Hellebore, In Rain

All vivid now…like hellebore in rain…

It’s been a strange, sometimes frustrating week. I had one–one!–very good working day, and it has given me a hunger for more. I should be content that the Sekrit Projekt has not been killed outright, and has indeed passed what I think is the middle of its curve. Well, not really, the true break-point is the death of a major character…but good enough.

I’m still deeply tired of all the bullshit that isn’t writing, and there are two books I want very badly to get to. I just have to finish the two I’m writing now, revise the half-a-dozen in the pipeline, get a great deal of administrative work out of the way, and and and…

No rest for the weary, the wicked, or the writers. Ever, world without end, amen. Thank the gods for coffee.

It’s hellebore season, and I love everything about these plants. I could be content with a mostly-hellebore garden, frankly, save for the irritating fact that slugs consider them a delicacy. And I’ve already got hostas and roses about so I might as well continue with those too. Still, maybe this is the year I’ll get a few more Lenten roses in. It’s nice to think about, as well as the prospect of a blueberry bush or two where there’s now a surfeit of sunlight since the cedars are gone. (Which irks me to no end even now; they were wonderful and someone else’s neglect did them in. Alas.)

At least it looks like we’ll be back to proper rainy weather after a bit of a freeze; I knew we were due for at least one more heavy frost if not a downright east-wind howler. Even the cherry trees are Getting Ideas now, and I can see hints of purple on a few magnolias. The season marches on, and today I have to write an Uncomfortable Declaration of Affection in the Sekrit Projekt.

There’s that to look forward to. And the weekend will see more incremental progress on the short-story anthology. Slow and steady will win my particular race, even if I near expire of annoyance.

See you next week…

Dual Garde and Pointe

I suspect today would be trouble, and in fact could have spent an hour or so sunk in a book rather than freeing myself from a warm bed-cocoon, achieving verticality, and staggering for the Moka pot. So far Thursday and I are proceeding in what appears to be a truce. The quiet is not quite ominous, yet I am still en garde and en pointe.

It probably doesn’t help that I’m reading some rather depressing history (as usual) and yesterday was a 7k writing day. The Sekrit Projekt is halfway, near as I can tell, and I was able to hole up in the office, free of administrivia, to concentrate on getting over that mark.

I am cautiously optimistic. That’s all I’ll say, for fear of jinxing it.

Yesterday also saw Boxnoggin bound and determined to catch a rabbit; coincidentally I have found the place in the nor’eastern fence the ferals are slipping through and I have a rather bruised arm. Lord van der Sploot would absolutely adore to break every barrier in his way while chasing Deathwish Bunny (as I have christened this new visitor to our backyard) but so long as I am capable of deterring him from making Extremely Bad Choices his ambition will have to remain (alas!) unfulfilled.

Deathwish Bunny is so named because he seems to have grasped that the dog is strapped to a lumbering biped uninterested in chase, capture, or homicide, and has taken this to mean he is the ruler of the backyard. In fact, Deathwish the Bun-Bun gives me rather filthy looks while sitting by the Venerable Fir, as if to question what the hell I’m doing in his demesnes. All while Boxnoggin quivers at the end of a leash, nearly vibrating inside his harness with the desire to please omg just once, just let me chase it once.

Even one time would be too many. I have a healthy respect for just how silly the dog can be when left to his own devices. Consequently His Majesty Bun-Bun is laboring under the dual misapprehension of inviolability and immortality; as spring advances we’ll see how the squirrels feel about his claims. Of course they can climb, so the ground floor doesn’t matter too much–but if he starts competing for certain resources we might see a bit of jostling. And of course both love taunting a certain square-headed canine.

You know who isn’t taunting him these days, though? The local corvids have discovered that doing so, as well as buzzing me to demand things, does not get them what they want. A system has evolved wherein the crows wait patiently (albeit loudly) at certain points for largesse, and if I am in a giving mood roasted peanuts in the shell are scattered after a two-tone whistle. And before anyone starts bleating about feeding wildlife, the rewards are random and please take it up with those who scatter peanuts for the damn squirrels first, since the crows manage to get a substantial portion of those without my feeble efforts, thankyouverymuch.

