15 minutes....

I got a bit of a surprise at work on Monday when a colleague beside me piped up , 'Why is your photograph in the Evening News?' It turned out that the local press had printed an article of significant size about, er me! A journalist from the paper had contacted me last week and I'd chatted to him about my story in the 'My Favourite Place' anthology. He seemed very doubtful that an article would come of it so I promptly forgot all about it. Until Monday.
So now I'm receiving chirpy little comments about being a 'famous author' at the end of work emails, wind-ups from mums in the playground and strange looks from people I only vaguely know - or maybe that's just me being extra paranoid. Truth be told, everyone has been lovely so I am trying to act graciously despite feeling that I've just come out of the (writers) closet. Still, I'm not sure I'm cut out for the fame thing.

The Scottish Book Trust put on a great launch event for the My Favourite Place book at the City Arts Centre last week, with a special performance from one of Scotland's best authors, James Robertson. Here's me with the book, photo courtesy of Literary Paparazzo Chris Scott

 

And finally, a big shout out to Aunty Emily who put together a fantastic blog and podcast about my story, Leith 1974, on the Leith Library blog

 

The Next Big Thing

The Next Big Thing is a great way to network with fellow writers and to find out a bit more about what they're working on. The idea is fairly simple. You, the writer, answer a standard(ish) set of 10 questions on your blog one week then ask five other authors (whose work you like and who you think might be The Next Big Thing) to answer the same questions the next week.

Last week I was chuffed to bits when local dynamo writer/ performer/ poet / media expert (you get the picture) Emily Dodd invited me to be one of the five writers she was passing the baton to this week. Emily's book, 'Banana Me Beautiful', is a heartwarming, fun and uplifting collection of poetry, songs, art and photos. I challenge you to read it without smiling or happily sighing 'Ahhhhhh' several times over.

 Right! Let the grilling begin.

 

1.      What is the title of your latest story?

Leith, 1974.

2. Where did the idea for the story come from?

The idea was prompted by the Scottish Book Trust competition for a short story on the theme of ‘My Favourite Place’.

3.      What genre does your story fall under?

It would probably be classed as life writing because it’s essentially about me when I was a kid. It condenses different experiences and events from my childhood into the space of one semi-real, semi-fictional day.

4. What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie?

Oooh – tricky. Who would I choose to play me and my childhood friends? I’m not too familiar with current child actors and actresses. I loved the kids TV programme ‘the Double Deckers’ when I was wee, so an ensemble cast along those lines would be great.

5. What is the one sentence synopsis of your story?

A young girl and her friends find adventure in a Leith council estate as they search for a rogue member of their gang.

6.      Will your story be self-published or represented by an agency?

My Favourite Place

It’ll be published in the My Favourite Place anthology, a special collection of writing to be gifted to the people of Scotland during the first ever Book Week Scotland. The book launch is tomorrow night and during Book Week Scotland, 150,000 copies will be given away in libraries, bookshops, museums, arts venues, train stations and workplaces, etc. To find out more visit http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/reading/my-favourite-place/the-book

7. How long did it take you to write the first draft?

There was a 1,000 word limit so it didn’t take too long. I jumped on a bus to Leith one afternoon during the summer so most of the ‘writing’ went on in my head that afternoon as I literally took a trip down memory lane.

8.      What other stories would you compare this story to within your genre?

Hmmmm. Not really sure. At a stretch I can only think of longer autobiographical works that have inspired and impressed me such as Stephen King’s, ‘On Writing’, and Muriel Spark’s, ‘Curriculum Vitae’. But perhaps ‘stretch’ doesn’t quite capture the magnitude of the gulf between their work and mine!

9. Who or what inspired you to write this story?

The Scottish Book Trust competition got me thinking about all the dramatic places in Scotland that I’ve visited, particularly the Highlands and islands. But I couldn’t choose which was my favourite. So I started thinking more about everyday locations and came up with the theory that everyone’s favourite place must surely be wherever they were when they were a kid - old enough to roam free all summer long with their friends but young enough not to be worried by more grown up concerns. So although the place where I grew up was fairly bleak, with the rose-tinted specs of youth, a pack of friends and a new found freedom, for me the whole area was one huge adventure playground.

10. What else about your story might pique the reader’s interest? 

I’ve referenced a few pop songs from the 70’s in the story. It’s amazing how a piece of music can magically and instantly transport you back in time.

