Piling Up

Is August taking an extremely long time or is it just me?

I seem to be caught in some kind of temporal loop where each day not only drags like a zombie with no legs, it speeds by at the same time. I have a growing list of little tasks that I can't find the time or motivation to tackle, yet must be tackled.

Without the clamoring human family, some things can be put off. Turns out a person can survive on Doritos for a week, especially if she keeps forgetting to thaw the chicken. That same person cannot survive without kitty litter. No way.

So, in the spirit of getting things done, I'm finishing this post and doing five or six little things before work that will allow me to do five or six things afterwards. I hope a good start will lead to a solid finish.

Happy Wednesday, dear readers. Say a prayer for those in Isaac's path. Iguana is one of them.

I'm Not Upset

Finally got around to asking my publisher about online sales figures. Not glowing, dear readers. Not glowing.

TT: Adding in my personal sales make it look a little better. 

She sent some kind words along with them of the "don't worry, slow starts can build" sort, but I admit, I was surprised at the smallness of the whole thing. Were I the sort who cared about numbers, I would be disheartened. On the other hand, I am convinced slow and steady is the only way to build a real fan base. If those who read my book now like it enough to buy the next, I'm good, provided I produce a next. My plan has always been to saturate the market with "me" until a reader can't turn around without bumping into a Turtle egg. If I live to 111, I have almost 70 years to achieve that goal.

I've said from the beginning, for me, this isn't about selling or being published or any kind of ego trip whatsoever. My goal was to finish a book, and I did that. Publication was more of a symptom of finishing. However, for the sake of my publisher and small fan group and the world in general, I will try to promote my book a bit more. I have one advantage over the average writer: I'm not afraid of people.

My launch party will commence Oct 5, 6 - 8 PM at World Cup Cafe.

I'm heading south in a couple weeks. I should contact that bookstore near Wichita and see about dropping in and hosting a book signing or something.

I have a contact name for my old high school. I want to donate a book to their library, but, frankly, I suspect I'll need board approval and a PG 16 rating. I'll get on that.

And, I have one ace-in-the-hole I've been too nervous to play. Thinking it's time to play it. More about that later, I suspect.

Happy Tuesday, everybody.

Of Backaches and Cavities

I am prone to cavities. Have been all my life. I brush, I floss, I go to the dentist every six months for cleaning, but I continue to get cavities. Such is my life.

I got two fillings about two weeks ago, and I'm supposed to get another one this week. The cavities are on opposite sides of my mouth, you see, so filling all of them at once would not only cause my numbed face to slide right off my skull, it would make eating impossible.

I was warned that one of the filling replacements - yes, fillings can wear out - was close to the nerve and would be tender for a while. She wasn't kidding.

After two weeks, I can't chew chips on that side. No, I don't need to chew chips, but I do eat granola, and broccoli, and other things that require some pressure on the molars. The second filling to be replaced - I mentioned fillings wear out, didn't I? - is also a molar and also close to a nerve. What happens if it freaks out, too? I'll be eating my steak through a straw.

Just kidding. I rarely eat steak. It would be ground turkey through a straw.

Here's the second half of the story. Replacing fillings causes the mouthpiece I wear to go out of alignment. When it goes out of alignment, I can't sleep, I get horrible back and neck aches, and I lose feeling in my left arm. These symptoms started this weekend. I currently have a stabbing pain in my neck that extends to the base of my spine, and it won't get better until several days after a mouthpiece alignment.

TT: I do wonder if the nightly chewing is what's causing these fillings to wear out so quickly. They're not more than 10 years old, I'm sure. The mouthpiece protects me somewhat, but pressure is pressure. Don't think that doesn't give me something to chew on. Sigh.

I want to reschedule my next dental appointment to give my new filling a little more time to calm down so I can eat on that side, but I don't want to wait to adjust my mouthpiece or spend $85 to adjust my mouthpiece between fillings. I doubt I could get in to do so even if I wanted to on such short notice. My orthodontist is quite popular.

