Grammar Hell + Air Brother by Freya Pickard

What are your feelings, not merely thoughts, on the importance of good grammar, punctuation, and spelling? As I continue querying literary agents (about my books here) this week, I lost a bout with the whole slew of them.

Has the informal haste of texting turned all care about tidy syntax and the like into a fetish? How about the decline of longhand writing? Do most people even apply pens to paper any longer? No doubt, I’m backwards for shuddering at a recent funeral when a mourner performed an entire eulogy while squinting and thumbing through their smartphone to read it aloud.

Alas, the good and the bad of experience is that valuable wisdom gained  can muck up embracing what’s new. Not that I remember when I gasped my first breath in the light of day, but I think I’m safe to guess I was already cranky. How couldn’t my equilibrium be thrown off from having no say in letting go of the old experience, let alone choosing what was ahead?

If only, for every step of the way, I could be in command of what I discard, set aside for later, keep, or pick up.

Dang, I’m just making excuses for myself. A few days ago, I caught some major flubs in the latest version of my query letter. Ouch doesn’t cover it! At least I’d only been using that sloppy mess for two weeks. Urgh! Two weeks of researching and reaching out to agents who I can’t pitch the same book to again. The best I can hope for is that they don’t remember the mess when I pitch them about the second novel in my trilogy… Oh, the shame of a writer who’s got writing errors glaring amid their plea to be embraced by a God(dess) agent…

Today’s guest, Freya Pickard is the author of The Kaerling series and Vampirical Verse. A cancer survivor, her poetry and prose dwells on embracing darkness and facing death head on.

Her latest book, Air Brother, is part of her The Kaerling series, a grimdark fantasy quest set in another world. Each book in The Kaerling series is designed to be read by itself as well as part of the chronological sequence. Air Brother, she explains, “takes four companions (Otta, Erl, Lored and Tari) to the shores of Jargoiden where they hope to catch up with the evil Kaerlings, who have abducted their friends, Derri and Lally. (The Kaerlings are a supremacist race who believe they are gods and have the right to decide who lives and who dies and who serves them in their impregnable mountain home. They only care for their own lives and the preservation of their race at all costs. The believe other races are sub-human and treat them accordingly. Those who defy them find their lives cut short. The Kaerling series slowly reveals their weaknesses and hypocrisy.) But, as the companions discover, catching up with the Kaerlings is not as simple as they hoped. Not only do the inhabitants of Jargoiden hinder their progress, the very land and the weather itself appear set against them.

Of her writing, she says, “I find a lot of writers actually do think of their characters as characters, rather than people, and force them to do/say/think things that are forced. The characters in The Kaerling series, to me are real people. I set them on a path and it’s up to them which direction they take!”

About how she publishes: “I started self-publishing in 2016. It’s not an easy process as I have a very limited budget. I basically do all my own editing and proof-reading as well as asking my handful of beta readers to check for plot inconsistencies. I have a friend who does all the book cover design for free (in exchange I promote his blog and work via my social media channels). I am at heart a writer and that is the part of publishing that I enjoy most. I am not a natural formatter or cover designer or marketer. But I manage and have slowly built up a network of like-minded authors who all share each other’s work and read each other’s books and leave honest reviews for each other too. The things you have to have, if you’re a self-publisher, are excellent time management skills and to be exceeding organised.”

Check out her blog for more about her and her writing. Here she discusses her process and offers us a sample…

Excerpt from Air Brother by Freya Pickard:

Descending from the pass the path took them down to another grassy vale. Cloud swirled, mist occluding the way. The oxen slowed their pace and stopped as Lored and the lead guard pressed ahead. Draping curtains of rain fell darkly as the sun sank towards the western horizon. Tari shivered, hunching into her cloak.

A faint cry ahead of them was the only warning the priestess heard. Then a tattoo of hooves behind them announced Otta’s arrival. The oxen snorted as the girl pulled her gelding to a halt and turned him around beside Tari’s mare.

“We’re under attack!” Otta’s reins were tied to the high, curving pommel of her saddle and she held a hooked knife in each hand. “Lored says we should retrace our steps.”

Erl forced the mare’s head round and the horses broke into a startled trot following Otta’s gelding. Around them, the wagon drivers slipped from their seats and disappeared into the veiling mist. The guards had drawn their curved swords, looking around for leadership.

“What about them?” Erl asked, from behind Tari.

Otta shrugged and turned briefly to look at the guards with cold, pale eyes. “Lored wants me to get you to safety. He’ll take care of them, if they turn against him.”

Tari shivered violently. She couldn’t imagine Lored killing anyone. But, she realised, she didn’t know if he or Erl had killed anyone aboard The Prince Silas when they’d been attacked by pirates. She assumed Otta had killed some of the boarders; the woman had made no secret of her previous kills when they’d journeyed to Port Hollis. The cold weight in Tari’s belly sent tendrils of fear throughout her body, weakening her knees.

Do you cringe over your writing errors? Feel free to point out mine within this post…

https://open.spotify.com/episode/1bKmdGi98yHTSe70pLcbyf?si=0cf963dc6d5546a7

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