Searching for Superwomen is launched!

Life has been BUSY folks.

Real, grown up life has been destroying my creative muse like some sort streptococcal flesh-eating bacteria. House buying.  Jobs. Parenting.  And let's not forget social media...

As seen on Classics Matters

Considering that The World's Best Critique Partner, Jessica Baker, has just doubled the size of her family by delivering twins and is STILL managing to write despite having no sleep at all, this is totally shameful (but congratulations Jess!). 

But let us not repine. I've squeezed in some creativity around the edges.  I participated in Our Dark Faery Queen's Writerly Bridal Shower (read the book - it's free on Smashwords and it's fabulous!). I brought a Medieval Knight to life.  And I wrote a couple of random stories inspired by 1. leaving my current job working with scientists... ahhhh I will miss them and 2. my current fixation with superheroes.

Which brings me on to Searching for Superwomen, the brain child of the super fabulous Emmie Mears and her fantastic co-conspirators Fran Roberts and Kristy Lyseng. I'm super excited (everything is super when you're dealing with Superwomen) to make a fourth in this new crime-fighting operation.

NAC: Teen Avengers- East by ~Red-Rum-18 (CC image)

Searching for Superwomen: The Mission

I'll hand over to Ms Mears to tell you all about it...

"We seek to create a home online where we can not only celebrate every facet of geek culture that interests us, but where we can show the media that geek women are a huge portion of their audience. Gamers, cosplayers, writers, artists, fighters — all are welcome.

We’re here to showcase awesome female superheroes, both in fiction and real life. We believe that fiction has an opportunity and an obligation to change entrenched attitudes of sexism in the media, from ridiculous outfits painted onto SuperWomen to worn-out tropes and stereotypes. Our goal is to foster positive dialogue, encourage female creatives to join these fields, and create meaningful commentary on the state of SuperWomen in today’s media. All are welcome here.

Want to be a part of it? Soon we’ll be putting out a call for submissions so YOU can join us. Write superhero fiction? Have something to say about cosplay? Repurpose Rubix cubes into LARP armor? We’ll want to hear about it. Be ready when we say go."

Why do I care? 

I could this to Buffy-inventor Joss Whedon, because his succint answer is pretty damn good:

“Q: So, why do you write these strong female characters?
A: Because you’re still asking me that question.”

 

But why else?

Because the world in which my daughter is growing up is becoming increasingly stratified into pink glittery princesses, where schoolkids download hard core pornography onto their mobile phones and share it in the playground, where homogeneous ideas of beauty are served up from kids TV onwards.

At some point, acceptable toy advertising shifted from gender neutral:

To gender specific. And pink. Or purple. Very pink. And very purple:

If you want to get really mad about this, try reading a few of these:
Science toys: just for boys?
How toy ad vocabulary reinforces gender stereotypes


When you're five and have at least four superhero personas (Rainbow Girl, Sun Girl, Cat Girl and Glimmer), a copy of the Marvel and the DC Encyclopedias and a close working knowledge of most Marvel cartoons, it's confusing to be told by a male friend that girls won't be invited to his birthday party because "it's a superhero party."

Should she just get used to that?  Because it won't be the last time that people infer, suggest or just tell her that she shouldn't be doing something merely because she's a girl.

Sites like Everyday Sexism tell us that, if we didn't already know.

As my good friend Thor would shout:

I SAY THEE NAY 

We, like generations of women before us, have an obligation to ring the changes.  In a world swamped by information and imagery, we need to teach our daughters to develop a critical understanding of the images with which they are being bombarded.  We need to create alternate paradigms, smart, funny and creative.

And we need to enjoy ourselves.  More than anything, we need to lead by example, by pursuing what we love and setting the world on fire.

So.  How will Searching for Superwomen help?

By creating a place for people to challenge stereotype, revel in what they love and to be the change.  Like Adlai Stevenson said about Eleanor Roosevelt, it's better to light a candle than to curse the darkness.

So let's shine brightly!

