A.M. Gray's Blog, page 11

it's my sixth anniversary

I wrote this post back in 2013, but it still works. Except that 'What was she doing?' is now on the fave list of 1469 fanfiction readers and pushes it down to fifth place. It has over half a million hits.

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June 9th. On this day back in 2010 I posted the first chapter of a little story called ‘What was she doing?’ My first attempt at writing fanfiction and the start of my obsession with putting the characters Paul and Bella from Twilight, together. It is little, too - just under 30,000 words. At least compared to some things I write now. banner by lapushstarlight
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6036022/1/What-was-she-doingThe title is actually the first line of the story. I am utterly hopeless at thinking of fic titles. If you save a document in Microsoft Word it defaults to name it whatever the first line is. That was the rough draft name and it just stayed, then it spawned a whole set of W stories after that. It is on the favourite list of 999 people at fanfic. That puts it at fourth in that list. Not bad for such a little story.Some days I look at it and think it begs to be rewritten, but if I started doing that with my old stories I would never write anything new. I’d be trapped in an endless cycle of rewrites. And in a way, it is a view of me back then; my style, my mistakes and things that I would write differently if I wrote them now. It’s historic MTR. I still get reviews from people who love it and take the time to tell me that, and I really appreciate that.
So I will pour myself a glass of wine tonight, toast that story and all the people who read it, and remember how it started my continuing obsession with writing.Thank you all.

I’ve heard he’s an exceptional lover

Writer’s Block
In one sentence is the spark of a story. Ignite.

Mission: Write a story, a description, a poem, a metaphor, a commentary, or a memory about this sentence. Write something about this sentence.

