Slow growth is the way to go

Being an author!

 As I am sure you are all aware as well as being an author I am a lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of Winchester. Over the summer, I did a lot of research and upskilling because I knew I needed to be able to help my third-year students prepare in the best possible way for what was likely to be a difficult job market thanks to our friend COVID. I wanted to help them stand out effectively and for the right reasons as well as realise what options would be available to them.

Little did I release this would prove so useful for me as an author too. I attended various business symposiums, career webinars and joined some groups. I followed a variety of people on social media that you wouldn't necessarily normally associate with my life as either an academic or being a writer. They were in fact more associated with my previous life, pre academia and pre writer. I learnt so much from them. 

Jessica Bendien

I attended a symposium for business women run by Emma Gosling, which had a variety of talks. Some of which were not useful but some were. I was checking out anything that was related to employability or presentation related that I could use for the students. Through the symposium, I won a one to one session with Jessica Bendien who runs Bang Talent but also Finding Fame courses. Don't be mislead by the title of the courses. It is not about being a celebrity. It is about becoming 'a go-to person' in your area and raising your profile.  It is easy to be sceptical about this and I am the world's worst cynic, but I learnt more in an hour with Jess than I have for a long time. She really made me stop and think about how I saw myself, what I wanted to achieve then how I was going to do it. 

Vix Meldrew
Glow & Grow

It has made me more conscious of my social media and how I use it. I am well aware that social media can have a negative impact on my mental health. I cam across Vix Meldrew with Glow & Grow on Instagram. Again it is aimed at business people. I have not joined the group (yet - I might soon but with school visits down so much finances are very tight). But I do follow them on Instagram and the information posted is very useful. I save a lot of their posts to remind me how I should be using social media. I am far more strategic about my social media engagement than I was before. I have a better understanding of it from both Jess and Vix. I also have found Alice Benham who is an advocate for slow growth, which anyone who is an author, is really going to empathise with. Nothing about being an author is fast. Everything we do is about the long game. It is not a race.

Now I can almost hear the shouting at this blog post. 'I am a writer, not a business person.' 'I don't need this.' And that is fine, you don't have to do it. This is just a way I have found of looking at my writing career and dealing with some of the issues I have faced following COVID, which I thought I might share. I have been lucky and always gained a lot of knowledge from people like Candy Gourlay who have always shared their author experiences including social media best practices. The links I have shared here just add a further dimension to it. For me, I became aware that I had a brand. There was Vanessa Harbour, author, and I needed to decide how to get that brand out there and what image I wanted to create so that people would be interested in my books and in me as an author with the knowledge I have. I needed to think about consistency and strategy. I confess I have not got this right yet and it is still a work in progress, but then I am working on the idea of slow growth. I intend to be here for the long run. What I do know is that I am open to ideas and seeing how  I can make my brand one that is recognisable, reliable and one that you would think of automatically. Yes, I am an author, but I need to remember not to be closed-minded when I think about how I am promoting myself. Anything is possible.

The Internet is a great resource and it is here to stay. Let's make the most of it. 

Enjoy Michael Kiwanuka's Light

Flight is a bestseller!

Flight is a number one bestseller! Thanks to Books Council for Wales Flight was announced the number one selling children's book in Wales for July. First Wales, next the world. If you look at the picture there are a huge number of Firefly books in that list which lifted my heart enormously, proving what a fabulous publisher I am with and highlighting their ability to back great books. 

I confess, it took a little while for me to spot that Flight was number one. I looked at all the other books and then at the top and thought 'That looks like Flight.' I had to do a double-take. It was the best feeling ever. Knowing that people are buying and reading Flight. After all, that is why I write books in the hope that people read and enjoy them.

Wins like this might seem small in the big scheme of things and they are strictly speaking but when you are a writer sat on your own they are huge!

I know I said I was going to write posts based on #writingishard. I am afraid the pandemic won with that. I did not get COVID, for which I am very grateful. But general living and getting through each day became my priority. I am sure we all felt the same. The writing is hard became true and I focused on finishing my novel and my university work. I needed to live in the moment and appreciate what was around me. 

I focused on walks through the woods. Listening to the cacophony of sound as the wind moved through the trees. The echo of the children's laugher that bounced from tree to tree. Always soothing yet inspiring as we moved through the trees. Trees always focus in my stories. For me, the walks were research too...or that's what I kept telling myself. 

We know it has been strange times and we all have had to adapt to what everyone has called 'new norm'. We spend our lives online talking to our colleagues, family and friends. We have a whole new vocabulary. Zooming, talking on Teams, hybrid teaching, blended teaching - are they the same. Who knows. We walk around with masks around, yet no one complains 'You can only see their eyes!' anymore. Strange that isn't it?'

