Welcome back for segment 2 of the “Ask the Authors 2022” blog series, with an introduction to Bobby Nash, who shares how to manage the many tasks which being an author entails, to the Ask the Authors 2022 Writing Reference Anthology, and a Q & A on Pre-Writing Rituals.
Last week, we learned a little about myself and author Kevin Killiany, in addition to the Q & A session on Writing Life. If you missed it, you can find it here.
And now on to this week’s post.
Meet Bobby Nash
Bobby Nash is not a man of action, a detective, or a hero, but he loves writing about characters who are all of those things and more. Bobby is an award-winning author of novels, comic books, short stories, screenplays, and more. He is a member of the International Association of Media Tie-in Writers and International Thriller Writers. On occasion, he acts, appearing in movies and TV shows, usually standing behind or beside your favorite actor. From time to time, he puts pen to paper and doodles. For more information on Bobby Nash and his work, please visit him at www.bobbynash.com, www.ben-books.com, and across social media.
Pre-Writing Rituals
Please tell us what genre(s) you write in and what type of research is required for your stories?
Mario Acevedo: I write commercial fiction—novels and short stories of supernatural fantasy, horror, and hard-boiled crime. My research is to make the story and setting sound as credible as possible.
Paul Kane: All kinds really. I’ve dabbled in a lot of genres and written in a lot of formats, from comics and audio scripting to TV and film. I started out doing journalism, so non-fiction, and had a couple of books out in that vein: The Hellraiser Films and Their Legacy is probably the most well-known. Then I returned to writing short stories, because I was always writing those growing up; especially for English classes where the teachers would get exasperated at the length of some of them. I started sending these off to small presses and was lucky enough to get some printed, which then led to a collection. At the same time I’d been trying to write a novel, The Gemini Factor. I’d had a stab at a few before, so technically this was about my third or fourth novel, but the first I wrote with any serious intention of getting it published – which it was eventually, and there was even an anniversary edition which came out in 2020 through Gestalt Media. That was a horror serial killer thriller, by the way – and indeed most of the stuff I was doing back then was horror, and I carried on in that vein for a little while. Then around 2007, I pitched a book to Abaddon/Rebellion for their post-apocalyptic Afterblight series, which was a reworking of Robin Hood. They accepted that and it was my first mass market novel, so I’d shifted into SF at that point and wrote three novels altogether – gathered together in the sellout Hooded Man – plus a novella for them. I also wrote my first YA novel, The Rainbow Man, as PB Kane. At the same time I was writing short films like The Opportunity and The Weeping Woman, and then some audios – I adapted The Hellbound Heart into a full cast audio drama for Bafflegab – as well as working on and running conventions. More recently I’ve moved into writing straight thrillers for HQ/HarperCollins under the name PL Kane and the first of those, Her Last Secret, Her Husband’s Grave and The Family Lie, have all done very well. In amongst all that, I’ve written a couple of short plays too, one of which – One for the Road – was performed at FantasyCon 2015. As for research, it very much depends on the kind of story you’re telling. Crime research is very different to SF, as you can probably imagine.
Chris Barili: I write in just about every genre, and I wouldn’t say one genre requires more research than the others. Rather, I’d say one series of stories requires it: Hell’s Marshal. Because it is set in the old west, I do extensive research to make sure it is accurate, or at least believable in light of the story itself.
Bobby Nash: I write in whatever genre the publisher wants. So far, I haven’t done a lot of fantasy, nor have I attempted romance or erotica. Most of my work has a thriller element to it. I also write a lot of action and crime fiction. Research varies from project to project.
Robbie Cheadle: My YA and adult books are all historical and most have a paranormal element. I do a lot of research for each book, plotting the historical events on a timeline and then overlying the events of my plot. A Ghost and His Gold had over thirty historical sources and my current work in progress, The Soldier and the Radium Girl, will end up have at least the same number of sources, possibly even more.
I also read a lot of books in the timeframe I am writing about, especially classic books that were written during the period. This helps me gain insight into the everyday lives of people living at the time and experiencing the historical events I’m writing about.
Nancy Oswald: I write mostly Colorado-set historical history for young readers. It’s not always in the same order, but I typically start by reading history of the area, but not always. I like to visit the sites and glean as much as I can about the area. For me, museums and history centers are a huge wealth of material.
Kevin Killiany: Young adult, because the stories are more direct and revelatory of character. “Hard” science fiction (which means the fictional science is compatible with and based on real world science) and historical. Both require serious research, because accuracy is essential to the authenticity of the story.
How do you prefer to conduct your research: Live? Online? First-hand accounts?
Mario Acevedo: While the Internet is the most used because it is right in my computer, I continue to surprise myself with what treasures you find in newspaper microfiche, libraries, and visiting a place.
Paul Kane: I mainly do my research through a mixture of online searches, books and documentaries. For example for Her Husband’s Grave I did a lot of digging into psychology and serial killers, because my main character Dr Robyn Adams helps the police with their serial cases. For The Family Lie, I watched documentaries about cults and stuff like Jonestown, which led to some sleepless nights I can tell you. The cult of personality and all that. You get first-hand accounts in documentaries about subjects like that, so I haven’t needed to go to the horse’s mouth yet. Apart from in one instance, where I had a weapons expert called Trev Preston who’d help me with some of the details in the Hooded Man series. I’d ask him bizarre things like, is possible to take down an Apache Helicopter with a bolas – and he’d say yes or no. The answer’s yes, by the way, and that scene is in Broken Arrow.
Chris Barili: I do almost all my research online. Just don’t have time or resources to go visit far away places. That said, I did do some of that during two recent road trips.
Bobby Nash: I enjoy meeting and talking to people who do the jobs. I’ve talked with FBI agents, police, doctors, etc. about their respective jobs to get a feel for what they do. That adds a personal touch to the characters I have in those roles. On-line research is an invaluable tool to have at your fingertips. I also like to travel and visit locations where I can set stories and scenes.
Robbie Cheadle: I do all my research on-line and I like to use diaries, letters, and journals from the time, if possible. Project Gutenberg is a wonderful resource for historical research.
Nancy Oswald: See above, but add first-hand accounts if they’re available. I usually save online for while I’m drafting, because inevitably I’ll need a piece of information that I couldn’t anticipate.
Kevin Killiany: I love a library—finding and searching through physical books—but these days the internet enables one to access more information quickly. Whenever possible, I visit locations used in my stories.
What are your best research sources?
Chris Barili: Town or county historians. As them the time and they will build you a clock.
Bobby Nash: Google is readily at my fingertips. Interviewing people is also a good source of information gathering and adds a personal touch.
Nancy Oswald: I like the online dictionary of etymology. Quick and accurate.
What do you look for in a source: Aim? Accuracy? Authority? Correlation?
Paul Kane: I think you’re always looking for accuracy, because it goes back to that thing of believability again. You need to be as accurate as you can with facts, just so the reader believes in what you’re doing. That said, it’s hard to research some of the things I write about, like monster cats coming back as ghosts and attacking people, but you just have to do your best. That’s where the imagination element comes into it. I recently wrote a story for a charity anthology that takes place in the universe of my novella The Rot, and I had to do tons of research into black mold to get that right – even just for short story. It’s that important.
Robbie Cheadle: I like my stories to be as historically accurate as possible, so I actively look for accuracy and correlate the information I find with as many other sources as possible.
Nancy Oswald: I usually check more than one source if I’m in doubt. For historical fiction I like to be accurate, but love, love, love historic photos for setting.
What pre-writing exercises do you employ: Outlining? Free writing? Brainstorming?
Paul Kane: I rarely need to brainstorm, because Ideas come to me all the time and I jot them down. This means I’ve got tons of notebooks to draw on if I ever go blank… And I do plans, outlines and chapter breakdowns for novels. I might not stick religiously to them, but I find it helps me focus and keep on the straight and narrow, to keep going whenever I lose where I might be in the story. Like a kind of roadmap. You wouldn’t set off for a destination without having one of those – or a Satnav, or your phone – so why set off on a journey of many hours of hard work and 80 or 90 thousand words without an idea of where you’re heading? Some people wing it, I know, but I suspect they’re just planning it all out in their heads or their subconscious.
Chris Barili: Yes. And more. Any tool I can get my hands on to make my writing better.
Bobby Nash: I rarely have time for pre-writing. Deadlines do not always allow for that. I spend my writing time writing. When I’m at the beginning of a project and creating characters, I will do free writing and just start jotting down notes as I get to know the characters. Sometimes, plot/story ideas will happen in this stage too.
Robbie Cheadle: I research each section before I start writing a new chapter. As mentioned previously, I have my ending plotted prior to commencing writing and that is the direction I write towards.
Nancy Oswald: Refer to answer about plotting or pantsing. Oh, it’s blank. None of the above. I think while I write most of the time, but I have used a time-line to plot on when I’m trying to track a fiction story-line and compare it to the actual historical events.
Do you try to write to market or write what you love?
Paul Kane: The quick answer is both. I’ve written stories just for the love it them, usually they’re new ones for collections – like ‘The Butterfly Man’, that was a story for a collection from PS of the same name. But I’ve also written for specific markets, like the Hooded Man stuff, or where an editor gives you a theme for an anthology. I wrote ‘The Shadow of Death’ for an anthology called Expiration Date, for instance, ‘Shells’ for an anthology called Terror Tales of the Seaside, and ‘Presence’ for Hauntings. So at that point you’re totally writing for a specific market or theme.
Chris Barili: Again, yes. I write to market within the boundaries of what I know and love. I won’t shoe-horn my writing into genres or labels, and while I write what I am passionate about, I don’t limit myself to things I know or share with the reader.
Bobby Nash: Write what you love. Writing to market can drive you crazy and often leave you unfulfilled. I speak from personal experience here.
Robbie Cheadle: I write what I enjoy and for my own pleasure. I would like others to enjoy my stories, but that is secondary to my primary aim of personal enjoyment. As a result, I have decided to continue to publish with smaller publishers rather than to try to get representation with a larger publishing house.
Jeff Bowles: I sort of try to do both at the same time, I suppose. I’ve always had this theory that solid, salable fiction can be fun and artistic, too. Crazy, I know, but that’s just how I feel! Anyway, I’ve sort of developed a unique style, and there’s certain subjects I seem to write about again and again, as it is with most authors, I think. When I try to write like other people, the results are mixed, so I learned a long time ago to try to hit the personal enjoyment metric and then sort out what I think is salable or not. It’s a fine line, one that’s almost always difficult to walk, but it’s almost always worth it in the end.
Nancy Oswald: I realized a long time ago I cannot write to a market. For one, living in rural Colorado, I can’t keep up with anything that resembles up-to-date or edgy. The last time I remember trying keep up with cool was when I was a teen (living in Denver) and I practiced doing “The Jerk” in front of a mirror.
Kevin Killiany: Obviously when writing tie-in fiction for a TV show or role-playing game, I have to write for the market. BUT I’m writing for that market because I love the game or show—you have to campaign constantly to get your foot in the door, and that requires a good deal of passion. With my own, original fiction, I write solely for me. If you guys like it, that’s fantastic.
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That wraps up “Ask the Authors 2022” blog series for this week. Be sure to drop by next Saturday for an introduction to multi-genre author, Roberta Eaton Cheadle, and a Q & A on plot/storyline. (Okay, many of you already know Robbie, some of you quite well. Drop by anyway for the Q & A.)
Ask the Authors 2022
You can get your copy of Ask the Authors 2022 at your favorite book distributors at the special price of 3.99 for the duration of this blog series, through the Books2Read UBL: https://books2read.com/u/3LnK8e
The deadline to enter the 2022 WordCrafter Short Fiction Contest, May 31st. There’s still time to get your submission in for a chance to have your story included in the Visions anthology alongside other esteemed authors, but don’t delay. You can find the full submission guidelines and entry here.
The deadline is fast approaching and will be here before you know it. The winner will receive a $25 Amazon gift card in addition to being featured in the anthology, but you can’t win if you don’t enter. If you write fantasy, science fiction, horror or paranormal short fiction, I want to read your story!
Welcome to Writing to be Read, where we’re celebrating the release of Ask the Authors 2022, the writing reference anthology that features essays by ten wonderful authors who have agreed to share their writing wisdom with us, along with an extensive Q & A, divided by topics. Contributing authors are myself – Kaye Lynne Booth, Bobby Nash, Roberta Eaton Cheadle, Chris Barili, L. Jagi Lamplighter Wright, Nancy Oswald, Mario Acevedo, Jeff Bowles, Mark Leslie Lefebvre, Paul Kane, and Kevin Killiany.
“Ask the Authors is an up-to-date and broad-based compendium of advice from today’s working writers, to help you with understanding your own writing career. Great information!”
—Kevin J. Anderson, New York Times bestselling author of Spine of the Dragon
Every Saturday, this blog series will introduce you to one contributing author and share a portion of the Q & A session. Today you will meet myself and Kevin Killiany and the Q & A topic is “Writing Life”. To gain access to all of the writing wisdom contained within the book, you can get it at the special price of 3.99, (regularly 4.99) from your favorite book distributor through the Books2Read universal book link (UBL) for the duration of the blog series: https://books2read.com/u/3LnK8e
Here is the schedule for this Saturday series:
Segment 1: You are here. Introductions for me, multi-genre author, Kaye Lynne Booth & media tie-in and science fiction author Kevin Killiany/Q & A on Writing Life
Segment 2:An introduction to award winning author & media tie-in writer, Bobby Nash/Q & A on Pre-writing Rituals.
Segment 3: An introduction to multi-genre author & poet, Roberta Eaton Cheadle/Q & A on Plot/Storyline.
Segment 4: An introduction to best selling horror author, Paul Kane/Q & A on Character Development.
Segment 5: An introduction to multi-genre author, Mario Acevedo/Q & A on Action, Pacing & Dialog
Segment 6: An introduction to award winning middle grade author Nancy Oswald/Q & A on Tone: Voice, Person, Tense, & POV
Segment 7: An introduction to multi-genre author Chris Barili/Q & A on Setting & Worldbuilding
Segment 8: An introduction to speculative and horror author Jeff Bowles/Q & A on Editing & Revision
Segment 9: An introduction to award winning author and publishing industry expert Mark Leslie Lefebvre/Q & A on Publishing
Segment 10: An introduction to Y.A. & middle grade author L. Jagi Lamplighter/Q & A on Book Marketing
*Note: The Q & As include answers from several authors on each question and they may run rather long, but they are packed full of useful information, so I hope you will stick with us until the end of the series.
I’ll start things off today by introducing myself.
My name is Kaye Lynne Booth, and I live, work, and play in the mountains of Colorado. With a dual emphasis M.F.A. in Creative Writing, writing is more than a passion. It’s a way of life. I’m a multi-genre author, who finds inspiration from the nature around her, and her love of the old west, and other odd and quirky things which might surprise you. My first novel, Delilah, found a home with a small independent press, but I’ve published all of my other work independently.
For more than a decade, I’ve kept up my authors’ blog, Writing to be Read, where I post reflections on my own writing, author interviews and book reviews, along with writing tips and inspirational posts from fellow writers. In addition to creating my own imprint in WordCrafter Press, I offer quality author services, such as editing and social media book promotion, through WordCrafter Quality Writing & Author Services. When not writing or editing, I am bird watching, or hiking, or just soaking up some of that Colorado sunshine.
Oh yeah, and I am the editor and contributor to Ask the Authors 2022 and your blog series host, which means I’m the one asking the questions. And now that is out of the way, let’s move on to the Q & A and see what the contributing authors have to say about…
Writing Life
Please tell us your top 5 rules for writing success.
Mario Acevedo: I’ll give you one. From W Somerset Maugham: “There are three rules for writing a novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.”
Paul Kane: I only really have three, and it boils down to the three P’s which I used to teach in my Creative Writing classes when I still did them. Patience, Persistence, Perspiration. Patience, because basically if you’re going to be a writer you need to be in it for the long haul. Some people are lucky, they get success really early on in their careers, but most have to work at it for a long time, winning little battles as they go.
This of course feeds into the second and third P’s, in that you’ll need to be prepared for knockbacks and rejections. You’re going to have to pick yourself up when you get a no, dust yourself off and get back on the horse. I’ve had countless rejections from publishers and editors in the past, but you just have to keep going, and remember that it’s all subjective. What one person hates another might love. Take on board any advice or feedback that makes sense to you, but don’t change anything you’ve written if it doesn’t because it’s your writing ultimately. Only you can write like you, with your background and experience and voice. If the advice you’re getting messes with that too much, then don’t do it.
And finally, Perspiration, because you’re not going to get anywhere unless you work for it. You should always strive to be better, even if you’ve been writing all your life. You’re never too long in the tooth to learn new things, to try new writing techniques or whatever, and the only way to be a good writer is to write, write and write. Oh, and to read a lot too.
Chris Barili:
Write.
Keep writing.
Write more.
Write daily.
And write whenever you can.
Bobby Nash: I wish I had a list of rules to share here. I have never thought of it in those kinds of terms. Certainly, treating it like a job has been invaluable in keeping on track. Writing daily is probably good advice. Learn to market your work is also a good one.
Robbie Cheadle:
Write as much as possible given your personal circumstances.
Seize opportunities to participate in writing and poetry challenges.
Seize opportunities to participate in writing competitions and anthologies.
Take advice that is given to you by more experienced writers, and I mean really embrace it and incorporate it into your writing going forward.
Enjoy your writing.
Nancy Oswald: Sit down, write, rinse, and repeat.
Kevin Killiany: I don’t have 5 writing rules, but I do have one reading rule: read as much as your write; some weeks read more. And I highly recommend these guidelines to your reading: A. Whenever possible read authors who will stretch your horizons. By that I mean authors who have histories, ethnicities, worldviews, cultures, gender identities, etc., different from your own. This is particularly important for white, cis-male, American writers such as myself, because we’ve been programmed from birth to see our culture as universal. [A codicil for writers who are of colors other than beige or whose identities otherwise differ from my own: read strong writers who share your identity or heritage in addition to (and maybe even before) seeking out others who could expand your perceptions.] B. Do NOT “read like a writer” as some guides suggest, with a highlighter and notebook at your elbow and underlining “important” passages. Read like a reader. Enjoy the story, lose yourself, don’t think about the writing. If, and only if, six months later you find yourself being haunted by a passage you can’t forget (scene, setting, dialog, etc.) go back and deconstruct how the writer pulled that off. Look for how the writer prepared the reader for the scene, the structure of the scene itself, etc.—learn how the writer did it so you can give your readers the same experience. C. Don’t read books you don’t like. If the story isn’t working for you—if the characters don’t work, the story doesn’t interest you, if the writing is dull—you are not going to learn anything. Time spent finishing a poorly written book is time wasted. [HOWEVER: If you hate the book because the writing is so powerful and evocative, it may well be worth reading. An example from my past: I hate The Bluest Eye. The hopelessness is so deep that every time I read it, I want to slit my wrists. But I’ve read it more than once because it is a master class in characterization and worldbuilding.]
Describe your personal writing space.
Mario Acevedo: Some writers claim their writing space as a sacred sanctuary that invites the Muse to drift in. My writing space is a sausage machine. I sit down on a schedule, flip a switch, and get to writing. The Muse is expected to clock in while wearing work clothes.
Paul Kane: We recently moved, so I have my pick of where to work at the moment. But I’m actually writing on my laptop on the couch, because it’s comfortable. I’ve done most of my work on there in the last few months and enjoyed it. For a while back there, whether it was to do with lockdown or whatever, I felt like I’d lost my writing mojo, but it’s slowly returning. Maybe I just got burned out as I did a lot of writing in the months after COVID hit big time – a crime novel and most of a collection called The Naked Eye for Encyclopocaplyse – and this change of scenery now has really boosted my fiction, as well as giving me the opportunity of working on a few new projects I hadn’t expected.
Chris Barili: Nothing special. Just a small home office on the first floor of my home. I also have a desk beside my bed (next to the fireplace) for those wake-up moments.
Bobby Nash: I have a very cluttered desk in an equally as cluttered office. I clean and straighten it on occasion, but the clutter always returns.
Nancy Oswald: Really? It’s my grown son’s old bedroom. No bed, but my mom’s sewing machine occupies one corner, my husband’s mom’s antique writing desk occupies another. There’s a dying plant, a small Navajo blanket, a horse painted on a plate, painted by my great grandmother is above the file cabinets, my son’s dusty karate belts on a hangar and several maps related to my research are on the wall next to that. The doors of the closet are also covered with maps—at the moment, these are insurance maps from 1896 Colorado Springs. There’s a chair with toppling books, book piles underneath the wrap around desk I purchased when I retired. You don’t even want to know what’s on top of the desk or what’s on the rest of the floor. Right now, it’s boxes and bags in various states of readiness for the marketing at crafts fairs I’m doing between now and Christmas. I’m looking forward to being able to walk in it again.
Kevin Killiany: Where I am now—wherever that is whenever ‘now’ happens.
Which of your books would you like to see turned into a movie? Who do you see playing the lead? Why?
Paul Kane: I’m lucky in that a few of my stories have been turned into TV episodes, short films and even a feature in 2021 called Sacrifice, starring Re-Animator’s Barbara Crampton. So that’s sort of happened for me anyway… There was talk a while back of turning my post-apocalyptic Robin Hood novels – gathered together in Hooded Man – into a movie, and we were hoping to interest someone like Michael Fassbender or Dominic West. But I’m not sure that’ll happen anyway now because the jumping off point is that 90% of the world’s population dies from a deadly disease. Of the books that haven’t been adapted yet, I’d love to see Before as an American Gods type TV streaming show for somewhere like Amazon, Netflix or Apple. I think the scope of that one, dealing as it does with past lives, is so massive it would be hard to fit it all into a movie. Arcana would make a great film, though, because of the mix of magic and crime; action and adventure. Leads for that one? I think someone like Charlie Hunnam and Emily Blunt as Callum and Ferne. The one people always ask me about is Sherlock Holmes and the Servants of Hell, which pitted Hellraiser’s Cenobites against the world’s greatest detective. That would be a rights nightmare film-wise, plus would take a budget in excess of most of the Marvel movies, so I wouldn’t hold your breath folks. That being said, never say never, and stranger things have happened.
Chris Barili:Guilty, with Frank Butcher played by either clint Eastwood or John Wayne (in their primes).
Bobby Nash: I think Evil Ways, Deadly Games!, or Suicide Bomb would make great movies. Snow and Sheriff Myers respective series would work better as a TV series, I think. As for who would play who, I don’t know. I try not to play that game because if it happens, I don’t want to be disappointed if the actor I had my heart set on is unavailable.
Robbie Cheadle: I think my Sir Chocolate stories would make a lovely TV series for small children. There could be a baking element to the show, where children learn how to make one of the recipes.
Nancy Oswald: I’d like to see the Ruby and Maude Adventures made into a movie. I’d like my donkey, Daisy, to play Maude.
Kevin Killiany: I have a young adult science fiction series, Dirt and Stars, that I would love to see become a TV series. The stories are set in an alternate history where most of the gee-whiz predictions Golden Age sci-fi of the 30s and 40s made about America in the year 2000 came true—fusion rockets, giant space stations, colonies on the moon, etc.—but the US is fiercely isolationist, cut off from the rest of the world. With the 21st century came the Civil Rights movement and the growing realization that America cannot sustain its monopoly on space. The Dirt and Stars series is set in the 2020s and follows several young people (15-18) coming of age even as the world around them is reinventing itself. Down to Dirt introduces Mara, a spacer—born and raised on Tombaugh Station—who’s been conditioned from birth to believe dirt (Earth) is little more than a prison for the diseased, criminal, unstable, or otherwise unfit for life in space; Beth, Mara’s Earth-born cousin, who believes in the fundamental goodness of everyone and is horrified by Mara’s racist elitism; and Jael, Beth’s best friend, grimly determined to be the first Black person to break the Space Service’s color barrier. Life on Dirt continues their stories and introduces Lije, first generation Ukrainian American whose father is spearheading a legal battle to break America’s control of access to space; and Fatima, a spacer of exceptional intelligence struggling to overcome a social communication disorder that makes interacting with others difficult, confusing, and sometimes painful. Rise from Dirt follows all five of them, but focuses on Jael’s fight to qualify for the Space Service training program. Book four (a work in progress that has gone through a few working titles) will introduce two new high school age spacers—one on Brahe Station, the other on Luna—as they deal with the unimaginable addition of “earthers” to their world.
Who do you see playing the lead? Why? Talented young actors that no one knows about. For every TV/movie star there are dozens of equally talented people who weren’t in the right place at the right time. I’d really like to play some small part in helping some of those young actors get their shot.
Is there anything unique or unusual about your writing process?
Paul Kane: Personally, I don’t think there is. I don’t have to sacrifice a chicken or something before I start or write upside down or anything; it’s all pretty normal stuff. I think that comes from my previous career as a journalist, just sitting at a desk getting the words down. I also had to do that for my BA and MA when I was writing essays, so all that was a good training ground for penning fiction too. It makes you disciplined about the craft. I am quite a superstitious person, so I suppose I do have little rituals I’ve developed over the years. I used to only be able to write novels on a laptop, and shorts on a desktop – when I still had one – but I’ve learned to adapt to circumstances. And I’m very reluctant to show my work to anyone too early, except perhaps my better half Marie (O’Regan), who’s also a writer and editor herself. Or to discuss my ideas with anyone other than her, unless it’s an editor or publisher I’m pitching to, so they’ll buy the work.
Chris Barili: I outline a bit differently than most people. I outline just a third of the story at a time, which allows me to make changes early in the story line much more easily.
Bobby Nash: I don’t think so. I sit down and write. Sure, I sometimes go over story points, scenes, etc. in my head before I start typing, but nothing out of the ordinary.
Robbie Cheadle: I think all writers have an individual writing process. I always write my endings first so that I know the direction my story must take and where I am heading. The endings never change. I also outline the bones of my stories before I start. I do this in my head and rarely write much down. People ask me if I don’t forget my outlines, but I don’t. I have a very good memory which is why I rarely re-read books; I can nearly always remember the characters and plot of books I’ve read, even when I read them many years ago.
Nancy Oswald: Unfortunately, when I was working full time, my motto was to find any scrap of spare time and move forward on whatever the project was. This led to some bad habits, because even though I’m retired, I have never let go of the idea that I have to fit writing in around other things. I’ve never been able to schedule writing time and stick to it. However, my husband did buy me a “ships” hour glass, and sometimes when I’m stuck or reluctant to write, I tell myself I can do one hour. Once I start, it usually goes beyond that, and once I’m into a project, I find I don’t need the hourglass at all.
Kevin Killiany: My first time through college (in the early 70s) I was a theatre major—an aspiring actor with the acting skills of a stage techie. I saw many, many plays in college, repertory, dinner, and community theaters from light booths, sound boards, and prop tables. As a result, I see stories as narratives built from discrete scenes, and frequently storyboard on graph paper: scenes are circles, boxes, or triangles linked by arrows denoting possible paths. When brainstorming a scene, I always start with dialog, spoken words without attributions, because a play begins as dialog, the script providing only broad suggestions for blocking and business, and comes alive as the directors and actors become familiar with the characters and the reasons for the words. Oh, and the scenes are never written in order. I write each part as it occurs to me.
What is the function of a story?
Mario Acevedo: To tell that story. Beyond that, to entertain, to educate, and if you’re like me, because you’re a constant day dreamer.
Paul Kane: I believe, first and foremost, that a story should entertain. You should get some enjoyment out of reading it, even if it’s a sad tale – in a sort of masochistic way, we think to ourselves at least that’s not happening to me.
It should be believable, and I don’t mean that it can’t be fantastical, just that the reader needs to believe in what you’re telling them. A lot of this comes from good description and characterization, because if you don’t believe in a sense of place or your characters then everything falls apart. If characters are just cardboard cutouts, you’re not going to care what happens to them or why.
So, the entertainment value first and foremost, because remember people are parting with their hard-earned cash to buy your story or book. If it can say something important as well, then all the better. I like to try and have a message or theme, like for example in my novel Before I was trying to say something I thought was important about the human condition. About what it means to be human, about life, love, the nature of good and evil, and everything in-between. Heady stuff. It doesn’t always have to, but if a story is educating and saying something you feel is worth saying, then all the better.
Bobby Nash: My first and foremost goal with my stories is to entertain. That’s what I’m here to do so that’s where I put my focus. I want the reader to enjoy the experience.
Robbie Cheadle: The function of my stories is to entertain while reminding readers of history and historical events. I believe strongly that we must remember our history and the terrible things that have affected humanity in the past so that we can make a good attempt to avoid reoccurrences.
Kevin Killiany: To entertain and through entertaining inspire thought.
What is your biggest writing challenge? Your biggest reward?
Paul Kane: The hardest thing I find, the hardest challenge, is to get started. Ideas come to me all the time, I write them down in little notebooks. In fact, I have different sized books for different things: small for just ideas, or snatches of dialogue; medium-sized for novellas and the like; and A4 ones for novels, because I work up chapter breakdowns and do research in those. For each novel I’ve written there’s an A4 notebook to go along with it. So, you have your idea and all your working out. No matter how prepared you are – and some people do more prep than others… I’m a big planner personally – just looking at that blank screen before you start is the most daunting thing in the world sometimes. It might not even be at the beginning of a project, either; just getting up every day and starting, even if you’re halfway through, can be hard. You have to force yourself to do it, push through those pain barriers – and if you look for distractions, you’ll find them, so try to keep focused on the task at hand. The flip side of that, of course, is when you’ve got your first draft done. You have a chunk of words you can play with, then refine and make better. That’s the most rewarding part for me, when you’ve done all that, or maybe even when the story’s finished – or as finished as it can be, because nothing’s ever truly done; you could fiddle with things forever. When you see it in print and people enjoy your work, that’s something truly special.
Chris Barili: Self-confidence followed closely by Parkinson’s Disease. One hits me psychologically, the other physically
Bobby Nash: My biggest writing challenge is me. Sad, but true. I am my own worst enemy. Once I get out of my own way, push distractions aside, and actually sit down and get started, I’m okay. Getting started is a big hurdle.
Robbie Cheadle: My biggest writing challenge is finding a stretch of about 2 ½ hours undisturbed time to write. I can write for a shorter time, but I usually find it takes me about 30 to 40 minutes to get back into the mindset of the story so shorter writing periods are not very efficient for me. I usually write on weekend days from 6 am to 8.30 am. Sometimes I write for an hour in the afternoon during the week but that depends on work. I am supposed to work from 9am until 3pm but that rarely happens and if I don’t start writing by 4pm, the day is lost to me from a writing perspective. I don’t write in the evening as I am tired. I do sometimes edit later in the day though.
Jeff Bowles: For me the challenge is always the sheer amount of time and work required to bring a new book to market. At the moment, I’m favoring indie publishing, which means everything from editing to production is riding on my shoulders. It takes a lot of effort to bang a fresh manuscript into shape. Luckily, I’ve got a lot of support from family, friends, and other professionals, so it’s always worth it in the end. The reward, as always, is seeing your book in the hands of others. It never really gets old.
Nancy Oswald: Getting started on a new project. Biggest reward, well, of course, finishing. Beyond that, I love holding the first printed copy of a new book.
Kevin Killiany: My biggest challenge is stopping. I write 500-word postcards, and I would have a wonderful time extending my narrative, exploring my characters, expanding my world. My biggest reward is having stopped. Because then I have a story to give people.
What is the single most important story element? Why?
