I LOVE DEBUT AUTHORS!!

In fact if I had to choose between only reading debut novels for the rest of my life, or eliminating them completely, I would choose the former.

I know that most of you think I’m mad. In the last few weeks I have seen several tweets/comments knocking debut authors and even a post revealing a cautious attitude to them. I thought it was time for me to explain my passion for them and try to get you to embrace debuts as much as I do.

Take a look at the following list:

• To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
• Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe 
• Gone With The Wind by Margaret Mitchell
• Sense & Sensibilty by Jane Austen
• The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
• Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe by Fannie Flagg
• Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis
• Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
• Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak
• The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
• Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
• Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
• Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone by J. K. Rowling

Apart from being classics loved by millions of people across the globe, they are also all debut novels. You may not enjoy all of the books on the list (I certainly don’t!), but you can’t dispute the quality.

The thing about debut novels is that they tend to reflect whatever the author is particularly passionate about – authors put their whole being into that book, unsure as to whether or not they will ever write another.  

It is also increasingly hard for authors to get their work published. That means any debut snapped up by an agent must really stand out from the crowd. I find that established authors can get away with printing fairly average books, but unknown authors have to produce something really special to even have a chance of seeing it on the shelves.

Many people noticed that my list of the best debut books of 2011 was much more appealing than the list of books written by established authors and I think this proves my argument – debuts are far more interesting and emotionally powerful than second or third novels.

Which is your favourite debut novel?

Do you think you can spot the difference between a debut novel and one from an established author?

In case you were wondering – all the books pictured in this post are debuts too.

Last week I reviewed Star Gazing by Linda Gillard. I enjoyed the book, but criticised it for having a few too many coincidences. Linda wrote a thought provoking comment in response to the issues I raised and I thought it deserved a discussion of its own.

Here is what she had to say:

I’m really interested in the issue of fictional credibility. As an author I’m constantly trying to produce something that is a contradiction in terms: believable fiction. Or if you prefer, true lies.

We all know truth is far stranger than fiction, yet we apply personal criteria to fiction and drama and measure the worth of something according to whether or not we believe it. When a character does something we don’t believe she would do, we dismiss it as weak writing and very often it is. But who do you know who behaves consistently at all times? If someone behaves out of character, we think they must be unwell, stressed or perhaps using drugs. A response to suicide is very often, “He was the last person you’d expect to do something like that! He was always so cheery.” People behave unbelievably all the time, but in fiction we expect and demand consistency.

What about when authors describe events? What makes something believable? Was it believable that all of those Chilean miners got out alive and unharmed? If that was a movie, wouldn’t we have expected a few of them to die, as they do in THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN? And what about Princess Diana’s death in a car crash, in Paris of all places, with her lover? If you gave a novel a climax like that, you’d be criticised for going over the top and tying up ends far too neatly, not to mention melodramatically.

So I’m conscious as a writer that I have to “tone down” reality to make my fiction look credible. I teach writing workshops and rookie writers will sometimes present chunks of raw autobiography as fiction. They’re mortified if I say, “I’m sorry, I just wasn’t convinced.” “But,” they exclaim, “it really happened! Exactly like that!” I have to explain there’s a big difference between something being true and something being credible and when writing fiction, it’s more important to be credible than true.

My favourite example of this is the opening page of GREAT EXPECTATIONS where Pip visits his family’s grave. Dickens apparently based this scene on a real graveyard where 12 little ones from the same family had been buried. Dickens thought this number would strain reader credulity, so for his opening scene he reduced it to seven.

As T S Eliot said, “Humankind cannot stand very much reality.”

Linda presents a convincing argument, but I think I must have a lower tolerance for coincidence than her. With the exception of science fiction/fantasy, where these rules are allowed to be broken, I like my fiction to be as realistic as possible. The problem is that I have no idea why this is the case. I know that strange things happen in the real world all the time, so why am I so averse to reading about them? I’d love some insight into this!

What do you think?

Should truth always be stranger than fiction?

Linda Gillard is the author of three books: A Lifetime Burning, Emotional Geology and Star Gazing.
Visit Linda’s website for more information about her writing.

I have always had a facial recognition problem. If two actors have the same coloured hair then I can’t tell them apart and if a good friend changes her hair style then I won’t recognise her until she speaks. At the age of 25 an eye test revealed that I have a depth perception problem. It means I’ll never be allowed to fly a plane and it explains my inability to park a car, but luckily I didn’t have any dreams of becoming a pilot. My problem seems to be more severe than most, but new research may explain why more and more people are having problems recognising faces.

This week New Scientist revealed that the same area of the brain is responsible for both reading and facial recognition. They think that having a high skill in reading may impact the brain’s ability to recognise faces. Research into this possibility is going to begin soon, but I wondered if you’d noticed any truth in this hypothesis?

Have you noticed that your ability to recognise faces reduced as your reading skill increased?

Are your non-reading friends more able able to distinguish differences between people? 

Edited to add: Test how face blind you are here: http://www.faceblind.org/facetests/index.php 
I got 57% right (scores of less than 65% indicate facial blindness problem).

