Fearless Friday - writing

You're probably aware that writing and I have not been too friendly these last couple of years. Ideas are there but not the words to flesh them out. I've been taking photos instead and doing little scribbles and just seeing where life takes me creatively.

But I've been invited to a writing event. My heart is so full of joy and excitement. I've been preparing for some time now, but in the back of my mind I was scared it would get cancelled or borders would close down or something disastrous (and you know, that may still happen, so I'm not over the fear of that yet!).

In this whirlwind of writing joy, I began to write again. Just a few lines, just for a few days, but words have started the slow trickle out.

And the story I've begun has been percolating for some time - way back when Team Player was being 'birthed'. It's a Glebe Gannets story, with one of the guys we met briefly in Team Player. A young guy, like Lyle, called Ashton.

His story idea came to me in a whoosh! He's a bit different - he's blunt, unapologetic, a footy nerd - some might say he's 'on the spectrum' but I don't want to label him. He's just uniquely Ashton. And he's young, I mentioned that, right? Somewhere between 18 and 20. So young.

But he meets this woman. God, it's so intense because she lets him be. He's usually told to shutup, be different, calm down, whatever. She just smiles and lets him talk. She lets him be Ashton. But she's not young. She could be his mother but he's not worried about that - she is though!

It's a story about shame - her shame. Her shame at wanting a younger man. Her shame of being seen as a footy groupie at her age. Her shame of sex. Body shame. Ageing shame. So much shame.

I'd tried to write it but it was bogged down in her feelings of inadequacy and awfulness - even though she was a successful woman. And I hated that. I couldn't write it.

When I began recently, I began writing as Ashton. Wow! What a change. I can depict her as a strong sexy incredible woman. That's what he sees. That's who is attractive to him. And her fears have to come out verbally, because he's pretty shit at picking up cues.

I don't think I've written (anything published) from the male perspective before, and I hadn't been comfortable doing it either. But Ash is a chatterbox and he's happy to tell this story. He wants to burn through this bullshit shame. He wants to love fiercely. He doesn't give a shit about age.

Maybe the last few years of no words has been about me changing my perspective and breaking out of my own boxes with how I write. Maybe I stuck myself in a place, and even if I wasn't completely happy there, I told myself that's how I had to write. That's how it worked. That's how the world worked. I have a few story ideas that aren't 'normal'. That are breaking out of what I usually do. It's thrilling and terrifying all at once.

Now, as I'm getting ready to go back into the writing community, I'm hoping that I can hold this new me. That I can keep this new (for me) way of writing and not get lured back to that corner where I hid.

So, wish me luck! I hope Ashton will keep yabbering at me and keep me away from shame and society's view of the non-sexiness of older women :) :)

I went to the footy last weekend too - I wonder if being in a crazy-high footy crowd also boosted my writing mojo!?

Postcard & praise

In my euphoria of last week, I showed off the photo of my ARRA trophy at Book Club.

I know! My Book Club of learned literary readers!

But... after me being so shy about telling them of my writing, they were brilliant about the trophy. I felt like a million bucks!

Then today, one of the lovely ladies in my group sent me this postcard - Oscar Wilde - with the message on the back being, "Congratulations! And may this be the first of many!"

I've been completely blown away by people's support. It's been incredibly reaffirming.

I've struggled so much with the criticism that's often aimed at romance and erotic writing but I feel like I've finally turned a corner. I'm finding my feet, and my confidence, in this crazy world. And good grief...it's only taken me how many years?

The impact of this has been incredible. Something I had no true comprehension of.

Thank you so very much ARRA, and my readers.

(I'll stop banging on about it now!)

PS I had another gorgeous card from a different Book Group. How I love readers xoxox

ARRA Award Thoughts

On this blog, I've tried to document my writing journey without too much censorship. Today's post is rather macabre, and also somewhat personal, so please be gentle with me.

I was stunned to see Team Player announced as ARRA's 2017 Favourite Erotic Romance. It was unexpected in the company I was keeping.

Team Player isn't a conventional story. It's written in first person, present tense, which so many readers hate. It's a MMF threesome without a submissive in the relationship. I was deliberately striving to create a threesome where each person had equal standing, if not at the beginning then by the ending, yet I know that's not conventional. It features sportsmen. It's quite explicit and raw in the descriptions of the sex, and I know some people had trouble reading it - the MM sex in particular. It hardly seemed the type of story that would win. However, I'm ecstatic that it did!

After the initial thrill at seeing my name, a sense of dread crept in, which has taken a few days to unravel.

