Archives (page 426 of 464)

September 23, 2011 / 159 Comments

Flash Fiction Challenge: Another Three Sentences

“The Numbers Game” — last week’s challenge — demands your eyeballs and appreciation.

At some point this week, I crossed 6000 followers on Twitter.

Which means: I’m going to send out some more terribleminds postcards, each with a piece of writing advice just for you. Penned by me. In the heartsblood of a magical white bull.

Okay, maybe not that last part.

Here’s the deal: I’m going to send out three postcards.

I will send them anywhere in the world.

In addition, the three winners will also receive one of my e-books in PDF format. (Winner’s choice.)

But you gotta work for it.

Last week’s challenge was brief — 100 words! — and this week’s is going to continue down Ole Brevity Lane and ask you to write a piece of flash fiction that is, drum roll please:

Three sentences long.

This can be in any genre. Any subject. No limitations beyond size.

Three. Sentences. Long.

Post directly in the comments below.

You have until Monday — yes, Monday, as in September 26th — at noon EST.

Then I shall pick.

EDIT:

I HAVE CHOSEN THE FIVE. I know, I said three. I’m saying five, because again you did way too many good ones.

I will send five postcards. One to:

Matthew McBride

Thomas Pluck

Shecky

Julian Finn

Amy Tupper

Folks: I need your addresses. Email me at terribleminds at gmail dot com. (I’ll also need to know what e-book you want.)

September 22, 2011 / 11 Comments

Greg Stolze: The Terribleminds Interview

Mister Stolze and I share a freelance-flavored past, in that both of us did substantial work for White Wolf Game Studios, and periodically add more to that resume. He’s since done a great deal of his own game design work and, in terms of both games and fiction, was kickstarting his own stories before Kickstarter even existed. You can find Greg at his website here, and Twitter at @GregStolze.

Why do you tell stories?

It beats honest work. In all seriousness, I think this world is a better, brighter place with me as a novelist than as a brain surgeon. Writing stories and designing games are the only tasks at which an objective observer would say I excel, unless you put in noncommercial tasks like “being a loving husband” or “getting lost even when driving to a location I’ve visited dozens of times.”

Give the audience one piece of writing or storytelling advice:

Hm, I’m trying to think of something that isn’t just a ripoff of Anne Lamott. I actually cut ‘n’ pasted her article at this link so I could send it off any time anyone asked me for writing advice. Summary version: Don’t be a writer if the process is just an implement of success for you, instead of the reason you do it. If you don’t write the way an alcoholic drinks — compulsively and at the expensive of many other good things in life — you probably won’t go far or like where you stop.

Or I could just rip off Justin Achilli’s advice of avoiding the word “will” like it’s radioactive cyanide. It was part of his grand, glorious crusade against passive voice. Passive voice is when you phrase something as “X happened” or “X was done” instead of the more active “Y did X.” Passive voice sounds all weaselly, like you’re trying to obscure responsibility. “Mistakes were made.” “There were discrepancies in the vote count.” “The body was found in the lake.” Sounds like abashed bureaucrats mumbling into their shoes. Compare with “I made a mistake,” “The vote machines couldn’t make the tallies come out even” or “So there I was, minding my own business and trying to get a picture of a snowy egret when suddenly I find this fucking BODY in the lake!” Mm, engaging!

What’s great about being a writer, and conversely, what sucks about it?

Getting to make stuff up all the time is pretty great. I have a brain like a butterfly, flitting hither and yon and never settling for long. Also, my brain spreads beauty and joy to all who behold it, which is why I’m saving up to have my skull replaced with a clear, strong polymer, probably Lexan(tm). Also, nobody knows where my brain goes in the rain.

What sucks about it? Hm, the publishing industry was a tough nut to crack when I was starting out and is currently undergoing cataclysmic upheavals that could well leave the landscape littered with the shattered corpses of once-proud dead-tree juggernauts. In the shadows of the bodies, nothing moves but tiny, furtive, hair-clad figures composing fan-fiction.

You’re a Kickstarter ninja, always kicking and starting fiction or game projects. What do you like about the Kickstarter model? And didn’t you kind of do this way back when with your “Ransom” model?

What I like about Kickstarter is that it enables my laziness. I don’t have to track who paid me or how much and, if things go pear-shaped, I don’t have to do refunds. They take credit cards so I don’t have to, and provide a nice platform where I can upload my videos and posts without swearing at HTML for hours. They take their percentage, as do the credit card companies, but what’cha gonna do?

