Done 28th April – added new scene of 1,321 words, which doesn’t show up as progress, but it is!
Done 29th April – added mostly complete new scene of 1,069 words – will try to finish the scene tonight.
Done 30th April – finished writing scene between Bentley + John, half way through edit of court martial.
Done 1st May – from court martial to Arctic voyage. Woo! Only a new scene with Lady Limerick to go and we’re into the happy ending!
So given that the second draft of this will be finished either tomorrow or early next week (bar illness, accidents and other acts of God) I’m trying to think of a good new title. ‘Secrets’ doesn’t really cut the mustard. Anyone out there inspired to name a gay Age of Sail novel on the theme of the damage homophobia does to society? It features one confused evangelical Christian lieutenant who discovers he’s gay, one happy go lucky gay lieutenant who learns the need for caution, an unfortunate aristocratic Captain with a sinister doctor, white slavers, pirates, a love triangle and a happy ending. Any suggestions?
Secrets – novel – first draft finished, first pass of self-editing almost complete:
Away with the Faeries – short – written:
needs me to sit down and write a quick plan, as it wants to grow longer than it should.
Boys of Summer – novel – written:
also needs me to firm up the plan, as it keeps changing shape. To do on this one: write synopsis before finishing the book in November’s NaNoWriMo.
Angelic Conversations – novel – written:
This has a good plan and is just waiting for me to finish the others. I need to decide whether anyone would publish a 100,000 word gay romance/space opera though, and whether to make it shorter for the romance market. If so, I’ll have to take out the political subplot at Queen Jane’s court, and the Decima subplot – ie all the girls.
Plans for this year: finish ‘Secrets’ by beginning of August. Finish ‘Away with the Faeries’ by end September. Finish first draft of ‘Boys of Summer’ by end of November. Maybe I’m not doing as little as I thought!
Oh, squee! Val Kovalin has reviewed my short story ‘Insubordination’ on her wonderful review site ‘Obsidian Bookshelf’. It’s always a total delight when you read a review from someone who really gets under the skin of what you were trying to do with a book or story, and Val really has the gift for that. Not to mention that her reviews are like hearing a well informed and interesting member of the slash community deconstruct a book in that kind of meta-y way that makes you want to start a conversation.
If anyone’s thinking of venturing into buying m/m books for the first time, I recommend her reviews (and not just because she likes my stuff!) because they really do give you an excellent flavor of the book before you buy it, and also because they’re so interesting in themselves.
An Interview with J.K Coi, author of the Immortals series
Who has been the biggest influence upon your work?
I think both of my parents have been the biggest influence on my work. From before I can remember, they encouraged the written word. By reading to me, helping me to learn to read on my own, and by showing me constantly that they enjoyed reading themselves, my parents fostered a love for books in me that has never diminished, and it was only natural that my love for reading evolve into a desire to create my own stories—and in that respect, I have to credit the early storytellers in my life; authors like Mark Twain, C.S. Lewis and Tolkien and then later, more contemporary influences like Stephen King.
Who is your favorite fictional character created by someone other than yourself?
I love, love, love Jamie Fraser from Ms. Gabaldon’s Outlander series. What I wouldn’t do to get stranded in 1743 Scotland with him—although I could do without the witch hunts, and I’m rather attached to modern-day plumbing.
Who is your own favorite character?
My favourite hero is Gideon from book 4 of my series, which is still on the WIP pile. In the course of learning about these characters, Gideon is the one who sticks with me the most. He’s the brother of Amy—the heroine of My Immortal. I think I love him best because he’s a reluctant warrior but comes by it honestly. He’s most at home in a laboratory studying a petrie dish, but having been dragged into the world of the Immortals, he wants to make a difference. He’s learned quickly and he’s good at what he does, but he’s still a science geek at heart.
How long have you been writing? What made you start?
I’ve been writing for years. And years. And years. I wrote in high school and in university. I stopped for a while when my career was getting off the ground and then when I had my first child. But I came back to writing about two years ago. All of a sudden it was a need I couldn’t ignore and that wouldn’t be denied.
What are you enjoying reading at the moment?
Right now I have three books that I can’t wait to read. I’ve already started a historical by Amanda Quick (Jayne Ann Krentz) called The River Knows, The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray which is book three in a fabulous YA series, and Duma Key by Stephen King. I like to keep my reading varied. I read romance, but also horror and mystery and anything else that crosses my path.
Do you do anything to summon up inspiration – write to music, have a special writing hat etc?
Honestly, I can’t write to music. I can’t write with the television on. My desk is super neat and tidy—mostly because I’m distracted very easily. Too easily. It’s disgusting really. Sometimes I even have to disconnect the internet so that I’m not tempted to go online, or I’d be wasting hours chatting, blogging and otherwise wasting time that I should be using to write.
