No more blank page

After months of pandemic, a three-week holiday, a 14-day period of self-isolation and now a Bank Holiday weekend, I have finally managed to concentrate for long enough to write what may turn out to be the first scene of “Plank 7”.  No promises and all that, but I’m pleased to have at last written something.  As this comes right at the beginning, I am trying to introduce the characters: there might be readers who come to this book without having read any of the previous ones, so I have to explain who everyone is and what they do.  It’s far from perfect, I know, but it’s an almighty relief to be off the starting blocks. (Apologies for the lack of formatting: WordPress has changed its editor and I can’t work out how to do anything at all!)

July 1829

There are some men who pursue change: as soon as they master a skill or see a spectacle, they are keen to move on to the next.  And there are those of us who treasure the familiar.  It’s not that I wish to return to the past –far from it, as anyone who has escaped the fish-stinking alleys of Wapping will agree.  And I am certainly not against improving myself; I read as widely as I can, and keep my ears open when I am with men who can teach me.  But I do not seek novelty for its own sake – a steadfastness for which my wife Martha might be a little more grateful.  Sometimes, however, the world thrusts change upon all of us, and we must make our peace with it.  Next year – God willing – I shall mark my half-century.  And since I was sixteen I have been a constable.  I once told Martha that I wanted to be buried in my uniform, which she said was in poor taste.  With Mr Peel’s innovations, I may no longer have the right.

William Wilson glanced at me as we paused to cross Oxford Street.

“Are you unwell, sir?” he asked.

“Unwell?” I repeated.

“You sighed,” he explained.

“Perhaps at the prospect of being asked ridiculous questions,” I said, and immediately regretted my bad temper.  Ever since Wilson had told me that he had decided to join the Metropolitan Police at the first opportunity I had been short with him – even though I had been the one encouraging him to think to his future and throw in his lot with the new force.  As Martha had observed after seeing me snap at the poor lad, just because the head wants something, it does not mean that the heart has to like it.

There was a small gap between the carts heading eastwards and we stepped into the road.  There was less traffic going west but we still had to wait for a neat little carriage to bowl past us, the coachman calling out a halloo of warning.  The shade cast by the shuttered theatre in Blenheim Street came as a relief; although it was not yet nine o’clock, the day was warm.

“Forgive me,” I said.  “I am out of sorts.  The heat does not agree with me – I have not been sleeping.”  Wilson said nothing but nodded tightly.  He would be quiet for perhaps ten minutes, I knew, but there has never been anyone less capable of bearing a grudge or staying angry.  “And how is young master George sleeping these days?” I asked.

Wilson’s face broke into a smile as he thought of his baby son.  “We’ve given up on clothes,” he said.  “When he’s asleep, he looks like one of those fat little angels you see in church.”

“Cherubs,” I said as we climbed the steps of the Great Marlborough Street police office.

“Less angelic when he’s awake,” continued Wilson.  “His favourite game now is giving and taking, which he can play for hours – handing something back and forth.  Me, I’m not so keen on it – everything he gives you comes with a generous coating of spit.”

“Talking about one of our visitors, are you, sir?” asked Tom Neale.  Our office-keeper was making an annotation in his ledger; I’ll wager that the records kept at the Old Bailey are less thorough than those in that ledger.

“Constable Wilson was regaling me with the perils of fatherhood,” I said.

“And how is Mrs Wilson’s latest project coming along?” asked Tom.  “Is she still troubled by the vomiting?  I remember Mrs Neale suffering terribly.”

“My mother tells me it should reduce,” confided Wilson, “now that we are past the early months.”

Tom nodded sagely.

“When you have quite finished with your discussions, gentlemen,” I said, leaning over the counter and tapping a forefinger on the ledger, “I wonder whether there is some work to be done.”

Time to name “Plank 5”

It’s a different time of year to usual (winter rather than summer), but don’t think for one moment that this excuses you from your duty: choosing the title of the latest Sam Plank novel, heretofore known as “Plank 5”.  Just to remind you, the four predecessors in the series are called “Fatal Forgery”, “The Man in the Canary Waistcoat”, “Worm in the Blossom” and “Portraits of Pretence”.  Of course, no-one can be expected to choose a title without knowing a little about the book, so here we go:

“Plank 5” is set in the autumn/winter of 1828.  Constable Sam Plank becomes curious about religious meetings led by a charismatic preacher at which ‘heralds’ claim that they can communicate with the deceased and pass on messages from them to their mourning relatives.  [This practice gained enormous currency in the Victorian period, with spiritualism and mediums gathering huge followings, but the idea has been there since the beginning of time.]  Some of the messages suggest that the subjects should donate quite a bit of money to the preacher’s cause – and when a man’s wife refuses to allow him to do this, the herald suggests a rather extreme solution, and this is how Sam becomes involved.  Others who attend the meetings because they have lost beloved children are told that, for a fee, replacement babies could be found.  And yet everything suggests that the preacher himself is an honest and godly man, who truly believes that you can communicate from beyond the grave.  Sam’s baffled scepticism is matched only by Martha’s heartbreaking desire to believe and Wilson’s stolid determination to make sense of it all.

