Allison Hurd's Blog, page 8

Everyone Likes Ink On the Page

My spouse is mean and insists that getting tattoos is a terrible idea because I don’t know when to stop and one day I’d come out neck to toe ink and rue my decisions.

I really think that sounds like I’d have won, but it won’t do to tell him that because then I definitely won’t convince him I’m responsible enough for a tattoo. Two. Two tattoos.

Three. Final offer.

The real thing I want is a tattoo of a portion of a quote from my favorite book The Once and Future King. “Although they are often ready to play the buffoon to amuse you, such conduct is the prerogative of the truly wise.”

It is part of a larger quote about how it does not do to embarrass owls, who may take it upon themselves to entertain, but do so in the knowledge that their frivolity is a gift rather than a requirement. For some inexplicable reason, this speaks to me, despite how unlike me this sentiment is.

Pin feathers and golly fluff!

Ahem.

And then the second tattoo would be to balance out the first, and the third, like karaoke songs, will be the overly optimistic mistake. Look, I’m trying to be honest here. That should be worth two tattoos, minimum.

Now that you’re all on my side, I’m gonna keep this short. I’ve got a few longer posts coming over the next couple weeks, and several life events happening (all good!) so today’s just going to be a quick check in.

The third book is still jogging along. I’m writing the end, and ends are always hardest for me, right up there with middles and beginnings. I really this it’s the ease with which I word-make that makes me a naturally good at novel writing. What’s that? You’re saying more like my crazy high pain tolerance? Yeah, that sounds more accurate, you might be right. I’m trying to add more voices and more action but even I, apparently, have a max on the number of voices I can have in my head at once and I may have reached it with some of these scenes! I imagine the editing process will be illustrative.

Please remember that my first short story is free if you sign up for my newsletter! And if you have Kindle Unlimited, you can find Feeding Frenzy on that list for now. As soon as I stop seeing pages read, it goes away again, so download that sucker while you can, suckers!

And thanks everyone for the new follows and all the birthday wishes! Glad to have you, I hope you enjoy both my buffoonery and any salient wisdom I might provide!

 

 

Demon Hugs and Wine Shrines

Somehow, when someone told me about the languages of love, I never thought how it’d apply to my day to day life. Even in this age of hyper-connectivity, it’s not like I see many of my loved ones daily. Really, just the one, and other than with him, I felt that I’d only have to consider words, actions, touch, gifts and time, like, once a month, when I venture out into the wilds of real people and need to remember to hug someone.

This turns out to be less the case, however.

My personal social media pages are a small shrine of affection from friends. It amuses me endlessly, and I am so pleased about it. People send me anything they find related to owls, wine, and metal music, and it’s so touching to know they’ve thought of me and wanted to share that they thought of me.

Even if it makes me look like an alcoholic satanic furry.

Especially since it makes me look like an alcoholic satanic furry–after all, if I am loved even then, I must be doing something right. Perhaps this is Satan’s influence, shielding me.

They took “throwing up the goat” a little far, I think.

It is true, I do love owls, wine, and music. But more, I love that people want to share with me, that they try to understand what it is that appeals to me and join in, no matter their own feelings on the matter. That’s delightful, thank you!

Please note, however, I am not actually an alcoholic satanic furry. Please stop introducing me to your mothers as your wino friend, even though I do appreciate that she sends a bottle of wine with you every time you come over. Perhaps also that’s a little concerning if she thinks I need this bottle to make it until lunch, but it’s nice to have an emergency bottle of red around, and as my spouse likes us to be prepared for catastrophe, I’m glad that I can contribute booze to the end of the world party. I am equally grateful that it’s the wine that gets gifted, and that my home has remained at an equilibrium of owl-related artifacts and zero actual owls for coming up on two decades!

Thank you, all, for the small gifts you give me daily and know they’re extremely appreciated! I hope I human as well as you do. What are your favorite ways to hear from friends that they care about you from afar?

Even demons can learn affection, after all! Anya, from Buffy the Vampire Slayer

I’d Like to Be a Lion But I’m Clearly Not

I am late with a post. I am very tired because I’m damn near convinced I’m actually part sunflower and especially on rainy days my very being knows where and when the sun will rise, so too do I.

I do not photosynthesize enough for this 5 am bullshit.

