Tusk

Paul is leaving to visit his mother on Thursday for a few days, which leaves me with a stark and lonely weekend of cleaning, writing, and reading. It’s needed, and there are also some long weekends coming up thanks to the holidays, so am feeling relatively confident I can get things finished the way I need to.

Fingers crossed, at any rate.

The weather, after that abysmal cold spell over the weekend, has now climbed back into the seventies for today; the high is supposed to be 74. It is one of those lovely days–warm, slightly cool breeze, bright blue sky with nary a cloud to be seen anywhere. Of course, I am convinced this is because I finally realized that it was smart to prepare myself for the cold in my home office and broke out the space heater.

*shakes first at universe*

Of course, rather than working on the two stories that need to be revised or the book in progress, all I can think about is the stupid short story i started writing this weekend. Do other writers have this creative attention deficit disorder? Why is it so flipping hard for me to focus on one writing project at a time, and why, oh why, can’t I simply focus on the one that has to be done? Heavy heaving sigh.

We continue to watch Ray Donovan, and continue to enjoy it, although there have been moments of ‘oh really?’ here and there. I am also still reading I Am Providence, not as quickly as I would like–the writing and everything–but I am moving along rather nicely. I also have been rereading Barbara Tuchman’s The March of Folly (watching Medici: Masters of Florence triggered me into wanting to read the section “The Renaissance Popes Trigger the Protestant Reformation” again). This book is one of Tuchman’s best; in it, she talks about how governments fail to act in their own self-interest with disastrous results because of an inability to see the big picture. She opens with book with the myth of the Trojan War and the Trojan Horse; an illustrative myth demonstrating folly. The war was folly, taking the horse into the city was folly; and then she moves on to three historical periods where folly and the short-term overruled the big picture with disastrous results: the afore-mentioned study of six consecutive popes (Pius II thru Clement VII); “The British Lose America”; and finally, “America Betrays Herself in Vietnam.”

I would love to write popular histories, but the problem of course is I don’t have the time to do the research. My time is already pretty limited, and let’s face it, if I learned anything from college it’s that I would rather read for pleasure than read something I have to. In fact, nothing takes the pleasure from reading for me faster than being forced to read something, which is why I want to reread some of the things I was forced to read for classes–like The Great Gatsby, which I absolutely loathed, and Hemingway, and various other things.

Ah, well, enough delaying, and it’s back to the spice mines with me.

Here’s today’s hunk.

Walk a Thin Line

Yesterday morning it was cold for here; it was only forty degrees out when I got out of bed and lumbered downstairs. It was even colder inside that it was outside–the joy of old New Orleans homes, built to be cooler inside than out–and sat here shivering at my desk trying to get some work done. It wasn’t easy and I was so cold, so cold that I decided when out running errands to buy gloves in order to cut off their fingers so I could type with them on so it wouldn’t be an issue. It wasn’t, of course, until later that I remembered I had a space heater in the closet upstairs, which I brought downstairs and set up. It’s not as cold this morning as it was yesterday, but I do have it on and I am relatively comfortable in here. This is a good sign. I didn’t get as much writing done yesterday as I’d intended; I have to write at least two chapters and revise two short stories this weekend–so of course, I started writing an entirely different short story yesterday, and one I don’t have a market for.

Heavy heaving sigh. Isn’t that always the way?

Ah, well. It’s an idea I had actually a really long time ago, and something I saw on Facebook reminded me of it, and so I actually started writing it. I’d forgotten the idea, quite frankly, hadn’t made any notes or anything, and it is a good idea, so I thought it better not to forget about it a second time so I took some action and wrote the opening. I also don’t know how to end it, either, so I am not going to try to write any more of it; rather, I’ll just print what I had and write out some notes and create a folder for it so it’s there when I want to get back to it. Which is what I usually do. Which is why I have a million folders everywhere.

We are still watching Ray Donovan, but I also discovered a new series on Netflix last night, Medici: Masters of Florence, which I of course wanted to start watching. Paul’s not into it as much as I am, of course, but he’s also going to visit his mother this coming weekend so I will have plenty of time to watch it while he’s gone. It’s focused on Cosimo de Medici (I love me some Medicis), and the building of Il Duomo. It’s lavishly and expensively shot–they’ve spared little to no expense–and the lead actor is the guy who played Robb Stark on Game of Thrones, Richard Madden, who is quite lovely to look at.

Those eyes!

