Close to Home ...Cath Cole

As a book reviewer I have made contact with authors from all across the globe and feel immensely privileged to be able to share some amazing work. However, there is always something rather special when a book comes to my attention which has been written by an author in my part of the North of England. So with this in mind I have great pleasure in featuring some of those authors who are literally close to my home. Over the next few Saturdays, and hopefully beyond, I will be sharing the work of a very talented bunch of Northern authors and discovering just what being a Northerner means to them both in terms of inspiration and also in their writing.

Today I'm delighted to introduce Northern Writer

Cath Cole

Home from Home by Cath Cole

The Origins of Home from Home

Depending on the individual I am talking to or the characteristics of the group I am with, readers ask a range of questions. These questions might be as varied as: Why did you write about a group of nurses in the 1960s?  Where is Farnton? Or perhaps the most interesting – Why did you write a historical novel? The latter question from a lovely lad, young enough to be my grandson, but I hasten to add, only by the narrowest of margins. We were fellow students studying for a Master’s degree in Creative Writing. He was astounded when I told him that the novel was very loosely based on my lived experience. He told me he would never have guessed I was SO very old. He emailed me recently to tell me he had bought a copy of "Home from Home" as a birthday present for his grandma.

Why did I write about a group of nurses training in the late 1960s? The three years of State Registered Nurse (SRN) training and the twenty months prior to training spent as a nursing cadet were a catalyst for me. I was utterly changed by the experiences of being both a cadet and a student nurse. I left school, at sixteen, a naïve girl from a working class background, university was never an option for me, the Infirmary was my best option for a qualification and a career. By the time I qualified as a SRN aged twenty-one I was a more sophisticated girl. The feeling of belonging and self-worth I gained through hard, sometimes gruelling work, friendships and discipline as well as the camaraderie needed to rise above the sometimes petty rules and necessary strict discipline underpinned the successful professional life I subsequently enjoyed. In addition, one of my nursing friends insisted I accompany her to a family party where she introduced me to her cousin who has been my husband for a very long time. The story of our meeting is played out in the novel.

Farnton is a corruption of Farnworth and Bolton. I was reluctant to use the actual names of the towns and names of restaurants, cafes and shops for fear of criticism that I had misrepresented reality. In my second novel I have thrown caution to the wind, actual names of villages, towns, pubs and shops abound. I was also concerned that if Bolton General Hospital and Bolton Royal Infirmary were used, readers, aware of the two hospitals, might be tempted to attribute the characters to real people. Which one of the girls are you? Is a frequently asked question. The answer is none of them, although some of the incidents reflect my experiences.

Another reason, and one I do not always admit to, is that writing about training to be a nurse in time of huge social and cultural change means I have left something behind for my grandchildren. A record of a different time, a time without sophisticated technology. A time when the social order was more clearly defined. A time of simple pleasures yet a time of revolution led by young people. A time when the old post war values were challenged and different voices began to be heard. And best of all a time of the greatest music ever.

Cath Cole

Corazon Books
2015

Home from Home: The lives and loves of five nurses in the 1960s

A touching, bold and, at times, amusing account of the lives and loves of five trainee nurses in the 1960s.

Home from Home is the true-to-life, moving story of five student nurses in the 1960s. Twice a bestseller on Amazon's medical fiction chart!

The lives of Theresa, Maggie, Jenny, Sarah and Chris are about to change forever as they start their nurse training at The School of Nursing at Farnton General.

They soon realise that they have much to learn about life, both on and off the hospital wards. A strong bond is formed as the young women face the challenges presented by families, boyfriends and their nursing responsibilities.

Friendships are tested as the young nurses experience the joys and heartbreaks of growing up. But for each of them, for different reasons, the hospital will become a home from home.

Amazon UK

Author Website click here

My thanks to Cath for sharing her thoughts about the writing of Home from Home and what it means to her.

 I trained as a nurse in the 1970s so a lot of what Cath says resonates with me.