Be sure to tag #writeworld in your block!http://writeworld.org/post/1451719092... heard he’s an exceptional lover,” her sister whispered in Andrea’s ear as they waited for Prince Robert to enter the room. The disturbance at the door indicated that his party had arrived.“How did you hear that?” Andrea asked. No reply, other than a smirk. The only rumour Andrea had heard was that he had come to ask for her sister’s hand. As the elder of the two it was appropriate. Andrea didn’t envy her. She was not ready to leave her home nor was she ready to marry at seventeen. Just as well her sister was the beautiful one and got all the attention.Robert strode through the crowd. It parted easily in front of him. He looked regal and dangerous. A big man with broad shoulders. And then he took off his helmet. Brigid stifled her gasp. Robert had clearly been struck across the face with a sword. The scar stretched from his cheek, over a ruined nose and up to his forehead. The marks where it had been stitched were visible. He stood, waiting for the moment to pass.Andrea wondered if the rumour had been started to make up for his looks. He had a beard, like most men in society but he kept it neatly trimmed; it could have covered some of the scar but he hadn’t bothered. He was at ease with how he looked.Her sister was not. The negotiations broke down. Robert and his advisors left in a huff. It was too late to ride for home but they would be gone in the morning and any hope of an alliance went with them.Andrea found her father staring out one of the tall windows. Peering past his shoulder, she could see Robert’s camp. “She refuses him,” he said without turning around.If Brigid had listened to news rather than gossip, she would have known how important this alliance was to the kingdom’s security. Robert fought well. His soldiers loved him. Andrea wasn’t sure if that made him a good leader, or a better man, but it did make him a formidable ally and an even more dangerous enemy. She knew her sister would not be swayed by such arguments.Her father’s shoulders were tight with tension and his face etched with worry. She had to do something, so she put on a hooded cloak and snuck out of the palace to the camp. His guards stopped her. “I-I need to speak to Prince Robert.”“Speak?” One chortled. “A little thing like you.” He leaned in too close to her face. “He’ll eat you for dinner.”“Long past dinner,” said the other. “More like a midnight snack.”They laughed wickedly.“Now!” she demanded. Fear overcoming her nervousness.Her voice carried and a man walking past took a second look at her. Robert’s second, Laurence, ordered the guards back to their posts, and took her to his leader’s tent. “I apologise Princess Andrea, but you should not have come unattended.”Too frightened to speak, she held tightly to the edge of her cloak and just nodded.“He is not in a good mood,” he added.Robert was sprawled on the floor of his tent.“You have a visitor.” Laurence did not announce her name. She glanced at him but he shook his head and motioned that she stay in the opening.“Not a woman.” Robert groaned. “This is your fault for starting that stupid rumour. I need wine.”“No,” said Laurence. “And it’s not a rumour if it’s true.” He kicked Robert in the side. “Get up and bow to the princess.”“What?” Maybe he’d already had some wine. He seemed slower to Andrea. “What princess?”“God’s blood, Robert.” Laurence threw up his hands and sat hard in the camp chair. He waved at Andrea to enter.Robert rolled over to his knees and looked at her. “Huh,” was all he said.She had never been so insulted in her life. “How dare you?” she demanded. “I came here to make you an offer that will hopefully get both of our kingdoms out of this mess and you can’t even be bothered to greet me appropriately.”Robert glanced at Laurence, who had his arms crossed and an ‘I told you’ look on his face.“What offer?” Robert asked.“To marry me, but I am inclined to withdraw it now.”“Please don’t,” muttered Laurence. “She came alone,” he added for Robert’s benefit. “I’d suggest her father does not know she’s here.”“Exactly. I may be the poorer choice in beauty but it could work. If I return, no further harm is done.” Andrea brushed down her skirts nervously, knowing she really was second best. “If I don’t return it could enhance your … reputation to say I was held here until I accepted.”Laurence sat forward in the chair. “Clever.”“Why would I do that?” Robert said. He rose to his feet and made an abrupt gesture. “I would never stoop to such vile behaviour. I’d rather walk into the castle and ask for your hand properly.”“Oh,” she said.Laurence snorted. He rose, clapped his hands together and said, “Great. I’ll cancel the order to leave in the morning. You have ten minutes.”Robert blinked at Andrea. He had just understood that he had accepted her offer. “Please sit, Princess.” He waved at the chair. “Wine?”She shook her head to both.“I was rude and I apologise. I know what it is to be judged by your looks. I was not pretty before this.” He waved at his face.She nodded warily. “Is it hard to breathe?”“Only when I am ill.” He reached out a hand to her.She took it and he wrapped the second one around it, drawing her closer. She felt how big and rough his hand was but also how gentle. He smiled down at her. The scar did not affect his mouth as he pressed her knuckles against his lips. “Are you sure about this?” he asked.Laurence had said the rumour was true and it worried her. “I know nothing of love. What if I am not good enough?”He frowned at her, and his brown eyes looked worried. “Let us find out. May I kiss you?”She nodded.When Laurence returned, he had to clear his throat loudly. They pulled apart. Andrea was very glad that she still had her cloak on and that Laurence could not see where Robert’s hands were. They were cupping her buttocks and holding her in so tight against him that it made her knees weak, which coincidentally made her lean against him harder.Laurence offered her his arm and she needed it to walk without tripping as he escorted her back to the palace.In the morning, Prince Robert threw open the chamber doors and demanded his princess. Brigid paled. Andrea stood to move towards him. The King opened his mouth to protest and then shut it again.“Princess Andrea,” Robert said as he dropped to his knees in front of her, his face transformed in adoration. She placed one hand on the top of his head and leaned down to kiss his forehead. Then, whatever he said to her, made her laugh and everyone could see the woman she would become and that she, too, was transformed.

May update

So I have been taking things a little easier after writing 92k in April. Reading a lot. 122 books already this year. Check out my pinterest page here:I have been doing more work on the poly threesome story that I should NOT be writing. Bad, bad brain. I read a very short erotica story that I did a Goodreads review of and said something about how there could be a really good story in there if they had dealt with all the conflict that they had just glossed over. And then, because I can’t help myself, I started to write it. Ideas come from literally everywhere. Naturally, one of the guys has morphed into a paulish dude. (My favourite fanfic character to write) That could be just because it feels easy for me to write him, and I was doing this story for the 50k for camp nanowrimo and I really didn’t need to be writing something really hard. But I am at the point where I really like them. And they are happy.And now, of course, I have to hurt them… mwahaha.
*rubs hands* bring on the angst and the pain…

The House of lost Hearts

I have sent the work off to a friend to read through for me. Someone who’s opinion I trust. It is about 95% complete and has 85,000 words. That makes it a short book; standard for a romance. There are a few gaps: names I have yet to choose, and some scenes need more details or description. I use this symbol %% to mark the spot and it is very easy to search through it for those gaps.I have read through it so much I can’t ‘see’ it any more. And it needs a fresh set of eyes. Then I guess I will have to go through it again. Welcome to the life of a writer. At least there’s one joke that makes me laugh each time I read it. Although I'm not sure if that is a good or a bad thing.

