HNT - Dark Is Not Enough

I've been reading the electronic version of Necrotic Tissue since it first came out in January 2008 and have quite enjoyed each issue. It has been a fun, quirky and visually appealing magazine with some fine chilling short stories in it.

The editorial team has done a great job of keeping to their mandate of putting together a nice package for fans of horror fiction while supporting horror writers not only by offering a paying market but by striving for quickly turned-around personal rejections. (IE, helpful comments on why a story wasn't chosen rather than "blank" form rejections)

After six successfully received electronic issues, Necrotic Tissue will be coming out in print format. Their July 2009 issue will be the first print copy of the magazine. And I'm delighted to be one of the contributing authors to that issue, with my short short "Less of a Man."

While my pay for this story will come upon publication, I was delighted to receive a Necrotic Tissue t-shirt in the mail yesterday. It seems I completely forgot that, upon acceptance of my story, the editor asked for my t-shirt size, because all contributors, on top of their pay, get a snazzy t-shirt with the Necrotic Tissue logo on the front "...dark is not enough" on the back and "Published" in a tiny script on the left arm. The t-shirt is just really neat, and an extremely nice touch.

Good timing, too. Since I'm an author guest at EerieCon 11 this coming weekend in Niagara Falls, NY, I'll be delighted to wear this t-shirt and do my small part to help spread the word about this fun new small press magazine. The great thing is that people can check out the fine quality of the first six back issues in electronic form (available in both a high resolution and low resolution format) before they subscribe. Go check it out.

When Technology Fails

There was an interesting article in The New York Times this past weekend that talked about how technology is making certain plot devices obsolete. Devices such as having to isolate a character, the inability to reach or contact someone, misunderstandings, etc.

It's a great article that covers some fascinating moments in literature. Author M.J. Rose is quoted in the article as talking about the fact that if a character missed a train in 1888 or even 1988, there was no way to contact the person at the other end, so they were likely to think you either changed your mind, had been captured, weren't able to escape, etc. But in 2009, Rose says, you simply whip out your cell phone or text the person that you're going to be late.

Given our socially connected world, it's a somewhat challenging thing to achieve. Isolation. Missed communications.

Interestingly enough, I faced the opposite challenge with my novel MORNING SON (which I had originally wrote half a dozen years ago and am currently revising) -- I needed to have a character traveling north of Sudbury, Ontario and being out of cell phone contact in certain scenes, yet have cell phone contact in others. My challenge was, at the time I originally wrote the story, there was NO cell phone signal anywhere near the town of Levack. But for the story, I manufactured the fact that there was a signal available in town, yet when the character travels north on highway 144, he loses his signal and therein lies a bunch of important missed phone calls.

Fortunately enough, reality caught up with me and currently, you DO get a cell phone signal in the town of Levack, yet there are spots as you head north on Highway 144 where the signal drops off.

Which is really good, because, Erratic Cycles, a story I had published originally in 1999 and which was reprinted in my book One Hand Screaming, relies on the fact that the main character's cell phone is useless to him when his car breaks down in the middle of the night on a deserted stretch of Highway 144.

So far, technology hasn't rendered THAT particular story unbelievable.

But I suppose that currently, in order to create isolation, there needs to be some sort of technological failure. Some sort of Kryptonite-laden circumstances that renders a technology useless for the convenience of isolation. However, nomatter how technology continues to progress and allow us ways to connect, I'm sure that writers will continue to devise new ways for people to misunderstand one another or establish isolation.

After all, technology changes, but plot devices abide.

Writer's Block - A Serious Illness

I found this embedded video on mb's blog. It's an episode of Steve Patterson's That's Not Debatable. Steve is the host of The Debaters on CBC Radio. You can see more episodes of TND as well as other hilarious clips on You Tube.

I have long argued that there is no such thing as Writer's Block, that I don't believe in it and that perhaps it's just a convenient excuse writer's use so we don't look like lazy asses.

But I just love the way that Patterson sums up his view of Writer's Block perfectly in just over one minute.

HNT - Inspired

A week or so ago, Francine ran in Around The Bay, North America's oldest road race which takes place every spring right here in Hamilton. As I'd mentioned, she continually inspires me.

