Category Archives: Writing

ADMIT ONE: Dark Carnival

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The Dark Carnival

 

Darkened laughter, cackles, screams
Harmless fun, draped in night
Beneath the cotton candy fluff
A carnival which breathes your name

 

Step right up! Come inside!
Pen and Muse, and the carnies posing as writers & illustrators, invite you to explore the secrets of the Dark Carnival.
Every Friday in October, sneak close enough to smell the fried foods & feel the wind whizzing off the rides.
Step closer still, and let the tales of the creepy, eerie, strange, horrific & macabre seep into you.

Out of the kindness of my heart, I provide you this ticket for FREE Admission to the Dark Carnival.
The question you must ask yourself, is whether my heart has already been won over by its darkness.

 

Preview the topics, Writers & Illustrators.

OFFER OF REP! (and why I said no)

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guy kneeling crying

Please, put down the torches and pitchforks.

I know how that title sounds. I never, ever imagined I’d turn down an offer of rep from an agent. But I did. I had to. It was a difficult thing to do, but maybe not for the reasons you might think.

It all started with the most recent #PitMad event. The day job was busy sucking the life out of me, so, the night before, I scheduled a few Tweets to jump in and scrap with the thousands of others vying for attention in the stream. By the end of the day, I had two requests: one from a small pub & one from an agent. Right away I knew I wouldn’t submit to the publisher. Because, you see, I’ve made the personal decision that I want an agent fighting by my side, adding value, experience, and wisdom to this passionate dream of mine.

So that left me with an agent who wanted to see more than the (exactly) 140 characters: Tera joins the crazy-twisted Phreak Show where she must embrace the truth: being a freak isn’t about looks, it’s a frame of mind #PitMad YAF

I’d previously researched the agency *a little*. My mind couldn’t instantly dredge up any black-listed reasons not to submit. Plus: AN AGENT WANTS TO SEE MORE OF MY STORY! Once I got home, I hunted the sub guidelines and shipped off the query, synopsis & first 25 pages. I grabbed some dinner and nonchalantly strolled into my weekend.

5 days later, this arrived in my inbox:

I’m absolutely obsessed with this. Your concept looks really tight and the message is just awesome. I think there is something so real about this, but you are entertaining instead of didactic. I could go on and on, but suffice to say I’m fangirling : ) I would be delighted to give your full manuscript a read.

Of course I did a celebratory jig (a cross between Riverdance & walking on hot coals) & sent it right over. An agent. Fangirling over my words! And only then did I do the in-depth research I should have.

Uh-oh.

As this process progressed, a half dozen of my fellow writers, CPs, and an Assistant Agent friend all suited up & went into research-war with me. There were a lot of questions marks, which twisted into perplexities, which then flared into big, flaming red flags.

– Predators & Editors only noted: slow response time to queries. [Well, hell. That’s 75% of all queries I’ve ever sent…]
– No agents with the agency are members off AAR. [Okay, well I know of some top-notch agents who aren’t…]
– No clients listed on the agency website. [Okay. Wait. What? You’ve been in business for years…Your website is a basic (and easy) venue to champion your authors’ work. If you’re not showcasing your clients & their books on your own website, then what kind of marketing value are you really adding?]
– Twitter digging, following the rabbit down its hole, unearthed a few “clients”. [Hmmm…few and far between. The quality of the book covers look little better than something created in MS Paint. Are these self-pubbers? I smell fish.]
– Even though the agency (and its parent Talent agency) has been around for years: no sales listed. None. Anywhere. [Slow the eff down. Even if the agent (for whatever reason) chose not to post sales, then the Editor, or the even the author most likely would. Right? HOW CAN YOU BE IN BUSINESS FOR YEARS AND NOT HAVE ANY PUBLIC RECORD OF SALES?]

And as a few more red flags were firmly planted: that dead fish smell clung to me, my manuscript, my misconception that landing a full request is always a good thing.

THE NEXT DAY: My phone rings during my commute home. I don’t recognize the number. It’s the agent. I pull over. I whip out my notebook, access the mental database of all those questions & red flags in my head.

I absolutely LOVE this. Love.it. The aesthetic you created is perfect for this concept, perfect for YA. The quirkiness is really good; weird in a good way. Your characters are a BIG strength; they feel so real. The whole story felt really emotional without sacrificing plot. It’s so hard to balance characterization, worldbuilding and plot, and you did it beautifully. That’s evidence of a great writer.”

Lucas’ brain: She’s genuine. She reallymeans every word. Damn, those words feel good. Why, oh why, does this have to smell like a Red Lobster’s dumpster?

I’d like to offer you and your phenomenal book representation.

Lucas’s brain: Oh fuck does this suck. Hard.

I dig into my questions: carefully. I ask about the things giving me major pause (or, actually, damn-near a full-on stop). She answers. She’s super nice. Her personality is vibrant, cheery, and wonderful. We’d get along great outside of the whole agent-author relationship thingy. Oh yeah. That’s the whole point. A knowledgeable agent guiding me through the process, selling-the-hell-out-of-my-book, connecting with contacts I don’t have, championing my story, fighting alongside me to make this passionate dream of mine a reality.

