Taking a break from writing at Angel’s Peak Scenic Area, south of Bloomfield, NM, in 2018.
Because I got almost no sleep on Tuesday night, I was dragging all day and managed to get a few words written or deleted for Shadows and Stars.
I did manage to read through Nocturne… and to at least think about where I should place the newly discovered poems and how the two poems might change the entire collection’s feel.
There is another poem that I would like to include, but it contains one very vulgar word. I may just delete that line. The poem is still powerful, but maybe not as powerful with that line removed, which may be seen as the climax of the poem. Still, none of the other works in the collection contain an obscenity. I don’t want the collection to be known for this one obscenity, which might brand me as the pornographic poet. This one obscenity might also prevent people from buying the book, if they hear it’s in there. I am trying to make this work very poignant and sensitive, but this one word might offend and/or repel a lot of people. Using it in a collection like this jars the reader and wakes him/her up, which is good and adds a touch of irony to the poem’s and the collections’ composition. I probably won’t include it.
I have another I would love to include, but its graphic depiction of the narrator being seduced might also be seen as pornography, though it contains no obscenities. Alas, I will have to leave this one out, though I like the idea of the moment of shock that it brings to a sensitive narrative. I like to shock people on occasion, but using shock must be done with discretion or people become numb to it and it loses its effect over time.
Hopefully, I will make some progress tonight. Congestion is making it a little tricky to focus.
I don’t recall exactly, but I am at around 85,000 words for Shadows and Stars with my goal to be around 80,000-100,000. I think it will take another 10,000-15,000 words to wrap this up nicely. I will go over 100,000, if that is what it takes to tell the story.
I enjoy editing and toying with words to get my message across exactly as I picture it in my mind. Checking details to eliminate plot holes or inconsistencies is also a weird sort of fun. I can get lost in editing and time passes before I know it. It was in either “The Telltale Heart” or “The Black Cat” that Poe talks about the passing of so many hours “of the time that flies”. I love that expression.
Working late at night in an IHOP in Midland, Texas, May 2019 (photo by Francene Kilgore-Slattery)
I worked on my novel Shadows and Stars for some time this evening and added around 2,000 words. I brought some things together and worked on eliminating inconsistencies. Then while I was watching a re-run of an episodes of Breaking Bad’s third season and simultaneously, my lower back seized up causing great pain. I took some Ibuprofen and waited for it to calm down so that I could sleep. I did several stretches and various things to decrease the pain. The pain did start to decrease after a while, but I don’t know if the stimulus was my stretches or the ibuprofen.
In any case, while I was waiting for my back pain to ease up and I started ego-surfing the Internet. I found three poems I had published in Apollo’s Lyre (now defunct), two of which are fairly intense romantically speaking. I decided they rated inclusion in Nocturne, so I decided to publish a second edition of Nocturne. I then looked for some other poems that I hadn’t in there, but probably should have. I found a few of those. I then looked at my photo file and went online to check out a couple of public domain photos. They had what I wanted, so I determined to come out with the second edition of Nocturne. There’s not much to add, so it should come out in a month or two. These poems and accompanying photos will definitely ratchet up the collections intensity overall.
Selfie with Lotus in background near Arkansas Post, September 4, 2019
Yesterday, I did no serious writing, taking only some notes during the course of the day. Most of the day was spent still putting up a few things after my recent move to Arkansas and doing a lot of laundry. I did come up with some ideas regarding some short stories I put on the back burner a year or so ago after deciding to focus my efforts on my upcoming sci-fi novel Shadows and Stars.
Over the last few days, I have been checking the stats for my negligible sales of my various short story collections. I thought it would be a good idea to produce a second edition of The Scent and other Stories after adding my short story recently published by FictionontheWeb.co.uk, “Be-Bye”. I thought of finishing another neglected story and adding it to A Tale of Hell and Other Works of Horroralso. Then I went back over my drafts and decided that I need to need to finish up several stories, over the next several months, and put some on them into their own collections.
