Nicole R. Murphy's Blog, page 12

Reading in 2010

So this year I read 76 books – nothing like the 200 plus I've seen some people munch through, but an improvement on last year's 65 and much better than the previous few years, where I'd pretty much stopped reading all together.

Reading has again become one of my preferred leisure activities, which was the aim of setting reading goals for the past couple of years. I've noticed that I tend not to read as much when I'm in editing mode versus drafting – so maybe this year I'll read more again (since it's a big drafting year).

Of the 76 books, only three were re-reads – so that's 73 new books, greatly ahead of last year's 52 new books. There were two books I didn't finish – Kaaron Warren's Dead Sea Fruit cause the year ran out, and Dracula cause I just stopped reading it. I'll try again this year, but I'm wondering if such a dense book isn't a good fit for an e-reader.

Last year, I chose a top ten with some thoughts and I'll do that again this year, although it's going to be hard – I had a fabulous reading year, with very few dud books. These are in no particular order.

* Death Most Definite and Managing Death by Trent Jamieson – a refreshing take on urban fantasy for a number of reasons. a) the first person narrator is a man, and he's not an alpha male either – in fact my description of him in book one is 'ineffectual'. b) It's set in Brisbane – what not to love there. c) Making Death an actual business in the real world is brilliant. b) Fabulous storyline that allows for each book to be a standalone, and yet the overall threat is building.

* The Demon's Lexicon and The Demon's Covenant by Sarah Rees Brennan – I absolutely loved these books. The interplay between demons, magic and the modern world is so new and so real and the characterisation is absolutely top notch. I can't WAIT for the third book.

* Scary Kisses – yes, this has a story of mine in it but even so, it was the best short story collection I read all year. I know that I'm absolutely the target audience for a paranormal romance anthology, but it also included two of my favourite stories of the year – Bread and Circuses by Felicity Dowker and The February Dragon by Angela Slatter and LL Hannett. A very even and enjoyable collection.

* Power and Majesty by Tansy Rayner Roberts – melding urban fantasy and traditional fantasy – who woulda thunk it? Well Tansy did and created a fantastic world and story and the second book isn't out until April and I want it now!!!!!!!

* Madigan Mine by Kirstyn McDermott – it gently drew me in, and then it horrified me. Honestly, I still think about what Madigan did, what her friends were doing and it makes me feel cold and small.

* Slights by Kaaron Warren – the woman is a freaking genius and I'd hate her, if she weren't so nice.

* The Southern Gothic series (aka Sookie Stackhouse aka True Blood) by Charlaine Harris – this year was the year I discovered Sookie, Eric, Bill the most boring vampire ever (although I understand my feelings on this will be changed by season three) and the rest of the gang from Bon Temps. I started with the tv series (season one was purchased for me last Christmas) and then went onto the books and could appreciate both as different visions of the same story. The most recent book disappointed me a little, but not enough to kill my love and have me panting for both season three and the next book.

* Stardust by Neil Gaiman – not often that you read something and you can hear the author's voice there in your head, reading it to you. I was surprised by how different the book was to the movie. One of my aims for 2011 is to study book and movie and think about what the differences were and why.

* The Zodiac series by Vicki Pettersson – if ever a town deserved to be the setting of urban fantasy, it's Las Vegas and Vicki's done a sterling job with a new vision of UF without nary a vampire or shapeshifter in sight (not that I have a problem with vampires or shapeshifters – see Southern Gothic above). It's a fantastic idea, twinning the notions of the twelve signs of the zodiac and good versus evil to create a stunningly original fight for the world scenario. Not to mention creating Hunter. Yum.

*Shadowglass and Poison Kissed by Erica Hayes – With every book of Erica's I read, I fall more in love. The dark, seemy underworld of Melbourne she's created becomes more real with every book and I love that she takes chances with romances that might not seem the norm but with confidence and a deep knowledge of your characters can really work.

So, what about 2011? Well, books I'm looking forward to include the end of Sarah Rees Brennan, Trent Jamieson and Tansy Rayner Roberts' series. Tracey O'Hara's follow-up to Night's Cold Kiss hits the shelves, which I'm really looking forward to. And then I look at my to-be-read shelf and see everything I didn't read this year and well… big year.

