`The Work`s`-A Writer`s Heaven
Okay so a few weeks ago I was browsing in `The Works`, a shop that sells lots of bits and bobs from craft products to sweets and books. I tend to spend quite a lot of time in there browsing the books, probably more than I do WHSmiths, maybe because they`re cheaper. No offence to WHSmiths because I love you all the same but there`s something about The Works that I love.
Anyway this not so particular day I was browsing the book shelves and the cover of a book called `From Notting Hill with Love..Actually` caught my eye.
You can probably see why looking at the cover. I picked it up and read the blurb and completely fell in love. For those who know me you will probably say that book pretty much summed me up purely from the first sentence.
"Scarlett loves the movies – they’re just so much more exciting and romantic than her own mundane life mending popcorn machines and living with her DIY obsessed fiancé David. So when everyone keeps telling her she needs to stop day-dreaming her life away in Johnny Depp & Brad Pitt’s arms, and settle down and get on with real life, Scarlett decides to prove them all wrong.
When she’s given the chance to house-sit in Notting Hill for a month, Scarlett thinks this will be her ideal opportunity to prove her family wrong about the movies. But she quickly finds the real Notting Hill is nothing like the celluloid version, and after she meets her new neighbour - the cool, confident, but movie-hating Sean, Scarlett starts to realise this challenge might be trickier than she first thought.
Every day Scarlett tries - usually unsuccessfully - to place herself in as many movie scenes as she can. But it’s when she’s least expecting it that she finds a link to one of her favourites…and it’s then that she discovers so much more than the fairytale ending she’s always dreamed of."
Take Me Back to the 1920s
So yeah, needless to say I picked it up and bought it along with two other books `Manhatten` a story about three girls living in the city of New York and `A Paris Wife` a book I had been looking at and kept going back to everytime I went into `The Works` about a women who falls in love with 1920s author Ernest Heminghway. Now since I watched Midnight in Paris, all those months ago, before that infact, probably since the end of primary school when I first watched Bugsy Malone i`ve loved the 1920s period. I swear I was sometimes born in the wrong time period, my tweets amonst those fangirling ones about how hot I think Tom Hiddleston is are mainly about how I wish someone could just take me back the 1920s. There`s something about that period I love. Maybe the clothes, the music, the city of Paris especially just appeals.
Anyway I`m getting back off track again, I apoloigse.
`From Notting Hill with Love..Actually` A Film Fan`s Dream
The next day I sat on the sofa reasonably earlier that morning with a hot chocolate and the first book in my pile I just bought. `From Notting Hill with Love..Actually` let me tell you from that first page I was hooked. I couldn`t put it down. I think the only times I put it down were to go to the loo and then when I ate dinner. It was so gripping and so good and my type of story and the characters and plot were so belivable and so like myself that I wanted to keep reading and find out what happened next.
I think it was pretty ironic that it mentioned references to loads of my favourtie movies, the obvious Notting Hill and Love Actually(hence the book title), Brief Encounter, Sleepless in Seatle. The list goes on. Also featuring some of my favourtite actors and actress, Julia Roberts and Hugh Grant, Kate Winslet and Johnny Depp and Keira Knightley.
I got so excited everytime I read a reference that mum asked me if I was sure I didnt write it. I wish I thought. It was a book I could really relate to. It really was such a good book, especially as by midnight that night I had finished it and come to the end of Scarlett`s adventure. I was kind of sad to see it end but I recently found out there was a sequel called `From Notting Hill to New York..Actually` which again I think will be up my street especially as it features the same characters and in one of my favourite cities I LONG to visit New York! which I ordered yesterday and should be with me on Valentine`s Day! I know how I plan on spending my Valentine`s Day, after hopefully seeing the re release of Moulin Rouge ofcourse.
The love of Twitter!
Twitter. Some people love it, some people hate it and can`t seem to get on with it. Twitter is just like the social networking site substitute for Marmite. I personally love it. Both Twitter and Marmite that is. Although I like my toast covered in Marmite and my Twitter in photos of Tom Hiddleston and a fangirl mess of Pixie Lott and Downton Abbey.
Twitter isn`t just for fangirling however, it is also for interacting with celebrities of your favourite TV shows and films. I have been very lucky on the numerous occasion of getting countless tweets from the cast of Downton Abbey including one that wished me luck on a presentation I did about the show for a college assignment.
It can also be helpful in making contacts and speaking to people within the industry you wish to work in. Amongst the fans of Tom Hiddleston(Hiddlestoners), Pixie Lott(Crazy Cats) and Downton Abbey(Downtonians) I also follow people related to the industry(s) I wish to work in. In my case journalists and authors who I sometimes tweet and ask advice from about how to get into the industries.
Only after reading `The I Heart Series` by Lindsey Keilk did I realise that famous authors who are published had Twitter accounts too. I followed her and got some lovely tweets from her about how she began writing etc which was lovely.
Since reading `From Notting Hill with Love..Actually` a few weeks back I realised that the author of such an amazing book Ali McNamara was infact on Twitter too. I immediately followed her and tweeted her throughout whilst reading the book and again once I finished to give her my final verdict about how amazing it was and how much I related and loved the character of Scarlett.
She was very sweet and replied to me quite a few times after I asked a few questions about writing etc. I asked her how she got in to writing and she replied telling me to look at her blog and website where I would find everything about her-which I did and have been doing for the past 4 hours.
You Never Know Where Fanfiction Will Take You
I found out that she began writing fanfictions on Ronan Keating`s official website which I found quite ironic considering I write fanfiction myself, of the Tom Hiddleston kind however which people seem to enjoy, especially a specific fanfiction called one `Moving House` which was the first fanfiction I ever wrote and am still writing. Out of the many one shots and other chapter fics I`ve written that one has had the most praise and loveliest comments and is probably the one i`m most proud of and one I can relate to most, especially as it is completely autiobiographical and completely based on me-like most of my characters are.
Ali McNamara`s blog posts about how she got started with writing and when she found out `From Notting Hill with Love...Actually was going to be published can be found below:
What with the release of the popular franchise The Fify Shades Triology which was orginally based on a Twilight Fanfiction you really never know where fanfiction can or will take you. It can take you to the extrodinary place of one day possibly being published or the other about the actor you`re writing about being very freaked out(which is what I think Tom would be if he ever found mine, or any of the other fanfiction written about him).
Anyway, I guess from this post what I`m saying is you never know where any writing, even fanfiction can take you. I look forward to seeing where my writing, fanfiction or not, will take me in the future.
For those who have been inspired by this post or want to check out the books by Ali McNamara or find out more about her and her stories you can either check out her website http://www.alimcnamara.co.uk/ or follow her on Twitter @AliMcNamara
Also if you wanted to follow me on Twitter or get in contact with me you can at @PontinEmily or email me at emily.p@hotmail.co.uk
Thankyou
Emily
<3
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