Au Revoir, Genève

The Schynige Platte: a nice spot
for some writing

For two and a half years, I have spent my days tidying stories in a turret. I have lived in a wood-panelled room – a land-locked ship’s cabin, I like to think – and I have watched the drifting of the clouds and the phases of the moon through the windows above my head. I have walked to a market each Sunday, or else taken a tiny orange train up a hillside to visit my cousin and his family. I have explored: cities, lakes, woods, summer mountains on foot, winter mountains on skis. I have become used to the unfamiliar, not just languages and cultures that aren’t my own, but the sound of church bells in the morning, the smell of cooking cheese or vin chaud in the street, the sight of little old men walking giant chess pieces around giant chessboards in the park… Reflecting on it all like this, I realise how wonderful and strange my time in Switzerland has been, almost like something from a story in itself. And now it is coming to an end - as all stories must.

I have always been driven by the desire to write – and the hope that writing could one day make up the bulk of my income. My Literary Consultant job here has been fantastic, but now I have the opportunity to put aside the editing and administration and concentrate on freelance ghostwriting and my own stories. And I know the place to do that is not in this charmed but expensive and faraway city, but in my beloved Edinburgh – my home, to which it is time to return.

View of Grand Rue, Geneva Old Town, the street on which I've lived and worked

Despite feeling fairly confident about this decision, it's breaking my heart a little, leaving Geneva while I'm having such a good time. I think perhaps it would help to dwell on the negative: the endless bureaucracy here, for example; the lack of sea; the customer service that borders on abuse. But I can’t. Switzerland, despite its reputation as a rather twee and snoozy little country, is an extraordinary place - not least for the fact its people once had the bright idea of dipping bread in booze and melted cheese. 

The mighty Matterhorn

It's also beautiful. I remember learning about  nature inspiring feelings of the sublime when studying Gothic literature at university, and I have felt that sensation again and again in Switzerland. When I hiked around the Schynige Platte above Interlaken last summer, or under the Matterhorn’s domineering shadow in early Autumn, the sights made my heart soar. I think I now understand why Julie Andrews went twirling off towards that mountainous horizon singing all sorts of silliness about musical hills – she just couldn’t keep it in. If you have never been to Switzerland, I urge you to visit at the first possible opportunity.

Of course, it’s people that really complete a place, and I have made some amazing friends out here. Geneva is a transient city, where most only stick around for a few years (or even months), so I’ve been very fortunate in this regard. Whether we’ve been indulging in thimble-sized glasses of wine in expensive bars, or slobbing out in front of TV shows in each other’s apartments; whether we’ve been lounging in the sunshine at the Perle du Lac park, or zooming down ski slopes in the biting cold - my friends and I have experienced this mad and magical place together. 

In many of these friends, and especially in my colleagues, I have also found kindred, creative spirits. We’ve swapped new story ideas, we’ve made colourful spreadsheets of competition deadlines together, we’ve read one another’s fiction – first drafts, fourth drafts, last drafts – and offered our comments. We’ve been there to share in each other’s successes – and commiserated in the face of a few, inevitable setbacks. We even made it official, forming The Pen Poppers writing group for regular practice, feedback and encouragement. As I have said before, writing is such a solitary occupation, I find it best to try and share as much of the process as possible. 

Skiing with my creative colleagues
(and two of my favourite Geneva people), Helen and Elodie

Which leads me onto my writing in Geneva. One of the reasons I want to pursue the next stage of my career in Edinburgh is that I have been a little starved of writing opportunities (as opposed to writing people) in Switzerland. But, in a way, being cut off from the UK literary scene has encouraged me to connect more in cyberspace. In the past few years, I have set up twitter and LinkedIn accounts, dedicated more time to Writer’s Block, completed Nanowrimo twice, joined two Reading Challenges, acquired Goodreads and Amazon author profiles. Now I think about it, I’m not sure I would have made my online presence quite so known, had I not felt far away.

