My (ammy) Vices

The Art of Fielding

2012-02-01T20:25:00.003-07:00

It's been awhile since I blogged here. I've been wallowing in a pool of creative mediocrity, and generally when I find myself in that pool, sans bathing suit, I read. Last September, Chad Harbach debuted with much fanfare The Art of Fielding, his first novel. Since I love stories about the writers, and since his was such a unique, eye-popping story (unemployed copy-editor, educated at Harvard, sells first book for $650,000), I decided to check it out.

I'm so glad I did.

The Art of Fielding is a wonderful book, full of original prose and remarkable observations about life. I marked it up like scripture, highlighting passages, memorizing sentences, and frequently finding myself in awe of the simplicity of the writing. And after I finished, like a moron, I googled it to see what other reviewers thought. I was genuinely surprised at the varied opinions. There were almost as many negative reviews as there were positive ones. How was that possible? I loved the book, so logic would follow that everyone else would love it as well. It is interesting to me, although perhaps it shouldn't be considering the different circumstances in which we are all raised, how subjective writing is.

I've been writing my entire life, but when I first decided to try my hand at a novel, I held to the fantasy that it would be loved by all. I think I spent entire weekends dreaming about the literary fame and unfathomable wealth I would soon experience, which almost always sent me, grinning wildly, on shopping sprees that maxed out my credit and taxed out my poor wife and kids. I loved to pre-spend the money I was sure to make on my future best seller. Of course, as life often does, my dream was reduced, by poverty, to a quivering jello-like mass of damage that I'll be paying for until I die.

Ah, the plight of a dreamer.

Anyway, the thing I liked the most about The Art of Fielding is that it is about people searching for, and daringly, often painfully following, what they really want in their lives, and that's a theme I can relate to.

If you're looking for a good late-winter, early-spring read, pick up The Art of Fielding. It was, in my opinion, the book of the year.

Heller Skeller

2011-11-19T19:20:00.004-07:00

Ever since I was a wee lad in training pants, I've been fascinated by the lives of authors--a fact I credit for fueling my dream to become a writer. I am also fascinated by the creative process, the muse, and the novel's journey to publication. Some of these stories are incredibly inspirational to me. Others (like Stephenie Meyer's), are not.

A few years ago, I subscribed to Easton Press's Great Books of the 20th Century, and I enjoyed the book inserts almost as much as the books themselves. Each insert told the story of the book's path to publication, and each one was a pearl of insight that greatly enhanced my enjoyment of the book. Since I'm a lousy blogger, and I rarely have anything of quality or substance to post here, I've decided to share some of those stories. How's that for original?

One of my favorite novels is Joseph Heller's Catch 22. It's themes range from sanity and insanity, to the absurdity of bureaucracy, to the distortion of justice, and they are all explored brilliantly in Heller's unique circular style.

Heller did not begin work on any of his stories until he had envisioned both a first and a last line--a habit that he and I share, incidentally--and Catch 22 was no exception. One morning in 1953, he thought of the line: "It was love at first sight. The first time he saw the chaplain, Someone fell madly in love with him", and the novel was born. Within a week, he had written the first chapter and sent it off to his agent, and then he did no more work on it for a year as he plotted the story out in his mind. When he was one-third done with writing it, his agent started to submit it to publishers, and eventually Simon and Schuster bought it for $1,500. $750 of that offer was given to Heller immediately, with the promise of $750 more when the novel was finished. Then Heller missed his publishing deadline, finishing it five years later. Eventually, the movie rights were purchased, and combined with his royalties, Heller became a millionaire.

He wrote a number of other books, but none were as successful as Catch 22, and when told later in life by an interviewer that he'd never produced anything as good as Catch 22, he famously quipped, "Who has?"

I like that story for a number of reasons, but most notably because it's encouraging when my own work is progressing s-l-o-w-l-y. And since I am a slow writer, I need that encouragement all the time. I also like that story because I can identify with a lot of it, and it offers a happy ending.

Are there publication stories that encourage your writing?

I have an idea. Praise the Lord.

2011-11-10T21:00:00.005-07:00

For some time, I've been frustrated with the publishing industry. And while I whole-heartedly endorse the notion that only the very best writing should be published, I feel like the sheer volume of manuscripts inundating the industry precludes many projects from reaching an audience.

I know, I know. I can hear you saying that e-publishing is changing all of that. But I'm here to tell you that without a top-notch marketing strategy and deep marketing pockets--or hours and hours of time dedicated to pimping your project on social networking platforms--you can e-publish until your fingers turn blue and your project will still not reach an audience.

In my mind, there are two things that all writers want: an audience for their work, and the chance to get paid for their craft. You can argue that you write for yourself. You can argue that you write for the sheer joy of writing, but you're not fooling me. I am a writer, and it's not much fun when you spend hundreds and thousands of hours on a project that will sit and collect dust on your hard drive.

One of the problems with acheiving those goals is that in order to find an audience for your work, it needs to be good enough to be published. And not many of us are good enough to be published. We may think we are, but then we spend a weekend reading Cormac McCarthy and we hang our heads in shame. The only way we can improve our craft is to find someone who will offer honest feedback, and in case you didn't know already, expecting honest feedback from your parents or your friends is about as realistic as expecting your puppy to poop rose petals. We need PRACTICE and we need FEEDBACK to improve our craft.

Here is my idea.

I would like to create a community of writers who offer honest, unbiased feedback to one another anonymously, and at the same time, give that community of writers a chance to get paid for what they love to do.

The idea is simple enough, but the execution is slightly more complicated.

I am in the process of building a website where writers will have the chance to compete in a weekly writing contest. Each week, they will be challenged to write 1,000 word essay on a random picture--a picture is always worth at least 1,000 words--and the best essay will get paid for their work.

Here's the kicker. Each contestant submits their essay with a $5 entry fee. All of the money goes into a pot, and the best essay wins. Simple enough, right? The tricky part is the judging.

When a contestant submits an essay, their essay will go into one of two pools--pool A and pool B. (The prize money will be split evenly between the pools, so there will be a first prize for pool A, and a first prize for pool B). If their essay goes into pool A, they will get 5 entries from pool B to read and judge, thereby maintaining the integrity of the contest. Each essay will be judged on a scale from 1-10 by a group of peers, and each essay will be judged in one of 5 categories. The best overall score in each pool wins the weekly contest and the prize money.

Each contestant gets a scorecard back on their essay from their anonymous judges. The idea is that your $5 entry fee buys you honest feedback, and the best writing is rewarded with cash money. What do you think?

If the pool of contestants gets big enough, there could be quarterly prizes from industry professionals (manuscript requests from agents, free manuscript edits, novel critiques, etc), and annual prizes for the best overall essays that year. The possibilities are endless.

I am begging for your opinions. Do you think it is simple enough to work? Do you think there would be enough interest to make it worth the time and effort? How would you improve it?

--Curtis

The Big O

2011-10-14T02:11:00.004-06:00

Is there any written text so heartbreakingly beautiful as the last page of Fitzgerald's Gatsby? For those of you unfamiliar with it, here it is:

Most of the big shore places were closed now and there were hardly any lights except the shadowy, moving glow of a ferryboat across the Sound. And as the moon rose higher the inessential houses began to melt away until gradually I became aware of the old island here that flowered once for Dutch sailors’ eyes—a fresh, green breast of the new world. Its vanished trees, the trees that had made way for Gatsby’s house, had once pandered in whispers to the last and greatest of all human dreams; for a transitory enchanted moment man must have held his breath in the presence of this continent, compelled into an æsthetic contemplation he neither understood nor desired, face to face for the last time in history with something commensurate to his capacity for wonder.

And as I sat there, brooding on the old unknown world, I thought of Gatsby’s wonder when he first picked out the green light at the end of Daisy’s dock. He had come a long way to this blue lawn and his dream must have seemed so close that he could hardly fail to grasp it. He did not know that it was already behind him, somewhere back in that vast obscurity beyond the city, where the dark fields of the republic rolled on under the night.

Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter—tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther. . . . And one fine morning——

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Ah, cue the orchestra. I can't think of another ending in literature that so truly captures the loss of one's hopes, the melancholy of growing old, and the longing for a time when it actually seemed not only possible to achieve our dreams, but probable. It is, in essence, the death of our childhood that Fitzgerald is mourning. The passing of our youthful optimism, and how tragic that is for all of us. But alas, it is not my intention to be weepy. I only bring it up to see if any of you bright-eyed readers noticed a change in the above passage from the way you originally read it.

If you said that in the original Scribner's version of Gatsby it was written as orgiastic instead of orgastic, then give yourself a big gold star. You are correct, good sir/madam.

I stumbled across an interesting tidbit this past week. In the new "corrected" version of Gatsby (edited by Matthew J. Bruccoli, Jeffries Professor of English at the University of South Carolina), orgiastic has been changed to orgastic. The editor's notes concerning the change explain that after Fitzgerald's death, Edmund Wilson edited the novel and substituted orgastic for orgiastic believing that Fitzgerald had intended it that way. According to Wilson, "The word orgastic, on the last page, I took to be Scott’s mistake for orgiastic—he was very unreliable about words.” But when Max Perkins (editor of genius) asked Fitzgerald about it, Scottie (forgive my casualness), said, "it expresses exactly the intended ecstasy."

I like the word orgastic (of orgasms) rather than orgiastic (of orgies) in that last passage. But more than that, I like that Fitzgerald was vocal about using a word that expresses exactly what he meant. That, in a nutshell, dear readers, is what I love about writing. Finding the right word is a hugely, massively, gigantically big deal.

I may have understated that a little.

Sometimes I look around and all I can say is . . .

2011-09-30T18:19:00.002-06:00

Crap.

Rhythm

2011-09-23T02:23:00.002-06:00

Hello, blog. Nice to see you again.

A writer friend and I were talking this afternoon about various things--contests, short stories, poetry, our works in progress--and she sent me a short story she wrote for a parable-writing contest. I read it. Liked it. Gave her some advice, because I'm a jerk like that. And one thing that occurred to me as we were discussing her work (it is a short story in verse), is how important rythym is in my writing. Perhaps you are thinking, What does he mean by rythym? This is what I mean:

I have to like how it sounds out loud.

A big part of writing for me is the way the words flow. The ease with which they fall off the tongue. Or, in certain cases, the difficulty with which they fall off the tongue. But most importantly, the way they flow.

Here is a quick example of the rhythm that I'm talking about:

Miranda wears that dress today,
The one she wore that day in May,
That day in May she went away,
Miranda wears that dress today.

Miranda cries a tear today,
The way she cried that day in May,
That day in May she went away,
That day her baby passed away.

Miranda puts her lipstick on,
The way she did when he passed on,
She smeared it on when he passed on,
Miranda's almost halfway gone.

Miranda's hair is ratted there,
On her neck, her shoulders bare,
Ratted like she doesn't care,
Miranda's hair is ratted there.

Miranda lies down in the tub,
Her dress, her hair, her lipstick rub,
She lies down in the tub to scrub,
Her memory bare, there in the tub.

Miranda takes the razor blade,
That wicked blade the devil made,
Miranda takes the razor blade,
And puts it to her wrist.

Now, I'm not saying that the entire novel has to rhyme. But I like the rhythm of the stanzas above, how the words sound when they are read aloud, and this is how I try to write.

Here is another example:

I'm blue. You, too? Boo hoo. What do you do.
One bourbon, one scotch, and one beer.
Blue's a cliche, she says to you. You expect it, too. Right on cue. What do you do.
One bourbon, one scotch, and one beer.
You prove through and through, that blue's tried and true, and always in view, but always too few. Like the juniper dew, or lupin in lieu of the ho-hum hue of the ocean.
Snow can be blue, if the night light is new, like the twilight that's due before dawn.
It's the color of rue, or the color of woo, or the bluebird the flew from the lawn.
It's the lake-front view from the pastoral pew of the tree trunk or two that the wind cruelly blew, like a hurricane brewing abroad.
It's the chill of the flu, a cat's doleful mew, Elvis's shoe, a blueberry brew, a pale-colored glue, are you getting a clue? Do you see how her logic is flawed?
What do you do.
Are you blue?
Yeah, me, too.
One bourbon, one scotch, and one beer.

I think this is why it is so important to read your work out loud. Rhythm is the key. Rhythm is fun to read, and rhythm will make the words stick in the mind and in the heart of the reader. Why do you think Shakespeare's stuff was/is so popular? He wrote with rhythm. Why do you think Eminem's stuff is so popular? It's certainly not his class, or his gratuitous use of the expletive. It's because it has rhythm. His words flow. The sentences themselves are musical. Rap, in general, is that way. There aren't any real power chords, or melodies. Just the thump of the drum and the rhythm of the words.

There is real power in that kind of writing.

5 books you probably haven't read. Or probably have. I don't know.

2011-08-31T02:19:00.012-06:00

I love book recommendations, which is why I am shamelessly stealing Kim Karras's blog topic and giving you 5 great book recommendations that you probably haven't read. Or, maybe you have. All of these were best-sellers and widely recommended. But whatever. If you're a writer, these are wonderful examples, in my opinion, of the craft mastered. If you're a reader, you'll be hard-pressed to find better reads.

A River Runs Through It, by Norman Maclean. I've said it before, and I'm saying it again: this guy could WRITE!

Rabbit, Run, by John Updike. Great setting. Great characters. A few uncomfortable moments, but they make the experience better.

The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway. Okay, I admit it. This is one you've probably read. But it is one of my favorite stories from one of my favorite writers.

The Gold Coast, by Nelson DeMille. The best book DeMille has written. And that's saying something because he's a terrific writer. In DeMille's own words, this is The Great Gatsby meets The Godfather. How can you beat that?

Different Seasons, by Stephen King. A collection of novellas, and all four of them are terrific. Three of them were good movies (Shawshank Redemption, Stand By Me, and Apt Pupil), but even better reads.

Do you have any recommendations for me?

How to write a novel

2011-08-26T06:57:00.003-06:00

I have read nearly every book there is to read about writing compelling fiction. I have spent more money than I can count on a creative writing education. I am a voracious reader. I have written 2 complete novels, 2 almost complete novels, dozens of short stories, and several blog posts. And with all of that knowledge and experience, I think I can finally sum up what it takes to be a successful author.

1 - A perfect opening line.

2 - An exciting opening chapter.

3 - 25 more exciting chapters.

4 - A smattering of witty dialogue.

5 - An emotionally satisfying ending.

6 - An agent. Which is not possible.

7 - A compelling character. Or a vampire.

8 - Thick skin.

9 - The luck of the Irish. And a leprechaun.

And finally,

10 - A large bottle of cheap whiskey.

That's pretty much it. Good luck, and good night.

Summer Movies

2011-08-24T23:59:00.003-06:00

Summer movie season is almost over. I saw a few stinkers this year, and I saw a few that genuinely surprised me in a good way. Here is my list of 2011 Hollywood winners and losers so far:

LOSERS:

5) Battle Los Angeles - I am well past the stage in my life where special effects trump a good story.

4) Hop - I can be a good sport when it comes to movies for kids. I have 3 kids of my own, after all. But this movie was the cinematic equivalent of being killed by mosquitoes.

3) Source Code - I fell through the plot holes and couldn't scratch my way out.

2) Transformers 3 - See comments for Battle LA.

1) Fast and the Furious 5 - I can't believe I actually paid to see this.

WINNERS:

5) Soul Surfer - Uplifting. Surprisingly well-acted if you ignore Carrie Underwood.

4) Larry Crowne - I had low expectations, but had no regrets after I left the theater. I didn't even mind getting raped at the concession stand.

3) Fright Night - Liked the original. Loved the remake. Lots of fun, and the 3D was perfect.

2) Super 8 - Despite the plot holes, and there were many, I liked the classic Spielberg elements. Entertaining couple of hours.