As Winter draws nearer I had expected to find myself reading an increasing number of books. I envisioned myself curled up with my favourite blanket, spending the cold, dark nights immersed in fictional worlds. This doesn’t appear to be happening. Instead I find myself reading less and I am currently finishing about half the number of books that I did in the Summer months. This goes against everything I believed to be true about seasonal reading.

I thought that in the Summer I would be so busy enjoying the sunshine that I wouldn’t have much time for reading, but it seems that while I was busy during the day I was quite happy to spend each evening quietly reading. I was also able to get out into the garden and read during the day. This isn’t the case now.

It isn’t that I have less free time in the Winter – I am just spending it doing different things. On these cold days I have found myself wanting to spend more time cooking: baking cakes and making other comfort foods. I have also been drawn towards the television: watching more films and keeping up with the X-Factor. 

I’m sorry if this means I have less books to review on this blog – you’ll just have to wait for the warmth of Spring to persuade me to read a bit more!

Hopefully I’ll make up for this by being a bit more creative with my blog and I may come up with a few more excuses to post photos of my family 😉

Am I alone in this seasonal shift?

Do you read more in Summer or Winter?

Libraries in the UK are in real danger. The number of library visitors is dropping all the time, down 50% in the last 20 years, 9% since 2005.

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In the past five years, library funding in the UK has actually gone up by 25% to £1 billion and with these hard economic times you’d expect people to be borrowing books from libraries instead of buying them, but that isn’t the case.

Why aren’t people in the UK borrowing books?

I have to admit that I didn’t visit a library for seven years. With a full-time job I found it increasingly hard to visit a library regularly. It was always shut in the evening by the time I finished work and I couldn’t guarantee I’d be able to get there on a Saturday morning. The city centre location, with expensive car parking and long queues of traffic put me off. Why would I put myself through that when I could just buy a second hand book from a car boot sale for 50p and not worry about being fined for not taking it back on time?

I eventually signed up to the library when my oldest son was 2-years-old. I wanted him to experience the love of libraries that I’d once had and, as a full-time mum, I had the time to get there. My children love their library, but as an adult I’m not that impressed. They often don’t have the books I want and although I can order some (at a cost of 50p) there are many books that never end up in my library system.

My local library is packed with people wanting free Internet access, but very few people seem to be borrowing the books.

School Libraries too good?

My oldest son started school a few weeks ago and now has access to a wonderful library in his school and computers with sodapdf to access pdf books online. I’m beginning to wonder if there is a need to go to the main public library now that he is bringing school library books home on a regular basis.

Things are different in America

In the US, despite cuts in library funding, visits to libraries are increasing, up 5% since 2006. I was astounded by the number of different initiatives available in some US libraries.

These include:

• Free DVD rental
• Free audio book downloads/rental
• Services that deliver library books to your door.
• Read to a dog days that encourage reading confidence in children.
• Video game nights to encourage teenagers into the library.
• Library book vending machines to ensure that best selling titles are available 24 hours a day.
• Numerous community events, courses and training programmes.

I’m going to look into the “books by mail” service a bit more and will report back with my findings soon.

The love for US libraries on Twitter was especially heart warming:

We go to storytime about 3-4 times a week at library. They also do lots of weekly crafts, put on a movie & special events. @mawbooks

Sometimes I take my kids to the library just for a family game night. We play board games there. So much fun. @pussreboots

I run a book club at my library, & there are always events like movies, writing groups, game nights, classes, etc. @pookasluagh

My boys have seen/petted more animals up close at the library at various events then they have anywhere else! @mawbooks

Compare the Usage Statistics

A Twitter conversation with @mawbooks led me to investigate her library in Utah. I have compared this with my local library system in Surrey, England.

I am aware that other libraries in both countries may have huge differences to these two, but as they served similar populations I thought it was an interesting comparison.

The difference in library usage can be seen by comparing the statistics:

Library	Population	Number of Borrowers	Estimated Number of Items that will be Checked Out in 2010
Surrey, UK	1.1 Million	355,000	6 Million
Salt Lake County, Utah, USA	783,000	680,000	15 Million

• Just 32% of Surrey residents borrow books from the library, compared with a massive 87% of Utah residents.
• That’s 5.5 items per year for each resident in Surrey, compared to 19 items in Utah.
• Roughly 4x more items are being borrowed per person in Utah.

The staggering difference can also be seen when you look at the number of copies of new books available to borrow:

Library	Population	Copies of Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins	Copies of Freedom by Jonathan Franzen
Surrey, UK	1.1 Million	8 copies on order.   No Holds	12 copies on order.   No Holds.
Salt Lake County, Utah, USA	783,000	962 copies,   2718 Holds	47 copies,   340 Holds

Note: Statistics were correct on the day each book was released in its respective country.

The Future of UK Libraries?

1000 libraries in the UK are threatened with closure in the next year.

I still visit my library, but it is more from a sense of duty than a desire to check books out.

I have been impressed by the recent advances Surrey libraries have made in some areas, including a new free audio/ebook download service, but I’m worried that this isn’t going to be enough to save many libraries from closure.

Drastic changes need to be made if libraries are to compete with the increasingly cheap second-hand book market. I’m not sure what the solution is, but we need to start thinking about it before we lose our libraries forever.

What would encourage you to visit your library more often?

Are you surprised by the difference in library usage across the Atlantic?

Which US initiatives do you think would work well in the UK?