I have other fulls out, so I need to nudge those agents and give them the opportunity to offer. A week ought to do. I ask for a copy of the agency’s contract to look over. I can text or email or call anytime with questions or concerns.

I’m torn. There’s no way I can accept this offer. But, at the same time, in an ooey gooey part of me, this is the call I’ve been working SO HARD to receive for years now. THIS EFFIN SUCKS.

If the red flags smelled fish-like, the contract is the bloody meat of every fish who ever died, piled on a shit-covered beach, rotting in the boiling hot sun while zombie skunks spray musk on the stinkbugs chewing on the eyeless corpses. You think I’m exaggerating. I’ve seen a few agency contracts, so I have comparison points. I work with contracts & legal docs in both my day job and in my own business. This contract isn’t for just this project, but basically for your creative soul. The Author’s Work is defined as:

“…all ideas, story materials, characters, situations, formats, and works of authorship which Author has created or creates during the term of this Agreement…”

That feels pretty all-encompassing. “Ideas” are included? And what’s with the “has created” phrase? The word “irrevocably” is used too many times throughout the contract. The clauses involving how the contract can be terminated revolve around a very specific period in time; not just with 30 days written notice, which seems to be the standard. With each new work, the contract auto-renews & resets the clock & the termination clause. The continuation of residual commissions is scary when combined with the agreement’s definition of the Author’s Work. If things weren’t fishy before, this contract alone would have been enough to lead me to a no.

My deadline for getting back to this agent arrives. My gut wrenches as I dial the number. And I’ve heard agents say this before: rejections suck no matter which side of the conversation you are on. This isn’t true with queries or partials, I’m sure. Probably not even with a lot of fulls. But here, with an offer of rep before me, knowing and believing that (despite all the salmon) this agent truly & genuinely loves my work, I feel so awful saying no. And not for my sake. Not because I feel like I’m losing something, but because this agent feels so strongly for my manuscript. My heart hurts because she has expectation and hope. And I’m the one dashing it against the stones.

It bites when agents give you a generic rejection, which leaves you wondering But, really, WHY? It’s harder this way (on me), but I’m super-honest and straightforward with her on the reasons why I am declining her offer. She is gracious, but sadness tinges her voice.

I received an offer of rep. And yet, I had to reject it.

But the story doesn’t end there. Since I rejected that offer, I expanded the deadline: for reasons. Baited hooks still dangle in the sparkling water, with the possibility of reeling in an agent with the passion, experience, and wisdom worthy of a yes. It may or may not happen this round. I’ll keep you posted. Thankfully, there are fish in that wide, open sea who don’t smell fishy at all.

Dr. Kevorkian and the Miracle of Coffee

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Patron Saint of Patience

Patron Saint of Patience

Sometimes you get so close to something you can feel the heat of it.

Like the aroma of coffee warming your nose before the cup ever touches your lips.

I’ve had this health issue thingy for over a year now. So as not to channel my Mama (who expertly lists each and every crick, ache & ooze of her own & those in our extended family, like she’s a hybrid living phonebook/family tree/Ailment Field Guide), I’ll keep it vague. Perhaps you’ve noticed I’m pretty candid at times. (I get that from Mama, for sure.) But, I also have it in me to engage my hush-hush & discretion genes when needed.

Unnamed health issue. Riding on a wave of not-so-good, then okay again. Doctors, meds, co-pays. A specialist. Surgery.

Thursday at midnight, I enter the land of no-food-or-drink-or-you’ll-turn-into-a-pumpkin. Which is to say: NO COFFEE ON THE EARLIEST MORNING IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD WHEN I NEED IT MOST. Java-less Friday dawns. Dread oozes over me as my chauffeur parks the chariot outside the Surgery Center.

Check-in. Consent form signage. Butt naked, then re-styled in surgical couture: graphic muu-muu with this season’s signature slit up the back, a powder-blue cap obviously offering a nod to little Toadstool from Super Mario Brothers, and a pair of grippy-bottom booties—the medical world’s Louboutin.

The second hand of the institutional clock circles like a slow, methodical vulture. The surgeon’s running a half hour late to the fashion show. (And you know what it’s like when you have to wait for things as important as Friday quitting time, to hear back on a full request, to go under the scalpel—agony.) So, decked in my trendy garb, I do what I always do when nervous, happy, pissed, scared, or basically anything other than sad; I joke. My chauffeur plays editorial photographer with his iPhone as I smize & nail risqué poses in my designer clothes. I cause the nurse to chuckle as she enters top-secret jargon into her sci-fi computerator. Nurse #2 (who resembles a young Roseanne Barr) giggles as she inserts the ouchy IV. Anesthesiologist is already jovial (probably hitting a mild sedative), so I surreptitiously prestidigitate, casting a spell to further augment his sunny disposition.

Dr. Sleptthefuckin finally darkens the doorway. Funny bone: amputated.

Questions. Expectations. With nurse #1 carrying my IV bag, my entourage and I own the red carpet (i.e. white linoleum) and sashay to the operating room. Sharp things glisten under the harsh light of the paparazzi flashes. Or maybe that’s just the weapons-grade surgical lighting bouncing off the stark white walls and stainless steel.

