P.J. Kaiser's Blog, page 10

More Tips for Being Found by Your Readers

From the comments and tweets, my previous post – "5 Tips for Being Found by Your Readers" – seemed to give people some things to consider for their blogs.  There was a lot of interesting conversation in the comments as well.  Since I called the post "5 Tips …" and only realized later that there were, in point of fact, only 4 tips, I felt I owed you at least one tip (not that anybody seemed to be counting since I discovered my little mistake myself )  So, without further adieu … or is it ado? … here are *more* tips (as with the prior tips, they're certainly not mandatory and some may have specific reasons for not wanting to follow these tips):

Make sure you include your website/blog address(es) in your personal Facebook profile. Whether you talk a lot about your website on Facebook or not, you'll want your friends to know about your website if they come poking around on your profile page.  So, to add your website, go into profile / edit profile / contact information / and enter your website URL and click "save changes".  Before you leave this page, read the next point …


Include your Facebook fan page, if you have one, in your website list on your personal Facebook. You're not limited to just one website, so go ahead and list your Facebook fan page there in addition to your website / blog.  Even if you invite your friends to your fan page, some may ignore your invitation (either intentionally or accidentally), so if your link is available to them then they may seek you out.  This is also very helpful if you're squeamish about inviting your friends to your fan page – it at least gives your friends a chance to discover your page if they are seeking out information about you.  Same goes for Twitter, by the way – you just might discover that some of your Facebook friends are also on Twitter.


Make your website links viewable to everyone, not just your friends. There are lots of reasons to consider doing this.  Maybe somebody follows you on Twitter and decides to try to find you on Facebook.  They search for you but instead of pulling up your fan page, they pull up your personal profile.  Maybe they don't know you well enough to feel like they want to "friend" you, but maybe they would be comfortable "liking" your page.  By having your website links viewable by 'everyone' you become easier to find.  Another scenario is if you make a comment on a Facebook fan page (perhaps a page of another author) that somebody else sees and thinks is profound (don't laugh, it could happen ) they might click to your Facebook profile page to find out more about you.  Again, maybe they don't necessarily want to 'friend' you but they might check out your fan page if you make it known that you have one.  In order to change your privacy settings, go into profile / privacy settings / customize settings.  The sixth item down should be 'website.'  I have my settings so that everything on that page is "friends only" except my website is set to "everyone."

Which of these tips do you do?  Which of these tips do you NOT do and why?  What other tips do you recommend for being found?  Thanks for reading & now, join the convo!

Inspiration Minute: 100 Portraits, June 14, 2011

In my feature, "Inspiration Minute," I'd like to share with you something that has caught my attention or inspired me recently.  Be forewarned, it may take a bit more than a minute! For readers, these posts might show you something interesting that you hadn't considered before and for writers, these posts might inspire a story – either directly or indirectly.

As you've already seen from my "Inspiration Minute" features, photography really inspires me and my mind starts churning on stories and character sketches as soon as I see an interesting photo – particularly a photo of a person.

Well, today I have for you one hundred little bits of inspiration – I hope you enjoy them as much as I have.  It's a collection entitled "100 Portraits" and it's curated by Larissa Leclair and Andy Adams.  To fully appreciate them, you can watch them one by one on the video widget.  I'm seeing a series of one hundred flash stories running through my mind.  Now if only I could find time to write them.

Please let me know if this is interesting or inspiring in the comments!  It will help me to hone in on the best items for future installments of "Inspiration Minute."

Coming and Going …

 Sorry for my unexcused absence.  Could I get my five year old to write an excuse for me?  Or maybe my three year old could draw a nice picture for you?  I'm sure you've all been going on about your daily business and didn't notice my absence.  Well, maybe a wee bit?  If you follow me on Twitter, you probably haven't missed me much cause I've still mostly been there.  And if you follow me, you'll know that these last few weeks have been nutso crazy.  Why is it that schools seem to pile on activities those last few weeks of the session?