Paul Kane: Probably characters, like I say. If you don’t believe in those then there’s no point to the story in the first place. I’m a big one for character studies – actually I have to rein it in sometimes because I get carried away. I’ll include various details about a person’s life when I’m only writing a prologue sometimes and people just want to cut to the chase and get to the meat of a story. I had to chop a lot of that at the start of my PL Kane crime novels Her Husband’s Grave and The Family Lie. All interesting stuff, but not the right time or the place. One of my Controllers stories ‘Eye of the Beholder’ was basically a character study of a woman called Lucy, taking you through her life, and at the end you realise these god-like creatures have been manipulating events for their own satisfaction. In a case like that, it’s actually working to help tell the story.
Chris Barili: Character. Without a dynamic, well-developed, and relatable character the story stops mattering.
Bobby Nash: I firmly believe that it all starts with characters, so that’s where I put my focus first. Telling a cohesive story is important.
Nancy Oswald: I think it’s character. As a reader, if I can’t latch onto or relate to a character, the reading is tedious.
Kevin Killiany: Character. People care about people.
Are you a plotter or a pantser (I believe ‘discovery writer’ is the trending term or as Dean Wesley Smith refers to it: “Writing into the Dark”)?
Mario Acevedo: I’m in between. I started as a panster and then after writing myself into a corner, I became a plotter. My plot outlines are brief chapter summaries—two-three sentences. I’ve learned however to keep the doors open for the Muse to suggest changes.
Chris Barili: Seriously addicted to outlining.
Bobby Nash: I’m somewhere in the middle. I have loose plots, but I leave open the possibility of the characters taking me to unexpected places, so sometimes the plot has to be adjusted. I’ve heard the term plantser used, but I don’t really like that term.
Robbie Cheadle: I am a plotter. I always have the ending of my stories in mind before I start, and I write towards that ending. As I write historical fiction, I usually follow the real path of the events that occurred heading in the direction of the ending. I often discover new and interesting information while I am researching for my stories, but that doesn’t ever knock me off my chosen storyline, it just adds to some of the ‘meat’ in the middle of the story.
Kevin Killiany: A bit of both. I work out what needs to happen when at the outset (storyboarding) but beyond that I usually don’t know how the narrative will get from point to point until I’m on the journey.
What is your best piece of advice for aspiring authors?
Mario Acevedo: Have faith in yourself. Keep learning and improving. Read a lot in every genre. You’ll be surprised how much blends from one category to another. And nothing happens until you sit down and write.
Paul Kane: Just to never give up. It always makes me sad when I see a talented writer walk away from the business or become so discouraged that they never send anything to editors, agents or publishers. It always makes me think ‘what great writing have we missed out on’? If Stephen King’s wife, Tabitha, hadn’t fished Carrie out of the bin, we’d have been missing out on all his excellent writing from that point onwards. No Shining, Salem’s Lot… No Stand. Heartbreaking. So keep going, keep fighting, because you never know where it might all lead.
Chris Barili: Don’t quit your day job until writing IS your day job. Then, really don’t quit your day job.
Bobby Nash: Determine where you want your writing to take you and set attainable goals to help get you there. Not every writer has the same goal, so you have to decide what success looks like for you, so you know what to aim toward. Then, once you do that, work to achieve those goals. Also, don’t forget to celebrate when you attain the goals. That’s important too.
Robbie Cheadle: Keep writing as much as possible. Practice makes perfect. I can’t believe how much I have learned between the launch of my first Sir Chocolate book in August 2016 and now. It’s been an amazing journey.
Kevin Killiany: I submitted my first short story in 1967. I sold my first story in 2000. I would have sold one sooner, but I kept giving up. Don’t keep giving up. Just as a musician perfects their craft through practice, we perfect our writing through writing. Approach everything you write as something you are creating for your own satisfaction, no one outside your head matters. Then do your best, because it is through doing your best every time that your best will steadily improve.
Before we end this first segment, I’d also like to introduce you to contributing author, Kevin Killiany. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic we’ve all been experiencing, he was unable to submit an essay to the work, but I want to introduce him here, so you’ll know who he is when you see his responses throughout this series in the Q & A portions. He’s a multi- genre and media tie-in writer and a generally all around good guy.
Meet Kevin Killiany
Growing up in Florida, Kevin was fascinated with space—he witnessed every manned launch from Cape Canaveral in the 60s, and never fully recovered from the discovery there were no rainforests on Venus for him to explore. Forced to stay on Earth, he eventually became a teacher, working with students at all grade levels before moving on to community support services, where he was a crisis intervention counselor and case manager for mental health and family preservation programs.
Kevin wrote his first story in 1967 and, after only thirty-three years of writing and submitting, became an immediate success with his first sale in 2000. In the years since he has written fiction for both Star Trek and Doctor Who and written web content, campaign books, stories, novels for various role playing games. Down to Dirt, book one of his original YA science-fiction series Dirt and Stars, was published in 2016.
The “Ask the Authors 2022” blog series is a 10 week Saturday series, so be sure to drop by next Saturday for an introduction to contributing author, Bobby Nash and a Q & A on Pre-Writing Rituals. If you grab a copy of Ask the Authors 2022 writing reference anthology while this blog series runs, from now until July 9th, you can get it at the special send-off price of 3.99, from your favorite book distributor through the Books2Read UBL here: https://books2read.com/u/3LnK8e
Sign up for the Kaye Lynne Booth & WordCrafter Press Newsletter for and book event news for WordCrafter Press books, including the awesome releases of author Kaye Lynne Booth. Get a free digital copy of Kaye Lynne Booth’s paranormal mystery novella, Hidden Secrets, just for subscribing.
It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.
–Pablo Picasso
We were certainly very sorry to hear about your death, Mr. Williams. Happens to even the best of His creatures, we suppose. Rest assured all the finger paints here on Planet Heaven are thrilled beyond words you have finally arrived. Begin reception of extraphysical sense and thought in three … two … one…
There. That’s better. This’ll help us get to know you. We see now, for instance, that your eyes have adjusted to the darkness, that you hear a thin dripping somewhere off to your left and that your feet scrape against rough, rough limestone. Understand, we finger paints have witnessed just about everything there is to witness.
Finger paints, yes. That’s what we are. Self-aware, creation-endowing finger paints. We dribble from a pin-hole wound in God’s lower back, right at the base of his spine. Whenever it’s time for him to paint, he scoops us up and lets out a giggle; a deified, bloody, Technicolor spinal tap. We wish you to know he’s been expecting you for quite some time. Sitting cross-legged here in his cavern, deep below the cliff face high, using his brittle fingers to paint portraits of your existence.
“Yay!” he often exclaims. “Colors time! Colors time!”
Few things get him so excited, save perhaps milk and cookies or his favorite Saturday morning anamatia.
Look, here’s the painting he calls Puppy, and there’s the one entitled First Time with a Lady. Note the lack of definition, of sharpness and lucidity. Sublime, isn’t it? Weren’t you an art history major? We’re great lovers of art, ourselves. In these paintings, Mr. Williams, if you don’t mind our interpretation too terribly, you aren’t so much a man but a concept. Of simple lines, basic shapes. Of any color that can exist in a rainbow of perfectly aligned moons and stars.
You approach God slowly, reverentially, overwhelmed, completely unsure of yourself and a thing so magnanimous as immeasurable love. You suddenly have visions of burning bushes and burning Sodom and savior children left to die on crosses for the salvation of all–
He spots you in an instant. His smile is broad and toothless. “Sorry, Daddy,” he says, eyes wide beneath bushy, peacock-feather brows, “I ax’dently spilled juice all over Taking too Many Per’skiption Pills.”
Taking too Many Prescription Pills, of course, is the one he painted just the other day after you’d passed out on the couch, stopped dreaming, stopped being much of anything.
God is ancient-looking and has paint stains all around his lips. He sits on the cavern’s floor, naked as the day he willed himself into being. He reaches for the painting in question, holds it up for you to see. Yes, completely ruined. The image of you–eyes rolled into your head, slobber trailing from your mouth–transcendentally post-Picassian though it may be, looks vaguely like a melting meat-puppet minus the hand up the meat-hole. It’s like Salvador Dali, but without the clocks.
When God says he spilled juice all over it, he means this rather literally. He drinks a lot of juice. Apple juice, to be precise. Not vino, vin, wijn, or the more aptly dubbed, Jesus Juice.
God cannot imbibe the red and/or white stuff. After all, he’s got the mind of a child.
“Daddy,” he says, “there’s sumfin I needs to ax you. Come closer.”
You lean in closer.
“No, Daddy, closer, closer.”
You get down on one knee, and you lean into his cracked, peeled-wallpaper lips.
“You love me, Daddy?” he whispers.
You nod. What man who can truly call himself a man does not love God?
“Love me bunches and bunches?”
You nod again. How humbling to hear the word and feel the breath and know the power that is–
God plants a big, sticky, icky one right on your cheek. He laughs in your face, then he slaps you so hard you see bloody Egyptian rivers.
Ouch. That smarts.
“Tee hee!” He says. “Got you, Daddy. Got you good. You’re gonna’ be God now!”
Precisely what, you inquire, does this mean, oh Lord of Space and Time?
And what, oh Lord of Space and Time, you query, shall be the object, function, and product of the change? For in changing God, does not man–nay, does not the universe–cease to exist in his glorious image?
“Huh?” says God.
You huff and shout, What the hell do you mean, baby needs changing!
And then God starts to cry.
Aw, look at him. You made God cry. Aw. Look at him, all naked, and old, and cross-legged, and bawling his eyes out. With his naked, old soul and his naked, old heart all torn to pieces. Tears and snot stream from every hole tears and snot are apt to stream from. We hope you’re happy now. We really hope you are.
You coo at God, and then you pat his back and scoop him up in your arms, because you’re desperate and just feel like such a jerk.
You never had any children. Never had any grandfathers, either. Leastways, you never had any grandfathers who acted just like the children you and your wife never managed … Well at least you say you’re sorry. Lord of mercy, you are so, so sorry. You never meant to yell at him. You love God. You love him just as much as you loved your wife, and your sister, and your mom, and your dog, and your…
But God, he is hurt. He pushes you away and screams at the top of his lungs, “I’m dyin’ Daddy! I’m gonna’ die real soon. I bleed each time I paint!”
What does he mean by this?
God shakes his head and frowns. He draws his fingers to his back, winces as he touches them to skin. He holds them up for you to see. Color. True and everlasting color, no kind of blood you’ve ever seen. You find us both horrible and enchanting. It’s like Edvard Munch, only you try not to scream.
“I been paintin’ so long,” God says. “So really, really long. I been paintin’ all of you. You know what’s gonna’ happin’ when there’s no more blood to bleed?”
He’s going to die. He’s going to die? Holy hell. You bite your lip and start to panic. He’s going to die? You run a hand through your hair. God can’t die. Holy hell. God can’t die, can he? You pose to him this very question.
He sighs, and though he looks even sadder and more impossibly frail than before, the tears stop flowing.
“I can,” he says. “Yup. And I’m real sad, too. So you’re gonna be God now, Daddy. I slapped you good, so now you got god-power. I made my daddy special. When I was paintin’ your pit’tures, I made sure to con … concen… con-cen-trate real, real hard.”
Enough with this daddy business! Why does God need a daddy? The creator of all that is infinite and everlasting can never, metaphysically speaking, create that which is, by act of temporal creation alone, both a beginning and an ending to his own existence. Can he?
Perplexed, unnerved, you find you only have the strength to ask him this:
Why did God cross the road?
He shrugs. “Prolly ‘cuz the big kids was chasin’ him again.”
# # #
God is dying in your arms, Mr. Williams. Right here, right now. We can feel him slipping away, death a fatal pressure building inside his spine. Recreation, such as painting pictures, is widely known to relieve pressure. And spinal taps are good, too.
He’s asked to die outside, far from his dank, dark cavern, because, as he says, the 29 moons of Planet Heaven remind him of his favorite spaceman animatia. The monstrous, towering cliffs of his river basin rise high and immeasurable all around you. The sky is a deep, ruddy purple, the grass a fine, silky blue.
Colors abound. In your nose. You smell the colors of the universe. On the tip of your tongue. Taste the colors of an endless dream. Smells like burnt cherry wood. Tastes like … paint. Because even though you had no children, Mr. Williams, you were a child once, and you know what paint tastes like. Because children eat it, and eat glue, and paper, and … God dying in your arms … if only you could eat paint and love it like you once did.
God’s breathing is heavy, labored. His lips are pulled back over his teeth, mule and horse-like. Does the body of God go to waste before the end?
“Daddy,” he says. His voice cracks and splinters. “Daddy, come closer.”
You lean in.
“No, Daddy, closer. Please, closer.”
You draw his body into yours, and you press your face in so close you can smell his breath.
“Don’t worry, Daddy,” he says. “I ain’t gonna slap you again.”
Well that’s a relief.
“I should, though. Cuz’ it’d be real funny.”
No, Lord, you say, please don’t.
He nods meekly. “Kay. Kay. Daddy?”
Yes?
“Daddy … Daddy?”
What is it, oh Lord of Space and Time?
“Don’t forget. Ladies wear dresses.”
You ask him what he means. You barely hear what he says next.
“When you paint ’em. Ladies wear dresses. Men wear pants. Doggies go arf, arf.”
You tell him to rest, to be still. He speaks again. So quiet, so fragile and insubstantial it breaks your heart to pieces.
“Also,” he says, “the act of creation is not a self-validating act in and of itself. Nor is the act of destruction. That’s childish, childish and misses the point of being the child.”
Childish? Child? Why is it he suddenly doesn’t sound like a child anymore?
“Wonder,” he says, “wonder,” and one final time, “wonder. In all that you do, my son, wonder. There is so much in this universe to … to paint for the sake of…”
And then God dies. No great final gasp, no moaning or earthly laments or anything so substantial that you think, yes, that’s it, that is the end. And you, Mr. Williams, are suddenly lost in your own grief, in thoughts of your wife, your sister, your mom, your dog and … how alone they all must be. How it feels to abandon. How it must’ve felt for God–just now, just a moment ago–to abandon so hastily all he’s ever loved and nurtured.
And now he’s dead, and in death so placid he may as well have drifted away, a newly winged thing, to paint pictures on the 29 moons of Planet Heaven.
So peaceful and serene. Except that…
The very next instant, his body explodes.
Pressure in the spine. Explosion, detonation. We come hurtling out. A million-billion gallons of paint splatter Planet Heaven and splatter you and splatter the universe beyond. Buildup, relief. Our viscous, fluid minds have blown out wide and interstellar. It’s like Jackson Pollock, only messier.
Red.
Green.
Blue.
Yellow.
An infinite pallet, besides.
We fill you up. Fill you in. Blood in, blood out. And you know such beauteous things. Such things no mere man could ever know. Is this what it means to be at the center of all places and times? You reach two fingers to your back and wince from the pain, bring those fingers to your open mouth and lick them. Oh, you think, maybe I still love to eat paint, after all.
END
Jeff Bowles is a science fiction and horror writer from the mountains of Colorado. The best of his outrageous and imaginative work can be found in God’s Body: Book One – The Fall, Godling and Other Paint Stories, Fear and Loathing in Las Cruces, and Brave New Multiverse. He has published work in magazines and anthologies like PodCastle, Tales from the Canyons of the Damned, the Threepenny Review, and Dark Moon Digest. Jeff earned his Master of Fine Arts degree in creative writing at Western State Colorado University. He currently lives in the high-altitude Pikes Peak region, where he dreams strange dreams and spends far too much time under the stars. Jeff’s new novel, Love/Madness/Demon, is available on Amazon now!
Check out Jeff Bowles Central on YouTube – Movies – Video Games – Music – So Much More!
That’s right. The writing reference you’ve all been waiting for has arrived. Ten talented authors and industry experts have gathered together with me to share their writing tips and advice in essay and Q&A, creating a writing reference anthology like no other.
Where can you find publishing industry experts willing to share their secrets?
Ask the Authors 2022is the ultimate writer’s reference, with tips and advice on craft, publishing and marketing. Eleven experienced and successful authors share what works for them and offer their keys to success in traditional publishing, hybrid, and indie. You’ll learn industry wisdom from Mark Leslie Lefebvre, Kevin Killiany, L. Jagi Lamplighter, Bobby Nash, Paul Kane, Nancy Oswald, Chris Barili, Jeff Bowles, Roberta Eaton Cheadle, Mario Acevedo and Kaye Lynne Booth.
This book offers up-to-date and tried-and-true ways to improve your craft, explores current publishing and book marketing worlds. Take a peek inside and find out what works for you.
Praise for Ask the Authors 2022
“Ask the Authors is an up-to-date and broad-based compendium of advice from today’s working writers, to help you with understanding your own writing career. Great information!” —Kevin J. Anderson, New York Times bestselling author of Spine of the Dragon
Ask the Authors 2022
Ask the Authors 2022 is available in both digital and print. You can get your copy from your favorite book retailer through the Books2Read universal book link (UBL) here: https://books2read.com/u/3LnK8e
Sign up for the Kaye Lynne Booth & WordCrafter Press Newsletter for and book event news for WordCrafter Press books, including the awesome releases of author Kaye Lynne Booth. Get a free digital copy of Kaye Lynne Booth’s paranormal mystery novella, Hidden Secrets, just for subscribing.
I’m kind of hesitant about vampire stories. I’ve read a few that were crafted quite well, like those created by Anne Rice, which I loved and more than a few with twinkling vampires or other gimmicks which veered from traditional tropes, which turned my stomach just a little. But when I received a review invitation from Jordan Elizabeth for the new anthology in which she has a story featured, I didn’t think twice before saying yes.
The Creative Words anthology, First Bite is a varied collection of vampire romance stories: vampires romancing vampires, vampires romancing humans, vampires romancing hunters, or vice verse, etc…., which might be classified as vampire erotica. While I must admit that horny vampires don’t do a lot for me, but many of these stories were explicit and the erotic portions were tastefully done. But be aware that some of these stories bordered on sizzling.
Several of the stories featured are prequels, leading into the rest of the series, rather than complete stand-alone stories. This may be a clever marketing trick to entice readers into the series, but it may also be frustrating to a reader who is expecting a complete story arc in each offering.
I personally, find this tactic annoying, because just when the author has grabbed your attention and you are really getting into the story, they pull it all away and say, “If you want more, go buy my book.” Seems a little underhanded, doesn’t it? But, I know this is a marketing tactic authors are often using these days. You usually see it in newsletter magnets and freebies, although I’ve not seen it in an anthology before.
But… I loved the unique, (at least to me), story concept for “Vampire Occupation”, by Kat Parrish. Although it ends with “to be continued…”, it left me intrigued enough that I’d like to read more. Apparently the tactic works, annoying or not.
There were no prequels or “to be continueds…” from the author requesting the review, Jordan Elizabeth. I’ve reviewed many of her YA novels in the past, and always find them quite enjoyable, and her story, “October in Elmdale “, was no exception. I was drawn into this story immediately by her skillfully placed hook, and her full story arc kept me riveted to the end, where love blooms around a broken curse.
Also worth mention in this story collection is “Must Love Humans”, by Amada Aggie, a complete story where love is kindled over a bet on a game of billiards; “Immortally Yours”, by Lenore Danvers, a complete story in which the vampire plays the part of knight rescuing a damsel who doesn’t yet know she is in distress, and “Once Bitten”, by Kathleen Ryder, a complete story where lost love is reclaimed in spite of a dark secret.
Only a vampire can cherish you forever.
Hidden among average cities and quaint little towns, monsters hunt unsuspecting prey. Secret predators prowl in plain sight, watching. Waiting. The lost souls they consume never see the beast before it hits. If they did, they’d willingly give in to the intoxication of the vampire’s sex appeal.
Overall, First Bite: A Limited Edition Vampire Romance Collection is a captivating anthology of vampire romance stories for the adult reader. I give it four quills.
Kaye Lynne Booth does honest book reviews on Writing to be Read in exchange for ARCs. Have a book you’d like reviewed? Contact Kaye at kayebooth(at)yahoo(dot)com.
Dr. Julianus Techt’s Five Easy Steps to Building a Better You
by Jeff Bowles
You are an absolute horror show. You are a wreck and ruin of a human being. I can’t even stand the sight of you anymore. You’re weak. Feeble. Go on and do it. Go on and rid the universe of your wretchedness once and for all. Sound familiar? Hi, friends. Dr. Julianus Techt here. Life got you down? No friends? No significant love interests? No point in living one more excruciating, soul-crushing day? Believe me, I know the feeling. Congratulations on your purchase of Dr. Julianus Techt’s 5 Easy Steps to Building a Better You. This book, and the accompanying materials and spells companion crate, are each designed with the lowlife in mind. Contained within these pages, friends, are the answers you are looking for. Not happy with the man/woman you have become? Why not simply build a better you? The methods, magics, and matriculations I am about to divulge are time-tested and fool-proofed. I know exactly what it’s like. I was once in your shoes. My PhD is in world-class suffering. I earned my doctorate at the school of hard knocks. Now I am a new man entirely. Come along with me and discover the secrets to self-love, self-respect, and self-actualization. Your glorious, resplendent days in the sun are just 5 Easy Steps away….