I know I’ll return to Switzerland, both physically and in my writing (I’m already noticing a lot more mountain scenery popping up in my fiction), so I’m sure this is not the last time I’ll talk about my experiences here. But I wanted to get at least some of it down before I went, because I know it’ll seem different in a few weeks, and more different still a year or two down the line. So this is how it is right now, on the brink of leaving Geneva - and this is how I am: happy, grateful, inspired, better organised, more focused, more like a writer, even a little more worldly. And, conversely, because of all that, I'm also ready to go.

Jumping for joy at the top of Mont Salève

Ghosting, Introduction: What is a Ghostwriter?

When I moved to Geneva a couple of years ago, I went to a few getting-to-know you events in order to avoid becoming a complete social outcast. Because of the corporate-humanitarian focus of this city, I always felt something of a curiosity amongst all the frighteningly ambitious young bankers and jaded UN interns at these drinks, especially when the inevitable question came up again and again: what do you do? And I learnt, after a few evenings of clutching at an overpriced glass of wine and trying to make conversation with - shudder - strangers, I could answer this question in two ways...

Answer One: I'm a Literary Consultant. I work in a Geneva-based publishing house doing editing, proofreading and coordinating the administration.

Answer Two: I'm a ghostwriter.

Both are true. Answer One is my day job, Answer Two is my freelance work. But I'm sure you can imagine which one always provoked the better reaction.

But what is a ghostwriter?* Although it varies from job to job, generally a ghostwriter is hired to write or rewrite a piece of text - whether that be a book, short story, report or article - by somebody who will be credited as the official author.

Going back to those drinks, this explanation has prompted some incredulity in its time: Is that a thing? I've never even heard of that.

By this point, I've found the easiest way forward is to mention the multitude of celebrity autobiographies that grace the bookshop shelves and bestseller lists. Of course, there are a lot of ghostwriters of fiction out there (myself included), but I would imagine the biggest pool of work lies in biographical writing; the self-penned stories of actors, sports stars, businesspeople and so on. In fact, I think most people would be surprised how many books out there are written, at least in part, by someone other than the named author.

And it's not a bad thing. That's another issue that arises from the ghostwriting conversation: there tends to be judgement - not of me, but of the clients - as though it's somehow shameful to have put your name to something you haven't bashed out on a keyboard, word for word. It's not. Plenty of individuals have stories to tell, but not necessarily the time, skills, education or even the confidence to tell them without a little help.

I'm hoping to return to these issues and more in an (occasional) series of posts entitled Ghosting. Firstly because the three and a half years I've spent as a ghostwriter have hugely affected my own creative writing - almost entirely for the better, believe it or not. Given that Writer's Block is intended to track my writing progress, it would be strange not to talk about it.

I also freely admit to not knowing a huge amount about the world of ghostwriting myself because, for obvious reasons, much of it is shrouded in secrecy. In Ghosting, I'll be talking about my experience in general terms, to protect the anonymity of my clients, and I would love it if other ghosties could come forward and do the same, in order that we might learn a little from one another. After all, I suspect there are a number of you out there, haunting the internet, so do give me a wail or rattle your chains in my direction if you feel so inclined.

*Incidentally, many don't need me to explain the concept of ghostwriting to them, because they've seen the Ewan McGregor film The Ghost Writer, or read the Robert Harris novel Ghost on which it's based:

In my experience, the profession is not nearly as exciting or dangerous.

Reading Review 2013

In January, I wrote of joining Goodreads and undertaking the 2013 Reading Challenge. Now, just in time, I have finished the final, thirty-fifth book (Graham Joyce's intriguing Some Kind of Fairy Tale), and so I wanted to review a few of this year's most memorable reads.

  

Best nonfiction: Your Voice in My Head by Emma Forrest. I found this memoir of mental illness a little meandering, and I would have liked more focus on the therapist character to whom it's dedicated. Having said that, Forrest is a frank, funny and utterly fearless writer, and the book is full of insight and wisdom concerning a subject that, in my opinion, is not talked or written about often enough. For example: Time heals all wounds. And if it doesn't, you name them something other than wounds and agree to let them stay.

Best reread: The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. As I wrote in a previous post, I was impressed all over again by Atwood's dystopian classic, and the act of rereading it stirred up a lot of emotions about my teenage years, and the closure of my old school.

