Roland Yeomans's Blog, page 115

The MIDNIGHT HOUR

Sssh! Food Guy is sleeping.

The big wuss. So he has a itty bitty cold. 

I thought his fever of 102 degrees made a warm pillow of his forehead for me.

He whined so much about going to work for one little day 

that I left a wedge of cheese for him on his pillow. 

And did he appreciate my joke of giving him cheese with his whine?

No, he did not.

Does he appreciate me curling up on his chest for added weight resistance as he huffs through his sit-up's?

No, he does not.

Does he appreciate my feline criticism as I paw at the keys as he types?

Of course not. My words would be magical. 

His words just lay there like stale tuna, as pretty as road-kill and about as tasty.

And all those literary ghosts who insist on ruining our sleep? What's up with that?

Ernest Heminway. 

Raymond Chandler. 

Mark Twain, well I like him ... 

he knows where I like my ears scratched. 

Still he insists on calling me Bambino!

 https://www.amazon.com/dp/1580892728/
But if that Frost guy shows up again, droning on about which road to pick, I'll pick one for him all right ...

 the one that leads to the door!

And so help me if Dr. Seuss dares to show his ghostly face, I'll barf up a furball in his green eggs and ham!

If you out there wonder where Food Guy gets all the great ideas, look no further than this Midnight Marauder. 

The lousy ones, of course, are all his.
***
Another mindless movie Food Guy will probably see and ... sigh ... enjoy:


But she does have pretty legs for a human!

I'M ABOUT TO GET INTO TROUBLE ... AGAIN

I like Supergirl
There I said it.
Supergirl has pushed above and beyond the other CW shows.
Kara is so full of sunshine that even 
Barry Allen (the Flash) can seem grim in comparison. 
Still, there are serious elements 
that tackle real life issues, 
ranging from immigration to gender inequality to even genocide.

The above scene was so much fun because at the time Supergirl was airing on CBS.
Cat Grant (Calista Flockhart) returned to the show Monday evening in time to face off 
invading alien queen (Terry Hatcher),
 a female U.S. President (Lynda Carter), 
and an evil genius (Brenda Strong).
More importantly she provided the nurturing Kara needed 


... and the sarcastic wit I've missed.



But the core of the show is the loving relationship between two sisters.







It is stressed that powers do not make a hero. It is what you do with what you have. 




Chyler Leigh and Floriana Lima have portrayed in their romance something healing to viewers struggling with their own sexuality in the real world.



It is beautifully, sensitively portrayed,giving lesbian viewersheroes to identify with.



Braving attacks from critics, Supergirl might be the most politically courageous superhero show on TV..

Show-runner Andrew Kresiberg acknowledged that 
“Our desire is to reflect back not just the world that we live in, but the world that we could live in.”
 Supergirl’s second season has focused heavily on the rights of undocumented aliens like Kara, 
a not-so-subtle allegory for the country’s contentious immigration debate.
 The pilot featured Kara’s boss, 
Cat Grant (Calista Flockhart), discussing the feminist implications of branding the new superhero “Supergirl” instead of “Superwoman.” 





 When asked if the series is political, Kreisberg retorted, 
“Is it political to say that we believe all people should be treated fairly, 
that people who are different from us deserve 
the same respect and rights and privileges we have?”


“The primary directive is to tell stories about characters that people care about,” he continued. 
“If you just wanted to be political and you didn’t have that, nobody would care.”

Lastly, the Supergirl show is not afraid to have fun with itself!

DO REVIEWS AFFECT SALES?

SOMETIMES
BUT OFTEN NOT LIKE YOU THINK



1.) A SAVAGE REVIEW CAN HAVE A POSITIVE EFFECT

 Once upon a time there was a children's book that got such an unfair review 
that I not only bought it but gave it a good review -- which it deserved.
"I can understand the disappointment of not getting any text with the free sample, but it is unkind to one star a book you have never read.

I have read this delightful book, and I find it everything you would want for your child ... 
ah, in this case, just the little child in me : 
fun, zesty, light-hearted with a sense of humor to it that leaves you closing the book with a smile.
 Even the illustrations had a smile on my face.

I highly recommend this book. And I am off to order the next in the series. Thank you, Sally, for a fun, delightful read."

2.) SOMETIMES REVIEWS ARE SO OFF THE MARK THEY ARE FUNNY AND SPARK SALES

 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B002HJ377A/


 
Don't judge me.  But after reading these reviews I just had to buy this shirt!
 ***
"I used to drive to work every day, now I can fly! Thanks Three Wolf Moon t-shirt!"
***
"The Three Wolf and Moon shirt arrived in the mail last week. 
When I got home from work I found the shirt had torn itself out of the packaging, 
destroyed my mail box, broke into my house, 
slept with my wife, kicked my dog, and mowed my yard." 
*** 
"I have to admit I wasn't convinced about the power of this shirt and bought it as a gag to get a few laughs with friends over. 
However something has changed since I put this shirt on, something has changed for the better that is!

