When I asked our nearly nine year old daughter what she thought I should write for this article, she said this: “The best thing about working from home as a children’s author is that you get to eat all the biscuits while your kids are at school.” I think she must imagine me and Tom (the author and illustrator Thomas Docherty) spending our days gorging on packet after packet of chocolate digestives, ginger nuts and bourbon creams. The reality is, of course, (somewhat) different.
Helen Docherty
After the usual morning scramble, we race to drop our two daughters off at primary school at twenty-five past eight, making the gate by the skin of our teeth. It’s a half hour round walk from our house to school and back, involving a big hill, and I like to think of it as my healthy commute to work. Tom often runs home, taking a detour along Swansea Bay, just to score a moral victory.
Once we’re home, it’s time to start work. For me, this often involves trying to think up brilliant new ideas for stories, which can be a bit like pulling teeth. The irony is that most of my best ideas don’t come when I’m sitting at my desk, as illustrated below:
Where/When I get my best ideas:
In the shower
Why this is problematic:
We are on a water meter
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On a walk
Why this is problematic:
The best ideas only come on random walks, never on walks taken with the specific aim of generating ideas
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In bed, at about a quarter to midnight
Why this is problematic:
This has been known to involve me jumping out of bed to work on an idea for the next two hours, resulting in the kind of sleep deprivation normally associated with people with babies or very young children
However, once I’ve got an idea for a new story (brilliant or not), the fun bit starts: the actual writing. Most of the books I’ve had published so far are written in rhyme, which can be both incredibly satisfying (when you find the perfect rhyme) and immensely frustrating. It’s a bit like trying to do an enormous jigsaw puzzle in your head; all the pieces have to fit together, each linking with the next. To rhyme a word, I usually write the alphabet down the side of a page in my notebook and list all the words that rhyme with the original one. I could of course refer to a ready-made list, but something about the physical act of writing the words helps to throw up more possibilities. Tea (and biscuits) can aid this process.
Not all of my stories make it to publication; I have a whole collection of texts that didn’t quite make the grade. The children’s book publishing industry is fiercely competitive, and you have to develop a thick skin. But when a new story is commissioned or a book comes out, it’s a huge buzz... and it inevitably generates more work, liaising with publishers and promoting the book.
As well as writing and illustrating, both Tom and I do regular author visits to primary schools (fun and exhausting), as well as helping young people to write their own books through organisations like Storyopolis, here in Swansea. I love the variety that this brings to the job, as well as the contact with kids – they have so much energy and imagination.
However I’ve spent my day, from 3 pm onwards I’m back to being an ordinary mum. I wouldn’t swap that for anything, even though it makes my working day shorter than most and means that I often have to catch up with admin in the evening. I know how lucky I am to have the flexibility to spend time with our girls... Even if they do think that all we do is eat biscuits.
Helen Docherty has been nominated for the Oscar’s Book Prize shortlist for her work The Knight Who Wouldn’t Fight. The award is supported by the London Evening Standard, Amazon and the National Literacy Trust and was set up in memory of Oscar Ashton a boy who passed away at the age of 3 from an undetected heart condition, looks to honour the best in early-years literature. The winner will be announced in May, with the £5,000 price awarded by Princess Beatrice at a ceremony in London.