Tag: writing
Sanity
Writing keeps me sane.
My usual tradition is to read a book after finishing a first draft, before beginning on the second. This time, circumstances aren’t quite usual.
In one sense, I’m barely aware of the world. Truth is, ten years ago I saw too much, and turned my back on society in disgust. I don’t like being a negative person, but there’s really no other way for me to describe why I live like a hermit in the middle of suburbia. Heck, we even tried going off grid several years ago, but that proved to be too difficult with the resources we had.
And yet, there’s a great deal that even I can’t hide from. I feel it every time I see a face mask littering the sidewalk. I know it’s out there, lurking just outside our fence line.
It’s seemingly taken away my ability to focus on reading. I can do everything else, but whenever I sit down with a book, I can’t follow what’s happening on the pages or remember who’s who. I can only finish short novellas if I read them out loud to my children (We’re currently reading The Fairy Rebel). I end up doing some sort of fiddly craft with my hands instead.
I can’t follow my usual ritual this time around. When I don’t spend my evenings re-centering my balance and exploring my fictional world, the noise from the children during the day gets inside my head too much.
So it looks like I’ll be plowing through the second draft of Alice and the Warden without “cleansing my mental palate” first. I have to work with what I’ve got.
Thank you for sharing my work!
What AatW isn’t…
My husband and I like each other, so we tend to talk a lot. Like, for at least a couple of hours every day. We’re serious BFFs.
Recently, my husband said, “The only reason Hackett isn’t a cuck is because of his sense of dignity.”
I both laughed and felt mortified.
Because for the last eleven months that I’ve been working on this story, I’ve been worried that it was going to be misconstrued as a cuckolding fantasy, or the MGTOW narration of, “Girl gets pregnant by sexy alpha, then dupes nice guy into financially providing for her.”
It’s not.
One of the main themes of the novel is the value of self-worth. Hackett comes in with a strong sense of who he is, and doesn’t let others belittle or manipulate him. Alice, on the other hand, starts off struggling to figure out her identity, while dealing with the aftermath of “living like she was disposable.” Essentially, Hackett becomes the example that inspires her.
Hackett still expects fidelity, and to be treated fairly and respectfully. He ain’t no cuck.
But I can see how the same scenario with a weak male lead would very easily be along those lines.
Thank you for sharing my work!
Romance Genre
I’m not entirely sure which genre Alice and the Warden properly belongs to. I call it Romance because the primary focus is on the relationship between the two main characters, but it’s very different from your stereotypical romance novel — it’s not based on any self-serving fantasies (*cough*50 Shades*cough*) that the ‘romance’ label usually connotes.
I also joke that if AatW were Women’s Fiction, Alice would immediately put her baby in daycare, go to college in pursuit of friendship and career, and desperately seek to regain her “lost” years — while Hackett was relegated to the background as a supportive cardboard cutout. Bonus: She’d call herself a good mother after constantly complaining how much time and energy babies take up.
Then there’s the Damon chapters…
(Yes, I am fully aware that I could never be a Hallmark movie writer.)
It’s always a bit awkward saying, “I write romance,” because people automatically think of books like Twilight — the whole, “Oh, you’re just writing shallow fantasies about rich men off the top of your head,” reaction. Personally, I see it as a very serious topic; one that I’ve applied years of research and real life experience into, because frankly, successfully writing marriage and love actually requires a deep understanding of psychology and relationships, and doing it wrong alienates readers.
And yes, writing romance even requires a philosophical stance, too. I portray “complementary” relationships, instead of the more popular “egalitarian” model.
So maybe it’s time to revamp the “romance” genre to include actual research, to reflect how real relationships work, instead of being purely the realm of self-serving sexual fantasies.
Goal number two: Write romance that appeals to men, lol.
Thank you for sharing my work!
Alice and the Warden – Table of Contents
Alice had gotten herself in over her head with a dangerous man, and ended up in prison for a crime that she did not commit. Locked alone in a tower in the middle of a forest, she finds herself and the value that she still possesses, as she seeks to prove that she deserves to keep her unborn child.
Somehow intertwined with it all, the Warden oversees her transformation and inspires her to keep trying.
Rated M for language, sexuality, alcohol, drug use, violence
Continue reading “Alice and the Warden – Table of Contents”
By Autumn Rain 