Jason Z. Christie's Blog, page 2

VioletEyes Book Covers!

These are all three still works in progress, but they're coming along nicely. I've contracted with two photographers for three different photos of my favorite fetish model VioletEyes. Is she a fetish model, or just a model I have a fetish for? At any rate, she is a great idealized SuperJanique for my Ultimate Hustle series, and is a wonderful person as well. I'm very grateful for her being somewhat okay with me using her likeness in this way!

VioletEyes - Photography by David Clic. The author typeface will likely change, because my DJ thinks it's ass, apparently.  I'm pretty happy with the back cover, too. 

VioletEyes as photographed by Jamie Mahon. This cover is *almost* perfect. Still playing around with the title. I can't bring myself to step on the image in any way, even though tiny cover text is a terrible idea for ebook versions. I'm full of terrible ideas. 

One more VioletEyes photo by David Clic. Okay, the author name font is definitely overboard on this one, Roman, I admit. It's like accessories, before you go out, take one off. That's the rule, and it's a good one. But I'm otherwise also happy with it. It's approaching too busy, but isn't. Once the author text is fixed, I suppose. This book is almost fully complete. It's a total rewrite of one that was stolen in my luggage, appropriately enough, in L.A.

Both of these photographers have great portfolios if you write these sorts of books, and are also very accommodating, as well. I can't recommend them enough. As for VE, she is sadly retired from modeling, and I am sadder for it. A terrible loss to the world.
I am having great fun revamping my covers this month. Hopefully I can be back to actually just writing soon. This is all coming about because of my new narrator and the forthcoming audiobook version of Radar Love. Without her, I don't think I'd be doing anything with my back catalog, or writing new stuff...

First Page of the Zombie Killa Comic Book!

So this artist, a young lady in Brazil, is so reclusive, she doesn't even have a portfolio page. Nevertheless, I found her, and she is going great guns on the Zombie Killa comic book. So here is the first finished page, and I couldn't be more excited! There's some great detail to be found if you look closely, namely the use of Brutal Truth posters and lyrics.

I'm going to have to restrain myself from publishing each page as it comes in. At any rate, I should have a finished comic in my hands in three months or so, by my estimate. It feels great seeing a project come together like this. 

The Process

How do you write a novel? Wait, don't tell me. This is about how I do it. Your mileage will vary wildly.

I'm a genre writer. That doesn't mean what you think it means, to me. I write books in all genres. So far, I have a thriller, a romance, sci-fi, adventure, fantasy, erotica, a mystery, and, well, other stuff. I'm starting to lose track.

So the first thing I start with is what genre I'm going to approach. That, I find, makes the rest a lot easier. Having a defined genre actually gives you the freedom to mix and match. If your structure is that of a thriller, say, you can work in subplots and themes from other genres with the confidence that when you're done, it will be easy to categorize, but can actually satisfy readers of different tastes.

My biggest tip? If you don't have a romantic element in your books, try again. That doesn't apply to every book, of course, but it's sort of a rule-of-thumb of mine that has worked well for me so far.

Here's the thing: I don't read romance books. From a clinical standpoint, I don't even like them. I would say I've never even read any. However, I have read a lot of Jackie Collins, Sidney Sheldon, and things like that. But there's a big difference between those sort of books and the romance mill novels that are consumed in bulk monthly by my Aunt Rochelle.

Even writers like Robert Heinlein and Stephen King taught me a bit about romance, which is really just good character development. The real challenge, to me, is to write romantic subplots that will appeal to both men and women. I can't tell you how to do this. In some books, the sex is emphasized over the romantic aspect. That's sort of a cheat, I suppose.

Men, almost instinctually, seem to want to be identified as heroes. But in these modern times, women don't necessarily want to be tagged as hapless victims, ragdolls, or plastic cut-outs of characters. Again, perhaps someone can explain how you actually achieve this, but I'm not sure I can, at least not in this essay. Perhaps I can expand on this theme in a future column.

Honestly, the best way to acquire this sort of skill is probably to study how others do it, and trial and error. I daresay you as a writer could probably benefit from reading my novels. And this is not a sales pitch. It's bragging. I'll email anyone any or all of my ebooks, at any time. All you have to do is ask.

