S.L. Luck's Blog, page 4

Another Beat

I’ve got some cool news for you today. Many of you have asked about the writing process and the various tools I use. When I finished Redeemer a month ago, my next step was figuring out how to edit the beast. As you are aware from my previous posts, you’ll know that I was really struggling with trusting an editor since my last one fell ill. I searched pretty hard and found a solution that worked best for me, at this early point in my career. I found a writing friend to swap edits with, plus the insanely keen (read: picky) eye of my husband, and…now this is wild…an artificial intelligence program (A.I.) for novelists, which I discovered by reading industry hot sheets (fancy term for news in the writing world). Anyway, I plugged my unedited novel into the program. While I felt I was on the right track with this book, I was a wee bit worried about what this program would think about my novel, considering the program, named Marlowe, has been fed thousands of books, both good and bad, so it could learn the components of a best seller. When the results came back, I knew I had scored. My narrative arc and plot were exactly where they needed to be, my complexity score and my character development were strong and my pacing was excellent. The program did identify one weakness in the narrative beats, or the rhythm of the story. It showed that I skipped a beat in the middle of the story. As something like this could turn readers off, or worse, bore them, I edited the novel intently and fed the book into the program again today. Guess what? SCORE!!!!! Where I wanted to add at least one beat in the boring middle, I added two. (Yay me!)

Another Beat

October 18, 2020

I’ve got some cool news for you today. Many of you have asked about the writing process and the various tools I use. When I finished Redeemer a month ago, my next step was figuring out how to edit the beast. As you are aware from my previous posts, you’ll know that I was really struggling with trusting an editor since my last one fell ill. I searched pretty hard and found a solution that worked best for me, at this early point in my career. I found a writing friend to swap edits with, plus the insanely keen (read: picky) eye of my husband, and…now this is wild…an artificial intelligence program (A.I.) for novelists, which I discovered by reading industry hot sheets (fancy term for news in the writing world). Anyway, I plugged my unedited novel into the program. While I felt I was on the right track with this book, I was a wee bit worried about what this program would think about my novel, considering the program, named Marlowe, has been fed thousands of books, both good and bad, so it could learn the components of a best seller. When the results came back, I knew I had scored. My narrative arc and plot were exactly where they needed to be, my complexity score and my character development were strong and my pacing was excellent. The program did identify one weakness in the narrative beats, or the rhythm of the story. It showed that I skipped a beat in the middle of the story. As something like this could turn readers off, or worse, bore them, I edited the novel intently and fed the book into the program again today. Guess what? SCORE!!!!! Where I wanted to add at least one beat in the boring middle, I added two. (Yay me!)

Here’s a cool graphic for you:

[image error]This is the beat structure of Redeemer before the first edit.



[image error]The beat structure of Redeemer after the first edit. (SCORE!)

My next steps are to give the book another brush up, finish the cover and get the print proofs approved so those of you who have been asking for the print link can get it. Thanks for your support, Dear Readers. Stay tuned…

Night Life

October 8, 2020

I have a new story for you today. Just something I whipped up as I thought about Halloween. It’s also on my Stories page, but I know some of you prefer to read it in the blog, so here it is. Enjoy!

“Night Life”

            The day had finally come. Joy, adjusting her mask, her smooth wig, the oversized romper and attached pacifier, regarded herself in the hallway mirror. There had never been a better baby nor had there ever been a more eager trick-or-treater. Behind the slits in her mask, Joy’s eyes glowed and the thin pads her cheeks brushed the rubber, unable to contain her smile.  This was the time of friends and adventure and trickery and excess. On the other side of the door, sugar and play and all things different awaited Joy and she took one last look at the oblivious others at their computer screens then quietly snuck outside.

            The sun was down and the streetlights were on and in the brightness of their intermittent cones, Joy at once saw little ghouls and witches, vampires, two-legged dinosaurs, clusters of superheroes and more princesses than she could count. She studied the flow of impersonators and dashed into an opening between a group of muscular turtles and a litter of cats and held firm to her pillowcase. “Awww, look at the baby,” one of the cats mewled her way. Joy put a gloved finger to the corner of her mouth and dipped her knees, giggling as highly as her voice would allow and joined the group wordlessly, hoping they would allow her to stay. The five cats took her in and then there were six of them darting up sidewalks, rushing over lawns, bolting across streets, ringing doorbells, knocking once here, more there, howling for candy until their bags were too heavy to lift and had to be dragged onward. Tired but unwilling to retire until the last porchlights went out and the last candy was given, they drew toward the condominiums where they could reach more homes with less effort. By now, Joy could feel pockets of blisters forming on her heels and on the pads of her feet but she carried on with her new friends, weighting her bag with each tiny anvil, each little boulder. At last, Joy could go no more; not on, anyway, and she waved to her five feline friends before turning toward home.