 

My tips for The Next Big Thing include -

Story writer, passionate performer, rabid reader, copy creator and coffee fiend, Lynsey May

Vicki Jarrett, author of ‘Nothing is Heavy’ a hilarious, surreal, furiously-paced adventure involving sex, drugs, chips and angels which hovers masterfully between tragedy and farce.’

 

Ever Dundas who (has a most fantastic name and) writes beautiful literary fiction, horror, dark fairy tales and science fiction.

 

And a couple of others yet to be confirmed...watch this space!

 

Bad Keith!

Without me knowing it, my kids (6 yrs and 9yrs) spent a whole 10 minutes devising a comedy plot better than anything I've come up with in a long time!

Plot
1. Tut, tut, tut.
2. Shame on you.
3. Keith goes to jail (hip hip hooray)
4. Keith is released (oh no).
5. Tut, tut, tut.
6. Shame on you.
7. Keith goes to jail (hip hip hooray).
8. Keith is released (oh no).
9. Tut, tut, tut.
10. Shame on you.
11. Keith goes to jail (hip hip hooray)
12. Keith is released (oh no - what happens next?)
13. Keith has had enough!
14. Keith gets angry.
15. Keith lashes out.
16. Keith goes to jail.
17. When Keith is released he asks Bradley to marry him.
(1 year later).
18. Bradley and Keith go to jail.
19. Keith marries Bradley.
20. Keith kills Bradley.
21. Keith is sad that his husband is dead.
22. Keith tries to bring Bradley back to life.
23. It doesn't work so Keith goes in a huff and SCREAMS!
24. Keith goes back home and decides to buy chips.
25. Keith buys chips
26. Keith feels happy.
27. Keith feels bad again,
28. Keith hurts Michael
29. Keith is on his last warning
30. Keith does something very bad.
31. Keith is sent to court.
32. Keith is found guilty.
33.Keith is sent to prison for a VERY long time.
34. Keith starts to cry.
35. A lady felt sorry for Keith and let him go.
36. Keith kills nice lady.
37. Keith escapes and buys a sandwich.
38. The sandwich was poisonous and Keith dies.
39. (Keith was pretending to be dead) The shop keeper was worried.
40. Meanwhile, Bradley was fake-dead!
41. Keith was fake-dead.
42. The sandwich was NOT poisonous.
43. Bradley got up from his 2 year sleep and walked over to Keith and the worried shopkeeper.
44. Keith got a SURPRISE.
45. Keith jumped up and shouted "DEAD BRADLEY".
46. Bradley and Keith were angry at each other for worrying a shopkeeper and faking dead.
47. Keith and Bradley divorce.
48. Tut, tut, tut.
49. Shame on you.
50. Keith goes....
51. " WILL YOU SHUT UP YOU STUPID NARRATOR."
52. "I quit," shouts Keith.
53. Even though Keith quits, his boss had already sacked him.
54. Keith goes home unaware that he is being filmed.
55. People stop filming Keith.
56. Bradley is now the main actor
57. The show is now called "Bad Bradley."
58. Bradley doesn't want to be the main character so his wife called lady is now the main character, NICE LADY.
59. Nice Lady wants her show to have REALLY funny stuff.
60. Nice Lady - " shhh now, please! No! Yes! No! Yes! Oh shut up! I have lots of candy"
61. The boss thinks it is not good and gets Keith back. Everybody is happy that Keith is back. (Hip Hip Hooray).
THE END!mariannepaget

Hooray for ....?!?

Cycling through Holyrood Park this morning I saw a troop of people making their way up the hill with large white shapes under arm. Half an hour later on my way back, I came across this! Is Dolly Parton coming to town by any chance? Or are those crazy Edinburgh Uni students up to some of their pranks again? It's all a bit strange, especially the morning after Halloween. But it sparked my curiosity - a gift for a writer - and for the rest of my cycle home had me coming up with all sorts of wild guesses as to what might be going on.
Any ideas?

Das Singende Klingende Baumchen

 

I took my daughter (9) on her first trip to Edinburgh's Filmhouse the other day. It was a trip down memory lane for me; a showing of 'The Singing Ringing Tree'. I had watched the serialised version of the film when I was a kid on summer hols in the 70's along with other dubbed classics such as Belle and Sebastian, The Flashing Blade and The Tinderbox. But The Singing Ringing Tree stood out for me. I was fascinated by it. The colours were so vivid and the story, characters and set so surreal that despite its cartoonish surface (or perhaps because of it), I found it all a bit creepy, especially the evil dwarf!

