Starting Over, or ten reasons why I'm ditching everything

So, I wrote a novel. It was OK. I thought it was quite good. And perhaps it was. But it wasn't Good Enough. I despaired, I ranted, I sulked. I threw not only the baby out with the bathwater, but all the words too. Then I picked them up. And picked myself up. And I had some lovely, kind, helpful, insightful feedback. I'm starting over. From scratch. Anew. Without looking at any of those soggy, bathwater words. And this is why I'm pleased about it.

1. Not good enough can always become better.

2. No words are wasted. Even those you throw away have helped to shape your world, your characters, your plot.

3. If you can't let go of your story, then it's yet to be written. It's just not the right shape yet.

4. Re-writing is scarier than re-drafting but it's fresh, exciting and, sometimes, the only way forward.

5. The thrill of finding the right story cannot be beaten.

6. I love this story. It's my story. Even if no one else ever reads it, I must write it. And I need it to be good.

7. This character in my head will not let me go until she is done. She's had a tough time. She wants to tell me all about it. How can I not let her do that?

8. As new ideas flood my mind, I am carried into my character's world. Who needs cinema? This is much better!

9. If I don't carry on writing, people (thank you fellow SCBWIers) will nag me.

10. We all know about Ernest Hemingway's first drafts. Why should I be any different?

So it's onwards and upwards, but most of all, inwards!

2012 - An Unimaginable Year

So 2012 started, and that was something I hadn't imagined would happen. Not for me anyway. Being diagnosed with late stage cancer in September 2011 made 2012 seem like an impossibility, yet here I am at the end of it. This is my year.

January: My hair has started to grow back. Just a bit, not enough to ditch the scarves, but it's a start. My wonderful, beautiful daughter turns 16. We go to the cinema to see Sherlock Holmes 2 - my first public outing since my diagnosis. A week later I'm in St Thomas's for my operation. All goes well, although the moment when we discovered that the anaesthetic coverage is patch is a bad one! Still it means I have the hand held morphine thing which is marvellous! During all this daughter visits and applies for sixth form schools. She wants to go to the BRIT School so very badly. It means an audition and an interview and a lot of written stuff.

February: Lovely Agent doesn't like final draft of the 17th century story I'd been writing for years so it's ditched. But I start writing a new 17th century story! Hospital consultant is pleased with my progress. I have my last two sessions of chemo. My hair falls out again.

March: CT scan is, after some deliberation, deemed clear. I join the Royal Festival Hall and start to socialise! I even see a play at the Young Vic - Bingo with Patrick Stuart. I go to an exhibition - Getty Images 'Marilyn'.

April: I visit family in Wales. First time I've seen my mother since August 2011. She cries. I think the trip is hard for everyone apart from me. I'm fine. I feel fine. Everyone else worries that I'll do too much too soon and get ill again. I go to the theatre again - in London. The Ladykillers. I take back my part-time jobs that the very lovely people kept open for me. It's rather good. I have Something To Do. I'm still writing. Lots. I'm not sure it's any good though.

May: I go to the theatre. Really making up for lost time here. Misterman at the National which is absolutely stunning! I see Hay Fever too, which is great fun. Daughter starts her GCSEs. I ditch my head scarves. My first writerly outing without the scarves is to Miriam Halahmy's birthday brunch. I feel vulnerable and scared but everyone is very nice.

June: Hospital check up is fine. Next one in three months. Daughter finishes her GCSEs. They've gone well. See the preview of Spiderman at the O2 with daughter. Fantastic. I go back to Wales. No one cries. They're used to me now. Daughter leaves school. I finish the new novel. Well, the first draft.

July: We visit the BRIT school. Daughter has a confirmed place on the Theatre course. Thank you thank you thank you! We go to Norfolk. I feel like a normal person. Looking at photos now my hair is SO short but it felt luxurious at the time! I go to the theatre! Midsummer Night's Dream at the Open Air Theatre and it doesn't rain! I go to Wales. I watch TV a lot. It's the Olympics! I get obsessed with Oscar Pistorius.

August: Daughter and I have an excellent day at London Zoo where I gaze adoringly at the Okapis. Should it have an 's'? GCSE results day. She passes them all! Then she goes to Reading Festival for the day but phones at midnight to say she's staying there overnight. Nice. You can imagine how pleased! I go to Colin Mulhern's event at Foyles for his new book, Arabesque. Haven't seen him for six years! And see the lovely NoN from Catnip too.

September: Send new novel to Lovely Agent. Still not sure about it. See Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime at a cinema with NT live. Amazing! Go to Paralympics and see OSCAR! Go to the SCBWI Sara Grant revision masterclass. And see Timon of Athens at the National. Go to Wales. Come back. Have blood test. See consultant. Marker is rising but still in normal range.