What do you do when you’re not writing?
I work. I have a full time day job working with a large law firm. I enjoy it and it gives me a break from the characters clamouring for attention inside my head. It pays the bills and gives me freedom to indulge the other thing I do when I’m not writing. Buy shoes.
What works in progress have you got on the go at the moment?
I’m just finishing up a novella. I started it as an informal way to give myself a break and had no intention of actually writing the whole thing. I had been working on my Immortals series for two years straight after all, and after finishing book 2 (Immortal Kiss), I decided I needed to distract myself with something just for fun, give myself a chance to refocus and reload before I started writing book 3 (Dark Immortal). But it turned out to be a really great story, and before I knew it, I had fleshed out the whole book and now I’m in the process of doing a final edit.
Tell us about the books you have out.
My Immortal is being released by Linden Bay Romance May 15, 2008. It’s the first in a paranormal series about a band of immortal warriors bound to protect humanity. Rhys is their reluctant leader, and he has spent hundreds of years on the front lines fighting a deadly war against evil. Amy is the woman who brings light and love back to his life after an eternity of darkness, but she brings a terrible destiny as well—of pain and blood—a destiny that Rhys glimpses in his dreams. He knows that of all the humans he’s saved, if he should fail this one woman, it will destroy him like nothing else has been able to.
Book 2, Immortal Kiss will be coming in July, 2008 and it is Baron’s story. He’s the youngest of the Immortals, but in no way is he the least experienced. He had already lived a dangerous life in the military, and those skills have proven to be very useful in this new occupation. Baron has embraced everything about being Immortal and left his old life behind without a second thought. That is until the only woman he’s ever loved shows up on his doorstep one night—rather, her battered and broken body is dumped on his doorstep by a brutal enemy.
What one thing are you the most proud of in your life?
I’m proud of my writing accomplishments, of course. But I’m most proud of my son. He is the light of my life, the fizz in my soda. He’s five now, and every day with him has been a joy and a blessing—even when I want to scream because he’s been driving me crazy. He talks a mile a minute, so fast half the time you have no clue what he’s saying, but it’s usually some obscure fact he’s learned about animals (which he loves). I love watching him learn new things. He takes on a challenge with such enthusiasm that I just know he’s going to do great things with his life, and I can’t wait to be there every step of the way.
Do you enjoy TV and movies? If so, what are your favorite shows/films? Do you find they inspire your writing?
I do have some favourite shows, but the writer’s strike this winter was a blessing in disguise since it left me with a lot more time to write, without the distraction of television. However, when I can, I like to watch Bones and House. I love the male characters of both these shows. Bones is an FBI crime solving drama that stars David Boreanaz (late of Buffy and Angel). Besides being too good looking for words, he does a great job covering up his character’s sensitivity with male blustering and jokes. Boreanaz has got a great presence on screen, and a witty, comedic style that goes well with his co-star, Emily Deschanel’s more literal, scientific character. On the other hand, I like Hugh Laurie as Dr. House for exactly opposite reasons. His character is rude, mean and completely devoted to his medicine not to save patients, but to satisfy his own curiosity. He’s an intellect trapped in an egotistical bastard’s body. It works perfectly and creates great television—although in real life I probably would have shot him by now, lol.
~*~
Please visit me at my website for more information about upcoming books, chats, interviews, reviews, and all things Immortal: www.jkcoi.com
I’ve also broken down and gotten a myspace page: www.myspace.com/jkcoi and I’m on Facebook
I blogged in a serious sort of way over on The Macaronis, on the topic of research for writing historical fiction. The whys, whens and hows of research, along with a list of the wheres 🙂 So if you’re thinking your next/first book might be a historical, or if you’re just interested in what goes into a historical novel – (or if, like some of my friends, you don’t believe writing is hard work!) – check this out:
I was reading a thread on Making Light this morning which was, as usual, intimidatingly erudite and much too clever for me, in which people were translating poems into LOL! and Txt! speak. But I was too embarrassed to try it myself among so many works of genius. (Also I’d gone to make a coffee and lost the bookmark by then). So I thought I’d try it here instead. See if you can guess the book of which this is a summary:
GnlEI: oh hai
Strvn: hai
We can has golden ballz. Mad king is mad. Strvn *is Nigmtik*
GnlEI: u suxxors
Monkd00ds: Nifty precognishun skillz, let us show you them.
Monkd00ds: Futur-knowing pwned. Ur nihilistic despair, we upgraded it.
Nu!Cntry: Opreshun; let me show you it.
