Requesting a Patten for a Dream Machine Please

I find it unbelievable, sometimes, that writers are granted the seeds to incredible stories in their dreams. They have these dreams that, just so happens, fall nicely into the genre they write, and are able to piece it together into a great tale.

I am not saying that this never happens. I just don’t think it happens like most of the writers’ claim it does. Or maybe they weren’t “dreaming” in the sense of REM dreaming, but were drunk, high, or medicated. What I really think happens is this: they do have a dream, but can’t actually remember every detail about it; somehow, though, they consciously expand upon the portions they do remember then say it all came to them in a dream.

Here are the last few dreams I had:

I was outside my home with my uncle. An older gentlemen—who my uncle and I both know—approached us. He threw his arms around my uncle, began saying “I’ve always appreciated you.” while crying. It is true that this older man—old enough to be my uncle’s father—does, indeed, make this remark every time he sees him.

I was riding around in a car with my friend. We were listening to music on the radio. Next, I was walking to a secluded cabin in the woods. A female friend of mine was asleep in the back room, but I sat down at a small table in the front room near the front door. I was drinking coffe, I think. Then a mechanical animal came through the front door. It was a robot dog, or cat, I’m not sure which one. The robot warned me that someone was coming for me. Apparently, I was a member of an elite special forces team. A chopper came over the woodland where the cabin was.

Next thing I know is that I’m standing on top of a tall building that is falling apart. My hope to survive is to grab a hold of a rope ladder extending from a chopper above. I do this and the chopper soars away, and I find myself dangling on this rope over a large body of water. There are some other people on the ladder too. They ask me what I did to get captured. I’m confused because I thought I was being rescued, but they inform me that this is the “enemy” chopper. Then the chopper is about to fly over a long bridge that crosses this body of water. So I decided to jump onto the top of a car as the chopper flies over. But I forgot about momentum and I end up falling short of the car’s roof and missing the bridge completely. Instead, I crash into the water on the other side of the bridge where I start sinking deeper, and deeper.

Somehow, though, I managed to survive. In fact, I found myself back in the cabin, but this time in the bedroom. I talked to my female friend, knowing I wanted something romantic to happen between us, but she just wanted to be friends. We hug goodbye and I leave the cabin.

At the end of the dream I am back in my friend’s car. We are listening to music again, and he’s asking me about my relationship with the female friend.

In the first dream not much happened. Actually, absolutely nothing happened. It’s almost like my mind was just replaying a scene that actually could have happened in my day-to-day life. Most of my “dreams” are like this, short and boring. Nothing inspirational here.

The second dream–which I gotta say, really freaked me out after I woke up–was far fetched, random, and disorganized. I rarely have dreams like this unless I’m taking cold medications or suffering from sleep deprivation. I actually told my female friend about this dream—she already knew that I wanted a little romance—and she asked me if I was on drugs. I told her that I didn’t need drugs to think up this sort of stuff, which, I added, may be a bad thing.

Somewhere in this last dream is a story. The drawback, though, is that I don’t write techno-thrillers, even though I’ve thought about it before. Perhaps I should keep this dream logged somewhere so that in the future I might write a story about a young man who is a member of an elite special forces group, but also trying to live a normal life with friends, and trying to convince his really good female friend to give him a chance. Well, when I say it like this it sounds lame, but all rough ideas need some spicing up.

Still, I think it would be nice to have a Dream Machine. It would be this metal, box like instrument with programmable options for selecting what perimeters you want included in your dream. Say you want “Action” and then you can select “Swords and Magic” or “Guns and Technology”, or choose “Romance” with sub-options for “Light Romance” or “Wet Dream”. And hell, if you’re a horror writer who needs inspiration you can put it on “Nightmare Mode”.

There are supposed techniques to manipulate your dreams, like “lucid dreaming”. I’ve even tried some of them before. But I’ve found it difficult to consciously enact these techniques once entering into a dream. My mind takes full control, goes on auto-pilot and sticks me in the cargo hold down below.

Anyways, that’s all for now! Sweet dreams, folks!

Rock’n’Bloggin’Rollin’: Keep on Bloggin’!

I’m not a fanatical blogger. This isn’t because I don’t have a lot to say—I’m infected with chronic logoreae. There’s just something awkward, perhaps a little presumptuous, about posting one’s personal musings with the expectation that anyone else will care to “subscribe” to your endless contemplations. Okay, granted, we do live in the age of Twitter and Facebook status updates where people post a moment-by-moment update to their daily life. But why? Does anyone, not counting yourself, your grandmother, or possibly your significant other—people you probably see on a daily basis anyways—really care?