Huge thanks also to Ian at Corazon Books for his enthusiasm for my Close to Home feature

I hope you have enjoyed this week's Featured Author

Coming next week : J Carmen Smith 

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Guest Authors ~ Sarah and Amy Beeson

I am delighted to showcase mother and daughter writing duo

Sarah and Amy Beeson

Sarah and Amy a warm welcome back to Jaffareadstoo.
You must be so excited about the launch of your latest book

Our Country Nurse

Harper Collins
25th August 2016

Sarah - following your career in nursing, what started you on the path to writing and how did you break into the publishing world?

During Amy’s pregnancy and after her daughter was born she and many friends wanted more information on breastfeeding, bottle feeding, weaning, sleep and someone to talk to about their feelings about being a mum. In that first year I spent hours on the phone to Amy and her friends and then friends of friends. I emailed a lot of advice to back up the conversations. After six months or so I started to work with Amy on the manuscript for a baby advice book that became Happy Baby, Happy Family. Several publishers bid for the baby book and HarperCollins offered us a three book deal for Happy Baby, Happy Family and two memoirs of my early career in nursing and health visiting (The New Arrival and our latest book Our Country Nurse). I’d never even contemplated writing about my life so it was a complete surprise – all nonfiction books but very different. 

Sarah - Your latest book, Our Country Nurse focuses on Health Visiting in the mid-1970s. How do you think nursing has changed in the intervening forty or so years?

There’s been big advances in the treatment of so many illnesses; the things we can do today are simply amazing – unimaginable when I was a young nurse. I like to think that when you take away all the technology that nurses are still made of the same stuff that we were and for the years before that. For me nursing is a calling. 

Today's nurses have many obstacles to overcome. It feels like all the staff in the NHS are fighting for a service that is under attack. Expecting student nurses to pay tuition fees to study is going to add another barrier to nurse recruitment. It’s such a tough job and salaries are still modest compared to other graduates. It’s very unfair when we know how vital nurses are to care in hospitals and in the community. 

Sarah and Amy - What are the ups and downs of being a writing duo and who is the worst critic?

Sarah: We mostly work alone but get together to plan and discuss. Everyday there are phone calls, FaceTime, Skype calls, emails and texts passing back and forth with ideas and feedback as stories develop and there are times when the other person isn’t always available. I'm critical of my writing and Amy is critical of hers but we try not to be critical of each other. Amy painstakingly checks facts and is scrupulous in being authentic with characterisation and narrative within the book. 

Amy: It’s actually great to have someone to share the highs and lows with because writing is usually quite a solitary profession. When you doubt yourself you’ve got someone to inspire confidence and when lovely things happen it’s all the better for having someone you love by your side. 

For me the lows are the late nights when you’re on a really tight deadline whilst trying to juggle being a mum with a young child and Sarah’s so caring and reassuring when mummy guilt creeps in. The highs are always meeting readers and hearing other people talk about your work. Discovering the books have helped or touched a reader in some way – that’s amazing. 

Sarah and Amy - Do you each have a favourite part of the writing/publishing process?

Sarah: My favourite part is spending time thinking about my memories of inspirational patients, clients and colleagues. It’s even better when I get together with old nursing and health visiting pals and we all laugh together about some of the situations we were in. You relive those times and revisit the places you lived and worked, the lives you touched and how it’s changed the course of your life. Sharing them with Amy is very special, I’m sure there are things we’d never have talked about if it wasn’t for writing the books. 

Amy: I love it when a story line comes together. You spend a lot of time thinking about plot, researching fashion, food, TV, historical events, homes, music as well as spending a lot of time talking about what was going on with different characters – you spend a lot of time with those characters and when it comes together it’s like magic. There are times when you feel like you’re willing them into life on the page.

Sarah and Amy - When you start writing do you have a writing plan, or do you plot out the story as you go along?

Sarah: A writing plan is very important and luckily for me Amy is a dab hand at planning. The first step is that I free write all my memories and then hand them over to Amy. She shapes the narrative and everyday emails the latest version of the book to me and then we discuss it and tweak bits until we get it right.

