Marian Allen's Blog, page 462

Should I Or Shouldn't I?

Today is food day on the blog, so here is what I made for dinner and a question that arises from it. Also a recipe.

Cucumbers with Honey French dressing.
Cheese tortellini (store-bought) dressed with mushrooms, margarine and parsley.
Zucchini and tomato casserole.

ZUCCHINI AND TOMATO CASSEROLE

Peel and slice zucchini into sections. Dredge in seasoned bread crumbs mixed with Parmesan cheese. Brown on both sides. Meanwhile, peel and dice a large tomato. Mix with chopped fresh oregano and basil. Grease casserole dish. Layer tomatoes, zucchini, cheese and breadcrumbs left over from zucchini. Dot with margarine or sprinkle with olive oil. Cover and bake at 375 F for 45 minutes or so.

Okay, so there was my dinner. And Charlie says, "None of those dishes would have been all that good alone, but it was a really good combination."

So my question is…. :/

WRITING PROMPT: Someone makes a comment which a character is unsure how to take.

MA

 

Coming Soon

The short story I wrote to go along with FORCE OF HABIT will be available soon. "By the Book" is set on Llannonn, the planet where most of the action in FOH takes place, and features Pel Darzin, one of the main characters in FOH. It also contains a character named Holly Jahangiri, Holly being the commenter who won the right to have her name in the story in my last contest, a character named Kurt Maxxon, the choice of Karen Overturf, who commented on every single appearance I made on my EEL'S REVERENCE blog book tour, and a character named Devra Langsam, named after the fanfic maven in whose fanzine, Masiform D, the Star Trek story upon which FOH is loosely based, appeared.

You can find a link to my current contest in the sidebar over there or on the links up there just under the blog banner.

Meanwhile, I'm posting today at Fatal Foodies, on the topic of miso.

WRITING PROMPT: Open a phone book or the newspaper or hit a web site at random and pick a random name. What kind of character would you create, beginning with the name alone (or, if your source includes the person's profession, the name and business)?

MA

Guest Post by F. A. Hyatt – Complexity Part 2

Here's the second half of Floyd Hyatt's post on Complexity in the Novel.

Some of the more important aspects (to Fantasy world builds) are:

A consistent magical system, if used.

Again, like in a game, the strength, movement ability, advantages and limitations of any piece need to be set down.  Limits need to be set on the use, and on the extent, or means by which the "physics" of the magical system may operate.  Ideally, the system should incorporate a sense of balance, of Peter paying Paul, where for every gain, there is a consequent cost.  Superman needs kryptonite, else there can be no practical conflict that he could not win, thus no story tension or point. Such systems need to be internally consistent.

A historical background, whether propounded or alluded to.

Worlds do not exist in a vacuum.  They have history, a logical course of development.  An over-all conflict  No society is perfect.  There are stories in the newspapers every day.  Again, whether yours focuses on one of these or not, the reader should remain aware that in the background, life is happening.

A political and social reality

This goes without saying, but whether this aspect needs to be writ large or small will (or should) depend on your story focus.

A geography/geology

Everything has a physical, or at least, sensible, presence.  Is that town to the north, or was it west?  Is that world of yours frigid, or like Dune, a desert world?  What about its structure, if anything, might affect its inhabitants' growth, society, politics, appearance?

Science fiction builds face similar challenges.  While some venues highlight marvelous devices, mechanics, and physics, still all the above elements apply and, in the end, most modern SF tales are character-driven stories, writ upon the backdrop of the imagined world, and the focus is likely only on particular parts that the characters must deal with, surmount, or find a way to live with.

The trick is, once these features are worked out, how much detail in each respect is absolutely required to carry out your plot.  Is it really necessary to envision that blue ice-cream makes babies cry?  That the mayor's fifth cousin, twice removed, has an adopted child?  That the planet has one point oh six more degrees of axial tilt than Earth?  And even if it is, can the story be told without reference to this?  Try to keep your chess board as uncluttered as possible.  After your story is writ, such non-essentials as seem to enrich, without interfering with the clarity of your story, can be added in, for color or further depth.  These elements can only enhance a good story; they won't putty over its flaws.

On the other hand, an involved  reader will invest a little work to follow a good story's logic, and some forms do focus on presenting the reader a Rubik cube as the plot itself.  But it is probably smarter for the author not to depend on background complexity to carry the story

F.A.Hyatt

WRITING PROMPT: A character in a fantasy stops in a food shop. The other customers are dressed differently than he or she is. The waitstaff treats him or her differently than the other customers. The amount and/or quality of the food he or she is served is different and the bill is higher or lower. Describe this is such a way as to SHOW something about the world or events around the scene.

