On the Money We Make (or Fail to Make) Through Writing

Getting paid more than zero for your work is the first step toward learning what it’s really worth to you, the best way to learn to stop obsessing about what it’s worth to everybody else.

This brilliant piece I just found on Slate.com touches on some of the key elements of making a living through writing. Many authors I know say it should never be about the money. Many others believe it shouldn't be about anything else. Some feel that making money off their 'art' is akin to 'selling out'; some consider payment the ultimate validation.

Either way, though, and as the article says, 

"Few connections are more mysterious than the one between writing books and making money."

Oh, and this:

In their candid moments, most publishers will admit going into business with writers whose work they regard as subliterary because they believe that they can profit from their books. This is still considered shocking in some unsophisticated quarters, but publishing isn’t literature: Literature is literature.

Read the full article at Slate.com.

Gay Degani's 'Rattle of Want' — Lessons on Writing Long vs. Short

I met Gay Degani back in 2013, when we were both part of the Pure Slush project 2014, A Year In Stories—and this is not the first time she graces this blog with her insight. She wrote two pieces for Quiet Laughter during the A2Z challenge in 2014, one on Setting, and one on using Pinterest to increase a book's audience, which has become a top-five in the blog's most viewed posts of all time.

Photo credit: Rachael Warecki

Her 'Old Road' series in the 2014 project (now collected as part of her newest release, Rattle of Want) had me hooked; the characters jumped off the page, the plot—half mystery, half personal drama—kept me riveted, and this cohesiveness to her writing made me certain Gay was a novelist. She had to be. Anyone who masters 'story' at that level must know the longer arcs well.

Imagine my wonder, then, when I found out that—although she does have a published novel— Gay is mostly a writer of incredibly prolific and award-winning flash.

Murder & Obsession: @yolandarenee Cover Reveal!

Flames burn between a hardboiled cop and a gifted artist, but soon extinguish as another man's obsession ignites into an inferno of desire, driving him to destroy the object of his madness.

Congratulations, Yolanda! A-ma-zing cover for Book #3 in the Detective Quaid Mysteries series!

Elevate Your Pitch!

Now that November is over, it's time to start editing the hell out of that NaNo manuscript. Getting rid of all the plot bunnies, the useless (yes, even if fun) tangents, the darlings and the indulgently purple prose.

And nothing helps focus on—even discover—the core of your novel like a cut-'em-to-the-bone pitch. Which is why Samantha Redstreake Geary, spectacular author and freelance writer for the music industry, has opened the Elevate Your Pitch competition.

Got a novel? Whether it's this year's NaNo project or something you've been working for longer than 30 days (and nights), you probably know that it's going to get nowhere without a brilliant elevator pitch.

What is an elevator pitch?

The way writers convey the promise of what reading their book will deliver on.
(paraphrased from Chuck Sambuchino @ WD)

He follows that with a tidbit of magic to illustrate:

"An unforgettable novel about finding a piece of yourself in someone else."
~ And The Mountains Echoed, Khaled Hosseini

Think of the pitch as the teaser trailer to your book. You have 20 seconds to hook a potential reader; how will you do it?

The best part: for this contest, you get to do it with music (like the pros!). Sam's providing all tracks of the Elevation album on the contest page—and if these awesome pieces don't inspire you to take your pitch to the next level, nothing will.

So go for it. Take a listen to the Elevation tracks, choose one that feels right for your manuscript, polish that pitch (max 3 sentences!), and submit via the comments form. Remember to mention which of the tracks you chose, so the judges can listen to it while reading.

Speaking of judges, I'm one of them—and I'm in excellent company, with author Amy Willoughby-Burle and Really Slow Motion director Agus González-Lancharro. Contest is open from now until January 8th, and prizes include:

— For the top three favorite pitches, digital copies of the Elevation album and of The Miracle of Small Things
— One lucky overall winner will receive a gratis license to one of the Elevation tracks for use in a book trailer, and a signed paperback of The Miracle of Small Things

Sound cool? Sign up here! (And check the contest site for guidelines.)

