Being Inspired by Local Folklore ...

Over the next few months the Novel Points of View team will be inviting guest writers to the blog. Their brief is to write a post connected to writing, reading, books and creativity. I'm delighted to introduce writer, Sandra Ireland to the blog as she shares how her interest in local folklore inspires her writing.

Rae Cowie

Sandra Ireland
Author

My new novel The Unmaking of Ellie Rook (Polygon) will hit the shelves on July 11^th, and it’s always nice to pause for a moment in the hectic round of promotion to reflect on how it all began! By the time a book is published, you often feel quite divorced from it. After all the editing, proofreading and general tweaking, it becomes a product, and it’s good to have the chance to revisit the inspiration behind it.

      Although ‘Ellie Rook’ is a contemporary story about strong women, or more accurately, women in the process of finding their strength, it is rooted in an old legend about a real historical figure who lived not too far from me in the tenth century.  I first heard about the legend of Finella from acclaimed St Cyrus artist Sheila MacFarlane. Sheila works from her boathouse studio in the windswept and beautiful village of Tangleha, just north of St Cyrus, Aberdeenshire. I spent a wonderful afternoon with her, discussing the legend and taking a peek at her work.

The story goes that King Kenneth II executed Finella’s son, and in revenge she set a trap for him at her hunting lodge in Fettercairn. Luring him there to show off her new weapons, she rigged a crossbow to kill the king when he opened the door. Other versions have a more complex set-up, but as soon as the king fell down dead, Finella was forced to run for her life. The king’s men and their hounds chased her through the Howe of the Mearns towards the sea until they came to a 65 foot waterfall in what’s now called the Den of Finella. The lady was forced to make a decision; to stand and be killed or to jump to her death.  I visited the Den for research purposes and the gorge is dizzying. You can’t actually get close to the waterfall now, so I had to use a little artistic license in my novel!

Sandra at Barrie Mill -
inspiration for her second novel, Bone Deep

Sheila has captured the strength, earthiness and dignity of this woman in two large wood/linocuts standing almost 2590cm high and 760cm wide. During my visit I was lucky enough to view the prints, one of Finella  standing on a tree stump, and the other of her diving headfirst into the water. She is accompanied in the first image by a black feral cat. The detail is exquisite, portraying not just the female form but the power of bone, sinew and muscle beneath the skin.

Finella's Face - copy of wood/linocut
created by artist
Sheila MacFarlane

Few people have heard of Finella. You might think that her outrageous act and daring flight might have assured her a place in the history books. Macbeth, after all, did something similar just a century later and we all know about that, or rather a version of the truth. I suppose all such historical tales are merely a version of events, which is why we have such a rich strand of folklore and myth in our culture. I’m very proud to have had the opportunity to create my version of Finella’s tale in my new novel.

Thank you, Sandra, for joining us on our blog this week and revealing how inspiration can be found in both folklore and other art forms. To find out more about Sandra, her novels and latest releases, plus purchase links,  just read on ... 

BIO:

Sandra Ireland was born in Yorkshire, brought up in Northumberland and lived for many years in Ireland. She’s now based in Carnoustie, the ‘home of golf’, a game she doesn’t play, but a walk around the golf course is the ideal remedy for writer’s block! She is secretary of Angus Writers’ Circle and co-founder of Chasing Time Writing Retreats, now in its third year.

Sandra is the author of three psychological thrillers: Beneath the Skin, Bone Deep and The Unmaking of Ellie Rook, all published by Polygon. A non-fiction title, Grist! The life, lore and  landscape of the Scottish Watermill will be published by Little Toller in the near future.

                          You can catch up with Sandra on

Twitter - @22_ireland

Facebook - Sandra Ireland Author 

Instagram - slireland22 

or on her

Website - https://sandrairelandauthor.com

Author of Beneath the Skin, Bone Deep and The Unmaking of Ellie Rook.

Grist! The Life, Lore & Landscape of the Scottish Watermill coming soon.

Secretary Angus Writers' Circle

One Third of the Chasing Time Retreat Team

Do you ever long to have a new beginning?

This blog sort of follows on from Linda's of the 22nd June where she talked about new things versus old. I make no apologies for this! I was stumped for ideas!

In less than a month I have a new book out 'Villa of Sun and Secrets'. Set in Antibes in the south of France it has a multi generation storyline and is about new beginnings for several of my characters.

July 14th is Bastille Day here in France marking the anniversary of the storming of the infamous Bastille prison in 1789 - a turning point for the success of the French Revolution. Definitely a new beginning there. Three years ago beautiful Nice became a scene of carnage when a terrorist targeted the Promenade des Anglais. For those having to come to terms with loosing loved ones in the attack it was an unwelcome new beginning to their way of life they most certainly did not want.

