SHUT THE LIGHTS AND CALL IT QUITS (Bringing a series to a close)

The end of a series. It's a weird animal. It's slippery. Not easily defined at the beginning of the series (unless you are a super freak plotter with OCD and a completest messiah complex) it is something that you either see coming a mile away or it sneaks up and ambushes you while you're looking the other way.

The best rule of thumb is to quit while you are ahead. Get out while the gettin is good. We've all seen shows that have lived past their expiration date and the last seasons (Scrubs I am looking at you here) totally suck. The characters have done all they were meant to do and so they start acting like someone else entirely. They do dumb shit and behave in stupid ways that just make you hate them.

You never want the reader to hate your character if they are someone they used to love.

(see, we used to love Scrubs.)


I'm 3 novels and 3 novellas into my Deacon Chalk series. I am about to start book 4 soon. I know exactly how Deacon will behave in book 4. It will be natural for me to write it because he is in the midst of his character arc. I know where his arc is going and what I am going to do to get him there.

Now if I write past that arc I will probably be having to force the story and then the books will be like the last season of Scrubs and it will suck major balls.

I'll set the books on fire first I promise you that.

SOUP-RISE, SOUP-RISE, SOUP-RISE! (What I didn't anticipate when I became a writer.)

What a good topic.
When you strike out to become a writer you have a lot of lofty goals and dreams and ideals. You've watched TV, you've seen movies. If there is a writer on screen they are always struggling with their next idea, their next manuscript, the next thing they must create......BUT THEY ARE STRUGGLING WHILE IN THEIR MILLION DOLLAR LOFT IN DOWNTOWN NEW YORK. Or their beach getaway, or their cabin in the Rockies, or in Paris....the point is they are portrayed as needing to write another book because they have been such a success with the first one.

I'm not saying this level of success doesn't happen for writers, but it doesn't happen for writers.

It's a BS Hollywood dream.

I mean look at Melvin's apartment in AS GOOD AS IT GETS.

GREAT movie, but did you see that place? Huge, 19(ish) rooms, a grand piano, a balcony, loaded with priceless antiques, and all in a city where the average cost per square FOOT is near $2000 dollars.
Read that again.
TWO THOUSAND FREAKING DOLLARS.

I mean really.

So it may have come as a shock that I cannot buy a second home in the mountains on my royalty checks or advances. It may surprise me everytime I walk out into my driveway to get into my 98 Honda Civic instead of my Lamborghini.

It's not that my books don't sell. It's just that real life ain't Hollywood. :)

I LOVE IT SO MUCH

Books we hate to admit that we love. HMMMM, well, I have no shame at all so I am proud to say that I LOVE the MEG series. I really do.

Don't know MEG? Let me introduce you.
Reader, this is MEG.
MEG, this is Read.....Oh I am terribly sorry Reader, MEG just ATE YOUR FACE AND THE FACES OF YOUR ENTIRE FAMILY OFF!

Meg is a Megalodon, a TWENTY TON PREHISTORIC GREAT WHITE. The Tyrannosaurus Rex of sharks.

This is pulpy adventure and I love them. It ain't great writing but it is great fun. I mean look at this cover for MEG: Hell's Aquarium.

Just look at that face! I am so jealous that I didn't write these books that it makes me cross-eyed.

Go check out the author, Steve Alten's website
HERE

And enjoy these thrill packed books.

GETTING THERE IN THE RIGHT BOAT (a metaphor about small press publishing)

Publishing nowadays is a big ocean. That ocean has a lot of waves and even some storms.  If you wanna be a writer then you have to pick the right boat to get you across that ocean.

 (yes, I know that is a pic that has NONE of the ships I am about to use as a metaphor....don't get lippy)

You have six big cruise ships that can carry you across. They are hard to get onto and they go in one direction, which is great unless you decide to change your destination.  You want to go somewhere else? Welllllllll, tough.  Those are the big six publishers. The "New York" publishers.

You can also get out in your own tiny speedboat of independent publishing. You can move faster, dart around obstacles, and basically pick your destination and head there, changing your mind in mid trip. However, it takes more work, you can't just set sail and then sit back. A big wave can come up out of nowhere and knock your boat off course. And sometimes the real truth is your boat may not take you all the way across that ocean. You may not make it to your destination.

In between the cruise ships and your own speed boat though are a number of choices, an entire armada of ships of all sizes who can take you damn near anywhere you want to go....if you match the right publisher to the right destination.