Meeting a Twilight fan

I was at the Medicare office this week making a claim. [No, I can’t do it online. No, I don’t know why it won’t let me do it. I don’t mind walking up to the mall.]I yawned, and the lady asked me what job I did to start so early and be off work in the afternoon. I have struggled with owning the fact that I write, so I decided to step up to it and I answered that I was a writer.“Oh, wow. I admire anyone who can produce a whole book.”And off she went to prattle on about her favourites (Nora Roberts). When she asked me what I wrote I said supernatural stuff; werewolves and so on. Also one of her favourites. I said I had given a lot of stories away. [It’s the easiest way to explain fanfic to people who don’t know what it is.] “Why?”I wasn't sure that I could write a whole book either.And then she leaned forward and she said, “One of my favourite books is Twilight.”Really? I love it, too. We chat about going to the midnight movie sessions.“I adore Edward.”Wolf girl all the way, I say.“You think she should have chosen Jacob?”No. [How do I explain my obsessive adoration of Paul?] I have written alternate versions of the Twilight books.Here, I say, and I write out my fanfiction name for her. Google mrstrentreznor and you will find my stories.
It will be interesting to see if she has read any by the next time I go in to the office. But even if she doesn't like *my* stories, hopefully I've opened a whole new world of fanfiction for her to read.

Oh look I didn’t fall on my face

Camp Nanowrimo winner, here. Phew… I did it.

Woo… look at that last day. It is the time zone thing, I updated late one night and then frequently the next day and it put it all in one 24 hour period. I didn’t cheat, I swear it.And a very interesting month it was too. In keeping with Monica’s writing method I tracked everything.

The columns across are times, word count start and finish, words per session, daily total, words per hour and words per minute. I did 20 minute writing sprints with short breaks in a Pomodoro style of 3 or 4 then took a longer break. I did seem to decline rapidly if I did too many of them, so I have learnt something from that: longer breaks are good. I used my breaks to walk so I've hit my step goals for the month as well. Go, me.This is my threesome romance. I can’t tell if I’m just good at writing that kind of content, or if I was in a coffee guzzling panic as the end of the month (and the deadline) approached. Meh… either way, my words per hour average for the month is 1155.So doing the math: if I wrote for one hour every day, I should have 1155x365= 421,575 words in a year.What? No, no, no, that can’t be right. That’s like 4 entire books.*frowns at figures* recalculates* admits math is right*Huh.I did kind of let the 500 word a day project go. But I added a lot of words to the haunted house story. It’s now at that read through, this scene should happen before that scene, did I just change the name of a character three times (he was matt, then max, then something else that started with M- mick? Bad, bad brain), oh the math on the character ages and children don’t add up… that stage. Do I like this stage of story writing? No. no, I do not.My total of all words for the month is 91,191 which IS an entire book.
So, I have no excuses.

Over-commitment update

I swear I am such a dag (aussie word for fool or idiot in an embarrassing way?) I have never failed nanowrimo and I am certainly not going to do it this month. So after a few days of almost flat-lining, I have written 13k words in three days. Now the site tells me I need to write 2,300 words a day rather than the usual 1,667 to finish on time.Meh, I can do that. (Watch me fall on my face.)The other projects?  According to my spreadsheet I have written 45k words so far this month. The 500 words a day one is behind.And, the haunted house fic now has 70k words. I did lose a whole day when kid 3 and I piled in the car and we drove south to scope out the random small town I had chosen. A good three hours’ drive from our place on freeways at 110 kmph and still three hours away.It seems that it was not so random. It’s funny how we choose something from a map or off a list and it is only later that our brain connects the dots on why we chose that particular thing. If I remember rightly, and as I remember it NOW, when my mother finished teacher training her first job was in the tiny town of Laggan, NSW at the one teacher school. There she met my father who had grown up in Crookwell, the nearest small town.And this was the area that I ‘randomly’ chose… Yeah, right.Thanks for that, brain.

