Writing Through the Night

Four Years of Fan Fiction

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

On this day, every year, I post some stats about fan fiction I’ve written; today being July 28th – exactly four years since I started writing it. You can view my stats for 2016 here, and 2015 here.

When I started, it was only Buffy fanfic, and it was only posted in a single place: Elysian Fields. After a year, I started sharing work to FanFiction.net and dipping my toe into other fandoms, also. Last year I decided to re-edit my back catalogue and stick it all up on Archive of Our Own. That is still a work in progress, as you’ll see below.

Total Words Written: 320,000
Words Posted to AO3: 100,000

On EF, I have left over 1,000 reviews totalling 50,000 words, and 84 people have favourited me.

130 people have favourited me on FF, and I’ve left 150 reviews there.
Total views to my FF profile page: over 10,000.

I have almost 500 ‘Kudos’ on AO3. Hits are over 12,000, subscriptions over 100, and 69 bookmarks (honestly, I don’t really know the difference between subscriptions and bookmarks, but I post the details here for reference anyway).

I’m not even going to begin trying to count how many reviews I’ve received, because it was in the thousands last year and it took me forever to total. Needless to say, though, I’m feeling pretty pleased with what I’ve accomplished.

All of the Thoughts

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

I feel seventeen again, and not in a good way.

I’m feeling like I was last September, when the poems were running out of me like blood and my mind was lost in space.

…and it’s all in my head, I think about it over and over again

I can’t stop thinking in song lyrics. Can’t stop thinking.

There’s so much more I want to say about Chester, but I don’t know where to start.

I may not get over this. I mean, Linkin Park have been with me 15+ years. Over half my life.

I may not still be living without them. How do I start to get my head around that?

wake me up, when September ends

Chester

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

I am devastated. That’s not hyperbole. Not an exaggeration. The death of Chester Bennington has rocked me. I’ve spent the last couple of hours crying.

Every so often a celebrity dies and there is public outcry. Often, a small portion of the population consider such reactions to be ridiculous, as if celebrities don’t count as real people, or as if someone can’t be crushed when someone they’ve never met passes on. Thankfully, most people aren’t as stupid as all that and know that music is one of the most powerful things on the planet and that, through it, singers and songwriters can touch you, and change your life.

Linkin Park changed my life. Again, I don’t care if you just read that as dramatic or whatever. Truly, the music they made saved my life and made it bearable. They have been my favourite band since I first heard them, in my early teens. Along with Buffy, they helped me through such intense highs and lows that are beyond words.

It cost me an absolute fortune, but I got to see the band live when they headlined Download a few years ago. I went on my own, and I sang my heart out, and I didn’t give a shit how it looked. I will treasure that experience for the rest of my life (even if I am kicking myself that I didn’t take any pictures).

I’ve spoken on here in the past about my checkered history with mental health. Many of you reading this will, I’m sure, understand what I’m feeling right now. Part of me is angry that a life is gone, but I know exactly what it’s like to just… not be able to continue.

For those of you with me, let me share some words that have come to mean the world to me:

Weep not for roads untraveled, weep not for sights unseen. May your love never end, and if you need a friend, there’s a seat here alongside me.

The Evolution and Extinction of Ellie Rose Writing Services

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

As I’m sure many of you reading this blog will know, I used to offer a range of writing-related services as a business. That business started in 2013 and, as of last month, has now ended.

It took me a long time to see it, but I was overstretching myself, and my mental health was paying the price.

Going forward, I’m feeling confident that I have a clear idea of where I’m headed and how to get there.

I’m still self-employed and that still consists of client work, but it is exclusively for writers and writing based organisations, now. The work is going to be carried out under the simple business banner of ‘Ellie Rose McKee, Author’ because, this time around, I’m not going to lose focus of the main strand of my career, which is writing for myself.

My main client at the minute is the John O’Connor Writing School, and I’ve just accepted the post of Project Support Officer with Women Aloud NI.

So, even though Ellie Rose Writing Services is no more, this is not a sad blog post for me to write. I was updating my CV just before writing this, looking over the testimonials I have received, and I’m damn proud of myself and everything I’ve achieved.

