I should make some resolutions, shouldn’t I? How about these –
Get back to my target weight.
(While I was ill, my digestive system went freaky, so I could gain or lose half a stone in a week without any changes of diet. I had absolutely no control over it, and after a couple of months of angsting about it I abandoned attempts to establish control as futile. Now that I am no longer anemic, due to the wonders of intravenously administered iron, it’s time to get back into the driving seat there.)
Walk or dance every week day
(I haven’t been able to get off the sofa for 6 months. I badly need to get reasonably fit again.)
Practice my whistle playing every week day
It’s amazing how fast you can lose all the tunes you know if you don’t practice them, and I have a massive book of morris tunes to learn and memorise. That’s not going to happen without some dedication.
Write at least 250,000 words of new fiction this year. Preferably 300,000.
(I wrote 260,000 words last year. Now that I’m no longer ill, I can surely add another 40,000.)
This one has sub-goals and a certain amount of vagueness attached, because you never know exactly how the muse will strike:
Finish editing Blue Eyed Stranger and Trowchester Blues before April.
Write third book in Trowchester series.
Find a publisher for The Glass Floor or publish it myself.
Write a new Fantasy.
Write that murder-mystery I’ve always wanted to try.
Edit and polish all these new things!
Try some short stories?
That’s it for new year’s resolutions. They’re more a case of setting goals which I know I can achieve. I will also not be too upset if I only walk or whistle 3 times a week – as long as I don’t end up not doing it at all.
People say that you don’t achieve your resolutions, but my feeling is that in that case you just set them too high. It’s useful to give yourself something to do that you know you can do. But even if you don’t fully achieve them, if you’ve tried to, you’ve probably achieved a lot more than you would have done had you not decided to aim for anything at all.
“Do or do not, there is no try,” is – excuse me George Lucas – bollocks. Everything that you achieve is achieved by trying and almost doing it, and then trying again and getting a little closer, and then trying again and doing it – fairly badly, and then trying again and doing it slightly less badly. Etc.
Edge up to your successes gently so that neither you nor they get startled and scared away.
who is guest posting here today in honour of the launch of her new Christmas short story Home for the Holidays. I gave her my standard third degree, and here are her answers 🙂
1. What was your first book and what was it about?
The first novel I completed I wrote as a teenager. It was about a group of street kids, and I’m afraid it wasn’t very good! *laughs* I never even tried to get it published. But after starting and abandoning about a dozen projects before that, completing the manuscript was a huge thing for me. That was the first time I knew I could do it – I could actually write novels! Woohoo!
2. What works in progress have you got on the go at the moment?
I’m currently working on a gay romantic comedy called “For Me, It’s You” and I can’t wait to finish writing it. I’m really quite fond of the main characters Sam and Gabe, a barista and a rock star. They’re complete opposites and yet a perfect match, and they make me smile a lot while I write them.
3. Who is your favorite fictional character created by someone other than yourself?
Oh, there are so many fictional characters I love, it’s hard to pick just one! I think it’s a tie between Samwise Gamgee from Lord of the Rings and Anne Elliot from Jane Austen’s Persuasion. I love them both for not giving up even when things seem hopeless.
4. Who is your own favorite character?
Ugh, another tough question! At the moment it might be Dean Monroe who is such a wild, untamable character – unlike any I ever created. But I also love Rizzo and James from Triangle. I’ve written those two boys for so many years they seem like old friends.
5. Tell us about the books you have out
My first German novel “Café der Nacht” (Café of the Night) just got published this November, which has me all kinds of excited. Before that, my co-author Romelle Engel and I self-published a novel about a gay love triangle, “Triangle – The Complete Series”. It’s a series we originally posted online, and by popular demand we finally put it out as an ebook and paperback. At the beginning of December I published a sequel called “Home For The Holidays – A Triangle Christmas Short Story” which, as the title suggests, is a Christmas story. I love this time of year!
6. If your book became a big Hollywood film, who would you cast to play your characters?
Wow, how awesome would that be? For Monroe I have two actors I would love to see in the role – either Stephen Dorff or Ken Duken. Both are terrific actors and I know they could bring the intensity and passion required to the role. For Maxim I can’t think of anyone being a better fit than Tom Schilling. He actually looks exactly like I always imagined Maxim.
7: How did you feel the day you held the copy of your first book in your hands?
Honestly, that was one of the happiest days of my life! After years of getting turned down, holding my printed book in my hands was a dream come true. It’s only been a month since it came out – I still can’t quite believe it!
8. What upcoming project of your own are you most excited about?
I’m really excited about “November Boys”, my next project after “For Me, It’s You”. It’s an unusual love story, and even though I’m still in the early panning stages I’m already in love with the characters. I can’t wait to actually start writing them!
9: Do you think you have specific themes you continue to return to? If so what are they?
I think a major theme in all my work is that when you found that special someone, you should never let them go. If you love someone, don’t hold back, be sure to let them know. Even if all odds are against you, love is always worth fighting for.
10: Who is your favorite author and what is your favorite genre to read?
