Ask the Author: Helena Coggan
Answered Questions (3)
Helena Coggan
Hello Samiha- it's lovely to meet you, albeit virtually! You're very kind- I've never thought of it as amazing so much as lucky, but if you want my advice, and I'm flattered you do, well...
Firstly: I would not advise thinking of it as 'trying to write a book', because when you're starting from very little the concept of a full manuscript is very very daunting. I didn't start using the word 'book' in my head until I hit about 80,000 words, and even then it was tenuous. Your aims are, in order: an idea, a set of characters, a world they live in, the rudiments of a plot, a thousand words, five thousand, ten thousand, twenty thousand... and that's still not reason to get your hopes up that it will make it to a full finished book (sorry). I was trying to write a full story from about eight (yes, I know, I was weird), and very few of them ever passed the four-figure-word-count threshold. More recently, and in particular when writing the book I'm working on now (my third), I had about *counts silently* six ideas, in drafts that amounted to at least a hundred thousand words together, covering a span of an increasingly panicky eight months. And that was when I HAD to write a book. So yes, in terms of advice: enjoy writing when it's still a hobby and not a job; keep your sights low; don't think about the possibility that things might fail, because that's never helpful; DO YOUR HOMEWORK FIRST I MEAN IT (sorry); and know that, if it means anything, you have all my love and best wishes- you guys are my kindred.
If there's anything else I can help with (apart from actually reading your work, which I can't do for reasons that are mostly legal, sorry) or any more questions you'd like me to answer, please do ask- this is what I'm for. That and writing down the voices in my head for a living.
All the best,
H
Firstly: I would not advise thinking of it as 'trying to write a book', because when you're starting from very little the concept of a full manuscript is very very daunting. I didn't start using the word 'book' in my head until I hit about 80,000 words, and even then it was tenuous. Your aims are, in order: an idea, a set of characters, a world they live in, the rudiments of a plot, a thousand words, five thousand, ten thousand, twenty thousand... and that's still not reason to get your hopes up that it will make it to a full finished book (sorry). I was trying to write a full story from about eight (yes, I know, I was weird), and very few of them ever passed the four-figure-word-count threshold. More recently, and in particular when writing the book I'm working on now (my third), I had about *counts silently* six ideas, in drafts that amounted to at least a hundred thousand words together, covering a span of an increasingly panicky eight months. And that was when I HAD to write a book. So yes, in terms of advice: enjoy writing when it's still a hobby and not a job; keep your sights low; don't think about the possibility that things might fail, because that's never helpful; DO YOUR HOMEWORK FIRST I MEAN IT (sorry); and know that, if it means anything, you have all my love and best wishes- you guys are my kindred.
If there's anything else I can help with (apart from actually reading your work, which I can't do for reasons that are mostly legal, sorry) or any more questions you'd like me to answer, please do ask- this is what I'm for. That and writing down the voices in my head for a living.
All the best,
H
Helena Coggan
Hi Gemma! I'm really touched that you guys are reading it- and of course I don't mind the questions! (Also, I love the idea of being the leader of a book club. That sounds amazing. I want to try that.)
The book took me a while to write. Actually, the writing wasn't the problem- insofar as time was a problem, which I never really thought it was, given that it just meant I had an excuse to spend more time writing (you may be able to tell at this point how inefficient I am)- the editing was the problem. The first draft of the book took six months- October 2012 until April 2013- to write. Then the second draft was another three months, or thereabouts- April through August. It wasn't until December that we knew it was getting published, and only in February 2014 did the actual edits start.
Now. I have a the most wonderful editor in the world, but even with her being as kind and brilliant and patient as she was, editing took a very long time (what with my being fourteen, inexperienced and overexcited), and that time didn't fly half as quickly as the months it took to actually write it. Once, I cut 70,000 words in one afternoon. The rest of it wasn't as brutal as that, but still: looking back now, I don’t think I really knew how much I loved the story, and writing itself, until I'd gone through six months of cutting it and dissecting it and stripping it down and building it back up again. But I still had the time of my life doing all of it (and will again with the second book, once the exams are over).
As for my favourite character� I loved writing them all, of course, but I had different favourites for different reasons. Felix was the most difficult to write; Rose became the strongest from the lowest starting point, from a PoV vessel two years and four drafts ago to an actual person by the end; but David, I think, has to be my favourite overall. He started as the quiet, unrecognised voice of authority- I don't think that survived even past his first two lines of dialogue. Certainly 'quiet' and 'unrecognised' didn't. He is the perfect example of why I can never fully plot out stories, scenes, or characters before I start writing them. They always, always change between my head and the page. If I could give one piece of advice to anyone about the actual process of writing, it's that: they always change. And that's a good thing, because it means they probably have life in them.
Anyway. Thank you so much for being so lovely, and I hope you all really enjoy the book! Don't hesitate to ask any more questions if you have them- it's wonderful to hear from you guys.
Best,
Helena
The book took me a while to write. Actually, the writing wasn't the problem- insofar as time was a problem, which I never really thought it was, given that it just meant I had an excuse to spend more time writing (you may be able to tell at this point how inefficient I am)- the editing was the problem. The first draft of the book took six months- October 2012 until April 2013- to write. Then the second draft was another three months, or thereabouts- April through August. It wasn't until December that we knew it was getting published, and only in February 2014 did the actual edits start.
Now. I have a the most wonderful editor in the world, but even with her being as kind and brilliant and patient as she was, editing took a very long time (what with my being fourteen, inexperienced and overexcited), and that time didn't fly half as quickly as the months it took to actually write it. Once, I cut 70,000 words in one afternoon. The rest of it wasn't as brutal as that, but still: looking back now, I don’t think I really knew how much I loved the story, and writing itself, until I'd gone through six months of cutting it and dissecting it and stripping it down and building it back up again. But I still had the time of my life doing all of it (and will again with the second book, once the exams are over).
