The Writing Life of: Georgia Rose
Georgia Rose
This week on ‘The Writing Life of:‘ I am thrilled to be interviewing author Georgia Rose. Georgia will be sharing with us detail of her writing life, telling us all about her latest book ‘Thicker Than Water‘, which was released on 18th September 2015 and answering a few fun questions too. Post contains affiliate links.
Georgia Rose is a writer and the author of The Grayson Trilogy books: ‘A Single Step’, ‘Before the Dawn’ and ‘Thicker than Water’.
Georgia’s background in countryside living, riding, instructing and working with horses has provided the knowledge needed for some of her storylines; the others are a product of her overactive imagination!
Following a long stint working in the law Georgia set up her own business providing administration services for other companies which she does to this day managing to entwine that work along with her writing.
Her busy life is set in a tranquil part of rural Cambridgeshire where she lives with her much neglected family of a husband, two grown up children and two dogs.
1) Do you remember the moment you decided that you would like to become a writer?
2) How did you go about following your dream?
I came home and, terrified that as soon as I got back into work the story would drift out of my head again, I wrote frantically.
Every second that I could squeeze out of my hectic work/home schedule was spent writing. I barely slept, as vivid scenes would come to me in the early hours, lost 20 lbs as I forgot to eat and three months later I had the first draft.
It was a magical experience that I wish I could recreate but I think that is the pure adrenaline rush of a first novel. There is nothing quite like it.
3) Is there a particular author that inspires you?
There are many, for several different reasons, but Sue Grafton comes to mind immediately as I love her character Kinsey Millhone in the "Alphabet series".
Having just finished a trilogy I am in awe of the fact that Grafton is up to X in her series and has managed incredible consistency in her characterisation and development of Kinsey and kept the series fresh and interesting – an amazing undertaking.
In the indie world I think anyone who has tried his work would agree that Mark Barry’s writing is inspirational and his ideas original. I have read all his books and no two are the same which while refreshing and constantly interesting creates difficulties for him in building a reader base because you never know what you’re going to get, other than always excellent writing.
4) What is your average writing day like? Do you have any strange writing habits?
Ahh, well I wish I had any actual writing days that were dedicated to that activity alone but sadly I do not.
I work long hours and what usually happens is that I open up my manuscript but then have to get on with client work. So I cram in the odd half hour here and there between client jobs when I zip over to the MS and type a bit – how things end up in the right places is beyond me!
I usually work until 10 or 11 at night so often do a bit of writing after then. I don’t write early in the morning as that doesn’t work in our household routine but my brain is usually buzzing then with what I need to get down somehow during the day.
I quite fancy having some sort of wonderfully eccentric writing habits but I just don’t have the time.
Where Georgia Writes
5) Do you write Longhand, Type writer, Computer?
Computer – I need to be able to constantly change things around. I am amazed by anyone who writes longhand. The ability to be that fluent and to be able to organise your thoughts well enough to do this at the outset is an outstanding talent.
6) From all your books, do you have a favourite character?
I have written three books but as a trilogy so the same characters are in each and out of these Emma Grayson would be my favourite. She has been through terrible times but is a strong no-nonsense character and I’m incredibly proud of her.
7) Do you plot your books completely before hand or do you let your imagination flow whilst in the writing process?
I plot them in as far as I know what the story is, from beginning to end but I don’t write any of this down.
I wish I did as when I started out I had romantic visions of having fabulous notebooks filled with scribbles and little asides and reminders to myself – possibly the occasional sketch (though why I thought this I have no idea as I have no drawing skills at all!). However, I set out with the best intentions to try and create this, get as far as mapping out a timeline, then I get impatient and crack on with the typing!
Concerning your latest book:
Author – Georgia Rose
Publisher – Three Shires Publishing
Pages – 229
Release Date – 18th September 2015
Format – ebook, paperbac
There are tough times ahead for Emma Grayson in the final part of these mysterious and romantic adventure stories as she struggles to move on from her old life.
‘Vaguely aware of the tremor in my hand I ran my fingers up through the thick locks of his dark hair. Fear clutched at my heart as I sensed the icy tendrils of grief reaching for me once more.’ As the overseas action steps up a gear for Trent, Emma has her own challenges to face.
Loyalties are tested and vengeance sought when she attracts interest from an unwelcome source. Because someone is coming. Someone who has Emma in their sights. Someone who will turn her life upside down… forever.
8) How long did it take to get from the ideas stage, to the date of publication?
It was planned out mentally on a sun bed in August 2012 and it was published on the 18 September 2015 as the third book of the trilogy.