So a brief check in:

-No one’s sure where Africa is. Probably someone (white) will have to discover it in the future to be sure it’s real.

-This book is throwing a tantrum and just doesn’t want to go to sleep, no matter the number of cookies or choke holds I lure it with.

-Several amazing friends have birthdays! Hell yes, July babies, Leos rock, and Cancers…whatever, you’re Leos in my heart! I hope this next year makes your wildest dreams look like house cats, and that you adopt all those cats.

Hm. I think I’m tireder than I thought.

In summation, here is what I would have named the constellations, if anyone had thought to ask me, a born Leo, about what is Right and Proper.

 

 

-Invisible dog on a leash (Invisidog)

-How drunk are you, do you see one or two constellations (Drunk Duo)

-Capsizing Boat

-Cthulhu of the stars

-Finger Guns

-Tuning Fork

-Baby Shark (doo doo doo)

-Dancin’ Fool

-Scorpio

-Tim Burton House

-Mouse (I’m sorry me!! But that’s a mouse.)

-Wish Bone (what’s your story?)

 

I’m sure you’re glad you read this now! Stay tuned for more quality content and don’t forget that The First One’s Free, which was written when I wasn’t entirely exhausted, is still free!

The Most Important African Myth

Just for the record, Africa is not a country.

I know you know that. But the internet doesn’t. So in case you begin to doubt yourself, please let me validate you. Africa is a continent. It has fifty-four recognized nations in it. There are roughly 26 different ethnic groups with dozens more subgroups across those nations, speaking various dialects of approximately six major linguistic cultures.

What it isn’t, for sure, is a fucking monolith.

Every Monday, I share a new being out of myth from around the world. Sometimes (often) it’s a monster, and I explain what it does and how to avoid or stop it. Sometimes it’s a deity or a myth or an ongoing rite or celebration honoring the national or local beings. I am enamored of learning and sharing these stories, to see how monster families moved from nation to nation, continent to island, and the monstrous effects this international game of demon Telephone had on things like vampires and incubi and werewolves. It’s delightful to see what our ancestors feared in common, and the idiosyncrasies of local imagination.

Except in Africa. Ask the internet about myths, folklore, or monsters of the Central African Republic, for example, and Google will return hits on “5 Scariest Monsters You’ve Never Heard Of” (but you totally have) or “10 Cool African Myths.” The library is sure that the only cultural phenomenon in the area is related to practiced religions and holidays.

So then you say to yourself, okay, fine. Actually, the Central African Republic is fairly new, as nation-states go, and not at all homogeneous, so it’d make sense that the nation itself wouldn’t have a mythos. So, you look up the predominant ethnic groups, which have rich and diverse traditions, from whole roving packs of what sound like dinosaurs, to prayers to local deities, ancestor worship, mystic cults and shamanism…the whole works. Okay, great. You learn that they are predominantly comprised of the Gbaya, Banda, Mandja, and Sara groups. So then you start looking through these.

And turn up nothing.

“How is that possible?” I hear you asking it. How is it possible that the Almighty Google, knower of all things arcane and ridiculous can’t tell me any goddamn thing about what these people do and love and fear?

Let’s back up. Africa is a continent. Before Europeans and Asians found it, it was doing its own thing, with lines that look nothing like the world we see today.

Africa, 1710

And then, (mostly Europe, most recently) just obliterated it. Slavery, war, colonization, the forced acceptance of Christianity, the remaking of nations that had nothing to do with the people who called this place home and everything about the people who saw them as a commodity to be monetized. They came in, conquered, set flags, forced new invisible borders in the middle of ethnic cousins and redrew them to include enemies, people who couldn’t communicate together or pray together and then forced new cultures and languages on them. And eventually, one way or another, left the mess they’d created and wondered loftily why no one was getting along.

Africa 2018

Why do I mention this? Everyone knows it (I hope) and I’m not providing any great detail.

Yes. You’re right. I’m telling the story of millions of people, of which I am not one, with horrific lack of detail. I apologize. This you can actually Google, and I heartily recommend everyone take a second to do so, but holy God choose carefully. Any that don’t mention slavery or the methods by which this land was forcibly taken is utter crap, in my opinion, and shouldn’t be trusted.

