I’m not quite sure what this meme is supposed to achieve, other than to make people feel bad if they somehow fail to live up to the standard of writerly purity expected. But I’m sure the standard to be a ‘professional writer’ should not be something that I achieve effortlessly just by being lazy and reclusive.
1. Is your home/work place messy because that time you’d put into cleaning it is better spent writing?
Often, yes. However sometimes it’s messy because I’m just lazy. I’m sure I could keep the house cleanish/tidyish and still write. I just can’t be bothered.
2. Do you routinely turn down evenings out with friends because you need to be home writing instead?
Pshaw! This assumes I have friends! How ridiculous is that?
3. Do you turn off the television in order to write?
I scarcely ever watch the TV anyway. It goes on for about an hour in the evening while our household eats dinner around it. The rest of the time it stays off. I do, however, move onto a computer that doesn’t have internet in order to write.
4. Would you rather receive useful criticism than praise?
I’d rather have both. I’m grateful for useful criticism because it’s useful, but praise is also useful because without it I lose all confidence in my ability to write and stop writing.
5. Do you plan vacations around writing opportunities (either research or networking potential)?
I have one family holiday a year, for one week a year. We go where we can keep the children occupied. What I do do, writing wise, is investigate all the interesting things I can find around where we’ve gone, and hope that they may provide me with writing inspiration. Hence Shining in the Sun, inspired by the fact that we pretty much always go to Cornwall.
6. Would you rather be chatting about the business of writing with another writer than exchanging small talk with a good friend?
See above about the whole friends thing. But yes of course. I have no friends and I despise small talk. If I had a friend I would want a friend with whom I could discuss interesting things, such as writing, history, fantasy, culture and science fiction films.
7. Have you ever taken a day job that paid less money because it would give you more time/energy/material to write?
I decided to stay at home and look after my children rather than go back to work in the hopes that that would give me more time to write. It did eventually work out that way, after the first 7 years of misery.
8. Are you willing to give up the nice home you know you could have if you devoted that time you spend writing to a more lucrative career?
See above. Already done.
9. Have you done all these things for at least five years?
It took the first 7 years before they were both at school for the majority of the day. It was a long-term plan 🙂
10. Are you willing to live knowing that you will likely never meet your ambitions, but you hold to those ambitions nonetheless?
I’m sorry? My ambition was to have a book published by a publisher. That has already been achieved. Anything else is gravy.
Hurray! I got a lovely overall B review from Dear Author for The Crimson Outlaw:
http://dearauthor.com/book-reviews/overall-b-reviews/b-reviews/review-the-crimson-outlaw-by-alex-beecroft/
Except for having m/m, action, and m/m action, this was a real change of pace from the previous Beecroft novellas I’ve read, all of which were Regencies. Impressively, not only is unusual setting beautifully realized, but the entire tone of the story is completely different.
~*~
I’m glad to say that they too were tickled by the absence of vampires in a story set in Transylvania, and they were kind enough to say that I had got away with the risky proposition of playing with whole ‘helpless captive’ fantasy without actually letting it go to any of the bad places it could have gone. That was certainly my aim. Vali is an entitled, self-confident privileged brat, and if he hadn’t been having lots of fun playing with the idea of being a defenseless hostage, it would have been a whole different story (which would certainly have involved more bloodshed.)
Thank you ever so much to Willaful on DA! 🙂
To say I’m pleased with this one would be an understatement. Particularly as I know how hard the artist worked to get something that was in-period, when I kept sending the mockups back. “It’s lovely, but they didn’t wear plate armour in those days.” “I love it, but I’m sorry, we can’t have a castle because they didn’t build them yet.” “It’s gorgeous, but the heater-shield didn’t come in until the 13th Century and has to go.”
I felt like a real diva. All the more so because I know exactly how hard it is to get stockphotos which are right for any historical period. I was trying not to nitpick, but on the other hand, I also knew that anyone who knew anything about the 8th Century would look at that shield and immediately think “Whoa, 500 years out of date, I bet that author doesn’t know what they’re talking about. Either that or they have no respect for their history/readers/own work.” So I just couldn’t let it go.
However, they put up with me. They changed the shield, they changed the helmet to make it look more like a spectacle helm, and eala! I am overjoyed.
All the kudos and praise to the artist, Kanaxa 🙂
Is lucky number 13. Who is… let me go and trawl through the comments to find out…
It is Carolyn, who was sensible enough to leave me her email address, so I will also email off list to tell her she’s won 🙂 Congratulations Carolyn!
Here I am, baring my soul on the Saucy Wenches’ Book Club Neither saucy nor wench are words I would normally apply to myself, but I greatly admire Nanny Ogg, who I’m sure was the sauciest of wenches when she was younger, so I was honoured to be allowed to tag along for the day.
In which we have the final stop on the Crimson Outlaw blog tour and I talk about things like ‘can anyone write a book’ and ‘what fascinates you about writing LGBTQ romance.’
Because I’m not very good with either maths or remembering things 😉 Today I am on the Book Reviews and More blog, talking about the musical soundtrack of The Crimson Outlaw – what I found when I went looking for the evidence for what a culture sounds like.
http://www.bookreviewsandmorebykathy.com/2013/08/15/3360/
I’m also talking about why this book set in Transylvania has no vampires in it at all 😉
And I’m here on The Armchair Reader answering such frequently asked questions as ‘where do you get your ideas?’ and ‘how do you get past writer’s block?’.
Thank you so much to The Armchair Reader for having me 🙂
And thanks to the Live Your Life, Buy the Book review site for this lovely review
I’m happy to say, I found myself charmed with this historical adventure and wishing there were more pages. ? The author’s writing flows beautifully; with details so rich they placed me directly into the story. She drew me completely into the emotions of young Vali as he set off on his errant path to discovery.
And this review from mmgoodbookreviews
I recommend this if you love historicals with great details, bandits ravishing innocents, taking control of your life and finding happiness against the odds.
Thank you to everyone!
I almost forgot to add a link to this. It’s the first day of my blog tour! And today I am on the Cup o’Porn blog here
http://cupoporn.net/2013/08/12/mix-it-up-monday-with-alex-beecroft/
talking about The Crimson Outlaw – where I got the idea, why it sounds more like a fairy tale than a historical – but also talking about my writing environment and habits, my favourite quote and the first ever book I wrote.
I’ve been trying to comment over there to thank the people who have commented to it, but the site just doesn’t seem to be acknowledging my comments. I write something, press ‘Reply’ and then it just disappears. So I’m sorry if you commented over there and I seemed to ignore you. I’m grateful really, I just can’t get through!
Despite the fact that you could get a copy yesterday, today is the first day The Crimson Outlaw became available on places like Amazon and Barnes and Noble, so it’s the official release day. Huzzah!
I’ve been trying not to look at what people on Goodreads were saying about it, but so far the reaction seems to be positive, and Diane even left me a message saying she had spotted Vali’s body double over here on Facebook. Spot on!
Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed it already and made the release day such an exciting one. I’m so glad that the slightly unusual setting doesn’t seem to have put anyone off 🙂
So, the Riptide website says The Crimson Outlaw is on pre-sale, whatever that means. But in practice if you buy it now you will be able to download it immediately, plus you’ll get 20% off. Offer only valid until midnight tonight (Sunday.) So if you do want it, and you’d like 20% off, this might be the time to get it 🙂
Apologies for me jumping the gun earlier when it turned out only to be available for reviewers and not general readers.
If anyone’s curious, I decided that the exact shade of crimson I was talking about was Harvard Crimson and not any of the many pinker options it turns out also fall under the ‘crimson’ label 🙂
