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Emmi Lawrence

~ MM Fantasy Romance Writer

Emmi  Lawrence

Tag Archives: Short Fiction

Coffee & Conversation: Removing large-scale defaults in my work

31 Monday May 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Coffee & Conversation

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answer, essay, FAQ, non-fiction, POV, question, reading, Setting, Short Fiction, writing advice, writing habits

Removing large-scale defaults in my work

I feel like who I am as a writer is always in flux. Which I think is a really good thing and I hope I always keep pushing myself. These are just a few ways that aspects of my writing have moved beyond a norm I’d instinctively set for myself.

Perspective

There was a time when every story I wrote was in third person perspective. Everything. I didn’t even consider writing in first person because I didn’t tend to like first person stories as much. You can get pretty close to a character even in third person, so I never thought much about it. There was even an interview I read by another author who said she only wrote in first person because she didn’t think she could get as close in third and I thought…”how silly” and “I would hate to only write in first.”

Slowly, I’ve gone beyond third person. I’ve written plenty of stories in first and even in second person (though I’m still iffy on doing whole novels in second because you need to have a really good reason for it). When I sit down to write a new story, I’m far more likely to truly consider perspective and decide which one will be best for the story I want to tell rather than default to the one I use the most often.

Setting

I also used to only write secondary world/high fantasy or distant science-fiction. I still default to distant time science-fiction if I write sci-fi because near future seems synonymous with hard science-fiction to a lot of people and I’m much more of a “hey, wouldn’t it be cool if…” and “who cares if it’s impossible” type of writer. Continue reading →

Coffee & Conversation: Do you finish everything you start?

17 Monday May 2021

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answer, essay, FAQ, non-fiction, Novel, question, reading, Short Fiction, short stories, writer, Writing

Do you finish everything you start?

My half a million WIPS say no :P

Okay, in all seriousness, the answer is yes, if we’re talking projects I’ve truly started. However, projects tend to fall into one of three categories:

1) The I-started-but-can’t-figure-out-what-to-do-with-it

This is the category of stories where I’ve jotted a beginning, maybe even got a few pages in, or, in one horrible rare case, I’d gotten chapters in, and realized I have no idea what’s going on. Or I realize that the story is fundamentally broken. Or I realize that the character makes no sense. Mostly though I realize that I was just writing to write and that there isn’t really a story here.

These ones feel more like writing exercises. I’m stretching my brain, I’m doing a little character creation or description or jotting down part of a dream I had. I like doing this sometimes with dialogue between two characters because of the fun it is to play people off one another.

A lot of these get lost amidst the world of notebooks. But often enough, some of these jotted creations will find new life later when I’m flipping through old notebooks and see something that gets my gears going.

2) The I-started-and-immediately-finished

These are the ones I wish happened every time. Continue reading →

Canvas Blues – LXVIII: Present

12 Wednesday May 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Contemporary, Fantasy, M/M, Serial

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Fantasy, fantasy adventure, Fiction, gay romance, long-reads, M/M, mm romance, murder mystery, Mystery, Novel, prose, Short Fiction, writer, Writing

CANVAS BLUES
Vignettes Regarding the Artwork of Brendon Kotes

LXVIII: Present

She’d been twenty-six. In the ground now these last eight years at St. Thomas next to her grandmother. Her obituary claimed she’d drown in her family’s home. They didn’t say bathroom or kitchen or Jacuzzi. They didn’t say saltwater. But Brendon remembered the painting he’d completed for the Yert family…eight years ago. Same year Robbie had gotten back from his European backpacking trip.

Marylanders and their crabs.

“It’d been another bayscape. I do a lot of them. Locals like it. Sort of a claim, part of what culture we have.” He swallowed and took another gulp of the whiskey Orion had brought when he’d arrived on Brendon’s doorstep. “Been on a few postcards,” he added. “Don’t know if they sell.”

