every day should be a susie day

Writers are a funny bunch. Half the time we think we’re chocolate: we have to, to believe we can fill up that big blank page,  that we have something to say, a story to tell that we can tell better than anyone else.  The other half we spend in a state of eye-poking misery, staring at the no-longer blank page full of adverbs and ‘just’ and that character we put in because nothing had happened for a few paragraphs, wondering why we ever thought we could do this.  The inner critic is a necessary beast, of course – but how do we tell whether it’s biting because it should, or just because we’re having a histrionic artiste moment?

If I were a useful sort of person, here is where I would shout TA-DA! and unveil my solution in a Paul Daniels stylee.  Unfortunately, I seem to be sorely lacking in Debbie McGees – because if I knew the answer, I probably wouldn’t be in the process of junking 40,000 words of book that didn’t work.  And before you all go Awww or Oh no! (or even Ha, she deserves such a fate for invoking Paul Daniels) , I’m utterly delighted.  Now I’m going to start writing a new flipped-about slapped-on-the-bum version of the very same idea, and I’m giddy and excited and skipping about at the prospect.  And while the 40,000 words that came before made me grin every now and then, I’m not sure they ever made me skip.

So: from now on, I’m only going to write skippable things, I think. If you see me out and about with both feet firmly on the ground, tell me to take a few days off from the manuscript. That way, I might notice when it’s not working a bit quicker.

The book formerly known around these parts as Project Poppy shall henceforth be known as Project Bluebell.  I hope it will make you skip too.

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Since I’ve been so hopeless about updating lately, I’ve read lots of things and can’t remember what any of them are. I think this means I didn’t like them very much, so that’s probably ideal. Oh, and I read one fantastic book which made me sob repeatedly on a  train (WHY am I always on a train with the weepifying ones?) but it isn’t out till January, so I will wibble about it then when you can actually get your mitts on it. (Then cry. On a train.)  I am planning the annual bookapalooza known as ‘Going On Holiday’ soon, though, and after happily paddling in kidlit and YA for months I’ll be dipping a toe in the grown-up pool. Planned reading list: The Summer Book, Tove Jansson; One Day by David Nicholls (who for ages I thought was David Mitchell: stop having Ls in your names, people called David); and some Borges short stories. That should keep my tent contented.

Completely unrelated to the above, I’m whizzing my way towards the end of a first draft of Super Sekrit Project #93, aka, um… hang on, it’s so secret I haven’t given it a secret name…er… The Jovial Adventures of Some Herring. (It’s not about herring. Although now I sort of wish it was. Herring herring herring.)  This one is making me skip rather a lot.

Playing tour guide (ie taking lovely visiting people to the Pitt-Rivers and then out for French Onion soup); watching a very wet, very wonderful Midsummer Night’s Dream in my old office, aka the Bodleian Quad; breaking my laptop; getting pathetically overexcited about my impending holiday – Canada, bears, possible airport strikes, oh my!

Luisa, Keris, Sarra and Simmone

What better way to celebrate 4 glorious years of Chicklish, the UK’s very first teen/YA book blog, than with a celebration of books by its founders and friends?  Luisa Plaja, Keris Stainton, Sarra Manning and Simmone Howell treated Dulwich to readings, a Q&A, and signings (thanks to the indie bookshop Tales on Moon Lane, who also kindly gave me directions to the event as I am an utter donkey who apparently likes to get to these things 30 minutes late looking like a sweaty beetroot).  The discussion ranged from sources of inspiration (the whole panel confessed to being developmentally stuck circa age 15/16: oh, how I relate), to plan or not to plan (Sarra: YES! Everyone else: NO!) and their varied routes into writing for teens.

What stuck out most of all, though, was the fondness and respect there is for Chicklish, and all the YA book bloggers who have followed here in the UK, and worldwide. Those of us who write contemporary fiction for teenage girls don’t tend to snag award nominations or broadsheet reviews: instead we’re reviewed by our readers, online, because they love books and want to share them. All hail them. And lucky us.

Cheers, ladies, for a fabulous evening! (And to the just-as-fabulous Sophia Bennett, who cooked me dinner and walked me to my train after more booky nattering.)  Can we do it all again next year?

