Chuck Wendig's Blog, page 167

Hot Wendig Sauce: A Recipe

That is pretty much the grossest blog title I have ever written.

But it’s done. It’s too late. I can’t delete it now.

(I can totally delete it. And yet, I don’t. What’s that say about me?)

(HINT: IT SAYS I HAVE BEEN DRINKING.)

Anyway.

Let’s talk about store-bought salad dressings.

Most of them are shitty.

Like, I don’t mean that they contain actual feces, I just mean — they’re kinda weak. They may in fact be where the phrase “weak sauce” comes from. A lot of store-bought things are weak, honestly, but the ability to buy them is so much easier than actually making them. That said, salad dressings do not fall into this category, because salad dressings are hella dopey easy to make. You could literally, while concussed from a cantankerous mule kick, while high on benzodiazepine, while blinded in one eye by a misting of cat urine, make salad dressing. It’s so easy, you’ll feel like an asshole for ever having procured salad dressing from the store.

Anyway, I wanted to make my own Russian dressing. Or Thousand Island dressing. I dunno why it shares those two names, and really, I’m too lazy to Google it, so I’m gonna go ahead and assume it’s similar to the “French Fries became ‘Freedom Fries’” thing — maybe we were mad at Russia because of the Cold War, and so we stopped marketing Russian dressing because who would ever buy Communist Red Sauce to put on their Fresh American Lettuce. Could be we called it “Thousand Island” because that’s what we were going to do to Mother Russia with our nuclear bombs — turn the big-ass country into a thousand little islands with big kaboom.

I don’t know and I don’t care.

You can call this what you want. Hot Wendig Dressing. Gulag Gravy. Putin Coulis. Zesty Vegetable Fluid Blanket. I’m happy to take suggestions in the comments below.

Point is, you want to make a dressing for your salad.

I’m going to tell you how to do that.

Take mayonnaise.

One cup of it.

No, not Miracle Whip. Don’t bring that nonsense up in my house. You know what Miracle Whip is? It’s emulsified diabetes. With sadness oil stirred in for extra sadness. It’s gross. Don’t use it. If you use Miracle Whip, then Flavor Jesus will come down from his restaurant in Heaven and burn your soul in the castigating fires of a George Foreman grill.

Miracle Whip. What is wrong with you?

Mayonnaise.

You can make your own mayonnaise, but that really is one of those things I think it’s maybe easier to buy than make. Whatever. I like Duke’s. Your mileage may vary. (And now I fully expect you homemade mayo types to freak out in the comments about how easy it is — so, please do, I accept any and all mayo recipes you care to share, food nerds.)

One cup goes into a blender. Or into a receptacle where you can use one of those cool stick blenders. Note that I did not say “dick blender.” That is a whole different thing.

Did I mention I’ve been drinking?

WHATEVER NO YOU SHUT UP

*throws a jar of pickles at your head*

Wait, gimme those pickles back, we’re gonna need ‘em.

Okay, so, like I said: one cup of mayo.

Then, four tablespoons of ketchup.

Then, one tablespoon of hot sauce. Your choice of hot sauce is your own — obviously, these days, Sriracha is quite popular on pretty much everything. I eat it on rice, hot dogs, hamburgers, pandas, street urchins. (Hey, jerk, don’t judge; street urchin is my favorite sushi.) Here, though, I might casually suggest Frank’s Hot Sauce. Because Frank’s.

One tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce (which is pronounced WOOSHTERSHURESHEER SHASS). Also, if you did not realize this as apparently many do not, Worcestershire sauce is actually just fish sauce. Seriously. People blanch at using fish sauce in their Thai dishes but then liberally dose something else with this stuff? It’s fermented anchovies, people. At least it’s not fermented people, people. Because, really, people are gross.

Three peeled shallots.

You could do onion or garlic but just suck it up and go buy some shallots. Shallots are awesome because they’re what happens when onion and garlic have a baby.

Then 1/4 teaspoon of smoked paprika (sweet or hot).

The smoke is key because I said so.

Two tablespoons of sweet pickle relish. (Or, if you don’t have relish, but do have bread-and-butter sweet pickles, toss a rough equivalent into the mix.)

Pinch of salt.

Pinch of pepper.

Blend until… well, blended. What else would you do? Blend until the world ends? Blend until your house catches fire? BLEND UNTIL YOU STARVE TO DEATH, STANDING BY THE BLENDER LIKE A SAD HOUND WHOSE MASTER DIED AT WAR AND WILL NEVER RETURN HOME.

Just blend it up, for Chrissakes.

