Judith Post's Blog, page 7
January 10, 2024
Shameless Self-Promotion
Just wanted to let you know that POSED IN DEATH is FREE January 10 – 14. It’s my first Nick and Laurel dark cozy mystery.
And to celebrate, I made FACING THE MUSIC, my second Nick and Laurel mystery, on sale for only 99 cents.2 books for less than a buck!
January 8, 2024
Killing Off a Character
HH and I have been watching REACHER on TV. Glad I had a box of Kleenex close by for the last episode we watched. In series 2, there’s been a large body count, and when a bad guy bites the dust, it’s time to cheer. Yay! Another villain gone. Because these villains deserve to die. Four good guys have already been disposed of.unpleasantly. A little hard for me. And other nice, walk-on characters have been killed. But in this episode, it’s someone I really liked who bit the dust. And that’s when I got choked up and ended up with puffy eyes.
It made me think of some of the series that have really reverberated with me. Pride and Prejudice (the 6-part series). Let’s face it. That’s because I was really into Elizabeth and Darcy. Bridgerton. That was just plain hot. But Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Game of Thrones kept me glued to the book or TV series because so much was at stake in each book or episode. The tension was major, and characters I cared about might not live. It made me wonder if the British are more willing to kill off heroes and strong, likeable characters than American authors. But let’s face it. Killing off a sympathetic character is a great way to add drama to a story. I know. I’m going to kill a character I really like in my WIP this week. And it’s going to make me sad, but it’s going to make the story a lot stronger.
Every book needs some serious reversals to keep the tension going. In romances, it looks like the hero and heroine aren’t going to connect for some reason. In Star Wars, the Empire might win. There always has to be some hurdle that stands in the way of a happy ever after. Disney perfected high stakes for kids’ movies for years. That’s why we remember Snow White and Cinderella. Wicked stepmothers made great adversaries. Comedy might be an exception. I don’t watch much of that, but even in the movie Bowfinger with Steve Martin, the underdogs almost didn’t get their movie made.
Do you have a character you loved who really bothered you when he died? I couldn’t believe it when J.K. Rowling killed Dumbledore. I was reading the book to the boys and I remember thinking, REALLY??? What about you? Anyone who surprised you?
January 4, 2024
The Dam Broke
I lost sleep last night. Lots of zzz’s. I’m feeling it right now. But, boy, was it worth it!
I woke up somewhere in the middle of the night, and the flood gates opened. BAM! I don’t know if your subconscious is quiet for a while and worries you, and then all of a sudden, it goes WHOOSH! and ideas flood you, but that’s what happened to me last night. A tsunami.
Our cat jumps on my side of the bed every single night at about 5:30 because he wants treats and he wants to be fed. We’ve NEVER had a cat–and we’ve had LOTS of them–that would dare do that before. But Dutchy’s fearless. And persistent. It’s easier to get up and feed him than battle him until you get up the next morning. And we’ve tried. We’ve closed our bedroom door. He wraps his paws around the doorknob and tries to open it…for hours. We’ve locked him in the basement. He knows the laundry room is under our bedroom, so jumps up and down, up and down, on the washing machine until I can’t stand it anymore. The cat’s too smart for MY own good. I finally caved, and I get up and give him whatever he wants.
This morning, when I went back to bed, though, my brain kicked on. I told it to go away, that it could come back in a few hours. It didn’t care. BUT, it gave me SO many ideas to the make the end of my WIP stronger, I don’t care. I’ll probably crawl into bed earlier than usual tonight, and that’s all right. That’s my reading time, but I just started a new book that I know I’m going to enjoy, so it can wait until Friday night.
I hope your brain kicks in at more convenient times for you, but if not….enjoy the flow of ideas. And hopefully, you can sleep in the next morning.
January 1, 2024
Happy 2024!
First, I’m wishing all of you a great year. Hope all goes well for you.
Last year, I did a decent job of getting words on paper. I hope to keep that up. But I did a horrible job of marketing, and it showed. I threw my poor books out into the world with as little promo as possible, and they pretty much floundered. I hope to do better this year.
My critique partners especially liked my mystery A GHOST OF A CHANCE, told me it was some of my best writing. That should have motivated me to get on the ball, but 2023 was full of pesky, little annoyances for me, and my energy fizzled more than usual. So I put it up, talked it up on twitter and my blog, did an ad, and started writing the next book. Writing makes me happy (most days). I don’t hate marketing like some writers do, but it is easy to avoid. So I did.
