French help please?

[erastes]

Can anyone speak French fluently? Can someone provide me with a few French phrases such as might be heard on the Docks at Calais changing for the boat trains?

hmm – looks like – from Noble Romance's new call for submissions that I won't be submitting there—the emphasis is on "hot and kinky" even for the historicals. There are many people who do hot and kinky historicals (Ava March and Fyn Alexander for two) and I am not among them.

I actually find it hard to write sex scenes these days, so I'm going to try and do a few short stories, it might help get the juices flowing as it were. Plus many submission calls ask that plot and characterisation and build up are every bit as important as the sex, which I find easier to do than the actual sex. I'm often bellowing around the 3k mark "AREN'T YOU GOING TO KISS HIM? EVER???" because they are having a jolly old natter. Note to characters. Less nattering more trouser time.

In other boggle-stuff (and vaguely related to Dear Author's post today about authors behaving badly ) do people really obsess about their star ratings on Amazon and Good Reads and the like?  I notice them, when cruising through to pick up a link—I know for example that Transgressions has a lower rating than Standish because probably of the religious and stockholm syndrome aspect, but … otherwise?  I really couldn't care less. Of course I like it when people like my books, and when they send me an email it's heavenly, but I'm never ever going to stalk the sales places to see OMG I'VE GOT A TWO STAR RATING I MAY DIE.  Plus it's all so arbitrary, someone can go and put five stars on everything you've written just because they've read one book they liked, or worse, are your friend in RL or your mother, so worrying if someone is putting one stars on my stuff seems like a waste of worry.

Comments

[ali-wilde.livejournal.com]

Coming from one of these lists where the one star thing is being debated, it seems that there is someone out there who is targeting books that contain gay erotica and giving them all 1 star rating (it doesn't even seem that this person has read the books, just giving them 1 star for the Hell of it), which is dragging down the actual rating. I haven't checked mine because, quite basically, if someone is going to buy one of my books based on a star rating, then good luck to them. I'd rather they read the blurb or bought it based on the strength of something else they'd read by me and liked - and then I hope they like the new one, too.

I also find that the books my partner and I write that don't have a lot of sex scenes in them sell just as well, if not better, then the ones that do. I know I skip a lot of sex scenes in books, especially the ones where there is a sex scene in every chapter, or ones that are sex held together with half a page of thin plot each chapter. I know I like writing flirting more than I like writing sex.

Sorry for rambling.

[tina kolesnik (from livejournal.com)]

It does hurt when you're trying to sell a book. Someone gave the RUSH anthology 1 star because he felt the stories were at best, for Yaoi novices and didn't feel like they were going anywhere [ongoing serial anthology-first issue, no the stories aren't going to end in the debut issue...and PS - it's not yaoi] and once that 1 star hit, the sales dropped.

Damn I hate LJ

[tina kolesnik (from livejournal.com)]

'weren't going anywhere' sorry -

Re: Damn I hate LJ

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Yes, but the thing is there's nothing much you can do about it, that was really my point. And complaining about it online seems to make it worse. You could get your friends to all vote you up, and that's what some authors are doing, --which seems just as bad as that person going and marking the GLBT books down--to redress the balance. I suppose some people must be affected by the fact that a book has a four star review average rather than a five, but they must be pretty silly or shallow? I'd rather read and excerpt and see for myself.

Re: Damn I hate LJ

[nagasvoice.livejournal.com]

Plus there's that cancelling out aspect where, if the troll goes around hitting *everything* with gay content, then it will even out across all the categories that have it.

[essayel.livejournal.com]

I tend to buy mostly by the recommendation of friends, and trusted review sites like SiN, but yeah *blushes* I'm one of the shallow ones who does take notice of star-ratings with books I've never heard of. Especially if they are in print and cost a lot. I'll take a chance on an interesting blurb if it's just a couple of dollars for a .pdf and I can get it pretty much immediately but not if I'm going to fork out £10 or £15 and wait a fortnight for it. I've wasted money on many occasions by taking chances.