These are small presses. They are publishers who run from tiny "couple of books a year" presses to publishers who can get you the same placement and distribution as New York can.

Most small presses, the good ones (cause we are NOT discussing the craptastic scam "publishers" out there. Be informed before you sign for goodness sakes, we have the internet these days, do your research.), are solid businesses. They have contacts and resources and the means to build your career. They can take you to your destination or even just part of the way.

Maybe you need developing as a writer. You wrote a good book, but you still need some seasoning...a small press can develop you.  Maybe you have a book that is good, but so tuned into a specific sub-genre that a big time publisher can't risk it, that is something a small press can do.

Small presses are great. I have many friends who run small presses or write for them. And hell, there is something to be admired in someone deciding to strike out on their own and make a business.

Here are some of the small presses I like. This is NOT a comprehensive list. It's not even a recommendation, just a bit of advice/opinion.
(the names of the presses should be links...if they don't work just use your Google-Fu)

Samhain Publishing.
Mostly e-book, mostly erotica and romance but now with a great new horror line, I really like Samhain. I don;t write for them, but everyone I know likes them and they seem like good folks. And, if you write horror, definitely a place to look into.

Kerlak Enterprises
Run by Allan Gillbreath this press is at a LOT of conventions. Allan is good peeps. They do a good amount of books and really seem to be pushing harder every day. I'll be doing a story in an upcoming anthology from them this winter.

Seventh Star Press
Another publisher who really works the convention circuit. Their books are really good looking and everyone I know who pubs through them is super nice. They mostly put out fantasy but do have some urban fantasy and others.

Bell Bridge Books
My good friends Kalayna Price and John Hartness are with Bell Bridge. They both love them. I will say they have a great presence online and at shows. Their stuff seems to be pretty top notch.  Like I said, both my friends are really happy to be with them.

One Buck Horror
If you have a short horror story then look into this publisher. They do collections of short fiction every quarter in a 5-story collection in e-release.  Chris and Kris are AWESOME. Easy to work with, nice, friendly. And they pay pro rates and ON TIME which is huge. My short zombie story is in their special edition ONE BUCK ZOMBIE (.99 cents everywhere fine ebooks are sold......end shameless promotion)
Working with them was an absolute pleasure.

So look into small presses, you might find your boat man.

WHEN TO TAKE THE LEAP?

This week's topics are about day jobs and how they relate to writing. I am in a bit of a different situation than most because my day job is owning a tattoo shop. I work when I want and get paid well. If I am at the shop and not actually tattooing then I can use that time to write. The majority of all the writing I do is done at the shop. I am not quitting anytime soon. When I do retire from tattooing I will still be able to run and own the shop with no problem. So I will always have a day job, no matter how successful my writing becomes.

However, I know a LOT of writers, both published and prepublished. They almost all have day jobs. I know NYT Bestsellers who still work the day job. Mostly for the additional benefits that come with it. So when should you quit and write full time? When you can afford to.

 It's a simple answer that is complex as hell and Jeffe did a great job yesterday covering a lot of the mechanics of it. But to write full time you are going to need either health insurance, which is astronomical, or no family to need insurance. If you are young and single then you can be a full time writer living on someone's couch. But have a kid, or even just a spouse and suddenly you need to look at benefits. Or you spouse has to hold the normal job to provide the bennies. It's math and economics.

The majority of us will always work a day job.

 Writing is wonderful, but the pie is getting smaller and the mouths that want a piece more numerous. Most of us have commitments (houses, spouses, kids with stomachs, etc) and those commitments are next to impossible to meet on the pay schedule writing gives you. So if you are still working and writing afterwards, join the club.

 Don't feel bad about it.

 Dream the dream but keep on making words. Don't get discouraged in anyway if you can't stop working the day job. It doesn't mean you are less successful than anyone else. You make your life work for you.

And now to provide some visual stimulation here some stuff I did at my day job. :)

