If you could have a trivial wish granted...

[DollyKim]

*The book isn't about a doll, it's about the character of Xavier, his family, and what they get in to. Little things like warn and worn could be typos. I don't have a beta reader, editor, or anyone else to help me on this end. Some of it comes down to finding someone I could trust not to take it themselves. It's only the first publishing, I'd want it a bit more polished before the big time, maybe change or add stories. The first story is adapted from a screenplay/script that was written for Xavier's muse Christopher Shea http://dolfielittles.typepad.com/.a/6a0 ... 970c-800wi

Xavier is a beauty white Dollzone Fei, and he's in my avatar.

[MeltedCaramel]

Perhaps I typed something out the wrong way in my last typo, I was quite tuckered out. I never thought the book was about a doll, DollyKim!! I just thought that I had heard that you given your character of Xavier a doll likeness, that's all!! <3 And I hope you know I meant no insult about the typos, some just seemed to almost be...playing with the nature of the word so to speak, like with worn/warn, so I had wondered if it was a stylistic choice. And I'm very sorry to hear you don't have anyone close enough to let them beta-read without stealing ideas. That's sad indeed. I tend to do my own betaing for the same reason though. Not because I think I'm a special snowflake with the mostest-bestest-wonderfulest (man that killed me using that slang) ideas ever that everyone is going to want to steal, but because the m/m erotica market is surprisingly competitive and (un?)fortunately it's also a good way to make some quick cash if you can churn out stories. So handing someone else in the same field my idea is like saying "Here, read my ideas and then borrow elements from them so I can't ever accuse you of plagiarism even when you so obviously are." Because even though I don't think I'm the special snowflake of the m/m erotica community, I do seek to fill some rather obvious niches that haven't been done by other authors.

As for betaing, unfortunately the best beta readers are readers and writers themselves so it is a vicious circle! I understand completely where you're coming from. I'd offer to beta your professional copy for you, since our genres don't clash in the least and I have no interest in stealing other people's ideas because I have way too many of my own, but I completely understand if you don't feel you know me well enough yet. Just know the offer stands for whenever you plan to publish. I've betaed for years and I'm quite competent at it. I have a rule for betaing my own work: A week has to pass before I even LOOK at the text again. That way I'm not immersed in the story anymore and can catch typos, places where the story jars to a halt where it shouldn't, an out of character comment thrown in at a three AM writing session, that sort of thing.

Beyond all that, it's quite nice to meet another author(s, I'm including victoriavictrix in here since she had a hand in the Thule Chronicles) on here!!!

[victoriavictrix]

@MeltedCaramel.

If your doctors don't think the herniated disk could be causing you that pain, they're quacks. That is exactly what caused my back pain, which was so extensive I couldn't even stand. Herniated disks always cause back pain! The only question is, how much? Bearable or excruciating?

I'm professional author Mercedes Lackey IRL. Over 80 books in print in five languages (at least at last counting).

[Gift_in_Edge]

@MeltedCaramel.

Have you tryed Dophin boy by Roy Meyers.

[DollyKim]

No harm no foul, the not being about the doll is incase someone else doesn't get it, you never know some times. Having survived a brain injury typos are the least of my worries when I write. The best writing advice I ever got was just to write and do the parts I do best and let other people do the editing etc.

With the beta readers part of it is the people closest to me don't read and/or don't care about or "get" what I write about. In the past people that were around me when I wrote were either fan fiction writers or people in Hollywood. A lot of it comes from past experiences that I'm getting beyond. Some of it is finding stories that are ready to meet the world too.

[MeltedCaramel]

Victoriavictrix Oh wow, I feel like I committed some author to author faux paus here. I had deduced (stupid me) from your SN that you were one of the writers working with Mercedes Lackey. I can't say I have read any of your works before, mostly because I tend to stay in my little m/f, m/m erotica world and curse the fact that no one seems to write what I would like to see in books. Or a friend recommends me something out of my usual urban fantasy/fancy cat burglars (yes, I read the modern equivalent of the dime store romance novel and I do not give a whit what people think. I put my time in with the "classics" and now I just read what I want). Still, I repeat, an honour to meet other authors such as yourself and DollyKim. It's nice to know that there are other writers that are either professionally published such as yourself, self published like DollyKim, and then lil' old me, who plans to publish when my medical issues aren't eating me alive.

If your doctors don't think the herniated disk could be causing you that pain, they're quacks. That is exactly what caused my back pain, which was so extensive I couldn't even stand. Herniated disks always cause back pain! The only question is, how much? Bearable or excruciating?

<---That makes me feel so much better. You have no idea. I was told that my herniated disk was still bulged but had 'healed' and that it should be causing me no issues. The pain is so bad I've considered...well...just not having to deal with ANYTHING anymore, to put it in vague but understandable terms. I'm confined to my bed, taking the kind of medication I'm sure you can imagine they put most chronic pain patients on which causes OTHER problems, and getting to an appointment requires overdosing and five days of preparation beforehand. I can barely move. The pilonidal cyst last year just did me in. Now it feels like someone has glued a steel marble to my tailbone whenever I sit, and I strongly suspect the cyst was so large (grapefruit sized) that it did actual tailbone damage, which isn't uncommon with these cysts, which happen to run in the family (they're insidious too, I had no idea I had one until I woke up one day with the area just above my...bottom end (eh, I didn't ask to get it there, it's a type of "birth defect" where a pore doesn't close all the way and creates a sac that's just waiting for infection in possibly the worst place possible) swollen as hell and moving felt like someone was stabbing me. I assume it filled up during the night while I slept.). I'm getting an MRI to update my records and then finding a different neurologist. The closest "hub" of professionals is Philadelphia, which I have to visit to see other specialists anyway. I hope I can find a neurologist as good as yours was. <3 Thanks for the advice/support/just talking about it. It makes me feel better to know I'm not alone in feeling the way I feel, even though I'm glad yours is mostly a resolved case.

