Remains

I lift the lid from a box filled with memories,
home to a clutter of paper mementos and ghostly remnants of a lost love -
A faded train ticket, a pressed flower, a dog-eared photograph.
These are the remains of you.
Your fingerprints must linger along with the fading smell of sadness.

When you left, a door slammed shut and extinguished a dying fire forever.
You abandoned me on the quietest road where no-one could hear my cries.
I walked for miles.
You set me adrift in the loneliest ocean
and for a while I thought I might drown in a sea of desolate souls.
I existed in a half-lit world where everything felt like engravings through tissue paper.
Only shades of pain.

I close the lid just as I closed my heart
and the echoes of the past are locked away for another time.

Suddenly I am caught up in a whirlwind of carefree laughter, unruly hair and jam stains.
In him I see the best of me but he also has your eyebrows and lopsided smile.
Such undiluted light shines from within, and I force myself to bask in his warmth for this borrowed time.
He is my antidote to pain, anaesthetic in human form.
A solitary flower poking up through the foliage of regret
he is absolute proof that beauty can be found in even the darkest of places.
It was our son who reminded me to breathe
and who helped to glue back together the remains of me.

Lunging at me with untamed love he challenges me to smell his feet -
which, of course I do willingly -
relishing a brief snapshot in time where only this moment matters.
We are separate and yet connected by an invisible, unbreakable thread.
I kiss his sticky forehead and my lips seek out the untrained down that decorates his brow -
Soft and strong
The remains of you.

Part of the reason...

...I wanted to be a children's writer was to inspire young people to put pen to paper themselves. Sometimes it just takes a 'connection' with a certain character or an ability to relate to a situation in a story to motivate a child to have a bash at story writing. Encouraging literacy skills in children is crucial since reading and writing provides the tools that might help them cope with the more difficult aspects of their lives - to broaden their horizons and to make them aware that there is more out there for them. It's nice to think that it might be possible for them to make their own escapes with the sweep of a pen. I asked Junior recently what it felt like to be able to read and he said it felt "fizzy". I loved that description! I am forever encouraging children to read for fun. Not because they have to but because they want to. Just read for reading sake.

When I was writing "Bree McCready and the Half Heart Locket" I was determined not to ‘dumb down’ my writing purely because of my target audience (9+). I strongly believe that as adults we so often make the huge mistake of underestimating young people. Children should be treated as clever, intuitive beings and in my opinion the use of complicated, expressive language will not only encourage an extended vocabulary but it will also inspire a thirst for knowledge. So considering all of this, imagine my delight when I received this email last night from "a happy mum".

"Hi Hazel, i went along to parents night tonight and came home a very proud mum. I was reading one of (my little girl's) most recent stories and was convinced she must have copied it out a book. On asking the teacher he informed me it was all her own work! you have most definitely inspired her and when i get a copy of this story home i will send you a copy. thank you for giving (my daughter) a new found confidence in writing"

Amazing! This makes me so happy because it's exactly what I strive to do when writing about Bree, Sandy and Honey and their adventures. Just knowing it's possible to make a small difference makes all the blood, sweat, tears and grey hairs seem worth it! I can't wait to see a copy of the story. Thanks 'happy mum' for the fantastic feedback. : )

Lack of light, lack of hope

OK. A bit of a depressing one today, I’m afraid. I can’t help it. There’s something that’s been bothering me for a while and it came to a head yesterday when I heard the tragic news about the two teenage girls who jumped off the Erskine bridge together in a suicide pact. Scotland has the highest suicide rate in the UK, according to figures from the Office for National Statistics. I’ll let that sink in for a moment.
I’ve had my own theories for some time about why this might be. It is well known that a deficiency of daylight can cause depression and let’s face it we are not renowned for having much of that in sunny, old Scotland. But there is more to it than that. We know that social inequality is closely linked to suicide. Then there are changing gender role expectations, increasing unemployment, drugs and alcohol misuse. We now know that both Neve Lafferty and Georgia Rowe came from troubled backgrounds. It saddens me beyond description to think that there are so many young people out there who think there is no hope. A life without dreams or prospects. How heartbreaking to think those two girls, at just 14 and 15 years old thought there was nothing ahead for them, that they had no alternative but to take their own lives. How terrible to think that they never realised their full potential. What a sad reflection of our society today.

I remember doing research for an essay when I was at University and I came across an article that outlined statistics showing that Scottish children have the lowest self esteem in the world. As a mother of a Scottish child I find that deeply troubling. I happen to think that kids get a rough ride. That might make me unpopular, but I don’t care. I know there are some children out there that do terrible things. I’ve seen it first hand and I’ve been on the receiving end of it more than once. But I’ve never stopped believing that there is so much that can be done to make a difference. I believe in the good side of people and when I struggle to see that I try at least to understand why they are ‘bad’. I think it’s just a cop out to label them as rotten to the core. Children are so often used as scapegoats, demonised when there is no-one else to blame for our “Broken Britain”. Yet I meet so many wonderful children during my travels - inspiring and funny and polite and clever. Why do we never hear about them? It must be so difficult growing up under this shadow of negativity.

On this sad day I find myself wondering what made two young, beautiful girls think that their future was so bleak that they had no other option but to link hands and jump? I know it sounds cheesy but I’m with Whitney Houston on this one. The children are our future. Maybe it’s time we started investing in them a bit more.