Anyway, genre, check. Sub-genres. check. Not that you necessarily need to rush in with a totally predefined list of things you want to hit on. That almost never works. I will admit that if one really plotted and planned an entire novel in advance in detail, and then stuck with it, you could probably write something really compelling. I just don't happen to work that way.

It's pretty hard to start writing a novel without at least one character.  Then that character needs another character. But most of my books start off about a single person.

If I don't have a compelling opening, I don't have a book. And I must say, my openings are probably the weak point in the entire text. That's just how I feel, true or not. But the funny thing is, I really like the way my books start, or I wouldn't have written them. I don't know. You'll never stop criticizing your writing. If you don't question your work, you're probably writing poorly and just don't know it.

By the time I've written the first 2-4 pages, I usually have an idea of where the bigger story is headed, and who else will be involved. At that point, I start brainstorming a bit about what's to come. This usually leads to a character list. I like to name the major characters, develop them a little, and have them in reserve when it's time for their debut.

Then I usually misplace the character list, and don't look at it again until the book's done. Which can lead to abandonment. My latest, Army of Me, has a few characters who appear in the first third or so, never to be heard from again. Of course, that book's not done yet, but it's something to be aware of. Not that every character has to hang in there until you write "The End".

But one piece of advice I found myself following before I actually heard it was that you should reuse characters whenever possible. Don't invent a new person for a scene when someone you've already introduced and developed could easily substitute. I am no Thomas Pynchon. Too many characters spoil the plot, I feel. Unless you're writing the sequel to The Gulag Archipelago.

Somewhere before I get to the halfway point of a novel, around there, I figure out how it's going to end. I don't write the ending, but I know what it will be, in most cases. And like the beginning of a story, the ending has to be great. Better than the beginning, I feel. Bad first impressions are one thing. Bad last impressions are forever.

In between, try and write a great middle.

Free eBooks All Weekend

I don't know why I'm bothering to post this here. My 17 actual followers already have my books. But I have five ebooks free on Amazon all weekend, including my funny sci-fi series, which is in need of some love, due to me pissing off so many fans of a certain deceased funny sci-fi author...

Perfect Me, Cure for Sanity, Six Stories Short & Sweet, Poetry: A Love Story are free as of now, and Zombie Killa goes free on Saturday. 

https://www.amazon.com/Jason-Christie/e/B006P7E0K8

Zombie Killa Comic Book Character Design

I'm so psyched to finally have work started on the Zombie Killa comic book! I have a great artist, and they're very easy to work with. In fact, while I've tried to self-censor and tone it down, they've indicated they have no problem with some over-the-top elements.

They've agreed to do charictures while they're working on the comic, at a flat rate of $20 each. 

Email me (collabs.and.covers@gmail.com) and I'll put you in touch with them. In the meantime, though, most of the main characters have been worked out, and I have storyboards waiting in the wings. The real challenge is losing so much dialogue in the conversion process.

Coming soon, I'll have a preview of the first page draft of the Hurricane Regina graphic novel...

Zealous1 Yours truly, looking considerably younger.
In the meantime, I've polished the text up a tiny bit. But where Zombie Killa really shines so far is the outstanding audiobook by Tom Rockwell, complete with a theme song by Zealous1 and some fantastic sound effect work.

Get Intimate with your Narrator

 

I’ve written about the process of making an audiobook before. I even halfway knew what I was talking about. But I am in the process of producing one for my most beloved novel, Radar Love, and the way it's being made has been greatly refined on my end.

Choosing a narrator was no small feat, in this case. My first impulse was to record this one on my own. I am of the opinion that no one can read a book quite like the author. But character acting is something else entirely.

Choosing a narrator was a crucial decision on my part, as it’s the first of a five-novel series, with the second already published, and the third nearly written. And, as I said, it’s my most important book, for various reasons. It’s my most popular, the one I feel most strongly about, and it has a lot of special meaning to me.

I had about twenty narrators to choose from, and none of them were quite right. Some, in fact, were terrible. Then I met Renee. I call her Renee because I *think* that is her name. Or will be her pseudonym. Neither of us are sure, at this point. I mean, sure she knows what her real name is. That’s not the point.

Renee nailed the audition. Although this is her first production, she is deadly serious about it. Not only that, but she is a huge fan of the work in question. So much so that she has inspired me to take my books seriously again. She wants to do the entire series, complete with a relaunch of the titles. Her passion is now feeding my own.

