Gallery and New Fic!

Howdy Folks! 

First of all, NEW LAYOUT! It was about time for one, I was getting tired of the old one. This one has better page displays and wider pages, which works for my new graphics gallery! (OMG FINALLY)

So I have a re-write up of a one-shot I wrote a while ago, taking place pre-Twilight in the early stages of Esme and Carlisle’s relationship. Originally titled “I Will Be”, I did some re-writing and editing, and it is now known as “Merry Christmas”.

Merry Christmas is my entry for the Twilight Novel Novice November/December 2008 Challenge: For the November-December Challenge, write a story about any of theTwilight characters celebrating the holidays.

click on banner for story!

In other news, check by my graphics page, I’ve gotten a gallery up, resources and credits, a tutorial, graphics request page, and fillers for a page of usable icons and signatures and stuff.

So I’ve decided I want to get more -writing- done … I’ve been really focusing on getting a gallery up, and I’m nearly done with those graphics. So what to do now? Work on some fanfiction! I’ve definitely missed being a regular poster, and with Winter Break I can get all sorts of writing done. Who knows, I may even finish a chaptered fic about the Denali Clan that I’ve had bouncing around in my head.

Putting together a gallery, and other news …

I’ve joined the Vesparium, the official graphics supplier of the Twilight Lexicon. I’m putting together a gallery of avatars, banners, and other such stuff. Any requests may be dropped in the comments of this post. 

I’ve downloaded GIMP and am messing around with it (oh heaven!) My one regret is that photoshop is a bit easier to use … oh well, it’s also ridiculously expensive.

In other news, I’m toying around with ideas for the Twilight Novel Novice challenge. In addition, I’m thinking maybe I’ll submit something to the Twilight Archives challenge that’s up … I’m not sure though — it’s something to do with Jacob and Renesme, and doesn’t really look like my thing. I might submit something, however.

Writing and graphics are sort of squished with all my schoolwork, but I’m hoping I’ll be able to balance things eventually. You know — I’d kind of like to finish the sequel of “Soul Searching” before I’m old.

Um … Wow!

My fic  “Lightning Bolt” won first place in the Twilight Novel Novice Challenge — my face was a bit shocked when I saw the results I did NOT expect to come in first place — wow …

 

Thanks, Twilight Novel Novice staff for spending the time to manage these fantastically fun challenges!

Congratulations to the other authors that placed here and I can’t wait till I have time to read all the winners, they look fantastic!

Lightning Bolt now out!

One-shot. Breaking Dawn spoilers.

Like a lightning bolt, my simple act of revenge split into electric fingers of heartbreak and devastation that crackled out of my control.

Irina’s POV during the final showdown. 

Twilight Novel Novice August Challenge

The fic mentioned a few posts ago is now out! You can view it at Twilight Archives or Fanfiction.net. Thanks so much to j3nn for being a fantastic beta!

I’ve registered at the Twilight Lexicon forum (again) and this time plan to actually be active over there. My screenname on the forum is Iris Messenger, same as most places!

edit:

Lightning Bolt WON! the Twilight Novel Novice Challenge!

Lightning Bolt

One of two one-shots I’m writing in response to the Novel Novice Twilight fanfiction challenge this August. It’s close enough that I’ve got a banner out!

 

sneak peak!

I was wrong. I was wrong, and now I would reap the consequences. Bitterly, I wished I had stopped to think of the plausibility of an immortal child created by one of the Cullen’s. After centuries, I still lacked trust in anyone but my sisters. In an instant of that cursed distrust I’d brought down the Volturi upon Carlisle and his coven. 

             I wasn’t frozen in grief and agony over them, however. It was Tanya and Kate standing proudly to the front that made it impossible to move.

            Nobody had ever seen such a child — have immortal half human, how was I to know that my accusations could have been false? How could I have known that the Cullen’s would have brought so many of our kind to bear witness, and die by association? How could I have known my sisters would come and stand so firmly? I saw it in their stance that they weren’t about to flee. 

After everything we had lived through, was it going to be my foolish actions that brought our destruction? 

 

-UPDATE-

Lightning Bolt is complete, and I’ve sent it off to my beta. It’s one of the longest one-shots I’ve ever managed, at 1,597 words. I kept it strictly canon, all dialogue in the scene is also in the book. 

new clothes for the website!

I’ve got a new layout now! I think I like this one a bit better than the last. I’ve made a custom header now that reflects the banners that I’ve made to represent myself on all the websites I submit to. 

