Steampunk and Synthesizers

The Universe Loves a Good Punch Line

2012-01-16T10:37:00.000-08:00

Life's a glorious thing, isn't it? Always keeps you on your toes, always has one surprise left around the next corner, and most of the time it's even more amazing than you expected.

An important lesson was re-framed for me recently, one of the essential nature of keeping onesself squarely balanced between confidence, experience and aspirations. Also known as "don't ever think you're too much cooler than you actually are."

What it boils down to, basically, is this: before you go around spouting wisdom, be sure you know your audience. Because chances are, they're wiser or more experienced than you are. It's just the odds of the game, really. I usually know this lesson pretty well, so it's always amusing when I get reminded. Yikes.

And, on that note, I resume my daily duties; there are stories to tell, books to publish, and progress to be made.

OH. And before I go. Any of you who plan to be in the Seattle area at the end of March, I'll be manning a table with the other writers of Talaria Press at the Emerald City ComiCon. Also, Kevin Smith and Jason Mewes will be attending. (that's Jay and Silent Bob, for the folks who don't already know)

So, you know, it might be an entertaining weekend. :)

First Step: A New Identity

2012-01-11T09:41:00.000-08:00

It was recently pointed out to me that I now get to add a new identifier to my name: Amazon Best Selling Author. At this moment, "Reaper's Return" is sitting at #8 on the children's Science Fiction and Fantasy list, #16 in the overall Fantasy list, and #371 overall. I have to keep looking at that in a desperate effort to make it sink in. Two years ago, I was just barely a published author, and now... this? Okay, so I have more than 7 books published at present, fine. And the numbers are bumped enthusiastically due to the current promotion I have on Reaper's Return, so I can't just totally lose my mind over this. A truer test will be to see how much of this translates into the rest of the series getting picked up, and I acknowledge that, even as I grin and Snoopy Dance, that numbers are only numbers and not the entire story. Regardless, I'm really grinning.

I've pushed the Amazon promotion out through midnight tonight, and I'll probably relaunch it later as well to see if I can maintain a bit of the momentum across the entire series.

But that's all maintenance stuff, and not the big thing that really struck me as interesting this morning.

It occurred to me as particularly interesting how we both shape and are shaped by our identities. We all pass through those during our lives - defining ourselves (or being defined, depending on how much control we have over the process) as children, siblings, friends, lovers, enemies, et cetera. Student, Teacher, Leader, Follower, Visionary, Victim - there are so many hats to wear, and we don't even always have the choice of whether or not to wear them.

I've gone through a lot of those through my life: from the Nerdy Little Freshman to The Freak in my junior year of high school, a Missionary, Musician, Husband, Father, Author, and so forth. Some of the roles we wear come with some pretty heavy specificity, some come with badges, and many become a matter more of perspective than any sort of official designation.

But lest I totally drown in rhetoric, the thing on my mind today is that I have this new identity, now. Part of the challenge in the present publishing climate is that there persists a sort of stigma with regards to being "self-published." In many circles, self published equal unpublished. I listened to one publisher a scant year ago compare self published authors to overweight twenty-somethings banging out fan fiction on a beat up computer in their parents' basement. You may be shocked to know that I'm pretty much quoting him on that, too. I didn't believe his assessment then, and I don't believe it now. Are there examples of that? Oh, I'm sure there are. I'm also equally certain that there are some financially successful authors who fit that same general description. Ripe fruit can grow wild in untilled soil.

I've seen a lot of the complaints levied against the self-published set: lack of editing is the most common one, however. Overall, I've seen so many folks who dwell in the midst of the status quo defend their own roles as Guardians of the Consumer, and I think that might be a bit of an overplay as well.

But really I think it comes back to a misconception that stems from the current publishing process' adoption of the term "traditional publishing."

Traditional? Really? I can't help but think folks have neglected their history classes when I hear that term bandied about.

Traditionally, books were manually printed on a press, usually by the author himself, and then taken around and sold - usually, again, by the author himself. Before that, they were hand-written.

The current process of agents, distributors, chain retail stores and publishing corporations are a much more recent process, just through the past 120 years or so. Granted, we've constructed some other, fairly elaborate traditions in that same time frame, so what's one more contrived entity between friends? And if you can't think of any offhand, we did just go through a holiday season that's rife with a plethora of fabricated "traditions". Like, why does Santa wear red? Google it if you don't already know, you probably wouldn't believe me if you didn't look into the background of that yourself.

Are you a writer? Do you want to be an author? Then publish. Do your best to make the book as good as you can make it; get it edited (an extra pair of qualified eyes never hurts!), and get it out there for people to check it out. Will everyone love it? No, of course not. Will everyone hate it? Of course not! Will you make thousands of dollars and be able to retire? Well, probably not, no, let's be realistic. Not everyone can have a #1 book, it's just the way of things. But neither should that be our goal - it's not something anyone can truly control. What you CAN control is whether or not you write a book, whether or not you decide to get it published, and what you decide to do about it if you do publish.

In the paraphrased words of a dream version of Jim Morrison, the only thing stopping you is the stopping.

And, like all journeys, it all starts with a first step - in the spirit of "fake it til you make it," the starting point as I see it is to define (or in some cases, redefine) yourself. What are you? Who are you? What are you doing? What have you done?

Seriously, take a moment and figure that out. Knowing that simple detail can and often will affect your course through the wackiness of life. Certainly, not knowing it can definitely affect you, but rarely in a good way.

And if you don't have the answers to any of those questions, take the time to answer them. And if you don't have definitive answers, that's okay. When it doubt, make something up. Who do you want to be? What do you want to do?

And, yes, it really is that simple.

So, if you haven't done this, or you haven't even thought about this before, take a moment to figure out who you are. What you are. What you're doing. What you want to do and who you want to be. And if one of those is "be a writer", "write books", and that sort of thing, then congratulations! And if it's, really, anything else.... Congratulations!

Cos in the end, what you are, specifically, doesn't matter so much as that you are.

My day

2012-01-10T13:39:00.001-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRwsTyUPIYE

How are you today, my lovelies?

Reaper's Return Amazon promotion!

2012-01-10T11:49:00.000-08:00

The special from Amazon is - for a very limited time - expanded to all Amazon customers! For the next 24 hours, you can purchase a copy of the first book in the Chronicles of Aesirium, "Reaper's Return", for the amazing price of FREE.

Seriously. Go. Check it out. Pick it up. You'll be glad you did! And, for that matter, so will I. :)

Doomsday

2012-01-10T11:46:00.000-08:00

CNN is talking right now about how the Doomsday clock is presently only five minutes from midnight.

Hasn't anyone over there read the Watchmen comic? Sheesh.

Brand New!

2012-01-09T20:48:00.000-08:00

Okay, it probably says something about me that I don't want to admit by the fact that it's more than a week into the new year (2012 - I need to get used to writing that, don't I?) before I actually blog about the new year. That's like getting a birthmark when you're 17.

But in my defense, it's been a grand and utterly, nonsensically, spectacularly crazy year already. Wee daughter's (okay, no longer quite so wee) birthday aside, it's been a packing up and moving on kind of year so far. Like 2011 was a 12 month frat party, but now the parents are pulling up into the driveway and if we don't get the empty bong pulled out of the fireplace and pick up the 3,491 red plastic party cups, my brother and I are gonna be grounded for a month.

And Mom, Dad? If you're reading this, I swear to god that never happened.

So, as I was saying before I literally interrupted myself, 2012 is going to be a lot of fun, if the past 9 days are any indication. Let's take an assessment:

The entire Chronicles of Aesirium are published and available online in first edition copies. Check.
Paperback and ebook: Check check. Oh, and before I go on, if you're an Amazon Prime member, you really ought to hop on over there and pick up a copy of book one: Reaper's Return. It's Free. Yes, seriously. Freebies. You go on over, click it and start the download while we finish up here. It's cool, I'll wait.

In fact, between them, the pair of "Middle Age" books and some other anthologies penned under a different author name, I'm now sitting at over a dozen books. That was more than my really generous goal for 2011.

My day job is my day job, and I've signed a code of conduct agreement indicating that I cannot say anything bad regarding my employer. It is a point of some interest that I don't consider the fact that I SIGNED A CODE OF CONDUCT AGREEMENT INDICATING THAT I CANNOT SAY ANYTHING BAD REGARDING MY EMPLOYER a bad thing. I'm weird, whatcha gonna do.But then again, I don't have anything really bad to say about them. They're a big company, they do big company things, it's hardly newsworthy. Besides, they put up with my shenanigans, and that alone should warrant a second look at that whole Nobel Peace Prize thing.

I did a few public appearances last year, did some interviews (in and out), and really fell in love with so many of my fellow steampunkers. It's just a great bunch of industrial and loveable freaks of nature. My kind of peeps. I have a few more things set up this year, such as having a table at the Emerald City ComiCon in the end of March. I'd love it if you could show up. It's right here in downtown Seattle, and I'll be there with the best Editor in this section of the known universe, as well as my two fellow authors from Talaria Press. Oh, the fun that will be had! Can you dig it, poppet?

But that's not all! I'm working on some Really Fun Things, many of which are going to have to remain somewhat secretish until they're coming up on my publishing deadline. But the hints I can give you about the two main projects are that one involves happy thoughts, and the other has truck with demons in the pacific northwest.

Oh, and I've been doing a lot of hobnobbing with Amazon - cos, you know, I'm, like, awesome or something - but seriously, I'm taking this whole process of being an entrepreneur much more seriously. Because, really, one must.

So on that stream, I'm going to start posting observations I've had about the self-pub world - ebooks and the printed medium. There will likely be examples of the music industry thrown in as well (because oh have I got some tales for you!), and, if we're both lucky, there might even be some teeny kernels of wisdom to take away from it. In fact, I'll guarantee it.

Okay, no, I can't guarantee anything. But it'll be fun. Feel free to toss me questions if you have them; I see no reason why I need to yammer off into your vision holes without taking the occasional question from the audience.

Audience?

Yes, I just called you an audience. Applause is totally optional. Just saying.

Okay, that's quite enough out of my fingertips for one evening. Thanks for checking in with me, and I'll see ya 'round the campfire, boys and girls.

Storytelling

2011-12-12T08:37:00.000-08:00

Years of routine have built into my subconsciousness a tendency towards reflection this season. I'm not really alone in this, I understand. But having a child definitely raises the stakes, and each year is a bit more...interesting.

I try to steer clear of too much elaboration on religion (author's note: if you think this is a strange statement to make, you should hear how much I talk about it when I'm not typing about it!), but rather than addressing December as a loosely-affiliated series of secular celebrations, I'd rather use my actual words.

Religion is a complex beast. It and all its accoutrements are so easily misinterpreted, depending on where you come from, what you believe in, and how you believe in it. Not only is it impossible to swing a dead cat without smacking someone in their religious indignation, but then you've got PETA on your case for swinging the dead cat around in the first place. I suppose one day I might chance putting my own views down on paper - there's always that next series of books, for example - but for now, please understand that I might be deliberately vague on that sort of thing.

But in the raising of my child, my wife and I have decided to give our daughter as broad and global an understanding of faith as possible. There will come points in life where she will more specifically decide upon her belief system, and we'll be as supportive of those choices - if not moreso - than we have been thus far. It's been a process of teaching and encouraging self-examination, followed by support for her ability to understand for herself exactly what she believes in, coupled with sharing our own beliefs.

So it was a bit disconcerting a few weeks back when I made a reference to Noah and the Ark, and she looked at me with confusion. "Is that from a comic book or from Star Wars?" she asked.

Yikes.

We realized that in my efforts to keep her religious exposure open, we'd actually not taught her any bible stories. But I should have noticed that - there were signs. Like that one time she read off the television the words "Jayses Krest" (Jesus Christ) and asked me what that meant. Okay, yes, she's ten. And I probably should have talked to her about that sooner, but yes.

December 2011 has thus become "the month we explore the bible." Starting with Genesis and going chronologically, we're going through the stories therein. Later this week, we'll be arriving in the new testament, and we'll wrap the month out with talking about other December traditions, from a variety of cultures. If this goes well, we've talked about exploring other cultures and philosophies in a month-by-month basis throughout 2012.

See, she has talked to me about wanting to write stories, too. Comic books, manga, short stories, etc. And regardless of what you may individually feel about the bible, what they all boil down to - all matters of faith aside - is that they're all stories. And not just any stories, but tales which hold a significant place within our cultural collective awareness. It's one thing to acknowledge that she doesn't see Star Wars the same way as I do. I saw it when I was seven years old, and it rewired my brain. It didn't have nearly the same impact on her as it did on me, and that's okay, too. But in order to tell stories, you also have to KNOW stories. A firm understanding of the cultural origins of your audience is essential; the same words, legends and imagery is crucial for an open structure of communication. Even if she doesn't grow up to be a writer, she should be familiar with all these stories, no matter how she feels about them.

Not for the first time, I'm really excited to see what kind of adult she grows into. And not for the first time, I'm terrified of not doing enough.

I'm pretty sure it won't be the last time for either one, either.

Reaper's Return: The Pitch

2011-12-08T12:18:00.000-08:00

As a followup to my previous post, a few folks have already asked me what I came up with a new, revised, shiny, happy new pitch.

Well, the short answer is that there are still several in the can. The shortest pitch? The 'elevator pitch'? The full monty? Well, don't make that face. I'm talking metaphor, here. This remains an essentially family show, after all.

My pitches have heretofore been a bit broad; I tended to pitch the entire series, which in hindsight is really a silly thought.

Try, for example, to pitch "Lost". The simplest thing - "a plane crashes on a tropical island. Weirdness ensues" - doesn't quite cover it. But neither does "Oceanic flight 814 crashes on an island that moves through time and space, giving all the survivors an opportunity to move on from the mistakes and laspes in judgment of their lives before, during, after and sideways from crashing on the island. There is a powerful electromagnet which powers the island and must be maintained by a guy with a cool accent who has to press 8 14 15 23 42 and I think I'm missing a number there but you see the numbers all throughout the series so it shouldn't be too hard to fix that in post, but there's this one great episode where a temporal physicist who is kind of crazy and played by the fantastic Jeremy Davies.... oh, but I digress..."

Or, another example I was thinking of.... how do you suppose M Night Shyamalan pitched "The Sixth Sense"? Because just saying "it's about a kid who can see dead people" isn't quite enough. And "it's about a kid who can see dead people, and the psychatrist who is trying to help him" is closer, but still kind of lacks a bit of the punch. But "it's about a kid who can see dead people, and the psychiatrist who is trying to help him... who is ALSO DEAD." is much better.

Oh, and if you haven't seen the Sixth Sense, sorry for the spoiler. And, also, welcome to the 21st century.

So anyway. Here's the latest presentation.

What if Death wore a pretty black dress?

Everyone in Oldtown had heard talk of the Reapers. Even though nobody had seen one in years, everyone whispered the tales: flying from rooftop to rooftop, stealing the souls of the unwary, letting their undead beasts hunt through the streets for any member of the community too reckless or fearless to heed the nightly curfew ... mysterious and terrifying, most feared to even mention them by name, lest they appear and gather your spirit away.

For 11-year-old Romany, her greatest fears were less about the mythological Reapers and more about surviving a miserable life inside of Oldtown's solitary orphanage. Her stark white hair made her an obvious target for the bullies, and the cruel nickname of "Ratgirl" had followed her for years. But if Rom thought her troubles were behind her, being struck dead by a bolt of lightning would only open the door to an entire life of new ones.

First on the list? Finding out that she herself...is a Reaper.

....aaannnnndddd.... Scene!

Thoughts? Comments? Feedback? Love to hear your ideas.

Reaper's Return, the first book in the 6-volume Young Adult Steampunk series "Chronicles of Aesirium", is available through Smashwords, Amazon (eBook and Paperback), Barnes & Noble (eBook and Paperback) and now on iTunes, too!

Pitch Imperfect

2011-12-08T11:03:00.000-08:00

Ah, my lovelies, I am a bad blogger. I mean, certainly, I've been busy with good reason, but more about that in a moment.

Was invited to a special thing last night that I couldn't really talk much about until afterwards - CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing held a really fun event which they called "Pitch 2.0". A fair subtitle might have been "Talking Yourself Up in the New Age of Publishing." About 100+ people were in attendance (I'm terrible at judging official counts of crowds, by the way. As far as I can tell, once there's more than 25 people, I need someone else to give me numbers. Just saying, don't ask me to be the advance scout for your invading armies, I'll never provide accurate intel on the enemy troop count.), most of which were indie authors working with CS and KDP for the self-publishing (present or future) of their books.

It was held up in the SAAM (the Seattle Asian Art Museum), which I will be returning to soon as one of the locations for my next series. I had some time to kill prior to the event, so I got the chance to peruse. Very peaceful. I hung out and did some reading on my new Kindle Fire (This is not abject product placement, I bought it myself and LOVE IT. Do not judge me.) while I waited and watched the crowd gather.

After they let us all in, we got some tasty noms and milled about. I took a few minutes to people watch. I love the strange way a room filled with relative strangers will eventually begin to coagulate. Little snippets of conversation weave their way through the audible haze and I had to stop myself from smiling like a loon. I really do love people. I don't even know why I own a TV, I should just go hang around groups of strangers and that would be all I'd need. And I don't mean that in a bad way. I'm literally just fascinated by people I do not know. Almost as much as I'm fascinated by those I DO know. I'm a weird person. Good thing you like me, or you'd probably try to have me committed.

After our free range time, we found ourselves - quite by magic - in one of the SAAM's lower auditoriums and got to meet our hosts for the evening's event. We had a rousing little intro (and thank you, Thom, for NOT doing the "I can't hear you!" follow up to asking if we're all having a good night. That can be easily overdone. Just saying. Maybe next time?) which led into a panel led by Jeff Ayers. Joel Friedlander, Jason Black and the brilliant Alan Rinzler headed up the panel. I have serious hair and scarf envy for Alan. I feel perfectly comfortable in that confession.

So now we began the meat of the night: Pitch 2.0.

This whole event began quickly feeling like an echo of my subconscious. It was like a dream I had where I'd left a really brutal and torturous party by fleeing into an alternate dimension in which everyone had cool goatees and ... er. Wait, that's the wrong dream. What I MEANT to say was that it was that they were saying all the things I've been enjoying about the self-publishing paradyme shift over the past couple of years in which I've been exploring it.

One of them mentioned the sense self-published authors had not too far back where they felt as if they needed to somehow gloss over the fact of their self-publishedness for fear of being treated like self-indulgent and delusionally frolicking lepers. I'm going to pause a moment to reflect upon the image I just conjured up there.

Hmmm.

Okay, moving on.

They also talked about the key logic behind making a pitch - then and now. Before, a pitch was all about talking to an agent, a publisher. "Please buy my manuscript. Please? Pretty please?" Always, with a sense of begging them from a position of inferiority. As if they alone governed our destiny. You know, laying it out there like that... it just makes me want to stir up a revolution. The RIAA made me annoyed enough, but... okay, putting the pitchfork (heh. See what I did there?) down and going back on topic.

Nowadays, though, the pitch is a far broader tool for authors. Thanks to social media (The Rule: Be Present), a more observable level of access between readers and writers, and the more expidited turnaround time for publication, it just makes sense to have a better feel for one's books. As authors, it's essential now to have that skill to discuss your work with the people who may - unbelievable, I know! - just happen to decide to pick up a copy of your book and give it a read. I remember a musician I worked with many years back who confided in me that he loved playing live, but hated the crowds. "Sometimes, they applaud loud enough, but when they don't, I just hate them." I asked him if they'd ever found a proper diagnosis for his condition.

Because, honestly, what the what?

If you don't like talking to people, then tell you what. Accept the process of Pitching 1.0. Keep writing, and keep submitting your books up to publishers, and that's fine. Perhaps you'll be picked up by an agent or a publisher, and that's all well and good. But, me? Well, I love the whole talking to people part. So much fun. And maybe since I haven't set out to write the Great American Novel. I mean, don't get me wrong, that's a great goal, but I know myself well enough to remain delightfully unclouded by the tendrils of self-delusion. I like to write enjoyable (and occasionally thought-provoking) fiction, and I'm fine with that. Presently, the part I enjoy most is introducing people to my books (oh, and speaking of which.... Ta Da!) and talking with other authors about their books. It's really a pretty amazing time to be an artist in general, isn't it? No, it's okay, you can dance that jig now that you were thinking about.

Oh, so after their panel, we had about an hour with Jon Fine from Amazon. Solid chap, that man. Made some great observations and challenging declarations about the democratization of publishing. Sometimes, I feel like perhaps I'm too jaded from so many years dwelling deep in the bowels of corporate America, but I keep forgetting how many forward-thinking corporations there really ARE out there. And, no, I don't believe they're purely altruistic. I suspect they realize that right now is a very good time to get on the side of the middle class majority, or, in this case, get all the THOUSANDS of independent authors already working with Amazon squarely on their side. Smart business sense. Something the RIAA really should have learned. (okay, I'll stop peeing on that corpse now.)

After Jon's message, we broke up and practiced pitching with a fwe editors who volunteered their time to come hang out and offer feedback.

I'm typically pretty comfortable in my delivery, but to be perfectly honest the idea of pitching one's book to a person who will instantly offer positive and ~~nega~~ - - er, I mean constructive - - criticism in front of a small group of peers.... well, it kind of felt like having your mother in law show up in the bedroom and provide a running commentary.

"Oh, dear, your father isn't like that with me at all, he's far more tender and... okay, I don't understand what you're doing with that there. I think it will work better if you move your hips like this..."

* shiver *

Okay, maybe not like that, but it was certainly one of more jarring experiences I've had since college. And I think perhaps that's why I appreciated the evening so much. Ideas for improving my pitches rushed the stage. It was intoxicating.

And on that note, I need to get back to work. What with six books - - did I mention that "The Crook and the Blade" is now available? Too much self-promotion? Hmm? Heh. - - being out, I'm only taking a few moments for my Snoopy Dance before I get back to managing the marketing and continue to prep for the next few books on my plate.

Oh, and have you jumped over to Smashwords lately? Book one, Reaper's Return, is still there and remains a free ebook download.

What if Death wore a pretty black dress?

He Blinded Me With Science: An Interview with Peter A. Smalley

2011-11-03T09:42:00.000-07:00

I sat down with Peter over a couple pints of Mac and Jack in the historic and eye candilicious Charlie’s Bar and Grill in lovely downtown Seattle. I couldn’t have picked a more perfect setting for conversations about Steampunk fiction if I’d tried – and if you’re ever in the Puget Sound, you really have to swing by. (I’d also like to point out that even though this blog has not been sponsored by the lovely people at Charlie’s, I would totally not be opposed to singing praises on your behalf. Just saying.)

We’re both dressed casually, quite taken with the idea of discussing the wheres and whyfores of the contemporary publishing industry, right here in plain sight. Oh, if only the other patrons knew!

The drinks are about halfway gone when we decide to make the interview a formality.

Ren: So tell me, Peter – how’d this all get started for you, this whole writing aspect? Did you always want to be a writer?

Peter: Does anyone really decide to be a writer? I think, more often, it's merely the choice of whether or not to actually write down the stories and characters that are already cluttering up one's head. The tales are already there; developing the craft and letting others into your mental sandbox is a step of tremendous vulnerability requiring an equal amount of self-confidence. I've always been a writer. It's only been in the last few years that I began taking the steps that would lead to sharing my writing with others.

Ren: Well spoken, sir. So that was the first big dream, then? (Peter shakes his head, a mischievous smile peeking through his graying beard) No? Well, what was the first big wish?

Peter: A chemist, circa third grade.

Ren: (blinks) Wow, really? Like mad scientist chemist?

Peter: (I can tell he’s humoring me, here, because we both know my joke isn’t that funny. This is what friendship is all about.) I make sure the food you buy in the store won’t make you sick.

Ren: Okay, I officially promise to never tease you about being a chemist ever again. So, chemistry aside, what opened up the realms of writerdom to you? Was there a moment you decided, “yes, this is what I’m going to also do.”

Peter: The first time I read The Hobbit to myself (age 6).

Ren: Very good pull! That one always made a better impact on me than Tolkien’s other books. I read them later, sure, but the Hobbit? I do love me some clever riddles. Were there other books that dropped you in the deep end of the pool?

Peter: I was a voracious reader for most of my youth, but I really cut my teeth on epic fantasy: Tolkien, Stephen Donaldson, Robert Jordan, Tad Williams, Katherine Kurtz, Ursula LeGuin, Steven Brust, Glen Cook, and Neal Stephenson. [The most recent one I’ve read is] Memory, by Lois McMaster Bujold. Bujold's "Miles Vorkosigan" series of books is a fantastic character study in a rich scifi setting. Highly recommended. Also, go read anything you can get your hands on by Dan Abnett.

Ren: *sighs deeply* I’ll add them to my kindle. (also, Amazon, just saying, if you’re looking for some casual product placement, I’m totally your man) Assuming you get more time to read, what’s next on your list?

Peter: I’m currently reading Antigone's Fall by R.K. MacPherson. He writes with grit and an eye for detail that brings his setting a sharp-edged realism, but it is the mile-wide flaws in his characters that make the story truly gripping.

Ren: Excellent! I’m sure my readers will love the extra plugs there, but now let’s talk about your own books. Tell me about "The Burning Times" and "Grimme." What inspired the concept, and what made you want to write it? Give my readers your personal background on the story, and what it is about these books that made you so passionate about them?

Peter: After a crossroads of a conversation with Holly Black at a convention in 2008, I determined that I needed to write a Young Adult Fantasy novel incorporating both traditional myths and fairy tales with an element of "punk" - be that Steampunk or, to coin a term, Fairypunk. The punk part of that neologism challenged me to re-imagine some of Western literature's roots in the fairy tales of the Brothers Grimm, building in a streak of social tension - and even revolution - often implied in the tradition of Western literature. That led in turn to a speculative fiction take on how history might have been different if Rome had fallen not to internal strife and aggressive Germanic tribes, but to a plague of dragons, and it all spiraled out after that imaginative lightning-strike. The part that really fascinates me is the application of real-world conflicts - say, the genocides in Croatia, Rwanda and the Sudan - to a mythic setting like the Corolarian Kingdoms. In that setting I can explore them in a way that not only allows young adult readers to understand their tragedy, but also the impact they can have on later generations. It is important to me to communicate the idea that our world is interconnected, and everything has the potential to affect everything else. Grimme takes that idea and personalizes it. I'm very happy with the results.

The Burning Times was actually written after the manuscript for Grimme was complete and in revision. I wanted a shorter piece to introduce some of the historical aspects of both the main characters and the age of conflict whose repercussions would come home to roost later in Grimme. Interestingly, I have had a number of readers ask for more stories from the time period of The Burning Times, and I plan at least one more full-length work to satisfy those demands.

Ren: Who's your favorite character? What inspires you to write him or her?

Peter: I love all my characters, especially the villains (villains need love too!) and, surprisingly, the bit-part characters who exist for only a few paragraphs before fading back into the tapestry of the novel. When it comes to the main characters it really is a very close call, but Maximilien is probably my favorite (as opposed to my favorite to write - that would be Marja). Maximilien is the bridge character for the piece, combining elements of opposing camps to become a conduit between them. He is a wonderful blend of ingenuity, determination, sensitivity, and possibility. I also think of him as the quieter of the two brothers, which makes him the natural one to feel sympathetic towards.

Ren: True, the over-the-top ones almost write themselves, but I completely agree that it’s the quiet ones that always get to you. So, going forward, any more books planned in the Europas Cycle? If so, can we have a teaser?

Peter: Of course! I foresee at least two sequels to Grimme and one more full-length work set in the time period of The Burning Times. As a teaser, imagine what might happen when Maximilien and Sora attempt to navigate the political jungle of the fractured city-states Adriatica and Tyrrhenia in search of clues to the whereabouts of Baron von Grimme, while Victor, Marja and Jonas investigate the unexplained disappearance of an entire village of good Gothic folk. What could these two threads, separated by half a continent, have to do with each other? Find out in the next volume of The Europas Cycle!

Ren: Oh, that’s just mean. But I did ask for a teaser, so I guess it serves me right - - I’m really looking forward to the next book! And speaking of the next book, those of us who got to see you at the recent Steamcon 3 got to see your latest project, 20,001. What led to the 20,001 Steampunk Odyssey anthology? Any more anthologies planned?

Peter: It actually began quite simply. Kindling Press wanted to begin highlighting great new writing talent and to publish a volume of short works. I was, and am, utterly in love with Steampunk - which, as you know, has had a co-evolution with self-publishing that is far from coincidental. We looked at the literature and the state of the genre and decided the stars were right for a volume springing from the Jules Verne work Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. It was the theme of this year's Steamcon, which would also be a good release date. What could be better? As it turned out, an extra month or two would have made for a less crazy editing pace, but the eight short stories and two novellas that make up 20,001 turned out extremely well, and we're very proud of its success - as well as our own success in finding and highlighting some great new writers in the genre. And yes, we are already planning our next anthology! This time, we're leaving ourselves a bit more time, both for submissions and for editing, but our goal remains finding and highlighting great new authors while providing cutting-edge fiction to readers at a very modest price.

Ren: Which leads me right to my next question. What with all the buzz these days about people shifting to self-publishing, epublishing and indie presses, what's the history behind Kindling Press? Who is working with you on that? What are your next plans?

Peter: Jason Vanhee and I founded Kindling Press in the late Spring of 2011 as a way to create an ebook imprint that readers could come to identify not just with us, but with quality writing. It's amazing to think it's already done so much in such a short time! Jason is a wonderful writer and a really stellar editor - by which I mean he pulls absolutely no punches when he sees something that could be better in plot, character or style. He also has great awareness of the fiction market, and ties to bookstores and printing facilities that have been critical for us. With my contacts and strengths in marketing and SEO - not to mention some rudimentary website expertise - we complement each others strengths and have managed to get this sometimes ungainly epublishing / writer's collective off the ground and into the air! We're still growing fast, but we are both writers first and foremost so the growth of Kindling Press is slower than it might otherwise be while we pursue our individual writing as well. We plan to add several more writers to the collective going forward, however, and this should help us maintain our growth while allowing more time for personal writing pursuits. Future directions include our next anthology - look for a call for submissions soon! - and appearances at Northwest science fiction / writing conventions such as Orycon, Rustycon, Norwescon, and more yet to be announced.

Ren: Okay, unfortunately, my time's coming to an end, just like my pint. I’ve got time for just one last question, then: Who’d win in a fight – the Six Million Dollar Man or the Fall Guy?

Peter: Ummm… MacGuyver.

Ren: Oooooh. Good one. Thanks for the beer and the time, sir - - and best of luck going forward!

Peter A. Smalley can be hunted down and tracked for his pelt, but would kindly appreciate it if you all would stop doing that, as he’s only got the one. More specifically, you should track down his books through the Kindling Press website, and support your indie authors. Seriously. Go now.

the 411 on 911

2011-09-11T14:29:00.000-07:00

I don't really want to empower the negative energies that seem associated with this day, but I'm having trouble with the rest of my writing, so I suppose I should just get it out and get back to work.

Ten years ago. It's really been that long, yes. Crazy times.