1) Rise of the Planet of the Apes - I am not a Planet of the Apes fan, but this was the best money I spent at the movies this year. Go see it. This is how special effects should be done: not at the expense of the story.

HONORABLE MENTIONS:

Limitless - I'm not sure how I feel about the message, (pop a pill, become superman), and there were those nagging plot holes, but I left feeling kind of limitless. That redeemed it.

Rango - It started to drag near the end, but there were some lines that made me laugh so hard, I cried. "I'll blow that ugly right off your face!" Hahaha! It still gets me.

MOVIES I HAVEN'T SEEN YET, BUT PLAN TO:

The Help - My wife saw this one and liked it. That's usually a bad sign. (Sorry, honey. Love you).

Water for Elephants - I enjoyed the book.

Tree of Life - The previews look amazing. And I have a man-crush on Brad Pitt.

Moneyball - I also enjoyed the book. And I have a man-crush on Brad Pitt.

Brave New World - Aldous Huxley. Need I say more?

A Virtual Hell

2011-08-24T23:31:00.002-06:00

It's such a strange, strange virtual world, isn't it? I've been here blogging away for awhile now, and I sometimes feel like a one-legged kid in the high school gym class.

Or Eyore.

I lost my tail.

Nobody loves me.

I'm not Mr. Sour Grapes or anything, but how do people build such an immense virtual presence? All of my writer friends start blogging and, within a few hours, have hundreds of followers. Do I need to take a virtual shower? Have I not put on my virtual deodorant? I brush my virtual teeth at least three times a day. What does it take?

I'll be curled up in my virtual corner sucking on my virtual thumb if you have any ideas.

A Voice from the Past

2011-08-12T21:19:00.006-06:00

I was saddened by the news tonight that long-time Braves broadcaster and the voice of my youth died at the age of 87. Ernie Johnson will be missed, not only for his golden voice, but for the memories that his voice conjures up.

These are just a few:

- Hot summer days followed by warm summer nights.
- The Braves on TV and Dale Murphy swinging for the fences.
- Sleeping on the trampoline with Tami and Randy.
- Atari baseball with Corey and Rod.
- Drafting Atari baseball teams from stacks of baseball cards.
- A week each July with my cousin, Troy.
- A week each August with my cousin, Brandon.
- Sleeping late.
- Waking up to the vacuum and to the sultry sounds of The Price is Right.
- Little league baseball.
- Big League Chew.
- Fishing under the bridge by the high school.
- Comic Books.
- Dad and Mom at my current age.

Sigh.

And the older I get, the more I realize how short the path is to the end, and how much of life was packed into those years gone by. How I miss the voices from my past. Now, for me, there is a bit of heartache with every setting sun, and the closing line from Gatsby is a poignant dagger:

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

Rest in peace, Ernie.

Going to the Movies

2011-08-11T19:29:00.012-06:00

It has been awhile since my wife and I went to the movies together. Coordinating that night out was like a strategic military operation. We had to recruit four-star Generals to pull it off. When you have children, nothing is spontaneously arranged. It requires days or weeks of planning.

Technology is a good thing. Now you can purchase your movie tickets in advance on the internet. The old way of getting movie tickets was always frustrating, but as a seasoned married couple, we were good at it. We split up the responsibilities.

"Honey, I'm gonna park the car, you get out and buy the tickets. I'll meet you in line."

We were a precision drill team.

"Okay, you get in the ticket buyer's line. I'll park the car. Come around the northwest corner and get in the ticket holder's line. I'll be there. Now, at nineteen hundred hours, the doors will open and I'll have to move out. If I don't have tickets in hand, we're dead. Get me those tickets. Now cover me, I'm going in."

This type of expertise didn't happen overnight. It took months and months of Friday nights to perfect. If you want to do it right, you each have to accept that there is a job to do and that there are sacrifices to be made. There is no romance. It's all business.

"Tonight, we'll see a movie, tomorrow we'll kiss. Now get out of the car and go go go go GO!"

Couples just starting out don't know this. Ever see first-date couples at a weekend movie? No. Because they never get in. They haven't developed their taste for blood. They're too busy holding hands, being polite.

"Which one would you rather see, the Eastwood movie or the other one? The Julia Roberts movie? That sounds wonderful. Why would anyone want to watch a boring old Eastwood movie when we could watch that really interesting, super-original love story. Whatever you want, beautiful...oh look, everything seems to be sold out."

Of course it's sold out. It's Friday night, eight o'clock. Separate. Split up. Do your jobs. Be nice to each other later.

***

Even when you get into the theater, it's not over. You have to get seats. Again, there is a science to this. Walk into the theater and grab the first two seats you see. Doesn't matter where they are. You may not even sit there. Grab them anyway. This is your fall-back position.

One of you now must guard the fall-back position. The other one goes to look for better seats. You move out into the jungle with a machete and a map, and periodically you look to the fall-back position secure in the knowledge that, at worst, you have two sucky seats in the front row waiting for you.

To find better seats, you have to bother other people. You see a guy next to a jacket.

"Excuse me, is that seat taken?"

You have to ask, because you don't know. Is he saving it? Is he dating his clothing? It's not always clear.

Sometimes you see a jacket and a hat. He's waiting for two friends. Once in awhile, you see a trail of clothing: jacket, hat, shoes, pants, socks, underwear, tie clip, belt, and way down at the end there's one guy sitting there naked and embarrassed.

"Yes, they're all coming back. We're a group of twelve. I undressed. I didn't think it through."

***

When you've found your seats, it's still not over. One of you has to go back out to get the popcorn. That is usually my job. I'm happy to do it, but there's nothing as embarrassing as coming back into a dark theater and realizing you don't know where you're sitting. Suddenly, you're 4 years old and lost at the circus. You're near tears.

"Honey? Honey?"

You're sitting in people's laps.

"Sorry, wrong row. Honey, where are you? I got the popcorn you wanted."

If you can't find the seats, you have to go to the front row and walk up the entire aisle, in plain view of everyone, hoping your partner will see you and come to your rescue. Of course, your partner is now watching the movie, and the last thing they are thinking about is you. So, you are wandering up and down the aisle like an idiot.

"Help me. Somebody?"

You're standing in front of a crowd with your arms full of crap you didn't even want.

"Anybody?"

You bump into another guy who is just as lost.

"Honey?"
"Babe?"
"Sweetheart, is that you?"
"Hey, my wife is Sweetheart."
"Sorry. Honey?"

For awhile, that is all you hear. Men whining. Women whispering men's names loudly.

"Steve!"
"Leonard!"
"Mitchell! I'm over here!"

It's pathetic.

In this situation, my advice is sit next to any woman. It doesn't matter who. Just level with her.

"Look, Mitchell is not coming back. I just saw him go into the wrong theater, so he won't be back for some time. My wife is sitting with a guy named Steve. Steve is with Leonard's wife. It's all screwed up. But I'm a guy, I got popcorn, it's the same exact thing. What did I miss?"

You watch the movie and you settle up afterward.

In the beginning, and other great openings

2011-08-06T18:05:00.005-06:00

I blew things up today.

That doesn't happen often. I don't even own a gun, let alone any grenades. But a friend of mine with a gun collection invited me to the shooting range, so I went and marveled at the fact that it's legal in my state to own a .50 caliber rifle. Have you ever seen a .50 caliber bullet? I have trees in my back yard that are smaller than the shell casing.

ANYWAY, as I was driving home, the scent of gunpowder delicately wafting about, I thought about stories. Do you know what really great stories and really great .50 caliber rifles have in common? Really great opening lines. Here are some of my favorites. See how many you can identify without cheating, add up your score, and post it in the comments. Answers are at the at the bottom of this post below the picture.

1. Call me Ishmael.

2. It was a queer, sultry summer, the summer they electrocuted the Rosenbergs, and I didn't know what I was doing in New York.

3. If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.

4. Marley was dead, to begin with.

5. It was a pleasure to burn.

6. There was a hand in the darkness, and it held a knife.

7. In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice I've been turning over in my mind ever since.

8. The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.

9. On those cloudy days, Robert Neville was never sure when sunset came, and sometimes they were in the streets before he could get back.