Most surprisingly enjoyable classic: Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. I had heard from various people that they hadn't been able to get on with Heller's satirical World War Two novel, but I was giggling away from page one, and had tears of laughter rolling down my cheeks by the 'flies in his eyes' discussion. Of course, like all good satire, the clever humour ensures the unfolding tragedy hits harder, making this both one of the funniest and most affecting books I read in 2013. (Runner-up: Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy).

Biggest commitment: 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami. When I worked at Waterstone's, many moons ago, my colleagues were always raving about Murakami. I'm afraid it's taken me this long to pick up one of his books - or rather, three of them, for the surreal and unique 1Q84 was published as a trilogy. Although I did feel the story was stretched too thinly towards the end, I'm not sure I've ever experienced such a bonkers plot being told in such clear, matter-of-fact prose. It's an irresistable combination.

Most disappointing read: The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera. I try to finish each book I start because I truly believe I can learn something from every story, even those I don't like. Yet I found this novel so incredibly pompous and misogynistic, I'm not sure whether I should have struggled through to the end. Awful. (Runners-up: Eowyn Ivey’s The Snow Child and Robin McKinley’s Beauty. I expected to love these novelised fairy tales, but found neither really had much to add to the stories they were retelling).

Best children's/young adult book: A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness. Having adored the author's Chaos Walking trilogy last year, I had high hopes for his award-winning A Monster Calls, and still the novel completely surpassed my expectations. I've since come to the conclusion that Ness just gets it: he gets teenagers, he gets stories, and he gets that the things that really scare us are more complicated and difficult to confront than any sharp-toothed, long-clawed thing that goes bump in the night. (Runner-up: Unwind by Neal Shusterman).

Best book: The Tiger's Wife by Téa Obreht. Recommended by the lovely Elodie Olson-Coons, I took to this novel straight away. I'm a big fan of magical realism, especially when it's used as sparingly and effectively as it is in The Tiger's Wife. I also love how Obreht has structured this ambitious book; the way she has blended the folklore and the fantastical storytelling with a gritty, realist narrative set during the Balkans conflict. Obreht is, I have recently found out, just a few months younger than me. Perhaps I should be envious of her, and the success of her first novel, but I'm not - I'm inspired.

Author Profiles

In my very first post on this blog, almost exactly four years ago, I wrote of attending a conference for Creative Writing MSc graduates, and learning the mantra: I am a writer. (Interestingly, an article entitled When Can You Call Yourself A Writer? has been popping up on twitter recently, and it's worth reading over at The Write Life here.)

Even though I now (ghost)write for a living, it sometimes still feels a bit odd to label myself a writer. I'm not sure whether it's because many people's idea of a writer is a JK Rowling-type figure - ie hugely prolific and successful, or whether being a writer is something I've wanted for so long that I can't quite bring myself to say it aloud, lest I jinx it somehow.

This week, however, a little validation (rare in this profession, and always welcome) came my way, as I managed to set up an Author Profile on Amazon, as well as update my existing one on Goodreads:

Author Profile on Amazon

Author Profile on Goodreads

Despite being published in Modern Grimmoire and Stories for Homes, it didn't really occur to me I would be entitled to a page of my very own on these sites until I realised others from the anthologies were featured on Amazon and Goodreads in this way. This timidity on my part took me back to the conference in 2009 that encouraged us declare: I am a writer. I think, in future, I shall be repeating that mantra to myself a little more often, in order that my next milestone as an author doesn't come as such a surprise.

Stories for Homes: Update

Just in time for Christmas, Stories for Homes has been released in paperback. As I wrote in a previous post, the anthology was put together to raise funds for the housing charity Shelter, and features the work of sixty-three authors, all responding to the theme of 'home'.

I am fortunate enough to be one of those authors, and my short story, Unsettled, is a re-imagining of a well-known fairy tale:   

She needs to cut [the branches] back, trim all of the trees that are creeping up on her house. In the early days, the young men used to help her, grumbling all the while about the decision to move so far in. It had been wise at the time: everyone had been running from something, everyone wanted to lose themselves between the branches. It wasn’t until they had built up the little settlement that they realised they weren’t the only ones hiding in the forest.

