Category: Music Monday

Music Monday: Mansfield Park, Friend of Mine

I’ve spent some time again this week watching period drama music videos between my editing and writing time — partially because I love them and partially because I needed a bit of inspiration as I began a new writing project, which I am excited to tell you about. 🙂 In fact, I am so excited, that the “excerpt” today is a full chapter.

Wantingyounear. “Mansfield Park – Friend of Mine.” YouTube. YouTube, 25 Apr. 2007. Web. 13 May 2017.

However, before I get to the new story, I will give you a quick update on a couple of other stories.  At All Costs is getting very nearly ready to be published.  In fact, I expect it will be available on May 25, which is about a week later than I had hoped. But I really want Better than She Deserved to be ready at the same time, and by pushing the publication date out by a week, I think I will be able to accomplish that.  Remember, that short novelette is going to be published but also used as a mailing list perk — for new subscribers and those with the excellent taste to already be part of that list. 😀  Be watching your inboxes both for info about a limited number of ARC’s for At All Cost and for your copy of Better Than She Deserved.

Now, on to the shiny new story. 🙂

At the beginning of the year, one of my goals was to write an Austenesque story — a story that had elements based on one of Austen’s novels but original characters and plot.  When I came to the end of Caroline’s story, the time just felt right for crossing that goal off of my list — no matter how anxious the thought of stepping out of the comfort of JAFF stories with its familiar palette of characters and plots as a base on which to build and instead, having a nearly blank canvas asking me to fill it with colour and form — with life and love.

I say the canvas is nearly blank because I am not leaving Jane behind — these stories will be categorized in my Touches of Austen series of books.

A Touches of Austen story will incorporate small touches from some Jane Austen Novel.  The one I am writing right now will pay homage to Mansfield Park.  The heroine in this story, Beatrice Tierney, will share some characteristics with Fanny Price.  The hero, Graeme Clayton, is loosely based on Tom Bertram — yes, Tom and not Edmund. Gasp! I couldn’t believe it either. I am a big Fanny and Edmund fan – and I had planned to match Bea with the younger of the Clayton brothers, but Graeme is not Tom, and his brother, Everett, is not Edmund.  And Beatrice is not Fanny.  So who are these characters? Here’s what I have at the moment.  However, you should be aware that these are working notes and subject to change as necessary.  🙂

The Tierney Family of Heathcote

 

 Father: Captain Tierney (navy)

Mother: Mrs. Tierney

Son: Maxwell (Max) Tierney (25, best friends with Everett Clayton)

Daughter:  Beatrice (Bea) Tierney ( 19, sweet and quiet, wishes to please, was a daddy’s girl so took the loss of her father hard, suffered a fever when young and has some lasting effects from it)

Cousins who are visiting:  Felicity (youngest, 17) and Grace (19, eldest and betrothed) Love
The Clayton family of Stratsbury Park Father:  Sir (needs a name) Clayton

Mother: Lady Clayton

1st Son: Graeme (27, more on the wild side ─ just too fun-loving)

2nd Son: Everett (25, looking for a wife before he takes his orders)

Can you see some of the influences of Austen in that list?  In addition to these touches of Austen, I have decided to set this story in 1814, which is the year Mansfield Park was published.

So, now, would you like a peek at Graeme and Beatrice in action? How about a look at the first chapter as it is right now?  Click the link to keep reading, and let me know what you think of the story so far. Do you see any other nods to Mansfield Park?  And, after reading, can you see why I chose to share the song I did today? (Oh, and please ignore the errors — this has not been edited much at this point.)

STORY EXCERPT from (it has no title just yet): 
Continue reading Music Monday: Mansfield Park, Friend of Mine


Music Monday: Berlin ~ Original song for 12 cellos (and a kick drum),The Piano Guys

I listened to several things while writing this week — my birdsongs cd, silence, and my Music to Write By YouTube playlist.  Obviously, today’s selection is from that playlist. 🙂  I kept randomly selecting a place to begin the list and hit shuffle. This song (and The Assassination of Jessie James OST ) popped up in just about every shuffle.  Both songs helped set the correct mood for part of what I was writing — and boy, did I do a lot of writing this week!

ThePianoGuys. “Berlin – Original Song for 12 Cellos (and a Kick Drum) – The Piano Guys.”YouTube. YouTube, 10 Apr. 2013. Web. 07 May 2017.

In fact, it was a record-setting week for word count, I believe. (Seeing as I have just started keeping records, it seems safe to say that. LOL).

How record-setting was it?

Well, Caroline’s story started the week with about 5,000 words and ended the week with just over 17,000 words! Specifically, I wrote 12,961 words!  (And that does not include the few hundred I wrote for this Tuesday’s AustenAuthors.net post.  :)) But, I had some goals I wanted to reach, and I pushed hard to achieve them.  And, having hit them, I felt very accomplished at the end of the week. (I had to use that word since it was a Caroline story I was working on. 😉 )

What were those goals?

