#PitchCB - Go On Have a Go!

Two weeks ago, on Friday 24^th July, I was sitting at my computer writing a magazine story when I decided I could do with a break. A cup of coffee and a few minutes on social media would be just what I needed to recharge my writing batteries, so I clicked onto Twitter to have a look at what was going on in the writing world outside my living room.

It wasn’t long before something caught my eye. Someone had shared a tweet from literary agents, Conville and Walsh, advertising a new initiative called #PitchCB. I had read about it before but hadn’t looked into it further for reasons I will go into later.

I expect you’re wondering what #PitchCB is.

It’s quite simple really. It’s an event for unpublished novelists, hosted by agents Rebecca Ritchie and Richard Pike, which is held on the fourth Friday of every month. You have 24 hours to pitch your novel idea in 140 characters or less, using the hashtag #PitchCB and during that time, agents from both literary agencies will be online to read each pitch. If they like yours, they will ‘favourite’ it, allowing you to submit the first three chapters of your novel in the usual way to that particular agent.

Sounds great – so why had I left it so late to consider submitting my pitch? Basically, it was because my novel wasn’t finished and I hadn’t planned to submit to agents until it was. So what changed my mind that Friday morning? It was the fact that I’d been thinking about a one-to-one meeting I'd had recently with a publisher while I was at the RNA conference. She'd told me she loved my novel idea and first chapter, and thought it very marketable - the only problem was they only accepted agented submissions. I needed an agent, and I knew I would be silly to miss this opportunity, so I sat down and wrote my 140 character pitch and tweeted it.

Once I'd done that, I tried to distract myself. Oh, how hard that was! Luckily, I only had a short while to wait, for within ten minutes I had received two ‘favourites’ – one from each agency. I can’t tell you how excited I was but, once I’d calmed down, I realised that the pitch was only the start of the journey… I would need to perfect my first three chapters, re-write my synopsis (based on advice given at the RNA conference) and write a covering letter that would hopefully make me look like a professional, enthusiastic, creative, and fairly normal person.

The next day, I emailed everything to the two agents and then set to work getting my novel finished. If the agents liked my first three chapters, and wanted to see more, I didn’t want to have to make them wait for months.

So here I am, two weeks latet, feeling very proud of myself for taking that big step. Not because I have heard anything yet but because the whole experience has focused me and given me confidence. It’s proved that I can write a catchy tag line and that my novel idea is interesting enough for agents to want to see the first three chapters at least (apparently the agents chose 100 out of 2,000 pitches). It’s also got me well on the way to getting the novel finished (I have only about another 15,000 words to write) and it's now with my RNA New Writing Scheme reader awaiting its critique.

So, if anyone out there is looking for an agent from a quality literary agency, I would highly recommend you have a go. The next #PitchCB is on August 28^th.

Go on… be brave!

You can find out more about #PitchCB  here

*UPDATE*

Since writing this post, I have heard from one of the agents from Curtis Brown. Unfortunately, the book wasn't their taste so it was a no but they said my writing was engaging, the idea appealing and that I write with real energy and enthusiasm. They also said it was a difficult decision to make as they were impressed with my submission. 

I can only be happy with that!

Bikers, Truckers and The People's Friend

I am delighted to have not one but two stories in The People's Friend Holiday Special and thought I would give you the inspiration behind one of the stories, One Big Family. 

Bikers and The People's Friend magazine - not something you would expect to hear in the same sentence, I know!

In my story, we are taken out of the cosy café people might expect to see in the magazine, and into a transport café. A different setting maybe, but one where the story remains true to the magazine's values of hope, friendship and loyalty.

One Big Family is a story about Janice, who has never married and has no children - she hasn't time for a family as Woody's transport café, which she bought five years ago, takes up all her time. When the café is threatened with closure after a bypass is built, she realises that her loyal customers have become, essentially, her family.

The inspiration behind my fictitious Woody's Café is in fact a real transport café on the A281 near Cowfold, called The Chalet Café. It is set back from the road and often has bikers sitting on the wooden benches outside. The funny thing is, I've never actually been inside the café but have passed by hundreds of times on my way to visit my mum, in too much of a hurry to stop. It appears from the outside to be a traditional place: simple, functional and from what I've read on their website, serving the hugest breakfasts imaginable.

Every time I've passed The Chalet, I've thought that it would make a great setting for a story. One day, as I was driving by, I wondered what would become of the café if something happened to take away their passing trade? Would the customers be loyal enough to keep on coming?

It was a light bulb moment. That would be the story I would write.

Now I am imagining walking into the café with a copy of The People's Friend in my hand to show them. I wonder what the customers would think!

To Read or Not to Read

An interesting question was posed on a Facebook group recently. How many writers read the magazines they write for?

This was my response:  'Shh... no.' 