So, do I go ahead with the filling and plan to eat oatmeal for the foreseeable future, or do I reschedule the dentist and live with the backaches for a month or more? It's also possible the filling won't calm down and will require a crown, but it could be the first crown that's giving trouble instead of the new filling, in which case my next option is a root canal and that leads to a whole new set of problems.

I hoped laying it out here would make the correct decision obvious, but I fear no "correct" decision exists. It's all "what-ifs" and wishes. I guess I'll schedule the mouthpiece alignment and plan to go ahead with the new filling. I have three days in which to cancel. We'll see if they make the difference.

Behind the Scenes

I've been asked to guest post on another author's blog, soooooo, awesome. Deeply honored. I'll keep you up to date on that.

Another co-worker started reading Star of Justice. She's gotten to the walking forest (ch 3). Her face lit up while she was explaining her reactions to the whole scene and she ended with "They're settling in for the night, but I just know something interesting is going to happen next."

Well, that's a pretty intense compliment, I'm thinking.

She's not the first to mention the walking forest as a favorite part. Even Big Brother, who prefers books where someone's head explodes in the first 500 words and gave me endless grief over using the word "trencher," made the off-hand comment that "the forest is pretty cool."

Huh.

Shall I confess?

The forest wasn't planned. I needed something to happen, and that was the first thing that sprang to mind.

When I directed puppets, one of the things we did as an encore was perform one of our songs with the curtains down. I wanted the audience to understand the kind of gyrations and coordination required to use signs, two-handed puppets, two-people puppets and puppets that move from back stage to front in a group of ten people in a confined space. It is something to behold.

I wonder if readers want to know those kinds of behind-the-scenes info on books? I always watch the "Making Of" segments of movies I like. Would I do the same for books? Or does that spoil the fun?

Let me know. I have reasons for almost everything I wrote. I'm willing to share many of them.

Titles Are Hard

After three years of blogging, I'm having trouble coming up with titles for my posts. Or my books.

TT: What about Elementary for Elementals? Make any more sense? I think I'm done worrying about it. The book is Elementals and that's that. 

I've stopped numbering or titling the chapter headings for Price of Justice. Asterisks will have to do the job until I've finished. Since I'm not 100% sure where the book is heading, and the same issues (you know, life and death, consequences for stupidity, power grabs, that sort of thing) keep coming up in every chapter for every POV character, the titles so far could all be "The Price."

Sounds utterly boring, doesn't it? I so don't want it to be boring. I don't want it to be depressing, either. Gotta find that happy ending.

I am writing, though. About an hour a night, which is all the stamina I seem to have at the moment, but an hour a night is better than nothing and it will get it done eventually. I'm back to writing on the laptop in the bedroom, away from the TV and the Internet. It's harder to edit using the fingerpad mouse, but it's easier to write new stuff. New stuff is what I need.

I'm also tentatively scheduling Star of Justice's book launch for Thursday, Oct 5, 6 PM at World Cup Cafe. I have to check with the owner that nothing else is happening that night, but I'm fairly confident that's the time.

TT: My Best Friend gave me a blank look when I told her about it. "Don't book launches happen when a book is published?" Yeah, yeah. I'm a Turtle. I do things in my own time. 

Just occurred to me I could do a reading of some portion of Price of Justice. That might be fun.

Why Canada?

I was thinking about zombie movies - I do that sometimes - and noticed a theme. The survivors want to flee to Canada.

Granted, I may not have an extensive familiarity with the genre, but the movies I have watched - Resident Evil et al., Night of the Living Dead et al., a rather well-made low-budget film on Syfy this weekend (although it claimed to be about vampires, but they acted more like zombies to me), um, that's all I can think of at the moment, but I'm sure I've watched more - show people trying to get to some mythical colony of survivors in Canada.

Why Canada?

