Draft #1 COMPLETE and a little fun with query letters

I don't even remember when I started working on this novel. I'm sure I have it marked down somewhere but it doesn't really matter, it was a long time ago. As some of you may know I had it pretty much done once before and then through the power of technology (read quirks) I lost over half of it. I'm happy about that actually. The story is better for it.

So, tonight at 11:42pm I wrote "The End" (actually, I didn't, perhaps I should, anyway…). I'm very proud of myself and the story I managed to puke out. At times, like tonight, it flowed out effortlessly, page after page of text and story, other times it felt like I had to drag my MC behind a bus with a chain. I'm sure I'll see those pages clearly when I edit. That is the next part.

So, if any of you want to know what my story is about, here is a synopsis:

DEATH BY PUTTS

Ed Putts is a middle of the road author, or so he believes and although his books have hit the best sellers list those around him keep telling him that is nothing overly special so he keeps plugging away. He gets paid just enough to make a living for himself in his small condo on the outskirts of the city.

One day Ed gets pulled into a meeting with his agent. He finds himself meeting with his editor and publisher as well and they drop the hammer on him. He's done. No more books, no more money, nothing. His series that he is in the middle of will just end. To top it all of a rotten contract has meant that not only do his books and characters no longer belong to him but neither does his name.

He can't write.

Although he is an established writer he finds himself having to try to start over again with no success.

Ed has made a name for himself writing a series about a suave and intelligent serial killer named Gavin Petters. Gavin Petters is Ed's portal to his own dark psychotic impulses. All of those who had supported his writing have sealed it off. It is just a matter of time before the pressure gets too strong.

A pretty, yet unbalanced woman enters his life and pushes him further down into his dark mind. When he kills her in self defense during a masochistic sexual encounter it sets off a series of events that shows him how dark he really is.

My apologies if the above is somewhat poorly written, it is late and I may have been drinking a little but hopefully it gives you an idea of what I have been doing.

WARNING: The following may contain some sarcasm :-D
So, now that I have finished my novel what am I going to do? What any first time novelist would do who hasn't done any homework, I'm going to query. I already have a list of 75 agents that I am going to send letters to, here is my standard form letter I am going to send:

Dear To Whom It May Concern:
My name is D. Ryan Leask and I have just finished writing my very first novel. As I'm sure you can understand it takes a lot of work to accomplish this feat so therefor anyone who has achieved it must truly be special as I'm sure you will see that I am.

My book is about a writer that kills a bunch of literary people who try to keep him from writing, so you'll likely be able to relate and I know this will be a winner with you for sure!

I haven't bothered doing any editing as I know that you provide such services for me when you chose to represent me, after all I am an author not an editor, lol.

I know it said on your website to send only a query letter/sample chapter but I have included the entire novel to save you the trouble of all the back and forth banter which we likely both agree is pointless.  I have one request. It said that I shouldn't expect an answer for quite some time but we both know this is just to keep those that have a really terrible novel from bothering you constantly. I have sent this letter out to a number of other agents so the sooner I hear back the sooner I can look through all the offer letters and give you an answer.  I'm certain that asking for at least a high five figure advance would be prudent.

I appreciate your time and look forward to hearing from you very soon.
Sincerely,

Author of Death By Putts

Chuck Wendig, you have inspired me!

• If you are under 18, disregard the following advice (for legal reasons)
• If you are a writer and offended by strong language get over yourself
• If you are a writer and you do not follow @ChuckWendig you must
• If you are a writer and you do not read Chuck Wendig's Blog (Terrible Minds) Do it
• If you do not have the poster below:
• posted as your desktop
• tacked up on a wall above your computer
• Embroidered into a quilt on your bed
• or tattooed across your chest

©2013 Chuck Wendig

• You have to
• If his blog hasn't inspired you to write more, sorry but the only thing left is this:

I don't write #SciFi… or do I?

For some reason lately I have been thinking a lot about the NaNoWriMo story I wrote in 2011.  When I was done I hated it.  It was supposed to be a sexy, funny space adventure full of quirky characters with a little bit of political and societal commentary.  It was none of the above.  I just seemed to dredge on and on without hitting the marks.  My characters were indeed quirky but never lived up to their potential and even though I created a whole universe and laws and so forth ─The Complete Idiots Guide To The Universe (And Beyond)─ I just couldn't do it.  Maybe it's because I wasn't a fan of SciFi as a kid.  I am now but not with the same love as someone who was a fan all their lives.

Another issue is that writing comedy is hard.  I think I'm a pretty funny guy (feel free to disagree with me) but keeping that up through a whole novel is really hard.  I have read very few books that were truly funny, James Herriot comes to mind as does this gem by Christopher David Petersen called What The Hell's Up With Heaven?

