Edward Hoornaert's Blog, page 43
June 5, 2018
She didn’t even shudder #mfrwhooks
Today, I have some backstory about one of my heroines’ wound from my WIP titled Audra Fleeing Audra Finding, book 5 in the Alien Contact for Idiots series. Here’s the short-form blurb:
She’s running from an abusive lover . . . but what is she running to?
When her abusive lover threatens to take custody of her baby, Audra Verhailey flees where even he can’t follow: the aliens’ forbidden cities underneath Kwadra Island.
But can the safe isolation she wants for her daughter survive a search party, a gang of alien criminals — and the love of an emotionally damaged Kwadran?
Kwadra’s queen is twisting the arm of a reluctant Duchess Opsie Beaverpaw to lead the search for Audra, the runaway young mother. Opsie tells us more about Tal Bakwiss, the young man who had helped Audra to flee to the underworld.
“Tal is a scarred man.” Realizing that he was watching her hand performing its nervous habit, Opsie lowered her hand from her jaw. “He sort of personifies Kwadra’s situation on this Earth. He’s a brilliant guy who can install or fix almost any of our devices. But does he use his skills? No, he works in construction.”
“Like you,” Verhailey said.
She’d started to touch her plaster-filled scars again. She lowered her hand and sat on it. “Between marauders and environmental collapse, the last few decades were a traumatic for my people.” And for me. “Tal lost not only loved ones, but he watched his whole world die. Given the overwhelming demand for our twenty-third-century technologists, Tal should be a wealthy man, but . . .” She shrugged.
Tal is me, she thought, but with alcohol thrown into the mix. And I am Tal, filled with rage about what marauders had done to me . . . except that I hide it better.
“The marauders,” she explained, “were desperate people from neighboring countries that had reverted to savagery when Earth’s environment collapsed. Marauders, as much as bad air and a dying environment, were why we moved our cities underground and turned them into fortresses.”
Nineteen years ago, seven marauders had attacked her when she stubbornly sneaked onto the surface without an escort. What a naïve, spoiled idiot she’d been. When she stole a knife and plunged it to the hilt into one of her assailant’s eyes, they avenged their dead comrade by beating and slashing her, then leaving her for dead: bleeding, naked, and shivering in cold, windswept rain.
A brief replay flickered across her mind, highlights only, yet she didn’t even shudder.
Maybe she and Tal should get roaring drunk together some time.
Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.
June 2, 2018
Effing Feline teases dogs #8sunday
I, Effing Feline, hate the cat videos on Youtube. Instead of glorifying my glorious species, they portray us as creatures to laugh at. That is so misguided. If you silly humans really must laugh at some animal, laugh at dogs instead!
Ed is working on rewrites of his near-future SFR tentatively titled Audra Fleeing Audra Finding. Audra Verhailey, a runaway young mother, flees with her baby from Oregon to Kwadra Island — a “duplicate” of Vancouver Island that its Native American rulers “hopped” here from an alternate Earth.
Penniless and desperate, twenty-something Audra lets a Kwadran construction worker guide her up a wilderness mountain to a back entrance to Kwadra’s abandoned underground cities. Eyes twinkling, he tells her they’ve reached their goal and challenges her to see what’s invisible. She succeeds, seeing bushes swaying in the breeze from the ventilation tunnel they were searching for.
The twinkle spread from his eyes to his whole face, revealing a different man underneath his impassive, unresponsive exterior. He was the opposite of Kwadran Island: Its buried cities were old and abandoned, but his buried features were young and full of life. For a second — two seconds — she was so startled by the change that she yearned to trust him.
“Your hiding spot awaits you, cheechako; whoever’s chasing you, they’ll never find you underground.” He rose effortlessly to his feet then reached a hand to help her rise.
Girding herself against that alluring moment of trust, she tightened her lips — but she was facing uphill, with Roxie on her chest. There was no way she could stand up on her own without undignified flopping and grunting and waking the baby, who’d want to eat, and no way was she breastfeeding in front of this guy — so she took his hand.
It was, she thought in surprise, a very nice hand, large, strong, and callused from honest hard work, though it somehow seemed delicate enough for more than mere hammering. He pulled both her and Roxie upright with ease, and she ended up nearer than she liked.
Audra discovered she didn’t mind this man’s closeness nearly as much as she expected.
Effing Feline here again. I told you about laughing at dogs — well, here is the absolutely perfect video for you to start on. This video is perfect. Ed can only hope to write something as timeless as this!
Be sure to visit the other writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.
Sale! Sale! Sail!
Newborn, book three in the Alien Contact for Idiots series, is on sale for just 99c on June 2 and 3.