I was going to set 2011 as the year of only reading books written by women. I wanted to investigate the assertion that's been put forward in some of the gender-fail arguments on TOCs in the past few years that men and women just read and write different things and there's nothing wrong with that. However, this year I have pretty much exclusively read women – of the 76 books, only 13 were written by men.

I've decided that I need not so much to focus on a gender, but focus on what I'm reading. So here's my plan for 2011 – aim of one book a week, alternating between male and female authors. Where I can, I'll match genre – so if my first reading is a short story collection by a woman, I'll follow it by one with a man. Urban fantasy with urban fantasy and so on. I'll take notes after each reading of things I noted like style, characterisation, plot, tropes and themes. At the end of each month, I'll report on the things I noticed.

Hopefully by the end of 2011, I'll be a little more informed about what men and women write and whether the argument that men and women just like different things holds weight. Hopefully this considered reading will also help make me a better writer.

Looking back on 2010

It pretty much goes without saying that 2010 was one of the most remarkable years of my life. It wasn’t always an easy year, but it was a growth year and I finish happier and more confident than I’ve ever been in my life.

The main factor of course was the publication and fabulous reception of Secret Ones. It’s kinda hard to continue with a ‘you suck’ mentality when the evidence is overwhelming that you don’t. Learning to live as someone with confidence in their worth as an individual has been an interesting experience. I hadn’t realised all the ways that I let my lack of esteem batter myself down – sure, I was aware of the big things, like the negative self talk and the self-harm through not eating properly and not exercising, but it was in deeper, more insidious things such as not thinking too deeply about things cause what right did I have to an opinion? I had nothing to say, nothing to offer, so why bother?

As a result, I think for most of this year I’ve been extremely self-involved and have had little patience for anyone in my life. For people I’ve hurt through this behaviour – I’m sorry. All I can say is that super-nice Nicole is coming back (although she won’t be letting people take advantage of her super-niceness any more and will be more vocal when people say or do things she doesn’t agree with). I’m going to make mistakes and will at times seem immature – I’m working through stuff that emotionally mature people deal with in their teens – but I will try to do so with understanding of the impact on those around me and be as thoughtful as possible.

Some relationships won’t survive this process – people I’ve been friends with for the wrong reasons. Some friendships which are strained at the moment will get better. Those who I love and adore know it, I hope.

The other thing I’m most proud of this year is how much better a writer I am. There was something about the crucible of needing to deliver two books in twelve months that forged me in a way nothing else has. I’m writing with more confidence now. I’m also learning to match the at times opposing forces of meeting expectations while continuing to challenge myself and grow as a writer.

So month-by-month, here’s how the year panned out:

 

I had another short story accepted for publication in 2011 and started some media and publicity work to promote Power Unbound. Ankle is now fully functional – except for the swelling in warm weather, poxy bloody thing. I guess I’ll just get used to that, instead of it disturbing me and making it hard for me to concentrate. In the meantime, I finish with 80,000 words written of book one of the Free Ones trilogy (which my family are calling ‘A New Hope’ – you know, the fourth one? Ah, love the Star Wars).

 

I’d love to give you a word count for the year but it’s hard – the first part of the year was mostly revising and re-writing and so I really don’t know how many words I wrote then. With the words I did for the revision of Battle for Odana and A New Hope, I guess that from September I’ve written 130,000 words or there abouts. Next year will be a bigger wordcount, since there’s lotsa drafting going on.

So, there’s 2010 for me. A good year. A fabulous year, one of the best in my life. Yet I’m already sure 2011 will be better.

Coolio.

Looking forward to 2011

Today I'm doing a looking forward post, to end 2010 on a positive and energetic note. Tomorrow, I'll so a review of 2010, to begin 2011 in a reflective and educative matter. I think deciding this is quite profound [image error]

So, 2011 is looking to be an utterly fabulous year. Already, with the things I know are going to happen, it's busy and full-on and then when you add things I want to have happen, and things I dream will happen… Well, it's gonna be a biggie.

So here's the way I'm starting 2011.

Professional.

