The Writer and the Fiancé

The writer and the fiancé.

We were all but joined at the hip for the rest of that academic year, she dated a couple of other male students; I went out with one other female, but there was no spark there, for me anyway, I wasn't certain how she'd been getting on with her two other friends. And I carried on writing my novel, eventually submitting it to an agent for consideration. He came up with some suggestions to improve the structure and flow of the story. I gladly took his suggestions and incorporated them.

The last three weeks before we broke for the summer were hectic, we both had finals and hardly had time to eat let alone any sort of social life. On Friday I'd be packing everything I had with me into my car and heading home, while Diana would be staying on, spending the summer at the local hospital as part of her practical training.

At least she'd only be a few miles away, less than an hour by car, rather than the usual two hundred when she went home, we would at least get to spend some time together. We could cope with that. At least I hoped we could.

It was the Thursday of the final week of the academic year. I took her out to dinner. As we sat sipping our wine after the waiters had cleared our plates away she looked at me. And she smiled that smile.

"Dan," she said, "I think it's time."

"Time for what?" I asked.

"I'm ready to tell you that I want it to be just me and you from now on. No more casual dates with others, I want us to be exclusive to each other."

"Well, you know that's always what I've wanted," I said, "so why the sudden switch?"

"Well partly because I don't want some predatory female jumping in and snatching you away," she said, "but mainly because I love you. I want you to be mine alone and I want to be yours."

For a brief moment, I was puzzled by her use of the two terms, mine alone and yours. Did this mean that what she really wanted was for me to be exclusively hers while she was free to play the field?

I'm a believer in openness, in getting things out on the table.

"Diana," I said, albeit with a smile on my face, "I noticed that when you said that, you used the phrase 'I want you to be mine alone,' yet when it came to you, you merely said 'I want to be yours,.' Does this signify that the exclusivity is going to be one way?"

"What?" she said, "no, that's not it at all, I meant that I want us both to be equally as exclusive. No more other girls for you, no more other men for me."

I took her at face value, after all, her studies concerned the human body and its problems, it was mine that explored words and their meanings.

The only problem that I could see was that In a year I'd graduate, while she had another three, possibly four to go.

We spent that summer with me driving over to her for the weekends. It had only taken me a couple of weeks to find a holiday job. It was nothing fancy or exciting and was most definitely a fill-in until I could find something I would enjoy. But it was experience of the world of work and would, at least fill a space in my CV.

Probably the best thing that had happened to me in that next year was a telephone call from my agent, half way through the first term, telling me that he had successfully sold my first novel, a police procedural, to a publisher and they wanted to meet with me to talk about options. They were even willing to pay my expenses to travel to London and meet them.

It was at their offices, early one Saturday morning that I got to meet my literary agent, Richard Phillips. I'd had letters from him and spoken to him on the phone. Even though we'd never met, as soon as I saw him walk up to the receptionist's desk at their office building, I knew it was him.

Not only did he have a very plummy Oxbridge accent, or possible Eton, but he was six foot five inches tall and rake thin with a totally bald head and the most piercing blue eyes I'd ever seen.

I walked across; once he'd been handed a visitor's pass and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Richard?" I asked.

"Dan?" he replied.

Once we'd established that we were talking to the right person he guided me over to the seating area so we could, 'have a quick chat,' before we were dragged off upstairs. We discussed tactics for the meeting. Or, rather he discussed tactics, I just sat and listened.

"The first thing you have to be aware of, Dan, is that these guys are not your friends, I am."

I decided to let that one lie, for now, we'd see how much of a friend he was as time went on.

"Now, the first offer that they make, we just turn down, regardless of how nice it sounds. That will not be their final offer and if they don't offer us something that we're happy with, then we stand, shake hands and walk away. The three things they will probably do is offer you an advance against a percentage of book sales. They'll ask for all rights, worldwide in perpetuity. We do not give them that, in fact, we don't even make concessions on that. We are here to discuss first publishing in the English language. All subsidiary rights, paperback, foreign languages, adaptations, you keep the right to. If at some point they want to negotiate for those rights, then fair enough, but for now, we keep them. Dan, just let me do the talking and don't agree to anything beyond accepting a cup of coffee and anything I tell you that you can agree to."

"You're the one with the skills and experience, you do it," I said.

We finished that conversation just in time, a woman somewhere in her twenties or perhaps, even her early thirties approached us.

"Dan Collins?" she asked.

"That would be me," I said.

She looked at me, she had that definite, 'I was expecting somebody older,' look about her.

I held out my hand and we shook; then I introduced Richard. As they shook I said, "and you are?"

"Oh sorry, I'm Philippa Herries, if we can come to an agreement, I'll be editing your book."

I made a mental note to insist on the right to choose my editor, there was something about her I just didn't like

She led us through a door to the left of reception which led to a short corridor with two lifts, one of which took us up to the fifth floor. We walked along to meeting room two.