It was so taxing writing this and I was so disappointed with the end result that I took a break from writing for a month (which turned into a whole year).  During this time I lost most of my writing in an unfortunate series of events including a crashed laptop which I used to back everything up (this was ironic as I don't store anything on my writing laptop because I'm always afraid it is going to implode and never does) as well as a flash drive that decided it was going to take all my files and translate them into gibberish.  I wasn't to sad about losing my NaNo story.  Now I am.  Maybe it's that absence makes the heart grow fonder (or is it absinthe makes the smart go wronger anyway…).

What I really should be doing now if focusing on my current WIP and just letting this one ferment but I can't help it so I am going to take a moment here to introduce you to that SciFi story I was working on and maybe later I will come back here and look at this and it will kick-start a new story.

James Styne Goes To Space (working title)

Synopsis:

James Styne is a career soldier in the Earth Navy Mars division and in his vary last year of being eligible to be the commander of his own ship.  His career had been halted by an unfortunate incident with a Generals daughter during his training and has plagued him ever since.  Running out of excuses his superiors finally assign him a ship and crew but do so with the full intention of failing.  The ship is a relic from the Americas and his crew are a bunch of misfits that the Navy has been hiding because they don't know what else to do with them.

The Good Guys

Characters:

Name: James Styne

Rank: Captain - Probationairy

Race: Human

Home Planet: Earth

A womanizing smart ass who questions authority.  He is the greatⁿ grandson of Allan Bartholomew Ian Styne, the greatest mind in history and the man that actually uncovered the truth of the universe.  He wrote The Complete Idiots Guide To The Universe (And Beyond).

Name: Reggie Cross

Rank: 1st Mate

Race: Human

Home Planet: Mars

Best friend of James since military school who rose through the ranks and joined the training program.  He joins James' crew to save James from himself taking a rank reduction in the process.

Name: Crissy Blane

Rank: Civilian - Empath

Race: Unknown Humanoid

Home Planet: Unknown Found on Mars

Crissy Blane is an empath but with severe limitations.  She can read minds but only if she is connected to the person sexually and them to her.  She can see the future however when she has a vision she goes into a convulsive orgasm and is unable to communicate until after the event has happened.

Name: Howard LaMonde

Rank: Private - Mechanic

Race: Formerly Human

Home Planet: Earth

Jake Howard is a ghost that has been attached to the ship, ENM Washington D.C. since he died in an unfortunate accident over a hundred years before.  No one including him knows why he didn't cross over to the beyond.  The army had no protocols for what to do with a trapped spirit and were unable to release him from service involuntarily so they were forced to keep him.  He is more useful than you would think as he can travel throughout circuitry.  He is able to use and move objects even though he is completely transparent.

Name: Gork

Rank: Private - Gunner

Race: Gork

Home Planet: Unknown

Gork is a seven foot tall three hundred and fifty pound hairy beast with short horns and an extremely limited vocabulary (I had actually created a gork/english dictionairy).  No one is quite sure where he came from or even how he ended up in the Navy.  His job as a gunner is to man the turret guns which are housed in a pod designed for a small human but for some reason Gork loves it in there even though he can barely move.  He even sleeps in his turret.

Name: Brian

Rank: 1st Officer - Helmsman

Race: Zygod

Home Planet: Unpronounceable (The actual official name the Milky Way Alliance gives it, only Zygods are able to say the actual name)

The Zygod's planet is just on the outside of the territory of the Milky Way Alliance (MWA) and are enemys.  Brian's father was a prisoner but what they didn't know was that, A) Male Zygods carry the children and B)Brian's father was pregnant.  He is very humanized with an affinity for 20th century Earth culture including 1970s rock and roll and pot.

Name: Sippertawn "Zippy" Ironthorpe

Rank: 1st Officer - Navigator

Race: Ironeze

Home Planet: Carbondale

Zippy's planet was destroyed by an asteroid but some of it's inhabitants were saved by the MWA.  At first the carbon-based refugees, Carbonics were believed to be the true inhabitants and the Ironeze thought to be robots as they were metal and filled with wires and ran on electricity.  The Carbonics were actually built by the Ironeze with artificial intelligence who had seen a chance at their survival by easily convincing their rescuers that they were in fact the true natives of the planet.  Many Ironeze were either not rescued or destroyed before the ruse was uncovered.  Zippy is one of only fifty Ironeze that exist.  His home planet had electricity in the air like Earth has air and must recharge himself regularly to survive.

Name: Theresa Godall

Rank: Private - Communications Officer

Race: Human

Home Planet: Mars

Former lover and current caretaker of Crissy Blane.  She is the only one who can detect with even mild certainty what Crissy's prognostications mean.  She is also a former one-night stand of Reggie's.

The Bad Guys

Name: General Maxwell Gregg

Rank: General, three stars

Race: Human

Home Planet: Earth

James had had a sexual encounter with his daughter resulting in a pregnancy which James never knew about. General Gregg has done everything in his power to try to court marshall or dishonorbly discharge James including plans which had resulted in his own inability to obtain his fourth star and be able to relocate back to his beloved Earth.

Name: Super-General Octavid

Rank: Super-General (Octopus Revolutionairy Army)

Race: Octopus

Home Planet: Earth

Within fifty years of social experiments on the highly intelligent octopuses they have formed a society which unbeknown to humans is attempting to take over the world.  Super-General Octavid is the leader of this movement.  His ability to not give in to his sexual compulsions has granted him a very long life (male octopuses die after ejaculation).  He has been pretending to be an ally to the MWA but only so that he can place spies throughout the organization.  He has had little success until he befriends General Gregg and convinces him to allow an ambassador to join the crew of the Washington D.C.  Octopuses can communicate with each other over infinite distances using telepathy.

The Ship

The ENM Washington D.C. was formerly the USS Washington.  It was in service before the Earth became one central government.  It is outfitted with similarly speced propulsion systems of modern ships however no one with the exception of Howard LaMonde knows how to repair them and as it was made in a secret factory on Mars which was destroyed during the American uprising no parts are available.  All of the systems are in an antiquated measuring system called the US customary units which cause great confusion.

Writing all of this has got me thinking again, dammit!  "FOCUS ON YOUR CURRENT WIP"

Anyway…

I'm sure we all have lost projects that keep popping into our heads, what is yours?

Thanks for Reading

Why I ♥ Pantsing

I like to read.  I am a compulsive reader and usually can't put a book down until it's finished because I just NEED to know what happens next.  I have never read the end of a book before starting it ever.  This is why I love pantsing.

Everyone has their own opinion this is a great post by my good friend Everett Powers on plotting (or outlining as I call it).  Obviously not every one falls into the two categories neatly, some do both to varying degrees, even I do but not until I've completed my first draft.

I only ever start a book with an idea a premise and a loose plot, sometimes even just a good line like one of my neglected WIPs started with this:

I was just finishing up a case I was working on, the case was scotch and I'd nearly gotten to the bottom of it.

When I started writing that I had no clue where it was going, still don't really and I'm about 75% of my way through.

To me pantsing is kind of like the "Choose Your Own Adventure" books I loved when I was younger.  You control what everyone is doing and where they will go but only when you get to a certain point and then everything works itself out from there (hopefully).  The fastest way for me to lose interest in a project is to figure out how it is going to end long before I get there.  If I do I quickly change direction and steer it away to some other unknown conclusion.  Things pop up as I write, interesting thoughts or situations that hadn't occurred to me until that moment and if I had outlined I may have skipped over them or tried to include them in some awkward way.  I'm excited to write this way, I can't wait until I find out what happens next.

In my current WIP my MC was planning to commit a murder to steer the cops away from him as a suspect for another one.  Until I wrote the words 

"He was surprised to return to his apartment and see four uniformed policemen and Tim standing at the door."

I had no idea they were going to be there.  It wasn't outside of the realm of possibilities but it certainly threw a monkey wrench into his (my) plans for what was going to happen next.  I can't wait to find out what it is and I hope that someday when you're reading it neither can you.

Just a side note.  I had already finished a first draft of this WIP and outlined it then lost most of the end of the draft.  I am re-writing it and guess what, I may as well throw that outline out the window because suddenly my characters aren't doing what they did last time, which is good because I already knew the old ending, now I get a new one!

How do you write and why?  I'd love to know!

Thanks for Reading

The Writer's Dojo Returns!

The Writer's Dojo is returning to its roots and invites you to join in on the fun! 

When I first started the writer's dojo in 2008, I did it as a way to keep the glory of National Novel Writing Month alive all year long. I loved the camaraderie and support I received during the month of November and desired that same feeling of community every month of the year, in every aspect of writing--not just the drafting.

Beginning February 1st, 2013, the writer's dojo returns to its roots and ushers in a new age of ninjawesomeness. Each month we will open three training rooms at the writer's dojo website. A room for drafters (Writing Month, aka WriMo), a room for revisers (Revising Month, aka ReMo) and a room for those querying (Querying Month, aka QuMo).

We invite you to set your own goals, whether it's to write a thousand words a day, revise ten pages a week, or submit twenty queries in a month, and register your goal in the appropriate training room.

Every Monday we'll post the leaderboard for the previous week, and at the end of each month those who met their goal will be able to post the coveted Writing Ninja Warrior badge on their blog or website.

To help you reach your goals, we have a number of ways to support you:

CHATS: At the dojo every Thursday at 4:00 p.m. Eastern time.

TWITTER: Anytime, day or night, at #writingninja.

GOOGLE+: Join our community for random write-ins and sprints.

NEWSLETTER: Subscribe to our Ninja News and once a month you'll receive an email with an encouraging note and a list of the top performers for the previous month. There will also be opportunities for giveaways, starting with February's newsletter!

We hope to see you at the dojo as you reach for--and achieve--your goals! If you’re interested in seeing what it looks like, just post it in the text box of your blog and then click on “Preview” and you’ll see the simple message=) Please feel free to add your own thoughts on the matter. I’ll see you all around The Writer’s Dojo!!

