Laura A. Ellison's Blog, page 5
September 5, 2012
Dinner's Ready- PartTwo
To understand the dinner situation, you would have to understand my father, something I never could. Dad was a Sagittarius; handsome, restless, selfish, thoughtless, intelligent, impatient, sensitive, very funny, and bad tempered. He was a contradiction. He loved his wife and children, but didn't like being a husband and father all of the time. There were times, I think, when he despised it. Because of this, he often dropped the ball. My parents were eighteen years old when they got married, becoming parents that same year, 1963. Children of the '40s and '50s, they weren't ready for the realities of marriage and children. As the world changed, so did they. But they managed to stay married in a time when divorce was becoming routine. (I think what kept their marriage together was that shitty house because, after it was finally paid off, neither one of my parents wanted to start over anywhere else)
My dad could eat pork steak and fried potatoes for dinner every night. We kept pigs in a barn on our property for my whole childhood. We also had horses and chickens at different times. My dad always wanted to be a farmer, for some reason. I remember, at nine years old, watching one of our pigs give birth to several piglets. We treated them like pets, but each pig made the inevitable trip to the slaughterhouse so we could have pork chops, steak, sausage, bacon, and ham. We ate pork chops or pork steak at least twice a week. I grew so sick of it, I would complain(we're having that again?)and my brothers would eat at their friends' houses. Dad didn't mind pizza sometimes, but he hated fast food. If I suggested something to my mother, and if she said,"Your dad doesn't like that," it was better not to press, because she didn't want to listen to my dad bitch.
I stopped eating dinner at the table by the time I was ten years old. I now had a TV in my room, but eating with my dad was an anxiety-inducing experience. He once poured a glass of milk over my brother's head. We were not allowed to laugh at the table or talk too much. I had to switch seats with Mom because my second brother didn't want me sitting next to him. My third brother, the one who got the milk on his head, had a tendency to pick at his food. One year, I think I was five or six, my dad didn't come home for dinner very often. He was drinking with his friends. When I was four years old, my paternal grandmother died at fifty-two. She was an alcoholic and had taken my dad and his father and siblings on the long, painful ride to her death. Dad felt guilty and sad, so he decided to be a jerk for about a year. He left us for a few weeks, and I can't recall being torn up about it, unlike my two oldest brothers.
My dad could eat pork steak and fried potatoes for dinner every night. We kept pigs in a barn on our property for my whole childhood. We also had horses and chickens at different times. My dad always wanted to be a farmer, for some reason. I remember, at nine years old, watching one of our pigs give birth to several piglets. We treated them like pets, but each pig made the inevitable trip to the slaughterhouse so we could have pork chops, steak, sausage, bacon, and ham. We ate pork chops or pork steak at least twice a week. I grew so sick of it, I would complain(we're having that again?)and my brothers would eat at their friends' houses. Dad didn't mind pizza sometimes, but he hated fast food. If I suggested something to my mother, and if she said,"Your dad doesn't like that," it was better not to press, because she didn't want to listen to my dad bitch.
I stopped eating dinner at the table by the time I was ten years old. I now had a TV in my room, but eating with my dad was an anxiety-inducing experience. He once poured a glass of milk over my brother's head. We were not allowed to laugh at the table or talk too much. I had to switch seats with Mom because my second brother didn't want me sitting next to him. My third brother, the one who got the milk on his head, had a tendency to pick at his food. One year, I think I was five or six, my dad didn't come home for dinner very often. He was drinking with his friends. When I was four years old, my paternal grandmother died at fifty-two. She was an alcoholic and had taken my dad and his father and siblings on the long, painful ride to her death. Dad felt guilty and sad, so he decided to be a jerk for about a year. He left us for a few weeks, and I can't recall being torn up about it, unlike my two oldest brothers.
Dinner's Ready- Part One
I had mixed feelings about family dinners at the table when I was a small child in the 1970s. The menu was limited due to budget constraints; food stamps filled in the gaps along with growing our own vegetables for a time. Guv'ment cheese made good grilled cheese sandwiches. I remember seeing the big box of Mason canning jars and the instruction booklet on how to can tomatoes and make pickles. My maternal grandmother was good at canning, but Mom had yet to master the right amount of salt or how to seal the jars. Mom soon lost interest in canning. She figured that the free time to do something else, anything else, was better than canning. Besides, canned goods at the store existed for a reason; for moms who worked, like her.
My dad dictated the menu, but Mom had veto power, because she did the shopping and balanced the household budget. As a small child, I was already addicted to sugar, chewing wads of bubble gum that Mom would find on the kitchen floor and living room. We did not have carpet in any of the rooms. I guess I wasn't being well-supervised, because no one seemed to notice when I dropped the gum from my mouth to the floor. When she would get the mop and bucket out, Mom would have to take a knife to scrape the old gum off the worn linoleum before cleaning with Spic and Span.
I grew up in an old house, built in the 1920s. At one time, the place had been one room, and wasn't haunted because what spirit would want to return to a shack? That was Mom's opinion, anyway. Other rooms were added on well before my parents bought the house. Garbage had been buried in the ground, and my brothers found old Indian arrowheads and various fascinating junk on the four acres of property. The land was almost worth the decay of the house. Dad wasn't one for home improvement in those days, so we lived in a rather indifferent state regarding the house. New carpet and paint were added over the years, and Dad did remodel the bathroom and kitchen by the time I was a teen, along with building a deck to the side of the house a few months before his death. The sudden interest in the house was a trade-off to Mom, because he thought she was thinking about leaving him by then. But that's another story.
My addiction to sugar was always at odds with the menu; however, I do remember eating some vegetables and fruit as a kid. I liked yogurt. I liked hamburgers and chicken. Fast food chains, unfortunately, were on the rise along with the popularity of sugary cereals. When I look back, I wonder if my parents' improving financial conditions, by the time I was eight years old, had anything to do with my childhood weight gain. I got an Easy Bake oven for Christmas that year, and I moved on to baking cakes and brownies in Mom's oven. This way, I could eat what I wanted, not having to rely on the dinners my dad and the budget dictated.
My dad dictated the menu, but Mom had veto power, because she did the shopping and balanced the household budget. As a small child, I was already addicted to sugar, chewing wads of bubble gum that Mom would find on the kitchen floor and living room. We did not have carpet in any of the rooms. I guess I wasn't being well-supervised, because no one seemed to notice when I dropped the gum from my mouth to the floor. When she would get the mop and bucket out, Mom would have to take a knife to scrape the old gum off the worn linoleum before cleaning with Spic and Span.
I grew up in an old house, built in the 1920s. At one time, the place had been one room, and wasn't haunted because what spirit would want to return to a shack? That was Mom's opinion, anyway. Other rooms were added on well before my parents bought the house. Garbage had been buried in the ground, and my brothers found old Indian arrowheads and various fascinating junk on the four acres of property. The land was almost worth the decay of the house. Dad wasn't one for home improvement in those days, so we lived in a rather indifferent state regarding the house. New carpet and paint were added over the years, and Dad did remodel the bathroom and kitchen by the time I was a teen, along with building a deck to the side of the house a few months before his death. The sudden interest in the house was a trade-off to Mom, because he thought she was thinking about leaving him by then. But that's another story.
My addiction to sugar was always at odds with the menu; however, I do remember eating some vegetables and fruit as a kid. I liked yogurt. I liked hamburgers and chicken. Fast food chains, unfortunately, were on the rise along with the popularity of sugary cereals. When I look back, I wonder if my parents' improving financial conditions, by the time I was eight years old, had anything to do with my childhood weight gain. I got an Easy Bake oven for Christmas that year, and I moved on to baking cakes and brownies in Mom's oven. This way, I could eat what I wanted, not having to rely on the dinners my dad and the budget dictated.
July 18, 2012
Update
Well, it finally rained early this morning. More showers coming, but the heat drags on.
Praying For Rain
I didn't fall asleep until two o'clock last night. The air conditioning was on, but I was still uncomfortable. My neck and shoulders have a tendency to ache from too much A/C, but without it, everyone in the house would be sick, including the dog.