Oh and did I mention that I love comics?  And fantasy... And Science Fiction....

Read Emmie's first post here... and discover why each of our Editors became involved every week throughout May.  You won't regret it.

AND follow us on Twitter @WeAreSuperwomen for more of Emmie's fabulous #Superwomen discussions.

For more Superwomen operating in the same universe see:

Girls Gone Geek
Feminist Friendly Fantasy Fiction 
Written World
The Hawkeye Initiative (laugh out loud funny)
D.C. Women Kicking Ass
Artist Paige Hall (poignant comic strip critiquing depictions of women in comics)
1979Semifinalist 
Digital Femme (editor and commentator Cheryl Lynn)
The Ormes Society (promoting black, female comic creators)
Fantastic Fan Girls (self evident!)
Green Lanterns Butts Forever 
Geek Mom 
Straightened Circumstances
Pai (and the associated review site PaiPicks)
The Mary Sue

And for a bit of female empowerment:

A Mighty Girl
Towards the Stars

A Selkie Song... for a Selkie Queen

If like magical romance, lurk on Twitter or have a secret obsession with selkies you cannot be unaware  that 25 April is....

Selkie Sorceress Day! 

Oh yes, the lovely Sophie Moss is unveiling and unleashing the third in her delightful, rose-scented Seal Island trilogy - three of the most magical romances you're ever likely to read. The Selkie Sorceress gives us the story of Glenna and Sam, an artist with a secret and an American undercover detective who has an unnatural knack of finding what is lost.  

If, like me, you have devoured read the wonderful Selkie Spell and Selkie Enchantress, you'll have been waiting with baited breath for Sam and Glenna's story.  

Not only is Sophie bringing us the books, she's bringing us three new gorgeous covers! Check them out on her website. 

You might remember that Sophie won the Fan's Favourite award in January's #12Masque contest for her poignant Rose Petal Masquerade. Part of her prize was to name a fabulous original Patricia Martin designed shawl. 

Not only did Patricia give Sophie the naming opportunity, she crafted a shawl that encapsulates all the finest elements of Sophie's Seal Island Trilogy.  It's intricately woven of silvery wool, reminiscent of the Irish skies and studded with delicate pearls. Perfect to keep a Selkie Sorceress cosy! 

You can find Patricia's designs over on Ravelry and in Knit Now magazine, in which she is a regular contributor. Here is the shawl beautifully modelled by singer songwriter Rhea:

And of course by the designer herself. Congratulations to Patricia on giving birth to a gorgeous baby boy on Saturday! Here she is in full bloom. 

Knitwear Designer, Patricia Martin modelling her own design. 

DFQWBS Entry... A Knight's Tale

It is my enormous pleasure to proffer a humble contribution to the Dark Fairy Queen Writerly Bridal Shower AKA #DFQWBS.  This challenge is the brainchild of three wonderful writers, Laura, Miranda and Rebekah, conceived as a literary celebration of the wedding of the fantabulous Dark Fairy Queen herself, the ever wondrous Anna Meade, to her beloved Michael. 

A Knight's Tale

“Good morrow, fair sir.” The page boy bowed, thrusting a yellowed scroll at Dave.  He looked down. The scroll ooked like a sheet of copy paper dyed with tea. That, he supposed, was meant to be an Order of Service.

“Cheers… I mean, thank you, fair… Cheers,” he stuttered to a halt, cursing his older brother for his obsession with Live Action Role Play. Pushing his tomato red cloak over his shoulder for the nineteenth time, he shuffled down the aisle. Thank GOD his mates from the footy team couldn’t see him. It was a good thing that Brian would rather lock himself in an iron maiden than invite the Rossendale Rams to his perfect medieval wedding.  

His brother Brian stood at the altar of the gothic church, in a rich gold tunic embroidered with sparkling thread. With his floppy hat and pointed shoes, no one would guess that he spent his days rebuilding computers. No sod that, everyone would guess he was a computer geek.  No one else would be weird enough to spend his weekends dressed like an extra from Sleeping Beauty.  Not Dave, anyway. Weekends were for football and beer and clubbing with the lads. Normal. Not like the fairytale nonsense their mum had peddled. School beat that crap out of his head. At Rossendale Primary princes from fairyland got their heads flushed down the toilet.

