Santa's Weakest Link

Freebie short story I put together in the spirit of the season. Merry Christmas all!

Santa’s Weakest Link

 

Santa checked his list. He checked it twice. As much as he hated this part of the job, a botched season five years ago had forced his hand and he’d instituted changes to his operation. Performance reviews.

He stepped up to the reindeer paddock and cleared his throat. From the two hundred strong herd, his team of nine separated themselves. While they approached him at the fence, the others maintained a curious watch from a discreet distance.

“Well, it’s been another good season,” Santa said, dusting snow off his sleeves as he opened with the perfunctory good news. “All deliveries made and no incidents. Always room for improvement, of course.”

The reindeer shuffled, dark eyes flickering back and forth. Donner, the biggest of the team, snorted a puff of vapor.

“Okay, let’s get on with this. Rudolph, we’ll start with you.”

Rudolph’s expression behind that shining red nose was challenging, proud.

“Decent outing last night,” Santa said. “And you were a beacon for the rest when we hit that rough patch over the Ohio River Valley. Can’t say I was too pleased with your off-season work ethic, though. Lack of focus, half-hearted effort at times. Not the sort of example I expect from my team lead. Just because you’re the most famous of the bunch doesn’t mean you’re immune to criticism. I ran with a team of eight for centuries before you were born and I could do it again.”

Rudolph bowed his head, his nose dimming slightly.

“Donner, Blitzen,” Santa said, turning his attention their way. “Again, good job all around. I know I can always count on you two to pull your load. Don’t think I didn’t overhear you two second-guessing my call to hit Italy before Switzerland this year, though. Remember, I see you when you’re sleeping and when you’re awake.”

The two reindeer shared a quick glance before looking back at the ground.

Santa turned back to his list. “Right, Dasher. Excellent off-season, but a little too exuberant when it came to the big night. Take your pace from those ahead of you. Don’t need to keep pulling to the left because you’re in such a hurry.

“And Dancer. Unremarkable all around. No real sore spots, but nothing to set yourself apart, either. Might want to show some initiative and push harder next season. Just getting by isn’t good enough for my team.”

Dancer nodded her head and took half a step back.

“Prancer,” Santa said, pausing to look up and make sure he had the reindeer’s full attention. “Gotta say, I was pretty disappointed last night. Getting your harness tangled up, not once but twice? I don’t know where your head was, but I know where it wasn’t.”

Prancer trembled. Santa didn’t know what was going on behind the scenes, in spite of his claims otherwise, but she’d been losing focus in recent years.

“Slider,” Santa said. “I know you’re the rookie on the team, so I can let a bit of over-enthusiasm slide. Good energy and stamina, but you’ll have to reign it in next season.

“Comet, last year we talked about your tendency to lose altitude on longer hops. This year, didn’t happen once. Thanks for taking that to heart. Good, solid year all around.”

Comet shook her head.

“Ares, gotta say I’m disappointed. Still up to those reindeer games. I let it slide during your rookie season, but I fear I may have been too soft on you. I know Rudolph, Donner, and Blitzen were warning you as well. You never know when you might run out of second chances.”

The young buck looked properly chagrined under Santa’s withering glare.

“Look behind you,” Santa said, waving his black-gloved hand toward the herd. “There’s over a hundred others chomping at the bit for the chance, the honor, the responsibility of becoming a member of this team. It’s not a one-night-a-year job. You have to live it, every minute of every day. We’re a team, and we’ll only ever be as strong as our weakest link.

“Prancer, I’m sorry, but this year that was you.”

#

“Have I mentioned how I hate this time of year?” Santa said.

He settled his bulk into a creaking chair at the dining room table. The crackling of fire in the hearth and heady intermingling scents of pine, cinnamon, and baking bread, aspects of home that always made him feel relaxed after a long season, did little to soothe him today. He poured a glass of milk and sighed.

“I know, dear,” Missus said, poking her head out of the kitchen. “You work too hard, sometimes.”

“What? Oh, no, it’s not the work. It’s having to play manager, boss. Performance debriefs. End of year evaluations.”

“Oh, right. That. Well, it was your idea.”

“And it has improved team performance. Maybe even morale, a bit, I suppose. At least among those who were pulling their weight.”

Missus vanished back into the kitchen, but carried on the conversation. “At the cost of adding stress.”

“Stress.” There was stress, and then there’d been the stress of five years ago.

“What dear?” Missus came out of the kitchen, carrying a heavily laden plate that she set before her husband. It smelled divine.

“Just talking to myself,” he said, tucking a napkin into his shirt collar.

“A week from now, we’ll be soaking up sun in Tahiti and you’ll have forgotten all about this.” She gripped his shoulder and gave him a kiss on his rosy cheek.

“Thanks, dear,” he said.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll leave you to your dinner. You know how I feel about tonight.” Missus gave him a look and he nodded knowingly.

Once Missus had retreated to the kitchen, Santa picked up his fork and knife and assaulted the reindeer tenderloin in lingonberry sauce. A guilty pleasure, to be sure.

Measure of Fate

My first officially published story, Measure of Fate, is now available. I'm honored to be a part of Fictionvale Episode 1. This may be my first rodeo, but I have a hunch I've been spoiled by the quality and professionalism of the folks behind Fictionvale. It has been a great experience end to end.

I'd like to send out a few quick thanks, the first of which goes to Mark Palise, my indispensable sounding board and first line of editing. It's awesome having a best friend who shares a passion for reading and writing and who just happens to also be an English teacher. Second, to the Slug Tribe writers group, for their excellent critique of this story. And, again, to the folks at Fictionvale - Venessa and Serena in particular - who worked me over pretty thoroughly in the editing process. (All for the best, I assure you.)

So, it's out in the wild. I encourage you to check it out. Episode 1 was open to all genres, so there's something for everyone. You can find it at Amazon or in a number of other formats here.

NaNoPants

October is here, which for me means that NaNoWriMo is looming on the horizon. Over the past seven years, I've approached my effort in a variety of ways - from complete seat-of-the-pants to moderately well-outlined. Two years ago, I went in with nothing more than a title (The Milkshake of Destiny) and a half-baked notion as to what it might be about...all chosen as I sat down on November 1 to start writing.

