So there it is, the end of Game of Thrones. We sat through 73 episodes over the course of 8 years to watch the journey of the Starks, Lannisters, and Targaryens as they fought and schemed for ruling power over the 7 Kingdoms. Masterminded through a story by George RR Martin and presented to us by Showrunners D.B. Weiss and David Benioff, GoT has easily been one of the most ambitious shows to grace our small screens. And now it’s over.

However, I’m not here to talk about the ending of the show. Though I will say I think it ended exactly as it should have. Did anyone really want to see a happy ending with Daenerys sitting on the throne? More so, did everyone really expect there to not be a twist from expectation? It’s what GoT does. From the moment they lopped off Ned Stark’s head, it was kind of obvious this was a show that would not follow expectation.

I’m writing this more as a commentary on creative rights and to answer the question: as consumers, do we, the viewing public, have any right over how a story should be told? The answer, to the disappointment of at least a million people, is absolutely f*cking not. We don’t have the right to say ‘this is how the show should end’. By all means, make assumptions, tell people how you think it should end, and what should happen because a good story should spark discussion. But at no point does Chad from Florida get to say ‘well, Daenerys should be allowed to sit on the throne and rule it all . . . make it so!’. Let me rephrase, he can say it all he wants, but at no point is it going to happen.

​Stories are dictated by creators, and for better or worse, those stories may not match up to your ideal conclusion. This appears to be the case with Game of Thrones for a lot of people. So much so that before the show finished, a petition was started to ‘do-over’ season 8. That petition has over a million signatures. That’s a lot of Chad’s from Florida who were very upset that their vision was not realized.

As viewing public we can control certain things. We can control whether we watch or don’t watch. We can choose to invest time into the characters and the story, or we can choose to watch something else. Whether we’re happy about the outcome or not, it won’t change the ending because we do not have creative control and that is perfectly alright. If we lived in a world where we got everything we wanted, it would be a miserable unrealistic world. Endings are not always what we want them to be. Dexter, Lost, Seinfeld, True Blood, X-Files, Heroes . . . all had endings that most people didn’t think were good enough. But why exactly do we think we deserve to say ‘we want it re-made’?

​We can give an episode a negative review, and that’s fine. Maybe it didn’t resonate with you, maybe it failed your expectations, and maybe you, Chad, want to share how upset you are about it all. That’s okay. That’s why we have the internet (that and to watch cute puppy/kitty videos and order our groceries online). But to ask that an entire season be re-made because you’re not happy about it is possibly the most rude and disrespectful thing you can say (read Misery by Stephen King for additional context). The showrunners, cast, crew, writers, producers, HBO, and everyone else involved with the creation of this show deserve better than a bunch of Chads sitting in front of their computer or on the their phone and demanding that they re-do the show they’ve worked tirelessly at for 8 years.

Counter-argument from Chad - “If I order a steak at a restaurant and it isn’t cooked to my satisfaction, I’ll send it back!” Solid point Chad, thanks for joining the convo. However, you steak didn’t cost several million dollars and thousands of people around the world didn’t spend months creating your steak. Thanks, Chad, go back to your oddly-colorer furniture and your pet chinchilla (probably called Drogon).

As an author and a creative person, I’m happy to accept negative reviews. Stories are subjective and you can never please everyone. However, if someone told me to re-write a story to suit them I’d just laugh, and laugh, and laugh, because it’s my story, and not theirs. I hope they’ll come along for the ride, I hope they’ll enjoy it, I hope they might even learn something. But it’s still my story and creators of any type shouldn’t have to bend their imagination to suit the wills of others.

So get over yourself, Chad. Game of Thrones Season 8 will never be re-made and it’s even less likely that Martin will bother finishing the final book(s). Love or hate the ending, try and appreciate the amount of hard work and dedication that went into the creation of the books, and the transition of those books from page to screen. It’s no easy feat, and it should be applauded, not dragged through the mud by opinionated audiences who think they know better.

​Now . . . bring on the new Lord of the Rings TV Show so we can complain about something else.

​I was considering my journey so far and one thing popped into my head that I hadn't thought about in a long time, and that was my first ever rejection. If had known then what I know now perhaps my writing journey might have been very different.

It was 1996 and I had just been discharged from the Royal Navy with a broken back. I decided to try and write a novel. I'd spent most of my life reading, especially at sea, and I had always wondered what it would feel like to see my name on the cover of a book. I never thought it would happen, after all I'd been a poor school student, and only clever and talented people could write a book, couldn't they?

I picked a subject that I loved; I'd always had a passion for animals and loved William Horwood's Duncton Wood series. I started to write a novel called Jaguar.