I really enjoyed writing A GHOST OF A CHANCE. I loved the characters. A LONG time ago, I faithfully watched the TV show The Ghost and Mrs. Muir with Hope Lange and Edward Mulhare. I can’t remember many of the details, but I remember really enjoying the dead sea captain and the gentle romance with the young widow who moved into his cottage. I don’t have a dead sea captain for my mystery. Instead, I used the ghost of a detective who’s called back to solve a crime when his old partner on the force is gunned down in his driveway. And there’s no romance between Harrison and Loretta. Loretta loved her Ira so much, she has no desire to find a man to take his place after his death. She’s a happy widow and intends to stay that way.
I did even less to market the last book I self-published in ’23. I knew FACING THE MUSIC was going to be a hard sell. It’s a dark cozy, and readers like my traditional cozies better. Instead of digging in and trying harder, I slapped it up with no pre-orders, no giveaways, not much of anything. It deserved better but didn’t get it.
In 2024, I’ve vowed to at least give my books a fighting chance. Hope you find what works for you this year.
December 27, 2023
A Jolt from the Past
This is going to sound weird, but I’ve been writing for a long time. And I’ve written lots and lots of short stories and novels that are “resting” in plastic boxes under the benches in our basement, because my writing was nothing to brag about when I first started. I didn’t expect it to be. I’m not a quick, brilliant learner, so it takes me a while to get halfway decent at anything. So, I just kept at it, and eventually, I got an agent, But I was writing paranormals back then, and the market was glutted. So even though Lauren liked what I wrote, she couldn’t sell it. But, she let me self-publish it. And it didn’t set the world on fire. I wrote under my name then, Judith Post. And finally, Lauren said “Enough’s enough. Try something else so maybe we can sell it.” She recommended trying romance. So, I wrote six, and Kensington took them, but they didn’t set the world on fire either. Then my editor suggested I try a cozy, and that’s when I started writing Jazzi and Ansel.
The thing is, the books I wrote as Judith Post feel like a lifetime ago. I hardly ever look at them anymore. But when I think about them, I still love them. So, when D. Wallace Peach read and wrote a review for Babet and Prosper, the first collection of four novellas, I was surprised, and it brought back tons of happy memories. It was wonderful.
I recently read her Seas of Time novella, book four in the Harbor Pointe Series and LOVED it! It’s a fun combination of time travel and fantasy with wonderful characters. Zam stole my heart. https://www.amazon.com/Seas-Time-Harbor-Pointe-Book-ebook/dp/B0CCQGRXH9/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3J2F50HJOPEBV&keywords=the+sea+of+time+d.+wallace+peach&qid=1703706879&sprefix=D.+Wallace+Peach%2Caps%2C168&sr=8-1
So, it’s an honor that she liked some of my early writing. Here’s her review: https://www.bookbub.com/reviews/1099927545. She gave me a great gift over the holidays. She made me think about Babet and Prosper again.
December 24, 2023
Merry Christmas!
December 20, 2023
FARE PLAY, part 2, the end
FARE PLAY, part 2
The girl bit her bottom lip, stifling a groan. Moisture seeped from the slick skin of her forehead. “We’re only two galaxies away,” she said. “I’ll make it.”
“You haven’t got a chance,” Elektra snapped. “What do you want to do?”
“If we land on Neukro, the nurses will flush my baby down the pipes, and Hobans have banned Pyforians from their ports ever since the Embargo Wars.”
She was right. The Hoban civilization was harsh and unsentimental, putting little value on any life form other than their own. Neukro was a water planet with a great, restless sea that thrashed the plastic pods that contained its floating cities. Storms churned its sky most of the year.
Elektra had heard too many rumors of shuttles forced to make emergency landings there, never to be seen again. She had no desire to be flushed out of the sea pod cities and used as food for Neukron’s tadpole-like offspring. The young fed on anything available, including one another, until they walked onto the floating pods as a new generation of Neukron citizens.
The girl’s pale green coloring was growing paler with each flap of her gills. Elektra had to do something.
A deserted satellite station was only a light span away. Elektra swerved toward its landing band. The supple metal strip circled the now-forgotten service mart like a Saturn’s rings circle the planet.
Once, fuel cubes and snack parcels were distributed by shuttle hops as travelers hovered impatiently. Now, with the advent of Enclosed Bubble Malls, most of the small stations were abandoned.
