No literary agent, no publisher - no book.

Literary agents are rare creatures. The official definition for a Literary Agent is: a person who manages business, financial, or contractual matters for a writer. Or, as the free online dictionary defines agent:  1. One that acts or has the power or authority to act. 2. One empowered to act for or represent another: an author's agent; an insurance agent.

But in my book the definition is: Author's agent - an individual or ever dwindling group of individuals with sufficient clients who are very unlikely to take on further clients unless they are famous. Which rather leaves me out in the cold. I understand their reason: a great deal of time has to be invested marketing a new, or relatively unknown, author and if it reaps no rewards who pays the agent's bar bill?    

So, having contacted a few agents and having some kind encouragement but no-one biting my hand off, I am starting to widen my circle. At the same time as approaching agents who may just find my book so riveting that they are willing to take my work on, I thought I would look into contacting book publishers direct. 

Book publishers are difficult creatures to corner. The definition of a book publisher is roughly: a company that pays to acquire, develop, design, produce and publicize a book. But the definition should probably include 'after which outlay there is no guarantee of return'. I understand the economics. 

Unfortunately, since my novel, A Little Blue Jacket, was published, few book publishers accept unsolicited manuscripts. An agent wants a best selling author, likewise, a publisher wants a best seller. Like an agent they know these are one in a million. So how do they wade through a slush pile the size of a Swedish forest. And what are their chances of finding JKR II in all that pulp.

It's for this reason that most book publishers only accept manuscripts through a literary agent. By using an agent to do their sifting they have cut their costs and increased their chances of success. I know that literary agents and book publishers are bombarded with requests from wanna-be published authors. I know that neither agent nor publisher can ever hope to cope with it all.

But now you see my dilemma without my really having to spell it out: no agent, no publisher. No book. So, tell me, how do I, a modest and talented writer (like all hopeful authors) with a highly individual manuscript ready and waiting to go, solve this conundrum. How is it to be overcome. Please give me a contact. Or just practical advice. Even a teensy weensy clue would help ….anything?  

Lucy

Trees in the Landscape

Now, in the south-east of England at the end of March, when our many native and naturalized deciduous trees are not in leaf, it is still possible to see far and wide across the fields and hills.


We all love trees in glorious leaf but the Hockney exhibition reminded me of the structural contribution that trees devoid of leaves make to the landscape. It is now in their unclothed form that we can see their bones - their silhouette - clear against the sky. And the overlapping canopies of tree belts, like medieval or Art Nouveau tracery, can be quite beautiful.

Tree identification is usually taught when trees are in leaf but, in fact, when trees are bare it is sometimes easier to appreciate their habit and identify them: how their branches divide, their twigs grow and the position of their buds or seeds is clearer.

Trees bare of leaf should of course be an important consideration when designing a landscape but so seldom are. Quite clearly, leaves are very important factor when choosing a species of tree. The colour of the leaf, the habit of its growth, the leaf size and shape and its texture will all form part of the decision.


Trees in our gardens and surroundings form boundaries and screens, views, enclosure and shade and there are species to suit them all. Their form or shape, habit and scale all contribute to the suitability of the choice. But it is, after all, for half the year that deciduous trees are bare and therefore this should be as important an aspect of the design as when they are in leaf.

There is only one book I have that celebrates bare trees in winter and that is a wonderful American publication, Trees in a Winter Landscape, and it is inspirational. Most books I have major on trees in leaf: some of them are beautifully photographed, others aspirational, most give good solid advice but, when you think of it, a tree in leaf is only half the story.


It is in winter that the wonderful peeling silver bark of the birch really makes an impact, that the rich red textured bark of the cherry adds such interest. The dramatic flowers of the magnolia stand out against its bare branches in our gardens, palest pink almond blossom - so delicate that it would be overwhelmed by leaves - covers the bare branches of the trees along our suburban streets. In the rural lanes, on bare hazel limbs, catkins already hang like lamb's tails while soft furry yellow and grey catkins glow on pussy willow branches.

With April just around the corner, the leaves have begun to unfurl and, given a few more sunny days, they will soon be out in all their cheering bright freshness. But please spare a thought for the bare old bones of the trees and remember to love them in winter too.

Lucy

David Hockney exhibition 'A Bigger Picture' at the Royal Academy, London

WOW! What an amazing exhibition. Right from the start the visitor has an over powering sense of positivity – it's as if Hockney has brought all the colour of California that he loves back to old England and washed the grey away with it.

