Michelle L. Levigne's Blog, page 68

New release sample: QUITTING THE HERO BIZ

 As the weeks crawled by and fall turned into winter, the reactions in Fendersburg wavered slowly back and forth. Glad the Ghost was gone, because it meant he wasn't interfering with their lives. Glad the Ghost was letting them grow up and think for themselves. Suddenly, the Ghost showing up to fix or prevent every minor catastrophe was seen as interference with the rights and freedoms of the people of Fendersburg. Then someone would make a mistake, cause an accident, take a stupid risk, essentially thumb their nose at the warnings of people with more common sense, and suddenly everyone was furious again. The Ghost had no right to abandon his responsibilities. The race resumed to blame someone for driving the Ghost away.

There was always someone who spoke with an almost homesick fondness for the days when the Ghost showed up within a few seconds of a call for help or the sound of squealing brakes. Girls who had never been within a hundred yards of the Ghost talked about the sound of his voice, the touch of his hand, feeling his arm around them as he carried them away from danger. Jane wondered how many times she could hear such outright lies in her shop before she became physically ill. As time went on, the worst of the airhead liars got into fights with each other over who the Ghost would have dated and eventually married.

She found some amusement in the torments Otis went through, when people remembered the broad hints he had dropped that he was the Ghost. Girls wanted him to prove his secret identity. People wanted him to pay for damage that he, as the Ghost, hadn't prevented.

New release sample: QUITTING THE HERO BIZ

 At the three-week mark, Jane took off Saturday night after closing up the spa and headed for Neighborlee. She walked around all day on Sunday, glorying in the quiet, the fall sunshine, the people who smiled at a total stranger and offered advice on where to get the best burger, the best bed & breakfast, and recommended she attend the college’s newest theatrical production. She made an appointment with the realtor to look at the Spindelmutter building, and laughed at herself, remembering last time she thought about doing it the Ghost’s way. It was perfect. Huge picture windows and a recessed doorway, old brick, in the middle of the business district, in a long row of quaint, fifties-style buildings.

The realtor, Debbi Kunardi, answered all Jane's questions. She couldn't take over the building right away. The county building inspector had found major foundation damage that needed to be repaired. The owner was in the middle of gathering estimates and determining what he wanted to do, how extensive he wanted to make the repairs. When Debbi told him that Angela at Divine's Emporium had recommended the location to Jane, the owner promised the repairs wouldn't impact the lease price at all. He would even sign a paper locking in his price before he found out the cost of repairs, guaranteeing Jane would have first refusal after the renovations had been made. He also promised a power wash to freshen up the outside of the building.

"Definitely weird," Katie agreed, when Jane reported on the results of her first foray into resettling to Neighborlee. "But nice." 

"It's kind of like what Beau told me. The town is alive and reaches out to welcome you, if you've found your place there."

Off the Bookshelf: STARGAZER, by Dan Wells

Audible, Audio Drama, Middle Grade

Full cast

Zero and Nyx are up to their chins in trouble yet again, on the colony world Kaguya. Colony ships that left Earth after their ship, the Pathfinder, had improved engines, so they are startled when one ship arrives years early. Even worse, Nyx's pirate family managed to sneak on board the new ship and hide among the colonists in cold sleep, and they land on Kaguya ready to do some more pirating and get rich and powerful. 

Problem: a second ship that left Earth is nowhere in sight. Did it crash on a nearby planet? Zero and Nyx barely manage to escape the prison the pirates put them in before they get into more trouble: trying to stop the pirates from finding the wreckage of the missing ship. Oh yeah, and they have to deal with nasty castaways, dragons, xenon in the air, and some prejudice that makes life pretty hard for Nyx.

Will they save the day? Listen and find out. Love this series by one of the contributors to the Writing Excuses podcast, and I certainly hope there's another installment coming out soon. 
 

New release sample: QUITTING THE HERO BIZ

 The usual bi-monthly diatribe about vigilantes and people living in fantasy worlds ran in the Fendersburg Trumpet a week after the Ghost's resignation letter. Instead of the usual demand for intensive psychiatric evaluation for the Ghost, the letter writer, Marijane Hunter, congratulated the Ghost on finally gaining some perspective and a grasp on reality.