Temperatures have soared close to one hundred, and every living creature feels hot, tired, and cranky. I can't remember a summer this hot since 1988, the summer before my father died. We had no A/C then, and I would watch the sweat drip down Dad's nose as he tried to eat dinner. Mom used to put ice cubes in the dog's water dish, which would melt in minutes. By seven-thirty, I would try to fit the box fan into my bedroom window. I would wake up in the middle of the night sticking to the sheet. There would be no relief in the early morning hours, when my parents would be getting ready for work. My friend Shawn lived in a trailer with her mother, and they had a window air conditioner running. I fell asleep face down on their living room carpet. Old shag carpet in that olive green color. I woke up with shag carpet marks on my face.
Extreme heat makes people strange. At K-Mart, my place of employment, people shuffle around like the walking dead, wanting to buy pools on clearance, which are already gone. We're making room for back to school items. People are irritable about the littlest things, such as an item not having a price tag or some other error. The A/C is kept at seventy or so, and I sweat, along with every customer who ignores their hygiene in the coldest of weather. Summer is not my favorite time at work; I'd rather deal with Black Friday, because November is so much cooler. It's not any easier for my nephews, brothers Zach and Jake, who both work in local foundries. Ten years ago, I worked at a small factory that made parts for the cooling and heating systems in Saturn automobiles. I wasn't on the Saturn line, so I could work in an air-conditioned area, but my Saturn co-workers were throwing up from the heat, the fans only blowing more hot air around the machines. They were not initially allowed to have water in their work areas, but the supervisor relented. I don't know how some people get through a summer so hot.
I was coming home from work one night when I discovered a mother cat with five kittens hanging out underneath my mother's car. We have been feeding the beautiful mother and adorable kittens since. They have a tendency to disappear at sunrise to beat the heat by finding a shady spot in the wooded areas by our house. We also provide plenty of water, but the mother is encouraging her young to go out on their own, being almost feral. I would take the mother to get spayed, but she takes off in the morning before I can get her in the pet carrier. We have thought about putting her in the carrier at night, but we would have to listen to mournful cries from mother and kittens all night. Our dachshund, Patti Page, has found all of this disruptive after beating a urinary tract infection during her personal dog days. She had a reaction to the first group of antibiotics, and was running a fever. She would lick the ice cubes I held between my fingers. The next antibiotic worked better. She's fine now, spending her time watching for when cat-mother, who Mom named Callie, and her brood return, none of whom are used to human contact. They let Mom pet them while they're eating, and they no longer nurse from Callie. They like to play in the yard at night. We worry about their safety.
When do I find time to write? I'm not even half-way through the new Fu Sheng story I've been working on. I've been thinking about writing something erotic and paranormal. I like the spooky stuff, but it seems I'm lacking a desire for writing lately. I'm more interested in reading and eating ice cream in my spare time, trying to scare up some inspiration, which I find in everyday life, like most writers. I'm in a bit of a creative drought, as dry as most of the country. I hear that rain may finally come to Michigan this week, and something's got to give. Even the hottest summers come to an end, animals know when to rest and recharge, and everything calms down for awhile. Hopefully, Fu Sheng will be patient with me. He's nine hundred years old, he's seen a lot of summers. :)
Temperatures have soared close to one hundred, and every living creature feels hot, tired, and cranky. I can't remember a summer this hot since 1988, the summer before my father died. We had no A/C then, and I would watch the sweat drip down Dad's nose as he tried to eat dinner. Mom used to put ice cubes in the dog's water dish, which would melt in minutes. By seven-thirty, I would try to fit the box fan into my bedroom window. I would wake up in the middle of the night sticking to the sheet. There would be no relief in the early morning hours, when my parents would be getting ready for work. My friend Shawn lived in a trailer with her mother, and they had a window air conditioner running. I fell asleep face down on their living room carpet. Old shag carpet in that olive green color. I woke up with shag carpet marks on my face.
Extreme heat makes people strange. At K-Mart, my place of employment, people shuffle around like the walking dead, wanting to buy pools on clearance, which are already gone. We're making room for back to school items. People are irritable about the littlest things, such as an item not having a price tag or some other error. The A/C is kept at seventy or so, and I sweat, along with every customer who ignores their hygiene in the coldest of weather. Summer is not my favorite time at work; I'd rather deal with Black Friday, because November is so much cooler. It's not any easier for my nephews, brothers Zach and Jake, who both work in local foundries. Ten years ago, I worked at a small factory that made parts for the cooling and heating systems in Saturn automobiles. I wasn't on the Saturn line, so I could work in an air-conditioned area, but my Saturn co-workers were throwing up from the heat, the fans only blowing more hot air around the machines. They were not initially allowed to have water in their work areas, but the supervisor relented. I don't know how some people get through a summer so hot.
I was coming home from work one night when I discovered a mother cat with five kittens hanging out underneath my mother's car. We have been feeding the beautiful mother and adorable kittens since. They have a tendency to disappear at sunrise to beat the heat by finding a shady spot in the wooded areas by our house. We also provide plenty of water, but the mother is encouraging her young to go out on their own, being almost feral. I would take the mother to get spayed, but she takes off in the morning before I can get her in the pet carrier. We have thought about putting her in the carrier at night, but we would have to listen to mournful cries from mother and kittens all night. Our dachshund, Patti Page, has found all of this disruptive after beating a urinary tract infection during her personal dog days. She had a reaction to the first group of antibiotics, and was running a fever. She would lick the ice cubes I held between my fingers. The next antibiotic worked better. She's fine now, spending her time watching for when cat-mother, who Mom named Callie, and her brood return, none of whom are used to human contact. They let Mom pet them while they're eating, and they no longer nurse from Callie. They like to play in the yard at night. We worry about their safety.
When do I find time to write? I'm not even half-way through the new Fu Sheng story I've been working on. I've been thinking about writing something erotic and paranormal. I like the spooky stuff, but it seems I'm lacking a desire for writing lately. I'm more interested in reading and eating ice cream in my spare time, trying to scare up some inspiration, which I find in everyday life, like most writers. I'm in a bit of a creative drought, as dry as most of the country. I hear that rain may finally come to Michigan this week, and something's got to give. Even the hottest summers come to an end, animals know when to rest and recharge, and everything calms down for awhile. Hopefully, Fu Sheng will be patient with me. He's nine hundred years old, he's seen a lot of summers. :)
June 28, 2012
Karma House preview
This is a preview of my haunted house novel ebook, Karma House, now at Smashwords.com, where you can also see the trailer. Also at Kobo, iTunes, and very soon to Nook. http://bit.ly/M9JQM7 This preview takes place about a quarter into the book.
Belinda, as an adult, would try to recall clearly what happened to her in the bathtub when she was six years old. Over the years, she would forget the details, only remembering how scared she was.
She had been old enough to wash herself in the bathtub, although her mother or Gramma Ed would help her wash her long, think hair; difficult to comb out when wet. Molly had spoken of getting her hair cut short, but Belinda did not want some stranger cutting her hair, making her look like a boy.
She was rinsing the soap off her bare shoulders and arms in the steamy bathroom that evening. She was alone, and sometimes she would sing or hum to herself. She liked being alone most of the time, because no one seemed to like what she had to say.
Gramma Ed, Molly, and Will told her she could not talk about the house to other people, they would misunderstand, so she stopped talking about it. If she stopped talking all together, she did not think anyone would notice.
She also did not speak of the changes she noticed on her body; the growth of hair between her legs, even the way she smelled was changing. Puberty had come too early for her; not a cause for celebration, but something she would have to watch carefully. Belinda saw her body as something uncontrollable, frightening, so she ignored it in her own childish way, along
with everyone else, including her mother.
Belinda felt the bathroom become cold underneath the steam from the bath. The chill seemed to land on her damp hair, down her wet neck and shoulders. She suddenly shivered, goose pimples covering her. The nipples on her bee-sting breasts had become more sensitive, and puckered from the invading cold.
A man’s hard touch brushed against them.
The movement was swift, making her gasp. She looked up, and saw the shadow through the steam, which was quickly
evaporating. The shadow was not against the wall, but to her left side, near the rim of the bathtub.
The buzzing sound was all around her as the shadow took on a more definite shape, forming into a man’s head and shoulders.