I broke my usual ‘no non-fiction unless I get to write an essay about it later’ rule for Libby Brooks’ The Story of Childhood, profiles of 12 children and young adults living in modern Britain. I should break that rule more often: it’s well-written, thought-provoking stuff, prodding at our strange cultural doublethink of over-protective child-panic, and the demonisation of the feral teen.  Also Gayle Forman’s If I Stay, which is one of those oddities where I can tell objectively that I’m reading a ‘good’ book without really connecting with it (though it reduced me to a sniffly weepy mess several times with perfect efficiency). Now galloping through Nicola Morgan’s Wasted, which turns on such a brilliant premise that it starts to creep into your brain, and leave you standing in the Co-Op, holding carrots in one hand and crisps in the other, wondering if this decision might be about more than my dipping-things-in-houmous choices, and how I’ll never ever know…

Ahhh, writing: sometimes it’s awesome and lovely and you’ve just written the funniest cleverest most emotionally gobsmacking sentence  OF YOUR ENTIRE WRITING LIFE, and sometimes you hate everything you do.  Mostly the reality is actually a wiggly line between those two – but not always, and sometimes the ‘oh dear, this book is bobbins, argh help flail’ feeling takes root for good reasons.  Which is a long way of saying I think like I’ve got a lot of rewriting to do on Project Poppy, so you might not see it for a little while.  Have gone from quivery meep-mode to a cheering sense that this makes me a Proper Writer type – Sophia Bennett told me she wrote 32 drafts of Threads (which is brilliant, by the way: high fashion and child soldiers in Uganda, and funnyfunnyfunny) before it was done. THIRTY-TWO.  I’m such a slacker – all the way to feeling a  bit excited, as I’ve got the loveliest idea for how to rewrite it…

Skipping around the New Forest with sister and family, where ponies stand in the middle of the road looking imperiously at cars and Bournemouth beach makes me ultra-freckly (or ‘spotty’, as Small Person would have it); hanging out with old college mates in old college pubs, and feeling cheered by how people’s lives work out (mine included); loving Matt Smith’s Doctor Who (and Amy, and Rory, and everything in it at all ever) like a big ninny.

My holiday picnic spot: lighthouse at Hurst Castle

The Guardian may think the Daleks win the monster-off, but for the stuff of nightmares nothing can top Weeping Angels.  Blimey.

The Time of Angels. Click if you dare!

Whovians are a crafty lot, btw: check out this spiffy birthday cake, and the magnificent cosplaying femme!Doctors (complete with a really intriguing answer to the ‘why are you doing that, then?’ question). Telly: it’s not just for looking at, you know.

Della Says OMG! – the debut novel from Chicklish‘s co-founder Keris Stainton.  It’s the best/worst night of Della’s life: she kisses the boy of her dreams, only to discover her diary has been stolen – and whoever has it is intent on torturing her, posting extracts online and into her friends’ pockets.  It’s a great set-up for exploring issues of trust and privacy, but above all this is a first-love story, written in sparky, convincing prose.  There’s a strong language warning on the back (which is definitely accurate!), but I hope parents and book-providers aren’t put off giving this to mature younger teens: there are wonderful positive messages in this book, about self-confidence and understanding your own body without shame.  This could be the Forever of the 21st century, girls…

My one quibble is with the cover, which is gorgeous but made me expect a very different book (something more immediately OMG!tastic, like Lauren Myracle’s Internet Girls series, or, erm, Big Woo/serafina67).  But if it makes the book leap off the shelves into readers’ hands, then it’s done its job – and the writing is so fresh, fun and beguiling that you’ll probably be halfway through the book before you’ve noticed.  A teen-lit voice to watch.

Note to self: PLANNING.  We do that now.  I sat down all excited to write the next chapter, and then realised I didn’t know what was going to happen in it or what any of the characters were like.  Have thus ended up with a lovely meandering string of crap jokes about Jane Eyre and ramen noodles, that goes nowhere at all.  (“It’s stream of consciousness, Miss! Virginia made me do it!”)  Also decided this week that Project Poppy is carp personified and I might well throw it away and start again.  So, funtimes.

Crawling to the gym for the first time in 3 weeks, ooer; watching Ashes to Ashes in open-mouthed awe; discovering baked sweet potato and blue cheese (taste: om nom nom; visual: Giant Mouldy Wotsit).

What did you do this weekend?

