Writing your own novel - Gracie's guidance notes

There is no denying the inevitable fact that I will be thirty in less than two months time. Now, if that were not traumatizing enough (and believe me, the way I'm hanging on to the last few weeks of being in my twenties is pathetic), it is also scary in the way it reminds me of all the things that I had set up myself to do before reaching the big Three-OH!and which, sadly did not.

I have already spoken about my wish list in an earlier blog, so won't go into all the details again, but there is one particular failed mission that is really quite disappointing. I have to face the harsh reality that the novel I had planned to write before my thirtieth birthday is not only not quite finished, but not even quite started. And by "quite started" I mean not started, at all, not even close. And by that I mean, I haven't, in the words of Phoebe Buffay, even written the page numbers yet. Having said that, not writing my own novel gave me the time to read extensively the works of other people throughout my life (and for those who are asking why I didn't spend the time writing instead of reading - well geniuses, it's easier to let yourself get entertained by other people's writing than to write you own. Not really Physics Advanced as a concept now, is it?)

Anyhooooo, reading all sorts of books from all sorts of authors made me realise that there are a number of ways to actually approach the writing of a novel, which I will try to portray here, as a sort of "Writing for Dummies - Choose Your Style to Make it Big!" guidebook. Once I actually choose what style works best for me ... you'll get to know. So ... here goes:

Austen/Dickens Style

This is the approach of writing specifically about what you know and see around you. Whether it is young marriagable women who spend their days embroidering or going to balls, or whether it is hungry, miserable orphans starving in the streets of London, Jane Austen and Charles Dickens made it big by faithfully reproducing the world around them, and writing about something that the readers at the time could totally relate to. In all fairness, it does help that readers of our time don't mind being unable to relate to their world, and that someone, somewhere decided that their works are classics and should be read and reread hundreds of years later.

If I had to take this approach, and seeing the lameness of my current life, I would base my novel on the daily adventures of a target and deadline driven government department from the point of view of a printer. I would call it Paper Jam. A real, edge-of-your-seat page turner. True story.

Ken Follett Style

This style is based on pure, thorough, detailed and exhausting research. Basically you either need to be as rich as whatevers from the get-go, or else you would have already made it big enough from the Austen/Dickens approach in order to have the money and time to actually spend years researching the trenches of World War I, or the architectural style of Medieval England. There is no way you can write something as gloriously beautiful as Pillars of the Earth without having anything else to do except research about it in some dumpy university library somewhere in England.

For the rest of us who work 45+ hours per week .... refer to the Approach 1. For those who have the time and the money ... do some research on the Great Siege like David Ball did in the Sword and The Scimitar. Fantastic read and welcomed smuttiness between a Knight and a Maltese damsel. Highly recommended, even by Tom Hanks on Twitter (I just KNOW).

Dan Brown/Michael Crichton Style

Write about nonsense, but make it sound real, and include a cliffhanger in every page. Then get Tom Hanks (hahaha mentionitis today) to play Robert Langdon in the movie version of your books. You'll get millions. And then you can go all Ken Follett on us and write something amazing.






Stephenie Meyers/Suzanne Collins Style

Now, this needs a multi-step approach, because let's face it, you need to write a saga that enthralls the Facebook generation, so you need to keep the teenagers happy, and the non-teenagers (like me v_v) so hooked to actually not be embarrassed to admit it. So, what you need to include in your swoony sagas is the following:

a. An obnoxious but still relatable heroine: Bella Swan is a complete disaster from Book 1, Katniss Everdeen is awesome until Book 3. However, the more annoying is the heroine, the more hope you give young girls that even if SHE can get the boy in the end, there is hope for the rest of us, who are more adjusted and who do not fall in love with vampires or have to fight to death in a televised arena.

b. A perfect hero: whether it is a vampire who refuses to drink human blood, or a baker's son whose aim in life is to sacrifice himself so that the heroine can make it alive from the abovementioned arena, you need to create a symbol of perfection that girls believe could actually exist. It of course helps if in the movie version the guys cast to play the role have a jawline that was friggin CHISELED BY ANGELS. *age-inappropriate swoon*


c. The useless other (hot) guy: I'm not sure why these guys are always included in such sagas. Meyers gave us Vampire v Werewolf, Collins came up with the Baker v Hunter and in both cases, the triangle added nothing but unnecessary angst to an already angsty book. It is obvious from Book 1 that these hotties will never get the girl, so I guess the only reason to put them there is to get the tweens to have two posters stuck to their wall, rather than one. But again, that somehow seems to get you millions, and bring a couple of boring actors (the love antagonists are always boring) to stardom, so I guess it's a win-win situation for some.

