RELEASE DAY: Cotton Crossing

Roadtrip Z

That’s right, my friends, the re-edited, shiny Season 1 of Roadtrip Z, my Patreon serial, is now available!

Cotton Crossing was a dead end, but not for Ginny Mills. She’s just marking time, getting experience in the county library system, before moving back to a decent urban environment. Then the phones stop working.

Lee Quartine knows there’s no way the pretty girl at the library will even look at him. Especially since he can’t open his mouth. He knows he’s a hick, but when the power starts going out and the woods are full of strange creatures, it’s good to have someone around who can build a fire. And kill.

Ginny, Lee, and their small band of survivors can’t stay put, and moving is dangerous. The infected are shambling in the hills and the concrete canyons of cities.

It’s gonna be a long trip…

Season 1: Cotton Crossing is now available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or direct!

We’re now deep in Season 2. Subscribe here to read, chapter by chapter, as the serial is written.

Rain, Dogs, Run

Rain! We only had misting and a damp-down yesterday, but I woke up this morning to tapping fingers on the roof, tree branches weighed down with welcome water…and dogs unwilling to go down the deck stairs because they’re forgotten what that water falling from the sky is. Odd Trundles, simpleton that he is, finally bowed to the inevitable pressure in his bladder, but Miss B had thoughts of finding a drier and more congenial spot to unload.

Like, inside.

I put a quick stop to that and almost had to chase her down the damn steps. She finally bowed to the inevitable, but not before giving me a filthy look. She still hasn’t completely forgiven me, but there’s a 5km run in her immediate future, so that will go a considerable way toward ameliorating her fury. (Read: She’ll smell so many interesting things she won’t even remember I made her pee outside in the RAIN.)

You guys are aching to hear about the tiny plastic crossbow, I’M SURE, but that story’s going to have to wait until Friday. (I know, I’m evil.) The squirrels were in a frenzy to bury all sorts of things last week; they could probably sense the rain coming. So, being distracted, they didn’t care so much about the dogs being in the yard. I think they’ve figured out Trundles won’t ever catch one, and if they come out in pairs Miss B wants to herd them instead of catching them. *eyeroll* Suffice to say there have been Hijinks, but I don’t know how many times I can retell “Miss B almost, ALMOST caught the squirrel” before you lot get bored. So I’m going to ration the stories, and only bring you the best ones.

Not that the wielder of the plastic crossbow is a squirrel. Oh no. That would be too easy, wouldn’t it. Besides, if those arboreal fuckers figured out projectile weapons (other than pinecones) I’m afraid humanity’s place on the food chain would slip a bit.

ANYWAY. I have practiced my French and my Korean this morning–Duolingo finally has a Korean program, and the Drops app is pretty spiffy for learning Hangul and basics–and absorbed some caffeine, so it’s time to get out and run in the rain. At least I’ll be able to breathe, without both snot and sputum being full of smoke particles. (I’ll spare you the description of just what color one’s snot is after breathing forest fire ash for a while. You’re welcome.)

They’re even saying there might be thunderstorms later. Which delights me, but will not delight Miss B at all. Fortunately she can hide under my desk, and probably will. The only drawback to that is her possible state of dampness after we get out for a quick 5km.

But oh well, if it makes her feel better, wet shins are a small price to pay.

Over and out.

Under Fire

Me: What on earth–
Phil: DON’T ASK.
Willard: *grooooooan*
Me: Does this have anything to do with the little plastic crossbow–
Phil: I SAID DON’T ASK.
Me: But–
Phil: I’M JUST GONNA SAY, THERE’S SOMEONE GONNA GET HURT.
Me: *picks Willard up, gingerly* Oh dear. Are you hurt, sweetheart?
Willard: *mumbles incoherently*
Phil: *pops pebble in Willard’s mouth* YOU NEVER CALL ME SWEETHEART.
Me: You’re not helpless.
Phil: DAMN STRAIGHT. STAY INSIDE FOR A WHILE, OKAY?
Me: You know I can’t.
*whooshing sound*
Phil: WOMAN, GET INSIDE.
Me: *eyeing the tiny plastic crossbow bolt buried in beauty bark at Willard’s feet* This is…exotic. And you’re sexist.
Phil: *vanishes*
*a long yodel floats from the roof*
Willard: *moans around pebble*
Me: *trying to look everywhere at once* Oh, hell.

TO BE CONTINUED…

Doubt Merely Looms

I’m not sure who I’d be if I stopped writing (other than a corpse), but I wonder sometimes if it would stop the periodic bouts of crippling self-doubt.

I’m not talking the lo-fi “maybe I should be a plumber instead,” or even the grinding envy when you read something achingly brilliant someone else has written. No, those are all normal, and well within tolerances. I’m not talking ennui, or procrastination, or even garden variety low self-worth.

I’m talking about a bleak black hole that rivals clinical depression in its will-sapping, crushing, even-just-breathing-is-an-effort numbness. I differentiate between the two because meds beat back the depression and hold the anxiety at bay, but do shit-all for the doubt.

No, I’m not there yet, but it’s close. Some days I feel it hovering. I’m sure the current on-fire state of the world isn’t helping. Empathy is critical to writing, but it can turn into a handicap really quickly.

The bigger thing is, of course, I finished a book that was huge, complex, better than anything I’d ever done before…and it’s having a difficult, tortuous slog through the publication process. It’s the kind of experience that, if I were a newbie writer, might put me off publishing altogether. It’s like being stabbed repeatedly, pulling the knife out only to have another go in, slow or fast, doesn’t matter. A perfect storm of “whatever can go wrong, will” has crashed into my life, and upended a lot of plans.