I’m willing to bet you weren’t abseiling off the top of the John Radcliffe Hospital – unlike my friend Sara, who conquered her fears for a truly deserving cause: Support for the Sick Newborn And their Parents.  Sara and Richard’s daughter Abigail spent her nine weeks of life there, and I’ve seen at first hand what a phenomenal job the staff of the Special Care Baby Unit do.

I can confirm she made it down all 7 storeys (eek!) in one piece: well done, you brave thing you!  She’s already made her fundraising target and then some, but if like me you spent your Sunday morning blearily trying to get your head around the hour change, you can still donate here.

I’ve just devoured Hilary McKay’s Saffy’s Angel, which won the Whitbread in 2002 and deserved it utterly.  I can’t imagine a ten-year-old girl who wouldn’t fall in love with the whole family.  And now I’m rereading Woolf’s To the Lighthouse for the umpteenth time, having spent an insomniac early morning, half-asleep, quoting bits to myself.  Oh dear, brain, what are you doing?

Project Poppy is finished!  Done!  Double-spaced, page-numbered, and sent off into the email-y ether!  Phew.  I’ve still got a wall full of notes, and the ending is still not quite right, but I’ve reached the point where I have to stop pulling out the loose threads in case I accidentally unravel the whole thing.  Now to spend several days eating jelly tots and trying to think of titles.  Ooh, and of course looking forward to My Invisible Boyfriend‘s publication on Thursday.  I like this week already.

Burning my was-going-to-be-delicious soup (parsnip and ginger, sniffle); getting cross in shops about  ‘girls are nurses, boys are doctors’ dressing-up costumes (it’s 2010, you twonks!); really looking forward to the holidays (Doctor Who! chocolate! playing with small children! DOCTOR WHO!).

Books! (And a door handle. Ignore that bit.)

Look what I’ve got! My Invisible Boyfriend (out in less than 2 weeks, wheee) in all her hardback glory.  If only cameraphone and dismal Oxford clouds could do it justice. Honestly, it’s the shiniest, most strokeable book I’ve ever owned, and that has nothing to do with my name being on the front.

Oh, all right, maybe a little bit. But I bet you’ll want to stroke it too.

Loveliest of all, there’s even a surprise when you sneak the jacket off…

Look! It's more of Heidi looking adorably baffled!

I have Happy Writer Face today.

The Diary of A Doctor Who Addict, by Paul Magrs. Sometimes a book resonates with you so powerfully that it’s hard to review. Part of you wants to incoherently mash the keys with glee, and just type READ IT READ IT IT’S WONDERFUL, because attempts at description will fail. Part of you worries that what made it so wonderful was so deeply personal to you that no one else will really get it anyway. But I want to try, because I loved this, so much, and it’s a book that’s all about realising that you aren’t the only one, after all. 12-year-old David is beyond giddy at the prospect of new Doctor Who on his telly in 1982: the Doctor looks like Peter Davison now, not Tom Baker, but David still can’t wait to record The Show, and listen to it over and over, and write his little stories about it. But his best mate seems to have regenerated into a teenager, one who thinks Doctor Who is just for little kids, and David is suddenly under attack – not from Silurians or Cybermen but the ultimate enemy: adolescence. Magrs has impeccable Whovian credentials, but The Show is but one metaphor in a gloriously well-drawn 80s landscape, where adverts convince you that Pot Noodle is delicious, and make-up thrillingly might not just be for girls. While the nostalgia is epic for an old git like me, this book isn’t a stealth memoir: it’s a funny, touching coming-of-age tale, with utterly convincing characters, especially Mum and her own overwhelming mother. David’s realisation that perhaps he’s not just a ‘sensitive’ boy – that perhaps he doesn’t want to kiss Karen, at all, and won’t ever – is beautifully handled, and I defy anyone to read the final chapter without filling up. This is what books are for. I’m so glad I read it. I want to read it again already.

Still tapping away at the Project Poppy edit (two and half chapters to go!), boosted by the fact that fabulous writing group buddies Sarah Mussi and Ruth Eastham have now read the first chapter, and a) didn’t hate it and b) kindly pointed out the part that was drivel. I’ve cut that bit. Now we just need a title. Um.

Stroking kittens, foolishly rediscovering my peanut butter obsession, getting all over-excited about the prospect of spring (even if it seems to have sodded off again this morning, the fiend).