Monday 18 April 2016

The Missing Hours by Emma Kavanagh - Blog Tour guest post

It's my stop on the blog tour for The Missing Hours by Emma Kavanagh. I'm delighted to welcome Emma to my blog today. The Missing Hours is being published by Cornerstone on 21 April 2016.




Book 3…Shouldn’t I have a grip on this by now?
by Emma Kavanagh



It is a dream, this job. Seriously. I get to make stuff up for a living. My brain can wander anywhere it wants to. Sometimes it even comes back. Ha! I jest. What was I saying…

Oh, right. When people ask me what I do, I mutter the word ‘author’ in an undertone, much the way one would say the words ‘drug dealer’. Because this is SUCH an awesome job, that I don’t want to appear cocky about it, don’t want the gods of fate looking down at me and saying “Oops, she’s getting a bit big for her boots. Let’s do something about that.” So I mutter and I deflect and I talk about how grateful I am, all the while thinking, please, vengeful gods, don’t take it all away.

Because, you see, it really is a cool job.

But…

“So, what book is this you have coming out? Three, right? Oh, you’re an old hand at this now.”

And I smile and I say yes and then I go and lock myself in the room and cry from the sheer terror of it all.

Because the thing is, it’s still the same, even three books in. There’s the day to day work, which, again, is totally awesome. And yet, each morning I sit before my computer and feel the sparks of fear erupting in my insides. What if today is the day that I forget how to write? What if today is the day that those words simply will not come and that blank screen just stares at me and stares at me until I am battered down into submission.

How dare I do a job like this? I am just an average woman from an average town. To get to do something like this feels like the unlikeliest of mistakes. What if today is the day that the universe realises what it has done, and it all goes away?

Then there is the book-out-in-the-word thing.

My baby.

Out there.

All alone.

I confess that, for the most part, I try not to read reviews as it seems like the most effective way to keep some distance between me and the lunatic asylum. But, when I do read reviews, I will scour (and I mean SCOUR) them for the worst they can throw at me. Even in a sparklingly brilliant review, I will hunt for some meaty bit of criticism that I can use to beat myself across the head with for days.

Yes. Yes, there is something wrong with me.

Then there are sales. Oh, god! You see, you want good sales. Obviously. Your publisher has worked extremely hard and invested an awful lot in your creation. You want to see that faith rewarded. But then begins the insidious little thought - well, what if they are too good? What if I can’t write another book that can sell that well and then the sales plummet and oh-my-god-we’re-all-going-to-die-somebody-get-me-a-drink.

As you can see, I like to plan ahead with my worrying…

I read somewhere recently that creative types are the most prone to anxiety because their powers of imagination provide a virtual trough of horror stories, projected apocalyptic outcomes, from which they can select.

Yay!

But the thing is, this job I do, it falls decidedly outside the realm of normal jobs. I get to make things up for a living. I live three quarters of my life in a fantasy world and I get paid for it!!! Yes, it is pressure filled. It is a job that involves making a large percentage of your inner life public. You pour yourself out onto the page, make yourself vulnerable for people to see. The best of writing comes when what is on the page is more than words, static two dimensional characters. We have to create people, and people have tragedies and pain, and when they live that, we live that, and so sometimes that can make you more than a little crazy. But this is not pressure like that experienced by a police officer on the beat on a Friday night who has to insert themselves between two people intent on killing one another. It is not pressure like a soldier who has to put one foot in front of another, knowing full well that any one of those steps may cause the ground to erupt beneath him and his world to end in a flash of light and pain.

This pressure, the pressure that comes with this job, it comes from being so damned privileged. From having been given an opportunity to do what so many people dream of, and from wanting so very badly to be worthy of that opportunity.

So, each day I take a few deep, calming breaths. I remind myself that I have done this before. That I can do this again. And I begin anew, each day striving to be worthy of the good fortune I have received.

Seriously, I think that by book four, I’ll have this thing down…


About Emma Kavanagh
Emma Kavanagh was born and raised in South Wales. After graduating with a PhD in Psychology from Cardiff University, she spent many years working as a police and military psychologist, training firearms officers, command staff and military personnel throughout the UK and Europe. She lives in South Wales with her husband and young sons.

Readers can find out more about Emma on her Facebook page and follow Emma on Twitter - @EmmaLK 


The Missing Hours
By Emma Kavanagh
Published by Cornerstone ( 21 April 2016)
ISBN: 978-1780894676




Publisher's description
One moment, Selena Cole is in the playground with her children and the next, she has vanished without a trace.
A woman returns
Twenty hours later, Selena is found safe and well, but with no memory of where she has been.
What took place in those missing hours, and are they linked to the discovery of a nearby murder?
‘Is it a forgetting or a deception?’

Read my review here.


Follow the Blog Tour





No comments:

Post a Comment