I’ve edited the text probably eight times since then, and licensed some amazing photography of a gorgeous model named VioletEyes by photographer Jamie Mahon. Now Renee and I are polishing her production for an upcoming release. I couldn’t be happier. I once again feel like I did when I first published, except everything is at a whole new level of quality.

Not only that, but this production has a decidedly different feel than any audiobook I’ve worked on before.

Previously, I sent a narrator a script, then waited until they were finished. I then suggested a few changes, they were made, and we published. Despite my spotty quality control in a few places, the releases ranged from good to great. This time, Renee’s enthusiasm demanded I not play a passive role in the production, and I am eternally grateful for that.

I have never had a lot of contact with my narrators, other than agreeing on terms, and delivering a script. Now it’s nightly back-and-forth sessions, collaborating, agonizing, and fine-tuning. The results thus far are more than worth it. Her readings have even shaped my edits, leading to a few small but important changes. 

For instance, I found a much better, more obvious chapter title that I had somehow never considered before. She asked for, and received, a new dedication for the book, which is far more poignant than it was previously. 

My point is, I guess, that if at all possible, take an active role in your audiobook productions. Don’t wait for the final product, but dive in with the first chapter and start making improvements early on. Make sure your narrator is not only stellar, but that they are serious about the project, and want to work actively with you on it. The process of refining and fine-tuning the production can result in improvements across the board, and even affect your ebook and print editions.

The results may astound you.

Mentor Others To Improve As A Writer

That famous adage “When we teach, we also learn” applies well to the art of writing.

At some point as you progress as an author, you will reach the stage where you can look at someone else’s work and genuinely say, “I can improve that.” Not from some egotistical standpoint, but because you’ve already made all those mistakes yourself, learned from them, and began to apply them to your work. Such things become easy to spot, at that point.

                It’s not just mechanical aspects, either. After you’ve written a few novels, you should have a sense of how to draw a reader in and keep their attention. Or at least not scare them off or bore them to tears. Beginning writers make a lot of mistakes in that regard. They fail to make their characters compelling. They don’t establish any sort of connection between reader and protagonist. Their introductory chapters, in particular, lack any oomph.

A poor paragraph flow, excessive dialog tags, “telling” when you could be “showing”, and things of that nature can turn a reader off quickly, and are common with newly-minted authors.

I am of the belief that not only should you be able to edit others, it’s something you need to occasionally do. That’s not to say you owe it to anyone else to edit their entire work into something more palatable, but taking someone’s first chapter and polishing it to something closer to decent is a rewarding task. Each time you improve the work of others, you reinforce those techniques in your own skillset. Rather than just writing “in the zone” on your own, you become more conscious of what works and what doesn’t, and why. That can only lead to more polished pieces for you.

Furthermore, many authors write in a void, early on. Imagine how you might have benefitted if someone with a bit more skill had taken up your first novel or short story and said, “Try it like this, instead.” A little direction early on can go a long way. I've edited two pieces recently, and both authors were both grateful and receptive to improving their work. It's likely that my influence will resonate throughout the rest of their writing careers.

I see far too many young writers on the verge of giving up. It’s difficult to get people to read their work, and it’s entirely possible that they might quit before they’ve developed enough of a style to gain a readership. At the very least, you can rest well knowing you’ve tried to improve the world of literature to a small degree.

I’ve found that Reddit is one good place to find such writers. There are several groups for critiques and beta reading, among other things. I’m sure similar things exist on Facebook and Twitter. Let’s face it, almost everything on Wattpad could use a facelift.

So get out there and touch someone’s life today. Be a part of the writing community, rather than just being a writer. The work you improve just might be your own.

On a related note, I've finally polished up one of my novels to the point where I feel comfortable recommending it to people. Check out the new edition of Radar Love on Amazon.

The Time We, Uh, Robbed a Church

Sorry, mom! This perhaps isn’t *quite* as horrific as the title suggests, but it’s definitely not my most wholesome story. And do I have any wholesome stories, really?

We were uncontrollable little metalhead ruffians, running  fairly wild in the ghettos and deserts of Las Vegas. We ran wild because we rarely got caught. So our families never knew what was going on.

The primary culprits were me, Terry, A.J., and my little brother. We caused some serious chaos.

