Category: short stories

Turn Around, Look At Me

Well, in perhaps the most exciting news (at least for me) of the week thus far, I actually wrote fiction yesterday.

Hurray!

I think writing that essay finally on Monday flexed the atrophying writing muscles, because yesterday I opened my document of “Quiet Desperation” and wrote well over fifteen hundred words in a very short period of time, until I was interrupted. Of course, once interrupted the flow stopped–which is why interruptions annoy me so very much. I might have even finished the story had I not gotten interrupted…but the great thing is that in writing so much on it today, I also was able to figure out how to finish it and what the core of the story is; what I am trying to say. Whether I will succeed or not remains to be seen–but it’s yet another one of those stories about a writer. I’m not sure why I keep writing these stories about writers, but it’s also what I suppose I know the best. But I like the direction “Quiet Desperation” is taking, and I’m also enjoying working on Scotty again–I also managed over a thousand words on the new book yesterday, which made me feel terrific. Even after all the writing I’ve done over the years, when you hit a fallow stretch or period, when you don’t feel like writing, or you do and you can’t, there’s always this terror that the well has, indeed, finally run dry; followed by constant self-reassurances that always ring hollow–because the only thing that can make that terror go away is actually writing something.

So, thank you, Sisters in Crime, for kicking me in the ass and getting me to write that overdue essay. I think I’m over the hump now–and I am really looking forward to writing today.

I am tired, though. Wacky Russian basically made me do legs today, the bitch, and so even though my legs are usually fried from the small leg workout I get every time, today they are particularly tired and sore, the bastard. That’s okay, though. I think I am going to go in on Saturday and do legs on my own, some cardio and maybe some stretching. I need to get in better physical condition.

And since it’s Wednesday, here’s a Hump Day Hunk for you as I head back into the spice mines.

Cry Like a Baby

Well, I finished my essay for Sisters in Crime finally yesterday and got it all turned in. Woo-hoo! That’s something–the first thing I’ve really finished this year since turning in the last manuscript, and I am going to ride that particular triumph all week, and hopefully get the other things I want to get written finished this week as well.

I can hope, at any rate.

I’m not really sure why I struggled so much with that essay; I’m not really sure why I am struggling so much to write in general since I turned in my last manuscript. Even this blog sometimes seems like a slog; although I do suspect in some ways it has everything to do with my usual inability to focus on what I am working on; deadlines can certainly make focus much much easier to deal with. But I really want to get these stories finished this week, and I am also wanting to get some editing done and some work on the book as well. Maybe I am overestimating what I can get done reasonably in a week, I don’t know. But it will be enormously satisfying, for example, just to get one of these stories finished. I actually was rereading one yesterday, also incomplete (“The Scent of Lilacs in the Rain”, for the record) and it’s actually quite good. It’ll probably need to be edited down some, but not bad–there’s about three thousand words or so already, and that’ll probably need to be sliced in half at the very least since there are at least several thousand new words needed to finish. I also have no idea where I would publish the story–I don’t know where I would publish any of the stories I’ve written/am writing. But I am enjoying working on them, so there’s that.

One of the things I am trying very hard to do is remember that I actually do ENJOY writing. It’s so easy to hate doing it, really–and that often has to do with the pressure of deadlines, or the frustration of it not going well, or it not going at all. I don’t miss the pressure of deadlines, in all honesty, but I am starting to get concerned about not getting enough done.

Heavy heaving sigh.

But we finished watching Big Little Lies last night, and got deeper into this final season of Bates Motel–which is so deranged it’s amazing! I am going to miss this show, and seriously, if Freddy Highmore is NOT recognized by the Emmys this year…I don’t know what is wrong with the Emmy voters. PAY ATTENTION.

I am still digesting The Underground Railroad (and the show Big Little Lies), but I hope to blog about both relatively soon.

And on that note, back to the spice mines!

Here’s a Twofer Tuesday hunk fest!


Midnight Confessions

Friday morning, and another week done on my slow descent into the grave. Wacky Russian was thinking about turning forty during our training session the other day, and along with it came the horrifying realization that I will reach sixty before he reaches forty. YIKES, right?

But I really don’t mind getting older. I miss the energy and the way my body used to bounce right back from exertion (of any kind) but other than that, I don’t mind. I don’t even think about myself being the age I am; it’s always a bit of a shock to realize I think of myself as being younger that I really am. But other than that surprise, I’m fine with it. I’ve certainly lived longer than I ever thought I would–being of the generation of gay men that I belong to, I never thought I would live to see forty, let alone get so close to sixty and still be going.

