Mind mapping research

Writing historical fiction is wonderful if you like doing research - which I do - but you can get bogged down in facts and your desk can disappear under a sea of paper.

So I make a big mind-map to summarize my research and stick it up on the dining room wall where I do most of my writing. Creating the mind map helps me get an overall feel for the subject, and is somewhere I can quickly go to find a fact.

Apologies for the poor photos, the mind map's high up and I had to work around the table in the middle of the room.

I've still got lots of books and bits of paper piled on my desk but it would be a lot worse without the  mind map.

The whole thing - 4 sheets of A4 sellotaped together and pinned on the picture rail.

 

Close up - can you read it?.

 

 

 

"You have an offer of a three book deal!"

Friday 26th February 2016 is going to be a date that I'll remember for the rest of my life - it's when a teenage dream finally came true.

I'd just got home after meeting the wonderful members of the Norfolk Chapter of the RNA for lunch in Norwich, when the phone rang. It was my brilliant agent Felicity, who I think said, "Are you sitting down?" I did. Then came the magical words, "You've got an offer of a three book deal!" This was followed by much squealing and jumping around which brought my husband rushing in to see what the matter was.

Unbelievably a second offer came in the following week, and negotiations started. Having one offer was amazing but to have two was way beyond my dreams. Both were excellent offers with fantastic publishers, so I went down to London for to meetings at both publishers as it was important to meet them and hear what they had potentially planned for my books. 

Then came the hard bit. I had to choose between them and it was a very difficult decision because they were both so good. I even made comparison charts to try to make it easier. In the end my heart knew who I should choose because they felt so right for me. It had to be the wonderful Little Brown Sphere.

Manpreet Grewal, who's my editor at Sphere made the announcement in The Bookseller yesterday see  http://www.thebookseller.com/news/debut-saga-series-sphere-329785

It's there in print so I didn't dream it after all.

The home of Sphere just across the road from the River Thames.

The Forgotten Service

How much do you know about the London Auxuliary Ambulance Service's work during the Second World War? I knew very little when it was chosen as the setting for my novel. I'd heard more about the Auxillary Fire Service and the A.R.P. wardens, but the crews of the L.A.A.S. seemed to have slipped under the radar and their work hasn't been given the recognition it deserves. Like those in the Fire Service and the wardens, the ambulance crews were out in the middle of air raids ferrying casualties to hospital. They had to deal with some gruesome sights.

When it came to starting my research the title of the first book I read was quite appropriate - The Forgotten Service by Angela Raby. Written from her aunt's memories and with many photos and lots of details about the work of the LA.A.S. crews, it's an excellent research source that I keep going back to again and again.

When you're least expecting...

Welcome to my blog.

I've been writing for years and have had short stories and Pocket Novels published and have nearly finished writing my first serial for The People's Friend magazine. Last year when I was least expecting it, I met wonderful agent Felicity Trew from the Caroline Sheldon Agency, who has since taken me on and my writing has gone off in a direction I would never have expected.

It's thanks to the brilliant Romantic Novelists' Association, who give writers a chance to meet agents and editors at their annual conferences. Last July's was in London, and for months I wasn't sure if I'd be able to go or not because of family illness. In the end I was able to book my place but didn't have any new writing to show an agent or editor so nearly didn't try for any one to one appointments with them. It makes me shiver now when I think how close I came to not taking that opportunity. In the end I thought I would send in the first three chapters from one of my Pocket Novels to get a bit of feedback. I certainly wasn't expecting what happened.

The day before the conference I saw an email from Felicity in my inbox and thought she was going to say don't bother coming for your appointment. To my amazement, it was quite the opposite, she liked my writing. My one to one appointment with her went brilliantly and although the writing I'd given her wasn't quite what she was looking for, she saw potential in my work and liked my "voice" - that illusive thing that each writer has to find. We arranged another much longer meeting and from that my new book was born.

I'm now working on a book which follows the fortunes of three different women working in the London Auxiliary Ambulance Service during the Blitz. I've immersed myself in research, reading books, visiting the archives of the Imperial War Museum and London Metropolitan Archives. It's fascinating and wonderful. I've been pushed way out of my comfort zone but I'm loving it as the story grows and develops and the characters take on a life of their own.