A Closer Look at Sagas:

Within your group choose 3 or 4 books that fit into this genre. You may want to choose titles from a random selection of authors or be more specific and choose to look at only one. You will find some of our suggestions below but of course there are many, many authors to choose from.

Decide whether you will each read a different book and report back, or whether the whole group will read all the titles. You may want to plan quite far ahead for a session like this to give everyone adequate reading time.

You may like to make the discussion quite structured, in which case you need to decide beforehand what areas you are going to discuss across the titles and everyone can read with these themes of discussion in mind.

Try not to get too bogged down in the plot details of the novels, as you may do if you were exploring a single novel. Concentrate on the theme and how it relates to all the titles and how well they work within it. Below are some areas of discussion you might like to consider.

Ideas/ Areas to explore:

1) How important do you think it is that saga writers do their research thoroughly? Do the period details add anything do the books or not? For example facts about the workings of the balloon operatives, Billy's epilepsy and the Flower streets in Liverpool in Down Daisy Street?

2) Why do these books tend to have women as their central characters? Do you think that the men always conform to particular stereotypes? And if so what are those stereotypes?

3) Why do you think sagas are perceived as being so generalised when many of them are very different in style and content - from the gritty back streets of London, to the more gentile manor houses and farmhouses of the countryside? Does it just depend on the writers?

4) Why do you think sagas tend to be set in particular areas of the country? For example Liverpool as is the case with Katie Flynn, Rosie Harris and Joan Jonker or London as is the case with Meg Hutchinson, Harry Bowling and Maggie Bennett?

5) Why do so many sagas have historical events, particularly World Wars I and II as their background? And does this restrict what they can write about - or increase their potential?

6) In Down Daisy Street Kathy and Jane have been friends since childhood, a friendship that is maintained into their adult lives. In Poor Little Rich Girl, Hester is appalled that Dick Bailey's brother has got a girl pregnant while she loves Dick from afar until their marriage. The moral values and society portrayed in both these books is quite strict and regimented - is this the case with all sagas? And why might that be?

Recommended reading:

The Bad Penny - Katie Flynn
Still Waters - Judith Saxton
Too Close to the Sun- Jess Foley
A Child at the Door- Maggie Bennett
Patsy of Paradise Place- Rosie Harris
Hearts of Gold - Catrin Collier
The Moth - Catherine Cookson
Catherine Cookson: The Biography - Kathleen Jones

Author Outlook:

See below for the viewpoints of two of our biggest saga authors, Katie Flynn and Rosie Harris, their descriptions give us some insight into where their ideas come from and how they bring their characters to life.

Katie Flynn

Katie Flynn spoke at an event to launch the hardback of her novel Down Daisy Street at Wrexham Library (28th May 2003) as part of their Arts Festival. She talked about writing her books and about how the characters in her saga bring themselves to life, below is an abridged version of her talk:

Down Daisy Street - plot Summary

Kathy Kelling is coming home to Daisy Street from her first day at High School, longing to tell her best friend, Jane, all about it. Then her brother, Billy, has a serious accident and Kathy's schooling is in jeopardy. The Kelling's life becomes a struggle; Billy needs constant attention so Mrs Kelling takes in lodgers since she's determined Kathy's schooling must not suffer.

Meanwhile, in Norfolk, young Alec Hewitt has problems of his own. A farmer's son, living within yards of the North Sea, one terrible night will change his life forever.

The War comes and Alec and Kathy meet, but it's the blonde and bubbly Jane to whom Alec is attracted…

Katie Flynn biography:

Katie Flynn has lived for many years in the Northwest. Many of her early stories were broadcast on Radio Mersey, and the reminiscences of family members prompted her to start her very successful series of books about Liverpool. She has also written books as Judith Saxton.

Katie Flynn on writing sagas:

I must tell you that starting a new book is always difficult. I know writers who will literally do anything in order not to write. They redecorate the house from attic to cellar, plough up the garden, move to Spain or start divorce proceedings… anything to put off the evil hour when they must knuckle down to sitting before the computer and actually writing the book.

So there are two sorts of writers. The ones, who follow the synopsis their publishers have approved, sit down at once and begin to write. And the others, of whom I was one of. After all, I had a whole six months to write this work of fiction… imagine it Six whole months! So no need to rush, I could perfectly well spare a month or two… Then, of course, one day I would wake up to the realisation that the deadline was only three weeks off - not three months, three weeks - and I would begin to write frantically, twenty hours a day, simply pouring out the story which though I wasn't aware of it at the time had been writing itself inside my head or in my subconscious for the previous five months. And then one day I would fish out the synopsis - and my face would pale whilst my hair stood on end… Nothing I was writing bore the faintest resemblance to the synopsis in which the publishers had such touching faith… even the names had changed and the title no longer fitted.