If, for whatever reason, you're not ready to participate, you might still want to follow along; several guests and judges will be providing pitch-rocking tips while the competition runs. (And Sam's blog is totally worth following anyway, for content and visuals. And music.)

The Weekend #MiracleTour Stop: That Annoying Animal Advocate

I'm over at Michele Truhlik's awesome blog this weekend, on the next-to-last post for the MIRACLE tour, talking about the pitfalls of animal advocacy in fiction... And the work-around I found — at least I think I found. Readers will tell :) I'd love it if you came by to say hi, and to help me shower Michele with love and gratitude for being such a wonderful hostess.

Happy Saturday!

The Listing Hop!

Happy Monday, and bon siman! 

(That's 'happy week' in Papiamentu, the language of Curaçao—and if you ever do come to Curaçao, make a note: all your greetings on Monday need to be accompanied by that... Under penalty of being classified as another rude foreigner ;) )

Today's the day for Bish Denham's

Listing Hop!

Rules:

Make a list. Any list. Sign up at Bish's page and join the fun. Here's mine:

Top ten twenty-two fifteen pieces of writing advice

(in no particular order)

Remember that, sooner or later, before it ever reaches perfection, you will have to let it go and move on and start to write the next thing. Perfection is like chasing the horizon. Keep moving.

No. 6 in Neil Gaiman's 8 Rules of Writing

Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.

No. 7 on Kurt Vonnegut's 8 Tips to Write a Great Story

Avoid your weaknesses. But do this without telling yourself that the things you can’t do aren’t worth doing. Don’t mask self-doubt with contempt.

No. 4 in Zadie Smith's 10 Rules of Writing

Tell the truth through whichever veil comes to hand — but tell it. Resign yourself to the lifelong sadness that comes from never ­being satisfied.

No. 10 in Zadie Smith's 10 Rules of Writing

Writing is a little door. Some fantasies, like big pieces of furniture, won’t come through.

From Susan Sontag's thoughts on writing

A writer, like an athlete, must ‘train’ every day. What did I do today to keep in ‘form’?

From Susan Sontag's thoughts on writing

Have moral intelligence — which creates true authority in a writer.

From Susan Sontag's thoughts on writing

You cannot write the pages you love without writing the pages you hate.

Robin Black, 21 Things I Wish I'd Known Before I Started Writing

Exaggeration is not a way of altering reality but of seeing it. 

Mario Vargas Llosa, History of a Deicide, speaking about Gabriel García Márquez 

(my translation from the Spanish)

Ordinary language is an accretion of lies. The language of literature must be, therefore, the language of transgression, a rupture of individual systems, a shattering of psychic oppression. The only function of literature lies in the uncovering of the self in history.

From Susan Sontag's thoughts on writing

If you are using dialogue—say it aloud as you write it. Only then will it have the sound of speech.

No. 6 of John Steinbeck's 6 Tips on Writing

Write freely and as rapidly as possible and throw the whole thing on paper. Never correct or rewrite until the whole thing is down. Rewrite in process is usually found to be an excuse for not going on. It also interferes with flow and rhythm which can only come from a kind of unconscious association with the material.

No. 2 of John Steinbeck's 6 Tips on Writing

You most likely need a thesaurus, a rudimentary grammar book, and a grip on reality. This latter means: there’s no free lunch. Writing is work. It’s also gambling. You don’t get a pension plan. Other people can help you a bit, but ­essentially you’re on your own. ­Nobody is making you do this: you chose it, so don’t whine.

No. 7 of Margaret Atwood's 10 Rules of Writing

The more abstract a truth which one wishes to teach, the more one must first entice the senses.

No. 8 of Nietzsche's 10 Rules for Writers

The richness of life reveals itself through a richness of gestures. One must learn to feel everything — the length and retarding of sentences, interpunctuations, the choice of words, the pausing, the sequence of arguments — like gestures.

No. 5 of Nietzsche's 10 Rules for Writers

***

Hooked? Here's a fabulous compilation of writerly advice, via Brainpickings.

