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The agent sat thoughtfully in her office chair puffing at her
cigarette. "What you need to do, darling, is write a fantasy
novel."
"But I don't really do fantasy, do I? I spent ten years writing my
Arthurian trilogy without any fantasy whatsoever because I wanted to
remove Arthur from the myth and magic."
"Yes but Harry Potter is all
the rage. Why not write something for teenagers?"
The author trudged
down the four flights of stairs and out into the London rain. She crossed
the road opposite the Ritz, wondering if she could afford tea there.
Checking her purse, she toddled into Joe's cafe instead.
She really didn't want to write fantasy. Nor for
teenagers. She liked writing historical fiction, she liked character
interaction, the what motivates people, the invention of characters and
what makes them tick. She liked writing about rugged heroes that were the
sort of men you wouldn't want to get into a drinking contest with, but who
would, all the same, be there to fix the fuse... and know where the torch
is!
A Holiday. Dorset. A wet, windy October afternoon. The rain had poured
all morning, but by early afternoon a weak, apologetic sun was squinting
from behind a barricade of grey cloud. The author decided to walk the dogs
on the beach. She armed herself with weapons against the weather. A hat, a
coat, wellies and her ipod.
All week she had been researching her
latest interest; the truth behind pirates. Now the film she had seen (and
the character she had fallen hook-line-and-sinker in love with) was all
very well, but it was not historically accurate. Tortuga, for instance,
was cleared of pirates in the 1600's, Port Royal was no longer a town,
just a naval base. Pirates did not turn into skeletons. But they DID wear
bright ribbons, wave cutlasses about, get drunk and have an awful lot of
fun.
As she was walking down the steep cliff-path, minding the bunny
burrows and reminding one of the dogs that it was not a good idea to get
stuck down one again, as he had yesterday and the day before, she
wondered, "What would happen if a charming rogue, such as Jack Sparrow,
met up with a white witch? Not someone like prissy Hermione in the Harry
Potty books, someone more like Obi Wan Kenobi in Star Wars? A good witch,
who had the Craft. She can't do magic, has no wand or spells, but she can
summon a wind, or talk to her lover via telepathy - if he is not blocking
her thoughts.
The author crossed the stream at the bottom of the
cliff, that smelt suspiciously of things that were not fishy (or were
fishy, in the dodgy sense of the word) and stepped onto the beach.
Immediately she was almost knocked over by a blast from the wind and the
dogs went haring off after those two seagulls that had been bugging them
all week.
The tide was ebbing, the breakers all white-foam and rolling
excitement. She walked along the wet sand, listening to the soundtrack of
Pirates of the Caribbean, cursing because the earpiece kept falling out of
her ear.
She had the beach to more or less herself, even
the seagulls had gone, although one of the dogs did find a dead crab.
Sitting on a
rock, she gazed out at the ocean. Well, it was the English Channel really,
but an author has a vivid imagination. It was not too difficult to picture
the hot sun of the Caribbean, waving palm trees, the rich turquoise blue
of the sea .... although it would have been easier if it had not rained
again. Quickly, she switched to a different scene. The Florida reefs,
1715. Eleven Spanish galleons went down, laden with treasure.
What
if... what if.... her mind was racing, her heart beginning to thud with
excitement. What if there was a 12th ship that went down? A pirate ship? A
ship that a young, handsome rogue had just commandeered? His first
captaincy ... he survived the storm, would want to get another ship as
soon as possible.... he had a brother, a half brother, who had bullied him
as a child... a brother who had burnt his only possession, a boat called
...... called..... Acorn! Yes, boats were made from oak ... yes, Acorn!
The Author was getting REALLY excited now! The boy - for he was only a boy
then ... fled the Virginia tobacco plantation and became a pirate.
