Helena Fairfax is the author of several romance novels and a non-fiction history of women’s lives in Halifax, West Yorkshire. She’s a member of the Society of Authors, the Chartered Institure of Editing and Proofreading and the Romantic Novelists’ Association.
Website: www.helenafairfax.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/helena.fairfax.9/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HelenaFairfax
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/helenafairfax/
Helena Fairfax, thank you very much for agreeing to be my fourth “In Conversation” guest interviewee. Welcome to Lorna’s Command Centre.
Thank you for inviting me.
Let’s begin at the beginning – Did you read a lot as a child?
I grew up in a large, noisy family. I started reading early and I loved books. I sometimes wonder now if reading stories gave me a way to carve out my own (peaceful) space.
What is your favourite childhood book? Do you still have a copy?
I was born in Uganda and came to England when I was six. It was a bewildering experience and I was homesick for everything we’d left behind in Africa. My mum always encouraged my reading. One day she bought me Miss Happiness and Miss Flower, by Rumer Godden. Nona, the little girl in the book, has come from India to England. She is miserable and unhappy, and feels none of the adults understand her. This was the first time I realised how books can speak to you directly, and I remember being massively struck. Rumer Godden paints a beautifully sympathetic picture of the misery children can sometimes feel. I read the book over and over again, and I still have my battered copy.
What are you reading now?
I’m reading Echolands: A Journey in Search of Boudica, by Duncan Mackay. The author travels England in Boudica’s footsteps. In some parts the landscape is practically unchanged, but I love how he also stands in the most mundane places – e.g. in the food hall on the ground floor of M&S on Fenchurch St, where 2,000 years ago there used to be a Roman food market. He brings the past to life as though it’s only just happened. It’s made me think much more about events that have happened in the places I walk.
Do you have a favourite author?
There are so many books I’ve loved. It’s just impossible to choose! Books I re-read often are Jane Austen’s novels, but I often think if I absolutely had to choose something to take to a desert island I’d choose the complete Tintin books, by Hergé. They’re so page-turning, and funny; the characters are brilliant, and there’s always something new to see in the artwork. He was such a great storyteller, at a time when people needed uplifting stories.
Can you tell us about how you became an editor? Was it something you aways wanted to do?
I’d never thought about becoming an editor until I started writing myself and had my own work edited. My first editor was brilliant and I learned a lot from her. I also learned a lot from the Romantic Novelists’ Association’s New Writers’ Scheme, after I submitted my first novel to them for feedback.
I began editing after collaborating with some American authors on an anthology, which I edited. I found I really loved helping writers make their story the best it could be. After this, through word of mouth, I began editing for more and more authors, and then I joined the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading and set up as an editor on a professional basis.
Is it difficult to edit a work you are not enjoying reading?
I mainly edit romantic fiction, as this is a genre I love. I find very little not to enjoy in a happy ending! I edit memoirs, too, which I also enjoy, as the writer in me is always interested in finding out about other people’s lives. (My husband would call this being nosy 😊 )
The times I struggle are when the author has written something that comes across as racist, or misogynistic, or homophobic, or else portrays a stalkerish relationship as romantic. I spend a long time trying to word my feedback in these cases.
Are you able to edit your own work or do you refer it to someone else for comment?
I always have my work edited by someone else. It’s really difficult to look at your own work with a dispassionate eye – for example, to note where the tension has dropped, or to see inconsistencies, or repetition. I find constructive feedback and suggestions really helpful and inspiring, even when they mean rewriting.
I view the relationship between an author and their editor as a professional one. Do you think it helps or hinders such a relationship to meet face to face?
It can be helpful for editors and authors to get to know one another in person, and even just online I feel I’ve got to know many of my authors as friends. The one thing I’d be concerned about is that if you become great friends, sometimes it can be harder to give an honest critique. Your mum and your friends will always tell you they loved your book! Whereas a professional editor is more able to give dispassionate feedback.
Do you find time to write every day?