“Is it safe here?” the Pyforian gulped.
“Safe, yes,” Elektra said, hovering above the metal strip before gently touching down alongside an antique transmitter. “But I don’t know how your species gives birth.”
“Don’t worry about it,” the girl said. “Just keep your Earth hands off me. I don’t need any help.”
Elektra sighed. Typical Pyforian. The rudest species in the universe. “Fine, I’ll wait.”
The girl glared at her with watering eyes. “It’s my first,” she stammered. “I don’t know what to do.”
“My husband would have told us not to panic,” Elektra said. “Just take one thing at a time.”
“Where is he?”
“Dead. Mining accident.” Elektra left the driver’s pod and climbed in the passenger cubicle with the girl. “Where does yours come out?”
The girl opened her mouth wide. The jaws came unhinged, and Elektra could see a slimy, knobby head worming its way up the girl’s throat. Elektra had to fight the urge to gag and forced herself to sound calm and confident.
“I see its head,” she told the girl. “It’s moving up fast. It must be healthy.”
The girl knelt on the shuttle’s floor, lowering her neck and face onto the seat, breathing hard and sweating profusely.
“It’s almost out,” Elektra said. “You’re doing fine.”
The girl’s midsection heaved, pushing the baby out of her mouth. Bile and blood gushed from her lips as Elektra picked up the wriggling infant and held it so the mother could see it.
A small smile lifted the corners of the girl’s mouth as fluids continued to leak from her throat. Too many fluids.
“Maybe you should try to sit up or something,” Elektra said.
The girl shook her head. “They told me I was too young, that my baby wouldn’t live. I think we’re in trouble.”
Elektra placed the squirming infant in its mother’s arms. “Just hang in there. I’ll have you on your planet in a flash.”
She slid back in the driver’s pod and pushed the power to full speed. In a blur of time, she lowered the craft onto the landing pad of a Pyforian hospital. She pressed the red alert button to summon aid and turned to check on her passenger.
The baby had attached itself to a nipple on the side of the girl’s neck and was sucking loudly. The girl herself was as still and pale as a withered leaf.
Medics wheeled an incubator out for the baby and rushed the girl inside. Primitive, Elektra thought. Earth had much more advanced technology, but at least the medics seemed sincere in their administrations.
After Elektra sterilized the shuttle, she called Mega and explained what had happened.
“Will she be all right?” Mega asked.
“I don’t know.”
“I wish we could do something to help her.”
“I got her here,” Elektra said. “I had to let them scan our entire identity files just to prove her situation was legitimate.”
“You’ve done more than most Earth citizens,” Mega said. “I think that’s great.”
Finally, a medic came to the landing strip. “If you’re waiting for your fare, you’re out of luck.”
Elektra took a deep breath. Pyforians! No wonder most Earth citizens didn’t want anything to do with them.
“How’s the girl?” she asked.
The Pyforian raised a green eyebrow. “She’d be fine if she had somewhere to go, but her parents won’t come for her. They don’t need another infant Pyforian in their domicile.”
How could a parent turn a child away? Elektra wondered. But babies cost time and money. Sometimes more time and money than was available.
“Can I see her?”
The Pyforian couldn’t hide his surprise. “Sure. This way.”
The girl was in a narrow bed in a huge, crowded ward. She looked young and lost.
Elektra slid into the small space between beds and took a deep breath. “The thing is,” she said, “I work almost all the time. My daughter does, too. Our living space on Earth is always a mess. We could use a housekeeper, but I can’t afford one. The only thing I could offer is room and board.”
The girl glanced down at her baby. The infant raised its head and blinked thick, hooded eyes.
Cute, in its own way, Elektra decided.
“I don’t take charity,” the girl said. “I’ll work hard to earn my keep.”
“Good, we’ll all work together.” Elektra glanced at the medic. “When will she be strong enough to leave?”
He motioned at the ward. “Look at this place. The sooner, the better.”
Elektra wheeled the girl to the cab-craft and opened the passenger pod in front. “I probably should know your name.”
“Lumina,” she said.
“And the baby? Is it a boy or a girl? Does it have a name?”
“A boy,” she said and hesitated. “I hope you don’t mind. I saw your identity scan. I named him Drunn.”
Elektra swallowed hard and pushed the accelerator lever. “Let’s go home.”