I will endeavour to be back more often. Remember to be resilient. We can do this. Live in the moment and, by the way, in case you forgot, I am a best selling author!!!

And I love this my McFly 'Those were the days'

 

#Writingishard9 - procrastination

A deadline looms and you know you should be writing or doing edits but you suddenly find this insatiable desire to...

Clean,

Iron,

Paint

Garden...anything but do the thing you are supposed to do.

Social media is checked more frequently. You end up disappearing down a Twitter rabbit hole.

Get lost in Tik Tok (does anyone really understand that?)

Watch TED talks, Facebook Lives, check Instagram in case you've missed anything.

Update your website including recording those videos you've been promising yourself for ages.

Anything...but write or do those edits. You watch the clock, knowing the deadline is getting closer. But look there's a cobweb, you better get rid of it first. It'll only irritate you while you work.

Now you need a drink and something to eat. Perhaps you better have a wee before you sit down to

write so you can focus....oh what's that on daytime tv that looks interesting. It won't matter if you watch just for a minute...it's research...

Tick tock, tick tock, tick tock tick tock.

It's too late to start them today. Start them first thing tomorrow. You'll have a clear head then.

And repeat

A deadline looms and you know you should be writing or doing edits but you suddenly find this insatiable desire to...

The world according to procrastination

#writingishard8 Anxious times

I am partly revisiting something that I have spoken about previously, but I felt it was important to do so again. I am going to talk about the pressures currently being faced. Damian Barr wrote an interesting article about this and also a fellow author had posted a status about the pressures he was feeling on Facebook the other day and these inspired me to explore the issue again.

It is very easy to feel daunted at the moment. There are all these online workouts, dance classes, choirs to name but a few. People are shouting about everything they are doing. Authors are producing incredible activities for their readers. This, in particular, was something the fellow author was talking about. They felt so pressurised to produce resources. They are not the only person I have spoken to that has felt anxious and overwhelmed by perceived expectations.

It was at this point I want to say to people, take a step back. Take a breath and think things through. I want to remind everyone of Matt Haig’s wise words from Notes on a Nervous Planet, which I know I have said to you before, but am going to say again:

How to be Happy

Do not compare yourself to other people

Do not compare yourself to other people

Do not compare yourself to other people

Do not compare yourself to other people

Do not compare yourself to other people

Do not compare yourself to other people

Do not compare yourself to other people

At the moment it is really important that you do what you can do and what makes you feel happy and comfortable. If this means not producing lots of videos, then don’t do it. You will find other ways to create resources. Life is hard enough without adding to the pressures.

Catherine Johnson

Don’t feel you’ve got to learn something new or do all the workouts. I tried them, but I walk with crutches and can’t kneel, it becomes incredibly frustrating when your body won’t behave, and everyone is lecturing you on what you should and shouldn’t do. Do what you can and what makes you feel good. Catherine Johnson has made me smile so much; she is posting videos of her dancing to songs she loves on social media. Philippa Francis post shorts videos of the sea near where she lives when she goes for a walk also on social media. The sound of the sea is glorious. They are both wonderful for making you feel good and I am sure both make Catherine and Philippa smile when they film them.

I am also aware the pressure for the aspiring writer, who have spent years working on their novel only to see articles about how those who have always thought of writing a novel will now have the time to write it as if you can suddenly knock out an award-winning novel in a few weeks. Don’t despair, remember you are way ahead of them. You’ve been honing your craft, polishing your manuscript

All about the rewriting

until it is in a fit state for submission. Hopefully, yours will be the golden nugget shinning out among a pile of rushed manuscripts thrown together during the lockdown and submitted before their time. Be patient and get it to be the best it can possibly be before submission. Focus on honing that writing craft. Remember writing is a muscle, the more you do it the stronger it gets. Writing is all about the rewriting. Do you want any more clichéd phrases thrown at you to encourage you?! Just remember you can do this. It is your journey, not anyone else’s.

The same applies to lockdown. What you do at this time is for you to decide. Do what makes you happy – if it is standing in the garden listening to the birds singing as I did yesterday, then do it. If it is producing incredible resources because you are a whizz with IT then go for it. This is your life, don’t let anyone tell you how to live it. Me? You'll find me getting lost in World War Two with two of my favourite characters, Kizzy and Jakob, writing a sequel.

Lockdown thoughts and a tribute to a lost friend

Today’s blog post is not a #writingishard post. Instead, I decided to write one from the heart. It is something I felt I needed to say. To say it is strange times is an understatement, isn’t it. We are living through history. In years to come people will ‘What was it like during Covid-19?’ and we will say we were there. People will write about this period in time. I find that concept quite surreal.