Amy: Yes, I start with a timeline of what’s happened. I have so many notebooks with pages dedicated to each character. We start with the plot, what’s each characters story that brought them into Sarah’s life; what challenge they are trying to overcome and how they got into that situation. I ask Sarah hundreds and hundreds of questions all the way through the writing process trying to reveal the heart of the story. 

Then there are other notebooks about the seasons or lists of people’s names and hobbies that were popular at the time. Our Country Nurse is set in a country village in 1975-1976 so it was really important to understand the context of different characters lives. Some are farmers knowing so about that happens month by month with livestock, fruit and vegetables, flora and fauna all comes into play. Knowing how people spent their leisure time, exactly what would have been on in the background on the TV or radio all help to create the scenes in the book. I do trips to archives to get primary source materials that help to create the descriptions. 

I have lots of private Pinterest boards where I mock up characters clothes and homes because a lot of what happens is in a domestic setting where the mums in the books spend most of their time is really important to us. Knowing what would be the oven or what cups she had in the kitchen cupboard all help to build up a picture of each woman. 

Sarah and Amy - How do you deal with writer’s block?

Sarah: So far so good. For us it’s more a question of what to leave out then what to put in. There were so many stories we couldn’t fit them into Our Country Nurse. We’ve got a whole extra book in unused notes. 

Amy: I don’t really get writers block because I don’t wait for inspiration to strike. I’m a working mum so I have very specific windows of time in which to write each day and I have to sit down and get on with it. Every morning after the school run I’ll be thinking about the story we’re working on that day and then just before I turn my laptop on I’ll feel a bit uneasy, I don’t quite know how it’s all going to come together. Then I just start to type and the words come. Some days your writing is stronger than others and some days you really surprise yourself. I think that’s why it often feels like conjuring. 

Sarah and Amy - Do you work on the book together or do you have separate work areas?

Sarah: When we write together it’s always at the kitchen table in my country cottage or Amy’s London flat. Most of the time we are writing separately but keeping in constant contact through calls and messages. 

Amy: I dream of having an office. I have so many Pintrest boards dedicated to my perfect office but I’m usually at the kitchen table, library or a coffee shop. It is nice when we are together because you can work much faster that way and there’s a lot of laughter and the continually humming of the kettle. 

Sarah and Amy – What keeps you motivated during creative slumps?

Sarah: I don’t really get slumps. I think after all those years nursing and health visiting you just keep on going until the job’s done. We’re both highly motivated people. Writing is a job that you do daily. As Amy says, you can't wait for inspiration but there are exceptional moments. Though, we do get through a lot of tea and we’re both very particular on which mugs and cups we use. Amy likes to have a literary themed mug.

Amy: I find on days when I eat well, keep hydrated and get up from my desk and do some yoga or a workout are the best days. When the pressure is on and you’re stuck at your desk it becomes very coffee and biscuit fuelled. 

And finally - how can readers find out more about you and your writing?

We do events where people can meet us in person and have a chat and get a signed book if they’ve like one. We’re also very active on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram so please come along and say hello. Visit our website sarahbeeson.org where there’s lot of articles and news stories to keep you entertained plus gift copies of the books are available. 

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sarahbeesonthenewarrival/

Twitter @NewArrivalBook https://twitter.com/NewArrivalBook

Instagram @sarah.beeson.mbe https://twitter.com/NewArrivalBook

Website http://sarahbeeson.org/

A huge thank you to Sarah and Amy for answering my questions so thoughtfully

Our Country Nurse is now available to buy online and from all good book stores. 

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The author in my spotlight is ...Sarah Beeson MBE

I am delighted to welcome the writers of The New Arrival

Mother and Daughter ~ Sarah and Amy Beeson

 The New Arrival

by 

Sarah Beeson

is published by Harper Collins in paperback at £7.99

Amazon

Sarah - The New Arrival is about your time as a young nurse in London during the early 1970's - what made you want to revisit this time?