We love my son's school and he's graduating from Kindergarten.  Which, in a Montessori school means that he's leaving the classroom he's been in for two years and moving on to a new classroom.  Usually, a third of his class would be going with him, but in his particular class, there are only three "third levels" (i.e., kindergarteners) who are moving on to the elementary level because the others are younger.  And he'll be leaving behind his dear teacher who's been such an integral part of our lives for two years.  So it's been an emotional departure at the end of this school year.

Oh, and both my three year old and five year old are going to summer camp in the mornings which will eventually give me a wee bit of free time, but it seems that the tornado of craziness has hit our house in the meantime.  We'll see how I (and my daughter) cope with her first experience with school.  My son's last day of school was last Friday and so we'll be continuing to run around like crazy for the two weeks that we have off until camp starts.  We're trying to get back to nature this summer, which I will probably be writing more about later.

In the meantime, I have some new posts for you that I'll be sharing this week and next and then *hopefully* I'll get back into my regular (irregular) posting schedule.  Oh, and I've got some very interesting developments going on behind the scenes regarding my writing that I can't talk about yet, so you'll just have to stay tuned for more on that

Inspiration Minute: Ellis Island, May 23, 2011

In my new feature, "Inspiration Minute," I'd like to share with you something that has caught my attention or inspired me recently.  Be forewarned, it may take a bit more than a minute! For readers, these posts might show you something interesting that you hadn't considered before and for writers, these posts might inspire a story – either directly or indirectly.

Many months ago, I came across some fantastic pictures of Ellis Island.  You're thinking, "Hmmm, big deal."  Well, these photos weren't of the Ellis Island that everybody has seen when they take the tour.  Periodically, private tours of the unrestored south side of the island are granted to media and professional photographers.  The group of photographs that I saw some months ago was very extensive and I have since lost the link, unfortunately.  But I was able to find this collection to share with you.  Imagine the history of the people that once walked those halls.  I hope that you find it as awe-inspiring as I have.

Please let me know if this is interesting or inspiring in the comments!  It will help me to hone in on the best items for future installments of "Inspiration Minute."

 

I won Third Place in the Door Contest

I almost never win anything.  It's a well-known fact.  For many years I gave up entering because I never won.  Then a few years ago, I won two prizes at a friend's baby shower and somehow my prize karma turned for the better.  And now I win every now and then.  Like Cathy Webster's door contest.  It was a guessing game to match pictures of doors to their owners and I miraculously got four answers right out of twenty.  Never mind that I was convinced that I had nearly all of them pegged.  I'll take being tied for third place.  I would've spent even more time researching, however, if I had known that such fantastic prize booty was going to be heading my way.  Check it out …

 

I got this very fun Canada t-shirt that I will be sporting on Canada Day.  First, I just need to find out when Canada Day is celebrated.  And of course the Canadian mittens will keep me warm during our bitter New Jersey winters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And I got this mysterious little plastic bottle of liquid.  I figure, knowing Cathy, that it's probably either bubble bath or Jack Daniels.  Either way, I suppose it's good for bathing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Again, in typical Cathy style, she had these fabulous mugs created.  You can see the pics match the header on her blog.  You probably can't read the text, it's just as well.  Ha – just kidding.  It says "Pierre Berton once said, 'A Canadian is someone who knows how to make love in a canoe.' Isn't that romantic, Dave?  OK, who farted?" (a little TMI, Cathy )

 

 

 

 

 

 

My daughter has fallen in love with this little keychain.  I guess he is the mascot of the 2010 Olympic games in Vancouver.  I don't think my daughter cares, she just thinks he's cute.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Since Cathy and Dave just got married recently, they still have piles of extra wedding stuff laying around.  I'm happy to take some of it off their hands – this CD of "mushy music" would've come in handy for our wedding anniversary which was just last month.  Hopefully we can find an opportunity to listen to it before next April.

