Reviews. Show an author some Amazon love...not, like, big women with bows and arrows though. Unless you like that sort of thing.

Do you know how important it is for authors to get reviews?

Probably not, because if you aren't an author, ie, you are one of the sane 93 % of people who take one look at what's involved in writing a novel and, very wisely, decide that that kind of torture is not for you and you'd rather eat another Fondant Fancy and watch Strictly, then reviews are almost always bad things.  In most jobs the only kind of review you get - apart from when a rather nice customer says that he (or she) always enjoys your custard slices - is a performance review, when management try to think of things to say to you and you try to think of ways to answer them.

Stick to the Fondant Fancies. It's the only sensible thing to do.

But to authors, ah, to authors reviews are Very Important Things.

Not for us to read, of course. Sometimes we do and sometimes we don't.  I mean, the reviews aren't for us, are they? They are for readers to tell other readers what they thought of the book, which is fine. Even if they hated it, it's still fine.  If an author does read their reviews, then they react in the following way:

"I loved the bit where..." 'they liked that bit. That means they hated all the other bits and are just being polite. I am a rubbish writer.

"I really enjoyed this book." Only 'enjoyed'. They didn't love it. Why didn't they love it? I am a rubbish writer.

"This book made me laugh and cry." I bet they laughed at all the sad bits and cried at how bad it all was. I am such a rubbish writer.

"This was the best book I've read since The Wasp Factory." They didn't say when they read the Wasp Factory. It was probably yesterday. This is the best book they've read since yesterday. I am a rubbish writer.

So really, when you leave a review, try not to think of the author...  Instead, think of Amazon.

No, not that one. This one..

Because Amazon has Algorithms. Which aren't a kind of intestinal parasite. Or pithy sayings from Al Gore. It's some kind of number magic, by which they calculate which products get shoved in the face of their millions of perusers. So, the more Amazon Reviews a book has, the more it is wafted in the direction of other people who might buy it. The more popular it is, the more popular it becomes. Because, Maths.

So, if you have read and enjoyed a book, even if you have read a book and thought 'I liked that bit where...', even if you only think it's the best thing you've read since The Wasp Factory, last Wednesday, then please leave a review. It doesn't have to be a long one, just 'a good read' will do. 

Because we can't fight Amazon.  It's the crocodiles, you see.
 

Are you ready for Christmas yet?

Okay, I apologise for the goady title...I am not trying to make you feel guilty for not having all your presents bought and wrapped, mince pies made and in the freezer, cake ready to ice...all that.  Mostly because I am a person who, despite loving Christmas in all its 'tasteless decorations and more food than you can safely eat' glory, waits until approximately the tenth of December before realising that there is nothing to eat in the house, and that tree won't roll itself in glitter...

Anyway.  Yes. Christmas.  So, in an attempt to make myself feel the whole 'Christmas' thing, and perhaps communicate a little Christmassy spirit to everyone else, I have just completed this year's Christmas Novella!  (You may remember last year's 'The Art of Christmas'...)

 Well, this year's novella is called 'The Boys of Christmas'.  I've sort of painted myself into a corner now, with this alphabetical titling thing, I suppose next year's novella will have to be called The Crotch of Christmas, or possibly, if based on personal experience, The Chaos of Christmas, although I find myself now rather liking The Crotch of Christmas and trying to work a story out around it...

So. Let's take our minds off crotches, and focus on boys, shall we?

The Boys of Christmas features Ruby Arden, who is hiding out with her friend Toby, from her emotionally abusive boyfriend. Ruby receives a rather unusual bequest, which takes her and Toby off to a snow-bound village on the Dorset coast, to solve a mystery...

Richard Austin pictures, by the way...

This is Lyme Regis, which isn't a village, but it's on a steep hill - and the village in the novella is very much like this, only much, much smaller.  Well, not smaller, the houses are the same size and everything, but it has a lot less shops in it.

And the scenery is a bit like this...

I used to live not far from Lyme Regis, so it's a town I know well, although I don't think I've ever seen it in the snow. However, living where I do now, in the rural wilds of North Yorkshire, I see a lot of snow, usually from the front.

This novella features such christmassy things as snow, the world's tattiest Christmas tree, carol singers, emergency helicopter food drops and a knitted octopus called Cthulu.  There's also chalk figures cut into a hillside, a pre-prep boys' school, and an Aga of malevolence.

To find out how these all fit together - well, you'll just have to read the book, won't you?

Writing

I am often asked by people who want to write a book, how to go about it.  I mean how DO you write a book if you've never written one before? 

You go into Waterstones and pick up those thick paperbacks with the glossy covers and you turn them over and read the author's name and you wonder how the hell they ever did it.  You see them interviewed in newspapers and on TV and they seem like ordinary people, if slightly better dressed and cleaner and with their hair brushed.  So what makes them special, what makes their words worthy of publication and how do you get to be one of Them?  What arcane skill do they have that gets them on TV and in Waterstones and Smiths and on the bestseller lists, and how do you acquire that skill, and can it be done on Saturday afternoons between one and four because that's the only time you have free?


The answers, in order are: nothing, luck and persistence, reading a lot and no, not really.

Writers aren't Special People. I've met lots of them - and, indeed, am rumoured to be one myself - so I know they are just ordinary human beings who worry about getting the hoover fixed and when the car is due its MOT and where that mysterious hole came from.  'If you prick us, do we not bleed?'  Well, yes, we do, but then we make a note in our book about how it felt to be pricked, how much blood there was, and the reaction of the person who did the pricking when we punched them soundly on the nose.

Because the only difference between writers and non-writers?   Writers write things. And if the thing they wrote doesn't get accepted anywhere, they write something else.  And then send that out.  And if that one doesn't get anywhere, they write something else. Or self publish.  What they don't do is sit about telling everyone how they will be published 'one day', when they have time to write something.  Writers don't talk about writing, they do it.  Over and over.  And when they get accepted for publication, they know they are lucky.  Not better, just lucky.  They wrote the thing that person wanted and got it on the right desk at the right time.

And then they go away and do it again.  And again.  They forgo watching TV (well, most of it) and having hobbies because most of them have to go to a day job and write in their spare time, which there isn't much of if you want to watch Emmerdale, Corrie, EastEnders and the Great British Bake Off.  They sometimes have to be reminded to eat, and other times eat nothing but biscuits because they fit in that slot beside the laptop.  They drink tea and coffee to excess, because walking to the toilet is the only exercise they get.  They blink in bright sunlight because they usually don't see much of it.  But they write. 

That's how it's done, I'm afraid.  There's no magic, just bum on seat, fingers on laptop, and keep doing it until it's right. Or as nearly right as we can get it.