…that sounds rather bad-tempered of me, but there’s been a positive plague of Reply Guys and finger-waggers lately. Fortunately they are outweighed by the very nice people, especially those writing to me now about liking A Flame in the North. Thank you, my beloveds–I keep meaning to do a From the Mailbag post, and keep getting sidetracked or having no time because there’s writing to get to.

Speaking of which, I’d best get underway. Boxnoggin is going to adore today’s sunshine even if we both dislike the chill, and I’ve my own corpse to shamble through something approximating exercise as well. I have big dreams for another uninterrupted chunk of writing since there’s a daring escape to pull off and a major character’s demise to plan for. For those of you who just gasped, you know that’s always a risk in my tales. I’m not looking forward to it any more than you are. (I already cried twice yesterday at an imprisoned protagonist’s emotional nadir, fa cry-eye.)

Time to drain the dregs and get some toast. There might even be some blueberry-lemon crumble left, we’ll see. All in all, there’s room for cautious hope.

But I’m still wary.

Peace, Despite Sunshine

Took a while to lever myself out of bed today. I meant to spring forth as soon as the alarm chirped, but that…did not happen. Yesterday wore me the fuck out, and even retreating early to finish a history book didn’t help. Strange dreams–including one about escaping a cult run by a particularly terrifying individual who has haunted a corner of my consciousness for a while, part of why I wrote Harmony–were less than helpful as well.

The morning’s news is that Facebook, Instagram, and Threads are all down, which must account for the sudden sense of peace in many corners. It’s too much to hope for that Meta has finally choked on its own toxicity, so I’m just going to enjoy it while it lasts. (Probably will be back up before I finish writing this post, but ah well.)

The weather app says we’ll have some sunbreaks today. It doesn’t look likely from the office window, and indeed I’d prefer a solid grey ceiling. But I suppose a lot of other people like the big yellow day-eye, and in any case there’s nothing I can do about it but hide in my cave and hiss. It’s not that I dislike sunlight, precisely, it’s just that I enjoy rain more. I am continually baffled by people who move to this part of the country from drier climes and proceed to complain endlessly about falling water. Of course, what with climate change and the collapse of certain ocean currents we might be looking at drought soon.

…I am a regular bundle of cheer today, aren’t I. Might be because I had to spend yesterday doing a great many things, none of which were writing, and am consequently a little tetchy. I just want to crouch on my strange little office chair, type my weird little stories, and pay my bills. It should not be so bloody damn difficult.

Anyway. Here’s something fun, I didn’t need to hear this song again (ever) but the choreography and the dancers’ precision are amazing. Plus the costuming is A+.

I have the day’s work all set up; I meant to talk about subtext today (due to a discussion in my personal Discord) but that’s just not gonna happen. I’d best finish my rapidly cooling coffee, choke down some toast, walk the dog, and shamble my own corpse before the day gets nay older. A great deal of plot tangles and whatnot will work themselves out while I do so; all I have to do is shut everything external down, turn inward, and let the stories take over once more.

Can’t wait. Have a nice Tuesday, everyone.

Bureaucratic Duck-Nibbles

It’s been trying to snow for days now, producing sleet and spatters between bouts of very cold rain. There’s the occasional edge of huge, wet flakes, but those disappear soon as they hit the ground. If we get a strong east wind through the Gorge we’ll have a deep freeze, but it doesn’t seem like that’s on the cards. As it is, we’ve had just enough below-zero this winter to cut down on some summer insect (or slug) infestations, and while the snowdrops are beginning to fade it looks like the hyacinths and cherries are holding off for a little while longer. Resentfully, in the hyacinths’ case, but at least it’s something.

The daffodils are out in force though. Little yellow YOLO trumpets, absolute mad lads.

Thankfully, I’m beginning to get some bandwidth back. The Junji Ito phase (one graphic novel after another) was apparently just what I needed, and this past weekend I also finished Dower’s War Without Mercy, which was a fascinating read, especially tracing how racist propaganda symbols can be inverted. I’m about fifty pages from the end of Lakota America, though that’s hard going–any real American history is. If one is not nauseated by the invasion, genocide, and racism, one isn’t paying attention.

There’s plenty to keep me occupied afterward. My next-to-the-bed TBR has swelled dangerously and needs some attention.