Are zombies immune to cold? They're dead, so that doesn't seem likely. Zombies can cover any terrain humans can cover, so that's not a hindrance. Does Canada's smaller population figure into this? Fewer people means fewer potential zombies? Canada has fairly open borders. It's not like a hoard of zombies couldn't overwhelm a few mounties and hello, brothers to the north, welcome to the feast.

In case of zombie attack, I'd go toward South America. It's way easier to survive in a tropical climate than an arctic one. Unless animals also get zombified, but if that happens, a grizzly or wolf pack or family of beavers will kill you just as dead as a leopard or tapir. Granted, I might run into groups of armed non-zombified humans on the way, but isn't that a good thing? If the movies are accurate, maybe not, but human survivors also figure into the "fleeing to Canada" equation. Who knows? Maybe with everyone going north, south will be a wide-open straight shot to relative safety.

Seems the safest place to go is water. If it's a land-based attack, get off the land and wait the thing out. Unless you're a chemist, waiting for nature to restore balance is really the only option in the zombie apocalypse anyway, other than suicide.

Just something to think about on a Tuesday.

Gardens In Babylon

So glad I had the foresight (for once) to schedule Saturday's post last Monday. After six weeks of spotty service, my Internet went out for good Thursday morning and stayed out until my new service provider installed a cable Saturday around 7 PM. That's an eternity in Farmville time.

I must now cancel the old service and move on with my new life of NOT watching FX and Syfy 24/7. Speaking of which, what idiot changed Scifi to Syfy? Was that a hooked-on-phonics marketing ploy? It looks ridiculous. Of course, so do many of the shows, so maybe I'm overreacting.

Anyhoo, now that I'm caught up a bit on my Farmville fix, I'll be tweaking Faith Awakened's blog tour post to connect for real to all the other Splashdown authors who previewed stuff.

I've read the book. It was a little slow in places, but by the end, it all came together in a satisfyingly DOS-programmer kind of way. You'll have to read it to figure that out. I won't explain more here because of spoilers.

On to today's real topic. I think I'm finished with the book of Jeremiah. Can't be entirely sure since the chronological Bible I'm reading this year rearranges stuff and I haven't checked how many chapters Jeremiah has.

Allow me to set the stage. The northern kingdom of Israel has been scattered, and it's Judah's turn to face judgment for idolatry. The Babylonians relocate the majority of Judah's citizens throughout the kingdom of Babylon. Judah's false prophets are telling everybody this is a temporary setback and they'll be home shortly.

God gives Jeremiah a different story. He tells the Israelites to plant gardens, have kids and settle in for the long haul because they'll be captive for 70 years and they have some repopulating to do in the meanwhile. Naturally, God is right.

What I take from this (especially considering one of my recent posts) is the command to get on with life. Yes, things are difficult. Yes, I'm in an alien land facing unknown dangers. However, life goes on until it stops. Plant my garden and live.

I'm not saying I'll be having children any time soon (or at all, for that matter), but I want to take this as a new resolution to occupy until Christ's return. I will write because I don't know the future. I will save for retirement because I don't know the future. I will hope in Christ, my only hope, because He's the only future that matters.

The garden is planted, Lord. Now to tend it.

The Faith Awakened Video Campaign

Having seen a number of other authors’ successes with viral video collections, I decided to give it a go myself. The videos didn’t need to have anything much to do with the book – as long as they were funny, watchable and shareable and included the book details somewhere. I lived in Germany at the time and roped in lots of my friends to play parts. So you have a bunch of people holding my book who don’t even understand English. They were pretty good sports about it! Remember this was way back in 2007, with my first video camera, and judge accordingly...

Book Causes Spy to Change Sides

Find Grace:

http://grace.splashdownbooks.com

http://www.facebook.com/gracebridges1

http://pinterest.com/splashdown

Info on Faith Awakened

 

Blog Tour Sites:

R. L. Copple                      

Kat Heckenbach               

Diane M. Graham          

Travis Perry                       

Caprice Hokstad         

Keven Newsome    

Frank Creed                       

Fred Warren      
Ryan Grabow     

Greg Mitchell   

The Silver Key

"When Randolph Carter was thirty he lost the key of the gate of dreams." The Silver Key, H.P. Lovecraft

Do you ever read an interview by an author who sounds so excited about writing? He just can't spend enough time at the computer. She can't wait to get up and blurt out that next chapter.

