Renée Harrell's Blog, page 5

Who's your favorite supervillain?

​Last week, while surrounded by children, I heard my favorite twelve-year-old ask one of the adults in the room, “Who’s your favorite supervillain?”
 
That’s the kind of unexpected question that would give me pause before answering. Roger didn’t hesitate. Without hesitation, as if he’d done his research in advance of such a query, he responded, “Doctor Doom.”
 
The twelve-year-old didn’t ask why Roger had made that choice. Roger didn’t explain himself, either. He didn’t have to: Doctor Doom. Great answer. The doctor’s name alone tells the audience that he’s All Evil, All the Time. If he wasn’t All Evil, All the Time, he’d have done something to soften his name’s impact.
 
“You can call me Vic,” the leader of Latvaria said. “Although, officially, it’s Victor von Doom-Markovich. I was willing to take Fruzsina’s last name, but she insisted we hyphenate. Such an angel.”
 
(If you’re wondering if Doctor Doom has ever fallen in love, he absolutely has. Fruzsina was only one of the lucky ladies that caught Doom’s eye.)
 
In fiction, names are often the telltale clue to someone’s soul. Prince Charming? Of course, you can pet sit for my cat. Professor Sinister? Fluffy Foo-Foo will not be left in your care.  
 
During our long drive home, I had time to reflect on this. I told Harrell about the exchange I’d overheard in Yuma, then asked if he thought we should change the name of the baddie in our next story. “Instead of Charisma,” I said, “maybe we should use something stronger.”
 
“Like Cruella?”
 
“Perfect example.”
 
“The Evil Empire would sue us.”
 
“I didn’t mean –”
 
“Who’s your favorite supervillain?” he asked.
​And, by now, I’d had time to think about that. Without hesitation, as if I’d done my research in advance of such a query, I responded, “Sideshow Bob.”
 
Robert Underdunk Terwilliger Jr., a.k.a Sideshow Bob of The Simpsons. The brilliant but easily distracted nemesis of Bart Simpson. Bob’s also a big fan of Gilbert and Sullivan, and someone who often bursts into song with little provocation. I’m not saying that I can relate, but, like Bob, I grew a little tired of Bart Simpson some twenty years ago.
 
“Not exactly a name to inspire fear,” my car partner told me.
 
“Who’s yours?” I asked Harrell.
​“Lasso,” he said immediately, which leads me to think that maybe all guys keep those kinds of lists in their head. Favorite food, favorite sports team, favorite supervillain. Women keep mental lists, too, but our lists aren’t like theirs. Not even close.
 
If you haven’t heard of Lasso, join the club. The character first appeared in Flash Comics #85 (1947), where he attempted to take down the heroic Hawkman and failed. Decades later, he was updated as one of a team of malefactors (2005). It was this version that Harrell enjoyed.
 
“Lasso dresses like a cowboy,” he said, “and the only thing he can do is throw a lasso. Not a super lasso, or a magic lasso, just a regular rope with a noose on the end. The same kind of rope that anyone can buy at a hardware store. Over the course of several issues of Hawkman, he talks big, does a little gambling, and hits on a woman. Just lingering in the background. He throws his lasso one time. Once. The rope is immediately taken from his hand by a more powerful baddie.”
 
“Then why is Lasso your favorite supervillain?” I asked. “He’s a weenie.”
 
(Look, I’d just spent several days with kids. It takes a little time to get back into adult-speak.)
 
“That’s why he’s my favorite supervillain. He makes me laugh.”
 
If you’re wondering why our writing royalties have never approached five figures, there's your answer, right there. My partner would rather laugh than create a memorable super foe. Although, I guess I would, too. It's one reason I love Sideshow Bob.
 
But Charisma Treadwell is going to overcome her name and be a great baddie. Wait and see.
 

Babies or blog?

