Very delighted to bring you Annalisa Crawford's new book The Clock in My Mother's House and other stories. I met her on line while blogging and have enjoyed her posts, newsletters, books, and her author success. Let's see what she has to say:
Thank you, Joanne, for inviting me onto
your blog today to help me celebrate the release of my new short story
collection The Clock in My Mother’s House.
People often ask writers where they get
their ideas from, and it’s a question we sometimes struggle with. For my
novels, it’s impossible to answer because several (if not, many) elements
converge over time until I have no memory of the inciting concept. Equally
ideas rise in prominence and fall away never to be seen again.
However, as all the stories in my this
collection were written relatively recently, it’s much easier to remember where
I was and which nuggets of inspiration stuck – and hopefully it will whet your
appetite to check out the book😉
Click – I
stumbled across an article, one day, about an art exhibition where an artist
had asked members of the public to send him photographs they could no longer
bear to look at – those too sad or poignant or painful. Isn’t that just an
incredible idea? (Just writing this has given me an great idea for something
new, too.)
So, one of the photos was of an man walking
away from the camera, which sparked an interest in the story behind it, and why
it had been sent. The story records the break-up between the photographer’s
mother and step-father.
All the Magpies Come Out to Play – This was my lockdown story, the story I swore I wouldn’t write
because who’d want to read about the pandemic while it was still so large and
raw. But a character, inspired by my dad who lived opposite me, appeared in my
head, waving at her neighbour, just as my dad and I had done when we couldn’t
meet in person. From there, I thought of the queues outside shops, as people
were allowed in one at a time. I recalled the way neighbours helped each other,
and the eerie silence across town as we all took our one-hour walk each day. I
wrote this story in the summer of 2020, I was still on furlough, some lockdown
measures about crowd sizes and mask-wearing were still in place, but people
were returning to work and school.
Everything in the story was my real
experience of how lockdown was in my town. It was published online, and many
comments scoffed at my ‘fairy tale’ depiction, which only served to make me
proud of the way my town, my friends and neighbours, stepped up to the challenge
of keeping each other safe. It was early, remember, we had no way of knowing
how the virus would affect us.
Vera Says… -
Oh, it’s another Dad anecdote! My sister and I often went on road trips with my
dad to see various air shows around the country. One trip, unbeknownst to us,
my mum had fiddled with the settings on the sat-nav which meant that wherever
we drove, the sat-nav became increasingly insistent we turned around and went a
different way. My dad and the sat-nav had quite a few arguments that weekend.
It was possibly on a different holiday that we named the sat-nav. It wasn’t
called Vera, but we can’t remember what it was. Luckily, we made it to our
destination. As do the characters in this story…
Thanks so much Annalisa. You make it look easy, but I know you've put a lot of time, effort, and editing to bring your new book to fruition. Now all we have to do is buy and read it!
Here's a blurb to whet our appetite
The Clock in My Mother’s House
Life can change in an instant, but
that’s not always a bad thing.
A hotel explodes leaving staff and guests in peril; a woman retrieves an old
clock from the attic with disturbing consequences; one man leaves heart break
behind him, and another arrives to bring adventure.
In this haunting collection, Annalisa Crawford creates characters who will
charm, captivate and intrigue you.
Annalisa Crawford lives in Cornwall, UK,
with a good supply of moorland and beaches to keep her inspired. She lives with
her husband, and canine writing partner, Artoo. She is the author of four short
story collections, and two novels.
Website: https://www.annalisacrawford.com/
Buy Links: https://books2read.com/clock-in-mothers-house
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/annalisacrawford.author
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AnnalisaCrawf
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