Several days into over commitment

Right… *dusts off hands* How am I going?Well… I posted a fanfiction one shot tonight - just over 3k words. It was in my draft folder and I had forgotten about it. Cleaned it up, edited it a little, and posted it.I have been nominated in the Favorite Veteran Author category of the Fanatic Fanfics Multifandom Awards. I’ve not heard of these before, so again, thank you to whoever nominated me! The website is here:or is it here:I don't know, one redirects to the other.Voting starts on the 11th April and closes May 2nd.I’ve never made it into a multi fandom awards contest before. How cool.As an update on my word count and recording everything (as per my earlier post)… 12k words in five days. Not so bad… but - and I know that Monica Leonelle will not be surprised by this - my highest word count per hour is when I dictate:  3,743 words per hour.The kids - all four of them - are the biggest distraction in an open living room where my desk is in a corner and there are no doors I can close.And this dictating isn’t really high tech. It’s me, huddled in my bed, talking into my chromebook using the inbuilt microphone and the Goggle Drive speech to text option. It’s not very good with commands, so I will have to go back and edit in speech marks and fix a few mistakes. Not sure how I count that in the word count?I just noticed it has an Australian English option. I assume that means it can translate ‘yew bewdy mate, let’s go down to maccas for a sausage sanger’ accurately. Or maybe not.So, back to the writing!

How did I manage that?

I have over committed myself this month. I signed up for camp nanowrimo. 50,000 words in a romance idea I had ages ago and had sketched out some basic story ideas for. That’s 1,667 words a day.I promised my therapist I would write 1,500 words a day for the Aussie haunted house romance story that I stalled on and that a first draft will be done by… you guessed it… the end of April.And I’m doing an Udemy course with Harry deWulf in which the homework is writing 500 words a day for yet another story. I chatted with Harry online and he gave me a voucher to the course. Yay. He’s a literary editor; the one who helps you iron out the story problems BEFORE you waste your time writing a huge chunk that has to be deleted later.I have often joked that my inner critic sounds like my ex and it really is becoming a problem when it has me so cowed I can’t finish any of my original fiction and I am making myself, and everyone else around me, crazy over this. So I am doing something I have never done before; talk to someone professional about it. I always feel drained after a session, so I guess it is digging out some old wounds. That is probably a good idea, too.In order to have public accountability for the Aussie story, I am posting the rough first draft on Wattpad if you want to check it out.And for the icing on the cake, I am following suggestions in Monica Leonelle’s book Write Better, Faster: How To Triple Your Writing Speed and Write More Every Day in which I use Pomodoro time sprints of 20 minutes each and track everything: where I am, what I’ve just done (walked, ate, consumed vast quantities of red wine), which program I’m writing on, music or silence, what distractions there are (the kids - always the kids), etcetera. The spreadsheet calculates how many words a minute I am producing so I can say conclusively (after some time) when how and where I write the fastest.With my luck it will turn out to be half drunk with music at full volume in the middle of the night, eh?Links: Camp nanowrimo
Harry deWulfWebsite Udemy course ‘Readworthy fiction’he’s just started a YouTubechannel as well
The House of lost heartsWattpad linkPinterest page
Monica LeonelleHer website - a lot of info is free on here if you can’t afford the bookWrite Better, Faster: How ToTriple Your Writing Speed and Write More Every Day

The Non-Canon awards 2016

What a fabulous surprise. I was nominated for the non-canon awards and then I confess, I just forgot about it. Usually I try to write a one shot and tell everyone to go and vote. So I didn’t have very high hopes but I got third in the Royal Author category - that’s the one they put you in when you are too big to go anywhere else. *grins*So thank you to everyone who nominated me, and voted for me. I'll be home for Christmas was nominated for the Royal fic award, too, but missed out to other deserving favourites.Thanks again.Links: https://thenoncanonawards.wordpress.c...