I had meant to get some more of the Angelov Wolves written, especially Misha’s book, which I really like. Unfortunately, limited bandwidth means I’m on still on the zero of Roadtrip Z’s third season, eking out only a few words each day, pushing against an elastic, resisting barrier. It’s all I can do to keep going with the serial, and I keep glancing up at the master to-do list and feeling like crying. I have taken to closing the office door, just so I can sit and stare, the engines of story working right below conscious thought, grinding slow but exceeding fine.

The only way out is through, I guess. Punching and jabbing and fending off the hovering black hole, telling myself that even two hundred words a day is two hundred more than I had before, and that with significant portions of my emotional energy taken up with healing after the latest round of oh-my-dear-gods-you-have-got-to-be-fucking-kidding-me-they-want-WHAT it’s good enough. The dogs help, of course, since as long as their bellies are full and walkies and snuggles are handy, it’s all good. And the kids are older now, so I don’t have to put on much of a brave facade. They understand when I’ve had a shit day it’s not them, and I can bitch about work at the dinner table a little and get some commiseration.

There’s coffee, and the weather changing, too. Rain is due this Sunday, and that means productivity. At least the worst is behind me, when it comes to this particular publication process. I don’t ever have to go through that particular experience again. It’s a good thing I’ve got years of accumulated experience in this career, so something like this doesn’t put me off that aspect of it completely.

But oh, my dear sweet fluffy bonnet, I need time to recover. The more I try to push, the more damage I’ll do and the longer healing will take. And thank goodness for the meds, since my brain chemistry, already having tried to kill me several times, does not need the provocation of the Gigantic Black Hole of Doubt.

After lunch–spicy, spicy noodles, plenty of curry paste and some Bangkok Blend–I’m going to take down my master to-do list, and make a new one with only three things on it, one of which I’ve already done. Narrowing one’s scope and focusing on details can push away the looming monster.

As long as it merely looms, and doesn’t settle on the roof entirely, I can get through. All this stubbornness has to be good for something. Also, Odd trundles has just settled to lick at my ankles, which means it’s time to get up and make that lunch.

Over and (damply) out.

Can’t Even

There’s a fine layer of ash over everything, courtesy of a fire in the Columbia Gorge. We’re not in any immediate danger, it’s just difficult to breathe. After yesterday’s long run, my body just isn’t having it, even on the treadmill. I suppose I’ll do an hour of yoga later in the day and call it good.

Rarely have I been so aware of the cleaning functions of mucus. I’ll just leave it at that.

Anyway, there are huge fires, Houston’s still underwater and another super-hurricane is coming in, and that orange racist bigot in the White House is doing his level best to hurt everyone he and his circle of cronies can.

It’s gonna be a long week. If you need me, I’ll be writing, desperately trying to find some good in the world.

Labour Day Run

A 12km run while uncaffeinated is not quite my favorite thing. Still, I wanted to get my long run for the week out of the way, and what better time than Labour Day? Yeah, sure, the smoke from the wildfires has turned the sun orange, but that means I’ll run better in the shade. I’m not a Spartan, but the principle holds. I turned in a respectable 7:45min per km, too. It may not sound much, but my long-run pace has hovered near 8min for a while, and it’s nice to see it coming down with no change in perceived effort. I guess the tempo runs have been paying off.

Tempo runs are still awful and hateful, though.

I did get out the door early enough that the heat wasn’t awful yet. The problem is, if I caffeinate before a run, I have to wait for the life-giving elixir to settle before I go and shake myself like a champagne bottle in a music video. I dislike throwing up, I hate it when my stomach evicts breakfast while I’m running, and I absolutely cannot stand wasting coffee. There were a lot of people out getting their daily exercise before it gets truly unlivable, and plenty of dogs. Miss B would have enjoyed that, if I would ever let her do more than 5km with me. Six is the absolute limit. She’s still bouncy, but getting older means her endurance is dropping, poor thing. I am in constant fear of pushing her poor little doggie heart too hard.

But now I’m home, a cold shower has been had, and that first glorious sip of coffee has slid down my throat. Now I’m waiting for the real jolt to hit, but that first small taste is the most pleasant part of most mornings. The rest of the day is for working on the zero of Roadtrip Z‘s Season 3. I had to write an awful scene involving a bigot last week, and it was dreadfully hard. Now I have the skeleton and can trim and pack it, but the main challenge will be not looking away from how horrid people can be. It doesn’t even take a zombie apocalypse for most people; as long as they don’t perceive a social cost to being an asshole. That’s part of why calling out bigotry is so important.

Anyway, there’s a big zombie attack coming up, and Lee’s going to have to make some decisions. Plus, I might have to give the librarian a cricket bat for up-close zombie fighting. She’s not too keen on a Louisville Slugger, for some reason. I mean, you can fight off a zombie with a golf club if you have to, you use whatever tool is to hand in an apocalypse, but she really, really wants a cricket bat.

I don’t know about these people in my head. They seem a little strange.

Enjoy your Labour Day, everyone.

*wanders away to make more coffee*

Glass Apples

I love glass apples. One can find them in the oddest places. Sitting in my office window, they catch the morning sun at certain times of year, and seeing them glow fills me with a deep wordless contentment.

Joy is precious. Find it where you can.