And who the hell is this guy?

Hi.

My name is C. Steven Manley and I am a writer. The ‘C’ stands for Chuck- not Charles as so many people seem to assume –but Chuck. That’s what it says on my adjusted birth certificate.

“Adjusted?” you may ask. Yes; I was born in 1967 and given the name Charles Lester Rittenhouse III (yeah, it’s a mouthful, I know) and after a decade or so of life and more drama than I care to relate in this short introduction, I was told by my stepfather that I could change it to whatever I wanted so long as my last name was ‘Manley’. I figured since everyone called me ‘Chuck’ anyway, I would just change it to that legally. ‘Steven’ came from the fact that I was already writing at that tender age and had just read Salem’s Lot by Stephen King and was enamored of the man’s talent and skill. Sadly, my ten year old(ish) self’s attention to detail was such that I spelled mine with a V instead of Mr. King’s ‘ph’.

Why the back story? Well, dear reader, it’s like this; when I was growing up we called blogs ‘diaries’ or ‘journals’ depending on your gender and they weren’t for public consumption. They were the places we recorded our secrets and our private dreams. They were for the things that were too dark or too embarrassingly wonderful to share with the work-a-day ‘fit in or be judged’ world. So, when I decided to dip my toe into the world of indie publishing and my younger or more internet savvy friends started suggesting blogging as way to put myself out there for exposure and interaction, I sort of balked at the idea.

Don’t get me wrong, it isn’t that I wasn’t interested in having a forum for spouting opinions- hell, who doesn’t love that? –but it was just the idea that anything I might have to say being the slightest bit interesting to anyone- anyone at all -confounded me. I mean, there are roughly a gazillion blogs out there in the land of Internet-vania and I just couldn’t fathom being able to add anything to that. Then, I was shown some samples of less than engaging blogs and I figured I could do better than those. The worse that could happen is that no one would read what I could essentially use as a non-fiction outlet for myself and that’s okay because, hey, it’s not like anyone gets a chance to listen to me now.

So, again, why the backstory?

Because this is my introduction. This is me extending my hand and saying hello and offering to buy the first round.

I’m not entirely sure yet where this blogging thing is going to take me but I will say this up front: I’m not going to get into religion or politics. The reason is that these are the two topics that attract trolls, crazies, and crazy trolls the same way rotting meat attracts vultures. It’s not that I don’t have opinions and thoughts- I do -I’m just old and cynical enough to realize that they don’t matter and aren’t worth arguing about.

What I WILL do is talk about things that get my attention, things that I love (speculative fiction of all sorts, cooking, Roleplaying games, different art mediums, stuff like that) and occasionally share a story or two from my youth in a friendly, reminiscent sort of way that doesn’t smack of self-obsession. Oh, and fiction; I will share some of my short stories now and again.

Did I mention I’m a writer? Yeah, I thought I did.

So, nice to meet you, come on in, have a seat, and let’s see what kind of questions and revelations we can wring out of this old brain of mine. Who knows, it might even get interesting.

Oh, and you can call me ‘Chuck’.

 

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