Terry did bring the heat down on us early on by painting three-foot high Van Halen and Black Sabbath logos on our own apartment building, of course. Lucky for me, I had nothing to do with that one.

A.J. and I used to ditch school with a kid named Duncan, to smoke weed, listen to Angry Samoans and stuff, and play Risk. We all used to run the mile every week for gym wearing combat boots.

Literal maniacs, like a junior version of A Clockwork Orange: American Edition. Terry and I were riding our bikes in both lanes of a boulevard one day. A car came up behind us and honked. We flipped them off without looking. It was a Metro cop car.

 Another time we were egging cars and houses, and got chased. Don't try and run with all of your pockets full of eggs.

Video Game Junkies

But before we started smoking weed, arcades were the thing. There wasn’t much to do in Vegas except get in trouble, if you were a kid there in the 80s. Video games and BMX were some of the only legit hobbies to have at the time.

Early on, we collected cans to turn in to Safeway for arcade money. This grew into a serious hustle.

We would put rocks in the cans before we crushed them, adding to their weight considerably. Once we forced a spark plug into one. Five dollars’ worth of cans quickly started to grow into ten and twenty dollars.

In one incident, we had turned in a huge bag, collected our money, and then continued to stand there after the clerk left. Another came by, and paid us a second time. Every bit of it went into arcade games.

There was a little pizza place that had three cocktail games, Moon Cresta and two others I can’t recall. Before we began our aluminum can enterprise, we had learned to put pennies against the back wall of the coin return and flip them upward for credits.

One day, another kid from school stood up and said, “Fuck this, I’m going to the arcade.”

The what?

In another building within the same damn strip mall was a new place, Fantasy World. It probably had forty machines and was literally heaven. It hit on every 80s arcade cliché you can imagine. They sold ice cream, made t-shirts, and was occupied by the full gamut of stereotypes.

Needless to say, we became obsessed.

It became quicker and easier to just find a bum who had collected a huge cart full of cans and wait until he entered a dumpster. Then we would just run up and take the whole thing as he yelled at us, laughing all the way. We also started just knocking on doors and asking people for cans. Oftentimes, retired people would give us all the returnable bottles they were saving, too.

I was at another kid Dennis’s apartment, and he silently showed me a ten-dollar bill. We lit out for the arcade immediately.

Thirty minutes later, his mom was tapping him on the shoulder. He had stolen it from his sister’s purse, and it was likely the only money she had.

I kept playing as they drug hm away by his ear.

Fantasy World gave away a shirt for each high score of the week on every machine. One day an older kid racked up a huge score on Scramble, one of my favorites at the time. I watched him play with admiration, and was in awe as he finally lost and just walked away. I entered my own initials, WIZ, and collected my shirt several days later.

Robbing bums was the gateway into shoplifting.

Den of Thieves

Terry and I walked into a drug store next to the Safeway one day, and without coordinating, each stole something. I don’t remember what he got, but I had taken a Penny Racer, a little car that had a slot in the back for a coin.

After we left and started walking home, sitting on a wall like the devil himself, was an older kid and his friend.

"Take this bag", he said, "go into the Safeway, and fill it with beer. Then just walk out. Bring me the beer and I’ll pay you."

I don’t remember if it was weed or money he offered. But like utter fools, we did it.

Successfully.

Except when we handed them the beer, they just took off.

Naturally, we chased them for blocks. Eventually, they ran into an apartment in a walled-in complex.

It might not have even been the right apartment, but we banged on the door. And interrupted some adult who was apparently having sex at the time, because some huge dude opened the door angry, in his underwear, with a fucking boner.

Doh! That shut down that escapade. We ran.

Once we saw how easy it was, stealing became a daily thing. We started taking a six-pack of Mickey’s beer (in the barrel bottles), and chugging them in the bathroom. We stole a lot of candy, of course, and some magazines, but my specialty was paperback books. Once I got not one, but two Jimi Hendrix biographies, and gave one to Terry.

I never got caught, but it was so commonplace for us, one winter I had a pack of unsweetened baker’s chocolate in my coat (!), and an employee walked up behind me and said, “Alright, what do you have today?”

I pulled it out of my sleeve without him seeing me. “Just this,” I said and handed it to him before leaving.

 

School Daze

Our reign of terror expanded as we got older.