Emmanuel Macron at the 2018 Bastille Day parade. Photo: AFP

Known in France as La Fȇte Nationale, this year Bastille Day falls on a Sunday which means the traditional weekday national holiday to celebrate all things French is lost. It will be work as usual on Monday - maybe! But it is still a day when the French really go to town celebrating their country. 

There's a big parade in Paris that goes on for hours, with tanks , horses, endless regiments of soldiers, sailors, and displays by motorbike riders, horses, and flyovers by military aircraft. TV coverage starts at seven in the morning with special pre-recorded documentaries about all things military as well as live interviews. In the evening there is an open air concert by the Eiffel Tower which is followed by a spectacular fireworks show. This year too, three years after the tragedy, the fireworks will return to Nice.

My first experience of Bastille day, twenty years ago this year, was in the medieval city of Carcassone down in the Aude department in southern France. And sorry to say it was all a bit of a damp squib - or firework to be precise. We were in the middle of our long cycle ride down south and on July 13th, we found ourselves in Carcassone. After finding the campsite and setting up our tent etc. we walked into the Cité itself to explore. (If you ever get the chance to visit, do go.)

But on this particular day everywhere was a mass of cables, no entry signs, and men busy setting up the fireworks display for the following evening.

Back at the campsite everyone told us that Carcassone hosted the most spectacular firework display outside of Paris.The walls of the Cité are lit up and it becomes the Red Cité. We had to see it. So late the next evening we joined a large crowd to watch and admire the pyrotechnics. We duly oohed and ahhed for roughly five minutes and then everything stopped. Due to a faulty something or other the rest of the display just didn't happen. The photo below from another year shows some of what we should have seen but sadly didn't.

domainedepalatz.com

Bastille Day in 1789 signified a new beginning for the French en masse. But thankfully new beginnings are much tamer affairs normally. 

In 'Villa of Sun and Secrets', Carla gets her welcome new beginning when she inherits a half share in a French villa. But her 73 year old Aunt Josette who owns the other half, is not totally delighted about this because it forces her into making life changing decisions and having a new beginning herself. 

So, what constitutes a good new beginning for you? Moving house? Starting a new job? Getting married? Do you ever long to run away maybe and start over again? Would love to hear from you.

* * *

A LOVE AFFAIR WITH AUDIOBOOKS

Regular readers of the blog will know how much I love listening to podcasts so I found it interesting when the Audio Publishers Association reported a 23% increase in audiobook revenue during 2018. Booklovers are apparently being wooed to the dark side, preferring to listen rather than read. But listening isn’t actually reading, is it? I still wasn’t tempted to give audiobooks a try.

Perhaps my reluctance to embrace audiobooks was caused by memories of stressfully long car journeys, wonky cassettes tapes and scratched CDs when my sons were small, when we listened to the Adventures of Winnie the Pooh on a loop. Or perhaps I treasured the time I spent reading as me-time. Whatever the reason, I held off joining the audiobook-loving masses until listening to an audiobook became the most sensible option.

WHY I TURNED TO THE DARK SIDE

My book group chose to read Joanna Cannon’s bestselling debut, The Trouble with Goats and Sheep. An excellent choice and a book I’d already enjoyed but didn’t wish to read again. I did, however, want to brush on the story, so I downloaded the audiobook courtesy of my local library - and loved it. The novel is so beautifully narrated, the changes in tone and depth for each character bringing Grace, the ten year-old protagonist, alive in a way that was magical and different to the experience I had when reading.

SO THE LOVE AFFAIR BEGAN …

I was hooked. Once I finished The Trouble with Goats and Sheep, I immediately began searching for my next audiobook read - My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante, Nine Perfect Strangers by Liane Moriarty, The Doll Factory by Elizabeth Macneal...

WHAT MAKES AUDIOBOOKS SO SEDUCTIVE?

So what changed my mind? Well listening to a story is comforting. Perhaps it taps into memories of being cuddled on mum’s knee, or harks back to times when families swapped stories around the fire. But audiobooks have been around in various guises for a long time. What has caused their popularity to soar NOW?

WHY THE RECENT BOOM IN AUDIOBOOKS?

Using quick and easy to install apps on mobile phones, bookworms are listening in the gym, on the train, whilst driving or powering through boring chores. But there’s a catch, audiobooks can be pricey. So where to begin?

