I'm doing it. Really I am. Honest. Here I go...

Well, I'm really doing it.

Soon.

Kinda.

No, really, I am.

Soon.

I'm talking about writing and finishing the synopsis to my novel and sending that out into the world of agents, so I can become part of the rejected writer's nation.

Let me back up, give those of you not in the world of writing a couple of definitions.

First, the novel. You all know what that is – a book-length work of fiction. I completed my novel, revised, edited, had it read over by some writer acquaintances of mine who tore it to shr—I mean offered some insightful, valuable suggestions. (Okay, no on actually tore it to shreds, but I did get an enormous amount of truly helpful suggestions).

I've had the novel finished, ready to go – at least as ready to go as I know how to make it – for a long time. Months.

I spent time on the query letter. In the world of traditional publishing a writer with a completed manuscript tries to land a literary agent. Most of the large publishing houses won't give the time of day to a would-be writer unless his or her manuscript is submitted by an agent.

Agents get paid on commission. Your work sells, they make money. Your work doesn't sell, they don't get paid. So agents aren't in a position to spend a lot time reading over every novel that comes their way, nor are they going to take too many chances. They understand what books work in what genres, what books might appeal to what publishers, and you have to fit your work inside those parameters, as well as write well and tell an engaging story, and that's what the query letter is for.

It's a brief letter that tells the agent what your story is about, what genre it might fit, names two or three recent novels that appeal to the same readership and why, tells the agent how your learned of him or her and why you've chosen to submit your work to them, as well as tell a bit about yourself, the writer.

All in one page. Agents read the query to weed out most of the slush pile of submissions to save time, progressing to actually reading the synopsis, and hopefully the full novel, afterward. The vast majority of submissions do not make it past the query-reading stage.

I have had what I hope is a fairly decent query letter ready to go for a couple of months.

The big hold-up is the synopsis. This document is roughly 500 to 800 words that gives the nuts and bolts of the novel – introduces the characters and who they are, what they're up against, supporting or significant minor characters, then gives a bit of a blow-by-blow of how the story develops and ultimately ends.

Think of the query as the sales pitch, the jacket copy on the back of a book meant to entice readers to buy. The synopsis is the blueprint, a work document tracing the development of the story to its end.

More than anything, this is the one that scares me. My novel is nearly 76,000 words, a tad over 300 pages. The idea of condensing that to two pages, relying on such a short document to communicate the story in a way that makes an agent not only interested, but believing that publishers and readers will want this too, is more than a bit daunting.

I've spent a good bit of the year putting it off – something else is always more important, or I'm too tired, or I'll get it done tomorrow (or next week) and here we are, the end of summer and I'm still sitting on this thing.

No more.

Yesterday I dove in, reading several guides to synopsis writing, listening to podcasts of literary agents talking about the documents. To take a break, I spent time researching specific agents who take this genre – learning what they want, how they want to receive the submission, as much as I can. Some agents want a query, ten sample pages and a synopsis, others just want a few pages and query, still others want several chapters and a query. Eventually, they all want to see the synopsis, so doing the work is inevitable.

Today I've spent time building the basic outline of the synopsis, and this week I'm going to spend time every day and get at least the first clean draft done and ready to review, so I can get this book out. I've already got the next one ready to write, and quite frankly the two after that as well.

I just have to get this synopsis thing done first.

And I will, This week.

Really, I will.

Back in the old ball game...

Hello.

I wasn't sure what to say in the rebirth of my little blog, John's Dark Scribblings, so I thought I'd just say hello.

After all, what does one start a conversation after a nearly 14-month absence?

So, hello, and welcome back.

I have been away from this little corner of the world for quite some time I suppose, and I should explain.

A lot happened in my life last year. I suppose that's always the case for a lot of people, but in my case there were some big, major life changes.

Tragically, my father passed away in February of 2013. I come from a strong family where we've been taught to just keep moving forward, keep working, never let all the bad stuff drag you too far down. So that's what I did, that's what all my family did in the aftermath of our loss – we just kept moving forward.

Between that loss in the late winter and the fall of 2013, there were more changes for our family, more joyous ones to be sure, but change none-the-less. My second oldest daughter went out into the world, going to the University of Virginia, in late August. A couple of weeks later my oldest daughter married a fine young man we've known for years and moved out of state.

Like I said, some major changes.

In the midst of it all I kind of lost my way in my writing, aided by a confusing, on-again, off-again policy by my employer that prohibited any employees from doing any writing or editing outside the company. Even fiction. Except when it didn't. Like I said, terribly confusing.

I never stopped writing – I still write and edit at work on the job as a newspaper editor (though just between you, me and the virtual fence post, my job has become more about compiling and writing reports, meetings, and paperwork than it has been about actual honest-to-goodness journalism -- you know, writing and editing work that is germane to your community). And I didn't call it quits entirely with the fiction work – I do some, let's say specialized type of writing under a pseudonym (and no, I'm not tell you anything else about it, at least not for now).

But the work that moved me – the horror that I once wrote, the mystery and historical novels I outlined - just kind of drifted away from me. Or maybe I drifted away from them. I arrived at a point where I couldn't just put my head down and keep working. I still had to do my day job, because I have a family that depends on me for income and a staff that depends on my to lead it and a company that's paying me to do that job. Beyond that I just wasn't sure what I wanted in my writing, or my life for that matter. So I stopped blogging about my work, even took this blog down from public view for quite a while.

Now I'm back, and I'll be returning to some of my writing roots over the coming months and years. I won't be terribly prolific – I have a burgeoning pseudonym career to keep going (well, okay, a pseudonym CAREER may be overstating it, but it's something I'll keep up for a while). I also still have the full-time job to keep working at, and I need to spend at least a little time with the family.

But I will be publishing a few horror and mystery tales here over the coming months – short stories, a novella or two, I'll be releasing a novel in August and another one in November. Beyond that? We'll just see how it goes.

For now I'll just say hello, and glad you're back with me.

Writer, thou shalt not live by indie publishing alone

I’ve been working on the indie publishing thing now for a few months, and overall I’ve been pleased with what entering this world has brought.

