by john | Apr 25, 2012 | Fiction, Writing
This time, Bubba hunts La Chupacabra! Here’s a little preview of the new Bubba story, on sale this weekend!
It was the middle of the night, and I was crouched in a damp, smelly field waiting for something the happen. This wrapped a lot of my least favorite things all up in a nice little ball of suck for me to gnaw on. I hate waiting. I’m a man of action, as they say. I like to do stuff, not wait around to do stuff. Now I’ll admit that some of the stuff I do sucks, like chasing down zombies, or werewolves, or fighting witches or ghouls or vampires or pretty much anything else that goes bump in the night. But it’s a damn sight more entertaining than sitting around waiting for something to show up for me to kill. Especially when I don’t know what I’m waiting on. Waiting to me just seems like a great big waste of my precious drinkin’ time.
I hate being wet, too. I’m a big dude — six-five and a good bit past three hundred pounds. And every damn inch is covered with hair. I got a ponytail that hit me halfway down my back, a beard that reaches almost down to my chest, and a pretty good suit of man-fur everywhere else. I ain’t one of these billboard pretty boys that’s got nowhere for a tick to hide on their cute little manscaped six-pack abs. I got a whole great big fuzzy pony keg of a belly, and that all makes it pretty uncomfortable when I’m rolling around in the cold damp grass. And it takes forever and about three big towels to dry off. I tell you, it’s just irritating.
And as much as I am a bonafide country boy, I’m not a big fan of the smells of nature, if you know what I mean. And this field was full of some impressively natural smells. I much prefer the kind of smells that come from a bottle. Like the sweet, soothing smell of Jack Daniels. Or the glorious lavender-scented cloud of stripper perfume. I once heard a fella say “they call it Destiny, but it smells like shame.” I disagree. It smells like the hopes and dreams of desperate men and women smart enough to take advantage of them. I love strippers, they have an uncomplicated view of life. You give them money, they show you boobies. I have a similarly uncomplicated view of life — monsters need to be killed, I kill ‘em.
And that’s why I was stuck in a damp, smelly field in the middle of the night miles away from the scent of whiskey or the sight of a boob. I had a monster to kill, and as long as the critter was playing shy, I was stuck out there freezing my ass off and bitching to Skeeter over the Bluetooth. Skeeter’s my backup, my technical liaison, my navigator and my best friend. He’d appointed himself my best friend since the day I kept Jason Skoonfield from running his underpants up the flagpole in middle school. I probably wouldn’t have stopped Jason from having a little bit of innocent fun, but since Skeeter was still wearing his underpants I thought that was a little over the line. So me and Skeeter struck up an unusual alliance. I kept him from getting killed for being the only black kid in our school, not to mention the only gay kid and the smartest kid in three counties, and he made sure I passed algebra and got out of high school. Even the principal thought it was a fair trade. He was pretty tired of replacing all the desks that couldn’t hold me, and he didn’t want to deal with the paperwork if Skeeter ended up dead. So he didn’t ask about my grades, and I didn’t tell.
“Skeeter, you remember when Jason Skoonfield was gone run your drawers up the flagpole in tenth grade?” I asked the air.
Skeeter’s disembodied voice came back in my ear. “It was one of the most traumatic experiences in a traumatic youth, Bubba. Of course I remember it. It may have been the pinnacle of my humiliation in that vile institution they called a school. Why do you bring that up now?”
“You know I get all philosophical-like when I’m stuck out here smelling cowpies and staring up and the stars. You ever wonder where we’d be if I hadn’t stopped Skoon and his buddies?”
Skeeter’s voice got very quiet. “I do, Bubba. Sometimes I do, but I try not to think about that too much. And you shouldn’t either, we’ve got a job to do.”
I knew where he was going, and it wasn’t a road I wanted to go down right then. Or ever, for that matter. I looked down at the glowing face of the child’s Mickey Mouse watch and thought back to happier days. Then I gave myself a shake and answered Skeeter. “Yeah, but what the hell is the job, Skeeter? I’m freezing off my danglies out here and ain’t heard nothing all night.”
“You know the monster’s been feeding every third night, and this is the only herd that hasn’t been attacked this month. So if there really is a chupacabra somewhere around here, this is the best spot to find it.”
“Yeah, it’s a pretty damn good spot to get a frostbit sack, too.” I grumbled. “You got it easy, sitting there in your nice warm little command center. Remember, I was on a lake just a few days ago in flip-flops and no shirt, and supposed to be there for another four days. Instead, I’m fully dressed in long pants, a leather jacket and a sweater and I’m still freezing my ass off!”