I have had plans to write some more stories featuring Quinn Gallagher, who appears in two of my shorts in The Scent and Other Stories and put them in their own collection with the working title of Tales of Quinn. As with the two stories where he is featured (“The Scent” and “The Slightest of Indiscretions’), these stories will be about the ups and downs of Quinn’s love life. Of course, “The Scent” and “The Slightest of Indiscretions” will be included in the collection. The one I will probably work on a bit in the next few days will be “Désirée”. I have ideas flowing for it now. I have not decided whether he will be seen in the background of one entitled “Fleur-de-Lis”, set in the Philippines in the late 1980’s. “Fleur-de-lis” is not far from completion.
Another group of stories that I have in mind are ones featuring Malcolm Flynn. Malcolm has not yet appeared as a character in any of my short stories, though he might be mentioned offhandedly in one or two at most. He is an important character in my horror novel The Man Who Escaped from Hell, which I intend complete just after I finish Shadows and Stars. I already have 80,000+ words for The Man Who Escaped from Hell, and was working on it until a few months ago, when the ideas for Shadows and Stars started pouring in and I was struggling to come up with any for The Man Who… So, I decided to focus on Shadows and Stars and come back to The Man Who…
Malcolm is a single, early-middle-age writer living in Corpus Christi, Texas. He is known in the clubs and social scene in Corpus in the early 2000’s, when some of the later action in the The Man Who… takes place. He becomes a close personal friend of the The Man Who…‘s main character, Jake Brody. I use conversations between him and Jake to bring out the inner turmoil of Jake and to give the reader a different perspective on Jake. I have always intended to have Malcolm feature in his own short stories, but not to gather them in a collection, although that’s not entirely ruled out. As with Quinn, a lot of the Malcolm stories will focus on the ups and downs of Malcolm’s Byzantine love-life, but it also feature some stories from the Corpus Christi club scene in the early 2000’s. I have always had it in the back of my mind to make Malcolm an important character in his own right, and I may do that yet, though I have no novels planned where he is the main character. Malcolm is an easy-going, savvy, Casanova-type. who usually wears a black suit sans tie, with a solid-color shirt, usually black or deep red. Often he wears a silk handkerchief in his coat pocket and he smokes small Nicaraguan cigars.
Currently, I have planned three stories to feature Malcolm: “American Dream”, “Nancy”, and “Carole.” I hope to finish “American Dream” before too long.
I have a few more science-fiction and horror stories in mind. One I hope to finish soon has the working title of “Charades”. It involves what happens to a captured alien general after his space fleet loses a battle with Earth forces over Denver.
Father Urbain Grandier, 1627
Two others are “Father Lactance”, a historical fiction which involves the witchcraft trial of Father Urbain Grandier in Loudun, France in 1634. Another, also based in history, is “Beneath Castle Bathory” (working title). This involves the historical Countess Elizabeth Bathory, who is accused of the torture and murder of dozens of young servant girls, if not hundreds, around 1600-1612. Several movies and books have been written on both Father Grandier and Countess Bathory. I intend to give my take on each story. “Father Lactance” is not far from completion. I have yet to complete a first draft of “Beneath Castle Bathory”. Eventually, I will probably add them, as well as “Charades” to my collection A Tale of Hell and Other Works of Horror.
The only thing preventing me from finishing “Father Lactance” is that I want to read Aldous Huxley’s The Devils of Loudun before completing it, so that I can further nail down the historical details and background.
Elizabeth, Countess Bathory
Anyway, most of the writing I did yesterday was jotting down some notes about my plans for upcoming short stories, which I did in my notebook for Shadows and Stars. I had intended to come up with and jot down some ideas for Shadows and Stars, but ended up writing down ideas for my short stories. Most of these I did while at dinner at El Canaveral Mexican Grill in Stuttgart, Arkansas.
El Canaveral has good food. It may be (I don’t really know for certain) part of the same chain as Ameca in DeWitt, Arkansas. Some of the menu items are the same. I had the pollo sabroso with rice and beans and a side of nopales (prickly-pear cactus) followed by a dish of Mexican apple pie. I do miss New Mexican and Texas cuisine. Nopales are commonly served scrambled with eggs for breakfast in south Texas. They can be found in other dishes as well.
