Siobhan's Sporking: Billy and me, Chapter 4

Hey, I'm back. I'm not happy.

I read chapter four after sporking chapter three last week, like, straight after, on my break at work.

I thought chapter three was bad. Chapter four is fanfic central.

Let's rock this bitch, and then I can go back to writing about Lamb and Carter and rub some balm into the mental scars that this creates.

So, we start with Sophie not being able to sleep again. But this time, it's because she feels humiliated rather than excited. And I had a blank moment of 'why is she humiliated?' Seriously, it's not like anyone's seen her in her underwear or anything.

 

 

She's just suffering from foot in mouth. Shit happens. I can understand embarrassment for how that turned out, but 'dread and humiliation'? Sophie, woman up for fuck's sake.

This leads to Sophie not reading as she walks to work, and I think my logic in the previous post where I mention how slow you walk when you do that has an affect here, because if it doesn't then I have a thousand questions, but we'll get to that (and a thousand might be an exaggeration).
Chapter four breaks the record, as we bump into Billy in the second paragraph. Remember how I said this book was going to be like, 90% Billy from now on, if it followed a typical Mary-Sue fanfic? Yeah, I was not fucking about.

For some reason, Billy is standing on the doorstep to the cafe, looking through the windows. Now I'm confused, is he looking for her in the wrong place or is this a fail and she meant teashop? You've gone out of your way to bullshit about the misogynistic differences between your teashop and the cafe and now they're interchangeable, is that it? I'm starting to wonder, as I will a bit later in this chapter, if Giovanna planned this out or decided to write a story about her connection with Tom and pulled everything out of her ass as she went along. I'm rooting for option two right now.
As Sophie sees Billy, she somehow forgets how humiliated and full of dread she feels and is nervously excited instead. She starts with the obnoxious straight away, so we can all feel really good about where this is going to go:

"What are you doing here so early?" I ask.
"Ah, Sophie! There you are!" he says, blowing onto his fingers in an attempt to warm them in the crisp spring morning air. "I wasn't sure when you opened."
"Not until eight, so you've got quite a wait."
"Really?"
"Yep."
"Bugger."
"I would invite you in but I can't offer you anything hot until everything's heated up. So no coffee, I'm afraid."
"I don't mind something cold until then! I couldn't just perch at a table and work on my script while you bake or whatever, could I?"

How convenient, Mary Sue: 22

Excited?! Me?!: 33

Okay, so this is what I meant. It's before eight, no one's in the teashop/cafe/whatever the fuck Giovanna's decided it is today. Now, I'm not picking bones about the fact that since they bake all the cakes they sell, they'd need to get in there early to both heat their oven, start their cappuccino machines and water heaters, actually bake some stuff, whatever. What I will pick bones about is that the other chapter where she walked into work, Molly was there, already setting up, because she was bitching about someone else's outfit. So is this shift work? Do they alternate opening and closing the shop? Has she thought through the actual patterns to the point where she could write a month of Sophie's schedule? It feels like she pulled that out of her ass, like 'oh how convenient that Sophie went early to work, before Molly, and Billy happened to be there. I had the vision of Tom standing on the doorstep of the teashop on the top of the hill and thought, yeah, that's good enough.'

No, it fucking isn't, when I've talked to so many awesome unpublished writers who don't have these plotholes and you luck in to publishing this through contacts from Tom, Sylvia Young's, and TOWIE. I haven't been so blind as to not notice this book came out a few months after your husbands, and in a cue of autobiographies from the nonentities at TOWIE. I have so much rage for this lack of consideration in a published novel. And I will harp on about it, one of my beta readers on my story, an amazing French-Canadian woman called Milou, has already commented on how everything I've written has an influence, and one of the things she's looking for is when something gets re-referenced or brought to a conclusion. She's the only beta-reader I've had who's known where some storylines were going and that freaks me out a little, but it does raise the point that to release a readable book that may be generic but still needs some mystery, you need these plot points to be well thought through. I realise I'm rambling and make no sense, but there's no real sense in Billy and me, so what do you expect?

