Mick’s Musings – Better Late Than Never

My first post for a couple of weeks. Better late than never – hopefully that’ll mean my blog boss won’t tell me off too much.

The reason for which is simple; I’ve been desperately putting the finishing touches to getting my one page synopsis down from a page and a half. I could easily write this post which wasn’t what I had planned, but let’s see where this actually does end up. So, welcome folks, step right this way for the Magical Mystery (Post) Tour. No buses, no Walruses, but perhaps plenty of flying pigs!

Please include a one page synopsis – only 6 words, a nice small sentence. Cue pulling out of hair, opening of that bottle of wine you swore you’d keep for that special occasion, making sure the fridge (it is hot at the moment) is full of your favourite chocolate – Milky Way Stars here please (any sponsors out there?). Now, pull out all those notes you have of what’s actually happening in your story and – SWEAR as loudly as you can. Who the heck decided this was a good idea???

Now, settle back and eat chocolate and drink wine until it comes out of your ears, you fall down and decide that yes, this is a good idea. You are now ready to condense your lovingly crafted story into one little page of paper (ok, screen). Sound easy? Of course it’s not. My latest is just under a page and a half and that was difficult enough – but it’s a nice page and a half. Wish it could stay at that length, but that’s the rules and this has to be ready to go out in three days time. So, now you know how I spent this lovely weekend, but if I want to become a published author, this is a cross to bear willingly.

That’s the rant over and I feel much better. Thank you to all of you who stayed with me.

What I really wanted to say, was to send a huge thank you to all those of you whom I met for the first time at the recent RNA Conference and of course to those of you I’ve got know previously since being fortunate enough to join. It was only my second time, but already it is right up there with the highlights of each year and I’m very much looking forwards to London next year. Personally, I had about as successful a time as was possible without the fabled miracle of being told, ‘yes!!! Gods yes! You’re exactly what we’ve been looking for all our years. Please, here’s £xx,0000 and a two book contract.’ One would like to see the whole thing after it comes back from the New Writer’s Scheme and I’ve picked myself up off the floor from crying my eyes out, and made the advised changes (hopefully not a complete re-write) and another’s happy to see the first three chapters. I think I’ll wait to do that until it comes back too. Another is happy to see the first chapter again once a few things have been changed – again, I’ll wait to send that out.

So, better than last year and still more than I could have reasonably hoped for. Especially as the one who wants to see the whole thing, was the one I nearly decided I wouldn’t go and see as I didn’t think what I’d written would fit their publishing house. Shows how much I know eh! And the best thing of all, I wasn’t the only one who had similar stories to tell from the Birmingham branch of the RNA.

I’ll close by putting in a shameless plug for my friend (hopefully not humping the gun there) Janice Preston who’s book ‘Mary and the Marquis’ has just been published by Mills and Boon (Historical). My heartiest congratulations and I hope to join you in the published field before too long.

Every fortnight, Mick will be chatting about his experience as a male author in the romantic genre. Mick is a forty-something member of the Romantic Novelists Association, New Writers Scheme. He lives in Northamptonshire and is the proud keeper of a cat bent on world domination. When he’s not trying to write books, Mick has a deep-seated love of reading that he’s brought from his teens to the current day with no signs of waning. He’s also mad on the music of the Beach Boys and enjoys the theatre and humouring his Manchester United supporting wife. Mick can be followed on Twitter.

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Laura

I’m Laura. I started Novel Kicks in 2009. I wanted a place to post my writing as well as give other writers like me the opportunity to do the same. There is also a monthly book club, a writing room which features writing prompts, book reviews, competitions, author interviews and guest posts.

I grew up by the sea (my favourite place in the world) and I currently live in Hampshire. I am married to Chris, have a cat named Buddy and I would love to be a writer. I’m trying to write the novel I’ve talked so much about writing if only I could stop pressing delete. I’ve loved writing since creative writing classes in primary school. I have always wanted to see my teacher Miss Sayers again and thank her for the encouragement. When not trying to write the novel or writing snippets of stories on anything I can get my hands on, I love reading, dancing like a loon and singing to myself very badly. My current obsession is Once Upon a Time and I would be happy to live with magic in the enchanted forest surrounded by all those wonderful stories provided that world also included Harry Potter. I love reading chick lit. contemporary fiction and novels with mystery.