Coworker Love

This one is a tribute to my coworkers (CW)…

When you have to go to that place, that damn building and sit at the damn desk 40, 50, who knows how many hours a week, coworkers are a lifeline. Very few coworkers know about my writing. It doesn’t mesh well with my job and I’m enjoying the separation of church and state as long as I can.

Friday I brought in the proof of Circling The Shadows. The support I feel from these people, has been extraordinary. And the joy they shared in seeing my book, warmed my heart.

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Truly, I tweet about IT CW incessantly. He is my perfect foil in every way… backgrounds, beliefs, etc. He likes to tell me to be more ladylike. I like to tell him I’ll kick him in the balls. It’s a nice friendship. Watching him hold my book, telling me how proud he was of my accomplishment, was lovely though, really genuine. There is another CW who gave me a huge smile with a beautiful text. Add to that everyone who literally breathed deeply the pages of my story, there was such kindness. How do these people, whose homes I’ve never seen, who have never eaten at my table, become like family? 

To these and many others, new friends and old friends, who shared my struggles with story and processes of publishing, I am so grateful to you. The daily grind is much less grindy with you in my life.

Where My Wit Ends

Wit, def. (noun) – The keen perception and cleverly apt expression of those connections between ideas that awaken amusement and pleasure.

I think I’ve found it.  My wit’s end.  The end of my wit.  The keen perception is iffy, cleverly apt expression is so so. I think amusement and pleasure are in serious jeopardy.  They are actually shot to shit.

Wit (idiom) – At one’s wit’s end, at the end of one’s ideas or mental resources; perplexed.

Yeah – that’s more like it.  Mental resources are very low and I am highly perplexed.

You may (or may not – shame on you) have noticed that I have not blogged in months.  I have found that life, work and writing enabled me to keep a fairly robust blog going.  Life, work and this process of self publishing… not so much.  For these last months I have been immersed in setting up accounts, art, designing and re-designing covers, fonts, styles, articles of incorporation, tax documents, ISBNs, formatting, .pdfs, Mobi, blow me. Not to complain but IT FUCKING SUCKS.  I can’t remember the last time I wrote something longer than 140 characters. I have actually come to rely on Twitter as a writing exercise because I am not writing. <— That is the saddest sentence I have ever written.

20140727_082449-1Here is the good news… If all goes well, even if all goes badly, Circling The Shadows will be available on Amazon Kindle and paperback on May 1. There is a tiny chance the paperback will lag a few days behind.   If you are wondering, the idea of a big fancy launch with actual marketing, was just too much for me this go round.  The irony is I am professionally in Marketing.  Oh well.  Forever Falling, book two in the Sunshine and Moonlight series, is ready to move into the editorial process.  It will release with some larger fanfare, perhaps, on August 1.

My blogsite got a bit of a face lift.  I added a page for Novels.  You can read about Circling The Shadows here.  I’ll add the Amazon links soon.

Screen Characters Blog Hop

Thank you to my twitter/blogger/writer favorite Susan Kicklighter, Writing For Kicks, for including me on this Favorite Screen Characters Blog Hop. Rules of the game… name your ten favorite TV or Movie characters, then nominate ten friends to do the same.

I love this but it is a really good, unintended, personality test. I love villains. I love characters willing to do anything to meet their goals… driven, singularly focused. Unfortunately I’m noticing that many of my favorite female characters are prostitutes. Strong women, sacrificing, typically are not Carol Brady characters. I’m going to dig deep here.

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Al Swearengen, Deadwood
No character in recent memory has shown such a complex diversity of emotions. He was vile, funny, terrifying, but had a sweetness that made him the perfect character in my book.

Darth Vadar, Star Wars
I can’t help it, I love every second he’s on screen. At this moment I’m wearing this shirt.

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Jesse Pinkman & Walter White, Breaking Bad
I don’t think it’s possible to list one without the other. To understand how Walter’s criminal genius unwinds his humanity, you need to observe Jesse’s hallow, childish, undeveloped psyche grow into his own true humanity. They are perfect foils in their twisted father/son bromance.

Joan Holloway, Mad Men
Male characters never have to go the distance to do what it takes to succeed. They are blessed with the ease of violence or self sacrifice that never includes their own sexual self sacrifice. Joan will do whatever it takes to be something more.

Cullen Bohannon, Hell on Wheels
Confession, Cullen is the inspiration for my main charachter in Circling. Cullen’s grief and strength as well as his blinding need for justice, of his own making, spoke to me and he is sexy as hell.

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Sarah Connor, Terminator
No one is more driven than Sara. I love her transformation between the first and second films. She tries to find support within the system and realizes saving the entire world is on her… and she meets the challenge.

Katniss Everdeen, Hunger Games
Katniss had me at “I volunteer as Tribute.”

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Baroness Karen Blixen, Out of Africa
The Baroness fought for her coffee, fought for the Kikuyu, fought syphilis and fought for her man. In the end she lost mostly everything, but her dignity and strength were stunning.

Willie Wonka, Charlie & The Chocolate Factory
For younger readers, let me clarify, Gene Wilder is the only Willie Wonka. Period. Sadism dancing with a cane in a purple velvet jacket. Perfection.

That was fun. Join me?

Gary Bailey
Bill Cunningham
Aaran Bhansal
Dena Rogers
Carrie Mesrobian
Michael Frost
Kris Holt
Pieran Dodo
Louise G. White
Victoria Davenport