Michael Offutt's Blog, page 146

Giving thanks from a serial narcissist

I made this turkey for you.

"Really?" you might say. "It's wonderful. I'll pin it on my fridge or display it on my door."

Even though I'm only eight, it makes me smile because it's the right thing to do. But in reality, I expect it, because let's face it, I cut colored paper up like no one's business. And my turkey is better than anyone else's turkey.

Here's a news flash for you. Nothing has changed between those days and now. I see right through you so don't even hide.

If you're a writer...you're like me. You started by making perfect cut-out turkeys in your grade school class. That's how it starts. That's how you get indoctrinated into the system and told your special. It's the other kids that ride the short bus.

Now that you're older, you drink chai or chocolate because either is the moniker of a sophisticated snob. But saying "chai" just makes you sound sophisticated. "Chocolate" doesn't have that effect.  You can thank Halloween for that because people give it away free to kids who dress up as a cow. There's no prestige in cows. Gateway has it all wrong.

You should thank a billion people in India for that. There's no sophistication to drinking chai in India as people consume it while wearing rags and riding on top of the train instead of inside it. But here in America, Starbucks can charge you $4.00 for a 20 ounce cup. Did you ever bother to ask yourself what $4 could buy you in India?
Liquid validation of your greatness.
No. Because you're a sophisticated snob like me. A morning for you, dear writer, upon the expectation of someone reading your words and leaving a comment may cause you to dirty yourself. The brisk winds of winter usher in that crucial moment where you stare at the sign and say, "Not the usual chai today. I'm getting the chai charger." All because the fifteen minutes you spent primping your hair is now ruined. COULD THIS DAY GET ANY WORSE?!

"Really?" asks the helpful coffee barrister (I like that word. It sounds so much better than clerk). "That's so...daring."

"I'm enslaved by nanowrimo and still have to stuff my turkey. I need 'daring.' It's a no holds barred day."

"What's a nanowrimo?"

HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY ASK THAT?!

Wait. Calm yourself. This person doesn't get you. If the wind hadn't ruined your perfectly-coifed hair, you'd answer. "I'm writing a novel," you smile and say.  And then you go to the restroom to fix your hair while annoying person makes your chai charger.

But maybe it's not as simple as a wonderful blend of cardamom, cinnamon, and cloves. Maybe what you really want is Tazo because (and let's be honest) it's the best and you only deserve the best. That's why you own an iPhone. Because Apple tells you it's the best with their commercials and commercials never lie. And as for that clerk! They'd better not skimp on the espresso or you'll mooch even more off their WiFi access!

Revenge is a chai best served cold and on ice cubes and in a cup made from recycled plastic. I think Shakespeare said that.

But, and God forbid, what if it's a peppermint mocha day. The combination of refreshing mint and sweet chocolate in a red cup that tells you, "Yes, it is indeed Christmas. Ho Ho Ho and all that, lass." Because let's face it. You're a narcissist and you wouldn't know the season unless your publicist told you what season it was. And you don't need to be rich to have a publicist. If you know where to slum, you can get one for thirty bucks who can spell your last name right half the time. But you get what you pay for, and that's America!

So from one writer to you (who I expect to read everything I write, who I expect to purchase my books and shower praise upon me with five stars) have a great Thanksgiving!

I'll be back on Monday. Until then, frequent your Starbucks, down your chai and chocolate, conquer your nanowrimo, and remember the mantra of every writer: "My colored paper turkey is better than yours, and you better post it on your sidebar, dammit!"

And maybe think of a blogfest or two that nobody needs.

Adieu :)

Another picture of Jordan from Oculus and my first Oculus review

CLICK TO EMBIGGEN AND SEE DETAILS!This weekend I didn't feel like writing so I drew another picture of Jordan from Oculus. I have no idea what kind of background to use, and I absolutely suck at backgrounds so it may stay this way for a while. If you look at my other art, it's usually a wall or some trees (because trees are easy). I just didn't want to draw trees. I really need to try and expand my absolute hatred of all things scenery. It's just...I HATE DRAWING SCENERY. It's soooo boring. But I know I know...it anchors the picture.