Speaking of writer wisdom, tomorrow I'll be over at Sam Redstreake's awesome blog sharing a pearl of my own on how music helps with writing... 
(With some outrageously wonderful music, of course.)
AAANNNDD — drum roll, please — also to celebrate the e-book release of
THE MIRACLE OF SMALL THINGS!
Come on over tomorrow and help me thank Sam for hosting me.

Want more lists? You'll find the complete list of Listing Hop List-makers at Bish's page... Hop on over and pay them a visit.

What's your favorite piece of writing advice? Inquiring (list-making) minds would love to know. And I looooove comments :)

Spectacular Settings! (#WEP)

Hosted by wonder-women Denise Covey and Yolanda Renee, the WEP (Write - Edit - Publish) Spectacular Settings hop is all about the power of place -- and the part it plays (can/should play) in writing.

Got a spectacular setting from a favorite book? Join the hop (it runs from the 19th to the 26th) and share! (More info here.)

The setting I'm sharing here is not from fiction but from poetry. And not just any poet, either. If you've followed this blog for a while, you might know I'm a huge fan of T.S. Eliot. A couple of months ago a long-time friend -- one of those people from the past that sometimes pop up into the present, usually bearing extraordinary gifts -- got together a small group of poetry enthusiasts for a reading circle on Skype (we're scattered all over, geographically), and the first piece we read was Eliot's Four Quartets. 

It's a piece I know well, maybe more than well -- it was none other than this old friend who introduced me to Eliot some 20 years ago, and the Eliot collection I own is one he gave to me back then... twenty years almost to the day we began reading. Several bits from Four Quartets have, in these two decades, gained special significance. For instance,

On a coolish autumn night in New York's Lower East Side...

A reading. In front of an audience--that, let it be said, contained only two friends of mine. Only two people I knew from before that night. Everyone else--and it was a pretty solid crowd--was a stranger or had been until an hour or so earlier.

The crowd.

Best 20 minutes you'll spend today

The End: 2014 A Year In Stories

After twenty-one months, the 2014 A Year In Stories project has finally wrapped up. The last three volumes (October, November, and December) are available for purchase and/or download. All twelve volumes--a volume per month, a story a day, 31 novellas--are now out.

Yay!

The Meaning of Cuernavaca

The city of memory, the city of nostalgia, of everything that's been lost, and found, forgotten, remembered.

We--my father, my mother, and I--moved from Mexico City to Cuernavaca in December 1975, when I was two months shy of three years old. I have fragmented memories of that December. For instance, walking around the pool wearing corduroy pants and a woolen sweater (yes, winters in the central altiplano of México can be cold), but my parents were wearing swimming suits, and I remember remarking on that, briefly, internally.

View of the house I grew up in, from the carport. The deep end of the pool is just off-frame to the right.
In the back you can see half of the sandbox I played in for hours, the tree where I had my treehouse
(long gone, rotted or something, before this photo was made), and a corner of the tennis court
(you have to look hard).
My father made this photo five months before he died.

Not dead, just...

Well... working, I guess. Yes, there's that new job--which I love--*love*--to bits (more on that below). But also the end of the Pure Slush 2014 Year In Stories project. I finally delivered my December story earlier this month--story which, by the way, was due at the end of May. Yep. Two months late. And I wasn't even the last writer to wrap up the cycle.

It's official: Matt Potter, Pure Slush editor, is a saint.

It was hard, wrapping up. I didn't expect it to be that hard. Saying goodbye to characters is always sad; "The End" is a production achievement, sure, but it's also The End--of a creativity moment, of a period of our lives, of our shared story with these characters.

Perhaps if I wrote happy--happier--endings I'd have more feel-good afterwards. From a creative production standpoint I'm pleased when I achieve the perfect ending for a story. In terms of craft it gives me a boost of satisfaction to wrap things up, to bring the story to its crescendo, to let the notes crash and bang and make their statement, and then fade.

Did I mention I have a job?

My first article for the Amigoe Express (a Curaçao newspaper) was published today. Centerfold and everything. It's only available in print, but if you want to read it online, here's a link to the PDF.

YAY!!!

The Same Old Tired Emotions?

