Confessions of a Self Published Author
My writing began with bad poetry. Fortunately, that has been lost. Thrown out more likely. Then came bad plays. Not intentionally, I just didn't know what I was doing. There were four of them, again all lost along the cliff path of time. Here's hoping they have fallen into the sea and decomposed. I have no illusions there were gems in that apprentice work.
At the time, I had the naïve belief in my genius as a writer. It's a common disease in writers but it is curable, though there are those who suffer it all their lives. My plays were sent off to various theatres, and given to friends and family to read. No one liked them. I was either a misunderstood talent, ahead of my time, or the plays were bad.
Coming to the reluctant conclusion they were not all I hoped them to be, I went on a playwriting course at the City Lit (abbreviation for City Literary College) in London. I was working at the time as an assistant gardener in a park. It was a good job for a writer as the job could be left behind when I left work. It didn't pay much, but enough to get by.
The City Lit course was a two hour evening class. The tutor on the course was Cathy Itzen, an American who had come through the US college system where they taught playwriting and theatre. I learned that I did have some talent, but needed to learn about the craft of playwriting. Good friends were made on the course, which is not a “by the way”, as fellow students appreciate what you are trying to do and can be very supportive.
After two terms, I submitted an idea based on an event that had happened in the park where I was then working. Cathy said: fine, write it. When completed it was a 45 minute stage play that was read in the class and went down well. I wondered what to do with it. Entitled 'Albert and the Mayor's Tree', it had about 12 characters. Great for a class, too short for theatre, way too many characters for any commercial set up. So it was changed to a radio play. And over the summer, when the course was in recess, I sent it to the BBC.
THE 70s
Within a month, the quickest response I've had, they accepted the play. It was performed on radio in 1972 and well received. Throughout the 70s, I continued writing plays. There were four on radio, one on TV, lots of short plays performed in theatres along with three full length plays. I went to work with Soapbox Theatre in the London Borough of Newham as their writer in residence. There, I wrote plays for the company, directed them, and ran a playwriting course. Some of my plays were naturalistic, some in a political vein, some absurd. They taught me about the importance of character, dialogue and surprise in a story.
Skills not limited to plays.
THE 80s
After three years with Soapbox Theatre, with my then partner Gill Hay, I set up a bookshop. Outside the theatre environment, I had stopped writing plays, and became involved in running the bookshop, as well as working in the vegetarian cafe that was also part of The Whole Thing, the name of our multifarious establishment. There, surrounded by books, I had a go at writing a novel, spending more than a year on it. But it was an impossible mess.
I went back to the City Lit. This time for a story writing class. I'd missed a term, and the tutor, Carol Burns, spoke in passing about things like point of view. What on earth was that? I had missed that session, so had to read it up. On discovering what it was, my fiction had more structure. I wrote some short stories. A couple were broadcast on radio.
With growing confidence, my next project was a novel for young adults, 'Rich Kids'. I'd read in a book for writers that you should send off four chapters to a publisher with a short covering letter. The novel finished, I did exactly that, sending off a letter with the chapters to four publishers. When one came back, another was sent out, until after more than a year 18 publishers had been contacted. All had turned the book down; not one of them wanted the full manuscript. And so, despondent, 'Rich Kids' was stuck in a drawer.
Around nine months later, I re-read it, being far enough away from the manuscript to be objective. I thought, this is good. But how was I to get a publisher to read it? Unsolicited manuscripts go into what is disparagingly known as the slush pile. There are many poor books in the slush pile, which makes it hard for any decent ones to be noticed. The office junior might take a bundle home to half scan. Not my aim at all.
I didn't want to sink in the slush.
THE 90s
There had to be a new strategy to sell the book. First of all, the title was changed; it became 'Hard Cash'. Then I persuaded my then partner's 11 year old son, Tom, to review it. Best handwriting, I insisted. And paid him a fiver for his troubles. His review was photocopied and sent off with a letter about the book, but with no chapters. The letter was addressed to a named person. Not to 'Dear Editor’, but to 'Dear Jane Brown' as it might be. My aim was to get 'Jane Brown' to ask me for the manuscript.
It worked. Four publishers were written to and each of them wanted the full manuscript. And one of those, Faber, accepted it. I didn't inform them they had already rejected it when it had been called 'Rich Kids' and sent to 'Dear Editor'. I had not changed a word bar the title.