In my defence, though, I do actually read the reviews, especially the 3 and 4 star ones, because they tend to be more considered and thoughtful than the 1 or 5 star ones. The one star trolls are pretty obvious, aren't they, the rat bags.

Can't help you with the French, and I've never been able to write sex convincingly. I do enjoy writing UST though.

[clarelondon.livejournal.com]

Just in passing ...
My latest short story WIP is becoming a standing joke in the house. I'm on 10k words and they haven't left the hotel bar yet, let alone gone to the bedroom (which is the whole darned point of *this* story).

Yes, definitely a case of too much natter :).

[tiggothy.livejournal.com]

Note to characters. Less nattering more trouser time.

Note to Erastes: For goodness' sake, put a warning on your posts when they contain such fabulous phrases as this! I nearly ended up with Chelsea Bun all over my Shiny Toy! I would not have been a Happy Tiggle if that happened! As it is, I just nearly choked giggling instead... *sigh* such sacrifices I make to avoid cleaning ;-)

(Seriously: was almost hiccupping with choky-giggles.) Love the way you phrase things. Also, I have this problem too, with characters avoiding the issue {as it were, *nudge-nudge wink-wink*}.

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Thank you dear - it wasn't until I posted this that I realised that if I ever (perish the thought) became famous this is the sort of idiocy that they'll quote...

[tiggothy.livejournal.com]

I've already been quoting you!
:-D

[tim crowhurst (from livejournal.com)]

Surely a better quote would be "less nattering more trouserless time"?

[tiggothy.livejournal.com]

Maybe they don't bother taking their trousers off? I know my characters often don't...

[erastes.livejournal.com]

often a bit difficult to get breeches and boots off without a boot rack and a valet. Easier to leave 'em on.

[beckyblack]

I'm mildly obsessed, with mine being my first, but I'm calming down now. Especially once I had a couple of reviews and some ratings.

Like you say, there's nothing you can do about them. If you start chucking your toys out of the pram about a bad review you go from being a writer with a bad review that only a limited number of people saw, to a dick with a bad review that half the people on the internet are now flocking to read after your rant about it. What's that quote from G.B. Shaw about wrestling a pig?

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

If the same troll is trashing all gay stories, authors or publishers could complain about it. Someone trashed Ransom once and LBR got the hatchet job removed.

I haven't even looked at Amazon ratings in months. It mattered a lot at first, but apparently some promo mavens have formed little groups that go around pushing each other's books up, and I just don't have time for such wankery.

[lee-rowan.livejournal.com]

ps -- what French phrases do you need? My wife speaks a bit of French...

[alanachantelune.livejournal.com]

Hello, I'm frensh and [info]mysid had said that you had need help.
What kind of phrases do you need ?

For example : "Hurry up, we're going late again!"

In common frensh, it's will be "Dépêche-toi, nous allons encore être en retard!"
but said in hurry, more frequent and less grammaticaly correct, it's will be :
"Dépêche, on va encore être à la bourre !"

Or maybe phrases said by dockers ?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

Just two or three random phrases like that would be perfect - "is this your trunk sir" "don't close the doors yet" that kind of thing that porters might be calling out to each other - that's very kind of you! (thanks to mysid too)

[alanachantelune.livejournal.com]

Ok ! ^^
So...
"Attention, veuillez ne pas gêner le passage, s'il vous plait!" (Be careful, please don't block the way)
"Ce sont vos bagages, monsieur ?" (is this your trunk, sir ?)


One more ?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

I think that will be perfect. I am not going to translate them because I want the reader to be as confused by the bustle as the protag--although he can speak pretty basic French, he's horribly hung over when boarding the train so it'sjust a big noisy jumble. Thank you so much!

[alanachantelune.livejournal.com]

It's was easy ! and a pleasure !

^^

[mroctober.livejournal.com]

Did you get the ms. okay?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

i did dear - and am beavering away, should have it finished and back to both of you by monday morning. xxx

[mroctober.livejournal.com]

As in Monday the 14th?

[erastes.livejournal.com]

No, should have been Monday 7th but the technical details we discussed have put me back a tad - you'll have it tomorrow without fail, i'm three quarters the way through