Easy Step 1: Back to Basics
Why is it you hate yourself so much? Why is it you’re so despairingly, disconsolately desperate to become a better human being? Is it because, like me, you’ve let down every last friend, family member, and lover who’s ever cared about you? Or do you, like me, simply find life painful, disappointing, a series of valleys–each deeper and darker than the last–without even a passing glimpse of a single peak or shred of hope? Ha ha. Well, you were sharp enough to buy this book. So at least you’ve got that going for you. I want you to imagine what the better you will look like. Now I want you to open your materials and spells companion crate and make it happen. Inside the crate you will find, One (1) man-sized sheet of multi-colored construction paper Five (5) century-aged cherry wood logs, each weighing approximately twenty-five (25) lbs. One hundred seventy-five (175) lbs. of premium oil-based plastilina modeling clay. One (1) ancient scroll of Black Soul-Shard enchantments. And last, but not least, One (1) complimentary Pizza Barn coupon, buy 1 slice, get the second half-off. Arrange your materials and spells in whatever manner that best allows for ease-of-access and attenuation with the life-force powers of the universe and the forsaken black domain of the damnation/animation god, Frülik. Ready to begin? Good. I was hoping you’d say that.
Note: Dr. Julianus Techt’s 5 Easy Steps to Building a Better You is, if nothing else, a trial-and-error process. Steps 2-4 will enable you to produce 3 different soul-shard versions of yourself. If at any time you become satisfied with a soul brother or sister, please feel free to skip to step 5, There, isn’t That Better? Similarly, if at any time you feel threatened or are attacked by your soul brothers or sisters, please discontinue use, flee your house or place of residence, and immediately cash in your complimentary Pizza Barn coupon as you await police/emergency medical technician intervention.
Easy Step 2: Frülik
From your kitchen, retrieve one (1) large knife, serrated; one (1) cereal bowl; one and one-half (1 1/2) teaspoons of iodized table salt; one (1) sticky bandage, extra-large; and one (1) lb. of leftover meat to offer as supplication to Frülik, the damnation/animation god. Retrieve your ancient Black Soul-Shard scroll and refer to enchantment #12 as you perform the following: Sit down on the floor with your legs crossed. Pour the salt into the bowl and set it in your lap so that it can catch the copious amounts of blood about to gush from the palm of your hand. This next part may sting a little. Slice open your hand and hold it over the bowl. As you howl in agony, notice that your blood runs red. This will change as you begin to recite the enchantment, the one which begins, “Oh mighty Frülik! I offer you my blood and meat! Cleave my astral self in twain! Take from me now that which you desire most!” Notice that three things occur. The first is that your blood turns black. Don’t be alarmed. This is simply an indication you have just sold your soul for something far purer than you can possibly imagine. Notice, too, that the air around you has suddenly grown approximately 50° cooler. Your breath puffs frost. You snort in the cold like a castrated bull. You should probably be aware that the damnation/animation god, who will be arriving shortly, cannot abide warmth. It reminds him the living still thrive in the world beyond his forsaken realm, and that for him, all hope for love, passion, and earthly pleasures are lost, lost, lost. Anyway, the last thing you will notice is that a 10-foot tall, bone-armored, entrail-covered, cloven-footed demon god will scratch and claw his way from the cereal bowl filled with salt and your precious blood. Once he’s standing over you, with the edge of his massive Broadsword of Deepest Lacerations resting precipitously against your neck, he will squeal like a cancerous boar. He will then say something to the effect of, “Woe unto you! Woe! Your soul is damned to the bleakest pits of horror and suffering! Pestilence! Rotten, fetid, malodorous flesh! I shall feast on your severed scrotum each mealtime for a thousand lives of men!”*
*Please note that based on your gender, Frülik may or may not in fact use the word “scrotum.”
The damnation/animation god will now use his broadsword to cleave your head from your shoulders. Do not be alarmed, this is simply an astral projection of your head and nothing more. Unfortunately, the pain you feel is entirely real and will no doubt haunt you for years to come. Frülik is consumed by his own lust for spiritual power. He will snort and stomp and pull exactly three (3) individual shards of your soul out through your neck. His desire, of course, is to eat them and thereby enslave you for all time as his personal Concubine of Nightly Anguish. It is now appropriate to offer him the one (1) lb. of supplication meat. “Meager vittles!” he will bellow, but he will nevertheless proceed to stuff the meat into his face and forget all about the severed pieces of your spiritual essence hanging from your throat. Please refer to enchantment #16 on your ancient scroll. Recite and repeat until the damnation/animation god is banished, moaning and cursing your name, back to his profane realm. “Mighty Frülik!,” you will say. “Return to blackness! Mighty Frülik! A caelo usque ad centrum!” Once Frülik is gone, and his howls of abject agony and rage have finally subsided, you will feel the urge to pass out and slip into the Sleep of Ages. This is completely normal, a side-effect of doing business with a demon god, and I must tell you, feels rather nice after a nightcap of chamomile tea and vodka. Before you sleep, pull the three soul shards from the astral wound in your neck and lay them out, as best you can, with the rest of the materials from your companion crate. When you awaken in exactly twelve (12) days and nights, we will finally create your soul brothers/sisters. Won’t that be fun?
Easy Step 3: The Better You Emerges
Twelve (12) days and nights have now passed. Are we back in the land of the living? Excellent. Quick, what is fragile, tenuous, rough around the edges, and excruciatingly, mind-numbingly easy to reduce to cinder? No, it’s not Dr. Julianus Techt’s four failed marriages. It’s paper, friends. Simple, well-crafted, infinitely pliable commercial paper. Your next task is to create a soul brother/sister from the man-sized sheet of multi colored construction paper you’ve retrieved from the materials and spells companiontjngsopjojgs kijipsgmijijithinign ijisrjomoejoig Frülik fhsko sohoihionofihisniohi Frülik shinjpspsom Frülik shions Frülik loves Techt Frülik loves Techt Frülik luvs Techt Frülik has Techt Frülik has Techtmpr Say goodbye, Techt Say goodbye, Techgtnikjigjopop
Managing Editor’s Note: And this is the last thing he wrote for the project, people. The police entered his home last week to find the place torn to pieces but otherwise empty. They found on his workstation a single Tupperware dish containing a full pound of rotting meat. Due to the highly volatile and disturbed nature of this manuscript–and of course, in light of Dr. Julianus Techt’s mysterious disappearance–One-Hill Prairie Publishing hereby suspends all production plans for Five Easy Steps to Building a Better You until further notice. We have also mandated the immediate destruction of all mockup materials and spells companion crates. Our number one priority is to keep the particulars of this project from reaching the public. Can you imagine what’d happen if some poor fool actually attempted any of this?
Post-Script: We realize that working with Dr. Techt these past weeks and months has been trying, and at times, freakishly horrifying. Free mental health screenings and complimentary Pizza Barn coupons to all who apply.
END
Jeff Bowles is a science fiction and horror writer from the mountains of Colorado. The best of his outrageous and imaginative work can be found in God’s Body: Book One – The Fall, Godling and Other Paint Stories, Fear and Loathing in Las Cruces, and Brave New Multiverse. He has published work in magazines and anthologies like PodCastle, Tales from the Canyons of the Damned, the Threepenny Review, and Dark Moon Digest. Jeff earned his Master of Fine Arts degree in creative writing at Western State Colorado University. He currently lives in the high-altitude Pikes Peak region, where he dreams strange dreams and spends far too much time under the stars. Jeff’s new novel, Love/Madness/Demon, is available on Amazon now!
Check out Jeff Bowles Central on YouTube – Movies – Video Games – Music – So Much More!
Since the beginning of this century, the publishing industry has undergone many changes at a very rapid pace due to the rise of digital technology and ebooks and the resulting swell of independent authors which has reshaped the way the industry operates. Traditional publishing houses have had a difficult time in adapting to these changes, which are transforming the playing field from being favorable to publishers into one more fair to authors. Trad. publishers are slow to adapt and their numbers are dwindling as they hang on to traditional practices that make little sense in this day and age. Just in the past five years we’ve seen the big 5 become the big 4, and in 2021 they merged into the big 3.
Many authors struggle with the decision of whether to self-publish or try for a traditional publishing deal, which could turn into an endeavor spanning years and your book may still not be published. Traditional publishing offers status and esteem when you can get it, but the road to a traditional publishing deal has many pitfalls and often ends in wrong turns and dead ends. It’s not easy to land a trad. publishing deal and there are no guarantees. This is nothing new. It has never been easy, but I think it’s harder than it used to be
When you take a good hard look at today’s publishing industry, you may find a few things which surprise you. I know I did.
Did you know…
Advances offered by traditional publishing must be paid back before the author sees any of their royalties? That’s right. An advance is just that – payment of royalties in advance. And the royalty percentage offered by trad. publishers is considerably less than what indie authors receive, so it may take a very long time to pay out that advance, and if s book does not sell well, it may never pay out. Many self-published authors have opted for smaller royalty payments over the long haul, rather than one big chunk of money in the beginning that may never pay out any more than that initial advance payment.
While a traditional publishing deal may still carry an advance with it, it seems the advance amounts have gotten smaller, as traditional publishers grow more unsure of your book’s ability to sell? While book publishers have always taken risks when signing a new author, with the rise of independent authors and publishers, there’s a lot more competition and publishers may be less confident of a book’s success, so they aren’t as willing as they once were to cough up the cash before the book has been proven. What’s more, they aren’t as willing to provide as much effort for promotion. In fact, trad. publishers today are looking at the reader platform, or fan base, that an author brings with them as well as their social media platforms, etc…, and they may expect authors to perform much of the marketing and promotion for their book. A small independent publisher which published my western novel, Delilah, but they did very little as far as marketing goes, and of course, there was no advance. I felt I could do better with it myself, which is why I chose not to renew my contract and will be re-publishing the book myself as part of the Women of the West adventure series.
Traditional publishing created a return policy for bookstores and retailers that allows them to return print books at the publishers expense, which still applies today, effectively preventing independent publishers and authors from having their print books carried in brick and mortar bookstores? While print-on-demand has revolutionized the publishing industry, making it no longer be necessary for authors to create large or small print runs and stockpile books I’m their basement or garage, it is still a challenge for independent authors to get their books into bookstores due to the ridiculous return policy trad. publishers created for bookstores. Today, bookstores have played by these rules for so long that they have no desire to change the rules even though they should. You can read about the options when you publish through Ingram Spark here. There may be a work around if you can find an independent local bookstore willing to take your books on consignment, but for the most part, indie authors are limited to selling their print books online because of an outdated policy that never made sense in the first place. I mean, what other industry allows to retailers to return unsold products after a number of years for a full refund, potentially devastating the maker when the charge blindsides them unexpectedly?