All of which has made me somewhat cynical about publishers.
'Hard Cash' was well reviewed, and was read on BBC radio by Tony Robinson, now Sir Tony. It is a crime novel, though I didn't see it as such at the time. It's about two boys who find quarter of a million pounds in an empty house and decide to spend it. In my eyes, it was a family book, as much about their families as it is about crime, and I was surprised when the Faber editor called it a crime novel.
Faber published two more of my young adult novels. 'Frances Fairweather Demon Striker!' was shortlisted for the Children's Book Award. The other was 'Half a Bike', which was shortlisted for a French book prize. Walker Books published a book of mine for younger children, 'The Magical World of Lucy-Anne'.
From 1998, I began visiting schools as a children's author. I was also tutor for the Writing for Children course at City University. But as for publishing, everything mailed out was being rejected. It was 'The Good Wolf', a book for ten-year-olds, that altered my mindset.
This is the first paragraph of the reply received from Hodder & Stoughton:
'I found 'The Good Wolf' a thoroughly enjoyable story with great characterisation. You bring the serious issues of being different and not belonging into the story, which gives it substance. It is a well written, fluent piece with a good use of language.'
I distinctly recall thinking as I read this, I've sold it! They love it.
Maybe they did. But not enough. The next paragraph begins:
'Despite finding much to praise, I do not feel it is quite right for our list.'
Looking back on the letter, 21 years later, I find it somewhat unbelievable. Well written, great characterisation, enjoyable story... But you don't want to publish it. What on earth are you looking for?
A badly written, boring story, with weak characters perhaps.
This wasn't the only positive rejection received for 'The Good Wolf'. Other publishers told me how much they liked it. But 'it didn't fit their list' either. That unarguable phrase kept coming in the mail. The book was good, they told me, but they didn't want to publish it.
I was dejected. What could I do? The only possible thing.
Publish it myself.
Self-publishing wasn't that respectable in 1998. But it was do that or pulp it. I read up self-publishing on the internet. And learned it had to be done well. The finished book must be indistinguishable from mainstream books.
I hired a book designer and an illustrator. And printed 2000 copies, under my imprint Earlham Books. It was published in 1999 and won the David Thomas award for the best self-published children's book of that year. And has been popular in my school visits which I began around that time.
THE Noughties
Self publishing has worked for me. Taking control, no more waiting six months to find out 'it doesn't fit our list'. I used to think good authors would always find a mainstream publisher. I don't think that now. I know of good books that have been rejected, and the writers too discouraged to press on. That's depressing. But the self-publishing revolution puts the ball firmly in the writer's court.
My 'Lucy-Anne's Changing Ways' was the only self published book in the Book Trust’s 2001 list. Their editor recognised it as such and phoned me up to congratulate me. I was chuffed, but at the same time miffed, as mainstream publishers weren't interested in my books.
It's hard not to desire a pat on the back from the respectable. Every year or so in that decade, I self-published a book. Most were children's books to go with my school visits where I often did a book-signing after school and so had a ready market.
There were though big changes in the book trade afoot, especially helpful to self-published authors. There was print-on-demand; no longer would my bulging loft have to put up with thousands of copies, but just a few could be ordered when I needed them. About the same time came the ebook, which I thought would be ephemeral, but the Kindle's emergence in 2007 ensured its permanence.
FROM 2010
In this decade, my school visits began to tail off due to government cuts in education funding. Setbacks can be an opportunity. I turned to crime. And began my 'Jack of All Trades' series. The first three were published in 2015. As I write this in 2019, there are nine in the series, set where I live, with murders galore. They are in ebook and paperback editions. All the books are entitled Jack something or other. It's my marketing device. They are:
Jack of All Trades
Jack of Spades
Jack o'Lantern
Jack by the Hedge
Jack in the Box
Jack on the Tower
Jack Recalled
Jack at Death's Door
Jack at the Gate
Jack is a builder who solves crimes. Wherever he works someone gets murdered. It is a wonder anyone employs him.
TEACHING Experience
I taught Writing for Children for eighteen years, beginning at City University, then at the Mary Ward Centre in Holborn. I was co-ordinator of Newham Writers Workshop for twenty years, and have run poetry and general writing workshops in various places. In schools, from 1998 to 2016, I ran story-writing workshops in primary and secondary schools.
I am a member of the Society of Authors and the Crime Writers Association.
