Publication Day dawns in Devon

The Russian Concubine is out there.

I did in fact spot it first in WHSmiths as I arrived in Paddington Station in London. What better start to Publication Day? Their Read of the Week.

And yes, I confess, in the Charing Cross Road branch of Borders I did actually walk in and fiddle with the display, so that the lovely cover was facing outward on the shelf instead of just the spine. Well, it's The Russian Concubine's birthday, for heaven's sake, so it's the least it deserves.

Seeing it there in the shops makes me realise how much I love this book. How anxious I am for it. Like a mother on her child's first day at school, a mixture of pride and nerves and that churning feeling in the pit of the stomach. You want them to come home with five gold stars.

A book is an extension of an author, no matter how much they claim that the story is fiction and the characters are figments of an over-active imagination. Writers distil a vital part of themselves on to every page, as much into 'bad' characters as into the 'good' ones. In an odd kind of way, it's a bit like being a stripper because you have to be willing to expose so much of yourself to the gaze of total strangers. That can be daunting, but I believe it's what makes a book work, that emotional connection with the reader. It's crucial.

The LittleBrown/Sphere team gave me and my agent, Teresa, a great launch lunch party at Moro's and drowned my nerves in champagne. They are a brilliant group of people, hugely professional but at the same time tremendously supportive and great fun. I am very lucky to be working with them.

And flowers. They sent me flowers as well. What more could I ask for?

Good reviews.

Publication in UK

Finally Publication week for The Russian Concubine is here in the UK. I am ecstatic. It satisfies something very fundamental in me to have my book published in my own country.

I can't wait to be wandering down the High Street into the bookstores or pushing a trolley round the supermarkets and have The Russian Concubine jump out at me. I think the cover is beautiful - thank you, Sphere and Berkley.

Will I rush in and rearrange the displays to feature mine more prominently? I might. I know it happens! And can you blame an author, after all that blood, tantrums and tears?

Sphere have been fantastic about keeping me posted about sell-in to retailers and which magazines and newspapers will be doing reviews. (That kind of update really helps the nerves.) So far it's looking good, with the major supermarkets taking it, as well as the major booksellers. I shall definitely be rushing into the bookshop at Paddington Station when I travel up to London this week and scouring its shelves, like a mother lion seeking out her cub. I might seriously have to restrain myself from thrusting it into shoppers' hands.

Reviews. The dreaded word. That's the next hurdle to leap. I shall be reading them from behind a cushion and with a glass of Pinot in hand, like my son used to watch Dr Who - without the Pinot of course!

But there are already exciting glimmers of hope. Marie Claire has named it Book of the Month in December and WHSmith Travel has chosen it for ROTW (that's Read of the Week) this week.

What a Publication Day present that is!

Flying High

Where did the summer go?


I was away at Duxford Air Show in Cambridgeshire only the other day, revelling in warm sunshine and Merlin engines, but today even here in Devon the north wind takes my breath away as I make my dash to the village post-box and back. It's depressing. I'm not ready for winter.

To cheer myself up I have posted a picture of me in a custard-yellow Tiger Moth biplane about to take to the skies. Huge fun.

I came dashing home from that high point determined to throw myself headlong into the new book, only to find:-

a) numerous email interviews awaiting my attention and filling up my time. I know they're essential as Publication Day in the UK approaches (1st November in case you haven't noticed) but they divert my attention away from the book (it's way too easily diverted).

b) a Buick-size rat putrefying under a cabinet - a tit-for-tat game my cat Misty is expert at to teach me not to go away.

c) a lazy summer-mind seems to have been slotted scarily into my skull to replace my writing-mind while I was on hols. Hmm, not a good way to start a book.

d) I like being home again.

e) Nowhere is more beautiful than Devon.

Okay, okay, time to pick up the pen and start writing.

On Target

Fabulous news!

From my editor Jackie in America. In the USA a huge store-chain called Target (1500 stores) has selected The Russian Concubine to launch its new dual Book Club. With front-of-department prominence, internet promotion and a mind-numbing 20 million circulars to get the ball rolling.

So hey, dreams do come true.

I feel honoured. For an author to have the deep satisfaction of knowing that so many people will be reading and talking about the book is profoundly rewarding. To make that connection with the minds and imaginations of so many readers is a privilege.

The Russian Concubine is about the bonds that form between people as they struggle to survive in a harsh world, and now the book itself is forging bonds. With its readers.

Thank you, Target.

Publicity machine

The publicity machine is beginning to hum. I like the noises it’s making. My UK publisher, LittleBrown, is starting to give The Russian Concubine a good push in national and local press, radio, magazines etc.

This is exciting for an author. After all the blood, sweat and damn hard grind of giving birth to a book, it is heartbreaking if it is then left to fend for itself in a vast sea of other books, all fighting for space and spotlight in the bookshops, jostling each other for the book-buyer’s attention.