NB: An extremely important point to keep in mind in writing these Young Adult sagas is to take good care of the names you give your protagonists. In the age of Brangelina and TomKat, I think Suzanne Collins should have been a bit more careful when naming the Hero Peeta and the Heroine Katniss. Some more care would have avoided the actors the embarrassment of standing behind signs that said "I LOVE PEENISS". Just saying.




There are other styles of course, and I just skimmed the most obvious perhaps, but I admit that I cannot even try to understand how J.K. Rowling could have possibly created the perfect world within Harry Potter, where a school of wizards could take our world by storm. I also did not mention Tolkien's Lord of the Rings saga, because well, that is pretty simple: write about a mystical world and leave out the love element. This will ensure that that part of the human population that was born with a uterus would avoid it like the plague. Boring!

So, to all aspiring writers out there ... don't procrastinate like me ... but just write! Then, send me your books, and I will read them. And dissect them to pieces, in true Gracie style.

Love and read!

Grace xxx

It's time for Daddy!

It's Father's Day! Consequently, I think that there is no better occasion to introduce the other half of my genetic structure, the man who is 50% responsible for the creation of me, and thus a very generous contributor to all the quirks, eccentricities and general set-up that characterize yours truly. You have already read all about my my mum here. Now it's time for daddy!



First things first, my dad gave me olive skin that tans so fantastically that I can't help being smug about it from between late May and late October. It is also the kind of skin that was never pimply during my teenage years, which at least allowed me to worry about other angsty adolescent stuff, and be a general tearful, moody and sullen pain in the arse without having to fill the bathroom with Clearasil and Zit removers. I also inherited my nose from my dad (which frankly, I really really wish he would have refrained from giving me, especially since my mother's was just so dainty), his sleeping habits - i.e. erratic sleep patterns and insomnia (thanks again dad!), love for books (I'm infinitely grateful!), the love for travel and the general desire to look beyond the cliffs and to stop believing that this tiny rock is the centre of the universe. For this last thing especially, thanks Dad!

My dad also taught me a good deal of sarcasm (though the student's capacity has now definitely surpassed that of the mentor, as our daily conversations clearly show), a limited knowledge of English grammar usage and other useless stuff, and the strict belief that "Do It Yourself" should be left to ... others, especially since they would do everything so much better than yourself. I can safely say that my dad and I would react to a post nuclear apocalypse by attempting to rebuild the world from radioactive ashes by passing caustic comments at it. We are that useless, but kinda awesome in that way. However, where my dad fails with the hammer and the driller, he excels in the knowledge of the irrelevant, by spouting WTF trivia during dinner, or knowing the difference between "while" and "whilst", and knowing when to use "who" instead of "whom". Although let's face it, the latter just has to be the fourth secret of Fatima.



When it comes to Football (and only that), my Dad puts his foot down, and looms large as the Master of the house. There is only one team, and that is Inter Milan. Other teams should not be mentioned, supporters of such other secondary clubs should be avoided or just grudgingly humoured. Slight respect may only be shown to Real Madrid and Barcelona FC, but that is to be limited to games where said teams are playing against the second team of Milan (unmentionables) and that team from Turin who(m?) one should not even acknowledge. This knowledge is deeply ingrained in me Dad, thank you for that. Will not disappoint you on this one.

Thank you Daddy, for your teachings, your sharing of values, your jokes and for generally putting up with me. Thank you for supporting all my decisions, even if there are some you probably don't agree with. Thank you for bringing me up in a way that has allowed me to make my own choices without actually feeling the need to discuss them with you, other than to announce them once they're a fait accompli. Thanks for making me the person that messes up decisions, but then fixes them herself. I know that it does not sound exactly like a good thing, but I think that actually living my own life for the past years without having to check with you is probably the best compliment I could possibly give you. I am what I am thanks to you.




Love you loads Daddy! You get to read it here, so treasure it, because all you'll get from me today will be the usual treatment :P. Oh, and please do act surprised at your present!

Kisses,

Gracie xxxx


PS Happy Father's Day also to all those sweet, hot daddies who always make my trip to the Supermarket so much more pleasant!!!!

Random Gracieness

I was asked, by some of the people who regularly follow my blog (scarily loyal and amazing people I believe) why I did not dissect, limb by limb, moonwalk by moonwalk, note by note, last week’s Eurovision song contest. Those who know me personally know the whole story, those who don’t ... well let’s just say that you need to know that blood is thicker than sarcasm. So no ... all eurobashing will have to wait until next year ;).