I occasionally hate those people.

I remember being excited about writing. In college, I wrote all the time. If I wasn't in class or getting a frozen yogurt from the gas station across the street, I was writing. It was mostly melodramatic garbage, but some fun ideas came from it. Elementals. A Star To Sail By (you all don't know about that one, but if the Earth continues to exist, I will write it). Past Ties, which laid the groundwork for Star of Justice and future forays into that world. Several really goofy romances that may or may not see the light of day. I couldn't write enough.

I hit thirty and something happened. I grew up. I looked around. I saw the world for the near-the-end place I believe it to be and nothing mattered anymore. Why write a book no one will have money to buy or energy to read? I became a fatalist, and the key to dreams slipped out of my hands.

"He had read much of things as they are, and talked with too many people. Well-meaning philosophers had taught him to look into the logical relations of things, and analyse the processes which shaped his thoughts and fancies."

Oh, Mr. Carter, I understand. That's the greatest horror of all. The horror of too much understanding.

"They had chained him down to things that are, and had then explained the working of those things till mystery had gone out of the world.

How do you write fanciful stories when you don't believe in fairy tales anymore? It is hard, dear reader. Very hard.

Doubt creeps in. Every typed word is over-analyzed and sterilized to correctness. Have I provided enough motivation? Am I missing some new scientific discovery that makes my storyline obsolete and ridiculous? When will I read that final comment that shatters any desire I have to share the stories I've dredged from the looming cynicism my life threatens to become?

I'm not depressed at the moment. I wish I were. I wish I could blame this on some chemical imbalance, but to do that, I'd have to say I've been mildly depressed for 10 years. Maybe I have. Reality can do that.

I keep hoping going through the motions will revive that excitement. One day I'll wake early to rush to my keyboard and spew out my next epiphany. Since the sun keeps rising and electricity keeps flowing, I'll keep trying. I have enough hope left for that.

Happy Friday, everybody. We have the day. Make the best of it. 

Horror According to Lovecraft

I've never felt an inclination to write horror. Well, except for that time I read the spaceship chapter of How To Survive A Horror Movie. Part of me really, really wants to write a space horror spoof, but it would so NOT be glorifying to God I'm not sure I can justify it, even for the funny.

Lovecraft knows horror, and his early works managed creepy crawly without even describing the creepy crawly too much. That is my biggest gripe with some of his early stuff. There's only so much "unnameable hideousness" and "indescribable horror" I can tolerate before I want him to try to describe it.

He gets more graphic in the 1920's, so I won't dwell overlong on that criticism.

Here's what's scary according to Lovecraft:

Murky water (swamps, sludge-covered oceans, bogs) that eventually erupts with corrosive smells and blobby or gigantic figures from hell.

Ancient, abandoned cities visible only in unnatural moonlight that echo with weird screams and either suggest or disgorge blobby or gigantic figures from hell.

Cellars found in old houses or ancient, abandoned cities that lead to hell and often involve glimpses of or encounters with blobby or gigantic figures.

Caverns that lead to hell and... yeah, you get the idea about the creatures, right? The blobby or disproportionally large non-human creatures made the more hideous by a small resemblance to humanity in an otherwise completely alien life form?

Stars that glow with reddish light and cause hysterical dreaming and the occasional parallel dimension traveling. 

Parallel dimensions visible in drug-induced states that reveal glimpses of hellish, other-worldly creatures that would destroy us all if they bothered to notice we're here.

Swarthy, low-browed subhumans of far-below animal intelligence who somehow manage to exist in otherwise civilized cities.

Anything that pre-dates human civilization, especially savage rites involving human sacrifice.