I know talking to friends that we are all going through similar emotions. A lot of the time we feel we are coping. Getting on with life doing a variety of things but then suddenly for no reason, we become

NANNY!

emotional and tearful. As I was talking to a friend on FB (Social media has never become so important as it is now) I think it is vital to acknowledge these moments of feeling overwhelmed. You shouldn’t be feeling ashamed of them. We are all feeling like it at times. My way of coping them is to do something mindless like colouring in a picture, doing some drawing (I’m a really bad artist but I know no one will ever see them), or dance crazily to my favourite music – it is the old adage, dance as if no one is watching – that is me. I live alone but I am lucky, and I know it, I have family very close, and I am mean very close. I was working yesterday and in the middle of a workshop, I heard this ‘NANNY’ being shouted. I opened my door and there was my youngest grandson at his fence wanting me to catch bubbles with him. There is a house between us, but Emily didn’t mind bubbles flying across her garden. I sneaked out for a couple of minutes to do just that. It makes all the difference for my sanity.

Family quiz

Checking in on people is vital at the moment. A quick message on text, Twitter, Instagram, WhatsApp or Messenger, whatever is your favourite method can make all the difference. It can bring a smile or even a giggle. My social life has taken a real upturn. We even have a family quiz night now. I went to the virtual village pub via Zoon last Friday night and have caught up with friends and siblings too. It can make a huge difference when you live alone just to hear someone’s voice. But the things I miss the most is a hug. Is human contact. Is my grandchildren wrapping their arms around me. Is holding my brand-new granddaughter and watching her newly learnt smile. The bear hugs from my sons and the all-enveloping hug from my daughter. The ache for those is physical. It really hurts. Those are the things I am going to do first when this lockdown is over.

During this time my colleagues and I have had to deal at a distance with the loss of a great friend. We

RIP Prof Neil McCaw

haven’t been able to come together to share our grief. Prof Neil McCaw was a larger than life character. He wore the best shirts. He so kind, but never suffered fools gladly. I have sat opposite him in meetings and he’d give me a look, just slightly raising an eyebrow, with a slight twitch of a grin. I’d know that I’d get an email later with his ‘thoughts’ on the meeting. His emails were the best. I’d quite often get an email from him because he’d found something that he knew would interest me because that’s what he was like. We’d talk about tv programmes, theory of creativity, life, dealing with illness and dogs. I knew if I had a worry, I could ask him, and he would give me an honest answer. It wasn’t always necessarily the answer I wanted to hear, but I knew it was always the best answer. Neil was a great support. He always had my back. He mentored me in my career and celebrated my successes. He was a truly gentle man and a gentleman, so kind and generous of heart. He knew so much and was so interesting to talk to. Passionate about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and George Eliot. You could have a fascinating and challenging conversation with him.

He started, with Andy Melrose, the Creative Writing Undergraduate Programme at Winchester. He always strove to make it the best it could possibly be. His leadership was such that we all wanted the same. He showed us how to be the best academic you could be. It made you push to ensure your teaching was at the top of your game. Neil achieved his aim too. The programme was number one in the country and renowned for what it offered. We were proud to be part of it and what he was creating.

My heart goes out to all my colleagues and to his family. Neil, go shine brightly for us.

This seems appropriate a bit of Paul Buchanan

#writingishard7 - characters

So much has changed in two weeks. When I wrote my blog two weeks ago, we were not in lockdown. People weren’t fighting over loo rolls. How quickly life can change as we start living in

our dystopian fiction. I could imagine telling a student their story was too far fetched if they’d presented me with this idea!

I thought this week we’d talk about characters. Characters inhabit your story and need to be fully rounded so that your reader can empathise with them. You will have protagonists and antagonists. All of whom will need to have flaws, wants and needs. It is important to remember that any decision that the antagonist makes will be the right decision for them to make at that particular moment even if it is going to cause problems for the protagonist.

When you create characters you automatically think about the basics. You think about hair colour, eye colour etc etc. I often search for images of people that I think look like my character. I then keep

writing letters

them in a closed Pinterest board that only I can access. It helps me visualise them and as a reminder. I also write a letter from my character to me introducing themselves. It is a way of getting inside their heads.

When writing Flight, I learnt to look at the relationships surrounding the main character and for me, I suddenly realised that Jakob was only surrounded by males including the horses, which were stallions. It was only when Kizzy came on the scene that he had anything to do with women. This was really important as I needed him to be unsure how to behave in front of a girl, clumsy and almost threatened by the situation. It was one of his flaws. You need to be aware of the flaws as it those that make them fully rounded characters and not flat, two-dimensional characters.

