Where Did You Go?!?

Okay so I've gotten this question from many readers over the past few days and figured that I would answer it here for those of you that care to look for an answer.

Yes, I removed my stories and my profile from FictionPress, yes there is an actual reason for this abrupt departure.

You see I'm an adult.  I was raised in a time where it was polite to say thank you when someone gave you something or did something for you.  I was taught that I wasn't entitled to anything that I didn't earn whether it was something of monetary value or as abstract as respect it didn't matter, if I didn't earn it, I shouldn't expect to get it.

For over a year now, I have been giving my readers something and asking for nothing in return, heck I've even thanked them for taking the time to read my stories.  There are a few that took the time to thank me for posting my work or even went so far as to tell me how much they enjoyed the stories which always makes my day.  Recently there have been less and less of those types of comments and more and more of the entitled rants that seem to be the trademark of recent generations that think they are somehow deserving of everything for nothing.

I get that the internet has put everything at everyone's fingertips and it's easy to believe that the content that appears on your screen just magically pops up there for your sole benefit but really that's not how it works.  There is an actual person out there that spends their time to create these things that you take for granted because they are free and readily available.  There are people, like me, that have busy lives but enjoy the creative process of crafting a well told story and admittedly, it's nice when other people read and enjoy those stories but in the end they are mine to share or not to share if I so choose.  No one is entitled to free access to my work.

I recently pulled a couple of my finished stories to try my luck at getting them published.  The first is still out there looking for a home but just last week I signed a contract to publish Loving Sarajevo.  I was so excited that someone thought something I wrote was good enough to publish that I shared it with my readers thinking they would be happy for me but apparently that is not the case.

I received far more PM's telling me how disappointed people were that I had removed what had apparently been many people's favorite stories.  Imagine my surprise at this since I had never received a review or a PM from any of the people that were complaining about the removal of the stories until they PMed me to complain.  My very favorite was from one person (I won't name names because I'm not that sort of person) that simply said, "I am so disappointed.  I stopped reading this in the middle because I needed to study for mid terms and when I came back it was removed.  Now I have to pay to read the rest of it?  So unfair!"

Well let me clue you into something here, something I learned long ago, LIFE IS NOT FAIR! A much better way to express your disappointment would have been along the lines of this person who expressed much the same sentiment but in a totally different way (and of course on a different site).  "Is that why it's been hidden...? *cries* I was in the middle of reading it! Oh, well... gonna go and buy it; congrats!!"  (I sent her a copy by the way because if you notice she said congrats and wow was that nice to hear or what?)

So anyway, this is why I removed my stories from FictionPress and will never post anything there again.  If you still want to read my stories feel free to come on over to AFF, of course you have to be over 18 which I find isn't that big of a deal since my stuff is mostly for a mature audience anyway.  Here's the link to my list of stories:  http://original.adult-fanfiction.org/authors.php?no=1296958003

In closing, thanks to those of you that read my stories, I still appreciate the fact that you're reading and enjoying them.  Of course letting me know occasionally helps but it's not required.

CL

Just Stuff I'm Doing

So not only am I a crap blogger, I'm also bad at doing what I say I'm going to do.  I did NaNo, I won NaNo (for those of you unfamiliar with NaNo winning just means you wrote 50k words in November), I didn't however post my NaNo novel on Smashwords.  I had every intention of doing so but then I realized how rough my rough draft was.

I wrote the whole book, over 74k words in twenty days without going back to reread it and that is why there is no way I could let anyone read it before I get a chance to edit it.  So I'll get to editing it soon enough and start posting the shiny edited chapters for all you people that are reading this.

Okay so on another note, I got Loving Sarajevo edited and reposted.  I think it reads much better than it did before but what do I know...

I should have a chapter of The Heart Wants ready to go tomorrow.  I'm having a hard time getting back into it.  The home stretch is proving to be harder to write than I thought it was going to be but I'm going to push hard and hope to have it finished by the end of this month.  That's my goal for this month, to finish off The Heart Wants.

Anyway, I know that this is sort of a short post but just wanted to let you all know that I'm still pounding away at all my stories.

Until next time...

CL

It's in the Bag - A Loving Sarajevo Halloween Treat

As promised here's my little Halloween treat featuring Gage, Nikola, and Hana from Loving Sarajevo.  I hope you all enjoy it!

It's in the Bag

Nikola walked slowly down the street next to Gage.  The fallen leaves crunched under their shoes and there was a definite hint of the long winter to come in the air.  Nikola shivered because Gage hadn’t let him wear a coat.  He was sure that the three thermals under his costume were the only things that kept him from succumbing to hypothermia.  Nikola would suffer through it though because it was Halloween night and Gage was having the time of his life taking Hana from door to door begging for treats. 

