As a little shake up on a limp Thursday, enjoy a teaser excerpt from The Red Triskelion plus the Book Trailer for your viewing pleasure.  As Joseph Campbell says: "You enter the forest at the darkest point, where there is no path. Where there is a way or path, it is someone else's path. You are not on your own path. If you follow someone else's way, you are not going to realize your potential."


"How can I be ready for something when I don’t even know what it is?" Rory wondered aloud, certain she sounded as frustrated as she felt. “I wish you would stop talking in stories,” she groused. She’d said that to Nana more than once, when she’d use old stories and fables to try to get a point across without ever really saying what it was. It always annoyed Nana when she said that, because it was her opinion that figuring out the lesson was as important as the lesson itself.

Rory expected a scolding, but she didn't expect the cold evasiveness in Nana's reply.

"You are ready to learn which stories are true," Nana's voice was firm and serious. "In the forest, it is not the wild animals you need to fear. There is life out there that most will not believe and cannot see; things that once you have met...well, you’ll see." Nana broke a piece of bread from the load in the basket and held it out to Rory.

“Nana, I don’t understand,” Rory said emphatically, “Are you saying you are going to send me into the woods to meet with someone or something
other people can’t see? Do you know what that sounds like?”

Nana didn’t dignify her question with a response. She changed the subject as easy as breathing. "Eat well and tonight I will show you how to truly see." Nana grinned like a cat baring her teeth; teeth still as straight and white. "Eat," she repeated, dropping the bread on the table in front of Rory.

That smile was frightening.

Rory wanted to march right out the door and never come back. She wanted to at least get up away from the table and straighten her shoulders and shake off the feeling of anticipation and anxiety that had descended on her. Instead, she sat still as a stone and slowly reached for the bread on the table. She took a bite.

This was crazy.

"Good, good,” Nana murmured and nodded with a smile as Rory chewed. “You will need your strength."
​
Rory swallowed. She recognized the feeling behind her ribs now; it had been ages since she’d felt it; she almost forgot what it was like. It had started the moment she heard that first rustle of leaves in the underbrush and hadn’t abated since. Maybe it was crazy. Butterflies and bumblebees buzzed wildly in her chest.

She was excited.

For the first time in a long time, it felt like something might really happen. It wasn’t just the forced hope she’d felt with Keller, but real, honest anticipation. Rory shivered as a wave of goosebumps rolled over her. The bread sat like a lump in her stomach and her mouth went dry.

Maybe it wasn't just Nana who was going crazy. 

Publishing is like cake.  It comes in the fancy traditional from scratch option, or you can buy a mix in a box. 

Anyone can do it and that seems to be the problem.

With all the free and inexpensive options out there, anyone can write and publish these days.  This has created the idea that anyone who chooses the self publishing route is either not "good enough" for traditional publishing or simply foolish in a number of ways.  There's a lot of elitism from the traditional side of the fence regarding all aspects of the process, not just the content of the work, but also the formatting, design work and all the other details that go into turning a raw material into a book.

While there is certainly plenty of reason to critique pretty much any published work no matter how it's published, self-published works tend to start at a disadvantage.  There is something about the very idea that someone would have the audacity to share their creations without a chaperone that sets people's teeth on edge, especially if they work in any industry that is involved in traditional publishing.  

I get it.  I really do.  There is something to be said for the fine quality of many traditionally published books.

But I am also utterly unmoved by it.

I considered how I would have to go about finding a publisher or an agent.  I also looked at the statistics involved in getting published.  The entire drama seemed disheartening and a complete waste of time.  Was I really going to spend all this time chasing after the 1% chance someone would be in the right mood when my query hit their desk?  Was I going to put myself through months or years of rejection when I could just be writing instead?

Like most writers, that's not all I am or all I do.  I have a job, because I'm funny and I like to eat and have electricity.  I also have a family and I like to do things other than bleed onto a keyboard.  (I bleed onto the keyboard plenty, but it cannot be all I do or I would go utterly mad and also have nothing to write about.)

After a lot of soul searching, self publishing seemed the only logical route.  But indulging my vanity wasn't what it was about.  I couldn't spend thousands of dollars to make this happen.  The mere idea is like asking me to build a space worthy craft out of popsicle sticks and fly to the sun.  I worked hard.  I kicked ass.  Eventually there came the point where I had to say good enough and hit the publish button.

And somehow, the imperfections don't bother me like I thought they might.  I can see how and where to critique my own work, and as I work on the next one I'm learning from this experience, even though it's been less than a month since I set it free to have a life of its own.  I expect I will learn a lot more as I go on and chances are, I'll change and grow.  Damn, I hope so.

But despite all the criticism, despite the snide comments and disparaging remarks, I truly think the publishing industry benefits from this.  Literature, storytelling, art; they all benefit from the chances people take.  What we create won't always be perfect, but it will always be something.