A busy day!

Many thanks to everyone involved with my sessions at Stepps and Moodiesburn Libraries today. I had a lovely time and you all made me feel very welcome and treated me like a true star.
Well done to all the children who came (and there were LOTS of you!). You listened really well and had some terrific questions to ask me at the end of my presentation. Very thought provoking and interesting. And your behaviour was impeccable. Give yourselves a pat on the back!
I hope to see you all again very soon. Thanks to everyone who bought a copy of "Bree McCready and the Half Heart Locket", I hope you enjoy it!

Teacher's Resource Pack - Out NOW!

http://stridentpublishing.co.uk/wp-content/images/bree-mccready-pack2.pdf

The FREE Teacher's resource pack to accompany "Bree McCready and the Half Heart Locket" has arrived!

Hurrah!!

For the month of October "Bree McCready and the Half Heart Locket" is Scottish Book Trust's Book of the Month!
I am delighted : )
http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/children-and-young-people/books/book-of-the-month

The trials of getting published

Hello y'all! I know, I know! It's been rather a while since I spoke to you but things have been pretty hectic since the launch of "Bree McCready and the Half Heart Locket". I will do my best to post something on my blog as much as I can but no promises!
Anyway, I've been planning a talk I am giving in October as part of the North Lanarkshire Works Festival. I thought it might interest some of the young people there to know what it's like to work towards getting your book published. Here is a rough outline of what I'll be saying if you fancy a read:

"Once I had finished writing “Bree McCready” I had absolutely no idea where to start getting it published. I didn't know anyone in publishing. I didn't even know anyone who knew anyone. All I knew was that I had a good book that I felt certain children would like. So I set to work. My first stop was the internet. I got the names of some well known publishers and I sent them a copy of my synopsis and the first three chapters of the book. After that I thought I had nothing better to do than to sit back and wait for the offers to come flooding in. What I hadn’t realised was that hundreds of other aspiring writers were doing the same thing! This is a very competitive market, you see. There are lots of children’s books out there and even more coming along every day.
When I started getting rejection letters I tried not to let it bother me. Everyone knows that even J.K Rowling got rejection letters. However, after the twentieth "thanks but no thanks" I started to feel a little downhearted. I started to anticipate the depressing thud of the returned manuscript every morning on the doormat. Was I doing something wrong? Nobody ever came right out with "this is absolute rubbish, don't give up the day job!" but at the same time nobody was knocking down my door to get me to sign that exclusive contract. Many of the letters I received were very positive - along the lines of "We really like this but.... or "Some great ideas and excellent writing but..." Always a but! It seemed that despite my having a good story full of terrific ideas this market was already saturated and highly competitive. Still, at least I was getting feedback. I had read somewhere that for every one manuscript that is read, two are filed under B for bin. I hadn't considered rejection on this scale but undeterred I kept going, sure that one day I would laugh at my run of bad luck. And on the bright side my pile of rejection letters would be something to talk to the newspapers about when I was mega famous!
One kind publisher (at the foot of their rejection letter!) advised me to invest in a copy of the 'Children’s Writers and Artists Yearbook' which I immediately did. This was very helpful not least because it advised me how best to structure my covering letter to publishers and how to lay things out so my manuscript wouldn’t get chucked in the bin before it had even been read. I re-wrote my synopsis and trundled off to the Post Office with another pile of bulging brown envelopes (*see foot note). I did a lot of waiting and experienced a lot of disappointment before my luck finally changed.

A lovely lady at Strident Publishing called Alison Stroak read my manuscript, as it was - very raw and in paper form. A pile of paper as thick as a doorstep and with lots of mistakes. But she loved it. Alison saw something special, something promising and she really believed in me and my book right from the beginning. That was all it took, just one person to see the potential and then the ball started rolling.

In the run up to Bree being printed there was an unbelievable amount to think about! The first priority was to consider the volume of the book. What I had written was almost three times the size of the finished book - which might have put some younger readers off. So my editor, a great guy called Graham Watson got to work. Editing was quite a long process which mostly took place via phone conversations and email but luckily Graham and I agreed on what was best for the finished article.

Then we had to decide on the cover for the book. Time was ticking on and we couldn't quite get the result that we thought would do the book the justice it deserved. With less than 6 weeks to launch I was starting to sweat that we would be having a launch night without a book! Graham reassured me that all would be fine and he was right (although he admits now that he was sweating slightly too!). I ended up with a cover that I could only have dreamed about (thanks Lawrence!) Then the different fonts were chosen and decisions were made about margins and where the page numbers and my name would go etc. Then there was the blurb to think about because that is as important as the cover. Proof reading was crucial - lots of different people checked the grammar and spelling and made sure that there were no big mistakes before the book went to the printers.
So, the next time you pick up a book spare a thought for all the hard work that goes into getting it just right!"

(* - I will always be eternally grateful to Carole at the Wester Hailes Post Office for her unwavering patience and support during that time. Not once did she ever loose her cool/roll her eyes to the ceiling/sigh deeply/swear/be rude/all of the above -even when I plonked my huge pile of envelopes down on the counter to get weighed and asked for individual receipts of postage for each and every one of them. She showed an interest in what I was doing and always had a smile for me. She never hurried me along even when the queue behind me snaked all the way up to Poundstretchers. To show my appreciation I popped in on Wednesday last week with a signed copy of Bree for her. She was thrilled.