In 2003, I won an award for best paper at a work conference. It was the pinnacle of my career. Such a huge accolade. I was completely blown away as I didn't know they presented best paper awards so had not even dreamed of it. It was before the time of mobile phones, and so by the time the event was over it was after 10 pm, too late to ring anyone and tell them.

I was working for a farmer group and our trial (which I had not been involved with during the planning, I came to it later) was quite unconventional. It excited me because of that. It was asking tough questions and was a huge undertaking. I loved the challenge of that. To win an award, to have people notice this work was a huge achievement. I thought we (our farmer-led research group) were destined for great things. (There are some similarities here, right?)

My Mum died that night, a few hours later. I woke in the morning to a phone call from Dad. My award was overshadowed by loss.

All of last Sunday, I kept expecting something terrible to happen. I'd won an award, surely a smashing defeat would come next, obliterating any excitement and joy. I waited... and waited.

It didn't come.

What came instead was this whopping realisation that I equated success with grief - a win with defeat

Damn it.

I knew I feared success more than failure...but I had no conscious understanding of why I feared success. Now I know.

Next comes the breaking down of those fears.

I'll have to dig out my 2003 trophy (that's buried in a filing cabinet) and place it with this beauty. I'll have to remain mindful of the pride and joy associated with each achievement, separate to sad events that surround each award.

ARRA Award

Thank you ARRA, Booktopia and readers. Tomorrow I might find words (some added now).

I wasn't able to attend the ARRA Awards Night because the other me had agreed to speak at the Sydney Writers Festival Live And Local event at Wollongong. My local ARRA member had organised this for me and so I asked her to apologise on my behalf when we realised the clash.

And then my book was a finalist. The lovely Diane tried to change my speaking time, but it meant changing the whole program. I decided to stay with my commitment and miss the Awards Dinner. Then Diane asked me for a speech - in case I won. I laughed but wrote words because she was being good enough to humor me - and represent me.

Today I had to go and find what I'd asked her to say because I had no memory of what I'd written. So while my thoughts are still so jumbled, here are those words.

Cath would like to thank: 

ARRA for fabulous events like the Awards and for their huge support of authors.

Booktopia for sponsoring this award.

Kate Cuthbert for her incredible self, her support and encouragement.

The Escape Publishing/Harlequin/HarperCollins team.

My writing friends and family who are only ever an email away and always get me out of trouble!

My family, especially my hubby, who manages to cope with not only my writing but this Cate, who none of them are very comfortable knowing!

Diane who’s representing me tonight after organising for me to give a talk today at a South Coast Writing Centre event. She’s great at prodding me when I’d rather stay in my cave!

Thank you to everyone who read and/or voted for Team Player, or JA Low’s Sapphire, or Vi Keeland’s Egomaniac, or Penelope Ward’s Mack Daddy. Authors love our readers. 

Thank you!

Team Player ARRA Finalist

A crazy thing happened the other day and in my mad excitement, I haven't posted about it.

TEAM PLAYER was nominated in the ARRA Favourite Erotic Romance category for 2017. You can find the full listing of finalists here.

Other nominees are:

• Egomaniac by Vi Keeland
• Mack Daddy by Penelope Ward
• Sapphire by JA Low

Booktopia are the fantastic sponsors of the award. So if you want to check out any of the other finalists, have a look at Booktopia, let me give you the links for the other erotic titles:
Egomaniac
Mack Daddy
Sapphire
Team Player.

JA Low, me, Donna Gallagher, Cassandra Samuels, and Diane Cassar.

JA Low and I are flying the Aussie and the threesome flags :) I met her at the ARRA-organised Wollongong Writers Festival Sex On The Beach talk in Nov 2016, so to be nominated with her is such fun!

When you're nominated for an award, it's an odd feeling - well, for me anyway.

To have found a connection between my story, my weird imagination, and with readers is incredible.

I know some people who nominated me will be friends, and in a weird way that concerns me, but I hope they haven't just nominated Team Player because of friendship. I hope something about the story resonated with them. I hope it means that Charlie, Lyle and Hannah and their odd relationship was believable. That they liked the people in my head enough to wish them the best, to hope that they have a future, to cheer for them when people might jeer.