Orion poured another few fingers and sat back in the armchair. The room felt tiny and tight, all the walls too full of drawings and sketches and work. Yet he didn’t seem to mind. He sat, larger than God and as ambiguous in his blessings. The small world of Brendon Kotes his to play in.

That might have been an unfair observation. A good painting though.

“That particular commission came from Katherine Yert. She took me into her guest bathroom—huge room, bigger than my apartment—and showed me the decor, wanted me to match the shades exactly. Quite particular so I took photos and copious notes even though it made the painting a tad more teal than would be right. Though, I guess that’s a matter of perspective.”

“What is it that makes you think Evelyn Yert drown because of your painting?”

Brendon hesitated. “She’s… She was…” Continue reading →

Coffee & Conversation: What writing website do you visit the most?

10 Monday May 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Coffee & Conversation

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answer, FAQ, non-fiction, question, reading, Romance, Short Fiction, tools, Writing, writing resources

What writing website do you visit the most?

There are a lot of great sites out there for writing-related topics. Some of them are kept up by writers who have been in the industry for a long time. Some of them are kept up by people with almost no experience or knowledge (looking at you, random youtubers who pretend to be grade A agents or successful authors yet have no examples of their work).

But for the most part, at some point, whether you realize it or not, advice sites are a sinkhole rather than a help.

The absolute best writing site I’ve found is called: 4the words.com.

I remember writing about a site called Fighter’s Bloc before, but if you aren’t aware of what it was, it was a site crafted where you fight a little monster by finishing words. Every time you stopped writing, your avatar took damage. Too much damage, you die. But if you go until you accomplish your target word count, you win!

4thewords is a similar site, except in all way better. It essentially gamifies writing.

You have an avatar you can customize. A map you can travel through. A quest book. There’s a main story line. Side quests. Basically anything you tend to see in an easy app game, this site has crafted. Your job is to travel into the wilderness and battle monsters, each with a different target goal and different drops, leading you to craft better weapons, better armor, etc.

There’s also an Inn that works as a forum, but I really don’t recommend going there. Forums are time dumps generally. Ignore them as best you can. I’ve never actually read a single post on 4thewords and haven’t started my own despite there being a quest to do to because that’s not the purpose I want for my account.

On the writing side, the site allows you to create as many files as you want, which you can organize into different projects. Each project can be divided into different sections, holding whatever files you need. All the files and projects can be customized, by color and shape, allowing you to easily see at a glance the files you’re looking for.

In terms of actual productivity, the monsters you battle each give a different incentive. Some are word count battles, where you are given a certain amount of time to accomplish a certain amount of words. For instance, the Wignow makes you write 250 words in a 30 minute time frame. Each monster is a different type of challenge, some giving you a relaxed time frame, some giving you a tighter one. There are also monsters who are endurance battles, more similar to the little 2-bit monsters you would have battled on Figher’s Bloc. These fights are really good for brainstorming sessions or dumping sessions where you’re just trying to get words out in order to push yourself into the zone.

All in all, I find the site really helpful as a writer :)

~Emmi

Coffee & Conversation: What traits do you think lead to success?

03 Monday May 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Coffee & Conversation

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answer, essay, FAQ, non-fiction, question, Short Fiction, writer, writing advice, writing habits

What traits do you think lead to success?

The traits that I feel are most important to success in the writing industry are: social acuity, endurance, and thick-skin. Keep in mind that my own success is debatable, depending on your definition of success and that most of this is from what I’ve observed within the industry.

1) Thick-skin

There are a lot of rejections in this industry. Some of these rejections are impersonal, leading some people to feel downtrodden because they don’t feel like they’re being read or considered. They don’t feel like they’re even getting a person on the other end. So the rejections feel automated.

Some of the rejections are personal, which can feel even more personal depending on what’s said. Some point out flaws in a particular story, while others point out flaws in writing ability. While still others might even go as far as pointing out potential flaws in the author themselves. And these are all, generally, from strangers across the world, people who you have no idea whether they have the training to be saying what they say or even if they’re someone whose opinion should be taken.