Onward and upward, as they say!

Dyspraxic Life

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

So, I was in the middle of writing some fan fiction towards my Camp NaNoWriMo goal, mug in hand, when I accidentally tipped the mug too much the wrong way and spilt a good portion of the contents over myself.

Ouch.

I know that’s not particularly noteworthy – especially when you’re me, a person who does such things several times a day. But what happened next was that I went online to complain about my clumsy self to Twitter, using the hashtag ‘Dyspraxic Life’ – I had to actually google the word Dyspraxic to remember how to spell it.

Having had the affliction for quite some time (or, I suppose, having had it for my entire life, and being aware that it had a name for a good few years), I’ve researched it before. I know the basic symptoms (particularly the clumsiness), so I wasn’t intending to actually find out about the disorder in my searching for it.

I did stumble upon a link, however. This here piece about Dyspraxia in Adults. I clicked it out of curiosity and, wow. I’m actually sat here stunned.

Never before have I seen such an extensive list of symptoms, and never before have I been summed up so accurately in a single document. It says at the bottom that “not even the most severe case will have all the above characteristics” but there are literally only one or two on the list that don’t personally apply.

I had no idea that my disorder affected me in so many ways. To those who know me, I really recommend reading the list. It’s a startling insight into my inner self.

Six Months of Books

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

Now that half the year is gone, it really is high time I got around to summarising everything I’ve been reading. I set myself the goal of fifty books this year, and I’m very pleased (not to mention surprised) that I’m well ahead of target with thirty-seven already down (74% of target, 13 books ahead of schedule).

Here is a breakdown of those thirty-seven books:

Poetry

Through a Hedge Backwards by Rene Greig, Reflections from the Enler by Alex Dempster, The Orchard by Isobel Gamble, The World’s Wife and Feminine Gospels by Carol Ann Duffy, Famous American Poems edited by Gene Baro, The Goose Tree by Moyra Donaldson, Undying by Michel Faber, Crow by Ted Hughes, and Stranger Baby by Emily Berry.

Audiobooks in the Dresden Files Series

Turn Coat, Changes, Ghost Story, Cold Days, Skin Game, and Side Jobs all by Jim Butcher.

Young Adult Novels

No Life But This and Spinning Thorns by Anna Sheehan, Terror Kid by Benjamin Zephaniah, Among the Ghosts by Amber Benson, Simon vs the Homosapien Agenda by Becky Albertalli, Life and Death by Stephanie Myer, The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, and Inish Carraig by Jo Zebedee (audiobook)

Adult Novels

Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austin (audio), As You Like It by Shakespeare (audio), Where Three Roads Meet by Salley Vickers, and The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins.

Non-Fiction

Where Am I Now? by Mara Wilson, Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert (audio), The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a F*ck and Get Your Sh*t Together by Sarah Knight (audio).

Novelty/Gift Books

In the Garden of Happiness by Dodinsky, Doug the Pug by Leslie Mosier, and Inside HBO’s Game of Thrones by Bryan Cogman.

Other

The Female Line edited by Ruth Carr (poetry and short stories), and a novel-length fanfic.

*sighs a deep, contented breath* What have you guys been reading?

Want even more stats? Follow me on Goodreads here.

Desire (for National Flash Fiction Day)

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

It’s National Flash Fiction Day here, in the UK.

To celebrate the occasion, I present to you a super short story of mine, entitled Desire.

Janet licked her lips. Her eyes glazed over as she looked through the window at her soulmate. She’d been sure it was meant to be from the moment she saw the advert online.

Taking a quick moment to preen at her reflection, she stepped into the café, ready to meet her destiny. Bravely, she approached the counter, practically salivating at the shop girl before her. Everything Janet wanted was within reach.

Until, suddenly, someone jumped the queue and took the last doughnut out from right under her nose.

On Pride

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

June is pride month – a month-long celebration of everything LGBT – and today is exactly one year from when I came out.

I thought I would reflect on that but, here’s the thing… I’m not sure I’m properly “out” – if there even is such a state of being. (I’ve heard other LGBTQA+ people talk about how you don’t come out just once, but lots of times, as you meet and interact with new people.)

