Can't believe it's August already!

Gonna have to go some if I want to try to hit any of the August submission dates. I don't think I'm going to make it - not unless I try to scrape something together which seems a tad self-defeating. Makes more sense to concentrate on finishing off my Taming submissions - 2 more weeks and I hit 4 years - and then look around at what various publishers are looking for.

In home news, the psychiatrist says LM has no psychological issues - they're all behavioural. Basically, she understands exactly what she shouldn't do - she just chooses to do it anyway. So back to the counsellor to see if we can get to the root of why she does the things she does. Sigh, I kinda knew it before the psychiatrist said it but still slightly deflating.

Went swimming this morning - told LM that I would try to teach her to swim a whole length of the pool without armbands. We had fun - although she doesn't seem to trust that she will float and panics a bit. I'm not sure we'll meet our goal but I know she had a good time which makes a nice change.  Of course, it was blissful whilst I was in there - weightless, able to move around easily. As soon as I made my way up the ladder, gravity hit me like a tonne of bricks and I am in agony.  The disabled showers at this centre are marvellous and I just sat there for a while, luxuriating in the hot water pounding against my back, but soon enough it was time to get out of there and driving home was torture. Have basically spent the rest of the day feeling like death warmed up, back stiff as a board and dreading doing it again. But we will - it's good exercise for me and her, and it's important that I stick to what I say I'll do.

So we have the new taming prompt : flail. If ever there was a prompt with Teen Wolf written all over it, this one is it. 

So maybe tonight I'll try to churn out the first story for the week and then there won't be such a rush.

Easter Holidays are over

Some of the time it was brilliant. LM had her birthday party as well as a trip to the Midland Go Karting company to spend an hour driving laps like a lunatic in a go-kart. She loved it and was pretty good, if not a bit of a speed demon.

We went to Merry Hill shopping centre and walked around for ages - next time I need to (a) have some money and (b) plan the route better. LM had her ears pierced and everyone was good.

The rest of the time though, LM was a screaming pain in the butt and it made me feel so sad that her big sister came down to spend time with her and had to suffer through the abuse. But hey, I got to spend time with three of them which is special, very very special.

I have been playing Covet like a complete lunatic - finding out there are groups on FB where you can join simply to get access to more wardrobes by friending a lot of people - that was pretty darn cool! So now instead of having 6 friends, I have something like 128! And yes, I am borrowing from every wardrobe I can!

Tomorrow, the anthology Juicy Bits is released with my story in it, and maybe I'm a little bit scared that people will hate my contribution. Oh dear, that might explain the lack of closed-eyes!!

Writing-wise, I've kept up with my Taming the Muse and am on 193 weeks, writing at least 500 words per week. Sounds really impressive and in a way it is. Not so impressive when I consider that I haven't written anything original in over a month, possibly two. I can blame so many things but what it boils down to is that I need to get a grip on real life - whether it's accepting that this is how things are going to be and I need to work with it OR this is what I need to do to make things better - and just WRITE!

No more excuses - just WRITE.

Nearly 2 a.m. so time to log off and get some sleep. But tomorrow, I'm going to take my own advice.

End of the weekend

I've had a really good weekend, although I should get the bad news out of the way first.

It would appear that the CEO of Silver Publishing has done a runner, taking with him all of the royalties he owes the authors. Not going to go into too much detail here but I've received full rights to 'Alien Christmas' back and can pretty much kiss goodbye to any money owed to me. It's all a bit dramatic, traumatic and has left a bad taste in my mouth. I can only be relieved that I only had one story with them as there are other people who are out a great deal of money.

LM was dropped with her paternal grandparents on Friday so that she could be there for their 50th wedding anniversary party. She's also having a mini birthday party and spending some time at their church play scheme, so all in all, I think she's having a ball. A little strange for me as I have always been there for each of the kids' birthdays, so to let her go be with someone else on her 10th birthday - double digits at last - feels strange.

I collect her on Wednesday and basically from then on, it's going to be presents, mini party here with my side of the family, and all of her other presents e.g. go-karting experience, getting her ears pierced, cinema trip, etc.

MD and I went up to visit my sister in Cambridge and finally met the latest addition to the family, my Great Nephew. He's absolutely gorgeous with the most striking blue eyes I have ever seen!! I got to hold him and he even fell asleep on me - unfortunately, by the time MD got to hold him he seemed quite grumpy and wouldn't settle. Got to have a nice chat with sister and my Bil, who has said he'll take some photos for MD of her cake work as she's setting up a blog and hoping to go into business over the summer with her baking.

I'll put up links to her blog, etc when she's happy with how it looks.

Last but not least, I sent my galley proofs of '2 Weeks 6 Days 2 Long' to a couple of friends for honest review and got a reply today.