Click the image below.
Find and click Earth-based Science Fiction.
[image error] Newborn
She was born to kill. Not love.
Jo Beaverpaw is born fully grown, well-armed, and impatient to tackle her Destiny … which is to kill her alien nation’s most wanted fugitive. Her life is pre-programmed and straightforward – until she meets the sexy bodyguard of her intended target.
May 29, 2018
Not the wishful-thinking type #mfrwhooks
Today, I have for you another hook from my WIP titled Audra Fleeing Audra Finding, book 5 in the Alien Contact for Idiots series. To help you figure out what’s going on, here’s the short-form blurb:
She’s running from an abusive lover . . . but what is she running to?
When her abusive lover threatens to take custody of her baby, Audra Verhailey flees where even he can’t follow: the aliens’ forbidden cities underneath Kwadra Island.
But can the safe isolation she wants for her daughter survive a search party, rebels determined to expel her from her newfound haven — and the love of an emotionally damaged Kwadran?
Kwadra’s queen is twisting the arm of a reluctant Duchess Opsie Beaverpaw to lead the search for a runaway young mother. In so doing, she introduces Opsie (the story’s secondary heroine) to Matthew Verhailey (the story’s secondary hero).
Verhailey had a cleft in his chin and a scar on his jaw, like hers but one-fourth the length. Straighter, too; his flesh had been cut cleanly, not torn like hers. She would’ve resented his good luck if she wasn’t constantly on guard against just this sort of jealousy.
He laced his hands and planted his elbows on his knees. “Audra is a twenty-two-year-old runaway, traveling with her baby, Roxie. My firm’s private investigator traced her to the ferry from Astoria to Kwadra Island. She was last seen getting into a pickup truck with a construction worker named Tal Bakwiss and driving toward—”
“Tal?” Opsie swiveled her head toward him.
“You know him?” he asked.
She nodded.
“It’s a pretty small island, I guess.”
“Not that small.” Thinking, Opsie ran a finger along the scar on her jaw.
“Then why do you know him?” Verhailey asked. “Can I hope it’s not through your official police capacity?”
“Yes, if you indulge in wishful thinking.”
His face hardened. No, he wasn’t the wishful-thinking type.
Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.
May 26, 2018
Effing Feline celebrates Memorial Day #8Sunday
I, Effing Feline, know that tomorrow is Memorial Day, a patriot US holiday. In honor of said patriotism, I dug out my sun glasses honoring the US and the other nations in Mr V’s heritage. How many of these flags do you recognize?
The first two are easy — along with Great Britain’s Union Jack, they’re the most widely recognized flags in the world. The other two, though, separate the Effing Felines of the world from mere puddy tats.
Ed is working on rewrites of his near-future SFR tentatively titled Audra Fleeing Audra Finding. Audra Verhailey, a runaway young mother, flees with her baby from Oregon to Kwadra Island — a “duplicate” of Vancouver Island that its Native American rulers “hopped” here from an alternate Earth.
Penniless and desperate, twenty-something Audra lets a Kwadran construction worker guide her up a mountainside to a forbidden back entrance to Kwadra’s abandoned underground cities. He says they’ve reached their goal, but she sees nothing.
“Look again,” he said, “and this time, see what’s invisible.”
No matter how she stared, though, she saw no eight-foot oval ventilation shaft into the hillside, no entrance to a safe haven in the now-abandoned underworld where Kwadrans had holed up when the environment of their alternate Earth went bad.
“I see an overgrown cliff, a bunch of trees, half of them dying — your forest isn’t adapting well to this Earth — and bright red berries on some bushes.” Glancing at him through narrowed eyes, she added, “And a guy I don’t trust.”
His eyes twinkled; “Notice anything about the bushes?”
“They’re, you know . . . bushes, okay? I have no idea what kind they are, if that’s what you’re after.”
But after several seconds, she saw something — something invisible.
A hundred feet uphill, shrubs were bending to and fro as though in a breeze, yet she felt no wind on her face. Feeling like Lewis and Clark exploring the wilderness, she licked her forefinger and held it up in all different directions; no breeze.
“Wind from the ventilation shaft,” she said, inordinately pleased even though she told herself she didn’t care what this guy thought.
Effing Feline here again. In honor of Memorial Day, here are a couple of patriotic songs that Mr. V’s woodwind quintet recorded a number of years ago, in honor of the commissioning of the USS Tucson:
Be sure to visit the other writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.
May 22, 2018
The Tiniest Trace of Sarcasm #mfrwhooks
Today, I have for you another hook from my WIP titled Audra Fleeing Audra Finding, book 5 in the Alien Contact for Idiots series. To help you figure out what’s going on, here’s the short-form blurb:
She’s running from an abusive lover . . . but what is she running to?