9) Did you suffer from writer’s block at any stage? How did you overcome it?
I wouldn’t call it writers block because I was never staring at a blank screen not knowing what to write next but I did struggle at one stage with writing this last book.
There were two reasons; one, quite boringly, was time, or the lack of it. I pretty much wrote both of the first two books before I published the first one, A Single Step, and entered the realm of social media which is a huge time-suck but essential nowadays for anyone to notice you. Adding this into my life has left little time for writing.
The second was expectation. When I wrote the first two books there was none, I was purely writing the books for myself and never expected to publish them.
This time I actually had people asking when the next book was coming and telling me how much they had loved the first ones – lovely, obviously, but incredibly daunting.
I became quite paralysed by the thought of disappointing them. However this was overcome by a very good friend telling me to spend an afternoon writing about Emma’s life on the estate, in all its descriptive glory, and to forget about the storyline for a bit – I did, and that was the turning point. I refocused on my reasons for doing this in that I wanted to write stories that I wanted to read and I got it done.
10) How did you come up with the name(s)for your lead character(s)?
They just come to me, that’s all I can say – a name I like, and that suits, pops into my mind and then I google it and keep my fingers crossed that it’s not already taken.
The Grayson Trilogy was slightly challenging on the names front as mostly surnames are used in the book so I made sure I didn’t call anyone something like Sebastian Fortescue-Witherington as I’d certainly have regretted that later on!
11) If your book was made in to a film, who would you love to play the lead character(s)?
Well now, this is a question I’m going to have to dodge I’m afraid.
I do know exactly who I would have playing the parts, however I am really against my readers already having a face in mind for a character, so I never tell. This is one of the reasons why I have no people on my covers.
For me the image of the character is a very personal thing so I like lightly painting them so that they will come to life in the mind of whoever is reading them. However I’m always open to listening to readers telling me who they would have playing the parts – I love that!
I will say one thing though; the entire cast would have to be played by British actors.
12) Did you get anyone in particular to read your work before sending it to the publisher i.e family member, friend etc?
Oh yes, this is very important. I have a team of six beta readers who read the MS after the first draft. They are made up of my daughter (always my first reader!) and friends, but we are very businesslike about this and so as not to ruin any relationships they are told they can be as brutal as they like but they must tell me the truth – there is no point having them otherwise!
They give me the big picture stuff – does the story work, are there any plot holes, is the pacing right, is anyone behaving out of character, do they feel emotion when I’m hoping they should and most importantly – do they believe!
I also engage the services of the team at SilverWood Books to carry out copy-editing, proofreading and cover design before I am ready to push that publish button. In between all of these stages there are obviously endless re-writes and re-reads.
You can find out more about Georgia Rose by visiting the website/social media sites below.
Three Shires Publishing Facebook Page
www.georgiarosebooks.com
@GeorgiaRoseBook
@TSPublishing
Facebook
Goodreads
Have a read of our reviews of Georgia’s books ‘Thicker than Water‘ – ‘A Single Step‘ and ‘Before the Dawn‘
This is terrific, thanks so much for such a lovely interview though I’m a little shocked to see an outsiders view of my office (it’s looking even worse at the moment!) It was wonderful to meet and have the chance to chat to you 🙂
“I quite fancy having some sort of wonderfully eccentric writing habits but I just don’t have the time.”
I love that! Like you, I don’t have any, either, I just sit down and write at my desk, mostly during ‘office hours’. The other day I did dream a story which I must get on with in a minute, but generally I just get on with it. Lovely interview, ladies ~ and I never thought of googling my character names!!
Your office isn’t that bad. I’ll have to post a picture of mine sometime, especially when it’s about 11pm and I’ve been working all day – papers, folders, ipad, laptop, phone, stationary, diaries and the odd bar of chocolate scattered everywhere 🙂
We are very practical people aren’t we Terry – just sitting down and getting on with it. You would be amazed at the number of people who on finding out what I’ve done have said that they have wanted to write a book and do I have any tips… actually yes, just one, if you want to do it then sit down and write, that’s all there is to it.
Oh yes I always google the names, particularly in case a name has popped into my head that I think is original but in fact I’ve subliminally taken it in somewhere and then find out it is the lead singer of some boy band I’m vaguely aware of. Anyway, many thanks for the comment Terry and I’m so pleased you liked the interview.
I’m so glad it’s not just me – usually the pictures I see of writing places are all neat and tidy – and bare – it would take a week (and probably the use of a skip!) to get mine looking like that!