Blackbird

Yesterday, I heard screams and flapping from the garden – an animal in pain – so I rushed out. In a haze of brown downy feathers and dead leaves from the tree where the attack took place, I had a vague sense of a large bird flying away. It was possibly a red kite. A small male blackbird fell at my feet and lay there panting, his displaced milk chocolate coloured feathers followed down and curled up around his body. Their beaks are so bright. I could see no blood and thought it best not to pick him up, as he was already traumatised. I just stood over him and talked softly, until gradually he stopped the panting, ran out through the iron gate, up onto the fence and away.

It made me think though, about the percentage of victim and bully/predator/confident being in all of us, how it differs with life experience, moods and attitude. I have met a lot of supremely confident red kites – soaring through life being admired by all. There have been sparrow hawks too, who bide their time but get what they want eventually…but only the odd gentle blackbird. Ummm…. Maybe we are all blackbirds inside, just hoping that no-one will spot the deception and hurt us.

I wasn’t a victim exactly but neither did I feel entirely in control on the Henry Kelly Radio Show on Radio Berkshire yesterday. Radio is an odd medium and presenters are a little like drug addicts: they become extremely twitchy if there is dead air…they need a fix of the human voice to feed that habit. Nodding my head is not the way to convey ‘yes’ and so I ended up saying ‘Absolutely’ and sounded as if I should have a hockey stick and small pony. It was primarily to publicise the book The Map of Me but also to try and come up with intelligent comments about the experience of being mixed race. But suddenly I felt very exposed, having to take about me. No hiding behind characters and their fictional motivations……I felt naked. Not in a good way. My mother-in-law listened and told me I sound articulated. Now that is a new one.

Brief interviews with The Map of Me authors:
http://www.penguin.co.uk/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9780141038926,00.html

It has been a good week in all though, with a few writerly things such as the radio broadcast and then a few other treats to boost confidence:


I have been shortlisted for The Asham Award this week. I have been shortlisted before, so my excitement is a little tamer this time. It’s still good. Now I send on my story for judging…results of the final twelve in February. It’s a big competition in terms of stature this one and there were 799 entries. To be published alongside Margaret Atwood – that’s something to fantasise about over Christmas.

I wrote six flashes for a wonderfully intense writing session on The Workhouse this week. The quality of all the writing (108 stories in total) was superb and reminded me why it's so life-affirming to hang out there so much. I’m proud to be in that company and am still learning what makes writing literary, resonant, publishable.

I am now visiting a lovely old lady of 86, who was a nurse during World War II and is feisty and fascinating. I love her company, her refusal to be taken for a fool and the stories she has to tell. She also has enormous compassion and insight. She also told me I was very pretty but admittedly her eyesight is very poor.

In early December I get to go to the book launch party at Penguin. I am very interested in meeting the other writers; their stories were impressive, elegiac, emotional.



So I will subdue my inner blackbird for now – that fluttering sense of potential failure and rejection that all writers carry in their hearts – to pursue this funny life of scribbling and making things up, being greedy enough to live several lives in a day.

Grasshopper?

Can I fall any lower? I have been stood up by a Buddhist monk. Finally I found The Priory, which was a humble detached house with only a small statue of Buddha outside to signal its purpose. For some ridiculous reason I was expecting something exotic…with gold leaf…which flies in the face of Buddhist humility. Then I rang the bell, while staring at a grasshopper that sat with its feet splayed on the window. I had been trying not to think grasshopper, as it is a cruel cliché from the old Kung Fu films, where the monk with the opaque eyes calls the seeker of truth ‘Grasshopper.’ Tried not to giggle and rang the bell again. Again. Rapped the door. It was hot and I was getting cross. Goddammit, where was this man who was to help me with my anger? Bloody hell, has he forgotten? Why can’t he hear me!

I went home very angry and it then only dawned on me the irony of being furious that a man who was to help me meditate and control my anger, had made me angrier. I also put a note through his door and my other half was frightened about what I might have said. He knows that I have a feisty soul, flashes of my mother’s shrewish temper. How could he think that I would be rude, whatever the provocation, to a gentle monk?

