Helen Glynn Jones

A Month Without Ambeth

Here we are, a week into November and, for the first time in nearly two years, a week since I have visited Ambeth. I’ve been writing my YA series about my fantasy world pretty much non-stop since last January, so it feels very strange not to be there. Oh sure, I’ve written other things in that time, work for clients, several short stories, ideas for other novels, plans and characters yet to come to me, just short pages of notes to be fleshed out at some future point, but Ambeth has always been the focus. I have four books in the series completed, the fifth one two thirds of the way done, the final and sixth one about half way. (I say final, though I have a feeling a book of short stories about the place is lurking in the recesses of my brain) I’ve edited and re-edited, passed them out to beta readers, wandered through woods and along country paths and suburban streets working out plot intricacies. I’ve even written the very last sentence of the last book – oh yes, I know exactly how the story ends, and the remaining pieces, the path that will get me there is becoming more and more clear.

And it’s not to say that nothing is happening with the books this month. Oak and Mist has just gone to the editor, while books 3 and 4 are out with beta readers, plus cover designs will be underway at some point as well. But I’ve not stepped through the Gate myself, not spoken with the characters or re-read familiar passages, wanting to get the words just right. And why, you may ask, is that so? One word. NaNoWriMo.

This month I’ve had to focus on a new book. It is November, National Novel Writing Month and I, along with millions of other writers around the world, am taking the challenge to write 50,000 words in one month. I must say I wasn’t sure, when I signed up, that I would be able to do it. 50,000 words seemed like an awful lot to complete in thirty days. I wondered whether they had to actually be in any sort of order, whether just typing out 50,000 unconnected words would count, you know, if I came down with a massive case of writer’s block and was unable to think of anything. I had visions of my family peering wide-eyed around the study door at me as I hacked away, wild haired and red eyed, desperate to finish. But so far, touch wood, it’s been pretty smooth sailing. I’m about 20,000 words into my novel, working up an idea I’ve had for a little while, and I’m really enjoying the story. It’s in first person POV which is new to me – in Ambeth all the characters get a turn to speak, their stories weaving together. I’ve written passages that have made me laugh and made me teary, each section I write leading into another idea. And so far, I’m still managing to keep up with family and work commitments, only Ambeth having to be sidelined for now.

The characters are still there, waiting for me to pick up the threads of their lives once more, half glimpsed figures in the glowing woods, silver fish words in dark leafy ponds, knowing I’ll be back soon. But the interesting thing about doing this is that it’s made me realise that I will have to leave Ambeth again in the future, as other books, other ideas come to me, other characters wanting to tell their tales. But I think, like all significant firsts, Ambeth will always be part of me, no matter what else may come along later.

There may be a day this month where I can’t resist, where I have a spare few minutes and I will go and visit. Or there may not be, depending on how things work out. So I write, and I think, and I see stories waiting in the woods. And once NaNo is over, I know I can go back there once more.

Dig Deeper

I’ve been thinking about this post for a little while, unsure whether or not to share it, but then decided I had to. The spirit of this blog is that it’s my journey to publication, lessons learned, paths taken, decisions made. And so here it is…

A little while ago I was offered a publishing contract for Oak and Mist.

Woo hoo, right? Champagne for everyone!

Well, not so much. I had seen this publisher mentioned on a few blogs and websites as one who took unsolicited submissions (and, more importantly, took fantasy submissions, for which there is a much smaller market in publishers and agents). So I sent my book to them and, about a month later, received a request for a full manuscript. So far, so good. About a month after that something, I don’t know what, spurred me to do a little more online research into the publisher. And what I found was a shock. They were a vanity publisher (you know I hate that term but for the purposes of this post it will have to do) who approached first time authors with what they called a ‘contribution scheme’ contract. So, they would publish my book, but I would have to contribute up front to the costs of doing so. Red flag number one. I was pretty gutted, but worked through it and in some ways they did me a favour, for it cemented my decision to self publish instead of waiting any longer.