Nikola reached up and scratched his head for the hundredth time that night – the temporary hair dye Gage had talked him into using was making his scalp itch.  Nikola decided that he really didn’t care for dressing up.  At least he’d talked Gage out of making him dress up as Dracula.  If he had to hear Gage beg him to say ‘I vant to suck yer blood’ one more time he’d kick the man’s ass.  Nikola swore his accent sounded nothing like the Count’s but Gage got a kick out of it none the less.

“Want to try this one, B?” Gage asked Hana who was walking at his side.

“Sure that looks like a good one,” Hana said eagerly.

Nikola snorted.  Hana thought every house looked like a good one.  Why wouldn’t she?  They all gave out candy by the handful.  Nikola followed them up the porch stairs.  Gage waited for Nikola to step up beside him before he rang the doorbell.

Nikola fidgeted while Gage stood with his bag positioned in front of him waiting for the unsuspecting homeowner to open the door.  It took only a moment, most people were ready and waiting to hand out their treats as quickly as they could so they could shut off their light and have some peace and quiet for the rest of the night.

The door swung open and an older lady stood there frozen in shock after just a glimpse of them.  Gage elbowed Nikola, “Trick or Treat,” they chorused.  Gage’s rendition of the phrase held much more pep than the lack luster version Nikola muttered out. 

Nikola waited for the inevitable to happen.  “Aren’t you boys a bit old to be trick or treating?” the lady asked as she took in the two giant Oompa Loompas on her porch.

Gage smiled as he said, “But I got all dressed up and I’m lugging around this huge bag.  It’s practically empty.  See?” he said as he pulled the bag open. 

The lady looked inside – they all did.  “Trick or Treat!” Hana yelled from inside the bag making the poor woman jump in surprise.  Hana giggled at her trick that kept on working.

“Oh my!” the woman exclaimed.  “That was some surprise.  You tricked me so I guess that means I have to give you a treat,” she said with a big smile at the little girl in the giant bag.  She reached into her bowl and brought out three full sized candy bars and put them in Hana’s bag.

“Wow thanks!” Hana said with big eyes for all that candy.

“Thanks,” Gage said, all puffy chested.  He was damn proud of himself and his crazy idea for Hana’s costume.

Nikola also thanked the lady before the three of them made their way down the stairs and back out onto the sidewalk.  Gage put his arm around Nikola’s waist immune to the stares they got from the other parents walking their own little ghosts and goblins around the neighborhood.  “See, we’ll have that bag full in no time and then we can go home and I’ll do exactly what I promised you I’d do if you dressed up with me,” Gage said.

“She gave me three big chocolate bars,” Hana said interrupting the images that had just started forming in Nikola’s mind.  She was looking into her bag, inspecting her haul not paying any attention to her babo and daddy.

“I know, that’s the third house in a row that’s given you extra treats.  Told you my idea would work,” Gage said with a wink.

Nikola shook his head.  Gage had come up with the idea for him and Nikola to dress up like they were the ones trick or treating.  It had also been his idea for Hana to go dressed as a giant trick or treating bag that Gage appeared to be carrying.  Gage had wanted to just tape a bunch of paper bags together but Hana had blanched at going as a brown paper bag for her first Halloween – she wanted to be Cinderella.  Gage’s mom had thought up a much better idea of making a decorated bag out of purple felt and glued on Halloween images.  The design had convinced Hana that being a bag was as good as being a princess plus she loved a good prank as much as Gage did.

Nikola scratched his head again.  “You’d better make good on that promise, this hair dye is eating my head and I’m pretty sure that orange isn’t my color,” Nikola complained while looking at his orange tinged hand.

“I told you I’d make sure every inch of your body is clear of green dye and orange paint.  I’ll keep my word… even if it takes all night,” Gage said.  His husky voice promised a long shower and much, much more when they got home. 

Nikola’s shiver had nothing to do with the chill in the air.  He decided that maybe dressing up wasn’t so bad after all.

Have a happy and safe Halloween everyone!

CL

EEK!! Who Knew One Person Could Get So Busy?!?

So like the title says:  Who knew one person could get so busy in such a short period of time?  I mean really, I went from having nothing to do but sit and write, to having a zillion and one things to do on any given day.  Admittedly, most of the things that I have to do are things that I've committed myself to so you could say they're self imposed so therefore I shouldn't complain.  I'm not going to complain but since I know some of you out there are actually waiting for me to get something written, I thought I'd give you all an update on all the stuff I'm doing right now since it mostly has to do with my writing.