It transpires (by email) that the monk was in the back garden and had not heard me (what was he doing – nude sunbathing, painting his gnomes?) Oh well, universe – life was buggered up again.

Onward. Mary Stott prize to enter. Book review and interview for Wolfprint. 5,000 words left for my 10,000 novel pledge. Bought a new copy of the Writers’ and Artists’ yearbook. After all, my other one is 2006 – editors have moved/died/gone insane. I once picked up an American equivalent and sat laughing at the extent of specialist magazines. Lesbian Biker Chicks on Acid who Knit – that sort of thing. Ours, with its Horse and Hound and Dogs Today, is so much more tame.

It’s a shame really.

The Future's Bright - But Is It Orange?

On Saturday, I have a date with a Buddhist monk. Shaved heads and acid orange. Yum. Well perhaps not strictly a date – more a search for spiritual solace. Not religion though – I don’t want the whole package. I did consider a Catholic priest – as Catholicism is my default setting and I did go to school with nuns – but no. Meeting up with a priest of that persuasion is like having dinner with a second hand car salesman. Eventually, they try and flog you something. Buddhism simply contains beliefs that largely correspond with my own but more importantly, they give guidelines to coping. Especially with anger. At present I have lots of that emotion; I am overflowing with it. Anger at loss. Anger at not achieving enough. Anger at exhaustion. You get the picture.

So back to the monk. I used to meditate, which had a wonderful calming effect on my impatient, twitchy personality. I want to learn that again, to learn how to centre myself again. As a child I was a very gentle daffy sort, who liked nothing better than counting stones in the garden, or adoring animals to the point of worship. That back please, or at least a little pocket of it that can be held at the core, to counteract all the crap of modern life.

So that is step 1 for returning normal service – essential for everyone around me who is endlessly patient and loving, namely my family. It’s selfish to be so indulgent (Buddha, he say NO to selfishness - apparently)

Step 2 is to help others – to life coach a writer friend who is suffering literary angst of the most critical kind. I have set aside a day to bring her back to a good place. How easy it is to give advice, whatever mess you are in yourself. Also, I have joined a Good Neighbour Club that visits lonely people. I love older people (after all, we are all old people in training) and also their stories. I was dithering about it but I was then invited to a party for all the Good Neighbour Volunteers to meet. Free cake! Tea! They knew how to entice this greedy slattern. But what are a few hours a week? It’s injustice that anyone is lonely in a society with billions of people, all talking to themselves (allegedly into their phones) or clutching fucking Blackberries (I like a good crumble myself.) When I was cat-hunting (no spears, honestly) I found aching loneliness in people, that desperate need to make contact. Every day for example, an old lady with an ancient dog crosses the road to my house and reads my Lost Cat notice. Every day. Then she wipes away a tear, pats her dog and stumbles on. Then I wipe away a tear at her wiping away a tear and awash I am with sentimentality. I can barely hold down my Special Brew. (I’m kidding – I have not succumbed to the demons of drink. I did have a packet of……..crisps though yesterday. I half expected Jamie Oliver to helicopter in with a megaphone, to hear that over-sized tongue announce my betrayal to good food in that cheeky mockney voice.)

Where was I….step 3…bloody hell…I have pledged to two writers friends that I will write 10,000 words of a novel by November 7th. I am also writing fillers, articles etc so quickly that my fingers leave steam on the keyboard. Zipped one off to The Guardian yesterday and now am about to write one for The Sunday Times. I have had a few already in the latter some time ago and they pay £200 for what is to me about half an hours work. Ker-ching. I also entered The Asham Award and for once, I was truly proud of my story. Not that I pretend brilliance or perfection – but that I absolutely felt in the skin of my characters. So much so that I had sensory delusions. It was set in India and I could smell it, feel the heat. Wonderful – like being actor.

Step 4 – to return to the bosom of The Workhouse to post a story and get back into a wonderful community. Also to critique…an important skill.