I’d thought about going to Costco this morning but I think I am going to wait until tomorrow. I may change my mind–it’s not even ten yet and I don’t have to be at the office until two, so there’s a window–but right now I’m not feeling it.

I didn’t finish “Quiet Desperation” yesterday, but am hopeful for today. I had every intention of getting it done yesterday, but I just wasn’t there mentally. Maybe I was being lazy; it’s always possible. But I am most pleased about having survived the post-Festival week, quite frankly. That’s always tough; not just TWFest/S&S, but after any book event, readjusting to regular life again the next week, while trying to get rested and back to normality, it always difficult. The first few days you’re mournful, wishing you could spend every day in the company of writers and readers; then comes the adjustment period. But it usually only takes a week–and is there anything more pointedly ‘back to reality’ than going to Costco?

I think not.

I also want to finish reading The Underground Railroad this weekend.

And on that note, perhaps I should get back to the spice mines. There’s a load of laundry to fold and a dishwasher to empty.

The glamorous life.

Here’s a hunk to slide you into the weekend:

Harper Valley PTA

Wednesday! It’s all downhill to the weekend!

Of course, that means I’m just wishing my life away, but I really am looking forward to a normal weekend. It will make a lovely change.

I am slowly acclimating back to my normal life, now that I am out of the Festival bubble. I got some writing done yesterday on one of the short stories I am working on–I put aside one and worked on another, simply because mentally it was in the front of my mind and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I think it’s a good, interesting story, but at the same time I don’t know where I am going to sell it, and I also think the tone is wrong, but it’s flowing right along and I’m having a lovely time writing it, so there’s that. Sometimes, I think, you have to write something that is just fun to write so you can remember how much joy you actually can get out of writing. Not sure how much, if any, writing I will get done today–I am that weird combination of sleepy, my muscles are tired (thanks to Wacky Russian this morning) and yet my brain is functioning fine. I could easily go right back to sleep, I think, it’s just a weird feeling.

Someone suggested to me over the weekend that I should do a collection of my crime and horror short stories; it’s something that’s occurred to me a few times over the last year or so, but I also figured I didn’t have enough published stories for a collection, and I would have to write a bunch of new ones. But yesterday, whenever I would get stuck on the story I was working on (“Quiet Desperation”), I started listing the stories that I’ve published that would fit into this collection, and was surprised at how many I actually have (I also have some finished, unpublished ones on hand); and thought to myself, hey, this collection might be easier to pull together than I originally thought. I have thirteen horror/crime stories that have been published; four that are finished and unpublished; and three partials I would need to complete. (Although I would probably revise the finished, unpublished ones again.) So that’s actually twenty stories; if each story was five thousand words that would one hundred thousand words total, not including the introduction.

That’s a book.

And on that note, I am heading back into the spice mines.

Here’s a Hump Day Hunk for you!

Tighten Up

Ah, reality officially slapped me in the face this morning. Yesterday–while my first day back in the real world–I was still kind of in the Festival Bubble; reality didn’t seem quite real. Getting up at six this morning to come to work for a twelve hour day? Shit got real. I should have gone to bed at ten last night; instead I waited until eleven, which wasn’t the smart thing to do. I am not sleepy this morning, nor am I tired, but I am also not completely awake, either.

Heavy heaving sigh. I suppose tonight I shall have to try to go to bed early, and break this cycle once and for all.

There are, of course, worse things.

I am hoping to have a productive week, and next week I am hoping that I am going to start my increased and enhanced workouts at the gym as I attempt to get myself back into tip-top physical condition. I also intend to make a dentist appointment, get my bloodwork done, and see about getting another eye appointment; I feel like I already can’t see as well with the glasses I bought last year, which is endlessly annoying. Only this time, I think I am going to get a prescription for contact lenses–progressive ones, at that–because I can always get the prescription refilled at Costco after I exhaust my vision benefits. Work. That. System.

This week I want to edit three chapters of my secret project, write two chapters of the new Scotty, and finish two short stories–at least the first drafts. A friend of mine suggested to me this past weekend that I should put together a collection of my dark stories–crime and horror–and you know, I think I might actually have enough stories already to pull together as a collection, plus might have to write a couple of new ones. It’s a worthwhile project, methinks, to try to pull together. And I do like to write short stories, I just don’t think I’m very good at them–they certainly are harder for me (in a different way) than writing novels. The two stories I am working on are “The Terrortorium” (which was originally “Happyland”, but I really disliked that title) and “Quiet Desperation.” (Of course, the first is a rewrite and the second is an entirely new story, ergo–more fun to work on, and more difficult, but in a different way.)

