David M. Samuels's Blog, page 3
July 6, 2020
July 2, 2020
Ending a Chapter (Prose Techniques)
(Img by Pierre Santamaria)
Closers are tricky. It’s all about leaving your reader with a reason to turn the page. Here’s a few techniques.
1. Foreshadowing
“This was the way summer should be. This was the way it was going to be. / Dale had never been so wrong.” – Dan Simmons, Summer of Night
“Amy wondered dully if she would be stuck on the hamster wheel forever, stuck in retail forever, stuck at Orsk forever. / But she didn’t have to worry. / Tonight would be her final shift.” – Grady Hendrix, Horrorstor
2. Stakes Reminder
“That, and a big sacrifice to…any other female goddess. / If I survived that long.” – Assaph Mehr, In Numina
“He should beware making enemies in the uncertain days to come”
“Whatever had crept under his skin would burn off with the sunrise. / He was sure of it.” – Stephen King, The Outsider
3. Motivation Reminder
“He’d give her a chance to fix it. But if he caught her with Aaron again, the break would never heal. / And to make it even, he’d break Aaron’s fucking neck.”
4. Ominous Repetition
“So do I,” Amos Hall replied, but the gentleness had gone out of his voice. “So do I.” – John Saul, Nathaniel
“It’s six months. A lot can happen in six months.”
“Everyone is changing and the change is not good. Not good at all.”
“She’d never thought of herself as maternal, exactly, but maybe she’d been wrong. / Perhaps she’d been wrong about everything.”
5. Humor
This one is hard to capture in a brief excerpt, since usually the humor builds on facts established earlier in the chapter. For example, in Ruth Downie’s Medicus, Ruso is given a cooking recipe that he believes he has no use for. At the end of the chapter, he chases puppies out of his room by throwing the recipe scroll at them. “So he did, after all, have a use for the recipe for venison gravy.”
June 16, 2020
I, EXILE | Free Today | Low Fantasy/Apocalyptic/SPFBO
In this homage to 90’s action, a renegade priestess, career thief, and tribe of nomads unite to thwart the Lich of the Wastes.
June 10, 2020
A Mother’s Crusade [Free Short Story]
[Fantasy setting, but inspired by research on the Children’s Crusade)
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Olvara knew something was wrong when she couldn’t find her Norvert at the family stall. These last fourteen years she’d raised him without a lazy bone in his body. Her maternal side always believed that hard work builds character while her mercantile side would never trust a layabout to represent Mirrors & Scopes at the city’s springtide fair.
Worried witless, she cut through the bustle of shoppers and closed in on her assistant, Eadwic. From behind the plank counter, the lean-faced brownbeard was polishing a hand mirror ‘til it sparkled like his eyes. The blue gaze snapped on his dame when she slammed the counter forcefully enough to shake the barrel supports.
“Uh. Hello to you, too.” Eadwic slid the mirror back with the rest on display.
“Don’t tell me I forgot the ledgerbook at the store again.”
“Where’s Norvert?” she asked breathlessly.
“Musta wandered off while I was haggling with a customer.” Eadwic rubbed the back of his neck. “I ‘spect he’ll be back soon.”
Olvara straightened a row of sun-warmed telescopes to help calm her nerves. “It’s not like him to dawdle.”
Far from it. Norvert was a good boy in every respect except one. His devotion to the Godking, namely, was getting out of hand. If only Sister-Prelate Evaline would stop encouraging him to join the Seminary of the Devout. The boy was too young to devote himself to a life full of dusty tomes and tedious sermons.
And yet Olvara feared nastier threats preyed on her son within the lurid labyrinth of tents and booths. Of most concern were the backwoods bumpkins whose brown carts and grey homespun flowed like sludge between the pastel pavilions. Now more than ever, those cautionary tales of out-of-town kidnappers troubled her out of her mind.
“Brought some munchums, have you?” Eadwic’s voice seemed to rumble from worlds away. He smacked his lips at the basket hanging loosely in Olvara’s hand.
Of course. How thoughtless of her to forget the reason for her visit: to reward Norvert’s work ethic with honey cakes and butter-cheese. So much for that.