The tree is his central motif, running through the whole exhibition, and the landscape of his Yorkshire youth is the subject. The first rooms lay the background for Hockney's new paintings, showing how from his earliest works he was interested in landscape painting.



His photocollages – the term conjures up school art projects but these are slick use of modern technology - clearly show how he builds up and later portrays wide panoramic views. Later paintings, almost naïve in style, show the patterns of fields and hedges, ploughed surfaces, houses and lines of hedges and trees. In these all traditional perspective is skewed and the sky is reduced to form a thin strip quite unlike the proportion usually adhered to in a classical landscape painting.

However, in the next room Hockney reverts to a study of the style of the old masters – the paintings hung en masse in a block - and here the classic proportions hold sway. After studying these in oil he returns to watercolour – the effect quite different of course.

A room devoted to his interest in 'tunnels' shows masterly perspective and one devoted to 'woods' is truly architectural in feel. I loved his charcoal sketches displayed in these rooms because they show his ability as a real draughtsman and how he used these quick sketches to work from – giving rein to his imagination - on the final oil paintings in his studio.

Throughout, Hockney demonstates how he has divided his large panoramas into separate 'blocks' to build up the whole. Allied with this is his use of the camera. But this is not to be sniffed at – he is merely reflecting history. The old masters used such tricks as the camera obscura to perfect their perspective and divided their canvases up in much the same way as Hockney does. The difference is that Hockney leaves us the signs.

The hangings entitled 'Trees & Totems' is a culmination of all that has gone before. These are painted in such vibrant colour that they have quite an electrifying, exuberant effect. The show was packed, so many visitors that we were forced into closer proximity than normal and this produced it's own dynamic: a woman next to me turned and said – unable to contain herself, wanting to share her feelings – "It's so exciting, so life-affirming, isn't it?" I had to agree.

His painting, 'The Arrival of Spring', is vast and very graphic in traditional Hockney style. It was produced after many sketches on his ipad and, hung all around, these form the basis for the final work. What a marvellous use of modern technology and what a wonderful tool it is – the 'brushes' facility is not technology subsuming the artist but technology aiding him - able to sketch quickly using the tablet is a bonus in such changeable weather as ours.

In a couple of rooms near the end of the exhibition there is film to show how Hockney engineered the recording of the landscape – concentrating on the close-up of the grasses and the hedges and lanes, it made me think of Thomas Hardy's novels - and a collection of his sketchbooks gives a fascinating insight.

Throughout, Hockney is celebrating the English countryside - it is landscape with a capital L – and those well trod lanes and hedges, tree lined fields and pitted roads that we all know in our locality take on a new persona – a different character – when we use his vision. With this show, Hockney has introduced a fresh way of looking at them for many of us – these landscapes are not all boring brown and grey in winter, not all the same old green in summer.

Do see this exhibition for yourself: it is COLOUR, it is TREES, it is BRILLIANT!

Lucy

Tess of the d'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

As an English classic, the story of Tess of the d'Urbervilles is well known. It is, I acknowledge, not one of my favourite Hardy novels (not that you would guess from the well thumbed copy you see below!) There is an over-riding sense of doom right from the start, and it makes me uneasy. However, that was not what made its original audience uncomfortable. The story draws attention to the hypocrisy of Victorian times and the behaviour of the heroine made it a very controversial story.

To sum the novel up in a few words, Tess of the d'Urbervilles is a romantic tragedy. The central character is shaped by her landscape: her moods and her pleasures are rooted in the countryside and the landscape plays a large part in what befalls her. There is passion and there is pain in Tess' story but - as in most of Hardy's novels – there always seems to be more of the latter.


Tess is the original tragic heroine but a very complex one: simple yet knowing; unspoiled but eventually quite spoiled; sometimes victim sometimes not; innocent yet sensual. What happened to Tess, Hardy shows us, was due to her naivety and looks: a beautiful but good natured, simple woman was at the mercy of those men who had no morals and no forgiveness. This was asking a lot of his readers and not surprisingly the novel was not an instant success.

But it is, for me, in the descriptions of the landscape and of the vanishing rural life that Hardy excels. He was a poet, and his descriptions throughout the novel are testament to this. Those relating to landscape – the countryside of Dorset he loved – are particularly moving and evoke a sense of beauty but also a real understanding of not only the minutiae of nature – the grasses and insects – but also the larger aspect of woods, forests, vales, moors and skies that give the reader of Tess such a true sense of place.