I spent Saturday doing administrivia–there’s been a lot of that lately, tax season and the change of year both conspiring–and setting up the framework for that anthology of my short stories I’ve been threatening for, oh, a year or more? Since the Jolene or My Rebbe’s Wife stories didn’t fit elsewhere, I decided I might as well put them in my very own antho to sweeten the pot. I had been holding off because the entire project seemed like too much to handle, but finally the bright idea of (wait for it…) cutting the entire shebang into small, easily-accomplished chunks and formatting one short story (or two) per weekend struck.

I don’t know why it took me so long to arrive at that strategy, since it’s my standard suggestion to others. Like Alice, I suppose I rarely ever follow my own good advice. But I have the stories chosen now–eighteen, all told–and even have ideas of putting a few which can’t be sold for cash (as they have other characters, like the Kolchak and Jill Kismet story, or the Zombies, Run fanfic) into a free ebook just for funsies.

We’ll see.

Today will be all about even more administrivia–I swear I am being nibbled to death by bureaucratic ducks–but once that’s done I can take a look at a second escape attempt in the Sekrit Projekt, and maybe get an election into the serial. Our favourite sellsword is about to have a moment of “if nominated I will not run, if elected I will not serve–whaddaya mean I don’t have another option?” Plus, one of the last pieces for this second season fell into place during some intense doodling and planning last week, so that’s a worry shelved, one I didn’t even know I was brooding over.

Plenty more where that came from, but I’m grateful nonetheless.

There are a few sales going on right now–many of my ebooks are 50% off during the Smashwords Read an Ebook Week, She-Wolf and Cub is a Kindle Monthly Deal, and Incorruptible is $2.99USD in ebook through these retailers for a few days more. And of course, A Flame in the North is still going strong–which provides some validation, even if I am still exhausted and burned to the ground by the effort to protect the series itself.

Dawn has risen while I’ve been typing, and the lacework of dark clouds under higher, lighter ones has turned into a soft infinite grey. Trying even harder for snow, I suppose, and though it’s too warm for any to stick it’s still chill-raw out there and I’ll be conservative with Boxnoggin’s walkies. His back leg appears to have healed completely but I’m still discouraging indoor parkour or any nonsense outside–the rabbit who has decided our backyard is now his notwithstanding.

But that’s (say it with me) another blog post. I had not believed a mere bunny could give me such a filthy look, but this one managed while also taunting 65+lbs of furred and muscled himbo terrier-boxer. The development does not bode well, though there was no sign of Compere Lapin this morning.

He’s perhaps just biding his time. Into Monday we go, boots on and eyeliner thickened. And with the baseball bat firmly to hand…

Leap Day Bitch Break

Selene

I turned my alarm clock off for yesterday and today, and boy howdy was it ever the right choice. Insomnia hasn’t been biting as hard as it used to, but a night and a half of it is a danger sign I’m not going to disregard. Plus, today’s February 29, which only rolls around every four years.

When a bitch needs a goddamn break, a leap year’s extra day will work as well as any other. I’m only going to work on things which please me today, and that might mean fanfic. It certainly won’t mean anything I have to strain over. Oh, and also in honor of leap day, Selene is $2.99USD in ebook through these retailers (it doesn’t go on sale often, but I heard the pleas of my Danny Valentine fans…), Rose & Thunder is $3.99USD through these ones, HOOD‘s Season One is $1.99USD through these, and The Complete Roadtrip Z (all four seasons) is deeply discounted to $9.99USD in ebook here. There are other sales in March and April, but since this is a frabjous day I went all out scheduling these.

We’ve had hours of rain and it looks like the trend will continue through the weekend, which pleases me to no end. Of course I’ll be physically miserable halfway through my morning run, but that’s more than balanced by the joy of getting home, slithering into a warm shower, and drawing dry socks over my lower paws. I have officially reached the age where good socks are a blessing, a luxury, and damn near a courtship gift.