Not only do you get told NO a lot, but we also get reviews. Reviews can be sweet and wonderful and the best things in the world. Or they can be downright cruel, some of them going as far as deriding the author instead of the work.

On top of rejections and reviews, many authors seek out critiques in order to try and improve. Some people can handle critiques. Some people can’t. [Also, some people give helpful critiques and some people…don’t.] Continue reading →

Coffee & Conversation: What’s your take on copyright? (1 of 2)

19 Monday Apr 2021

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answer, author, copyright, FAQ, non-fiction, question, reading, Short Fiction, writer, Writing

What’s your take on the current copyright law?

This is based on the law in the United States.

There’s this persistent, nefarious belief that authors should not be allowed to hold copyright of their work for any decent length of time (the going argument is copyright should only last 20-30 years after publication). I hope, rather than know, that these beliefs are only held by a loud, uneducated minority, but since there’s probably a lot of misunderstanding concerning copyright, I wanted to talk about it.

Let’s first talk about what copyright is:

Copyright is the ownership of one’s words (or other creation). In the United States, copyright lasts for 70 years after the author’s death. [There are other, slightly different, time frames when doing things like work-for-hire, etc.] For the sake of this post and the next, I will be talking about copyright mostly from the perspective of writing.

You gain copyright of your words the moment you write them. Not when you register a copyright, not when you show your words to anyone, not even when a book is published. Your copyright is yours the moment you write those words. They could be on a napkin. Or a piece of fabric. Or even written on a wall. Doesn’t matter. They are yours. Continue reading →

Canvas Blues – LXIV: Yesteryears

14 Wednesday Apr 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Contemporary, Fantasy, M/M, Serial

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author, Fantasy, fantasy adventure, Fiction, gay romance, M/M, mm romance, Novel, Short Fiction, writer

CANVAS BLUES
Vignettes Regarding the Artwork of Brendon Kotes

LXIV: Yesteryears

The day Casey found out Robbie had sex with Evelyn Yert was a cold, slushy day in mid-January. He came roaring up in that blue Mustang of his, exhaust cut short as if he thought the world wouldn’t notice him otherwise. He wore no coat, not even a rain jacket to hold off the mush occasionally sluicing down for minutes at a time.

Short-sleeved and angry, Casey banged on the door, setting off Mom’s angel prism to spinning tortured rainbows across the entrance. From down the hall came her voice, her ears attuned to the chaos that was Casey.

“You tell that rascal not to punch my door, Brendon. Tell him I’ll not invite him to a single casserole dinner if he can’t find some quiet in his crazy.”

Red-eyed and rough, Casey scowled the moment Brendon opened the door.

“Not inside. Can’t be cooped up. Not now. Come on.” He turned before he’d finished speaking, sure in the knowledge Brendon wouldn’t resist.

He was bouncing on his toes in the wet street, hands shoved into his pockets and breath coming out in dragon steam puffs by the time Brendon joined him, handing a second coat over. Casey merely laughed miserably and climbed into the driver’s seat, so that coat went into the back, crumpled to the floor where it lay forgotten for three weeks.

“Did you know?” Continue reading →

Canvas Blues – LXIII: Yesteryears

07 Wednesday Apr 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Contemporary, Fantasy, M/M, Serial

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author, Canvas Blues, Fantasy, fantasy romance, Fiction, gay romance, long read, M/M, mm romance, Mystery, Novel, prose, Short Fiction, Writing

CANVAS BLUES
Vignettes Regarding the Artwork of Brendon Kotes

LXIII: Yesteryears

The fact that Tori Kel no longer hung around Robbie, rubbing in Casey’s face all that he could not have, became a springboard for that rubber band to return. The two of them called a grudging truce one random day, with not an iota of advance warning or thought to it.

“Can I sit here?” asked Robbie that April, tray of sloppy joe and french fries held balanced in one hand with his red bookbag hanging from the other.