MA

Sample Sunday – The Cryptography Scene

Today's sample is from MY NEW BOOK, FORCE OF HABIT — MUCH REJOICING!!1!

In this scene Bel Schuster, who has gone off-limits and gotten herself kidnapped by a criminal who thinks she's a VIP he can trade for amnesty, has called her co-worker, Tetra Petrie. Tetra Petrie, a native of the planet Gilhoo, has trained herself to talk without using contractions because she observed that humans implicitly trust people who don't use contractions. Quatro is her brother. Captain Joan Fazzaria is known as "Jinx" because bad luck trails her like magnetic mines after a starship. Harry Chestney is all about action. Wotan Hessaphess is all about free drinks. Donna Meichi is the communications officer. It's that kind of book.

The connection ended.

 Jinx raised Donna Meichi. "Any luck locating the call's origin?"

 "Negative, Captain. It came from Council City, but the call was too brief to get a bead on."

 "Thank you, Ven Meichi. We expect another such call. Stand by to boost sensor power and engage locus lock-on."

 "Yes, Captain."

 Silence fell in Conference Room B15.

 After a moment, Jinx prompted them. "Anyone?"

 "Peanut butter," said Hessaphess. "On her star charts."

 "On the contrary," said Quatro. His recent foray into duplicity had whetted in him a hitherto unsuspected appetite for it. "She was sending us a somewhat heavyhanded message saying she's in trouble."

 "We know she's in trouble," the Captain pointed out gently. "If we hadn't known it already, her calling from offlimits would have given us a subtle clue, don't you think? Not to mention the fairly straightforward text of her prepared statement and the presence of an apparent captor."

 Quatro's face took on a pinched look, the corners of his mouth turned sharply down, which Tetra knew meant he had been touched on the raw.

 "Captain," she said, "I believe Quatro is correct. We are missing a subtlety which he has observed. Since it is obvious Ven Schuster is in trouble, why did she call our attention to an overlying peculiarity about the call?"

 "Peanut butter," Hessaphess muttered, and chuckled.

 Quatro nodded. "She wanted us to look more closely at her prepared statement," he said, his confidence restored. "Depend upon it, there's a message hidden there."

 "Let's all get out our decoder rings," said Hessaphess.

 Jinx simply turned to him, saying nothing, but drumming the tips of her bitten nails on the table.

 He subsided.

 "May I ask the computer to give us transcriptions?" Tetra's finger rested on the print button.

 "Excellent idea," said Fazzaria.

 "Captain," said Chestney. "Request permission to call up a Security squad to transfer to Ven Schuster's locus as soon as it's determined. We could have her liberated and back aboard ship before the natives know she's raised us."

 "Permission denied," said Jinx. "Ven Chestney, you will oblige me by suppressing your desire to storm the fortress before we've established the existence of one."

 Harry ducked his head with the half-flattered chagrin of one certain everybody else secretly admired his impetuosity.

 When each member of the Crisis Team had a copy of the contact transcript, Tetra said, "I believe Quatro is right. Ven Schuster wanted us to examine the prepared statement more closely. That is why she signed it as she did, and why she included the signature with a verbal transmission. 'I.S.' Her initials, of course, and 'Rosettastone,' to indicate a code. And that," she said to the Captain with a dizzying rush of relief, "is why she called me, specifically. Because I am faculty sponsor of the Rosettastones, and would be the person most likely to recognize the indication."

 "She reckoned without me," said Quatro.

 "Thank you, Mr. Bond," said Tetra, but Quatro was too engrossed in the problem to hear her.

 "She wouldn't have had time to come up with something elaborate," said Dr. Frazni. "Especially if, as she says in the text, she was 'knocked silly.' I'm inclined to believe the words of the text are, on the surface, accurate. After all, her captor would know if they weren't."

 "Good thinking," said Jinx. "The word choice sounds a little stilted, though. 'Now the wonderful exotic little vacation's exploded.' 'Exploded'? 'Identity nears nonexistence'?"

 Tetra took a mechanical pencil from the pocket of her sweatpants and marked some of the message's letters. "Well, I will be a monkey's uncle," she said. "You have hit upon the key, Captain."

 "I have?"

 "She chose her words partly for their surface accuracy, but also for their initial letters." Tetra read from her paper, "'Ten twelve blocks from Inn.' Ven Schuster has not only told us what happened to her, but her general location. She is within a ten-to-twelve-block radius from Jok'rel's." Jinx raised ComSpec Meichi again and told her how far too narrow her next scan.

