Blog Hopping!

Eileen Thornton - http://www.lifeshard-winehelps.blogspot.co.uk -  author of The Trojan Project and Divorcees.biz, which I have just finished reading on my new Kindle and can highly recommend as a fun, warm-hearted read, has invited me to participate in a writers' blog hop, to talk about what we are currently working on. She in turn was invited by author Oliver Eade - http://www.olivereade.blogspot.com - so now I shall have a go.

I am still waiting to hear if my revamp of Perfect Lives has been accepted. I've had most of the advance, thank goodness, but I would love to know when it is going to be published. Soon, I hope! Meanwhile, I have been working on something completely different...

What is the working title of your next book?

ALL THE WEIRD STUFF
that's happened to me

Where did the idea for the book come from?

I have wanted to write a memoir for a long time but was finding it hard to integrate all the many and varied strands that go to make up a life. Then, in the early hours of New Year's Day, the solution came to me: why write just one book when I could write several, each dealing with a different topic? So last weekend I began writing about all my strange experiences connected to the supernatural and clairvoyance, starting with hearing a ghostly train when I was 7, and I've already completed 12,000 words.

What genre does your book fall under?

Er... that's difficult. Autobiography? Mind, body and spirit? I'm not sure.


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

Meryl Streep could play my mum and Patsy Palmer, who plays Bianca Jackson in Eastenders, could play me, if she didn't mind wearing glasses!


What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

Other realms are all around us; you just have to find a way in.


Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Self-published. Agents I have mentioned it to have said that as I'm not famous, no conventional publisher would be interested. Huh!


How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

I'm aiming at 40,000 words, so as I have written 12,000 words so far this week, I would guess a month.


What other books would you compare this to within your genre?

Um... I can't answer that because I can't think of anyone who has had lots of spooky experiences and written about them using a mixture of horror and humour.

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

A desire to share my stories first of all with my daughter, who works as a clairvoyant, and secondly with anyone else who has ever had any odd experiences and would like to feel that he or she is not alone. Thirdly, with anybody who wants a spine-chilling, thought-provoking read.


What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?

The fact that these things are all true and happened to me. Who would believe it? My follow-up book will cover ALL THE BAD STUFF that's happened to me: for instance, who would believe that I could be held at shotgun point during an innocent afternoon's baby-sitting? But it happened to me back in 1968, and I want the world to know.