That’s where the magic words ‘front-of-store’ come into play. One of the facts I’ve gleaned recently is that a huge percentage (I can’t recall exactly what the figure is but I know it’s indecently BIG) of would-be purchasers never get further than the first ten feet of the shop. Too much of a rush? Too bemused? Too bored? Too something anyway. They just grab one of the first books they see and run. Therefore, for ‘front-of-store’ read ‘gold-dust’.

So you can see why a bit of Publisher Pressure is vital. That’s where Joanne, Tamsin, Louise, Emma and their cohorts at LittleBrown come in. They are working hard to raise awareness of The Russian Concubine before its launch in November, aided by a great review in The Bookseller – the UK trade mag that can open bookshop doors.

My lunch with the LittleBrown team was hugely enjoyable – in Joe Allen’s in Covent Garden, a cool place to eat – and they weren’t scary at all, just full of enthusiasm for The Russian Concubine and its progress so far. And patient when bombarded with questions. We got through lots of good stuff and serious discussions about titles and sequels. You can see a picture of us, raising a medicinal glass of something – hmm, I notice it seems to be quite a theme of the photos on this blog!

But afterwards, instead of the dutiful hours I’d intended to spend in the British Library – seizing the opportunity for more research – I popped into its hallowed halls only briefly. Instead I was seduced into buying a new Zara jacket and going for a lovely drink with my agent, Teresa. Devon is a gorgeous place to live and I adore its sea, sand, rivers and moors galore, but it is not much good at shops. So when in London, how could I resist?

Right, that was fun-time. Now it’s work-time.

Summer writing

Summer is a rubbish time for writing. Or is it just me?

Too many distractions. If the sun is out, the beach is only a hop, skip and jump away and then I’m no good at staying chained to my desk, or even to a pen and paper for that matter. Which is why I’ve been so lax about posting notes here. Sorry about that.

As the sun grows hotter, I become more cunning at displacement activity. I stare blankly out of my study window seeking inspiration and suddenly spot a begonia or rose that absolutely must be dead-headed right there and then, on pain of death. But once I’m out there, that’s it. I’m done for. It’s only a short step to the woods. To the badger set. To the tennis court. To the ice-cream seller on the beach. (My special favourite: honeycomb dripping with Devon clotted cream. Mmmm.)

But today I have answered an email magazine interview, hunted out the pages on Stalin’s Five Year Plan from my mile-high pile of notes, and written a first personality sketch of one of my new characters. (When you start putting details of a character down on the page, instead of just chatting to them in your head, they suddenly acquire a stubborn life and will of their own which can be quite disconcerting.) This burst of activity is because I’m bunking off tomorrow.

Tomorrow provides me with the perfect guilt-free displacement activity. I can skive off for the whole day without a single twinge of conscience because I’m going up to London by train to meet with my lovely LittleBrown editor, Joanne. But there are Good Things and Bad Things concerning this:

Good Things:-
a) Three travel-hours each way of uninterrupted reading for pleasure.
b) A yummy lunch.
c) Wine.
d) Joanne’s delightful company.
e) Meeting others from LittleBrown for the first time who deal with PR, media etc (I envisage them all scarily Armani suited and with sharp haircuts).
f) Hearing lovely plans for The Russian Concubine launch in the UK – on 1st November - in case you haven’t heard.
g) Talking cover-design, blurb etc for my next book.
h) More wine.

Bad Things:-
a) Have you seen the cost of rail tickets to London???
b) Suffocating on the Underground in blistering summer heat. Nooooooo!
c) No ‘real work’ done.
d) Traipsing up and down St Martin’s Lane hunting for the model-car shop in the hope of getting my mitts on the Schuco my husband craves.

So just to make the day feel more like ‘real work’, I’m planning on a visit to the British Library to get in a couple of hours research. At least it’ll be cool in there. I’ll post the results!

Research and imagination

Okay, back to how. How I could write a book about China without going there.

Actually I am surprised that people seem to find it so extraordinary. The answer is, of course, imagination and solid research. The world I was writing about no longer exists in China, the controlling web of International Settlements is gone, though of course the cities like Shanghai (once an International Settlement) are still there but they have changed dramatically from the 1928 versions of themselves.

I was extremely fortunate that a whole stream of books has come out of China in recent years, following Jung Chang’s wonderful Wild Swans, that gave me an intimate insight into the detail of domestic life in China, both pre and post communism. These helped enormously. I adored doing the research and found that the magic of that extraordinary vast country flowed like Yangtze floodwater under my skin. Honestly, it was easy to fall in love with the place and its people.

But then I’m a sucker for research. I admit it. I could go on burrowing in books forever and have to kick myself to say enough is enough, it’s time to get down to writing the book! It was the same with my next book – set in 1933 Russia. But more of that later.