I’m horizontal. Action. White-coated bumblebees buzz all around me. I want to close my eyes. So bad. I want to just block it all out. This isn’t fun any more. In that moment, I think, No. Keep your eyes open. Suck it all in, read the visuals like tea leaves, focus on description. Scribble notes in your head so you can fictionalize this experience in a novel someday. 

Electric sensors latch on to my back and chest, cuffs squeeze both legs and one arm, a crab claw clamps down on my finger, sunny-anesthesia-man twists a little plastic knob, my arms get strapped to wings jutting from each side of the table. Dr. Kevorkian palpates the soft skin he’s about to slice wide open. His hands are neither cold nor hot, but they’re definitely not just right. I can barely even feel them.

He grimaces. His unibrow furrows. He pushes with so much force it hurts. He looks at me, mumbles some words that may or may not be proper English.

A complication?

A miracle?

For reasons: the surgery can’t proceed. Not today.

In the recovery room, I cry.

Not because I wanted the surgery, but because I wanted the unknown over and done with. So much build up, months of worrying & wondering, crackling nerves, a coffee-less morning, pokes & pricks, a resolute part of me whispering It will be over soon. Rest well, Lucas. Rest well.

Sometimes you get so close to something you can feel the heat of it. An orchiectomy. A request from a writing contest. A blessed email asking for the full. A surprise phone call and an agent offering your book—you—representation. An editor at a major house whispering yes, blowing the steam over her coffee cup. Just a few more sales to shimmy on to the bestseller list.

Like the way things oh-too-often happen in the writerly world, my health issue and I are back to waiting, to see what comes. It’s a limbo-esque place to exist—fret with hand-wringing, impatience, and the nervous shits. But also: hope. That things are okay for now, and there’s a chance a miracle has happened. That one stage of the waiting may be over. That chauffeurs who take provocative pictures, and nurses who look like Roseanne, will be there supporting you no matter what comes.

And, perhaps most importantly of all, coffee is always there. Even on those most dreaded of java-free mornings, it smiles—warm and comforting—just on the other side of the wait. I’m savoring the heat of it right now. But, Patron Saint of Comedic Coping help me, I’m ready to take a sip.

Sucking Smarties Until the Chocolate Comes

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But it aint chocolate

But it aint chocolate

FACT: Every stage of traditional publishing is slow.
FACT: The waiting can drive you batty.
FACT: Distractions between stages are a necessity.

I’m not ready to start my next novel. It’s percolating, but the idea isn’t hot enough yet. The concept hasn’t reached its boiling point. So, while it simmers, I’ve been fighting off the crazies by both reading and writing (shorter pieces).

There is this [anonymous] bestselling YA author, see, and I’ve tried my best to like her books, to enjoy them, to discover their appeal. Last week I made a third attempt—the first book in a trilogy—in hopes that this would be the one which would win me over. No ma’am! Not even close. I slogged through it, forced myself to just.make.it.to.the.last.page, which is a horrible thing to have to do with a book. And thus, my non-relationship with this author has officially ended with a whimper.

Flip that coin over. Let’s talk about some BANG. Through the wonder of word-of-mouth, which is to say: a random Tweet floating by in my feed, I strolled a block to my local library & checked out Rainbow Rowell’s Eleanor & Park. Now, let me state for the record that I rarely read Contemporary YA. YA Fantasy? Yes. Non-fiction about psychology, science, philosophy, astronomy, etc? Why yes please and thank you. So this wouldn’t normally be a go-to novel for me.

Well, I suppose the best testimony for how much I dug it, is the fact that I ordered Rainbow’s new release, Fangirl, the day it came out. This is the first hardcopy book I have purchased in probably a dozen years. My m.o. is 75% borrow from the library and 25% purchase for the Kindle. So, obviously, excited. Whatever your preferred genre to read and/or write, whatever tastes you normally fall back on, I highly recommend both of these books. Because: quirky, endearing, relatable, solid.

Now, on to the writing-as-impatience-repellant.

Flash fic keeps me loose. It’s like the warm-up laps in a pool before swimming from Cuba to Florida. It purges ideas—exorcises them, if you will—to clear out headspace and make room for more. But it has its limits. Flash fic is akin to eating a pack of Smarties when you really really want chocolate. (Y’all know exactly what I mean…) So, I chew on it when there’s no time-chocolate, attention-span-fudge, or even complexity-syrup in the house. But it doesn’t satiate the craving for: more, a robust arc, deep characterization, subplots, intricate weaving of symbolism or layered themes.

That’s where short stories gallop in like white horses, or unicorns, or bronies, or [equine analogy of your choice]. If novels are king-size candy bars, then short stories are like the fun-size. Scroll down a post or two and you’ll find where I mentioned that “dark” seems to be whispering my name. (Mmmmm, dark chocolate is the best.) So I says to myself, “Self, how about some short stories? Make ’em dark. Oh! And I know, seek out venues in which to share them.”

