Category: Writing

Hit the road, Linda!

It’s almost NaNoWriMo Eve, boys and girls! And what does that mean? It means Linda has to get ready to write another novel during November as part of the annual self-flagellation ritual known as National Novel Writing Month! Yay!

This year’s novel will be a romantic comedy called Hit the Road, Jack! I’ve been doing a lot of planning for this novel…

Let’s see…

Basic plot points logged in the Plottr software… check!

Basic character sketches typed into Scrivener… check!

Book cover done and ready to use… check!

Scary horror movie reruns on repeat all through October… check!

Massive amounts of Halloween candy consumed until I want to throw up… che—WAIT! NO! I’m not ready!

I knew I was forgetting something! The chocolate! But I can solve this dire situation in plenty of time for NaNoWriMo Eve, thanks to socially distanced grocery pickup and a little bit of will power (so I don’t eat all the candy before the little brats—I mean, the cute kids in adorable costumes—get here next week).

Sure, they’re kinda cute, and sure, I’m gonna have bowls of candy ready for them, even if their costumes are just unwashed pajama pants and dirty, used N-95 masks, but they’re not getting my stash of Fun Size Hershey’s Miniatures!

Everybody knows that—after cheap liquor and cigarettes—chocolate and coffee are both classic novelist fuel. (Kinda like rocket fuel, only better tasting.)

So, once I’ve got my rocket fuel here alongside me, and once the little brats—I mean, cute little trick-or-treaters—are done nibbling away at my candy stash, I’ll be ready for NaNoWriMo 2020.

Because, after the year we’ve all had, what could go wrong? I figure sitting at a typewriter, hooking myself up to a coffee drip I.V., and inhaling chocolate for a month is a sort of mirror of the past six months anyway.

The power of storytelling

My two-year-old grandson, affectionately known as King Arthur, came to stay with us this past weekend. He’s at that fun age where he can finally communicate his wants and needs verbally (instead of simply grunting or pointing), and in most cases I can now figure out what he’s saying.

The “toy bomb” detonated within five minutes of his showing up. I’m still not sure why I purchased a set of a bajillion wooden blocks and a set of a gazillion pieces of plastic food, but they were all dumped out and spread across the living room floor as soon as the weekend started. Walking around the house for the next two days was like walking through a minefield.

But King Arthur has always been a cheerful, delightful kid, so I spent a lot of time down on the floor with him playing with those blocks and all that plastic food (which looks better than most of my actual cooking). When my back and my knees announced that enough was enough, I quietly hoisted myself up and watched him continue to play from the safety and comfort of the couch or my little recliner.

What struck me this past weekend was that even a two-year-old with limited vocabulary and verbal skills is drawn to telling stories. I caught him recreating The Three Little Pigs, with the toy basket and the block basket as “houses” he blew over as the Big Bad Wolf. The story starts about halfway into this minute:

He also told himself completely unique stories, with characters he moved around, anthropomorphic trucks and trains, and lots of smashing and crashes along the way (with proper toddler sound effects).

At the time I didn’t think much of this, but I’ve been marveling at it all week since he left. If you’re a fiction writer who wonders if storytelling has any relevance anymore—in this world of anger, divisiveness, disease, and turmoil—let me assure you: YES, YOUR STORIES MATTER. And they’re NECESSARY.

How do I know this now? Because one of the first things a child learns as they come into language skills is HOW TO TELL A STORY. I realized this weekend that a lot of what a two-year-old does when left to his own devices is to tell himself stories. Not just ones he’s heard, such as The Three Little Pigs, but ones he makes up himself.

Let that sink in. This is a human being who has only been in the world for two years. He’s had to learn how to feed himself, how to move himself around, how to help Mommy and Daddy dress him and change him, how to understand and also speak words and sentences (thereby learning how to understand ideas). He’s had to learn the physics of almost every move he makes. He’s had to learn EVERYTHING.

And yet, within two years of his arrival in Life, he’s already spending a good amount of time making up fictional stories.

Nobody told him to do this. Nobody coached him that this might be a good use of his playtime. He decided on his own to sit in my living room and tell himself stories.

I’m convinced that stories are built into our DNA, that we need them. And frankly, if there was ever a year and a time when we need the comfort of storytelling, THIS is it.

