Sir Harry Johnston International School

Had a lovely time this morning talking to Year Seven at Sir Harry Johnston International School (@SHJSecondary), Malawi. 

My friend Col works there as an English teacher and he's started a monthly author talk. Last month they spoke with crime writer Adrian Magson, which made national news. Was a really good session, and the students had prepared some challenging interview questions about my writing process, my influences and background. It was great to hear about what they're reading too: Neil Gaiman and one of my nephew's favourites, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, among others. Hoping to catch up with Col back in the UK over Christmas, and I've been promised a write-up of the interview, which I'll post here on my blog.

If you're an author and you're interested in helping to inspire tomorrow's writers, drop me a line and I'll put you in touch with Col.

The Dabbler

Just wanted to mention a lovely interview I did for Dianna L. Gunn on her blog The Dabbler, where I talk in detail about the inspiration for Rosy Hours.

I think it is always difficult when an author takes on characters with cult status. The Phantom of the Opera is so entrenched in popular culture, it’s so well known, that you run the risk of upsetting a lot of people. Choosing to return to Leroux’s Gothic roots makes things tricky, too. Most people know Phantom from the musical adaptation. Erik is a character who inspires much greater sympathy in Webber’s version – less torture, less murder, less of everything except singing. 

I rather took the other approach – more torture, more murder, less singing.

A few weeks back I was also reading an article in which they asked acclaimed authors what had most surprised them about the writing life. One of my favourite answers was Linwood Barclay (who I was fortunate enough to see at Cheltenham in 2013):

The biggest surprise I think is that becoming an author has afforded me the opportunity to experience humiliation in ways I never knew existed. You think, 'Wow. I'm a published author, now.' Then you go to a bookstore event, and absolutely nobody comes. The only thing worse than nobody coming to an event, is if only one person shows up. If nobody comes, you just go to the nearest bar. But if one person is there, you have to talk, and maybe even sign a book, if one manages to get sold.

I've seen this happen to friends, and sat through a book signing of my own where not a soul came. It's been a huge relief this time around that people have turned up to talks, venturing out in the dark and the rain. Really means a lot to writers to meet their readers.

Kendal Library Talk

Had a fabulous time at Kendal Library in the Lake District yesterday. Thanks hugely to Kinga and Janet for making me so welcome, and to all who ventured out in the rain to talk Mazandaran in the mid-1800s. The feedback was truly lovely, glad to have fun and inspire. A copy of Those Rosy Hours at Mazandaran is now available in the library.

Dead Letter Chest

Loving this article: 300-year-old letters found in leather trunk shed light on life in the 17th Century

Apparently writing on behalf of a “mutual friend”, a Dutch opera singer who left for Paris, the letter details of the singer discovering of her pregnancy and appeals for money to make a return trip home...

The letter itself is marked “neit hebben”, meaning the merchant (and most likely the father of the child) declined to accept it...

It reminds me of a film called Dead Letter Office:

Alice's father left when she was a child. She continued to share her life with him in letters that she sent not realising that he never received them. Eventually, they all come back with "Dead Letter Office" stamped on the front. As an adult, she becomes consumed with a desire to find him and takes a job with the Dead Letter Office, convinced that she can use them to fulfil her romantic notions of a reunion with her father. What awaits her at the DLO is far more than that. -  Peter Webb

Since that film I've always been a little fascinated by the idea of lost letters, and a DLO. A graveyard for missed opportunities, hopes and desires.

Live Tea and Jeopardy

If you haven't been following Emma Newman's Tea and Jeopardy podcast, you can catch up here. She's just uploaded two live episodes from Octocon, Dublin with author C. E. Murphy and FantasyCon, Nottingham with Brandon Sanderson. For those who don't know, Emma is the voice of Those Rosy Hours audiobook. Check out her latest release, Planetfall.

The Butler Did It

Well, in the last ever episode of Downton Abbey (bar Christmas shenanigans), the butler really did do it - to himself.

If you haven't seen it yet and don't want spoilers, go read somebody else's blog for a bit.

I'm not a mad Downton fan. I don't dislike it either. It's just sort of become one of those background programs like Doc Martin and Midsomer Murders which is so quintessentially British that it quietly reaffirms our heritage in the background whilst we're running a bath and contemplating what's for tea.

But this week the long-foreseen-unless-partially-blind plot inevitability came about, whereby tortured, lovelorn Mr. Barrow the Butler, gay in a time when you got jailed for it - and narrowly having avoided just such a fate in previous episodes - finally decided to pack it all in and top himself.

Actor Rob James-Collier played it so well that you understood it was headed that way, but I still found myself a little dismayed.

"I really like Mr. Barrow. He's my favourite character," I said. 

"Why?" my friend replied. "He's an arsehole."

Well, yes. But arseholes are often the most interesting characters.

He's always been so very:

Not exactly evil - well, yes, sometimes a little bit evil - but perfectly understandable. I like arsehole characters because they're complex, and complexity is the closest constant of the human state. Open your mouth and what comes out is not necessarily what you meant to say, but it defines you in the eyes of others.

Poor Mr. Barrow. So much ambition, trapped in a place where you must know your place. Think most of us know what it's like to dislike our job, miss out on advancement over personality clashes, be misunderstood, feel unloved, ashamed or embarrassed. I think he's the most human of the lot.

I think, as writers, that's what we're always looking for - the reaction behind the action. What are characters reacting to in order to behave the way they do? What triggers them, what pushes their buttons, what effect does that have on those around them?

It's harder to do that with real people. Characters allow you to slow things down, rewind, and consider the situation from different angles without being embroiled in the plot. Whereas Real Life (tm) drama rarely gets a rewrite, and our own characters play out before objectivity has a chance to step in and rescue us.

Anyway, I'm glad they fished him out of the bathtub in time.

On another note, I also caught London Spy. I gave a little squee of delight to see Ben Whishaw and Jim Broadbent together (total Cloud Atlas fan). As someone tweeted, it was refreshing to see a lead gay man where his sexuality was just him, rather than the be all and end all of his character. I think we are seeing this more and more. Telly is getting more complex over sexuality with things like Black Sails, Last Tango in Halifax and that traumatic ending of Outlander. When I think back to what I used to watch round the box with my parents and grandparents - we're living in interesting times. Possibly the most fabulous time ever to be a writer.

Remembrance Sunday 2015

Posted elsewhere about Remembrance Sunday. You can watch a video clip of our village march there. Some more pictures of Nana and Great Granddad Tom on this blog.