She felt his hand against her small chest, pushing her, keeping her in the water. She was too shocked to call out to anyone. She felt another hand on her plump thigh, and its firm grip was moving upward, to her belly. Then it started moving
downward, past her belly button.
The man’s hand brushed past her emerging pubic hair to her vagina, and Belinda could feel that icy-coldness spreading between her legs as those dead fingers penetrated her gently, seeking out her pleasure underneath her fear, a back and
forth stroking as light as a feather.
The nauseating dread Belinda felt was undermined by the shock from her body‘s response. Many years later, she would realize she had been traumatized.
She did not experience anything like an orgasm, the touching stopped before her body could react that strongly. The buzzing sound just stopped, the shadow was gone.
She jumped fast out of the bathtub, the water now completely cold. She grabbed a towel, covering herself, wanting only to be clothed and safe in her room.
She dressed in her blue flannel pajamas after drying off, getting under the covers of her canopy bed. When she stopped shivering, she reached for the stuffed animals around her; the beat-up teddy bears; the old toy stuffed dog. She surrounded herself with their comforting presence, reminding herself that she was still a child. She fell asleep, not allowing him entrance into her dreams.
*****
Molly was on the phone when the children came downstairs, Will bringing the tape recorder. Edna had gone upstairs to take a nap, after putting the twins down for their afternoon rest.
Shawn Rush, who was one of two full-time writers for the Sentinel, met Molly that morning when she visited the offices. The secretary had referred her to the library, but she bumped into Shawn on her way out. He thought she resembled some kind of hippie housewife, wearing her old multi-colored sweater, her long hair hanging in her face.
Molly explained what was going on in her house, and he did not laugh at her or seem offended. He gave her his card, and told her he wanted to help, as long as he could write an article about the house in the future.
Molly felt she had to explain who she was from the beginning, telling Shawn about her family and John‘s family, her father and Nedra. She knew this would spark his interest, no matter what John thought.
Shawn told her, when she called, that he was going to set up an interview with one of the Degan descendants. Molly was ending her conversation with Shawn when Will and Belinda entered the kitchen.
Molly hung up the gold-colored phone on the wall, which matched the gold and avocado-green patterned wallpaper. Belinda, many years later, would shudder at the memory of that seventies design.
Molly shook her head at them; she was too tired to deal with her children lately. “Your Gramma Ed told me what you two
did, and you’re both grounded!”
“Okay, Mom,” Will said. “Do you want to hear the tape?”
“You were taping down there?”
“Yes.”
“Did you pick up something?”
“Maybe. A woman’s voice.”
“We think it might be April’s,” Belinda said.
Will played the tape on the dining room table while his mother finished her coffee. The buzzing sound filled all their ears, along with the voices of Belinda, Will, the woman’s murmurings, then Edna yelling at them to come out of there.
“She sounded mad,” Molly said.
“Belinda fell.”
“Are you all right, Bel?”
“Yeah.”
Will played the tape several times for his mother. Rewind, play. Rewind, play. He is ashamed, Mom. He killed her, Mom.
“But why would he want her dead?” Molly asked.
“I don’t know.”
“What about the reporter...Shawn?” Belinda asked.
Molly ignored the question, knowing she had not told either child about Shawn Rush yet. “I didn’t find anything in the old Sentinels,” Molly said. “No murders of a wife by her husband.”
“Maybe he got away with it,” Will said.
*****
Shawn Rush visited the Harts in their home that summer, in June of 1980. The weather had been humid and rainy, with the window air conditioner in the living room broken.
Shawn, a young reporter in his early thirties, was close in age to John and Molly. He was unmarried, so the sight of four children watching television, toys scattered about, with their tall, handsome grandmother sitting in a rocking chair in the corner, was a touching scene.
Shawn did not know what to expect at 1225 Gable Road, although he had written a few articles about haunted houses in the past. When he was living in Georgia, he followed local paranormal researchers, a married couple, into a haunted plantation house, partially burned down during the Civil War. He spent the night in the place, bored and getting attacked by mosquitoes. The wife, who claimed to be a medium, made contact with the spirit of a black man who died in slavery before the War. Nothing dramatic happened, except for the creaking noises on the ancient staircase. The overall rot of the place aggravated Shawn’s asthma. He could not wait to leave that morning.
Shawn was a skeptic, but even he was a little taken aback by the calmness of the family. Molly made a point of cleaning the house, her first attempt in months, and all Shawn saw were clean surfaces and the smell of tonight’s dinner, pork chops. The boy, Will, a tall kid with gray eyes, had greeted him at the door. He politely let Shawn in, whose jacket was sprinkled with rain.
He followed the boy to the dining room.
John Hart, the adult embodiment of Will, sat at the table with a cup of coffee. He wore a white shirt with his tie loosened. Molly had said her husband sold insurance for a living through Oracle Insurance, a company that had been around forever.
Shawn, whose father was an alcoholic, could see that Hart wanted a drink. He was not fooling anyone with his coffee. He had the desperate look around his tired eyes and on his mouth. The whites of his eyes were slightly yellow, uncommon for such a young man. His hands were small, the hands of an artist, a gentle person. This was not a man who yelled at his wife and kids; he beat at them gently with his unhappiness, drowning them in guilt and self-reproach.
“Mr. Hart?” Shawn asked.
“Call me John. Molly’s in the kitchen. Please, sit down.”
John took in this young man, who seemed younger than him. His brown hair was cut short, his eyes a hazel-green and, along with his corduroy jacket, he gave off the air of the yuppie. John found the young man’s vulnerabilities easily; he was ambitious, but feared himself. He had a rough childhood, an alcoholic father and a mother who was frequently ill. Like John, he was a man of order who favored being in control. He was a good journalist, wanting to write books that would make him famous, but he suffered from self-doubt. “Molly tells me you are quite interested in our crazy house here.”
“She tells me there have been frightening disturbances, that this house is haunted.”
“Yes, it is.” John paused a moment, looked down at his coffee cup. “Did she tell you about our families?”
Shawn nodded. “She did. The Harts and Murdochs are famous. Nedra Hart was your grandmother, right?”
“She certainly was. She had a gift, so did Molly’s father, Samuel Murdoch.”
“Mr. Murdoch did publish many books. There is also a Pauline Murdoch, she wrote a book in the early fifties, about reincarnation. She was living in Scotland at the time...”
John could feel his right hand squeeze into a fist underneath the table. Why did Molly do this? he thought. Didn’t she know this man would dig into every bad thing?
John kept his voice cool and pleasant. “Pauline is Molly’s sister.”
“Does she still publish?”
“No. Pauline has been ill.” John rose from the table. “I’ll go get Molly.”
Molly had been detained while looking for the audiotape Will recorded from the cellar. She wanted to play the tape for Shawn. She also dug up the photographs. John found her in Will’s room, letting her know Shawn Rush was here. As they were walking down the staircase, he whispered, ”I didn’t know your sister had a book published.”
Molly abruptly stopped walking, making John almost bump into her. “I forgot about that book. It was only published overseas. She wrote it almost thirty years ago. She was in her early twenties, living with James—”
“Shawn Rush must have found that book.”
“Really? I’ve never read it.”
“We can talk about this later. He’s waiting.”
Molly wanted to take Shawn to the cellar, and had purchased several flashlights and had purchased a 35mm camera for this occasion. Before going outside, Molly had presented Shawn with the photographs and played the audiotape in the dining room.
However, Shawn did not see anything in the photos, light or shapes, which would suggest an apparition, including the plume above Belinda’s head, or any flaws in the photos of the twins. John and Molly looked at each other, shocked. The flaws were plain to them; Edna and Colleen had seen these flaws as well. Molly played the tape on her son’s tape recorder, but all Shawn could hear were the voices of Will and Belinda and Edna. Towards the end of the tape, where Molly could swear were the murmurings of a woman, John’s head snapped up from the table, his face burning red, as he looked over at his wife.
Shawn was feeling quite awkward by this time, with Molly’s angry exclamations and her husband’s nervousness. He began to
feel sorry for Molly, he noticed she had taken extra care with her appearance; her hair cut in a short, layered style, with makeup and a new sweater and jeans. John had also seen this, but failed to make any connection between his wife’s new friend and her sudden, revived interest in her looks.
