Little Miracles
Giselle Green came to the attention of book lovers with the release of her novel Pandora's Box, she had published an Astrology book before moving into fiction, but now she is back with her new book Little Miracles.
I caught up with her to talk about her new book, juggling writing with raising six boys and what lies ahead.
Your new book is called Little Miracles so can you tell me a little bit about it?
Well it’s about what happens to a young couple when their young child goes missing and how they cope with that.
The story could be compared to the Madeline McCann story was that influential at all?
There could be comparisons yes but I had thought of the story months before that tragedy had occurred; I was well into writing it when it hit the news.
In fact I rang up my editor at Harper Collins and asked should I maybe not right this book because the topic was all so live and public but I was urged to go ahead and do it anyway.
Our feeling was I had put the synopsis through in February 2007, so that was way ahead of anything ever happening, and I was well into writing it and the fact is that children, very sadly, go missing every day of the year in every place in the world and their parents are effected by that too, it could effect anyone of use.
And how much research did you do into the subject, as you say children go missing all the time?
I actually didn’t want to do too much research into it because I wanted to get into the emotional space of my couple and write it from their emotional space, I didn’t want to be influenced by what was happening to anyone else and how they were coping with it because I had my characters and I wanted to see where they were going to go with it, so very little indeed actually.
And both this novel and your previous book Pandora’s Box deal with the theme of losing a child, albeit in very different circumstances, what is it about this subject that interests you?
It does doesn’t it? I had noticed that (laughs). They are sad aren’t they? I think it’s to do with grieving something that you think you had and then you don’t have it anymore and I suppose a space inside of me that feels that way; I have had to deal with that in my life because two of my children are autistic.
You have expectations when you have those children and while you haven’t lost a child you have lost your expectations for that child and that can be quite sad.
How did you get into writing in the first place?
Well I have always, always written, it was just my thing, and I always said that that was what I was going to do since about the age of nine I think.
I suppose any hobby is something that absorbs your interest and your imagination we didn’t have computers and maybe television programmes weren’t that fascinating and I just loved getting into the world of the characters and exploring where things would takes them I just really enjoyed it, always have and I still do.
I think what I’m writing about now is more painful in a way it’s more difficult but what I want to do is take them through into a better place, but them in a dark place and put them through the ringer and then let them find some hope to let them find something good at the end of it really.
You took a degree in Biology so what drew you back to writing?
I never stopped writing, even when I was doing the biology and the information science, I was writing all the way through that and it was something that I was able to return to when the children were younger and I had time at home to do it, but it was always something that was fitted in around the edges when you have children.
Well that sort of leads me into my next question really as a mother of six boys it’s a miracle that you get anything done at all so how do you manage to juggle the two?
Initially, for many years, it was filled in between the gaps and spaces of time when I got a moment her and a moment there but I never ever stopped writing.
But now that I have a contract and I’m writing professionally as it were I’m allowed a bit more space, I have just been away for a week with some writer friends to do some writing, but my husband incredibly supportive but even when I didn’t have a contract I was still allowed to go off and do some writing. I think writing is essential to keep me sane and to keep me calm.
How difficult do you find going away and leaving your family?
I felt really sad actually leaving them this half time, but they are getting older now the youngest two are twelve. But the first time that I went away my fourth child was only a few months, in a way it was an essential part of being able to cope with lots of little children when you get back because if that’s all you don and you never have any time and space to gather yourself and your thoughts how can you be good at what you do?
It’s essential to have that me time to gather back yourself again.
Getting a book deal and be quite a long process with a string of manuscripts being knocked back so how did it all work out for you?
I must have sent of four or five manuscripts before Pandora’s Box got published or accepted. But when Pandora got accepted it all happened ever so quickly; it went to the publisher and came back within a couple of weeks saying yes lets meet.
I expected that it would take months and months and lots and lots of time having had that expectation built up over the years but it did go very quickly.
How does the ideas and writing process work for you?
I like to latch onto an emotional theme with these three books, I have a three book contract, the first was about hope so I thought it would be really fun if the second one was a bout faith and the third about charity.