The difference between the right word and the almost-right word is the difference between lightning and the lightning bug.

~ Mark Twain

For your born writer, nothing is as healing as the realization that he has come upon the right word.
~ Catherine Drinker Bowen

Fill your pages with details. Work hard to get the right word.

~ Robert Littell

How important is the right word to you? How much time do you spend trying to find it? Is there anything--plot, characters, tension, etc.--that trumps that right word for you in terms of value to your writing?

Go on, share. I'm curious.

A whole month off...

Where did May go?
(Image credit)

May flew by and--not a single post. Oops.

Yes, the A-to-Z took a lot out of me this year. Never again with more than one blog, never again in the middle of another project...

'S a matter of fact, maybe never again. Or maybe just not next year. It would be nice to just spectate for once. Get to visit blogs instead of stressing over my own posts or about not keeping up with the lovely comments y'all leave here. Which I love, and which I'll miss...

Well. We'll see. I love being a part of the A-to-Z, but I feel I miss out a lot. Yes, pre-writing is the key. (Why the hell is it so hard to follow one's own advice?) If I'm able to get at least half the post prewritten by January, when the sign-up list opens, maybe--maybe--I'll consider having another go. Right now I'm simply too exhausted to consider it.

What's been happening here over the last 30 days? Well, my laptop broke down mid-March. (The fact I did the A-to-Z on a borrowed computer might've contributed to the aforementioned exhaustion.) No, it's not fixed yet. It's a 2007 MacBook, and one of the fans is shot--but Apple doesn't manufacture it anymore, which means the pseudo Apple store here can't order it. They told me it's available on eBay or similars, but they've failed to give me (in spite of numerous calls to remind them) the specifications on what, exactly, I need to order.

Perhaps a new laptop is the solution. Sadly, seeing as I'm a starving artist (ahem) with a copious family of dogs who cannot starve, that solution isn't much of a solution at all.

Then the washing machine broke down. And then my car broke down.

This sounds like the beginning of a bad joke.

I'm done whining, though. I have this awesome borrowed laptop (borrowed from an even awesomer person--thank you, Cor!) to keep me connected to the world and--most importantly--to keep writing. The washing machine couldn't be fixed, so said Awesomer Person bought a new, supersonic and super quiet, one (thank you, Cor!)--and, as an added brushstroke of the Universe's goodwill, the delivery guys even took the old one away. And my car has been fixed. It was expensive, and it's not perfect (yet), but it drives. (Thank you again, Cor!)

It's possible the dogs might've missed the car more than I did. Which is saying a lot.

Awkword Paper Cut

Another marvelous thing that happened in May: I was featured all month on Awkword Paper Cut, in the Writers on Writing section, along with two other (pretty fantastic) writers to talk about Mexico and why we writers must (sometimes) leave our countries to find our writing. Awkword Paper Cut is a beautiful literary journal, and the Writers on Writing pieces provide powerful inspiration--as well as much-needed diversification--every month. Bookmark them, visit often, and enjoy.

2014 A Year In Stories
A 12-vol anthology
published by Pure Slush Books

And then there's the Pure Slush 2014 A Year In Stories project. Yesterday was the deadline to deliver all 12 stories in our cycles. I've delivered 9, have #10 in an almost-workable draft.

(Today, by the way, my June story is happening. Want to read it? You can, for free. It's part of the Amazon preview for the book. Just click on the Look Inside link and... enjoy. If you do like it, please remember I'm the ugly duckling among these swans of writers. Their stories are so worth your time. And money.)

As of last count, there's 315 stories (out of 365) delivered and approved for print. The July volume is now out, too, and volumes January through May have a 20% discount on Lulu.com.

Aaaaaaand... The fantastic Susan Tepper, another of the magnificent 2014 authors, has snagged a reading date for the project at the KGB Bar in New York's East Village. Talk about illustrious venues! We'll be there on Wednesday November 5th--so if you're in the NYC area, it would be a super treat if you stopped by.


All right. You're all caught up. Now it's my turn to catch up with you.

