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“Merry Christmas, Ya Hairy Devils”

Life around the compound has been crazy-busy, which I’m sure everyone out there can relate to, so I’d like to take the time to wish the readers of this blog a safe and lovely holiday and a prosperous New Year. I suspect that everyone out there has had just about enough of 2011 and will spend the time off quietly regrouping and refreshing their souls. At least, I sure hope so. Real life will start cranking back up soon enough. Enjoy some drinks with family and friends, catch up on your Tivo or Netflix queue, take stock of what you value in your life and choose some things to leave behind on the trash heap. You deserve it, and you can’t really move forward without it.

I’d like to thank those of you who’ve helped me out this year, by buying my books, listening to the podcast, and generally keeping my name out in the public mind. I’d like to buy you all a drink and some Beer Nuts, but something else will have to do. So, below is the link for a genyooine unpublished Christmas story, starring Top Town’s favorite bigshoe, Rex Koko. It’s got everything: thievery, tightwaddedness, fraud, deception, and a happy ending. And lots and lots of Yuletide Monkeys. If you listen to the whole thing (less than 20 minutes), you’ll understand the title of this post.

So please enjoy this. Take time to enjoy life this next week, strengthen your heart and friendships, enrich your life in whatever way you can think of. Tis the season, pally.

2012 UPDATE: I’ve taken down the MP3 until next December, when you will all be able to listen to it again and make it part of your holiday traditions. No sense turning it into “It’s a Wonderful Life”, which used to appear on every TV channel at year-end because its copyright had lapsed.

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Indie Book Blowout !! Cheap books, Kindle giveaway and more!

While this blog isn’t used often to sell things…oh, wait, yes it IS!…so I’ll tell ya…

Honk Honk, My Darling is currently part of the Indie Book Blowout, a little pre-Christmas promotion for indie book writers. The 12 Days of Christmas Blowout features dozens of writers of thrillers, horror, sci-fi, fantasy, romance and any other genre you might like, all offering their books for a mere 99c!

If you have a Kindle, you know that it’s a baby that needs constant feeding. So here’s your chance to fill it up for a song. The 12 Days of Christmas Blowout wraps up on December 24, Christmas Eve, so go check it out, help out the writers involved, buy a few volumes for the people you’re giving a Kindle to this year, and help yourself to some terrific books — among them, the world’s first noir thriller and Book of the Year from the Chicago Writers Association.

The Indie Book Blowout is also giving away a new Kindle, with no purchase necessary. In addition, every day they are giving away a $25 Amazon gift card so you can buy even more books.

Whether you’ve done all your holiday shopping (in which case, you deserve a treat for yourself) or you haven’t even started (in which case, you might as well let it wait until the after-Christmas sales, so mellow out with a good book), you need to go to the Indie Book Blowout and get yerself blown out with some books. The 12 Days of Christmas Blowout is a lot cheaper, neater and quieter than your standard 12 Days of Christmas, that’s for sure.

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Writer’s Corner: Productivity

So, this has been a very productive week. This raises two questions: Why? and How can it happen again?

I can figure out the why to some extent. The week of Thanksgiving (and a lot of the week before that) was a bust, work-wise. Hosting meant a lot of legwork, cleaning, and family obligations. Turkey Day itself was quite enjoyable, though we didn’t get to finish our “Treehouse of Horror” Monopoly game. And it was also sublimely enjoyable to watch Liesel sing in “Boris Godunov” again, on Wednesday night.

The rest of the week, though, was one big obligation. Certain family members were here who usually bring out the worst in me, who without knowing it cause all the bad habits of mind and character I’ve been trying to change for most of my life to crawl to the surface again. A lot of psychic energy is needed to fend off these habits, which can get very frustrating. Everyone knows the feeling of how old family roles begin to take shape again when relatives visit. Sometimes these can be laughed off, and sometimes they can’t.

Of course, this only shows you how fitting my “family role” — touchy, overly sensitive, impatient aesthete with strange tastes and dismissible opinions — must be. If I’m so touchy about being reminded that I’ve always had an unpleasant personality, well then, it must be true, right? This unavoidable, “unassailable” circular logic can make you want to punch a brick wall after a few days, so it was a relief to get it off my back. Maybe this was the kind of “slingshot” effect I needed to dig into work and produce.

I don’t recommend this type of “therapy” be used very often, but harnessing the negative energy when it does might be useful. (And any relatives who might be reading this will know, by that fact, that I’m not talking about them.)

