A small favour
Today I want to ask a small favour from all readers who have not yet heard the news via Facebook or Twitter. I wrote a piece for a travel blog the other day, and it’s been published – I mentioned it last week and the publication date of the 18^th March, but it went out on 20^th. It’s there now, and the thing is, this site is more inclined to take articles from writers if they get lots of views, and likes, and all those other social networking tricks that are everywhere these days. So, if you wouldn’t mind, please take a look at the link below (it will open in another window/tab so you can see to it in a minute, or come back to this page after).

It’s a piece I wrote about Bran Castle, in Romania. At the top of the page, below the photo (the photos are all mine) you will see the heart symbol. Click this if you like the post. There are also the standard share buttons to use for your various social networking accounts if you have them. Thank you and here’s the link: Bran Castle: The Dracula Connection.

And back to Symi which, today (Monday) is very calm and quiet, sunny and still. I can hear a few motorbikes going past the house, and the birds outside, and I heard the catamaran come in earlier, but there is no building work going on next door, not today. Not that it bothers us much. The cat has been doing his usual ‘going bonkers’ thing, mooching around the house in the morning searching out the heater which is still in use in the workhouse in the mornings as it’s still chilly in here at times. He’s found his place in the sun, got fed up with that, found another, wasn’t sure about it but had a quick wash anyway, then checked out the view from the bedroom windowsill. When the window is open he’s quite at liberty to go out and have a look around, but I think, at his age, the three-foot jump to the ground and the two-feet jump to the wall opposite are too tricky for him. We don’t let him out unless he goes of his own accord because, when this has happens, he doesn’t come back for days, and we usually end up having to track him down at the old house, which is now a building site.

That’s the cat news. My news is rather less exciting as there is none. I’m off to town again this morning with a list of things to do: boat tickets, bank, post office, cat litter, cat food, folders for my health check-up papers, and some other things I can’t remember but which are written down in the other room. That’s about as exciting as my Monday mornings get these days.

But what is nice is that we’ve already started receiving some emails from visitors who are coming back for another Symi holiday, with some coming as early as next month. Easter is on April 16^th and coincides with Easter in the yUK, so hopefully, teachers and families will be able to make the most of the timing and come and experience a Greek Easter. I’m sure it’s not too late to check out cheap flights and find somewhere to stay…

I’ll leave you with that and get ready for a walk down to Yialos to see what’s going on and this time, I might remember to take my camera.

Don’t forget Bran Castle: The Dracula Connection.

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Lent starts and competitions are entered
We’ve bought the fish and put it in the freezer to replace the chicken. Lent begins today in Greece but, not being Orthodox, I am not sure if we will keep to the no-meat and other restrictions for the next 40 days. It’s Clean Monday today, a traditional; holiday day with barbeques (fish and seafood) and kite flying, families together celebrating at home or out in the countryside. It’s a usual day at the desk for me, at least for the morning.

Over the weekend, I managed to get two submissions together: one for a film festival (screenplay submission) and one for a new novel competition. You always think, ‘I’ll knock that synopsis up in a few minutes, I know the story’, but then, confronted with only one side of A4 and only 600 words max, it all starts to become rather tricky. You want to tell the whole story. You can’t. You want to mention this twist and the subtleties. You can’t. You need to grab the reader and leave things vague enough to invite a reading, but at the same time, you want to make points clear. I do the synopses of my stories usually in four acts, a bit like a film script (standard four-act structure). Things like backstory and the really interesting stuff have to be left out, but the important stuff has to go in.

That’s why it’s always useful to start your writing of a novel with a ‘logline’, another film term. You keep this to yourself, but it helps focus you on what exactly you are writing. You can then develop it into the synopsis and later the whole story. You may change it as you go, but if what you end up with has no relation to what you first summarised your story as, then you’ve strayed from the path. Or, as Sondheim/Lapine say in ‘Into the Woods’, “The path has strayed from you.” The one or two sentence logline sums the whole thing up. Probably the most difficult thing to do, these are the things you see for films, and I guess books. Here are a few, for fun. See if you can guess the films. [Answers below.]

The ageing patriarch of an organised crime dynasty transfers control of his clandestine empire to his reluctant son.

The lives of two mob hit men, a boxer, a gangster’s wife, and a pair of diner bandits intertwine in four tales of violence and redemption.

A young F.B.I. cadet must confide in an incarcerated and manipulative killer to receive his help on catching another serial killer who skins his victims.

Two imprisoned men bond over a number of years, finding solace and eventual redemption through acts of common decency.

Fun, isn’t it? No, it took me all Sunday morning to do, and I already had a logline and synopsis. Still, both things, a script and the first three chapters of a novel, have been sent off to two competitions, just to see what happens. Meanwhile, it’s back to Symi, back to Greece and Lent. See you tomorrow!

