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'Fairies' Reaches Completion

October 12th, 2006

Laura has completed the first draft of her 93,000 word 'Fairies' novella, overcoming her concerns about writer's block and the inherent difficulty of experimenting with new genres. She comments, however, that she would 'welcome any suggestions for a suitable title!'. 'Fairies' is an unusual and fantastical psychological thriller set in a reality far divorced from the utopian vision of supernatural bliss that is perpetuated by most stories of this nature..

The second chapter of Laura's exciting new creation is available below for your perusal.

Aurora gazes out, bored, from the circular window flooding the cave with light. Her wings, cranberry blues, droop even more. They are already held back by tight strings which, although they appear made of the thinnest cord, are stronger than iron chain links. Cynthia is incredibly late. Aurora looks around the white cave. Stalactites and stalagmites wink at her in diamonds. They remind her of something, and she glances down at her fingers. On the trim middle finger of her left hand is a moonstone ring, encased in an intricate framework of delicate silver. The ring on her right hand is of a cruder setting, gold and housing a pearly rose quartz.

Letting out the minutest sigh, Aurora shakes her hands. She can see by the way the sun beams are rippling off the glassy pool inside the cave that the hour for expecting Cynthia is long past. Only a small crease in between her eyebrows suggests she is slightly worried. It would not be unlike Cynthia to arrive late, having forgotten an appointment in daydreaming. Not quite this late, however...

Deciding to go and look for her wayward friend, Aurora takes a piece of material which resembles a sari and wraps inside it berries and some dried flowers. Being now completely ready, she emerges from her gave into the land of Laseri, where the fairies live.

It is a large, cool, round kingdom, forming almost a perfect circle of white Romanesque palaces inside the tangle of the forests beyond. The air appears to be tinged with a golden colour, illuminating the carpets upon carpets of multicoloured flowers which poke out from fresh green grass. Towards the centre of Laseri's circumference the landscape grows rockier, mounting up in dark hills and springing out tinkling waterfalls. At the utmost peek presides a grand Colosseum, waving grand banners, where handsome Deucalion, King of the Faries lives. Naturally Laseri's commerce and bustle centre round this great oracle. At the base of the hill the rocks give way to marble colonnades and shimmering tents, spreading out in a vast market place where the soft clang of wind-chimes can always be heard. Aurora must skirt the edge of this busy bazaar. As she does, dainty chin stuck resolutely out, the eyes of a female fairy, which is called a fay, behind a stall selling tall phials of golden, sticky nectar follow her with no very benign expression. "I wouldn't believe it!" the customer she is serving hisses in a shocked whisper. "The assurance, the heedlessness she walks with! As if she didn't know every eye was upon her! It must be Aurora Optilete. Never, until now, could I credit that the stories about her were entirely true."

The stall-keeper casts a jealous look over her produce, checking it has not suffered any contamination from its near brush with peril. "Not true?" she repeats, apparently without the ability to modulate her voice to the civil, sniping whisper of her customer. "You saw for yourself the appalling hair, lopped off in scrags. Tell me, would great Deucalion submit to that ultimate shame any fairy who could possibly be innocent? Say," she adds, nodding towards the majestic palace guards in burnished armour, "very loudly you think just Deucalion could be wrong."

The appearance of the guards somehow lessens the customer's prepossession in Aurora's favour. With a look like a frightened rabbit, she comments: "No, I would never consider that. Only it is so strange she has not lost her flight! You know she would have done, if she had borne a pixie, or even..." "But the freckles! Actual freckles! Did your mother never tell you that we fairies are so pure, if we ever have reason to blush we will be marked forever with freckles? Or could you not credit that to be entirely true, either?" "Well, she does have freckles," concedes the customer, running her hands meditively over her phial of honey-coloured nectar. "But you know it is our job always to hope for the best..."

"Take my word, she's a traitor alright, in some way or the other," is the kindest allowance the stall-holder can grant Aurora. "And I will take three coins for the phial, before those guards come any closer. I'm sure they heard you doubt Deucalion."

One of the guards, slim and youthful, hears their conversation and breaks off from his regiment. Discreetly he slips away and follows Aurora's path. Once free of the market stalls he spots her, gazes round to make sure no one sees, and breaks into a run, the plume from his helmet flying in the wind, his white Apollo wings, after which he is named, shivering.

Soon he is by her side, and, as he is somewhat vertically challenged for a male fairy, only just manages to keep trotting along at her pace. Aurora acknowledges him with a slight nod of the head. In her childish days, Aurora was foolish enough to practise her spells upon poor unsuspecting Apollo - to wit, a love potion, which she thought at the time would be particularly amusing. After so many years the results have failed to stay amusing. Apollo is certainly not in love with Aurora - her magic was not good enough to produce that result - but he has developed a tendency of following her about, and acquired the need to always stand at only an inch's distance from her body. Aurora is terribly fond of Apollo, yet she does not think this is the kind of behaviour which ought to be encouraged, so she says nothing.