The Ransom Model was, in some ways, crowd-funding before it was called that. For me, a TRUE Ransom (as opposed to them bitch-ass frontin’ ersatz pseudo-Ransoms, many of which I have run) works on the notion that “If I get $X, the already-completed work becomes free for everyone.” The D…iS! fundraiser isn’t a Ransom as much as a pre-order. The nice thing about ransoming, especially for short stories is (1) once it’s free, I can point people to links and say, “Look, go there and get free reads. If you enjoyed ‘Enzymes’ or ‘Two Things She Does With Her Body,’ you’ll probably like this next story I’ve written” instead of having to explain what’s brilliant about the story without being able to tell the whole thing. You know how people try to get you to work for free, saying “Oh, you’ll get so much valuable exposure!” — a line that most sober college students can see is bullshit when a guy at Spring Break waves his camera at them, but which inexplicably works some times on artists and writers. Now I can get all the valuable free exposure I want, on my terms, and get paid for it. Also, I keep my clothes on.

Advice for authors or game designers looking to “kickstart” a project that way? Lots of Kickstarter projects out there: any way to stand out?

Kickstarter emphatically DOES NOT CREATE DEMAND. That’s your job. It can turn trust and goodwill into money, but you have to give people a reason to want it. Having a good promotion video and intriguing sell-text will get you partway there, but you also have to hustle your ass off getting the word out any way you can. It’s not like an ATM. Expecting it to do the work for you is like putting a hammer on top of a board and wondering when your scrollwork-engraved cabinet will be done.

What are your thoughts about the publishing industry as it stands — agents, editors, publishers? Is that a road you hope to travel? Or are you all up in the DIY model?

I have a horrible, horrible psychological block regarding agents. I mean, I’ve sent in my share of query letters — to be brutally honest, probably a little less than my share, but I’ve struck out every time. I take it too hard, and when the rejection arrives, I ask myself “Why did I piss away all that time and hope and effort researching the agent, finding out what she likes, crafting the approach letter, editing the approach letter, then spend 2-3 months biting my nails before the brush-off? I could’ve written, edited, promoted and self-published a $500 short story in less time, with less heartache AND been happier with myself.”

It’s a phobia. I used to feel that writing an agent query letter was like eating a piece of my own death. Now I feel it’s more like eating death, vomiting it up, eating the vomit, shitting it out, and then somehow eating my own shit-death-puke. Which is not the agents’ fault. I’m sure many of them are lovely, lovely people. But life is short. Approaching publishers directly is just as bad. I met a local publisher personally, gave him my card, shook his hand, spoke politely with him after his talk to my writer’s group and, afterwards, shyly sent an email about maybe, possibly submitting a novel if he wanted to see it. That novel is “Mask of the Other.” I’m quite confident that I’ll have it available for sale before he ever gets back to me.

Add in the current publishing climate, and there are days when getting an agent looks like hiring an interior decorator when your house is burning down. That said, I’d love to have someone else do all the editing, layout, promotion, marketing, shipping and distribution for me. Still. Here we are. It would have been nice to have had the option, I guess.

What are the differences between writing game material and fiction? You prefer one over the other?

It’s the difference between making a guitar and playing one. When I write game material, I’m trying to be some kind of invisible helper elf, enabling others to create their stories and do what they want. When I write fiction, I’m telling the story exactly the way I want it to go (mostly). Both have their charms. I loved writing stories even before I started gaming, but gaming loved me BACK before fiction really did.

You are a storyteller with children. Having only a four-month-old, I know that’s not easy-peasy-diaper-squeezy, so: how the fuck do you do it?!

Set manageable goals. Understand that writing is going to take a hit. Personally, I found a place near my house where I could park my toddlers for something ridiculous like $4 an hour each at the Eola Community Center. Now the rules were that I had to stay in the Center and they’d come and get me for diaper changes, and they wouldn’t hold a kid for more than two hours at a stretch, but if you plan ahead, you can get 1100 words written in an hour. Now, of course, they’re in school all day. So just work towards that, Chuck.

Favorite word? And then, the follow up: Favorite curse word?

I’m kind of partial to “Ah.” Also “fuck-pole,” which I think is underutilized.

Favorite alcoholic beverage? (If cocktail: provide recipe. If you don’t drink alcohol, fine, fine, a non-alcoholic beverage will do.)

In the summer, I like a G&T like this: Fill a tall glass with ice, crush a quarter lime in it, fill that with tonic (the kind with quinine) almost to the top, then a double-shot of Tanqueray on top. Stir and drink. But when I ran out of gin and didn’t want to run to the store, I replaced the gin with one shot of Grand Marnier and one shot of Jose Cuervo tequila. I called it the “Grand Killya,” but don’t let that stop you from trying one.

Or you can go with two scoops of ice cream, a tiny drizzle of chocolate sauce, a shot of Bailey’s Irish Cream and a shot of Frangelico hazlenut liquor in a blender. Smoothy-fy it and drink on the back porch while trying to get a grip. I call that one “Home-Made Prozac.”

