Little by little

Well, I've priced local editing services - yikes! Luckily I've got a network of local writers who also do editing, and one will give my stuff a look-see for free. I'll take advantage of that while I can. Phoenix Hatching is now in her hands. I've polished it to my best ability. Basically I just wanted a fresh pair of eyes to go over it and catch anything I missed. You can't proof your own work, you think it says what you wanted it to say. She can also check for any plot inconsistencies and other problems. While she's doing that, I'm checking into options for cover art. Here's an advantage over traditional publishing: you get to pick your cover art. You don't have to have Generic Chick in short top, tramp stamp, and sword. You can actually have someone who looks like the character.

After my editor's done, and I have the cover art chosen, then Phoenix Hatching will come out on Kindle. It's science fiction, set on Earth about 1000 years after the human race has become extinct. From underground labs, a race of beings called Mutas are beginning their own civilization. One of these is a 17-year old girl named Hallia. Abused by her own people, she exiles herself and is rescued by a scouting party from another group. As they travel across the deserted country, Hallia develops from a waif into a warrior. And she'll be needed once the group returns to its home.

Here goes nothing

Actually, I hope that it all comes to a lot more than nothing. I've had enough of form rejection slips, query packets that come back unread because I used didn't use the font the editor prefers or put two spaces after a period, or had a 5-page synopsis instead of a 4-page. I am going to self-publish through Amazon.com, first in Kindle editions and then in print-on-demand, if possible.

To make a success of self-publishing, one has to put out a good product, and has to promote the bejeezus out of it, because no one else will. You can't just let it sit.

To that end, I'm going to be logging the process on my blog (poor neglected blog) and getting some cards printed up with the cover of this novel, once it's selected. I'm going to have it edited, so a fresh pair of eyes can maybe catch what I've missed. I want to work with an artist to design the cover. This will be one thing better than traditional publishing. Those authors have zero say over what the cover looks like.

So, watch this space. I'm going to blog the entire process. That will either inspire other writers, or serve as valuable lesson to other fools, whichever. The book in question is Phoenix Hatching, a science-fiction novel. I wrote the original version a very long time ago.

Very tired old plot that needs retired.

I’d like to gripe about a movie plot device that has gotten overused to the point that it’s beyond cliché. In fact, it makes a good portion of the movie that uses it so completely predictable that all suspense is gone. I’m calling it the Cassandra Syndrome.

Cassandra, for those of you whose education is either in progress or inadequate, was a woman in Homer’s Iliad who started off as a priestess of Apollo. He fell in lust with her and gave her the gift of prophecy. When she refused to have sex with him, he cursed her. Since even gods couldn’t take back gifts they’d given, the curse was that no one would ever believe her.

You’ve all seen these movies. They can be horror, sci fi, or action. Something is invented or discovered. Among the party of inventors or discoverers is a Cassandra who predicts dire consequences, which are laughed off by the person/s in charge, the main one I’ll call the Pooh-Pooh Bear. The invention is turned on, or the discovered item/creature is released. Dire consequences promptly come to pass. Big yawn. Is there anyone over the age of seven who hasn’t seen this plot a hundred times? Retire the sucker already! It doesn’t fool anyone! Are you listening, Science Fiction Channel?

You know you’ve seen it. This plot covers the main points of a gazillion cheap (and even not cheap) horror movies, science fiction, and action flicks. “Don’t let the thing out of the basement!” shrieks the Cassandra. “It’ll destroy us all!” Or maybe it’s “Don’t sequence the raptor DNA!” or “Don’t make the computer able to learn on its own!”

“But it’s the discovery/technological development of the millennium!” hollers the Pooh-Pooh Bear, and promptly lets it out, or turns it on without adequate testing, whereby it promptly destroys everyone. Except one or two of the heroes.

Ah, the heroes. These, too, remain the same from movie to movie with very few variations. Besides the Cassandra (who might be one of the heroes) and the Pooh-Pooh Bear, there’s the inevitable Main Character Trio. The Hot Chick, The Big Hero, and the Sidekick (these days, where Hollywood is trying to show how Politically Correct it is, frequently a Black Guy).

Inevitably, Hot Chick and Big Hero have a love affair going on, and Sidekick Black Guy gets killed off sometime during the movie. One notable exception was Deep Blue Sea, in which the Hot Chick bought it and the Black Guy lived. Way to throw us a curve ball, Hollywood. Yeah, change one plot element and pat yourself on the back about how Innovative you are.

Another example: Stealth. The special effects were amazing, I’ll give them that. However the first half of the movie was the same old Scary Discovery, Cassandra, Pooh-Pooh Bear, and Hero Trio. I was beyond not surprised when the Black Guy bought the farm and the Hot Chick and Big Hero (who was also the Cassandra) wound up together. The rest of the movie was good enough to almost make up for this, but not quite.

