Dear Author review of Hidden Conflict

I can’t believe I didn’t post this when it first came out.  I thought I had, but when I checked back recently it turned out that I hadn’t.  What an oversight!

I don’t know what it is about Beecroft’s writing that ravishes me so. Maybe it’s that her prose is like Keats’ poetry to me: redolent with scent, aching with color, and beautiful with taste and sound. Maybe it’s how she scours me inside with the deeply-felt emotions of her characters. But this story manages to do in 58 pages what False Colors did to me in more than 300.

Hee!  A comparison to Keats!  I am beyond chuffed 😀

There’s a certain amount of quibbling in the comments, but you can’t win them all 🙂

It seems this week is going to be a holiday

Or at least, I’ve done no writing today, and tomorrow I’m off to the Reenactor’s Market all day.  Oh well, Away with the Faeries is now 22,224 words long, though only on Chapter 7.  It’ll benefit from me having a couple of days to mull it over.

It should be an exciting weekend, what with the market on Friday and the fact that on Sunday I’m going to a bodhran course run by Mog of Renegade Rhythms.  I can’t help fearing that this may be slightly excruciating, given the state of my left arm – but that’s what painkillers are for!  For a bonus, I have ordered my very own drum from him, and will be able to pick it up at the same time (and if I test it out and don’t like how it sounds, he’ll have others there which I can try instead.)  Very cool!

Of course, once I’ve got it home, I’ll have to hand it to Andrew to be wrapped up for Christmas, and won’t see it again for a month, but you can’t have everything 🙂

On other news, this is a great post by Jackie Kessler on the subject of Harlequin’s move into vanity publishing.  It’s particularly sad, because they had just launched Carina Press, which was going to take LGBT romance, and everyone was very excited that this meant a real breakthrough into one of the biggest romance publishers out there.  Now they’ve pretty much devalued their entire brand and been banned from RWA in the process.  Not good.

Shoulder bad news/good news

So, I went to the physiotherapist today, and she prodded my shoulder and asked me to demonstrate how far I could raise my arm in various directions, and how well I could push against resistance.  This apparently showed her that my muscles were in good shape, but the problem was with the capsule of the shoulder, around the bone.  In short, I have absolutely classic symptoms of frozen shoulder.

Good news – it’ll go away by itself given time.

Bad news – we’re talking up to three years time.  Also I’m still in ‘the early stages’, so the pain and inability to use that arm will only increase until it’s pretty much useless.  At which time, I’m told, swimming is going to have to consist of backstroke legs only, and I may find even jumping up and down morris dancing too painful, even if I’m not moving the arm at all.  I’m a little worried because it’s already getting painful to drive, and if it gets worse, that’s going to be out, so I’ll be stuck at home.

I’m also a little worried because the other shoulder has similar symptoms, though much less advanced.  I really hope I’m not going to be stuck with neither arm working, four months down the line.

Further good news = at least I can still type.  And I have exercises to do to stop the muscles from atrophying in the couple of years I won’t be able to use them.

More good news than bad?  Probably.  At least it will get better in time.

Yay for good reviews :)

The Hidden Conflict anthology carries on getting great reviews 🙂 This one’s from Jessewave.  Thanks Wave!

http://www.reviewsbyjessewave.com/?p=11012

“any historical romance lover would be thrilled to possess such a wonderful chronology of the lives of a few soldiers in the times that shaped history.”

~*~*~*~

The I Do anthology has been Joyfully Recommended!  If you’re smarting
about the vote in Maine, or you’ve buckled in for the long haul fighting
Prop 8, this would be a great book to buy for that book lover in your
life, as all profits from the anthology go to help the fight for
marriage equality.

Also, it’s a great book!  Joyfully Recommended by Joyfully Reviewed.

“I Do! Is the best collection of same sex love stories I’ve come across
in a while. Each story is unique and will appeal to different people. I
got reacquainted with authors I know and met a few new ones as well.

My favorite stories were the bright, happy ones but those that touched
me more deeply were the ones that hit me in the heart…

… all of the stories in I Do! are gripping and so emotionally charged
that you can’t wait to read the next one. I Joyfully Recommend I Do!”

http://www.joyfullyreviewed.com/reviews/RRs/Nov09RR/ido.antho.html

Thank you, Willow!

Go Red Three!

The Red Arrows have just recruited their first female pilot, Flt Lt Kirsty Moore

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8350286.stm

I remember being part of the generation who were told that women just couldn’t bear up to G forces as well as men.  Amusingly enough there’s a little aside in the article that says “and then we redesigned the flight suits to suit women and after that, they could.”  So all that time I’d been thinking it was a genetic thing, and actually it was just that women were trying to do the job in equipment designed for men, like trying to drive a car when the seat was set too far back for them to reach the pedals.