You may have also noticed the site looks subtly different; there’s a lot of work going on behind the scenes to get rid of certain plugins and services provided by companies who have drunk deep the “AI” Flavr-Aid. No more Google, thank you very much–I am weighing even turning off Analytics–and I’ve done a lot of work over the past few days to make sure I can switch away from the Jetpack plugin wholesale if Automattic tries scraping sites where it’s installed. To be strictly honest I don’t think the latter will happen, but I’m not leaving any openings. “AI” and “machine learning” enthusiasts have proved themselves so rancid and exploitative they will never be welcome in my house, world without end, amen.

It’s a huge goddamn grift and I’m tired of it. Even the faintest whiff of that nonsense is enough to turn me away entirely.

On the bright side, my coffee tastes exceptionally fine this damp grey morn. I mean, the first hit of caffeine is always a blessed event, but sometimes the stars align and one receives a superlative jolt. Perhaps some of it has to do with also getting a decent night’s rest after a week of uneasy-at-best toss-turn, or the fact that the Muse has turned away from certain types of input and is back to history books. The latter is a profound relief. I’m not me when I’m not writing, and I’m even less me when I can only get a quarter-hour’s worth of uninterrupted daily reading.

Boxnoggin will not enjoy beginning our walkies in these conditions, but he’ll like skipping them even less. I suppose I’d better finish this marvelous set of espresso shots and amble for the toaster.

Give yourself a wee bit of a break today if you can, my beloveds. You’ve earned it.

Lightning, Once, Enough

Rolled out of bed to find that the Moka pot had been prepped on the stove for me, and one of my children (who had kindly set that up for their poor caffeine-dependent mother) was absolutely bursting to tell me all the news. Apparently that plagiarist Somerton is back at it with a fresh empathy-free nopology1, testing the waters to gain some engagement dollars from hatewatchers; I am continually amazed at the rinse-and-repeat cycles granted certain shameless narcissists.

Yesterday was a bit of a wash. I got a lot of administrivia handled, including things that couldn’t be done on the weekend, but that bled off the force I needed to get certain other things moving along. As a result, the writing part of the day felt like clawing my way out of Sarlaac pit. Both the serial and the Sekrit Projekt are chonky bois2 and being past the point of shiny-and-new makes for a lot of current to swim against, even without the Sisyphean emotional labor on the Sekrit. I want to add a third project to make them jealous, but so much of my energy is spent pushing against the resistance of previous damage there’s not a single leftover erg. Maybe that’ll change when edits for Chained Knight drop and I take time to do revisions on that book and Gamble.

At the very least I’ll be using different mental muscles. Sometimes that’s as good as a rest.

The promo experiment over the weekend went well, too. There’ll be a second experiment next month, and if that goes well I’ll consider recommending the particular promo platform to others. I was amused (and touched) so many folk decided any book capable of garnering that particular “fuck God” review was worth picking up for four bucks and giving a whirl; thank you all. I hope you like it.

I wrote Moon’s Knight during lockdown, in something of a fugue state. And I wasn’t going to publish it, but the howls of protest from my beta readers–who received an early draft on the theory that it might help them escape their own stress during that time–convinced me otherwise. There are whole passages I got to revision on and thought, whoever wrote this sounds like me, makes the choices I would…but I have no memory of this place. It was a very Gandalf set of moments, and I was quite jumpy looking for the Balrog.3

Chained Knight will be out later this year–I already have the cover, it’s a real beaut–and maybe I’ll write the third Tale of the Underdark next winter. I know precisely what happens and how it closes the circle. Of course, these books are variations on a theme rather than a proper series, as I’ve said before. If Moorcock could do it with a certain albino Melnibonean, why can’t I with a riff on something else? It’s the sort of project I wouldn’t be able to do without self-publishing technology and the experience garnered over the last couple decades, so at least I can feel good about that. Even if nobody ends up liking these books, I’ll be happy.

Of course, the response to Moon’s Knight has been overwhelmingly positive, notwithstanding that one hilarious “fuck God” review. Which, again, was absolutely priceless promo, the likes of which I might not ever see again. Ah well, hit by lightning once is enough. The amusement itself is worth the price of admission.

Today is for a meeting of clan-lords during which a certain sellsword receives what is, to her, very bad news, and a scene during which two prisoners somewhat bond over their fate. It’s the latter I’m looking forward to most, since it presents a chance to invert quite a few tropes. Turning such things inside out pleases me mightily, and honestly I doubted I’d get to ever write this particular scene. There have been many dark nights of the soul lately, only a few shafts of random light poking through to accentuate just how hopeless I’ve been feeling.

