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If you\u2019ve looked at this blog before, or you look back at the dates on previous posts, you will see that there are major gaps and there has been a long hiatus when I\u2019ve posted nothing. Stuff happened – and didn\u2019t happen.<\/p>\nIf you\u2019ve looked at this blog before, or you look back at the dates on previous posts, you will see that there are major gaps and there has been a long hiatus when I\u2019ve posted nothing. Stuff happened – and didn\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n
I started the blog because I wanted to get into the habit of writing and sharing what I had written. Even when you know you want to be published, putting your words out in front of people can be difficult and scary. However, consistency, in good habits at least, is not one of my strengths. I\u2019d get into whatever fiction I was working on and stop writing blog posts. I\u2019d get despondent about writing and stop. I started another, secret, blog. Life would get good or bad and the blogging would be abandoned. I\u2019m back to it now because I\u2019m excited that my book is being published and not yet back into writing the work in progress – I find it difficult during school holidays.<\/p>\n
So, although you can see some of the journey through the blog, I thought I should share an overview of how I got to this – exciting – place.<\/p>\n
Like most people who write as adults, I loved writing, and reading, as a child. There were reasons I didn\u2019t start writing fiction seriously until my forties, and I might share those another day. For now, we\u2019ll skip forwards…<\/p>\n
I was the mother of a difficult young child, work as a freelance communication consultant and business writer was difficult, I was stressed and needed to do something creative. Unable to find an appropriate creative writing evening class, I signed myself up to do a part-time Masters course in the evening at my local university. I tried different writing forms, started to find my voice and found a novel I wanted to write. I finished the course with an MA, some lovely writing pals, a half-written novel and writing as part of my daily life.<\/p>\n
I finished the novel and entered it into a competition, the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize. It was shortlisted and one of the judges, Allison Pearson, said some very encouraging things about it. I submitted it to agents and found no takers.<\/p>\n
I wrote two more novels, was shortlisted in the Good Housekeeping novel competition, got an agent, broke up, amicably, with the agent, and did some more work on my first novel (and it\u2019s pitch) before sending it to a publisher inviting open submissions for a new digital imprint. Ta-dah! (That sounds much easier and quicker and less soul destroying than it was.)<\/p>\n
The editor, Victoria Oundjian, loved Beverley from the outset and was amazingly positive. I couldn\u2019t believe it when I received her email saying she was interested in my book and I couldn\u2019t believe how lovely she was. I was used to rejection (that\u2019s a lie, I don\u2019t think you ever get used to rejection) and re-read the email many, many times looking for the \u2018but\u2019. With Victoria\u2019s gentle encouragement, I made some more edits and came up with a new title. (I am terrible at titles. I use obscure cultural references that mean something to me and about 12 other people in the world. I fear it reflects the fact that I am not naturally aligned with commercial realities and, you know, other people. I think I got there in the end with \u2018The Busy Mum\u2019s Guide to Murder\u2019.)<\/p>\n
The thing with digital publishing is that the turnaround is incredibly quick. I signed the contract about a month ago, did my copy edits last week and the book is published in 30 days\u2019 time. I haven\u2019t met any of the people involved in person and I even signed the contract electronically. It took years to get to this point and now it\u2019s all happening in weeks!<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t know how it\u2019s going to go from here. I fear everyone will hate my book – well, the three people outside of my friends who read it. I want to publish more novels, but am concerned that I won\u2019t be able to deliver what the market wants. (And now I feel like I have to be funny. I\u2019ve never tried to be funny before. I think life and politics may have sucked me dry of humour.) I\u2019d like an agent who has the time to help me develop a career. None of this might happen. I have to keep the insecurities at bay, enjoy this moment of success and hold on to my love of writing, whatever comes next. So, for now, cheers!If you\u2019ve looked at this blog before, or you look back at the dates on previous posts, you will see that there are major gaps and there has been a long hiatus when I\u2019ve posted nothing. Stuff happened – and didn\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n
I started the blog because I wanted to get into the habit of writing and sharing what I had written. Even when you know you want to be published, putting your words out in front of people can be difficult and scary. However, consistency, in good habits at least, is not one of my strengths. I\u2019d get into whatever fiction I was working on and stop writing blog posts. I\u2019d get despondent about writing and stop. I started another, secret, blog. Life would get good or bad and the blogging would be abandoned. I\u2019m back to it now because I\u2019m excited that my book is being published and not yet back into writing the work in progress – I find it difficult during school holidays.<\/p>\n
So, although you can see some of the journey through the blog, I thought I should share an overview of how I got to this – exciting – place.<\/p>\n
Like most people who write as adults, I loved writing, and reading, as a child. There were reasons I didn\u2019t start writing fiction seriously until my forties, and I might share those another day. For now, we\u2019ll skip forwards…<\/p>\n
I was the mother of a difficult young child, work as a freelance communication consultant and business writer was difficult, I was stressed and needed to do something creative. Unable to find an appropriate creative writing evening class, I signed myself up to do a part-time Masters course in the evening at my local university. I tried different writing forms, started to find my voice and found a novel I wanted to write. I finished the course with an MA, some lovely writing pals, a half-written novel and writing as part of my daily life.<\/p>\n
I finished the novel and entered it into a competition, the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize. It was shortlisted and one of the judges, Allison Pearson, said some very encouraging things about it. I submitted it to agents and found no takers.<\/p>\n
I wrote two more novels, was shortlisted in the Good Housekeeping novel competition, got an agent, broke up, amicably, with the agent, and did some more work on my first novel (and it\u2019s pitch) before sending it to a publisher inviting open submissions for a new digital imprint. Ta-dah! (That sounds much easier and quicker and less soul destroying than it was.)<\/p>\n
The editor, Victoria Oundjian, loved Beverley from the outset and was amazingly positive. I couldn\u2019t believe it when I received her email saying she was interested in my book and I couldn\u2019t believe how lovely she was. I was used to rejection (that\u2019s a lie, I don\u2019t think you ever get used to rejection) and re-read the email many, many times looking for the \u2018but\u2019. With Victoria\u2019s gentle encouragement, I made some more edits and came up with a new title. (I am terrible at titles. I use obscure cultural references that mean something to me and about 12 other people in the world. I fear it reflects the fact that I am not naturally aligned with commercial realities and, you know, other people. I think I got there in the end with \u2018The Busy Mum\u2019s Guide to Murder\u2019.)<\/p>\n
The thing with digital publishing is that the turnaround is incredibly quick. I signed the contract about a month ago, did my copy edits last week and the book is published in 30 days\u2019 time. I haven\u2019t met any of the people involved in person and I even signed the contract electronically. It took years to get to this point and now it\u2019s all happening in weeks!<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t know how it\u2019s going to go from here. I fear everyone will hate my book – well, the three people outside of my friends who read it. I want to publish more novels, but am concerned that I won\u2019t be able to deliver what the market wants. (And now I feel like I have to be funny. I\u2019ve never tried to be funny before. I think life and politics may have sucked me dry of humour.) I\u2019d like an agent who has the time to help me develop a career. None of this might happen. I have to keep the insecurities at bay, enjoy this moment of success and hold on to my love of writing, whatever comes next. So, for now, cheers!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If you\u2019ve looked at this blog before, or you look back at the dates on previous posts, you will see that there are major gaps and there has been a long hiatus when I\u2019ve posted nothing. Stuff happened – and didn\u2019t happen. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":""},"categories":[96],"tags":[67,7,25,31,35,80,52],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/501"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=501"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/501\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":607,"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/501\/revisions\/607"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lynnfraser.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}