On some as-of-yet-undisclosed Friday in October, my Until it Pops, short story (weighing in at 3,400 words), along with accompanying illustration, will be part of the #DarkCarnival. http://penandmuse.com/freaky-fridays-dark-carnival-writer-illustrator-showcase/ 

Then there’s this other project, which isn’t so much of a definite thing. Today I submitted my short story, Bastardbreed, (weighing in at 6,200 words) off to the guys heading up a Clive Barker fanfic anthology. (Which feels a little weird for me to say. Like fanfic is somehow unclean or not real writing. Which is silly. Because I created my own offshoot of a world, birthed brand new characters, and incorporated all the complicated elements listed three paragraphs up.) If the story makes the cut, it won’t be available for public consumption until Fall 2014 when Tor releases it in simultaneous hardcover & paperback.

FACT: Traditional publishing is a reaaaaaallllllyyyy slow process for high-octane chaps like me.
FACT: I won’t let my wiring keep me from pursuing that end.
FACT: I’m writing, reading, percolating, producing, and sucking on Smarties until the chocolate comes.

Update: So once this posted, I found out that Canadian *Smarties* actually ARE chocolate.
FACT: I feel ripped off, ‘MERICA!
FACT: I should move to Canada.
FACT: Everything should be made of chocolate. Except that would be really messy & make many things anti-useful. Nevermind. NOT A FACT after all.

AUTHORS: 9 Ways To Get Information Into A Character’s Hands

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This is pretty solid stuff on the means of getting important info to your characters.

Victoria Grefer's avatarCreative Writing with the Crimson League

Content editing doesn’t have to involve changing major aspects of your plot (though it can.) Sometimes, it just involves making sure a character learns a bit of information in a more logical manner.

I was reminded of that this morning editing “The Esclavan Abductions,” my NaNoWriMo novel from last year.

I got to a section where the villain pretty much spouts off lots of valuable info to his enemy while they’re fighting. (In my defense, this was a first draft and it was NaNoWriMo.)

I realized that needed to go. No question. Within five minutes I also figured out  more logical way to have the hero figure out the information he needed to know: and the editing work involved was pretty minimal (luckily for me!)

There are SOOO many ways that characters can get valuable or important information. Not all will work in every situation, and that’s awesome.

It means…

View original post 552 more words

Flash Fic: Dublex Orb™

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Inhabisphere™

Inhabisphere™ – 100 years ago

Of course I’ve had roommates before. Down on Earth™, I mean. Not up here in the Thermosphere™. But the new policy makes double-occupancy mandatory. It’ll be good to have someone to talk to and interact with. Maybe even touch like once a year or something.

It’s ridiculous and kinda pathetic. 1.2 trillion of us crammed into such a small space, yet we all live completely disconnected lives.

All realms of our Inhabisphere™ are overcapacity. Down on Earth™, the thousand-story skyscrapers are packed so tightly over every acre that they’re pretty much a single, sprawling building. The Tunnelands™ have already burrowed farther than they safely can. Even the Sealands™ are filled now: the ghettos on the seafloor and down in the trenches, the upscale topside floaters. In the Skylands™, only two narrow causeways remain undeveloped.

The Housing Council™ started the Thermosphere Development Program© out of desperation. They launched the Duplex Orbs™, like the one I live in, through the northern port of the Skylands™ a year ago. That’s when a billion of us moved up here to orbit like secluded satellite moons. The Resource Restrictions Act© forbids us from visiting one another.

So we basically live in floating prison cells.

The last two ports through the Skylands™ close tomorrow. They’ll be sealed shut to gain the last bit of atmospheric real estate remaining. After that, we won’t be able to directly trade with the Groundlands™ anymore. Tariffs are gonna skyrocket.

My last shipment from the surface will be here any minute. This month’s visit is a bit different than all the rest. Twice as much Oxygen®, twice as many rations. All because my Duplex™ is about to house twice as many people.

Dania seemed cool enough during our minute-long v-Chat®. Kinda quiet and distracted maybe, but I’m hoping she’ll open up once she gets here. She’s a Digi-Designer® like me, so we at least have that in common. If she’ll unplug long enough to give me three minutes of face time a day, I’ll be happy. Five minutes would be even better, but I’m trying to be realistic.

The supply taxi just docked. The recycled Oxygen™ is already pumping into the tanks. Why am I so nervous? There goes the bay door. The rations are loaded. Oh Gods™, the airlock. I think I’m gonna throw up. The first flesh-and-blood person I’ve seen in over a year. The stranger I’ll spend the rest of my life with.

The warning horn blares. The door swooshes open.

Dania stares at the PodPad® in her hands.

“Hi,” I say.

Her left eye twitches a little. That might be a sign that she heard me.

“Which way?” she asks.

“Your room’s on the right,” I answer.

Without looking up, she expertly navigates the furniture in the common area. She places her palm on the KeyPad® and steps inside her room.

I move towards her. “I thought we might interact for a bit.”

She stops, but doesn’t turn. “I’ve been De-egged®.”

“What?” I stare at the soft skin on the back of her neck. “No. Not like that kind of interaction.”

Her PodPad® monopolizes her attention. “What kind then?” she asks.

“You know, talking, eating rations together.” My mouth is so dry. “Maybe even playing a game?”

“I’m busy,” she answers.

