Tag Archives: Chris Penhall

#WritingWednesday with Chris Penhall: Writing Characters.

Guest Post, Writing Wednesday, , , , , , ,

My #WritingWednesday guest this week is fellow Ruby Fiction author Chris Penhall, talking about the benefit of writing characters as if they are in a film.

Over to you, Chris …

One of the best tips I ever had was to think about your characters and scenes as if they were in a film.  It may seem obvious, but it was a game-changer for me. I’d written my first novel, The House That Alice Built, and had some good feedback for it, but it wasn’t quite there, so I invested in a mentor who helped me get it to the finish line (i.e., it won the Choc-Lit Search for a Star Competition and was actually published).

And that was one of the things she told me to do.

I honestly think I thought that’s what I was doing. But once I really started closing my eyes and began to think about what my characters actually were doing when they were talking or where they were sitting when they were thinking, what they could hear, see and even smell,  I realised I’d been paying lip-service to it as I typed away.  (I do love the sound of a tap tap on the keyboard, especially if it’s fast, so can get carried away with volume rather than quality…)

I love watching films as much as I love reading books, so once I began to really picture each scene in my head, I enjoyed the process of writing even more.

What could Alice Matthews see when she was driven along The Avenida on the Lisbon coast in Ignacio’s yellow Rolls Royce for the very first time? As a heads up, the section of the film The Yellow Rolls Royce starring Shirley MacLaine and Alain Delon on the Italian Riviera is one of my favourite pieces of cinema – oh, the romance, the colours, the feel of it …. Alice had come from a rather grey London, and what she saw from the window of that car was full of colour and vibrancy. What was it like sitting in Ignacio’s yellow Rolls Royce at the beginning of the sequel New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun? Another spoiler alert – there were many balloons. Why were they there?  That was easy – but also, what did they look like, what did they do, what did the car look like as it drove away?

It’s very easy to slip into writing banter when characters are having a conversation, and I have to discipline myself to slow down and think about what people do when they are talking to each other – smile, take a sip of a drink, glance out of a window – and, although I may not use all of that on the actual page, the fact I’m thinking of it as a film or television scene allows me to see it in 3D and somehow helps bring the characters to life in my mind.

Now I’m working on my sixth novel, I have already closed my eyes and plonked my main characters in the area where most of the action is set. I can see them walking around, exploring their new surroundings, having conversations and gazing out to sea (my characters always gaze somewhere…) I am seeing them in 3D, and that is what helps me to write. Even though I haven’t put any words on paper yet – my hands are poised above the keyboard so I can start next week – I am ready to move them around and start them on their new adventure.

Also – I’d love my novels to be made into films. Any producers out there? Just thought I’d ask…

Definitely worth an ask 😉 Thank you for sharing another great writing tip, Chris. xx

Books by Chris Penhall:

The House That Alice Built

Home is where the heart is … Alice Dorothy Matthews is sensible. Whilst her best friend Kathy is living it up in Portugal and her insufferable ex Adam is travelling the world, Alice is working hard to pay for the beloved London house she has put her heart and soul into renovating. But then a postcard from Buenos Aires turns Alice’s life upside down. One very unsensible decision later and she is in Cascais, Portugal, and so begins her lesson in ‘going with the flow’; a lesson that sees her cat-sitting, paddle boarding, dancing on top of bars and rediscovering her artistic talents. But perhaps the most important part of the lesson for Alice is that you don’t always need a house to be at home.

Discover more or purchase here.

New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun

Follow your yellow brick road …. Alice Dorothy Matthews is on the road to paradise! She’s sold her house in London, got rid of her nasty ex and arranged her move to Portugal where friendship and romance awaits. All that’s left to do is find a place to call home. But Alice’s dreams are called into question when complications with friends, work and new relationships make her Portuguese paradise feel far too much like reality. Will Alice’s dream of a new home in the sun come true?

Discover more or purchase here.