            Joy had gone no more than two blocks when the sounds of happy children and delighted patrons were suddenly severed by a cacophony of sirens and bells and alarms. She walked on, quickly now, ignoring the pain as streets were flooded with blue and red lights, tugging her bag over her aching shoulder so she could move with speed. She took cover in the dark between houses, under trees, behind fences, and soon she was staring up at the bright lights of the manor. Joy breathed, gathering courage with the cool air, then with her chin tipped high she went inside.

            Silently, she thanked the saints and spirits that facilitated her invisible re-entry and swiftly hid her pillowcase in the back of the closet beneath her blankets. Then Joy pulled her mask off and instantly aged eighty-two years.

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Baby Step

September 30, 2020

I just gave myself a kick in the ass. Let me explain…

Last night I couldn’t sleep because I was mentally scheduling Redeemer’s release. First I thought December, then January, then March. Then sometime in 2022. Then 2025. Maybe even 2029. This, not because the book isn’t ready or good enough but because the thought of releasing it makes me nauseous. Like drinking an entire bottle of Pepto nauseous. (I haven’t yet.) While research and education have prepared me for the hard realities of publishing, I find it difficult to prepare myself for everything else. The reviews. The marketing. The dreaded self-promotion. I have a degree in marketing but I’ve always found it so much easier to promote everything, anything else besides myself. So please bear with me as we journey along together in the crazy world that is publishing.

That said, a few minutes ago I put Reedemer for pre-sale on Amazon and the link will be live once approved by the mega giant. December 10 is the current release date. (Sounds cool but this is just a baby step, as there is SO much more to do and consider in terms of distribution, marketing, format, etc.) Really, I just needed a date to aspire to, so it’s before Christmas. I whipped up a cover and some back copy last night and I’d love your thoughts on it. I have quite a while to change it and make it better, so I’d love your feedback. Stay tuned…

Back Cover Copy – Draft

Holy Redeemer was a place of glory. Until it was a place of terror.  

Father Robert Pauliuk would always remember the Redeemer fire. His former parish, Holy Redeemer had been his first assignment. It was where he grew into his canonical competencies and where he met his wife, Donna.

 It was also the very building that killed her and his curate, Stu Kline.

When small-town editor Phil Beecher survives the deadly COVID-19 pandemic twenty-two years later, he is compelled to solve the mystery behind the Redeemer fire. He enlists newly unemployed Vanessa Penner for a fresh take on the case and gets much more than he expected.

Death.

[image error]One of my many proofs, but I’m leaning toward this one…

Dearly Departed…

September 23, 2020

I have a dilemma. I’ve made a commitment to you that I don’t think will work for either of us. Here it is…

You know that recently I finished my thriller, Redeemer, and that my plan was to serialize Popcorn & Politics on this site. While I have no problem at all giving the latter book away, I had an epiphany when I revisited it yesterday: the two books are absolutely so magnificently different. This was obvious to me before and I thought that it would give my readers an idea of the range of which I can now comfortably write. But…

But P&P is written in first-person, present tense. It makes light of almost everything. It is highly experimental. Beyond this, the book was written over the course of 3 years. I often left it, came back to it, let it die, and exhumed its bones whenever I had the fancy. Yes, my master’s dissertation was this book. Yes, I received one of the highest creative scores the university could give….but the writer that wrote that book is the outer cocoon of the writer I am today. This said, I don’t believe I will let the book permanently rest. There is a significant chance I go digging again and wake it up but if I were to present it to you now, I think we both would sniff a little at its emaciation.

The biggest reason for this delay, though, is because my beta readers for Redeemer wanted to see more of the fictional city, Garrett, that I created. They were sad when the story ended and wanted more and urged me to bring them more of the characters they had grown to love. Couple that with a new idea that practically knocked me off my chair on Saturday, I’m itching to start writing another book. The main characters in the new book will not be the same characters as in Redeemer, but much of the secondary characters and scenery will be the same. (Note: It will not be a series.)

I will share other stories with you as we go along and hope for your forgiveness. I think this approach is better for us, as I don’t want to shock you too much…yet. With my focus now on the new book and getting Redeemer ready for publishing, you will see Redeemer sooner than later. Stay tuned…

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I’m done!

