Kevin Lucia's Blog, page 44

Bradbury Challenge, Finis: Final Tally

Back in June - ironically enough, just before modern American literature icon Ray Bradbury passed - I resolved to enforce in my daily reading life what, also ironically, could be considered the "Bradbury Daily Plan." He proposed that a writer should, every day, read a short story, a poem, and an essay. 

I decided to make that my daily reading diet, with some tweaks, because of course I'm also always reading two novels at once, one in the morning, and one at night, so I added to that (and keep in mind, I'm an English teacher with the summer off):

- a poem in the morning at breakfast; a poem at night before bed (currently, Robert Frost in the morning, William Blake at night)

- a chapter of non fiction in the morning (currently, C. S. Lewis)

- a short story before I writing in the morning 

- several short stories in the afternoon, specifically horror anthologies

- and, at the very LEAST: one Bradbury short story every day, and if I could fit in more than one, more power to me

Last night, I read the last Ray Bradbury short story I own, in his 100 Most Celebrated Tales - "All In a Summer's Night."  A perfect story to end a perfect summer of reading, in memory of Ray Bradbury. What's astounding, of course, is knowing there are SO many other short stories of his out there. 

I'll probably hold off, though, on reading any more Bradbury stories until next summer. For me, after this summer...reading Ray Bradbury short stories will always be a summer endeavor, as it should be. Besides, with school starting up, I'll soon be teaching Something Wicked This Way Comes, Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine and The Halloween Tree. More than enough Bradbury to keep me happy for awhile.

It's been a dizzying summer, intellectually.  Between the daily Bradbury challenge, horror anthologies by Charles Grant, Karl Edward Wagner, J. N. Williamson, nonfiction from Stephen King, C. S. Lewis, Noel Carroll, gothic novels and literary collections like Winesburg, Ohio and the current James T. Farrell's and others...add in the novels and novellas I've read...and my head is spinning. In all the right ways. And I can tell you, though I don't intend on writing short stories any faster than I am now, (I still plan on writing slowly and carefully) there are so many more ideas, now. So many more.

I'm not going to recount ALL the short stories I've read this summer. That would be tooting my own horn a bit much.  But, here's the result of my summer "Bradbury Challenge":

4 collections total:

The October Country
The Martian Chronicles
The Illustrated Man
The Golden Apples of the Sun
Bradbury Stories:  100 Most Celebrated Tales

For a total of: 197 short stories

There are still so many other Bradbury stories to read. But those will have to wait until next summer.  Because that's how I want to remember him, as drowsing slow and easy in the cool but soon to be roasting early mornings, basking in the blazing glow of an eternal summer sun...

My Serial Novella, "And I Watered It With Tears", Debuts At LampLight: A Horror Quarterly

The first installment of my serial novella, "And I Watered It, With Tears", debuted yesterday in the first issue of LampLight: A Horror Quarterly . It's available on Smashwords in a bunch of formats, (I recommend the downloadable .pdf) and the best thing is, this first issue's free.

Here's a break-down of its contents:

Welcome to the first issue of LampLight. We hope you enjoy the dark tales you'll find inside. We speak with Bob Ford about writing, life and hair products. There is fiction from William Meikle, Nathan Yocum, Rahul Kanakia, Ian Creasey and Mandy DeGeit. J.F. Gonzalez brings us a view into our literary past. with a discussion on reprint anthologies. Kevin Lucia brings us part I of a volume long novella.



I'm thrilled about this novella, for a number of reasons. One, it represents another step higher on the ladder.  Appearing in a publication with the likes of J. F. Gonzales and Bob Ford is awesome. Also, LampLight was professional, prompt, and they paid well. I know, that dirty little word that no "true artist" wants to talk about: money. Now, money isn't the ONLY sign of a quality publication. But, in a shrinking market, LampLight is a big breath of fresh air and opportunity, so if you've got something good, think about submitting for future issues. 

This novella is important for another reason, however...because it's the most personal thing I've written to date. Many parts of this story I lifted straight from me, from a very personal fear of mine.  Writing it was cathartic, in many ways, and it feels better than anything I've written, lately. 