One weekend night, we had a twelve pack of beer, and a Japanese police baton. We drank all the beer in a laundry room, and hit the streets, drunk as hell.

First, Terry smashed in the window of a parked truck. This was hilarious to us. So we jumped the wall into a trailer park, and started throwing rocks at cars.

They were slamming on their brakes, screeching, turning around. Then we started throwing rocks at trailers.

This led to the manager driving up on his van.  Terry played it off, walked up to the guy’s window…and spit in his face.

We ended up getting chased on three-wheelers and splitting up. I ended up tripping over some low-wire fence or something, but we both got away. We were each sure the other had been caught.

When I made it to my apartment, my mom said, “Terry showed up and said he had to go back home…”

The first day of sixth grade is when we started smoking pot on our own.

Sixth grade centers are a Vegas thing. K-5 is a school, and then 6th grade is an entirely separate one. You usually get bused way into North Las Vegas. At least we did.

It would travel down the Strip, and we would flip off tourists, spit on them, etc.

But on the very first day of sixth grade, at the bus stop, Terry said, “I stole a half a joint from my brother. Wanna smoke it?”

Fire that shit up, bro.

On the bus, we were all going apeshit. In the back, flipping people off, mooning them. I think a kid threw a sandwich on someone’s windshield.  The primary target was this little old lady who was following behind us.

She was the superintendent of the LV school busing system.

She pulled the damn bus over. I crawled forward under the seats, and popped up elsewhere, But she recognized me, and put the three of us into the back of her car, and drove us to school.

We were so baked. We attended a class or two, and then they called me to the office. They used these little wooden paddles as hall passes.

As I stepped out into the corridor, Terry and A.J. were walking in unison, saying “Bus-ted, bus-ted”, and slapping their palms with the passes. I joined in without us missing a beat.

At the principle’s office, I tried to play it off like I was bored and cool.

“Are you on medication, son?”

I don’t think anything really came of it. The trick to doing stuff at school and getting away with it is intercepting the mail before your parents checked the mailbox.

 

Metal Up Your Ass

One night, Dark Angel was playing at an all-ages club. Dark Angel was a bit of a Slayer rip-off band that later grew into their own. But at the time, first album, they were pale imitations of Slayer. Singer Don Doty did the same high-pitched yell, and even took an album photo that looked exactly like Tom Araya.

We loved them all the same. Terry made arrangements to meet us there, and A.J. and I walked to the show through the desert. On acid.

As we were talking, he accidentally spit his hit out. We actually looked in the sand at night using lighters to try and find it, to no avail.

It was an all-ages show, but they were searching people at the door. Thinking I was slick, I put my pipe in my inside pocket of my leather jacket. The old man at the door slid his hand inside without hesitation, felt it was a pipe, and waved us in.

Terry arrived shortly thereafter.

The line-up was actually two bands we had never heard of playing first. Voluntary Manslaughter was a local act, I think. Cool, punky hardcore stuff. They had their own eponymous theme song. The second act was also pretty wild hardcore/punk. A little band named Pap Smear.

Unbeknownst to us, this was Jeff Hanneman of Slayer’s side project. It might have been Dave Lombardo on drums, too. We had no idea that we were seeing an extremely rare performance that few would ever witness.

There was a little plywood barricade between us and the stage, and at some point, we made the agreement to tear it down when Dark Angel came out.

We did, and it was a pretty chaotic opening. But the club owners were pissed, of course, and made us put it back up before they would let the show continue.

To our right, was this big dude with a bottle of Budweiser, leaning over the barricade trying to grab the singer, and screaming “Fuck you!”. Terry said, “I think that’s Kerry King!” and it was.

Later we got into a mosh put with this big skinhead in a bandana. We did the Milano Mosh with Billy Milano of Stormtroopers of Death.

There’s no telling how much metal royalty was in attendance that night. Some terrible footage of the show exists, we’re centerstage in the front row.

So that was fun.

At some point a few months after that, Terry and I stole some wood and a can of gas out of the back of some trucks. In broad daylight, I think.

We took them to the desert and built a big cross. It was probably twelve feet high. Then we soaked it in gas, stood it up, and lit it on fire when it got dark.

You could see it blazing from two highways. We got out of there when the LVPD helicopters started showing up. Once a helicopter gets you in the spotlight, you’re done.

And now we come to the climax of this tale.