I heard a sharp intake of breath as Skeeter started to reply, but I cut him off with a hiss. “Shut up, I think I hear something.” There was a rustling sound coming from the fenceline a few feet away. I crept over in the direction of the sound and suddenly realized that the source of the sound was a cow. I got to within three feet of the beast before I could make out its shape in the moonless night, then I scrambled backwards as quickly as I could as the cow unleashed the most terribly stench I’d ever experienced right in my face.
“Skeeter you sonofabith a cow just farted on me!” I screeched into the earpiece, trying to get away from the cloud of methane that was wrapped around my head. I heard Skeeter laughing uncontrollably in my ear as I worked hard not to vomit.
“You know I’m gonna kill you when I get out of here, right?”
“I don’t make the assignments, Bubba, I just send you the emails.” He sounded dangerously close to hyperventilating, and I was dangerously close to walking off the job when I heard the scream.
If you’ve never heard a goat scream, you should do everything in your power to keep it that way. It’s a sound like nothing on earth, kinda like a mix of a human scream with a deeper tone than any human can make, and it can carry for miles. It chilled me to the bone, and put my butt in gear. I started running for the sound, drawing Bertha, my fifty-caliber Desert Eagle as I went after the monster. When I got there, I stopped dead in my tracks at the scene in front of me.
This was not what I had come here to hunt.
by john | Apr 23, 2012 | Writing
No, not like that, you pervs. I just wanted to knock out a quick update on my whereabouts and doings before I head home from Nashville. This makes a good halfway point between Batesville, Arkansas and Charlotte. I was in Arkansas for the first time ever for the 2012 Pulp Ark convention, where I got to make some new friends, hang with old friends and learn more than I ever wanted to know about Lamont Craston and the rest of the pulp heroes of old. If you missed me on the Pulped! podcast, you should go listen to that – Tommy Hancock and I had a great time recording it.
I’m still having a great time working on the Black Knight Omnibus (out this summer!) and Black Knight IV – Paint it Black (out late summer/early fall). I’m learning a ton through the process of working with this publisher and editing team, and I’m sure there’s more to come. We’re polishing all three of the early Black Knight novels, brushing up on some continuity things I screwed up the first time, cleaning up some bad writing habits that I had in Book 1 that I’ve worked my way out of by Book 3, and generally making the books tighter, cleaner and better. I think there will be enough new going on in the Omnibus that even if you’ve read all the books, you’ll find something fun in there. And I’m trying to figure out what kind of little bonus content I can put into the Omnibus for the folks that buy it – maybe an exclusive short story or something like that.
That sound? That was my editor’s head esploding from the concept of editing another short story from me in addition to the revisions on THREE NOVELS in time to make the release dates for this omnibus :). That’s what writers do, we don’t just torture our characters and readers, we torture our editors, too. Love ya!
But I haven’t forgotten the Bubba fans. I’m halfway through the next Bubba short, and it should be finished, polished and uploaded THIS WEEK. I make no promises when this week, but Bubba the Monster Hunter: Hall & Goats will hit before April leaves us, I swear it. And I’ve got more Bubba news – next month you’re going to get more Bubba than you can shake a stick at (I’ve never understood that phrase). Not only will I do a new May Bubba short story, but that will give me four Bubba stories since I released Monsters Beware. That means it’s time for a new four-story Bubba Collection! And with eight Bubba stories under my belt, I think it’s time for a Bubba the Monster Hunter PRINT COLLECTION!
That’s right, kids. Come find me at a con in June or July – ConCarolinas, HeroesCon, Fandom Fest or LibertyCon – and I’ll have a Bubba the Monster Hunter print collection available! I’ll also have print copies of Genesis at those cons, because I’m going to spend May holed up in my office editing, formatting and writing. When I’m not in a theatre, but anyway.
So that’s the news that’s printed to fit for today. See you in the funny books!
by john | Apr 10, 2012 | Book Spotlight, Writing
Tamsin Silver is an old friend of mine, and I’m happy to lend her this space (and it means I don’t have to come up with a blog post!)
I love being a Fantasy writer. What a fun genre to write in. I’ve attempted to write Crime…and I can do a downright awesome beginning, but blimey, I cannot get past that. Hats off to J.D. Robb and those other folks that write Crime, like Richard Castle. What? He’s not real? Oops, my bad. 😉 (Nathan Fillion, you’re real to me🙂
I’ve been writing stories since I was…ten or eleven (we will NOT say how long ago that was…but I will say I wrote them on an electric typewriter.*shudders*) and I’ve been often told, “Write what you know.” So, when I was redoing my series, Living Dead Girl, a few years ago I set them in the Goth/Industrial scene seeing as I’ve been in that since 1989 (*cough cough* please don’t do the math). We used to always joke that the real vampires could hide in the goth/industrial scene easily since so many “posers” and “wannabes” were there, no one would know the difference. Thus the background for my series was born.
