Getting the blog back together or, The Writing Process tour

I was flattered when my friend and colleague, Lisa Peers, invited me to join this blog hop on the writing process. I gave her debut novel, 'Love and Other B-Sides' a four-star review primarily because I thought a four-star review would be more trusted than a five-star one. That, and I am sort of a prickly pain in the ass.

Whenever I sit down to write I feel like I know more about how not to do it than how to approach it, but perhaps you can learn something from my mistakes.

What am I working on?
Too much, which may be part of my problem. First of all, I have three stories posted on Amazon, published through Kindle Direct Publishing. They are, in no particular order: Unclaimed, a fantasy/sci-fi short story featuring an eventual series character, Keegan; Keeper of the Dead, a fantasy/horror story about an aging warrior battling his own (and someone else's) demons; and A Better Way, a modern satirical thriller about a regular guy named Darryl Johnson whose life goes horribly awry. Unclaimed is the only one that has sold so far. It has only a few reviews, but they are five-stars and it is, in my humble opinion, the weakest of the three. Sorry, Keegan. Maybe next time.

Next up, I have another fantasy short story, Two Cows Too Many, to hit the cyber stores soon. After that, Lady of the Lake, featuring another series character, a modern mystery based in part on my past as an editor and reporter of a major weekly newspaper chain here in Metro Detroit. Charlie Morton, the POV character, is like I used to be, only smarter and funnier.

I am slogging my way through another fantasy short story, The Sigilist, and only last night discovered one major problem and how to fix it. Then I have another Keegan story, Three Sacrifices, that will need to be rewritten. Also, I have at least one novel I'd like to finish and post before the end of the year, either a Charlie Morton story (probably) or one of the three first draft fantasy novels I have tucked away on my flash drive.

I write on this blog sporadically as well as on two practice fiction blogs, one a fantasy series, the other strictly sci-fi, based on the space adventures of my bored cat. Feel free to check them out, but I warn you they are just first drafts, proofed only for spelling.

How does my writing differ from others in its genre?
The quick answer to this (I hope) is humor. I think spending more than a dozen years in the news field has given me a good ear for dialogue, too. There are other former newspaper writers who have turned to fiction, of course, but I deliberately didn't go the way they did, with novels or stories set in major cities. My protagonists are not very heroic; they often don't know what they're doing, or why. They are small-timers living in a small time world tackling problems that most of us face.

Why do I write what I do?
Entertainment, mostly. The stories come to me and I feel obligated to get them down. I am, however, taking a more serious look at what I do and why I am doing it (or why I want to, at any rate), because I feel it's important to have some kind of message hidden among the one-liners and snappy comebacks. A Better Way in particular has a few thought-provoking lines tucked away in Darryl's non-linear ramblings. He's like a Billy Joel song that way.

How does my writing process work?
I alluded to this in the beginning. The short answer is, I'm still working on that part.

I had a dream, once, a silly little dream, that I could write a short story a week and get them published. This was based on my optimum writing speed of about 1,700 words an hour for two hours every day. I've backed off from that because of age, infirmary and common sense. Writing is hard work; good writing, even more so.  I still think it is important to write every day and I am using this blog post to jump start my efforts again.

My concept is simple: spend the first hour editing one work, the second hour writing a different one. The idea is to gradually get into the creative mind set while you're fixing your mistakes during your first hour. I've tried two different versions of this: The Rooster Plan (from 5-7 a.m.) and the Owl Plan (from 10 to midnight). Both have their challenges, lack of sleep chief among them, and neither have exactly taken flight. Not that a rooster can fly, but you get the idea.

Who's next?
I have never met @NatRusso, but I liked him enough to ask if I could include him at the end of this and he graciously agreed. You can find all sorts of information about him and his work here. (As you can see, his Writing Process blog was actually posted before mine. His book, Necromancer Awakening, is among the current top-sellers on Amazon. I've started it and have been impressed so far (I sense another four-star review coming). Also, he is a good writer to follow on twitter because he finds a good mixture of advice, marketing and general conversation.

Also, check out the work of an old friend who writes as PJ Lincoln. Like me, he's another former newspaper guy who has a growing collection of fiction published through Amazon and elsewhere.

Thanks for stopping in. Feel free to share, leave a comment, download a story and post a review!