Sometimes, when you bake a cake, you end up with a lump of ill flavored charcoal no matter what ingredients you start with.  Sometimes, it's fantastic.  Usually, it's a just a cake.  

But, hey, wow cake.

There are things you don't understand that hide in those trees, child. You just might lose your way.  

Rory is trying very hard to be just like everyone else.  You know how it is, wanting to color between the lines and want what everyone else wants (or at least what it seems like everyone else wants.) But it nags at her; it doesn't feel right.  It tends to go poorly anyway.

As I wrote The Red Triskelion, I wanted to create something exciting, fun and sexy, but on its own, that's the sort of story you forget as soon as you close the cover.  Sometimes, that's fantastic.  I've enjoyed reading and writing those sort of stories.  But I wanted a little more from this story.  Something that might stick with you when it was over.

Only you guys can tell me if I've accomplished that.  I look forward to all critiques, comments and reviews, good or bad.  The most important thing to me is to tell stories that my readers get something out of.  If I make you cry or laugh or maybe turned on a little? Then I've done what I set out to do.

The Red Triskelion is available in paperback and kindle format at the link and can be found on any of the Amazon family of sites by searching for the title.

I hope you'll give it a look.  I can't wait to hear what you think.

If you read any of the marketing blogs/websites/lists for writers, they talk about blogging which, of course, makes sense.  Writers write, so the idea of writing a blog and sharing ideas and thoughts should be second nature.  The whole point seems to be to connect to readers, get your name in heads and on lips and hopefully in their book wishlist.  


Thus, here I am, trying to write a blog.


I do come up with ideas pretty frequently but I notoriously forget before I can get them down.  Stories are different for me.  They hound me.  The characters remind me to tell their stories.  I can't get away from them.  I have unfinished stories and novel ideas from ten years ago I still think about, even after abandoning them as unusable.


(Sounds like I hear voices; I swear, I really don't.  I think. Maybe.)


But blogs...blogs are hard.  They aren't the same.  The only character is me and sharing my own thoughts is super strange for me.  Not that my stories aren't my thoughts and don't have a lot of me bundled into them, but this format, where its me talking to you?  Damn.


I'm an introvert of the worst kind, which seems to be pretty common among creative types, but for me that leads to this struggle that anyone wants to hear a story about me.  Unless its really dramatic? It just seems weird.  Even writing this right now seems pretty awkward.


Yet, readers like to connect with creators.  I know I do.  I might not be really comfortable writing this, but I read a lot of blogs myself, quietly lurking without commenting.  A lot of them say the same things over and over again, which I can never decide is if it's because the advice is good or because its just this thing everyone does.


Blogging seems like one of those things.  But I'm giving it a shot.


Giving advice is great, but only if its actually helpful.  A lot of blogs work with that in mind.  Yet I feel utterly unsuitable to give advice to anyone over the age of ten.  I certainly don't feel I'm the right person to give advice on how to write, how to create characters, how to not sound like a jackass when writing a blog.


I do think about these things all the time.  If I'm not thinking of a story to write, or a moment to paint or the in between moments in my favorite games (where I create all new stories to make those already rich worlds all-encompassing) , I'm thinking about how to create a story.  I think about how to get the story out of my head into the world.  I think about the impact the stories have on me and you and everyone else.  


(Sometimes, I just think about sexy things, but I digress.)


It still feels weird.  It feels awkward and strange and really outside of my comfort zone.  But I love to give the same short advice all the time, both to others and to myself; fake it 'til you make it.


So here I am.  Whatdya wanna talk about?

I've always been a storyteller.  


When I was 6 years old, I wrote a story about unicorns and on some of my grandpa's scratch paper made illustrations and had him staple it together into a book. All in crayon.


I've been telling stories ever since.


So why is it that I'm 40 and I'm just getting ready to publish my first book?


That's a questions I've been asking myself for a long time.  Its not that I wasn't writing. I've written enough to fill multiple novels; some original and some in the safe, unpublishable world of fanfiction.  No pressure there, though admittedly fanfiction readers can be a hard crowd to please.


I came up with any number of excuses; it was too stressful, it was too hard, what if no one wanted to read it? Where did my book fit? Who would publish it? Would they put a cover on it I hated? Don't I have to quit art to be a writer or quit writing to be an artist? What if everything went wrong? What if I failed?


But it hit me, that old cliche: the only sure way to fail is not to try.  I was going to write anyway.  I was going to paint anyway.  Might as well share it with the world.  Even if my audience is small, there's someone who's going to be better for having read it.  I didn't have to write Siddhartha or The Metamorphosis for my words to be important to someone, to give someone a little happiness, some beauty in a world that isn't always very nice.


So its coming soon, the first novel; The Red Triskelion which is an adult twist on Little Red Riding Hood, with romance, sex and some tropes dangling by their ankles over a cliff.  It's fun and sexy and maybe it even has a moral.  


There will be more to come. There will be more paintings and more fanworks too.  There are lots stories to tell.  I hope you'll stick around to hear them.