Lets go over some of the things that have happened within just a few hours of putting this shirt on. 
Keep in mind these are facts that have been verified by others and your results will vary:

1.) I won the lottery for $3 Million Dollars
2.) I have about 10 supermodels fighting for my attention
3.) My muscles have become much larger then before
4.) I may or may not have super powers (possibly developing signs of x-ray vision)
5.) I rushed into a burning building and saved a bunch of school kids and some kittens."
 Don't neglect to read the answers to the 41 questions if you go to this shirt's Amazon page:
Q:Is there a difference between the $6 shirt and the $30 shirt?  I don't see any more wolves.
A:Yes -- Twenty-four dollars.
***
Q:Does this shirt glow in the dark?
A:Of course not!  It is much too stealthy to glow in the dark.
But if you chew Mint-O-Green Life Savers with your mouth open in the dark, you can see sparks!


3.) REVIEWS DON'T SELL BOOKS/ WORD OF MOUTH DOES
Who do you trust more, a stranger or a good friend?  
Yeah, easy answer, right?
Lightning strikes where it will.  
None of us know what group of strangers might read our book and spread the word ...
to a local book club ... to their local library ... to their close friends. 

4.) THICK SKIN IS A MUST FOR WRITERS
"I have pretty thick skin, and I think if you're going to be in this business, if you're going to be a writer, you better have a thick skin." - John Irving .
Bad reviews are just part of the tuition of being an author.  Hang in there, everyone.

MOTHER is not a 4 Leter Word

Though you might think it a term of profanity 
from our modern movies.

Sadly, the full term is used more and more lately.

In fact, it is the duct tape that binds Samuel L. Jackson's dialogue together!


Yet, MOTHER is a name that is so complex depending upon the situation in which you hear it 

that it is a many-faceted gem of many colors and nuances. 


The young woman hearing that she is soon to be a mother 

may hear the term with hope, despair, or fear of being like her own hated mother.


The teenager yelling "Mother!" may feel unloved, controlled, or ignored.


The man sitting by the death-bed of his mother 

may whisper the name out of a wellspring of loving memories 

or from a dark pit of having never been understood.


Mothers are only human:

 some saintly, some devilish, most somewhere in between.


We train our children in schools on how to do everything senseless but not how to live well.

Shouldn't we have classes on how to parent?  

How to deal with stress?  

How to manage a budget?


Mothers make it up as they go along.


Sandra, my best friend, had a son, Drew, 

who was forever fiddling with the electric wall sockets close to the floor boards.

She finally put covers on all of them.

Sometime later as she did her business' books on her computer, she heard a Fittzz and saw the lights go dim.

She turned to the sound of faltering steps.

There stumbled poor little Drew, his hair looking like Einstein's, holding his trembling right hand high.

"Mama right.  Mama right!"


From that time forward, Sandra would counsel Drew when he felt compelled to do an unwise thing. "Mama right."

Usually, Drew would later sadly confide to her with a wry, hurt smile.  

"Mama right.  Mama right."


May we all have had mothers wise enough for us to follow their counsel.


Happy Mother's Day 
to All My Friends 
For Whom This Day Applies!

CHASTIZED

In the dog house again!
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1939844363/

Two important personages from IWSG have slapped my wrists cyber-wise.

I was sent the Publisher's Weekly review.  I did not seek it out.
But since I posted a positive review of my story in the collection, I thought it only fair to post a negative one.
Especially since two of my fellow anthologists got glowing reviews.

{Actually all the stories in this collection are absorbing and entertaining.
Obviously the reviewer was suffering from a hangover when he read the stories!}

If my fellow anthologists feel I have stained their stories or reputations, I apologize.

My post contained 2 glowing reviews of Jen and Erika and I only included the  "unique" review of mine.
People would have had to follow the link to read the rest of the review.
Besides, Publisher's Weekly is hardly a fly-by-night site.
I thought it best to face the music and contest it.

What did that one email say?

"It’s one thing when it’s a review of your own work and another when it involves others.
Considering how hard the others have worked to promote it, that’s not really fair.
Sorry, but the IWSG admins wish you hadn’t posted it for all to see. Looks bad on us as well."

I disagree. 
What you are called does not matter -- only what you answer to.