Funny thing. He's right about the water and the cellars/caverns, and I'm willing to give him a nod on the abandoned cities. I've never been creeped out by a star before, and I won't be trying any consciousness altering drugs stronger than a Melted Snowball, but I've gotta admit, the man knows horror. 

Thinking should I ever write that space horror story, I'll have to work a blobby giant in somewhere.

Nightmares and H.P. Lovecraft

I won't be reading Lovecraft right before bed anymore.

Although I have been chewing on The Complete Collection of H.P. Lovecraft as compiled by cthuluchic from Amazon for Kindle at the ridiculously reasonable price of .99 for approximately 4 months like a ghoul gnawing on a freshly dug corpse, I have yet to pass the 25% mark.The man was prolific.

I've seriously enjoyed most of the stories and been completely creeped out by several of them (The Outsider and The Picture In The House being two I remember clearly). The Rats in the Walls gave me shudders, but Pickman's Model was apparently too much.

Yes, after reading that story, I succumbed to a terror so intense that after waking, I couldn't decide if I wanted to turn on the light to assure myself that all was well or leave it off in case it wasn't. The last time I had a nightmare that intense was following the debut of The Grudge.

This particular nightmare involved siblings Ivy and Isaiah, the basement level of a concrete parking garage and a child's toy whose unnatural proportions spoke of eldritch planes of existence. Yep. Been reading too much Lovecraft.

I won't stop reading, but I will be doing it earlier in the day. With all the lights on. And the curtains open. And a cat or two nearby. And maybe a neighbor.

Where's that nightlight?

Plumping Up on Bubbly Pies

If you've read any of Anne McCaffrey's dragons of Pern books, you know what a "bubbly pie" is. You know it has crystallized sugar around the edges and bubbles in the middle when it comes out of the oven and remains delicious even when cooled. You suspect it's about the size of a personal pot pie and contains some kind of berry filling. It's a special treat and when they're made, you stuff yourself. Oh, you don't know how to make one. You don't have a chance in Hades of ever eating one. But you want one.

You also know the people drink klah, some kind of hot beverage made from bark that to my mind is a hot chocolate-cinnamon hybrid. You know they use numbweed to anesthetize wounds - a salve distilled at great effort from aloe-like plants harvested on the Southern Continent. You've slurped into a redfruit and saddled a runnerbeast and oiled a fire lizard.

You know how you've done these things? Through description.

Creating a world is a complicated process, but showing that world to your readers takes work. It takes description. It takes you the author presenting your case to the reader in an interesting way that engages their senses through that most amazing sense organ - the brain.

I'm all for stories moving forward. I resent useless description as much as the next LOTR-fan who's slogged through three pages of hills to get to the "point." However, stories that move forward by sacrificing sensory details and world-setting descriptors leave me flat.

If you don't want to get rain in your eye, or stuff a sausage in your mouth, or dodge spatter from a sword fight, don't pick up my book. Go to those mainstream authors who write so fast you're panting by the time you turn the last page. I have no problem with that.

I'll be here trying to make bubbly pies.

Brighter Morning

A six and a half hour nap bracketed by the Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law Sherlock Holmes movies has helped restore some perspective. That, and some ice cream.

Every artist has those moments when she looks at her art and despairs. It isn't Star of Justice so much. That book is done, and I'm trying to move on.

Price of Justice has me climbing walls. Mom suggested I stop writing it, but that's impossible. It's my next book. You'll all just have to bear with me when the compost that is my initial draft overwhelms my sense of perspective.

What you must understand, dear reader, is that ultimately my writing is my responsibility. I can have the best crit group in the world, the best editors, the best publisher, even the best intentions, but it all boils down to "what will I do with this story?"

That isn't arrogance. I can ask "what do you think I should do?" but you'll give me your opinion, not the answer to life, the universe and everything. If I ask that question of every person, I have, at best, a democratic parody where the majority rules and, at worst, a different opinion for every person I ask. What am I supposed to do with that?

