New Book!

Just in time for the holidays!

My cover designer finished the cover for my short story collection (can I call it a collection if it's just two stories? And if not, what SHOULD I be calling it? Seriously, this has been driving me nuts. A duology? But they aren't connected to each other, just similarly-themed) a couple months sooner than I was expecting. The stories themselves have been ready to go for ages, so all I had to do was fix up a little bit of formatting, and voila! Just in time to add to your Christmas wish list:

If This Be Magic & The Traitor and the Spy, available now at Smashwords and Amazon, and soon to be available in print.

Here's the blurb for If This Be Magic:

As if being the worst student at Miss Cranston's Select Seminary for the Study of Sorcery weren't bad enough, now sixteen-year-old Sophie Abbott suspects her uncle, the most respected magician in Boston, of secretly working for the Kaiser. The year is 1915, and though America isn't in the war yet, Sophie can't sit by and do nothing. Before long, she and Uncle Edward's apprentice Owen are deep in danger and treachery, and Sophie's unique ability to see magic as a spiderweb of spells might be the only thing that can save them. Time is running short and Owen's life is in her hands. Every spell she has ever attempted has failed spectacularly - can Sophie trust her magic now?

And for The Traitor and the Spy:

Philomena Stirling-Vane is fourteen years old in Victorian England, and in the unhappy position of having accidentally inherited the family magic. Her father is outraged, and her mother nearly prostrate with grief over the unhappy prospect of a lady magician in the family. When Jonathan Kempson, Mr Stirling-Vane's former apprentice, requires another magician's assistance to track down a traitor to the Council of Magicians, Phil sees her chance. Disguised as her brother, she accompanies Mr Kempson to London, where they must overcome their mutual dislike and learn to work together to unweave the tapestry of deception laid around them.

I was immensely proud of Justice's Mask, and still am, but these two are even closer to my heart. They are fantasy, for one, which is my first and best love. They also both have a great deal more humor than Justice's Mask, and while the more serious tone fits JM, I really do prefer to keep a more light-hearted tone when I can.

They are also set in the same world, though different eras, as my forthcoming novel Magic & Mayhem (I am aiming for a summer publication - we'll see). This is my first attempt at playing with different stories and different characters in the same fantasy world, and it's been so much fun.

Also, the cover. Isn't that just gorgeous? I am so in love with it. It was created by Kathryn Jonell, and I highly recommend her work for anyone looking for a cover designer.

I have two more short stories and a novella from my summertime non-novel writing. I'm not sure when or how I'll publish those, but for right now, I am so, so pleased with the three I've already published.

I hope you all enjoy them as much as I do!

Influences: LM Montgomery

I don't remember a time in my life when I wasn't acquainted with Anne Shirley. I can't quite remember now which came first, watching the movie or reading the book, but they certainly happened close together. Thankfully, the movie never ruined the book for me, and while these days I have to grit my teeth through parts of the sequel (and I refuse, utterly and completely, to ever watch the third), even knowing and loving the books as well as I do, I can still watch the movie without flinching.

This fellow might have something to do with that. Oh, Gilbert!

I've never been as big a fan of the Emily books - I adore Emily of New Moon, but the later two books of the trilogy get under my skin in parts. Frankly, Emily herself infuriates me the older she gets, as does Ilse.

However, as one who grew up in an extended family that can only properly be called a clan, with aunts and uncles and cousins galore, as well as second cousins and the like (my father is the oldest of eight; his father was also the oldest of eight, and his mother was one of five), my favorites out of all of LMM's works would have to be the Story Girl books. And not just because my sister and I watched Road to Avonlea every week on CBC when we were growing up! The books are so different from the show.

For one thing, the books didn't have him. Oh, Gus!

Ahem.