I have never believed in being an ostrich
but in a life of openness and integrity. 
I would not do well in the Trump administration, right?

I believe books, even collections of short stories, receive unwarranted bad reviews.
To pretend they do not exist makes us appear as if we believe their accuracy. 

All of you in this anthology,
if you perceive me as unfair and cruel, I am sorry for any discomfort I have unintentionally given you.
I will never submit to another anthology again

OUCH!

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1939844363/
The lauded Publisher's Weekly has posted a review of the anthology
that has the misfortune of having my story in it.
https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-939844-36-1
It had some great things to say of Jen Chandler's and Erika Bebee's stories:
"The most moving of the entries carry resonances of rural American folk tales, 
including Jen Chandler’s Appalachia-inspired “The Mysteries of Death and Life” 
and Erika Bebee’s “The Wheat Witch,” which evokes the healing mystique of Kansas agriculture."
Then, there is my story:

"Roland D. Yeomans’s “Sometimes They Come Back” is an ambitious but lackluster Poe-esque excursion into the grotesque; 
it’s larded with references to humanity’s graven images, some familiar and some perhaps better left forgotten. 
Few new insights stir the imagination here."
{Scratches his head}
As a former English teacher, I know my story has its roots in Ray Bradbury 
and obviously the reviewer has not read Poe in a long time to liken my story to his prose.
But then, I remember a review of Thinner when Stephen King was using Richard Bachman to sell more novels:
"This is the way Stephen King would write  if Stephen King could write."
In essence, bad reviews are the price of writing.
What matters is if our prose lives on or dies horribly like characters in Stephen King's novels.
And that depends solely on the future the details of which none of us knows. 
I leave you with the words of Stephen King
The most important things are the hardest to say, because words diminish them.

Why Should I Buy Your Book? or How to Write a Book Blurb

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1939844363/
HOW TO WRITE A GOOD BOOK BLURB
 WHY SHOULD I BUY YOUR BOOK?
That's the question the prospective reader asks when reading your book blurb.

Book Blurb?  You know, the copy on the back cover or on your Amazon book page.

After the title,

It is the most important prose you will write in regards to the book that you have slaved for months to produce.

How do you manage to spotlight your book and NOT torpedo it?

1) Seduce the reader with your protagonist or world.

Amy Wilkins, Assistant Manager of Digital Content and Social Media at Harlequin, says a SHORT TEASE can win readers to your book in a heartbeat as in

STONE KISSED by Keri Stevens:
“When Delia Forrest talks to statues, they talk back.”

 a.) A hint of the plot: "Secret Experiment. Tiny Island. BIG mistake. (Scott Sigler, ANCESTOR)

Other times it is more important to set the scene by establishing the world of your story --

especially it is set somewhere unusual.

SHORT is again the key.


b.) Idea of setting: Washington DC, Rotunda (Dan Brown, Lost Symbol);

“from the Roman Coliseum to the icy peaks of Norway, from the ruins of medieval abbeys to the lost tombs of Celtic kings” (James Rollins, Doomsday Key)

2) Hooks: yes or no?

Hooks are that bit of bolded text at the start of a blurb or between paragraphs that grab the reader’s attention and entice them to read on.

Good hooks are unique, short, and convey at least one KEY QUESTION to the story.

 Unsuccessful HOOKS are tired clichés, too long or don’t add anything of value.

 3) I'm a writer, Jim, not a doctor. 

Prose Triage. 

You are going to have to become a specialist in prose triage in order to sell your book to a stranger. 

As you write your blurb, ask: Does your reader really need to know that? (and be harsh)

Could it be considered a spoiler?
Are you telling the whole plot, including how the conflict will be resolved?

 Don't give away the punchline:
Oh, you will never believe that the psychologist was dead all along!

4) Learn from drug dealers.

Give the potential customer a free taste -- a SHORT snippet of your prose to present your voice and prose style as a tease.

5.) Think of your blurb as a movie trailer.

End in conflict.  End in a question.  The stakes are high.  The heroine is sexy.  The world is at risk. 

Make the reader want to read more.

Do movie traliers tell you how the movie will end?  Keep your potential reader in suspense.

6.) How long?

SHORT! 

  West of Nightmare Waits  the House Eternal


SEE HOW IT'S DONE:
Show More

FACE-TO-FACE NO MORE

"If Friends was created today, you would have a coffee shop full of people 

that were just staring into iPhones," Jennifer Aniston recently said in an interview.

Growing up, I was always told to take responsibility for my actions 

no matter how badly I wanted to avoid doing so.

I learned to deal with problems by speaking about them in person, and to form relationships face-to-face. 