#atozchallenge: Zoology

2014: A Year In Stories
A twelve-volume anthology published by Pure Slush Books

I want to end on a light note. Some of the posts in this series got a little ponderous, a tad heavy on the wank--which is ironic, since Pure Slush's slogan is Flash... Without the Wank.

The 2014 project is a landmark happening, and all of us participating are honored to be a part of it, but that doesn't give us--me, at least--the right to take myself so seriously.

Writing is meant to be fun. Yes, it's hard work--especially if one wants to get good enough to play in the big leagues--but I hope life will always find ways to lighten me up.

And this is why I give you the Find your Inner Animal quiz!

Worldwildlife.org

Thank you, Hans Pleij
and CURious2Dive,  for the photo--
and for the amazing dives!

Some of the 2014 authors who were in the mood to play along with me and my--sophomoric-ness? sophomoricity?--took the test for themselves or their 2014 characters--or both.

Gay Degani, whose work you read in several of this series' posts, and who's not just part of the 2014 project but also editor at Every Day Fiction, and just had a novel published, is

an octopus. 

(Somehow I'm not surprised.)

Mandy Nicol, who's participated extensively in the A-to-Z series for the 2014 project, and who's a fellow animal lover with whom I hope I'm establishing the foundations for a good friendship (even though we live continents apart), is 

a Moose.

Mandy was also the only brave author to volunteer her 2014 protag for the test. Nadia--the seamstress that lives with her mom and gets badgered by her sister, and who'd have no problem at all with a one-night stand (if it happened out of town; otherwise there'd be talk)--is 

a Great White Shark.

(I wonder if she herself knows about her potential to, uh, bite.)

(Image credit)

Stephen V. Ramey, the other author who contributed more material and insight to this A-to-Z series than I could've ever asked for, who's given the project a huge boost by reviewing the day's story every day, and whose 2014 series has a suspiciously eponymous protagonist (although the author insists it's not, at least not completely, autobiographical), is 

a Lynx.

(Hmmmm...)

I'm trying hard not to take my own result personally. You'd be sensitive about it, too, if you'd been born in a country where the average height was three inches shorter than yours. I never learned to walk in high heels--in ballet slippers I was already taller than everyone around me (except my dad, who, we therefore assume, is to blame for the whole issue to begin with). The test says I'm...

Not funny.
(Image credit)

a Giraffe.

Luis Villalobos, my character from the 2014 project--the superstar tax attorney, soon-to-be Managing Director at a prime firm, who perceives himself as the prototype of an A personality, the lion of the herd, the Alpha male (and doesn't the fact he's sleeping with his boss--that's right, the MD he's going to replace next year--prove that?)--poor, delusional Luis came out as 

a Big Horn Sheep.

(The "big horn" part doesn't come even close to mitigating the shame of the "sheep" bit. Poor Luis. One wonders if he'll keep fighting to be a lion, or if he'll embrace his nature--and, perhaps, come to be happier. You can read Luis's progress stories for free in the Amazon previews of the January, February, March, April, and May books. The May one is happening tomorrow!)

I'm a lion in sheep's clothing. Hear me BAAAAAAAA!
(Image credit)

And you? If you have a minute to play, go take the test. Are you the animal you expected? Did the result reveal something surprising about yourself?

Most importantly, will you not-so-solemnly swear to do something every day to remind yourself that life shouldn't be taken so seriously?

~ * ~

Thank you for the company on this A-to-Z journey. I apologize for the late posts, the misposts, the long-windedness. I hope you enjoyed discovering these authors as much as I've enjoyed telling you about them, and if you do get a chance to read the books (all or some) in the 2014 series, please do come back and tell me what you think. 

Looking forward to returning all your blogger love during May!

#atozchallenge: Xipe Totec, (my) God of Literature

You probably know the pre-hispanic cultures of America weren't shy about extensive pantheons: it must take an army, after all, to keep the universe going in all its complexity, all its diversity. These multiple gods--sometimes even, because it wasn't already complicated enough, multi-faceted gods--have one universal quality in common:

Goriness.

To make the sun rise? And you'll be wanting this every day? Right, then. A few bloody, still-beating hearts should do it, old chap. 