An example of a badly explained summary:

In the last two decades of the 19th century conflicts and rivalries in Europe began to affect people in Africa directly. In the 1880’s European powers divided Africa up amongst themselves without the consent of people living there, and with limited knowledge of the land they had taken.  – The BBC

Holy Cats! Without their consent! It makes it sound like when you borrow your neighbor’s lawnmower, intending fully to return it before they get home! “Well, they would’ve let us if we’d asked. It was naughty, I know, but certainly nothing like press-ganging millions into the war efforts of their oppressors.”

I digress again. Why am I badly explaining the history of African colonization to you?

Because to find anything about the people that call the Central African Republic home, not just their numbers, but their hearts, I went through each group until I found one associated with a well-known (to white people) culture that created artistic idols and ritual masks. I then looked at the masks until I noticed name patterns, googled the names, found them on an auction website and from there was able to get enough information to query the rituals for this god and goddess, which led me to a research paper written in French sixty years ago that referenced more than the specs of the statuette and which auction house or museum possesses these shrine protectors.

I had to go back sixty years, through the “non-consensual” selling of a whole people’s art to find anything about what the Ngbaka people love and fear, what they think happens on this earth and what might happen next. The fundamental questions of what it means to be a small human in a vast, merciless universe had no answers that I could find since then.

And this is horrific. We are molded by our languages, our faiths and the traditions of our people. We speak in metaphor, the actions we take for safety also affirmations of love. The things we fear codes for disapproval. And they have been erased for millions upon millions of people. Sure, there are scholars and of course the people likely know. But how awful to look at a respected news source for the people who persecuted you for generations, and find your entire struggle, the lost grandfathers, the separated families across new state-lines, reduced to two sentences more sheepish than informative.

“Woops! We destroyed even the memory of these people! Haha! Just tell the world that all Africa is one big happy family so we can shake our heads when they get upset at us.”

It enrages me, friends. As the benefactor of most of this awfulness, I’m sickened. We need these stories. We need a world knit not by false boundaries but by a shared respect for the stories and truths of all citizens. We are more alike than we think. And when we bury one of our truths, we’ve killed some part of the greater truth that we all share.

So this week I have a request. Help me, please. Learn about these people. If you have any stories of any of the regions or ethno-groups of Africa–children’s stories, folk tales, legends, mythologies, particularly those not of Arabic or Yoruba traditions, please, please tell me about them! Share a link or a source or the whole story! I will publish it on my site so that maybe we can remember and honor some larger portion of the world than I can reach with my keywords.

Thanks in advance for sharing your stories!

 

An Adventure…in Moderation

As I stand here, making the avocado peanut butter mousse I found on a food blog I follow for more-healthy, gluten-free, dairy-free, added-sugar free ways to trick myself into thinking I’m eating dessert, I wonder how things got so off track.

Ok, but the avocado truffle was legit delicious.

I was so convinced as a kid that I wouldn’t grow up to be one of those people who make excuses because they have to get to the gym, that I’d still delight some days in cake for breakfast, that I wouldn’t fall for the lies of maturity that say that to be wise is to deny fun.

But you see, I’m really tired of my knees hurting and oh, God, why is this corn attacking me?! Why did no one explain that it’s not that you wouldn’t love to have Reese’s as an entire meal, but that you know that trying to process that amount of sugar would leave you comatose and probably vomiting, because your stomach is a traitor and refuses to take one for the team?

I’m cool with the bill-paying and the job-going, but I’d really like aching of various organs and joints to sit the hell down. And so, I go to the gym and I eat cauliflower that calls itself pizza (I’m not senile, just grown, cauliflower, you aren’t fooling anyone) and gear up the courage to try “nutritional yeast mac and cheese” not because I am personally dairy free, or because I’m that desperate for mac, but because it sounds positively awful and I have a perverse need to know.

Nutritional yeast mac. DON’T LIE TO ME!

That trait, at least, has survived my childhood.

I have gotten somewhat more judicious in which links I click (and yet, I have a growing number of regrets) but adventures are still the absolute best, and can include going to countries which do not share a language or staple food with mine, but are also so many little things in daily life–new books, new hobbies, new skills, new ways to flap my unflappable partner, new foods that apparently are poison.

In my writing, I’m also on a new adventure. I’m so close to done with the first draft of Blood and Bone, and am experimenting with new tensions. I’m hoping folks will follow me through this journey, and know that after this, things will revert to more light-hearted fare.

So, what new adventures are you having?

