TAKING THE GOOD WITH THE BAD, THE PRAISE WITH THE CRITICISM.

All consumed with the excitement of having my first novel published, it hadn’t really dawned on me until I had it physically in the palms of my hands the fact that there are two sets of audiences that will read it: those people I know, the ones who will be the first to grab a copy and loyally support my efforts - family, friends, colleagues and associates; and those I’ll never meet - the wider and hopefully way larger public audience. For the sake of this blog, it’s the first group I’m focussing on because they’ve already parted with their hard-earned and demonstrated support and interest by purchasing copies. Right now The Acquisition is in transit to their bookstores and mailboxes, or in the process of being read; some have finished reading it and still others on finishing it have even kindly posted some quite humbling reviews. Wow thanks, but…. gee, how are they all going to react to it? I know all of them! Many I love, most I like, all I respect and my novel is, quite unapologetically, peppered with a number of expletives and the odd lewd act! It is, however, my responsibility as the author to consider and determine the use of strong language and the horrible conduct of some of my more unsavoury fictional characters and as long as its use is not gratuitous, then I feel it is imperative to be true to their inherent nature, rather than appear mealy-mouthed for fear of offending some of my readers. Put simply, if the character is a vile and disgusting person then it is wholly consistent that their language and their actions match their persona. It would not do justice to the authenticity of the character that they be portrayed in a more sanitised way. I guess the great acid test since time immemorial is ‘what would your mother think?’ so I would be lying if I were not to admit to feeling a slight sense of apprehension handing over a copy of my newly published book to my 80-year old mother who, like my father - God rest his soul, and to whom I dedicated The Acquisition to - is an avid, lifelong reader. I did forewarn her that the book contained some rather coarse language to which she replied “I’m an 80-year old woman for goodness sake, there’s nothing I haven’t read, seen or heard that’s going to shock me now!” I am under no illusion that my novel will be everybody’s cup of tea. It would be naïve to assume it won’t attract some criticism from people I know, but that comes with the territory. You put it out there, you’ve got to be prepared to take the good with the bad, the praise with the criticism. Oh, and the verdict of my dear old mum ……. an emphatic thumbs-up – well admittedly she is biased of course and you’d hardly expect anything else from your mum, would you?

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