‘The Serial Dater’s Shopping List’ by Morgen Bailey

‘The Serial Dater’s Shopping List’

      31 men in 31 days – what could possibly go wrong?

Isobel MacFarlane is a recently-turned-40 journalist who usually writes a technology column for a newspaper based in Northampton, England, but her somewhat-intimidating boss, William, has set her the task of meeting 31 men, via a local internet dating site, all within a month. Having an active, though fruitless, social life with her friend and ‘Health & Beauty’ colleague Donna, she knows what she wants in a man, so creates a shopping list of dos and don’ts, and starts ticking them off as she meets Mr Could Be Right Except For, Mr Not Bad, Mr Oh My Goodness and Mr Oh So Very Wrong. Follow the ups (there are a few) and downs (there are many) of the dating process and intertwined with her experiences, get to know her colleague and family, including her niece Lola who, apart from being an amazing storyteller, can eat ambidextrously whilst wearing a Princess glove puppet on her right hand, and Baby, William’s non-too-healthy African Grey parrot.

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Excerpt:

I shake my head, attempt a smile and watch him clear the plate. Finally, he picks up the chicken bones and I expect him to eat them whole, but he just licks them clean and drops them back on the plate. He issues another belch, this time apologising as he realises it was loud enough to draw attention to himself, as if the devouring of an African family’s monthly intake wasn’t bad enough. Throughout the whole episode, there’s not been a word of proper chat between us. He’s been too busy eating and I’ve been concentrating on keeping my hotpot down.

As the last morsel of food disappears into the black hole, the waitress heads for our table, I assume to clear the platter away, but she’s holding a plate above her left shoulder. I’m relieved it’s not big enough to be another meal for two, although I wouldn’t put it past him, but more like a standard sized dinner plate. I will it to be nothing I would normally eat, but am sorely disappointed as laid before me is a double helping of, the waitress announces, “homemade Banoffee pie”. I could cry.

I smile less than half-heartedly at the waitress who looks sympathetically at me before retreating to the kitchen, I assume to gossip about Table 14. At the thought of the beautiful dessert being dismembered in such a way, I look at Tim’s eyebrows. I can’t bear to look any further down as his nose is running and it’s close to meeting the barbecue sauce on his upper lip. I’ve finally had enough and blurt out, “I’m sorry, but I’ve just remembered I’ve left my oven on.” But then I recall Duncan’s battle to lose weight and feel guilty, until Tim’s mouth gapes open revealing a mixture of toffee syrup and pastry, which threaten to spill over the edge like a coin cascade at a fair, and I can’t bear to look at him anymore.

As I get up to leave, he splutters a, “so, do you want to meet again?” and I don’t know what to say without hurting his feelings. I mumble a non-committal, “I’ll message you” and almost do a Usain-Bolt-sprint down the stairs.

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Morgen Bailey biography

Based in Northamptonshire, England, Morgen Bailey (“Morgen with an E”) is a prolific blogger, editor / critiquer, tutor, speaker, and podcaster. Chair of two writing groups, she is a freelance author of numerous short stories, novels, articles, and some poetry. Like her, her blog, http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com, is consumed by all things literary. Her email is morgen@morgenbailey.com. 

Blog: http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Morgen-Bailey/e/B007SNIBF8

Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Morgen-Bailey/e/B007SNIBF8

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/morgenbailey

Twitter: https://twitter.com/morgenwriteruk and https://twitter.com/NtonWritingGrps

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/morgenwriteruk / http://www.facebook.com/MorgenBaileyAuthor

Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/5313774.Morgen_Bailey

Morgen’s books: http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com/books-mine

Morgen Bailey talks about blogging

‘To Blog or Not To Blog’
by Morgen Bailey

(this article was previously posted)

A Blog: Why start one?

• You write and want to tell people that you exist;
• Writing blogs are usually read by other writers and readers and it provides you with a community;
• You’d like to invite other writers to take part in your site;
• You want to provide useful information to others;
• You want to sell your writing and you know you need an outlet.

What do you have to say?

