Summer Holidays? Kate Walker

It’s still supposed to be summer. At least that’s what the calendar says.  August  - is part of summer isn’t it?  Though I have to admit that, listening to the rai lashing against the windows as I write this, it doesn’t seem that way, It feels a lot  more like autumn – sorry, Fall – with a nip in the air and a

wind whistling round the chimney. 

In the UK the  schools are still closed and the children on holiday so everywhere is busier than normal.  If we go out, travel anywhere by train or bus, the seats are full of boys and girls, all glad to be out of the classrooms and enjoying their free time. So right now, for me, it’s a good time to be staying at home and writing.  It’s cool enough to work, damp enough to want to stay indoors, and I can get the peace and quiet I want sitting at ,y desk and enjoying the company of my characters.

So as far as I’m concerned, August can stay like this for a while. I’m glad to pause and take a breath. 

  You see,  July is always a pretty hectic time for me and my DH. We have the UK’s Romantic Novelists’ Association Conference  which this year was held in  Telford, Shropshire. That was  a fun get together of so many romantic fiction writers-  or would-be romantic fiction writers – lots of great workshops, discussions, debates,  excellent meals and a little bit of wine drinking.  Oh, and a quiz – our team (myself, DH and  4 friends) won the quiz, if only by half a mark!

We had time to come home, do some laundry, arrange for a changeover of cat-sitters, and then we set off again – for Wales this time.  As always we headed for Fishguard and the wonderful Writers’ Holiday.   More workshops, more talking, more discussion, more eating – the food in Fishguard is always good and plentiful. Another quiz – which our team won again,  this time by 5 points!  Oh yes, and the usual wonderful ending to the holiday listening to the fabulous sound of a Welsh Male Voice Choir.  We were all in tears by then at the thought that so sadly  this was the last summer Writers’ Holiday. (But we will be back again for February!)

After we arrived home, we had to set out again – this time for my DH to appear and do a signing in a bookshop in York – August 1^st is Yorkshire Day – so as a Yorkshireman  born and bred, his books on Yorkshire history and crime were very popular. I’m always happy to visit this wonderful city so  I didn’t even mind when the rain started – there were plenty of shops to visit!

So that was July. And I’m sure you can understand why I feel glad to snatch a break and stay inside at home and actually do some writing! I have a book to finish and send in to my editor before September – because in September it all starts again – There’s a trip to London  for the Association of Mills and Boon Authors lunch. A Conference in Liverpool  (DH is speaking there so hopefully I can find it a bit of a break ) . . . another writing weekend to plan and teach.

Funny thing is, DH and I are supposed to be retired!  But then I suppose writers never really retire.  Certainly my husband never did – he’s written more since he left his fulltime job than he ever did before.

So – summer holidays?  Er, no – we plan (fingers crossed ) for a short break later in the year. I won’t mind where or what the weather’s going to be like because I have a pile of books to be read that

would challenge the Eiffel Tower in height.

And of course, by then I will have hopefully finished off the revisions on this book and maybe even started on another . . .

What’s that they say about no peace for the wicked? Well, all I can think is that I must have been very

very bad – but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I hope your summer is fun – whatever the weather.

I've been slow writing this year so there isn't a new title out until January - which I'll tell you about just as soon as I get the full title and cover details - but until then you can keep up to date with all my news on my web site blog page  or my Facebook page   where you can find out when I have new books appearing in the shops.

Friends and Readers

It’s been one of those rather special weeks.  A week when I have enjoyed the unexpected, sideline

joys of being a writer.

When I first started writing, all I focussed on was the hope of getting published.  I  wanted  a publisher to buy my story, put it into  book form and put it out on the shelves in the bookshops.  I remember I said to the Senior Editor I met on my very first trip to London to meet someone from the Mills and Boon Editorial team, ‘I just want to see my name on a book and I’ll be happy.’

Of course there’s more to it than that.  When you hope to be published you also hope that people will read your  stories. You hope that people – lots of people! – will buy  your book and read it, and enjoy it and buy the next one.  . .  You hope for readers out there in the world.  But I have to admit that I never got to thinking about those readers  - and other writers  - and that they might become friends and  maybe even part of my life.