This made me realise just how much I actually missed make some good, harmless and innocent fun of other people, and how really enjoyable that is. So today, I’m just going to allow you all that opportunity by asking you to join me in some good natured and jovial laughing at myself. Yes, that’s it ... today I’m going to give you all the ammo and fodder you need to poke all the fun you want at me next time you meet me. Just make sure, that if you’re a good looking bloke, you don’t have a beautiful woman with legs up to my neck hanging from your arms. That makes me insecure... and an insecure Gracie is no fun to be around, especially if she decides to wallow in a corner drinking diet coke.

Anyway, here goes. These are the random facts about me that should provide you with some conversation ice-breakers and an entertaining half an hour at my own expense :D:

United Nations

I love the United Nations, I follow what it does and I’m one of its biggest fans. This is not really because it has served as a guarantor (for the time being) against a new World War, because let’s face it, all it takes is for Mr Barack Obama (Mr Obama!!! Mr Obama!!!! – that’s my best Berlusconi impersonation yet) and Mr Ahmedinwhatyoucallhimfromiran to wake up in a grumpy mood, and bham, there we go again with ze nuclears. My love for the United Nations is not even wholly due to the amazing names of its Secretary Generals – does anyone remember Boutros Boutros Ghali??? I mean ... how awesome is that? “Oh I am sooo pleased to meet you, my name is Gracie Gracie Fancysurname. Enchanted, truly!” No actually, I love the United Nations because the first time I ate sushi EVER in my life was in their canteen in Vienna. Random mentions of sushi this week made me remember this fact, and it does bring extremely good memories of a trip there back in 2003. Good times.

Barcelona

I love Barcelona. Everyone who knows me in the slightest heard that, on multiple occasions. What might not be totally general knowledge is that I slept in a military tent on a beach in Barcelona for a week in August of 2004 and I was woken up every morning by this song. Strange times ... and the pulled muscle from the hard bunkbeds remained painful until the following April. Fantastic!

Shopping

I shop at www.boohoo.com. It’s girly, flowery and cheap, which should be a good indication to NOT go on and on about famous and expensive fashion brands that I cannot afford. That makes me grumpy. I also glaze when you mention shoes, but I love handbags. I love Furla, but I don’t own anything of the brand. Can’t afford it either.

F*** my life. On incidentally, this reminds of an amazing website http://www.fmylife.com/ I discovered while volunteering in Ghana. Don’t judge me, there was a mouse in the kitchen and no running water. So there.

Future family plans

I want daughters and I have a Blackberry application to prove it (and assist me). Future husband (or husbands, because really – who am I kidding? Monogamy with the bitch from hell??) are not allowed to formulate an opinion on the matter, and is expected to think pink. And fluffy. Now that we’re on topic, where the HELL is my future husband? Hmmm … oh right. He’s in Milan, coaching Inter Fc, sporting a chin dimple *swoon* and not thinking pink. Or fluffy.

Right…

Music

I love songs that make me cry and are not too mainstream. But I also need to come out of my musical superiority closet and admit that yes, I also love Taylor Swift. It took me a long time to come to terms with it, but there are only so many times that one can find oneself singing “I hear the preacher say speak now or forever hold your pee eee eee ace!” or “keep your feet reaaaaady, heart beat steaaaady, kee eeep your eyes oooopen” without knowing there is really some Swift love going on. And I know that it doesn’t help that when I sing I sound like Katy Perry, KeSha and Lana Del Rey all rolled into one … without autotune. However, rest assured that I do draw the line at Justin Bieber though, no matter how many times he sensually wonders what it would be like to be my boyfriend. And no amount of improbable chest hair growth would ever convince me otherwise.

Ok, so that was a little taste of Gracie quirks to set you going next time you meet me. I don’t really drink, but a glass of 35 South would ensure other stories to surface. Until then, keep tuned!

Quirky and steaaaaaaady love,

Gracie :)

Straight but not narrow

A dear friend of mine, much loved and much admired (by me and all who know him) brought the video below to my attention some days ago, and I was truly touched to the core, both by the story shown therein, but even more by his reaction to it - the hurt at being hit "too close to home" and the actual fear that this might happen to him and his partner.

Unfortunately, I couldn't share his feelings towards his video as much as I would have wanted to, because in reality, this is a situation that I am lucky enough to be able to avoid, because I was born in the comfortable normality of the socially accepted side of sexuality. I am straight, so my love for my partner will be never frowned upon, discriminated against, and ignored by both family and the legal and political structures.

