for anyone thinking of moving on from short stories to something longer.

The two main outlets for pocket novels are My Weekly Pocket Novels and The People's Friend Pocket Novels.

• My weekly Pocket Novel guidelines are here (Thank you Sally)
• The People's Friend Pocket Novels guidelines are here (Thank you Pocketeers)

Also, take a look at Kate Jackson's excellent post on her blog where Maggie Seed the editor of My Weekly Pocket Novels gives a 5 step plan to writing a successful pocket novel.

This is just the bare bones and if anyone has anything to add, please do. Hope this was helpful Marianne.

One day I may be brave enough to try to write one!

The Pocketeers