Research! Deathonomics!

7 09 2016

EmilysQuotes.Com-born-poor-mistake-die-death-intelligent-money-Bill-Gates

Your soul is worth $348 Million per year of life.

Your mortal existance is worth between $71,500 and $9.4 Million.

Your body is worth approximately $551,ooo depending on how much skin you have.

I read somewhere that based on amount of emotional stress your death would cause, and how much it would take to compensate for that amount of stress, your life is worth $250,000. Can’t find the link.

Isn’t that alleged Gates quote nauseating?  Here’s another one, Alleged Gates:

“We sold what? To who? ” – IBM





Best British Horror 2015 edited by Johnny Mains

11 07 2015

Best British Horror 2015 edited by Johnny Mains.





“The story I am working on may suck and that’s okay.”

15 01 2015

The two main reasons I procrastinate are “Fear of Failure” before I write and “Trying To Be All Things” after the first draft.

Both have dogged me in humor writing, writing horror, writing blog posts, and — if the Japanese concept of “Do” is applied here — in my life in general.
It takes effort for me to trick myself out of these mindsets which cause the procrastination. Here’re some things that have worked for me.
“Fear of Failure”: I joined a comedy group when I was at college and I went a full year without writing anything or performing on stage. The other performers were very patient. The problem was that I imagined that I had to be the greatest thing ever to happen to comedy. I imagined that my entire reason for existence was to be the greatest comedian-humorist the planet ever produced.
The same problem happened with writing prose. That story I was working on had to be the one to set the world on fire.
Immature and self-absorbed? Hell, yes. At the same time, I was terribly self-critical. If what I did wasn’t received enthusiastically, I would despise my effort.
How did I get around that chronic insecurity?
I started small. I showed what I wrote to a few friends whose opinion I respected. A writing group is good for that, whether face-to-face or online. I got to realizing that writing and performing were learned skills (yes, one can teach “art” and “writing” and “acting”). I didn’t expect a man who was leaning to play piano to bang out a concerto or write a symphony in the first month or even the first years, did I?
Art is a dialogue. You learn from it while doing it. You learn more by showing it to others. Then you write another story. All writers have stories that didn’t work and bursting trunks full of half-baked ideas.
When I read slush for Weird Tales, I was told by the editors that even Big Name Authors submitted stories that made the staff scratch their heads.
So I allowed myself to fail.
To get around “Fear of Failure” I remind myself “The story I am working on may suck and that’s okay.”
Related to that…
“Trying To Be All Things”
Sometimes I come up with an idea for a story or sketch and I get that rush of inspiration. The first draft goes well. I “cast” my story with people I know and tweak those people to fit the plot needs and discover the characters still worked. The ending has a satisfying conclusion, whether it be funny or bleak or whatever. The theme that emerges doesn’t make me too uncomfortable.
Who am I kidding! Those things never happen in the draft stages!
Because that first idea will lead to another idea and another, and I want to include several generations of ideas in the story. Or I’ll read a blog that I agree with about how there’s already way too much stuff out there that’s This Thing, and there needs to be more That Thing. By this time the tone is vibrating between “body horror” and “commentary about the US surveillance state” and “post-modern YA urban fantasy”.
Eeesh. I get a headache just thinking about it.
To get around this “Trying To Be All Things”, I remind myself the story does not have to accomplish anything but have a plot, provoke an emotion, and reveal a deep and lively truth. Decide on the emotion and the plot will fall into place.
Which emotion? Whatever the writer finds most satisfying.
My solution at this time of my life: “Which emotion makes me, the author, most uncomfortable?” Not just in terms of making me say “eww”, but in revealing something new to me about myself.
Where I believed myself One Philosophy then discover maybe I understand or appreciate Something I Had Held In Disdain. In this case, perhaps, where I had disliked YA Urban fantasy, I discover and feel the uplifting and inspirational aspects of the genre.
Why would I resist that sort of uplift and inspiration? That question would be the source of conflict for the story.
But what if I discover that I like the idea of torturing cats? Don’t I have any ethics, man?!
Hence “deep and lively truth”. One of the few things I like about Ayn Rand was her insistence that art inspire people to want to get out of bed in the morning (my paraphrase. She would have said that in 30+ page monologue. zing!)
What if my “truth” annoys someone?
Part of art’s dialogue is weighing what reader’s say. I haven’t really had to deal with aggressive disagreement, so I’ll find out what I’ll do when I get to it.
So! Write like its a biological function! Show it to others! Listen and weigh opinions! Keep your work to one message or feeling! Repeat!
Excrete, sculpt the poo, fling. Get the judge’s scores. Adapt your technique. Repeat.