 "Shall I collect a squad now, Captain?" Chestney halfrose.

 "When I want you to collect a squad," said the Captain, "I'll ask you to collect a squad. I want to know where Schuster is. I may not be able to use the information, but I want to have it. In the meantime, we need to clear and secure the Inn."

 "We're bowing to the Stokk's demands?"

 "I don't see why we shouldn't," said Jinx, "since he demands we do what we were about to do anyway."

 "He does?"

 "In effect. Ven Petrie, prepare to transfer to Jok'rel's. I'll have Faline Mahoud cut a credit voucher for… How much do you estimate twelve hours of our custom would have been worth? Anyone?"

 Quatro scratched figures on his transcript. "Twelve in the party…less one, because Hessaphess never spends his own money…times twelve hours…times what Tetra spent on Riga…less two hours and fifteen minutes…. Approximately 340 credit units, Captain."

 "Three hun–" She cocked an eye at Tetra.

 "Moderate, Captain," Tetra said. "My expenditure on Riga was, as ever, moderate."

 Jinx raised Commissariat Faline Mahoud. "Cut me a credit voucher payable to Jok'rel's Traveler's Rest Inn," she said. "For 340…. Better make it an even 350 credit units. Send it to locus B15 for signature and dispersal."

 "Yes, Captain."

 "And prepare the paymaster to deduct it, five credits per packet, from Wotan Hessaphess' pay."

FORCE OF HABIT is available for a mere $2.99 in many fine electronic formats at Smashwords and OmniLit. Your patronage is much appreciated. Don't forget to enter the contest to win this or another of my eBooks, a MomGoth's Sweet Little Baby Angels pin or your name in a short story.

WRITING PROMPT: Would your main character be good as solving a cryptogram? Why or why not?

MA

 

Krone Conservatory Part 1

Okay, this is taking longer than I thought, so I'm going to post some of the pictures today and some another day.

Krohn Conservatory is in Eden Park in Cincinnati. So this one lady on the bus says, "Hmmm. A garden in Eden…." And this other lady says, off-hand, "Don't eat the fruit."

These pictures have gotten all mixed up somehow, but the first thing we saw when we went in was a bunch of umbrellas and parasols hanging upside down. It was very cheery, somehow.

There was a koi pond and, as is the case with any smallish public pond, pool, pit, basin or well in America, people had tossed pennies into it. I don't know why people learn to play the violin when they could just put a bucket on the sidewalk and label it, "Drop a coin, make a wish" and retire to a villa on the Riviera.

Anyway, here are some of the pictures.

WRITING PROMPT: If wishing wells worked, what would you wish for (must be selfish)? How about your main character? Your villain?

MA

Friday Recommends – Cincy and Footnote

Went on a group tour to Cincinnati on Wednesday. I love visiting Cincy. It's a gorgeous town–the parts the tourists get to see. We went to the Krohn Conservatory in Eden Park. I took many pictures, which I haven't had time to go through as yet. I hope to have a slideshow available on Saturday. Meanwhile, you can visit their website, which has much better pictures than mine.

Then we went to Jungle Jim's International Market. Yes, I got miso! I got some of those delicious daifuku mochi with sesame seeds on the outside and sweet red bean paste inside. I got some almond crush pocky. I got some rice noodles, some Saya snow pea crisps, which brings me to my first web site recommendation: Food Junk, my new favorite foodie site. And I got miso. Mmmmm, miso! I got a block of miso so big and so concentrated that, if it were dope, the street value would be incalculable. Imma write a poem to miso one day. You've been warned.

We did NOT eat Skyline Chili, although I adore it. We did NOT go to a Riders in the Sky show, although I adore the Riders, too.

Have you been to FantasyREADERS yet? I just got turned onto it. Free Stories! Free, free, free!! You can submit your own stories there, to get your name out there, but you can also READ stories. Did I mention they're FREE!?

I don't think I've recommended A Strong Man's Cup Of Tea yet, which was quite negligent of me, because I love the site. This is a link to one of my favorite of his posts.

Footnote - sandals and matching toenails of tour guide's daughter

Don't forget to enter my contest to win a free eBook, a MomGoth's Sweet Little Baby Angels pin or your name in a story.

Don't forget to be so excited about FORCE OF HABIT, my newly released cop/sf/farce, you can't wait for the contest drawing and want to buy it NOW.