Fran and I used to run together, many years ago. We had completed a 5K race together many years back (The CIBC Run for the Cure in support of Breast Cancer) When Alexander was born, I kind of fell out of running. But she kept at it, and has continually improved and inspired me.

Another inspiration was Alicia Snell's story -- the one she tells in her riveting book: Me Minus 173: From 328 Pounds to the Boston Marathon. In it, Alicia describes how at the age of 42, she decided to make a life altering choice of eating healthy and exercising -- which led to losing 173 pounds in 15 months and shortly after completing the Boston Marathon. Ten years later, Alicia has run 18 marathons. If you've ever wanting to change your life for the better (whether it's lose weight, stop smoking or whatever), Alicia shows that it can be done with a bit of conviction, determination and goal setting -- get your hands on her phenomenal book and you will NOT be disappointed.

Now back to me.

I turn 40 next month.

I thought it would interesting if I did something neat and fun to mark the milestone occasion.

Late last summer, after a minor health scare, I finally decided to do something about some extra poundage I was carrying around. Based on my BMI, I was 40 pounds overweight. So in the period of about three months (from August to December 2008), I lost 30 pounds. Since then, I've been fluctuating the final 5 to 10 pounds on and off, back and forth, teeter-totter.

To lose the initial 30 pounds, all I really needed to do was take a bit of care in what I was eating. No, I didn't become a health food maniac -- I simply watched what I ate, tried to follow Canada's Food Guide (which mostly meant trying to increase my intake of fruits and vegetables) and took Francine's advice to stop shoveling food indiscriminately into my mouth. (Yes, imagine Homer Simpson when he sees a pile of donuts -- that's me -- or, it was me. I'm still tempted to devour a whole box of donuts whenever they're presented to me -- but I now tend to curb it down to one, or perhaps two, maybe three) But making decisions such as "sure, I'll have the extra donut today, but next time I'll skip desert" goes a long way to providing balance while still allowing me to slip and have fun non-healthy treats.

In any case, I turn 40 next month and I still have this extra 5 to 10 pounds -- and I don't feel I'm in as good shape as I can be. So I thought perhaps a return to running would be in order. The regular exercise would likely help me control those last few pounds. And, after all, I want to still be able to play with Alexander and perhaps keep up with him for at least the next 10 to 15 years. That, and I really want to be around for a long time (am I asking too much for just another 40 years?) to watch my son grow.

So, running is fun. Besides, with an mp3 player strapped on, I can listen to more audio books and get more reading done. Thus, running serves two purposes -- tunes the body, informs the mind.

To give myself a "okay, you're 40, do something cool" goal, I thought it might be fun to run in the upcoming 10K Mud Run in Toronto. It takes place in June and at the end of the 10K of hills, river crossings, climbing walls and going through and over various obstacles, you end with a rump (or dive) through a giant mud pit. Sounds exactly like my cup of tea.

I've got two months to train for it and I started last Sunday. My legs actually stopped hurting late yesterday from Tuesday night's run -- which means I'm getting better at it so far. But I still have a long way to go.

So to inspire me, I've got this picture of Francine that was taken in this year's Around The Bay Road Race. Okay, it was a cold, very rainy morning, yet Fran looks awesome in this pic -- she looks more like she's out for a mid afternoon stroll than running 15K soaking wet.


Of course, to remind myself that I need to be doing something to meet my own goal, I have a second version of the picture. A little less pretty, of course.


Stop looking at my man-boobs!

Not Pod-Fade Away

A few years back, I started doing an experimental podcast that was a strange combination of snippets of my fiction and the "author notes" behind the writing of it. Called Prelude to a Scream, it was meant to be the testing grounds for creating a podcast version of my story collection One Hand Screaming.

The project ran out of steam at a certain point. It began with a technical issue that a podcasting friend pointed out to me -- one that, for the life of me, I couldn't resolve. Also, in my quest to make each episode as "perfect" as I could, I kept running into issues where I wasn't satisfied with the recording of a story or my rambling babble, and so ended up re-recording the same thing a half-dozen times and getting nowhere. And then the whole project went south when I began losing more writing time, and was reluctant to work on what I saw as a "past project" rather than work on new writing, and new projects.

