Tag Archives: Liz Fenwick

PUBLICATION DAY SPECIAL: THE SECRET SHORE BY LIZ FENWICK

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I’ll say up front that for me, this is Liz Fenwick’s best book yet. It is just so very rich in everything; the sense of the era, the superbly described settings, the characters that refuse to leave your side.

The Secret Shore is also Liz’s first fully historical novel and her research is impeccable. Not only that, it is used so sparingly in both tiny period details and sweeping events, it whisks you back the Second World War in an entirely credible and unsentimental fashion that never gets in the way of the story.

The entire narrative is carried by the main character, Merry, an Oxford geography lecturer recruited to help the war effort. Merry is an expert in maps and they stretch into every corner of her world; her vital work, her hobbies, and even her personal life. If there is something she cannot map she is deeply uncomfortable. Liz uses the metaphor well and it never seems overdone.

War, however, throws up the unforeseen; the unmappable, the unfathomable, the tragic, the moments of laughter and intense joy. But it is also a time of transit, impermanence, the last time of all that career-minded Merry would want to listen to her heart.

Set mainly around Liz’s beloved Helford River, this book is a treat not to be missed.

When Liz told me in passing she had read forty books in the name of research, I had to ask more about how she set about that gargantuan task:

If I had known beforehand that it would require me to read forty books and multiple academic papers in order to write The Secret Shore, would I have done it? Yes. This story was one I had to write because I love the Helford River so much. The story of the secret flotillas in WW2 is part of the history of the river and I have wanted to write about them for ages. But I struggled to find a way until the character of Meredith Tremayne, a cartographer, came to me.

The starting point for my research was the book The Secret Flotillas by Brooks Richards. In the course of writing The Secret Shore, I reread his book three times just to keep straight the different operations running the routes from Devon and Cornwall to Brittany. After learning of the teams’ immense bravery, I made the decision to use the names of the real people in my novel and this led to more books to research… from general history, to biography, to memoirs, and finally to obscure titles to find the small details. Some I had also read previously while researching for The Returning Tide, such as the personal memoir of the woman who managed the Ferryboat Inn during the war.

In all this fascinating background work the key thing for me was to digest the information and then to step away. It’s far too easy to want to squeeze in all the riveting facts, but that would have dragged the story down. By the end of my research, I may have done the equivalent of a Geography A level, but more akin to the study of geography as taught in the 1930s.

For The Secret Shore I stuck to my tried and tested method of doing my research in chunks. To begin with, only enough to write the first draft, then as the story develops I commence the deep dive for the right information. I can if I’m not careful become easily led astray down the many rabbit holes of research. Through the ensuing drafts I keep seeing the need for further information and will keep reading more to add subtle layers, without overloading it, hopefully bringing the story alive for my readers.

Now the big question is where to put all the books?

 

 

 

SUNDAY SCENE: LIZ FENWICK ON THE HELFORD RIVER AS A SETTING FOR HER NOVELS

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I first visited the Helford River in June 1989 and it has held my heart since then. It has become my muse, or a major part of it at least. It is difficult to write about this part of Cornwall without reference to the river. It pulls you in as much as the moon pulls the tide in. My first six novels are set on both the north and the south side of the river and this coming Spring my latest novel, The Secret Shore, returns there once more, this time set in 1942. The protagonist Merry Tremayne was born on the south side on a farm just above Frenchman’s Creek. From her early explorations of the many creeks that feed the river she draws her very first map. This is the start of her life journey that many woman of her time did not and could not travel.

It was a challenge to look at the river through Merry’s eyes as I am so accustomed to viewing it through my own. But a setting only has true meaning when seen through the eyes of those viewing it. With each novel I have had to look at this familiar landscape and yet see it anew. In my debut, The Cornish House, it was fun to look at the area through the eyes of a stroppy London teenager. All Hannah could see was an empty landscape devoid of her former luxuries such as a decent latte and all she could smell was the air reeking of cow shit! Whereas Gabe in A Cornish Stranger experienced the area through the river’s sounds… the shrill cries of the wading birds at low tide and the soft wind in the Eucalyptus trees.

Merry is an Oxford geographer who doesn’t simply see fields and hills, but their structure, composition and development. She only notices their true beauty when she thinks of her mother Elise, an artist. It is Elise’s view which causes Merry’s analytical mind to stop every so often, enabling her to pause and see the elegance beyond the facts and figures.

Standing high on the plateau above the Helford, I watched the world change from the indistinct shapes of dawn to the defined ones of the day and I recalled my mother’s search for what she described as impossible light. It was the moment when the beauty was so sharp, so clear it hurt and broke into your mind and your soul giving everything new meaning. The only thing she had been able to compare it to was when she fell in love with my father. In that moment of understanding, her perception of everything changed.