I'm hoping that this story, the story forthcoming in Cutting Block Press' Horror Library, Volume 5 - "Almost Home" - and the story I'm writing now for Crystal Lake Publishing's For the Night is Dark - "Haunted By a Thousand Faerie Forms" - marks a new path, for me.  Still horror, still strange, weird, supernatural stories - but stories drawn from inside me. Personal stories.  Stories that vibrate and resonate.  

Ideas have come a lot more frequently, lately. Partly because I've been reading so many short stories this summer.  But also, because, I think - I hope - I've sharpened my focus. I've decided what I want to write about, what types of stories I want to write.

Who knows if this publishing trend/fortune will continue? All I know is I'm thankful for every day I can get up early and write, and thankful for whatever work sees the light of day.

Can't go wrong, there.

My Serial Novella, "And I Watered It In Tears", Debuts At LampLight: A Horror Quarterly

The first installment of my serial novella, "And I Watered It, In Tears", debuted yesterday in the first issue of LampLight: A Horror Quarterly . It's available on Smashwords in a bunch of formats, (I recommend the downloadable .pdf) and the best thing is, this first issue's free.

Here's a break-down of its contents:

Welcome to the first issue of LampLight. We hope you enjoy the dark tales you'll find inside. We speak with Bob Ford about writing, life and hair products. There is fiction from William Meikle, Nathan Yocum, Rahul Kanakia, Ian Creasey and Mandy DeGeit. J.F. Gonzalez brings us a view into our literary past. with a discussion on reprint anthologies. Kevin Lucia brings us part I of a volume long novella.



I'm thrilled about this novella, for a number of reasons. One, it represents another step higher on the ladder.  Appearing in a publication with the likes of J. F. Gonzales and Bob Ford is awesome. Also, LampLight was professional, prompt, and they paid well. I know, that dirty little word that no "true artist" wants to talk about: money. Now, money isn't the ONLY sign of a quality publication. But, in a shrinking market, LampLight is a big breath of fresh air and opportunity, so if you've got something good, think about submitting for future issues. 

This novella is important for another reason, however...because it's the most personal thing I've written to date. Many parts of this story I lifted straight from me, from a very personal fear of mine.  Writing it was cathartic, in many ways, and it feels better than anything I've written, lately. 

I'm hoping that this story, the story forthcoming in Cutting Block Press' Horror Library, Volume 5 - "Almost Home" - and the story I'm writing now for Crystal Lake Publishing's For the Night is Dark - "Haunted By a Thousand Faerie Forms" - marks a new path, for me.  Still horror, still strange, weird, supernatural stories - but stories drawn from inside me. Personal stories.  Stories that vibrate and resonate.  

Ideas have come a lot more frequently, lately. Partly because I've been reading so many short stories this summer.  But also, because, I think - I hope - I've sharpened my focus. I've decided what I want to write about, what types of stories I want to write.

Who knows if this publishing trend/fortune will continue? All I know is I'm thankful for every day I can get up early and write, and thankful for whatever work sees the light of day.

Can't go wrong, there.

Finally Writing Stories I've Really Wanted To: My Serial Novella Debuting in September, and my story in "For the Night is Dark"

The final TOC has been released for Crystal Lake Publishing's first anthology, "For the Night is Dark", and I'm happy to say I'll be numbered among the fine folks listed. Very excited to see my name amongst a whole new group of people I've not previously cracked into. Like my story in the upcoming "Horror Library, Volume 5", this represents another inch up a ladder, up to another level.   Scan the names below, Google some of them, and you'll have no problem understanding why I'm eager to measure up:

Gary McMahon
William Meikle
Jasper Bark
Jeremy C. Shipp
Stephen Bacon
Armand Rosamilia
Tracie Mcbride
Robert Walker
Tonia Brown
G.n. Braun
Mark West
John Claude Smith
Blaze McRob
Joe Mynhardt
Ben Jones
Kevin Lucia
Daniel I Russell
Ray Cluley
Scott Nicholson
Carole Johnstone




Also, September will see the first installment of my serial novella, "And I Watered It, In Tears".  Considering my past posts detailing how I've come around in terms of epublishing, the publication featuring it offers the best of both worlds: Digital installments in almost every kind of format imaginable, and at the end of the year, a trade paperback collection of the year's stories. Doesn't get much better, in my opinion. 