However, given that my podcast seems to have faded away (a term often used for that in the world of podcasting is to "podfade"), I wanted to give it another shot, because, an avid listener of podcasts (both great writing podcasts as well as fiction podcasts, I really want to contribute to the world of free downloadable audio) -- And apparently, podfading is too generous a term to use for what happened to my podcast -- mine sort of just seemed to hit a giant brick wall one day.

Sigh.

But I'm going to make an effort to put out a new episode within the next couple of weeks -- perhaps something shorter, with a complete work of fiction in it. But at least something.

But nobody hold their breath.

It's Like Being Back In Levack

I recently saw this interesting video clip of Matthew Ingram (Globe & Mail's Communities Editor) talking about social media at an event in Toronto that was posted by Matthew Burpee.

Ingram talks about social media tools are turning everything into a small town, which has both good and not so good side effects.



It reminds me so much of what it was like growing up in Levack, a small community that is part of the town of Onaping Falls in Northern Ontario about an hour's drive north of Sudbury.

The experience was both extremely wonderful but at times frustrating and constricted. I'm continually conflicted about the great sense of community I grew up with, but also the frustrating "everybody knows your business" aspect of growing up in such an environment. Francine and I continue to speculative about whether or not Alexander would be better off growing up in such a pleasantly quaint community rather than in a city. We still haven't finished lining up the pros and cons, as we're finding they're evening matched. But in any case, I'm delighted for my own experience of having lived and grown in a small town.

Interestingly enough, I've used social media to connect with dozens and dozens of friends, school-mates and other folks from my small town -- it has partly brought back those feelings of community spirit and pride, which is really cool. Part of what makes it even better, though, is the "catching up with old friends" aspect of it. I find it fascinating and wonderful to connect with people I haven't seen in a few decades just to see how they're doing and what they're up to. Interesting stuff. Just this morning, for example, I accepted yet another Facebook friend request from a friend from my old school that I haven't seen in ages. It will be neat to see what he's been up to, where he lives now, etc. It's like a perpetual higgh school reunion.

Which tells you, I suppose, that I must miss that sense of community spirit more than anything, right?

Don't Squeeze The Bacon

What will they think of next?

Well, why not squeezable bacon? Sounds good to me.

Actually, part of me is disturbed and disgusted. The other part of me wants to go buy some and try squirting bacon paste onto ALL of my meals.

A friend of mine recently passed on info about this from ThinkGeek.com, one of the coolest places in the universe to get neat stuff.

Of course, one of the great things about ThinkGeek is that they don't just have the coolest, neatest new things, but things that have been around for decades but perhaps were only available in selected markets or regions of the world.

Vilhelm Lillefläsk, the inventor of Squeez Bacon ® developed a new way to process bacon while working in a kitchen in Sweden shortly after WW II. He created a fully cooked 100% bacon paste that could be squeezed from a tube. The process that creates it requires no preservatives or other additives so the end product is as "healthy" as real bacon.

In the classic words of Homer Simpson: "Mmmm, bacon. . ."

Okay, I was going to end my post there. But I'll be honest, this was an April Fool's joke from the good folks at ThinkGeek. And a classic one at that.

However, despite any suspicions you have, you don't find out it's a joke until you click the "BUY" button. But I have to admit, the concept still partially disgusts me, but another part of me is really sad that the "BUY" button doesn't actually lead to this marvelous product . . .

Check out the video that went along with it. It's so goofy it looks real.

Another interesting note about the video -- apparently, if you translate the Swedish to English, you get the lyrics to Rick Astley's "Never Gonna Give You Up" -- therefore you not only get fooled and disappointed about the bacon, but you get Rickrolled.

Ah, those fun people at ThinkGeek -- what will they think of next?

It All Adds Up

So this morning I opened my email to find a rejection from a publisher for a short story I'd submitted about a month and a half ago.

That's never fun.

However, whenever I get a rejection, I typically respond by looking at the story, any comments the editor might have made on the rejection, seriously consider constructive feedback (if provided) and potentially edit/modify the story accordingly if I feel it's necessary, then attempt to find another appropriate market to submit that story to.

I like to keep at least 5 or more stories "out there" in the slush piles of various markets at any given time.