John Hart sat quietly at the dining room table. “Molly, maybe you can take Shawn into the cellar. I need to sit for a
minute.”
Molly knew something was wrong with him. It was not like John to resort to any dramatic maneuvers around strangers. She noticed he was struggling to stay sober all evening, drinking coffee. The voice from the tape had disturbed him.
“Okay, honey,” she said. “I’ll take Shawn to the cellar, we won’t be long.”
John waited for them to go outside before he replayed the tape. He waited to hear her voice again.
He is
ashamed.
He is
ashamed.
John knew that voice did not belong to April Degan, as he was expecting. He had not heard the tape until tonight; he believed the voice to be April’s due to Molly and the children’s excited chatter, but he only needed to hear three words, in that Irish lilt, to recognize the voice of his grandmother, Nedra Hart.
Nedra died when John was in his early twenties; he and Molly had only been married a few years. She always knew she would live to be in her eighties, live a long life, and die a sudden death. Nedra and her husband, Dr. William Hart, had raised three sons, with Robert, John’s father, as the oldest. After the boys were born, Nedra more or less retired from using her psychic gifts in public, although she did write a few books on the subject of life after death. She wrote of the tunnel and the light
fifty years before anyone else started to believe in those things. She had a spirit guide/control named Tomah, who she spoke of at length. Nedra had been tested, as a young woman, by a psychologist friend of Dr. Hart‘s, who diagnosed her as schizophrenic with delusional tendencies, but highly functional. She laughed about that for years, as she grew more reclusive, preferring the life of a wife and mother to that of a famous freak.
Nedra had been small and dark, with the gray eyes John and Will had inherited. She wore her brown hair in a single
braid, her skin fair and freckled. She was always a little plump, no taller than five feet. John owned a framed photograph of her, taken around 1912, when she was in her twenties, wearing a high-necked, dark dress, and boots that buttoned on the sides. The photograph had been taken in a parlor, with Nedra standing, looking off to the left, a serious, distracted look on her face.
John wanted a martini, but he played the tape again. He was convinced he heard his grandmother. Each time he played
the tape, the voice became louder in his head. Nedra had been born and raised in Ireland, spent some time in England, and moved to the states when she was nineteen. She traveled with her brother throughout the country; she was already famous as a psychic back home.
Nedra had believed in reincarnation, but she was raised a Catholic in Ireland. She did not speak of reincarnation publicly or mentioned it in her books.
He is ashamed, John thought. Who is 'he’, Grandma? Why are you on this tape?
Will had painstakingly described, for an eight-year-old, his experience with his sister in the cellar. He mentioned the jar, how he saw the twin fetuses, remembering this image from his dreams. When the jar fell on the ground, he said a liquid spilled that smelled like death. John knew what the boy meant–the scent of rotting flowers and spoiled milk.
We only moved into this house because of the twins, John thought. That’s when everything went downhill. The twins have been the focus from the beginning, for all of us, the ghost included. Molly said she saw the ghost in the cellar with Mom and Colleen. Will and Belinda saw something down there, Belinda talked endlessly about the cold grip on her wrist. He is ashamed. I am ashamed. I have no control. Molly thinks she does, but she‘s wrong.
Shawn Rush was not the reason John had stayed sober today. Will had told his father about when he was almost suffocated in his bed and what happened to Belinda in the bathtub. The ghost came with the sound of buzzing, like a swarm of bees. John had heard that sound at night when he was trying to go to sleep, or whenever he was alone. He thought the sound could be coming from the furnace, in the vents, but that excuse could not be used in the summer, and he had checked for bee‘s nests in and around the house.
John hated bees. When he was six years old, he had accidentally stepped on a collapsed cardboard box in the woods behind his home and was attacked by a small swarm of yellow jackets that lived inside. Edna saw him running and screaming up to the house, which would be bypassed by the tornado weeks later. She sprayed him with the garden hose, later counting at least twenty bee stings on his body.
Belinda was now six. Will followed his father to Belinda’s room. John asked about the ghost touching her. He sat on her bed and looked around. This was maybe the second time he had been in her room since moving into the house. He remembered Molly painting this room, Belinda sharing Will’s room then. Molly had also painted the hallway and the twins’ nursery. She accomplished a lot of work before her bed-rest, although the place had been slowly turning her into a nervous wreck.
John felt so awkward around Belinda, the child he was the least close to, but he had to know what happened to her. “Will said the ghost wouldn’t stop...touching you...in the tub?”
“Yes.”
John wanted a martini now more than ever. “Where were you touched?”
“All over.”
“Your legs?”
“Right.”
She did not look him or Will in the eye, she just looked down as she sat at the bed, one leg hanging down from the edge, the other curled under her.
“Did he...touch your privates?”
Her eyes, so much like his, shifted to the left, then right. “Yes.”
“Between your legs?”
“Yes.”
“How come you didn’t tell me, Belinda? Why have you kept it to yourself?”
She gave her father that blank look, which he would misinterpret for a lack of intelligence but, in fact, was really despair. She thought her father and mother were hopeless and this despondency would dog her until that day in Las Vegas, over twenty years later. John would blame himself. He was supposed to have been the father, the protector, but he had failed.
Belinda shrugged her shoulders. “I told Will. Besides, the ghost hates the twins, not me. If he kills the twins, he’ll leave the rest of us alone.”
“Sam and Sarah are only babies,” Will said.
“He killed the other twins,” his sister replied. “April’s babies.”
*****
Shawn Rush could feel the icy coldness in the cellar, but not any odor. Maybe a little mildew, the smell of earth, but nothing unusual. “I’m sorry, Molly, but I don’t smell anything out of the ordinary for a cellar.”
Molly had only been in the cellar once since the children were terrorized. She had not touched anything, including the jar on the cellar floor. Whenever she came close to the jar, still resting in its fetid puddle, the rotted flower smell assaulted her nose,
making her nauseous.
Shawn can’t smell it because he is an outsider, Molly thought. He’s not a member of the family.
“You know,” Shawn said, “I managed to find a descendant of John and April Degan’s in town. Her name is Jean Larabee. April and John were her grandparents. She’s a very large woman and a recluse. I visited with her for a little while, but she didn’t really want to talk to me. I think she would rather speak with you. I don’t know why, maybe she trusts women more. Maybe she would tell you something she wouldn’t tell me.”
“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”
“No, I don‘t think you‘re crazy, but the disturbances have only been witnessed by yourself and family members. No one outside the family has seen anything in or outside the house. Maybe Jean would be of more help right now. In the meantime, I’ll keep researching.”
“I was hoping for a book.”
“Me, too. But there has to be some sound evidence to put in a book, hearsay isn’t enough.”
Thank you for reading :)
Belinda, as an adult, would try to recall clearly what happened to her in the bathtub when she was six years old. Over the years, she would forget the details, only remembering how scared she was.
She had been old enough to wash herself in the bathtub, although her mother or Gramma Ed would help her wash her long, think hair; difficult to comb out when wet. Molly had spoken of getting her hair cut short, but Belinda did not want some stranger cutting her hair, making her look like a boy.
She was rinsing the soap off her bare shoulders and arms in the steamy bathroom that evening. She was alone, and sometimes she would sing or hum to herself. She liked being alone most of the time, because no one seemed to like what she had to say.
Gramma Ed, Molly, and Will told her she could not talk about the house to other people, they would misunderstand, so she stopped talking about it. If she stopped talking all together, she did not think anyone would notice.
She also did not speak of the changes she noticed on her body; the growth of hair between her legs, even the way she smelled was changing. Puberty had come too early for her; not a cause for celebration, but something she would have to watch carefully. Belinda saw her body as something uncontrollable, frightening, so she ignored it in her own childish way, along
with everyone else, including her mother.
Belinda felt the bathroom become cold underneath the steam from the bath. The chill seemed to land on her damp hair, down her wet neck and shoulders. She suddenly shivered, goose pimples covering her. The nipples on her bee-sting breasts had become more sensitive, and puckered from the invading cold.
A man’s hard touch brushed against them.
