It is the start of December tomorrow and at the weekend I will be going up into the attic and getting the Christmas Tree down and putting on Fairytale of New York and maybe having a beverage or tow to celebrate the start of the festive season. Christmas, that wonderful time of the year when the shops are bulging, women are fighting over turkeys in Marks and Spencer and when adults spend most of their time fluctuating between food comas and hangovers with mild spells of drunken behaviour between. Ah, Christmas.
Call me crazy (and often people do) but I think Christmas is about more that that. At Christmas, my thoughts gravitate towards those for whom it will not be a season of goodwill, but a season of getting by. For the children that are struggling to come to terms with being parted from their parents, either by illness, death, or having been put into a foster home. Some children may be suffering alongside their parents. It's been a bleak year financially for most of us, but for some people every year is a bleak year. Whether that is through losing jobs or expected expenses, Christmas can be just another day for children.
One charity that aims to help is Cash for Kids. Most local radio stations in the UK run a campaign alongside this charity, as do ASDA to try and help the less fortunate. I applaud that. Childhood should be a time of wonder and awe and Cash for Kids looks to help kids have fond memories. Which is why I am going to be donating 100% the proceeds of my book to this charity in December. I'm not rich, but I know I'm lucky. The money I would have got from the sales of my book could have benefited me and helped me buy something I didn't really need. Or I could give it to a child who needs it which is a greater reward in itself.
This Christmas, do something unselfish. It doesn't have to be much, but if we all do a little bit, then it might make a difference to somebody's life.
C J Evans
Wednesday 30 November 2011
Monday 28 November 2011
Gary Speed RIP
I was about to write about my book and the sales figures and how I'm a little bit ahead of where I wanted to be, when I read the attached article by Matthew Linley, the brother of my former flatmate. It highlights how depression and depressive illnesses can afflict the strongest of us all. The inspiration for which is the shocking news yesterday of the death of Gary Speed, the manager of the Welsh football team and former professional footballer for Leeds, Everton, Newcastle, Bolton Wanderers and Sheffield United at the age of 42.
I was driving home with my uncle and my cousin from my sister's fiance's Stag weekend when I heard the news. It was a bulletin on Radio 1 and after searching through the internet I found out how it had happened. It appears Gary Speed took his own life, leaving behind two young sons and a wife. My thoughts, as are most of the country's are with them. The conversation in the car took a turn away from the frivolity of the weekend to our own understanding of depression. My uncle talked about a work colleague, while I talked about my understanding of the disease as a Psychology Lecturer. What I didn't mention was that for some years, I have suffered from depression.
Why didn't I talk about it? There is still such a stigma to suffering from mental illness. When the British boxer Frank Bruno sought medical help for his battle with depression, the vile rag that is The Sun ran the headline 'Bonkers Bruno Locked Up'. While I would dismiss using that publication to wipe my arse with, it raised an important social point. Depression is seen by many as a weakness, a flaw in one's character. I even used to think it myself, hiding from the truth. I saw myself as weak because of the way society portrayed people who suffered with the disease. There are over 6 million people in the UK receiving treatment for mental illness at the moment. Nearly 1 in 10, a greater percentage than are physically disabled and yet there is still a stigma attached to it. Maybe it's the traditional British 'stiff-upper lip' or maybe it's that not enough people understand the illness. But the real truth is, depression is prevalent in our society. It exists and yet sufferers are forced to believe that they are weak. They are anything but.
People who suffer from depression face a double battle; one with themselves trying to conquer the feelings of hopelessness and despair even during those moments that others would consider to be happy ones. And they face a social battle, of having to cope with public perceptions of others that somehow they are lesser individuals because of their affliction. As Dorothy Rowe once said, 'Depression is a prison where you are both the suffering prisoner and the cruel jailer'.
Here's a list of people with depression and ask yourself are these people worth any less than me because of what they suffer?
