Jane Davitt's Blog - Posts Tagged "hourglass"

Dear Author is doing a book giveaway in August and one of the freebies up to be won today is my book, Hourglass

Full details in the post here

I have a fondness for Hourglass. It's the story of a producer who brings two actors back to make a movie of a cancelled 90s TV show called Hourglass. I added snippets of script from the TV show at the start of each chapter, or articles about the show, so there are three stories going on within the book; the TV series plot, the movie plot and the story of the two actors rekindling their romance.

And really, Steve and Rob, the fictional characters played by Ash and Lee, are as real as the actors because take one step back and look; the actors are characters in a book.

It was a little different for an m/m romance in that the two actors weren't the only POVs in the book; the story has a few chapters from the (straight) producer's POV and I stand by that because Ben is Cupid, Ben is the catalyst. He brought Lee and Ash together in the first place and he's reuniting them now. He's vital.

And Samantha, his daughter, is us. The fans. Because if Hourglass is anything it's a homage to fandom.

I spent the day the last episode of Angel aired in tears. Floods of them. I called the TV station to complain, voice choked with more tears, when they cut the special Grr-Argh from the final episode of Buffy to go to a commercial.

I put all the intensity I feel about shows I love into this book.

This is one of the chapter headings that I wrote pretty much as me with maybe the tip of my tongue in my cheek ;-)

OMGOMGOMG!! They've cancelled it! Hourglass has been cancelled!! I can't -- I'm just gutted. I'm crying here, srsly. I don't know why, the article said something about contractual issues and timeslots and I JUST DON'T CARE!!

We've got to do something. We've got to get them to change their minds. Spread the word on all the lists you can. I'm going to start a petition and find out who to send it to.

I'm just -- no more Steve? No more Rob? EVER? Two more episodes left? And they've already been filmed so God knows where they left it or if we'll ever see them hug the way we've been waiting for.

I just can't deal with this right now.

I mean, I was just at the con last month and there was NOTHING, you know? I got a photo with both of the guys and they were joking around like everything was FINE. Ash even remembered me from the year before and asked after my cat!!!

I'm supposed to be posting another chapter of 'Sands of Time' and I know you guys want to know if Steve finally gets a clue about how Rob feels after what happened with the pie and it was going to get really steamy, I swear, but after this I just can't write a word. Totally blocked.

Why did they cancel it? WHY?

[Post made on a Yahoo list 'Hourglasses and Egg Timers' in April 2000]

Way back in the day, I wrote Hourglass and when I got the rights back, I revised it and Loose Id are publishing it at the end of the month. And here's the cover!

It's by Syneca Featherstone and it's perfect for this story, set a decade ago and featuring a 90s TV show I so want to watch, being made into a movie.

Hope you like Ash, Lee, and their producer and Cupid, Ben.

Get it at Amazon for $3.98

or from Loose Id at $3.99

When Ben Adler gives in and grants his young daughter's wish, making a movie out of a TV show he used to produce, he knows he's going to have big problems. One of the leads from the original is a big star now, but the other's vanished into obscurity, leading a life far from the glitz and glamour of Hollywood.

Ben can also still remember how the two actors' scorching off-screen romance went up in flames. Undeterred, Ben goes forward with the project, recruiting Ash and Lee by dangling very attractive carrots before them.

The cameras start to roll, but the main action takes place off set. It's never easy to work with an old flame, or to handle the emotions that are bound to surface, but as two men who could never get enough of each other deal with a rekindled attraction, they discover that when it comes to love, there's always time for a retake.


Note: This book was previously released by another publisher, and has been re-edited and revised

When I wrote Hourglass in 2010, I dedicated it to my oldest daughter, Eleanor, because Lauren was too young to care. Now, with the reissue of the book, revised and tweaked, I changed the dedication to include them both:

Dedicated to my daughters, Eleanor and Lauren, who share Samantha's regret that their favorite shows have to end.

Hourglass is born out of my fierce, abiding love for fandom. It's where my writing career began, it's what sparked the realization I could write. It's the story of a young girl discovering a dusty show, cancelled early, and demanding it be brought back to life. Samantha's too young to grasp the human cost to granting her wish, and the financial aspect isn't important; her dad owns the rights, after all.

She wants more. Any Firefly fan would understand. And so do my daughters. I've shared their grief when shows they loved were taken off the air. Hell, the night the last episode of Angel aired, I cried from dawn to midnight and that's not hyperbole. I went to sleep on a tear-soaked pillow.

So though Hourglass is a romance, it's more than the love story of Ash and Lee. It's a love of the story itself. Any story.

When I wrote Hourglass one of the bits I enjoyed the most was the chapter headings. I used snippets of scripts from the TV show and movie the characters star in and other stuff. Like this:

The set of the new hit show Hourglass is a busy hive of activity, but the two stars of the show, Ash Morden, known to viewers as the idealistic young lawyer on the popular drama Crimes of Passion, and Lee Simons, in his first major role, kindly agreed to be interviewed for Star Chat during a break in filming the season one finale—and no, I'm not giving away any spoilers, folks.

I asked handsome blond Ash how it felt to be the star after so many supporting roles, and he looked at me with a twinkle in his eyes. (And yes, ladies, they're as blue as they look on screen!)

"Patty, every role, every character I play, is a star in their minds, the star of the show that is their life. I try to portray that."

"So what you're saying is that you don't mind how big or small the role is, because you can still make it your own?"

He smiled at me, and I'll admit my heart skipped a beat. His character, Steve York, is a rich businessman with a playboy streak who gets a social conscience—and a new girl every week—and it's no secret that Morden is a ladies' man himself, seen in all the right places with a string of models and movie stars. "That's exactly it, Patty."

I turned to the young man fans are swooning over and asked this rising star how being discovered by Ben Adler has changed his life. Pushing back his riot of curly hair (it's rumored those brown locks have a section in his contract) he looks at me with eyes two shades lighter than the hair and smiles. It's like being hit by a searchlight.

"Ever won the lottery?"

I tell him that if I had, I wouldn't be here talking to them, I'd be on a beach in Hawaii, and they laugh, exchanging warmly friendly glances, an easy camaraderie already evident between them.

[Extract from Star Chat April 1999 issue]