Hope, Love, and Peace: Thoughts of speaker and author J. Timothy King: Page 19

When high-school bad boy Derrick Weston returns after ten years, for his grandfather’s funeral, old rivalries and new robberies place him right in Ginger’s path — whether they like it or not.

I’ve been wanting to read one of Lazette Gifford’s books for a long time now, because she (like me) admires Holly Lisle’s work. So I took the opportunity to check out this novella, Return to Redlin, downloadable for free from Smashwords. She’s billed it as a contemporary romance, though I’m not sure where she’s going with it after having quickly whipped through chapter 1 this morning. Continue reading “Teaser Tuesdays: Return to Redlin”

Teaser Tuesdays: Ship of Magic

Not far from the Six Duchies lies Bingtown, hub of exotic trade and home to a merchant nobility famed for its liveships- rare vessels carved from wizardwood, which ripens magically into sentient awareness. Bingtown’s Old Traders, their wealth eroded by northern wars and the rapacity of southern pirates, now face an influx of upstart merchants who bring change to a complex society.

I first considered Robin Hobb when I noticed her blurb on the back of Talyn: “Yet again, Holly Lisle creates a world and society that completely absorbs the reader. An unflinching examination of relationships amidst a clash of societies. This is not your average fat fantasy book.”

Of course, I agreed with every word of that endorsement. So when I saw Ship of Magic in the Used Book Superstore, just one shelf above a Holly Lisle title (which I’ve been collecting), I took a closer look. The story sounded like it might engage me. And I figured, if Robin knows good stuff when she reads it, maybe sheâ€™s written some good stuff, too. Continue reading “Teaser Tuesdays: Ship of Magic”

Still Writing after All These Years

When I think about my plunge into the emotional smoothy-blender we call “writing fiction,” I usually credit an experience from late 2002 that inspired me to write a novel, tentatively entitled When the Sun Stood Still. (And aside from the fact that you can’t actually pronounce that title, I still like it.) I quickly discovered that I didn’t know the first thing about writing a novel. So I began studying fiction, writing short stories and such. And I have a long list of short stories from 2003 and 2004, some ridiculously unpublishable, others only half-finished, and a few that might have shown promise if only I had possessed half a clue what the hell I was doing.

So that was a healthy 8 or 9 years ago, long enough that now I clearly ought to know what I’m doing. (And whether or not you consider that my writing is still incompetent, at least I can comfort myself that I know what I’m doing and write that way on purpose.)

But over the weekend, I remembered a story attempt that predated When the Sun Stood Still by several years. Continue reading “Still Writing after All These Years”

Teaser Tuesdays: Fire in the Mist (again)

I’m about 85% through Fire in the Mist, one of Holly Lisle’s earlier titles published by Baen Books. (And now available electronically from the Baen Free Library.)

Holly throws the plot a curve ball at around page 210, and breaks one of the premier “rules” of storytelling. And I’m loving it! Unfortunately, I can’t tell you any more than that, because it would give away the story.

Today’s teaser, from page 219 (randomly selected by Random.org) of Fire in the Mist: Continue reading “Teaser Tuesdays: Fire in the Mist (again)”

Spring in New England

This morning, a radio ad began, “Now that the beautiful spring weather is here in New England…”

Ha! Good joke! Especially for April Fool’s. That made my day.

You see, God sometimes has a bizarre sense of humor. One year, for April Fool’s, he allowed me to get laid off from my job, and so began my end in that industry. (Seriously.)

This year, on April the 1’th, he sent snow. Actually, more like slush falling from the sky. It collects on the trees, which then take great pleasure in shelling you with it as you pass under. So, all of nature is in on the joke. They got me really good this morning, hit my car dead-on with a slush-balloon, and I nearly jumped out of my skin.

“Hit!” I swear I heard them laugh in the distance.

So today, I thankfully reproduce the speech of Mr. Samuel L. Clemens on New England weather, as reported by the New York Times, December 23, 1876.

