The Girl on the Swing

Slow burning, beautifully written, brimming with emotion without overstating....
This is wonderful, onto my bookshelf.
Good luck with this.
James

Dear Ali, Today i'm trying to read bits of all the books which i should have read ages ago. Yours is one of them and I'm so glad I've found it, albeit belatedly. This is, to my mind, exquisite writing, ablanced and quite beautiful. The wistfulness and resignation of what you are writing is also conveyed by the rhythm of the words. There is such a maturity of expression- a writer who has developed all the skills and is using them to great effect. The analogy of the filing cabinet brought tears to my eyes and I'm going to have to stop fro a while now i've reached the end of chapter four because this is a weekend of difficult anniveraries for me. So i'm bookshelving now but I will come back and read more because this is beautiful writing and i am learning so much from your mastery of language. Jak

Dear Ali,
I am swept away by the quality and richness of your writing. It's evocative and sensual and mesmerising. It is a book I would definitely buy and would add as one of my favourites...and I haven't read it all, yet!
I think that I have found the best book on this site, really and truly.
I don't know what comments to make on it, Ali, other than this is excellent, I wouldn't change a thing. Your images, sense of colour, atmospheric writing make it a very polished, tight, seamless piece of writing.
Congratulations!
I am putting it on my bookshelf.
Take care,
Annia ;-)

What a fasicinating read, very different, something I genuinely like...I thoroughly enjoyed what I've read. I'm not an author, just a genuine reader of good books. I wish you all the best and look forward to reading the book as soon as I can get my hand on a copy.

Wasn't there a book by Richard Adams, published in the early eighties, with the same title?

A lovely opening, full of suppressed emotion, sadness and suggestion. I like the small details, the subtle depiction of the conflict between Richard and the narrator, the fault lines in the relationship, and the utter emptiness of grieving. I'l looking forward to reading more of the other life.

WoW THIS IS STUPENDOUS. YOUR DESCRIPTIVE WRITING IS TRULY MAGNIFICIENT AND ONE CAN TAKE LESSON FROM THIS.

VERY CLEVER AND MOST ENJOYABLE
BACKED
THE LORD OF THE DAWN

This is a good story. I didn't realize until I scrolled down to write a comment and saw the Harper/Collins note that this already had a gold star - so I think you probably don't want more comments - but I read the three chapters you have posted so I will make a comment. The writing is beautiful. You have a good character in Julia. Your premise is compelling; my mother believed that she lived a previous life in the 1800s so I was raised on the thought that memories of the past are really true memories of a past life. Made this a good read for me. I'll add it to my shelf. Burgio (Grain of Salt).

Ali, I really like your narrative style. I understand why you made it to the top.

Good job in that first chapter. Backing this out of respect.

Regards,

Joffrey

Loved it!

Adding it to my shelf :)

Cheers
Freya

www.BookBuzzr.com
World's No. 1, Free Online Book-Marketing Technology for Authors

Hi Ali,
What a wonderful book! I can certainly see why a publisher would be considering it. I read all 7 chapters and I guess I'll have to wait to buy the book to find out what happens next.
Best of luck!
Kat
The REAL Poop

I was drawn to your book when I first joined, but have a lot of things going on. I read to the end of chapter 2 and am finding it intriquing. I look forward to reading more.

Hi Ali, I found your novel on the book charts and thought it looked intriguing. I am fascinated with past lives and how they can be woven into fiction or even be the fodder for it. Your writing is lovely, even breathtaking. There is just enough description to create a poetic ambiance and keep with the pastoral flow of the story.

You do a wonderful job speaking in the first voice and go so deeply into Mrs. Spencer's psyche. Now I know why you have that gold star.

I am not shelving because your work has already been on the editor's desk and I need to make room for books that are currently on the rise.

Patricia

Wow it is almost as if you are painting a masterpiece. The first paragraph just draws you in and you just can't stop reading. If you get this published I'll defiantly have to buy a copy. Good work.