In the winter though, I’ve been trending towards aquavit — it’s like liquid rye bread that makes you sleepy.

Recommend a book, comic book, film, or game: something with great story. Go!

For writers, I recommend Italo Calvino’s If On A Winter’s Night a Traveler… even though it’s distinctly aimed at you, the reader. No, literally: The book is written in the second person, and details your adventures as you try to get your hands on an unmangled copy of ‘Italo Calvino’s new novel If On A Winter’s Night a Traveler…’ It hilariously explodes the book trade, publishing, literary analysis, the entire reading experience and especially, especially writing. There’s a wonderful scene where two writers find out they’re at the same resort. One’s a highbrow literary lion who agonizes and thrashes over every line, every word, every phrase. The other’s a bestselling thriller-monger who “produces books the way a vine produces pumpkins.” There’s a beautiful woman reading by the pool, and each of them is agonized by the thought that she’s reading the OTHER writer’s book. That, in my experience, is the literary life compressed into a single image.

What skills do you bring to help the humans win the inevitable zombie war?

I’ll be honest with you Chuck, most of my training has emphasized hand-to-hand combat with humans, paying particular attention to ligature strangles. Sure, I did some Okinawan kobudo back in the day, but I suspect I’d be best used keeping the survivors from turning on one another. You know, some sort of “Are you going to give Katy her Skittles back or do I have to put you in the sleeper hold again?” kind of arrangement.

You’ve committed crimes against humanity. They caught you. You get one last meal.

Two beer-boiled elk sausage bratwursts with horseradish mustard, one with carmelized onions and sauerkraut, one plain, each served on fresh-baked, lightly-toasted split french rolls. A bottle of Jhoom beer and a G&T as described above. Home-Made Prozac for dessert. Yeah, if I’m going to get a dose of Edison’s medicine, I’m not bothering with a balanced meal and I’ll want to be as smashed as possible.

What’s next for you as a storyteller? What does the future hold?

Let’s see. SWITCHFLIPPED is out now, that’s right here, and I’ve been shilling that all the livelong day. The fundraiser for Dinosaurs… in Spaaace! is ticking down and I’m hoping like hell that makes it. It’s making me anxious, so I’ll probably go for shorter, smaller and cheaper stuff for a while — perhaps drumming up the cash for a SWITCHFLIPPED print run.

After I clear those decks, I’ve got Mask of the Other, which I’d call a “military horror novel” — a squad of US soldiers stumbles across the wreckage of Saddam’s occult weapons program in 1991 and gets entangled with the Cthulhu Mythos demimonde. Within that frame, it also deals heavily with modern-day ghost towns. Parts are set in Varosha — pictured in these links:

http://woondu.com/images/strange/varosha-ghost-town-cyprus/varosha-ghost-town9.jpg

http://www.flickr.com/photos/danielzolli/2440928047/

http://greekodyssey.typepad.com/my_greek_odyssey/images/2007/04/12/forbidden_zone_2.jpg

Varosha’s a neighborhood in Cyprus that was abandoned during the Turkish invasion in 1974, and during the occupation, the Turks just fenced it off and said, “No one goes in or we shoot them.” Other parts are set on the island of Hashima:

http://amazingtourismtraveling.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/Ghost-town-Hashima-Island-Gunkanjima-japan.jpg

http://static.omglog.com/uploads/2009/10/hashima-island-decaying-city-photos-555×371.jpg

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-yw3j8kNsVyE/TctfQGbxhyI/AAAAAAAAEuw/iKpeMUUTUoE/s400/hashima01.jpg

…which was basically a town built on top of a coal mine on an island the size of a few football fields. It was very suddenly evacuated and abandoned… in 1974.

That’s all true or, at least, internet-true. I asked myself, “what would make people abandon cities on islands in 1974?” and came up with some HPL-style answers. That’s the novel.

Way off on the back burner, I’m thinking of open-developing a new set of RPG mechanics and ransoming out polished versions of them in a sort of “fantasy science” setting — nice short chunks, maybe 10,000 words like the REIGN ransoms. That might work better than big stuff like D…iS! That project’s called HORIZON, so keep an eye peeled.

