Lavinia Collins's Blog, page 19

**NEWS** THE WARRIOR QUEEN completely free on Amazon for a limited time only!

Scoot along and grab a bargain! The Warrior Queen is completely free in both Amazon UK and US stores! Get it while you can!

“A sumptuous romance based around the life of Guinevere and Arthur’s Court.

Never before has the magical world of Queen Guinevere, King Arthur and Lancelot and the knights of the Round Table been so deeply explored than in this warming saga of passion, duty and infidelity. Drawing on a rich seam of historical sources Lavinia Collins has created a fictional masterpiece, and epic romance that will stand the test of time.”

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/THE-WARRIOR-QUEEN-Guinevere-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B00IPRC0TE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1393635696&sr=8-1&keywords=lavinia+collins

US: http://www.amazon.com/THE-WARRIOR-QUEEN-Guinevere-Trilogy-ebook/dp/B00IPRC0TE/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top

Does a “romance” need a happy ending?

A recent, and very thought-provoking, review at geekgirlinlove.com of the whole of the Guinevere Trilogy (read it here: http://geekgirlinlove.com/2014/09/22/book-review-the-guinevere-trilogy-by-lavinia-collins/) made the very good point that, though I myself call my novels “romance” and happily list myself as a romance writer, as she puts it:

“If you know your King Arthur lore, and most of us do, it’s not a spoiler to say that Guinevere, Arthur, and Lancelot do not end up practicing open love in Avalon while dining on cake.”

Firstly, if only the original tale did end that way! Secondly – I really do see the point. When I was pitching to publishers, I myself had terrible trouble trying to decide  what exactly to pitch the book as. Arthurian-inspired literature is kind of its own category, somewhere between history and fantasy, and when focalised through a key romantic player in that narrative, I guess it’s come out as a romance.

The thing is one of the beauties of genre fiction like romance, is that the audience knows what to expect. What kind of ending. It took me a long time to figure out what romance review bloggers meant by a “HEA” (and why that meant they weren’t interested in my novels!) and I do think that there’s an important sense of satisfaction in something ending the way that we expect. That’s the way high Greek Tragedy works, and it’s the way that the modern ‘romance’ novel works.

So I’ve found myself in the position where I kind of talk around the genre, and Amazon doesn’t have room for that. It’s a kind of romance-fantasy-Arthurian-historical type novel, rather than being firmly rooted in a particular genre. But this is difficult as well – you want to let people know what to expect. People don’t like surprises, I’ve found, especially in terms of book genre.

So I’m going to keep muddling through a little more. I myself am not a big fan of the straight-out happy ending, but I think endings are hard, and they trouble us all. Anyone with any tips – genre OR ending related – feel free to chime in in the comments :)

Stop Calling Things “Medieval” When You Actually Mean “Horrifying”

So the word ‘medieval’ has been bandied around in the press a lot lately. It’s a word (understandably) that I care a lot about. I want it to be used correctly. I’m not just talking people who respond to me saying I’m doing medieval literature by saying “Oh, you mean Shakespeare?”

People have been calling the horrific executions of Islamic State “medieval”. Can we just back up a bit here?

Violence wasn’t invented in the medieval period. Anyone with even the vaguest knowledge of Classical history will know that. Even a cursory glance through a biography of the Emperor Nero would have to agree that senseless atrocities are at least a pre 500CE thing.

It’s not really that the word is wrongly used. That’s not really my problem. My problem is that this all feeds into this smug narrative of progress. “Medieval” means the past. It means we’re better now. It means we’re different. But the atrocities perpetuated by Islamic State are not a throwback. They’re a symptom of the disease in our modern society. In human nature. We tell ourselves this neat little story that in the past people were violent, life was cheap and brutality was rife. We tell ourselves we’re better now. We tell ourselves that women and the poor were oppressed, and we’ve learned better now. But it’s 600 years later and the same record’s still playing. We still kill each other, oppress each other, hurt each other for our personal gain, or out of a misplaced sense of ideology.

We need to stop calling atrocities of violence “medieval”. We need to own up to the fact that these are our own modern problems. The monsters we created. Only then can we deal with the causes, and take responsibility, rather than writing these horrors off as something from a distant time.

Emma Watson Naked Pictures: Seriously, World? SERIOUSLY?