I remember that we were at that time banning cable tv in our house. So in the middle of the afternoon, when my mother called, shocked, we didn't know what she was going on about.

"They blew up the trade center!" she was saying.

I thought she was kidding. Bad prank, I thought.

I was finally able to pull up a few random pages on CNN - the site was almost completely shut down by traffic - and realized that it was true. The buildings were gone. Gone.

Our daughter was at that point less than a year old. Not walking, not talking, not really doing much of anything, as young infants are known to do. Drooling, sleeping, eating, pooping, crying - that was the bulk of her activities back then. But all I kept thinking, as the reality was sinking in, was "why did we bring a child into THIS world?" It was a dark, sad moment.

Then we went to war.

Nation regimes were changed, a lot more people were killed, and it still goes on. "911" is now some sort of strange rallying cry, a touchstone of philosophy and political debate, used like a shield behind which people may seek defense for their opinions or decisions, or use like a hammer against those who might disagree with them.

There is no debating that it was a tragic day in the history of the United States, regardless of your feelings on whether it was a cause or an effect or both. It was what it was.

My heart goes out to all the people who either died in the attack, as a result of it, or those who war in its name.

I don't know what more, really, to say about it. There are so many feelings I have about this, but so many remain unfiltered and unresolved in the vast wasteland of my subconscious. It's something that will, in large part, require additional waiting. But today seemed a good day to pull it up and dust it off, even if only for a short while.

Behind the Quill: Q and A with HL Reasby

2011-08-19T07:50:00.000-07:00

Halloo there, ladies and gents; changing up the context by bringing in a special treat for all of you. I had a chance to sit down with the fantastic H.L. Reasby, author and self-confessed fangirl, to discuss her current Sekhmet's Light trilogy, her foundations in literature and her own past, present and future. So let's warm up the WABAC machine, Mister Peabody, and sit back for a fun conversation with a wonderful woman.

RC: First, let me get you something to drink; coffee, or tea or something brewed?

HL: Ironically, I never really drank coffee before I came to Seattle, but now I drink it on a semi-regular basis. Generally speaking, however, iced tea or water are my drinks of choice.

RC: Yes, the northwest seems to have that effect on people. I never really understood that before. Okay, so let's jump right in. Pretend we're in line to see "Columbiana" or something, and we have a couple minutes. Also pretend that we've never met - - tell me about your books before we get to the cashier.

HL: The Sekhmet’s Light series combines Ancient Egyptian mythology with a modern setting. It’s a superhero-like universe where the gods grant power to avatars to combat the followers of their enemies. Another writer I know refers to it as “Isis meets Wonder Woman”.

RC: Isis meets Wonder Woman. Sold me! Where'd you come up with an idea for characters like the ones in your books? What was the inspiration? And why Egyptian mythos, as opposed to Celtic, Roman or Grecian?

HL: The idea for NuruSekhmet actually came from a dream that I had a long time ago now, shortly after a visit to the Field Museum in Chicago. I was interested in Egypt before that, but I became absolutely fascinated by their Egyptian exhibit which has lots of hands-on type displays. The night after we visited the museum, I dreamed about a woman who was given a portion of Sekhmet’s power and, through that, gained a spiritual connection with the goddess. Through further research, I decided to name her NuruSekhmet (which translates into Sekhmet’s Light) because Sekhmet is strongly associated with the sun and fire.

RC: Bonus points for not only giving us great stories but teaching us a bit in the process. An extra +5 for having this idea come to you in a dream. That's excellent! Now, you're in the middle of writing book 3 right now - how's that going? Any spoilers you want to share?

HL: Work is continuing apace on book 3. I’m at about the halfway point of the first draft. I’m very happy with the way some of the characters are evolving and with some of the turns it’s taken. Although it wasn’t my intention initially, the third book is, in many ways, turning into a little bit of a love letter to the Special Forces community. In book 2, I introduce the readers to Maximus “Church” Churchill who is the leader of one of the Horus temples, and a SEAL.

In book 3, Church and other SpecOps guys get more spotlight which really allows me to highlight the quiet professionalism of these men that many writers don’t seem to understand very well. Although I’d always intended to take Church from tertiary to secondary or primary character, I do think that recent events in the real world have prompted me to focus on that a little more than I’d originally thought I would.

RC: Makes sense - - sounds fantastic, I can't wait to read it! (I may have to send a copy to my brother, who's over in Afghanistan at the moment.) To be honest, my "make or break" element of any book is, above all, the characters themselves - and the Sekhmet's Light trilogy is filled with some pretty diverse and very interesting characters - of them all, who was the most fun to write? Who was the biggest challenge for you?

HL: Oh, wow. Well, here’s the thing… all of them have times when they’re a lot of fun, and sometimes each of them can be just a pill to deal with. The one who’s most consistently easy to write is Aramair. She’s very sweet and nurturing so it’s pretty easy to see what she’s going to do in most situations.

Honestly, the one who’s the hardest is Nicole for the most part. She throws me curveballs on a fairly consistent basis and, especially in book 3, she can be very unpredictable.

The most consistently fun to write have been Bailey and Weber. They have a great chemistry between them and it’s been fun to explore their relationship.

RC: I can imagine! I definitely can appreciate the kind of theatricality you embrace in your books, as well - both in the interpersonal dramas as well as the pacing and action; I could totally see them on the big screen. If your books were already made into movies, what soundtracks would they have?

HL: The first book would definitely be geared more toward traditional-type Egyptian music. It really explores the more traditional aspects of the sects and although it takes place in the modern world, it’s very anachronistic in many ways.

The second book would be more rock based, or maybe a score similar to Steve Jablonsky’s work on the Transformers films (say what you will about the movies themselves, the music is just AMAZING). It really drives home the fact that although the Ancient world intersects with the modern, it’s definitely not the old days and that the sects can’t afford to pretend otherwise any more.

The third book should be similar in tone to book two, but with the ‘epic’ feel cranked up a few notches and with instances of a Latin flair thrown in as well.

RC: You had me at "anachronistic" - hah! So, going forward, now: once you're done with this trilogy, what's next?

HL: I have a tie-in collection of short stories/novellas that I’ll be compiling to fill in some of the back story that is only hinted at in the novels. You’ll get to see the raid that Meshrew and Imanekhet conducted that resulted in the rescue of baby Aramair and her mother, the origins of the very first NuruSekhmet in detail, more about Bailey and Weber’s partnership and more.

From there, I’m planning a couple stand-alones: I was asked to do a pirate story, so I’m pondering that. I also have a story about the lost continent of Atlantis which could turn into another series as well down the road.

RC: Pirates! Yes! I'm already in line for that one. Are you putting in any public appearances we should know about?

HL: My first official public appearance as a writer is going to be at Emerald City ComiCon the last weekend of March 2012. I’m particularly excited about that because ECCC is run by a wonderful bunch of guys and the crowd that attends tends to be incredibly friendly and warm.

RC: So, here's a pretty hot topic I'd like to touch on. I notice that you're self-published - why did you decide to go that route, as opposed to going through a "traditional publisher"?

HL: There were a lot of reasons for the decision, but the primary was that by self-publishing I actually retain control of my creation which is important to me. Also, by going the self-pub route, I’m keeping the lion’s share of the money from each sale for myself instead of it going to the publishing company. The unfortunate truth is that many first-time writers get lost in the shuffle of big publishing. The major pubs don’t want to spend money to promote an author that doesn’t have a track record, so there’s little effort made to bring awareness to those books, generally speaking.

RC: Those are some great points! How do you think being self-published has helped you connect to your audience?

HL: By self-publishing, there’s no expectation that anyone’s going to promote my work but me so I’m walking in with eyes wide open. It means that I have to find a way to get in touch with my audience so I’ve taken it upon myself to join as many social media outlets as possible (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc) as well as book-oriented sites like Goodreads so I can make myself accessible to readers who want to know more about my books.

RC: That's definitely refreshing - I'm surprised more authors don't turn to social networking to get to know their readers, but I'm really glad to see that you do! So, changing gears again, let's set the WABAC machine for your childhood - - awwww, you're such a cute kid! So tell us - what is the little you thinking? What does she want to be when she grows up? If a writer is the top of your list now, what's number two?

HL: I was a big animal lover and for a long time growing up, I wanted to be a veterinarian. That lasted until I realized that being a vet would mean seeing animals in pain and having to do things like put them down which was just too much to contemplate. Once Veterinary school was out, I then latched on to paleontology/archeology, but unfortunately, I didn’t have the grades to pursue those avenues. I was one of those kids that drove teachers up the wall because I was obviously smart and knew the material because I always did well in class discussions and on tests, but I despised homework and rarely applied myself in that arena.

RC: On that same note, when did you realize you wanted to be a writer? What was it that really made that decision come alive for you?

HL: I’ve always enjoyed making up stories, but I didn’t really start writing them until I hit college. I needed another elective after reading some of my stories, my mom convinced me to take a creative writing workshop.

Boy, let me tell you that was terrifying. The way the workshop worked was that each week we were required to bring in enough copies of a 1-3 page story which we would then take home and read and critique. We would then come in and read the piece aloud and listen to feedback before collecting the copies of our stories so we’d have the hardcopies to improve our work.

As a kid who was notorious for being painfully shy all my life (I didn’t even speak until I was three, according to family lore), it was nerve wracking, to say the least. However, as that first semester went along, I found myself looking forward to the opportunity to read my piece and hear what everyone thought of it. It helped me overcome my shyness and also showed me that I had genuine talent for writing.

Unfortunately, I didn’t do much with it until after my mother passed away in 2001. She was always my biggest fan and expressed confidence that I could be a writer if I wanted to be. By early 2003, I’d decided that I would try to make something out of that faith and came to Seattle for the first time to attend the Fairwood Writer’s Conference at NorWesCon. I got a universally great reaction to the concept for Sekhmet’s Light from the pros that critiqued it, but I struggled with it for several more years. Once I figured out why it wasn’t working and corrected the issues (turns out I was trying to cram a trilogy into one book, which was the major problem), it worked well.

Once I got the first book done and held the proof in my hands for the first time, I knew I’d love to do this for a living.

RC: Isn't that the best feeling EVER? So what's the best piece of advice you've ever had in regards to being a writer?

HL: I’m not entirely certain who first told me this, but it was something to the effect that “writers write”.

RC: I've heard that before as well. I always liked the directness of it. So, home stretch time: Who was the better archeologist - Allan Quartermain or Indiana Jones?

HL: Okay, I think this is a great question because both of those guys tend to make actual archeologists cringe. I think in terms of sheer panache, I have to give it to Indy (the fact that he was a massive childhood crush of mine might also come into play).

RC: Good call. We named the DOG Indiana, by the way. True fact!

Okay, let's tell people what they've been dying to know: Where are your books sold? What formats are they available in? If my readers want to know more about you, where can they go?

HL:All the major outlets are carrying my books and they’re available in paperback and the major ereader formats: Amazon’s Kindle, and ebook which is the standard for NOOK, Sony, and others. I’m also more than happy to do direct sales if anyone has problems purchasing from the various outlets which can be coordinated if they contact me via my website.

Akhet for Kindle
Akhet for NOOK
Akhet Paperback
Peret for Kindle
Peret for NOOK
Peret Paperback

Thanks so much to HL Reasby for taking the time to chat with me - - best of fortunes going foward, and do check out her Sekhmet's Light series, at an e-bookstore (or brick and mortar, as well) near you!

Interview by Daniel L Carter (Aug 2011)

2011-08-11T06:42:00.000-07:00

Had a fun weberview with fellow author Daniel L Carter that just got posted up on his site. Fun times!

Here's a bit of it - - go check out his site for the full enchilada!

DLC: I want to thank you Ren for stopping by and doing this interview with me. Before we get into your cool looking series please share a little bit about yourself.

Ren: My name is Ren Cummins, up here in the delightfully and mostly cloudy greenery of the Pacific Northwest. A stone's throw (okay, a very hefty throw, like, with the wind at your back or something) from Seattle; I live up here with my wife and daughter, a pair of cerebrally-interchanged dogs and a cat who is very in touch with his Egyptian mythology. I gave up the rock-and-roll ambitions I'd carried over from my youth once my daughter was born, and fell back in love with telling stories as she started to be interested in hearing them. Been writing professionally now for several years, and am using all the wonders of this interweb contraption (I kid. I'm a kidder) to get my books out on the market.

DLC: I think just about every author is still trying to figure out this interweb thingy. =) So, speaking of books, tell us about your series.

Ren: The series I'm working on right now is a Young Adult Steampunk Fantasy series called the Chronicles of Aesirium. It revolves around a "sort-of-Earth" planet called Aerthos where technology has evolved from a focus on steam-engine-driven tech, but this has been made feasible by the addition of magical skills called simply "Art." By using Science and Art, the civilization - in spite of a few growing pain setbacks - has made great advances, but, as so many societies do, fell into a civil unrest dwelling on the differences between those who prefer science and those who prefer magic. This civil war left them irrevocably divided, with the artists losing and being exiled beyond an enormous wall originally built for the defense of the city. The story begins about 200 years after this exile, with the citizens of the city, Aesirium, becoming more like mythological figures to the people of Oldtown-Against-the-Wall, the descendants of their exiled forefathers.

If generations of exile weren't bad enough, there are monsters in the wild lands to the west; great, corrupted and undead beasts that find their way into the nighttime streets of Oldtown. And this, on top of the bedtime stories of the Reapers, powerful and mysterious beings believed to cart off the rebellious souls of the unsuspecting.

The story itself focuses on a trio of children growing up in this challenging but still fantastical environment, each with a specific role to play in the history and future of Oldtown and Aesirium - a future which will change the greatest city on the face of Aerthos.

Okay, that probably sounds a lot more epic than I intended. But you'll have to read for yourself and see if I'm lying.

DLC: Epic is exactly what I'd call it. Which character would you most identify with?

Ren: Oooh, that's a tough one. There's something of myself in all the characters, of course, but the one I just get the most is Ian, an old wizard with an odd sense of humor and an even more odd sense of fashion. His role isn't large in terms of the story's entire narrative, but he does give the children a sense of direction and focus that they need at crucial times. I most enjoyed writing his odd sense of comic timing, how he'd dance between sober wisdom and quirky silliness.

(continued at site)

Thanks for the interview, Daniel! The rest of you - go check out his blog and his books - - -go! Go now!

the Right to Write

2011-07-13T09:20:00.000-07:00

July already? Crikey.

The past month or so has been both wonderfully and painfully busy - been networking like it was free (it mostly is) and writing/editing as if it generated oxygen. Somewhere in the middle of all of that, I managed to hold down a full time job, help take care of the house, take road trips to Portland and Montana, and, I'm pretty sure I might have slept once or twice. Tired but still creatively motivated.

More and more, the reality of this new adventure is rearing its delicious head up into my horizon - in fact, it feels as if I've already passed into the golden fields, having crossed its border sometime during the dark night now fading behind me. Somehow, I became a writer and didn't even notice.

Seems like every week or so, I get another idea for a story or a book or more, and I'm still less than a book away from finishing the current 6-book series. I'm not complaining, though - clearly, it's better to have more stories than you have time to write than to have no stories and all the time. A lot of them are staying on the back burner for now: the harder science fiction - especially the ones who would do with a fully-developed schedule of tech research, for example - will have to wait until I can dedicate more time to it. On the front burners, there are already plenty of projects I'm pushing through. Still don't understand why I don't feel more stressed out about it. Too busy enjoying doing it, I guess.

One of the parts I'm actually enjoying the most is the mingling with peers. It's so strange to think that as recently as two years ago, all these great people working in publishing - comic books, fiction, sci fi, films, what-have-you - are now people I interact with on an almost daily basis. It's kind of dreamy. I swoon.

Seriously, though, the downside to that is that I still presently have a day job - one that is decidedly NOT being an author. And every day, I'm unfortunately reminded of the distinctions between these two worlds. Some days, it feels like I'm Bruce Willis in Twelve Monkeys, uncertain of which reality is "now". It can be both frustrating and disorienting.

For example, one of the most positive elements in self-publishing is the idea of recognizing the motivations and logic behind every decision I make. Each element of work or marketing or design, each step of the way has a reason behind it, and if I don't like something, well, then I just go ahead and change it. But in the corporate world, I'm comparatively unpowered in such aspects. "Don't ask why, we just ask 'how high?'" It's strangely dehumanizing. And the strangest bit of all is how I managed to not notice that sooner. Sure, I knew I didn't like it, but I didn't exactly realize why.

And speaking of the big Y, I've been reading a lot of wonderful blog posts recently by other authors that talk about why they write, or why they self-publish, or why they write and self-publish, etc. It has been really satisfying to see so many who've come into this process for so many of the same reasons I have. It's a wonderful community of writers, and thank god for the internet to bring all our tiny islands together.

One other update - I attended my daughter's school last month at the invitation of her teacher, to sit and talk to the class about being an author, writing, and all of that. It was one of those pivotal and mind-altering moments, to be perfectly honest. The children really got excited about the idea that all these movies and video games and comic books; these myths, even the history we learn about - all of these things come from the craft of storytelling. It's all just one person telling a story to someone else, or writing it down so that it may be later read and shared. The kids were really engaged, and I hope I helped them get a little more enthused about reading. The teacher was very happy with it; and on a side note, I still have trouble calling my daughter's teachers by their first names, even when they're younger than I am. That's just weird.

Well, speaking as I was in regards to the day job - and the writing, for that matter - I have more things to do today than spend my time blogging. Thanks for reading along today, it was nice having you here.

And, as always, if you enjoyed this, feel free to jump over to amazon and check my books out. I remain a pretty big fan of the stories there, and I hope you will, too. Sorry for sounding like I'm pimping myself out, but I am grateful for every single one of you that picked or will pick up one of my books and enjoy the stories written therein. If you do, I'd love to hear what you think of them.

Until then, be well, my friends. Enjoy the day.

Setting the WABAC Machine

2011-06-09T10:10:00.000-07:00

Been enjoying a spirited conversation regarding the past, present and future of publishing over on Twitter today. It reminded me of the line from "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" - life moves pretty fast; if you don't stop and look around, you could miss it. Because, seriously, the publishing world IS moving pretty quickly. Or is it?

I frequently examine the world of literary publishing and perform a compare/contrast to the world of music publishing - it seems like the rush and crush of the music industry's marketing blitz has driven the industry and technology a bit faster than book publishing, game publishing and the film industry (in no particular order). Or perhaps it's just that we've noticed them in a particular order and the technology just took a while longer for various industries to become readily apparent.

Back in the 90s, yes - I was focused primarily on the music industry, myself. Recording, live shows, publishing, etc. The digital age at that time was battling between DAT and CD, and the internet was a pale fetus of what it has developed into now. The only way to really get your music out and about was by doing shows or getting on the radio. And the latter was so much more of a challenge. AOR format kept most unpublished artists off the air - if you knew a DJ or were fortunate enough to live in a city that had any sort of "Local's Only" show, then you had the chance to get your song played at, like 11:35pm on a Thursday night or whatever. I was fortunate enough to know Nyk Fry when I was working on my album, who at the time was working at one of my local radio stations. He and I had worked together on a couple other things, and he had a free slot open on his show and invited me to come on and pimp my CD. It was a pretty great opportunity; I don't know how much of a dick I might have been on air, but to this day I remain very grateful for the chance.

Also, at the time, I was working days managing a downtown hotel - we hosted a lot of the bands who came through to play the Zephyr club or the Dead Goat Saloon, such as The Church, Big Head Todd and the Monsters, and even Dee Snider. Christopher Titus stayed with us for a week, and a chunk of the crew working on the filming of The Stand even hung out with us while filming in Utah. It's so odd now to consider how much around the periphery I was to all these media outlets, and yet never really figured out a way to convert that into a more professionally creative endeavor. Different times, a different brain in my skull.

It's been over ten years, and though I no longer pursue the music as a professional path, the entire time period of "back then" taught me a great deal about how those things work.

And that makes it doubly strange in that a lot of the people running those organizations and corporations involved in music, books, film and video games seem to be struggling with how to adapt to these new technologies.

For example, look at music.

For the past few years, the RIAA has been complaining that their poor starving artists have been victimized by the horrors and atrocities of the heartless digital pirates, who have been stealing away millions of potential profits from the musicians they represent. They point to line and bar charts as evidence of their financial ruin, and draw a direct correlation to the increasing use of the internet. Oh, yes, obviously there is a connection there.

However, companies who have embraced the digital age have thrived and prospered. iTunes, Amazon MP3, Rhapsody, etc - - they're doing pretty well, in spite of the apocalypse that the RIAA has described. But the truth is that these other companies have done well because they have evolved into the new business model as defined by the good ol dollar bill. The people have voted with their wallets and chosen the format they're most interested in. And people have frequently turned to the availability of music on the internet to sample and validate music to see if they want to actually purchase it. I have a friend (who wishes to remain anonymous) who says he frequently downloads music to see if he likes it. And if he does, he deletes it and buys it through one of the online stores. And if not, he just deletes it. Sounds perfectly reasonable to me, but, then, I'm not a highly-paid RIAA lawyer.

Neil Gaiman did a test with his release of "American Gods", where he allowed a free copy of the book to be downloaded for, like, a month. And he noticed that sales actually spiked upwards as a direct result. That seems to go completely against the expectations we are led to believe from conventional wisdom. Some people point to his results as an anomaly, but either way, it's an interesting experiment.

But that's just one aspect of this topic. Book publishing is becoming an increasingly facilitated process: POD (Print on Demand), Vanity Press and e-publishing sites are making it easier and easier to snap the final pieces into place when publishing a book. For example, I can upload my book to CreateSpace and Kindle, and within two or three days (usually much less), I've got books for sale. It's actually Very Simple.

Now, no, I don't get the amazing distribution channels that the Big Publishers get. I can't manipulate the shelf real estate of a book store like they can; I'm just one author out in a sea of other authors. And in that way, "traditional publishers" still retain a perceived lion's share of the business. I'm not bitter or anything, I accept that this is how things go. They have the bigger quantities of authors to look out for, so clearly they're going to wrestle things in accordance with their best interests. And though I'm outside of their monkeysphere, I don't take it personally. We're both doing somewhat nicely in sharing our ecosystem.

But I keep hearing these strange rumblings coming out of them which sound disconcertingly similar to the panicked cries of music publisher stockholders from 5 or 6 years ago. I see strange declaratives being made about "book piracy" and "basement press market pollution" that seem to emanate from that same place of fear and confusion. Old School publishers are indicating that they're not making their same money, and, in their blind and unweildy fear, they're striking out at the people they have decided are responsible: self-publishers.

I can't help but worry that it's not just a coincidence that I've noticed so many one star reviews on Amazon which seem to attack specifically Self Published novels on the merits of...well, sometimes for no merit at all other than being self published. Terms of "Vanity Press" and "Self Published" get used as insults, as if those terms alone were valid arguments against them. I've read enough "Traditionally Published" books that contain typographical errors and poor narrative, 2-dimensional characters and flimsy story arcs to warrant the regret of 20 dollars poorly spent. But at the same time, I have a different view on purchasing music, books, films, and so forth. I'm not just supporting the label or the publisher or, sometimes, even, the artist. I support the industry itself. If I see something of quality, I'm as likely to buy it to help the industry itself take a small step forward. I also confess lately to be adjusting this, however. There are just so many new independent authors out there, whose books are every bit as good (or better) than the books I've read in the past from the Big Publishers. Did you really believe that a book is only good if it came from a company that's already published 10,000 books? Size really isn't everything, after all. Ask Goliath.

But here's where the title of today's blog comes in. Go back about a hundred or more years - go on, Mr Peabody, set the WABAC machine and let's go! And let's see how publishing worked - back before the day of the Conglomerate. Publishers were just a guy with a printing press and binder. You'd pay them to set it up and print it and bind it, and there you were, proud owner of a stack of books. Sounds awfully similar to vanity presses, come to think of it.

And now I read someone arguing on behalf of the publishing houses, claiming that they're not so much in this for the money as much as they're here for the readers. That's right, they're here on behalf of the readers, saving them from losing their money on rubbish. They're doing this for you, people. They're the watchers at the gate, keeping out the millions of craptastic novels written by people you really don't want to waste your hard earned dollars on. Very altruistic, huh? Okay, okay, I don't want to pick on them too much. I know it's been hard for them lately, and I don't mean to kick them when they're down. Besides, one day, they might throw a bucket of money at me, and then won't I feel like a sham?

Seriously, though, my concern for them is really only that they - like so many other similar industries - have forgotten one of the primary concepts of success: Innovate or Die. Keep up, or fall behind. Evolve or become extinct.

It doesn't need to be a scary world. The asteroid hasn't hit the planet - well, okay, maybe it has - but they don't need to stumble around with their silly T-Rex arms. The publishing worlds are changing, and if only they were willing to evolve with it instead of trying to stop it, they'd probably be in much better shape.

Q and A day

2011-06-02T13:05:00.000-07:00

Geez, I talk a lot. Well, in the interest of fostering a bit more of the good ol' Give and Take-iness of the internet, I'd like to just open up the floor a bit.

Any questions? About Steampunk, the Chronicles of Aesirium? Other projects? Music? Movies? Video Games? Philosophy? Comic books? Math?

Ask away, I'll answer.

The Tragic Downside of Writing What You Know

2011-06-02T10:05:00.000-07:00

It's been a difficult couple of months lately for anyone who watches the news and is empathetic to the struggles that befall our earthly cohabitators. Japan's continuing difficulties were still powerfully fresh in my mind when one of the most powerful tornados on record carved a path through Joplin, Missouri. My day job required me to be involved in that one from a professional standpoint, as my company has employees there, and without going too deeply into it, I will just say that it remains a powerful event, even many days later.

I've been on a variety of conference calls for the past two weeks now, working with directly and indirectly impacted people, and observed as my emotional state careened dramatically between despair and horror and the occasional moments of elation. There were moments of optimism, truly. But these seemed - to my mind - to be the infrequencies rather than the norm.

I even took a full day off last week from work just to untether my mind from the reality of that devastation. "Untether"? Unhitch? Unhinge? *shrug* I don't know that any of those words works better than the others. To be frank, I just needed to disconnect from it.

So I spent a day as something else - not a crisis manager, but as an author. Went with a good friend to a coffee bar (frequented by - gasp - other authors!) and enjoyed a good cup of mocha, a tasty raspberry doughnut and a fantastic conversation. From there, went to a local comic book shop and hung with three other good friends of mine, and, following a brief nap (please keep all your "Old Man" jokes to yourselves, I've heard them all, thanks) went to a meeting with a few other authors to discuss ongoing and future projects.

Sadly, I didn't actually get any writing done, but I did the next best thing in that I gave all the cacophony a moment to settle.

Later in the week I was able to sit back down with my next novel and eke out a few trembling paragraphs, which is better than I'd been able to do all week - so I took it as an achievement. But through all the craziness of the past few weeks, a conversation with another author jumped out at me, regarding some of the challenges at writing fiction versus non - namely, the concept of writing what you know.

It's a common enough statement, uttered as the Primal Commandment of Literature for all struggling authors, to keep your emotional associations and personal experiences as grist for the mill, as the base matter for your Eternal Writing Engine. That idea used to make me smile - my first books have been about sci fi and fantasy, all tales strewn from a world wholly unlike my own life-experiences, with concepts such as dimensional travel, death and the soul, magic and that sort of nonsense. Heh. Nonsense. Oh, sure I can talk casual, but I do love the material. And I make no excuses for it - - - fiction though it may be, I know exactly where every twisted non-reality comes from in my own life.

Just like any author will draw some corrolary item out of the congealed memories or experiences of their past or present, a writhing, living creature from the subconscious colonies of their own spirit, I just paste together a mosaic of this or that when building out the worlds, the characters, the elements that combine to form the narrative. How much of it is conscious or not... well, I suppose that's a question only my therapist would be equipped to answer. (Or, well, they would if I had one. For now, a blog is cheaper. *snrk*)

So, back to Japan and Joplin.

I'm on chapter 3 of the conclusion to my 6-book Chronicles of Aesirium series. It's all been quickly rising in intensity the past few books, as all the opposing forces are arrayed across the fictional chessboard. And this is the big one, the throwdown between good and evil. I won't lie - and I'm not spoiling, I hope - but it's not gonna be a clean war, here. There will be casualities. There will be destruction. Book five was emotionally intense enough for me to write, but book 6.... yikes.

I've sat on the threshold of this story for a few months, now, ever since book 5 wrapped back in the first part of 2011. It's not just that it's a big epic confrontation, filled to the brim with infinite moving parts - well, okay, it kind of is, but that's not the reason I've been pausing.

And I don't think I even fully appreciated why I was hesitant to start until Japan started to really affect me. With the added impact of my co-workers in Missouri, the point was truly driven home. Basically, I'm not just writing a story of a teenager who becomes an angel of death, or the story of her friends - the streetwise prophet or the budding mad scientist. It's a story about history - about how we allow ourselves to be misled when we don't understand the very world we've been born into, and about how the future is driven by the comprehension of that past. But it's also about how we communicate NOW, and how we as a large community experience the present. And that realization is when the light went on.

Why were Japan and Joplin so potent in my emotional core? Because I need to write them into this. Their story is noteworthy - their experience is not just applicable, but it's something that is potent. It resonates - not just with me, either, obviously. I'm just some guy writing books. But hopefully I can manage to shape this tale as a way to expand the resonance of these real-world events, even if it's just in my own small way.

I recall hearing a story about Anne Rice's initial inspiration to write the "Interview with the Vampire" book - about how it came from a question of how to deal with the loss of her daughter - - "can a child live forever?" Certainly, such a powerful experience can lead an author in powerful directions. Additionally, I see the stamp of Hiroshima in many of the anime shows I've watched - Robotech, Akira, Grave of the Fireflies, for just some of the more blatant examples. They deal with the wound to their culture through...well, their culture. And so the cycle continues, I suppose.

It's a literary catharsis, in a manner of speaking. And it's not simply relegated to writing - musicians, painters, sculptors, actors, whatever - - we create from our own experiences and observations, from our own emotional response to the world we live in. So what if the price is a little bit of heightened emotion? So what if we're, as a simple result, just a little more emotional about things? Is the price worth it?

Actually, that's kind of a silly question, isn't it? If I didn't think it was worth it, why would I still be doing it?

Some days, I don't really expect tremendous and earth-shattering nuggets of wisdom here - - sometimes, it's just nice to check in and remind myself why I do this. And with that, back to work.

The Age of Man

2011-05-18T07:07:00.000-07:00

When do you know when you're halfway there? This odd rhetorical-esque question popped into my head on the way to my day job this morning, and embedded itself like a splinter.

Do you ever know? Because, technically, you really wouldn't. Think about driving somewhere. Oh, you might be able to guess that you're about halfway to your destination, based on time or mileage, but you can't KNOW you're in the exact middle of something until you've gotten to the end, and, even then you're no longer in the middle. Right? It feels oddly existentialist, but that could just the lack of coffee in my bloodstream.