As ever, I have thought of five possible titles and will leave the final choice to you.  The poll will run from today for three weeks – i.e. until Friday 9 February 2018 – and then I have to give the title to the cover magicians.  So here we go, the five contenders…

A new Plank for a new year

I know I am taking things more slowly this time – giving myself two years instead of one to write “Plank 5” – but I did promise myself that I would write the first scenes before the end of 2016.  Unusually they are, at least for the moment, the actual first scenes of the book, but of course that might all change when it comes to my “jigsaw” phase of writing (assembling all the disparate bits into the finished sequence).  But for now, here you go:

Friday 4th January 1828

By the time I reached the doctor’s premises in Savile Street, there were crystals of ice clinging to my whiskers.  Around me people looked down at the ground as they trudged through the settling snow; so far this new year had brought us nothing but steady snow and the yellow hue of the sky suggested more to come.  I walked heavily and slowly up the three scrubbed stone steps and knocked on the door.  It swung open, and the relief showed on Wilson’s face as he saw that it was me.  I tucked my gloves into my hat and left them on the hall table alongside Wilson’s, and glanced to me left into the parlour that served – that had served – as the doctor’s waiting room.  Perched on the edge of one of the seats was the maid.  She held a cup in two shaking hands, her cloak still around her shoulders and her unpacked bag of shopping at her feet.

“She found him,” said Wilson quietly, “when she came back from the market.  It was her screaming that sent the message lad to us.  I was in early this morning and Mr Neale sent me on ahead.  The message lad said she,” he indicated the maid, “was in a state, but he didn’t know why – she couldn’t tell him.”

“Has anyone else been here?” I asked.

Wilson shook his head.  “The cook from next door came in to tend to the maid, and she’s in the kitchen now, but neither of them will go back into the consulting room.  Can’t say that I blame them.”  He stood aside as we reached the closed door of the doctor’s consulting room.  “It’s rather bloody.”  I looked at him and he swallowed hard; Wilson was a big lad, and brave when needed, but his stomach was easily turned.  “Very bloody,” he amended.

I hope that’s whetted your appetite.

Martha’s American fans

About a month ago, a retired high school teacher from America contacted me by email, saying that she teaches four groups a course called “History Through Mystery” [how much do you want to go on that course – me too] through an organisation called the Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes.  OLLIs offer courses and activities for older people through US universities – it sounds a bit like the UK’s University of the Third Age.  Anyway, this lady said that in June her four groups would be discussing “Fatal Forgery” because it “definitely evokes the feeling of the time without being tedious”.  I was thrilled to hear this, as you can imagine, and gladly supplied some background information, as the novel has no author notes, which reading groups like these days.  And then I waited nervously – it’s quite something to know that lots of well-informed, well-read people are discussing your novel.

And true to her word, this lovely lady emailed me again a couple of days ago, to say that the last of the four groups had just finished with Sam.  And their verdict?  “In every group, it has been one of the most favorite books.  Everyone loved your writing style and found that it was not only easy to read, but it draws the reader into the time period.  Yes, we all wanted more Martha, and a number of members have already read the next two Plank books (as have I) in which there is more Martha.  What a wonderful character.  She is such a great complement to Sam, and he is able to bounce ideas off her and get some very intelligent response.  The other thing which was appreciated is how you triangulated the narrator (Plank, Wilson and Martha) in order to give us a very complete picture of what was going on.”

As you can imagine, Sam and I – and especially Martha – are beaming.  He even says that he might be willing to overlook that little dust-up we all had in the 1770s, given the civilised nature of the resulting population.

Sam shows me the way

First of all, thanks to everyone who took pity on me after my disappointment last week, and wrote to encourage me to take it on the chin.  Excellent advice, and next week I will be going to see the new manager and start again with the wooing.

I have also – after reading this inspiring post by Catherine Ryan-Howard, whose book “Self-Printing” was my bible when I first started self-publishing – set up a Goodreads Giveaway for “Fatal Forgery”, starting on 4 February and running for about a week.  As Catherine explains, giveaways are all about publicity (“eyeballs”, as she puts it) and I figure that for the price of one paperback and postage to somewhere in the world, “Fatal Forgery” could do with a little more exposure.  So in mid-February, Sam could be winging his way to any country in the world.  As ever, I’ll keep you posted – particularly around whether the exposure seems to translate into sales.  (One of the few benefits of having quite low sales figures is that I can spot a peak very easily!  Pity poor old John Grisham, trying to figure out which were the fabulous weeks for book sales among the merely terrific.)

And as though to make up for my despondency, Sam himself has been on cracking form this weekend.  He demanded attention for most of yesterday and then two hours this afternoon and has dragged me to three London premises in the course of 2,655 words. He also finally told me where Wilson lives – although sadly we can’t go there as it’s now under the railway lines at St Pancras.