Are we those guys now? Are we literally those guys as a species? You know, those guys who just never let anyone do anything good without ruining it? Could we not just let one woman suggest that we all be nice to one another for a change without immediately proving her point by being massive dickheads? I mean, come on. As an entire genus, I’m disappointed in us.

4Chan’s fuzzy logic is at best laughable, at worst disgusting. Emma Watson has been naked therefore stop talking, tits, and lie there naked while I shame you for being a slut! Ha ha ha that will teach her to leave the kitchen.

Emma Watson’s call for equality at the UN conference is all the more poignant for the way it has now been contextualised within society’s non-acceptance of a woman who opens her mouth, and opens that mouth to speak.

Emma speaks of how grateful she is not to have had her progress inhibited by sexism. As soon as she says that, the internet claims to have her naked pictures.

That wouldn’t happen to a man.

Not a male celebrity. Not a male actor. Not a male underwear model. Certainly, the internet’s reaction would not be the same.

It’s all of our business to stop this bullshit. Men and women alike. Everyone deserves a chance to speak. To talk without fear about the things that are important to them. If we live in a world where this shit still happens, how can anyone say that men and women are equal?

I can’t even with this naked photos bullshit anymore.

Chick Lit Prejudice: Romance Isn’t for Smart Women

I’ve had a bad review. I know, I know, authors aren’t supposed to talk about this one. But I want to talk about this one, because it flags up for me some interesting issues around the kind of thing I write, and the kind of attitude in general our society has to it.

(There’s recently been a very good article on ‘girly’ book covers by Maureen Johnson at the guardian here: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2013/may/09/coverflip-maureen-johnson-gender-book)

This Amazon reviewer was disappointed that my novel, The Warrior Queen wasn’t what they expected. Despite the naked woman on the cover. Despite it being listed under ‘romance’ on Amazon.

Why were they disappointed?

Because they had googled my bio (I know they googled it, because the details of my education aren’t on Amazon, because I removed them, because I thought it would lead to just this kind of assumption) and they didn’t think that this was the sort of thing a woman like me should have written.

There were two points of objection for them:

I am Oxford-educated

I did my undergraduate degree at Oxford. I deleted this from my Amazon profile, because people are such twats about it. It’s annoying enough when you’re there and people assume that you’re all posh, super-intellectual snobs with nothing better to do than quote Keats at each other all day because that’s what the students do in Lewis. We’re normal people, with normal lives, dreams, hopes, sexualities etc. You know that bit in Legally Blonde where Elle’s parents tell her not to go to Harvard because it’s only for people who are boring, and ugly and serious? Yeah. It’s basically the same thing.

So because I went to Oxford I’m not supposed to enjoy romance fiction? A light read? It’s probably OK for me to read stuff like that, I mean, in an ironic way, right? But y’know only as a sociological study, yeah? And only, like, in protest? I’m secretly reading To the Lighthouse, but with the cover of this romance novel on, but as a social experiment, yeah, cos I’m like so intellectual? But writing it? Oh no.

This review expressed doubt that I really was Oxford-educated because I had written a piece of genre fiction. Sex fiction. Sexy sexy historical sex fiction that I enjoyed writing because I am a human, just like you. (Maybe not JUST like you, but pretty like you). What did he expect? What, so because I’m educated I can only write po-faced pseudo-intellectual literary fiction? Unreal Camelot! Unreal Camelot! Yeah, no thanks. I wrote it for fun, for entertainment, for sexy kicks. I had no illusions that I was writing the new Finnegan’s Wake. It’s listed under romance. It’s romance. My personal history has nothing to do with it. But, y’know, thanks for googling.

I am a Feminist

The reviewer also expressed disbelief in my feminism, because Guinevere, my main character, is not the perfect paradigm of empowered female behaviour at all times. Therefore I am not a feminist. I represent a medieval woman with limited powers of influence – not a feminist. I represent a woman who likes to have sexy sex with sexy men – I’m not a feminist. I write a romance novel – I’m not a feminist. According to him.

I would just like to say at this point, what a boring and dishonest thing literature would be if everyone who was a feminist had to represent a perfect world with women who were empowered, who never absorbed the patriarchal cultures around them, who never showed weakness, or vulnerability, or love. I would also like to say: my characters are not me. I did not write them to hang some kind of feminist lesson on about how women should behave.*

Here’s the Problem

There’s this strange idea that romance fiction isn’t empowering. But it’s written by women (often), for women (often), and it’s one of the few genres that often focuses on a female viewpoint. Any surprise that it’s the most vilified? The most often called ‘trash’, or ‘fluff’? Because women’s viewpoint narratives can only be less momentous, less interesting, less significant than men’s. If it’s ‘romance’, it’s trash, and it’s not the business of an Oxford-educated feminist to write it. If that’s not some industrial-strength bullshit, I don’t know what is.

