Short Story Sunday

Although I've been working with my Kenyan thriller novel, I've started a new tradition, Short Story Sunday. I have a library of short stories, some finished (here), most unfinished. Worse than unfinished stories are stories not even started. I've decided to fix this by dedicating Sunday morning to short story writing only, and Monday's to giving snippets of those stories to this audience. So, enjoy:

 Breakfast With the Lifers

By Dick Hannah

If asked, I doubt if I could pin it down to just one action or happenstance. Maybe it was the shades, maybe the good cooking, perhaps like so many odd coincidences in this world it was just a series of unrelated incidents that coalesced to create one huge, crazy, pre-midlife drama for me. Like so many other things in life what happened to me was probably not the result of one event, or even two, but a combination of many small things. It could have been Michaelson talking too much, my apartment being in a flash in the pan neighborhood where shops and people drift in an out of favor as quickly as teenage pop stars, or it could have been my not putting my a stop to things quickly enough, but one thing is for certain, Hoffman opening the shades that first morning was the pivot point, and if not it certainly acted as the catalyst that started the whole Rube Goldberg like mechanization that led to my restaurant.

I never wanted to become a restaurateur, I never had that calling. I’ve thought about it, thought about it a lot, and it boils down to the fact that it is just too risky. There is no safety net, no assurances, the customer base is too fickle, the market is too precarious, too many avenues where things could go sour. I like my life planned out and orderly. I rejected the idea of owning or operating or even working in a restaurant a long time ago. I’ve patronized too many establishments too often, and regarded them with a practiced eye toward failure potential, to make the mistake of investing in them myself. I don’t gamble. I go into all my ventures, few they may be, with a wealth of research and always a well thought out plan consisting of a feasibility phase, a production phase, closure, extraction and so on.

(if you'd like to read the rest, please follow this link: here)

Evershade, evershades, ever shade, ever shades

A Dose of Absurdity

I have a wonderful post to complete my ersatz series on change management. It is about defining Task Condition and Standards. But it's too much for today. Got too many things going on for that type of post. Today, with a with done with her job, a series of problems at work with no goal or destination, a friendship dashed against the rocks and sinking beneath the waves, and needing to get to the hospital for surgery this morning, there's just too much other stuff for a Task Condition Standard post. So instead I offer this absurdity:

 

Seriously, Chicken's in Sweaters is a thing. Whenever I wonder if this blog is silly. Who reads it? Who want's a failing authors ideas on writing and publishing? What's the point? I see something like this and realize that not only is my blog NOT absurd, but it may not be absurd enough for this world.

Task Condition and Standard can wait till next week.

Does "It" Have to be "What It Is?"

Yesterday and the other day I wrote about change management (here and here) and today may be no different. I had a call with my co-worker the other day where she got upset about how quickly everyone in our company tends to be rolling over to the demands of the company we merged with. "It is what it is," she said. I found myself in a situation the other day that she would have enjoyed being a part of. When confronted with a director who didn't want to make a change I had a make a case for the change, and execute. I found out later that he has been working behind my back toward his own ends, so I had to confront him about that. Fireworks ensued.

The "is what it is" comment hit me. I have another (wonderful) friend, E, who loves using this turn of phrase. I hate it every time she does. "It is what it is" is such a passive acceptance of events. I don't believe in that philosophy she uses so quickly. I believe in overcoming. I believe in making my own destiny. I believe in being upfront with people and discussing things and coming up with a plan to get over whatever obstacle happens to be in the way. Maybe it's my military foundations coming into play, but in my unit, there was no retreat. There was no, "Well, we were supposed to go this way, but someone is shooting at us, so we better just turn around." Nope. The unspoken motto was "adapt and overcome." If one thing doesn't work, try another, if that doesn't, try another, and another, and another, until you succeed. Quitting isn't an option and "is what it is" is a sop for quitting.

Confronting my director the other day reminded me of my father. Not only was this fellow someone who refused to try something new, to innovate or adapt and overcome, he was duplicitous and conniving. I think about my father and his death two years back (see here). I think about how I have acted in my life. Have I acted with integrity or insincerity? Have I been upfront with people and truthful or have I been meek and fearful? Have I worked to be supportive and helping or have I undermined and been corrosive in my actions? Can I place on my tombstone "No Regrets."

I know from having dealt with my father that he was all of the positive aspects listed above. He was too gentle and truthful a soul to be otherwise. It's my job to try and be the same. To set the same example and surround myself with people who have the same desire to be that type of person.

