When my publishers first mentioned a book trailer for Maze Running I was a bit worried – I thought I’d have to script it, or at the very least appear in it. But it’s been a very painless process: Floris Books wrote it, filmed it and edited it themselves, with no involvement from me at all. And now the Maze Running trailer is up on Youtube, I’m really pleased with it. I think it’s a combination of wonderfully simple and excitingly pacy. (Here it is…)
I’m a fan of trailers. When I go to the cinema, I always make sure I’m settled down in plenty of time to see the trailers, so I can enjoy a little taster of films I’ll probably never have time to go and see. And I’ll even admit to wasting a bit of writing time recently watching every available version of the Hobbit trailer online.
A film trailer is usually (not always, but usually) a good way to decide if you’ll enjoy the full film, because you get a sense of the content and the style of the film.
But is a trailer a good way to decide if you’ll like a book? If you like the look of the trailer, or the background music, or a voice-over, then you might decide to read the book, but none of those elements will appear in the book (which is simply words on a page, not pictures on a screen or music in an earphone.)
And if you don’t like the music or the camera angles, could the trailer put you off the book? And would that be daft, because the book trailer isn’t made up of bits of the book in the way that a film trailer is made up of bits of the film?
So is a trailer a useful way to judge a book?
Probably it’s no dafter a way to judge a book than by its cover, given that the cover artist often hasn’t even read the book! Or by its blurb, which isn’t usually written by the author.
Are any of these useful ways to pick a book? Or are they all just ways for a book to catch your eye, then the story inside must live up to the cover, blurb or trailer’s promise?
Are book trailers just another way for publishers and authors to try to give books a presence online (like Facebook, Twitter, and blogs like this…) and does all this (very time consuming!) online activity actually help readers choose books?

So what do you think of the current trend of trailers for books?

Have you ever gone out and bought a book simply because of a trailer?

What do you think of the Maze Running trailer?

And what other book trailers have you enjoyed?

There’s a set of questions doing the rounds of authors’ blogs at the moment – the idea being that one author asks five other authors (authors whose work they like, and who they think might be The Next Big Thing) to answer the same questions the next week.
I was delighted to be asked by Roy Gill last week (here are his answers, about his fabby new book The Daemon Parallel) and you can find the authors I’m passing the torch onto at the bottom of the blog.
Here are the questions:
• What is the title of your next book?
It’s called Maze Running. Its full name is Maze Running And Other Magical Missions, because it’s part of a series which began with First Aid For Fairies And Other Fabled Beasts, so each subsequent book has a long and unwieldy title. But the book answers to Maze Running when you’re shouting it in for its tea!
• Where did the idea come from for the book?
It grew out of a quest I nearly wrote for Wolf Notes, the second book in the series, but which didn’t quite fit with that story. It was about Helen (my human heroine) and Lee (an untrustworthy faery warrior) going on a quest to find a token with magical healing properties. Then I thought – why not END the series with this quest, because the books are about a vet’s daughter who uses scientific and veterinary healing techniques to heal magical creatures. So I wondered – what if one of Helen’s friends is magically injured, so her rational human first aid won’t work, and they need to find magic to heal magic? Then the single quest turned into three simultaneous quests, as all of Helen’s friends desperately quest for the one object which will save their friend, but which might also – just to add to the tension – help the usual lurking baddie to take over the world. So a quest which wasn’t right for one book, ended up inspiring an entirely new book.
• What genre does your book fit into?
Scottish fantasy adventure, for 8 – 12 yr olds (if that’s a genre!)
• What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
This is the question which worried me most when I agreed to do this blog post!
I’ve always loved the covers of these books, because the silhouettes of the centaur, the selkie, the faery etc, leave the readers lots of space to imagine the characters, to create their own unique film running in their head as they read. But if I picked a few actors’ names out of the air, and attached them to these characters, suddenly readers would see those famous faces imposed on the characters in their heads. And I think that would alter the relationship between the reader and the story. So, I’m not committing myself to this one!
• What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?
Searching Scotland for the magic to save your friend, and the courage to stop those who would use your quest to control the world, all by sunset on the Spring Equinox.
• Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?
I am represented by the wonderful Fraser Ross Associates and these novels are published by the equally wonderful Floris Books.
• How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
Just over six months, which is half as long as most of the novels in the series, because the story was so clear in my head when I started, and also because I really know the characters well by now.
• What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
I wouldn’t dare compare anything I write to the books I love the most … but I know what I’m aiming for. I love the mix of myth and modern in Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson and Heroes of Olympus books, and as a child I loved the Chrestomanci books by Diana Wynne Jones, which are amazing at creating worlds which are almost, but not quite, like our own.
• Who or what inspired you to write this book?
The readers who loved the other books in First Aid for Fairies series. And who – it turns out – are quite upset that Maze Running is the final book in the series. Sorry!
• What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
The real Scottish locations. I’ve used real places which have legends and magic attached to them, like the Eildon hills, the Sutors of Cromarty and the king-making hillfort of Dunadd. But if mythical geography isn’t your thing there are also some kickass baddies in Maze Running: minotaurs, dragons, uruisks and some very creepy women in red.

