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My In-laws Bring a Curse With Them Every Time They Visit My House

I love my wife’s parents. And although in-laws have been the butt of jokes practically since the dawn of time, I really hit the in-law lottery when I married my wife. You couldn’t ask for two nicer people to be in your extended family.

But…there’s a problem.

They carry a curse—a jinx, a hex, call it what you will—that manifests itself each and every time they set foot on my property. You probably think I’m exaggerating, but I’m not. Let me explain.

Although I've never seen it, I've come to believe something like this follows them when they pull into my driveway. — Although I’ve never seen it, I’ve come to believe it looks something like this, and comes rolling in behind them as they pull into my driveway.

Every time they visit, something goes wrong with (or in) our house. It’s usually something small; that’s why it took so long before we saw a pattern. Maybe an appliance would go on the fritz unexpectedly. Maybe a faucet would spring a leak, or a trash bag would break, spilling garbage all over the kitchen floor. It’s always be something different, but something inevitably goes wrong when they’re here. Finally, my wife and I put the pieces together and reached the only rational conclusion—they are cursed, and bring the evil force into our home whenever they come visit, where the house embraces it like a dear lover and lets mayhem wreak havoc in our humble abode.

Two visits ago, the main drain in the house—which leads to the sewer—backed up into the basement. Now, you may say, But something like that takes a long time to happen. Months at least, if not longer. I get that. But what are the odds that it just happened to back up the day they were there? What’s that, you say? Coincidence? Pfft. Poppycock. The water was summoned to the surface by the malevolent force they brought into my house.

It was the curse, plain and simple.

I sense you’re not yet convinced. Allow me to present more recent evidence: the fallout from their last visit, starting Sunday evening and concluding Monday afternoon. The following events occurred during their 20-hour stay:

The cold water in the shower began turning colder BY ITSELF during showers, causing my wife to cry out so loudly that I almost broke my neck running to check on her.
The toilet in the front bathroom quit flushing on two separate occasions, and still requires an occasional jiggle of the handle to work properly—obviously the lingering effects of the curse.
Not one, but three (3) light bulbs burned out in the house, one in the living room and two in the kitchen. How often do you have light bulbs burn out? Every few years? And, I might add, these are fluorescent bulbs (CFL’s) which—under non-cursed conditions—last for several years. We had three burn out on the same day.
Ants. Ants felt the curse calling them and came crawling out of the cracks between the cupboard and the oven, seeking to please the dark overlord temporarily occupying our home. Since the in-laws left, the ants have dwindled away and disappeared now that there is no electric crackle of Hellfire in the air.

Perhaps, despite all the evidence I’ve presented, you think I’m crazy. In that case, let me present the final and most compelling, mind-blowing piece of evidence that will prove once and for all that the curse exists: it has gained power, moving on from inanimate objects to living things.

Driven mad by the evil spirits cursing our land, a poor, innocent squirrel committed suicide, leaping from a high branch of our golden rain tree to the hard concrete steps below. Why else would a squirrel lose the will to live unless it was consumed by delirium? It’s heartbreaking proof of the power of this terrible curse.

Does anyone out there have any advice for dealing with malevolent entities invading your home?

Luckily, the in-laws are back home for now, a state away, and not slated to return for approximately five weeks, giving us time to fortify the house with crucifixes and holy water, hopefully ensuring our safety. But who will help the squirrels?

What Has Two Thumbs and Just Got a Short Story Published?

I had to read the email three times to make sure I wasn’t seeing things, but yes indeed, one of my short stories is being published! My sci-fi flash fiction piece Tale of the Revolution is going to appear in the upcoming issue of Nebula Rift magazine, Volume 2 Number 4, put out by eFiction Publishing. It should be available by the end of the month—I will naturally pass along the exact release date once I have it.

So, this is what it feels like to finally get something published, huh?

Taste vs. Talent

Do you guys listen to This American Life on NPR? It’s one of my favorite shows, running the gamut from serious to comedic, light-hearted to heart wrenching, sometimes in the same sixty minutes. Well, this post isn’t about This American Life, but it does have to do with Ira Glass, who serves as the show’s host, as well as being a TV and movie producer, writer, and all around cool-seeming guy.

There were other pictures on the internet of Mr. Glass, of course, but if this one doesn't exude cool, I don't know what does. — There were other pictures on the internet of Mr. Glass, but this one was too tempting to resist. If you really want to know what he looks like today you can google him. 🙂

When you struggle with writing, you tend to look for things to make you feel better, like it’s not a lost cause; like all the crap you’re going through is going to be worth it somehow, someday. And if you search enough, you’ll find the same tips, the same advice over and over, until it’s all a bit redundant and (in my opinion) not all that helpful. There is one quote I’ve come across a few times, though, that really made an impact, and it comes from the aforementioned Mr. Glass.