THIS IS A REALLY GREAT SHORT STORY!!! Seriously, you know how picky I can be when I put my mind to it, but this is ready to go as-is.

You hit a nice balance of background, family bonds, and hotness, which makes for an enjoyable and _marketable_ story. (Tougher to do in a short story than with a higher word count; this is nicely concise, yet fully fleshed-out).

I'm really chuffed as I value this person's opinion and she has always been very honest with me about what she thinks of what I've written. So if she likes it, then it's good!! I just hope other people share her opinion!!

I'm hoping that the next few days without LM will awaken my original muse and I can get some writing done.Here's hoping!

Juicy Bits Anthology on the Coming Soon Page.....

Out on 28th April, one of my stories is part of the Juicy Bits Anthology from Dreamspinner Press.

2 Weeks 6 Days 2 Long by S K Manganelli Matt’s partner Craig has been away on business for almost three weeks and he’s getting fed up with sleeping on his own. It seems he’s not the only one. Craig surprises him with an early return at a family get-together. Matt is even more amazed when Craig demonstrates how much he missed Matt, and that two weeks and six days are simply too long to be apart! Click the pretty to pre-order!

Procrastination is an art form....

...of which I seem to be a master. I can't even say that I don't have the idea in my head because I do - I have a rough outline of what I want to write, and approximately 1000 words already written. I just - can't seem to make myself write the next couple of thousand.

There's a deadline - 15th April - which is getting closer and closer, especially as I have to travel to take LM up to visit her grandparents; counselling appointments for LM; and hopefully visting family.

I've opened the word document, re-read what I've already written, pulled out the writing book with my notes - all set to get started. And now all I want to do is sleep, watch TV and read fanfic. It doesn't even need to be good fanfic - just pages and pages of something to focus on instead of writing.

Part of it is fear I think. The story is due out soon and I'm concerned about the reaction to it. I got seriously burned by Alien Christmas so can't help being anxious for this one. Add to that the fact that Silver Publishing is being taken over and I may never see the royalties from Alien Christmas - all of it just seems a bit overwhelming.

LM been screaming on and off for four hours because she was asked to sweep the (miniscule) hallway and I just want to put my head into a bucket of water and scream.

Hmmm, maybe it's not procrastination - maybe it's just plain old depression!

Review of 2013

Actually, not so much of a review as a bit of a ramble.

I've been living inside my own head for a few days. The reviews for 'Alien Christmas' really upset me - like, unable to write upset me.  There's no point in going on a long diatribe as to why they've upset me - I'm pretty sure that anyone who's created anything and had to read/listen to other people's views on it will get it - the need to defend and explain that in the end won't make any difference to the reviews you've already got and could prejudice anything for the future. So, suffice it to say that I've had to promise Stripelessz that I won't go off into a fit of depression over every negative review or consider it the end of my writing career as I know it.

I write because I need to. I write what I like, what I enjoy, what I would want to read. And there are going to be people who like it and people who don't. I'm loving writing fanfic at the moment but I also have about four different original stories that I would like to finish and maybe send off to be considered and I won't do that if I keep living in my head.

On a private note, we might be getting a flat which means packing up a four bedroom Victorian house and moving to a small three bedroom flat. Better for us financially and security-wise, but still going to make the next couple of months busy, full of hassle and financially draining in the first instance. I want to make sure I keep writing but I need to start weeding through my stuff - dvds, books, clothes, etc - and deciding what to keep and what to get rid of. I did it 18 months ago but there is still so much stuff there. I need to let go of the past - anything not used/worn in the last 18 months needs to go - gulp!

Christmas was lovely as I spent it surrounded by various members of family. I've not been as sick either - at the moment, it's just a slight throat infection, lightheadedness and a temperature so for me, pretty darn good.

I have an idea for my first taming the muse for this week - the prompt is Cox swain which I must admit made my head spin in several directions as I debated dropping out of the entire thing as I tried to figure out how I was going to shoe-horn that into anything I'm in the middle of writing. The first one is going to be a complete one-shot because getting coxswain into any of my current stories may be above my capabilities!!

It's back to being me, Striplessz and Gidget at home which is good - school starts next week, and there are hospital appointments at the end of this week. I think we're all going through variations of coming down from Christmas so we're living in jimjams and trying to be nice to each other. Can't ask for a better start to the year than that.

Resolutions:
* prove that getting a story published wasn't a fluke;
* stop melting down at every negative review - a work in slow progress;
* finish 'Parental Units' and accept that it may well be one of the last bits of Spander fanfic that I write. I need to finish 'Refuge' with The Lady and I signed up for 'Spangel Rekindled' at the end of January but I think that's pretty much it.
* get back into Atkins and lose some weight.

Hmm, they may be a tad weighted in the writing department - can I consider them as personal growth or do I need to look at other areas of my life too? If you've made it to the end of this, well done on wading through my crap!

