Blog | Alison Morton Author

Speaking at conferences - the truth

Whether you’re invited or have submitted a pitch to speak at a conference it’s the same on the day. You have a mass of faces in front of you. You re alone in the arena and the lions are pacing back and forth, tongues salivating. The be-tunicked and be-toga-ed are watching, a smile on their lips, ready to be entertained, but their thumbs are ready…

An exaggeration, perhaps, but speakers are expected to perform and to be as nifty as the retarius, secutor or (even) gladiatrix. As Maximus Decimus Meridius alludes in Gladiator (the first one), the crowds wishes to be entertained.

Sometimes people who are expert in their field are not happy to speak to an audience. They’re diffident about their expertise and think what they know is ‘normal’, nothing special. It isn’t, of course. This is a pity as they are the very people we’ve come to see and whose pearls of wisdom we’d like to hear .

Now, I like standing up in front of people and talking my head off, but that’s not enough. I still agonise about whether I’ve got too much or too little material or if I’m pitching it at the right level for the audience. I always ask the organisers what stage people in the audience have reached in their career, but usually get an airy ‘Oh, all levels‘ (which is never true).

Suited up!

During my business career, I gave talks to audiences from six up to a thousand and I’ve spoken over the past dozen years about writing, indie publishing, Romans, historical and alternative history fiction at many different events. Now I’m starting to prepare for chairing a panel on taking the Romans to the public for the Historical Novel Society in a few days’ time. My panel parters are authors Kate Quinn and Ruth Downie, both fabulous historical fiction writers. It’s always fun and you get such interesting questions from the audience!

So here are a few ideas for you when you are asked to speak at an event…

Dare to do it
Nobody is going to eat you (It’s against the law.) and quite a lot of people would like to hear from you. Obviously, you need to know the subject area and that in itself breeds confidence. Say yes. Once booked, you’re unlikely to backslide.

Agree the topic and scope with the organiser
Very important to clarify this with the organisers at the start. I’m amazed by how many talks I’ve been to where the topics differed from the title on the programme. The most notable one was at the 2014 London Book Fair! I chatted to the speaker afterwards and found she’d been given the wrong briefing. I felt so sorry for her. Her talk was really interesting, but not the one in the programme.

Start gathering your ideas early
The longer lead time, the better. You could come across some terrific new research, or meet a new person to consult, or a find new way of presentation if you have a few months. Also it forestalls panic as the date approaches if you’ve got most of the presentation under your belt.

Write it all out
You’re probably not going to read it verbatim – that’s boring for the audience and you’ll lose them within a few minutes. We all need to remember the ‘entertain’ bit. However, composing your talk in your head and tapping it into your computer when preparing means that the thoughts go through your brain and hopefully stick there and possibly mature. When you’re ready, you can transfer the meat of your talk to postcards, tablet or whatever aide-memoire you use.

Speaking at the international Writers’ Festival, Dublin

Practice and timing
Your nearest and dearest may be ready to call for the men in white coats when they see and hear you doing this, but I strongly recommend you rehearse your talk out loud, even if you’re only addressing the dog (who will listen) or the cat (who will walk away, its tail in the air). You need to know how long your delivery will take.

I usually allow ten minutes of non-presentation time for fiddling around with tech at the beginning and questions at the end.

Use slides/pictures/objects/maps/charts, but…
I like images, so perhaps I’m biased. Regular readers know I always have illustrations in every blog post; they break up the narrative and give readers a chance to absorb what I’ve written. They may even be amused. So it is with talks. If you have spellbinders like Lindsey Davis or David Nobbs, there is no need. But for us lesser mortals, while we engage, we are not in that class.

And resist the temptation to submit your audience to lines of text. One or two slides of maximum three bullet points interspersed with images can work, if used sparingly.

And here’s the ‘but’…

Do not depend on images and slides or you could be stuck like a cat up a tree with no firefighter to rescue you. If the technology fails, you should still be able to give your talk.

Take a breath
Aim to speak slightly slower than normal – everybody except the complete expert speaks faster out of nervousness. And if you get lost or befogged during your talk, pause, take a breath, glance at your notes to gather yourself together. You’ll soon recover because you’ve practised this damned talk so many times, you know exactly where you are.

And answer questions nicely
You haven’t finished yet. Look and smile at the questioner even if you think they resemble the tough interrogator from the local vigiles cohort in ancient Rome. While there will be some nit-pickers, you may be surprised by how supportive some of the questions are. And lastly, don’t try to fluff an answer. If you don’t know, offer to find out and email them later.