Casey looked up with mouth frozen half-open and for once didn’t seem to have a word to say, though his gaze bounced all around Robbie and down to his hand where the splint had been a mainstay for many months during middle school.

“Sure,” said Brendon with a raised brow toward Casey. He scooted his sketchbook down, away from danger, and crumpled his trash to a more reasonable diameter. “Read any good comics lately?”

“Oh man,” said Robbie with a grin for the ages. “You know that one you really like about the mage with the tattoos? The guy who wrote it just came out with a new webcomic. It’s about a werewolf patrol that falls into a different dimension. It’s pretty good.”

“Send me the link.”

After a few moments of painfully awkward silence at the table, Casey cleared his throat and said, “Saw a new BMW in your driveway last week. Parents get a new car?” Continue reading →

Canvas Blues – LXII: Present

31 Wednesday Mar 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Contemporary, Fantasy, M/M, Serial

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Canvas Blues, Fantasy, fantasy romance, Fiction, gay romance, LGBT, long-reads, Love, M/M, Mystery, Novel, prose, reading, Romance, Short Fiction, Writing

CANVAS BLUES
Vignettes Regarding the Artwork of Brendon Kotes

LXII: Present

They walked the downtown streets. Brendon waited patiently—mostly patiently—while Orion peeked into shop windows and made inane, yet safe comments on their contents.

“What’s this one then? A gallery. ‘Local Artisans.’ A lot of crabs, I see. Marylanders seem to like their crabs. Always blue ones.”

“You’d rather dead ones?”

At the caustic tone, Orion cast him a glance, but didn’t engage with a response. “And here we’ve got herbal remedies for the soul and spirit,” read Orion off one of the plaques in the next window.

He put the last of his ice cream into his mouth and tossed the cup into the trashcan that sat at the base of the banner pole behind them. Then took his painting from Brendon with a nod of thanks.

“Rosemary for remembrance and yarrow root for protection. Should I buy you a bundle of dried herbs to hang in your studio?”

“I’d rather a coffee.”

“In this heat?”

Brendon lifted his gaze heavenward for a moment. “Why are you here?” Continue reading →

Chapter One of Lost Isle (Launch Day T-4)

19 Friday Mar 2021

Posted by Emmi Lawrence in Excerpt, Fantasy, M/M

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

adventure fantasy, Fantasy, fantasy romance, Fiction, gay romance, LGBT, long-reads, Lost Isle, Love, M/M, Novel, prose, reading, Romance, Series, Short Fiction, The Ocean's Aviary, Worldbuilding, Writing

CHAPTER ONE

Where I am is where I’ve always been,
but what I see has changed.

They cut us free somewhere near the Gulf of Caines. The water dark, the moon nothing but a sliver and the stars clouded as the ship’s canvas swelled with an easterly that took it far into the distance within precious little time. Left me rocking in a skiff, alone, but for the limp form of my companion—a man weathered by the sun and salt with a still-seeping gash under his left eye.

I calculated I had three days. If I were lucky. Though, luck had never been on my side, especially not recently.

That first long night, shivering in the unfettered ocean wind and my hunger for revenge keeping the pangs in my stomach at bay, I resisted the urge to dump that man overboard. I wasn’t sure why. Could just be I was so preoccupied by that fading black smudge on the horizon. Plus, I’ve never been one to handle loneliness well. And even a man condemned by his brothers for a traitorous nature was better company than the tang of salt spraying into my face whenever the skiff smacked on the downside. The fact he was also attractive despite the cut didn’t hurt either and I admit to dreaming of wringing a few good moments out of life with him before we succumbed.

Besides, I figured a dead man in the water brought sharks faster.

Dawn found me hunched in the stern, tired because I’d kept jerking awake, sore, since finding comfort in the wooden edges of the skiff was impossible. I gingerly raised myself high enough so I could scan the horizon. Nothing but morning color on one side and the violet haze of a relenting night on the other.

