The Great Spring Rearranging

About two weeks ago I came to the realization that I was rapidly running out of bookshelf space. The bookcases in my office: crammed. The DVD shelves in the bedroom: overloaded. The bookcases in the downstairs library: close to bursting. The solution? The four big bookcases given to me by my mother before she died. They've been sitting out in the garage for the last few years and the time finally came to clean them up, move them into the house and use them. Alas, things could not be that simple. Are they ever? Those four bookcases don't really match any of the others, so I wanted to keep them all together on one wall. This necessitated moving half the freaking house around. Because various bookcases were bought separately, not all match and are the exact same height. Others were inherited and are unique. Thus the great move went like this:

1. Move the four bookcases from the garage into the library.
2. The three bookcases usurped from the library would go upstairs, one to my office, two to the bedroom.
2. Move two existing bookcases from my office to the bedroom.
3. Move two different existing bookcases from the bedroom to my office.
4. Completely rearrange the (now) 8 bookcases in the bedroom.
5. Remove collectibles from one large bookcase in living room and place into two barrister bookcases given to us my The Other Half's mother.
6. Move this now empty bookcase and use it for books.
7. Move four small bookcases from various locations around house to bedroom.
8. Move one (of two) TVs from bedroom to office.
9. Rearrange entertainment center downstairs.
10. Buy wood and cut new shelves for various bookcases.

Of course, in order to do all this moving, all the books and DVD's in these bookcases had to be removed. Great googly moogly! I never knew how many I had until I went to take them out and keep them in the same order. There were books and movies stacked EVERYWHERE! Some books moved from one room to another, but for the most part, they stayed where they were at. The really tough part was because The Other Half has a pinched nerve in her neck/back, she can do very little physical work. Thus it fell on me to move everything by myself. With my bum shoulder it took some work, but I managed to get everything done over the last two weeks - and this is why it's been so quiet on this blog...I've been utterly exhausted. Now, after all this moving, there is plenty of shelf space for more books and DVD's. At least for another five years or so. After that, I have no idea what I'll do.

Musical Inspiration: Tenebre

Today's musical selection is the theme from Dario Argento's 1982 giallo-thriller, Tenebre (also known as Unsane). Tenebre or Tenebrae is a Latin word for darkness or shadows. The film follows a writer who arrives in Rome only to find somebody is using his novels as the inspiration for committing murder. As the death toll mounts the police are baffled, and the writer becomes more closely linked to the case than is comfortable. The music is by the legendary band Goblin, who provided music for many a horror film, including George Romero's Dawn of the Dead. The Tenebre theme has a very disco-like vibe to it and I can't help but picture guys in leisure suits dancing to it or chicks on roller skates zooming around to it. Needless to say, it is currently the one piece of music that I cannot get out of my head. Give it a listen:



The French electronic music duo, Justice, sampled the music for their songs Phantom (which you can hear below or here) and Phantom Part II. This leads me to wonder, when is sampling a good thing, if ever? Some artists only sample specific beats and riffs, while others sample larger pieces. Where is the line drawn between being so creatively challenged that one has to lift music from others and the desire to take an older piece of music and put a modern spin on it? From all accounts, Justice had Goblin's blessing, so die hard Goblin fans cannot get too irate. Personally, I prefer the original version, but that's just me. Oddly enough, this sampling theme fits with the movie Tenebre, where a writer has his words co opted by a killer and used in several bloody murders. Now I just need to snag a copy on DVD. Fortunately, a newer special edition is available, since the original edition went OOP quite some time ago.

Review: One Million AC/DC

Simply put, this movie sucks worse than a malfunctioning sex doll. A tribe of cavemen deal with horny apes and hungry T-Rexes while simultaneously inventing pornography, wine making and BBQ. When not engaged in one of these activities, you'll find them screwing non stop. Hey, at the rate these morons get themselves killed, the Earth needed repopulating real quick.