Here (in no particular order) are five other writers and illustrators I’d like to introduce you to, who are going to answer the same questions NEXT week, so please check back and see what they say about The Next Big Thing:

Lynne Rickards, who writes very funny and touching picture books, mostly about penguins and puffins! (She’s also a great artist herself, so her blog is always beautiful.)

Cate James, who is a wonderful illustrator of picture books, and also has the great responsibility of being the illustrator of my first collection of myths and legends (all my favourite Scottish stories) which comes out next year.

Joan Lennon, who writes the clever Slightly Jones Mysteries, and who kindly let me sit in on one of her school visits when I was an ‘about to be published author’ almost 5 years ago.

Helen Grant, who writes extremely spooky, action-packed teenage novels set mostly in Germany, which have a very fairy tale feel. But not the fluffy pink fairy tales, the deep dark forest Grimm fairy tales (which I much prefer.)

Caroline Dunford, who is a prolific writer of non-fiction, crime novels and plays, and still manages to be a huge support and source of advice for other writers too. She also has the most incredibly cool Twitter name: @verdandiweaves

And of course, if you want to read other writers’ answers NOW, you could go back to Roy’s blog, read his fascinating answers about his excellent book the Daemon Parallel and also investigate what the four other writers he tagged last week, are putting up this week. (I hope we all give different answers…)

I visited Traquair Maze again last week, filming an interview about Maze Running. I’ve been to the maze several times now, the first couple of times to research the novel, then another couple of times for press and publicity things (research is far more fun!) But this time, something had changed.
We came round the corner of the lovely old house, lugging cameras and tripods and copies of the book, and we walked into a
BEAR.
A bear. Just standing there. Ignoring us.
It took a minute to realise that it was a statue of a bear. There were two of them: one bear near the corner of the maze by the house, the other bear near the entrance of the maze. And they were obviously permanent residents – there was even a sign saying ‘do not lean on the bears.’ It’s probably ok to feed them, or tell them stories, though!
They were lovely bears. But they annoyed me, because they weren’t there when I researched the book! So when I described Helen running round the maze, or Sapphire landing between the house and the maze, I didn’t mention any bears. And now someone reading the book who knows the maze, or someone who visits the maze after reading the book, might say: ‘How came Helen never saw those big bears?’ or ‘Why didn’t that writer research the maze properly before she wrote this book?’
I did research it! And if the bears had been there when I first visited, Helen would undoubtedly have used them in some clever way to defeat the Master.
But the bears weren’t there last year. So they didn’t make it into the book, and now the book is already out of date, even though it was only published a couple of months ago.
Does it matter? Is it just one of the risks of using real life places, that they don’t stay the same? It’s happened to me before though…
When I first visited Dunvegan Castle to case the joint for the break-in during Wolf Notes, there was a ‘prisoner moaning’ sound effect in the dungeons which sounded like a monster howling, so I put that in my book. When I went back to do an event about Wolf Notes, they had changed their sound track and the moan wasn’t there any more. (So I read a different bit that day!)
These changes in a location can make me feel like the world is moving my goalposts without telling me. And every time it happens, I think, ‘oh no, I should never revisit locations!’
I never regret using real locations, though, because I want the fabled beasts to have their adventures in the same Scotland we live in!
But sometimes these new discoveries at locations can enhance the book, in a way which is almost magical.
I researched Smoo Cave for Storm Singing in the winter, so there were no boat tours to the inner caves (that didn’t affect my research, because all the action happened in the outer cave and the first cave, which you can see from the viewing platform.)
I went back the next summer, to read the quest in the cave to a group of kids in the cave, and I went on the boat trip too. When the tour guide dropped bread in the water of the dark cave, where I had imagined a giant eel snapping at Helen’s feet, suddenly the water was alive with fish, snapping at the bread. That was a spooky and shocking realisation that what I had imagined – predators under the water – wasn’t very far from the truth!
Locations change, of course they do. That’s bound to happen if I use real life places. Sometime they change in a way which makes my research a wee bit out of date, and sometimes they change in ways which make the adventures seem even more true!
And I didn’t really get too annoyed about unexpected bears. Especially when they were happy for me to read Maze Running to them…