So, tell your stories. You’ve probably been doing it since you were a toddler. And right about now, we could all use a few good stories to get us through.

Stay safe, my friends!

You get a book! And you get a book!

Yay! Charlotte’s Website, the third book in the Red Ink Mysteries cozy series, is finally available for preorder here. If you order now, it’ll mysteriously drop onto your Kindle on May 22. I don’t know how that works. I think it’s some sort of magic. It scares me a little. And excites me too. Kinda like my husband.

For you old-school types, the print edition of Charlotte’s Website should also be available on May 22. Although this whole pandemic thing has meant no in-person book signings or book festivals, I can still send you an autographed bookplate sticker thingy to put inside a print copy of any of my books. Ask for one (or more!) here. I won’t even make you beg… much. Just remember: these are for print books. Don’t put a sticker on your Kindle. It will end badly.

Next week, you can easily (and economically) catch up on the entire Red Ink Mysteries series by taking advantage of sales on both of the previous books in the series. Can’t you feel the excitement?

https://amzn.to/35S1lAF <—-Find The Scarlet Letter Opener HERE!
https://amzn.to/35SDLDK <—-Find The Tell-Tale Heart Attack HERE!

Mark your calendar. Set an alarm on your phone. Tell all your friends. Throw a socially distanced party. Drive around your neighborhood with banners attached to your car.

Whatever you do, don’t miss these sales!

And while you’re buying and reading and buying some more, I’ll be feverishly working on more books. It’s not like I have anything better to do these days. It’s either more writing… or quarantine baking… or <shudder> housecleaning.

I’ll choose the writing every time.

And you, my friend, should choose to read. I can think of a few books you might be interested in…

34 Things You Didn’t Need to Know about Me

The more you know, the more you realize you didn’t want to know QUITE that much…

This survey has been circulating around Facebook, so I figured I’d post it here for the three or four of you left in the world who aren’t yet my Facebook friends.

1. Who are you named after?
Middle name: Mae, after my grandmother, whose awesome full name was Fannie Mae Hockenberry. I swear, with a name like hers, she should have been selling strawberry preserves.
First name: Linda, just because my parents liked it, especially once they realized their first choice, “Amy Au,” sounded silly. (This, coming from my mom, Ann Au, who doesn’t even have a middle name!)

2. Last time you cried?
Earlier today. I came home from a weird grocery shopping trip with a store full of just adults (not a child anywhere), none of whom were talking AT ALL, not even couples talking to each other. NOBODY TALKING. It didn’t bother me till I got home and was writing to someone else about it and busted out crying… I’m a very, VERY serious person most of the time, as you all know. (cough) The last time I cried before today was when we ran out of ice cream and the stores were all closed. (See? Very serious. I weight all personal tragedies equally.)

3. Do you like your handwriting?
What are we, in third grade? Here in my office alone I can see eight keyboards and ten typewriters. I type everything these days, so I don’t think I’ve even SEEN my own handwriting since the Reagan Administration.

4. What is your favorite lunch meat?
Don’t judge. Oscar Mayer B-O-L-O-G-N-A. (You know you just sang that. And you know you’re going to curse me at 2 a.m. when it’s still stuck in your head.)

5. Longest relationship?
Romantic? Then, depending on how you define it, either my husband Wayne… We’ve beaten my first marriage by 7 years so far, although calling it “romantic” after 20 years now means “date nights” at a casino buffet, where Wayne saying “Here’s fifty bucks. Let’s have some fun!” has a very different meaning than it would have when I was twenty… or, if imaginary relationships count, then Gene Wilder. (I SAID, DON’T JUDGE!)

6. Do you still have your tonsils?
Wait, let me check… gnnhgrrr grrrllllnnngggg… Yup. Still there. Whew, for a moment I thought somebody might have stolen them.

7. Would you bungee jump?
Is this a trick question? Because I don’t even like getting on a step-stool with more than two steps.Next question.

8. What is your favorite cereal?
Deep philosophical questions like this really confound me. I’d have to say either Cap’n Crunch original or Honey Bunches of Oats With Almonds (in spite of their ridiculous, clearly-too-literal name).