This week, I managed to rewrite about 9000 words, mix a huge podcast and record another. And yesterday I wrote a complete story for my upcoming project, Tea Party Fairy Tales, in one sitting. Oh, and winning the Book of the Year from the Chicago Writers Association also put a little wind in my sails. I think it also helped that materials I’ve been waiting for from other people started to arrive, so I got the feeling of deadlines needing to be met. (This might be the No. 1 hurdle to get over when self-employed. Deadlines can get very flexible, especially if I want to avoid a crowd at the grocery store, so the extra effort that could go into meeting them gets diverted. I’ve tried everything in the book to get deadlines to stick, but it gets harder and harder.)

Now the tougher question: How to keep it going? Hard to say. My work habits don’t change much between fertile and fallow periods. My ass is still in the chair 5 hours a day. Creation, reflection, promotion, household maintenance and screwing off in various degrees fill the day. This week a sense of urgency was calling me, with the literal feeling of grabbing me by the nose and pulling me forward. It’s the closest thing I have to feeling “inspired.” She’s a fickle bitch, that muse of mine. I don’t like to rely on inspiration. I’m more the type of guy who wants to get something good done a little bit every day. Sometimes that little bit never comes, and all the devilish voices of doubt start coming from the corners of the room. Then, sometimes writing comes in a burst, along with promotion ideas, organizational breakthroughs, and other tag-alongs, flotsam and debris. Time stretches out, and everything seems doable.

Is it a question of my basic disposition? A passing mood? Is it the standard for every writer but Stephen King, and doesn’t even bear looking at?

I really don’t know. I think all I can do is treat the work and progress this week like molten glass, something that forces urgency to be made into something bigger, something further, something useful. Maybe the load of unfinished work will quicken my mind next week and not drag me down into despair. (I don’t believe in Hemingway’s bromide of stopping short of completion at the end of the day, to leave “something in the well” for the next session. Never got me anything except a lot of unfinished paragraphs.) And maybe the looming work break at Christmastime (with the promise of more interaction with blood relatives) will light a fire under me too.

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New Podcast Episode Now Up!

Here’s the recording for Chapter 10 of Honk Honk, My Darling, in which Rex finally meets the woman he’s been searching for, and almost starts a food fight.

Featuring the dramatic debut of Mary Dixon, siren of the morning news at WXRT-FM.

Brought to you by the Hindenberk Car Company.

(If you’d like to download the MP3 and play it elsewhere, just subscribe at iTunes or go to http://rexkoko.libsyn.com.)

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“I’ve Just Won a Major Award!”

You mean, the lamp made out of a woman’s leg?

No, something better!

Honk Honk, My Darling has just won the inaugural “Book of the Year, Nontraditional Fiction” from the Chicago Writers Association !!! YAHOOOO!!

This is truly awesome! I am so overjoyed that the judges gave the nod to Rex (and indirectly Lotta, Bingo, Boots Carlozo, Jimmy Plummett, Pinky Piscopink, Happy Jingles and all the other kinkers of Top Town). While I will proudly proclaim “Nontraditional Fiction” to mean my own strange brew of whatever makes me chortle, it really is directed at e-books and self-published books. And that’s pretty cool, too, in this brave new world of publishing, to have made a splash.

Here’s what judge Robert W. Walker said in his release:

This novel packs so much humor on each page, combining humor and the solving of the case with a unique panache. The novel defies categorization and flies in the face of convention while at the same time using the conventions of humor and mystery, a rare find; a paradox that works.

Man, it feels pretty good to defy categorization, and then win a category.

The last award I won for writing was in 1981 for a couple of short plays I wrote while at the University of Michigan. While writing has been good to me over the past 15 years, it’s pretty darn nifty to receive an award like this, voted on by my ink-stained peers. The award ceremony will be held at the Book Cellar, 4736 N. Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, on January 14. We’ll all be reading and signing, and it will be open to the public. Can’t wait.

(Damn, I think my snark engine is broken. That’s what genuine gratitude gets you. I hope this isn’t a permanent condition.)

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Thanksgiving Ramble

I sat down today, fully intending to write up a blog post that people could read over this long holiday weekend. This post would be clever and erudite, but also ground-breaking. It would cement in the reader’s mind that, despite the comical trappings around here, I was someone to take seriously, that my musings were something to tap into on a regular basis, that any sliver of spare time spent here would be rewarding. And from a crass commercial angle, it would get me a little web traffic and remind readers I was still alive and still flogging all my e-books, especially Honk Honk, My Darling.

Sorry, gang. It didn’t happen. Whatever thoughts might have been pacing around up there in the waiting room, ready for their debut, have somehow vanished. Maybe they were in a pique because I’d ignored them for most of the month, and they were loath to be trotted out hurriedly like a kid reciting “Twinkle Twinkle.” Maybe thoughts of baking, cooking, hosting and running around locked the door on them and pretended the key’s been lost. Maybe the thoughts are stuck in the security line at O’Hare. Maybe I ain’t got a cogent thought to present in any interesting way, and never did.