Leo Tolstoy, author
Charles Dickens, English author,
John Keats, poet,
Michelangelo, artist
Bette Midler, entertainer
Charles Schultz, cartoonist
Dick Clark, entertainer
Irving Berlin, composer
Rosemary Clooney, singer
Jimmy Piersall, baseball player. Boston Red Sox
Burgess Meredith, actor,
Peter Illyich Tchaikovsky, composer
Charlie Pride, singer
Sylvia Plath, poet and novelist.
Janet Jackson, singer
Patty Duke, actress,
Roseanne Barr, comedian
Marlon Brando, actor
Maurice Bernard, actor
Buzz Aldrin, astronaut
Margot Kidder, Actress
Jonathon Winters, comedian
Pat Conroy, author
Ernest Hemingway, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist,
Tennessee Williams, American playwright
And I didn't even mention Stephen Fry, Kurt Cobain, Abraham Lincoln, Isaac Newton, Van Gough, John Kirwan, Stan Collymore, Marcus Trescothick, Paul Gascoigne or many others.
Depression is not a weakness except in the eyes of the general public and it's about time that changed.
I was driving home with my uncle and my cousin from my sister's fiance's Stag weekend when I heard the news. It was a bulletin on Radio 1 and after searching through the internet I found out how it had happened. It appears Gary Speed took his own life, leaving behind two young sons and a wife. My thoughts, as are most of the country's are with them. The conversation in the car took a turn away from the frivolity of the weekend to our own understanding of depression. My uncle talked about a work colleague, while I talked about my understanding of the disease as a Psychology Lecturer. What I didn't mention was that for some years, I have suffered from depression.
Why didn't I talk about it? There is still such a stigma to suffering from mental illness. When the British boxer Frank Bruno sought medical help for his battle with depression, the vile rag that is The Sun ran the headline 'Bonkers Bruno Locked Up'. While I would dismiss using that publication to wipe my arse with, it raised an important social point. Depression is seen by many as a weakness, a flaw in one's character. I even used to think it myself, hiding from the truth. I saw myself as weak because of the way society portrayed people who suffered with the disease. There are over 6 million people in the UK receiving treatment for mental illness at the moment. Nearly 1 in 10, a greater percentage than are physically disabled and yet there is still a stigma attached to it. Maybe it's the traditional British 'stiff-upper lip' or maybe it's that not enough people understand the illness. But the real truth is, depression is prevalent in our society. It exists and yet sufferers are forced to believe that they are weak. They are anything but.
People who suffer from depression face a double battle; one with themselves trying to conquer the feelings of hopelessness and despair even during those moments that others would consider to be happy ones. And they face a social battle, of having to cope with public perceptions of others that somehow they are lesser individuals because of their affliction. As Dorothy Rowe once said, 'Depression is a prison where you are both the suffering prisoner and the cruel jailer'.
Here's a list of people with depression and ask yourself are these people worth any less than me because of what they suffer?
Leo Tolstoy, author
Charles Dickens, English author,
John Keats, poet,
Michelangelo, artist
Bette Midler, entertainer
Charles Schultz, cartoonist
Dick Clark, entertainer
Irving Berlin, composer
Rosemary Clooney, singer
Jimmy Piersall, baseball player. Boston Red Sox
Burgess Meredith, actor,
Peter Illyich Tchaikovsky, composer
Charlie Pride, singer
Sylvia Plath, poet and novelist.
Janet Jackson, singer
Patty Duke, actress,
Roseanne Barr, comedian
Marlon Brando, actor
Maurice Bernard, actor
Buzz Aldrin, astronaut
Margot Kidder, Actress
Jonathon Winters, comedian
Pat Conroy, author
Ernest Hemingway, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist,
Tennessee Williams, American playwright
And I didn't even mention Stephen Fry, Kurt Cobain, Abraham Lincoln, Isaac Newton, Van Gough, John Kirwan, Stan Collymore, Marcus Trescothick, Paul Gascoigne or many others.
Depression is not a weakness except in the eyes of the general public and it's about time that changed.