Reading Maze Running to a Bear

Unexpected bear, at Traquair

At the Edinburgh Book Festival earlier this week, I was sitting at a signing table looking at a long line of First Aid For Fairies fans (I knew they were fans, because most of them were cuddling a stack of slightly dog-eared books) and I had to think of something personal, interesting and appropriate to write in each book.
Because Maze Running is the last of the series, I asked most of the readers “Who’s your favourite character?” so that I could write in their book: “Thanks for coming on x’s last adventure.”
I’ve been asking that question in all the events I’ve done this summer, and I’ve been surprised to discover that pretty much every character has fans. In a line of readers there will almost certainly be Helen fans, Yann fans, Sapphire fans, Rona fans, Lavender fans, Catesby fans… There might be fewer Sylvie, Lee, Serena and Tangaroa fans, because they don’t appear in as many books. But even so, I think almost every character in the series is somebody’s favourite. At the Maze Running launch, I even met a boy whose favourite character was the Master of the Maze!
And I’ve met, or seen pictures of, children dressed as various First Aid For Fairies characters for World Book Day (I’ve met Helen, Lee, Lavender and Rona, but I wonder if there have been any others? Any phoenixes? Any centaurs? In fact, I hereby promise to send a free signed book to the first person who can prove they’ve successfully dressed up as Yann!)
I have my own favourite characters too. But I wonder whether I like my characters for the same reasons readers do?
Do some readers like Lavender or Rona because they like the idea of being a fairy or a selkie? Do some readers like Sapphire because all dragons are cool? (As well being as fiery hot…) So now my signing queues could get even longer, because I might start asking not just: “Who’s your favourite character?” but also: “Why?”
As a writer, I like my characters for lots of different reasons. For example, a particular character might be very useful when I’m writing the story: Sapphire is incredibly handy as transport, Yann is great for kicking doors in, Lavender is very easy to injure (sorry), Sylvie can be relied on to disagree with pretty much anyone. And there wouldn’t be a First Aid for Fairies series at all without Helen to be our guide in that world, or all those nasty baddies making the adventures necessary.
But I don’t just use my characters to push the story along, I enjoy their company too. So my truly favourite characters are the ones whose voices I can hear in my head, who seem to come alive as I write and who surprise me by doing things I don’t expect. For that reason, Yann is my absolute favourite because he argues with me all the time (I can sometimes actually hear him shout at me) and I’m also very fond of Lee, because I never quite trust (or understand) his motives or indeed his world, which is a very interesting position for a writer. And outside the First Aid For Fairies series, I love Emmie in Rocking Horse War, who changed that entire story by putting her hands on her hips and giving me a cheeky smile.
So, who are your favourite fabled beast characters, and why? And do you think writers and readers like characters for different reasons?