I started a list of things I was thankful for, but that started getting a little mawkish. Besides, everyone else’s lists have been on Twitter and blogs all week. While it was nice to read them all, it pushed me closer to the idea in Matthew 6, about praying by yourself in a closet.

Is that in the spirit of the holiday? Who knows? One of the best things about Thanksgiving is that it’s a little amorphous in how you approach it. There are traditions a-plenty, but the idea of celebrating the day “properly” rarely comes up. There’s no blowback if you choose to spend it by yourself or with friends, whether you eat turkey or lasagna, whether you go shopping or watch slasher movies at home. It feels like a real Do-It-Yourself holiday, and since it’s the first one of the season, everyone is a little less anxious.

At least, that’s how I feel about it. Family tensions certainly arise, as crowds gather for the celebration (or as people tell their families that they won’t be coming). The Black Friday stuff makes me want to join a monastery, in the Marianas Trench. The Christmas commercials during the parades and football games are nauseating (I feel so inadequate that I won’t be able to give my sweetie a Lexus this year, with a big bow on the top!). Seriously, it takes A LOT to turn me off from watching a parade, but CBS and Macy’s have perfected a formula for it. So, opportunities certainly arise for tension, disappointment, regret, but I’ve somehow blocked them out. Perhaps I’ve learned a few lessons in life by the half-century point.

At least we’re not the ones traveling this year.

And double at least, The Detroit Lions aren’t an abomination now, so both football games might be worth watching.

And I get to watch my darling daughter singing in “Boris Godunov” again tonight at the Chicago Lyric Opera.

So I’ve got lots to be thankful for. And I thank you for reading this far. Have a happy holiday weekend, y’all.

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Tea Party Fairy Tales: Aesop’s Fables #1

The Two Sheep

One morning two sheep were deciding where to go to graze grass.

“I think we should go up the mountain,” said the first sheep. “Not many other animals go there to graze, so there should be enough to eat. Besides, the view is very pretty.”

The second sheep said, “No, let’s go down near the river. The grass is very sweet and plentiful there, and we’ll be shaded from the sun and wind.”

“I don’t like that idea,” said the first.

“But I don’t like yours either,” said the second.

“Well then, let’s compromise. We can go to the broad plain that lies between the mountains and the river. It should have enough grass to eat, and the weather should be fine for both of us.”

“Agreed,” said the second sheep.

And as they set off down the road to the broad plain, they were both attacked and eaten by lions.

Moral: Compromise equals death

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A Little On-Line Chit-Chat

If you’re curious about a little of my background and writing process, you can check out the nice interview with me on a new site called Creative-Writing-Help.com. Thanks to Tracey Tressa for the nice write-up.

Here’s a creative writing exercise for you after you read the interview:

What sort of undersea creature does my pale bald head remind you of? What would you do if it confronted you while on vacation? Would it be dangerous? How do you think it could be killed?

 

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“Honk Honk” Podcast, Chapter 9

For all you eager kinkers out there, here is the latest podcast from Honk Honk, My Darling, featuring an appearance by my darling daughter as a sassy street urchin. Hope you enjoy.

If you DO enjoy, try leaving a comment in the iTunes store, because that will give it a little more momentum in their rankings.

And tell your friends, leave a review on Amazon, and join the “Honk Honk, My Darling” Facebook page. All these things add up. You want the circus to come back again next year, don’t you?

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Cover Competition: Can We Cop “Mr. Congeniality”?

One of the best blogs out there for e-publishing is The Book Designer, where Joel Friedlander dispenses advice on making self-published and indie-published work look as good as it can. So I was excited when I read that he had a monthly contest for book covers. Every book has a cover, but so many of the e-books I’ve seen look, imho, completely amateurish, with poor font choices, muddled or cliche design, cockeyed proportions between elements, and empty space you could drive a donkey cart through. A lot of them wouldn’t have worked for a Ladies League Cookbook.

But putting those impressions into words is beyond me. I thought hearing from a professional like Joel about both my own cover and those of other e-books would be very educational.

And hey, frankly I thought we might win the contest. But alas, not this time. Joel had mostly positive things to say about the cover, designed by Airan Wright.

This cover has some of the most sophisticated typography of all the covers this month, and professional-quality illustration. What held it back, in my view, was the difficulty making out what exactly the illustration is, and what meaning it has. Also, having so many strong elements on one cover has led to a bit of graphic confusion.