Stalking macaroni and cheese

"Nobody stalks macaroni and cheese," is one of my favorite lines from 'A Better Way,' a story I published recently on Amazon.com.




Subtle and silly in its own right, it sums up the bewilderment Darryl Johnson feels as he realizes the strange occurrence that keep happening around him are all related and that he has somehow offended some very powerful people.


I have a mild affinity for this story, which I started writing a few years ago. I took the name of the main character from my late cousin, but that's where the similarities between real Darryl and fictional Darryl end. Fictional Darryl is in a world of trouble and he doesn't realize it; he is a regular guy with a wandering thought process that was a challenge to write. Indeed, his thought process was so random and filled with a bizarre kind of stream-of-consciousness wool-gathering that the story was once three times as long as the final version (you're welcome for that, those who read it).


The story itself was based on three things: the title, which came from a Ben Harper song, an upside-down stamp and the disquieting feelings I had about the action of our government (and our willingness to accept those actions) in the wake of the 2011 terrorist attacks. Okay. I may as well admit it here, too. It was also partially based on a fart joke.


It was initially designed to be a pure satire, but it took on a darker tone in the week or so before I finally published it and I included some observations about the state of corporate America. I still think the comedic elements hold up, and I like the way little bits of universal truth peek through the seams when you are not expecting them. (Wait long enough, Darryl muses, and God will eventually turn you into everything you once mocked.)


Real Darryl's funeral, if you'll forgive my own wandering thoughts for a moment, was such an inspiring and unexpected affair that it will be recreated, in some fashion, in a forthcoming novel entitled The Other Side of Goodbye. Real Darryl was a regular guy like fictional Darryl: a mail carrier, volunteer firefighter and a pilot, but his funeral procession required the cooperative efforts of three different policing agencies to manage, it was so long and it reminded me that we all, each and every one of us, deserve to be celebrated.


Thanks for reading.

Home, home again....

"And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish and strengthen you."
I Peter 5:10


That verse came up on my daily Bible app during the early part of Henry's Health Scare. I posted it then, shared it with him when Pastor Chris Thomas from First Presbyterian Church came by (Henry nodded and gave me the 'thumbs up' when he heard it) and I've reflected on it often in the past several weeks. I did not, at first, truly come to terms with it.


When you're looking down on your stricken child, 'a little while' is an eternity. I wasn't ready to think about restoration. I was too wrapped up in the suffering. There were plenty of moments during those early days of helpless fear and anger and worry when I gave the chapel at Mott Children's Hospital a wide berth--certain that if I had gone inside, I would have tried to pick a fight with God.


I put on a brave face. I stayed positive. I prayed. I reassured. I asked you all for help. Inside? I questioned. I wondered why it would happen, how it could happen to him--he is a good kid, blameless and strong, kind and goofy. I didn't feel strong, at all.


But the key to that verse is actually in the one ahead of it, which speaks to the fact that the experience of suffering is required of everyone throughout the world. Nobody can dodge that particular bullet forever.


So if suffering is universal so, then, is restoration and growth. We're not quite there yet. Tomorrow (almost today, as I write this) will mark our second week home after 34 days in the hospital. I wonder what we've learned, how we've grown.


His health has improved. The dressing changes are not a two-person job any more. We had a follow up visit today (yesterday) with the surgeons and learned that even those kinds of bandages aren't needed any more. He could be stitch-free in a two weeks. He's getting caught up on school work, too.


His spirits? Fortunately, they are more up than down, but there are times when I sit with him as he tries to drift off to sleep and he asks me some of those same questions I asked. What did I do to deserve this? Why did this happen? 'Nothing,' I answer to the first and 'I don't know.'  or 'We'll see one day' to the others.


That's where faith comes in. It's about being thankful for the restoration before it comes, or being grateful for the answers before you know what they are.

Resisting normal

Things have settled down here now, 11 days into what I will call Henry's Health Scare. The initial days of panic and worry are beyond us and he is resting more comfortably now--and more often, now that the doctors, nurses and lab technicians don't have to come check in as often.


We are officially in Phase II. The real danger has passed and our goal now is to keep him rested and help him heal (apparently by filling him with protein) in order to get to Phase III, which is home. I guess you would call Phase II the eye of the storm. Recovery will be long and, at times, frustrating. I think we'll be in the hospital for another two weeks, possibly three, and face an additional month or two at home before things return to normal.


