As I’ve said before on this blog, writing is my passion. I’m in the fortunate, yet unfortunate position of being in full time employment. Fortunate, because so many people don’t have work and no matter how hard they try, don’t seem able to become employed, or end up in jobs that barely pay a subsistence wage. Unfortunate, in that it drastically reduces the time I can spend writing.
Ahh, poor you! I hear you mutter, before going to make a cup of tea, or do the ironing. But it’s not self pity or the mere desire to moan that motivates this post. It’s a longing to be a worthwhile author, to know that what I write is enjoyable and pleasing to any readers who happen to stumble across my work. This desire is greater than wanting to be rich or famous, although those things’d be great too.
Just being published is living the dream I’ve cherished for more years than I care to remember and in that I’m content. At least I’ve achieved one of my ambitions, seen it come to fruiton and for that I am eternally grateful 
http://www.wattpad.com/user/KatrinaJack
http://askdavid.com/reviews/book/urban-fantasy/4787
http://pinterest.com/kateannejack/books-books-more-books/
http://www.readwave.com/kateannejack/
Book covers are important. I tend to judge a book on its cover, and will only read books with a naff cover if I know and like the author. And there are some terrible ones out there. In the old days, before Photoshop and computer graphics, when mass market paperbacks got the ‘cover artist’ treatment, like as not they looked as though they came out of a catalogue.
The beauty and power of words cannot be underestimated. They can lift you up, or knock you down. They can create, sculpt and are constantly evolving.
Words can be used to shape worlds, real and fictional. They can carve characters and populate the pages of books. They can take readers on epic journeys, or send them into the soft twilight of evening, or a glorious sunrise.
Mighty trees spring to life in an instant, from pen to page. Mountains form and crumble in the blink of an eye. Mythical beasts become real. Faeries, wizards and witches cast their spells, enticing the reader into their webs of magic and enthrallment.
Words rule all our lives.
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I’d like to introduce you to the thirty-eighth interviewee in my ‘Meet the Author’ series. She is Katrina Jack.
Hi, Katrina! Welcome to Susan Finlay Writes blog site. Can you tell us a bit about your background as a writer?
As a child, I loved to make up stories in my head and was constantly daydreaming. When I went to school, I learned to read and write pretty quickly.
Jess stared at the tattered, faded black and white photograph and sighed. So long ago now, seventy years or more, and yet it still felt like only yesterday when they posed for the camera. They all looked so happy, but it was a facade – a lie.
She knew why the image felt so fresh. It wasn’t because she had a good memory, or that the time spent away from her bombed out home in London had been so good – far from it. Even before the war started, the street of terraced houses had been a hell on earth, riddled with damp and overrun with rats. When she’d been told she was being evacuated, it seemed like a dream. She was going to a farm. There’d be cows, chickens, horses and lots of grass and flowers – heaven!
The memory sat in her mind like a canker, weighing her conscience down, never fading, only becoming stronger as she grew older and nearer to the grave. If only things had turned out as she’d imagined, but the farm had been just another form of hell on earth.
With an aged spotted, trembling hand, she placed the snapshot on the coffee table and stared down at it. It appeared to grow larger, the grainy black and white image expanding, until it filled the whole of her vision; she closed her eyes.
A warm summer breeze brushed her face and the oh-so-familiar scents of animals, hay and fresh milk filled her nostrils. Birdsong sounded in her ears and she gasped. So evocative, so real!
Then the aches and pains of her aged body faded and she felt her shoulders straighten. Hair brushed her cheek and she glanced sideways as it swung forward. She reached up and felt the smooth glossiness, free from its usual frizzy perm. Then she glanced down at her arm and her eyes widened with astonishment. It wasn’t so much the youthfulness of her limb that astounded, although that was more than enough, it was the fact it was grey!
But not the grey of death. When she took in her surroundings, she recognised it at once. She was standing in the farmyard, but there was one major difference – everything was in black and white, just like the old photograph. The sun shone, the breeze blew, but it was all monochrome. How could that be? Then a voice broke into her confusion, replacing it with dread.
‘Hey Jess!’
She turned and there was Tom, the farmer’s son, in his shabby old jacket and thick knitted jumper. His knees, dirty and covered in grazes, stood out, bony and knobbly from beneath his long grey shorts, cut down from an old pair of his dad’s trousers. This explained both the belt and braces he wore to keep them up.