Sophie spasms about Billy asking for somewhere warm to read his script and it makes me think that, since he's not staying on location, he must be sleeping rough (is there no guest house in this crazy-ass village?) and says how Molly won't mind, because Molly was right. Wait, Molly's trying to set you up with someone? Well, that never happened in Mean Girls! Wait ...

 

Ah, Kevin G!

So Sophie lets Billy into the teashopcafe, and she putters about at the oven and drinks machines as he sits down, saying he has to be on set at nine. He also blames her for distracting him from learning his lines, which I agree on totally, but he makes it seem like flirting, and that makes me feel ill.

Sophie then smarms up to Billy and ... you know what? You have to read it to believe it:

"I think I'll blame Miss Brown for kicking it all off with her suspicious mind."
And me, for a variety of things, I think. "Well, I don't think she'll be doing that again - not now that she knows she's in the presence of greatness. In fact, I bet she's been on the phone all night to everyone she knows gushing about you. She'll have been telling anyone who'll listen that she knew there was something 'special' about you from the start."
I swear I can actually see Billy's cheeks redden as he mumbles, "I'm sure she hasn't."

Oh, vom.

-Oh no, Sophie, is Billy not letting you take all the credit for your stupid meet-cute? Is he giving it to someone else who prompted a way for you to blab your vacuous thoughts? How rude and un-Stu like is that?
-Presence of greatness? He's an actor, not the doctor who saved your life or the Pope. Maybe 'not now she knows your exciting story!' or 'not now she knows your name.' Presence of greatness. I can't even.
-So you know for a fact your face goes pink or red, but you only swear that you could see his cheeks colour? They either did or they didn't, but you're more likely to know than to speculate on another person WHEN YOU ARE WRITING IN FIRST PERSON. This is so, so backwards.

Sophie gushes about how he's a Hollywood superstar (wasn't he up-and-coming and someone she barely knew about two chapters ago? Oy, the price of fame) and isn't he meant to be egotistic? To which I say: Sophie, Sophie, he was giving you eyebrow action when you flaked on knowing the fuck he was. It's safe to say he has an ego. And now, the next day, he's a superstar? Way to project, you dumb bitch.

I'm getting to the point, halfway through chapter four, where I'm wondering if I can continue reading this. I just ... I know where it's going, I can guess all the 'obstacles' in their way, and I can't like the main character. Billy has some good points going for him, but he's a little bit douchebag in the wrong places too. But I never leave things until their conclusions so I will plough on but ugh. Just ugh.

Billy tells Sophie to act like he isn't there, and Sophie turns everything on, then makes muffins, cupcakes, bread and carrot cake, all before Molly comes in at seven forty-five (so what the fuck time were Sophie and Billy fucking about outside? I can understand Sophie setting up, but dafuq Billy?) who instantly starts talking up Billy being there early. Not in the 'we're not insured for a non-employee's presence' way like I would be (I am a bitch, yes) but in a 'oh, Billy, I knew you couldn't keep away from me Sophie' kind of a way. She then winks at Sophie who somehow knows for sure she blushes. Gosh, first person is a tricky pickle, isn't it?

There's a line coming up now that I will share and put out of context because I love when people don't think how they phrase things:

Having finished my contribution to the morning load I watch Billy

I hope you washed your hands in between, Sophie.

Billy's frowning at the papers in front of him (I think he's reading this story with 'dafuq' written all over his face) and Sophie says

 

In an attempt to make up for my appalling behaviour, I decide to say thank you and sorry by taking him a pot of coffee and some freshly baked breakfast muffins.

At least she admits she's from Bitch, I guess. Doesn't make her behaviour acceptable.

Also, does Molly not have rules about stock and employee usage, or does she straight out take the cost of that from your wages? What the hell kind of business is this? It's an independent teashop, you can't just eat the fucking profits, how big are your margins? Do you look at P&L? Cost from base? Are these just words to you? Is my knowledge of a fucking business interfering with your painting a picture of idyll for you to live in?

Billy looks surprised, probably because he can understand that eating stock is akin to theft and therefore gross misconduct anywhere else, but maybe because I don't remember breakfast muffins being on her above list of baked goods. Muffins, yes, but breakfast muffins are not the same as sweet muffins, and she didn't differentiate. Observe, Giovanna and Sophie:

Breakfast muffins. Also known as English muffins.

