The Ampersand Agency Blog

A quick apology to Ampersand clients with their own blogs and websites, links to which have been mysteriously absent from this blog for the last few weeks.  I was all set to alert Nergui, Mara and our other resident super-sleuths (follow the links to these great crime titles from Ampersand authors) but it seems Wordpress are aware of “The Curious Incident of the Disappearing Blogroll”, and a quick search revealed I’m not the only one to have been affected. 

In any case, I’ve now reinstated the information (let’s call it recycled blogroll!) so all your favourite Ampersand authors are once again just a click away.  On the blog front, I can particularly recommend Michael Walters’ musings on Mongolia, crime fiction and current affairs and Niamh Shaw’s consistently funny Deadlyjelly blog.

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Praise from the Times for Ampersand’s S.J. Bolton, “the High Priestess of English Rural Gothic”…

Just a quick post to draw your attention to this wonderful review of S.J. Bolton’s Awakening. In the same vein as Sacrifice (aren’t those chilling, one-word titles fantastic?), Bolton’s latest is a thriller with a disconcertingly innocuous setting, centring round a quiet young veterinary surgeon working in sleepy Dorset.  Guaranteed shiver-down-the-spine stuff, ideal for anyone suffering in the heatwave…

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“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife who can drink him under the table…”

I have a good friend whose cure-all question in times of crisis is “What would Nicole Kidman do?”  Although Vanessa Curtis might beg to differ, I can vouch for the fact that it works quite well when you find yourself in a tricky situation (although what Nicole would do, as a general rule, tends to be the opposite of what you would be most comfortable doing yourself!)  The literary equivalent, at least as far as chicklit is concerned, is “What would Jane Austen say?”

So whatever would she make of Smart Casual?  Well, I’m pretty sure the flaming sambucas, slurred words and singed eyebrows would come as a bit of a shock, but there’s no getting away from the fact that it’s a riproaring, sidesplitting, thoroughly modern read.  There’s something distinctly Austenesque, distinctly “of its time”, about Niamh Shaw’s humour and social observation. 

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As micro-blogging fever continues apace, I’m pleased to announce that the Ampersand Agency is holding its own.  Come and see what all the fuss is about and sign up to follow us on Twitter.

Tweets are short, sweet updates, rather like text messages, designed to keep followers up to speed on your activities, thoughts and whereabouts (for the blog this means you get the title and the first few words, then a link to the full post).  It’s all such good fun that people have even started turning great works of literature into tweets. 

I think Twitter could be great news for agents and editors, swamped with material from would-be authors on a daily basis.  Maybe tweets will eventually replace the traditional (and considerably longer) extracts and synopses sent by authors, thus freeing up more time for the famous “publishers’ lunch”!

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Anyone who’s spent any time working in an office over the last ten years will tell you that email-writing is a complicated business.  In fact so much so that novels composed of exchanges of letters (à la Dangerous Liaisons), or diary entries (such as my old favourite, Adrian Mole) are old hat.  You heard it here first, folks - emails are the new literary art form…

Not convinced?  Then take a look at the greetings below, addressed to Joe (Blog, not Bloggs!), and see if you can spot the difference, without the help of my explanations in brackets:

- “Hi Joe” (everything’s fine and dandy, in fact we could even go for a drink after work.  Are you married, by the way?)

- “Hello Joe” (everything’s fine – business as usual!)

- “Joe” (I’m going to cut to the chase here because you’re seriously irritating me!)

Dispense with the greeting altogether and either you’re really pressed for time, or it’s an official – albeit tacit - declaration of war…

For more of the same, don’t miss the inspired and hilarious episode in Smart Casual where we are invited to read between the lines of a terse email sent by main character Olivia.  Wreathed in office-speak, it keeps her on the right side of the code of conduct, while still managing to be wickedly scathing.  Hell hath no fury…

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Anyone who has been following Niamh Shaw’s blog recently will know that she has a new dog called Jed.  And anyone who’s read Smart/Casual will know that Jed shares his name, as well as a number of traits, with one of Niamh’s main characters…  Friendly, loyal, exuberant, Jed Marshall is Olivia Anderson’s best friend, although thankfully not partial to face-licking (that turns out to be another character’s alarming fetish!)

This got me thinking about the various characters I’ve read about in Ampersand books over the past year (yes, the blog will soon be one year old!) and the kind of animals they most resemble.  Isn’t Michael Walters’ Nergui a bit like a cat (wily and enigmatic)?  Is Vanessa Curtis’ Zelah Green a quiet mouse or a resilient, industrious ant?  Cora Harrison’s Mara, of course, couldn’t be anything other than a wise old owl…

I’m keeping schtum about the rest of the Smart/Casual characters, but let’s just say there’s at least one snake in the grass…

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When Twitterfeed was first mentioned, I must admit I found myself wondering when my job description had changed to include pet care (more of which next week).  If only it had been as simple as tossing a few seeds to a budgerigar!

After much head scratching and several emails to more technically au fait people (not a particularly rare breed, I have to say, but thanks in particular to Hilary and Ben nonetheless), I might just have cracked it (although I am bracing myself for a deluge of comments confirming the contrary). 

Anyone wishing to do so should now be able to follow the blog on Twitter.  Anyone wondering if they’ve just slipped into a parallel universe, rest assured - business as usual will resume next week…

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Intertextuality is definitely my word of the week.  As well as boasting an impressive number of letters (not to mention Scrabble points), it describes a rather fascinating and surprisingly common literary phenomenon:  When you scratch the surface, it’s amazing just how many stories are reworkings of familiar tales.

Some claim that there are actually only a few staple stories to be told and that everything else is inevitably a retelling of one of these – Christopher Booker has whittled it down to a list of just seven.  It’s a sobering thought for any writer struggling to write something fresh, new and dynamic…  Or perhaps a liberating one…  Vanessa Curtis has certainly succeeded in adding her own brand of magic to a well-known fairytale. 

If you failed to spot Snow White, the Wicked Stepmother, Prince Charming and co. first time round, it’s time to re-read Zelah Green, Queen of Clean…

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