10. My wound is geography.

11. Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again.

12. When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow.

13. It was a dark and stormy night.

14. It was love at first sight. The first time Yossarian saw the chaplain he fell madly in love with him.

15. This is a tale of a meeting of two lonesome, skinny, fairly old white men on a planet which was dying fast.

There you have it. 15 great opening lines by authors who knew what they were doing. Here is how the scoring works. You get two points for every one you get correct, title and author. You get one point if you only know the author. Likewise, you get one point if you only know the title. Post your score in the comments for a super terrific pat on the back.

This is a picture of a .50 caliber sniper rifle. It is the scariest thing I can think of this side of Anthrax.

ANSWERS!!!

1. Moby Dick, Herman Melville

2. The Bell Jar, Sylvia Plath

3. The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger

4. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens

5. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury

6. The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman

7. The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

8. The Darktower: The Gunslinger, Stephen King

9. I Am Legend, Richard Matheson

10. The Prince of Tides, Pat Conroy

11. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier

12. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee

13. A Wrinkle in Time, Madeline L'Engle

14. Catch-22, Joseph Heller

15. A Breakfast of Champions, Kurt Vonnegut

Thank you for playing. I, for one, will return now to crafting fabulous opening lines for my novels. Ones that have a .50 caliber bang.

Kindle

2011-07-31T20:17:00.003-06:00

Well friends, I've been experimenting with e-publishing and I put together a handful of short stories I wrote for college writing classes and short-story exercises. In case anyone is curious, you can find my endeavor under the pen name, Seth Eborn. The title of the collection is A Bridge and Other Short Stories. It's only $0.99 and you'd be supporting a starving artist. Go check it out. Buy it if you'd like. Recommend it if you would. Thanks for your patronage.

Editing

2011-07-21T23:49:00.002-06:00

That word up there in the title box makes me nauseous. It is the single-word equivalent of a steaming pile of fish guts. The reason that I'm a writer is because I like to do things that make me feel good, and I like to participate in creation--both fruits of the creative writing tree. Incidentally, that's also why I like sex. Once said object has been created, I don't typically like to revisit it, no matter how ugly it may be. Unless that object is one of my children. Then, what choice do I have? Fortunately, my children and my books are perfect, which is, also incidentally, what every parent says. Even the parents of grasshoppers. Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is this: it's a nauseating word, but necessary if you take your craft seriously. Fortunately, that's why editors were invented.

For those of you who have a completed manuscript and would like to have someone edit it for you, I have two (count them, TWO) recommendations. Both are terrific editors. Neither will break the bank. And ONE of them is having a super-duper editing giveaway. Click HERE to enter.

Recommendation number 1: Precision Editing Group. I have used PEG on two manuscripts and have been more than pleased with both edits.

And recommendation number 2: Cassandra Marshall, freelance editor extraordinaire.

Check them out. Use them. You won't regret it.

An artist's lament

2011-07-15T23:42:00.004-06:00

The black cloud that followed Pablo around spit lightning, and it was meaner than most. It struck him three times before he turned forty. The first time, he was pitching apples against the trunk of a tree, and the charge from the bolt knocked his clothes off. When he awoke, he was in his underwear prostrate in the dirt; his Tuffskins and Chuck Taylor’s hung from a branch fourteen feet up, and smoke streamed from his fingertips like ten lines of silk thread. He suffered from dizzy spells after that and a patch of white hair sprouted from his crown, spotting his thick brown mane like bird shit on the hood of a Monte Carlo. The second time stopped his heart, and if it hadn’t been for the help of a nearby doctor, Pablo would not have lived to experience the third time, and the people of Last Chance, California would have missed out on the fireworks that accompanied his fortieth birthday.

Pablo manipulated puppets on the pier for a living. He worked for peanuts—sometimes literally—and he never experienced love, or had children, or looked for anything that could potentially bring him joy because he knew that the black cloud would spoil it. He saw the blue sky and the sun shining down on those around him and he generally hated them for their good fortune. But his resentment was superficial because he knew deep down that their happiness was by no fault of their own, just as he knew that he was not responsible for his own despair. The cloud was to blame.

He lived in an old bait shop. He ate frijoles when he had the money and peanuts when he didn’t, and he drank rainwater, always in plentiful supply, from two Hills Brothers coffee cans that he kept on his porch.

On his thirty-seventh birthday he went out to collect a fresh coffee can of water and he saw three colorful hot air balloons on the distant horizon. At that moment, he hatched a plan that would allow him to escape from under his black cloud. And as he was enthusiastic about it, he began to advertise it right away. He told his audience on the pier about his plan. Then he wrote it on the sidewalk. Of course, his perpetual rainstorm washed away the chalk letters, so he improvised and spelled it out with pebbles.

His plan was to rent a hot air balloon and rise above his black cloud. It was time to cut the strings. Nothing was going to stop him. But for a humble puppeteer, it would take some time to gather together the money required for such a feat. Thus, he allotted himself one year, and just like that, Pablo’s Plan (as he liked to call it) was penciled in to celebrate his thirty-eighth.

He scrimped and saved every penny. He rationed out his frijoles, and instead of eating six peanuts for dinner when the frijoles were gone, he ate five. If he felt especially hungry, he drank an extra glass of water—for the cloud could always be counted on for that—and he lost fifteen pounds during that year. He almost had sixty four dollars saved when the big day arrived, which was just enough to rent the balloon for an hour, so the sacrifice was worth it.

He rolled out of bed with a smile. Outside his window, the sun shone bright and the sky was blue, except for around his bait shop where it was raining. He pulled on his galoshes and donned his raincoat, and when he reached for the Mason jar where he kept his money, he saw that it was gone. Someone had stolen it during the night. Pablo’s Plan would have to be postponed.

Perhaps when I’m thirty-nine, he thought.

For another year, he scrimped and saved every penny. Once again, he rationed out his frijoles, and he pared down his peanut allowance to four in case of inflation, and by the time his thirty-ninth birthday rolled around he was thin enough to hula-hoop a donut. He also had almost eighty dollars stuffed into his jar.

He held the jar tightly under his left arm as he unlocked his front door. It took him a few extra minutes because he had fitted it with two additional locks, and he made his way to the balloon shop to rent his escape. For the first time in his life, he heard the birds singing. He noticed the flutter of leaves in the trees. He could even smell the perfume of the flowers as he walked by, and despite the rain dripping off of the hood of his raincoat, he felt a flutter of optimism in his stomach. He was about to be free.

Unfortunately, just as he reached the door of the balloon shop his cloud opened up and zapped him again.

After he stopped twitching, he looked around for his Mason jar. It was in pieces at his feet. A few dollars were scattered here and there, and he collected a half-dozen coins in varying denominations, but when he had gathered up every single scrap of money on the street, he was only left with fifty-one dollars and twenty-six cents.

He was not discouraged; he made his way to the fabric shop. He purchased as much nylon fabric as his meager savings would allow, and he went home to build the contraption himself.

Another soggy year piddled by and Pablo used his peanut money to purchase more fabric. He also bought thread, wire, bamboo, and matches. He used the thread to sew the nylon fabric together. He used the bamboo to weave a large, but shabby basket. He planned to use the wire to attach the balloon to the basket, and the matches were to stoke the fire.

The day of his fortieth birthday finally arrived. Everyone in Last Chance knew of Pablo’s Plan and a crowd began to gather around his bait shop. They stood basking in their sunshine, and they formed a circle around Pablo’s shack just far enough away to keep from getting rained on. They cheered when he emerged from the front door.

Pablo carried the homemade balloon under one of his frail arms. The bamboo basket sat next to the bait shop. Pablo unfolded his nylon balloon and fastened it to the basket with the wire. He climbed a rickety ladder onto the roof of his bait shop and he latched one side of the nylon balloon to a ringlet on the cupola. He dragged the rickety ladder to the opposite side of his bamboo basket and he climbed into the branches of a tree that grew there. He latched the other side of the nylon balloon to one of the branches so that the hole in the bottom of the balloon stretched over the basket, and when everything was set, he climbed into the makeshift hot air balloon and he waved to the cheering crowd.