For the past three years I’ve been extremely busy with editing. I really enjoy editing – I’ve been lucky to read some great manuscripts and to meet all sorts of people – but at one stage I did start to feel a little overwhelmed. This year I’m taking on less work and I’m looking forward to getting back into writing in earnest.
Are you most inspired at a certain time of day?
I feel compelled to ‘clear the decks’ before writing. I can’t start with emails or other tasks hanging over me. I used to get cross with myself for feeling like this, but then I heard Kate Mosse say exactly the same thing about her writing process, and that she can’t look at her manuscript until these tasks are done. That made me feel so much better!
Do you write chronologically – start at the beginning and work through to the end?
Yes, I nearly always write like this. It can lead to being blocked, though, if I’m not careful, and so sometimes I might skip a scene I’m finding difficult and come back to it.
What is the most challenging aspect of writing for you?
I love the ideas stage – the time I call ‘mulling’. The challenge is getting the ideas out of my head and onto the paper in a way I’m perfectly satisfied with. That never happens.
Can you describe the moment when the idea came for your first book, The Silk Romance?
Many years ago I worked as an au pair in Lyon, the city of silk. One day I was sitting on a crowded train on a commute to work in a Yorkshire mill, on a dark and rainy morning, thinking of the sun and heat in the south of France. I thought about Lyon, and imagined taking up a job in one of the silk mills. And so my heroine came into my mind. I began to scribble ideas down every day while on this packed train. It was a wonderful escape from my long commute.
Your non-fiction historical work, Struggle and Suffrage in Halifax: Women’s Lives and the Fight for Equality, one of the “Struggle and Suffrage” series is well researched. What role does research play in your romance writing? Is it something you enjoy?
You’ll know how you can be thrown out of a story if the scene isn’t realistic, or the characters do something that would just never happen. Whenever I’m writing a scene featuring something I haven’t experienced myself – for example, I’ve had a freshwater diver, and someone parachute out of a plane (something I’d never do with my fear of heights!) – I try and research as much as possible, so that readers stay immersed in a believable story.
At a book group talk recently I was asked about the themes in my writing and whether I had a message or messages I wanted to get across. How would you respond to such a question? Personally, I write the book then notice there may be a theme.
I write in a similar way. The story is the most important thing for me, and it’s only when I have the bones of it down that I see how a theme is coming out of it. I’ve noticed many of my stories feature a theme of loss, but my overriding theme is the strength of love, both in romantic relationships and between family and friends.
I have read several of your books. My favourite is Felicity at the Cross Hotel. Set in a quaint old hotel by a lake Felicity Everdene is looking forward to a quiet break from working in her father’s stressful business.
But then the hotel’s new owner, Patrick Cross, takes Felicity for the replacement barmaid, and things don’t turn out quite to plan. It’s a most engaging story of heartwarming romance.
Do you have a favourite amongst your own books?
My favourite to write has been In the Mouth of the Wolf. I wrote it as an homage to one of my favourite authors, Mary Stewart, who wrote romantic suspense, and I really loved building the setting and the mystery. It also has my favourite hero.
Do you think writers can improve their craft outside of writing by following other activities? For example, by travelling, taking courses?
My feeling is it’s the characters in a novel that generally leave the biggest impression on readers, rather than the plot. For me personally a really good writer has a natural empathy, understands a wide range of emotions and can relate to a wide variety of people. One thing writers can easily do is listen to other people tell their stories (my husband’s ‘nosiness’ again!) and also read, read, read other authors and study how they portray the characters in their books.
Is there anything else you would like to tell us about your author’s life? I know you like to walk with Lexi.
In very sad news, Lexi developed kidney failure a few weeks ago and we lost her recently. She’d been my writing, editing and walking companion for a long time, ever since we adopted her from the Dogs’ Trust twelve years ago. She was a brilliant dog. We gave her the very best life we could, and she had as happy a life as possible with us. RIP my dear dog!
She sounds like a faithful companion and you will miss very much.
Thank you, Helena.
From Lorna's Command Centre 