First and foremost, as most of you who are following along know, I'm trying to find a publisher for Falling For Him.  So far I've gotten one rejection because the publisher doesn't publish fanfics (so not a fanfic but if they can't be bothered to do their research I'm not sure I want to publish with them anyway), one revise and resubmit (this is good because it means they're interested, the story just needs some tweaking), and I've yet to hear back from another.  So I'm still working on that, doing some editing and also tweaking so I can resubmit to the interested publisher.

Second and probably not something that anyone thinks is a priority, I've been doing an overhaul on Loving Sarajevo.  I decided that I really didn't like the story told from the first person point of view so I'm working on converting it to third person and also fixing some issues I have with it, both in the story and in some of the writing quirks I had when I first started writing.  All in the hopes that the end product will be something that I can maybe, possibly self publish in the near future.

Third and boring as all get out, I've been doing research on self publishing.  Although I feel like Falling for him is just as good as some of the dreck out there that I've read from the predominately M/M publishers, I have to have a back up plan in case I'm totally delusional.  That's why I'm thinking about self pubbing Loving Sarajevo as a sort of test, getting my feet wet so to speak.  There's a lot of work that goes into self publishing so if I go that route, I want to make sure I know what I'm doing.

Fourth and you guys are going to hate me for this, I have other stories that want to come out before the ones that I'm supposed to be working on.  I've said this before and it bares repeating - I can not control the voices in my head.  If I can't get one of my MCs from one of my current WIPs to talk to me their story doesn't get updated.  So although I've still been writing, there's been nothing for you guys to read.

Fifth and yes this one is something I want to do but will delay my updates another month or so, I've decided to do Nano this year.  I had two ideas running around my head and they won't leave me in peace to write anything else.  One was Spence's story, which would have involved Gage and Nikola's wedding.  The other is about Henrick, the twink that Gage met in Sarajevo, and a pro soccer player.  I decided to go with Henrick's story because Gage and Nikola's wedding is going to include the whole cast of characters that I've created so far and it will be a bit of an undertaking.  Anyway, I've decided to put my Nano Novel on Smashwords so you all can follow along with my progress if you want.  I'll update after Nov. 1st with a link to it for anyone that's interested.

So as you all can see I've been busy.  One of the ideas that wouldn't leave me alone, I blame the upcoming holiday for this one, was a short and by short I mean very short scene with my characters from Loving Sarajevo.  I had to write it out and I've decided since it's written, I may as well share it.  So if you're interested, stop by here on October 30th for a little Halloween treat.

That's all I have for now so until I post again... Thanks for stopping by.

CL

Busy, Busy, Busy

Okay so if you're following along, you all know what a crap blogger I am so I'm not even going to apologize (although I am sorry) or make excuses (vacation, unexpected hospitalization of a child).  I am however going to tell you all why my updates seemed to have dried up in the past couple of weeks.

I blame it all on Bronxwench.  Yeah, that's so not her real name but it's her fault all the same.  You see we were chatting the other day and she got it in her head to send me her publisher's information for submissions.  Then she stroked my ego a little and being the big attention whore I am, it worked.  Today I sent in my first submission to a real, honest to god publisher.

I've spent the last couple of weeks editing (why didn't you guys tell me that I use conscience instead of conscious?) and trying to write my first query letter.  I finally got the story spit shined to perfection and wrote the best query letter known to mankind.  Then I stuck it all in an email and cried for ten minutes while holding my finger over the mouse which was hovering over the send button.

Now, I know that if it gets rejected that it will really change nothing because, well, I'll just be right where I am now, right?  That's not so bad, I guess...  Everyone keeps telling me that a rejection is no big deal, it happens to everyone but it's still going to hurt to hear that my book's not good enough.  It's like my baby and nobody wants to hear that they have an ugly baby (mine were all gorgeous by the way).

So that's why I've been slow to update.  I have had little time to write or edit new chapters but that should change now that I've sent my baby off and out into the great wide world.  Cross your fingers for me and send me good thoughts.  I may need some comfort when I get the news so really nice, sweet, ego boosting reviews will be welcomed whole heartedly.

Just Because I Thought I Should

So I got an attack of conscience today and decided that I should try to update my blog.  I'm one of those people that feels bad when they say they're going to do something and then doesn't.  You know, like writing a blog for instance?  Though I'm pretty good about updating my stories regularly, the blog, well not so much.