I wish you a lovely end to 2013 and hope your 2014 brings you everything you truly need and desire.

S x

Merry freakin' Christmas aka...

...don't visit your book on Amazon unless you've prepared yourself! Very quiet day as no kids and this evening ended up on Amazon. I didn't even realise 'Alien Christmas' would be on there - yes, I really am that unaware. Unfortunately for me, the first review is a bad one - like, they found the story laughable type of bad. I read the review a couple of times and let it sit with me. Then, once I'd got over the urge to submerge my face in a vat of ice cream, I decided it was one person's view. And everyone is entitled to their own opinion.

 I won't say it didn't hurt because heck yeah, to have your first ever published story described as laughable is a hit to the ego, but I knew there would be bad reviews - you can't please everyone. And it's the first story so it isn't going to be perfect. I have to trust in the friends who give me their (direct) honest opinion that it's a good story - it can't be that bad otherwise no publisher would have picked it up! So, big girl pants on and move along.

 On other news, I got some money as a Christmas present so I think I will hit the shops when I get the kids back. Treat myself to something nice, although since my idea of a nice self-present is an Arc writing book from Staples and I already have one in every colour they have, I may have to broaden my range a little.

 I've finished one Taming for the week but still have 500 words to write by Saturday. And that werewolf story isn't going to write itself, so enough celebrating and time to knuckle down and write something. After all, I promised myself 2013 was the year I would send something off to be published - 2014 is the year I try to prove that getting published wasn't a fluke!

 P.s. Still kinda want that vat of ice cream though...

Should you review your own work?

Stripelessz and I are sat discussing my first bad review and whether or not I should review my own book. I thought it might be a good idea because I don't think it's perfect and it might give insight into where my squirrelly brain was going with everything. However, she made me see that it would either look like I was tooting my horn and people wouldn't trust the review anyway OR it would look like I hate the story and people wouldn't buy it because if I didn't like it, why would they?! So, no review from me on Alien a Christmas.

 Interestingly enough, the 'bad' review I got encompasses some of the things I personally think of the story. Because it's a short story, something had to be missing - in this case it was background on the characters, bringing other people into it, and the Sci Fi elements. It was never meant to be a science fiction story but because it has an alien in it, it kinda has to have that tag. Part of me wonders if I could actually write more on Stoly and Ramsay - how they met and got together, the ceremony, what happens next. But my muse isn't being forthcoming with that at the moment.

 Positives I got from the review: they finished reading it so they didn't hate it entirely, lol!! They thought it was too short which means they wanted more - yay! The sex was hot - phew!

I liked the fact that Goodreads talks to you about the review and what you shouldn't do - I imagine some people have ignored that advice and regretted it when it looked like an author tantrum. And hey, look, I got my first negative and I'm not curled up under the duvet crying - yay me!

 Happy Christmas! Xx

Werewolf fic has eaten my brain!!

I've started a short shapeshifter fic, sort of writing to a submission I saw - of course, now I can't remember which publisher it was with *d'oh* And in the meantime, I'm knee-deep in a Sterek fic that's light on plot and heavy on the whoa, semi-beastly sex!! It looks like the muse is determined to get me writing mating and knotting with a vengeance. It started as a one shot, but is currently on four chapters and I feel like I might have to write a follow-up to see what happens in the aftermath. So here it is, His Inner Beast. Derek’s letting out his inner wolf-man and the plan to use Stiles as bait to bring him back goes awry. No surprise there then... my first multi-chapter Sterek fic, you can read it by clicking on the nifty little banner I created or clicking here

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I was so right....

....by the end of it, I hated edits!! First there was the whole Libre won't show comments and I don't have Word. Then I manage to get a trial Word package and see all the changes I need to make.

Then it's going through the story and basically picking up all the bits you normally gloss over and fixing them. Some of it made me pull at my hair; other times I was stomping around shouting; but ultimately I definitely think they made the story stronger and more cohesive.

But I can't see me looking forward to edits ever again - well, apart from the whole 'if I have edits that means I'm being published' kinda vibe!!

I have edits!!

Somehow, I would imagine by the end of the process I won't be quite as excited but I have an editor and I have edits!! Which means Alien Christmas is one step closer to being published. Excuse me while I squee!!!!

State of Shock.....

......Silver Publishing have offered me a contract for Alien Christmas!!!

The editor said she thought it was unique and sweet and passionate!! OMG, I'm going to have a published story!!!

Seer - Chapter 4 - Kol/Nick

He definitely hadn't heard that right, his gaze automatically going to Threadgood's so his partner could confirm or deny what had been said. Threadgood was doing his best not to snort and Nick looked at the Captain, sure he would see a similar expression of disbelief or something that said that this was some sort of joke. He didn't and Kol continued speaking. “At a little after eleven on Thursday night, I closed up after an event at my book-store. I was driving home when the vision took me over. I managed to pull over before I lost sight completely.”