The Mexica (Meh-SHEE-kah, though you probably know them as the Aztec) are most famous for goriness. But like the Romans, they absorbed the religious practices of the peoples they conquered; most of the grisly rituals they shocked the Spanish with were in use long before the Mexica ever rose into the horizon of Mesoamerican power. Xipe Totec, for instance, has his origins in the Olmec civilization, the oldest one in México; so old, in fact, that by the time of Christ it had been gone for centuries.

Xipe Totec (SHEEP-eh TOH-tek). The god of Spring. Renewal. Seeding. The elemental force of rebirth. The shedding of the husk that frees life.

Xipe Totec himself. (Image credit)
Note the "extra" skin on his face and arms.
The "extra" hands.
Yep, they actually did this.

Also called "Our Lord the Flayed One." And always depicted as a man wearing the skin of another man. During the celebrations dedicated to him, prisoners--men, women, and children--were flayed, and others would wear their skins. Their "husks."

(Trust the Mesoamericans to goryfy the Easter bunny.)

I like to think that, among the diversity of blood in me, a bit of pre-hispanic DNA might have survived. (My great-grandmother was a Purépecha indian--I have hope.)

Perhaps this is why I find so fascinating this idea of Shedding The Husk. 

Transformation. 

Becoming.

Emerging.

The 2014: A Year In Stories project embodies this in a very literal sense: a year in the lives of. Think of your own year: on January 1st, where were you? Who were you? It's the end of April; where are you now? Who are you now? Where will you be by December? What marvelous things might have happened in your life? What wonderful people will you have met? How much will you have changed, what will you have learned?

Who will you be?

2014: A Year In Stories
A twelve-volume anthology published by Pure Slush Books

Good literature is about this Shedding of The Husk. 

So is a good life.

~ * ~

Thank you for the visit, and for your patience with the delay in posting. 

Y and Z coming soon.

Happy last day of A-to-Z-ing!

#atozchallenge: What Came Before (by @GayDegani)

"A literary suspense novel sparked by racial tensions and family history: Fed up with being tied down by twenty-five years of domestic bliss and everyone's expectations, Abbie Palmer is struggling to assert some independence from her husband Craig and find her creative self. When he tells her, "No man is an island," she flings back, "That's exactly what I want to be, an island. I'm sick of being a whole continent." But breaking away from her mainland isn't so easy, what with cops, Molotov cocktails and Hollywood starlets, lost memories--and maybe an unknown half-sister..."

There is a certain hallucinogenic quality to the writing that shuffles back and forth between Abbie’s adult reality, and the muffled memories and snapshots of a past she still carries. Author Gay Degani has taken this family saga a step further, into the realm of mystery, while managing to maintain a literary quality to the style and presentation of What Came Before. Racial tension, an unexplained sibling, a fire, and plenty more action make this a page-turner. For this particular reader, the heart of the story centered around Abbie’s intense desire for inner peace. Peace that she was robbed of at the tender age of four.  

– Susan Tepper, author of The Merrill Diaries and From the Umberplatzen

What Came Before is being serialized at Every Day Novels (or you can buy a beautiful hard-cover edition at Amazon). I challenge you to read this teaser and not keep going.

Gay is one of the 2014 authors who's contributed substantially to my Year In Stories A-to-Z series. She's a fantastic writer, no stranger to publishing success, and this new novel is a brilliant addition to her credits. Find her at her blog, on Facebook, and on Twitter.

All the best for Gay and What Came Before!

~ * ~

Thanks for the visit, and happy A-to-Z-ing!

#atozchallenge: Voice

"Voice is the je ne sais quoi of spirited writing. It separates brochures and brilliance, memo and memoir, a ship's log and The Old Man and the Sea."
~ Constance Hale, Sin and Syntax

Voice. The je ne sais quoi of spirited writing. I love that. (This book, by the way, is the core of a writer's joie de vivre. If you haven't read it, get it now. Nothing will ever be the same.)

But what is voice? What is that je ne sais quoi? Is it just language and syntax, how a writer chooses to put sentences together? Does it have to do with subject matter? With characters? With the writer's vision of the world?

