“Being a writer is wonderful – it gives us carte blanche to get away with everything.” Simon Hall, seven times published novelist, former BBC
News Correspondent of twenty years and tutor at the University of Cambridge, tells the gathered members and guests at Hampshire Writers’ Society’s Tuesday night meeting.
Simon loves to ‘people watch’; often from a spot in the pub in his beloved Cambridge. It is characters that drive his writing. Adam Breen and Dan Groves, even Rutherford the dog, the characters that he created for his TV Detective novels work together, not only literally, but together they form a crucial ‘relationship’.
Dan Groves, the TV reporter half of the duo appears to have everything. He also suffers with depression which he calls “the swamp”. Simon tells us that he has received many emails from men suffering the same affliction, saying thank you for giving the illness this coverage; it is good to know that they are not the only ones, the character of Dan is one that they can relate to.
Story telling is innate in all of us, he says. There’s no secret to writing a story, there may even be a formulaic way to do it and plenty of stories start at the end – reverse chronology. Simon once killed off a character; something for which he, his editor and publisher received much criticism – in reality, the character would have survived. But Simon argued the necessity that she be “killed off” – Dan, having had three successes, was in danger of succumbing to delusions of grandeur; he had to be taught a valuable life lesson.
So, here Simon imparts a piece of advice – “Let the story find you. Use your characters and your experiences.”
Research is done on-the-job. Simon recognises that it is important and suggests a researcher try to get as close to the original source as possible, because there you’ll often find an interesting fact to support your research. For his new book which is out in September this year (as yet it has no name – The Editor is a popular choice – although, Simon likes to have at least three words in the titles of his novels) he spent much time researching the city of Cambridge, which of course he greatly enjoyed.
“Writers are a species apart.” he says. It is a relationship, which is possible why everyone has their favourite authors – they can be relied on the to give ‘value for money’. As such, Simon follows four unbreakable rules which he calls the Four S’s
1 He steers clear of science. Except for on the peripherals – a crime novel will always need a little of science.
2 He skips on what he calls “slop”, we would understand slop as gore. The reason for this is that he feels he could not write anything worse than the reader can imagine. Most people will say that their favourite scene in Hitchcock’s Psycho is the shower scene. “You don’t actually see the murder.” Simon points out. The mind bridges the gap, your imagination does the rest.
3 He avoids swearing, using it only to keep the dialogue real.
4 He doesn’t do sex. His first attempt at writing a sex scene was laughed out of the draft by his editor.
“Humour is ubiquitous in our society”. he says. Humour is what keeps us going, it forms a bond between us. It is therefore omnipresent in Simon’s writing. “Everyone seems to think that the past is terrible and that the future is scary,” he tells us. Horrible things do go on and, as a reporter for the BBC, he has seen some of the worst. But, he truly believes that the majority of people are good.
Report by Lisa Nightingale
John Hayes is Smug! Winchester’s first satirical magazine Remember Viz, Mad and Punch? Well, it’s a bit like those. Smug is a mix of humour and investigative journalism backed up by in-depth research – people watching!
Derek’s eyes followed Sally as she walked through the beaded curtain that separated the lounge-diner from the cramped and slightly squalid kitchen beyond. The beads swayed and clacked marking her passage. As Sally started to clatter about filling the kettle and trying to find a couple of semi-clean mugs Derek knew he only had a few moments. He picked up her bag from the coffee table. He was always astonished at the weight of his sister’s handbag, she must have a gun or brick in there to weigh so much. He paused briefly but he could still hear Sally in the kitchen. The craving for tobacco and a complete absence of cash clearly meant it was okay to filch a few cigarettes from your sister. Carefully he unzipped the bag watching for any signs of his sister’s return. Glancing down at the contents of the bag he could see a disorganised mass of half-opened packets of tissues, an over-stuffed purse, old rail tickets, gloves and God only knew what else. He couldn’t risk trying to empty the bag so thrust his hand in hoping for the familiar feel of an open packet of fags. His hand brushed against something cold, metal and solid. Curiosity got the better of him and his fingers curled around the object as he pulled it out. Derek sat back in surprise at the sight of the large grey automatic pistol that he was now holding by the barrel. His surprise turned to fear as he looked up into the impassive flinty stare of his sister watching him from the kitchen.
She shared her top tip for writer’s block. When she is developing her characters for a novel, she studies photos from papers and a plethora of magazines for people who have features that match those of her characters. She sticks these images on index cards creating a box of faces for each novel. When she’s stuck, she stares at a card and lets the face take on a life of its own. She lets any idea come into her head to unlock her creativity. The Gothic face of the antagonist in her book Where Death Lies came for a teen music magazine. The book is available from September on Kindle for 98p for a limited period only.
Andrew writes organically with no defined plot or structure, just some fragments that he wants to feature. He likened it to having a packet of seeds but no idea of how the plant will look when it’s fully grown. He said when faced with writer’s block he forces himself to write, even if he’s not sure where it will go. He stressed the importance of creating a hook at the end of each chapter to keep attention high. His first novel developed into a crime novel but the intention at the outset was purely to write a page turning story that was authentic. His publishers made the point that crime is always popular so this would secure a place on the booksellers’ shelves which is more difficult for mainstream novels. However they asked him to edit it by a third, an act that he said felt like sawing off the legs of his first born, but one that he eventually saw made the book a success. He made the point that professional writers take advice that amateurs won’t…