As a historical crime writer, I’m naturally interested in the forensic methods and knowledge of earlier times. I try to track down old handbooks on the subject, one such being Henry Cadwalader Chapman’s Manual of Medical Jurisprudence, Insanity and Toxicology. It’s slightly after my period, but a lot of the techniques it discusses were in use during the time I’m concerned with.

Interestingly, the section on medical jurisprudence takes up about 200 pages, and that on toxicology about 80 pages, with a mere 19 given over to the massive subject of insanity. The writer does acknowledge it is an extensive subject and therefore he is only going to limit himself to giving the salient points. But this is presumably intended to be enough to qualify the reader to undertake the following essential task: “Every practitioner should appreciate the importance of the fact that at any moment he may be called upon to visit a person said to have lost his reason, and should be qualified, therefore, to express an opinion as to his sanity.”

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Your Inner Critic's real nature is the anti-writing demon: personify him/her as you will (mine is short and plump, with blue and green scales and a tail: he's well-intentioned, and his intention is to protect me from failure, shame, embarrassment and danger, by stopping me writing). In a coda to Making the Skeleton Dance I was suggesting that anything which stops you writing can also be a costume hung in your Inner Critic's wardrobe, because most of the time the demon's in disguise.

For the avoidance of doubt, I should define my terms: there's all the difference in the world between the Inner Critic, hard-wired by parents and teachers and the world in general, and what I call the Inner Editor. The Inner Editor engages when there's there's a sentence or a paragraph or a chapter or a novel on the page to edit: s/he reads the words, and from that reading decides what needs to be changed. None of us would write anything worth reading without an Inner Reader-Editor. The Inner Critic, on the other hand, spends most of his/her life in costume, pretending to be something entirely useful. This is particularly true when you've learnt to ignore her/his obvious "you're no good" "you'll never succeed" schtick. Then s/he opens the wardrobe, and with fiendish (s/he is a demon, after all) cunning, picks out the costume of whichever adult in your life you're most attuned to, and begins to talk:

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I have a notion that Wordsworth’s line, I wandered lonely as a cloud, has nothing to do with walking the Cumbrian hills but is a metaphor for the poet’s mental state when he wrote. Writers mooch lonely in their thoughts whilst under the tips of their fingers the novel forms and grows as they tap at the keys. Sometimes they think they have created fields of daffodils but even the prettiest words that appear on the screen have no guarantee of making it into the finished piece; at any moment they could be dragged and dropped, substituted or deleted, leaving not a trace.

But there comes a day when the writer has to say (like Pontius Pilate when asked to change what he’d written on Christ’s cross): ‘What I have written, I have written.’ No more revisions. The last pre-submission draft is printed out, is packaged up as if it's the stone on which is scoured the Ten Commandments, and sent to the publisher or agent.

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The first was an email I received. It was a review of my book by Archie Clark. It put a big old grin on my big old face.

Archie said:

"I Met a Roman last Night, what did you do? By Nik Perring.



Review by Archie Clark. Aged 8.



The book ‘I met a Roman last night what did you do? ‘ is a very good book. It starts with a boy called Jack who does not want to go to bed, he wanted to find out more about the Romans he’s learning about them at school. Eventually he went to bed and to sleep and in his dream he met a Roman and the next night he met a Celt and the

next day when Jack was at school the teacher, Miss Bean told them they were gong on a surprise school trip. That night he dreamt he met a Viking the next morning Jack went on a school trip. That night Jack wanted to stay up to find more info on the computer but he knew he needed his rest for sports day, so he went to sleep and he met a young girl in the war then he woke up and went to sports day.



Make sure you buy this book for your child. I would rate it age 7+ and the story 9+."



Thank you so much, Archie, for such a well written and brilliant review. I hope you find lots of other really good books to read.

***

And the second thing that made me very happy today was the postman delivering me this, Heaven Can Wait, by Cally Taylor.

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Dear Impressive Agent,
I’m enclosing a sample of my first novel - ‘Brilliant'.
I’m not bothering with a synopsis because the book speaks for itself. I know you probably get a lot of letters from nutters who write in green ink and it must be a relief when some real quality turns up in your slush pile.
I want to be a writer because I think it would be cool to see huge posters with my name on them on the Tube. It must be great to be paid to sit around all day and make up stories. I know that you will work hard to get me a really good deal with a reputable publisher. I’m thinking a six figure deal is probably about right. [By the way, I’m not sure I’d want to do anything like book signings but I’m sure you can get round that.]


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You're tuned into the Joker Channel. Coming up: more pithy analysis, quirky observations and unique insight from the bar.

We're all mini-broadcasters now.

Many of us still have a weakness for traditional sources of information such as television news, the national newspapers and even the good old-fashioned library; but if you also have any kind of online existence, you'll have noticed how much richer the information-gathering experience is these days.

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My story, Mrs. Aldershott and Pease Pottage is out now in the November (not October, as previously mentioned!) issue of First Edition Magazine, available from WH Smiths and Borders.

Unfortunately, it is only for sale in Actual Real Paper (ARP) format in the UK but there is a web edition that you can download from the website although (sensibly, perhaps) they still have the October edition up at the moment.

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Well, today is my birthday. I actually did most of the celebrating on Sunday, when I went to see the Anish Kapoor exhibiiton at the Royal Academy. The exhibition started out in the courtyard, with the impressive tower of silver balls called Tall Tree and the Eye.

The main theme of the exhibition seemed to be producing art which appears to not have been touched by the hand of an artist, a concept which, as a sort-of writer, I found interesting. To write something without leaving a trace of an author would be pretty impossible, and probably quite dull. One of the rooms was filled with intestine-like curls of concrete, looping round and around, which had been generated by a computer (not formed by a person), but programmed by Kapoor.

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Cally Taylor completed her first novel in 2007, having previously written short stories. In 2008 she signed with her literary agent and Heaven Can Wait, a supernatural romantic comedy, has been published by Orion this week. Check out Cally's website here. She is kindly giving away a copy of her debut novel - the winner will be randomly chosen from those people commenting on this thread. (Sorry, but Strictly Writers are not eligible.) The winner will be announced this Sunday!


Which 3 writers, living or dead, would you invite to dinner?
Margaret Atwood, Stephen Fry and Jane Austen.

Favourite writing snack?
Chocolate! Or mixed seeds when I'm trying to be 'good'.

Longhand or computer?
Longhand for planning a novel and scribbling down notes and ideas. Computer for writing the first draft and editing.

The best thing about being published is...
Knowing that, over next few years, eight different versions of "Heaven Can Wait" (seven foreign editions) will end up on my bookshelf and I'll be able to look at them, marvel over the different covers and go, "Ooooh...my...god. I did that!"


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