William L. Domme's Blog, page 4

Writer’s Block and How to Cure It.

Give up!

Yes. Give up. You are a writer and you are blocked; not from a former facebook friend, not from a person you maybe called too much, not because of that hunk of Smoked Gouda you ate late last night when you felt bummed and thought no one was looking. You are blocked in the head, albeit not as violently as receiving a block to the head but if you don’t relieve the pressure soon from not being able to do that thing you used to do so much more easily than sneaking cheese at one in the morning you are going to explode and hopefully no one will be around to see that lest they get spattered in characters and dialogue, motif and theme. Eww, gross! Who got characterization all over me?

Take a breath and hold it.

Little longer.

Feel like you’re about to pass out?

Good.

Now you’re only thinking about one thing. Survival. When is this guy gonna say, “Simon says, breath.”?

Did you see that?

I see you’re nodding those blue cheeks. Yep, I wrote “breath”.

And…

Breathe.

I’ll wait while you catch your breath.

See, I was able to write a misspelled word, a minor editorial infraction committed, yet full of dire consequences in the context of this exercise. Simon didn’t say, “breathe,” and you went on struggling to stay conscious while also acutely aware of my little scribbler’s crime. Ooooh, a misspelled word. How could he go on?

That’s the source of your writer’s block. You’ve probably written some amazing work in your time. Most likely you’ve got even more amazing work yet to come. But, even in the face of losing consciousness you couldn’t overlook a minor mistake. And you cannot drive through a first draft with that kind of shit on your mind. You paralyze any start you may have made wondering how much work is going to be left down the road in the wake of the big bang of any first draft.

Stop!

There’s one more thing you need to see. Grab the magnifying glass, some latex gloves, and follow me to the mass spectrometer.

Ahh, here. See that?

Cheetos and hummus. Don’t look away.

Extra foam lemon caramel latte with a nutmeg dusting? Are you kidding me? You can’t be blocked to come up with something that creative.

You’ve been celebrating, haven’t you? Yes, that paragraph you wrote last fall about Zip-line builders on the helium loaded satellite NASA built as a last ditch revenue stream who became seduced by the whistle-pigs stampeding on the unlit half of the lunar surface then devised a reckless plan to zip line to the dark sty of the moon was a really transcendent moment in the history of your work.

You’ve been celebrating much too long. Don’t do that. Don’t do it when you win contributor’s copies and don’t do it when you hit the lottery and sell 100,000 of those little books you’ve been working on.

Remember not being able to breathe? One day that will be for real. One day you won’t be able to celebrate the success ad naseum. Get back to work as soon as you can.

Every word counts.

You’ve done it before. Do it again. And again.

One letter follows another follows another. Worry about the corrections when you have something to correct. A novel. Rough as it may be. Sit down and shut up about what’s not the work. Work. There’ll be time to instagram your breakfast in the nursing home.

…unless you’re still writing.

Get to work.

Good luck!

 

Enter to Win a Signed Copy of THE CONFLUENCE

Your challenge: Print and post this flyer in your town and tweet a selfie of it to @atypeofwriter and I’ll send you a signed copy free.

Winners of Signed Books

Signed, sealed, and shipped. Two Goodreads members won signed copies of The Confluence. Their arrival is but days away. Enjoy! Thanks for participating.

Read an Excerpt of The Confluence (free)

Chapter 1 of THE CONFLUENCE is available for free here: EXCERPT

Get acquainted with Godwin Merritt and the land around Echo Cliff. Follow the link at the end of the excerpt to find out what lengths he’ll go to as he confronts one demon after another.

…God­win pat­ted the bulky satchel beside him and said, “As a mat­ter of fact, I’m pre­pared to give you pay­ment here and now if that’s what it takes.”

 

Goodreads Giveaway of 2 Signed Copies of THE CONFLUENCE

Enter to win one of two signed copies of THE CONFLUENCE on Goodreads. As always, reviews are invited, good or ill. Share your experience.

Goodreads Book Giveaway


The Confluence
by William L. Domme

Giveaway ends March 15, 2015.

See the giveaway details

at Goodreads.

Enter to win

THE CONFLUENCE in paperback!

"Dear sir or madam, would you read my book? It took me years to write,
could you take a look?" - "Paperback Writer" The Beatles.

Very HAPPY to announce the paperback edition of THE CONFLUENCE is now available.

 

Here is an excerpt of an early review:

“After reading, the author shows a trusting, researched grasp of a fading period in American history, examining with a second set of modern eyes the often forgotten struggle to protect a family’s land in the ever evolving anthropological wake of greed and competition inherent in man past, present and convincingly, the future.”

 

 

COMING SOON! THE CONFLUENCE in PAPERBACK!

Here is the cover for the paperback of THE CONFLUENCE which will be available soon. And just a reminder that the novel is still free as of March 9, 2015 to download via Amazon Kindle and it will remain free to download until March 11, 2015 so go get yourself a great read and feel welcome to leave a review on Amazon of your experience with the book. THANKS!