I have always loved short stories, especially scary or mysterious ones, like the ones written by Poe or Conan-Doyle. This is one reason I decide to publish a weekly horror story or poem from the nineteenth or early twentieth century on this website each Saturday night at 8:00 pm. (Central time) in what I call “The Saturday Night Special”. Watch for it. Coming up on the 12th is Poe’s “Ligeia”.
Working late at night in an IHOP in Midland, Texas, May 2019 (photo by Francene Kilgore-Slattery)
I felt tired all day, although I did get about five hours sleep last night, which is normal for me.
I didn’t get any writing done on the novel today. I was too tired all day and most of the evening, and didn’t wake up or have any energy until I started updating my Amazon’s author’s page around 10:00 p.m. Earlier, I updated my ads for Nocturne and Click and A Tale of Hell and scheduled the posting of one of two for various times during this month.
Reading “Kansas City Ganges” felt really good to me. I guess I just needed to read something good. I have been watching movies and surfing YouTube of late. Sometimes I just need to hear/read a good story. Some of the most fun I have had recently has been listening to audio books and classical music on a German classical music station that I can get via the Internet. I was listening to Derek Jacobi read The Odyssey earlier. That is a really beautiful telling and a wonderful story. I can understand why it’s remembered after…what? 2,500 years? Hearing a master speaker like Derek Jacobi read it is a wonderful experience.
I have been listening to Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle in my car. It’s a struggle to get through it, not because of the narration or writing though. Both are great. But the story is so da—- depressing. I don’t recommend reading this if you are depressed or feeling down. It definitely won’t lighten your day any and it may nudge you closer to the brink. Still, it is a good story, expertly, if not beautifully written. I checked out Sinclair’s bio on the Internet recently and found out that his primary writing background was as a journalist. That explains a lot about his writing voice.
There are several audio-books that I need to just sit down and focus on and finish in one sitting. One is Stephen King’s Christine (if I can find disc 2). Another is The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. I also have Methuselah’s Children by Robert Heinlein, though it’s not as intriguing to me as the first two.
In hardcover, I need to finish Kerouac’s Desolation Angels, William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist, and Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart. I just find it hard to sit down for very long and focus on one book. Follow me on Goodreads, if you want to see all the other books I should be finishing.
It’s almost 2:00 a.m. and I have to rise at 7:00. I must go to bed.
Selfie with Lotus in background near Arkansas Post, September 4, 2019
Over the weekend I made some important progress with my novel in progress, Shadows and Stars. Although I have over 80,000 words, there were still some large holes where I could not come up with a good plan to fill them. On Sunday, the 29th, I went to Ameca Mexican Restaurant to have lunch and took my notebook/journal for Shadows and Stars with me as I usually do when I go out to eat or have coffee. After eating (a delicious pollo Chihuahua by the way), I started writing another synopsis of the plot, which is something I do when trying to generate ideas. I try to reduce the entire novel to one sentence, one “elevator pitch”, or what you could find on the back of a dust jacket. The ideas started flowing and I could not stop writing for a few hours. I finally wrote one additional (and important) chapter of about 1,000 words, which I typed into the novel tonight. But, the important take-away is that I finally came up with the entire plot. Now I will continue expanding on that and refining it, until I have the first draft completed, which I hope will be by Halloween. Then I will refine that until I have the novel as perfect as I can make it. Wish me luck.
Selfie with Lotus in background near Arkansas Post, September 4, 2019
So far I have spent a small part of the day posting ads for my works for every day up to October 6. I neglected to do so for August and the few sales I have had show that.
Last night I went to dinner at Hoot’s Barbecue in McGehee, AR. The food is good. Hoot’s seems to be the social navel of the county and surrounding area. It’s the hot spot on the weekends. I happened to be in Dumas running errands as the time for the dinner approached. To go from Arkansas Post to McGehee, my co-workers had to pass through Dumas. We arranged to meet in the Mad Butcher (yes, that is a business. Inexpensive meat) parking lot. As I had about an hour to kill, I went to the nearby El Toro Mexican restaurant and had some iced tea and jotted down notes about Shadows and Stars. I think I came up with a really good twist for the end of the story. Something hopefully unpredictable and jaw-dropping that will make readers drop their margaritas and stand up to scream “Of course!” to the heavens.