This story was born from some confused thoughts after I'd finished Deep Diving. Cooper and Samantha from Deep Diving are heterosexual, and while I was writing that story, I was thinking a lot about relationships with elite athletes and how they might work and how they may affect life beyond the professional one. At the same time, Australians were talking about the same sex marriage debate, which (I felt) was being used as a political tool, which annoyed me. Then I began to wonder about how that might affect someone playing professionally in Australia, especially in a male team sport where to date, no playing athletes have 'come out'. One guy came out after his retirement, which was an incredible thing because he opened up a dialogue and he was a tough player, so it vetoed the 'wimpy' gay male stereotype. I also enjoyed writing Lana, with multiple characters, so I was keen to explore that more. All these thoughts rumbled around in my brain and Team Player came from those.

And it's a threesome story where I didn't want a submissive female character. I wanted a relationship where the three characters held equal roles in the dynamic. I wanted a strong woman who knew what she wanted. I wanted a woman who wasn't blackmailing or conniving, but somehow connected with these two men. I wanted to show a solid relationship that could sneak by public scrutiny, but in doing so, I needed to show how difficult those choices are, without jeopardising the dynamic.

It was a struggle to get what I wanted from my head to the page. I had lots of help from my writing buddies to get things clearer. For all that hard work to be recognised by readers enjoying the story, and then going to nominate it as a favourite erotic read, is beyond incredible. It's humbling, it's exciting, it's wonderful, and it's terrifying.

This writing caper has days that are gold, mixed up with days of black despair and everything in between, but it is the best job in the world :)

Sunday Story - Love is Love

Australia is having a same sex marriage discussion...and I can't see that it's going to be pleasant. People can be nasty beasts.

I have quite an odd view about this issue, well, it causes the people in my life to stare at me with some pained horror, so I'm assuming it's totally odd. I'm interested in what you think.

To me, marriage is an act of the patriarchy, used to pass women from the care of their father to the care of their husband...because women are unable to be a whole person in the patriarchy, they are seen as a possession, or a second rate citizen. And I think this is a large reason for the conservatives wanting to retain marriage as is, because any deviation puts a dent in the patriarchy.

I'd like to blow the patriarchy to smithereens. 

I'd love to not have marriage as a part of society at all. If people chose to have it as a part of their religion, then that's their choice. But as a society issue, I'd like marriage to be disbanded.

I'd like individuals to exist. And in that way, people would be allowed to make choices for themselves. And when they made a choice, they could lodge a 'relationship' with a government authority (or whatever that choice is). 

I'd love to see Love Is Love. And whatever relationship choice individuals make, then it is valid. Someone may choose to live solo. Valid choice. A partnership. Valid choice. A polygamy set up. Valid choice if all are in agreement. Threesome. Valid choice. Some other form of bonding. Valid choice.

Why does society need to dictate not only a heterosexual pairing, but any other form of relationship? Can't we be adults? Consenting adults, open to Love Is Love.

Okay, so am I too 'out there'?

Phallic Friday - Release Day for Team Player

Today is release day for Team Player!!! The MMF I've been chatting about in recent times.

I did a FaceBook release party slot for JA Low and her release last week, and I realised that I never spend any time on FB chatting to people.

Many years ago, I was addicted to chatting online, and so I've consciously avoided falling into that trap again (because I don't have time for addictions if I want to write, and have a hubby, and eat, etc!). But I have gone the other way where I fly on for a few minutes, chuck a few words on someone's post, like a few things, then fly off and do work, or write, or cook, or living stuff.

But release day is a good time to spend the day chatting with reader friends, isn't it? I'll be juggling the day job with chatting, so hopefully that'll work.

Besides, taking myself to lunch isn't all that exciting :)

So, come and visit me on FaceBook if you're bored today. Hopefully the day job won't decide that they need me to be frantic, and I'll be chatting!

Facebook author page http://www.facebook.com/CateEllinkAuthor

Other places to find me today:

 

ARRA have a giveaway on their post for Team Player today. (You might need to hunt for it a little)

AusRom Today have a guest post from me today too. (And the lovely J'aimee suggested Team Player was a MUST READ for August, which I'm very happy about, especially since there are some writing friends on that list too).

BLURB:

She’s never been shy about what she wants – and now she wants them both…

Hannah Maynard, sports reporter, is sure it’s only her lust-filled fantasies linking Australian rugby league captain, Charlie Maxxin, with relative newcomer, Lyle Smythe-Jones. She and Charlie have shared quite a few steamy sessions over the years, so surely he’s not in a relationship with the young, unflappable player she’s dubbed Marble Boy?

Hannah lures Charlie to dinner and his reaction is all the answer she needs. But she doesn’t want to report on the biggest secret in Australian sport – she wants to take part. However, it’s not just Charlie’s decision and it can’t be just casual. If Hannah wants in, she has to be all in, with Lyle, with Charlie, and with the hottest action any of them have ever experienced.