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Don’t tell me nobody wants to read my stories.

book cover of Piggy Monk Square by Grace Jolliffe on a post called Don't Tell Me Nobody Wants to Read My StoriesPiggy Monk Square is a fictitious area of old derelict buildings in Liverpool, left to rot after being heavily bombed in the Second World War.

In the seventies, it became an unofficial children’s playground.

A warren of crumbling rooms and stinking cellars – wonderful for kids.

It is coincidentally, quite close to the place where I grew up.

I moved to Ireland in the late seventies and first started writing stories about Piggy Monk Square in the late 1980’s.

All my stories were narrated by the same nine-year-old girl, Rebecca, AKA Sparra.

Most of the stories were based around Sparra’s encounters with the locals and not so locals in the inner city area of Liverpool where she lived.

THE AGENT WITH NO IDEA HOW TO MARKET 

I didn’t try and getKids Swinging on a maypole illustrating article about the book Piggy Monk Square by Grace Jolliffe any of these stories published at the time.

I sent one to an agent (I picked her because her address was funny) and she replied that they were ‘marvellous’ but she had no idea how to market them.

This caused me to lose confidence in the marketability of my work and it stopped me from sending them anywhere for a long time.

DON’T TELL ME NOBODY WANTS TO READ MY STORIES

Strangely it didn’t stop me wanting to write an entire novel based on those early stories and so I did. I can be a bit perverse like that – don’t tell me nobody wants to read my stories.

By the time I started writing the novel I had returned to education and was studying film and television in college. It was a huge mistake for me. I was a single parent and struggling.

I thought this college would be a way out of poverty for me but I hated it and felt creatively strangled every day I was there.

I kept writing the novel though. I mostly wrote on the 90-minute long bus journey I took each day to get to college.

That journey allowed me to spend three hours a day handwriting Piggy Monk Square in spiral bound notebooks.

Since I didn’t have a computer at home I used my ‘computer’ hours in college to type it up.

DISGUSTING AND WEIRD

At the time I used to attend a writers group and I read a short piece of the novel aloud one night.

For a few moments, there was a horrified silence.

My slice of Liverpool working-class life didn’t sit well at all with this nice group of middle-class men and women.

One man said it was ‘disgusting and weird’ and following his pronouncement, the others unanimously and mercilessly decided to tell me that my novel would never, ever be published.

The timing for this was bad. I was going through very tough times.

I had separated from my husband and had severe financial and other problems. I felt humiliated and disrespected by the group and more than a little depressed.

GREAT LITERATURE – NOT

In my opinion, their output usually consisted of soul-less attempts to produce great literature.

Unfortunately, like in many groups, a clique had formed and this clique were consistently encouraging to each other, no matter how bad the writing.

I don’t mind constructive criticism. I welcome it – good criticism can help a writer improve and progress – if it is also supportive…but don’t tell me nobody wants to read my stories.

I was back on the bus to college next morning and thankfully the journey was as long and boring as ever – so despite feeling down I continued writing Piggy Monk Square.

NOTHING TO LOSE

Soon I became lost in the writing again and forgot all about the group’s opinion.

I  just kept going, day after day. I had nothing to lose after all.

However, I got very busy with college projects and after leaving college I focused on making short films and documentaries. This demanding work and paying off debts took over my life.

Some years later, I was attending a documentary festival in the Unity Theatre in Liverpool and picked up a leaflet about the Tindal Street Press publishing company.

Birmingham based Tindal mentioned that they were looking for stories from the UK regions, rather than the more London centred novels that other publishers tended to favour.

MELON-HEAD – THE KERB-CRAWLER

One thing I had no shortage of were stories from the regions.

I sent them one of my Liverpool short stories. It was called ‘Melon Head’ and was about Sparra’s encounter with a kerb-crawler.

‘Melon Head’ was drawn from my own real-life experience with a kerb-crawler.

VILE SECRETS

The horrible man had approached me while I was a child out playing in the street. He said some vile things which I didn’t fully understand until much later.

Now that I was sending this story away I felt like I was revealing part of my secret self, which in a way I was.

book cover of Piggy Monk Square by Grace Jolliffe on a post called Don't Tell Me Nobody Wants to Read My StoriesDISGUSTING LITTLE STORY

I had never disclosed this incident to my parents.

My late mother used to proofread my stories for me but I had never let her proof this one.

It was a total secret until I posted it.

As soon I put it in the post box I started to regret it.

The Tindal Editor would surely stamp all over my disgusting little secret story and probably tell me there was no market.

I still kept the secret and fretted constantly about revealing it. I feared my disguising a true story as fiction would not fool anyone.

THE SECRET’S OUT

I was on the point of ringing Tindal and asking them to ignore it because I had sent it by mistake when I received a letter with a Birmingham postmark.

