I only managed one post last week. I had a bit of difficulty getting my head in the right places. There were shoulder demons and doubtful thoughts and it was all-around ugly. Today I'm back with my head on my shoulders where it ought to be. Nothing restores faith in oneself like edits. I hear you laughing, but sitting down with The Turncoat's Temptress really put some sparkle back in my eyes. To celebrate that, from the book, an excerpt. Which is fitting, because Basil was doubting himself before Nora got a hold of him.
Basil took his hand away from her face and reached inside his coat. He pulled out the tintype, bent, worn, a little faded, and set it on the table.
A younger Nora smiled up at them. Her mind pulled her back to the day the image was taken. When she thought she'd known what the world was about and love was the only thing that mattered. Basil had stood behind the photographer, making silly faces, trying to get her to laugh. She'd mastered her emotions and arranged her face in what she'd hoped was a seductive pose. After the flash of powder, she'd blinked away the light and found Basil looking at her with unmasked passion.
The heat of that look stayed with her. She still felt it, curling at her like flames over paper. It was different than the look he gave her now, but the old spark was there.
“You kept it because it reminded you that there's still some good in the world. And I wonder if you hoped that someday you might come back to it.” She stared at him daring him to deny it.
“I tried a dozen times that summer to tell you why I was at Brighton Manor. What I was. Who I was. Christopher and your grandmother both warned me not to. That it would only frighten you. So in the end I kept the secret.” He gazed down at the photograph then ran his finger along the edge. “Why haven't you run away yet? All this talk of fairytale creatures and the supernatural. Most women wouldn't stay.”
“I'm something of an oddity, Tinwhistle. I think you'd have learned that by now.” She touched the image. “We're magnets. Stuck together in this. Sometimes we might get flipped over, might push away from each other, but we'll always come back.”
Deep breath. 49 days til Basil and Nora meet the e-reader world. It's fine. It's all good. After all, they're the ones facing ancient monsters. Promoting is a piece of cake compared to slaying wanna-be dragons.
Monday, February 25, 2013
Monday, February 18, 2013
My, How Times Change
There was time in my life when I was stone cold traditionalist. I'm extremely conservative (removeth the political meaning from thy mind). I like things done one way and one way only, time after time. Don't touch my stuff because it's where it is because I like it there.
When I was just getting into western novels, watching Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, and writing Play-By-Email western stories, I was wholeheartedly into maintaining the tradition of the American West. Mind, while I was flunking History of the American West in school. It's not my fault, I had two classes with that teacher and she was mercilessly hard. Besides, the American West is not the-dull-and-very-long-history-of-what-happened-right-after-the-War-of-1812. To me, it starts with the Oregon Trail. I thought I would like HAW class. I was wrong. Thank God my GPA recovered from that before graduation.
The west, to me was gunfights, Louis L'Amour, cowboys (sans range wars--boring!), Indians, and pioneers, all wrapped up in bloodshed and fierce determination.
So when Wild, Wild West (1999) came out, I was horrified. Yes, I watched reruns of the original and I was okay with it, but I preferred Gunsmoke. More than the bad script and less-than-stellar acting, the cheesy Southern bad guy, it was the technology that bugged me. I liked the idea of simple times where people relied on stuff that was handmade and had to get by using their wits rather than throwing machinery into the mix. I hated history after the Civil War, where there were cotton gins, steam trains, and factories everywhere. I wanted cowboys pushing cattle into vast stretches of prairie and mail-order brides who traveled by stagecoaches.
And yet . . . I was enamored when I sat in the theater and watched The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003) brought us the Nautilus, the flashy car, and especially the silver-plated Winchester repeaters. I went with a friend and as soon as I saw the rifle I whispered, no doubt a gleam in my eye, "A Winchester. It's beautiful." Because like some kind of weird-o, I was fascinated by historical guns.
Especially repeaters. To this day, one of the prettiest guns I believe was ever made is the Henry Golden Boy, featured in Silverado (1985). Although I'm also partial to the Winchester Mare's Leg like Vin Tanner carried in the television version The Magnificent Seven. I saw a version of this in Academy Sports & Outdoors and I keep trying to convince my husband I would look badass if I had that strapped to my leg while I'm out walking, but he's reluctant to shell out that kind of dough. It was also featured in Firefly as the gun Zoe carried. According to the Internationl Movie Firearms Database, it was also (the same gun Zoe used) in the TV show The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.
Okay, this post wasn't supposed to be about guns. It was supposed to be about why I strayed from traditional westerns into steampunk. The tipping point.
Well, it was LXG that did it. Something about that gung-ho American 'cowboy' Tom Sawyer and the way Quatermain was told by a witch doctor that Africa would never allow him to die. You can see how this fed my special brand of crazy, inspiring me to write a novel with legends and steampunkery. When I began The Treasure Hunter's Lady, it surfaced around Romy, the tomboy daughter of a famous British adventurer. Couple her with a devil-may-care cowboy, which stuck to my western-loving roots, and breathe a little magic on it. It very much took me away from conservative stand on westerns and opened a whole new world.
