Anna's Blog

Whiskers on Kittens

June 26th, 2009

I’ve had so many lovely things happen this week. Even if I am past 7 months pregnant and it is suddenly a billion degrees outside with six billion percent humidity. Although come to that I suppose I can still be thankful that I am not (yet) nine months along in a sudden heat wave.

But in the spirit of the famous song, here are my favorite things of the last several days:

• We saw the most beautiful rainbow at the park the other night.  The sun was going down, a rainshower just starting to drizzle down, and I happened to glance up and see the most perfectly clear, storybook, pot-of-gold at the end of it rainbow I’d ever seen arcing across the horizon.  I called Bella over and pointed it out to her–the first rainbow she’d ever seen apart from in picture books–and she said, “Ooh, look it has colors!”
• My incredibly wonderful mother-in-law has been staying with me for the last week while Nathan travels.  And I’m so, so lucky because she is warm and wise and just great to have around–and of course fabulous with my girl.  They’ve dug in the garden and played grocery store and made illustrated books with old stamps while I sprint to finish this book before baby time.
• I sent a partial draft of Sunrise of Avalon (book 3 of the trilogy) to my editor, and she pronounces herself delighted.  Always wonderful to hear.
• Two lovely bloggers gave Twilight of Avalon lovely reviews on their sites:  Marie Burton of The Burton Review and Jenny at Jenny Loves to Read. Though it’s actually unfair to mention only them because several other blog reviewers have also said lovely things about Twilight of Avalon–just not this week. So many thanks to Michelle, at A Reader’s Respite, Arleigh, at Historical-Fiction.com, Margaret at historicalnovels.info, Linda from Musings of a L.O.O.N, Jennifer at Per Omnia Saecula, S. Krishna, at S. Krishna’s Books, Elena, at All Booked Up, and Sarah from Reading the Past.  And to Jen at Devourer of Books thanks and many congratulations on the birth of your gorgeous baby boy!  And if there are any other bloggers out there whose reviews I’ve missed seeing, thank you all so much, too–and everyone else who’s expressed excitement on-line or anywhere else.  There’s just no better feeling than hearing from people who’ve connected to to Trystan and Isolde and their story.
• The incredibly talented Joshilyn Jackson has made the NY Times bestseller list with The Girl Who Stopped Swimming.  I’m just so happy for her.  The book is just amazing–easily one of my absolute favorite reads this year–and it’s so great to see it getting the recognition it deserves.
• Nathan is now home (if tired) after a week of travel and next to no sleep.  It’s hard to say who’s the happiest: me, Bella, or me watching Bella be so happy that her Daddy is back.
• And I have a preliminary cover for Book 2, Dark Moon of Avalon!  There will probably be minor changes made, still, but it’s there in the main and I’m too excited about it not to share.  So here it is.  I love the painting (by John William Waterhouse) that they chose–it just perfectly captures the spirit of the book for me.

Posted in Uncategorized | 5 Comments »

The Burton Review

June 23rd, 2009

I’m guest blogging today over at The Burton Review. Stop by to read my thoughts on balancing historical verisimilitude with fantasy when writing Arthurian fiction! And many, many thanks to Marie for the lovely review (also posted on her site today) and for the invitation!

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Happy Father’s Day!

June 20th, 2009

This blog seems to be turning into a shrine to my husband this week–but I couldn’t let father’s day go by without mentioning my girl’s daddy. My husband was an only child, and the youngest cousin in his family to boot. Before Isabella was born, he’d held a baby maybe twice in his life, had certainly never changed a diaper or had anything to do with day to day baby-care. And yet–

And yet from the moment our daughter was born, he jumped in and started taking care of her as though he’d been doing it his whole life. I remember him effortlessly scooping her up and rocking with her when I went to take a shower an hour or so after she was born. And now, two and a half years later, it’s just the same. He takes her for outings to the park, on worm hunting expeditions, on trips to the library, reads to her and teaches her all about airplanes and pretends to eat the pretend food she cooks not only to give me a break or allow me writing time, but because he just plain loves his girl.

Six months ago, when I was in the throes of all the first-trimester morning sickness horror, he practically took over the childcare duty entirely. Isabella was heavily into having tea parties with her toy tea set back then. And let me preface this story by saying that the words “tea party” are not exactly the first two that spring to mind when I think of my husband. But one day I staggered into the kitchen and found him, completely on his own initiative, brewing a pot of herbal tea for her because he “thought it would be fun for Bella to have a party with real tea for a change instead of only pretend.”

