This is Alison’s first novel; developed from her prize-winning short story, Swarm. She was struck by the beauty of one image she had created; that of the flying fish - the wingfish - and wanted to take the idea further.
Alison was joined by her publisher, Dr Teika Bellamy, from Mother’s Milk Books, who talked at length about how she had combined her scientific background and editing skills to ensure that the world Alison created in MATW was consistent, cohesive, and adhered to the laws of physics as we know them.
Teika had previously published a piece of Alison’s work about motherhood, so when she struggled to place MATW - despite encouraging feedback from editors - Alison decided to approach Teika.
Dr Bellamy was immediately struck by the empathy of the main character, and the themes of collaboration, caring for other creatures, and the benefits of working together as a society, which all combined to make MATW a good fit for Mother’s Milk Books.
She loved Alison’s poetical and lyrical writing, but felt that her world building needed expanding. They worked together for approximately eighteen months before the book was ready for publication, and in that time the world of MATW was repeatedly questioned and revised until everything fit together. The biology, physics, and evolutionary considerations all had to match reality whilst sustaining the dream throughout the novel.
Alison read some beautiful passages from the book, and we were all immediately immersed in the vivid world she had created. She talked about how she is an intuitive writer, rather than one who develops characters or detailed plots in advance, but acknowledged that writing MATW had made her realise how lucky she was to have an editor who had so much input from the early stages - unusual in today’s publishing climate.
You can buy Maysun and the Wingfish from Mother’s Milk Books:
