Silver linings

Well, we made it official.  The house-buying is a no-go.  We contacted the crappy-assed broker who screwed us over with his incompetence, and asked for a letter of denial from the lending institution, so we could get our earnest money back.  But, we're still having to move next month.

Turns out that, soon after we put in our notice to vacate on the word of the shitty broker who said he was sure we would be approved, the apartment complex rented out our place.  The good news is, they have another one with the same floorplan in a different building opening up at the end of August.  The bad news is, we have to be out of our current one by the end of the July.  But the good news is they have a smaller 3 bedroom that they will let us rent for a month in the meantime.

Good lord, I need a drink.

Bottom line is, we have about 15 more months of renting.  In that time we will be focused on organizing and decluttering, both physically and metaphorically.  We will work on growing my wife's business so that, when we are able to count her income, it will be significant.  And we will continue to improve our credit scores.  All in good time.  Sometimes it's hard to watch people who seem like they don't deserve good fortune enjoy an abundance of it, while we suffer for stupid reasons.  Universe?  Yeah, I'd like to order a Break Special with a side of Good Fortune, please.

In other news, my recently graduated daughter has secured employment, and as of Monday, will be enrolled in cosmetology school.  She's pro-active and motivated, and impresses me with her drive and determination.  I'm glad she didn't get that part of my laziness.  We're also hoping that her forward momentum will inspire Isaac to follow suit.  It's time he started learning to be a man, IMHO.  But, I don't blame him for his hesitancy.  He went through some tough times, and this whole thing is forcing a lot of learning on him.

But, just so this post isn't only about me and my personal problems, let's talk writing.  With all of this stress lately, writing has been difficult at best.  However, today my head is a bit clearer, so I think I can start to refocus myself.  Yesterday I tinkered with an unfinished sci fi story I have.  Some of you may recall my attempt to do serial fiction about a character named Thomas Magni, Galactic Man of Action.  Well, I have his first story about 2/3 to 3/4 done.  I just need to figure out the particulars of the ending and then write it.  It's only a short piece, and probably won't break much beyond 5k, if that.  But, it's a fun story, with a lot tongue-in-cheek humor and action.  I'll probably try to shop this one around the markets more before I just give up and ePub it.

Yesterday, while perusing Facebook, I saw a comment regarding the late, great Richard Matheson, and the older days of Sci Fi/Fantasy literature, and it made me think.   The comment was about how stand-alone novels seem to be things of the past.  And it seems that every book written these days, regardless of genre, is geared towards a series or trilogy.  Related to that comment was someone else's opinion that they prefer shorter works, and are tired of the gigantic doorstoppers.  I was just glad I'm not the only person who feels that way.  So, I'm thinking this may be where I am going to steer some of my writing.  Individual novels of moderate length, that can stand on their own, without sequels.

We'll see how that goes.  First I need to knuckle down and just write a damn book.

Rollin’, rollin’, rollin’

Imagine this guy as an Orc
wearing a battered red beret.

Not much has happened that I haven’t bored my reader with before lately. We’re still awaiting a final loan approval on the house. This part makes me nervous. If, for some reason, we don’t get the loan, we have to come up with a Plan B. Which will be difficult. I’m sure the apartment complex we live in would let us withdraw our notice and stay here. But, then again…

It’s all made more nerve wracking because the guy doing our loan doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence. He just asked me a question regarding my income last week that was exactly what he asked me a few weeks ago. And it’s not even a difficult question, and one he, as a mortgage professional, should already know. We were told he can be a bit eccentric, so I hope that’s all this is.

Things are interesting at the Doolan house these days. With my daughter there full-time, I get to see how she and her boyfriend interact on a more regular basis (you may or may not recall we rescued him last November from a very bad situation). For the most part, they have been very well-behaved. Expect that they tend to talk to each other like they are 12, and he can really be a smarmy ass sometimes. I sometimes have to bite my tongue, so they can work out their own relationship. But, it’s starting to affect the younger ones, so I feel that we are going to have to have a sit down with them.

Anyways, enough of that stuff. Last week I finally got around to watching Predators with Adrian Brody. It’s a sequel of sorts to the 1987 Arnold classic, and was really well-done. I thought this one was actually better than Predator 2 with Danny Glover, and I liked that one. But this brought to light that my daughter hasn’t seen some of the great sci-fi action movies that I love, like Predator and Aliens. So, we watched Aliens last night. I think she liked it, but it was so late when we were done last night I forgot to ask what she thought. She did get creeped out at the right spots, so that’s a good point.

Interestingly, when I was watching it, I realized something. One of my recent projects is a military sci-fi story featuring Orcs and other fantasy races in space. I’m building my own universe, but it’s highly influenced by Fantasy Flight’s Dragonstar RPG.  This story is based on a squad of Orc mercenaries. So, when I watched Aliens again, it struck me that I seemed to be basing my main character, Sgt. Gorm, on the character of Apone. And I’m cool with that, though it wasn’t a conscious effort. I worked on that story last week, and may work some more on it today, and this week.

Another note on this project, I recycled a snippet that I had written about an Orc sniper a while back. I might have posted that here, but I can’t recall. Either way, with a bit of trimming and tweaking, it fit perfectly into the story I was writing, and will serve as an excellent opening scene.

Yay for recycled writing!