Scrivener … I’m in love. It’s a word processing program that’s designed specifically for drafting long documents, such as novels or long fanfic. It only works on macs, but it’s fantastic! I’m on the thirty day trial period — gosh I wish I could actually buy it!

Still haven’t started working on that challenge fanfic — I should stop procrastinating.

I’m back and ready to write!

So I’m back from my vacation and ready to start writing again! Breaking Dawn has obviously sparked new one-shot ideas, as well as given me more insight into characters that are featured in a few of my works in progress. (That Tanya one-shot that’s been in the works forever comes to mind). I’m planning on participating in the Novel Novice Twilight challenges as well. 

 

please do not read the rest of this post if you wish to remain spoiler free. 

**BREAKING DAWN SPOILERS**

 

 

 

I’m surprised, first of all, by all of the Breaking Dawn hate that’s been showing up all over the twilight communities. Sure, there were a lot of surprises that came along, but really … referring to the book as “the book that shall not be named”. I can sympathize with a little bit of the dislike — my first reaction to a lot of the book was face-palming and rolling of eyes and annoyance. After digesting all of the book for a day, and reading the book for a second time though, I’ve gotten over the annoyance. 

After all the scathing reviews of “Edward gets human Bella pregnant”, it is slightly humbling to have Bella, in canon, become pregnant. Most of us thought it couldn’t happen. My mother when reading the books had no problem wrapping her head around pregnant Bella. This was because she’d been just reading the books, not the Q and A sessions with Stephenie Meyer that I had been reading prior to the release of Breaking Dawn. 

Overall I quite enjoyed it, particularly the insight it gave into the Denali coven. It was such a relief that Tanya was quite nice, and not the jealous shrew that she’s often written as in fanfic. I also enjoyed seeing more of the Clearwaters. I’ve been writing quite a bit of Seth in the sequel to Soul Searching, as well as a short story focusing on Leah — and it’s a relief to know that I’ve actually been writing the characters in a way that’s consistent with the canon that’s now out.

I must admit that the name Renesme is, in my opinion, awkward. I did enjoy Bella’s reaction to Jacob’s dubbing her “Nessie”.  

So that’s my two cents. While Eclipse is probably my favorite Twilight book, I thoroughly enjoyed Breaking Dawn, and think that it finished quite well. 

•• update ••

After reading some more Q and A’s by Stephenie Meyer, my quibbles with the logistics of Bella’s pregnancy are gone. 

Stephenie Meyer: 

One of the longest things about this last year is that I’ve been reading all these quotes that people have been attributing to me that I never said. I had a rough draft of [this story] by the beginning of 2004, so before I ever did a tour or answered any questions or did an interview, I knew where the story was going. … When people said, “Hey, can vampires have babies?” I always said no, because female vampires don’t change at all, and it takes a lot of change for your body to accommodate a fetus, so it’s not possible. But I never said anything about the part that I knew was coming. … It is true … there’s a whole chromosomal-count difference, but venom works a lot of different ways, so for me, it always worked just fine.

     — MTV “Twilight Tuesday” interview

I also wanted to make it clear that I loved the book — faults and all. I think that there wasn’t really any book that could have satisfied every fan, but Breaking Dawn did a good enough job of satisfying me. 

New One-shots

Just a quick post to let anybody who follows this know that I’ve got two one-shots posted, and one sent off to my beta. 

When Dead Hearts Break 

Alice always knew that Bella wouldn’t move on from loving Edward, but that doesn’t make it any easier to deal with the visions that slip through. My entry to Pel’s website!

 

 

What She’s Got

Cullen One-shot ChallengeThough Rosalie didn’t come out to meet Bella that day when the whole family did, she was watching …

I thought she would be prettier up close. That’s what Rosalie thought when she saw Edward’s human walk slowly into the house.

update:

That Conversation, my entry into Segolily’s Odd Fathers Challenge is now out on both my fanfiction.net account and my twilight archives account.

New Fics in the Works … WOOT!

Wow … I’ve got one one-shot finished that I’m submitting to Pel’s website, I’m working on another one-shot for the Father’s Challenge on the Twilight Challenges forum, and I’m also starting yet another one-shot for the challenge on Twilight Archives. Be prepared to see these three by June 15 (the submission date for all three). I’m afraid I haven’t at all been working on any of the chaptered fics I’ve got going, but I will as soon as all these challenges are done and my life has gotten less busy. (who am I kidding, life will never slow down ) Anyway, just a heads up for anyone that ever checks this little doodling. 

Thanks go to j3nn and Kayla Ariev for being FANTASTIC betas!

Hopefully these one-shots will speed up writing on my other junk.