What I've found from these disparate approaches is that the story tends to be better when I have it outlined. Seat of the pants yields some interesting results and lets the characters own their stories, but also leaves me occasionally struggling to define and stick with a plot. It's even tougher when I don't know how the story will end.

On the flip side, I don't like rigorous outlines. I know some authors are well-known for having excruciatingly detailed character biographies, political histories, and outlines down below the scene level. Once I start writing, my characters inevitably gain a life of their own, and trying to force them to stick to the script can make scenes feel forced...which is a major pet peeve of mine as a reader. So I've had better luck with character sketches and vague outlines that hit on key plot points and the general flow/structure of the story. Nothing is so firm that I can't adjust on the fly if and when the characters begin to take over.

So, after a couple years of largely "pantsing" it with a story picked at the last minute, this year I've decided to get back to the roughed outline approach (no-pantsing). In terms of settling on a story idea (90% certain) and beginning an outline (first pass done), I'm well ahead of the game for a change. Just putting my surgery recovery downtime to good use.

Happy day!

Okay, been away from the blogging for a bit, but not entirely away from writing.

As I posted back in April, I finally made my first story submission.  Finding it difficult to judge my work against the standards and tastes of various publications, I threw caution to the wind, aimed high, and sent it off to a well-known pro-level publication.  Two weeks later came the first rejection letter.  I took it well, though, having both fully anticipated it and accepting it as a rite of passage.  I couldn't quite tell if it was of the "personal" or "form" type, though...just that it was succinct and polite.

Quick turn-around from there to my second choice, also a pro level publication.  Another rejection, but this one was most definitely personal.  Hey, that counts for something, right?  According to the Submission Grinder website, that publication was accepting at a rate of about 2% and only 8-9% got personal letters. Again, moral victory.

My next stop was in a slightly different direction. I sent it off to a brand new publication that was still gathering stories for its first issue. The pay was in the semi-pro range (really could care less...just using this as a proxy for judging the audience of the publications since I don't follow the markets very closely) but they were working on bringing it up to pro (and succeeded).  I saw a post on their website saying they'd received something like 240+ submissions and were accepting 10, so it was long odds already, but the final selection deadline was fast approaching and I still hadn't gotten a rejection.

And then I got the email last night - they want to use my story. So - happy, excited, relieved, validated. Now I just have to wait for the contract, possible edits (if any), and then publication later this year.  So excited to have reached this part of the process for the first time.

More details once the contract is signed and sealed.

In the meantime, the pressure is now on to clean up my most recent story and get it out for consideration.

Collaboration 1, part 8

[MP]
* * * * * 

Gerald hated Elvis. And yet, for business trips, Elvis was invaluable. Elvis was everything. If Elvis were okay, all was well. Even Presley’s untimely demise in the fall of 1977 played its role. Gerald’s work had been made infinitely easier by the King of Rock & Roll. Still, Gerald hated him, in spite of, or perhaps even because of, his encyclopedic knowledge of the most minute detail of Presley’s life. And every time he had met him after the fall of ’77, even as he had appreciated the information Elvis’s existence gave him, he was still glad the man was supposed to be dead. 

Gerald strode north along 3^rd street, approaching Beale. The sights and sounds were familiar to him, but it was the smells that played havoc with him. Cigarette smoke – as often unfiltered as not, barbecued meat with the scent of cayenne pepper and paprika from the famed Memphis dry rib rubs, automobile exhaust saturated with carbon monoxide and lead; all of these catapulted memories into his conscious mind: Johnny Dicks, gunned down outside of the then-Beale Avenue Auditorium; Mabel Douglass and her sister strutting along Union Street, ermine hats and full-length coats in stark contrast to the pristine clouds of their breath against the crisp December evening; and of course, the music…B.B., Ray, Bo…the best of the best of the best.
However, none of these memories or the scents that triggered them could cover up the rank, fetid odor of mountains of garbage piled along every street and on every corner. 

He hitched up his pants again. One of the first things he had done was to find a new set of clothes. With what he was wearing, he had been far too conspicuous. Unfortunately, the transient he had sold his clothes to had been a bit larger than Gerald was now, although if he was still wearing these when – if, he supposed – he made it home, they would probably fit just fine. The .38 he had tucked into the waistband did nothing to help the sagging of his trousers either. 

His cane trailed behind him, remembered only because he was carrying it with him. He hated to lose the damn things, but more often than not, they got lost in the hustle and hurry of his trips. He should have left it at home, but then again, he hadn’t expected to leave the house today.
Speaking of home, he wouldn’t make it back to finish that damn crossword if he didn’t get about the business of business. 

He started with Elvis. If the King were good, he was good. 

“Excuse me, gentlemen,” he called to a trio of young white men waiting for a trolley. “Can you tell me when the Elvis picture is playing at the Orpheum?” 

The men had the tight close-cropped hair of the military. They looked at him askance and puffed up a bit, trying to decide whether or not to harass him. They saw the cane sagging in his fist and it seemed to confuse them enough that they decided to just answer his question. He wondered what he looked like to them. 

“What Elvis picture?” said the shortest of the three. 

“Whichever one they’re showing this week,” he replied. “I can’t really keep track of them, but I try not to miss any of them if I can help it.” 

“Boy, you must be drunk. There haven’t been any Elvis pictures since before the war. How is he supposed to make anymore movies?” 

“What do you mean?” 

The trolley arrived and passengers poured out of its sides. Two of the boys climbed onto a bench in the back, pushing each other a bit and jockeying for position on the inside. Before he climbed on, the final boy looked at him, almost with a look of pity. 

“I don’t know where you’ve been, but Elvis died 10 years ago. Friendly-fire during a training exercise.” 

Shit. Something was up. He grabbed the newspaper. April 1, 1968. It was his birthday. He was 35.

Spring in a flash...or not...

So, it's been a slow couple months on the writing front. After a brief flurry of activity in getting my well-aged short story polished and out for consideration (still waiting to hear back), I did manage to crank out my first real effort at a piece of flash fiction...as a hard sci-fi no less. For a change of pace, I started with a title and figured out a plot to go with it. The idea is decent, but I just couldn't keep it under a thousand words. It stands at around 1200 and really needs to be expanded to give the protagonist a better arc. Ultimately, it'll probably end up somewhere around 2000 words, but much better for it.