Before we started work on the book I met up with my old nursing friends Appleton and Lynch and we had such fun reminiscing over our wild days in Hackney; counting up all the boyfriends we’d had between us, the parties, the clothes and the hairstyles and most of all, the people we worked with and the extraordinary patients we’d encountered. It’s been a gift to take the time to remember all those experiences and realise just how far we've come as a society since the 1970s. I see it now a time when there was a spirit of optimism and fun and a real desire for social change.

Sarah (second from right) is seen with her student nurse classmates in preliminary training school

January 1970

Sarah - When writing the book did anything surprise you about your memories of that time, if so what?

I see now how exploited the nursing staff were. We worked such long hours for little pay. We went into nursing as a vocation and it was still in the spirit of Florence Nightingale which made for some fine nursing but it wasn’t fair in the sexism there was towards female nurses. We’ve come so far in striving for equality for women and children. Hackney was the real beginning of me becoming politically aware, of getting involved in feminism and social justice. I saw first-hand how the NHS really worked and learnt how to try and influence things to benefit staff and patients.

Amy -  you have collaborated with your mum on the writing of the book , what did this experience mean to you?

It’s been the best job in the world writing with mum. It’s a dream come true to get a book published but to do it together is just amazing. We’re very close so to have each other’s support has been a wonderful experience and it’s been enriching for me as a writer and a daughter to find out more about what my mum’s life was like before I came along.

What is it about the book which you think will appeal to readers and who is your target audience?

I hope the book will have broad appeal. What’s been very lovely is all the young women and girls who’ve contacted us who are considering a career in nursing. I think it has the broadest appeal for women but what’s nice is that readers from 14 to 86 have told us how much they’ve enjoyed it. We’ve got a lot to thank Call the Midwife for - it has awoken an interest in social history about NHS staff and patients, as well as in the cultural history of the recent past.

What would you like readers to take away when they finish reading The New Arrival?

I’d like them to enjoy it first and foremost. To be moved, to laugh, to feel like they have a connection with the characters because they were real people. I also hope it inspires nurses or people who want to be nurses of the value they bring to the NHS and the difference caring for people makes in the world.

Sarah receiving her MBE from the Queen for services to children and families.

Buckingham Palace , February 2006

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My thoughts on The New Arrival

I'm a huge fan of the television series, Call the Midwife, not just because of the nostalgic pull of the story and its vintage setting in the 1950’s, but also by the social commentary of the life and times of those who lived and shaped the health of the nation in this important time in post-war Britain. When I was given the opportunity to read and review The New Arrival, I immediately jumped at the chance to experience what life was like for a young student nurse in London during the early part of the 1970’s. What I discovered was a social commentary, similar to that of Call the Midwife, but with an added twist of bringing the story into an era I know rather more about. My own nurse training commenced during the latter part of the 1970s, and in many ways Sarah’s nursing story is similar to my own.

An undeniable warmth pervades The New Arrival and Sarah writes with great conviction and real compassion for those in her nursing care. Her sharp and canny social observations really bring this era to life in a lively and informative way which neither patronises nor sensationalises the nursing profession but which gives huge insight into just what life was like for young nurses during this time. The book is populated with a rich array of characters; all based on real people whose lives intertwined and whose stories become deeply personal and immensely moving. There are the usual lively high jinks, which all nurses are all too familiar with, and which add a lovely richness to the narrative. I found myself with a wry smile on my face especially when Sarah describes hiding a well deserved cup of tea in the bin during Matron's ward visit -I remember doing something similar with a bowl of ice cream !

The New Arrival captured this inspirational time so realistically that  I felt like I was transported back in time to a less technological age when good nursing standards were the order of the day and where nursing sisters guarded their ward areas like the dragons they were. It made me immensely proud to have been part of the nursing profession for thirty years of my life and I am thankful that Sarah – with her daughter Amy’s collaboration - will continue to describe her nursing exploits in further volumes of her story.  

My thanks to Sarah and Amy for giving such a thoughtful interview and to Virginia Woolstencroft at Harper Collins for the generous offer of a  copy of The New Arrival for one lucky UK winner of this giveaway.

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