Finding Summer Happiness

You won’t find happiness without breaking a few eggs …Miriam Ryan was the MD of a successful events and catering company, but these days even the thought of chopping an onion sends her stress levels sky rocketing. A retreat to the Welsh village of her childhood holidays seems to offer the escape she’s craving – just peace, quiet, no people, a generous supply of ready meals … did she mention no people? Enter a cheery pub landlord, a lovesick letting agent, a grumpy astronomer with a fridge raiding habit – not to mention a surprise supper club that requires the chopping of many onions – and Miriam realises her escape has turned into exactly what she was trying to get away from, but could that be just the thing she needs to allow a little bit of summer happiness into her life?

Discover more or purchase here.

The House on the Hill – A Summer in the Algarve

Layla is calm, in control and is definitely not about to lose her serenity for the man next door!
Surely it can’t be hard to stay peaceful at one of the oldest yoga and mindfulness retreats in the Algarve, surrounded by sea, sun and serenity? Mostly, owner Layla Garcia manages it – with the help of meditation and plenty of camomile tea, of coursekeeping her grandparents’ legacy alive is stressful, and Layla has become so shackled to the work that, for her, The House on the Hill is fast becoming ‘The Fortress on the Hill’.
Then writer Luke Mackie moves to the villa next door, bringing with him a healthy dose of chaos to disrupt Layla’s plans, plus a painful reminder of a time when she was less-than-serene. But could his influence be just what Layla needs to ‘dance like no-one’s watching’ and have the fun she’s been missing?

Discover more or purchase here.

About the author:

Chris Penhall won the 2019 Choc-Lit Search for a Star competition, sponsored by Your Cat Magazine, for her debut novel, The House That Alice Built. The sequel, New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun was published in August 2020. They are both part of her Portuguese Paradise series of novels.

Her third novel, Finding Summer Happiness, is set in Pembrokeshire in South-West Wales and her fourth – The House on the Hill – A Summer in the Algarve, is another in her Portuguese Paradise series.

All are available in e-book, audio and paperback.

Chris is a writer and freelance radio producer for BBC Local Radio. She also has her own occasional podcast – The Talking to My Friends About Book Podcast in which she chats to her friends about books. Good title!

A lover of books, music and cats, she is also an enthusiastic salsa dancer, a keen cook, and loves to travel. She is never happier than when she is gazing at the sea.

You can find out more about Chris and her work here: Website | Twitter | Instagram | Facebook 

#WritingWednesday with Chris Penhall: A Sense of Place.

Guest Post, Writing Wednesday, , , , , , , ,

This #WritingWednesday, fellow Ruby Fiction author, Chris Penhall, shares her brilliant tips for writing a sense of place.

I read all types of fiction, from romance to crime to historical and everything in between. When I write, however, what comes out of my imagination are contemporary romances set in beautiful places.

Once I started writing my first novel, The House That Alice Built, I knew the physical setting was very important because of the way it affected the main character. That’s why I decided to place her firmly in Cascais near Lisbon because I know that part of Portugal very well as I used to live there, and now I spend a lot of time in the Algarve in the south of the country. If I want to meditate and take myself off to a beach in my mind’s eye to help me do it, it’ll be a Portuguese beach. If I pop into town and smell a barbecue, I’ll be in the square in Cascais in an instant. It feels so real to me that once I started Alice’s quite literal journey, I found it surprisingly easy to take her there.

The sequel, New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun is located in the same place, but she visits Lisbon more often and also south of the river Tejo. I went on a long weekend break to the city just after I started writing the book and the colours and sounds (and food!) were all very vivid to me when I got home and got to work on it again.

My latest novel Finding Summer Happiness, is based in south west Wales. This time it’s not set in a specific place; I have created an imaginary village by the sea inspired by many visits to Pembrokeshire over the years – most recently when I spent some days walking parts of the glorious coastal path with friends. I was born in Neath in West Glamorgan, so the coast of that part of Wales is somewhere I’ve been lucky enough to enjoy since I was born. My memories of childhood days on the beach can be conjured up in an instant for me because I do the coast!

So, now I’ve written three novels with a real sense of place, I’ve finally worked out how and why I do it.

In all three stories the places my main characters find themselves in are part of the catalyst that makes them want to change, and so in a way the locations are characters in the novels. That is why I feel it’s important to describe them in the way I do.