  1. Finish the first draft of Caroline’s story — which by the way now has a title (and as of Sunday afternoon an ebook cover)
  2. Finish the final edits for At All Costs.
  3. Write and schedule my post for Austen Authors, which includes an excerpt from At All Costs and an excerpt from Caro’s story that I have not shared here.

All three can be crossed off the to-do list!

So, looking forward to the week ahead, I will now need to start first round edits on Caro’s story and keep plugging away at getting At All Costs ready for publication.  And, then, well, I guess I have to pick a new writing project to start so I have something to share with you next Monday. Hmmm….I wonder what it will be?

One quick reminder before I get to the excerpt — With the Colonel’s Help will begin posting this Thursday. 🙂  I am looking forward to it!

And a little story note:  I took the name suggestions of Franklin and Rhett but flipped them (because I wanted to call the hero by his last name and enjoyed calling him Rhett instead of Franklin when I was typing 🙂 ) Thank you, Patty and Julie, for your help with that! 🙂

I think the story excerpt below gives a good indication of Mr. Rhett’s personality — although, it is a teaser and ends with a question unanswered. 🙂

EXCERPT FROM Better Than She Deserved: Continue reading Music Monday: Berlin ~ Original song for 12 cellos (and a kick drum),The Piano Guys


Music Monday: Fields of Gold, 2Cellos

While I wrote this week — and it was a busy week of writing, my Music to Write By YouTube playlist, which includes the song below, got a good work out. Besides music to keep me company while writing, I also had a couple of author friends who joined me via the internet during writing time.

Mborray07. “2CELLOS- Fields Of Gold.” YouTube. YouTube, 06 Aug. 2011. Web. 29 Apr. 2017.

Every evening this week, I met up with my friends, Rose Fairbanks and Zoe Burton, for an hour of uninterrupted/undistracted writing time.  Well, it was supposed to be uninterrupted and undistracted, but there are kids that wander through my corner of the living room and there is also the occasional “Oh, I need to know that” quick search that easily pulls one off onto some interesting tangents.  However, despite these little diversions, I did accomplish what I wished to and a bit extra.  Part of the reason for that is the fact that I didn’t stop writing at that hour limit unless I had completed a scene or had met my thousand-word minimum for that day.

But as you know, writing is not all that is on my schedule. I also have a scheduled editing slot in the evenings with specific daily minimums of work that have to be accomplished there, too.  🙂

(A little side note:  I am finding that I am rather driven by goals — I don’t like to miss those minimums at all. My husband would likely make some comment about my stubbornness here. 🙂 Also knowing I am going to write a post about what I did or didn’t do in a week is motivational. So keep reading these Monday posts, and you should get books/stories on a regular basis since I don’t want to have nothing to share. 😉 )

So, here are the particulars of what I accomplished:

  • Editing:  I completed my edits for Not an Heiress and have sent that story on to my first editor. So, it is well on its way to being ready for publication in June.
  • Writing:  I completed a first draft of the next Thursday Three Hundred story, With the Colonel’s Help.  I used to write these stories each week, but when I got to At All Costs,  I decided to write the full draft before beginning posting to make sure I had all the series things wrapped up as they should be.  Well, I liked having it set to post each week.  🙂  So, I decided to try it again this time around because I am kind of into the whole scheduling thing at present in an attempt to maximize my productivity. 🙂
  • More Editing:  I began final edits of At All Costs.  The tentative publication date for that book is May 18.  So, after the epilogue posts this Thursday, the story will remain up until next week. Then it will have to come down as I make final preparations to publish the story.
  • More Writing:  Since I managed to finish With the Colonel’s Help, I have turned my writing attention to writing Caroline’s story.  If it is going to be a short story, which I cannot tell quite yet, I am about a third of the way through it.  I should be able to tell if the plot I have in mind will be more or less than ten thousand words soon….I hope. 🙂

So, since my new work schedule seems to be work quite well, I have a new problem for which to find a solution.  Completing Caroline’s story will cross off all the stories on my “Write Me” list.  One of the things that I am considering putting on that list is an Austenesque story. Back in January, I mentioned that I wanted to try one, so I think I am going to give one, based in part on Mansfield Park, a shot…maybe…. 🙂 There are also those fairytales I had wished to attempt as well as a set of three stories (find them here if you wish, beginning with A Change of Heart) that I would like to develop into a Dash of Darcy story, and I have an idea floating around for a companion story to that one. I just need to decide where to begin and write out that list, it seems.