I remember hearing the stories about Cristobal Colon (Christopher Columbus in the anglicized format) being nearly at the point of a mutiny (nearly at the sword point, not to put too fine a point on it - - okay, I'll stop that now) because the crew simply didn't think they were past that point of no return and would rather risk a long trip home than continue on towards the unknown or the likely expectation of a trip over the edge of the world. And the historically accepted facts indicate that Chris - once they did actually arrive at land - didn't even realize the truth of what he'd accomplished, that he'd "discovered the americas."

Although, actual history reveals that he didn't actually discover it. And not just because people were already living there (an old Lakota Sioux friend of mine used to joke about wanting to celebrate Columbus day by discovering someone else's home and claiming it for his own), but because Vikings had been here - apparently several centuries earlier than the Nina, the Pinta and the Santa Maria. But I guess it's really okay, since Chris didn't realize he had found the new continent anyway. Plus, there's that whole thing about how Amerigo Vespucci did the cartography and got to name the place, so that's an entirely other complication. But I digress. The point I was going for is that all too often we really don't know exactly where we are. Not while we're on the journey and, many times, even after we've arrived.

There have been a lot of significant moments that we can look back on as world-changing events. some of them leave monuments, like the Pyramids; others have monuments erected in their honor. Some are chronicled in stories, songs, paintings or statues - and some simply have the memories of their enduring impact, engraved into our hearts. July 4th, 1776. May 10th, 1869. December 7th, 1941. November 22nd, 1963. July 21st, 1969.

I started thinking about all those historical moments - the good and the bad - and realized that many of those big events don't necessarily have a date stamped on them. And while many of them do, some of those dates aren't even entirely accurate - like in the case of July 4th not being the actual date on which the Declaration of Independence was signed. But we like to commemorate dates. Most Christians celebrate December 24th as the birthday of Jesus, even though it is widely understood that this date was simply chosen as a means to absorb Christians into the Roman practice of Saturnalia.

Additionally, fundamentally global-altering discoveries don't generally have that sort of a birthday, either. The telephone, the computer, the television, the internet. When did any of those begin? Can anyone pinpoint the moment at which they emerged, blinking, into the light? You might as well attempt to get people to agree on the moment life begins, or when the first man (or woman) walked on the earth. Perhaps it's more like an accomplishment than an invention that gets our attention? For example, the concept of flight has been around for centuries, but it was the Wright Brothers who achieved it in 1903. And although trains had been around for years, it was a spike being driven into the ground at Promontory Summit in 1869 that made history.

Computers seem to be the big event of this generation - the internet has brought the world together in new and amazing (read: sometimes frightening) ways. Processing speed is unbelievably fast - and transmission rates are already into the realm of well beyond the fantastic. You don't think we've come a long ways? Go back and watch "WarGames" or the original "Tron". You'll cry.

There's that whole "Technological Singularity" that seems to be causing a bit of concern - simply because things are rapidly moving along so exponentially fast that people can't even imagine what's going to happen after a certain point of development; that things will occur so quickly that the human capacity for thought will get left behind in the virtual snap of fingers. That transitional apex of understanding and development is assumed to be so evolutionary that it looks like a pinhole in comprehension, one that no one seems to be capable of peering through. Others seem to view this as the concept of approximating zero or approaching infinity. From any point approaching the horizon, it looks like a line across your vision, but isn't it just another perpetually migrating destination?

Kind of makes me feel like my own life. Have I already passed the halfway point? Am I already more than halfway between birth and death? Did I already miss my chance to have a midlife crisis? I never really wanted a toupee or a really fancy car, so maybe I'm just not wired that way. Or would I even know?

Feeling awfully rhetorical today. I don't have the answers, here. I'm in the same boat with all of you, looking out over the water and hoping for land. Although, to be perfectly honest, I'm happy enough with the sound of waves and the feel of the wind against my skin that I don't mind the open horizon. Are we there yet? Eh. We'll get there when we get there.

You Must Unlearn What You Have Learned

2011-05-12T06:57:00.000-07:00

Was challenged - in a kind and encouraging way - to open up a thought on the topic of "diversity". The original blog was delivered from a perspective that comes to us straight from across the pond, and, as this topic never fails to do, it got me wondering about my own sense of bias, my feelings on differences between people and the stereotypes which often ensue.

This is a challenging topic to address, one might say, because I fit into the traditional model of "what the $%&@!! do you know about diversity?" - I'm a straight white male in my middle age, so that kind of makes me more in line with "the man" than "the oppressed", right?

Well, I guess I'd have to say to that, yeah. Not that it would be something I'm proud of, because I honestly didn't do anything to be white, straight, or male, and the fact that I'm still alive in my early 40s has more to do with dumb luck than any particular methodology of heath care upon which I've set myself. Do I get any kind of benefits - real or implied - by being thus? Or, at the very least, do I avoid many of the pitfalls and challenges that face other people who are otherwise? People who are different - whether by the color of their skin, their sexual orientation or gender - or different in any of the readily obvious manners that some people use to instantly categorize or assume prejudice against? I guess I'd have to say yes, since that's just an issue of public record: people in this world commit - still today - all manner of atrocities against others simply because of whatever excuse they may find. Merely, as it inevitably becomes apparent, due to some sort of differentiation that the aggressor finds intolerable.

Now, on the one hand, I do understand the notion of categorization. It's a natural tendency of people to expect a pattern in the world around them. People will generally buy the albums from an artist or genre they love, simply because of past experiences - or watch movies with a particular expectation simply because of the actors or writers or directors. Or, consider your favorite flavor of ice cream - and then ask yourself if the company who makes that flavor really matters, or are you predisposed to like that flavor, generally regardless of who manufactures it? What's your favorite color, and when choosing a new shirt are you more likely to pick that color of shirt over another color you don't like?

Let me be clear, here: I am not in any way attempting to justify prejudice. I think the automatic fear or hatred of a person simply because they possess a specific characteristic is horrific and profane. What I'm saying here is that prejudice does partially result from what is an automatic human characteristic. We tend to gather similar experiences and build a common expectation from them. You burn your hand on the stove, you become nervous around stoves. But you also shouldn't go around destroying stoves because you burned your hand that one time.

Prejudice is a learned response - and this means it can be UN-learned. In fact, it may be one of the lessons most worth un-learning of all the possible things we can deliberately evolve during the course of our lives. See, the fact is, everyone's different. And though certain life experiences may sometimes establish some commonalities, it's not just unfair to the person who's being generalized, it's also unfair (albeit to a lesser degree) to the person doing the generalization. I'll explain.

A guy's driving home, late one night. The highway he's on has some construction up ahead, so he hops off the freeway before he gets stuck in a nasty traffic jam, but ends up in a part of town he's not used to. He can't find the onramp back to the freeway, and after several minutes of panicked wrong turns, he finds himself in "the bad part of town" and promptly gets a flat tire. It's late, he's lost, and his cell phone can't get a proper signal, so he decides to get out and walk to find a 7-11 or a pay phone. After a block, a couple kids who live in the neighborhood - approach. They've both got dark colored skin.

"Hey man," they say.

He turns and runs, fearful that they mean to do him harm or rob him.

They look at each other, shrug, and keep walking along their way. Unbeknownst to the man, both kids have cell phones (their parents wouldn't imagine letting them out at night without a way to call home), and one of their parents is a mechanic, to boot. The other kid's dad is a police officer.

Now, considering that story, who was most hurt by prejudice? Clearly, the two kids didn't need a reminder that some people are afraid of other people (note, I didn't mention the man's skin color, did I?), and could very easily have grounds to be offended by the man's behavior. But in this case, his stupidity really harmed himself - his fear kept him from learning that the two kids might have helped him.

On a less extreme level, as a writer I have to embrace the fact that every person has a story. Every single person. And though the stories may in some case be similar, it's usually only superficially so. Being prejudiced isn't just a horrible character flaw; for me, it would also be crippling from a spiritual and creative perspective. I love that people have uniqueness, that, really, if you put four people on the tv screen and sang "one of these is not like the others", I'd like to think you could pick any one of the four as the odd man out. I know I'm not the same as all other straight white males. I don't think there's a single characteristic you could pick out about me that's the same as any other person, actually. And I prefer it that way - just like I expect most people to be.

If every characteristic were an ingredient you might find in your kitchen, imagine combining twenty of those ingredients in any manner you wished; order of mixing, arrangement, cooking time, etc. Now, adjust the process, order, temperature, preparation techniques and so forth, even in the slightest way - and you're liable to get something totally different. I found this out when I was a child, making chocolate chip cookies for the first time. I thought that the important thing was just to put all the ingredients into the bowl at once and then mix. Turns out that you won't make cookies that way. Well, okay, you CAN, but they'll taste like crap.

And people are made up of millions of ingredients - each moment is a new experience, each person a different procedural step, and even beyond all of that, there's a certain element of personality and soul which comes from somewhere altogether ELSEways.

The fact is, assuming two people are the same because they kind of look the same is like saying Vanilla ice cream and lard are the same, because they're both kind of white.

So really all I'm saying here is that you can KIND of reach some generalities, but that everyone's different in at least some ways, and that everyone sort of makes assumptions about other people as a general rule of thumb. But that doing so is lazy, ignorant and should be avoided whenever possible. Like, if the dude you see coming towards you is wearing a hockey mask and holding a bloody machete in one hand and someone's head in the other, maybe it's not a good time to ask them about their philosophical uniqueness. Just saying. That's a rare example, though, obviously.

Oh, and sharks. I still don't like sharks, and if I see one of them walking towards me, I don't care if they have a cell phone in their pocket, I'm going to be running the other direction. And you should, too. You don't believe me? Ask Roy Scheider about that - or, I suppose you could, but you can't, and I'm pretty sure sharks had something to do with that, too. But I don't HATE sharks. I'm just terrified of them. Completely. Absolutely. And I don't consider that a phobia, because a phobia is an unreasonable fear, and I think a fear of sharks is completely reasonable.

But that's a totally different thing than being afraid of people or hating them because of the color of their skin, their gender, nationality, religion, sexual orientation or any of a thousand characteristics you decide to be so horrifying. Except, perhaps, characteristics of bigotry or misogyny or homophobia, those kinds of things.

Fear and hatred stemming from prejudice; we should probably agree for that to be intolerable. Just a little confused why we can't seem to do that.

Gravity and Grass Stains

2011-05-10T10:21:00.000-07:00

I remember this one hill near my home when I was a kid; it was near the high school and we'd often ride our bikes out and play around the grass and playground equipment. Tag and kites, whatever the day required, that field had it. It's almost difficult now to remember being so easily entertained by...well, a park. But, anyway, in the middle of it all was a really big hill that bottomed out into an inverted dome of grass - and one of the things we did was roll the hill. You know that one, right? Just lay down, cross your arms and let gravity spin you into a near-vomitous pillar of laughter. And eventually, one of us would get the idea of taking the hill at a run. Just nose towards the base and run run run. It was great until about half way down, when you just couldn't keep your feet under you any longer, and BAM. Wipeout.

Sometimes I really don't know how any of us survived childhood.

At any rate, that adrenaline was just awesome. It was a drug, honestly, wasn't it? You just don't see people laughing like that when chemicals aren't involved.

But all that aside, the sense of being almost ready to wipe out, where you're churning your legs as little flesh-and-blood pistons of fury, recognizing that, at any moment, you're about this far from face planting. It's pretty exhilarating. Very exciting, and yet empowering. It's also a very close approximation to the sense of omnipotence that is generally only experienced when we're too young to know better. Joy versus risk. When do we discard one for the other? At what point do we allow the possibility of failure to unseat our celebration of life?

Or are the two mutually exclusive? I'm leaning towards not. I think it's the possibility of risk which makes the celebration more satisfying, to be honest. Running down the hill for the first time and laughing right up to the moment where you wipe out is fun, yes. Crazy mad insane fun. But picking yourself up, going back to the top and doing it again? Oh, that's just super-crazy. And even more fun.

Granted, "all things in moderation" (including moderation?), meaning that, yes, we can't hope to live in that realm wherein all the world's cares go screaming past, too blurred to distinguish or bother; but we certainly can opt to visit there from time to time. I think I took a while off from that place, but yet.... starting to feel that again. Only, without so tremendous a risk of grass stains.

Getting ready to launch three more books - book 5, "Into the Blink", as well as two of my autobiographical journals, "The Middle Age (1 and 2): A Geek's Journey from Boy to Man (and back again)". That'll bring my library to a not-so-whopping-and-yet-still-nothing-to-shake-a-stick-at total of Seven. And this will be an even crazier year than last. In addition to working on "The Crook and the Blade" (book 6) - with a target launch date of mid-September 2011, I'm also developing a few more ebook anthologies, as well as some other projects that are still kind of hush-hush (for now).

Me and my daughter are working on some short stories for a children's anthology, which I would like to have completed by this fall, too. I would love to find a good artist to work with for some interior art, but have been toying with the idea of just doing the sketches myself, in a kind of A. A. Milne sort of reductive style. It'd be fun to break out the pencils and pens and see what I could do after so long. I should think my old college art professors might be a little relieved that I haven't just completely thrown away their lessons.

Working with some other fantastic authors now, too - Jen Ashton, HL and Garth Reasby, just to name drop a few - and the projects I already have lining up for 2012 are just so exciting that it's all I can do not to throw everything else aside and work on them right now.

So here I am, laughing, arms flailing, feet going just as fast as they can, wind rushing past my face and the ever-present threat of a park full of rich sod stretching out its innumerable tendrils to cushion my fall. And yet, I've stopped worrying about the possibility of falling; today, I'm more enchanted by the possibility of flying.

It feels like a good day to enjoy words.

What's your hill? What's that one place for you that gives you that "I AM SPARTACUS" moment?

Who Do You Think You Are?

2011-04-27T08:59:00.000-07:00

I caught myself mentioning in a work meeting the other day that I "made my living writing fiction", and I mentally hit the pause button and told myself, no you don't, you fool. You only wish you made your living that way.

But that brief internal dialogue stuck with me. I'll make no secret about the fact that although my books do actually sell, I do have a "day job" that pays the larger part of my bills. And that doesn't make me unique - most authors - even bestselling ones - do have other jobs that allow them the option of spending their free time with their literary pursuits. But is that my living?

I still consider the first time I held a printed copy of one of my books in my hands as one of the great and individually triumphant moments of my life - up there (but not above) my wedding day, the birth of our daughter, my first real kiss, et cetera. Just above listening to my CD for the first time, or that time I was on stage with Douglas Spotted Eagle. Or being with my belly dance troupe "Parthenon" at the 1999 Kismet Bellydance festival. It's just a certain kind of creative triumph that sets itself apart from other moments in my life, and one that has only been replicated with each successive release of my other books.

It's become, for me, a strangely altered sense of success and joy. Like the proverbial game of "Poohsticks" (a reference that will only make sense if you're a fan of Milne or Hoff), it's not about who wins so much as the playing which makes it a joyful game. It's an unusual manner of self-consideration, reminiscent of a piece I recall from Robert Fulghum, speaking of what he did for a living. He summed it up by saying he breathed, slept, ate and wrote, among the many sundry activities which comprised his existence. I first read that some time back, and it kind of stuck with me like the summit of the mountain calls to the climber. "Here I am," the philosophy waved to me, "come on up and claim me for your own!"

It takes me back even further, to my days of reinvention back in high school. Did anyone else think of that as a specifically elective period of time, wherein we deliberately craft ourselves into the people we want to be. Granted, we're teenagers, so our perspective is often quite limited, but it can - if we really think about it - help us learn the valuable skills of self-guidance and self-determination. Or, in the words of that great classic Oingo Boingo song, who do you want to be today?

But I have to be honest. I have days where I'm more successful at that than others. I have a few tracks off my CD on my iPod and they pop up from time to time, and it often takes me several moments before I realize it's me. I glance at my books on their section of the bookshelf and smile at the thoughts of the many little miracles that happened to bring them to print. But at the same time, it doesn't always FEEL like a big deal. If I check the map, sure; the 'You Are Here" button has changed places, and when I really consider the last few years then I have no choice but to accept that things are in fact in a different sphere than they were back then. I'm a different person, too, with a whole assortment of new recognitions of experience waiting to be sorted out and offered up as material offerings to the gods of fiction (and when I say "gods of fiction", I'm talking about the metaphorical ones and not people like Neil Gaiman, Tom Clancy or the rest of you lot who really aren't actually reading this blog, even though I wrote this sentence as if you did).

I keep reading so many articles on line about "what it takes to be an author" or so forth - - lots of fantastic advice and suggestions for what it takes to be successful. But along with all of that, I can't help but think that the best advice I ever heard on how to be a writer was.... "Write."

I know, I know. That sounds oversimplified and trite. But doesn't every journey start with the first step? Doesn't being begin with believing?

So, I'll ask you: who do you think you are?

Author, Edit Thyself!

2011-04-19T07:05:00.000-07:00

An old roommate of mine once engaged me in a conversation wherein he was very serious about wanting to go back to high school and live it again. Like, not in just a subjective "what if" scenario, but he actually literally, seriously, wanted a do-over. I initially entertained the notion; in a purely philosophical examination, how we review our own history is a fascinating conceptual revelation as to how we see ourselves and look at the world in the present.

It's like that old adage, that history is written by the victors. Well, I believe that can be applied to ourselves and our "remembered" pasts. Kind of a curiosity, isn't it? What does how we remember our own past say about who we are?

In the case of my roommate, he, as a then-twenty-something, looked back on his high school life as a bit of a failure, riddled with missed opportunities and "almost was" moments. Granted, I thought he took the concept a bit far in that he wanted to not so much turn back time as just go back to high school as a twenty-something and go a couple of years under the guise of being a high school-age student. The legal ramifications of potentially dating classmates far below the age of consent aside, I eventually saw a few layers of flawed logic to his arguments, dismissing the entire concept under the reality of living in the now and not allowing the past to govern the future, etc.

Because, the truth is that you can't go back and change the choices you made, once upon a time, right?

Well, that's where I love editing.

Writing books - especially under the present technological opportunities afforded authors now - is so much more instantaneous and liberating than it once was; or, I suppose, for some, still is.

When I was recording "Obsidian Bridges", I was hampered by the constraints of affordable studio time and just the premise of analog recording. When you're laying down tracks and don't have your own studio or unlimited time to spend there, it seems like there inevitably comes a point at which you must make a sort of Sophie's Choice of takes where, combined within a surgically inalterable sequence of notes, both statistically impossible good and bad notes exist. And you have to ask yourself, "do I erase that and try to nail it all again, or do I live with the one bad note?"

I got to that point on one song - "All Along", a track which appears on the original CD print, but not on the newer MP3 download album offered on Amazon (woo hoo! Blatant plug!) and decided I could live with that. Well, turns out, ten years later, I can't. I don't even like LISTENING to that track anymore, because I can hear the bad notes. *sigh*

With publishing, that has ceased to be a concern.

I got book 5 - "Into the Blink" - back from Quiana, my editor, last week, and, giving myself one day to take a deep breath, jumped in and reviewed/corrected over the next three days. Finished up the edit on Sunday, and sent it back for another (final?) review. Made a few additional changes, such as chapter sequences, and I'm going to have to revisit the opening paragraph, which still isn't quite where I want it.

And I'm also working on the cover, which is "close but no cigar" level, and I may just dump it up and run a proof to help with the review process (I seem to catch my typos and work choice issues better on paper, don't know why that is), but, pending changes....I mean, the book could be available for purchase in a couple weeks, outside guess. And, thanks to the online submission process, if I find any errors after that, I can simply make the corrections and upload the new document, and voila - done!

The traditional publishing model sees books being announced - cover art, etc - months in advance of actual sales. I understand that much of that has to do with the release schedules of other books, the constraints of distribution, etc.... but honestly, I like the fact that I can get my books out there as soon as I can get them written and edited. I like being able to go back and make corrections - - - like, for example, the choice to redesign my trilogy into a six-book series. The whole process took me less than a month to break out 2 books into 4, covers and all.

But to be honest, I love the stressless mindset that comes from the peaceful knowledge that I can make the books look however I feel they need to look. I don't have to feel like some arbitrary requirement is being placed upon them or upon me, or that I, due to some larger body's marketing expectations, am forced to put up a sub-standard product just in time to make the Christmas present shopping season.

The fact is, I'm writing books. I'm telling stories. The process, though somewhat structured, is still relatively organic, and I can't help but wonder if the loss of that organic quality is where a lot of authors find themselves struggling. Dunno.

The honest truth is that I'm probably not as meshed into that scene to really make a judgment on it. And, strangely enough, I'm kind of okay with that.

I'm out. More to do. Chat later.

Tuesday Open Mike Blog! "Lost and Found"

2011-04-19T06:24:00.000-07:00

Today's question option:

What's the strangest and most random item you've ever found? As in, "Found", as in stumbled upon, tripped over, seen by the side of the roadside, Found?

or

What's the one physical object from your childhood which has gone missing from your life and you would most wish to find again? (and as I said, physical objects - your youthful optimism doesn't count.)

Tuesday Open Mike Blog!

2011-04-12T07:25:00.000-07:00

Screening a new feature here on the Steampunk and Synthesizers page: the open mike blog day.

Although this blog is mostly dedicated to my journey as a writer and my hobby of being human (when I have time), I wanted to open it up to the five or six people who show up here from time to time to chime in. I do tend to go on and on, as you know.

But rather than just drop the mike in your lap, I'll even give you a choice of topics:

1) if you were already a superhero, what would you want your secret identity to do for a living?

or

2) if you could take a train to ANYWHERE, where would you go? (and let's not allow silly things like time or space be a problem. Let's assume that your train is magic and could go ANYWHERE.)

Okay, then. Hit me. Gimme what you got, baby!

The calm before the ... calm?

2011-04-12T07:19:00.000-07:00

The Pacific Northwest gave us a rare gift this past weekend - and by gift, I mean that it was sunny for about 24 hours and forced us to put everything else we'd planned to do on hold long enough to shuffle around outside like cockroaches under the cover of shadow and get all those "have tos" out of the way. In our case, it was the idea of mowing our lawns so that we weren't "those people".

It was the first mow of the year, so naturally the lawn mower tried to roll back over and tell us to leave off, but after a couple near misses, the poor beast finally started up. But I was struck by a strange sensation of excited anticipation as I pulled the cord - "oooh, is it starting? Maybe this time? What about this one?" It was a silly sort of holding of one's breath for something that really shouldn't be all that exciting, but maybe due to being in writer mode, I was just open to analogies.

Nevertheless, the engine engaged, sputtered to life, spat out the most incredibly funky puff of smoke, and then ran like a champion. The grass didn't stand a chance.

How this is seeping into my consciousness now is the idea of feeling like I'm doing that exact same thing with publishing. I've got the four Chronicles of Aesirium books on line now, I've got #5 with my editors, and I'm chomping at the bit to begin working on book 6. I'm doing a few side projects with Jen, also, and have been doing as much research as I can manage into my next series so that I can as much as possible hit the ground running as the Aesirium books wrap up. I've got that whole series, plus a few other standalone books knocking on my cerebellum, so it's really now turning into a situation of trying to focus on whichever of the voices in my head scream at me the loudest. So this is what crazy feels like, hmm?

My good friends Heather, Garth and Quiana and I are laying out the groundwork for our tiny coalition of writers, including an anthology (or two), and it turns out that we'll be having a booth at next year's Emerald City ComiCon, so that's one more big thing to start prepping for.

Jen has been an amazing help to me the past few months. I can't say the process of fully efforting a shift into a writing career has been overwhelming, but it's definitely been whelming. It's exciting, like putting in a day at a theme park - you just know in your soul that you're unlikely to hit every ride before they close the park, but, by God, you're going to give it the best shot. But in addition to her advice and reassurance, it's just been wonderful to become friends with someone who's actually successful in this line of work. She doesn't feed me false expectations of the challenges, but she lays out the whole process of it, and has been fantastic and helping me learn a lot of the lessons she's found out the hard way. Simply an awesome person, and I'm very proud to have come to know her. Everyone should have a friend like that, seriously. But you'll have to go find your own "Jen", so don't get any ideas.

Seriously, though, it finally sunk in yesterday that things are proceeding well. I think I needed a moment to look back and see how far things have gone in only a couple of years. And if things have gone so well so far, what will happen next? Yes, I know - - the future is vast and filled with alternatives - I accept that things will only succeed insomuch as I am diligent and remain positive. But I am Zen with a Purpose, baby. I am Tao with a Motor. Life is good, the towels are oh-so fluffy, and the sky smells like Root Beer. Not an altogether bad place to be, and the further things go into publishing, the more and more wonderful people I've been meeting.

For example, those of you who come here from my comments on Twitter? Please say hey, would you? I'm curious to see how much actual traffic I get to this blog from Twitter. Or, if you came here from Facebook, please let me know. Feel free to pimp your own site on your comment as you like, I'm all about cross-marketing.

And... let's see, what media bits have crept beneath my eyelids? Duran Duran has a new album (quite wonderful), trying to finish a season of any show at all (not even halfway through with season 1 of Fringe, but keeping current on Castle), haven't seen anything in the theater since... god, I can't even remember. Maybe Tron? But very excited for Doctor Who this month, and the Green Lantern movie this summer. (and speaking of GL, why hasn't "Ring Capacity" been put onto that movie's soundtrack? Seriously, people, that's just gotta happen.) Beyond that, the most consistent schedule of media I've maintained has been listening to Kevin Smith podcasts - er, sorry, Smodcasts.

But really, Doctor Who. I can't wait to see the Neil Gaiman episode or hear the new Murray Gold soundtrack. Ah, such wondrous delights! Thank the universe for putting such talented souls upon this world, in whose works I so shamelessly soak my creative noggin.

And thank you, too, for dropping by. You're quite awesome. Have a day, man!

Changing the Flat Aspire

2011-03-21T07:43:00.000-07:00

I had a recent conversation with a friend regarding fiction and non-fiction, and we discussed the concept of how each category of book defines and treats the concept of honesty. Their assertion was that fiction treated honesty with a lie - wrapping all truth in metaphor and analogy, like saying "the sky is blue" by actually describing it as if it were brown. My point was that because non-fiction books only talk about the truth, they can be biased by only painting a partial picture of the truth; focusing it through the director's lens, so to speak, and only using those scenes or details which support the writer's objective. I'll grant that the debate was mostly facetious, but in the midst of it all, we stumbled upon a clever observation: that one of the most consistently honest of all books ends up being our high school yearbooks.

At the time, we laughed about it, but it stuck with me. Because, in its own way, the high school yearbook is really just a big wish, a terrible lie. There we are, forever locked in what in many cases would now be regarded as the worst of all fashion decisions, immortalized in the frozen carbonite of one of the most social awkward stages of our lives, our smiles beaming of optimism and aspiration, but our eyes often betraying our deepest fears.

High school may have been many things, but honesty might not have been one of them; although, looking closely at the lies we told ourselves, or the ones in which we chose to believe, we were at least the most sincere about our self-deceptions. We believed it would be the most significant time of our lives, it would be filled with cherished memories, we believed it would determine the paths of our respective tales of success or failure. And yet, I suspect we knew on some level that it wouldn't be any of those things. We knew that with pimples and bad hair, the cards were stacked against us from the outset. Oh, certainly we did the best we could. In some cases, we owned our awkward attempts at social redemption, struggling for the Breakfast Club moments that could propel our sense of self up and over the challenges of our teen years, and some did a fine job of coming to terms with the reality of it all.

Many did not.

The reality didn't really start setting in until later. Now, though, many years later, I look back on it and don't wonder why I didn't know better, but rather how I'll feel when looking back on myself now. You know, in the now when I feel like I understand the me of twenty+ years ago and think I understand myself from then better than I did then.

But if nothing else, our old yearbooks serve as an intriguing time capsule for not just the people we thought we were (and hoped we really might become), but exposed our sense of the definitions of the future. How many of the kids who were most popular in school were selected as Most Likely To Succeed? I think I got "Most Unique" - - which I concede is not really what most kids in my high school would have wanted, but I wore it as something of a badge of honor in that I never really did feel comfortable on the path most traveled. But that's a whole other story, and not even the point of what I was feeling today.

I was looking through my twitter feed today, and just looking at some of the people I follow and who follow me back, and, it's no big surprise that I follow a lot of authors - I'd follow more if Twitter would let me! - and, if you don't already know this, there are some amazing, fantastic and supremely talented authors out there, not getting the recognition they deserve. And strangely enough, a lot of them keep using the term "aspiring author" or "aspiring writer".

Aspiring.

I see that word a lot, and yet, I don't think I ever truly analyzed its meaning or historical evolution. So, let's examine it.

If you're not deeply familiar with the definition, it's like Inspiring (which means to breathe in) and Expire (to breathe out) but means the act of breathing. Literally, that's what it means, To Breathe. Now, along the way, it got equated to more of a panting, exerted breathing, and became synonymous with desire - - the kind of exertions... well, you get the idea.

So it eventually took on an applied definition of more that sort of an empassioned, generally focused sort of desire with which we equate it today. But I fear it's being used, perhaps, too much. Yes, I might just be thinking that because I've seen it a lot, but... well, okay, it's not really a big deal.

I guess the deal is that I don't want to just aspire anymore. My friend Jen wrote the other day how thrilled she was to realize that she was no longer looking forward to living her dream, but that she was living it. That's the goal, isn't it?

It got me thinking. See, as much as I've tried (lol - I almost wrote "aspired" there. Oh sweet irony!) to pursue a more taoist mental path, I've begun to see how I have still projected much of my joy onto a conditional set of parameters. You know the deal, where you tell yourself "I'll be happy when..." And though I've been mostly happy with life, I keep leaving this little bit of "extra" happiness for when I'm able to dedicate myself completely to writing and publishing, etc.

It's weird, but looking at that last sentence, I can't decide which thing I find more incorrect. How much of that is accurate, versus how much is only accurate based on how inaccurate it is? It's like, back when the world believed that the earth was flat, they were essentially, completely wrong - - - but that misconception tells us so much about the truth of the world at that time.

Keeping all that in mind, it does point out a very real truth: that I can never place too much faith on my present perceptions. The lens is always biased, as they say. But, in the end, that will have to be enough. Rather than turn the lens, I focus on letting the world happen; letting me happen, whatever that will mean. And while I'm still the Captain of my vessel, I will work with the wind, the great and breathing tides of the universe. But even while I respect and accept the wind and tides, I remain at the helm, keeping my eyes fixed on the constellations and the seas ahead.

Aspiration isn't a bad thing - - we must have a passion for the life we lead - - but the danger comes when we are passion without focus - a sail with no rudder, or a rudder with no sail.

And, trust me, the only person I'm preaching at today.... is me.

Good morning, my friends. Let's get something wonderful done today.

Reaper's Return: The Giveaway!

2011-03-17T12:13:00.000-07:00

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Reaper's Return

by Ren Cummins

Giveaway ends April 16, 2011.

See the giveaway details

at Goodreads.

Enter to win

I'm also going to include a complimentary copy of my CD, "Obsidian Bridges" with the three winning copies. Oh, you know you want that.

Hop on, and good luck!

Reaper's Return; Chapter 1

2011-03-15T10:24:00.000-07:00

A couple things are in the plans to celebrate the new launch of the Chronicles of Aesirium; a Goodreads giveaway will be forthcoming (expected start: St Patrick's Day), but to whet your appetite, I'm going to share here the new opening chapter.

