Tag Archives: Words For The Wounded

Business of Books: So Much to Give – Part 1

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Jane Cable on how authors get together to support charities

It’s that time of year again. The time when Chindi Authors stand outside the Cancer Research UK shop in Arundel for ten whole days during the town’s festival trying to sell books. Not an easy task when the second hand offerings inside are so much cheaper, but we stick at it because we can add to the coffers of this excellent cause, promote our own books and meet readers.

We know we’ll be well supported by our members and local people, but organiser romantic novelist and kidlit writer Carol Thomas was asked by author contacts up and down the country if they could donate too. While she did the charitable thing and set up a donation page – http://www.carol-thomas.co.uk/Chindi-cruk/ – her generosity simply got me thinking about how much writers achieve when they band together for good causes.

The most high profile recent example of this was the Authors for Grenfell online auction which attracted pledges of more than £150,000, over £30,000 of which was for Philip Pullman to name a character after one of the young victims of the fire. Quirky lots did well too, with conductor and writer Lev Parikian putting together a package which bridged both his worlds: “I offered signed books and (more importantly on this occasion, I think) conducting lessons. A bidding war between three people meant we raised £1,700.”

 

CLIC Sargent runs an annual ‘Get in Character’ eBay auction where authors such as crime writer E V Seymour and novelist and poet Claire Dyer have offered bidders a range of lots including – you guessed it – having a character in a book named after them. Critiques prove equally popular and previous Business of Books guest Karen King (https://www.frostmagazine.com/2017/04/how-to-have-more-than-100-titles-published/) offered one in the Authors for Refugees auction last year, an initiative which raised £22,000.

 

Another way of writers getting together to raise money is by giving their time to contribute to and to edit anthologies for causes as diverse as cancer and heart charities, earthquake appeals, women’s rescues and hospices. Some have very personal links to the cause, including saga writer Elaine Everest (also a previous Business of Books guest): “I organised and edited the anthology ‘Diamonds and Pearls’ (Accent Press) to celebrate my 30th anniversary of surviving breast cancer (7 years ago) with funds going to Against Breast Cancer.”

 

Crime & thriller writer Jane Risdon is a serial contributor to anthologies, supporting amongst others Women for Women, Breakthrough, Women’s Aid, The Norfolk Hospice, The Princess Alice Hospice and Save The Children. She was slightly upset when there was no thanks from certain charities, but would still do it again. Other authors say that smaller charities are more responsive than the larger ones so they prefer to work with these.

 

Some writers go the whole nine yards and get together to form charities of their own. A prime example of this is saga writer and Frost contributing editor, Margaret Graham, who together with Jan Speedie and Penny Deacon set up Words for the Wounded which exists to raise funds for injured service personnel through writing prizes and events. It’s a wonderful organisation and every penny goes directly to the people who need it. Authors can help in a variety of ways – Chindi raised almost a thousand pounds by organising a litfest, others give their time to speak at events or in my case I donate £1 for every Amazon review of my book Another You. Find out more about W4W here: http://www.wordsforthewounded.co.uk/.

 

 

Best Endeavours Book Blogging Best: Jane Cable on what happens once that digital publishing deal is in the bag continues.

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janecablenewbookwriterBEST ENDEAVOURS

Jane Cable’s blog about what happens once that digital publishing deal is in the bag continues.

BOOK BLOGGING BEST

It wasn’t how I’d expected to find out that Another You was live on Amazon. It was just a hint, really, in an email from Endeavour. The lovely Dorset author Rosanna Ley had given me a cover quote for the book so I’d passed it on. Only to receive the reply that the Amazon description would be changed but it might take twenty-four hours to update.

I was straight on the internet and searching. Yes – there it was. Pristine, undownloaded, unnoticed. Just how I wanted it to be.

Nevertheless I sprang into action. My Amazon author profile needed updating and the book linked to it. My web designer needed a prod… but only because she’d been moving house and once she realised the urgency she rushed to publish the updates.

