There is a place you can touch a woman that will drive her crazy. Her heart.
~ Melanie Griffith, Milk Money
Is there a moment, somewhere in your past, that you look back on once in a while? Is there a day you yearn for? Is there an hour you’d capture, pin down, try to do again? Do you remember what it was like to look on the person you’d fall in love with someday and be left breathless with that desire of first glance? Do you recall the power in being a child, on the young side of twenty, looking forward and holding tight and leaping without knowing what was waiting for you but wanting, more than anything, to do it all with the person beside you?
Sometimes I think that’s why we read romance--and why we write it. To remember those awesome, and sometimes awful, sweeping emotions that knock us over. That exhaust us. That exhilarate us. It is amazing to me how the details of everyday life, how jobs and families--as wonderful as they are--can carry us so far away from the magic falling in love.
With the high school quarterback. With the gorgeous rock star. With the boy next door. With our first true love. With our second one. With our first sex. With the bad boy. With the good one. With the one who’ll eventually get down on one knee and ask us to stay.
With ourselves.
###
Now that my contracts are in with Samhain, I have all this work to do: put together a promotional blurb, choose an an excerpt, write up tips and requests for my cover art, send a bio to their site for my author’s page. It’s still all a little surreal to me. Who knew that having a manuscript accepted was just the teeniest bit of the iceberg? It’s exciting but overwhelming too.
###
A funny story from work: last week my high school seniors read the short story “Miss Brill” by Katherine Mansfield. It’s about an elderly woman who goes to the park each Sunday to people-watch, knowing she will be missed if she doesn’t show up, only to be made fun of by a young couple in love.
I asked my class how old they thought the main character was (she’s probably 70+ or so). One girl raised her hand and said, “Older?”
I said, “How old is older?”
She thought for a minute, and then, in all seriousness, looked up at me and answered, “Thirty?”
Oh. God.
4 comments:
Welcome to the Samhain Family, Allie! It can seem overwhelming, but you'll do just fine.
Smooches!
Congrats on getting your contracts in. I have some pages I downloaded a million years ago with promotion ideas on them. I'll type up some of the better ideas and get them to you.
RE: age story. One of my daughter's friends a while back was talking about a customer he had. He rolled his eyes and said, "She was really old, ya know... like... about fifty or something!" I just looked at him. He looked back and me and started... "but, but, not that YOU are old or anything." Boy, did I ever get milage out of THAT one!
LOL on the age thing. I can remember when 30 was ANCIENT. Now I'm 40 and, when I look at my mom who is 73 I think: Yanno, 70 isn't so old.
:-)
I'm so excited for you and all the writing "busy-ness" you're involved in. Can't wait to hold your book in my hands (yes, I'm waiting for the print version and your autograph!).
Have a great day.
Wow - Thirty old - there was a time I thought thirty was really old and turning fifty was beyond my comprehension... Now 70 is looking not that old to me --- I guess everything is relevant to where you are in life.
I am a firm believer that age is a number and you need to stay current,involved, happy, passionate about things that matter and being a little silly doesn't hurt no matter what age.
Keep up the good work!!!
Post a Comment