4 WAYS TO LISTEN FOR FREE...

1. Check out the audiobooks available to download for FREE via your local library.

2. Amazon’s excellent Audible service offers an introductory three-month trial, allowing readers to download one book per month absolutely FREE.

3. Amazon also offers FREE trials of its Kindle Unlimited service, during which time booklovers may listen to as many audiobooks as they wish.

4. Finally, for UK readers, Good Housekeeping magazine has partnered with publisher, Harper Collins to create the GH Audiobook Club and over the coming months will be offering every Good Housekeeping reader FREE audiobooks via Kobo. This month’s FREE to download book just happens to be The Trouble with Goats and Sheep which I highly recommend! To find out how to claim those free books click here.

I will always love learning via podcasts but now I enjoy mixing things up by listening to audiobooks too.

So, if you are already a lover of audiobooks, which do you recommend? And if you have yet to join the audiobook revolution, are you tempted?

Happy listening!

Rae x

WHAT DO YOU CALL A MAN WITH NO NAME? by Victoria Cornwall

I am one of those writers who prefers to plot out a novel before I begin to write. It stops me from going down an avenue that I can't get out off, going off piste or forgetting where I am in the story if I take a short break. I felt confident in this foolproof method ... until I wrote The Daughter of River Valley.

Despite plotting the story, I soon discovered I had a major problem I did not plan for. I was only a few pages in at the time and I knew I had several hundred to go before the problem would be solved. "What on earth was the problem?" I hear you ask.

At the beginning of the story Beth Jago, the feisty heroine, finds an intruder in her home. Acting on instinct, she does what any feisty gal would do, she knocks him out with a frying pan. The intruder, which just happens to be our handsome hero, soon regains consciousness, but it quickly becomes apparent that he is very unwell and has no clue who he is. He has lost his memory, cannot recall why he is in Beth's house and, more importantly, who he is. Yes, that's right, he has forgotten his name.

This is the main thrust of the story. Who is this intruder? Will he die? Will Beth be arrested for murder? Should Beth care for him until he recovers? Can she trust him? Is he as dangerous as his nightmares suggest?

So I was happily typing away when I came up with my first problem, namely what do I call him if I don't want to reveal who he really is? Each time he spoke I couldn't simply tag his words with his name, so I had to resort to typing the man/stranger/intruder.  There was a limit to how many times I could use said the man or the man replied. I feared that using the man might form a barrier between the reader and the character and I certainly didn't have the energy (or motivation) to use it for several hundred pages. It's difficult to feel as if you are getting to know someone if you don't even know their name. What was I to do? Simple ... let one of the characters give him a temporary name, thought I.

A temporary name seemed the perfect solution, but even this has its pitfalls. There is the risk of the reader bonding with a character who has one name, then feeling a little disconnected when it is finally revealed what he is really called. Imagine reading Pride and Prejudice, you have bonded with Elizabeth, the heroine, for several hundred pages, yet towards the end of the book you discover she is called Annabelle. There is a slight disconnect, a feeling she is not exactly the same woman you have accompanied through the novel. It was something I wanted to avoid, yet it seemed impossible not to.

So it was a conundrum. How did I solve it? You will have to read The Daughter of River Valley to find out, but the first thing I had to do was go back to the drawing board and re-plot parts of the story. Will I write another story which involves memory loss? I don't plan to, but you know what they say ... the best laid plans ...

The Daughter of River Valley is available in the following formats:-

Paperback 

Audiobook download

Ebook

CD Audiobook

Victoria Cornwall

SO WHAT'S NEW? Linda Mitchelmore

I make no apologies for saying I like new things. That's not to say I spend endlessly - I do cherish the old as well; the favourites, the sentimental things. But there's something about new things - shoes, clothes, jewellery, bags, a food mixer even - that can lift the spirits. Finding a new author to read and enjoy can be one and I well remember 'finding' Elizabeth Berg and then devouring just about everything she's written. I got that in first because this is a writers' blog. But it was actually a photo of a friend's newly-born pigeon pair twins that sparked this blogpost. There's just something so scrumptious, so full of hope, with a new baby, isn't there?

I extend that sentiment to all new life, be it wild and domestic animals, bird life, insect life .... it all seems such a miracle. (I will draw the line at reptiles, but that's probably another blogpost!) And then there's the new romance. You know, that butterflies-in-the-tum feeling you get just thinking about the new person who's come into your life and with whom you are falling in love. It colours our days, doesn't it? Consumes our thoughts. Again there's that full-of-hope feeling for a future we get. There is the ecstasy and the agony of it .... the ecstasy being that we can feel how their hand felt on our cheek, or smell their unique scent, or hear their voice, even when they're miles away. And the agony is sitting by the phone just willing it to ring - will they still feel the same as they did half an hour ago when you parted? Will you be able to detect a cooling off or a hotting up of the relationship?