Then put it on your salad and eat it. Or just drink it if you’re one of those weirdo adults who are averse to vegetables. Though, point of fact, if you’re one of those weirdo adults who are averse to vegetables, you’re a dumb person. And probably unhealthy. Enjoy your scurvy and your rickets, your weak bones and your tumbling teeth. Vegetables are amazing when they’re cooked right and you need to grow up right now and learn to eat a fucking carrot once in a while.

Meat is awesome, too, but vegetables are just meat that grew in the ground.

Whatever. Enjoy the Hot Wendig Sauce.

Goes good on salads, burgers, pandas, and street urchins.

Brian McClellan: How I Came To Create My Own Expanded Universe

Brian McClellan is my beard brother. TREAT HIM WELL, INTERNETS. That is all. Anyway, here he is to talk about some things and some stuff. Stay frosty.

* * *

A week ago I put out a new novella called Servant of the Crown. It’s the second novella and fifth piece of short fiction based off the world I created in the Powder Mage trilogy. That trilogy, starting with the novel Promise of Blood, is published by Orbit Books, the science fiction and fantasy imprint of Hachette. The short fiction is something I put out myself electronically.

This makes me a “hybrid” author. You may have heard the term. Our own friend Chuck Wendig has written about it for Writer’s Digest. In short, a hybrid author is someone who has fingers in both traditional and self-publishing. These kind of authors are becoming more and more common.

In my experience, most authors approach hybridization by putting out some novels themselves and others with their publishers. Maybe it’s every other book. Maybe one in three. Everyone does it differently and that’s something that I took to heart when I got my initial idea for the Powder Mage short fiction.

Back when I had just signed my first contract, I asked an author what he thought about writing in other universes for pay. Star Wars, video game freelancing, that kind of thing. I had gotten a nice advance but I knew it wouldn’t pay all my bills, and was looking around for other options. He told me to forget it. Freelancing for another intellectual property is fantastic and can pay well, but I had a good a contract for a shiny hardcover trilogy. Focus on my own universe because it was just that: mine.

I thought about this a lot. I considered applying for a creative position at Riot, one of my favorite computer game companies. I daydreamed about writing for Blizzard or Star Wars. After all, I grew up reading Star Wars novels and playing Warcraft. How stinking cool would that be to write in those universes? I never pursued it seriously.

The idea of self-publishing came up once in a while when my bills were tight. I had some old novels laying around that I could clean up and put out myself, but that seemed kind of silly when I have an agent and a publisher. If I was going to go to that effort I might as well try to sell them traditionally. But I worried about trying to juggle two original universes. I don’t have that kind of brain power.

Like looking for a creative job in another EU, I never took the plunge on self-publishing a novel. Then, strangely enough, I read an article about erotica.

The article talked a bit about the success some erotica authors were finding on Kindle, Nook, and the other self-publishing platforms. They’d go for volume, pumping out a 4000-word piece every week or two, and build themselves a big backlist. Over time, that turns into a pretty solid income stream.

We could have a debate over “art” and “selling out” and “oversaturation of the market,” but I thought that was a smart business model. Maybe I could make a serious go at self-publishing with shorter stuff like what these particular erotica authors were doing. But I was writing in fantasy, not erotica, with a different end-game in mind. I didn’t want to just pump out a bunch of content to make a buck. I wanted to create something with the depth of a fantasy world and, happily enough, I had a universe already handy.

I took an idea for an origin story of one of the side characters from my trilogy and wrote an 8000 word piece called “The Girl of Hrusch Avenue.”

I had a budget of exactly $0. Using some awesome friends and family, I had it edited professionally and threw together an adequate (if generic) bit of cover art. The only hiccup came when my agent asked if my publisher was going to be cool with this. After all, they had the rights to the trilogy that this universe was attached to. After a stressful day or two waiting for my agent to check with them, I got the green light.

The result wasn’t overwhelming at first. The way Amazon’s royalty rate is set up I would only make $.35 off of a $.99 sale, and I could not in good conscience charge $2.99 for one of these short pieces (the minimum required to make a 70% royalty rate). But they kept selling consistently, and my first book Promise of Blood was doing better and better, and I noticed that when my novel had a good week the short piece would often have a good week as well. It was a small spike, no more than a few books, but a logical and easy correlation.

I wrote another short piece and did the same thing. Zero budget but with professional editing and lots of beta readers. Put it out. It did a little better than the first. Then Promise of Blood went on sale for $1.99 and got some well-placed publicity and there was a (for me) huge spike on the short pieces as well, which put money directly into my pocket every month. For someone who gets paid sporadically, that’s kind of a huge deal.