When writing about landscape it’s important for me to be in my character’s mind because what the character sees also reveals her point of view. Does she pick out the light or does she notice how rundown things are? Victoria in Under A Cornish Sky sees the landscape through history and folklore whereas when Merry is on the river she experiences it quite differently.

This old canoe had provided Oliver and I with endless trips on the Helford and around its creeks while we pretended that we were travelling on the Amazon, or the Nile, or the Yangtze. The bending oaks and hollies had become far more exotic and dangerous.

The joy of writing is that with each book and each character I can take a fresh look at the landscape around me and discover something totally new. I appreciate it all the more for the experience.

 

 

www.lizfenwick.com

 

 

JANE CABLE REVIEWS LIZ FENWICK’S EXCEPTIONAL NEW NOVEL

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For some years the pinned Tweet on Liz Fenwick’s profile has been about kindness, and it struck me that in many ways The River Between Us is too. The First World War heroine, Alice, must learn to be kind to others, and her modern counterpart Theo needs to be kind to herself.

Their stories are more than linked – they are woven together – by place and by so much more. But as always with Liz Fenwick’s books, it isn’t so much the resolution of the mystery that is important, it is the journey itself. And this is an especially rich and sensual one.

Newly divorced Theo buys a ramshackle cottage on the Cornish banks of the River Tamar, once part of the estate belonging to the manor house, now hotel, on the Devon side. The seeds of mystery are planted quickly, as Theo discovers a box of letters dating from the First World War, and when her grandmother dies it comes to light that she had secrets of her own.

In the historical narrative, which begins in 1914, Alice is a rebellious debutante, determined to speak out for force-fed suffragettes to the king and queen during her season. When she does so she is banished to Abbotswood in Devon, where she is attracted to the ghillie, Zachariah Carne.

The coincidences may fall a little too thick and fast for some, but this takes none of the enjoyment from the story. Liz Fenwick’s prose takes the reader from seeing Abbotswood as a prison for a young girl, to casting it in a dream-like quality, full of beauty and wonder, as Theo falls in love. In this book the tiniest of details matter – the tying of flies, the shells in the shell house, the flowers and their meanings. And that is brilliance of it.

But The River Between Us is more than an exhibition of faultless prose; the characters leap from the page and sink into your heart. Both contemporary and historical plots are complex and resonate with each other, and by the end of the story all the strands are as neatly woven together as DNA.

Books as good as this one are the reason I don’t read when I am writing a first draft, because they have the power to transport you to a different world, even when you aren’t physically turning the pages. But I am discovering they are excellent to read when editing; tomorrow I need to return to my own work in progress, inspired to make it so much better.

 

Publisher’s blurb:

Following the breakdown of her marriage, Theo has bought a tumbledown cottage on the banks of the river Tamar which divides Cornwall and Devon. The peace and tranquillity of Boatman’s Cottage, nestled by the water, is just what she needs to heal.

Yet soon after her arrival, Theo discovers a stash of hidden letters tied with a ribbon, untouched for more than a century. The letters – sent from the battlefields of France during WW1 – tell of a young servant from the nearby manor house, Abbotswood, and his love for a woman he was destined to lose.

As she begins to bring Boatman’s Cottage and its gardens back to life, Theo pieces together a story of star-crossed lovers played out against the river, while finding her own new path to happiness.

The River Between Us beautifully explores the mystery and secrets of a long-forgotten love affair, and is published by Harper Fiction on 10th June.

 

 

 

 

 

 

SISTER SCRIBES’ READING ROUND UP: OCTOBER

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Kirsten:

I haven’t been reading very much lately – I’ve been wrestling with proposals and second drafts and teenagers – but one book I have read and very much enjoyed is Bonnie and Stan by Anna Stuart.  It’s a story of mature love and the premise is that after over 50 years together, Stan – who still adores his wife – starts dating again.

In a dual time-line. Bonnie and Stan met during the Swinging Sixties, to the soundtrack of The Beatles and the Merseybeat scene. Bonnie’s the only woman on her architecture course and Stan is in a band. This bit is great fun –music and fashion and energy and sex and working out which one of the band members will end being Stan because they all have nicknames.

In the present day, the two have grown old together, had children and grandchildren. This bit happens at the beginning so I’m not giving anything away but Stan has cancer and is running out of time, and can’t bear the thought of leaving Bonnie on her own so, with his teenage granddaughter Greya, he sets out find Bonnie a new love. And it must remain a secret …

I thought it was a fabulous book – ultimately uplifting but with moments of real terror and fury and vulnerability.

 

Susanna:

One of the things I love and admire about books by Carol Rivers is that, while some authors get a bit stale and produce books that feel samey, Carol always writes something fresh, using new ideas, at the same time as remaining true to the drama and strong sense of personal relationships that characterise her books. Christmas Child is a story for any time of year, not just for the festive season.