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A Christmas Story
I sold a short Christmas sci-fi story to Sun magazine in 2002. I was so excited about it, told all my friends. And when it came out, the paper published it with great illustrations and gave it a lot of space…and put the wrong author’s name on it as a byline. I was crushed. But I’ve always liked that story, so I decided to look it up, retype it because it was on a floppy disk that no one uses these days, and share it with you. Here’s part one:
FARE PLAY
(a Christmas story)
By Judi Lynn
PART 1
As she inched her shuttle forward, hustling toward a good spot at the curb, she saw a Pyforian female signaling for a ride. Fat chance! Elektra watched one driver after another turn their heads as the girl tried to wave them down.
Among all the aliens, the Pyforians were the worst. One had cheated Elektra out of a fare last week, and she’d never met one of the slimy green misfits who knew how to tip. A healthy Pyforian was bad enough, but this one looked a little greener than usual around the fins. Her protruding eyes were wild and bloodshot, her knobby head rippled like a queasy stomach, and her gills filtered air in short gasps.
As Elektra inched her way toward the front of the passenger zone, the girl grew more desperate. She tried stepping in front of a shuttle driver two crafts up, but the man swerved around her, bumping her with the air cushion that skirted his craft. She stumbled and clutched a post to keep from falling.
Serves her right, Elektra thought. Driving shuttle wasn’t charity work. It took long, grueling hours to make a living.
The traffic braked suddenly, and Elektra stopped beside the girl. Customers lined the docks, ready to tip extra if you sped them home in record time to spend the holidays with their families. It would be easy money tonight.
Elektra glanced sideways at the girl, just to make sure she wasn’t going to try something stupid, like pushing on the craft’s entry panel; but the fight had left her. She leaned against the post, her shoulders drooping.
She was young. Awfully young. Probably about the same age as Mega. Her gills were the pale green of an unfurled spring leaf.
What if it were Mega, stranded on some foreign planet, trying to return to her own galaxy? Wouldn’t Elektra expect someone to stop and help her daughter if she were desperate and ill?
The lure of easy money tempted her, but Elektra’s conscience tugged her to a halt. Against her better judgment, she jabbed the control that opened the side panel and said, “Where to?”
The young female stared at the open door in surprise, then practically fell onto the molded passenger seat. “Home, if you can get me there in time.”
Typical Pyforian, thought Elektra. If would be Elektra’s fault if the girl was late.
“What’s the trouble?” she asked. In the rearview screener, Elektra noticed that the Pyforian clasped a hand over her mouth. Her species didn’t look decent on good days. Ill, they were positively repulsive.
“I don’t feel good,” the girl whined.
Earth citizens didn’t catch many Pyforian diseases, the species were so different, but Elektra couldn’t afford to lose any work time. In one more year, Mega would graduate from Solar Service School and get a job at the Space Trade Center. She was fluent in the languages of seventy different galaxies. But first, they had to survive this year.
“You’re not contagious, are you?” Elektra asked.
“No.”
Everyone knew Pyforians lied. “Here. You might need this.” Elektra handed the girl a disgorge container. “I can’t afford time off.” Ever since Drunn’s laser digger tipped, crushing him beneath it, Elektra had been the sole support for their family.
The sooner she got this over with, the better. She pushed down the accelerator lever and sailed from the dock. Earth blurred behind them. Pyforia was only half a dozen galaxies away, but after passing Barx and Landu, the girl began to pant.
“I’m taking you to an emergency clinic,” Elektra said and entered the gravity range of Xenor.
“No!” There was panic in the girl’s voice. “They won’t take me.”
“Why not?” Visions of an epidemic flooded Elektra’s mind. What was wrong with this girl?
“I’m pregnant, and the baby’s coming.”
Elektra understood in an instant. She’d never really considered the problems for an expectant Pyforian before, but she knew Earth’s rules. No Pyforian was allowed to give birth in Earth’s atmosphere.
“You’re not allowed to deliver your child on Xenor either?” she asked.
The female covered her mouth. “We do the dirty jobs on every planet, but no one wants us.”
Tell me about it, Elektra thought. You’re not the only ones. Before the aliens had invaded Earth, she’d been fairly well off. Drunn made a good living, drilling deep holes to tap the Earth’s core for heat and energy. Then the Barxans landed, bartering high tech equipment for ores deep beneath the earth’s crust. Drunn had died trying to pry minerals no one had ever heard of from the planet’s guts.