The movement was swift, making her gasp. She looked up, and saw the shadow through the steam, which was quickly
evaporating. The shadow was not against the wall, but to her left side, near the rim of the bathtub.
The buzzing sound was all around her as the shadow took on a more definite shape, forming into a man’s head and shoulders.
She felt his hand against her small chest, pushing her, keeping her in the water. She was too shocked to call out to anyone. She felt another hand on her plump thigh, and its firm grip was moving upward, to her belly. Then it started moving
downward, past her belly button.
The man’s hand brushed past her emerging pubic hair to her vagina, and Belinda could feel that icy-coldness spreading between her legs as those dead fingers penetrated her gently, seeking out her pleasure underneath her fear, a back and
forth stroking as light as a feather.
The nauseating dread Belinda felt was undermined by the shock from her body‘s response. Many years later, she would realize she had been traumatized.
She did not experience anything like an orgasm, the touching stopped before her body could react that strongly. The buzzing sound just stopped, the shadow was gone.
She jumped fast out of the bathtub, the water now completely cold. She grabbed a towel, covering herself, wanting only to be clothed and safe in her room.
She dressed in her blue flannel pajamas after drying off, getting under the covers of her canopy bed. When she stopped shivering, she reached for the stuffed animals around her; the beat-up teddy bears; the old toy stuffed dog. She surrounded herself with their comforting presence, reminding herself that she was still a child. She fell asleep, not allowing him entrance into her dreams.
*****
Molly was on the phone when the children came downstairs, Will bringing the tape recorder. Edna had gone upstairs to take a nap, after putting the twins down for their afternoon rest.
Shawn Rush, who was one of two full-time writers for the Sentinel, met Molly that morning when she visited the offices. The secretary had referred her to the library, but she bumped into Shawn on her way out. He thought she resembled some kind of hippie housewife, wearing her old multi-colored sweater, her long hair hanging in her face.
Molly explained what was going on in her house, and he did not laugh at her or seem offended. He gave her his card, and told her he wanted to help, as long as he could write an article about the house in the future.
Molly felt she had to explain who she was from the beginning, telling Shawn about her family and John‘s family, her father and Nedra. She knew this would spark his interest, no matter what John thought.
Shawn told her, when she called, that he was going to set up an interview with one of the Degan descendants. Molly was ending her conversation with Shawn when Will and Belinda entered the kitchen.
Molly hung up the gold-colored phone on the wall, which matched the gold and avocado-green patterned wallpaper. Belinda, many years later, would shudder at the memory of that seventies design.
Molly shook her head at them; she was too tired to deal with her children lately. “Your Gramma Ed told me what you two
did, and you’re both grounded!”
“Okay, Mom,” Will said. “Do you want to hear the tape?”
“You were taping down there?”
“Yes.”
“Did you pick up something?”
“Maybe. A woman’s voice.”
“We think it might be April’s,” Belinda said.
Will played the tape on the dining room table while his mother finished her coffee. The buzzing sound filled all their ears, along with the voices of Belinda, Will, the woman’s murmurings, then Edna yelling at them to come out of there.
“She sounded mad,” Molly said.
“Belinda fell.”
“Are you all right, Bel?”
“Yeah.”
Will played the tape several times for his mother. Rewind, play. Rewind, play. He is ashamed, Mom. He killed her, Mom.
“But why would he want her dead?” Molly asked.
“I don’t know.”
“What about the reporter...Shawn?” Belinda asked.
Molly ignored the question, knowing she had not told either child about Shawn Rush yet. “I didn’t find anything in the old Sentinels,” Molly said. “No murders of a wife by her husband.”
“Maybe he got away with it,” Will said.
*****
Shawn Rush visited the Harts in their home that summer, in June of 1980. The weather had been humid and rainy, with the window air conditioner in the living room broken.
Shawn, a young reporter in his early thirties, was close in age to John and Molly. He was unmarried, so the sight of four children watching television, toys scattered about, with their tall, handsome grandmother sitting in a rocking chair in the corner, was a touching scene.
Shawn did not know what to expect at 1225 Gable Road, although he had written a few articles about haunted houses in the past. When he was living in Georgia, he followed local paranormal researchers, a married couple, into a haunted plantation house, partially burned down during the Civil War. He spent the night in the place, bored and getting attacked by mosquitoes. The wife, who claimed to be a medium, made contact with the spirit of a black man who died in slavery before the War. Nothing dramatic happened, except for the creaking noises on the ancient staircase. The overall rot of the place aggravated Shawn’s asthma. He could not wait to leave that morning.
Shawn was a skeptic, but even he was a little taken aback by the calmness of the family. Molly made a point of cleaning the house, her first attempt in months, and all Shawn saw were clean surfaces and the smell of tonight’s dinner, pork chops. The boy, Will, a tall kid with gray eyes, had greeted him at the door. He politely let Shawn in, whose jacket was sprinkled with rain.
He followed the boy to the dining room.
John Hart, the adult embodiment of Will, sat at the table with a cup of coffee. He wore a white shirt with his tie loosened. Molly had said her husband sold insurance for a living through Oracle Insurance, a company that had been around forever.
Shawn, whose father was an alcoholic, could see that Hart wanted a drink. He was not fooling anyone with his coffee. He had the desperate look around his tired eyes and on his mouth. The whites of his eyes were slightly yellow, uncommon for such a young man. His hands were small, the hands of an artist, a gentle person. This was not a man who yelled at his wife and kids; he beat at them gently with his unhappiness, drowning them in guilt and self-reproach.
“Mr. Hart?” Shawn asked.
“Call me John. Molly’s in the kitchen. Please, sit down.”
John took in this young man, who seemed younger than him. His brown hair was cut short, his eyes a hazel-green and, along with his corduroy jacket, he gave off the air of the yuppie. John found the young man’s vulnerabilities easily; he was ambitious, but feared himself. He had a rough childhood, an alcoholic father and a mother who was frequently ill. Like John, he was a man of order who favored being in control. He was a good journalist, wanting to write books that would make him famous, but he suffered from self-doubt. “Molly tells me you are quite interested in our crazy house here.”
“She tells me there have been frightening disturbances, that this house is haunted.”
“Yes, it is.” John paused a moment, looked down at his coffee cup. “Did she tell you about our families?”
Shawn nodded. “She did. The Harts and Murdochs are famous. Nedra Hart was your grandmother, right?”
“She certainly was. She had a gift, so did Molly’s father, Samuel Murdoch.”
“Mr. Murdoch did publish many books. There is also a Pauline Murdoch, she wrote a book in the early fifties, about reincarnation. She was living in Scotland at the time...”
John could feel his right hand squeeze into a fist underneath the table. Why did Molly do this? he thought. Didn’t she know this man would dig into every bad thing?
John kept his voice cool and pleasant. “Pauline is Molly’s sister.”
“Does she still publish?”
“No. Pauline has been ill.” John rose from the table. “I’ll go get Molly.”
Molly had been detained while looking for the audiotape Will recorded from the cellar. She wanted to play the tape for Shawn. She also dug up the photographs. John found her in Will’s room, letting her know Shawn Rush was here. As they were walking down the staircase, he whispered, ”I didn’t know your sister had a book published.”
Molly abruptly stopped walking, making John almost bump into her. “I forgot about that book. It was only published overseas. She wrote it almost thirty years ago. She was in her early twenties, living with James—”
“Shawn Rush must have found that book.”
“Really? I’ve never read it.”
“We can talk about this later. He’s waiting.”
Molly wanted to take Shawn to the cellar, and had purchased several flashlights and had purchased a 35mm camera for this occasion. Before going outside, Molly had presented Shawn with the photographs and played the audiotape in the dining room.
However, Shawn did not see anything in the photos, light or shapes, which would suggest an apparition, including the plume above Belinda’s head, or any flaws in the photos of the twins. John and Molly looked at each other, shocked. The flaws were plain to them; Edna and Colleen had seen these flaws as well. Molly played the tape on her son’s tape recorder, but all Shawn could hear were the voices of Will and Belinda and Edna. Towards the end of the tape, where Molly could swear were the murmurings of a woman, John’s head snapped up from the table, his face burning red, as he looked over at his wife.