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”

That really hit home for me. It pinpoints what I’d been feeling for quite awhile but couldn’t put my finger on. I was fairly happy with the things I’d written, but I just knew something was off. And then, a couple of days ago while looking for something in my basement, I found this:

It’s the second ‘extended’ story I ever wrote, back in 2000 when I had just started a new job. I worked split shifts, meaning four hours in the morning, then a few hours off, then four more hours to finish the work day. My wife (girlfriend at the time) and I were sharing a car, so I was stuck there during the 3-4 hour break and I did what seemed like the only logical thing—I wrote.

I remembered writing the story—about a down-on-their-luck couple in love who concoct a plan to rob a bank—but I didn’t know I’d saved it. I thought it had been lost or trashed years ago. I sat down and started reading it and realized a couple of things.

It sucks. Naturally, of course it does. But it doesn’t totally suck. The bones of a good story are there, it’s just not very good due to several factors: wooden characters, stiff dialogue, plot problems, etc. But the thing is, it highlights what Ira Glass said. I can see what the then 26 year old me was going for. If you want to get right down to it, my ideas for stories nowadays aren’t all that different (it seems I’m destined to primarily be a crime writer, as that’s what tends to come naturally). But the taste far outweighed the talent.

That story (titled Karmic Justice—it came to me as I’ve been typing) was the last thing I wrote until I started back up a couple of years ago, and I’ve been bridging that taste/talent gap ever since. Are they equal? No. Not quite. Not yet. But it’s getting there, and finding this little gem in the basement (and comparing it to what I’m working on now) has helped drive home just how far I’ve come.

So while it may not apply to everyone, if there’s something you do that you’re still trying to get better at—writing, photography, music, cooking, woodworking, whatever it is—go back and look at (or just think about) some of your early stuff for a reminder of how much progress you’ve made.

Because once your taste=talent, there’s no stopping you.

You Know Who Manages to Pull Off Some Pretty Wild Plot Twists? Life, That’s Who.

Up until maybe a year ago, I would’ve told anyone who asked that my life was really pretty boring. With an odd sense of pride I would’ve said my life contained zero drama, and I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I would write a little in the morning, go to work, write a little more on my lunch break, come home from work and maybe even write a little more after dinner, then go to bed and get ready to do it all over again. It might seem a bit bland to some, but it was okay by me.

I think it was even reflected in the blog, as sometimes I simply had nothing personal to write about. While some people could write volumes about what was going on in their lives, I wrote instead about True Detective, the Wilelm scream, and Stephen King, making the site feel at times (to me, at least) like some kind of wannabe Entertainment Weekly rather than a personal blog.

In July, I wrote a little bit about taking my wife to the emergency room for internal bleeding. She ended up staying a night in the hospital so they could check her out, and was then sent home with the rather vague instructions ‘don’t do anything to irritate your stomach.’ No ulcers or any rupture in the stomach lining were found, so we were slightly baffled.

In the proceeding months, whatever it was that was wrong became increasingly worse until she was forced to take medical leave from work in September while we made numerous trips to the doctor(s) to figure out what was going on. After numerous tests there was still no official diagnosis other than that her liver wasn’t functioning properly, but with the prescriptions she was given she was feeling…well, okay. Some days were better than others. We got into a new routine (which now included numerous doctor visits, tests, and prescription pick ups) and adjusted to the way life had changed while we waited for the doctors to figure out what was going on.

Life apparently decided we’d been in that routine long enough and proceeded to kick things up a notch. One night about a month ago my wife began throwing up copious amounts of blood, and against both of our better judgement we didn’t go to the emergency room straight away. There would be more blood, and once we finally arrived at the ER the next morning she was examined and promptly admitted to the Medical Intensive Care Unit and given several units of blood, among other things, to stabilize her.

The next morning, a man named Dr. W. Ransom Kilgore (ironic name for a doctor if ever there was one, no?) did a scope—putting a little tube with a camera on it down my wife’s throat—and found a rupture in the portal vein, also known as bleeding varices. Using tiny rubber bands placed over the varices, they stopped the bleeding. She would remain under the watchful eye of the people in the MICU (and be given still more blood) before being transferred to a ‘regular’ room for further observation until ultimately being cleared to go home. I finally brought her home after four long, sleepless nights for both of us. She was absolutely miserable the whole time and my back and ass hurt from sitting (and sleeping) in hard, uncomfortable chairs. It was a rough go, but at least it was over, right?