Originally, my series was going to be this love story between a vampire and a witch. Then I set the book down to finish college, become a teacher, run a theatre company, move to NYC, and produce theatre. But one New Years I made a resolution to finish it. As I reworked it, the characters took over. Atlanta fell in love with someone else, the primary plot changed, and I was stuck sitting there going, “Where did my original story go?” Then I thought, “Who cares?”
From that point on I’ve written without an outline. I just let the characters take me on a journey. From what I understand, this is not normal practice. And, it very likely is why I have to do a lot of revision and cuts, but I enjoy the adventure my characters take me on.
That journey got a wakeup call one day when a YA vampire movie, that shall not be named, was all people could talk about. I worried, “What if it’s my story?” So, on a Friday afternoon off, I went to see said movie the day it opened (I was one of 4 in the theatre) and saw that it was NOT my story, not by a long shot. HOWEVER, it made me realize…someday it might be. If I wanted my story out there, I needed to take my dreams seriously.
I sat down to finish The Betrayal (the first book in The Living Dead Girl Saga) and began to shop it around. I told myself I had two years to get a bite on this book or I’d consider going to grad school. Thankfully, I did get a bite, and in October of 2011, Eirelander Publishing released The Betrayal as an e-book. The second book of the saga, Shattered, is in edit now, and hopefully will hit e-book “stores” this summer!
Speaking of October, I was lucky enough to be interviewed at NYC Comic Con this October by the talented and lovely Ana Catris (Link to Interview: http://is.gd/sIbCn1 ). The audience of that online publication is primarily Young Adults. Now, my books fall under the 17+ age range so I’m not used to getting YA feedback. So I asked Ana what they had to say. She told me that they felt the interview made me sound normal, like anyone else they would know, giving them hope for their own writing. That made me supremely happy to hear.
If you have a dream, be it writing, theatre, dance, drawing, graphic design, etc. You should go forth and do it! If you have an original idea, let the world know about it! Have the confidence in yourself. I didn’t have that confidence for ten years and this book sat printed on paper, in a drawer, bouncing about with me from SC, to NC, to NYC. And thankfully I saw that sparkling vampire movie, because it put a boot on my ass…and my simple “love story” became a story of self discovery, strife, love and standing up for what’s right. It’s an adventure not only for those who read it, but for me as well. I couldn’t be happier.
I pray that you pursue what you love. It makes all the difference.
Take care and happy writing! If you are interested in asking me anything…find me on Twitter…I lurk there often! Username: @tamsinsilver
xo
Tamsin J
P.S. If interested, you can snag an e-copy of my book by going to my website: www.tamsinsilver.com and if you don’t have an e-reader, the book will be out in print through Amazon Print On Demand by the end of March, 2012.
For fun, if you like my characters, there are pictures of them here: http://tamsinsilver.com/photogallery-2.php as well as info on each of them on my blog: http://tamsinsilver.blogspot.com/
by john | Apr 6, 2012 | Vegas, Writing
It’s taken all week, but I finally think I’m getting the hang of this new life. Last week was all about figuring out just how much other shit can eat into my day when I don’t have a day job. This week has been about actually getting shit done.
So far this week I’ve –
Finished and submitted a short story to a steampunk anthology
Finished the novella about the teenage assassin, Cindy Slaughter (now a nickname based on your preferences)
Gotten to within spitting distance of finishing the rough draft of Black Knight IV: Paint it Black. I’m well into Act III of the book at this point, and expect to be done with it before I fly to Vegas next Friday.
Written more words of fiction than I did in all of March. Not that my word count for April is impressive (about 22K so far), but March sucked out loud, what with travel and illness and all that jazz.
Finally gotten around to listing the Big Bad anthology with Duotrope. If you’re a writer and you’re submitting work to anthologies and magazines, Duotrope is the best resource in the world. And now that I’ve listed the anthology on there, I’ve gotten more submissions in 48 hours than I did in the first 12 weeks submissions were open.
Gotten back to reviewing submissions for Red Dirt Review. I’d gotten ahead, then gotten behind again. Now I’ll spend time this weekend catching up.
Registered for the NAB conference so that I can get this marketing business rolling.
Edited a revision of Genesis that I should have done before I put the book on sale. But I suck, so that didn’t happen.
Planned out bad guys for the next dozen or more Bubba stories, insuring that I have no BS writer’s block excuse to keep me from churning words with that character.
Started planting the seeds for a longer Bubba story, or at least a bigger arc that explains how he came to be a Monster Hunter, what makes him the way he is, and why he likes strippers so much. But really, there are pretty obvious reasons he likes strippers. They’re called boobs.