The story flashes back and forth between the time when Cosimo is a young man with aspirations of being an artist, and forced into the world of banking and power by his father, Giovanni (played by Dustin Hoffman)–who dies of poison at the opening of the first episode. The present day is 1429, so the ‘past’ is 1409. Giovanni is the one who started the bank and founded the dynasty; Cosimo took it much higher–Cosimo’s grandson laid the groundwork for two Medici popes and, in time, two Medici queens of France. (The Medici eventually reached noble status, and eventually royal. Not bad for a family of bankers.) The Medici are fascinating, of course, and watching the episodes we did see made me, of course, long for Italy. (Next year’s Bouchercon anthology is themed Passport to Murder; I have some ideas for stories set in Italy, which is kind of exciting for me. And of course, there’s an Italian novel I want to write–not in Italian, set in Italy, of course.)

I am also still reading and enjoying Nick Mamatas’ I Am Providence, which is really hitting its stride nicely. I am not sure what I intend to read when I finish it; there are some lovely horror novels in my TBR pile, but then again, every book on my TBR pile looks lovely.

Heavy heaving sigh.

Beautiful Child

Everyone is making and publishing lists of their favorite books of 2016; I intend to do the same, of course, with the stipulation that I shall simply name my favorite reads of the year, regardless of publication date. I can do that because, you know, this is my blog.

So, in no particular order, my favorite reads of the year:

Wilde Lake by Laura Lippman

A haunting story of an ambitious state’s attorney whose current case forces her to confront her own past–as well as the way she remembers that past–with some sly social commentary about changing societal attitudes towards racism, classism, and sexism. It is also extremely well-constructed, alternating between the present day and the past with different tenses and distinct voices; the voice of a child and that same voice as an adult.

You Will Know Me by Megan Abbott

We watch them on television every four years when the Olympics roll around, marveling at their skill and being moved by their prepackaged and manufactured personal stories without wondering what really goes into the day-to-day world of raising a prodigy athlete, the sacrifices that must be made–and just how far is a parent willing to go to not only protect their child but make their dreams come true? Megan Abbott, one of our strongest writers, asks those questions in this chilling tale, and the answers aren’t what you might think.

The third novel by Edgar and Macavity Award winning author Alex Marwood might be her best yet; a compelling study of narcissism and the damage it can do to one family, structured around the disappearance of one of a pair of twins during a holiday weekend where the adults basically abandoned all responsibility and how the past is still affecting the present, when everyone from that weekend gathers for the funeral of the lost child’s father.

What Remains of Me by Alison Gaylin

This astonishing tale of two murders, twenty-five years apart, is also a study of fame, and notoriety. Twenty five years ago a teenaged girl went to prison for murdering a notorious Hollywood director. Now, after getting out and married, her father-in-law is murdered in a very similar fashion. Did she commit both murders, or neither of them? The secrets and motivations from the past, long buried, now come rushing to the surface as all the players from twenty-five years ago have to face inconvenient truths long-buried.

The Watcher in the Wall by Owen Laukkanen

My first Owen Laukkanen novel definitely won’t be my last. A teenager commits suicide, and the FBI becomes aware of ‘suicide groups’ on-line, where suicidal people go for solace while opening themselves up to the potential predatory conduct of a sick voyeur who enjoys watching teenagers commit suicide on live cam. By showing us how the predator was created, and the point of view of the current victim he is nursing along, Laukkanen takes this from just another thriller to a complex and complicated exploration of human nature, how damage begets more damage, and how far the law is behind our modern technology.

Crazy Love You by Lisa Unger

Also my first Lisa Unger, and it won’t be my last. Gorgeously written, Unger keeps the reader guessing what is really going on with her protagonist right up to the end–and even then, the reader still isn’t sure. Phenomenal.

Dear Daughter by Elizabeth Little

Published a couple of years ago, Elizabeth Little here tells the tale of a Paris Hilton like celebutante, convicted of murdering her mother when she’s seventeen and released on a technicality ten years later. Her main character is untrustworthy and untrusting as she embarks on an attempt to find out who really killed her mother ten years earlier–if she didn’t do it–and the trail leads her to a bizarre small town in the Dakotas where the secret of her true past is hidden.

The Ex by Alafair Burke

One of the best legal thrillers I’ve read, Burke’s main character is a tough, driven defense attorney whose personal life isn’t the best, takes the case of an ex she treated badly years before, which she has always felt guilty about. But does her belief in her client’s innocence justified, or is it based in her own guilt? As the evidence mounts against him, she begins to question her own motivations and values as she struggles to defend her client. Extraordinary.