I also never thought, back in those early days, when The Chalk Line  was first published,  that I’d get to know other writers, or that the internet, email,  Facebook,  Skype etc would make the world seem so much smaller and people so much closer and  communication so much easier.

This was bought home to me in the first couple of weeks of March as it seemed that every day brought another connection, another communication, with a friend  I had made  as a result of being a writer. Someone I would never have met up with, or even communicated with  if it hadn’t been for this unique job I have.  

March has the birthdays of a couple of  friends – Irish author,  Abby Green  has her special day on March 3^rd , and then  Tote Bags ‘N’ Blogs  own Lee  has her birthday a day later – on the 4^th.   Next up was a special visit from a  dear friend  from ‘across the pond’ as  AnneMcAllister was always described in the past when my  cat Sid and she were great friends. This time Anne came to stay for a few days while she’s in England researching  a new book in  a quartet for Tule that she’s 

writing.   Sadly, Sid the Cat is no longer with us but she had two new felines to get to know – Ruby the black and white rescue cat is always friendly and welcoming, but unexpectedly Charlie the Maine Coon, who is usually rather stand-offish – decided to become her best friend. This can be a double-edged privilege as  Charlie is a very large cat  - and when he decides to sit on your knee . . .well, look  at the photo of him and Anne together!

Another  friend this week let me know that she is embarking on a big adventure later in the year. Rachael Thomas, who was once one of my students at the  Writers’ Holiday Fishguard course and is now multi-published in her own right, has signed up to  walk the great wall of China 

forcharity.   Go for it Rachael – I’m so happy to support her in this.

And talking of courses, I have another one coming up in Cirencester in April – and then a get together  for my birthday in May with some one of the students who have become ‘regulars’ on my courses and are affectionately known as Walkers  Stalkers. When I first started writing, I never even dreamed of doing any teaching but now  I meet up with ‘stalkers’ regularly  - and   their company is another joy I never expected to receive as a result of my writing.

Then there are so many people, more widely flung, sometimes known, sometimes never ever met in any way -  the hundreds, thousands of readers who have bought and enjoyed my books  so that I can continue to write more for your enjoyment. I have had a lot of emails since the publication of Indebted to Moreno  and recently one of these was a reader who has been in touch with me since way back when.  15 years or more I think.  I love it when readers get in touch with me – and just lately  people have been asking just when my next book is coming up.  So I’m happy to be able to say that  this new story – current working title is Claimed by The Corsican – will be out in February 2018/ I know, it’s a

long time to wait, but in the meantime I have to get on with and complete the second part of the duet. These two linked books I’ve called The Scandalous O’Sullivan Sisters  - the first one is  Imogen’s story and now I’m at work on her  sister, Ciara’s romance. I need to get it finished so that they can come out close together.

So while I’m thinking about all these wonderful friends and readers I’ve gained as a result of being a writer – I just wanted to say  a great big thank you to all my friends and readers out there, wherever you are in the world. I value you all and appreciate  your support and  the lovely emails you send me.  After all, that’s why a writer writes-  to be read and the sales of the books means I can keep going, write some more romances – so I couldn’t do it without you!

Thank you to all my friends and my readers (and Student Stalkers!)   Wherever you are,   I’m so glad you’re there.

You can keep up to date with all my news on my web site blog page  or my Facebook page  which is where you can also find details of my courses with    Writers' Holiday  or Relax and Write

An Alfred Hitchcock sort of life

Some time ago, a friend sent me a great quote about writing – fiction in general or drama in the form of a screenplay of a play script.  This quote was attributed to Alfred Hitchcock, but later I found that

Hitchcock was in fact quoting another screenwriter and director.

His name was François Roland Truffaut  and the quote was this:

“What is drama, after all, but life with the dull bits cut out…”

I always remember this when I’m writing. Particularly when I want to create a fast-paced, heightened scene, one in which the intensity sparks between my characters and things are really hotting up. It’s when I use what I call the ‘cup of coffee’ test.  Because, when  the conflict and the emotions in the story are really important, making my characters do something as ordinary and everyday as making a cup of coffee can slow the whole action down and   reduce the pace. (Unless of course the way they make that cup of coffee is full of drama with the mugs banged down on the table, the water spilled from the kettle etc.)