This is next for us!! Hahahahaha Oh God I’m just kidding, my knuckles swelled and my feet went numb just thinking about it. How about a nice new podcast instead?

A Real Character

Sometimes when I’m telling stories I wish I had a fun character thought up already for a quick cameo. Someone memorable, who stands out from the rest, but doesn’t require a lot of back story or fleshing out. In case you, like me, wish you had that available, here’s a list of a few character types that would make great short-lived heroes.

Constantly uses non sequiturs or improper antecedents
Has a large vocabulary, but can’t say the words, or mixes up what means what
Fidgets with whatever is nearest
Giggles nervously at inappropriate times
Extremely thick accent
Has a patois of the local language or uses local slang that is entirely unfamiliar
Extremely clumsy
Can hear something you can’t, and talks to it
Likes animals way more than people
Up-talker
Close talker
Can’t breathe with their mouth closed/really bad cold
Complete know-it-all/ says everything as if it’s conclusive
Mimics the other characters unconsciously
Unreliable “yes” man
Doesn’t speak where action will suffice
Indecisive without direction
Extreme risk taker
Very religious
Conspiracy theorist

 

In book-related news, the first beta reader came back with the first four chapters and said that it might be my strongest start yet, and that she got misty-eyed! Score! Now just to finish the damn thing. Everyone please send me fast-writing thoughts. Or if you see me loitering on Facebook, tell me to get my ass back to work. Thanks!!

Just Like Grandma’s

I have sent the first four chapters of Blood and Bone to the first beta reader, because I am mean and she is a great person who tells me I am not mean, I am merely offering her a chance at a new serial story. And because I am vain, I let myself believe her.

We’ll see what she says next! It’s possible she’ll agree I’m mean, and then I’ll have to do some soul searching. I hope I don’t have to do that, I haven’t figured out how to get my label maker in there and everything’s sort of like that one grandma’s attic, where getting the holiday decorations involves a haz mat suit, a machete, and call from your lawyer to update your last will and testament.

OH, GOD, WHY?!

Anyways, I just got back from the wedding of one of the sweetest people I know, and I am tired, so I’ll say Mazel Tov to the new couple!! And then I’ll go to bed. This week’s post will be short and sweet, just like me.

Hey, it could be true. You don’t know.

 

The Key to Great-Dadding

Happy Father’s Day! After extensive analysis, it seems like most of the great dads encourage their children to play with sticks, whether those sticks represent swords or wands. Okay, I’m ready for parenting. Here’s a few of my favorite fathers in fiction!

Stormlight Archive

This series has two rad dads! Dalinar respects and loves his children as they are–all he expects is that they live honorably. Sure, he’s got a few skeletons in his closet, but he loves his sons for the men they are. And strict, protective Lirin wanted his sons to have the world, hierarchy be damned. Sure, maybe he pushed a little hard, but Kaladin carries the goodness his father taught him even in the darkest of times.

Harry Potter

Mr. Weasley is, without a doubt, that world’s greatest dad. Though poor he lives constantly in joy. He teaches his flock curiosity, kindness, respect, and courage, even when you don’t seem to be the knight in the story. His generosity is boundless, and his ethics unimpeachable.

Sabriel

Terciel, binder of the dead, gave his daughter more of a life than should have been possible. It’s not easy when you travel a lot for work and your daughter starts her life already caught in the waters of death, but he made it work. He never coddled her, only encouraged, and he made as much time for her as he could. He taught strength, resilience, duty, and that death is nothing to fear.

By Laura Tolton

 

The Once and Future King

Sir Ector was a good man. Hard working, perhaps a little love-blind to the faults of his children, but just tickled by their accomplishments. He struggled to get his children a first rate eddy-cation, and taught his boys that being master of the land is a lot more like being in service to its people.

Here’s to great dads! Thanks for not letting us impale ourselves on shardblades, forget the excitement of learning, always scaring away the monsters, and encouraging us to grab every sword by the handle until we rule all of Britain!

I Broke the Universe, But I Refuse to Buy It

I think I’m making wormholes and eating more electronics. My nascent wizardry may be at the toddler stage.

For those who aren’t aware of my backstory, I break electronics at a prodigious rate. Laptops don’t tend to last more than a year around me. Desktops make it about three years before they just don’t turn back on. Cellphones lose battery power within six months. Streetlights turn off when I walk by. I don’t know why, and it’s really quite frustrating, but I take it in stride because I assume this means soon I’ll get my Hogwarts letter.