A large tin bucket was on the center of the basket floor. An open umbrella had been fastened over the bucket and a tangle of dry sticks sprouted out of it. Pablo struck match after match until a small flame crackled the twigs, and after awhile, the nylon balloon stretched, and filled, and grew into a colorful patchwork egg. The balloon broke free from the roof ringlet, and it broke free of the tree branch, and when Pablo felt the basket slowly lift off, that old flutter of optimism tickled his insides. This time he mistook it for nausea though, and he wretched a few peanuts and a swallow of water onto his threadbare shoes.

Within minutes, Pablo’s balloon was fifteen feet off the ground; then twenty; then twenty-five. Soon the faces in the crowd were too small to distinguish, and when the black fog of his cloud engulfed him, the faces below him disappeared entirely from view.

His cloud was meaner than most, however, and much more committed. It bucked his basket, and then pitched it violently from side to side. One wire snapped, and then another wire snapped. The bamboo basket tipped and the tin bucket spilled. Flames licked the bamboo. Pablo’s pants caught fire, then his shirt caught fire, and when the remaining wires snapped, both the basket and its passenger screamed back down to earth.

He broke both of his legs, but his rain cloud doused his clothes and the burns were not serious enough to require skin grafts.

Perhaps when I’m forty-one, he thought.

As a writer, I often feel like poor Pablo, trying to stay optimistic in the face of a very difficult industry. Do any of you ever feel the same?

Bogart

2011-07-14T13:27:00.003-06:00

Mom is not crafty. She doesn’t sew, or scrapbook. She rarely cooks. There aren’t little wooden signs around the house with catchy Christian sayings, or annoying inspirational mantras. Still, when I was a child she was forced to be resourceful. I understood that money was tight because Dad taught school and they reproduced a lot, and because of this, I tried my best to be grateful for the things I was given. On my eighth birthday, Mom gave me a stuffed pillow that she sewed herself, and I named it Bogart.

Bogart was made out of a pattern purchased from a craft store. Mom stuffed him with cotton and sewed him together, and I loved him. He was a Basset Hound, complete with the long ears and droopy eyes, and I carried him with me everywhere for most of that year. Whenever we asked Dad for a pet, he would say, “If you can’t milk it, ride it, or eat it, you shoot it,” so Bogart was Mom’s way of granting my pet wish.

The year I turned eight was significant for a number of reasons, not the least of which was Bogart. That was also the year we moved from a big city to a small farming community, and Bogart became my only friend. In my mind, we carried on conversations. I would explain basic human function, like using the toilet and taking a bath, and he would explain how in his canine breed, long ears were symbols of consequence and distinction (he didn’t like to boast, but he sometimes tripped on his). I slept with him, ate with him, camped with him, and watched Saturday afternoon baseball with him. His face was fixed; constant in my changing world, and Mom made him for me.

One afternoon, six months after moving in, my older brother had two Marks over to spend the night: Mark Darcy and Mark VanTassell. They were rowdy, obnoxious, and older than me, so naturally I clung to them like body odor. They took Bogart and teased me the way sociopathic twelve year olds do, and after rescuing my stuffed stoic friend, I sniffled the tears back and left them, hopeful that a just God would strike them with palsy.

At some point during the night, Bogart came up missing and I panicked. I woke Mom and she woke the boys, but each feigned ignorance and when they left the following morning, my best friend was gone forever.

Mom is not crafty. She doesn’t sew, or scrapbook. She rarely cooks. There aren’t little wooden signs around the house with catchy Christian sayings, or annoying inspirational mantras. However, in one loving burst of thoughtfulness on my eighth birthday, she created a companion that still understands me better than anyone I’ve known since. Now, when I take my dog for a walk and people ask me what kind of dog he is, I say: “He’s a Basset Hound—and generally speaking, the longer the ears, the more attractive the dog. He doesn’t like to boast, but he sometimes trips on his,” and when they ask me his name, I reply with a lump in my throat, “His name is Bogart.”

Poetry Schmoetry Blogfest

2011-07-06T03:37:00.005-06:00

I am a willing participant in Shelly Brown's Poetry Schmoetry Blogfest.

Here is my entry:

A Boat Against the Current
by Me

The gentle lap of salt and sea
lick tenderly the aging hull.
My body’s just the boat, you see,
the tides, the clock that will not slow.

Memories, like misty rain
or green-light glints across the bay,
tug and pull—a tender pain
that flickers there, but will not stay.

Deserted dreams, like anchors sink
through darkened leagues, past hopes and fears.
Fading gray with every blink
but not forgotten yet, I think—
too deep to vanish with the years.

And so I sail and ebb and flow,
waiting for my time to go.
Forever borne back to my shore,
my youth, my life, my nevermore,
and isn’t it tragic to think so?

A boat against the current
waging war with Father Time.
Searching for that summer place,
that first embrace, that lover’s face--
yearning for a chance to grace
my carefree youth gone by.

*Find more Randy Moser songs at Myspace Music

Just for fun, I had my immensely talented brother put my poem to music, and although I've pared down the poem now to what you see above, the original version is in the song.

5 quotes I wish I could take credit for, and why I love them.

2011-06-19T21:52:00.005-06:00

If you're a writer, or you dabble in the ink pot, you have probably heard the same writing quotes regurgitated at every writer's conference, in every writing manual, from every motivational speaker, over and over again until you can say them in your sleep. You know the ones I'm talking about. And if there is something every writer should avoid, it is a cliche. They're not bad quotes--just overused. So, for this Father's Day post, I wanted to share 5 non-cliched quotes about writing, and a brief bla-bla about why I love them.

1) The act of putting pen to paper encourages pause for thought, this in turn makes us think more deeply about life, which helps us regain our equilibrium. ~Norbet Platt

Over the past five years or so, I've been discouraged by the direction of our post-high school educational system. It seems that more and more, the nation is headed down the path of the technical degree. Universities everywhere are reducing budgets for their Arts and Humanities programs, or worse, doing away with them altogether, and a degree, which used to give its bearer an education in a wide array of subjects, now shows a proficiency in one field, and one field only. You can see evidence of this by the dramatic rise in the number of technical schools, and I believe that within the next 20 years, the traditional university will have gone the way of the dodo bird. How tragic, in my opinion. The quote above is one of the many reasons I have such a devotion to writing. Humanities programs, art programs, reading, and especially writing, demonstrate an appreciation for deeper thought--a reluctance to believe everything that we are spoon-fed from the media, and I think that is what makes America great.

2) So often is the virgin sheet of paper more real than what one has to say, and so often one regrets having marred it. ~Harold Acton, Memoirs of an Aesthete, 1948

Having a great idea, and knowing what I want to say in a story, is one of the most painful things that I endure as a writer, because it is so difficult to capture that idea correctly on paper. And the saddest thing of all is the fact that once I "mar" the paper, as Mr. Acton so eloquently put it, the story begins to evolve and take on a life of its own, and if I'm not careful, my original idea blinks out like a faulty flashlight.

3) It is necessary to write, if the days are not to slip emptily by. How else, indeed, to clap the net over the butterfly of the moment? For the moment passes, it is forgotten; the mood is gone; life itself is gone. That is where the writer scores over his fellows: he catches the changes of his mind on the hop. ~Vita Sackville-West

This quote is great because it illustrates the importance of capturing a moment and making it everlasting. Memory is unreliable, and it only gets worse with age. Writing something down--be it in a journal or on a blog post--cements a moment in time, and what is more powerful than that?

4) Easy reading is damn hard writing. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne

One of the things I strive for the most in my writing is to make it clear, and concise, and easy to understand. When I read something that flows well, I am always in awe of the writer. And this quote gives credit to that labor.

5) The story I am writing exists, written in absolutely perfect fashion, some place, in the air. All I must do is find it, and copy it. ~Jules Renard, "Diary," February 1895

This is, without a doubt, the most difficult thing a writer must do. See quote #2.