Maze Running signing queue at Edinburgh Book Festival 2012

I’m not long back from the most memorable and fun Maze Running event I’ve done yet.
I do thoroughly enjoy chatting to kids about books in libraries and bookshops, but the kind of event I love doing most is taking books and readers out into the real world, to talk about research, inspiration and imagination in the legendary locations where I actually set my adventures.
And yesterday, I climbed to the top of Dunadd, a rocky hillfort in Kilmartin Glen in Argyll, and read an ambush scene involving minotaurs, dragons, wolves, swords, axes, mice and some very odd rope, to more than thirty people in the bright sunshine, including a mix of readers from 6 year old girls to 13 year old boys.
It was wonderful! There is a tiny natural amphitheatre right at the top of the hill: a curve of Iron Age (I think) wall where I put my books and bottle of water, facing a slope of grassy hillside where all the readers and their parents sat. We were just above the carved footprint where Scottish kings were crowned many years ago, the footprint which was at the heart of the magic which drew me to set a scene at Dunadd.
And the audience were all fantastic! Dunnadd is, in the nicest possible way, in the middle of nowhere. Everyone had had to drive a significant distance to get there (one family had driven for at least 90 minutes to attend the event), everyone had to wear sensible outdoor clothes, and listen to a health and safety talk at the bottom, then climb up a rocky steep path to get to the top. So they were REALLY keen. That’s the best kind of audience!
Some of them even brought their dragons. A head count would have suggested five dragons, but as the orange one was two-headed, there were really four different cuddly or plastic dragons at the top of the hill. And someone brought a large white unicorn, which given the rescue scene at the start of Maze Running, was very appropriate!
So, surrounded by the sunlight and the rocks, with everyone having a view of the wonderful Scottish landscape all around us, I read the start of the quest on Dunadd, pausing a couple of times to point out that the dragon was parked just behind the lady from Kilmartin House Museum, then to say that the minotaur was holding his blackhandled axe in amongst the parents at the back and that the grey-legged faun was being nasty to a mouse where I was standing. It’s amazing to read a scene out loud exactly where I imagined it happening. It brings the characters and action to life, in a way which is almost magical.
Then I encouraged the children to imagine their own quests and adventures on Dunadd. We had a few dragon ambushes, some very sneaky treasure hunting, and a really unusual way of hiding a centaur. Everyone’s imaginations were sparking in the sunshine!
Then I told a myth which had come over to Scotland from Ireland, just like the kings of Dalriada who were crowned on Dunadd. I chose that myth because it allowed me to stab the wee boy reclining on the grass slope at the front with a particularly nasty spear.
But my favourite moment was when I described how the silent ambush tactic used by the minotaur was inspired by a snake I had seen on Dunadd on one of my research visits. When I said “snake” everyone in the audience jerked backwards, half stood up, or checked the grass under their bottoms, and they all looked extremely worried for a moment. (The adults looked much more worried than the kids!) So I had to say that I knew what kind of snake it was, and it was NOT poisonous, and anyway, we had seen it way over on the other side of the hill LAST YEAR.
No-one had worried about a fictional minotaur in their midst or a dragon behind them, but almost everyone reacted very speedily to a passing mention of an innocent snake! That’s something which never happens in a bookshop.
In previous years I’ve read from First Aid for Fairies at Tam Linn’s Well, Wolf Notes outside Dunvegan Castle, and Storm Singing in Smoo Cave, all of which were wonderful locations, but I think reading from Maze Running on Dunadd was my favourite outdoor event so far. Partly because of the incredible weather, partly because of the snake reaction, but mostly because of the huge effort all the readers made to get there and the wonderful dragons and ideas they brought with them.
Books. Hills. Kids. Stories. I have the BEST job in the world!

Maze Running event on Dunadd

We launched the fourth and final book in the First Aid for Fairies series last night.  In a hot and crowded hall just off the Royal Mile (there were groups from at least 6 primary schools there!) we held a launch party for Maze Running.

But what is a book launch FOR? For readers it’s a chance to eat some crisps, and get a signed copy of the book before anyone else. For the publishers it’s a chance to let booksellers and buyers know the book is out there. And for the writer it’s a chance to thank all the people involved in turning a story into a book (and for Maze Running there were lots of thanks, including publishers, agents, early readers, my kids, vets… I hope I didn’t forget anyone last night!)

So a launch is really a hello to a book. A birth day birthday party, perhaps.