I know I’ve said I never want to go back to high school, but I only meant Muggle school, I swear!

It then progressed to cursing. I mean like manifesting evil intent, verbal cursing isn’t new for me. A friend in Quebec was tormenting me with his talk of a vacation and so I said, quite understandably:

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It then snowed for a week. In April. I also gave four people sinus infections because I was miffed they couldn’t hang out. That was meant to be a joke, though, universe. I wasn’t actually mad at them. (Sorry, friends!) I then said out loud I didn’t want to have to turn the AC on until June, and it rained the rest of May. So now I have to watch out for that, too.

Well, it’s gotten even more interesting. This week, as I was contemplating whether the Ghostbusters would accept texts in lieu of calls, an apple fell out of my work bag. I heard it hit the pavement. I looked under my car for it, and the cars next to me, but it was just gone, girl. The only possible explanation? It fell into an alternate  universe. I thought that was pretty weird, but then I went to get coffee. And while planning a day of seeing how many times I could say “no” to someone without using that word, I stirred my beverage and saw a lone bubble floating at the opposite end of the kitchen from the sink. Now, it’s possible that while washing up, I managed to create one soap bubble, and distressed as I was about the apple-eating blip in physics, missed it. It seems unlikely though, because I have the situational awareness of some sort of, like, really good hunting animal. You thinking what I’m thinking? Yes. Definitely a slightly different, more bubble-prone universe.

I’d be fine if that’s where it ended. Okay, a few more bubbles. I’m not anti-bubble by any stretch!

But then the universe ate a whole car. It was behind me in heavy traffic, and then it wasn’t. It wasn’t anywhere around me, and there were no exits it could have taken. It was just gone.

I’m freakin’ out, and if any of you happen to have strange new memories of people, or holes where you think maybe a silver SUV…

OMG!!! Wait! I KNOW A SILVER SUV! SHIT! I’VE TEMPORARILY MANIFESTED MY BOOK WORLD.

Oh, friends. Oh, jeez. This is not good. This is very not good. Yeah, definitely get “The First One’s Free,” (now free!) we need to start beefing up on ways to defend ourselves against formerly mythical beasts.

Good luck and God speed. Be safe out there!

First One’s Really Free Now

My short story is free, to begin with.

 

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You’re damn right it is.

Listening now?? Okay, so what had happened was, approximately 3 trillion hours ago, I set up a sign up for my site. You see it every time you come here, unless you’ve signed up. The intent was that I would annoy you for three seconds, and then you’d be able to get my newsletter, which would have free stories and extra character stuff and so on.

Except that, um, I’m a total noob about how all this works, and it took me all 3 trillion hours to figure it out. BUT I DID! I think! So now when you put in your email address rather than clicking exit, you will get an email sending you the free ePub version of my short story “The First One’s Free.” It’s quite quick and shares the story of a banishment job where everything more or less, sort-of-kind-of goes exactly according to plan. If you’ve not yet read one of my full books, it’s a good taste of my writing style and the characters. If you have read something else, you’ll get a little more backstory that’s been hinted at in the books!

“But I don’t want another newsletter,” I hear you say.

Well, let’s be perfectly frank here. I don’t have 3 trillion hours on a regular basis. Newsletters are likely to be sporadic and contain either free stuff or really cool things that don’t work for any of the other EIGHT (omg, is it really that many??) social media platforms I’m on. Maybe one or two a year with free books, extra content, or earth shattering news. Help me, help you, n’a mean?

Here’s what I anticipate right now for all marketing:

First One’s Free for free via newsletter
Continue to post 1-2 times a day on Facebook
Continue weekly blog posts on Sundays
Chances for free copies of Feeding Frenzy or Sacrifice in anticipation of the release of Blood and Bone. Possibly via newsletter.
Try to traditionally publish a book that’s not at all in this universe, but which does feature my love of fairytales.
Another short story called Just a Taste which will become the new free sign up book via newsletter and First One’s Free will become free elsewhere.

That’s basically it. And this is about 2-3 years of planning. So, you can see that the newsletters aren’t intended to be a tool oft wielded.

Sign up! At least then I’ll stop talking about it!