Thank you for reading – I hope you’ve enjoyed it.

Thoughts, anybody? Or any questions?

Revised and republished 2024

Alison Morton is the author of Roma Nova thrillers – INCEPTIO, CARINA (novella), PERFIDITAS, SUCCESSIO, AURELIA, NEXUS (novella), INSURRECTIO and RETALIO, and ROMA NOVA EXTRA, a collection of short stories. Audiobooks are available for four of the series. Double Identity, a contemporary conspiracy, starts a new series of thrillers. JULIA PRIMA, Roma Nova story set in the late 4th century, starts the Foundation stories. The sequel, EXSILIUM, is now out.

Download ‘Welcome to Alison Morton’s Thriller Worlds’, a FREE eBook, as a thank you gift when you sign up to Alison’s monthly email update. You’ll also be among the first to know about news and book progress before everybody else, and take part in giveaways.

Trust your reader!

When we write, we hope that somewhere, in some way, somebody will read it and embrace the message we are sending. When we receive an email from a reader saying they ‘get’ our concept and book world, or when a reader comes up to us at a book event and says it to our face, we experience a flow of delight and satisfaction.

Not only have we delivered and met those readers’ expectations, but we also feel we’ve formed a connection with them. They trusted us to produce a book in which they were prepared to invest precious reading hours (and taxed money!)

But how did we induce that reader to trust us?

The key is how we visualise potential readers as we’re writing. For me, anybody who picks up a book and reads it is already a smart person. But do we see a potential reader as bright and fully capable of intuition, discernment, and depth of feeling? Or do we think of her as a bit slower and less sensitive than us? Do we trust him enough to resist over-explaining everything we want her to feel?

Yet there’s a tendency, common to new writers but also affecting multiple-book authors, to punctuate every action with an interior reflection about what an action or decision means, evokes, or portends. It slows the pace and risks annoying the reader. (Confession: I often do it on my rubbishy first draft.)

Experiencing is much more powerful when one hasn’t been told a moment before what one is going to feel or is supposed to feel. This extra telling diminishes the power of what preceded it. If the writer has dragged me to the spot and insisted, repeatedly, that I look where she’s pointing, I feel as if I’m being lectured. Much better if I’m so engrossed in the story-world she’s created that I can’t not feel it.

So as I write, I keep saying to myself: ‘No, the reader smarter than that. Don’t patronise them with lazy prose or an easy notion.’

How to avoid (or remedy) overwriting

When writing and even more when editing…
• Take a red pen to your words and mercilessly circling or crossing out every place where you’ve conveyed a point more than once.
• Stop and imagine a smart, sensitive reader. Would they understand my meaning if I offered it simply and directly, in fewer words?
• How could I make those fewer words more powerful rather than adding more words?
• If you need to add a back-up sentence to explain a word in the previous sentence, then use a different word in that previous sentence, then you can cut the back-up.
• Use dialogue – a tried and trusted technique which will feel more immediate to the reader.

The opposite danger is under-writing

While I’m a huge fan of the Hemingway school of pared-down style, there’s a balance to be struck between being so succinct that nobody has the foggiest idea what your work is about and wandering, overdone prose. Underwriting assumes that we’ll automatically feel everything that happens to the protagonist exactly the way they would. But if we fail to give context that points the reader towards the character’s desires or woes, the reader will feel disconnected from the character. We’ll have to explain it later, or the reader may misperceive the entire story and throw the book at the wall in frustration.

Trust your reader!

Exposition works only when it challenges, surprises or in some way takes us, emotionally and mentally, somewhere new. Respect the reader enough to participate in your story and its world by giving them something additional to process.

It’s winter and it’s snowing. For some reason, your protagonist isn’t wearing a coat. He’s soaked. He trudging through slush. Then you write that he’s feeling miserable. There’s no need. Trust me, readers will work it out.

Find out more about Roma Nova, its origins, stories and heroines and taste world the latest contemporary thriller Double Identity… Download ‘Welcome to Alison Morton’s Thriller Worlds’, a FREE eBook, as a thank you gift when you sign up to Alison’s monthly email update. You’ll also be among the first to know about news and book progress before everybody else, and take part in giveaways.

The political author's dilemma

Reposted after update 2024

Bit of a tricky one, this.