I brought in airships, designated a band of law enforcement that watches over the airships, named some electromagnetic guns of my own (the Bennett Special, a character favorite called the Lighthouser .745, and the MacAvoy rifle), invented an automobile called Eidolon, and much more reliable than the mail system, created a wireless telegram machine referred to as a 'gram. All of this before the last novel, which is set in 1890.
I have difficulty imagining that I'll ever return to straight historical romance, but I once said I'd never write any kind of novels where there was impossible technology in the 1800s. You see how that turned out.
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| Photo by Fishdecoy |
The west, to me was gunfights, Louis L'Amour, cowboys (sans range wars--boring!), Indians, and pioneers, all wrapped up in bloodshed and fierce determination.
So when Wild, Wild West (1999) came out, I was horrified. Yes, I watched reruns of the original and I was okay with it, but I preferred Gunsmoke. More than the bad script and less-than-stellar acting, the cheesy Southern bad guy, it was the technology that bugged me. I liked the idea of simple times where people relied on stuff that was handmade and had to get by using their wits rather than throwing machinery into the mix. I hated history after the Civil War, where there were cotton gins, steam trains, and factories everywhere. I wanted cowboys pushing cattle into vast stretches of prairie and mail-order brides who traveled by stagecoaches.
And yet . . . I was enamored when I sat in the theater and watched The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003) brought us the Nautilus, the flashy car, and especially the silver-plated Winchester repeaters. I went with a friend and as soon as I saw the rifle I whispered, no doubt a gleam in my eye, "A Winchester. It's beautiful." Because like some kind of weird-o, I was fascinated by historical guns.
 |
| Photo by Ben41 |
 |
| Photo by Gunmaster45 |
Okay, this post wasn't supposed to be about guns. It was supposed to be about why I strayed from traditional westerns into steampunk. The tipping point.
Well, it was LXG that did it. Something about that gung-ho American 'cowboy' Tom Sawyer and the way Quatermain was told by a witch doctor that Africa would never allow him to die. You can see how this fed my special brand of crazy, inspiring me to write a novel with legends and steampunkery. When I began The Treasure Hunter's Lady, it surfaced around Romy, the tomboy daughter of a famous British adventurer. Couple her with a devil-may-care cowboy, which stuck to my western-loving roots, and breathe a little magic on it. It very much took me away from conservative stand on westerns and opened a whole new world.
I brought in airships, designated a band of law enforcement that watches over the airships, named some electromagnetic guns of my own (the Bennett Special, a character favorite called the Lighthouser .745, and the MacAvoy rifle), invented an automobile called Eidolon, and much more reliable than the mail system, created a wireless telegram machine referred to as a 'gram. All of this before the last novel, which is set in 1890.
I have difficulty imagining that I'll ever return to straight historical romance, but I once said I'd never write any kind of novels where there was impossible technology in the 1800s. You see how that turned out.
Friday, February 15, 2013
Lines I'd Love to Include, But . . .
I always have them. Those lines that would be funny or absurd and just don't quite fit in a manuscript. Sometimes when the characters are having conversations, one of them will just come up with an answer that's inappropriate.
Here's some conversation between Lo and Bliss, the characters from The Maiden's Match. He's trying to get inside an abandoned mission in California to search for a demon called the cluitie, but Bliss is determined to keep him out.
I'm 99.9% certain there's not a single f-bomb in any of the L&L books. So this line has to go. Nice try, Lo.
Another one was an argument in the 4th book, The Siren's Sentinel, where the hero was arguing with his brother. I wanted so badly to include the word asshat in the dialogue, but it wasn't period appropriate. Maybe someday I'll write a contemporary romance and just sprinkle asshat throughout.
Here's some conversation between Lo and Bliss, the characters from The Maiden's Match. He's trying to get inside an abandoned mission in California to search for a demon called the cluitie, but Bliss is determined to keep him out.
“Open the damn door, woman.”
She resisted the juvenile urge to ask or what? “You've
trespassed onto sacred land. The occupants of San Amaro are not
required to open the door in times of threat.”
“The occupants of . . . . This mission is supposed to be
abandoned. In ruin. Forsaken by godly people and left salted and
devastated by pagans.”
Bliss laughed, a bitter sound that burned her throat and ears.
“Which are you?”
“I'm the f—king cluitie hunter, that's who!”
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Baby Steps
Today marks the 5th day in a row I've worked on The Maiden's Match. I've written almost 6,000 words on a novel that shouldn't be, on the final chapter of the Legends & Lovers series.