 

Haunting the Chapel

Tim was a kid who lived in one of these massive Las Vegas trailer parks. If you’ve ever flown into Vegas, you’ve probably seen them. An absolutely massive sea of shimmering trailer homes, walled in. This one, the same one we had vandalized earlier, even had its own convenience store inside.

When I first met Tim, he had short hair. That was seriously not a thing in the Vegas metal scene. He told me he got tired of it, and shaved it off.

Later I found out a few older kids had held him down and shaved his head. He was that kid. A compulsive liar who annoyed everyone he met. And his parents were old. Like, well past retirement old.

I watched him get off the school bus one day, and this little blonde punk girl cold-cocked him. Just punched him in the face and knocked him down.

I used to deliver weed to him when he was punished, bringing to his window. I kept half of every order.

The same girl ate a whole pack of Dramamine one night while we were drinking Black Velvet in the desert. One kid, Duncan the Hawaiian Punk, passed out. We left him.

A day or two later, he showed up at school. “Bruh, thanks for calling my dad. He came and saved me.”

No, I didn’t call your dad.

“Dude, you don’t have to say it. I know you did, and I really appreciate it.”

So one day Tim and I ate a pack or two of Dramamine each. It didn’t do anything to me.

He started talking to people who weren’t there. I got freaked out and left. His mom called mine soon after.

“My son is talking to an empty room. He says he can’t shower because people are in there. And that there are people under his bed. What is he on?”

For whatever reason, I said acid.

Another phone call. “This is not acid!”

His mom was pretty damn hip. I told them to look behind his speaker for the empty Dramamine packs. I really don’t recommend ever trying this.

One day we were smoking a joint in his room, sticking out of an empty pen, for whatever reason.

His old-ass mom walked in and said, “I’ve never understood what you kids see in that shit.” Then she grabbed it and took a huge hit. She left the room coughing as we died laughing.

Tim was an altar boy at some church by my apartments, forced to attend by his parents.

“Hey, man. Come to church with me. I’ll steal some collection money and we’ll buy a sack.”

Say no more. I’m there, dude.

So, we did it. But while there, I noticed the crucifixes the altar boys all wore. They were thin, square, and pretty big. Just very cool. A plan developed.

The next day, me, Terry, my little brother, and A.J. went back during a service.

Wearing Slayer shirts. Which we had turned inside out so as to not appear conspicuous. Which made us look even more bizarre.

But the crosses were all being worn during church. We stood in the back, arms crossed, the entire time. I’m sure people were nervous.

When church was over, we all went outside.

Then Terry and I, the masterminds, sent A.J. and my little brother back in.

They both came running out with two handfuls each. Chased by a hundred Koreans. The adrenaline was high that day.

We got away, of course, because we always did, being little desert hoodrats.

I moved to Louisiana, and took mine with me. I think we each got two of them.

I traded one to a kid named Craig, who later died in a car wreck in front of a Catholic church. The other, I left hanging on a fence by a pool the day I met my first wife.

Terry, on the other hand, drilled his and hung them upside down. A few years later, he met Tom Araya of Slayer and gave him one.

So if you ever see a photo of Tom wearing a long, thin, square crucifix, that was ours. An upside-down cross stolen from a church. I don’t think you can get more metal than that.

The Most Insane Rap Show I’ve Ever Attended

 (Ticket stub is from a Detroit show)

I’ve been to a lot of crazy concerts, including a lot of death metal and punk shows, but this was the all-time wildest thing I’ve ever experienced. Hell, I’ve performed at some pretty wild metal shows.  Note also that for some I might even hold this crown in their own lives, for my blacked-out performance in Vegas when I rapped while unconscious, cursed the club owners, and threw my drink at the wall. But that’s bush-league stuff compared to this epic event.

The year was 1988. I wrote rap lyrics, sold acid, and hung out with my metal band Gortician before they started writing original music. The bass-player/singer and I heard about a show in New Orleans and decided to attend.

Naturally, I dressed for the occasion. A Sonic baseball cap turned jauntily askew, 3D glasses taped to my head, and my wife’s dance outfit from when she was younger. It was a leotard that I had cut the bottom off of, and had a green-sequined bow tie with checkerboard sleeves. Because Flava Flav.