When her abusive lover threatens to take custody of her baby, Audra Verhailey flees where even he can’t follow: the aliens’ forbidden cities underneath Kwadra Island.
But can the safe isolation she wants for her daughter survive a search party, rebels determined to expel her from her newfound haven — and the love of an emotionally damaged Kwadran?
Today’s hook is about the formation of the search party. Kwadra’s Queen Elinor is twisting the arm of a reluctant Duchess Opsie Beaverpaw to lead the search.
Nowadays, Elinor served as an informal liaison between Americans and her new people. Matthew Verhailey must have applied to her for help. She hoped his request was more interesting than plastering, because helping him might mend some badly broken fences.
“I’m looking for a woman,” he said.
Opsie waved to indicate her unfinished office. “I’m afraid my brothel isn’t quite open for business.” The joke felt forced, but Elinor liked it when Kwadrans, especially the nobility, acted with the informality of her homeland.
Instead of smiling, Verhailey frowned. “It’s my niece, Audra.”
“Oh. Sorry.”
“She ran away to Kwadra and then disappeared,” Queen Elinor said. “We don’t have private investigators yet — too busy building our infrastructure from scratch — but as our recently retired head of the gendarmerie, you’re the closest we have.”
Opsie stifled a groan. Finding a runaway young woman who didn’t want to be found, on an island two-hundred-eighty miles long, sounded worse than plastering. But did she really have a choice?
“Thank you very much, Your Majesty,” she said with only the tiniest trace of sarcasm.
Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.
May 19, 2018
Effing Feline pees on that #8sunday
I, Effing Feline, am livid with rage! I’ve discovered that some jerk has stolen MY money.
Last week I showed you one of my greatest poems. You have to admit, it would’ve made a great book. But what did I learn? Some jerk has stolen my greatness and made a litter box full of money with a book called I Could Pee on This: And Other Poems by Cats. I’m outraged at this theft of MY IDEA!
But back to my job: writing this blog.
Ed is working on rewrites of his near-future SFR tentatively titled Audra Fleeing Audra Finding. Audra Verhailey, a runaway young mother, flees with her baby from Oregon to Kwadra Island — a “duplicate” of Vancouver Island that its Native American rulers “hopped” here from an alternate Earth.
Penniless and desperate, twenty-something Audra lets a Kwadran construction worker guide her up a wilderness mountain to a back entrance to Kwadra’s abandoned underground cities. She hopes to escape her abusive lover’s threat to get sole custody of her baby; he’s a lawyer, so the threats are believable. A brief flashback shows:
That she has a history of running away from problems, and
Why she panics when she’s alone with Mr. Helpful.
As a young teen, she ran away from home twice — which her foster mother, now her adoptive mother, had totally not deserved — so she knew all about girls who disappeared off the face of the Earth. Years ago, she had shared a tent with a street friend from Montana. They were veging out at Pioneer Courthouse Square when Evangeline met a fleek guy who seemed nice. She had wiggled her fingers at Audra in a cute, see-you-soon wave as she went off with him.
Never to be seen again.
The guy had had dark hair. Audra liked a boy in her class with blond hair, and that was the only reason she hadn’t flirted with this dude. But what if she, rather than Evangeline, had gone off with him . . . ?
She knew all this shit, yet what had she done? Gone off with a dark-haired guy who seemed nice.
Effing Feline here again. I have a plan to get even. I’m going to trademark the word Cat, then send threatening letters to authors with that in their title — and demand all their royalties. That’s a good idea, don’t you think?
Be sure to visit the other writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.
instaFREEbie
The Trial of Tompa Lee is available on Instafreebie. This science fiction novel with romantic elements rose to #2 in Amazon sci fi back when I released the e-book. It was a hardcover in 2005 (my last foray into trad publishing) and I created the e-book when I got the rights back.
Praise for The Trial of Tompa Lee:
[image error] “Tompa Lee is an attractive, ambitious vagabond.” — Arizona Daily Star
“Ed Hoornaert is a marvelous writer: a terrific, engrossing storyteller and a consummate stylist.” — Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo-Award winning author
“A rollicking romp on a distant planet, full of adventure and heart.” — Amber Belldene, author of the Blood Vine series
“Reminiscent of the best of classic Star Trek.” TheBestReviews.com
“Hold a tissue ready, as Mr. Hoornaert knows how to squeeze the heart of the reader.” — Love Romances
“Classic science fiction, but with enough character development to interest non-science fiction readers.” — Romance Reviews Today
Learn more about The Trial of Tompa Lee or The Trilogy of Tompa Lee.
