Room in Your Heart by Wendy Clarke

I'm afraid LitPig hasn't yet recovered from Wendy's launch party, read here for the full story ... but we

couldn't resist telling you all about Wendy Clarke's first collection of short stories Room in Your Heart. Why don't we let her introduce herself ...

Wendy Clarke is a full time writer of women's fiction. Since starting writing three years ago, she has sold nearly a hundred short stories and her work regularly appears in national women's magazines such as The People's Friend, Take a Break Fiction Feast and Woman's Weekly. Wendy has also written serials and a number of non-fiction magazine articles. Room in Your Heart is Wendy's first collection of short stories.

LitPig says:

When you read a Wendy Clarke story you instantly know you’re in safe hands. She knows how to weave a story, how to twist your emotions and is an expert in tweaking those heart strings. I love how she writes likeable characters and is able to get inside the heads of both her male and female leads. Some of my favourite stories are written from the male point-of-view, and particularly loved Robert in ‘Those things you never told me’.  I also wanted to thump Kevin in ‘Let’s start again’, but then ending up blinking away a few tears on that one. Loved the clever plot technique in ‘Every time you say goodbye', not seen that done before. Wendy also beautifully presents the angst of teenage life in ‘For your eyes only’ (an excellent homage to the Bond movies). This is a heart-warming collection that you can dip into or immerse yourself and read in one sitting, go on treat yourself.

Before the eventful launch party LitPig did manage to chat with Wendy ... see above photo

LitPig – How did you select the stories out of your huge number of published pieces?

Wendy - It was difficult! I knew I was going to be using published stories but I wanted to know whether people would prefer a collection of stories with one theme/genre or a mixed selection. The majority of people I asked said they would prefer the former. I grouped my stories into genre and found that I had more romances than anything else so that was the obvious choice. Most of them were stories that had previously been published by The People's Friend so I decided to use these. In the collection, I've tried to use a mix of stories: male and female viewpoints, past and present tenses and first and third person.

LitPig – When a story idea comes to you do you immediately know the best pov or does this come through the writing? I ask because you write both male and female pov so believably, a rare talent for romantic writer.

Wendy - The simple answer is yes. I always know straight away who is going to be telling the story. Strangely, I prefer writing in the male pov.

LitPig– How much of ‘real life’ do you put into your stories? Do any of these include genuine experiences or characters/places?

Wendy - It varies from story to story. Some have nothing from 'real life' while others will have quite a lot. The first story in the collection, Read These When I've Gone has the two characters reminiscing about a holiday on the Isle de Re - the conversation in the French bistro was based on a real one I had in my twenties!

LitPig – Are you planning more in the series? Will there be another collection and can you share the theme?

Wendy - If Room in Your Heart is well received, I am planning to publish at least one more romance collection. I would also like to put together a Christmas collection for next year.

LitPig– In the short time you’ve been writing, your success has been inspiring. Go on, don’t be shy, how many short stories have you now sold to national magazines?

Wendy - At the time of asking, I have sold ninety two stories - I'm hoping this might be more by the time this post goes live!

(LitPig - Blimey! 92!! I think the Indoor Writer will expect a pile of teacakes when she next gets together with Wendy.)

LitPig - A little piggy tells me I can read more about how you put the collection together ... can you tell us more?

Wendy - Yes, I have written an article on my own personal experience of putting  together the short story collection as an e-book using Kindle Direct Publishing. It is in this month's Writing Magazine and hopefully will be useful for anyone wanting to do the same.

Thank you for inviting me to be a guest on your blog.

LitPig - It was a pleasure to chat with you, Wendy. And thank you for keeping Bonnie the dog at trotter's length.

 Now for the important bit - where to buy your copy of

Room in Your Heart

& do leave a review for Wendy too.

You can learn more about Wendy's writing at:

Wendy's Writing Now

Facebook

Twitter: @WendyClarke99

Paperback copies of Wendy's collection will soon be available, follow her on Twitter or FB for more information.