I also needed to tell the bloggers signed up for the tour. I’d envisaged tying it in with a January launch but it was becoming clear there was no way I could keep my promotional powder dry for that long. So I consulted and we’ve agreed that it doesn’t matter so very much and we’ll probably go for early February. It’s an enviable line up of premier British book bloggers including Rosie Amber, Liz Loves Books, Linda’s Book Bag, Being Anne and Jaffa Reads Too.

The next question was review copies. With my previous titles I relied heavily on Netgalley – and Netgalley promotions – to reach anyone who may want to review the book. Matador had made them available for four to six weeks but Endeavour’s policy is just seven days – and the clock started ticking on Friday. My next task was to reach every blogger who’d shown an interest in my books in the past; by email, through Twitter – even Goodreads (although Goodreads frown on this sort of behaviour) just to let them know the book was there. Some weren’t interested but overall the response has been really good. And of course I’m tweeting the link to the Netgalley download as often as I dare.

Jane Cable, publishing, writing

Regular readers of Frost will know my connections with Margaret Graham’s charity, Words for the Wounded, and I had always intended to use the book to raise funds and awareness. Not just because I believe in it, but because a major character in Another You is a soldier suffering from the aftereffects of combat. So what I have decided to do is to donate £1 for every review of the book on Amazon in the UK and the US. For more information on the hows and whys, please visit my article on Words for the Wounded’s own blogspot:http://wordsforthewounded.blogspot.co.uk/

In the middle of all this activity, sometime on Sunday evening, the book escaped. It was being downloaded, beginning to achieve an Amazon ranking. So there was no point in keeping quiet about it anymore. Which leaves me with quite a long to do list for this week.

Happy Christmas everyone!

Jane Cable is the author of two independently published romantic suspense novels, The Cheesemaker’s House and The Faerie Tree, and a sporadic contributor to Frost. Another You tells the tale of how chance meetings on the 60th anniversary of D-Day help forty-something Marie Johnson to rebuild her shattered confidence and find new love. Discover more at www.janecable.com.

Gransthread: Roots, and how many of us revisit them? By Margaret Graham

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It’s strange to return to our ‘roots’. This weekend we took a train to Newcastle, which is where my mum, a Geordie, had one of the few pleasurable experiences in her young life. Her dad took her to see Peter Pan in between the wars, and a short while later, he died.

 

Mum was born in 1914 in the pit village of Washington, which was then in County Durham. Her Da wasn’t a pitman but he and his brother ran a couple of shops. Mum’s was in Brady Square, which still exists in Washington Station, though as a house. Her mum died when mum was two. My grandma, Annie, was off her head with sepsis and took poison. Mum’s dad was at war, Mum’s brother, my uncle Stan, was seven.

 

We think times are hard now, but you ain’t seen nothing, if you weren’t living then. The depression was in high gear, war trauma was rife, jobs were scarce. My grandfather killed himself when mum was eleven, soon after he had taken his children to Peter Pan. Post Traumatic Stress, which is one of the reasons I started the charity Words for the Wounded.

 

I’m not really sure of sections of my mother’s life, but I do know she ran amuck as an orphan until a cousin came to Washington from Gosforth, looking for her. This cousin took mum, now 14, to live with her, sending her to school. Into a class of 7 year olds little Annie Newsome (as she was called) went, to learn to read and write. In time Mum, also an Annie, trained as a nurse.

 

She worked at the Royal Victoria Hospital as the 2nd World War broke out, and is mentioned in Brenda McBryde’s book, A Nurse’s War. Mum became a military nurse, travelled to India to look after the troops in the Burma campaign, meeting my dad, an RAF pilot, on the convoy going over.

 

As children my sisters and I used to go to Uncle Stan’s shop for our school holidays. It was the shop where my grandfather died. It is now a house and we were shown round by the current owner last year. My mother would have been sitting up on a cloud roaring with laughter, because he told us the shop was bought on my uncle’s death by a Madam, who ran a knocking shop, until closed down by the police. She spent a bit of time in clink and featured in a national newspaper. Tall story or the truth? Who knows.