I don't want to write by majority rule. I have to work out my own problems in my own way and that's all there is, really.

I'm just not accustomed to feeling so lost so early. Oh well. Inward and upward.

On a brighter note, God gave me one of those little treasures I seek. A moth flew into my car on Saturday, a big, brown moth that went right under my dashboard where I didn't have a hope in heaven of finding it and getting it out to continue its short life. Tears flowed until I looked up and discovered the moth fluttering against the passenger side window, waiting to be released. A silly thing, yes, but it's my silly thing. Thank You, Lord.

Thank you, too, for my friends who took a moment to support me. I love you guys. I'm doing better.

The Little Things

"It's the little things in life you treasure." Fred Kwan, Galaxy Quest

Normally, I agree with Fred. Celebrate the small stuff because that's all most of us will ever see.

The last couple of weeks, however, it's been hard to enjoy even the small stuff. I want to blame hormones, but it's more likely the little, unexpected, mostly unpleasant changes happening in my life.

The Olympics have put a complete end to my TV routine for I don't know how long. That shouldn't be a bad thing, but it is disruptive. One of my cats has cavities that must be treated. Several of my friends are changing their life circumstances in ways that directly affect my life circumstances. My car sickens while I put aside money to buy a new one. My dog sprouts these little blisters that may or may not be heat-related. My daily Bible reading just finished Isaiah and has started in Jeremiah. Have you read Jeremiah? Road construction has forced a change of driving routine and added about 5 minutes to my commute, which totals 20 minutes more a day in the hot car avoiding stupid people in the same situation. Grandma Turtle's one year anniversary just passed and I miss her. I have a tingling in my left hand that may be nerve-related instead of jaw-related and I don't want to deal with it. I intended to garden this morning and instead spent two hours trying to deal with my hacked email account. I'm now so wound up with frustration, I don't know what to do with myself.

Yes, they're all small, ultimately meaningless tripe, but they're wearing me down.

Add to them the writing issues, and I'm thinking about packing up my cats and moving somewhere far, far away. Not Idaho. Apparently stupid people live there.

I eavesdrop on several writing groups. I rarely jump in for various reasons depending on the group, but I follow the discussions somewhat. I need to stop.

Aslan tells Lucy in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader that no good comes from eavesdropping, and he's right. Proverbs says gossip is like a tasty morsel going down that sours the stomach. I've got the stomach to prove it.

I now worry that I didn't do justice to Ehsu's dialogue, that good stories don't include God because God as the ultimate superpower removes all tension, that my preferred writing style (and reading style, btw) of "plump with description" instead of "action-focused" (I may post on that later) means I'm a poor writer who lacks the ability to edit herself and that writing as a job will shortly go the way of the dodo, so everything I do at this computer is utterly meaningless.

That could be the depression talking.

It's important to remember, people, behind the arrogance of the writer is a huge well of self-doubt. We're putting ourselves out there in a show of bravery, but that doesn't mean we're brave or that we have everything figured out or that we even think we've done a good job. It just means we're trying.

I'm my own worst critic. I don't need more reasons to doubt myself.

I am searching for those little things to treasure, but at the moment, they are few and far between. I hope your life is full of them.

The Swamp in July

Taking advantage of a rare not-100-degrees-at-6-AM morning, I wandered the garden and snapped a few pics.

My Swamp has been through a lot in the last year. Sewer line replacement, tree removal, and drought have all taken their toll, yet some beauty remains, mostly thanks to the annuals.

Bermuda grass is taking over with abandon. I'm letting it because it's keeping the little soil I have from blowing away in the humid Kansas wind. I will regret that decision but I'm not about to go fight Bermuda grass in 106 degrees. In case you're not familiar with Bermuda grass, it loves the heat, it grows by seed and by runners and it's almost impossible to kill. It's pretty much a weed but most Kansans put up with it because it actually grows here. I hate grass, so I hate Bermuda grass. It's that simple.