Fully vaccinated and comfortable at the idea of entering the outside world once again, the first thing I did was… make an appointment to get my hair cut. Doctor visits, dentist visits, that stuff can wait. After fifteen months of isolation, I’m not going to try to fix the sad, flyaway stuff on top of my head. Harrell volunteered to help, but that wasn’t going to happen. I saw what he did to his own hair.
 
Six months into the pandemic, my guy watched 15 minutes of a YouTube video and decided he had haircutting down. It turns out, he’d overestimated his abilities. Holding the hair clipper in hand, he came out of the bathroom and told me, “Guess I have a mullet now.”
 
I so wish I’d had my cellphone handy.
 
Since my face is all wrong for a mullet – here’s how you know: Do you have a face? If you do, it’s all wrong for a mullet – I called Heather, my hair stylist. She didn’t have any openings for a couple of weeks, so the second thing I did was to fuel up the car, drive for hours across the desert, and went to see babies. I’m still with the babies. As soon as I’m done with this note, I’m playing with the little ones again. If the babies weren’t so far away, I’d be tempted to do this EVERY week. If this particular blog is a little short of sauce, you now know why. I’ve been distracted.
 
Because I almost never think of grabbing my cellphone, I failed to take a picture of the desert as I crossed it. Instead, I borrowed this image by Simon Maisch from Unsplash. It’s not unlike “my” desert.
 
I do have this to share: I set up an Amazon Author Central page a couple of days ago. I’m not a fan of Author Central pages. I find them to be awkward-looking things, not unlike a mullet, but a very nice person has offered to help promote one of my new releases and asked I set one up. Since I had to include an author’s photo, I used one from a few years go. You know, back in the days when someone else was cutting my hair. And coloring it.
 
It’s not my best picture. My best picture is in my head, which is where I imagine I look better than what my evil, lying mirror shows me.
I also discovered an interesting site, How Many of Me . The website uses Census Bureau data to estimate how many people in the USA share whatever name you enter. We’re not talking exact numbers here, but it’s definitely in the general vicinity. When I plugged in “Renee Harrell”, for example, the HowMany team told me there are 36 people sharing the same name in the States. No idea if any of those names are pen names, though. There are 13 people named “Anne Glynn”, our other pseudonym. It feels like all of them are on Facebook.
Last week, I used their calculator to see how many real people shared the same name as the villainess in our next story. HowMany said, There are 1 or fewer people in the U.S. (with that name). That sounds a lot like “none” to me. This fictional bad girl is a really, really awful person. For no real reason, I’m pleased there’s only one of her.
​ 
Now, if you’ll excuse me, babies!
​

The Mouse is a louse

​The mouse on the left is a field mouse and, as long as the mouse stays in the field, the two of us are good. Come into my house, we might have a different conversation. I'm allowed to use this mouse photo without charge because it's in the public domain.
 
No, I’m talking about the Walt Disney Company, whose most famous mascot is a cartoon mouse. Why aren’t I showing a Mickey Mouse image on the blog? The character’s not in the public domain. Despite Mickey having been created almost a century ago, WDC keeps pressuring Congress to extend their copyright protections well past what the law originally intended. Congress being… well, Congress… is only too happy to help their big money donors as long as the big money keeps flowing from palm to palm.
 
Which doesn’t give me the warm fuzzies about either of these two groups, but what are you gonna do? It’s not right, but it’s not technically evil. You know what does seem to be an act of evil? The way big money Walt Disney decided to withhold royalties from little money authors. Allegedly.
 
This first came to my attention when the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) posted this notice. If you don’t care to read the entire thing, it comes down to this: The Disney Company purchased LucasFilms and, with it, Splinter of the Mind’s Eye, an Alan Dean Foster novel. Then, gobbling everything in sight, WDC picked up 20th Century Fox and the rights to three other novels that Foster had written. According to the writer, a gentleman who lives in my community, the company appeared to have taken the stance that they had the right to profit from the sales of the novels, but they were no longer obligated to pay the guy who wrote those novels. Because… they’re Disney. With Congress in their pocket, they weren’t too concerned that a small-town author had the muscle to go up against them.
 
Fighting an aggressive form of cancer and caring for a medically-fragile wife, Foster had a lot on his plate. He’s also a fighter, so he went public with his situation. The SFWA helped spread the word. Harrell and I decided, until WDC met their legal obligations to him, we were done with those shysters. No Disney+, no Disney movies, no Disney toys. We formed a two-person boycott and shared the news pretty openly. We were pleased recently when, many months after the royalty statements stopped coming, Foster posted on his website this May that all was well. “The issue with Disney regarding back royalties has been resolved.”
 
Just in time, too, because Disney+ will be releasing the Loki television series in June. I really want to see the Loki television series. Tom Hiddleston as a megalomaniacal Trickster God? Yes, please.
 
Except *sigh* it appears that there was worse to come. According to Publisher’s Weekly, multiple writing organizations are now saying that the Mickey Mouse organization has shafted lots of other writers. Some of them for years. Romance writers, mystery writers, science fiction writers, horror writers… the WDC has been an equal-opportunity offender. The hashtag #DisneyMustPay has been established, so keep an eye out for it.  And if you, by chance, are one of the casualties, the SFWA wants your information. You can contact them here.
  
Oh, and I’d like to share a little advice with Tom Hiddleston ‘cause I know he’s checking this out. Tom, get your money upfront.

You know what's better than true love?

​We were still talking about writing serial fiction when my friend, the Good Witch, asked me that. It was an unfair question, because it’s all about context, isn’t it? When my college roommate first discovered poison oak, then discovered that evening that she was highly allergic to poison oak, she sent her boyfriend away when he came to our door. That night, generic Benadryl was ranked much higher than true love.
 
There are times when true love is the shiniest star in the heavens. There are other times when I will absolutely abandon a hug and tickle for a pair of Café Rio’s fire-grilled chicken tacos. I enjoy hugs and tickles, but I haven’t been to my favorite Café Rio in almost two years. At this point, it’s not about desire. This is lust.
 
But Good Witch had a point to make: “What’s better than finding true love is finding a true love with a massive bank account.”
 
I disagree with her. The only person I’ve personally met who has a massive bank account – lottery winnings, who says there’s justice in this world? – is a gigantic hemorrhoid of a person. Which is what I shared with G.W.
 
“First of all, ---- is barely a multi-millionaire. Does ‘five’ count as multi-millions? Secondly, he’s a douche. He’s nobody’s fantasy lover,” G.W. pointed out, quite accurately. “I mean, for this new serial fiction thing, you should write a billionaire romance story. They’re so popular.”
 
I vaguely knew that “billionaires” are a romance trope. The heroes (because it’s usually a man who has the money) are often emotionally-damaged and uninterested in commitment, which is in keeping with what I’ve read about the super-rich, they tend to be gorgeous, unlike every other billionaire anyone has ever seen in person, and they end up falling in love with the story’s extraordinarily ordinary heroine, which seems so unlikely to me. But I enjoy reading and writing romance, where the unlikely is what makes the motor run, so I was okay with that.
 
“Maybe I should use a trillionaire,” I said, because if an ungodly amount of money is good then a massively obscene amount of moola would seem to be better.
 
“It’s been done. Didn’t go over well,” G.W. told me. “It’s not realistic.” As if realism is the defining feature of any serial I wrote in this genre.
 
“How about a multiplujillionaire, then?” – which is when we learned that Harrell had been listening in to our conversation. “Mr. Scrooge McDuck. From the way he acts, I’m pretty certain that he’s emotionally-damaged.”
 
(Before I wrote this blog, I did a little research. In 2011, Forbes magazine estimated that the avian multiplujillionaire’s fictional money vault held over $44B in gold. Also, although McDuck’s been in love before, he’s currently single. On the downside, he’s a duck. But what man is perfect?)
 
