Why Blog?

A Blog is a Vital Extension to your Business Card

This weekend the Leicester Writes - Festival of New Writing is taking place. Most of the talks are at the Phoenix Arts Centre with some at the LCB Depot. I will be on a panel tomorrow afternoon talking about the use of social media. It is at the LCB Depot if you're thinking of coming along. In case you can't get there, the following is some of what I will be talking about:

I first began blogging in November 2009. I had attended a session at the Leicester Adult Education College and the advice was that every new writer should start a blog and get a Twitter account. The blog must be kept up to date with regular posts that are lively and interesting and you should tweet with other like-minded people promoting your blog posts as you go. So that is what I did.

When you first start blogging it's hard to know what to write and what style to adopt. (These days I never have to think. I just write!) The month after I set up my blog I saw an online challenge. It offered to advertise my site in return for me blogging about a local independent bookshop. I took up the challenge. I blogged about The Reading Shop, our very own independent children's bookshop in Oadby, and that's how I first got talking with the owner and now also my publisher, Lynn Moore. You can read that blog post here.

Not long after this, Lynn was approached by a publisher asking if she knew any local writers who could write history for children. Thanks to the blog post that I'd written and the discussion that we had, she knew that this was the job for me and put my name forward. I received the commission to write The Children's History of Leicester.

By this time I had built up a group of online friends who visit my blog regularly and I also had quite a following on Twitter. I blogged about the book. I tweeted about the book and they retweeted.

My friendship with Lynn developed and when Richard III's body was discovered under the car park in Leicester she asked me if I would be writing about it. I said I would but when my publisher said they couldn't commit to such a book Lynn stepped in with the awesome line, "If they won't pay to get it published, then I will!" And she did.

Part of Alice Povey's illustration of the Battle of Bosworth

This was new territory for both of us but I didn't have to worry because there's every kind of advice any writer can ever ask for in the blogging world. Bloggers are amazingly generous, supportive and knowledgeable.

We needed an illustrator and, if it had not been for Twitter, I would never have heard about Alice Povey. Alice's mother tweets under the name @Richard1483. She is even more obsessed with Richard III than I am and that was how we got to follow each other on Twitter. I admired the art work on her blog and she told me about her daughter, Alice, who went on to illustrate my Children's Book of Richard III.

None of this would have happened without my blog and Twitter. I am now researching for my Children's Book of the Crystal Palace and, although the contact was made when I was doing a book signing and wasn't directly due to my Internet presence, people from the Friends of the Crystal Palace were able to check me out and look at my work by visiting my blog. This is why my blog has become a vital extension to my business card.

Do share your story in the comments below if your blog or Twitter account has directly created a publishing opportunity for you.

The Children's History of Leicester Goes Live!

What a treat I had this morning!

I have often read how playwrights either love or hate watching their words being acted out on stage. Well that was me this morning and I loved it! 

CCM Theatre Company have turned my Children’s History of Leicester into a play to be performed in front of schools throughout the City. They have been supported by the Schools Heritage Fund who are providing a class set of books for each participating school.

This morning I was invited to watch their very first production of the play. They took my gambol through the history of Leicester, from Roman times to the present day, and they turned it into a comedy, a farce, a tragedy. They had the children hanging on their every word. It was brilliant.

I’m making this sound like it was a mammoth production and yet the Company consisted of three people; three talented actors. We, in the audience, didn’t notice that there wasn’t a cast of hundreds. Neither did we notice that they only had time to change hats and scarves between scenes or that the main props were an old chest and three stainless steel ladders.

It was truly an inspiring experience. A big thank you to the CCM Theatre Team, Michelle Gutteridge, Claire Cogan and Jed Spittle for bringing my words to life.

Here are a few shots of them in action. They're not very clear so apologies to the Team. I was trying to be unobtrusive.

This first photo shows the introduction as the three actors produce a chest which 'carries' the narrative thread of the play

This second photo is their rendition of Richard III with the Witch of Daneshill to the right of the shot.

The third photo shows them working hard at the Stocking Frame Knitting Machines. The three ladders to the right of the photo had minutes earlier been the railway tunnel at Glenfield bringing the first steam train to Leicester.

And this is my book that started it all off. 