September 21, 2011 / 33 Comments

“Get A Real Job”

As you may know, REVENGE OF THE PENMONKEY is on sale (a mere $2.99) — it’s been selling well and I’m up over 200 copies, which is just fine by me. The book features an autobiographical open which talks about my life and all the crazy shit that adds up to the writer’s existence — van crashes and strap-on-dildoes and lessons in profanity with my father and my father’s death and all that. It aims to be equal parts funny, sad, and enlightening all in one fell swoop. Anyway, I thought it might be best to give a taste of that intro (which is around a 10,000 word piece) as I think it’s one of the things that plagues most writers — this persistence that they should get a “real” job. I assume many artists and creative-types go through it. Regardless, here then, is a snippet of text from ROTPM. Please to enjoy, and please remember that procuring any of my e-books is what helps this blog stay in existence. And it’s what keeps me drunk and eating cheeseburgers on my office floor.

* * *

Writers will hear this a lot: “You need a real job.”

As if writing is a job on par with “unicorn tamer,” or “goblin wrestler on the Narnia circuit.”

Even still, you hear it often enough, you start to believe it. I got kinda beaten down after college. I’d written two crap-tastic novels. I’d been hired for a bunch of bullshit writing work that was as pleasant as a dildo violation or a van crash. I was starting a lot of work that I just wasn’t finishing.

I felt like I had tires spinning in greasy mud. Couldn’t get traction. Spraying shit everywhere. The dream of being a writer was fading—a wraith in the fog I could not grab and could barely see.

My father was one of the voices in the “real job” chorus. He got me a “real job” at the plant where he worked. Want to know what that job was? I stood in an abandoned wing of a dirty factory all day attending to a giant 20-foot-tall pyramid of file boxes. I would pull down a file box. I would take the thick-as-my-thumb files from within. Then I would run the whole file through a giant industrial shredder I named:

THE BITCH.

The Bitch chewed through these files like she was a wood chipper in a former life. GGRRNNNGH. GRRRAAWWW. VBBBBBBBNNNGGGGT.

All day long. Eight hours. That noise. Destroying documents that may or may not have been documents people did not want the EPA to see.

After one day of doing this work, I came home filthy and smelling like weird chemicals.

I knew I had to quit. But quitting meant telling the boss. And the boss was my father.

Desperate, I drove around that night, looking for something, anything, literally hoping that a job would magically fall into my lap. And lo and behold, it did.

I found a discount bookstore setting up shop about 10 minutes from my house. They were just opening and needed workers to unload and shelve books. Books. Books. Fuck, I thought, I love books!

I went in that night. Met the manager, old Greek guy from Philly named Pete.

He said he liked me. Hired me there on the spot.

He hired me as the assistant manager.

Now, here’s the thing. The bookstore was only going to be there for summer and fall and then close up shop. It was always meant to be a temporary thing, but fuck it, a job was a job.

And it was the best job I have ever had.

It’s not just that I was surrounded by books. I’ve worked other bookstore jobs and they bounced between “ehh” and “fuck this noise.” But this job was different.

This job had Pete.

Pete was, like I said, Old Greek. Built like a sagging brick wall, head like a melting lump of Play-Dough, Pete was not what you would think of as a reader. But he did read, and he read a lot: lot of crime, lot of thrillers. (Lisa Scottoline, I recall, was one of his favorites.)

This was not Pete’s first bookstore rodeo. In fact, this one was rather cushy because a lot of the discount bookstores he opened were in the city—often in shitty parts of the city. He in fact was once shot while setting up just such a bookstore, taking a bullet as the place was robbed—prematurely, as it turns out, because they didn’t have any cash on hand yet. Pete he was proud enough to lift his shirt in the store and show off the pair of bullet wounds on the front and back of his egregious trunk (the entry and exit wounds, respectively).

He took a bullet for books.

Because, he said, books matter. And he liked his job. Worth the bullet. Proud of it.

Fuck yeah.

It started to get me riled up about writing books again. Here’s a guy who took a bullet for books. Here’s a guy who was not dismissive of me being a writer but was in fact excited by it. To top it all off, every once in a while if Pete and I were on shift together he’d tell me to go around the store, pile up a single box with books I wanted, and then quietly go out to my car and ease it into my trunk. “I’m the manager,” he said. “You’re the assistant manager. It’s fine.” He let me essentially steal boxes of books from the store. Just wander away with them and take them home. Like so many lost puppies.

That summer I read a epic fuck-ton of books. It was glorious.

But Pete, man. Giving me all those books. All that storytelling energy, and there I was at its nexus. I bought all the Gaiman Sandman run. I read lots of obscure horror. I bought scads of weird reference materials, all of which I still own and still use (Dictionary of Phrase and Fable? Lawd’s yes). Pete took a bullet for books.

Because stories matter.

Holy shit.

Suddenly, I started writing again.

It was good to emerge from that low place. Once again another lesson lurks in the weeds: writers will often have these moments of doubt, and you need to find your way out of that. You need to march your doubt out into a field and put a .357 round in the back of its head. Let its death soak into the earth, grow the wheat, make bread from its blood. Because, for real, fuck doubt. Fuck doubt right in its wax-clogged ear.