Enjoy, friends!

-----------------------------------

Chapter 1: Rom

Rom leaned close, hugging her friend. “Count to a thousand. If I’m not back by then, run home.” Rain pelted the tattered umbrella just loudly enough to mask the chattering of the two girls’ teeth; Rom wiped away a clump of her unnaturally white hair from her face so she could look directly into her friend’s eyes. Finally, Kari’s head bobbed in as much as shiver as a nod. Leaving before either one of them could talk her out of it, Rom pressed the umbrella into Kari’s hands and vaulted the fence into the unknown beyond. She didn’t like the idea of leaving Kari there, but they needed to move fast if they didn’t want to be late, and the rainfall was slowing them down. Plus, Rom reminded herself for the forty-seventh time, there were monsters out here past the fields.

Facing a choice between slow caution and fast defensiveness, Rom chose the latter. The orphanage’s standard issue long dress and jacket protected her against the hundred small whips of the thorns and sharp leaves as she first began to make her way through the plants. After only a few moments of it, she grew annoyed with the many slight stings and pushed off from the ground, using her unnatural degree of skill to cover ten, twenty, as much as thirty meters in a leap. She was never able to really push herself like this: the rooms at the orphanage were small, and the tiny courtyard used for their afternoon constitutional was only barely big enough for the children’s daily game of “try to hit ratgirl before she gets away”. Plus, Rom didn’t like to jump as far as she knew she could, if any of the other children were around to make fun of her. Her hair was unique enough; no reason to give them any other excuse to tease. For a few moments like this, it felt like flying. They said that there were animals out in the Wild that could fly too, far from Oldtown-Against-The-Wall, where the sort of thing like being different could get you punished; but flying was said to be a “challenge to the Wall itself”, and was a crime listed among the worst of them.

Five hundred meters out, a distant lightning flash lit up the area near the landmark drawn on the map they’d been given – the wrecked remains of one of the large Machines, left partially-submerged in the ground. She’d seen drawings of them in the daily class sessions, and a few of the larger and simpler constructs were still left rusting around the edges of the fields, but this was the first time she’d seen one of the latter generations of them with her own eyes. They probably looked less unsettling in the daylight, she told herself. Or when it wasn’t raining. Or both.

The actual constructs which had been built to tend to the fields had been simple – designed for the functions they required. Thus they were boxy, blatantly mechanical things – but when the constructs began to make their own machines, their designs took on a much more organic look. They had never known why the Machines began building new Machines, much less why they had built them so unrestrained by the tenets of apparent efficiency; but one thing was certain. When the Machines began to create other Machines, they made them look like people.

All the historical lessons the matrons had taught her came back to her with that single strike of lightning as she looked upon what could only be described as a face – albeit one which had to be ten meters in height – half-submerged in the dirt and dramatically overgrown with the brush and plant life left unattended and wild this far out beyond the fence line. As her eyes readjusted to the darkness, she could make out the darker shadows of what must be a shoulder, an arm, and so on. The Machine had to have stood more than ten times as tall as she was, she decided. She shivered, but was pretty sure it wasn’t from the rain. She wished Kari were there to see it: this was old Science, and there were few things her friend loved more than that.

Her eyes caught a smaller patch of darkness near the face, a slight movement, roughly boy-shaped.

“Cousins?” she yelled. “Is that you?” Rom growled, spitting out a mouthful of rainwater. With the rain crashing down on the metal shell of the ruined Machine, there could be someone yelling right into her face and she probably wouldn’t hear it.

She took a half-step closer when there was a great commotion from behind her; it registered only briefly what a wonder it was that she could hear it, but a growing ache in her stomach seemed to be accompanied by a strange enhancement of all her senses, as if time were slowing down. She’d felt this before in the orphanage courtyard; her body seemed to react to certain situations by seeing everything more clearly, more distinctly, making her more aware of everything as it was happening.

And now, in spite of the rain, she could make out three sets of footsteps – one the hurried run of a girl, and the other, two pairs of feet, most definitely not human. Kari’s voice rushed at Rom even more quickly than her feet.

“Rom!!! Help!!” her friend screamed, from somewhere still beyond her in the overgrowth.

Rom stood in the center of the clearing, and her eyes looked quickly around her for anything she could use as a defense or a weapon – a rock, a stick, anything – but in the falling rain, all she could see was mud and water, pooling up around and leaking into her tattered boots. Whatever it was out there, Rom hoped it was small enough that she could kick it until it went away.

Cupping her hands to the sides of her mouth, she called to her friend through the darkness. “Over here!”

A moment later, Kari burst through the branches, still clutching the battered umbrella. Right behind her by a scant breath, a large feline creature jumped into the clearing as well. Lightning crashed somewhere far behind the girls, but momentarily coated the clearing in a silvery brightness that gave them both a clear look at what had been chasing Kari. It stood shoulder-to-shoulder with them both, its grey fur matted by the rain, with yellowed horns emerging from just in front of its ears and curling back around to angle slightly outwards past each side of its jaws. Across its back was what looked like a black leather folded shell, extending from just below its neck and down to its long tail. From its belly down, it was coated in mud, and its golden eyes were rimmed in red, and a sickly green foam curled around the corners of its fanged mouth. It reared back at the flash of lightning, but Rom could still see it silhouetted in place when the darkness once more engulfed them all. Though the lightning might have disoriented it, it evidently realized that a second potential prey stood before it, and it paused to adjust for its next attack.

“Get behind me,” Rom said. “When I tell you, run to the Machine back there.” Her eyes glanced to the umbrella, and, without thinking, took it from Kari’s hands. It wasn’t much, but it would have to do.

“M-machine?” Kari said, her curiosity threatening to overcome her fear.

“Don’t study it; you need to hide in it!” Rom hissed. “Please, Kari, just think of this like another game of hide from Milando!” she added, referring to one of the larger bullies also living in the orphanage.

“Hide?” Kari repeated.

“Yes, I need you to wait for me over there while I go box his ears, nothing to worry about.”

She could sense, somehow, the creature preparing to make its move. The beast seemed to recognize her confidence and crouched, she thought, preparing to jump at Rom. It was basically predatory, and it saw her as getting in the way of what it wanted to eat.

“Get ready, Kari,” she whispered above the sound of the rain. Rom could see, even in the darkness, its back muscles and hind legs shuddering, tensing. The horns would be a problem, she figured, so a strike for the head was out; the ends of the horns would keep her from getting to its throat, and that shell was going to make it impossible to get at from above. It was an impressively made monster; Rom thought that if it wasn’t trying right now to kill her, she’d probably think it was brilliant.

She spun the umbrella over in her hand, feeling its balance. The handle might be strong enough to use as a weapon – it was metal with a solid wooden handle, and came to a metal end the length of her hand. Absently, she considered that it was a poor choice to bring out into a lightning storm, but she would hopefully be able to regret that later. That was one nice thing about regret, Rom thought, you can always do it later if you’re too busy.

The creature tensed one last time and pounced. Even before the creature’s paws left the ground, Rom was telling Kari to run, even pushing her back with her left hand to make sure she moved. Rom ducked slightly to draw the beast’s eyes down and away from her friend, hoping as well to create a smaller target for her much larger opponent.

Time seemed to drag even more – the monster looked like it was jumping almost comically slowly. Rom looked closely; she could somehow perceive the angle of its jump, and knew instinctively that by shifting her weight to the right and rolling down and back across its path, she would avoid its front paws and bring her up in a position to land the first strike. With its weight, claws and teeth as its obvious advantages, she would have to play on its disadvantages – its size and desperation for food meant she might be able to out maneuver it, and hopefully outthink it. The rain, mud and darkness, she hoped, would keep everything else even for them both.

Hopefully.

She dove under the angle of its jump and stabbed upwards as it passed harmlessly past her, feeling a warm streak of its blood spray across her face and arms. It let out a loud cry and hit the ground unsteadily. Instantly, she felt a pang of remorse. It wasn’t the beast’s fault it was attacking her and Kari. It was just trying to get food, and…

“You’ve got babies!” Rom breathed. “Oh no.”

The animal was between her and Kari, and she could see Kari making her way quickly to the machine’s head. But the creature must have decided that Kari would make a less difficult catch. It quickly spun away from Rom and was after Kari in a heartbeat.

“No!” Rom yelled, leaping up after the creature. “Run, Kari!” she screamed.

She landed on the animal’s back, just above the shell and behind the horns. She grabbed on to one of the horns with her right hand to both secure herself and to try to somehow steer the cat from her friend. The animal stopped running, and turned its attention on trying to rid itself of this unwanted rider. It leapt backwards in a completely circular flip, Rom somehow managing to keep herself from falling off. It spun its head from side to side, raking the girl’s legs with its horns.

But then, with a snarl, it opened what Rom had mistakenly believed to be the shell on its back – and two great leathern wings unfurled. Before Rom could jump free, the cat leapt into the air, and they flew up into the night sky. She dropped the parasol so she could hold onto the horns with both hands, and gripped the cat tightly above the shoulder blades with her legs. Higher, higher, they flew, up towards the clouds themselves.

Below her, she could see the distant blue glow of the town’s defensive barrier, mirrored by flowing sheets of lightning in the clouds above. She could feel the creature’s panic and fear – it wanted to run, but it was conflicted by a need to acquire food for its young. Rom clung to the creature, however, hoping they would soon descend to a low enough altitude that she might safely drop off without injury, but they continued to ascend higher and higher. The rain crashed against her, a sensation washed away by a single thought: I’m flying.

The momentary exhilaration lasted only thus; replaced by the realization that it was not so much flying as it was riding; but for a sudden jolt and the ground would break her into small pieces.

She frowned, blinking against the falling rain. “Hang it,” she grumbled.

Just as she thought her situation couldn’t get any worse, a light – brighter than any she had ever before seen – filled her vision with a thunderclap that stopped her heart and burst her ears.

Distantly, she felt as if she was falling, slowly, insubstantial like a snowflake, drifting down towards the far away ground; helpless on the winter breeze.

Reaper's Return - and the following three books in the Chronicles of Aesirium - are available in paperback and ebook format at Amazon.com.

Steampunk Jesus, with a side of Chopsticks

2011-03-15T08:39:00.000-07:00

Thanks to a brief interaction with @TeeMonster and @lavietidhar over on Twitter, a conversation regarding variant offshoots and "sub-genres" of Steampunk into things like "Dieselpunk" and "Sandalpunk" included the latter triggering thoughts of Steampunk Jesus, blessing his disciples with a robot arm. The image made me giggle in so delicious a fit of sacrilege that I declared on the spot that I was going to blog about it. In fact, I'm a little disappointed I didn't come across that sort of idea earlier....but whatcha gonna do. Inspiration is a polyamorous lover.

(author's note: a brief typo there led to the accidental invention of the word "PolyArmory", meaning, as I can only imagine, a person who enjoys putting his sword in many weapon rooms? Hmm. I'm saving that concept for later.)

Having a series of YA Steampunk books, I get into the question a lot, "What is Steampunk?" I've been asked that question in, I believe, every interview I've done, and I must say I'll be sad the first time I don't get that question. The simple answer is contained in the specific traits that nearly all Steampunk books contain - goggles, airships, mad scientists, etc. And yes, not all of them do, but they're common enough traits that everyone pretty much gets it. But there are other traits; more subtle ones, that whisper more to the sensibilities of steampunk. It's a frame of mind, it's an aesthetic, it's a slow waltz with a pocketwatch in the priomordial aether to the sounds of an all-automaton somnambulistic boilerplate quintet. (And, yes, I know that means they're 5 machines playing water heaters while sleepwalking. I was just checking to see if you were paying attention. And now that we've established that you are, in fact, doing thus, we shall proceed.)

Part of my fondness for Steampunk is its industrial pioneering spirit, of boldly going where no one had completely gone before. I was always a fan of that throughout my youth, of taking the untravelled road if, for no other reason than because no one had yet taken it.

There was a conversation - one which most of us have at some time or another with our parents, when they give us the whole "if everyone else was jumping off the bridge...?" challenge. I remember once asking my mom for something, and explaining that I was interested in that because several of my friends were involved (not because I wanted to be just like them, but because it made whatever it had been seem curious). So to respond, she inexplicably tossed out the bridge dilemma, but I responded that if all my friends were jumping off the bridge, the only explanation could be that I already had.

(Author's Note #2: Let me be clear a moment - - I don't actually believe that. Nor did I then. I was trying to be funny, I swear.)

But there's something to that notion that both tickles and sets me to a mind of pondering in the Unwavering Determination to Pioneer that I have encountered as much in Steampunk as I have seen in many other genres, subcultures and the like. Allow me to elaborate, if you will.

An analogy, I should think, could be found within the concept of atheism.

Now, being a long time student of All Things Religious, I have found myself on many sides of the Great Theist Debate, and I have found there two be two generalized definitions of Atheism, and they both vary depending on your own personal belief structure. To the monotheist or polytheist, they generally see an atheist as a person who doesn't believe in god. But to an atheist, they generally believe that an atheist is a person who believes there are no gods. Very subtle distinction, and it boils down to the perception of whether or not an atheist believes, which, if they are truly an atheist, DOES believe - - they just believe in something different; diametrically opposed to the theist, in point of fact.

I've even heard the term "atheist" spun to include people who don't like religion, but this isn't the same thing either. (Personally, I think there should be more atheist religions, but I once mentioned that to a friend, and she told me that's what Sunday Football was for. I'm still not sure about that.) But at the same time, not all people who don't believe in religions are agnostic, either. Sometimes, people just don't like worshipping their god with other people.

Some people don't like following herds/packs/mobs/congregations/what-have-you - - they'd much rather just go their own way. And while I suppose some people would go their own way just out of an act of rebellion, I think it's a vast oversimplification to presume that anyone who rebels at any time against any particular thing does so from the base cause of rebellion for rebellion's sake.

Take the character of Jesus (messianic allegations aside, treating him for the context of this blog as a literary character), for example. Here's a guy who was nothing more than a thirtysomething Jewish carpenter who decided to preach his own way of looking at the universe, challenging two major societies: the Mosaic Law and the Roman Empire. It isn't surprising that he ended up being executed, it's only shocking that it took them three years to do so. He ruffled feathers, man. It would have been a simple thing on several occasions to not say the sorts of things that would infuriate them the most, but he stood up and said them anyway. Kind of an impressive degree of wanton stubbornness, I would say. Or, you know, conviction.

Rebellion doesn't need be quite so bold, or so unrelenting. It can be the little things, like letting someone merge ahead of you on the road, or, maybe not parking your shopping cart in the dead center of the aisle and ignoring everyone else who's trying to get around you.

Sometimes, like in the world of literature, it's about writing the stories you want to tell, regardless of the genres and the industry's need to place your books into a single genre. Or sub-genre. Or sub-sub-sub-genre. Yes, on the marketing side, we authors need to have a strategy in mind for the distribution and categorization of our work - because we all want to be read, we want to be purchased; we all want to make some sort of living off of the work we do. The people who honestly only write because they love to write are rarely ever going to be published or, for that matter, read by many people - but if a person says they want lots of people to enjoy their writing, then let's be honest: whether they know it or not, they're opening themselves to the same arena of the literary publishing industry as the rest of us. It's competitive, and it includes having to jump through many of the same hoops as anyone who tries to publish for a mass audience.

And, unfortunately, one of those hoops is Genre.

Now, I don't have a problem with Genre itself - not even with any of the genres - but it becomes a challenge when your book conforms to more than one genre. For example.

The Chronicles of Aesirium books aren't Science Fiction OR Fantasy. There are elements of both - magic and high tech; mystical creatures and mad scientists. But in this case, the glue that holds them together, the concept which draws them into a shared orbit like the moons of Grindel and Prama, is a Steampunk sensibility. It just worked as a general concept, in form and spirit, like chopsticks, you know? One of my favorite old Jerry Seinfeld bits was about the chopsticks - why, in an age of forks and spoons, are people still using a couple of polished sticks to eat with? Well, to answer that, there's an elegance and grace and tradition inherent to that; not to mention, it forces you to eat slower so you can be filled up with less food.

Steampunk reminds me of that. An almost hopeless rebellion, with a touch of elegance. Steampunk Jesus, with a side of pork fried rice. And maybe some gyoza, because damn those are tasty.

And now that I've wasted more of your time than need be, I'm getting back to writing. Or tweeting. Or perhaps just looking busy. It's still early yet, I could go either way.

Emerald City ComiCon 2011: Post Con Wrap Up

2011-03-08T09:54:00.000-08:00

Several years back, in the days/nights when I was a graveyard shifter, I'd find myself stepping across the divergent social ecosystems of Nightlife and Daylife, blinking into the analogous sunlight at all the people who frittered about their day-to-day meanderings with the literal confusion of a new alien arrival among my unsuspecting soon-to-be-thralls. Or, putting that less verbose-ly, I simply felt dramatically out-of-phase with the rest of the world. It was as if, each night, the world slept and I was Legend, a solitary man among the slumbering masses. Only the other darkened spirits wandered the streets, and we, unspeaking, nodded distantly against one another in a primal "guy nod" of acknowledgement, and nothing more.

The eventual transition of night to day took me quite some time, but on occasion I find myself drawn back into the sensation, when circumstances envelop me in a transitional vortex of divergent sociologies - the emergence from the big matinee, so to speak.

This weekend has done it to me again.

I spent the past four days engaged in assistance with the Emerald City ComiCon - - volunteering for some friends of mine who run the show, essentially as an unpaid extra to their Circus des Comiques sideshow of fun that goes on each spring in Seattle, Washington. It was my...umm... fifth? year at volunteering, and each year has become progressively more and more a practice of managing my own aging corpse into the demands placed upon it and finding ways to chat with some of the people there who are gradually moving from the category of "really cool peeps" into "really cool friends".

Got to sit with Michael Oeming and Taki Soma, a local pair of creators who are not only extremely talented, but are genuinely nice people. If you aren't familiar with their work, go pick up any copy of "Powers" or "Rapture" and I suspect you'll be pleasantly content with the purchase. Also, Mike does the art for the new Brian Michael Bendis graphic novel "Taki-O", which I have waiting for me in my comic stop box and am VERY much looking forward to. Again, they're both simply fantastic people, and have become collectively one of the reasons I love being a part of the Con.

I had a bit of time to chat with the SteamCrow team as well - along with Camilla d'Errico, some of the art which has had a tremendous inspirational impact on visual cues for my Chronicles of Aesirium books. Talking with both of these creators at much more length than I've previously been afforded fills me with an additional layer of urgency to push through the last two of my books so I can focus more on the marketing aspects of the series, and even go on a promotional book tour or two, and spend additional time working with these people on more of a peer level.

There were many other creators, as well - from Emonic to Bryan Glass to Kirby Krackle to Ron Marz... I really didn't have any of the time to spend with them as I would have liked, but they're all quite forged from the fires of Mount Awesome, all in their own aspects. I should very much have liked the con to have lasted a few weeks, just so I could have had enough time to spend with all of them.

A few of the media guests were, as always, on hand this year - William Shatner, Bruce Boxleitner, Brent Spiner, Jonathan Frakes, Wil Wheaton, James Marsters, Felicia Day, John Noble, Jasika Nicole, Sean Patrick Flanery, Norman Reedus, Amy Okuda, Clare Kramer, and Nicholas Brendon (did I forget any? If so, sorry) - but I never really made it down to their floor. I did get friendly guy nods in passing from Brent and Bruce off-site, and, really, that was nice all on its own. Never crossed paths with the Shat, but, then, he was swarmed, so I'm okay with not adding one more body to the throng.

But on another note, I got to meet Phoenix Jones, Red Dragon, the Black Knight and Blue Sparrow - all actual local costumed superheroes from the local streets. My feelings about these people are varied and expansive, but it was by itself one of the more surreal moments from the con. My mind has been thus beseiged with ideas about future books involving (or being inspired by) their actions. I Invited Jones to talk more via email; the concept of being a self-appointed community soldier and protector is just... well, it's something I can very realistically understand. Sometimes, yes, the pen may be mightier than the sword; but sometimes, you have to use the sword, too. So it's something that really resonates with me. In my own world, I juggle the two faces of Ren: the successful project manager for an accredited telecom company by day, an author of fiction by night. Granted, neither facade is particularly mild-mannered, but what are you gonna do?

Hopefully, I'll have more to say on that topic later.

The downside of all of this is that I'm still in the middle of transitioning my eyes into the light of day; having spent my weekend in the world of science fiction and fantasy, I am once again in Mister John Anderson's cubicle, and idly wondering why everything has that pervasive green tint to it, and hoping against hope for that FedEx package containing Morpheus' cell phone to arrive.

And, evidently, doing everything I can to postpone that inevitable reintegration for as long as possible, by blogging about it.

* sigh *

On a related note, I got the proofs for books 1 - 4 this weekend and found errors on the first two, delaying the paperback availability yet again. They're updated now, just waiting for them to be re-processed, and then I can announce them.

Errors aside, they look great. I'm happy with them so far. I need to review Books 3 and 4 as well, and make a simple edit to the ebook of Morrow Stone, and then I should be all caught up. And then back to writing and editing books 5 and 6.

And working on the new Talaria Press anthology, and.... oh, did I not mention Talaria Press? I guess that's something else we can talk about later.

Later!

Conventions and Mile Markers

2011-03-01T07:26:00.000-08:00

Good morning, world!

Uusually, I have some idea of that which I will be blogging, before the first character hits the screen; in fact, I usually begin the darned thing with a title which I will ascribe (I actually considered both proscribe and prescribe before settling on that one. More coffee, please, miss?) to either hubris or folly. Though I suppose you can't go wrong with "folly", since it goes with everything. It's like a good black leather belt, I suspect. Today, however, it took me until nearly the end before I realized what this blog was about. All I did know when starting out was that I needed to write.

I'm of a silly mind today. I quite literally stand with feet stretched out into both careers - a situation in which I find myself more and more of late. For example, I'm taking the next week off from my day job so that I can work as staff for the Emerald City ComiCon. The gentlemen who own the show are some solid folks; I look forward as much to hanging out with them for a few days each year as much as I do working towards making the con an enjoyable event for all the attendees and guests.

It makes me think back to riding in the car on long family vacations. One of the ways I'd pass the time was to count (up or down) the mile markers along the highway. Every once in a while, the big "Miles To..." signs would whoosh by, and I'd keep myself from asking "Are we there yet?" by actually doing the math on how far we'd gone and how much further we had yet to travel. I probably asked a few times prior to that and was told to keep my mouth shut or something. At any rate, I busied myself in my mind, keeping the brain-numbing effects of the open road at bay.

Over the years, I learned to enjoy the spaces between those mile markers as well, though. They were the bits that made the mile markers mean something, you know? It's in line with that saying of how it's all about the journey, not the destination.

So, back to ECCC - one of the elements that has meant so much over the years has been the apparent diminishing of perceived space between me and my creative aspirations and all the great and talented artists and writers who attend this con each year.

My first year of volunteering, we also had Peter Mayhew as a guest - Star Wars fans may recognize the name as the actor inside the walking carpet, Chewbacca himself. Let me say, Peter is a fairly awesome and impressively tall gentleman. He and I chatted a bit during and after the con, and I had the chance to thank him for being part of a movie which - when I'd been all of seven - had quite convinced me of the plausibility of life on other planets. And even now, I can kind of track it to the performance of Chewie. Something about how he played that cracked a hole in my young and burgeoning imagination. Yeah, I knew it was a guy in a costume (I wasn't a total gundark. Yes, I said it. I embrace my geekdom), but for just a moment, it made me wonder how "aliens" really were. And were they sitting there, wondering how "aliens" were. And so on. It just kind of connected the constellations for me.

But also, shaking Peter's hand was a trip. It is just freaking huge, I'm telling you. I literally felt like a child again, shaking his hand. So it was a weird juxtapositioning of a span of 30-some years from then to now. But that illusory temporal wormhole - being simultaneously 7 and 37 - brought it all into a sharper focus, like some sort of time capsule of imagination and youthful, undaunted and unlimited capacity for dreaming.

Successive ECCCs have had a similar sort of effect - it's like having a high school reunion now, but a new one every year. And much like we do each month with our daughter, I line myself up along a sort of mental/professional wall and chalk off the line atop my head to see how much further I've grown.

Two years ago, for example, I was struck by the realization that, after more than ten years out of college, I still hadn't finished a book. Last year, I had one completed. This year, I've got 4 - plus anthology and short story work. Plus, developing an e-publishing coalition. A fifth book is in edits, a sixth is being written, and more anthology work is forthcoming. Five non-fiction collections are being sorted, and even my children's story anthology has taken more shape. I've made a lot of friends in the writing and publishing biz, now, my twitter account went from about a dozen followers to just under a thousand, and I've even been interviewed. That's not a bad year. A crazy good year, in fact.

It's just a funny thing about mile markers. On their own, they're just a number. Taken on their own, they represent a fixed point, and, when speeding by, only account for a moment in the large journey. They spend more time in your memory than in your vision, but the journey needs them. You can't simply arrive, else there is no journey at all. And after all is said and done, the journey is what crafts you, molds you, makes you into something more than the moments. It turns you from the image of you into the fully realized film.

So, that being said, here we go. I'll take good notes at the convention, though I suspect I'll be working hard and coming back to my hotel each night exhausted, aching, and most likely a little bit drunk.

Until then, friends, have a spectacular week, and enjoy the journey until we speak anew.

New Edition! (sorry, not you, Bobby Brown)

2011-02-24T09:05:00.000-08:00

I should probably clear up something on a more technical front. I've done some massive reconstructions on my original trilogy, turning them from 3 huge books into 6 normal-sized ones. In the process, I've apparently confused the snot out of folks, however. As an apology, please allow me to try and reconcile this.

The original Trilogy - "The Aerthos Trilogy":
Book 1: The Morrow Stone
Book 2: Reaper's Flight
Book 3: The Fall of the Shepherd (unreleased)

The new series - "The Chronicles of Aesirium":
Book 1: Reapers' Return (available as eBook, pending proof for Paperback)
Book 2: The Morrow Stone (pending review for eBook)
Book 3: The City of the Dead (available as eBook)
Book 4: Reaper's Flight (available as eBook)
Book 5: Into the Blink (to be released Spring 2011)
Book 6: The Crook and the Blade (to be released summer 2011)

Note: What WAS Book 1 of the original Trilogy has been broken up and expanded (a la Director's Cut) into Books 1 and 2 of the new series.

Note 2: What WAS Book 2 of the original Trilogy has been broken up and expanded into Books 3 and 4 of the new series.

Note 3: I have discontinued the printing on Books 1 and 2 of the original series, and am in the process of replacing them to match the format and content of the 4 currently-released ebooks.

Note 4: I'm not trying to emulate George Lucas here; I swear.

I hope this answers any questions you may have; I'll update soon when all four books are uploaded into Amazon and ready for purchase. Thanks for bearing with me on this; I promise I'll be posting something clever and witty very soon.

Full Steampunk Ahead!

2011-02-18T13:50:00.000-08:00

The universe has been a great place to chill lately. Not that I've been taking the time to do so, but clearly, if I did... it would so totally be a delight.

I've been given some great advice recently about rolling up my sleeves and getting some established work done; I'd been essentially spinning my wheels, waiting for the right artist to fall into my lap with respect to designing my ebook and paperback covers, and it's been so slow going.

But my new best author friend Jen walked me through her recent success story of accomplishing her publishing goals just by e-publishing, and in an effort to "pay it forward", has been showing me the ropes.

And, voila, I give you The Chronicles of Aesirium - "Reaper's Return" (book one) and "The Morrow Stone" (book two).

I've converted books 3 and 4 to ebook format, and will be working on the covers this weekend, so they should be up within a week. Book 5 is in the hands of my editors, so final launch date is pending rewrites, et cetera. Book 6 is still in first draft stage, but I'm pausing while book 5 gets processed. But they should both be up by the end of spring, barring other complications.

I've got the prices more in line with where they ought to be, and as I dive back in, it is nice to see the positive reception the new designs are already receiving.

I'll be honest, I really question the value added by traditional publishing models. The success of ebook authors like Amanda Hocking, JR Rain and Jen Ashton should really stand out as examples of exactly why book stores like Borders are struggling or imploding.

I mean, honestly, are books no longer being written? No. Are they no longer being purchased? Not at all. So why are these large chains collapsing? They haven't changed their business model.

Well, as of now, I'm changing mine as well. This will result in various potentially inexplicable comments from me over the next few weeks (with a brief interlude while I attend the Emerald City ComiCon 2011), but I assure you, all will be revealed.

Yes, it's full steampunk ahead, my pretties. Get your tickets now. It's gonna be a fantastic ride.

Caught Between the Scylla and New York City

2011-02-14T08:51:00.000-08:00

How Arthur's Theme and The Police's "Wrapped Around Your Finger" got mashed up in my head I'm sure I couldn't tell you. But that's how these things go sometimes. The best that you can do... (the best that you can do...) oh wait. More lyrics. Ah well.

So, in the process of shaking off the monday morning lazies, and trying to remain under the radar at my day job is turning into a full time process of its own today. However, no one particular stream of coherence is ruling the roost thus far, so I suspect this blog is one part killing time and three parts conscious efforting towards a specific consciousness. I am uncertain as of yet precisely what this will bake up, but I'll be the first one to taste it, don't you worry.

Recent conversations have engaged upon me a particular awareness of attempting to balance two particular lives. In my case - lest ye fear for my eternal soul - it is the precarious juggling of a full time job, complete with marginal benefits, and the aspirations of being a full time author. The former is an occupation which I have spent the past 20 years cultivating. It bears fruit, it possesses some degree of shade, and though it is a frightfully horrific sight, it persists as a utilitarian success story. It provides for my family, offers me an ongoing sense of achievement, and bolsters my genetic needs for being a provider. Well, sort of. The economy being what it is, my wife and I both work; my job just happens to make a slight bit more (which I say as point of fact, and not out of an obligatory sense of competition).

The second of my two lives in in being an author. Self-published thus far, but with Flying Pen Press working on publishing my books later this year. I'm taking this a step further and moving on ebook publication, as well, working with my new friend Jen Ashton to learn the ins and outs of finding success through ebooks. As it turns out, it's nowhere nearly as complicated as I once thought; I've already converted the first 4 of my YA Steampunk books into e-form, and once I get the covers nailed down, I'll start releasing them.

But beyond the basics of ebook construction and marketing, one of the things Jen's helped me come to see is exactly how much of our success in life begins with decisive ambition and resolve. Logic laughs at me here - it realized this truth years ago, and I'm pretty late to the game, as it were. But the fact is, what we get from life is based almost entirely (either directly or otherwise) upon what we think, do and maintain.

It's like this:

Three years ago, I'd never finished a full book. Several aborted starts, but never anything that flowed all the way from cover to cover. And now I have five novels, several short stories, and even more "next ideas" than ever before. And did this happen all at once? Of course not.

Ask any author how they write a book, and eventually it's going to boil down to this: One Page at a Time.