Whatever genre you write, something of you, the author, creeps into your work. Perhaps it’s shades of your opinion, your wishes or even your frustrations. Perhaps you are writing a story that you wish you were living in a far, far away place and time.

At the very least, your ways of expression imbue your story. Your language and selection of vocabulary will slide in, sometimes consciously, sometimes subconsciously. And your choice of worldview, the slant you put on events, will be there.

Now that’s all fair enough; you are the creator of your book and its world. Some readers will love it, some it will leave cold, others will hate its guts (Hopefully, not too many of those!). We would be a very boring people if, sheep-like, we all liked the same thing or the same book.

Coryn Redgrave as Sir Walter Elliot (BBC)

Inside the book, characters can express every kind of view – political, moral or social. They can outrage, amuse, annoy and give joy to the other characters. An author can have enormous fun playing around with characters and their ideas and values.

Short of outright offence and hate speech, you can have them say anything obnoxious and politically incorrect as long as it serves your story.

One character I would have LOVED to have written is the pompous and self-absorbed Sir Walter Elliot of Kellynch Hall (Persuasion, Jane Austen). She must have had such fun writing him (and sending him up!). I have to admit there are aspects of him in Lucius Mitelus Superbus in PERFIDITAS. 😉

So, that’s the book world where you can do virtually anything.

But what about you, the author?As readers have bought your book and paid to come to an event to see you, it’s your duty as well as commercial sense to be pleasant and approachable. I love chatting to readers, and I can talk about the world of Roma Nova until the cows have come home, been milked, slept and gone back out to the fields the next day.

This is a total pleasure for me, but for some shyer authors it can be difficult as they are often incredibly modest and self-deprecating about their work. But that’s part of the author’s job and readers are often curious about the writer’s life, ideas and values.

Being anything but authentic as an author is not a good idea; it’s deceptive and unfair to your readers.
They want to read about and meet a real person. I imagine it’s quite hard work keeping up a false persona and you’re bound to come unstuck at some point. But an author doesn’t have to reveal their inside leg measurement, number of fillings or how often they did their child’s homework for them. They can sift what they want to tell readers, but what they make public should be true and genuine.

But should they express political views, especially in these febrile political times?

My EU hat in 1999. I won a competition with it!

Passionately held values and ideals are part of anybody’s personality; they are often what makes somebody unique, or at least remarkable. Many things contribute to these – upbringing, education, experience at work and in relationships – and however careful an author is publicly, something will slip through. That’s being human.

However, expressing strong views whether it’s about Brexit, American elections, financial scandals, climate change and other large-scale events can be a double-edged sword. Some readers, whether in Real Life or on social media, will like you standing up for a cause, some will disagree and some quietly unfollow you. Others will buy all your books, or vow never to touch another one. That’s the risk.

But if you stay neutral on everything, you run into the danger of looking characterless; a person of no view and no emotional side to them. And the second possible risk is that you may look rather bland and as if you bury your head and have no interest in the world around you.

Given the inflammatory nature of social media, and some of the unspeakable people who lurk there, I can understand the reluctance and sincere wish not to become embroiled. But that’s not me. Being a ‘political animal’ from my earliest years, I do tend to get involved in things. As I get older, I find the urge stronger. I aim to be calm and polite, analytical and informational and rant only very, very occasionally.

I am an author who likes to sell her books, and I hope I don’t put anybody off, but the freedom to express my views is such an intrinsic part of me and a privilege which I’m not giving up any time soon.

Refusal to contemplate either the extreme left(LFI) or the extreme right in France(RN) in 2024

Aged writers?

Probably done through ignorance, carelessness or thoughtlessness, this graphic aroused some strong reaction in the digiverse.

Some thought it silly, others were mortally offended. Most were insulted.

I think it springs from a sincere wish to attract mature writers, those who haven’t been able to write a creative work because of family or work commitments or a lack of confidence.

The genre is speculative literature, presumably along the lines of Ursula Le Guin or Margaret Atwood. So we’re looking at, for example, science fiction, fantasy, alternate history, horror, dystopian, magical realism and steampunk. Basically, anything that bends reality.

Yes, these genres may seem superficial and trashy to some people, but in the famous words, “They know not of what they speak.” I don’t think people would consider Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go or P D James’ Children of Men as trashy.

INCEPTIO in Waterstones (me at 62 years, 7 months)!

As a writer of alternate history thrillers that (I hope!) have some thoughtful moments, this is my field. My first Roma Nova thriller, INCEPTIO, published then by SilverWood Books, came out in 2013 when I was 62. In no way did I consider myself an older writer. I was just a super-thrilled writer holding her first book.