September 20, 2011 / 39 Comments

25 Virtues Writers Should Possess

1. A Wild And Unfettered Imagination

This one goes up front: the bubbling turbid stew that comprises your brain-mind combo must possess an endless array of unexpected ideas. Your head should be an antenna receiving frequencies from the furthest-flung reaches of Known Creative Space. You want to survive, you’ve got to have an imagination that won’t lay down and die. That fucker’s like a North Korean 9-year-old: up all night, smoking cigarettes, working his fingers to the bone. He never cries. He only works to make the pretty baubles.

2. Discipline

Given that we’re creative types prone to art-o-leptic fits of imagination, if we’re given no leash we’ll just wander off into the woods to create our masterpiece. Where we are promptly eaten by bears. Imagination is the fuel, but it’s a fickle and volatile fuel. It needs a channel. It needs a furnace. It needs discipline. Discipline to wake up, to weld your shit-can to the chair, to squeeze out word-babies, to do the work.

3. Optimism

The only way you’re going to stay on target is if you believe this thing you want to do can actually happen. It can. It really can. But like with elves and Jesus, you gotta believe. Otherwise, the magic dies.

4. Realism

By the same token, realistic expectations are the order of the day. You think you’re going to walk out the door with a script and the mailman is going to buy the rights-in-perpetuity for a million bucks, you’re off your meds. A good reality check now and again keeps your optimism from messing your pants with endless squirts of premature wheejaculations.

5. Pessimism

Here’s where you say, “Wait, wuzza? Wooza? I’m supposed to be an optimist… and a realist… and a pessimist, too?” Yes. Yes! Yes. Writers without a healthy dose of pessimism will find themselves bent over an end table with a bad publishing contract rolled up and shoved deep into their colonic grotto. A little dollop of distrust in humanity will serve you well. I’m not saying to be selfish. But do protect yourself.

6. Sticktoitiveness

I’ve always said that no matter the flavor of your writing career, it’s basically you putting a bucket on your head and running full force into a brick wall. Again and again. And in the end it’s either you or the wall. Any success is going to be in part due to dangerous levels of persistence and stubbornness.

7. Honesty

Writers are liars who use those lies to tell truths. Let that boil your noodle.

8. Confidence

Put your work out there and find pride and power in what you do. Be assertive in your language, sure-footed in your prose. Why would anyone want to read anything if it has all the backbone of a cup of sun-warmed pudding? Go forth. Kick ass wearing oiled leather boots made from the rent pages of your own super-fantastic manuscript, a manuscript written on the flesh of your adversaries. It doesn’t need to be ego-fed to be confident. Though I’d rather read the work of an ego-bloated megalomaniacal Narcissist than a weak-in-the-knees ehhh-mehhh-pbbbt insecure writer-whelp. Insecurity is no pleasure to read.

9. Thick Skin

Your body shall be a road atlas of misery by the time you’re ten years into a writing career. The slings and arrows of rejections. The bullets and flying glass of editorial notes. I’m still picking metaphorical gravel out of my elbows and knees. Want to survive in this gig? Your skin better be tough as a Brooklyn phone book.

10. Humor

If you can’t laugh in this business, you’ll cry. And then you’ll evacuate fluids from all orifices. Then you’ll be kicked in the South Crotchal Region by an itinerant donkey before dying. Humor’s also good to put in your work. People like a laugh now and again. It can’t all be turbulence and pathos and frowny faces.

11. Responsibility

You will have deadlines. Someone might ask you to turn in a synopsis. Or an outline. Or an edit. Do these things. Do as they ask. Do them on time and according to parameter. Your readers, too, will want things. They will want your attention. They will ask that you provide them with quality. Give them what they ask (within reason). Know your responsibility. Fulfill that responsibility. Do not be a stinky dickwipe.

12. Appreciation

A wee touch of humility and appreciation will go a long away. Appreciate your audience. Appreciate that you can do this thing that you do without getting your hands cut off by an oppressive fundamentalist government. Appreciate the words your forebears have flung into the firmament. Appreciate the work, the opportunity, the general aura of overall pantslessness. Because seriously, pants are for jerkholes.

13. Coffee

Fuck you, coffee IS TOO a virtue. Do not deny me this. Do not dare!

14. Business Sense

Writers have all the business sense of a gin-drunk wildebeest. But it pays to know something about something when it comes to business. Know enough not to get fucked. Know enough not to fuck yourself.

