" I am interested in the demonstration of human resilience in the face of failure and in the saving grace of humour "

AmeriCymru spoke to Welsh author Bel Roberts about her writing, travels and future plans. Works by Bel Roberts:-

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AmeriCymru: Hi Bel and many thanks for agreeing to be interviewed. You started writing, or at least publishing, quite late on in life. Were you always a writer? Did you always have it in mind that you would one day publish your first novel?

Bel: Whilst I was an undergraduate at Aberystwyth University (1959-62), I wrote comedy sketches and acted in them during annual Rag Week Charity Events. Later, as a qualified teacher, I taught English up to GCSE ‘A’ Level standard to pupils in 7 secondary schools in England and Wales over 30 continuous years and also achieved the position of Deputy Head Teacher in 2. In some of these schools, I contributed articles for school magazines and wrote pantomimes and sketches for end-of-term concerts, but it was only when, following spinal surgery, I retired prematurely from teaching in 1993, that I had time to write fiction with the intention of getting it published. My first short story, A Touch of Gloss, won second prize in a national open short story competition judged by novelist, Beryl Bainbridge and was broadcast twice on BBC Radio 4 during Armistice Week in 1995. Between 1995 and 2004, I won 5 national open short story competitions and further short stories were included by Honno Women’s Press in 3 of their anthologies, Catwomen From Hell (2000), Written in Blood (2004) and All Shall Be Well (2012). I have had several poems published in various anthologies. In 2000 I was awarded an MA in Creative Writing by Bath Spa University.

AmeriCymru: Can you tell us a little about your first novel ''A Discerning Woman’s Guide To Manhunting''.

Bel: T.V. sit-com series scriptwriter of The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrrin and prolific novelist, David Nobbs, was my tutor on a Creative Writing Course in Ty Newydd in Gwynedd. He appreciated my robust sense of humour and encouraged me to write A Discerning Woman’s Guide to Manhunting, which took me 30 years as a serial manhunter to research and 3 years to write! It traces the desperate attempts of Geri, a retired sixty-year-old ex-teacher, to find an intellectually stimulating and sexually active partner. She is DISCERNING, so she’s looking for Mr Right – Mr Will Do just won’t do! The book is about starting again, re-defining self in middle-age and facing real limitations and challenges with a spirit of optimism. Geri not only becomes a mature student, studying alongside teenage students, but also acts as part-carer for her octogenarian mother who has the first stages of dementia but who adamantly resists going ‘into care’. Geri is typical of many middle aged women today who multi-task and get little acknowledgment for their selflessness but Geri is unusually head-strong, non p.c. and outrageously funny. She is not a defeatist, a whinger, or a dignified dear old lady. This woman is dynamite.

AmeriCymru: You have travelled and taught in South Africa and elsewhere. Care to tell us a little about your experiences there?

Bel: My partner and I first visited South Africa as tourists on a fortnight’s sight-seeing holiday at Christmas 2001. On the second day of our visit, we decided that we would like to spend our long, wet British winters there, so we invested in a small coastal shack in the Eastern Cape. Between 2002-7, we spent 6 months of the year there as ‘swallows’ ie fliers migrating to the warmth of an African summer; Chris becoming a typical ex-pat (ie spending most of his time on the Bowls’ Club green, or in its bar!), while I assisted in teaching school leavers English at two township schools. I also did a little relief work at peak holiday periods at a local AIDS & TB children’s clinic, but I had no specific duties to perform there.

I have travelled extensively abroad: New Zealand, Australia, Goa, Hong Kong, Macau, Thailand, Canada, Mexico, W. Indies and sailed down the Amazon as far as Manaus. On my retirement from teaching and as a mature student of the German Language, I visited most cities in Germany as well as other European destinations in Italy, France, Portugal and Greece. Having the time to travel is the main advantage of old age. Despite the current inconveniences at airports etc, I feel a compulsive need to travel whilst I am still mobile. I have a weak back (supported by 2 titanium posts and 8 titanium screws) but I don’t allow it to stop me doing anything. I love seeing new places and meeting different people. I attend a gym every other day and I am full of energy and enthusiasm for new ventures and experiences.

AmeriCymru: You won a number of prizes for your short stories prior to the publication of your first anthology ''Opportunity Mocks''. How did it feel winning The Bill Naughton Short Story Competition amongst others?

Bel: In 1999 I was a runner-up in the Bill Naughton Short Story Competition and in 2000 I was awarded first prize and had a second story entry in the same competition highly recommended. The winning stories were published in ‘Splinters Winners Collection’ (Waldron Dillon 1999 and 2000) respectively. It was an immense honour to win successive Irish literary awards, especially those in honour of Bill Naughton, playwright and author ( 1910-92).