I like El Toro. I may go there to write when I can. The food is also good. Surprisingly, there is a good Mexican restaurant called Ameca’s in DeWitt. If you find yourself in this area, I recommend it highly. I had the combo Fajitas Hawayanas (Hawaiian fajitas). It contains the usual beef, chicken, and shrimp plus pork and pineapple and a light cream-like sauce, whose name I don’t recall. It was really tasty and plentiful. Prices are reasonable.
Yesterday, I visited the public library in Dumas. It’s a very small affair behind the police station. It has maybe ten free-standing bookshelves at most, some bookshelves lining the walls, and about half a dozen computer terminals. It also has a small display of Egyptian statues that a deceased patron collected on her trips to Egypt and bequeathed/donated to the library. The labels were accurate as far as I could tell. However, the display also included some foreign currency. One bill was a 100-drachma note from Greece (I read some Greek). However, it was labeled as one Egyptian pound. I found the Egyptian pound taped to the side window (of course inside the case). I told the librarian on duty about the mix up and she said she would mention it to someone. She seemed rather indolent to me.
I went to Stuttgart, AR, on Monday. It’s a nice little town about 40 miles from here. It has an active little arts center. I may get involved there and try to establish another writer’s circle. It’s a little closer than Pine Bluff.
My short story “Bye-Bye” has been accepted for publication at Fiction on the Web and will appear there, today, July 26. If you are interested in finding out more about them, follow this link to an Authors Publish review of their site. In their first paragraph, Authors Publish says this about Fiction on the Web:
“Fiction on the Web (FotW), was founded in 1996, which makes it one of the oldest online literary journals. In fact it is the oldest online journal that focuses solely on publishing short fiction. They have had hundreds of thousands of readers over the years…”
“Bye-bye” is a mainstream love story, which I feel is very poignant and says something about the better side of human nature. It is based on an actual event I witnessed, when I was in the Navy and our ship, the USS Enterprise, made a portcall in Toulon, France, in 1986. I never spoke with any of the characters involved and most of the story is fiction, but it has a kernel of truth at its core.
The story is unusual for a work of short fiction, because it uses footnotes to explain some of the Navy jargon. I felt I had to keep the jargon to keep the story realistic, though I tried to keep the footnotes to an absolute minimum, so as to interrupt the narrative flow as little as possible.
Please visit Fiction on the Web on July 26 and let me know what you think of the story. One excellent advantage of publishing on Fiction on the Web is that their stories normally receive a lot of good, constructive criticism from their readers. I find that very helpful in developing my art.
My short story “Bye-Bye” has been accepted for publication at Fiction on the Web and will appear there on July 26. If you are interested in finding out more about them, follow this link to an Authors Publish review of their site. In their first paragraph, Authors Publish says this about Fiction on the Web:
“Fiction on the Web (FotW), was founded in 1996, which makes it one of the oldest online literary journals. In fact it is the oldest online journal that focuses solely on publishing short fiction. They have had hundreds of thousands of readers over the years…”
“Bye-bye” is a mainstream love story, which I feel is very poignant and says something about the better side of human nature. It is based on an actual event I witnessed, when I was in the Navy and our ship, the USS Enterprise, made a portcall in Toulon, France, in 1986. I never spoke with any of the characters involved and most of the story is fiction, but it has a kernel of truth at its core.
The story is unusual for a work of short fiction, because it uses footnotes to explain some of the Navy jargon. I felt I had to keep the jargon to keep the story realistic, though I tried to keep the footnotes to an absolute minimum, so as to interrupt the narrative flow as little as possible.
Please visit Fiction on the Web on July 26 and let me know what you think of the story. One excellent advantage of publishing on Fiction on the Web is that their stories normally receive a lot of good, constructive criticism from their readers. I find that very helpful in developing my art.