Then her door swooshes closed between us.

***

That was six months ago. I haven’t seen Dania since. I’ve stumbled across her username in the forums, so I know she’s still alive. Sometimes, I press my ear to her door, but I’ve never heard a thing.

It’s sad, really. We’re now up to 1.4 trillion people in the Inhabisphere™, and I haven’t seen one in half a year. Haven’t touched one in almost two. There’s no way I’m the only one who’s lonely. There must be others tucked away somewhere in our stuffed-full world.

I keep hoping Dania will accidentally come out of her room, that she’ll forget she has a roommate in the Duplex Orb™ and will stumble into the common area by mistake. Or that she’ll suddenly get the urge to unplug and interact.

Just sixty seconds, once a month. That’s all I need.

There’s a new plan to add more Duplex Orbs™, to link them airlock-to-airlock so they form a massive sphere encircling Earth™. Maybe my new neighbors will want to hang out. But I’m not holding my recycled-air Breath™.

Flash Fic: Alchemy 2.0

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Ipad Gold Ingot

To be honest, I’m not sad that Paracelsus is dead. He was old as dirt. Not only can I do my own thing now, but I don’t have to cringe at his judgmental, gold-toothed sneer anymore.

Don’t get me wrong; he was an okay mentor who taught me the basics of alchemy. I’d be nowhere as awesome as I am without him. But, the thing is, he was stuck in the old ways. As wise as he was, Paracelsus wouldn’t accept that we have technology in the 21st century that the old coots didn’t.

Like his whole Great Work obsession. I get it. It’d be cool to create a Philosopher’s Stone to transmute junky base metals into gold. But, really? Who cares?  For thousands of years, wrinkly dudes with scraggly beards have been trying to do that. It’s not gonna happen. Just move on already.

He never even got close to making it happen. Instead, he charged me with stupid busywork of extracting existing gold from ore. A bunch of rock crushing, washing the dust over copper plates coated in mercury, then the repetition of that tedious refinement process, over and over again until he had a few tiny gold flakes worth a couple bucks. Boring as crap, not profitable, and totally not alchemy.

Paracelsus was all about the exoteric, physical process. I’m much more spiritual, into the esoteric/mystic vibe. My new process marries the ancient with the modern. Pretty genius if you ask me. And my piles of glittering gold speak for themselves.

I use some old-school materials like salt, mercury (of course), caustic lime, and sulfur. But they’re just catalysts to amp up the intensity of the spell. The Molecular Receiver and 3-D printer soft-wired through my smart phone hotspot make the actual alchemy possible.

Chugging a few shots of absinthe doesn’t hurt.

That stubborn, backwards-thinking Paracelsus would say I’m bastardizing the alchemical tradition. Whatever. I’ve got more gold than the geezer ever dreamed of. Sure, I’m not actually creating it from scratch, but neither was he. At least I’m making precious metal instantly appear. And it’s not like I’m stealing. I’m simply finding things which were lost and forgotten.

Take my first experiment two months ago.

I lit orange candles, for luck, during the full moon. Eff off if you think that’s lame. Some of the old traditions can’t be broken. I laid out the salt circle in my mom’s basement and ignited the mercurial sulfur amalgam in a coffee can. Low tech stuff. I calibrated the printer and backhauled the Molecular Receiver’s signal over the wi-fi. High tech. Next came the software-of-sorts. Every good alchemist knows you need magick to drive the process.

I filtered this ancient incantation from Tycho the Elder through my voice recognition app. I was super cautious, though. I had absolutely no idea how much lost gold was out there, so I set the parameters pretty tight to only include [“charms” AND “baubles”].

Then I chanted.

What gold is lost, I must now find. Charms and baubles, make them mine.
Bring them back, they must be found. Take my fortune, spin it round.

One iteration is all it took.

The 3-D printer immediately started spitting out gold: lockets, tiny spoons, fancy buttons, these cool little rosettes, clasps, bracelet charms in all shapes and sizes. Before I knew it, mom’s musty basement was flooded with stuff lost over the centuries. I could barely keep up with the transmission. At one point, I was scrambling with a shop broom in one hand and a rake in the other, trying my damndest to make room for more. By the end, waist-deep in gold trinkets, I had no choice but to disengage the receiver.

Stick that in your stinky-ass pipe, Paracelsus.

That single interrupted spell produced a crapload of gold. In theory, I’m an effin billionaire. I only scrapped a small portion of it—a shoebox worth—and scored 350 grand. I reinvested it right away: upgraded all the equipment, bought some property. It took me three full weeks, four dozen truckloads, and two pulled muscles to haul all that scratch to an old 50,000 ft2 warehouse-turned-mystical-lab on the south side of town.

By then, the moon was already waxing full again. I cast the spell to summon gold statues lost through antiquity. I qualified the parameters [height>=6” AND height<=12”] and [“soldiers”]. I ended up with my own army of 30,000 miniature warriors. It felt wrong to melt them down. So I lined them along the edge of the mezzanine so they could watch over the awesomeness happening in my lab below.