15. A Critical Eye

You can’t be all wide-eyed and dopey-smiled. Your gaze must be razor-honed. Your mouth ever in an uncertain sneer. To know how to write well you know how to write poorly, which means you have to identify poor writing in yourself and in others. It’s no longer your pleasure to be entertained; it is your job to be suspicious, dubious, and ever-critical. Turn your brain off? Not likely. Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage. Rage. Against the dying of quality plots, compelling characters, and magical stories.

16. A Willingness To Do Evil

Okay, settle down, sermonizers. I don’t mean in real life. But your job is one of mighty evil. Evil splashed across the page in great heaving buckets of torment and blood. You’re not a nice monkey. Not to the fictional people that gambol and preen upon your manuscript pages. It’s your job to fuck those people over and up. Your evil shall know no bounds. Your cruelty is the engine of conflict. Yes. Yessss.

17. Patience

In the time it takes for the light from a supernova star 10,000 light years away to reach our eyes here on earth, you still might not have a project pass through all the proper channels and put a paycheck in your hand. This industry often moves slower than a legless caterpillar rolling up a rocky knoll. Be ready for that. Exercise patience. Find other acts of wordsmithy to fill those gaps. Breathe in. Breathe out.

18. Tact

You’re going to deal with publishers, writers, readers, fans, and it isn’t all going to be newborn puppies and pina coladas. Tact goes a long, long way. This is shorthand for, “Don’t be a fuckweasel.”

19. Discomfort

Discomfort is good. Discomfort is that stinging nettle at the cusp of your butthole telling you that sometimes you need to get up out of that chair, kick down the walls of that box you’re in, try something new. Discomfort drives you forward. A little taste of dissatisfaction makes you crave bigger and better. Comfort is nice. But comfort is overrated. Flee that zone now and again. Truth lurks in conflict.

20. Courage

Have the courage to go forth and do not what everybody else is doing but what you want to do. Have the courage to put yourself out there. To give a big neon middle finger to those who will inevitably disrespect and misunderstand your choice to be a storyteller. Invoking your craft and creating art (in a perfect world) is an act of bravery. Of putting all your sensitive bits on the cutting board.

21. Liquor

GODDAMNIT IT IS TOO A VIRTUE. I will break this vodka bottle over your head if you try to take this away from me. Or if you try to take my vodka away from me. Daddy needs his potato juice.

22. Tranquility

Sometimes you need that Zen place. Find the blank chalkboard, the tabula rasa, the motherfucking no-mind. Mow the lawn. Listen to the rain. Thousand-yard stare. The story sometimes lives in this place.

23. Loyalty

A good writer finds his loyalty to be a raft on which he can float in even the most turbulent storm-tossed seas. A raft with a beer cooler. And a snack machine filled with bacon. You’ve got to be loyal to your own work: no taking another manuscript out for a little rumpy-pumpy behind the shed when you’re supposed to be working on another. And be loyal to your own ideas, too. Stick to them. Stand by them. Finally, other writers. We’re a tribe of individuals but a tribe just the same, and that means this whole thing we do is made of people. Loyalty matters to them, to you, to the whole lot of us farking moonbats.

24. Ten Pounds Of Crazy In A Five Pound Bucket

Speaking of farking moonbats: we’re moonbats because we need to be moonbats. I mean, really. To want to do this thing? To want to have this life? You gotta be a little bit — and by “little bit” I mean “project a massive crackling force field of” — crazy. Crazy is defense. Crazy is enlightenment. Crazy is the act of doing differently. For the record, I don’t mean “crazy” to be, “please go masturbate at the salad bar” or “to stop the voices you will first have to kill every third member of British Parliament.” I mean crazy as in, to have that electric vibe pushing you to put the words on the page and to create stories unbidden from the empty ether.

25. Love

The most important thing. You gotta love what you do. It’s the only way you’ll make it through. This is not a safe nor sane journey. It’s not a career choice for most normals. It’s also not a road that offers a whole lot of initial reward: you step into the breach on the whiff of a promise, on the potential for success, and so it is that the only prize you’ll find early on is the love and passion and satisfaction for what you do. Without all that, what’s the fucking point? You don’t love it, then being a writer is no different than pushing a broom or making a corporate nest surrounded by four fuzzy gray cubicle walls. And by the way, why are cubicle walls fuzzy? Are they draped in the pelt of some dull, listless monster? Some bleak hell-cow wandering the world’s uncharted swamps? Whatever. Fuck it. The point is: love this thing you do and you’ll have all the reward you need. Except vodka. Because despite my many letters to Congress that shit still costs money.

* * *

Want another booze-soaked, profanity-laden shotgun blast of dubious writing advice?

Try: CONFESSIONS OF A FREELANCE PENMONKEY

$4.99 at Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), B&N, PDF

Or its sequel: REVENGE OF THE PENMONKEY

$2.99 at Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), B&N, PDF

And: 250 THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW ABOUT WRITING

$0.99 at Amazon (US), Amazon (UK), B&N, PDF

September 19, 2011 / 14 Comments

Guess What? Pig Butt

I will now make love to your mouth.