All of it? None of it?

Undefinable as it is, voice is the most visible quality in writing. And nowhere is that more apparent than in an anthology of short fiction.

2014: A Year In Stories
A twelve-volume anthology published by Pure Slush Books

He thinks it's time now to find a cab or a hotel but the crush of bodies around him becomes greater, another throng of people swept up in religious fervor. This is what he wants: ecstasy and spectacle, animal sacrifice and widow-burning and fire-walking. This is why he has come to India, after all. Isn't it? 

~ Azure, by John Wentworth Chapin (2014 March Vol. 3)

BTW I was thinking, maybe you might want some assistance, just to speed the editing up a little, because it's taking a little longer than it would normally, probably because summer has hit you early and that red pen can get a little slippy and slidey all over the page.

~ Schöne Grüße aus Tirol, Sally-Anne Macomber (2014 March Vol. 3)

Jump out of bed. Shower. Blow-dry hair. Apply makeup. Put on mom costume. Walk down hall to kids' rooms. Wake them for school. Same thing, Monday through Friday, August through May. Rinse and repeat. This is your life on motherhood.  

~ Rinse and Repeat, by h. l. nelson (2014 March Vol. 3)

As Stevie reaches into his backpack he weighs what he dislikes about Rick, starting with the fact that he knows it was Rick--Rickie back then--who stole his Star Wars lunchbox in the seventh grade. It was not from the new series either; it was vintage, from the original ancient series from his parents' wonder years.

~ No. 2 Pencil, by Michelle Elvy (2014 April Vol. 4)

It isn't baseball weather. Grey and forbidding, with a misting rain falling out of low, angry clouds, it's soup and blanket weather for most, but just another early season day in another city for us. Nobody wants to play--not the sparse group of diehard fans huddled under cover; not the umpires, huddled inside until the last possible moment; not the ground crew warming their hands over the hot dog steam; and certainly not the players, conscious of the fragile bodies they are compensated so well for using. 

~ Fourth Inning, by Michael Webb (2014 April Vol. 4)

Do you have a favorite author? Could you recognize their work among others'? What do you think makes a writer's voice unique? Is it only writers who have it? What constitutes style? Is it something we're born with, like blue eyes or brown? Or is it something we can cultivate?

~ * ~ 

Yes, I realize V day was yesterday for the rest of the A-to-Z world. Seeing as I haven't behaved this week, I'm giving up my day off tomorrow and posting W then. Sorry :(

Thanks for the visit!

#atozchallenge: Uganda, Ukraine, Uruguay, or Union Square?

Uganda

Exotic (to a Westerner like me), alien, hard to get to. A challenge.

Ukraine 

The seat of current conflict, a long and bloody history; the sort of place a wanna-be journalist might dream of visiting.

Uruguay

New Zealand in South America. A quasi-mythical place or a tax haven (depending on how you found out of its existence). 

Union Square

Familiar and safe, even to those who've never been to San Francisco (or even the U.S.).

So. Which of these places would your 2014 character most likely be found?

2014: A Year In Stories
A twelve-volume anthology published by Pure Slush Books

Uruguay! Because it is the hardest to say. Trudy would probably end up on a cattle farm that's going broke so she has to supplement her income with rodeo shows--but in pidgin Spanish.

Or something like that.

Sally-Anne Macomber

Union Square.
Mandy Nicol

Luis Villalobos thinks he'd choose Uganda. In truth, and given his career in international tax, chances are small he'd be anywhere but Union Square. Or Uruguay. But highly unlikely he'd cross paths with Trudy in her failing farm; he'd stick to the financial center in Montevideo.

Guilie Castillo

Under fences, bushes, shrubs--wherever Pedersen can watch but not be seen.
Susan Tepper

Sally-Anne, Mandy, and Guilie: Eww!
Susan: Yes, well. He's a creep.

And you? Uganda, Ukraine, Uruguay, or Union Square? 

~ * ~ 

Thanks for the visit, and happy last full week of A-to-Z-ing!