So, Taking Flight is out next Tuesday! (It’s already on pre-order at a few places if that’s your thing). I thought I’d do one of those terribly insightful writer posts about how sometimes things work and sometimes things don’t work and sometimes you have no idea which is which until you start to get the words out on the page.
The Celtic Myth stories began almost as a joke. The Cariad Chapter of the Romance Novelists’ Association were talking about Welsh romances for St Dwynwen’s Day. St Dwynwen is known, rather inaccurately, as The Welsh St Valentine. I didn’t have anything to put forward to be promoted for her ‘day’ of 25th January, so I sat down and wrote something. I took the elements of the Dwynwen myth and made a short, low-heat hurt-comfort story about two men who meet at a remote cottage in the depths of January. It also featured a large dog and some chickens.
I enjoyed writing it so much (and making the cover) that I thought I’d do another one. I have always been fascinated by crows and so St Kevin and the ornithological element to his legend was easy. I still really enjoyed the short-story exercise, so I just kept going and because the previous two stories were about birds, the story of Brânwen and the starling seemed like a natural progression.
It brewed around in my head all the time I was writing The Fog of War, with the starling as the main character. I was going to have him fly off with Brânwen’s message to her brother Brân and then fall for Brân and the two of them go back and rescue Brânwen. But when I came to write it, it really didn’t feel right.
This was partly because it’s such a huge story, I think, and I didn’t want to write a full-length novel. The Mabinogion is not for the faint-hearted. But it was also because as I went along, it felt like Brânwen was just a plot device in the story. And of course, she is, in the original. The poor woman has no self-realisation at all…she gets married off, she gets banished, she gets rescued, her son gets killed (by her half brother!), both Wales and Ireland get razed to the ground around her and the only decision she makes at all is at the end of the story, when she kills herself. It felt really weird trying to craft a low-key romance for two other people around that.
Nevertheless, I tried.
After a while, I realised I was writing rubbish, so I stopped and had a think. And my think led me to the conclusion that I didn’t want to write about Brân the Blessed at all. He’s Gwyn’s big brother in my story and I had great fun with him when I was able to cast him as overprotective sibling. As a main character though, he didn’t work at all.
Once I’d got that straight in my head, I was able to take the Brânwen character and make her/him the master of his own destiny. Gwyn gets himself out of his situation at The Kings of Ireland hotel with the help of Darren Starling. He has some help. But he manages his own life rather than being moved around like a chess piece.
It’s a much more satisfying story and was a salutary writing lesson for me.
I really hope you like it!
Taking Flight
Gwyn Mabler is on secondment at the Kings of Ireland Hotel at Tara. He and his brother Brân are in the process of buying the place and Gwyn is getting to grips with the everyday running by shadowing the current owner, Mal Reagan.
Gwyn’s an idiot, though. Mal made it clear from the start he’d like to get Gwyn in his bed and after a couple of weeks of pursuit, Gwyn gave in. Mal was hot and pushy and just the kind of dangerous to pique Gwyn’s interest. He honestly thought Mal knew he was trans.
Since that horrible night, Mal has had Gwyn ‘workshadowing’ Chef in the deeply unhappy kitchen. He doesn’t want to go home and cause a fuss that might make the sale fall through, but when a huge row breaks out over a flour delivery and Mal backhands Gwyn across the face, he finally decides enough is enough. With the help of Darren Starling, one of the line-cooks with whom he’s formed a tentative friendship, he leaves.
During the two-day journey from the middle of Ireland home to Wales they have plenty of time to exchange confidences. Could the delicate pull of attraction between them grow into something stronger? Is it safe for Gwyn to out himself to Darren? Will Darren want to go out with a trans guy? And how will his brother Brân take Gwyn’s arrival home with a stranger?
A 14,500-word short story in the Reworked Celtic Myths series.
Preorder Taking Flight: Amazon – Everywhere Else!