And that's the key to doing anything. The danger comes from looking at JK Rowling or Stephenie Mayer and thinking "yeah, that's how you get successful!" But the fact is, JK and Stephenie are like Lady Gaga or Justin Beiber - they're quite successful, but they're also the exception. For every Gaga or Beiber, there are thousands of people out there, struggling through in various levels of success; some you might hear of, but most.... well, you won't.

Having sold a few hundred copies of my books with essentially no marketing strategy to speak of has already given me a greater degree of success than many writers out there - people with incredible talent and dedication to the craft, and yet whose work may never even see the light of day. Hell, I've written a lot of things that will never see print. It's just how these things go, I'm sure.

But that brings me back to the title of this blog.

One of the things Jen and I were talking about the other day was about the kind of faith it requires to just "take the leap from the lion's mouth" - (yes, an Indiana Jones reference. If you don't like it, learn to cope.) and how that sort of thing - Faith - has been a sticking point for me most of my life.

But something occurred to me today - - -

Faith in a supreme being - a concept I in many ways have simply come to the conclusion that I may never fully resolve - is something that people either have or they don't. They may even have faith that there is NOT a supreme being, but that's faith, too. But for me? It borders on the faintest edge of hope. And though this screams in the face of my youthful aspirations, I have also come to the realization that a lack of hope in a divine being does not mean I want to live my life as an experiment in anarchy and remorseless hedonism. Life may exist to be experienced, but I also want to have a purpose, principles, a guiding path that governs my decision-making processes. Even if only to me, I want my life to mean something. I want to live well.

Doing that doesn't require Faith, it just requires choice, with a smattering of foresight and resolve.

So, perhaps faith in oneself can work along the same basic principles? Mayhaps one doesn't need to well and truly believe that they're going to be successful like Stephen King or Neil Gaiman; maybe just being resolved to write and write well is enough to define one's sense of accomplishment, and let the universe do what it will.

I used to observe - with some degree of disillusionment - that one of the most disappointing side-effects of religion was the idea of being good so that your god will reward you (or at least not punish you). But I think that holds a secret truth to any sort of faithful pursuit. In the end, it's not about the rewards bestowed upon you that will give you the deepest satisfaction.

At the end of the day, will you look upon your works with satisfaction at a job well done, or will you with fear and derision avert your gaze?

Something to think about, today. As for me, I've got a couple of jobs to do. More later, peeps.

Turn, Turn, Turn

2011-02-04T05:50:00.000-08:00

One of the first grownup books I remember reading as a small person was a post-apocalyptic book called "Earth Abides" - fairly solid read, but what really got to me were the elements of personal philosophy that were interwoven between the chapters. One that to this day, so many years later, has still remained with me was the concept of perceived immortality.

Essentially, the idea was reflecting upon mankind's tendency to extrapolate their future purely from their past. Namely, that what they believed to be within the realm of possibility could only have been previously experienced, which inaccurately limits their ability to prepare for future eventualities. The examples thus were given: just because I've never broken my arm does not imply that my arm is unbreakable; just because I have not died does not make me immortal.

And yet, as a world and as individuals, we do that same delimiting comprehension of our expectations. "It's never happened, and thus it never shall."

What a load of crap that is, though.

Case in point:

Twenty years ago, I'd never recorded an album. I'd never written a novel. I'd never been married. I'd never had children. Hell, twenty years ago, I still had a full head of hair. Life does funny things to you whether you're paying attention or not - - - which was, by the way, the general intent of yesterday's blog, though I suspect the point may have been lost in my general sense of meandering.

This week has been far less productive in terms of book progress than it has in making a perspective shift. It's a challenging enough prospect to stand up and say "Oh hi there, I'm an author" after so many years of being so many other things, and I suspect perhaps it took a bit for the blood to make its way back into my head. But a series of powerfully well-timed conversations gave me the appropriate nudges into my present state of mind, and, as I know now so many other authors who find themselves either previously, presently or potentially in this same transitional state, I wanted to mark the occasion with a few declaratives.

First, it's essential to remember this - - you are as you decide you are. No one else has more power over your destiny than you do. Want it? Then be it.

Second, there is neither an expiration date nor an incubation period for happiness. Happiness is a choice, not a result. You want happy? Be happy.

Thirdly, if you want something done, get off your ass and do it. If you don't know how, ask someone. "The only thing stopping you is the stopping," as Jim Morrison once said to me in a really funny dream.

And lastly, never forget that this world is a pretty damned impressive place. If you're a student of life, a writer, a lover or a fighter, just take a moment to breathe it in, every chance you get. The only form of hell I can imagine would be the regret for a life unlived.

And on that note, I got some writing to do. Be back soon, hopefully with some news and a bit less soapboxiness.

Be well, peeps. Let me know how you're doing.

Busy Making Other Plans

2011-02-03T08:44:00.000-08:00

Been a fun week for many of us; my day job has kept me up to my sideburns in conference calls and emails and the like due to the winter storms, blizzards, ice storms, and potentially lethal corporate human resources business decisions. To be honest, I've spent the better part of my week shaking my head at the power of corporations, and governments. I could say more, but that would risk violation of my code of business conduct at work. Just one more reason to strive for self-employement, I guess.

Worse than the impact to actual time I would have rather spent writing, it's kept my mindset so focused upon uncreative endeavors that it's requiring substantial effort to wrap my brain back around my author tasks.

But it reminds me of sleep. (warning: analogy follows!)

I have a certain knack to fall asleep on a dime. Like, just shut all systems down and be deeply REM-ing in moments. It's not like I'm narcoleptic; it's a conscious state of deep mental relaxation that permits me to slip almost effortlessly into a rest state. But this ability is a learned one, not a natural gift.

The key to it is building a practiced habit and series of "triggers" that my mind recognizes as a buildup to slumber; visualization, a particular playlist on my iPod, laying in my bed with a nice book, that sort of thing. As my mind notices these elements, it just slips right into sleep. Clockwork, baby.

The curiosity I have is how to train my brain in a different way, as well - how to train it to put myself into writing mode. I've tried using other playlists on my iPod, that sort of thing. It's becoming easier now than it once was - I tend to be easily distracted - but this week has been fairly all-consuming, and I'm struggling to get back into my preferred mode.

The big thing that weighs upon my shoulders is the fact that my day job - as a crisis manager for a major telecommunications company - requires me to be on-call 24/7. This includes setting up and hosting conference calls, email correspondence, or just being a central point of communication upstream and down in the middle of crisis events. When the sun shines, its' all reports and paperwork. When the snow/rain/ice falls, the wind blows, the ground shakes, or technology thumbs its nose at the business processes, then my life revolves around that.

When the system works, it's a wonderful sight to behold - managers, leaders and executives all pulling together to keep the employees safe and well-cared-for, ensuring that the customers' needs are met, etc. It's all grand when it works well.

But.... * sigh *

Anyway, all I can say at this time is that I was discouraged this week. Disappointed.

And that sense of being let down has distracted me somewhat more than usual. Today, I just want to get back on track with the multiple projects I've set myself to complete.

But it's not all gloom and despair. A new good friend of mine has given me a degree of inspiration I haven't felt in some time; and has been pure, undiluted awesomesauce in terms of challenging my conceptualization of my career path and direction. Essentially, I have seen a series of options that I hadn't really considered feasible or (yes, I'll say it) profitable. Some aspects of this will be forthcoming shortly; some will be flying well under the radar, as necessary. (don't fret - I simply mean that some of it may require the use of a pseudonym) However, the goal remains solid: becoming self-sufficient through writing.

A few things which have risen back from the grave include: a time-travel anthology, the children's story anthology, and a lot of other stories I've written that hadn't been getting much consideration. Oh, and the non-fiction "Collected Writings" tomes that had been once considered but set aside for the steampunk books.

The math is impressive - especially when considering I could potentially have at least 10 eBooks up by my birthday. And that's 10 of my own, not counting appearances in other anthologies.

Hmmm. Odd. Now I want to write. Gonna go grab some coffee. Want anything while I'm out?

Oh, and on that note: if you're an author and living in or planning to visit the pacific northwest - from Portland through Vancouver BC - - drop me a line. We should chat.

Many Hats; One Head

2011-01-31T08:36:00.000-08:00

Okay; first four books in the Chronicles of Aesirium (out of 6) are complete and prepped for final formatting. I'm going to get them a final edit or two just to make sure all the Is are crossed and the Ts are dotted, but it's nice to be patting them on the head. Book 5 needs an edit or two, but it's mostly done, save for a few last bits, and book 6 is already a couple chapters in, but yearning for me to write it. In spite of the world, I proceed.

Was headed into a nice vibe yesterday when all hell broke loose across the nation in terms of bad weather alerts. Now, I'm not one to bite the hand that feeds me, so while I really can't hate the fact that I had a paying job that needed me to shift my focus away from writing fiction and onto hazardous weather tracking and continuity planning....well, at the time, it was fairly frustrating.

The entirety of wearing multiple hats is not unknown to me; don't get me wrong. It's good to have a grounding and foundation of an established job in those lean months of creativity - it's liberating in a very real sense in that I never need think "I MUST write, for if I do not, I will starve!" I'm fully capable of generating my own sense of urgency, trust me. What's more, I love writing. I'm very happy to just write and write anyway.

But all the same, there are days in which I do not enjoy the conflict.

And before I continue, please let me state for the record that I appreciate the irony of a person taking time out of his busyness to address his...busyness. I get it, I do. But at the same time, this sense of frustration is like a burr beneath my saddle. A moment of resolution will prevent catastrophe, trust me.

So here's a snapshot of where I am for my 2011 projects:

Chronicles of Aesirium (6 books total):

Drafts complete: 5
Concept Kit: Complete
Final Edits complete: 0
Formatting complete: 0
Cover Art complete: 0

Project P (Secret Flying Pen Press project):

Materials received and being assimilated;
Business proposal will need to be written.

Steampunk Shakespeare:

Sonnets completed: 0

Steampunk Short Stories (2):

Steampunk Comedy; Conceptualized, outlined
Cousins origin story: conceptualized, outlined

Anachronology 101/The New (ab)Normal:

Data compiled, needs to be sorted and formatted
Estimated: 5-6 books (faith, the internet, parenthood, work, politics, random observations about the world)

One of the big changes I'll be making this year is shifting my focus for my personal projects to an eBook one. Flying Pen Press has stated that they would be publishing the Chronicles of Aesirium books, but their focus is in POD distribution, and not on ePublishing, so there's still a vast arena to be explored.

But I've also met a very successful ebook author who has offered to introduce me through that process - so it may be a bit less dangerous than I'd previously expected.

Hmmm. I can't decide if this blog has helped me or made me feel more stressed. Bleah.

Editing Hell? Nah. Not even "Heck", really.

2011-01-26T09:39:00.000-08:00

I hear a lot of other writers using the term "editing hell", as in I'm stuck in editing hell, etc. I'm in the middle of what I believe is what they're talking about - - I'm turning 3 full-length (92k+ words each) novels into 6 YA-length (50-60k+ words) books. And, to put this into perspective, here's the present status update:

I began with the following:

Book One - "The Morrow Stone" - 92k words, 277 pages, 7x9 format
Book Two - "Reaper's Flight" - 126k words, 285 pages (much smaller font), 7x9 format
Book Three - (working title) - 60% complete with 72k words

And this will be converted into 6 books, thus:

Book 1 - 60k words, 280 pages, YA paperback format
Book 2 - 55k words, 270 pages, YA paperback format
Book 3 - TBD
Book 4 - TBD
Book 5 - TBD
Book 6 - TBD

In terms of drafts, I'm almost done with reconverting what is now going to be book 2, and following a weighty review of Reapers Flight will then break it down into 2 books following the design formatting I've done so far with Morrow Stone. Then I'll be wrapping the first draft of what WAS book 3 into what will be books 5 and 6, also following the similar format. Follow me so far? If so, that might just make one of us.

The thing is, the books have made thus far for a fairly simple transition from one to two books. It's also given me the chance to expand on the narrative in ways I truncated in the original versions because of the constraints of space. When I look at them now, I already have 5 completely new chapters that weren't in the original books, and that's not even including the "director's cut expanded scenes" that are getting filtered in throughout the entirety of the books thus far.

As I wrap the expanded cuts of Reapers Flight and start back into the last half of the original 3rd book, though, I expect to see little additional expansion; I'm just going to write the books as the stories need to be told, and not worry about cutting for size or space.

Very liberating.

The biggest challenge so far has been on expanding the scenes; I've had to retain a coherent sense of where the characters are way back at the beginning of the books and ensure that I don't let them behave as they do much later, or that they don't know something they didn't learn until later, etc. I thought I knew my own books before, but the truth is that I know them now so much better.

That realization should probably frighten me.

But all the same.... "editing hell"? I don't know, I really just don't feel it. Yet.

Maybe that's the whole punch line of hell, really. Maybe it's one of those things that just slowly sucks you in, and you don't realize you're in it until it's much, much too late.

...

Okay, now I'm a little worried.

New Year's Revolution

2011-01-06T13:29:00.001-08:00

So let me get this straight - we're already a week into the new year? Shut the front door!

I am aware of the need to update things here, but every word is tinged with the bitterness of guilt that I'm not putting words into the novels. So, here's a quick update of what's the what.

Morrow Stone - am mostly done with the rewrite - the first 5 chapters have been recombobulated into a much more dramatic arrangement. Very happy with the new look and feel and pacing of it - shocked by how simple it was to reconstruct it and make it work so much more deliciously. Will be adding a second new chapter to it plus a prologue written by one of our favorite scoundrels. Then it's off for a new round of edits with Matt Delman at FPP to see what more needs to be changed. Plus I need to get it properly formatted to the printed page, AND I need the art done. And, if I can find the right person, a book trailer. Feelers are crawling out.

Reaper's Flight - will get to this one soon enough as well; will need to do a few tweaks in order to put it in line with the pattern being established by book 1's second edition and the steadily progressing 3rd novel. And then there's art.

Fall of the Shepherd - have crossed the midpoint of the book. Still a good ways to go. With the holidays behind, it's time to get back into gear and write.

Additional projects - FPP's "Steampunk & Co" is doing a pair of anthologies, and I'm submitting a "Cousins" prequel short story and some sonnets for the Steampunk Shakespeare antho.

And Matt's pitching around the idea of plushies for the Aerthos books - Mulligan, Yu and Rickets. That thought alone is making me giddy.

Oh, and if you hadn't already seen them, I've been interviewed twice this past month - one in Lexi Flint's blog and once in Lorna Suzuki's blog. Both interviews were absolutely fantastic experiences, and if you haven't read their blogs, then shame on you. Go do it now. Seriously. I'll wait right here until you're done.

Okay, all good? Sweet.

Let's see, what else. Oh, yes. Got a kindle for Christmas, so now I get to read EVERYWHERE. BWAH HAH HAH HAH! Awesome sauce.

And then, just when I thought I'd NEVER catch up, I won a contest from Tor publishing that netted me a BOX full of new books - like, 30 of them. They sit beside me by my writing desk and taunt me.

And if that wasn't bad enough, I need to update the site, too.

all right, now I'm just stalling. Back to work. Thanks for visiting!

Yule Wish I'd Skipped This Pun

2010-12-20T08:56:00.000-08:00

Sorry, yes, couldn't help myself. I'd blame the nog, but I've been nog-free for years and haven't fallen off the sleigh yet.

It's not just nearly the Christmas season, I notice, but it's very nearly almost no longer the Christmas season. Solstice is nipping at my nose, in point of fact. How do these seasons get away from my notice so quickly? Oh, yes, I've been busy, that's right.

Work on book 3 has been coming slowly. Have my new and shiny office mostly set up now, which if nothing else serves as a new and shiny reminder that I should be working on book 3. There is much, in fact, to be done at the moment, and only my day job seems now determined to get in the way - though I note in retrospect, if this were in fact the case, how exactly would I manage to be writing this? (Good question, but kindly do be quiet, inner monologue)

For example, my good friend H. L. Reasby has finished her re-write of her second book, Peret, and I need to sit down and give it a good reading. Matt Delman, managing editor of Flying Pen Press' steampunk imprint, is putting together a Steampunk-inspired Shakespearean anthology (or is that a Shakespeare-inspired Steampunk anthology? The mind reels.) and I have some material to create for it, as well. And if you're a writer and have wanted to write for a Shakespearean/Steampunk anthology, you should, too. Really.

Another anthology is in the works, too, and I need to finish a short story for that one - a prologue to The Morrow Stone. The Morrow Stone, speaking of which, is going through a bit of redevelopment as we get her ready for a second edition printing and re-design. Since Morrow Stone was nominated for Steampunk.com's 2010 Steampunk book of the year and is going to be published by FPP in 2011 - along with Reaper's Flight - there's a lot of little things to be done to get her all dolled up and ready for the ball.

And by the way, please, if you get a moment, swing by Steampunk.com and check out the other nominees, or even take a moment to vote, if you thus fancy a chance to support your local (or not local as the case may be) author. I still can't believe the amazing company I'm with, there. Truly amazing writers. In fact, if you haven't read much steampunk in the past, you really can't go wrong with them.

Cherie Priest in particular is rather awesome. I'm reading Boneshaker very nearly at this precise moment - come on, people. Airships and zombies, all taking place in Victorian Seattle. If it gets any better than this, it's obviously been declared illegal or at least regulated. Which is not to say Scott Westerfeld or Nick Valentino aren't also fantastic, because they are. I actually got to meet Nick briefly at Steamcon 2 this past month - great guy!

And, to top it all off, I'm expecting an entirely new project as well, involving sci fi and curious things I can't even talk about yet. God help us all when that starts up. I've already been doing a great deal of research and prep work on that one, but I'll let you know what it's all about when I can officially announce it. And believe me, you're likely to be pretty dazzled by this one, folks.

That being said, it is as mentioned previously the holiday season, and there's much yet to do before I can feel content to put this year into the archives. Thank you for reading, for your support, and for just being a part of the wondrous internet mosaic. May the new year find you well and prosperous, and may it be filled with bliss and satisfaction.

Much love, all.

Steampunk Book of the Year

2010-12-15T07:19:00.000-08:00

Steampunk.com has announced its nominees for the 2010 Steampunk Book of the Year, and "The Morrow Stone" is in the final five! Very exciting news!

The only real downside is that I feel like there are plenty of other fantastic authors who could just as easily have found their books on this list, and the other 3 authors (Cherie Priest had both her SP books nominated) are just amazing wordsmiths. But, really, it makes me feel quite fine to be counted among them. That whole "everyone's a winner" thing? Oh, yes, indeed.

Feel free to check out the other nominees here - - voting will be going on from now until December 21st: I don't want you to feel obligated to vote (not even for me), but I promise I will sing a song of gratitude for every vote I get. They may be short songs, however. Depends on my allergies.

Today is a little strange. Did something happen? Is this a new weather front passing over us?

It sure feels different.

Cool.

Tis The Season

2010-12-08T11:07:00.000-08:00

Christmas is coming, and word has it that the turkey has put on additional weight from all the autumnal lack of activity. Poor creature, but please don't mention it. Apparently, turkeys can become quite self-conscious about their figures.

Wow. Yes, I'm a bit of an odd duck (second bird reference in as many paragraphs. Hmm.) today, but I can safely say that cold medication might just have everything to do with it. Yesterday found me utterly laid to waste by a combination of cold + remedy. Brutal. All in all, I'm just happy November did not completely destroy me. Still not sure it hasn't.

November was nice in terms of getting stuff done. Domestic tasks were mostly completed, and I even managed to crank out 50,000 + words on Book 3, and have even gone back in and done some rough edits as well. The downside? That only puts me solidly into chapter 10. Of a 25 chapter book.

It's not easy to push through the third book of a trilogy, I'm finding. In books one and two, so many sub plots were left as tantalizing hints of narrative rewards yet to come: "I'll be addressing that in book 2 or book 3," I would say, fully meaning to do so.

I can't do that now, however. If a character is slated to die, they will die - and if their death is to be merely an obscured one, then I still have to resolve it IN THIS BOOK. There's a lot to revisit in this one, plots I've set in motion in the first two volumes. Such as, who is Cousins and why is he here? Why was the wall built and why do prophecies indicate that Rom will bring it down? Where did the Machines go, and why did they leave in the first place? Who are the Sheharid Is'iin? Who is Artifice and why is she killing the other Reapers?

Those are just a few of these, all just laid out from Book 1 and going forward. There were more questions dropped - as many as I believe I answered - in book 2. And yet, as I wade through book 3, I realize that there are some questions that I simply do not yet wish to resolve.

These first three books are most specifically a tale of the central character, the white-haired Rom, and closely outline her and her struggles along the paths of self-discovery and the question of pre-destination: a couple of my own favorite subjects. But no one travels a path alone, and Rom is no exception; she is shadowed in part by Kari the steamsmith and Cousins, the streetwise young lad with aspirations exceeding the norm for the rundown streets of Oldtown.

So even while I follow their individual story arcs as well as Rom's, Rom gets the focus, and they're left to secondaries. They come to small conclusions, but they're never given the same sense of priority as Rom is during these books.

And then there's Favo. He and Mulligan have fast become the fan favorites, which is no surprise as they're my favorites too. I'm already planning on having Favo get his own series of books (whether as prequels or parallel novels I'm not yet telling), and even Cousins is going to have a short story written as a prequel to The Morrow Stone. But there are so many bits and pieces to this world that I love...but I can't yet write about it all.

Some of the tertiary characters - like Force, Memory and Inertia, as well as Marcos and Jontal - are also really interesting to me. The Sheharid's lives all play into the history of Aerthos, so many of them will be tied into the plot and associated revelations in book 3, but I'm finding that they just reveal more of the culture and history that I want to later explore.

These books are starting to envelop me, but I don't yet know that it's a bad thing. Though at this point, maybe it's a bit of a moot issue, since I haven't really gone all full court press on the marketing of it. It's possible that the association with Flying Pen Press will change things - though at the same time, I expect to be fairly busy working with them on their own projects.

I really picked a bad month to get a cold. It's not easy to sit out and wait for health to return.

Talk to you later!

Harvestday

2010-11-25T17:17:00.000-08:00

(author's note: the following scenes take place at the end of the events of "Reaper's Flight", and prior to book 3)

Summer was behind them now; well behind them, in fact. The great Machines were deeply into their harvesting program, drawing in the last of the crops to be processed and churning down the remnants of the plants and roots, there to lay dormant until the first inklings of the spring thaw. The chaff and inedible leavings were channeled to the forge-fires, offering a finality to the growths that fed back into the unending cycle that balanced life and death for the people of Oldtown-against-the-Wall. The soot-tinged breezes blew up and over the great blank Wall to their east, mingling with the songs of celebratory bliss that mirrored the hearts and minds of the agrarian culture that had developed from their generations of exile.

Though it was a harder life than their ancestors had enjoyed in the virtual utopia of the city beyond the Wall, their years of migration into harmonious give-and-take with the land itself had cultured in them a respect and appreciation for the soil and water which raised their crops, as well as the fires and steam which powered their town. Full bellies and grateful spirits, as the Matrons had said so often in the orphanage, the young steamsmith Kari recalled.

She paused in her tinkering to scratch the small grey animal that lay near her behind the ears, just under the twin yellowed curving horns that grew from the top of his head. He raised his head and his leathery wings ruffled briefly, a soft purr vibrating from the depths of his chest. He opened his golden eyes slowly, blinking several times to let his pupils dilate to the flickering sodium lights in Kari's workshop.

"Sorry to wake you," Kari whispered. "We have to go soon; Goya is having a meal for the Harvestday celebration, and I told her we'd get there early to help."

The small creature nodded. "It's all right," he said lazily. "Was just having a dream. Odd things, those dreams."

Kari set the small wrenches down she'd been using on the control mechanism for her latest construction. "Did you never dream before..." Her words dropped off uncomfortably. "Well, before?"

With a single shake of his head, he replied, "No, not really. Before, I didn't even need to sleep or eat or anything like that, I just did it because...well, it was something to do like regular animals did. It's strange now, but it's also remarkably satisfying." He shrugged. All their conversations seemed to come back to the same long pauses, the same uncomfortable silences. Sometimes, it was just better not to say anything in the first place.

A sudden knock against the metal loading doors startled them both. Their shared gasps of surprise turned into rolls of laughter that continued even until Kari had crossed the room to the service door built into the large double doors that rose nearly all the way to the ceiling.

Kari knew who it was even before she opened the latch, but seeing Cousins' smiling face never failed to lift her spirits. The cold air gave his nose and cheeks a rosy tint beneath his goggles, making him seem ever so slightly more happy. She reached out and gave him an unexpected embrace, which he, after a moment to set aside his surprise, reciprocated.

"Blessed Harvestday to you too," he whispered into her ear. In spite of the pain of recent events, the two young friends had begun to discover a growing fondness for one another, however awkwardly they approached it. Cousins stepped back after a moment, waving a gloved hand in greeting to the feranzanthum who still rested upon Kari's workdesk.

"Hello, Mulligan!" Cousins said cheerily. The creature stood up, arching his back and flapping his wings several times to get the feeling back in them, before flying across the room to perch on Cousins' shoulders. He looked past the tousled blonde hair of the street-savvy entrepreneur to regard the young man's preferred form of transport: the two-wheeled, steam-powered runabout.

"Isn't it a bit...chilly...for that contraption?" Mulligan asked.

"Nonsense," Cousins countered, in spite of the wool riding coat and gloves. "It's a fine brisk afternoon," he said. "Besides, another few days and we'll have snow on the streets; might as well get my riding in whilst I can."

“Fair point,” the creature replied.

Kari rolled her eyes. “I’ll get my coat,” she said, retrieving it from the small apartment that sat on one side of her spacious laboratory. Cousins exerted an impressive amount of self-control to ask Kari about the nature of her latest work – it took up most of the space in her shop and strongly resembled their her first effort at a functional airship. That one, christened the Aethernaut, had been impressive in its own right, but had met with an equally notable end.

Cousins watched as Kari came back across the room, holding the thick black jacket over one arm as she fussed with her toolbag. He pointed at the grey sack that hung from her opposite shoulder, the various pouches clearly stuffed with her various pieces of equipment. “Seriously?” he grinned. “We’re going to dinner, you realize.”

Scoffing, she held the coat out to him to help her into it. “Well, you brought your cards and glasses,” she teased. “Planning on telling the future tonight?”

He held out the coat, raising it up over her shoulders. “If you must know, Goya asked me to bring my cards. But the goggles are to protect my eyes, oh sarcastic one.”

The three shared a laugh as Kari locked up behind her, they mounted up on the runabout and Cousins drove them to Goya Parva’s home and apothecary. They pulled up to the front, Cousins applying a fair amount of brakes and bringing them to an abrupt stop. Kari felt inhale sharply, and looked past him to see what had shocked him so much.

Standing to each side of the front door to the apothecary shop stood two Whitehold soldiers, clad head to toe in white, their faces obscured by featureless porcelain masks.

“It’s all right,” Mulligan whispered. “These aren’t the minions of the old Queen; I could feel it if they were. These are just soldiers in the uniforms, not Sandmen.”

With a curt nod, Cousins extended a hand to help Kari off the vehicle, snapping the kickstand down with a jerk of his right boot. He joined her after she stood clear, keeping Mulligan balanced across the back of his neck.

“Your driving has improved,” the animal said dryly. “Only half my fur is standing on its end.”

“Careful, my friend,” the lad countered. “The unfamiliar observer might think you were paying me a compliment.”

“Can’t have that, can we?”

Cousins chuckled. “Well, it is a holiday; stranger things have happened.”

The two soldiers nodded to the small trio as they approached, one reaching around to open the door for them. Even now, months after defeating Queen Karema and her army of undead soldiers, Cousins still felt uncomfortable around these Whitehold men and women. The new Queen had confided in him that she had considered replacing their uniforms, but the visible identity of the Induru Il-faraon still had traditional weight among the people of Aesirium, and in spite of their recent monstrosities, they remained an ultimately comforting presence in the city.

They found Briseida inside Goya’s living area, just past the store. The two women stopped whatever conversation they were having as Cousins, Kari and Mulligan entered, Briseida standing and greeting them all with hugs and smiles. The past few months had been transformative on them all, but none so much as on her. Cousins could scarcely see the soft-spoken and delicately hard-working apprentice as they’d come to know her beneath the radiant elegance she now possessed as the remaining heir to the throne. He was actually a bit disappointed that he hadn’t seen it earlier. Some seer he was, he thought ruefully.

An array of delicious smells wafted out from the kitchen beyond them, echoing out with the sounds of strangers’ voices and the general noise of metal on metal.

Following the youngsters’ eyes, Briseida smiled. “I brought some of my staff along to manage the meal; we’ll have more time to talk this way.”

“Well done!” came a familiar voice from behind them all. Favo Carr, reformed criminal (although there was some speculation as to just how much reforming had actually transpired) walked in, leaning heavily on a cane.

Kari frowned loudly, crossing the room to help him quickly to one of the many chairs present in the room. “You shouldn’t be up so soon,” she glared at him.

“What, and miss out on a feast fit for royalty?” He said, wincing as he sat. His wounds were mostly healed, but his side still ached with nearly every motion. “If you’ve ever known me to miss out on a well-catered function, well, you haven’t really known me at all, have you?” He ended his clearly-prepared rejoinder with a dapper wink, making Kari feel suddenly self-conscious and the room far too warm.

“Enough out of you, you wicked man,” Briseida chided him. “If you’re going to make a nuisance of yourself, you can do that well enough on your own.”

“Yes, my Queen,” he teased with a mock bow of his head.

Goya ignored all of this – or pretended to, at any rate – and waved the group to pay attention. Kari visited Goya nearly every day, but every day she was surprised at just how much older Goya seemed. Her hair seemed nearly transparent, and her eyes seemed to have been taking on a thin milky gleam. Kari brushed these thoughts aside as she always did. Goya had always seemed old, she decided, but that meant nothing in the broad picture of things. Just like the Wall, some things would just continue on as they always had, unchanging and unmoving.

Speaking to them in a voice which, though soft, carried the authority of a long and experience-filled life, Goya said, “You are the remainders of that which I could only describe as my family, which is why I have asked you to spend this Harvestday with me.”

The aged shaman leaned forward in her chair. “I know well the challenge it is for you all to be here, so stark are the painful reminders we all create in one another. But Harvestday is a day wherein we must address both the joys we have felt in our successes as well as the poignant losses which create the aching within our hearts. For to be grateful is not an emotion of pure joy so much as it is a joy which comes at great cost. Just like the crops we have toiled away all season long, we must cut them down – these things must fall away so that we may rise up.”

Mulligan jumped down to a nearby chair back, resting his chin upon his paws. Kari stepped to the other side of him, scratching him comfortingly behind the horns.

“I am grateful for you all,” Goya continued softly. “You are the closest thing I have to my children, all of you. Even,” she added, glancing meaningfully at Favo, “those of you who I should have liked to have educated more properly. And I love you all, bound as we are through our trials and by those of us who should have been here today and are not.”

Kari felt the tears welling up and for once felt no shame at it, letting them roll unhindered down her cheeks. She could feel Cousins’ arm around her, and she leaned her head against his.

“That loss is what makes the joy I feel at your presence today all the stronger,” Goya added. “And that is what fills me with the gratitude I feel.”