WRITING PROMPT: Do you believe in magic? Does your main character? Why or why not?

MA

I'll Drink To That!

I was away from the internet all day yesterday, so I'm catching up today, but I had to share this with you.

My pal Red Tash has just finished edits on her upcoming book, This Brilliant Darkness. She was in a writers' retreat with me at one point in the process, and read some chapters aloud. Her description of the creature she created struck me, and I was like, "You know, a flying birdbath sounds funny at first, but I bet it would be WAY creepy if you actually saw one." And everybody else was like, "…Are you nuts, or are you hard of hearing? It looks like a flying bird-bat, you lunatic!" And I was like, "Oh."

Well, in celebration of the completion of the latest and possibly final round of edits of This Brilliant Darkness, I have invented a drink called:

FLYING BIRDBATH

Blue Curacao
Blue Sapphire Gin
Twists of citrus peel

Mix equal amounts of liquors in a martini glass. Garnish with citrus peel.

WRITING PROMPT: A character is terrified by something he or she mishears.

MA

Bite of the Bumblebee

One of the generous restaurants who contributed dishes to World on the Square last Saturday was J. Gumbo's, and one of the dishes they contributed was Bumblebee Stew. Also called Bumblebee Soup or Bumblebee Chowder, it's called Bumblebee Whatever because it contains yellow corn and black beans. Here's a video of how to make it. It's very easy, and I might make it at home, except I won't put as much hot stuff in it as J. Gumbo's does. I also think they might put some sweet cream in theirs, because it looks creamy and tastes, you know, sweet. VERY good, though.

Just in case you don't know, that song they're playing during the video is Flight of the Bumblebee, written by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. I have it as my ring tone.

And, just for fun, this:

WRITING PROMPT: What is your favorite piece of classical music? Any kind of music? Think of a dish that would represent it. Or your favorite bug, I don't care.

MA

Meanwhile, Last Saturday….

So last Saturday was World on the Square. You can see a photo-spread of it from the Courier-Journal Online. I'm in the second picture, looking massive but jolly in my Community Unity T-shirt.

Our long-time Food Chair retired from that post this year, and no one wanted to (nor could anyone) take her place. We hired a caterer, but she prefers to do the kitchen work and have somebody else do the meet-the-public stuff. But nobody wanted to be in charge of that. The fantastic Joy Kirchgessner volunteered to help round up donated food–raw ingredients and made dishes–from vendors, restaurants and individuals. Other people volunteered to serve the food. But nobody was in charge of the "front of the house" crew.

Then somebody opened her big fat mouth and admitted she had worked in the food area of the festival before. And suddenly, people were asking her what they should do. Fortunately, they only did that when an actual decision needed to be made that they didn't want to make, and fortunately that was seldom. So that wasn't a disaster, after all.

Outside was a different story. The festival was going great. Everybody was having a great time. Then a 60-mph straight-line wind descended, and wiped it out. Torrential rain blew sideways through the grounds. Tents went flying into trees. Goods, artifacts and informational material went airborn, except what was too waterlogged to fly. Within 20 minutes, a festival became an insurance fair.

But then there was a rainbow. Not just a literal one, the human one that so often follows a crisis. People checked on each other to make sure everybody was okay. People gathered up other people's things and returned them. People cooperated and, in general, demonstrated the attitude that the festival was all about.

In the basement, where we were serving the food, we only knew about the storm from the people who came sloshing in with stories of the wreckage. Those who didn't go home immediately were immensely glad of a dry place and hot food.

Could have been worse.

Please remember to enter the contest for free eBooks or your name in a story.

I'm posting today at Fatal Foodies, on the subject of booze.

WRITING PROMPT: An anticipated event is interrupted by disaster, either comic or not.

MA

It's Alive! IT'S ALIIIIIVE!!!!

RELEASE DAY FOR FORCE OF HABIT

And it's live and kicking at Smashwords, with Kindle, OmniLit and possibly print to follow.

Here's a link to the release page with a description.

Here's a link to the first chapter.

Here's another sample.

Here's a link to a post about turning fanfic into original fiction.

Here's one about the roots of this novel in Star Trek (TOS) fan fiction.

Here's a link to a post about cross-genres and mash-ups relative to FORCE OF HABIT.

Want a free copy? Enter the contest to win one of five eBooks, a Sweet Little Baby Angels pin or your name in a forthcoming story. Or offer to host me as a guest on your blog. Or request a review copy of any of my books.

WRITING PROMPT: A character gets so excited about something, he/she forgets to do something he/she does every day.

MA