Beginnings, Middles or Endings??

What's your favourite part of writing a book?  Is it the beginning - where everything is new and fresh and there is a whole world of opportunities?  Is it the middle where things are tying together, you have two fully-fledged characters that feel real?  Or is it the end - the happy ever after - the bit everyone is waiting for?
Or maybe you're a little bit bad.  And your favourite part is the big Black Moment.  That horrible bit of the book where it seems as if there is no return??

I'm in a happy place.  Last night I started a new book.  And you might have guessed it but my favourite part of the book is the beginning.  I love the ideas, the potential developments, the little sentences you drop in that let the reader know there is something in this characters back story that will stop his or her path to a straightforward happy ever after.

I also love the drama.  Starting in the middle of something.  And not always with the two main characters on the page.  My first book It Started with a Pregnancy, began with my hero and heroine meeting in a bar and a night of passion followed.  Not the most unusual start.  But I learned from this.  And I developed.

My second story had drama.  The Boy who Made Them Love Again started with my hero pulling up outside a small hospital with the First Lady in premature labour in the back of the car!  He comes face to face with the woman he walked away from five years earlier and so the drama continues.

My third book was a follow up - still using the President and First Lady.  In this one my heroine turns up at the police cordon, heavily pregnant and trying to reach the doctor that's looking after the President's premature daughter.  She promptly collapses and is taken inside to meet her ex - the hero - and the only man she can trust to rescue her much-wanted child.  Sigh.  I love a bit of drama.



Book four, A Bond Between Strangers, starts with my hero receiving a letter telling him there has been an IVF mix up.  The embryos that had been created for him and his wife (with his sperm and a donors egg) and were due to be destroyed, have been mistakenly implanted in someone else.  His wife is long gone - but this is his baby - and all he's ever wanted is a family.  Someone else is carrying his child.  And he wants it.

Book five is the christmas story.  Her Christmas Eve Diamond starts with my heroine going to get her fortune told with her friends.  She doesn't believe in all that and is less than impressed when the fortune teller predicts she will be a Christmas bride.  It's August and she doesn't even have a boyfriend.  What's more she's vowed her next man will be a fellow Scot, but the fortune teller has other things in mind.....

Book six is the cruise ship story.  An Inescapable Temptation.  This one starts with the hero jumping in to rescue a child in Venice harbour.  He gets knocked out and my heroine ends up resuscitating him!

As for Book Seven????  Well, I'm not going to give too much away.  But again there is drama.  My study currently has a very important algorithm for a certain disease pinned on my wall.  Something big is going to happen in Chicago - something very big!

So, you can see a pattern forming here.  It's a bit worrying to be honest.  Apart from my first story, do I know how to write a story with a quiet build up?  I try not to do the backstory dump thing, and I do always try to start in the middle of the action.

What's interesting is that the middle of the action doesn't always have the hero and heroine on the first page.  It was one of the things I noticed about the New Voices contest.  I wanted to see the hero and heroine together straight away and yet I don't always do it myself.  Granted, it happens within a couple of pages, but maybe I still have a few things to learn.

So what's your favourite part?  Are you all about the middle and the developing characters?  Are you a wrung-out sort of person and all about the Black Moment?  Or, are you hearts and roses and all about the Happy Ever After?  Or are you like me, all about drama and all about beginnings?

Lets start at the very beginning, a very good place to start!

So, while we're all singing along with The Sound of Music tune up above, let us think about where we start our stories.
There have been over 1000 New Voices entries.  Some of the starting points have been good, some have been unusual, some have been mediocre.  Lots of the comments have been around telling people they haven't started their story in the right place.

Do you find it very easy to start?  Do the words just flow easily along?
Or do you have a few hit and misses before you can really get started?

I've done both of these things.

In my first book It Started With a Pregnancy, I wrote the beginning three times.  First attempt had Missy in the shower thinking about what she'd done the night before.  But it was too much tell and not enough show.  Second attempt had her walking into the ward and meeting her one night stand.  But again, too much thinking back to the events beforehand.

But neither of these versions 'felt' right.

Attempt three started in the bar, where they met, left together and did some horizontal dancing.  And the words just flowed from there.

Book number two, The Boy Who Made Them Love Again, started with Abby Tyler having a lazy day in the ER, seconds later her ex Luke Storm shows up with the First Lady in labour in the back of the secret service limousine!  This time the starting point felt right.  There was panic, shock and a very important patient to treat.  Not to mention, Luke finding out Abby has a young son.

