What's Next?

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I’m stealing thunder from my posts that I’ll make on my goal-keeping sites tomorrow, but I think this can go here as well. I did a 2013 recap last week, so it’s fitting I do some goal setting for 2014 this week. Here goes!

*CHOKE, SMOKE, BROKE - promote and sell

*SMOKE & BROKE - put out audio books

*STROKE - start writing

*DEATH IN THE TIME OF ICE - promote and sell

*sketch out a sequel to ICE (DEATH ON THE TREK) write first draft

*EINE KLEINE MURDER - promote and sell

*REQUIEM FOR RED - (sequel to EINE) finish rewrite

*FAT CAT AT LARGE - finish Janet Cantrell web page (pub date is Sept 2014)

            August: Hold a Fat Cat Story contest for free copy (copies? mugs? totes?)

*FAT CAT 2 - proposal by Feb 1st, manuscript by June 15th

*FAT CAT 3 - proposal by Nov 1st

*short stories - get more than 6 published (submit 1/month)

There are some short stories in the works. The Austin Mystery Writers are working on an anthology that I’ll contribute two stories to. Then we’ll get edits and seek a publisher. I have these mostly finished.

I’m slated to write a story for a Memphis Noir anthology. I haven’t started that yet. I would really like to work in a trip to Memphis first.

I contributed a story for an anthology that will be out in 2014:

            PRINCE FLOUNDER AND THE FISHERMAN, requested for Grimm Futures

I’d also like to put out another short story collection, or maybe two, one mystery, one dark fantasy (or horror, whichever you prefer).

Send out rewards to my Street Team in January.

One more thing: a children’s book for Sam

Happy New Year!

I’d like to be the first to wish you Happy New Year!

Since I post on Wednesdays and next Wednesday is Christmas and I’ve chosen not to post that day (but to kick back and enjoy it with my family), this will be my last post for this year.

I’m pleased with the way my writing work has gone in 2013. Here’s a brief recap:

I finished my manuscript of the first Fat Cat novel, now titled FAT CAT AT LARGE, turned it in to my Berkley Prime Crime editor on time, and am pretty sure I can finish the edits she suggested by the end of this month.

Untreed Reads published my Neanderthal novel, DEATH IN THE TIME OF ICE, and I’ve gotten some terrific reviews. I’m still working to get it out there into the wide world as much as possible. For now, it’s in e-book form only, but a paperback should be published by Untreed Reads in 2014.

Barking Rain Press published my Cressa Carraway Musical Mystery, EINE KLEINE MURDER, and again, I was gratified by the excellent reviews it received. I’m also working hard to get more notice for this book. It’s out in e-book and paperback.

My first Imogene Duckworthy mystery, CHOKE, was produced in audio by Veronica Newton. It’s selling pretty well, but of course, I’d like it to sell really, really well.

I succeeded in getting 3 short stories published, but several more have been accepted for publication either later this month or in 2014. One was accepted for an anthology that was never printed, however. That was disappointing. I’ll do something with it some day.

Oh yes, my husband and I moved from Texas to Tennessee. It’s actually amazing I got anything done between redoing a bathroom, the yard, the lights, and finding our way around Knoxville.

EINE KLEINE MURDER was a finalist for the Silver Falchion at Killer Nashville--a very proud moment for me!

I hope next year brings more publications and many more sales!

(Links to all my publications are at the right and at http://kayegeorge.com/.)

Drones and Robots

The buzz, lately, has been the drones that Amazon plans to use to deliver packages. Not for few years and in a limited capacity. Still, it’s pretty 1984 stuff. Well, maybe 2084, but you know what I mean. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/02/amazon-drone-delivery-jeff-bezos-hype

and

http://www.the-digital-reader.com/2013/12/01/amazon-now-working-delivery-drones-video/#.UqfbovSrxKU

However, didyou know that Amazon is planning, more immediately, to use robots in the warehouses? 4 minute video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRg_1j-iWFU

Staples and Best Buy already use these! I had no idea.

Wall Street Journal article on this: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303330204579246012421712386

Amazon declines to comment.

Here are a couple of hilarious recordings of Samantha West, a telemarketing robot:

http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/12/10/meet-the-robot-telemarketer-who-denies-shes-a-robot/

These are great stories for science fiction writers. But what about people? Are we going to become obsolete. We can just sit around designing robots, I guess, and waiting for packages to be delivered from the sky.

free photo from http://www.morguefile.com/

Weather and the Writer

I’m sure that, if you’re a writer, you’ve used weather to set the mood or to impede your intrepid main character, or something like that.

But how do your own personal attitudes color your writing? If you love spring, do you use fall and winter--maybe even summer--for hostile settings? If you love fall, could you describe spring lovingly?

I love winter. I dwelt on the cold a lot in my one (so far) Neanderthal novel. In fact, one day I finished up a writing session that had gone on for two or three hours. I had been writing of the impending doom of the cold season and the scarcity of game. I had literally been shivering and my toes were icy. But when I woke up from writing, I was shocked to notice that it was the depth of August in Texas and it was, in fact, sweat-dripping hot out. When the sun coming in the window hit my eyes, I blinked, it was so bright after the darkness where I’d been.

Everywhere I’ve lived, April has been a lovely month. Spring is easy to like, tender blossoms and color bursting forth from ground that looked dead so recently. 