I sooo need a partnership with someone like Rusty Webb who can whip up the most amazing landscapes and backgrounds.

Anyway, this picture came of me desiring two things. I wanted to put slight freckles on Jordan's skin. I thought they turned out great. I also wanted to satisfy my leather jacket fetish. I loved doing the leather jacket! It was so much fun. And note, I even colored his teeth and put texture on the cuff of his right arm from the dress shirt he's wearing under the jacket.

I don't know why I can spend hours drawing a guy and all of his clothes, but I absolutely dread the background. It's another reason why I'll never be a real artist.

If you think of a background that might be cool to try, you should let me know. I just...don't want to do trees. He should be indoors, because he's barefoot.

This drawing was done using coloring pencil on illustration board. You may pin it, or use it if you like. Just give me credit.

Oculus also got reviewed. You can read it for yourself HERE.

Dear Munk Davis Oh How I Miss You

Today is the Oh, How I Miss You blogfest hosted by Andrew Leon, Alex J. Cavanaugh, and Matthew MacNish.

The bloggers we really miss…
and the ones we would really miss!
Do you have a couple blogger buddies who aren’t posting as often? Those who’ve pulled back and seem absent from the blogging world? Do you have blogger buddies you are grateful they are still around and would miss if they vanished? Now is your chance to show your appreciation and spotlight them!
On November 16, list one to three bloggers you really miss and one to three bloggers you would miss if they stopped blogging. Then go leave a comment on those blogs.
Our blogger friends are special – time to let them know! 

Okay then! With that in mind, I want to say that I miss Munk Davis. You can find his blog HERE. I don't remember how I found Munk, but I instantly liked his avatar with the cooky hat that he wore and the fact that he was a chemical engineer. I took three years of chemical engineering before I went into something else. I feel like I have a kinship with this Oregonian, even though we've never met.

And he has an astounding sense of humor. It really shines through in his writing (which I got to beta-read). I hope he gets busy and publishes the thing. "Booker" is such an unusual name.

As for bloggers I would miss, there are so many. So I'm just going to say all of you. I would miss all of you...every...single...one. And I hope you continue to be a part of the online community.

Cheers to the three men above who came up with this blogfest.

Have a great weekend.

Blog Fests Still Looking for More People

First up, I wanted to talk about the "Merry Christmas to All" blog fest that my friend, Briane Pagel, is trying to put together.

You can find the sign up for this blog fest/ original post HERE .

In a nutshell (because Briane is incredibly long winded about anything he writes), authors who sign up for his blog fest agree to:

1) Choose one week day (Monday thru Friday) either on November 23rd or any day following (up to and including Christmas Eve).

2) On your chosen day, you write a post that has something to do with the holidays. You also give away one free ebook to someone who comments or is chosen through some other means. You can do the giveaway through a rafflecopter thing or whatever.

3) Do your best to spread the word about the other books being given away, either in your post, or on days when you are not posting.

I would never consider Briane's rules to be super strict as he's a big squishy soft guy that is a lawyer who tries to legalese everything. The important thing is to try and participate, which I hope you do because you all write such great books and people need to hear about them :).
Please remember that tomorrow is the "Oh How I Miss You" blogfest. This one is hosted by Andrew Leon, Alex J. Cavanaugh, and Matthew MacNish. They don't need nearly as much help as poor Briane's fest does. Briane's only has four people which means the "blog fest" is gonna be really short, especially since we all just read each other's books anyway. Sign up for the "Oh, How I Miss You" blogfest on Alex's blog HERE.

Have a great Thursday.

If I channel David Sedaris maybe I can understand

If I channel David Sedaris, maybe I can understand why some people do the things that they do. I can finally understand why we have sales opening on Thanksgiving or why people get mad at saying Xmas when the entire notion of punching someone in the face under a banner that reads "Christmas" to get an LED television that's 70% off, isn't any better.

