Authors Electric

So, last month I promised to be boring about my new book. Today, as a woman of my word, I deliver: you can tell I'm not a politician. I thought for the sake of brevity I’d interview myself: we’re in lockdown who else is going to do it? So, Nicky, where do you get your ideas from? This particular idea came from reading far too many stories of global warming. I love dystopian and apocalyptic fiction and JG Ballard’s Drowned World has been in my head for years as has Pullman’s Gyptians.  I live near the Thames and walk on the tow path most days. There are a number of old barges moored on the Twickenham side. They are covered in plastic and odd bits of timber, but in all the apparent chaos there is order: herb gardens and strange solar panels, half-built inventions put together from scrap. The boats got me thinking about surviving in a drowned London.    Ollu my heroine is one of a group of respected bargers. She lives on ‘the Ark’ a matriarch boat built before The Chaos, wi...

As a writer of books for children, you might expect me also to be a regular reader of them. But how many other adults are? And what types of children’s books do adults tend to read? I remember a beta reader of my first completed (as yet unpublished) novel ‘Time out of Time’ saying she thought lots of adults might enjoy it as a ‘cross-over’ book, owing to the copious references to my 1970s’ childhood. It was the first time I’d really thought about whether my books could be classed as ‘cross-over’. A quick Google search suggests the term might more readily be applied to books enjoyed by both adults and teenagers, rather than children (e.g. https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/sep/19/thegrandtraditionofcrossov ), drawing on ‘coming-of-age’ themes instead of aiming squarely at pre-teens as my books do. But ultimately, after publishing my first two books, The Order of the White Boar and The King’s Man , conversations with buyers and readers (both face to face and ...

'Crossover' is a term sometimes used by children's publishers to refer to a book published for young readers on a children's list - usually but not always the YA (young adult) section - that crosses over into an adult readership. I am often to be found reading YA fiction, because a lot of the titles I used to find in the fantasy and science fiction section have migrated over there. In fact, I might never have read any children's fiction as an adult reader, or sent my own work to a children's publisher, without the British Science Fiction Association magazine's review of Philip Pullman's Northern Lights ( the first title of His Dark Materials trilogy ) , which I read and enjoyed back in the 1990's and always assumed was published on an adult SF list, until I discovered it was originally brought out by a children's publisher. At around the same time, Susan Price's The Sterkarm Handshake  won the Guardian Children's fiction prize. It in...

Weird thing being a writer, I've always thought. Two things have happened in the last couple of days that made me think of synchronicity (among other things). Firstly, out of the blue, a comment popped into my inbox about Wild Wood, my comic subversion of Mr Grahame's mighty masterpiece. It was appended to a review in Awfully Big Blog Adventure from last April, by a man I don't know. Easiest thing to do is to reproduce it: BRIAN BERKE said... On January 1st, 2015 I decided to reread The Wind in the Willows sixty years after first having it read in class at school and then reading it myself. Later, and by chance I decided to see if any books with the work of William Rushton were available on ebay. What a joy to find Wild Wood. It compliments 'The Willows' wonderfully, and it was published to encourage children to read! 12 March 2015 at 05:54 That was good enough in itself, but the synchronicity comes in this wise: the same morning, I trundled down from ...

I suppose you could say that what I'm going to write about is vanity publishing gone mad. But there is reason behind it. Two issues set this latest crazed ambition going. The first is the ubiquity of artists' limited edition prints. The urge to possess a lovely giclee print not far off original with a number to prove it and so certainly pretty exclusive, especially if it's signed just for you, makes the limited edition print a worthwhile proposition for painters. Giclee prints on sale! The second is something I first heard about when the publishing director of a major but noticeably enterprising (in a good way) publisher spoke to Writers in Oxford about three years ago now and said what they were doing to come to terms with ebooks. First, to test the market, they took some of their genre novels and put them up as ebooks for silly prices. They were amazed at the take up so they put the prices up and were still amazed. Eventually they decided that the traditional...

Back in March, before I suddenly took on the totally unwelcome, ugly, and unwished for status of widow, my head was full of ideas, plots, images. My first picture book: '...and Nobody Noticed the Mouse', was due to come out, with TopThat! in September, and a second: 'Quicker than a Princess', had been accepted for publication by the same publisher for some time in 2014. My only other picture book text had been 'DOUBLE DRAGONS', which was really part of an anthology, so I was delighted to have sold two stand-alone stories. Things felt good. Since David died, I have done no writing except for that single, previous May blog for Authors Electric, which was mostly devoted to him. This will be my second. Writing a monthly blog, I tell myself, is probably a healthy discipline. Whether I can continue doing it remains to be seen. I said no writing , but that's not entirely true. I have been writing letters to my man. This was David at Christmas, opening one o...

I’ve just got back from a school visit. It was just an hour with Years 5 and 6 of a local primary school. In about three hour’s time, I’m off to our Central Library to run a writing workshop for children. It’s all part of Literally - Coventry Book Festival which started yesterday (Monday as I write this) and runs till the weekend. It’s a busy week and I love it. I’m hoping some of this morning’s youngsters will get along to the workshop later. There were some really keen readers and writers in the group. But I’m also hoping that the little boy who put his hand up to ask a question about characters will come along. His teacher told me afterwards that he never asks questions, he’s never interested in books or writing – and they were gobsmacked to see he’d put up his hand to ask such a question. “ And did you see his face when you were reading?” One of the other teachers remarked. “His eyes were almost popping out of his head!” Another teacher was very excited about one ...