I'm keeping the blog to document the journey that will take me to the end of the series, mostly because I want to remember these moments. There are so many good ones I've forgotten during the entire writing process.
Some background on the L&L series for those of you not familiar with the works. It started in 2009, after a 5-year drought of words. Long story short, I started writing again with a historical romance set in Australia. I had such a good time researching a country I've never been to, and so enthralled in their legends, I decided to write a steampunk romance based around the Rainbow Serpent.
It took a little over a week to write out a 28,000 word novella. That novella eventually took on the title, The Treasure Hunter's Lady. It was followed in late 2010 by a novel called The Sky Pirate's Wife, which taunted The Turncoat's Temptress into life. Which spurred me on to The Siren's Sentinel.
Setting changes abound, electromagnetic weapons, airships, airship wrecks, explosions, all sorts of nasty creatures, a secret underground organization that prevents the destruction of the world as we know it, and four heroes and four heroines later, we come to the beginning of the end.
In addition to feature steampunk gadgetry, I dug into the deepest, darkest corners of the Internet in order to bring the supernatural into play. The first three books have American Indian legends behind them. I shifted gears (no pun intended) to Celtic and Norse lore in the fourth book and right now at the pantsing stages of the fifth I have Scottish, Norse, and some Spanish myth in mind.
Some of the characters from the books are recurring. Basil Tinwhistle, from book three (coming to an e-reader near you in April), is a prominent character. The only book he hasn't squeezed into was the first. But the most common character is a Native American woman named Hummingbird (or sometimes called Aunt Renee). I intended the 5th book to be about her and how she got tangled into this mess in the first place. My pantsing brain has other plans. She'll still figure in and we'll still learn her true purpose. Never fear.
My progress has been slow since starting. Five hundred words here, six hundred words there. Little by little I'm learning about my characters. The hero is a man named Roland Bonham, called Lo by his friends. I've seen the movie Gettysburg so many times over the last year because my husband cracks up at the boys from Maine ("You mean, chawge?!"), that I swear I had General Lewis Armistead's name stuck in my head and then character starts talking out of nowhere. His name is Lo and he wants a girl and a book, in short order.
Short order might be pushing it, but it certainly has a beginning, it has some research behind it, and yep, there's a girl.
Baby steps. If I have to, I'll put my head between my knees and remind myself to breath. Just because it's a series end doesn't mean it's an end-end. There are other books to write. And there are 75,000 words left in this one. It's going to be okay. It's all about putting the pieces of this puzzle in their final places. Which is really more exciting than scary.
Some background on the L&L series for those of you not familiar with the works. It started in 2009, after a 5-year drought of words. Long story short, I started writing again with a historical romance set in Australia. I had such a good time researching a country I've never been to, and so enthralled in their legends, I decided to write a steampunk romance based around the Rainbow Serpent.
It took a little over a week to write out a 28,000 word novella. That novella eventually took on the title, The Treasure Hunter's Lady. It was followed in late 2010 by a novel called The Sky Pirate's Wife, which taunted The Turncoat's Temptress into life. Which spurred me on to The Siren's Sentinel.
Setting changes abound, electromagnetic weapons, airships, airship wrecks, explosions, all sorts of nasty creatures, a secret underground organization that prevents the destruction of the world as we know it, and four heroes and four heroines later, we come to the beginning of the end.
In addition to feature steampunk gadgetry, I dug into the deepest, darkest corners of the Internet in order to bring the supernatural into play. The first three books have American Indian legends behind them. I shifted gears (no pun intended) to Celtic and Norse lore in the fourth book and right now at the pantsing stages of the fifth I have Scottish, Norse, and some Spanish myth in mind.
Some of the characters from the books are recurring. Basil Tinwhistle, from book three (coming to an e-reader near you in April), is a prominent character. The only book he hasn't squeezed into was the first. But the most common character is a Native American woman named Hummingbird (or sometimes called Aunt Renee). I intended the 5th book to be about her and how she got tangled into this mess in the first place. My pantsing brain has other plans. She'll still figure in and we'll still learn her true purpose. Never fear.
My progress has been slow since starting. Five hundred words here, six hundred words there. Little by little I'm learning about my characters. The hero is a man named Roland Bonham, called Lo by his friends. I've seen the movie Gettysburg so many times over the last year because my husband cracks up at the boys from Maine ("You mean, chawge?!"), that I swear I had General Lewis Armistead's name stuck in my head and then character starts talking out of nowhere. His name is Lo and he wants a girl and a book, in short order.
Short order might be pushing it, but it certainly has a beginning, it has some research behind it, and yep, there's a girl.
Baby steps. If I have to, I'll put my head between my knees and remind myself to breath. Just because it's a series end doesn't mean it's an end-end. There are other books to write. And there are 75,000 words left in this one. It's going to be okay. It's all about putting the pieces of this puzzle in their final places. Which is really more exciting than scary.
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