Book number three, West Wing to Maternity Wing, starts with Lincoln Adams looking after the President's premature baby.  Seconds later he gets a call to say his heavily pregnant wife has collapsed at the police cordon outside the hospital.  Only problem is - Lincoln Adams doesn't have a wife.  

And Book four starts with John Carter receiving a letter.  He is expecting it to tell him the embryos that him and his wife created for their now defunct marriage have been destroyed.  Instead the letter tells him that one of those embryos has been wrongly implanted, and someone else is now carrying his child.

And Book five?  Right now, I have no idea where it will start.  All I do know is - I always need to start in the right place.  Otherwise things don't flow and the story doesn't progress.

So what about you?  Do you have problems starting in the right place?  Or, does it all just flow easily?  Or, have you ever read a book that you felt didn't start in the right place?

PS  I'm going to the Mills and Boon Author Lunch in London on Friday and can't wait!  Will tell you all about it next week.  Also hoping a friend of mine will share some good news!

On the shelves!

My book!  On the shelves in Tesco!  I let out a scream when I saw it and scared a pensioner standing next to me.  Then I took out my secret pile of bookmarks and stuck them in all the books.
Then I decided to go to WH Smith and do the same!
Can't wait to see what the Australia cover is going to look like!

How much fun can one girl have?

First of all apologies, I'm due to post on eharlequin medical authors blog and it seems to hate me. So right now the only way to post is to do it here first and then copy to the other blog. Some of you may have already seen this on the Minxes of Romance, so if you have, apologies!

The gala dinner with editor from Harlequin and fellow authors

It didn't start well. The train to Newport in Wales was packed with a variety of dogs and children crawling down the aisles. At one point I ended up with two unknown babies sitting on my lap. However once we arrived in Newport I recognised some fellow women scrambling with cases and shared a taxi with the lovely Freda Lightfoot to Caerlon.

Conference is all the about the people.  Last year I met the lovely medical author Kate Hardy, along with Heidi Rice and Kate Walker.  This year, I met two other lovely medical authors Margaret Barker and Jennifer Taylor.  I also had the privilege of meeting two Present authors India Grey and Natalie Rivers, and the lovely Harlequin Romance author Fiona Harper.




Scarlet with Harlequin editor Flo Nicoll




But then there is also the lectures - to give us all a chance to learn a bit more about the craft.  There was a huge range of topics covered in the programme and the hardest thing was picking what to attend. I have to say that this year I was naughty and ducked out of a few lectures through sheer brain drain.

But the ones I attended were fab. The conference started with Celebrations and this year there were a lot of members with good news of sales. It seems great that when we continually hear about tightening purses and less income, writers are still considered a priority. There was an award winning panel with Louise Allen, Elizabeth Chadwick and Jill Mansell all answering questions on how they wrote. I was amazed to learn that Jill Mansell writes all her books longhand with a Harley Davidson fountain pen! I was even more amazed when Fiona Harper (who writes for Harlequin Romance) pulled out her moleskin notebook from her bag and showed me that she writes long hand too - her next book was sitting right in front of me. I nearly snatched it and ran away!

Scarlet with Harlequin Romance author Fiona Harper

The Harlequin editors delivered a talk on being Unpredictable - their latest buzzword. They want new twists on the old stories and are still keen to acquire new authors.

Jenny Hutton and Anna Baggaley from MIRA and Mira Ink gave an overview for their line, highlighting all areas that sell well in women's fiction and teenage fiction. They also have new websites www.mirabooks.co.uk and www.miraink.co.uk

My favourite talk was given by Fiona Harper on getting emotion on the page and keeping it there. You could have literally heard a pin drop in the room while she was speaking. She has promised to put her notes for the talk on her website

The conference ended with agent Carole Blake and her client Elizabeth Chadwick letting us know how they were 'A Perfect Match'. Their working relationship has lasted longer than Carole's two marriages and they were a true doubleact!

It was a perfect end to a great conference and after the long journey home to Scotland I spent the next few days in bed recovering!

But then it was up and off to London with my kids and what did I do?  Something I can never help.  I bought tat.  Lots of it.  My other half cringed in horror when I was let loose in the Harrods Gift Shop.  Any item that had the name Harrods on it - I bought.  And here's the proof.

So what makes a fun day for you?  Attending a conference?  Buying tat?  What will it be??

Scarlet Wilson's debut book It Started With a Pregnancy is out on 2 September in the UK.

Freaking out!

So, as a subscriber to the Mills and Boon reader service my books have just arrived.
Drumroll please......