Both the Stories for Homes paperback and ebook are now available from Amazon (and would make excellent Christmas presents!) All royalties raised go directly to Shelter.

Leaflet by Debs Riccio

Thread

The November issue of the online journal Bookanista went live today, featuring one of my short stories, Thread.

Thread is probably my most experimental piece of fiction to date. I have been playing around with fairy tales and myths for a few years now, but have recently begun to think I can use them more sparingly in my work. With Thread, I started with a myth, but tried to write over rather than around it, hoping the original tale would show through in places, but not distract the course of my new, modern-day narrative.

A little taster:

You don’t choose your own story.” That’s what Mama had said, the real one.
Papa had grunted into his pipe, raised his gaze to the ceiling. “Let the children dream.”
Biting down a response, Mama had pulled the quilt tight over their little bodies, nudging them closer together to warm like coals in a grate. Then she had bent down, kissed their cheeks, stroked their hair, and blinked back the tears that were threatening to spill into the space between them.
“Very well,” she had said, while Papa puffed away in his chair. “But I will choose the story tonight, as I wish I could choose all your stories.”

Bookanista is a fantastic website packed with literary news, extracts, interviews and articles. It places particular emphasis on publishing new fiction, from both fledgling and established writers, and I am very excited to be contributing to it this month.

Guess the myth.

To read Thread, and the rest of Bookanista's November issue, head over here.

Stories For Homes, Homes for Stories

Every so often – though certainly not as often as I should - I go on a serious trawl of the internet for literary journals, magazines, websites and competitions, searching for places to send my short stories. A few months ago, on one such mission, I came across the website Stories for Homes, which was requesting submissions of short fiction for an anthology of the same name on the theme of ‘home’.

Immediately, one of my stories, Unsettled, popped to the forefront of my mind: it concerns a house, a community, and an outsider - themes I thought might sit well in the anthology. However, it is also a retelling of a famous fairy tale, and given that the book was being produced to raise funds for the homeless charity Shelter, I wondered whether the editors might want to stick to more realist(ic) stories to reflect the serious nature of the cause.  

Still it was worth a shot, I thought, so I sent off Unsettled with a rather sheepish this-might-not-be-quite-what-you’re-looking-for disclaimer, and was therefore doubly delighted when, shortly afterwards, I learned it had been accepted for the anthology.

(The story behind Stories for Homes – from its pitch to publication - is rather fascinating in itself, as described by Debi Alper on her website here.)

Given that the book was being put together for charity under significant time pressure, we writers were then paired up over cyberspace by the editors/organisers/superwomen, Sally Swingewood and Debi Alper, and asked to look over one another's work. Although editing is a large part of my day job, at the time of this request I was holed up in a French chateau with sporadic internet access (ghostwriting larks...) and so a little worried about how I was going to find the time/means to pull off a decent editing job.

Fortunately, I was paired with Isabel Costello, who I later discovered runs the excellent book blog On the Literary Sofa. Isabel’s wonderful story, Half of Everything, about a woman coming to terms with the breakdown of her marriage during hurricane Sandy (totally different to my fairy tale piece!) hardly needed any tweaking, so it was a very pleasant editing task indeed. And a useful learning experience for me too, because it's not often my work is edited by someone I don't know. I usually entrust it to a few writerly friends, but Isabel provided some really constructive and thoughtful feedback, which led me to look at my piece afresh and give it a good polish before its publication. 

I am very proud to have been involved in the Stories for Homes book, and in awe of the people who worked so hard to pull it all together. It's strange to think that I stumbled across its website when looking for a home for one of my stories. I couldn't have predicted that search would lead me to such an exciting project, one that will hopefully make a big difference to people in desperate need of a place to call their own.  
  

Stories for Homes promo by Imran Siddiq

Stories for Homes is available now in ebook form on Amazon for just £5 and I’m told there will be a paperback version coming soon. One hundred percent of the royalties goes straight to Shelter.