No, not quite.

Despite the doctors still not knowing exactly what’s going on (and despite her just having had a biopsy), they know enough to tell us that her liver isn’t getting any better and it’s time to start checking into procedures for getting her on “The List.” At some point in the future, they’re confident (i.e., certain) she’s going to need a transplant. We have a preliminary appointment with a specialist in June.

A little time has passed since they delivered the news, and in my own amateur research I’ve read that liver transplants have an extremely high success rate, and the vast majority of transplant recipients go on to lead normal, productive lives again, but still…the initial shock was devastating. We both took our health for granted for a very long time, but after that first visit to the ER last year (and the subsequent numerous doctor visits) we followed orders, made the recommended changes, and had faith everything would get better. I still think it will, but the road getting there is going to be quite a bit longer and bumpier than we’d expected.

Needless to say, with all this comes the fact that the blog will most likely take on a more personal tone as I chronicle at least some of the ordeal we’re going through. We’ll adjust and carry on, as it’s just what we do: we adapt. And while my wife has her doubts and fears, I think I know her in some ways better than she knows herself—she’s the type who’s actually much stronger than she realizes, and just needs the occasional (or sometimes frequent) vote of confidence to remind her of it. And once the dust settles, I’m confident (i.e., certain) we’re going to be fine.

I’ve Been to a Magical Land, Full of Free Books for Every Man, Woman, and Child—They Call It a “Library”

When I was in Junior High/High School, the library was nothing more than the place that housed the encyclopedias and whatever else I might need to complete a research paper or other such project. I never appreciated the library for what it was—never saw its full potential. It didn’t help that the local branch, while a mere 2-3 minute drive from my house (also known as walking distance to the non-lazy), was old and run down, with a small selection of books. The library became less and less important as time went on, to the point that I thought they were all but obsolete.

After moving to the Midwest I never thought about the library once, until I started blogging. Among the blogs I started following was Eleventh Stack, run by the fine people at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh (they don’t just blog about ‘library stuff’—it’s all things movies and music as well as books). Seeing one of their recent posts lit the light bulb over my head—Hey, yeah, libraries…remember those? I wonder if there are any still around. I looked up my local branch (which, while not walking distance is still very close) and decided to take a trip down to get my library card and have a look around.

I was less than impressed. It was much as I remembered the libraries I’d been to in the desert: small, old, and with a limited selection. After some thought, though, I decided to try again. My reasoning being that while my local branch was small, I do live in the largest city in my state, and surely the main branch would have more to offer. I located the central branch and went to check it out.

Well now, this is better. — Well, now. This is better.

The building was impressively large from the outside and my hopes began to rise. I walked through the automatic doors into the atrium and my expectations were blown out of the water. The library is three stories in all, with a ground floor, upstairs, and basement level. I realize how silly this sounds, but I was kind of amazed by how vast the library was. Having only been in my small-town desert libraries years before and the local branch recently, this was incredible.

The bottom floor houses administrative offices and a Genealogy department, which I only poked my head in for a look around but did not actually enter. Another time. The top floor is dedicated to the arts and multimedia—CD’s, DVD’s, and books about art/artists, music/musicians, etc. I did a little more exploring here, and on my next trip I will definitely cover every square inch. This visit however, was dedicated (naturally) to fiction.

The landing between the ground floor and top floor. — Looking down from he landing between the ground floor and top floor.

To be honest, for as large as the library is I expected there to be more fiction, but seeing as how this is the biggest library I’ve ever been to maybe my expectations were unrealistic. There was still a very large amount, split between general fiction, mystery, fantasy/sci-fi, and western. Now that I think about it, I didn’t see a section for romance—do most libraries have a romance section? It would seem like they should. Anyway, I perused the shelves and found books by just about every author I could think of except for Chuck Wendig and Jack Ketchum, who I suppose are a little more under the radar. Aside from Stephen King, every author I did find had books I wasn’t familiar with, so I look forward to reading more obscure work from some of my favorites.

From the far wall, looking toward the top floor.

After some walking back and forth and careful deliberation, I picked a book from an author I knew and another I’d been wanting to read for quite a while. And you know what? As silly as it sounds, I like having a due date—it gives me a deadline. I know I can renew them or simply pay the minuscule late fees, but if I finish these two books by May 16th I’m going to feel like a freakin’ winner.