Most importantly, these stories represent a shift in my short-story writing in two ways:

1. they're much more personal than anything I've ever written
2. Their ideas came 9 months, to over a year ago...and I SAT on them

1. they're much more personal than anything I've ever written:

I've probably over-quoted this, but in an email conversation with Mort Castle (acclaimed writer and editor, one of my instructors at Borderlands Press Writers Bootcamp), discussing my work, he made this statement, which will always stay with me, and, I hope - especially concerning my short fiction - always be my guiding light:

The real stuff, the stuff that lasts...comes out of late-night conversations with your very own self  

 These stories - and the story in Horror Library, Volume Five - have come from those kinds of conversations.  They are about stuff I've thought about, inside. Some of them, my own philosophical, spiritual musings. One of them, about a deep, deep fear. And one about an abiding interest that could easily rival writing, if it ever got off the ground.  But, more so than anything else I've written, they're about me, deep inside.

And that's happened, quite frankly, because:

2. Their ideas came 9 months, to over a year ago...and I SAT on them:

The genesis of the novella came over a year ago. I first thought of the story I'm writing for "For the Night is Dark" about nine months ago.  The story in Horror Library, I re-wrote and re-wrote on my own, through one of my graduate school workshops, through Borderlands, and then I kept rewriting it, literally engaging in a "conversation with my very own self" as I wrote it.

This represents a complete shift in my approach to short stories. Ideas come to me all the time, at the most random moments.  And, I usually draw my ideas straight from life.  But, in the recent past, motivated by some early "success", I sat right down and banged those stories out.  And, even as I was achieving perhaps more and more technical proficiency, those stories lacked heart.  They lacked....me.  I had an idea, hatched a plot, and wrote the plot, without infusing the spirit.

Which for me, I've learned, takes time. Not necessarily time writing, but time thinking.

And thinking, thinking, thinking.

That doesn't mean that plot-oriented short stories are out for me, or are bad.  I have a nice little Lovecraftian story in the next edition of The Midnight Diner entitled "The Gate and the Way." It's a straight Lovecraftian tale. I like it.  It isn't anything more than it's meant to be. And also, that story has been re-written multiple times. Ironically enough, it's the end result of the very first short story I ever wrote, almost five years ago, now.

But what I've done this past year is two-fold: drastically widen my reading to include current horror, classic horror, gothic horror, quiet horror, westerns, mysteries, poetry, classic short stories, webcomics...and when ideas pop up, I write them down in a notebook, and leave them there.

So I can have late-night conversations about them.  So when an opportunity pops up, and one of those ideas fit, I've been mulling over it for months at a time.

Obviously, this has required a little patience. I've drastically reduced my submissions that last year and a half, because I found that, quite simply, I was encountering submission calls, dashing out stories based on those submission calls, sending them in, and when they were rejected...left with stories that would probably be ill-fits elsewhere. 

So the new goal became: to write short stories I really wanted to write, and then submit them where they fit.

And so, I've reached another milestone: I got to write a story in the novella I've wanted to write for over a year, and I'm currently writing story I've wanted to write for months.

That, quite frankly, is all kinds of awesome.

On Being Inspired Once Again by the Late Charles Grant: Work Ethic and Reading Habits

As always, I've been thinking a lot about why I do what I do, every day.  Getting up every morning at 2:30 AM to read and write before everyone else gets up. I'm bound to think about it a lot, because I ask myself the same sleepy question every day, those first ten minutes sitting on the edge of my bed, trying to draw myself together: "Remind me again...why do I do this?"

And the answer, more and more, comes back as thus: to write, for writing's sake.  Because I love reading and writing, and (outside of being with immediate family) don't really want to do anything else.  And, I'm daily thankful I CAN pull myself together so early in the morning and write every day, because I suspect (well, no, lots of people tell me) that others might not be able to do that. So managing to write every day - even with a full time job, two children and a family to build - has become a blessing itself.

I've shed a lot of "things" by the wayside.  Baggage.  Allusions. Though I still have career aspirations, I no longer write with a career in mind. I'm finishing a novel on-spec because I NEED to finish it. Same thing with a novella. And for the last year, I've jotted down ideas for short stories, SAVING those ideas, not rushing and slamming them down in time to submit to this or that anthology published by this or that publisher, but giving them time to marinate and grow in my brain.Waiting until the time is RIGHT to...er...write.