Wednesday 23 November 2011
First book blues
It's been a hectic couple of weeks since I've last written a blog. Nearly three weeks since I posted anything at all, but I do have a good reason for it. MY FIRST BOOK - THE SURROGATE- WAS PUBLISHED THIS WEEK! I must be excited, I'm using block capitals. I've been up late at night, re-writing, editing, re-editing to try and get the book out on time (I didn't) but it's finally out there and...I feel sad.
Why do I feel sad? I think the book is okay. I would have like a little more time with it, but then I probably would have procrastinated over what word to use here or there? Do I have to capitalize the A in 'ah' when I am using it as dialect to replace 'I'? Stuff like that. I'm glad it's out, but I miss it.
Is your first novel like your first child? Do you cajole it? Mother it? Tell it off when it doesn't do what you want it to? Maybe. It depends what type of parent you are I suppose. For many years I was a neglectful one, and now I've spent some time with it, I didn't want to let it go. I'm like the parents waving their first born off to university, weeping at the dorm room, hoping it'll be okay in the big bad world.
Then I remember something. I have other children. Lots of other children all craving my attention. When one flies the nest, another egg cracks. So back I go to the little office in my house and prepare to write my next novel, with one eye on how my baby is doing in the real world. Although, i might just enjoy having the house, and my head, to myself for a little while first.
C J Evans
Why do I feel sad? I think the book is okay. I would have like a little more time with it, but then I probably would have procrastinated over what word to use here or there? Do I have to capitalize the A in 'ah' when I am using it as dialect to replace 'I'? Stuff like that. I'm glad it's out, but I miss it.
Is your first novel like your first child? Do you cajole it? Mother it? Tell it off when it doesn't do what you want it to? Maybe. It depends what type of parent you are I suppose. For many years I was a neglectful one, and now I've spent some time with it, I didn't want to let it go. I'm like the parents waving their first born off to university, weeping at the dorm room, hoping it'll be okay in the big bad world.
Then I remember something. I have other children. Lots of other children all craving my attention. When one flies the nest, another egg cracks. So back I go to the little office in my house and prepare to write my next novel, with one eye on how my baby is doing in the real world. Although, i might just enjoy having the house, and my head, to myself for a little while first.
C J Evans
Friday 11 November 2011
11-11-11 Remember
In Flanders Fields
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Saturday 5 November 2011
That was the week that was...
Well, what a week that has been. Coffee spilled on a lap-top, three days of lecturing in Evolutionary Psychology, Bonfire Night, Halloween and some stomach troubles I'd rather not share with the rest of the world...but I just have.
If that weren't bad enough, I was doing my usual skim through the blogs of other Twitter users when I found an article called Self Pub Suicide. Now there are several things I could do here: 1) I could dismiss this article as literary snobbery - 2) Engage in a debate about Traditional vs Independent Publishers or 3) Descend to the level of calling names and throwing tantrums. I'm going for the fourth option. Rationality.
I see the publishing industry as not being too dissimilar to the music industry. For most writers, it's the ultimate goal to get picked up by one of the Big 6 and having their book plastered across poster sites at railway stations across the country. Personally, I'd love nothing more that to walk into Waterstones and see my book in a prominent position with a five star review from somebody famous. But for most authors, that isn't going to happen. That's a fact. Regardless of whether you get picked up by one of the Big 6 or one of their subsidiaries, as an author there is a high likelihood you are going to sell less than 1,000 copies in your first year and then get dropped. This is where being an independent has it's advantages as you just carry on writing and hope the next one will be better.
Perhaps Indie writers have lower expectations, but we know that outside of our friends and family we're going to get less sales. For most of us, the dream is not to sell thousands of books, but just to sell one to somebody we don't know. Be that a downloaded E-book or a copy through a POD publishing site, seeing our work read by somebody who wouldn't normally read our book is an achievement. Indie writers are the bands that tour in the back of a transit van, lugging their own equipment, getting their music (or stories) out for the public to judge. Often we'll get bottles throw at us on stage, sometimes we'll get a free bar, but all in all, we're at least letting people see our work. Do we sit and home and send out letters saying 'please print my book'? Sometimes. Do we dream of the big stadium gig (in this case - national distribution in leading bookstores) of course. But we don't wait for it to happen. We take risks and try and write, and write for the public to see and judge.