Stranded by Bracken MacLeod

This story of an ice-locked freighter and its crew is almost unbearable in its tension and suspense. Told from the point of view of the ship’s scapegoat, who despite everything manages to rise to heroic behavior in the face of unspeakable terror and horrific conditions to save the ship, I can’t recommend this highly enough.

How Like an Angel by Margaret Millar

There was a reason Margaret Millar was named a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers of America, and this novel is an example of why. A car breakdown outside of a strange religious cult’s farm leads our unlikely hero into a long-dead murder mystery going back quite a few years, and it has a strange connection to the cult.

How Star Wars Conquered the Universe by Chris Taylor

A must read for every Star Wars geek out there; it’s not only a history of the films and the merchandising but a history of the fandom. Most enjoyable.

So, there it is: my favorite reads of the past year off the top of my head. I didn’t read everything, of course, and I am sure I forgot books from this past year that I deeply enjoyed. But those are the ones I remember from the top of my head, without reviewing my blog for the last year.

I may add some before the end of the year.

And now back to the spice mines.

Honey Hi

The book is coming along nicely, if slowly, but I feel that this weekend (no college football) will be a MOST excellent time for me to get caught up on it. I am also making terrific progress on the revision of the short story, and I have another to revise on top of it, so my work–around errands and cleaning–this weekend is cut out for me indeed.

But as I always say, I’d rather be busy–and holiday weekends are coming, as well. I’ve done the majority of my Christmas shopping already; Paul is, as always, a challenge as he simply buys what he wants when he wants it, and he never really wants much in the first place.

We’ve started watching Ray Donovan on Showtime, and we’re enjoying it so far. I’ve always been fascinated by Hollywood ‘fixers’–albeit the ones in the days of the big studios–so it’s kind of interesting to see a fictional series about one in the present day.

I am almost finished reading Gore Vidal’s Empire; it’s slow going, as so much of Vidal’s work is (although I’d really love to reread Julian the Apostate again; and The City and the Pillar as well). It’s part of his fictional ‘American history’ series, which I’ve not read. Vidal was, as one of my co-workers said, the kind of American intellectual we will probably never see again in this country; I tried to think, and have been trying to think, of whom the current day American intellectuals are, without much success. I don’t know if that’s my failing, or that of our society; I don’t know who the current day equivalent of Vidal or William F. Buckley Jr. would be. Vidal was incredibly intelligent, but there was also a sneering, condescending superiority to him that I never particularly cared for (Buckley was much the same); a sense that “if you don’t agree with me you are clearly mentally inferior.” No one likes to be told they’re stupid or not as smart as someone else; that puts me off even when it’s someone I agree with. Vidal had a deeply cynical view of American history and of the country itself; I’ve not read his essays on American history and politics so I am not sure if that cynical contempt was of the country or how it mythologized its past and the hand-over-heart patriotism it promotes; the concept of American exceptionalism, which does bear much deeper scrutiny than it gets as a general rule. I do know that he was fascinated by Aaron Burr (his fictional biography, Burr, was the first book in his series about American history) and felt he was an unappreciated American hero unjustly vilified by his enemies, whose view of him has come down to us through the centuries.

I’ve actually never read Burr, or any biographies of him; what I know of Burr has primarily come from reading biographies of his political enemies (Hamilton and Jefferson) or histories of the period that are slanted towards his enemies; it only stands to reason if Hamilton and Jefferson are to be heroes, than their enemies must therefore be villains. Yet Hamilton and Jefferson were political enemies; throw John Adams into the mix and you have quite a confusing mishmash of who is the bad guy/who is the good guy. The truth, of course, is they were human and a mix of both the good and the bad, despite the mythology.

Heavy thoughts for a Friday morning; and not where I really wanted my blog entry this morning to go.

Then again, I’m listening to the Hamilton cast show album, and Burr is mentioned periodically in Empire, so perhaps there was an inevitability to this, after all.

(And now, of course, I want to reread both The Federalist Papers and The Anti-Federalist Papers, damn you, Hamilton cast show recording!)

All right, perhaps it’s time to return to the Spice Mines.

Here’s today’s hunk:

I Know I’m Not Wrong

Another gray morning in New Orleans. I don’t have to be at work until later; a short day in store for me, so I am going to run a couple of errands this afternoon and diligently work away at my computer while also trying to straighten out/clean the kitchen/office. Seems like every day, doesn’t it? Ah, well.