First, I’ve met some wonderful people – a few readers who’ve contacted me to talk about my work and a number of writers who have been wonderfully supportive and helpful as I learn the ropes.

Second, I’ve managed to see a few sales along the way. My debut novel, CLAIMING MOON, has done okay, though I really seemed to hit on something with the release of several of my horror shorts last autumn and a mini-collection of holiday-related horror shorts in December.

Since then I’ve been concentrating on writing, doing a little marketing work along the way, and interacting with other indie writers, to watch and learn from what they do. I’m also working on a longer collection of horror shorts I plan to release in a few weeks.

While doing some edits on a few of those stories this past weekend, I realized something – I haven’t submitted to a publishing market in a long time. Probably not since 2011. A big part of that is because I’ve been so focused on indie publishing.

But I miss subbing. So I sent out four shorts on Sunday, and I have another handful I hope to send out to various markets over the next week.

I know in many ways indie publishing is a better long-term business model. While the millions of stories and ebooks floating around out there stack the odds against me in terms of getting my work noticed, there is still a measure of control, the ability to generate at least some level of income, in this brave new world of independent publishing.

Still, there are very few thrills for a writer that measure up to getting an acceptance from an honest-to-goodness magazine or website. One of the few thrills that does match that is getting paid. I’ve never subbed to anything other than paying markets, and over the years I’ve been paid as little as $10 for a story and as much as $150, mostly for stories in the 2,000-word to 5,000-word range (unfortunately, most markets won’t take anything longer).

I miss that thrill. Both of those thrills. So I’m taking a slightly different approach over the next few months. I’ll continue working hard at publishing more original novel-length work this year, and I’m still moving forward with the short story collection, but a lot of my as-yet unpublished short fiction will be finding its way into the slush piles at various publications, and hopefully, eventually, find their way into publication.

Who knows, I might even query an agent or three for a couple of my novels.

I’ll keep you posted.

One tradition dies, another is born

Christmas Eve, as I was filling the last stocking and preparing for bed I was struck by how much life has changed over the past year, and how much more it will do so in 2013.

At that moment I realized we had lost one holiday tradition that has been a part of our family just as much as Christmas trees and wrapping paper, when I noticed there was no milk and cookies on the table for Santa.

That’s right – my little one, who turned 11 earlier in the year, has finally reached the point where she no longer believes in dear old St. Nick. I have five kids, with the oldest of the brood turning 21 in October, and for 20 years we’ve placed the little mug of milk and a saucer of cookies on the end table nearest the Christmas tree. For 20 years the last thing I’ve done after everyone is long gone to bed and I’ve filled the last of the stockings is sit on the sofa, watch a little television or listen to some music and munch on those cookies. Some years there was a note, and I’d scrawl out a reply, taking great pains to hide my handwriting style.

As you can imagine, with five children our house has always been busy, particularly at Christmas. When our four oldest were really young (my first child was a month short of turning 5 when the fourth one was born), after I’d eaten the cookies and left the note my wife would cover the doorway to the den with wrapping paper, as if the entire room was one big present. That served the dual purpose of enhancing the excitement for the kids and keeping them out of the room in the wee hours of the night.

I can’t tell you how many Christmases we’d be awakened at 2 or 3 in the morning, the sound of little footsteps running up and down the hall, hushed voices talking about what might be behind the wrapped door or how many hours were left until they were allowed to rouse us from bed. We’d chase them back to bed, only to repeat the process every hour or so until 7.

Despite running low on sleep, that was always great fun.

Gradually those days gave way to less excitement, and now, for the first time in two decades, sadly, no Santa, and already I’m missing those days when Santa was real and the kids were little.

A new tradition was born this year, though even that one has a bit of bitter-sweetness to it.

My oldest daughter is engaged to be married, having officially accepted the young man’s proposal in October. Every year we have a family Christmas Eve dinner, just my wife and I and the kids. This year we added to that mix the young man engaged to my daughter. After eating, the two of them opened the presents we all had purchased for them, then left on a four-hour drive to his family, where they spent Christmas Day and the days afterward.

Saying bye to the oldest of our crew on Christmas Eve, watching her ride away to spend Christmas with her soon-to-be husband and his family is the new holiday rite we’ll be observing. My daughter is ecstatic over her pending marriage and her new family, and I’m genuinely happy for that, but it’s still a little sad to see the holidays change, knowing we may never all be together on Christmas again.

Change, of course, is the nature of life. I think it was Billy Joel who sang “Life is a series of helloes and good-byes.” I was a very young man when I first heard those words, and while the young tend to think they understand everything in a way no one else can, it’s only with age one truly starts to understand such sentiments.

I’ve witnessed a great deal of change in recent years, with the declining health of my parents, approaching adulthood for my kids, and my own advancing age. Still, I’m not unhappy. My oldest is as content with her life as I’ve seen in a long time, and my other children are growing up to be, if I do say so myself, nice young men and women whom I’m proud to know.

The coming year offers great promise: the aforementioned marriage, my second daughter’s transfer from a community college to a four-year school, and I hope my continued development and success in the literary world.

Still, forgive me if every once in a while I sit and wish for times gone by.

Weekend warrior writing challenge results

Well, folks, just reporting on my weekend warrior writing challenge.

If you’ll recall from my last blog, posted Friday afternoon, I was challenging myself to put out 5,000 words on my novel in progress, while also mowing the lawn, making a few trips to the gym, and doing whatever odd jobs my wife had planned for me around the house. Not all at the same time, of course.

I didn’t quite make it.

First, the excuses. Friday night I arrived home only to find my youngest and one of her friends at the house, using the computer. They kept it busy until well into the evening – right around 11 o’clock, and I just didn’t feel up to starting any writing that late.

Then came Saturday morning, and instead of rising early and jumping on the writing, I had the rare occurrence of having a few extra bucks in my pocket, so I took my wife out to breakfast, then we ran a few errands, and…well, you get the idea. Between all of the unexpected stuff, the planned mowing and other chores…I did not reach 5,000.

I did manage slightly more than 3,000 words. Given the fact I had managed a total of 1,000 the entire week prior, I’ll take that. It’s not what I wanted, and by-and-large I have no one to blame for that but myself, but I’m back into the novel, writing, and I’m feeling pretty good about it. And I still managed to slip online a few times for a bit of posting/marketing about my recently published novel, CLAIMING MOON, available on Kindle for just $2.99.