Holy crap. I did it. I’m done. Finito. Complete. Still can’t believe it. An hour ago, I officially completed the first draft of Redeemer. It’s by far the fastest book I’ve ever written and, I daresay, the one that will require the least amount of revision. I’m proud of this one. Now, Dear Reader, as promised I will have Popcorn & Politics up here for your reading pleasure soon. One more editing scrub and then I will give it up and out to the world. Keep in mind that the latter novel is a satire and the first is a thriller so your reading experience will be different with each of them. That said, I’ve never liked the idea of genre as a classification because, increasingly, novels are more than any single designation. I’ve found satiric novels that are also equal parts thriller and I’ve found romance novels that seem more mystery to me. However you feel my novels should be classified, I hope you enjoy them. Stay tuned…

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Corner Warriors

September 18, 2020

I’m told I should blog more but it’s hard to do when you’re busy completing a novel. So I’m pulling myself away to update you on my progress and I can tell you that it’s going better than well…I’m almost done. In a few days, a week at most, Redeemer will be complete. My younger self would have sent portions of my work out to get feedback but my older (more mature?) self has waited until this week when I put my newest (yet not quite complete) baby into my Beta readers’ hands. Feedback has rolled in and I believe I’ve scored with this one. It seems I’ve invaded my Readers’ dreams, their lunch breaks, their quiet mornings, their busy evenings with something that demands their attention. Score! I say. Yes! I high-five those inner portions of myself that need occasional reassurance. So…the age old problem I’ve rolled around concerns the editing process. I’m a firm believer that all books NEED an editor but my history with editors thus far has been sub par. For my last book, Popcorn & Politics, I gave an advance deposit of half the required amount to my editor. Things went well for a few weeks. Feedback was consistent. Then the editor seemed to have dropped off the face of the earth. Unfortunately, some sleuthing on the editor’s professional and personal pages leads me to believe that the editor met with irrecoverable illness. Not at all the editor’s fault, but now I’m out money. I tried an editing swap next, where I dropped what I was doing for weeks to edit a fellow author’s book, making hundreds, if not thousands of edits the author accepted. The author was supposed to read my work and send me feedback, too. It’s been seven months now and that author has not only published the book I edited and is presently working on a second book, but has yet to give me one word of helpful advice on my own work. Not a single word. Double whammy, right? So, my dilemma is a serious one of trust. I do have some solid people in my corner but the process has shown me that not everyone is going to meet me half way. Many won’t even leave the starting gates and some, unfortunately, will even retreat. How’s that for a morale booster?

I digress.

My plan is still to serialize Popcorn & Politics for free on this site. I wrote it when I was reading a lot of satire and though I realize satire is not your typical page-turning genre, its experimental what ifs are probably why they should be read in the first place. Implausibility aside, they are fun mediums to make you think and that’s what I hope to accomplish when you first read about Jim Tennant and Canada’s Dream Bank Program.

Stay tuned, Dear Reader, and thanks for being in my corner.

[image error]Redeemer
Coming Soon.

Christopher’s Perfect Day

August 27, 2020

My husband and I celebrate 16 years tomorrow. (Yay us!) He’s not a card kind of guy unless there’s a hockey player on it and there’s nothing we need and nowhere we can fly off to, so I figured I’d put my writing skills to use and write him the perfect day. Our oldest daughter watched me cry-laugh as I read it out to her (clearly I’m not as funny as I think I am), but I think it does justice for the ball of fun that is my favorite guy. (For a little bit of context, we returned to Canada a year ago from Serbia. We LOVED every second of living there and exploring all that the country and the rest of Europe has to offer and we can’t wait to go back.) Enjoy, Dear Readers!

“Christopher’s Perfect Day”

Christopher woke late in the morning, the spindly chords of Toma’s “Ej, Branka, Branka” playing from the kitchen as he smelled coffee brewing. He rubbed his eyes, tired still from the previous night’s free UFC on TV, and sat up. His wife, even now incredibly youthful and insanely gorgeous in her 40s, carefully carried his latte into the room and kissed his head. “One hotdog or two?” she asked sweetly.

He sipped his coffee, considering. “Three too much?”

“Sounds perfect to me,” his wife agreed and left the room.