So far in 2011, there is confirmed publication of two novels and two short stories. I say two novels because technically, Power Unbound is published January 1 even though lots of people already have it. Rogue Gadda comes out in July.

In April, The Protector's Last Mission will appear in More Scary Kisses and some time in the first few months, The Fairy King's Child will be published in Issue 46 of ASIM.

In terms of things I want to have happen – well I'm hoping 2011 will mark the sale of the Dream of Asarlai trilogy into foreign markets. I've got a short that is on the cusp of publication, another that I'm waiting on news of and a third that I need to polish for submission in January. I'll probably write some more shorts over the course of 2011 – I'm becoming more confident in them.

Novel wise, my focus for the year is the Free Ones trilogy, the sequel to Dream of Asarlai. I want to have it drafted, book one polished and hopefully even sold to a publisher by the end of the year. In between, I'll be working on the Battle for Odana duology and hopefully have it fully drafted by the end of the year.

I'm also going to look into other forms of fiction. For example, I've got some ideas for paranormal novellas to get up and about, and then there's a couple of contemporary romances that keep banging themselves against my head to get out.

2011 is the year of the convention for me. In March, I've got a quick fly in and out visit to the Australian Romance Readers Association convention in Sydney. A week later, I'm off to LA for the Romantic Times convention and then near the end of April, to Perth for Swancon/Natcon 50. Later in the year, there's the Romance Writer's of Australia convention in Melbourne in September and Conflux in Canberra in October.

So, that's 2011 for me professionally – you can see why I'm looking forward to it, can't you? [image error]

Personally.

It's been a long time since I've started a year in such a positive place. Everything's going so well, and yet there's still things to aim for.

The big one is my health. I'm determined to keep losing weight – I want to lose at least another 20 kilos. I also want to get fitter and stronger – it's amazing just how hard on the body a sedentary job is. So it's things like going to the gym, exercising regularly and making massage treatments an important part of my life.

This year, Hubby and I are going to have some long stretches of time away from each other, and we'll have to take care to ensure that we remain connected through them all. The first few months of the year, we'll only have a week or two a month together (except February, which mostly is just weekends apart). It's been ages since we've had a good holiday away together – might be an idea in the middle of the year.

I've spent a lot of this year locked up in the house, ignoring family and friends. In 2011, I'm aiming to be more social and connect better with people, particularly my parents and siblings.

And on a creative front, I've set myself the challenge of making handbags this year [image error] One per month, trialling a variety of techniques. I don't know how well it will go – I have virtually no skills in the area whatsoever, but I'm going to let myself experiment (and fail, which is something I have issues with creatively) and we'll see what happens.

So, that's how 2011 is shaping up at the moment. Hopefully, the trials that come will be minor or able to be handled with little effort and I'll plough ahead and do fabulous things this year!

More Scary Kisses–TOC

From Ticonderoga Press: We're pleased to announce the table of contents for More Scary Kisses, edited by Liz Grzyb.

Heather Albano - "The Dark Season"
Annette Backshall - "Hunting Rabbits"
Liz Coley - "Marriage of Convenience"
Dayle A. Dermatis - "Matchmaker"
Roxanne Dent - "Miss Luella's Magic Shop"
Felicity Dowker - "Berries & Incense"
Donna Maree Hanson - "Phantom Love"
Martin Livings & Talie Helene - "The Last Gig of Jimmy Rucker"
Kirstyn McDermott - "Frostbitten"
Nicole R. Murphy - "The Protector's Last Mission"
Jason Nahrung - "Resurrection in Red"
Amanda Pillar - "Philomena and the Blond God"
Carol Ryles - "Snake Charmer"
Fraser Sherman - "Sword of Darcy"
Eric Steele - "3am"
Frank Summers - "Dances with Werewolves"
DC White - "The Dark Night of Anton Weiss"

Seventeen stories from some of Australia's brightest talents, complemented by fantastic tales from the US and UK.

More Scary Kisses promises vampires, aliens, fairytale princesses, parallel universes, voodoo, werewolves, wizards, phantoms, dryads and cherubim.

More Scary Kisses will be launched in April 2011.

About The Protector's Last Kiss: with this paranormal romance short, I delve a little into the world of the fae with the question – when things go so wrong on the other side, where can the fae hide out until it all blows over?