The best of lists are coming out now, and as expected, I am seeing some books that I absolutely loved this past year (Laura Lippman’s Wilde Lake, Alison Gaylin’s What Remains of Me, Megan Abbott’s You Will Know Me, Alex Marwood’s The Darkest Secret, Alafair Burke’s The Ex) showing up on many of them; as well as many other books in the TBR pile I’ve not gotten to yet. The awards season for crime fiction this next year is going to be something, methinks. I’ll do one at some point this months of my favorite books that I read this year; I don’t limit myself to books published in the current year, of course. I love to read, really. I’m always amazed when people tell me they get bored, because it’s mystifying to me; how can you be bored when there are so many wonderful books to read, so many that even as voracious a reader as me will never even get close to scratching the surface of every book I want to read?

Reading is so satisfying. I’m very glad I have a passion for it. I only wish I had more time for it.

My vacation week was actually rather lovely; I would get up in the morning and drink my coffee and answer emails, write a blog entry; edit what I wrote the day before, go run some errands, come back home and write for four or five hours until the well went dry; and then curl up with a book in my easy chair while I waited for Paul to come home. This, I thought, is the life. Now that I am going back to the office every day, my timing is more tight and thus I have to juggle my time a bit better. There isn’t the time, for example, to laze around because any wasted time is time taken from my writing or editing; usually what this means is I have to cut out my reading time. I try to create a balance between work and relaxation; if I don’t I get stressed and tired, have trouble sleeping, and that affects the next day.

Which is why I get behind.

Sigh.

My office is such a mess I feel claustrophobic.

All right, I need to get back to the spice mines.

Here’s another French farmer:

Never Make Me Cry

I had a major breakthrough on one of my short stories yesterday, and got some decent work done on the book. Not as much as I would have liked–and yes, I am behind on it–but progress is progress and I will always take it. Here’s hoping I can get back on schedule this weekend. A couple of really “on my game” days is all it will take, really.

Hopefully, some of that magic will occur today.

It’s always lovely to have a breakthrough on a story. This particular one was written several years ago for an anthology submission, was turned down for that–then slightly revised and resubmitted twice more, only to be rejected twice more. It’s seem right for yet another submission call, so I dragged it out again because I know there’s a publishable story in there somewhere. Yes, I can be stubborn, and I am determined to get this story not only right, but published somewhere. (I hate that there are so few markets for short stories, but that’s a whole other story.) But I did go through it another time and make some good corrections; then last night in the car on the way home I was struck by the proverbian lightning and realized exactly what was wrong with the story, and now I know how to not only fix it, but make it so much better.

It’s SO annoying when it takes me so long to work out what’s wrong with a short story.

THIS is why I find short stories so hard, I might add. Sometimes a short story just springs from me, the first draft just being rough but the actual story is there and just needs tweaking, some polish, and some refinement; other times it takes me years and I can never quite put my finger on what’s wrong with it–and then, hopefully, out of the blue the answer comes right to me, like yesterday.

Needless to say, I prefer the former over the latter. There are some stories still languishing in my files, waiting for the lightning bolt to strike. Some of those waiting for me to figure out what’s wrong with them include “Fireflies”, “The Ditch,” and “The Weight of a Feather” (although I think I’ve figured out how to fix that one).

There’s another subset; stories that began as ideas that I started writing, got pretty far into, and couldn’t figure out how to end: “The Scent of Lilacs in the Rain”, “Never Kiss a Stranger”, and “All Hallows Eve.” What often happens is the stories turn out to be different then the original idea (the last being one of those) and yet I still try to graft the original idea onto it rather than saving that for another story and just writing the story as it comes to me.

Idiocy, really.

And now back to the spice mines.

Today’s hunk is Zac Efron, on a skateboard.

Brown Eyes

It has rained all night, and in the dawn’s early light outside my windows everything looks wet and soggy. It was still raining this morning when my alarm went off, but as I sip my cappuccino and prepare my lunch before sitting back down to my computer, the rain has ceased, or at least there’s now a temporary respite. These are the days when I would rather curl up under a blanket and read a book, but alas–that is not to be.

I started reading Nick Mamatas’ I Am Providence last night and am enjoying it so far, although I’m only a few chapters in. I’ve not read him before, and this is a crime novel set at the Summer Tentacular, a conference/festival in Rhode Island celebrating Lovecraft. (I’ve also not read Lovecraft, which is another reason, one would suppose, why I am terrible at writing horror; Lovecraft apparently is de rigeur for writing horror or fantasy. I tried reading him when I was a teenager and didn’t get very far; I would try again but my TBR has basically already taken over my living room.) I love books about writers, and I love books about writing conferences–two of my absolute favorite books are Isaac Azimov’s Murder at the ABA (long overdue for a reread), which is set at what was once called the ABA (American Booksellers Association) and now called BEA (Book Expo America), and Elizabeth Peters’ hilarious Die for Love, set at a romance fan festival in New York (also long overdue for a reread).