It’s now late on Sunday, I’m readying myself for the week ahead, and part of that week includes 800 words a night, Monday through Friday. No excuses accepted.

And, lest you forget, let me remind you all ...

CLAIMING MOON is now available on Kindle, and soon will be on Nook and other mobile readers. If you don’t have a Kindle, you can download a free reading app for your PC, Mac, or other device here. And, while I don’t have any fancy, schmanshy contest to drive readers to buy my novel, I will send a Hershey Almond bar to anyone who downloads the story and offers a review on Amazon. In fact, I’ll send a LARGE such bar to the first three people who do (but you have to send me your mailing address!).

Weekend warrior -- mowing, exercising, and writing 5,000 words

Okay, I admit it. I published my first novel, CLAIMING MOON, on Kindle a few days ago and I’ve checked the sales reports for it about a million times. I’ve tweeted about it, posted on Facebook, let a few writer friends know, even sent out a couple of e-mail blasts to a list of folks supposedly (hopefully) interested in my writing.

In the midst of holding down my fulltime job, watching the Olympics, doing a few things around the house, and all of this “marketing,” guess how many words I’ve written on new work?

Zilch.

I was afraid this might happen. Other writers have told me it would. You, as a writer, get so caught up in the work you just published, in marketing and talking about it, in finding potential websites to do a review of your published novel, that you lose focus on what’s most important – continuing to write.

I’m going to remedy that right now.

I’m leaving work sometime between 7 p.m. and 7:15 p.m. I don’t work this weekend, so these are my plans, my to do list, what I have to accomplish between the time I leave today and when I return to work on Monday morning.

First, I have to mow the yard.

Second, I have a couple of trips to make to the gym – one tonight and another either Saturday or Sunday.

Third, whatever else it is my wife has on my list.

Fourth – write 5,000 words on my novel-in-progress.

Yep, that’s right – 5.000 words.

I got the inspiration to do this while perusing Brian Keene’s website. I came across a blog post from July in which he talks about writing 80,000 words in a weekend. A single, three-day weekend.

That’s astounding. Far beyond what I can manage at present.

I don’t have the advantages he had – I’ll not be alone, but instead surrounded by my wife, my five kids, boyfriends of the two oldest will no doubt be making a few appearances, maybe even friends of the younger ones will be running around the house.

Still, I’m going to do this.

I’ve written little over the past week. First, I was spending time formatting my novel for Kindle. Then I was spending my time fixing screw-ups in the formatting. Then I spent time telling everyone about it. All totaled, I’m guessing I actually wrote 1,000 words on my novel in progress.

For the whole week.

This is not how to make a career as a writer.

So, from the time I arrive at home tonight, somewhere between 7:30 and 8 o’clock, and the time I go to work Monday morning, I’m chasing down 5,000 words.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

You want me to do what?

Here it is, two days before the release of my debut novel, CLAIMING MOON, on Kindle (Nook, other formats to follow). I should be all wrapped up in preparing for that, nervous, thinking more about how to get the word out, continuing to find reviewers for the work, all that sort of stuff.

I am doing that, I really am. But you know what is foremost in my mind right now?

Basketball.

Any of you who know me know I coach, or I did coach, a girl’s high school varsity team up until March of this year. (For a little more on the end of that season, and why I coach, check out my blog from Feb. 29).

As much as I love coaching, I decided to give it up for two primary reasons. It is an all-consuming commitment. There’s practice planning, conducting practices, studying the strengths and weaknesses of your players, designing drills to address those, scouting other teams, watching video, preparing specific game plans for some games, travel to games…the list could go on. The team I coached played 35 to 36 games every year, traveling across three or four states to do so. We start practice in August and finish the season in March.

It’s great, but it’s long and takes, as I said, all my time outside of work.

My first reason for giving it up was simply to spend more time at home, with my family. I have five kids. Two of them are attending a local community college and will be transferring to four-year schools after this upcoming school year. This is my last chance to be at home with them (although, to be honest, they both work, they go to school, they have boyfriends – there still isn’t all that much family time at home with them).

The second reason was more time for writing. This summer I’ve edited and revised and prepared a novel for publication, I’ve collected a novella and some of my short stories for two upcoming collections to be released (some are original stories, some reprints), and I’m about a third of the way through a new novel.

None of that, most likely, would have happened if I were still involved with basketball.

So what’s the problem?

I opened my e-mail yesterday and there was a little note from a coaching buddy of mine. He started up a girls homeschool basketball program two years ago and, quite frankly, has done a remarkable job growing from a start-up to a fairly competitive program in just two seasons.

Now, the parents want to start a boys program, with a junior varsity team this year. He asked if I’d be interested in helping to get it up and running and to serve as the coach.

Wow.

I was just thinking a couple of days ago about how it’s nearly August, and how much I miss the preparation work I’m usually doing at this point for the first practices, but also how much I’m enjoying the freedom from that time commitment.

If you followed the link I supplied earlier in this blog, you know a little bit about my coaching. I coach because I love the game of basketball, and I’m far too old to try playing competitively. I coach because I get great satisfaction from working with kids, watching them struggle and work and then suddenly get it, master some skill, understand the offense, figure out how to play defense. It’s amazing to watch -- sometimes you can literally see their face light up with excitement.

That’s usually just the beginning. They grow more confident, on and off the court, become a stronger, more self-assured person. I’ve had a handful go on to play some college ball.

I enjoy the competitive aspect of coaching. The chess game, matching wits with another coach. The feeling after a close, hard-fought game (elation with a win, disappointment at a loss). I’m not above bragging a bit here – in three seasons we won 72 games, we went to two state title games, winning one and nearly pulling of a major upset in the other. There’s a camaraderie between coaches, between coaches and officials, coaches and players, that can’t be matched anywhere else.

All of those are reasons I so much enjoy coaching. And, honestly, miss it already.

Yet that is a chapter I had closed, at least for now. I had moved on. Or so I thought.

Anyway, I’m going to give it serious consideration. It is a junior varsity, after all. Not as much practice, not as many games, no late-night video sessions to scout the other teams, not quite as much time, right?

