About Rae Toonery:
I'm a media teacher from the UK in real life and in my fantasy world, I'm a writer who no longer has to teach to pay the bills!
I started writing poetry in my 30's – at Uni – and have since completed 7 novels. I have an over active imagination; always on the look-out for a storyline or character.
My favourite authors are John Irving, Sue Townsend and Emily Bronte. I have always loved to read and I couldn't imagine life without books or music. My favourite place in the world is a bookshop or library.
I'm a keen cyclist, vegan and dog owner and Proud to be non binary.
What inspires you to write?
Life! The people I work with or who I grew up with. Random folk I see out and about; like there's this woman I see when I go dog walking and she has like, a PACK of pugs. She ties their leads to a pram when she walks them and they are CRAZY. The other day I saw a woman on her front yard raving with a beer can in her hand – she was putting on a show for the queuing traffic on the road she lives on. Then I saw the pug woman coming out of that same address and I realised it was the same person. She is definitely going to feature in my next book.
Then sometimes it can be just a small thing, like a person's name. I was listening to the radio the other day and someone mentioned their kid was named Artemis! And I thought, what if I made them a character, only one family member will insist on calling them Armistice.
I do sometimes underpin humorous characters and situations with serious social issues that I care about as well – so Mental Health is a biggie for me and my next novel is actually going to be about the power of music to rescue my protagonist from suicide. One of my books is set in the London Riots and explores the issue of social class and social inequality which is an issue I really feel very strongly about. I suppose underneath it all, all my stories explore identity because I am a bit introspective and self anylitical (sorry if that's a bit of an author cliche).
What authors do you read when you aren’t writing?
John Irving is my all time favourite. His work is so rich and varied and yet there is that common thread that runs through them all. He is a true master – can pull off weighty literary fiction with that element of absurd humour and such intricate, involved plots. There is no one to hold a candle to him alive or dead. (Wish he's get Darkness As A Bride published already though! What's the hold up?)
I also love Sue Townsend, that lovely British dead pan humour.
And I like anything absurd or satirical, particularly Irish writers like Flan O'Brien, Jess Kidd and Craig-Jordan Baker.
And I actually love poetry – Yeats, Shelley, EE Cummings, TS Elliott…
Tell us about your writing process.
I get the concept first: so book 1 was 'let's follow a library book from borrower to borrower and get to know each character for a short time and then move on (with quite a bit of overlap between the stories)'. Then I would do a chapter by chapter plan – very sketchy (kind of just which characters are the focus of that chapter and the main event I'm building towards). I would create brief character descriptions (especially what motivates them and how they relate to others).
Then I start writing.
Usually I can't stick too close to the plan because the characters kind of take on a life of their own as I write and so organically, narratives go off on tangents (so what I'm building up to in 1 chapter of the plan could take up 3 or 4 chapters to develop!)
Also my books tend to have large casts and so every time I introduce a new character I add them to my character list (same with settings). I often have to refer to this to check if I've already used a name, for instance.
For Fiction Writers: Do you listen (or talk to) to your characters?
YES! I absolutely do and I imagine them in different scenarios with other characters, sort of like I'm watching them in a TV soap. Sometimes I imagine interviewing them on a chat show. And sometimes when I'm facing difficult situations, I think, what would 'character' do now? Which is probably why I'm not great at problem solving!
What advice would you give other writers?
Join a writing group – I have only just recently done this, after years and years of just writing in a vacuum. Try to get into crit groups and form a support network. Also, try to build your social presence because this is becoming more and more crucial now that publishing has morphed into a massive media / marketing machine.
Personally, I regret self-publishing, but I know that for some writers it can be the best route to finding an audience. If you're going to do it – just make sure you have A] money (for advertising) and B] lots of time to put into promoting it.
And if you get rejected by one publisher – keep sending them other work. Persistence can pay off.
A would also say that my creative writing really developed and I really improved technically in the degree modules I took – if you can get onto a Uni course (BA or MA) you get the best tutors!
How did you decide how to publish your books?
I got tired of all the rejections and decided to go it alone (do regret this now though).
I have now paid for a coaching package with a mentor who comes from a background in the publishing industry, so she really knows her stuff. We are working together on making my next submission (including extract, synopsis and cover letter) the absolute best it can be and of course, she knows what is likely to get me noticed… so hopefully this will be money well spent. Shop around though – I saw consultancy fees in the thousands when I was looking into this, but I'm only paying a few hundred and I really do trust her from what she's given to the process so far.
What do you think about the future of book publishing?
Oh no! The dreaded question… it's pretty depressing and looks to be headed in the same direction as film and music: dominated by a small number of profit orientated giants who will only take on books that are 'safe' in terms of genre (crime is the biggie, of course) and having an obvious mainstream appeal. It's good that SP is becoming less frowned on and that some individual authors are going it alone. I just think it's real shame that reality TV stars can churn out memoirs of very little literary merit just based on the fact that their name and face will sell copies, yet someone who pours blood, sweat and tears into their craft, but only has a very limited social media following won't get a look in.
So I suppose, for people like me, with my 30 Twitter followers and no cash to invest and working a full time job to pay the bills – it's only going to get harder.
What genres do you write?: Literary fiction / humour / social satire
What formats are your books in?: Both eBook and Print
Website(s)
Rae Toonery Home Page Link
Your Social Media Links
Goodreads
Facebook
Twitter
All information in this post is presented “as is” supplied by the author. We don’t edit to allow you the reader to hear the author in their own voice.