Dave got real, quick.

Brian, on the other hand, found LARP - and Wendy. A match made in heaven, or in the local LARP group at any rate.

 “Dave,” Brian hissed as he approached. “The rings? You remembered them, right?”

Oh.

Shit.

A bead of sweat slipped down his back. “Course. Listen, I’m just going to see if I can see Wendy, alright? Wouldn’t want you thinking you were getting stood up.”

Brian paled.  “She wouldn’t-”

“Course not you idiot. It was a joke. Still, I’ll go and see.”

“Yeah, okay.” Brian fiddled nervously with his sword. 

Dave sighed. “Wendy adores you, you great lummox. She said yes remember?”

His brother’s smile was luminous. “You’ll find a girl just as -”  

Oh crap. Not the True Love talk again.

“See you in a minute.”  Half running, he hurried back up the aisle and glanced around. His flat was five minutes away. If he ran like Hussain Bolt he might just make it there and back in time.  Taking a deep breath, he started to run, his footsteps beating a wild rhythm. 

Bloody Brian and his conviction that all Dave needed was The Love of a Good Woman. The last time he’d wanted to marry someone he’d been eight years old and thought he was one of the Knights of the Round Table. He’d only seen her once, sitting in a circle of mushrooms making daisy chains, her eyes as green as dew stained grass.

Ridiculous.

Heart pounding, he slammed through his front door and raced up the stairs two at a time.  The rings were where he’d left them, in a box on his bedside table.  Snatching them up, he flew back out of the front door like his arse was on fire.

The spire of the church reared up over the rooftops as the blood thundered in his ears. He was going to make it.  He was going to-

Tyres screeched, a horn screamed tearing the air.

He was flung sideways, the ring box flying from his hand. With a bone-jarring crunch, he hit the pavement. 

“Dave? Dave!” He heard screams. Legs surged all around him, a confusing tangle of limbs. The world went black.

“Are you okay?” A cool hand touched his forehead.  Groaning, his eyelids fluttered open to meet a gaze he had seen only once before.

With a tentative smile, she held out a small ring box. “I think you lost something.”

Words bubbled in his throat, choked with laughter and pure joy. He must look like a fool, an idiotic, grinning fool.  It felt wonderful.  Reaching out, he took her hand and smiled into her shining grass green eyes.

“No. No, I didn’t. I found something.... someone. You.”

[Very Inspiring] 2012 Blog[ger] of the Year

The lovely Melpomene Selemidis nominated me for a Blog of 2012 award - a lovely gesture and even more meaningful coming from a poet and writer of her talent. Make sure you check out her blog - all passion, music and drama! 

Just as pleasingly, witty and gritty romantic suspense writer, the fabulous Incy Black nominated me for a Very Inspiring Blogger award.  If you want to cry with laugher, read Incy's fantastic original blog post. It's brilliant! And so is she. 

I decided, in the spirit of not talking excessively about myself to combine the two memes. Here's the rules: 

2012 Blog of the Year: The Rules

• Display the award logo on your blog.
• Link back to the person who nominated you.
• Link back to the Blog of the Year 2012 Rules page so people can read the real, complete, and fully accurate rules of this slightly-different blogger award.
• State 5 things about yourself.
• Pass the award on to 6 other bloggers and link to one of their specific posts so that they get notified by pingback.

Very Inspiring Blogger Award: The Rules

• Display the award logo on your blog.
• Link back to the person who nominated you.
• State 7 things about yourself.
• Nominate other bloggers for this award and link to them

So here's my version....  I'll state 7 things about myself and pass the JOINT award onto my nominated crew! Hope they appreciate the double billing (they are all worth it!).

1. My cat and my daughter are both called different versions of the name of the Greek mythological Queen of the Underworld (Purrrr-sephone, geddit?). Oddly enough, this is a coincidence. 