I often wonder if people think that the life of a writer is a drama like the ones we write about.  Writers only seem to get into the papers when the big /TV/magazines when the big things happen –  a major signing a huge advance, a public event for some literary prize, a personal drama or perhaps a huge price paid to turn a book into a film.  The rest of the time we are shut away in our workrooms, with just us, the computer keyboard – and our imaginations. 

The past few weeks though have been what I would term my life with the boring bits taken out.  Part of this was because of my writing – the other pat was because of my husband’s work. He writes too, though mostly fact – true crime and  local history. And just lately he’s had a book of short stories published with the title Uncle Albert, based on memories of growing up in a Yorkshire village and the characters there.

So our summer which is always pretty busy has been more full than usual. We had to travel to Haworth  (where the Bronte sisters lived) to launch the Uncle Albert book – then fly to the Isle of Man to launch the ‘one man show’ that went with the stories.  3 events, radio interviews, all were great publicity but we’re writers – and writers aren’t used to appearing at public events. We’d barely got back before our summer commitments started. I usually go to the Romantic Novelists’ Association conference (and sometimes the RWA one) but these had had to be left aside as there were other commitments

for those dates and times. There was a trip to Wales, where I was teaching at Fishguard Writers’ Holiday, and my DH was giving two talks during the week. We got back, unpacked, did the laundry, repacked – and set out again. This time it was for another event, at the Gilbert and Sullivan Festival where my husband was giving a talk on another of his books – A Victorian Somebody - a biography of George Grossmith who used to appear in the Gilbert and Sullivan productions in 1870s and 80s.   (He also wrote a famous comic book The Diary of a Nobody.)

All this was fun but time consuming. It certainly wasn't 'dull' - but there were times when I wished I could just draw breath and stay put for a while.   Now we’re back home and – thankfully – can breathe again for a little while. The travelling will start again in September when there will be a trip to London to meet with the Association of Mills & Boon Authors – and many of the Editors from HMB London (and Toronto)  I have another course to teach and so does my husband (actually two!)  – and he will be appearing at several book festivals to talk about Uncle Albert and his other books.  Phew!

And before I know where I am, my next book  - Destined For The Desert King - will be on the shelves and I'll need to do some publicity on that one!  

But in the meantime, I’m hoping for a decent patch of quiet time so I can sit at my desk, switch on the computer – and focus. I have a deadline and the next book isn’t going to write itself.  It’s funny that people think  a writers’ life is a hectic and public one. I know that the publicity and the teaching, enjoyable as they are, are the times that interrupt my writing. It’s when I’m sitting  - as the saying is- BICHOK – Bum in Chair, Hands on Keyboard  that I feel most like a writer. Just putting the words down, on paper or on a screen, is what the real writers’ life is like. Even more so, there’s the time that I spend thinking and wondering and planning – before I can even begin to tell the story of my hero and heroine’s journey to their happy ever after.

That’s when I’m working hardest as a writer!  So right now, I’m looking forward to some time where life is pretty dull and ordinary – that’s the way I can best get to know my characters and write their story.   And I can build their story into a drama – by leaving out as much of the dull bits as I can, and focusing on the dramatic bits.

I can’t show you the  image that the cover designers have come up with for the UK edition of  my December book – Destined for The Desert King – but  I can share the Harlequin Presents  cover I’ve only just seen for the first time. This is set on one of the balconies in the palace  in  Hazibah, even if you can't see very much of it.   I like this cover a lot - but it's a bit scary seeing the Christmas decorations on the red banner on the top of the cover  - it reminds me that, even if I get the peace and quiet I want, the time just slips away - and I'll have another deadline, for another book by then.

My  latest romance  is Olivero's Outrageous Proposal published in April in Harlequin Presents and Mills and Boon Modern Romance . Coming next is   Destined For The Desert King  which is published in December this year.

Then there's the  12 Point Guide to Writing Romance, the newest edition of which is available on Kindle or a revised and updated paperback edition now available on Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com

Kate Walker's web site is here   and the up-to-date news can be found on her blog or her Facebook page.

February Fill Dyke with Kate Walker

It’s been raining again – hmm, no,  I think that needs a little more emphasis  . . . It’s been raining again.