Jane Austen is my favourite author. I just love her work so much. As far as genres go, I do love a good love story, no matter if it’s het, gay, or anything else. I also really like urban fantasy.
11: Tell us more about who you are. Anything you want your readers to know? Information on where to find your books, any blogs you may have, or how a reader can learn more about you and writing?
Hi! I’m Susann. I write m/m and other LGBT novels, some light and charming, some with a slightly darker edge – but always with a happy ending. I publish books in English and German, am owned by a particularly crazy cat and live in Germany. I’m online a lot, and I love fandom. Come visit my website and say hi, I’d be delighted!
My official website & blog: http://www.susannjulieva.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/SusannJulieva
Twitter: http://twitter.com/susannjulieva
You can find my books on Amazon and Smashwords (http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/susannjulieva)
Thank you for interviewing me, Alex! It’s been a real pleasure.
Went to see The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug last night and… it was OK.
Let’s get this out there – I’m the kind of person who finds action sequences boring. I sighed in Raiders of the Lost Arc as Indy was attempting not to be sucked into the treads of a speeding tank. So, in The Hobbit #1 I checked my watch during the goblin tunnel sequences, and in The Hobbit #2 I started wondering how much longer I was going to have to be there during the running around in the mountain stuff.
No film that replaces a sense of wonder/magic/dread with a hell of a lot of running around and shouting is ever really going to do justice to these books, for me.
Because I think I’ve figured out what it is about Peter Jackson’s films that I don’t like. He is utterly cliche. He trivializes everything except for the warrior’s journey. That macho thing that involves being able to kill more people than anyone else? With its trappings of masculinity and kingship and manpain – that very thing that Tolkien undermined by having his heroes be ordinary and small and the kind of people who had never picked up a weapon in their lives, that’s the thing that PJ is all about.
He made LotR into Aragorn’s story instead of Frodo’s, and he’s made The Hobbit into Thorin’s story instead of Bilbo’s.
And in doing so he’s taken away so much of what made these books unique. Now the films play like a D&D quest, where it’s all running from things and amassing hit points and banter and hollow heroism where heroism means killing things.
I saw threats aplenty from the beginning to the end, but I saw none of the regular beats of beautiful things that Tolkien puts in there. Beorn is… where’s the wonder and fun of him? The threat, yes, it’s there in the book, but you come away feeling like you’ve seen a marvelous and beautiful thing that ought to be preserved. In the film it’s all threat except for a few shots of pretty scenery. Where’s the wonder and yearning of the wood-elves’ songs and partying in the darkness of Mirkwood that makes everyone run towards them even though they were warned not to leave the path? Where’s the sense of relief and plenty on reaching Lake Town that makes you happy that these people exist, despite their slightly oily master?
Now everything’s got to be threatening or corrupt or both, and it makes me wonder why anyone’s bothering to save Middle-earth, since it’s obviously a dump.
I liked Tauriel, and she’s nicely canon in the sense that Tolkien wrote that among elves there was no gender segregation, so that the only task that could not be done by both genders was the baking of lembas (which was a female-only craft.) But if you’re going to go that way, then where were all the other female elves? Where were all the other female elf fighters/guardsmen/extras? How come none of the merchants/toll booth workers/officials in Lake Town were women? Putting Tauriel in there as a token woman just throws into stark relief how few other women there are with speaking parts. And writing a love triangle around her just because she’s there and she’s female? Not on, PJ. Really not on.
I’m going to watch the third one really because I can’t not. But I doubt if I’ll be buying any of them on DVD. I don’t want to watch either of them again.
It may seem that I’ve phased out again, and certainly the blogging is sporadic, but quite a bit of paddling’s been going on under the surface. The consultants have finally decided that there’s no way I’m getting my iron levels back to normal without one or possibly two iron transfusions, which will each give me 4 months’ worth of iron in one shot. They mentioned that the chest pain and the breathlessness I’ve been suffering was also a symptom of anemia – I never knew that! They think my period is the culprit, causing me to lose all the iron, so I’m to go to get the GP to do something to put a stop to that for the rest of my life, pump me full of iron, and I should be OK again. I can’t wait.
On the writing side of life, I passed my 250,000 word target for the year today. I’m not doing NaNo, as I’ve failed it the last 3 years and that’s rather discouraging, but the yearly word target allows me to have big gaps and days off when I’m editing/planning, being a mum or being ill, while catching up whenever I can.
I’m not stopping at that, because I’m on scene 27 of Trowchester Blues, which is planned as a 30 scene book, and I want to finish it by Christmas. (Ideally I want to finish it next week.) So my eventual total will probably be more like 275,000, which is not too shabby 🙂
I think, despite being ill for the last 6 months, this is the first year when I’ve been properly productive. Now I’ve just got to keep it up.
I meant to organize something organized for the launch of this book, but I failed. However, Stevie came to my rescue and interviewed me on her blog, so if you wanted to know a little bit more about Too Many Fairy Princes and why I am suddenly all about the elves, those answers are available here:
http://stevie-carroll.livejournal.com/222476.html
Thanks Stevie!