Have you ever heard (or perhaps more appropriately read) someone saying “I need more blogs to read”? Because I know I’ve seen these words written many times. I’m not sure what the fascination behind reading blogs is, but I won’t lie and say that I haven’t ever read them. Problem is, however, I’ve never “subscribed” to one because I’ve never actually found one that amused me enough to stick around—this may have something to do with my neurotic personality and inability to be consistent with one thing; hell, I find it phenomenal that I’m able to remain interest in one writing project long enough to finish it, though, I admit it takes me much longer than it should to complete one.

Here I am, though, bitching about blogging, and questioning the reasoning for all the madness…on my blog! Absurd, isn’t it? But I’ve begun to realize some things that, hopefully, will revolutionize the way I feel about blogging: 1) In my writing projects I fret over self-editing, proofreading, and making things look polished, but with blogging/journaling I just write down my thoughts, and don’t hassle myself with uptight correctness. 2) I have a mind-full of ideas, rants, philosophy, personal observations, and so much more that I need to find an outlet for. And 3) I may as well start developing (or at least attempt) some semblance of an online personality outside the small writing critique groups I frequent.

And I hope that some of my future blogging will be either amusing or informative, if not both. I won’t blog a lot about my writing projects in specific details to avoid seeming like I’m trying to cram my “awesome kick-ass” novel down anyone’s throat—please read the sarcasm between quotations.

I did write an article the other day titled “The Creative Writer’s Fitness Routine”. I’ll be certain to post it within the next few days—after a bit of light editing.

Note: Some may argue that if a writer can’t take the time to proof/edit his blog post then how serious is he taking his real writing? I would love to proof/edit all my blog posting to appease the grammar-obsessed masses, but quite frankly, I just don’t have the time to for editing these post, and writing and editing my real writing projects too—I do have a day job, you know? So kiss off.

Blackened Westerns: The Revised World (Part One)

Blackened Westerns: The Revised World

While the original concept behind what was then called “Dark Frontier”, and later “Blackened Fantasy”, was mostly a mix between western and traditional sword and sorcery fantasy. In a way it sort of felt like Dungeons and Dragons in a wild-west campaign. Even though I wrote an entire 120k word novel (badly written I may add) and began the sequel to that novel, along with countless short stories and a novella all based on this original concept it all had a silly vibe to it. In the novella, “Where The Mourning Lotus Grows”, for instance: a cursed gunfighter seeking a cure for a were-disease basically goes on a hero’s journey, and meets a handful of characters including a wood elf, and a cleric. Perhaps even more silly was the ogre outlaws and bounty hunters in the novel, “The Ascension”, which took me over two years to complete—it was the first novel length work I ever completed.

Yet today I can’t, or rather won’t, allow these stories to be presented on any public venue because it is not the world I had wanted to show. All those stories that I spent so much time writing, and obsessing over had never felt right to me. In the end I think it’s safe to say that I was trying too hard to be “weird” and different. But those stories do not reflect the Realm or Morgue as I want it to be presented.

I dropped the term “Blackened Fantasy” as a description of the world. Instead I chose, “Blackened Westerns”, and it is currently the tentative title for my newest project: Blackened Westerns: Volume One. If this was some sort of Role-playing universe then those old stories would possibly be part of some alternative campaign or an outdated version.

Thus, all future audience should disregard anything concerning Realm of Morgue that describes it as “Blackened Fantasy”, or fantasy of any intense nature. “Blackened Westerns” is the new direction.

During some time in 2009 I took on a frightening task: I decided to strip the Realm of Morgue down to it’s basics, reevaluate the foundation, and revise most of it’s design. This endeavor began as an experiment. I had taken the bottom-up approach to build the world, starting with one small location, in a small region of the realm, then expanded outwards over time. During the revamp if was like taking a few screws out here, a few bolts out there, reassembling some pieces, and rearranging some parts, removing a few attributes, and adding in new elements.

At first I was uncertain what I was doing was going to be worth a damn. But I was basically at the end of the line with this world—it was do or die. So I did it. I went in totally new directions, but directions I felt I knew better. I began to have a lot of self-reflective topics in my Writer’s Journal, looking for what I truly cared about in my fiction, and what I really wanted to write about it.