Three days later, her house was burglarized. She wrote a scathing letter to the editor, blaming the entire town for the Ghost's retirement.

Other than Marijane being robbed, Jane didn't notice any change in the crime rate in Fendersburg. She suspected someone had struck Marijane because of her letters to the editor. For all she knew, people blamed her vitriolic letters for the Ghost leaving.

The accident rate went down, now that people no longer took their safety for granted. Jane would have laughed, except she felt an odd little twinge of guilt. Had she encouraged people to be careless about their own welfare? Maybe her leaving was good for Fendersburg. Maybe it was good for the world that there really weren’t any comic book style superheroes.

It didn't matter. She reminded herself of that firmly every time she heard someone discussing the Ghost’s reasons for quitting. She reminded herself of that every time she crossed a day off her hidden countdown calendar.

New release sample: QUITTING THE HERO BIZ

 

Timmy Higgs got stuck in the tree, chasing his balsa wood plane two days after the letter appeared in the paper. He hung there for nearly half an hour before his mother called for the fire department. Ginny Piper, Fendersburg's fire chief, laughed about it when she came into the spa that afternoon for her weekly therapeutic massage.

"Kind of nice, you know? Using our equipment and training." She sighed as Jane rubbed deep into her shoulder muscles. "That kid was actually scared, just hanging there, kicking and starting to blubber. And you know what he told me when we got him down to the ground? He said the Ghost was his friend, and he wanted to know what we did to scare him away. The Ghost has too much sense to be friends with that brat. He kicked me in the ankle when I told him not to climb that tree again." She snorted. "His mother swatted his bottom before she dragged him away. I bet that's the first time that ever happened. For both of them."

"Probably," Jane agreed. Inside the privacy of her head, she wavered between shrieking and laughter. Timmy thought he was her friend? Not for all the tea in Asia!

Off the Bookshelf: SOVEREIGN, by Jeff Hirsch

 

Audible

Narrated by Jesse Einstein

Micah  is living the dream -- space exploration before he even gets into high school. The problem is that it's his parents' dream, not his. He just wants to go back home to Earth and reunite with his friends.

The Doris, the little mining/exploration ship crewed by just his parents, is days and jump gates of travel away from the nearest station when disaster strikes. A meteor storm forces Micah to abandon ship. He lands on the planet Sovereign in a lifeboat. One disaster after another strikes, separating Micah from his lifeboat, from the equipment that will help him survive, and from any hope of sending out a distress call and eventually being rescued. And where are his parents? Why haven't they repaired the Doris and come back for him?

Micah has one chance remaining, but the equipment he needs to send for help is more than two months of walking away, across unknown territory, with weird, ferocious native animals, and no certainty of edible food or clean water. His struggle for survival and the choices he makes and the things he learns about himself along the way make for an intense listening experience.

New release sample: QUITTING THE HERO BIZ

 

"The moment you're ready to make the move, do let me know." Angela rested her hand on Jane's wrist for a few seconds. "I know a good two, three dozen people who would be ecstatic to have a place like yours come into town. In fact, if you started now, you could be open in time to take advantage of the Christmas rush."

"Oh... I... Well..." Jane fought not to yank her hand out from the soothing warmth of Angela's hand. “It’s not that easy.”

Demetrius and Beauregard would never let her abandon Fendersburg. Even if the Rivals were ignoring the town lately.

"Anything is possible."

Later, as Angela was ringing up the shirts Jane had picked out, and a bag of two pieces from every candy jar, the Wishing Ball caught her attention. Angela laughed and nodded at it.

"Go ahead. Make a wish." A chiming laugh escaped her. Something in her gaze dared Jane, while quashing the automatic, unspoken response: Wishes are for children.

Jane waited a moment for the colors to swirl gently in the reflective, black opal surface. They didn't. When she put her hand flat on the top curve, she didn't feel that zip-tingle she had always gotten as a child when she made her wish. The disappointment was thick enough to block any words she might have tried to speak.

Please... I want to get out of Fendersburg. Away from those lazy, greedy, totally oblivious people. I want to find a new place to live, and a spa even better than the one I have now, where people use common sense and don't expect a miracle to come out of a jar. I want... I want there to be magic again. Something beyond me, bigger than me, stronger than me. Something mysterious and awesome.