“You promised me fire-grilled chicken tacos,” I told Harrell. In less than a minute, he’d gathered his books and left. Not to get me my tacos, just to escape from sight.
 
If you go online, you’ll see there are over 50 pages of listings for billionaire romance books on Amazon alone. Going by the cover photos, the world’s wealthy spend an inordinate amount of their time at the gym. There are bad boy billionaires, gangland billionaires, billionaires with babies, billionaires who want babies, vampire billionaires, and werewolf billionaires.
 
Overwhelmed by so many options, I didn’t see anything new I could bring to the genre. And then, out of nowhere, a new story title popped into my head.
 
I shared the name with G.W.
 
“You can’t use that,” G.W. told me. “It’s obscene!”
 
But it’s my working title or, it will be, if the Amazon Vella folks approve it. If they don’t, I think I’ll pass on writing big dollar romance – or maybe I’ll use The Bad Boy Multiplujillionaire’s Surprise Werewolf Baby. It’s not dirty in the least, it covers a few of the bases, and, as of this morning, no one else has used it.
 
I can hear the cash registers ringing already.

Amazon wants ALL the money

​The picture to the left? That’s cash Amazon won’t be getting until they accept Chinese Yuan for USA purchases. In early January of 2020, when Harrell and I decided we needed to leave Beijing in a hurry – there was talk of a scary virus going around – this was the folding stuff that was in our wallets when we boarded our plane. A Yuan is currently going for about fifteen cents, USD, so it isn’t a lot money… but I’d like to do something with it. If you’re headed to China shortly, let us know.
 
For those of you kind enough to email and ask how we did following our second Covid-vaccination, we’re fine. More accurately, I felt a little lethargic the next day while Harrell had a fever, chills, body aches and couldn’t manage to stay awake until it was time to go to bed. The next day, we were both doing our usual things.
 
To the week’s topic, I’ve recently learned that Amazon is taking its first tentative steps into publishing serial fiction. They are way late on this. Wattpad was in the game in 2006. A much later arrival is Radish, which came along a decade later. These days, there’s a feeding frenzy of these kinds of publishers – WebNovel, Tapas, KISS, HiNovel, so many, many more – and all of them seem to be using the same playbook. They’re publishing micro-fiction for an audience that wants bite-sized chunks of story that can be read on the go. They share a lot of the same terminology, too. These short bits are referred to as “episodes”, instead of a chapter, and a collection of episodes is called a “season”, as opposed to a novel or novella.
 
I was new to all of it. I knew about Wattpad, because the Good Witch has dabbled in it, but for the rest? Not a clue. Once I heard about Vella, I did a little looking around. It surprised me to learn that Radish has its own writing staff , and that these Emmy Award-winning folks use reader feedback to produce “hit stories in a hyper-fast, data driven way.” They update their most popular series several times a day. Several times a day….  Then I learned that the most popular “Radish Original” stories are never meant to end. Really?
 
How is a writer who can’t figure out how to off-load Chinese Yuan going to compete with that, I ask you? I’m incapable of being hyper-fast in anything. It takes me half a day to write a blog and, you’ve probably noticed, the words aren’t all that polished. I’m lucky if I can update something once a day. Oh, and I won’t write a story that doesn’t have an ending. I like endings. But maybe I’m the only one.
 
So, how are things working for the Radish organization? Those data-driven super scribes are making bank. In April, it was announced that Kakao Entertainment intends to buy the company for over $350 million . There’s money in mobile publishing, which is why it’s surprising that Amazon was so slow to step in. It took them until April of this year to announce their beta program for “Amazon Vella”. They encourage writers to create episodes, not chapters, with cliff-hanger endings. Don’t offer anything that’s already been published as a novella or novel. As I write this, there’s no date for when the program goes live, but there are hints that it might be available by August-ish.
 
