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On the road

by gailaldwin

Me and David are heading off to spend time on the road. It’s hard planning which clothes to take given the weather will be variable. We’re going to Edinburgh first, then London, then Spain, Portugal and Greece. Although I’ve decide to abandon my fleecy coat, I will take my electric blanket which I’ll use while we’re in the UK. Oh, and I’ve packed lots of outfits which involve layers.

I’ll continue writing while we’re away. My work in progress – now titled The Escape Village Resort – is developing well. I’ve fine tuned the elevator pitch to 280-characters – the length of a tweet – to aid online querying. Which version do you prefer?

ABIGAIL’S PARTY x THE SERPENT (This relates to comparable TV programmes)

Six mismatched millennials live it up at a tropical resort: one couple are honeymooners, another get married, the third approach the seven-year itch. A storm threatens. Who’s to blame when one of the women goes missing?

FOLEY x LOGAN (This relates to comparable authors, Lucy Foley, author of The Hunting Party and T M Logan, author of The Holiday which was recently televised on Channel 5)

Three mismatched couples live it up at a remote island resort. Amongst the group are a flirt, a bully and a show off. During the shenanigans coercive control rules. The temperature rises, storms threaten. Who survives the tropical party?

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Submission journey for The Girl and the Tutor

by gailaldwin

As I mentioned in my last post, I’m currently working through a list of literary agents who appear to be a good match for my latest novel, a work of psychological fiction titled The Girl and the Tutor. Every submission requires a different configuration of pitch and synopsis. Here’s the latest information I’ve been sending out:

The Girl and the Tutor is a topical novel with its focus on historic offences and would make a good book club read with discussion around the individual journeys of the two main characters. Although middle aged, Stephanie continues on a path of personal development where the teenage Carolyn grows into an emotionally-stunted adult due to her obsession with the maths tutor who let her down. To include diversity in the novel, Stephanie’s housemate is a successful business woman with Gujarati/Ugandan heritage. Prior to Covid-19, I volunteered in Uganda and with the fiftieth anniversary of the expulsion of Asians by Idi Amin approaching, I feel this is timely.

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Writing plates are spinning

by gailaldwin

I’m currently in the fortunate position of having a debut novel published, a children’s picture book under contract, a novel on submission and a new work-in-progress. My time is carved up between marketing and promoting The String Games, sending out submission packages for This Much Huxley Knows, finalising the illustrations for Pan de mo nium and cracking through the first draft of Little Swot. It’s just as well my only other commitment is ten hours a week e-volunteering with VSO. Some days it feels like my feet hardly touch the ground but I’m not complaining.

Does this girl look like a little swot?

With all of these plates spinning, the real excitement is my new work-in-progress Little Swot which is quite different from my other manuscripts. The idea came from evenings in Ugandawhen I was too tired to read, too hot to sleep and so listened to podcasts. I’m writing one thousand words each day which soon adds up and I’m now over half way through the story and pleased with my progress. I’ve written a synopsis so I know what’s going to happen and I’ve played around with ideas for pitching the novel to publishers when the time comes.Indeed, I’d love to receive some feedback from you. Do you think this novel idea has legs?

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Flash Fiction with Retreat West

by gailaldwin

I was delighted to join five other writers at Retreats for You in Devon, where Amanda Saint delivered input to support the development of flash fiction pieces for inclusion in a Retreat West Books anthology to be published November 2019. Each morning we met after breakfast to write three new pieces of flash fiction based on a different theme.

On Tuesday we were inspired by picture prompts to develop characters and settings around the theme of peace and there was a further activity using sentence starters to complete our work. On the following day, Amanda encouraged us to write new fiction on the theme of love using prompts including music, selected words and what if scenarios. Our final day focused on the theme of power where further images and sentence starters activated ideas. My task is now to develop nine pieces of new flash fiction for submission to Retreat West Books in April 2019. A couple of the stories arrived almost fully formed but others will need considerable work to bring them up to publication standard. It was great working alongside other writers to achieve the shared goal of ideas generation and drafted pieces to be developed over the next few months.

We were very well looked after by Debbie Flint and her team at Retreats for You. If you fancy a few days dedicated to writing, you won’t find anywhere better than this. With a warm welcome, comfortable accommodation and meals with wine, what’s not to like?

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Walking and writing

by gailaldwin

We spent the weekend in Fowey and took an amazing walk around the coastal path where this photo was taken – hard to believe it’s January from looking at this.

The journey back took us inland along the Saint’s Way. This path was rediscovered in 1984 when local ramblers found a series of forgotten granite stiles. The circular route was labelled ‘strenuous’ and ‘muddy’ and with adjectives like that, I would normally have avoided it. But, with my new fitness routine established, everything was fine.

At my desk on Monday, I received feedback on a writing submission I made earlier in the month. The lovely Suzie at Writers in the Alley forwarded a request from an agency interested in using local writing for a South West Trains advertising campaign. I rang the company and with a ten-minute deadline submitted some work. Two pieces of flash fiction were shortlisted for presentation to the client. When I learnt more about the proposal I was scared silly that my stories would end up on one of those huge ‘out of home’ posters opposite the platform at London underground stations. I needn’t have worried. South West Trains didn’t go for the idea and I’m left feeling disappointed and relieved.

On the upside, I have received some good news. My application for a writing residency at Brisons Veor has been accepted and I’ll be spending a couple of weeks at Cape Cornwall later in the year.

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