I had the idea for the story – the answer to the above question – and the characters, but the bloody plot wouldn't come to me. After several months, and with the deadline for More Scary Kisses approaching, I thought that it wasn't going to happen for me. Then, I woke up the Wednesday before the deadline with the story clear in my head. "I'll just go pick up my tax cheque," I thought, "and then I'll sit down and write the story." Then I fell down some stairs and sprained my ankle…

By Friday, the pain had died enough and the story wouldn't let me go so I grabbed my computer and banged the story out. Begged for some quick critiques from friends and then sent it off just in time.

I'm delighted to be in this anthology because the first was so fabulous. I'm delighted to see another Felicity Dowker – her story in Scary Kisses was incredible, and there's some amazing writers in this time such as Kirstyn McDermott and Jason Nahrung. My good friend Donna is back again as well, this time chasing the darkness around the Civic bus station (for Canberra residents this story will freak you a bit [image error])

Should be another fantastic read.

Christmas, family, and the weight

Yesterday, a momentous thing happened – my brother beat my father at Trivial Pursuit. I stuffed up the last questions so I came second although I was first to get all the dibs. The reason this is momentous – it marked the end of Dad's reign as the Dunkley king of TP. He used to cream us. On one occasion, he decided to continue the game after getting all the dibs and answering the final question and won THREE TIMES before someone else finished [image error]

All in all, it was a nice afternoon in Chez Murphy. It was only my second time of hosting the family. I had been a little concerned I wouldn't have enough food – needn't have worried. We've got plenty of leftovers – salads in particular. I'm wondering whether to take some down to Melbourne with me or not.

Was doing well food wise, until I decided to relax a little and have a few drinks, and then I got stuck into the chips… I didn't lose weight last week and I was disappointed, but the leaders at the Weight Watchers meeting said that at this time of the year, not putting on weight is an achievement and I didn't do that.

So that's the way I need to think for the next few weeks – I've got a week in Melbourne, and then two weeks at a writing retreat in Oberon and it's gonna be hard to eat exactly how I want to eat, so I can't get focussed on continuing to lose weight. Except it's hard for me to accept the status quo as success.

So tomorrow hubby, my brother and I head down to Melbourne. Hubbie's playing in the Victorian Open – he's had a really hard year work-wise so it will be good for him to have some time in the sun and have fun with some friends. We're staying in a cabin in a holiday park, so I'll be able to look after the diet morning and afternoon, but we're probably eating out most nights and that will be tough – sometimes there's not a lot of good choices available.

We'll get back and I'll have a day in Canberra before I head off with the guys and girls of FWOR. Again, I should be able to control breakfast and lunch. Dinner is something we share responsibility for and here I'll be able to do portion control to contain the intake and fill up on salad if needs be. The drinking is another matter…

I can foresee lotsa walking in the next few weeks.

It's going to be interesting to get back to Weight Watchers in mid January and see what the result is. I'm proud of what I've done so far – 8.5 kilos gone, I feel fabulous, lots more energy and the reflux has really settled and I'm getting fitter. Clothes are fitting better. I just don't want to go backwards – it's so easy to keep going when it's working.

A writerly update

I've been struggling a bit this week – a combination of being in the third quarter of the novel and being a bit over it all, the lead up to Christmas, too few days off recently and menstruation. I've not been helped by the fact that my editing brain is starting to chaff at the bit – 'I know there's things wrong with this story, I can see it, see it's too slow there and it takes too long to get to there and just let me fiddle, just a little bit'. I've told it to stay in its place – that's good that it sees that stuff, and I've done a bit of tweaking but it can just sit and wait cause I don't trust its objectiveness at the moment.

Then there's the fact I've come to an important part of the book and working out how it will happen is proving a challenge. I mean, if you were human and you were trying to pull one over on the guardians of the gadda, how would you do it? Those guardians can do just about anything!!!!

Last night, I was driving from Queanbeyan to Dunlop to visit a friend (for those who don't know, that's clear from the eastern side to the western side of Canberra – the only way to get a longer trip is go north to south) and on the trek across (admittedly still only about 50 minutes, so that tells you how big Canberra is) I took the opportunity to muddle it all through in my head.