I've scaled down greatly on Cons. Mostly, because of money, but that's made me realize something very important: while Cons are crucial in networking and it's wildly fun to hang with like-minded scribes and friends...they're not what's most important in a writing career. There are two things most important in a writing career: reading and writing, and I'm committed to doing those two things, above all the other "stuff" I used to think important in a writing "career".

Also, I'm doing my best - and getting better - at ignoring social media. While a reality that can't be ignored by today's writer, a tool that must be used, it poses one definite drawback: the constant, daily, "in your face" from other writers pimping their wares. Some of them make me jealous and depressed. Because they're moving (or appear to be) much quicker along than I am.  Some of them annoy me, because they're posting reviews comparing their work to Stephen King, pimping crappy self-published fare and their fifty-fifth free novel download from Amazon.

And, quiet frankly, some of them make me jealous and depressed AND annoy me. Because, despite my best efforts, I wonder what I'm doing wrong. Or, if I just know the wrong people, and for some reason, because I'm not on certain people's "radar" and never will be, my career will only go so far.

I have no idea what it was like in the "old days", but I suspect it was a lot simpler without social media. You kept your head down.  You read and you wrote and you submitted.  You collected your rejections and kept writing.  Even when you sold a work, you didn't run off and post about it on numerous social media outlets, blogging about your story, "breaking it down" for folks who couldn't care a less, you put your head down and wrote some more. You attended Cons and workshops, but at home you surrounded yourself with your thoughts and ideas and inspirations, cut yourself off from the world, and just WROTE.  

(And of course, I waffle on this.  One day, I hate Facebook and everything it stands for in authors pimping themselves, and the next, I pimp my most recent story)

But I've been thinking more and more of several things written about one of my favorite writers, the late Charlie Grant, in his best-of collection, Scream Quietly. The first by Stephen King, in his introduction:

Charles Grant works at it.  Not all these stories (in said collection) came easy; he probably had physical headaches over plenty.  His stomach was probably upset as he wrote some of them, he probably smoked too much over some of them, lay awake over some of them.  He probably wrote some of them thinking in the back of his mind it would be a hell of a nice day to go to the beach and wrote others thinking it would be a hell of a nice day to find some long field bordered by blazing autumn trees and ramble it to its far end.  If he's like most writers, I imagined his back ached and his kidneys felt crunched during more than one stint at the typewriter, and I imagine that more than once his brain itself felt crunched, dismal, and as devoid of inspiration as a sleety afternoon late December.






I keep coming back to this little bit.  Work ethic. How important it is. How maybe, in the end, it's the only important thing.  There's so much we can't control in LIFE, period, much less in pursuing a writing career. The one thing I can control is my work ethic. I don't know if I'll ever earn the tag "writing professional." But I can certainly write with a professional attitude. 

Also,  I've broadened my scope of inspiration even wider. In Scream Quietly, an essay by Nancy Holder says this about Charlie Grant: 

He kept a notebook by his elbow while he watched TV and his plethora of horror movies, looking for new words...

And in an interview in the same collection, when asked about "How he writes", Charlie said:

I keep a log...its titles, last lines from songs, something there I could use. And I have images...images is what starts me with books.

In the same interview, when asked for his advice to young writers, he said this:

Read...read anything and everything. Read the old stuff, too. Get a little foundation for what's gone before so you don't repeat. I see that a lot in the new writers. That's all they read - the genre they write in. They have no idea what makes a good novel, because most novels are awful. Read good mysteries, good thrillers. Read Dickens. Read Mark Twain. Read. Just read. That's the only real honest way to learn how to write is to read what the best writers have done. 

So another thing I've tried to do, more and more, is stuff myself full of works for inspiration (if you've been following my Goodreads updates, you've seen this). And it's been a dizzying summer, intellectually speaking, so far.  Reading and reviewing current horror. Reading classic gothic horror, suspense/thrillers. Reading hundreds of short stories, both horror and literary. My "Bradbury a Day" short story challenge, which is still going strong.  A poem by William Blake before bed every night, a Robert Frost poem when I get up, every morning.