A sweet muffin, and the first option when you google image the word 'muffins'.

Billy asks why he's getting profits/food that was not made. Sophie basically says she's fattening him up ("It looked like you could do with it.") and that his frown lines are getting deeper and that's not a good look when he ends up on a cinema screen. And fuck it, I don't think you're going to believe me unless you see this verbatim:

"It looked like you could do with it. Your frown lines have been getting increasingly worse for the last hour - not good news for someone who's face regularly gets blown up to the size of a house!" The words spurt out of my mouth before I have the chance to censor myself. "I mean, in cinemas, because the screens are so big. I'm not saying you have a big head or anything.' I'm aware of myself rapidly turning into a bumbling buffoon, but Billy takes the comment the way I originally intended and he begins to laugh out loud uncontrollably, yet again.

*sighes* *rubs forehead with both hands to calm herself the fuck down*

Yes, Sophie, you need to install a censor filter. Because then you would just be silent. And trust me, you can successfully write a novel in which the protagonist never speaks, and still develops relationships. That's a general you, don't take that as an invitation. Think I'm kidding?

 

She burnt her oesophagus by drinking bleach. The only frustrating thing about that book, apart from Santana being completely un-fucking-believable, is that it's one of those 'make your own ending' piles of shit. I've decided she does take a cinderblock into the bath with her, because 'make your own ending' books make me vindictive (do not confuse with the 'choose your own adventure' books).

Anyway, Billy admits he needs help reading through his lines, and decides to ask Sophie because she's Mary Sue and can do anything by way of flirting. And then we see Giovanna pull more stuff out of her ass, because Sophie who was debilitating in her shyness suddenly once was in an am-dram club and got to play the Wicked Witch of the East in The Wizard of Oz and I groan as I die inside.

Billy then thinks to ask her if he's stopping her working, haGoodoneBilly, and she says no, even though they open at eight, no one shows up until eight thirty. I say that's an extra half an hour of wasted labour and electricity bills. Molly can't run a business for shit.

And then, I kid you not, the next two pages in my kindle is ripped out of Pride and Prejudice. Okay, it's littered with 'Billy said' and 'I tried' and 'I grew warm in my special place' and all that jazz (I like to paraphrase) but seriously, is she paying into the Jane Austen foundation or something? Or flat out plagiarising? You know how I would've written those last two pages?

Billy handed me a copy of the script, and I understood that he wanted to work from memory. I started, a little nervously at first, but Billy's skill soon made me comfortable enough that when he made a mistake I could correct it. His mistakes were small, missing a word here or there, or swapping the word 'assembly' for 'gathering'. I was impressed, at his professionalism and enthusiasm, and more and more I could see why he'd been chosen for the role, could see why he was viewed as such a skilled actor. I could almost picture him in a turncoat and breeches. Nothing disappointed me more than realising that Molly was beginning to stress as business picked up, and that I was being paid to serve tea and cake, not stare into Billy's expressive eyes.

In fact, I just summed up two-and-a-half pages, in one long paragraph. It's as descriptive, it mentions all the foibles that came up when reading the script, you get more characterisation and I don't want to kill myself.

Billy's gotta go because it's almost nine, and he says she's useful so he's going to carry on harrassing her. Ah, sweet romance! And then there's a sentence which Jenny Trout would flag up in her 50 recaps:

"Bye Sophie," Billy chuckles, as he sweeps out of the shop, leaving me to stare after him with bright-red-blushed cheeks - yet again!"

To which I have to ask: the fuck those cheeks belong to? Jenny's taught me lots about dangling participles, and the last person mentioned before the cheeks blushing referenced is Billy. So is Billy blushing? But he has his back to her. How can she know? Is she referring to herself? Can we please clean this sentence up?

"Bye Sophie," Billy chuckles, as he sweeps out of the shop, leaving me to stare after him, my cheeks heating up as I do so and I know I'm blushing, yet again!"

Little tip, Giovanna? A good writer doesn't make the reader do all the work. This was easy writing, because it sure as fuck isn't easy reading.

