Evil Editor's Blog, page 87

New Beginning 1036

I've been a valet for four days, and hated every second of it.

‘Chin up, Collins. You’re not at a funeral.’

Lord Alfred Gordon Byron Lyte Cadogan. A long name for a long pedigree that would look better on a dog than a man. He holds out his arm. The creases in his shirtsleeve are so perfect they’re almost a work of art. I think about stabbing him with the cufflinks, but instead thread them through his sleeves. He fastens them himself, which is a miracle, as I have to do practically everything else for him.

I hate rich people. I hate wizards. Most wizards are also rich. I don’t know why that is. Maybe the poor don’t have enough time to wonder about the existence of the supernatural or magical. Maybe the wizards have a system where one has to live in Kensington or Belgravia to discover their innate magical talent. Either way, they’re all snobs. I think they take extra delight in hiding from the rest of the world. A secret club that only the privileged and well-bred even know about, and only a handful of people are able to join.

Cadogan flicks his hand in my direction. ‘Collins. Jacket.’


Thanks!


Fuck you and your jacket.


'And now, it's time for the fox hunt. So I'm turning you into a hound dog. If you corner the fox there will be a nice biscuit for you.

'And Collins, I advise you not to poop on the oriental carpet. You'll just have to clean it up when I transform you into the maid.'

'As you wish, My Lord.' Fuck you and your carpet.

'Apparently you've forgotten, Collins, that wizards can read minds. After the hunt, I'll be changing you into a hot eighteen-year-old nymph and I will fuck you.'


Opening: Alice Smales.....Continuation: Mister Furkles

Continuations Wanted

An opening has appeared in the queue and now awaits your hilarious and brilliant continuation.

Having trouble coming up with something? Try one of these all-purpose continuations.


Also, as most of those who visit this blog are writers, I assume you've written the first 150 - 200 words of something recently, and could use some feedback. We take openings of novels, memoirs, stories, chapters, how-to books, wills, blog posts, and suicide notes. Sorry, no shopping lists. Agents and editors: we'll even critique the opening of your (non-form) rejection letters. Send to evledtr@gmail.com.

Evil Editor Classics

New Year's Resolution

So Tsu Me

Some people have been abandoning Facebook and joining a new social media site called tsū. I'm not one of them, mainly because I wasn't on Facebook to begin with.  Tsū allegedly has an advantage over Facebook (at least for writers), in that tsū agrees not to use your content for anything. Also in that only 10% of tsū's advertising income goes to the corporation; the rest goes to content providers or their selected charities. Also, they don't charge you to send your posts to all of your followers.

Presumably few content providers (people who post stuff) will make much money, but if a million people earn an average of five dollars and opt to give it to charity, that's better than all of it going into some billionaire's pocket. I'm talking to you, Zuckerman. Also, with tsu you're one in a million while with Facebook, you're one in a billion. That's the difference between being a beautiful wildflower in a meadow and being a grain of sand on a beach.



Anyway, I was going to start blogging on tsū in hopes of finding new blood, as it's been a while since anyone submitted anything here. Until I discovered I apparently can't use italics or blue text. However, I can post comic strips, cartoons, photos, and my own unpublished novels.

So I've started a tsū site where I'll be posting that kind of stuff, and I now need to build my number of followers up from the embarrassing current total of 0 so that people will think it's a popular site. Possibly you would like to be one of my original followers. If so, and you're already a Suette (or is it a tsetse?), click on this link to visit my site: https://www.tsu.co/EvilEditor. If you aren't a TsuBee, you can still click there and be invited by me to register. Or you can be invited by anyone else who already registered.

The New Year Strips

Merry Christmas to All

It's that time again.

Like Wikipedia and possibly some other site I don't know about, I keep this blog ad-free. But once every five years I ask you to donate a few minutes of your precious time to watch these ads:

How This Blog Is Like the Universe

It has been theorized that the universe is expanding, and will do so until such time as it begins contracting. (Not unlike my stomach, which I'm hoping will cease the expansion phase before I have to purchase yet another wardrobe.) At some point everything in the universe will shift into reverse and eventually be back in one place, finally allowing people from distant galaxies to read my blog.

On a less galactic scale, I noticed some time ago that this blog was approaching 7000 posts. It occurred to me that someone new to the blog, in order to catch up, would have to read twenty posts a day (plus all the comments) for a whole year. At which point they would still be a year behind.