And I've got more stuff I want to consume. More poets. More literary writers like Faulkner and O'Connor. More classic horror, pulp horror, newer horror.  Like Charlie said: I want to read anything and everything.

I still have no idea where this is all going. But I think I'm starting to really enjoy it, more than I ever have. Because I enjoy it for what it IS, not for its status. And that can't be a bad thing.

On Decoding That Coming of Age Novel I Want to Write, and How My Dad Is Going to Help

I had a completely different blog planned for this morning, but realized I was able to sum it up entirely in a Facebook post, so I went with this:

Was going to blog about this, but been busy, so here it is: have no idea where my "career" is headed. But lately, I've just been unbelievably thankful that I'm able to get every morning like this and write - write EVERY DAY. Sure, I still have my hopes and dreams, and then more realistic goals. I've absorbed all kinds of "writing advice" - about the craft and career choices - from dozens of writers. But at this point, I'm just happy to "be here", toiling away every day. Because that's what makes a person a "writer". And I'm down with that.

Really, what more is there to say? The most important part of a writing career is the writing, and I all need for that is pen, paper, a little time every day, somewhere quiet (preferably my office,  filled with my cool "Bradbury Shelf" and all the books I love, which has become my sanctuary as of late), and I don't need anything else.  Because that's writing. That's the stuff I can control, every single day.

But, I was able to express that in a Facebook post, so I'll move on this morning to what I've been turning over in my head a lot lately, above all the current writing projects: my magnum opus, my epic coming-of-age novel, based on my life and friends dear to me.

The one that's failed, miserably, over and over.

Probably my favorite kind of novel is the "coming-of-age" novel.  IT, of course, by Stephen King, is one of my all time favorites. Boy's Life and Mystery Walk by Robert McCammon and To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee are also beloved, as is The Talisman by King and Straub, Phantoms, by Thomas Tessier, Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury, and too many others to name. Believe it or not, A Christmas Story - the movie - is a staple in this house.

And I've tried to write that novel, so many times before.  It was the first post-science fiction novel I ever tried to write, almost seven years ago.  And I spent five or six years rewriting the first half of that novel, until I gave up, decided I had to start smaller. 

I experienced some successes. Small ones, to be sure, but enough to convince me it was time to try again.

And, it failed once more.   Died at around six hundred pages.  But luckily, Billy the Kid started talking in my ear around that time, I outlined it, and now I'm almost done with that. And in the meantime, I've written a novella, and am halfway through another.

But I've been turning that unfinished novel over in my head this entire time. Because I really WANT to write that novel.  So in the meantime, while writing other things, I've re-read novels similar to the one I want to write, studying them. Breaking them down.  

Now, here's  the thing:

I've heard from several different folks who feel that, as a writer, you CAN'T analyze works of literature, break them down, study them, see what makes them tick, to make you a better writer. That somehow this ruins the magic, and ruins your creativity.

Every writer is different, and different things work for them. But as an English teacher of 10 years, having studied English and Creative Writing at the undergraduate and graduate level, I disagree.

Sort of.

See, I sort of agree.  And, I've fallen prey to studying other writers too much. When I first started writing, I wrote a lot like Stephen King (or so friends said. They were probably just being nice). But, that made sense: I read NOTHING but Stephen King, then.  

Then came a Dean Koontz phase. A Lovecraft phase. A Bradbury phase. Hopefully, I've worked myself out of that, because I try to keep my reading very diverse these days. Although, I have caught myself trying to imitate Charles Grant, lately.

But when it comes to a specific TYPE of novel, or a novel that you're stuck on, I believe study of like works CAN help.  See, this big, epic, sprawling "coming-of-age" novel is something I DESPERATELY want to write.  So this entire time, while I've been writing other stuff, I've been studying other works, mulling over this unfinished manuscript while driving, running errands, walking, mowing.

And the first thing I realized was terribly simple: I was having such a problem because I was trying to mix two things: a coming-of-age novel with a fast-paced, F. Paul Wilson/Dean Koontz-esque supernatural thriller. So, my first realization: I had two novels competing for the same space, and they needed to be separated. 

