Journal

March 2010

I hate the dark, dull days of winter. Still here we are at March 1st, Spring is about to leap over the horizon and the sun will start shining. Oh well, we have to be optimistic don't we? It might stop raining or snowing soon.

You will be pleased to learn that I have been working hard. The Great Edit is more or less completed, apart from my US editor Sara having another read-through, a few last minute twiddles and the final copy-edit etc. Thank you to Jo Field, my UK freelance editor who scrutinized the opening few chapters for me. Best wishes and Bright Blessings for your house move this month Jo. The lucky lady has bought a beautiful old house overlooking the Devon coast where, in the Sea Witch Series, Jesamiah was born - but you will have to wait for me to write Ripples In The Sand to find out more about that part of Captain Acorne's past.

I was dismayed at the errors in A Hollow Crown, but have now done my best to give the final polish the book deserves. It is due to be published in the USA and Canada in November 2010 under the title of Forever Queen - hopefully I might have the new cover to show you next month.

Meanwhile, I am trying to convince Arrow Books to re-print the updated version. Sadly, I am not having much success. Can anyone tell me the logic of today's publishing houses? A Hollow Crown is almost out of print in the UK, less than 100 copies remain in stock. In future they will only be produced via Print On Demand, a more environmentally friendly way of publishing books as there will be no storage needed, but would you not think that Random House would welcome the offer of the new file and take the opportunity to produce a novel that is better, tighter, and 40,000 words shorter? I appreciate the file they possess will have to be re-formatted, but with modern technology is that a difficult or expensive process? And the saving of something like 140 fewer pages on the present book has surely got to be worth it. Apparently not.

For my books in North America, the beginning of March sees the publication of Shadow of the King, the final volume in my Pendragon's Banner Trilogy. These editions are doing very well indeed. A big thank you to the many fans who have contacted me to say how much they love them - I am truly flattered and overwhelmed by the amount of positive feedback. I have always known my Trilogy would be a success, it's just a pity I've had to wait all these years for them to be so beautifully produced and efficiently marketed. Thank you to everyone at Sourcebooks Inc. for your enthusiasm and support.

Here's a taster review: "Because Hollick adds her own unique twists and turns to the familiar mythology, Arthurian devotees will be eager to see how she wraps up her version of the legend." - Margaret Flanagan, Booklist. The full review will run in the March 15 2010 issue.

My appreciation also to all of you who kindly voted for Shadow in a recent blog poll. I wasn't the winner, but my status as an author was not compromised!

I have a "Muse and Views" blog site that I am in the process of building. It could do with some more followers and added comments please. Around the middle of each month I will post my views or musings, and welcome any feedback and comments. Nothing is meant to be taken seriously, I might add, this is just a place for me to share my thoughts and ideas with people who are interested in my books, or writing in general. If I eventually gain enough followers and interest I might make my additions weekly. We shall see.

The present "view" concerns King Arthur. Why not hop across after reading this journal entry and have a look.

As for my pirate captain Jesamiah, he is collecting new fans by the boat-load. How's this from one of his recent followers? "I fell in love with Jesamiah from the first chapter and continued to fall throughout the entire book. What an amazing, complex character!" And this: "Just a quick line to let you know I not only fell in love with Jesamiah but Tiola too... wasn't expecting that! What a rogue that pirate is!"


Ron and I had a lovely weekend at the start of the month with our good friends Towse and Graham and Bronwen Harrison, singer, songwriter and all round fantastic artiste. Bronwen is the voice behind the music on the 1066 Myspace site, and has written a fantastic song for the movie in conjunction with harpist Sue Rothstein. Can't share it with you yet, but I can most certainly direct you to Broni's Guesswork site. The wedding dress worn by the bride in the Gathering Dust track, by the way, was mine.

Bronwen's talent, like so many struggling musicians, is not being recognised. As with new authors, just how do creative people get noticed? We do this silly job of writing books or songs because it is an urge inside us that we cannot set aside. All we want is for our work to be published so we can share it with others who will appreciate our gift. Unfortunately, business and money-making takes precedence over the darn good read or listen. Only politicians, cooks, footballers and 20-something celebrities seem to get into print at the drop of a million-pound contract.

