Spasm

I've been working out with the Bowflex for two weeks now ... feeling stronger every day. Nice machine and the muscles gained don't disappear later the same day like they do with weights. So I'm sure you can imagine my surprise when I threw my back out this morning vacuuming! Yes, this is the second time this year, though the first time I could feel a tad more masculine about it as I was moving heavy boxes into our new home. It's like killing yourself washing windows or breaking a leg mopping the floor. So it looks like me and the Bowflex (and the vacuum and mop) are quits for the next week or so. It doesn't feel like a full back outage ... but it's enough to bend me in the middle. Damn it!

--

Finished Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. I'll probably be putting a review up about it on my message board later today. Started, Forever Will You Suffer last night. Now, initially, I was a little disappointed, though nothing to do with the new book. You see, at the end of Wicked, there was a preview chapter of Son of a Witch, the sequel, and though I'm not certain why, I wanted it to keep going. I mean, Gregory Maquire's an interesting writer, albeit wordy and a little dry at times and Wicked never really exploded the way I hoped it would. But there's something about his take on the Land of Oz, the violence and political shifting that makes me want to continue my journey through it. So as I opened Forever Will You Suffer, I realized I'd rather be reading Son of a Witch.

Having said that, I'm rather enjoying the new book. It reminds me of the writing style of a friend of mine, though more mature. I can see my friend writing this way in another few years, once he finds his true style and polish. It kind of grabs you right from the beginning. It's not written like Stephen King or Dean Koontz or Clive Barker, so it may never reach the upper echelon of the horror genre and thus it's shelf life will be much shorter, but that doesn't make it any less interesting to read. Told from a snappy first person point of view, it has gotten my attention. Now we'll need to see what it does with that attention.

--

Online; A Ghost Story--The first section of Chapter 4 "Convalescence" is done, and came out swimmingly, I might add. Like shit through a duck's ass. (Quoting my father here ... and what kind of man would I be if I weren't to quote him at least a couple of times in my life?)

Drain--About three more scenes to go, though one of them is rather lengthy. I still have hopes to complete this first draft before the end of the week. Hopefully my back will allow me to continue to sit at the computer. I can't write long hand. At least not for any length of time, so I'm shit out of luck there. However, if I'm couch-bound (ie, flat on my back) I'll see if I can use Holly's laptop to complete my writing for those days.

Currently Reading: Forever Will You Suffer by Gary Frank

Karl Kolchak And The Winds Of Destruction

On Friday morning, as I sat at my desk writing, a great wind shot by my home. To look at the trees across the way, one might assume that the wind was nothing more than my overactive imagination. The trees did not sway and yet that freight train sound of wind billowed past my closed window. The straw from last season's lawn seeding blew and swirled in great circular gusts and I assumed, for just a brief moment, that perhaps this was a cyclone about to whirl me and my house off to the land of Oz (for which I would have been thoroughly prepared as my current reading has greatly enlightened me about what to expect there). Then just as quickly as it had begun, the great wind ceased. I once again lost myself in the fictional world of Crescent Bay, where 'here there be ghosts'.

Later, as I waited for lunch to cook, I opened the sliding door to let the dogs out and what do you think I saw? No, not Dorothy's farmhouse all the way from Kansas, but rather my rather heavy and sturdily constructed gazebo ... a full forty feet across the yard. The lawn furniture that used to be inside it was knocked here and there but the gazebo itself, a tortured wreck of wood and metal almost into the neighbor's land. I was a bit surprised, as you can imagine and the rest of my afternoon was spent completing the task that nature had begun ... demolishing the gazebo. Not sure what kind of wind that was, but let's just say I'm glad little Perry wasn't outside at the time. It would do no good for Toto to wind up in Oz without Dorothy.