Henry's spirits are good, his strength humbling. He is handling this with more grace than most adults would. I can only imagine what's going on in his 13-year-old brain as he lays in his bed, subject to frequent pokes and prods and general biological intrusions at an age when most people aren't too sure of themselves to begin with.


We have settled into a routine; we have a few sets of clothes folded and kept as much out of the way as possible. There are laundry facilities here. We've made trips home and are working on a regular schedule. I've even set up a make shift work station consisting of my laptop, a wooden folding chair with a pad for the seat, a headlight so I can work while Lisa and Henry sleep, and an small hospital tray that doubles as a desk stop and dining table. I call it the Writer Cave--Mott Annex.


It is a strange thing. You're trying to get a handle on your life, the day-to-day responsibilities (the bills, the pets, the day job, etc.) while pondering the big picture issues, like making sure Henry doesn't have any long term scars (physical or mental, knowing we have no power over the physical ones). You want to get a good system going, yet you don't want it to feel normal. You don't want to get used to it.


It also gives you a lot of time to think, and I've been thinking a lot about faith and family. I know that we have been blessed: we live in a great community, Henry goes to great schools, has good friends, I have a great job with compassionate people and, although things are generally tight, we don't want for anything.


We can tend to take simple things like that for granted, and forget to thank God for the things we don't have to worry about, even as we ask Him for strength to handle the things we do worry about. Family is like that, too. Even before this Health Scare erupted, one of my goals was to spend more quality time with the family (part of my three-tiered goal to reconnect and re-engage with family, friends and faith). Now it feels even more important.


Technology is a wonderful thing, but it can be counterproductive to the family unit. The same devices that allow us to connect to the outside world--friends, information, inane games or other distractions--can hinder the kind of real communication we need with those closest to us. We would frequently reach for our tablets or smart phones or head to the computer as soon as dinner was over. Not any more. We will carve out more time for the simple things that are more important.


We're still not sure how this happened. Perhaps we will never know what started the infection that brought us here. The 'whys' are coming into focus, however, and this is one of the lessons we'll take home.

Jack's Vacation

A number of you have asked after Jack, and how he has been handling our abrupt departure. We have not been home since Saturday, but don't worry; Jack is fine. He has been on vacation.

For those that don't know, Jack is a Jack Russell Terrier that we adopted through a rescue program about three years ago. We think he's five or six years old now. He's a typical JRT (if I had to describe him with one word, it would be 'insistent.')

Jack has been staying with my mom and using that insistence as well as his natural charm to forge new ground as far as pet permissions go. He has, for example, been able to break the 'no dogs on the bed' rule as well as the 'no lap dog' rule without any repercussions.

Grandma Lynn's yard also comes with a built-in playmate: a Husky named Mariah. Mariah is a full-blooded Husky, although it would not surprise me if there was a bit of wolf blood in her--and a little horse, as well. She is huge. She could pull a sled across the Alaskan tundra even if that sled had an F-150 on the back of it. She can take scraps off the dinner table without putting her paws on it. When she stands on her back legs, she's easily taller than I am.

Henry 'helped' build Mariah's doghouse. 

She loves to play, too. Like me, she tolerates lesser creatures as long as they don't make too much noise, so she and Jack have gotten along famously. They've been running around in the back yard--even with the snow--in intermittent rounds of doggie tag. Jack enjoys keeping out of her reach, darting away from his lumbering pursuer. He's always enjoyed showing off his speed. Things were going pretty good--until Jack's boy-dog instincts kicked in.

Jack doesn't know that he's a little dog and, if you were to try to tell him, he wouldn't listen. It was probably only natural for him to try to take their relationship to the next level (anyone who's visited our house has a leg or a shoulder that can attest to that), and if he had any concerns about not being able to reach his intended target, he didn't show it. He just kept climbing higher and trying harder. He got his front paws almost up to Mariah's haunches before she reminded him of his place. Jack may not know that he's a little dog, but he is a smart dog--and he's smart enough to know his place once it's been shown to him. They're back to being friends now.

I'm sure that he misses us and I know that we all miss him but, with continued prayers and lots of protein, I think we'll be out of here soon. In the meantime, we'll visit when we can. He doesn't know it yet, but he's in for a walk tomorrow, when I take my first trip out of the hospital since Henry's ordeal started. I only hope I'll be able to keep up.