For now, maybe in writing this I’ve gotten basketball out of my mind for a few hours. Time to focus on writing.

If I can.

Sleeping with skunks, dancing with yellow jackets

That title line could easily be the description of the mini-camping trip we took over the past several days. It was a quickie to a state park here in the mountains of Virginia. With so many of my family now working (my three oldest all have jobs), it’s hard to find time for a family get-away. But we managed, arriving at the camp early Sunday and leaving mid-day on Tuesday.

It was pretty standard fare as far as a state park goes – cookie-cutter camp sites for pitching tents and grilling, crushed pebbles for sand on the lake, lifeguards who looked as if they would rather be anywhere (even back in school) than sitting in their chairs blowing their whistles at teens chicken fighting in the shallow swim area.

Still, it was a nice get-away. No computers, no television, no radio, nearly no telephones (my wife and two oldest daughters took their cell phones because they are addicted to the things). And we had a nice sized crew – my wife and I, our five children (ages 20, 18, 17, 15, and 11), and boyfriends of the two oldest kids.

Not to bore you with all the details, but we arrived early Sunday, set up camp and spent the rest of the day at the lake, bobbing in the water, splashing one another, throwing the football around – all the usual stuff.

Sunday night we had our first encounter with a bit of wildlife, when a skunk ambled by our campsite. Other than making sure he kept going as far as our flashlight beams would reach, we gave it little thought.

Later that night, as everyone was turning in, my youngest son – the 15-year-old – complained about it being too hot inside the tent, and he was right. I’ve never cared much for tent sleeping in the summer, because the heat builds up inside and takes most of the night to dissipate. So he and I bedded down outside, under the handful of stars we could see through the canopy of pine and oak trees.

Around two o’clock, my youngest – a girl – woke me. Some creature, we figured it was a raccoon, had tried helping itself to a few of our supplies. My son apparently heard him, turned on the flashlight and found himself in a stare-down with the little bandit. Being the he-man that he is, my son high-tailed it for the tent and only by chance woke up his little sister. Dad? Oh, well, my son conveniently forgot about me. It was the 11-year-old who thought maybe they should wake me and let me know I wasn’t alone out there in the forest.

Eventually we all got back to sleep, including the 15-year-old, the two of us still sleeping outside.

The next day was fine – hot and breezy, perfect for hanging out at the lake, swimming, building sand castles, just an all-around nice day. Lunchtime, however, was a bit of a challenge. Seems a horde of yellow jackets decided they liked the scent of our water melon, so lunch ended up being the Dad Run and Dance Olympics. With the bees swarming our site’s picnic table, we ate at the vacant adjacent campsite; with yours truly being the one who darted in and out of the bee swarm, grabbing the cooler, the bread, the napkins – whatever someone else decided was needed.

I’m not certain, but I think a few of those requests were simply to see me dancing in and out of the bees. Amazingly, I was not stung a single time, although I may have been risking permanent injury with some of the contortions I put on display.

The afternoon was more of the same – hanging out at the lake, not dancing with bees, I mean. Things changed a bit in the evening with not one, not two, but THREE skunks moseying on in and out of our campsite whenever they darn well felt like it, even while we were still sitting around the fire making s’mores.

When time to turn-in rolled around, the 15-year-old decided he was going to sleep outside again.

“What about the skunks?” I asked.

“No skunk’s going to come around as long as we’re out here,” he replied.

“They did while we were making s’mores.”

“Well, even if they do, they won’t bother us while we’re sleeping.”

I told him okay, if he was up for it, so was I. Truth was, I really did not want to sleep inside the tent. We went inside, grabbed our sleeping gear and stepped back out, only to see two of the little stinkers walking around exactly where we planned to unroll our sleeping bags.

My son and I looked at one another and, without a word between us, turned back into the tent and slept there for the night.

You know what? Despite all the wild creature problems, it was a nice trip. My two oldest are in college now, still living at home, but likely to move away in another year. The next two are right behind, and even the youngest, with another seven or eight years before she’s ready for college, will be grown and going her own way before long. These sorts of family times are, I’m sad to say, dwindling, and it was a good time to enjoy being together, away from the rest of the world, even if it was just for a couple of days.

*****

Being away from the e-word doesn’t mean the writing stopped entirely. As many of you know, my debut novel CLAIMING MOON is set for release on Aug.
1. One of the things I’ve been struggling with is a follow-up, the sequel to the book, a way to carry the characters (at least the ones who survive) on as their lives continue to evolve.

While the wife was lying on the shore, getting a little sun, and the kids (and the boyfriends) were all off splashing and playing, I spent a few moments out in the water, floating along, watching the opposite shore line, when my attention was drawn to a sailboat drifting, seemingly without any direction from its occupants. For a few minutes I even wondered if anyone was on board, or if it were going to come on in to the swimming area, carried there by the summer wind.

That’s when the germ of the idea hit me. I spent that night, and the next, once everyone else had gone to sleep and the camp-invading creatures weren’t intruding too much, working out some plot lines, and I think the little mini-vacation has given me what will become the second novel in my series.

Now I can’t wait to get cracking.

A crushing day, and the real reason I do what I do

FAIR WARNING: This blog is not about writing, publishing, or an interview with a literary figure. It is simply something I felt I had to write – it tells you a little about me, hopefully, and a little bit about where all my time has been spent these past three years (instead of writing). It’s long. It’s heartfelt, and if that’s not your cup of tea, feel free to pass right on over. I’ll be back with regular stuff soon.

Saturday was a painful day.

Some of you know I coach a high school ladies varsity basketball team. It's a team of homeschoolers – but let me say up front you probably don't know what homeschool basketball is all about. It is where more of the top high school talent is playing, where more colleges are going to find players, because homeschoolers often play a college-like schedule – 30 to 40 games a season, a fair bit of travel, and national tournaments. Talented players, and their families, are sometimes opting to go the homeschool route for athletics – most notably in basketball.

I began coaching this team nearly three years ago, at the start of my oldest daughter's senior year. A week after practice began the coach quit. At my daughter's cajoling, I offered the athletic director my assistance to whoever might be named coach.