Made in 1969, this film was nothing but a cheap "nudie" made to play on the grindhouse circuit. Nowadays the only grinding will be your brain as it comes to a crashing halt when watching this utter mess. This is the very first film in The Graveyard's history to score my lowest rating possible: The Toilet. Seriously, all copies of this film need to be consigned to the sewers along with the alligators and cannibals.

Lessons imparted by this film include:

1. "Going Ape" had an entirely different meaning a million years ago.
2. Even in prehistoric times, blondes were trouble.
3. All cavemen were capable of copulating without having to remove their fur clothing.

Go to review, if you're willing.

What's In A Name?

For the last couple weeks I've been outlining the story for Lair. Everything is going along great, but I am experiencing something that for the life of me I cannot seem to surmount very easy: naming my characters. Oh, I can shut my eyes and see them in my head. The color of their hair, their families, their jobs, their personalities, their quirks....but not their names. I have never had so much difficulty coming up with names for these folks. I've tried random name generators on the Internet, but while that has given me some names, I tend to dislike most that are suggested. I've tried mixing up the first and last names of people I know, but am afraid that if they do ever read the finished product, they'll be offended somehow. What to do? How do you come up with names for your characters?

The Character Pool

Throughout most of the year 1997, I crisscrossed the country as a long haul big rig driver (or over the road driver using industry jargon). You know that song, "I've Been Everywhere?" Well that was me, darn near. I made it to 44 out of 48 contiguous states and visited every major metropolitan area with the exceptions of Miami, New Orleans and Washington D.C. I met a lot of unusual people in the many places I passed though and started jotting down notes on some of the more quirky/memorable ones for use as character outlines. These characters went into a file I referred to as my "Character Pool." I had no specific story in mind for them and often they had no name, but I maintained the list for future reference.

Alas, that file was one that went bye-bye in the tragic hard drive crash of 09', though to be truthful, quite a few of the characters in that pool had hardcopy backups. Since then, I've jotted a few more down in a new (and properly backed up) file. Lately I've been going over them, trying to decide which ones I might use in Lair, the novel I will be attempting to write soon. Some fit my general idea for story setting while others do not. Still, even these may help spark some creative mojo in crafting new characters. Fleshing out these people and their backgrounds has turned out be a rather fun task and I find myself already imaging certain scenes and dialog exchanges based solely on their personalities and relationships. Of course, some are going to come to some very bad ends. Hehehe. Time to take some notes and refill the Character Pool.

Does anyone else have any specific ways for creating characters?

Review: The Angry Red Planet

New at the Graveyard this week is the 1959 (or 1960, depending on source) scifi flick, The Angry Red Planet, which tells the tale of four utter morons and the first manned expedition to the planet Mars. Too bad the Martians didn't tell us to stay off their lawn before we put all that time and effort into making the trip.

Lessons imparted by this film to remember include:

1. Bombers are used to ferry Generals from base to base.
2. Hot girls are always more important than the threat of radiation.
3. Rockets are like a TARDIS: bigger on the inside than on the outside.
4. Loafers are standard issue foot wear for rocket crews.
5. Bulova is a contractor for NASA.

Go to Review

Time To Reel Them In

I'm the type that nearly haunts Duotrope when I have more than three or four pieces out in submission land. I'm on that site constantly to see if any new responses have been reported from the same markets to which I subbed. When I went on my temporary break from writing a few months back, I had five stories submitted to various places. Sometime in December, one was accepted. The other four are still out there. They had already been out for some time when I went on my break. During the time I was focused on the movie site, I paid no attention to how long they had been out, but now I am seeing that the four stories have been out for 170, 225, 324 and 374 days, respectively. Two are zombies stories, one is a flash piece and the last (the one that's been out the longest) is a time travel story.

The time travel story is gonna stay where it's at. It went to the Time in a Bottle antho where it was promptly lost. It wasn't until K.C. Shaw mentioned to them that I had also subbed that they found it. Since the TOC for the book was already finalized by then, I had the option of withdrawing the story or letting them keep it for consideration for volume 2. I went with the latter. The other three stories however, may need to be addressed. Am I right in thinking it's time to query and/or withdraw them?