[Answers: The Godfather, Pulp Fiction, the Silence of the Lambs, The Shawshank Redemption.]

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The Saddling, an update
I rather wore out all of my weekly words and humour allowance on yesterday’s post so I am running on fumes today, Wednesday, as I look out on a grey and wet day. We’ve had thunder since the early hours (I was up at 5.30 wondering if I should unplug everything) and some heavy rain, which is much needed. The air temperature has warmed to the extent that I can take my socks off while watching the box in the evening. The fire is still on, as are the blanket and layers, but at least the feet are warm. My view today (yesterday) was pretty much like this all day:

Despite the weather interrupting plans (this was to be the week I started on daily walks again) I am quite ‘up’ today – the day after Tuesday. And that’s because I have had some more book cover ideas from my designer. I really want to share them with you but will wait for the agreed final before doing that. They won’t mean much without you knowing what the story is and the back cover is not done yet. Mind you, a book cover should make you want to read the book even if you don’t know the author or the title. My designer, who is in Portugal (isn’t the internet a wonderful thing?) has been very quick and patient with me and will probably have another version back at me in a day or so, so you shouldn’t have to wait long.

‘The Saddling’, the next book as I am sure you are bored to distraction by hearing, has been read by only four and a half people so far. The half is because Gwenda is still reading it (hello!) and one of the four is me. So far, and I am not trying to influence Gwenda here, the feedback is that it is the best yet. Mysterious and even creepy in places, dark with a poignant theme, readable, a good handle on dialect, and ultimately makes you think ‘What would I do?’ All of which was good to hear. There were also comments about one particular character with a 50/50 split among the four on the use of said character (again, not wanting to influence Gwenda I won’t say which one) and so I have made some adjustments there as some of the points I did agree with. I’ll leave you today with the current draft of the ‘back blurb’, the text on the back cover of the book, to give you a flavour of how things are coming along.

“Their faith was stronger than his reason.”

Tom Carey will inherit his aunt’s fortune only if he unlocks a one-hundred-year-old family mystery. The solution lies in a village on the Romney Marshes which lives willingly under an ancient Lore.

The village is preparing for its ten-year festival but Tom has no idea how deadly his part in that festival will be. Meeting the ethereal Daniel and the earthy, reliable Barry, a gradual realisation of who he is forces Tom to confront a secret of his own.

The villagers set in motion a string of calculated events that will ensure that this will be the last ever ‘Saddling’ and Tom finds himself the unwitting hero in a struggle between superstition and sense, denial and love, with no escape from either.

“Meticulously imagined in the eerie mists of Romney Marsh. A wonderfully evocative landscape of mystery.” Ann Butler Rowlands (Author of ‘Heaven’)

Praise for James Collins:
“Comparable with the best of Stephen King.” Charles Allenden
“Very gripping, imaginative read.” Amazon
“He has mastered that technique of forcing you to start the next chapter as you really care what happens to these people.” Derek Stephen
“A real page turner and kept me guessing right to the end.” David Hendry

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The London Greek Film Festival
You may remember that last year I submitted ‘Shocking The Donkeys’ to the annual London Greek Film Festival and it was shortlisted but didn’t win. Well, this year, the company behind ‘The 13^th‘ (The Judas Inheritance story) have submitted the film to the same festival. We won’t know until a few months’ time if it has been accepted for anything or nominated, or if it will be shown, but in the meantime there is the trailer to view if you haven’t already seen it. This is the two-minute version, longer than the one in our right hand column over there >> It shows you the main cast, some of the extras (Neil included) and the locations as the film was shot entirely on Symi, even the scenes set in a British school. (Just shows you how versatile the island is.)

More news will follow in due course, the backers will be receiving an update officially, as soon as there is either good or not so good news about the festival entry to report and meanwhile, please check the trailer and pass on the link (or this post) to your friends. The more views it has the more popular it becomes. The London Greek Film Festival his here.

And the trailer is here:

By the way, if it does get shown at the festival that might well be considered the world premiere, and it will be in London. (Perhaps we will be able to show it simultaneously on Symi somehow.)

I’m afraid all I could manage yesterday by way of photos for today was a quick dash up onto the roof for a few snaps, and a couple taken from the kitchen window; the only window in the house that’s not shuttered up against the cold at the moment. I was dressed in my thermals, trainers, jumper, sweatshirt and another jumper, hat and fingerless gloves and could still only manage a couple of minutes out in the cold. Wimp, I know, but at least it was warmer outside, at five degrees (without the north-wind-chill) than it was in the house. Heater blasting, Cat has found it, still in gloves and hat inside and fingers almost working on the keys after two hours of typing.

