Sweet November Lilacs

My header sounds like a purple prose romance book title. I like it.

No lie, my lilac decided to bloom today. How lovely. Those fragrant flowers, three marigolds and three nasturtiums made me extremely happy. The garden is fading fast but my troopers keep on blooming despite the dreary weather.

Yeah, I do take my gardening way too seriously. We all need those little obsessions.

No Heroes Here

Oh dear. What have I done in my fantasy worlds? 

I realize I'm not creating heroes. I'm not crafting characters that are good or bad. I'm not writing about alpha males. 

I can't. If I did, I'd write lies because my characters don't speak to me in black and white. They use a pallet shaded across the gray zone, well, tinted with plenty of purple, but never cut and dried or good and evil. My first novella Canes and Scales swerved the closest to the "good and evil" story and, really, closest to having an alpha male in Prince Linden.

My one hero kills in order to exist. Another slides to the dark side in order to exist. He's fucking unhappy about his place in the world but he endures. Another is a demon in Hell.

Yeah, hmm, I do need to write a contemporary tale where the whole "good and evil" notion fades away.  Pffffth, I bet I'll twist something the wrong way.

 So it goes.

When Your Lead Character Starts Out as a Douche

Any sane writer appreciates five star reviews. An extremely welcome arrived in Goodreads, only the reviewer called the main character a "douche."

Deja Dei said:

I love the narrator's attitude! If you're tired of m/m books that are all very similar to each other and want something really different, read this. The narrator might seem like a douche at first, but he really is awesome if you stick with him. Best of all, he's unique, which sold me right away.

It's a lovely review. I do admit when I saw my character regarded as a douche, I stepped back and mutttered, "whoa there."

Is Amando a douche? Let's see, he's not a feminine product, in fact, he never goes near females. If Amando was a douche he'd run screaming for the horizon.

Yeah, come on, I know the slang isn't literal. I think of  douche as a, well, hold on, time to consult the Urban Dictionary:

a word to describe an individual who has shown themself to be very brainless in one way or another, thus comparing them to the cleansing product for vaginas.  Well there you go, I always regarded a douche as an opinionated ass, like the critters I encountered in corporate America. Brainless, eh? My mental jury is still out on if Amando deserves to be called a douche. An egotistical flake, absolutely.   Hey, at least Amando redeemed himself from absolute douchedom and that soars above all else.

My Mojo Has Returned from Vacation

Remember those Andy Roddick commercials a few years back where they kept talking about him losing his mojo then he lost in the first round of the US Open tennis series? Talk about ouch!

I feel a little like poor Andy. Last month my mojo wandered off a long, secret vacation and forgot to tell me. I was writing but only in fits and starts. The only project that moved along in true coherency was a free story I owed to a contest winner.

This weekend saw a return to tapping away in my nasty old manner. Solid chunks of time flowed past without me wandering off the path. I moved chapters from one spot to another. I saw serious plot problems. I'm sure I created other problems but the forward motion relieves me. 

Anyone know how to capture my current mindset and save it for when my mojo skips off to Bermuda again?

Geesh.

Divine Devine's Love Song

Directly on the heels of book number three comes book number four!

Divine Devine's Love Song is a radical sci-fi romance set in a blasted future. Yes indeed, a wicked corporation took over the US and blew it all to hell. Hmm.

In a world destroyed by nuclear mismanagement, a deformed young man named Trill finds an intact Netpad. Once he secures a working battery, he discovers a story penned by Sam Devine, a hacker who led a rebellion against the insane corporation BCM thirty years before.

Sam works for BCM out of necessity rather than choice. He despises the company for its lack of ethics and knows the best way to destroy it is from within. When a staff meeting opens with the torture of BCM’s captive enemies, Sam sees his chance: he lies to convince his bosses he wants to further degrade one of the warriors, a man named Pokatawer, and once Pokatawer is released to him, Sam finds they share common goals and lusts.

But Sam and Pokatawer are up against a hugely powerful corporation, and they’ll have to bring BCM to its knees to escape nuclear wrath and make a life for themselves somewhere outside the company’s grasp.

Devine is calling you to join his mission!