Uhh.

Let’s try that again:

Let my meat make love to your mouth.

Hrm.

Okay, forget all that, what I’m trying to say is, I’m going to give you now three recipes, and these three recipes will comprise your dinner at some point this week. Trust me, you’ll do it. You’ll do it, and you’ll like it. You’ll like it so much, you will give me money. And a gift basket. A gift basket of hookers. Because that’s how good these recipes are. Are you ready to receive my culinary insight? My gastronomical penetrations?

My meat in your mouth?

Step One: Pulled Pork From Pork Butt

Contrary to its name, pork butt — or “Boston Butt” — is not actually the ass-end of the pig. It’s the shoulder. They called it that because they used to store and ship it in barrels called “butts.” Either that, or they thought it was funny. “HA HA HA you’re eating butt,” those randy old New Englanders would say. And then they’d say “pahk the cah in the gah-rage wicked smaht” and “go sox” before throwing tea into a harbor.

Anyway. You’re going to need a big round rumpy-pumpy of pork butt.

Select a pork butt that is around three or four pounds.

Take it. Coat it first with a lacquering of olive oil.

Then coat it with a liberal smattering of:

a) kosher salt

b) chili powder

If you’re so inclined, wrap it up in Saran Wrap. Which, for the record, I am incapable of using. Because seriously, fuck Saran Wrap. The way they package that stuff is for assholes. Foil? I love foil. The cutting teeth of the foil box work as designed. Pull foil, tear down, riiiiip, blammo. Piece of foil. But the cling wrap shit, the teeth are on the opposite side. So you have to tear upwards. And the boxes aren’t sturdy enough for this. They bend and warp and the teeth aren’t sharp enough and the wrap resists, it resists as if it has a mind of its own. By the time I’m done putting Saran Wrap over something so simple as a mixing bowl, I’ve pulled out half the supply of cling wrap and it’s all bunched up over the top and it’s lost any semblance of static cling. I might as well cover that mixing bowl with one of my son’s diapers.

Of course, my wife wields cling wrap like a ninja. She walks over — riiiiiiip — then places then cling film over the bowl like she received training in a Shaolin kitchen somewhere. Lesson: she’s either been training with Buddhist kung-fu cooks or I’m a total dipshit. I’m leaning toward the “kung-fu kitchen” theory.

What I’m saying is, give the pork butt time to absorb the salty chili-ey goodness.

Now go to your grill. Turn that bitch on, then prep for indirect heat. Make sure the grill hangs around 300 degrees. If you have the ability to utilize smoke, that’s your call — for this recipe, I did not. Oh, and if any charcoal purists come over here and try to tell me you can’t do this on a gas grill, I will have my Shaolin wife come karate chop you in your gonads. A good gas grill will serve you well. Like a hound. A hound made of propane and metal and melting fat who breathes fire and chars animal-flesh.

You could probably do this in the oven, by the way. Same deal — 300 degrees.

But seriously: the grill does this better. I’m not fucking around. Don’t think that I am.

Anyway.

Get your pork butt HA HA HA HA HA butt. Just shut up. Shut up and go get it. Take it. Put it on the grill — indirect! not over flame! — and then close that bad bitch up.

Come back in five hours.

Step Two: The Roasted Red Pepper Sauce

This is not a red pepper coulis, exactly, but fuck it, you can call it that and I won’t tell. I won’t sick the gourmand police on you. Foodies will not descend from helicopters to punch you in the mouth.

You’re going to need some things for this.

You’re going to need one sweet onion.

You’ll need one large or two smaller tomatoes.

Then you’re going to need a fuckload of sweet peppers. (A fuckload is equal to one pound.)

Red, yellow, orange, whatever. I like the little guys, but your mileage may vary.

Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Chop coarsely. Curse while doing so. Call someone’s mother a “whore-biscuit” or “canker-nipples.” While disparaging someone’s mother, also be sure to remove the seeds from the tomato and the peppers because, ew. Who wants to eat a bunch of seeds? Squirrels, that’s who. And I assume you’re not a squirrel. If you are, and you’re all up in my blog chewing the wiring and depositing your foul little squirrel pellets in the programming, I will shoot you with my .410, which is my squirrel-killing gun. And it’s also my chicken-killing gun, just in case you’re one of those. Because chickens are dickheads.

Put all this stuff in a roasting pan over foil, get it good and lubed up with olive oil, and then liberally sprinkle with some salt and some Herbs de Provence. Yes, seriously. Hush up and do it, for Chrissakes.

