Ask the Author: Paula Smith
Answered Questions (7)
Paula Smith
I love the author Catherine Alliott - so I am always keen to read her latest.
Paula Smith
Yes, living without chocolate
Paula Smith
Everyone exper'iences this. I leave writing for a few days and I soon become eager to return to my story to continue it. Sometimes thinking time is needed. I like to go back over my story line in my head and sometimes I realise my writing block has been down to needing to rethink some of the scenes.
Paula Smith
It excites me to write. It has opened up new challenges, friendships and the desire to entertain others.
Paula Smith
Get your ideas down on paper and forge out a story line. Think about your main characters and those that will support them to move your story along. The first few chapters can be hardest but once you get into the flow of your story it is surprising how the rest of it just falls together. Write when you feel most inspired and not when you feel you ought to. I would sometimes leave writing for several days at a time and then come back to it.
Paula Smith
The inspiration for the actual story is an interesting one. Firstly, as a woman of a certain age (yes, we all get there eventually) I have many stories to tell of the trials and tribulations of friends and colleagues who have experienced the end of long-term relationships. My heroine, Alice, faces just this. However, it was essential for me that Alice had a happy ending to her story. This is not just because I am unashamedly, a hopeless romantic but Alice’s story came from all the true, real-life happy endings I have witnessed in my own life.
Nearly all the friends and colleagues I know whose long-term relationships have come to an end (in some cases after many years) have all agreed that their life changed becoming stronger as a result of their experiences. The trauma of a relationship ending can never be minimalised but the rainbow at the end can be very real indeed. Many friends discussed how the very changes they were forced to make in their lives ultimately made them more confident and independent people than they had previously been. It may have been a longer journey for some than others but it was a journey that had a positive outcome.
My character, Alice, goes through such a journey. Ultimately it isn’t her makeover with the fashion guru Gok Wan, or her reading of Daphne D’Amour’s self-help book on how to be irresistible to everyone you meet but it is Alice’s journey to independence and self-discovery.
Nearly all the friends and colleagues I know whose long-term relationships have come to an end (in some cases after many years) have all agreed that their life changed becoming stronger as a result of their experiences. The trauma of a relationship ending can never be minimalised but the rainbow at the end can be very real indeed. Many friends discussed how the very changes they were forced to make in their lives ultimately made them more confident and independent people than they had previously been. It may have been a longer journey for some than others but it was a journey that had a positive outcome.
My character, Alice, goes through such a journey. Ultimately it isn’t her makeover with the fashion guru Gok Wan, or her reading of Daphne D’Amour’s self-help book on how to be irresistible to everyone you meet but it is Alice’s journey to independence and self-discovery.
Paula Smith
For me it was lockdown! After many years of what seemed like driving up a road with many different lanes at considerable speed, life suddenly came to a halt. For the first time, in many years, I found myself with too much time on my hands. It was at this point I decided to make the best of a bad situation. I had no more excuses but to get on and write. Writing is all consuming; it was just the tonic I needed. I wrote for hours each day.
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