And I don't know about you but I find we get to a stage where we don't really notice our surroundings .... the couch has been there for ages, the lamps came out of the ark, the footstool was your grandmother's or whoever's, and then suddenly it all seems so deadly drab and we have to do something - it needs something new. Cushions do it for me, which is probably just as well for my bank balance.

So where, I hear you ask, is this all leading? Obvious really, this being a writers' blog - I have a new book out. Oh yes, I do. It's called THE LITTLE B&B AT COVE END and is out already in ebook format and paperback will be in early August, although I've got my author copies now .... and very lovely they are too. There's that new paper smell of them, the pristine way the pages almost crackle as you turn them for the first time.

But a new book won't be new for very long .... soon it will be last month's publication, last year's. So I have to start working on a new book .... and I have. Its working title is PAST PERFECT and I am 72 pages in .... watch this space for the next new thing.

The Devil in the Detail

Historical research:
time-consuming but rewarding.

So I decided to write a historical novel.

This isn’t strictly true. What I actually decided to do was write about a set of characters whose story wasn’t set in the present day. Although I love reading historical fiction I’ve always consciously avoided writing it, because the necessary research seemed time-consuming, unwieldy and difficult. But one character, in particular, has niggled at me for a while. She’s a woman whose husband survived the First World War but might as well not have done. He’s physically healthy but the war broke him and he’ll spend the rest of his life in an asylum.

Where does this leave her? In her early twenties with a young child, she’s effectively a single mother. The ring on her wedding finger means her reputation is intact but she’s trapped in a limbo made for her by her own loyalty to her husband and society’s expectations. What if she wants more children? What if she wants to marry again?

This character was my starting point. Once she’d settled in my head there was no option but to write a historical novel, but the process is overwhelming. I’ve read extensively about the period so that gives me a good start. Much of the area in which she lived is relatively unchanged since the inter-war period and if you can close your eyes to anything post-1939 (there are historic maps which help) it’s easy to envisage the location.

I’ve read a lot of books about the social side of it and I’ve spent time reading old newspapers, which taught me that people don't change. Some men fell out in pubs, others were abusive to railway staff, and their counsels appealed for mercy on the grounds of their background. (“On the Saturday immediately previous he had been discharged from a Carlisle hospital where he had been for five months suffering from shell shock.”) Young women tried to kill themselves and left heartrending little notes. (“Please forgive me, Granny, for all that I have done. Everything is against me and there is nothing left to live for.”)

The big picture, then, is fine. People were pretty much the same as they are now. So I cracked on, only to fall down over the details, not of what my characters do or think or feel but of how they actually lived. So far I’ve completed 1000 words and the following questions have stumped me:

What was a first World War demob suit made from?
How much was a country bus fare in 1920?
How big did a village have to be before it had its own policeman?

It’s going to be a long process. Historical novelists….how do you do it?

SURPRISE! SURPRISE!

Something a bit different for our joint blog this time. We all answer 3 simple questions:

    1. Do you like surprises? Have you ever had a memorable surprise from anyone?





 2. Have any of your characters surprised you by 'talking back' or doling something you hadn't plotted?

3. What makes you smile?

    KATH starts us off:

1. Ye-es... I do like surprises... but sometimes they can be a bit overwhelming, so I always urge caution to people planning them. My most memorable surprise came on the weekend of Valentine's Day, 2000. I had thought we were going to visit friends for the weekend, then going out on Valentine's night (the Monday), and had booked a restaurant and babysitter. Unknown to me, my husband had thought it would be nice to spend the first Valentine's of the new Millennium in Athens. So, on the Friday morning when I thought I was spending the day working from home, my parents turned up to babysit for the weekend. I was asked to pack quickly, then whisked away, with no idea where we were going until we arrived at the airport check-in gate. My husband had arranged my days off work, cancelled my meetings, phoned the friends I thought we were visiting and asked them to play along, phoned the babysitter I'd booked and explained the situation to her as well, and cancelled the restaurant reservation I'd made. It was a litle disorienting!

Anyway, we had a wonderful few days and it was a memorable long weekend, but a part of me felt I'd missed out on what I'd planned. Also, anticipation of an event is half the pleasure, isn't it? Since then I've said I like surprises BUT I like to know that a surprise is coming. Does that make sense?