AmeriCymru: Could you tell us a little about ''Opportunity Mocks''? What can readers expect to find between the covers?

Bel: ''Opportunity Mocks’ is an anthology of diversely themed short stories, some autobiographical; some fictitious. Three of the sixteen stories are written in the ‘voice’ of a frightened, bewildered child from the past, others include that of a depressed stalker, an eccentric spinster, a victim of a confident trick and a street-wise petty thief. The protagonists of the stories, whether motivated by good or bad, are humans driven by obsessive promptings which dictate their actions and mould their characters. They are all searching for something they desperately want: love, security, survival, superiority, revenge, identity and they all fall short of their target. I am interested in the demonstration of human resilience in the face of failure and in the saving grace of humour.

AmeriCymru: What can you tell us about ''Surfing Through Minefields''?

Bel: ‘Surfing Through Minefields’ belongs to the hybrid genre ‘reality fiction’. I have set the story in a fictional contemporary comprehensive school in Monmouth and have researched the facts surrounding the Senghenydd Pit disaster of 1913 in such a way that the history of the event is seen from the prospective of a modern teenager and by the residents of an old people’s home who have actual mementos of the tragic event. The heroine, Lauren, is an English teenager sent to stay with her grandmother in Wales while her parents sort out their various problems. The book shows the challenges she faces settling into a strange environment and her relationship with her new school mates who are not all friendly. In History, she chooses as her special topic the Senghenydd Pit Disaster of 1913. The dreadful living standards and inhuman conditions of the miners (some younger than her when they became victims of the tragic accident) make her question her own comfortable background and middle class values. The book contains humour and champions the triumph of the human spirit over adversity.

AmeriCymru: We learn from a recent newspaper article that you intend to donate to the Aber Valley National Mining Memorial Fund. Care to tell us a little about the fund and your personal reason for supporting it?

Bel: The Aber Valley Heritage Committee has set up a fund to finance a new Universal Colliery Memorial Garden which will be officially opened to mark the centenary of the October 1913 Universal Colliery disaster, the worst pit disaster in UK history. Sponsors have been buying ceramic tiles, made by local school children and bearing the names of the victims of the pit explosion. I have donated £80, the reading fees I’ve been offered by local groups, such as the Caerphilly Women’s Institute, in lieu of expenses. I have further book readings planned and I shall donate more profits to the fund from the proceeds of the book, if sales increase. My father was from north Wales and had no mining connections, but the men in my mother’s family were all coal miners. I have in my possession a death certificate issued to a cousin, who began working in the mines at 14 years of age and who died at 26 years, as recently as 1951. The causes of death are given as ‘Exhaustion and Pulmonary Tuberculosis’. I feel a sense of anger at such statistics. I was born in the Rhondda Valley, a place synonymous with coal mining; I have a great respect for all miners working underground anywhere, both present and past.

AmeriCymru: What''s next for Bel Roberts? When can we expect to see your next title in print?

Bel: I am currently working on a fictional novel influenced by my post-war childhood in the Rhondda. The MS needs to be double its present length and to give a more focused sense of ‘place’. If I were to cut down on my travelling, the book might be finished by early 2014. I am constantly torn between the two priorities in my life: writing and travelling. I am also re-editing half a dozen poems that have been lying dormant for a decade.

AmeriCymru: It is always of interest to know what our favorite authors are reading currently. Any recommendations?

Bel: I loved Hilary Mantel’s biographies of Thomas Cromwell: ‘Wolf Hall’ and ‘Bring Up The Bodies’ and eagerly await publication of the last book of the trilogy. By contrast, I’ve recently finished reading and reviewing Duncan Whitehead’s debut novel ‘The Gordonston Ladies’ Dog Walking Club’, a black-comedy crime story, which I found hilarious. Duncan is an English ex-pat now living in Florida.

AmeriCymru: Any final message for the readers and members of AmeriCymru?

Bel: I am pleased and honoured to be part of the cultural twinning of Wales and America through Americymru. I wish you full success with the Eisteddfod Poetry Competition and I look forward to reading more of the entries online. I will do my best to keep updating my membership page and to keep abreast of your news, so that I bolster my friendship with authors and readers across the mountains and The Pond that separates us. It warms my heart that there are readers so far from Wales who are interested in, and who appreciate, what I write. It makes the backache worthwhile. Diolch!