And those, dear reader(s), are 5 of my favorite, non-cliched quotes about writing. What are some of yours?

Hi Eight Us

2011-06-19T03:27:00.002-06:00

Hello, faithful blog reader(s)! <----that's a hopeful S.

I apologize for the delay in posts. I have been on a two-week hiatus from work and life, much of which was spent at Disneyland with my kids. And, while it was a much-needed break and I loved spending time with my family, the next time I'm given a choice between Disneyland and a long drop on a short rope, I'll take the hanging, thank you very much.

Right now, I am breathing a sigh of relief, because I am finally, finally, finally done with my WIP. It was a struggle. I rewrote the ending about a dozen times. But I am putting it away now, happy that it is complete and satisfied with the way that it all came together. Now comes the painful process of submission. Wish me luck. But finishing my WIP also means that I, at long last, have the time to catch up on the things on my to do list. So, for those of you who are waiting patiently for me to review your writing, or do some editing, or listen to your music, my procrastinated opinion is forthcoming. Hooray!

But enough about me--here's something about me:

I was recently talking with one of my writer friends about his writing habits, and he mentioned to me that he does his best writing in a crowded cafe downtown. I have also read that many writers like to write to music. Which surprised me a little, since, when I write, I can't write to any distraction at all! No music, no television, no children crying, no dogs barking. In fact, I remind myself of Chevy Chase in Funny Farm, sitting at his writing desk and pitching his coffee on the bird outside because the chirping is driving him crazy. In my perfect writing universe, I am in a small, soundproof closet for hours, with nothing but 360 degree views of the ocean.

Does that make me strange?

What is your ideal writing space?

10 Commandments of Good Writing

2011-06-01T03:28:00.004-06:00

With the whole End Of The World thing fresh on my mind, I've been doing some soul-searching, and many of you will be shocked to hear that I actually found it! I've also been doing a little self-evaluating, and one thing led to another, and before long, I had formulated a Commandment list for good writing. Enjoy.

1. Thou shalt take thy craft seriously.

2. Thou shalt proofread carefully.

3. Thou shalt not use the adjective in vain.

4. Remember to write daily, and keep your writing time holy.

5. Honor the Elements of Style (Strunk & White).

6. Thou shalt kill your darlings.

7. Thou shalt not commit plagiarism.

8. Thou shalt read often.

9. Thou shalt not bear false witness. Do your research.

10. Thou shalt not covet the New York Times Bestseller's list. Thou shalt not expect to be paid for thy writing. Thou shalt not expect to find an agent, nor a publisher, nor an editor, nor anything like unto it. Thou shalt write for the joy of writing, and if thou ignorest the advice to not look for an agent, thou shalt, at the very least, not expect to find an agent with anything you write or wrote for NaNoWriMo.

25 songs I'm listening to right now. Simultaneously.

2011-05-28T21:29:00.008-06:00

I saw this post on Amanda Hocking's blog recently and I like the idea of giving you, my legion of blog followers, a list of 25 songs that I'm listening to now. Not right now. I can't listen to music while I write. But I listen to these songs while I'm mowing the lawn, or when I'm in the shower. Sometimes when I'm eating breakfast. Not often while I'm making my bed, but I'm not opposed to the idea.

Here they are, along with some standout videos. Love the Beasties.

1. The Black Keys - Sinister Kid

2. Cage the Elephant - Around My Head

3. Coldplay - Yellow

4. Mumford & Sons - Little Lion Man

5. The Heavy - How You Like Me Now

6. Beastie Boys - Make Some Noise

7. The Raconteurs - Salute Your Solution

8. The Killers - Spaceman

9. The Airborne Toxic Event - Sometime Around Midnight

10. Biffy Clyro - Many of Horror

11. My Chemical Romance - Bulletproof Heart

12. Dan Fogelberg - Same Old Lang Syne

13. Metallica - Fade To Black

14. Bob Marley - Stir It Up

15. Damien Rice - The Blower's Daughter

16. Green Day - Jesus of Suburbia

17. The Black Keys - Thickfreakness

18. Kings of Leon - Pyro

19. Sleigh Bells - Rill Rill

20. Death Cab for Cutie - You Are A Tourist

21. The Beatles - The Ballad of John and Yoko

22. John Lee Hooker - Bang, Bang, Bang, Bang

23. Bob Dylan - If you see her, say hello

24. AWOLNATION - Sail

25. The Naked and Famous - Young Blood

Anything you'd recommend? I'm open to suggestions.

A teensy tinsy bit of tensiony tension

2011-05-27T02:42:00.005-06:00

Okay, writer friends. I see that you are all super tense about this tension exercise. I'm game. Here is my best effort--though I'm obviously not talented enough to do it in 300 words or less. Mine is 800 words. Nothing I do is short. And I'm not compensating for anything.

Purple

The single-page letter sits atop the phone book on the kitchen counter. The envelope, torn now with its lavender flap open, is on the floor next to her crumpled black dress and the pieces of a broken wine glass. He sees the letter written in purple ink shouting at him in its delicate shade. The words, he’ll never know, and, it’ll be a night to remember, stab at his throat and his heart like icicles plucked from the January eaves over his garage. The house is silent except for her muffled moans coming from the bedroom. The evidence of her infidelity is her dress on the floor, his tie on the back of the couch, her high-heeled shoes against the wall where she has playfully kicked them off, and of course, the letter.

He found it stuffed between the pages of a book, used to mark her place within the sleazy confines of a paperback romance. The novel was on the nightstand next to their marital bed. As if he wouldn’t flip through the pages looking for a cheap thrill. As if he wouldn’t recognize the return address. As if he wouldn’t know that she had continued her correspondence with him after her promise that it was over. He knew his handwriting from the bundle of letters she kept in a box at the top of their closet. He knew his address from the times he’d been there, driven by jealousy, to catch a glimpse of his wife’s secret lover. And now he has caught them, and now his stomach is sick, and now, behind the stocking cap he wears over his face and under the leather gloves that cover his hands, he will make them pay for their sins.

He had brought the letter with him, along with a black-handled hunting knife, and he had placed the letter on top of the phone book as evidence to the world of her adultery. The lavender envelope had fallen to the floor.

Now he unsheathes the knife and creeps through the living room without fear, without noise, without remorse. Her moans are louder. He is only a few steps away from the bedroom door, and he grits his teeth at her apparent ecstasy—a sound unfamiliar to him after four years of marriage.

On the wall beside him, a large clock echoes the rhythm of his heartbeat—uncharacteristically methodic despite his emotional state—and it seems to slow as he nears the door.

Tick. He steps on the bottom half of her violet lingerie. Tock. He reaches for the door handle. Tick. He pushes the door open. Tock. He sees her.

Her back is to him, though he can see that her eyes are closed. Her hair is in a tumble over her bare shoulders and she is astride him. The sound of the clock is gone, lost in the dark music of their lovemaking, and he steps into the room as soft as the petal of a lilac. A hint of her perfume lingers in the air, mingled with the smell of a scented candle—the light of which flickers and dances with his wife’s shadow on the wall.

She sighs and the name of her lover drips from her mouth.

Carlos.

In another tick of the silent clock he is upon them, the cold steel blade slicing a thin line across Carlos’s throat, which is now violently crimson in the candlelight. He can hear the choking, can see the struggle to push her off of him and then Carlos is silent and she is sobbing and panicked on the sheets beside her lover.

He is halfway done.

He is astride her, a wicked inversion of her recent position, and he is twisting and holding her wrists over her head with his left hand. He sees the bruise on her neck knowing that it was made moments before in passion, and he knows that in the full light of the sun it would be the color of a plum, but here in the candled light it is as black as the handle of his knife. She writhes like a snake beneath him, whipping her hair to the left and to the right, stopping the minute he plunges the knife into her chest.

It’ll be a night to remember, the letter said. The evidence is splayed out beneath him in gory black pools on the bed. He can hear the clock again and it echoes the rhythm of the heart he holds in his hands.