Having just finished a good book and shelving it, I am now ready to begin to read your book. I will read all 8 chapters before I comment other than to say, this book has already captured me with your pitch. I only read a book at a time so it will be at least two or three days before I tell you how I felt about your book and whether I will shelve it.

Your first chapter drew me right in; being a gardener and all it had me smiling with excitement. Loved it. Having just finished reading chapter two you began describing the feelings of guilt and I continued to read on liking every word, every sentence. Great read, so much I plan on coming back to read more.
Housecleaning: there are a few words that need correction~for example 'towelling' should only have one 'l'
I know I appreciate anyone pointing out those things to me as writers are so busy writing, we neglect to see words that spelled correctly.
I like your story and will come back.

This pitch drew me right in. Enough to have me WL your book.
I like the the idea of previous lifes.

All I can say is, "Wow!" This isn't normally the genre I immediately turn to but the idea of past lives intrigued me and I dove right in. I am definitely glad that I did. I found your writing to be very eloquent and I actually enjoyed the first person present tense. You very rarely see that (I'm not sure that I ever have) and it seemed to work. The only issue that bothered me was between chapters 23 and 24. I feel that there may not have been quite enough transition and I felt like maybe I missed a chapter in there somewhere. However, I kept on reading and soon found the pace again and learned everything that I though was missing. Great job and congratulations!

Hi Ali
I have just signed up to this site today. Yours is the first book I chose to read. On chapter 6 now and glued! I love your work. Your descriptions, micro-observations of the most ordinary events and realities (ie the tiles under the rug in the hall, the feel of the rope on the swing etc) - it is rare to find a writer who can sustain this level of acute observation and the ability to 'show' the scenes so well to the reader. I find the writing - ie the writer - deeply intelligent with acute powers of observation and a talent for telling and showing what you observe. I just Love it. I wish I could observe the world so acutely, so precisely and share the picture. It reads to me great as it is - ready for the bookshops for sure. I hope you get selected for publication and that it all goes well for you. Thanks Ali - I am totally lovin the read.

end of 33-- wonderful. Simply wonderful. I am getting a little dewy around the eyes, but mostly I just enjoy how the different parts resolve. Thanks for a great read!

ch 28 -- wow. just wow.

ch 26-- I was waiting for her to feel guilty about Jamie's death and connect the dots between her mother's story and this one. This guilt and self-doubt make Julia's character more believable to me. It also opens up the possibility of past lives having an influence on the course of Jamie's life-- not just his DNA. I like it.

Well, I have finished chapter 25 and it does not disappoint! Good job of setting up one expectation and then delivering another, keeping the story going in a way that seems natural, not forced, but keeping the reader a bit on their toes.

I guess you already posted more chapters! Well, I will certainly read them while they're up :)

I am sure that I read a book with this title or something very similar several years ago. Have you done a search

Ch. 17 That Clare. The slut.

I thought this was a complete book? Is this just a sample then?

I'm really loving it so far :-)

ch. 12 Totally what I've been waiting for. I wonder at Maggie's awareness of the "voice." It seems as if she doesn't really exist anymore, except as an image, a memory. Is this past life regression supposed to be like "traveling back," reinhabiting that body, reliving that day? I'm not trying to find fault-- I'm just wondering.

good hook at the end of ch. 11

Ch. 10 -- I feel a deep kinship with Julia and her "prudishness"-- especially in the wake of her loss of her son. I also feel that odd, anachronistic (some would say) repulsion to Clare and her free sexuality. It is rare to find these characters in books or on screen these days, but we still exist, don't we?

This is not criticism, but I do wonder where the survivor's guilt is in this story? In my experience there is quite a bit of guilt in being alive when a loved one is gone, and I feel it is much stronger for a mother. Just a thought. (This comes to mind as I read chapter 8.)

