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| The Sterkarm Handshake and A Sterkarm Kiss by Susan Price |
I have finished the first draft of Sterkarm 3!
I know some of you already know this, but I’m still
performing happy dances whenever I remember it.
It’s been three years.
I started work on it early in 2009, the year I also started work for the
Royal Literary Fund.
RLF work slowed the writing down, but not by much. Writing a book is a long, slow business.
My Sterkarm books are set on the Western borders of Scotland
and England, a place of high moors and steep valleys, many streams and much rain.
It comes easily to me to compare the writing of this book –
of all books – to being lost in this country with only the faintest idea of
which way I should go. I set off,
scrambled up a steep hillside, with much panting, while being scratched by
heather twigs and briars. I stumbled
into bog-holes, lost a boot, limped on, got to the top, and paused to hear the
larks singing.
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| The Sterkarm Handshake |
Then realised I’d gone the wrong way and needed to slither
all the knee-jarring way down again and climb up the opposite hill.
(And I have done all that in the real world, so I don’t make
the comparison lightly.)
In three years, only occasionally have I seen the way clear
and followed an easy, well-marked path – and have sometimes found that even
well-marked easy paths can end in a thorny broom thicket. (But does any bush have such a gloriously
yellow flower? Does any other British
flower smell of coconut?)
It’s been exhausting, but I don’t know any other way to get
a book written. Even if you set off with
a map and a sat-nav – well, both can be misleading.
Even now I’m not finished.
I have 110,000 words to read through and rewrite. I’m looking forward to it – rewriting is
always the best part – and dreading it at the same time. (What if three years’ struggle produced
nothing but bunk?)
I hope to find out what the story’s about. For three years I’ve been concentrating on
plot, which means asking myself where did I last leave Andrea, and why is Sweet
Milk, when I need him, miles away on another hillside, asleep?
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| A Sterkarm Kiss |
I intend to wait at least a month before I even look at
it. I hope a close reading will reveal,
among all the plot, a theme.
The first two Sterkarm books, The Sterkarm Handshake and A Sterkarm Kiss, are now out of print.
I don't know what will happen to the Sterkarm books now. My agent is looking for another publisher but, who knows if they'll find one?
Would anyone, I wonder, like a look at the first chapter of Sterkarm 3, in
rough?
Read an interview with Susan Price about the writing of the Sterkarm books here.
And here's Blott -