As you can imagine, it raised a few eyebrows - so I thought that I would write a blog post to clarify my response.

There seemed to be two threads to the question and I shall address each in turn.

Firstly - Should writers buy the magazines to support the publication that buys their work?

Obviously writers will have their own opinions on this but here is my stance: I do buy any magazine I have a story in but this is so that a) I can keep a copy for myself and b) I have one to show my friends without them feeling obliged to buy one themselves. Funnily enough, this has indirectly helped to support The People's Friend (for whom I write regularly) as one of them liked reading it so much that she has now started to buy the magazine herself on occasion.

At the end of the day, writing stories is my only income (apart from my story collections) and if I bought all the weeklies I write for and all the specials, it would make quite a dent in it.

I feel I support the magazines in a different way - by writing good quality stories which I hope the readers will enjoy and which will, in turn, help to sell the magazine. I also give my support by helping to advertise the magazines on Twitter and Facebook and my blog and a few months ago had an article published in Writing Magazine about writing serials for The People's Friend for Writing Magazine and have contributed to a similar one soon to be published in Writer's Forum.

Secondly - should writers buy the magazines to use as research?

Obviously I wouldn't dream of telling writers trying to break into the magazine market that they shouldn't - but on the other hand (I know my People's Friend editor Alan reads my blog so he will have to put his hands over his ears now!) I have never made a secret of the fact that I never have.

To explain this, I need to give a little background to my writing career. While I was doing an online writing course, we wrote short pieces and stories and when the course finished, my lovely tutor suggested I try sending some of my work to magazines. I chose my favourites, and wrote a few more, then after reading the guidelines for each magazine (very important) I sent them out. I'd never bought any of the magazines and I hadn't ever read any of the stories. The reason for this is I love reading novels too much - I have a whole pile by my bed waiting to be read. I was lucky to sell a story quite quickly, first to The People's Friend and then to Take a Break Fiction Feast, followed a little while later by one to Woman's Weekly. What this did was give me a benchmark to work from for the next story.

What if I had read the magazines first? Well, I think that if you study the magazines too hard there is always a danger that you look at a successful writer's work and think, "I'll write a story like that." But what if you do? It's important to remember that the magazine you are studying already has that writer writing those types of stories in that type of style, so why would they need another writer doing the same?

Recently, I attended the RNA writing conference where an editor said that the problem with suggesting your novel was like someone else's was that the agent/publishers were looking for unique voices - not a clone of someone already on their books. I believe the same can be said for magazines. My style is unlikely to be the same as that of x, y or z because I haven't read their stories. My stories are unique to me... and that's how I want it to remain.

When I was a new teacher, working in an open-plan school, there was a teacher in the class next door who I greatly admired. I loved her teaching style and tried to copy it, hoping it might help me with my classroom management. It was a disaster! It wasn't until I had found my own style of teaching that I knew I was becoming a halfway decent teacher. I think I learnt a lesson from that.

I'd love to have my novel published by one of the top publishers (wouldn't we all!) or be represented by a top agent but does that mean I will read all of the books published/represented by them in the hope of emulating them? Of course not! What I will do, when the time comes, is read the biographies of the agents I'm thinking of sending a submission to, to find out what they are looking for and I will read the submission guidelines over and over to make sure I am doing it in the right way. And my novel? Well, I will allow it to speak for itself... in the same way my stories do.

So there you have it - the reason I don't buy magazines! Please feel free to add your own thoughts.

Fancy a Dirty Weekend? - Guest Post Deirdre Palmer

Today, I am very excited to welcome fellow RNA member, talented writer and lovely friend Deirdre Palmer to my blog. Deirdre is the author of Remarkable Things and her second novel Dirty Weekend will be published on 4^th August (both with Crooked Cat Publishing). Deirdre kindly made time in her busy writing schedule to answer some questions about her writing life.

Do you remember the moment you decided you wanted to be a writer?

I don’t think I ever made that decision. It’s something that’s always been there, right from the time I learned to read and write. When I was about eight, I announced in the playground that I wanted to be an author when I grew up, which met with a lot of bemused stares. Pity it took me so long (to become an author, I mean, not to grow up, although, come to think of it…)

What were you like at school? Would your English teacher be surprised to see that you have become a published author?

I was awful at arithmetic and, later, maths, and I hated PE and games, but the rest didn’t give me much trouble. English was always my best subject, and my early ‘compositions’ were read out a lot in class, so perhaps my junior school teacher wouldn’t be surprised. There was a lot more competition at grammar school - standards were very high - so I doubt any particular talent in that direction would have stood out.

How long did it take you to write Remarkable Things?

Hard to say. I still had the day job when I started it, so I only wrote for a few hours each week. It went through the NWS twice, once as a partial, and got revised countless times along the way. So, over two years, probably.