Because, at the end of the day, rejection is part of the business (each market gets hundreds of submissions and can only accept a small handful - and you're not going to wow every single editor with every single story - like dating, there has to be a nice fit between the story's content/style and the editor's tastes/mood as well as whether or not the editor has already chosen a similar story for their magazine/anthology/project. It's a tricky hit and miss process (okay, it's more miss than hit, but THAT'S why a writer has to not stick their head in the sand and keep at it)

After all, you can't have a story accepted for publication with it just sitting there in your drawer.

So far, in the past couple of years I've been pretty good about keeping a small handful of stories in circulation. For a handful of yearsusing on novel-length projects, I had slipped on that mandate, and my "sales" of short fiction completely dropped off. Why? Because (and I'll repeat this in case it was missed) you CAN'T sell a story if you don't send it to an editor. Honestly. It's true. I've tried it. There are some great stories sitting in my drawer, and not once in the past 15 years has a story sold without me having to submit it anywhere. (Okay, it sort of happened once, but it was a fluke and isn't typical -- it's on par with winning the lottery) Unless you're a "name" author, you're not going to receive invitations from editors to send them a story.

No, at the end of the day, you have to submit to be accepted.

And speaking of submissions, I still occasionally submit to market that pay lesser amounts (IE, they pay less than professional rates). I know that many schools of thought among writers circles suggest this is a terrible idea. And for the most part, I agree with them. Giving your away for free or less than pro rates isn't usually a good idea. However, I'll sometimes do that because it's a reprint for which I've already made a decent amount and the story works so nicely in the project it would appear in, the editor is a friend and I'd like to support them or do them or their project a favour, or perhaps because the market is a great one, offering high exposure (the key is HIGH exposure, not just exposure - I can get ho-hum exposure by posting a story along with a naked picture on my blog) or is considered prestigious among enough circles that appearing in it is a good thing for a writer.

However, despite exceptions that I will make if all the stars are alligned, I don't often submit to no payment or "contributor copy only" markets much anymore. When I first started out, I certainly did -- and that was a good area to hone my craft and get some experience.

But one thing that has happened over the years, and continues to happen, is that I'll get cheques (or checks if you're not Canadian) in US funds for really small amounts, like $5.00 or $25.00 or something like that. It has happened less in the past 5 or so years due to options like PayPal where it's more cost effective for editors to pay small amounts via that option -- but I still do occasionally get smaller royalty payments in US funds.

For that reason, I have a US funds account with a Canadian Bank where I've been depositing these small cheques into for at least the past decade. Again, not so much lately as when I first started out. And though the amounts are small (the larger US cheques go straight into my regular Canadian account, auto-exchange, etc because I usually need them to do things like eat and buy clothes), they've added up over the years. And since the US account I have has no monthly fees just to keep the account open (a giant anomally among banking institutions) the account continues to grow with tiny interest deposits plus my occasional small deposit.

I've let it sit over the years, and it has added up to several hundred dollars. Not bad for small deposits. And I'm going to be taking advantage of it to help pay for attending Eerie-Con 11 in Niagara Falls, NY in a few weeks.

You see, attending conventions is yet another type of investment that a writer can make in their career. But that discussion is for another day.

HNT - Scare Net

And here's reason number 14 that I don't work in an environment that requires me to wear a hair net. I'm too damn freaky looking with one of those things on (particularly since I don't really have that much hair to net) On me, the hair net looks more like a "scare net" (Of course, the shitty pair of 5 dollar sunglasses don't help the look)

This week's HNT picture was taken as Francine, Alexander and I were waiting outside the Walker's Chocolate factory in Burlington for an open house tour last weekend.

Cute aside: Just to the left of my head you can see a large scrap metal pile -- behind us was a scrap metal yard, with giant cranes hefting large compacted boxes of metal around. Alexander was convinced that WALL•E was over there and wanted to go check it out. I managed to convince him that he'd already left with EVE and they were on the Axiom rescuing the reject robots, so we returned to our quest to find Oompa-loompas in the chocolate factory.

2nd Canadian Book Challenge - Update

A while back, I joined the 2nd Canadian Book Challenge.

The originator (John Mutford), challenged bloggers to read (and write about) 13 Canadian books (by Canadians and/or about Canadians) in the 1 year period between July 1, 2008 and July 1, 2009.

Here's a status update on how I've been doing in the challenge so far.

To Date:
1) The Killing Circle - Andrew Pyper
2) Cricket in a Fist - Naomi K. Lewis
3) Wolf Pack - Edo van Belkom
4) Lone Wolf - Edo van Belkom
5) Cry Wolf - Edo van Belkom
6) Wolf Man - Edo van Belkom
7) In Tongues of the Dead - Brad Kelln
8) Wake - Robert J. Sawyer
9) Grown up Digital - Don Tapscott
10) Too Close To Home - Linwood Barclay

See my original post about these books here.

Latest Additions:

11) The Gargoyle - Andrew Davidson
(Finished reading Feb 16, 2009)
This is a wonderful story of love through the ages. Although the premise for this book wasn't exactly my cup of tea (a contemporary novel raved about by folks who enjoy fine new works of literature), I started reading it and got hooked by the author's compelling prose. Once his prose hooked me (that took not much more than a few lines of reading), I wanted to know what happened next, and so on, and so on, until the end of the novel. The book is about a narcissistic porn star who gets severely burned and almost dies in a car accident. While recovering in the hospital, a strange lady by the name of Marianne Engel shows up and starts telling him stories about how they've been together forever in his past lives. She tells him stories of love throughout the ages, including their own story of how they first met. And, though he knows she is a mental patient and manic-depressive, he can't help but be compelled by her stories and her, and gradually falls in love with her. The title comes from the gargoyle carvings she does (and the fact that the main character describes his burnt self as looking like a gargoyle). Excellent book.
Link(s): Andrew Davidson's author profile on RH Canada website

12) Frozen Blood - Joel A. Sutherland
(Finished reading Feb 23, 2009)
A well written first novel by Sutherland, containing a good sense of place (Ottawa) -- it actually made me homesick for the city. As apocalyptic novels go, it succeeds in actually being about the end of the world as we know it, though a bit depressing. Sutherland's characters were well crafted, the situation was filled with tension and suspense and the story steam-rolled its way to the very end. A great first novel by Sutherland, and I was pleased to see that this novel made the short-list for the upcoming Bram Stoker Awards for superior achievement in a first novel.
Link(s): Joel A. Sutherland's webpage

13) Me Minus 173 - Alicia Snell
(Finished reading March 15, 2009
Alicia's story of how, at the age of 42, she decided to make some dramatic changes in her life is a poignant, touching and ultimately inspiring tale. Within the space of 15 months she lost 173 pounds and began running -- since then has completed 18 marathons, including the Boston Marathon. Her story is self-effacing and honest, straight-forward and uplifting and wonderfully documents how a person can choose to make a significant and positive change in their lifestyle and come out on top of something that has plagued them their entire lives. I put this book down feeling inspired and motivated and know that her tale is going to help so many others in the pursuit of their own dreams and desires.
Link(s): Alicia Snell's website, the book (because it's not yet broadly available - not YET)

14) The Book of Negroes - Lawrence Hill
(Finished reading March 30, 2009)
Absolutely brilliant novel -- wonderfully written, compelling, moving, touching -- It's incredibly easy to see why it has won so many awards and continues to dominate the bestseller lists. This fictitious story of Aminata's life, born in Africa, captured into the slave trade and taken to America, then her travels to Nova Scotia and back to Africa are filled with an endless stream of struggles and heartaches that are staved by the ultimate triumph of the human spirit. I had the pleasure of meeting Lawrence several months back when he was writer in residence at McMaster -- he is a great guy, down to earth and easy-going and is as wonderful a speaker as he is a writer. I strongly encourage anyone who has read his book that, you get a chance to go to an event where Lawrence is reading, you definitely go check it out. There's not much point in me writing too much "review" type content about the book, because far better reviewers than me have raved about this fantastic novel. This is yet another example of a book that I purchased a long time ago but didn't get around to reading it until a later date -- and for that, I continue to kick myself.
Link(s): Lawrence Hill's website, mention of Lawrence on this blog

So at this point, I've already reached and passed the 13 required books for the challenge. But I've got more books (one of which I'm currently reading) by Canadians -- so perhaps I'll reach 16 or 17 by the time I reach Canada Day 2009. Not hard to do as there is no shortage of fantastic books by Canadian authors.

