Skip to main content

#HistFicThursdays - Nero and Sporus by SP Somtow - Book Excerpt

 Today for #HistFicThursdays, I am delighted to once again be teaming up with  The Coffee Pot Book Club , this time to share an excerpt from  SP Somtow 's fantastic new book  Nero and Sporus ! First of all, let's meet the book... Finally available in one volume! The decadence of Imperial Rome comes to life in S.P. Somtow's Literary Titan Award-winning novel about one of ancient history's wildest characters. The historian Suetonius tells us that the Emperor Nero emasculated and married his slave Sporus, the spitting image of murdered Empress Poppaea. But history has more tidbits about Sporus, who went from "puer delicatus" to Empress to one Emperor and concubine to another, and ended up being sentenced to play the Earth-Goddess in the arena. Nero and Sporus  is available on #KindleUnlimited via  this  link . And here's an excerpt to whet your appetite: I suppose we were anxious to see who the surprise competitor would be, but no one was as surprise...

NaNoWriMo Day 29 - Endings

Friday 29th November - Endings

Well, we're pretty much at the end of NaNoWriMo!  If you're anything like me, you'll be wondering where the last month has gone!  It might seem strange to have the penultimate blog on endings, but hopefully this just proves that the end of your book is not the end of the adventure!



On the first blog, I spoke about the importance of beginning a book well and how - in many ways - it's the most important part.  Endings are equally important, but for a totally different reason.  You don't have to hook anyone in, you want to give them a satisfactory ending for the characters they've invested in.

One thing I realised, after several years(!), is that happy endings are never going to be exclusive.  As readers, we invest so much in characters, so by the end what we're really looking for is a contented ending.  The reader will be as lost without these characters as you are, so give them an ending full of hope.  This could be with a stereotypical happy ending, but more often (speaking as a reader here, as well as a writer!) it's by leaving it open for good things to follow.

Here are a few ideas about ending your story:

  1. Life is never easy, but after the rollercoaster you've sent your characters on, make sure you open up the opportunity for it to be as near-as!
  2. You've built your characters into your readers imaginations.  Don't spell out their whole lives, let your readers decide what happens next UNLESS...
  3. ...There's a sequel! But still allow the book to stand alone.  There's bound to be someone who starts in the middle of a series!
  4. Comeuppance is underrated.  Sometimes a satisfactory ending is more about what happens to the antagonist than the protagonist.
  5. There will always be that person who reads the last line first (Grrrr!).  Make sure your ending is slightly ambiguous, just to keep them guessing!
Whatever your ending, just remember: you've built this world, now let your characters (through your readers' minds) continue to live in it.

[Psst! Have you seen this: Power to Your Word]

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Masterworks: Legacy - Samantha Wilcoxson - Interview

  Today is the last of a series on nine interviews I'm sharing on the Crowvus Book Blog. These are from the authors of the short stories included in the  Masterworks  anthology by the  Historical Writers Forum . We're running through chronologically, some are video interviews, others are written. I am delighted to welcome the fantastic Samantha Wilcoxson, who is sharing the artist inspiration for her short story Legacy , as well as the appeal of James A. Hamilton, and the delights of researching. First of all, tell us a little bit about yourself, what you write (besides Masterworks!), and what inspired you to begin writing. I was inspired to write by my love of reading. After watching me read, write reviews, and keep journals for twenty years, my husband asked me why I didn’t try writing, so I did! Without really planning on it, I ended up writing historical biographical fiction. I’m drawn to a tragic tale but also to lesser known historical figures with emotive stor...

#HistFicThursdays - Apollo's Raven - Linnea Tanner - Book Blast

 If you've been following this blog for a little while, you might remember me sharing a fabulous guest post about this book in 2022 (which you can read here ). It's always great to welcome Linnea Tanner onto the Crowvus Book Blog, and I'm delighted to be taking part in her Coffee Pot Book Club book blast blog tour. So, let's meet the book... A Celtic warrior princess is torn between her forbidden love for the enemy and duty to her people. AWARD-WINNING APOLLO’S RAVEN sweeps you into an epic Celtic tale of forbidden love, mythological adventure, and political intrigue in Ancient Rome and Britannia. In 24 AD British kings hand-picked by Rome to rule are fighting each other for power. King Amren’s former queen, a powerful Druid, has cast a curse that Blood Wolf and the Raven will rise and destroy him. The king’s daughter, Catrin, learns to her dismay that she is the Raven and her banished half-brother is Blood Wolf. Trained as a warrior, Catrin must find a way to break t...

#HistFicThursdays - The Historical Fiction Community (and why I'm so glad I'm a part of it!)

 Today is the arrival of #HistFicMay, now in its third year. When I started it, I did it because I had really enjoyed meeting new writers through a similar #IndieApril list of prompts. I had a quick perusal to see if anyone had done a Historical Fiction one, saw they hadn't, and decided to set one up. It had the desired effect, and I have "met" (only online!) and discovered some wonderful writers and their books over the last couple of years. Community is a bigger thing than most writers realise. The more detached individuals may refer to community as networking, but the writing community is so much more than that. Don't get me wrong, I'm as introverted as they come, but without those people I have met during #HistFicMay or the online community of historical fiction writers, there are so many things I would never have known - sometimes even things which have led me to write certain scenes or books. I'm not saying you can't be a fabulous historical fiction ...