Many find Hardy a bit heavy – I will admit his descriptions are rather long-winded – but I love his work for not only the poetry of his descriptions but also for the realism of his settings: life was hard for the working country man and nature had an over-powering influence.

Walking with Freddie today in the rain, mud underfoot, wind through the trees, I could just imagine what it must have been like to have to battle with such elements everyday. Reading Tess one is aware of the physical discomforts of country folk then and fully appreciative of the mundane things we take for granted such as waterproofs and wellies and the luxury of being able to sit in the warm and read a well written book.

Italian Shoes by Henning Mankell

This is surely the time to read Mankell's 26th novel, Italian Shoes. Firstly, because the book is shortly to be made into a film starring Judi Dench and, possibly, Anthony Hopkins. (There, you have the main characters of Harriet and Welin drawn for you.) And, secondly, like his Kurt Wallander series, Mankell's story is set in the Swedish archipelago and the wintry sense of place is spot on: the reader can positively see and feel the snow laden countryside and the people that are moulded by this harsh environment.



The central character, Fredrik Welin, is a retired surgeon fleeing from a particularly harrowing professional error. Indeed, abandonment is the central theme of the novel. Welin is also fleeing from his personal life – what there was of it – and from himself. He had already abandoned his mother, his former lover, Harriet, and will come to abandon even his closest relation.

Welin is an outsider, an unsympathetic character with no empathy. He cannot tell the truth but admits to himself that he is a shit whilst he continues to be one: snooping, abandoning, lying. This is the psychological insight that Mankell has come to be known for in his Wallander books. Welin is so estranged from society and so isolated on his island that he has to cut a hole in the ice every day and swim in the frozen water to prove to himself that he is still alive.

When, twelve years on, the dying Harriet arrives looking for him to fulfil a promise, Welin reluctantly has to face his former life with all its painful reminders and start to interact with others. Physical contact is difficult for him. When he finally has close family contact he still makes the sort of wrong decision that has characterized his life to date.

Almost too late, when he is ill, Welin comes to realise that he has wasted his time cutting himself off from society, that he has lost the chance of precious relationships. The secondary characters in the book are all as odd as Welin but while Mankell makes him a fully formed character, they somehow remain marginal. And as it unfolds the story to some extent loses its credibility: belief is stretched too far.

The central character comes into contact with the political beliefs and hobby-horses of the author: the break-down of Swedish society; refuges and asylum seekers; foster families and suicides; the parlous state of the ecology; how pollution is affecting cave paintings in France; the sad fact that no-one treasures the artisan (those hand-made Italian shoes) any longer.

Similarly, the work of the violent and talented artist, Caravaggio, is a theme - the dark and light of his paintings an analogy for those of his character. Unfortunately these factors are too obviously something that the author wants to make a point of and sit uncomfortably with the narrative.

Yet this light book, this occasionally unsatisfactory story, is so well-written (and it is very well translated) that it is a pleasure to read. The descriptions are wonderful, the prose spare, the structure good. Suspense is built up although usually to no end. The possibility of redemption is there, but in true Mankell style there is no reassuring happy ending. This is a book for real Mankell fans but not, I think, one that will automatically convince the uninitiated.

Lucy

Brazzaville Beach by William Boyd

I did not realise that Brazzaville Beach was a real place in the Congo until I heard it mentioned on the radio the other day. So much for my geographical knowledge. However, it is a slightly confusing title because the story is really set in Angola.

Few who have read Golding's other novels would fail to agree that he is a good writer. Indeed, Brazzaviile Beach, written in 1995, was nominated at the time for the James Tait prize. I can see why he is popular: his books are easy to read and appeal to both sexes. I too liked the book. Mostly. Although, sometimes it jarred, occasionally it disappointed.


The main character, Hope, leaves her floundering maths whiz husband and goes off to study chimpanzees in Angola. Soon, Hope discovers that the group of chimps she is studying show aggression. Her boss, Eugene, refuses to believe her theories or findings: funding for further research is dependent upon the publication of his book about the passive chimps.

The denouement of the novel comes when there is a murderous fight between the two chimpanzee groups in the study. This part of the story is most certainly based upon the findings of Jane Goodall, whose famous and expert research in Tanzania (circa 1965) showed that chimpanzees could be very aggressive, killing other chimpanzees if necessary to maintain their social group. And, generally, the theme of the novel is the parallel between how the chimpanzees and the researchers behave.

