On Editing ... A Door Called Sally.

Some of my fellow Rhemalda authors have blogged recently on the subject of editing and, with the second book of my Artesans of Albia series, King’s Champion, nearing this process, I thought I would add my own thoughts.

Being a British author in an American publishing company brings its own unique set of circumstances when it comes to edits. As I am also a freelance editor, proofreader and writing mentor, I have experience of this process from both sides. Does it make having my own work edited easier or harder? The answer is that I don’t really know. No one likes to see their precious text covered with red, or have someone tell you that a certain scene doesn’t work, or that you have failed to spot a glaring typo in the sentence you’ve read a hundred times. Yet maybe I can take this process easier than some, because I have personal experience of trying to be diplomatic when dealing with other writers. I know that the process isn’t personal, and that my editor is trying to help me make my novel as clean and as good as it can be. And I do know how hard it is to spot your own mistakes! A case in point was when I first decided to design and have printed some King’s Envoy bookmarks and flyers. How many times did I check and recheck the wording on the files before I sent them to the printer? And how ticked off was I when they came back, and my mother instantly spotted the “h” missing from the word “publisher” and the “g” missing from the middle of “engaging”?

Very ticked off. Seriously – very!

So, if an experienced proofreader can still miss typos, a good, impartial editor is invaluable.

Yet there is leeway for discussion when your edits come back, especially if your novel, like mine, is set in a particular historical period.

My Artesans of Albia series is set within a completely fictional fantasy world, yet for inspiration I drew heavily on the English Medieval period. There are no machines in my novels, no guns or engines; people rely on horses for transport and swords, bows and knives for defense. The nobility live in fortified manors or castles, wealthier citizens in towns, the ordinary people in small villages. Health care is basic, with drugs being purely herbal, although procedures such as blood transfusions are just coming into use.

 Ok, you are thinking – what does this have to do with editing?

It all comes down to terminology.

If you follow a certain trade, you will use terms that most lay people will not understand. For instance, how many people today could name all the parts of a sword? How many of you know what a tang is, or a quillon? Yet a swordsmith or blacksmith would know these terms intimately. The same applies to the various sections of a castle – it’s no good someone telling you there’s a fire in the bailey if you run with a bucket of water to the keep.

This issue of long-forgotten, or specialized terms came up for me once the first round of King’s Envoy edits came back. Two in particular caused some confusion. The first was the word “midden”, and the second was the term “sally port”. For those of you who don’t know, the word “midden” means a dung heap. It can apply equally to what comes out of a horse’s stable or to the unusable leftovers from a kitchen. It is, quite simply, a pile of refuse. This is where the differences between UK English and US English come into play because although it’s an old word, I believe more UK readers would recognize the term than readers in the US. As it was not vitally important to the story, and I didn’t want to make my readers keep reaching for their dictionaries, I was quite happy to substitute this word and use “dung pile” instead.

However, the term “sally port” is a specialized term relating to castles and fortified manors. Simply put, a sally port is a small door either to the side of, or actually let into, the huge doors or gates leading into a fortified building. It would be used when a small number of people, on foot, wanted to enter or leave. The word “sally” can also mean a charge or sortie (as in battle) or to go forth, as in an excursion. The term is derived from the Latin “salire”, meaning “to leap”. (Who says fantasy novels can’t also be educational? J)

In this case, I felt justified in sticking to my guns and asking for the term to be kept in the novel. As the photographs show, I also managed to find a living example of a genuine sally port in the ruins of a small castle in Pembroke, Wales, UK.

So, although the editing process can often mean change, it can also be useful for highlighting what is important, or what needs to remain.

Expect Unusual Excitements!

You would be forgiven for thinking that having your first book published is the epitome of excitement, that it doesn’t get any better than that. And, in many ways, you’d be right. Before my Artesans of Albia series was accepted by Rhemalda, I spent many years believing nothing could top being offered a contract, and then seeing my very own creation, my book, displayed on a bookstore shelf. Don’t get me wrong – that was, and still is, one of the best moments of my life. But, of course, the excitement doesn’t end there.

There’s the entire exciting process before the book is ready for publication – editing, cover design, layout, etc – followed by reviews, a book launch and, hopefully, the thrill of fan mail. There’s a bit of stress involved there too, of course, but on the whole, the process is exciting, especially the nearer you get to completion. For some reason, I didn’t consider any of these things when I was dreaming my dream of publication. I guess I thought I wouldn’t have much involvement in the cover design and book layout stage; I imagined the publisher would have their own style and that I, as the author, would have little or no say in how the book looked. It’s one of the many perks of signing with a small press rather than a large, impersonal one – you get much more say in these important decisions, and it was my first unexpected excitement.

