Disappointment

So Severe Discomfort is not The Guardian's 'self-published book of the month' for October.

I had high hopes when I spotted this competition - but I have high hopes whenever I enter a competition or send a submission off to a prospective agent or publisher.  Victory or acceptance is certain and as a result, my work will reach the audience it deserves.  Books will sell in serious numbers.  Funds will be raised that do more than buy biscuits.  Public opinion will shift.  The Daily Mail's sales will slump.  The minds of politicians will be changed.  Policies will be rewritten...   

However, within minutes of dropping the envelope into the box or pressing send, I am convinced that I haven't a hope in hell of getting out of the slush piles, let alone winning the prize or contract.  It's all a waste of time.  I've pitched it wrong - and to the wrong people.  It starts too slowly.  The characters are too ordinary.  It's not literary enough.  Its chronological format is too conventional.

- It's not very good...

- But 'Occupy London' gave it a great review, and so did those people on Amazon and Goodreads, and only a couple of them are my friends.

- You don't have any friends...

This Gollumesque monolgue persists until an outcome is known.  The lingering hope is torture until the result is published.  The deadline passes without contact. The rejection letter or email arrives.  It's simultaneously a disappointment and a release.

This time it was worse than usual as, having entered the competition in August I assumed it would be September's result I needed to watch.  As the first Tuesday approached and there was no contact, hope faded.  A worthy winner was named.  Then I looked more closely and found September's result was the judgment on July's entries.  Hope was cruelly rekindled for another month - only to be snuffed out again. 

And I really was optimistic this time.  Previous winners of the Guardian's monthly contest have been a pretty ecclectic selection and, although it ought to be a measure of literary merit, you do half-hope that a progressive paper might take pity on your political agenda if not your prose.  Imagination conjures up a scene in which an earnest junior reviewer pleads your cause, even as the Chancellor is on his feet at the Conservative conference being cheered for slashing in-and-out of work benefits alike.  But if there was (and it's conforting to think there might have been), he or she hasn't prevailed.

Never mind, eh?  It may have made very little difference to the book's prospects.  After all, I had to search surprisingly hard for this month's result as the story doesn't even figure on the 'books' page of their 'culture' section today.  If I had been the winner (Mark Capell with Cafe Insomnia - good luck, old chap!) I would have felt more than a little short-changed at that. 

Anyway, I'll keep trying.  I am an optimist at heart - didn't I return to benefits advice work in 2013, just as things started to get really nasty?  The prospect of fighting a long defeat does not daunt me.

So let's see - I wonder if the Morning Star run a writing competition? 

On Location

Not Andromeda House

I've been back in the borough that inspired Severe Discomfort et al, catching up with friends and family.  I've also been wandering around my former home village and the neighbouring city, reminding myself of the atmosphere and architecture as I get further into the first draft of a story with homes and housing very much in the spotlight.

Looks like the Construction Co-op have been at work!

In particular, I needed to refresh my memory of the local ex-Council housing.  Northern estates have different brick colours and house shapes; more brick walls but fewer hedges, garage blocks and owner-occupiers.  It helped to get another look at the type of house where Lyn and Terry muddle through their lives together, with Stu and Linda next door and Susan up the road.  Their crescent of houses isn't a real road, but if it did exist I know exactly where in the borough it would be.  



Who lives in a house like this?



It wouldn't be Netley Abbey, where I grew up, though Netley's housing, past and present, does inspire some of my characters' homes.  Houses like Hilary's fine old Victorian villa - only with the misfortune to stand in less auspicious locations than the prosperous environs of Winchester - have fallen beneath the tracks of JCBs, having decayed through multi-occupancy and low-budget care home use over the decades since they ceased to be sought after by officers from the old military hospital. 

New flats in a variety of shapes have sprung up in their place, many blessed with the fake balconies so detested by Sally Archer (she knows a crap building when she sees one), leaving parts of the village feeling claustrophobic, but a few gems such as the one at the top of this post remain - for now.  Netley's Station Road also has some larger classic 'thirties semis' of the type where Mike, Lorraine and their children reside, though their home isn't sited anywhere near here in its imagined version. 

It's possible, however, that someone will end up in one of these trendy terraces along the 'front of the village' before the end of the current tale.  No spoilers!