Might be a while before I try flash again. Either it's just not that easy to write, or I'm simply not wired that way. Heck, I still find novel length material easier to write than "ordinary" short fiction.

My short term goal is to fix up that non-flash story and then maybe knock out one or two other shorts I have in mind before getting back to the novel side of the to-do list.

In the meantime, I'll throw out another bit of the collaboration story. I think this is where it really starts to expand the scope of weirdness.

Stepping into Submission

In recent years, most of my writing has been centered around novel-length work, and none of that has been edited sufficiently yet to consider shopping around. Since joining the Slug Tribe writers' group where I've had the pleasure of reading and critiquing many dozens of quality short stories, however, I got the urge to dabble a bit in that format. One of those efforts finally reached my level of satisfaction to deem it worthy of trying to find it a home.

I've found the trickiest bit of getting that first story out there is figuring out where to try to submit it. The various markets all tend to have certain types of stories they buy - not just by genre but tone and style and such. I, unfortunately, haven't done a whole lot of reading in these short story markets, so there was a lot of poking around and consuming to be done. I think I read more short stories in the last month than I had in the past few years.

I finally settled on one for my first effort and the story is officially out. Now I get to sit back and wait for my first rejection letter. This all has a very rite-of-passage feel to it.

Collaboration 1, part 7

[BL] 

“I need to get into a safe deposit box,” she said, unable to shake the nerves of anticipation. 

“Right over there,” the woman said, pointing to a desk at the end of the row of tellers. “Marcie can help you out.” 

“Thanks,” Vega said, giving the woman one last lingering look before crossing the room.
Marcie, a dinosaur at fortyish compared with all the other tellers, looked up from where she was tapping away at a computer behind the desk. Her gray eyes looked up over a pair of gaudy green-framed reading glasses with an inquisitional stare. Vega wondered what kind of punishment she could be in for if it turned out this was the wrong bank or if the box rental was no longer properly paid up. 

Vega held up the key Grandma had left like an admission ticket. “Need to get into a safe box.” 

“Certainly,” Marcie said, her voice and demeanor suddenly a great deal less intimidating as she hopped up from her seat. “Number?” 

“One ninety-eight,” Vega said, handing over the key to the woman’s outstretched hand. 

“Right this way.” Marcie led her back behind the desk and through a nondescript door beyond which was a second, heavily armored door swung wide open. Beyond, in a more dimly lit room, were several hundred safe boxes lining the walls of the walk-in safe. Unhesitatingly, the woman walked to about halfway through the room, withdrew a second key from under her shirtsleeve where it resided on a pink, coiled bungee, and slid both keys home into one of the medium-sized boxes. With practiced ease, she opened the door and withdrew a closed metal box about the size her new running shoes had come in and placed it on the island counter in the middle of the room. 

“Let me know when you’re done and I’ll close it back up for you,” Marcie said with a polite smile and took her leave.

Moment of truth, Vega thought to herself as she stared down at the cold, steel box. What secrets had Grandma hidden away inside this unassuming little container? It had no latch, only a simple hinged lid, and it opened smooth and quiet. 

Inside the box were two items – a rolled up old plastic grocery bag and a weathered manila envelope suitably sized for legal documents. Vega picked up the plastic bag and could tell there was something about the size of a Twinkie inside, firm but not heavy. She carefully unrolled the bag and withdrew what appeared to be little more than a wad of dried grass and leaves, tightly bound with longer strips of grass and reed. It had a slightly herbal scent to it, but she was at a loss to explain what it was. 

Hoping for more answers, she returned the grassy object back into the bag and withdrew the envelope. This felt like it contained at least a hundred sheets of paper judging by the thickness and way it flexed. She unwound the string binding it closed and let a well-worn book slide out into her hands. It looked for all the world like one of the old church fundraising cookbooks her mom collected, with its orange card-stock covers and amateur plastic spiral binding. The title was clearly done with an old typewriter, but the words were utter gibberish. 

Affixed to the cover was a stickie note: “Vega or Isabelle, burn the herbs and inhale before trying to read. Love, Grandma.” 

Who the fuck is Isabelle?

Collaboration 1, part 6

[MP]
The two-block walk to First Bank of Baltimore was an interminable blur. She was sure there was a good explanation for Gramps’s disappearance, but even the good explanations sent waves of dread cascading through her. At her worst moments, she was sure the bastards next door had taken him, were going to torture him, and his bloated, decaying corpse would soon wash up in the Chesapeake, courtesy of the Patapsco River. More probably, he had thumped his way down to the drug store for his weekly supply of Immodiam AD and Preparation H. But until she saw him, she’d never be able to relax. 

And then there was that strange letter from Grandma. What exactly was Gramps into? Why would Grandma think he would need help? What kind of help could she possibly be if Gramps was “in over his head”? And what would she be finding in the safe deposit box? A gun? Why keep it in the safe deposit box rather than at home, especially in their neighborhood? For a moment, she grinned, thinking of Grandma stashing Marvin the Martian’s Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator, but the levity quickly faded. 

Maybe it would be some sort of paperwork. Gramps had owned the rowhouse at one point, but their paltry savings wasn’t enough to cover even the cost of Grandma’s bargain basement funeral services, and he had had to refinance. Maybe she had been worried about that. But as quickly as the idea occurred to her, she rejected it – considering the way she died, Grandma couldn’t have been talking about the refi of the house. How would she have known he would need to do it? 

The more she thought about it, everything about Grandma’s final communiqué was odd. She must have prepared it ahead of time, but if so, why not talk to Vega about it instead of leaving some inscrutable message? Hadn’t Grandma trusted her? 

The way she had had it delivered was odd, too. Two months after Grandma passed a knock had come at her door. A courier was there with a letter, saying it had been held at his store with directions that it should be delivered if one month had gone by and they had received no communication from Mrs. Elenor Bond. Apparently she had been writing to them once a month for two years to keep that letter from being delivered. 

The final straw as far as Vega was concerned was the bank itself. While First Bank of Baltimore was close to the house, Gramps and Grandma had always had their accounts at Baltimore County Savings Bank, or as Gramps still called it, “The Building and Loan.” In fact, she even remembered their disapproval when she decided to keep the account her parents had opened for her at FBB instead of moving her assets over to Baltimore County. Why would Grandma have kept the safe deposit box at FBB? 