My short story “Bye-Bye” has been accepted for publication at Fiction on the Web and will appear there on July 26. If you are interested in finding out more about them, follow this link to an Authors Publish review of their site. In their first paragraph, Authors Publish says this about Fiction on the Web:
“Fiction on the Web (FotW), was founded in 1996, which makes it one of the oldest online literary journals. In fact it is the oldest online journal that focuses solely on publishing short fiction. They have had hundreds of thousands of readers over the years…”
“Bye-bye” is a mainstream love story, which I feel is very poignant and says something about the better side of human nature. It is based on an actual event I witnessed, when I was in the Navy and our ship, the USS Enterprise, made a portcall in Toulon, France, in 1986. I never spoke with any of the characters involved and most of the story is fiction, but it has a kernel of truth at its core.
The story is unusual for a work of short fiction, because it uses footnotes to explain some of the Navy jargon. I felt I had to keep the jargon to keep the story realistic, though I tried to keep the footnotes to an absolute minimum, so as to interrupt the narrative flow as little as possible.
Please visit Fiction on the Web on July 26 and let me know what you think of the story. One excellent advantage of publishing on Fiction on the Web is that their stories normally receive a lot of good, constructive criticism from their readers. I find that very helpful in developing my art.
My short story “Bye-Bye” has been accepted for publication at Fiction on the Web and will appear there on July 26. If you are interested in finding out more about them, follow this link to an Authors Publish review of their site. In their first paragraph, Authors Publish says this about Fiction on the Web:
“Fiction on the Web (FotW), was founded in 1996, which makes it one of the oldest online literary journals. In fact it is the oldest online journal that focuses solely on publishing short fiction. They have had hundreds of thousands of readers over the years…”
“Bye-bye” is a mainstream love story, which I feel is very poignant and says something about the better side of human nature. It is based on an actual event I witnessed, when I was in the Navy and our ship, the USS Enterprise, made a portcall in Toulon, France, in 1986. I never spoke with any of the characters involved and most of the story is fiction, but it has a kernel of truth at its core.
The story is unusual for a work of short fiction, because it uses footnotes to explain some of the Navy jargon. I felt I had to keep the jargon to keep the story realistic, though I tried to keep the footnotes to an absolute minimum, so as to interrupt the narrative flow as little as possible.
Please visit Fiction on the Web on July 26 and let me know what you think of the story. One excellent advantage of publishing on Fiction on the Web is that their stories normally receive a lot of good, constructive criticism from their readers. I find that very helpful in developing my art.
My short story “Bye-Bye” has been accepted for publication at Fiction on the Web and will appear there on July 26. If you are interested in finding out more about them, follow this link to an Authors Publish review of their site. In their first paragraph, Authors Publish says this about Fiction on the Web:
“Fiction on the Web (FotW), was founded in 1996, which makes it one of the oldest online literary journals. In fact it is the oldest online journal that focuses solely on publishing short fiction. They have had hundreds of thousands of readers over the years…”
“Bye-bye” is a mainstream love story, which I feel is very poignant and says something about the better side of human nature. It is based on an actual event I witnessed, when I was in the Navy and our ship, the USS Enterprise, made a portcall in Toulon, France, in 1986. I never spoke with any of the characters involved and most of the story is fiction, but it has a kernel of truth at its core.
The story is unusual for a work of short fiction, because it uses footnotes to explain some of the Navy jargon. I felt I had to keep the jargon to keep the story realistic, though I tried to keep the footnotes to an absolute minimum, so as to interrupt the narrative flow as little as possible.
Please visit Fiction on the Web on July 26 and let me know what you think of the story. One excellent advantage of publishing on Fiction on the Web is that their stories normally receive a lot of good, constructive criticism from their readers. I find that very helpful in developing my art.
My short story “Bye-Bye” has been accepted for publication at Fiction on the Web and will appear there on July 26. If you are interested in finding out more about them, follow this link to an Authors Publish review of their site. In their first paragraph, Authors Publish says this about Fiction on the Web:
“Fiction on the Web (FotW), was founded in 1996, which makes it one of the oldest online literary journals. In fact it is the oldest online journal that focuses solely on publishing short fiction. They have had hundreds of thousands of readers over the years…”
“Bye-bye” is a mainstream love story, which I feel is very poignant and says something about the better side of human nature. It is based on an actual event I witnessed, when I was in the Navy and our ship, the USS Enterprise, made a portcall in Toulon, France, in 1986. I never spoke with any of the characters involved and most of the story is fiction, but it has a kernel of truth at its core.