The sounds of his children whispering quietly came at him and when he looked out his bedroom door, he saw his daughters, one carrying the morning paper and the other with a new box of hockey cards fresh from the mailbox. They presented these gifts to him along with quick hugs and promptly went downstairs to clean their bedrooms. Christopher stretched, drank his coffee and read the paper before turning to his phone. Not five minutes later, three hotdogs and a tall glass of chocolate milk adorned the nightstand beside his bed so he tossed his phone aside and searched for the remote. His wife, too, searched wildly for the contraption. She stretched, bent, leaned over him and…well, the remote was found and the TV eventually turned on. There, on the screen in front of him, fast men with quick sticks proved their worth as the Habs won the Stanley Cup and would swiftly begin the regular season the very next day. Christopher skipped into the shower, singing.

He was just drying off when his wife banged on the door. “Chris! Come quick! You need to see this!” She panted and screeched and Christopher suspected trouble but when he finally opened the door, his wife took his wrist and drove him to the window, where she jumped and pointed. “There! See it? Look!”

And there it was. Right beside their very own house, in the middle of their quaint residential paradise, a new building had been erected. Halifax Donair. On the freshly emblazoned widows were the words, FREE FOR NEIGHBOURS. Sometime later, Christopher woke on the couch. “What happened?” he asked, confused, rubbing his head.

“You fainted, but don’t worry. You were only out for a second. The owners saw you through the window and wanted to make sure you were okay. They asked me to give you this.” From behind her back, his wife produced a bag from which she pulled a donair that was bigger than his oldest child when she was born.

He ate, admiring the new view out of the window when he heard scraping sounds coming from the basement. Christopher put his donair down and went to investigate. Taking the stairs two at a time, he found the sounds coming from the laundry room. He peeked in and saw two sets of hind legs and two tails poking from two litterboxes. Scrape, shuffle, scrape, shuffle went the sounds inside and Christopher cleared his throat so as not to startle his cats too badly. A grey head and a tabby head emerged, pulling with them two small scoops. His smallest daughter barrelled in. “Mommy taught them to clean up after themselves,” she exclaimed jubilantly. “Isn’t it funny Daddy?”

Christopher steadied himself against the wall. “Amazing,” he admired. Upstairs, his phone beeped and he looked at the message on his screen. A new floorball association was being developed and would he like to play? Yes! He quickly typed. Yes!

In the evening, as he ate ćevapi and enjoyed Zorica and Đani on Spotify, he checked his lottery numbers from the night before. Of course, he won.  

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Write Like Your Mother Is Not In The Room

August 20, 2020

I just had a conversation with a writer friend about authentic writing and it dawned on me that she was holding back. I could tell where her writing was authentic and where it was reserved. The result were characters that would refrain from vulgarity or expletives. Now, even the most reserved character tends to let loose under severe pressure or physical pain or emotional trauma. Fiddlesticks! and poop! only go so far to let readers know how the character is feeling and dialogue such as this tells us more about the writer than the character when all the focus should be on the characters. I told her to write like her mother is not in the room. I say this from experience because my first two books, written in my late twenties, were reserved like my parents were standing over me. I’m in my 40s now and I don’t fear the wrath of my family and reserved friends like I used to. Those who know me know I am not reserved, so those first books were written inauthentically. Hence, the reason I never took them off the shelf after I wrote them. I’ve gotten bolder, braver since then. The last two books I wrote, Popcorn & Politics and Redeemer (which will be finished by the end of August), are unashamedly authentic and that’s why they work. Plot holes of P&P aside, knowing the protagonist Jim is easy because his shit is out there for all to see. I had to learn to write this way. To be authentic. It didn’t come easy but now it’s all I know. And it works. The stories I write won’t be for everyone but they will be for that perfect reader. I know you are out there because you write to me and message me and encourage me. You don’t mind a pants-splitting fall down the fucking stairs because you’ve had that fall, too. Just like me.

As for my newest book, Redeemer, it is officially the best book I’ve ever written and I’m not even done it yet. Six books of experience has told me this. I’m glad I kept going.

Thanks for staying with me, Dear Reader. P&P will be serialized for free on this site once I’m finished my last edit. In the meantime, keep reading whatever floats your boat. Stay tuned…

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“The Most Boring Family In The World”

August 6, 2020

I posted this one a while ago, then pulled it off to clean it up. Here it is again for those who have asked and for those readers who are discovering it for the first time. Stay healthy, Dear Reader.