It's not that I don't have anything to say, if anything there's just too much.  I could blabber on for pages and pages but really who wants to hear that much about anything I have to say?  So I get stuck for something I can talk about in a few short paragraphs and still make sense.  I tend to ramble.  No, really, I do.  (Count yourself lucky if you've never had to have an email conversation with me, yeah, it's that bad.)

So I was trying to think of something I could blog about so that it didn't look like I was being a total slacker on this end.  (I wrote three chapters for three different stories yesterday, I'm not slacking I promise!)  I wracked my brain and you know what?  Nothing.  I guess that doesn't say much for what's in my brain but seriously I need some inspiration that doesn't end in me starting another story.

Oh off topic for a second, (What?  There was a topic?  Did I miss something here?), I have a story that needs a title.  I left a little synopsis of it on my profile page under the 'Yet to be Published on FP' section.  If anyone has any ideas I'd do whatever you wanted for a good title. (Um... by that I mean like lots of thanks and credit for helping with or providing the title so don't get excited that you'd be getting an indentured servant for life or something.)

If you have any ideas feel free to PM me or I have a discussion thread in the AFF forums here  You don't have to be a member of the forums, though you do have to be over eighteen, to read or post your suggestions there.  I wish Fictionpress had a forum like AFF does because I do review replies for my stories on AFF in there and it's nice for the readers but there you go, me getting sidetracked.  Check it out if you want, that's all I'm saying.

Back on topic.  So since I have nothing to complain about, what do I write?  Hmmm, well... any ideas?  No?  See it's not so easy, is it?  Feel free to shoot me some ideas if you're good at blogging or even if you're not and just have a good idea for a post and I'll try it out.

Anyway, I know that this is a short post but I felt bad that I hadn't updated in a while so it's just to make me feel like I'm doing what I'm supposed to do.  There I feel better, how about you guys?  No?  Well jeepers, I'll try harder next time, I promise.

See ya!

CL

Sequels or Why My Readers Are Going to Hate Me

So I'm assuming that if you're reading this there's a pretty good chance that you're familiar with my writing.  If not: What the hell are you here for?  Anyway if you are familiar with my writing then you've probably, most likely, read Falling for Him, right?  Good because this post is going to deal with the upcoming sequel to that story.

You see when Gavin and Lex first started jabbering at me, they were already together and it was around ten years after FFH took place.  They were all a flutter over this new woman in town that they just couldn't get out of their heads.  So I started writing their story but about six chapters in Gavin started telling this new woman about how he and Lex had gotten together.  Now I'm listening and thinking hell that would be a good story to tell because it's funny and interesting and just how the hell does a straight guy end up with another man?

So I put the first story on the back burner while I delved into finding out how a straight Gavin fell in love with the very flexible bisexual Lex.  The story tuned out to be fairly engaging and I was actually surprised at the level of feelings that were involved between the two of them.  They seemed pretty well matched and they are really sweet together.

Now I know that quite a few of you that read FFH are pretty dedicated slash readers.  You like your man on man action and get either squicked out or just flat out pissed when a woman is thrown into the mix.  But you see, Lex and Gavin are both bisexual, they like women too.  Yes they are happy together and maybe they could be enough for each other but if they both want something more, where's the harm in that?

In FFH I wanted to explore the notion that the gender of a person isn't the determining factor in if you can fall in love with them.  Gavin had never had feelings for another man nor had he ever been sexually attracted to one.  I know that people throw the word bromance around a lot and I wondered what would happen if these men that had these so called bromances threw out their fear of being labeled gay or what other people would think of them and actually had a relationship with another man.  I found out and Gavin found and fell in love with Lex despite the fact that he was a man.

So that brings me to why you, my dear readers, will hate me when I start rolling out the sequel.  The title is Falling for Her.  I know it's terribly original.  The title should give you a hint as to where the story is going.  The funny thing is that this is not the original story that's sitting at chapter six on my hard drive.  This is actually another back story.  I know right?  What the heck?  But when I went back to that first story I realized that the ten year gap would leave so many holes in the story that I had to write a third story.

I want to be clear here so there are no misunderstandings.  Falling for Her is a M/M/F story (it's different from M/F/M believe me you'll see).  It means there will be a woman added to their relationship at some point in the story.  As with all my stories there will be a slow build so there will be plenty of just Gavin and Lex moments and even after She joins in they will still be together.  I hope you won't view her as an interloper because she's going to fill a hole in the guy's lives and end up giving them one of the greatest gifts one human being can give another.  Just give it a chance, who knows, you may be pleasantly surprised.

I'm sure that I will have to fend off people who get upset at this turn of events.  To those of you that just can't stomach it; my advice to you is to just not read the sequel.  Let the story end for you where it made you happy.

Thanks for reading...

CL