I’m leaving out the rest of the ground floor, with its technology center (computers with internet access), plus its massive non-fiction area and the references and periodicals, which I stuck my nose in briefly, and what I believe may be the area where you can get the most bang for your buck, audiobooks (seriously, why are audiobooks so expensive?). They had a fair selection, but I didn’t spend much time looking as most of my audio listening is digital nowadays other than in the car, and I’m not currently planning any cross-country road trips. Again, another time.

So tell me, do you guys take advantage of your local libraries? Leave me a comment and let me know. Meanwhile, I’ll be doing some reading—I’m on a deadline here.

EDIT: I’ve come to find out that I’m publishing this post two days after the end of National Library Week, so as usual my timing is impeccable. As a tribute to libraries in general, here’s a picture of the Kansas City Public Library, which has the coolest parking garage ever.

The BOJ Quarterly Book Report: Spring Edition

One of my New Year’s resolutions was to read more. I set a goal for myself of at least 12 books this year; I thought that was attainable without stretching myself too thin. So far I’m right on pace with my book-a-month goal—in fact, I seem to be picking up a little steam as time goes on, maybe building my reading muscle back up(?), so I might even exceed it. Time will tell.

I toyed with the notion of writing reviews for each book on GoodReads as I read them, but so far I’ve yet to pull the trigger on that (and BTW, if any of you are on GoodReads feel free to look me up and send a friend request—I don’t do much except rate books as I finish them, but lord knows you can’t have too many friends on social media, right?). Then I thought about a recap of all the books I’ve read at the end of the year, but then I thought I wouldn’t even want to write anything that long, why would anyone want to read it? So I came up with a new plan, to do a few at a time; quarterly seemed to make the most sense, at least for the time being. I’m not sure how long I’ll stick with this format, but for now I’m just going to go with it. The star ratings are what I gave them in GoodReads.

NOS4A2 by Joe Hill (2013)

I’d been wanting to read some of Hill’s work for a while, and when Amazon had a sale on the e-book I couldn’t resist.

Victoria “Vic” McQueen is a fairly normal little girl. Until, that is, she jumps on her trusty bicycle. With it, she has the ability to ride onto a rickety old bridge (that was actually demolished years earlier) and use it to transport her to different places, helping her “find” things—and people—that are lost.

Someone who shares a similar gift is Charlie Manx, a vampiric old man who gets powers from children. He abducts kids and takes them to “Christmasland,” a surreal land from which there is no escape for the now soulless children. Vic encounters Manx as a child and manages to escape his clutches, upon which he is locked away until he seemingly dies. But with a little help Manx is let loose upon the world with revenge on his mind, and his eyes set on Vic’s son.

Thoughts as a reader: A great, original idea that’s a little anti-climactic. Despite it’s length, there are leaps in time from Vic’s childhood to adulthood where a little more detail might have been nice. Still, a really good book.

Thoughts as a writer: I really liked Manx; he reminded me almost of a modern-day Freddy Krueger, in that he was terrifying but had a twisted sense of humor. He also had a very distinct way of speaking—I found it a little distracting at first, but it grew on me by the end. Most of the characters were well fleshed out, except for Vic’s son Wayne.

4 stars

Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig (2012)

If you’re a writer, you most likely already know of Chuck Wendig. If you’re not, you’ll probably know about him soon enough. Author of god knows how many books and the Picasso of profanity, Wendig’s website, terribleminds.com, is a wealth of knowledge no writer should do without. It was high time I read something other than his blog, and Blackbirds, being the first in a series, seemed the obvious choice.

Miriam Black has the unique ability to be able to see how and when you’re going to die. All she needs is the briefest of contact—a handshake, the brush of an elbow in passing, anything—and she can see how and when you’ll meet your demise. She uses said gift to get by in a less than scrupulous manner, when she meets a man who knows her secret and blackmails her into going deeper, trying to get more and more, and a trucker who, through one of her visions, she can see will die in thirty days, calling her name. She is drawn into a world of criminal heathens who don’t care if she lives or dies, and must rely on her wit to make it out alive and try to save her new trucker friend.

Thoughts as a reader: A short, fast-paced, and original story. It was a lot of fun to read and I have the sequel ready to go for the near future.

Thoughts as a writer: Wendig isn’t exactly reinventing the wheel here, but he clearly knows of which he speaks on his website. His writing crackles with energy and the story is tight. There were some cut-away chapters of Miriam being interviewed that seemed almost like filler to get the story to novel length, but other than that, no complaints.