Well, no reason to let it go to waste. She shoved the basket into Eadwic’s arms and hurried off into the heart of the fair. Weaving around postholes and dungpiles, she scarcely noticed the puppeteer’s foldout cart, nor the litter of kittens up for sale, nor her neighbor Wylos until she bumped straight into him.
“Watch it, woman,” the blacksmith grumbled, tugging his packmule by the halter.
“Forgive me,” she said, mostly because the man’s temper burned hot as his forge.
The bruises on his children could attest to that. “I’m looking for my son, if you’ve seen him.”
“Odd. Wylos Minor is gone too. Damn boy was supposed to fetch Betta. Lookit us now. When I get my hands on him…” He spat onto the flattened patch of grass between them. Those manners would’ve earned him a tongue-lashing if they were inside Mirrors & Scopes. Or maybe not, given that temper. “S’pose he’s with your boy?”
Olvara didn’t suppose that for a second. Instead she remembered with gut-wrenching clarity four years ago, when Norvert tumbled off a tree outside their shop. She’d witnessed it all from behind the counter, including when Wylos Minor fled with a slingshot in hand. That same maternal dread resurged now in a tide of cold panic.
After curtseying away from the smith and his donkey, Olvara heard a chorus of hums rise over the hubbub. Soon it resolved into a paean to the Godking Almighty. The song floated from the lichyard north of the fairgrounds, where the city’s dead were laid to rest in the shadow of the walled basilica.
Which brought to mind Sister-Prelate Evaline. If that meddlesome vulture had something to do with Norvert’s disobedience, Olvara would speak her mind and to all hells with the consequences.
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Hundreds of youths swarmed around the stone angels and mossy tombstones that dotted the lichyard. Olvara took pride in her skill with the abacus, but even she couldn’t tally them all—especially since more than a few sat half-hidden in the branches of elm trees. Backs turned away from the iron-spiked lichgate, their attention never wavered from something at the foot of the walled basilica.
Olvara’s blood froze over from their sharp-pitched chorus, only to warm up when she singled out the crackly chirp of Norvert. Before she could pin him down, the chanting faltered to silence.
Another voice rang out from somewhere ahead. Not that of Sister-Prelate Evaline, but a vowel-stretching brogue from the backcountry. Stranger still, it belonged to a child.
“Peers of Vournos, listen good! All your lives adults’ve treated you like dogs, shouting out commands and whipping you for misbehavior. Well I’m gonna unlock your kennels with the truth! Truth handed to me from the Godking himself!”
Olvara didn’t dare step any further than the shed that doubled as a gatepost. Never a good idea to waltz into a sermon targeted against folks your age. Instead she climbed the cordwood stack on the other side of the shed in order to find Norvert.
Across from the first row of onlookers, Olvara saw seven boys in patchy wool robes fanned out on the steps to the Cordray family crypt. Each held a shepherd’s crook garlanded with the green and white posies sacred to the Church of Aeons. The gaunt cast to their faces convinced Olvara that they needed a meal, not religion.
The mousy-haired one up front was doing the talking. His emerald eyes flashed in the dappled sunlight as he said, “The Godking Almighty was only twelve years of age when he conquered these lands. Now the adults’ve let the western heathens break off from Flauria and set up a godless freehold!”
If anyone resented the Flaurian Freehold, it was Olvara. Ten years ago, her husband had marched against the rebels and never returned. And yet vengeance was the last thing on her mind. Another war could only spell trouble for what family she had left. Biting her lip, she picked at her cuticles as the shepherd boy preached on.
“Tell me, fellows of Vournos. Will you sit aside while the westlings tear our heritage apart? Continue to lap up the lies of your houndmasters?”
A nerve-tingling, “No!” erupted from the mob.
“Don’t tell me. Tell them.” He speared a finger at the lichgate, and for a moment Olvara feared he was pointing at her. But actually he directed the mob’s attention to a squad of plumehelms fast approaching from the fairgrounds.
At the sight of all those children, the guards halted and muttered uneasily amongst themselves. The fathers among them twisted their faces in concern that Olvara felt herself. Most widened their eyes and took a step back when the children launched another, “No!” their way.
“Together we’ll march westward!” shouted the ringleader. “Unstained by the sins of adulthood, we’ll succeed where the grownups’ve failed. Nothing can stop us with the Granite God at our side. So I ask you, who’ll join me?”