 

In the 70's you were allowed to have evil dwarves. In fact I think it might have been mandatory that all dwarves in any kind of drama were evil, unless of course you were Snow White. I had therefore been a little concerned about my daughter's reaction to the film and hoped I wasn't setting her up for nightmares. My fears worsened immediately before the film started when the cinema filled up and there was only one other child in the audience. But I needn't have worried. She laughed her socks off along with the rest of the audience every time a cardboard tree shook or a polystyrene wall crumbled. She thought that the evil dwarf was hilarious and that the weird mega-fish was 'cute'. I should have realised that if she can happily watch the Corpse Bride and Night at the Museum that she'd be fine with a freaky 1950's East German B movie!

I have to admit to feeling a bit dismayed by all the laughing though. I wanted everyone to take it as seriously as I had all those years ago - CGI or not!

 

If you want to re-live some of your favourite kids' classics from bygone days, there's a great website at http://www.thechestnut.com/

 

I'll leave you now with the tinkle-tingle music of Das Singende Klingende Baumchen

CASE HISTORIES

I visited one of the sets for the BBC1 series Case Histories at the weekend. The Beeb were filming on location at Edinburgh Council's Waverley Court, which in the series acts as Edinburgh's police HQ.

Arriving on set at the unearthly hour of 8am on Sunday, I found a cast and crew of about 80 people bustling about laying tracks for the dolly, rehearsing scenes, applying make-up, fixing lighting glitches and generally being very, very busy. Star of the show, Jason Isaac, was there too but as he was surrounded by a hareem of very protective looking wardrobe and make-up staff and I am really quite shy at heart, I didn't pluck up the courage to go and speak to him.

I did however chat to some of the crew when they weren't haring around, including a very relaxed line producer (relaxed because the office is shut on a Sunday) and a ridiculously busy unit manager who was having to deal with the aforementioned glitches and who was also a woman down due to a last minute change in requirements for yet another location.

A great revelation for me was that TV isn't all that glam, even for big name actors. There's a lot of just hanging about while film crews do their stuff: putting dots on the floor to track scene movements; measuring distances between the camera and action points; and lots of rehearsals and takes of the same scene over and over again. And my illusions about BBC budgets were shattered when I found out that all of the staff had to sort out their own accommodation and travel to the set in Edinburgh when, judging by accents, most were from the west coast or beyond. That said, it was a really interesting day and when I write in future I'll be sure to bear in mind the people grafting behind the scenes, especially the locations team.

Not sure what that means for my idea of a sitcom in a cadaver lab!

 

 

 

PORTY BOOKFEST 2012

PORTY BOOKFEST 2012

I had a fantastic time at the Portobello Book Festival last weekend. The festival is devised and delivered by a group of enthusiastic local volunteers and is a great example of what can be achieved with a good dram of community spirit. And in keeping with that spirit, all events are free, so everyone can benefit.
This year's festival opened in Porty library on Friday night with live music from local musicians and readings of poetry and prose from nine local writers who had entered the 'In the Library At Night' competition. Now, I always get nervous about performing my work in public, but I was more nervous than usual this time as you might guess from the title of my story - '50 Shades of the Library At Night'. It's a piece that needs to be delivered with a certain amount of sass! Fortunately the audience hooted with laughter all the way through, which, as a spoof piece, was the intention. I had feared that if folk took it as a serious piece of writing I'd never be able to show my face around Porty again.

On the Saturday morning, I ran a writers' workshop in the Old Parish Church in Bellfield St. There was full attendance and a great bunch of people along. A few were new to writing and a bit nervous about being at the workshop. I knew how they felt as it was my first time running a writers' workshop.

In the afternoon, I squeezed in as many as possible of the exciting events that were on offer. There was a talk by three debut novelists chaired by local writer Alice Thompson, a hilarious session with Christopher Brookmyre and Denise Mina (fab hair) and to top off the Saturday, James Robertson reading from his epic 'And the Land Lay Still'.

On Sunday there was a fascinating session with Paul Story on his Honesty Experiment. He self-published his Dreamwords book then left copies at random locations around Scotland encouraging people to send him payment if they enjoyed it. He hasn't yet broken even, but with an 8% return, he's running one heck of a successful marketing campaign from the comfort of the tent where he lives!

I finished off by going to see Scotland's 'other' super sporty Andy Murray. He's a doctor, the Scottish Government's physical Health Champion and an ultra marathon runner to boot! Amongst his other running achievements, Andy won the North Pole Marathon earlier this year - the first Brit ever to do so. Go on, Andy!

Porty Bookfest takes place during the first weekend of October - don't miss it next year.