About a week later a big fat envelope from the publisher plopped through onto my doormat. I picked it up, then went to the kitchen and made myself a big greasy sandwich and a cup of tea (comfort food), before taking the lot up to my office (spare room) and sitting down to read. Luckily I was prepared, for on the surface this was a very exciting envelope to receive. ‘Publishing Contract’ said the black letters on the glossy covers of two official looking documents. A nice cover letter cited their ‘excitement to be working with me’ and their ‘faith in my ability as an author.’ A second insert listed a whole bunch of different ways in which a book could be marketed, but then ended by stating this wasn’t necessarily what they were going to do with my book. Red flag number two.

So I took my glossy gleaming contract and flipped it open, taking a bite of my sandwich to fortify me as I read on. Interesting. According to the contract:

The Publisher could amend or edit my book whenever they wanted and how they saw fit
They had the final decision on the look of the book
Other than ten author copies for me and five sent to university libraries, there was no mention of how many other copies they planned to print in the first run
They could decide at any time that my book ‘no longer warranted publication’ and could then cease to print or market it (so after the first fifteen copies, if they wanted to)
They would market the book by any means at their disposal (very vague) but could not be held responsible if no bookstores wanted to order it
If they failed to pay me my royalties on time I ‘had the right’ to notify them of this in writing – no other penalty was mentioned
They wanted first refusal on my next two books

Ding ding ding! Red flags everywhere! It was like a Communist Party parade at this point, but the kicker, the real icing on the cake of this contract, was that I could receive all this jammy goodness for the princely sum of £2500, my so called ‘contribution’ to the scheme.

Um, no thanks.

If I’m going to spend £2500 to publish my book, then I’ll spend it myself, designing a cover I like, editing the book to my satisfaction and marketing it the way I want to, while retaining the rights and a much healthier slice of the royalties. And I’m sure I could do all that for a lot less than £2500, to be honest. But I can see how for some people this offer would be very enticing, the language of the contract and accompanying letter written in such a way that on first glance it hides the fact that the deal is so heavily weighted in favour of the publisher.

A few months ago I attended an agent workshop at Bloomsbury. It was a great day, I learnt a great deal and met some wonderful people. One thing I do remember is sitting next to a well known agent as she told the room that, often, publishers don’t make back their advances. They make their money on the bestsellers, the books that do well, then offset these other losses against that. But they do what they do because they believe in the book, they believe in the writer and they are willing to put their money where their mouth is in a speculative business. And that’s the sort of publisher I’d like to work with. One who’s willing to back me and my work all the way. And at the moment that’s me, though I live in hope.

So the lesson for me was to dig deeper, do more research. My problem is not with their offer, it is in the way it was presented, their website making no mention of the fact that this was how they operated, so I wasted time and energy submitting and waiting for a response. I’m not bitter about it, nor am I angry. It is what it is and the choice was with me as to whether I chose to sign with these people who, after all, are in the business of making money. I chose not to, because I want better for myself and better for my book. So I sent them an email, politely declining their offer and they sent me one back, very nice, wishing me every success with my publishing. So I will take their good wishes and move forward, a little bit wiser (I hope) about it all.

PS – Three days in to NaNowriMo and I’m over 7,000 words along! The novel is taking shape so I’ll keep you posted on my progress.

In Praise of Nothing

So tomorrow I’m going to have a day where I do nothing in particular. I like to do this once in a while, usually during school holidays, as the morning rush of uniforms and breakfast and walking to school interferes somewhat with the idea of having absolutely nothing planned. Just to be clear, I’m not planning on doing nothing – it is rather, an absence of planning altogether. Other than the fact I will wake, I will eat at some point and I will breathe, the rest of the day is wide open. Of course, being a parent, there are certain things I need to do, but I’m lucky in that I have a very relaxed child who is happy to lose herself in a craft project for a few hours, make up dances, practice handstands in the garden until they’re absolutely perfect or just sit on the couch with me and watch 17 episodes of Gilmore Girls, if that’s what the day brings.