I find myself writing, or at least thinking about writing, about writers more frequently these days. I’ve tried to avoid that trope (although Stephen King has written about writers a lot, and has done so extremely well) for most of my career, but I find myself going that way more and more lately. It’s something I am incredibly familiar with, for one thing, and I also know a lot of writers (not that I want to write about people I know, of course). I think the first time I wrote about a writer was in my short story “Annunciation Shotgun,” and since then I’ve kind of created a writer character who’s kind of a stand-in for me in some ways; he was the narrator of my story “An Arrow for Sebastian,” and I kind of used him again in both The Orion Mask and Garden District Gothic (Jerry Channing is his name). I find myself sometimes thinking about short stories and novels about writers, and I default to him…I even have an idea for a stand-alone novel about him. So…we shall see. Even “Quiet Desperation” is about a writer–although most definitely not Jerry.

Not sure what that’s all about, but there you have it.

And now, back to the spice mines.

Love is Blue

Monday morning. I didn’t want to get up this morning, and in fact, hit snooze repeatedly for over an hour before finally dragging my sorry, lazy ass out of bed shortly after eight. But I do feel rested, which is a dramatic improvement over how I felt last Monday when I started out the week already tired. Which is fortunate, because this weekend is TWFest/Saints and Sinners. Paul will be abandoning me on Wednesday to check into the hotel, and I don’t have to go till late on Thursday. I took Friday off as well, and am coming in late on Monday as well. So, I trust I can survive the weekend in one piece and without being completely exhausted by the time I return to work on Monday. We shall see, I suppose.

The weekend wasn’t as productive as I would have liked–then again, when is it ever–but it did accomplish its primary purpose: getting rested for the new work week. I read some more of The Underground Railroad, which is slow going. Partly because the subject matter is so intense, partly because it’s written so simply yet beautifully I want to savor the experience, and I am constantly having to put the book aside to think. The best books always make me think. It really is quite extraordinary, but not a quick or easy read.

So, I made my weekly to-do list this morning, and am proud to say that I only had to transfer half of last week’s list to this week’s; which is always a good thing. I really need to get back into the habit of making the weekly to-do list. I don’t know when or why I stopped in the first place, because there is ever-so-much satisfaction in crossing things off the list; even when you don’t finish everything on it, you know? It felt really good this morning crossing off the things I got done last week, and even in adding the uncompleted tasks to this week’s list was, rather than ‘oh, you lazy bastard’, more of a ‘oh, this will be easy to get done.’ We’ll see how it goes, of course, but at least making the list this morning wasn’t daunting and didn’t make me feel even more tired, the way it did last week.

Last Monday, as I worked on my story “Happyland” for a submission deadline the very next day, I suddenly realized the reason–despite several rewrites already–the story kept getting rejected every time I submitted it anywhere was because the way the story was structured it simply didn’t work–and I hadn’t even gotten to the scary part yet. I realized that the entire story needed to be overhauled; I had developed a bad case of the ‘lazy edits.’ This happens to me from time to time; an attempt to make small tweaks to a story that doesn’t work rather than starting over again from scratch while retaining the best bits. “Happyland”, as originally envisioned and written, simply doesn’t work. It’s nothing new, it’s nothing original, it’s nothing fresh, it has nothing clever to say for itself. It’s based on something that happened to me as a kid–one summer when my immediate family, along with aunts, uncles and cousins on my father’s side–were staying for a week at a beach house in Panama City Beach, Florida, only about three blocks from the water. There used to be an amusement park, the Miracle Strip, that we used to go to every time we stayed at the beach, and one time I got stuck with my youngest cousin who wanted to ride the haunted house ride and was also too small to ride the rollercoaster–so every time we rode the coaster someone had to stay off and mind him. I was annoyed and angry, it was hot and humid, and the haunted house ride–which was, even to my eleven year old mind, lame–this time it was actually intense and scary. There was something different about the interior that time; and I’ve had nightmares about it ever since. That was why I wrote the story in the first place; to dislodge it from my subconscious as well as to follow Stephen King’s admonition to ‘write about what scares you.’ But the story as I wrote it doesn’t work, and on Tuesday I started, slowly but surely, to rebuild the story from the very first line. It may not work this time, either–but I want to get it done this time.

That way it’s ready the next time a call I want to submit to comes around.