I am going to get a children's story published… PIII

Well, I just have to get an unbiased read through from someone who doesn't know me well (or sleep with me :-) ).

Next I have to write a really kick-a$$ cover letter and send it off.

Is it too early to be excited?  I have decided that I will not be rejected!  That should waylay the doubt for at least three months.

I am going to get a children's story published… PII

Dear readers, it has been two hours since I last confessed…

Perhaps writing what I am going to do first is a good way of actually doing it.  After I wrote my last blog I began researching publishing children's books.  This is what I found:

“So You Want to Publish a Children’s Book: Advice from an Insider” by Victoria Fanning
Some words of wisdom on submitting your work.  Most importantly it answered my question of whether or not it needed to be illustrated.  The answer was an overwhelming NO!

"How to format your manuscript for a children's book" by Cynthea Lui

A step by step guide to how exactly to format your children's book for submission.  Typical double-spaced times new roman nothing fancy.

I also found two three publishing houses that are taking unsolicited manuscripts for children's book:

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

Boyd Mills Press
Orca Book Pulbishers (Canada Only)

As well as a good list of others that aren't quite what I was looking for but still good to know

So, I have formatted my story as per Cynthea's advice, stopped worrying about the artwork.  I now have two other things to do.

Get someone to look over my manuscript for mistakes/grammer etc. and find out if I can submit to both of these places.  I have heard that some PHs only want you to submit only to them.  

For the record, if you are going to take 3+ months to get back to the submitter (which I completely understand) I don't think it's fair that they have to wait for an answer/non-answer before submitting to someone else.  I know that you believe someone is wasting your time if they submit to multiple places and may decide not to go with you but it is only the time it takes to read/think/write a letter as opposed to three months of waiting.

Here is my goal.  To have my manuscript in the mail to someone by Friday!  Luckily I have two great editors by way of my wife who is an elementary school teacher and my friend Allison who has an English degree.

I am going to get a children's story published…

just don't know how yet.
Two years ago just before my daughter was born I wrote a book for my son called:

My Baby Sister is an Alien

It's a look at pregnancy, birth and early infancy from the perspective of an older brother.

My wife has been bugging me ever since to get it published and perhaps I should.  There are just a few things that I want to find out first.

1. It's not illustrated (well the version I made used clip-art but that doesn't count), do I need to have it illustrated before I try to submit it or will they hook me up with someone?
2. Who is a really good children's book publisher that is taking submissions from unknown hacks like me?

I am going to start some research and let you all know how it's going!

So far I have:

Asked twitter

Googled and read a bit on some of them.

Next, make a list of my preferred publishers and look into submission requirements for each.

Wish me luck!

Thanks for Reading

It's December 1st, now what? KEEP WRITING!

I spent the month of November frantically shooting words at a computer screen and hoped they'd fit.  They did.  I hit my mark of 50,000 words!  I'm very proud of my accomplishments (as I should be) and also very proud of all of my friends that acheived theres, or at least gave it an honest effort.

Over NaNoWriMo I started off at the kick-off party and wrote my face off until two in the morning.  Tired and butt dragging the next day I managed to sneak in a couple of thousand words the next day and carried on.  I never looked back, never deleted anything and just plowed through my story like a blind dozer driver.  I managed to take a little breather with the mid-way party on the 15th then, did the most insane thing ever, on the  26th, a twelve hour write in.  We spend all day (from 2pm - 2am) couped up in the Wok n Grill at the Roadking truck stop and wrote our asses off!  I threw down over 8,000 words that night and at around 10:30 got up and rang the bell, marking my completion of 50,000 words.  I really want to thank the Calgary Municiple Leads, Naiya Azurewater and Xanateria for their stand-up jobs running the shows, keeping us in line and exceptional support, especially for a newbie like me!  The next thing is the TGIO aka Thank God it's Over celebration but here's the thing:

IT'S NOT OVER

My story hasn't yet concluded.  I think that I am actually only three quarters of the way to the real finish line of the story, my characters are still hanging out waiting for the climax, it's coming, it's building but it hasn't yet arrived.  I need to keep writing.  The 50,000 mark is just an arbitrary goal, a book mark in an unfinished tale.  I must set a new goal, I can't just leave James, Chastity, Brock, Brian, Mary-Jane, Nestor and Glorik hanging out at The Restaurant and the Edge of the Universe (btw, this is not a metaphor, they are actually sitting there) chatting with James' Great-great-great…grandfather while waiting for the formerly kind but now evil General Navy McClintock to find them.  The story must go on.

I know many of you are probably sitting in the same position as me, you've hit the mark, rung the bell and sat back and said, "Phew, that was fun but I need a break."  I hope that you are able to pull your writing brain back together and finish your story, your characters deserve it!

After that, editing, but I don't even want to think about that yet.

