by admin | Dec 9, 2015 | Uncategorized
I’m really grateful to my friend Eric who managed to squeeze this 16 minute interview on to my website. You’ll find the link in the My Books section on ruthsutton.co.uk, and it should work if you click on it. The BBC Radio Cumbria interviewer Paul Braithwaite asked some really good questions and made it easy to keep the conversation going, for much longer than I expected. If you look at the last blog post and then listen to the interview you’ll see the connections between the two. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
I’ll be back shortly with a fresh blog post using tomorrow’s experience of a library talk and a book group back to back to reflect on what I learn from readers. One reader is already emailing me as she reads, trying to slow down to make her reading of ‘Cruel Tide’ last as long as she can. Once she’s finished she’ll have to wait almost a year before the next ‘instalment’ of the series is written and produced. ‘No pressure’ she says, but I can feel the pressure already.
by admin | Dec 4, 2015 | Uncategorized
I’ve been waiting to write this post until the most recent interview I did on local radio was able to be linked in, but it’s not ready yet so I’ll go ahead anyway. It made me think about the Q&A of a good interview, and what I learned from from the many oral Q&A occasions in my recent working life, most of which have been to do with my education work rather than writing, although the process involved is much the same. Here some points from what I’ve learned:
1.The first of the points I’m going to make here apply to any interview, whether it’s oral or appears in written form, and it’s about preparation. You can’t assume that the person who will be interviewing you knows anything at all about you. Why should they? They work in a different world, with different concerns. They will know all about many people in that world, their world, but may not have met anyone like you before. So tell them beforehand. Give them something to work with. A week before my most recent radio interview I sent a copy of my book, which would be the main subject of the interview, and a little about myself as well. The interviewer, whose name in this recent case was Paul, could then glance through the information, read the back cover blurb, and dip into the book at various points to get a feel for what we might talk about. I didn’t expect Paul to read the book, but he obviously had a pretty good look at it, which added to the quality of the questions he asked me. It wouldn’t have been fair to assume he would get hold of the book for himself, or be able to salvage anything useful from it without proper notice.
2. This advice also applies to any interview: before it starts, take a few minutes to clear your head. Focus on the topics that might come up and leave everything else behind. If you’re lucky enough to be on radio, it doesn’t matter how you look or what you’re wearing. The interviewer will probably notice if you’re flustered. or late, or pre-occupied, so do whatever it takes to reduce those distractions. My interview last week was live on the radio. I knew I wouldn’t be actually in the studio until a minute or two before we started, so I sat quietly outside for ten minutes before I was called through, just opening my head up and getting rid of the clutter of the journey, the weather, and anything else that would get in the way.
3. For a live interview, try to be there in person, however tempting it might be to save time by using the phone. It took me one and half hours to drive to Carlisle for my fifteen minutes in the studio, but it was worth it. The first time I was interviewed I didn’t understand this and accepted the option of going to an outreach studio closer to my home. Mistake. The sound quality was better but it’s still like the phone because you can’t see the person you’re talking to. I realised how important it is to see and respond to the person asking the questions and listening to what you say. This time in the studio I shifted the mike a little so I could see Paul clearly, and wore the headphones so I could hear him and myself really clearly too.
4. Being there in person helps, especially on radio, but be careful. In normal conversation you sometimes murmur a few things while the other person is talking, saying ‘uh, huh’ in agreement, for example. It’s like the oral equivalent of smiling or nodding your head. Or you might disagree with what’s being said and let out a murmur of dissent, saying ‘Well…’. Not really interrupting, just responding. It’s only when you hear the interview again that you realise how distracting this is for the listener. Even if you’re on TV you may be out of shot, with the camera trained on the person who’s speaking not the person who’s listening and trying to respond. In a TV interview they’ll do a few ‘nodding shots’ to edit in afterwards, so that the viewer can see both the people in the interview at once, although there’s only one camera. On the radio, all you hear is an indistinguishable noise: if you could see the person making the noise it might make sense, but you can’t and it doesn’t. I know that I should keep quiet when the other person is speaking, but even this time I didn’t. At one point you can hear a funny sound that was actually me laughing when Paul said some thing funny, but I should have smiled instead. I’ll remember next time.