The new Scotty isn’t going as well as it should be either; again because I was trying to make it easy on myself rather than recognizing that the framework can stay but the story is new and different. Ugh, such an idiot, really. But every once in a while lightning strikes and I wake up.

Heavy heaving sigh. And I got started on my taxes!

And now back to the spice mines.

Grazing in the Grass

Good morning, Friday! How are you doing? I slept late again; it’s lovely to be able to sleep again but I would so love a happy medium; somewhere between insomnia and oversleeping would be somewhat lovely.

But I’ll take oversleeping over insomnia any day of the week, thank you very much.

The cold snap of the past few days has come to a merciful end, thank you Jesus, and our temperatures are supposed to go back up into the 70’s today, which will make for a lovely weekend. I didn’t take the car into the car wash the way I’d intended because I overslept this morning, but it will be a lovely chore for the weekend, most likely Sunday while everyone’s at church.

I made some progress on the book yesterday, which was a lovely feeling. Not as much as I would have liked, but I’ll take 1200 words. My writing machine is a bit rusty, so I am still working out the rust and kinks and having to warm up and stretch the muscles. The thought also crossed my mind last night that maybe I should put it aside and write something else first…but that’s probably just crazy talk.

But getting good sleep has made me feel energized again, and I am looking forward to all the things I need to get done this weekend. I even started pulling together my expenses for my taxes yesterday (RIGHT?), and may even be able to get all of that finished by Monday (rather than sitting down and making myself do it all at once, I am going to go slowly and do some here, some there, etc. until it is all finished and I am emailing my accountant). I also want to get my story “The Terrortorium” finished this weekend, and I want to start editing a secret project I can’t talk about publicly yet.

Never a dull moment around the Lost Apartment.

Here’s a hunk to slip you into the weekend:

Too Busy Thinking About My Baby

Another glorious night of sleep, and I feel terrific this morning. I’ve already done one load of laundry, am well through a second, had breakfast, and am about to put the dishes away. I have a shorter than usual day at the office today; I logged some extra time earlier in the week so I can go in later–which is truly lovely; I have my morning free both today AND tomorrow (tomorrow morning I will be getting the car washed on my way to work). I decided to wait until next Friday to get my new outfit for the Tennessee Williams Festival opening party (I’d debated going this weekend, but I really don’t want to face any mall on the weekend). My breakthrough on Crescent City Charade definitely is working; I am very pleased with the flow now, and I am also hoping to get the rewrite of the short story finished up this weekend. All in all, a win all around.

I also got some book mail this week: Lisa Unger’s In the Blood  and Jonathan Beckman’s How to Ruin a Queen. Constant Reader will remember how much I enjoyed the first Lisa Unger novel I read last year, and I am definitely looking forward to reading more. The Beckman book is history (although that would make a great title for a noir about someone obsessed with revenge on a drag queen); it’s about the Affair of the Diamond Necklace, a huge scandal from the 1780’s that helped set the stage for the French Revolution. I’ve always been vaguely aware of the story, but not in any great detail. Someone from an old noble house of France, the Cardinal de Rohan, claimed to be an agent of  Marie Antoinette’s in order to buy a fabulous necklace for her–once the necklace was purchased the Queen claimed to know nothing about it, and a trial ended up happening. Marie Antoinette was so hated by this time that popular opinion was solely on the side of the Cardinal de Rohan; he was eventually found not guilty and there was a massive celebration at this public humiliation of the Queen. Every step of the way the royal family mishandled the situation, but I’ve never read enough about the Affair of the Diamond Necklace to know exactly how it played out and it’s never made a lot of sense to me. So, I am really looking forward to diving into this one (I also recently acquired a book about an enormous scandal at the Court of Louis XIV, The Affair of the Poisons, which I am also looking forward to reading). As you can tell, Constant Reader, right now I am going through a French history period.

I also want to get this essay about being a gay crime writer finished this weekend, and I also need to do the deep clean of the Lost Apartment.

I also can’t believe it’s almost April. Then again, time flies at the beginning of the year always, as it’s one thing after another in New Orleans. We’ve been having a slight cold snap this week–temps in the 50’s and 60’s–which after the gloriously beautiful spring days we had for Carnival seems completely unnecessary, wrong, and flat-out vile.

As this is also the last weekend before the Festival kicks into gear next week, I doubt Paul will be around much; as it is, I’ve barely seen him the last few weeks. He gets home after I got to bed and sometimes leaves after I do, so he’s still sleeping when I leave the house. He’s already out the door this morning; I got to see him awake for all of ten minutes. Sigh. But soon enough things will be normal around here again. Heavy heaving sigh.