We do Das_Mervin's favourite and time jump a few days, because Sophie doesn't interact with Billy and we can't have such filler as Sophie interacting with anyone else now that Billy is on the scene. Life in these days without Billy is 'torture' and Giovanna really shouldn't be so heavily influenced by twilight. I am getting so sick of all this fucking melodrama.

 

That's what you sound like, Sophie, you co-dependent dish rag.

Sophie waxes lyrical a bit more about how obviously Billy was an illusion and now I'm starting to wonder if this is Twilight. Didn't Edward fuck off for a bit at the start and make Bella doubt his existence? Just sayin'. And it's obviously Mary Sue Bella Sophie's fault, she's put him off in some mysterious way (it's not mysterious, he knows from bitch too).

She's making a sixteenth birthday order up, because we're all about the Sweet Sixteen celebrations here in the UK (woo, you get to have sex and play the lottery and maybe drive a moped! Get in, you lucky grown up, you!) and in Billy walks, and I was getting worried about two whole paragraphs dedicated to his absence. She gets a squiffy tummy and starts grinning and I think she just had a bad dinner or something, but maybe I just don't recognise twoo wuv (to which I say, fuck that shit, I'm writing epic romance. It's not my fault that no one has picked up on the oh-so-subtle hints I'm laying down so far, they're skipping off instead with red herrings I never meant to put in there. But when it gets revealed, hold onto your undies ;) ).

And ... ugh, look, you read, I'll just do a count and let you make of it what you will. And remember, this shit is published with an actual publishing house, unlike Alys Cohen who was told 'change it and we'll print it' and opted for the self-publishing route. Unlike Jenny Trout, who published, got a big hurrah, and when her next novel didn't give something that blew her agents mind got dropped and now epublishes and posts one novel on her blog as well, and readers choose the donation. Remember this somehow surpassed both incredible writers.

He is here. He has come back
I decide to say a quick hello while Molly serves him ... I can't resist it!
"Hey! How have things been on set?" I ask, walking over with a glass bowl in my hands, mixing together some sugar, butter and eggs.
"Great! Well, actually, it's been quite full on, which is why I've not been in."
"I see - we thought maybe you'd been replaced by Jude Law." I quip.
"What, a real actor? No such luck," he says with a smirk.
"Shame! Good to see you back." I grin, returning to my workstation.

Excited?! Me?!: 34

Ellipses! Ellipses! ... more Ellipses!: 37

Remember the glass bowl, that's an important piece of information for later chapters! Seriously, did we need that? We don't know what Sophie looks like past her button nose and frizzy brown hair, so do we really give a fuck for that sort of detail?

Sophie carries on showing off how well she can bake (she whips, whisks, folds and beats so ... is she fucking this cake up? Or is this several different batches of different cakes, pastries and breads and we don't actually get that kind of information, because it's not as important as the glass bowl?) while watching Billy revise some more lines. Dude, take a leaf from Frankie Muniz's book, he says the more he tries to learn his lines the shittier he does, and looking a handful of times is better because then he can work on the actual memorisation. And he played Malcolm, child genius, so if at twelve he can remember complicated physics formulae ... it's probably good advice.

Sophie can't resist her libido and once these magical cakes that can be beaten after folding (because who needs air in a cake?) are in the oven she goes up to Billy, set to flirt in full-on foot-in-mouth mode. He starts their dialogue by calling her Mary Sue and admitting he's a Gary Stu, or some shit like that:

"Sophie, I know I haven't known you long. But I just wanted to say that I've really enjoyed spending time with you over the last week and I'd really like it if you'd come out for dinner with me tonight ... on a date. To say thank you."

How convenient, Mary Sue: 23

Ellipses! Ellipses! ... more Ellipses!: 38

How has he enjoyed spending time with her over the last week? She just said she's been tortured by their days apart. Weeks are comprised of days. Giovanna, I have to say this to you, and I never thought I would:

 

 

So anyway, Sophie laughs in Billy's face, and I'm trying to think of one thing that I like about her and failing miserably. Billy kind of looks at the rest of the shop to see who witnessed her laughing at him, and since everyone is sitting there gaping, he bolts. Well done, bitchface.

 

She follows him out the shop because she's not done with her damage and actually apologises for laughing. First apology for the shitty behaviour all book. She says she wasn't expecting him to ask her out and she goes down another Twilight Fifty Shades of grey fanfic deep, dark and scary route I wish she wouldn't.