My "Early Girl" tomato has officially broken through its support and creeps toward the house, I suspect, in pursuit of fresh fertilizer. I'm extremely wary of reaching into its depths to pick tomatoes for fear my arm won't come back out. Mom suggests a short story will come of it. She may be right.

I'm thinking I may take tomorrow morning, you know, before 8 AM and 100 degrees, to go out back and try to restore some semblance of order. Then again, I may wait until December's probable mid-80 temperatures to tackle it. At this rate, another few months will see the entire back yard consumed by Bermuda and all I'll have to do is mow.

I hate mowing, too. I'm not letting this garden go without a fight.

Schedule Interrupted

Like my cats, the Turtle is a creature of habit. 

My schedule this week has been filled with unexpected, although not necessarily unwelcome, interruptions and they are taking a toll. I handled last night's loss of Internet rather well, I think, although it did lead to a somewhat restless sleep as I considered my options should it not be restored. My posting this means I have Internet for the moment.

A normal person probably takes change in stride and compensates. I must assume this since I'm not a normal person. Change staggers me and throws all life into confusion until routine is restored. No wonder I relate so strongly to Dr. Sheldon Cooper. His issues are my issues. 

I will hopefully make it through the rest of the week with my patience intact, although I expect some manner of retribution to occur Saturday. We'll see.

If you don't see me hanging about FB or email on schedule, it's because my Internet quit again and I'm hammering my modem into a charm bracelet to pass the time.

What My Book Says About You

Yes, I'm doing it again. I'm reading my own interpretations into your perfectly normal and reasonable actions.

Most readers are familiar with the idea that a book says a lot about the author. Unless you're a reading machine who devours books the way some devour gummi bears and never bother to think about them as you go, I suspect at some point you've read a passage and wondered what the author had to go through to come up with that idea. At least, I hope you have. It's OK to think about a book as more than a story.

I maintain the first book an author writes is a therapy book: meaning, intentionally or unintentionally, we write it as part of our own therapy. I may think this because I trained as a marriage and family therapist and tend to view the world through that lens (relax. It's a strengths-based lens and I'm looking for what's right with you, not what's wrong).  I will concede - grudgingly - that the first book written may not be the first book published, but I suspect it is more often than not. 

Why? Because writing and completing a book is hard work. Very hard work. Something drives the author to work that hard not only to finish but share his masterpiece, and I posit it is his desire to tell his story in whatever altered form his subconscious dreams up. He may disagree if he wishes, but I will apply Shakespeare's "the lady doth protest too much, methinks" and he'll lose anyway.  No offense, gentlemen.

I've written in this topic elsewhere, and I'm sure I'll write about it again, so I'll move on to my title theme.

What I did not realize before I published is how often a reader approaches my book with an automatic bias. The difference may be that I now hand over a brick with a picture on the cover and a concise little blurb on the back that supposedly sums up the story (it doesn't, really. No blurb ever does justice to the real story) which allows the reader to form an opinion other than "Good Lord! That's a 4 inch, two ream, 6 lb binder you're handing me!" And God bless all of you who took it.

Since I've handed over that brick, I've heard "Dragon-worshippers? So they're the bad guys?", "Ooo, shape-shifters," and my personal favorite so far, "Blood? You wrote a book with blood in it?" Each of these statements says more about the speaker than me. Why assume dragon-worshippers are bad guys? What makes "shape-shifters" stand out? Why is it so surprising I would write about blood? Have you met me?

It's almost as interesting as the questions and comments I get after the book is read. It's fascinating to see which parts capture people's attention, especially when I compare their reactions to what I intended when I wrote it or what I wanted people to take away from it.

TT: It is amazing how we manage to communicate with each other at all. Our separate experiences and focuses are so different, how can my words mean the same thing as your words, and how does that meaning travel through sound or sight and take up residence in your brain in any shape remotely similar to my intention? Wow. Just...wow.