I can’t stop making lists of all the gold I can dredge up: watches and fobs, rings, armor, chains, inkwells, crowns, chalices, flatware. I’ve got pages of programming possibilities. The most exciting are [“coins”] and [“bullion”]. Can you even imagine how much is out there? Buried in the earth, lying in the sewers, shipwrecked and lost at sea? I’ll have to set parameters like [mint_date<1500CE] and probably [max_value=10000 “coins”] and then cast the spells by time period until I find them all.

It’s ridiculous how much lost and forgotten gold is out there. I’d never be able to spend it all—or even spend what I’ve already summoned. Still, I want to find every last scrap of it. Because I’m spiritual like that.

The full moon’s rising. The candles are lit.

I know it’s stupid, but I keep catching glimpses of Paracelsus’s sneer glinting at me from the greasy, dark corners of my warehouse. Ghost or not, I’m snatching those gold teeth right out of his critical jaw tonight. His, and a million [“incisors” AND “molars”] like them.

All lost and forgotten.

Which is something I’ll never be. The filthy rich, and humble, Rodney the Magnanimous will be remembered and venerated as the Father of Alchemy 2.0. That’s got a good, golden ring to it.

I have a nice little collection of Flash Fic pieces & figured I’d share a few over the next couple weeks. Hope you enjoy!

The Taste of His Skin–Like Lemonade Spiked with too Much Sugar

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creepy baby doll

[That post title is as long as some old-skool Fall Out Boy song title.]

Some things are essential in life:

  • 10-key pad on the laptop
  • Hair gel
  • Frequent kisses
  • Sugar
  • Shoe polish

I mean, come on. It’s not like we live in a third world country or something.

Another essential thing: perpetual creation

Since letting go of my obsessive Phreak Show revisions, I’ve been scribbling new concepts & possibilities as they emerge. A designated notebook, a One Note file, post-its, and random scraps of paper have all been employed to record the snippets. Some ideas are random & stand alone. They explode like witty fireworks, burn brightly for a moment, then cool into ash. Their purpose completed, they sleep. Others grow a little bigger & get amplified, expanded, more fully formed.

This is the sifting process whereby seeds are planted & weeds are pulled.
Somewhere in the mix is the germ of the next novel waiting to sprout.
And what a haphazard bunch of wildflowers they are.

I’m a spec-fic kind of guy. So that’s a given.
With this next tale, I want to go dark. Very dark. Push it beyond a little grit & really dig into psyche-twisting.
THE concept hasn’t fully formed yet, but there are a few contenders in the garden. Or, better, in the mound of oozing body parts?

For fun, raw bits of character, dialogue, ideas, science, scribbled things. Most are not dark. At least, not yet.

  • “I read carnage like tea leaves.”
  • Clocks slow down the closer they are to the strongest force of a gravitational field.
  • “In a world with such tiny grains of peace, it alone drives back the sickness and the sound. It alone allows us to walk in the brightness. To us, the ritual is not blasphemy; it is salvation.”
  • Note: use Fibonacci number for dates in the solar year (Day #1, Day #2, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233 – Julian Calendar?) as key dates/days in the spell process. [Research where these numbers fall. Count it from one of the soltices?]
  • Human thoughts are physical events which can be felt by others
  • “Take this,” Rosette says, then she tugs down her veil, and slips behind Lori’s robe.
    I unwrap the decaying cloth. The blade inside is rusted and dull with the sleep of twenty years.

    Lori steps forward. “It has your father’s blood upon it.”

    “Don’t call him that,” Rob spits. “He’s grown as cold as his master. He’s another Kraphet waiting to happen.”

    Lori’s eyes grow moist. Even though none of her life actually flows through our veins, she has adopted all the lost-ones as her own. Pain radiates from her each time her surrogate children deny their maker. She worships Laban as I worship Rob.

    I grip his arm, and force him to bow with me. “Thank you for the gift.”

    Lori reaches towards me to caresses the blade with her pale hand, then lovingly tucks the corners of its shroud back in place. “I do not know what help it can offer, but it is all I have to give.”

  • An anti-matter bomb would be ridiculously destructive, but such a thing would take 10,000’s of years to construct.
  • We are mostly empty matter—empty space with a few pinpricks  of material (like rocks floating in space) making up our physical form.
  • The Latin maxim ignoramus et ignorabimus, meaning “we do not know and will not know”, stood for a position on the limits of scientific knowledge, in the thought of the nineteenth century.
  • Studies show that lack of control causes our brains to see patterns in what would otherwise be randomness.
  • “Magic is real, all around us. Much of it is so mundane it is overlooked and accepted as a fact of life. Words are magic. Movement is magic. Emotions are magic. These come naturally, they are intuitive, and are thus considered normal. Then there are the higher magics, the rare kinds, the ones most would call magic. These are beyond simple comprehension, stretch past the bounds of our logic. These types of magic are harder to wield because doubt is the default human condition. And it is difficult to believe in things which we can not explain. All manifestations of magic—from thought, to speech, to gesture, to emotion, to the higher orders—can be wielded with either selfless intention (white magic), or selfish, harmful intention (black magic). But in between, where most intentions fall, there is gray.”
  • q: Spit in its mouth? Breathe into it? Hold it to her skin & sing/chant/incant to it?
  • Further along in the process, the heart falls out, because it hasn’t taken yet.
  • Love triangle: Combo of Beauty & the Beast meets Dr. Jekyl & Mr. Hyde
  • “Science is nothing more than magick which has been explained. Gravity, magnetism, x-rays, germs, radio signals, DNA, reproduction—these are all magick.””I don’t like thinking of magick as science. I don’t want it explained away. I like the mystery.””Do you know how a computer works? How binary code and electric currents transmit images so you can play games, or chat with friends, or view pics on a screen?””Well, zeros and ones, and switches, and electric impulses…and…not really…”