Eventually, what I discovered was that I needed to go with things that had fascinated me for long periods of time since I was a young kid, and that still fascinated me today. I also had to look into myself to determine what values and messages I believed in that I wanted to convey in my stories. Believe it or I try my best to slip subtle, positive messages into my fiction. There are pages of journal entries about all of these things.

Surprisingly to me, or perhaps not, was discovering the things that did fascinate me beyond no end. As part of my self-reflective writing revealed, I’m not a modernist, but rather a retro-geek. I’d rather enjoy books, movies, music, or other entertainment from decades past than any current releases of anything. This led me to aggressively pursue retro-era entertainment that I had always enjoyed, but rarely took the time to engross myself into it all at once.

Suddenly I was reading old comic books from the 1970s, and Marvel superhero comics from the ’80s and ’90s—back when things were really good. I was playing beat’em arcade games like Double Dragon, Mutant Nation, X-Men, Robocop, and more. As far as movies went I have always watched older flicks from the early ’90s or before, even classic horror with Bela Lugosi, Vincent Price, and Alfred Hitchcock, and ’70s and ’80s gory, near pornographic horror films.

And that’s when I began to realize that the Realm of Morgue needed to be revamped. It needed to reflect these personal pleasures of mine, and hopefully I thought, turn others on to these same pleasures. My love for classics, and retro entertainment began to fuel my disdain for contemporary entertainment industries including movies, music, and even books.

The Realm of Morgue drastically changed; but it became something that I knew was going to be even more impacting than before. The old Morgue was like an electric skinning knife, but the new Morgue was like an over-powered chainsaw at full throttle. Gaps that had been m,missing were suddenly filled, and things that I had never thought about were being fleshed out to add more substance to the world. And then the world itself grew into an entire universe!

Morgue has become such a strange chimera of a beast that I have felt overwhelmed at some stages of it’s development. For inspiration I have searched for other stories, and books that deals with a similar world, but I have yet to find one. I won’t presume that this world is so unique it has not been done before, though, in all actuality I can’t find anything that is an exact match. This can be viewed as a good thing—it’s an entirely original universe—but on the other hand it could be too original that it won’t ever make an impact. Yet this is perfectly acceptable with me because I do not intend to write for the masses, or appeal to a large audience; thus, I feel more liberties in what I can do, and what I don’t have to necessarily do. While there are many fictional universes in existence that do feature things similar to Blackened Westerns, there are still none that fit it perfectly. Take the Wild, Wild West, or Adventures of Brisco Country Jr. for instance: Both depict a typical American wild west setting with anachronistic technology, and strong elements of science-fiction similar to Morgue, but both are light-hearted, sometimes comical in story and characters while Morgue is darker, and more serious.

Joe R. Lansdale’s Dead in the West is a weird west about a small western town that is cursed by a vengeful Indian’s spirit, and plagued by the living dead. Though it does have the wild west setting with supernatural themes like Morgue, it relies more on horror than science-fiction, and technology.

DC Comic’s Jonah Hex, and Scalphunter take the western genre into near superhero territory. Jonah Hex has been known to do battle with some rather gruesome foes, leaving behind trails of blood, and gore. The Hex series relies heavily on wild west themes, and characteristics, but with some supernatural and fantastical attributes thrown in.

After all is said, and done, though, I think the post-revamped Morgue is an excellent playground for my creative tendencies. And I am hoping that it will attract a small audience when final drafts are completed.

Serial Fiction Writing

Serial Fiction Writing

A Thesis

The Serial Fiction is based on the continuing stories with related character, settings, themes or other aspects that link all the stories together. In Buffy, The X-Men, and The Twilight Zone, there are all interconnected elements which tie the stories together; in the first two examples, the link is within characters and setting; in the latter example, the interconnected element is the theme and concept. In the first example, Buffy, the continuity is established by the characters, settings and common events ex: vampire hunting, school life, romantic relationships. In The X-Men, the series is connected by character and setting but also by continuing plot threads creating a more direct link between the episodes ex: A battle began in Issue X may continue into Issue Y and Issue Z before being completely resolved. And in The Twilight Zone, the connection is not with characters and/or setting but with a reoccurring theme ex: The concept of the “twilight zone” and strange unnatural events.