9. Do you untie your shoes when you take them off?
When I even wear shoes, NO. I’ve replaced every shoelace in every shoe I own with these rubbery things that look like shoelaces but that simply turn your tied shoes into slip-ons. Every pair of Chuck Taylors are now SLIP-ONS. This was a game-changer for me. I mean, like, Yes, There Is A God game-changer.

10. Do you think you’re strong-willed?
Only if you want me to be.

11. Favorite ice cream?
Black raspberry or Mint chocolate chip. On a good waffle cone, please. Aaaaaand, now I’m hungry. Aaaaand there is no ice cream in the house. Now I must cry for the second time today. (See question 2.)

12. What is the first thing you notice about a person?
These days, whether or not they’re six feet away. Before March 2020, whether they look like they have a sense of humor. If they do, I whip out the sarcasm and snarky jokes. If they don’t, I whip out even more sarcasm and snarky jokes. Win-win.

13. Football or baseball?
On TV? football. Live? baseball. Getting hit in the head? Wiffle ball.

14. What color pants are you wearing?
I beg your pardon? Any day of the year it’s _____ [fill in the blank with a color from black to gray] sweatpants. Well, except for summer when it’s hot. Then it’s _____ [fill in the blank with a color from gray to black] sweat shorts.

15. Last thing you ate?
Low-carb pizza on a cauliflower crust. Pray for me. I’m going to cry for the third time today. I hate this survey.

16. What are you listening to?
The latest episode of Outlander via Roku on the TV in my office. And the tinnitus ringing in my ears 24/7. Anybody’s guess which one has more of my attention at any given time.

17. If you were a crayon, what color would you be?
Having worked for Crayola in the distant past, I can definitely say it’s NOT PERIWINKLE. But it might be Burnt Sienna. Just… NOT PERIWINKLE. I’m having PTSD flashbacks from 1981 now.

18. What is your favorite smell?
Crayons, but that’s probably because of the previous question. Really, it’s freshly ground coffee. Or freshly minted money. Or freshly washed babies. Just not low-carb pizza on a cauliflower crust. (Four times.)

19. Who was the last person you talked to on the phone?
My brother on St. Patrick’s Day. (Hint: That was a week ago. DO NOT CALL ME ON THE PHONE.) He was checking in on our parents, who hadn’t answered their phone because, oddly, it never rang. Even more oddly, I was at their house when he called, and I told him they were fine. Even more oddly still, neither party wanted to actually talk to the other one so I hung up. Dysfunctional much?

20. Married?
Yes, so you’ll have to find some other poor shmoe to harass through your swipe-left-swipe-right app. I already have my own shmoe and we harass each other daily.

21. Hair color?
Until recently, Clairol Nice ‘N Easy #121. When I stopped coloring it, what was underneath was a lot whiter than I would have guessed. But it’s too late to go back now. Everybody’s seen it this way, and there are too many pictures!

22. Eye color?
Wait, let me check… Darn, that only works for tonsils… and genitals. (It’s more fun with the genitals than the tonsils, by the way, but the answer takes a lot longer.) I just dug out my driver’s license and it says brown eyes, so let’s go with that because “bloodshot” is apparently not an appropriate answer.

23. Favorite food to eat?
Wait… what am I doing with the OTHER foods if I’m not eating them??

24. Scary movies or happy endings?
Scary movies with happy endings. (Because happy movies with scary endings are just weird.)

25. Last movie you watched In a theater?
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, with my friend Crystal and her family here in Pittsburgh. Before that, wow… was it Gone With the Wind with my mother? (NO! NOT THE ORIGINAL SHOWING! I’m not THAT old, and neither is my mother!)

26. What color shirt are you wearing?
It’s always a _____ [fill in the blank with a color from gray to black] sweatshirt (today is gray) with a changeable T-shirt or raglan T-shirt underneath. (The layered look is still in, right?) Our freakin’ huge house has 12-foot ceilings and two furnaces so it’s always ch-ch-chilly in here. Even in August.

27. Favorite holiday?
Halloween, or, as I refer to it, NaNoWriMo Eve.

28. Beer or wine?
Neither. Sorry. Rum and Diet Coke, a.k.a. a Skinny Captain. Or a fruity bad-for-this-diabetic punch-like drink, preferably served to me with a tiny paper umbrella while I’m lounging on a lounge chair while I’m cruising on a cruise ship (just not the Diamond Princess).