So that's me, warts and all, writing on, and about to share with you my experience of writing crime.
[This is chapter 1 of 'Writing a Crime Novel', a book for would-be crime writers, published in June 2019.]
At the time, I had the naïve belief in my genius as a writer. It's a common disease in writers but it is curable, though there are those who suffer it all their lives. My plays were sent off to various theatres, and given to friends and family to read. No one liked them. I was either a misunderstood talent, ahead of my time, or the plays were bad.
Coming to the reluctant conclusion they were not all I hoped them to be, I went on a playwriting course at the City Lit (abbreviation for City Literary College) in London. I was working at the time as an assistant gardener in a park. It was a good job for a writer as the job could be left behind when I left work. It didn't pay much, but enough to get by.
The City Lit course was a two hour evening class. The tutor on the course was Cathy Itzen, an American who had come through the US college system where they taught playwriting and theatre. I learned that I did have some talent, but needed to learn about the craft of playwriting. Good friends were made on the course, which is not a “by the way”, as fellow students appreciate what you are trying to do and can be very supportive.
After two terms, I submitted an idea based on an event that had happened in the park where I was then working. Cathy said: fine, write it. When completed it was a 45 minute stage play that was read in the class and went down well. I wondered what to do with it. Entitled 'Albert and the Mayor's Tree', it had about 12 characters. Great for a class, too short for theatre, way too many characters for any commercial set up. So it was changed to a radio play. And over the summer, when the course was in recess, I sent it to the BBC.
THE 70s
Within a month, the quickest response I've had, they accepted the play. It was performed on radio in 1972 and well received. Throughout the 70s, I continued writing plays. There were four on radio, one on TV, lots of short plays performed in theatres along with three full length plays. I went to work with Soapbox Theatre in the London Borough of Newham as their writer in residence. There, I wrote plays for the company, directed them, and ran a playwriting course. Some of my plays were naturalistic, some in a political vein, some absurd. They taught me about the importance of character, dialogue and surprise in a story.
Skills not limited to plays.
THE 80s
After three years with Soapbox Theatre, with my then partner Gill Hay, I set up a bookshop. Outside the theatre environment, I had stopped writing plays, and became involved in running the bookshop, as well as working in the vegetarian cafe that was also part of The Whole Thing, the name of our multifarious establishment. There, surrounded by books, I had a go at writing a novel, spending more than a year on it. But it was an impossible mess.
I went back to the City Lit. This time for a story writing class. I'd missed a term, and the tutor, Carol Burns, spoke in passing about things like point of view. What on earth was that? I had missed that session, so had to read it up. On discovering what it was, my fiction had more structure. I wrote some short stories. A couple were broadcast on radio.
With growing confidence, my next project was a novel for young adults, 'Rich Kids'. I'd read in a book for writers that you should send off four chapters to a publisher with a short covering letter. The novel finished, I did exactly that, sending off a letter with the chapters to four publishers. When one came back, another was sent out, until after more than a year 18 publishers had been contacted. All had turned the book down; not one of them wanted the full manuscript. And so, despondent, 'Rich Kids' was stuck in a drawer.
Around nine months later, I re-read it, being far enough away from the manuscript to be objective. I thought, this is good. But how was I to get a publisher to read it? Unsolicited manuscripts go into what is disparagingly known as the slush pile. There are many poor books in the slush pile, which makes it hard for any decent ones to be noticed. The office junior might take a bundle home to half scan. Not my aim at all.
I didn't want to sink in the slush.
THE 90s
There had to be a new strategy to sell the book. First of all, the title was changed; it became 'Hard Cash'. Then I persuaded my then partner's 11 year old son, Tom, to review it. Best handwriting, I insisted. And paid him a fiver for his troubles. His review was photocopied and sent off with a letter about the book, but with no chapters. The letter was addressed to a named person. Not to 'Dear Editor’, but to 'Dear Jane Brown' as it might be. My aim was to get 'Jane Brown' to ask me for the manuscript.
It worked. Four publishers were written to and each of them wanted the full manuscript. And one of those, Faber, accepted it. I didn't inform them they had already rejected it when it had been called 'Rich Kids' and sent to 'Dear Editor'. I had not changed a word bar the title.
All of which has made me somewhat cynical about publishers.