Digging for a King

The history beneath our feet never fails to fascinate me. Archaeologists from Leicester University are, as I type these words, digging up Leicester’s Grey Friars Car Park. A few days ago they found what they believe to be a section of wall from Grey Friars, a Franciscan Friary where it is thought that Richard III's body may have been buried. They are continuing the dig in the hope of finding his remains.

Richard III was killed at the Battle of Bosworth Field which is only a few miles from Leicester. Over the centuries there has been much speculation as to what happened to his body. Some say he was buried in Grey Friars. Others say his body was thrown into the River Soar. Now we may be about to find out the truth.

In my book, The Children’s History of Leicester, I talked about the Witch of Daneshill. They say that she was among the crowd who watched the King ride into battle on 21^st August, 1485. Richard had stayed overnight in the White Boar Inn near Leicester’s River Soar. As he rode off over the river his foot knocked against the cornerstone of Bow Bridge. The Witch of Daneshill called out,

    “When next he comes over that bridge it will be his head that knocks the cornerstone!”

They say that her prediction came true. His body was carried back, thrown across a horse, and his head knocked against that very same stone. 

Bow Bridge is still there. It’s now part of a busy thoroughfare and only a few streets away from the archaeological dig. This area of ground has never before been excavated as it had been private gardens for many centuries and then a car park. I can’t wait to see what secrets it’s about to reveal.

Are there any historical mysteries beneath the ground in your area?

If you want to keep up with the news of the dig as it breaks then you can find the latest on The Leicester Mercury site.

A Tourist at Home

Seeing with Fresh Eyes

I’ve lived in Leicester all my life. I’ve wandered round all the well-known bits. I’ve even written a Children’s History of Leicester. [I needed to do plenty of research for that!] But yesterday was the first time that I’d been a real tourist at home. I went on a guided tour of Leicester’s Castle. There’s not much of it remaining. We couldn’t climb worn stone stairs or wander wind-blown ramparts but we were able to look at odd bits of stone rising up here and there, The Turret Gateway, John of Guant’s Cellar, the mound of grass that was once the Motte and, with an expert in the lead [Richard Buckley from Leicester University’s Archaeological Services], we learnt so much more than lumps of stone could ever impart.

This is a page from my Children's History of Leicester.
The photo on the yellow background shows remains of the castle wall where gun holes were
punched in it to defend Leicester (unsuccessfully) from Prince Rupert's army in the Civil War.

Why have I never been on a local guided tour before? When we go abroad we always sign up to guided tours so why not in our home town? That was a rhetorical question. I know the answer. It’s because we think we know what’s there. We get so used to seeing it that we stop seeing it. Why does our brain do that? [That wasn’t a rhetorical question so do please let me know if you have the answer.]

The same thing happens in other areas of our lives. I’m very lucky to have a lovely house and a beautiful garden but days go by and I forget to notice them… until a friend visits and I see it all through their eyes and remember. Yes, I am lucky.

I wonder if this happens with writing. Do we become so immersed in the character detail of our work-in-progress that we forget where we were intending to take the story? Or maybe we get too hung up on plot twists to work on our characters.

It certainly happens with relationships. It’s not until we run the risk of losing someone that we look through our seeing eyes, the ones that view things for real.

I know that I need to use my seeing eyes more often and I suspect I’m not the only one.

A reason for blogging

Some people blog to promote their writing and I’ve mentioned before that I wouldn’t have got the commission to write my Children’s History of Leicester had it not been for this blog.

Some people blog because they’ve got something to say and want to spread their words far and wide and you only have to check your stats to see how well blogs can do 'far and wide'. Here is a copy of my stats graph showing the location of this week's visitors:

United Kingdom – 264

United States – 203

Germany – 39

Russia – 36

Netherlands – 16

Canada – 13

France – 13

Australia – 8

South Africa – 5

Japan – 4

It’s pretty much the same each week, give or take a few countries, and I often wonder who these visitors are, why they came, and whether they found what they were looking for.