The boat pitched then, slamming my head into the side. I cursed like the sailors I’d been traveling with, calling out to that living, breathing leviathan believed to be responsible for every death upon the waves. My voice cracked, loud enough I must have woken the other man.

He groaned and twisted, his knee rising and his hand moving for his head. I settled within the stern once more and observed him as he fumbled his way to a sitting position, his hand missing the edge of the skiff once before he focused. As intelligence sparked in his eyes, the fog of unconsciousness slow to release him, he narrowed his gaze at me.

“Yer the cartographer? The grunt who made the star charts that led us astray?”

I shrugged, striving for a carelessness, but my heart hammered behind my rib cage like a fleet-footed deer and I reminded myself that not every sailor took up with men simply because their prospects were slim.

His stare turned more intense, as if he could see right past my feeble attempts to project some form of unconcern. “I’m curious,” he said, in a tone that said he wasn’t truly curious, but wanted an excuse to mock me. “Was ya purposefully leadin’ us wrong or are ya simply that inept?”

Affronted, I said, “My charts were fine. And considering they’re left in the care of the sailing master instead of dumped in here with us, I presume he knows that.”

The man cracked a sliver of a smile. “Ya’d argue ta the death over their accuracy despite sendin’ us so far from the Giant’s Belt. So tell me, where are we?”

“Given you likely know the ocean currents better than I, I was hoping you’d be able to answer that.”

“The stars did nah speak ta ya all night?”

“It was cloudy.”

He laughed bitterly. “Of course it were.”

“It was,” I protested, though I sounded like a petulant child, insisting on an excuse to free myself from punishment. I quickly staunched my whining and pressed my lips together in a thin, insincere smile.

The man hefted himself onto the thwart at the bow end of the skiff, the position putting him at an angle so I was forced to look up at him. At least with the sun at my back he was mostly within the light, which gave me a full view of the tattoos running along his shaved head. On one side the black markings were of a wicked looking sea serpent, crudely done, and low on the other curled smoke-like lines that I assumed represented the misty maidens who populated the sea between the continents.

He had a number of small scars across the side of his neck, as if shrapnel from a shattered bulkhead had embedded there once. His pale eyes were hooded from too much squinting in the sunlight, but had a piercing quality to them that only added to his intensity. His hands, rough and weathered like the rest of him, gripped the sides of the skiff as if he were prepared to launch at me at a second’s notice.

We were opposites, him and I.

Me with my hands soft and stained with ink rather than callused from rope burn. Me with none of the hardness he possessed. None of the decades’ worth of experience of facing down the fickle nature of the sea and its deadly inhabitants.

“What’s yer name?” he demanded. Continue reading →

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CANVAS BLUES
Vignettes Regarding the Artwork of Brendon Kotes

A serialized novel begun Jan 29th 2020. Here you can find links to the beginning and the most recent additions.

I: Prologue
II: Present
III: Yesteryears
IV: Yesteryears
V: Present

……….

L: Present
LI: Yesteryears
LII: Yesteryears
LIII: Present
LIV: Yesteryears

New chapters published every Wednesday!
Next up: Jul 7th 2021

FREE SHORT STORIES

THE BAYWATER & THE HURRICANE
(fantasy M/M)

WHAT SECRETS MIGHT REMAIN
(fantasy M/M)

TALL, DARK & HANDSOME
(contemporary M/M)

THE IMMORTAL LOVER OF LAKE PHANTA
(fantasy M/M)

ACROSS THAT OCEAN OF SAND
(fantasy M/M)

MY LIFE, HIS BREATH
(contemporary M/M)

POET’S BANE
(fantasy M/M)

What’s Up!

  • Canvas Blues – XCV: Present
  • Canvas Blues – XCIV: Present
  • Coffee & Conversation: How to keep your plots/stories from being repetitive?
  • Canvas Blues – XCIII: Yesteryears
  • Coffee & Conversation: How to critique someone else’s work?
  • Canvas Blues – XCII: Present

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