They all remained thus in silence for several minutes, each feeling the moment in their own way, until the chefs began to emerge from the kitchen with the fine meal they had prepared for the small gathering. Briseida crossed to Favo’s side, helping him in spite of his protestations to the table. She silenced him with a final threat of feeding him at the table if he wished to continue behaving like an infant, which seemed to satisfy his resolution to argue with her. Cousins noticed a lingering gaze that passed between them, however, but the enticing aroma of the dinner erased all further questions from him.

Mulligan sat atop the chair for several minutes longer, his golden eyes peering into the growing darkness outside the salon windows. Rom had been gone for several weeks, and though he was inexplicably left here in the realm of the living, he could not help but think it was some sort of final gift to him, giving him an actual life of his own. The idea that she was gone still seemed to escape him, eluding his grasp like the morning mists.

He couldn’t shake the thought that she might still be out there, somewhere, lost but looking for a way home. Mulligan knew it was a wild fancy of his mind, some abstract and illogical delusion his subconscious had devised to keep grief away from his consciousness, but he didn’t care. Kari called his name, distracting him from his thoughts. She held a piece of grilled fish in her hands, letting the tangy smell of it cross the room and fill his nostrils.

Rom, he thought as he leaped down to the floor, if you’re out there, please find your way home; we miss you so much.

Thoughts of his white-haired Sheharid Is’iin friend was then mingled with the warm laughter of their other friends, as they sat and partook of the Harvestday meal, filling themselves with delicious food and the company of their loved ones. Memories of struggles past lingered just on the edge of joy, like the shadows surround a solitary candle and making it the brightest of all things within the growing night.

Every Snowball Starts with a Flake. And I guess that's me.

2010-10-26T10:11:00.000-07:00

I was reading a really interesting article this morning which discussed the inertial blindness affecting the various publishing industries - specifically music and literature, but I believe this can be seen in many more industries as well. It's basically the realization that people tend to trust word-of-mouth more than blanket napalm advertizing and that more industries need to learn how to shift their marketing model from the one they currently employ and adopt one that more closely follows software development.

In software, anyone can invent anything. They can "mass produce" it (in other words, distribute electronically) and build up a target audience and use that to gain credit with the larger distributors or developers.

But with music and book publishing companies, they will only invest in the sure things - - creators who they know - KNOW - they can make a buck off. And these creators are usually desperate enough to sign away their rights to getting that brass ring contract. Most musicians, for example, don't start making any money off their albums until they're 2 or 3 albums in, and usually only after they're able to re-negotiate their contract to something more favorable.

I saw a recent statistic that addressed the number of iTunes downloads you would need each month in order to sustain it as a career. Literally, it was in the hundreds and thousands. But as an independent producer, it goes up dramatically. It's not unusual for first-time musicians to make literally pennies off each unit sold through a major publishing company, most all of which gets absorbed back into the production and marketing costs and their advance. The number of bands who declare bankruptcy after selling millions of albums isn't even unusual anymore - if anything, it's become the average experience. How sad is that? Meanwhile, RIAA is blaming illegal downloads as the cause of their financial ruin. Nice.

So this is where I come in. I've now written two novels, and am preparing to start my third - but as I don't follow the old school structure of marketing (as I don't have $150,000 to simply toss around), I turn to you for help.

My two novels - "The Morrow Stone" and "Reaper's Flight" are presently framed up on two sites: Amazon.com and Goodreads.com. They're actually sold on the first site (paperback and Kindle versions), while Goodreads is set up as a reader/author site - - - think Facebook but with an absolute focus on reading. Now, I know times are tough - - so if the 11 bucks (for the paperback; the kindle versions are around 6 dollars) is too much an investment, it's not a worry.

What I'd really like are reviews, feedback; that sort of thing. In fact, if you're interested in doing a review, but haven't read the book but would like to and don't have the extra cash to purchase a copy, let me know, and we can work something out - perhaps a pdf review copy, that sort of thing could be exchanged. Amazon is a great place to put those reviews, as well - - all good feedback helps get my books higher up and more visible.

Additionally, on Goodreads, there are opportunities for leaving reviews or simply adding the books to your "To Read" list. There are also genre lists that feature books of a like vibe, and voting for these is not only free, but it's easy and can make a supreme difference in other people's decisions to invest in the books. For example, The Morrow Stone is currently on these lists, and simply voting for it can give it a new level of visibility and recognition, either one of which can help it to be picked up by other readers.

Also, there's a book by a fellow independent author friend of mine, HL Reasby. Her Egyptian-themed contemporary fantasy novel "Akhet" can be likewise found in both places - feel free to give her book some props, too. She's in the middle of edits on her next book, and I'm sure she wouldn't mind a bit of positive attention for her first one. Edits suck; she could use a little applause right about now, I'd wager.

Lastly, if you're an author or musician or artist, etc, and would like some additional internet praise, please let me know - - I will happily share the good word with my peeps and take one more giant leap for independent content creators.

So there's my plea and my offer. Thank you for - if nothing else - reading this; thank you twice for anything you can do to help get the word out. And thank you thrice for being involved at all, whichever way the process unfolds.

Be well, peeps.

Last Minute Checks

2010-10-25T07:57:00.000-07:00

With Morrow Stone and Reaper's Flight completed and online, one last hurdle in my Trilogy plan remains: book 3. Throughout all the writing over the past two years, things like "marketing" and "promotion" and "submissions" have been essentially set by the wayside as I focused on the elements of writing which most appeal to me: namely, writing. Now, though, I have to consider that in a few months as production on book 3 comes to a head, I'll need to dust off that businessman hat and get ready to actually try and pitch myself. But it's only just occurred to me that this not only isn't such a bad thing, but that I'm actually rather looking forward to certain aspects of it.

Went and had coffee yesterday with another local writer, and we just sort of gabbed on about the state of the biz and specifically about the Steampunk genre, which appears to be having a few growing pains as it struggles for self-definition. I'll be honest about something while I'm on the topic - I don't really see myself as a "Steampunk Author", as it were. Yes, the current trilogy does employ various elements common to Steampunk as a setting - pseudo-Victorianism, steam-engine-based technology, pipes, gears, pocketwatches, and even a clever little pair of goggles.

I personally love the flair and sensibility of the setting inherent to the sub-genre, but I don't plan on writing all my books in this genre. My next series - the next one I plan to write, so it remains to be seen what I actually end up writing next - is looking to be more of a contemporary supernatural horror genre, taking place in Portland, Oregon. Not really a steampunk environment, that.

The books I have on track beyond that include genres like deep science fiction, an anthology of children's stories, and so forth. Although I already have plans to continue the books in the current world-setting, as well, so I'm nowhere near done with the steampunk yet, nor do I believe that Steampunk is done with me. There's an elegance and anachronology to it which has always appealed to me, and though I fear for its present overindulgence in pop culture, it looks to be around for a long while to come. So, basically, no worries.

I've been thinking about my affection for Steampunkery a good deal in anticipation of starting up this third book in the present series - how much embellishment of pipes and steam do I permit to have root in the book - is it requisite for story or setting; or does it strive to become its own character in the book, elbowing out narrative in an effort to steal the show?

I struggle with a lot of "Steampunk" books in much the same way as I struggle with books on new age philosophy or vampires. I love both as themes, but all too often the themes themselves take over the narrative. Too many vampire books feel like photocopies of photocopies - - with each author claiming to really "get" how a vampire might feel; when its clear that they're really just writing about how they think they might feel as a vampire. Are they correct? Are they accurate? Who knows, but then that's part of what lures me into a book - my belief that the writer a) knows what they're talking about, and b) isn't hitting me over the head with their brilliant observations.

Clearly, hitting one over the head with "brilliance" is best left for blogs.

Ouch.

Yes, that was sarcasm. And yes, I was indicting myself.

Anyway, sorry, before I went off on a preachy tangent, let me just cap that whole idea off with the realization that what "is" anything is a perception and a personal observation. Do I write "true Steampunk"? No, probably not. My books have a careful (and deliberate) balance of retro-tech and faith-based magic to at best classify my books as "Steampunk Sci-Fi" or "Steampunk Fantasy". But really, at their core, they are books about finding out what you're best at, and trying to do that as well as you can; and the acceptance that everyone finds their own path through their lives, and no one path is perfect for anyone but you.

So, armed with that recollection, I put the finishing touches on my synopsis/outline and prepare to start writing at the end of this week. My goal this year for NaNoWriMo is going to be 2k words/day, every day. Hell or high water.

I'll be posting daily updates on Facebook and Twitter - not because I expect you to care, but because it's harder to let myself slack if I'm trying to keep up a habit in public.

And to all my other NaNo friends, feel free to NaNo-buddy me.

Have a great month, peeps! Let's write novels!

Reaper's Flight giveaway done!

2010-10-11T20:37:00.001-07:00

Thanks to the literally hundreds of people who jumped in on a chance to win a copy of my latest book, "Reaper's Flight". Sorry I couldn't give away copies to everyone who wanted one, but to the three who won (Scotland, Glouchestershire and Mississippi), your books are in the mail and should be there in the next couple weeks.

I hope to hear back on your thoughts regarding the book; I've enjoyed writing it and have been more than happy to share it out there.

Amazon's listing it below 9 dollars paperback (6.50 kindle) for a limited time, and in spite of the fact that even saying that makes me feel like I'm selling a Sham-Wow!, feel free to hop on that price while it lasts. Because, you know, it won't. Meanwhile, the giveaway for The Morrow Stone is still active for another week.

Meanwhile, I'll jump back into Book 2.5, which is like an itch I really have to get to scratching.

Oh, and Mully says to say hi. Or, in his native tongue, "meow."

So... um.... Meow.

Going the Distance?

2010-10-04T14:07:00.000-07:00

I'm taking a moment - right now, as we speak - to breathe in the satisfaction and high of completing a project and not yet thinking it was a pile of steaming fine. Buoyed by this mild intoxication, I've already sketched out an outline for the next book, which as it turns out will be a prequel to the current trilogy. Sometimes, it would seem, you must go back before you can go forward - a concept which certainly seems true in this case. The current outline, however, conservatively estimates things out at a 17 or 18-chapter structure, give or take. The assumption that this remains constant puts this next project as a 70 or 80 thousand word mini-novel.

Though, yes, that's "mini-novel" when it comes to the scifi/fantasy genres. It's almost a satisfactory quantity for an average novel. The plan is to have this available by springtime. The pacing of my books so far still seems very relaxed, though. Morrow Stone was 92,000 words, and I spent a year from start to finish; Reaper's Flight was 126,000 and took around 9 months. Just crunching those numbers, however, book 2 was a vast improvement over book 1. Book 1 would have averaged about 250 words/day, while book 2 would have been double that. It remains to be seen if I can improve on that kind of turnaround.

Granted, I have had days where I've clocked in 8000 words; I've had 15,000+ word weekends. But I've also had 20,000 word weeks that ended in a complete "writer's block". Thanks to my participation in NaNoWriMo the past two years, I no longer fear that sort of thing, though. I know that with the right controlled environment I can knock out words on a daily basis, even if I end up tossing them out later. But it's not crap; I somehow manage stories I still enjoy even after the morning blush has faded. It reminds me of that old rhetorical question of whether or not a particular process were a sprint or a marathon. In this particular one - of being an author - I'm going to go with a marathon.

For example - - the current trilogy is turning into a trilogy plus a prequel, followed by an anthology (or two) and at least one more book just focusing on Favo. Then I have another series in development following a modern supernatural horror concept, as well as another sci fi series which is already sketched out. And there's also the anthology of children's stories. And a smattering of different graphic novel pitches. And... god, there's so much. It's a mighty big whale, and it seems like the "one bite at a time" metaphor is just paling in comparison to this leviathan I see before me.

Will I ever get to write a Spider-man story? And now that JK Rowling is admitting that she'd like to write more Harry Potter, that HP: The College Years is right out. Okay, that last one was only mildly serious.

Sometimes, with all the ideas stretched out across my imagination, it seems faintly overwhelming. Will I live long enough to write all the stories I have in my head? I suppose I better. At some point, too, I'll need to become financially stable enough with the writing to dedicate more time to it and only to it. Working full time as a crisis manager certainly eats up a lot of free time and mental energy.

I should probably talk to other writers, and see how quickly they can churn out projects. Folks I know who write comics - they have monthly deadlines, but the 22 pages of story and dialogue are probably about equal to the chapters I'd need to type for mine, but they incorporate the edits, etc into that time. That process seems both insane and yet... so very ideal.

Okay, I can't tell if trying to crunch these numbers is an effort to schedule myself more efficiently or to distract me from writing. I suppose I should stop letting myself be distracted and get back into it.

Right. Sorted.

On Making the Mental Shift

2010-09-29T07:43:00.000-07:00

Pursuing a career in any of the "creative arts" becomes by definition a fairly complex and in many ways unlikely endeavor. It becomes an issue of ambition, determination, skill, natural talent, timing, social connections, and many times just a matter of dumb luck - and that's just the basics of getting your foot in the door! You also need tenacity, reliability, a work ethic, marketability, reputation and a lot of additional luck to remain in the game. It's an ongoing process, and I see many people with high quantities of skill and talent who never go anywhere. Some don't want to; some don't want to...enough.

Some of the fields of "the arts" are more competitive than others, clearly. Acting, popular music are two of the most intensive and difficult to be highly successful at, but anytime your skillset or potential market footprint is valued on an admittedly subjective scale, it's going to be a challenge to convince any of the "powers that be" to invest in you, to trust you to make money for them.

Oh, sure, in a perfect world money would never be part of the equation; in an artistic utopia, all artists would be greeted unilaterally with open arms, minds and hearts by all who happened upon their works; enjoyed and appreciated without being funneled into the merchandizing sausage-maker.

Clearly, we're not living in that utopia.

I've known a lot of musicians, for example, at all stages of commercial success. I remember a lead singer from a band you've never heard of who was eventually dismissed from the group because he insisted on having a roadie carry his microphone and mike stand from their van to the stage and back. This contrasted with their drummer who managed all his equipment himself, and did the full setup and sound check on his own. Some folks might believe that to live the dream, you have to start early. But make no mistake, the life of a diva must be earned. Earned. And even then, it's rarely a good idea.

I also knew a belly dancer who would often become very frustrated - to the point of casting vitriolic insults - at audiences who didn't "appreciate" her talent sufficiently, either by volume of applause or tips. Sadly, she'd neglected the primary rule of thumb: as a performer, you're there to perform. The audience is not there for you; you're there for them.

I give these examples for two reasons.

1) As an artist, you should forget that success rarely comes without much effort. If it was easy, everyone would be doing it.

2) If art is truly something you love doing, you should love doing it for the sake of doing it. If you're looking to be loved, you're in the wrong business.

Back in the days of striving for a gig as a professional musician, I confess that I leaned more in the direction of "maintaining my artistic integrity" - which is a wonderful, if not naive, perspective. And if, really, my artistic integrity was all I wanted, then, hey, I succeeded. I made music that I felt strongly about, and the music sounded the way I wanted it to sound, etc. Was I financially successful? Well, that's a point for debate. I paid off all my debts; I didn't make my millions, but I neither owed millions. That alone put me in a better place than many professional musicians.

In the end, I looked down the barrel of a music career and decided that in a combination of my own resolution and likely marketability, I just wasn't going to ever hit that magical plateau of artistic imaginings and economic payoff. But I also discovered that I was okay with shifting my focus. That alone - the realization that I really didn't want it so badly - was really informative.

So now, ten years later, I write books. I'm just getting started in the process (just the two printed novels thus far), but have been impressed with the vast and striking similarities between the two publishing industries (music and literature). Both are highly competitive, fairly subjective, and encourage perparation and self-sufficiency in their candidates for success.

In short, it isn't just about being "good enough". There are a slew of additional qualities that prospectives should struggle to engender in themselves, for example:

Work Ethic
Quiet Confidence
Objectivity
Business Acumen
A Thick Skin
Manners
Humility
A Sense of Humor
Financial Sensibility
A Second Job

That last one - - I'm serious! I know plenty of professionally published authors who have to maintain a full time job in order to have enough money to actually write. Their usual advice to me boils down to this: "if you're just writing because you love writing, then no one's stopping you. Write and be happy."

I have no false aspirations about writing. The odds of ever being financially independent based upon my royalties and earnings as a published author are roughly that of winning the lottery(and, since I don't play the lottery, that should help put things in perspective for you). No, my aspirations are a little bit love of a good story, buoyed by the desire to share that story with others. Any money I make at the process (and once again, I find myself in the contented state of a balanced spreadsheet - no debts from writing, but no house in the Hamptons, either) just goes towards justifying what might otherwise be nothing more than a satisfying hobby.

Speaking of satisfaction, I got my first copy of my second novel last week. I found myself grinning every bit as broadly as I did from the first - like Christmas all over again. Oh, sure, I'll deal with balancing my dissatisfaction in this word choice or that, later. And I still need to jump back into the next novel, too. And there's the whole process of slowly building my net presence, taking the next steps along my marketing strategy, and so on. Those sorts of fundamental challenges which require the mental shift from creator to businessman are, yes, essential, because I would love little more than to be able to justify spending my Work-time each day on the various projects I have planned out for the next few years and beyond.

But for now, I get to wear each hat, one at a time. I'll take another few moments, grin stupidly at the new shiny cover, and celebrate with the realization that I've managed what was previously unlikely. The zen and tao training tells me to pause now, and recalibrate, and continue again on my path, feeling tranquility and joy in all things. The mental shift is mine to initiate, and for now, I choose to smile.

Take a moment, would you, and smile as well? It's a good world, and it's a good time to tell stories, hear stories, and be present for the telling.

Whethering Storms

2010-08-30T05:32:00.001-07:00

Reaper's Flight is speeding its way through final edits - it's been much quicker and more painless than book 1, and I'll confess to a bit of mixed feelings on that. But, really, I think the majority of my trepidation comes not from the questions of "is it ready to release?" but more a renewal of my inner monologue and introspective curiosity of an undefined path.

I was introduced to the idea of "the road less travelled" at an early and impressionable age, and over the years I've added to that concept the counterpoint of "sometimes the roads are less travelled for good reason". And yet, here I am, continuing to embark upon an author's path that - at least in recent years - is counter to the established.

Just like in my earlier flirtations with music production, I see a pretty impressively endowed Industry, casting a tremendous shadow upon me and others like me. Authors who do not believe that one must be signed to the great and all powerful Oz, and that he's really just a little guy sitting behind his curtain pulling levers and hoping we don't look too closely at him. We are told - on professional websites, at writer's conventions and the like, that the individual does not succeed. We are given countless and often contradictory advice on how to write submission letters, how to try and seem marketable to a literary agent, and... well, the advice goes on and on.

I won't lie; a publishing contract - oh, yes, and certainly a tidy sum of cash - wouldn't send me into a spiralling depression. A bit of industry validation is always a good thing, and it would definitely broaden my audience. It would make future literary ventures also possible, and to be honest, the more financial and marketing elements of publishing tend to feel more like distractions from the act of creation. And I'm not even all that much of a purist!

I've submitted to a few agents who seemed in the proper market, but the ones accepting unsolicited queries rarely seem to have a lot of books published I've even heard of. It makes sense that the ones who publish the most wouldn't necessarily need to post out for the thousands of unpublished authors who would happily ship out their life's work to them for even the fleeting glimmer of hope that they'll get picked up. The polite declines I've received have never gotten me down, either. That was a pleasant surprise. I suppose, unlike the more intimately personal music, I'm just not so tender about my books. At least, I think that's part of it.

Added to that is the inexplicable reassurance that my books aren't half bad. I enjoy the stories they tell and on the levels they tell them. The idea of being signed or picked up by a publishing house rather feels like a secondary aspiration - I'm not writing to be published, I'm writing to put my tales on paper.

Speaking of which, I've got the next few projects laid out - - I've taken a week to pause and gather my sense of direction - - a short novella will be released in the early spring to present the background of one of the main characters of the current series of books; more on that after Reaper's Flight is available. The final book in the present trilogy should be out around this time next year, earlier if possible. Two anthologies of short stories about the world introduced in this "Aerthos Trilogy" is in consideration, as is another possible series focusing on Favo Carr, one of the more scoundrelly of the secondary characters. He's fast becoming one of my favorites, and I just can't tell more of his story now without hijacking the main plot. But I'll get to him soon enough, don't you fret.

I'm also looking into developing out some of the cross-marketing ideas for the books as well. Tarot Cards, stuffed animals, that sort of thing. I'm working with an artist friend of mine (he did the editing for "The Morrow Stone" and produced an amazing cover for HL Reasby's "Akhet") to do the covers for all three of the Aerthos books, but I can see more possibilities for the material, as well. So, see? I have the occasional marketable braincell as well.

I've also already figured out the setting for my next books - it'll be a bit darker, a bit more R to the current PG of the Aerthos books. Additionally, I want to put some more meat onto the bones of my children's story anthology. It has about 5 stories so far; I'd like to have 25-30 when it's time to actually publish it.

The time travel and zombie books are on the back burner for now. I don't have the time to put anything down on either one, and by the time I got around to them, I just don't expect there to be much interest for the themes. Additionally, my sci fi screenplay has been shelved, as has my "Pilot" book. Back into the vault, you two. I'll have to get to them later; just no time in the present. Ditto for my "Union Jack" treatment.

Now that I look at it, am I ever going to be caught up? I suppose, to be fair, it's better than the alternative, no? Okay, I've rambled long enough. I have a book I should be editing now. Plus, Hurricane Earl is bothering some friends of mine in Puerto Rico. Looks like there's a lot of storms on our horizons. Time to hunker down and prepare.

Later!

Top Ten list!

2010-08-11T06:26:00.001-07:00

Was recently contacted via Twitter regarding the Morrow Stone - a reader posted their blog with a top ten list of their favorite books, and included Morrow Stone at number 10.

I'm ashamed to admit I have no words to express how delightful that is. I'm really just pleasantly gobsmacked by the idea that people would LIKE my books at all, but there were definitely times that I worried about the delusionality of it all.

Doing anything that people love doing becomes at times a contest of will - - though most often pitting your own will to succeed against your will to not embarass yourself. And through my years of music production, I really saw a lot of bands that - to channel a bit of Simon Cowell - were really kidding themselves. And it wasn't that they sucked; the quality and skill of a musician isn't so clearcut. It was usually that they weren't very good and didn't realize they weren't that good.

A failure to honestly scrutinize onesself is a dangerous thing. Check the mirror before you go out. Look to the blind spot before backing up. Do you have your keys/wallet/cell phone? Are you forgetting anything? Have you practiced your ass off to become as good as possible? Have only your parents heard what you do? Have you considered all the angles? Are you ready?

Speaking of Simon Cowell, my heart breaks watching those shows when a child is thrust before the judges' headlights, and is clearly their first time auditioning for anything. Parents? Hello? What the hell?

I'm not saying that risk is bad, or that you should never try new things, or that it's wrong to hope for the stars. But if you're going to jump for the stars, you really should try and limber up first so you don't pull a muscle. Learn all you can before getting into that situation, talk to people who've been there, practice practice practice. Perform live (if your ambition is suitably designed for such things), and get some people as friends who aren't afraid to point out ways in which you can improve.

And then, when you're pretty sure you're ready for it, jump from the lion's mouth.

Now - - granted, even after all is said and done, all these things cannot guarantee that you're going to be the next Lady Gaga or Sting or Brad Pitt or whoever - but there is great satisfaction to be found when you know you've done your absolute best, even if you don't make the big millions.

Sometimes, just seeing your name on a blog of a complete stranger is enough to make your entire journey seem worth the effort.

Have a good day, my friends. Be delicious.

Reaper's Flight: Post-Production

2010-08-11T06:04:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the delay on my updates - I'd been bouncing around between introversion and distraction in my writing - shifting between "all sail, no rudder" and "all rudder, no sail"; I finally found my wind last week and pressed through until Book 2 of the Aerthos books was wrapped. I've started the oh-so deliciously tedious and occasionally heartbreaking editing process, although I already feel much better this go round.

I'm not logically certain that I should feel so confident, but there it is. Book 2 - "Reaper's Flight" is much more ambitious - we see more of Aerthos this time, with travels to centers of mythological and historical wisdom; we see more technological marvels and even pick up with Rom's journey over the Great Wall that haunted her youth in the scientifically stunted community of Oldtown. Old friends, new enemies, and even a look under the hood, so to speak, as to the nature of Rom and the Sheharid Is'iin.

From a specifically trichotomous (I dare you to find a way to use that one in a sentence!) perspective, I've technically passed the halfway mark in this Big Story, but I already don't want to leave. Book three (tentative title: Fall of the Shepherd) is already laid out and waiting for me to dip my quill (how did that sentence become so naughty?), but I will be spending my time also developing out a novella I plan to release - potentially for free, or at the least as an appendix to book three - focusing on the main villain, Artifice.

I do enjoy a good villain - and when I say "Good Villain", I mean the ones who have a perfectly sound justification for all their naughtiness. Take Darth Vader, for example. He was so much more interesting when he was caught between his love for his son and his loyalty to his Emperor. Granted, it was a challenge to follow him down the dark and sinister path towards the dark side, but I kind of have to point a finger of blame on George Lucas for that one. All the pieces were there, it was more a case of actual movie production dropping the ball.

But that whole idea of "best intentions" serves me not just as a warning sign for my characters, but for me. As much as I enjoy the stories that are there to be told, I am aware of the responsibility I have to tell them well. I'm not just concerned about people finding the books to be a waste of their money, but a waste of their investment of time. Every minute someone spends in one of my books is a minute they're not spending elsewhere - that's an investment which humbles me more than I can say.

But after all is said and done, I believe that all these characters - regardless of the outcome of their choices - have wonderful stories to tell. The whole world I'm discovering right along with my readers is even more fascinating than I had promised - and even as I fall ever deeper in love with it, I have to force myself to remember that it is only my vacation home.

We'll visit it together, shall we? And then come home and talk about our journeys.

So for now, the first draft of Book 2 is complete - it is being given a couple rounds of edits, and then will be into the final stages of production - design, cover art, etc. I've come up with a nice concept for the cover - and will probably have Morrow Stone re-designed as well, to balance all three books out with a solid visual staging, but don't worry - 2nd Edition of book one will also drop in price the moment book 2 is launched.

Plus, I'll be attending the Emerald City ComiCon 2011, and handing out freebies with the book art as well. Presently, we're on track for a September/October launch.

More deets as they become available.

Finding the Happy Place

2010-05-13T14:03:00.000-07:00

Writing is really not a simple in the microcosm of a daily life as I'd like to pretend it is. I've been able to knock out entire novel HALVES in a month's time, and then go for half a year and barely eke out a chapter. This is no way to pace oneself.

There's a cold, hard reality to being a writer - shoot, being an ANYTHING, really - that depends so much on finding your rhythm and then getting all possible distractions locked outside your periphery. A good friend of mine who's working on his first manuscript actually took several days off from his paying job so he could focus on it. Another author I know actually works full time as an editor to pay the bills so he can afford to write.

Myself, I work as a crisis manager for a "major telecommunications company", meaning that on a good day I have almost nothing at all to do. And on a bad day I'm up for 24 hours straight, taking phone calls, sending emails, and generally trying to keep track of where all the bodies are. It sounds fairly idyllic, yes?

Then to dash that little fantasy, bear in mind that about 75% of my job happens without warning. Just your basic sunny day, birds singing, people laughing, all is fine in the world, when suddenly, BAM.

Tornado over Oklahoma.

Then, it's all sirens and phone calls and SMS messages and emails and .... bleargh.

Living in potential expectation of that possibility is what keeps me from just sitting at a desk and writing an additional chapter in the book. No, to be honest, I actually almost prefer the crazy days - - because, then, at least, I know something's happening. I can set things in motion and my mind can, oddly enough, relax. Once the crisis has passed, however, my brain remains keyed up to that elevated stress level, and it takes sometimes weeks for it to calm down and flush the adrenaline from my bloodstream.

And then, it's quiet. Almost...too quiet. And how am I supposed to write, then?

No, clearly my job does not intend for me to have any brain juices left with which to grease my creative wheels.

And that's not all. Occasionally, the flavor of my writing slips unnoticed into my professional communiques - and let's be clear on this: far too many professional types do not appreciate getting a little fictional prose in their bullet points. It's an entirely other kind of writing style - and one I can do, but one that I do not necessarily enjoy. I was reminded today that corporate professionals do not like italics or boldface. It reads to them like condescencion and superiority, not emphasis for content.

Now, when I say I was reminded today, I mean that in quite the literal sense. Reminded, in fact, by my grand-boss (the boss of my boss). Now, he was awesome about it. Really. He knows I write, and realized that I had dropped some of my chocolate in their peanut butter, and in this case the mix did not go over well. Execs took my points as abrasive and cocky and arrogant.

What a swell way to be reminded of why I'm not really in an occupational environment hand-designed for me. Granted, I whisper soft the faint reminder: "You are not your job," I say. "What pays your bills is not your Soul nor your Identity." But if you spend all day long working in the sewer, you still smell like s**t. And if I may be completely honest, I'm really tired of smelling like s**t.

So, on that recognition, I sent out another query letter today. Haven't heard back from TOR publishing, but then I didn't honestly put all my chips on that square anyway.

But I don't expect quick fixes. Need to write. I'm on chapter 13 of "Reaper's Flight." Not quite the home stretch, but it's about ready to smack into the end of Act 2. It's coming together much more cleanly than "Morrow Stone" did. But it also feels a lot like chiseling out a statue from marble:

Look.

Breathe.

Look again.

Measure.

Sip of Water.

Look again.

Position chisel.

Ready hammer.

Breathe again.

Change your mind; step away.

Repeat.

The rush will happen again, that's not my worry. The simplest way to respond to "writer's block" is to just embrace it and let it happen; clutching it just keeps it around.

Enough for today. Time to leave work and clear my head. The words will come again.

Death and the Maiden

2010-05-11T08:42:00.000-07:00

It might have started with the zombies.

Yesterday afternoon, the Bean and I were talking about this and that while working on her homework, and the conversation turned to zombies and ghosts. She asked me if I'd ever seen a ghost, which led to another conversation - one that I'll save here for another time, perhaps.

Then she asked me why I thought ghosts were here at all - this led to another series of topics involving ghosts vs spirits vs angels, empathy, reincarnation, and, well, death. This is a tricky conversation to have with a 9 year old, let's be honest. But the Bean has always been very sensitive to the concept of death - it's been kind of surrounding her since she was very young - with Lizz's parents and uncle Stan having passed away, it's just become a sort of thing present in the background ever since she was born. But also, it has really impacted her in general.

I made a kind of breakthrough, I think, in that we were able to address the concerns of life and death and life beyond in a way that didn't involve religious considerations, but still embraced the idea of faith and belief. Those are things that I had feared forever tainted by my exposure to religious indoctrination, and it was liberating to see that they were really only as inextricably bound as I allowed them to be.

I was able to tell Jillie what I believed, and it gave her something to consider - something that she realized she also thought was a good thing to believe in. We even talked about the scientific principle about the conservation of matter and energy; about how something can never be destroyed nor created, but can only be converted and processed. It gave her something to wrap the unwrappable in, and gave her a toehold to believing in the immortality of the human soul.