I almost didn't write this because I fear shutting down those comments and questions that fascinate me so much, like Captain Picard who couldn't think what to say when he discovered the empath loved listening to his voice. I do hope you'll keep asking and commenting. It's my story, after all. I want to tell it.

The Definitive Guide to Star of Justice

Great idea, huh? A sort of Cliff's Notes version of my 400+ page monster?

As part of this new Splashdown Blog Tour idea, we authors can submit snippets of our works to pique interest in readers and tell why we like those snippets. This led me to consider my favorite snippets. Guess what? Almost all of them contain plot spoilers.

I'm not saying you can't swing a small dragon without hitting a plot point in my book, but...almost. I am saying the bits I love the best are the bits where you the reader get a solid dose of character angst or plot revelation. Those were the parts I lived for, and I spread them around liberally.

One of the few daydreams I do have about Star of Justice is seeing it show up as "recommended reading" for an English class, or, when I get really high on Melted Snowballs, a textbook for "Great American Authors." One of my greatest fears is my book showing up in such a class and everybody getting it "all wrong" when it comes to interpretation. Why I wrote what I wrote. What I meant to convey as opposed to what the reader gets out of it. I've seen what history has done to Tolkien.

Control freak that I am, it is tempting to consider writing a Definitive Guide for future reference. Hard to argue my intentions when I spell them out for you on paper. Not impossible. Just hard. However, since such a book would be one giant spoiler, I suppose I'll write it on the sly and request my great-nieces publish it posthumously.

The goddess Nike

I got about 3 hours of sleep, which forcibly reminds me, once again, to NOT drink a Melted Snowball after 5 PM. Yes, it was maybe 4 oz. Yes, that's all it takes to keep The Turtle wide-eyed into the wee hours. Stupid espresso.

We got some lovely rain last night, too, and I was wide awake to enjoy it. Thank You for that, Lord.

When writing inspiration lacks, my last resort is following the precepts of the goddess Nike and "just doing it." Sometimes, you just need to do something. Last night, after my espresso and before my failed attempt to sleep, I edited pages 50 to 57. I pared down the telling, corrected directional issues and once again got the story back on track.

I refuse to allow two paragraphs to hold me up for two weeks anymore. It's just silly. I have an entire book to tell stuff in, and if I can't find the right spot in 400 pages, I can write a short story later. No big deal. This is writing, not rocket science. Just do it.

Here's hoping tonight's writing time will see similar, if not more substantial, success.

38 Down, 56 To Go

Page 38 of my WIP has stumped me for weeks. I sit at the computer, open the file, and stare at page 38 while it mocks me with its inaccuracy. Actually, I stared at two paragraphs of page 38 that just didn't fit there. Monday night I finally figured out how to cut them (turns out I just "cut" them and pasted them into my delete file. Why did that take me so long?). Circulation returned, the rest of the chapter now made sense and I moved on with my story.

Then I ran into page 56. Same thing. Timeline out of whack. Directions all messed up. Motivations unclear. It's more than one or two paragraphs this time. I'm looking at what could be "telling" or what could be the ramblings of an increasingly unhinged narrative mind (no, I don't mean me).

Caissa's narrative is generally straight forward with occasional detours as bits of trivia get sucked along for the ride. In SoJ, I worked to keep this extraneous info in her spoken dialogue and generally only when she was under stress.

Well, she's under stress from page 1 (actually, pg 50) in this book, so the extraneous info keeps oozing into her thoughts/general narration.

I can't have her say it, because her companion knows most of it. There'd be no point. I'm considering cutting it, but some of it should be known and this is really the best place I can imagine to bring the reader up to speed. So, last night, I stared at page 56 and it glared back, mocking me with its bloated inaccuracy.

I refuse to be stopped for weeks, though. It is way past time to be done with this foolishness, so, tonight, with my bag of Doritos beside me and the promise of half an hour of Sherlock "A Study in Pink" as my reward, I will untangle this silly mess and move on.

It really is the least I can do.