Knowing that few have the patience and persistence to read 7000 posts, I was relieved to discover recently that the blog's contraction had begun. Apparently the Book Chats and Writing Exercises were the first posts to vanish, and recently the Evil Editor Classics (which were mere copies of posts that remain) disappeared. (Don't worry, everything that's gone has merely been saved as a draft, not deleted. So if you desperately need to read something that's gone, it can be retrieved.)

Suddenly we're down to about 4500 posts. If we can get down to 365, a newcomer would have to read only 1 per day for a year to catch up.  At which point they would still be a year behind. But what else can we afford to lose? The New Beginnings that appear in Novel Deviations, vols 1 - 3, and are thus available to anyone willing to fork over the price of a medium-sized movie theater popcorn? The Q & As that appear in Why You Don't Get Published, vols 1 - 2? The 50 Face-Lifts that appear in Dear Literary Agent? The cartoons that aren't as funny as the other cartoons? Everything that isn't wildly entertaining?

I could remove the cartoons from the blog and give them their own website. Same with the query letters. Then those who care about only one feature wouldn't have to wade through a lot of clutter to get to their favorite stuff. This would require work, but what else do I have to do? It's not like anyone submits anything anymore.

Evil Editor Classics

There've been two "Guess Which Titles Are Real Cookbooks" quizzes over the years. I've combined the best of both into one quiz. Ten of the titles below are actual cookbooks. The rest were made up by EE and his minions. Answers are below the quiz.


Go Fork Yourself: Recipes for Life

Moon Unit Zappa’s Vegan Goodies

The Endangered Species Cookbook

The Hunting in the Nude Cookbook

The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken
Mama Nazima's Jewish Iraqi Cuisine
Ring of Fire: Recipes for Anal DistressFishwife's Guide to Cooking for Ingrates
The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry
Stoned Soup: Favorite Recipes of the Martyrs
Long Table: The Complete Giraffe Recipe Guide
Yeast Infections: Natural Bread Baking at Home

Hungry for You: From Cannibalism to Seduction
The Head's the Best Part! 101 Ways to Cook Brain

Unsettling Soups For Your Pre-Suicide Farewell Party

From Here to Eternity: Recipes Inspired by the Afterlife.

Erin go Burp: Traditional Meals from Ireland's Emerald Shores.

The Bulimia Cookbook: Recipes that Taste Just as Good Coming Up

Beyond Offal: Decorating Dishes With Hooves, Teeth, Horns And Fur

The Willie Nelson "Cooked Goose" Cookbook and IRS Financial Advisor

Eat What You Want and Die Like a Man: the World's Unhealthiest Cookbook

The Redneck Grill: The Most Fun You Can Have With Fire, Charcoal, and a Dead Animal
Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany






The actual cookbooks are:
The Hunting in the Nude Cookbook

The Endangered Species Cookbook
The Lost Ravioli Recipes of Hoboken
Mama Nazima's Jewish Iraqi Cuisine
The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry

Hungry for You: From Cannibalism to Seduction
The Willie Nelson "Cooked Goose" Cookbook and IRS Financial Advisor
Eat What You Want and Die Like a Man: the World's Unhealthiest Cookbook
The Redneck Grill: The Most Fun You Can Have With Fire, Charcoal, and a Dead Animal
Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany

New Beginning 1035

“Why do you look to the north?”

Esmerelda flinched at the voice from so close behind her. She would never get used to Henrick’s penchant for appearing and disappearing silently. Could not magicians use doors to enter and exit, like everybody else?

“These are my private chambers,” she said, turning to face him. “It would be polite to knock.”

His twisted smile told her, as if she did not already know, that politeness was not much of a concern for him.

“You have golden fields to the east, lush green hills to the south, and a verdant forest to the west,” he said, pointing to the high windows on each side of her top-of-tower room. “Why would you insist on looking in the one direction where the view is so spoiled?”

Esmerelda turned to the north-facing windows again. The ground, so very far down below in the valley at the base of the cliff on which her castle was perched, was withered and black. The trees were thick with gnarled branches outstretched like grasping claws, but no limb sported so much as a single leaf. Patches of limp dead grass floated like islands amid pools of oily mud. Even the northern air seemed still and gray, catching none of the breeze and very little of the sunlight that danced at the other points of the compass.

“You know why,” she mumbled.

“I’m sorry, Princess Esmerelda, I couldn’t quite hear that.”

“It’s just Esmerelda,” she snapped. “I am no one’s princess.”

"Sorry, sorry," he whimpered.
"Never mind. Now, tell me--when are they setting up the drilling rigs? I want to get the crude moving to China while OPEC's still imploding."


Opening: JRMosher.....Continuation: Khazar-khum