-TimK Continue reading “Spring in New England”

Easy to Be a Good Customer

When I first met Jeffrey Tanner, fictional costar of my short story “The Widow’s Granddaughter,” he told me, “Nice guys finish last.”

I didn’t believe him then, and I still think he was seriously misguided. Fortunately, that character discovered that there is much more to life than alpha-male-ism.

What an appropriate memory for the days around Purim, which fell this year on this past Sunday. Purim is the Jewish celebration of the story of Esther, in which the nice guys actually saved the day, and the get-ahead-no-matter-what villain got what he had coming to him. What goes around comes around, as they say. And there’s some truth to that, despite our base instincts to the contrary.

(If you’re not familiar with the tale, you can read the story of Esther in any Bible or Jewish Tanakh.)

And what originally brought this thought to the forefront, a frustrating, transforming experience last Wednesday, which really brought this principle into focus. Continue reading “Easy to Be a Good Customer”

Whipped into a Feeling Frenzy

Sharks are infamous for the feeding frenzy. They smell blood, and they lose control. All their instincts go on high alert. They turn into a finely tuned hunting machine, with one goal, to eat the kill.

Other animals, too, have their frenzies. The predator hunts, and the prey runs. Instinct tells them to panic, and that’s exactly what they do. The adrenaline pumps. The muscles engage. All of the creature’s strength and brain power directs itself toward one goal, whether to kill or to avoid being killed.

And humans are no different. Continue reading “Whipped into a Feeling Frenzy”

Running on Coffee Fumes

This past week has been the busiest writing week in a long time.

I’ve decided to focus more of my effort at my writing blog, including posting each morning a link to an interesting article along with my comments. Most afternoons, I’m still posting a writing article there, too. It’s been exceptionally easy to come up with compelling extra content reading through my RSS feeds, but we’ll see how long it lasts before my brain implodes.
I finished a new story, “Perhaps to Dream,” about a woman who is even busier and sleepier than I am. Unfortunately, her solution to the problem I do not have available to me.

Continue reading “Running on Coffee Fumes”

Teaser Tuesdays: Chasing Beth Rider by Ellen C. Maze

Can writing a bestseller be dangerous? Christian author Beth Rider’s 2nd vampire novel hit number 1. Sheâ€™s flying high, until confronted by an evil she’d only experienced in nightmares. Jack Dawn, a supernatural monster belonging to an ancient race of bloodthirsty immortals, â€œmarksâ€ the young writer because of her bookâ€™s redemptive effect on his people, leaving her racing for life.

I’m reading Rabbit: Chasing Beth Rider at the request of Linda Boulanger, the fine lady behind TreasureLine Books, who is responsible for bringing this book to market and who also got me a complimentary ebook for review. Rabbit is the first in Ellen C. Maze’s “Rabbit” series of “curiously spiritual vampire tales.” Continue reading “Teaser Tuesdays: Chasing Beth Rider by Ellen C. Maze”

I Am Such a Geek (The Star Trek: TNG Trivia Game)

One of the quip-hits from an ebook I’m putting together for Read-an-ebook week, Catnapping for a Living: Humorous Sketches and Tails (because I don’t have enough time to think of a better title):

“Tomolok the Romulan is dead now, you know. But heâ€™ll always be Gâ€™Kar to me. I am such a geek.”

And if you don’t get that, don’t worry: it just means you’re normal.

So anyhow, this past weekend, my brother pulled out of my parents’ basement the old Star Trek: The Next Generation Trivia Game. Yes, this thing actually existed, and yes, we actually tried to play it. (Update: And OMG, you can still get it. I guess they just couldn’t sell out of these back in the 90’s.) It was kind of a cross between Trivial Pursuit, Battleship, and the old, original Star Trek computer game from the 1970’s. Continue reading “I Am Such a Geek (The Star Trek: TNG Trivia Game)”