--
We lost Darrin McGavin this past week. For those of you who don't recognize the name, he was the father from A Christmas Story. For those of you who go back a wee bit further, he also played the bumbling hero, Karl Kolchak in CBS's The Night Stalker. That was my first trip into horror as a wee child ... and I got to stay up late every Saturday night to watch the show. It was always the same, but that's what made it so lovable. Karl would discover some creature or another (vampire, headless biker, underground demons) and of course throughout the show no one would believe him. And in the end, it was always down to Karl and the monster for the last fifteen minutes of the show. Karl would of course, defeat the monster and escape with his life ... just barely. And of course he'd write the story (as he was an investigative reporter) which his editor would absolutely refuse to publish. Chris Carter, creator of The X-Files also loved the show, and indeed borrowed heavily from it at times. A classic show, my first monsters and a great hero, now resting in peace. Godspeed.

--
Finished up Chapter 3 of Online and completed the outline for Chapter 4, which I'll start either later today or tomorrow. Drain is nearing completion and the first draft should be done within the next couple of days.
--
I'm almost at the end of Wicked and Holly and I treated ourselves to a little shopping at Books-A-Million. Now, I've got to say, I don't like this store nearly as much as Barnes & Noble or Borders. The don't seem to have the same type of selections. Indeed, I went looking for Owen King's We're All In This Together (yes, there's a relation to Stephen ... it's his son!) but it wasn't there. I mean, being such a nobody, I could understand that. WTF? You wouldn't think it would be tough to find a book by Stephen King's kid, but you'd be wrong. I also went looking for Scott Nicholson's The Red Church. They didn't have that either. They did have Home, but after reading the copy and several random pages (a lesson learned from the Survivor incident), it just didn't do it for me. Funny thing though, I'd have bought The Red Church without such scrutiny. Son of a Witch, the sequel to Wicked was there (along with about 1,000 other Gregory Maquire books) but it was still in hardcover ... and I don't think I'd like it enough to drop the cash. I'll wait for paperback or electronic version (if Sony ever releases their damned Reader). Also, Jeff Long has a new one out in hardcover called The Wall and man, was that tempting. Eventually though, I settled on two paperbacks. The first was a Jeff Long book called The Reckoning and the next was by Gary Frank entitled Forever Will You Suffer. That one passed the copy and random page check, so I'll let you know. Cool cover though. Not sure which I'm going to start first after Wicked. Guess I'll flip a coin. I'm real decisive that way.

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

Distracted Masturbation

Did you ever try to get yourself of, but your brain was just too pre-occupied with other things? No? Uh huh ... suuuuuuuuuure. Well for the few of you that admit to yourselves that you have, that's kind of what writing is like. You have a goal, an idea of what you're setting out to accomplish. But as you begin, you find yourself distracted. You're distracted because an email comes in, or an instant message or the telephone rings. The vision that you're holding in your head gets wispier with each passing distraction until what was once solid is now at tangible as a ghost. If you press on ahead, you're like to finish what you started, but there's little to no joy in the result.

So why am I talking about this? To illustrate a point for starters. To make people aware of my new schedule for finishers. So here's what's what.

In the morning, I'll do my usual household tasks and then I'll sit down to write. Outlook won't be open. Any IM program won't be open. The only Websites that will be up will be used for research only. (I managed to do that successfully today ... only one search site and dictionary.com were hit.) So if you're usually able to reach me or hear from me in the day, you'll be less likely to do so now. Oh, I'm not blaming anyone so please don't get that idea ... I'm only blaming myself. I enjoy these distractions a bit too much and make them readily available.

Is this going to work? Well let's see ... today I wrote un-rushed and undistracted. I've completed Chapter 3 of Online and banged out another 5 pages in Drain. That's about 3,000 words! About twice what I usually come up with in a day, and it's not even noon yet. So, the entire downstairs of the house has been swept, vaccuumed, and mopped, the dishwasher emptied, filled and run, the laundry done and both the novel and current short story worked on. Yeah, I'd say it's working. :) NOTE: Just to be clear about things ... Holly in no way expects me to do these household chores ... I do them of my own bidding because I like her to come home to a clean house! Just thought I'd make sure everyone understands that. Hee hee.

