Ben Ellis

The debut novelist describes how a move from speculative fiction to contemporary romance snagged him a publishing deal

‘I’ve always had a creative drive, from ignoring Lego instructions as a kid and building my own object, to writing bad poetry as a teenager, to writing bad songs later on. ‘In my mid-twenties I read a lot, especially speculative fiction, and I had ideas I wanted to express but song lyrics didn’t really lend themselves to corporate overlords controlling populations. Not for me, anyway.

At 28, I was fortunate enough to get a job in the US and moved to Detroit to work for a software company. This move not only enlightened me to life in the US but I learnt a lot about being British and the differences between us. I did an evening course in creative writing whilst I was there which started the ball rolling and demystifying the writing process. It was great as you were set writing assignments, deadlines and received feedback.

‘I then spent the next three years filling a notebook with ideas for a speculative fiction novel but never actually wrote a word. I moved back to the UK and realising I was procrastinating, serendipity alerted me to an online course run by one of my favourite authors, Max Barry. This course gave me the kick start I needed and I wrote the first chapter of my first novel, which got me moving.

‘About eighteen months later I finished the first draft and I remember walking out of the coffee shop in Worthing absolutely stupefied that I had actually written a novel.

‘I think the best advice to getting over that finish line is to keep moving forward and get that first draft written. Max spoke about “not letting the editor into the room” during the first draft, don’t keep looking back to check that what you’ve written is any good. It probably isn’t but that really doesn’t matter right now, keep writing new stuff. The second point I’d make is, plan. I think writers who say they don’t plan still have a basic structural idea of the book they want to write; who the protagonist/s are, themes, and a basic ending or destination. Planning, no matter how basic (just a page is better than nothing) saves a lot of heartache later on. Plans can be flexible, they aren’t cheating, they’re your friend. Books are magic, but magicians are meticulous planners.

‘About fifteen years later, three novels written, a couple of screenplays, a few short stories, over 100 rejections from agents and publishers, after seeing a call for submissions in Writers’ News, I got an email from Accent Press saying they really liked my manuscript. Who? What? Me? I nearly missed the email because in a sudden change of tack one day, I decided the one-worded title was holding me back (Blindsided) so I changed it to How We Got to Today, as longer titles seem to be en vogue. The email had this new title as the subject and I’d forgotten about changing it, I nearly deleted the email as spam until I saw it mentioned my name and the word ‘novel’ in the preview window.

‘How We Got to Today is a contemporary romance, whereas my first two novels are dystopian. I thought I’d try a different genre as I wasn’t getting much luck with the first two. However, the publisher, Accent Press, offer three-book deals and after reading the first two novels, wanted to pick up all three. Then Accent Press got acquired by Headline (part of Hachette) and all of a sudden I’m part of a huge publishing conglomerate, my novel cannibalising the sales of authors like Martina Cole and Neil Gaiman… only in my own imagination.

‘To get published, I edited the old advice of “write every day” to “contribute to your writing career everyday”. Writing every day is just not realistic for someone like me, and probably you, we have normal lives, partners, kids, jobs, and other distractions but with a shift of some priorities and emphasising to people around you that writing time is important, then you should be able to get your head in the game at least a couple of times a week. I use the “Don’t break the chain” approach by contributing to my writing career every day and then making a note of it in an app

(Way of Life). A contribution can be anything from writing a paragraph to completing a chapter, researching something, writing a blog post, making some submissions, contacting some book bloggers, to writing an article for Writing Magazine (today is ticked!).

‘Good writing requires good thinking, but sitting around thinking can be a procrastinator’s black hole (see also research), so I only include good thinking when I’ve also written down those thoughts in my notebook.

‘I set broad goals like; complete a first draft this year, finish a draft by the summer, get published before I die. No-one needs to be getting down on themselves for not writing 4,000 words a day. I mentally say to myself, sit down and write one sentence. That’s all. 99% of the time you’ll write more. The 1% of the time you don’t, you still achieved your goal.

‘I would also thoroughly recommend writing in a new discipline. For example, I’ve also written two feature film scripts and a TV sitcom pilot. Screenwriting has really solidified the importance of planning and structure, and allows me to focus more on dialogue, which I love. I think trying other disciplines of writing makes me a more wellrounded writer.’

How We Got to Today

is published by Headline Accent