Rollercoaster days

Things are changing fast here at Alexander Towers (my house is NOT called Alexander Towers but it so should be!). Cancerman will be cancer-free or close to it within the week (is it tasteless to call him Cancerman? I do think of him as a superhero), two people have recognised me *cringe* from a newspaper article in the Daily Mail, and both were really lovely about it, I got notes about book 2 from my editor, which were very helpful and positive, and I've been trying to organise the whole of Solstice/Christmas before the surgery. We've also fitted in a wedding, trips to the hospital and mastering eating out when one of us is gluten-free and one is vegan. We are also going for a cure for his cancer, and have a great team behind us.

Meanwhile I have barely written anything in two months, usually the time it takes to write half a book. It's depressing, and I've realised how much therapy writing is for me. Losing myself in someone else's much more immediate worries (if fictional) and if necessary playing god at the same time, is therapeutic. I always knew that but now I'm finding it works better than I thought. So I'm going to roll my sleeves up and write again, get back into my routine, because I feel like I'm blown about by hospital and kids and Christmas and not by the demands of the books. Not to mention cooking vegan every day - that's an hour extra most days, because the kids aren't vegan and there's a lot to do!

* It's OK to call him Cancerman providing I stop once he has the surgery. He's still going to be a superhero but with better health. I'll try really hard not to point out how much he glows in the dark during radiotherapy. Really hard.

Drowning or waving?

That's me, with the hands trying to reach the air. I may be waving.

By Sarah Thomo

I'm waiting for cancer to be scooped out of the man I love so he has a chance of living. A good chance, sure, but surgery is so savage. It's so aggressive. But so is the cancer, so we have to man up and cope with the whole thing and not let it affect our lives too much. Only it does. It's hard to think about anything without it creeping in.

I'm writing the end of book 3, in which a couple of characters die, and it's heart-breaking. I want to save them, I want to wave my god-like writer's hand and rescue them because I can't do it in real life. In real life some young woman surgeon gets to wave her less than god-like hand and attempt to get all the cancer cells that have inexplicably set up home inside an otherwise healthy man. No, we have to rely on human skill and radiotherapy and drugs.

So my writing and my life are melancholy at the moment, and I'm trying not to plan too much, or commit to anything beyond the needs of my large family and the books. I'm waiting to rewrite book 2 and knock it into shape for my editor, then finish book 3, late but better (hopefully) than the others.

Meanwhile we grieve for the old days, when we planned a long future and enjoyed our ignorance. I think I may be drowning after all.

Blogging and Cancer

It's been incredibly difficult to blog through the last few weeks. I thought it would be easier, with the book coming out on the 10th October, but that fact has been overshadowed by other events on my life. Twenty-two years ago, I was widowed. My young husband was being treated for a chest infection in hospital when he collapsed and died from what turned out to be leukaemia. I was crushed, and also felt totally let down by the medical system that had repeatedly failed to notice - despite us asking - that he had leukaemia. Now, in the last few weeks, my second husband has been diagnosed with another form of cancer. I don't want to dwell on it here, but you can't totally put yourself aside when you write (well, I can't, anyway). At least he has been diagnosed, and has been offered treatment, and unlike Steve, has a good chance of surviving, at least for many years. That's all I can say about it, except that it has driven a tractor through my writing schedule, and with surgery coming up in just weeks or days, will continue to do so. I shall just have to write when I can.

Book wise, the good news is that The Secrets of Life and Death has sold in Finland as well as Germany and the US. I have no idea how it's selling here yet - hardbacks don't sell well here and it's really Kindle sales and Amazon that we'll eventually look at. The paperback will get a bit more of a plug next year. Selling abroad is just a bit of a bonus for the author. They may be quite modest sums involved - the cost of translation is huge - but the writer doesn't have to do anything for it. I'm really looking forward to the covers - they will suggest another take on the book, another graphic interpretation. Interesting stuff.

I'm tackling the contemporary strand of book 3 and after sorting out a weird moment when I've introduced two different divergent explanations of the same thing, have found the story flowing again. I'm looking forward to adding all the Kelley stuff, of which I've written about half, but will need to completely rewrite in the first person having started out in third. The thing is, the other two books work in first person so I think I need to bring them into line. Tricky stuff when the tale is being narrated as much by his daughter as anyone. I'll work it out.

I have had great fun blogging for Mslexia - another distraction from blogging here. I also had the surreal experience of being photographed for the Daily Mail. This led to some strange conversations with a make-up lady called Antonia.
'Have you got anything a bit more formal - less pattern, not black?'
Everything I have is black or patterned. Or black and patterned.
'Well, think about what you would wear to a dinner party?'
I usually wear an apron, since I'm always the cook, or we're going to someone's barbeque in which case I wear T-shirt and jeans. Like I'm wearing now.
'Well, do you have shoes?'
Boots or trainers?
'No, proper shoes. Oh, you really do mean boots or trainers. How about a nice necklace? Let's have a look at your jewellery box...you don't have one?'

I wouldn't let her put curlers in my hair, but she did plaster me in make-up - to my mind, anyway. I do appreciate that the flash will bleach out anyone, but I don't normally wear make-up since I don't really give a f*@k what I look like. I couldn't wait to get it off. But she, and the photographer were so nice and friendly and kind we did do our best to co-operate, and hopefully the result will be worth it. Watch this space.

Beyond publication - what happens next?

I started my blog Witchway - A Writer's Journey to Publication - in July 2009, full of optimism that I could improving my writing. At least to the point where a creative writing tutor wouldn't run and hide when I submitted the next dreadful instalment of my learning curve. Seriously. I once removed all the adverbs and adjectives out of a short story which then became flash fiction. I wrote:

I must believe that anything I do to the empty page must be worse than just enjoying it's white lovely blankness.