I was scared to open it and it took many mugs of strong tea and several cigarettes to get the courage.

But when I finally did, I discovered that they actually loved the story and they even asked me for more. That gave me a problem, a wonderful problem.

DUSTY PAGES

Piggy Monk Square had been sitting on a floppy disk (remember them?) for a few years and I was still skint and still had no computer.

Luckily, I had printed it out before leaving the college and in the intervening years, it had become a dusty and slightly mouldy heap of pages in the damp little shed where I did my writing.

I borrowed an electric typewriter with a small memory and began the task of retyping and rewriting.

HOLDING MY BREATH

As soon as it was finished I posted it to Tindal and held my breath and held my breath.

After hearing nothing for six months I stopped holding my breath and accepted it would never be published.

I wished I had never picked up that leaflet as it had just brought me hope followed by crushing disappointment.

GIVING UP

I stopped watching the post and gave up on visiting the library to check emails.

More months passed and I visited the library – I was passing anyway. There was an email. Piggy Monk Square was going to be published – don’t tell me nobody wants to read my stories.

My unpublishable and unmarketable book went on to be optioned for film, was adapted for RTE book of the week, and was shortlisted for the Commonwealth New Writers Prize.

So the lesson for all your writers out there is never, ever give up.

CLICK HERE TO READ PIGGY MONK SQUARE REVIEWS


ABOUT PIGGY  MONK SQUARE

The first eBook edition of my novel, Piggy Monk Square is now available. The novel was first published by Tindal Street Press in the UK in 2006.

Piggy Monk Square is a dark and humorous novel, informed by my own personal experience of growing up in 1970’s Toxteth in Liverpool. The action takes place shortly before the infamous Toxteth riots.

Although the novel is narrated by a nine-year-old girl it is not a children’s story. Rebecca’s parents are splitting up. Her best friend, Debbie, has a father who is constantly in and out of prison.

Their world is dark, confusing and frequently brutal and the two girls tend to mix reality with fantasy – especially when it comes to coping with what will soon become their terrible secret.

One day, Rebecca and Debbie are playing in the cellar of a derelict house when a policeman warns them to keep away from there. But this is their favourite place to play and when they can’t keep away and are again caught by the very angry policeman.

They ‘leg it’ and he chases them but he falls down a ladder and goes ‘asleep.’ The girls have been taught not to trust the police and are so terrified of getting into trouble that they don’t tell anyone.

The injured policeman is unable to escape the cellar and becomes dependent on the two girls. But their efforts to help him have disastrous consequences for them all.


PIGGY MONK SQUARE

book cover of Piggy Monk Square by Grace Jolliffe on a post called Don't Tell Me Nobody Wants to Read My Stories

Get eBook from Amazon.com

Get eBook from Amazon.co.uk

Get paperback from Amazon.com

Get paperback from Amazon.co.uk


With thanks to Dot Carter for letting me use her photograph of the Maypole in Sefton Park Liverpool.

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6 Responses to Don’t tell me nobody wants to read my stories.

  1. jaye July 26, 2014 at 10:40 am #

    what an inspiring story, underlining the need to never give up. I have nearly finished my first attempt at writing a book, so I need all the inspiration I can get!
    Thank you for the gift of confidence…

    • Grace July 26, 2014 at 10:43 am #

      Hi Jaye,
      So glad you like the post and it really means an awful lot to me to hear that you were inspired. Keep going – and best of luck with your book.
      Grace

  2. Jane Scorer July 28, 2014 at 7:18 pm #

    Hi Grace, yours is a fantastic story, and a great inspiration to all struggling writers ! I respect your tenacity and, clearly, your writing skills !
    I lose confidence far too easily in my writing, and never have the faith needed to keep going. It only has to be refused by one person and that is enough to stop me trying again, so I will start to write something new and hopefully ‘better’ !
    That is one of the reasons that I love blogging so much – there are no Gate keepers ! You write it – you publish it ! Simple as ! maybe I should think about publishing …

    • Grace July 28, 2014 at 7:51 pm #

      Hi Jane, thanks so much. I too lose confidence as well. Sometimes I know I am right to drop a project in order to move on to something that is better for me. However if you find yourself wanting to return to something that is probably the one to devote more time to.
      Blogging is great and I think it encourages us to write more and more which in itself improves our work.
      Best of luck if you do go ahead with publishing.
      Grace

      • Jane Scorer August 1, 2014 at 9:06 am #

        Yes, Grace, I can see the value in trusting that inner voice , I guess I just have to learn to do it !

        • Grace August 1, 2014 at 12:16 pm #

          I hope you do Jane.
          Best wishes

          Grace

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