I don't want to say that the traditional route is not worth going down. For many people it is. If you write literary fiction or chick-lit or even crime and thrillers, it can be an incredibly profitable avenue to explore. Just like with indie authors, if you have faith in your talent, then why not give it a go. The traditional route is much like the pop music industry or even classical music. Do you think that the London Symphony Orchestra has ever played a gig in their local pub? Can you ever imagine Britney Spears or Beyonce busking in the street? No. Because they don't have to. Indie writers on the other hand do. We don't have the access to the same level of resources. We don't always fit into neat little genres or have target demographics. Yes we have rough edges and sometimes we sing out of tune, but for me, personally, I like that. We make our mistakes in public, but sometimes those mistakes lead to moments of beauty. I'd much rather be a Seasick Steve or a Jeff Buckley than a Take That or a JLS, but that's my preference. I appreciate that others will have different tastes.
Which is the best option? Indie or Traditional? In the words of Harry Hill, there's only one way to find out - FIGHT!!!!
C J Evans
If that weren't bad enough, I was doing my usual skim through the blogs of other Twitter users when I found an article called Self Pub Suicide. Now there are several things I could do here: 1) I could dismiss this article as literary snobbery - 2) Engage in a debate about Traditional vs Independent Publishers or 3) Descend to the level of calling names and throwing tantrums. I'm going for the fourth option. Rationality.
I see the publishing industry as not being too dissimilar to the music industry. For most writers, it's the ultimate goal to get picked up by one of the Big 6 and having their book plastered across poster sites at railway stations across the country. Personally, I'd love nothing more that to walk into Waterstones and see my book in a prominent position with a five star review from somebody famous. But for most authors, that isn't going to happen. That's a fact. Regardless of whether you get picked up by one of the Big 6 or one of their subsidiaries, as an author there is a high likelihood you are going to sell less than 1,000 copies in your first year and then get dropped. This is where being an independent has it's advantages as you just carry on writing and hope the next one will be better.
Perhaps Indie writers have lower expectations, but we know that outside of our friends and family we're going to get less sales. For most of us, the dream is not to sell thousands of books, but just to sell one to somebody we don't know. Be that a downloaded E-book or a copy through a POD publishing site, seeing our work read by somebody who wouldn't normally read our book is an achievement. Indie writers are the bands that tour in the back of a transit van, lugging their own equipment, getting their music (or stories) out for the public to judge. Often we'll get bottles throw at us on stage, sometimes we'll get a free bar, but all in all, we're at least letting people see our work. Do we sit and home and send out letters saying 'please print my book'? Sometimes. Do we dream of the big stadium gig (in this case - national distribution in leading bookstores) of course. But we don't wait for it to happen. We take risks and try and write, and write for the public to see and judge.
I don't want to say that the traditional route is not worth going down. For many people it is. If you write literary fiction or chick-lit or even crime and thrillers, it can be an incredibly profitable avenue to explore. Just like with indie authors, if you have faith in your talent, then why not give it a go. The traditional route is much like the pop music industry or even classical music. Do you think that the London Symphony Orchestra has ever played a gig in their local pub? Can you ever imagine Britney Spears or Beyonce busking in the street? No. Because they don't have to. Indie writers on the other hand do. We don't have the access to the same level of resources. We don't always fit into neat little genres or have target demographics. Yes we have rough edges and sometimes we sing out of tune, but for me, personally, I like that. We make our mistakes in public, but sometimes those mistakes lead to moments of beauty. I'd much rather be a Seasick Steve or a Jeff Buckley than a Take That or a JLS, but that's my preference. I appreciate that others will have different tastes.
Which is the best option? Indie or Traditional? In the words of Harry Hill, there's only one way to find out - FIGHT!!!!
C J Evans
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