Malcolm R. Campbell's Blog, page 241

Ides of March 99 Cent Sale

There's no need to be scared of the Ides of March. As Infoplease reminds us, there's an Ides every month (if you use the old Roman Calendar).

But, since the words "Ides of March" tend to get people's attention, Vanilla Heart Publishing is having a 99 cent Jock Stewart and the Missing Sea of Fire e-book sale on Smashwords. The e-book is available on Smashwords in multiple formats, icluding Kindle.

OFFICIAL BOOK BLURB:

Mainstream humor with a dash of mystery... A throwback to Hollywood's film noir reporters, Jock Stewart is out of touch with the looming world of digital journalism.

While he goes out of his way to mock those in authority by pretending to kowtow to them, he admits he does his best work by "being an asshole." A mix of Don Rickles and Don Quixote, Stewart is the man for the job when the skirts are up and the chips are down.

Hard-boiled reporter Jock Stewart wakes up on the morning after the Star-Gazer office party with a hangover and an old flame in his bed and he cuddles up with the mayor's wife in the back seat of a 1953 Desoto. Between these defining moments, he investigates the theft of the mayor's race horse Sea of Fire and the murder of his publisher's girl friend, Bambi Hill.

Stewart discovers the truth for his news stories via an interview style based on lies, pretense and audacious behavior.


--Malcolm

My reading inadvertently merged with my writing

My work on Sarabande, a heroine's journey, novel-in-progress, is unfolding much like my work on three previous novels: it sends me to Amazon, my bookshelf and numerous Internet sites for facts and inspiration.

However, sometimes raw synchronicity steps into the picture and brings me well-timed nourishment I didn't count on for on-going research.

During a recent trip to Florida to visit my brother and his family, I finished reading the novel I took with me sooner than expected. So, I stole a copy of Zora Neale Hurston's poetic, heroine's journey novel off his bookshelf. Set in early 20th century Florida, Their Eyes Were Watching God is a strong, beautiful novel. It brought new perspectives about women seeking validation and authenticity into my consciousness.

Before an after the trip, I was busy reading an advance reader copy of Patricia Damery's novel Snakes , due out from il Piccolo editions March 21st. The novel focuses on the story of a woman who leaves the family farm in the Midwest to go to college in California, and then wonders about the choices she's made.


In my review of this book in Literary Afiionado, I write that "Snakes is a poetic meditation about the intertwined cycles of life and farming. It is also an evolving letter of love from Angela to her recently deceased father about life as it was, mundane and unexpected daily events, and, of course, the snakes. Snakes and the cycles of life are constant images throughout the book; snakes in the corn crib, snakes in the garden, snakes in the kitchen. We fear snakes, yet we also see them as protectors of the land and as symbols of the natural stages of everlasting life."

There couldn't have been a better time for me to read and review Snakes because it is very much on point to my needs as an author struggling to tell a story from a woman's point of view. Janie, a black woman living in a long-ago culture of central Florida in Hurston's novel and Angela, a Midwestern-born white farmer's daughter transplanted to California in Damery's novel, are very different people in settings that could hardly be more disparate. Yet, there I found that my work on Sarabande made me a wonderful melting pot for the universal sentiments in two novels that inadvertently merged with my writing.

You May Also Like

The Shadow Knows – Books for the Journey - resources for understanding the concept of the shadow as it applies to the hero's journey.

Portrait of a Writer as a Young Man - I don't like being asked when I decided to become a writer, but that doesn't mean I can't answer the question.

Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of "Garden of Heaven: an Odyssey"

Save $$$ and trees: read an e-book this week

I think that I shall never see
a billboard lovely as a tree.
Perhaps, unless the billboards fall,
I'll never see a tree at all.
- Ogden Nash

I think that I shall never see
a paperback tall as a free.
Perhaps unless more e-books fly,
Fewer trees will each the sky
--Malcolm R. Campbell

Welcome to the 2011 "Read an E-book" Celebration at Vanilla Heart Publishing and Smashwords. Get 25% off on our VHP featured books, including "The Sun Singer."

The Sun Singer

Young Robert Adams is going on a family vacation unlike any other family vacation in the history of the universe. His parents worry about the family's secrets, but they refuse to share. His grandfather has been injured, so he no longer remembers, though he does know he left a mission incompleted and that those dear to him are in danger. Follow Robert into a world where magic runs deeper than the mountain rivers, and where he will have to use a rare talent he has up to now tried to forget.

Malcolm

When do all those book promo superlatives turn you into an addict?

I enjoy reading through the ads and blurbs in the Baker&Talor book catalogue to find new titles for my TBR list and check in on what's happening in the world of copywriter superlatives.

As a reader, I need more an more superlatives every month because they are like cocaine. It used to be that the words "an enjoyable novel" got me to plunk down my money. Then, I became numb to that, and needed to see "a blazing and enjoyable novel." Soon, the word "novel" was forgotten altogether, and everything became "a read."

A gut-ripping read. A jaw-dropping read. A fast-paced read. A blood-curdling read.

