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So, 2009, aka, Epic Post is Epic.
My Year in retrospect, by gillyp, aged.
Sadly, 2009 saw the continuing waning of my fannish vibe. In January, I shut down The Temple of the Sentinels. It was no fun anymore and it really was a blessed relief to finally put it out of its misery.
I finally finished epic angst-fic Blue, got a goodly number of LMFA noms for three of my fics (for which, many, many thanks good people. I am thrilled you still enjoy my sometimes rather heavy stories. I do firmly believe that a nom is easily equal, possibly superior to an actual win so – thank you, really, it truly is always appreciated). I even won an LMFA - believe it or not, my first ever H/C award - for Chasing Rainbows (ah, sweet story, despite your age and dubious qualities, you are still popular, good for you. *g*).
Best of all, I got recc’d on Crack Van for one of my oldest fics, an ASJ story, Happiness.
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fluterbev and I are jogging steadily to the finish line on Decimated which I’m almost certain will be my last fic. I mean, never say never but I’m pretty sure. I am having enormous fun writing with the ever-adorable fb and the story is a constant joy. I’m looking forward to seeing what you all make of it when it’s finally posted. ;o) I’m hoping to put my shoulder to the wheel on that for the remainder of the holiday in the hope of getting a first draft finished asap.
I have no new fandoms to report but I made new friends all over the shop, in many fandoms, not my own, which has been delightful. I had one old friend unfriend me for reasons unknown, but that’s just life, I guess.
And we lost that dearest, most delightful of LJersbetagoddess who I still miss like a lost limb.
I finished Entanglement*, sent it to an agent who expressed instant interest but then never got back to me – it happens. I sent my submission out to another 2 agencies a couple of weeks before Christmas. If anything comes of that, I promise, you’ll all be the first to know. ;o)
*When I say I finished it, I thought I had but when I printed it out with the intention of reading it through start to finish over the holidays, I found it still needed a lot of work, a pretty severe edit as it turned out which I finally finished yesterday evening, so all together, it took pretty much exactly one year to complete.
I’m about to start a new novel – trouble is, which one? I have 6 good ideas, three of which are well planned and ready to start. I keep wishing and washing on which one I want to write - gotta make up my mind soon if I’m to start writing next week :o)
Not including non-fiction (only dull, worky stuff, alas), I read 75 books this year:
1. Doctor Who: Timeless
2. Doctor Who: The Scarlet Empress
3. Doctor Who: Sick Building
4. Madame Verona.
5. The History of Love
6. Nikolski
7. The Bird Room
8. Good Omens
9. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
10. Chocolat
11. The Dice Man.
12. The Life of Pi
13. John the Revelator
14. Burial
15. The Reincarnationist
16. About the Author
17. Reeves and Mortimer
18. Captain Corelli's Mandolin
19. The Elegance of the Hedgehog
20. Glover’s Mistake
21. Far North
22. Map of the Invisible World
23. Loser’s Town
24. Cloud Atlas
25. Solo
26. Tokyo Cancelled
27. How to Paint a Dead Man
28. The Immigrant
29. Jeff in Venice
30. The Whole Day Through
31. As Meat Loves Salt
32. The Vintner’s Luck
33. The Graveyard Book
34. The End of Mr Y
35. Security
36. The Time Traveler’s Wife
37. The Swansong of Wilbur McCrum
38. Candy Everybody Wants
39. White is for Witching
40. Stamping Butterflies
41. The New Life
42. Less than Zero
43. The Harrowing
44. Cold Earth
45. The Piano Teacher
46. The Vesuvius Club
47. The Autograph Man
48. An Accidental Light
49. The Street Philosopher
50. The Reinvention of Ivy Brown
51. Baking Cakes in Kigali
52. The Last Town On Earth
53. 84 Charing Cross Rd
54. The Duchess of Bloomsbury St.
55. Dr Ragab’s Universal Language
56. Breath
57. Amulet
58. The Graveyard Book
59. The Thirteenth Tale
60. The Gates
61. Air
62. The Bradshaw Variations
63. Day After Night
64. The Shadow of the Wind
65. The Cry of the Sloth
66. The Einstein Intersection
67. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell
68. Neverwhere
69. On Chesil Beach
70. Vineland
71. The Lovely Bones
72. The Road
73. Makers
74. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
75. Special Topics in Calamity Physics
My reviews, such as they are, are at Goodreads
In general: Life has been a bit rough at times. We’re still doing one week home, one week at Dad’s which is stressful and tiring. Dad is exactly as he was, some days up, some days down (some days very down indeed), it’s become routine really, a bit bothersome. I have to keep reminding myself that in many respects, I have a life that’s pretty good, that many might envy. OK, a bit (very! Oh so very...) uneventful and dull, but far from arduous and relatively free of pain. I do keep reminding myself of that (but if the Gods are listening, a little more excitement – of the nicer sort - really wouldn’t go amiss in 2010)
So to round off 2009, I’m going to do that first-post, last-post LJ meme and say, have a marvellous 2010 everyone, I think we all deserve a break. Much love to you all, thank you so much, every one of you, for the laughs and the love and for keeping me sane.
HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!
The first and last lines I wrote on LJ for each month of the year.
Jan 1st: I just finshed the notes for my novel - FX: A cork is pulled. wine is poured.
Jan 31st: Mark has been drying logs in the oven. The whole house smells of sweet, warm resin, very nice indeed.
Feb 1st: heavy snow is forecast - It's been bright, cold and sunny all morning but now the first few flakes are trickling down.
Feb 26th: Time to break out the OLIVES, the GIN and the SMELLIEST of CHEESES and SCREECH! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! To the SPLENDIFEROUS,the GLEAMING, the GLITTERING, the SHINIEST and most ESTIMABLE of GASTROPODS,SNAILBONES!!!May each and every day be a FRIDAY, hon. XXX
March 1st: David Mitchell, I think I love thee.
March 31st: Your middle name + the name of park you played in as a child = theatrical actor's name to be used when booking hotels or in chatrooms. Valerie Bedford. Fantastic!
April 1st: Oh glory be - I'm off to stock up on Darjeeling.
April 28th: My free BBC seeds have just arrived. More stuff to plant. Oh joy.
May 1st: I can has Dreamwidth - Thanks to the glorious, the almighty, he who must be worshipped ravurian, I now have a DW ac.
May 28th: If you're in the UK, the best historian in the world in space, Michael Wood - a man who could make porridge an exciting, poetic delight - on Beowulf, BBC4, 9pm, a glass of wine is called for, methinks.
June 1st: Doxie's day out - Back from a truly delightful day in Lancaster with fluterbev and mrs_tilford.
June 30th: And then the heavens opened, and then my camera batteries died. :o)
July 1st: It's too hot - Can we be returned to our regular weather now please?
July 31st: Bobby Robson has died, beaten by the hand of god one last time.
August 1st: The novel is going great guns.
August 30th: News is all blasts from the sixties pasts today - Police to re-examine the death of Brian Jones.
September 1st: It's submission time again - I've been fighting all weekend with synopses of varying lengths (every agent wants something different).
September 20th: I recomend you trot along to Listen Again and have a delicious gander (Michael Palin and Mitchell and Webb are on too, if that helps).
October 4th: Go HERE, now try and 'view all comments' - you can't, nothing shows till you click 'show messages marked as spam'.
October 17th: I shall throw out some spangled, golden kisses and chocolate-coated delights anyway, for old time's sake, use them wisely, I shall be testing you on them later. XXX
November 1st: Winding down, thinking about going up to bed, watching that Fleetwood Mac thing on BBC2 and thinking about Tony Harrison's bold demand: "Tusk," in its entirety, with the pauses as Lindsay Buckingham intended! Watch the room crumble at the aura of the H-Man!
November 28th: It's snowing! There is snow!
December 3rd: I was just about to head off to the PO to post a shiny set of new subs to agencies when I see our pale cream curtains are COVERED (and I do not exaggerate) in oily black stripes - seems Mark filled the coal bucket this morning then decided to draw the curtains without bothering to wash his hands.
December 31st: Oh, and HAPPY NEW YEAR! to you all, too. We'll be staying in, I expect, watching Graham Norton or Jools, anxiously waiting for Big Ben so we can go to bed *g* we live a quiet life around here, love to you all.
Sadly, 2009 saw the continuing waning of my fannish vibe. In January, I shut down The Temple of the Sentinels. It was no fun anymore and it really was a blessed relief to finally put it out of its misery.
I finally finished epic angst-fic Blue, got a goodly number of LMFA noms for three of my fics (for which, many, many thanks good people. I am thrilled you still enjoy my sometimes rather heavy stories. I do firmly believe that a nom is easily equal, possibly superior to an actual win so – thank you, really, it truly is always appreciated). I even won an LMFA - believe it or not, my first ever H/C award - for Chasing Rainbows (ah, sweet story, despite your age and dubious qualities, you are still popular, good for you. *g*).
Best of all, I got recc’d on Crack Van for one of my oldest fics, an ASJ story, Happiness.
fluterbev and I are jogging steadily to the finish line on Decimated which I’m almost certain will be my last fic. I mean, never say never but I’m pretty sure. I am having enormous fun writing with the ever-adorable fb and the story is a constant joy. I’m looking forward to seeing what you all make of it when it’s finally posted. ;o) I’m hoping to put my shoulder to the wheel on that for the remainder of the holiday in the hope of getting a first draft finished asap.I have no new fandoms to report but I made new friends all over the shop, in many fandoms, not my own, which has been delightful. I had one old friend unfriend me for reasons unknown, but that’s just life, I guess.