I did have a specific reason for setting up this blog and it wasn’t to promote my writing. It was to see if I could find others whose lives have been affected by Amyloidosis, by chemotherapy treatments and stem cell transplants. It’s not that we never meet other Amyloidosis sufferers. We go each year to the Amyloidosis Awareness Day run by Myeloma UK and Mr A has to have a two-day check-up twice a year at the specialist unit at London’s Royal Free Hospital so we get the chance to compare symptoms and treatments but I still feel the need to talk with others who understand when I ramble on about Lambda and Kappa Free Light Chains, Nephrotic Syndrome, Amyloid loads, not to mention all the drugs.

Mr A was diagnosed with Amyloidosis in 2008. I began my blog in 2009 and my first ever blog post says it all really. My blog writing style and presentation may have changed but unfortunately the Amyloidosis hasn’t. The levels were knocked back by the stem cell transplant in 2010 but we’re anxious that they’re starting to rise again. Maybe it’s a blip. Maybe things will stabilise once more but if anyone reading this is having similar experiences, we’d love to hear from you. Somehow, every now and then, it just helps to share the load.

... And that's my reason for blogging. What's yours?

“Please can you sign my book?”

I'm having a book launch at

The Reading Shop, The Parade, Oadby, Leicester 

at 11 am on 16^th April.

The books are in

 A Children’s History of Leicester  ISBN: 978-1849931496

And they've put some of my Bathtime Rap books in the window display too

All we need now are some visitors to make my book launch a really fun morning... or is it? My pen is feeling nervous. It’s watched other authors signing books, their pens moving with a flash and a flourish and the signing is done. So why can’t my pen do the same? It seems to get tongue-tied (nib-tied?). It has no trouble when I write a manuscript. It works perfectly well when producing a covering letter. It even enjoys signing the contract but it has never managed to grasp the art of book signing.

So if you come along to the book launch (and I do hope you will) don’t forget, when you’re ready to have your book signed, to please go easy on my pen. It may be feeling just a little nervous.

    

I was on the radio

The following is, as promised, one of my regular chatty blogs. If you’re here as part of the A to Z Challenge then please visit my previous blog.

Last Friday BBC Radio Leicester, invited me in to record a piece for their afternoon chat show. They wanted to talk to me about my new children’s book, a Children’s History of Leicester, and our book launch which will take place at The Reading Shop, Oadby on 16th April (more about that later). 

I’ve been on Radio Leicester before but it’s still terrifying. I tried being rational. They’re not going to trip me up. It’s Rupal Rajani and her chatty programme. And it’s not live so we can stop if I say something ridiculous. And besides, I’m going to be talking about my favourite subject, my writing. Why should I possibly be nervous?

But as usual my body wouldn’t listen. I paced and practiced and got myself into quite a state but then, as always seems to happen on these occasions, I was fine when it came to doing it. I sat down in the studio and started chatting away as if I was having coffee with a friend.

Rupal Rajani in her recording studio

All too soon the interview was over and I was striding back to the car, proud of the way I’d managed to remain calm in the face of a mass of microphones.

The chair where I sat with all those microphones staring at me

I was just negotiating the car around a protruding kerb at the entrance to the car park when the voice on the car radio (which of course was tuned to Radio Leicester) issued a quick ‘later today’ item and it was my name... on BBC radio... I drove straight over the kerb. Clunk! Not as calm as I thought I was, huh?

If you’d like to hear my interview then you can find it at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00cs2cf with 5 days left to listen. It’s about 35 minutes into the 1^st April programme.

   

There's a postman at the door!

Last week the advanced copies of my latest book arrived, A Children’s History of Leicester. I wasn’t expecting them. I had Mum on my mind, her extreme agitation and the beginnings of what we suspect could be cancer-related delirium. I had Rod on my mind, his run of infections following all that chemotherapy, and yet another course of antibiotics for him to take. And I had the new cats on my mind. The postman’s visit meant that the front door was open and the cats were still confined to quarters. In fact, the last thing on my mind was a delivery of books which made their arrival all the sweeter.

The cover was shiny, tactile, exciting. I turned the pages and felt that (almost) familiar thrill that I hope will never pall. All my words are there, all that research and writing, selecting and editing, but I had only ever seen them as black on sheets of white A4. Now the colour and illustrations have brought my words to life.

Two have already been placed on The Shelf. It may not be heaving with books quite yet but it’s starting to look almost respectable, don’t you think!