Turns out that was me.

Spending that time with my daughter was a wonderful experience for both of us, and gave me memories I'll cherish always. As a proud father, I have to tell you one of those memories was in the season-ending national tournament we attend each March. We advanced to the final four (in the nation, may I remind you), and, with the final seconds ticking away in that semi-final game, my daughter hit a shot that sent us into overtime!

Here's the thing, though – well, before we get to the thing, let me give an ever-so-brief background on our program.

We work hard on this team at preparing for the season, at doing whatever is necessary to win (within the rules and good sportsmanship, of course). We work and play to win. My first year as coach we were 30-5, won the state title and finished third in that national tournament.

With six seniors graduating, the next season was more challenging, particularly since our team was mostly made up of ninth-graders (and a couple of eighth-graders and a seventh grader thrown in). Our top scorer from the previous year did return, but injured her ACL a week before our first game, so we were behind the eight-ball from the start. Still, finishing 18-17 with one of the youngest varsity teams in the state was quite an accomplishment.

This year, we're still young – a senior, a junior, three sophomores, and the rest freshmen, ninth-graders, and an eight-grader -- so we struggle at times, but our record stands at 22-9. It's that ninth loss which made Saturday so painful.

Sports can be an emotional roller coaster. Little more than a week earlier, we made it to the semi-finals of the regional playoffs, where we squared off with the No. 1 seed in the state. They were on their way to pounding us pretty good, with a 20-point lead in the third quarter, and our prospects were looking bleak. The loser was done for the year, the winner would move on to the regional championship and clinch a spot in the state playoffs.

One thing you need to know about my players – they don't know how to quit. From 20 points down, they stormed back. Fittingly the senior who missed her entire junior year with the ACL injury hit the free throw – with 2 seconds on the clock – that sent the game into overtime, and we went on to win.

I'll never forget at the end of the game seeing her fall to the floor, overcome by emotions, tears of joy rolling down her cheeks.

We continued moving on, winning until Saturday, the day of the state championship, where we faced a team of giants. Our opponent was stacked with seniors, their shortest player is taller than my tallest, and they have three that top out at six-foot or taller. While the game was back and forth for three quarters, we just couldn't hang with them for the entire contest.

Here's where we get to the pain. It wasn't the loss, but afterward, when that same senior came walking off the court. A few steps before reaching the sideline, she went down to one knee and started quietly crying.

What do you do? The other team is lining up to shake our hands, the tournament directors are setting up at midcourt to hand out the trophies, and the two teams preparing to play for the guy's state title are filing from their locker rooms, ready to take over the two team benches. When the game's over, you celebrate quickly, then move on.

This young lady went through hell over the past year. She had two knee operations, months of agonizing physical therapy, and times when she felt she would never make it back.

Yet all season she has been the team's heart and soul, pumping up the others when they felt down, leading by word and deed. She had already tasted success at this level, on that state title-winning team from two years earlier. She put everything she had into leading her team back to the state title game, only to fall short in the end. She was crushed, yet the rest of the world was ready to move on.

What do you do?

As far as I was concerned, that court was going to be ours until my player decided she could stand and walk off. That took a while, but finally, surrounded by her teammates, she stood and we walked off the court.

And that brings me to the “thing” I mentioned earlier.

I love coaching basketball. I love the competitiveness of it, the strategy, the nervousness and energy – particularly when you face a team that outmatches you physically, or when you're going into a major tournament or season-ending championship. I get an even bigger thrill out of watching my players grow up, become more confident on the court, and then carry that confidence into other walks of life.

In the end the wins, the trophies, the championships – we've collected a lot of them over the past three seasons – they mean less and less as time moves on.

But certain events will always be with me – watching my daughter jumping up and down like a kid on Christmas morning, her teammates overwhelmed with joy, when she hit that shot to send us to overtime; then watching those same ladies absolutely crushed when we fell short, losing our long-sought national championship (I spent a lot of time over the next hour with my arm around shoulders, comforting weeping players); watching this year's team – especially that senior I've talked about – be absolutely overcome with joy with that 20-point comeback which propelled us onward in the playoffs, and then consoling her on that court as the bitter realization hit that her dream of another state title was over.

When you share eight months of the year with a group of young people, you grow close, and you feel one another's emotions – joy and pain. That connection, the ability to reach across three decades of age difference, to be a mentor, and a friend – THAT is what coaching is all about.

Several of my former players are playing college ball now, and some on this season's team will no doubt do the same. I keep in touch with quite a few – they drop me e-mails, Facebook messages, show up at some of our games. Whenever we see one another, we strike up a conversation. They keep me up-to-date on how life is going, what their plans are, and I understand them, and they know I do, because of what we've shared.

My youngest – she is 10 – has expressed a bit of interest in playing organized ball next season, and if she does I'll probably help out with the team, but otherwise, this will be my final season on the bench. I love doing it, but coaching at this level is time consuming. I have a demanding full-time job and a family. I've lost family time to coaching, missed out on plenty of sleep (was up until 4 a.m. the night before the state championship, watching video of our opponent) and my writing career has essentially been on hold during this period.

We have the national tournament coming up in March and after that I'll be hanging up my whistle. I'm going to miss it. Already the thought of being away from the game, away from the players, of not being in a gym come August, is depressing. But it's what I need to do, to be with my family more, to resurrect whatever writing career I might have.

Still, I wouldn't trade these past three seasons for anything. The highs and the lows, the emotional connections I've made to these players, knowing I've helped them through those and hopefully taught them a life lesson or two along the way – those are lifelong treasures that nothing could replace, and will be with me long after the wins are forgotten and the trophies are packed away.

Show me yours, I'll show you mine

Twitter name that is. What did you think I meant?

Yes, I’m on Twitter now. I’ve resisted for quite some time. No, resisted is the wrong word. Let’s just say I have held no driving interest in pursuing Twitter until now. The first time I heard someone saying they were going to tweet me, I wasn‘t sure if I should be offended or afraid. All sorts of images came to mind, until I learned Twitter was another so-called social medium.

I took a look at it and found a lot of people telling the world what they ate for breakfast, what they decided to wear today, what kind of tooth paste they use, and how often they go to the bathroom every day. There’s enough of that on Facebook, right?