I meditate most days, and find that there is a point, once all the swirling thoughts and ideas finally calm down, when there is nothing. Nothing but breath and darkness. But not a sinister darkness, instead one like that which precedes the dawn, a breath taken in about to be exhaled, ripe with possibility. It is a wonderful feeling and, I think, is the point when we as humans can touch on something much larger, commune with inspiration. It is a space where anything can happen. And that is what I’m trying to achieve, on a broader scale, with my day full of ‘nothing.’

Someone, I’m not sure who, described this idea of taking time out as ‘the space between the music notes,’ which I think is a wonderful analogy*. Imagine listening to a song and the notes are so jumbled and close together that it’s hard to discern the tempo or melody, just an endless cacophony. Then you add spaces, pauses between the notes, long, short or somewhere in between, and all at once the melody becomes evident. It can be this way with life. We can become too caught up in the idea of having to be doing something at all times, not wasting any part of our day, planning and doing and moving about to the point where we lose sight of the bigger picture, the days moving past filled with this and that until we wonder ‘Where did this year go?’ I realise I’m lucky to be able to take a day without having to schedule anything, but surely it isn’t that hard to do, that we can’t all find one single day when we can just let go.

As a writer, I find that setting myself goals (ie, I must write x amount of words in x amount of time) is a great way to get writer’s block. Instead I’ve found I need to just stop and think, go for a walk away from the work and let the idea coalesce so it can flow without pressure (and I’ve never missed a deadline so far). I’ve signed up to do NaNoWriMo next month and I do have a novel waiting in my head, bopping and burbling about, demanding to be released onto the page. Whether there’s 50,000 words worth of novel in there remains to be seen, but getting ready to set it free is part of why I’m taking this brief pause, walking away from the idea of writing for a day so the idea has space to grow.

So that’s what my day of nothing is about. It’s about taking a step back and just being. Letting the day unfold. Seeing what it brings instead of trying to control it. Creating space between the notes, so I can hear the melody once more. Showing the gorgeous child that it’s OK, sometimes, not to have a plan. To listen instead to the melody, and let it take you where it will.

* I know that Debussy was quoted as saying that ‘music is the space between the notes’ – whoever made the quote that I remember was extending the idea xx

The Domain of Ambeth

A few days ago I received an email from someone stating that they were the owner of Ambeth.com, letting me know it was up for auction online if it ‘met my needs.’ So I went to have a look, curious to see what value might be ascribed to a domain name based on my fantasy world and there it was, listed for the sum of $6000, which seemed both bizarre and expensive to me.

Because Ambeth is a made up name. It’s the name I came up with for the land where my characters live and it’s based on the Welsh ‘am byth’, which means forever. I had originally wanted to call my fantasy world The Everlands, but on Googling it discovered the name was already in use as part of a video game. So I came up with The Ambeth Realms instead and then, on the suggestion of a friend, shortened it to Ambeth. I did Google this name as well, just to make sure, and, apart from a singer who happens to have Ambeth as a first name, no-one else seems to be using it for anything significant.

So now I don’t know whether to feel flattered or alarmed or simply brush the whole thing aside as a bit of targeted spam. I mean, this is what this person does for a living, and no doubt they send hundreds of emails out to people like me every week, hoping to get one or two to take them up on their offer, taking a chance on a name they found online. For that’s all I am at the moment – an as yet unpublished writer with a handful of (greatly appreciated) followers on this blog, so the idea that I would have $6K to spend on a domain name is laughable.

This experience did give me a glimpse into what it might be like if my books do take off. A quick search of the auction site revealed that there are many permutations of my domain name available and, if I have a fan base one day, these names will be available for them to use as fan sites linked to my books. I could go mad and buy them all up, but why should I need to?

