Merry Go Round, Go Round, Round, Round

Today sees the very last of the prep for Atlanta Bound‘s release next week, and also the debut of HOOD. I figure I’ll offer a little of the latter for free, as dealers are wont to do, in order to entice a customer or two in the door. Imagine me in a hoodie on a dark street corner. “Pssst. Hey. Hey, you. Wanna read some Robin Hood in Space?”

True to form, I have a great deal of nervousness about starting a new serial. Roadtrip Z was a ride and a half, and I was (relatively) relaxed since I was doing something new, for me, and able to make a mistake at any time. Now that I (somewhat) know what I’m doing, I’m back in the territory of terror, so to speak.

I should just make friends with the fact that I’m always going to feel that fear. Maybe if I make friends with it, it’ll be a little less sharp.

One can hope.

I finished the skeleton of the Cyborg Alice in Corporate Wonderland yesterday, and will leave that short story in a mental drawer for at least a week before going back to put muscles and skin on said skeleton. Between that and the Hansel & Gretel Kung Fu short story, I feel like I managed to actually work all through the holidays, though to be fair I did spend most of my office time cleaning and reorganizing instead of writing. Physical cleaning helps your brain sort through and clean stories too. Letting things bubble and stew in the subconscious before opening the gate makes for a sense of furious transcription rather than painstaking creation. Building up just enough pressure that the story comes out quickly but doesn’t tear its way free causing injuries is a fine art, and one I doubt I have mastery of even at this late date.

I also managed to get out to Barnes & Noble with the Princess. I had Yule money to spend on books–always a welcome event–and I scored some interesting things.

I’ve been wanting to get into old-timey cowboy romances–I love that genre, as readers of The Damnation Affair no doubt will recognize–and the abridgment of Glantz’s magisterial Stalingrad trilogy was a happy accident. The biography of Stonewall Jackson will be difficult reading; American history is a catalog of genocide and slavery permeating every aspect of society and culture up to the present moment, and nowhere is that more in evidence than in the hagiography of treasonous Confederates. But to understand where we are, we must understand where we come from, and that’s part of it.

Something tells me I’ll need something good as a chaser after the awfulness, and it’s a pity I’ve already finished In Want of a Wife.

In any case, the day’s work beckons, and as soon as I finish this post it will be time for a session with Boxnoggin and Miss B. Tiring them out with pets and wrestling looks to be the most enjoyable part of my day by far, even if I can get bread dough put together before 10am.

In short, it’s a Thursday, we’re all back at work, and the devil’s not after the hindmost only because he has holiday paperwork to catch up on too.

See you around, chickadees.

Back to the Grind

Roadtrip Z

The last season of Roadtrip Z has ended. I’ll be sad to say goodbye to Ginny, Lee, and the gang–heaven knows they have a great deal of work ahead of them–but it’ll be nice to get into a new story. Robin Hood in Space is about to hit the ground running, and I’m pretty thrilled about it.

I took a great deal of the holidays off, with very little access to social media. Cleaning out the internal pipes, so to speak. I only finished a single short story between Yule and New Year’s, but I think it’s a good one; the Hansel & Gretel Kung Fu vibe was fun to play with.

I did get my office cleaned and reorganized. There was a lot of dusting, and a lot of getting rid of old cords and plugs. The big cabinet of school supplies is also organized; it’s strange to have only one kid in school now. Of course, I tend to overbuy office supplies, so I won’t have to get pencils again until my grandkids are in school.

May that day be far away though. I’m not ready.

What I am ready for is more work. There’s the Roadtrip Z box set to finalize, HOOD‘s first season zero draft to gear up on, another short story (Alice in Wonderland with cyborgs and dici-plagues) to trace the skeleton of, and book two of the Five Winds to begin serious work on. I also want to play with the storm-god-and-witch story, subverting a few paranormal romance tropes.

I’m starting 2019 right where I like to be: with a whole lot of work in front of me and dogs snoring in my office. Of course I’m going to roust them and go for a run as soon as I finish the morning’s built-up correspondence, and Sir Boxnoggin for one will be thrilled. Running is one of the highlights of his day.

I hope you have something you love as much today too, dear Readers. I believe we shall kick 2019 in the pants, and am already stretching out.