The new issue of Ghostlight Magazine is now out. This one features my story A Private Misery, the idea for which came to me one day when I wondered what would happen if an itch in a sensitive and private area would not stop. The awesome Aaron Polson also has a story in this issue and by my count this is the fifth time I have shared a TOC with him in a book or magazine. I guess they have to balance out his genius with my drivel.

Musical Inspiration: The Fog

When writing, there are times when I am so into "the zone" that I can ignore all manner of distractions while on other occasions I need almost complete and total silence in order to get anything done. Often I will play some music or have a movie running in the background to help get me in the proper frame of mind. Naturally, a lot of the music is rather creepy, given the genre I most frequently write in, but there are plenty of times I go for something more uplifting. Tonight's selection is the theme from the original version of The Fog.

100,000

Sometime on Sunday, the old Graveyard rolled over 100,000 hits. That's just the counter for the home page, so I'm sure collectively it's garnered a few more than that, but I've only kept track of that one page. That may not be very many for a site that's five years old, especially when compared to similar sites, but I'm rather proud of it.

On the writing front, despite dabbling with a short story over the last week, I find myself drawn more and more to the ideas I have for novel length tales. Writing short stories was supposed to help me get into a regular groove and work out some kinks. Now I find that I'm not too eager to return to smaller projects and really want to tackle something longer. Naturally, all my ideas for longer stories involve a monster of some kind. The one word titles I use to refer to these ideas are Lair, Nest, Arisen, Parts, Hunter and Jars. Aside from the creatures, I fear that the stories are much too similar and am trying to think of ways to help them stand apart. The first one, Lair, is the most developed (I actually went on a road trip to research stuff for it) and probably the one I'd tackle first. Who knows what I'll do. Any advice?

Consolidation

I have decided to merge both of my blogs, as I am tired of juggling two different ones. As I get my new writing schedule in place - one that allows me to work on both fiction and my beloved film reviews - I need to find ways to save time and consolidating THIS blog with the one before your eyes seemed the logical choice. More additions and changes will follow, including a name change for this one, as evidenced by the banner above.

What To Do?

Last night was a total loss. I fell asleep shortly after seven PM, and other than the five minutes at eleven to take the dogs pee and then haul my ass up the stairs to bed, I slept straight through to when my alarm went off at 5:20 this morning.

Tonight I began looking over my various "in progress" stories as well as my idea folder. For all intents and purposes I have not really written anything since October, so I'm trying to figure out where to pick things up. Work on an existing WIP? Start a new story based on an idea in the idea file? Perhaps brainstorm a new idea and story? For right now, I opted for the second one. I tried looking over the existing WIP's, but since it has been a while, I wasn't feeling much enthusiasm for them. Thus, I figured to actually get to writing, it would require something new. I chose an idea that I had been bouncing around in my head for some time. Right now it is painfully rough, but I just want to get accustomed to writing each night again before I worry about the numerous edits it will need.

Work sucks. The only bright spot is being pretty much invaluable to the company. Right now I am the only one who can operate both a fuel truck and an oil truck while maintaining an up to date familiarity with all our products AND current customers.. Each department has its own dispatcher and they've both been fighting over who gets to use me. Too bad oil usually wins. It's been moving all those damn 400 pound drums that helped screw up my shoulder.

Quicksand

Sheesh. Has it been that many weeks since I last posted? I can't believe that much time has gone by. No, scratch that. I can believe it. So where have I been? Let's see...

Once the new year rolled around and I wrapped up my big movie site project, I took a few days to rest and get ready to hit the keys again in crafting fiction. Then I got sick. A bout of sore throat-stuffy nose-raging headache extended my stay in bed. Once I got past that, the real humdinger hit me. For months I have been dealing with a growing pain in my right shoulder. In January that pain decided to become a full on damaged rotator cuff. Suddenly I couldn't move my arm much without it hurting really bad. This required a round of doctor visits, x-rays, shots and physical therapy that I am still dealing with. Through all this, I felt little or no desire to sit at the computer. As the days went by it was easier and easier to let this blog, my writing and other things just slide. Turning 41 didn't help my mindset much, but I am slowly trying to pull myself out of the funk and get back into my earlier groove.

