A Light On The Horizon - Writing Process

With the release of another of my short stories in The People’s Friend magazine, A Light On The Horizon, I’ve decided this blog post will be about my writing process for historical fiction 😊 It’s an adventure romance set on the Norfolk coast with lighthouses, smugglers and a great big storm! Currently available in issue 236 of The People's Friend Special.

 (Some pictures may need to be clicked on to better see the text)

Gorgeous illustration by Mandy Dixon

Growing up, I loved reading fiction which wove lots of historical detail into the narrative. When I come up with ideas for my own stories, I like to focus on one interesting fact, such as local folklore or how ice-cream was made in the 19^th century, and shape the plot and characters around this. As most of my stories are set along Norfolk’s coast, countryside or in Norwich city, I also include a regional meal or location.

Winterton Lighthouse

For this story, Winterton-on-Sea’s lighthouse was my inspiration. I often see it while taking my dog for walks along the dunes and I wondered just how long the lighthouse had been standing there. I was also inspired by old smuggler lanterns, whose elongated spouts were covered and uncovered to send signals to ships.

Writing the actual short story means I start with either the opening or ending. I hardly ever begin a work in progress by writing the middle, as that’s the part which normally needs the most work! For A Light On The Horizon, I actually had a bit of a helping hand.

Every Tuesday on Twitter, The People’s Friend magazine hosts a twitter hour for writers to let them share recent releases as well as try out writing prompts.

The prompt for one week (ages and ages ago, I cannot even find it on my feed now) was:

“I never thought I’d see you again, Jack.”

My tweet response was:

“I never thought I’d see you again, Jack.”

And yet I do not lower the pistol. We both know he’s with the smugglers.

I decided to incorporate the old prompt for my story, but wanted the confrontation scene to come later. So instead, I changed the opening to the main characters playing a childhood game, to echo what would happen later…

“I know you’ve sided with the smugglers.”

I kept my weapon trained on Jack Robinson. He grinned, revealing the gap in his teeth.

“Going to surrender, Miss High and Mighty?”

“Never!”

Laughing, I took the shot. My slingshot twanged and the pebble flew, striking the rock my friend ducked behind.

My first draft consists of key scenes in the story. Opening paragraph, ending paragraph, location descriptions and any dramatic scenes.

When I can’t think of anything else, I delve into more thorough research. I looked into the history of lighthouse architecture, how the lights were maintained, as well as Winterton’s history (and I discovered Robinson Crusoe is briefly set along Yarmouth, so I had to include a small reference in one scene!) I referred to my copies of David Higgins’ Winterton Remembered and The Winterton Story while writing this.

 

Work in progress. I write a breakdown of each scene.

Researching also helps me with the non-existent middle. I always struggle to link the beginning to the end without the pace dragging or a character’s decision coming out of nowhere. For this story, it was how I was going to get Amelia and Jack to stop being enemies and work together.

Somehow, I managed to do it, after reading how easily a pistol’s powder could get wet if the frizzen was left open, leaving my heroine bluffing her way through a hostage situation.

Still a work in progress. Text highlighted while I decide whether to keep or delete. A lot of these scenes have changed in my final version.

With almost all of the scenes written out, I begin editing. This means changing the font to Comic Sans to make it easier to read. It’s also a lot less painful deleting whole paragraphs in this font!

Sometimes there’ll be a few blank spots in the story. In a separate Word doc, so I don’t get hung up on editing the already finished text, I finish typing any additional paragraphs and paste them into the main story.

After all this, my word count actually ended up being this long! 😊 But that’s good! Better too much than too little, now I just have to figure out how to get it to The People’s Friend preferred 3k. This is the time I decide what research to keep. Sentences are snappier, some descriptions are lost, sometimes even entire characters vanish. By this time, I’m on my fifth/sixth draft.

I’ll then put the story aside for a week or two and work on something else. When I come back to it, I find it easier to spot any errors or don’t feel so bad cutting the word count down.

A Light On The Horizon about to be submitted, previously titled The Smuggler's Lantern.

Finally, I read the story out loud all the way through. Luckily, I have a family member willing to sit through this. I’ll then make any suggested changes, do a final proofread and research check and then submit.

And here is the final version of this scene, with any changes The People’s Friend decided to make to fit their in-house style. I was really proud of this story, so please check it out!