This chapter is strangely reminiscent of some scenes I have in my own story. I guess we're working with a lot of the same material? Well done, though. I am still hooked!

This is cool. And well written.

The momentum is a little slow, but there is a deeply interesting undercurrent to keep one reading.

An excellent piece of work. Some of the narration is astounding. Brilliant. Best I have read, on this site, so far.

It's so confusing - Carry Me Away is too slow and immediate yet this book is too descriptive and slow-burning. I guess all editors are human and all reviews are subjective. I'm glad to see advocacy for the old 3rd person. Congrats on what is still a hugely positive review. It's a huge achievement to get it under their noses in the first place.

Mike

When will this be published? I will definitely be buying and savouring it. Congratulations! Kirsty

Dear Ali,

Last November, you approached me to look at your work. At the same time, you critiqued The Little Girl in the Fig Tree and said you would shelve it the following day.

The Authonomy records show that you never did. Please shelve me now.

I did read, critique and back two books of yours and promoted Swing on Forum.

I have a second book too. Would you spend a few minutes with it?

Go well with your work. Dying to see what the eds have to say. From what I see of their crits, they can't write and don't bother to edit their own stuff.

Will still talk to you about San Francisco and Edinburgh if you come unstuck.

Regards.

Pierre.

Hi Julia,

Hannah recommended me your book and I can see why. Sorry I havent found you until now, I hope you have been one of the lucky one's and they are going to publish your book.
Healing our past lives forms part of why we are on this planet at this particular time!!!!!!! This mision is printed in capital letters in each one of our personal life books. Nobody is left behind. Doing this act of surrender to our past, heals our present and the future of our blood family.
May the force be with you,
All my love Mia. xx

I find it intriguing I am interesting in taking time to read more

Ali,

Thanks for the early endorsement of Katharsis. I've looked at Girl on a Swing a couple times now. It's surely beautifully written...just not in the direction of my quirky reading interests (find this encouraging).

Cheers,
Rob

I haven't read the entire piece but so far I do think it's good. The pace might need to be upped slightly, in my opinion, as I think it's a bit overwritten in parts. Less description and more plot maybe? I do think parts of it are well written though.

Best of luck with the Harper Collins Editors!

Alex.

I haven't read the entire piece but so far I do think it's good. The pace might need to be upped slightly, in my opinion, as I think it's a bit overwritten in parts. Less description and more plot maybe? I do think parts of it are well written though.

Best of luck with the Harper Collins Editors!

Alex.

Ali, I love this. Your writing truly grabs and holds me. I can smell the flowers and hear the music. All I can say is WOW! This is going on my bookshelf.
Vicki Fitzgerald (don't know why my name is showing up as Kathy Lamb - I'm looking into it).

This is a theme I'm quite interested in.

Late in Ch. 2, Julia visits her department and makes plans for her return to work, and everyone “seems pleased” that she’s coming back. But in the early part of Ch. 3, she opens the letter that says it would be inappropriate for her to return to work until the case has been heard. This bothered me a little. I can’t usefully comment on British clinical practices, but it seems odd that on the eve of Julia’s anticipated return to work, her own locum tenens doesn’t know that Julia’s not returning. The locum would have a need to know....

Another quibble (for that’s what this is): sometimes you get carried away with your own prose and over-write a little. Examples: “During the past few weeks I have invented an excuse, a cover story.” (Ch. 3). Either excuse or cover story seems sufficient. “I turn my head, twisiting my face above the water, breathe out the last remnants of air from my lungs, breathe in warm, humid, chlorine-scented air.” (Ch. 4). This isn’t necessarily “wrong,” but a little of this sort of thing goes a long way. It’s possible to make a tighter, more focused book by cutting down on some of these things, though I know you wouldn’t want to give up the poetry entirely.

I think you handle the changing tenses quite well. I was initially a little put off by the present-tense narrative, but after reading into the story, I think you’ve pulled it off nicely, and it contrasts well with the preterite flashbacks. As to first-person, I find it gives an immediacy to the work, if written well, that no other POV produces.

