Category: The Ramble (page 166 of 475)

That’s not a recent macro, but I figured given the white stuff that dumped upon a lot of you in the past few days (though we only got a couple inches at most), this macro was appropriate.

Not much else going on, really, of note.

Blackbirds, the first Miriam Black book, remains $1.99 for your e-machine: at B&N, Amazon, Apple, Kobo and Google Play. So, if you were looking for a cheap and easy way to dive into Miriam Black’s blood-soaked, nicotine-charred world of asphalt and motels and murder, well, there’s no price like the present one.

It is official, too, that the Chinese publisher Beijing White Horse Time procured the rights to publish the next three Miriam books — Thunderbird, The Raptor & The Wren, and Vultures in China. Woo!

Go forth and pin your week to the ground and slay the beast, folks.

AND WE’RE BACK.

It’s time to revivify these challenges, I think, and this time around, let’s lean hard into our current geopolitical poopshow and ponder THE APOCALYPSE.

Except, here’s the deal.

I don’t want you to write THE USUAL APOCALYPSE.

I want you to make one up you have not seen before.

A rare, strange, unparalleled apocalypse. Unexpected. Unwritten.

You have, ohhh, let’s say 1500 words to give us a glimpse of your brand new uniquely-you Apocalypse. Due on (dun dun dun) Friday the 13th, by noon EST. Post at your online space, drop a link in the comments below so we can all read it. Go forth and end the world, my friends, and write a compelling tale to go along with a fitting end.

DEAREST AUDIENCE,

I write to inform you of a recent change regarding my debut original novel, Blackbirds, which features the first adventure of the heroine, Miriam Black, a scalding cup of rat poison in human form. Miriam is a psychic and is able to see how and when you die simply by touching your skin to her skin. This has, quite clearly, left poor Miriam feeling less and less pleasant as regards humanity and the rest of its sweaty ilk.

That novel is presently on sale for a mere one dollar and ninety-nine pennies, and it is for sale at this price at B&N for your Nook, though you will also find it price-matched at Amazon and at Apple and yes, also at Kobo and even at something called Google Play. I do hope that if you have not yet enjoyed the Frisbee-to-the-face that is Miriam Black that you will choose to begin her venomous adventures here with the first book, with the consideration that oh my oh my, there are two more books published (Mockingbird and The Cormorant, respectively) and three more on the way (Thunderbird coming out next month, The Raptor & The Wren out by end of year, and the final book, Vultures, out at some point before your inevitable demise).

If you remain uncertain, please enjoy this book trailer.

I promise, it’s actually a very good trailer.

If you don’t enjoy the trailer, I will in fact compensate you for your lost time, as I am a chronomancer with power over the temporal threads that bind the universe. But please don’t spread that around as it causes me trouble.

Enjoy Blackbirds, should you endeavor to pluck it from the digital ether. If you were inclined to pre-order the newest, Thunderbird, I would be positively ebullient. Further, if you are caught up on the first three but have not yet read the novella called Interlude: Swallow that ties together Cormorant and Thunderbird, then behold the collection in which it sits: Three Slices.

See you on the other side, goodly folk! Ta!

With deepest disregard,

CHARLES Q. WENDIGO, THE THIRD

p.s. the art is by the mighty Galen Dara

AND SO IT IS DONE.

The votes are tallied.

The awkwardness is codified and canonical.

Here then are the top four winners —

#14 (by a long shot), #22, then in a tight race, #27, and #15. #2 also came in close enough where I’m gonna just go ahead and count it as five winners as much as four, because those last three were one vote off apiece, and god only knows if I fucked up the vote count.

Congrats to you winners.

I mean, “congrats,” because c’mon. *side-eye*

YOU WINNER HUMANS, you need to email me at terribleminds at gmail dot com and gimme your deets. By which I mean, your mailing address so I can mail you a book.

Here, then, are the top five:

#14

#22

#27

#15

#2

Every year I try to offer up some kind of writerly resolution, some goal, some quest, some authorial charge to lead you into and through the New Year. It’s half-bullshit, as everything here ultimately is — because I’m not you and you’re not me and a single resolution is just a brick in the wall. And writing advice is mostly bullshit, anyway.

I offered up a metric fuckload of resolutions in 2013.

I had a lesser gaggle of resolutions in 2014.

In 2015, I said that as a writer you should be big — and you should be small.

I don’t think I said squat in 2016, because I was just getting over pneumonia? And pneumonia, as it turns out, feels like someone has defecated inside your lung sacks. (EDIT: nope, wait, I did write one: be the writer that you are, not the writer other people want you to be.)

