Questions and Answers

Q: Are all your novels set in the west country?

A: All have the west country at their heart but often the characters go away from there for some time. My latest novel ‘The Way We Were’  actually starts in Wales although it moves west within the prologue. One of the central characters  has a son living in Hampshire and she vists him every now and then.

 

Q: What is the best order in which to read the books?

A:  I hope that all the books ‘stand alone’ but this  may help..

The Chadwick Trilogy: Looking Forward; Holding On; Winning Through

(It is fairly important that these three books are read in the right order.)

The others: Those Who Serve; Hattie’s Mill; Thea’s Parrot; Starting Over; The Courtyard; Second Time Around; A Week in Winter; Forgotten Laughter; The Children’s Hour; The Birdcage; The Golden Cup; Echoes of the Dance; Memories of the Storm

 

Q: What is your typical writing day?

A: When I am actually writing (which is for about six months each year), I become very businesslike. I am usually in my study by 9.30 and I start by checking through what was written yesterday: often that means a bit of polishing and adding in a few sentences. Then I settle down to the day’s writing—anything from one to two thousand words—but I have to take a break every hour and a half or thereabouts because I suffer from RSI which makes life difficult. Normally I will have finished writing by lunchtime (which we have late, about 2.30) and the rest of the day is spent on brooding about what I shall be working on tomorrow.

 

Q: Do you decide the destiny of characters at the beginning of your novels or do they develop minds of their own?

A: It all depends on what you mean by ‘the beginning of the novel’. It often happens that I begin to have little glimpses of new characters before I have finished the book I am writing. These glimpses are very vague—an elderly woman, a young girl, a child, a man coming home on leave from the navy– and they often raise many more questions than they answer. Why? What are they doing? What sort of people are they? How did they earn a living? Is that when the book begins?

Over the next few months these glimpses become more detailes until the characters gradually take shape. When I really know them and know what they have been up to in the past, it is time to start writing the book. Some would say that this is when the book begins but even then the characters may have surprises to spring on me and someone I thought I knew will present a side that had, until then, been hidden.

As to their destinies, that is more difficult. When we find ourselves faced with a given set of circumstances there are often various options open to us. Turn left and life follows one path—turn right and something completely different happens. It is like playing a game of ‘what if’ on a daily basis but the novelist cannot cheat—the options have to be those that the specific character might take (which will depend on the sort of person he or she are) Once the novelist has chosen one particular option, what follows may well become inevitable and may well take the story in directions which had not been previously considered.