Amidst the next round of cheers, the baker’s boy climbed off the shoulders of his friend at the edge of the crowd. Not just any friend, but one with black hair and a pale neck that Olvara had scrubbed times beyond count.
“Norvert Eustus Larian!” She drew plenty of stares in her efforts to clamber down from the stack of cordwood. “Just what do you think you’re doing?”
“Eustus?” teased the baker’s boy. “That’s your middle name?”
Olvara stomped up to Norvert and gave his friends something else to laugh at by dragging him away by the ear. She’d hauled him halfway to the lichgate when he knocked her hand aside.
Arms crossed over his freshly laundered tunic, he ducked his chin to his shoulders. “You’re embarrassing me, Mother.”
“I think you’ve done a fine job of that yourself. We’ll discuss it at the tent. As for the rest of you,” Olvara shouted at the top of her voice, “go home to your parents! They’re likely worried to death.”
But none of them moved a muscle while Olvara steered Norvert into the fairgrounds. Instead they gazed back with an intensity that made her skin crawl. Far too much zealotry inspired by the boy who claimed to hear a god.
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Norvert wriggled in Olvara’s grasp all the way back to the family’s stall. Since Eadwic was drawing up a contract with some wholesalers in the front, she prodded her son into the canopied counting chamber in the back. Crates and caskets filled what space wasn’t occupied by the table of ledgers and ivory counters.
Norvert twisted free and dropped into a stool by the table, arms crossed and scowl downcast from his mother’s gaze of concern.
“What’s gotten into you?” Olvara’s keyring jangled as she planted a fist on her hip. “You were supposed to watch the tent today, and here I find you playing crusader in the lichyard.”
“It’s not a game, Mother,” he huffed in the tone he’d used in the face of rare punishments.
Let him sulk. He was in for a week of sweeping once Olvara was through with him.
“To call it a game is to—” Norvert cut himself short with an eye-rolling sigh. Then he grabbed one of the counters and sent it spinning on the table. “You wouldn’t understand.”
Olvara slapped the disc flat on the planks. “You don’t actually believe that shepherd boy, do you?”
“With all my heart.” Norvert looked his mother in the eye, which was a start at least. “The Godking speaks to him, Mother. I can feel it.”
“Feel it? You’re willing to lay down your life for this pint-size prophet on the grounds that you can feel it? For pity’s sake, Norvert, that’s absurd!”
“No!” He surged to his feet and glared at the stack of counters. A boy like Wylos might’ve swept them off the table, but Olvara had taught Norvert better. “What’s absurd is your lack of faith.”
“Faith, he says.” She barked out laughter, all bitter and dry. “Your father had faith, and what did that earn him? An unmarked grave in the Freehold, that’s what. I won’t lose you to another war.”
“As if you’re worried about me,” he grumbled. “All you care about is Mirrors & Scopes.”
A knife in the heart would’ve stung less. Clutching her bosom, Olvara said, “Why would you even think that?”
“Because you’d rather have me slave away at the shop than let me attend the Seminary of the Devout.”
“That’s what this is about? Spite is no reason to throw your life away.”
Black strands swished over his eyes with each shake of his head. “I’m not throwing my life away. I’m committing to a cause greater than us both. I love you Mother, I do,”—she felt her heart swell when he put both hands on her shoulders. Since when had he grown so tall?—“but at some point you’ve got to let go. Give the business to Eadwic, I’m sure he’ll run it well.”
Just then Eadwic popped his head past the flap. Breadcrumbs shook from his beard as he asked, “Somebody called?”
Norvert took that moment to squeeze past Eadwic on his way outside.
Knees shaking, Olvara latched onto a barrel for support. “Where did I go wrong with him?”
“Nowhere, m’dame,” said Eadwic. Presumptuous of him to pat her shoulder, but not unwelcome either. “Some folks get blinded when they’ve got their heads in the heavens is all.”
“That’s it!” If Norvert’s head was stuck in the heavens, then it would take a heavenly disciple to bring him back home.
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Word about the children’s crusade had yet to reach Sister-Prelate Evaline by the time Olvara found her in the basilica. The bald-shaven prelate had been too preoccupied overseeing renovations in the sanctum, not to mention the messenger-boys weren’t exactly available.