 

 

 

 

 

And the sweetest bit was this note from Cathy.  It was my pleasure taking part in your contest, Cathy.

Thanks for all the fun loot,

your contest was a hoot!

 

 

Owning Your Platform

Writers are encouraged to spend time building their "author platform."  I frequently picture me up on the high dive (a platform dive, of course) with quivering knees preparing to make the leap.  What they're referring to, of course, is building Facebook pages, blogs, Twitter followers, etc.  Much of this advice is valuable because at the end of the day, it's about reaching readers.  Readers who hopefully want to read my stories.  After all, what is the point of writing if there's nobody out there to read it?  Unlike the writer who is content to have notebook pages filled with stories stuck in the bottom of the filing cabinet, I want to connect with readers.

Two events in the past week have made this entire "author platform" effort deeply unsettling for me.  The first is when Facebook changed its policies regarding the ability of authors to host contests.  OK, not a big deal – no contests.  But this is just another quibble on top of a long list of quibbles that I already have with Facebook.  One of the other big quibbles is that as a page owner I have extremely limited tools to be able to see who has "liked" my page.  When I pull up the list of names, it is in reverse chronological order with the people who have "liked" the page most recently at the top (and for a several day stretch recently, that list was conveniently displayed in *random* order).  I can't sort it, I can't search for a specific person, I can't even bring up a list of my friends who have liked the page.  In other words, I have no way of managing this list because I can't even see it properly.  Back when I had twenty people who liked my page it was easy, I could scan the list.  Scrolling through a list of 242 people looking for one name is much more of a chore.  Why is this important?  Firstly, I like to connect with the people who have reached out to connect with me.  I also like to return the favor if a fan of my page has their own fan page, but it can be difficult to track them down.  This makes me feel like although I can use my Facebook page to reach out to readers, it's often more of a one-way communication tool than a two-way unless people engage with the posts on my wall.

And what if they change some other policy or if I forget my password and my Facebook page is locked or deleted?  What then?  The investment that I've made in cultivating that page is gone.  Poof.  Will all of those people remember me and seek out my blog?  Some of them will.  Some probably wouldn't.  That's why I feel like I don't really "own" my Facebook page at all.  I'm only renting space there and Facebook can pull the rug out from under me at any time.

So, OK, I have issues with Facebook.  But Twitter's safe, right?  Starting late last week, some users are seeing somebody else's avatar when they view my tweets in their Twitter clients in any search column (e.g., #fridayflash, #tuesdayserial, etc.).  In the same way that other people's avatars are important to me – I'm a very visually-oriented person – my own avatar is important to me.  It's who I am.  So I filed a ticket with Twitter support.  Four days ago.  No response.  Luckily the avatar who's posing as me isn't terribly offensive, it's obviously a woman and she does have brown hair.  But she's not me.  What if it was an avatar from an obvious spammer.  You know the kind.  If I'm feeling a bit violated now, imagine how I'd feel then!

And this is just an issue with an avatar.  I've had several friends have their accounts completely shut down by spammers.  So, it turns out I don't own my platform on Twitter either.  Luckily I still have my Twitter connections and hopefully they'll straighten out my avatar.  One day.

But at least I'm safe on my blog, right?  I own my domain name.  I do self-hosting with Wordpress.  Yeah right.  Remember what happened to my blog in January?  I'm still recovering from that.

So, this whole author platform thing is a great goal, but do you own your platform or do you just have a short-term lease using somebody else's technology?  Is it a sign that I am too much of a control freak that I don't like these things being out of my hands?

In case you're looking for the "5 tips to make sure you own your author platform," section, it's not here.  I don't have any solutions in this post.  I'm just venting and wondering if I have a reason to feel nervous about this.  So, do I?

Are You Ready for Tuesday?

I've been lucky enough to be involved in two recent projects with Emergent Publishing – "Nothing But Flowers" and "100 Stories for Queensland."  "Nothing But Flowers includes my story "Golden Opportunity" and "100 Stories for Queensland" includes my story "Save Me Hay-Zeus" in the "Staff Contributions" section.