Further analysis on these interconnected elements in a moment. But for the purpose of this article, I am only concerned about the first two examples—the Buffy and X-Men theory on serial fiction. These two series are based primarily on character and setting, and to a degree, theme.

The most important components to a serial universe is the Characters and Setting. These two elements must be established as interesting, alluring and pose a continuous sense of curiosity that causes the audience to stay hooked. The character and setting must remain fresh, inventive and resonate with mystery; if the audience begins to predict the nature of the series or isn’t attracted to the hooks and characters then the series will fail.

Joe Edkin describes the Three Key Elements of a series as “Family Unit”, “The Secret” and “Memory” to which I will briefly cover below. But first, the series should not only have enjoyable character and setting but also engrossing plots, sub-plots and also arcs for both characters and plot threads.

“Family Unit” is the group of main characters that the series is essentially about which can include: friends, co-workers or blood related family.

“The Secret” is the mysterious and unknown elements that either the reader is not privy to or the characters are unaware of but that the reader knows. These secrets create mystery and suspense that keep the reader interested in wanting to know what happens next.

“Memory” is the basic premise to any series which is related heavily to the continuity within the serial story. Memory plays both an important role for the characters and the reader; for example, if the character encounters someone or experiences an important event in one issue then they would remember that person or event in later issues and so will the audience if they witnessed the original encounter. This is true unless other factors are involved such as “mind wiping” or other devices are used to erase memory of past events—but this factor should be established so that the audience is aware of it.

More about continuity and the analysis of Buffy and the X-Men: Continuity, related closely to the memory factor, is the essential element that creates cohesion between the episodes, linking them with one another and creating an overall plot arc that remains similar throughout the series. For example, in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, there are several continuing plots; the most obvious of these is the premise that Buffy is a chosen vampire slayer thus hunting vampires and other creatures throughout the series. Another element, however, is the ongoing relationship between the characters and character arcs that show gradual change and development. To think of this is simple terms, in a general fiction series, we are introduced to the main character(s) and see how they become connected to other characters (Buffy finding and making friends and enemies) and in the following episodes the friendship or rivalry continues, sometimes changing in subtle or dramatic ways. With Buffy however, the sub-plots and most episodes are not directly linked and are essentially completely stand-alone stories. If you had not seen the first season or two, you could still watch an episode and pick up on the story and rules of the fictional world. Still, there are reoccurring major plots that are either present in every episode or at least hinted at.

Regarding the X-Men series, though, some of the sub-plots will carry on for several issues which is commonplace in the comic world. In the world of non-comic and non-graphic novel writing, though, this doesn’t work as well. The scripts for a comic are greatly condensed and for the most part the graphic panels tell the story. Whereas in the exclusively written world, images and senses must be provoked by relying entirely on prose. That is not to say that it cannot be done and in today’s high-tech world it can be accomplished much easier than 10-15 years ago. With the evolution of the internet, especially blogs and webzines, the serial story has found a wider audience. In this past such written serials were typical to newspapers and pulp magazines.

To paraphrase Joe Edkin, “Every comic is going to be someone’s first experience” so the secret is to make each episode a self-contained story; with the additiona of subtle “memories” to past episodes this creates the continuity within the story. The degree of this connectivity varies between series but for the sake of this thesis let’s assume that the connections are as so that within a 10 issue story, someone can pick up issue 4 or issue 6 and completely understand the plot. However, it might be difficult to pick up issue 8, 9, and 10 without having read the others. This is where serialized stories becomes difficult at least in the sense of marketing. The idea, however, is that through the first few issues a respectable readership is formed and also for anyone that arrives in media res will feel inclined to read the back-issues. With this theory in mind, I could propose that anyone who discovers the series during issues 8-10, would seek out the previous issues in order to answer their questions concerning the concluding plot arc.

Also, based on this theory of “Readership cult”, each issues that is published will be followed by the fans. For the fans to have access to each issue, though, would mean having the issues freely available to them on-line. This would mean they can read each issue for free and follow the plot without having to spend any money in order to do so. As such, this would mean that the series needs to appear in either a webzine, a blog, or other free access location.

The problem this presents for webzine and third-party publication (outside my personal website) is that it could be difficult to sell a story which requires previous knowledge of the characters, setting and plots. There are a few possible solutions to this dilemma that I have contemplated thus far.

