What I learnt about writing from writing Pride & Princesses...

Pride and Princesses was the sixth novel I began and the first novel I wrote for young adults. I learnt that I found it hard to be a good reader whilst I was writing my own stories, and I missed reading other people's published works. Like many writers, I have read since I was small (avidly). I think the first story I remember reading was Charlotte's Web (I loved it) then A Little Princess (also big love). I learnt that it is very difficult to concentrate on writing your own work whilst reading other people's. This could fill a very long post...but I'm gonna keep it short-ish. What I know about writing is that your writing is unique...no one else wrote the exact words in the same order to create the story, so only you could tell the story the way you told it...and there is some real satisfaction in creativity! The process can be so taken over by business and the pressure to find an agent and publisher, but it should never stop you doing what you love...putting words on the page in your unique voice. 

Pride & Princesses: Ballet Shoes Cover

PRIDE & PRINCESSES is a teen romance set in a Los Angeles High School, a mix of Pride & Prejudice meets Emma.

Pride & Princesses (original first page)

There were a few different versions of  'the first page...' This is one of them. Thanks to my twitter readers who have sent me messages. You are all wonderful & ah-mazing! Now, if only I could work out how to add friends to my blog...

The original first page, it changed in subsequent drafts…

Chapter 1

Arrivals

    The day Mark Knightly transferred to Sunrise High from some snooty boarding school in England was the day Mouche and I began the Boy-Rating Diaries. They weren’t written in the traditional manner although they started that way. We wrote our thoughts on pink notepaper and used a feathered pen popular with countless teenage girls from previous generations. Suddenly, the secret diary became a blog that ended up as a how-to-guide to dating within the hallowed halls of our Performing Arts School. We went from social wallflowers to social winners in under a month all because our fantasy men walked the halls one surprising day in September and stopped to ask my best friend Mouche directions to  home room. ‘And not a minute too soon,’ Mouche noted, ‘I was beginning to think high school could only be fun in movies.’

    It was our junior year and from the instant we took Mark’s photo, blogged and tagged him, the meanest girls in school, Teegan, Freya, Brooke and Tory (the Princesses), sat up and started to take notice of all the great advice we shared about boys in our weekly column, The Sunrise High Newsfest. Of course, Mouche (pronounced in the French way – Moosh) never really planned to let love into the picture but that was before Mark Knightly entered our world and we hit on the idea of dating twelve different boys, one for each month.

    Mark was the first month, his friend Jet the next. Thoughts of them filled our every waking moment but that’s not what I’m meant to say and certainly not how it seemed to others at the time. Neither Mouche nor I realized that the start of the new school year would result in us both scribbling ‘I heart Mark’ and ‘I heart Jet’ in the spaces of our play scripts. But I digress.

Dressing up

After drying off and embracing sobriety and dressing up in 1920’s outfits we’d worn in last year’s version of Guys and Dolls, we collapsed in a corner after dancing to retro music and resumed our discussion about the perfect junior year.

The Princesses

From Pride & Princesses by Summer Day

As I told you, Mouche and I had lain low as transfer students and couldn’t believe how unlucky we were when Teegan, Freya, Brooke and Tory were expelled soon after we were politely shown the door at the Los Angeles High School for Young Bitches. Oh, did I say bitches? I meant young ladies. The Princesses were fairly considered to be the most evil teenage girls Sunrise had ever produced; two sets of non-identical twins with plans to take over their new school, safe in the belief that since their fathers owned half of Sunrise, the school was theirs for the taking.

Shop or Store

Oh, that’s something else you should know about me. I was born in England and sometimes I use British-isms like ‘tidy’ and ‘lolly’ and ‘shop’ instead of store.

Uggs

    ‘It’s true, this place is a mess, but at least I remembered to stack the cupboards with fresh food from the market,’ I said, as Mouche and I grabbed our sweaters and pulled on our Uggs  in differing shades of caramel and pink...

Summer Day: PRIDE & PRINCESSES Chapter 3 Girl History

Summer Day: PRIDE & PRINCESSES Chapter 3 Girl History