Because I see the above as an obvious state of fact, I still can't understand why a discussion on gay marriage/union/whathaveyou still subsists. What on earth is there to discuss? In a world where every kind of hatred is somehow justified, where war is fought in the name of a supernatural deity, I can't understand why there is a still a vociferous majority that refuses to believe that there are many forms of love that can exist, and that two consenting adults may choose to love whoever they please, because really ... how is that love affecting the rest of us?

I refuse to accept people pontificating at me, so I will not pontificate myself and stop here. However, I would just like to say that it's ok to be straight, it's ok to be gay but it is even better not to be narrow.

And while we're discussing this, let me just add that it is also ok to be black, white, green, red or blue. The most important is that while we're at it, we never forget to breathe and live the incandescent beauty of the various shades of grey.

So please watch this video ... and also visit this site: http://www.wearesbnn.com/. You will see that with this kind of thinking, you are in very good company.

Gracie's Back!

The fingers twitch and the keyboard responds. Gracie is slowly coming back to narrate the chronicles of nothing that used to fill this blog on a semi regular basis until the inspiration dried up, and the random events in her life stopped coming with the silver lining of irony that used to make her laugh at herself and want to share the joke.

Oooh. Deepness.

Ok ... so this is what really happened. Well basically, for the last few months, some stuff happened that made everything just a little bit harder to deal with, where sleepless nights dredged on to dreary days, and the will to share was stifled. This was due to events and circumstances that fall under my self-imposed list of censorship and that thus could not be blogged about and so, needless to point out, this blog was all but abandoned since my last post.

In the meantime, I embarked on my own very personal mission to get back on track, tellingly entitled Operation Middle Finger (I leave the reason behind the choice of name up to your own intuition), and made sure to love and support myself in all the ways I could think of. I started exercising and lost some weight. Actually my clothes seem to indicate that I lost some weight - the bathroom scales are stubbornly refusing to budge more than the bare minimum with SoBness that is comparable only to that of another inanimate object in my house, namely the printer, who always used to refuse to work on the day of a deadline to hand in an assignment, or a report, or my thesis. The ugly death the printer had to face should be an indication to the bathroom scales really, but anyhoo, as always, I digress.

Besides the forced exercise (not fun! not fun at all!), I've watched reruns of Friends and rediscovered my love for Chandler Bing, dreamt of anonymity in New York while practising it in Valletta, sang to Kelly Clarkson's "What doesn't kill you" and Augustana's "Boston" too loud and too often and beat my personal record by reading three books in 4.5 days.

On this last topic allow me to publicly thank Suzanne Collins for creating the most lovable and selfless character in the history of modern English literature. Anyone who's read the Hunger Games Trilogy and discovered Peeta Mellark (even if not in 4.5 days) will know what I'm talking about. I sometimes wish I were sixteen again so that I could shamelessly declare myself to be in "Team Peeta!", but being twenty-nine, I will keep it much more dignified, and just say that this young hero is extremely well written, and just the slightest of swoony. And he is not a vampire that sparkles in the sunlight, so really, he is just awesome without visual assistance. Right ... I'm feeling myself going teenage again so stopping right here. If I had to compare teenage angst with the late twenties counterpart, I'd rather pick the latter - at least at my age you're done with your O and A levels and you can pretend to be gainfully employed.

Unfortunately, Operation Middle Finger also entailed an increased range of sarcasm and some unnecessary and uncalled for sniping, which led me to realise that I really must have the most patient friends in the world. Public apologies to those who were on the receiving end of the Full Package of Sarcasm 2.0. Had no idea that it came with so many unattractive features - it's admittedly a blast to use though.

Finally, in these past months I also realised that the mountain that refuses to come to Mohammad is also refusing to come to me, so I decided that I should just walk to it myself by taking a plunge, or two (or three and four) and face some long overdue decisions should such mountain profess the need for them.

Shiny crap ... I'm going all metaphorical and obscure today, which is probably not the best way to get you back to reading this blog, but do try to bear with me and stick it out. As I said, Gracie is slowly coming back. Give her some time and patience.

Operation Middle Finger continues! But in the meantime ... I have some laundry to sort out.

Love,

Gracie

2000 hits!

Thank you :)

The Aurora Borealis and the Chronicles of Dreams

All those who know me personally are well aware that I'm not exactly a "sports" person. In fact, my idea of enjoying sports is that of letting other people do it, while I react accordingly with enthusiasm or otherwise. Even though in the past few weeks I did embrace a more active lifestyle, and I'm already feeling so much better for it, my reaction to invitations for "fun runs" is still that of incredulity ("how can a run be fun??!!") and the idea of running a marathon, i.e. running for hours for no particular reason, is still unfathomable. Needless to say, my involvement in last Sunday's marathon was that of wishing my friends well, and checking out their pictures on Facebook on Sunday late morning while still in my pigiamas and sipping green tea. It was at that moment however, that a picture out of the many did catch my eye, and since then, I just cannot get it out of my mind.