And, spring-boarding off that idea, I thought about what makes coming-of-age stories so powerful: REAL LIFE STUFF.  Which is important for all works of fiction,  but it seems like coming-of-novel stories hinge on real life stuff almost as much as the main plot.

So, I picked my favorite coming-of-age stories: Boy's Life, To Kill A Mockingbird, It, Dandelion Wine and - believe it or not - A Christmas Story. And what I've realized - through studying them -  is that they're all composed of small little stories about real life, stuff not necessarily connected to the plot itself. Certainly supportive of character development...but they serve as stories unto themselves, also.

Ah.

Ha.

Now I still have a lot of work to do.  But as soon as  that revelation hit me - like a thunderbolt - I grabbed a pen and started scribbling down all the stories I remembered of my childhood that would serve as springboards for a plot. And, WOW.

There were a lot of them. So I made a list.  And realized that all I  needed was a central, connecting narrative... and there it was.  Also, my Dad and I have been talking about a project that's left me giddy with its story-telling potential. 

Dad wants to chronicle his childhood and memories of family, friends, and the fifties, and he'd like me to write something about them. Sort of chronicle a memoir. He's going to record himself talking about his memories of that time, and turn them over to me.  I agreed, on the condition I could draw on them for my fiction. He agreed. As you can imagine, this is probably one of the greatest resources I could ever hope to draw upon.

So, someday. Soon.  Maybe even after Billy is completed, if the story "calls to me" strongly enough. I mean, hey - it took Stephen King over 10 years to write and complete It. 

Figure I've got a few more years.....

On Building My Novels Like Blocks; Or, How Love Is Enough to Push On

After taking a side-trip to work on a quite unexpected - but delightfully realized - novella, I've jumped back into the "Billy the Kid" novel.  Been over a year working on this one, every single day, and I have to say I've really loved it. First of all, it looks like - barring anything further unexpected - this the first novel draft I'll ever actually finish.

And that, in itself, is saying something.  Especially considering I spent five years re-writing the first half of my first "novel", and then a year and a half writing 600 pages of my second "novel" before it ground to a halt a little over a year ago, before I began the Billy Project.  And even before that, TEN years ago, my first-first novel (an overly-bloated monstrosity of 178,000 words) didn't even end, but finished with  a cliff-hanger "to-be-continued" ending.

And, I have an outline to thank for it all.

Never thought I'd say that.

See, I used to be one of these folks who'd write by the seat of their pants, "going with the flow", discovering the story along the way.  My favorite writers did it -  Stephen King, Robert McCammon - so why couldn't it?

Problem was, I kept getting frustrated.  Stopping, rewriting, changing the story...because I didn't know the ending. I wasn't necessarily a first-draft perfectionist, as blogged about by Mike Duran, but not knowing that ending really screwed up the works.

Then, I wrote Hiram Grange, and because I was on a deadline, I used an outline. Was pleasantly surprised with how quickly I wrote because of that.  But then dismissed it with: "Well, that's fine for a novella. I'll never outline my novels.  They occur best organically."

And then, a year and a half later, I ground to a half on my second unfinished novel.

Because I couldn't nail the ending.

And then I read an interview with NY Times Bestselling author - and very helpful - F. Paul Wilson, in which he adamantly advocated outlining, his words being something like: "It's my damn novel, and it'll do what I want it to." That gave me pause, because by then I'd fallen deeply in love with Paul's work and Repairman Jack.  So I thought, "Wow. If outlining produces novels as streamlined and well-paced as Paul's...."

So, before plunging into The Billy Project, I took the time to outline it first.

And here I am, little over a year later - having written the most words ever on one project - confidently closing in on the ending.  And that's the key word for me, there. Not faster. But confidently.  Because I know the ending. I'll finish it. And because of that, I've enjoyed this writing project as much as Hiram Grange, more than another other writing project I've ever worked on before.

Because I know where it's going.