Publication Day for THE CONFLUENCE

I am excited and proud to announce the publication of THE CONFLUENCE. 

In the last quarter of the 19th century, Godwin Merritt discovers the entrance to his Colorado silver mine is legally on his neighbor’s property. Without tipping his hand to his neighbor, Danforth, he sets out to purchase the land to secure his rights. Schemers in the boomtown below the mine team up with Godwin’s old rivals, The Black Rock Runners, to snatch the land away and with it all the silver it puts out.

Danforth finds himself on the wrong end of the sheriff’s gun and dies in a negotiation. His spirit persists in haunting Godwin throughout his battle with the old rivals, at times aiding him and others driving him mad. Danforth practices a dark art he acquired long before he died when he was a sailor in the Mosquito Fleet tearing up and down the Gulf of Mexico chasing pirates in the early-mid 1800’s. With his mystic ability to see into the near future and Godwin’s increasingly unstable mental state deteriorating with each new development that reminds him of his original crime back home in Sawyer’s Kill, Danforth steadily guides Godwin toward his ultimate goal, freeing himself of the blood feud with The Black Rock Runners and securing his mine property.

Early on, The Black Rock Runners dispatch gunmen to Merritt’s ranch and after bloody confrontations in Colorado, Godwin gathers what remains of his family and heads back to Michigan to confront his old rivals. A battle on the confluence where Godwin brutally kills his enemies leaves him hollow and wondering if he will ever be whole again. Godwin Merritt wants to do something he can’t…stop killing Mattocks.

Decades later, Godwin, ravaged by battles and illness, finds himself with one more demon to slay…on his own doorstep.

The Confluence is a tale of revenge and redemption with its old-style feud reminiscent of the Hatfields and McCoys mixed with the supernatural interventions of the deceased neighbor fans of Cormac McCarthy and Stephen King should find this tale similarly entertaining.

Short Story Submissions Take Time. No, Serious.

Dear Author, AKA: A Letter To Myself,

In the rush of crafting a short story from the ether guided by your all-knowing and possibly frequently truant muse be sure to heed the cautionary words of Ice Cube and “Check yourself before…” You know the drill. There will come a point in the excitement of having written what you believe to be the Alpha and/or Omega of world literature that you say, “Well, this is wordtastic and no matter where and to whom I submit it for publication they’ll be fighting for dibs on my historic achievement.” STOP! BREATHE! *looks at you out the side of my eyes. It’s revised and edited, right? That’s not a steaming pile of first draft you just fed through the glorious mystery of the internet, right? OH, PLEASE SAY YOU ATE THAT AND REGURGED IT A FEW TIMES BEFORE YOU LET IT SLIP INTO ONE OF YOUR FOUR STOMACHS. MOOVE it to the back burner a second. Let it simmer.

You need to start doing some research. You only just heard about Duotrope and I know you’re loathe to shell out the little money you have after taxes, insurance, and whatever other myriad expenses siphon your pay each time your boss cuts you a check but you’ll see the value in as little as fifteen to thirty minutes if you run a search for markets compatible with the genius you so willy-nilly cast upon the page as your fingers stumble like a meth-addled jackrabbit suffering an apocalyptic bout of vertigo around your keyboard. Believe me, I waited too long to dive in and use their services(Completely unsponsored, no reimbursement or kickback mention). They’re a road map for the countless places to submit fiction of all stripes, lengths, diseases, deformities, and cuteness.

Check the back burner. Make sure that gem isn’t burning to the bottom of your chipped Teflon pot. Oh, you stopped to check Twitter, Facebook, and Nicotine-Eye-Patch-Felines.com? Stop it. You don’t have that kind of time. None of us do. Write. Edit. Submit. Dry your eyes for the first hundred rejections. Repeat. Hopefully, by the second hundred rejection round things will start to improve. But, I have read that in the short fiction markets that a 1% acceptance rate for manuscripts submitted is the norm. So be brave and forget the miracle. It’s hard work and banging your head against a wall that are going to break you through this paradigm. Write. Forget fame. Write.

Sincerely,

Yourself.

Bizarro Short Fiction’s Alluring Freedom

I have found another word for freedom and it is “Bizarro”. Bizarro has form and structure but its horizons are far wider and it’s ceiling breathes like a lung. I stumbled into Bizarro by chance a few weeks ago and couldn’t wait to try my hand at it. I’ve posted the first short story I’ve written in the Bizarro genre under Free Reads here: Mr. Pork’s Web

Described as the literary equivalent to the cult film genre of cinema, Bizarro seems to be weird, dark, funny, and enlightening in a direction from which most genres steer clear. I’m still new to it, so I may be a little wrong. But, from what I’m reading so far these are the things I’m finding. If you’d like to dig into it too I suggest starting here: Bizarro Central

First, check out my Bizarro short story, or attempt anyway. Mr. Pork’s Web