But then I discovered something. There are loads of people using Twitter as a way to keep in touch with family, with friends, and as a means to promote their work. Some come out looking like cookie-cutter tweets auto-generated by some computer, but others really come across as genuine, albeit brief, conversations. I don’t know that you can get to know anyone through Twitter, but keeping track of what they are doing, where they are visiting, what they feel is important, is definitely one step toward learning about them. And for writers (or other business people), there’s nothing like being able to keep your readers (or customers) up to date on your latest work.

And if you follow me, I can keep you updated on some pending publishing news for a couple of my novels, and let you know when some great author interviews pop up right here on ye olde blog!

So now I’m a Twitterer. Are you? My Twitter address is @johnpeterswrite. You can follow me by there by checking out my Twitter feed to the left of this blog.

There, I’ve shown you mine, will you show me yours?

P.S. Don’t forget -- you can enter into a drawing for either a copy of the Stoker-nominated Horror Library 3 anthology or the just-released Night Terrors 2, both of which feature more than two dozen chilling tales (including an offering from me in each collection) for your reading pleasure. Join my blog and leave a comment and you’re entered!

Sweathogs, aging, and dreams

Oh man, Epstein died.

I read those words on Facebook the other day in a post by writer extraordinaire Stephen Mark Rainey, and a quick bit of Web surfing confirmed that Robert Hegyes, who played Sweathog Juan Epstein on the 1970s television show Welcome Back Kotter, had died.

He was 60.

I think reading that sentence, that he was 60, surprised me more than his death.

I was never a big Kotter fan, not because I had anything against the show, but this was back in the days when TVs came equipped with rabbit ears and needed an antenna mounted on the roof of the house. Where I lived we received two network television stations, CBS and NBC affiliates (and on rare days when the cloud-cover was just right, a fuzzy PBS affiliate). Welcome Back Kotter, carried on ABC stations, simply wasn't available. I caught it some while visiting my sister – they had this cool thing called cable television – and I thought it was mildly funny. Welcome Back Kotter that is, not the cable TV.

Still, I have an image of Epstein, and Vinnie Barbarino, Arnold Horshack, and Gabe Kotter very much like the one in this picture accompanying a New York Times article telling of Mr. Hegyes' death. Sure, I know it's been 32 years since that showed left the airwaves, and three decades is a long time. Still, in my mind I see the people in that series just like they appeared at that time, and learning Mr. Hegyes had died, that he had grown into the beginning of his seventh decade of life before dying – it just seemed sudden and sobering. Like he had aged all at once.

Has that ever happened to you? You see an interview with some star from a series you recall from years ago, but today they are gray and wrinkled – or worse, they have died – and it strikes you in some visceral way that they are getting older.

And that means you are, too.

Which brings me to this. Aging hopefully brings with it some wisdom and understanding. Chief among that understanding is that some of those hopes and dreams you might have had when you were younger were simply unrealistic. Others, though, may still be worth pursuing, maybe even more so now with the benefit of a few years of that wisdom as part of your make-up.

That's what I'm hoping. And that's why I've started this blog, and gotten more active over at my Facebook account, because I have decided 2012 is the year to return to a few of those dreams of my youth.

And make them reality.

Oh my! Mustangs, Legos, and writing at the speed of light: An interview with author A.J. Brown

Today I'm featuring an interview with author A.J. Brown. I had the good fortune to meet A.J. several years ago in an online writer's group, and we've kept in touch off and on during the years. You can even find a couple of anthologies here and there in which both of us have work (just this month, Blood Bound Books released Night Terrors 2, an anthology in which work from both of us appears). Truthfully, it's hard to find an anthology or publication that A.J. doesn't have something in. I don't know that I've ever seen a writer so prolific -- over the past two years A.J. has written a combined 112 short stories, a figure which puts most writers to shame. Over the four years immediately prior to that, he wrote an astounding 512 -- with a high of 135 stories in 2008. Most recently he's had his story, "In the Shadows They Hide," published in the aforementioned Night Terrors 2 anthology. And earlier this month, Dark Continents Publishing released a collection featuring three of his stories entitled Along the Splintered Path. The collection's release was part of Dark Continents' project Tales of Darkness and Dismay, featuring a series of novellas and collections from a dozen different writers.

If you want to know a little bit about the nuts and bolts of how A.J. and Dark Continents put the collection together, writer Michelle Garren Flye covers that in an excellent interview with A.J. at BREATHE.

Now, A.J., let's get started.

John: Tell us briefly about the Along the Splintered Path -- how did you whittle your work down to the stories you chose, how they were chosen, what were you looking for when Dark Continents commissioned you to do the collection?

A.J. Brown: I didn’t have a lot of time to put this together. Thankfully,  throughout 2011 I had put together a couple of larger collections in hopes of having one of them picked up. I received a few nibbles and even had a few promising leads, but they all fell through. So, when DCP contacted me about putting something together—a novella or three or four short stories for a collection—I jumped on it. 

I did a ton of editing on around twenty stories last year so I perused those and chose six pieces. I then enlisted help from a few friends and got it down to the four pieces I ultimate sent off. DCP chose the three they liked and Along the Splintered Path was born.

As far as what I was looking for: I’m a writer and I want to be published, I want readers to be able to see my work, to enjoy the words I put down. That’s the goal—to reach readers.

John: I'm particularly interested in The Woodshed. I read that story several years ago in its first public incarnation in the Dark Distortions anthology. You said in Michelle Garren Flye's interview that you rewrote much of the story since then. Is that a difficult process? How do you set aside what's already there, how the story already came to life once, and put together a separate piece that maintains the essence of the original? Isn't that, in many ways, more difficult than the original writing?

A.J. Brown: When I decided to rewrite The Woodshed I knew it would be a challenge. It had garnered some good comments and a lot of people really liked it.  As a writer yourself, you know that things you wrote five years ago may not be as well written as things you would write today. When I went back to the Dark Distortions version, I saw a few things that could use tweaking and a lot of that had to do with the way Kyle came across. He had to be a sympathetic character and his voice had to ring true throughout the entire piece. There were parts in there that I felt Kyle lost his voice. There were also a couple of contradictions that I can’t believe I didn’t catch back then. 

