Nicola Pryce: Why I Write

I wrote my first book, The Adventures of the Ten Green Bottles, when I was ten. I can remember being totally absorbed when writing it, even obsessed. Each bottle had a very distinct character, a name, and an adventure that matched their personality. Some made it back to the wall, others were way-laid by dastardly rogues; some found happy homes, and one rolled into the river and was never seen again.

I adored English literature and history. I took English A level and left school telling everyone I was going to write a historical novel.

After all, I had been at boarding school since the age of eight and books had been my escape. But however well my heart may have been set on the stuff of dreams, my head was firmly set on earning a living; running around the shrubbery in petticoats and delicate satin slippers was all very well, but it was not going to pay the rent. 

My sturdy black lace-ups firmly fastened, I began a fulfilling career as a nurse. Along the way, I studied for a degree in humanities with the Open University, and I read, and I read.

And I did not write.

I had nothing to say, and even if I did, I would not be able to voice it so eloquently. I had no fire burning in my soul; I did not have to overcome great hardship; I was not wronged, nor could I give a voice to those who were. I had no struggle to convey. I could not speak for others’ inequality or abuse. I had made no great political contribution, and nothing I wrote would make people see the world in a different light. 

The ten year old’s absolute conviction that she had written the definitive telling of the Green Bottles, the teenager’s equally strong conviction that she would one day write a novel and see her name in print became firmly buried under piles of laundry, the chaos of family life, and the blossoming of my three children.

On long car journeys, however, it would surface. Place names became characters. The kids would ask, ‘Who’s Fenny Bridges, Mum?’ And way before Downtown Abbey, I would have her down as a cook or a servant and a story would follow to pass the time.

Still, I did not write. 

The task seemed too enormous. Where would I start? How could I justify hours spent at a keyboard when there were so many other demands on my time?

But something deep inside me was not listening to these practicalities. Or rather, other voices kept cutting in, demanding I listen. I found myself eavesdropping on random conversations going on in my head – an argument, a misunderstanding, an angry father demanding to be obeyed. I started looking at writing magazines, picking up my books and studying the way they were written.

It was not until I was giving chemotherapy to a lady who had my exact date of birth that everything changed. We both knew her treatment was palliative, and it would be the last time I saw her. Her words shot through me like a bolt. ‘It’s not what you do that you regret, it’s what you don’t do.’ 

Her birthdate, my birthdate: suddenly life seemed so fragile. Forty-five years after my first book, I decided I had to write. Not for vast recognition, not for vast sums of money. Not to win prizes or be on any best-selling lists. Not because I could write beautiful prose that people would linger over and admire, but because I owed it to my younger self. I must never regret what I did not do. 

And I could express a voice. Not an oppressed one, not a political one, not a famous one, nor a fabulously intelligent one, but my voice. How would my children know the real me if I did not tell them what was going on in my head? It was like coming full circle, recognizing who I was, who I had always been, as well as the person I had become.

I bought a laptop and began writing with no thought about publication. Somehow, I was going to slip the finished manuscript into the kids’ Christmas stockings, and they would tease me for being a romantic. I wanted that teasing, that recognition. Not a mother, not a nurse, but me, an incurable romantic who forty years after leaving school had her first novel published. 

I write to be true to myself – to let my family and those reading my books know the real me. I write what I love to write, for people I hope will love it too. That first book was taken up by an agent, Teresa Chris, and published by Corvus Books, an imprint of Atlantic Books. Three books followed and my fifth will be published this November. With their help, encouragement and expertise, my manuscripts have been turned into the books they are today. 

In these troubled times of lockdown and Covid 19, I write because I like to instill hope. My books contain jeopardy, yet they remain optimistic and if they can help someone step aside from reality for a few days, just as the books I read as a child helped me escape the confines of a strict boarding school, then that makes me extremely happy.

Better still if I can inspire someone else to come forward as their own voice.                                                                                                                             

—

Nicola Pryce trained as a nurse at St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London. She loves literature and history and has an Open University degree in Humanities. She is a qualified adult literacy support volunteer and lives with her husband in the Blackdown Hills in Somerset. She and her husband love sailing and together they sail the south coast of Cornwall in search of adventure. If she isn’t writing or gardening, you will find her scrubbing decks somewhere.

Pengelly’s Daughter is her first novel, followed by The Captain’s Girl, The Cornish Dressmaker, and The Cornish Lady. A Cornish Betrothal will be published in November.

Nicola is a member of The Historical Writers’ Association and the Romantic Novelists’ Association.

nicolapryce.co.uk/

https://www.facebook.com/nicolaprycebooks/
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THE CORNISH LADY

The fourth novel in a stunning series set in eighteenth-century Cornwall, perfect for fans of Poldark.

Educated, beautiful and the daughter of a prosperous merchant, Angelica Lilly has been invited to spend the summer in high society. Her father’s wealth is opening doors, and attracting marriage proposals, but Angelica still feels like an imposter among the aristocrats of Cornwall.

When her brother returns home, ill and under the influence of a dangerous man, Angelica’s loyalties are tested to the limit. Her one hope lies with coachman Henry Trevelyan, a softly spoken, educated man with kind eyes. But when Henry seemingly betrays Angelica, she has no one to turn to. Who is Henry, and what does he want? And can Angelica save her brother from a terrible plot that threatens to ruin her entire family?

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