    “See? Even though someone knows how those things work, and can manipulate the elements in the right way, that doesn’t make the magick behind it any less mysterious. You have no idea what really makes it all work. You only know—from experience—that it does. You take the magick behind the science for granted.”

  • The taste of his skin—like lemonade spiked with too much sugar. The billow of his heart pumping moonlight into me.
  • Mara’s eyes glaze over. “The guardians know you are coming. They will suffer the second death to protect their maker.”
  • Darkness, thick as oil, clogs the side alleys and doorways. Red occasionally burns through the shadows in the glow of hungry eyes and the flare of smokers sucking in death-grass fumes.
  • Maybe they conflict because of his interest in magic/spiritual/paranormal & her interest in solid science/provable/tangible things?
    • Random thought:
      • They have a history—when they were kids, they were “Ghost Hunters”, stayed in a haunted house, investigated graveyards, Ouija, toyed with levitation & seances, etc.
        • This is where some connections for the QUORUM can come from–contacts earth boy already has.
      • Parted ways partly due to their difference in worldviews–but MAINLY, REALLY due to a failed attempt at a relationship.
  • “Loving a teddy bear or grandma’s locket isn’t enough. Love is weak magic. Way weaker than most people pretend.”
  • The buzzing and screams work into a frenzy as they near climax, “chastising & condemning as only a wilting god can”, then
    explode, then fall utterly silent.

And I could go on and on. Somewhere in this cacophony may be the root of my next novel. Or maybe not. The essential thing is that I keep the conduit open & continue searching for that perfect seed.

And who the hell knows? I may not even end up in dark for the next novel. I doubt it’ll be sunshine & cupcakes, but I guess it could. No. Definitely no the fuck it won’t. LGBTQ themes are always on my mind. So far, I’ve been too chicken to push in that direction… Hmmm…perhaps focus on that AND go dark? :: grabs scribbling pen :: 

The Ugliest Mona Lisa I’ve Ever Seen

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mona lisa - ral

You know this lady.

Her name’s Mona. You can call her Mo for short. She’s kind of iconic.

She’s here today to help me illustrate this *thing* I’m going through which relates to the world of writing. No, it’s not about visualizing characters, painting a story landscape, or any such helpful advice from a novice. Sorry about that. There are plenty of other blogs with unpublished writers giving profound & sage wisdom…

The topic this blogger is tackling today is: [Well, shit, I can’t really sum it up in a single word. This isn’t Twitter; it’s a post. So eff it, I can ramble if I like.]

Let’s go with this freeform string of thoughts: I have multiple fulls out with agents, which have been out for a while. I recently nudged on one & the agent confessed that she hadn’t gotten to it yet. Cool. No big deal. Another one is past the 10 week mark, at which point I would normally nudge, but I have not because of [keep reading]. The third is in this nerve-wracking, string-a-long sort of web which doesn’t seem to have an end. I am hopeful that it will turn into an offer, but the more pages of the calendar I rip off, the less that feels like reality. So, I have just kind of turned off my wishfulness on this matter until such time as it needs to be either revived, or incinerated.

After all that, I guess what I’m trying to say is: I don’t like to feel like I’m begging.

To be candid, I totally get that agents are busy, clients come first, I’m swamped, it’s conference season–all that. And writers are always labeled “impatient”. “This is a slow process,” we tell each other. Agents say it, too. Yet, still, are we really impatient? 2 months? 4 months? 6 months? 12 months? How long is too long to wait to hear back on a full request? An R&R? At what point has the timing passed beyond simple impatience on the part of the writer?

What it boils down to is that I want an agent to *LOVE* my work. Like, SHAZAAAAM! BAM! YES I WANT IT GIVE IT TO ME RIGHT EFFIN NOW I CAN’T WAIT TO START WORKING WITH YOU AND GET THIS THING SUB-READY BECAUSE AWESOME IN MY FACE AND OMG HAVE YOU SIGNED THE AGENCY CONTRACT YET OR WHAT BECAUSE AHHHHHHH????!!!!!

Instead, thus far, I have felt less like Phreak Show is the real Mona Lisa, and that perhaps it is more like this:

mona lisa - bad

 

And, yes, my loverly invisible ink finders. I KNOW that Phreak Show looks/reads nothing like that horrid ol’ fake. I’m just sayin’ I want that acceptance, that go-get-it agent who believes in me & my story so much that s/he can’t get hold of it fast enough. A dream? Perhaps. But my life has been built on dreams such as this. And damn it, I’m not done believing in magick.

