Katherine Villyard's Blog, page 11

Under the Sea

Electronics don’t work in water.

Melusine had a “dry room,” where she kept her Xbox, her computer, her television, her cellphone. The glow from her monitor and a collection of LED lights illuminated the cave walls in blue and green and pink. She would run a nice bath and watch Netflix or play games from the tub. She ordered sushi takeout from Uber Eats and ate it in front of her monitor, working for hours on her website—social media for merfolk.

The internet latency was terrible. Not enough to go to the sea witch and ask for legs, though.

Adoption Agency

We sat together in the dark, musty office, nervous. The woman across the desk had a wrinkle between her forehead as she frowned at her computer, then back at the papers. “So, what made you want to adopt a baby?” Her voice was bored, toneless. The keyboard clattered.

“We’ve always wanted children, but we… can’t.” My wife sobbed into her lace handkerchief.

 “You didn’t list your career.” Clatter, clatter.

“Data center. Night shift.” Hopefully that explained my pallor.

“Stay at home wife.” Actress, pre-talkies.

She gave us an appraising look. She wasn’t allowed to ask whether we were “Undead Americans.”

Corporate Witch

She closed the conference room doors and knelt on the meeting table. A packet of salt provided a circle around her. She called upon the forces of plenty, of power, of clever, strategic war, and lit a green candle in the center of the table.

Outside, visible through the floor to ceiling glass, there was traffic thirteen floors below. The big meeting was soon.

The ritual ended. She left the candle burning in the center of the table, climbed down, smoothed out her power suit—green jacket, green blazer, white blouse, black shoes. She swept the salt into a wastebasket.

Urban Wolf

The moon glowed, but it was the streetlights that illuminated the streets. He trotted through trash-strewn, dark, reeking alleys, avoiding honking automobiles, and slipped into the park. Everything glowed in a red haze. He caught and ate a squirrel, chased dogs, cats, and cars. At some point it rained, and he reveled in it, racing joyfully through puddles and sending water splashing high over his head. When the men came, he charged them, hackles up, and bit one of them.

He woke up naked in animal control. The sign on the door read, “Hold for Rabies.”

Just another Wednesday, then.

In 100 words

The moon glowed, but it was the streetlights that illuminated the streets. He trotted through trash-strewn, dark, reeking alleys, avoiding honking automobiles, and slipped into the park. Everything glowed in a red haze. He caught and ate a squirrel, chased dogs, cats, and cars. At some point it rained, and he reveled in it, racing joyfully through puddles and sending water splashing high over his head. When the men came, he charged them, hackles up, and bit one of them.

He woke up naked in animal control. The sign on the door read, “Hold for Rabies.”

Just another Wednesday, then.

Goodreads Giveaway!

Want a free copy of my book Love Stories? You can get one through this Goodreads Giveaway! Entry is open from March 1 to March 15. Winners announced on March 15.

And hey, while you’re there? Maybe follow me on Goodreads!

Novel update

So, based on feedback, it’s basically not possible to withhold information from my first person main character narrator and tell the reader. I mean, I feel like it should be! but no matter how sledgehammery I think I’m being, people just don’t get it.

So, enter more POV characters. Ludwig is returning to explain it all to you–you know he loves it–and Abraham’s wife is also a POV character because this way she’s a character and not a MacGuffin and can help me pass the Bechdel test. 😉 She didn’t have enough to do in the previous draft, and this answers some questions someone had, so.

I’m actually super frustrated about the whole People Not Getting It thing, but I really like the new material! so I think it’ll be for the best. I mean, who doesn’t love more Ludwig? 😀

I’m in Publisher’s Weekly!

I hear I’m in Publisher’s Weekly today! 😀 I… haven’t seen it, though.

Coincidentally, the ebook of the title in question is 99 cents right now most places ebooks are sold. So if you’d like to read it, now is the time to buy it, while it’s cheap!

Hardware update

So, when talking about the Librem 5, I mentioned that I had a really old Librem 13 that I wasn’t using as much as I would like.

Since then, the laptop that I was running Qubes on seized up and died, so… I’m once again running Qubes on my beautiful Librem 13.

Apparently, this laptop, in addition to being pretty, is darned near indestructible. I bought it in 2017! I stopped using it for Qubes because I had an issue with Qubes freezing randomly, but it’s stopped doing that for the most part. It’s an older machine, but it’s an older machine that I put a larger, better hard drive and more RAM into.

In short: Go, Purism, go!

(I’m less particular about the Windows laptop and got a Dell refurb.)

Also, restoring Qubes onto new hardware is a “like nothing ever happened” experience–my favorite!

Kirkus likes my book…

“An imaginative collection that puts a modern spin on beloved fairy tales and myths.” — Kirkus Reviews

You can see more of the review here.