Back and tired

My daughter and me, giving the "daddy eyebrows" that
we are both known for doing when we are irritated.

In case anyone couldn’t guess, driving from Wisconsin to Las Vegas and back is tiring. When it’s done in a mid-size sedan with four occupants on the way there, and five on the way back, it’s downright exhausting. And when one of those occupants is a 10-year old girl…well, you might be able to imagine how glad we all were to get home.

So, after several days of driving, hotels, bad nights of sleep, and a constant level of tension, followed by four days of absolutely lethargic recovery, I am back at work. And I am welcoming the break.

The whole purpose of the trip was to see my daughter graduate high school, and then to bring her and a good portion of her belongings back home with us. This mission was a success, and really, having her home with us makes it all worthwhile. I was pleasantly surprised that her mother didn’t make any trouble, and was even quite civil. More on that in August, when I am not legally forbidden from speaking ill of certain parties openly.

This trip kicked off a rather busy summer for us. As I may have mentioned, we are buying a house. My wife and I have been married for six years. When we first got married, we lived in a condo. When the economy tanked a couple of years later, and I lost my job, we ended up filing a BK, and losing the condo. We are finally getting back up and dusting ourselves off.

The only saving grace is that the condo was in her name alone (she bought it before we even met), so the foreclosure is not on my credit. So, with a VA loan, we are going to be able to buy a nice, old house with a lot of modern upgrades. Our closing date is July 12th. Which means the next few weeks will involve a lot of packing and planning.

Fortunately for me, my wife is very organized and a bit of a control freak (but not so much as to be heinous about it), which means that the majority of my contribution to the packing and moving will involve heavy lifting and not much else. I can handle that. We also have the advantage of starting earlier than we did last time, so it should go relatively smoothly.

As you can imagine, this past week has not been very productive. I managed the minimum of work for my latest class, and that was about it. No writing, no reading to speak of (though I did manage almost an entire John Carter novel on audio during the drive). I’m hoping to make some progress on a few things this week. But, until we get moved, and settled in, it probably won’t be a whole lot. The good thing is, I will have a little “personal space” where I can retreat from the family, and write unhindered and uninterrupted.

Until then, I will do what I always do; open a file, and chip away during my down-time at work mainly, with an occasional bout at home, if I can.

Vegas, baby!

We're off to Vegas this weekend!  But, it's not what you're thinking.  My daughter graduates High School on Monday, and due to financial constraints, we will be driving rather than flying (four of us on the way there, and five coming back).  It'll be a packed car, but the drive promises to be beautiful.

So, as you can imagine, I won't be around until next week.  I know, I know, how will you survive, right?  Easy, just read my older posts and imagine a different date.  I usually blather on about the same crap anyways.

As a little bit of an update, I started my new class yesterday.  History and Pop Culture; it's not what it sounds like.  At least not according to this professor.  Rather than studying actual pop culture, we are studying the idea of the "city" through the lens of pop culture.  I have some reading to do this weekend that promises to help me get some sleep.

Speaking of reading, been having a hard time finding fiction to read lately.  As you may recall, I set aside a shelf of books that I was determined to get through within the next year.  I finished my first one, and then grabbed the next on my list.  But, despite it being a great story with wonderful writing, my brain couldn't get into the genre (space opera).  So, I set it aside and grabbed a different one.  Again, still can't get into the genre (it's also well-written and promises to be a great book).

Maybe it's all the D&D stuff lately, but I find I want to read some old-school gaming fiction.  I recently picked up a trilogy of books based on the old Spelljammer setting for D&D, so I might start that.  I dunno.

Anyways, ta-ta for now!  See you all next week (though I may sneak in a quick post from Vegas).

Reviews

So, I seem to recall reading in some article about how to succeed at self-publishing in the eMarket that reviews are crucial. There was a possible direct correlation between the number (and of course, ranking) of reviews to the number of units sold. Now, I might be misremembering, and it may not work that way. However, there has to be some truth to this, even if I simply made it up in my mind.

So, on Friday I made an announcement on my Facebook page that I would send anyone who asked in a PM a free copy of whatever story they wanted to review, if they agreed to review it on both Amazon and Smashwords. I gave them until last night to request it.

No one asked. Of course, that may be because I ended the offer with an ultimatum: "If you don't review the story within 14 days, I will publicly out you as a liar and a thief on Facebook." But, I made sure I ended it with a smiley! :) (Although still I would have done it)

So, this idea tanked. I know there are things I should be doing. Advice I get is to ask bloggers to review my stories. Really? That's how it works? I guess so, since a couple of my followers are bloggers who review, and thus get asked to review stories and books.

Still, and this may be a stigma or some such, but the thought of doing that brings up images of panhandling for reviews. Like I'm standing at a blogger's door, my hat nervously in my hands, saying "Please sir, might you review my paltry story for me? I can offer no recompense, but for the feeling of good will you shall receive."

Am I being overly dramatic? Probably. Still, if anyone wants a free copy of a story to review, let me know. I will email you one. This week. After Friday the 7th, no more will be available. :)

Oh, and for those who are thinking I should just offer the story for free for a limited time on Amazon, I can't. My stories are not registered with KDP Select (so I can publish them at other places, like Smashwords), so I can't run promotions. Quite a little scam they got going on over there, I think.