I'll be away from my office from tomorrow, so no more blogging till Monday I expect. If anyone's in Oxfordshire and fancies meeting up then drop me a line and I'll see where I'm up to.

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And, as far as I'm aware, Canalside Community Radio will be broadcasting what was recorded at the launch night for 20 Photographs & 20 Stories, this Sunday from 8am (you can listen online here).

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Julia Churchill joined the Greenhouse Literary Agency in January 2002, where she heads up the UK/Commonwealth side of the business. Previous to this she was an Associate Agent at the Darley Anderson Agency.


Which 3 authors, dead or alive, would you invite to dinner?
Alexandre Dumas because THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO is my favourite book. Roald Dahl because he's still got the best stories. And Cathy Cassidy because she's one of the nicest people I know and I love everything she writes. Also because if I'm meeting two dead heroes I'd really like a friend there to talk about it with afterwards.

When I was a child I read....
Everything that came my way.

Favourite desktop snack?
KitKats and Earl Grey tea. I dip.

When rejecting I...
Try to be quick and kind. Like a good waxer.

Independent bookshop or Amazon?
Bookshop. I like to browse.


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Not mine, no no. This one, on God Shuffles His Feet - Can Writing Be Taught?

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So, in the light of the tube strikes I decided to catch the boat to work this morning. I board at 7.15 am along with other smug commuters, complete with flask of tea I settle myself into the front deck of the boat. Several stops later the boat is rammed full and I am freezing cold, desperate for the toilet, suffering from mild sea-sickness and then the heavens open. I have nowhere to go for shelter, so as the boat continues, droplets of water the size of lakes hit me straight in the face and I can barely see for squinting into the wind. I am also only twenty minutes into my two hour journey into work. Forty minutes later we arrive at Blackfriars, soaked, dishevelled and green only to be hurled into the side of the jetty, since the driver of the boat mistook his distance between the side of the boat and the jetty. A few people plunder sideways and I narrowly escape being thrown off the side of the boat - (although, I figure, it wouldn’t make much difference since I’m already soaked through.) I climb the three foot high step onto dry land, losing all dignity in the process since my skirt had to be hitched up in order for my legs to stretch the distance.



The walk was pleasant enough, though still raining. I did not get lost so was able to easily observe the chaos on the streets and roads of London: People wandering about clutching soggy ‘Google’ maps, the morbidly obese, red faced and wobbling slowly down the street, middle aged admin ladies huddling over maps like they are taking part in an orienteering, office bonding excursion. Tourists dragging their suitcases behind them looking totally bereft – Yes, London is expensive and the transport is crap to boot. If you value your health or your life, never come back.



Two hours and twenty minutes later I arrive at work. Only to be told by chirpy colleagues that the two tube lines that I normally get were working after all.



My only hope is that my return boat journey tonight does not sink in a monumental effort to impersonate the Titanic.

The try-on scene is surely completely played out now - the fact that it's speeded up here seems to hint at that. What we could do with is more writing class scenes. Besides, it would make much more sense, as she doesn't mind the age gap, for aspiring writer Kate to settle for octogenarian Mike. At least they'd have something in common.


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I subscribe to Literary Review; if you don’t, you should. The writing is sparkling and I’ve learnt more about the yays and nays of how to knock up a novel from their reviewers than from many of the how-to books crowded on my shelves. Much of LR covers non-fiction books which can lead you down interesting research paths for fiction. Even reading the reviews can throw up ideas for stories. The only danger is that you spend all your money ordering sacks of books using the readers' offer. Well, that’s my review of Literary Review, but this post is not about that: it’s inspired by LR in a different way.


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I've had a lovely week (what day is it today?) travelling around with J, from London to Cambridge, cross country to Cornwall and the gorgeous and organic Bangors B&B which ticked every "perfect B&B" box, from the views to the food, the fabulously friendly proprietors to the 3-week old kittens (missing them terribly). We are now in the Brecon Beacons, which is absolutely stunning, and a surprise is planned for tonight, can't tell you anything about that yet.

Internet access has been sporadic and brief, snatches here and there, but to my delight when I logged on a few days ago, I have had a poem accepted by Contrary magazine, a (paying) online literary journal I greatly admire. This is an enormous thrill, mainly because I have only been writing poetry for a few months and frankly had no idea if I was being utterly presumptious in calling it "poetry" at all. An acceptance by a poetry editor tells me that maybe I am allowed to call it that!

So, a problem. On my website, my tagline is:

"Tania Hershman. I write. Stories."
...

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Everywhere you go, you hear it. ‘Oh, we can’t sell literary fiction’ (from publishers). ‘Oh, publishers won’t take literary fiction’ (from agents). ‘The panel ended up with a list they described as “page-turning” and “readable”. According to Portillo: “We have brought you fun”’ (from a newspaper article about the 2009 Booker Prize panel of judges).

It’s enough to drive the thinking publisher insane. On the Two Ravens Press blog (http://tworavenspress.wordpress.com/) we often have a bit of a rant at the ‘dumbing down’ of fiction. Not that David and I believe in any way that a work of fiction has to be deeply literary in order to be worthwhile: I enjoy a whopping good story as much as anyone. It’s just that we get more and more desperate as, with every year that passes by, the less possible it is to find anything different and challenging to read on the bookshelves of most retail outlets. I have to admit that I get very bored with the kind of very carefully crafted novel (whose author has obviously devoured and internalised every page of whatever ‘How to Write a Blockbuster’ manual is hot today) that pushes all the right buttons but has nothing interesting to say. The truth is that we get that kind of novel submitted to us all the time, and we almost always turn it down. We don’t want a carefully crafted piece of work that’s carefully crafted to be like most every other novel out there today: we want something different, something that challenges us, something that makes us look at the world in a different way. We want to publish writers who take chances with language, chances with structure. Who aren’t afraid to write from the heart rather than to write to a formula. As our ‘publishing manifesto’ (see the ‘About Us’ page of our website) says: ‘Everything that we publish, we publish with passion. We love each of our books. They say something about the author, they say something about us and they say something about the time and the place they were born into. Each book is a person we like being around. Because each, in its own way, fights back against formulas and homogenization, against the analgesic washing-out of colour that threatens to fade our bright thoughts.’



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