It also made me realise how possessive I feel of Ambeth and the characters I’ve created. But I guess that’s part of writing – that once your idea is sent out in the world, in some ways it is no longer yours. Of course you retain the rights to your work, to the worlds and characters you’ve created – that’s called copyright. But stories can take on a life of their own as others pass them on, embellishing details and adding their own twists. It was the way of things before the written word, bards and storytellers passing on their tales to others to ensure they weren’t lost as the centuries passed, each recipient adding their own flavour to suit the time in which they lived. Now we have a cyberworld, a virtual library where words and images live on long after we do, fan fiction sites adding to the stories told, whether right or wrong. So I don’t share any of my writing work on here because I don’t want to, not yet. Not until it’s officially out in the world for all to see.

I’m lucky in that I have people I can ask about this stuff. And, after a little online searching and messaging, I sent an email back to the owner of Ambeth.com saying thanks but no thanks, that I was happy with the domain name I currently own. And now I’m blogging about it. Comments and thoughts are much appreciated on this post – have any of you gone through the same thing with your own work?

Update: I have some wonderful friends out there! In the interest of sharing all the steps on this journey, the person in question has held the domain name since 2013. So, a happy coincidence, serendipity that they happened to stumble onto my blog and contact me. It shows we do not create within a vacuum and that the internet is a vast and free world xx

More Updates!

Hi Everyone,

Just a little bit more news on the self publishing front – I’ve now engaged an editor to work with me on Oak and Mist, and cover designs are underway!

I’ve also done another guest blog post for the Writers & Artists website – here’s the link:

https://www.writersandartists.co.uk/2014/10/to-plan-or-not-to-plan

Other than that, I’m now working on book five in the Ambeth series and gearing up for NaNoWriMo which starts next month. It’s my first time doing it and the idea of writing 50,000 words in 30 days is a little daunting! Still, nothing ventured and all that. I’ve an idea for a book that’s been going around in my head for a while, so that’s what I’m going to be doing. I’ll keep blogging and let you know how it goes…

And the woods are changing, green to gold, leaves falling, so it’s time for another photography outing…

xx Helen

Finding Stories

I found this little guy on the beach a few weeks ago. I say little guy because to me it looks like a porcelain dog’s head, weathered by its time in the sea but still holding a vestige of what it once was. And it is porcelain, not just some strangely weathered stone – traces of shining crackled glaze run under its ‘chin’ and the shape seems too regular to have been made by anything other than human hands.

The beach where I found it is in South Wales at the mouth of a river, tidal surges combined with a point making it perfect for surfing waves, one of the reasons we were there. A small town sits on the hillside above, looking out across the silver sea, but there’s nothing at the river mouth now except green flatlands intersected with twining ribbons of water, then pebbly shingle as you get closer to where it meets the sea. But there was something once. Red bricks, weathered by the waves into undulating shapes, still overlaid in places by concrete aggregate, shattered and cracked by the power of the water, hint at a large structure here once, many years ago. And that’s where the story comes in.

This little guy speaks to me of long distance voyages, creaking timber ships laden with treasure from lands steamy with tropical heat. Crowded ports ringing with voices, languages and customs in layers too heavy and convoluted to tell apart, a glorious mix of cultures and ideas. I imagine a journey south, stopping at spice-scented ports along the way, trading until the great horn of Africa is rounded and the long haul north begins, the ship with its cargo fetching up here only for a dish or vase to drop as it’s carried to shore, shattered porcelain pieces sinking below the waves, its journey ended just moments too soon. Or perhaps someone came home from the East (for this is Chinese porcelain, I can just feel it – a little snarling dog with cloud-like curling painted ears), leaving silks and gentle customs behind to return to the green mountains and cold waters of the north, bringing treasured possessions all this way only to drop something, a crate breaking or trunk popping open at the last moment.

So it’s just a little piece of broken china I found on a shore, yet it tells me stories that take me far out into the world. I love stuff like this, the energy they contain. There is a psychic talent, if you believe in such things, called psychometry, whereby someone can tell the history of an item simply by holding it, drawing impressions from the energy it holds. Perhaps story telling is another facet of this, drawing on experiences out in the world and tying them into a narrative. I don’t know where this came from, but I can dream and think and weave what I know with what I don’t, and there lies the story. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – stories are everywhere, if you care to look for them.