But last night was not just a hello. It was a goodbye too. Because Maze Running is the last in the series, I was saying goodbye to the characters and to the series.  Which wasn’t easy.  And quite a lot of readers in the signing queue asked me to write another one PLEASE! But I can’t write another First Aid for Fairies book.  I stood up there and said to everyone: “This is the last time Helen will go on an adventure with the fabled beasts, to heal their injuries, at the solstices and equinoxes.” And while the word “last” in that sentence seems quite definitive, it might be possible to gallop a centaur through the wide gaps in the rest of the sentence…

However, several other readers in the signing queue mentioned that their favourite book of mine was Rocking Horse War, and wondered if I would write a sequel to that, now that I’m done with Helen. So that’s an idea I’m kicking about as well…

But right now, I’m not thinking about what I’m going to write next, I’m concentrating on saying hello to Maze Running, and goodbye to the fabled beasts.

So here are a few (slightly blurry) photos of the launch. Me reading to a small group of fabled beast fans, and a few favourite character pictures from Lorne Primary in Leith and Calderwood Lodge in East Renfrewshire.

Thanks to everyone who helped to launch Maze Running!

chatting to a handful of fabled beast fans

some of Lorne Primary's favourite characters

some of Calderwood Lodge Primary's favourite characters

I just looked at the very first folder for Maze Running, created when it was still called First Aid Four, and when I was working on each chapter individually, rather than in one big manuscript.

Looking at the names of the chapter files, you would think that I never sat at my own desk:

• One chapter was started in a primary school staffroom (Chap 6, Priorsford)
• Another was started in a primary school general purpose room between author events (Chap 17, Troon)
• At least three were written on long train journeys
• One was started in a train station in Lanarkshire when I on got the wrong train and was stuck in a waiting room for a couple of hours
• One quest was completed on the platform at Dundee train station
• One chapter was written in a hotel when I was doing a book festival in the North of England (Chapter 20, Durham)
• One was written in a B&B in Gairloch, in the far north west
• Another was finished in a guest house in Wigtown, in the far south west
• One was started at Meadowbank Stadium in Edinburgh
• “Chapter 11, Mitchell” suggests that I injured a dragon in the Mitchell library (quietly!)
• Three different chapters are titled “ballet” because I started them sitting on cold steps outside my daughter’s ballet class.
• And another is called “Argyll quest at ballet exam” because I wrote part of the fourth quest while my daughter was sitting a ballet exam.  (She passed.  Helen and the fabled beasts didn’t do quite as well!)

In Maze Running, I send Helen and the fabled beasts on seven different quests, missions and rescues, to the south, north and west of Scotland.  But I’ve realised that the book was written in even more places than that!

So, does this mean I spend too much time away from my desk? Am I not taking my writing seriously enough? I don’t think so, because I don’t need a desk to write – I just need my netbook, or a pen and a bit of paper.  Or I can even just scribble on my other hand, or a napkin…

Does it mean I’m only inspired to write when I’m out and about, rather than at my desk, and should get out more often? I don’t think that either! I write a lot at home too, but because I’m not transferring those files from one computer to the other, I don’t give them such detailed names.

It really just means that my three jobs – being a writer writing, being a writer talking about writing and being a mum – are all part of the same life, rather than neatly separated.  So I take whatever book I’m writing with me everywhere I go, and write it wherever I can.

It also shows that I can have really good ideas when I’m sitting outside a ballet class, or in a cold train station.  Even if I am typing with gloves on.

I write fast-moving action and set my books all over Scotland, so writing on the run and in lots of different places is probably very good for my stories. And I write for 8–12 year olds, so working out how I’m going to start the next chapter just after speaking to P5 about cliff hangers and just before speaking to P6 about chase scenes, is probably the best way to write!

I wonder where I’ll write the next book?

tools for writing on the run: netbook, notebook, napkin

It’s less than a month until the launch of Maze Running, the fourth and final book in the First Aid for Fairies series.

The fourth and FINAL book.

And right now, I’m asking myself: Why is it the final book?  This is a successful series, with lots of fans, with recognisably stunning covers, set in a world where I could easily have found dozens more adventures.  So why have I stopped?