If you haven’t heard, readers can read the first three episodes of any Vella serial for free. After that, future episodes will be available for 1/20th of a cent per 100 words. If I’m doing the math-thing correctly, that same reader can buy a 2,000-word episode for one penny. The writer doesn’t get to bank that entire penny, though; it’s split 50/50 with Amazon. Which leads me to believe that my math has to be wonky. If it's correct, this sounds like a great deal for readers (like me), a lousy one for writers (like me).
 
And, yet, the Good Witch says I’m missing a bet by not reaching out to this audience. She knows I’m wary about some of these other serial fiction outfits – and, if you’re a writer, you should be, too – thank you, Victoria Strauss and Writer Beware – but G.W. trusts Amazon to play it straight. She’s encouraging Harrell and I to jump in and try a romance sub-genre that we’ve never written.
 
“Stretch yourself!” she told me. “It'll be fun!”
 
Stretch myself? At my age? But… once she started talking to me, the perfect (obscene) title for a new romance popped in my head. Does Vella allow obscene titles? I was typing the title into our “Future Stories” folder when, suddenly, the computer exploded!
 
No, it really didn’t. I’m practicing cliff-hangers. More next week.

Happy today, dreading tomorrow

I usually try to post a little something on Tuesday. I’m bumping the schedule up this week because, this morning, Harrell and I went to receive our second dose of the Moderna COVID vaccine. It didn’t go quite as smoothly as the first time. When we showed up at the vaccination spot, the doors were locked. There was a paper sign on the window, advising potential vaccinees that the location was closed and that we’d all have to go five minutes down the road to get our poke.
 
If I’d been thinking, I’d have taken a photo of the notification instead of borrowing the blog’s image from Spotify’s Burst website. I’d also have taken a cell shot of the second piece of paper on the window, the one that wanted anyone inconvenienced by this change to join in a lawsuit against the non-profit healthcare organization that was giving these injections.
 
We could have walked to the new vaccination site. The space was smaller, but lines were light and social distancing was easily accomplished. The guy wielding the needle suggested I take it in my dominant arm (if you’re new to the process, here are some other tips) and I barely felt the poke. Today was a very good day. It’s tomorrow that I dread.
 
Twenty-eight days ago, after receiving my first shot, my arm hurt. I did the windmill exercises that are recommended to lessen the pain, but who knows how effective they were? The arm still hurt, but did increasing my circulation keep it from hurting more? That was my only side effect from the injection, though. Harrell experienced the same arm pain. Ten hours later, he also experienced chills and a mild fever, but they were both gone by morning.
 
Some friends and family members tell me it’s the second dose of the vaccine that carries a delayed punch. I’ve been told it’s not today that’ll get me; it’s tomorrow that brings the surprise. The reactions seem to vary from person to person. One friend didn’t feel a thing while his wife had an unrelenting headache that settled in for an entire day. One of our relatives had a miserable muscle pain throughout her body. And then there’s my friend, the Good Witch.
 
“I couldn’t,” she told me.
 
“Couldn’t what?”
 
“Couldn’t anything. I woke up the next day, feeling as if the blood had been drained from my body. I sat on the sofa the entire morning. That afternoon, to switch things up, I laid on the sofa. For two days. You didn’t call.”
 
“I did call,” I said. “The phone went to voice mail.”
 
“You think I was going to get off the sofa to answer the cell phone?” she asked.
 
By Day 3, she was fine. If she’s well enough to nag, I know she’s gotten better.
 

Some things can't be unseen

​My sweet sister-in-law tagged me in a Facebook post, knowing I wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation to see what was written. What I saw was wrong and twisted. It shouldn’t even exist. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
 
Let me back up. At the end of our “Anne Glynn” stories, there’s a note about the author. It reads:
 
A collector of vintage Barbies and younger boyfriends,
Anne Glynn currently resides in the American Southwest.
 