Over the fall, a bunch of awesome things happened. Promise of Blood was a finalist for Best Debut Goodreads Author in the Goodreads Choice Awards and a semi-finalist in the Fantasy category. It garnered a few more cover quotes by really awesome authors. The sales continued to increase (it was still $1.99 at this point) and with them the sales of my short fiction. For about every ten sales I got of the novel, each piece of short fiction sold one. Small, sure, but that does add up.

I was pounding out book three, The Autumn Republic, at this point. I had ideas for other short fiction and fans had started to ask me about putting out more. But I was pretty busy. That’s when Orbit delayed The Crimson Campaign by two months. It was a good decision in the end and I’m glad they did it, but I was the one who had to tell fans that it would be late. In the end, I delivered the news and immediately tore into writing what would become my first novella, Forsworn. I hoped if I could put out something new, they might forgive the delay easier.

I revisited the Powder Mage Universe, this time with a prequel featuring the mother of one of the main characters. I gave myself a $500 budget, which I quickly went over, and I commissioned my first professional art and was able to pay a copy editor. With a longer piece and real cover art, I felt good about charging $2.99. Note that this means Forsworn would make six times as much money per sale as “The Girl of Hrusch Avenue.”

From start to finish, Forsworn went from an idea to readers’ hands in about six weeks, reaching them a full two weeks before Crimson Campaign‘s original release date. It sold well and no one complained about the price, which is something I worried about a lot. I never want people to feel like I’m trying to rip them off.

This is the point I realized that I had created my own expanded universe.

There are a few downsides to self-publishing an EU. For one, I have to keep all this stuff straight. If I write something in a short piece it’s technically cannon. I can’t just pull a Star Wars and wave my hand, saying none of this actually happened in-universe.

Well, I could, but it would be a jerk thing to do.

I worry about oversaturation. More publishing credits means I’m hawking more things on social media, which is a dangerous line to walk before getting all of your friends and fans annoyed with you. I also worry if I put out one of these short pieces too often if people will get sick of them, but I suppose if that happens I’ll just see sales dry up.

In the end, it has too many upsides to ignore. It’s good for me because I get to pull down an extra small salary from a half dozen electronic publishers. I get to explore all the little side plots and prequel stuff that would never make it into the novels. I also have greater control. I can see how many of each story are selling each week and on what format, with all that data at my fingertips. Deadlines and production times aren’t really a thing. The last novella, Servant of the Crown, went from an idea to published in less than four weeks.

It’s good for my publisher because I’m creating things that draw my fans deeper into the world, getting them more excited for the next book to come out. And it’s good for my fans, because they get to explore the world alongside me. Every time someone emails me and says they can’t get enough of the Powder Mage Trilogy, I have someplace I can point them.

All of this is because, as a friend once advised me to do, I’ve invested in my own universe rather than one that belongs to someone else.

* * *

Brian is a flintlock fantasy author of the Powder Mage Trilogy, including Promise of Blood, recent winner of the Gemmell Morningstar Award. He lives in Cleveland, Ohio with his wife, where he plays computer games, gardens, and tends his hive of minions honey bees.

His newest is the novella, Servant of the Crown:

Captain Tamas is an ambitious young officer in the Adran army. As a commoner, he is one of very few without noble blood to hold a rank. When he challenges the son of a duke over an insult, the subsequent duel lands him in hot water with the nobility and the royal cabal of Privileged sorcerers. Tamas is soon drawn into a conflict that goes to the very highest office in the land, and his only ally is the most unlikely of people: a young noblewoman named Erika, who needs Tamas to teach her how to wield her powers as a powder mage.

Brian McClellan: Website | Twitter

The Powder Mage Series: Amazon | B&N

One Month To Blightborn Preorder Contest: Win A Kindle Paperwhite

Hey, sooooo. Here’s something.

Planning on pre-ordering Blightborn?

If you do, you could win a Kindle Paperwhite.

Blightborn, Book Two in my Heartland series, continues the adventures of the Big Sky Scavengers in a cornpunk agri-dystopi-pocalyptic future where the poor Heartlanders scrabble in the dust and the bloodthirsty corn while the rich Empyrean flotillas float above their heads.

The official description:

Cael McAvoy is on the run. He’s heading toward the Empyrean to rescue his sister, Merelda, and to find Gwennie before she’s lost to Cael forever. With his pals, Lane and Rigo, Cael journeys across the Heartland to catch a ride into the sky. But with Boyland and others after them, Cael and his friends won’t make it through unchanged.

Gwennie’s living the life of a Lottery winner, but it’s not what she expected. Separated from her family, Gwennie makes a bold move—one that catches the attention of the Empyrean and changes the course of an Empyrean man’s life.

The crew from Boxelder aren’t the only folks willing to sacrifice everything to see the Empyrean fall. The question is: Can the others be trusted?

They’d all better hurry. Because the Empyrean has plans that could ensure that the Heartland never fights back again.

Chuck Wendig’s riveting sequel to Under the Empyrean Sky plunges readers into an unsettling world of inequality and destruction, and fleshes out a cast of ragtag characters all fighting for survival and, ultimately, change.

It also features more than one Pegasus. And a grackle named “Erasmus.”

Just so you know.

Anyway!

So, the book comes out next month in Kindle, paperback, and hardback (yep, all three formats at once). Preorder any of these — and send me proof of said pre-order — and you might win the aforementioned Kindle Paperwhite. (Extra bonus: pre-order the Kindle version, which is only $3.99, and you get a free short story set before Under the Empyrean Sky.)

I’ll also toss a prize-pack to a runner-up.

Prize-pack is a handful of my books devalued with my signature:

The Kick-Ass Writer

Under the Empyrean Sky (hardcover)

Unclean Spirits 

The Cormorant

You can send proof of preorder to me at terribleminds@gmail.com.

Subject of the email must be: [Blightborn Preorder Contest Entry]

Brackets included, please.

Proof of pre-order should be easy to obtain. Just screencap the order information (you can grab it on Amazon in Your Account > Your Orders / Digital Orders > Open Orders), then email it to me.

This contest is good up until noon, EST on Monday, July 28th.

United States participants only, please.

I’ll pick two winners (one for the Kindle, one for the books) on Tuesday, July 29th.

Kim Curran: Five Things I Learned When My Publisher Went Under

On Friday the news broke that Strange Chemistry, Angry Robot’s sister imprint and my publisher, was shutting doors effectively immediately. Which meant that Delete, the last in my Shifter series of books wasn’t going to be published in August as planned.

As you can imagine I was gutted.

I cried. A lot.

I drank. A lot.

I generally stomped around feeling angry and sorry for myself. But then, as the rum hangover started to clear, I realised that actually there were some important lessons to be learnt in all of this. And I will share those lessons with you, thusly:

1) People are awesome

The outpouring of support* for everyone affected by the Strange Chemistry closure has blown me away. The publishing community is a family (complete with the drunken, grumpy uncle who mumbles sexist shit in the corner and everyone tries to ignore). Like all families, they bicker and fall out and want to kill each other a lot of the time. But when it comes to it, they rally together. The tweets, emails, texts and calls that came flooding in after the news broke was proof of just how amazing humans can be.

2) It was a privilege to be published at all

While it felt like the ground had opened up underneath me because I wasn’t going to be able to complete my series, I went home and looked at the two books that had already been published. And it made me realise how lucky I was that they existed at all. I’d had the experience of seeing my books out there in the world, on bookshelves, being read by people. And that was pretty freaking awesome.

It’s so easy to lose sight of your goals once you’ve achieved them because they become replaced by new goals. Once you get an agent all you care about is getting a deal. Once you get a deal all you care about is getting a bigger deal. Or awards. Or whatever. It’s so rare to take the time to look at what you’ve achieved and go ‘well, bugger me, I did it.’ And so whatever happens next, I’m going to make sure I never forget to feel grateful for what has happened so far.

3) You can fail at what you don’t love

I’ve worked in advertising for over 15 years so I’ve seen business at its most ruthless. A few years back, I was working for an ad agency that went out of business overnight and 50 people were out of a job a month before Christmas. So there I was, with a new mortgage and no job wondering what the fuck I was going to do. What I did was go freelance and get a contract within twelve hours of the company going under. It taught me that no job is ever safe, so there’s no point in clinging on to a job you don’t love. It taught me to feel comfortable with risk and know that if there’s a choice between taking a chance and standing still you should always take the chance. Because if you’re going to fail, fail while daring greatly.

4) Write for you

It’s one of those old chestnuts that writers say a lot. Along with: where are my goddamn pants**? But it’s true. Because there are no certainties in publishing. And if you write for an audience or a marketing niche or to a trend and it all goes to shit, what you’ll be left with is a book that was written to a brief rather than one that was written from the heart. But if you write for you, no matter what happens, you’ll have a book that you’re proud of even if you’re the only one who will ever read it.

That’s what I did with my book Glaze. It didn’t find a traditional home, but it’s is out in the world kicking butt, and I couldn’t be prouder of it.