One is the reliance on the “Readership cult” theory. Using this as an advertising strategy could work in aiding the publication of the series. This presents a double-edged sword, though. First, a readership must be acquired which means stories must be published somewhere. This had led me to give thought to a couple solutions unique to this problem: The first few issues can be published on my personal website/blog and hoping I can interest people into reading the series; presenting these early establishing issues in an attractive and high quality format (obviously) is also an idea.
The second solution to this double-edged problem is making the first few issues have a lax continuity, essentially making each a complete stand-alone story that can serve as the “start” of the series; after these first few issues are published, assuming this builds up a readership, then the following stories can expand upon the overall continuity and implement more “memory” aspects to reference these earlier events.

The second solution would involve having a single webzine publish the issues so that the readers of that publication all have the opportunity to read the series in one location; this, in my opinion, would be no different than having the series published just like a comic series; it would have a permanent scheduled release and the series can retain a better connectivity. At the moment, I plan on having ten issues of THE DEADSLINGER series; after these ten issues are completed I will consider whether or not to continue the series into a “volume two”, create a spin-off or put the series to rest (hopefully it won’t come to this.) If there is a publisher willing to take this project, I could easily prove them with the first volume to be published during their scheduled rounds. And I have also given though to a couple other ideas including: Dividing “volume one”’s ten issues into 4-5 issues so that the magazine would only need to publish the first few issues and the second collection could be considered after or I could find a new magazine for those. Another idea was to have volume one divided, placing half on my personal website and finding a publisher for the other half.

Still remains the greatest problem of acquiring that initial readership. Without a fanbase of any size, the series will flop and issues 8-10 won’t even make an impression (or make any sense!) So I have devised a (clever?) plan in hopes of alleviating this problem just a bit.

The Origins story, at the moment considered “Issue One”, is technically a novellete length concept. This story features, of course, the origins of the main character and a clear presentation into the fictional universe that this all takes place within. In an attempt to prolong this tale and hopefully make it easier to digest, Origins will be split into multiple parts. Each part will be published on a regular schedule through my blog (or a blog devoted entirely to the series.) Once this “issue” is published and available for reading, I would hope that it attracts a small “readership cult” thus giving me creditable proof of the series marketability on a more commercial-based webzine (whether semi-pro or free, at least an established market.) With this idea, I would need to work hard at some self-promotion. I could even write some non-related stories, have them published and refer back to this site. This project is not to be considered lightly and will require a lot of hard and exhausting work—as it has already!

Writing Can Burn

So last summer my mind was on fire! I was writing some of the best material I have written in my life. Ideas were flying from my head to paper I couldn’t even find the time to write most of the short story projects I outlined. And then back in November I really got to cooking when I started “Blackened Westerns: Volume One” project.

This project has become one of my most ambitious endeavors to date. The fact that I’m still obsessed with it, still being motivated to continue writing it, all speaks volumes on how much I want to finish this. Actually, I don’t want to finish it. Finish Volume One, yet, but I hope that I can continue escaping to the Realm of Morgue for years, and years to come. Hell, I’ve already been there for years, and years now.

I have a journal entry from back in mid-October entitled “Writing Binge in November”. I had been writing nearly 2,000 words every night on stories. I had written, and completed several short stories, and was one of the most active members on the FWO fantasy writer’s forum. In fact, I finished Part One of Blackened Westerns: Volume One back then, and had started on Part Two—the entire book is broken into multiple parts of at least four.

But sometime in January I was dragging my tail. My daily quota was dropping, some days there wasn’t even a quota at all. The story slipped away from me, other things started taking priority. Then I realized something that I had suspected for years: I was going through my annual burn out.

It’s true. I spend several months at a time writing like a wild fire that can’t be contained. Every free moment I get I’m going to be typing away on a keyboard, or scribbling in a notebook. Some of my best work comes about during these committed sessions. But eventually my mind starts to surrender, give in, and then give out. Like a well that is tapped dry I just can’t fathom writing another coherent sentence.

These “burn outs” last a couple months or longer. Usually during those times my neurotic personality takes the helm, and I’m off on some other pipe dream, or just finding new hobbies, and new interest to occupy my leisure time. For instance, I took up the pastime of trapping during the winter months, enjoying the cold, outdoors. I also took up kickboxing, and studying martial arts philosophy, and techniques. Nothing too serious really, but I don’t have the time or money to go pay someone to learn a martial arts. Even then those people rarely teach the philosophy behind the arts.