May 15, 2018
Not going to have sex with you #mfrwhooks
Here’s another hook from my now-finished WIP, tentatively titled Audra Fleeing, Audra Finding. The title confused some people (including Lisabet, who’s opinion I cherish) because I haven’t shown you Audra yet. Instead I’ve been giving selections from the book’s other main thread.
Therefore I’ve decided to confuse you by switching to Audra’s thread. This is the very beginning of the book, and it’s longer than my usual. I apologize in advance!
Time: Five years from the next summer solstice.
Place: A forest on a duplicate of Vancouver Island that doesn’t exist…yet.
“I don’t care how helpful you’re being,” Audra Verhailey panted with as much defiant dignity as she could muster. “I am not going to have sex with you.”
[image error]Her lanky, dark-skinned guide—an honest-to-God alien from another world, though he looked like someone she might meet on an Indian Reservation—slowed his stride. He glanced back at her with a sad, faraway expression, as though remembering a healthier forest on a distant planet. Then he resumed climbing the steep hillside.
Scowling, she followed. If he got too far ahead, she’d have to shout, and that might wake Roxie, the best baby on this Earth. The least the alien bastard could do was stop to listen to her.
This was the first time either of them had spoken during forty minutes of climbing through a dense yet sickly evergreen forest that shrouded her with soul with a sense of otherworldly age. She’d been meaning to state her terms for at least thirty-nine of those minutes, ever since they started up this mountain. But the steep trail and his fierce silence had robbed her of words.
He was being so over-the-top helpful that he obviously wanted something from her. All she had was her baby and her body, and of those two she assumed that he, well…
She’d met him this morning when he climbed out of a construction company pickup truck near where she was sitting with a map spread out on dirt that would one day be a paved street or a sidewalk. Maybe a house. She remembered thinking they might have to build whatever-it-was around her dead body, because she was at the end of her hope, almost quivering with despair.
But then came an unexpected ray of not-despair. Baby Roxie had smiled up at him and dropped the keys Audra had given her to play with. He picked them up then let Roxie grab his finger.
For no better reason than that, Audra had made a rash decision she now regretted. She asked him if he could read the map for her. Maybe give her directions to her destination.
No, he wouldn’t give directions. She’d just get lost. Instead, he volunteered to guide her.
Everybody, or at least every woman, knew that a guy who abandoned work to help a total stranger was damned suspicious. Or sick of the job, she supposed; she knew that feeling. Even so, he must want something.
Confused yet? This is the Audra of the title, a young runaway. Her uncle Matt, whom you’ve met in my other posts, is enlisting Kwadran Duchess Beaverpaw to search for her.
Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop.
Free!
You’re in luck! I currently have a book up on Instafreebie — The Trial of Tompa Lee. This science fiction novel with romantic elements rose to #2 in its niche back when it was re-released; it first came out in hardcover back in 2005, and I created the e-book when I got the rights back. It’s the first book in The Trilogy of Tompa Lee.
[image error] “Tompa Lee is an attractive, ambitious vagabond.” — Arizona Daily Star
“Ed Hoornaert is a marvelous writer: a terrific, engrossing storyteller and a consummate stylist.” — Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo-Award winning author
“A rollicking romp on a distant planet, full of adventure and heart.” — Amber Belldene, author of the Blood Vine series
“Reminiscent of the best of classic Star Trek.” TheBestReviews.com
“Hold a tissue ready, as Mr. Hoornaert knows how to squeeze the heart of the reader.” — Love Romances
“Classic science fiction, but with enough character development to interest non-science fiction readers.” — Romance Reviews Today
May 12, 2018
Effing Feline is a poet #8Sunday
I, Effing Feline, have a plethora of divine accomplishments, but you may not know that I write poetry worthy of the ages. In honor of Mother’s Day, here is one of my masterpieces:
Roses are red, violets are blue,
You love me, Mommy, and I love me too.
Ed’s nearly completed WIP (now finished! First draft, at least). It’s tentatively title Audra Fleeing, Audra Finding. Audra Verhailey, a runaway young mother, flees with her baby from Oregon to Kwadra Island — a “duplicate” of Vancouver Island that its Native American rulers “hopped” here from an alternate Earth.
Penniless and desperate, Audra lets a Kwadran construction worker guide her up a wilderness mountain to a back entrance to Kwadra’s abandoned underground cities, where she hopes to be safe from her abusive boyfriend. But she defiantly tells the Kwadran she won’t have sex with him, no matter how helpful he is being. Trying to reassure herself about her quiet guide, she asks a question that ends up increasing, not decreasing, her anxiety.