Here is the blurb for it:
​
"Valaria is young, in prison and pregnant. She is also a Jaguar.
The brutal slaying of her mate prompts her audacious escape from an illegal predator collection on the edge of Exmoor Forest, England. Heavily frequented by humans, the woodland presents an even more dangerous proposition than her natural home in the lush rain forests of South America. But Valaria finds an unexpected, and unlikely, ally in the form of a local shepherd and animal rights defender, Tom Smith.

Her captor and tormentor, Edward Forsyth, is in hot pursuit and must track Valaria down and kill her, or risk spending the rest of his life behind bars if his illegal collection of predators is discovered. For Edward this is not an option and his greatest desire is to hang her head on his trophy room wall.

Putting herself between the barrel of a gun and her offspring to ensure their freedom may be her only option. "

I did a lot of research about jaguars and visited a local zoo so that I could get close and personal with the cat. The owners of the zoo at Sparkwell, just outside Plymouth were really helpful when they found out I was writing a novel and had the cat's keeper give us a tour and a talk about the jaguar. To me this was amazing, a very authory thing to be doing LOL. Remember, I was very new to this writing game; naive and excited.

I sat at home with all my research and started typing on an old electronic typewriter with a copy of the Writers and Artists Yearbook sat on the table. I also had a couple of magazines which talked about the craft of writing and who to submit your shiny new novel to. I spent several days thinking about what I wanted to write about. I'd always hated the idea of these rich people who hunted animals just to decorate themselves and their homes. I also wasn't a fan of people who thought that they could capture these beautiful creatures and keep them in cages as living trophies. So, the story of Valaria grew in my head.

I sat and wrote the first three chapters and was so excited that I'd managed to achieve that small victory. I knew at that point that I wanted to be a writer for a living; yes there is that naive bit again LOL. So, the stupid part of me, which rears its head fairly often, decided that what I really needed was a literary agent or an editor to help me shape the novel. I sent the first three chapters off to one of the big five (can't remember exactly which one, but it may have been Harper Collins). While it sat in their slush pile--they had slush piles in 1996--I carried on writing.

After a while, when I was half way through the novel, around chapter 16-17, my manuscript came back with a rejection slip. I was pretty gutted, but I didn't realize that what I had in my hand was golden. The rejection slip wasn't a form rejection, it was a very nice personalized one that said she loved my writing, but wanted to see more from jaguar's point of view. If I had known then what I did now I would have dove back into the manuscript and worked it using the advice of this big 5 editor. But, I decided that I need to get a job and earn some money rather than try and scrape by on my military pension. Jaguar was stuffed into a drawer and I taught myself how to be a computer programmer. I got a job and that was that, until in 2003 we decided to move out here.

Fast forward 8 years and while having a shower an idea popped into my head that revolved around an inept young wizard who lives in a realm where a wizard's power is dictated by his height, and promotion is given in inches; they also take inches away when demoting you for mistakes. Gerald being who he is is never going to have a smooth ride trying to become a great wizard. I jumped onto my pc and had written the first draft within 6 months. I then revised it time and again until I started to send it out--I'd finally learned about the correct way to query agents and publishers by then and I still feel embarrassed when I thought back to my initial foray into the publishing world with JAGUAR. GERALD was finally published in May 2017. Since then I've finished JAGUAR, written the sequel to GERALD; written a free prequel short story and am half way through an Anglo Saxon novel.

I still think back to that rejection slip I received in 1996 and wonder what might have happened if I had known what a nugget I had then. A personalized rejection with advice on how to improve the chapters I'd sent. I've had plenty of rejections since then from agents, but I carried on and finally got a yes from a publisher for GERALD.
​
Can you remember your first rejection, and were you as naive as me when it came to querying agents and publishers?

​Christmas is dead, Santa is dead, mistletoe is basically poisonous, and everything sucks. That’s what I got from the mid-season finale of Riverdale. Did you get anything different?

​Let’s turn the teen angst level up a notch! Because let’s face it, Riverdale is normally so tame and bland . . . This week we had violence, date rape, drugs, psychological torture, and Hot Dog. Oh, and I have a theory as to who the Black Hood is . . . let’s get to it.

On the Lodge side of the world, things aren’t going perfectly and they need to stir up some capital for their new development. As such, the St. Claires come to town along with their son Nick, an old pal of Veronica’s. They party it up, the jingle jangle is flowing, Nick hits on Ronnie, who has none of it, and then Nick admits to being an addict, and all is forgiven. Classic one episode redemption story. The jackass rich boy has his own demons and we all feel a little sorry for him, but wait! Then he goes and drugs our fave redhead and we learn it’s not a redemption story at all. We also learn the only thing worse than a Serpent’s Gauntlet is the Pussycat’s Gauntlet, as the sometimes trio (deservedly) beat the living hell out of Nick. Despite Cheryl always painting herself as an outsider, she always has a lot of friends, Archie included, ready to rally behind her. That’s the power of gingers, people. ​