Zander And The Chocolate Factory

The other night, I finally finished reading Charlie & The Chocolate Factory to Alexander. I fondly remember this book from my childhood and was glad to share it with my son.

Interestingly, when I picked up the first Harry Potter book I remember being filled with that same sense of wonder that reading the Roald Dahl book gave me -- and not all that dis-similar when you look at them. A young impoverished boy struggling through his days is given a chance to enter into a magical world of wonder and discovery.

Of course, this second read-through of the Dahl novel wasn't quite so fun for me as I remember it as a child. Alexander enjoyed it, though, particularly the very last scene in the novel when the glass elevator goes crashing through the roof of the factory (he's rather fond of smashing and crashing)

In any case, shortly after finishing reading the book, the locally owned Walker's Chocolates had an open house. People could go on a tour if they brought non-perishable food items for the local food bank.

And off we went to get a tour of the Walker's Chocolates factory in Burlington.

It was a decidedly fun afternoon. We got to learn a great deal about how they make their different chocolate treats and watch the various stages of the "life" of a hollow chocolate bunny. It was great to see how the hollow chocolate figures are made, and the stages they go through before they are complete and ready for the shelves. Not only that, but they flattered me by insisting that I wear a hair-net. yes, it was decided that I actually had enough hair to warrant wearing one -- wOOt!

Quick note -- Harry Walker, the owner, was not eccentric like Willy Wonka -- and the Oompa-Loompas must have had the day off, because there wasn't a single one in sight.

Halfway Around The Bay

Francine just left to run in Around The Bay -- North America's oldest road race.

She'll be doing a 15K relay with one of the friends she runs with regularly on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

The first half of the race is what Fran will be running. The race begins on York Blvd., 1 block west of Copps Coliseum and proceeds east on York which turns into Wilson Street to Sherman Avenue. At Sherman Ave runners turn north and then east at Cannon Street. Runners stay on Cannon Street which turns into Britannia Ave to Parkdale Ave. Runners then turn north at Parkdale Ave and east bound at Melvin Ave to Woodward Ave, and then north on Woodward Ave to the Beach Strip. That's where her partner Muriel, will take her running chip and do the second half of the race, completing the circuit around the other half of the bay of Hamilton Harbour. After crossing the Canal lift bridge the race turns onto Eastport Drive to Northshore Blvd. The race will turn west bound onto the rolling hills of Northshore Blvd., and then west onto Plains Rd. to Spring Garden Rd. Just past Woodland Cemetery awaits the Valley Inn Hill leading up to York Blvd. and the finish into Copps Coliseum at York Blvd. and Bay Sts. Here's a Google Map of the race.

I'm continually amazed at how far she has come since she first started running a few years ago. We used to run together, and made it up to the 5 K mark. But at about the time Alexander was born, I fell behind, haven't run anywhere near as often as Francine, and never made it past 5 K. When I run now, I usually only do about 2.5 or 3 K and at that, it's usually on the treadmill downstairs rather than outside enjoying the scenery.

But she's off -- she'll be doing the first 15 K of the stretch and starting at 9:30. It's a rainy morning, and I'm hoping the rain slows down so she can run with less hassle.

Alexander is still sleeping and I'm about to go back to doing some writing/editing work. Here in my clean, warm, dry basement, while she slogs through downtown city streets on a cold, wet March morning.

I love her conviction. She continues to inspire me.

Go Fran!

Fran running Around The Bay in 2008

HNT - The Boys Of Chorus

Usually, whenever our family is getting ready to do something, poor Francine has to contend with the antics of a couple of four year old in the house. Namely, Alexander, who is 4, and me. Yes, although I'm almost ten times my son's age physically, I have to be honest and admit that I'm just as amused by the same things my four year old finds fun.

For example, the other day when we were all getting ready to head out, while Francine was in the bathroom getting ready, Alexander and I paraded down the hallway in our underwear singing the "We're the Boys of Chorus" song from that old Bugs Bunny cartoon "What's Up, Doc?"

You remember it, don't you?

Bugs is talking about his first big gig on Broadway, and then they flash to him and three other guys doing a warm-up chorus number at the beginning of the show, and singing:

Oh we're the boys of the chorus
We hope you like our show
We know you're rooting for us
But now we have to go . . .

Alexander loves performing this song with me and we do it every chance we get.

Poor Fran.

In any case, I thought a "boys of Chorus" pic would be appropriate for this week's HNT picture.


If you want to want the entire video (it's about seven minutes long, but I swear when I was a kid I thought it was a 20 minute epic story) you can watch it online here.

Do Do Do Lookin' Out My Back Door

. . . okay, I was looking out my back window, actually.

This morning I got up early to do some writing. I've been working at another draft of my novel MORNING SON -- going through it with a red pen and a wicked spirit, tolerant of no word or "phrase" that derails the story in any way, boldly striking out the offending ones and hopefully feeding new life into the ones that remain and partnering them with newer, better word choices. (Okay, I know, it's a fanciful way of saying I'm editing and making revision notes)

When I went upstairs at about 7 AM to get a refill of my coffee, I was struck with how powerful and beautiful the morning sky was. Since my novel MORNING SON is a play on words with MORNING/MOURNING and SON/SUN, and does include a key scene that takes place during a spectacular sunrise, I thought I would try to take a quick picture of what I was seeing.

No, I'm not a photographer, but I did my best to capture the beauty of the colours in the pink and purple "cotton candy" clouds.

Boo Hoo Bird

I recently bought a copy of Jeremy Tankard's new book Boo Hoo Bird for my son Alexander.

With our entire family being huge fans of Jeremy's first book (Grumpy Bird), we were delighted to see this character and his friends return for another adventure.

I had the chance to meet Jeremy a couple of years ago at Book Expo Canada and was able to get a signed copy of Grumpy Bird for Alexander, which we have read repeatedly over the years.

Grumpy Bird tells the story of one day when Bird wakes up too grumpy to eat, play or even fly. "Looks like I'm walking today," he says, and stomps off. As his friends join him on his walk, a bit of silliness ensues and Bird finds it's difficult to stay grumpy with so many friends hanging out and having fun.

It's an incredibly cute story, wonderfully illustrated, and one we've read time and again.

Jeremy's second book, Me Hungry is another cute story -- this time about a caveboy eagerly seeking out a snack. Alexander has also enjoyed that one, but not nearly as much as he likes Grumpy Bird (which we also have a nice signed poster of on his wall)

That's why I was delighted to read Jeremy's latest book, bringing back Bird and his friends, with a cute story about what happens when Bird and Raccoon are playing catch and Bird gets bonked on the head.

In the classic style of Grumpy Bird, it takes a common situation and turns it into something everyone can smile about.

I strongly recommend Jeremy's books for kids and adults alike. Particularly if you're a grumpy bird. After reading them, you'll have one less reason to be grumpy.

Who Was That Lens-ed Man?

My good buddy Greg Roberts, photographer extraordinaire, has created a SoFoBoMo blog.

The SoFoBoMo project is kind of like NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), except it's for photographers and isn't geared towards ONE particular month, but rather a 31 day period. Thus, SoFoBoMo is short for The Solo Photo Book Month.

Several years ago, Greg took some photos for me that I've been using as author photos for various things such as on books, websites, author profiles, FBI most-wanted lists, etc. You can tell he's good because in the photos he makes me look somewhat intelligent and pensive.

Greg's skills in photography are quite varied -- he does great portraits and slice of life pictures, great landscapes and wonderful textural shots as well. I'm curious to see what sort of mix he'll bring to this particular book project or if he'll focus in on one area.

I've long been hoping to see Greg put together a book of photographs and am thus quite looking forward to following the progress on this fun, fast-paced project.

Twitbook

I'm normally okay with change. Sure, for most of us, the initial moments of change are unsettling -- it's human nature, after all. But I like to believe I'm open-minded enough to check out the change and see what's good about it.

Like Facebook -- the last few times they made changes, I found it uncomfortable at first, but after a day or so managed to intuitively find my way around and roll with it. No harm done, life goes on.

But this last update (about a week ago now), in which they basically tried to change Facebook from, well, from being Facebook and into a Twitter-like environment, is a bit more difficult to accept.

It's not longer intuitive -- no longer easy to check out what my friends are up to -- at least not as easily as before, IMHO.