This year —

*whistles*

Listen, 2016 was a nasty beast who nested in a cradle of our heroes’ bones. The year was good for me personally and professionally but, outside that, also felt like a year where we were slowly watching the Death Star being built in front of our eyes and we couldn’t do shitsquat to stop it. And though I hope 2017 has dull teeth and bad eyesight, there’s also a very good chance it is a far greater monster than we can imagine. Best case scenario, the next 2-4 years are gonna get weird.

As such, it feels both necessary and also unmercifully glib to offer up writerly resolutions in any form. I want to say, WRITE YOUR REBELLION, and that’s not a bad idea, to put to paper all your fears and your ideas — give voice to your own idea of resistance. I want to say, BURN IT ALL DOWN TO MAKE GREAT ART — some snarl-mouthed snaggle-toothed middle-finger assertion to leap into the mouth of the monster and cut its throat from the inside with a sword made from your own wordsmithy. I want you to be bad-ass. I want to be bad-ass, too. I don’t want resolutions. I want revolutions. I want fire and steel and anger, I want politics and rage and poison, I want Hunter S. Thompson and Spider Jerusalem and Nine Inch Nails. I want brimstone and batshit. I want heartsblood spattered on the walls that dries in the form of your stories.

At the same time, that’s not going to be all of us.

I don’t even know that it’s me. I don’t know how brave I am or how good I am. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know who I’m going to be as a writer by the end of this year, or next, or in five years. I don’t know who you are or who you will become, either.

What I know is this:

We’re writers, and writers write.

And so, this year’s authorial resolution is far humbler, far smaller —

Write, despite.

What I mean is, no matter what happens, keep writing. No matter how exciting or terrifying the news becomes, write anyway. Force the time. Look away. Focus up. Eyes on your paper. Demand of yourself the creation of stories. Carve out the mental and emotional territory, and the temporal and physical landscape, in order to keep doing what you’re doing. In times like this, the distractions are endless. It’s easy to stop. It’s all too simple to feel overwhelmed by what’s going on and to stare at the Eye of Mordor as it fixes its gaze upon you. And yet, no matter what, you gotta do the thing. You gotta tell the stories. You gotta write it all down.

Write, despite. Or if you’re so inclined, write in spite of everything.

Your art does not need to be rebellious for you to rebel against everything. Just making art is an act outside the natural order. It is already a contravention of the status quo. And it’ll only get moreso in the coming year(s). Write despite. You needn’t aim any higher than that. You can. But the best thing you can do is to give yourself that mandate:

Write no matter what, write anyway, write always.

Have a great 2017. Carve your words into its hide. Tell the monster your tales.

(penmonkey logo above by Amy Houser)

My son associates Star Wars with Christmas a little bit, I think. In particular, both Empire Strikes Back and The Force Awakens, maybe in part because both films have snowy planets? Or maybe it’s just because he watches both around this time of the year and they get stuck in his mind like a seed between the teeth. No idea.

What I do know is, during our most recent rewatch of ESB, I responded particularly to one Han Solo moment. Now, Han Solo gets a lot of moments in ESB, arguably more and better ones than Luke does. This moment, however, is close to the beginning. Luke has gone out and is promptly mauled by the cantankerous Wampa. Han and The Gang learn that Luke has not returned. Night is falling. The temperature on an already frigid planet is dropping.

And Han says, fuck it, I’m gonna go look for my buddy.

So he mounts a Tauntaun — hey, did you know those are lizards? — and rides out.

But! But.

Just as he’s riding out, a short exchange occurs:

Rebel Deck Officer: Your Tauntaun will freeze before you reach the first marker!

Han Solo: Then I’ll see you in Hell!

I joked at the time with my wife, that’s an astonishingly aggressive overreaction by Han. It’s like, “HEY DUDE YOU MIGHT FREEZE TO DEATH,” and Han’s response is basically a nuclear, “THEN FUCK YOU, GUY WHO WAS PROBABLY JUST WARNING ME ABOUT THE SUB-ZERO DEATH TEMPERATURES AND HOW MAYBE MY FUZZY DINOSAUR FRIEND WASN’T EVEN GOING TO SURVIVE OUT THERE SO HOW COULD I POSSIBLY SURVIVE. EAT POOP, JERK!”

We also joked that it was a very good response to really anything anyone ever says to you.

“Have a nice day!” “THEN I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL.”

“That’ll be $7.63.” “THEN I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL.”

