Authors Electric

Jen, who died alone in hospital aged 38. Her story matters.  My September blogpost, Deaf in High Places?   was written as I was preparing to set off for the first public session of Module 3 of Baroness Hallett’s COVID-19 Inquiry: The Impact of the Pandemic on Healthcare Systems.   I still find this a troubling title. What about the impact on patients: will individuals and their human rights and needs be forgotten again in the focus on the system? Remember that slogan ‘Stay at Home – Protect the NHS – Save Lives’? I'm working with the Patients Association and Care Rights UK. We will argue that many people's lives were lost or blighted because of this focus on protecting the institution.  Why did the NHS need protecting? Because it was (is) so seriously lacking capacity that even pre-pandemic it was routinely in crisis. Remember the BBC2 series Hospital back in 2016, bed managers and consultants desperately searching for any available Intensive Care space to treat peo...

I’m in quite a few writerly groups on Facebook, of varying degrees of ability and professionalism. Some – like Authors Electric’s own former blogger Wendy Jones – runs an excellent group Women Writers, Editors, Agents and Publishers . This is a highly-moderated pro group for women only and full of useful advice and networking; I highly recommend it to any women involved in the literary world.  Other groups are less professional and often have little-to-zero moderation, resulting in a large number of members of dubious reputation or ability. Sadly, newer writers join – all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, full of enthusiasm to write their book and are often sucked into offline chats almost immediately: How do I start my book? Is this a good opening line? Should I do x or y?  Let’s chat about that. Kindly DM me.  And you just know that the newbie is going to drown in shady promises of instant fame and fortune. These incredibly generous offers of help come from people who are a...

Because social media and the trials and tribulations associated with using the various options loom large in the novel I'm currently writing, I thought I would share what's been happening with my own social media accounts. They haven't caused me quite as much trouble as my characters are having in the novel, but I must admit to finding aspects of them a little baffling/annoying/anxiety-inducing just lately. I've been using Twitter (X) and Facebook for some time. Although Twitter has been horrible lately in many ways, there are still some nice things about it. For instance at the time of writing I've just taken part in a hectic and very friendly discussion there with other writers and readers about cosy mysteries, using a hashtag to group all the relevant posts together. And then there are the cat and dog accounts, of course! I see that recently many of these have also appeared on other platforms, so I'm fairly confident that if/when I give up on Twitter I will s...

There is a plethora of book awards up for grabs each year. Most of us have heard of the Pulitzer and Booker prizes, probably two of the most prestigious and instantly recognisable in the literary world. Then there are the British Book awards, sometimes called the Nibbies because of the nib shaped trophies. OK I will admit I Googled that one. Others include the Kirkus Prize, Women’s Prize for fiction, International Dublin Literary Award, Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Hugo Award, and the Paul Torday Memorial Prize. Each award has criteria to adhere to regarding date of publication, other specifications can be based on geography, gender, age, or genre. But most primarily reward those who have published through the traditional route with nominations from the publisher. The Ink Book Prize has been “created to recognise and celebrate the outstanding literary work of self-published authors in the UK and Ireland.” It has been established by award-winning author Abiola Bello and award-wi...

                                                                                           A Look at the Booker Prize for Literature     I recently noted that Anne Michaels had been shortlisted for this year’s Booker prize for her novel  Held (2023). I had read her earlier novel,  Fugitive Pieces  (1996), about the displacement of children during World War Two, some years ago and I had included discussion of it in a course I was teaching about Canadian Literature for The Workers’ Educational Association (WEA).  Held , published many years later and which I received as a Christmas present, is a very different book: it is an account of the development of the generations within a family, who are dealing with events from the early twe...

Many years ago, at the height of Britain’s football hooliganism problems, I came across a delicious comedy sketch on BBC Radio 4 which went something like this:  Policeman : I'm arresting you for affray leading to grievous bodily harm, with intention to commit. Do you have anything to say?  Lout : Yeah, well, it were like this. Me and my mates was just leavin’ Waiting for Godot at the Prince Edward theatre, like, when these guys come up to us and start rantin’ and swearin’ that Beckett’s rubbish, everyone knows that, not a patch on Chekhov whose Three Sisters could wipe the floor wiv us, yeah, and our muvvers too. Well, that crossed a line that did, I’m not takin’ that lyin’ down. So yes, officer, I did clock ‘im one but there’s provocation, see.  Laugh-out loud comedy, ah those were the days.  Having the temerity to issue a challenge.  Photo by Daisa TJ: https://www.pexels.com/photo/man-holding-sword-3408420/ Anyway, this popped into my mind because recently...

  The weirdest things have happened to me this month. I’ve been super-busy, as I always am. I’m reprising my role as Patricia Highsmith in a play, Writing Crime in Akenfield, by local author Suzanne Hawkes, which returns to the stage in October. I’ve also been editing my novel, which launches in December, and trying to help other creatives by championing their various projects. I lost two family members in the last fortnight, and so it got me thinking about how life changes and whether there is an afterlife. You know, simple little questions like that! I’m not a church-goer, and not a consciously religious person, but I would describe myself as quite a spiritual person, maybe an ‘intrigued agnostic’ and always happy to approach anything with an open mind. I have certainly had several interesting spiritual experiences which would not rule out the existence of some sort of afterlife, as they were too unusual to explain by any rational means. In a contemplative state of mind, I found ...