I write about the locations when I feel it’s crucial to the story. In my first two novels my main character, Alice, is rediscovering her artistic talents and is inspired by what is around her. That’s why the colours and the landscape are so clear to her and help her to find a new way to express herself, which in turn, enables her to move on.

Miriam, the main character in Finding Summer Happiness is looking for her childhood past in a little village on the coast in south west Wales, and her walks along the beaches and the cliffs on the coastal path help her to do that. She is also trying to get some peace away from other people and her busy mind, and there are parts of the path that are very quiet and so provide a contrast to the hubbub she left behind in London.

So, the lessons I have learned whilst writing these three books and my two short stories are:

I love films, and when I’m working on scenes I picture them as if I am watching the characters physically move around in them. I put myself in their shoes in my mind and think about what they are seeing and hearing, whether anyone else is around, even what they can smell – food and flowers and the sea are ever present in my books!

I use things I’ve seen and heard which I have somehow filed away in my memory without realising it. For instance, in The House That Alice Built there is a section in which Alice and Luis watch a ship sail out to sea in the darkness, illuminated by its own lights and the stars above it, so it seemed to be floating in the air. I remember looking out of the aircraft window flying into Lanzarote many years ago, and seeing the lights of a liner down below, near to the island. Our hotel was very close to the airport and when we walked in, the reception opened up to the sea, and I saw the same huge ship almost floating past in the darkness. It was absolutely beautiful and felt incredibly magical and that’s what I describe in the novel as it reflected what the two main characters were feeling having got together for the first time.

When I’m writing the story, although I have it loosely planned ahead, sometimes where the characters physically travel through to affects the action and changes the flow of it. So, when it feels appropriate, that’s what I write.  However, I can also get stuck in a dead end too, so I’ll jump ahead to a particularly vivid scene – which I love writing and therefore motivates me to carry on – and go back and bridge the gap another time.

So, in conclusion, I feel that when writing descriptions of where a novel is located, it’s important to think about whether it’s crucial to the action and to move a story on, or if it’s to scene set. Is it a reflection of how the characters are feeling, and is it affecting them? And also how you do it depends on whether you are writing in the first or third person, and whether the novel is from one character’s viewpoint, or more.

And most of all, once you’ve decided how to write it, just enjoy it!

I loved those great tips, Chris, thank you for sharing. xx

About Chris Penhall’s latest release, Finding Summer Happiness:

You won’t find happiness without breaking a few eggs …

Miriam Ryan was the MD of a successful events and catering company, but these days even the thought of chopping an onion sends her stress levels sky rocketing. A retreat to the Welsh village of her childhood holidays seems to offer the escape she’s craving – just peace, quiet, no people, a generous supply of ready meals … did she mention no people?
Enter a cheery pub landlord, a lovesick letting agent, a grumpy astronomer with a fridge raiding habit – not to mention a surprise supper club that requires the chopping of many onions – and Miriam realises her escape has turned into exactly what she was trying to get away from, but could that be just the thing she needs to allow a little bit of summer happiness into her life?

Publisher: Ruby Fiction
Genre: Contemporary romance.
Purchase here.

About the author:

Chris Penhall won the 2019 Choc-Lit Search for a Star competition, sponsored by Your Cat Magazine, for her debut novel, The House That Alice Built. The sequel, New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun is published on 25th August 2020.

Chris is an author and freelance radio producer for BBC Local Radio.

Born in Neath in South Wales, she has also lived in London and in Portugal, which is where her two novels are set. It was whilst living in Cascais near Lisbon that she began to dabble in writing fiction, but it was many years later that she was confident enough to start writing her first novel, and many years after that she finally finished it!

A lover of books, music and cats, she is also an enthusiastic salsa dancer, a keen cook, and loves to travel. She is never happier than when she is gazing at the sea.

You can find out more about Chris and her work here: Website | Twitter | Instagram | Facebook 

Feel Good Friday with Chris Penhall.

Author Interview, Guest Post, , , , , , , , , , , ,

Rounding off my Feel Good Friday posts, I am delighted to welcome Chris Penhall, as she shares an extract from her new novel New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun.