If you’re here, you know the notice isn’t entirely truthful. “Anne Glynn” isn’t one person. Of the two people who share that pen name, one of them has never had a younger boyfriend. The one who had younger boyfriends no longer collects them. And, although I continue to be fascinated by vintage Barbies, I’m far from being an obsessed collector. Yes, Harrell claims that I have every Barbie reference book that’s ever been printed, but I don’t own any of the expensive dolls and all of the outfits I’ve found are in less than mint condition. I think I’m fairly balanced, hobby-wise, when it comes to Ruth Handler’s creation. For example, even though I had all of the supplies necessary to bake a cake, I never suggested that my friends and I celebrate Barbie’s birthday on March 9th. I may have made her a card, but it's not like I sent it.
 
(Yes, I’m aware that Ken’s birthday falls two days later on March 11th. No one celebrates Ken’s birthday.)
 
Which brings me to what happened the other day. Laurie tagged me on that Facebook post. When I followed up on it, I discovered it was an article about Margaux Lange and her mad Barbie jewelry . If you follow the link, you’ll find that Margaux hasn’t cherished her Barbie dolls. She hasn’t traveled across the state to find the parts to rebuild a plastic yellow ’70s Dream House to give them a place to stay. (It’s the very coolest Dream House ever.) No, M.L. takes new Barbie dolls and... cuts them up.
 
Their plastic eyes go into brooches. ($800.) Their “twin mounds” become necklaces ($250) or earrings ($130 and sold out). Their smiles become pins ($90 – sold out) and earrings ($160 – sold out) and pendants ($240 – sold out). If she’d used Ken dolls in her abattoir, I might have understood. Might even have approved. But Barbie?
 
Harrell caught me staring at the screen. Leaning over to see what held my attention, he said, “Whoa, that’s different.”
 
It was so different that I was speechless.
 
“They’ll probably have the jewelry in stock again by your birthday,” he told me. “Interested?”
 
“You monster,” I said. 

World's Best? Darned if I know

You know you have a good life partner when the two of you can write books together without killing one another. So, going forward, understand that I appreciate the man who shares my house. Not that he is without flaw. For one thing, he’s a sucker for the “World’s Best” ... anything. If he passes a roadside sign that reads, World’s Best Pancakes, he wants us to try them. Immediately. Because what if that particular corner gas station just happens to actually serve out-of-the-world hotcakes? He has to know.
 
Food-wise, Harrell’s tried the World’s Best pancakes, hot dogs, burgers, salads, tacos, and fudge. He’s yet to find the best of anything. Each time, he’s vowed never to make that mistake again – and he hasn’t, not at the same location. He’ll make that mistake again at the convenience store with the broken plate glass window … because what if that particular convenience store with the broken plate glass window has the most amazing flapjacks? He can’t chance missing out.
 
Harrell’s also hard on socks. (Stay with me. This will all come together at one point.) During this COVID-19 year, staying at home and possibly more aware of little things than usual, I noticed how often those big box store socks ended up with holes in their heels. I mentioned it, more than once. What I should have said was: nothing. Those socks cost maybe $12 for six pairs. Each pair lasts a few weeks. In hindsight, not a terrible deal.
 
As unlikely as it seems, these two bits of oddness – my guy’s fascination with all things “Best” and the destruction of his hosiery somehow became intertwined and it ended up running us $71.52 for two pair of socks. Yes, you read that sum correctly. I was astonished when I saw the receipt.
 
It happened like this: I complained about the latest sock casualty and, this time, Harrell heard me. Going online, he typed in “Socks that last a lifetime” and up popped an ad for Darn Tough Socks of Vermont: Socks Guaranteed for Life. He read the reviews, then placed his order. Afterwards, he shared with me that he’d soon be receiving the World’s Best Socks.
 
They have to be. They last a lifetime – guaranteed!
 