Tick. It is bigger than he imagined it to be. Tock. It is heavy and hot and slippery with blood. Tick. It seems to slow as he nears the door. Tock.

And the sound of the clock is gone, as silent now as her cold heart.

The End of the World

2011-05-23T20:45:00.003-06:00

I knew better. Of course I did. I've been through the Bible a time or two and I knew that the likelihood of the world ending at precisely 6:00 PM on Saturday was slim, at best. After all, I haven't published my book yet. Still, with all of the hubbub, I couldn't help but wonder what I would do if I knew when the end of the world was going to take place. How would I spend my final hours? So, with that in mind, here is my super-duper, final hour, end-of-the-world bucket list:

1. Wake up on the wrong side of the bed.

2. Speed-read Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, and Faulkner in case there's a quiz in hell.

3. Practice all of my curse words so I can communicate properly with the devil.

4. Call in to work sick, then go in late and leave early, just to spite them.

5. Drive 37 miles with my right blinker on.

6. Skinny dip with piranha.

7. Tell everyone that the sky is actually red.

8. Listen to church hymns backwards for subliminal hints.

9. Throw my cell phone in a lake.

10. Order 19 pizzas and send them to a bus stop.

What would you do?

And the winner is...

2011-05-19T22:26:00.008-06:00

I'm not normally one for shameless self promotion, but this blog post is going to be shamefully shameless, and it's going to be self-promoting, and I'm ashamed that I'm not more ashamed about it.

Recently, I attended the LDS Storymaker's conference in Salt Lake City, and I entered their annual First Chapter writing contest. Amazingly, my entry won first prize! I'm humbled by that, seeing as I had the chance to read the 2nd place entry, and it was unbelievably good. (You can visit the 2nd place winner's blog here).

I thought I'd post the winning chapter for you. Let me know what you think.

A Starlit Road

A novel written by me:

Narrated by him:

Chapter One

Good dog or bad dog? It’s an age-old question, and I’ve given it a lot of thought. I feel like I’m basically a good dog. My heart is almost always in the right place. But here I am in jail, and this time I deserve it, so I guess I’m a bad dog.

What hangs me up is the fact that I know a lot of bad dogs with good intentions and I know a lot of good dogs with bad intentions, so how do you really know? Is it the intention that counts or is it the result? Because if you add up everything I’ve actually done, I’ll be roasting wieners with the devil for a long time. I know the wiener part sounds fun, but I don’t think the devil is very good company. Even if you call him Dev for short. And I don’t think they’d be hot dog wieners, unless you consider that in hell, I’d be one hot dog. On the other paw, if you give me credit for everything I meant to do, and everything I did that turned out wrong by accident, I’ll be prancing through meadows of clover. Except I’m allergic to clover.

Anyway, good dog or bad dog: that is the question. I hope when all the biscuits are eaten and processed I’m thought of as a good dog, but I have my doubts. And I hope the biscuits aren’t processed all over Finn’s carpet because he’ll blame me for sure.

My name is Bogart. I have very long ears, which is why I’m so popular with the ladies. In my breed, long ears are enviable, and I am able and envied. I am a Basset Hound and I don’t like to toot when I bark, but long ears make Basset Hounds very attractive. Sometimes I trip on mine, so you see what I’m getting at. I live in that little brick house over there, but I spend a lot of time in this jail just thinking about things and watching the grass grow. Loneliness makes watching the grass grow seem interesting. If you’re not careful it can also make you frothy at the mouth. Sometimes I’m not careful for the fun of it.

At night Finn takes me into the house and I curl up next to him to sleep. I have stumpy legs, and that makes it hard to get onto the bed. I have to get a running start at it, and I have to use the dirty laundry piles as springboards. If I don’t catch the wind right, I don’t get the lift I need to clear the edge of the mattress, and that’s an embarrassment. But I’m older now and I have a lot of experience, so most of the time I get it right.

When Finn takes me into the house, I look up at the stars and try to imagine my place in the universe, and even though I hate to admit it, I can’t help but whimper. It’s a pretty big universe and I’m a pretty short dog. What I really want is for something to shrink. Not my ears or my brain, or anything else that I’d miss—but you know what I’m talking about. I don’t want to be insignificant. I want to leave my mark on something before I die, and not just the neighbor’s lawn. That’s why I did what I did. That’s what got me thinking about the whole good dog/bad dog thing, and in the end, that’s what’ll send me to the wiener-fest with Dev.

My jail is made of chain link. The floor I sleep on is cold grass and hard dirt, except for the corner over there that I use as a potty. It can be cold and hard sometimes, too. But when it’s steamy-warm and soft, you don’t want to be lying in it, trust me. Finn calls my jail a “run,” though it doesn’t have any legs and I haven’t ever seen it walk, so the name doesn’t fit—like Tiny the Rottweiler, or Lucky the three-legged Beagle. And if he was referring to what I should be doing in it, he was way off-base because I never run if I can help it.

Every morning before Finn leaves, he brings me here to the jail. I don’t mind most of the time because he usually throws in a couple of hot dogs to freshen up my breath. But once in awhile, he forgets the hot dogs and I make him haul me across the lawn with my tail dragging just to shake things up. On those days Finn growls at me. Secretly, though, I suspect he likes it because I’m heavy and it’s a good workout for him, and after Finn closes the jail door I always walk around the “run” real slow. I don’t want him to think he’s in charge or anything like that. You give your human an inch and he’ll make a poodle out of you. Sometimes I howl real sad because I like to make him feel low for locking me up, and occasionally it’ll earn me another hot dog or a leftover burrito. Then I sit on my tail and watch as he goes off down the street into the great beyond.

The big question you’re asking yourself now is what did I do? It all started when Finn dragged me out here a few days ago. I remember it well because it was the day of that rainstorm, and even though I got here before the sky turned all cloudy and dark, I knew it was going to rain. I could smell it in the air. I have this long nose, you see, and it’s not only nice to look at—it’s also spectacular. I always wanted to be a superhero like Underdog, and I think that when God made me, He gave me this sniffer as a way to grant my superhero wish. But God is interesting because He balanced me out with stumpy legs. Trying to keep me humble, I suppose.

Speaking of the stars and the universe and God and balancing things out, I believe that one of the secrets to everything is balance. Otherwise, how do you explain teeter-totters? Plus, if the universe wasn’t balanced out, we’d probably all be walking around tipping over or dizzy, and after the first few hours like that, it wouldn’t be any fun at all. That’s why God created balance. I don’t want you to feel like I’m putting on a clinic about the universe. It’s just that I’ve learned a few things in my life and I’d be a bad dog if I didn’t let you in on a secret or two. Balance is one of the greatest secrets I know.

So I was sitting here in my jail that day waiting for the rain to start, and I was thinking about how I would avoid the raindrops. I have a Chihuahua buddy named Pepé who lives next door and I don’t suppose he’d have any trouble avoiding the raindrops on account of how skinny he is. He’d probably have to run around in them to get wet. But I’ve got massive wrinkles so I have a whole different set of problems altogether. It’s hard to avoid the raindrops and wet isn’t a very good look on me. Naturally, then, rainstorms give me a lot of stress. The clouds were starting to tumble over the rooftops, and they were purple and gray and blue, and they were tumbling along silently gearing up for their big show when Ginger stopped by.

Ginger is a Border Collie I’ve been seeing. Not in visions or anything. Just on the side, like meatballs. When she got here I was starting to get a little jittery for the rainstorm, and I wondered if she could bust me out.

“Nice legs,” I said. They are pretty nice. They’re long, and black with some white around the paws. I’ve seen her jump real good on them—which is what I liked them for that day. “Think you could spring me?”

She looked up at the jail door. There’s a latch there that looks like a horseshoe, except it’s got pointy ends and it’s hinged in the middle. That way you can lift either side and unlatch it from the metal pole it’s stuck on. I’ve tried to get to it a bunch of times, but when I stand up against the fence and stretch real hard, it’s out of my reach. And if I jump I look ridiculous. I figure if I could somehow stretch out my ears I could lift it because they’d give me an extra eight or two inches, easy. I’m not sure how much that is—but it doesn’t matter because I don’t know which muscles to use to make my ears stand up anyway. As far as I can tell, they just lay there against my head heavy and useless. That’s why I thought Ginger could spring me, because she’s got those great legs and she jumps real good on them.