“The Flesh Sutra” Chapter Is One Of The Best Of 2014!

9 01 2015

According to the blog “Diabolical Plots“, my story “The Metal and Its Mold” was one of the best on Pseudopod last year, in such company with James Tiptree Jr., Elizabeth Hand, Ferrett Steinmetz, and Charles Dickens.

That story is Chapter Five of “The Flesh Sutra”, available on Amazon.





Human Gene Cheese: Unsettling Questions

4 01 2015

Read this article! Here it be!

Questions!

1) What DNA source was used? Yes. I am talking about that.

2) Is this cannibalism, or cannibalism’s newborn cousin “can-nosh-alism”?

3) How the hell is something made from people called “vegan friendly”? Answer: The DNA is from a friendly vegan!

4) Is it cannibalism if the donor is still whole, unharmed, and a volunteer?

5) Imagine its creamy texture? On your tongue warm and rich? In your Four Cheese Macaroni? Have you achieved “eww” yet?

6) If a more highly advanced civilization came and bought the rights to manufacture this, what would the logo look like?

7) Would a generation starship use this as an option?

8) What do you think the “food replicators” have been using in Star Trek? Why do you never see anyone who works in the cafeteria of the Enterprise?

9) If a civilization is uplifted, or goes through The Singularity, that civilization would be “post-food”. Eating would be merely a sensory experience. If nothing is food, then couldn’t anything be considered “a gourmet flavor experience”?

10) Would those people without benefit of Ultimate Technology be considered food for the gods? How long before condos are built in the stockyards?

11) Are there experience-based economies in the universe? How many quadloos to savor a human?

12) Would a person with an especially savory gene sequence have to litigate to retain rights to his recipe?

13) Would the departed by cultivated in tubs to be savored wistfully on a rainy day?

14) What would the bagels be made from?

 

 





I’ve Submitted To The Stoker Awards!

4 11 2014

“The Flesh Sutra” has been submitted into the Novel and First Novel categories! I’m excited because I believe in a world filled with zombies, vampires, and subtle surrealities, “The Flesh Sutra” offers something deeper, more insightful, and vivid.

Keep your eyes open, as I plan to submit to the Compton Crook and the Shirley Jackson Awards.

Meanwhile, take a glimpse of something that weirded out the editors of Pseudopod. Click the image.

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A Great Article With Book Recommendations

21 10 2014

Reggie Oliver is way underrated, for example. He writes great suspense.

The Literature of Fear: 12 High-Quality Horror Books for Sleepless Nights





The Flesh Sutra

18 10 2014

“The Flesh Sutra” is a work filled with fascinating characters, surprising, sometimes horrific, events and a very sweeping, cinematic style.”
In Fin de siècle Boston, the mystic healer Alecsandri Keresh falls into the desperate embrace of his lover, Mrs. Olivia Spalding, as he is shot dead. In those final moments before the soul passes through the gateway of death forever, Alecsandri’s rage transforms his power and he forces his way back. But he does so through ghastly means and returns to life – as an abomination.

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Reading Ghost Stories As Research

15 10 2014

To prepare for a ghost novel I plan to write, I have read three contemporary ghost stories. “The Little Stranger” by Sarah Waters is the most classically gothic, set in a post-WWII English estate. “The Green Man” by Kingsley Amis takes the classical ghost story and updates it to swinging ‘60s England. Grady Hendrix brings the story to post-industrial Ohio to comment on our working world in “Horrorstor”.

“The Green Man” follows a traditionally alcoholic and rakish Amis protagonist as he runs a bed-and-breakfast in developing rural England. The character tolerates his family, drinks huge amounts of scotch, and works to connive ménage a trois with another man’s wife. He is turned into an anti-hero by his biting observations and the unsettling death of his father.
The B&B setting is haunted by a 17th century sorcerer. The protagonist’s obsession with the apparition drives the story to an end that’s more contemplative and less chilling. It’s an examination of death rather than the dead.
The book itself is only worth examination. The sorcerer is intriguing but Amis gives no thought as to what powers his work. Plot threads dangle and sway in the wind.
I found this useful only in how well Amis works with realistic characters.