Emergent Publishing is planning an Amazon Chart Rush tomorrow, Tuesday May 17, 2011.  Jodi Cleghorn was kind enough to share the following information with me about both books and the chart rush:

What's a Chart Rush?

Readers are invited to purchase a book on Amazon, in a nominated 24-hour period, with the intent to capitalise on the volume of sales to move the book up the Amazon best seller list. The higher up the chart it is (we're aiming for a spot in the top 100) the more visible it becomes to other readers who may go on to purchase it.

It's all about exposure and helping new readers find the books.

This Tuesday – May 17, 2011.

This coming Tuesday eMergent Publishing will be releasing 100 Stories for Queensland and Nothing But Flowers via an Amazon Chart Rush. We're inviting readers to purchase one or both books  on that day with the aim of getting them into the top 100 selling books for the day (and beyond!)

By releasing both charity anthologies concurrently we're hoping people will add one extra book to their cart on the day,  whether that be someone stumbling onto 100 Stories… or Nothing But Flowers for the first time.

If  you can't buy on the day, you can add it to your wishlist. Every little bit counts to rocket the books up the chart.

You can find both books on Amazon and Amazon UK.

Nothing But Flowers retails at US$17.99 or ₤5.99

100 Stories for Queensland retails at US$19.99 or ₤9.99

What is Nothing But Flowers?

Nothing But Flowers is the second Literary Mix Tapes anthology and the first to make it into paperback. It started on the 6th of January (a week before 100 Stories was launched) as a Valentine's Day anthology with the goal of creating stories exploring the challenges and complexities of love in a post-apocalyptic world.

With the flood disaster already weeks old, I suggested to the authors involved we donate the money generated by the sale of the anthology to a flood related charity. But I had no idea the disaster which was only days away and waiting to travel in the worst apocalyptic sense, down the Lockyer Valley and into Brisbane.

I worked on Nothing But Flowers side by side with 100 Stories for Queensland, in a crazy juggling act which was made possible by the wonderful support of Maureen, David, Trevor, Nick and all the other wonderful literary folk who read, voted and edited the stories of 100 Stories for Queensland in the first six weeks. When Nothing But Flowers was web-released on Valentines Day the hits to the site were the equivalent of selling 60 paperbacks in 48 hours!

The book has been getting rave reviews, so please, if you are dropping into Amazon on Tuesday to buy 100 Stories, consider adding Nothing But Flowers to your shopping cart! All funds collected from the sale of Nothing But Flowers will be donated to the Grantham Flood Support Flood.

Thanks very much for the information, Jodi – please join us on Tuesday to help both of these worthy causes.  And don't forget, these terrific books make wonderful holiday gifts 

Inspiration Minute: Chernobyl, May 16, 2011

In my new feature, "Inspiration Minute," I'd like to share with you something that has caught my attention or inspired me recently.  Be forewarned, it may take a bit more than a minute! For readers, these posts might show you something interesting that you hadn't considered before and for writers, these posts might inspire a story – either directly or indirectly.

After posting the amazing photographs of Fukishima a few weeks ago, I came across some incredible images of Chernobyl.  April 26th was the 25th anniversary of the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl.

I also heard a story on NPR about two parallel exhibits in New York City with photographs by freelance photojournalist Michael Forster who lived just outside the exclusion zone at Chernobyl for two years.  The "After Chernobyl" site has a plethora of images and captions with which I could spend hours.

Please let me know if this is interesting or inspiring in the comments!  It will help me to hone in on the best items for future installments of "Inspiration Minute."