Belief really is a tricky thing. It's even stranger to think of how much it's been a part of my life, but, stripping away all the extra trappings of it all and leaving it in its primal, simplest state.... it's a very beautiful thing.

Jillie also made a comment that has stuck with me. She said "sometimes I wonder if I'm just dreaming or if this is real. Or if my dreams are real."

Nine years old, facing an existential quandary? Is that a symptom of bad parenting? Hrm.

It made me think a lot, as well, about my expectations for development with my characters in the Morrow Stone's sequel. I'm over halfway through the first draft at this point, and I've noticed little perceptions coming out in Rom and Kari, as well as Cousins, as they've learned more about who they are and about the world in which they live. The concepts of life and death have been radically altered, and it won't be the last time they have to face the transition of the two states of reality.

It's funny how life imitates reality, really; how sometimes our own characters have lessons to teach us - even those of us who pretend to be the gods of their destiny.

My 2009 self-pimpage

2009-12-14T08:45:00.000-08:00

Okay, I'm going to just post this and then get back to work on the other pending projects, and...well, work.

The Morrow Stone (paperback)
The Morrow Stone (Kindle version)
Obsidian Bridges (2009 re-release)

Broadening the distribution of the paperback, but also shifting my focus now back to a Time Travel anthology and book 2.

Have begun discussions with a few other local entrepreneurs on the merits of forming an actual business partnership for local publishing. Yikers.

It's Official!

2009-12-06T16:01:00.000-08:00

"The Morrow Stone" is now available for purchase, through Amazon.com and Createspace.com. It's available in Hard Copy and Kindle format.

The re-release of "Obsidian Bridges", with new songs, will be available soon.

Past and Future Presence (Presents?)

2009-11-09T09:31:00.001-08:00

I might have picked a bad year to jump into another NaNoWriMo - - apparently, at least, the universe has other plans. There are several lessons it seems I need to learn - mostly about Desire, Belief, and Surrendering to the Will of the Wild or something. I'm still learning the questions to these many mysteries that are now waking me up at night; still far from having the answers they allude to.

The quest that presses me forward into publishing has brought some remarkable new friendships into my life, all of whom challenge me in new and deliciously brutal ways. I know it's brutal because I find myself half-longing for the darkness and relative seclusion I once favored. Or perhaps "favored" isn't the right word. I'd come to a point, intellectually and spiritually, where I felt I no longer lacked for dramatic surges in personal growth.

I should have known that was an illusion. Yes, I do get that.

The process of this latest book is forcing me to confront long-concealed self-recriminations, thoughts on my own value (as a person, writing or otherwise) in addition to simply questioning my own skill as a writer. One question I posited this weekend was: why do I write YA Fiction? Is that how I see myself as a writer, or a thinker, or is it just the genre I'm most comfortable in?

Comfort is a thing against which I have to remain on constant vigil - I don't want to become artistically or creatively lazy. I just refuse to take the process for granted.

I suppose this process wouldn't even be a blip on my blogging radar if it didn't seem to be mirrored in my personal foundation of belief and faith. I feel like I'm peeling back the foundation I laid down 15 years ago, when I first began scraping myself out of my old paradyme. and I knew the temporary foundation of faith was only that - temporary. But I appear to have laid a good deal atop it. And now I need to start resolving that ghost of religion past, before I get one of those "tonight you'll be visited by three spirits" conversations.

You know, with all this in mind, maybe it's a good thing I'm only writing YA fiction. Clearly, the adult resolutions are still a little ways out yet. I followed up on a recent suggestion by reading up on some of the work by Bill Plotkin in talking about the nature of the human soul, and the nature of... well, nature. Today, I sit at work (the one which pays me) in a vest and tie and recognize that I'm far from the wild man that wants to throw it all off and dance and sing and howl.

For now, though: stories about young children saving the world. Tomorrow, I'll work on the finer points of the soul. I've already got a couple books addressing that, I'm just not yet ready to write them.

Enough for now. Write on, space cowboy.

Painful and Awkward Realizations

2009-11-05T13:45:00.000-08:00

I once considered myself a would-be professional musician. I invested a good deal of time and energy into it, put myself out there in bands, solo work, studio sessions, live shows, radio shows.... etc. Have reels of studio recordings, demo recordings and a CD to show for it.

In the end - when life showed me the brutally explicit future my life as such held in store, I chose to step off that path.

Life without a creative outlet was as close to spiritual death as I could have imagined, but I rediscovered the joy of writing - of telling stories, crafting modern re-envisionings of mythologies ancient and contemporary. I'm in the middle of a second of three novels, YA SciFi/Fantasy genre, and I only just now forced myself - or allowed life to force me, more accurately - to see a brutal truth.

These books are not the books I have yet to NEED to write. These are fun books, stories, fantasies and pretends. But there are tales that are more primal to my consciousness, and I'm nowhere near ready to expose those deeper thoughts. The truer fears and founding principles that power me - or restrain me - still exist well out of reach from the fictional yarns I'm weaving.

The question I must ask myself, however, is this:

Can I survive as an author if I do not confront these darkest daemons from my core? Or will they one day claw their way unbidden to my surface? This is not the moment I expected to ask these questions. But, then, does any one of us make an appointment with their inner demons, in an effort to seek a confrontation of convenience?

The rest of this book should prove interesting.

exerpt from "The Morrow Stone"

2009-10-20T14:36:00.000-07:00

Still two streets from the fields, Rom knew her sense was right – the workers were running past her in a chaotic stream, more than one bloodied and obviously injured. After being run into for the third time, she took a deep breath and jumped up and onto the nearest rooftop. From there, she took another relatively small jump and landed just near the edge of the final building towards the fields.

A small gathering of workers seemed focused on something not too far from the city itself – they were clustered in a loose circle, and something large and blue moved quickly among them. Screams and calls for help made their way to her ears. She tapped the bracelet and summoned her shepherd’s crook.

“Hold on tight, this is a long jump,” she said. Mulligan complied.

She kicked off, and the winds rustled through the folds and pleated gathers of the dress – only the sound of the fabric and the wind whistling past them could be heard until she landed, just beyond the men.

“Run!” she yelled to them. “Go on, I’ll take care of this!”

A few of the men were reluctant to leave this young white-haired girl – particularly, the ones who did not see her just leap more than a hundred feet across the sky – but enough did so to give her a clear view of the indigo-furred creature.

It was taller than her at its shoulders, with a black mane and a single horn extending upwards from the tip of his nose. It had the look of a large dog, but with pointed ears and enormous bird’s wings protruding from its back. Its tail was long and flicking about, the end barbed with what looked to be a large assortment of quills.

“A mundaline,” Mulligan whispered. “They’re… really tough,” he said, falling substantially short of the mark for his efforts at nonchalance, but overcompensating as he continued, “but I’m sure you’ll best him.”

“Thanks,” she said dryly. “I feel much better now.”

She slapped the staff into the palm of her hand. “Hey, you! Big blue dog-cat-thing!”
It fixed his attention on her and she began to back away slowly, drawing it away from the group of farmers. They opened the circle into a large curving line, standing as if to defend the city against this wild beast.

“Come on, you whatever you are! Come on and fight me!”

“You’re doing great, Rom, he’s definitely doing exactly what you’re telling him to do.”

“Hush, Mully,” she hissed.

“Do you have a plan for this?” he asked nervously.

“A plan for what?” She twirled the staff around a few times to keep its attention on her – the whistling sound created as the curved top cut through the air seemed to work.

His whisper increased in intensity. “What do you mean, a plan for what?”
She sighed. “You need to figure something out about me, Mully.”

“What’s that?”

She stopped moving backwards, and placed one foot back behind her, turning partially away from the creature and holding her staff in one hand, the top pointed low towards the ground. The mundaline paused, lowering itself towards the ground.

“I never plan things out.”

I am David's White Blood Cell

2009-08-21T14:15:00.000-07:00

I am David’s white blood cell. Just one of a million or so – probably more, if you believe the propaganda – little white blood cells just like me, doing our job. No need to thank me. Though, just between you and me, a little gratitude wouldn’t be a bad thing. Sure, it’s a thankless enough job, running around the veins and arteries and capillaries of this guy day after day, night after night. But I suppose you could say, just like any job, that it has its own rewards.

Long as I can remember, this has been me: microscopic little entity, floating among a stream of other white and red cells, just patching things up as we see them. Been doing this since the beginning, and it’s good enough work, I suppose. Though, originally I really wanted to be one of those guys up in the optic nerve. Now THERE’S a job with a view.

Let me tell you – since I have your attention – about my day. I don’t really sleep – we don’t need to – but I do like to kind of keep track of the days and nights. See, during the night, David’s pretty boring. Not a lot of activity in here, and it gets pretty quiet – but it’s peaceful and means we usually don’t get called up to head here or there, lay some smack down on foreign intruders or whatnot. Some of the bits of the innards get a bit creepy – lots of weird sounds that no one can explain, long miles of, really, nothing to do. You get that much time with nothing to keep you company, you start to really think about stuff. So I do a lot of pretending: I play like I’m a virus and beat up on some of the new Reds - that always screws with the other whiteys, who really don’t know what to make of that. Or I head down to the stomach and count the bubbles. David’s stomach has a lot of bubbles. It’s almost hypnotic, really, all that acid. Makes me wish I could eat an Oreo.

Then David wakes up and it’s back to work. My favorite days are when I get to go down the arms. David has a pretty low-impact job, so really I just watch as he types on his computer – the fingers all move in this weird little dance of language, and when he gets into a groove, that place really gets jumping. The places I don’t like? The ass, as you might expect, is pretty bad – but I haven’t been back there since I was on a written warning from the boss for trying to fake my timecard. I don’t like heading up to the brain, either. Too much electricity from all those neurons, it screws with my iPod. Last time I was up there, it erased my entire Nine Inch Nails playlist. So now when I get called up there, I just phone it in and hang out around David’s thyroid with some enzymes I met last year at a rave in David’s liver. Those girls really know how to party, man.

Hmmm – hold on a second, I need to check something out. Ah, never mind, just a shadow. Today, they’ve sent me down to check on the lungs for a bit, just kind of an employee exchange program they’ve been initiating lately. There were a lot of cut backs last year when David had some work done on his right knee, and everyone’s been really nervous. Turns out they brought in some outside help – cheaper, more affordable labor – but I personally believe that once you start outsourcing, it’s just a matter of time before they outsource everyone. Much as I might dislike my job, it’s the only one I got, and I’m in no hurry to try and spruce up my resume.

Buddy of mine found out that the whole outsourcing plan works both ways – he found an ad for donations, and made his way down to the testes. Never heard from him again. I hope he’s okay. Me, I don’t care for the kind of riff-raff you generally find down there. Maybe when I was younger, sure, but I’m no spring chicken any more – I get enough excitement from surfing the aorta. Honestly, that whole region is trouble, if you ask me. Any time you get too close to the exits, you’re running a pretty big risk of unemployment.

The lungs are a pretty fascinating place. I don’t really understand how this whole “oxygen transfer” thing works, but they come in cold and go out hot, and it seems to work out nicely for them in the long run. It’s pretty odd, really. I can’t imagine being a Red. “Red”. Heh. As if it’s all so easily defined. But anyway, they have such a simple life – from my elevated perspective, right? At least as a white, we’ve got some choice, some sense of variety to our menial existence. Not like the reds. Pick this up. Take it there. Drop it off. Come back to the lungs. Pick up another one. Blah blah blah blah. God, I’d have to shoot myself if that was my job. Ooh. Speaking of my job, I need to be heading back to the chambers again. Come on, we can talk on the way.

This job’s really not too hard. It’s just keeping an eye out for trouble, most of the time, calling for a few special forces teams to show up and take care of any undesirables, or to help patch up the occasional leak. Brain gets wind of an ache or twinge or something, they tell us to go check it out, make sure it’s all on the up and up. We don’t have to make the Big Decisions; we just follow orders, write up the reports, and let folks know if things need to be given more attention. Sometimes, we have to hang out on a crime scene, clean things up or whatever, but we usually just boss the little Reds around and make them do it. No, don’t make that face. It’s totally fine, they like to help.

Okay, hold on, we’re hitting the heart now, it’s my favorite part of my day. It’s all in the timing. Just – yeah, lift your feet just like that, keep your arms and legs inside the vehicle at all times - - and YEAH! God, what a rush. I love that place.

Hmm. Okay, see, here’s what I was talking about. A little spot of concern down nearDavid’s left kidney. It’s probably nothing. He had an infection there a couple of years back, and now whenever it’s about to rain, everyone gets all in a huff. A bunch of Nervous Nellies, if you ask me. Now, that over there is the digestive system – that big bloaty part is David’s stomach, like I told you about earlier. It may not look like much from the outside, but if we had time, I’d take you by there for the full effect. I heard someone say earlier that David was thinking about having sushi for lunch. Sushi is the best, I’m not even joking. If this turns out to be a false alarm, I’ll try to swing us back by.

All right, now this is exactly what I figured. See? That whole area ahead of us? That’s where the so-called “Pain Report” is coming from. And….nothing. Not a goddamned thing. Kidney’s fine, no unusual lumps or shapes, no leaks, no breaks. Just business as usual David’s Kidney. After a while, I just don’t even want to show up any more. It’s been nothing but false alarm after false alarm the past few months anyway. A guy never gets a chance to kick his feet up, take a breath, throw back a beer or whatever. And that’s no way to run a body, if you ask me.

We’re going to have to swing the full loop around, now that we’re down here, I might as well show you the sights. That bit over there is the whole “exit” area I was talking about. Nothing but piss, shit and the occasional ejaculation: nothing to write home about. And we’re gonna hang a right at the femoral artery. About this time of day, it’s just bumper to bumper there, and no one ever signals. It’s just an excuse for a hemorrhage, waiting to happen. Mark my words, there’s trouble there.

Now, that’s weird. That, over there – that finger-looking bit of nonsense? That’s David’s appendix. I heard from a guy who said he had to deliver a couple skanky endorphins there a year or so ago, said they’re some top-secret shit that goes down in there. No one ever likes to talk about it, it’s all pretty hush-hush. A couple years back, I might’ve hopped the fence and taken a look about, but, you know, I got myself to think of; a guy can’t take that sort of risk anymore, if you catch my meaning. Anyway, maybe it’s just the beer talking, but I don’t remember it looking quite that…big. Eh. It’s probably nothing. Besides, they don’t pay me to be proactive, that’s a job for David’s Brain.

Moving on, we’re making good time, so let’s head over to the stomach a bit. You hear that – that low rumble? That means the show’s starting. We’re pretty far away from David’s esophagus, but that’s the best view to check out the inbound arrivals. Some Whites buck for that kind of job – up in David’s head. They like to check everything out as it comes in – air, liquids, food, whatever comes down the pipe. I got offered a job up in Customs, but I’m not that ambitious. I prefer to just kind of handle stuff as it happens. Guy can work every day of his life and still not get anywhere, no sense in killing yourself just to try and get a medal pinned on your chest. “Most heroes are awarded posthumously”, as they say.

Geez, there’s a lot of traffic around here, all of a sudden. Seems like everyone’s always in a hurry these days. See that group over there, the bunch of Whites? You can see it in their eyes, the clenching of their jaws – they’re on the job. Got a bunch of their pet platelets along with them, too. I won’t bother asking them what’s up, they’re too busy to sit and chat. Kids. Full of dreams and optimism. Ready to change the world, one little symptom at a time.

Good way to get turned into a scab at an early age, that’s what I say. See? Take a look at those bubbles. That’s a good sight. Mmm… baked salmon rolls. David has good taste.

Damn it. Just when it was getting good. That’s a message from upstairs. Looks like they’re not ready to call that kidney pain a wash just yet, and they want me to go back and check it out again. No, don’t get up just yet. I’m on my lunch break. The kidney’ll still be there after David finishes his food, and we’ll go back for a closer look then. Besides, there’s a million other White Blood Cells, let one of them be the hero today. I’m no hero.

I’m just David’s White Blood Cell.

by Ren Cummins

You May Rely On It

2009-07-27T07:05:00.000-07:00

Gary almost laughed when his eyes fixed themselves on the dusty black sphere on the back row of items on the shelf. He’d come in here looking for a nice accent piece for his new cube at work – something with a bit of character to it, maybe something artistic. Maggie had suggested one of those electric meditation fountains, but those just made him need to pee. He’d driven past this old antique shop – why are there never new antique shops, he’d mused – various times on his way to or from work, and he simply felt the jones to swing by and check it out today. A sort of celebratory tour in honor of his recent promotion, he decided.

It was a nice – if not mildly overpriced – selection in the musty store. Mostly handmade and well-worn items from the 1920s, some WWII memorabilia and signage, a slightly wobbly coat rack and loads of furniture. He blinked, trying to rationalize the appearance of this silly toy from the 1980s. But his eyes weren’t deceiving him – it was a magic eight ball. He reached out and picked it up, blowing the thin layer of dust which had collected on it from presumable months of being overlooked. The faded and handwritten orange sticker listed the price at $1.00. He smiled, shaking it lightly and wondering to himself, should I buy you, little eight ball?

He turned it over and nearly dropped it when he read the words float to the surface of the deep indigo liquid: Yes, you should.

He looked up, feeling a little strange. He’d never owned one of these back then, but he couldn’t remember that having been one of the phrases on the plastic geodesic widgets inside of these toys. “Whoa,” he breathed. “That’s creepy.”

The owner of the store was an older gentleman, likely retired, with a blue shirt and grey slacks which were held up by a pair of dark green suspenders. His thin reading glasses sat further down on his pointy nose than would likely have been helpful, and Gary had the momentary suspicion that he only wore them to add a sense of dignity to his appearance. He was shuffling about near the front window displays with a feather duster, meticulously adding a few million motes to the already cluttered air. The sunlight outside the window seemed almost helpless to penetrate the countless floating specks. The old man looked over at Gary, half-smiled and returned to his task.
Gary was shaking up the ball again, muttering to himself. “Why even bother? The place is just gonna get dusty again in five seconds.” He grinned at his pessimistic observation, but stopped instantly when he saw the words floating up on the surface of the eight ball: I know exactly what you mean.

He extended his hand, suddenly uneasy with the toy. But before he could replace it, he decided to give it one more test. He closed his eyes, inverting the ball and giving it a gentle shake. Do you really know what I’m thinking?

He held his breath, turned it back over and read: Of course I do.

He bit his lower lip, furrowed his brow and thought again, giving the ball another spin. “How much do you cost?” he whispered.

When he spun it upright to read the spindle, he gasped. It read: One Dollar.

He paid the dollar in cash and left the store.

Gary’s apartment was your standard Seattle flat – small bedroom, small living room, small kitchen, with an even smaller bathroom tucked off to the side. He’d been living here for about two years now, and remained among the more affordable parts of his current lifestyle. Though the Capitol Hill area had its random incidents, the local flavor and proximity to his work kept it favorable, and the price had miraculously remained lower than most apartments in the northwest – to say nothing of the downtown housing in general.

They also had a single floor of underground assigned parking – the parking alone was worth its weight in gold. Gary pulled into his space, locked the car and went upstairs, his messenger bag held tightly under his arm.

Up in his apartment, he went about his usual homecoming routine – bag on the couch, keys by the door, wallet on the end table. He microwaved a simple dinner, some flavorless box of something resembling meat with vegetables and some sort of opaque sauce. The light on the answering machine was flashing, but for some reasons he didn’t feel like checking it. His eyes returned to the bag each time he walked back through the living room, and, after a few minutes, he finally settled down on the couch next to it. He unsnapped the latch and drew out the black plastic ball.

Holding it in his left hand, he used his thumbnail to scrape off the price sticker. “I’ll say one thing for you, you really don’t look like an unusual toy,” he muttered. “Just like any other random magic eight ball.”

He flipped it over, and read the words as they floated to the top.

Ask a question.

Chuckling, he turned it back over, and asked, “What makes you so special?”

The ball then read: I always tell the truth.

“Always?”

You may rely on it.

“Good touch,” Gary laughed. “But it’s kind of... weird. You don’t mind if I put you to the test or something?”

It’s up to you.

“Okay, then…hmmm…” Gary looked around the room, finally grabbing the remote and turning on the TV. CNN faded into life, the talking head there sharing the screen with a graphic of a meteor or something, and talking about ‘most favorable conditions’ or whatnot. “What’s on TV right now?” he asked the ball.

The News, the ball responded.

“Whoa. Cool.” Gary flipped a few channels, stopping on a football game: Patriots versus the Oilers. The Pats were up by three with only seconds remaining. “Who’s winning?”

The Oilers.

Gary’s smile froze. He looked from the ball to the screen a couple times. “Okay, well, you’re wrong. That’s, just… weird.”

Wait for it.

At that moment, there was a commotion on the screen. Gary looked up to see one of the Oilers’ defensive lineman pick up a fumble and run the ball all the way to their end zone, a few seconds after the time ran out. Final score now showed the Oilers winning by three points.

“Oh my god. That’s amazing! How’d you do that?”

Hello. Magic Eight Ball.

“But seriously, that’s really cool. Um… what should I do now?” he asked, unable to think of anything at the moment.

Take a shower.

“What? Why?”

You stink.

“Nice. I meant, was there some reason in particular?”

Big day tomorrow.

“What kind of ‘big day’? Am I gonna win the lottery?”

You don’t play the lottery.

“Well, if I was going to win, I’d play,” Gary explained. “Though I suppose that kind of defeats the purpose of gambling, doesn’t it?”

Good answer.

“So you’re not going to tell me what’s going to happen, besides telling me it’s a big day?”

Bingo.

Gary frowned. “I can’t even play ‘hot or cold’ or something?”

Quit stalling.

“Geez. For a plastic oracle, you’re pretty pushy.”

You should meet my sister.

He laughed, delicately set the ball back on the table and went off to the bathroom. Whatever this “big day” was all about, it couldn’t hurt to be prepared.

Morning. 5:30 am. Gary turned off the alarm and practically jumped out of bed. Dressed and cleaned up in record time, he walked into the living room and went straight to the magic eight ball. He’d picked it up before he’d even realized he didn’t know what to ask. He grimaced a moment, then simply turned the ball over.

You’re going to be late.

He looked at the clock, which showed ten minutes before 6. Normally, he ran out the door around 6:10, and still got to work on time. “You’re off your mind, man. I’m totally early.” His mind flashed back to the last-second, come-from-behind win in the football game. Frowning, he turned the ball over. “Why am I going to be late?”

You’ll miss the bus.

“Some prophet you are,” he laughed. He placed the ball in his messenger bag and picked up the ring of keys by the door. “It’s called owning a car, mister Wizard.”

He locked up behind himself, took the elevator down to the parking level of his building, and stood for five minutes in front of his empty parking space.

“You could’ve told me the car was stolen,” he muttered. “In fact, you could’ve warned me that the car was going to be stolen.” He looked down his shoulder at the bag. “No, I can already bet what you’re going to say. ‘You didn’t ask.’”

Snapping his fingers, he unzipped the bag and pulled out the ball. “Where’s my car?”

It’s called car theft.

“Smart ass. Now what?”

You’ll miss the bus.

He could already hear the bus arriving at the corner as he ran from the parking lot entrance. He stopped at the corner, bent over with his hands on his knees, panting heavily. He didn’t waste time with the ball; most likely, it already knew what he was thinking.

He finally got to work fifteen minutes late, tossed his messenger bag on the desk and sat at his computer. For having a miraculous prognosticating ball, his day was off to a fairly craptacular beginning. Shaking his head, he pulled up his email – the most recent one was from his girlfriend, Maggie.

“Didn’t hear from you last night. Is everything okay? Bad news, I can’t make it to dinner today, I got called into an emergency office planning meeting. Call me later?
– Mags”

He sighed. They’d been dating on and off for a couple years now, and with their time being dedicated so much of late to their respective jobs, they didn’t see each other very much at all. He’d half thought the ball’s promise of today being a “big day” might even be a hint at some new direction in their relationship. His head rested down on his desktop. This day was not going well.

“You okay, Gary?”

He sat up. It was Amy, from two cubes down. They’d engaged in casual “office flirting” for the past few months, ever since she’d broken up with her boyfriend. She was attractive, but he hadn’t really given it any serious thought. But now… He smiled. “Yeah, just a little winded. Someone stole my car and I missed the bus and…” he chuckled. “But I’m here, so that’s something.”

“I’m going downstairs for a coffee. Want to come with?”

He took a slow breath. “Nnnoooo, I think I better get to work, I’m already late.” He added, after a moment of mentally kicking himself, “but thanks. Maybe next time?”

She nodded, smiling. She had a nice smile. “Okay. Be right back, then.”

He sat back in his seat, shaking his head. His hand reached into his bag, pulled out the 8 ball.

“Moron or hero?” he asked, mostly to himself.

Moron.

“We’re gonna talk about my car when I get back,” he muttered, putting the ball down and jumping up. He called out after Amy, catching up to her as she held the elevator door for him.

She did have a very nice smile.

The rest of day was lively. He and Amy chatted over instant messenger, and it was actually enjoyable – any guilt he might have otherwise felt was fading fast under the barrage of Amy’s obvious interest.

Before he knew it, it was getting close to lunchtime. He looked from his email window to his instant message window and, from there, to the magic eight ball. He found himself hoping for a specific answer to his unspoken question before he even touched the ball.

Ask Amy.

He had a small thrill of excitement when she messaged him “yes”, even though the ball had already told him she’d accept.

They decided to go to a nearby diner – it was pleasant and cozy, and the food wasn’t bad. They took a booth near the window and made small talk. Things went nicely – the gentle tingle of potential attraction was intoxicating, and a good enhancement to the meal.

About five minutes before the check arrived, Gary got that sinking feeling – the strange “someone is looking at me” vibe, the herald of doom, if ever it had a name. He looked out the window to see Maggie and two of her friends standing, staring at him. He couldn’t tell if Maggie was about to cry or throw one of her friends through the window at him.

Needless to say, the lunch ended poorly. He’d run after Maggie and tried to talk to her, but her friends ran interference until one of the chefs from the restaurant caught up with him and threatened to call the police on Gary for running out on the bill. In the commotion, Maggie and friends made their escape. Gary went with the chef back to the restaurant in time for Amy to slap him across the face and leave. He settled the bill and slowly made his way back to work.
His manager met him on his way back to his desk, and they had a brief conversation regarding interoffice relationships and his repeated tardiness. He slumped into his chair and glared at the magic eight ball. Snapping it up from the desk, he tried to calm himself.

It’s not my fault.

“What do you mean it’s not your fault?” he whispered. “You said to ask Amy!”

That’s right.

“But it ruined everything! Now she hates me, Maggie hates me, and my job’s in danger!”

That’s also right.

“Wait…” he frowned, “are you just trying to ruin my life, or is this one of those things where you trim out all the bad things so that I get something good?”

Trust me.

Gary sighed. “Well, we still need to figure out where my car is.”

The widget seemed to take its time rising to the surface. Don’t worry about it.

His eyes narrowed and a long breath made its way from his nostrils. “Easy for you to say, all you have to do is tell the future.” If the ball answered him, he didn’t waste any time reading it. He had four more hours on the clock to try and salvage his job, and would probably need every available second of it.

At some point after 5:30, he capped off a pretty horrible day with some reasonably impressive reports, and watched his manager reluctantly concede that Gary’d still have a future with the company, which, at this point, Gary was prepared to accept as a victory. Amy had already left, so thankfully he didn’t have to avoid eye contact on his way to the elevator.
He was already halfway across the parking lot before he remembered that his car had been stolen, and, having no better ideas, sat down on the parking block and pulled out the magic eight ball. It was a cloudy evening, unusually warm with the sky the gentle orange of sunset. He looked across the street at a convenience store. The word “Lotto” blazed at him, its undeniable temptation feeding into his frustration.

“Should I start playing the lottery?” he asked. A woman was leaving the store at that moment, a small nylon bag of groceries in her hand.

Don’t bother.

“What, you’re not going to help me win quick cash? Some help you are. Is there some rule or something that won’t let you help me get rich?”

That’s not it.

“Then why?” The woman had turned the corner, leaving Gary alone with his increasing frustration.

She has the winning ticket.

Gary closed his eyes. He could probably hit the far wall from here with this stupid ball.

Yes, you probably could.

The widget rolled of its own accord, changing to read: But please don’t.

“Give me a good reason why I shouldn’t! My whole life is ruined – I’ve lost my car, my girlfriend, and almost lost my job, all from listening to you.”

It’s for the best.

Gary sighed. “Yeah, and now you’re gonna tell me how I’m going to do something really big in the future that will save the world or something, and it’s all because of all the crap you’ve helped happen now.”

No. Not at all.

“Not really helping your case, man.”

Your car was a piece of crap.

“Dude. Totally uncalled for.”

I'm sorry. But I'm right.

Gary sighed. It was a piece of crap. It was paid off, but it was starting to nickel and dime him. Still, it was paid off and that meant something.

“Fine, I’ll agree with that, but Maggie?”

You didn’t love her.

Gary stopped as he was about to argue with the ball. As much as he hated to admit it, he didn’t really love her. They’d been together for a long time, but he really didn’t see the relationship going anywhere. Maybe it was for the best that they broke up and she found someone else who really cared for her like she deserved.

Exactly.

“Okay, fine. So you haven’t totally ruined my life, then. But at least she’d be able to come give me a ride home.”

Also true.

“So, see? That would’ve been a good thing, then.”

Not for her.

He shook his head. “Thanks, that’s really nice. I get that she deserves better, but it’s not like giving me a ride home would’ve killed her.”

Funny you should say that.

Gary read this latest response twice. “What do you mean?”

Nothing. Don’t worry about it.

“Oh no, you don’t. You meant something.” He shook the ball. “You said you always tell the truth. What did you mean by that?”

The little widget again seemed to take its time in floating to the surface. When it finally slid into place against the clear plastic, Gary nearly dropped the ball.

You’re going to die.

Gary’s throat nearly closed. “Wha- what? When? How?”

Now.

He blinked at the unexpected revelation. “No way. You’ve got to be joking or…something. Right?”

I’m sorry.

“But - - -but how?” The words “I’m sorry” repeated on the ball. Gary shook it again, harder. “Tell me!”

It doesn’t matter.

“It matters to me!”

You can’t avoid it.

“At least tell me! I can try to… I don’t know, change it, or something!”

No, you can’t.

“Don’t you tell me that!” he screamed. He stood up, oblivious to the people pausing briefly in passing to stare at the man’s apparent argument with a small black plastic sphere.

“I’ve watched those movies, there’s always a way to change the future or something!”

I only tell the truth.

Gary looked into the ball. It all seemed darker, somehow, like all the light had gone out of the world. He felt defeated, exhausted. The air tasted like ash in his mouth, the air felt dry and bitter. His eyes welled up, and he looked back at the crystal ball in his hands.

Don’t look up, it read.

Gary didn’t.