Or any more in the spirit of "Christmas."

Maybe I can understand why a critic would choose to "criticize" when they haven't actually read the thing their critiquing. People say all kinds of things about the Affordable Care Act. But when I ask them if they've visited Healthcare.gov to read it, they say no. They don't have the time. But they critique it nonetheless.

Maybe I could understand why, even if I put on an elf hat and a green suit and stood next to a candy cane in a shopping mall, I wouldn't be an elf. I'd just be a creepy fat guy in a green suit. And I'd understand Christmas even less. Elves don't get Christmas. Elves were invented by department stores to sell stuff. That's the only reason they exist.

People will say, "that's not Christmas, that's just people being nasty." But you're wrong. You can stick your head in the sand if you want to.  It is Christmas. The holiday is totally that, and it gets worse every year. Democrats have been called socialists. I always wondered what a socialist looked like.  So what does a capitalist look like? Well, capitalists look like the day after Thanksgiving in a Wal-Mart store. That's Christmas, and you can hear the cash register bell ringing like a sleigh bell with a ho ho ho. Half the people will buy things that come with instructions. They won't read them. Instead they'll leave bad reviews on Amazon.

"I write and don't read," one of them might say.

"Oh really?" I ask. "What are you writing?"

"A critique of your book. I give it 2 stars because I just can't bring myself to give it 1.5."

"How generous of you.  Is there more?  I'm curious what you didn't like?"

"I don't like your character, Jason."

"You mean Jordan.  It's Jordan Pendragon," I say. "His name is in there hundreds of times."

"And I didn't like how you pulled off the time travel parts," expert critic adds.

"There's no time travel in my book. There's no time travel on the blurb or the synopsis."

"Actually this is the worst time travel book I've ever read. And why do you refer to hockey as ice hockey?" opinioned person asks.

"Because in America we have field hockey. I want to make sure people who aren't Canadian know the difference. And there's no time travel in my book."

*Snorts. "Why did you market this book as time travel? Jason Pendragon uses too many drugs. Kids don't use drugs. You should write that instead. And they don't have sex either.  What an unbelievable book."

"His name is Jordan. It's not Jason. You didn't read the book, did you?"

"I can't say I'll read any more. Saga of Jason Pendragon doesn't interest me. Lucky it was a free book. 1.5 stars. Too many other books to read."

Yeah, so maybe I could understand if I channeled David Sedaris. Or maybe not. Or maybe some people are just jerks who don't read anymore because they're too busy writing.

A day late to the Renaissance Fair, but who's counting

I'm one day late to the party, but better late than never I say.

The Renaissance of Hetty Locklear by M. Pax definitely seems to be heading in a different direction from Mary's usual offerings. I've read one of her books, a pretty hard hitting science-fiction, and I really liked it. Here's what it's about:

A New Adult Urban Fantasy, The Renaissance of Hetty Locklear is the first book in a new series. And it’s out now! The main character, Hetty, is a 22-year-old stumbling about in an effort to become a full-fledged adult. She struggles with self-esteem, weight, relationships, and making the transition between college and the real world.


Graduation from community college isn’t the magic elixir Hetty Locklear counts on for becoming an adult. Her parents, who work the Renaissance fair circuit, insist she spend part of the summer with them. Hetty doubts pretending to live in the Middle Ages will help her find her way.To make it worse, an entity haunts her at her dead-end job, warning her of a dangerous man she doesn’t know. The ghost leads her to a lover who has a lot of secrets. He pulls her farther into peril and into a strange, hidden world of genetic experimentation.
New Adult Urban Fantasy with a contemporary sci-fi twist. Mature content.