Anyway, I guess what I'm trying to say is that you won't be able to reach me in the AM except by cell phone (and if you don't have the number I most likely don't want to talk to you anyway) and that should only be matters of some importance. After lunch I should be available again for a couple of hours, usually starting sometime between 1 and 2PM. Sometime around 3 or 4 I'll go back and write for a little bit more. So if some of you are wondering what's happened to me ... I'm not dead ... I'm dreaming.

And I have to say ... without distraction ... the result is rather ... pleasurable.

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

Cause I Have To

Just a quick update here ...

It's been a busy morning and I haven't gotten to today's pages for Online, but I DID get the chance to start Drain yesterday afternoon. It's written in a style I've not yet used and I think it will be fun to read. Holly really like what little I read to her yesterday. If I can keep control of my time for the next few days, it might be ready sometime next week! :)

That's it for now ... see y'all on the dark side ...

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

Meatballs Before Bed

Check out what I found on the Web:

h'ok for the people who want free short horror storie si would recomend going to www.darkwrite.com. The author is called stefan bourque and some of the stories make you want to turn on every light in the house, and lock all your doors and windows!scary stuff people

I love finding stuff like that. It makes the long days totally worthwhile. :)

Chapters 1 and 2 of Online seemed to have a sense of hope about them. The possibility of romance, and the general positive growth of the main character. Chapter 3 is all about despair and the unfairness of life. The only thing that really makes me happy about this chapter is the return of Chapman Carter. Yes, for those of you who read Juggler, Chapman is the Chief of Police in Crescent Bay. I guess he got tired of the political corruption (not to mention the loss of half the department in the big fight sequence toward the end) in Saltonstall and headed south to the coast. Perhaps he thought he'd work the next few years in peace before retirement. But I'm not done with him yet.

It's funny, I never thought I'd have a recurring character ... and if I did, I always thought it would be a nice looking woman or a pretty-boy bad guy. Not some old guy with great intelligence and a big heart. I think he reminds me of my grandfather ... though who really knows what goes on in the mind of a writer? Not me, that's for certain.

Drain is still banging around in my head but hasn't yet been started. Maybe I'll get a chance this afternoon to let my mind wander with it some. It's based on a creepy dream I had (no more pasta and meatballs before bed ... or more correctly, only when I want nightmares that lead to story ideas) and I want to make sure I can create the same creepy feeling from the dream. Maybe you should read it while eating pasta and meatballs before bed?

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

Another Exciting Title Goes Here

For those of you who keep coming here looking for an update, my usual posting schedule should be Mon-Fri (sans holidays) and I'll try to get them out before noon. Having said that ... I'm sorry I fucked up last week's. I hadn't even realized I left off on a Wednesday. Tsk tsk.

It's been a crazy few days and last week was a real mess. Our home in Richmond just underwent the buyer's home inspection ... and a little negotiation later, we're on track for a mid-March closing. We're still waiting for a termite inspection (nasty little wood eating fuckers) and the bank appraisal. Could this difficult journey finally be close to an end? We can only hope. We started this at the beginning Oct 05 ...

I'll be working on Drain, a new short story in between working on the novel. For those of you who don't notice the home page of the site, there's artwork up for the story already and a link to access it.

Been getting a lot of emails ... so if you've sent one recently that requires a response ... I'm getting around to it.

Created a pretty cool myspace account, been working out with the Bowflex and putting off taking the trash to the dump (a little side-effect of country-living).

--
Online's coming along nicely. I'm somewhere around the early 70s, which is pretty cool considering the first draft for this part of the book was in the mid-30's. So as you can imagine there's significantly more substance. Everyone of the characters has changed somewhat ... they've not lost thier alignment (ie, if they were nasty villains, they're still nasty villains), but they're more human now and that just makes things better.
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So this book I'm reading is interesting. Not gripping mind you, but interesting. It's a different world of Oz than the one we're used to seeing in the movie. It's not a cute little Munchkin-filled fairy tale. Parallels could be drawn between the Oz in this book and Germany in the late 1930's. The Wizard more or less can be seen as Hitler, easily enough. All in all though, it's tough to root for a character you know dies when a chubby farmgirl throws a bucket of water on her. I think it's sad for any literary character to suffer the chubby-farmgirl-thrown-bucket-of-water death. :)

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

Living (Through) The Drama

I received many emails regarding the situation with my grandmother, and I appreciate all the responses. So as there's a good number of you wondering what's going on, I have the latest update ... and you're not going to believe it.

