Archive for August, 2007
August 30, 2007
typhoid fecklet
So Dave and I had this horrendous and very fast-acting stomach bug on Sunday but the Fecklet showed no symptoms and was all cheerful and happy even when his parents had to take turns to run and puke. Tuesday he was still feeling well, so I took him to the child minder for the afternoon so I could write. Then, yesterday (Wed), the child minder tells me her daughter has come down with the bug. I also find out that one of the people the Fecklet was playing with at the Festival on Saturday has come down with it, too.
So essentially the Fecklet is fine while all around him people are dropping like flies.
Have I got a disease-carrying baby? Or is my friend Jenny right and the Fecklet (whom she calls Dr X) is actually an evil genius and this is his first step to taking over the world?
August 29, 2007
site update
Just updated my main page and my books page, so if you happen to look at it and see anything missing or weird, please let me know.
August 28, 2007
Reading Festival
I’ve been to Reading Festival several times: as a paying ticket-holder and on a guest pass as the wife of someone working there. Usually it’s an excuse to drink all day, hang out with friends, look at interesting/weird people, go see some new bands, dance whilst off your face, eat unhealthy food and complain about the toilets. If I have a backstage pass, I hang around watching for celebrities and usually see very few. (Backstage isn’t much more interesting than anywhere else at the festival, but it is usually cleaner.)
Going to Reading Festival with a baby is something else altogether. We went the back way with the pushchair so as not to have to fight the drunken crowds, and as soon as we got backstage, laid claim to a table and chairs. We put the baby on the grass with some toys (first looking out for potentially lethal fag ends), hung out with our friends, and took turns going out to see bits of bands.
Mostly, though, I looked around for other babies. It’s a very strange thing, but when you’re a parent you get a special baby filter and you’re suddenly interested in seeing babies and talking to other parents. We met three other babies and the Fecklet had a bit of a play with all of them.
So no celebrities for me this year. Just babies.
Around six o’clock, Fecklet started to get tired so the husband packed him up and took him home. (It was the deal that Dave got to stay on Friday and Sunday nights, and I got to stay on Saturday. Of course in the end he didn’t get to stay on Sunday, because we both got sick instead.)
I was struck with the oddest sense of dizzying freedom. I couldn’t quite believe it, that I was at the festival and had no responsibilities. I sort of hovered at the table for quite awhile until I finally got it into my head that I could go somewhere else, by myself, and so I did.
I listened to a band on the main stage (don’t know who, that wasn’t important at that moment). I got a veggie burrito and ate it while listening to another band (don’t know who they were either). I got a beer and drank it. I wandered the arena and looked at people. All by myself. It was wonderful.
The strangest sight I saw was a woman painted entirely red, sitting next to a woman painted entirely green. This wasn’t too strange in itself except for as I watched, the red woman got up and said to the green woman, “Well, it was nice to meet you.” Which meant that they were strangers and had painted themselves these colours completely independently.
The weird things that bring people together.
I watched Arcade Fire, who were brilliant and made me dance and laugh, and The Red Hot Chili Peppers, who were too slick and bored me. I met some new people. The ending of my book came to me in a total flash and I told everyone I could about it.
Then it was ten o’clock, and I was tired and lonely for Fecklet and my husband, and I walked through the festival detritus and got a cab home from the station.
des petits pimpages
We’ve recovered, and the Fecklet seems to have escaped the bug, though we’re still keeping our fingers crossed.
Three quick pimpage things, and then after I’ve got some words down on my wip, I’ll post about the Reading Festival:
My friend Christyne Butler has her first book, Reilly’s Promise out today: her website
Anna Louise Lucia has the cover of her first book with Medallion Press on her blog: www.annalouiselucia.com
And click here to donate mammograms: www.thebreastcancersite.com
In the past two weeks I’ve received copies of my books in Japanese, Greek, French, Italian, and Spanish. I know there are some Portugese and German ones out there, too, which I haven’t received yet.
August 27, 2007
Ugh, I haven’t been able to post about festival because we have all come down with the flu. Well, not the baby yet, but I expect it in a matter of hours.
August 25, 2007
It was just SO AWESOME.
August 24, 2007
rock on, baby
Mmm…boys with guitars
The Fecklet and I are going to Reading Festival tomorrow for the day. Partly because I figure he might as well see his daddy’s working world and partly because hey, I’m writing a book about a rock star and this is all tax-deductible.
It should be an interesting experience. I’ll post all about it. If we ever emerge.
August 23, 2007
a life lesson
Oh and I just wanted to mention once again, for those of you who might have forgotten, that my book which is number six on the WALDENBOOKS BESTSELLER LIST was rejected twice by Harlequin/Mills & Boon before they bought the revised version.
Just goes to show. Something.
(I’m on Kate Rothwell’s blog today.)
August 22, 2007
bestseller!
MacAllister’s Baby is number six on the Waldenbooks/Borders series romance bestsellers list this week.
My fellow Modern-Extra-authors-released-as-Presents are on there too–Kelly Hunter (at NUMBER TWO!!), Kate Hardy, and Trish Wylie.
Hooray!
August 21, 2007
Honey Trap hero
I’m about a third of the way through this book and I only just picked my model for my hero, Dominick Steele, who is a former alcoholic rock star:
His band’s name is Dirtysweet, which I came up with myself (after listening to T Rex), but he’s also got a former band called Stainless, which is thanks to Jess.
August 20, 2007
beyond the hearts and flowers
I’m back from the course I was teaching with Kate Walker.
What a great weekend!
It was an awesome group of writers–every one of them 100% committed to making their writing the best it could be. We laughed and worked and drank (a little) and ate chocolate and generally had a blast. Kate mentions that one of the highlights was when I was leading a session on how to write a sex scene, and a man came in with the heater we’d requested earlier…of course by that time we didn’t need it! He was a little bashful (I wonder why) and hightailed it out of there, even before I’d put up my overhead about “bodacious ta-tas”.
Some of the main highlights for me were these:
…Seeing and working with the marvellous Kate. We write quite differently and it was great to be able to demonstrate two entirely different ways of approaching writing: I analyse things, and Kate writes from instinct, and yet both approaches work. Team teaching is great fun and it was really useful to always have an expert there to enrich what I was doing.
…Meeting the twelve participants. Everyone was so friendly and so excited to be there. The bar was hopping on Friday and Saturday nights (even though we were asked to be quiet for the lecture going on next door)!
…Getting Jane and Pat to solve the my book’s plot problems in the bar!
…Doing a crit session and going around the table and praising each other’s writing. For some people this was the first time they’d shared their writing and it was wonderful to be able to assure each and every person that she had talent and potential. And then asking each person what she’d change about what she’d done, and seeing that everyone had geniunely taken things in and were able to turn what we were saying into concrete strategies for making their writing stronger.
So thank you, Kate; and thank you, Sue, Gray, Melanie, Karen, Pat, Jane, Jacqui, Jo, Lara, Marie, Sarah, and Liz; and thank you, Arts Training Council for making this happen.
August 17, 2007
something for the weekend
I’m off to Leicester this morning to teach a weekend residential course on Writing Romance: Beyond the Hearts and Flowers with Kate Walker.
I’m nearly ready for it.
I’m not quite ready to leave the Fecklet for an entire weekend, but that’s another story. I expect many neurotic phone calls in my future.
I’ll be back Sunday, but in the meanwhile, I’ve got a post up on Romancing the Blog.