We drove down from Baton Rouge smoking weed, and arrived fashionably late, missing the first act, MC Hammer. That was probably intentional. We seemed to be the only two white dudes in attendance, in a massive throng of New Orleans natives. No pun intended.

It was December, but that doesn’t mean cold, in Louisiana. In fact, the 15,000 or so attendees made the arena decidedly warm from the start. Which made EPMD’s decision to wear their bomber jackets on stage the beginning of a very interesting evening.

“Fuck it, we’re gonna rock it with our shit on!”

They hit on all their most popular tracks at the time. Probably “Jane”, “Strictly Business”, and “You Gots to Chill”. This alone would have been worth the price of admission.

Then they said, “Can our DJ fuck his turntable?”

Scratch, as he was known, proceeded to literally hump the turntable, and literally cut up a record up using his crotch. This was my first and only time witnessing such an event. Epic.

Ice-T was up next, and for whatever reason, my bassist and I split up. He probably went to get a beer.

I was stage left, and pretty close to the action. Ice-T and company were wild. Extremely amped up. Some swole cat was doing one-armed push-ups. Afrika Islam was the hype man.

Everything was extremely frantic. Ice was throwing albums or cardboard posters into the crowd like frisbees. T-shirt cannons were being fired, and they might have had real money packed in them? It’s a bit of a blur.

Something really got the crowd’s attention, probably “Colors’. As I’m standing there taking this all in as best I could, I was pushed from behind.

I turned around to see a kid standing there with his arms crossed as if nothing happened. Oh, well. It must have been an accident. Although there was no one else there.

I ignored him, turned back to the show, and he did it again…

If I hit this kid, I thought, I will never exit this arena alive. Letting it go might be the smartest decision I have ever made. If it had been a metal show and a metalhead, I would have probably jumped on him the first time.

But the set ended, and Public Enemy was up next, which is who we were really there to see. My bassist and I found each other, somehow, and started moving in through the standing crowd at center stage.

“Excuse us, excuse me,” we said as we pushed through.

We got within ten people of the front row, and what seemed like the biggest dude there tapped us on the shoulder and shook his head no. We probably should have argued the point. It was fucking Public Enemy. However, noise conditions made rational debate difficult, and we were already in over our heads. Plus we were pretty close, and were able to keep our spot. A compromise was reached.

Now, when I say it was December, it was actually December 24th. Christmas Eve.

PE came out hard. The first words spoken were by Professor Griff. “Fuck a motherfuckin' white Jesus!”

Woah. This did not sit particularly well with the New Orleans crowd, and set the tone for the rest of the performance. Try as they might, they absolutely could not capture the audience’s attention in a positive way. Even Flava Flav’s “New Orleans is rock-kin!” singalong fell flat.

In fact, the only real reaction they got was when Terminator X cut up the Flash Gordon theme song. To be fair, he probably was the greatest part of the ensemble on that night, doing his best Johnny “Juice” Rosado impression.

As if the set’s opener wasn’t shocking enough, the New Orleans Police Department was doing security that night, and about three songs in, Chuck D took it down between songs and said, “There’a a lot of niggers out here…with badges and guns.”

Yes, hard R and all. I think the first part really shook the audience, and the punchline was lost on them. It probably contributed to the lukewarm reaction. But holy shit, Chuck. They kill people down here for less than that. It was easily the most radical statement I’ve ever heard at any concert.

We split up again after that, probably for another refill of beer. N.W.A. was up next.

N.W.A. with Ice Cube, mind you.

They came out loud as fuck, heavily distorted and yelling. The atmosphere changed instantly. You could smell the weed, dust, and  coke in the air. People were drunk and riled up.

There were gunshots in the mix. There might have been gunshots in the arena. Everyone chose that moment to go buck wild.

No more than two or three songs into the set, and we found each other. By mutual agreement, we both said, “Let’s get the fuck out of here” and made our way to the exits. Along the way, the gang task force had groups of people in identical track suits lined up against the wall. It looked like every available cop was arresting someone.

We made it to the vehicle and split back to Baton Rouge. That was 33 years ago, and it remains the wildest concert we’ve ever been to.

 Here it is on a list of the 20 greatest rap tours of all time.

Run a Consistency Check

 

I am probably the last person you want to take editing advice from. Only now, ten years after self-publishing a flurry of novels, am I giving them the edits they deserve. I also can’t teach you how to write. Most people can’t write. Some write badly. Many who have more or less mastered the mechanics still write bland, boring books.