Was she hiding it from Gramps? And if so, how was it still being paid for after three years, especially since Grandpa balanced his checkbook to the penny every month; there would be no way for FBB to be automatically drawing money from Baltimore County without it sending Gramps into a tirade. 

As she opened the doors to First Bank of Baltimore, Vega sighed a breath of relief as the cool air flowed over her. While it wasn’t truly into the heat of the day yet, she could tell that it was going to be a scorcher. 

The bank was laid out in a giant circle, with an entire half-wall taken up with a counter manned by a platoon of tellers. In the middle hulked a large information kiosk surrounding a petite young woman of about 23. She wore a khaki-colored skirt that was cut tastefully above the knee and whose design hid, yet accentuated her shapely legs. Her full crimson blouse matched her well-kept nails, and she beamed a professional smile at Vega as she entered the bank. 

“Welcome to First Bank of Baltimore,” she said. “What can I do for you today?” 

She’s pretty, thought Vega, feeling herself respond to the sight of the receptionist’s lush bosom. Too bad I only date sistas.

Collaboration 1, part 5

[BL]
“What the hell?” she muttered as she pulled harder on the handle without success. 

Vega pressed her ear against the door, but the sound of music – both Reggaeton and blues - had faded altogether, leaving her with nothing more than the thumping of her own nervous heartbeat. She pounded on the door in frustration and called to her grandfather again. As expected, there was no response. 

What is he up to? She kept trying to tell herself that he was a smart and capable man and wouldn’t needlessly get himself into trouble. And, if he was next door, hopefully the neighbors would prove to be more bluster than action. Until she knew for certain, though, she wouldn’t be able to relax. 

Vega trotted downstairs and let herself out the front door, trying to figure out what she would say to the neighbors when they answered. At least it was sunny outside as the sun vaporized the last of the late morning clouds. Approaching the neighbors felt inherently safer in the light of day. 

She climbed the steps and heard the doorbell ring in response to her touch. The house was eerily silent – no music, no laughing or yelling or Jerry Springer turned up too loudly. After thirty seconds of no answer, she rang again and pounded on the maligned storm door. Still nothing.
Her mind went through a dozen possible scenarios, none of them good. Could she really call the police? That could get ugly if Gramps was breaking and entering. It seemed far more likely that the neighbors were the interlopers, but she suspected that was more a matter of her personal biases and fears playing tricks on her. 

A memory came to her unbidden - the words Grandma had shared from beyond the grave in a letter willed to Vega. It had been a peculiar thing at the time, a simple note asking the then twenty-three year old woman to watch out over Gramps because he had some secrets and might one day need help. Impossible as it seemed, the note now seemed to have a prescient feel under the current circumstances. What secrets and what kind of help? 

Vega had stashed the note inside the cover sleeve of her well-worn copy of Huck Finn and she found herself jogging back to her second floor room to retrieve it. She plucked the book from the shelf and extracted the nondescript mailing envelope on which her name was written in Grandma’s elegant hand. Fingers trembling, she withdrew the note and reread the last line: “If ever you think your grandfather might be in over his head, and only then, go to the First Bank of Baltimore on 2^nd and Washington, deposit box 198.” Affixed to the paper with Scotch tape just below “Love, Grandma” was a small metal key. 

Vega refolded the note and tucked it in her sweatshirt pocket. Had her grandmother somehow anticipated this circumstance? Before this moment, and aside from Gramps’ secretive attic room, there had never seemed to be anything unusual or exciting about her grandparents before. Just what hadn’t she been told? 

She stepped into the hall outside her room and called out again, but only silence responded. She then ran back up to the attic to try the door one last time. Nothing. No sound, no phantom smells. 

Vega touched the envelope through her sweatshirt. That bank was only two blocks away and it wasn’t even Sunday.

Collaboration 1, part 4

[MP] 

She considered leaving for the space of two breaths. If nothing were wrong, she knew Gramps would be ticked at her for invading his privacy. If. But she knew she would rather Gramps not speak to her for a month than try to live with herself if something were wrong and she did nothing to help him. 

She climbed fully into the attic and nearly leapt a foot as music came pouring from the open door. Reggaeton. God, she hated that crap. The Latino gang-banger-wanna-bes next door blasted it at all hours. Normally it was simply a minor irritation thumping through the common wall of the row house, but up here, with the thin attic floors and this open door, it was an unexpected aural assault that scared her half to death. 

Braving the lion’s den, Vega hurried across to the open door and peered inside. The attic was illuminated only with the meager light from her own attic and with the faintest ribbons of light from minute imperfections in the ceiling and floors. 

Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary that she could see. The attic had the look of living space. A bed lurked in a far corner, and closer to her was what appeared to be the outline of a couch and what was probably a coffee table. Odors of sex and marijuana flooded out of the doorway, gagging her. There was no sign of Gramps. 

She couldn’t be sure he wasn’t in there, thanks to some dim, unidentifiable shapes in between her and the attic entrance to the neighbor’s house, but she was even more hesitant to enter this attic than she had been her own. The worst Gramps would do would be to yell at her. The worst from The Latin Fools as she and Gramps referred to them…. 

She settled for calling his name. Shouting, really, given the volume of the “music” streaming up from the floor below. She strained to hear a response, but there was nothing. If he were in there and if he were hurt, she’d have to go in there to find him. Her only alternatives were to knock on their front door and risk being made a guest of their tender mercies or get the police involved and risk retaliation and Gramps’s arrest. 

She would need light. That meant a trip downstairs. 

She stood and turned toward the attic stairs, and as she did so, she saw another door across the room. She decided to check that door before she went for a flashlight. After all, if one of the doors was open, maybe the other one was, and if Gramps were anywhere other than in the attic now behind her, she’d be a happy camper. 

She jogged across the room past an enormous wooden box standing open and empty in the middle of the space, almost as if it were on display or in quarantine. The slight breeze of her passage rustled the forest of pinned up news clippings. She crouched and tried the small door inset into the wall, but the deadbolt was thrown. Even if it hadn’t been, both it and the hinges were rusted beyond repair. 

A news clipping had fallen from the wall just to her right. She picked up the push-pin that had held it up and then carefully plucked the small yellowed paper from where it lay on the floor. The headline caught her eye: Three Die in House Fire. The dateline read May 23, 1886, St. Louis, Missouri. 