PS And for those of you who think this is a bit of old meerschaum pipe, or a funny looking stone, or something completely different, let me know! This is the story it told me – perhaps it will tell you something else xx

Believe

My daughter, who is awesome, gave me this painting she’d done a little while ago. You can see what it says, right?

‘Mummy’s book published, and this will really happen!’

So that’s me on the stage with my books, bunches of roses and apparently a whole lot of cash from all the people buying my book, some of whom are sitting in the front row (she couldn’t fit them all in, she told me). How cool is that? I hugged her and kissed her and told her how amazing she was, and that I was going to put it above my desk to remind me of what was going to happen.

Now I’m all for the power of the mind, and the fact that belief can manifest in reality. But there are limits of course. No matter how much I meditate on it, I’m not going to be shorter or taller or look like Eva Green or whoever. You know what I mean. But I think if you hold onto an idea and you focus on it and it’s the right thing for you, that opportunities will present themselves. You just have to be looking for them. We all have a path to travel to where we’re going and it’s best to keep our eyes open, or else we might miss something. Don’t let the days amble past until they’re all gone.

Writing is a solitary game, as I’ve said before, and there’s a lot of hoping and waiting on other people to make decisions, and you get a lot of rejection so you really do need to believe in yourself to keep going. At least that’s what I’ve found. You also need to believe in the story you’re telling, because if you don’t, who else will? And if you self publish, like I’m about to, you have to believe in what you’re selling and get out there and push it like crazy.

So I’m going to put my daughter’s picture on the wall above my desk, just like I told her, to remind me. To believe. And then maybe, wonderful things will happen. Or maybe they’ve happened already.

Heart’s Desire

As I walked home from school after dropping my daughter off the other morning, I pondered, as I usually do, the latest plot twists in the book I’m writing. Then it struck me that this is what I do now. I thought back to a couple of years ago, before I started writing about Ambeth and all the other stories coming through me and was amazed by how my life has changed.

‘Will I always be like this?’ I thought to myself. ‘Is this it now, or will I look back in a few years time, shaking my head at how obsessed I was, how writing was a compulsion, a daily requirement?’

You know what, I really do think this is it. After forty something years of life, three different continents and a myriad of jobs ranging from martial arts instructor to waitress to casting co-ordinator and photography producer, I think I’ve finally found my groove. My place to stay, my happiness, as they say. Sure, I’ve been writing all my life, just like my bio says, and for the last nine years or so have been writing for other people. But this is different. This is writing for myself, tapping into the muse and weaving stories to life, words shining silver in the slippery darkness of the pond, fossils emerging from the forest floor. It is discovery and catharsis and creation and desire all rolled into one, a wonderful compulsion to put words on the page, to bring characters to life and tell their stories as they come through me.

So lucky me. I will say this, I have never given up the search for my heart’s desire. Through jobs I’ve hated and tolerated and thought perhaps I liked, through moves across town and state and country lines, I’ve always needed some sort of creative outlet. For a long time it was painting – I’ve sold a few, been exhibited once (just a small show) and several pieces adorn the walls of my own home. There is a peace and joy in painting once I get into the mood, music and brushstrokes a form of meditation. But it is nothing like the fire and excitement I get from writing, the pictures in my mind coming on to the page so much more easily than they did onto the canvas. There are times when I laugh a little and sigh, that my passion is not for some sort of fiendish financial calculation whereby I can make a fortune, but I am rich in so many other ways. Writing has conferred upon me a freedom, a confidence to be myself and express my thoughts, a confidence that grows and brings me back to the true self I came so close to losing some time ago. There is more value in that than in anything else I can think of, for it allows me to love and be free, to care for those around me and appreciate small wonders in the world, seeing them for the story they tell.