• You want to share your writing – put up poems, short stories, novel extracts, non-fiction pieces;
• You’re writing your first novel and want to let others know how you’re doing;
• You surf the net and find articles of interest want to share the links;
• You want to learn about writing so you have guests discussing various topics;
• You have other hobbies, or businesses, you want share with the world.

How often should you post something?

• At least once a week. You don’t have to do what I do and post 3-4 times a day because you’d have no life and really, would you have enough to say? I don’t, which is why I let everyone else to do it for me.
• The advantage of having so many guests involved is that they give me the content and they are always so appreciative of having a platform to share the news about their latest book.

When should you post something?

• Probably without exception, most of your traffic will come from the United States so you’d want to post your items at a time that will catch most viewers. I post a main post at 7am so it catches late night US traffic and pre-work UK traffic then another post writing prompts at 6pm to catch the US lunch-timers and UK evening traffic (but not so late that they won’t get to do the exercises). It also means that most posts are at the top of the home page for at least 11 hours meaning everyone gets a chance to see it. I have menus at the top of the blog so the links to everything I post is accessible. This helps visitors, guests and I get to keep a track of who’s doing what when. It also fits in with my ‘working day’, although I generally schedule items in advance.

Which platform (host) do you choose?

• I have nine WordPress blogs, one Blogspot (Blogger), and a Weebly site. I also build (and maintain) blogs for other writers, so you can guess which one I recommend.

How much does it cost?

• It can cost nothing. To-date I’ve posted over 2,500 items on the mixed blog and 700 interviews on the interview blog and various on other blogs and it’s not cost me a penny. All the WordPress blogs have ‘WordPress’ domain names e.g. http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com, which some authors wouldn’t want. For around $20 a year you can choose your own domain name. I didn’t because by keeping http://morgenbailey.com I have two ways for internet search engine users to find me. I may change this as you can’t put any advertising on the free versions, or you can let WordPress put advertising but it would be their choice. They can (and technically do) that already but I’ve only ever spotted one item on a random (old) post and I can’t even remember what it was for.

Pros and Cons

• PROS: Marketing your books is seen as a necessary evil with self-published authors knowing that they have to do all the work and traditionally published author still have to do the majority because their publishers don’t have the budget to invest. I’ve only had two authors say their publisher does all their marketing but those authors are still active online (Twitter, Facebook etc). It’s part of the ‘job’.
• CONS: Is there a downside to blogging? Not really. If like me, it takes over your life, then that could be seen as a downside time-wise, and it has affected my writing, or lack of it, but it’s been a wonderful experience and I’ve ‘met’ SO many people (authors, editors, agents, publishers, readers) because of it and other than a better balance of blog-time and writing-time, I wouldn’t change a thing.

Do you blog? Which platform (e.g. WordPress or Blogspot) do you use? What do you like or dislike about the blogs you’ve read?

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   about Morgen Bailey 

Based in Northamptonshire, England, Morgen Bailey (“Morgen with an E”) is a prolific blogger, podcaster, editor / critiquer, Chair of NWG (which runs the annual H.E. Bates Short Story Competition), Head Judge for the NLG Flash Fiction Competition and creative writing tutor for her local council. She is also a freelance author of numerous ‘dark and light’ short stories, novels, articles, and very occasional dabbler of poetry. Like her, her blog, http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com, is consumed by all things literary. She is also active on Twitter, Facebook along with many others (listed on her blog’s Contact page).

Main blog: http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Morgen-Bailey/e/B007SNIBF8

Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Morgen-Bailey/e/B007SNIBF8

Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/morgenbailey

Twitter: https://twitter.com/morgenwriteruk and https://twitter.com/NtonWritingGrps

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/morgenwriteruk / http://www.facebook.com/MorgenBaileyAuthor

Pinterest: http://pinterest.com/MorgenBailey

eNewspapers: http://paper.li/morgenwriteruk/1318769216 and http://www.scoop.it/t/morgen-bailey-daily

Forum: http://morgenbailey.freeforums.org

My books: http://morgenbailey.wordpress.com/books-mine

 She also recently created five online writing groups and an interview-only blog. Her debut novel is the chick lit eBook The Serial Dater’s Shopping List and she has six others (mostly crime) in the works. She also has several short story collections and writer’s block workbooks available on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk.