Let the signings commence

So the time for signings is with us again. Usually the first one takes place in the Harbour Bookshop in Kingsbridge but this year the proceedings started in the Totnes Bookshop on the Friday after publication day. Marcia was really delighted that this year the signings started in her home town. Friday in Totnes is, as you know, market day which means the town is very busy and the car parks are full – and especially so in the morning – so this year it was decided to try the afternoon instead. 

In Totnes Bookshop

It just so happened that Marcia's friend for a couple of hundred years or so, Susie (you may remember that our last dog, Jossie, came to live with us after Susie's mother died), was in the town as was a chap called Terry Ford, with whom I worked about fifteen years ago and have not seen for ages. It was a wonderful surprise to see him and to swap news. While we were waiting for Marcia to finish at the bookshop, Susie, Terry, his cousin and I sat chatting around a table in Rumour – the bistro just down the road from the bookshop – where we were joined by Bob Mann: writer and historian (Bob and I have collaborated in a couple of books on local history), literary critic (it was Bob who wrote the very first review of Marcia's first book - Those Who Serve), publisher (he now runs Longmarsh Press which he describes as a "craft publishing house") and good friend. Eventually Marcia joined us and the party really took off. Indeed, it was gone five thirty before we all decided, reluctantly, that the time had come to move on.

Bob Mann: writer, literary critic, historian and publisher.

Next day it was down to Kingsbridge and the Harbour Bookshop. As always here, there was a group of readers waiting for Marcia and a pile of books to be signed for people who were unable to be there in person.

Work is being done on one of the roads we usually use.
As a result we were driving down a lane we haven't used
for years and there, suddenly, in the middle of nowhere
was this lovely group of cyclamen in full bloom/

There seems to have been a subtle change in the signings over the last eighteen years or so. To start with there were far more people at the signings and virtually no books set aside to be signed in the purchaser's absence. Now that is changing. This is probably because more people work these days and so cannot make the signings but, whatever the reason, the number of books Marcia signs steadily increases each year.

This is the first of the foreign editions of
Postcards from the Past to arrive.
Please note the Newfoundland dof!

There was a report of an interview by Benedict Nightingale with Tom Stoppard in Wednesday’s Times. Here is something he said: “There are too many things I find it difficult to say no to. So I’m clearing my desk and planning to work without interruption. When I was younger I could do something useful just by being free for half a day but now I need five days to get the world I’ve left out of my head and ten days or a fortnight of not talking to anyone to hold what I need to hold inside my head. I can’t just put things aside for a day and come back. My brain just isn’t good enough any more.”

I’m a year younger than Tom Stoppard and I have to agree that getting back into gear is taking me far longer than it used to – and, unlike Mr Stoppard, what I do is not creative. These days I find myself starting to stare at the blank screen and then, without really willing it to happen, find I am doing something else by way of displacement therapy. Sometimes this is something useful (like paying the electricity account) but often it is totally pointless. Clearly this needed to be discussed with another creative writer, Marcia (eight years Mr Stoppard’s junior). Did she recognise this problem?

“Yes, very much so. Every year it is harder and harder and so difficult to get people to understand. It doesn’t take me as long to switch from one world to the other as it does Tom Stoppard but stopping for ten minutes to drink coffee with someone may not look much to them but it probably means it is the end of writing for that day. How can you be, say, down on the River Tamar inside Oliver’s head as the world shifts beneath his feet and be talking about something else, something completely away from your inside world at the same time? You can’t and I am going to have to learn to say ‘no’ more often.”

There is a bit of a story about this week’s very tiny blog dog, Beau. He has been rescued from a home where they could no longer afford to keep him and where he lived with a number of flea-ridden cats. These had been such an irritant that he had bitten himself almost bald. Now, after treatment at the vet’s and a few week’s wearing a collar to stop him licking off the medication, he is as right as rain.

A few weeks ago, we had an Oscar of unknown breed and I was asked what he was. Well, I have been hoping to see him again and find out from the owner but no such luck. My guess is that he is a cross and may even have three breeds tucked away inside that strong little body. Do I see a touch of terrier and a bit of labrador? I think I do.