But I finally got back around to browsing through my writer’s notebook a couple weeks back. I’m ashamed to admit that I can barely read my own writing sometimes. I have worse handwriting than my left-handed dad. But I was able to revive the stories, the ones I had been working on, in my mind, and pick up almost exactly where I left off. I gotta say, without that writer’s notebook, or the dozens and dozens of Writer’s Journal pages on my laptop I probably would’ve been lost! There is so much in my notes that I had forgotten about regarding the story, and characters, and themes, and…yeah, you get the picture.

As I wrote in my Writer’s Journal on June 3^rd 2010, “Here I go again! Back in the saddle!”

Three New Sub-Genre Labels that would fit “Morgue”

“Guns and Sorcery”

“Blackened Fantasy”

“Steamgothic”

I was trying to think of a clever term to describe the setting of Morgue. It has elements of “swords and sorcery”, “Dark Fantasy”, “Epic/High Fantasy” and even “Steampunk”. Although I usually form upon those “-punk” term words I have to say that the description to this fantasy sub-genre fits my stories somewhat, though there isn’t the overwhelming element of technology present. :

“Steampunk is a subgenre of fantasy and speculative fiction that came into prominence in the 1980s and early 1990s. The term denotes works set in an era or world where steam power is still widely used—usually the 19th century, and often set in Victorian era England “

(Read the entire Wikipedia article here)

It is true that Morgue is similar to a 19^th century Victorian England but also has a wild-west setting like America in the mid-to-late 1800s. Gunslingers, lawmen, outlaws and gangs are predominant staples to the world but so are wizardry, dark magic, demons and mythical creatures.

So I find the term “Guns and Sorcery” is a fitting term but the “Swords and Sorcery” term is typically associated with “low-fantasy” or cheesy swashbuckling tales. Morgue conjures more epic high-fantasy tales.

“Blackened Fantasy”, I thought was a clever term because Morgue is more than just “dark fantasy”. It teeters on the brink of demonic fixation. Although the stories do not promote Satanism nor do they inspire anti-Christian views, they do however have a nihilistic and misanthropic undertone. The worship of demons such as Beelzebub, Baal, Dis(Satan), is rampant throughout the world and Pagan beliefs are the norm.

So I thought, “Blackened Fantasy” would be a nice label, right?

As for the third term, “steamgoth”, I was just taking a jab at “punk”. “Goth” isn’t referring to the subculture of vampire-lusting, black-clothes wearing, pseudo-depressed juvenile outcast. It is denoting the Victorian Gothic and/or Southern Gothic elements in classical literature that are present in Morgue.

I hope nobody reads this and takes me serious. I’m not launching a campaign to get any of these three terms as an “official” label. I was just toying around with some random thoughts that had crossed my mind recently.

My stories will probably just have to fall under “Dark Fantasy” or “Epic Fantasy” no matter how many other attributes from other genres is possesses.

Still….gotta love that “Blackened Fantasy” concept.

HERE are some links worth checking out if you are interested in Fantasy, Dark Fantasy, Sword and Sorcery or any other source I may (or may not) have used for this blogging.

Sword and Sorcery: Reviews of the Classics

http://www.swordandsorcery.org/book-reviews.htm

High Fantasy, Epic Fantasy on Wikipedia (I hate citing Wikipedia as a source but this is a good article to read if you aren’t familiar with high fantasy or the authors who write it)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epic_fantasy

Black Metal (yet another Wikipedia entry)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_metal

Shape of Despair (this is just a band I frequently listen to while writing including while I wrote this blog)

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=15041195

ALSO SOME RECOMMENDED BOOKS (on the subject of fantasy, dark fantasy writing.

The Writer’s Guide to Fantasy Literature: From Dragons Lair to Hero Quest

http://www.amazon.com/Writers-Guide-Fantasy-Literature-Dragons/dp/0871161958/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1221224142&sr=8-3

Alchemy with Words: Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy: Volume One

http://www.amazon.com/Alchemy-Words-Complete-Writing-Fantasy/dp/1896944094/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1221224287&sr=1-2
The Tough Guide to Fantasyland by Diana Wynne Jones

http://www.amazon.com/Tough-Guide-Fantasyland-Essential-Fantasy/dp/0142407224/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1221224570&sr=1-5

Doomsday Party has been Post-poned…

By now everyone knows that the LHC fired off a perfectly acceptable beam early this morning and no black hole opened up to suck the world inside of it.