Well, he’s probably right about the graphic confusion. We’ve talked a little bit about changing the cover in the future, taking out the starburst at the trapeze, and inserting a hand and forearm. But it’s pretty nice to hear that we have “the most sophisticated typography” of the month. I know what I like, and I liked Airan’s work right away. It’s grabby, and it’s going to work for other books in the series.

Among all the choices a self-publisher must make, one of the most important is what to do yourself and what to hire out. This requires deciding what you’re good at, and frankly that can be difficult. But you don’t get a second chance to make a first impression. A strong cover is important, and will be increasingly crucial as more color tablets enter the market and people use them to browse for their next read. I learned a long time ago that while I may have an EYE for design, that doesn’t mean I can actually DESIGN something that will attract other people.

Friedlander’s website, and especially the contest, is something every self-publisher should check frequently. You can’t judge a book by its cover, except most of the time.

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Great Week for Baseball — and Bardball

As you fans know, this has been a helluva week for postseason baseball. I’ve had the obligation (yes, this is what I tell my wife) to watch my hometown team as it struggles mightily against the scary Texas Rangers. How many one run and two run victories can either team survive? There have been no laffers, no routs, nothing that would make you turn the game off early.

And as usual with the postseason, the expected heroes (Verlander, Cabrera, Hamilton) have not been nearly as productive as the also-rans (Nelson Cruz, Delmon Young). Why this happens every postseason is worthy of someone’s research. Maybe the heroes are too exhausted, or too distractible from all their interviews, or put too much pressure on themselves to single-handedly carry the team. Whatever it is, it’s what makes October baseball so awesome.

And it’s been a great week for limericks at Bardball.com. Earlier in the week, I relaxed the rule of only one post per day, and the limericks have been plentiful, in both posts and comments. And shame on us, we haven’t been able to give any space to poems on the Brewers-Cardinals series (well, I do have one lim on the Cardinals, but because it came from a Cubs fan, it’s really nasty). Below is a sample of one of our better ones, by Hilary Barta, who also runs the site LimerWrecks. Come on over and check it all out before the World Series. That’s gonna be a yawner, I tell ya.

That hit over Beltre was crazy
A bit of the old upsy-daisy
The Rangers were trounced
when Detroit’s way it bounced,
still kicking like Cameron Swayze.

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Latest Podcast for “Honk Honk, My Darling”

Attention all kinkers! The latest podcast of “Honk Honk, My Darling” is now up and available for listening! Death continues to follow Rex Koko like a yappy little dog as he follows the trail of Boots Carlozo to the trailer of her latest bunkmate, Flying Fleming! Brought to you by Robillard’s Shrimp Sticks, in handy stick form!

(Sorry this one took so long, but there were a lot of characters, sound effects and background sounds to tinker with and get right. Ever since my brother told me to get serious about the SFX, I’ve been getting more and more particular about how I put these together. Hope you agree!)

Download from this link or click on the embed below:

(Sorry the embed looks like a cheap piece of op art. It looked fine when I uploaded it. I’ve had continuing problems with the artwork when I try and manipulate it on Libsyn.)

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(Political) Corrections from the Mail Bag

I’ve always told readers of Politically Correct Bedtime Stories to send me their corrections of mistakes I’ve made in my writing, of unwitting sexism, racism, classism, antipolyamorism, or any other bias that might offend any reader or non-reader. I’m only human, after all, though that’s a pretty flimsy excuse. Here’s my latest mea culpa (sorry for the pro-western classicism), a big error brought to my attention by new fan Sherry Spence:

Since you encouraged suggestions in the event of “any bias as yet unnamed” in your Introduction, I feel encouraged to point out the unnamed bias in your use – in that very sentence – of the word, “rectification.” This reference to the right hand being the one that corrects is a direct affront to my left-handed husband and left-handed grand-daughter. I am sure that you can right this sinistral wrong with even-handed treatment and your usual verbal dexterity in the next printing of your righteous tome.

Guilty guilty guilty. Right doesn’t make might, not without what’s left.

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Some Pictures from “Reading Under the Influence”

One of the best and most idiosyncratic reading series in Chicago is “Reading Under the Influence”, which takes place monthly at Sheffield’s Bar. Earlier this month I read a steamy passage of Rex Koko being molested by the formerly reserved wife of a senator, from the yet-to-be-released mystery The Wet Nose of Danger. It went over well, as far as clown sex in public goes, and if you look at some of the other pictures, you can see Amy Guth from the Tribune daydreaming about a romp in the bushes with a healthy joey.

Everybody’s got a fantasy, right?

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The rest of the pictures are here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/raylumpp/sets/72157627628985235/