Best of the year, with salt, 2007

Sara Crowley3 Comments

Book of the year
Miranda July ‘ No One Belongs Here More Than You’
I am a little surprised that this is my book of the year but it undoubtedly is. It is a collection that has stayed with me, the characters and voice resonating long after. I believe one of my initial criticisms was that the voice of the characters was always the same voice, but now I think of it as being so strong that I’m not sure it matters.

Film of the year
Miranda July ‘Me and You and Everyone We Know’
So, I was inspired by her short stories to look out her film, and it’s a good’un! The voice is the same as that of her stories, and yeah, for sure, it’s a quirky film, but brilliant too. Where July succeeds so well is in showing what is beneath the surface of people. She highlights the odd, the askew, the searching and yearning of folk. The film is romantic, but peppered with disturbing comedy. And who is the star of the film? Why, it’s none other than July herself. She is an artist/writer/director of undoubted talent. And she’s beautiful too. Sigh.

Most tediously hyped book of the year
Ian McEwan ‘On Chesil Beach’
I am sooooooooo sick of selling this book. It has been in every promotion, every display, every magazine, every window, on every table, in every paper. Yes, Ian McEwan has a book out, some other people do too, not that you’d know, what with all the fucking piles of Chesil Beach everywhere. Enough already!

Sleb of the year
In the heat/perez world of sleb only one has stood out like a shiny beacon of loveliness, and I have fallen a little in love with her, so it gives me great pleasure to name Alesha Dixon my sleb of the year. She was inspirational on Strictly as she played out her Cinderella will go the ball story. She looked gorgeous, danced amazingly, bounced and screamed and wiggled and smiled. She exuded positivity and the ethos of hard work and integrity. Viewers all over the country delighted at the thought of love rat Harvey weeping into his hands as he saw what he had lost.

TV of the year
For froth you couldn’t beat Strictly come dancing. And I’m not ashamed to admit shedding a tear or two of joy at the final! But televisual event of the year has to be the Sopranos finale. I’m still wondering what the fade to black was! It was a superb ending to an intelligent show blessed with the most fantastic cast.

Game of the year
Has to be Scrabulous on Facebook. Thanks to the makers for updating Scrabble and bringing the joy back without any of the tedious sitting and waiting for an opponent to make a move.


Once more with feeling…

Happy new year

x



End of year reflections.

Sara Crowley1 Comment

I have always been a sucker for a blank page, ooh preferably in a brand new notebook, lovely. A morning is good, a fresh week is better, a new year is glorious, just full of hope. I am forever full of the same resolutions that I first made as a girl: lose weight, exercise, write more, be a better person. Not much change there. This year has been all right though, I have made progress in my writing if not my weight/exercise/being a nicer person wish. And actually, screw the nicer person thang, I am nice, and a little fucked off with people taking advantage of that!

So, good things have happened with my writing this year, and I can go into the next knowing that some people like my words. I am aiming to finish my novel by the end of 2008, it is a huge goal, and I want to focus and pour heart and soul into it.

I have learnt a fair bit too:

Other writers can be the most generous, warm, supportive, nurturing people. (They can also be destructive, bitchy, thoughtless, harsh and argumentative. So many egos! )

I have begun working with The Fiction Workhouse, and it has been ACE!

I wrote something that I knew wasn’t working, and I showed it to the people I work with on-line at The Workhouse. They critiqued it so thoughtfully and shone light on its flaws, it really brought home to me how solitary it has been, sitting here, typing away, trying to create stories with real depth and meaning. I am not a lonely writer any more, thanks to them. There’s a place I can go for inspiration, advice, critiques, help with craft etc. (Hark, is that the Cheers theme tune I hear starting up?) Anyway, it has been an illuminating experience being part of this team. I look forward to working hard with them in 2008.

The benefit doesn’t just come from sharing my work. By reading and critiquing others stories I get to learn more about what works for me, what doesn’t, why and so on…Invaluable.

Through The Workhouse I have discovered Flash Fiction. It was entirely alien to me before this year, and now I find it exhilarating and wonderful. I am still learning the requisite skills, but whoo, it’s fun and a great way to spark out new ideas and learn how to hone prose so that each word matters.

One must not be too reliant on the opinions of others though. I was told that something I had written wasn’t right, and yet when I read it again and again it was exactly what I meant and I submitted it as it was, with hope, and had a significant success with it. This showed me that sometimes other people won’t magically know what is ‘good’. Perhaps they excel in a different style or area. I must trust me.