So I said (with three adjectives) in 2009. Since then I've written about how much courses have improved my writing, and how much reading improves my storytelling, and I've banged on about how competitions can get you a) noticed and b) an agent. But now I'm in the And Beyond area - what happens after your book comes out?

Foreign deals were one thing I hadn't expected. First it sold in dollars to the US, nice to know but since I'd sold the World English rights, it only affects my advance here (it pays some off). I might have to look at some edits to make it into an American book at some point. But then it sold in Germany - wow! I get a bonus, and the best thing is someone else gets to do all the work of translating the novel (they get handsomely paid, don't imagine some language sweatshop turning out manuscripts in various languages). So I went off to the World Fantasy Con (my first) and immersed myself in the world of fantasy writers, editors, readers and agents (this is my impromptu interview with audible.co.uk). I got home to find there had been an offer from Finland as well, so exciting!

The book was also mentioned by the Independent as well, which was very encouraging, as I'm working on book 3 at the moment. It was great to be at the Del Rey UK party, watching people look at our books, pick them up, discuss them - and then be asked to sign a stack of them. People bought a book, I'm still amazed by that. I want to run after them and say 'I do hope you enjoy it...' 

Life also goes on and I'm adapting to some changes in our family up here on our clifftop, haunted and rambly house (more adjectives). It looks like we may be better moving into town, so I'm going to have to fit edits to book 2 and finishing book 3 around packing and showing people around. *Sigh*. I shall miss it, even the ghosts with their malevolent influences, and no doubt it will end up in more books too. 

Finding myself published

It's been a strange and wonderful journey, from almost too afraid to expose my first attempts to a tutor on a course, all the way to publication. Today I got flowers from Del Rey UK, although I think I should have sent them some, so beautiful is the cover and all the work they have put in to make it stand out. The others are from Russell, who has been amazingly supportive. My friend Downith hosted a blog interview on her blog and the book went up on our very own Del Rey website blog. I've blogged for Mslexia today about my journey from 6 year old writer to the present day. And I received a card of congratulations from Charlotte, my agent, who is so encouraging and supportive she has filled me with renewed enthusiasm for writing. I've eaten too many chocolates, gone out for lunch, and have a bottle of something with bubbles cooling in the fridge (and I normally only drink at Christmas!). It's been a very long day already.

I find myself humbled by the process, the very good fortune I have had to get published. I know there are many writers just as good, with just as good stories, who's timing hasn't been so lucky. I shall continue to bang on about these writers because, while I may be a debut writer, I am a pretty experienced reader. I would like to see these people's books out there.

I have also had my very first Amazon review. It was a good one, and whatever reviews come my way, that will be the one that cheers me up this evening and gives me hope that at least a healthy percentage of readers will like the book. Whoever Alisha Bookseller is, she has put frosting on an already very good day.

The excitement of a new book

I've started my ghost story - or rather, I've started the complete rewrite of the ghost story I wrote three years ago. It's creepy fun, my only dilemma is the main character (ghost's) name - Charlotte. That's my agent's name, so it seems odd to keep using it but honestly? It was her name first and I'm struggling to change it. Maybe I'll be able to further down the line but for the record, Charlotte the ghost is completely unlike Charlotte the agent, who is lovely.

I've also found that it's entwined with another story, the family history of the main characters from their home in the Caribbean and their reluctant return to England. I love the idea of one of those rich families in colonial times gradually losing all their money and more importantly, status, over time. I'm also interested in the experience of people of mixed ethnicity and class in the 1940s, so will be looking at some research about that. I may just have to go to the Caribbean for research purposes. Sigh.

The book comes out on Thursday, and I've sent off 24 copies for review and publicity. It has to sink or swim all by itself now, I'll see what happens. I do like the physical presence of the book, it's a small hardback with a touchy, feely embossed cover, it feels a bit different when you hold it. That seems in tune with its fantasy theme. I'm looking forward to celebrating with friends on the Island this month, and then with Devon friends in November. Great excuse for a party, really. In between, I will be at World Fantasy Con in Brighton for a couple of days, please come and say Hi if you're there, I'll probably be skulking around the Del Rey UK area, hiding behind my book.

Lots of news

Lots of things have happened in the last two weeks. Kids have been taken to university, one daughter has got dream job and now speaks in frequencies only bats can hear, and I have met loads of new writers. Well, not new but new to me... I started teaching locally a few months ago, doing a couple of short story workshops for the library in relation to a competition, then a couple more in two libraries - and it keeps my writing practice pushing forward. People have problems with adjectives - it reminds me to work on my overuse of them. People have slow starts to stories - looking at mine yielded some extremely boring first lines. People have problems calling themselves writers - well, we've all been there.


I've also found out my paperback is coming out on the 13th of March next year and looks like this. Pretty colours and they kept the crows flying. There's a big inferno in chapter 59...

Apart from that it's also been a worrying few weeks about health issues (family, not mine) and now one of the cats has swallowed a load of string. We're feeding it and hope it will pass said string (I'm not looking forward to counting up the pieces from the litter box) otherwise it's a vet visit.

The book actually coming out seems far, far away - but is only on the tenth. I think it will all seem real when we get together with friends on the Island to celebrate on the 22nd.

Meanwhile I have contacted my agent and she suggests writing another book for her to sell. I was working on a thriller but have gone back to a book I started years ago and love. It's the story of two sisters, one of whom dies, and the other carries her around in her head. It's a ghost story but in my imagination ghosts aren't all bad. It's also about genealogy as three women come together because they share a common ancestor, the kind of man who creates lost souls trapped in the house he built. I'm having fun with it, and book three is still getting added to and tweaked.