Gift_in_Edge No, I haven't. When was it published? It would have to be before 1998 at least to qualify as the book I'm looking for, but if it's got the same sort of theme I'll be adding it to my list! Thank you!!

DollyKim Hmnn, I'm starting to think all doll collectors are sufferers or survivors of some major injury of some kind. But in all seriousness, I found what I read to be intriguing and well worth the price to find out what happens next. Typos are part of an author's job in my opinion. We can't help making them. I have horrible grammar, it all seems to have floated off into the ether for me.

Well, as a person who writes the occasional "fanfic" (though I don't publish my work online), I wouldn't be so quick to lump them into one category. I consider my "fanfic" work and my work I want professionally published to be in two different categories, the only similarity I try and achieve is the quality of the work. As for not "getting" your work...you need to find new people to hang around with then! I may not have picked up your book based on the back cover blurb alone, but having read some of it, I find myself fascinated and wanting to know more, despite it being leagues away of what I would pick up off the shelf of my own accord. People that can't stretch their imagination to include other genres and dip their toes into different ponds are useless in my opinion. It creates a rigid mindset that often follows them in other aspects of their life. I wish you the greatest of luck in finding a kind, understanding editor DollyKim.

[DollyKim]

I lump other writers together in not wanting to give them my good ideas before I've had a turn. Heck, my best fan fiction that I might be able to carve in to an original piece came from someone else's idea. *(I didn't mean I don't want other people to use my ideas for their writing and I apologize. If they can write it better than let them. More explanation in a later post.) They changed gender on a lead and I ran with it. Writing is writing.

[victoriavictrix]

I lump other writers together in not wanting to give them my good ideas before I've had a turn. Heck, my best fan fiction that I might be able to carve in to an original piece came from someone else's idea. They changed gender on a lead and I ran with it. Writing is writing.

Just as an FYI, DK, most professional writers that I know agree on two things.

(1) There is no such thing as an original idea
(2) Any two writers will take the same idea and make two entirely different works out of it.

Case in point: back in the late 60s, the editor John Campbell decided to do an experiment. He took three authors from the magazines he published, gave all three of them the same "idea" (one was Theodore Sturgeon, one was Chad Oliver, and I no longer remember who the third one was) and asked them to write a novella on the subject.

You would never have known the three works came from the same basic idea if Campbell hadn't said so.

[MeltedCaramel]

I agree with Victoriavictrix on the writing thing. I had a wonderful original fiction idea for publishing, came up with it all by myself, and by accident stumbled upon a previously published work that carried many of the same themes as my book. I didn't let it discourage me from writing out my ideas though, I told myself "I'll make mine better, I'll make it mine." And many fanfiction writers, you have to remember, are already writing from the vantage point of characters that are not their own. They fully realize this, and thus, why it is called FANfiction. My original works aren't derived directly from things I see. You won't see any direct carbon copy works with character names changed. There's no challenge in that, no fun. I like superhero stories. It doesn't mean I'll be writing about "Catman, hissing avenger of Cotham City" any time soon. I twist and build my stories like a sculptor sculpting clay.

If a writer writes the exact same story as you, that is called plagiarism and it falls under a completely different category from similar ideas. I could tick off a list of at least twelve "Angel of Death" stories (even ones who may or may not be), off the top of my head. Does this make your story any less valid to you, or the people who read it? Not at all, if anything, the better you do something, the more it's your story that will stick in their minds.

The difference is in the details, and the details are entirely your own. I wouldn't worry so much about people stealing ideas from you, because even if they stole an idea, it's still just an idea, not your story. They're going to have to build their OWN work around that theme, and like victoriavictrix said, no two authors are going to write the same story. Part of the writing process is feedback and criticism, and to get both you need others to actually read your work. DollyKim, you strike me as strong enough to stand up to anyone trying to bully you into something you feel isn't true to your characters.

Besides, and please don't take this the wrong way because I mean no offense, but you just said so yourself that one of your ideas came from another person's story. That's essentially saying "I can do it, but I don't want anyone to do it to me." (That sounds so condescending but I have no idea how else to put that, I'm so sorry, please don't think I'm standing on a soapbox here.)

If anything, just remember publishing a book professionally you have to take into account that other people are reading it too, and there has to be some give-and-take between what you want to write and what readers want to read. If you want to write something fully for yourself with no outside influence whatsoever, do what I do and just leave it on your hard drive to enjoy by yourself. Otherwise...concessions do have to be made, no matter how much an author might love to bypass editors and rewriting suggestions. (Wouldn't we all? X3)

In short: Please don't take this as a criticism of your character of any kind, just a reminder since you mentioned you wanted to eventually professionally publish. I mean no disrespect, nor ill intent, if anything it is the opposite and I would love to see your book sitting on a shelf one day.

[DollyKim]

I know there's no original ideas. What I meant in the original idea comment is taking a fan fiction idea and changing enough to make it work as a not so much fan fiction idea, something I would feel comfortable publishing. I didn't want it to sound like I don't want someone else doing it to me. If they can do a better job than do it. I took the idea of a gender switch for a TV character, worked it out longer, and shared it with the fan fiction group. We worked off each others ideas all the time and everyone had fun. I want to take some of the better parts of that exorcize and work it in to something else.

Writing I can take it on, everyone has an angel of death, to paraphrase my own story they would be busy. Some day it will get where its going.

*Should I have said gimmick instead of idea? Meaning the special little thing that makes it your own? Does that explain it better?