Giles Diggle on Twitter @50oakwoods

Thursday 29 September 2011

Sunshine is the Currency of Memory

It's here. What really matters. Ten minutes ago, sitting in the dappled shade by the pond, looking at the sunlight, I found it.

Sunshine is the currency of memory. It enables you to trade with the past and put something away for the future. Children's fiction mostly comes from the memory of sunlight and cool earthy places. If the story begins in the dark, it always looks for the light.

For me, it was the heat of today that has brought me to this place. There is something rustling in the hedge on the other side of nettle patch.

I have picked up a stick. I have written my first sentence. The sentence that changes everything.

Wednesday 28 September 2011

Some Pings I Can Do Without - What an email Address Tells Us

The Ping came while I was eating lunch - I missed it. And therefore the sense of expectation that comes with one of the few noises that drowns out the sound of the keys. (I punch them very hard as if I am still using a typewriter.) The excitement of the Ping is is usually dampened by news from John Lewis or Amazon.

I am glad I was away from the computer for this particular ping. The proforma rejection (it is now 3:2 ) was sent by an intern at the agency, if the email address is to be interpreted correctly. I have nothing against interns; they are trying to learn their trade, unpaid like many others. I  hope they get to read some books and not just press the pro-forma reject button and operate the shredder. I'm sure their Kindles or iPhones are full of entertaining .pdf's.

What am I trying to say? pa@ is better than admin@ is better than intern@. NAME@ is best of all! There is something to be said for an eye-catching title.

Tuesday 27 September 2011

The Kindness of Strangers

I turned left at 10.00 a.m. yesterday. It took me two hours to make a choice.

I'm a few paces down the road, looking over my shoulder, wondering whether I left the gas on, thinking I should have turned the water off at the mains. I can still see the crossroads. There's no devil there to parley with. I am on my own.

I chose the course of realism, then camped out overnight within sight of all things that are familiar. Not too late to turn back. But I have notes and some notion of what I might find in the dusty streets that lie some miles ahead. There are strangers I need to get to know in the quiet outskirts of town.

Across the fields, I can hear a voice tempting me down another fantastical road.

Monday 26 September 2011

Roads Not Taken

Back at the crossroads. 7.50 a.m. Monday morning. Four roads to go down and no chance of a popular vote to nudge me one direction or another.

I could backtrack today and revisit my agent list and maybe revise my synopsis, or even God forbid mess around with the structure of The Key to Finlac.

And what of the other roads? To the left and the right I am faced with beginning two novels for young people. One is set in the past in the real world, the other is fantastical. This is my dilemma. It reflects my writing history. Inside the Glasshouse and Roosters v Badgerman & Bogwitch and The Key to Finlac.

How is a reader going to characterise me: realist or fantasist? Does it matter? Aren't I just a story-teller, capable of drawing people in regardless of their preferences. Not sure it works like that.

Readers might prefer a series with recurring characters; there is comfort and safety in that. I am interested in the story a character has to tell, but they tend to tell me only one. Then I leave them and listen to another. I am curious as to what happens to them next, but it is never as interesting as what has happened to them before. Anyway, the reader can carry on the story into the future should they so wish.

And the bumpy road, that lies straight ahead with its diversion signs and contraflows.... roadworks in progress? An adult thriller.

This morning I must choose which road to go down.

Saturday 24 September 2011

iPhone Therefore I Am

Holiday reading? Take a pile of books, or take a Kindle. In the case of travelling light take an iPod Touch or an iPhone or another smartphone. I wear glasses for reading; it helps.

While I was away, I read The Redbreast by Jo Nesbo on my iPod: the screen is 3"x2". The Redbreast is a full-length novel. A page scroller. A thoughtful thriller. It does have short chapters. It is written in the Hemingway style. Filmic. Possibly the ideal ebook. It may be the future. The seemingly impossible is possible.

Perhaps, I have a short attention span? I'm not sure I would read Moby Dick on an iPhone. I would certainly read it on a Kindle. If I'd had a smartphone as as student, I would probably have spent even longer in coffee bars and cafeterias.

I also had the full manuscript of The Key to Finlac formatted as a Kindle ebook on my iPod. I couldn't revise it, but I could read it and it looked ok.

The children's ebook market is young, but it won't take long to mature... as long as children keep reading. The smartphone is the portable Penguin/Puffin of the ebook world.

 I am not attached to paper. I am glued to the story.