She moved to pin the clipping back in place, and jumped for the second time in five minutes when the door behind her swung shut with a solid thump. She grimaced as she jabbed the push-pin into her finger. A drop of blood welled against her coffee-colored skin before oozing its way down her finger and onto the clipping. 

She jammed the clipping into the wall and ran back across the room, sucking her finger as she went. She tugged on the door, but the rusty hinges wouldn’t give. As she pulled, she could have sworn she smelled the faint odor of roasting meat, and, even fainter, the muted strains of “The Beale Street Blues” wafting out from behind the door.

Collaboration 1, part 3

 [BL]

Gerald took one last look around the room before relenting to the inevitable task at hand. Satisfied it was still as seemingly empty as before, he grasped the door's handle with his free hand and gave it a firm tug. What was left of the hinges groaned in protest and flakes of rust drifted to the floor to join their brethren. He held the pistol at the ready and flung the door open wide.

“Memphis,” he cursed under his breath. “God dammit.”

* * * * *

“Gramps?”

Vega tossed her keys on the kitchen counter as she wrestled to close the back door with arms full of reusable grocery bags. These she deposited on the table beside her grandfather's still steaming cup of coffee and crossword puzzle. From the look of it, he wasn't getting very far.

Assuming that he had just popped off to use the bathroom, she unloaded the bags and put everything away. Perhaps more than any part of the adjustment of having moved in with him, getting him to relent to both her cooking and her way of reorganizing the kitchen had been trying. Fortunately, he didn't like to cook, so she ended up getting her way by default. He would constantly complain about the food she prepared - “Damn healthy crap” - but she knew it was mostly in good humor and appreciated. She thought he was secretly starting to prefer it to the usual meat, potatoes, and gravy.

When the food was all in its proper place and she still hadn't heard a peep from the old man, Vega got a bit concerned. He was in decent health, but there was always just that little bit of concern whenever she came home to the residence of a man nearing eighty. She listened to the background noise of the house, but couldn't hear him.

“Gramps?” she called again, this time from the living room and a bit louder. Still nothing.

She bounded up the steps in her new Nikes, taking them two at a time like usual, and was about to call again when she noticed the door to the attic open at the end of the hall. For two decades as a kid, she had visited her grandparents in this house and never seen the door open before. And now, after nearly three years as his roommate while finishing up her doctorate, she still had no idea what was up there. Any time she dared to tease grandpa about what his big secret was, he would make up another entirely absurd story. It had almost become a game, until she was old enough to sense there was something in his evasiveness that was terribly personal, at which point she let it drop.

Vega walked to the end of the hall and peered up the narrow stairs. All she could see was a blandly painted wall and ceiling up above. Would he be pissed if she went up there? Surely, he must not have expected her home at this hour.

“Gramps? You up there?” She waited for a response, but there was none forthcoming. She began to get nervous again.

“Gramps?” She knocked on the attic door, but still there was no response.

Reluctantly, she placed one foot on the stairs and waited for him to poke his head over the railing and tell her to buzz off. She took a second and a third step. She forced herself to breathe, realizing that she'd been holding it.

Three more steps up and her head crested the attic's floor level. The room was drab, furnished with only a desk, chair, and filing cabinet. Most of the walls were covered with news and magazine clippings, many probably decades old judging by their wear. For all the years of mystery, it seemed to be a bit of a letdown.

Grandpa wasn't anywhere to be seen, though a door near the other end of the room was open. She realized that it had to lead into an adjacent house, which seemed peculiar since he didn't get along well with either of his current neighbors. He wouldn't be snooping around his neighbors, would he? She wondered if she shouldn't just turn around now and pretend not to have seen anything.

Collaboration 1, part 2

Two entries today to get this rolling...

[MP]

While his memory may not be what it had once been, Gerald knew that the box had been shut. Not just shut, but locked. Not just locked, but locked with the second key on the necklace he wore – one for the door to the attic and one for the box. 

Now the box was open. 

Gerald’s heart skipped a beat, and then made up for it, trip-hammering so hard and fast that it fluttered his shirt front. Gerald had not been in the attic since Elenor left him, and the last thing he had done on that day was to shut the box, lock it, and leave, both literally and figuratively putting the lid on that portion of his life for what he thought was forever. 

He knew nobody had come into the attic through his house. That left only two other avenues into the attic, and he moved to check them now. 

Gerald surveyed the room one last time, the harsh white light illuminating the far corners, bleaching the aged wood and seeming almost to render the tight attic living space in black and white. 

He was alone. 

Although he saw no one, his crocodile brain was not reassured. He fairly slunk into the attic, moving quickly to place and keep his back against one of the short walls, one that he shared with the row house next to him. Gerald sidled along the wall, feeling for all the world like a 14-year-old boy who is too old to be afraid of the dark, and yet can’t help but crab-walk up the steps, peering behind himself self-consciously all the time for that thing he knew lurked in the dark. 14-year-old like Hell, he thought to himself, what kind of 14-year-old has a .38 in one hand and drags his cane behind him with the other? 

As he traversed the wall, his back brushed the clippings he had mounted to the wall, clippings accumulated across nearly 45 years on the job. He relinquished the wall by an inch so as not to dislodge the fragile newsprint and magazine pages, but even that inch felt like a gaping chasm behind him. His eyes scanned the room, ticking off possible points of entry and possible points of concealment – a useless application of a habit built over a lifetime. The only points of entry were the stairway he had so recently ascended and the other small attic door across from his current destination; the only potential hiding place was under his desk – nobody there – and the box, into which he was most decidedly not ready to look. 

It was only when the small attic door in the far wall was almost directly across from him did he realize he had reached his destination. Now he was at a crossroads. He was loath to take his eyes off the room, but he couldn’t very well inspect the door and look at the room at the same time. Well, he supposed he could, but something in him recoiled at the idea of reaching down and touching the door without being able to keep an eye on it. 

He sighed, sighed again, and then, groaning nearly as loudly as his squalling joints, lowered himself to one knee. He put his cane on the ground.

He held onto the gun.

The door was metal, the paint faded to match the bland beige Elenor had colored the attic when he announced his intention to convert the space into an office. Before he focused on the door itself, he made a quick inspection of the wall: no cracks in the cinderblocks, no chunks missing or holes where rodents had broken through. A brief glance at the ceiling yielded the same conclusions: given the sun bathing the tops of the row-houses, he would know if the integrity of the roof had been compromised. 