Now, for a short clip of something I wrote this week.  This is from With the Colonel’s Help and comes from the section of the story that is starting to wrap up the issues (the denouement), so, although I have tried to excerpt it without too many spoilers, it is, in of itself, a spoiler — read at your own risk. 🙂

EXCERPT FROM With the Colonel’s Help:  Continue reading Music Monday: Fields of Gold, 2Cellos


Music Monday: Enchanted ~ Period Drama Montage

Today, along with writing news and a writing excerpt, I thought I would share this fan video that YouTube was so kind as to suggest that I needed to view. 🙂 I think it is very well done —

SpellboundStudios. “Enchanted ~ Period Drama Montage.” YouTube. YouTube, 31 July 2012. Web. 22 Apr. 2017.

— and I enjoyed the song, so I added this video to my Music Meets Movies playlist. I’m up to 72 videos on that list now. It’s a great place to take a short break between writing projects. And this was a week full of projects.  Let me list a few of them for you.

  • Tuesday was the official release day for Discovering Mr. Darcy on all retailers. It was a good launch with the book ranking fairly high in some of its categories, and it already has 7 reviews the last time I looked.  Thank you to all who purchased and to those who reviewed as well.
  • The print copy of that book finally came and, after a slight tweak, it was approved and is now available for purchase.
  • Because of the way the epilogue flows from Discovering Mr. Darcy to Not An Heiress, I wanted to have Not an Heiress available for people to preorder when they finished reading Discovering Mr. Darcy.  That meant getting a file transferred into the proper format, writing a book description, filling in all the information required on all my retailers, and setting a date.  As it is booked right now, Not an Heiress will release on June 20, 2017.  This is the first time I have placed a book on preorder before it has entered the final stages of editing, so I will admit to being a bit nervous. However, I believe, I have set aside enough time to complete all the editing that needs to be done before the deadline for the final manuscript upload. In fact, I should have first round edits completed by the end of this week.
  • I mainly focused on With the Colonel’s Help during my writing hours this past week, but I did write a few words that are the beginning of what I am planning to make a short story to go with At All Costs, although I have this sneaking suspicion it could end up being a bit longer than a short story. 🙂  Oh, and At All Costs has been sent to my final editor for reading. That story will be available May 18, 2017 (hopefully 😉 ).

So, as you can see, this was a busy week of varied activities, which meant lots of opportunities to watch Music Meets Movies videos as I transitioned from one activity to another. 🙂

Now, to chose a bit of the writing that I did this last week.  While I managed to add around four thousand words to With the Colonel’s Help, I think I will give you a peek at those first 700+ words from the rough draft of the story about Caroline, which has no title as of yet. Be prepared for a surprising Mr. Hurst in this scene.

EXCERPT FROM Caroline’s Tale:  Continue reading Music Monday: Enchanted ~ Period Drama Montage


Music Monday: Let Her Go, Passenger/Break of Reality

Today, along with some writing news and a short story excerpt, I have the same song two times for you.  The first video is an instrumental cover of Passenger’s “Let Her Go” by Break of Reality. This video is on my writing playlist (no lyrics means it can play while I write).

Break of Reality. “Let Her Go – Passenger Cello Cover by Break of Reality.” YouTube. YouTube, 13 May 2014. Web. 15 Apr. 2017.

The second video (below) is a lyrics video that someone created. I thought I would share that one for those who might be curious as to what the words to the song are. It’s not a happy song, but I have not been writing happy stuff this week (see excerpt), so it fits.

Marcohordijk. “Passenger – Let Her Go (Lyrics).” YouTube. YouTube, 15 Dec. 2012. Web. 15 Apr. 2017.

So what have I been doing this week in my writing life?

  • I was worked on getting the print version of Discovering Mr. Darcy ready.  That was not easily done as my computer did not wish to play nice with CreateSpace for a couple of days, and then, I forgot to change the font colour on the spine and didn’t notice until I got the digital proof back. That has been fixed, and I finally have a print proof on its way for approval. They say that I should have it by April 25th.  I am hoping I have it sooner. 😉

 

  • I finished Not An Heiress — the epilogue is done! And it was fun writing a little bit about the Darcy and Fitzwilliam children. 🙂  And I began first round edits on the story in preparation for June publication. Although this story will not be ready to release for a couple of months, I am hoping to have a preorder up for it by Tuesday, so that when readers finish DMD, they can order NAH and be ready to continue the story that the epilogue of DMD hints at.

 

  • I returned to writing With the Colonel’s Help just in time for the story to take a sad, angsty turn. As a result, writing times have been shorter and word counts have been less because I struggle with the emotions of writing things like this in large doses. I internalize the emotions — happy or sad — when writing and reading. I have needed a longer “decompression” time after those sections. The good news is I think the story should be through its darkest part very soon, and then I can get things set right. That should be easier (and faster) to write.

And now for…

A SHORT EXCERPT FROM With The Colonel’s Help:  Continue reading Music Monday: Let Her Go, Passenger/Break of Reality