Words of Colour present Yvvette Edwards

Words of Colour Productions, in association with Waterstones Piccadilly, hosted an evening of conversation with award-winning author Yvvette Edwards at the pre-launch of her second book The Mother, a whole week before it’s official release date. Joy Francis, journalist and executive director of Words of Colour, introduced Yvvette, to a packed audience.

Joy asked Yvvette about her reading influences when she was growing up.

Yvvette spoke of how she first started writing as a child after the death of Elvis. "I did my first big piece of work in 1976 when I was ten years old. It was an autobiography of the life of Elvis Presley after he had died. My mother and relatives wailed as if a family member had died so it was a way of working through my grief and trauma."

She then went on to talk about Rosa Guy's The Friends (1995), and how she was so excited that the text had a black protagonist and that Guy was a black author. She devoured the book and looked for more but couldn't find anything.

She also read Stephen King, though the stress of horror means she doesn't read him nowadays. If she comes across a writer she enjoys, she tends to read everything by that author. Toni Morrison is her star writer and she is always thrilled by the beautiful, lyrical and groundbreaking writing.

In her 40s, Yvvette began thinking about her own mortality and began writing about things that aren't written about. Stories from voices you don't hear very often. Women of colour are often presented as caricatures and stereotypes. Yvvette wants to create 3-D characters.

The inspiration for A Cupboard Full of Coats (2011), was a real life scenario. A friend who had got rid of a violent partner. Some years later, she showed Yvvette a newspaper report. The ex partner had been convicted for murder of his then girlfriend.

Yvvette kept thinking about the what ifs, what if the friend had stayed with him. She found herself troubled by the report and wanted to explore different types of love, possessive love that can result in death. Though she was quick to point out, "It is funny in places too!"

It was her agent that pointed out there were no white characters in the novel. And while the agent was speaking about this, Yvvette was doing a silent inventory in her head, thinking "there must be one somewhere".

Joy asked Yvvette how it wasn't until she was 40 that she decided she was a writer even though she had been writing most of her life.

Yvvette spoke about how for her writing is cathartic, a kind of therapy writing, she was always writing, writing. And then one day, thought, I'll send it to the BBC (un-edited).

They sent it back with suggestions. "I thought that's it, I won't be sending them anything more". She did lots of jobs with "no real ambition". Then when she got to 40, she dragged herself up by the lapels and "gave myself a talking to". She reduced her hours at work and began editing.

Yvvette then read an excerpt from A Cupboard Full of Coats.

How would you describe your writing? Asked Joy.

"That's not really my job," laughed Yvvette. And went on to say "...a strong dose of realism, uncompromising, not especially graphic". She enjoyed Silence of the Lambs - found it terrifying even you don't see anything graphic happen. "I try to make that happen with my writing". She went on to say, she had difficulty defining herself and had a resistance to being pigeonholed.

Joy discussed Yvvette's latest novel, The Mother due to be published 7th April, and how it came to be written, whilst observing that she seems to be obsessed with violence and death. But, in a way to convey the humanity of it, and writing about violence in particular.

Yvvette replied she was interested in the "ripple-effect of trauma". A number of things happened that led to the writing of the novel. She saw another stabbing on the news and a friend said, you've got to write about this. And then Yvette's stepson was stabbed. He went out with his friends to Nandos and was stabbed by a random person. He survived but because of his injuries there was the possibility he would have a colostomy bag for the rest of his life.

Yvvette was in shock and couldn't understand how a young boy could go for something to eat with his friends and come back with a colostomy bag. His life changed forever. This traumatic psychological event left her dwelling on stabbings in the UK and led her to question, like many others, "What's going on with young people in this country? Why are they turning to crime?"

Through a series of events, Yvvette found herself interested and listening to experts. And the seeds of The Mother were sewn.

However, there was a novel before The Mother. A second novel that suffered with Second Book Syndrome. When a writing friend had mentioned this, Yvvette dismissed it. But went on to discover the protagonist was too much like Jinx in A Cupboard Full of Coats, and the writing just wasn't happening. She eventually had to admit her writing friend was absolutely right.

But she felt she had worked through some angst in that discarded second novel, so that when she came to write The Mother, it simply flowed.

© Joy Francis

Yvvette then read an excerpt from The Mother, which had the whole audience enthralled. I had been umming and ahhing about reading the book because, I find young boys being stabbed so heartbreaking and thought I wouldn't be able to read it. At the end of the evening there were questions from the audience and I found myself thinking about how writers sometimes write from a place of trauma, when somebody asked:

Had Yvvette experienced a change within herself by the end of each piece of writing?

She had changed since writing The Mother, that even though she was empathic, she had become more so and she understood so much more about the youth of today. As well as the reading that was so engaging, so well-written, this answer intrigued me. Would I be changed after reading it? I found myself buying a copy. In fact I was first in line. I began reading it on the way home and was so engrossed, I didn't realise I had got on the wrong branch of the Northern Line until I found myself in Hampstead. I live in Finchley.

It was an interesting and inspiring evening and I'm pleased to add that Yvvette will be joining us for this year's Finchley Literary Festival 24th-26th June. Readers and writers are in for an absolute treat.

Bone by Bone by Sanjida Kay

It wasn't until the train went past that she saw the small body lying in the long grass by the side of the wood.

The opening sentence of the prologue of Bone by Bone by Sanjida Kay prepares the reader for a gruesome read and from the text a suspiscion that a child has been murdered.

When Autumn had first started at Ashley Grove in September, Laura had been as nervous as her daughter. She’d been worried about Autumn – if she’d make new friends, if she’d fit in – as well as for herself – would the other mothers like her? 

Laura is making a fresh start. Newly divorced and relocated to Bristol, she is carving a new life for her and her nine-year-old daughter, Autumn. But things aren't going as well as she hoped. Autumn is being bullied.

‘Autumn. What kind of dumb name is that? Who’d call their kid that? It’s like say, “Hey, November, come in for your tea.”’ …As he continued, calling her more random and ridiculous names, the boys in her own class started to laugh too, and some of the girls put their hands over their mouths and smirked.

The action takes place over seven months from October to May. The perspective alternates between Laura and Autumn. Not only does this give the reader an insight into how a mother might deal with a bullying situation or not as in this instance, but also the child perspective.

This is a clever device for a book about bullying as it not only illustrates the mother’s worry and powerlessness, but also the vulnerability of being a child who is bullied. A vulnerability created by not wanting to make a fuss, by hoping that the bullying will stop, by believing in the good of people in general.

When the bullying doesn't stop, Laura makes a mistake with dreadful consequences. Autumn fails to return home from school one day and Laura goes looking for her and happens upon a crowd of bullies taunting her little girl. Rage overcomes Laura and spills into violence.

Something inside her snapped. She wanted to kill him. He was so close to her that it only took a shift in her weight,a slight movement forwards and she was right there, her hands on his chest, and then she pushed, as hard as she could.

In the heat of the moment, Laura makes a terrible mistake. A mistake that will have devastating consequences for her and her daughter. But Laura can not anticipate just what those consequences will be, and just how much worse things can become. Friendships begin to unravel, leaving Laura and Autumn even more isolated and lonely. 

In an age where many people have a lot of personal information online, Sanjida gives an insight into the power of the Internet when used for benign purposes and just how easy it is to sabotage a victim's life. The cyber bullying tactics that spill over into real life, are very topical and will resonate with a lot of parents today.

Autumn was acutely aware of the space that had opened up around her. She was alone. no one spoke to her. it was difficult to breathe. She stared down at her shoes on the cracked Tarmac of the playground, a tree root visible beneath the asphalt.

There is an underlying sense of unease throughout the novel as the reader waits for the anticipated murder. As Laura and Autumn struggle with incident after incident, the inaction of the school, of the bully, of his father and of the other parents, the narrative builds and builds to an unexpected climax.

Bullying is horribly common: the NSPCC says that almost half of all children are bullied. Three-quarters of those bullied were physically attacked and 62 per cent were cyber-bullied in 2015 according to a report carried out forDitch the Label. Nearly half of those children who were bullied, didn’t tell anyone about it, but suffered in silence. Sanjida is donating a percentage of the profits from Bone by Bone to Kidscape, the anti-bullying charity.

A disturbing psychological thriller, here is a writer who knows how to upset a reader's equilibrium. A confident insight into the on and offline consequences of bullying, and the nature of the victim. Sanjida's training as a zoologist (she studied chimpanzees for her PhD) is evident as the narrative evolves into a study of bully and victim. If you enjoy reading on the edge of your seat, you'll enjoy this novel with its twists and turns and things that are never quite as they appear to be. 

Sanjida Kay is a writer and broadcaster. Bone by Bone is her first thriller. She lives in Bristol with her daughter and husband.

You can follow Sanjida on Twitter: @SanjidaOConnell

Psychological thriller, Bone by Bone, by Sanjida Kay, published by Corvus Books. Out 3.3.2016

Thank you to Sanjida and Corvus for the review copy.

Finchley in Fiction Part III

Last May, around about the time of the Finchley Literary Festival, I gathered some literary mentions of Finchley. Finchley in Fiction Part I and Finchley in Fiction Part II. These posts received a lot of interest including some new references. 

David Goldstein who has lived in Finchley all his life sent in the following anecdotes.

"Having just read your blog posts about Finchley in Fiction, I would like to contribute a few more:

A Doctor Who episode from 2009, The Waters of Mars, reveals via a screen readout that one of the characters was born in Finchley. This can be seen here

In the 1990s there was a short-lived BBC TV series called The Ghostbusters of East Finchley. Though not that many of the Finchley scenes were actually filmed here. There are some clips online and synopses of the episodes here

When I went to see the 2005 Narnia film at the cinema and heard Susan's line "We're not heroes. We're from Finchley", I was delighted. I would have cheered but I was in Basingstoke at the time.

Having checked the text of The War of the Worlds, I found references to Hampstead and Highgate but sadly none to Finchley.

One of my favourite references to Finchley in fiction is a musical one. In 1967, The New Vaudeville Band got to Number 11 with Finchley Central, a song about the Tube station. 

Having used East Finchley station throughout my life, I have more than a passing acquaintance with Archie. I was once told that the arrow he is firing into the tunnel was at one point represented by an arrow sculpture at the other end i.e. Morden, until thieves took the arrow. I don't know if this is true.

© Mark Moxon 1995-2016 All Rights Reserved

I've also found a book about Archie: Ned's Big Day, written and illustrated by Pam Coiley, published by the Northern Line in 1990. Ned is a Northern Line train who thinks everyone has forgotten his birthday - including his friend Archie - while all along they have been planning a surprise party for him at Morden Depot (which Archie somehow manages to attend!). Ned visits East Finchley station twice during the story."

What a lovely story, thank you to David, for sending these very interesting references.

Peeping Tom by Man Booker prize winner, Howard Jacobson sees Barney Fugleman's two major preoccupations in life: sex and literature. He is obsessed by the life and work of a man hailed by many as a genius of the nineteenth century - and by Barney as a 'prurient little Victorian ratbag'. This curious propulsion drives him out of Finchley, and out of the life he shares with Sharon and her 'rampant marvellings', to Cornwall. There he offends serious ramblers with his slip-on snakeskin shoes, fur coat and antagonism to all things green and growing as he stomps the wild Atlantic cliffs on long, morbid walks, tampering with the truth, tangling with the imperious Camilla - and telling a riotous tale.

Finchley is not just a place that is mentioned in literature, it is also sometimes a character. In Criss Cross, by Don Tracy, written in 1948. "Johnny Thompson" has a job as guard on an armoured truck. His broken nose, scar on left jaw, and a broken knuckle do not enhance his charms for the fair sex, but this does not keep him from courting Anna, a blonde with lascivious eyes and seductive curves. However, Johnny is not "in the dough" and Anna passes him up for Slim. It is the character, Finchley who has to work out how to pull off a seemingly impossible crime, the successful robbery of an armoured truck. His reward will be a week of credit at the liquor store. There will be fake hold ups, double crosses, murders but in the end it is fate that sorts things out.

Finchley is also a character in 'Protected Species', by H.B. Fyfe. A Science Fiction short story that was first published in Astounding Fiction, March 1951. Since then it has also been published in A Science Fiction Omnibus (2007) by Brian Wilson Aldiss. Humans have arrived on a new world to colonize. A world with ancient ruins of some intelligent species no longer around. A world humans are in a hurry to civilize. Finchley is the coordinator of the colonisers. He and comes up against Jeff Otis, the main character who has come to the planet to check the progress of its colonization. Everything is on schedule but he is perturbed by the worker’s attempts to hunt and kill a primitive ape-like species. He encounters one for himself. There is a startling revelation. This short story is very relevant today re affluent man's greed for money over protection of the planet. 

Mark Billingham mentions Finchley in Bloodline (2010). The past is coming back to haunt the people of London: a murderer is targeting the children of victims of Raymond Garvey, an infamous serial killer from London's past. Emily Walker is found beaten and suffocated with a plastic bag in her Finchley home, she appears to be the victim of a domestic dispute.

And on that cheery note, I'll say adieu. Do contact me if you know of any other mentions of Finchley in Fiction. 

Email me: rosiecanning1@gmail.com
Follow me on Twitter: @rosie_canning

Celebrating the Quick Reads 10th Anniversary

Last night I attended the inspiring Quick Reads 10th Anniversary celebration at Foyles in Charing Cross. I had two reasons for doing this; one, I am a huge fan of the Quick Reads initiative and always choose them as my World Book Night choice. And two, I attended in my role as Senior Library Assistant because I wanted to boost our Quick Reads collection in the medical library where I work.

There was only one problem. At a recent library meeting when I mentioned this was what I intended to do, I was asked why we should have fiction in a medical library. I'll come back to this later.

The evening was chaired by Cathy Rentzenbrink. When Quick Reads was founded in 2006 Cathy Rentzebrink was an assistant manager at Hatchards. “I can remember thinking that short books for less confident readers were a good idea. I can also remember wondering pessimistically how many people in that bracket would manage to get themselves into the corner of the basement of Hatchards and stumble upon the books made and meant for them.” Read more here.

The evening's writers—Fanny Blake, Rowan Coleman, Matt Haig, Elizabeth Buchan and Veronica Henry—took to the stage to read from their short stories collected in The Anniversary, edited by Veronica Henry, to celebrate this landmark year.

Veronica Henry spoke about not being able to read was for her like not being able to eat. She went on to say that we don’t always want a full meal, just as we don’t always want to read a novel. That the short story is like a starter. And there was something for everyone in The Anniversary, the book commissioned as a celebration of the tenth Quick Reads anniversay. 

Cathy Rentzenbrink will usually commission a book from a well known author but sometimes if something happens, like illness, the line-up has to be rethought. When this happened last year, Fanny Blake, agreed to step in at the last moment. Blake has written for Quick Reads before: Red for Revenge. Blake said she was shocked after asking for a deadline, and was told two months! She had no time to think about it and in some ways this suited her as she just likes to get on with the writing of it. Though, Blake was given some advice and told, don’t think about the rules, just write it. Go back and change it if you need to. Which is good advice for anyone who has a habit of procrastinating.

Elizabeth Buchan had an operation last year and was feeling a bit fragile, a bit sad. She found reading QR’s the right level for her mind at that particular time. This was echoed by many people in the audience. Her short story, 'Moment of Glory', included in The Anniversary anthology, left the audience on a cliffhanger.

Rowan Coleman has dyslexia and felt marginalized as a child when she was put into remedial groups or in corners with pens and told to colour-in. A teacher who saw 'that' something in her, encouraged her.

Rowan learnt to become friends with her dyslexia. She used to have a great fear of the density of the text and would miss out massive chunks when reading. She would even mime hymns at school which showed great ingenuity. She finished by saying: 'I began my journey of friendship with dyslexia, and the wardrobe opened to Narnia'

Matt Haig spoke about how before he became depressed, he’d been doing a Masters and reading a huge amount. When he got ill he couldn’t read anything because he couldn’t concentrate. He was living back home with his parents in a small town that didn’t have any bookshops. As a way to escape his own mind and do something that wasn’t bad for his liver, he began reading children’s books, his old favourites. He had little moments of losing himself: 'Books are very therapeutic for you'. In the past Haig had a tendency to think that a good book had to be difficult to understand, all tied up with academia. 'There is a lot of snobbery around books,' he said, 'and we have to watch that. Books are for everyone.'

After the last reading, Cathy Rentzenbrink passed the microphone to the audience. Sitting patiently, I asked the final question of the evening. I explained the fiction in medical libraries conundrum, and asked the panel to give me some ideas to take back to the next library meeting.

Some of the suggestions I had already investigated, such as Books on Prescription, Mind Boosting Books, but I hadn't heard of the Wellcome Book Prize. An annual award, it is open to new works of fiction or nonfiction. To be eligible for entry, a book should have a central theme that engages with some aspect of medicine, health or illness. 'The Wellcome Trust is an independent global charitable foundation dedicated to improving health, because good health makes life better.' And that should be the basis of everything we do in the NHS.

A medical library enables NHS staff to boost the health of its patients and heal them. If we inform staff of the therapeutic and mind boosting qualities of fiction, then they in turn can inform patients. However, just as important in my opinion, is the health of the staff. Without them, patients will not get better. And, as most people are aware, the austerity that is being forced on the NHS is having an effect on the health of staff who are being overworked by the shear number of patients they have to look after. I feel it is my job to support the staff in my hospital, and that is what I intend to do.

Matt Haig said that the line between non fiction and fiction was grey, blurred. 'Non fiction is fiction in waiting.' He also said that when he was ill fiction helped him more than non fiction. Stories are all about change and this helped Haig believe change was possible.

The Reading Agency has just published a report with such gems such as:
- A fifth of the nation has been motivated to take better care of their health by reading a book

- 27% of the population have been inspired to make a positive change in their life from reading such as look for a new job or end a bad relationship)

- 41% of adults even find reading to be a better cure for their everyday worries than a night out with friends

I'll be using the report in a new exhibition about health and wellbeing, which will be my response as to why we need fiction in a medical library. If all else fails, I'll have to try some bribery with Galaxy® chocolate that I collected at last nights celebration. GALAXY® Chocolate and Charity Quick Reads revealed research showing 30 minutes reading and [eating chocolate] a week can improve lives. Read more here.

Here are the 2016 Galaxy Quick Reads:

The Anniversary: Ten Tempting Stories From Ten Bestselling Authors (edited by Veronica Henry)

The Double Clue: Poirot Short Stories by Agatha Christie (edited by Sophie Hannah and John Curran)

Too Good to be True by Ann Cleeves

A Baby at the Beach Café by Lucy Diamond

On the Rock by Andy McNab

I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban (An Abridged Edition) by Malala Yousafzai with Christina Lamb

QR titles have now been loaned by libraries nearly 4.3 million times, according to new data from Public Lending Right (PLR). The latest figures for public library loans of all Quick Reads titles up to June 2015 show that total loans since the scheme began are now nearly 4.3 million (4,280,157) - an increase from 3.9 million in 2014.

'Quick Reads are the bridge between literacy and literature. They’re the next step after learning the basics, they’re a crucial tool in the journey from being a non-reader to being someone who has the world of books and words at their disposal.' Cathy Rentzenbrink

To find out more about Quick Reads, visit their website.

Follow Quick Reads on Twitter: @Quick_Reads
Follow the Reading Agency here: @readingagency
Follow Cathy Rentzenbrink here: @CathyReadsBooks
Follow Matt Haig here: @matthaig1
Follow Rowan Coleman here: @rowancoleman
Follow Elizabeth Buchan here: @elizabethbuchan
Follow Fanny Blake here: @FannyBlake1
Follow Veronica Henry here: @veronica_henry

Reading for Happiness

January is a dismal month. With the recent storms, it’s becoming almost impossible to step outside the door without either being drenched, swept away or frozen to death. It’s a much more sensible idea to batten down the hatches, stay home, stay well, and read a book.

Painting by Marie Fox

As far back as Plato, storytelling has been a powerful way in which to mould the human mind. Think moral tales - told for the purpose of conditioning little brains, to warn us of the perils in life, the piggy house made from straw or the wolf hiding in grandma's bed.

If a story can influence a mind, create a set of moral rules for life, a list of rights and wrong, do's and don'ts. Can a story also take a mind that is broken or damaged and re-wire the brain, rewrite life and fix or heal something that was broken or at least provide understanding and relief?

This then is the one of the premises behind bibliotherapy, the therapeutic use of literature to help an individual understand and cope with an illness, or another problem.

This is not a new idea, bibliotherapy was first used in 1916 by Rev. Samuel McChord Crothers in Atlantic Monthly where he talked about a bibliotherapeutic process, literature, both fiction and non-fiction was prescribed as medicine for a variety of ailments.

During World War One, Sadie Peterson-Delaney, a librarian, established one of the earliest recorded formal programmes of bibliotherapy when she prescribed literature to WW1 veterans to boost their self-esteem and "relieve the mind from malady and worry" [1]

In 1946 it was applied for the first time with children. Sister Mary Agnes, published a study on bibliotherapy for 'socially maladjusted children', stressing its use to help children overcome their problems. [2]

There are also Creative bibliotherapy schemes, the library based model, whereby readers self-refer or are referred by health workers to library based bibliotherapists, usually on a 1:1 basis. And the Reading Group model usually linked to the library though not exclusively, like The Reader Organisation who use novels, short stories as well as poetry as their tools for expression.

And there is Poetry Therapy. The focus being on poetry for healing as self-expression and growth of the individual rather than on poetry as art.

Read at the right moment in your life and a novel can—quite literally—change it, save it, and most definitely improve it. Recent neurological studies show that readers of fiction quite literally become the characters they are reading about. (I have always known this.) And this enables a more empathic connection with others.

Ella Berthoud and Susan Elderkin use books to heal. In 2008 they set up the bibliotherapy service at The School of Life in London, and since then have been prescribing books either virtually or in person to patients all over the world. Their prescribing resulted in The Novel Cure: From Abandonment to Zestlessness: 751 Books to Cure What Ails You. It is a reminder of the power books can have on the human mind. ‘Whether you have a stubbed toe or a stubborn case of the blues, within these pages you’ll find a cure in the form of a novel or a combination of novels to help ease your pain.’ 

The Yellow Wallpaper, first published in 1892 in the New England Magazine, explores what happens when a young woman is not allowed to read or write. The story is a first-person account of a young mother’s mental deterioration and is based on Gilman’s own experiences of postnatal depression. The unnamed protagonist of the story is advised to abstain from any and all physical activity and not to use her imagination. The woman’s husband takes her to a country house where she is kept in a former nursery decorated with yellow wallpaper.

After reading The Yellow Wallpaper, you might just need a lift. The Reading Agency’s Mind Boosting Books scheme is a national promotion of uplifting titles, including novels, poetry and non-fiction. The books are recommended by readers and reading groups around the country. Classics such as The Enchanted April by Elizabeth von Arnim; A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr; Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro; and The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce are just four of twenty titles listed.

'There they hang in the wardrobe of our minds, the shapes of books we have read like clothes we have taken off and hung up to wait their season.' [Virginia Woolf]

We wore that jacket, that book cover for a while, it went everywhere with us, on bus and train journeys, to the doctor's surgery, and back home. One day we came to the last page and in many instances there was joy, sometimes sadness and yearning for more. The story had reached its final destination, it was time to say farewell, to close the chapter and with a deep sigh, caress the book and place it back on its shelf or return to the library or friend.


[1] Jack and Ronan, 2008
[2] Agnes, 1946