Finding Treasure Island

I’ve just bought a secondhand copy of the first book I ever owned. I think I got it as a Christmas present when I was either four or five. It was published in 1956. I really loved this book. I don’t think I could read all of the words at first. But each page of text had dramatic colour illustrations. Like many other children, this book sparked my imagination and stimulated my sense of adventure. I don’t know what happened to my book after I’d finished with it. I suppose it got handed on to my younger brothers and then on to nephews and nieces. It was no longer in the house when we came to clear it after my parents died. I’m delighted to now be reunited with this lovely book.

I was an avid reader as a child. I quickly graduated to the full text of Treasure Island, followed by a series of other classics: The Three Musketeers, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, The Coral Island and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. These would all have been Christmas or Birthday presents. We had hardly any books in the house, apart from a set of cheap encyclopedias, first published in 1922, which I devoured. So I used to read my father’s crime novels after he had finished with them. These were pulp paperbacks that I suppose he’d bought in Woolworths.

Around this time, a teacher asked my primary school class to bring in the book they were reading at home. Many kids brought in picture books, some brought in children’s classics, I brought in a pulp crime novel. The teacher was horrified. My parents were summoned to the school and given a stern lecture by the headmaster about the suitability of reading materials for young children. I would have been seven or eight. There was no mention of my advanced reading ability or that I might have been a gifted child.

The rest of my formal education included many beatings from teachers and regularly being told that I was stupid. It wasn’t until I returned to study at the age of 27 that I discovered I had a good brain. A distinction in my Masters led to a Manchester University award enabling me to study for a PhD, then followed a career in Higher Education that culminated in an Emeritus Professorship.

Treasure Island really did sow the seed of adventure in me. This took me rock and ice climbing, high altitude mountaineering, fell running, wild camping and on long-distance cycle tours in developing countries. These adventures were an education in themselves, and built qualities of resilience and determination in me that I’ve needed to call on many times in my life.

The Big Heat

This film noir, directed by Fritz Lang in 1953, is infamous for the scene in which Lee Marvin assaults Gloria Grahame with a pot of boiling coffee. But I’m referring to the remarkable week of sunny weather with unbroken blue skies that we’ve just had in Northern Ireland. With temperatures of 25 degrees and over, it was more akin to what you’d find in the Canary Islands. In truth, NI only has two real seasons: it’s either ‘boilin’ or ‘freezin’, with the latter holding the upper hand for most of the year. ‘Boilin’ usually puts in an appearance for a day or two at best, before cool conditions return. But this last week has been exceptional and has done wonders for retailers of sunscreen and ice-cream. Indeed the heat built up so much in the house that we had to keep the curtains closed all day. Even so, it was still uncomfortably warm at night. Had the heatwave gone on, we would have needed to commence the Spanish practices of having a siesta and eating at 9 pm. Today our normal summer weather has returned: overcast skies, drizzly rain and only fleeting glimpses of the sun.

I realize that most of Western Europe and Southern England have been suffering from intense heat for many weeks. But the weather is very different here. We don’t have any glaciers to melt, our rivers have not run dry and the grass is still green. Unbroken blue skies and sunshine all of the time sounds lovely. But in fact it becomes burdensome and tedious. I lived in California in 1992 and ended up looking forward to the periodic rainstorms. This taught me that it’s variation in the weather that makes life interesting. It also probably shapes the culture and norms of these islands. I’m just owning up to enjoying a week of bright sunshine amidst the months of overcast skies.

The Joy of Food

A week ago, I got food poisoning on a trip to Derry and Donegal. And since then the runs have continued. So my constant companions have been sachets of Dioralyte and rolls of Andrex. By the fourth day, I was feeling rather weak and exhausted, so I rang my GP. He told me that most food-poisoning was caused by viruses, but there could be other culprits. So he needed a sample to send to the microbiology lab. T went to the surgery and collected a large brown envelope he had left for me. Inside was a small container, a wooden spatula and a pair of surgical gloves.

I put a plastic picnic plate in the neck of the toilet. It wasn’t long before I had to go. The watery diarrhoea collected in the plate. I scooped some of it up with the spatula, screwed the cap onto the container and sealed it in the plastic envelope. I also made a mental note to never look for a job in a microbiology lab.

The doctor also included a prescription for an anti-spasmodic drug. You take one tablet a half an hour before eating. He also advised me to only eat dry toast, mashed banana and plain boiled rice. This is not much of a menu. But at least it was something to munch on. I remembered one of my times in hospital for cancer treatment when I had to fast for twelve days. After four days I lost all interest in food, and by the end I had to learn to eat again.

I have kept to my plain menu and the anti-spasmodic tablets. Indeed, for last night’s tea, I had a very exotic dish: broth with slivers of boiled chicken in it. And this has managed to stay in. So I am hoping that I’m now turning a corner. I’ve heard nothing from the microbiology lab, so I don’t know yet what bug has laid me low. But I am looking forward to maybe trying a bit of boiled carrot with my chicken broth tonight. I don’t think I’ll be taking food for granted again.

The Agent Submission

I’ve now reached the final task on my Advanced Crime Writing course. The agent submission comprises my writing bio, the synopsis and the first three thousand words of my book. The opening is the most important part of any book, because it either gains a reader’s interest or it does not. And the reader I am trying to interest at the moment is one of the literary agents at Curtis Brown. They will be reading the openings of the novels of the thirteen writers who have completed the course. If one of the agents is interested, they would then ask to see the full manuscript. Over the past week, the course organizers have been lowering our expectations. An expression of interest in our work is possible, but unlikely. And all of the agents are ‘very busy’. So we would not hear anything for several months, if at all. But hope springs eternal.