 

Anyway, now I go up north as often as I can. It has changed beyond measure. The pits are gone, the slag heaps too. It is steadily regenerating. Though it has changed it is still ‘home’ and to arrive is a relief, to leave is not. It is an area that informed my writing. Indeed, my first novel After the Storm was based on events in mum’s life. My writing gave my mum immense pleasure. She liked to paint, my father wrote poetry. Perhaps between them they gave me a talent, but it was the north east which gave me inspiration, and continues to do so.

 

www.wordsforthewounded.co.uk

www.margaret-graham.com

 

 

BEST ENDEAVOURS: Best Of Days: Jane Cable’s Digital Publishing Journey

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Jane Cable, publishing, writingBEST ENDEAVOURS

Jane Cable’s blog about what happens once that digital publishing deal is in the bag continues.

BEST OF DAYS

That’s it – the manuscript has been emailed to Endeavour and acknowledged. In four to six weeks I’ll know how much more work I have to do.

So how do I feel? Exhausted – and suddenly very uncertain about my book. Of course the logical part of my mind tells me to get a grip; all I’ve done is a little tweaking and tidying up – they’ve read The Seahorse Summer, for goodness sake – and they’ve bought the rights. So of course it’s going to be fine. The tired, emotional part of my brain, however, is so mashed up I got motion sickness on the elevator in Sainsburys. No kidding.

But last night in my favourite pub, The Victory Inn at Towan Cross in Cornwall, an important aspect of my book was validated when conversation around the bar fell to a former soldier who was going badly off the rails. In so many ways they could have been talking about one of the two GIs in my book, Paxton.

Now when you tackle a subject like combat stress it’s important to get it right. I was lucky enough to be introduced to a former para turned fitness instructor who was prepared to tell me what he’d seen and heard from the soldiers under his care in Afghanistan after they came home from setting up Camp Bastion. The sense of isolation when separated from their unit on leave. The struggle returning to normal family life and relationships after all they’d experienced. How combat can scar a man in ways unseen. How fireworks are never the same again.

publishing, writing

Readers of Frost will be no strangers to Words for The Wounded, the charity set up by author and contributing editor Margaret Graham. The charity supports soldiers suffering from combat stress and I very much hope that I can do something with The Seahorse Summer that can help them in this work.

In the meantime, with the editing finished, what now? Feet up for a while? Not a chance… there’s a huge ‘to do’ list of tasks which have been swept to one side and too long ignored; a vast amount of marketing to be done – both in advance of The Seahorse Summer and for The Cheesemaker’s House and The Faerie Tree which have been sliding down the Kindle charts while I’ve been busy editing; and, of course, picking up the threads of my current manuscript again.

But as for today? I’m on the north Cornish coast and the sun is shining. Quite honestly, I think I deserve a little break.

 

Jane Cable is the author of two independently published romantic suspense novels, The Cheesemaker’s House and The Faerie Tree, and a sporadic contributor to Frost. The Seahorse Summer tells the tale of how two American soldiers born sixty years apart help forty-something Marie Johnson to rebuild her shattered confidence and find new love. Discover more at www.janecable.com.

 

 

 

GransThread Jan Speedie Talks About Her New Phase

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Jan Speedie: Surrey Reviews EditorRetirement is entering a completely new phase of life; I am not going to say final phase. I have to admit when faced with retirement after 30 years working in the NHS I was worried what life would bring  – daytime TV, expanding waist line with too many coffee and biscuits, aches and pains of a maturing body.

Being one of the three Grannies who helps administer the charity www.wordsforthewounded and faced in 2015 with the Mud Challenge, our fundraiser for that year, it was off to the gym to get fit and not let my team down. I remember the bemused faces of the staff at Ash Manor Sports Centre when I explained that in 6 weeks I needed to be fit and ready for the challenge – well they did it and now I am a regular at the gym and will even admit that I enjoy the hard work and friendship.

The fundraiser for 2014 was a tandem skydive: pushing 70 and strapped to a gorgeous young RAF instructor what more could a girl want – it was an amazing experience. Then there is feeding 40 people lunch at the W4W Litfest with little experience of mass catering which has proved to be an interesting and rewarding event.

Back to everyday retirement – I have 4 grandchildren who still want to be with granny, but are totally unimpressed with my technology skills – but I am learning. I have been cajoled in to doing book reviews for Frost Magazine which is great as it keeps me reading and the brain ticking over.  It’s great to be able to holiday anytime and fly off to interesting destinations – Canada, Portugal, Italy, Poland and skiing in France and soon to add Australia to my list.  Then there are days out with friends completing things on our bucket lists. I take a renewed interest in cooking, gardening, decorating and even cleaning my house. Still need to investigate U3A, the WI and many more.

Some weeks my calendar is empty but it’s amazing what turns up or just occasionally it is nice to do nothing. Remember that 70 is the new 50 so let’s go for it and enjoy.

 

 

WforW Short Story Workshop

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short story workshop, short story, writing Words for the Wounded is a charity founded by Margaret Graham, author and contributing editor for Frost Magazine. WforW raises funds through writing events   to help wounded ex-service personnel, with 100% of everything raised going to the wounded. To this end, WforW is holding an inaugural writing workshop on 24th September. There are just a few places left on the:

Short Story Workshop.

Short stories can earn you cash as well as being your calling card. Learn how to turn those rejections into sales.

We will ground you in the basics of short story structure, and provide you with the ability to target your work towards a market of your choice. It will be fun; Margaret and Tracy’s workshops always are.

Tracy Baines has been selling her short stories for almost twenty years. Her stories have appeared in Woman’s Weekly, Take a break, My Weekly and The People’s friend and many others in the UK as well as overseas markets.     www.tracybaines.co.uk

Margaret Graham is a best selling author with Arrow. She also writes short stories and features. She is a creative writing tutor,mentor, editor, and also contributing editor for Frost Magazine. She is founder and administrator of WforW.  www.margaret-graham.com

Saturday 24th September:  10:00 – 16:30   ( Registration 09:30 )

Venue: Downley Community Centre, Old School Close, Downley, High Wycombe, HP13 5TR.  (trains run regularly from London to High Wycombe, Downley is about 2 miles and there’s a taxi rank  at the station )  There is parking at the venue.
Cost: £45

Book online www.wordsforthewounded.co.uk

 

 

Words for the Wounded: Review of the Third Place Entry

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Words for the Wounded Independent Author Book Award 2016

The Secret of Skara Vhore, by Jennifer M Calder by Margaret Graham

(published by Matador) 

skara vhore

‘A great setting and good tension between a real and fantasy world… the loneliness of an unwanted teenager discovering a world where good and evil battles… great concept and world building…’ Felicity Trew. (Caroline Sheldon Literary Agency) 

 

Katie is a lost and troubled teenager who is claimed by distant, unknown relatives and is dispatched to a remote Scottish island. Distrustful of the world, she slowly accepts the friendship of perceptive Morag, mischievous Robbie and the reticent Kirig, a strange boy who lives in the hills. But sinister and ghostly events threaten them as past time spills into the present. Katie struggles to uncover her forgotten history but then is asked to risk the lives of those she loves in order to battle against the forces of chaos and fulfil her destiny. Set in the highlands of Scotland, The Secret of Skara details the battle between good and evil, as well as the loyalty among friends. 

 

Judge’s comments: This Young Adult novel (the first of a trilogy) has a perfect setting – the loneliness of an unwanted teenager discovering a world where good and evil battle. It opens with an anonymous boy stumbling through a moorland landscape with no clue to its time or place. The next chapter gives us an unnamed girl in an all-too-real  – and  equally desolate – contemporary England town. The origins of these two children, their coming together and its consequences, form a great setting and tension between a real world and fantasy world.

 

Katie is a troubled teenager with a buried past and Kirig is a strange and almost silent boy. Together with two other children, perceptive Morag and impish Robbie, they must find their way through the confusion of past and present to a new understanding of who they are.

 

Calder creates both the wilderness of a Scottish island and the equally bleak desert of a run-down English town with a confident use of detail and it is so nearly ‘there’.  However, with an eye to any forthcoming novels in the series: sometimes the writing can be quite dialogue heavy which unravels the pace and sometimes the Young Adult voice doesn’t grab and pull in the reader, (essential in this genre). Maybe change the title – it must speak to the audience.