Invitation to the launch of The Siren Journal's debut anthology FUGUE

The Indoor Writer is pretty excited to have a short story in The Siren's debut anthology FUGUE. If you live in or near London then why not come along to the launch party at the London Review Bookshop, 24 October, starting 7pm (details below). There will be wine, nibbles and author readings. If you can make it then please RSVP to contact@thesiren.co.uk and let them have your name ... and don't forget to come and say hello!

You can buy the Fugue anthology from the following:
The Siren
Waterstones

Venue location: 14 Bury Place, 

London, WC1A 2JL 

London, WC1A 2JL 

(near Holborn London Underground Station)

The Fuguists are: 

Adrian Slatcher, Adam Steiner, Stephen 

Totterdell, Brandon Robshaw, Avgi meleti, 

Stuart Snelson, Gary Budgen, Neill Ran- 

dall, Gary Budden, Tracy Fells, Stephen 

Scott, Róisín O’Donnell, Darren Lee and 

Charles Yu 

Edited by: Lucy Carroll 

The Lie of You by Jane Lythell

I'm delighted to welcome Jane Lythell to the blog today to chat about her novel 'The Lie of You'. I recently met Jane over the summer at a workshop on writing radio drama in Brighton. She's a local writer and I was intrigued to learn she'd just published her debut novel ...

I'll let Jane introduce herself:
I live in Brighton and I'm a sea-lover, star-gazer, film and football fan. My background is journalistic writing and television production. I was a Producer at TV-am and then Commissioning Editor of Features at Westcountry Television. I left to become Deputy Director of the British Film Institute and later Chief Executive of BAFTA before joining the Foreign and Commonwealth Office for seven years.I now write full time. My debut novel THE LIE OF YOU is published by Head of Zeus and my second novel AFTER THE STORM will be published in January 2015.
I am on Twitter: @janelythell


One woman's fear is another woman's weapon ...
The Daily Mail describes 'The Lie of You' as a 'clever psychological thriller ... the author's real skill is her ability to invent memorable original characters. A thrilling read.'

I took 'The Lie of You' on holiday (Lake District) and very quickly became absorbed in the dual narrative of Kathy and Helga, two very different women both working on the same architectural magazine. Kathy is Helga's editor and boss - and it soon becomes clear that their relationship is strained. For a couple of days this book stayed in my rucksack as I needed to keep reading at pub lunch stops between bouts of hill-walking. This is a page turner and I loved the different voices of the two women. Sympathising with Kathy's growing paranoia and also empathising (eventually) with the obssessive Helga. It's easy to label Helga as the 'baddie', but as the story develops we learn the reasons behind her, at time, very odd behaviour. 

The prose is tightly written carrying you along at a cracking pace, but also the characters and settings are beautifully drawn as Jane is a very visual writer. With the first person narratives of the two women you really are inside their heads, experiencing all of Kathy's insecurities and Helga's jealously. The readers clearly see how strained Kathy and Marcus' relationship is becoming, but poor Kathy ploughs on trying to balance all the conflicts of a full time working mum with a young child. At first small things start to go wrong at work, but the mistakes start to build and Kathy doubts her own abilities when in reality her life is being manipulated by a malevolent individual. I found this aspect of the novel quite chilling, as it felt all too believable. It also brought back some painful memories of the early days of balancing life as a new mum with a full-time management role, I did feel for Kathy.

This novel explores every woman's fear of being watched/stalked and the disruption and dangers that such obsession can eventually reap in someone's life. What I enjoyed was that we often overlook the obsession of women with other women and this is fully explored in Jane's enthralling novel. I enjoyed this immensely and highly recommend 'The Lie of You'.

Q: With a successful career working in TV production (amongst other things) how did you come to write The Lie Of You?

I wanted to write all my life but I had a small daughter and a big mortgage so for years I worked in full-on occupations which left very little thinking and writing time.  I would go on Arvon weekend courses to keep the writing flame alive. That is a great organisation. It wasn’t until I got into a financial position where I could give myself two years writing time that it really started to happen. That was in May 2011 and how joyful that felt – to have time to write.

Q: Why did you choose to write a psychological thriller with these particular themes?