During the course, I’ve been preparing my submission with great care. An earlier draft of the opening of my book got helpful feedback from the tutor and other participants. Since then, I’ve formed a feedback group with several of the writers on the course. And over the past week we have been reviewing one another’s submissions. The deadline for the agent submission is tomorrow. So today I have been making final edits to the opening of my book. The structure and content is already there. It’s more a matter of a word change here or there, and a comma instead of a full stop. But small details matter.

When I finally send it, I will cross my fingers and breathe a sigh of relief. But that is not the end. For then I have to go through the rest of the manuscript and make it as good as I can. Editing is painstaking and rather laborious work. But it has to be done, and done carefully and thoughtfully. In a couple of months, I just might be getting a request from an agent to read the manuscript. Please wish me luck.  

 

Masterclass with Lisa Jewell

The most recent event on my Advanced Crime Writing course was a brilliant masterclass with Lisa Jewell. Knowing that she had published 20 thrillers in the same number of years and had sold over 10 million copies worldwide, I was expecting a rather formidable person. But she was very engaging, down to earth and disarmingly open about her craft. The masterclass proceeded in a Question Time format. All of the course participants had submitted their questions in advance. I was delighted to be called. What is the most important skill for a writer of crime fiction? I asked. And why?

Lisa’s reply was quite long and covered a lot of important issues for any writer of fiction, me especially. ‘Trust and believe in your natural instincts as a writer,’ she said. She told me that she began her books with one or two characters and a setting. And she did not construct a plan of the plot. She inserted dilemmas and challenges into the characters lives and saw where that took her. This organic process worked really well most of the time. Sometimes she found that she needed to put events in a different order; cutting up the story with scissors and stitching it back together again

For her first few books she thought that she was doing it wrong as a writer of fiction. She told herself that she really ought to have a plan for the book. Then she gave up worrying about it and just carried on writing in her own way. She said that readers remembered characters rather than plots. She wrote with her instincts and constructed the plot as she went along. This, she said, required confidence, positivity and faith.

I thanked her very much. I said that I had written my novel in this way too. And I had also thought that I was doing it wrong, because I didn’t have a plan. I came away from the masterclass with a great sense of validation and empowerment. And I returned to my manuscript with fresh energy and insight.

 

My Free Lunch

There’s supposed to be no such thing as a free lunch, but I think I’ve found a way. Boosted by my fourth vaccination, I headed out on a little trip. The destination was the Strandfield Café in Co Louth. I was meeting a friend of mine, who lives in the ROI. He chose the venue because of its covered outdoor seating. But Strandfield is more than that. It comprises a bakery, a café with a great menu and a specialist grocery. Despite not being far from the motorway, there are plants and greenery all around. I did feel anxious being among people again. Almost all of them weren’t wearing masks.

We sat outdoors and chatted over tea and cake. I hadn’t seen my friend since before the pandemic. He is a film-maker. And he’d been busy, making programmes for both RTE and BBC NI. I told him about my novel and the Advanced Crime Writing course that I was doing. It wasn’t long before we were talking about story and narrative.

Unsurprisingly, the worlds of film and fiction are closely intertwined. I found myself telling him about my plot problems. And he told me about storyboarding the new documentary that he is working on. And before long, I realized that he was offering me a very helpful lens through which to see my plot problems.

We chatted for a couple of hours, and then went to our homes. The next day, I found myself reworking the first act of my novel. I repositioned some of the scenes, moving several between chapters. I also cut several scenes out. The end result was a much better and tighter opening to my novel.

I’d highly recommend the Strandfield Café. It’s got great food and a comfortable ambience. You never know who you might encounter. And just up the road towards Carlingford, you can buy diesel at 18 pence a litre cheaper than in NI. With a fill up of the car, your lunch at the café is effectively free.

The Moderna Booster

I’ve just had my fourth Covid vaccination. And I realize what you might be thinking. Well, I am an old git. But I’m not quite that old a git. I discussed the matter with my GP and he put me down for the jab. I am clinically extremely vulnerable, but I’m not immuno-suppressed or over 75. Not yet, anyway. I had no reaction to my previous vaccinations, other than a day of tiredness and a sore arm. I was given two Pfizers and a Moderna before. But this time, I did have a significant reaction.

About half an hour after this Moderna vaccination, I began to feel very tired. And this increased. Within a few hours, my head was befuddled and I started the shivers. It was just as if I was down with the flu. I also felt very hungry. All I could do was to sit in an armchair. I actually watched the Giro D’Italia broadcast in Welsh. I don’t speak the language, but I enjoyed the pictures of sunnier climes.

I went to bed early, thinking that I’d wake up feeling back to normal. But the flu-like symptoms persisted for the rest of the next day. I began to wonder how long I would be stuck with these symptoms and whether I was having an unusual reaction. I also realized just how bad it would be to get Covid itself. Thankfully, the following morning, my head had cleared. And I was just left with the normal post-vaccine tiredness. By the end of the third day, I felt pretty much back to normal.

It’s strange how the reactions have intensified over time. And also that they were significantly different to the Moderna booster I had last November. I suppose the fourth vaccine is different to the previous ones, as it is trying to protect you against new variants. Anyway, I am now up and about and grateful for the opportunity to take part in the world again.