October: See Damned by Despair at the National. Only person in the world who likes it. Go for a tour of Wilton's Music Hall. Wonderful place. SCBWI Miriam Halahmy stuck in the middle masterclass. Visit a Victorian mortuary during the London Open House weekend. A story spark is lit. Visit Rotherhithe, Wapping, and the Crossness Pumping Station. The spark grows. Talk to Lovely Agent about 17th century story. She's not sure either. I suggest we ditch it because the Victorian idea is So Much Better. I go to Bob the cat's book signing. Love him! See the Judas Kiss at Richmond Theatre. Good grief! Have blood test. Marker is now above normal range. I have a scan. I panic.

November: The scan is clear. The marker is still too high, but the scan is clear. I start writing the Victorian novel. I see 55 Days at the Hampstead Theatre. Douglas Henshall and Mark Gatiss. Perfect. My mother falls and breaks her knee. Is effectively bed bound. Not so perfect. Especially for my sister. SCBWI conference. Brilliant, inspiring, fun.

December: Daughter and I have a day out - shopping, lunch, and The Magistrate at the National - great fun and the best curtain call ever. Jo Franklin gets tickets to see Benedict Cumberbatch (and some others) recording Radio 4's Cabin Pressure and she takes me! Daughter is furious. I am thrilled. Take Cat #1 to the v.e.t. His ear is cancerous and will have to be removed. So will a couple of teeth. Operation booked for January 3rd. Mother's knee is mended. I have blood test and see woman-who-is-not-my-consultant. Marker is still going up. She is pessimistic. I don't like her. But, for now, all is OK as the scan was clear. I see the Hobbit and love it. So much!

So that's it. Tomorrow I'm off to Wales for Christmas. I'm back on the green tea. I feel fine. I'm optimistic. The Victorian novel is going extremely well. 2012 has been a mixed year but overall an excellent one. I'm still here and plan to be so for a very long time. This year has shown me how lovely people are. I'm so very grateful for the support I've had from friends, family, SCBWIers, and Facebookers. I've been carried along on a tide of good wishes. So thank you. 

I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

The Living Story

Things have been a bit rubbish recently. Lovely Novel turned out to be Lousy Novel and has been discarded. The doctors thought there was a chance the cancer had come back (it hasn't). The little girl missing in Machynlleth is from the town where my family live and the whole place is, understandably, in shock. My mother broke her leg, well, her knee, but it's a full plaster and she's totally immobile. So that's that.

But, there has been a gleam, a little sparkle, a nugget of loveliness. And, bear with me here, it all started with a trip to a Victorian mortuary. Yes, I know. It doesn't sound that great. During the London Open House weekend (which is a splendid thing and everyone who can go, should go), I went to Rotherhithe to see the mortuary. I thought it would be interesting, after all, I am the woman who spent the evening at the Old Operating Theatre in London Bridge, listening to a talk about the history of autopsies. There's nothing left of the mortuary now - it's a community centre - but as I listened to the history of the place, how the building was used, how they took in the bodies washed up in the Thames, the seed of a story planted itself in my head. I spent the rest of the day wandering around Rotherhithe. I spent another day wandering around Wapping. And I went to the Crossness Pumping Station in Erith Marshes. And I read. Peter Ackroyd's London Under building in particular built on my story idea. I went mudlarking. I went to the Mayflower and the Angel (oh, such hardship in the name of research) and I scribbled notes, took photos, and let the story evolve.

It struck me how lucky I am to live in London, the place where my stories are usually set. You can still find historic buildings and atmospheric lanes. The river itself tells so much - the shores, the old jetties, moss covered steps long since abandoned. And all these things build a picture in your head, give your characters somewhere to grab onto, make the story come alive. We have excellent museums. The Museum of London has a Victorian shopping centre. Their off-shoot in the Docklands has Sailor Town - a street with a lodging house, shops, the riverfront. You are never far away from the past, whether real or imagined.

And my story? It grows day by day. I have my setting. I have my story line. I have my characters (thank you Miriam Halahmy for the fantastic SCBWI masterclass). But because of my wanderings, I have my world. It's in my head. It's real, it's breathing, it's alive. And you can't get better than that.

My first Moleskine

I just came across the first Moleskine I ever owned. It's a black pocket ruled notebook and I bought it in 2005. Up until then I'd used spiral bound notebooks from Smiths. I don't know why or how I moved onto Moleskine but, and this will come as no surprise to those who know me, I haven't looked back since.

But it's so exciting looking back at the things I was writing and plotting and planning at the time. I was in the middle of writing a distopian novel - I was ahead of the game! - which actually looks rather good. Obviously there had been massive climate change which meant society had become completely divided with the rich, naturally, taking the upper hand. And of course I had a serial killer. I also had notes for a story about someone called Tirion (long before Game of Thrones), who I think I planned to turn into a star. Yes, the astral kind.

I've got lists of agents to submit to. Only one of them was interested, I seem to remember, and not all that much, sadly.

I've got lists of titles. The distopian ended up being called Ripped Apart, for what it's worth. I've got lists of characters. I have no idea who Connor Mullen or Bridget Rossini were going to be. Or Gabriel Beaumont.