Was I bored? (No! I love this world and these characters.)

Did my publishers say, nah, that’s enough thanks. (Not to me…)

Was I running out of readers? (Nope, not that either!)

So why, as a new-ish writer, trying to build a career as a real proper writer, have I stopped writing a successful series?

It’s a bit daft, really. I have strong characters I enjoying working with, and a formula which could repeat endlessly in different parts of Scotland, with different baddies and different magic.

But that’s really the point: I don’t want it to become a formula.  I want each of my books to be original and different, not to feel tired and samey. And while I don’t think I was anywhere near that with the First Aid series, I suspect I would have got there before I hit double figures!  So I wanted to stop while the books were getting steadily stronger and more exciting.

Some of my readers are a bit upset, even politely annoyed, that I’m ending the series here, but actually that’s quite good (sorry!) because I want to leave you wanting more.  Perhaps you’ll go on to make up your own stories set in the fabled beasts’ world. I also hope you’ll wait eagerly for whatever I write next…

Another major reason for ending the series here is that my characters kept growing up.  Because I have been very specific about each adventure’s time of year, there have been months between each book, and Helen and her friends are now all more than a year older than they were in First Aid For Fairies And Other Fabled Beasts. If I kept writing about them for another few months, and honestly reflected their lives and concerns, I wouldn’t be writing for 8-12 year olds, I’d be writing for teenagers, which I’m happy to do, but not within this series.

Also I don’t want to get too comfortable with these characters, nor do I want to tread the same paths with them again.  I know them really well, and I’ve taken several of them on tough emotional journeys, as well as dangerous quests.  I don’t want to artificially push them backwards just so we can watch them develop all over again. (Yes, Yann, I’m talking about you. And Lee and Rona, and maybe even Helen.) I want to meet and work with NEW characters.  Though I really am going to miss these ones.

I don’t want to be pigeonholed as a writer either. I want to write lots of different kinds of books (which I’ve possibly achieved already with picture books, retellings and teen novellas.)  But I want to write other novels too – my only standalone novel Rocking Horse War sometimes gets a bit lost amongst Helen’s adventures, so I want to concentrate on other ideas like that for a while.

So, sorry to all the First Aid for Fairies fans out there.  No more books about Helen healing her fabled beast friends at specific seasons of the year.

This is the end.

But I think it’s best to go out with a bang!

And here’s the cover of Maze Running. What do you think?

I’m just recovering from the most emotional edit I’ve ever done.
Normally edits are about reducing wordcounts, tightening language, cutting repetition, checking facts, filling in plotholes, and generally telling the story in the best way possible.
And yes, that is what I’ve just done with Maze Running. I found some silly mistakes (I sent a dragon called one name off on a quest, and brought a dragon with a different name back! It’s ok, I noticed and sorted it) and I found a few last minute plotholes (one of which I covered up, literally, with a cloak – handy things cloaks.) I replaced weak wobbly words, made sentences clearer and took out dialogue that wasn’t necessary for the story. I also made a few tweaks to answer questions from my editor. She’s excellent at noticing things which I don’t explain clearly enough, or explain far too often, or which I can’t explain because they don’t make any sense.
By the time I sent the manuscript away a few days ago, it was shorter, clearer, faster and more exciting than the draft I finished at the end of last year. So the editing went really well.
But I was miserable. Actually (and don’t tell anyone this) I was sniffing, wiping my eyes and blowing my nose a lot.
Why? I’m happy with the story and I’m excited about sharing it with people. So why was I sad and upset?
One reason is because my relationship with a book alters once it’s sent off to the printers. I always find it a bit weird reading the printed version of my novels, because I can’t change them any more. If I suddenly think of a different way to express what’s happening, I can’t do it. I have no power over the story any more. I’m not really the writer any more. Just the person who wrote it.
So the final edit is slightly terrifying, because it’s my last chance to get it right. My last chance to spot mistakes, but also my last chance to do the story and the characters justice. Once I’ve sent it away, that’s it. I can’t make it any better. So that’s why the last edit of every book is nerve-wracking.
But with Maze Running the emotional wrench was ever harder. Maze Running is the fourth and FINAL book in the First Aid series. This book is the last adventure I will write about Helen, Yann, Lavender, Rona, Sapphire, Catesby, Lee and the rest all together.
If you think you’re upset about that (and I’ve already met readers who are a little bit annoyed with me for ending the series! But I’ll explain why I made that decision in another blog post soon…) So if you think you’re upset, just imagine how upset I am. I’ve spent more than five years of my life with these characters. I know them better than most people I meet in the real world. I hear their voices in my heads. I put them in terrible situations (worse situations in this next book than any other, sorry guys) and I trust them to get back out again. I work with them, listening to their reactions, letting them guide and sometimes even change the story. And now I’m done. Now I won’t write about them ever again, not as a group, not in this way, maybe not in any way at all.
And it was my decision. I feel like I’ve left them. Which makes me feel sad, guilty and almost like I’m grieving.
I know I will read their adventures out loud at book festivals and in author events. I will read the cliff-hangers, the quests and the fights. But because I won’t be able to change one word of what’s on the page, then I won’t be writing them any more. I’ll be reading them instead.
First Aid for Fairies was my first book. I owe these characters a lot. I really enjoy being with them. And when I handed the manuscript to Floris earlier this month, I was saying good bye to them.
That’s why this edit was highly emotional, and very sad. But also very exciting. Because who knows what I’ll write (and then edit) next…