As of this writing, my grandmother is not only alive and well (as well as any 89 year old can be I suppose) but safe and sound at home! Yes, that 's right ... she ignored the ticking of the Deathwatch Beetle again.

The day after her regular doctor wanted to put her on life support, she declined. Another doctor, an actually competent one (and a heart specialist to boot) came in and told her to "Not worry about what the other doctor recommended." Her original doctor believed the fluid in her lungs was going to shut down her heart. The heart doctor put her though some tests to see if it was in fact her heart that was creating fluid in her lungs. (Those tests have not yet come back.) Either way, Doctor B believes that Doctor A is an ass and was damned near responsible for putting her on a dangerous and envasive medical care that could have caused enough trauma to kill her.

She does have acute lung disease, and nothing at this late stage will cure that. But she's certainly not at a point where she needs to be placed on life support.

And so another drama concludes ... and was as useless as most drama is.

Thank you all who have reached out to me during this time. It was appreciated.

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

No G'news Is Good G'news?

Can you fucking believe it? I'm still waiting. Yup ... no word. No call from anyone. It's a good thing I'm not concerned about my grandmother's health. I've called both my parents numbers and got only answering machines. I suppose I could call my grandmother's hospital room, but I think I'm too much of a coward to do that. I have horrible visions in my head of doctors running around with electrified paddles calling out frightning things like "Clear", "Code Blue" and the like, and my little phone call ringing endlessly in the background. I may have no choice, but I'd like my parents to call me back. Sigh ...

Needless to say I could only bang out about a page yesterday, but it's a dream sequence so you can kind of have fun with those. I'll get to dabble a little bit more with that today. Maybe I'll get to escape for a little while.

It's times like these that make it hard not to pop open a pack of smokes and start up again. I don't have any real desire to do so ... but it's just what your brain remembers to do in times of high anxiety. Instead, I'll just gnaw on my shirt collars and go on about my day.

--
So I'm reading this book about the life and times of the Wicked Witch of the West. I'm sure most of you have heard about it by now, it's been on every face out bookshelf at Barnes & Noble since I can remember. It's surprisingly smutty and extremely well-written, thought just a tad bit on the dry side. For me, that's harder to "fall into", but I'm starting to.

After this I'm thinking of moving on to Scott Nicholson's The Red Church. A friend of mine really likes his work and I've been reading some great articles of his on the Horror Writer's of America Website, regarding his trials and tribulations of becoming published. Very frank details about the publishing industry.

I'd love for the new Sony Reader to come out already. Okay, at least after we sell the other house. This thing has great new technology (e-ink) that looks like printed ink on white paper. No flickering LCD screens to tire the eyes and it uses very little battery power (only used to turn the pages ... no power is needed to hold the e-ink in place once the page is turned). Perhaps the most exciting thing will be the Sony Connect store, where they will offer e-books in much the same manner as ITunes does music. Many of the major publishers are already on board to provide content so there could be upwards of 50,000 titles available. My reading appetite will double once this happens. So many books available at the click of a mouse!

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

Waiting Is The Hardest Part

As I write this, my grandmother is deciding how she wants to die. The doctors want to put her on life support but that would place her in a coma. (This I don't understand but I'm receiving the information second hand from my father, a man unfamiliar with details.) Or, she could continue consciously until her heart gives out from lack of oxygen from her old lungs. To summarize, she's never leaving the hospital alive. At least that's how the story sounds now. Having been thorougly irritated by the lack of details, I call her myself. I could hear my mother in the background as I spoke with my grandmother (my father's mother).
"How are you?" I asked.
"I have bad news," she said.
"I know, I heard from my father. But how are you? What are you going to do?"
"I don't know. What would you do?" She asked.
"I don't know. I'm a fighter I guess. I wouldn't do it." I answered referring to spending my last days on life support and possibly comatose.
"I'm a fighter, too," she said. "I'm not going to let them do it. You're mother's here now, can I call you back?"