 

An interesting novel, a great concept and world building. A worthy 3rd place.
About Jennifer M Calder:

jennifercalder

Jennifer studied English Language and Literature at Edinburgh University. From childhood she has had a fascination with words and story-writing and during her time as a full-time mother she wrote for her own children.

On returning to the classroom Jennifer taught in inner-city schools in England, where her expertise lay in the field of children’s literacy. Later came a career-change into another area of ‘word work’: copy-editing and proofreading for academic publishers.

But when Jennifer returned to her home in the Scottish highlands – coming back to the sea,  heather and hills of the magnificent landscape that inspired The Secret of Skara Vhore – she made the decision that she would concentrate on her own writing.

While teaching Jennifer had met many pupils with chaotic lives who deserved to be rescued from their situations. At least in fiction she could make it happen for one troubled girl.

Happily, the novel has been very well received by reviewers and readers. Although officially aimed at the  teenage market the novel is being enjoyed by anyone who is into the dark supernatural.

The Secret of Skara Vhore is Jennifer’s debut novel.  She is now working on the second novel in this trilogy.

 

 

Words for the Wounded: Review of 2nd Place Winner

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Words for the Wounded Independent Author Book Award 2016

Words for the Wounded: review of  2nd Place winner.

alisonclink

The Man Who Didn’t Go To Newcastle by Alison Clink

(published by Matador)


‘Lovely pace and voice… It’s a really moving exploration of siblings across their lives and most importantly, mortality.’

Felicity Trew (Caroline Sheldon Literary Agency)


‘In June 2007 whilst out walking my dog, I opened a text from my brother saying: Am in St Georges – Rodney Smith Ward. Ring me. A.’  Alison’s brother Adrian had been admitted to St. George’s Hospital in Tooting with a cut hand and low blood pressure. Tests had led to more serious concerns and he was calling on Alison to be with him when the consultant brought results of a biopsy on his lung. Alison heeded his call and took the train up to London the next day, only to find that the results weren’t available. She then went back to Somerset, with no idea of what the next few months would hold for them both. Whilst juggling her home life – at a time when her four children still lived at home – with long-distance hospital visiting, Alison tried her best to cope and make plans when Adrian eventually told her that, following the results, he’d been given a year to live. She had no idea then that he wasn’t being entirely truthful…
Judge’s comments: In The Man Who Didn’t go to Newcastle Alison Clink charts her care of her terminally ill slightly older brother, Adrian, with a lovely pace and voice and creates a really moving exploration of siblings across their lives and most importantly, mortality.  This is a situation which unearths not only memories of the past they have shared, but an awareness of their separate adult lives, especially as friends of his arrive to cheer him on. With each visitor it seems, another puzzle piece is put in place. Throughout this memoir Clink weaves the present and past together with a honesty which reveals the difficulties of caring for someone who is no more perfect than the rest of us.  There is not only sadness but humour, and implicit tension but it was felt that the diary structure was a little constricting. A more complex play with point of view rather than the date and time of the diary might have made it stand-out more.

It is interesting to consider how Clink’s undoubted and empathetic writing skills would be translated into fiction. She already writes short stories so let’s hope we don’t have to wait too long for an Alison Clink novel. Bravo. A worthy 2nd place.

alison-clink5

About Alison Clink:


Alison Clink is a writer and creative writing teacher living in Somerset.

Over fifty of her short stories have been published both in the UK and abroad. Several of her stories have been broadcast on Radio 4 and two short plays have been performed in Frome and Bristol.

Alison runs a drop-in creative writing group at Babington House near Mells, Somerset on Wednesday mornings 10am – 12.  This is for members of Babington House, guests of the house and my guests.

She also write critiques for aspiring writers, and gives talks to writing groups.

Her memoir, The Man Who Didn’t Go To Newcastle, is now published by Troubador and her first novel, Two Blackberry Lane is close to completion.  You can find her on facebook and twitter.
Alison says:

 

‘I am delighted to be supporting the ‘words for the wounded’ charity.’

 

www.alisonclink.co.uk