And we lost that dearest, most delightful of LJers
betagoddess who I still miss like a lost limb. I finished Entanglement*, sent it to an agent who expressed instant interest but then never got back to me – it happens. I sent my submission out to another 2 agencies a couple of weeks before Christmas. If anything comes of that, I promise, you’ll all be the first to know. ;o)
*When I say I finished it, I thought I had but when I printed it out with the intention of reading it through start to finish over the holidays, I found it still needed a lot of work, a pretty severe edit as it turned out which I finally finished yesterday evening, so all together, it took pretty much exactly one year to complete.
I’m about to start a new novel – trouble is, which one? I have 6 good ideas, three of which are well planned and ready to start. I keep wishing and washing on which one I want to write - gotta make up my mind soon if I’m to start writing next week :o)
Not including non-fiction (only dull, worky stuff, alas), I read 75 books this year:
1. Doctor Who: Timeless
2. Doctor Who: The Scarlet Empress
3. Doctor Who: Sick Building
4. Madame Verona.
5. The History of Love
6. Nikolski
7. The Bird Room
8. Good Omens
9. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time
10. Chocolat
11. The Dice Man.
12. The Life of Pi
13. John the Revelator
14. Burial
15. The Reincarnationist
16. About the Author
17. Reeves and Mortimer
18. Captain Corelli's Mandolin
19. The Elegance of the Hedgehog
20. Glover’s Mistake
21. Far North
22. Map of the Invisible World
23. Loser’s Town
24. Cloud Atlas
25. Solo
26. Tokyo Cancelled
27. How to Paint a Dead Man
28. The Immigrant
29. Jeff in Venice
30. The Whole Day Through
31. As Meat Loves Salt
32. The Vintner’s Luck
33. The Graveyard Book
34. The End of Mr Y
35. Security
36. The Time Traveler’s Wife
37. The Swansong of Wilbur McCrum
38. Candy Everybody Wants
39. White is for Witching
40. Stamping Butterflies
41. The New Life
42. Less than Zero
43. The Harrowing
44. Cold Earth
45. The Piano Teacher
46. The Vesuvius Club
47. The Autograph Man
48. An Accidental Light
49. The Street Philosopher
50. The Reinvention of Ivy Brown
51. Baking Cakes in Kigali
52. The Last Town On Earth
53. 84 Charing Cross Rd
54. The Duchess of Bloomsbury St.
55. Dr Ragab’s Universal Language
56. Breath
57. Amulet
58. The Graveyard Book
59. The Thirteenth Tale
60. The Gates
61. Air
62. The Bradshaw Variations
63. Day After Night
64. The Shadow of the Wind
65. The Cry of the Sloth
66. The Einstein Intersection
67. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell
68. Neverwhere
69. On Chesil Beach
70. Vineland
71. The Lovely Bones
72. The Road
73. Makers
74. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
75. Special Topics in Calamity Physics
My reviews, such as they are, are at Goodreads
In general: Life has been a bit rough at times. We’re still doing one week home, one week at Dad’s which is stressful and tiring. Dad is exactly as he was, some days up, some days down (some days very down indeed), it’s become routine really, a bit bothersome. I have to keep reminding myself that in many respects, I have a life that’s pretty good, that many might envy. OK, a bit (very! Oh so very...) uneventful and dull, but far from arduous and relatively free of pain. I do keep reminding myself of that (but if the Gods are listening, a little more excitement – of the nicer sort - really wouldn’t go amiss in 2010)
So to round off 2009, I’m going to do that first-post, last-post LJ meme and say, have a marvellous 2010 everyone, I think we all deserve a break. Much love to you all, thank you so much, every one of you, for the laughs and the love and for keeping me sane.
HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!
The first and last lines I wrote on LJ for each month of the year.
Jan 1st: I just finshed the notes for my novel - FX: A cork is pulled. wine is poured.
Jan 31st: Mark has been drying logs in the oven. The whole house smells of sweet, warm resin, very nice indeed.
Feb 1st: heavy snow is forecast - It's been bright, cold and sunny all morning but now the first few flakes are trickling down.
Feb 26th: Time to break out the OLIVES, the GIN and the SMELLIEST of CHEESES and SCREECH! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!! To the SPLENDIFEROUS,the GLEAMING, the GLITTERING, the SHINIEST and most ESTIMABLE of GASTROPODS,SNAILBONES!!!May each and every day be a FRIDAY, hon. XXX
March 1st: David Mitchell, I think I love thee.
March 31st: Your middle name + the name of park you played in as a child = theatrical actor's name to be used when booking hotels or in chatrooms. Valerie Bedford. Fantastic!
