Retain the power to surprise

I haven't had the chance to read JK Rowling 's new novel The Casual Vacancy yet but, like many, I've scanned the reviews which, predictably perhaps, were circumspect at best. How much of the tepid response, I wonder, was down to the novel itself and how much because it wasn't titled Harry Potter and The Casual Vacancy?

Rowling was always going to be on a hiding to nothing. When you have created a world as imaginative and era-defining as Harry Potter's which, for many will represent their childhood the way Roald Dahl does mine, any new work is going to suffer in comparison.

But that's not the point. Rowling has committed herself to do what every writer should: to take the reader on a journey, to make the reader work just a bit and to retain an element of surprise. And that doesn't just mean in terms of story line or character, but in subject matter too; in addressing issues and themes that perhaps you would not expect to read from that particular author. She has resisted the temptation to slip into a formula purely because it has worked spectacularly before. Nor has she decided to retreat into retirement, count her cash and leave her reputation intact. The Potter series ended at a natural break in the characters' school careers and Rowling resisted the urge and indeed the calls to keep writing new Potter stories simply because she could. She took the step instead to take herself and us with her into a new and very different environment, knowing that many would find the transition a difficult one to make. But that's no bad thing. Rowling knows more than most that, done effectively, challenging the reader can engage and involve them in a way that spoon feeding every answer and tying every loose end rarely can.

I had an email from somebody who had read my first book, The Bitterest Pill. Towards the end of that book one character cuts his wrists. My correspondent told me that she felt it seemed right that the character in question should have taken their own life. My response was that I never made up my mind that they had; I left it open ended because I didn't necessarily think it was my decision to make But I loved the fact that the reader was so challenged and engaged with the characters that she had reached her own conclusion completely unaided. Her view and indeed mine may well be different from yours.

So let's not resort to the easy option of knocking The Casual Vacancy or judge it out of context. It may be impossible to do so but lets read it instead as if Harry Potter had never existed and make up our own minds. Kids and kids at heart owe JK Rowling nothing less. And who knows, it could be magical.

Leave a little piece of yourself on the page

I love the movies and, I’ll share a secret, I have always been a little bit fascinated by Alfred Hitchcock; not just for the palpable sense of suspense he managed to create but more for his trademark of always having a background walk on part in each of his films. No matter what the story, you knew as a viewer that there was literally a little piece of Hitchcock in the movie somewhere.

It's not dissimilar with writing. The best piece of advice I was given was to put together the story that I would want to read. Don't try and copy the trademarks of one genre or another, write for myself and tell the story that I want to tell. Not everyone will love it, but more will than won't because it will carry with it an authenticity that is hard to fake.

Authenticity is crucial in good writing. It creates a distinctive voice as opposed to delivering just another me-too novel. And writing should be about the individual, the quirky and the distinctive. We should always be looking to give our individual take on the world.

But it requires more than that. It requires the author to leave a little bit of themselves on the page. Sometimes that's tough. It requires us to explore our own emotions, to ask ourselves how we would react to the situations in which we place our characters and in some cases to delve back into our own past and experiences which may be uncomfortable and even painful. But it's worth it. In the book I am currently writing, I am working through an event that happened to me nearly 40 years ago when, aged nearly 8, I was present when one of my friends drowned whilst we were out swimming together. The event had been pushed to farthest corners of my mind, many of the details suppressed by the subconscious of my eight year old self but I have brought it back to the front. I wouldn’t say it is cathartic necessarily but it is taking me on a journey. The story will ultimately help me make sense of what happened that day, is my small way of acknowledging that friend and keeping his memory alive but, just as importantly, it should provide authenticity in the story telling that would otherwise be difficult to achieve.

I have said many times that I enjoy taking ordinary characters, placing them in extraordinary situations and exploring how they and others would react. To achieve that - if I have achieved that - I have to first do the same to myself. Only then can my voice and the voices of my characters be authentic and can I genuinely say I have left a little piece of myself on every page.