The thing with rewriting a story from beginning to end is you can’t be enamored with a line or paragraph or even entire pages. You have to be willing to say this has got to go and this needs to be reworded and, oh boy, how did I miss this? Your mindset is completely different and the work is more tedious—it is harder than sitting at the computer and typing something all new. 

To best explain the process, it’s kind of like working on a car or fixing the roof of your house. You see what needs to be done, you figure out what things need to be taken off or dismantled, then you repair it by putting in new parts or making the old parts sturdier. It’s time consuming and sometimes—okay, a lot of times—you mash your thumb or mess something up and have to go back and do it again, but in the end, you have things the way you want them. Your car is running again and your roof is fixed. Can you tell I’m from the south?

John: We haven't kept in touch too much over the past year or two, but I recall from earlier times you were really wrapped up with short story writing, with no inclination toward longer works. Any ideas of tackling a novel now, or have you already done that?

A.J. Brown: Ha! Yeah, I still have no real interest in tackling a novel. However, I have written two in the past couple of years.  I know, a contradiction of sorts. I didn’t set out to write a novel or really anything over five or six thousand words. I never do. I have a process for when I write: I sit down with a thought or a story swirling in my head and I just start typing. Most of the time the hardest part is coming up with the right opening line. I write. If a story ends up being two thousand words, then fine.  If one ends up being sixty-seven thousand, then I’m fine with that also. I chose a long time ago not to limit my stories based on a word count. I found writing to a word maximum was restricting for both the stories, and me so I stopped doing that. The two novels I wrote were done so by just sitting and writing and letting them take me on a journey.

John: Along the Splintered Path is an e-book collection, available for download to the Kindle. In this age in which it seems nearly every writer is abandoning traditional publishing for self-pub e-books, why did you choose to work with a publisher, rather than go it alone with self-publishing the work?

A.J. Brown: I was lucky. Simple as that. 

I actually did do a little e-publishing at the beginning of last year. Three stories were posted in a four month period over on Smashwords. They got some good reviews and I think I even got a fan or two out of it—which made the effort well worth it. But, ultimately, I’ve always wanted a publisher to think that my work was worth putting out there. 

I must have queried fifteen different places in 2011 about putting together a collection. It may have been more. I’m not sure. But, the no’s outweighed the nibbles and I strongly considered calling it a writing career and being done with it. 

Earlier in the year I subbed to DCP and they were very polite in their rejection and, honestly, I marked them off my list for 2011 and thought I would try again in 2012. Then at the tail end of November I received an e-mail to consider submitting for the e-book launch, Tales of Darkness and Dismay. Of course, I submitted and I’m happy I did so.

You never know when a door you thought was closed may reopen. As I said, I was lucky. 

John: Tell me, how in the world do you write at such a prolific pace? Before you answer, let me tell our readers those short story figures I mentioned in the introduction are for fully completed stories. They don't count the unfinished pieces, nor do they count the poetry, blogs, and other writing you do.

A.J. Brown: It was something that developed in 2005 when I joined the workshop you mentioned earlier. In that workshop are various private offices and there was one called, I can’t quite remember the name, but something like ‘Nellie’s Flash Office.’ It was an office where you were given a topic on one day, you had one hour to write the story in under a thousand words and post it up for the other contestants to read and then 24 hours to read and review the stories and vote for your top three. 

This was more of a literary type office, but I learned a lot about the economy of words and how restricting they can be. But I also learned how to take a simple idea and turn it into a story in an hour’s time. Now, understand what I’m saying: View the topic, come up with a story, write the story, edit the story to some degree and post it in sixty minutes. That’s when you realize how short an hour can be.

Later on I joined another flash contest office before creating my own dedicated to horror stories only. 

After I stopped writing flash stories (they are just too restrictive for a long winded person like me) I still implemented something I learned in that original office. Instead of writing in increments of a thousand words I began writing in increments of five hundred. By writing five hundred words, walking away for a few minutes or an hour or whatever, then coming back and writing five hundred words again, that word count became a breeze and I could write six, seven, ten thousand words in a day (when I had that type of time) easily. For me, I actually have a notepad by my desk so when I write I note the current word count and the time and then write until I reach the five hundred word mark, then stop (unless I’m on a roll and then I keep going). I make note of the new word count and time then do it again. It’s almost like I’m holding myself accountable to five hundred words every single time I sit to write. Not four hundred ninety-nine. It’s always five hundred or more. Always.

John: There are not enough markets to publish all of your works, I don't believe. What are your plans for all those stories that have not yet seen publication?

A.J. Brown: I’m going to rewrite them. I started that process last year and have turned some bare bones stories into meaty pieces by concentrating on what’s good about each piece and improving on them.  I’ll never get them all published and I don’t think I’ll try to. But, there are easily a couple to three hundred good pieces that can be fleshed out a little more and that can come alive with a little more work.

John: Let's stray away from writing for a bit for a round of quick questions to give readers a little insight into you. What would be your dream job?

A.J. Brown: Coaching. I love coaching kids.

John: Dream car?

A.J. Brown: 1972 Mustang

John: Dream location to live?

A.J. Brown: Wow. I really don’t know. I would love to live in Ann Arbor, Michigan so I could go see the Wolverines play, but my wife says no way to that.

John: Favorite non-writing-related activity?

A.J. Brown: LEGOs. No joke. I love LEGOs.

John: Who is your favorite big-name author?

A.J. Brown: Stephen King

John: Favorite not-quite-so-big-name author?

A.J. Brown: I absolutely love John Mantooth's work. So elegantly written. His stories are just phenomenal works of art.

John: Favorite television show?

A.J. Brown: The Walking Dead

John: Favorite movie?

A.J. Brown: The Outlaw Josie Wells

John: Okay, back to the writing. What's the best part of the writing process for you?

A.J. Brown: Watching my characters come alive and seeing how the stories unfold. I rarely have a clue where my stories are going or how they’ll get there. I have an idea and I just go with it. Learning about the stories and sitting in the passenger’s seat while they unfold is awesome.

John: Is there anything in the process you particularly dislike?