That was 7 hours ago. I'm 600 miles away, and I'm wondering what's going on. I'm trying to go about my day as normally as I can. But in the back of my mind I'm preparing myself for a 12-hour road trip that will end sadly.

My grandmother and I made quite a pair when I was younger. Getting lost on back roads while trying to find my grandfather's gravesite. Teasing me about having to wash dishes in a Chinese restaurant because she wasn't sure she had enough money on her to pay for lunch. She bought me my first computer, and then my first word processor. She's the one who called the Haverhill Gazette and told them they had a writer in town. As stated in the dedication of Darker..., she's been my guardian angel.

Never an emotional woman (unless she was angry, then watch out!) I know she loves me. And I love her. And who knows ... she's been in tight spots before and managed to come out of them okay. The Death Bell has struck for her before and she refused to heed it's call. Maybe that will happen again. My grandmother's a tough lady and if I have half as much fight in me at half her age, I'll consider myself to be doing pretty well. But I know as well as every human being, that no matter how tough you are, you can't avoid the tolling of the bell forever.

But for now I wait. I wait for the call informing me of her decision. Then I'll wait for another call. One that will most likely come in the wee hours of the morning, because it seems that bad news travels quicker at night. I'll wait to be told of the passing of a woman who fought her whole life, and fought right up to the moment when there was no fight left. And then fought a little more. Because that's my grandmother through and through. And I hope I do her half as much justice when my time comes due.

Still, I wait...

Currently Reading: Wicked by Gregory Maquire

Character Assassination

Stephen King fucking did it to me again! The bastard gets me to care about a character, tag along with them for chapters and then BAM!, takes them away. Don't think I haven't forgotten what you did to me with Bag of Bones ya bastard! :)

Seriously though, it's a nod to the author when you care as much as you do about a character. I wrote the scene I'd been hesitant about yesterday, and it was one of the scariest I'd ever shaken out of my head. "It's up there," Holly said. She also used terms like "hair raising" which I don't think I've ever actually heard anyone say, just read it on the back cover of a paperback perhaps. But she wanted more about the character that had clearly died in the scene. She wanted to see things from the character's point of view. And she was disappointed when I told her that wasn't going to happen. She understood of course, it would be sad and disillusioning to go into that character's head at the time, but disappointed nonetheless. And that was of course one of the greatest compliments she could ever give. I had written this character so well that Holly didn't want her to go.

And that's what it's all about.

Currently Reading: Cell by Stephen King

Late Morning of the Dead

Cell is getting scary. Not in that "BOO!" kind of scary, but in that Land of the Dead kind of scary. It's bad enough the zombies in that movie were reanimated dead people, but the fact that they learned to use tools and weapons was downright un-fucking-fair! I'm not sure if Romero wanted me to feel sympathy for the creepy flesh-eaters, but I certainly did not, regardless of how corrupt and idiotic the survivors were. It's war after all, if you have too much sympathy for your enemy you're going to wind up dead.

What would you do in a Dead-World? I think I'd hone my fishing skills to the max and find an island somewhere ... but a small one. One that I could "clean out" systematically. Of course I'd always have that special clip for the 9MM. The one with only two bullets in it ... for Holly and myself of course. If you can hold out long enough, those things will rot themselves away, they are a dying breed--pun fully intended--after all. Pretty soon the muscles will rot away, tendons will dry out and break and someday all you'll have to do is sweep them away like so much dust. The horror of the Dead is short term really, they're just not designed for the long haul.

Yesterday I spent time creating the outline for Chapter Three ("Click") and will start that in a few minutes. And yes, this contains the scene that I've been stalling on, so it should be over today, finally.