I read “Horrorstor” all the way through in one sitting. I’ve enjoyed Grady Hendrix through Pseudopod.org’s readings of “Tales of the White Lodge Street Society”, farces in which a Carnaki-like adventurer spins tales of ghosts, booze, money, and racism. Hendrix also writes a very funny weekly takedown of CBS’ “The Dome” for Tor.com.
He brings his mix of morbid humor and social commentary to “Horrorstor”, a ghost story set in a furniture store styled like Ikea. As a ghost story, it owes more to Stephen King than M.R. James, with awesome effects over suspense.
I work in a Big Box store and sympathized with the young protagonist Amy in her retail job, dealing with customers, the cost of living, and corporate culture. In its own way, this book was its own cutthroat retail operation.
To keep the plot moving, Hendrix cut character development to the bone. For the plot to be plausible, he eliminated resources like custodial contractors, Asset Protection, and lighting to assist surveillance. To serve both humor and horror, the story effectively had two endings in which the villain is defeated but the innocent still suffer.
I’d like to be funny, chilling, and socially aware when I write. I like this book. It had some laughs and a few chills.

I learned that I want a conclusive ending and to keep as close to “real” as I can get. “Conclusive” can be tricky in the Gothic tradition, where hauntings could be ghosts, or hallucinations, or psychic projections onto reality. “The Little Stranger” by Sarah Waters uses artistic sleight-of-hand on the reader through limited and sometimes unreliable POV. A young man come of age in the shadow of an English estate, studies to be a doctor, and becomes physician and confidant to the estate family. The war has shattered the soul of the heir. The matron mourns a child long deceased. The independent daughter feels stifled by tradition. The house is falling into ruin. Who is setting the fires? Who is scribbling childish phrases in the most unlikely places?
Sarah Waters researches the hell out of her subjects. Her descriptions feel lush and full without slowing the plot. The suspense alone was enough to get me through the 500+ word novel, the first one of such length I had read in years.
From this book, I learned a couple of neat phrasings, and reinforced the idea of “adverbs should be placed after the modified verb, if they must be used at all.”

Overall, I think I gained only some focus through reading these novels. I discovered I want a conclusive, objective force powering the supernatural events. I gained a better sense of how to balance description and action. I still want to experiment with anomie versus physical isolation, and see if I can pull off the trick of “things walking in broad daylight”. I’ll be reading Peter Straub next, I think, and see what I can find.





STEAMPUNK SPARKLEZOMBIE REGENCY ALT-TEEN CTHULHU

8 10 2014

“Write your own magic system.”

That’s what Darryl Schweitzer told me years ago, after I had submitted a pretty egregious Lovecraft pastiche.

“If you do not get the details right, someone will make note. That adds an additional burden to your tale.”

That last part was a paraphrase, but I believe I captured the spirit. Maybe I even invented that part because I have learned that to be true: with a pastiche, the best you can hope for is building something impressive in someone else’s sandbox.

I’m young enough and egocentric enough to think I can do a good job on my own world building.

Mind you, when a writer is starting out, a writer MUST study and model the style of their favorite writers. But there is a difference between (to use a music reference) Brian Wilson studying The Lettermen and making their style into a new sound, and Noel Gallagher doing the same to John Lennon and making 2nd rate John Lennon.

A style comes with talent, practice, and aspiration. No writer can control innate talent. Writers can put in lots more practice and get plenty of rest and study other works to improve.

Aspiration is a whole ‘nother thing.

How distinct do you want your work to be?

How much of your own voice, that secret and heard only by yourself voice, is in your work?

Does your idea remind you of someone else’s idea? What new twist can you bring to that idea? A twist that gives you a thrill and makes you say “cool!” and “I’m not sure anyone else will like this.”

Does a character you write remind you of something you’ve read or that distinct person you know personally?

By writing your own world in your own voice, I believe you add to the dialogue of civilization. Your work can be both enjoyable to write and also challenging to yourself and to your reader. Editors tend to like stories that are different and provoking.

For the record: read and write whatever you want. Also, there are far better and more accomplished writers than me who write pastiches. One of my favorite stories is “A Colder War” by Charles Stross, a Lovecraft political parody.

But when one of the foremost Lovecraft scholars told me to swing for the fences, I’m inclined to listen. As a result, my writing experience has been more rewarding for me, has better impressed editors, and has gotten enthusiastic response from readers.








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