I've also really enjoyed the editing process I've applied to this novel.  Encountered it first in one of Norman Partridge's blogs, in which he likened it to a house. You build the foundation - write the opening chapters, establish the story - go back and edit them.  Then move forward on to the next "section" - edit - and move on.  And that's what I've done with Billy, most specifically:

1. written a section long hand, until I felt I needed to stop
2. typed it, editing it along the way
3. line-edited that typed segment
4. applied edits
5. moved on to write next long-hand segment

And again, I've loved this. It's so immersive.  It's allowed me to shape and tweak the story along the way, as well as show me how much I can cut out, too.  And, who cares how long it takes, really? Especially right now.  There's no guarantee I'll sell this anywhere.  And no pressure, no deadline. Maybe someday, there will be deadlines pushing me. Or maybe never, and I'll never sell another piece of fiction.

Either way, I'm enjoying this. Loving it, the way you're supposed to.  And right now - that's good enough.  That's all I need, to love it, and do it every day.

Which dovetails perfectly into my next post...loving it and doing it every day being all I need to push on...

Weekly Round-Up - Where I'm "At"

It's summer break, which means I'm doing lots all over the 'Net. Here's a round-up of where I've been the past few weeks:

- recent review of The Telling, by Mike Duran, over at Shroud Magazine Book Reviews

- a "Modest History of Horror" installment at The Midnight Diner, featuring Al Sarrantonio

- yesterday's blog about my Dad building things with his hands, and how I build things with words

- my first podcast in an upcoming podcast series covering my study of the horror genre, at Tales to Terrify


 - and here's what my office looks like

That's about all for now. More reviews later this week and another blog, probably. Now off to run Madi to camp, polish off the novella, and maybe hit the beach again for some reading time, if it's nice.....

By My Father's Hands, By My....Words? On Sacrificing Stuff

Last week, our water heater died. Or, as it happens, just stopped working for a day.  I stared at it, mumbled "Huh."

And called Dad.

Two weeks ago, my lawnmower broke - a mooring holding the engine down snapped, so every time I pulled the cord, the engine tipped back (not good). So, I called Dad.

Once, the water pipes burst.

In my face. So, with water gushing all over the place.....you guessed it. Called Dad.  And he came out with his acetylene torch, copper tubing, and fixed the dang thing.

I could go on. As  you can see, I'm not much of a handyman.




Not long ago,  author Briane Keene blogged about his weekend-long writing marathon, to catch up on deadlines. In his blog, he shared something I really identified with: 

I didn’t mow the lawn. I didn’t clean the house. I ignored all incoming phone calls. I skipped out on attending events , and I declined invitations to hang out with friends. All I did was write. 

Now, I can't say I've ever endured a writing marathon of that magnitude. But the part about stuff he wasn't able to do - because he was writing - really struck a chord within me. Ordinarily, with rare exceptions - like this week, with Madi at summer camp, and Zack at summer school, leaving the whole week free -I usually write for two hours EARLY in the AM, and if I'm lucky, an hour right before bed.

But I do it. Every single day. And even if for some reason I sleep in, I steal some moments at some point later in the day to get my quota in. I've had to make sacrifices in order to do this.

1. To get up so early every day, I need a rock-solid, set bedtime. So, I don't watch TV anymore (which is okay, 'cause I really don't think there's much good on).

 2. I don't have much of a "social life". See above, RE: bed time.  But that's okay, because I'm not much of a social person. Kind of a hermit.  I've always said that if weren't for Abby and the kids, I'd never leave home. But even so, there are things I'd like to attend occasionally - basketball games, concerts, plays, poetry readings, etc - but if I did, I wouldn't be able to get up early the next morning and write. 

3. I'd call myself a "good" teacher. I do the best I can.  But I'll never win "Teacher of the Year", have yearbooks dedicated to me, or win any awards.  Those folks - they amaze me.  They eat, sleep, dream, breathe, live teaching. I'm not even sure I COULD do that.  But the fact is, though I love teaching...I'm a writer.  Any spare minute I have will be dedicated to that. Not my teaching career.

4. I keep up with the chores as best I can, try to maintain the upkeep around here.  But there are big projects that need to be done.  And sometimes, I wonder if I'll ever get to them.  Why? If I have a free moment, I'm not working on the sidewalk, mowing the lawn, staining the fence, or trimming the trees.  I'm reading or writing something. 