‘So you came back,’ he said, as with hands in pockets he sauntered towards her. The lopsided grin scared her, but the coldness of his eyes chilled her to the core.
‘You came back to keep your promise,’ he said.
Jess shook her head. ‘I didn’t mean it,’ she whispered and was startled by the sound of her own voice, young and girlish, no longer tremulous with age.
Tom turned his cold gaze on her and now unsmiling said, ‘You promised.’ He gripped her wrist and despite her efforts to pull free, held on, his fingers digging into her flesh. ‘You promised to help me. If you don’t, the old bugger’ll kill me.’
She knew what he meant. Tom’s dad was a hard man and not shy of using his belt on his son and any of the evacuees, if it came to that.
‘If you help me,’ Tom said, his voice earnest, ‘We can be free of ‘im. The farm’ll come to me, when I grow up, an’ we can get married.’
‘No, no, you don’t know what’ll happen. I do. I didn’t mean it, but it all goes wrong!’ she cried, but then found a box matches in her free hand and Tom was running towards the barn, pulling her along behind him.
It all seemed to speed up then. Before she knew it, Tom had shut and barred the barn doors. Like an automaton, she took a match from the box and struck it. It flared into yellow light, bright against the monochrome background. She threw the Lucifer onto the bales of hay stacked beside the doors and stepped back. Tom whooped and yelled, skipping and hopping like a maniac, as the flames took hold.
‘Let me out!’ a deep voice, filled with rage bellowed. Blows hammered against the barn doors, as the man inside tried to break free.
The flames spread with incredible speed, the only colour in a black and grey world. Jess watched transfixed, only too aware of what would happen next. She tried to move, tried to call Tom away, but couldn’t. All she could do was look up, when she heard the drone of an engine in the sky. It was all happening again, but this time the outcome would be different. She wouldn’t run, she wouldn’t survive and she was glad.
The German plane circled high above the farm, obviously off course after a raid on the city. She saw the bomb doors open to release their deadly load and watched the dark dots plummet towards the farm. This time she knew she’d pay for her crime. She wouldn’t be able to flee, leaving Tom to die alongside his father. Her wrongdoing would be hidden beneath the bomb damage, but this time three bodies would be found, not just two.
A few seconds before the bombs struck, Jess glanced over her shoulder. Hanging in the air behind her, was a colour photograph of herself, as she had become. As she watched, the picture began to fade and the old lady’s face vanished.
Forever young, she thought, just before the world exploded around her.
http://www.wattpad.com/user/KatrinaJack
http://askdavid.com/reviews/book/urban-fantasy/4787
http://pinterest.com/kateannejack/books-books-more-books/
http://www.readwave.com/kateannejack/
When starting to write you next book, do you plot it all out, including the locations your characters will inhabit? I do.
I start by thinking about various places I think might be suitable. For instance, in Midnight Days I used places round my home town, Liverpool, amongst which were St Luke’s bombed out church
and houses in Faulkner Street, as two scenes. I then “transported” them, mentally placing the church next to what became a character’s house.
There’s nothing you can’t do, when creating backdrops to your story. They don’t have to appear in your work as they do in real life. You can mix and match places to suit your own needs and tailor them to suit the story.
So set yourself the task of making your story’s background as three dimensional as possible. Paint a word picture for your readers to absorb and enable them to “live” your creations.
The world’s out there waiting for you to capture its many images and create them anew – go for it!
http://www.wattpad.com/user/KatrinaJack
http://askdavid.com/reviews/book/urban-fantasy/4787
http://pinterest.com/kateannejack/books-books-more-books/
http://www.readwave.com/kateannejack/
I recently joined writers site, Readwaves, and posted some of my short stories there. Well, guess what? My short story, “When the Willow weeps for me,” has been chosen as staff pick of the week
To view the story and discover other new writers, go to:
To all mothers, past and present, thanks for your commitment, sacrifices and selfless work.
And to my mother, sadly no longer with us, here’s a virtual bouquet, with all my love.
Live the adventure. Fight to win your freedom. Run, until your lungs burn and your heart pounds. Be carried away on a swirl of music. Let it fill your mind and soul. Immerse yourself in a story you’ll never forget.
Step into the world of Jeremiah Tully
http://www.wattpad.com/user/KatrinaJack
http://askdavid.com/reviews/book/urban-fantasy/4787
http://pinterest.com/kateannejack/books-books-more-books/
http://www.readwave.com/kateannejack/
Best Unknown Young Adult Books
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