Two men were waiting for us when we entered, they stood, they were polite sharks if sharks were what they were.

After introductions and handshakes, we were invited to sit, asked if we'd like something to drink and after taking our orders, the older of the two men, Simon, opened the meeting.

"First of all, Dan, welcome to Samuelson Publishing. We're very keen to welcome you to the Samuelson family and want you to know that first of all we were all excited by your submission, so we have an offer for you."

"We're glad to hear that," Richard said, "we'd be wasting our time here if you didn't."

Simon sat back in his seat and let out a sigh.

"Now, having said that, Dan, we have to take into account that you're an unknown quantity, your book is good, but it's going to take a lot of work on both our parts to make it publishable. With that in mind, obviously, we can't afford to be as generous with you as a new author as we perhaps would be with someone more established."

"We understand that Simon, now why don't we cut all the crap and the sales pitch and you just outline the offer?" Richard said.

"I like a man who cuts to the chase," Simon said, "all right, we will offer you five thousand pounds for all rights to this book, plus a royalty of five percent of the wholesale price."

"No thanks," Richard said, standing up, "let's not waste any more of each other's time gentlemen. Obviously, we have different aims here."

"Then why don't you outline your thoughts on the matter, Dan?" the other man, Frank said.

"Thank you, Frank," Richard said, "very well. Fifty thousand against ten percent of retail, for first rights, English language worldwide. All other rights are to remain with the author and individually negotiable. On a one book deal with you having the first refusal for six months from submission of any subsequent writings."

"We can't agree to that," Simon said.

"Shut up Simon," Frank said, "you're pretty certain of your client's appeal, Richard."

"I wouldn't be here if I wasn't, Frank," Richard said, "now are we going to talk sensibly or do we have to sit through more bullshit?"

"I can do that," he said, with Simon sitting beside him looking like his nose was seriously out of joint.

We ended up agreeing on everything we'd asked for apart from two points, the Advance was going to be thirty-five thousand, not fifty and the rights would be worldwide first publication on twenty-five percent of what the publisher sold them to foreign publishers for unless the foreign publisher was in any way associated with Samuelson in which case it would be seventy percent. As Richard explained it after we left, we weren't going to let them short-change us by selling the rights to themselves. One other thing that Richard introduced was that in the event of Samuelson going bust, being sold to another company or attempting to pass the contract on to a third party, all rights would revert to me.

We walked out of there with a proposed contract which Richard promised to get checked over by lawyers and assuming that went well, I'd have a cheque for thirty-five thousand pounds in my possession, less Richard's commission of course, within a week of the signing.

As we walked out of the building I stopped and leaned against one of the door posts. It wasn't finished yet but I was going to be a published author. I knew that there was someone I needed to tell, someone without whom it would have never come about. But that would have to wait. Richard and I caught a taxi back to his office.

"A couple of valuable lessons for you today, Dan," he said, once we were safely ensconced behind the closed door of his private office. Firstly don't ever take the first offer, if they're coming in at a level, they're willing to come out at a higher one. The second lesson is that there's no such thing as a non-negotiable offer. Remember those two and you'll be able to negotiate successfully."

"That and you can't have it all your own way you have to both give and take?"

"That too," he said, "although the trick is to make sure that you take more than you give.

"There is one thing I want all my own way though," I said, "that woman, I don't want her as my editor."

I stayed that night in London, the publishers had paid for the hotel room, it would have been rude to waste their money, before packing up, checking out and taking the tube to King's Cross for my train back up to Yorkshire.

I took advantage of the free Wi-Fi on board to look at my emails and found what proved to be the first of many from Phillipa Herries, welcoming me on board and informing me that she was looking forward to working on my manuscript and making it fit for publication.

Those last three words got me angry. I pulled my phone out and called Richard.

"I know what you're ringing about," were his first words, "I'll speak to them tomorrow morning. At least we haven't signed the contract yet, so we have some wiggle room. For what it's worth I agree with you. I know her, she's an excellent editor but she does try and run everything. I think that temperamentally, she'd probably ruin you as an author. Don't worry about it. I'll get the lawyers on the contract tomorrow, call them and point out that if they don't replace her with someone acceptable to you, the contract will not get signed. I have another couple of publishers I think we can place you with if this doesn't work out."

"Then I'll leave it with you, Richard and get back to being a student."

"You could get back to planning your next book," he suggested, "I have a feeling this one will run when it's published. We'll have a big seller on our hands and demand for more. You have to keep writing."

"Well, I'll do what I can, but I just feel I may be the writing equivalent of a one hit wonder and that's assuming that my book is a hit."

"Oh, it will be, Son, it will be."

We got a different editor, a sweet charming man in his sixties who really knew how to make words leap off a page. I learned a lot about writing from him,.

