Category: Writing

Writing Wednesday: A Dragon Poem

On By cherylmahoneyIn Writing5 Comments

I recently took a break from my revisions to play with a sudden idea for something very different.  I was having conversation with a writing friend about her new kitten, named Dragon, and his dragonish qualities, like his dragon heart.  I asked if he had a dragon’s voice though, and it turns out he’s quite squeaky!  With leaps and bounds, this led us both into separate ideas for a children’s story about a dragon seeking his roar.

Because it all looked rather Dr. Seuss-ish in my head, I ended up spending a week writing a rhyming tale of baby dragon Squeak and his search, in all the wrong places, for his very own roar.  I’ll offer the initial qualifier that I am not a poet, and offer a few verses just for fun.

And so the days passed, and the baby dragons grew,
Named for the sounds of their first cry and hue,
Gree and Fwoof and their fine brother Squeak,
Who hated his name, sounding so soft and so meek.

He was a brave dragon, he knew this was true,
He knew that his roar should be brave and strong too.
He tried and he tried, and then he tried even more,
Opened his mouth and produced a shocking squeak.

“Don’t worry, my child,” his kind mother soothed,
A serene dragon she was, not easily moved.
“You’ll find your own roar, just like all your kin.
Just remember your roar must come from within.”

Writing Wednesday: The Vicomte de Chagny

On By cherylmahoneyIn Writing4 Comments

In revisions for my Phantom trilogy, I’ve been working on the scene that introduces Raoul de Chagny, Christine’s love interest–one of them!  We see him through Meg’s eyes in my novel and…he probably doesn’t come off as well as he does in some versions!  Here are her initial impressions, which probably sum up my portrayal of him rather well.

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I was about to ask her directly if she was looking for someone, when her hand closed around my arm and I saw that her gaze had settled on the far end of the Dance Foyer.  “Do you know that man?  The one talking to Sorelli?”

This could be the answer to the question I hadn’t asked.  I looked for Sorelli in the direction of Christine’s gaze.  The lead ballerina was easy to spot in her vivid red gown, talking to two men dressed in somber grays.  The older one was a usual visitor to the Foyer, and with a little thought I recalled the younger man’s name too.  “That’s Philippe, the Comte de Chagny, and his younger brother the vicomte, Raoul.  The comte and Sorelli have been, you know, keeping company for years.”  Surely Christine couldn’t have been looking for him.

“But Raoul,” she said in a low voice, “what do you think about him?”

“I don’t, usually.  I guess he’s nice enough.”  Continue reading “Writing Wednesday: The Vicomte de Chagny” →

Writing Wednesday: French Influence by Way of Mr. Dickens

On By cherylmahoneyIn Writing1 Comment

I didn’t read A Tale of Two Cities with the intention of researching for my Phantom novel, but it has turned out that way anyway.  Not a lot has been directly relevant, but it has added some definite shadings through reading the history.  The book is set about ninety years before my novel, but considering the French spent the intervening time having repeated revolutions and changes of government, it feels like it still has a lot of bearing for my characters’ experiences.

And there was one direct edit I made as a consequence of reading about the howling mobs depicted by Dickens.  The Phantom, you see, has a terror of falling into the hands of a mob, something mentioned in the very first scene told from his point of view.  After reading this book, I made some key edits.  Here’s the paragraph as it was before:

Any attack would be more complicated than a simple mob with pitchforks; France was a civilized country, but the result would be the same.  The end of a noose or even worse—a cage.  He was guilty of the crime of being different, the world had convicted him at birth, and he had ample precedent to suggest how they would sentence him.

And with edits:

Any attack would be more complicated than a raging mob with pikes; France was a civilized country, outside of her sporadic revolutions.  The result would be the same.  The guillotine or even worse—a cage.  He was guilty of the crime of being different, the world had convicted him at birth, and he had ample precedent to suggest how they would sentence him.

Small changes, but I feel good about them.  Also, weird historical note: I looked up the history of the guillotine to make sure it was still in use in 1881.  Turns out, it was France’s standard method of execution until 1981, when they ended capital punishment.  !!!  But maybe if I was French, that wouldn’t seem weird after all…

Writing Wednesday: The Grand Escalier

On By cherylmahoneyIn Writing3 Comments

Faithful readers may have noticed that content has been sparse around here lately, though at least I’ve managed to keep the Friday feature going with some regularity.  Life is good and no one should worry, but life is also busy. In the last two months (and a bit) I got married and bought a new house, so life is still very much in transition.  My new favorite phrase has become “it’s a process.”

Since long-form book reviews have not quite worked their way back into my schedule, I’ve been thinking about some other features to explore.  Today launches one of them–Writing Wednesdays, because even though I’m not blogging I’m still doing pretty well keeping on my fiction writing.  So why not tell you some about it?  I’m not sure if this will be a weekly or semiregular feature but…it’s a process!

Right now (and for the last couple of months) I’ve been working on final (?) revisions to what turned out to be Book One of my Phantom of the Opera Trilogy.  I’ve been properly working on this (at intervals) since 2013, and the roots of the story go back almost ten years before that.  So it’s very exciting to be getting close to a final version of…well, a third of the story at least! Continue reading “Writing Wednesday: The Grand Escalier” →