As for my favourite character� I loved writing them all, of course, but I had different favourites for different reasons. Felix was the most difficult to write; Rose became the strongest from the lowest starting point, from a PoV vessel two years and four drafts ago to an actual person by the end; but David, I think, has to be my favourite overall. He started as the quiet, unrecognised voice of authority- I don't think that survived even past his first two lines of dialogue. Certainly 'quiet' and 'unrecognised' didn't. He is the perfect example of why I can never fully plot out stories, scenes, or characters before I start writing them. They always, always change between my head and the page. If I could give one piece of advice to anyone about the actual process of writing, it's that: they always change. And that's a good thing, because it means they probably have life in them.
Anyway. Thank you so much for being so lovely, and I hope you all really enjoy the book! Don't hesitate to ask any more questions if you have them- it's wonderful to hear from you guys.
Best,
Helena
Helena Coggan
Oh, I'm so glad your mum enjoyed the fair- believe me, no one thinks it's weird more than I do, but the audience were very kind and patient, and I loved being there.
I'm afraid I was disappointingly mainstream when I was younger: I absolutely loved the Harry Potter series, enough that I can still quote passages now and remember the words I learnt from reading it. I also loved The Chronicles of Narnia- my dad read it to me when I was about six, and I adored the whole idea of magical worlds and eternal winters and being an archer-queen who could fight wars against evil (although I used to fiddle a bit with the canon and pretend I would be called Valiant instead of Gentle at the end of it). I remember keeping my school's copy of Cliff McNish's The Doomspell in my desk pretty much throughout the whole of Year 5; and a bit later, when I was eleven or twelve, I loved Derek Landy's Skulduggery Pleasant series. (He taught me how to write humorous dedications and author's biographies, especially if, like me, you don't have much bio to graph.) I also read and reread Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials and Philip Reeve's Mortal Engines series; and finally of course I loved The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; the book that taught me and thousands of other kids that sci-fi wasn't just brilliant, weird, imaginative and exciting; it was also, when you stop and think about it, really really weird. It was a lesson I learnt again a year or so later from Doctor Who.
I learnt a lot from those books, from reading them over and over again, and from loving them. Firstly I learnt that I was probably going to spend most of my life adoring imaginary worlds and so I might as well try to find a use for that, but I also learnt a lot about the mechanics of storytelling: suspense and cliffhanger endings, plot and plot twists, character development and relationships. But I also learnt things I didn't particularly want to know- most importantly, that part of what qualified a heroine was being beautiful by the end of the story, and that, I realised sadly at about eight or nine, was a criterion I was highly unlikely to meet. As if in compliance with some immutable law- spoiler alert- Hermione Granger, Valkyrie Cain, Trillian, Lyra, Wren, the Pevensie sisters all ended up beautiful and/or in love (and for that matter so have all the Doctor Who companions since the reboot, and many before). That particular lesson is one I intend to try to make as many girls and teenagers unlearn if I can, because it's no small thing, really, to believe that you're disqualified from ending up like your heroines.
If you have any younger sisters or friends aged about eight and upwards, encourage them to read all of these books. But tell them in advance to imagine the girls as looking like them- they'll be much happier.
I really hope you enjoy the book- and thank you for being so kind!
H
I'm afraid I was disappointingly mainstream when I was younger: I absolutely loved the Harry Potter series, enough that I can still quote passages now and remember the words I learnt from reading it. I also loved The Chronicles of Narnia- my dad read it to me when I was about six, and I adored the whole idea of magical worlds and eternal winters and being an archer-queen who could fight wars against evil (although I used to fiddle a bit with the canon and pretend I would be called Valiant instead of Gentle at the end of it). I remember keeping my school's copy of Cliff McNish's The Doomspell in my desk pretty much throughout the whole of Year 5; and a bit later, when I was eleven or twelve, I loved Derek Landy's Skulduggery Pleasant series. (He taught me how to write humorous dedications and author's biographies, especially if, like me, you don't have much bio to graph.) I also read and reread Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials and Philip Reeve's Mortal Engines series; and finally of course I loved The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; the book that taught me and thousands of other kids that sci-fi wasn't just brilliant, weird, imaginative and exciting; it was also, when you stop and think about it, really really weird. It was a lesson I learnt again a year or so later from Doctor Who.
I learnt a lot from those books, from reading them over and over again, and from loving them. Firstly I learnt that I was probably going to spend most of my life adoring imaginary worlds and so I might as well try to find a use for that, but I also learnt a lot about the mechanics of storytelling: suspense and cliffhanger endings, plot and plot twists, character development and relationships. But I also learnt things I didn't particularly want to know- most importantly, that part of what qualified a heroine was being beautiful by the end of the story, and that, I realised sadly at about eight or nine, was a criterion I was highly unlikely to meet. As if in compliance with some immutable law- spoiler alert- Hermione Granger, Valkyrie Cain, Trillian, Lyra, Wren, the Pevensie sisters all ended up beautiful and/or in love (and for that matter so have all the Doctor Who companions since the reboot, and many before). That particular lesson is one I intend to try to make as many girls and teenagers unlearn if I can, because it's no small thing, really, to believe that you're disqualified from ending up like your heroines.
If you have any younger sisters or friends aged about eight and upwards, encourage them to read all of these books. But tell them in advance to imagine the girls as looking like them- they'll be much happier.
I really hope you enjoy the book- and thank you for being so kind!
H
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