Olvara’s news sent Evaline into a blaze of fury. Normally as cool as the Godking’s statue at her side, the bulky sister-prelate snapped a yardstick across her knee and hurled both halves over her shoulder. One piece clacked against the scaffolding while the other would’ve thumped the laborer’s noggin if he hadn’t crouched behind a sawhorse in time.
“Godking’s good graces!” The spikes in her deep voice resounded through the nave, the acoustics of which blocked off the chants outside. “What rot my sisters must teach in the hinterlands, for this boy to believe the Purifier waged crusade at age twelve. Let alone the fact that he thinks himself a prophet. I shall teach him a thing or two, but not without the Holy Swords.”
Green-and-silver robes swirled at her heels as she spun to face the guardroom off the foot of the sanctum. She strode two steps before Olvara hooked her in place by the plush sleeve of her vestments.
“This so-called prophet is but a foolish child,” said Olvara. “Eager to spill his blood for a cause he doesn’t understand. What makes you think he won’t try to fight your Swords?”
Evaline jerked her head back at the epithet. “If he desires bloodshed, then I shan’t deny him. No one threatens the children of Vournos.”
“But don’t you see? The children — our children — want to fight alongside him!” She shuddered just thinking about how fiercely the youths reacted to the plumehelms. “There must be another way.”
“Do you have any suggestions?” asked Evaline with a skeptical curl at the end.
“As a matter of fact…”
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“…I do, whereas you know nothing.” Sister-Prelate Evaline’s voice rang along the avenue of children and up to the shepherd boys atop the Cordray crypt. The upper half of her staff was garlanded with similar flowers to those decorating her adversaries’ crooks. Although a close observation would reveal her posies were darkened to gray and swamp-green by some liquid or other.
“Parables tells us that the Purifier lived eighteen summers before he marched south from the River Counties. Whoever told you twelve is full of coral. Furthermore…”
While Evaline distracted the children, Olvara stuck close to the lichyard walls on her way to an angel statue near the shepherd boys. Not once did her fingers uncoil from the sweat-slickened tools in the pocket of her blouse. She could only hope they would serve their purpose.
“If you’re so righteous,”—the self-styled prophet jolted Olvara’s heart when he pointed at her—“then why’s your friend worming her way nearer?”
Hundreds of small faces looked up at Olvara. Faces of angels who’d devolve into demons if they discovered her intention. It wasn’t hard to find Norvert amongst them—he alone broke off eye contact and blushed to the black roots of his hair. If only he knew Olvara was doing this for his own good.
“Looks like she’s siding with me instead of you,” sneered the would-be boy wonder. “I bet she sees the truth in my words.”
“Certainly not,” said Evaline. Most of the stares returned to her as the debate flared on, with the prelate listing off patristic proofs and the prophet launching barb after barb. His forked tongue won more laughs from the children than her logic did convince them, so everything relied on whether Olvara succeeded in her task.
Only after the last gaze slid away did she backstep to the stone angel closest to the Cordray crypt. She arrived moments before the prelate dropped the cue.
“Alright, child,” said Evaline. “If the Granite God truly speaks to you, then prove it. Let us see you perform a miracle.”
The shepherd boy tipped up his chin and looked down his nose from the crypt steps. “Everyone knows the Godking doesn’t work wonders for the sake of vanity!”
“True enough. But vanity is not at question here. What’s at question is your legitimacy as a prophet. Surely the Godking would lend you his hand to prove yourself in the eyes of others.”
Excited whispers rippled through the avenue of children and to the seven shepherd boys. Their leader scrunched up his forehead and mouthed words that wouldn’t come. Eventually he regained enough composure to respond, “If what you say is true, then let’s see you do a miracle!”
A few shepherd boys piped up in agreement, only to falter the instant Evaline spoke up, “I’m not the one who makes claims to divinity. However—”
“Excuses, excuses!”
“—however the Purifier occasionally works his will through his lowlier subjects. Perhaps he’ll grant me a boon to prove the error of your ways.” With that she brought her staff up high, and Olvara knew what to do.
From her blouse she retrieved a hand mirror and a lens of convex glass from the shop. Normally used in the swiveling telescopes aboard merchant ships, the glass would serve a different function today. Tilting the mirror in one direction and the lens in another, she magnified the springtide sunlight and bounced it back to Sister Prelate Evaline.