5) People love a comeback story

In the three-act structure there’s a plot point right before the final act called ‘the reversal’. It’s when the protagonist appears to be closest to achieving their goals and it’s all taken away. Like in Karate Kid when Danny LaRusso gets injured in the final and you supposed to think it’s all over. But us viewers, we know what that means. It means they’re going to come back even stronger than before. And everyone who’s ever been knocked back needs to remember: It will all work out in the end. And if it hasn’t worked out, it’s not the end.

So Mr Miyagi up, mutherfuckers, and go out there and start crane-kicking some ass.

* The best way you can support any Strange Chemistry authors is by buying their books, or checking them out of libraries, and reviewing them. Also, keep an eye out for all the announcements (no doubt coming soon) on what they decide to do with the books that have been cancelled – and then buy them.

**Which is an even more disturbing thing to hear if you live in the UK.

* * *

Kim Curran is the award-nominated author of books for young adults, including Shift, Control, Delete and Glaze. She studied Philosophy & Literature at university with the plan of being paid big bucks to think deep thoughts. While that never quite worked out, she did land a job as a junior copywriter and has worked in advertising ever since.

She is a mentor at the Ministry of Stories and for the WoMentoring Project. And lives in London with her husband and too many books.

Kim’s newest is Glaze:

PETRI QUINN is counting down the days till she can get on GLAZE. But when a protest turns into a riot, Petri is blamed and banned – from the only social network worth being a part of. Her life is over before it’s even started. Desperate to be a part of the hooked-up society, Petri finds an underground hacker group to set her up with a black-market chip. But it has a problem: it has no filter and no off switch. Petri can see everything happening on GLAZE, all the time. Including things she was never meant to see. As her life is plunged into danger, Petri is faced with a choice. Join GLAZE… or destroy it.

Kim Curran: Website | Twitter

Glaze:  Amazon | Amazon UK

New Summer Books

It is summer.

Time of heat.

Of sand.

Of cool drinks and crappy plotless movies.

Also: an excellent time to read.

NEW BOOKS ARE COMING.

Seriously, scads of awesome releases coming in the next few months — so, whatcha got? What’s on your radar? And, if you’ll permit me a follow-up question:

What’s one of your favorite summer reads? A book that seems divinely-crafted to sit on the beach and devour while your body turns to a glistening lobster-colored blister?

Be advised: crappy people recommend their own books.

Don’t be crappy.

See you in the comments.

In Which I Continue To Answer Questions At Goodreads (Plus: News!)

I’m still doing that, apparently.

Though, I’m like, 30+ questions behind so far.

Just the same, if you wanna read the answers to current questions or ask your own, then make with the clicky-clicky and head over to Goodreads to deposit your query into my BRAIN QUEUE, and I will occasionally flit in and out of the thought-bramble like a curious butterfly to deposit my wisdom upon you like so much golden pollen.

Man, that was a weird-ass metaphor.

It’s early, yet, on a Sunday, so.

*drinks more coffee*

*eats psilocybin oatmeal*

*rides space cat into the Gordian Knot universe*

Two Price Drops

First: Under the Empyrean Sky (bloodthirsty corn! sky-boats! piss-blizzards! teenage dustbowl heroes trying to spit in the eye of the rich people who float above their heads in big flotilla cities!) is now only $7.99 for the hardcover — sale’s on till July, I’m told. This is cheaper than the paperback version, which is coming out on Tuesday. The hardcover is lovely, and sometimes I pick mine up and I stare at it and stroke it. Which often gets me in trouble, because when I do this I am also unclothed at the produce section of your local grocery store.

Yes, your local grocery store, not mine. I like the produce at yours better.

Also: Blackbirds is only $6.87 for the paperback. Not sure why or how long, but there it is. Also — the book is up to 245 (!) reviews (!?), which is exciting! Woo. Woo, I say, woo.

*does happy dance*

*makes out with organic broccoli*

Speaking of Blackbirds…

The TV show squeaks and ekes closer to existence.

Producer David Knoller (Carnivale, Big Love) is onboard the show.

From Deadline Hollywood:

Under the overall pact, David Knoller also is joining Starz’s drama Blackbirds, from John Shiban, and will develop other projects for the pay cable network. The hire gives extra boost to Blackbirds, already on a fast track for an order after recently setting up a writers room. Adapted by Shiban from the novels by Chuck Wendig, Blackbirdscenters on Miriam Black, a hitchhiker who struggles with a unique ability to see how and when you die when she touches you. Shiban and Knoller executive produce the project, which is being developed under his Knollwood Prods. banner, with Ian Williams serving as the company’s director of development. “David is one of those rare people who is able to make everything he’s involved in better,” said Carmi Zlotnik, managing director of Starz.

The news continues to sound good, but we’re still not there yet.

All tendrils, extremities and appendages crossed, if you please.

Flash Fiction Challenge: Doing The Subgenre Twist, Once Again

Last week’s challenge: “The Cocktail Is Your Title“

This week, again we will take 20 subgenres. You will pick two from the list either using a d20 or random number generator (or hell, divine it from the guts of a pigeon, whatever), then you will write a short story that mashes up those two subgenres.

This time, you’ll get 2000 words.

Because I’m sweet like that.

This is due by next Friday, noon EST.

Post at your online space.

Link to it in the comments below.

The subgenre list:

Haunted House
Dystopia
Revenge
Zombie
Weird West
Wuxia
Body Horror
Grimdark Fantasy
Cozy Mystery
Military Sci-Fi
Comic Fantasy
Conspiracy Thriller
Superhero
Erotica
Heist / Caper
Alternate History
Parallel Universe
Noir
Time Travel
Shapeshifters

Sharing Is Caring, You Stingy Little Jerk

*struggles into too-tight ranty-pants*

I just read this article:

“Why I Don’t Make My Son Share.”

And, y’know, honestly, I’m torn.

On the one hand, I get what’s going on here — and I agree that sharing as a blanket concept is one with some notable holes in the fabric. Sure enough, if my kid is playing at the playground or in the parking lot of a strip club and he has a Matchbox car he’s vrooming around, just because some other little shitbird or some parking lot hobo wants to play with it isn’t reason enough to give it up. Sharing is not a religious tenet — consent is a concept that is learned early, and if a kid says, “No, you cannot play with my Go-Bot, motherfucker,” then that has to be respected. You don’t just get to paw at things you want because you want them.

On the other hand, we try to teach little B-Dub to share — within reason. Because while sharing as a concept is a flawed one, most concepts are flawed and pretty much all of life’s lessons are possessed of a spectrum of nuance (and we know how well toddlers do with nuance!). I mean, it’s one thing if my kid has his own toy he doesn’t want to share. But if he’s bogarting a slide or has sprawled out in the McDonald’s ball-pit like he’s Baron Harkkonen or some shit, y’know, he has to let public objects be shared amongst other children. The slide at the playground isn’t a seat at the movie theater. He didn’t pay for it and stake claim to it — it’s a thing that exists for the public good. If I don’t step in, he’ll run that slide all day long, continuing a perpetual motion loop that freezes out any other kid who tries to get near it. Their eyebrows will be blasted off by the speed with which he continues to lap the slide again and again and again and again.

And it’s times like these I realize that lessons learned in childhood are lessons that could carry on through adulthood. This isn’t just playground bullshit. This is life stuff.

Recently, I’ve seen a fresh spate of Stupid Assholes on Facebook (they should really be their own tribe at this point — the SAoF!) say things like: “I’m an old man, why should I have to pay for some lady’s maternity care!” Or, “I don’t have kids, why should I pay school tax!” Well, uhh, let’s see, you selfish fuck-swab, maybe it’s because that’s not how this stuff works. You have to pay for that woman’s maternity care same as her insurance covers your boner pills so you can stick it to sassy Margie McGovern in the retirement home break room. You pay to keep schools up because — oh, for shit’s sake, do I really have to explain this? Because we want to live in a smart country, not a dumb one. Because our taxes go toward community support, and it isn’t an individual savings account geared toward the things you think you deserve. I pay for roads I don’t drive on because — oh, I dunno, YAY ROADS. Taxes aren’t about You. Taxes are about Us.

So, then I wonder: were these people taught not to share? Were they allowed to cleave to that most toddlerian of impulses — the near-feral ME, MINE, WANT, DON’T TOUCH, MINE, MINE, MINE?

Then, on the other hand –

People who download books and movies and TV shows and all kinds of things they didn’t buy. They, too, have that precept of MINE MINE MINE, but the original lesson could’ve gone the other way — they believe in wide open sharing, that what’s yours is mine and what’s mine is yours and sharing is caring which means give me that newest Game of Thrones episode or I’m going to upload web-cam pics of your naked mother to 4Chan.

And then I wonder: how much does this tie into one’s idea of personal liberty? I’m Murrican just like the rest of you — I bleed Heinz Ketchup and gunpowder, too, folks. The problem is when people extend that personal liberty to be something they deserve even when it inhibits the liberty of others. That’s where things get fucky. And again I wonder: does all this start in childhood? Does one’s rampant selfishness start there (almost certainly) and stay because of what happens at that age (could be, rabbit, could be) –?

I don’t have any good answers here. I’m just shouting about stuff.

