Tag Archives: fiction

An old dog’s new trick: asking for help

I’m not good at asking for help. I’m much more comfortable helping than being helped. I don’t know why; it’s probably some kind of pride thing. Or stubbornness. Who knows?

This self-publishing biz has taught me there are some things you can’t do alone. Writing is a fine thing to do alone, but writing sometimes leads to publishing, and publishing beats the hell out of introverts.

You don’t have to ask for help if you can afford to pay for it, but I can’t do that either. Take that, foolish pride!

I’ve had to learn to ask. I’m still learning. It’s a long lesson.

So this is me, practicing asking for help.

If you’ve been following this or my other blog, you may know I’ve been preparing a new book for publication. It’s taken a long time, but I’m finally on the cusp of having the project pulled together. My wife is planning a small release party for me on June 25. (This happens to be the anniversary date of Custer’s Last Stand, but I was never into omens, and it was a pretty good day for Crazy Horse.)

Over the past couple years, I’ve asked and received valuable help from beta readers, editors, and a talented artist named Jessica O’Brien who provided the amazing cover art.

Jessica's wonderful cover art.

Jessica’s wonderful cover art.

Now, I need more help, lots more. Perhaps even your help, if you are willing.

Besides visitors to my blogs, and a sprinkling of people on Facebook, few others know about this book. Once the book is released, this has to change. I need people to help spread the word. So, to any who are willing, I humbly ask that you use whatever social media you are comfortable with to help. Whether it be a link on a blog, a Facebook post, a Tweet, whatever you’d like to do will help.

I will announce the official release. (You bet I will!) I will then welcome your assistance. You don’t even have to tell me how you’re helping spread the word, although it would allow me to thank you if you did.

Helping does not mean you have to buy or read the book. I’m just looking to let people know the book exists so they can make their own decisions about their interest in it. If you want to read the book and share your impressions of it, that would be fantastic, but just pointing a few people toward the book to see for themselves is also very helpful. Whatever you are willing and able to do is appreciated. And if you’d rather just wish me luck, I’ll take that too.

Some info about the book.

Title: A Housefly in Autumn

Genre: Is Young Adultish a genre? I’ve tried to write a story that would appeal to Young Adults as well as General Fiction readers. In doing so, I have incurred the risk of missing both audiences, but what is life without risk? (Just ask Custer.)

Blurb: A Housefly in Autumn is intended for Young Adults and up. A historical novel, set in 19th century Europe, it follows the life of a young man whose dreams have crumbled down around him. In an act of heroism, he sacrifices his own promising future to save the life of another. Now he must decide whether to cling to the unlikely hope of regaining his old life, or aim his efforts toward making the most of the life fate has dealt him. Though it is difficult to let go of the rewards that life once promised, perhaps the greatest rewards are the ones earned by building new hope from the bits and pieces of wrecked dreams.

More description can be found here. I will post purchase links when they are available.

A big Thank You in advance to all willing to help.

 

 

Truth is stranger than fiction, and has better acting

For reasons unassociated with my personal viewing preferences, we have been watching movies on the Syfy channel of late. This is the outlet where up-and-coming actors and screen writers practice as they wait for a big break that will earn them recurring roles on Lifetime, thus winning them fame and respect for their craft.

The two big blockbusters we watched recently were Sharknado and Snowmageddon. Sharknado was a tornado made up, or at least consisting largely, of sharks. Rather than sucking things up, as might be expected of your garden variety tornado, Sharknado spit things out, namely sharks. It is possible that it may have originally sucked them up from the ocean, or SeaWorld, but I missed the beginning and I don’t want to make assumptions, as I am not a trained Meteorsharkologist.

Storm's comin'!

Too much said?

In spite of the shocking nature of the material, the acting was outstanding. The sharks nailed all of their lines. I think many of them did their own stunts. If not, the stunt doubles were made up perfectly; I couldn’t tell the difference between the stunt sharks and the lead actors.

Snowmageddon was about a winter storm that, beyond hurling wind and snow at innocent folks, also shot at them. I’m not talking about real bullets; that would be ridiculous. This snow storm shot flaming chunks of ice that exploded into fireballs on contact, just as you would expect to see any bad winter storm do.

It's not winter without fireballs

I knew I should have bought a snow blower this year.

At first, I thought this was Mother Nature’s revenge for our cavalier use of fossil fuels, but then Snowmageddon appeared to take special pleasure from attacking a bus. Well, Mama N., if you insist on destroying our means of mass transit, I guess there’s nothing we can do to please you. We might better learn to take our flaming ice beatings like men, or add extra horse power to our vehicles so we can run away faster.

Incidentally, all of this wacky weather was caused by an enchanted snow globe. Maybe it’s time to stop worrying about carbon footprints and start questioning our need for dangerous souvenir collections.

Shortly before we switched the TV over to the Smurfs movie, my son asked me about Snowmageddon, “Daddy, is this fiction?”

“Yes.”

“Because it’s not real?”

“Yes.”

“Was the shark tornado movie fiction?”

“Yes.”

“Then what about aliens? Are they non-fiction?”

This wasn’t so easy. Though I’ve had conversations with space aliens online, I’ve never met one face to face. Still, the universe is a big place.

Before I could begin to formulate an appropriately wishy-washy reply, he answered for me. He pointed his finger directly at me and exclaimed, “Yes! Aliens are real!”

“How do you know that?” I asked.

“Because there was a show about them on the History Channel.”

I’m not sure which channels to get my news from anymore.

Let’s just watch the Smurfs. They’re good, honest folk. Salt of the Earth. Real people.