Hey, everyone!

I felt like I needed some way to stay in touch with all of you after the madness that was FanLit!

I’m gearing up to try NaNoWriMo for the first time, and I’m looking forward to seeing many of you over there in the AFL Nano’ers group.

I suppose for my first blog post, it might be mildly interesting to share how I adopted this name, “Tessa Dare.” The day I learned about FanLit was September 16, the Saturday before submissions closed for Round 1. I read about the contest in a nifty WSJ article that featured our very own ErvinA. The article was passed on to me through a group of friends I’ve made in the Jane Austen fandom. On the recommendation of the same friends, I had just started reading Middlemarch by George Eliot – one of the many classics I am embarrassed to admit I have not read.

So there I was, reading the Prologue and chapter 1 of Middlemarch, in which the heroine, Dorothea Brooke, is introduced and her fascination with mystic and writer St. Teresa de Avila is mentioned. I put down the book, checked my email, read the WSJ article, and logged on to FanLit immediately. I was so enraptured with the beginning of Middlemarch, I almost chose Dorothea as my screen name – but I decided it sounded a bit old. So I took my inspiration from St. Teresa (who has always fascinated me, as well) and changed it … Read More »