My “coming out” was in the form of the blog post I linked above. It’s a disjointed, rambly thing that I hope got my point across, but I’m not 100% convinced that it did.

At the time, I was incredibly nervous to post it. It felt monumental for me, and it was (purely for the fact of how I felt about it), but looking back at it now, I’m not sure it was clear enough. The detail I go into about my religious upbringing accounts for that.

Putting the “I’m pansexual” declaration up on my blog was, as well as being terrifying, a very liberating experience for myself. Perhaps only for myself, though. Outside of people who have read it, I’m not sure anyone knows about my sexual orientation. I’m fairly certain my family don’t, hence me wondering if I am indeed truly out.

Part of me feels like it doesn’t matter if people know or not – in a sense, it does, while in other ways it doesn’t matter at all. Like, why should who I find attractive matter to anyone? Especially since I’m in a secure, monogamous relationship. Relatively speaking, it’s a small part of who I am.

Yet I know the importance of representation. I’m sure there are young (and old!) gay and lesbian people out there who haven’t been able to tell people about their identity, who find heart in stories of other’s bravery. And I think it’s important to stand up and be counted as a member of the community. It’s important for the people who run the country to be aware of how vast the community is so they’re better able to represent it.

Regardless of who knows and who doesn’t and whether that matters or not, I can only speak of my own personal experience and feelings on the matter. One thing I can say objectively is that, no less than two years ago, the idea of attending a pride parade filled me with a sense of dread, whereas now I actually know what it means to have pride in that aspect of myself. For me, love won.

Readings at the Belfast Book Festival 2017

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

With this year’s Belfast Book Festival in full swing, I’m sure you’ve seen event news all over social media. It’s been fabulous, and I’m here to add to the deluge!

I’ve been to two events so far – the Tools for Solidarity poetry competition awards ceremony (in which I received a booklet with one of my poems in) and the Poetry NI annual slam (which I entered).

Two events still to come that I’m involved with are the Crescent Writers Read event on Wednesday (which is FREE!) and the Women Aloud NI readathon and mass reading on Saturday (the range and magnitude of which I’m very excited about).

Also on Saturday, the wonderful Claire Savage launches her first book – Magical Masquerade. I’m planning to get to that, too.

On Book to Movie Adaptions

Posted on by Ellie Rose McKee

I’m not a particularly fast reader. Maybe that’s down to my dyslexia, maybe not, but whatever the reason, the fact stands. Books over 300 pages make me nervous because I know they’ll likely take me forever to get though.

Now, that said, I just finished The Girl on the Train. I finished it in like three days, and it’s 400 pages. So, it’s fair to say I loved it. Fantasic page-turner and highly accessible. It got five stars from me.

Originally, I started reading it in way back in October last year. I devoured the first section (thirty or so pages) and was instantly gripped. I loved the writing even more then than I did when I restarted it a couple of days ago.

But why did I stop and take several months to go back to it? You might be wondering. Well, put simply, I watched the movie adaption.

Don’t get me wrong – I enjoyed the movie adaption. It gripped me, too. And I thought it would, which is why I chose to go see it. Some people refuse to see adaptions before reading the book they’re based on, and I understand why, but not me.

Experience has taught me that if I see the movie after I read the book, I will hate the film. The casting will be completely unpalatable because of how I’ve imagined the characters in my head, and I won’t be able to get past it. I know a lot of people have the reverse reaction, but reading the book after seeing the movie has never proved to be a problem for me before.

In fact, when I read The Perks of Being a Wallflower after seeing the film I actually think knowing the story in advance improved my experience. If I hadn’t known where the story was headed, I may have felt bored and frustrated with the slow start.

Anyway, back to the Girl on the Train. As I’ve already said, I enjoyed the movie and loved the book. So what’s the problem? Well, it’s not really a problem, exactly, it’s just that, for the first time, I felt that knowing all the twists and turns in advance did dull the experience for me, if only a little. I still loved it, but I think I could have loved it more. And yes, I probably would have disliked the movie had I not watched it first, but perhaps my heightened enjoyment of the book would have been worth that sacrifice.