SUMMER LOVIN' HAD ME A BLAST

Ahhhh summer in GA when you are a big fella is kinda miserable. It's hot, it's humid, the days are long, and the bugs are mutant. But I do love the South and wouldn't really want to live permanently anywhere else. I just happen to like the Fall and Winter. But there is one thing that happens in the summer that the Tuck family looks forward to all year long....well, 3/4 of the Tuck family. That thing is DRAGONCON. Dragoncon is the Southeast's largest genre convention. It takes over whole city blocks in downtown Atlanta and turns Labor Day weekend into an endurance trial. There are 50,000 people who all show up and get their freak on and me and my family are right there with them. It's a chance to see costumes, wear costumes, buy your wardrobe for the year, meet people and hang out with awesome friends. Dragoncon is where me and Linda, my fellow word whore get to hang. I freaking love it and if you can, you should come down and join in the fun. It is the highlight of the year. Now I work it because of the writing and that impacts the amount of fanboy-ness I get to indulge in, but I love that too. Here are pics to show the awesome. Late night Werewolf panel where me, Linda Robertson, J F Lewis, and Stephen Swinarski acted like the rock stars we are. My son as a zombiefied hunter who was sad to be eating pizza instead of brains. Dragoncon is one of the few times a year that my loverly wife will wear jewelry in her septum piercing. Damn it is HOT! Conor as a ninja in a Warehouse 13 shirt....at Dragoncon he was perfectly normal. This past year I got to moderate some panels including this one with Sara Canning from The Vampire Diaries (which I am a fan of) And you can round a corner and find things like this going on!

SING A LITTLE BIT OF THESE WORKIN MAN BLUES

I love being a writer. I truly do. Everything about it, even the tedious things (a million emails I'm looking at you.). I also love my day job which is owning and operating the best damn tattoo shop in the world. But I have worked a ton of jobs that weren't so great. I've been a bouncer, a collection agent for Citibank, a youth pastor, a cook, a sunroom builder, a comic book shop jockey, and many, many more. I've been working since 2 weeks before my 15th birthday. I'm not complainin', just sayin'. I have worked all my life. Today you get the story of the first job I ever walked out on. I was 16, driving, and in need of a job so that I could put gas in said car so that I could keep on driving. So like most teens I hit the mall looking for a job. Low and behold I snagged a job at the Manchu Wok in the food court. They needed a dishwasher and I needed a paycheck so the two of us met in the middle and I was hired. It was a terrible job. I was the dishwasher, which is fine. I have gone on to wash many a dish in my life at all kinds of restaurants. It's hard work, but it's simple and because washing dishes kinda sucks it usually pays alright. Well, this job was really weird. First of all, I was the only non-Asian person working there and other than being shown where the sink was by the lady who was in charge NO ONE WOULD TALK TO ME. None. Not a person. Not the lady in charge, not the food runner, not the cook, oh hell no not the cook. Ever meet someone and know immediately that they do not like you? That was the case with me and the cook. He was smiling when he was talking to the food runner, then the lady in charge tells him I will be the new dishwasher (I am assuming. It was not in english.)and it looked like he had an attack of stomach flu. His face twisted into the deepest scowl I have ever seen. In a split second he switched completely. I wasn't concerned. I wasn't there to make friends with the cook. I was there to make money. I figured I would work hard and he would come around. Oh no. I took my station, washing the stack of pans already there. It was a deep three bay sink. One sink with hot soapy water. One sink with a disinfectant rinse, one sink with hot rinse water. The Manchu Wok was a food court chinese resturant where they keep the dishes of the day in hotpans out front. as the pans get low, the cook would make a fresh batch of whatever the item was then I would wash the wok and put it in the stack of clean woks for his use. The food runner would bring over the empty pans and stack them up on the counter beside the sink as he filled the new items. The first refill of something, egg rolls, sesame chicken, whatever, goes out. The cook is done with the wok. He screams something at me that sounds like a pterodactyl attacking a baby pig and hurls the hot wok at me and the sink. CLANG! He doesn't hit me, it hits the sink full of hot soapy water, splashing it and oil residue up on the rubber apron I am wearing. It's not enough to flip out on this old Asian man (seriously, he looked to be about 70), it's just enough to annoy the hell out of me. This happens over and over all night for all three hours I was working. Finally the shift was over. The lady came back and pointed at two bags of trash. "Take those out." I picked them up and took them out the back hallway to the dumpster. I kept on walking to my car. I didn't go back for my check. I went and found another job the next day. Worst job ever. And to commemorate it, here's some Merle Haggard for you.

I'M GONNA MAKE SOMEBODY CALL ME A BAD NAME

Why would I make one of my fellow Word Whores call me a sumbitch? Cause I post on Mondays which means I get second pick of what we are talking about and I am about to steal someone's choice for B-movie. See, watch this. THE EVIL DEAD. Somebody just cussed me. If you don't know why Evil dead is the greatest B-movie ever made I am not sure I can explain it to you. First of all you have Bruce Campbell. He's the freaking man. And this movie is him when he is all young and raw and full of hunger. He really puts it out there in this movie. You should go buy THE EVIL DEAD COMPANION and read about all these people went through to make this damn movie. It's CRAZY. Then you have a new swing at the monster/zombie/possession gig that turns up in movies. The Deadites are off the hook. Especially for 1970 something and on a $5 budget. It is a crazy, nutso, no holds barred, grab your sack kinda film. If you haven't seen this, EVIL DEAD 2, or ARMY OF DARKNESS then get the hence to the video store and just buy the damn things.

