No,no,no...yes! by Cathy Ace

Give us your writer’s manifesto.

Easy: I don’t have one. (At least, I didn’t have one until I wrote this blog post! Be sure to read to the end…)

In 1999, with Mum and Dad, when I was made a 
Freeman of the City of London, 
in recognition of my services to marketing

Why? My pre-fiction-writing background is in management and marketing, where my life was full of helping clients craft their corporate mission statements, so I now absolutely avoid anything of the sort.

Again, why? I found that most mission statements were developed to appease various stakeholders and then became an albatross (which is possibly unfair to albatrosses)…so, no, not for me.

Thus, I’m going to answer this question instead: why do I write, and what do I hope to gain and give by it? (Which is exactly what a manifesto is, but if I don’t call it that it doesn’t count, right?)

The simple truth is that I love to tell stories: throughout the non-academic part of my pre-fiction-writing life I told stories that were crafted in such a way that they, essentially, helped non marketing managers to become marketing managers; then, during the academic portion of my life I told stories to university students to help them prepare for the world of marketing and communications when they left the comforting confines of academia; now I tell stories to entertain those who enjoy a bit of murder and mystery when they’re relaxing. And…because I love to tell stories – I write stories; no longer do I write textbooks for managers or students, now I write novels for “readers like me”.

Thus, I gain the satisfaction of being able to spin a yarn to entangle then release my readers, which is the best feeling in the world…so it’s both a get and a give for me, simultaneously, and I currently apply that to two series of books.

If I were advising myself, as a client, I would suggest this:

“Cathy Ace is an author who seeks to create relatable characters and spin yarns to entangle, entertain, and satisfy readers who enjoy a puzzling murder mystery that’s thought-provoking and has depth, but not too much grit.”

Rats! I ended up with a manifesto after all.

PS: if you fancy reading a book by the author with the abovementioned manifesto, check out her website for full details of all her books: https://www.cathyace.com/ 

COMING ON 24th JULY