And my book is amongst them!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

All of a sudden this seems real and completely terrifying!
People are actually going to be able to read my book and comment on it!  Oh NO!
What if they hate it???
I'm also not sure when I will receive my author copies to give to my family, friends and the people the book is dedicated to.  I'm hoping they won't take long.
In the meantime I will sit here shaking, waiting to see if on the 1 August someone will put a review of my book on the Mills and Boon website.
The thought petrifies me!

My first book cover!!!!!

So, drumroll please..................here it is my first book cover!!!!!
This is real, it isn't some wild fantasy I've cooked up in my head or dreamed up at night.  I really DO have a book cover posted on Amazon.
So what do I think?  Well, I am a tiny bit disappointed the writing isn't in red - but that's just me.
What can you expect from someone called Scarlet?

And blogger still hates me.  I can sign in to put up a new post, but it doesn't recognise my sign in for commenting on any pages.  Including my own.  I am now named Anonymous.  I have to go and use someone else's computer for it to work.  So what's wrong with mine?  Can anyone give me a clue?

The Irresistibly Sweet Blog Award

So, thank you Rachael Johns for this award.  Now I need to think up 10 random facts to share with other bloggers.  And since I've done something similar, I really need to find 10 different facts....

1. My book that is due published in September - It Started With A Pregnancy, is really the book of my heart.  To sum it up, a diabetic midwife falls pregnant and starts to freak when she realises she can't control her diabetes the way she used to.  Been there and done that.  Twice.  For someone who has spent their life knowing when a hypoglycaemic attack is about to hit, and could usually always avert it, to have a total change of condition and have NO signs of oncoming hypos is/was terrifying.  I could have normal, rational conversations with people with a blood sugar of 1.2 (normal is between 4 and 7, hypo warning signs usually show when it drops under 4).  Even my family were freaked by it.  And for a control freak like me, well....
2. I'm a trained nurse and health visitor.  I've worked in medical wards, orthopaedics and coronary care.  I've also worked as a District Nurse and as a health visitor I was addicted to the smell - yes, the smell - of newborn babies.  You really didn't want me near your child!
3. My favourite kids were the ones who refused to do the assessments.  The ones who threw the bricks off the wall instead of building a tower.  The ones who you tried to coax to say five single words and all they would say was NO.  The ones who wouldn't draw a circle or a cross but would look you in the eye and take the crayon along the wall.  I like kids with spunk.
4. As a student I was once asked to put cream on someone's APRON.  I was working in the ward from hell, with the Sister from hell, so I pulled the curtains, armed with my tub of cream and thought "Wherever the apron is I'm going to get it."  The poor patient had cream from the top of their forehead to the tips of their toes.  Incidentally, the APRON is the roll of fat that hangs over your belly!
5. I once auditioned for ballet school in Glasgow, but wasn't really sure I wanted to go.  I did ballet, tap , modern and jazz dancing until I was 16.
6. I used to be a good girl.  At school I was known as a goody two-shoes.  I've never done drugs and didn't start drinking alcohol until I was 19.  Please note, I said used.
7. My radley bag collection (from the last post like this) has unfortunately grown.  I now have 18 bags, and a suitcase (which isn't that great!).  All the bags are absolutely essential and none of them I can do without.
8. I wrote my first Mills and Boon when I was 17.  It was a medical and was called Hidden Love and involved a typewriter and that horrible tippex white paper for whenever you made a mistake.  Funnily enough I got a standard R, as it would now be known, and took myself off in a huff for a bit.  I didn't write my next one until 2009.
9. I'm taking my beloved and my kids to Eurodisney this year at Christmas and we are going to stay in the Disney Hotel at the park entrance, all with my M & B advance!
10. I have two wonderful critique partners for whom I am extremely grateful.  Nancy (Sheandeen on eharlequin) and Rachael Johns, both take a bow.  I am not going to forget that I couldn't have got published without you!

PHEW!!!!!!!!!!  All done!

Now, I would love to pass this on to others.  Feel free to download the pic and participate!

News and the Shred

I am in a happy place.  I heard back from my editor today with revisions for book 2.  I am delighted.  This is the book I wrote while waiting to hear back from Mills and Boon about It Started with a Pregnancy.  So, my editor had never heard anything about this story, hadn't seen a proposal and hadn't agreed it at all.  After I got The Call for book 1, I sent this in and held my breath.
So now I am breathing a huge sigh of relief.  I don't need to write something completely different.  I have to make changes, but that's fine.  The revisions seem reasonable so I'm going to bury my head in the sand for the next month and work away on them.
Next, I've joined the Craze.  The Craze for the Shred.  I've heard other people talking about it and finally decided to see what it was all about.  I'm currently only on Day 4 and I'm still at level one of the 30 day Shred.  Apparently if you follow this 20 min exercise routine every day for 30 days you can lose 7-10lbs, change shape and drop a dress size.  Now I hate exercise.  I'm practically allergic to it.  I danced up until I was 17.  Then did nothing for years.  I went swimming for a bit, only because I'm not a particularly good swimmer and wanted to get better.  But it annoyed me.  The grey-haired swimming brigade kept swimming in front of me (going breadth wise instead of length wise - why would people do that?) and as I can't tread water, every time they swam in front of me I sank like a stone.  Recently I've been going to a Zumba class once a week and have quite enjoyed it, but an hour a week is not going to sort out my flabby tum.
So, Shred it is!  I've decided not to weigh myself until the end of the 30 days - so I'll let you know how it goes.