The time that you must wait for your book to go through the traditional publishing process could be two to three years or more from the time of signing, if you do manage to land a traditional publishing deal? Even after you have a contract, that doesn’t guarantee that your book will actually be published, and the publishing process is so long and tedious that your book could potentially be in limbo for years. Of course, that is not what happens most of the time, but it has happened. Children’s books take even longer to go through the publishing process. They can take up to five years or more. Imagine the disappointment of not being published after waiting years to get a trad. deal, and waiting even more years to go through the publishing process. This may be even more of a possibility with the instability of the traditional publishing industry today.
Traditional publishers often ask for rights they never intend to use, and if you give them to them, you can no longer do anything with them? Traditional publishing contracts are not traditionally author friendly, often asking authors to throw in many rights that are unnecessary for the author to give up. For example, many publishing contracts ask for audio rights, even when they have no intention of publishing your book on audio. If these rights are maintained by the author, they can be licensed separately or used to produce their own audiobook through one of the many audiobook platforms available to authors today, but if they are included on your contract, the publisher can sit on them and the author will make nothing from them. That’s money left on the table that the author can’t touch. It is very important that authors know what they are signing and don’t sign away rights that they don’t need to.
Authors today have choices which authors of the past did not. We no longer have to go through the submission-rejection-resubmission grind for months or years to find someone else who likes your writing and might want to publish it. Today we can publish our works ourselves because we like it, and hopefully find others who like it too and will become fans and loyal readers. There are many authors today who choose to try the best of both worlds in some sort of hybrid combination that fits their needs.
I can’t see trying to beat a dead horse, and for me, I think that is what traditional publishing would be. Although making money from my books is always a goal, as I pointed out above, there are no guarantees that I would ever find someone who wanted to publish my book and, even then, there are no guarantees that it would actually happen, or that it would sell. I want people to read my books and that will never happen unless they are published. That’s why, for me, independent publishing will be the course that I choose. Which course is right for you?
Kaye Lynne Booth lives, works, and plays in the mountains of Colorado. With a dual emphasis M.F.A. in Creative Writing, writing is more than a passion. It’s a way of life. She’s a multi-genre author, who finds inspiration from the nature around her, and her love of the old west, and other odd and quirky things which might surprise you.
She has short stories featured in the following anthologies: The Collapsar Directive (“If You’re Happy and You Know It”); Relationship Add Vice (“The Devil Made Her Do It”); Nightmareland (“The Haunting in Carol’s Woods”); Whispers of the Past (“The Woman in the Water”); and Spirits of the West (“Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs”). Her western, Delilah, her paranormal mystery novella and her short story collection, Last Call, are all available in both digital and print editions.
In her spare time, she keeps up her author’s blog, Writing to be Read, where she posts reflections on her own writing, author interviews and book reviews, along with writing tips and inspirational posts from fellow writers. She’s also the founder of WordCrafter. In addition to creating her own imprint in WordCrafter Press, she offers quality author services, such as editing, social media & book promotion, and online writing courses through WordCrafter Quality Writing & Author Services. When not writing or editing, she is bird watching, or hiking, or just soaking up some of that Colorado sunshine.
Sign up for the Kaye Lynne Booth & WordCrafter Press Newsletter for and book event news for WordCrafter Press books, including the awesome releases of author Kaye Lynne Booth. Get a free digital copy of Kaye Lynne Booth’s paranormal mystery novella, Hidden Secrets, just for subscribing.
I started watching the birds which visited my yard about fifteen years ago. My property is densely forested and the early morning chatter in the trees was difficult to ignore, so my gaze would naturally go up to the trees around me, and I was amazed at the number of different types of birds that were dropping by. So, I began to sit out in the yard to write on summer days, and that first summer, I kept a journal of the different birds that I saw,
When winter came around, I bought a bird feeder and some seed. I wasn’t sure how many birds were stick around during the cold months of Colorado winter, but I was pleased to learn that, although many birds migrated south for the winter, birds such as Chickadees, Nuthatches, and Blue Jays were year round residents and the Juncos appeared. When summer roles around, the winter birds clear out and various other species of birds take up summer residence or stop by on their way through.
I even have a group of resident Ravens, originally two pairs until one was taken out by a BB gun by a neighboring child. Now there are only three, but they are always around, and we talk back and forth to each other. (I don’t really speak Raven, but I fake it well.) Watching birds has brought me inspiration, and I have a whole children’s book series, in which the characters are birds and there is a moral lesson to each one, but I haven’t yet been able to publish it for lack of an illustrator. If you’re interested, you can read the story of how I had and lost both illustrator and publisher for the first book in the series, “Heather Hummingbird Makes a New Friend” here.
Mountain Rock DoveAmerican Robin – Morning BathRed-tailed HawkGray-Breasted Blue JaysWoodpecker on a Hummingbird feederMountain Chickadee
Little by little, I’ve added feeders and water features, provided habitat conducive to birds and wildlife. I now put out several types of seed feeders as well as suet feeders in the winter, and in the summer I add Hummingbird Feeders, as well as planting a variety of flowers, water features and bird baths in order to create a bird sanctuary. Over the years, I have viewed bird species in the double digit numbers: American Robins, Red Crossbills, Western Bluebirds, Western Tanangers, at least three different types of Hummingbirds, Juncos, Evening Grosbeaks, Cowbirds, Owls, Mountain Doves, Hairy Woodpeckers, Red-Shafted Flickers, I don’t know how many types of Sparrows and Finches, Gray-breasted Blue Jays, Red-tailed Hawks, and even Turkey Vultures. No matter what time of year, the birds who dip into my feeders always appreciate the plentiful bird seed and suet feeders that I put out, and they line up on the tree branches for their turn at the morning baths in the summer.
By this winter, word had gotten out and the bird sanctuary has become a busy place. I put out my Moultrie Digital Game Camera, which is motion activated, for a day and got thousands of photos of birds at one of the feeders. The feeder they are using is a birdbath in warm weather, but I filled it with Sunflower seeds during the cold spell we had recently, and it is obviously quite popular. Among the birds in the photos below are Evening Grosbeaks, Casin’s Finch and several small Sparrows at the feeder.
MOULTRIE DIGITAL GAME CAMERAMOULTRIE DIGITAL GAME CAMERAMOULTRIE DIGITAL GAME CAMERAMOULTRIE DIGITAL GAME CAMERA
I get a lot of joy from watching the birds that visit my bird sanctuary. They are so much fun to watch as they wait their turn to grab a bite. Of course, at times they don’t wait. They just jump right in squawking and pecking to get their share whether it’s their turn or not, and mid-air skirmishes are not uncommon. Just the other day I watched as a Gray-breasted Blue Jay swooped in a broke off a very large piece of suet, then he turned to take off with it, making a quick get-away. The piece that he had in beak was so large that it weighed him down and he took an unexpected dive, almost to the ground, before catching himself and swooping off into the trees with his bounty. Blue Jays are known around here to be big bullies, so it was really kind of comical to watch as he struggled due to his own gluttony.
It is true that birds of a feather flock together, as Evening Grosbeaks swarm in on the feeders as a yellow and black mob, temporarily chasing off any little guys and interrupting their meal. The Blue Jays flock in too, but the Grosbeaks are the only ones who won’t back down from them. Juncos gang up on the ground, catching the seed others knock down from above. Birds like Mountain Chickadees, Nuthatches and American Robins, usually visit in smaller family groups, and the bird sanctuary has seen a lot of families raised, but even the Hairy Woodpeckers usually visit in pairs.
It’s been a busy place this winter, but I’m looking forward to the coming of spring and the arrival of a new batch of birds, especially the Hummingbirds, which never fail to keep things buzzing around the bird sanctuary. I always look forward to their spring greetings, as they actually come and say hello, hovering right in front of my face upon arrival as the weather warms. But Hummingbirds are a whole other post. If you’d like to hear about them, comment to let me know, and maybe I’ll write about them later in the year.
Kaye Lynne Booth lives, works, and plays in the mountains of Colorado. With a dual emphasis M.F.A. in Creative Writing, writing is more than a passion. It’s a way of life. She’s a multi-genre author, who finds inspiration from the nature around her, and her love of the old west, and other odd and quirky things which might surprise you. She has short stories featured in the following anthologies: The Collapsar Directive (“If You’re Happy and You Know It”); Relationship Add Vice (“The Devil Made Her Do It”); Nightmareland (“The Haunting in Carol’s Woods”); Whispers of the Past (“The Woman in the Water”); and Spirits of the West (“Don’t Eat the Pickled Eggs”). Her western, Delilah, her paranormal mystery novella and her short story collection, Last Call, are all available in both digital and print editions.
In her spare time, she keeps up her author’s blog, Writing to be Read, where she posts reflections on her own writing, author interviews and book reviews, along with writing tips and inspirational posts from fellow writers. She’s also the founder of WordCrafter. In addition to creating her own imprint in WordCrafter Press, she offers quality author services, such as editing, social media & book promotion, and online writing courses through WordCrafterQuality Writing & Author Services. When not writing or editing, she is bird watching, or hiking, or just soaking up some of that Colorado sunshine.
Sign up for the Kaye Lynne Booth & WordCrafter Press Newsletter for and book event news for WordCrafter Press books, including the awesome releases of author Kaye Lynne Booth. Get a free digital copy of Kaye Lynne Booth’s paranormal mystery novella, Hidden Secrets, just for subscribing.
Winner of Playboy Magazine’s Best Story of The Year
Sitting indolently in his gravity couch, Nerl Forfeech was lasciviously eyeing this month’s Plaything centerfold. Two of his tongues hung out from his upper crease as the shiny cellulose pages fell all the way to the floor. Such a lavish display was essential on the planet Znar-foot, a world where six genders struggle to reach alliances and make trysts. The photo that Nerl studied included all the erotic subtypes, built up into naked pyramids of hair, tumescences and orifices.
In this issue, as always, a gorgeous nude six sprawled in the typically suggestive pile, gravity being so low on Znar-foot that any other arrangement would have resulted in the lovers floating away. Their faces were lit with the ecstasy of romantic communion, their organs photographed to be all but fully visible. Nerl, idly fondling one of his protuberances, sighed as he viewed the tinted nipples, the arousing half-glimpses of fur-covered apertures.
Then, suddenly, the door-iris swooshed open and Cloong walked in. Nerl, hastily stuffing the segments back into the magazine, almost fell from the couch as he attempted to hide the issue under some cushions.
Cloong giggled at her embarassed partial lover. “Oh, go ahead,“ she piped, “You can unfold the layout again. I don’t care. They ARE rather lovely… but so impossible, don’t you think?”
Nerl threw down the magazine in disgust. “I wish you weren’t so right. I’ve had only two sixes in my entire life, and both of them got weird right away… right after….”
His voice trailed off at the memory of it. The ecstasy! And then, inevitably, confusion.