What I do know, however, is this:

What you teach your kids matters. And what you teach your kids is better when it isn’t some black and white convention — because much as we’d like life to be THIS WAY or THAT WAY, it almost never is. Everything is on a spectrum. All things, given to nuance, and in the process, gravitate toward the middle of things. Maybe if we build into our kids a sense of “it’s a little bit this, a little bit that” — creating in them a clear sense that not everything is simple — then we won’t end up with the festering dungbucket that is the current state of the Internet, where everybody takes an entrenched MY WAY OR THE INFORMATION SUPERHIGHWAY position and digs their heels in so hard the horse they’re riding buckles, farts, and dies. Maybe if we teach them about give-and-take, and sharing (when it’s appropriate), and consent, and the complex vagaries of existing on this little blue-green planetary marble we call home.

Then again, maybe I’m a crummy parent. Who knows?

Oh, the other thing I know is:

The worst thing about other children is the parents of other children.

Seriously, Other Parents, if your kid is being a little jizz-stain, I blame you, not him, except one day he’s gonna be out there on his own and you won’t be around anymore and when he’s all-growed-up as an “adult” (note the sarcastic air quotes), the blame will fall to him by proxy, so maybe pay attention to your kids, don’t let them be little assholes.

Whitney Houston said, I believe that children are our future.

That could be a hopeful promise.

Or, knowing some kids out there, it could be a damning threat.

*rips off ranty-pants, flings the into the trees, runs into the woods*

Kieran Shea: Five Things I Learned Writing Koko Takes A Holiday

Five hundred years from now, ex-corporate mercenary Koko Martstellar is swaggering through an early retirement as a brothel owner on The Sixty Islands, a manufactured tropical resort archipelago known for hedonistic indulgences and simulated violence. Surrounded by slang-drooling boywhores and synthetic komodo dragons, the most challenging part of Koko’s day is deciding on her next drink. That is, until her old comrade Portia Delacompte sends a squad of security personnel to murder her.

* * *

1. Save

Save. Save everything. Your notes, the sauce-stained napkins on which you wrote down dialogue at 2 in the morning in the back of a cab, your early drafts, and so on until the ARC or the final published book is in your sweaty, blissed-out hands. Trust me, you do not want to know what twenty-seven thousand words obliterated by a crashed hard drive feels like so get organized. Lock it down, back it up, and be a grownup for Pete’s sake. Don’t wait until you’re at 2,500 feet in 115 mph free fall to check your chute.

2. Enjoy Yourself

There are vast, the-end-of-Raisers-of-the-Lost-Ark warehouses crammed with books that will never see the light of day. Despite whatever honors you’ve achieved or whatever others may think of your talents, your novel might end up being one of those books. To paraphrase Saint Ben and Saint Jerry…if you’re not having any fun writing then why write it at all? Writing is lonely, isolated work with long-odd payoffs. Get comfortable with masochism and learn to enjoy it.

3. Please Say Something Impressive

Remember that book you dragged your eyeballs through several years back? Yeah, the one that didn’t say sweet jack-all about anything relative to the human experience? Don’t do that.

You have a bone to pick? Pick it. You can’t stand a particular injustice or bigotry? Get it off your chest. Wrap up your issues in metaphor and verbal pyrotechnics and take those bastards to the woodshed. You might only get one shot at this, so don’t forget to go for the kill shot. Drive your message straight through their still beating hearts.

4. Trust Your Reader

Reading requires some level of functional intelligence so have faith in your reader. If the story makes sense to you then guess what? In all likelihood it should make sense to them.

Unless, of course, you’re insane and then all bets are off.

5. Fear Is Your Friend

Don’t take the easy way out. Be brave and write in ways you think are beyond you. Push yourself until the words break and then push yourself some more.

To put it another way, the dancehall is on fire and the doors are locked. You can either die screaming in a full-on panic or you can grab the pretty girl by the hand and kick out the door.

***

Bricoleur, ex-professional chef, and former ad man, Kieran Shea’s fiction has appeared in dozens of venues including Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Dogmatika, Word Riot, Plots with Guns…as well as in several notable anthologies. He’s been nominated for the Story South’s Million Writers Award twice and divides his time between Annapolis, Maryland and Cape May County, New Jersey. 

Kieran Shea: Website | Twitter

Koko Takes A Holiday: Amazon | B&N | Indiebound

Dump The Margarita: The Paloma Is Your New Summer Drinky

I see you’ve got a margarita there.

Lovely drink, the margarita.

*urinates in your glass*

NOW YOU’RE DONE WITH IT.

Ew, what are you doing? Why are you still trying to drink it?