Inspired Links – May 15, 2011

In my "Inspired Links" feature, I provide links and brief descriptions of thought-provoking articles.  I hope you enjoy these little treasures

- I've long-been suspicious and reluctant to utilize Facebook as an integral component of my author platform.  It's risky relying on a platform over which you don't have complete control.  There is some inherent risk in every platform, but with this blog, for example, I own the domain name and I contract with my hosting company for the server and I am responsible for all the content.  Facebook recently came out with a new policy restricting the ability for authors to hold contests which is a serious blow and it leaves many authors wondering why they should bother with Facebook at all.  Here's the article from Galleycat with more specifics.

- And another goody from Galleycat, here are some quick links to do-it-yourself style guides for e-books including Smashwords, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple iBookstore, and Calibre.

- With respect to writing craft, there are few thornier issues than showing vs. telling.  In this insightful post from author Jody Hedlund, she explains why going too far in either direction – showing OR telling – can be detrimental to the story.

- In "A New Mission for Literary Agents," author Roz Morris proposes that agents should take on the role of author advocate and start new "discovery" imprints to provide a proving ground for new writers.  These imprints would be pre-screened by the agents and would provide added exposure for new writers to the big publishing houses.  It would also be a win for readers who could enjoy pre-screened books.  Interesting food for thought.

- Nathan Bransford's post "The Case for Putting a Manuscript in a Drawer" makes the argument that not every story and not every novel can be saved even with exhaustive editing.  Sometimes it's best to simply move on.

- If you're considering life as an indie author, then you certainly need to spend time reading J.A. Konrath's blog.  And he has a guest post up from Scott Sigler that explains in wonderful, exhaustive detail just how he made it from newbie writer to having a multi-book deal with Crown Books by using the bootstrap method of writing.  You won't want to miss this post.

- In "How Will Ebooks Change the Author Experience," Jason Pinter provides a bit of nostalgia for being an author of printed books and what we might be missing out on if printed books become endangered species.

- Evelyn Lafont shares some terrific insight as she's analyzed the details of her book sales trends in this post "Reasons behind Self-Published Book Sale Spikes and How I Was Wrong."

If you're wondering about my methodology for choosing links for inclusion in this post, rest assured there isn't one.  It's just a collection of things that I found interesting and I thought you might too.  Please let me know what you think!

 

A guest #FridayFlash – "Chicken Sh*tfaced" by Monica Marier (Part 2 of 2)

Due to Blogger's prolonged outage, I am welcoming my friend Monica Marier as my guest today with her Friday Flash story.  Please make Monica feel right at home

CHICKEN SH*TFACED PART 2 of 2

By Monica Marier

This is the conclusion of last week's story, which can be found HERE

A special thanks goes to PJ Kaiser for helping me post this in a time of techno-drama.

 

The night was in full swing when the two men trod shivering through the black soup of darkness. The lantern swung erratically in large arcs casting ghostly fairy lights and demonic shadows across gnarled trees. He and Vilori had followed the tracks as they led with distinct purpose to apple orchard that marked the edge of Uncle Red's farm.

"Think the chickens got peckish and decided to have a late tea of apples?"

"Chickens don't eat apples, Vilori," said Harcourt. A thought suddenly occurred to him. "But I hope for our sakes they're trying."

"Why's that?"

"Cause if they haven't stopped at the orchard, and they're headed due South… that means that they went into The Terrible Woods."

"Which terrible woods would that be?" asked Vilori.

"That one! The Terrible Woods! Capital 'T'—The Terrible Woods."

"Is that really its name? How unimaginative!" cried Vilori in disgust.

"Yes. It was named by a town of very unimaginative people… WHO KEPT DYIN' in the woods," hissed Harcourt.

"What, is it Haunted? Do the ghosts come out at night?" asked Vilori with a snort.

"Ghost nothing! It's full of dense bracken, sudden drops, peat bogs, wolves, bears, griffons, and dragons, AND poisonous spiders."

Vilori stopped dead.

"How big are the poisonous spiders?" he asked in a hollow voice.

"They're poisonous! Does it really matter how big they are?" replied Harcourt.

Vilori nodded. "I concede your point."