Thanks for Reading!

Took a Break From All That Is Writing, And it Was Good

As you may have noticed I haven't really been all that active lately on the writing front.  I finished the first draft of my novel at the end of June and then didn't really know what to do.  I attempted to start editing right away but I didn't think that was a good idea so I moved on to my next project.  I got about 15,000 words into it and lost interest.  What I think I needed was a break, a break from writing, thinking about writing, writing about writing and talking about writing.
Over the past few weeks I haven't been on Twitter much, I think I was somewhat embarrassed about my failure with my story I was working on for NaNoWriMo although I know I have nothing but supportive friends.  I think that the biggest issue however was that after my first draft of "Death By Putts" was finished I just didn't know what to do with myself so I headed off in too many directions and then just stopped everything, but I now have a plan:
(This is what I am holding myself accountable for)

1. Finish Beta Reading for Steve
2. Finish Setting Up and Pimping out my G+ account
3. Work on a Design Idea I have for Threadless
4. Return to my one a day one liners for My "My Brain Farts Stink" Blog
5. Catch-up with friends
6. Re-start editing for "Death By Putts"

This is my plan for the rest of 2011.  I am going to take things a bit slower now.

Thanks for Reading

D. Ryan Leask

Am I F*#king Insane? Camp NaNoWriMo and Editing?

What have I done?
Since I learned about it, I have always wanted to participate in the NaNoWriMo (stands for National Novel Writing Month).  Generally it occurs in November and runs for a month.  The goal is to write a novel in a month, or at least enough words for a novel in a month.  That's 50,000 words or approximately 1667 words a day (yikes, when I put it that way it sounds even scarier!).  I recently found out about Camp NaNoWriMo, it's the same thing except they are trying a year round thing and well, I joined.
Now this in itself isn't that bad except just yesterday (well this morning if you count the rewrite of the ending) I finished the first draft of my first novel.  I set out a goal for myself of editing ten pages a day.  Why did I start NaNoWriMo when I obviously have more pressing things I need to do?

Here is my dilemma.  When I was two-thirds of my way through "Death By Putts" (DbP) I realized there was another story that needed to be told, a story about Gavin Petters, the main character that my main character made his career from.  I had a really cool storyline that needed to come out.  I could have waited until I was completely finished DbP but I really think that story should be read after the one I want to write for NaNoWriMo.  Both would be stand alone and you wouldn't have to read one to get the other but there are certain aspects of DbP that may serve as minor spoilers to my idea (tentatively named "Killing Gavin Petters" (KGP). So, in a spur of the moment decision I joined July's running of Camp NaNoWriMo.  I outlined most of KGP today, after all I do already know the two main characters from writing DbP and that one is complete.

Well anyway you know what they say, all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

You can find me at Camp NaNoWriMo as DryanRack, I'll be the one attempting to cliff jump into shallow water when I realize that I have bitten off more than I can chew!

Thanks For Reading

D. Ryan Leask

What to Do, What to Do, What to Do? My now WEEKLY blog

I tweet, I blog daily, I have a weekly blog-story.  I am participating in #5MinuteFiction and #SaturdayShorts  I run a daily blog of Original Quotes by me which is somewhat associated with my Threadless T-Shirts Account where I routinely submit slogans for their Type Tee designs and am an active member or the Official Slogan Club.  I finished 365 days of Sloganeering too.

Wow! How the hell did I stretch my writing so far?

I really have to be sure that I don't loose focus of what I am really trying to do which is finish something that I have been writing, be it "Richard Babcock and the Hollywood Starlette" or "Framed" or perhaps even "To Beat the Band".

I think it's great that I have made all of these connections, especially through Steve Umstead's #pubwrite (buy his E-Book Gabriel's Redemption) as well I now have six followers of this blog!  I'm learning so much about publishing, dos and don't of writing and just very interesting stuff about other peoples writing lives.  Fantastic!

I have people that would be interested in reading my work, potentially contacts with agents, thoughts on what to do in terms of publishing.  I have tons of places to get my name out and to put out short stories for competitions.

Fantastic! Except...

I have nothing.  Well almost nothing.  I have "Counting Down the Storm" my novella which is currently only in paperback form of which I only have a few copies left.  I really need to get it into e-book form as I really can't afford to have another run printed (yeah, I self-published it).

Now what I really need is to finish something new and here is how I am going to acomplish this.