Anyone who looked at the angel statue would only see a glare of light as it refracted straight toward Evaline’s staff. The oil-soaked garlands around the staff went up in a whoosh of feathery flames.
The children stepped back in bug-eyed bafflement, almost trampling each other to recoil from the heat. They were so caught up in things that none of them noticed Olvara dismount the statue and mix with the screaming, jostling horde.
“Leave Vournos tonight, or face justice at the discretion of an ecclesiastical trial.” Although Evaline spoke with iron in her voice, the tilt to her brows betrayed the slightest apprehension. At first she’d rejected Olvara’s plan on the grounds that faking a miracle—no matter the motive—was sacrilege.
Olvara had to employ all the bargaining tools she’d picked up from her husband over the years. The sort of arguments that kept Mirrors & Scopes in business long after his passing. That time was of the essence; that the alternative left them no better off; and, to top it off with her own improvisation, that the Godking would’ve struck them down if the plan was so offensive.
Thankfully, no thunderbolts came down to smite the prelate as she let the staff drop onto the crushed gravel path and strutted away.
As if to hide amongst the statuary, the shepherd boys stood rigidly upon the steps of the crypt. Olvara couldn’t help but feel a dash of pity for the misguided sheep as they flicked questioning glances at their ringleader.
When he finally stammered out of his stupor, most of his flock were already filtering out of the lichyard. Norvert must’ve left too, since Olvara couldn’t see him anywhere in the vicinity. Just as well. She had other business to deal with first.
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Olvara couldn’t help from tearing up when she sliced onions for dinner that night. The sharp fumes mingled with a garlicky aroma within the riverstone walls of her kitchen. She mixed the onions into a bowl of mushy meat before pouring it all into trenchers of bread still warm from the oven.
The jingle of harness outside told her that Eadwic had returned from the fair. When Norvert followed him indoors, her heart soared to the rafters with joy. And yet the shaken look on his face sank those spirits as it does when any mother sees her child unhappy.
He stopped at the archway between the shop and the kitchen. Those gray eyes of his met Olvara’s with an apology he wanted to say but couldn’t put into words.
The grumble of his stomach filled the silence. Blushing, he clapped a hand onto his belly. “Is that what I think it is?”
“Calf’s brain custard,” Olvra said brightly. “Your favorite.”
Another step brought him past the archway. After their argument from earlier, he had the look of a man who’d ventured into a dragon’s lair to discover the beast throwing him a surprise party. “But why?”
Olvara tapped her spoon on the rim of the bowl. “I’ve given some thought to what you said back at the tent.” She called into the shop, “Eadwic? Be a dear and bring me a document I left in the counting room. The vellum in a red ribbon.”
Eadwic returned in a few thumping footfalls. He whiffed a lungful of the food and exhaled a blissful sigh, pink tongue curled around a brown beard.
Olvara needed to clear her throat to snap him out of his reverie. When he offered up the roll of parchment, she shook her head and jutted her chin at Norvert.
The paper crinkled under Norvert’s fingers as he untied the ribbon. Then he paused to crook black brows at his mother.
“Go on,” she said.
Without his spectacles, he had to tilt it up close to accommodate his overworked eyes. Yet not so close that Olvara couldn’t see the grin sprouting across his face. A grin that branched off in dimples and bloomed into a crescent of white petals.
“I can’t believe it.” He looked happier than the time he’d received an inkstand for Autumnfest. “Permission to attend the seminary! But you said—”
“I said a lot of things. We both did. And though most of it was twaddle, I know a good point when I hear it. It’s wrong to steer you in one direction when you want to go in another.”
In a sense the boy-prophet was right, not that Olvara would admit as much openly. All this time she’d been clutching too tightly to Norvert, unwilling to let him spread his wings and fly. Though it cut her heart deep, she’d rather have him leave the nest under her watch than soar off with pigeons playing at falconry.
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Six months later, Olvara spent the autumn afternoon sweeping up leaves from the shopfront. It was one of many tasks she’d taken up since Norvert had left home, but she did them with the peace of mind that it meant his happiness.
When her eyes landed on Wylos across the street, however, she cut her humming short. His son was one of the few who’d followed the shepherd boys out of town. No word from him yet, and Olvara didn’t expect there to be any.