One thing that helped was receiving some contracts to sign as well as some contributor copies. That really made me want to get back to my stories. So, hopefully, I can maintain some degree of regularity with this blog and my other endeavors. To that end, I may do some redesigning. I may not.

So what did I miss?

2009 In Review

A new year has arrived. Time for the obligatory year in review post. Before we get to 2009, I must first report on the month of December:

Words written: 0
Acceptances: 1
Rejections: 0

There that was simple. Now for the entire year. As I've mentioned a time or two before, 2009 was the year I finally got serious about writing. This stemmed from discovering 52 Stitches in 2008 and on a whim, whipping up some stories to submit. Two acceptances later, I was encouraged enough to keep going. Since I consider myself a newbie, my only goal for the year was to be consistent with my writing, editing, revising and submitting. I think I accomplished that. So for 2009 as a whole we have:

Stories written: 33
Stories sold: 29
Total acceptances: 30
Total rejections: 44

My goals for 2010 are the same for 2009, except this year I want to take the time to craft my stories better. It could be easy for me to claim that since so much of what I produced sold this year, it was good enough. The thing is, much of it was stuff I felt could be better, so "good enough" just doesn't cut it. Instead of churning out stories like mad, I want to take the time to really make each one shine. I've proven to myself that I can write and sell, now I want to write better. That and participating in Nano this year are my only real goals.

So here's to 2010! Woot!

Reading Fail

The other day I finished reading my 24th book in 2009, a far cry from the 50 I had hoped to complete. Of course, back in January I was working a different position at my job, one that allowed me plenty of time to read. Along came the recession and did away with my position for the time being, necessitating the move back to my old job, one that gives me NO time to read. Thus, my reading really took a dive this year. I've had to read (gasp) at home, rather than at work! That means reading time has to compete with writing time and movie time...and oh yeah, spending time with the wife. Next year doesn't look to be any different, so I'm not even gonna bother keeping a list.

Saw this the other day and it made me smile:

Happy Holidays!

Just popping up out of the void to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyful Kwanza, Festivus or whatever. I hope all is good with everyone out there.

I should be back to my old blogging habits come the first of the year, so expect the inane ramblings to increase exponentially. My big movie site project is about 95% complete. I'm really looking forward to writing some fiction once again!

November

Another slow month as far as writing is concerned.

Words written: 0
Rejections: 1 - Weird Tales
Acceptances: 2 - "Matches, Martyrs and Mortality" to the Zombie Feary Tales antho and "The Wind Whispers My Name" to 52 Stitches.

Despite the slow last couple of months, 2009 was a good year and I'm getting myself prepared to hit the keyboard hard and fast come 2010. Until then I continue to work on my big movie site project, which gradually nears completion. I'm over halfway through it all, so things are proceeding on schedule.

In nearly forgot that I had a tweet go up yesterday at thaumatrope.

The Twisted Legends antho came out, with my take on the tarantulas-in-the-cactus tale, "Desolation's Brood."

Plus, the "Road Trip" themed issue of The Monsters Next Door arrived, with my story "Valley of the Splintered Oaks."

It's been out a few weeks, but I don't think I ever mentioned the Creature Features antho from House of Horror, featuring my story, "Returning to Eden."

Okay, enough pimping. Time to get some real work done.

One last thing: congrats to all of you who fought your way through Nano this year. Next year, I am so there! :)

A Cause For Celebration

Back in 1996, in the midst of one my earlier attempts at writing and submitting stories, I wrote a story called A Cause For Celebration. Inspired by the movie Independence Day, it told of a world wide alien invasion that grinds to a sudden halt when the extraterrestrials discover they have mistakenly attacked the wrong planet. The story is told from the view point of some random bar patrons, drowning their miseries and watching things unfold on TV. Of course, the story didn't sell and after two or three rejections, I pushed it aside and soon after stopped even trying to write (the general idea was explored again in 100 word Micro I posted earlier in the year).