Currently Reading: Cell by Stephen King

Wifey

God, I adore my wife. She's beautiful, intelligent, sexy, trusting and the absolute perfect woman for me. What's more, she's my best friend. She's also very much into me. That's something that, no matter what insight I learn over the years, no matter how deeply I farm my intelligence, I can't understand. And you know what? I kind of think it's supposed to be that way. When things work perfectly, there's always this lingering question of 'why?'. When things go bad, well we always kind of expect that don't we?

All I know is that Holly is going to come home today and she's going to ask if she can sit down and read what I've written. And I'll sit her in my office chair, open the manuscript to the correct spot and linger just around the doorway of the office while she leans back and reads. She'll laugh or utter some comment like 'wow' and she'll chat with me about it. She'll tell me she loves it, or she'll tell me that she didn't quite get it or wasn't feeling it. We'll make dinner while we talk. Then we'll settle on the couch, switch on the TiVo and catch up on a couple of shows. If she's tired, she'll lie down with a pillow in my lap and I'll lightly brush her hair. If she's stressed I'll rub her shoulders. But no matter how she feels, she's right there next to me, leaning against me, holding my hand ... just being close.

In the mornings she'll get up early and do her Pilates, take her shower and then wake me up and we'll have breakfast together. Then we linger by the front door, neither of us wanting to part. I'll clean up after that, myself and the house. I'll wash her little things and put them away in the closet, only wanting to give back a tiny percentage of what I get.

Then it's time to sit in front of the computer, sun usually shining in the office window and I sit to write. And as I do so, I realize without any doubt, without any feeling of approaching doom, that I'm one well-loved writer. And I put my fingers on the keyboard and I write ... I write every word for her. For the woman I'm in love with.

For my wife.

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What a difference a book can make! How long did you see "Currently Reading: Small Town by Lawrence Block" on the bottom of my journal entries? All I know was that it was quite a while. I started Cell by Stephen King yesterday and I'm nearly half way through already. I can't stop reading the damned thing! I don't think it's just because it takes place in my old stomping ground. All the places he's mentioning, I've been. His trip north from Boston touches on all the roads and towns I lived around. It's not just that, though it helps, but it's more this neverending suspense. I want to know what's going to happen! I definitely feel the love. The love he has for the story ... the love he has for the reader. He's not pushing you through the book, he's going on ahead and praying that you'll follow him. And I will ... right up to that point where I turn the last page and I begin to feel sadness that all the characters I fell for so quickly are gone. Such a bittersweet moment is that. Then I'll go on to other authors and pray for the same experience. Sometimes I'll be pleasantly suprised, though sadly, I'm usually disappointed. But I know this, regardless of how many times he says it, Stephen King will never retire. So as long as this man draws breath, I know I'll be looking forward to being swept away yet again, only to know that someday, the book will come to a close and that bittersweet symphony will play once more. This is the ground that only reader and author have ever tread upon. No movie can recreate this. It is sacred ground.

Currently Reading: Cell by Stephen King

Painful But Necessary

As I've noted in previous entries, I'm spending more time with characters in this version of Online; A Ghost Story than with any other work I've ever done. I've always been a little timid about states on inaction within a book. That. seemingly, is no longer an issue with me. Of course there's a side effect. I now care more deeply than before about certain characters. I've spent a lot of time with one in particular that, although she played a signifigant role, it was a very small role. Now her time is coming, her exit from the Grand Stage of Life, and I find myself much more unwilling to write the pages than before. We've just spent a solid 12 pages in a row with her ... and believe me, for my style of writing, that's a long ass time. She's strong, resolute and well, beautiful. Her father is a nervous and caring man who dotes on her. What's going to happen to him once she's gone? But what can I do? Life, or more correctly, death doesn't take these things into consideration when it chooses to take one of us. It doesn't look at our loved ones and say, they'll be so sad when this person is gone, maybe I'll let them stay. And the world of the novel, at least if it's well-written has to play by the same rules as the world in which we live, fantasy and sci-fi aside of course. Having said that, tomorrow I must write pages I'm less than thrilled about. Indeed, I think I've even been stalling a little, waiting for word from the Governor for a stay, perhaps. Alas, none has come and I'll walk with her tomorrow as she steps through her last moments. Man, sometimes this omniscient thing sucks.