29. Night owl or morning person?
If you’re asking if I like to stay up late and work, then night owl. If you’re asking when I like to actually go to bed, then morning person.

30. Favorite day of the week?
I might be the only person who answers this question with MONDAY. I love Mondays. Promise of a new week, and all that crap… yada yada puke. (Seriously, it’s Monday. Now put down those pitchforks!)

31. Favorite animal?
As pets, CATS. As critters in my back yard, fox squirrels. As just animals I wish I could have as pets, then maybe a panda or a sloth or a koala or a semi-sedated fox squirrel on Quaaludes.

32. Do you have any pets?
I have none of the animals listed in #31, sad to say. Instead, I have two 4-year-old asshole guinea pigs named Carl and Steve, who are biological brothers. Both are drama queens who act either like they’re starving or like you’re killing them. There is no in-between with the little tailless prima donnas.

33. Where would you like to travel?
In late March 2020, to a grocery store with toilet paper.

34. What are you working on at present?
THIS SURVEY. Haven’t you been paying attention to how this works??

Yoo hoo! Is this thing on?

I have been chained to my desk so long now that I’m starting to feel like a character in a depressing Charles Dickens novel. If a bunch of orphans in ratty clothes start gathering around me and singing in Cockney accents, I’ll know it’s time to find a way out of this home office.

Until then, though, let me do a brief run-down on my summer:

1. editing The Tell-Tale Heart Attack to death. It’s the second novel in The Red Ink Mysteries series. It nearly gave me a heart attack just trying to finalize this project and get it out the door. But, as of last week, OUT the door it went! If you haven’t read the first book, The Scarlet Letter Opener, that’s a fun place to start. I cut my teeth on mystery writing with that first one—and it’s kind of “mystery lite,” for lack of a less derogatory term. This second book was a lot more fun to write. Half the time even I didn’t know whodunnit. (Oh, that first book smells like it’s time to go on sale. Be on the lookout for that sale in a week or two.)

2. going on yet another cruise with the hubster. He wanted to enter Carnival’s big Grand Blackjack Tournament to see what that’s like, and since he won a free entry back in December, well, there we were, on another cruise ship in May. Great fun … but not a good time of year for me to be away from the desk for a week. (You know, the one I’m currently chained to.)

3. attending the St. Davids Christian Writers’ Conference in June. The yearly trek to Grove City, Pa., was (as usual) like a big writer-family reunion. Crazy-good fun with crazy-good people. As a board member, I had a lot of tasks to complete before conference started, including doing the booklet layout in time to have printed copies ready to take with me. There’s nothing quite like late nights, jazzed up on caffeine, gathering faculty data and troubleshooting layout issues with Amazon! I’m kidding: there are a LOT of things just like it, but most of them involve torture or stints in hell. And speaking of typesetting …

4. typesetting books for everybody but me. It’s a good thing I enjoy typesetting book interiors, because I’ve been doing those in my sleep lately. Some were for friends (we’re all debuting new books at Beaver County BookFest next month). Others were for a great cause and hobby of mine: TYPEWRITERS. You can pick up these amazing TYPEWRITTEN anthologies of what a non-digital world might look like here: Paradigm Shifts (which happens to also contain a story of mine) and Escapements. Both books are bargain-basement-priced, in order to get them into as many hands as possible. These projects were a labor of love. And although I thoroughly enjoyed working on them, squeezing these projects in after that crazy cruise was the result of copious amounts of caffeine and lots of loud grunge music at all hours. 

5. outlining and planning six new, shorter books in an upcoming new cozy mystery series, under a pen name! It’s been great fun finding a voice through my alter ego, Muriel Preston, who apparently writes cozies (shorter ones than I’ve been writing, so they’ll be churned out a lot faster). Her first series will be the Totally Tech series. Six covers ready to go!

      
6. heading back east soon for a few days of visiting family and outlining the six Muriel Preston cozies. Apparently I’m going to unchain myself from this desk, then drive six hours to the other end of Pennsylvania, only to chain myself to a completely different desk. Hey, whatever works! I love road trips. 