I want to say, I’m smart, I’m educated, I’m a feminist, and I like a good romance story. I like things that are light and fun, as well as things that are serious. I have a healthy sexuality. I’m sick of this idea that “women’s interest” is some kind of code for “stupid”. That something fun and female-centric is something unworthy of the thinking woman. That if women are smart, they should be like men.

I’ve already deleted my education from my bio because of this stupid attitude. Maybe I’ll put it back.

Romance is great! I’m ready to fight for it. We’ve taken back the night. Let’s take back the bookshelves.

*(Just as a side note, the reviewer takes “feminist” issue with a point in the text where Guinevere faints. Perhaps this was too much of a medieval in-joke, but just FYI anyone out there worrying about my feminism, this was actually a nerdy reference to the fact that in the original, men faint all the time, because in medieval literature fainting is a kind of literary shorthand for when people are overcome with emotion in situations where they would not be able to verbalise their emotions. There’s been a lot of critical literature on the ‘swoun’ in medieval romance. But still, even though it is a nerdy reference, surely women should be allowed to faint without having their ‘feminist’ badge taken away??)

The 10 Best Heroines in Classic Novels

10. Tess Tess of the D’Urbevilles

I’ve never seen a film or TV adaptation that does Tess justice. Sure, she feels sorry for herself quite a lot, and sure she calls her child Sorrow (I mean, WHAT is with that??) but Hardy manages to get across a toughness that has not yet – to my knowledge – made it to the screen, earning Tess a place on my list.

9. Lady Chatterly Lady Chatterly’s Lover

She’s a super hot lady who knows what she wants, and goes purposefully about getting it, and I’m a big fan, but let’s all be honest with ourselves here – everyone in the world’s favourite character in this book is Mellors, the hot gamekeeper. Grrr!

8. Esther Summerson Bleak House

Esther is a bit of an unusual choice for me, in terms of favourite female characters. She’s quiet and deferential, but she has a strength and an endurance in that quietness, and that is why she is on my list.

7. Gudrun and Ursula Women In Love

These sisters are a special BOGOF in my list, because I can’t choose between them. Fancy a bit of philosophical pondering alongside your sexual encounter? Look no further than these two sisters for a bit of sex followed with, “Oh but Rupert don’t you wonder what it all MEANS? I mean to exist…?” etc etc etc.

6. Rebecca Rebecca

Ok, so she’s not the heroine blah blah stop breaking the rules you say. Shut up this is my list, I say, and even though Rebecca never really appears she sounds like she was an amazing bitch, just not giving any of the fucks and wanting to dress up as a shepherdess and hang out on her boat so she has my vote, sounds amazing fun. The narrator woman is so BLAH.

5. Lolita Lolita

Is she a heroine? I don’t know. She’s a mystery wrapped in an enigma, wrapped in a puzzle. Light of my life, fire of my loins…

4. Daisy The Great Gatsby

She’s a bitch, and I love her. The film did not do her justice.

3. Emma, Emma

Meddleuse supreme – if you’ve got a life dilemma, she’s got an opinion. Also inspired this fab Hollywood modernisation:

2. Scout To Kill a Mockingbird

This one needs no explanation. If you haven’t read it, read it.

1. Cathy, Wuthering Heights

She’s hot, she’s crazy, she’s going to come back from the dead to mess with you. What’s not to love?

Also inspired the best ever novel-inspired song:

BONUS PRIZE FOR LEAST APPEALING FEMALE CHARACTER:

Little Nell The Old Curiosity Shop

I believe it was that noted wit Oscar Wilde who said “It would take a heart of stone not to laugh when little Nell dies”, and I do believe that he was right.

Chime in with your favourites in the comments! Feel free to tell me that I’m wrong ;)

Jennifer Lawrence Naked Pictures: If You Click, You’re Part of the Problem

Do I want to see Jennifer Lawrence naked? Sure. I’m a big fan, and I think she’s lovely. Do I want to help perpetuate a culture that sells women’s bodies like commodities, and violates people’s privacy? Not even a tiny bit.