There have been others along the way and they will probably be subjects of other blog posts. But my latest excitement was the most unexpected of all, and I can still hardly believe it happened. It resulted from a casual stroll around an antiques centre following a nice walk with  my husband, Dave, back in the summer. The UK has many of these centres – they sell traditional antiques such as furniture, items of silver, old paintings, etc, but they also sell architectural salvage, such as old stone urns or statues from people’s gardens, as well as “kitchenalia” and jewelry. In fact, you can find almost anything. Outside this particular shop, mounted on the wall high above my head, as if it was flying, was the most gorgeous metal owl. Sculpted in rusted iron, it is, to me, a thing of incredible beauty. It was a bit pricey though, and we left the shop without buying it. Imagine my excitement when I found that Dave had bought it for me for Christmas! He is just so lovely (Dave, I mean. Well, and the owl too.)

After I had opened this wonderful present on Christmas Day, Dave proceeded to tell me the story that went with it. As a way of advertizing my book, both of our cars carry flyers in the window depicting the King’s Envoy cover. When Dave went to visit the workshop of the artist who made the owl, in order to collect mine, the artist saw my flyer. He was instantly drawn to the depiction of the tangwyr, the strange flying predator on the cover, and asked Dave all about it. He said he liked to create strange and wonderful creatures in metal and that my tangwyr would make an excellent sculpture. He said he might make one later in the year. In fact, he was so taken with the idea that he made his sculpture within two weeks, and sent Dave some photos of it. Because Dave didn’t want to tell me about the owl, he had to wait until Christmas to show me these incredible pictures. To say that I was amazed and excited would be a huge understatement! 

So it seems that being an author and having a book published can lead to all sorts of wonderful and exciting things. I feel so proud that my tangwyr creation, brought to life initially by the talented artist Eve Ventrue, should have led to its existence as a striking and beautiful work of the metal smith’s art. I simply have to have one, and have high hopes for my birthday in March. Watch out for another blog post then!

How Do You Find Inspiration?

One of the commonest questions fiction writers get asked, I think, is “where does your inspiration come from?” The simplest, and actually truest, answer is “everywhere”, yet that always sounds like a cop-out to me. In reality, inspiration CAN come from anywhere; from your everyday life, from the people around you. It hides within the events of your day, or maybe what you see on TV or read in the newspaper. It can spring out at you from something you overheard, some joke or snippet of gossip while you were in the coffee shop or having lunch with your friends. Creative people can recognise inspiration where others might only see the ordinary, or mundane.

Personally, I think that finding inspiration also depends on what type of genre you write in. If I was a romance writer, or a crime writer, I could find a wealth of inspiration on any news channel. Horror writers too, I’d imagine – far too often! But what if you’re like me, a fantasy writer? How does a writer who works in unfamiliar, created worlds find inspiration? Does it come purely from our own imagination or can it also be found in our everyday lives?

The answer, of course, is “yes, of course it can,” and just the other day I found a prime example of how inspiration works for me.

I am extremely fortunate to live in a particularly beautiful and rural part of North Hampshire in the UK. I am surrounded by farmland, by fields of crops, by hedges that change their colours depending on the season. Rabbits and hares, deer and pheasant run in the fields (not always a good thing when you own Lurchers, as I do!) and there are wide field margins around which the farmer permits us to walk. Our roads are country lanes and therefore fairly quiet, and the village is one of the prettiest around. It also contains some of the nicest people you could wish to meet.

This area is primarily a working, food-producing farm. Wheat, sesame, oilseed rape, grass for seed and hay, sheep, cattle and pigs can all be found in the fields. Tractors are a regular sight and they can churn up the lanes and field margins, especially at this time of year. Farmers by nature and profession are a practical lot, not given, you’d be excused for thinking, to flights of fancy. And yet, one day, I turned a corner of a field I often walk around and was confronted by the scene in the photo above. There, in the entrance to a mundane, muddy, working farmyard were these fabulous standing stones, appearing as if by magic (although I suspect by tractor) overnight. I was entranced. Such an unexpected sight immediately set my writing senses a-tingle – how could I fail to be inspired?