There is a culture clash at work in my office. Do we obfuscate and knuckle in to the culture war, and to the challenges that face us in life and in this instance at work, or do we innovate, adapt and overcome and never quit on things we believe in. Using my father's example and understanding how quick life can be over, I think I know which I'll choose.

I look forward to providing both sets of characteristics to characters in my book. The "is what it is" character who will fail for not having tried, and the "adapt and overcome" character who may not win but who will be able to look back on his actions with pride and no regrets. I hope fireworks ensue.

Wag and Prudence

I had a coffee date with my long time friend and former/still might be, co-worker, C the other day. Two things popped up in our long and ranging conversation that would make the date notable for this blog. The topics included: home grown inventions (Popquiz Password), life hacks (Styrofoam coffee pot timer) applications (Wag . . . an incredible Uber for the dog walking world), Eastern philosophy (who knew she was into that), and series 7 exams (again, who knew!). But the two that made a dent in the writing world were: children’s books and addiction.

C has recently written a book about her dog, Prudence (pictured above), that she wanted to talk to me about. Naturally I foisted upon her my own book, and we didn’t discuss publishing to the degree she might have wanted, but it was a topic. My take was the same that my writing friend Allie from years ago told me; we live in an age with an amazingly low bar to enter the market. The ability to write and publish a written work and produce it, advertise it, and market it for an audience is easier now than it has ever been. There are multiple channels for printing, print on demand, and an amazingly quick and inexpensive creation ability. This was the reason I eschewed the typical, literary agency mode of publishing. There’s just no benefit for the hurdles one must endure. If I had the date to do again, I’d go back and talk more about this. Still, way to go Prudence.

The other factor that came up quite a bit was addiction. C and I have a mutual friend who is facing some stiff challenges in terms of addiction, either to pain killers or drinking or perhaps both. My latest novel draft that I have just completed for NaNo had a theme of addiction and how to deal with addiction. Thankfully, I’ve never had a problem with addiction so it was tough to write about, but I expanded my horizons and looked at my life outside of the typical addictions and I was able to find some “unhealthy” things in my life and realize that I had a hard time giving them up even though my life would be better if I did.

It was over that cup of Joe that C both gave a word of thanks that we weren’t addicted to anything.

Great First Line

THE SMOKE CARRIED UP FROM THE Cahuenga Pass and flattened beneath a layer of cool crossing air. From where Harry Bosch watched, the smoke looked like a gray anvil rising up the pass. The late afternoon sun gave the gray a pinkish tint at its highest point, tapering down to deep black at its root, which was a brushfire moving up the hillside on the east side of the cut.

Connelly, Michael - The Black Ice

Yep, I am back to writing out the first lines of books. Micheal Connelly's first lines are just as good as Lawrence Sanders who I think is the best of them all.

In these first few sentences Michael Connelly does all of the things that I find both intriguing and irritate me about Californians. Connelly (and most Californians) are obsessed with the nomenclature of their area and particularly so when discussing traffic patterns and highways. I despise this but I suppose he is trying to immerse the character in the writing and the setting.

The other thing that Connelly does that Sanders does as well is use color in the imagery. That "gray anvil" or "pinkish tint" and "deep black" are all there giving more depth to the sentence. I like the fact that there is that next level of modifiers in first sentences. These tell me that Connelly, unlike other sentences and passages that just move the story along, this first sentence is crafted and tuned to what it is now.

Greatness of NaNo

So I finished the 2017 NaNoWriMo successfully and it's a great feeling to have accomplished that. Is it a complete novel? Far from it. In fact I remember it was Vapor Trail (here) that made me realize that writing isn't "writing" . . . writing is "re-writing."

I wrote Vapor Trail as a NaNo submission back in 2013 or 2014. I only published it last year. It takes a lot of re-writing to get a NaNo submission into a publishable book . . . and even what I think is publishable is still a long way from perfect.

Still, it's nice to have a draft. Am I working on Sunset Perfect now? Nope. Not even considering it. I have a great 50,000 word draft, but it will be another year or two before I work on it and want to try and publish it.

What am I working on now?

I'm working on my 2015 NaNo submission. I wrote a thriller about an orphanage in Kenya, and a team of mercenaries who are hired to protect it. The great thing about NaNo is that I have absolutely no recollection of ever writing that draft. None whatsoever. It's like picking up a completely foreign manuscript and being able to work on it. It's a great feeling to be so far into writing a novel and already be so far along.

First in the Trilogy

My new best friend, B, recommended a book for me. B likes long winding novels with lots of plots all going on at the same time. I'm happy for the recommendation, Ken Follet's Fall of Giants.

I've been a fan of Follet's for years. I read The Pillars of The Earth way back in my early twenties I believe. I've read and reviewed several of Follet's books since starting this blog five or six years back (see here).