My daughter, Air Training Corps cadet that she is, is going to be stoked to hear this! 🙂

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

In which I join the throng

In a spirit of trying to broaden my mind and my experience of the Romance genre (I grew up reading SF/Fantasy, and had never read a romance before writing Captain’s Surrender), I decided to try some of the famous authors I’ve been hearing about.

Georgette Heyer was not exactly a disappointment because – aware of my enormous ignorance – I was not really expecting anything.  On the whole, after trying three of her books, I’ve decided she’s not really my cup of tea.  I don’t like her heroes, and I get bored with the way all the characters seem to spend page upon page doing nothing more than exchange wearingly ‘witty’ dialogue.  She’s clearly a good writer, but she’s not my thing.

Nora Roberts on the other hand… I just read “Blood Brothers” by her, in which three childhood friends-turned-heroes have to defend their town from an ancient evil, with the help of three conveniently turned up sassy heroines. And I can’t wait until I can find the next book in the series and read what happens next.

I wouldn’t say her style is much more than ‘perfectly competent’, but she has a real storytelling gift.  Her pacing is wonderful – I never got bored.  Her characterisation is wonderful, with all six main characters individual and likable, and the minor characters well drawn too, and the book is chock full of plot.  I skipped the sex scenes because I’m like that, but there were few enough of them that it didn’t put me out more than a couple of pages.

I liked all her heroes and I liked all her heroines, and I liked the dynamic between them in which nobody gets overwhelmed or subjected to bad gender roles.  And there were demons, and mysteries to be solved, and paranormal, spooky goings on, so that the characters actually got to do something together and prove how clever and brave they were (very brave, possibly not that clever.)

I’ll definitely be reading the next two books in the series, and then looking out her J.D.Robb novels as well.

25% off Samhain books at All Romance

If you were thinking about getting the new edition of Captain’s Surrender in ebook, then this is a good opportunity to get it cheap 🙂

The book collector strikes again

I’m definitely not much of a collector of anything, except for odd socks.  However, a year or so ago I found a book called “Rodney” by David Hannay for sale on abebooks, and as I’m a bit of a fangirl of Admiral Lord Rodney, I bought it, only to find that it was published in 1891 and I was now the proud possessor of a book which was almost 120 years old.

Well, today I went into the Oxfam charity second hand bookshop in Cambridge, and discovered both volumes of Oliver Goldsmith‘s  The Citizen of the World, published in 1790, available for £25 for the pair!  The second volume may be (as Terry Pratchett would say) slightly foxed and lightly badgered as well, with it’s front board detached (but still present) and the ends of its spine missing.  But the first volume is almost perfect apart from a bit of staining.  It’s actually in better condition than the Rodney book, and the gold work on the spine still gleams.

They’ve got the ‘f’s for ‘s’es and everything 🙂  I couldn’t let fuch wonderful books languifh in a fhop, or even go to a home that wouldn’t appreciate them.  Not when it would cost me £17.50 even to get the modern paperback.

So now I’m the proud owner of two books which are almost 220 years old!

I’m beginning to get a taste for this 🙂  I’m also thinking that I’d like to have the second volume restored so that the front doesn’t keep falling off.  Anyone know anything I ought to know about re-binding ancient books, before I go out and look someone up to do it?

Giving up NaNo

Word count on “Away with the Faeries”

15085 / 50000 words. 30% done!

So, I’ve completed 30% of the novel in the first week.  But despite my defense of NaNo on the metawriters site and elsewhere, I think I’ve decided to give up for this year and possibly for good.

I’m really not enjoying it the way I did the first year.  I’m too aware that the focus on getting the words out fast means that I am not thinking them through.  I’m getting very aware of all the massive editing problems I’m storing up for myself after I’m finished – such as needing to re-write chapter 3 in Chris’ POV rather than Ben’s.  I’m aware that my POVs are not balanced, and that my characters are tending to do things that don’t make psychological sense.  And that’s because I can’t tell what they’re feeling, because I’m writing too fast to be able to get into their heads.

It’s not working, and I’m thinking that I will switch back to my more usual pace of between 1,050 and 1,400 words a day, which has thinking time and looking-stuff-up time built in.  And also doesn’t make me snippy and unpleasant to my family and unable to answer my emails.  It might also allow me time for swimming, which I need on account of the fact that my shoulders are now so bad that I can’t wear jumpers (too painful to pull them over my head) or sleep properly at night.

At a pace of 1,050 words a day, I should get the first draft finished in three months (call it four to take account that not much writing happens over Christmas), and it should need about half the editing it would need if I did it in one.  Which may even end up being faster in the long run.

I don’t like to be a quitter but, as you can see, I am at least quitting while I’m ahead 🙂