Cloong took Nerl by the trunk nooks, and they clung together in mutual frustration. Cloong was Nerl’s Two. And together they had a tentative Three with Albolon Farfing, who, unfortunately, was doing a loose sort of thing with a Two, Three and Four down in the Freesex District, the swinger’s playground in the city of Fichi Forfoot. Albolon had a tendency to be unreliable and he slipped in and out of identities like six-sided dice. He was a Her Two, but no… she is a her3Him… or sometimes a 4femmhe. Albolon was sketchy but still they loved him, if a bit reservedly, in return.
“What do you want to do tonight?” Cloong asked, licking Nerl’s eyeknobs playfully. To Nerl it only made the craving for someone to be inserting into his side slits more powerful. Cloong was only a quasi-femguy, good for sucking and the like… but he shouldn’t be too unfair to her. After all, he was only a quasi-himgalhim, and had limited abilities, as well. Like it or not, it was the way nature made them. With dozens of erogenous zones, the Znar-feet needed flesh on all sides, working in combination to produce the orgasmic culmination of multiple personalities. You could get off with Three; Four and Five were even better. But being a Six was the ultimate, and pitifully elusive, Total Turn-on.
“What can we do?” Nerl echoed distractedly. “Is there anything we can actually do to remedy this feeling?”
“Sure,” Cloong cheerfully volunteered. “We can go pick up Albolon and cruise a Triples Bar. You never know what might happen.”
“Not again,” Nerl groaned. “I can’t take it, the futile games, the flash and glitter. I’m a simple person. All I need is a good, simple five-to-one relationship. That’s not so much to ask.”
“Come on, “ urged Cloong, lifting her appendages in his trunk nooks. The effect was sufficiently erotic. “You’ll never meet anybody if you don’t show your faces. What can you lose? Would you rather stay home all night and masturbate in the washing machine?”
“Okay okay,” Nerl gave in. “Let me get my threads on. I’ll wear my jewel-studded trunk shapers and my simulated-tumescence trouser pads.”
“That’s the way!” Cried Cloong, getting up off Nerl’s abdominal folds. “Dress up sexy!”
Later the three of them strode snout in snout down the flamboyant promenades of Flesh-Bargain City, the accepted cruising ground for Znar-Foot’s frustrated sexuals.
Cloong was bouyed up between her partial lovers, dressed in a revealing mini-suit that left quite a few of her tubes exposed. The night was torpid, just right for the ongoing voyeurism of Gendervender Plaza. (Sometimes known as Six Sex Street.) Of course Albolon and Nerl were elegant beyond compare in their striped priapic enhancers. As they progressed down the brightly lit avenue, they caught the envious stares of lonely Ones or Twos, and occasionally the pitying glances of bustling Fours and Fives. But there were no Sixes. The Sixes would undoubtedly be at someone’s apartment, in bed. Or else arguing.
Cloong, Nerl and Albolon stopped to peer into various clubs and bars, to see which ones were running Threes that night. The formats always changed, rotating a nightclub’s patronage through the various combinations, Two-Fours, Five-Ones, Singles Night, and so forth. Of course, no one EVER went to a Single Night. Too humiliating.
As they walked, peering through the transparent view bubbles of the different clubs, they were accosted by street hustlers making suggestive offers: “Say honeys,”a gaudily dressed Non-specific eyed them speculatively. “I got just the Three for you, never been Sixed before, any of them. Got a taste for some fresh action?” Or another: “Need a massage, sports? Got a lovely pair, just juicin’ to get their trunks on you.”
Ignoring the lascivious stares and remarks, Cloong, Nerl and Albolon arrived at their favorite place, The Sexagram Club, and saw that it was running Triples that night. The house band, The Numbers Racket, could be heard raucously blaring, and their pulses raced with anticipation at the wild action within. The Numbers Racket, a successful Four offstage, never failed to turn on the audiences with their erotogymnastics and jerk’n’jell music. Cloong, Nerl and Albolon showed their IDs and entered the crowded room that smelled of trunk-pit persp and stimu-mist.
“Hey babies,” a Triple, rocking past in an orbiting dance, called out. “Hey hey, let’s get it on.”
Cloong pulled back. “How unsubtle. Come on, boys, this is no place to meet nice people. Let’s get out of here.”
But Nerl and Albolon had already spotted some promising looking action. “No, let’s stay, Cloong. It was your idea in the first place. If we don’t like it after a while, we can go someplace else.” They pulled her farther into the seething mass, where dancing bodies yanked and plopped spasmodically, simulating sex.
Onstage, The Numbers Racket had sprawled atop one another in an explicit orogenital configuration, while, up front, dancing Threes screamed their shock and delight.
Against the walls of the room, stimu-mist vendors lined up next to sensory-enhancement dealers, exchanging money balls for popular brands of dope. The rest of the room was all dance floor, with sufficient space in which to flirt, writhe and show off simul-sex aptitude.
Cloong and her hims moved onto the dance floor, their eyes constantly shifting across the room, taking in the more attractive groups, canceling out the ones who held no appeal. Since their tastes were relatively alike, they intuitively crossed through the various combinations until they were close to another sexy Three who seemed alone.
Perfect! A Three with two fems. Cloong lowered her tubes a trifle suggestively at the him of the group. Meanwhile, Nerl had shown a definite tumescence at the she-she-it in the flaming orange trunk gripper. They danced up closer, coyly initiatiing eyes contact. Albolon, however, didn’t move correspondingly. He was too busy eyeing a fem in a different Three altogether.
Cloong jerked at him and he staggered forward. “Idiot,” she hissed, but the cute Three had caught the little interchange and had indifferently moved away through the crowd.
Nerl reprimanded Albolon. “You blew it for us, man. Didn’t you see those gorgeous fems? Himwit! We would have been perfect. I just know it.”
Albolon cursed. “Ah, the one in the dotted tube-throttler was a pig. I almost scored another Three for us all by myself until you pulled at me so obviously.”
Cloong waved her eyeknobs impatiently. “Look over there. Do you think we can all agree on one Three to come on to? How about that short-tall-tall number in the corner?”
Al and Nerl furtively checked it out. “Okay. Let’s go.”
Again, they spasmed across the dance floor, dodging single and double Triples to get near the attractive Three that Cloong had pointed out. This one was a good dancer, doing all the most fashionable orifice-openers among several maneuvering Threes. They were dressed in one of the latest cozy-suits, a gauzy garment that joined the three bodies in a spacious but intimate arrangement. There was an obvious zipper where another Three suit could easily be hooked in.
“We don’t have one of those suits,” Nerl commented negatively. “This Three’s too uptown for us. And look at the competition. I hate standing in line.”
“Don’t be a onesyhead,” said Albolon, who lusted after high class liaisons. “We’re artists. Rich Threes need us.”
“Now that I think about it,” said Cloong abjectly, “rich people have no sensitivity. Maybe we should go check out that long-haired Three over there in the middle.”
By the time they were in close, Albolon was dragging the others. The music lulled for a moment. Agressively, he leered at the Three and said, “Hey, babies, didn’t we meet at a sensory-awareness clinic in Big Stir?”
The chic threesome laughed disdainfully and, without even answering, lost itself in the crowd.
Nerl and Cloong clung to each other in utter embarassment.
“Albolon,” she said sadly, “if we don’t get our relationship together, pretty soon we’ll be a Two.”
Albolon farted from his side vents in frustration.
“Would that be so bad? I’ve heard you two talking together, I know what you think. You think I care about that Trip up in Snort Beach, the one you guys can’t stand.”
He was beating his trunks up and down laboredly. Cloong stroked the pits with tender solicitation.
“No, no,” they said, “we’re not jealous of them, Albolon. It’s just that sometimes your crude come-on ruins our chances.”
Albolon backed away petulantly. “You’re just possessive, that’s what. Just because I have my style and like to check out things on my own.”
He turned, broke away from them, while they stood there, stunned. All around, Threes were watching them and giggling.
“And you know,” Albolon said stingingly, “I do get off on my other Trip. At least my Snort Beach floozy gives me plenty of space. Not only that, but they give better trunk, too.”
“Albolon, you’re crazy,” protested Cloong.
“You see,” he said, his eye nooks wide, “that’s what you really think of me when I’m being honest. Well, goodbye.” He pivoted and was lost in the whirling bodies. Cloong and Nerl tried to catch him, but the door of the club hissed shut and Albolon was gone.
Shocked, under the mortifying gaze of twittering Threes, they left the club. Outside, the street was empty of Albolon. With tears rolling down their face-folds, they made their way across the livid avenue, but the lights and gaiety had lost their charm.
“Let’s go home, Nerl,” Cloong said mournfully. “This is no way to find your nice, simple five to one relationship.”
Nerl stood stubbornly in one spot. “Go home? You must be kidding! We just lost our Three. I don’t want to go home alone tonight. I’m just not ready for it.”
“You’re NOT alone,” said Cloong, a trifle peeved.
“You know what I mean,” said Nerl, regretting his spite.
“I guess I do,” she said, fatalistically.
Nerl gazed up into the dimly visible heavens, reddish in the glow of the street lights. All his anguish at the way they had been constructed poured out of his heart and flailed weakly against the indifference of the cosmos.
“There are are some worlds out there,” he said distantly, “where I’ll bet they have only three genders, or maybe even just two. Different arrangements entirely.” Cloong laughed and took his center trunk with her snout. “Come on, Nerl. That’s absurd. Think how dull life would be. It would all be too simple.”
He shook his shaggy mane, as if to dispel the far-flung fantasy. Taking his girlfriend by one of her more exposed tubes, he led her down the hysterical walkways in search of a Four-Two club.
Arthur Rosch is a novelist, musician, photographer and poet. His works are funny, memorable and often compelling. One reviewer said “He’s wicked and feisty, but when he gets you by the guts, he never lets go.” Listeners to his music have compared him to Frank Zappa, Tom Waits, Randy Newman or Mose Allison. These comparisons are flattering but deceptive. Rosch is a stylist, a complete original. His material ranges from sly wit to gripping political commentary.
Arthur was born in the heart of Illinois and grew up in the western suburbs of St. Louis. In his teens he discovered his creative potential while hoping to please a girl. Though she left the scene, Arthur’s creativity stayed behind. In his early twenties he moved to San Francisco and took part in the thriving arts scene. His first literary sale was to Playboy Magazine. The piece went on to receive Playboy’s “Best Story of the Year” award. Arthur also has writing credits in Exquisite Corpse, Shutterbug, eDigital, and Cat Fancy Magazine. He has written five novels, a memoir and a large collection of poetry. His autobiographical novel, Confessions Of An Honest Man won the Honorable Mention award from Writer’s Digest in 2016.
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