Available as an ebook at Amazon / Amazon UK / Smashwords / iTunes/ KoboVisit www.mpaxauthor.comfor more links.
M. Pax is celebrating her latest release with a jousting tournament and contest at www.mpaxauthor.com. Cheer for the knights to help them win the grand prize, and you’ll be put in a drawing to win an ebook copy of The Renaissance of Hetty Locklear. Five will be given away. Huzzah! Have a great Tuesday and stop by to wish Mary a happy release day :)

I'm drawing characters. This time it's Andy.

CLICK TO EMBIGGEN IF YOU WANTBecause it was so snowy outside my window this weekend here in Utah, I decided to finish a pencil drawing I started a month or so ago of Andy Callahan who makes his appearance in "Oculus." So this is what I think he looks like. In the last third of the book, there's a part where Jordan spends Thanksgiving with Andy at his parent's home in the Hamptons, which is surrounded by woods. It snows and interesting things happen. And yes, I really like writing about the children of the 1% (because let's face it peeps...the 1% live a lifestyle I will never know).

Thanks for all the support regarding the "Oculus" cover reveal. For those of you who indicated interest in being part of my blog tour, I sent all your contact information to my publicist, Roxanne Rhoades, who is helping me set it up. I just got overwhelmed with individual emails, the book getting plopped in my lap, and planning my business trip to the Consumer Electronics Show on January 5th.

Between that and trying to figure out what to do, I just realized I could use some assistance. Roxanne previously helped Ciara Knight which made me think, if Ciara got help from this lady that's good enough for me. Plus she was uber affordable. I was like, "OMG, I spend that kind of money on one meal out with friends. So totally worth it."

So if you get an email from Roxanne about scheduling, please don't toss it. She's just helping me. Things are super busy at work too. And look at it this way, with her helping me, my visiting to your blogs shouldn't diminish because I'll have time to do so now. :)

Thanks everyone. Have a great Monday.

Oculus is here

So this is my cover. It's full of creepy crawlies. And seeing that you've probably already viewed it by now on my sidebar or through the tab above, I wanted to offer a little explanation of what's going on here. The cover does fit the book. Even if you may be scratching your head and thinking...can Mike really write about spiders
this much? Yes, yes I can. So here's the scene that this cover actually reflects (although it is a symbolic cover and not an actual scene as taken from the book):

*****Kathy did as instructed.  A video started up, showing an individual approaching the front of the building.  He wore a long cloak, but his face was unmistakable.  Charon possessed skin as transparent as glass.  He had silver eyes and deep red hair that flowed down from his scalp and swept over his shoulders to fall in the darkness behind his hood.  As he walked forward, he parted his cloak, and Kolin saw the redness of Charon’s heart, beating under all that transparent skin, supplying blood to the demigod’s limbs so that he may live.From inside the flap of his coat, millions of glass spiders emerged and washed across the black asphalt like a glittering flash flood.  Charon directed them like Poseidon must command the waves of the ocean.  They blazed with their own silver light and swarmed over cars, benches, and lampposts, scurrying toward the front of the building.  Guards at the doors pulled out pistols and shot off a few rounds but were quickly overwhelmed by the spiders.  These tiny arachnids with gears visible on the inside of their glass skin spun silver thread about the struggling humans, encasing them, and then proceeded to drill into their heads, lacing their brains with microfilament fiber optic wire.The video had no sound so Kolin couldn’t hear the screaming.  But he could see the men and women shrieking.  He watched.  His skin got clammy under his armor; his mouth dried of spit.  Despite the fact that the wounds inflicted by the spiders were small, blood flowed over the floor as thick and sticky as syrup.The spiders continued their march and entered the building, cocooning anyone they came across.  The millions of tiny creatures were unstoppable, like a deadly tide, and they crawled over everything, leaving threads of blinking light that flowed into Charon’s body.  People fell in the lobby and became enshrouded in webs.  They collapsed in doorways or in the chairs in which they sat.  Meanwhile, Charon just continued to cackle and smile with glee.*****So what's going on with the cover. Well, the color red is very important to the book. The team that Jordan plays on is called "The Big Red" and its colors are red and white.  Jordan plays ice hockey so the spiders are walking on what could be construed as glass or ice. Blood on the ice is an important theme in this book, hence the blood droplets underneath the spiders. So in a way, the cover is perfect for the story and they definitely look like a part of the same series. I wasn't sure if I quite liked it, but it's growing on me. What do you think?