I have read a lot this year. Although looking at the reviews here you wouldn’t know that. I made a choice not to write reviews of books that I had nothing good to say about. It was a hard call. I am a stickler for honesty, what’s the point of a wishy washy review? I’d rather read some real vitriol. Hmmm. But, as a writer I know how devastated I am by criticism, and the idea that a precious publication could be trashed by an unknown blogger makes me uncomfortable. I am such a grumpy reader though, hard to impress, hence the lack of reviews!

I have been reviewing for other people too. Pulp net asked me to review some books for them, which has been brilliant, and I have reviewed for The Short Review. In the new year I will be reviewing for the Waterstone’s magazine as well. Anyone else want a book reviewed? Just holler!

I was commisioned to write a piece on being a part time writer too, which was a fascinating change for me. I really enjoyed writing non-fiction, and getting paid for it too made me feel very professional!

There’s some other stuff that is happening, but until it actually does I don’t want to say for fear of, I dunno, fucking it up somehow.

Anyway, I am going into 2008 so much more of a writer than I was coming into 2007, which can only be a jolly good thing!

I’m planning a best of 2007 round up in the next day or so, but just in case I don’t get round to it:

Happy new year to you all

The Almost Moon by Alice Sebold

Sara Crowley2 Comments

I was not a huge fan of The Lovely Bones. In fact I was disappointed by it. I don’t recall much, except that I thought it a very strong idea that was let down by the execution. So, yes, what do I know, it continues to sell strongly, although I can’t understand how as surely by now everyone in the country has a copy!
Alice Sebold seems rather fabulous though. I read an interview with her recently that was the determining factor in me wanting to give The Almost Moon a go despite having not rated TLB’s highly.

The Almost Moon begins with the line ‘When all is said and done, killing my mother came quite easily.’ So, no messing about, here is the meat of the novel; a woman kills her mother. Then we follow the next 24 hours, as we stay with the narrator, Helen, and hear her thoughts, her flashbacks and watch her past unfold. There is a sense of cool detachment that reminds me of Lionel Shriver in ‘We need to talk about Kevin’. And they do have a similar core I think, In WNTTAK the main character struggles with her feelings for her son, here in TAM the central character struggles with her feelings for her mother. When all is done though I am left thinking, oh, so the mum had mental health issues, as did the dad, as does the daughter. Oh. And any sympathy that arises quickly dissipates when not only does Helen kill her mother but then hacks off her long plait and stuffs it into her bag, then goes to fuck her best friends son, coldly and mechanically. It becomes hard to care for her, although perhaps I did a little.

There is a smattering of therapy speak, and some of the motifs are a little heavy handed. This is a flaw I found irritating, oh look she is wearing her mother’s slip and her father carved wooden people and her ex husband sculpts with ice and dirt whist she strips as an artists model and so on. Argh!

I have to assume that as intelligent and honest and sparkly as Sebold seems to me in interviews, I am just not going to ‘get’ her fiction in a meaningful way. I’m sure I’ll be selling this book for years to come though.

Female role models who smell like this…

Sara CrowleyLeave a comment

There has always been a severe lack of female role models I think. There are writers I admire, but they are not role models, not people I aspire to be. When I was young and feisty I couldn’t find females to admire in that way, and I still can’t. I loved Sylvia Plath but y’know, I wouldn’t choose to be her, Margaret Thatcher was a ‘strong’ woman, but ugh, she still makes me shudder, Courtney Love is fierce and gorgeous and writes poetic lyrics that I heart, but she’s still a fuck up. I picked men as my heroes: Billy Bragg, Henry Rollins, Steven Page. (Funny how they are all singers.) Men with principles and humour, a mix of communication and passion and honesty. There were no women doing the same.

I am an adult now, and Rollins seems misogynistic and misguided, Bragg remains a wonder, as does Steven Page. I look around and still can’t see where the strong, smart women are.

Germaine Greer of course. This woman who speaks with such assurance that she can make me believe almost anything. Who else?