The novel explores jealousy that deepens into full blown obsession. I’m interested in what makes people do extreme things.  I think all of us have a dark side which we strive to tame and control. Then something can happen which tips an apparently sane person into obsessive and destructive behaviour. I wanted it to be credible though, not so extreme that the reader would say I don’t believe that. By writing alternating chapters from the point of view of the two women I hoped to reveal their motivations and create sympathy too.

Q: I found some sections quite unnerving, perhaps because they dwell closely on deep-seated fears such as being watched when sleeping. How much research did you undertake and can you tell us about your particular process?

The voice of Heja came to me very clearly. I saw her as a woman who had a deep malevolence towards another woman who is unaware of it. I then had to work out why she felt like this. From what deep seated disturbance did her hatred of Kathy arise? As for research I was fascinated by psychoanalysis in my thirties and read a lot of Freud. Actually Freud is a master storyteller and I found his writings both illuminating and enthralling. Psychological thrillers allow you to explore the interior landscape of your characters.

Q: This is an incredibly visual book. As I read I could clearly see the characters and their surroundings. What do you see when you’re writing? Has a background of working in TV production stimulated or influenced your writing and…

Do you have any plans to convert The Lie Of You into a screenplay? It would make a terrific film or TV drama.

Thank you. Quite a few readers have said that. I studied cinema as a postgraduate and worked in television for fifteen years so I’m sure I’ve been formed by this. And I’m a huge fan of Hitchcock. I do see the scenes in my novel unspooling as film sequences as I’m writing them. For example I had to see in my head the two flats that Heja and Kathy live in right down to the layout of the rooms and even the sounds they may hear from the street below.

I would love The Lie Of You to have a second life as a TV or film production. And it certainly has enough cliff-hangers to make a good drama over two or three nights! The way that works though is that you have to get a TV station or producer interested in doing the adaptation and they make it happen. Fingers crossed.

Q: With your first book doing well can you share what your next writing project is? I believe you’ve now finshed book 2? Anything you can share with us?

I completed my second novel this summer and Head of Zeus are publishing it in January 2015, with availability on Kindle from December. It’s called After The Storm and has a very different setting and characters. However there is still a psychological disturbance at its heart which drives the story forward.

Q: There are many writers out there keen to get their work published. Hw did The Lie Of You make it to print?

For me the turning point was finding a literary agent. I’m represented by Gaia Banks of Sheil Land and I couldn’t have a better champion. I sent Gaia the first forty pages of The Lie Of You and she loved it but said the novel was too short. It was under 60,000 words at the time. So we worked together on the manuscript for six months. You only get one chance with a publisher so you need to get your book into as perfect a form as possible. Never submit too early. Take the time to edit again and again and show your drafts to people you respect. Gaia’s comments were invaluable and my partner also gave me masterly feedback. The final version of The Lie Of You is 87,500 words and I learned a lot in the process of revising and editing.  

Here are some links to where you can buy 'The Lie of You':

Amazon

WH Smiths

If the above whetted your appetite then here is an overview of Jane's next novel: After The Storm

A man who had no voice. A woman who helped him find it.
Rob and Anna have only just met Owen and Kim. Now they've chartered their handsome old boat to take them to a far off island in the Caribbean.
With just the four of them on board, Rob dreams of lazy afternoons snorkelling. Anna looks forward to the silence and solitude of the sea.
But why does Owen suffer acute insomnia and seem so secretive about his past? Why does Kim keep a knife zipped into her money-belt? Anna, a speech therapist, can usually get people to tell her the truth... but does she want to this time?

Jane is also appearing at the SHOREHAM WORDFEST - details below if you live close enough to attend:

Saturday 11 October 11.00 – 12.30 Sussex Yacht Club Tickets: £6.00

Domestic Chillers  http://www.shorehamwordfest.com/books.html

Jane Lythell and Lucy Atkins
Laura Lockington, organiser of Brighton’s Bookish Suppers, will interview two authors working in this genre today.

Jane Lythell, TV producer and former BFI Deputy Director, wrote The Lie of You, a chilling psychological thriller about jealousy, manipulation, and obsession between two women.

Lucy Atkins, award-winning journalist and book critic, is the author of The Missing One.