• Focus on only one story.
• This is my biggest weakness, too many irons in the fire.  I am currently working on "Richard Babcock..." and that is all (with the exception of #5MinuteFiction and #SaturdayShorts.)
• #6amWriters- A Twitter Group that I am attempting to form.  So far I am the only one but I pretend there are more to keep me accountable.
• The purpose is to get up at 6am and write until I have to leave for work or on the weekend, the family gets up and harasses me.
• Generally an hour to an hour and a half.
• During this time, no internet, NONE! or tweeting
• It has to be on ONLY one WIP
• My goal is to write no less than 800 words and preferably >1000
• #1KaDay- Another twitter group that focuses on writing 1000 words each and everyday.
• Stop blogging this blog daily
• I am going to limit this to once a week.  I think that Mondays are a good day for it.
• Not take on any other writing projects unless:
• They Make me Money (Prize money kind of okay)
• I have something outlined that would fit the criteria
• Preferably both

Hope this works.  I feel a bit like I put the cart before the horse so to speak but what the hell.  Maybe I'll become really good friends with an influencial person and they will name drop me and I will get a million dollar book deal before I have even finished anything.

Which reminds me, I recently got pregnant while riding on a flying pig over atlantis and being chased by a Monster Army of Yeti Cyborgs!  Wow, that was a day.....

Thanks for Reading
D. Ryan Leask

And Please, Please do not ever use this line:
Sparkling like a vampire in the sunlight

From Moleskin to Microchips, getting started again

Would you read a story that started with

I was just finishing up a case I was working on, the case was scotch and I'd just about gotten to the bottom of it...

After spending time looking over all of my old notebooks filled with fragments of stories and getting frustrated with where I am with my serial killer story I have decided to take some time to move
Richard Babcock and the Case of the Hollywood Starlet
from moleskin to microchips.  I'm kind of excited too.  I forgot how far I had actually gotten with this story.  I only wrote it when I needed something to lighten the mood when I was doing darker stuff.

Synopsis:
Richard Babcock is a stereo-typical Hollywood detective, drunk, down on his luck and broke.  He's a throwback to the 1940s but 20 years too late and 1960s Hollywood is not the same place for a Film Noir reject.  A famous Hollywood Starlet stumbles across his path and solicits his help in trying to find out who is trying to kill her and why.

Something told me it was a good time to head back to 1175 Vermont, walk into my office and tell Miss Movie-star where to put her ten grand, that was the part of me that was almost a new paint job on my old ford.  But who was I kidding?  My life wasn't worth ten grand, she got a bargain.

At some point this Hollywood Princess ends up having to stay at Babcocks office.

"Mr. Babcock!" She furiously pulled the coat around her shoulders.  I noticed her dress folded neatly on top of a small white suitcase.  "Do you not have any respect for a Ladies Privacy?"

"With all due respect, lady, this is my office and that's my bed your sleeping on."

Complete with car chases even, wow!

I helped her stuff the few things she had in her bag then grabbed a few odds and ends (scotch) of my own.  We ran out the back and tossed the stuff in her trunk.  I heard a car brake hard and looked.  It was the same Lincoln that followed me from the Roosevelt.

"Get in!" I ordered and yanked the driver's door open got in, started the car and threw it into reverse in one fluid motion.  She was seated but hadn't even gotten her door closed.  "Hold on!" I barked and raced backwards towards the offending car.

Anyway, hope this was a tease and not a bore!

Later
D.

Too Dumb to Dance

Dear Constant Readers:

I hope that none of you are crying in your pillows about the demise of Karma's a Bitch.  I know I'm not (and as I am likely the only "Constant Reader" they you aren't either).  I have replaced it with an epic journey of three young men trying to make it in the world of Competitive Men's Throw Dancing.

Not Since Slingovich and Flotosky has there been such talent unleashed upon this world.

I hope to have weekly chapters added to this saga on the Too Dumb to Dance page of this blog.  Read, follow, comment, critique, pan, review share, make fun of.

So far there are three chapters up.

Too Dumb to Dance
Enjoy!

D.

Keeping Focus, Smoking and Stuff I've Started and Never Finished.

My wife thinks that I may suffer from ADHD, she's an elementary school teacher so she knows it when she sees it.  I have been thinking the same thing over the past several months.  I especially have been seeing it since I quit smoking.

I started smoking when I was 14.  It was like a "Where have you been all my life?"  Most people coughed and hacked and nearly died with their first cigarette, I wish that had been me, I tend to not do things that make me feel terrible more than once (like eating Lentil soup).

More than 20 years and several attempts later I think I have kicked the habit.  Not sure how long it will take me to give up the gummy ---insert animal here--- addiction will take to kick but that is a problem for another time.

Anyway, I digress (which really should be tattooed on my forehead)

Cigarettes gave me a break, a chance to focus on one thing, smoking, glorious wonderful opening the blood vessels slowing the heart rate smoking.  When I smoked my mind was able to wander freely which then allowed me to focus when I returned to my task.  My mind now wanders freely whenever the hell it feels like it.  Perhaps I was self medicating with cigarettes, a diagnosis I was given for a related disorder I suffer from, depression which, incidentally enough is also a symptom of ADHD!

So as I am not going to start smoking again perhaps I should talk to my doctor.  I think if I was able to focus I would be a much better writer, perhaps even an author, and not just a starter.

which is a segway into the next part.  Stuff I started and never finished:

To Beat the Band
A story about a small town band that gets discovered years after they gave up making music and went their own ways.
-About 200 typed pages completed
-I kind of got to the meaty part of the story then the ending popped into my head, I wrote it down and that seemed to end my interest in the story.

