Joan Hessayon Contenders 2017: Morton S. Gray

Today we welcome another of our contenders for the Joan Hessayon award.

Welcome to the RNS blog, Morton, and many congratulations on being one of the contenders for this year’s award.

How long have you been writing - Is this your first published piece?

In my early teens, I would hide away in the little attic room behind the chimney at home, writing

poems and stories. I had a box of pictures and items that inspired my writing. I still have this fascinating time capsule that also contains the pages of my first novel. It was typed on an electronic typewriter on A5 pages and I gave it to a school friend to read aged fourteen.

Then … life happened. I didn’t write much apart from academic assignments, work reports and training materials for years.

In 2006, I won a short story competition that I’d entered on a whim. I was looking for a new direction, feeling a little lost at the time, so I enrolled on a creative writing course to see if I could write. The academic course I studied introduced me to plays, flash fiction, short stories, poems and memoirs. I quickly realized that I wanted to write novels. I began to attend a weekly writing group run by RNA member, Sue Johnson and she suggested I join the NWS. The yearly critiques have helped to mould my writing. I would move heaven and earth to make sure I submitted a manuscript each year.

I’ve shortlisted in a few first chapter competitions, but ‘The Girl on the Beach’ is my first published novel.

How many years were you a member of the NWS and did you submit a manuscript each year?

I joined the NWS in 2012 and submitted a manuscript for each year that I was a member. I used my time on the scheme to experiment with writing contemporary romance, time-slip and historical novels.

What came first, agent or publisher?

Publisher

How did you find your publisher?

I submitted my 2015 NWS, then entitled ‘Who is Harry Dixon?’ to Choc Lit Publishing’s Search for a Star competition and won. Very exciting, because they were the publisher I’d always dreamed of being published by.

Do you have a contract for one book or more?

The contract is for one book with a clause to look at my next work of romantic fiction.

When was your book published?

My book, renamed ‘The Girl on the Beach’, was published on 24 January 2017. A date that will forever be etched on my memory.

Tell us something about your book

The novel ‘The Girl on the Beach’ is based around the question – Who is Harry Dixon? It is a contemporary romantic suspense novel set in a fictional seaside town.

When Ellie Golden, an artist, meets Harry, her son’s new headmaster, she thinks she recognizes him. However, the man she remembers wasn’t called Harry Dixon and Ellie believed him to be dead.

Harry doesn’t recognize Ellie. His presence in the seaside town of Borteen, where she moved with her son to escape her past is unsettling, but maybe Harry isn’t the person Ellie should be worried about, because there’s a far more dangerous figure from her past lurking just outside of the new life she has built for herself and her son, biding his time, just waiting to strike…

What are you currently working on?

My publisher, Choc Lit, have asked me to base more books in my fictional seaside town of Borteen. I am currently working on three novels in this location, but there is the potential for many more. I can now walk down the streets of the town in my head, as it and my characters based there have become so real to me. It truly is a fictional town, born of visits to many different seaside locations over the years.

What piece of advice would you give current members of the NWS?

Make sure you use your yearly critique by planning to submit a manuscript each year. Use your time on NWS to experiment with different styles of writing, to discover your own voice.

Keep going, keep writing and get your work out to competitions, publishers and agents. Writing is a constant learning process and success is about persistence. You need an imaginative spark, yes, but you also need to be willing to check your work over time and again to make it the best it can be. What is the point of a manuscript in a drawer?

Also, take advantage of the RNA conference and the local chapter meetings. Writing can be a solitary business, but there is a whole support network out there waiting for you.

Links:

Facebook

Blog

Twitter: @MortonSGray

Thank you, Morton. Congratulations again on graduating the New Writers’ Scheme and I hope you enjoy the Summer Party.

Morton S Gray: My Path to Publication

It is always a thrill to hear about our members’ new books. To know that a book enabled an NWS member to graduate to full membership makes it extra special. Today we welcome Morton S Gray who shares the story of her journey to publication.

Like many writers, I’ve dreamed of publication for many years, but I still have to pinch myself to

remind me that my debut, The Girl on the Beach, will be launched into the world by Choc Lit on 24 January 2017.

A love of stories comes from my early years. My mother always read to me. We visited the library as a family on Saturdays. My nan read to me too, usually falling asleep at a good bit, and she watched films with me on those long ago Sunday afternoons. I loved Enid Blyton, wanted a big brother called Julian and longed to be whisked away by a dark hero on a tall ship with the sails billowing, after watching so many Errol Flynn swashbucklers.