“I suppose I could,” she said. “What’s in it for me?”

I looked at her like this.

That’s my seductive look.

She rolled her eyes and jumped. It took her a couple of tries, but she got it open and I was free! She sniffed me and I sniffed her.

“Why do you smell like cats?” I asked.

“Do you like it?”

“Of course not.”

She looked hurt, but I have only one rule. Never lie to the ladies. My mom taught me that.

“Some dogs are crazy for it,” she said.

“What happened to that bacon perfume you’d been wearing? I liked that a lot.”

“It wasn’t perfume,” she said. “April made bacon for breakfast last week and the smell sticks to everything.”

I looked at my bowl of Alpo and said, “I’d never leave my jail if Finn gave me bacon for breakfast. That dog food there may be the blandest stuff ever invented.”

“Have you tried rice? It’s pretty bland.”

“I once had lice.”

She said, “I don’t think that’s the same thing,” but what does she know? She’s not always right.

I asked, “So, why do you smell like cats?”

She said, “There is this Dumpster up the road and some stray kittens were stuck in there. I jumped up on the edge of the Dumpster and they were all tied up in this sack. The whole group of them was making this tiny meowing sound and I couldn’t just leave them in there, so I climbed in on top of a cardboard box to pick up the sack and I carried it home where April let them out. She gave them all a little saucer of milk, and after they licked it up, they curled in around me and slept there, bundled together in my fur and rattling as cute as you please.”

“That’s disgusting,” I said as I walked over to use the neighbor’s lawn. See what I’m saying? Sometimes good dogs do bad things even though they mean well. Now there’s a sack of kittens over at Ginger’s place and those kittens might have been as comfortable in a Dumpster.

Since it was going to rain and the plastic flap into the house was all locked up behind a screen door, I ventured out into the great beyond for some shelter. Ginger followed me and we wound up in front of that same Dumpster she told me about. All of the blue in the sky had been swallowed up by clouds and the first drops of rain were starting to fall. As I said, I don’t run unless I have to, but I was in a panic because the last thing I wanted was for Ginger to see me wet, so I ran around the Dumpster looking for anything to keep off the rain. When I got around the second corner, I saw a raggedy old tom cat all prickly and hunkered down in a patch of long weeds. It hissed and the fur on its neck stood straight up, and since I was already running and I wouldn’t have to start the motor again, I chased it as any sensible dog would. It screeched and lit out of that long grass zigging and zagging like it was hopped up on catnip. I almost got it at the first turn, but once it made it out into the open and hit the afterburners, I couldn’t keep up. I followed it for a pawful of steps though, so that’s not too bad.

The cat stopped running and looked back at us. I was posturing for Ginger, keeping my tongue in and trying my best not to wheeze, and I think I was making a pretty good show of it when it said, “Meow.”

“Are you calling me fat?”

“Meow,” it said again.

By now I was getting pretty worked up. No one calls me fat in front of Ginger, so I snarled and paced back and forth a bit. I’m more of a lover than a fighter—almost anyone can tell you that—but it’s like I said earlier, I have this compulsive need to leave my mark on the universe somehow and at that moment, it got the best of me. The universe was about to be one cat smaller.

I revved up my back legs and started after it again. Ginger joined me and we ran and ran and ran until my lungs stopped working. It was then that I realized hell must be an endless race track with one of those fake rabbits where you just have to run forever. I definitely don’t want to end up there.

So you can see that early on I was already mulling over the whole good dog/bad dog thing. The question didn’t sneak up on me. And the shame of it is that it didn’t make any difference in the decision I made. I chased that mangy old cat anyway. I shouldn’t have done it. And the real awful thing is that I didn’t feel bad about it until after the accident. Slugs and cats must have it pretty easy because they don’t have the brains to think about anything; that way, the moral baggage doesn’t weigh down their eyes. You never see cats with baggy eyes like mine, and slugs don’t even have eyes.

I ran out of gas on a dirt road near a wire fence. Behind the fence, a couple of cows were swishing their tails and grinding away on whatever it was they were eating, which must not have had any fiber in it because you should have heard them moaning. Poor constipated animals.

The sky was dripping pretty hard now. I could feel it matting down my fur. I knew Ginger was going to see my fat wrinkles since that’s what happens when I get wet, so I went through the fence and stood under the belly of one of the cows. At first it worked great. The cow didn’t seem to mind and I was staying dry.

“What are you doing?” Ginger asked.

“Just checking things out,” I said, and I pretended to look around. “Interesting under here.”

There was a big pink bag on the cow’s stomach and it had some hot dogs dangling from it, so I took a bite out of one of them.

Big mistake.

The cow jumped and barreled through the wire fence right in front of a truck that was driving by. The truck hit the cow. The back of the truck bounced straight up in the air and came down again and the man who was driving the truck crashed through the glass and flew over the cow, landing in a heap out in front of us. His hat flew off his head and he hit the road making a terrible cracking sound. His body crumpled around his neck falling over in the most unnatural way, and after all the commotion, the truck didn’t move anymore, the cow didn’t move anymore, and worst of all, the man didn’t move anymore either.

Steam hissed out of the front of the truck. Distant cows groaned. The rain pattered and tapped around me, but despite all of that, it seemed terribly quiet all of a sudden.

Ginger looked at me. Her tail was sagging, but I don’t think it had anything to do with the water that dripped off of it—mine was sagging too, and it was still mostly dry. We walked over to the man in the road and nudged him. He was pretty messy. Blood covered his face and arms and hands. It mixed with the rain and dripped off his skin onto the road making red-black puddles of mud. A mass of red pasted his gray hair to his skull, and off the road a few paws away, the hat that he wore sat upside down. His tongue was wedged between his teeth and it hung there and bled where he had bitten through it. His nose and ears were bleeding.

Ginger whimpered, “I think he’s dead.”

The man’s eyes were open. He stared at me and my stomach lurched and twisted around itself and I couldn’t look away. My legs trembled. I knew him. I recognized his eyes. The lifeless man before me, the man that I had just killed, was Finn’s father.

So, good dog or bad dog? I hope when all the biscuits are eaten and processed I’m thought of as a good dog, but now you see why I have my doubts.

15 things you probably don't want to know about me

2011-05-18T02:59:00.005-06:00

Welcome to my blog. This isn't my first blog rodeo, or blogeo for those of us in the biz, but it's been awhile since my last post, so this is your reintroduction to me. Since this is the initial post here on my new blog and many of you would like to know more about me, I thought I'd start by listing 15 trivial things about me that you probably don't want to know. How's that for being a non-traditionalist.

1. I think Carl Barks was the most brilliant storyteller of the century, and his greatest contribution to literature was Uncle Scrooge.

2. I like to eat Chips Ahoy cookies dipped in milk--I can polish off an entire package in one sitting--and I like the chunky milk as a chaser.

3. My favorite place to read is in the bathtub. It makes me happy when I've been in the water long enough to pucker the skin on my toes.

4. I think the person who invented the designated hitter should be hung by his armpit hair.

5. I have a low tolerance for stupidity, including my own, but I pretend that it doesn't bother me.

6. I want a tattoo of a quill pen under my wedding band.

7. I've always fancied myself as an amazing lover, but I think the reality is that I'm sadly mediocre.

8. I struggle with narcissism and self-loathing.

9. I don't like to disclose my political leanings because they make me unpopular in my community.

10. I secretly wish I was addicted to coffee. I like people with petty vices.

11. If pride is a sin, then my children are condemning me to hell.

12. I like the smell of my dog when she is wet.

13. I don't smile as much as I used to, but it is more sincere now.

14. Blues music makes me feel better about my life.

15. I hate that I'm tired all the time, but I'm not ashamed of why.

Tell me something about you now.