The weekend from hell

"Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand."

-Proverbs, 19:21

In other words: man makes plans, God laughs. I had this year all planned out and I was looking forward to it: the stories I would write and publish, the debt I would clear away, the places we would go. I had a list of goals four pages long, most of which fell under the broad umbrella of 'Action, not excuses.'


All that went out the window Saturday morning with the relatively innocent announcement that we should take Henry to the emergency room. He had been sick for more than a week, mild-grade flulike symptoms: a low fever, minor aches, fatigue. He slept more in that week than the previous four, I think.


Late in the week he had been complaining of some pain, and that was what finally did it. The area, normal the day before, had swelled to two or three times its regular size. One look at that and we were out the door in minutes, our destination: the Oakwood Urgent Care Center at Warren and Canton Center roads.


Dr. David Weaver is a solid ER doc; I know him through my work with the healthcare system. His diagnosis was almost immediate: Take him to Children's Hospital in Detroit or Mott's in Ann Arbor. You could drive him yourself, he said, but I'd advise an ambulance. By the time the ambulance arrived, Henry's fever had spiked another four degrees and Dr. Weaver told them to make haste.


They put Henry in the back and I climbed into the cab, numb. The ride to the emergency room in Ann Arbor could have taken five minutes or it could have taken an hour. Time had lost its meaning. I can only recall two coherent thoughts and they are both silly, in retrospect: it was not as much fun as it looked like at TV and the driver, no matter how insistent you are, won't follow your 'short cuts.'


Mott Children's Hospital in Ann Arbor is pretty amazing. I quickly lost count of how many doctors, residents and nurses that greeted us. We even tried to keep a list and still lost track. They told us, several times, that it was good that we brought him in when we did. The infection was serious; he needed surgery. It was serious enough that they used phrases like 'we need to do this to keep him viable.'  He was in surgery in about two hours.


Without getting into too many details, he developed an infection that was so severe it killed a lot of soft, internal tissue. They had to cut that out and clean up the rest. They pumped him full of antibiotics, gave him a morphine button for pain, and we spent all of Sunday recuperating, resting. There was another surgery today, along with an MRI. The doctors wanted to see how things looked and make sure all of the infected tissue was gone. There will be another surgery tomorrow, perhaps more later in the week.


He is in good spirits, comparatively. He is scared, but still trying to tell jokes. (He calls his room Motel Sick and, when one of his monitors wouldn't stop beeping, he called the nurse down saying: "This thing is beeping like it's free Slurpee day at 7-11."). The primary infection has been handled, so the doctors think, but the recovery will take some time. We may be here for a couple of weeks as they make sure they chase the last vestiges of it from his system and he heals properly.


Where did the infection come from? I don't know. How long was it there? No clue. Why did this happen? I've been wondering that, too. I'm a religious person--although I don't always talk like it when I'm driving or trying to fix something--and I haven't really had time yet to look for the divine purpose in all of this. Perhaps my goals for the year were all messed up. Maybe I should have thought merely about focusing on my family.


We'll find out, together. Right now I am just relieved, happy that the light of my life is still shining. I know we have challenges ahead and I thank you all for the grace and support you've showed through this horrible weekend. (You should know that, when I didn't trust my own words, I sat next to Henry and read him yours.). I have a new list now, with Henry's name at the top.


Thank you for your continued prayers.

Driving in a Winter Wonderland

Tires spin,
See them slipping

Steering wheels:
We’re all gripping
The corrections we make,
Tapping our brakes
Driving in a Winter Wonderland

 

Where’s my lane, are you kidding?

Tried to stop, but I’m still skidding
I finally touched 50--
In a graceful 360
Driving in a Winter Wonderland

 

In the left turn lane I did a donut

Trying to avoid a big snow plow
I know you’re trying to help
But Jesus Christ, man
Watch out where you’re going
Holy cow!

 

Later on,

I’ll exhale
Despite the road crews’ epic fail
Happy as sh*t
I avoided the ditch
Driving in a winter wonderland

 

At least the freeways have been somewhat salted

And I can get my car out of first gear
I’ll have lots of fun driving 20
Until some other jackass forgets to steer

 

When it snows,

And you’re driving
Elements, morons conniving
To get in your way
You better pray
When you’re driving in a winter wonderland…