I have just dashed outside to rescue my washing from the latest downpour. I probably should have known better than to even think of putting things outside on the line’ After all, every day this week has had more than  its share of wet weather.  The water barrels we set up to collect the rainfall,  much-needed back in the  long ago hot days of summer – have been overflowing every single day, and the flower beds, the lawn have been reduced to a quagmire  where even the cats squelch as they walk along it. And it has just been announced that January has been the wettest in the UK for 100 years. 

 But I couldn’t resist just the little hint of sunshine that appeared at breakfast time. The  brightness of a blue sky that promised a dry  hour at least.   That was about all I did get! From the middle of the day,  dark clouds had been gathering and  now the brief pause in the rain and winds has  ended and we’re back into the  - well, the wettest  beginning to February that you can imagine.

But the truth is that I don’t really care – not too much.  For one things living here in Lincolnshire, we have luckily been spared  a lot of the worst of this wild weather. We have been drenched, and the winds how blown trees down in the local woods where I have my morning walk,  but that’s nothing when compared with the floods, the tornadoes, the savagery of the seas and the damage it has caused in other places.  Aberystwyth in Wales which is where I and my husband met,  has been pounded by ferocious waves, with metal benches that were concreted into the seafront wrenched up and thrown aside, and huge amounts of sane dumped on the road until it resembled a new, wild, beach. We were sad to see the places where we had walked on peaceful sunny evenings turned into a  total devastation.

My mother always called February ‘February fill-dyke’ meaning that the rain  that fell filled up the dykes and the reservoirs ready for the Spring. And there’s certainly been plenty of that going on!  But also, I’ve found the past few weeks have been a  sort of time of renewal,  off ‘filling the dykes’ for me. The slight lengthening of the days, the way that more light lingers in the evenings, the  glimpses of blue sky and occasional sunlight have meant that there is a promise of Spring in the air. And just at the end of January there was the Chinese New Year to celebrate.

I’ve always felt that I was better to celebrate the Chinese New Year than the one that comes so fast after Christmas

. If you read my blog last month, you’ll see that I wasn't too keen on the ‘New Year New You’ thing that happens then  (Not that that stopped me from looking at all the articles  on  renovating and rejuvenating that were published around then.)   But  now I feel that this  hint of the approach of Spring has lifted my spirits and giving me a fresh lease of life. I’m looking forward to the course  - Advanced Romance Writing  - that I’m teaching in Wales at the end of the month (just hoping that the roads are clear and we can get there in safety!). Talking about writing /reaching writing always revives my interests in the creative side of my life and I’m itching to get on with the new story I have in  mind – and half on the page.  I have to get this one down fast because there is another one, another hero another heroine, demanding that I tell their story. That’s a real sign of the fact that the ‘dykes’ of my imagination have been filled  and refreshed.

Oneof the reasons for this is that I've just spent an intensive couple of weeks working on revising and updating my 12 Point Guide to Writing Romance, ready to being out a brand new edition In a whole new set of formats. With the help of the lovely Lee  Hyat – who of course runs Author Sound Relations and this blog -  I’ll be bringing that out soon and making it available it to a lot more people  more easily.  So – watch this space.

So I haven’t really minded that it’s been pouring down outside, or that the winds have been lashing the windows – I've been busy and  absorbed – working on planning courses, revising the 12 Point Guide,  and getting to know my brand new Spanish hero who has a dark grudge against the family that rejected him when he was younger  . . .

It’s great being a romance writer. When the weather outside is vile or life is dull and dreary you can transport yourself off to a  totally different world and enjoy being there, meeting new characters and telling their stories.

And on February 26^th I’ll be heading for Fishguard to talk about doing just that with all my students – can’t wait!  We won’t care if the rain is lashing down outside – we’ll be warm and safe  . . .and dreaming of new and exciting places and people.  

And this year we will have an extra-special reason to celebrate  because one of my students - lovely Rachael

Thomas - whose entry in the So You Think You Can Write  contest was in the final Top Ten. She didn't win one of the major prizes - but she  didn't need to because she has just received The Call from Harlequin Mills & Boon to tell her that her entry  Behind The Scandalous Facade has been accepted and will be published in Mills & Boon Modern/Harlequin  Presents  later this year. So look out for that . We'll definitely be raising a glass  - or two - to congratulate her at the end of the month!

February fill dyke will have  given us lots of refreshment and inspiration for the rest of the year to come.