Hello Christine, thank you so much for stopping by.

Thanks for allowing me to be part of your blog.

You’re very welcome, anytime. In light of the year we’ve all been experiencing, I am asking each of my guests to share a top tip to promote wellbeing.

Events in 2020 have certainly proved that looking after ourselves and taking care of our general wellbeing is hugely important when things around us seem overwhelming and out of our control.

My top tip to promote wellbeing is to do something that takes your mind away from the day to day routine. I am an enthusiastic salsa dancer and have recently taken up tap – when the music is playing, all I can think about is the melody and the beat, and the rest of the world disappears for a while. But it could be anything like that  – cooking, swimming, yoga, an uplifting film, or a long walk by the sea.  I do them all!

That’s great advice, and I love that you are doing salsa and tap! I know some exciting things have happened for you this year too, with the release of your latest novel. Please tell us a little about it.

New Beginnings in the Little House in the Sun is the sequel to my debut novel, The House That Alice Built. Set in Cascais near Lisbon in Portugal, it follows Alice after she has finally dealt with the issues she had with her bullying ex and her beloved house in London.  She heads back to Portugal full of plans for the future, but a few surprises along the way put her relationship, work, and the dream of owning a house in the sun into question. So, what does Alice do next?

I loved The House that Alice Built, it really transported me to Portugal at a time when I was in much need of a holiday, so I am looking forward to New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun. And I am delighted to say, you are sharing an extract:

This is the day after Alice arrives in Portugal having left London for good, excited to view a new house.

As Alice walked out into the morning sun the following day, she rummaged in her bag and made sure she still had the house details. The trees dappled patterns on the grass and swayed gently in the spring breeze. Everything smelt fresh and floral and alive. Her mind fizzed with excitement as she hurried through the back streets of the old town to the square. The birds sang happily, and the white, purple and pink of the spring flowers burst from verges and window boxes.

She heard the clink of china from a kitchen window as cups and plates were moved, a family chattering noisily over breakfast, and then she skirted around a workman painting a wall a bright, luscious yellow. As she walked closer to town, the cobbled streets widened slightly and she could see more people moving around, beginning their day. She loved Cascais first thing in the morning, when the cafés were just setting up and the shops were about to open.

Oh my goodness, you have such a wonderful way of depicting a sense of place. I love it. And for readers wanting to join Alice in her escape to Portugal, here are those all important purchase links:  The House that Alice Built | New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun

So where will you be taking us next? What are you currently working on?

I’m working on my third novel now, which is set in the UK this time. It’s about Miriam, a successful businesswoman who rents a house by the sea for a 6 month break away from everything. However, due to an administrative error, she finds that the solitude she is looking for is in short supply.

That sounds fun. Finally, before you go, I like to ask all of my guests five quick fire questions for fun:
Mountains or beach – Beach
Cinema or Netflix – Cinema
Trainers or heels – I wish I could say heels, but if I’m being honest, it’s trainers!
Favourite season – summer
Who would you give your last rolo to? – Keanu Reeves, of course. (Very good choice!)

Huge thanks for rounding off my Feel Good Friday posts with such a wonderful extract, Christine. And a very big thank you to all of the authors who have stopped by over the summer to share  their top tip for wellbeing and an extract from their novel. I really appreciate it! xx

About the author:

Chris Penhall won the 2019 Choc-Lit Search for a Star competition, sponsored by Your Cat Magazine, for her debut novel, The House That Alice Built. The sequel, New Beginnings at the Little House in the Sun is published on 25th August 2020.

Chris is an author and freelance radio producer for BBC Local Radio.

Born in Neath in South Wales, she has also lived in London and in Portugal, which is where her two novels are set. It was whilst living in Cascais near Lisbon that she began to dabble in writing fiction, but it was many years later that she was confident enough to start writing her first novel, and many years after that she finally finished it!

A lover of books, music and cats, she is also an enthusiastic salsa dancer, a keen cook, and loves to travel. She is never happier than when she is gazing at the sea.

You can find out more about Chris and her work here: Website | Twitter | Instagram | Facebook