Let’s do this.

Elf Gleams

The Princess went to see the Nutcracker, which called for hair decorations, of course. I love that you can just twist these into your headfur. They’re bright, cheap, and make her feel like Galadriel.

May we all find something similar this holiday season.

Getting Through to New Year’s

Tomorrow is Yule proper, the longest night and the celebration of light returning–or at least, the hope of such. Today is the absolute earliest day I will allow Christmas music in the house; however, the Princess and Little Prince rarely want it. It saturates all public spaces; this is, by contrast, our refuge.

The dogs sense my tension. Boxnoggin is determined to fix whatever has my tail tied in a knot; Miss B dimly suspects this has happened before and is more sanguine. Come the morning of the 25th, when the cooking begins, both of them will be excited and anticipatory. I wonder what Boxnoggin’s other Christmases have been like. No doubt he’ll calm down once he’s stuffed full of ham, belly-scrubbings, and treats.

Growing up, this time of year was inevitably one of mounting unease culminating in explosion. I used to try to decide which was worse: several small fires or the menacingly quiet build-up to a terrifying conflagration. On the one hand, the several small rages and punishments kept me in a state of low-level terror until after New Year’s, on the other, the tension leading up to the huge explosion made me sick with anticipation and I eventually feared for my life during the inevitable culmination. Year after year it was a roulette.

The first time I spent a quiet Christmas just by myself was revelatory. Nobody was screaming, breaking plates or my toys; nobody was hissing that I didn’t deserve presents or that I was a selfish child for having been born; the day passed quietly without me sneaking away to hide under my bed or vomit hopelessly behind a locked bathroom door that could still be screwdriver-opened at any moment. I wasn’t dragged out to “participate”, I wasn’t glared at while I opened presents and tried to guess which ones would be taken away after extended family went home and the war I’d never signed up for returned.

It was wonderful.

When my children arrived, their obvious and visible joy in the holiday frightened me. I worried that I wouldn’t be able to live up to their expectations, I worried that they secretly felt as awful as I had during the whole thing and were suffering trying to hide it, I worried that I wasn’t providing enough gifts, enough “traditions”, enough of anything, especially on Christmases where the budget didn’t permit much in the way of presents. It’s kind of funny now–both kids tell me they’ve always loved the holiday and I’ve always made it special for them. They don’t really understand my unease, since it’s always been a time of joy for them, a time to roll around in evidence that their Mum indeed loves them fiercely, completely, utterly.

I still can’t decide which was worse, the ongoing small fires or the huge explosion. The latter generally cleared the air for a while, but the absolute unremitting fear for my life during it seems a high price to pay. On the other hand, the grinding tension of several small pokes, slaps, pinches, nasty comments, glares, tiny humiliations occurring in clusters before a relatively smaller eruption turned me into a big-eyed, quivering wreck, afraid to even breathe deeply.

There’s really nothing to recommend either.

The kids, of course, are oblivious, looking forward to tree-decorating and a glut of good food. Presents? Well, they have everything they want, really, but I was able to afford some small things this year, and it pleases me to think of their joy when the Glorious Morn rolls around.

Among my friends this year, I feel like I’m the strong one. I just want to get everyone through to New Year’s with a minimum of damage. I feel like I’m clinging grimly to a lifeboat’s sides, making sure everyone has their vests secured and rationing our shipboard biscuits while we wait for rescue, comforting who i can and soothing as far as I am able.

Sometimes I long for the brief period in my life where I could let this entire time of year pass without decoration or remark, safely curled up inside my shell. I only participate for others, and some years I wish I didn’t have to.

All the same, participating for the joy of others is exponentially better than the conflagration or the wilderness of small random fires. It’s even quite beautiful in its own way, and I’m happy to bring joy to the people I care for. It gives me a deep satisfaction that helps battle the residual stress, the way Christmas decorations or the collection of holiday smells make my stomach clench with pained panic. I often feel that being incapable of enjoying the damn holiday season detracts from the joy of people I love, and worry that it indeed makes me the selfish brat I was accused since birth of being.

For me, even the best Christmas isn’t as good as a regular day spent working. It’s a gauntlet to run through, something to endure, and I’m always deeply glad when it’s over.