If you didn’t know what a guy wanted or what he was afraid of, there were no handles to grab to steer him in the direction you chose. And he was too alien and spooky for her to grasp anything about him.
When a new possibility hit her, her legs wobbled so much that she lurched to the right and had to lean against a huge tree trunk to keep from falling. “Are you with the police?”
His bark of laughter reassured her — until he spoke. “Only when the gendarmes lock me up.”
Oh God, she’d hooked up with a criminal. “Not for murder?” Please let him not be a murderer. “Or for rape?”
Effing Feline here again. Ed is no poet — you can take my word on that! — but he does have a tagline for Audra Fleeing, Audra Finding. You’ll notice that unlike mine, the tagline doesn’t rhyme:
She’s running from an abusive lover — but what is she running to?
If you have any thoughts about the title, tagline or blurb (below), vent your spleen in a comment. And be sure to visit the other writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday.
When her abusive lover threatens to take custody of their baby, Audra Verhailey flees to find safety where even he can’t follow: the forbidden underground cities of Kwadra Island.
But can her desire to make a safe and quiet, if isolated, life for her daughter withstand the love of an emotionally damaged Kwadran who vows to fight off rebels determined to expel her from her newfound haven?
May 8, 2018
A Silly Dream #mfrwhooks
Here’s the next hook from my almost finished WIP, which I have now tentatively titled Audra Fleeing, Audra Finding. Audra is a young woman you haven’t yet met in the hooks I’ve selected for you.
This snippet follows immediately after last week’s text. When her alien nation’s queen arrives at Opsie Beaverpaw’s under-construction house, Opsie is a mess after getting plaster on her face. It turns out the queen isn’t alone. When she shakes the man’s hand, she gets plaster on his fingers.
Opsie handed him a couple of paper towels. She’d paid more attention to the plaster on his hand than his name, but she had a born leader’s knack for remembering: Matthew Verhailey. They sat and exchanged a few pleasantries.
That done, she faced Elinor and kept her voice carefully devoid of expression. “I assume you brought Mr. Verhailey here because you want me to do a favor for him.”
The queen was American. When Kwadra had appeared overnight off the coast of Washington State, panicking the whole world, she had led a team of scientists exploring the impossible, world-changing phenomenon. She’d made first ‘alien’ contact with the Kwadran leader, Tro Eaglesbrood. During a quarantine of several weeks, the two of them fell in love. Their marriage had cemented the tentative friendship between the new neighboring countries.
Although the words had never been spoken, before that marriage Opsie had always fancied she would marry Tro. They were perfect for each other in every way, except love. It had been a silly dream, nothing more, yet losing it to this woman hurt.
Be sure to check out the hooks by other great writers in the Book Hooks blog hop. And if you have any reaction to the new working title, let me know.
May 5, 2018
Effing Feline lets a dog speak #wewriwa
I, Effing Feline, feel lazy, so I’m turning this week’s post over to my pet humans’ pet canine, Twiggles the Dog. Try not to laugh too hard. Ha ha ha ha!
[image error]TWIGGLES: Good day, my dearest ladies and gentlemen. I, your unworthy and obsequious host, hope that you will excuse my inexperienced writing and lack of a tail. I was, unfortunately, born without one. Tail, that is. But pay no heed to my disgrace; I am undeserving of your sympathy. Also, please please please forgive the profanity in this snippet. Please, I beg you!
In Ed’s nearly completed WIP, Audra Verhailey, a runaway young mother, flees with her baby from Oregon to Kwadra Island — a “duplicate” of Vancouver Island that its Native American rulers “hopped” here from an alternate Earth. Penniless and hungry, Audra lets a Kwadran construction worker guide her up a wilderness mountain. She defiantly tells him she won’t have sex with him, no matter how helpful he is being.
What did he want from her? This guy was Spooky with a capital S — which could also stand for Silent or Scary.
She hadn’t paid enough attention to his name, Al, Hal, something like that, but his silence was a wall forbidding even simple questions. She didn’t understand him, not even a little, and that terrified her because people — guys, at least — didn’t help a woman on the run out of the goodness of their hearts. Though Kwadrans hailed from an alternate Earth, they were human, and human guys thought with their dicks no matter what planet they were born on.
Guys were dicks, no matter what planet they were born on.
“I just wanted to make that clear, okay? No sex.”
“Okay.”
Only one word, but it was progress.
Effing Feline here again. Lousy post, right? A blog post written by a dog — a mere animal! Who ever heard of such a ridiculous idea?
Be sure to visit the other writers in Weekend Writing Warriors and Snippet Sunday. They’re written by humans, so you’re safe.
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