BRING THE HAPPY ONE TINY TENDER MOMENT AT A TIME

I am a very happy person. Truly I am. I own a tattoo shop and tattooing is a really cool day gig. I have a well-recieved series from Kensington that I am truly happy with. the Deacon Chalk series is EXACTLY the kind of book I want to read and I am damn proud to have written them. I have a wonderful woman that I am married to. I have a great family that I love and am really proud of. I have some good friends. I live in a house that is exactly the kind of house I wanted with exactly the kind of yard I was looking for. But none of these are the secret to my happiness. They are sources of happiness for me, but the reason for my happiness lies inside me and today, today only, I am going to share that secret with you. You have to stop worrying about shit. Seriously. It's very simple to say. Very hard to do. Simple very rarely equates to easy in life. But in near 42 years on this planet we call home I have found that 1) things happen for a reason and 2) it all works out if you give it long enough. Now I am not telling you some pie in the sky BS. You have to get involved in life. You have to get up, get out, and get some and there are things that happen in this world that are terrible. Cancer sucks and all that. But in the everyday, man just chill. Let it come. Relax. Say the serenity prayer (not: “Now I did a job; and got nothing but trouble since I did it, not to mention more than a few unkind words as regard to my character. So let me make this abundantly clear. I do the job and then I get paid. Go run your little world.“) Drink some green tea. Whatever you have to do to stay loose and relaxed. When you get all uptight you miss the small things and the small things are what make life worth living. It's a kiss from your wife, your kids telling you they love you, or any of them doing something that makes you so damn proud of them you want to bust open. It's a banana and mayo sammich at midnight, it's an Elvis song, it's a prayer in the morning, it's a twenty spot you find in your wallet, it's the perfect drive into work when the temperature outside is crisp and just right for driving with the windows down and that song, THAT SONG, comes on the radio. It's good books, a good episode of How I Met Your Mother, a good orgasm, a good cup of coffee, a good insert your random weirdness that brings a smile to your face. (ummmmmm bacon.) Don't waste your life and your opportunity for happiness waiting for the big stuff to come along and knock you off your feet. Trust me, the big stuff that whallops you usually won't be good. It's the small stuff you have in your life every moment. Fill it from now til the end with THAT and I guarantee you will be happier. That's the secret man. And now, for the rest of my fellow word whores happiness and to drive traffic to the blog a hunk of half dressed man. (You're welcome Allison!)

THESE THINGS ARE FOR CHILDREN???

Ahhh fairy tales. They seem so innocent, so friendly, so sweet. No, they are just so sanitized. lol. The original fairy tales were born in a really horrible time. Plagues, crushing poverty, oppressive caste system, brutality abounding... you name it and it sucked big time in the dark ages....this wasn't no damn Ren Fest. My favorite original fairy tale is Rumpelstiltskin. You are familiar I am sure, but here is the recap, James style. A miller decides to let his mouth write checks his ass can't cash so he makes some dumbass claim that his daughter can spin straw into gold. The king says: "Well, that sounds pretty damn good to me." Orders her locked in a tower and demands she spin straw into gold for three nights. If she can then he will marry her, if not then off with her head. Of course the girl is a bit distraught by what her (probably drunk) dad has gotten her into. She cries and cries until the emanating grief from her calls forth an imp. Now, word to the wise, if an imp appears in your room like Nightcrawler from the X-men, you should probably NOT play Let's Make A Deal.

He tells her that he can spin straw into gold if she gives him a gift. She pulls off her necklace, gives it to him, and he spins the straw into a pile of gold. The next night, same deal. Crying, imp, deal, gold. (Some say the miller's daughter gave up the goods on night 2 since she had already lost her necklace and the 3rd night offered the same, but old Rumpy said no to used goods.) The third night the imp shows up, and the daughter has nothing to give him. He asks for her first born. She agrees and the deal is struck. The king marries her and sure enough, one thing leads to another and one year later, she pops out a kid. Guess who shows up to claim his prize? Yep. She of course is a welsher and doesn't want to pony up so he tells her he will let her keep the kid if she tells him his name.