"Really?" He turns round to face me and I notice he looks like a hurt little boy - wounded and embarrassed.

Bitch, you did not. You did. You infantilised the love interest. The actual fuck? I don't want to read paedophilia, thank you. Not in a romance novel. If I was into crime, then maybe. If Dorothy Koomson included it as a theme in her books, it would be tolerable (oh, wait, she did that in The Ice Cream Girls! And the paedophile was stabbed by his younger girlfriend who did twenty years, not knowing his ex-wife walked in after both his teenage lovers ran off and finished the job. And I found that hard to stomach).

Anyway, Sophie plays the whole virgin card after infantilising him *coughs*Ana Steele*coughs* and says she doesn't get asked out in the teashop because men don't go there. Well, news flash, bitchbum, this guy did both. Somehow, Billy thinks he has a shot because she came and apologised, tries again and gets shot down ... again. How many chances do you think you have, woman? And then she has the audacity to *grinds teeth*

"So, fancy dinner tonight?"
"Actually, I can't-"
"Right, look, don't worry about it," he interrupts, turning to leave, his mood changing instantly.
"Oi! Will you stop being so bloody dramatic?"

Yeah, drama is only acceptable for the Mary Sue! Know your role, Gary Stu!

Sophie says she's spending time with her mother, and that maybe if he tried for another night she might say yes. My, how honourable and gracious of you. Bitch. They make plans for her day off, which is Sunday. Fantastic. What day is this taking place?

 

Twice, Giovanna. Twice in one chapter. How are you published?

Sophie goes back to the shop and giggles with Molly and all the old bats in the teashop that she's bagged a date, like she worked up the courage to ask him or something. They all cheer for our Sue, and Molly wastes more labour and stock by making her a cup of tea and giving her some carrot cake. They sit there for an hour wasting this shit as she divulges all the details of our romance so far. What fucking romance?

There's a scene change and the house is dark when Sophie comes home. But her mum hasn't bailed, she's sitting there in the living room in the dark, eyes shut. Sophie, you unobservant prig, she's asleep. It's exhausting working a library when you spend more time making pretty displays and reading magazines than making sure all your books are kept in good condition and eyeballing anyone who dares ruin them.

Sophie notices there's a damp tissue in her mum's hand, so we know she's been crying. When Sophie wakes her up, there is confusion and disappointment in her eyes. I think Sophie's meant to look like her dad, but this isn't spelt out for us for once. They sit there debating dinner and not talking about how her mother is obviously sad about something, so Sophie can add understanding and sympathetic to her list of characteristics that she just plain does not have.

Sophie's mother asks about her day, though, so go Sophie's mum for not being as irritating as your daughter. And then it turns out her mum knows all about her date with Billy. Miss Brown blabbed. I don't think she knows her characterisation for these old women, they're just interchangeable. Anyway, somehow her mother can talk her way through the gossip line, so apparently the whole village knows that Billy's been taken in by this bitch. We get an annoying flashback about her dad working to ask her mum out and *pukes, actual vomit splattering out of my mouth*

"He and a group of his friends were planning on going to the cinema that weekend, so he asked if I'd like to join them."
"And did you?"
"A good-looking boy like that asking me out on a date? Of course I did."

Yeah Sophie, he was sexy as, it's a no brainer. Fit as fuck goes above all else. And what fucked up kind of date is that? He'll be monkeying with his friends and acting like a prick like men do when their friends are around, and not acting like he's on a date. This is settling on the circumstance of pretty. Fuck that.

We then get Sophie reminiscing about her love life and it goes against everything she's said so far about being a shy wallflower so thanks for once again pulling this out of your ass. And the last story, about the last guy, is just ... weird. It's long, but I'll try and transcribe anyway.