I love LMM's writing style. I even love her "purple prose." I've been writing LMM fanfiction since 2005. I started it as a bored and lonely newlywed, while Carl was at work and I needed something to distract me from my loud and inconsiderate neighbors, and the fact that I had no car or any way to get away during the day. Escaping to PEI, and a simpler time, more romantic way of life, an era I've always loved ... well, it just might have saved my sanity. It certainly brought me some wonderful friends (hi, Adrienne and Cathy!) who shared my love for LMM and her works. 

Thanks to LMM, I learned how to explore different genres of writing besides just YA fantasy. I learned to play with different styles, to change my tone depending on what type of story I was writing. I learned that, as Mr Carpenter tells Emily, "pine woods are just as real as pigsties, and a darn sight more pleasant" - meaning, don't let other people force you to write ugly things just because they are "realistic." I learned how to write gentle romance (romance of any kind always having terrified me before).

I also developed a mad, passionate love affair with adjectives and rambling descriptions, which I am now desperately trying to combat. Not all influences are good!

I recently started my eleventh LMM fanfic (yes, for those of you who follow my LMM stories, that would be Gwen's WWII story). I am not exactly working hard on it, having a few original projects that are taking most of my attention, but it is growing in my brain and a little bit on paper. No matter if I ever get published, or wherever my writing takes me, I suspect I will always have some LMM story brewing on the side.

It's the least I can do to honor the woman who brought such magic to my childhood (and adulthood, if I'm honest).

Did you grow up reading the Anne books? Did you have a crush on Gilbert Blythe (or Gus Pike)? Is there a book that you have read for so long that you can't remember a time when it wasn't part of your life? Do you write or read fanfiction at all?

Friend and Brother

I don't often do this, but yesterday I started thinking about a new Narnia one-shot, and today I took advantage of staying home from church with the teething toddler to write it out. I rarely, rarely move this quickly on a fic, but somehow the world of Narnia inspires me to write, and write fast.

I also think, oddly enough, that figure skating helps to inspire me to write Narnia fic, because the last time I wrote something this quickly was last year during the Nationals, and last night I was up late watching the ladies' free skate from this year's Nationals.

Whatever the cause of this burst of creativity, I am very pleased to be able to offer you:

Friend and Brother

Featuring two of my favorites Narnian characters, Eustace Clarence Scrubb and King Caspian X. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Fanfiction vs. original writing

I am nearing the end of yet another fanfiction story. This one, The Summer Between, is considerably shorter than most of my recent full-length works, and would probably fall somewhere between novella and novel (it should finish out at a little over 40,000 words). I could have padded it out, brought it up to at least 50,000, and if I ever go back and edit it, I might do just that, but for now, this is the story that wanted telling, so I'm not messing with it too much.

Fanfiction (also known as derivative fiction), for me, is a completely different writing process than original fiction. I don't do a tremendous amount of pre-research, preferring to look things up as I go along. I don't need to do much world-building, since I am playing in a world someone else has already established. Neither do I do a great deal of editing: no first, second, or third drafts. Once I have about four or five chapters written to my satisfaction (and this is the part that takes the longest), I start publishing. I try to always maintain that distance between what is written and what is published, about four to five chapters. That gives me the chance to go back and change something, within reason, without having to take down a published chapter and "fix" it.

So each chapter might get some individual editing, but as a whole, the story's first draft is the final draft. This makes for a less polished final product, certainly, but it also allows me to get the entire story up before my audience has tired completely of it. It's also a good exercise, for me, in getting things as right as possible the first time. I know many writers believe that the first draft should be sloppy and unkempt, but for me, it works much better to make my first draft as tight as possible, and just get it tighter and better with each succeeding draft. That's my own personal style, and fanfiction has definitely helped me hone that.

Since starting to write fanfiction, about six years ago now, I have written eight full-length or nearly full-length novels, seventeen shorter pieces, and started two Jane Austen pieces, both of which are unfinished, both of which I hope to finish eventually, neither of which I am certain when that will get done.

More important than the amount of fic has been the improvement to my writing abilities, and the friendships I have made through this community. It has been a wonderful way to meet other writing friends, and to both encourage and be encouraged along this journey.