Or what passes for normal, at any rate.

All right, I suppose I should return to the spice mines.

Here’s today’s hunk.

 

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Suspicious Minds

I had insomnia both Sunday and Monday night, and the sleep assistance I usually rely on did not work. So both days I was tired, sleepy, crabby and miserable, unable to focus on anything. I was trying to finish a short story for a submission call with a deadline of yesterday; Monday as I worked I realized the story, as it stood, simply didn’t work and needed a complete overhaul. Ordinarily, two days to overhaul a story where the basic framework was already in place wouldn’t be a problem for me (whether it would have been accepted, of course, is a whole other ball of wax), but tired and unable to think clearly? No, that made it completely impossible. I’ve also been kind of stuck on the Scotty book–but last night, as I kept dozing off in my easy chair, it came to me how to get past the place where I am stuck with the Scotty book; as I suspected, I simply hadn’t gotten back into his voice. So, I am hoping to make some progress on it this week as well as rewriting the story–that way the story will be ready the next time something it might be appropriate for rolls around.

Win-win.

There really is something horrible about the inability to sleep. I can’t afford to have sleepless nights, as I am always juggling so many things that I really can’t have a day where I get nothing done. And while I didn’t sleep through the whole night–I woke up around five, and then slept on and off until it was time to get up for Wacky Russian–those six or so hours of deep, restful sleep have certainly made an enormous difference today.

I may even start pulling my taxes together. #madness

I’ve also been too tired to read, so I am also hoping I can get back to The Underground Railroad this week and get it finished. I think I am going to read Ben Winters’ Underground Airlines next; I thought it would be interesting to read the two books back to back for a compare/contrast kind of thing.

My goal is to write/revise a short story every week while working on the Scotty book. We’ll see how that goes, but hey, best intentions and all that. I am also going to start revising a secret project as well; getting back to it is long overdue, and I am kind of excited.

Again, it’s amazing what a good night’s sleep will do for someone.

So, here’s a hunk for you to get you through Hump Day.

 

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Hot Fun in the Summertime

I am not feeling particularly motivated today. Yesterday I cleaned the Lost Apartment thoroughly for the first time since before Carnival, and frankly, between that and the laundry, I got a bit overwhelmed. This morning I woke up feeling tired and not well-rested and slightly out of it; again, motivation is NOT there. And I need to make groceries. And it’s cold and gray outside. (Okay, okay, it isn’t snowing.)

But I do need to rewrite a story today that I am submitting tomorrow for a submissions call (of course, deadline is tomorrow) and I want to get Chapter One of the new Scotty finished today at some point. And I need to start getting to work on my taxes.

Shoot me now.

But at least the apartment is clean. I’ll have to clean again next weekend, of course, but now that the first clean is done the second, more thorough clean will be that much easier. At least, I certainly hope so. It’s just so hard to keep up, you know? I also understand that I have unrealistic cleanliness standards (thanks, Mom), and there is only so neat and tidy the always-under-construction apartment can ever look, but I really wish I could someday get past the stress of ‘my house is always so slovenly looking.’

God, I do not want to make a grocery run.

But it’s not getting done by me just sitting here. I’ll be back in a bit.

Okay, that wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought. Sunday mornings and early afternoons are the best times to hit the grocery store in New Orleans; I even had Doris Day parking in front of the house when I got back. I’m in the process of preparing food for the week (made a salad; sauteed some brussel sprouts; and now I am going to do the prep for tonight’s dinner), and also reorganizing and redoing the interior of the refrigerator. I really hate my fridge; one of my goals for the year is to buy a new one with the freezer on the bottom.

Wow, I am just incredibly exciting, aren’t I?

I’ve also been toying with the rewrite of the story I mentioned earlier. It’s for a horror call, so I kind of have to amp up the scary, which isn’t easy for me. This is why I am not good at horror; I’m not good at scares, and I am not inventive enough to come up with the proper backstory that creates great horror. But, taking Stephen King’s advice–‘write about what scares you’–I am going to give this story the old college try. It’s based on something that actually happened to me when I was young–maybe around eleven or twelve–and obviously, it was more about how I scared myself at an amusement park when I had to go on the haunted house ride with a younger cousin, to the point that when we finally finished and came back out into the light I had goosebumps and my teeth were chattering and I was shaking a little bit.

But it was all in my mind. In the story, not so much.

We’ll see how it goes.

And on that note, it’s back to the spice mines.

Here’s a Sunday hunk for you, Constant Reader.