Getting to know your characters inside out means you will know how your character will react in any given situation. It needs to be a realistic and appropriate reaction. In an extreme situation (and you do have to be brave to do this) I have gone out pretending to be my character to see what it would feel like. How would they view the world? It is about writing the height. How would the world appear to them? Important if you are writing a ten-year-old character or a fourteen-year-old character. The world is going to feel very different from the world that you see. The other thing you can think about is what would be in their pocket always? Their phone? A pebble? Sweets? Intriguing idea.

During this lockdown perhaps take this time to get to your know all your characters intimately so you

Social distancing

will know automatically know how they would react in any situation without having to think about it. Have some fun with it.

Stay at home. Stay Safe.

#writingishard6 - right way to write...

The right way to write. In my various roles I’ve been asked for formulas for how to write; where’s the ultimate place to write or the perfect time. I am afraid I have no magic answers to any of these – other than maybe you need a beginning, a middle and an end. It is all about finding out what works for you and your writing style.

Lucy Christopher

Some people like to work in silence, others in noisy coffee shops. Some like Lucy Christopher has sometimes talked about a playlist linked with their novel. This can be the music they listened to while writing. Annaliese Avery posted a track of ‘white noise’ that she likes to listen to when concentrating. People like to write first thing in the morning before everyone is up or late at night after everyone has gone to sleep. Others might take snatched moments. There are those that aim to write every day and those, like me, who might write every few days, fitting it in around other jobs. I have written about this elsewhere. Writing is like a muscle the more you do it, the stronger it gets.

Some people love to handwrite first using a pencil (Blackwing), pen, fountain pen (oh the choices are numerous but I am definitely a Lamy fan) in to an equally glorious number of wonderful of notebooks – A4, A5, lined, blank, squared, Moleskine, Lechtturn etc. I confess I tend to use my notepads to write scenes in and all my research but always have to have a new notebook for each novel. Others, like me, will write straight onto the laptop. I do it because I can type faster than I can write plus I can read it! Again, there is no right or wrong way. It is what is right for you, and what is right for you at a particular time. It doesn’t matter if it changes.

As a writer you find that people will be very quick to tell you what their writing practices are and some may even insist that their way is the ‘ONLY’ way to write. You can’t be doing it right unless you are doing it their way. Wrong. (Unless of course, their way does work for you!) It is like having children, everyone has an opinion as to how you should do it. You need to filter it just like you do when you have children when you decide who to listen to. There are the experts who you work with that you know you can trust pretty well plus there are those friends whose advice is always sound such as maybe your crit group (find your tribe – I’ve written about that before too). From the rest, you pick out those golden nuggets that make sense to you. The rest you nod and smile sweetly at them and say thank you. Remembering always, this is your story, not theirs.

The other important thing to remember though is to be adaptable. As a writer, you will change and evolve. Sometimes this is forced because of the needs of an agent or publisher. Other times it is just as you become more and more experienced as a writer, your writing style develops. I found this myself recently. The publisher wanted a chapter breakdown for the contemporary novel I was writing. I struggled with this for a bit because I am a bit of a ‘Planster’. Let me explain. I am definitely not a detailed plotter/planner when it comes to writing. Neither am a ‘pantser’ in that I don’t just write it and see what happens…or not totally. I usually know my beginning and know my ending; I might have a couple of scenes in the middle, but the rest is definitely written by the seat of my pants. Therefore, coming up with a chapter breakdown really challenged my creative processes. 

I could do it because I was able to use all the theories and skills, I had gained from writing Flight with Imogen. It worked well but it took me outside of my comfort zone. I completed that novel and sent it off to my agent last week. Interestingly, on the same day, a complete chapter breakdown for the next novel fell out of my head. This had never happened to me before. It seems my writing style has adapted. But these are my ways of writing. You will often hear how I ‘write cold, edit hot.’ I get a basic story down, so I know structure works then go back in a fill in the colour. I know plenty of people who do it the other way around: ‘write hot, edit cold,’ needing to cut out masses of words. As a writer, you have to find what works for you and don’t be afraid to try different ways until you find ‘your fit.’ This follows on from the last post where I said you never stop learning. 

What I will assure you is even if you have written a book, when you are sat facing the blank screen, white piece of paper because you are starting a new project, the chances are for the briefest moment you will think ‘can I remember how to do this? Do I know how to write a book?’ We all do it. It never gets easier. Just try to enjoy the process as much as you can. However hard it is, it is still the best job in the world.