5. This point follows on from the previous one and is especially pertinent to radio, live or recorded. Don’t interrupt or talk over someone. I know that early morning news people do it all the time, but that ambiance is sometimes rightly adversarial and that’s what adversaries do, even though it’s annoying even then. An interview about your latest book is unlikely to be adversarial. The interviewer may have an axe to grind, but you gain nothing by trying to interrupt or talk over him/her. Letting them finish what they have to say gives you more time to think about the best response: interrupting probably means the listener will not be able to make sense of what’s being said. Radio hates both no sound and two voices at once. If the question is a good one and makes you think, don’t think in silence for too long without saying anything. ‘That’s a really good question’ you say with the front of your brain while the rest is working out a response. ‘Dead air’ they call silence in radio, and it will probably make your interviewer speak again just to fill the void, and the flow of the interview is lost.
6. The interviewer will probably control the time you have, unless you’re a real big shot with a press agent who sits in and insists on the interview running to schedule. Most of us don’t have a ‘minder’ and we are in the hands of the person asking the questions. This means you can’t choreograph the interview as you might like, If you’re saving your best line until the end, it may never happen. Part of your preparation will include some anticipation of what you might get asked about, and the most interesting or memorable phrase you might use in response, and you use any of those that you can, obviously, but not if they don’t fit. I’m sure some media training might suggest ignoring the question and just ploughing on with your prepared responses, but my instinct and limited experience suggests otherwise.
7. For the interview to flow along well, you need to listen really carefully to the questions that are asked, and see how to respond in a way that steers the conversation towards the things you really want or need to say. It’s quite subtle, and hard to do if your mind is in a whirl, hence the need to gather yourself ahead of time. If your mind’s relaxed the responses will flow. It helps to have rehearsed some of the things you want to say if you get the chance. Don’t just think about the words to use, say them out loud a few times so that they are more likely to come to mind quickly when the need arises, especially if the wording needs to be fairly careful.
8. If you can see the interviewer, he or she can see you. They may not look at you regularly, but that’s because they’re busy, thinking about the next slot or the next music, not because they’re being rude. On TV a distracted interviewer is less likely because it looks so rude, but on live radio it will happen, so don’t take it personally. Smile, focus, nod, but don’t mumble, tap the table, or fiddle with the mike. Think of the sound man, sitting in the booth, trying to make sure that the listener has a good audible experience. By the way, if you get the chance, say hello to the technical support person on your way in to the interview. You’re relying on them to make it go well.
That’s probably all the guidance I can offer from my limited amateur experience. I’ve been interviewed on live radio maybe a dozen times over the years, and I’ve always really enjoyed it. The main thing for me is that on radio appearances don’t matter at all: all that matters is what is said, not your hair, or make-up or clothes or the pimple on your nose. I think I have what’s called a ‘radio face’! I’m also told I have a radio voice, unaffected and clear: you can hear my expression it, which is why I try to let my voice reflect my mood and the energy in my head. If I’m feeling warm, I sound warm, and vice versa.
Your interview can be a great way to present your work in a different medium and encourage people to take an interest in you as well as what you’re written. Prepare, focus and enjoy it. Come back to the blog in a few days to see if the live radio interview I did last week is available, listen to it and see what you think. I thought it was a good one, and have told the BBC Radio Cumbria interviewer, Paul Braithwaite, how much I enjoyed his questions and the whole experience.
by admin | Nov 23, 2015 | crime fiction, formula, plotting, self-publishing, structure, writing
Two things have prompted this question. The first was a response from a well-known crime writer I asked to read ‘Cruel Tide’ a few weeks ago. I was pleased that he said some positive things about it, but he ended his note with words to the effect that I needed a specialist editor. I thought about what that implied, but then put it out of my mind in the flurry of activity leading up to publication.
The second nudge to my thinking about this question has arrived today. This evening I do my first public outing of the new book,at the library in Ulverston, and I’ve thinking about what to say. Why did I turn to crime fiction after the character-driven trilogy that preceded it? What does crime fiction entail, and what have I learned from this experience? The remark about a specialist editor came back to mind and now I’m thinking harder about it.