I love the cover. How important do you think the cover is to a potential reader?

Thanks. I love it too, although the abstract design wasn’t anything like I’d originally had in mind, but I’m glad it turned out the way it did. I think the cover is fairly important, but the promise of a good story more so. With ebooks, though, the cover has to be eye-catching as you have only seconds to grab the potential reader’s attention. 

Tell us something about the main character that will make us want to find out more about them.

There are two equal main characters in Remarkable Things, Gus Albourne and Millie Hope, although Gus’s story has slightly more importance than Millie’s. Gus has a strong sense of loyalty to his family, which is severely tested when he discovers their secrets. He’s not a stereotypical romantic hero; he isn’t afraid to show emotion and doesn’t care what other people think of him. Millie is a strong, independent woman but her sense of self falters when her daughter turns against her. 

Are you a pantster or do you plot?

I’ve plotted less as I’ve gone along, probably because I’ve gained more confidence. I need a title, a theme, a couple of main characters, and a rough idea of where the story is going, but other than that I’m happy to wing it. I do make a lot of notes as I go along, though, and I keep a track of the chapters and what happens in each. Writing ‘Dirty Weekend’ was quite a revelation; I signed up to NaNoWriMo at the last minute, so had no time to plot beforehand. I just got the words down and it seemed to work. I had no idea I could write that way. It was very liberating!

What have you found to be the most difficult thing about writing a novel?

Sustaining the thing for 80,000 words or more. I’m always afraid the story will be over too quickly, but I also worry about introducing too many story threads and making the whole thing too confusing. Having said that, writing a full-length novel gives me far more satisfaction than writing shorter fiction. I like to know exactly what’s going on in my characters’ minds, analyse their emotions and their actions. That’s part of the reward for me as I find out a lot about myself in the process. You don’t get to do that with short fiction.

Do you have a special time for writing? How is your day structured?

The theory is that I write in the mornings, from about 8.30 to 12, as that is when I have the house to myself. But I’m not that disciplined so it doesn’t always happen. If I’m in the zone, I can write at any time, but I can’t be doing with too many interruptions.

Your first novel was self-published. What have been the advantages of having a traditional publisher for your second?

It’s been my lifetime’s ambition to have a book accepted by a publisher, so achieving that was amazing. Self-publishing is exciting and rewarding, but there is still some kudos attached to being traditionally published and I wanted that – well, I waited long enough, so why not? Getting a publication deal also gave me full membership of the RNA, which is nice. I like the sense of belonging that being with a publisher gives. Crooked Cat is like one big family really.

Your next novel, Dirty Weekend, is out on 4^th August.  Will it be in the same genre?

I’m never too clear about the genre of my books. Dirty Weekend will probably appeal to women more than men, so you could class it as women’s fiction, the same as Remarkable Things, but the style is completely different. It’s fast-paced with lots of humour, the main characters are only eighteen, it’s set in 1966, and it’s far less introspective than Remarkable Things, so I guess the answer to the question is no…

What next for Deirdre Palmer?

I’m halfway through the first draft of a new book called The Promise of Roses.  It is a romance, this time between people in their twenties, but there are other themes such as entrapment and bereavement. There have been a few stops and starts with this one while I wrote some short stories and did other things, but I’m determined to get on and finish this one now, and get it in a fit state for submission by the autumn.  I’d like to try my hand at a novella but I’m trying not to think about it in case I get sidetracked again.

Wendy, thanks very much for inviting me onto your blog. It’s been fun answering your questions.

You're very welcome, Deirdre. Thanks for being such a lovely guest.

Deirdre lives in Brighton, the city by the sea, on the south coast of England. Most of her working life has been spent in public sector administration, most recently at the University of Brighton.

Mostly she likes to write novels, but enjoys the occasional foray into short story writing, and blogs regularly with a group called ‘The Write Romantics’. She has twice been a major prizewinner in the Mail on Sunday Novel Competition, and has also won prizes for flash fiction.

She is a member of the Romantic Novelists’ Association.

Deirdre's collection of short stories set in the 1960's is currently FREE! If you are interested in purchasing this or any other of Deirdre's books the Amazon link is here.

 

Dirty Weekend is available to pre-order here

You can find out more about Deirdre through her website

Follow her on Facebook, Twitter, blog and Pinterest 

A Dance, a Date, a Garden Centre and a Cracking Deal!

A bonus post this week where I share the inspiration behind my stories in this week's People's Friend Weekly and the Special.

 First there is Dance Fever. It's a story very personal to me. As most of you will know, I love dancing - all types, but my first love was modern jive. I have written many stories about dancing and also many posts... you can read them....here

A few years ago, I went to a dance class and was saddened at the way some of the men showed off, throwing their women around and making out they knew it all. Although I was a competent dancer, I still wanted a courteous dance partner, someone who would make me feel special on the dance floor. I found him in Fred... who was wheelchair bound. This story is for him.