3 stars

Bag of Bones by Stephen King (1999)

I didn’t realize until after I finished this book just how well-liked it is. With someone who puts out as many books as King does, he has quite a variety of fans: there are the ones who still think of him as a horror author and don’t like anything else; those who don’t like the horror but enjoy the more literary works; and the sci-fi/fantasy crowd that love his Dark Tower books. As I read reviews on GoodReads, it seemed that this is considered one of his best “literary” books. And while not horror, it is spooky and does have some truly horrific goings on.

Mike Noonan is a successful writer who lives in Maine (hmm…sounds familiar) when his wife dies suddenly of a brain aneurism. It takes Mike a long time to start picking up the pieces and try to move on with his life—he does so by deciding to spend the summer at the lake house he and his wife had as a vacation home in a small town. Once there, a chance encounter introduces Mike to Mattie Devore, a young widower, and her daughter Kyra. Mattie is fighting for custody of Kyra against her father-in-law, a mega-rich old man who rules the town and can buy pretty much anyone/anything he wants, and is used to getting his way.

Thoughts as a reader: I thought it was really slow off the mark, taking a good 60-70 pages before anything happened (besides the death of Mike’s wife, which happens right off the bat). Once Mike gets to the lake house it does pick up and get more interesting, and there are some neat developments. It’s a good book, and I can see why some people (who don’t care for his horror novels) might hail it as one of his best. I wouldn’t quite go that far, as I’m not one of his “horror only” fans, but I do like a bit more in the scare department. Some of the scares here, especially toward the end, seemed a little hokey to me.

Thoughts as a writer: Is this book ever the lesson of Chekov’s Gun—the idea that something introduced in a story must come into play later on. If memory serves correctly, there is literally nothing in the story that doesn’t mean something and help resolve things toward the conclusion. I really enjoyed/appreciated that aspect of the book.

And while those first 60 pages or so seemed slow story-wise, as a writer they were very interesting, as he detailed what life was like as a famous author—the pressures put on him by his agent and publisher; the marketing strategy as to when they would release his books; how that can all get derailed by another famous author releasing a book out of their normal schedule (damn you, Mary Higgins Clark!); and, perhaps most interestingly, how when he was on a hot streak he wrote book after book and stashed them away, so that when he was crippled by writer’s block after the death of his wife he was still able to produce books on schedule for four more years. I assume most of that is pretty much true, which just goes to show once you “make it” you still have plenty of pressure on you to perform.

3 stars

Freaky Deaky by Elmore Leonard (1988)

One of the coolest things about having a pretty good sized library of books is that you can go through them and find books you either forgot you had or don’t even remember acquiring. The latter was what happened with Bag of Bones—I still have no idea where that book came from—and the former is what happened here. A few years ago my wife bought me about 8 or 10 Leonard paperbacks (always the good wife, love you honey!) and I thought I’d read them all until I moved some books around and saw there were two or three I’d forgotten about. Despite the horrendous-looking cover seen above, I picked this one.

The story starts with a bang, literally, as we meet Detective Chris Mankowski, who as the story begins is leaving the Firearms and Explosives division for a job in Sex Crimes. Meanwhile, we’re introduced to Robin, a former radical/activist in the sixties, and Skip, her old flame and partner in crime who took his talent for making things go boom and got a job in Hollywood as a stuntman and explosives coordinator. Robin convinces Skip that the time they spent in jail in the sixties was thanks to two brothers: Mark and Woody Ricks, who since the hippy days have inherited a boatload of money and are now filthy rich. Robin has a plan to get some payback (and payment) from the Ricks brothers and needs Skip’s help to see it through. As with most Elmore Leonard stories, things don’t go according to plan.

Thoughts as a reader: Classic Elmore Leonard. Aside from Greta Wyatt, the woman Chris meets when she comes into the Sex Crimes unit to file a report on Woody, every major character has an angle and is looking to score. Robin and Skip’s plan changes almost right away before starting to unravel completely, but it never feels contrived or forced. For these (mostly dimwitted) characters, everything that happens seems perfectly plausible. King will always be my favorite writer, but Mr. Leonard’s books give me a certain satisfaction when I finish them that not all of King’s books do.

Thoughts as a writer: Good god, where to start? The dialogue. The characters talk in a natural way, which I’ve realized is hard to pull off. It’s really difficult to have a character talk like a normal human being without it sounding forced or corny. He really is the master. Also, his advice to writers about leaving out the parts that readers would skip? This is a good example of that. It’s a pretty short book, but the story is tight—there’s no need for any more. One final note, I really have to give the man credit—I don’t know how many other writers could pull off having a character named Juicy Mouth.

4 stars

As you can probably tell, I’ve been staying well within my comfort zone as far as author and subject matter go. I’d like to expand my horizons, so to speak, but I’m not really sure which way to turn. So, as corny as this sounds, have you read any good books lately?