April 1st: Oh glory be - I'm off to stock up on Darjeeling.
April 28th: My free BBC seeds have just arrived. More stuff to plant. Oh joy.
May 1st: I can has Dreamwidth - Thanks to the glorious, the almighty, he who must be worshipped ravurian, I now have a DW ac.
May 28th: If you're in the UK, the best historian in the world in space, Michael Wood - a man who could make porridge an exciting, poetic delight - on Beowulf, BBC4, 9pm, a glass of wine is called for, methinks.
June 1st: Doxie's day out - Back from a truly delightful day in Lancaster with fluterbev and mrs_tilford.
June 30th: And then the heavens opened, and then my camera batteries died. :o)
July 1st: It's too hot - Can we be returned to our regular weather now please?
July 31st: Bobby Robson has died, beaten by the hand of god one last time.
August 1st: The novel is going great guns.
August 30th: News is all blasts from the sixties pasts today - Police to re-examine the death of Brian Jones.
September 1st: It's submission time again - I've been fighting all weekend with synopses of varying lengths (every agent wants something different).
September 20th: I recomend you trot along to Listen Again and have a delicious gander (Michael Palin and Mitchell and Webb are on too, if that helps).
October 4th: Go HERE, now try and 'view all comments' - you can't, nothing shows till you click 'show messages marked as spam'.
October 17th: I shall throw out some spangled, golden kisses and chocolate-coated delights anyway, for old time's sake, use them wisely, I shall be testing you on them later. XXX
November 1st: Winding down, thinking about going up to bed, watching that Fleetwood Mac thing on BBC2 and thinking about Tony Harrison's bold demand: "Tusk," in its entirety, with the pauses as Lindsay Buckingham intended! Watch the room crumble at the aura of the H-Man!
November 28th: It's snowing! There is snow!
December 3rd: I was just about to head off to the PO to post a shiny set of new subs to agencies when I see our pale cream curtains are COVERED (and I do not exaggerate) in oily black stripes - seems Mark filled the coal bucket this morning then decided to draw the curtains without bothering to wash his hands.
December 31st: Oh, and HAPPY NEW YEAR! to you all, too. We'll be staying in, I expect, watching Graham Norton or Jools, anxiously waiting for Big Ben so we can go to bed *g* we live a quiet life around here, love to you all.
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My Year in retrospect, by gillyp, aged.
::snorts softly:: I so know the feeling *g*
I love these retrospectives... and goodness, you've read a lot more than I have this year. I seem to have got bogged down in Russian history - I'm wading through the stuff with wellies and a miner's lamp *g*
Good luck with getting Entanglement published - I'm sending positive vibes your way on big flappy pink wings - yeah, that should do it!
I miss Helen like crazy too. Somebody tried to tell me recently that you can't have serious friendships on the internet with people you never meet... I didn't actually smack the bloke in the chops, but it was oh so tempting. Twit! *g*
I hope this year grows better for you with the passing of every day. Keep smiling hon.
::snogs you again::
::iz insatiable::
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Helen. I almost didn't mention her in the post because it made me so sad to type her name but to not mention her seemed far worse. LJ is a colder, darker place without her constant enthusiasm, for certain.
I hope this year's the best ever, for us all. ::snogs you back under the sadly wilting mistletoe::
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♥
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And I am still hoping to read another sentinel fic by you.
All my wishes for Entanglement publication.
And may this year to be full of interesting events and creativity for you. It's always a pleasure to read you and your posts full of humour.Happy new year.
You read so many books
Thanks so much for your good wishes. It's still early days with Entanglement, I've only approached 3 agencies so far so - fingers crossed, it's a hard, hard business.
And thank you for the lovely work you post here, you're immensely talented.
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Didn't you win anything, then? It's been an odd years for the awards. Some strange noms and stranger wins. Personally, I think you're one of the best writers we have (but what do I know? ;o) *G*)
We think/hope Decimated will put cats amongst some bloody big pigeons. I hope it'll be a good swan song for me, maybe Bev too, she thinks this might be her last as well. We're having a terrific laugh writing it. ::cue evil laugh of evil:: And Entanglement... is in the lap of the Gods now. I need to concentrate on the next one - whatever it turns out to be. :o) Did anything happen with that book you were going to write? I'd like to read that someday.n
I hope we get to see more writing from you, anyway, and hope you both had a wonderful Christmas and New Year. ♥
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I'm still toying with an idea for writing about the hospital, but things have been so busy lately that I don't have time to do fannish writing, much less original writing. And I don't see things getting much better for the next few months, since I'll be teaching this semester. :-( But maybe in the summer...
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But... Isn't your New Year a few days away yet?
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one on 14th
Your New Year = my birthday. I don't know why that pleases me but it does. :o)
Happy New Year(s)!