Untitled Group of Related Stories
I just wanted to write a number of stories about very sick people from their points of view.  I used the Ten Commandments and Seven Deadly Sins as a rough concept of what people could and would do but did not focus on these.  I started several stories as well as the underlying theme, characters and setting which was a beautiful and secluded spot I spent a few weeks in north of Pheonix.
-About 50 pages

Framed: The Story of Henry James Smith (A Killer)
Terrible Title but I'm sure something better will arise.
A story of a serial framer.  He goes around killing people so he can watch others be blamed and prosecuted for their deaths.
-About 100 pages written
-I'm having issues with POV and the character that is required to pull the whole thing together I just can't relate to.  The murder scenes are wicked fun to write and I have a whole vault of them written I just need to tie them all together with a stronger story.

Too Dumb To Dance - (A Blogged Story)
The world of Mens Pairs Competitive Throw Dancing
-Three postings.  I have a bunch more written in some notebook somewhere.

Richard Babcock and the Case of the Disappearing Startlette
A Hollywood Film Noir type book
-Written inside a couple of notebooks somewhere
.....
-------
My ADHD his kicked in again

I found my notebooks!  I really need to spend some time digitizing them.  I have some stuff in there that I forgot I even wrote!

I won't bore you readers with anymore of what I have started and perhaps just say that I'm going to add some pages someday of short stories.  I need motivating and I think looking over something I have worked on previously will keep me from starting on a new idea almost everyday.

D.

A Magicless Wizard and Wise words for Flatulant Fungal Spore Creatures From Outerspace

I’d like to give the rules for the game that got me here today. I call it the
ASPIRING WRITER game. On your turn, you write a book. Then you submit. Then you
roll a 500-sided die, don’t look at it, cover it up. Wait 3 to 6 months (or
longer), then uncover the die. Is it on number 42? Nope? Well, write another
book. Submit both of your books. Roll two 500-sided die, don’t look at them,
cover them up. Wait 3-6 months (or logner), then uncover the die. Is it on
number 42? Nope? Well, repeat the above steps as often as necessary. And
remember, the game only ends when you quit.

---A. Lee Martinez

From his Blog Post: Zen of Games

Talent is like a muscle: without something to push against, it atrophies.

---Robert McKee

From Story: Substance, Structure, Style and The Principles of Screenwriting

(Quoted in Rachel Walsh's Blog Post: Boxing-In Your Muse)

Two completely unrelated quotes. Nothing to do with what I am going to talk about today.

My most productive imagination time is right before bed. It is the only time I have to myself that is quiet and I am able to contemplate things that do not matter in the real world. I generally lay awake for an hour moving and creating characters, figuring out how to set scenes and so on. Obviously I can't write any of this down the best I can do is try to retrieve it from my flawed memory tracks and commit it to paper. It never works as well as it did the night before. I wish someone would invent some sort of USB attachment for our brains.

That being said though I have formed and begun to write the opening sequence for my Were-squirrel story, the epic battle that led The Wizard to attempt to save lives of men by giving them "blood transfusions" (we are talking middle ages here so an extremely rudimentary attempt) using blood from Wolves and other wild animals.

It's a back story and a start to the Ware (Weir, Wiere, Were Where etc.) family, their special place in the world and their powers. The Wizard, a character whom I can not seem to give a name too that doesn't sound either incredibly stupid or too close to Merlin, is becoming very interesting and I think perhaps he needs to be in more places. I guess we'll see, it's the joy of writing.

The fun of The Wizard is that he is in fact a wizard and he also knows that magic does not exist. His magic and that of all wizards and witches is simply training, luck, observance and centuries of experiments. I sure wish I knew more about magic, not the fairy tale kind but the real behind the scenes stuff. Oh well, one of my favourite personal slogans:

Sometimes I just make shit up

Will apply well here.

As for Karma. I am going to give "Squirrel-boy" a rest and do a few lines (The Charlie Dickens kind, not the Charlie Sheen kind) and see how it goes.

"When lacking in action one must compensate with wit"

D.
P.S. I realized that up until now I have mention nothing about Flatulant Fungal Spore Creatures From Outerspace.

Karma is really turning out to be a bitch & A "Novel" Idea for an agent I'm following on Twitter

Part One

So over the past couple of days I wrote several pages outlining my character Karma. I ran into a pitfall that perhaps others can understand. I was making her a situation driven character. I made everything work out just right so she would be in the right place at the right time doing the right thing in order for the story to pick her up however in doing so I made her waaay too nice and waaay to unbelievable.

I had to shake my head when I realized that I had a 19 year old owner of a tattoo parlour who got there because of incredible book smarts and the kindness of others. To that I say

POPPYCOCK!!!

Yes, that's what I said.