And given their heads, my characters do awful things. They fall in love with the wrong people, get drowned on their way to their own weddings, die in the wrong bed at the wrong time… and I follow dumbly writing down the story which the characters now seem to be telling, and don't forget that I was now writing twenty hours out of twenty four, because I have never missed a deadline yet and don't intend to start now! But for the sort of book I write I believe this is a great advantage. The people in a synopsis are unreal, just names and descriptions, but once I begin writing these people become as real to me as my own family - and possibly better known. Their actions change because they know best how they would react in certain circumstances and I simply give them their heads.

Now I am a different sort of writer. I have had to learn discipline and how to pace myself - but my characters still rule the roost.

Rosie Harris

Patsy of Paradise Place - plot summary

When Patsy Callaghan's father realises that her mother Maeve is neglecting her he stops going to see and sets himself up as a carrier on the Liverpool Docks. Patsy likes nothing more than going out on the cast with him and the boy, Billy Grant, who helps him.

But then John Callaghan is tragically killed in an accident. Maeve turns to drink but Patsy manages to keep the business going with Billy who is madly in love with her. Patsy's passions, though, lie elsewhere - with Bruno Alvarez a fairground showman whose actions will turn her world and Billy's upside-down…

Rosie Harris biography:

Rosie Harris was born in Cardiff and grew up there and in the West Country. After her marriage she lived for some years on Merseyside before moving to Buckinghamshire where she still lives. She has three grown-up children, and six grandchildren and writes full time.

Rosie Harris on the settings for her sagas:

I was born in Cardiff and I have always had a very special 'feel' about this lovely city.

When I left school I started work at Cardiff City Hall and every day as I approached that magnificent city centre I felt proud to be working there.
It is a gleaming white stone edifice, topped by a magnificent dragon. Flanking it is the equally impressive buildings of the Cardiff Museum, the Law Courts and the University buildings.

They are grouped around Cathays Park which was once part of the grounds of Cardiff Castle. The centre-piece of the splendidly laid out Alexandra Gardens is the beautiful Temple of Peace, its double colonnade enclosing the Cenotaph.
To the south is Cardiff Castle itself, an impressive reminder of the city's long history, and which until 1947 was the home of the Marquis of Bute. Flowing past it and on through the town and out into the Bristol channel is the River Taff. Another landmark which has just been added is, of course, the new Millennium Stadium, the great sports centre which replaces Cardiff Arms Park.
This is modern 21st century Cardiff but my sagas are set at the beginning of the 20th century when Cardiff was still growing, a busy seaport that was expanding almost daily thanks to thriving ship building and export of highly valued steam coal that came from the nearby mining villages.

A great many of the workers, however, were earning pitifully low wages, and the tightly packed houses were shared by two or even three families. With so much overcrowding tempers became frayed, tragedies happened and many of these streets became slums especially around Tiger Bay and the dock area.
Most of these roads have now vanished, replaced by smart office blocks or shopping precincts. I feel it is important that the memory of them and of the hardworking people who lived in them, often under dire conditions, should be remembered. This is what I try to do in my Sagas set in Cardiff and I hope they are a tribute to the wonderful wives, mother and daughters who bravely struggled against tremendous odds. They deserve to be remembered; they are the unsung founders of today's prosperous City.

When I first crossed on a ferryboat from Liverpool to Wallasey I was impressed by the grandeur of the waterfront- Liverpool became important at the beginning of the 20th century. Some of the greatest ships of all time docked in Liverpool loaded with tobacco and cotton which brought wealth to the area and raw material to the cotton mills of Lancashire.

Today all that is gone. The massive warehouses have become Art galleries and leisure centres but the waterfront, which has a skyline very similar to New York's, still remains every bit as impressive. The stately rattling Green Goddess trams have been replaced by sleek buses, but it is still a city full of bustle and importance.

Many of the Courts and alleyways around Scotland Road which feature so strongly in my Sagas have long since vanished, but I always try to make sure that their names and locations are accurate. The history of those times may reflect the raw poverty and deprivation and be something we would like to forget. I feel the stories of those who struggled against such adversities and helped to make this great city what it is today deserve to be remembered.

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