The role and function of an editor is always tricky for someone like me who’s written a lot over the years and always alone. Many education writers do their work collaboratively, sharing ideas, reading each other’s stuff, getting feedback as they go. I never did. I wrote, read it over a few times, made some adjustments and that was it. Only with the final education book, about school progression for the Canadian market, did I write with others and then have an editor employed by the publishers. I didn’t expect the editor to change much, but she did and all of it for the better, not about the content but in terms of the clarity and economy of expression. I analysed the changes she suggested and learned a great deal about how to write more clearly.
The role of editor, it seems to me, is three-fold: first there is ‘content’ editing. For a novel, this is the story edit, that looks at structure and character and chronology, how the whole thing flows and fits together. Then there’s the way that meaning is communicated, the structure of a paragraph or a sentence. Finally there’s the proof read, checking spelling, punctuation, speech marks and so on. All three functions have been undertaken in my books so far by the same person, a friend who has worked in publishing for decades, but almost exclusively with non-fiction. As a reader and book group member she’s analysed my stories in their various iterations, suggested changes, and pointed out anomalies or others mistakes to be ironed out in the final drafts. She would not describe herself as an expert fiction editor and she has – as far as I know – no links with current fiction publishers.
I’m hesitating to go back to my crime writer colleague and asks him what a specialist editor could do that my current editor can’t. He’s a busy bloke, and I’ve probably imposed on his time enough already. I did follow up with a phone call to a specialist editor he knows, and during the conversation what became clear was not so much the editing function as the networking that lay behind it. The person I was speaking to was well-connected, to other crime writers, to agents and publishing houses. She lived at the other end of the country and was already very busy, so I took it no further, but I was left still wondering what this editor could do for me.
I was back yet again to the issue of genre and the specialised protocols that seem to apply to different genres, and even sub-genres. Obviously a crime writing specialist editor would be more familiar with these protocols than me. She/he would know the insider tricks of the trade that would distinguish my book, and make it more interesting to an agent who would probably also specialise in crime fiction. Editor and agent would have a shared language and recognise my attempts to join that club.
The idea of this shared understanding and its unwritten rules is not attractive for me. It plays to my innate and sometimes unhelpful aversion to following rules of any kind that I don’t understand or see the point of. I still ask myself, what do readers really want? Do they get a buzz from seeing how the crime fiction rules are followed in different contexts and with different protagonists. Do they smile in appreciation as they recognise the genre features that they expect as soon as something is described as ‘crime fiction’? Do they only ever look on the crime and mystery shelves of the library or the bookshop?
‘Cruel Tide’ is not classic crime fiction, as far as I can judge. It doesn’t have the closed group of potential suspects, or a single dysfunctional detective with a drink problem, or even a genius problem solver. The story is propelled by the characters as much as by ‘events’. There is no final reveal that ties up loose ends and looks ahead to a certain future. The goodies do not necessarily triumph. What would a specialist editor have made of all this, I wonder? If the advice was to follow the rules of the genre more carefully, how would I react? It’s my story after all. If the editor told me that an agent or a potential publisher would expect me to do things differently, I’m not sure I would have warmed to that advice. I’m too old and too awkward, and I’ve chosen to self-publish with all its attendant risks rather than chase any commercial publishers’ approval. If it doesn’t work, so be it.
But still, the notion of a specialist story editor lurks in my head. If I could learn from that interaction, it’s probably something I should do, for myself, but it would have to be someone I respect, and I’d offer no guarantees about my response. Maybe I’ll wait and see the reaction to my first crime novel and go from there. I need feedback, people: specific, considered, detailed feedback and suggestions about alternatives before I embark on the next book in what will probably be a series, although I’m not sure how many more books I want to write. It’s hard work!
by admin | Nov 17, 2015 | crime fiction, genre, readers, trilogy
I read something recently about how many readers will only buy books from an author they already know, and how much harder that makes it for people like myself who are just starting off. There are so many books available, and some of them are so poor, that you do need some assurance that your hard-earned money and space on your shelf aren’t both going to be wasted. I do it too. It’s understandable.