Signings as of today (all signings last 1 hour):

Friday, October 18: Bookstop, Tavistock 10.30 am

Saturday, October 19: The Torbay Bookshop, Paignton 10.30 am

Tuesday, October 22: Bookshelf, Saltash

Saturday, October 26: Waterstone’s, Plymouth 11 am

Saturday, October 26: Waterstone’s, Roman Gate, Exeter 2 pm

To be scheduled: Waterstone’s, Truro and The Bookshop, Liskeard.

Lastly, Marcia will be appearing at the Taunton Book Festival at 7.30 pm on Wednesday, November 6th in Brendon Books, Old Brewery Buildings, Bath Place, Taunton. For details CLICK HERE.

Here we go again!

“She has this small girl with her but it’s not her daughter. The mother is visiting someone in Australia – or New Zealand – or somewhere. Now all we have to find out is who this is, who is the daughter, where are they and what do they have to do with the story.” That isn't a quote but boils down what Marcia has been saying for the last few days into one simple sentence.

Simple? Well, not really. Still, that should be pretty easy – given the odd miracle or two – so why are we waiting? Well, we aren't  We are getting on with it. Between us we have driven about three hundred miles this week in trying to find the answer. Not that we've found it. All we know now is that there are a few places where they aren't and a few where the definitely are not. There is a subtle difference: in the first case it means that there is no sign that they are there whilst the latter means that this is so wrong that there would be no point in even thinking about it.

It is rather like when we were looking for a river. Not any old river but one particular river. If you remember we started looking in Cornwall and some weeks and many miles later found it by accident when we were up on Exmoor. Hey ho.

To be fair, searching around looking for Marcia’s people has taken me to places that I would otherwise not know exist. It has made me realise just what a wonderfully rich part of the world the south west of England is. Having spent a part of my life as a travelling trouble-shooter I have made brief trips to may countries and they all have some spectacular scenery and fascinating wild life. Mind you, I seemed to spend more time in their industrial estates than I did in their countryside but even so I took whatever opportunities I could to have a good look around. 

There are many I would have loved to explore more fully but it seems to me that there are two sorts of explorers in this world (and most people are neither). There are the ones that want to visit as many places as they can and then there are the ones that want to know one area as intimately as they can. I belong to the second group and every time we go off I will see something new, something I have never noticed before. Also, as the seasons revolve I shall know where to look for old friends – early snowdrops, shy violets, the first bluebells and so on right through the year – and in some ways this is just as important as finding the new.

Gorse, bell heather and ling (the paler of the heaths).

There is the whiff of autumn in the air. The wonderful lanes of spring have long since gone although there are a few places where there are good shows of wild flowers. Not entirely sure that I fully know why. On the open moors, the bell heather (Erica cinerea) is nearly over – what there is tends to be in the low clumps of gorse which is in flower at the same time – but the ling (Calluna vulgaris) lingers (and, before you ask, that is not why it has that name). It is also known as Common Heather or just Heather and is far paler than the bell heather but keeps going longer into the autumn.

' ...wild flowers behaving badly ...'

That’s about it for colour at the moment: the odd patch of wild flowers behaving badly and the gorse with the attendant heathers. Oh, and the rowan or mountain ash, which Marcia loves, is now covered in berries. 

Beech trees in the Exe valley in autumn

Meanwhile we have the proper autumn colours to look forward to. Nothing as spectacular as they see in Canada, of course, but there is nothing lovelier than the Exe valley when the beech trees prepare for winter.

Thanks to my brother-in-law, the puzzle of the moth has been solved. The problem was, of course, that we were looking at the underside so that the wonderful orange and red colours that adorn this animal were hidden. Anyway, all is revealed and what we were looking at was a Jersey Tiger Moth (Euplagia quadripunctaria). My thanks to the Natural History Museum for the following image.

Beau - well it had to be, didn't it?

Signings as of today (all signings last 1 hour):

Friday, October 11: Totnes Bookshop 2 pm

Saturday, October 12: The Harbour Bookshop, Kingsbridge 11 am

Friday, October 18: Bookstop, Tavistock 10.30 am

Saturday, October 19: The Torbay Bookshop, Paignton 10.30 am

Tuesday, October 22: Bookshelf, Saltash

Saturday, October 26: Waterstone’s, Plymouth 11 am

Saturday, October 26: Waterstone’s,, Roman Gate, Exeter 2 pm

To be scheduled: Waterstone’s. Truro and The Bookshop, Liskeard.