Allegory is played upon: apart from the fighting chimpanzees being an allegory for the war torn setting of Angola, so it is that Eugene's behaviour towards Hope is as unpleasant as that between the groups of chimps. Then there is the break up of Hope's marriage as an allegory for the crumbling politics of the region.

Obsession is another theme that runs through the novel: Hope is obsessed with her research, to such an extent that she leaves her husband for months to pursue it. Her husband is so obsessed with his mathematical theories that he goes crazy; her boss so obsessed with his theories that it leads to violence and his assistant is obsessed with him to such an extent that she abets his attempts to doctor research.

This is all very well, and the chapters about the chimpanzees (surprisingly for a person like myself not naturally drawn to chimpanzees) was interesting and very readable, but there were some annoying facets to the book. Some of our groupies did not like the way the book jumped between fist person and third person, which was used to differentiate the past and present. Nor did they enjoy the time-switch itself, back and forth between former married life with nutty professor husband in England and current chimp research.

This did not worry me in particular but I did agree that Hope's husband was a conceptual character and agreed that we could have done without the married bit altogether: it added nothing and did not hang together. We would all have preferred hubby's (nonetheless interesting) maths theories as a separate novel altogether.

However, we were all in complete agreement that the most unconvincing part of an otherwise entertaining read was the characterization of the heroine, Hope. Why on earth did Golding have to make the main character a woman? She was not only unbelievable as one (too masculine and unemotional) but difficult to like. Her love for her husband and her lover did not ring true and her self-sufficiency and obsessions took a very male form.

Nevertheless, I enjoyed Brazzaville Beach more than I expected and will read one of his novels again, whenever I happen across one.

Lucy

The Turner Contemporary, Margate, Kent

The idea of a new modern art gallery in an east coast less-than-fashionable British seaside town was viewed with caution, disbelief, suspicion, if not considered by many as a downright waste of time. Would anyone go there? Could it bring people into the town in the winter season? Would it be appreciated by those who live out in the sticks?


Well, one hopes that these doubts have been dispelled: the building and facilities have been completed in the best possible taste. I like the clean lines of the structure and the mass of it is in scale with its surroundings. The inspiration, it seems to me, was to be that of the bulk of an ocean liner and it certainly sits comfortably in its landscape: the outline is simple and pleasing and does not jar with either the Georgian buildings on the esplanade nor the coastline.

The expectations of those who had the vision have surely been vindicated. Residents should have pride in a forward looking and classy development and well as having a cultural icon at its centre.


I admit that I went to see the building: it was the structure and its setting that drew me to visit. I also admit that I did not expect much of the exhibition, Nothing in the World But Youth. But I did the exhibition and youth in general a disservice. I was reminded of the creativity of those teenage years: we so often see the ability to take risks and the need for experimentation as negative aspects of youth. They can sometimes be but they were, and are, more often the years that shape tastes in fashion and music and teach the value of friendship or spirituality.

As ever, some youths are rebellious whilst others are saddled with responsibilities in advance of their years. Many are overcome by fears others by fantasy; some agonize over their bodies and sex, others celebrate it. Whilst some youths are bent on destruction others are idealistic and embrace our ecology, feeling passionate about sustainability.

All of these aspects of youth were demonstrated in the exhibition and what struck me most is that none of this is new. Photographs of gangs of street youths in the 1950's looked surprisingly familiar; similarly, sadly, girls gave birth to illegitimate babies. Conformity in the uniform of the gang or the need to be different and make a statement were no different than they were when adolescents were first called teenagers in the 1940's. In between the works of young people were dotted paintings and drawings by such well-known artists as Peter Blake, Daivd Hockney, Andy Warhol and even Turner himself: nothing could illustrate the point better.

Some visitors found several of the images disturbing but I prefer to think of them as challenging. What is the point of an exhibition that is merely window dressing; we all love to see something pretty, to appreciate a beautiful image or a sublime sculpture. But surely we need to question, just as we did as teenagers, and seeing the world through the eyes of a youth can remind us all that we too were once both fearful and brave, experimental and yet desperate to be one of the gang. And in showing the complexities and contradictions of youth I think the exhibition, Nothing in the World but Youth, succeeds.

Lucy

PS The café is excellent – better than those in most London Art galleries – so treat yourself to brunch or a delicious Catalan fish soup for lunch. If the soul is a little less than uplifted I often find good food helps!