What my childhood did not prepare me for 

was the impact technology would have on the way my generation communicates. 

Has it become the norm to confront others through text message?

 This is the age of the non-committal, unlabeled relationship. 

People meet and add each other on Snapchat, Facebook, or whatever chosen platform 

and proceed with minimal effort and maximum caution. 

Are we so busy texting that we have forgotten how to talk meaningfully to one another?

Face-to-face communication seems to have become a lost art.

What Do You Think? 

Are We So Connected
That We Are Alone?

 

BOOKS SMELL LIKE OLD PEOPLE

"Books smell like old people"  - High School student in New Haven
There is an "Old Person" smell 
( a grassy or greasy odor ) 
but books only carry it psychologically to young people.

{As the skin grows weaker, its natural oils become oxidized more quickly. 
 Fatty acids, which are secreted by the sebaceous glands, react to the oxygen in the air to form nonenal. 
Because it isn't water soluble, nonenal can remain on the skin despite washing, 
even remaining after intense scrubbing. 
Therefore, the smell persists, even in extremely clean environments.}
 Certain ingredients can also help combat nonenal, such as persimmon extract and Japanese green tea.

But let's get back to young people's attitude towards reading books
Teenagers, addicted as they are to texting and FB, probably read more words than ever ...
just in shorter, concentration- reducing, tidbits. 

When they become twelve or thirteen, kids often stop reading seriously. 
The boys veer off into sports or computer games, 
the girls into friendship in all its wrenching mysteries and satisfactions of favor and exclusion.
 Much of their social life, for boys as well as girls, is now conducted on smartphones, 
where teenagers don’t have to confront one another. 

Oh, the terror of eye contact! 

 A recent summary of studies cited by Common Sense Media indicates 
that American teenagers are less likely to read “for fun” at seventeen than at thirteen. 
 I know that reading literature, history, science, and the rest of the liberal-arts canon 
helps produce three-dimensional human beings. 
Such beliefs defy trying to prove them with statistics. 
Common sense is often not a matter of math but of logic.
But how is a taste for such reading created in the first place?

What Do You Think Of All This? 

WHY SHOULD YOU WRITE SHORT STORIES?

“A short story is a love affair; 
a novel is a marriage."  - Lorrie Moore

In this modern, fast-paced culture ...
An intense love affair is often preferred over an all-consuming marriage.
You would think then that the short story would be more popular than it is ...

Which brings us to May 
Being Short Story Month
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01NC0JNHI/


Stephen King, at the start of his career, thought of a short story as a quick kiss in the dark from a stranger.
And like with kisses, some short stories are better than others!

In the beginning of his writing struggles, Mr. King thought of his short stories as a series of pinatas he banged on --
not with a stick but with his imagination. 
Sometimes they broke and showered down a few hundred dollars.  Other times they did not.
It was an easier market to sell short stories then.  Now, not so much. 
SO WHY SHOULD WE BANG 
ON THE PINATAS 
OF SHORT STORIES 
IN THIS HARSH MARKET?


1.)  IT HELPS YOU WRITE LEAN
Each scene in your novel should be spare and lean so that the drama stands out like stirring chords in a soundtrack.
The limited space in a short story forces you to keep only what is absolutely needed 
to paint the scene and leave the rest behind.
Like Elmore Leonard advised -- Leave out the boring stuff.

2.) SHORT STORIES APPEAL TO OUR MICROWAVE CULTURE
Many readers feel that they do not have the free time to commit to a whole novel.  
They want entertainment in bite sizes.
Why do you think James Patterson writes mini-chapters?
Short stories can be read in a doctor's office or before you drift off to sleep.

3.) WRITING SHORT STORIES SAVES THOSE NEAT IDEAS THAT ARE NOT UP TO FILLING OUT A NOVEL.
How many times have you come with intriguing ideas 
that you know do not have the essence of an entire novel with its many character arcs?
You have this riveting scene with sizzling dialogue that seems to exist all on its own
 with no future beyond that moment.
A short story is perfect for that idea.

4.) SHORT STORIES PROVIDE THE PERFECT BRIDGES TO MAINTAIN INTEREST IN YOUR NOVEL SERIES 
A book can take anywhere from one to two years to complete.
Publishing short stories with the same characters can keep the interest high in your world or with your prose.

5.)  SHORT STORY ANTHOLOGIES INTRODUCE YOU TO A WHOLE NEW AUDIENCE
Also be careful in submitting your story to anthologies whose cause or company of authors mesh well with your voice and personality.
Getting your "prose voice" out there may well draw you additional fans.

Do You Write Short Stories?
Do You Read Anthologies of Short Stories?
Why or Why Not?