In the February catalogue, there are enough superlatives in the full-paged ad for Delirious that I'm now delirious from the blurbs alone:

blistering
fast-paced
edge of sanity
mind-bending
great thriller
high-speed thrill ride
electrifying ride
non-stop suspense
fiendishly clever
techno savvy

If the novel delivers, then what? I'm going to be damaged goods until I can score a new book and that promises an even greater high. My mind will be bent as I try to cope with the withdrawal and the drain on my income and the inevitable fast-paced ride to the rehab center where I won't be allowd to escape until I can stand up in front of a group of people and admit that I was an addict out for a high-speed thrill ride.

Brothers and sisters, I will say meekly, one adjective leads to two, and two lead two four, and pretty soon you can't get enough no matter how fiendishly clever you think you are. Learn from those of us who have gone to Delirious and back and have lived to tell the tale. Think about your families and your self-esteem and what your brains look like when they're on adjectives.

Let us pray it's not too late.

Malcolm R. Campbell
Author of Soul-Strangling Hero's Journey Novels
Gardern of Heaven

Potentially shunned by Prince William and Catherine...and other matters

Shockingly, my invitation to the royal wedding never arrived. I feel less depressed about it today, though, as I read that the President and the First Lady were also not invited. I don't know how the President feels, but I'm hoping the whole thing is a misunderstanding rather than an intentional shunning.

Teaser Tuesday

This week's Teaser Tuesday, "The Other Life" by Ellen Meister is here. After writing about alternate universes in The Sun Singer, I'm immediately intrigued by other novels about parallel lives in different realms.

Lee Libro's Review of The Sun Singer

Author Lee Libro (Swimming With Wings) posted a nice review of The Sun Singer on her Literary Magic blog. Thanks for reading, Lee.


You May Also Like

What do you need to become a successful author? Thoughts about the long haul to writing success along with a few links.

Hero's Journey: Books for the trip. I like the way Jonathan Shay has focused on war veterans and their needs with his hero's journey books Achilles in Vietnam and Odysseus in America.

Malcolm R. Campbell
"Garden of Heaven: an Odyssey"
Author of hero's journey novels
http://www.malcolmrcampbell.com

Books that help authors: Premium Promotional Tips for Writers

Once you publish your novel, how will readers find out about it?

The question may be somewhat moot if your book is being hyped with a $200,000 promotional budget by one of the mega-publishing conglomerates. But, if you self-published or went with a small press, you have work to do.

Fortunately, others have figured out how to navigate the promotional road ahead of you and are willing to share. I like Jo-Anne Vandermeulen's approach in her pragmatic, real-world e-book Premium Promotional Tips for Writers .

I like her approach because, she's been there and done that. She didn't pay a marketing company to figure out how to sell her work; she learned what it took by going out and doing it. Her information in "Premium Promotional Tips for Writers" is the kind that you can implement today.

Malcolm R. Campbell
"Garden of Heaven: an Odyssey"
Author of hero's journey novels
MalcolmRCampbell.Com

etc. pondering wolves in the scheme of things

I'm a firm believer in the proposition that nature knows what it's doing.

We tinker, I think, at our peril. For example, some say life would be better in numerous ways if we got rid of the wolves. Look what happened to Little Red Riding Hood, for goodness sake.

I'm partial to wolves. I used a pair of white wolves, Lord and Lady Snowdrift, out of Montana's history as minor characters in Garden of Heaven: an Odyssey because they helped illustrate the insanity of one man who killed wolves with the relish of a preacher charging after Satan.

Learning to live with nature instead of separate from nature is, I think, not only good citizenship and good stewardship, but pragmatically essential to our own survival in our finite world. When we do not consider the consequences of our quick fixes to such challenges as living with wolves, a domino effect of consequences often occurs.

Case it point: removing wolves from Glacier National Park was previoulsly a death warrant for news stands of aspen trees returning to fire-damaged areas. And that's just the beginning. Bringing wolves back has, however, helped the aspens. Why? Without the wolves, there were too many elk, and too many elk meant a lot of hungry critters munching their way through the trees.

Turns out, we need the wolves more than we thought we did. In fact, a whole ecosystem depended on them being there.

Conservation biologist Cristina Eisenberg has much to teach us as she explores the relationships between predators and prey in her wonderful book The Elk's Tooth . While all of us may not need to read this book to craft a positive attitude toward nature as it was meant to be, the concept of trophic cascades--habitats, biodiversity, the food change from top to bottom--is an idea worthy of consideration each time we get the urge to tinker with an ecosystem that is already perfect.

As for how we might keep an excessive number of Little Red Riding Hoods in check, that is a challenge I'll leave for the philosophers to ponder.

--Malcolm

February Special - 'The Sun Singer'

This month, you can purchase the PDF-format version of The Sun Singer for only $3.99. The novel, published by Vanilla Heart, is also available in paperback and Kindle versions. Here's the link for the special.

Book Description

When young Robert Adams sees the statue of the Sun Singer in a lonely meadow, he experiences a powerful flow of energy that brings him the gift of prophecy. Knowledge of the future is exhilarating: his friends even call him the Soothsayer of West Wood Street. Then the gift becomes deadly serious, and he tries to throw his cursed talent away.