When things had started to go bad at the end and he saw the way the neighborhood was deteriorating, he had used a low-tech solution to seal the attic once and for all – or so he thought. He had used a turkey baster to blast water into the locks and coat the hinges until they had rusted solid. Short of a blow-torch or sledge-hammer, the attic should have been impregnable. 

It should have been impregnable. 

Instead, lying beneath the door were two small talus slopes of rust, one under the lock, and one under the hinges.

Collaboration 1, part 1

As I mentioned in a previous post, +Mark Palise and I took a couple cracks at collaborative writing. The rules were simple - we discussed nothing about the project (not even what genre it would be) and we would take turns writing between one and two pages of material before handing it off to the other.

So, for fun, here's a glimpse into how that first effort turned out. I don't know if I'll post everything we wrote, but I'll post it incrementally for a while.

I opened the first effort with a scene I hoped would be sufficiently open-ended as to the genre of the story while quickly building a sense of mystery.

[BL]
Thump. 

Gerald looked up at the cracked plaster of his kitchen ceiling. His hearing wasn't as reliable as it used to be, but he was pretty certain that something upstairs had just made a noise. He tapped his hearing aid out of habit. 

After a full minute of silence, Gerald shrugged and returned to puzzling out fifteen down, “Part of a foot,” four letters. He hated crosswords, and yet he had not missed the Daily Herald's offering in over five decades. His granddaughter had tried to push something called a Sudoku on him, but her explanation of the process alone left his head throbbing. 

Thump. 

“Dammit,” he said, setting his pencil on the Formica table top with a snap. As he collected his cane and pulled himself to his feet, he wondered what on Earth could possibly be making that noise. He was too close to death to be worried about an intruder, but if a rodent or other critter had let itself in to the old house it could become a mess. 

Glancing up the stairs on his way to the first floor bedroom, he saw nothing but motes of dust playing in beams of the late morning sun before settling upon the collection of old family photos that lined the wall. For a fleeting moment, he wondered if it might not be the ghost of his dearly departed coming back to haunt him. Elenor probably would have a few choice words to share regarding the way he'd cared for himself these last three years. Gerald shook his head in a mix of amusement and regret. 

His knees creaked alarmingly as he knelt on the floor beside his bed and reached underneath for the old wooden box. He flipped up the two tarnished latches and opened the lid, revealing his grandfather's old Smith and Wesson 38 DA pocket revolver. He knew he would feel a damn fool when the noise upstairs turned out to be nothing more than one of the oak tree's limbs banging against the siding in the wind, but the heft of the old piece gave him just a bit of reassurance should it end up being something else. The neighborhood just wasn't what it used to be. 

With the gun held loosely at his side in one hand and cane in the other, Gerald resumed his journey upstairs. The stairs squealed under his weight, announcing his approach to anyone in the entire house. He rounded the corner at the top of the steps and looked down the hall. The two bedroom doors, like usual, were closed, and the bathroom door was cracked open. He was about to open the guest room when he heard the mystery sound again, from above.
“That better be a rodent,” Gerald muttered under his breath as he began to fish out the key he wore on a thin chain around his neck, safely tucked beneath his shirt. 

At the end of the hall was the door leading to the attic, his private domain even in the years Elenor had ruled the roost. It was scarcely larger than a closet door, but it was solidly built and had a quality lock personally installed. He slid the key inside and it turned with a reassuring click. At least someone hadn't broken in that way. 

Gerald looked up the narrow staircase and was further relieved to see it dark. He flicked the light switch and grumbled when the usual yellow glow didn't instantly appear. His granddaughter, bless her heart, had bought some new-fangled compact fluorescent bulbs that he'd been forced to use to replace the attic's lone bulb when it had finally conceded its miserable murky hue to eternal darkness. The new bulb took nearly as long to reach full brightness as it took him to climb the stairs and it had a harsh whiteness to it that seemed to change the character of the attic entirely. It wasn't for the better. 

He thumped his own way up the unfinished wood steps, letting his cane proclaim each step along the way. As the top of his head crested above the attic floor, he glanced around at the room for any sign of intruder – human, animal, or otherwise – but found none. The familiar newspaper clippings covered each wall, even if they felt out of place in the new lighting. His desk and chair, and the old AM/FM radio, all in their proper place. 

Then he noticed the box.

Seven Lines and Ten Questions

Okay, so fellow blogger Madison had a good post over here today, posting seven lines from the seventh or seventy-seventh page along with answering ten questions (the Next Big Thing part of it) from her current work-in-progress. Answering questions about your work is always a good way to make sure you have a solid handle on it, not to mention knowing how to "sell" it to others. So check out her responses through the above link and/or continue on to mine below.

Excerpt from page 7 of Ends of the World:

“How about you? What do you think of it?” 

Seeing the end of the world had brought out a number of new thoughts and feelings in Rish, but he found it challenging to articulate their meaning. He took his time considering his response, knowing that the older boy would patiently wait. That was one of the things Rish most respected about Darnan, he always seemed to push Rish to think things through more rigorously without belittling him in the process. 

“I think I have come to a greater understanding of my kin,” Rish finally said.

1. What is the working title of your book?

The Ends of the World.

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?

It initially came out of a thought experiment - what would a duo-theistic society (in the fantasy genre) potentially look like? Pantheons of gods are common, but having only two, especially if they're diametrically opposed, could color every aspect of society. (In this case, I actually have three gods, but only two are "hands on" in the world of mortals.)

Secondly, I riffed off the concept of the Ringworld series and made a world that is more like a ribbon (or conveyor belt, really), that is itself very much a direct result of the two gods' impact on the setting.

After that, a story line started to emerge from the setting and I just took it from there. 

3. What genre does your book fall under?

Fantasy.

4. What is a one-sentence synopsis of your book?

While his adopted home town is on the cusp of falling off the end of the world, a young man torn between two cultures tries to find his place in the world.

5. Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Not even thinking about this one yet.

6. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

About a year. I started it during NaNoWriMo 2008 and nearly finished it the following month. Then it languished for most of a year before I finally got around to finishing the first draft. Since then, I've done a lot of brainstorming on things that need to be edited and changed, largely based on how I've sketched out the rest of the story, but have yet to edit much more than the first chapter.

