Please don't read my books!

... says Terry Deary, according to the Telegraph. And, do you know what? I agree with him - not that children shouldn't read his books, but that being read in schools is a risky business for a writer.

I've caused shock and horror before now amongst fellow unpublished authors when I've said that I would never want a novel of mine to be a set book. Surely any reader is a good reader?

No. As an ex-teacher of sixth formers, I've seen too many students arrive with a dislike of an author I love in place because of  the experience they've already had of them in the classroom. Of course, they loved every text they studied with me ... *ahem*

Therein lies the dilemma, and I don't know what the answer is - or rather, maybe Deary is on the right lines. Yes, children should be introduced to knowledge of history, experience of literature, etc., in as accessible a way as possible, but at the same time we should leave something for them to discover and enjoy independently.

What do you think?

Where do all the stories come from?

Ever wondered? I started thinking about this - again - after reading an article in last week's Sunday Times. Part article, part review of Jonah Lehrer's book Imagine: How Creativity Works, Stephen Armstrong considers the brain science of creativity, and how to stimulate it. As the title The answer is blowing in my alpha waves suggests, the story of how Bob Dylan wrote an iconic number - actually Like a Rolling Stone - is used as an example.

... the singer decided to quit the music industry after a harrowing European tour, and set off to write a novel [*taking the easy option then!*] in a cabin in the middle of nowhere ... [He] wanted to do nothing much apart from avoid writing another song, but soon after arriving he ... grabbed a pencil and started scribbling.

The rest is history.


It's all to do with something called alpha waves. This isn't the place for a detailed examination of the theory - and if it were I'm not the person to do it. It's controversial of course, but seems to be backed up by some scientific research.

As Armstrong says,

In a process that has yet to be understood, these [waves] suddenly flood the right brain roughly eight seconds before an idea pops into the mind ... It is alpha waves that fire up when jazz pianists are playing [*I find that amazing*]. ... According to Lehrer, Dylan's frustration and isolation combined to trigger the right hemisphere of his brain, which drew all his disparate influences into one catchy song.

As I said, I'm not going to attempt to take on the science of this, but it does chime with my own experiences as a writer, and as a practitioner and teacher in theatre. In fact, although I'm primarily a writer now, I find I'm constantly going back to what I learned in acting - obviously about role building, but more fundamentally about creativity itself.
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Armstrong's thesis is that the capacity for creativity is there in all of us, waiting to be triggered by the right conditions. Stanislavsky understood that. He said that an actor should believe in the life of their character, as a child believes in the life of her doll. We are all born with the ability and desire to role play, to make marks and sounds and to move experimentally and joyfully, and to tell stories. These abilities get locked in by society's expectations and judgement: you are are weird if you continue to do these things, unless you have unusual ability.


I once watched a young actor perform. He was academically bright and took an analytical approach to his work, which was often sadly a bit wooden. This time he was just helping out a friend by playing against her for her assessment, and so not trying too hard. The result was one of the most moving pieces of theatre I've ever seen in the classroom. Freed of over-intellectualising, he produced something with real truth.


So what are the right conditions to produce that kind of magic? If only I knew, then I'd be able to bottle it. Armstrong quotes a number of different suggestions, some conflicting, some illegal. I'm with him totally on one: there's nothing like going for a walk to get the wheels in my head turning.

One thing I'm sorry the article doesn't address is what happens after the moment of inspiration. Novels take a long time to write. If you're constantly waiting for something from outside (actually inside) yourself to provide the impetus, progress is going to be slow. The gift needs to be nurtured.


What do you think?

Reading Delights (and how to sell them)

Last week I was playing shop amidst a feast of reading delights. Or, to put it more clearly, I did a few shifts on a bookstall at the Bath Literature Festival (sadly finished now for this year).

And not just any bookstall. I was working - oh, all right, volunteering - for the lovely Mr B's Emporium of Reading Delights. (Seriously, check out the link to see just how therapeutic a bookstore can be.)

I hoped I was going to enjoy myself, but I never realised how much. People who like books are easy to be around. And I was surprised how swiftly I became interested in what was often not what I would expect to be my kind of book, when I saw it through the eyes of someone who could appreciate it. But mostly it was amazing to be surrounded by so many of them.

I don't think I've ever really thought before what nice things books are. They're more than visually attractive, they're tactile, designed to be picked up, opened and explored. And they have a life. I was quite upset recently to visit a craft fair where one of the products was books mutilated into becoming CD racks and suchlike. But I digress. Whole and healthy, they're nice things to sell.

This might sound a bit odd coming from someone whose last post announced her conversion to e-books - but don't get me wrong:  I never meant to give up the hard stuff. Why does there always have to be a choice? Dogs or cats. The Beatles or the Stones. Shakespeare or Beckett. Why can't I have them both? I think our lives are enhanced by enjoying things in as many ways as we can.