The man in the next illustration, in my story Sowing the Seeds  (in the People's Friend special) was someone who I saw in a garden centre while I was having coffee. He looked sad until the woman who was serving behind the counter went over and talked to him, and I wondered what his story was. I like to think that this was it.

My other story in The Friend Special, called First Night Nerves, was inspired by a friend of mine who had split up from her husband. After they had been separated a while, they started seeing each other again as if for the first time. This is the story of their first date nerves.

If anyone reading this would like to read more of my People's Friend stories, I have reduced the price of my romance collection, Room in Your Heart to 99p for one week only.

You can buy it here at Amazon 

Ten Things I've Learnt from my First RNA Writers' Conference

From my previous post, you will know that at the weekend, I went to my first RNA Writers' Conference held at St Mary's College, Mile End. I've thought long and hard about how to present my findings and have decided to make a nice list (I like lists).

So here they are - the ten things I have learnt from my first RNA conference.

1. I am as bad at facial recognition as I thought I was. I sat next to a lovely lady called Tracy at the gala dinner and chatted about all sorts of things, including pocket novels. It wasn't until the following day when I attended a talk by Sally Quilford (someone I really wanted to meet) on characterisation, that I realised it was the same person. I hadn't recognised her from her photo and she writes under a pen name.
2. Luckily nobody else seems to have facial recognition problems - otherwise I might have been Billy No Mates..
3. If anyone seems lovely, friendly or funny online...they generally are. I met some great people including fellow People's Friend writer, Kate Jackson who's in the photo with me.
4.  If my stomach rumbles during a pre-lunch lecture, when the room is hushed for question time, there will be someone to offer a bite of their breakfast bar (thanks Heidi).
5. It really is worth going to any lecture given by Julie Cohen (I'd listen to her talk about motorways in the 1970s and think it was entertaining).
6. The industry one to ones are invaluable... they really, really are. I've been given masses of valuable advice (and even been asked to submit a full manuscript to a publisher). Better get it finished!
7. It's impossible to sleep the first night. It will either be too hot, too noisy, your head will be spinning from all the talks you've attended - or your head will be spinning from all the wine!
8. Despite the above, it is possible to manage to repeat the whole experience again the next day, with the help of adrenaline, chocolate and many cups of coffee.
9. My sense of direction is as bad as my facial recognition. I had to be given directions to the ladies loo twice at the gala meal and gave out strict instructions to send out a search party if I didn't return.
10. You will come home exhausted, elated, enthused... and then you'll sleep for ten hours.

Thanks to John Jackson for the photograph.

Go with the Flow

I've just been reading an interesting post by Helen Pollard (you can read it here) about summer being a bad time for writers. It certainly struck a chord. Since I started writing, I have definitely found that I am more productive in the winter when I can squirrel myself away in my cave with little or no distractions. 

Unable to stay inside and write in the summer, I find that like Helen I have to contend with sunlight on the screen, bad internet connection as well as bugs dropping on me from the pear tree. This is not all though...  I also have an overwhelming desire to be doing something other than writing.

It bothered me at first but now I just accept that this is the way things are and no longer get het up about it. Instead of fretting that I should be writing another story, editing my novel or writing a blog post, I take Bonnie for a walk or potter in the garden. I've learnt to go with the flow, as they say.

Which leads me very nicely to the canal boat holiday I've just been on with my husband, step-boy and step-dog. Its the third we've been on and this time we spent five days on the Kennet and Avon starting at Aldermaston. As always,we had a fantastic time but, when we booked it, none of us could have predicted the heatwave! Opening eight locks in 32 degrees, when there is no shade, is no joke I can tell you. No wonder I slept like a baby, even though the double bed was the tiniest you could imagine.

While we were travelling, we saw the lovely horse-drawn barge in the photo above. It was pulled by Joey who apparently one day had fallen into the canal and had to be rescued. Luckily, he looked fine when we saw him, so it couldn't have been too serious. 

Evenings were gentle, warm and peaceful. Husband and step-boy fished and I sat at the prow, with a glass of wine, and managed to write a story, I hadn't gone with the intention of doing so but one just popped into my head - see this is what sometimes happens when you don't force it in the summer.


While I was in Newbury, I managed to get a copy of The People's Friend as I wanted to see the illustration to go with my story, You'll Never Walk Alone.

Now I'm back, all I need to do is think about what I'm taking to the RNA conference on Friday. My clever husband has made me some business cards (though I'm not sure who I'll be giving them to) and I've bought the chocolate and wine... I'm told that's probably all I shall need!  

Finally, if there are any other newbies attending, this post on the RNA blog is a must-read.