I also needed to remind myself of the streets of more modest semis in the suburbs that ring Southampton, as a couple of intrepid first-time buyers are trying to settle in just such a neighbourhood.  Having picked my location based on memory, I was able to note a few new features of the area that will be crucial for a pivotal scene I'll be writing very soon. 


Southampton Semis



In fact one reason (among many) making me feel I should move on from my current cast and location after this story is the rapidly changing face of the area where it is set.  Even since I last checked out the Woolston area for a cameo appearance by Weston Shore in Limited Capability, a vast number of new flats have sprung up on the site of the former Vosper Thornycroft shipbuilders' with yet more under construction.  Both Southampton and Eastleigh have inexplicable new road layouts and strange new buildings in prime locations, new industries and new communities since I last worked there.  Unless I decided to travel back in time and meet the cast at an earlier stage in their lives, I fear their world and mine are drawing further apart.

If it feels as if it's time to move north for locations and characters, there's no shortage of material.  Daphne has a backstory and two notebooks of draft adventures for a start.  Alternatively, having read and thoroughly enjoyed Hilary Mantel's short story The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher in the Guardian last weekend, the field of alternative history beckons.  Perhaps we might go back to 2002 and watch as a broken old television set falls from the third storey window of an Easterhouse tenement onto the balding pate of a failed Tory Party leader...?

I need a Tardis - right now!

Why I write what I write

I had planned something light-hearted for this post, but events have overtaken 'Plan A' so apologies in advance if this comes across as something of a ranty one - more Martin Connolly than Toby Novak, for those of you familiar with my characters.  It's all Atos's fault - naturally.  Or perhaps it's the Daily Mirror's fault - yep, that is Mirror not Mail, this time.  See what you think. 

What's got me riled is a story doing the rounds of various social media disability rights and anti cuts groups (several of which I support) which has recently been published in the Mirror.  Headlined "Humiliated blind woman asked by ATOS benefits assessor: 'How many fingers am I holding up?' " it describes a fairly typical Work Capability Assessment - typical in that the probably under-trained and inappropriately qualified assessor stuck to a standard script rather than tailoring the assessment to the obvious impairment of the claimant.  Discourteous, humiliating and arguably in breach of the Disability Discrimination Act.  Maddening - but that's not what's making me seethe.

My problem is with the alleged quote from the subject of the story.  According to the Mirror:

'Natasha said: "There are so many people receiving benefits that they don't really deserve, people who don't want to work.  And yet people like me who have genuine disabilities, many much worse than mine, are being forced to do humiliating tests like this.  Benefits Street is being filmed a couple of miles away in Stockton and programmes like that give people the impression benefits are being handed out to everyone.  I listened to the first series and there was someone on there with 11 kids who didn't seem to want to work.  And yet I'm told I have to find a job based on tests I am still struggling to understand."'

Natasha may very well have said just that.  People naturally lash out when they're angry.  My former clients often did - so often, that there were times I could have hurled someone's appeal papers at them for being so damned self-righteous.  It's what we're all told: it's what Benefits Street exists to tell us.  But the Daily Mirror proports to be a left-wing, or at least a Labour, newspaper.  I don't expect the same old, same old.  I expect proper analysis and truth.  If this is a journalistic licence version of what she said, shame on them.  Even if it is what was said verbatim, I fail to see how it helps the story to incite ill-feeling towards other benefit claimants who are already frequent victims of hate crime.

Proper analysis of this story wouldn't be asking readers to vote on whether Natasha should be reassessed either.  You could reassess Natasha a dozen times and, if you followed the regulations, you'd get the same result.  Seriously.  'Atos' are not the problem here.  Yes, their assessor was clumsy, insensitive and sceptical, but a paragon of good practice would also have to give 9 points because, since April 2011, that is the law.  I know this, because I wrote a minor character with an identical degree of visual impairment and mobility into Limited Capabilty to make that very point (Linda Jenkins - ebook Episode 2).  She got 9 points from one of the 'good' assessors at my fictional assessment centre; there were no solid grounds for her to appeal.

