As I told you last week, Mum was beginning to Dream Big. Her first novel, Cloughfold, was in the shops and selling well – and the typescript for her second one, When Daffodils Bloom, had been delivered to the publisher and had met with his approval.
Now she had a year in which to write her third one and already the ideas were forming in her head. She caught a glimpse of Barkisland Hall, near Halifax, on the local news programme and that became the inspiration for the setting for the new novel…
while a chance comment on her trip to Siberia about two women surviving a struggle through a terrible snow storm inspired two incidents in the story.
Even better, as the story took shape in her mind, Mum realised that it was set between 1827 and 1833 – just the same period as Cloughfold and When Daffodils Bloom and so she’d done most of the research already.
The publisher had already told her that this third book would be what was known as a breakthrough novel and would make her lots of money. He said it would sell in the USA and, once that happened, Cloughfold and When Daffodils Bloom would sell there as well. He even mentioned the possibility of it making at least £250,000 – which would be almost £1,444,000 today – and Mum began to dream really big.
On her frequent trips into the Yorkshire Dales she found herself looking in estate agents’ windows for her dream house and saw several that she quite liked. She even got as far as going to look at a newly-renovated detached house in Cotterdale, near Hawes, and, though it was out of her reach financially at that time, she couldn’t help hoping that it would stay on the market until she could afford it.
Having enjoyed her holiday to Siberia and Mongolia so much, she also let herself dream big about travelling. She booked a holiday to Tashkent, Bukhara and Samarkand for Spring 1979, to be followed by a long weekend in Iceland. She also had an invitation to visit an old neighbour who’d emigrated to Durban in South Africa, while her very special dream was to fly on the Air France Concorde from Paris to Rio de Janeiro…
Before she could do any of that, however, Mum had to get that third novel written and, because he was expecting it to make so much money – for himself, as well as for her! – the publisher wanted to see a detailed outline and the first couple of chapters before she wrote the whole thing.
Quite apart from the chance it might make her a lot of money, Mum was really enthusiastic about the story itself and threw herself into making it the best she could. Thinking of how it might make her dreams come true, she even titled it The Dreamchasers…
But, to her dismay, the publisher said it wasn’t what he wanted. Though The Dreamchasers was a good story and well written, he wanted Mum to write a saga, covering three generations of a wealthy family in one book. He also wanted it set in Victorian times – about which Mum only had a very basic knowledge – and written in the third person, which Mum hated.
Then, while she was trying to come up with an idea for that, she started to get more feed-back on When Daffodils Bloom from the publisher. He loved the story as it was and didn’t want her to make any alterations to it. He wanted to change the title, however, and rename it The Romany.
Mum argued against this as she said it had very little to do with the story, but she was overruled and the novel was eventually published with that title. She also had problems with the artwork for the dust-jacket which was once again by John Rose. Although the background for the wrap-around design was great, the two main characters on the front were nothing like the way Mum had imagined them. And the hero was especially wrong…
In Mum’s mind he’d been around 21 or 22 years old when the story started and had a look of David Essex at that time. On the dust-jacket, however, he looks at least 40 years old with the build of a world-champion heavyweight boxer.
That was bad enough, but then Mum noticed that behind the two characters the artist had depicted a bow-topped wagon, or vardo – something that didn’t come into use until more than 20 years after her story ended. Once again her views were overruled – and, to her relief, if anyone else has noticed this mistake then they’ve been polite enough not to mention it!
Apart from those niggles, however, things were going well. Mum put The Dreamchasers to one side and concentrated on trying to write the saga that the publisher wanted. Having been born and brought up in a Yorkshire mill-town, she decided to have a mill-owning family at the centre of the story and to set it mostly in the second half of the 19th century.
Because it was all strange to her, it involved a lot of research in libraries and museums, as well as in working mills, but eventually it began to take shape and, though she wasn’t as happy writing it as she’d been with her other novels, she did her best.
And in between writing the new novel and doing her part-time job in the school library, she continued writing stories for her favourite magazines and travelling when she could. Highlights of that year included a trip to London to see Evita,
a trip to Bristol to see Naomi the baby gorilla at the zoo,
a visit to Kellingley Colliery where she went underground and walked through the coal-face,
and an invitation to the Lord Mayor’s Christmas Reception in the Civic Hall in Leeds.
Enjoying every minute, Mum wanted it to go on for ever, but it wouldn’t be long before she found out that life has a strange way of slapping you in the face when you least expect it.
I’ll tell you more about that next week, but meanwhile look out for a Hallowe’en bonus from me at the weekend. Take care – and I’ll talk to you again soon!
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29/10/20
Wilf the bear-faced blogger 