And you know what? Not only did I work out how they were going to do what they're going to do, but I worked out how to pull in an intriguing little truth that I learnt earlier in the book.

This series is set two years after the events that conclude the Dream of Asarlai trilogy. Without giving anything away, I will say that as I wrote Dream of Asarlai, I was quite determined that at the end things weren't going to just go back to normal. Some really full on events happened in the course of the three novels and regardless of who wins (the guardians or Asarlai or maybe both?) things just aren't going to be the same again. The three couples get their happily ever after (these are romances, after all) but as for the world of the gadda and the individuals within the story – well, they've got stuff they've got to deal with.

I thought when I started writing The Free Ones that I knew what all those consequences were. Then two of the characters showed me that some really insidious stuff was going on and that's about to come out. The shit, as they say, is going to hit the fan and for a series favourite, it's gonna suck big time.

It's moments like these that I really, really, REALLY love my job.

And so, it begins

Power Unbound is now available for sale in all good bookstores near you. Not a bookstore near me, unfortunately – at least, wasn't on the shelves at A&R Queanbeyan when I went in this morning. But I know they're on the shelves elsewhere, cause I've seen pics and two people have contacted me to say that they've got their copies.

Yet again, my sister-in-law was first cab off the rank. Thanks Michele [image error]

The wait is over, and I can kinda relax. Celebrate too – Moet with dinner tonight. Of course now, the question is – will the reaction be good? First review of the book was very positive – thanks to the great folks at Angus and Robertson Edwardstown and particularly Taran. So many people have told me how much they loved Secret Ones that I've been living with a strange type of fear for months now. Namely – what if I stuffed it up?

What if, in the process of writing Power Unbound and Rogue Gadda and doing a better job with both of them, I have destroyed the thing that made people love Secret Ones so much? Whatever that nebulous thing was?

Well, it's time to let it go. I've done the best I can and I think it's a great read. Readers will react to it how they will. Some will love it. Some won't. Some who normally would love it will read it at the wrong time in their life and so not love it.

I can't control any of that. All I can do is write the best book I can. Which is why I put the excitement aside and did my words on the new series for today.

Am now half way through book one of the Lost Ones trilogy. Romance is so far cooking along nicely, but the other aspect of the storyline is doing an iceberg trick on me – from time to time, I see glimpses of the whole and it's tantalising, but the entirety is yet to be revealed.

I love my job.

PS Please buy my book. I'll love you forever if you do. Yes, YOU! You can get it on Kindle here or go to your favourite bookstore.

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Writing process–my colour charts

Following on from last month’s posts about how I wrote, edited and published Dream of Asarlai, a few people have shown an interest in my colour charts, so I thought I’d tell you a little more about them and show you.

The idea came to me courtesy of Scott Westerfeld and Justine Larbelestier. Last year, for Nanowrimo, they did a series of posts on aspects of the writing process and a couple of them talked about meta documents, that is documents related to the WIP.

Scott put up a blog about pace charts. In this blog Scott talked about using Scrivener’s corkboard to track each chapter and see where the tension was building, where there was action, where there was release and getting an idea on how your novel was moving. In that blog, he linked to an earlier one by Justine in which she talked about the spreadsheets he used to use.

It all sounded great to me – I needed a tool to enable me to look at my manuscript objectively, and because I knew plotting and narrative drive aren’t necessarily my strong suit, something to help with that would be great too.

So I opened up a spread sheet and started to devise what I was going to do.

As you can see from this, some things are immediately clear – novel starts with a bang, there’s plenty of magic through the book, Ione and Stephen have a pretty equal face time on the page and around chapter twenty, it gets really slow. There’s a bit of action, there’s a bit of kinda action, there’s plenty of magic but there’s a whole lot of sitting around and talking. Not a good way to start the second half of the book.

Compare that now to the colour chart for the eighth draft.

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Not as much teal blue in the second half there – I‘ve re-written or rearranged scenes so there’s more action. Nothing major – but it’s moving up to the last big final battle scene.

So this is one way in which to look at your plot and gain some objectiveness about it. Any further questions – feel free to ask.