What gets your creative juices flowing? Has anyone else come across something so unexpected, it resulted in a piece of writing? I’d love to hear!

Take Your Opportunities Where You Can.

Recently, I attended the British Fantasy Society convention in Brighton, UK. I had never been to one before and I have to say that these things are not normally my cup of tea. I’m quite shy among lots of people I don’t know and I’m not good at starting up random conversations with strangers. Even when those strangers share a common interest, i.e fantasy novels. However, because King’s Envoy had so recently been launched, and because I’d had the excitement and acclaim of having a short story accepted for the Society’s 40^th Anniversary Anthology, ‘Full Fathom Forty’, it was too good an opportunity to miss. So, along with my husband, I went.

The convention was held over three days, Friday through to Sunday. Due to work and other commitments, we couldn’t go until the Saturday morning. This meant I missed being in the signing line up for Full Fathom Forty on the Friday afternoon, which was a shame. It would have given me the chance to meet my co-anthology-authors, and also the opportunity to speak to buyers of the anthology about King’s Envoy. Still, it couldn’t be helped.

Once we registered on the Saturday and collected our goodie bags full of free books and other yummy stuff, we planned our day. Christopher Paolini, author of the Inheritance Cycle, was being interviewed that morning and I thought it would be interesting to hear what sort of questions he was asked and how he handled them (just in case someone ever wanted to interview me like that!). The interview lasted around 45 minutes and it was quite interesting. I was slightly surprised to see how few people turned up to listen though – he was one of the major convention guests yet only about a third of the available seats were taken. The best bit for me was when he was asked a question concerning what he thought about the fantasy genre in general. His answer was that in his opinion, there was a lack of strong, credible female main characters in fantasy novels. My husband nudged me at this point and whispered that if Christopher Paolini wanted to see a really credible and strong female fantasy character, he ought to read MY books. I smiled and nodded – like THAT was ever going to happen. Imagine my surprise when, after audience questions and the interview broke up, my husband went up to Christopher and gave him a copy of King’s Envoy! To the guy’s credit, he actually looked interested and said he’d read the book when he could. I would never have had the guts to do that, but my husband is very used to conventions in his own business life and he’s very good at connecting with people.

That was the first good thing to happen at the convention. The second occurred when I was waiting to try and catch the eye of an agent who I knew would be attending the convention. This agent is known for representing fantasy authors and years ago, when I first began submitting King’s Envoy, she was very helpful to me. She was the first real publishing industry professional to give me any feedback on my work. She was very encouraging, and looked at my work on three separate occasions. Although she didn’t take me on, she did give me much helpful advice. As she was going to be at the convention, I thought it might be nice to introduce myself and thank her for all her help.

While I was waiting for her to come out of another meeting, I was approached by a guy who said, “I saw you in Christopher Paolini’s interview. Would you mind giving me your thoughts on how it went?” It turned out that he was working for Random House, Christopher’s publishers, and he was doing video interviews with people. I agreed to be interviewed and managed to get in a few good plugs for my book, including the one about strong female characters. That was a bonus I didn’t expect!

I then managed to catch the agent as she came out of her meeting and found that she was as nice as she had seemed from her emails. I think she was genuinely pleased that I’d taken the time to connect with her and thank her, and then she asked for a copy of my book! I hadn’t tried to plug it at all and I hadn’t shown it to her, so there was no pressure on her to ask for one. Her favorable reaction to the cover picture really pleased me and she seemed genuinely interested in reading the book. Who knows what could come of this? I’m not even sure I’m looking for an agent, but when opportunities present themselves like this, I believe in taking them. I also believe in thanking people who go out of their way to help me.

These three things all came about quite unexpectedly, and stemmed from me pushing myself to do something out of my comfort zone. The lesson here is that you should never think something isn’t worth doing, and you should take these opportunities where you can. Who knows where they might lead?

Why I Love Books So Much.

In times of stress or worry, or if I need some comfort, I often find myself thinking back to one of my earliest childhood memories. I have lots of very early memories – I can remember being in my baby carriage (long before those neat three-wheeled baby buggies were invented!) and crying because my mother had lowered the clear plastic cover to keep me dry in the rain. Even then, I hated being closed in! I can also clearly remember the red plaid rug that she used to sit me on out in the garden, when the weather was good. But neither of those are the one I’m talking about here.