Put in oven for one hour, or until you start to see the peppers darken around the edges.

While cooking, stand around, smelling that smell. Mmm. So good. Rub yourself. Just a little bit. Not to be gross or weird or anything. Gentle circles. Mmm. Yeah. So nice.

Ding. Hour’s up.

Veggies out of the oven, let ’em cool, then pop ’em in a mixing bowl.

Get your immersion blender, penetrate the sauce with your whirring doom-stick, and blend the shit out of those veggies. Metaphorically. The veggies should contain no actual shit. If it does, then you need to check yourself. You need to say, “What’s wrong with me? Why did I put feces in my food? Why did I sabotage myself again? I’m not a success. I’m my own worst enemy. This is why my wife left me.”

When you blend, you don’t need to blend it to a complete slurry. I like it with some pieces of pepper still floating around. Give it a little texture. Your call, though. You do what you like. It’s your sauce.

Now, add to this sauce two things:

a) 1/4 cup of creme fraiche (or sour cream if you’re, y’know, a hillbilly)

b) 1 TBsp of softened cream cheese.

Stir. No need to blend. Just stir. Not with your finger. Or your penis. Put that away. You should really see somebody about that. Always sticking your extremities into moist foods.

Cool in fridge until meat is meatified.

Step Three: Corn Done Two Ways

This is like a Choose Your Own Adventure game where every adventure ends in corn-a-licious delights rather than, say, getting eaten by Snarveling Moon Beasts or some nonsense like that.

Get four ears of corn.

Cook ’em however makes you happy. Boil them for 8 minutes, grill them for 15 minutes, char them, whatever works for you. Just make a decision and cook the fucking corn already.

Then: de-corn the cob. Or un-cob the corn. I dunno. Cut the corn off the cob. Serrated knife FTW.

Option #1: CORN SALSA. Take the cut corn and put it in a mixing bowl and add in there: salt, pepper, one diced tomato, a de-seeded and chopped jalapeno, some melted butter, and the juice of one lime.

You could, quite seriously, add a splash of tequila in there. “Margarita Corn Salsa.” Awesome.

Option #2: CREAMED CORN. Chop up one small sweet onion or a handful of shallots and put ’em in a skillet to soften them in butter — dice up a couple-few cloves of garlic in there, too. Throw the corn in there after about five or ten minutes (when onion is beyond translucent and nice and soft). Milk the cob, too. (Pork pulled from pig butt? Milk the cob? Meat in mouth? No wonder they call it food porn.) By milking the cob, I mean, scrape your knife down the cut cobs and get the rest of that “corn juice” out of there. Into this goes salt, pepper, and whatever herbs you have laying around. Oregano and parsley are nice here. But you could go with those Herbs de Provence, again, since you’re lazy and you already have them within reach of your greasy hands. Then mix in there two TBsps of creme fraiche again. Or sour cream. You pedestrian.

Sticking The Landing

Remove pork from grill. It will be crispy on the outside and unctuous on the inside. Pull it apart with your mind. Barring an unforeseen lack of psychic powers: tongs and fork.

Slap the pork on buns. (Butt? Buns? Goddamnit.)

Glob a dollop of that roasted red pepper sauce on there.

Put some Corn Your Own Adventure on the side.

EAT LIKE A FUCKING CHAMPION. Snarl and pound the table in delight.

Don’t forget to order me my gift basket.

September 16, 2011 / 102 Comments

Flash Fiction Challenge: “The Numbers Game”

“The Torch — last week’s challenge — is large and in charge and demands your eyeballs.

Here’s a number’s game for you.

I’m going to give you five words.

You must choose three of these words and incorporate them into a story.

That story may not be more than 100 words long. I didn’t say 1000. Rather: one hundred.

The five words, chosen by Random Word Generator:

Enzyme.

Ivy.

Bishop.

Blister.

Lollipop.

Again, you have 100 words only.

You may post your story directly in the comments if you so choose. Alternately, feel free to deposit them in your own post and drop a link to said post in the comments. Your call, Cochise.

You have until next Friday, September 23rd, at noon EST.

I will pick three of my favorites. Those three will get my short story collection IRREGULAR CREATURES (with thirty-nine 4- and 5-star reviews at Amazon) in either Kindle or PDF format.

Choose your three words. Spin them into 100. BTFO, emmereffers.

EDIT — WINNERS:

I can’t do it.

I can’t choose just three.

Thus, I pick… er, five.

Shut up.

The winners:

SUE ANN JAFFARIAN

BRIAN LINDENMUTH

CHRIS MACKEY

YOJIMBOJAPAN

JO EBERHARDT

You all need to contact me at terribleminds [at] gmail [dot] com.