I have decided that she got that tattoo parlour out of pure manipulation, seduction and black mail, that's more like my little fiery vixen!

Part Two


Sara Megibow, of the Nelson Literary Agency wrote on her facebook:

What am I looking for from young adult novels in the slush pile?...dorky
heroes, Vikings, pirates, ocean adventures, space ships, terraforming, first
contact (that's geek sf talk for "aliens"), romance, spring vacations gone awry,
travel, multiculturalism and global settings, elves, dragons, magic, monsters,
haunted houses...and, of course, a great story that's well told. :)

I think I have just the thing for her. It is very unlikely she is following this blog and as right now it isn't much more than a couple of pages and an idea I wouldn't contact her but it has inspired me to get back to it. This is the concept:

----------------
An 11 year old boy can't wait until his 12th birthday, actually to be exact the first full moon on his 12th birthday. You see Harold Ware is a Ware (or as they are known to the rest of the world "Weres") Most people are familiar with Werewolves, which are by far the most common type, but there are all kinds of other creatures that Wares turn into as well; Bears, Jaguars, Birds of Prey, Foxes and even Deer and Songbirds to just name a few.

The prophecy states that on the first full moon of the thirteenth year your true identity shall be revealled. This means Harold will get to find out what he will be. His branch of the family is particulary revilled for it variety. His oldest brother is a Werebear, his sister (female weres are incredibly rare) is a Great Grey Owl. His father is a wolf but his Great-Great Grandfather was a great Black Stallion and strangest of all was that his grandmother, who was from a very distant family branch of Wares was a beautiful maiden, not that she was homely during other phases of the moon but during the full moon her beauty was beyond enchanting and ageless. Never before and never since has there been a Were-human.

------------------------
See, I am getting into it already. The above is just brain farts and just more of a description than anything you would see in the story. A couple of other things about Harold is that he is a narotic child who believes (and may be right) that he suffers from an OCD, he is the super geekiest, wierdest child (may tune it back a bit). He is so excited to become something else. Here's the kicker though, when his true identity is revealed to him he is a squirrel.

Nuts eh?

Anyway, I hope it doesn't sound too lame, I think it will work and seems to be working out in my mind and on paper so anyway, I'll keep you posted with my progress on that.

D.

Why I Prefer Writing Short Stories

Of course my ultimate goal is to write the not-so-great un-American Novel but in the mean time I just want to write some short stories. It’s so hard to have the uninterrupted time it takes to write a novel without losing your place. I write kind of like I read, start and can’t put the book down until it’s done. I need to break myself of this habit as it tends to leave a couple hundred pages of story with no clear direction and a need to read every page before getting back to it if I hadn’t looked at it for a couple of weeks.

Being able to write a short story in one or two sittings is much more preferable to me. I don’t need to worry as much about screwing up characters, messing up timelines or going too far into the back story and never coming out. All rookie mistakes I’m sure and anyone who reads this that happens to be an accomplished writer is probably rolling their eyes at me right now.

So where does that leave me?

I am in the middle of writing a book about a Serial Killer who gets off less in the murder and more in the watching others go to jail for it. I have wrote several detailed murders that in and of themselves could make for interesting stand alone stories.

I have my two related stories from Counting Down the Storm

A couple of things I wrote for a concept story I had involving the Devils Motel

I also have two new story ideas, one about a Hitman and his unstoppable and illogical need for a post kill burger
The other about an elderly man who finally gives in to his curiosity of how it feels to kill someone.

As you can see I have a theme. Sunshine and Lollipops!

Anyway it’s the weekend which for most would mean some time to relax and maybe sit at a keyboard for an hour or two but for me it means working my ass off getting ready for Baby Girl Evangelina, finishing the basement stairs, cleaning up and if given the chance, breathing.

Is it terrible that I almost hope my contract isn’t extended at the end of September just so I can really focus on what I want to do?

Saying that makes me feel really selfish.

Blowing off the dust -Giving away 10 Free Copies of my book

Today's Entry


It's time for a little spring cleaning so it's also time to blow the dust off an old blog and maybe see if I can resurrect it as well as resurrecting my desire to become a more serious writer. I once had delusions of grandeur in believing that I could make a living at writing. Perhaps I could if I:
a: Was Single (or married to someone who made a buttload of cash)
b: Did not have a family (or was married to someone who made a buttload of cash and who hired a Nanny)
c: Was not at all concerned about where his next paycheck was coming in and did not have to rely solely on himself to get it. (or was... well you understand)

If I was a more practical man I likely would have found the wife I mentioned above, however as I am a dreamer (which is a pretty important thing for a writer to be) I choose love instead, silly yes but no regrets. (I will revisit that thought again in a few weeks when baby #2 is born).

So what is my new goal?

Just to get published somewhere, anywhere. I have numerous resources on where and what to send, now I just have to do it.

One nice thing about having self published is that I own all rights to my stories so I can sub those.