I’ve chosen names for two children, and both times it was a lot easier than naming my next novel!

Titles are sometimes very easy to find. Some of my books have arrived in my head with titles almost fully formed.  I had the idea, I thought ‘oh, that could be a book!’ and by the time I’d reached for a notebook to start scribbling the idea down, I already knew what title to put on the cover.

For example, Rocking Horse War and How to Make a Heron Happy were always the titles of those books. I never considered anything else.

And the title First Aid For Fairies And Other Fabled Beasts arrived very fast too.  Though to be fair, I always expected someone (my mum, my agent, the publisher) to say, ‘don’t be daft, please come up with something shorter!’ But no-one did; everyone seemed to like it.  And it does describe the story pretty well!

However, it did leave me with a bit of a problem, which is that the title of every subsequent book in the series has to have the structure:

Something Something and other Something Somethings.  Whew.

This has posed problems for every book.  Wolf Notes as a title didn’t appear until I was about 2/3 of the way through the book. I knew I wanted ‘wolf’ or ‘fangs’ in the title, but didn’t know what else, until my husband found the phrase ‘wolf notes’, which I loved because it fitted the feel of the book. Though I have to admit that I went back through the story and changed a few bits of the plot to make the title fit perfectly.

Which poses an interesting question: do you write a different story if you already know the title?  Do you write the story to FIT the title? Is it better to wait until the end of the plot-building to come up with a title, so you aren’t pinned down by the title, or is it better to know the title at the start so you can keep the story focussed?  I’m not sure – I’ve done both, and both ways have worked for me with different books. And of course, sometimes a writer will think they know the title of a book, but the editor will disagree, so the title changes at the last minute! (In which case, can the title ever really fit the book?)

Storm Singing was a title I liked right from the start of the writing process, and I agreed it with the editor early on – we even had the tricky second part (And Other Tangled Tasks) sorted too.  So writing the book and that title went hand in hand, which meant the idea of Storm Singing was a vital part of the plot from the start.

But now I’m working on the fourth First Aid book. And this time I wrote the whole plotline with no idea what the title was going to be.  I had a few ideas, but none fitted perfectly, and the ones I liked best my editor didn’t like at all.  So I finished the story, and started to edit it, still with no idea what the title was going to be.  This felt very weird, because I had little signposts in the book to various potential titles, and I didn’t know which were going to stay in and which were going to come out.

Then only two weeks ago, I came across a phrase which was PERFECT! It fitted the story, it even added another layer which I hadn’t anticipated, and it sounded great!  And not only that, my editor likes it too.

So… I can now announce that the title of the fourth and final First Aid for Fairies book is:

Maze Running And Other Magical Missions!

What do you think?  Please let me know…