Make the Wave Crest

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Here, I'm watching all the water crashing from afar. A few minutes later, I was at the base of the Falls, surrounded by that power.

Here, I’m watching all the water crashing from afar. A few minutes later, I was at the base of the Falls, surrounded by that power.

Travel changes you. At least, it changes me. Every time.

I could just say that, and I guess you’d believe me. But I have a nugget of tangible proof—easy evidence you can check out to confirm. For a while, I had been blogging weekly. Until now, I haven’t posted in over a month. My trip to Toronto is the cause. Not because I was unplugged from the matrix for that long, but because the waves of that change I’ve been hinting at are still rippling through me. It took this long for the rocking to settle down enough that I could wordify it.

Toronto kinda just happened. With an unspoken stirring-of-sorts already inside me, a rare 4-day weekend appeared. I seized its throat.

[While the trip itself could encompass a month’s worth of posts, I’m challenging myself to cram it all into a single paragraph.]

Amtrak’s time management skills suck. Still, travel by train is enjoyable. Toronto, for me, exists as a wonderland of breadth & depth, a thousand cultures coexisting in complicated public transport channels & rolling towers of skyscrapers stretched out like they’ll eventually spread to both horizons. As I already knew, Couchsurfing has my heart forever. My hosts were amazing. They introduced me to their particular nooks & crannies of the city, and gifted me with unforgettable experiences. Among them: poutine, Canadian beer, the Village, Distillery District, Fringe Festival, a refrigerated wall of cheese, Honest Ed’s, a rainbow of nationalities partying on a high-rise patio, a real-life impromptu game of Where in The World is Carmen Sandiego (only, I was Carmen), the Vomit Comet, a four-feet diameter orange made out of flip-flops, much laughter, etc, etc.

The pace of this short trip can be summed as: fuck sleep & cram in as much as you can. Embracing that philosophy, I left my house at 3 a.m. on July 4th, and rolled straight from the train station to work at 7 a.m. on July 8th. Yeah, worst.Monday.ever. It wasn’t until Tuesday, once I had caught up on sleep & could logically process incoming data, that I realized a major shift had happened inside me.

This can best be described as an opening up, an enlarging. Perhaps a renewal. But not like an atomic blast of realization. More subtle & barely noticeable, the way sunrise slowly tickles its light through the darkness until, suddenly, all is noon-bright.

I know that sounds all poetic & dreamy and shit. But it’s honest.

This trip changed me.

And it wasn’t [particularly] Toronto, or the long layovers in Buffalo, or visiting Niagara, or the people, libations, architecture. The newness did it to me. The possibilities of passion. The opportunity to embrace each day with wonder & exploration & expectancy. I thought I was already doing that. In fact, I know that I was. Or, perhaps more accurately, that I had done so in the past.

Passion undulates through a life. It crests & crescendos, but eventually flows over the downhill side into a trough. And it waits there, stuck, rocking back and forth with no reason to do otherwise. Journeys into new surroundings take all that potential energy at the bottom of the cycle & thrusts it up into another kinetic crest.

Or something.

I suppose you want more proof of this change, you needy buggers.

Well, much of it is uber-personal. Things which you wouldn’t reel at as I am reeling. A few, concrete examples I can offer:

– A reset in my relationships. An infusion of passion & forward-thinking. [Okay maybe this isn’t as concrete as you’d like. Get hold of me and I’ll gladly share. You know, if you can handle details of a life which often raises eyebrows. SEE: everyone who’s ever asked.]

– New drive in my business life. I’d been slacking in this area for *reasons*. No more. Re-oxygenated blood is pumping through the veins. Passion has been revived.

– A fresh commitment [and an actual plan!!! Seriously, I have a calendar on the fridge now] to travel more. And often. And keep kineticizing those stubborn waves.

– Oh yeah, after 3# years of waiting/denial/fear/trepidation, I finally came out to my conservative, Southern Mama. So there’s that. Pretty damn concrete.

Supposedly this blog is about writing, right? My trials & tribulations, progress & successes. Not much of that included in this post, Lucas. Ahhhh, but that’s where you’re wrong. [Actually, now that I’ve mentioned it, I’m sure your mind is connecting the dots, imagining how every word of this post, every tendril of feeling within it, has tickled my writing bone like that poetic sunrise tickling the world.]

My unsolicited advice: GO SOMEWHERE. DO SOMETHING.

Hop on a bike, book a flight, inflate a raft, take a train that will never be on time. Hell, strap on a pair of skates and try not to break your neck as you slide down the handrail. Pop out your thumb and jump into a semi with a burly truckdriver named Bo or Nancy. Take a walk through an unexplored or long-forgotten part of your hamlet. Dust off your passport. Taste new eats. Get nosy with the stranger in the elevator, bookstore, grocery store line. Yes, especially the weird one. Shit–invite your neighbor over to watch a movie or play Canasta. With as much abandon as you can muster, break your damn routine. DO IT. Today.

Make the wave crest.

If I’m wrong about the whole change-and-passion-catalyst-thing, you can totally fire me as your life coach.
If I’m right, send pics. Tell me stories. If you’re doing it right, you’ll have plenty of both. And some passion to spare.