Fall of Giants was a lot of fun to read but it certainly is the beginning of something much much longer. It reads like just the introduction for a larger story. That's low hanging fruit to predict since the entire Century Trilogy has already been published, but I'm looking forward to Winter of the World.

My favorite parts were not the descriptions of trench warfare on the Western Front, which were fun to read, nor were my favorite parts the story lines about turn of the century British nobility, a la Downtown Abbey. Not even the secret love affair between Maud and Walter, which I thought was well weaved, my favorite part to read. The portions of the book that called to me the most were those that dealt with the Eastern Front and the Bolshevik Revolution.

I remember taking a Russian History class back in college. What I liked about this story was that it simplified and made the Bolshevik Revolution understandable. Follet uses a foil, Grigori, to show how the revolution took shape and to show the reader how Trotsky and Lenin were able to take power. Easily the most interesting parts of the novel.

If you enjoy long, historical novels with winding story lines like a soap opera, then this is a great book for that. Can't wait for book two!

Still Hanging in There

So we are less than a week away from the end of NaNo and I'm still in there.

I got alot of writing done on the flights and at the airport. Over and above that I was able to wake up super early before the family got up to work on my novel as well. With today's fifteen hundred words moving me along I've hit 41,800. What's great is I still have lots of story left to write. I'm barely 60% through the story. I feel quite confident I'll make 50K and not only that when this story is complete it will easily meet my past standard of 90K words.

Things are looking up and I'm plugging along. The finish line is in sight. Just need to power through.

Characters All Around Us

Yesterday I wrote about Composite Characters (see here) but today I was reminded about characters in general; those characters who are all around us everyday.

This week I've been in some terrific "people watching" places. A couple of airports (I'm writing from one now), buses, trains, mono-rails and amusement parks. A plethora of characters have passed by me. All of them insanely interesting and incredibly compelling, crazy wardrobes, interesting walking styles, funny faces, incredibly engaging (sometimes hostile) attitudes.

Apparently, I'm a character myself. There was a family in line with us for a ride at the amusement park. The line was an over two hour wait. That's not hyperbole. It was two hours and fifteen minutes of slow walking, needing to use the restroom, needing water, waiting in line. While waiting I chatted with the cute couple from Mississippi next to us. Just little chitter chatter to do something. We never really met, just joked about the line mostly. Today, I'm getting a coffee at the airport and up comes the mom from the cute couple to flirt. Made my day! Apparently I'm a memorable character to her.

But that's not the point of this post.

Today as I was walking throught the security line on Thanksgiving day, I took out my clearly metal money clip and put it in the dog bowl that the screeners use to put loose things through the x-ray device.

The TSA screener stopped me and said, "You shouldn't put you money through the x-ray. You should hang onto that."

"But it's metal," I replied.

"Then just hold it in your hand and don't let them see you do it."

Cracked me up. Here is a TSA security screener telling me to hold some metal in my hand and hide it from her co-workers. Not only that she told me to take some metal through the metal detector. It was absurd on so many levels. What did I do? I put it in the dog bowl and put my hat over it so no one could see it. Better than being dinged at the walk through screener and having to tell the security agent why I was holding a piece of metal in my hand.

That lady would be a perfect character for a thriller novel.

Composite Characters

In each of my novels I like to include as many characters as possible who have compelling and interesting back stories. I don't remember where I read about it, but I remember reading that plot can only take a book so far. Readers don't read a book for the plot, they read a book for the characters. It's not the distance or route traveled that readers want to know about, it's the story of the people on that journey that is important and compelling.

I create composite characters. Madison and Wynn in Toe the Line, Joe in On the Edge and Stubby and Elizabeth in Vapor Trail are all composite characters of people that I've known. It's not just one person but a whole host of people encapsulated in one character. But always there is a basis for that character. One single person who inspires the character. For Sunset Perfect one of the cornerstones for one main character is going to be my wonderful friend and neighbor, Marianne.

Marianne is a terrific neighbor. I've yet to see her down or depressed. She is perhaps the best cocktail party guest in that when she arrives for a visit she always brings something (usually many things) to help make the food and drinks, and she doesn't drink so she's a cheap date too! She's the best and I can't wait to use here as the foundation for a terrific character. Sure it may not look like much, those characteristics up there, but they will be enough for me to create someone that readers are drawn to and want to know more about. She's a terrific angel, or white knight to come charging in to help the main character with his problems.

You'll notice that I've labeled this post Composites, so I expect to write more of these in the days to come to discuss some of the other characters who will be showing up in Sunset Perfect.