Anyway, I think the situation is far worse for girls today than it was for me. At least I had, I dunno, Toyah and Cyndi Lauper and Siouxsie Sioux showing that women didn’t have to be page 3 stunnahs. I sound like such an old bag I know, but today I went into Superdrug, and there were all these celebrity scents piled high for the last minute Christmas rush: Kate Moss, Britney Spears, Katie Price. I couldn’t help but wonder who would want to smell like them, and why? Who could possibly envy them or wish to be more like them?

I love Bluebell by Penhaligon’s myself, even after I found out that it’s the queen’s favourite, but I wouldn’t have bought it if it was called Her Majesty, or even Germaine! Dumb arse world.

Posted in UncategorizedTagged

Christmas customers part II.

Sara Crowley1 Comment

Argh.
Work was really shit today. Relentless and tedious and full of rude people barking words at me like:
‘TV magicians.’
‘Survival’
‘Cookery’
Usually at Christmas time there is an energy, a buzz that comes from the busyness, and people smile and are a wee bit chatty and cheery. Not this year. So many grumpy people.

‘My girlfriend likes books, I dunno, she likes romance, what shall I get her?’
‘My mum likes Catherine Cookson, what’s like that?’
‘My dad likes historical fiction, what have you got?’
‘My mate loves Dan Brown, what’s similar?’
‘Have you got Kerry Katona’s biography?’
And so I dutifully fetch them whatever utter shite it is that they think their loved one wants, and they snatch it up and leave, and I sigh and wish that people read what I want them to!
Actually, there was a quote in Time Out this week from a chef, and he said something like ‘Good taste is not subjective, it’s what I have’, and it made me chuckle, because yeah, actually, me too! 🙂

Krazy khristmas kustomers

Sara Crowley2 Comments

So it’s the season eh?
The time of year when people who generally avoid bookshops get asked to buy a book as a gift and find themselves baffled by the sheer volume of stock. We have five floors of books organised by subject matter, and yes, sometimes it is confusing.
Poetry? Sure, it’s next to parenting, obviously!
An atlas? Hmm, would that be with geography on second, travel and maps on third, or reference on fourth?

Yesterday I was asked for Kerry Katona’s novel. My colleague refused to believe such a thing existed, saying that surely it was in biography, but no, Ms Katona is named as the author of a, cough, novel.
The customer was a youngish woman, and she said that she knew it would be under ‘K’, but that’s she’s not good enough with her alphabet to be able to know where K would come. Which is too obvious a joke, and you know, let’s say she is someone who doesn’t read much but that Kerry putting her name to a book encourages her to read, so, it’s a good thing really and we should stop being so fucking snobby. I did bite my lip and try not to smile.
Anyway, even though the computer said that we had six copies I couldn’t find them at first. This was because the lovely man who runs fiction had hidden them under a table. (He denied that they were hidden, because, as he said, I did find them eventually.)
My colleague turned to me after the customer had left and said ‘That must really piss you off, you’re a writer and yet someone like Kerry Katona has a novel published, just like that.’ I said yeah, and then we got busy and I didn’t think about it much, but it occurs to me now that whilst I think it is utterly stupid to give book deals to people who can’t write and don’t write, who instead employ other people to cobble something together for them, I am not pissed off by it. It’s up to us to decide if that is the sort of book we want to read, and it is simply not something I would aspire to at all. Perhaps Kerry did write this book, or maybe she dictated the ‘story’ to someone who merely polished the grammar and so on, or possibly she just allowed her name to be used. Whatever. It’s not a book I would want my name on, it’s not a book I would want to read. But some people do want to, and my question then is why?

Why?

I get that it is fascinating to read a sleb biography, and as I understand it (not being one who gives a shit about it) Kerry’s story is as grim and bleak as any one of the misery memoirs that are so prevalent. But who the fuck then needs to read a fictionalised account?

Baffled.

Authors and promotion and the sheer slog of it all.

Sara CrowleyLeave a comment

I met an author on Saturday. I didn’t know at first that he was, he looked just like an ordinary customer. Joke. In case that doesn’t translate. Anyway, he asked me for a book, and he got the title a bit wrong but I knew what he meant, and we had a bookseller/customer polite conversation. We were smiling and chatting, and he asked if we had any books signed by the author. I assumed he wanted to buy one, and said that whilst we do, yes indeed, have signed books, we do not keep them in one area. Then he said no, he is an author, and we sell his books, and he wondered if we would like them signed. He looked uncomfortable asking this, and I enthused loudly to try to overcome the embarrassment. He told me his name, I fetched his books, he signed them, he left. I put special ‘signed by the author’ stickers on the front covers, I displayed one title in a bay, slotted the others back onto the shelves.