The book did go on sale today. Go HERE for purchasing options.
A FAVOR ==> If you are looking for an idea for a post (I'm not asking for any special treatment), could you just mention the cover in a snippet either today or tomorrow?
I'm not blogging tomorrow so I'll see you Monday.

Thanking the Resurrected Insecure Reader Support Group Wednesday

Dear reader,
This is my time to say thank you to the many people who have taken the time to read my words. I appreciate you because you invested time in me. Without you, I would still think I had no voice. I would still feel invisible. In many ways, my life is greatly improved for having and keeping this blog.I feel like I am now part of an amazing community of the most intelligent and diverse minds in the world. Even if we disagreed either politically or ideologically, the intelligent discourses that we have engaged upon either on your blogs or through mine has been an entertaining experience, and I look forward to many more in 2013. I am thankful to you, dear reader, for everything that you do.

"The essence of all beautiful art, all great art, is gratitude." Friedrich Nietzsche
This blog fest is the brain child of Tara and Vicki. You can visit their blogs by clicking on their names in the previous sentence. :)
*****
Now onto my second blogfest which also happens on a Wednesday. Many of you are familiar with it, as Alex Cavanaugh came up with it and truthfully, I think it's the most brilliant blog fest ever for three reasons. 1) Simplicity. 2) It re-occurs. 3) It's helpful. Alex, my man, you are a genius. My insecurity comes about mostly this week because I'm wondering when exactly to start a blog tour for my next book. Deron with Double Dragon Publishing gave me my cover art this week. I wasn't expecting it. And truthfully, I don't think he really was expecting to tackle it. Deron is kind of random. He focuses 100% on getting the book to where it can be bought online. That's where his responsibility ends. And, he has tons of projects to do, because as you all know, everyone is writing (this is a good thing in my opinion because writing encourages critical thinking). Literally, DDP has posted on their website that they will probably not get to new submissions until 2014. I said to him, "I have no problem in waiting my turn. Do not give me any special favors." He responded by saying he'd probably get to it in the spring.
Something obviously happened between then and now, because he just got excited about it and is going to publish it this week. I haven't even had time to think about sending out review copies. But none of that matters anyway because the only people that are going to read it are people who have read the first book. No one I know dives into a series in the second book. No one.
Anyway, with regard to publishing Oculus, it hasn't quite happened yet because there were "issues" with the equation editor that I use in Microsoft Word (yes, my book has math in it). However, before you, dear reader, let out a groan...Donna Hole (beta reader extraordinaire) had me remove all the calculus. She said in pretty blunt words "THIS HAS GOT TO GO." And I said, "Yes ma'am." No calculus at all remains. It is simply one square root equation and one polynomial that Jordan explains fully in the narrative. It's easy stuff that we all learn in fifth grade.
Now, my insecurity isn't that I won't have support from bloggers for a tour. It's that I can't make a decision. THIS is one of the things that really does paralyze me. I AGONIZE over decisions. I've been living in an apartment for four years because I can't decide on where I want to live, or what kind of house I want. Seriously. I'm driving an old car because I can't decide if I want a new one or not. I sometimes can't decide whether or not I should go to a doctor. Right now, I can't decide whether I want my blog tour to start in December or January.
Now, I AM going to have some help from a professional marketer/publicist. I've been communicating with her and really like the fact that she'll be helping my scatterbrained mind to stay organized. I may seem organized on this blog, but if you knew me in real life, you'd know how scatterbrained and "not together" I really am.
I may decide to do some in December and some in January and skip over the dead space between Christmas and New Years. But no matter what, I have a decision to make.
If you would like to see my cover art, you can find it on the tab OCULUS BLOG TOUR above or just click on those caps. If any of you are reading this and would like a free blog post (sometimes we could all use one of these), I'd appreciate a cover reveal on your blog whenever you'd like. The book isn't commercially available yet, but I expect it to be on Friday. You can find the blurb HERE under the words "Short Synopsis." I myself am doing a cover reveal tomorrow just because it's Thursday and it's the first day this week that I don't have anything scheduled.
***** This is the last blog fest I'm participating in that also falls on today. It is the brain child of Mina Lobo , a fantastic and supportive author from the blog "Some Dark Romantic." Please go visit her and check out some of the blog fest entries if you have the time.
I wrote a post in the first year that I started blogging. It's about exclamation points, and you can find it HERE . It still gets quite a few views but not any new comments. I promise, it's really funny if you go and take a look.
Whew...I think I survived "Thanking the Resurrected Insecure Reader Support Group Wednesday".