Next on the plate is dealing with COBRA, getting a crown on one tooth (yay!), dealing with cashing out my 401(k) (yes, I know the penalties, but I also know what I make and how long it will take for my income to catch up to my expenses, so cashing out the 401(k) is a big part of this career change plan, and getting on the artist’s calendar to get my phoenix tattoo finished up.
Then I go to Vegas next Friday. Lemme know if you’ll be there then, we should grab a drink.
by john | Apr 4, 2012 | Appearances, Promos/Giveaways, Real Life
Check out the widget for the winners! Entering enough times to flood the system certainly worked for JK, who picked up one of EVERY PRIZE! Thanks to everyone who entered, I appreciate your help in spreading the word about my work. I’ll be doing another giveaway in the next few months, so stay tuned for that! All the books will go out by mid-next week, because I leave for Vegas at the end of the week, and want to get all that off my plate before I fly.
I’m still adjusting to life without a day job. I still sit in front of a computer for most of the day, and it still starts at about the same time, but I will admit that there are days that I don’t put on pants until well after noon. This being one of those days. It’s a perk, I’ll admit it. I broke down and bought a new MacBook Air, which I love. It’s crazy fast, and all my stuff transferred over almost seamlessly using Migration Assistant. The only thing it looks like I lost was the saved games in Zuma’s Revenge, so I guess I’ll just have to make my little frog burp up a lot more balls and reclaim my accolades.
Still working on the weight thing – I’m cutting back on portions and cutting back on sodas, so I think I’ve lost a few pounds. Nothing spectacular, but it’s a slow process. I figure in this time of life change if I can lose a couple pounds a month that’ll be a miracle, especially as much as I’m traveling over the next few weeks.
To that end, here’s a list of where I’ll be the next few months if you want to say hello. If you live in any of these areas and want a hard copy of a book, let me know and I’ll pack some, even if I’m not coming to a book show. And I’m always happy to meet folks in a bar or casino to chat about writing, the characters, whatever. If you’re interested in meeting me and hanging out, please don’t be shy. I love to talk about writing, literature, all of it.
April 13-17 – Las Vegas, Nevada – National Association of Broadcasters. I’m staying at the Excalibur and plan to play the Venetian Deep Stacks on Saturday and Sunday. Then I’ll be pitching my new marketing firm at NAB during the week. I’m totally available for drinks in the evening.
April 20-22 – Batesville, Arkansas – Pulp Ark 2012. I’m driving for two days to get to this convention featuring the best new pulp writers and fans in the nation! Come on out if you’re in the Mid-South area. I’ll be stopping in Nashville on the way, so if you wanna get a beer there, let me know.
April 27-29 – Wilkesboro, NC – Merlefest. The only exception to the “I’ll bring books anywhere” rule. I’ll be on a mountain listening to boogie. You’re welcome to listen with me. And chat. But there’s no booze at the festival, and I’ll conduct no business there. It’s a family vacation, and a semi-holy spot for me. You’re all invited, it’s a great time. But no business that weekend :).
May I’ll be buried in a couple of theatres. I’m designing 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee for Theatre Charlotte, then I go straight into the theatre for the Blumey Awards, a new awards show the big performing arts center in town is hosting to celebrate regional high school theatres. That’s got me booked most of the first three weeks of May.
June is back on the con circuit, kicking off with ConCarolinas here in Charlotte June 1-3. I’ll be hanging out with my Magical Words friends and plenty of other cool folk, so come on by! It’s an excellent mid-sized con for writers.
June 22-24 I’ll be at the Charlotte Convention Center for HeroesCon 2012, one of the largest comic book conventions in the US each year. I’ll be sharing a table with Stuart Jaffe and Tamsin Silver, so come say hi! I’m counting on them to wrestle me to the ground and keep me away from the other vendors so I might actually make a profit this year instead of spending all my money on comics.
Then at the end of June I’m heading to Louisville for what is shaping up to be one of the best cons of the year – Fandom Fest. Stephen Zimmer is putting together some of the best panels I’ve ever seen at a con, and the guest list is super-badass! With guests of honor like Richard Kadreay (Sandman Slim), Ernest Cline (Ready Player One), Robin Hobb (too many to list), Jim Hines, Julie Kagawa and others, not to mention media guests like Bruce Campbell, James Marsters and Sean Astin, this is going to be an awesome show.
That gets me to the July 4th weekend, when I plan to collapse for a few days. I’m currently only scheduled for one con in July and then DragonCon, so I might be looking for a beach house to hole up in and write for the month of August. Hope to see you around one of these events!