TONTO NEEDS YOU

It’s not just about what Tonto can do for you… it’s about what you can do for Tonto. Or something.

Is that Wheatman geezer after more favours? Nah, not really. Something I mentioned on Facebook recently and want to bring it up on here in case anyone is interested.

One of the newspapers up here, The Journal, runs a culture awards thing every year called The Journal Culture Awards. This year, they’re calling it The Journal Culture Awards 2009, and it seems that there may be the possibility of bagging something.

It’s always nice to get recognised for your work. Looking at the categories, there would be two that people may be interested in voting on: Writer of the Year and Best Event.

I think Sheila Quigley is worthy of an award for Writer of the Year for several reasons. I’m not sure I can vote being her publisher, but I will if eligible. Sheila’s the kind of writer we need. She has great ideas and enthusiasm for writing. This latest novel has been a testing time for her too; not just because she’s had to work with me, but because she went blind with cataracts during the writing of it. Her sight had been getting worse for a few years, she didn’t act upon it, and the inevitable happened. For anyone to go through this is terrible and for a writer it really is the end of the world. She battled through until she couldn’t see and had to have two operations. This was probably out of fear of knowing you need an operation and, if I know Sheila, probably part ‘I’ll be OK. It’ll sort itself out’ stubbornness.

Being a writer is all about surviving. Doing what’s best for yourself, being thick-skinned, looking to progress all the time. When I met up with Sheila, she’d indicated that, for reasons I won’t go into, there was a chance that she’d sign up with Tonto Books. This was a risk for her and a bit daunting for me. The risk was going from massive publisher to minuscule publisher with big ideas. She hadn’t had a book out in a while and she’d need to know she was making the right decision. Me? I like working with writers and getting the best out of them that I can. And I’m looking to take over the world one day, so I needed someone to help me on my way. My plan was that we’d learn a bit from each other during the process and I’m sure we have. I’m sure we’ll continue learning more too. But then there was the daunting task of stepping up a few gears to get Sheila to the level that a big publisher could always do with ease. It’s a daily struggle. We’ll get there. To me, this shows Sheila’s resilience and that she’s willing to take a calculated risk too. This shows more about her than just what you see on the page – which again backs up why I’d call her ‘writer of the year’. Like bands who haven’t released a CD for a bit, The Road to Hell is her comeback album. And significantly, she’s came back to a north east publisher. It’s not often you see a Mackem and a Geordie work together, you know. It’s like working for the UN this.

Before I start to sound even more like Eamonn Andrews, there’s the ‘Best Event’ category. Maybe if any readers of this blog attended the launch party for the book, you may think it is worthy of a mention. I’ve always tried to make Tonto launches a bit more interesting than cheese and wine in a boring old room and am quite proud that this event had projections onto the outside of the building, a splendidly-dressed interior, a brilliant band playing Sheila’s book titles as the set list… and another brilliantly-planned speech by me. I always rehearse them for weeks in advance, as you could tell.

A link to the voting form can be found on this page. If you were at the launch or if you are thinking about nominating Sheila, please feel free to add the Tonto contact details on the form. Contact details are on the website here.

Just posting this to make you aware of the awards as not all of Sheila’s readers are from the north east and not all will know of The Journal.  The deadline is 31 December 2009.