Well, I've finally finished reading Small Town and was more pleased by the end than for most of the book. I state a little more in my message board and you can go there if you're curious. Overall not a terrible book, but also not what I was hoping for. I will get to start Stephen King's Cell today, and I'm pretty excited about that. I always get a sick thrill out of being dwarfed when I compare what I'm working on with this literary giant. It makes me try harder, strive to be better. And I ask you, what's wrong with that?

It's Long, It's Hard And It Hurts Like Hell ... Must Be The Shaft!

Okay ... so I'm getting a little flak for not keeping this journal up to date more regularly. So here is today's as promised on my message board. I'll work on getting these written daily (workdays) before I go to work on my book. Having said that, you can tell that I'm running a little late on my pages today. It was only 400 emails to sort through, no big deal. Fucking spammers!

So to catch up ... it appears that Holly and I have brought development with us. As some of you know from visiting our home in Richmond, we were plagued by the development of houses being put up in what was once a beautiful stretch of trees just outside our backyard. I used to sit on my deck and watch squirrels running to and fro, watch birds flutter about from tree to tree and try to target that bastard of a woodpecker who put more than a few holes in my house. Instead of that nearly peaceful scene I had to watch sweaty guys put up one cookie-cutter house after another. Huge homes with no backyards and only a driveway separating them. Then I got to watch the chumps that bought them pay $450,000 and up to move into them. All to live in Richmond's West End. The Joneses must be fabulously wealthy, because everyone's killing themselves (at least financially) to keep up with them.

And now, as I write this in the office of our little Cape Code style home in the country, I'm listening to big machines knock down hundreds of pretty trees just on the outskirts of my property. I'm too afraid to go out there and look. I might see hundreds of birds and squirrels running away from sweaty men building cookie-cutter houses. WTF? I just found a property in Colorado that has over 10,000 acres. No more building around me, motherfucker!

In the last week or so, Holly and I have tossed around ideas for our retirement (well ... writers don't really retire, we just move some place prettier and keep on writing til' we die) and dream house. We originally were looking at Texas. Not just for the acreage, but it was there. Not for the small town Americana, but it was there. It was also the last place in America that still seemed to be America. A friend of mine once said to me, "Texas doesn't take shit from anyone, including America". There was something poetic about that for me. Then some other friends brought up the idea of Colorado ... you know, cause 61 acres in Texas wasn't enough privacy or something for us. So we were looking at lots from 1400 to 10,000+ acres. Beautiful mountain scenery and all the freedom you could want. But we're not quite as anti-social as we seem and we do like our friends to come and visit. So then we turned our attention to a real passion for both of us. The ocean! Yes, we spent two absolutely blissful (okay there was one fight ... but we were both drunk and it was resolved in minutes) days and nights in North Carolina's outer banks. Suddenly and certainly, we knew where we wanted to retire, grow old, wear diapers and die. So that's the new plan ... and it's going to require millions. But what the hell ... if you can't dream, then you're either upper management or dead.

So things have been a little tight with two mortgages ... and yes, we've finally received a contract and closing date for the home in Richmond (making the sign of the cross) and if all goes well, before the end of March we'll be out of this troubling scenario. With that in mind, we haven't had much spending money but we had to buy a birthday gift for a friend and so off to Barnes & Noble we went. We bought our friend a gift card and I actually had a gift card, a Christmas gift from my sister-in-law (thank you Amy) so I could pick up Stephen King's latest hardcover, Cell. (No I didn't just give my friend my gift card ... it seemed too cheap to do that ... and I wanted some new books dammit!) Well, as it turned out I had just enough left over to get one new paperback. I looked and looked and finally chose a book off the "New In Paperback" rack. The back looked exciting, a woman kidnapped while on vacation for the purposes of a snuff film. Sounded intense ... and Chuck Pahluniak has been writing twisted tales, both graphic and poetic for years, so I got kind of a taste for such things these days. It was a Leisure Book, which I tend to avoid because ... well they suck, generally. Poor workmanship from both publisher and author, and the audacity to throw advertisements in the center of the book all make for a lousy read. For some reason, and I think it was because Leisure hired a new copywriter, I forgot these things. There were quotes from some moderately well-known horror authors (if you read outside the best seller list that is) and even a favorable one from the New York Times Book Review. So, being pressed for time (still had to stop at the in-laws before my friend's party) we brought our purchases to the counter. We practically skipped to the car as this was the first real gift we gotten for ourselves since our wedding back in early December.