I recently realized I’ve been writing stories about writers a lot lately–a couple of unpublished short stories, and of course, Jerry Channing appeared in both The Orion Mask and Garden District Gothic; I’m even thinking about an entire book with Jerry as the main character–and it’s always been something I’ve resisted–writing about writers, even though it’s something I know intimately and always enjoy reading. I even said this to one of my co-workers at the office lately, a quote that’s always in the back of my head: there is nothing more narcissistic and masturbatory than writing fiction about writers. That thought has always been in the back of my mind, and whenever I start creating a character who is a writer or have an idea for a story about one, I always pull back, remembering that. Saying it to my co-worker recently got me thinking about it–where did I read it? Who told me that? Stephen King has, for example, always written about writers–both ‘salem’s Lot (Ben Mears, moderately successful novelist) and The Shining (failed novelist Jack Torrance) have writers as main characters; and I can think of any number of other authors who’ve also done it, quite successfully. Elizabeth Peters’ series character Jacqueline Kirby starts out as a librarian, and eventually becomes an international bestselling romance novelist, for another example.

And then, last night as I revised a short story about a writer, and then curled up with the Mamatas novel, I heard the words clearly in my head again, and knew exactly where they came from.

That wretched writing professor who told me in 1979 I would never get anything published.

I might have known.

So, tonight as I continue to revise that story and work on the new book, I am giving you once again, Asshole Writing Professor, the finger.

And now back to the spice mines.

Here’s a hunk for today:

That’s Enough for Me

A grim, rainy Monday outside the Lost Apartment, and I can hear the wind roaring around the upper level of the house. It is pouring here right now; the leaves are glistening with wet in the gloom–and am I ever glad I got the windows in the car fixed!

Yesterday was a lovely day; I got some work done, went to Costco, and managed to finish reading Paul Tremblay’s wonderful A Head Full of Ghosts.

“This must be so difficult for you, Meredith.”

Best-selling author Rachel Neville wears a perfect fall ensemble: dark blue hat to match her sensible knee-length skirt and a beige wool jacket with buttons as large as kitten heads. She carefully attempts to keep to the uneven walkway. The slate stones have pitched up, their edges peeking out of the ground, and they wiggle under her feet like loose baby teeth. As a child I used to tie strings of red dental floss around a wiggly tooth and leave the floss dangling there for days and days until the tooth feel out on its own. Marjorie would call me a tease and chase me around the house trying to pull the wax string, and I would scream and cry because it was fun and because I was afraid if I let her pull one tooth she wouldn’t be able to help herself and she’d pull them all out.

How much has passed since we lived here? I’m only twenty-three but if anyone asks I tell them that I’m a quarter-century-minus-two years old. I like watching people struggle with the math in their heads.

Earlier this year, the book won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel, and as I have mentioned previously, I’d started it before and got distracted and for some reason hadn’t finished it. I picked it up again last week and started at the beginning again, and this time read it all the way through. It’s an interesting book–well-written, certainly, and I also thought it was interesting the way Tremblay chose to deal with its subject matter: is Marjorie Barrett a mentally ill teenager, or is she possessed by a demon? Complicating matters is that her father is descending into religious mania, while her mother is quite rational and skeptical; and while all of this is going on the family, in need of money, has agreed to have it all filmed as a reality show, The Possession.

The point of view character is the younger daughter, Merry (Meredith), who is remembering it all as it happened in two ways; she is remembering it for the afore-mentioned novelist, who is writing a non-fiction book about what happened to the Barretts, and Merry herself is writing a blog about the television show AND the case under a pseudonym for Fangoria.

It’s an interesting book, and it reminded me a lot of Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle in the voice; an emotionally arrested young woman telling the story in a child-like way about what happened when she was a child, and does she have an adult voice?

I’d read somewhere recently about how horror novels and films are often attacked by religious groups when the books themselves actually are quite affirmative of religion; I’ve always thought that to be true–Anne Rice’s vampire novels are actually very much about affirming Catholicism; and doesn’t almost every vampire novel, really, confirm that the symbolism necessary to defeat or keep vampires at bay those of Roman Catholicism? (Particularly interesting in that in Dracula, a Transylvanian would have been Greek Orthodox not Roman Catholic.) I don’t know enough about the genre to write knowledgeably about this, but it is definitely interesting.