Once the autumn kicks in (not a moment too soon for me), things don’t slow down. I’m staring at Beaver County BookFest in early September, the AAUW Kitchen Tour in late September, a trip to West Virginia for a big book festival in early October (as an attendee this time), the yearly gathering of typewriter nerds (also in West Virginia) in late October, a few board meetings, and …

wait …
wait …

WHAT YEAR IS IT??

Who is Muriel Preston?

She’s younger than I am.
She’s prettier than I am.
And thinner. Much thinner.
She has gorgeous long hair, flawless skin, beautiful blue eyes, and keeps her nails long but still manages to type a lot faster than I do.

She drinks espresso shots throughout the day, listens to smooth jazz, used to be a chain-smoker until she quit cold-turkey about ten years ago, and joins the gym every January, though she stops showing up at all by March.

She’s been married—twice—but both times realized the guy was just too big a distraction from her work. Each of the men wasn’t surprised when she left. They’re all still good friends, and on rare occasions she’ll take them both out to dinner or a movie. At the same time. Then they all get creeped out about it and don’t have any contact for at least six months.

She is an enigma wrapped in a conundrum.
I, on the other hand, am a conundrum wrapped in bacon.

—

So, who is this mysterious Muriel Preston?

Well, okay… she’s me.

Starting this winter, the not-so-mysterious, nothing-like-me, completely fictitious Muriel Preston will start churning out light, short cozy mysteries. Just because she can.

My own cozy mystery series, The Red Ink Mysteries, is now officially two books long. (The Tell-Tale Heart Attack is finally available, folks.) The third book, Charlotte’s Website, is due out by Christmas.

But our new friend Muriel? She’ll be churning ’em out a lot faster. She has nothing better to do, after all. She lives for her work. Lucky for me.

Her first series, the Totally Tech Series, will contain five separate quick reads. I’ll update here as these become available. For now, take a gander at her tentative titles:

Vote for Secret Agent Manny!

Hey, gang! Do something for me, wouldja? Vote for Secret Agent Manny to win in the Mystery/Thriller category for the 50 Best Indie Books of 2018. Thanks to Readfree.ly for holding this contest!

VOTE HERE!

Thanks so much for taking a few minutes out of your crazy schedules to do a big favor for this pathetic little humorist, novelist, and scapegoat.

You guys are awesome. I love what I do, and I love taking you all along for the ride.

Secret Agent Manny

NaNoWriMo 2018: And so it begins…

Somehow, today starts my fifteenth year of participating in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). Somehow, I’ve completed the previous fourteen and won. Somehow, two of those books have become available to the public (here and here).

Will this fifteenth attempt turn into something Amazon-worthy? Only time will tell. But if Day One is any indication, I’m excited to see what happens this month. Wherever this new story takes me, I’ll be traveling there with my IBM Selectric II typewriter for the first draft, with my trusty NaNo Rhino cheering me on as a mascot. (I’d call him a muse, but he’s a bit of a jerk and doesn’t always like to help me solve plot dilemmas. He’s too busy eating leftover Halloween candy. Jerk.)

DSCN2431

Why a typewriter, you ask? Well, I’m glad you asked. (Actually, no, I’m not. I get tired of this question after the 237th time.) I use a typewriter because sometimes—just sometimes—you need to see the paper move. Physically move. And you need a device that makes it impossible to self-edit along the way. During NaNoWriMo—during any first-draft stage—you need to move forward, always forward.

Don’t look back! That’s what I hear when I listen to the hummmmmming of my Selectrics. They’re marvelous beasts for typing for long periods of time. I often have to tear myself away from the keyboard because it’s such a delight to use. Give me a Selectric keyboard over any computer keyboard any day.

If you’re participating in NaNoWriMo this year, leave a comment and tell me what your process looks like. Mine involves not only the Selectrics and the rhino mascot, but also copious amounts of caffeine, a lot of ’90s alternative music in the background, and a heavy reliance on voicemail.

 

Granny to a Weasel

If you’ve endured any amount of time around me, you know I’ve whined about wanting grandchildren for the past few years. Between us, Wayne and I have six grown kids. Three of them are married. You do the math. (It involves multiplying, of course.)