This is the issue at the centre of the leaked photos of celebrities in the buff that has made the internet explode this week. The focus has been on charming, sexy and super-famous Jennifer Lawrence, but there are over 60 people whose privacy has been violated by some creepy internet pervert looking for bitcoins or some kind of pathetic five minutes of fame.

If you were famous, why would you take naked photos? I hear you cry. Well, why should anyone be ashamed to be naked? Why should these people have been afraid to share a private moment with a loved one? Many film actors travel a lot, and are in long-distance relationships with their partners. These things are meant to be secure. But aside from that, why should people whose jobs put them in the public eye not be able to have sex in private without some creep hacking their computer to get photos and videos? It’s not like ordinary people don’t do it. I’ve had friends whose boyfriends have shared intimate photographs, and it’s just as disgusting, but did the whole internet perv over them? Thankfully not, because they weren’t famous. We seem to think we own these people – especially these women – because we’ve seen them on TV. We don’t own them. They’re people like us, who want their privacy, and sometimes make the perfectly valid choice of taking private photos.

And let’s talk about the list. There are some male celebrities on it. I don’t know who, because no one cares. Everyone wants to ogle sexy naked Jennifer Lawrence, no one is interested in perving the naked men, or shaming them for daring to be naked/having sex.

So, I saw the post. I was curious. I’m sure we all are. But I didn’t click. And I’m not going to. Every click adds fuel to the fire that hacking people’s phones and computers to get to DELETED files sent within private relationships will earn you internet fame in the form of clicks and bitcoin. It’s a violation, it’s disgusting. You’re tacitly condoning the invasion of private moments from someone else’s life when you click, or google, or share. If we all just shrugged and said “we all knew that celebrities had sex, just like us, and were naked under their clothes just like us, and we are not really interested in your creepy stolen photos” then it would stop happening.

So please, just think before you click.

Why Feminism needs the NHS

Are you a feminist (i.e. do you believe that men and women ought to be equal in society)? If so, then whatever your other political stance may be, you need to be pro-NHS.

Let me explain.

First, we should compare the situation in the UK (NHS), with the situation in the states (privatised medicine). A woman needing contraception in the UK can get it the same day she asks for it for free in a walk-in clinic without an appointment. She doesn’t need to pay. You doesn’t need anyone else’s permission. A woman in the US, before she can even buy the contraceptive pill, needs to have medical insurance. She needs to pay for it (I think it’s something like $50, but correct me if I’m wrong). She can only do these things under her medical insurance if she has her employer’s permission, or the permission of the university (/college) she attends.

In a privatised healthcare system, it is your employer, rather than you, that decides on the moral boundaries of your contraceptive choice.

Adequate contraception saves female lives, allows women to be independent, to enjoy the same sexual freedoms as men, to control their own bodies. It has been one of the most powerful tools in women’s liberation. It should be free. It should be available to anyone and everyone regardless of money, religious beliefs and any other concern. If we privatise our healthcare in the UK, I am afraid we will lose it.

The NHS isn’t perfect, but it’s not perfect because the government isn’t perfect. It’s imperfectly funded. It’s staffed and run by fallible, imperfect humans. So would private hospitals be. Only they would cost patients money. Lots of money.

There’s sometimes a mistaken belief that private medicine would give us more choice than the NHS. That’s not true. It means that the choices would be in the hands of people running companies for profit, or powerful people in high places – employers, university chancellors, etc. – making those choices for us as they calculate our insurance package.

Aside from the fact that human health and a human life isn’t a product to be bought and sold, we should be very proud – and protective – of our NHS. I certainly am. I don’t want to imagine a world without it. I don’t want to have to live in one.

10 THINGS YOU NEED TO WRITE A NOVEL

1. An Idea. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ah, the beautiful moment of conception where the novel begins! The flash of creative genius etc. But the beauty is, it doesn’t even have to be your idea. I’m certainly not ashamed to say I stole all my ideas from medieval literature, and it doesn’t matter one little bit, because they can’t sue me, cos they’re all dead. 

 

2. Some Free Time. 

Sounds obvious, right? Well actually the art is in making free time when it doesn’t actually exist. Supposed to be doing you “real” job? No worries! Write your novel instead, and hurriedly minimise the page whenever anyone walks past! Supposed to be cleaning the house? No worries! Leave it long enough, and whoever lives with you will eventually be worn-down enough to do it for you. Probably ought to be asleep? Nah. Sleep is for losers, and besides that 3am sleep-deprived creativity rush is one of Nature’s most generous natural highs. 