I hear there is now a proposal to make a movie of Jade Goody's life. While it is very sad that someone so young should die of cervical cancer - what life? She was 27. Do we really need such a movie? {long sigh...} And, in case you are wondering, yes the 1066 movie is still on track, we're getting there financially.

February was rounded off nicely by having a delightful lunch with author Suzanne McLeod in a London pub near Leicester Square. As she says herself, she writes books about dangerous faeries, seductive vampires, bureaucratic witches, eccentric goblins, rock-solid trolls, magic, mayhem and murder. We had a great time talking pirates, vampires, fantasy fiction and writing in general. The lunch was good too!

Just read on Facebook that apparently women somewhere in the world, may have been Turkey, can sue for divorce if their husbands do not provide them with enough coffee.

Ron? Ron! Are you reading this…?

Lege feliciter (read happily).

February 2010

Well, January was a mild improvement on December, but we were not far from being snowed in, and the water taps became frozen up at my daughter's stable yard, resulting in the need to scrabble around for various empty bottle to fill from home. I had two funerals to attend in one week, my Mum's and my Aunt's, and I have the added delight of being executor for Mum's will. Say no if anyone ever asks you to do the job. Still, I am at least able to walk about again now - although no way was I going anywhere near icy pavements. Hibernation has its good points, I am thinking.

Talking of hibernation. I thought squirrels tucked themselves away for the colder days? Obviously the two in my back garden have not read the right nature manual. Okay, I know they are technically furry rats with tails, but I like my squirrelly squiggles. They are fun. I put nuts out for them on a shelf beside my office window and they jump across from the fence. I can even feed them by hand if I go out quietly with a tempting hazelnut.

I just had to laugh yesterday though! I'd taken Rum the dog for his morning walk in Epping Forest, come home and done all the boring chores, then sat down at my desk with a cup of coffee and a couple of digestive biscuits. The squirrels were doing their squirrelly thing outside, so I opened the window and left a piece of biscuit on the shelf. It was duly pounced on and appreciated. Ten minutes later, having finally got down to doing some work, I looked up and there was Squiggy on his hind paws, standing up at my window peering pathetically in at me. I fell for it of course. I got him/her another biscuit. Does anyone know how you tell a Mr from a Mrs/Ms Squirrel by the way?

The birds are also doing well. My gang of yobbo sparrows has made it through the bad weather, as well as the robin and the blackbirds and the collared doves.

We had a panic with the fishpond because the pump which keeps the water clean packed up, but it did not take long to get a new one, so the fish are fine, all happily 'hibernating' on the bottom. Now all I want to complete the countryside effect is a couple of hedgehogs in the garden.

I could also do with a return to normal brain-function. I'm assuming the extra do-lally-ness I am presently experiencing is an accumulation of the residue of December's unpleasant events. If not, I must have senile dementia setting in. Yesterday I was driving along a road I have known for over 50 years, but suddenly had no idea where I was. And today, my husband received a letter from our bank sending condolences for the death of his wife. I telephoned to tell them in no uncertain terms that I am still very much alive - only to find our bank account had been suspended and was quite a bit of money short. Cross was not the word. I then discovered that I had sent a letter to my Mum's account, at the same bank, to pay the funeral bill. Only I had managed to insert my own account number and not hers. So the bank had assumed Mrs Hollick had passed away and had paid the bill from our account.

In my defence, the bank should have realised the account number did not match any of the other details of my mother's name, her address etc, and they had most definitely not been notified of my demise. Everything was easily sorted out, but I am now wondering what other stupid things I have inadvertently managed to do these last few weeks. Do let me know if you spot anything!

Add to all this I have been doing a massive re-edit of A Hollow Crown which is to be published in the USA and Canada in November of this year as Forever Queen. I needed to cut it by about 46,000 words. Gulp. At first I was reluctant and had no confidence, or even inclination, to do so. But on the advice of a very good author friend, who truthfully told me there was a great book trying to get out of a good book and I should welcome the chance to set it free, I plunged in.