Ren, 2008

The New Prayers

2009-07-24T09:28:00.000-07:00

Commuting can be fun. No, really - I'm not being sarcastic here. I've got a thirty or forty minute commute in my little vw beetle, and it's really kind of evolved into a good experience; one I almost look forward to at the start and end of my day. Some days I'll just enjoy the scenery in which the sheer quantity of traffic forces me to indugle; other days I'll test the impact resistance of the windows in my car by belting out...well, whatever playlist I deem best on my iPod (this week it's Dream Academy and Ai Otsuka), and if you ever happened to drive past me during one of those days, then I thank you for not staring or laughing.

Some days, though, I just want to talk. Occasionally, I'll scroll through the phonebook on my blackberry and figure out who I haven't talked with in a while - but if I get a couple voicemail answers, I just put the phone away. It's never pleasant to look forward to a good conversation, only to get shoved into a mailbox. I know it's nothing personal - or is it? - but it just doesn't wet my whistle, if you understand me.

Many years ago, I'd just send my words up/out/down/in to God. Just kind of a free-form prayer or something. Not a formal "Our Father Who Art In Heaven..." or something, just kind of a "checking in with Dad" conversation. If there were things on my mind, the process of mental ramblings would often hone the comprehension of my thoughts to a degree to where I could generally figure out the answers to my own questions. Back in those days, I'd just take this happy little response as some kind of confirmation to my faith - God answering me in the 'still small voice' in the flutterings of my heart.

I think that's the one single thing I miss about really believing in God. There was always something kind of comforting, like knowing the monsters can't get you when you pull the blanket over your head when you're five years old.On my way home yesterday, I found myself in that distantly familiar mindset. And I didn't know who or what to talk to. That was kind of annoying to me. But did I let that stop me? (Clearly, no, or this would be an even more depressingly pointless blog than I fear it could yet become.)

Most of what I found myself saying... well, that's a blog for a different day. But the thing that it impressed upon me overall was the idea of prayer itself. Prayer. I remember a line from "Shadowlands" - that movie about the life of C.S. Lewis, played by Sir Anthony "Hannibal Lecter" Hopkins. He was encouraged in a moment of grief and sorrow to pray to god for blessings or whatever, and his response has always stuck with me: "I do not pray to god to change his mind; I pray to god....to change ME."

There's a poignant and significant element to prayer about how we see ourselves in an imagined reflection of a Perfect Being. In those eyes, who would not feel small and insignificant? The greater and more omnipotent we conceive our god to be, how much more broken and worthless do we become? Appreciating this comparitive self-analyzing attribute of prayer has made me address a "chicken and egg" scenario for myself:Did I stop believing in God when I believed myself too "aware"? Or did realizing I had no belief in god gradually cause my ego to increase? The worst part of that question is knowing where the questions themselves have come from: fear.

Sometimes, faith - to me - looks like playing the lottery. Like, people play because they're afraid if they don't play, they'll never win - which, yes, is technically true. But, actually, it's very likely that they never will even if they do. What's the old joke about the lottery? "It's a tax for people who can't do math."

Well, what about faith? Is it really as bad as that?

I don't have an answer for what's REALLY out there; I've had hopes, I've had this feeling or that, but no single event that couldn't more easily been attributed to chance or coincidence. Well, okay, serendipity - a happy little convergence of random events which, when viewed from a certain angle might look like something else. But it's all figures in clouds. People don't KNOW. They believe, sure, but "know"? Not even the leaders of the various religions or churches know for certain. I can see it in their faces when they talk about it. It's an act, a performance. Even the leaders of my old religion - they didn't see the face of God him/herself, they didn't actually hear the Actual Voice of God with their own actual ears. They've even said so - but understandably, those quotes don't really make the headlines.

So, knowing this, it makes it a challenge to pray. Because then, you know, it's just me talking to myself. It just kind of slid into place yesterday, though, in the midst of my auto ramblings:That's why I blog.

Sure, I know there's maybe four or five people who read this - maybe one or two even get to the end! - but in between the punch lines, the political commentaries, or the imported webcomic strips and YouTube clips... there's the occasional blog like this that I write just to write it out.

I'd love to think God (or whatever) reads it. But honestly, even if not a single person ever sees one word of it....it feels good to just write it down.

It's a big world. A bigger universe. And maybe I'm just a butterfly in an open field in china - but maybe the collective breath of my fellow insects will gather itself up into a summer rain that sweeps across Nebraska. and perhaps those rains will nourish the crops there, sending a fresh batch of health to a needed village in the center of africa. And maybe one of those villagers will grow up strong and sound and go off to school to find a cure for everything. Then, with those longer lifespans, scientists will figure out a way to leave this planet and meet our neighbors across the vastness of space. And in that collective web of ideas and experience, we will push ourselves just a little closer in our evolutionary path towards a perfect being.And maybe, to the little butterflies like me, that being will each down their hands and be God.

Sure, it's a broken analogy, but if you've gotten this far, I wanted to at least give you something to laugh about.

Have a day. Blog. email. Send it out.

I might be the Walrus. Koo koo ka choo.

2009-07-22T09:13:00.000-07:00

We watched the first volume of the Beatles Anthology documentary series, and if you haven't seen it, I already highly recommend it. We're planning on picking up the Rock Band release in september created around the Beatles franchise, so I figured it made sense for us to brush up on our Beatlesology, so there we were. I should have also figured it would creep its way into my dreams.I had three last night - or perhaps 3 chapters to the same dream, I'm not sure. But it/they were really interesting, hence all the sharing.

The first one was on a set I call my "urban cul-de-sac" set - it's a cobblestone side street, somewhat reminiscent of the brick frontage street down by Pike's Place market, but with other shops in the place of the flower and food vendors. There's a little two-story cafe in the location (in my dream), and I've hung out there a few times. There's also a small venue next to the cafe where various acts have shown up (Once, Pearl Jam was there, holding auditions; another time it was Peter Gabriel doing an acoustic set). In the opening scene in my dream(s) last night, it was just a club where various local bands were performing. I was a pianist (a stretch, I guess?), but I didn't so much have "a band" as much as I was working with a variety of groups and trying to finesse my way into a headlining gig. But apparently I'd become something of a staple, because a lot of other bands kept coming over to me for advice or requests.

A really successful local band walked by and the group went silent. "That's the Police", someone whispered in reverent tones. "Their bassist is AWESOME." Sting brushed some of the wild hair from his face and nodded in confident acceptance of their admiration. I begrudingly admitted they were totally right. Damn him and his ego.

They finally opened the doors to the performance hall and some of us filtered past the milling throngs into the backstage area. All our instruments were there, but my keyboards were locked up and I couldn't get to them. We eventually busted the locks and pulled them out, but all the buttons were written in some kind of japanese characters and all I could do was to make the keyboard make little laser sounds.

Before you ask, yes, I know what the really not-so-subtle message there was.

Anyway, we did one number and managed to make people like us, though the other members of the band I was playing with it kept giving me dirty looks. Finally, I abandoned the keyboards and started playing the old piano at the side of the stage. It sounded pretty tinny and distorted and was slightly off key, but it filled out the arrangement better than little laser sounds, so it was good and the band stopped hating me.

Unfortunately, the audience apparently preferred the lasers and booed us off the stage. We walked off the stage under a hail of beer bottles but felt like heroes.

Back up on the street, we laughed and joked about the night's performance and the other musicians came by to offer their congratulations. The Police meandered back by, and Sting nodded to me, a subtle hint of a smile on his far too cool face. It was better than a Grammy or a Gold Record.

The darkness in the sky faded to light, and we started to stand up and make our way back to our homes to sleep off the day like musically precocious vampire lads and when one of the other musicians asked me where I was going (I was at that moment stepping onto a bus), I explained that I was going to go "do a mission." He assumed I was talking about "video game stuff", so nodded and gave me the thumbs up.

I hopped on the bus and it flew off. (yes. It's a dream. They can do that there.)

When the busplane landed, I was in the wilds of spanish arizona or something. The ground wasn't quite red enough to be the arizona I know, but the houses were all made of clay and though nobody was of a particularly distinct racial appearance, they all spoke spanish and russian. Or something. It sounded russian, it could have been klingon, for all I know. Anyway.

They started asking me a lot of church fact questions, all of which I answered. They were all very happy with me, and said I was going to be a great asset for them and their "great work" to convert the rest of the world. I looked around the rest of the world and couldn't see anything but a wasteland beyond the little scattered houses I could see directly around me.

I asked them how many people were left, and another much older person stepped out of a small house and said, "only 1000 people left, and half of them are already ours."

I was invited in with a few other "missionaries", who finally looked at me with my button up shirt, long hair and beard and asked me why I was there.

"You're not a missionary, are you?"

I laughed. "No, I'm not even a member of your church," I answered.

The local missionary leader's brow furrowed. "Then why are you here?"

Not really sure how to answer (what do you say when your dream-people ask you about your dreams?), I shrugged and said I didn't know.

They all escorted me out of the building and told me I needed to leave, because I didn't belong there. "You don't have the proper underwear," they said (this makes a lot more sense if you're familiar with the mormon church, btw). "We can do this without your help."

I thought of a thousand things I wanted to tell them, but was once again reminded that you cannot tell someone a thing if they don't want to know it. And, besides, my alarm clock was going off, and I needed to wake up.

I hit snooze but didn't really awaken, instead going right back into the dream.

I was now back at the cafe, but dressed in nicer clothing and with a much better haircut. But all the other musicians were still there, but looking a bit older and with a bit longer hair and dirtier clothes than before. They asked me where I'd gone, I told them.

They laughed. "Really? A missionary? But why?"

I explained it was because I'd needed to know what I believed in. They laughed again and poured me another beer. From behind us came a voice at another table. It was Sting, now looking more like how he looks in fact, today. At his table was John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison. Sting gets the best tables, damn him.

Sting said, "So what did you find out?"

I looked back at him. "I found out that I didn't believe in anything."

Jimi laughed. "Not true, man. You can't find nothing."

John agreed. "Even when you don't find what you wanted, you do find something else. Faith is faith, even if it's not the faith you were looking for."

I looked over at Jim, expecting something else as an addition, but he just half-smiled behind those annoying sunglasses of his, and pointed a thumb at Lennon. "it's cool that you took the journey, man, you gotta be happy with that."

Sting just shrugged. "Best thing you ever did was leave the road they gave you in search of something new. The trouble now is that you don't know where to go."

I agreed, recognizing the truth when I heard it. "Can't I just go everywhere?"

Jim raised his glass. "I like this kid."

Sting and John shook their heads. "Not all at once," John said. "Just one road at a time."

The low beeping started sounding off out of the club again, like some truly annoying pager. The four musicians raised their glasses. "You're on, kid," the guy at the door said.

"You'll do fine," Sting assured me.

John peered at me over his glasses. "But you already knew that."

Jimi took a long drink and nodded with a sort of half-smile that told me nothing at all without making me feel like I'd been ripped off from my brush with fame.

Jim leaned back, looking up at the sky. "The only thing stoppin' you is the stoppin', man."

I looked back at the club's opened doors and closed my eyes.

Least Favorite News Conventions

2009-07-17T10:40:00.000-07:00

1) Putting "-gate" on everything potentially scandalous. "Watergate" was the name of the effing building. It wasn't a scandal about Water, you tards.

2) "Breaking the Glass (insert random noun)" - "Breaking the Glass Ceiling" can't become "Breaking the Glass Rotors" just because she's a female helicopter pilot. There's no such thing as glass rotors on a helicopter. Besides, the term "glass ceiling" is a metaphor for an projected inability to move up in one's organization based on being a member of a relative minority.

3) "Balanced Reporting" = Putting two loud and diametrically opposed people on the screen and let them scream over the top of one another. Balanced reporting should be a calm and logical explanation and representation of the facts, not a cage match of the most enthusiastic extremes.

4) "Breaking News" = It might be an explosion, it could be a kitten up a tree, but it's HAPPENING RIGHT NOW!

5) Editorializing masquerading as "professional interpretation." You're a talking head, not a truth filter.

6) Pharmaceutical sponsorship - ever wonder why the ads during news channels tend to be treatments for depression, ADD, and sexual dysfunction? Maybe it's all the news' fault that we're all unable to maintain an election. Yes. I punned. Get over it.

7) Reporting on the News: yes, we get it - you're the news agencies. We realize that when you run out of things to talk about, you talk about yourself. But that's when we're changing the channel.

8) Talking about the other guys: this reminds me about dating girls who talked smack about their past boyfriends. It always made me think, "god, how are you going to rip on me to the next guy you go out with?" Keep it professional, and stop trying to talk yourself up to me against your competition. Ripping on them just makes me want to go watch them instead of you.9) Graphics and High-techitude: if it gets in the way of the information it's supposed to be providing, then maybe you need to stick to just talking.

10) Ripping on the Internet, Bloggers, Twitter and YouTube: they'll always be just a little better and faster and have less commercials than you. Stop whining.

2007-05-07T12:25:00.002-07:00

This really, really hurts. I'm kind of a big fan of the comic, the character, and, thus far, the movies. So it is with a heavy heart that I have to confess I wasn't really impressed by the latest one.
Spiderman 3 has some noble aspirations, I think. I suspect that Sam Raimi had some really specific plans for this movie, incorporating a lot of characters and elements - specific plot details as well as storyline and development arcs - into one movie.
However, whether it's just a continuation of the "Trilogy Curse" or just poor planning, this one just didn't work for me.
The basic plot is simple enough: the birth of a new villian, Flint Marko (who shares his last name with an Xmen villain, Juggernaut - Cain Marko - yet no one ever asks if the two are actually related), a petty thief who, on the run from the police, falls victim to a particle acceleration experiment which disintegrates him; though permitting him the ability to re-integrate himself as a silicon-based being. He retains his mind, though he possesses the ability to control his body in a sand-like state - thus, Sandman.
The transformation sequence where he first returns to life is genuinely one of the most dramatic CGI scenes I've witnessed on film; the struggle is painfully displayed, and between the filming and score, you really feel for the man, and witness his determination to survive. Honestly, it's one of the best single scenes in the movie.
But we also encounter the first big flaw of this movie: they make Sandman FAR too sympathetic a villain. The man's just trying to get money to take care of his sick daughter, and he's had some bad luck. Most of the time Spidey's beating on him, I just wanted to tell Spiderman to back off the man. Leave him be, he's just trying to get help for his child, man.
He never really leaves this state, either, because at every possible opportunity, we are shown him looking at the locket that holds his daughter's picture. Oh, yeah. His daughter's sick. He's doing this for her. We got it. Moving on.
In one of the more spectacular fight scenes, we are re-introduced to Spidey's arch-enemy and best friend, Kid Goblin. Okay, they never call him that, but now he rides a snowboard and has cool goggles, and his mask doesn't look as silly as his dad's did. Okay, it's still silly, but for different reasons. I noticed that he protects his face but not his head. I guess the idea of moving 200 mph on a jet-propelled skateboard means you just want to have the wind move through your hair and keep the bugs out of your eyes and mouth, but you're determined not to have helmet hair. Can't see a problem with that, so long as you don't hit anything... oh wait. Yeah, that might be a problem.
This ends up being the most interesting story arc in the movie, the issues between Peter and Harry. They were best friends, now they're not. A girlfriend (MJ) and Harry's dad's death both keep them on opposite sides of the law. It's a bittersweet arc here, full of triumphs and I feel they wrap it up too clean, too soon for us to enjoy it as much as I would've liked.
The MJ/Peter issues reach a new level of annoyance with MJ feeling threatened by Spiderman's public success versus her own struggles with fame and celebrity. I think I can see what they were going for here, but in the end, she just comes off as whiny. I'm still shocked that Peter has a job at the Daily Bugle, by the way, since he did steal away his boss' son's fiancee. Apparently JJ Jamison is a lot more forgiving a man than he comes across. I would've expected him to have canned Pete the day his son got left at the altar.
By the end of the movie, I'm really surprised MJ wants anything to do with Pete. This part left me really disappointed. The ending feels DRAMATICALLY forced and superficial. It was almost like they made the characters think, "hey, this is the end of a movie, we better get along now."
They made several changes to MJ's character for the movies, patterning her more after another character from the books, Gwen Stacy. And then they brought the Gwen Stacy character into this movie, which for me, means only one thing: someone's gotta die.
See, in the comics, Peter becomes spiderman, and starts by using his powers for personal gain, until that greed inadvertently leads to his uncle's death. This death was what made him decide to use his powers for good.
Years later, his girlfriend - Gwen Stacy - was killed by the Green Goblin. This made Spiderman confront the Goblin, during which battle the goblin was killed by his own glider stabbing him through the chest (just like in the first movie). But this whole situation stuck with Spidey and made him question whether his choice to be a "superhero" was in fact a bad idea, as the people around him were constantly in danger.
Basically, Ben's death led him to start on the path, Gwen's death nearly took him off it. It also kept him from having meaningful relationships for several years.
He and MJ had a lot of problems just because she KNEW about him being spiderman and figured if he wasn't comfortable enough with her to tell her, then apparently they didn't have a strong enough relationship.
Anyway, that's the comics. In the movies, they kind of took that whole element of Gwen Stacy out. In this movie, she's here, but she's dating a guy named Eddie Brock, who also works at the Bugle and apparently has a lot of Peter Parker envy.
Now, when I say Gwen and Eddie are dating, apparently what I really mean is that he dated her once - they went for coffee - and he's just totally stuck on that idea.
When they first introduce him, he makes the comment that they're dating, and I actually thought it was an interesting choice (they never even met in the comics, Gwen having died YEARS before the arrival of Eddie Brock). But, speaking of "interesting choices", let's go right from this to the arrival of the "alien symbiote."
The black costume. Ugh. Now, while I think the black costume and what it represents to spidey (his darker years and his current dark times as a rebel against the law in the comics right now) is a really interesting plot device, I always HATED that it was actually an alien being that drained his energy and had a mind of its own. It was kind of... I dunno, silly. Yes, I said silly within a comic book storyline, as if the whole thing was somehow a higher form of literature.
They recently started a new line of comics, called the "Ultimate" universe, where they've kind of re-told the spiderman stories, taking the best elements and congealing them into a solid continuity, removing little silliness like how he was actually a clone for about 2 years' worth of titles and has had to battle against the Spider Gods to keep his powers, blah blah blah. Yes, I'm not making that up.
Anyway, in this "Ultimate Spiderman", they had the Venom character, but it was actually made by a mad scientist's (Doctor Octopus) efforts to create another spiderman in a lab. The dna, mixed with one of their test subjects, led to a creature called venom, who had such unstable cellular structure that he was like liquid, changing and morphing in the Big Gnashing Teeth scary thing we almost saw on the screen in this movie.
I would've liked a better tie in to that origin. I know, it would've been two genetically altered supervillians (3, if you count Harry Osborn), and maybe they were worried that people'd think they were just harping on Genetic experimentation, and not telling a superhero movie.
Anyway, this black ooze takes Spidey over, and before you can spell "Excelsior" (btw, Stan Lee finally gets a good cameo in this one), Pete's walking down the street in a really bad impression of 70's cool, and we are forced to watch the painful primping as we share the neighborhood's discomfort as Peter acts like he owns the world.
Complete with Emo hairdo.
The problem is, this whole event, this transformation into that which he hates most, the realization of this and the attempt to get it out of his life, and the repercussions of where the black outfit goes next happen in the end of the second act of the movie. It's too late for us to even care about that at this point, I actually looked for a watch to look at so I could ask myself "do we have time for a new villain? Isn't this almost over by now??"
The last act is even worse, though. Aside from a few very necessary scenes with Pete and Harry (Spiderman and the new Goblin), we're thrown into a completely forced "final battle" with the Sandman and Venom versus Spidey, with MJ in the middle.
They never really explain why Venom/Eddie Brock figures out that MJ is even hostage material, so we're kind of dragged along with the assumption that the alien symbiote told Eddie at some point, or else the villains just have been passing around that little tidbit off-screen. Either way, it has never been more clear that MJ really needs to move to LA to work on her movie career. They try to make her break out of her "helpless victim" category by having her get into the fight a bit - calling out "look out!" and throwing concrete blocks at appropriate times, even though you'd think Spiderman's "Spidey Sense" would've tipped him off once or twice.
Speaking of which, I don't even think he has that spider sense anymore. It didn't tip him off ONE SINGLE TIME during this movie.
(note: yes, in the comics, his spidey sense doesn't work against Venom, but if that's the case in this movie, they really should've mentioned it; my point is that it didn't seem to work AT ALL.)
I also hated the very ending.
I like to have my spidey movies end with him being spiderman. Swinging, the whole thing.
Not only does it NOT end like that, there was precious little spiderman-ness going on during the whole movie. It felt, overall, less like a Spiderman movie, and more like a Peter Parker movie.
Which we kind of had in the first one. Tobey Macguire must have demanded more face time in this one, and if that's the case, shame on him. I don't really want to see him in the movies. I want to see spiderman.
And speaking of not seeing Spiderman, why does he always seem so Emo in these movies? Spiderman cracks wise, man! That's his trademark - forget the red/blue tights, the wall-crawling, the web-slinging - he's the guy who usually wins by pissing off his enemies to the point where he can stop them with a few well-aimed webs and a couple heavy punches. but here... he's just so..... depressing.
Okay, but not to say it's all a lost cause. I'm sure the movie can be saved by a really effective Director's Cut (though, Mr Raimi? If you've got the holy grail for this movie on the editing room floor, then SHAME ON YOU!) that has more action and more Spidey-time.
It also had a GREAT scene with Bruce Campbell in a restaurant, which is really very well done (and counters what would have otherwise been an unbearably horrible scene), and some great short bits with JK Simmons (plays JJ Jamison, the cranky editor in chief). Also, the aforementioned origin scene with the Sandman is absolutely fantastic.
My advice? go ahead, check out the movie. It's not crap. It's decent. I probably expected too much.
Overall, it felt like the director was trying to make two movies at once. I think if he could've found a way to combine just the Harry Osborne and Sandman plots and then just leave the black costume/alien symbiote/Eddie Brock/Gwen Stacy bits for the next movie (or maybe leave the movie ending with the arrival of the black suit), it would've left this as more of a solid movie and not the hodgepodge it felt like to me.
Doing so could've left this as a good piece of the franchise and yet still leave people wanting more from a Spiderman 4. As it stands, I have a bad feeling this is going to do for the spiderman movies what Joel Schumacher did for the Batman movies.
Evidently, the Trilogy Curse may be alive and well. :(

2002-08-26T22:16:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I'm noticing a trend, lately. Time was, movies were a magical place. For that 90 minute to two hour span, my life was on that screen. The actors, the cinematography, the soundtrack...they enveloped me, whisked me away, and I was there. As the closing credits would roll past the screen, I'd slowly return to life, realize my popcorn was cold, my soda was warm, and my shoes firmly adhered to the floor.

Me and my friends would wander out, talk about the movie, the conversation eventually returning to real life somewhere on the way home.

I'd later read the critic's reviews and roll my eyes - who, I thought, could hate THAT movie? After all, did it not lull me into reverie with its elegant intoxication? Did I not travel across reality to share in its magic?

Well, It was magic to me. I remember Jaws scaring me out of the water (I still hate going in the water, silly me), and Star Wars STILL kind of impresses me. Some of the more pathetic stereotypical bits in movies have almost always, infallibly, suckered me in. I confess: I didn't see the ending to "Unbreakable" or "The Sixth Sense" coming until they came, "The Usual Suspects" only recently has lost its shock value, and I still have to turn away at the particularly gruesome moments of army movies like "Saving Private Ryan" and such.

*sigh*

But... movies aren't quite doing it for me like they used to. I find myself shaking my head at a lot more on the screen than I ever would have just a year or two ago. Like "John Q" or "We Were Soldiers", which just didn't do it for me, at all. "A Beautiful Mind" was all right, not really as Beautiful as the oscars seemed intent on hyping it up to be. Granted, Lord of the Rings was pretty spectacular, and the occasional Steven Soderburgh flick is faily groovy.

What bothers me is that I can't figure out if its just that "they don't make 'em like they used to", or if I'm just getting older and a bit more jaded.

Or maybe the reality is a better-connected anchor than it once was? Geez, I don't know.

Well, now that I've opened that philosophical can of worms, I'll wrap this up for the day. I'll have to consider it's implications later.

After all, I have some DVDs to watch before I have to get them back to Blockbuster's.

I know. I'm pathetic.

2002-08-10T14:39:00.000-07:00

You know, I always felt a little envy for "army brats." The notion of travelling all across the world, never more than a year or two in any one place, seeing wonderful locales, experiencing astonishing cultures, the whole shebang...

Well, so far, I've been all over the USA, Canada, Mexico, and I've lived in a half-dozen states so far. So I guess I've at least approximated that wish of mine. But now I see why they hate it so much.

A couple weeks ago, I was feeling really down. You know the kind - that borderline melancholy malaise... that sense of "who really gives a s**t, the world just keeps on spinning..." Thank the gods it didn't last long, because I personally can't STAND myself when I'm like that. The weird thing about this time was that I got shaken out of it by the realization that I had NO IDEA who to talk to about it. First time that ever happened, that I could recall.

It's not to say I've led a life, surrounded by friends, loves, family and admirers - that's not really the case - but it's just not something I was aware of. Oh, sure, I went through my black period when I was 13, and toyed with the notion of offing myself when I was 16, but this was something different. I just didn't know who to talk to about my mood.

Mostly, it stems from the fact that I HATE whining. (and no, I consider whining different than venting, so don't go there) I just don't want my friends to ever think, "God, Ren's such a whining bastard." All part of that strong as steel illusion I like to create, I guess. At any rate, I used to have friends that I could be weak around. Friends that accepted the brokenness within me and would patiently await my struggle to rediscover my way.

Now, this is not to say I don't have friends. I do. But... I don't know. Sometimes, some friends aren't the ones you want to unload on. And sometimes your significant other is in the middle of their own shadows, and you don't want to pile on.

I also read something or other a while ago that spoke about men internalizing their complaints in order to resolve them, while women tend to express them to resolve them. I don't know how much I believe that (have I mentioned I'm a disbeliever?), but sometimes I do fit that mold. Sometimes I just don't want to talk about things.

[No, moron, its better to write it on a public journal. I'm such a tard.]

Okay, I knew I was going somewhere with this. On to the summary.

So what I mean by all of this is that something started happening a few weeks ago, right after this blue period. I woke up, feeling like this is home. We just got a house of our own, I'm doing the occasional wrestling match with the backyard, we have a pair of himalayan kittens (Karma and Tashi), and our 18 month old has a lot more space to ramble about. We're choosing interior decorations, furniture patterns, I finally get to keep my keyboards set up... the list goes on and on.

I looked over at the relatively small stack of yet-to-be-unpacked boxes, and thought, "Something's still missing."

Well, I know what it is, now.

I have to reopen that circle around me. The friends. We've lost touch with the best friends we had before we moved, and, as usually happens, we've all kind of gone our own ways. It sucks, but, as many times as I've seen this, I'm getting kind of used to it.

Now, there are jam sessions with new musician friends, barbeques, video game afternoons and even the occasional guilty pleasure I derive from role playing games (my current fave is the d20 system game of Spycraft).

But it's just the beginning, I know. These things take time. The last place I lived I had lived their for 9 years straight. Just long enough for one of my best friends to die.

Gods, that was the wrong thing to think about.... maybe I'd better just jump off that train for now.

It's worth getting out of my system, I guess, but that's for another day. For now, I'm done. I'll write more later.

2002-08-10T14:37:00.000-07:00

So this is it, eh? An online journal.

Sigh.

Well, I don't care if this is read by anyone or not. Frankly, I'm too cheap
to buy a journal, and don't think I can balance the notion of killing a tree
or some nonsense just to pen a few ideas. So howdy do, the internet.

There was actually a thought I was pondering the other day, and it led to
another one, etcetera. Maybe I can pull on it enough to unravel it.

It all started with thinking about the whole chakra thing. As I understand
it in my mediocre fast-food metaphysical two-step, its how a soul connects
to the universe by allowing energy to enter, pass through and leave along a
series of "doors" or centers, each of which are symbolized by colors, bodily
organs/regions and aspects of the persona: heart, passion, sexual energies,
the third eye, that sort of thing. It is drawn as a line which begins at the
base of the spine and leaves out the crown of the head.

Along with that clever interpretation, crystal enthusiasts talk about
"opening" chakras by attuning them to the respective colored crystal, which
is placed just above the related body part. I personally don't know quite
that I buy into all of it, but, then, I'm a skeptic now, and I guess I'm
entitled to my doubts. Sometimes, doubts are all I have, so I'm proud of
them. If you don't like doubts, don't read my journal. I'm guessing it's
gonna be a theme.

ANYWAY.

So the image is that energy can be 'blocked' along the chakras, when one of
the centers isn't opened fully.

What I always wondered was how that gets observed? I was introduced some
years ago to the notion of energy transfer between individuals - another
theory I'm skeptical about - and also through tai chi meditation, which I'm
pleased to report I actually enjoyed. So the thought that energy is a
transmittable, palpable thing isn't too foreign to me. I kind of like it.
Embrace it, actually.

But here's the thought that really baked my noodle.

What I've ALWAYS hated about religions (this is only slightly a tangent,
trust me. Don't stray too far, you'll enjoy the ride) is that they tend to
focus on the physical habits - go to church, pay the church, don't drink,
don't laugh too loud, pray like this, don't go there, don't do that, blah
blah blah. And if you don't act, look, speak, whatever just like you're told
to, then that means, of course, that you're a bad person.

Well, rubbish. Poppycock. Bull pucky.

Perfectly wonderful people look bad, act bad, and do things that might not
get you selected to lead the hymns on sunday meetings. And perfectly
wretched people sit there in their churchday finest with all manner of
twisted perversions (and not the nice kind) in their hearts and minds.

But, at the same time, you gotta get alcohol away from the alcoholic, and
that sort of thing.

So, going back to the chakra comment. Does the crystal idea really work? Or
is it the inner change which creates the effect? Does it even matter?

Does the physical act of turning on a light switch create light? Or does the
faith in the action do it? Ahhhhh, now THERE'S a great puzzle.

But you know, on second thought, maybe it doesn't even matter. Who cares if
the chicken OR the egg came first?

They're both here now.

'Nuff for today. More later.

2002-08-09T11:16:00.000-07:00

okay, day two, lesson one.

After typing in a HUGE post I was soooooo proud of, Blog logged me out, and I lost it. That sucks.

So rather than attempt a second take, I'm just going to cut my losses, lick my wounds and post something else later.

Poop.

2002-08-08T11:33:00.000-07:00

Goodness gracious, it's official. I'm writing a journal on line. *sigh* I don't know who to blame, but I'm sure it's several peoples' faults. A good friend of mine from high school - John - and my wife, Lizz, I'm sure will cackle with glee to know they have pushed me inadvertently over the cybercliff into this.

At the same time, I blame myself for being too damn lazy to buy an actual book, and, thanks to nearly a decade of solid computer use, I can't write with a pen to save my life. (it rather defeats the purpose to write what you need to later hire an anthropologist to decypher)

Ah well. I don't know quite how else to start this, so I'll leave it at this for now. If you're reading this, thank you for wading through what I'm sure will be a whole lot of oddity, and also for contributing to my delusion that I have something interesting to say.