Friday 23 September 2011

Blanc to Blank and Back Again

Just back in from France. My mind is a complete blank, which, surprisingly, for a writer is a good thing. The bad thing would be not to get back into the writing habit as soon as possible and begin to fill that blank space with some new words.

 I didn't think about writing while I was away, though I did cast an occasional thought in the direction of Literary Agents. As far as that goes, it's two-all at the moment. Not two for my work and two rejections. It is as you might expect, four rejections in total. When I say the score stands at 2:2, I mean two pro-forma rejections slips versus two personal and kind letters.

Does this give me hope? Sort of. Does this make me doubt my writing ability. No. I can turn a word into a phrase, into a sentence, into a paragraph, into a chapter. I know my characters are good and have something to reveal. Does it make me question my story-telling? That's another tale, the end to which has yet to be written.

What the experience does do is make me value more than ever the work of my previous editors at Faber: Christopher Reid and Louisa Sladen. They gave me plenty of their time and taught me well.

I hope I listened enough. (They'd probably have cut ten words out of the previous paragraph.)

Friday 9 September 2011

Something for the Weekend

A subtle, but happy ping this lunchtime. Not only do agents work on Sundays, but Friday lunchtimes too. It is not quite the Big Bang of my literary universe, but there is a glimmer of light in the void. I am warming to Agents.

A signed rejection letter yesterday ( I am actually not being facetious) and today an invitation to submit my synopsis and first three chapters. It is not exactly a first date, but at least it's an invitation to the High School Prom.

Curiously, I use metaphors in this blog - and maybe mix them up a little too. I seemed to have dropped my stella theme in the previous paragraph. (A lesson in how not to write, perhaps.) I try to expunge all metaphors and similes from my prose; something I learned early on. I guess in this case metaphors are a symptom of happiness, so I am content to live with them for a while.

What have I learned on this adventure so far? Literary agents are just normal busy people and they do reply when they have time. Patience.

P.S. This is my last post for a short while. Blogging in the next few days days will be dependent on the availability of Wi Fi.

Thursday 8 September 2011

Please Mr Postman...

Ah, a pleasant letter today from someone who would be good to work with.

However, it is not to be. Rejection again, but with kind words. That is always a good thing. Like being picked up by the person who has knocked you over. Better than being left floundering in the street. My pride is intact...and I have not been robbed.

The nice person who wrote this knows who she is, and I thank her for her consideration:

"Thank you for giving me a chance to look at the opening chapters of the Key to Finlac. You write well and with great fluency, but I'm afraid I wasn't completely won over by the story you were telling. I am sorry: my opinion is necessarily entirely subjective and another agent will certainly respond positively to your storytelling. I wish you every good luck with your project."

So, I carry on. I shall begin writing a new book at the end of September.

Wednesday 7 September 2011

In the Writing Room

There's little point hanging around until the Christmas lights are switched on. I've upped the energy and sent off material to four more agents today and enquiries to two others. I have come across another agent who won't even consider looking at anything until January (that makes two) and another three who won't consider anything at all. That leaves me with only three or four more lines of enquiry to pursue!

The good news? I had an automated out of office reply from an agent who will be back on Monday. Communication at last. What good timing on my part, though. She'll have a week's worth of emails to plough through on her return.

The bad news? I did that stupid thing of sending off an email to an agent without the attachments; I re-sent it, hoping they wouldn't notice or they'd think me eccentric. Trouble is there seems to be no margin for error in this business. And there is no point in sending witty Oops, I'm an idiot but creative really messages.

And the brave thing? I have contacted a well-known publisher directly by letter. I addressed the envelope in my best handwriting, like a school boy writing to the President of the United States. I enclosed an SAE.

By way of displacement activity, I have added another page to my website www.gilesdiggle.com. The page is called The Writing Room. Could be worth a visit.

Maybe I should have called it The Waiting Room?

Tuesday 6 September 2011

Rejection Letter - What does it look like?

This is yesterday's rejection email. It is the standard response. Busy people. Polite. I have no complaints. It is the business. Dust myself down and carry on. It is a grazed knee only.


"Thank you for your submission, which we have read with interest. Unfortunately we did not feel enthusiastic enough about it to offer to take it further.

We are sorry to give you a disappointing response, but thank you for thinking of us in connection with your work. We regret the necessity of a form email but we are unable to respond personally because of the large volume of unsolicited material we receive.

