Heather Rosser: Joan Hessayon Award Contender 2015

Today we welcome Heather Rosser to the blog. Heather is another of our contenders for the 2015 Joan Hessayon Award.

Can you tell us when you first decided that you wished to become a romantic novelist? 

I have wanted to be a romantic novelist since reading romantic sagas as a teenager. My first novel was shortlisted for the Constable Trophy but not published. After my mother died I realised I had my own saga to tell based around the house in North Wales that had belonged to our family for nearly a century. I knew that I needed a structure for my story with its family secrets and colourful characters so I signed up for a ‘starting your novel’ course which is where I had the good fortune to be told about the RNA.

How many years were you a member of the NWS scheme and did you submit a different book each year? Which year’s book did you graduate with?

I graduated in 2013 with In the Line of Duty. I was a member of NWS for six years and submitted a partial manuscript of this novel under the title Shadows Across the Mountain and a full length manuscript titled Feathers in the Wind. I also submitted Rebel Causes, a stand alone sequel to In the Line of Duty.

How did you find your publisher?

I met most of the publishers who were interested in my book at RNA events. I also had recommendations about my current publisher from friends in the Oxford Writers Group.

Promotion is a big part of an author’s working life. How did you promote your novel?

I sent personal emails to all my friends, set up an author facebook page, was interviewed by local radio and had features in local newspapers. I persuaded local bookshops to stock my novel. I gave away copies on Goodreads. Since publication I have given monthly talks to libraries, WIs and other local groups. I always carry postcards promoting my novel which people enjoy receiving.

 

What has happened to you as an author since that first sale?

Metaphorically I have grown taller.
 

How did you celebrate your first book sale?

By opening a bottle of bubbly with my family in Oxford. And another bottle later with my family in New Zealand.
 

About Heather:

During my childhood I spent summers at the family home above Conwy in North Wales. As a student, I returned for weekends in Snowdonia with Leicester University Mountaineering Club. I was posted to Ghana as a VSO teacher and travelled to Timbuktu with Adrian: Reader, I married him. We spent twelve years in Africa and I became a writer for the Botswana Guardian newspaper and for British magazines with an interest in childcare issues. Later we bought a smallholding in Lincolnshire where I set up Wold School of English for international students. Since moving to Oxford, I have written Social Studies text books for Africa and short stories published by OxPens. I am working on my next novel set in Africa and North Wales.

 

 

Links:

Amazon

Thank you Heather and good luck with your writing career.

FIRST WORLD WAR IN FICTION

Today we welcome Heather Rosser to tell us about the history behind her novel, In The Line of Duty.

I hadn’t set out to write a First World War novel as such. In the Line of Duty was inspired by the house on the Tal-y-fan mountain above Conwy built by my great-grandfather in 1912 and remained in the family for 60 years. My mother claimed the house was cursed because a builder was killed during its construction but my childhood memories are of carefree holidays exploring the beautiful mountains and coast of North Wales.

My great-grandfather was a railway police detective with offices in Euston and Llandudno Junction. For part of a chequered career his son, my grandfather, was a locomotive engineer. I chose my title, In the Line of Duty, to reflect the romance of railway journeys as well as the conflicts between duty and desire ever prevalent in war-time.

            There was a mystery surrounding my grandfather’s service as a sea plane pilot with the Royal Naval Air Service which I was determined to unravel. When I telephoned the Fleet Air Arm museum to find out why my grandfather had lost his commission as a Flight Lieutenant I was told that, according to a copy of the letter sent to him in 1917, ‘he was a very good pilot but had some reluctance to engage with the enemy’. Once I started researching the RNAS I began to understand my grandfather’s point of view. Pilots were the ‘eyes of the fleet’ and it wasn’t hard for me to imagine my young forebear, who had obtained his civilian pilot’s license in 1912, being excited about signing up and turning his glamorous hobby into a job. I never found out the exact circumstances leading to my grandfather losing his commission but my research, combined with family myths, enabled me to weave the facts into a credible story.

            However, his time with the RNAS wasn’t the only mystery surrounding my grandfather. Far more intriguing for the romance novelist was his illegitimate son. My mother dismissively referred to her elder half-brother as ‘a product of the First World War’. He was brought up and apparently spoilt by my great-grandparents. The parentage of his mother is unknown to this day. But, not long before she died, my mother told me she thought his mother was her own mother’s sister. Her mother had died when she was three, her father had re-married and this was the first time I had ever heard her mention her mother’s family. I was driving when she announced this bombshell and was too shocked to say anything. Sadly my mother died soon afterwards and it was too late to ask questions.

            The idea of turning some of my mother’s reminisces into a novel came very soon after her death. I became fascinated with places she had known, particularly the Welsh churchyard where her parents are buried. I desperately wanted her mother to be Welsh but, when I found out that she wasn’t, I lost interest in genealogy and wove my own story around family myth although the characters in In the Line of Duty have taken on a life of their own.

          

  William’s story is told through the eyes of his mother, Alice, and his sweetheart, Lottie. William and Alice are very loosely based on my grandfather and great-grandmother who lived in Belsize Park but Lottie’s family in Llandudno Junction come entirely from my imagination. During my research I became interested in the iniquitous custom of giving white feathers to men of all ages and abilities and I have used several such incidents to further the plot. Five years is a lot to cover in one novel and so each chapter begins with a quotation from The Times. This enables the reader to know how the experiences of Alice’s family in London and Lottie’s in North Wales relate to the wider events of the war.

www.heatherrosser.com



Thank you, Heather.

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