The idea for the second one actually came through in a writing healing session, I actually got that story to come through, I knew it was going it was going to be about faith but the actual story about a child going cam through in a healing session.
It was almost as if I was watching a movie in a semi-meditative state and I could see the parents realising that there child wasn’t there anymore and I sensed the grief which was the main thrust of writing that story.
And I have read that you have had some film interest for Pandora’s Box can you tell me anything about that?
Ah well it’s all very much in the early stages, I know a producer was reading the book, and that’s as far as it has got so far and I can’t say anymore than that really.
You have also written a book about Astrology so where does you interest in that come from?
That’s right yes it was the first book that I wrote. That’s another thing, like the writing, that I have been interested in since I was really little and I did study it and I have got my qualifications in it, which was something I did when the children were very tiny.
I have always said that Astrology and writing are very similar because they are both about people and what happens to those people so it’s almost as if I’m using the same part of my brain when I’m either doing Astrology or writing.
Finally what’s next for you?
Well the next book is about charity, and that is the one that I’m writing about at the moment, and it is based around the theme of… or maybe I shouldn’t say it (laughs). But it will be based on charity and I’m about half way through it and that’s where I am at the moment.
Little Miracles is out now
FemaleFirst Helen Earnshaw
Giselle Green came to the attention of book lovers with the release of her novel Pandora's Box, she had published an Astrology book before moving into fiction, but now she is back with her new book Little Miracles.
I caught up with her to talk about her new book, juggling writing with raising six boys and what lies ahead.
Your new book is called Little Miracles so can you tell me a little bit about it?
Well it’s about what happens to a young couple when their young child goes missing and how they cope with that.
The story could be compared to the Madeline McCann story was that influential at all?
There could be comparisons yes but I had thought of the story months before that tragedy had occurred; I was well into writing it when it hit the news.
In fact I rang up my editor at Harper Collins and asked should I maybe not right this book because the topic was all so live and public but I was urged to go ahead and do it anyway.
Our feeling was I had put the synopsis through in February 2007, so that was way ahead of anything ever happening, and I was well into writing it and the fact is that children, very sadly, go missing every day of the year in every place in the world and their parents are effected by that too, it could effect anyone of use.
And how much research did you do into the subject, as you say children go missing all the time?
I actually didn’t want to do too much research into it because I wanted to get into the emotional space of my couple and write it from their emotional space, I didn’t want to be influenced by what was happening to anyone else and how they were coping with it because I had my characters and I wanted to see where they were going to go with it, so very little indeed actually.
And both this novel and your previous book Pandora’s Box deal with the theme of losing a child, albeit in very different circumstances, what is it about this subject that interests you?
It does doesn’t it? I had noticed that (laughs). They are sad aren’t they? I think it’s to do with grieving something that you think you had and then you don’t have it anymore and I suppose a space inside of me that feels that way; I have had to deal with that in my life because two of my children are autistic.
You have expectations when you have those children and while you haven’t lost a child you have lost your expectations for that child and that can be quite sad.
How did you get into writing in the first place?
Well I have always, always written, it was just my thing, and I always said that that was what I was going to do since about the age of nine I think.
I suppose any hobby is something that absorbs your interest and your imagination we didn’t have computers and maybe television programmes weren’t that fascinating and I just loved getting into the world of the characters and exploring where things would takes them I just really enjoyed it, always have and I still do.
I think what I’m writing about now is more painful in a way it’s more difficult but what I want to do is take them through into a better place, but them in a dark place and put them through the ringer and then let them find some hope to let them find something good at the end of it really.
You took a degree in Biology so what drew you back to writing?
I never stopped writing, even when I was doing the biology and the information science, I was writing all the way through that and it was something that I was able to return to when the children were younger and I had time at home to do it, but it was always something that was fitted in around the edges when you have children.
Well that sort of leads me into my next question really as a mother of six boys it’s a miracle that you get anything done at all so how do you manage to juggle the two?
Initially, for many years, it was filled in between the gaps and spaces of time when I got a moment her and a moment there but I never ever stopped writing.