In my early teens, I would hide away in the little attic room behind the chimney at home, writing poems and stories. I had a box of pictures and items that inspired my writing. I still have this fascinating time capsule that also contains the pages of my first novel. It was typed on an electronic typewriter on A5 pages and I gave it to a school friend to read aged fourteen. I taught myself to type to help with my father’s fledgling business. My nana and my dad are sadly not here to share my publication success.

Then … life happened. I didn’t write much apart from academic assignments, work reports and training materials for thirty years.

In 2006, I was recovering from two operations. Someone locally launched a short story competition to advertise their new publishing venture, I entered and unbelievably won. I was looking for a new direction, feeling a little lost at the time, so I enrolled on a creative writing course to see if I could write. My friend joined me in this adventure and we had great fun speed writing in cafes and sharing our work with laughter and coffee.

The academic course I studied introduced me to plays, flash fiction, short stories, poems and memoirs. I’ve always loved learning, but quickly realised this was taking me away from where I wanted to be - longer fiction and novels were calling me. I read, Sue Moorcroft’s Starting Over and found my genre.

Mills and Boon called for entries for a competition and after a day course on heroes and heroines with Iona Grey in Cheshire, I wrote my chapter and entered it. I didn’t get anywhere in this competition, but I met lots of other writers online, many of whom I’m still friends with and a fair proportion I’ve now met in real life.

Sue Johnson, whose weekly writing course I attended for many years, suggested I join the Romantic Novelists’ Association’s New Writers’ Scheme and I was lucky enough to gain one of the competitively sought after places in 2012. The yearly critiques have helped to mould my writing and proved invaluable. I have moved heaven and earth to make sure I submitted a manuscript each year.

Attendance at the RNA events is so helpful too. I relish the yearly conference and love chapter meetings. I’m a member of Birmingham Chapter and can still feel those butterflies when I arrived for my first meeting at the library steps in Birmingham and saw someone else looking anxious at the top. It turned out to be Janice Preston and it was her first meeting too. We’ve been friends ever since.

I entered a chapter and was shortlisted for the 2013 New Talent Award at the then Festival of Romance and again met writers whom I number amongst my friends – Bella Osborne, Lynda Stacey, Catherine Miller, Lucie Wheeler, Lizzie Lamb, Vanessa Savage, Kate Scolefield to name a few. We’ve done well, girls!

In 2014, I began to write the story that became The Girl on the Beach on the back of an envelope while my husband drove the car down the motorway. At one point, he asked if I was okay, as I was so quiet. In 2015, I sent this manuscript to the NWS and received my most encouraging report yet with suggestions for tweaking. Thank you to my reader. When the book was revised, I submitted it to Choc Lit’s Search for a Star competition and won!

I guess if I had to give advice to wannabes it would be learn the craft, write loads, enter competitions and submit your work to publishers. There is, I believe, no magic formula, just hard work and persistence.

The Girl on the Beach by Morton S. Gray:

Who is Harry Dixon?

When Ellie Golden meets Harry Dixon, she can’t help but feel she recognises him from somewhere. But when she finally realises who he is, she can’t believe it – because the man she met on the beach all those years before wasn’t called Harry Dixon. And, what’s more, that man is dead.

For a woman trying to outrun her troubled past and protect her son, Harry’s presence is deeply unsettling – and even more disconcerting than coming face to face with a dead man, is the fact that Harry seems to have no recollection of ever having met Ellie before. At least that’s what he says …

But perhaps Harry isn’t the person Ellie should be worried about. Because there’s a far more dangerous figure from the past lurking just outside of the new life she has built for herself, biding his time, just waiting to strike.

About Morton:

Morton S. Gray lives with her husband, sons and Lily, the tiny dog, in Worcestershire, U.K.

She joined the RNA New Writers’ Scheme in 2012. Winner of Choc Lit Publishing’s Search for a Star 2016. Debut novel The Girl on the Beach published by Choc Lit 24 January 2017.

Links:

Blog: www.mortonsgray.com

Twitter: @MortonSGray

Facebook Page – Morton S. Gray Author

Purchasing link:

Thank you so much for sharing your writing journey with us Morton. Good luck with your book launch.

If you would like to write for the RNA blog please contact us on elaineeverest@aol.com