This picture showed a person I know and really admire crossing the finish line, and the look of pure, unalderated joy on her face was truly amazing. It was an expression that I have never seen before, certainly not in the mirror, and it made me realise that THAT is the look of someone who has just achieved her dream through hard work, constant effort and a mulish stubbornness to keep going. I suspect that my driving instructor did have an expression slightly similar to that (albeit mixed with incredulity) when I passed my driving test, but I was too surprised myself to actually check it out, so I cannot really be sure. Also, as an aside, the person who teaches you how to drive is the Instructor and not "The Learner", and if I hear a sentence sounding remotely like this "Hadt l-ingejc u poggejt brajs it-tifla tal-lerner", I will not be held responsible for my actions.

Anyway, the point I am trying to make is that this picture brought to my mind my many childhood and adolescent dreams and caused me to carry out a little soul searching exercise into my past, which led me to come up with the following Checklist of Past and Current Dreams:

1. Marry Prince William and become Duchess of Cambridge. Well, in all fairness, at the time when I actually wanted this, the idea was to become a "Princess" since I had no idea of the intricacies of the British Allocation of Titles Structure. It can now be safely assumed that this dream has become moot following William's marriage to Kate last year but I'm not worried. There is still Harry after all, and after reading and *cough*streaming*cough* The Pillars of the Earth, I've discovered the surprisingly endearing charm of redheads. In fact, Ken Follett, with his Jack Builder, achieved what J.K. Rowling did not with Ron Weasley - he created a red-headed hero that kicked ass.

2. Learn how to play the Cello. Not achieved. Not even in the slightest. I can play chopsticks on the piano though, and the office playlist I have put together is what is keeping the country going. Joking of course! Kind of.

3. Become a lawyer. I did manage that, even though I still don't know how. Passed through all my exams, wrote a thesis (can't really remember what it was about and the conclusions I reached) and somehow got my warrant. The problem is that halfway through all this effort, I realised that I didn't want to be a lawyer after all, and would have been so much happier studying English, reading books and writing about them. That is what you get when you base your career prospects on a "Few Good Men".

4. See the Aurora Borealis. Not achieved. Not even close. However, this.has.to.happen.someday. Soon. Who is coming with me?? I'm actually a great travel companion, as long as you don't propose to go shopping - if you do I'd kick you back to Sliema or Valletta where you can do all your shopping and not waste more of my precious "abroad" time. You have been warned.

5. Embrace Buddhism in a temple in Bali and achieve inner peace. What I achieved so far is the talent to sit at my desk and listen to nonsense with a half smile while imagining myself bashing the brains of the speaker with a baseball bat. The only telltale signs of the mental demise of the other party in the conversation is usually the fact that I start typing at the speed of light, and increase the rapidity of my blinking. The latter action should not, of course, be confused with the fluttering of my eyelashes, since that is reserved only to a situation where you're a good looking, intelligent and funny bloke and I actually like the look of you. It is thus very difficult to be "fluttered" at by me, so never assume that it is happening. Many times I'm just mentally beating the crap out of you.

6. Watch Inter play against Milan at Sansiro. I am determined to make this happen soon, but at the moment all I have achieved is seeing Sliema play against Valletta at Ta Qali. It was actually great fun, especially when hearing my friend screaming "you need to pass to the Blue Kit and not to the White one!", since due to the fact that we were a grand total of 20 people on the Sliema side, I'm pretty sure the Sliema players were hearing these very helpful hints. To be honest, however, I was more intrigued by a man with a suitcase moving randomly round the ground, but what the hell, Up the Blues!!

7. Write a novel. So far I achieved aka-gracie.blogspot.com, which I'm pretty psyched about actually. (thanks for reading! 2000 hits soon!!) All I need now is a plot, time for research, money and a publisher and Chronicles of Nothing will then become part of your bookshelves or kindles :).

The above list shows some of the many dreams that make up my life. Some of them will never be achieved, others will. I'm not sure whether any of these dreams can ever create on my face the expression I saw on the photo last Sunday, but I guess it's worth a try. Alternatively, I might just have to start training for the marathon myself, and get back to you all with an update this time next year!

Wishing you all a week of achieved ambitions,

Gracie xx