Shawn was feeling quite awkward by this time, with Molly’s angry exclamations and her husband’s nervousness. He began to
feel sorry for Molly, he noticed she had taken extra care with her appearance; her hair cut in a short, layered style, with makeup and a new sweater and jeans. John had also seen this, but failed to make any connection between his wife’s new friend and her sudden, revived interest in her looks.
John Hart sat quietly at the dining room table. “Molly, maybe you can take Shawn into the cellar. I need to sit for a
minute.”
Molly knew something was wrong with him. It was not like John to resort to any dramatic maneuvers around strangers. She noticed he was struggling to stay sober all evening, drinking coffee. The voice from the tape had disturbed him.
“Okay, honey,” she said. “I’ll take Shawn to the cellar, we won’t be long.”
John waited for them to go outside before he replayed the tape. He waited to hear her voice again.
He is
ashamed.
He is
ashamed.
John knew that voice did not belong to April Degan, as he was expecting. He had not heard the tape until tonight; he believed the voice to be April’s due to Molly and the children’s excited chatter, but he only needed to hear three words, in that Irish lilt, to recognize the voice of his grandmother, Nedra Hart.
Nedra died when John was in his early twenties; he and Molly had only been married a few years. She always knew she would live to be in her eighties, live a long life, and die a sudden death. Nedra and her husband, Dr. William Hart, had raised three sons, with Robert, John’s father, as the oldest. After the boys were born, Nedra more or less retired from using her psychic gifts in public, although she did write a few books on the subject of life after death. She wrote of the tunnel and the light
fifty years before anyone else started to believe in those things. She had a spirit guide/control named Tomah, who she spoke of at length. Nedra had been tested, as a young woman, by a psychologist friend of Dr. Hart‘s, who diagnosed her as schizophrenic with delusional tendencies, but highly functional. She laughed about that for years, as she grew more reclusive, preferring the life of a wife and mother to that of a famous freak.
Nedra had been small and dark, with the gray eyes John and Will had inherited. She wore her brown hair in a single
braid, her skin fair and freckled. She was always a little plump, no taller than five feet. John owned a framed photograph of her, taken around 1912, when she was in her twenties, wearing a high-necked, dark dress, and boots that buttoned on the sides. The photograph had been taken in a parlor, with Nedra standing, looking off to the left, a serious, distracted look on her face.
John wanted a martini, but he played the tape again. He was convinced he heard his grandmother. Each time he played
the tape, the voice became louder in his head. Nedra had been born and raised in Ireland, spent some time in England, and moved to the states when she was nineteen. She traveled with her brother throughout the country; she was already famous as a psychic back home.
Nedra had believed in reincarnation, but she was raised a Catholic in Ireland. She did not speak of reincarnation publicly or mentioned it in her books.
He is ashamed, John thought. Who is 'he’, Grandma? Why are you on this tape?
Will had painstakingly described, for an eight-year-old, his experience with his sister in the cellar. He mentioned the jar, how he saw the twin fetuses, remembering this image from his dreams. When the jar fell on the ground, he said a liquid spilled that smelled like death. John knew what the boy meant–the scent of rotting flowers and spoiled milk.
We only moved into this house because of the twins, John thought. That’s when everything went downhill. The twins have been the focus from the beginning, for all of us, the ghost included. Molly said she saw the ghost in the cellar with Mom and Colleen. Will and Belinda saw something down there, Belinda talked endlessly about the cold grip on her wrist. He is ashamed. I am ashamed. I have no control. Molly thinks she does, but she‘s wrong.
Shawn Rush was not the reason John had stayed sober today. Will had told his father about when he was almost suffocated in his bed and what happened to Belinda in the bathtub. The ghost came with the sound of buzzing, like a swarm of bees. John had heard that sound at night when he was trying to go to sleep, or whenever he was alone. He thought the sound could be coming from the furnace, in the vents, but that excuse could not be used in the summer, and he had checked for bee‘s nests in and around the house.
John hated bees. When he was six years old, he had accidentally stepped on a collapsed cardboard box in the woods behind his home and was attacked by a small swarm of yellow jackets that lived inside. Edna saw him running and screaming up to the house, which would be bypassed by the tornado weeks later. She sprayed him with the garden hose, later counting at least twenty bee stings on his body.
Belinda was now six. Will followed his father to Belinda’s room. John asked about the ghost touching her. He sat on her bed and looked around. This was maybe the second time he had been in her room since moving into the house. He remembered Molly painting this room, Belinda sharing Will’s room then. Molly had also painted the hallway and the twins’ nursery. She accomplished a lot of work before her bed-rest, although the place had been slowly turning her into a nervous wreck.
John felt so awkward around Belinda, the child he was the least close to, but he had to know what happened to her. “Will said the ghost wouldn’t stop...touching you...in the tub?”
“Yes.”
John wanted a martini now more than ever. “Where were you touched?”
“All over.”
“Your legs?”
“Right.”
She did not look him or Will in the eye, she just looked down as she sat at the bed, one leg hanging down from the edge, the other curled under her.
“Did he...touch your privates?”
Her eyes, so much like his, shifted to the left, then right. “Yes.”
“Between your legs?”
“Yes.”
“How come you didn’t tell me, Belinda? Why have you kept it to yourself?”
She gave her father that blank look, which he would misinterpret for a lack of intelligence but, in fact, was really despair. She thought her father and mother were hopeless and this despondency would dog her until that day in Las Vegas, over twenty years later. John would blame himself. He was supposed to have been the father, the protector, but he had failed.
Belinda shrugged her shoulders. “I told Will. Besides, the ghost hates the twins, not me. If he kills the twins, he’ll leave the rest of us alone.”
“Sam and Sarah are only babies,” Will said.
“He killed the other twins,” his sister replied. “April’s babies.”
*****
Shawn Rush could feel the icy coldness in the cellar, but not any odor. Maybe a little mildew, the smell of earth, but nothing unusual. “I’m sorry, Molly, but I don’t smell anything out of the ordinary for a cellar.”
Molly had only been in the cellar once since the children were terrorized. She had not touched anything, including the jar on the cellar floor. Whenever she came close to the jar, still resting in its fetid puddle, the rotted flower smell assaulted her nose,
making her nauseous.
Shawn can’t smell it because he is an outsider, Molly thought. He’s not a member of the family.
“You know,” Shawn said, “I managed to find a descendant of John and April Degan’s in town. Her name is Jean Larabee. April and John were her grandparents. She’s a very large woman and a recluse. I visited with her for a little while, but she didn’t really want to talk to me. I think she would rather speak with you. I don’t know why, maybe she trusts women more. Maybe she would tell you something she wouldn’t tell me.”
“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?”
“No, I don‘t think you‘re crazy, but the disturbances have only been witnessed by yourself and family members. No one outside the family has seen anything in or outside the house. Maybe Jean would be of more help right now. In the meantime, I’ll keep researching.”
“I was hoping for a book.”
“Me, too. But there has to be some sound evidence to put in a book, hearsay isn’t enough.”
Thank you for reading :)
Under Review
Yes, I am one of those dumb writers who reads her own author reviews. I need to stop, because it's too distracting and makes you feel like the girl who stayed home on prom night because she couldn't get a date. But there I go again, spending too much time Googling for opinions about my work when I should be working-in other words, writing new material.
My reviews from readers can be found at Goodreads, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble.com. Some have been five or four stars with some positive comments. Some are three or two stars with no comments, and I can deal with that. But when I receive one star and the comment,"Meh," it makes me wonder if this person even read the book. The Last Girl was intended for YA readers, but I know there are teen readers who are far more eloquent writers and reviewers. As a teen, all I was ever told to write were book reports. I didn't write anything like a critique until I was in college. My work has never been reviewed by a major publication, but I appreciate my book-page reviews, but I am honest enough to admit that negative reviews screw with my head.