Quite frankly, it’s been awful. Maybe some of that is breaking up, though. Hand over hand, clinging to a rope made of stories, I keep climbing–and throwing out ropes of my own for others in different pits. It’s a life’s work and as I get older it seems more and more inevitable; I was always going to end up here, and I largely don’t mind. Weaving a net to keep others from the abyss keeps me occupied enough to struggle upward another few handholds.

And now it’s time for breakfast. Boxnoggin was an absolute fur-covered brat during yesterday’s walkies. He’s simply in that part of recovery, which means I need to be even more vigilant about making sure he doesn’t re-injure himself–a thankless task, to be sure, but a necessary one. I just heard him shake his collar as I typed that last sentence, so off I go.

Happy Tuesday, my beloveds. Let’s keep hauling ourselves upward.

The Devil Does Promo

The interval after one gets the first sip of coffee down but before the initial blessed intimation of caffeine in the bloodstream is a liminal space. Thresholds are funny things, and this one’s no different. Technically caffeine’s one of the few substances capable of going straight across the stomach lining (along with aspirin, very simple sugar, and a proportion of alcohol) and by the gods am I ever grateful for that. It’s not so much that my brain needs jump-starting–the collection of squirrels inside my skull is always coked up and singing, thank you–but coffee seems to impose some order on the damn chorus and bring the body into sync as well.

Whew. Anyway, over the weekend I did an experimental promo thing with Moon’s Knight, offering it for $3.99US in ebook. (It’s still going; today’s the last scheduled day for the price drop even though the official promo is done.) I’m testing a certain marketing platform, and I also highlighted the sale on social media. I can’t tell which proportion of sales is which yet; those analytics should be interesting.

Of course, it was sort of a gimme, since this is the book that garnered one of my favourite Amazon reviews, in which a pearl-clutching “Avid Reader” took exception to the protagonist thinking, “fuck God” at the funeral of her best friend. Normally I don’t glance at such things, but the stars aligned in this particular case and I had to laugh. I mean, you can’t buy promo like that, it’s bloody priceless. I’ll probably find that the bulk of the sales are people who saw that on my Mastodon or Bsky feeds and said, “that sounds like a good time”.

The fact that the book almost wasn’t published at all–only the intervention and insistence of my beta readers convinced me to do so–only makes it funnier.

You all know how much I loathe marketing, but if this is the year I’m prepping to go full-feral indie, I need to get more comfortable with it. Intellectually I know that living under late-stage capitalism means we’ve got to use the tools we have, people won’t know about the books unless I tell them, and that it’s necessary and good for an artist to talk about their stuff and make a living. But the brute work of promo does not move me and I have no patience for the douchebags who want to shame artists for having to engage in it, so I’ve been avoiding the whole shebang except when I absolutely cannot.

Needs must when the devil drives, though and Mama’s got rent to pay. I keep hearing that bit in Always Look On the Bright Side of Life where Eric Idle riffs, “Incidentally, this record is available in the foyer…some of us gotta live as well, you know…”

There are far worse earworms upon a Monday morn.

Today is for setting up the next pitched battle in Highlands War and getting a protagonist locked in a dungeon elsewhere. After, of course, Boxnoggin gets his ramble and my own corpse its endorphin-producing shamble. The former will be reasonably pleasant since his leg seems well on the way to full healing, but I’m still keeping him on very easy walkies and discouraging indoor parkour. He is only moderately upset at that last bit since we’re providing canine puzzles and lots of other not-so-leaping fun and encouragement to keep him occupied. (By “puzzles” I mean “very easy Kong toys”, since…well, we love this dog, but he is not a rocket scientist, let’s put it that way.)

The morning has been passing weird, which is to be expected on a Monday. I’m waiting for the Chained Knight edit letter to drop, at which point I’ll shift to revising that book and Gamble. Hopefully this week should see some other things shake loose…but if they don’t I’ve got more than enough to keep me occupied. Rather like Boxnoggin, in fact.

Time to grab some brekkie and stagger forth.