I’m buckled in and buckled down, prepared to see it through. Let’s hope we all reach the New Year with the minimum of damage, my friends.

Over and out.

Playing Wrap-Up

Last night I felt like telling a story, so I told the tale of the Llort and the Fox Princess. I do have another llort tale, but it’s going to have to wait, since it’s a sad instead of an instructive one.

It felt good to get it out of my head, and it was nice to get immediate feedback. Maybe I’ll toss the llort stories into an anthology, if I ever get off my ass about putting one together. I think it would be cool to have a great many of my short stories gathered in one place, and of course I’ve got the rights. The problem is just doing the gathering and formatting. Maybe after I get the Roadtrip Z omnibus sorted out I’ll use a short story anthology as a weekend project.

Anyway, the fourth and final season of Roadtrip Z is now available for preorder and there will be an omnibus. There may even be an omnibus in paper.

The next serial, starting after January 1, is HOOD, and from now until the end of the year I’ll be working ahead on that. So far the plan is for three seasons of Robin Hood in Space, and I have the ending firmly in sight. I generally do; the fun is all in getting there.

i’m also poking at a couple of short stories. The Hansel & Gretel Kung Fu Cannibal story is coming along nicely, and the Alice in Wonderland–Resident Evil–Blade Runner mashup is bubbling in the back of my head, waiting for its time to shine. I need the first line of the latter; once I have that, the rest of the cut will follow.

Short stories are difficult. I have to know the angle of the cut before I even think about putting my hand to the hilt. I’d much rather have a novel’s space to roll around in, but it’s good to do things outside one’s comfort zone. And they’re fun, besides, bite-size pocket universes.

Anyway, it’s a Monday, the dogs want running, and since the world is on fire I might as well work.

Over and out.

“Lucky” Cup

I almost, almost bought this. The only thing that stopped me was the prospect of a squirrel either deciding to pop out of the cup or that said cup would provide a beautiful home for its furry ass.

Still…it's just the right size to fit in the espresso maker.

I'm still tempted…

A Heckin Good Protec

The dogs want a run this morning. They won’t get one, mostly because my ankle is still tender. Maybe some walkies, if I can get enough coffee in me. As it is, I’m staring at the screen while sucking down as much caffeine as practicably possible, and wondering, as I perennially do after a release or a revision, why recovery takes so goddamn long. 

Even when I force myself into a couple days of doing absolutely nothing that can be considered work (I’m only allowed two hundred fresh words on such a day) it STILL takes longer than I think, and I inevitably try to go back to work, have a spasm of productivity, and then sit, staring and blinking, for about three days.

You’d think I’d have this down by now, but I don’t.

The dogs, meanwhile, are ecstatic. I cook a lot while in recovery, which means the kitchen is full of dropped scraps and lovely smells. There is much snuggling and rolling about on the floor, much playing with toys, and much repeating of “you are a GOOD dog, yes you are!”

The spasm of productivity was getting Atlanta Bound all prepped for preorder and the final chapters of Roadtrip Z prepped and scheduled for patrons and subscribers. That takes a significant load off my diminished capabilities until after the first of the year, which is welcome. It’d be nice to get the box set (all four Roadtrip Z seasons, paper costs may mean that comes out only in e-format, which would be a shame) all settled and ready to be put in the preorder pipe in January, but that’s a pretty high bar, especially if I want to re-edit the whole thing.

*sigh*

Sir Boxnoggin is letting out a series of chesty barks at short intervals, summoning me to come peer out windows at neighbors who are doing yard work. If he glimpses movement, or hears a car door slam/tree branch fall, he is ALL OVER THE BORKING. Which means, of course, that Miss B has to be all over the borking as well. After that, there’s nothing for it, Mum has to get up and investigate and make much of Boxnoggin for alerting and Doin A Heckin Good Doggo Protec. Then Miss B has to horn in and get some snuggles and pets because she did a good heckin protec too.

Consequently, I can’t finish a damn thought. Time to wrap this up and get the dogs leashed for walkies. After they stuff a great many scents into their snouts, they’ll have to come home and process, which means napping. Which means some quiet while I figure out omnibus paper costs.

Wish me luck.