2. I can do a bad ass impression of a bull frog. Yes, you heard me. A bull frog. My tapir impression ain't bad either.

3. My desert island foods would be goats cheese (grilled with honey, yum!), marmite and Heinz baked beans.... all served on toast.  Most things in life are better on toast.

4. My childhood dream was to sing in the chorus of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor dreamcoat. A modest aspiration.  Not the narrator. Not even Potiphar's Wife. Just one of the little white t-shirted kids singing "ahhhhhahhhhh."  It never happened.

BUT

5. I came second in a BBC North audition to be in a period drama (A Likely Lad) when I was about 13.  Just think, if it had come off, I could have ended up starring opposite Richard Armitage in North and South.  Not that I've ever fantasised about that. Ahem. 

6. I was once invited to be a Sarah Brightman lookalike.  No, really.

7. I've got a deep and abiding passion for mills (those "dark satanic mills" you hear about in Jerusalem) and factories.  I grew up in a former cotton town on the outskirts of Manchester. Those big, grimy red brick buildings and magnificently curved cooling towers were part of the landscape of my childhood. I find them majestic and just, well, cool (see earlier North and South reference).

Now for my nominations....

It is my great pleasure to nominate the following wonderful bloggers for this award:

Jessica Baker: a fellow historical romance writer and The World's Best Critique Partner, Jessica has lovely blog which cleverly winds in snippets of real life, with snippets of her witty and romantic work.

Ruth Long: a writer of gripping suspense and cracking characterisation, Ruth has a constantly changing blog, featuring her award winning writing along with incredibly useful advice for those of us who aspire to her standards! Ruth is so prolific and generous to the writing community you can also find her co-hosting Sweet Banana Ink.

Kern Windwraith: I love reading Kern's blog which is full of wry and beautiful insights into her life and her writing, from writer's block through to things to simplify your life.

Brewed Bohemian:  Like your fiction flash with a dose of caffeine?  Head on over to Jenn's blog, full of brilliant bite size fiction and the odd splash of gourmet baking.

Stacey Bennett-Hoyt: This lady taught me all sorts about world building. She writes fantastic fantasy, flash and is a fabulous hostest with the mostest when it comes to festive blog hops!

Michelle Woodall: Not a writer this time, but a thinker of thoughtful thoughts.  Michelle's blog is full of depth, wisdom and healing.  A counsellor by training, she shares all her experience with generosity and love.

Rachel Brown: Funny and brilliantly well observed is how I would describe Rachel's blog about the adventures of an optimist around town. Read it, laugh and get a dose of her infectious cheer (and black humour)!

Ladies.... over to you.


For ten more surprising facts click here and read on... 

Back in the Saddle... Well, nearly

The last few weeks have slid by in a confusing maelstrom of work, moving house, sickness and family woes all at the same time. You know that one?  The one where you're up all night with a vomiting child and trying to sort out mortgage applications in your lunch (half)hour. 

Inevitably some things slide.  Sadly, blogging is one of them, tragically writing is another.  

It's a funny one, the writing thing. In times of emotional stress writing can be incredibly cathartic - if not in acute phase, then certainly as things start to process. Bereavement and break ups have both stimulated a great outpouring of creativity.  

But general life stress?  Nope.  It's like a glutinous Victorian smog that chokes any spark of imagination and leaves you only the narrow focus of a to do list circled in red. 

Gah. 

Well, I'm slowly edging past that period (I hope).  Last week, for the first time in a month I actually wrote something.  OK, less than 300 words of something, but it was a start.  Better still it really was a start -a new start for Banshee and one I'm much happier with. 

Bonus!

So, with the first glimmers of spring sunshine, hope stirs that I might not be completely brain dead after all. 

And so... 

I'm going to be pouring writerly WD40 on my mental gears (it's scary how quickly they get rusty) and opening up my notebook to start afresh. 

Banshee.  Right.  

After I've chased up that deposit....  