“Everybody’s got problems,” Elektra snapped. “Pyforians don’t have special dibs on them.”
“Yeah?” the girl asked. “You could fool me. It’s all I’ve ever known.”
A sorry statement. Elektra had known happiness once, and she was somewhat happy now, but Pyforia had never been prosperous and probably never would be.
“We’re not going to get you home in time,” Elektra said, returning to the problem at hand. “Where should I take you?”
(the rest of the story will be continued on my blog tomorrow)
December 16, 2023
Neighbors
HH and I are rejoicing. Our property is deep. It runs from the street in front of our house to the street in back of the house. Long and narrow. But it means that no one lives behind us. When we sit at our kitchen table, we have a great view. The neighbors on both sides of our back lot put up privacy fences, so we don’t even see their backyards. Which is a good thing. Because the neighbors on the right are conscientious and take good care of their yard. The newer neighbors on the left are a nightmare.
Everyone who lived in that house previously were dream neighbors. Friendly. Nice. Took good care of the house and yard. These people? I’ve never met them, but they only mow the grass after the city comes out and puts up a sign that they mow or pay a fine. They throw trash in their front yard. A dead mattress rested there for months. It hurts to look at their property. And trees sprouted all along their privacy fence. It was just sad. They got cats…and didn’t feed them….so they came to our house, meowing for food. (We have a cat, and they must have thought we’d be a soft touch. We were. I couldn’t stand seeing how their sides caved in so I give them Friskies gravy wet cat food every morning).
For some reason, ANY reason, all of a sudden, their front yard looks presentable. They’ve picked up all the trash, mowed the grass for winter, and the front of their house looks nice. It’s a Christmas miracle. And we love it.
In my Jazzi and Ansel WIP, I decided to give Jazzi and Ansel awful neighbors. The older couple who lived next door to them sell their house to retire and move to Florida. The new people who move in are horrible. Five kids with no manners and no rules. Parents with no manners and no respect for property lines. Ansel, who’s usually really easy-going, can’t stand them. He comes home to find their kids swimming in the pond he built behind their house with no supervision, no one to make sure the kids stay where it’s shallow. He walks the kids home and tells the parents it’s not safe to let them play in the water alone, only to find the kids there again the next day. Unsupervised.
It’s been sort of fun to take something that’s rankled HH and me and add to my story. People in our neighborhood have always taken care of their property. I don’t know how many times people have called on the neighbors behind us, but nothing seems to make much difference. I don’t know why they’ve decided to clean up their front yard now, but I hope it lasts. It’s nice to look over at their house without wincing.
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Cookie Exchange
Once again this year, I signed up for Staci Troilo’s virtual cookie exchange on her blog. It goes live on Thursday, December 14th. If you’re in the mood for some new cookie recipes, she’s gotten some great ones from fellow writers. https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fstacitroilo.wordpress.com%2F%3Fp%3D10789&data=05%7C02%7C%7Cff2be4eb12d3462c077808dbfa676840%7C84df9e7fe9f640afb435aaaaaaaaaaaa%7C1%7C0%7C638379094263819818%7CUnknown%7CTWFpbGZsb3d8eyJWIjoiMC4wLjAwMDAiLCJQIjoiV2luMzIiLCJBTiI6Ik1haWwiLCJXVCI6Mn0%3D%7C3000%7C%7C%7C&sdata=12YMLOv2i2V1oq7GU9dWCD2ud%2B23gNwgLGu6NUW09cw%3D&reserved=0
This year, I shared chocolate crinkle cookies. They’re a bit messy if the dough gets warm, (then I just refreeze them), but they’re worth the bother! If you try them, I hope you like them!
Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
(I got this recipe from the Betty Crocker cooky book from Golden Press, New York. I’ve had it for years. It’s so used, its pages are coming loose, but it’s full of great cookie recipes).
Mix together:
1/3 c vegetable oil
2/3 c. melted semi-sweet chocolate chips
2 c. sugar
Blend in 4 eggs
2 t vanilla
Then add 2 c. flour
2 t. baking powder
½ t salt
Mix, then cover with saran wrap and put in freezer overnight or longer.
Heat oven to 350 degrees when ready to bake.
I use a small scoop then roll dough into small ball (smaller than a ping pong ball)
I fill a bag with powdered sugar and drop scoops in it to cover them.
Place 2” apart on cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.
Bake 10 to 12 minutes until almost no imprint remains when touched lightly in center.