And, being a man - this is a source of never-ending guilt. I try to keep on top of things, but it's always been this way.  When I was kid, Dad once tried to prod me outside, teach me how to tune the car up. My response? "But I'm not done with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe yet!"  And this leads directly to the last: 

5. I'll never be the craftsman my father is. He amazes me. I'm literally envious every time I visit (once a week, over the summers), when I look at everything he's built: with his own hands. By himself.  Check it out, below:




I'm okay at basic repairs, I can mow the lawn, change a tire (used to be able to actually tune up old FORDS), paint, and I'm decent at gardening.  But I'll never be able to build stuff like this.  Yeah, I know: I'm comparing my 38 year-old self to a retirement-age engineer who's been working with his hands all his life.  When he was 38, he wasn't building BARNS by himself, with his hands.

But, that's the thing: I'll never be able to build stuff like this.  Because I made a choice, long ago.  That I'd build things with words, not my hands.  And I'm pretty sure - unless something changes in a big way - when I'm done writing, give up, whatever, those buildings of my Dad's will still be around long after my words fade away.

I can tell you one thing that came from Dad, though. The work ethic.  Dad always preached that, from day one. If you "love" something, "prove it". Don't talk about it. JUST DO IT. (Apologies, Nike. My Dad said it first). Go do it, every day, and maximize what you have.  And, well...I "love the IDEA" of building stuff like my dad, but I LOVE WRITING more.

Which leads into my next blog topic, coming soon....

On the Autistic Character I Want To Write Someday

I've talked a lot about our son Zack and his autism. This blog isn't exactly about him - although an update is overdue - but more about how I've wanted, for a really long time, to write an autistic character into some of my fiction.

Writers often draw from personal experience in crafting their fiction. Some of the most powerful stories, I believe, are drawn from the well of personal experience. This is not to say, however, that writers transcribe fictional events directly from real life events, but rather channel thoughts and emotions and memories to inspire elements of fiction based on personal events.  Because award-winning author Gary Braunbeck put it best in his recent writing memoir, To Each Their Darkness , "Great fiction doesn't give a damn how it REALLY happened."

Case in point: several years ago I wrote a novella for my graduate school thesis, about a man whose autistic son dies, and afterward he's haunted by what he's done...and maybe, by his son. I've had to re-write it, however, because the original version was too close to how it really happened. Which, when you bog things down with lengthy passages on diagnoses, treatment options, trying to take things that happened to us and turning them - exactly as they happened - into stories....you don't get very good fiction.  At least, not for me. SO, I shelved that for two years, and am now slowly re-writing it, also removing the boy's autism.

Because I think Zack's autism is too close to me.  I can't find the distance to write about it as a STORYTELLER first, and parent of an autistic child second, or even third. I get too ranty, and that doesn't make for good storytelling.

Also, lots of people have written about autistic children, at this point.  In very realistic, and supernaturalistic (they have powers, are savants, etc) ways.   Another case in point, I recently changed a child's condition again in a work, because the "autistic-child with super-freaky psychic powers" HAS been done, by now. Lots.

But I still want to create an autistic child character with "special" talents. Probably in the next novel.  But I want him to be severely autistic, and perhaps have severe speech and communication limitations.  How can he communicate with others, how can he form thoughts and ideas, however?  This is something I struggled with for awhile.  Then, I had a brainstorm. Believe it or not, it came from Transformers 3.

Yes, you heard me. Transformers 3 (Because I grew up with Transformers, and they are good, explodey, action fun).  I found my inspiration in this one scene with Bumble-Bee.  Jump to 2:05 to see it.



I've always thought of Bumblee-Bee as autistic, in a way. Very cliche, I know, only because he can't talk...but, call me an overwrought emotional sensationalist (and you'd be correct), I find something very poignant in a character that can't speak, but must us a hodge-podge semblance of speech from others' words.

And that's the idea I have in mind. Sorta. An autistic child that's largely non-verbal, read to all his life, and the only way he can think and express his ideas and communicate is through snippets of poetry and literature. (Peter Straub did something similar in A Dark Matter , though the character was traumatized and living in an institution, not autistic).

Anway, I'm not quite there yet, so my ideas may change.  And no - especially considering Brian Keene's blog this morning - I'm not afraid someone will steal my idea.  Mostly, because I'm still tinkering with it.

Tinkering. That's me, always tinkering....