If the Boston Globe is to be believed, Cabot Hosiery Mills was on its last financial legs twelve years ago when most of their big retail customers shifted production to overseas factories. Focusing on a high-quality product, creating their own brand, and giving away their socks to runners at the Vermont City marathon, they somehow hoped to stave off bankruptcy. And it worked. It more than worked; their revenue has soared. (If you follow the link to the Globe, know that one part of the article isn’t to be believed. Should your pet put holes in your Darn Tough socks, too bad for you. Cabot Hosiery Mills isn’t going to replace that footwear.)     
 
 
As far as I know, Cabot Hosiery Mills have never referred to their product as the best in the world. They do offer to replace their socks if and when they wear out, but how many people are going to go through the hassle of doing that, really? Harrell will, that’s my lifetime guarantee, because he paid seventy-one dollars and fifty-two cents for two (2) pairs of over-the-calf black men’s socks.
 
The day the Darn Tough box arrived, Harrell put the first pair of socks on. I was watching as he looked down at his feet and wiggled his toes.
 
They didn’t look all that different from the big box assortment. I asked, “How do they feel?”
 
“Like socks.”
 
“Like amazing socks?”
 
“No,” he said, and a little doubt crept into his voice. “Just regular socks.”
 
Darn Tough of Vermont, you’d better not disappoint my guy.

What's the opposite of bragging?

If the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is to be believed, the opposite of bragging is to be uncomplacent, which is “not feeling or showing satisfaction with oneself or one's position or achievements.” Uncomplacently (spellcheck claims this isn’t a word, but spellcheck can be such a brat), let me share with you that our latest novel, One Bride for Seven Brothers: The Last Brothers is available on Amazon as a preorder .
 
The preorder has been up for a while, to tell the truth, but I forgot to share the news here. Or anywhere, actually, because I am lacking in marketing skills. The book will be out of preorder and published on April 4th, 2021, which is less than a week away.
 
Because I’m lacking in calendar-reading skills as well, I was unaware that Easter also happens to fall on April 4th this year. I discovered this today. So, we have our first full-length novel in four years coming out on a national holiday. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing (see: lacking in marketing skills), but I guess I’ll see. I’d like the novel to do well because I really like what we wrote. Also, it’s the conclusion to our long-running One Bride series. There were a lot of storylines to be resolved and I think (I hope) they were resolved in a satisfactory fashion.
 
Normally, I’d do a happy dance to celebrate this achievement. I still might but, at the moment, there are a couple of other things that are bothering me right now.
  
What bothers me the most is that some readers are going to be unhappy that we’ve priced the new book at $2.99. Every other One Bride story was listed at $0.99, so this probably feels like a cash grab. Easter or not, *ugh*, the reviews we'll see. All I can say in our defense is, The Last Brothers is three times longer than any of the earlier stories and took five times longer to write. In regards to blood, sweat, tears, effort and word count, the price is fair.
 
The other thing that itches at me is that it’s been forever since we published the first story in the series. We always knew we’d complete the run, if life didn’t interfere and finish one of us first, but it’s taken a ridiculously long time to go from, “Placing her master’s cup in its place, Flora carried the silver serving tray into the study” to finally typing, “The End.”
 
I told Glynn, we must never take so long to finish a writing project again. He agreed. Then I told him there were two more stories I thought we should write set in the same world. He did not do his happy dance. I’ve yet to tell him The Last Brothers is coming out on Easter. Until we turn the leaf on that calendar, he'll have no idea.
 
What’s the opposite of “happy collaborator”?

Dizzy, part two

​Please note that nothing I write here should be accepted as medical advice. I'm not an MD and I have no medical training. I'm relating what happened to me, not what you should do for you. With that disclaimer in place, let's go on.
 
