My Illustrious Body of Work
I've been writing stories (outside of school) since about grade 2. They're all comedies, with some romance, and usually a kidnapping.
Cora and General Custer
(1981 or 82) This is the great adventure that began it all! Of course I hadn't the slightest idea who Custer was, other than some cowboy looking type fellow. Cora, her dog, and Custer travel through time by bumping their heads into various objects. It was the story that never ended.
The Santa Maria Pintanina
(1985) In grade 7 I took all my friends, made them about 30 years old, put them on a Love Boat type cruise ship, and sent them out to be romanced, laid, and shipwrecked.
Thorn in the Side
(1986) I think that was the title of the grade 8 adventure. Again, everyone in their 30s, except this time they've all been kidnapped and are trying to figure out why.
Song I associate with writing this story: "Thorn In My Side" - Eurythmics
Song I associate with writing this story: "Thorn In My Side" - Eurythmics
The Black Rose
(Summer 1988) This was a play I wrote the summer after grade 9. My friends were all in it again, only in medieval times. And I was exorcising some personal demons.
Song I associate with writing this story: "Love and Affection" - Joan Armatrading
Song I associate with writing this story: "Love and Affection" - Joan Armatrading
The Three Baboons
(1989) Written in grade 11 about my new friend that year. The play takes place during the French Revolution, and is a retake on The Scarlet Pimpernel, only the rescuers are a trio. And fools.
If Music Be
(~1991) A 1930s murder mystery about my church friends, written when I was about 18. I quite liked the hero, Victor, who was endlessly spouting quotes from my well-worn Bartlett's Book of Quotations.
Song I associate with writing this story: "Dance Me to the End of Love" - Leonard Cohen
Song I associate with writing this story: "Dance Me to the End of Love" - Leonard Cohen
Les Filles d'Asclepius (also titled Epiphany)
(Summer 1993) Written sometime during my first degree, my BA in English Lit. I used to take the train with a fellow student who was always having love life troubles, and we had a crush on the train ticket dude. We decided he looked like Ovila from the Quebec blockbuster mini-series/book Les Filles de Caleb.
So the book, like that series, is about a one-room schoolhouse teacher in the late 19th century, and the guys chasing after her. And I filled it with all the literary terms we were learning in our American lit summer course, like epiphanies and pathetic fallacy.
Song I associate with writing this story: Theme from Les Filles de Caleb
So the book, like that series, is about a one-room schoolhouse teacher in the late 19th century, and the guys chasing after her. And I filled it with all the literary terms we were learning in our American lit summer course, like epiphanies and pathetic fallacy.
Song I associate with writing this story: Theme from Les Filles de Caleb
Books and Bonking
(~1996 - 98) A novella I wrote about working in a bookstore. (Guess what I was doing from 1995 - 2010.)
Snuffed by Shevaun Ryan
(~1997) A Regency romance with a murder thrown in (mostly because I didn't know what to write next.) One of the few stories not written about people I know, probably because I realized that I'll never be able to publish my books if they're all about real people.
That's a pretty damned good title for a Regency murder mystery. ...Or a Regency porno murder mystery.
The tag line says: "He came to die and found a reason to live." The blurb: "From the award winning author of The Santa Maria Pintanina, If Music Be and Les Filles d'Asclepius comes the greatest novel of our time. A disillusioned nobleman returns to England and finds his life turned upside down by his estranged wife. Can he avenge himself against her before he falls in love?"
The review on the book is from the New York Times: "A literary tour de force." The review at the bottom is from Kirkus: "A writer of power and emotion."
That's a pretty damned good title for a Regency murder mystery. ...Or a Regency porno murder mystery.
The tag line says: "He came to die and found a reason to live." The blurb: "From the award winning author of The Santa Maria Pintanina, If Music Be and Les Filles d'Asclepius comes the greatest novel of our time. A disillusioned nobleman returns to England and finds his life turned upside down by his estranged wife. Can he avenge himself against her before he falls in love?"
The review on the book is from the New York Times: "A literary tour de force." The review at the bottom is from Kirkus: "A writer of power and emotion."
Gossip and Gossibility by Shevaun Ryan
(~1998) A Regency romance, murder mystery adventure. The sleuths were a marriage-of-convenience couple, who carried on with other people. This is the second one, not sure what the first one was called.
The blurb: "From Mayfair to Paris, ladies are disappearing and corpses are piling up like unwanted fruit cakes at Christmas. But when Hot Passion wars with Ruthless Logic, even Lady Steinway and Lord Marcus doubt their ability to turn out a happy ending. And without being caught in the crossfire!"
Song I associate with writing this story: (with the second one) "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah" - The Pogues
The blurb: "From Mayfair to Paris, ladies are disappearing and corpses are piling up like unwanted fruit cakes at Christmas. But when Hot Passion wars with Ruthless Logic, even Lady Steinway and Lord Marcus doubt their ability to turn out a happy ending. And without being caught in the crossfire!"
Song I associate with writing this story: (with the second one) "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah" - The Pogues
Corky
(~2002) I never finished this one, but it was going to be a 1930s murder mystery, in London, starring one of the cashiers I worked with.
The Letter of Introduction
(November 2002) My first Nanowrimo novel, a remake of Georgette Heyer's Frederica, and stars no one I know. About a southern American woman in Oxford who is trying to finish her academic book when her three suddenly homeless cousins arrive from Tennessee, determined to live with her in her one-bedroom home. Desperate for help, she digs out the letter of introduction her brother gave her to his old Oxford school mate, and sucks Lord Rotherfield into the vortex of chaos that her life has become. This one is half rewritten, I'd like to get back to it some day.
Song I associate with writing this story: "You'll Accompany Me" - Bob Seger
Song I associate with writing this story: "You'll Accompany Me" - Bob Seger
Hobby
(~2003) A novella about a 50-something English professor who is trapped in a job he hates until a mysterious new professor arrives on campus and points him towards his true calling. It was my experiment in plotting.
Song I associate with writing this story: "Rhiannon" - Stevie Nicks
Song I associate with writing this story: "Rhiannon" - Stevie Nicks
Genie
(November 2008) For my second Nanowrimo I decided to write the first 50 000 words of back story for my next book (Henry V remake). It's the story of my heroine's great-grandmother and how she starts her business and falls in love and marries the wrong man. It takes place in turn-of-the-century San Francisco. Because I stopped at 50 000 words it stops at a very depressing point, where we think the hero is dead! My oh my.
It's based upon Henry V's ancestors--Isabella the She Wolf, daughter of the French king, who married Edward II, and through whom Henry V made his claim on France.
Song I associate with writing this story: "Morris Brown" - Outkast
It's based upon Henry V's ancestors--Isabella the She Wolf, daughter of the French king, who married Edward II, and through whom Henry V made his claim on France.
Song I associate with writing this story: "Morris Brown" - Outkast
Faux Fiancé
(September 2006 - April 2016) The working title for this was "One Year" because I gave myself one year to write it. Ho ho ho...
Actually I did write the first draft in a year--mostly in a summer. But it's been through a lot of changes since then.
Song I associate with writing this story: "If You Asked Me To" - Patti Labelle or Céline Dion
Actually I did write the first draft in a year--mostly in a summer. But it's been through a lot of changes since then.
Song I associate with writing this story: "If You Asked Me To" - Patti Labelle or Céline Dion