“The Most Boring Family In The World”

It had been too long without someone to play with. Young Peter Jefferies used to play hockey. He used to ride his bike. He used to gather with Fred and Tom on their bikes and hunt doorbells and pedal like mad when they were finally answered. What he wouldn’t give to have even one of those angry owners scream in his face again. But no. Peter Jefferies and the rest of the world were trapped inside while the virus raged on. This meant no friends at Peter’s house and no Peter at Fred or Tom’s homes until someone said it was okay. He wanted it to be okay. He wanted to see another face beside his mother’s or his father’s or his sister Suzy’s or his Grandmother’s, none of whom were much fun at all and when Peter thought about it, he was sure they might be the most boring people on earth.

“Absolutely not,” his father said when Peter had asked for just five minutes with just one friend, any friend at all. His mother said the same and his Grandmother only grunted at him while she knitted a sweater in the corner.

Peter was so desperate for company that he asked Suzy to play with him, but she wasn’t interested so here Peter was, staring out the window at an empty street. He popped gum in his mouth, then outside his mouth, then high onto his nose, and finally went for the window. It stuck well. “Peter!” his mother yelled, throwing her dish towel onto the counter, scrambling beneath the sink for something to clean the window with. “Go outside and get some sun! Anything, please, just go outside.” He went.

But a boy could only go so far when it wasn’t yet okay to travel. He tossed sticks around his backyard, plucked grass, sat and watched a beetle crawl over his fingers. Then the click of the back gate stirring in the wind called to Peter like the ring of a bicycle bell. He stood, going to the gate as one would an airport, where new things waited for you at the end of your travels. Peter released the catch and pulled the gate open, emerging into the forest behind like a new deer on an African veldt. Big trees were bigger here. Birds wilder. The thrill of unfamiliarity surged through him and suddenly Peter was running, running and going far, farther, up, over, through, down and into every part of the living forest. A boy could breathe here! He could turn and free himself on logs and high up on tree limbs and in black burrows and on the rocky shores of the silver stream that wound through and beyond to other enchantments. Peter was just about to race a fallen leaf downstream when his mother called. “Peter! Peter Cameron Jefferies you get back here! Right this minute, mister! Right NOW.” She bellowed so that Peter could hear the thunder in her voice cracking through the trees.

He sighed like a boy who had almost rung a bell but didn’t quite get to the door, then he picked his way through the forest toward his backyard when something cried out at him. Peter froze. The thing howled, whining and shuffling beneath a pile of leaves. His mother’s thunder hailed him, threatening something much worse than isolation but then the leaves parted and the grey head of a kitten mewled at him. He picked it up and ran.

“No way,” his mother said when he held the small thing to her face. She wrinkled her nose at the animal but when Peter pressed, she said, “Go ask your father.” Busy fathers on virtual computer meetings pleased their children even when they didn’t know they were pleasing them, they were only vaguely aware that the were being called upon to settle something for which their wives were reluctant or unwilling to answer. During these meetings, their answers were almost always yes, so this is when Peter asked his father about the cat.

Peter named him Fred. The kitten was fun but it slept a lot and Peter soon found he got bored with it and thought that maybe it would be a good idea to search the forest for another pet.

He found a rabbit.His father said yes.

Then Peter found a lizard and an abandoned nest of baby sparrows.

His father said yes.

Then Peter found a duck and two more kittens and even a chipmunk.

His mother stopped her cleaning and his grandmother stopped her knitting and even Suzy stopped adding glitter to her crafts and they all said, “No more pets, Peter.”

But Peter couldn’t go out and he didn’t want to stay inside with the most boring family in the world so he went back to the forest and collected a colony of ants and an infant fox and ten fish in buckets. By the time Peter’s father had finished his computer meetings, there were snakes in the vents, spiders in the sockets, turtles in pillowcases, nests in the attic, minnows in the toilets, geese in the kitchen, and a cow in the living room. “But what’s all this?” his father asked, having not noticed the strange looks his coworkers gave him when they looked at him and his house from their own computer screens.

“Company!” Peter cried delightedly.

“A mess!” his mother cried, cleaning goose poop off the stove.

“Destruction!” Grandma cried, tearing her yarn away from the kittens.

“Gross!” Suzy gagged, flicking spiders away from her dolls.

Peter’s father looked around and saw for the first time in many months that his family was busy and energized and surrounded by other living, breathing creatures. He did not shout at Peter, nor did he shoo the animals outside. Instead, he looked at the smile on his boy’s face and at the renewed vigor of his family. Then he put on his shoes and joined Peter in the forest outside to find a bear.

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