Stacey E. Bryan's Blog, page 14

Testing, testing, one, two, three…

Today I’m testing out the website to see if I’ve linked it correctly to my author page on Facebook. I’ve been running around like a headless chicken trying to get the blog tour organized, so I’ve missed a week of posting, and I have nothing prepared. So I’m gonna use the author interview questions I filled out for my publisher, Vagabondage Press. A ready-made post ripe for maniacal internet experimentation. [insert insane chortling here]

Okay, here goes:

When did you first realize you wanted...

Heaven and Hell

So here’s the thing about adoption and being adopted: it’s a mixed bag.

I was adopted when I was a year and a month old. I’ll elaborate on why over a year went by before I was snatched up by someone in another post, ’cause that’s a whole different arena.

Anyway, once you’re taken in by a family, if the people who adopted you clue you in early on, you basically go through most of your life with two opposing thoughts:

Boy, was I lucky that someone wanted me bad enough to bring me into their l...

They Live! (in short stories first)

I’m fascinated by the idea sometimes of writing a short story that gets made into a movie. Imagine working on something for a couple of weeks, a month max. You’re pretty happy with it. A magazine accepts it for publication. Then one thing leads to another and eventually you’re sitting in Mann’s Chinese Theater one day eating popcorn and watching your characters come alive on-screen. How mind-blowing would that be? How insanely jealous would the average screenwriter who’s been slaving away at...

Collective Lunacy

During my college years, I worked at a dude ranch two summers in a row in Wyoming and I met this guy around my age, Bill Barnett, the first summer I was there. I was hired as a waitress, working with a crew of girls my age to serve the “dudes”, or guests, every morning, afternoon, and evening. Bill would ferry people to and from the airport, to and from the town, parts of which were straight out of the 1950s. The ranch was a surreal place, having been around since the turn of the century.

B...

That Ultimate Thing…

The weird thing about famous people passing away is how shocked I am when it happens. As if Prince was a good friend, just lounging around in my living room the other day sipping iced tea, one leg crossed over the other, chit-chatting about traffic on the freeway or how surprised he was that he didn’t miss eating meat at all.

But he wasn’t sitting in my living room and I didn’t know him and he had no idea that I existed. Somehow, though, memories of Prince, like other famous people, got wove...

It’s Time…

It can sneak up on you out of the dark, and you may never see it coming. You start like a thief caught in the act, whirl around and stare it in the face.

“Oh, it’s you…” you may say. “What are you doing here?”

Or more likely, more to yourself, “Am I ready for this?”

Worse, it can blindside you, a train roaring out of nowhere, and you’re standing in the middle of the tracks.

“Get off the tracks!” the audience yells, but by the time you turn to look at them and then turn back, the train is upo...