It was almost a year later and Diana and I had become very firmly a couple by then four things happened that summer than changed my life. First I earned the right to call myself Daniel Collins, M.A. I had a degree already, in English Literature, albeit, ironically for a man destined to be a very successful author, with only a Desmond. A Two-Two. Second class honours in the second degree. Now I had a Master's degree in creative writing. The second thing that happened was that my book was launched and, against my will but at the insistence of the publishers I did my first ever book tour. Seventeen cities in nineteen days. The third thing that happened, against the odds and my expectation, I delivered the manuscript of my second book to Samuelson's.

The fourth big thing happened at sea, somewhere between St Lucia and Barbados. I'd treated Diana and I to a Caribbean Cruise. We'd flown to Fort Lauderdale in Florida, boarded the ship and were very much looking forward to our two weeks of sun, sea and whatever else we got up to.

On the Thursday of the first week out we'd left St Lucia and we had been invited to the captain's table.

The steward passed everybody at the table a menu and when Diana opened hers a small velvet bag dropped out and landed in her, fortunately empty, soup bowl.

"What's this?" she asked.

"Why don't you open it and find out, my dear?" Captain Fargo said.

She did. Carefully untying the string that held the bag closed, she upended it and looked down at the circle of gold topped with one diamond and four graduated emeralds and looked at me.

"Diana," I said, "I love you very much. I can't even begin to picture my life without you, will you marry me?"

Very delicately, she took the ring between the thumb and index finger of her right hand and handed it to me.

Once the ring was in my palm she looked down at her own left hand, particularly at the ring finger.

"Well, it does look quite bare, doesn't it?" she said, then looked at me, smiled and whispered, "Yes, darling, I will." And held out her left hand for me to slip the ring onto her finger.

The whole restaurant applauded, the Captain and all his guests congratulated us and whether through nerves or excitement, neither of us did proper justice to that night's meal.

After the meal and a decent amount of conversation, we excused ourselves. We did after all have to call our families and give them the good news. That was our excuse, I don't think anybody believed us. I'm not sure that the Purser's office didn't receive a few noise complaints the following morning. Diana was quite vocal in her appreciation of my efforts when we got to bed that night.

We did call our parents the following morning when we finally emerged from our stateroom. They were all pleased, even thrilled at the news and of course both our mothers went into wedding planning mode. Until we told them that they had plenty of time, we had no intention of tying the knot until after Diana graduated and that was two years away.

She'd be spending those two years in Hull, splitting her time between the university and the local hospitals, her course was a joint one between the two universities, York and Hull and would result in her receiving her degree from both.

I started my first and only job in October of that year as a copy writer for a London Advertising agency. The great thing about it was that it was mainly a virtual company, apart from the occasional trip down to London or out to a client's premises, I worked from home, which before long was the cottage.

I'd spotted the cottage in a small village about midway between York and Hull. Its only disadvantage being that it had a really bad internet service. It did, however, have excellent mobile phone connections. I upgraded my phone contract to one with unlimited data and discovered that I could get a much faster connection via that than I would have if BT had deigned to install Fibre in the place.

Goodmanham is a small place, less than 250 people and the cottage isn't large. Thanks to a sympathetic alteration to its attic space it had three bedrooms, a living room, dining room, kitchen and two of the bedrooms downstairs. The third, largest bedroom is up in the attic and there's a basement, which is unused, it has no power and is a touch damp particularly in winter. According to the deeds it was believed to have been built sometime in the fourteenth century.

And I fell in love with it the first time I saw it. What was left of my advance from Samuelson's provided the deposit and my salary from work provided the monthly payments, until my first royalty cheque arrived five months after publication of the novel. It was enough to pay off the mortgage, which I did.

I'd worked out that I was getting £1.84 for every book sold, that first cheque was for just short of a hundred and fifteen thousand pounds, nearly 80000 books sold. The next cheque was for double that and was quickly followed by another for £50000, the advance for my second novel. Then the foreign sales started rolling in.

By the time Diana graduated, she was going to marry a millionaire. I sat, with all four of our parents and watched as she walked up the steps onto the stage of the York Theatre Royal to receive her Bachelor of Medicine, Bachelor of Surgery degree certificate from one of the lesser members of the royal family and afterwards we all went out to dinner.

"So," her mother said as we sat talking after eating, "can your mother and I start planning the wedding now?"

Diana and I looked at each other, we hadn't really thought about it and we knew that her first two years, until she got her full registration would be hectic.

"How about this time next year," she suggested, "that will give you two time to plan and us time to get used to my crazy work patterns."

"That would work," I said, "right now I have no idea how that's going to be."

At that point she had no idea how she wanted her career to be focused, apart from that she wanted to go into surgery and that she most definitely did not want to follow her parents into general practice.

At the end of the meal we split up, my parents drove back home, since it was only a little over fifty miles away and motorway for forty-five of those. Her parents were staying at the cottage with me and then I realised it wasn't me any longer, she wasn't a student any more, they'd be staying with us. And tomorrow we'd be going over to clear out her student room and transport everything home. In three weeks, she started her first job. A six month stint in A and E at Hull Royal infirmary.