'Hard Cash' was well reviewed, and was read on BBC radio by Tony Robinson, now Sir Tony. It is a crime novel, though I didn't see it as such at the time. It's about two boys who find quarter of a million pounds in an empty house and decide to spend it. In my eyes, it was a family book, as much about their families as it is about crime, and I was surprised when the Faber editor called it a crime novel.
Faber published two more of my young adult novels. 'Frances Fairweather Demon Striker!' was shortlisted for the Children's Book Award. The other was 'Half a Bike', which was shortlisted for a French book prize. Walker Books published a book of mine for younger children, 'The Magical World of Lucy-Anne'.
From 1998, I began visiting schools as a children's author. I was also tutor for the Writing for Children course at City University. But as for publishing, everything mailed out was being rejected. It was 'The Good Wolf', a book for ten-year-olds, that altered my mindset.
This is the first paragraph of the reply received from Hodder & Stoughton:
'I found 'The Good Wolf' a thoroughly enjoyable story with great characterisation. You bring the serious issues of being different and not belonging into the story, which gives it substance. It is a well written, fluent piece with a good use of language.'
I distinctly recall thinking as I read this, I've sold it! They love it.
Maybe they did. But not enough. The next paragraph begins:
'Despite finding much to praise, I do not feel it is quite right for our list.'
Looking back on the letter, 21 years later, I find it somewhat unbelievable. Well written, great characterisation, enjoyable story... But you don't want to publish it. What on earth are you looking for?
A badly written, boring story, with weak characters perhaps.
This wasn't the only positive rejection received for 'The Good Wolf'. Other publishers told me how much they liked it. But 'it didn't fit their list' either. That unarguable phrase kept coming in the mail. The book was good, they told me, but they didn't want to publish it.
I was dejected. What could I do? The only possible thing.
Publish it myself.
Self-publishing wasn't that respectable in 1998. But it was do that or pulp it. I read up self-publishing on the internet. And learned it had to be done well. The finished book must be indistinguishable from mainstream books.
I hired a book designer and an illustrator. And printed 2000 copies, under my imprint Earlham Books. It was published in 1999 and won the David Thomas award for the best self-published children's book of that year. And has been popular in my school visits which I began around that time.
THE Noughties
Self publishing has worked for me. Taking control, no more waiting six months to find out 'it doesn't fit our list'. I used to think good authors would always find a mainstream publisher. I don't think that now. I know of good books that have been rejected, and the writers too discouraged to press on. That's depressing. But the self-publishing revolution puts the ball firmly in the writer's court.
My 'Lucy-Anne's Changing Ways' was the only self published book in the Book Trust’s 2001 list. Their editor recognised it as such and phoned me up to congratulate me. I was chuffed, but at the same time miffed, as mainstream publishers weren't interested in my books.
It's hard not to desire a pat on the back from the respectable. Every year or so in that decade, I self-published a book. Most were children's books to go with my school visits where I often did a book-signing after school and so had a ready market.
There were though big changes in the book trade afoot, especially helpful to self-published authors. There was print-on-demand; no longer would my bulging loft have to put up with thousands of copies, but just a few could be ordered when I needed them. About the same time came the ebook, which I thought would be ephemeral, but the Kindle's emergence in 2007 ensured its permanence.
FROM 2010
In this decade, my school visits began to tail off due to government cuts in education funding. Setbacks can be an opportunity. I turned to crime. And began my 'Jack of All Trades' series. The first three were published in 2015. As I write this in 2019, there are nine in the series, set where I live, with murders galore. They are in ebook and paperback editions. All the books are entitled Jack something or other. It's my marketing device. They are:
Jack of All Trades
Jack of Spades
Jack o'Lantern
Jack by the Hedge
Jack in the Box
Jack on the Tower
Jack Recalled
Jack at Death's Door
Jack at the Gate
Jack is a builder who solves crimes. Wherever he works someone gets murdered. It is a wonder anyone employs him.
TEACHING Experience
I taught Writing for Children for eighteen years, beginning at City University, then at the Mary Ward Centre in Holborn. I was co-ordinator of Newham Writers Workshop for twenty years, and have run poetry and general writing workshops in various places. In schools, from 1998 to 2016, I ran story-writing workshops in primary and secondary schools.
I am a member of the Society of Authors and the Crime Writers Association.
So that's me, warts and all, writing on, and about to share with you my experience of writing crime.
[This is chapter 1 of 'Writing a Crime Novel', a book for would-be crime writers, published in June 2019.]
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