An emotional and enthralling tale, it follows Ettie as she faces up to life’s dangers and challenges and learns the hard way that not everyone deserves to be trusted. I love stories set in Victorian times and I’m delighted that Carol Rivers has, for this book, left behind her customary 20th century setting and moved into the 19th century. I hope there will be more Victorian stories to come from this wonderful writer.

 

 

Jane:

I went on holiday last month and as such had a little more time than usual to read, so a couple of books I’d been wanting to get my teeth into for a while came to the top of my TBR pile.

The first was Liz Fenwick’s The Path to the Sea, a truly absorbing book, well researched with the strands of the story pulled beautifully together. It is set in 1962 and 2018, with a clever structure that means the action is set over the same three days of both years, flipping between them, but taking events sequentially in both. It must have been an absolute sod to write, but it’s so beautifully managed it never feels contrived and I was caught up in the story rather than the way it was told, which is exactly how it should be.

Three generations of women come together at Boskenna for the last time, both bound together and torn apart by the secrets and lies between them. It’s a fabulous story, but what I loved the most was that important thing wasn’t what had happened, but why.

The second book was Jen Gilroy’s The Cottage at Firefly Lake. Far more of a traditional holiday read, it’s a heart-warming small town romance set in Vermont and featuring realistically scarred characters you want to alternately hug then knock their heads together. Two sisters return to Firefly Lake after eighteen years to sell their late mother’s cottage and more than just old passions are ignited in this beautiful place. The book’s just perfect for readers who love a truly emotional romance.

 

BUSINESS OF BOOKS: FELINES, FILMS AND FINESSING

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If there’s one creative mountain that’s harder to climb than getting a book accepted by a publisher, it’s selling a screenplay to a film company. But stripped back to its most basic level you’re actually creating, and selling, the same thing – a story.

Of course I’d heard of novelists using screenplay techniques but I’d never given it serious thought until one day last summer when I was lazing in author Liz Fenwick’s gorgeous garden and she told me these were methods she used. Given how much I admire Liz’s work I quite literally sat up and took notice. And given how much of an evangelist for these skills she is, just a few hours later she sent me a reading list.

The first book on it has the unlikely title of Save the Cat and is written by Hollywood screenwriter Blake Snyder. While the title is intriguing the contents are a veritable bible and one or two areas in particular resonated with me. Especially as I’ve always struggled with what authors term ‘the elevator pitch’ and what Snyder calls ‘the log line.’

The log line’s job is to sell your screenplay – or your novel – in one or two sentences. I think we all know that. But Snyder digs down into what a great log line should be and stresses that you shouldn’t get too far into your opus (or indeed start it at all) until the log line has been pinned down, finessed, and tested. Once it has, it isn’t just a selling tool either – it becomes the starting point for developing your story.

The first question it needs to answer is ‘what is the book about?’ Go on, scribble it down. Just reducing it to a couple of sentences will most likely be a challenge. But honing it until you have the right selection of words takes much more skill and again Snyder gives us the tools: Does it hook the reader’s interest? Does it create a compelling mental picture? Is it easy to tell who the intended audience is? There’s a whole chapter on genre and categorising your story in film terms – which gives a very interesting perspective on classifying novels too.

After the ‘what’, comes the ‘who’. Who is the hero? And what is he or she up against? If that’s already clear from your log line, then great – but the chances are it won’t be, so out comes the red pen again. Snyder advises that at the very least you need to have an adjective to describe the hero, an adjective to describe the bad guy (in the widest possible use of the term), and to show the hero’s compelling goal – which has to be one the audience will identify with.

And once you have all that right there’s just one more tiny thing – the killer title. I didn’t say this was going to be easy, did I? Talking of killer titles, what exactly does Save the Cat mean? It refers to that small but important moment early in the story where the hero does something to make the audience love him or her – a very small point in the overall context of the book – but as titles go it certainly does its job.

Of course I’m skating over a great deal of detail here – my aim is to whet your appetite, not give a blow by blow account of the whole technique. There are so many valuable hints and tips between the pages of Save the Cat any writer who wants to perfect the log line would be wise to read it themselves.

 

 

BUSINESS OF BOOKS: SENIOR SERVICE

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Jane Cable gives a talk at a local retirement community and finds the learning experience is mutual

It was Liz Fenwick who put me up to it. Since moving to Cornwall I’ve been lucky enough to fall in with a fabulous group of writers who give each other a great deal of support in every conceivable way.

When Liz told our little band she’d had a wonderful afternoon giving a talk at an independent living retirement community and they were looking for more speakers, I jumped at the chance. For two reasons, really; it was just down the road and Liz used those incredibly motivational words: “They give you cake – and they buy books.”