.. it was walking down the hill one day on a delivery, juggling with a load of boxed cakes that were threatening to topple over, that Shane came to the rescue. He kindly grabbed half the load and continued with me to my destination, which was a couple of minutes down the road. As a thank you I agreed to have coffee with him straight away afterwards. Perhaps because there was no build-up to it and no mention of the word 'date', that led me to be relaxed in his company - or perhaps I let him in because he was so sweet to me and softly spoken - his face rounded and trustworthy. We started to see more of each other as the months went by.
Looking back now I know I saw him more as a friend than anything else - he was the first person my age who I'd enjoyed spending time with in years. It was that fondness for him which led me not to grumble when he started to call me his girlfriend, or when he kissed me ... or when he placed his hand under my top to unhook my bra and cup my breast ... or when, at night-time, he'd led me into the park on numerous occasions, where he'd guide me under one of the giant willow trees and we'd have sex in the darkness. No, I didn't object to any of that. It was when he started to say he loved me that it all got too much. He was the second man to ever tell me he loved me. A fact I couldn't cope with at the time.

Apart from the obvious non-consensual rape, and the flipping of the tenses ... did she just say he was the only man other than her father to say the word love and it got too much? What the fuck kind of daddy-issues does this girl have? I can't even ... I said this chapter was bad. So bad.

Oh my God, even after the stories about her love life, she's still wittering on about her Special Snowflakeness and there is so. Much. Filler. She decides she'll have insomnia again, so does the smart stupid smart thing of googling Billy. She has to scroll down google to find imdb, much lolz, and starts rambling about how big his profile is. And seriously, you put eight years into about seven words, but loading up a laptop has a whole page dedicated to it? And also, she's barely heard of Billy, but he's been in loads of films and she's seen a few so eh?

She moves onto his wiki page, and obviously hasn't heard to take wiki with a pinch of salt, since anyone can contribute. She finds out what Billy's parents do and how many siblings he has, but says it's quite barren in the ol' family section of the site, so he must be private about that. Does that even make sense? Again

 

Three strikes, you're out.

She then gets to his personal life, and all his ex girlfriends, so this is the 'exes' talk by another name, this chapter. Sophie says she feels inferior because he's dated supermodels and I want to bitchslap her for upholding shoddy ideals like that. Feel inferior to people like Lionel Shriver who are incredibly articulate and good at writing, not beautiful people who work in a field you clearly have no interest in. That's like me thinking my mcjob can compete in any way with my friend who works with shoes. I'm obviously inferior, because my customers moan about pickles in their burgers rather than demanding shoes in different sizes during sales, and not understanding that the shoes come in pairs of the same size. Same crazy, different way, that's all. Nigella Lawson, that's a woman to make you feel inferior. She cooks, she eats, she's crazy beautiful! Fuck you Sophie, for upholding stereotypes.

The next day, Sophie's shit at her job, burning food and dropping plates, and Molly has to act OOC to further the gossip. And when Sophie explains that she's "boring old me" Molly's answer is to refer to Billy ... and seriously, FUCK THIS SHIT.

Maybe she's feeling inferior because of how her mother treated her that morning? Maybe because she's suddenly BellLolClumsy. How fucking dare you assume her pity party is the direct result of a male who happens to have dated before. What, was he supposed to wait for her to explode his love-juice everywhere? You lost it to a guy you were apathetic at best to. WHAT ABOUT SOPHIE IS MEANT TO BE LIKEABLE?!

*tries to breathe*

Molly makes the speech to end all speeches, showing she has Sophie's penchant to put her foot in it (He might have all these fans, or whatever, but they don't actually know him - they just have this fantasy version of him in their heads)

 

Thank you Giovanna, for having Regina George be your mouthpiece for why you deserve Tom more than the fans. You know what? Fuck you, those fans (the rabble, remember?) are the reason you have a nice house, and go to nice places on holidays. They're the people who made your wedding dress and wedding day happen, the people who have funded all your clothes and Christmas and birthday presents for the last few years. Bear that in mind before you write drivel like this. So fucking angry. Why not just write "I'm Giovanna Fletcher and all Tom's fans are beneath me."? Because that's what this chapter feels like. That's what Molly's Speech feels like. They basically bought your car in exchange for record sales. STOP ACTING LIKE YOU'RE SO DESERVING OF PRIVELEGE! Sophie barely knows Billy, this is absolute horseshit for the storyline and is therefore all the more evident as being your little soapbox for how you hate the fans.

Thankfully that's the end of the chapter, and I'm sorry I stopped with the counts but you can see why, right?