So there it is. Hope in the darkness.

A Trilogy of Inspiration

I have had three days brain-deep in all things literary. A distraction that came when sadness was weighting me down, for many reasons. I was safe in the company of writers at Litcamp: the fragrant Vanessa Gebbie, the truly lovely Alison, incomparable Sara (of Asalted), gorgeous Kerry……. Litcamp made me feel like a professional, a contender. I was cheered by an ‘excellent’ verdict from Steve of Willesden blog infamy on a short story of mine. My god, I needed that. I needed it all….even the daft and the delusional at the event who made me giggle. Including someone who thought that if their mother told them their book was fab, that was all they need to continue. Ahem.

My head full of books and the infinite possibilities of language, I also attended two days of the Reading Crime Festival – a first for Reading and initiated and run by the borough librarians. It began with a writers’ workshop with Cath Stanicliffe, where my daughter (aged 11) rather surprised a roomful of adults by conjuring up her own method of murder: stuffing snow down someone’s throat. I may have to sleep with one eye open from now on. Bless her gothic soul. The day continued: literary discussions, writers explaining their craft, a talk on the role for coroner….all very juicy. There was very much an old tale repeatedly told by the male (usually bearded) writers: ‘I had a good lunch with an agent/publisher and then later had several films made of my books………’ To the aspiring crime writers there it sounded wonderful, easy. It took Frances Fyfield to be honest and admit that it was ‘Easier in my day…it is hard for people to get published now…it is a different business.’ A friend of mine, after a particularly turgid reading from one of the crime writers, was tempted to ask him if he thought that he would get published nowadays. I stopped her…it was a little too blunt, even if true. Fyfield at least could see beyond her own accomplished world and realise the current market.

There is also a great friendship between some crime writers. Bored, Fyfield rang up Val McDermid one morning to ask her what she was doing. (I love that image) ‘I’m bleaching spoons,’ she was told. Increasingly Fyfield’s honesty was so fresh….she hates the actual discipline of writing and will often resort to mundane displacement activities. Hurrah! Someone else! Someone widely published!

Speaking of the spoon-bleacher, Val McDermid was a delight, in every way. In smiling Scottish brogue, she held a huge room of people like a professional actress. Passion shone from her. Writing was everything. ‘Ah, I saw they called this the ‘Big Author Event,’ she laughed. ‘Why do they not say FAT and be done with it!’ I asked a question at the end about whether the growth of crime fiction may in fact be due to our perceptions of a lawless society. Quick, articulate. clever – she explained how a crime book is a contained and controlled entity, a moral universe. The real criminals out there, she said, were far worse than even our imaginations could muster. Things are not solved, people are not saved. From someone who writes the graphic scenes in the ‘Wire in the Blood’ series, that was a terrifying thought. Afterwards, I dutifully bought her new book and shuffled up for a signing. I gave my full name and she looked at me curiously, with some recognition at the name. The moment seemed right and so I thanked her for choosing my story in Mslexia some time ago, when she judged the submissions. I specified which one. ‘That was a lovely story,’ she smiled. ‘Very moving.’

Very moving. Very moving. I wrote it on my mirror in eyeliner when I got back and in the morning, thought how batty that was of me. Vowed that if I ever become successful I will try and endorse writers still climbing: it means so much.

On the Sunday evening at the final event, Mark Billingham and John Harvey rolled through the doors from the pub. Much banter and silliness, much use of the words ‘Fuck’ and ‘Bollocks’ between the two daft beggars. Mark Billingham read from his new novel and proved that a writer who can read well, tell stories…will be a successful one because he can also do the circuit, entertain. He later slagged off John Banville (‘I hate these up themselves authors…he told me that its perfectly possible to read a book with a dictionary by the side….what!!!!!!!!!!”) Agatha Christie and Jeffrey Archer were also for the chop. The Crime Writers’ Association has black tie award events at £90 a ticket, full of old buffers. ‘But did you know,’ he said, ‘that the Australian equivalent is called the Ned Kelly Awards and they have a stripper.’ It was that kind of blokey nonsense. John Harvey, who was much more drunk and was intellectually freefalling, talked about the Paralympics for no reason, then decided that the first few pages of his new novel wasn’t good enough and ripped it up. Went to read something else and then discovered that he had actually ripped that up instead. All fun and games. The death of the short story…how there was no market....blah blah…came up and John Harvey even admitted that he had to approach a small press to take a recent novella, despite the fact that he has published many books and has a ‘name.’ Billingham praised the short story and everyone bemoaned the fact that they are not supposed to sell.

