Dark is the Night for All

Even though I enjoyed writing vampire fics when I was 15-16, I never had any hope of publishing any of it because I knew that they weren't very original. I mean, yeah, I like vamps, but hasn't it all already been done before?

I never would have read this book if one of my readers had not written me and told me that my writing was quite a bit like Stephenie Meyer's. It sort of intrigued me because I was like, "You mean there's an actual published author who knows how to write?" I also saw a lovely little article on a Chapters flier saying how her vampire fic was 'the new Harry Potter'. So, I bought a copy to see how sad 'Dragon's Moon' looked in comparison. Yeah, 'Dragon's Moon' is definitely rough around the edges, but I was expecting to read something that really showed me all the ways that I need to improve - something that showed me that I still have a long way to go. Not so. Actually, I cried.

Don't get me wrong though. I'm not angry with her. In a way, I'm cheering for her. I wish I knew how to market my story to literary agents - if I did, maybe I would have cleaned up 'Dragon's Moon' and sold it five years ago. Not that I could have had her success - that's impossible for me. And I'm not being pessimistic for all you people who come to my blog and don't comment (hehehe). I'm being realistic. By this point, I know what a pack of hounding maniacs teenage girls are for fluff, kissing scenes and skank. Most of the teenage girls I know who like romance stopped reading teenage fluff ages ago and started reading romances for adults (which also explains the writers on ff.net who claim to be 15 and write the sort of books that usually have a scantily clad couple on the front). Though I don't think Stephenie Meyer degraded herself by the scenes she wrote - I could never have done it. Like I wrote on my Ghost Mist blog - I just can't do that sort of thing. I can't write more than two paragraphs in a row about a couple making out without wanting to DIE. It's not just that it makes me uncomfortable, but also that I've read so many such scenes that I feel like they are such old hat as to be ... boring ... predictable and overly sentimental. However, that's exactly what the teenagers want.

Anyway, yesterday I had a published author look at a chapter of 'Whenever You Want' and she said that I was ready to get something published. And you know what? I think she's right. I wish I had something ready to send right now, but I don't. I need to get to work. Even if my trilogy can't be sent and 'Whenever You Want' probably shouldn't - I can come up with something new - work on it and send it out. I feel like I'm ready.

So - final comments on 'Twilight' - I wish Edward's thoughts hadn't been so predictable, but as I've learned talking to several of my friends who have read it, it's not predictable if you're not familiar with vampire fiction.

I wish she hadn't said 'I'm going to give you the choice I never had' in book three. Okay, that's not exactly what she said, but isn't that the most famous line from 'The Vampire Chronicles' by Anne Rice? Clearly, it can't all be 100% original since they are talking about the same subject, but wouldn't that particular line be taboo? And yet, there it was, all by itself in it's own paragraph and everything. Maybe she hasn't read them ... or heard the delightful way Tom Cruise says it as he stokes Brad Pitt's cheek.

Next - if I were writing it - it would be way more slashy slashy than kissy kissy. By the end of the first book, I totally couldn't understand why Edward hadn't slashed his wrist yet. I was sitting there going, "What are we waiting for?"

I may talk about this more later, but I gotta go. All in all, it was a pretty good book.