I’m just seeing a faint glimmer of hope, however, after years of plugging away, speaking to groups of readers in out of the way places, sometimes no more than half a dozen at a time, and getting occasional mention of my books into the local media. The new book seems to be selling more quickly than any of the previous ones. There could be all sorts of reasons for this. It’s the first attempt at crime fiction, and we know how popular that genre is. Even my daughter, who was vaguely interested in my previous books, greeted the new one with more enthusiasm and said she might actually read it! And we’re learning about how to promote the book ahead of time, on FB, on Twitter, in the local press, and by contacting people who’ve bought books from us before. Incidentally, we had a curt email from Amazon recently, saying that on no account could we ever contact anyone who’d used their website to buy from us. Fortunately the number of hard copy Amazon sales is low. I wish we could do without using Amazon altogether, but the Kindle sales are too good to miss and that still seems to be the most popular route to the ebook market.
I wonder if the main reason for more of the books being sold so far is that more people actually recognise my name on the cover. It’s possible: not a radical change but a gradual seepage into the local consciousness and the word-of-mouth network. And the cover itself may be helping too. It’s certainly striking.
I called one of the local papers last week just to tell them that I had a new book out. They’d run stories about the books before and I thought they might do so again. The initial response was pretty bland, but an hour or two later a young woman from the paper called me back, introduced herself and asked for an interview. We had a good long chat: I quickly realised how important it was to clarify that the content of the book was not drawn from local events, but from the enquiry into child abuse at a boys’ home in Belfast forty years ago. It had been through reading the report of the Kincora Boys’ Home enquiry that I’d begun to understand how institutional abuse could begin, develop and continue even though key people were in a position to know – and to stop – what was happening. I didn’t realise how much of that knowledge stayed with me until I began to write. Some of it, and what I have learned since, was horrifying and I had to tone it down. I wanted my readers to be clear about how the children and young people had suffered, but too graphic an account would be like abusing them all over again.
The other thing we talked about was how young women just like the young reporter I was talking to, and the WPC in the book, had struggled with their treatment in the workplace in the 1960s. There may be many things wrong with our lives in 2015, but as a woman I’m glad I’ve seen things change during my lifetime.
I’ve yet to hear how readers of the new book respond to its fairly dark message, which provides both the context and part of the plot. I’m afraid some of the male characters don’t come out well, but so be it. Two of the young female characters have been badly affected by behaviour which these days might put the perpetrators in the dock. Some of the previous themes in my trilogy also reflected their times and the place of women in society, but perhaps not quite as starkly as this. ‘Cruel Tide’ is not meant to be a polemic, and I hope it won’t be read as such. If the community it represents is deeply flawed, that’s just the way it was, and I hope my readers aren’t disappointed by that. They can’t be expecting a happy ending, as they haven’t had one yet, and the ambivalence is still there in the last chapter. Maybe I should have tied up more of the ends in a neat bow. Let’s see what reactions I get this time. I’ll let you know.
by admin | Nov 11, 2015 | Cruel Tide, self-publishing, selling
Well the books are here, 400 plump pages in each one, fresh from the printers in Cornwall, boxed and shrink-wrapped and fork-lifted into the storage space, ready to be sent out again as feverish demand mounts. I wish, but we did ship out six boxes straight away to waiting customers and that number should grow over the next few weeks in the run up to Christmas, and with the various planned ‘launches’ and events. I earned more through direct sales last year than any other route to market, which is interesting but unsustainable, and I’m constantly looking for ways to increase sales through the regular bookshops beyond the reach of Hills of Workington, the Cumbria-based distributor that takes most of my stock.
The other big distributors, Gardners and Bertrams, keep small publishers like me at something of a distance. We’ll have to pay them a big discount for the privilege of having them store my books ready for despatch. As it stands, they email us whenever they get an order and we send it off, one or two at a time, which is so wasteful and inefficient. With sales relatively low we’re just too small to be taken much notice of.
These distribution issues, and the cost of storage, make the ‘ebook only’ alternative sometimes seem very attractive, but I still can’t bring myself to take that road and abandon the ‘book in hand’ altogether. I love books: ebooks are OK for travelling, but I love the feel of a book, the smell of it, the touch of a page under your fingers, the sight of the spine on the shelf or by the bed. So for the time I’ll carry on playing the real book publisher game and enjoy it, rather than berating myself for making less profitable choices. If you’re proud of what you’ve done, back yourself.
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