Francesca reveals the inspiration behind her newsletter giveaway story, I’ll Be a Sunbeam
This month, if you sign up for my newsletter (details at the bottom of the post), there’s a special treat in the form of an exclusive story, set in the same area and era as the Valleys novels.
I wrote the story around the same time that I was writing Heartbreak in the Valleys, as a tribute to my great grandmother, Mary Jones.
Mary, the real one, was living in a mining village during the First World War (Abertysswg, the village my setting of Dorcalon is based on), as is Mary Jones in the story. Gran (as we called her) was married to Percy (or Pa, as we all called him) like Mary, but unlike my heroine, already had four children by that time, including my grandma, Charlotte, who was born in 1914. And she’d go on to have three
As those who’ve read War in the Valleys might know, I dedicated the book to Mary Jones, who also appears as a minor character in those books (she gets around!). I wonder what she would have thought of that. I do recall Gran having a book on her shelf called Mary Jones, which was a true story of a Welsh girl who wanted her own Bible. I guess it is a common name!
As the dedication reveals, times were hard for Gran, as they were for many people a hundred years ago. For a start, she lost three of her close female relations to tuberculosis (or consumption, as it was often referred to then). Her mother was only forty-two when she died of TB in 1891. Gran was two years old
In 1899, Gran lost her older sister, sixteen year old Charlotte Ann. In 1935, Gran’s oldest daughter, Clarice, also succumbed to TB, after giving birth to her second child, Maureen (who died a month later). Gran’s younger daughter, my grandma, also contracted TB in the early ‘fifties, but survived.
Child deaths were rife in the early part of the twentieth century. The 1911 census lists how many children were born to a family ‘alive’ and how many had since died. It reveals just how many didn’t make it past childhood. Mary, sadly, did not escape this fate and lost her 6th child, Davy, in 1922, when he was only two years old. My mother believed it was from pneumonia.
Then there was World War Two. The family moved to Lancing in the 1930s, in order to escape the mines and find a better life. There’s a sad irony here, as, had they remained in Abertysswg, her four surviving sons would probably have been in a reserved occupation and not conscripted. Only two of them came back. Cyril went down with HMS Fidelity in 1943, aged twenty-three. Tommy was also killed that year, in Sicily, aged thirty-four.
By the end of the war, at the age of only fifty-six, Gran had lost four of her seven children.
I came along twelve years later. Gran was only sixty-eight at that time, and, as she lived until the ripe old age of ninety-seven, I was privileged to know my great grandmother for twenty-nine years. My grandma (her daughter) emigrated to Australia in 1958, and my nonna passed away in 1960. My paternal grandfather was killed in 1915 and my maternal one died in 1945. After Pa passed in 1963, she was the only grandparent close by, so I’m grateful that she was in my life for such a long time.
As a child I’d regularly go with my parents to visit her in Lancing, eleven miles away. I loved sitting in her ‘kitchen’ (a sitting/room diner to us today). Her Victorian terraced house was set up as it would have been in the similar house she’d had in Wales. She referred to the kitchen as the ‘scullery’, even though it now had the cooker in it, which would have been a range in the ‘kitchen’ previously. The ‘front room’ was never used, and simply housed a chest of drawers and photographs. I think maybe, when they first moved, various members of the family slept there.
And what of the song, ‘I’ll Be a Sunbeam’ (also known as ‘Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam’)? Gran was a Baptist chapel regular, and had been all her life. ‘I’ll Be a Sunbeam’ was a song she taught me as a child. I suppose she must have sung it at chapel. (If you’ve never heard of it, you can listen to it here )
Whenever I hear it, I think of her with sadness and love, and remember how much of a bright spot she was in my life, despite the sadness that had dominated her
She was certainly a sunbeam for me.
To read the exclusive story, I’ll Be a Sunbeam, sign up during June for my newsletter, which will come out each month with my latest news, offers and much more.
Go to https://www.francesca-capaldi.co.uk/ and sign up at the bottom of the page.
Published by Hera Books / Canelo
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Blog post first published on https://www.francesca-capaldi.co.uk/blog
Last week saw the publication of my latest pocket novel, Desperately Seeking Doreen, set in Littlehampton in 1972 . The idea for the novella came from my own teens. In the summer of ’72 I was fourteen-years-old, working the summer holidays in my dad’s restaurant (The Blue Sea in the story), which is under five minutes walk to where my main character, Jackie’s, (imaginary) guest house is situated. A large number of the tall, red brick Victorian houses on South Terrace, opposite the sea, were guest houses. Some still are. Jackie works part time at the funfair, which I don’t name but was in fact owned by Butlins at that time.
In September 2016, The Foyles Bookshop Girls, which is a World War One family saga, hadn’t even been thought of. I was writing a Victorian novel.
Whatever people may write about any genre, it is important to remember the only thing that matters are the readers, as they are your marker. Yes, I’m sure it would be lovely to be recognised by your peers as doing a brilliant job, but surely that’s not why we write is it? It’s not why I do it. I write because I love to write, and yes, I want to publish the best I can, though not for my writing peers, but for my readers.
So what will my promotion look like? I’m not altogether sure. My publishers are arranging things behind the scenes and I know that includes a blog tour. For the people who don’t know, bloggers do a fantastic job reviewing books, interviewing authors and hosting competitions. They probably do a whole lot more than that, but I am in awe of the time and energy they put into their blogs, mainly because they love to read and to encourage others to do the same. If you are not a writer, please search out the bloggers on the Internet. They do a wonderful job.
Social media is now a big part of the process of marketing and promoting yourself. Do I hear you all scream noooo? Yes, that was me several years ago, when I was at the start of my writing apprenticeship.
Wherever your career path takes you, think ahead to your marketing strategy. There will be blogs out on the Internet that probably cover every subject you can think of. If not, start your own. Build your social media platforms; it’s how most people find things out these days. Take lots of photos; we all love a photograph.
While the First World War wasn’t the only catalyst for change for women, it did bring women to the forefront of society. Prior to the war, many employers refused to take on married women, so it was mainly single women or widows that were employed outside of the home. Once the men had enlisted to fight for King and Country, women were actively encouraged to leave domestic service and take on more difficult and strenuous work. It’s no coincidence that it was after WW1 that some women got the right to vote and a few were allowed to stand as members of parliament, although that did take a few years to happen. On a practical level, hems got shorter and, in some cases, fashion took on a more military theme. With the men away, they also became the main wage earner; in some cases, the only wage earner. They took on managing the home, the family and elderly relatives, as well as managing the money. Earning a wage, albeit less than men doing the same work, also brought about the feeling of independence for the first time.
In my case, the dream, or the lofty ambition, was to become a published novelist and to see my name on a cover. I have been lucky to have many short stories published in different countries, but the novel was always my dream for as long as I can remember. There were times when it felt the learning curve, the work, the commitment needed was insurmountable, but it wasn’t. It just needed time, patience and reminding there was no rush. I had to learn my craft.
Write Minds 