Children's Submissions"

Monday 5 September 2011

Rejection Letters: When a Ping Becomes a Pong.

Be careful what you wish for! As soon as I changed my email alert from a pong to a ping and moaned about the lack of even an automated response (check out No Ping No Post & The Thank You Experiment) I received a very polite but automated rejection from a well known Literary Agent. And on a Sunday too - they obviously work weekends. Or the mail server does. Impressive.

How did that make me feel? For starters, like an eighteen year old getting their first rejection from university.  I soon got over that. Then it was the sting and giddiness of an unexpected punch in face coming from the left. A quick shake of the head cleared that. Then of course it is anger and bitterness and a how could they? This soon passed. Rational again. Clarity.

Of course, a response after three weeks was pretty much what I was hoping for and the message was pretty much as I expected. Anyway I had another date in my diary to look forward to.

Three weeks ago I checked out an agent's website for their submissions guidelines and discovered they could not possibly take any proposals until 5 September. (Today!) So I paid the site a visit at 8.00 a.m., only to find that they can't possibly take anything until 12 January 2012!

This is how difficult the children's fiction market is. Strangely, their message gives me hope!

Sunday 4 September 2011

The Thank You Experiment

How long does it take to answer an email? How long is a piece of string? (In the case of string, a quick tug will tell you something about it, whether there is something tied to the end. There will always be time to measure it and make a proper assessment later.)

So how long does it take to acknowledge an email? According to the Thank You Experiment it takes precisely 7.5 seconds. That is how long it takes to click on the message, type two words and press Send. Should you put the findings of the experiment into practice, you will discover that you can answer 40 emails in five minutes - while the kettle boils. Easy. Polite even.

Why then doesn't a literary agent send out a simple acknowledgement of short email proposals? Or at least set up an automated reply on a submissions email account?

Perhaps, I am being unfair.


The Thank You Experiment:

  • Open your email.

  • Compose short message.

  • Email it to yourself.

  • See how many times you can click on the message, type Thank you, & press Send in the space of a minute.



If my observations or calculations are wrong, please let me know. Send me your results.

Saturday 3 September 2011

The Art of Lying Down

How long does it take to Tweet? How long does it take to Blog three short paragraphs? More to the point how long does it take a children's fiction author to install a Follow me on Twitter button on his website?

The answer is one sleep and a lie down. The sleep was last night. I woke up still confused. It was the cloud-watching that did it for me five minutes ago. The sun was shining, the clouds were as in childhood, the sky was blue. The answer came to me. Now the problem is solved; the button is installed. So the software is intuitive after all. Except that if you asked me now to install a Follow Me button, I probably wouldn't remember how to do it.

Lying down has always worked for me; it is one of the arts of the children's fiction writer.


Friday 2 September 2011

No Ping No Post

Still no ping from the email, or strictly speaking in the case of my New Message alert: still no sound like something dropping into a blocked toilet.

It is nearly three weeks since I emailed a couple of agents and posted off my synopsis and three chapters to two more. Half their allotted time is now over (six to eight weeks for a reply). But there's no point in rattling their chains.

Time passes.

The garden centres will be full of Christmas decorations next week and the supermarkets will be thinking about Easter Eggs.

Time to hedge my bets.

On Monday I shall send out four more proposals. Right now I shall change that embarrassing plop to an expectant ping!

Meanwhile, if anyone could tell me where you can get that happy You've got mail! alert I would be pleased to hear from them.

Thursday 1 September 2011

Hep! L has broken loose: The Curse of the Typo

Typos are like flies on the windscreen. They appear as soon as you've finished a clean. And they do matter. I wish I could find an effective typo eradicator. When my first book, Inside the Glasshouse was published, I was sent six author's complementary copies by Faber. The first page I opened contained a typo, despite twelves months of editing and proof reading.

Typos matter because they distract the reader and that's what they remember for the next few pages. They matter, because they're embarrassing, like not being able to spell embarrassing, or environment (This was the first word I ever chalked on a blackboard in my first teaching practice - and I left the n out! - and I was being observed.)

And typos are so important in uploading your web page to Go Daddy. Yesterday, I missed a forward slash from a dialogue box and my web page wouldn't appear. Three hours later having poured over Google pages, I discovered my error.

Curse the typo! Sigh of relief at last! Please visit www.gilesdiggle.com and report  any typos to me.