They walked a few more yards in silence, following the razor straight lines of chicken feet and trying not to think of spiders.

"Oh bugger," sighed Harcourt. The lantern light bounced in his hand, but Vilori plainly saw the chicken tracks leave the soft earth of the orchard and trail into the tall grass bordering it. The grass had been trodden and bent in a tiny thin path no wider than an arm's length. It led with mathematical precision to the forest. Vilori snatched up the lantern to examine the tracks.

"Well it looks like this wasn't done by any man, Har," said Vilori agog. "There's no signs in the grass that anything bigger than a chicken has gone through here.

"Which means what?"

"Um… the chickens are in on it?" supplied Vilori uncertainly.

"What, like they're?" asked Harcourt in disgust.

"Well, I don't know!" mobilzin' cried Vilori, waving his free arm in exasperation. "What other explanation have we got?

"A spell?" asked Harcourt.

"….yessss," nodded Vilori nodding his head. "I've never heard of chicken magic before."

"I have," said Harcourt seriously. "I heard of men in the hot islands that puts paint on their faces and dances around fires and sacrifices chickens. 'Hoo-doo' they calls is. Barbaric," he added.

Vilori sniffed in similar suspicion. "Ah, well that's foreigners for you. Sacrificin' all manner of things. As if pidgeons and goats and virgins aren't good enough."

"Goats was good enough for me granddad."

"Indeed. So you think it's some foreign hoo-doo thingummy stealing chickens with magic?"

Harcourt scratched his sandy chin. "Dunno. It's better than your idea of mobilizin' chickens."

"Yeah, that was stupid, sorry," sighed Vilori, flushing red.

"S'alright. I know it's just 'cause you're pissed."

"And how," mumbled Vilori stifling a belch. "Well, into The Terrible Woods then," he said tramping through the tall grass for the tree-line.

"You coming?" he asked when he noticed Harcourt lingering behing.

Harcourt nodded. "Yuh. Alright," he said in a high voice. "Only be careful. The sudden drops in there can break your neck… and the spiders…"

"What do the spiders look like?" asked Vilori warily.

"They look like leaves."

"Grand."

***

"Is that a spider?"

"No."

"Is that a spider?"

"No."

"Is that a spider?"

"Would you give over already, Vilori!" Harcourt said through clenched teeth. He was trying to keep his voice down, but with Vilori buzzing around him like a gnat it was hard.

"Is that a —"

"SHH!" Harcourt waved at Vilori to shut up. "DO you hear something?"

The men strained their ears for the slightest sound when they both heard it. It was a warbling susurration, like the sound of hundreds of tiny voices having hushed conversations.

"What is that?" asked Vilori.

"It's chickens! Must be hundreds of em," said Harcourt advancing slowly. Vilori observed sweat trickling off his friend's brow in the growing light. "There's a light up ahead," he said.

"Someone's got a fire lit, I reckon."

"You were right! There's Hoo-dooing and dancing afoot, no doubt!" hissed Vilori.

"Well the chicken noise is coming from there, so we'll see."

"Good. I'm ready to finish up and get to bed," yawned Vilori. The night was getting colder and a thick mist was starting to rise from the forest floor, undulating in ghostly shapes in front of the lantern. They grew closer to the fire, and unsheathed their swords. Swords could only do so much in the face of magic, but they could generally sever a head from a neck, which was sometimes enough.

Cautiously, they peered over a bramble thicket to see what they were dealing with.

Both men dropped their swords in shock.

"Is that…?"

"It looks like…"

"Dear GODS."

A large clearing was occupied entirely by chickens.

There wasn't the slightest sign of human involvement; only avian. They weren't milling about in typical chicken fashion, but they were evenly spaced in a circle, five deep around a ring of standing stones. Large fires had been lit in key places around the field casting a weird orange glow on the perfectly still birds. In the middle of the ring was a large flat rock lying lengthwise on the ground.

It was currently empty.

"How do chickens light fires?" wondered Harcourt aloud.

