Authors Electric

My mind drifted into fantasy land at a very early age, and stayed there, more or less. Like my mother, I’ve never really thought of writing as a proper job, and the highs and lows of earning from it (which for most of us are getting lower all the time) never had much concrete reality. When I needed proper money I did a proper job (or worked on the grotty tabloids at least) until the financial choke-chain eased a bit, and for the rest of it – well, who wants to be rich anyway? Enough is as good as a feast; did any of you ever meet a rich man/woman who was happy? Me neither. Lately, though, my life’s been more grounded in reality, and I haven’t enjoyed it particularly much. People very dear to me and mine are falling gently to pieces, and I’ve been a minor part of the hands-on caring process. It’s made the idea of knocking off another novella or two, or taking much part in Cally Phillips’s Edinburgh ebookfest (both of which I actually want to do) seem a wee bit too much. Despite t...

About five years ago the depressing odds of mainstream publication were clearly explained to me (the following “facts and figures” are plucked from memory and this was just before the real advent of e-publishing). If your submission letter to a literary agent is one of the handful picked out of several thousand they receive each year, if your manuscript is considered worth taking on, if the agent manages to secure a publishing deal, then any advance you will receive from the publisher will be unlikely to run to more than a few grand (unless you’re the Next Big Thing!) Writing novels isn’t a get rich quick scheme. Don’t give up the day job (so say people who’ve read my books). When a new title hits the shelves it has a few weeks to make an impact and a share of the sales proceeds will be offset against your advance. If the book stops selling before the advance is paid off then it will have failed to earn out and that’s the end of the road for that book. Bookshops will...

I had another piece lined up for today, but then realised that my posting slot coincides with Charles Dickens' two-hundredth birthday (well, it would be hard to miss that - Dickens is every where). He hardly needs another mention, but here it is anyway. I'm reading Bleak House, enjoying the revelations as the plot unfolds, the slow grinding of the law court in the background, and of course the cast of characters - effete Mr Turveydrop, the neglected but spirited Caddy Jellyby, the birdlike and ever-hopeful Miss Flite, useless Mr Skimpole, Lady Dedlock doomed by her guilty secret. Esther Summerson's first-person narrative alternates with the chapters relayed more conventionally by an omniscient narrator, giving variety and freshness to a complex plot. (Is Esther Summerson the only female character in Dickens to be given her own voice?) Throughout, there are universal themes of finding the balance between happiness and duty, and of individuals striving to find goodness, purp...

TWICE TIMES DANGER Enid Richemont Here's my latest ebook, originally published by Walker Books. It's a thriller, involving two girls who are doubles, a crazy mongrel called Dracula, a fashion designer who's in deep trouble - and some very scary people. The book's set in West Cornwall , in the little coves and inlets around St Just. To celebrate Chinese New Year - the Year of the Dragon - here are the opening lines of DRAGONCAT, my as-yet unpublished junior novel about a kitten born with extra flaps of skin under its front paws which enable it to glide (a bit like a flying squirrel). The story takes place in and around a small Chinese supermarket in North London. The kittens were born in a cardboard box. Ma showed them to Wing-Yu after breakfast. Wing-Yu tried to pick one up, but Ma wouldn't let him. "They're much too new," said Ma. "You let me hold Mei-Ling," grumbled Wing-Yu. "Mei-Ling was your sister,' sai...