7. If your book were made into a film, which actors would you cast as your characters?

Hmmm.  No idea, honestly.  The main characters are all around 17-18 years old, and I don't know enough actors in that age range.  Might be able to come up with some actors for the older minor cast if I really tried.

8. To what other books would you compare this story within your genre?

Honestly, I can't think of another good comparison. It carries a number of "stock" fantasy elements (gods indirectly involved in the affairs of mortals, magic, etc). At the same time, however, it studiously avoids many of the more common fantasy elements - only has humans, the characters aren't particularly powerful, and the entire first book is set in and around a single small village.

9. Who or what inspired you to write this book?

See answer to question #2. Also, I needed a NaNo project. My wife did help keep me plugging away at it for a while, though, when she was pregnant and needed something to read during her nightly bath.

10. What else about your book might pique the reader's interest.

I made a conscious effort to make this feel like a comfortable fantasy setting (nothing too exotic), while adding a good bit of original feel to it. With the world being very unique - perpetually being created on one end and destroyed on the other - I put a good deal of effort into considering how civilization would have grown under those circumstances. The end result, I hope, is the sense of a world that functions logically and is internally consistent.

Collaborative Writing

In my previous post, I lamented my ability to stick with the daily routine of writing that I enjoy while participating in NaNoWriMo.  It reminded me of something I tried a couple years ago as a means by which to establish this daily habit - writing with a partner. Now, as for why I thought that might be a good idea...

The seed for the idea was planted a couple years ago. I was trying to remember something from the Illuminatus! trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, books I'd read ages prior. (They're an interesting read, intertwining just about every conspiracy theory you can imagine into one wild story.) In trying to find my answer, I ended up at the Wikipedia entry, and stumbled upon this little nugget about how they came to write the story while working together as associate editors at Playboy (where they handled numerous conspiracy-laden letters to the editor from their readers):

They had a lot of access to research staff. And so under the guise that it would be helpful writing articles for Playboy (I don't think it was really) they got into the Illuminati. Wilson would bung these memos to Shea as material came in from the researchers—like the memos in the book. When they got to memo 23, Shea said, "If we imagine a New York cop came across these memos, I think we've got the basis for a fine thriller!" So the next one Wilson wrote was episode one of the thriller. Shea replied with episode two. They were playing a game really. Like, I bet you can't continue this! The answer is, "No I can't, so we'll continue with this!"

Sounds like fun, right? Well, of course, you'd need the right partner for that sort of collaborative effort. Fortunately, I had just someone in mind - +Mark Palise, best friend, fellow would-be writer, and long-time brainstorming and editing partner. We had never tried to write anything together, but this sort of back and forth format seemed like it might just work.

I proposed the idea with the following guidelines:

• Each writer takes a turn, writing between one and two pages.
• Ideally, turns would last one day.
• No discussion about ideas for the plot or characters was permitted - the only discussion allowed was to clarify previously mentioned material or to correct things that directly contradicted something mentioned earlier.

Mark readily agreed and we were in business. From my perspective, I was intending to write my 1-2 pages on this project when it was my turn, and on alternate days I would work on finishing my NaNo project. I got to write with my best friend and be held to some level of accountability for writing output, all while establishing a daily writing habit. 

The effort itself, while eventually fizzling out, turned out much better than I anticipated. It started innocently enough, but quickly ballooned into a wonderfully complicated mess of time travel and magic, alternate timelines and wrecked ones. With neither of us knowing where the other was trying to take the story, it kept taking unexpected turns. Each day's entry tended to end with a bit of a cliff-hanger, or by writing the other into a corner to see how he could weasel his way back out.

As I mentioned, the story eventually ran out of steam. I think the complexity of it did us in more than anything - we were having to re-read the material a lot in order to keep things straight, and we reached a point in the plot where things really needed to start coming together but instead continued to expand in scope. The effort was enjoyable enough that we took another crack at it, starting fresh, but that's a story for another day.

 

Off the NaNo Clock

I’m going to credit NaNoWriMo with one thing - it gave me the nudge to actually tackle writing something of novel length. Okay, two things - it also got me back into the groove of writing at all. Admittedly, that groove tends to be rather irregular and littered with months-long spans of neglect, but it’s better than the years-long droughts I had previously endured.

The downside to NaNoWriMo is that I now have a collection of half-written novels (I always reach the 50,000 word count goal, a number that unfortunately never coincides with the end of the story). Six of them, to be precise. Only one out of seven started is actually done, and it’s just the first book of what is either a three or four book series...so, in a sense, it's also incomplete.

So why do they remain abandoned? After putting in so much work, why not finish them? Surely it's easier than starting a new novel from scratch?

For several of the novels, I’d gone into NaNo with a nugget of plot in mind, but no idea how the story would end. Even after getting to know the characters and the story through a couple hundred pages, I usually only had a vague notion of how it might end. No story had been railroaded into a dead end plot-wise, but when combined with the burnout following the binge of writing that is November I just lacked the energy to figure it out. My one finished novel, in contrast, I knew exactly how it was going to end and what most of the major remaining plot landmarks along the way were, and I’m sure that was a key difference.

The second issue is that aforementioned burnout. Much as I love the sense of accomplishment in getting my 1667 words (give or take) down each night, it’s a difficult grind. Television shows go un-watched, chores and family are slightly neglected, and I start to slack off on my running. By the time I’ve recovered, that head of steam has long since vanished.

And my third and probably greatest problem...well, I’m highly motivated by a fear of failure (missing deadlines, in particular). When I sign up to do NaNo, there is absolutely no way I won’t finish it. After I reach the word count goal, however, I no longer have that outside accountability pushing me. Yeah, I could tell myself that I have until the end of December or January to finish the first draft, but it’s just not the same. I can’t convince myself to work under such regular daily or weekly word goals, even if lessened to a more realistic number, when I’m off the NaNo clock.

How to crack that nut of realistic personal accountability? Hmmm...

Wild Cards short

Woot!