2. Oh yes, my characters don't always do what I had planned for them. I remember one in particular, in The Girl from Ballymor, who told me in no uncertain terms he'd grown up and was a different person now, and just wasn't going to do what I thought he would, and therefore I'd need to work out some different motivation for him. Actually he was right and the book was all the better for his intervention, so it worked out in the end. Half the fun of writing is getting to know your characters, and finding out how they react to the situations you put them in!

3.  What makes me smile? Mountains. I have what my family call a mountain smile, which only appears when I am half way up one. I also smile at kittens, cute children and large cups of tea being handed to me by my husband.

JO:

1. Hmm…it rather depends on the surprise. A delivery of flowers I wasn’t expecting? Lovely. A dead (or worse, live) mouse in the kitchen (courtesy of the cat)? Not so much. And then there’s context. If the loving note I find on my pillow is from my other half, I’m over the moon. If it’s from a complete stranger, I’m calling the police.

2.  My characters always surprise me, partly because I write the first draft as a way of learning about them. I won’t give details because of spoilers, but at the end of one of my crime novels one character revealed themselves to me as the killer. I had written the whole thing convinced it was someone else…

3.What makes me smile? Cute animal videos. Clever visual jokes. Good guys triumphing against the odds and bad guys getting their comeuppance. Sunny days. Happy endings.

LINDA:

1. I like surprises unless it’s a surprise meal out somewhere posh and I haven’t been warned and am in scruffs! One of the loveliest surprises I’ve ever had was coming up to my birthday when a parcel from Amazon arrived and inside was the most glorious book, The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris. A whopper of a coffee table book I would never have bought for myself it is full of the most exquisite paintings of nature with calligraphy letters and short verse.

2. My characters speak to me always. But it was Janey in Christmas at Strand House who surprised me most by announcing she wanted to be an artist – that wasn’t in the script – and it meant I had to do a bit of extra research on art on her behalf!

3. Trees make me smile, always. I love the almost silk fabric texture of emerging leaves, sparse at first, as though some unseen hand has magicked them onto the bare winter brnaches. Then they fill out, week on week during summer getting so dense you can’t see the centre, before the bonfire flame display of autumn. And we go full circle again with bare branches against a steel-grey winter sky ..... how can all that not make you smile? 

VICTORIA:

1.   I would love to have a surprise party thrown for me (as long as I am dressed for the occasion and not looking as if I have been dragged through a hedge backwards!) Or a surprise holiday (as long as I have nothing already planned). Hhhmmm, I always thought I liked surprises, but perhaps the reality is that I don't!  

2.  I am a great plotter, but I didn't plot the twist in A Daughter's Christmas Wish. Nicholas, the hero, was keeping a secret that even I wasn't aware of until I wrote and exposed it.

3.  What makes me smile? My husband when he is being funny. The sound of birds on a summer's day. Animals and little children doing silly things. My adult children when they are happy about something. Lots of things ... too many to list here. They usually cost nothing and has something to do with nature and the positive (or innocent) behavior of animals or humans.

RAE:

1.Yes, I love surprises. Although when I think about it, I haven't actually received that many. The most recent was tickets to see Michael Bublé in concert in Hyde Park. I've had a crush on him for years and practically hyper-ventilated when I opened the envelope. Perhaps it's for the best that I'm not surprised too often!

2.Yes! In my current emotional fiction novel I mapped a whole strand for a main character who, half-way through, decided to take a different route. She is someone who doesn't trust authority, so perhaps it was to be expected!

3.What makes me smile? The brilliance of nature in all its forms - a wild coastline, snow-covered mountains, the baby crow I found, my pet cat, the perennials that bloom in my garden despite being irnored, wildlife documentaries - all lift my spirits. As does listening to the La La Land playlist.

JENNIE

1. I think I do like surprises although like Rae I haven't had any real surprises recently. One I remember though happened a couple of years ago. We'd taken the dog for his five minute mid-day stroll the usual 200 yards down to the river and as we walked back up we could see a car parked outside the cottage. Our daughter and family had come for the weekend. 'We wanted to surprise you,' daughter said. Well they did that!

2. Yes, my characters often take me down plotlines that I hadn't anticipated. I wish I could be more of a plotter than a pantster but I can't. Writing a synopsis before I've written the story is my béte noir - once I know the ending, as far as I'm concerned the story is finished!

3. What makes me smile? Phone calls from friends, watching Django our rescue collie play with Gus our stray cat, walking along a Devonshire shoreline in winter,

baby goats, hearing happy news from my children and watching Mama Mia always without fail makes me feel happy. I'll finish the post with the picture of Gus on the roof because he's always making me laugh.