The story is unusual for a work of short fiction, because it uses footnotes to explain some of the Navy jargon. I felt I had to keep the jargon to keep the story realistic, though I tried to keep the footnotes to an absolute minimum, so as to interrupt the narrative flow as little as possible.
Please visit Fiction on the Web on July 26 and let me know what you think of the story. One excellent advantage of publishing on Fiction on the Web is that their stories normally receive a lot of good, constructive criticism from their readers. I find that very helpful in developing my art.
Working on “Shadows and Stars Lying Down” with hair thinning. May 24 or 25, 2019, in IHOP, Midland, TX
One issue I have struggled with is whether to publish The Man Who Escaped from Hell as one volume with two parts or as two volumes because of a distinct story line break. Part I is where the protagonist, Jake Brody, is in Hell remembering the past and then escapes, and the second part, Jake is on Earth again with new problems to face.
Looking at word count, part I has 54,000+ words. Therefore, I am now strongly considering publishing it as the first volume to be followed at some point soon by the second part, which currently has 30,000+ words.
The advantage of the two volume strategy is that it builds suspense for the release of the second volume and will hopefully increase sales. The disadvantage, of course, is that the second volume has to be superb in order to avoid being a disappointment and damaging my long range goals.
The post immediately before this one, gave me an idea/revelation (remember that I am still a novice at marketing).
Advertising my upcoming novels by updating the progress on them is like a TV mystery series with a definite but unpredictable conclusion somewhere in the future. Hopefully, it will likewise draw an ever-increasing audience as a TV mystery would.
At the moment, we are watching “Good Omens” (very entertaining) on Amazon, which stars Michael Sheen and David Tennant of “Broadchurch” and “Dr. Who”. The connection with the preceding paragraph is that the first season (at least) of “Broadchuch” is a good example of at TV mystery that intrigues the audience and draws them toward a inevitable but unpredictable conclusion.
There was another revelation associated with this, but I can’t recall it offhand. I have had little sleep over the past few days and my mind (or what’s left of it) isn’t functioning at full capacity..
One of my concepts of cover art for The Man Who Escaped from Hell using an alternate title. The locket is a significant detail in the overall story. The graphic is from the public domain, but it dovetails nicely with the story and provided inspiration for the inclusion of a locket.
After reviewing the word counts on my three novels in progress, I realize that I should be focusing on The Man Who Escaped from Hell (working title), which is by far the furthest along at 84,000+ words. I want it between 80,000 and 100,000. Shadows and Stars…, however, is at 54,000+ with the same goal of 80,000-100,000. Another, The Long-Pig Inquiry, (working title, sci-fi/horror), is at around 34,000+ with the same goal. I worked most recently on The Man Who… over the Fall and Winter, but the ideas would not flow, but ideas for Shadows and Stars… were coming constantly and still are. Ideas for The Long-Pig Inquiry come occasionally.
But with The Man Who… being closest to a complete first draft, I will take some time to review its status and see if I can stimulate enough ideas to bring it to a well-crafted conclusion. I do not want this to be some (pardon my French) half-assed hack work. I want it to be a true work of art. I will have to continue with Shadows and Stars… simultaneously, because the good ideas keep coming. It would be foolish to let them slip away.
By the way, “long pig” is a term cannibals of New Guinea reportedly use to refer to the flesh of humans, much as we use “pork” to refer to the flesh of swine. The taste is said to be similar to that of pork.
Of course, the subject of The Man Who… is a man who literally escapes from Hell, but there is a twist revealing that escaping from Hell is not as simple as one would think, not that escaping from Hell would be ever be simple.
One thing I have learned in writing these posts, is that it is fun to tease the audience with the superficial details of a mystery and this helps me learn how to hold an audience in suspense.
Phil Slattery, Writer, Publisher 