"Where are you going?" pants the black-haired Apollo.

"To find Cynthia," she replies with purpose.

"Oh. Is she missing?"

"Not - not missing. It does not qualify as missing. I do miss her - I lack a Cynthia - but you guards would not call that missing. You would say she is merely late. Embarrassingly late." Aurora shakes her head again. "It is not like her" she says to herself.

"It is very like her," corrects Apollo, taking off his helmet and walking a little easier now she has slowed down.

They reach the edge of the wood as Aurora grinds to a halt and looks at him. "No. It is different this time. I feel it is somehow different." Silence reigns until Aurora glances over Apollo's shoulder. "Shouldn't you be back guarding the gates?"

Apollo puffs out his chest. "No. I am coming with you."

The information does not cheer Aurora as much as it might. "Won't you get in trouble?"

"A guard following you will not be looked upon as a strange thing," Apollo points out sadly.

Aurora gives a grim smile. He will be someone to talk to, at least. "Very well," she says, swinging her arms together, and walks with a jaunty step towards the trees.

Apollo is scampering after her in a flash, haphazardly jamming his helmet back on. "Wait! You're going in - in there - you're going into the woods?!". "Certainly," Aurora shrugs. "You know she sometimes sits in a tree, close to the kingdom boundaries.

Apollo recalls with perfect clarity that regrettable habit of Cynthia's. It makes him, a fully fledged guard of the gate, shudder. "Yes, and the more fool her for it! It is not safe!" He tries to make himself a barrier between Aurora and the shade of the heavy forest. They are within touching distance of the rough barks now; one more dainty step and they will leave Laseri.

"My dear Apollo," Aurora begins her lecture, "What is the purpose of every fairy?"

"To find the one they were made to protect," he delivers immediately.

"And if they can, bring them into the grace and sanctuary of Laseri, so they may be like the fairies," finishes Aurora. "It pleases our ancestors, the angels."

Apollo nods. "But you were not made to be Cynthia's guardian."

"No - a human's. So next tell me this: how do you propose to meet that human, much less bring them into Laseri, if you never leave?"

He blinks blankly at the gesture she makes around the kingdom and her provoking tone. "No fairy has stepped far past the boundaries since the last war when the kingdom shrank. It is not safe."

Aurora puts on an air of gravity. "No. It is certainly not safe. But luckily I will have a brave guard of the palace looking out for me."

Apollo is left stuttering as she raises her eyebrows and stubbornly walks on. With all the bravado of mortification and reluctance, he intrepidly follows.

'Envelope of a Letter' Reviewed in Jane Austen's Regency World

October 2nd, 2006

'Envelope of a Letter' received a brief review in issue 22 of the magazine 'Jane Austen's Regency World', a bi-monthly magazine for (perhaps unsurprisingly..) admirers of the Regency era and of Jane Austen's work.

The review is reproduced below:

Review of 'Envelope of a Letter. Image ©2006 Jane Austen's Regency World

No doubt Laura will be flattered by the comparison of her writing style to that of one of her favourite authors!

Laura's Victorious Short Story To Be Published

September 1st, 2006

Laura has received further recognition for her winning entry in the 2004 Fygleaves Short Story competition with the news that her winning composition 'Whitewash' will be published in an upcoming compilation.

The short story that shot local author Laura Dawn to prominence is being published in an anthology this week.

The publishers of her book, Envelope of a Letter, are releasing a collection of 5 photo stories on 1 September which will include the best entries from the last three years of their competition which challenges writers to link five specified pictures in an imaginative short story of only 1200 words.

Laura's entry in the 2004 competition led to her book being published by Fygleaves, 'authors revealing their leaves to the world'. The story, Whitewash, is centred around the captivity of a political prisoner, and was acclaimed for its combination of descriptive beauty and fast-moving pace.

The anthology, 39 Emergency Exits, will be released on 1 September by organisers 5 Photo Story. Writers in the 2006 challenge had to submit stories linking together an emergency exit, a key, a ladder, a park bench, and a petrol station.

The publishers received submissions from all over the world, including Australia, France, Spain, Greece, and India, and have selected 39 entries for publication, choosing the best-told stories which are the most imaginative in terms of linking the pictures together: "It's amazing what people will come up with" says competition judge and editor of the book JD Stamp. "I am constantly amazed at the wide variety of ways different writers are inspired to link the same five photographs and it is a tribute to the unique power of story-telling."

He says "Ever since the beginning of the competition we have posted the winners and short-listed stories on the internet but I have always felt this doesn't do justice to the wide variety of plots and settings which I am privileged to read as the competition judge - so it feels right that we are now able to publish this compilation. All of the stories are short, and punchy, and we have also included the best stories from the last two years, which are based on different competition pictures, so those are an added bonus."

5photostory is an imprint of Fygleaves Publishing, which specialises in opportunities for previously unpublished writers - authors "revealing their leaves to the world".

Although some of the writers have had stories published in magazines or anthologies before, many of the featured authors are previously unpublished.

Source: Fygleaves