On The Joy of Discovery

This post mainly serves as a way for me to knock the rust off, as it were. As you may or may not have noticed, I’ve been gone for a little bit. I’ll go into what caused my temporary absence sometime, but for now I’m just trying to get back in the water, so to speak.

Here are words I wasn’t sure I’d ever say: I saw a really good Woody Allen Movie recently. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against the man, and there are quite a few of his movies I might enjoy, but the ones I’ve seen, well, they just weren’t my thing (full disclosure—I haven’t seen any of the “classic” Allen movies like Annie Hall or Manhattan). Then I saw Match Point (2005).

Jonathan Rhys Meyers stars as a has-been-that-never-quite-was tennis pro who takes a job as an instructor at a posh country club in London. He strikes up a friendship with one of his clients, then becomes obsessed with his friend’s fiancé, played by Scarlett Johansson. Meanwhile, his friend’s sister falls head over heels for him, so he begins dating (and eventually marrying) the sister mostly just to keep himself around the fiancé (and his wife’s family’s money), until finally initiating an affair. From there things unravel in quite an interesting—and intense—way.

The movie was a bit unusual in it’s pacing to me. It was sort of a fast-paced slow burn of a thriller. At times it seems like not a whole lot is going on, and yet the story really never stops moving. It was interesting from a storytelling point of view how little wasted time there was. Some scenes would literally be thirty seconds long, giving you just a glimpse of a character’s facial expression to show what they’re thinking/feeling before moving on to the next scene. It was the increasingly rare movie that didn’t feel too long or drawn out; the two hour running time flew by.

Near the end the police enter the story, and their handling of affairs borders on implausible, but the movie was so good that I felt I could let that slide. If you’re in the mood for a dark, intense couple of hours, give it a shot. The tone reminded me a bit of The Talented Mr. Ripley, though not as high a body count.

Now then, on to the title of the post—discovery.

As I’ve mentioned before, in my early twenties I worked at a retail record store (the fact that we didn’t sell actual vinyl records not withstanding). I clearly remember when LeAnn Rimes came out with her debut album, lots of older/elderly people would come in asking for the CD, all of them remarking “She sounds just like Patsy Cline.” I would think, Why do you want to listen to somebody who sounds like someone else? Why don’t you just listen to Patsy Cline?

There was another artist, the name escapes me (maybe D’Angelo?), that people would buy because they thought he sounded like Al Green. Again, I thought, Just go listen to Al Green. Which really isn’t too bad of advice, people. Seriously, put some Al Green in your life. I digress. The point is, now I think I get it.

I was reading about the goings on at SXSW and happened upon a sentence or two about a band called Radkey. I decided to look them up on YouTube, and well…holy crap. Three brothers from Missouri who play punk rock with just the right touch of melody and harmony (for my tastes, anyway—I’m not much for the really poppy sounds, if you haven’t been able to tell from previous posts), and hearing them felt like someone put jumper cables on my nipples and jumpstarted my head.

There’ve been the occasional bands I’ve come across in the last few years that I liked pretty good, but I seem to keep drifting back to my comfort zone: music from the 90’s and early aughts. Nothing I found recently really moved me except for a select few: Red Fang, which is really up my alley but still not totally freak out worthy; Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, whose funk stylings are awesome but sometimes veer too far to the R&B/soul for my tastes; and OFF!, whose brutal attack of songs are great but short—you can listen to their first four EP’s in less time than it takes to watch a sitcom (without the commercials).

All of which makes Radkey that much more special to me. For the first time in years I found a band that’s actually out right now that I like a lot. Part of what makes them so exciting is how young they are—both in the literal sense and also as a band. They managed to get attention early on and are getting breaks fast, having put out only two EP’s so far. To be able to track their progress in the industry and see how they grow as a band as it happens is something I haven’t done in a long, long time.

Are they perfect? Hell no, far from it. A couple of their songs are kind of generic, and all three brothers are far from virtuosos (the drummer is adequate at best). But that’s the beauty of punk rock—you don’t have to be a master of your instrument, you just need the passion, energy, and emotion, and as long as that comes across in your music, why, you’re just fine. And they’re only going to get better.

Now, I know a lot of you may not share my taste for this particular slice of musical pie, but if you’re so inclined, give ’em a whirl. They have a definite Ramones influence, and at times the singer/guitarist sounds an awful lot like Glenn Danzig, giving them a Misfits vibe. There’s more to them than that of course, so if you’re into that kind of thing check them out. You can visit their website and stream their EP’s here, or you can find performance clips on YouTube—I’ve included a link to my favorite song of theirs, Out Here In My Head, live on Later…with Jools Holland.