She doesn't know it, some random woodsman (what is it with the woodsmen in these stories?) passing by hears him bragging that she'll never guess his name is Rumpelstiltskin. He rats him out to the now Queen. The imp shows up to collect, she drops his name, and he flips his lid. Stomps his foot so hard it sinks into the floor then freaks out trying to get free that he RIPS HIMSELF IN HALF. So what is the moral of the story? Beats the hell out of me.

LIES, DAMNED LIES, AND WRITING ADVICE

Walk into a room with 10 people and you will find a writer. Everyone is a writer, or knows a writer. I'm not knocking that. Hell, I LOVE writing. You want to write, by all means, you should. Go for it, rock it out, make it happen. So now we come to the truth of the situation though. If you have a writer in every room, you also have writing advice in every room, because the only thing we love to talk about more than writing is......well...nothing. Lots of advice on writing gets bandied about. The worst, absolute worst, piece of writing advice is anything that tells you to follow what's selling. "You should write a crappy romance with light BDSM elements because it sells." "You should write vampires because they sell." "Oh you should steer clear of vampires because nobody reads that." "You should write like Jodi Picoult" You should write like John Grisham" "you should write like YA books." SHADDUP ALREADY WILLYA! Listen to me dear readers because I am only going to say this once. IT TAKES A LONG TIME TO WRITE A BOOK. BY THE TIME YOU WRITE WHATEVER TREND YOU THINK YOU SHOULD FOLLOW IT WILL BE OVER. Plus, why would you ever want to shortchange yourself by ripping off someone else's gig? Let Jodi Picoult write her books. Let Stephanie Meyers write her books. You? You should write your own damned book. Trust yourself. Write what you want to. Go crazy. Make shit up. It's fun. Create your own world and then go in and screw with it like the maniacal, power-hungry god that you are but do it honestly. Now the best piece of advice is this: HEAD DOWN. MAKE WORDS. That's mine. I coined it. You wanna be a writer? Well listen up cupcake, writers write. It's simple. Not easy. Simple. Get to writing. And no, messing around with your author fan page or checking your twitter does NOT count. Make words appear on your screen that make a story. Get busy writin' or get busy dyin'. Seriously. Why are you still reading this? Oh, you want a NSFW inspirational Kevin Smith video? Okay, but after that you open up your damn story and you don't look away from it until you have a decent chunk of wordage. I mean it....don't make me come over there.

Pets back in the day.

I'm with my fellow Word Whore Jeffe in that while I remember pets I have owned in the past, I don't really have pictures.

There was Zeus, the rottweiler/lab mix. He was a good dog. Big and scary looking but sweet as hell. Minded pretty well unless he got free and then all you could do was send up a prayer for his safety cause he was gone. No looking back, just running wide open. He'd come back in a few hours and lay on the carport until he was let back in. lol.
I would probably still have him today. I moved into an apartment that did not allow pets so I had a friend take him for a bit until I could move to a different unit that did allow pets. It took a month and by that time he was living like a king in a neighborhood full of kids who would get off the bus and go get him and take him through the woods on adventures. Plus my friend had truly fallen in love with him so I left him with her and her husband.

Back in the day, when I was a wee child we had a dog named Tiger. She was a German Shepard mix. Wonderful dog. Sweet, protective. She was always there when we were outside, watching over us. My mother still tells the story of going inside to get something and leaving me in the yard. A moment later she heard me start screaming so she came a running. I was on the edge of the yard, standing there trying to get in the road and Tiger had me by the cloth diaper, holding me back. I was apparantly mad as hell about it, hence the screaming.
Tiger was a good dog, lived a long life and finally died of old age.

I've had cats here and there, but most of them were crappy. I am not a cat fan. Even the coolest cat winds up peeing in my laundry basket....the clean one.

I did have a 10 ft Burmese python named Abigail that I traded a tattoo for. She was beautiful, but very scary. A 10 foot snake is twice the size of my bicep all the way around. She's a 10 ft tube of pure muscle designed to kill things. I lived alone when I had her and I always thought to myself "If this snake decides to take you out while you hold her, what could you do?" Nothing....hope I could stagger outside with 100 pounds of snake wrapped around my face and convince my neighbors to call the cops instead of pointing and laughing.

Abigail went to live at the animal preserve outside of Cleveland Ga.

Now I have a house full of pets. 6 dogs, 1 cat, 1 bird, 1 hamster.

But this one is mine. His name is Cash and you have my permission to "awwwwwww".