"What is this place?" Vilori managed in a terrified voice.

"It's the faerie ring! It's older than…than… really old stuff! It probably predates the word 'old'," Harcourt stammered, his face ghostly white.

"The chickens aren't doing anything! They're just standing there!" squeaked Vilori.

"No, see. They're all looking outside the ring on the southwest side…. They're waiting for something!"

"For what?"

As if in answer a loud roar shook the air and made each man cower with his face in the dirt. It sounded like someone trying to saw a bottle in half with cello string.

Vilori and Harcourt gibbered momentarily before rounding up enough sanity to look at what was approaching. Their swords were still on the forest floor, untouched.

A dark shape sillouetted in the firelight descended on the avian crowd. It walked upright like a bird, but there was something distinctly mammalian about it. It had a snout full of cruel teeth despite its coat of feathers, and its feet were definitely paws. It let loose another shriek, similar to a dog's howl, but there was no mistaking the consonant and resounding "BWARRRRRK!" that shook the tree tops.

Harcourt and Vilori were suddenly more sober than a teacher on Monday.

"It's a cock-a-doodle," said Harcourt.

"A what?" asked Vilori.

"Part dog-part rooster. Distant relative of the cockatrice."

"Cor," said Vilori. "What's it got there in its paws?"

Squinting in the gloom the men could make out something round and flat with something lumpy on it. It was clutched awkwardly in the cock-a-doodles forepaws as it approached the flat stone in the middle of the ring. The beast then lay the object in the middle of the stone.

"I don't like this…" said Harcourt, trembling.

"Why what's he got?" asked Vilori, trying to make heads or tails of the dim shapes.

"That's the carcass of the chicken we had for tea tonight," he said.

Now that he knew what he was looking at, Vilori could indeed see a former chicken picked clean with bits of sage still stuck to its insides. It was even on the willow-ware patterned platter Harcourt's Aunt had served it on and surrounded by wrinkly cold potatoes.

The cock-a-doodle roared again, and the susurration of idle chickens stopped. Silence blanketed the clearing, and even the crackle of the fires seemed to have stopped.

Then the cock-a-doodle began to utter strange sounds in a low monotone drone. After he began the chickens would answer him, all clucking in perfect unison to a strange rhythm.

"BWAARK BWARRK BWARRRK"

"Bok-bok bok-bok b-bok bwaark!"

"BWAARK BWARRK BWARRRK"

"Bok-bok bok-bok b-bok bwaark!"

"It looks like…" began Harcourt, afraid to finish.

"It looks like a ritual," answered Vilori.

Harcourt and he exchanged glances of pure horror, before watching the birds and their master again, helplessly captivated by their own curiosities and the mounting terror of events.

The standing stones began to glow an unearthly green and the light channeled by the outlandish carvings in the stones fed into the oblong stone table where the sad remains of dinner sat. The boks and bwarrks grew louder, faster, more fervent as the light grew brighter. Vilori felt the hairs on his arm stand up and felt his ears block up as an oppressive cloud of energy grew around them. Just as the chickens were so frenzied that they seemed about to break out of their orderly ranks the last of the light flowed into the now-glowing dead chicken. Silence reined again.

The men held their breaths as they stared at the carcass. If birds could hold their breaths, it was very likely the chickens were doing the same. Only the cock-a-doodle seemed cooly confidant.

Then it happened.

It was subtle, but every eye, beady or otherwise, caught it.

One of the naked wings began to twitch.

Harcourt and Vilori didn't know how they got back to Uncle Red's farm. To Vilori it was all a blur, and if Harcourt remembered, he wasn't saying anything. Uncle Red and Aunt Primula took it with the resigned attitude of "boys will be boys," assuming it all to be a drunk hallucination and were kind enough to never bring it up again. It didn't seem there was any harm done anyways, since all the chickens were back in their coops the following morning.

Although… and this was the strange thing…

…It seemed there was one extra bird.