25/03/2019
Q&A with Ellie Dean
On a Turning Tide is Ellie Dean’s sixteenth novel in the Cliffehaven series. She lives in a tiny hamlet in the heart of the South Downs in Sussex which has been her home for many years and where she raised her three children.
The Waiting Hours came out in large print in March and On a Turning Tide was published in audio in the same month and comes out in large print in November. With Hope and Love will come out in audio in September.
1. Can you tell us how your writing journey began? Did you always dream of becoming a novelist?
My writing journey started when I was still very young. Taught to read and write and create my own stories by two formidable English Great Aunts, it was always something I found natural to do. I have loved reading all my life, for as an only child, it took me to different worlds and exciting adventures, the characters becoming companions. I never really thought about writing my own stories except for my school English lessons, and it wasn’t until I was about twelve that I was inspired by Leon Uris’ Exodus, and decided that one day I would write such a book. Marriage, children, work and divorce put that dream on the back-burner until I hit my fortieth birthday. With the children having flown the nest, my husband leaving and the bailiffs banging on my front door – his debts, not mine – I sat down and began to write, shutting out the real world and diving into one I could manipulate and weave into something far more pleasant. That book has never been published – it was truly awful – but I joined a writer’s group and learned over the next five books how to write well enough for a publisher to take it. My sixth and seventh books, ‘Reap the Whirlwind’ and Queen’s Flight were psychological thrillers, published by Hodder & Stoughton under the name of Tamara Lee. I have since had thirteen historical, multi-generational sagas set mainly in Australia published under the name of Tamara McKinley, and sixteen war-time sagas published under the name of Ellie Dean. The dream I had all those years ago has been realised!
2. What for you is the best thing about being a writer?
The very best thing about being a writer is that you don’t have to join the commute every morning, but stay at home in front of your computer in your dressing-gown and watch the rain come down outside.
3. You were born in Australia, can you tell us about your life there and how you came to live in England?
I was born in Launceston, Tasmania, and left in the nursing home for some weeks by my unmarried mother until my grandmother decided she would raise me with the help of her sisters. It was an uneasy atmosphere in that little wooden house close to the sea, for my mother lived with us, and she really didn’t want me around so I spent a lot of time on the nearby Bluff Beach. The little house had paddocks behind and to one side of it, and there were always horses in the stables, at least two dogs and lots of chickens. At one point we had a couple of sheep to get the grass down, and a goat we called Billy who took great delight in waiting until we were close enough to lift his leg and wee on us. My Great Aunts duly arrived and took over my education before I went to school – both had done service during the Second World War, one as a marine engineer, the other as part of Barnes Wallis’ team which developed the bouncing bomb – I had a lot to live up to. Once my mother married, we moved out of that house into another, my grandmother formally adopted me, and four years later she decided to go back home to England – she’d come out before the war and hadn’t expected to stay so long, but me turning up ruined her plans!
4. Where did you get the inspiration for the Cliffehaven series? How long do you think the series will run for – do you ever worry that you will run out of ideas?
Although I’d been writing very successful historical sagas for some time, I wanted a change of focus. When my agent was approached by Arrow with the idea for a saga series set on the South coast of England in a boarding house during the war, I leapt at the chance, and after reading many books of that genre and having lots of discussions with the editor, I finally sat down and wrote ‘There’ll be Blue Skies,’ the first of what I thought would be five books – one for each year of the war. I hadn’t realised how popular they would become, and that five turned into sixteen, and I’m now writing number seventeen, ‘With Hope and Love.’ The series must draw to an end, although I’ve yet to run out of ideas and have come to love the characters so much they feel as if they are family – especially Peggy Reilly who is the mother I wish I’d had. ‘Homecoming’ will be the eighteenth and final chapter in the series, and is due to be published in January, 2020.
5. One of our typesetters would like to know if Phillip is still alive, but we’ll understand if you don’t want to give that away just yet!
There has been much speculation over Sarah and Jane’s father, Jock, and Sarah’s fiancé, Phillip who were captured shortly after the fall of Singapore. Have they survived? Will Sarah fulfil her misplaced duty to Phillip and marry him after rejecting the love of her life, the American Delaney? Has their father Jock come through despite his age? And will there be a happy ending for all of them. I’m sorry, but you’ll have to wait until ‘Homecoming’ is published to find out.
6. Ellie Dean is a pen name. Are you writing any other books under your real name Tamara McKinley?
I write very long books, and as I’m contracted to do two a year for the Ellie Dean Cliffehaven series, there has been very little time to do much else. I did push myself to write ‘Echoes from Afar’ and ‘Spindrift,’ both published by Quercus under the name of Tamara McKinley, but it proved too much, and I’ve had to let Tamara McKinley take a sabbatical.
7. What do you hope readers feel when they pick up one of your books?
I hope that when readers pick up one of my books they will be delighted to find a long, absorbing read that will not only teach them very gently about the historical setting, but introduce them to characters they will come to know and love and want to follow throughout the story. I have been told by my fans that they just love being in Peggy’s kitchen with Ron, Cordelia and Harvey, for it feels as if they’re coming home. That to me is the highest praise any author could want.
8. Do you have any tips for aspiring writers?
If you are serious about writing, and I haven’t met an author yet who isn’t, then you have to learn your trade thoroughly before you can expect to be taken up by a reputable publishing house. I know there are lots of writers out there who have self-published, but having to promote and sell your books at the same time as writing another one isn’t easy. I’m very glad that I have an agent and publisher who will do that for me, as well as pay me an advance against sales. My agent deals with contracts, foreign agents and publishers world-wide. The publisher promotes my books and gets them into supermarkets and bookshops – which is an extremely rare achievement for a self-published author. I would advise the new writer to decide firmly on what genre to write in, and look to see where it might fit in the bookshop shelving. Then try to get an agent. If it’s good enough it will be snapped up, and should a publisher want to take your book then you will be expected to write in that genre and have a clear idea of what the next book is about. In short, my advice is to read published books in the genre you’ve chosen. Join a writing group, take criticism on the chin and write, write, write, edit, edit, edit. Then, when you’re ready look for an agent and let him or her do all the hard work of selling and promoting. Be aware though, that being a published author is a full-time job which demands hard work, sacrifice, and some heartache thrown in with a pinch of great elation and excitement. During my career, I’ve had books rejected, and been turned down by publishers, but amid it all I’ve hit the best-selling list and been translated into eighteen languages, with hardback, paperback, audio and large print for every book. So whatever happens, keep that dream alive and don’t give in!
Interview by Nicky Solloway