Monsters in fiction need to make sense. Wisdom from author L. Blankenship

I am pleased to welcome author L. Blankenship to my blog. I discovered Ms. Blankenship a few months ago. She's a fantastic speculative fiction author, and I have to say that I've been zooming through this offering of hers like a kid through cotton candy. Perhaps next week, I'll have a review for you. Until then, please read what she has to say :).

*****
FROM THE BACK COVER:

The saints favor her, else-wise a peasant girl like Kate Carpenter would never be apprenticed to the kingdom’s master healer. But her patron saint also marks her ready for the duty of tending to a mission that must cross the ice-bound mountains.
Their little kingdom faces invasion by a vast empire and desperately needs allies; across the snow-filled pass, through the deathly thin air, is a country that’s held off the empire and may be willing to lend an army.

Kate knows about frostbite and the everyday injuries of wilderness travel. She can heal those.

She’s not ready for the attentions of a ne’er-do-well knight and the kingdom’s only prince, though.

And she isn’t ready for the monsters that harry them night and day, picking off their archers first, wearing the party to exhaustion, pushing Kate beyond the limits her healing abilities.

She must keep them alive, or her blood will be on the snow too.

SOME THOUGHTS ON MONSTERS:
The monsters that Kate and her companions face are unsettlingly smart and organized. The cover story to keep their mission secret is that they're on a hunting trip to thin these monsters' numbers. Who's thinning whose numbers becomes a going question once the travelers are worn to exhaustion.

They call the monsters lamia. The lamia are wolves who've grown up drinking the magic-laced waters of a fount -- it changes them into something more dangerous. But lamia are still part of the local ecology and however intelligent they are, they still need to "make sense."

Any fantasy world that includes monsters, whether it's dragons or unicorns or invented creatures like my wolf-lamia, ought to take basic ecology into consideration. Even monsters need to eat and raise their young. They need places to sleep and everyday lives to go about.

It's a personal peeve of mine that in so many movies, our hero goes into a forest/jungle/desert and immediately trips over a large predator who has nothing better to do today than chase a random human around. This is usually fatal for the predator, too. It's a senseless and annoying trope IMO.

Author photo of L. BlankenshipI asked myself some basic questions, when I was creating my lamia:

What do they normally eat? Why are humans on the menu? My answer: they eat deer and elk, normally. But most humans are easy to kill, especially children. It's the ones with bows you have to look out for. What ordinary animal are they filling in for? My answer: wolves, bears, and cougars all at once. An area can only support a limited number of predators, and my lamia fill all those niches.What are their motivations for approaching humans? My answer: they are defending their territory, especially the magical fount. They know humans are competition for both the fount and for prey in the stretch of forest the lamia claim.  
What questions would you add to my list?

Find L. Blankenship at the following places:
She keeps a book blog at DISCIPLE OF THE FOUNT Her writing blog called NOTES FROM THE JOVIAN FRONTIER can be found HERE.Disciple on AMAZON KINDLE is located HERE.Disciple on KOBO is located HEREAnd you can find her on GOODREADS located HERE.