Can’t someone in Hollywood write something new? Sequels, remakes, filmed comic books and old plots rehashed with new special effects. Never mind you know everything that will happen in the movie, folks! Watch us blow shit up in new and exciting CG! Ooh, and now we have 3-D! At least for people with good eyesight. If you're blind in one eye or have other depth-perception issues, it just looks blurry.

Yawn. Pardon me, I think I’ll read a book.

Lip-synchers

Frankly, I wouldn't pay fifty cents to hear Britney Spears "sing," but I'll bet the ticket for the now-infamous Australia show were upwards of $50.

I'll tell you right now, I shell out good money for a concert and go to all the trouble of going, that bitch better be singing live. She should pay everyone back their money.

Thinking of cats past: Muffet

My arms remember the feel of cats past. My ears remember their purrs and meows. I can breathe in the memory of their spicy-musky scent. All of their antics, all of the fun we had is secure in my memory. No two have been alike.

Heaven for me would be a comfortable armchair, all the books I didn't have time to read - and my favorites to re-read. An unending supply of all my favorite snacks. And most important: all my past cats taking turns purring in my lap.

My first cat was a green-eyed shorthaired tom cat, inexplicably named Muffet. We had just moved to Hastings, Nebraska, and I was going to start first grade in the fall. Across the street was a ramshackle two-story house that always seemed to have dozens of cats running around. The back screen door was visible from our front yard, because it and our house sat on corners, facing different streets.

I had spent weeks watching kittens of assorted sizes running around that house, going in and out through a tear in the screen door. I'd go across the street to see if I could play with them, but they'd all run and hide. Sometimes it was like a river of cats going in that screen door.

After a month or so, I became determined to catch one. I hid around the corner of the house and waited. A little orange tabby stuck its head out, looked right at me, and went back in. Then a little black and white kitten peeked out, but only looked in the other direction. It jumped out and padded off the way it had been looking, and I tiptoed after it and caught it. I carried it across the street, went inside my house, and told Mom I found it on the porch and could I keep it.

Well, I would never have a career as a con artist. Besides the fact I've always been a transparent liar, my Mother had watched the whole thing through the picture window. Amazingly, she told me that if I asked the lady who lived there if I could have the kitten, and she said yes, I could keep it.

Pathologically shy, I looked down at the kitten who looked back up at me, and went back across the street and knocked on the back door. When the lady answered, I murmured my request.

She answered, "Why, of course! Are you sure you want that one? Come on in and pick another one if you want." So I went inside.

I will never forget that room. It reeked of cat pee. The only thing in there besides cats was a brown sofa, laying on its back, shredded. You could see the springs. There were cats and kittens everywhere. I looked at them and then back at the kitten who had settled into my arms and begun to purr. He had little white mittens and boots, a white chin, and half a white mustache on his little black face. The mustache gave him a rakish look. I thanked her kindly, and said I'd keep this one. She ushered me out and told me to come back anytime.

Muffet (where did I get that name?) and I had a seven year relationship. I'll tell some of his stories in the next few blogs.

What is this Jon and Kate crap, anyway?

I don't watch reality TV so I may be missing something here. From what I can tell, these people are famous and have their own show because they have 8 kids. Evidently the first two weren't sufficient, so they did in vitro or fertility drugs or whatever and added sextuplets.

So they have 8 kids under the age of 10, and decided it would be a wonderful idea to put their family on national TV. And now, big surprise (I mean that in deepest sarcasm) are having marital trouble.

Ya think?

Why anyone should be famous for having a lot of kids is just plain beyond me. My great-grandparents raised 13 without the aid of fertility drugs, in vitro, or national television. And they did it on one salary without nannies/au pairs/day care. Crap, they deserve medals!

Curly hair has become endangered!

Oh, my natural-curly sisters and brothers, it is time to band together as the vagaries of fashion have once again swung against us. As it was in the 1960s, the Gods of Beauty have decreed that all American hair must be straight.

I had seen that many celebrities with beautiful natural curls were straightening their hair, and sorrowed. Hollywood forces its women into such a narrow mold. But today I read an article on msn.com by a woman who says she went to a job interview with naturally curly hair, and didn't get the job because the interviewer thought she was too lazy to blow dry it straight. She went on to detail her frightfully expensive beauty-shop procedure - one that will only last until the next time she washes her hair - and how having Straight Hair changed her life. Lies, I tell you, lies.

Once again, my sisters and brothers, we have gone from being the envied to being the pariahs. Those of us who are old enough to remember the Dark Days of torturing our hair and ourselves to fit the straight-haired mold know what is coming. My sisters, you will spend hours and days of your lives trying to maintain a style that is artificial and harmful to your hair. I spent my entire adolescence keeping my hair straight. It was my only hobby, taking up nearly every moment I wasn't in school. Sisters, straightening your hair will steal your life.

Never again, I say to you! We will not let this happen again! Band together, oh curly ones! Resist the evil that once again stalks America. Wear your curls proudly. If anyone gives you grief, tell them straight hair is boring.

NEVER AGAIN WILL WE STRAIGHTEN!