And you know, as many wonderful things as my husband has done for me, as many wonderful memories as I have of our nine years of being married, it’s times like those–times like watching him patiently help Bella pour the tea into the teapot and get pot, cups, saucers, etc. for them both all set out on her little tray–when I most of all think, You are so, so lucky to be married to this man.

And before I sign off, I would be a horrible daughter if I didn’t mention my own daddy today, as well. I owe him so much–but for this post I’ll mention just one of the gifts he’s given me, namely my writing career. I was raised by two English PhD’s in a house filled pretty much from floor to ceiling with books. Growing up, I read and made up my own stories constantly, so I think the idea of wanting to be a writer was always there in the back of my mind, always something I knew I wanted to do. But at the same time, apart from journals and stories and poems and the like in private notebooks, I was afraid to try writing seriously–afraid that what I wrote would be no good, afraid of having it, you know, actually read by other people.

So, fast forward to my final year of college, when one of the requirements of my program was a senior honors thesis. I was incredibly busy that year, planning a wedding, carrying a very heavy course load of classes, but my dad (also a writer) essentially sat me down and said, “You are writing a historical novel as your thesis.” He took me out and bought me my first laptop to work on, pushed me (in a good way) and encouraged me and was with me through every step of the journey from outline to first stumbling chapters to finished draft.

Without that, I don’t think I’d have had the courage to try it. But by the end of the school year I’d finished a 300 page novel. Not that it was exactly a masterpiece, but it taught me a lot about what being a writer meant–and more importantly, made me fall in love with everything about doing research and getting to know my characters and building my own fictional world within a story’s frame. When I graduated that May, I couldn’t have stopped writing if I’d tried.

Thanks, Daddy! And happy Father’s Day!

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

Clothes Make the Writer?

June 20th, 2009

For some reason, I remember times in my life by what I used to wear then. Not even by my favorite outfit, necessarily–just something I particularly remember having worn at any given time. When I think of high school, for example, I instantly think of gray tights, a gray pleated skirt, and a pale pink cardigan sweater. (Preppy was in during my high school years). When I think of college, I think of Doc Martins and jeans and a purple cotton crewneck shirt from J. Crew. I can go all the way back to nursery school that way. (A blue corduroy jumper with an appliqued apple on the skirt).

And I’m the same way with books. There’s Scarlet’s famous green velvet dress in Gone with the Wind, of course. But the Anne of Green Gables series . . . Jane Eyre . . .Georgette Heyer’s regencies . . . so many of my favorite books, when I close my eyes and think of them, I instantly remember the clothes.

So given all this, you would think, wouldn’t you, that I would leap at the chance to dress my own characters? But no. I dread having to describe what people are wearing. For some reason–and I have no idea why it should be–the instant I have to invent a gown or a piece of jewelry, my imagination goes completely blank and the words stagger and stumble and refuse to come. The funny thing is that I want to enjoy writing in the clothes. I was practically born with medieval princess dress-up fantasies. I love paging through costume books, gorgeously colored picture books on Celtic and Saxon jewelry. And yet the sad fact remains that I am far more comfortable describing a sword fight than one of Isolde’s gowns.

I’m a huge admirer of Bernard Cornwell’s books. He’s an amazing writer with an incredible way of evoking a past that lives and breathes. And yet reading his novels I’m always struck by the fact that Bernard Cornwell, master of the so-real-you-can-smell-the-sweat-and-blood battle scene seems to have a lot more fun than I do describing women characters’ jewelry and clothes.

Is it only me, or does that seem somehow slightly wrong?

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »

FAQ’s and illustrations

June 15th, 2009

My webmaster husband has updated my FAQ’s page. Have a question I haven’t yet answered? Please just let me know! I love all the questions people have asked so far.

And because my last post made me start reminiscing and flipping through old pictures, here are two photos to illustrate my story of last week. The first was taken on my first trip to England just a few months after the night I wrote about–when Nathan had become my actual boyfriend, as opposed to my creepy-guy deterrent pretend one.

And here’s a picture from our wedding. Nine years and (almost) two children ago, now. I remember one of my friends telling me she’d heard a wedding toast once that said something like, When you look back through the years of your married life, may you remember your wedding as the time you loved each other least. Because you were just at the very beginning of love.

I’d say that’s pretty true.

Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

A Story

June 9th, 2009

When I was in college, the ballroom dance club on campus was very popular. I’d grown up watching old Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers movies, so I started to go to the meetings–and I absolutely loved it. The dancing was fun, the music great, and the people I met there all friendly and fun and nice. For the most part. There was—

Okay, I really don’t want to be mean, here, but I am completely unable to think of a nicer way to put this: there was a certain contingent of creepy skanky older men looking for an excuse to put their hands all over the hapless girls they wound up partnering. And it was impossible to completely avoid them, even if you came to the lesson with a partner, because the instructors insisted on everyone rotating partners in the interests of getting used to dancing with more than one person.

So, on the night my story begins, I had had the bad luck to wind up with one of said creepy skanky older men for one of the dance rotations. And this particular guy also had two left feet and couldn’t keep a rhythm to save his life. Which wouldn’t have been a problem–I mean, I know plenty of wonderful people who just can’t keep a beat. Except that this particular guy kept tripping over and/or stepping my feet and then blaming ME. At one point he stepped on my feet for the dozenth time, stepped back, folded his arms across his chest, scowled, and snapped, “Try it by yourself a few times while I watch!”

(I pinky-swear I did not make any part of that up–that is exactly what he did and said). So, I was gritting my teeth and doing my best to just smile and get through this while praying that the instructors would call a new rotation and I’d be able to make my escape. And then the guy said, “So, do you have a boyfriend?”

Caught totally off guard, I answered, truthfully, “No.” And then my brain kicked in and screamed at me, You idiot! He’s going to take that as an invitation to ask you for a date!

I should explain here that I am HORRIBLE at saying no to anyone. I once made a phone call intending to quit a freelance editing job and wound up signing on for the duration of the project. (The client was this really sweet 90 year old man, you see, and yes, his writing was fairly incoherent and his handwriting atrocious, but he was so nice and just grateful to the point of tears for anything I could do, and . . . )

Anyway, if I am bad at saying no now, I was six hundred times worse at just-left-home-for-the-first-time 18. It would be hard to find words to describe the complete, utter panic I felt at the prospect of having this guy ask for a date and having to turn him down. I mean, there was not a worm’s chance in a henyard I was going to go out with this man. But at the same time, I knew myself and I had a horribly clear mental image of him saying, Want to go out? And me, my tongue absolutely refusing to spit out that, “no” saying instead, Um, okay.

And then I’d be forced to fake my own death and drop out of school to get out of it.

So I did the only thing I could think of. I backpedaled. Completely incoherently and in probably the most unconvincing and totally flustered way you can possibly envision. I think what came out of my mouth was: “NoNotReallyWellKindaSortaYes!”

My temporary partner, unsurprisingly, said, “What?”

Well, okay, I was committed now, so I took a deep breath and said, more calmly, “What I mean is, Yes, I have been seeing someone.” And my partner gestured across the dance floor at my regular practice partner, the boy I’d come to the lesson with that night, and said, “Is that your boyfriend?”

Now, it is at this point in my story that an alien force temporarily took possession of my body. That is the only explanation I can think of. Because my regular partner was a boy in my year who lived in the same dorm I did. We’d been introduced by a mutual friend because the friend knew we both went to ballroom dance and were looking for practice partners. We’d chatted a few times on the walk to and from ballroom club meetings, and I thought he was a very nice guy and we always had a good time dancing together. But I didn’t know him even REMOTELY well.

Nevertheless, as my temporary partner gestured to him and asked, “Is that your boyfriend?” I heard myself say, “Yes, that’s right.” Honestly, I have no idea what I was thinking. Maybe for a split second it just seemed like a good idea–like a concrete, visible boyfriend person would be more convincing than some hypothetical guy in the background. Still, as soon as the words left my mouth I totally flashed hot and cold and asked myself if I’d completely lost my mind as the reality of what I’d just said set in. I mean, I wasn’t even 100% sure my regular practice partner did not already HAVE an actual real girlfriend.

I think the instructors called a new rotation soon after and I escaped without the creepy skanky guy asking me out after all. Which was good. Except that I now faced the HIDEOUSLY embarrassing prospect of having to admit to my regular practice partner what I’d done. Because as embarrassing as it was going to be to tell my practice partner the truth, it would be infinitely worse if the story somehow got around and he heard it from someone else and wound up thinking I was some kind of weird stalker girl who went around making up fictional relationships with guys she barely knew.

