Writing Greedily Yours By Emma Hamilton

Mia and Tom came to me as characters as I was cycling along the Rhein to work one day, although in my head she was initially called Hannah. It’s an hour long journey and it was a sunny summer morning. The water was glinting and the hills and fields alongside the Rhein were lush and green and everything was right with the world. I could smell summer and holidays even though I was on my way to work and as my legs were pumping away, my brain was whirring. I got so inspired by the idea of Mia that as soon as I could, I wrote down a synopsis of her as a person and her journey which turned into the eight episodes. I love alliteration and Mia was short, sweet, means Mine in Italian and reminded me of a positive friend of mine, Maya all at the same time. Maxwell, I thought because ultimately she’s a positive person who tries to be happy and get the most out of life.

Fast forward a few weeks and I guess I did manage to convince with that synopsis. We had a development meeting at Bastei Luebbe to talk more about the characters and where we should go with the books and things started to evolve from there. I would find myself lost in their world as I was writing the books, particularly when out jogging or cycling, I’d suddenly realise I’d slowed down as I was busy thinking about what the characters would do next. Weirdly, sometimes, what I’d planned for them didn’t happen because they took on a life of their own once they hit the page; I’d be writing, thinking, ‘right, they need to say this or do this’ and then suddenly other lines of dialogue would flow out of my fingers and on to the page and that would seem somehow right for them and I’d then have to rethink where that particular book was going.

The time frames slowed down too a bit from the planning stages to writing as I got so involved in each place or plot Mia was subject to that I didn’t feel I could jump ahead as fast as I had at first thought.

I made a series about food and culture around the world during my work as a journalist and broadcaster and I’ve lived in or reported from quite a few countries, including the places featured on Mia’s journey. So lots of my experiences and tastes of delicious dishes have found their way on to the page or influenced what happened to Mia along the way. The same goes for the characters. They are all works of fiction but lots of traits or words of dialogue might have been culled from people I have met along the way.

I grew up in London so it seemed natural to give Mia a similar biography and I holidayed every year in Cornwall as a child and still love going back there to visit. The first couple of episodes were written in Cornwall, staring out at the bobbing boats in the bay, or after long windy cliff walks, or a salty surfing session. Those two places provided the backdrop for Mia, Paul and Tom and I hope my love of those places comes through on the page; although I kept the geography vague and deliberately mixed up north and south Cornish landscapes to create a parallel Cornwall that doesn’t quite exist.

I spent six years reporting from Italy and travelled all over the country in that time, so writing the Sicilian episodes was a lot of fun too. That allowed me to revisit in my mind and through my fingers the great food, the beautiful landscapes and the entertaining and captivating people.

The actual writing process was really fun although with an episode a month, things had to go pretty fast and there wasn’t a lot of time to really stop and think. The books were being translated one month after I wrote them so there also wasn’t the luxury of going back and changing something but I’m pleased I managed to hit my deadlines and I think that having to produce something quickly stopped me becoming too precious about it. When I had more time, like the first month, I found myself constantly rewriting and thinking, ‘no, not like that, like this.’ Once I got into the flow of things, the characters started, to a certain extent, to write themselves. Their traits and foibles developing and changing as they got to know themselves and each other better. That isn’t to say there wasn’t a lot of messing around before writing though. Often before I started, I’d listen to an episode or 5 of Desert Island Discs or Woman’s Hour just to get into hearing dialogue and how people talk, and also as a way of putting off actually starting. Sally Wainwright’s shows, particularly ‘Last Tango in Halifax’ were also great sources of inspiration for plot, character development and dialogue, or so I told myself as I ploughed through a box set instead of actually writing something myself. Working in radio, I’ve always written for the spoken word and so perhaps it wasn’t surprising that I found the dialogue bits of the book the easiest to write.

Creating each character’s biography and family trees was really fun at the beginning and really helped with working out what they might do next and how they might react with things. But having heard interviews with other writers, I think, if I get the chance to write some more books I’ll do even more of that kind of planning in future because it really helps provide a solid foundation for the characters on the page.

Mia has taken me on a journey over the last year, and I hope that she takes you on a pleasurable one too. Happy reading!