Our family was, and is, a close one and when me and my older brother (how I always wished I was the oldest, not him!) were growing up, Mom was at home looking after us. She didn’t get a job until we were old enough to go to school. Finding things to keep us occupied never seemed hard work for her, we didn’t have much spare money but there were always plenty of toys around.

There were also books. Both parents read to us children and my brother, at a very young age, too young to read, knew the story “Dabbity Duck” off by heart and could recite it as if reading from the book my father held at bedtime. I have no particular memories of being read to at bedtime but I do remember coming round from an emergency peritonitis operation when I was eleven, and asking my mother to read to me. I doubt I was awake more than ten minutes that first time, the sound of her voice reading to me soothed me back to healing sleep.

But my most comforting memory, the one that always returns if I feel I need time to myself, to de-stress, is of a dark, cold and rainy English winter’s day. My mother and I had just returned from a walk to the local library and I had borrowed a New Book. I was so excited! There was a warm and cheery fire in the hearth, I had a small bag of chocolate buttons, and I curled up in a soft armchair with these and my New Book, and read the winter day away.

Now, maybe forty-seven years later, my best way to relax is still to do exactly the same thing. Ok, the chocolate buttons play a big part in this, but even they wouldn’t taste so good without an exciting book to read. I am very grateful to my parents for ensuring that reading and books played an important role in my life. I’m pleased when I see my grown-up stepchildren reading to their kids, and the way the kids also love books. Maybe one day, they will enjoy curling up in a big old soft armchair with a bag of chocolate buttons and one of their Nanny Cas’s fantasy books. That would surely bring a huge big smile to my face!

Review of Legends Reborn: Light of Epertase Book One, by Douglas Brown.

By virtue of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, skilled warrior Rasi finds himself accused of crimes he didn’t commit. It soon becomes clear that he can remain neither in Thasula, nor in the service of its King, Elijah. Personal tragedy overwhelms him and as his life is now forfeit, he is forced to retreat high into the mountains with only his loyal steed, Salient, for company. Yet even when faced with seemingly insurmountable foes, even when hunted by his former comrades, Rasi remains committed to the country of his birth. Against all the odds he finds companionship where he least expected it, and even a fledgling love, yet such things must remain unresolved while enemies threaten Epertasian lives. Suddenly, the people need his skills once again and so, aided by mercenaries and with the backing of Epertase’s new Queen, Alina, Rasi finds himself at the head of an army, once more pitted against a terrible foe.

Legends Reborn is an action-driven novel, full of gritty conflict and hard-fought battles. The characters are varied and well-drawn; their relationships complex. The setting is an unconventional mix of fantasy and reality, magical powers and technology, while the dialogue is forthright. The author pulls no punches – this novel grabs you by the arm. And while there is closure of a kind at the end, there is plenty of potential for the next two novels in the series. I await Book Two with great interest.

Review of An Empire Lost by Kori Valley.

In An Empire Lost, author Kori Valley sets the scene for an epic struggle between the races of the Seven Lands and the hordes from Mishrak Cu Ra. The Golden Age has ended and it is time for the legendary Shelter Lord to reappear. He must travel the lands searching for the mysterious Eminanti – the Son of the Gods – while raising the races of Druids, Elves and Men to stand united against the Destiant Lord and his forces, called the Black Company.

To help him, the Shelter Lord takes Abasa Snerich, once King of the Druids; a man looking to validate the futility of his former life and find meaning for his future. Also Visara, the Witch Queen of Itsmalle, childhood sweetheart of Abasa. There’s also Bobolli, a once powerful wizard who is now a little too addicted to drink, and Brodderick, Seeker of Tast, the man who brings confirmed news that the Black Company are indeed on the move. Once the City of the Tyrene begins to fail – guided now by a King who does not have her interests at heart – the company leave. Along the way they gather other companions and thus form a company of their own. But before they can begin their appointed task, they must rid the city of South Oprem of the goblins that threaten to overwhelm it. This terrifying battle cements their shared goal and strengthens the ties that bind them.

The book gathers momentum as it progresses. This is understandable, given the scope of the author’s intentions. It also contains many errors, which is a shame, and would have benefitted from a thorough editing, but it is to the author’s credit that he informed me of this before I began reading. My 3-star rating would have been higher but I felt it had to reflect the book as a whole. The errors aside, An Empire Lost shows promise. The characters have the potential for further development and the Seven Lands themselves are a fitting backdrop for the scale of the premise. Given the almost visceral descriptions of the battle for South Oprem, the inevitable final battle ought to be well worth a read.