Although, keep this mind,  in most horror fiction the first experiment  usually always goes as planned.  We all think that everything is fine and dandy…

Then out of the blue…BOOM!   The gates of Hell open and the world is infested with demons/the undead/gian lizard creatures ect.

So perhaps the Doomsday Party has only been post-poned for a later date.   Unfortuntely we may not know when this date is.  It could be tomorrow or it could be next month.   One slip up with the LHC, one mis-calculation, a single “ooops, I pressed the wrong button”  and we could all be staring into the deep depths of the appocalypse.

And while some people are concerned about this experiment bringing about the end of days someone in the project decided to make an educational “rap” video to wise us up on what the hell these scientiest are babbling about.

CERN LHC Rap

—–

I think I have found an editor for ASCENSION, book one of the “Abandon All Hope Trilogy”.   It could be edited to perfection in 45-days and ready for submitting.   If everything goes as planned (meaning I have to get my ass busy) the book could be published and available by sometime next year.

In the meantime though, I am working on a collection of short stories to compliment the trilogy all featuring twisted dark fantasy tales with a deep southern flavor.   These stories will be available either through online/print magazines,  e-book format or published for free reading right here on this blog (or at least a link to a webpage featuring the story.)

Also please keep a look out for a page on this blog that will delve further into what the “Abandon All Hope Trilogy” (AAHT) is about and why you should not miss out on it.   Damnit people, I’m busting my ass here to write these stories so give them a chance.  I think they will appeal to horror fans as much as they will to fantasy, dark fantasy and perhaps even western fans.  Louis Lamour is not an inspiration of mine but I do enjoy a good violent shoot’em western and one of my all-time favorite movie characters is Val Kilmer’s portrayl of Doc Holiday in Tombstone.  “You’re no daisy…”

The trilogy  does have a lot of influence from The Divine Comedy, H.P. Lovecraft,  some E.A. Poe-ish overtones and a little bit of a “rock’n’roll”  soaked into it.

So keep an eye out for it!

(removed fiction)

Okay, so I had published a short piece of fiction here but after I read it several more times,  I couldn’t even stomach it anymore.

The cold hard truth is, I don’t think I am into writing gore and graphic sex anymore.  At least not in the overly detained style I use to use.   Shock value only goes so far before it just becomes comical. The only person in existence who can get away with shock value as an artistic art form I think would be Alice Cooper.

I am going to start making an effort of only publishing non-graphic stories.  Stories with more literary meaning than just blood and guts.

Okay, there will still be blood and guts but I’m just taking the bloody sperm ouf of the mix.

Abortion and child abuse isn’t funny…but dead baby jokes still crack me up!

Lyrics: Novembers Doom-Rain

Becoming one with madness, a chaos to embrace
Struggling for my sanity, clear skies turning gray
My demons stand before me, and taunt my every thought
The only way to cleanse my soul, is drown my dirt with rain

Water now engulfs me, it burns my sins away
Enemy preys upon my flesh as darkness burns the sky
Surface drifting further, taken from my sight
The only way to cleanse my soul, is drown my dirt with rain

No one to save me, a promise to be made
For heartsick memories, below the murky wake

In shallow water, I will drown unfeigned
My death knell rings below the flood
To wash away my sins of yesterday
And give me the chance to murder your name again

Becoming one with madness, a chaos to embrace
Struggling for my sanity, clear skies turning gray
My demons stand before me, and taunt my every thought
The only way to cleanse my soul, is drown my dirt with rain

In shallow water, I will drown unfeigned
My death knell rings below the flood
To wash away my sins of yesterday
And give me the chance to murder your name again

Listen to the song here:

Lyrics Agalloch-Dead Winter Days

There lies a beauty behind forbidden wooden doors
A beauty so rare and pure, it would make human eyes bleed and burn…

…She killed herself in the fall…

I am the unmaker, I bring death to the beautiful dawn
With pillor, cold, and a legion of dying angels…

…I killed myself in the spring…

A grim bough had hung me high
I sank the fires of the Sol
Here, nightfall reigns

I oppose the light
I gather the storms
with a sword I wield with hate
I shot down the sun with bow and flame
Pillorian for the dead winter

I am the unmaker
The pillorian…the ending
I…die…
I damn you the dead winters…

(copyright Agalloch)

Lyrics are not mine, I simply post them because I draw inspiration from the music.