Interior layout’s done, I’ve seen a mockup of the beautiful cover Heather Balchunas is doing for me. I’m very excited to share this object with you! I am planning to have copies with me when I read at the North Quabban Garlic and Arts Festival later this month, and following that, you’ll be able to order it online from this site (the price will be ten bucks) or if you see me around and about, I will likely have copies to sell with me.
I’m resisting making an ebook, for probably silly reasons, but that’s how I’m going to roll here. I much prefer physical media anyway. I think there’s something powerful about being able to hold an object in your hands, and to feel a connection to the maker of said object through the thing itself.
The book itself will contain 10 short pieces — three poems and seven stories — all on some point in a spectrum between nonfiction and fantasy. It comes out to 60 pages total, not counting the cover. My last bit of work to do before committing it to print is to make a copyright page, and that should happen in the next couple of days, I think.
And then it’s off to the printer. And then, if all goes well, you can get yours from me!
this is an early draft of the cover, printed out and “filed.” Photo by me, artwork by Heather.
Because even though I don’t really play music much any more, I still think of myself as a musician
I stopped playing music over a decade ago. Honestly, I stopped playing gigs another decade earier than that. The reasons for it were multitudinous, but came down to a few overarching concerns, some having to do with transitioning my gender (voice dysphoria) but others going to the simple fact that playing out was getting to be nothing but a grind, something I had little passion for… essentially, it was burnout. I went through a number of years when I didn’t even listen to music, preferring to just enjoy the ambient noise of life.
I’ve definitely returned to music appreciation now. I used to do all of my retail therapy at the record store. I’ve redeveloped that habit. A couple of years ago, I decided I wanted to have a working turntable again. I now have that, and I’ve just about tripled my vinyl collection since doing so. I’m considering a moratorium on buying new stuff, just so I can spend some time with the things I’ve picked up and decide on some favorites. I mean. I do have favorite things, and I’ve written about a few of them on this blog, but there are things I’ve filed away, having listened through them once or twice, that I want to make time to pull out again and listen on repeat, because that’s how you get things into your bloodstream and make them part of your internal soundtrack.
So I’ve been thinking about whether I should get back to playing music. I have no real interest in reconstructing my solo act. I was so tired of the lack of interaction with other players, of endlessly repeating the same songs in rehearsal and at gigs. One of the things I prefer about writing is that you compose, you perfect, then you move on. That’s not what playing music is like.
But it would be fun to have a group of humans to get together with on a regular basis and treat music as the social interaction it’s meant to be. I’m sure I would enjoy it, as long as it was somewhat low-key, done for fun, and kept away from the crazymaking that is also so much a part of being in a band. One thing I’d need to do to get back to playing is to update my equipment. Some of that is only worth doing once you know what sort of music you’ll be playing (some kind of rock music for me, but even that carries lots of variables) but I do find myself looking at various basses and guitars – mostly basses – that it would be nice to have and play.
My top three basses to get would be a Stingray, a Thunderbird, or (and?) a Mustang.
My top guitars to get would be a Les Paul, a Martin 00, and a Mustang.
All except the Martin would be red with a black pickguard, ideally.
But the fact is, I don’t have any reason to buy any guitar. I have guitars. I have worked hard to retrain my creative impulses towards writing, for reasons listed above as well as a few others I’m not going to bother listing here.
There’s nobody around who is interested in making music with me. I’m not really pursuing it. It’s OK. I’ll enjoy music as a consumer/spectator, and keep putting my energy into writing, which suits my life and my interests better.
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Yesterday, I went to the Greenfield First Sunday Word open mike. I read my blog post A 500-Word History of a Lost Civilization That Stood for Over a Thousand Years. As I was going through the piece, I realized that what I was reading was a high school history report. Which is fine, I suppose. Paul and others joked that there would be an exam. Hah. The original post was a writing assignment I set myself to see if I could do it. The challenge was the title. All in all, I give myself a B for that post (to continue the joke.)