*bats it out of your hand*

Listen. Listen. It’s okay. I’m going to help you drink something better. Because that’s my job — to take the somewhat mediocre poop-squat of a life you are currently experiencing and gussy it up so that before death claims your dumb body, you get to possess a few crucial moments of actual happiness. I mean, remember when I was like, YO THE COFFEE YOU’RE DRINKING IS BASICALLY SWILL RUN THROUGH THE INTESTINAL TRACT OF A SICKENED MUSKRAT and you were like, no way, nuh-uh, except then you did what I said and suddenly you were all like, WHOA-DANG TELL ME MORE, COFFEE WIZARD?

This is like that.

Okay, so, first things first, let’s talk about a couple things.

First, my recipe for the Paloma probably ensures that it’s not actually a Paloma anymore, but hey, fuck it, whatever. I am merely an amateur boozeologist; I do not hold a proper doctorate. Besides, when I was testing out making this lovely drink, none of the actual recipes seemed to agree anyway. Grapefruit soda? Grapefruit juice? Fresh-squozen? Or not? Meh. Meh, I tell you, meh. Screw the authenticity factor. High-five to the THIS SHIT IS DELICIOUS factor.

Second, I am not actually well-tested in the ways of tequila. I’m only starting to dip my toes into those agave waters — and some recipes here can’t agree on whether it’s the blanco or reposado variants. This is in a mixer, and needs to play well with other flavors — further, you’re not sipping it all by its lonesome so you (to my mind) don’t need top-shelf for this. Go to your store, find something in the middle price range, and buy it. I quite like the Siembra Azul Blanco. But really, it doesn’t matter, because my real recommendation is that you scrap tequila for this and instead go with its smoky, surly cousin: motherfucking mezcal.

Mezcal is basically the Lagavulin of tequilas (except, shut up, it’s not actually tequila). It’s made from maguey. They roast that shit underground, and whilst there, the Devil rises up from within the heat-blasted earth and gives it a little kiss, which is why it tastes like smoke and Satan’s love.

Mezcal is basically amazing.

(Note: it is different from mescaline, as well, which also comes from a cactus but is less a beverage and more a thing you take in order to fight jaguar gods and commune with machine-elves in the desert. Your mileage may vary.)

If you want to try mezcal, find this stuff: Ilegal Mezcal Joven.

Avoid shit with “the worm” in it, because the worm is probably just some dumb touristy thing and besides, it’s added after production anyway and sometimes the worm is actually alive and will eat holes in your bowels and set up a silken tent inside your hollowed-out chest cavity and give birth to a thousand more like it, and they will sing a song that summons those you love and soon the squirming worms will hollow them out, too, and then everyone you know will be reproductive puppets for these insidious, drunken parasites.

(Note: I may have imagined that story while high on mescaline.)

Anyway. Onto the drink.

Here’s what you’re gonna do.

Get a highball glass. Salt the rim. (Sounds like a fancy sex move. Something with buttholes?)

Get a shaker.

Into the glass goes:

1/3 cup of mezcal or tequila.

Into the shaker goes:

1/3 cup of grapefruit juice, either freshly squozen or, y’know, from a bottle.

The juice of one-half a lime.

A teaspoon of sugar or simple syrup.

Ice.

Shake the shaker. Shake it like your Momma gave ya. (Wait, shake it like your Momma gave you what? The DTs? Epilepsy? Mescaline? Inquiring minds wanna know.)

Pour what you done shook into the highball glass.

Throw in a few more ice cubes.

Top with — and here is where I differ with a lot of recipes – tonic water. A good, bitter, botanical tonic. (Fevertree is nice. Pro-tip: if it has high fructose corn syrup in it, it’s probably a bottle of garbage — that’s regardless of your feelings about HFCS, but frequently that as an ingredient is a sign of inferior deliciousness.) You won’t need to add much, really just a splash — no more than 1/4 cup at the end of the day. Gives it a little fizz and the botanicals lend it a bit of depth. A lot of recipes say “club soda,” or instead eschew juice and club soda and combine into “grapefruit soda,” but hell with it, I like the juice combo.

Now, drink ten of these.

You’re welcome.

(Variant additives might include: grapefruit bitters, grenadine, the tears of La Llorona.)

Now: share your own cocktail recipes.

DO SO NOW.

* * *

A reminder that if you dig this kinda thing, a whole buncha authors (LIKE ME) have gotten together and formed a church — er, “church” — the HOLY TACO CHURCH where we discuss food and booze and books and foodie boozy books and bookish boozy foods and books about booze foods or whatever. You can go there, subscribe to the newsletter, check out the blog DO SO NOW OR I WILL TELL THE MEZCAL WORMS TO HUNT YOU FOR YOUR FLESH.)

Go and be delicious, tacolytes.