Seer - Chapter 3 - Nick/Kol

The waiting was the worst.

He hoped desperately that what he had felt, had seen, was an overly involving nightmare but he knew it wasn't. Somewhere out there she lay dead, still waiting to be found. It made him feel nauseous just thinking about it but he couldn't put it out of his mind. He'd ended up leaving the book-store closed, unable to concentrate enough to consider dealing with people – pitiful indeed.

156 weeks writing & new banner.....

Received my 156 weeks award at Taming the Muse and am really chuffed. I can't believe I have written at least 500 words every week for the last three years - I am blown away!!

And as part of my dragging my writing partner into this whole 'let's write something original and expose our delicate, sensitive psyches to even more people who can crush us with their rejection, I sent my lovely sis TLM the following banner in an attempt to tempt her into writing an original story with me!!

I started it as my original Christmas Anthology for Dreamspinner but found I wanted to write it with TLM so we held off. But I would really be interested in using it to write our taming prompts and see if we could actually do this thing together.  All I need now is her pseudonym.....oh, and to make her write something! Subtle I'm not!!

Still behind on my word count - not looking like I'm going to make 45,000 words in August but I have written a few drabbles over the last couple of days that I am pleased with.

Tomorrow is exam results day - I wonder if that's why I'm not sleeping.....

Tumblr is rather marvellous.....

.....and I now have a banner to work from for my Juicy Bits story - it's called "2 weeks 6 days 2 long" and I just loved the colours!! Didn't do much - added a poppy overlay, poppy red font with a dark grey/white shadow and it's all done!!

So, that's three new banners which mean 3 stories to write. Oh dear, methinks less art and more writing!

Epic Fail....

Two days of not writing and I really don't think I'm going to manage 45000 words with the way things are going.

Little monster has been a complete and utter *bleep* for the last two days and I am exhausted, headachey and generally feeling like dropping my head into a blender and turning it onto pulse!!

BUT I have had a couple of ideas for Open Submission Calls and I have written quick characters and story outlines, and of course, the ever present banner that helps me picture my lovelies while I try to write them.

So, here's one provisionally called "Good With His Hands" for either 'Love at First Sight' or the 'Bears' prompt!! Dead car, sexy mechanic, dirty greasy sex - works for me!! The first version I did had pink writing and looked 'wrong' but after discussing it with my on-site consultant (Izzy), she reminded me that I seem to like cool sensitive blues and helped me figure out font and colours, etc.

The next story in my head apart has no title or banner but I do have a story outline, and a page or two of what I want to write.  It's for the Juicy Bits open prompt and I can see me heading there for when I want/need to write some unrelenting smut!

Got a friend popping round for an hour tomorrow, so need to try and get some sleep but will see about writing a page or two first.

Hmmm, maybe not an epic fail after all?!

Seer ~ Chapter 2 ~ Kol/Nick

SEER 

Kol Barrington used to be a psychic until a traumatic event took his powers away from him. Until now.

Nick Taylor is a detective faced with a case that is getting stranger by the day. He has what looks to be a nasty serial killer on his hands and a so-called psychic who can tell him details that no one but the killer should know. He also has a desire for this strange witness that he has never experienced before in his life and that part of him wants to take as far as it can go.

If only he could get past the idea that Kol can read his mind and Kol can get past the idea that Nick might well be using him as bait to catch a killer.....

Loosely based on the 1995 novel Dream Man by Linda Howard  

TWO 

Seer ~ Chapter 1 ~ Kol/Nick

SEER 

Kol Barrington used to be a psychic until a traumatic event took his powers away from him. Until now.

Nick Taylor is a detective faced with a case that is getting stranger by the day. He has what looks to be a nasty serial killer on his hands and a so-called psychic who can tell him details that no one but the killer should know. He also has a desire for this strange witness that he has never experienced before in his life and that part of him wants to take as far as it can go.

If only he could get past the idea that Kol can read his mind and Kol can get past the idea that Nick might well be using him as bait to catch a killer.....

Loosely based on the 1995 novel Dream Man by Linda Howard

ONE

Seer ~ Prologue ~ Kol/Nick

SEER 

Kol Barrington used to be a psychic until a traumatic event took his powers away from him. Until now.

Nick Taylor is a detective faced with a case that is getting stranger by the day. He has what looks to be a nasty serial killer on his hands and a so-called psychic who can tell him details that no one but the killer should know. He also has a desire for this strange witness that he has never experienced before in his life and that part of him wants to take as far as it can go.

If only he could get past the idea that Kol can read his mind and Kol can get past the idea that Nick might well be using him as bait to catch a killer.....

Loosely based on the 1995 novel Dream Man by Linda Howard

PROLOGUE