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the e-Book

"I'm not much of a reader, but since we've had one of these ..."

This is not me talking, you will have guessed. It's the lady from the couple I got talking to while looking at the demo e-readers.

I'd reached a tipping point. As always with these things, it was an accumulation of forces which led me there. Recently, I heard from two friends who are going to be published electronically later this year (ec newman, and Kim Donovan's St Viper's School for Super Villains) and I need to be able to read them. I also remember a respected YA author answering a question at the Kids' Lit Fest last year. Of course he liked e-books: his house was full of paper ones, and the overspill in the garage was getting damp.

I don't have that impressive a library - each time I've moved on in my life I've taken only the books that meant most to me, leaving the rest behind - but our house is small and when the piles start growing on the landing you realise you have to do something. That something could of course be giving some away, and I weed fairly frequently, but I went through them a couple of weeks ago and managed to find two I was prepared to part with. I use my local library extensively, but some of the books I want are not available without expensive inter-library loan fees. If I got an e-reader I could buy more without adding to the piles; I could even make space by replacing some battered classics with free downloads.

Enough worthy reasons to give myself permission to start browsing scrummy on-line bookstores full of inviting titles, and playing with tablets and e-readers... it's a toy! I want one!

Back to the lady in the shop. The really interesting thing about that couple - besides the fact that they had been turned from non-readers into readers - was that they already had an e-reader, but one was not enough. They were shopping for another, fancier one so they could both read at the same time and stop fighting over the one they already had.

Video didn't stop people going to the cinema. I have no statistics to prove this, but my sense is that it gave the film industry a boost, allowing people to develop their taste for movies. I've had my first personal experience of how e-publishing may do the same for our appetite for reading.

      Be not afeard: the isle is full of noises,
      Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not ...

Sorry. Could never resist a bit of Caliban.

Time for a Change of Portal

The snow gives me an excuse to put a new image at the head of my blog. It's cheating a bit because it was taken last year, but there is snow here on the street outside. It was taken in Somerset, near Priddy, and if you look closely you can see sleigh tracks on the path.

I collect what I call "portal pictures": images which seem to lead from one world to another. It's a bit hard to get away from wardrobes and lamp posts with ones like the snow picture, but here's another. Where do you imagine it might lead?

Commercial or Literary?

This one's been known to get my unmentionables in a twist before now. I end up getting all hot and bothered about 'Why can't a book be popular and well written?'; and 'If literary means valued, how can you judge your own work as such?' Or for that matter 'Why would anyone set out to write something that isn't literary?' But calm down - an excellent post here from bigglasscases puts the argument in a useful practical frame.

i.e., for every person like me protesting (again) that Shakespeare was commercial and literary, there's a hardworking agent out there trying to place books who finds it helpful to have a handle on where they might fit.

Sarah LaPolla also has a better shot at defining the difference between literary and commercial fiction than any I've come across before, with a nice analogy to catwalk vs high street fashion; and some advice for debut authors pitching their books.

So the question is, where do you see your work?

For my own part, Timehikers is (I hope) definitely commercial. Not so sure about Better than Stars or Water: a suggestion that it's a problem I need to sort out, maybe?

The Future's Here, and It's Electrik!

Electrikinc, to be precise. And it's sparked off with a bang, drawing attention from the Bookseller and across the Channel  [apologies for the fact that you have to be a subscriber to read the first article and to speak French to understand the second: who said publicity was easy to get? And at least on the second link you can see the cover for Kim Donovan's St Viper's School for Super Villains].

Yes, Electrikinc is a publication venture, but one with a difference. A small group of Bath Spa graduate children's authors, with some impressive editorial skills between them, have got together as a co-operative to publish their own work. It looks to me like a promising alternative to the pitfalls of self-publication; and crucially one which embraces the advantages of new technology. Kim's book will be first to hit the market - I would say shelves, but of course the name is a bit of a giveaway. Electrikinc will focus on e-publishing and print on demand ... which has led me once again to think about electronic vs. paper books.

What do you think?

I try not to make judgements about things where I have no personal experience, and I have yet to read a book on-screen. I'm bombarded by other people's opinions, and the observation I've made is:

People who don't have an e-reader don't like them. People who do, do. But they would, wouldn't they, in both cases? No-one's going to buy one unless they like the idea in the first place.

Maybe that's a clue to the truth: for the time being at least, there are going to be those who prefer one or the other; I've even heard people say they like both, but for different purposes: e.g. paper for books to treasure, and electronic for books to take on holiday.

I can't help noticing Electrikinc will be offering print on demand. Perhaps what we're witnessing is not so much the death of the physical book, more the end of its primacy, and of the long print run.

One thing's for certain: I'm going to have to get that e-reader.