Unless the actual Work Capability Assessment is changed - or scrapped - the real Natasha's and Linda's will keep being found fit for work.  Arguably, they are - the DWP itself had a blind Secretary of State in 2005!  But they are also quite obviously of 'limited capability for work' in any meaningful sense of the phrase since many roles and professions would be precluded by thier disability and many others by the unsuitability of too many workplaces and inflexibility of too many employers.  Benefit entitlement should surely reflect this.

Finally, I'm not at all sure where the Mirror got their numbers from, but I sincerely hope they haven't gone away without telling Natasha about PIP (if she isn't already getting DLA - high rate mobility, low rate care?) and that in fact her JSA wouldn't be a basic £72.40 at all, but should include a disability premium of over £30 a week. 

Sorry - does that count as a spoiler?

Fully Re-covered!

  

A bonus scene from the 'Director's Cut' of Limited Capabilty

[No spoilers - honest!]
Just in time for the 5th Friday and thus the 'big giveaway' of Limited Capability, I've finished replacing the 'art paper' covers for the ebook episodes with appropriate photos.  I've also taken the opportunity to fix some typos, though the major proofing exercise is still on hold pending the final reports from two of my triumvirate of proof-readers.

My original plan for Episode 13 (a pair of trendy trainers - that will make sense when you read it, if you haven't already) has been superceded by a details from a picture of a classic Victorian Town Hall.  It could be the home of the Solent Welfare Rights Project, as I pictured them working from a building of this era, but in fact this one is a long, long way from Hampshire.  It is Fenton Town Hall, here in the heart of the Potteries - Fenton being the sixth of what Arnold Bennett named the 'Five Towns' (and whose inhabitants have never quite forgiven him his oversight).  It's an appropriate choice despite that, though having promised there would be no spoilers I can't spell out why!

One thing the Project staff won't get to admire in their Town Hall is a First World War memorial with the grandeur of Fenton's.  An impressive tribute to almost 500 local men lost in that conflict and made from individually hand-painted Minton tiles, it is absolutely unique. 

Having been used as a Magistrates' Court since the Six Towns became one city, Fenton Town Hall is being sold by the Ministry of Justice and may very well pass out of public ownership.  Even if the building is safe (and many local campaigners are not convinced it is) public access to the memorial could be greatly diminished or lost.  The memorial certainly won't move to a safe home in a museum - the attempt would result in its destruction.  There is a petition calling on it to be saved for posterity here:

http://www.change.org/p/stop-the-desecration-of-fenton-great-war-memorial-1914-1918

It already has over 10,000 signitures, but a few extras won't hurt.

Episode 14 was always going to be a tough one to pick a pic for and I haven't really, as the photo illustrates the final chapter of the story available as an ebook, though the current paperback omits this event.  It's still part of the bigger picture, however - I've decided to save it for the opening chapter of the 'new book'. 

Treat it as a sneak preview!

Don't forget it's something of a giveaway weekend - in addition to all of the Limited Capability episodes free tomorrow, the Severe Discomfort ebook is free Saturday and Sunday and, for all you quick readers, Continual Supervision is free the following weekend.  If you enjoy the books and can afford to do so, please make a donation (on Lyn and Terry's behalf, as it were) to your local CAB and if you are feeling particularly generous, pop a rating (or even better, a little review) on Amazon or Goodreads for me.  Thanks!
https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=sarah+honeysett

Ebook Freebie Timetable

It would be fabulous to think that I could make a living as a writer - but better scribblers than me are feeling the pinch in these days of digital downloads.

There's also this problem that, having priced my ebooks as low as I can go to make them accessible and affordable to as many people as possible (there being a public information or 'counter-propaganda' element to my tales), for each £1 we raise for the 'Beverage Fund', Amazon takes £2.

I would rather give the stories away than settle for that, so I do.  Episodes of Limited Capability are currently free to download every Friday with 1, 5, 9 and 13 available on the first Friday of the month, 2, 6, 10 and 14 on the second and so on.  They're all free on the 5th Friday (the next one is 29th August).  I may swap the day later in the autumn, so people who have lively social lives and are out on Friday nights can also get their Welfare Rights Lit fix for free.  I've added an 'ebook freebie timetable' page to the blog that you can check for updates.

Severe Discomfort doesn't have a fixed timetable but is next due for free release on 30th and 31st August and 13th and 14th September.  Continual Supervision is free on 6th and 7th September and 20th and 21st September.

If you download free ebooks and can afford to do so, please make a donation to your local CAB, Law Centre or local Welfare Rights Project.  Biscuits are good.  Cash is also good, as we don't get as much as that from the Government and local councils as we used to. 

If you aren't sure what the 'Beverage Fund' is supposed to do, the blog post about it is here: http://benebook.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/the-beverage-report.html

One day I'll find out how to do those clever links without the whole web address...

Looking the Part

Following my recent discovery that my books and ebooks are on Goodreads, I've taken the plunge and set up an author page that I can edit.  It's here... 
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6959945.Sarah_Honeysett

Potentially, it's great publicity as there is space for an author profile (done one for Amazon - copied with minor edits to GRs), a blog or a link to an existing blog (check!) and a photo.

Not this one.  The guidelines talk about a 'professional author photo' and other (ie.'real') authors generally have nice head-and-shoulders black and white pics of themselves.  While I'm a stranger to the professional studio, I have no shortage of pictures taken by my husband, some of which are in focus and others I even quite like, but most of the recent ones do make me look like Professor Mary Beard steering a narrowboat.  Not, I hasten to add, that there is any disgrace in looking like the fabulous Prof. Mary but it would be dreadful to be mistaken for the great lady writing under a pseudonym and have people post questions to you in Latin and expect authentic Roman puns and witticisms in reply.

I decided it would also be a shocking cheat to go back too many years and flatter myself with a more youthful image, though I'm sure there are authors who do.  That narrowed the field considerably.

 

 I eventually settled on this one.  It's from 2012, taken by Jon while we were strolling round Portmeirion (the village in Wales, not the pottery) on his birthday.  It's an appropriate choice as, in addition to catching me with a smile (rather than a manic grin) and with my eyes open, it was during this little holiday that I told Jon that while he had been out with his pals on their regular Thursday pub night, I had started writing a book.

After posting it on Facebook, one friend commented that she could imagine it on the back cover of a good paperback.  That's an encouraging endorsement. 

All I have to do now is write one. 

A Good Read?



A perfect spot for a summer afternoon



At a loose end and unable to settle to writing after too much screen-gazing at work today, I've just been 'googling' my name and book titles.  It almost seems vain to do any such thing, but I have an occasional check to see whether anything interesting is being said, or whether anyone has reviewed a volume or two.  It was doing this that turned up the very positive review on Occupy London's blog that I mentioned in my post And the winner isn't... last month.

The surprise this time was discovering that my books are listed on Goodreads.  I (being a complete amateur, obviously) assumed that you opted on to this app by setting up an author page, or your publisher put you on if you were successful enough to have one, or too dead to do it yourself. 

Setting up on Goodreads has been on my 'to do' list for a while...

But the books are there already, without a move from me.  There are a mere three ratings so far, allocating 4 and 5 stars to Severe Discomfort (oddly, from the same person - but thanks for both Louise, if you're reading this!) but a mere 2 to Continual Supervision (from a different reader).  

Friends and Facebookers who use Goodreads, you may wish to help The Cause by adding your own rating or review here...

https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/6959945.Sarah_Honeysett

...though, as it links to you Facebook identity, you will have nowhere to hide if you say anything evil!

Ratings, as opposed to reviews, can be a tiny bit frustrating because you don't know what the reader liked or didn't like, and I would quite like to know.  Constructive criticism is helpful, but as it stands I don't know what impressed Louise, or didn't appeal to my two-star rater.  Was the conclusion to the plot too contrived?  The writing style not literary enough?  Disappointly political, when it gets off to quite a saucy start, or vice versa?  I may never know...

After pondering the ratings, I noticed a link to 'similar authors'.  Overcome with curiousity and mild trepidation to see what that would suggest, I clicked the link.

Nothing happened.  

Does this mean there are no similar authors?  Or is it just that there is too little information on me and the books for the Goodreads algorithms to start making suggestions?  If they're as good as the ones Facebook use to target ads and pages at me, I'm almost afraid to add any further data!  FB has been prompting me to like David Cameron's page for most of the last fortnight.  It might suggest Iain Duncan Smith as a 'similar author'.  Perish the thought!

Towards the foot of the author page there's a space for 'Sarah's fans'. 

And then the words 'none yet'.  (Sigh!)

But who needs fans, when you have comrades?