One of my all time favorite series of books is Wild Cards, a massively sprawling series helmed by George R.R. Martin and including dozens of contributing authors that sets a high bar for "super hero" fiction. I was drawn into the series by its somewhat more practical approach to explaining why super powers exist - an alien-engineered virus, intended as a means by which to enhance the innate telepathic abilities of said aliens, was tested on humanity (near genetic match, with some hand waving). The initial dispersal happened over New York City back in the '50s, but the spores of the virus spread worldwide and continue to create random outbreaks from time to time. It's not contagious, but does re-write the genetic code of the afflicted as a recessive trait that can be passed on. When the Wild Card expresses in a person, there is a 90% likelihood of a very quick and ugly death ("drawing the Black Queen.") Of those who survive, 9 in 10 "draw a Joker" and are mutated in some usually unpleasant manner. The remaining few, the lucky 1%, draw an "Ace" and are gifted with some manner of super power.

On top of having a single origin source to avoid the multiple-origin implausibility that's prevalent in traditional super hero comics, the powers themselves tend to at least behave somewhat within the known laws of physics. Powers are mostly telepathic or telekinetic in origin, even if the actual expression of the powers is highly variable. Many powers seem to derive from the victim's subconscious, reflecting their personality in some way.

Oh, and there are very few "super heroes." Characters who try to fit the stereotype find that it doesn't work so well in the real world of litigious lawyers and paranoid politicians. Stories are often dark and gritty, the world has a new class of oppressed in the freakish Jokers, and events have lasting consequences.

All in all, I highly recommend the series, even if super heroes aren't usually your thing. Some of the older books are starting to get a new lease on life in reprints and digital. I guess Mr. Martin's success with a certain television show hasn't hurt the exposure to some of his other projects.

Anyway, that brings me back to the point of this post. I just stumbled across a new short story from one of the most prolific of the Wild Cards authors +Daniel Abraham . Looks like it just went up on Tor's site a couple days ago. Nice little read, giving a good insight into how things really are for public Aces. Oh, and it has some sweet cover art!

When We Were Heroes

Formative Inspiration

I was thinking the other day about what books had the greatest formative influence on my writing. These aren’t necessarily my favorite books (okay, most are still right up there), but more the ones that left a lasting impression during my most impressionable years. They established tastes in genre, characters, and scope. Here are a few of the heavy hitters and the reasoning behind each:

Dragonlance Chronicles (Margaret Weis and +Tracy Hickman) - First read in my late grade school years, this was my real introduction to fantasy after dabbling in D&D with my friends for a couple years (the red boxed set). It read like the most epic, coherent game imaginable, with the rules practically establishing the framework for the story. What I really stuck with me from the story, however, was how the death of major characters raised the stakes for everyone else. If the authors could kill Flint and Sturm, who else might die before the dust finally settled?

Hitchhiker’s “Trilogy” (Douglas Adams) - Don’t think much needs to be said about this one. In a sense, it influenced me away from ever trying to write anything humorous, as I would inevitably hold it up to this standard and immediately toss my drivel. Can’t overstate how much I loved these books, though, and how they allowed me to take everything in life a little less seriously...as it should be.

Riftwar Saga (Raymond Feist) - Read this series while in junior high and it immediately became my favorite series of books, necessitating a couple of re-reads. I loved the development of Pug, struggling between highs and lows as a magician’s apprentice. The series managed to balance some pretty epic power creep between Pug and Tomas by shifting focus to Arutha and Jimmy later in the series. The series instilled in me the importance of epic action set pieces and great ensemble character development.

Snow Crash (+Neal Stephenson) - I read this one in high school, after re-shelving it a few times while on the job at the public library. One paragraph in, I was thinking to myself “whoa.” By the end of the first chapter, I adored it, but feared the rest of the book couldn’t possibly live up to the beginning. As I finished the book, I flipped back to page one and started again - the first and only time I’ve ever done that. There are so many things about this book that are difficult to pull off, and yet Stephenson managed it brilliantly - satire, mythology, action, and cool. If there was one aspect of the book I would call out as a takeaway, it would be “internal consistency.” The book was unlike anything I’d previously read, but its own universe was so brilliantly realized that I never once felt like I was slipping out of the story.

While putting together this list, I tried to think of any little known work I could call out. Alas, there wasn’t much that came to mind, or at least to which I could recall the title. There was one book involving kids trapped in a three dimensional maze like lab rats who had to engage in arbitrary rituals to get food. Another I can distinctly recall the title, yet nothing of the plot - Surfing Samurai Robots. Maybe that is just a lesson in the importance of finding the right title?

Anyone else out there have some good formative reads to share?

Industry Insider Screenwriting Contest

So, on top of my dabbling in writing fiction, I've also considered writing screenplays. Movies, in particular, as I'm not sure I'm necessarily cut out for the format of a television series. I took a couple wild cracks at movie scripts during the Script Frenzy "contests" - usually achieving the intended page count goal but not finishing with anything resembling a complete script. Each attempt was fun and educational, though, and I still have that nagging desire to see one through to the finish.

Which brings me to another contest - this one much more legitimately deserving of that term - that I've had my eye on for a year or so now, the Industry Insider Screenwriting Contest. This one is targeted primarily at new, aspiring writers, and has a low barrier to entry - you only have to submit the first 15 pages of a script for a logline provided by someone well established in the industry. Ten finalists then work with one of the Writers Store's staff over the course of a couple months, getting valuable feedback with each new set of pages added to the script until finished and then a winner is chosen. Really does sound pretty ideal for a first timer.

Well, with each new round of the contest, I've sat down a brainstormed a few different sketches for the logline. Some had a bit of potential, but none sucked me in and demanded to be written. And, thusly, I have yet to try to enter the contest.

A new round of the contest just began and I'm in the process of working up some ideas. The logline was provided by Edward Saxon (Silence of the Lambs, Philadelphia, and others) - "After a storm destroys her small farm, killing her mother and father, an adolescent girl is sent off on a journey of survival."

Not bad. It provides quite a bit of structure, while remaining wide open. I immediately discarded the first couple thoughts that came to mind, most surrounding tornadoes in the mid-west (something with which I grew up) and the recent hurricane disasters, figuring it was best to head in an unexpected direction. I now have three very rough ideas, two are hard sci fi and one is magic fantasy, and in most all variants of these the "small farm" has nothing to do with produce. There are lots of different kinds of farms and I wanted to use an unexpected interpretation.

Now the tricky bit - fleshing these out to see if I can get one to suck me in and demand to be written...