“Sir, you can’t park your Tauntaun here.” “THEN I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL.”

But then, of course, as 2016 continued to harangue the world with news of new POUTUS appointments and sad deaths, the phrase came out of my mouth as sort of a grim, teeth-clenching rejoinder to whatever 2016 had on order. It became an automatic response to the year in general, both in what it still brings and retroactively as to what it already gave.

THEN I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL, 2016.

But it occurs to me —

2017 isn’t likely to be much better.

I mean, 2016 wasn’t a blip. It was the beginning of something. All the bad news that’s arisen isn’t isolated. It’s part of a pattern. This shit is just getting started. The bump that was 2016 isn’t a hill we’re climbing over. It’s the top of Cthulhu’s head as he emerges from the deep. Sure, maybe 2017 won’t be as bad as we think. (Alternatively, maybe it’ll be worse!) Yep, 2017 will likely bring some good news along with some bad news, because that’s how things are.

Just the same, I expect it will have some unpleasant surprises in store.

And when it springs its many traps, I will remember Han Solo saying:

“THEN I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL.”

And yet, I’ll also remember what goes into that phrase and why he said it.

I’ll remember this exchange, too:

Rebel Deck Officer: Sir, the temperature’s dropping too rapidly.

Han Solo: That’s right, and my friend’s out in it.

The reason he gets on that tauntaun and rides out into certain icy doom is because his friend’s in the middle of that shit. Night’s falling. The cold is seizing the planet. And he goes out anyway. That’s where we’re at, folks. The mercury in the thermometer is dropping like an elevator with its cable cut. The night will be long. The year ahead will have sharp teeth and and a big mouth and some of us will do better with that Wampa than others. Just the same, our friends are caught in the storm. And we’re going to have to mount up anyway, and ride out even if our snow lizard will be a popsicle by the first marker. Because others need our help.

So, 2017 and all your tricks and all your traps:

I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL.

* * *

I feel like I should also follow up with a personal year-in-review. I tend to do them each year, though this one feels a bit strange given all the utter shitnanigans going on in the world. The year brought with it a lot of personal good, but much of that tastes a bit ashen because I don’t really know what’s coming down the pike for people. (I know, I’m a white dude in America, I’ll be okay. That’s true to a point, though I’ll add that I still need healthcare, and Obamacare has been helpful even with its increased costs. I also have a kid who will have to contend with education in America theoretically sliding down the poopchute.)

Just the same, sure, I’ll play.

I wrote two Star Wars books this year. Life Debt is out, obviously, and Empire’s End is on its way in February. (And Life Debt landed me on the NYT list again, so I certainly won’t be mad at that.) I wrote the fifth Miriam Black book, The Raptor & The Wren, too — plus 2017 will see release of Thunderbird in February.

I also wrote a goodly portion of a new writing book, Damn Good Story, coming next year.

Which means really, I only wrote three (and a half) new books this year, which is light for me.

Of course, I also edited a bunch, and then I got to be a cool kid for a little while and write some comic books — Hyperion and the Force Awakens adaptation, both for Marvel. (Though the latter was really less of an adaptation and more of a translation.)

And I might have some more comic work coming up… *coughs into hand*

As for books released in 2016 —

Atlanta Burns: The Hunt (February)

Star Wars: Life Debt (July)

Invasive (August)

The Forever Endeavor, a novella (October)

Hyperion: Daddy Issues (November)

The Force Awakens TPB (December)

And as to what’s coming out in 2017:

Star Wars: Empire’s End (February 21st)

Thunderbird, Miriam Black #4 (February 27th)

The Raptor And The Wren, Miriam Black #5 (4th qtr, 2017?)

Also sold a pair of books to Del Rey — the first being Exeunt, which will come out in 2018 and is kind of… well, I’m hesitant to say too much and spoil the soup, so let’s just call it my take on The Stand, Swan Song, Station Eleven, The Fireman, and other epic apocalyptic horror stories.

It’s been a good year, overall — at least personally. And I’m hoping to retain some of that as I go forward. The new book deal lets me write a little less per year — so I can cut my output (which is doable, if occasionally a little punishing) and concentrate all fire on Exeunt. Life’s fine, the family’s good. Not sure where 2017 will leave us in terms of everything else, though.

Be well to all of you and best of luck in the New Year. We’re going to need it. And, I suspect, we’re going to need each other. Mount up. Get ready to ride. Because 2017 is almost here.

Thanks for coming by. Thanks for being readers and pals.

Onward, fellow weirdos.

*tauntaun gargle-bleat*