He
had a few adventures, got rich on plunder, but was, underneath all the
swagger and pretence, lonely. It was alright having whores crumpets and
strumpets, but there was also the horror of the hangman's noose dangling
over him. Then one day ... one day he meets a girl. He was in deep shit,
wounded and being chased by East India Company agents and this girl... no,
not a girl ... the white witch ... rescues him. They fall in love, but he
misses the sea. Because of ... er, because of (the author decided to think
of a because of later) because of dah di dah happening, there is a mix up.
The pirate assumed the girl didn't love him any more. And the girl, who
was really a white witch, thought the pirate didn't love HER anymore. So
they were both very miserable for a few months. The pirate found solace in
a rum bottle (as pirates do) and the girl gave in and married the rich
creep who had been pestering her all this time.
Then the pirate's
brother caught up with him (very annoyed because the pirate had stolen his
ship - one that happened to be full of tobacco to be taken to England to
be sold)
The author's bum was getting a bit numb, so she moved to a
softer rock, but found that the cushioning sea weed was wet, so walked on
up the beach instead.
The annoyed bully brother is in league with the
creep who married the girl... Tiola! the author thought, her name is
Tiola. Tiola what? The author kicked at a piece of drift wood, cursed in
true pirate fashion. There was a rock behind the piece of wood that she
hadn't seen. Tiola is a good witch, she is all that is good... a.l.l.
t.h.a.t. i.s. g.o.o.d ... an anagram! An anagram of ... furious muttering
.. an anagram of Tiola Oldstagh. Yes!
The author walked on, she was
nearing the far side of the bay now, and the tumble of rocks that were
full of fossils and things. Or so the guide books said. She was blowed if
she could find one.
The annoyed bully brother is in league with the creep who married the
girl Tiola. The two men are plotting to capture the pirate and have him
hanged - Captain Woodes Rogers, a real figure in history, has just
become Governor of Nassau and is offering a pardon to all pirates. The two creeps
arrange to meet at Nassau, guessing that the pirate will turn up, looking
for amnesty. Which he does - but the bully brother nabs him & chains
him up in the bilge of a ship & heads off back to Virginia where he
has promised the other creep that he will hang ... only the bully brother
has no intention of hanging the pirate, he wants to
have his fun first and punish the pirate for stealing his ship.
Tiola is a witch and she loves her pirate. She tells the creep who is
her (forced) husband to go jump in a lake and boarding the pirate's ship
(which he has called Sea Witch) sets off in pursuit of her true love -
having to conjure up a wind to do so .... meanwhile because the witch is a
witch and because the ship is special, the girl and the ship sort of
become one and .... and the author could see a small sub-plot coming here,
something about Tethys, goddess of the sea who wanted the pirate for
herself ....
The author was quite pleased, it seemed a good basic
plot. Lots of character interaction, the chance to get to know these two
young lovers, the boy meets girl, boy falls in love, boy loses girl then
finds her again plot, but if Shakespeare could use it over and over ...
not that the author was anywhere as good as Shakespeare, but she had five
other books published and loads of people seemed to enjoy her writing
style and the way she brought life into her characters and made them real
... and her fans particularly said she was good at creating loveable
rogues ... look at her creation Arthur for instance!
So all she needed was her pirate. She couldn't use
Jack Sparrow (as much as she would like to use him!) ... she had reached
the rocks, turned around. The wide sweep of the beach was deserted. The
rain had washed away everyone, who normally came to the beach of an
afternoon. She looked at the wet sand where the tide was scurrying in with
lace-edged patterns of foam. Saw a man standing there, twenty or thirty
yards away. He was tall, rugged. Had an untidy chaos of curled, dark hair,
with a few blue ribbons fluttering in the wind tied into it. He wore knee
high boots, a faded coat and a three cornered hat. He was looking out to
sea but he turned, grinned at her, showing the flash of two gold teeth.
With his left hand, he took off his hat and with his right, gave the
author a small, acknowledging salute.
An earring dangled from one ear... an earring shaped like an acorn.
"Hello Jesamiah Acorne," said the author.
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