Days Go By

So the title for Days Go By came from a Delta Goodrem song. Yes, we all know I love Delta. This song was never on an album, but it was actually chosen to use as the winner's single for.... I think Norwegian Idol or whatever it was called (the Norway version of American Idol).

I really love this song because it's so happy. And I thought the lyrics were appropriate for the sentiment of this story.

"Days go by and you're still by my side

With all we've been through you're the one thing that's true in my life

Days go by, as sure as the sun will rise

Being together we only get better with time

As days go by"

And the line "Making together forever one day at a time".

Elphaba's wedding dress in THE BEGINNING OF FOREVER

Ok, here is Elphaba's wedding dress and other related photos from The Beginning of Forever .

Pretty :D

Elphaba's headpiece thingy. Yep, thingy.

Galinda and Nessa's bridesmaids' dresses

Just a few things of interest

The first thing is that I made this the other night after the mind-blowing reaction to chapter 39 of Come What May.

A politer way of saying "chill the hell out" ;)

Also, some of you who follow me on twitter may remember (The Resident Artichoke already mentioned it!) that I posted this photo on twitter as I was writing the last chapter of CWM, and some people.... kinda freaked out:

The sentence written here may not actually exist

Um... yeah. I wrote that as a joke and tweeted it to mess with everyone's heads. Just to make you think there may not be a happy ending this time. Of course there is though.


The other thing is that during the week I was interviewed by Dimple for her series of "Wicked Interviews" basically where other fanfic authors are interviewed and then the author writes a one-shot at the end of the chapter.

You can check out my interview and one-shot here and review it!

Message for all Come What May readers

So, I was going to wait until I finished posting the story to put this up, but I am impatient. So, from me to all of you- this is for you.

And yeah, I'm in my PJ's and dressing gown. I was tired and cold.

Books

So, I wanted to just put this up for everyone who read chapter 22 of Come What May. Because, yes this book does exist.

You know what else is fun? Sticking pins in your eyes. 

And while we're on the subject of books, I thought I'd share this. So, I took this photo a month ago when I was in Melbourne. I had had about 4 hours sleep, and I was exhausted and killing time at the airport. From a distance, in my sleep deprived state, I saw this book and thought the title said 'Killing Frex'

I can think of many people who would actually read a book about the murder of Frex. LOL. Hmm... fanfic?

Come What May

I'm actually really nervous about this story. This (and the next one I'm writing) are the most nervous I've ever been about a story. The next one is just because it has topics that I'm sure will be very unpopular with Fiyeraba readers. To be honest, I'm even like "oh, I don't want this to happen", but it's such a good story and the idea came to me so clearly... I can't not write it.

I've been nervous about Come What May because... well, it's so different than anything I've ever written so far or anything that I've ever seen on the site.

I guess the main reasons I'm nervous, is because... this subject is a sensitive subject. To a lot of people. Including me, long-time readers (especially those who read Out of the Blue and Three Leaps Ahead) will know my grandfather died of cancer during the posting of that story.

I also spoke to a lot of people about the logistics of the story. Given that this is Oz, and Oz has magic... I wasn't sure. I figured there was no reason cancer couldn't exist in Oz- it's just bad cells. Oz doesn't change their biology. They're still human, still made of cells despite living in a land where magic exists. But we (me and a few select friends) decided that all that would change was the way cancer would be treated. I couldn't do chemo, because chemo didn't exist until the 1950s. So we did the Oz equivalent... with pretty much the same side effects. I don't believe that magic is a simple fix for every problem. Cancer? Do this spell/take this potion and you're all cured. I didn't want to do that.

I chose Hodgkin's Lymphoma for 2 reasons. One, it is the cancer I had the most knowledge of, being that 10 years ago in 2003, Delta Goodrem (Australia singer and one of my idols) was diagnosed with the cancer. She fought it and is now in remission. One of my mother's best friend has fought Hodgkin's lymphoma twice and survived both times. (The first time I was like 5 and I don't really remember it. The second time was a few years ago). And the second reason is that (according to the internet) lymphoma is the most common cancer diagnosed in young women. It's also (again, according to the internet) one of the most easily treatable cancers.

I had the idea in June 2012.

The number of ideas I get near midnight, usually when I'm trying to fall asleep is ridiculous.

OK, so I might be slightly vindictive... it's not that I get pleasure from your pain. Really. 

 So before and during the writing process, I did a lot of research, as I try and do with any topic I write about. I have 52 websites bookmarked in a folder. Websites, blogs, articles, anything I could find. And do you know what I found? The terminology on so many of these sites, or trying to find answers.... it's a good thing they have cancer forums where you can talk to other people going through it, because so many sites I found either don't have the information you want or have it written in complicated terminology.

Seriously, if I had been actually diagnosed with cancer and looking for information to explain it all to me, the forums or a really great doctor who could explain everything in layman's terms would be my best hope;  because the internet kinda sucks in that regard.

But there was something else I noticed. To try and get the full understanding of the experience of fighting cancer, I also read a lot of books, watched a lot of films and TV shows... basically anything I could find. And what I noticed is that every time in film or literature that a character had cancer, they were nearly always terminal and/or died. If you want a character to survive cancer, TV might be your best shot. Which I find quite ridiculous, actually.
Again, if you had cancer or had a family member or friend who did, it would just depress you and not give you any hope at all. I get that having the character be terminal or die adds is more dramatic, but is that the message you want to send?

I know how many people die of cancer each year, and it's this stuff that brings awareness... but just as many people survive cancer each year (OK, I don't know if its "just as many" but it is a lot. Maybe its more?).

I'm not going to claim I got everything 100% exactly right with the medical stuff, due to the first point I raised about how hard it was to get and understand some information. But I've tried really hard, and I've done a lot of research. The only thing I took a bit of liberty with was the time frame with the diagnosis and tests results, because in real life... that could take weeks or months. But at the same time, it's not instant or magic, it's probably more like how TV medical shows do it.

There were very few films/books/etc things I found where they had someone survive cancer. TV had a few instances, so TV execs can have the drama without actually losing a character.

I don't really know what my point is here, but I just wanted to let you know that I didn't write this story lightly, and I hope I've done it justice.