Later that night, with the party and all the hoo hah of the day behind us, we got home and Holly popped the book in question out of the bag and began to peruse it. She read the prologue and asked if she could read this to me. After some attrition on my part (I'm particular about other people reading my books before me ... but I soon got over it) I let her read. And guess what? Yup, it sucked! Oh my God, did it ever suck! The characters in just the prologue itself were horrendously two-dimensional, absolutely unbelievable and the scene itself, ridiculous. Imagine this, it's the 50's and a little school girl of sixteen or so is walking home, but first she has to stop off at the house of a local housewife, whom she's having raunchy sex with. It's okay though, because she's already given herself to "guys" in the past, so she's ready for full-on lesbian sex with bondage and flaggelation. Did I mention it was the 50's? If this hollow reality was really the only problem with the book, I'd have kept my mouth shut. After all, as an author myself, I don't wish to add to anyone's long list of critics. But the book is far worse than this. The housewife sucks out the eyes of the girl. No mention as to what this housewife then does with the body. Maybe she just leaves it there while she goes upstairs and makes dinner for her family. What follows is the lowest piece of literary pornography (read: absolutely obscene) load of horse puckey anyone's ever (except maybe this asshole himself) put to paper. Graphic displays of baby mutilation, cannibalism and yes, even skull fucking. Now, I'm a horror fan first, a horror writer second. I understand what goes into horror, believe me I get it. But graphic scenes of the utmost violence is NOT skill. I can do it ... shit any teenager with a pen or computer can do it. It's not hard. But writing your characters so that one cares about them when something is happening is. Introducing violence necessary for the creation of scene and atmostphere is much harder than typing with one hand and jerking off with the other while you write out sick fantasies that amount to nothing more than literary masturbation for your own fetish. And just for curiosity sake ... how can someone's cock be "blood and flesh-stained"? Seriously dude ... you're running on pure shock value. Your reviews on Amazon ... the ones NOT submitted by your friends speak the truth. This is the dullest story ever, trite, empty of love for your characters OR your readers and you should flat out be ashamed of yourself. This story has as much characterization and class as one that starts out with, "Dear Penthouse, I never thought this would happen to me..."

Now, am I angry as an author? Yes. Is it because I'm jealous that this guy has three times the published books as I do? Not in the least. I'd rather have one book that strives to be good, than fifty that spit in the face of those who do try. I'm angry as an author because some unknowing consumer is going to pick this book up and think all those dwelling in the horror genre are not only baby eating, skull fucking, eye sucking perverts, but that we're talentless as well. And that's what really pisses me off.

I'm also pissed off as a consumer. SEVEN dollars for what should be nothing more than a piece of Internet trash! Both the publisher and the bookstore should be ashamed of themselves. And so should I. I knew better than to buy Leisure Books. I knew it ... and I did it anyway. Shame shame on me. Well that was the last time for that little mishap.

Oh ... and to the New York Times Book Review who quoted the following on this little piece of trash, "Forces the kind of visceral relationship between writer and reader that the best horror writing can produce.", fuck you!

Okay ... so Online is going well ... up around page 50. And ... what's that? You want to know what book this is? Well, I've thought about this ... and since I was never actually asked nor paid to give a review, I'm not going to say. I don't wish to start an author flame war ... but I will say this as a consumer ... stay the hell away from J.F. Gonzalez's Survivor!

Currently Reading: Small Town by Lawrence Block