Nevertheless, your novel can always be improved. Ideally, long before publication. While going over one of mine about eight times now, I’ve made a few observations that can shore up any story. Even if your book is bad, the writing should be consistent. That will make it significantly…less bad.

Doing a global search for these pitfalls can reveal numerous issues. But don’t use a global replace, or you’re likely to make changes you didn’t intend.

Okay/Ok

Pick one usage and stick with it. Personally, I feel ‘okay’ is the way to go, here. But, whatever. Don’t include a mix of usages. Ok?

 

Contractions

Traditionally, we were taught not to use contractions in our narrative. I find that not using them in that case feels stilted, and seriously affects your tone. You don’t want your contemporary novel to sound like it was written in the 1800s, do you? Again, it’s a choice of styles, but whatever you choose, make sure you follow that pattern throughout the entire book. This doesn’t apply to dialogue, of course.

 

Foreign words/accents

If you’re including a second language, no matter what amount, don’t make assumptions about spelling and phrasing. Take the time to do your research here, and make sure you get it right. If a word gets accented in its native form, then accent your usage as well.

 

Open and closed quotes

I’ve noticed that Microsoft Word’s “Smart Quotes” could be smarter. Sometimes after a spate of typing or editing, it will enclose a quotation with two closed or open quotes, instead of a matched pair. It can be easy to overlook.

 

Brand names

Visquine, right? No, it’s actually Visqueen. Weird. Plexiglass is generic, Plexiglas is a particular brand. It only takes a few seconds to check, but it’s an important detail that's easy to get wrong.

 

Ellipses

One could write an entire column on these three little dots, and many have. Aside from taking a look at how often you use this device, make sure the application is consistent. There are multiple ways to go, all are correct in one school of thought or another. Just make sure you don’t mix and match them.

 

Names vs. Pronouns

This is a big one. I write longhand, and used to turn my stuff over to my typist. I have no idea how she was able to decipher my handwriting. But when you’re banging out pages this way, you tend to use your character’s names more often than you should. At least that’s the case for me. Wherever possible, use a pronoun if the subject is made clear by context. That’s not to say obliterate every reference to a character’s name, but it generally doesn’t need to be used more than once a paragraph. Each occurrence should also be viewed against the previous and following paragraphs. Find a balance between clarity and style, and err on the side of pronouns.

 

Word choice/proximity

I hate when I use the same word near itself. Consequently, I am able to avoid it most of the time. Even so, I slip up, and kick myself later. Especially when the text goes to audiobook format, which is a lot harder to get changed. As you edit, pay attention to this aspect. That’s not to say you should go crazy with synonyms if a scene necessitates using the same word several times, but in briefer instances, that’s a good solution. Barring that, you might consider rewriting the passage to minimize repetition.

 

Do you really need that semi-colon?

Probably not. I just don’t like them. They should be used sparingly, if at all. I’ve found that most sentences that use semicolons work just as well or better when split into two sentences. If you’re using them, make sure they’re justified.

 

So, But, and And

It is incredibly easy to overuse these words at the beginning of a sentence. In most cases, it works just as well without them. They’re better suited for dialogue. That’s not to say you should never begin a sentence in the narrative this way, but be aware that you’re doing it, and how often.

 

Overusing words in general

Once you get past words that absolutely will be repeated endlessly, we all have some that we favor without knowing it. If one keeps popping up in your edit, do a search to get a count of how many times this is happening. It sounds a bit dispassionate, but statistical analysis can improve your text.

 

Adverbs

Search for words ending in -ly. Eliminate three quarters of them. It sounds harsh, but it will improve the quality of your work tremendously. Oops.

 

Approaching these problems in a global fashion will speed up your editing process in the long run, and make for a much more consistent book. It’s not a substitute for poring over each sentence word by word, but running a consistency check before you dive into deep editing will eliminate the possibility of accumulating many small stylistic errors that can add up in a longer piece. Once you become aware of these problems in your text, I daresay your next effort will be much improved from the start.

Don't read my books. Seriously. I'm relaunching them slowly, one at a time. On the other hand, my audiobooks are worth listening to...

https://www.audible.com/search?searchAuthor=Jason+Z.+Christie