So many treats at that festival…including a plant forensic scientist who looked as if he were being played by an actor. Tweed and dusty moustache, guffawed in all the wrong places as if he did not mix with people much, lived with his microscope. He once had to collate evidence from a rape case (that was one where he laughed, inappropriately) and the police gave him a dress from the victim. ‘Now if there were evidence to collect, it would not be on a dress.’

He then came up with a great book title for his memoirs:

The Answer Lies in The Knickers.

Going to Ground

I have been in a dark place recently (although not in a cupboard – that would be weird) – for various and serious reasons. I have wanted to skulk, be invisible, be sad. No writing except one bullet fired short story for a local competition in this time, but a lot of thinking. A skip full of brain matter amount of thinking. Already in this dark place, I woke up one morning to discover that one of my cats had disappeared. A neutered tom – a house cat of thirteen years, whose only outdoor pleasure has been to potter in the garden, rest in the warm soil and sleep. I would look at him and feel peace. Now he was gone. No sign. No clues. A frantic campaign of search followed which included exploring the grounds of the local school, discovering a vast allotment full of kindly old men growing beautiful fruit and vegetables. Then as time passed and I became more desperate, I have knocked on doors and even accosted strangers in the street. Tried to spot ‘cat’ people – the old ladies in dressing gowns (one who told me that if anyone had hurt my cat she would break their legs and go to prison for it – which had me crying on her doorstep). Then I approached ‘dog’ people – because at least they had animals, would understand. Discovered the huge and wonderful world that he might have found beyond his doorstep, with crunchy mice, delicate birds and perhaps even an indulgent saucer of food donated by one of those ladies who talk to themselves.

I have been awake every night – my animals are precious to me, very bonded into my psyche. Moriarty – so named after Sherlock Holmes’ nemesis – is so very unlike his name. He is soft in heart, goes limp and heavy when I pick him up and lets me put my face into his fur. That fur has been cried into, ruffled when I’m happy – all those stupid sentimental moments that we all try to hide from our adult counterparts. We are supposed to be grown-ups after all, not children. But with an animal we can indulge the child, the primal, the id if you like – it all depends on whether you embrace Freud or Jung.

What has got my molecules all stirred up, made me feel insecure and lost – is the not knowing that so many people talk about. Losing something, someone – and never knowing their fate. Whether they are in pain or dead – it haunts to an unhealthy degree. Then I did some more deeper searching – navel-gazing if you like, discovered that I have never liked losing anything, losing control of myself or anything around me. But in writing – now here is where I found a strange truth – I can control everything. I am the puppet-master, the leader of lives. I can hold in my hand the fate of my characters – but also know that the encapsulated world is real on the page, but cannot hurt me as much as life can do. I can step out from the page and breathe afterwards. I may feel for the characters I create and similarly, I feel real grief for those I read about in fiction. But I perversely enjoy that feeling – which is why I am fond of the Russians, who can make melancholy sweet and satisfying. It makes me feel alive to feel deeply to care, as I do for my family, friends, animals.

One lost cat. My friend, my writer’s muse. Grief that cannot be understood by everyone but hurts more than anything. It has made me think very very hard. I love unhappy or open-ended endings in books – that palpitating resonance. Here, I need a happy resolution – to believe that the universe is a good one. I have thought about God too – a little – but I am not ready to negotiate with St Anthony for Moriarty’s safe return. Still atheist/agnostic – not sure, but realising that it must give a lot of comfort to some to ‘hand over’ worries.