In failing health, Grandfather Elliott sends Robert on a dangerous journey. The aging avatar has left old missions unfinished and lives are at stake. After stepping through a portal into look-alike world, Robert knows he must resurrect his dangerous gift to survive.


This hero's journey story takes readers deep into a hidden mountain world where time and space can be bent by an apple wood hiking staff--if one knows how to call forth its power. Robert must learn the secrets of the sun before his grandfather's friends are destroyed by the dark magic of the moon.

Not a small matter, but Robert hopes that in the process, he finds his way back home.

The Sun Singer is set in Glacier National Park.

Praise for "The Sun Singer"

"The Sun Singer is gloriously convoluted, with threads that turn on themselves and lyrical prose on which you can float down the mysterious, sun-shaded channels of this charmingly liquid story." – Diana Gabaldon, Echo in the Bone (Outlander)

"It is high adventure that his grandfather plans for Robert and for all in the family. We are not surprised to learn that Mother disapproves of the journey. Do not mothers always disapprove of the fun grandfathers plan for the boy in the family? It is not just fun, in this case, that Mother opposes; she is against dabbling in magic." – Living Jackson Magazine

"This magical coming-of-age tale takes the reader through a labyrinth as a teenage boy/man sets off into the cosmic dimensions of the unknown to redeem his grandfather's kingdom and rightfully claim his position in life as a true leader. What I'd give to have Malcolm Campbell's imagination, wisdom, wit, and mastery of the written word." – Mel Mathews, SamSara (Malcolm Clay Series)

etc - brenda

I thought about Brenda today while working on a scene in Sarabande.

Years have passed by since I saw her, that frail, dark-haired child whose world was defined by the walls of the state department of mental health center where she lived, where I was--for a brief time--a manager of one of the group homes.

In those days, I had high hopes for the adults, young adults and children who came to that center after years of being warehoused in an older state facility where nobody got a lot of care and the mentally ill and retarded individuals were simply out of place and out of mind.

Brenda was profoundly mentally retarded, quite likely autistic. Her paperwork said little. Her parents were unknown. I knew one thing, though, that had not been entered into her file.

She had been sexually abused. I knew because she told me. Not with words, but inadvertently one night when I was--in a Shamanistic way--asking what had happened and what we could do for her. The abuse played a primary role in who she was and who she had become.

I think of her as I work on my novel because I'm looking at womens issues, issues which go to the warp and weft of our society's fabric: rape, assault, abuse, stimulus deprivation. Like Brenda, many of the people in our facility of group homes would never have come there had they been cared for even minimally from the day they were born.

One of Eric Berne's more cynical comments comes to mind: words to the effect of, when you look at how a person has turned out, consider what you would have to do to them as children to create what you are now seeing. That gives you an idea about their background, what happened to them, why they are developmentally disabled and/or suffering from mental illness.

Brenda will always remain in my memory as the resident I could have helped more, had I known more, had I been in that job longer, had there been some obvious way to intervene in her life. In those days when my dreams were more psychic, I saw her playing with others while I--knowing I was moving to another town--saw myself looking out a window at the far stars.

I have no skills for handling such matters other than, perhaps, hope. Suffice it to say, I was not then or now a miracle worker. Nonetheless, I wonder if more could have been said and done.

She was part of a pivotal moment when I was opting not to go into psychology. This moment begins many of my what if? speculations about life's pathways.


Malcolm R. Campbell is the author of The Sun Singer .

Saturday's Bits and Pieces

"If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular?" -- Anonymous


The authors at Vanilla Heart Publishing are thinking about love and chocolate as Valentine's Day approaches. We're thinking about you, too, and hope you have a special someone to share the day with. If you enjoy reading to each other, we've got the perfect gift: a free PDF book filled with love, stories, humor, and recipes. For your copy, click here: Malcolm's Valentine's Gift.


Finally, Sunetra Gupta's latest novel Go Good in Black, published two years ago in New Delhi, has found a U.S. publisher. It will be released next month from Clockroot Books. The website includes a comment from my review of the earlier edition:

Well worth the wait: So Good in Black, Sunetra Gupta's first novel in ten years, is character-driven literary fiction, featuring a non-linear plot, Spartan passages of stylized and pointed verbal jousting between characters, and highly evocative descriptive passages... Gupta's most powerful work to date challenges the reader with the dynamic and often contradictory shadows cast by friendship across the illusory counterpane of certainty and time.


Deborah J. Ledford has followed up her stunning debut novel Staccato (Second Wind Publishing, 2009) with the highly readable, taut thriller Snare. Set in the Great Smoky Mountains and the Taos Pueblo in Central New Mexico, the novel has been nominated for a Hillerman Sky Award. My review is posted on March of Books.


And, for those of you who write, here's a tempting new anthology from PEN Canada coming out next week. See January Magazine's comments here.

My writing focus continues to be Sarabande, the heroine's journey sequel to The Sun Singer . Once NaNoWriMo was over, I returned to my usual leisurely writing pace where I listen to my muse when she has something to say and don't worry about deadlines when she doesn't.

Have a great weekend and a happy Valentine's Day.

--Malcolm