And with that, I think I’m officially rust free. 🙂

Stephen King’s A Bit of a Tweeker

I was doing some what I heard once called AFTK (away-from-the-keyboard) writing the other day—some of you may just call it ‘spacing out’—and as I thought about a particular story idea, I realized I needed a certain type of minor supporting character. As luck would have it, I had already created such a character for a different story that would fill the role nicely; the two stories were set in the same town, so it was perfectly plausible. I thought that was neat, having a little thread connecting two stories. Then I started thinking, and realized that I’ve either already done that or had planned on doing it in almost all my longer stories.

I know they were conscious decisions on some level, but it was never anything I really put a lot of thought into. It’s not just a little easter egg to myself (or my eventual readers, someday), there’s some actual benefit to it. Once you create a character you like (and manage not to kill them off), it makes it a little easier to put them into a story because you already know them. Their backstory, their attitude, the way they talk. It provides a depth that new characters may not possess until they’ve been developed a lot further.

I’ve been thinking about Elmore Leonard a lot lately. I just started reading his book Freaky Deaky, and for the story I’m working on right now I’m trying to shoot for a Leonardian (did I just make up a word?) vibe and wanted some inspiration. Mister Leonard has also happens to have quite a few intertwining characters throughout his world of cops, crooks and cretins. It adds an interesting layer of depth to his stories if you happen to know the characters from other books.

Then there’s Stephen King.

I’d heard once that a lot of King’s characters wove their way through his stories, so I decided to check it out for myself. It’s enough to make your head spin. I honestly don’t know if there’s a single novel of his that doesn’t cross over with another in some way. Not even just characters themselves but relatives of characters. King has created entire family trees in his universe, even going so far as writing himself into his heralded Dark Tower series (a fact I didn’t know until I started doing the research for this post—I really have to read that series).

If you have the time are awake and alert enough to try and follow it, click here to see how his characters, locations, and more intertwine in this insanely detailed flow chart.

Do any of you find yourselves going back to characters like they’re old friends you’re going to visit for a spell? Are there books or authors that bring in characters from other works that especially tickles your fancy?

Auditory Time Machines and The Concert from Hell

A while back on Facebook there was a thread going around to list the first ten albums that sprung to mind that were special to you and had stuck with you over the years. It was a lot of fun, and not just in making up my own list but seeing the lists my friends came up with—there would be one or two that would stick out from the others that told you there might be more to your friend’s musical tastes than you thought.

When I looked over the list I made, I realized something: each album I listed brought to mind a very specific period in time. Sometimes it was a span of a couple of years, sometimes it was just one memorable night. Some examples:

Minor Threat was a punk band with a short (but brilliant) career. Their entire discography is only about 45 minutes long, and was all released as one album after their demise, titled simply Complete Discography. Although they were around in the early 80’s I didn’t discover them until a decade later, when I was in my first real band and going to lots of concerts and playing shows of our own, etc. To this day, hearing Minor Threat puts me back behind the wheel of my old red Ford Tempo, driving around the desert picking up my friends without rides so our band could practice (a lot of good it did us *ba dum tish*).

Jimi Plays Monterey is a live album that was released in 1986, just after I had moved to a new town and started at a new school. I found a friend who also liked listening to his parents’ records, and instead of Flock of Seagulls or Depeche Mode we were listening to Cream and Jimi Hendrix. That album (which is still incredible if you’re a Hendrix fan) takes me back to doing homework in my room while furious guitar solos blared in my ear.

Then there’s the one that takes me to one night. December 26, 1992, to be exact. The concert from hell.

I volunteered/was volunteered to drive four of us to see the band Ministry, on tour supporting their new album Psalm 69, with opening acts Helmet and Sepultura. All bands I really liked a lot—it looked to be an awesome night of music and I was really excited for the show. The concert was in North Hollywood, which was a couple of hours from our desert homebase, so we planned to leave early in the afternoon to avoid traffic and get there in plenty of time, which was standard operating procedure.

In the interest of anonymity, I’m going to change the names of my passengers. We’ll call them Paul, George, and Ringo. As we were leaving for the show, Ringo told me we needed to stop at his brother’s house on the way. His brother lived in a city that was right off the freeway and really wasn’t out of the way at all, so it was no big deal. Still, my spidey-senses should have started tingling right away. Without going into too much detail, things went down at said brother’s house which put my passengers in a much better mood but freaked me out A LOT.