 

The passion of James and Alice

In conversing with a reader, I was reminded of the 1974 Queanbeyan flood, which washed away part of the graveyard and sent coffins bobbing down the river into Lake Burley Griffin (the cemetary has since been reinforced, so shouldn't be an issue). The sad part of it all was that by the time everything was gathered together, no one knew who was who and so the remains were reinterred but without their own gravestones. Instead, a memorial was put up in their honour.

Any-hoo, I loved the story the moment I heard it and eventually, it turned into a story in my mind. Unfortunately, the damned story wouldn't come out as narrative and so voila! My first piece of poetry in forever.

The truth, dear friends, is that I suck at poetry, so I've not been able to do the story of James and Alice justice enough to get it published on paper.

But in honour of this week's flooding of the Queanbeyan River, I'm going to put it up  here. Please, be gentle [image error]

Even when dead

The ghost of James Mason sat on his grave,
A miserable shade of a boy.
He watched phantoms promenade through the rain,
And could not connect with their joy.

Day after day, from moon rise to moon set,
He sat on that stone and he sighed.
If asked, he'd talk about pretty Miss Alice,
his angel, the love of his life.

James had been just nineteen when he'd died,
his old nag hadn't clear that last fence.
He'd only just pledged to Alice McGowan
And he'd missed her every day since.

He never stopped loving, never stopped wanting,
He kept himself pure and alone,
Living in hope one day his Alice would lie here
And in the graveyard, they'd make a sweet home.

In seventy-four the rains came,
The river rose, the danger grew.
It tore at the hill of the graveyard,
Through dirt and wood it chewed.

Gravestones and coffins and bodies
were washed into the churning wake.
James sat on his coffin, buffeted, wild,
And rode the river down to the lake.

Shadowed trees held tight to the shoreline,
Scared that they too would be taken.
It seemed to him the whole world had been
Picked up and tossed round and shaken.

James perched on his box and wondered
When he'd return to the calm of his grave,
Then he saw a slim, girlish figure
Walk towards him over the waves.

The tilt of her head was familiar,
A gesture of her hand made him calm.
Then her smile, her curls, her crystal blue eyes,
And James felt no more alarm.

"Are you hurt?" called his Alice as she neared him
"Are you worried? Please, do not fear.
I will not hurt you, just want you to know
That there is somebody near."

James smiled and said "Alice" and eyes widened
As shock moved across her sweet face.
Then she gasped and she cried out "My James, my love"
And she threw herself into his embrace.

Safe in his arms, Alice told him
Of lost love that she could not endure.
Straight after his sad little funeral,
She'd come to the lake and enacted the cure.

"It didn't work," Alice sobbed, "didn't help,
I was dead but my love wouldn't die.
And I couldn't leave to be with you
But was trapped where my bones did lie."

James kissed her and calmed her and soothed her
And promised never again would they part.
With the help of her watery-friends and neighbours,
Soon their bones lay close in the dark.

When later the divers found them,
And collected the bodies - his and hers -
They took all the bones to the grave yard
And made sure every one was interred.

If anyone noticed the newest arrival,
Not a word of it was said,
And late one night by a glistening moon
ghostly James and Alice were wed.

Now James smiles and nods and is happy
As he watches the others go about.
He sits on his stone and hold Alice's hand
the sweet reward of the devout.

Even when dead, the heart yearns,
A grave yard cannot separate friends.
Even entombed, the passion still burns,
It never ends, never ends, never ends.

Queanbeyan in flood

The Queanbeyan River flows through the centre of town in a gentle way. It’s a very pretty river. Observe:

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This is where the Riverside Caravan Park currently is:

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This is where it usually is:

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When we went down (at 3.30pm) there were hundreds of people there. The police and SES weren’t too concerned. The Army arrived, to start helping with things. The water had started to drop at this stage, but this picture of the waterline at the entrance of the Riverside Plaza carpark shows where it was:

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See the black line around the pole at hubby’s hips? There. And he’s not short, either.

So all in all – Queanbeyan is flooded. Who knows how long it will be before the water goes down and we know the extent of the damage. Hopefully, it won’t be too bad.

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