Readers of this blog will note that last week I posted about seeing Gang of Four up in Maine the previous weekend. Before I got up and read, I thought about referencing the band before I read the piece, but ultimately decided not to. I’m not one to avoid a mixed message generally, but in this case, it didn’t seem like the right thing to do to put what would ultimately be seen as a disclaimer in front of my own work. I try not to do that.
But here’s the disclaimer I didn’t perform at the open mike. I agree with the sentiment in that song. And the piece I read (as you will see if you go back and look) is all about a few of the Great Men of the Eastern Roman Empire. I’m currently working on a novel that is a fantasy set in some factually erroneous version of the world of the Romans. One of my rules for the book was that it would not be about the nobility or rulers of the Empire. I wanted it to be about individuals walking around on the ground, not the folk in Blachernae Palace. There’ve been so many “court intrigue” novels. I have no desire to write another.
Perhaps, at some point, I’ll write another history post and try to give the flavor of the life of an ordinary Roman, and maybe something about how that changed over time. What would it be like, I wonder, to live in a stable, long-established place in the Empire? Probably not so different from any other place in the main, but very different in certain details.
One detail I can share is about how a middle-class house in the Empire was set up. There was always a great central room where day-to-day living, entertaining, and even worship would typically happen. It wouldn’t include the kitchen, although dining would likely take place there. Kitchens were always off to one side and out of sight.
Stay tuned. This interests me. I’ll see what I can do.
Recently, I had a speed date-style Zoom meeting with a generalist/genre book agent. It was an interesting and informative experience. I’d even say that on the whole it was a good experience. But it was also awkward and distant, and a little bit depressing. I’m clearly not the author this agent wants to represent, that’s the first thing to say. And I’m OK with that. As with any speed dating sort of situation, you’re looking for something to click.
When it became clear that this wasn’t going to be a thing, I asked a couple of biz questons and they were open and honest with their answers. Helpful. Cheerfully so.
more AI slop
I asked about how it is out there for trans authors these days. I was told that trans adult fantasy authors can pretty much do what they want, it doesn’t seem to matter. But kidlit is getting hit pretty hard, lots of bannings, lots of pushback.
I guess we’ve found the actual canaries in the coalmine. If you’re a trans-inclusive YA or middle grade author, you’re having a rough go right now. I don’t think that points to a winner in the contest, but it does make it clear that it IS a contest. There’s a war being fought out there. And if the trans kid’s authors lose, I’m next.
further AI slop
What the agent kept repeating when asking me to talk about my project is “What are the stakes? What’s the thing I can’t walk away from?” This caused me some cognitive dissonance because the whole idea of my novel is the protagonist walking away, over and over. And it’s not that my main character is an anti-hero. Sometimes Rose walks away from things by choice, sometimes she walks away because she’s forced to. Sometimes she’s kidnapped. Sometimes a disaster happens, either on a large or a small scale. Sometimes it’s her fault. Sometimes she’s a victim. Sometimes it’s a sacrifice she makes. And that’s a story too. It’s a story I feel personally, because it’s how my life has been.
My perception of the general run of fantasy novels these days — and I’d have to say that most everything I’ve read in the genre for the last ten or so years fits into this formula — is that you start with an action sequence, it sets up a conflict and some tension, the bulk of the book is the main character on the run and under the gun based on the conflict/tension, but also there’s some guy or girl who is very very annoying until they’re not, then there’s an aha moment when the protagonist figures out what’s really going on and consequently how to win, and then there’s a huge high-stakes battle, like a multiple orgasm of crash! bang! pow! as big as whatever the author can imagine, then a few pages of happy every after.
Such AI, much slop
Whose life is like that? Having read a hundred iterations of that, who needs it again? I think this is a problem, and it’s not something I want to “create” the next iteration of, although I will say the story I’m working on actually does follow that formula to some extent, though it doesn’t have that ratchet-up, ratchet-up, and ratchet-up-again thing going on.
At some point during the interview, I began to imagine the novel I would write to meet the standards of this era of fantasy fiction. The title would be “Rama Lama Whippity Ding #1” and the first sentence would be “How do you like your steaks?” I bet I could get a few thousand words out of riffing on that.
Clearly, I wasn’t made for these times.
last bit of AI slop… for now.
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