It seems silly. I'll be forty years old in August, but the thoughtless remarks from a teen-or maybe younger or older-reviewer still bothers me, because I know how much work I put into my writing. I also deal with promotion, spending a lot of time on Facebook and Twitter. But none of this should concern the reader; they should just read the book. I want to know what they think. The author has offered the story as a gift, and not all gifts are appreciated at face value. When I read a book, I go into it with a pure heart. I really want to like it, especially if I have paid for it. But I don't always go with the hype; for instance, just because everyone else is reading Fifty Shades of Gray doesn't mean I'm going to drop my hard-earned K-Mart dollars on it. I read the summary, and the book doesn't appeal to me personally. However, a reader can simply stumble over a book and love it. The reader is looking for a leisure experience, not stressing over writing anything afterwards. Kind of like how I felt after finishing college as an English major. Yay! No more essays! But have the young readers been given too much power, in terms of sales and reviews? I think the answer is yes, but everyone goes where the money is, which sometimes means pandering to people you would never take seriously while working at K-Mart. Or next to you behind the register at McDonald's. People between the ages of twelve and twenty-three are not always known for a sharp sense of discernment, but neither are most adults. We never really know what we want until we already have it, then we want something else; so is the case with readers and writers. For the writer, whatever bad review you receive for one book or story could very well even out when you receive a good review for the next book or story. For the reader, one is bound to bump into a book or plot they don't like, but another reader might love it.
The ego of the creative person is sometimes ridiculous, even to themselves. A negative or stupid review seems to hurt my feelings more than when a customer or co-worker at K-Mart is rude to me, and the answer why is simple-when my shift ends at the store, I go home; however, I can spend two years or more working on a book. Writing is where my dreams are, and what I love can't be stored in Layaway. :)
My reviews from readers can be found at Goodreads, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble.com. Some have been five or four stars with some positive comments. Some are three or two stars with no comments, and I can deal with that. But when I receive one star and the comment,"Meh," it makes me wonder if this person even read the book. The Last Girl was intended for YA readers, but I know there are teen readers who are far more eloquent writers and reviewers. As a teen, all I was ever told to write were book reports. I didn't write anything like a critique until I was in college. My work has never been reviewed by a major publication, but I appreciate my book-page reviews, but I am honest enough to admit that negative reviews screw with my head.
It seems silly. I'll be forty years old in August, but the thoughtless remarks from a teen-or maybe younger or older-reviewer still bothers me, because I know how much work I put into my writing. I also deal with promotion, spending a lot of time on Facebook and Twitter. But none of this should concern the reader; they should just read the book. I want to know what they think. The author has offered the story as a gift, and not all gifts are appreciated at face value. When I read a book, I go into it with a pure heart. I really want to like it, especially if I have paid for it. But I don't always go with the hype; for instance, just because everyone else is reading Fifty Shades of Gray doesn't mean I'm going to drop my hard-earned K-Mart dollars on it. I read the summary, and the book doesn't appeal to me personally. However, a reader can simply stumble over a book and love it. The reader is looking for a leisure experience, not stressing over writing anything afterwards. Kind of like how I felt after finishing college as an English major. Yay! No more essays! But have the young readers been given too much power, in terms of sales and reviews? I think the answer is yes, but everyone goes where the money is, which sometimes means pandering to people you would never take seriously while working at K-Mart. Or next to you behind the register at McDonald's. People between the ages of twelve and twenty-three are not always known for a sharp sense of discernment, but neither are most adults. We never really know what we want until we already have it, then we want something else; so is the case with readers and writers. For the writer, whatever bad review you receive for one book or story could very well even out when you receive a good review for the next book or story. For the reader, one is bound to bump into a book or plot they don't like, but another reader might love it.
The ego of the creative person is sometimes ridiculous, even to themselves. A negative or stupid review seems to hurt my feelings more than when a customer or co-worker at K-Mart is rude to me, and the answer why is simple-when my shift ends at the store, I go home; however, I can spend two years or more working on a book. Writing is where my dreams are, and what I love can't be stored in Layaway. :)
June 14, 2012
Karma House at Smashwords.com
I have published Karma House over at Smashwords.com as an ebook for $1.99 http://bit.ly/M9JQM7 The trailer is at the book page and also at You Tube http://youtu.be/N8ih0x9wWhE :) Leave a comment and tell me what you think of my homemade trailers.
June 11, 2012
Why Libraries Are Important
Last Friday, I had the pleasure of finding my own book, Karma House, on the shelf at my local library. After getting over the shock(I cried after I got home), I thought about how communities still need their libraries.
Here's the reasons:
1. Everything Is Free
In this economy, people can not always afford to buy books for pleasure, along with Kindles, Nooks, iPads and smart phones. Some people have sold their computers(or had their PCs or laptops stolen, not to mention their cell phones)and cut off internet access in their homes to save money. These people then go to the library to use the computers, looking at job listings, Facebook, and everything else. The few things that bug me is when parents bring their young children and can't keep them quiet or older kids and teens who occupy the computers to play games. Someone might need to check their bank statement or pay a bill, and some thirteen year old is screwing around with Farmville. Aside from the things that make me hostile, there's other free stuff at the library; namely, CDs and DVDs. The movies are usually old, but I rented Catfish from my library, a movie I never would have paid money for to rent(although I enjoyed it). The CDs are not usually recent releases, but you can find an old favorite and even rip it on to your computer(not legal, but everyone does it).
2. Libraries Like Readers and Writers
Libraries now offer to help readers download ebooks, and this includes free books. Many indie authors, including myself, have books to offer for free. I have yet to check if The Last Girl is available through my library's ebook system, but it might be worth checking out. Also, libraries offer books from independent publishers, including my publisher for the paperback of Karma House, James A. Rock and Co. It may have taken two years to arrive at my library, but it was no less a thrill.
3. Libraries Are Still The Best Place To Discover New Authors
I never would have read Terry Pratchett or Barbara Kingsolver if not for wandering in the library. As a kid, I found a lot of favorites at my elementary school library, including a book called Gypsy Courier(can anyone tell me the name of the author? The book was about a gypsy boy who helps a resistance group during WWII by delivering messages)and another called Casilda of the Rising Moon, about Saint Casilda. I wasn't even Catholic, but I found the story fascinating. In the days before Bookmobiles, we had R.I.F, Reading Is Fundamental. I read Summer of the Swans because R.I.F gave me a free copy.
4. Libraries Teach You To Respect Books
In the '80s, when I was growing up, I was taught that books were important because of the expense, not just what was on the page. The school librarian could spend weeks in the summer checking text books over for scribbles, using huge rubber erasers to remove roughly drawn hearts and other declarations of love, penises, boobs, and rock band logos, along with obscene limericks. Old chewing gum was the worst; the book would have to be thrown out, pages stuck together by a pink wad of Bazooka or Bubblicious. These little acts of vandalism would cost the school money, and school books were becoming more expensive. In the inner cities, kids had to share books that were falling apart, pages missing. I look back and realize how lucky I was. I discovered book stores by the time I was twelve, spending my allowance on popular authors, discovering Stephen King and Jackie Collins. Clive Barker's Books Of Blood. Lace by Shirley Conran. Flowers In The Attic, being passed around by the girls in my ninth grade biology class. By junior high, I learned that the popular kids did not hang out at the library, but I didn't care, I liked the quiet. I have to admit, sometimes I love animals and books more than people. My manager at K-Mart was kidding with me one night, because I have a tendency to take my book or magazine to the much-quieter training room to read instead of the noisy break room. I felt the same way about his comments as I did the popular kids in eighth grade-what do they know, anyway? Besides, the weather has been hot, and the library always has air-conditioning. :)
Here's the reasons:
1. Everything Is Free
In this economy, people can not always afford to buy books for pleasure, along with Kindles, Nooks, iPads and smart phones. Some people have sold their computers(or had their PCs or laptops stolen, not to mention their cell phones)and cut off internet access in their homes to save money. These people then go to the library to use the computers, looking at job listings, Facebook, and everything else. The few things that bug me is when parents bring their young children and can't keep them quiet or older kids and teens who occupy the computers to play games. Someone might need to check their bank statement or pay a bill, and some thirteen year old is screwing around with Farmville. Aside from the things that make me hostile, there's other free stuff at the library; namely, CDs and DVDs. The movies are usually old, but I rented Catfish from my library, a movie I never would have paid money for to rent(although I enjoyed it). The CDs are not usually recent releases, but you can find an old favorite and even rip it on to your computer(not legal, but everyone does it).