Our landlord’s representative came to collect the rent for him yesterday and told me that he was fine, though where he is got lost in translation. We have saved his mail and put it over at his house opposite for whoever wants to collect it for him. No-one has asked us to but it seems the most sensible thing to do. The bills get delivered to us and we take ours and then leave his inside his bathroom window, between the grill and the glass. It’s quite safe there, dry and won’t get blown away. I did nip over yesterday and closed his kitchen door, which has no lock, and held it shut with some paint cans. It had blown open in the wind the night before and was banging about I also checked that there were no cats or birds inside before closing it.

So, that’s it for today. If/when I have any other news about ‘The 13^th‘ and the Greek Film Festival I will let you know.

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On writing (weak words)
First though, for my Symi-fan readers, a quick update on what I have seen or been told: The weekend weather was wonderful, after light cloud and rain early on Saturday morning. Looking at the harbour on Sunday morning around seven, it was bright, flat, calm and empty; all very peaceful. Out and about on Saturday afternoon, I noticed that the Rainbow is open again now Yianni is back from his break attending a wedding. The Panormitis festival starts today and runs for three days (I may be going, I may be writing) and the boats from Rhodes are mainly calling in to Panormitis rather than Yialos. Today’s photos are Symi photos from the summer taken from Neil’s file and so have nothing to do with what I’m talking about today .

This morning, I thought I’d put up some of my own ideas about writing. I’m not a writing tutor or anything but I thought a few notes on how I go about things might be of interest to others out there who are writing fiction and going down the indie-publishing route. You could be going down the ‘traditional’ publishing route as well, it doesn’t matter, but as I’ve done very little this week but write, I thought… Well, why not? (There may be more of these kinds of posts in the future, if they are of interest; feedback welcomed.)

And so: Draft three. I’m working on ‘The Saddling’ a new novel which should be available next year. The first draft of this one was actually a screenplay as that’s how it started out, the story idea came from a moment in a dream and developed from there, the first prose draft was partly written on Tilos earlier this year and the draft I have just gone through was based on my notes after reading a printed copy of the MS – much easier than reading one on the screen.

I’ve been asked if a third, fourth, whatever draft is a complete rewrite and in this case it’s not. Some sections have been re-written, yes, some sections have been taken out, other parts improved and others left alone as they are fine. One of the things I like about this edit/draft stage is the tidying up. You’ve done all the hard work, the bashing out of, in this case, 111,000 words and now you can get critical with yourself. This draft was all about 1) making sure the story is there, 2) making sure the facts add up, 3) making sure it’s logical 4) cutting out repetitions. Now, with a draft four, I can look at what I call ‘weak words’ and then sit back and ponder the deeper things like: 1) is there motivation here? 2) Would that really happen? (Difficult that one, as we’re talking about a gothic style novel where there is a little supernatural and where the setting is a place that has its own lore and law.) 3) how can I draw out those characters more interestingly? And how can I avoid words like ‘interestingly’?

Actually, ‘interestingly’ is fine, but I am now about to check through the draft looking for my weak-words. What are they? Well, for me, they are normally verbs such as: went, started, looked, walked, turned, and to a certain extent, said. There are a lot of ‘saids’ in a novel with dialogue, and it’s the best (simplest) way to tell the reader that someone said something, but too many close together in dialogue and it becomes too obvious. He said, said Tom, he said, he said… So, one way to improve the MS is to think again about ‘said.’ You don’t always need it. For example, if you put a character action after the dialogue.

‘I’m not doing that.’ Barry started walking to the door.’  (Factual, but dull.)

We know Barry spoke as his action is in the same line. What’s wrong there though, for me, is ‘started walking.’ I found ‘started’ 46 times in the 100,000 words MS. (The other thing I did with the draft was cut out roughly 10% of the words, so we’re now down to 100k.) That’s easily done by ridding your MS of ‘started to’ and simply putting ‘walked’, as in this case. But ‘Walk’ is weak. How did he walk? What mood was he in? Why did he walk? What was he really doing?

‘I’m not doing that.’ Barry backed away, searching for an escape.

That gives us some new information and still the movement, but it now means so much more.

I could go on like this all day but I won’t as I expect you’ve had enough now, but for any writers out there here are my first few tips:

• Don’t think about it, do it.
• When not writing, read.
• Don’t get it right, get it written (then re-draft and edit).
• Don’t pay a lot of money for creative writing courses to get you started, you don’t need them; the only thing useful about them might be making contacts and discussing your, and others’, work. Cheaper to join a forum or set up your own writers’ group.

But I shan’t go on about my thoughts on that one either, not today. I’ll leave you with this longer-than-normal post and get back to my trawl through draft 3-to-4 looking for weak words and maybe, tomorrow, I will have left the house and have some local chat for you.

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