Reading through, I realise that A Hollow Crown was not given the final polish by my old, previous, publisher that it should have had. There are so many unprofessional errors that a good editor would have picked up, and indeed, that I should have noticed. Things like duplicated words and phrases, rambling paragraphs, repeated information, Point of View changes and 'head hopping' from one character to another.

Maybe I am now a more experienced a writer, or just more confident in myself? For whatever reason, the Big Edit is proving most enjoyable, although extremely hard work.

My worry now though, given my present deranged brain-scrambling, is that maybe the chapters I have been blythely deleting were, in fact, important to the story. Oh well, that is what editors are for. Sorry Sara at Sourcebooks Inc, I hope I'm not going to be sending you back something that is even more gibberish than it was in the first place!

Hmm, maybe I'll go wrestle alligators as a new career move.

Lege feliciter (read happily).

January 2010

December 2009 was not a good month.

Pain, physical and emotional, thickened with every passing day. It was not a month I particularly wish to revisit, so I apologise for this journal entry being somewhat shorter and much sadder than usual.

It all started with a torn muscle in my groin and a fall. I tripped over my dog Rum, landing heavily on my knees. (Thank you for the joke, Julie. She sent me a lovely smile along with a get-well card which included the message: "I always knew rum would be your downfall.") I thought I was only shaken and bruised, but two days later I was in agony unable to walk. My back was out and the muscles of my left leg, from thigh to ankle, had gone into acute spasm, adding to the interestingly-coloured bruising!

I only have a small house, but the distance between bed and bathroom may as well have been a marathon. More often than not, abandoning dignity, I gave up trying to hobble and crawled to "the necessary" or "seat of ease" as termed in my Sea Witch novels. Ice, heat, painkillers… In the end my doctor prescribed something really strong which deadened the pain and what little was left of my awareness. I stayed in bed and became great friends with various BBC Radio 4 programs.

The 10th of the month brought devastation. Kathy had to take her horse, Izzy, to the vet because she had suddenly become chronically lame in her hind foot. Regular readers may recall that Izzy had recently undergone treatment for her hock. That had healed, but x-rays showed dreadful, irreparable damage to the navicular bone. The tendon had been scraping across it and had almost worn it away like a cheese-grater. Nothing could be done, except to put her down. We have lost several horses over the years but never has the sorrow been this hard to bear. Maybe my grief was all the worse because I was bed-bound and beyond hugging her, so could do nothing to help my daughter through her distress.

And then my elderly Mum had another fall. The ambulance was called and I managed to hobble to the hospital going through and beyond the pain barrier while waiting in a very busy Accident & Emergency department for a doctor to attend Mum. Her heart was failing, dehydration, old age - basically her almost 92-year-old body was shutting down. The nurses of Bracken Ward were so very kind, and once I'd made it back to my bed, in absolute agony, I at least knew Mum was in the best place and being well looked after by professionals.

My leg was mending enough by Christmas Eve, so on crutches and using a borrowed wheelchair once at the hospital, I managed to visit Mum. I opened her Christmas cards with her, told her all the latest family news and helped her eat her favourite yoghurt treat. I left her dozing into a peaceful sleep. Sadly she passed away in the early hours of Christmas Morning.

As I write this, thoughts of all the things that now have to legally be done are whirling around my head adding to the loss of my Mum and Kathy's horse, with the lingering memory of excruciating pain. It is however a relief that Mum is at rest; she was very frail and ready to go to her God. Izzy had lived in a happy, kind and caring home and did not suffer much pain. She will be remembered with great affection.

As is our way we have taken a deep breath and moved forward. Kathy has found herself a new horse, a grey thoroughbred called Ace, whose owners were desperate to find him a good home. Let's hope he helps to heal Kathy's deep hurt. I want to add how very proud I am of my daughter. She ran the house while I was ill in bed, visited her Nan in hospital, took care of everything and set about ensuring that Yule would not be forgotten, even if enthusiasm was a little on the thin side. She decorated the house beautifully, did all the shopping and then cooked an entire Christmas dinner. December was a sh*t of a month - but my daughter ranks among the very best in the entire world.

Thank you Kath.

Lege feliciter (read happily).