Never a happy man at the best of times, Wylos had since dropped to new lows of despair. When he wasn’t drinking himself into oblivion, he was hammering away at his anvil as if it stood in for his son.
Olvara hated to think she might’ve suffered the same fate of her neighbor. But no. Norvert was alive and well in the Seminary of the Devout. And thriving, if his letters were any indication. He was learning to read antediluvian runes and had even picked up playing the fiddle. Oh, how he’d grown over such little time. And if he’d left a void in Olvara’s life in the process, well then she filled it herself.
Back inside the shop, she hooked her winter coat on a peg by the door and called, “Eadwic?”
He emerged from the workshop with a grease stain on his cheek. “Yes, m’dame?”
“Here, you’ve got something on your face.” She closed the distance to wipe it off with her handkerchief.
“It’ll be a cold one tonight,” he said, stroking her wrist with a grubby forefinger.
“That may be so.” She grabbed ahold of his wrist. “Good thing I have a young sweetheart to help warm me up.” And together they went upstairs, arm in arm, this family forged anew.
END
Other Works: https://storyscriptorium.wordpress.com/contact/
May 30, 2020
Fantasy Humor Flowchart
May 27, 2020
Writer’s Handbook: Wood/Carpentry
[None of the quotes below belong to me. They are intended to be used as references for influence and not to be copied directly]
Related:
Architecture: https://storyscriptorium.wordpress.com/2018/04/13/brick-by-brick-architectural-details-in-your-writing-setting-series-1/
50 Types of Rooms: https://storyscriptorium.wordpress.com/2019/08/10/50-types-of-rooms-for-brainstorming-medieval-and-fantasy-architecture-writers-resource/
TYPES OF WOOD (DECORATIVE)
Blond-wood
Satinwood
Cherrywood (reddish brown wood of a cherry)
Rosewood (a fragrant close-grained tropical timber used for making furniture and musical instruments)
Lemonwood
Mahogany
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Roughhewn (“planks of the table”)
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Cedar
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Hardwood (the wood from a broad-leaved tree (such as oak, ash, or beech) as distinguished from that of conifers
Dark-grained paneling
Dark-paneled cupboards
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FLAWS
Wood has wormholes
Worm-eaten
Dry-rotted floor
_-stained
Splintery
“Splintered wooden counter”
Warped wood; split wood
Sea-whitened
“Scoured pale by the salt wind”
Water-softened wood
Scuffed wood
Salt-stained/salt-scarred
“Wood softened by dry rot”
Wood dark with age
Nicked
Cracked
“Picking at a knot in the warped wood of the table before him”
Knothole
Buffed out (scratches)
Wood is bruised by time and weather
“Split the pillar down the grain”
DECORATIVE
Inset (“…battered wooden box inset with many dozens of small drawers.”)
graved/engraved
Lacquered
Marquetry (inlaid work made from small pieces of variously colored wood or other materials, used chiefly for the decoration of furniture | a marquetry tabletop)
Lacy carvings
May 24, 2020
Sensory Details in Creative Fiction: Touch/Tactile
One advantage literature has over most art forms is that it can engage all five senses. Besides movies and lyrics, only prose can transport you to a fair spring afternoon in Paris, where you can enjoy a freshly-baked croissant to the melody of street musicians.
Sensory details are important for immersing the reader. On a visceral level, they help draw the reader in with concrete/imaginable experiences. So whenever I write, I take into account all of the senses: sight, smell, taste, and sound. Yup, all four of them. Wait, that can’t be right….
Ah! How could I ever forget touch? Many writers do. Tactile details are few and far between in plenty of works. In fact, they’re hardly employed compared to the other senses. Part of this is because there aren’t many words to describe concrete experiences with touch, so here I’ve listed a handful for your reference:
[None of the quotes below belong to me. They are intended to be used as references for influence and not to be copied directly]
ROUGH TEXTURE
Granular [resembling or consisting of small grains or particles.]