Still, there was something about the story that I liked. While events of epic proportions were unfolding, it focused on just a handful of everyday folk and their own personal views, using the alien invasion more as background. About a year ago, when deciding to give "this writing thing" another shot, I dusted off that story and changed the background events. Rather than an alien invasion, it was now a plague overrunning the Earth, transforming people into zombie-like hordes of the infected. What remained the same was everything else: people in a bar discussing the impending end of the world. I began sending the story out again...and again it got rejected. A lot. I was on the verge of shelving it forever when it finally sold to The Nautilus Engine.

Aside from any references to the virus and zombies, this is the exact same story from 1996. When you have a chance, read it and let me know what you think.

A Cause For Celebration.

Remembering October

October was an easy month to sum up:

(fiction) Words written: 0
Rejections: 0
Acceptances: 1

See? Easy. The reason I wrote nothing is the same reason why I have opted to not participate in Nano this year. Some of you may recall me mentioning a movie website I maintained. Well, that site got hacked and that disaster coupled with my hard drive crash from early in the year meant that I lost quite a bit of material. Thus, I have been working to update all those older movie reviews in a new format. This means writing about 3k (on average) words each for the 44 reviews I had on there. That is what I've been working on and what I will be working on for the rest of the year. This blog may be in run silent, run deep mode until January, but I'll pop up from time to time.

I hope Nano is going good for those giving it a go!

Blog? WHAT blog?

Yikes! Nearly two weeks since I posted here! The truth is, not much has been happening. Certainly nothing worth blogging about. I have written zero words this month. Well, aside from the notes for my Nano project. I've been mapping it out with a very rough outline. I continue to think that story over in my head each day, still not convinced to take the plunge and give Nano a shot this year. I've also been busy on several other non-writing projects, so I figured if I am going to do Nano, this month would be a good time to get to all the things that have been piling up, cuz I won't have a lot of time in November.

I've been reading everyone's blogs, but just have been too tired to comment. I haven't even bothered to trying to get caught up on Twitter. I get home each day and it announces that I have 200+ new tweets to read. That's when I leave the room and go take a nap.

WIP Wednesday

My WIP this week is a story called The Anubis Appropriation. The title is recycled and has a strange history to it. It started off as an unnamed Tweet story for thaumatrope. They rejected it, so I decided to expand it beyond 140 characters to a full blown 100 words for the now defunct Micro 100. At this point I came up with the title, to help describe the story of two buffoonish con men/adventurers who raise a mummy from the dead in hopes of tricking it into revealing the hiding place of its treasure. It got rejected again. I think I posted a different 100 word version on this blog as part of that 100 days/100 Micros thing that I gave up on. Then along came The Scroll of Anubis anthology. I expanded the idea into a 3000 word story, but since the anthology already had the name Anubis in the title, I changed the story's name to The Legacy of Seshat. This time the story was accepted and it tells the tale of Arthur Davis and Miles Kirkpatrick, two unscrupulous Indiana Jones wannabes that get in over their heads when raising the mummy of Prince Ibus from the dead. Davis and Miles survived the story, which brings us to my WIP.

Since I never used the name The Anubis Appropriation, I decided to haul it out again for a new story, again featuring Davis and Miles ( I hope to use them in several future stories, each one detailing a new scheme of theirs or further inept attempts at getting rich while dealing with the supernatural). This time they're trying to procure (steal) an ancient Egyptian artifact from a Las Vegas pawn shop that legend says was cursed by the god Anubis and which gave rise to Jackal-men, which in turn eventually lead to modern werewolves centuries later. Maybe this time the title will stick.

My flash piece The Sea Hath No King is now up at AlienSkin magazine. Check it out and let me know what you think. It was one of those stories that I wrote on the spot, having been inspired by the old monster films, The Horror of Party Beach and The Monster of Piedras Blancas. In fact, I paused one movie halfway through and came to the computer to write the story before continuing with the film. Dutiful members of the Aaron Polson fan club should note that the new issue of AlienSkin also features his story, Melons.