So what upset people about this cartoon graphic?

The Older Writers’ Grant has been awarded annually since 2004 to writers who are at least fifty years of age at the time of application to assist such writers who are just starting to work at a professional level. So far so good. This could give all sorts of a boost to such writers especially those taking writing up as a later career.

But… (You know I always have a ‘but’.)

Is the image in the advert a true idea of how people, especially younger people, see women and men over 50?

I consulted some of my fellow writers. These two comments sum up most of them:

“I’m 72. And the image in that ad is complete bollocks. My friends are in their 60-80’s and are superb! Filled with youth and energy!”

“This might work if eligibility started at age 100.”

Several posted photos of themselves at 67, 73, 70, nearly 60. I won’t repost as I haven’t asked their permission, but they’re on my Facebook author page. Gosh, they’re a fit and youthful lot. Most are wearing jeans or sports kit.

Ageism something that’s hard to avoid in any line of work, in the arts, and in every aspect of our culture, which is a great pity. It can inspire, especially when you’re told to take it easy now you’ve retired. (Falls over laughing.) Such a remark tends to spur me on. I mean, who doesn’t like a challenge?

Perhaps agents and publishers would prefer to publish a first novel by a 30-year-old writer with a potential career ahead of several decades than by a 75-year-old veteran writer, no matter how distinguished the latter’s career. Unless your recent book or books have sold exceptionally well, it’s a rough market for a new book, no matter its quality.

But older writers have secret assets: they’ve lived a long time and gained many insights through experience, something many 30-year-olds haven’t had time to accumulate. They’re also more crafty, patient and persistent. They’ve had to be as they’ve survived life so far.

But my core argument is not about age itself, but the perception of age. Yes, you can laugh off the image at the top as a silly joke. The couple in the image are cute and endearing, but totally unreal. It’s somebody’s limiting and rather patronising view of two older people.

In Real Life, we wear jeans and trainers, go out dancing, drink, drive sporty cars and work ridiculous schedules. We’re often looking after our children’s children or our own parents. Either requires stamina, patience and an agile mind, Yes, we probably get a little more tired, but most of us are not at the slippers and knitted rug stage, if that was ever a thing.

I applaud the initiative of the Older Writers’ Grant. I applaud any grant that supports writers, but I believe the Speculative Literature Foundation should really rethink their PR. This daft image does nobody any credit, least of all them.

And let’s just see writers as writers. It’s what they produce that counts, not the count of their years.

Cheers!

Writing retreating

Left to right: Me, Carol Cooper, Jean Gill, Jane Davis, Karen Inglis, Clare Flynn, Lorna Fergusson in April 2024

No, I don’t mean retreating from your writing, but going on a writing retreat.

A retreat implies withdrawing from the world.

A writing retreat implies getting away from the everyday and being able to sit down and write without Real Life intruding.

How does this work?

Retreats can be single person ones. I know a number of writers who book themselves into a local budget hotel where they can get basic food on tap, where somebody else cleans the room and where they are left alone. They are in their home area, but do not have the distractions of making meals, taking dogs for walks or children to school or being tempted by household chores. (Believe me, sometimes loading the dishwasher is a great displacement activity!)

Fully catered retreats usually take place in a special writing venue or even off peak university accommodation. A little more upmarket from a budget hotel. You may know some of the others on the retreat or nobody else, but you do come together for meals.

Self-catered joint retreats are with a group of writing friends, usually at the same level of experience, but not necessarily in the same genre. One person books it with a property owner and everybody chips in with the food expenses and takes turns in cooking and tidying. You have to know the other people reasonably well…

Why do it?

Your mental health – you are a human being who needs contact with like-minded souls
Sharing experiences and information about competitions, agents, the ever-increasing number of routes to publication, conferences, writing and book events
Obtaining thoughtful critiques from other professional writers
Honing writing techniques and approaches to work – not just how to sling words together, but about characterisation, the senses, novel or poetry structure, research and, increasingly, technology
Um, having writerly fun which includes excursions to inspiring places.

Working!

But you do have to do some writing. This is not a jolly or a holiday.

I recently organised one lasting a week near Tours in the Loire Valley. We achieved word counts between 2,000 and 15,000. Some did in-depth marketing, others tech projects, others extensive research. But we all went home inspired.

We did manage some excursions – this was the Loire Valley, after all.