Satchmo Strikes Again

[erastes]

Do please pop along to Jessewave’s Blog for my column this week.  I’m discussing the Hero. We love him on the page, but would you REALLY want to live with him?

Come along and share your heroes and the reasons why you’d DEFINTELY not move in with him (or whether you would!)

In other news, the novella (Tributary) is getting there.  I would say it’s “almost done” because it IS, in a way—but it’s only half written.  As usual I’m writing it in rather a jigsaw fashion; the main bulk of the book moves forward, but I work on scenes that may or may not make their way into the whole thing, and of course, I’m writing the end. Meant to do it yesterday but felt too much like crap. Better today, thank you!  Still got a nascent cough and a snuffle, but nowhere near what I was expecting after yesterday.

What' I’ve realised is one of my characters has to have a name change.  His name is Louis and his lover’s name is (surname) Armstrong.  Is this my subliminal guilt that all my characters are white?

Have a small sniplet:

He rested like that for a moment, stealing the still moments from Louis when he could—God knows they were rare enough, the boy was eternally restless.  He rested his hand on the curve of Louis' back, that warm space which might lead to delight in a moment, if Louis kept still long enough.  He felt Louis' lips against his shoulder and the flutter love stretched again, deep in his being, for it was more poetic than saying it happened in one's belly. Stupid old man, he castigated himself. What a predicament to find yourself in, after all these years.  In love.  At your age.

Louis shifted, predictably, unable to stay in one place, sliding from James' grasp.  James didn't try to hold on; he couldn't force Louis to stay, not in his employ, and not in his arms.  He was only grateful that he did.  But Louis granted him a brief, dazzling smile before turning away into the bedroom.  As James changed into his pyjamas he could hear the boy humming from the other room and it took effort not to watch him through the crack in the door.

Instead he sat on the edge of the bath and washed his face again. As he stood up, he shivered. He'd been feeling a little dizzy since he took the stairs and now his joints were aching.  He hadn't paid attention to them much during the evening, but they'd been complaining since before dinner. Oh no.  Not again.  Looking at his lined face in the mirror he could not resist a grimace at the comedy of errors he was in.  He knew he was obsessed.  Knew he was caught in the saddest of things—an older man's fancy for something he could never keep, and he played his part.  He didn't cling. Didn't go overboard. Louis had to know that he could trust him to be there—so far, and no more.  How Louis would shy from the truth—the truth about all of it.  How he'd hate to know the depths of feeling running under the surface, he'd run from that.

Comments

[leatherdykeuk.livejournal.com]

What a beautiful vvignette.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thank you, dear! :)

[joannesopercook.livejournal.com]

Done and done.
Louis Armstrong? It just shows that you have excellent taste in music. ;-)

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I do love LA. Muchly.

[joannesopercook.livejournal.com]

Looking at his lined face in the mirror he could not resist a grimace at the comedy of errors he was in. He knew he was obsessed. Knew he was caught in the saddest of things—an older man's fancy for something he could never keep, and he played his part. He didn't cling. Didn't go overboard. Louis had to know that he could trust him to be there—so far, and no more. How Louis would shy from the truth—the truth about all of it. How he'd hate to know the depths of feeling running under the surface, he'd run from that.

Oh, beautiful...and so painfully true...how one's expectations - of many things - are necessarily reined in as the years begin to pile on...how we tell ourselves that we can no longer expect what we once did, that we ought to be past that now, and if it does come, then we will be 'mature' and 'sensible' by not holding on.

I always find myself admiring your ability to take some one aspect of human nature and freeze it in a living, realistic way. Brilliant.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thank you, dear, what nice things to say. Although it's going to have a HEA because of the constrictions of the genre, it's a love-triangle which means I can make it a tragedy in some respects.

I've been thinking about Mere Mortals the last couple of days and wondered what on earth the book would have been like if I'd added Philip's POV in - impossible as the book is first person, but it would have been an interesting exercise in self-delusion.

James is wrong, of course, about Louis. as we all often are, thinking that we know someone, and how they'd react. That's the tragedy of it.

[joannesopercook.livejournal.com]

OMG Philip's POV would have been seriously fucked-up - wonderfully so!!!

Any news on MeMo, publishing wise?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

No, no news. Either this means that they don't bother to say "no" when they don't want it, or he's taking it to a panel for a decision (optimistic in me working hard here) or he didn't get the pigging email in the first place. I'll chase it up in a few weeks.

[joannesopercook.livejournal.com]

Optimism is always a good idea, given the alternative - and I think any publisher should be down on their knees for it. :)

[beckyblack]

Lovely snippet. :)

Ah, my best "I have to change this name!" moment - I was just about to introduce a character who was a geneticist, when it occured to me that the plan to have him be called "Gene" might just be considered be inadvertantly hilarious.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

chokes with laughter!!!

Gene!! That's brilliant!

And thank you for liking the sniplet.

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

Oh, lovely. Play it again, Sam.

Re the race thing... next time you do sci-fi, you could make one of the characters a different race -- in a universe that doesn't have this one's social issues. Or you could have a charcter who had a great-grandmother from India, with a bit of gene-mixing but not enough to create issues that would get in the way of your story.

I have to admit that after all the race-fail and other (justified, but I think sometimes out of proportion) uproar, I'm leery of doing any characters who are other than vanilla, even though I've got some Native American (a term some American Indians hate) genes myself, and have been allowed to learn from a couple of tribal elders. No matter how a thing's written, there are bound to be people who will hate it and turn it into an argument, and I've got enough aggravation with the 'you shouldn't write m/m' brigade.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

Oh I wasn't being at ALL serious. Other than sticking in an equivalent of a Ms Schwartz from Vanity Fair, it's unlikely that I'll be writing any people of colour in my books - as you say - we get enough stick writing about men, as I said on the Dear Author thread, and people will give me hell if I start writing people of colour. And I think a Ms Schwartz was more acceptable than a Mr Schwartz would ever have been!!!

[alex-beecroft.livejournal.com]

Oh that's lovely! How are you managing to be both prolific /and/ good? It seems deeply unfair to we lesser mortals.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Aw thank you, dear!

Hardly prolific! I made myself an agreement to write one full sized novel and one novella minimum per year - and this was the first year and I've just about stuck to that - although I know now how much sitting around playing molehill empire this entails. Next year I'm upping it to 12 short stories too.

At this rate I'm going to be bursting with unsold stuff.

[alex-beecroft.livejournal.com]

Well, you've got another novel finished already *and* a novella well on the way. It seems like a lot to me, particularly as I know your novels are quite long. And adding 12 short stories is a bit superhuman if you ask me.

I'm aiming for a novel and a novella too, but the trouble is that I can't decide when the year begins, because I'm usually starting something half way through something else.

Thumbs up to the lack of bad news on Mere Mortals :D

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Two novels! *weeps* Junction X AND Mere Mortals. I'm holding JX back and trying to get an agent for it if I can.

Well, doofus, the year begins when you start the next project!! :) I'm lucky that at the moment its running parallel with the actual year. We should use the Macs yahoo group more for Nano-like support.

Lack of bad news is always good! :)

[alex-beecroft.livejournal.com]

Yes, once I've finished Away with the Faeries, I mean to write a novel (probably Dragon of the Fen) which I can start the whole agent finding process with. It does seem to be the only way.

*g* In that case this year began on November 1st, and now contains four chapters of a new novel. Last year contained "Shining in the Sun" and "Blessed Isle" and the year before that "False Colors" and "The Wages of Sin." That's not so bad :)

It would be nice to have a bit of a support group for works in progress. It's a bit of a lonely slog with no one to talk to about it.