And what do you think of this?  It's my banner for my new website which is being built by a work colleague.  Hopefully it will be ready soon.
Finally a huge congratulations to Leah Ashton, the winner of New Voices who just sold her book to Mills and Boon.  I look forward to reading it!

After the Call...

First of all, thanks to everyone who sent their good wishes following The Call.  You might have been able to tell I was on a high...
So what happens next?  Quite a lot actually.  I wasn't asked to do any final tweaks to my manuscript so have been able to sleep soundly.  My editor let me know that my book will be titled It Started with a Pregnancy and will be published in Sept 2011.  WHOOPEE!
I also had to agree a date to have my next manuscript ready.  I've agreed on the end of May but have just finished writing a medical romance that's a little different.  It's been off to my critique partner and had some changes and has now been sent on to my editor, who will get back to me in a few weeks.
I'm not delusional.  I know that revisions will be required.  And hopefully now I've had some practice I will be better at them.  My big worry is that my editor will tell me she doesn't like it and I'll have to start something new completely.  Because I love this story and I love that it features a profession I've never seen in a Medical Romance before.
In the meantime I've started revising something I wrote last year and has room for improvement - oh, and a POV!
I've just had my first set of Author Alterations sent to me and I plan to work on them tomorrow.  This is the last time I get to see my book before publication.  Yikes!
I also received my contract, which made my knees tremble as I printed it out.  So I just need to sign that and send it back.
I also purchased a domain name for my website and a friend at work is going to build my site for me.
Finally I found out that my first book will be eligible for the Joan Hessayon Prize with the RNA as it went through the New Writers Scheme.  So next year I get to go to the RNA Summer Party!  Yippee!
So how is everyone else getting on?  I know some people are still waiting for their SYTYCW entries and my fingers and toes are crossed for you all!

The Call!

At 1.34pm today my life changed. The phone rang. The Call. As I was driving. The number came on the dashboard and I thought 0208???? is this a marketing call? But I pressed the button on the steering wheel and it was the lovely Sally Williamson from Mills and Boon.
Now at first I was worried. When other people have got the "The Call" they've usually had an email to arrange a time to talk. I hadn't had an email. But the day before I'd emailed Sally asking if she'd had time to look at my revisions and if she liked them or not. So I was worried. The crows of doubt were definitely circling.
My first thought was - she's phoning to let me down gently. So when I heard the words "We want to buy your book" I screamed so loudly I probably deafened her. Then I had to pull the car over as I started crying. Happy tears. Lots and lots of happy tears.
Then I heard the words "forward" and "two book deal". It was all a bit of a blur after that. I phoned my beloved and shouted "I can pay off the Visa bill!"
Then I ran into work and started shouting "I write for Mills and Boon!" The people I work with are wonderful and have known that I was waiting to hear for a while, so flowers and cake seemed to appear out of thin air.
Then I took two minutes to go and email my critique partner Nancy, my other online colleagues, Rachael, Jackie, Joanne. Then I emailed the poor Mills and Boon medical authors I've been stalking for a while Kate Hardy, Wendy S Marcus and Anne Fraser.
Then I had to go and tell my mum, dad and sisters. None of whom knew about my exploits to write for Mills and Boon - so that was fun.
So tonight I've finally sat down. I've read the confirmation email that Sally sent me. This ISN'T a dream. It is true. I've got to pick a pseudonym as there is another Romance writer in America called Susan Wilson. So what will I pick? I have no idea. But I have a whole weekend to decide. Feel free to make suggestions... Friends have already told me to call myself Scarlet, as I spend my life wearing red, but I'm going to take a bit of time.
Finally to say, that this all came about because of a Pitch on the eharlequin website in March last year. Wendy S Marcus, myself and two others won the chance to pitch our stories to Lucy Gilmour from medical romance. A partial was requested and then I was passed to Sally who requested the full. The rest as they say is history!
Now, to find the wine...........