Granulated (having a roughened surface)
Sandy
Craggy
The pebbled leather
nubbly/nubbled
“Its ancient leather cover corrugated like a toad’s skin”
“His fingers felt rough as crocodile”
Scabrous stucco
“Misshapen stones were gritty to the touch”
Bristly cheek
Sandpaper stubble
Spiny
Spiky (eyebrows/tactile)
grooves/grooved
Scaly
Scratchy mattress
Prickly grass
Fuzz (Gormas’s fuzzy excuse for a beard)
“Aluminum pans of gelatinous pasta”
Springy tissue
Elastic
Mushy snow
glaucous (having a waxy or powdery coating that gives a frosted appearance and tends to rub off)
Oily
Sludgy
Glutinous (like glue in texture; sticky)
Gummy
Waxy
Squishy
Spongy
Dough-soft
“What felt like skin the texture of cooked mushroom”
“His breath feathering Luke’s neck”
CRUMBLY
Flaky
Crumbly
“crumbled to the touch”
SMOOTH
Sealskin-smooth
dolphin-smooth
Smooth as glass
Mirror-smooth granite
SOFT
Plush (carpet/upholstery)
Fluffy
Supple (capable of being bent without creases/cracks)
Velvety
“Through the crinkly hospital gown”
Feathery
Fuzz (Gormas’s fuzzy excuse for a beard)
Stay tuned for a phrase list on temperature reactions!
May 22, 2020
Review: The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix
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Set in the same town as My Best Friend’s Exorcism, The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires (henceforth referred to as SBG) follows Patricia, mother of two, and the other gals in her book club. When children start disappearing around town, Patricia’s knowledge of criminal pulp leads her to believe that the new neighbor, James Harris is responsible.
James Harris has to be one of my favorite vampires, right up there with Nosferatu and George RR Martin’s Joshua York from Fevre Dream. Harris’s Ted Bundy-esque charisma is so likeable that it’s almost impossible to believe he’d harm a fly. I found it interesting how Hendrix departed from some vampire tropes/motifs while staying loyal to others.
Rule #1: NEVER INVITE ONE INTO YOUR HOUSE.
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“Would you like to meet my family?” she asked.
“I don’t want to interrupt your meal,” he said.
“I’d consider it a personal favor if you did.”
He regarded her for a split second, expressionless, sizing her up, and then he matched her smile.
“Only if it’s a real invitation,” he said.
“Consider yourself invited,” she said, standing aside.
After a moment he stepped over her threshold and into the dark front hall.
Hendrix, Grady. The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires (pp. 74-75). Quirk Books. Kindle Edition.
This might be my favorite work from Hendrix to date. The interpersonal relationships and stakes reminded me much of Anne River Siddon’s The House Next Door, and (to a lesser extent) Stephen King’s The Outsider. I also found it somewhat ironic how the silliest concept for a Hendrix novel turned out to be the darkest entry in his oeuvre yet.
May 17, 2020
Banshee Song [Free Fantasy/Horror]
Oh, the things I would do to turn back time. To have never killed that streetwalker, never gotten conscripted, and – most importantly – never bedded the wife of High Marshal Luthos.
The marshal’s deep tenor remains chiselled in my memory: For a soldier who seeks the warmth of my wife’s bedchamber, what better punishment than the coldest land of them all?
Now available on Dark Fire Magazine’s website.
April 29, 2020
Explore Euvael [My Publications]
6/20/19 | Three Nights in Faral-Khazal
What do a royal chef, an embalmer, and a career thief have in common? Three Nights in Faral-Khazal is a triptych of standalone (but interconnected) stories in the same high fantasy city.
9/6/19 | Of Steel That Stings and Other Sharp Things
Emelith the Finder infiltrates a manor to sabotage a duel in her client’s favor.
1/29/20 | Ebb & Flow
Diary entries from both sides of a naval siege.
https://swordsandsorcerymagazine.com/archive/ebb-flow-by-david-samuels
2/29/20 | I, Exile
Exiled into a wasteland because of a heist gone wrong, Emelith vows to hunt down the one responsible. Except not all is what it seems in the haunted realm of the Cauldron.
3/20/20 | The Corpse Eternal
When Advocate Moralt investigates the body of a possible saint, he begins to wonder if murder is afoot.
TBP Silver Blade Magazine
4/12/20 | A Hero Reborn
The granddaughter of Odysseus seeks training from Atalanta.
Available on The Fifth Di… by Alban Lake Publishing
5/1/20 | Banshee Song
Soldiers on the frozen frontier of Euvael uncover a dark secret.
TBP Dark Fire Magazine