I’m not sure why, but from the moment Julia signed up for the prison visits, I cooled toward the story. Nothing I’d read so far did anything to prepare for this choice of hers. It feels forced, a plot device which is meant to turn the direction of the story. It succeeds in that, but I wish you’d found a more organic way to get to where you were headed with it.

-Alan Justice

Hi Ali
I haven't been round here for a while and just checked back in to see did you make the Editor's Desk.
Woohoo - well done. I am thrilled for you.
The Girl on The Swing absolutely deserves to be published - a terrific read.
Best of luck with the review from HC.
Siobhán

Congratulation on being selected by Harper Collins . I can not think of a better choice ! Your work is simply stunning !

I made it just in the nick of time Ali and you sit proudly on my bookshelf even though I was only able to read the first four chapters last night and another four today. Those eight chapters were enough to show me that this is going to be an amazing story that certainly deserves backing.

Julia's sense of grief and confusion is palatable, yet never too much to be overwhelming to the reader. The underlying tension between her and Richard is well played and quite realistic. The way that their different styles of coping and surviving the loss of Jamie takes them in separate directions is played out across the world on a daily basis. I saw it first hand when a dear friend of mine lost her daughter. She threw herself into her work, even going so far as to go back to school for her doctorate degree while her husband just sort of skimmed the surface of life and living. They coudn't communicate at all because neither one of them could bear to acknowledge the white elephant in the corner - the loss of their child. The way that you bring all of that reality into play, while tying her previous lives into the mix is remarkable.

I look forward to reading the rest of 'The Girl on the Swing' and wish you all the best in this month's competition.

This is beautifully written Ali. Plus you mention Belgian chocolates, which I've been eating all day. (Fresh off the plane!)

Happy New Year!

Lockjaw

Okay I'm going to take a risk and back your book on the merit of its descriptive style and the quality of the writing itself. I like your long wordy descriptions, they are very colourful and pleqasing to the mind. As for the story I don't feel I've read enough of it just yet so I'm reading some of the good comments you already have below. I'm voting purely on the quality of the writing, because of this.

Ali - I like the slow drift into the past as it is done with so much keenness of the five senses - indeed of the sixth sense too! The return into an awareness of the present garden as one of such familiar modernity rang true for me and, after an escape to "hollyhocks turning their faces to the sun" , reminiscent of the old cottage garden, we are plunged back into the starker reality of "bright terracotta stained dark and ugly by the residues of mining and exhaust fumes".
I did feel you might have broken scene where you begin "It was over twenty years ago that I first discovered Kimberley Place".
However, I do like the way you almost effortlessly use the aberration to slip into the past - a daydreaming into which the reader readily slides with you if he/she wants to daydream - and I certainly do, despite my decades.
Some of your description is so painstaking - hints of the John Masefield you like, only more particularly his poetry. Lovely though this is, if it becomes a focus in itself, it may distract from the main thrust of your story and frustrate a little too long the reader's need to get closer to the girl in the existence of "The Girl on the Swing" and those she knew in a previous life.
Still, the opening chapters have a gentle dreamlike quality before the storm and perhaps we need the richness of description to support this from the beginning.
So though I am only beginning and you - we may soon celebrate - seem near to ending your expedition through autonomy territory, I would like to support you - upon my shelf!
Best wishes, Raymond

Thanks for the support Ali, I have returned the favour in an effort to keep you up there where you deserve to be....

When you read the Dust Bunnies how about coming up with a theme song, I've been asked to re write the story along the lines of the Wombles, or the Clangers possibly for TV so a good catchy sing along song will be required. Hell the Wombles made into the top 10 why not us.....?
Good luck for the end of the month and I hope it will be a happy New Year for you.

Probably a bit late in the day for comments! Just to say you write well and I've backed the book. Good luck.