15 Year Olds Can Have Personalities Too

In the last two weeks I've read two young adult books.

One was Robin in the Hood by Diane J Reed.

One was Enlightened by Devyn Dawson.

Both came with great reviews, so my expectations were set relatively high. I read Robin first and anyone that follows me on Twitter will know what I thought of it.

I loved it.  I loved Robin's character, I loved the patchwork, eccentric, touch of magic world that Diane created.  I loved the character arc and the growth and change that Robin experienced.  And I loved the spark and emotional resonance between Robin and the utterly intriguing love interest, Creek.

So that was it. Thanks to Diane, I was all about young adult fiction.  What would I read next?

Hence Enlightened.  

Now, just to be clear I haven't read book 1 in this series.  If I had read book 1, chances are I would have been more deeply invested in the characters.  As it was I found them a struggle.

Despite the fact that the heroine Jessie was way powerful and had A Great Destiny, she still seemed to me to be remarkably childish.  Whatever Big Events had happened in book 1 didn't appear to have given her much wisdom or depth of character, bruised her or scarred her at all, or even given her a great deal of inner strength.

In fact, she seemed to come across a bit like the sort of fairly superficial teen you get hanging around the fringes of films like Clueless.

Lots of Oh My God My Boyfriend Is So Gorgeous.  Lots of Oh She Was A Bit Mean To Me In the Loos.  Lots of Ew My Mum Just Mentioned Birth Control (Yuck).

It didn't seem to recognise that most people of 15 or 16 are dealing with Real Life, experiencing complex situations and emotions and carving out the foundations of the adults they will become.

It's the same failing I found in the mega successful Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief - Percy loses his mum, finds out he's a demi-god and doesn't appear to change as a consequence.  Oh please!

Young adults are just that, young adults.  Changing. Growing. Hurting. Maturing.

JK Rowling recognised that.  Harry Potter is shaped and changed by his experiences.  As the books progress we get to know a darker, more mature Harry.

C S Lewis recognised that.  In the Voyage of the Dawntreader, Eustace isn't affected so much as transformed.

Diane J Reed recognises that.  Her Robin learns a sense of responsibility and sacrifice.  She still thinks about how hot she looks in her jeans (she is human, damn it) but her experiences change her.

And that's how YA characters - no, any characters - should progress in a book.  If a character has learned nothing as a consequence of their experiences the reader will be left ultimately dissatisfied.  There needs to be change, and their needs to be growth.

Presenting teenage characters as solipsistic and superficial doesn't just let them down, it lets us all down.  

Unless they change, of course.

Announcing... The Romanchics

I love my Darcy to Dionysus blog, so I do.  I get to....

• Focus on my writing goals
• Share lessons I have learned along the way
• Keep momentum up on my work(s) in progress
• Host contests along with my fabulous fictionistas Ruth, Kern, Jenn and Stacey (love you ladies!) 
• Join blog hops and flash fiction contests
• Obsess about Greek Mythology
• Ponder mental health issues
• Critique films

It's all very cathartic but ever so slightly random.

So when the lovely Aimee Duffy suggested a blog focused on romance I thought, "What the heck! Why not?"

CC licensed image by fidgetrainbowtree

For the last year my romance writing has been kept on track by four very special ladies:

Jessica Baker, my wonderful critique partner, who writes witty and sensual historical romance
Incy Black, a super smart writer of fast paced romantic thrillers
Aimee Duffy, who writes steamy modern romance
JM Stewart, who writes sweet and spicy heartfelt romance

All talented, all different, all slogging their guts out to write the best possible romances for their readers.

Every Thursday we share 100 words of our work in progress with each other in what Jessica dubbed The Dashing 100.  

We each have different strengths, styles and very different voices but we have two things in common: we devour romance and we create romance.

We are in fact, complete romanchics (geddit? Incy's idea).

So.

Here it is.

In glorious technicolor.

With wit, wisdom and passion in our pens.

May I proudly present.....

The Romanchics

Five writers dashing to their happily ever afters!