Our stop was longer than intended and it put us behind schedule if we met any traffic on the freeway the rest of the way to LA, which was quite common. So we rushed back on the road and sure enough, stop and go, bumper-to-bumper traffic. Finally we seemed to get past the congestion as everyone sped back up to normal speeds again, when suddenly everyone slammed on their brakes again. I stood on my brake and came within inches of the car in front of me, letting out a sigh of relief until George yelled “REAR END!” and we were hit from behind by a car with, I’m guessing, worse brakes or poorer reflexes.

We dealt with the accident and got to the venue about twenty minutes after start time, missing most of the first band. We’re weaving our way through the maze of parked cars when George sees a nice Mercedes with a primo parking spot, and is suddenly very upset by this. Since he already had been complaining about needing to find a bathroom(and was of a mental state that could not exactly be defined as sober), he decided to kill two birds with one stone and proceeded to urinate all over the expensive luxury sedan. This freaked me out, because as part of the group I figured I was guilty by association. Luckily, no one saw this go down.

By the time we got inside the venue and reached our seats, I was an electric ball of nerves. It had been a long trip getting there, and I wasn’t looking forward to the drive back. Then to top it all off we managed to get separated at one point, so I didn’t even know where everyone was. Needless to say, Paul, George, and Ringo were all oblivious to my ulcer-inducing experience and had a much better time than I did that night. But ever since, whenever I hear any song from the album Psalm 69 I’m taken right back to that fateful trip to North Hollywood.

Okay, guys—story time. Tell me the memories you have tied to music, good or bad. What are your auditory time machines?

On Reading Bad Books To Become A Better Writer

I don’t know what happened to me.

I used to be able to devour books like a hungry, gasoline-fed fire. It wasn’t unheard of to finish a book in a matter of days, and never more than a month. But now, I can barely finish a book in a month if I’m lucky.

I know a lot of things keep me from reading as fast as I used to—TV is probably chief among them, as well as the fact that I seem to have a much shorter attention span than I did before, thanks in no small part to the Rise of the Devices, where I feel this idiotic need to constantly check my email and Facebook and Twitter. I used to be able to read for an hour or two straight with no problems. Now I read a few pages then start feeling distractions pulling at the corners of my brain. My ability to focus while reading has seemingly gone by the wayside.

As I’ve been working on strengthening my writing, I’ve put in a lot of work and I think that hard work is starting to pay off. Even though I still have a long way to go, I’m feeling a certain confidence in my writing that I didn’t have before and I think it shows. The thing is, for all the writing, editing, and studying I’ve done to improve, there’s one piece of advice I haven’t taken, and it’s always bothered me.

That advice is (paraphrasing): Read as much as you possibly can, even books you don’t like or that aren’t very good. You can learn just as much if not more from a bad book than you can from a good one.

Really?

I mean, it makes sense on a certain level. I suppose that carries over to other arenas as well, not just writing. But the thought of spending my valuable time reading a book I don’t like or isn’t very good seems, well…crazy.

Now that’s not to say I won’t finish a book I don’t like by an author I do like. I’m about 50 pages into Bag of Bones by Stephen King, and even though I’m still waiting for something actually happen, I’ll be patient and I’m sure I’ll finish the book even if it doesn’t pick up. But reading a mediocre-to-bad book by an author I don’t even like?

Reading a book is something I try to enjoy. I say try because unless what I’m reading has me absolutely engrossed, I’m still a little distracted, looking at word choice or use of punctuation, and not enjoying the book like I feel I should. I’m reading more like a writer than a reader. If I was trying to read a bad book I’d probably never finish it because I couldn’t keep myself interested. It is worth noting, however, that of the very small amount I read of one of the Twilight books, Stephanie Meyer managed to make sure I never use any form of the word incredulous.

One thing I have been doing, though, is slowly dipping my toe into the pool of online critique groups. I mentioned my Reddit ‘No Sleep’ experiment before, and that was fun, but you don’t get any actual feedback there. I did some more exploring and found the subreddit Shut Up and Write, which is a point-based peer critique system. As you review and critique the work of others you earn points that you cash in when you submit your own work for review.

So I guess I’m still improving my writing by reading stuff that isn’t necessarily top of the line, it’s just that instead of going ‘Ugh, this sucks,’ and chucking a book in the trash I’m giving some hopefully useful and constructive feedback that helps the other writer. It feels much more productive than reading a poorly written book.

Hopefully then end result is pretty much the same, because I really don’t want to read bad books. I really, really don’t, but I will if it’s that valuable to my writing. But you tell me—do you finish every book you start, even the crappy ones? What do you take away from them?

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