A.J. Brown: Getting stuck. Sometimes I write myself into a corner and have to go back and figure out where that happened. I hate it when that happens.

John: What do you do to get away from it all -- when work is hard, writing doesn't fill the bill -- how do you recharge your batteries?

A.J. Brown: My mind never really leaves writing. It’s always there, intentional or not. Anything can be a story idea—anything at all—and that is both the exciting part of being a writer and the bane of existence as well. 

Music, I think, is the one thing that takes my mind away—at least temporarily. It gets the juices flowing again and helps with the writing process.

John: Plans for the rest of 2012? Where can we find your work? What big projects are on the horizon?

A.J. Brown: Keep writing and promoting for Along the Splintered Path as well as for the other books in the Tales of Darkness and Dismay release. I hope the collection is a springboard of sorts and that someone reading it would consider my work for something else further on down the line. I do have those two novels—one of which I’m pretty sure readers will like.

Places you can find me are:

My blog, Type AJ Negative

Facebook:  AJ Brown

I have a Twitter account, but I hate Twitter.  However, I do use it.  You know how it is with all those necessary evils.

Twitter:  @AJBrown36

John: Thanks so much for taking the time to answer my questions. A.J. I'm looking forward to reading the new version of The Woodshed, the rest of the stories in Along the Splintered Path and to seeing what else you have coming down the road this year.

A.J. Brown: Thank you, John, for having me.

John: My pleasure, A.J. For any of you wanting to keep up with A.J. and his work, visit his website at Type AJ Negative

We got it wrong -- the Mayans predicted a new beginning

I’m sure you’ve heard -- a thousand times by now -- the Mayans predicted the end of the world on Dec. 12, 2012. While that might make for good fiction, it’s far from the truth, because what ends is the Mayan calendar, not the world. We measure time in hours and days, weeks, months, years and centuries. The Mayans had their own units of measurement, and Dec. 12, 2012, for them, was to be the end of a measured era, not unlike what we might consider the end of a millennium.

In other words, there would be a next day. It wouldn’t be called Dec. 13, 2012, but it would be there none-the-less.

I do believe this year is another one in the long and, lately, steep decline in the traditional publishing world. I’m no expert, and I’m not one of the many writers with book deals who have seen their income dry up, their contracts disappear. But I have been reading widely about the industry for years. I’ve made my own forays into the world of fiction writing, with a few of my works showing up in print and online. I’ve always made it a point to only submit to paying markets, so that’s limited my opportunities to be published. And I’ll be the first to admit I have not pursued writing and publication with all the ardor often considered necessary to achieve any level of success. Still, given the time I’ve put into it, I’m happy with where I am in terms of the volume of my work which has been published.

I’ve made a few runs at breaking into the world of traditional book publishing with some novels I’ve written. Two of them, middle-reader works aimed at kids in the 9-year-old to 12-year-old group, garnered a bit of encouragement and referrals from a couple of agents, but never went any further. The past two years, however, have been difficult ones in many ways. I coach a high school basketball team, and that takes a tremendous amount of time. My workload on the job has increased significantly, requiring quite a few 12- and 14-hour days. My computer decided to quit working. And my health isn’t as great as it once was.

Yeah, I know, excuses, excuses. That’s not really the focus of what I want to say, though. I’m making a few changes in my life this year, and some of these will allow me to focus more on my writing.

But I’m focusing in a different way, at least on the publishing end, because I believe 2012 is the year many writers -- and more importantly, readers -- will truly realize the old publishing world is dying. Or at least changing dramatically. I believe the big publishers still will be around, pushing best sellers and making money on them. And I believe small, specialty publishers will remain, selling extremely limited editions of books for more money than it takes to feed my family of seven for two days.

The rest? I think you’ll see traditional print publishers continue to fall by the wayside.

So why am I putting a major emphasize on writing more in 2012?

For one thing, I enjoy it. Sometimes it’s like slamming my head against the wall. Other times writing is like having someone yank your teeth out -- without Novocain. But in the end, it’s a process I love, and when I’m not doing it everything else in my life loses a bit of its luster.

Second, I believe I don’t have to depend on the hope, however remote, of making it with a traditional publisher. Electronic publishing, via Kindle, Nook, and other e-formats has opened up the world to writers and readers in a way never before imagined. For writers, each of us now has the power to decide which pieces of our work will or won’t see publication. We decide the title of the novel, the cover design, how it is to be marketed, even the price.

For readers, the possibilities are endless. I recently received a Kindle (thanks to winning a contest by romance writer Michelle Garren Flye) and I’ve been amazed. It seems there is an almost endless supply of novels, novellas, and short story collections. Some are a little pricey for my tastes, but it seems an overwhelming percentage of the works are available for prices ranging from 99 cents to $2.99. Quite a few are even free, while others are available through Amazon’s new Amazon Prime lending library program.

As a reader, that’s hard to beat, especially when I know the writer of a $1.99-cent novel is actually making more on that sale than he would if a traditional publisher sold the work in paperback for eight bucks (because, in the literary world, moving product and making profit is the emphasis, the writer is mostly raw material to be used up and cast aside if he doesn’t like working for little more than a few quarters on each sale).

As a writer, this is becoming a big, brave new world. There are quite a few examples of indie publishers making it HUGE via e-publishing (J.A. Konrath, Amanda Hocking, etc.), but that’s really not it. If it’s all about the money, even selling a couple of dozen copies of a novel is a better business deal for the individual writer than having the novel collecting virtual dust on the computer hard drive while one publisher after another rejects, or even ignores, your pitches.

But it is more than the money. As a writer, having the ability to put your work out there, making a connection with readers -- be it a few dozen, a few hundred, or if I may be permitted to dream a bit, a few thousand -- is far beyond the hopes most writers have dared to dream.

So maybe, rather than think of 2012 as another step toward the end of traditional publishing, it’s the beginning of a wonderful new universe.

For writers and readers, there will be a Dec. 13, 2012. And it just might be better than Dec. 12.

Note: Coming up on Wednesday, Jan. 25, a conversation with author and confirmed super-speed-writer A.J. Brown, author of the recently released collection Along the Splintered Path, published by Dark Continents Publishing.