 

4. Privacy. 

I don’t know about you, but I cannot write if I think someone might see what I am writing. My entire family have this really annoying habit of looking over my shoulder at whatever I am doing on the computer, and reading out loud whatever words they see. This would probably be fine if I were writing a children’s book, but it is my absolute nightmare that my mother will lean over my shoulder when I am visiting her and just shout out “NIPPLES” or something. Writing must be done in absolute secrecy. I also travel a lot, which means writing on the train with the screen of my computer switched off, resulting in whoever I am sitting next to thinking I am a spy. 

 

5. A Friend. 

Like my own dearest love of my heart, fire of my loins best friend and inspiration Kay (to whom I dedicated my first book) a friend is essential for writing a novel. Particularly useful in those moments where you say, “I’ve read it back, and it’s awful, and if anyone ever reads it I will have to move to darkest Peru out of shame”. I am sure many of you will agree that without a certain special friend who  was there with you throughout the creative process, a novel would never have come out of it. 

 

6. Chocolate.

 

This one is self-explanatory. 

 

 

7. A Cat. 

The therapeutic qualities of a good pet are well known. Personally I’m a cat lover. Nothing like sitting with your lovely cat while you write, and he’s filling you will chill, good feelings. Of course, my cat has mastered the art of running his paw over the trackpad and then jumping on the spacebar, which highlights and deletes a large portion of text, which is not always so relaxing, but in the main, I would call a familiar of some kind a must-have! 

 

8. Lack of Inhibition. 

Gotta get rid of that shame. I was certainly really really embarrassed to share my work with anyone else, but the time comes when you have got to let go, and just put it out there. Not everyone will like your work, but if they don’t then it’s no big deal. You still wrote it, and that’s pretty amazing. 

 

9. Another Hobby. 

Just do it. Or you’ll go mad. Running, swimming, something where you can just let the thoughts come to your brain, otherwise you get that thing where you have been staring at your computer typing for 7 hours without getting out of bed to wash or eat, and you feel like you don’t exist anymore. 

 

10. Determination. 

Good old fashioned determination. It’s a novel, so it’s got to be long, so you got to write it to the end. Of course, this must also be done with the help of number 5 (a friend), and the help of number 6 (chocolate)! But with all these ingredients, I’d say, conditions are perfect for novel-writing.

 

If anyone has anything  else they consider essential for the writing process, please add it in the comments! The more the merrier. 

 

 

 

Writing Endings – and rewriting them

I got a call from my friend Jenny the other day. Mid-conversation, it went something like this:

Me: Did you finish the book?

Jenny: Yeah I finished your book.

[Awkward silence]

Me: … did you like it?

Jenny: … … I didn’t like the end.

Me: Oh.

Jenny: [spoiler spoiler spoiler] should have happened.

Me: But that isn’t what happens. What happens in the story. It was a story based on another story, and in the original story, that’s what happens. Sorry.

Jenny: Well I don’t like it.

Me: … I can write you… your own ending?

Jenny: Yeah, yeah do that. The original ending is too [spoiler].

So there it was. The truth I had asked for but not wanted. Jenny didn’t like the ending. It’s not like it’s never been OK to change endings in literary adaptations. Even the old time-y pros are doing it when they adapt. Shakespeare changed the ending of King Lear, from his sources. And The Winter’s Tale. People change the ends all the time when they adapt. 

Jenny thinks I ought to have changed the end. Well, I don’t want to. I like the end the way it is. The way the legend properly ends. But also, I’m an obliging type, and I want to lend a hand, so I’m going to write Jenny her own special ending where what she wants to happen, happens. What can I say, I’m just that kind of friend! 

But it did get me thinking, the way that we think of the start-point and end points of stories being fixed. I made a lot of changes to the original material I used to write The Guinevere Trilogy, but I never wanted to change the beginning or the ending. We think of these as giving the writing shape, and in a way they do, but I’m going to write this other ending just for Jenny, and see how it goes. It’s an empowering thing, I think, to take something old and adapt it, and make it all yours. 

So wish me luck! And I would love to hear in the comments about people’s thoughts on how they wrote their own endings, and if they changed the endings of things that inspired them!