Too Many Fairy Princes is out today! I would be more enthusiastic about this if I was not (a) anaemic and (b) still sedated after yesterday (literally, I’m not yet legal to drive a car as it hasn’t worked its way out of my system yet.) So I’m afraid I cannot manage anything terribly upbeat. I’ll have to content myself by saying that I will give away a free copy to the first five people who comment, if you will promise to review it on Amazon. Like it, hate it, I don’t mind, but I’d really be grateful if you would tell people about it, because I am just … I just can’t, at the moment. Sorry.
Too Many Fairy Princes
Happily ever after doesn’t always come quietly. Sometimes it puts up a fight.
Kjartan’s family is royally dysfunctional. He’d prefer to ignore the lot of them, but can’t since his father has set him and his brothers on a quest to win a throne Kjartan doesn’t even want. Worse, his younger brother resorts to murder and forces Kjartan to teleport—without looking where he’s going.
Art gallery worker Joel Wilson’s day has gone from hopeless, to hopeful, then straight to hell. One minute he’s sure his boss has found a way to save the floundering business, the next he’s scrambling to sell everything to pay off a loan shark. If anyone needs a fairy godmother right now, it’s Joel. What he gets is a fugitive elven prince in a trash bin.
They’ll both have to make the best of it, because fairy tales run roughshod over reluctant heroes. Particularly when there aren’t enough happy endings to go around.
What I appreciated the most is Kai’s characterization… there was a lot in his character I could relate to as sympathetic, decent and likeable, but there was always something in him that felt alien to me and I really liked that. I liked that he felt like being from another world, rather than just looking like one.
Sirius for Dear Author.
Yes! Result! If there’s one thing I can’t bear, it’s elves that don’t feel any different from humans with pointy ears. I can’t tell you how badly I wanted for Kai to feel like he was of a different species or order of being to the rest of us. It’s not an easy thing to draw a character who reads as convincingly inhuman, when all you have to go on is your own humanity. So I am so chuffed that it worked.
I reserve judgement on the issue of the coincidence in the plot. I think that fateful revelations of this kind are part of the way the fairy tale universe works, more often than not. But it’s not terribly realistic outside of storybook rules, I agree.
Thanks so much Sirius/DA 🙂
I’m still shuffling from doctors to hospital and back again while ingesting various chemicals and being scanned for things. CT scan yesterday, in which they tried to put a cannula in me in three different places and my veins played hide and seek. Back for another day of being sedated on the 4th of November… So, normal life has still not resumed.
On the plus side I had an absolutely gorgeous review of Blessed Isle today:
Now, I can’t recommend this enough. It’s one of those rare stories that is more than the sum of good plot + good characterisation = success. Blessed Isle is more than an experience, it’s a memory and you will live it. This is a love story that will survive centauries. It’s beautiful.
Which can’t be bettered
I am half way through writing Trowchester Blues, at a wordcount of 36K, which means that it seems well within reach to plan to finish it during NaNoWriMo. We have here the ex-cop falling for the not-quite-ex-enough con, both of whom are mature gentlemen in their forties. I remember the mid-life crisis up close and personal, and sometimes it’s nice to write characters who are closer to your own age.
But the most exciting thing going on at the moment is the imminent release of Too Many Fairy Princes described by Publisher’s Weekly as an “effervescently charming fantasy romance”
It’s due out on the 5th of November, which is fortunately a day on which I’m not due to be sedated, huzzah! I can’t wait 🙂
Remember remember the 5th of November,
nefarious fairies and plots.
The Queen has her two-bore and she’ll always be sure
she welcomes those goblins with shots.
Or at least, the publication day of Too Many Fairy Princes approaches, but I liked the grammar of the title better.
I have a lovely early review from Publisher’s Weekly, calling it an “effervescently charming fantasy romance”
http://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-61921-742-3
but due to the whole ‘being ill since June’ thing I have not managed to arrange any kind of blog tour. How would anyone out there feel about me doing a guest spot on your blog? I’m really not getting the hang of this marketing and promotion thing, and I desperately need help.
Reciprocal spot on mine guaranteed whenever you like, of course!
Off to hospital tomorrow to swallow a camera so they can check whether this is a stomach ulcer or not. They sounded alarmed that I’ve been steadily getting more anemic even while I was taking iron tablets, and instead of going “Take this and come back in a month” they’re now going, “OK, next week is too far away, can you come in tomorrow?” I can’t say I’m looking forward to it, but I get the choice to be sedated while it happens, so I think I’ll go for that.
This has all put a bit of a crimp on the writing, but I have started a new book and am 8000 words in. As is typical of me, having blogged about the Fantasy I began thinking “This needs more research time,” and have ended up writing a contemporary instead. This is fun because I have decided to take a leaf out of many peoples’ books (Midsomer, St. Mary Meade etc) and create my own small English city rather than set the book somewhere that really exists. So now I’m enjoying mapping out the environs and features of Trowchester, which will contain everything I find at all interesting and nothing I don’t. This satisfies my desire to worldbuild while also being cosily familiar, and I can do with as much cosy as I can get at the moment.