Wowsers! I had noticed in recent weeks a little theme, shall we say, of frustration creeping into my work. And that’s not really me. I love writing and, even though there are rejections and frustrations to suffer, none of them do anything to change that fact. So I thought I would write a post on how I feel about writing, letting my fingers flow. And so they have, reminding me of why it is that I write now, and why it is that will always be so, as long as I have ideas to dream of.

Tell me of your inspirations, if you like.

PS I’ve been walking in the woods a bit, taking photos and getting inspired, for much of my Ambeth stories take place in the woods. So I thought I’d share them with you.

A Little Update

I’ve just submitted another guest blog to the Writers and Artists website, and here it is:

https://www.writersandartists.co.uk/2014/09/in-praise-of-beta-readers

It’s all about you lovely beta readers (you know who you are), and how valuable I consider you to the writing process. Thank you to each and every one of you for the insights and time you’ve given me!

I’ve also, I think, made the big decision to self publish my first book. I’ve another three already written behind it, another two taking shape, and have signed up for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), in which I commit to writing 50,000 words of a novel in the month of November. So, with all this work written and underway I feel like it’s time to send the first one out there, start the ball rolling, so to speak. I’m now working on some cover designs and may post a couple for comments once they’re put together.

So thanks to all of you for reading along with me so far, lots more good stuff to come!

xx Helen

Green Eyed Monster

Image from Wikimedia Commons - Author: Petritap — Image from Wikimedia Commons – Author: Petritap

Another weekend, another article in the paper about a new writer getting a great publishing deal, being touted as ‘the next big thing.’

‘Why not me?’ I think to myself, shuffling the pages resentfully. ‘When will it be my turn? Huh, bet they know someone in publishing, bet they’ve met an agent somewhere, had some lucky break.’

But then I get over it. Because I can’t get all bitter and twisted about somebody else succeeding in my field, I really can’t. So I push the green eyed monster aside and read further into the article and, more often than not, this ‘new’ writer has been working their ass off for years, writing and rewriting, getting rejected, honing their craft until the magnificent moment when they are accepted and published, all the hard work paying off. Sure, there are those who hit it straight out of the park first go, young writers whose brilliance is such they’re picked up by the first agent who spots them, catapulted up the publishing ladder. But they are few and far between and the majority are just like the rest of us, toiling away until they are plucked from obscurity, chosen for the spotlight for a little while.

I was talking with a friend the other day, both of us discussing negative influences in our lives and she told me about a therapy method she’d heard about from another friend.

‘So you imagine a bonfire, and you and the other person who’s bothering you are there…’

‘And then you push them into the bonfire?’

We both laughed then, in that conspiratorial way you do with friends when you know you’re sort of joking but not really. You were actually supposed to talk with the other person across the bonfire, letting them know how you felt about whatever it was they had done to upset you. But I actually quite like the idea of using fire to burn away negative thoughts and energy. Bloodthirsty thoughts aside, the concept of fire as a cleansing entity is not new. Ancient stories reference fire coming from heaven to clear battlefields, taking the bodies up to heaven in a pillar of flame, Australian aborigines used fire to cleanse the landscape, opening it up for rejuvenation. Then there is trial by fire, in which we pass through metaphorical flames to emerge the other side strengthened in some way.

If you’ve ever read Zen In The Martial Arts by Joe Hyams (and if you haven’t I recommend it – you don’t have to be a martial artist to appreciate the lessons it holds), he writes about the late great Bruce Lee and a conversation they had about getting rid of negative thoughts. If something negative entered his mind, Bruce would visualise it as being written on a piece of paper, then would visualise crumpling the paper into a ball and setting it on fire, watching it burn until it was gone, taking the thought with it.

So I read on, taking my jealous thoughts and writing them down on that sheet of paper in my mind, burning them up and letting them go, grey ash floating in a metaphorical wind, knowing I cannot become upset or jealous when others get what I desire. For if all of a sudden there were no new voices, no new ideas to appreciate, then I would worry. It’s a great thing that there are always new writers coming up, being talked about, being promoted. Because it means they’re still giving out turns. Maybe next time, it will be mine.