2. Libraries Like Readers and Writers
Libraries now offer to help readers download ebooks, and this includes free books. Many indie authors, including myself, have books to offer for free. I have yet to check if The Last Girl is available through my library's ebook system, but it might be worth checking out. Also, libraries offer books from independent publishers, including my publisher for the paperback of Karma House, James A. Rock and Co. It may have taken two years to arrive at my library, but it was no less a thrill.
3. Libraries Are Still The Best Place To Discover New Authors
I never would have read Terry Pratchett or Barbara Kingsolver if not for wandering in the library. As a kid, I found a lot of favorites at my elementary school library, including a book called Gypsy Courier(can anyone tell me the name of the author? The book was about a gypsy boy who helps a resistance group during WWII by delivering messages)and another called Casilda of the Rising Moon, about Saint Casilda. I wasn't even Catholic, but I found the story fascinating. In the days before Bookmobiles, we had R.I.F, Reading Is Fundamental. I read Summer of the Swans because R.I.F gave me a free copy.
4. Libraries Teach You To Respect Books
In the '80s, when I was growing up, I was taught that books were important because of the expense, not just what was on the page. The school librarian could spend weeks in the summer checking text books over for scribbles, using huge rubber erasers to remove roughly drawn hearts and other declarations of love, penises, boobs, and rock band logos, along with obscene limericks. Old chewing gum was the worst; the book would have to be thrown out, pages stuck together by a pink wad of Bazooka or Bubblicious. These little acts of vandalism would cost the school money, and school books were becoming more expensive. In the inner cities, kids had to share books that were falling apart, pages missing. I look back and realize how lucky I was. I discovered book stores by the time I was twelve, spending my allowance on popular authors, discovering Stephen King and Jackie Collins. Clive Barker's Books Of Blood. Lace by Shirley Conran. Flowers In The Attic, being passed around by the girls in my ninth grade biology class. By junior high, I learned that the popular kids did not hang out at the library, but I didn't care, I liked the quiet. I have to admit, sometimes I love animals and books more than people. My manager at K-Mart was kidding with me one night, because I have a tendency to take my book or magazine to the much-quieter training room to read instead of the noisy break room. I felt the same way about his comments as I did the popular kids in eighth grade-what do they know, anyway? Besides, the weather has been hot, and the library always has air-conditioning. :)
May 17, 2012
Trailer Park
How does an independent author promote their work? It seems as if the writer hits a wall after Facebook and Twitter. But there is another new tool known as the book trailer. You don't have to be a filmmaker to put a trailer together, but it would probably help.
When I realized I could use the MovieMaker feature on my PC, I started downloading photos I could find from Facebook and other sites, which I assume are for public consumption. Music? That's when I learned something interesting. After searching through my CD collection, I downloaded some of these songs into my PC. Oh, snap! I can't transfer any of these songs to my trailer, and my computer informed me to remove the music file. Well, I didn't want any trouble, so no awesome music for my trailer. I pondered on this problem for a day or two. I was at my job at K-Mart, folding ladies' jeans, when I realized that my voice belongs only to me, so why don't I simply narrate the trailer? But how? I dropped the jeans, made sure a manager wasn't watching me, and dashed to the electronics department. I wasn't sure what I was looking for, maybe an MP3 player. I have never owned one but, as I roamed the aisles, passing the TV sets, CDs, and batteries, I found what I needed. A voice recorder. Forty bucks. The recorder might come in handy for other things, although I couldn't think of another use besides my trailer. At breaktime, I bought the recorder with my credit card.
I am one of those people; once I get started with any kind of project, I like to see it through. After returning home, I went to my computer. My mother, who is retired, has a tendency to keep the volume on her TV quite high. Rather than get into another discussion about hearing aides, I shut the door to my office room and sat down to figure out how to use a voice recorder and download my voice as a file. After installing the batteries(baby steps)and reading the instructions, I recorded my narration(Ray Thorpe is falling in love for the first time...). I played it back; it sounded okay. I don't like having my picture taken, and hearing the sound of my voice made feel almost as self-conscious. I then proceeded to download the voice file after figuring out the software(another baby step). This file was accepted by MovieMaker, so I could finish the trailer. Upon completion, I went to bed.
The next day, I watched my homemade trailer all the way through. I was satisfied with it, considering my inexperience. Time to upload. I went to my Facebook page first to post. Then I went to You Tube. To upload your video there, you have to remember your password, which I had failed to write down, so I had to make a new one(baby step #3). Then I had to change my .wimp file to a .wmv file(who wants to be a wimp, anyway?). More patience...patience. Keywords, other bullshit. Finally, my trailer was uploaded and ready for others to watch. I went to Twitter and Google+. My head hurt. I was neglecting my new writing in favor of more promotion for Blood In Trust. I wanted the book to be successful, but I'm an indie writer with an ebook. I don't have Anne Rice's PR machine, and there are indie authors with trailers slicker than mine. These trailers look almost like little movies, and there are people who make book trailers for a fee. However, I do not have a disposable income to hire other people to help me. The best thing about working for yourself is what you learn; such as how to use MovieMaker and uploading videos. I know, these are things most people under the age of twenty-five learn in high school. I'm a bit late, but I'm catching on. :)
When I realized I could use the MovieMaker feature on my PC, I started downloading photos I could find from Facebook and other sites, which I assume are for public consumption. Music? That's when I learned something interesting. After searching through my CD collection, I downloaded some of these songs into my PC. Oh, snap! I can't transfer any of these songs to my trailer, and my computer informed me to remove the music file. Well, I didn't want any trouble, so no awesome music for my trailer. I pondered on this problem for a day or two. I was at my job at K-Mart, folding ladies' jeans, when I realized that my voice belongs only to me, so why don't I simply narrate the trailer? But how? I dropped the jeans, made sure a manager wasn't watching me, and dashed to the electronics department. I wasn't sure what I was looking for, maybe an MP3 player. I have never owned one but, as I roamed the aisles, passing the TV sets, CDs, and batteries, I found what I needed. A voice recorder. Forty bucks. The recorder might come in handy for other things, although I couldn't think of another use besides my trailer. At breaktime, I bought the recorder with my credit card.
I am one of those people; once I get started with any kind of project, I like to see it through. After returning home, I went to my computer. My mother, who is retired, has a tendency to keep the volume on her TV quite high. Rather than get into another discussion about hearing aides, I shut the door to my office room and sat down to figure out how to use a voice recorder and download my voice as a file. After installing the batteries(baby steps)and reading the instructions, I recorded my narration(Ray Thorpe is falling in love for the first time...). I played it back; it sounded okay. I don't like having my picture taken, and hearing the sound of my voice made feel almost as self-conscious. I then proceeded to download the voice file after figuring out the software(another baby step). This file was accepted by MovieMaker, so I could finish the trailer. Upon completion, I went to bed.
The next day, I watched my homemade trailer all the way through. I was satisfied with it, considering my inexperience. Time to upload. I went to my Facebook page first to post. Then I went to You Tube. To upload your video there, you have to remember your password, which I had failed to write down, so I had to make a new one(baby step #3). Then I had to change my .wimp file to a .wmv file(who wants to be a wimp, anyway?). More patience...patience. Keywords, other bullshit. Finally, my trailer was uploaded and ready for others to watch. I went to Twitter and Google+. My head hurt. I was neglecting my new writing in favor of more promotion for Blood In Trust. I wanted the book to be successful, but I'm an indie writer with an ebook. I don't have Anne Rice's PR machine, and there are indie authors with trailers slicker than mine. These trailers look almost like little movies, and there are people who make book trailers for a fee. However, I do not have a disposable income to hire other people to help me. The best thing about working for yourself is what you learn; such as how to use MovieMaker and uploading videos. I know, these are things most people under the age of twenty-five learn in high school. I'm a bit late, but I'm catching on. :)
May 8, 2012
Blood In Trust trailer
I have put together a trailer for my new vampire novel, Blood In Trust. It's at Facebook, Twitter, and You Tube at http://youtu.be/6hJcPWU4REY Take a look and tell me what you think:)
