The title of this post should be received with a dash of irony, since I spent several hours today having this conversation with my two-year-old son:
Son: Go to the train museum!
Me: We’re going to go, honey, just as soon as the museum opens at 9:00. Which is in two and a half hours.
Son: Go to the train museum NOW!
Me: I’d love to, but we can’t, because if we go now, the museum won’t be open yet, and the doors will be locked, and all the lights will be turned off.
Son: <indignant, endless, ear-splitting scream, thrashing on floor, etc.>
Me: <endless calm soothing of son, followed by irritated attempts to reason him out of crying, followed by ignoring him in the hope that he’ll stop wailing, followed by bribing him with cupcakes and/or Thomas the Tank Engine movies on my iMac>
<ten minutes pass>
Son: Go to the train museum!
This went on for most of the period between 5:30 a.m., when he woke up, and 8:30 a.m., when I finally gave up and buckled him into the car.
All of this is to say that serenity and I are not close acquaintances today. However, I want to write about Serenity, not serenity, so all’s well.
Serenity Woods is the nom de plume of my writing buddy, my friend, and my favorite Kiwi. And this week her new novella Something Blue is out from Samhain Publishing, so I thought it would be fitting to serenade her for a few paragraphs.
I met Serenity via the Harlequin Forums, where we were both searching for a critique partner. We exchanged tentative e-mails and sent one another a few chapters to look at. We were both immensely relieved that the other’s writing didn’t suck. After a couple of polite e-mails with suggestions embedded in heaps of cheerful praise, we exchanged full manuscripts. I stayed up until 3:00 a.m. reading hers, totally riveted. A later draft of that book became White-Hot Christmas, now contracted to come out from Samhain in November or December of this year. (Oh my God I love that book.) She told me what was wrong with mine, and she was precisely right, and I eventually got around to fixing it, and now it’s THE MORNING AFTER, a manuscript I’m immensely proud of.
Funny story: Serenity is English. When we first started corresponding, she was nearly finished with a manuscript about an English heroine named Cat (full name Catherine, which the hero uses even though she doesn’t like it) and an American hero, Heath. Cat is prickly and distant, okay with sex but not okay with relationships. Heath knows what he wants from the get-go: he wants Cat, and he wants her for keeps. I am an American. When we first started corresponding, I had just finished a manuscript about an American heroine named Cath (full name Mary Catherine, which the hero uses even though she doesn’t like it) and an English hero, Nev. Cath is prickly and distant, okay with sex but not okay with relationships. Nev knows what he wants from the get-go: he wants Cath, and he wants her for keeps. Both mss. are contemporaries, both targeting Harlequin Blaze.
My mom asked me what I made of all these coincidences, and I said, “Nothing, really.” I’m not the sort of gal who makes things of coincidences. But they do suggest a degree of compatibility that I’m fortunate to have stumbled upon. Fifteen hundred e-mails later, give or take, Serenity and I are tight. We’re constantly e-mailing one another, we exchange new writing every few days, and we’ve each figured out what the other needs at the various stages of the drafting process. (Me: Tell me I’m funny, then rip me to shreds! Serenity: Tell me you love it, but don’t slow me down until later!) And the more we critique one another’s work, the more grateful I am that we connected, that we became friends, and that we have each other to talk to about writing. It’s an invaluable thing, knowing as you write that there’s someone looking forward to reading what you produce — someone who won’t hesitate to tell you when the scene isn’t working, but who will also always find your jokes amusing and your heroes hot. Unless they’re not, in which case she’ll say so.
So happy release week, Serenity! If I had any pull, I’d send all my minions over to buy your book. Since I don’t, I’ll just tell my nonexistent minions how much I enjoyed it (lots), how funny and compelling it is (very), how hot the hero, Josh, is (yowza), and how proud I am of your successes (like a mama hen).