Last week, I talked about what happened when I suddenly and unexpectedly developed benign paroxysmal positional vertigo. Here’s the short version: the dizziness came out of nowhere, I thought I’d had a stroke, the local ER doc had no idea how to treat it and, at home, Harrell found a procedure that made the BPPV less terrible. Still, even after using the Epley Maneuver, this overwhelming sensation of vertigo was a fresh dose of miserable that would strike me every two to three months. I lived in dread of when it would happen again.
 
To prevent it, I began making lifestyle changes. I stood more slowly, turned my head more cautiously, and tried to avoid anything that might cause the calcium crystals in my middle ear to shift and send the world spinning. I gave up dancing, either with Harrell or just joyously alone, and I used to love to dance. I was doing whatever it would take to continue to feel normal.
 
During my downtime, I went on the internet, trying to see what I could learn about BPPV. I discovered that women get it more often than men; that the middle-aged and old are more likely to suffer from it than the young. There’s a possible genetic component, too; I found out later that one of my female cousins has it. At one time or another, BPPV will strike about 8% of the population. For most people, it’s over and done in less than two months. For others, about 2.5% of the total, it can continue to recur for their entire lifetime.
 
Without surgical treatment, I was looking like a lifer. Surgical treatment is available, but rarely recommended; the failure rate was too high for my comfort. On top of that, when it doesn’t work, surgery can make things worse. I started haunting BPPV forums, where people spoke about what they’d done to try and improve their situation. One woman said she’d increased the amount of water she drank and it had helped. Another said she’d stopped ingesting caffeine, and that had helped. I didn’t see how either of these approaches would keep those damnable ear crystals in place, but both suggestions were benign approaches to the problem.
 
I could do those things. Maybe. As much as I feared vertigo, you need to understand, I’ve had a long-term love affair with my morning cup of coffee. I’ve worn t-shirts that say as much, and my refrigerator has magnets that celebrate our tight-knit relationship (I HAVEN’T HAD MY COFFEE YET. DON’T MAKE ME KILL YOU.) If I was told I had to decide between waking up with Harrell or being greeted by a hot cup of Joe… but that wasn’t the decision, was it? The choice was between nausea, vomiting, and being incapacitated, or losing the daily jolt and suffering from a headache while mourning my caffeine high.
 
Very reluctantly, I switched to decaf. I abandoned chocolate, started checking labels for caffeine content, and increased my water intake. In short order, my inner ear quit misbehaving. The benign paroxysmal positional vertigo became less frequent, then it seemed to go away.
 
It didn’t return until I visited my regular doctor and her assistant flushed away some inner ear wax. Almost immediately, the world started spinning again. I begged the assistant to stop, she did, and my MD recommended I go to see one of our town’s Ear, Nose and Throat experts. Since my regular MD is wonderful, I did as she asked.
 
Which, if you’ll recall, is where I left off at the end of my last blog. During my consult with the Otolaryngologist – they get paid by the vowel –I told him I was much improved from how I’d been. I told him, I thought I knew why, too. When I shared the more water/no caffeine regimen, he said, flatly, “There’s nothing about that in the literature.”
 
I knew this. I’d seen the literature. “Still,” I said, “there’s no harm in telling someone what worked for me. If you have a patient who’s at her wits’ end, you might mention it to her.”
 
He didn’t respond, but his expression said, There’s nothing about that in the literature. No matter the situation, he wasn’t sharing what I’d said. Not with anyone.
 
Then he suggested that the two of us do a little experiment together. If I truly had BPPV, this procedure would throw me into full-blown vertigo. Within minutes, maybe seconds, I’d get dizzy and feel like vomiting.
 
“And this will help you fix it so that it doesn’t happen again?” I asked.
 
“Oh, no, there’s no cure,” said the sadist solemnly. “But your reaction will allow me to make an official diagnosis. Then I can put that in your chart.”
 
Either he loved his charts or he hated me. I decided not to do this. Instead, I went home and poured myself a cup of decaf. Later this year, I’ll be attending a wedding.
 
I intend to dance during every song the DJ plays.