GnlEI: DO NOT WANT
Awsum Strvn is awsum, gots buket GnLE
Snow: *has a flavor*
Campy tiems is happy tiems. Dont go b4k Strvn!
Strvn: *goes b4k*
*g* It’s been a productive day, for a change. Three chapters of editing on ‘Secrets’. 500 words on a new short story, which have enabled me to discover that I should have started it somewhere else – this is progress for me! And a blog post for The Macaronis
Is there anyone out there who has a screencap of the guy Jack Harkness flirts with during the ‘Utopia’ episode of Dr. Who? The guy has sandy spiked up hair and is wearing a knitted woolen tank top and (I think) a green shirt. I don’t think he says anything but Jack says ‘and who are you?’, shakes his hand, and then is called to heel by the Doctor. He’s in this fanvid by fan_eunice which, unfortunately I can’t seem to load into movie-maker to get the component parts.
If anyone has a screen cap, can I please, please, have a copy? He’s my model for one of the guys in the short story (the one of the 500 words as mentioned above), and they do say that a picture is worth a thousand words 🙂
My overall reaction to this episode is massive squee. That was good! It messed with my expectations in the best of ways. I honestly did buy the idea that John was the bad guy until he explained otherwise. I honestly thought, when Ianto said he was going to try and shut down the nuclear reactor from the inside, that that was the end of him in a ‘going out as a hero’ season finale way. So when Owen went instead I was like ‘oh yes, of course, cos he’s already dead! Even Owen’s mysterious control over the weevils was used in a way that made loads of sense.
I think this episode had the strongest plot I’ve seen in an episode of Torchwood yet. Things worked – the aforesaid Weevils; Jack coming up through Torchwood’s floor not in one of RTD’s usual deus ex machina coincidences but in a carefully set up subplot that made time-travelling sense! I squeed, I honestly did 🙂
Of course it made no psychological sense whatsoever. Is there anyone out there who seriously believes Jack would still be sane after being buried alive for a thousand years? He’s falling into the trap of New Who – the trap of making the hero such a ghastly Mary Sue that you hate him. And why has Jack come back speaking like the Bible? Redemption? Atonement? ‘I offered you absolution’? Yes, yes, you were drawn alive out of the grave and now you live forever. Seriously, Jack, you do not make a good Christ figure, and you do not want to make a good Christ figure because someone else has already done that, better. You were more amusing as a messed up con-man trying to become a decent human being than the cut price deity you’re in danger of becoming.
Ahem, but on to other things…
While I’m ranting, can I say that the ‘hero’s evil brother’ thing has been done to death. It had been done to death when Robin of Sherwood revealed that Guy of Gisburne was Robin’s younger half-brother – and that was 20 years ago. If Jack is going to be saddled with mythic archetypes (which frankly don’t suit him) they could at least try to do it differently, or well!
Grey turning out to be evil has got to be the only ‘plot twist’ that can’t have surprised anyone at all. I was honestly hoping that Torchwood would not go there. But it did.
Still, where it didn’t go, though I thought it would, was killing Ianto. So I’m a happy camper. The fact that they killed off Tosh, who is my second favourite character is made up for by the fact that she had one hell of a death scene. Tosh saves the city! And then she saves Owen’s sanity and she does it all while dying from an abdominal wound in extremely well acted agony. Yes, it made me cry, but it made me elated too, because the writers had been consistently letting Tosh down in terms of storylines this series and she at least went out in such a way as to demonstrate to everyone that she was a big damn hero.
Owen – I fully admit that when he got locked in the reactor my thoughts were ‘oh, thank god, they’re finally going to get rid of him properly!’ But he claimed my affection with his wild, honest panic – something so human that you don’t often see from TV heroes. They finally made me believe, too, that he and Tosh might have worked after all, if they’d been given time. So that was bitter sweet and really well done.
Can I say on a shallow level that Ianto storming in and shooting everything in sight gave me a fangirlish squee? Gwen was also awesome with her take-chargeness, though I still find her behaviour with Jack inappropriate considering Rhys. LOL! But it’s amusing that the only people left standing are Jack and his harem. Probably a very good decision, ratings wise, too – since most viewers want to see Jack end up with either Gwen or Ianto, though from what I can tell there’s also a faction who are fine with him having both – and they’re pretty happy too.
To sum up; everything except for Grey and Jack’s overly epic battle = squee. But Jack? You’re not the Doctor, and you’re not any kind of deity, OK? It’s just no fun. (And frankly the Doctor used to be more interesting when he was just a well intentioned time traveling alien and not the messiah too – but that’s a different rant.)
The Boat of Small Mysteries - A cozy mystery aboard a narrowboat, in which a murder and a disappearance keep our aroace detective from fully relaxing into the idyll of country life.