When he went I looked him up as to my shame I haven’t read his work. Not only is he an acclaimed writer of novels and short stories, he is also an award winning poet, and a playwright. This is a man who has ostensibly ‘made it’. Yet he still thought it prudent to put himself through the uncomfortable squirm of asking to sign his books. Sensible though, the books are now being promoted in our store more prominently than they were before. But should he have to worry about such things? It clearly wasn’t a matter of ego with him. (Yes, there are awful booming do you know who I am kinda people who demand to sign, he wasn’t one of them.) I assume that he has been told to do his bit to promote his work wherever he can. I dunno, it seems to me that a writer is never allowed to stop the scramble for acceptance.

Talking to one-who-knows-such-things recently was rather depressing. They pointed out that a beginning writer may sub work in the hope of small publications and so on, leading to bigger prizes and hopefully, ultimately, you may be lucky enough to catch the eye of an agent. The agent may like the work enough to take on the writer. They then try to sell the writer’s work to a publisher, who then tries to sell the work to bookshops and media, who then try to sell the work to customers. If you’re not in a 3 for 2, or a Richard and Judy, or on a prize winning list, then what sets your work apart. At the end of the day, bluntly, who really gives a fuck about reading anything that you have to say? You constantly sub work in the hope that it will be successful, and I was told (not sure if this is true or not) that an average author will only make £8, 000 a year.

That’ s why it has to be a compulsion. Any other motivation for writing other than it being that thing that you do because you simply must seems rather silly. It is my thing, my compulsion, and so…on I go.

Ooh, look at this…

Sara Crowley2 Comments

Cool bananas eh? I have apparently been awarded this Roar For Powerful Words Lion. Cheers Vanessa.
It is an idea set up here:
http://theshamelesslionswritingcircle.blogspot.com/2007/11/roar-for-powerful-words.html

I am supposed to tell you three things that I believe make writing good and powerful, and then I nominate my own recipients of the award.

1. Truth.
I believe that when writing is honest it shows. I read somewhere recently that fiction is the art of telling truth in an entertaining way.

2. Passion.
When someone cares that shows too.

3. Words.
The larger ones vocabulary the easier it is to say exactly what you mean. That’s why Stephen Fry will always be far more articulate than me.

Five people I award this to:
John Self at Asylum
Mark Farley at Bookseller to the stars.
Kellie at The book of Kellies
Kirsty at other stories
Steven at Some other life, cold and complicated

Vanessa Gebbie; writing, competitions, and brilliance.

Sara Crowley3 Comments

Unsurprisingly I love reading as well as writing, but I am incredibly fussy about what I read. God I really am awful; judgemental, bitchy, impatient. Sometimes on this very blog I have moaned about how I yearn to be moved, inspired, delighted or even just entertained by the stories I read, and yet I am so often disappointed. As a writer who is starting to submit to competitions and magazines I am keen to read those who have previously been published in the ‘zines or comps. I promise that I don’t start from a sneery position, I genuinely wish to be impressed. More often than not I am left feeling very blah about it, and truly wondering what I am missing that the editors saw. Then one day I read the winning entry of a competition at Cadenza by Vanessa Gebbie called ‘Yellow diggers, dead crows, gifts” and it was all that I aspire to as a short story writer. Beautiful, moving, precise prose. So, I googled her name, found her blog and left her a message.
http://vanessagebbiesnews.blogspot.com/
Which was when I began to discover how generous she is as a writer. She visited my blog and offered to critique a story I was moaning about. We left messages back and forth, and eventually she invited me to join her online collective for intermediate literary fiction writers “The Fiction Workhouse”. I honestly feel that it is only now that my writing can move on to the next level, and a lot of that is to do with Vanessa. She teaches, nurtures, discusses, explains. I don’t always agree with her but wow, she’s great to disagree with too, she’ll listen and reconsider and argue with passion.

Anyway, she has got plenty going on: a short story collection coming out next year, she came first this year in The Daily Telegraph Novel competition, she is working on her debut novel and now, fanfare please:

She has placed second in The Bridport Prize.
http://www.bridportprize.org.uk/storywinners2007.htm

I just wanted to say huge, warm congratulations to a brilliant and lovely writer.