My growing family

It is very interesting now that I am hawking three books, rather than just one or even a pair.  When I published “Fatal Forgery”, I genuinely thought that would be it: I had done what I had wanted to do since I was a little girl – write a story book – and it would be out of my system.  But no, I found I couldn’t live without Sam, and so on I went with the second.  And then in the best tradition of all addictions, I found that a second dose simply made the craving worse, so the idea of the series was born.  And not just a series, but a septology.  What?  It’s a word!  It means “series of seven works” – like a trilogy, but 233% better.

However, what I have found is that when a new book is out, I concentrate so hard on promoting and boosting it that I sometimes forget the two older ones, who are now standing in a corner, rolling their eyes and looking grumpy.  “Fatal Forgery”, in particular, gets a cob on and reminds me that he was here first, and he got us into the bookshops, and he introduced me to Sam.  And that’s right: I should give my first-written more credit.  This was brought home to me today when I took a little tootle around Amazon, as I do, checking for new reviews.  I’m ashamed to admit that I can tell straight away if there are any additions, as I know exactly how many reviews I have: seventeen for “Fatal Forgery”, eight for “The Man in the Canary Waistcoat”, and two for “Worm in the Blossom”.  But wait a sec – what’s this?  Today there were eighteen for “Forgery” – a new one!  And such a lovely one too, with five whole stars and comments like “What a find!” and “carefully crafted writing and tone”.  And to think that I almost missed it, focussed as I was on “Blossom” reviews.

When people see that there are three Sam novels, they often ask which is my favourite, and I honestly don’t know.  I am fond of particular passages in all of them, and I love each cover in its own way.  As to whether you have to start at the beginning, my answer is always the same: the stories can stand alone, so it doesn’t matter if you jump into the middle of the series, but – as with all series with a familiar cast of characters – you do learn more about Sam and Martha and Wilson as you go along, so I suppose it depends on whether you’re a plot person or a character person.  Meanwhile, I shall revel in knowing that I have the luxury of four more novels in which to become ever more addicted to my lovely constable.

A museum of Plankish treasures

I did warn you that things would be going quiet, didn’t I?  I am still in the “let my mind wander” phase of plotting for “Plank 4”, which is very enjoyable but must end soon.  And to keep me disciplined, I have decided to mark the end of this phase with a Day Out in London next Wednesday.  I do have some work that day – a much-anticipated meeting in New Scotland Yard, to do with money laundering – but once I’ve left the police, the rest of the day is Sam’s.  And here’s what I have planned for him:

• We are calling in to Daunt Books in Marylebone High Street to try to persuade them to make room for Sam, Martha and Wilson on their shelves – I’ll explain that this is home turf for my trio, and see if I can melt their book-buying hearts…
• Martha and I are going to an antique jewellery shop just off Oxford Street to look at an emerald and pearl ring that was created in 1820 – we’re wondering whether some broad hints to Sam might be in order
• We are all going to the Sir John Soane’s Museum in Lincoln’s Inn Fields for a good rootle around among the architect’s arty treasures – “Plank 4” deals with art crime, so Sam and I need to get a good feel for what the respected collectors of the day were after.

After that, I might go out for a pasta feast at the wonderfully 1950s Spaghetti House in Goodge Street, although I daresay Sam and Martha would prefer a pie shop – spaghetti might be an import too far for them.  So Wednesday next week is when I have to stop daydreaming and start the serious plotting, but a grand day out will make the transition that much more bearable.

It’s title time again – please vote!

I know, I know: I said I would wait until July to do this, but I’m just too excited, and anyway, it’s my book and my publishing and if I want to think about the title now rather than in July, then I can.  So there.

The name of the first Plank novel – “Fatal Forgery” – was all my own work.  However, long-time readers may remember that when I was publishing “Plank 2”, I asked for your help.  I created a short-list of five possible titles and asked you to vote on your favourite, and that’s the one I used: “The Man in the Canary Waistcoat”.  And you played a blinder, dear readers: everyone, but everyone, loves that title.  So I am shamelessly going to plunge into the same pool of title-picking talent once again, and have devised my short-list of five possible titles for “Plank 3”.

Of course, you need to know a little something about the plot – but not too much….  Let me see.  Well, you have Constable Sam Plank and his wife Martha, and his junior constable William Wilson, all involved again.  But this time, the crimes they are trying to fathom are fratricide (good Biblical crime, that one – murdering your own brother), blackmail, child prostitution and lottery fraud, with some high-level corruption thrown in for good measure.  So, without giving any more away, which of these titles do you like?  I’m trying to avoid anything too “Regency romance” (“Daisies of Dishonour”, or “The Wicked Earl and the Willing Maid”), or anything that makes you think of the Blackadder spoof titles (you may remember “Dish and Dishonesty” and “Nob and Nobility”…).

I’ll keep the poll going right up to the point where I need to give the title to the cover designer – end of September.  Please vote!  And if you can think of something along these lines but better, let me know – we can always go to a second round of voting to accommodate later flashes of inspiration.  So here are your options: