Books and bookshops

Talking of titles – as I was in my last blog - when we, the Goldenford girls, (http://www.goldenford.co.uk/) were at the Farmers’ Market last week, a woman stopped to stare at our piles of books. When we caught her eye, she said, indicating The Fruit of the Tree, ‘Is that book about apples?’ ‘There is a mention of a Bramley apple tree,’ I said, ‘but actually it’s an autobiographical book. It’s about children.’ She turned away with a dismissive air.

This got Irene and me talking about books titles and how easy it would be to put our books in the wrong category in the bookshop. The Moon’s Complexion, Irene’s novel about India could be placed under Astronomy; Pink champagne and Apple Juice, Anne Brooke’s gay novel would be in the wine section, along with my novella, A Bottle of Plonk, (which was indeed placed there, in one of the local Waterstone’s on one occasion.) Tainted Tree, will of course, be found with The Fruit of the Tree amongst the gardening books – subsection, diseases of trees, perhaps. Jay Margrave’s mediaeval novel, The Gawain Quest is the only one of the novels we’ve brought out, where the title says precisely what the book’s about. See them all at the Goldenford site.

Early in the week, when M was home, no-one having rung for his services, I suggested that we do some invoices. We keep a record on small dockets and when no-one’s paid us anything for a while, we remember to go through them and M spells out what he actually did. It looked as though we had about thirty invoices to do, but when we started on them, they were almost all for one customer, and the work was unfinished. Yippee, I could put them aside, after dealing with the only two relevant ones, and get on with something of my own with a clear conscience. So I finished the short story – the one which started out as an ill wind, almost became anonymous letter and finished up as no smoke without fire. I called it Seeds of Doubt. I can’t say it was the best story ever, but it was beginning to feel like a log-jam. I had to clear it and start on something fresh. I’ve sent it off to the Writers’ News competition now, and can start thinking about the next comp. and my novel too, which has also dried up. I have continued editing Tainted Tree, though. It will soon be ready to submit to others at Goldenford for their comments and editing.

I also nearly finished my reread of The Amateur Marriage for tonight’s reading ‘Round Table’ where apart from discussion, we had a delicious chocolate cake for our third birthday. The general consensus was that Anne Tyler is a good writer and a keen observer of people behaviour and relationships, but we were not enthused by this book; its view on marriage left us rather depressed.

Irene and I have had two bookshop trips this week; today’s to Leatherhead was not productive, because the manager/owner was busy. But he will read the information we left with him and we’ll talk with him again, when he’s had time to browse through our stuff. Yesterday – to Farnborough again, was excellent. The manager of Bookboyz in Farnborough (that’s Hants, not Kent) has booked Irene and me to do a signing event on 6th November with the possibility of another event for the other two at a later date. And he’s ordered our books, already.

If this is what being multi-skilled is all about, we’re certainly doing it. This week, we writers have again been salespersons and marketers, as well as writers and editors. I, of course, at home, have also been a secretary, bookkeeper and financial wizard. Next week we’ll be selling books at some lunchtimes at the Guildford Institute, during the Book Festival. Delighted to say hallo to any Guildfordians. The lunches are good there, too.