Autumn is gorgeous almost everywhere, too--everywhere that it occurs. That time of year gets my blood going. I can easily write about the colors of the trees and shuffling my shoes through the dry, crackling leaves.

Could I write about summer so lovingly? I’m not sure. We lived in Texas for nearly thirty years and each year, more and more, I dreaded the advent of summer. (There are only two seasons in Texas, after all: summer and another season that is not summer.) Now, living in Tennessee, I’m overjoyed at the frosty mornings and the fact that I can wear sweaters without discomfort. I even bought a pair of boots to wear with skirts. Heretofore, for many years, I’ve worn sandals nearly year round. 

What’s your favorite season, and how does that affect what you write?

Some seasonal poetry for your pleasure--here’s the Middle English poem about summer:

Sumer is icumen in,
Lhude sing, cuccu;
Groweth sed
and bloweth med,
And springth the wode nu;
Sing, cuccu!

Awe bleteth after lomb,
Lhouth after calue cu;
Bulluc sterteth,
Bucke uerteth,
Murie sing, cuccu!

Cuccu, cuccu,
Wel singes thu, cuccu;
Ne swic thu naver nu.

Sing, cuccu, nu; sing, cuccu;
Sing, cuccu; sing, cuccu, nu!

[Spring has arrived,
Sing loudly, cuckoo!
The seed is growing
And the meadow is blooming,
And the wood is coming into leaf now,
Sing, cuckoo!

The ewe is bleating after her lamb,
The cow is lowing after her calf;
The bullock is prancing,
The billy-goat farting,

Sing merrily, cuckoo!
Cuckoo, cuckoo,
You sing well, cuckoo,
Never stop now.

Sing, cuckoo, now; sing, cuckoo;
Sing, cuckoo; sing, cuckoo, now!]

Then there’s this parody by Ezra Pound:

Winter is icumen in,
Lhude sing Goddamm,
Raineth drop and staineth slop,
And how the wind doth ramm!
Sing: Goddamm.

Skiddeth bus and sloppeth us,
An ague hath my ham.
Freezeth river, turneth liver,
Damm you; Sing: Goddamm.
Goddamm, Goddamm, 'tis why I am, Goddamm,
So 'gainst the winter's balm.
Sing goddamm, damm, sing goddamm,
Sing goddamm, sing goddamm, DAMM.

poems quoted from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumer_Is_Icumen_In

pictures from morguefile.com

CHOKE Giveaway!

To celebrate my newest audio book, I’m giving away 5 free copies! This is an MP3 file, so you can listen to it just about anywhere*, on any device. Just comment on this page between today and Saturday the 23rd to enter. (If you have trouble commenting, you can email me at kayegeorge at gmail dot com instead.) (Here’s a little trick that helps me with the blurry codes--hit control and the plus sign to enlarge the screen. You can do it several times until the code is big enough to see. Keep track of how many times you do it! That way you can hit control and the minus sign to get your screen back to normal.)

If you don’t know anything about my Imogene Duckworthy series, I’ll give you the teaser.

Twenty-two-year-old Imogene Duckworthy has been waiting tables at Huey's Hash in tiny Saltlick, TX, itching to jump out of her rut and become a detective. When Uncle Huey is found murdered in his own diner, a half-frozen package of mesquite-smoked sausage stuffed down his throat, Immy, an unwed mother who has always longed to be a PI, gets her chance to solve a real crime.

There’s a sample at the site: http://www.amazon.com/Choke-An-Imogene-Duckworthy-Mystery/dp/B00GJG822M/. I think you’ll agree that my reader, Veronica Newton, had just the right voice for this book.

The reviews have been terrific. Here’s a snippet from one: How can such an off-the-wall funny mystery be so well written?

To see if you’ve won a copy, please check back on Saturday, either here, or by email. If you leave you email in the comment, I’ll contact you.

*Be careful about listening to this book at work or in public. You may end up laughing pretty loud.

NEW! CHOKE as an audio book

This project is finally complete! It took a few weeks after everything was turned in, but Amazon has approved my ACX project and my very first published novel has been read by Veronica Newton and is for sale at Audible.com.

If you’d like to listen to this book instead of read it on an e-reader or as a paperback, here’s your chance. You can pick it up at http://www.amazon.com/Choke-An-Imogene-Duckworthy-Mystery/dp/B00GJG822M/.

(Didn’t Karen Phillips at http://www.phillipscovers.com/ do a terrific job resizing the cover for audio?)

Please let me know if you like this version. Thanks!

Trimming

You may have been my facebook post on this, but I’ve been thinking more about this operation. Our neighbor had a very tall tree taken down today. A large limb had destroyed the garage roof, and this was just after the whole house had been re-roofed. The insurance company paid to finish taking the limb down, but the entire tree needed to be removed so it didn’t continue to fall on the house!

I’m afraid of heights, so the guy in the cherry picker fascinated me. I think they call it a bucket, though. The other impressive part of the operation was the choreography. The guy in the bucket would slash the limbs off, letting them fall gracefully to the ground--but with a loud thump (and probably some holes in the ground). At an unseen signal, he would quit cutting and the ground crew would step in and heft the logs to the wood chipper (great murder weapon, I was thinking). I watched and watched for communications between them, but they all seemed to just know when to get out of the way of falling limbs and when to gather them up.

Those are good writing lessons, aren’t they? Trimming out the dead wood--and pacing. When to step it up and when to slow it down.

The only worrisome part was the guy who kept a constant cigarette going around all that sawdust!