And now back to the spice mines.

Angel

Writers write.

I’ve posted something along those lines before, both on my blog here and on Social media. I do believe that to be the truth; writers are people who write. Writers don’t write all the time of course; we take breaks, we step away from it for a while–sometimes days, weeks, months, years; some writers walk away and never write. But writers do write.

Sometime in the past year or so–I don’t remember when–I saw somewhere, I don’t remember where–someone took umbrage to the notion that writers write and wrote a lengthy diatribe about how some writers don’t write; as I read all the reasons people don’t write I just kind of shook my head. I take time off from writing periodically; sometimes it’s necessary to take some down time to think, to read, to relax so you don’t burn out or get stale.

And no matter what anyone thinks, says, or feels, I will always think it’s true: writers write.

Michael Thomas Ford (aka That Bitch Ford; or TBF for short) writes. He writes a lot. And he’s very good; he can pretty much write anything. He’s written children’s books and young adult; mysteries and romances and vampires and zombies and essays. I first became acquainted with his work when he was writing a syndicated column in the LGBT press (there used to be such a thing, kids) called “My Queer Life.” I met him when he signed a collection of those essays at the Marigny Bookstore, Alec Baldwin Doesn’t Love Me, and they were all quite funny (included in that collection is my favorite essay about writing ever, “The Nonwriting Life,” which is absolutely spot-on), and over the years we’ve stayed in touch, remained friends; he was one of my contributing editors when I was at Lambda Book Report, he’s contributed to my anthologies over the years, we’ve shared editors, friends and enemies and lots of snark.

Endless amounts of snark.

But after several years away from writing, he’s back, and once again, he’s done a fantastic job with his new work, Lily.

Lily is a fairy tale of sorts, in the same way Tim Burton movies like The Nightmare Before Christmas and The Corpse Bride are; like Neil Gaiman’s Emmeline. Lily is a little girl who, on her birthday, develops the ability to know when whomever she touches will die; and the book follows her after her mother sells her to a traveling tent revivial–as she struggles to fulfill a quest given to her by the witch Baba-yaga as well as find her way back to her safe old world.

The illustrations are quite beautiful, and they match the tone and beauty of the story as well. I am often amazed at how TBF can so easily master different voices and tone and styles. It’s a wonderful wonderful story; one adults can enjoy as well as children.

It’s an excellent addition to your library.

Sisters of the Moon

I went to my first Christmas party of the year last night and stayed far too late; I didn’t roll out of bed until after ten this morning but at the very least I do feel very well rested, at any rate, if groggy. I stuck to Sauvignon Blanc last night, which I really like–I use to loathe white wine, but have developed an appreciation for both Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. I rather like wine, but rarely drink it at home.

Perhaps a glass every evening will help me sleep?

Yesterday was, on the whole, a good day. I spent most of the day washing the bed linen and organizing my kitchen (not as much as I should have done, of course; I never do that as much as I should. I really need to clean out the drawers and cabinets; a project for my vacation that never happened), and I worked on editing one of my short stories. I came across an anthology call for submissions that is absolutely perfect for this story, and I needed to go over it again. It’s been rejected a minimum of three times–for two conference anthologies and from Ellery Queen; but I kind of figured it didn’t strike the right tone for the conference anthologies and Ellery Queen was a long shot. But when I opened the document yesterday, I immediately saw what was wrong with it and why it had been rejected so regularly, and I also knew how to fix it, so I started working on it. I hope to get that finished today and sent off and out of the way; there are couple of other calls I’d like to submit to as well; and the stories need to be worked on a bit, and I also need to get going on the new novel as well. I also got editorial notes I need to mull over today, and I need to make the Costco run that I should have made yesterday but put off.

But it’s also raining; thunderstorms off and on all afternoon. Costco in the rain? Hmmmmm.

I do rather like how gray it is outside, though.

And lord, what a mess this kitchen/office area is this morning.

I do feel more motivated today than I did yesterday–whatever that may mean for the day; I would like to finish reading my book today, and I’d like to get some good work done.

Why is it so hard for me to remember that I enjoy writing? I actually do, you know, and I suppose as with anything I just get very frustrated and annoyed when it’s not going well or with myself when I get lazy.

Okay, need to focus and get things done.

Here’s a French farmer.