So I spent the rest of the evening with my stomach in knots trying to think of a way to tell him, dreading the end of the lesson when we’d walk back to the dorm and I’d have to explain.

Turned out he was pretty great about it all, though.

As of tomorrow, we’ve been married for nine years.

Happy Anniversary, love!

Posted in Uncategorized | 6 Comments »

Questions and News

June 7th, 2009

I’m updating my FAQ’s on Twilight of Avalon based on the questions I’ve gotten from readers so far–I’ll post here as soon as my webmaster husband has the new page up.  And please, if anyone else out there has a question about the book (or anything else) feel free to ask!  I love hearing them and answering them.

And, moving on to the “news” part of this post, the lovely Joshilyn Jackson (who happens to have the same fabulous agent I do) has her latest book newly out in paperback. It’s The Girl Who Stopped Swimming, and it’s an absolutely wonderful read. Easily one of my top favorite books I read all year. Funny and poignant and beautiful and hopeful.

In other exciting news, Bella brought home her first pets the other day–a tub of worms she’d found with her daddy. I would post pictures, but they are . . . well . . . worms. Not really the most photogenic of creatures. Very low maintenance, though! Bella is utterly thrilled with them. She likes to push them around the house in her baby doll stroller. Two is such a great age.

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Backstory

May 28th, 2009

I’m guest blogging today over at Backstory. If you’re curious to read the full story of how I came to write Twilight of Avalon, please stop by!

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Memorial Day

May 25th, 2009

The world of Dark Age Britain was a violent one, a place of constant strife and battle, nearly constant war. And in setting Twilight of Avalon during that age, I quickly realized that I knew almost nothing about warfare. Not only about Dark Age warfare, but about war itself, about the kinds of men who would be called on to fight, to give their lives for their lord or king.

I started to read the period primary sources: the old Celtic hero tales, the bards’ laments for fallen warriors and commemorative battle poems. And as I listened to the voices speaking across the many centuries between then and now, one thing became very clear: the tactics of war, the technology of battle has changed immeasurably with the years. But the emotions of war, the bonds it forges, the effects it has on the men who fight has remained very, very much the same.

So as I worked out my own fictional version of the Dark Age Arthurian world, tried to understand the many warriors amongst my cast of characters, I would watch any documentaries I could find about modern day war: many, like the PBS documentary Bad Voodoo’s War, using footage filmed by the troops themselves. And watching programs like that, regardless of your political views, it’s impossible not to come away with tremendous awe and admiration for the self-sacrifice and bravery of the men and women who serve in our armed forces. At least it certainly was for me.

On this Memorial Day, I want to send thanks out to all our incredibly courageous servicemen and women, and to their amazing families as well for all they’ve done, all the sacrifices they’ve made and are still making every day. Thanks, thoughts, prayers, and wishes for lasting peace to come.

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

The Sound of Silence

May 23rd, 2009

I know many, many authors like to listen to music while they write to help get into the mood of a book. Lots of my favorite writers post playlists on their websites for all their books of all the songs they listened to during the writing process. It always makes me feel kind of like there must be something wrong with me, because I am so, so totally not like that at all. I really like absolute silence to write. Or as close to absolute silence I can get with a toddler in the house. Which, okay, is usually not all that close–bless my sweet girl–but at least my office has a door.

The only time I did write to music was while I was pregnant with my daughter and working on the first draft of Twilight of Avalon. I felt kind of sorry for her, all cooped up in there with nothing to listen to but the click click of keys all day, so I would play music for her while I typed away at my computer. And it really was fun to see which songs would make her kick hardest and which seemed to just leave her cold. And even now, at two, she still loves listening to the music–jazz trumpet albums and Handel, mostly–that I would have called her favorites before she was born.

So I felt like I ought to do the same this time around. Except . . . except I really, really like silence while I write. And those precious couple of nap-time hours when the house really is silent go by so very fast. But then I thought–headphones! Headphones could work on your stomach just as well as, you know, on your head. Which is why, as I’m typing this, I have a pair of headphones stretched out across my rounder-by-the-day belly. The baby is dancing away to the Irish folk music I put on and I have . . . silence. So everyone is happy. Even if anyone dropping by my office would probably think I looked a little strange.

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

« Previous Entries Next Entries »

Anna Elliott's blog is proudly powered by WordPress.
Entries (RSS) and Comments (RSS).