Last night I was sitting on a bench in the local school with torch, cat food, even a recording of my cat’s sister so that he might hear and respond – my last night because it is a boarding school and I was not allowed to wander around at night when the girls were back – looking at the bats, seeing a fox leaping after prey as if a small trampoline was hiding in the bushes. I was calm.

I hope to be writing soon and also contacting friends and colleagues that I have badly neglected. I do want to stay in the darkness though a little longer, until I feel able to face the scrutiny of light.

Suffering Sophocles

It will be boring, friends said. Why on earth are you spending two days doing that when you could be shopping, sleeping, swimming? But the recent workshop on Antigone’s Sophocles (with Brecht and Jean Anouilh thrown in as supporting artistes) was a true revelation. .

Antigone was the daughter of Oedipus – not a great start because he was a motherf..….well, you know that story. So already from a doomed family, her two brothers then murder one another, Oedipus dies and his brother, Creon, becomes king. One of Antigone’s brothers Polynices has rebelled against the state and is to be left outside for the dogs and vultures to pick over his bones. But Antigone decides to bury him and so the wheels of fate roll on when she is condemned to death. There will be more deaths that follow.

No relevance to today? Family versus state? Idealism? Dying for a cause? Conscience? All those themes, written in 441 B.C, wrapped tight in the most rhythmic, beautifully phrased prose:

‘My plans, my mad fanatic heart, my son, cut off so young…’

Suddenly, I saw the roots of King Lear and many other great works of literature. It was back to the source of things….

So, I have made enquiries about doing a part-time Classics degree. Not more Creative Writing – the route I thought I would take. Perhaps I am very impractical about this and I will end my days as a crusty, dusty and far from lusty would-be academic with whiskers and a snuff habit. I feel intoxicated by the Ancient Greeks – this was a time when skilful language was everything: it was valued, honed and considered an asset. Well, I want to be more skilful, understand the cadences of every sentence, the power of one adverb over another, to move people. (Brecht to be recommended too, for his poetry. Anouilh I found too sentimental.)

It is all in the lap of the Gods whether I get (and can afford – there is always that little sting) a place at the University. I may fall to earth pretty fast but hey, an academic friend of mine said it well:

‘I've found my own classical studies incredibly enriching. Not only have I experienced that amazing sense of connectedness with our vast cultural heritage (something that the educated person once took as given but which has been sadly lost in recent decades) but I've felt like a traveller into other minds. I feel I've rubbed shoulders with people recognisable as coming from the same species as ourselves but very different in other ways. The realisation that thought is words and that words do not correspond across all languages is humbling, liberating, and utterly vital for a writer. I love Ancient Greek because I feel that it is the evolving language of a people developing both their philosophies and the ways of expressing them in tandem. I also feel that I didn't really understand Byron and Shakespeare until I understood their exposure to the Classical tradition.’

So backwards to go forwards, really.

Affirmative Captain

I have been impulsive lately. Spontaneous. Jumping in before the evil analysis paralysis dampens the fun.

YES to the possibility of kicking off a discussion group at a Lit Fest in September. (That’s to network but also to enjoy a day with other writers, agents and publishers. The talented VANESSA GEBBIE will be there, reading her work.)

YES to reading a short story in Brighton. (That’s for my confidence and scares me back into thumb-sucking and nappies)

YES to a classical Greek workshop next week, discussing Sophocles’ The Three Theban Plays, Bertolt Brecht’s Antigone. (That’s purely for my intellect, that should be fed at all times)

Best of all I have said YES to that insistent voice that has asked me for years to turn what I consider to be in a strong idea, into a NOVEL. (That’s for my future.)

Saying YES feels like a ride, a scary one. But even when the news tells is that we will die in poverty or be engulfed in a tsunami/fire/nuclear holocaust – saying yes is just moving forward, ignoring the detractors. It also gives me news to tell people.

I will keep doing it. As long as it is to do with my beloved writing, my family or my friends.

Within reason.