*  *  *  *  *

I rarely suggest that Marcia's readers would be at all interested in my other blogs but the one I posted today - Friday 13th - may be an exception. If you want to see what I am talking about, please CLICK HERE. This post is called 'Three Crows'.

Visitors and the editorial notes

One of Marcia’s friends who lives in south west Wales, Vivien, was on holiday in St Mawes with her parents (leaving her husband behind holding the fort) and, on the way home, she called in to see us. I am delighted to say that she follows my blog and so is well aware of my recent obsession with corrugated iron.

It turns out that I am not the only one: she brought with her a mounted copy of a picture taken by the St Mawes photographer Ray Bradshaw which he has titled “Old Rusty”. It is a lovely pressie and I have found a frame for it and soon it will be hanging beside the tapestry of Trubshawe that Vivien worked for Marcia some time ago.

I would be breaking copyright by showing it to you but if you want to see what I am talking about, click here.

After Vivien had left for Wales, we had lunch at the pub – nobly served by Steph (who had been eating blue bubble-gum ice cream) and John.

* * * * *

We are approaching the moment when Marcia can safely wave good-bye to the characters inhabiting the last book to be written. Approaching - we are not there yet.

The dreaded editorial notes arrived recently. I say dreaded with no exaggeration. Any writing is as dear to the writer as babies are to their mothers. How dare this other person say anything negative about my baby?

We have a rule: nothing that I write goes out of the house until Marcia has read it, commented on it, offered a critique and (hopefully) some positive suggestions. The roles are reversed when she is writing. Obviously, over the years, we have learned to be gentle with each other but there is that initial moment when the process hurts. So, instead of starting off by saying, "The second sentence in paragraph three is rubbish," one starts, "This is really good, love it. By the way, you might like to have another look at the second sentence in the third para. I think you could word that a bit better."

Having said that the editorial notes are awaited with dread, I should add that the sooner they arrive the better it is. This is because the characters that will appear in the next book are beginning to take over but must not be allowed to displace the old lot. Marcia will need to revisit them when those editorial notes arrive and so is presently in that parlous state where she is trying to juggle with two very disparate groups: terrified that the old ones will intrude into the new book and that the new ones will, as it were, contaminate the old ones. That is why I say that the sooner these notes arrive and Marcia has dealt with them the better it is.

It had been arranged some time ago that Marcia would be in the Harbour Book Shop in Kingsbridge. As always, there was much jollity and laughter but had Marcia known when the editorial notes would arrive all this would have happened on another day.

Most editors are aware of the impact that their editorial notes will have on the writer and they tend to follow our practice. This time, sure enough, they start by explaining that the novel is really wonderful. I agree with that, but then, I would, wouldn't I? Then come the matters that the editor feels need to be addressed.

Actually, although I doubt Marcia would agree with this, her editorial notes rarely contain anything of great importance. Sometimes editors require what really amounts to a re-write and that has never happened. Mary Wesley also dreaded what she called "the blue pencil" and after one of the early books, having heard from Marcia what her then editor wanted, said, "That is nothing. If that is all she wants you are very lucky."

It was a great benefit that Marcia knew Mary in those early days. In fact there was a wonderful group of writers based around Totnes then: Joan Brady, James Long, Mary and then, of course, Marcia. These thing never last. Mary is, of course, no longer with us. James has moved to the Bristol area and Joan to the Midlands. As you know, Marcia also moved away but is now back but the town is poorer for the absence of the other three.

Now, as I write, Marcia has almost finished dealing with these editorial notes for the novel that will be called - well, whatever it is that Transworld decide to call it (and if I tell you the working title we shall the same problems as we had over The Ginger Jar which was published as The Prodigal Wife.

Anyway, within the next few days, Marcia should be able to wave good-bye to the old characters and be able to turn her searchlight on the new lot.

This is a rather special blog dog. Bennie is Vivien's father's dog and the two are inseparable.