I was starting to wonder how many more of our kids we’d have to marry off before we started to see grandchildren. I mean, honestly, kids, what’s your rush? You’re only in your thirties! By the time I was your age, I was wrapping up the whole childbearing-years thing … and I had four of you by then! FOUR.

Not that I’m bitter or anything.

Who does a gal have to sleep with around here to get herself some grandchildren? (That was rhetorical. I know exactly who I had to sleep with to get myself some grandchildren.)

Okay, for now I’ll stop whining. Because this is all going in the book and I don’t want to spoil it too much. I’ll save the spoiling for the grandchild.

Yes, in a few weeks, dear reader, I’m going to be a grandma! My son and his wife are expecting, and she’s positively glowing. (And we’re the ones who live near the nuclear power plant, go figure.) I haven’t noticed if my son’s glowing or not. He’s a bit of an introvert and sometimes I’ve gone years without noticing him. Just ask him.

I think about my impending grandmahood all the time now. As for my beautiful grandchild’s parents, I’m trying to stay out of their way and not hover (and it helps that they live about fifty miles away), but boy, do I want to hover. I’m coining the phrase “helicopter grandma” now, before the baby’s even here. Because clearly it’s all about me.

My son sends me a text every week: a picture from some app that tells them what size their little offspring is this week, compared to some other animal. This week Li’l B’s the size of a Pomeranian. (Probably without the fur.) Last week I got a comparison picture of a skunk.

506

Before that, a chihuahua. Before that, a ferret.

Most of these were cute and funny. Around the middle of the pregnancy, though, they were just weird. The naked-tailed armadillo was a particularly troubling choice at the end of April.

463

Not to mention the slow loris in mid-March or the least weasel. (What the heck is a “least weasel”? I suppose it’s a compliment to say, “You’re the least weasel you can be.”)

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Naturally, I found guinea pig week (in mid-February) kinda cute. Of all the animal pictures, this was the only animal that was eating something. Clearly the artist has owned guinea pigs.

386

There were never any squirrels, though, which was a little disappointing.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yeah, the book.

It didn’t take long after hearing about the pregnancy last November for me to develop the urge to push. No, I don’t mean THAT. I mean, to push my opinions and wisdom on this poor kid. So, I started taking notes. Keeping a journal. Stuff like that. And what do writers do with a whole bunch of words when they think they’ve got ’em in the right order? They publish ’em.

So, sometime toward the end of this year, be on the lookout for my book of grandmotherly wisdom for this first grandchild (and any subsequent grandchildren we have … I HOPE YOU OTHER KIDS ARE LISTENING! Tick-tock, tick-tock). I’m fiddling with titles, and I already have my cartoonist, Mike Ferrin, on board for the cover art. The tentative working title right now is something like: Dress in Layers at the Casino … and Other Wisdom for My Grandchildren.

Because I’m nothing but classy all the time.

Slot_Machine_Queen

(photo: Slot Machine Queen, from Photobucket [@SatuS_albumi]

The Secret Is OUT!

It’s ready!
It’s available!
It’s for sale!
It’s… well, you get the idea!

What, exactly, is “it”? Well, see, it’s this little story. It kinda goes like this:

Bored empty nester Amanda Charles has too much time on her hands. After an “incident” at the house while Amanda is away, she begins to suspect that her husband, Manny, is not really an engineer, but is instead a spy… and she inadvertently turns their lives upside down in her quest to discover the truth. Does Manny really work at the nuclear power plant… or is he a spy? Does Manny really take endless trips to the hardware store for power tools and plumbing parts… or is he a spy?

Amanda enlists the help of two of her friends to find out what’s behind Manny’s increasingly suspicious behavior. And, she’s going to find out what’s going on if it kills her.

MANNY AVAILABLE RED BACKGROUND

And now, just in time for National Sea Monkey Day gift giving (What? Doesn’t everyone give gifts for National Sea Monkey Day? You totally should!), you can get your very own copy of Secret Agent Manny! Both the paperback and Kindle editions are available now!

You want the Kindle edition? Click here: Secret Agent Manny Kindle edition.

You want a paperback copy? Click here: Secret Agent Manny paperback edition.

You want 200 copies for your closest friends and family? Click here: No, seriously, click here!

I’m so excited about this book release I could wet my pants! Seriously, I—oh, dear, excuse me!