A single spark leaped off the Wishing Ball as she removed her hand and Jane gasped, staring at her index finger where the spark rested for a moment, a golden-green, swirling ball that seemed to have a core of black, just before it vanished.

She thought Angela frowned at her, but a moment later she wore her usual serene, slightly superior, slightly amused expression. What her friend Katie always called a "Vulcan smirk."

New release sample: QUITTING THE HERO BIZ

 "I have a spa, back home. Facials, manicures, pedicures, massages, sauna."

"You do all that? Multi-talented. And probably overworked." Angela gestured with a tip of her head toward a corner of the main room. Jane saw a white wrought iron bistro table and chairs.

Definitely overworked, but nothing I can admit to you.

Angela chuckled as she went behind the counter. "Iced green tea with ginseng and honey?"

"That sounds lovely, thanks." Jane settled down at the little table. "Umm, actually, I don't do all those things. I have people who come in and provide services. I have plenty of room in my store, so... Most of what I do is make appointments and sell all sorts of teas and creams and bath salts. The good kind, the legitimate kind," she hurried to add.

"Of course. I wouldn't expect anything else." Angela came back to the table with two glasses full of ice and two tall bottles of iced green tea in Jane's favorite brand. 

Was there room behind the counter for a cooler and glasses and ice? She shrugged away that consideration. Things happened at Divine's Emporium and it was wiser not to ask questions. Answers might destroy the wonder, the sense of "anything is possible."

"We could use a spa like yours. If you ever consider coming back home to Neighborlee, I know just the place. The old Spindelmutter building. Lots of room, three floors, and the third floor is an apartment. You could add a whirlpool and expand your offerings to include exercise clothes and such."

Jane took the information from Angela and chatted about the possibilities. She had actually been thinking about expanding her merchandise to include clothes and homeopathic treatments. Who was she hurting by playing along? It was a good cover story.

Although, a niggling sense of warning crept through her after just a minute or two. Essentially, she was lying to Angela, and Jane vaguely remembered some unspoken law that no one ever crossed Angela or tried to steal from Divine’s Emporium.

New release sample: QUITTING THE HERO BIZ

 

Angela smiled wider, her expression lighting up as she studied Jane's face. "Yes, definitely. You were that quiet, pale little girl who kept trying to turn yourself invisible." She laughed.

Jane laughed with her. The caress in Angela’s voice made her attempts to fade into the wallpaper sound charming. Sensible.

"I still have that volume of The Jungle Book you loved to read whenever you visited. Jane Wilson. Or did you change your name when you became a legal adult? Did your adopted parents change your name? Never mind. That's your business." She waved her hand, brushing away the questions before Jane could feel invaded. "What brings you to Neighborlee?"

"Playing hooky." She laughed a little.

It was nearly the truth, even if she was here on official Hoax, Inc., business. The grinding stupidity of Fendersburg, where everyone expected the Ghost to save them from a total lack of common sense, made any brief escape feel like a vacation.

"From what?" 

For a moment, that familiar, crooked little knowing smile played across Angela's face. It hinted she knew all the things Jane couldn't say, the things she was feeling and hadn't been able to put into words. She knew her secrets and would wait patiently until Jane was ready to spill them.

Off the Bookshelf: STUCK, by Chris Grabenstein

 

Audible Original

Reminiscent of old-time radio drama. A fun performance by a full cast.

Life is rough for Jackson, who anticipates with dread moving up to middle school. Until his grandfather makes a wish for him ... and suddenly he's living fifth grade over and over again. Which is fine for a while,  since he knows all the answers in school, and he's able to improve in baseball and trumpet playing.

But there's the problem of all his friends leaving him behind, as they grow up and move on in life ... and forgetting him. Every new school year, everybody else's reality and their memories of him get re-set. What's a kid to do to get unstuck, and move on with his life again? Every time Jackson figures out how to re-wish and fix the problem, it doesn't work.

Jackson has to learn some important lessons about life in general, and himself in particular, before his answer comes and he gets his own re-set.

Clever!