I've got notes for a new novel which then went on to be called The Boxed Crystal. No one wanted that one. But I liked it.  I've got notes for a rom com (really?!) which actually looks quite good, but I'll never write it.

I've got notes from a SCBWI event, which was at Sara Grant's house, with the publicity people from Penguin, I think. Kirsten and Adele?

I've got notes for a story set on Easter Island, which never got written. There's a short story called The Unseen which I enjoyed writing more than people enjoyed reading. There's a bit of flash fiction that I put on Write Words, which was really good fun. And there's the start of the sequel to Ripped Apart, which was a bit ambitious seeing as no one wanted the first one.

It's great to look back to see the energy and enthusiasm I hope I can still muster. I can see just how much my writing has improved over the years but there are still a few gems there; some well-rounded characters, exciting story ideas, and even some rather good dialogue. I'm tempted to sit down and read through all my notebooks but time has taught me that it would be a form of procrastination. I'll save them for another day.

Ten Things I Have Learned About Writing and Life (and why I still need a hairdryer even though I have no hair)

In September 2011, I was diagnosed with stage four ovarian cancer. It was something of a life changer and, boy, has my life changed. These are some of the things I have learned.

1. The internet is both brilliant and useless for research. From a writer's point of view, it's brilliant. I can visit people and places from anywhere and any time; I can discover new things, get information on old things; I can find inspiration and motivation. From a health point of view, it's appalling. Think scaremongering, misinformation, and conflicting advice. If I believed everything I read, I would in fact be dead now, or at the very least On The Way Out. (But I am neither - hurrah!)

2.  Being a Lady of Leisure (hereinafter referred to as a LoL), should mean that I am writing reams and reams of perfect prose. So I thought. Ah, well. When I was diagnosed, I thought I'd give up writing altogether. After all, what was the point. I might die? I quickly got over that but there were still no words. I wanted to write, really I did, I just couldn't seem to get to it. So I read. I read fiction - oh some lovely books - and I read books about writing. It was only when I re-read Stephen King's 'On Writing' that I felt the flicker of an urge to write something myself. So I did. I started with a couple of hundred words. It felt like a massive achievement. Then I re-wrote The Novel. And now? Now I'm back to faffing. I'm scribbling ideas for new projects but, if I'm honest, being a LoL is not what I thought it would be!

3. There are some fantastic books out there that so deserve publication. And there are some that really don't. In my reading frenzy I have been filled with both admiration and horror at the beauty/awkwardness of the writing. Rarely have I been so swept away by a story that I didn't notice the writing style. But it's happened on occasion (Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor, Dark Parties by Sara Grant). There is no such thing as a perfect novel. There are right time, right place, compelling novels. Novels where plot is key. Novels where character is key. This pleases me.

4. I love my Kindle. I had a sneaking desire for one but somehow I felt like a bit of a traitor. Shun proper books? Could I? Should I? Then I got a Kindle for Christmas. And I really love it. But, I have found some great  authors I may not have come across. And I read real books too.

5. Once you start to write, you just can't stop. Yes, I know this kind of negates point 2, but bear with me. Even when I'm not sitting at a desk - and it's really sore when I do at the moment - I'm still filled with words. Ideas come from everything around you, everyday experiences, people you meet - and I met some corkers in hospital - so even if the page itself isn't filling up, my mind is. That new novel will pop out any minute now.

6. My, how you find out who your friends are when you're ill! And I am lucky enough to have so many. Thank you! Joining the SCBWI was one of the best things I ever did. If you write for children, join it! Here! The people are wonderful and will support you not just with your writing, but with your whole life too.

7. Facebook, Google+, and Twitter are not writing. Fancy that. I mean, it's words, yes, but it's not a novel is it? Unless you're Melvin Burgess. As a LoL, I've managed to embrace all three with open arms. But words on a social networking site are no substitute for words in a story. So turn it off. Actually, that's a lesson I'm yet to learn.

8. The brain is a marvellous thing. You can achieve so much if you just put your mind to it. Four months since my diagnosis, there is now not a cancer cell in my body. Chemotherapy and a wonderful surgeon are largely responsible for this (thank you, thank you Guy's and St Thomas'), but I honestly think my sheer bloody-mindedness and forced positivity helped. If only I could put that much willpower towards my writing. Perhaps I will.

9. You can't force it. I absolutely do not believe in waiting for "the muse". If you're going to write, then do it. If you waited for inspiration, you'd never write a word. But you can't make it happen either. Oh, anyone can write anything, and if you write for long enough you might find some good words. But I have learned that sitting down and trying to force words out does me no favours. Stress is so last year! Perhaps this is more the case when starting new projects, and perhaps it is a form of procrastination, but I know when I'm ready to write. I think.

10. The hairdryer. Bizarrely, I have to dry my wound (soon to be a scar) with the hairdryer after I take a shower. Who needs hair?