Luckily the talk was to be an informal one. I say luckily because I was also in the middle of preparing for an appearance at Helly’s International Festival with another of our happy Cornish band, historical fiction writer Victoria Cornwall. We’re tackling the serious subject of setting in novels and that’s required thinking, research – and rehearsal.

So on a Thursday afternoon a couple of weeks ago I pottered up the road with a few notes and a rucksack of books on my back. I arrived early and was welcomed by the book club organiser and the community manager and given a Jackanory (for those old enough to remember) style armchair in front of several rows of seats in the elegant dayroom. Slowly but surely the rows started to fill and looking around the room I wondered if I would be able to keep so many elderly people awake.

I needn’t have worried. After my brief introduction and a slightly stuttering start, the questions flowed. When did I write? What was my inspiration? What about editing? There was quite a lively discussion about the use of commas at one point – lively and well informed. These people were serious readers.

But when I mentioned I was researching World War 2 the tables turned and I was the one asking the questions. Some of the residents had very clear memories and two had actually been in Lincolnshire at the time – which made me very excited because it’s where I’m setting my book. Listening to their tales of watching for returning planes from Lincoln Castle, or visiting a cousin based at RAF Scampton, brought the war alive in the way no other research could have done.

This is a generation we’re on the verge of losing. Or if not losing, writing off as too geriatric to make a contribution. How very, very wrong. They were interesting, amusing and fun to be with. Not only do they want to read, but some of them want to write as well. Rather rashly I volunteered to help them start a creative writing group and there are already ten people signed up for the autumn. To be honest I’m feeling just a little out of my depth but I know if I go in with the attitude we’ll all learn from each other then we’ll have a fabulous time.

At the end of the talk I was given tea and the promised cake. Gluten free cake, which the community manager had gone to the trouble of buying specially. I spent so long chatting and signing books that I had a text from my husband asking where I was. I sold so many I had to go back the next day to fulfil the orders.

Since then I have persuaded three more of my Cornish writer friends to book themselves in and the book club calendar’s full until Christmas. And then, I hope they have a party. And I hope I’m invited!

THE BUSINESS OF READING: JANE CABLE TAKES A HOLIDAY WITH A FEW GOOD BOOKS

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I’ve just been half way around the world on holiday, but visiting Cambodia and Vietnam it actually felt further than that. Intense heat, spicy food, incense drifting from temples and a recent history which shocked and disturbed me. Strange or inevitable then, that my choice of holiday reading was firmly fixed back home in Cornwall.

For a long while I’ve been promising myself I’d read some of Winston Graham’s Poldark novels. I can barely remember the 1970s TV series starring Robin Ellis and I’ve never watched the current BBC dramatization, but I wanted to read the books. And I was entranced to find that they were set exactly in my part of Cornwall, and in the limited gaps between excursions, I devoured the first three.

But the first book I read, at the beginning of the holiday, was Cornish writer Liz Fenwick’s latest and it was anything other than what I was expecting…
Jane Cable’s review of One Cornish Summer by Liz Fenwick.

Book marketing can sometimes be a slightly disingenuous thing. The cover and the blurb promise one thing, but the story inside delivers quite another. Sometimes this can lead to disappointment, but at others the opposite is true. And this is very much the case with Liz Fenwick’s latest novel. It isn’t a light and fluffy holiday read – it’s brilliant and challenging and altogether so much more.

To me it seems a shame that the publisher wasn’t entirely as brave as the author. The blurb describes Hebe as having ‘a life changing diagnosis’ and ‘memories slipping away’, but shies from actually mentioning the ugliness of Alzheimer’s.  From very early on in the book it’s clear Hebe has early onset dementia. And what’s more, she is written in the first person, something only a truly accomplished writer like Fenwick can pull off.

Hebe is every inch a full and rounded character, and one I sorely missed once I’d finished the book. To chart the cruel descent of her illness in such a way as to carry the reader with her must have been a serious challenge and I asked Liz Fenwick why she chose to do so.

“My best friend’s sister has early on-set Alzheimer’s and it has been sitting in the back of my mind waiting for me to find the story to write…in a way so that I could work through my own grief. And that leads into research…first hand, reading a great deal through the various support groups and finally my mother is in the early stages…so although not the same I was living it.”

One Cornish Summer is actually set over the course of a Cornish autumn and winter but the title is not a misnomer, even if the cover image might mislead. Hebe and her niece Lucy’s days in the damp and draughty ‘Hell House’ are contrasted with the former’s memories of a bright and colourful summer just the previous year when she was able to share Cornwall with the love of her life before her memories of it completely dissolved away.

As Hebe’s condition worsens, parts of the book are heart-breaking to read, for example when she answers the door without her trousers on. But there are thoroughly heart-warming parts too, as ‘Hell House’ reveals its secrets and Lucy, at least, is finally able to move forwards. Thought-provoking and ultimately life affirming, One Cornish Summer is an excellent read.