And, a week later, despite my initial reluctance to get all flustered over the change and try to find some good with it, I'm throwing my hands up in the air. It's simply taking too long to figure things out -- and I don't have a lot of time as it is. It's meant to be a momentary distraction, a fun quick break (usually in the early morning before I take off to work) then on with the real parts of my day.

It's no longer Facebook. It's, as one of my friends pointed out: Twitbook.

Sigh. I like Twitter being Twitter. I like Facebook being Facebook. I like MySpace being MySpace. I like Second Life being Second Life. You get the point. Anyone who tries to make a single application/networking flatform do ALL those different things that draw people to each of them might not be barking up the right tree.

People use or login to the applications they do because they like them for the different and unique things they bring and can offer.

And I can't help thinking that this whole Facebook update is akin to the same grand failure Coke faced when it introduced NEW COKE.

It's 1985 all over again, this time in the virtual world.

I'm wondering when they're going to come to their senses and bring back "Classic Facebook?"

Happy Bookstore Accidents

Here is Michael Tamblyn's presentation of 6 Things That Could Change Publishing for the Better, which was presented at the BookNet Canada Tech Forum 2009 in Toronto on March 12, 2009. Michael is the CEO of BookNet Canada.

The forum was a great day and this was a phenomenal presentation to sit through last week. It's even better to be able to see it the second time around.

I love Michael's presentation style -- entertaining, lively, engaging, filled with the perfect mix of insightful and intelligent information delivered with Michael's sense of quirky humour. There's always a nice combination of slide and presenter when he "performs." (I'd say that he presents, but he's not just presenting, he truly is performing) The editing of the video of the presentation (or the performance) was also quite skillfully done which makes it almost like being there.

Something I made a note of during the presentation was when Michael talks about the "Happy Accidents" that happen when you're browsing in a bookstore. Such a perfect term to describe the experience.

But the 6 Things mentioned are interesting and definitely worth taking a serious look at.

HNT - POW!

Yesterday I received a book in the mail -- part of a blogger's chance to get the book for free from Andy Nulman. It's called POW! RIGHT BETWEEN THE EYES: Profiting from the Power of Surprise by Andy Nulman.

All I had to do was ask for it on my blog. (Okay, so maybe I begged a little)

And now it's here.

Woot!

I can't wait to read it. Looks like an awesome book. If the title interests you, go check out Andy's blog, where you can get a feel for his writing style. Once I finish reading the book, which I'll have to immediately add in to the "books I'm reading" list, I'm going to be posting a review here (as well as on Goodreads, Amazon, Chapters/Indigo, etc)

Mourning Son

Has it really been six years since I lost my father?

It feels like just yesterday. And the pain, though not as sharp as it once was, is still acute.

At the beginning of the year, when I was making my annual "writing goals for the year" plan, I specifically mentioned that I would pull my novel Morning Son back out of the drawer, give it yet another read-through and re-write, and send it off to a publisher. It has been a couple of years since I last sent it out for consideration.

Although I normally write horror, this novel is a contemporary tale of a man's quest to lay his father's ashes to rest. I wrote it in an attempt to face what had been a fear that had plagued me for much of my life -- the fear of losing my father. So in many ways, there is an element of horror in the story. When I was younger, I remember waking in a cold sweat, tears in my eyes and practically screaming because I'd had a dream that my father had died. It seemed to be the most terrible thing that could happen. And so, what I often do with my fears is incorporate them into a story. Of course, despite it having been an exercise in facing my fears, the novel is ultimately about a son discovering a new love for his deceased father as he uncovers hidden family secrets and learns much more about the man, many things he never knew while his father was alive.

A couple of years ago, I blogged about working on the novel Morning Son while on Manitoulin Island with my dad and cousin. One afternoon I shared a bit of the novel in progress with him, and though we didn't often have lengthy in-depth discussions (we preferred to just hang out in each other's company; not much conversation. Either we were goofing around and telling each other jokes, or we were just somehow comfortable in the silence between us), that afternoon when I'd shared a scene from the novel with him was one of the most wonderfully intimate moments we'd had when I was an adult.

Of course, I blog regularly about my dad. How could I not?

Just a few days ago, I pulled Morning Son out of the filing cabinet where it has been resting, and started working at reading it again and making some notes for another re-write. Then I can send it off to publishers again.

The experience of working on this novel, which is, in many ways, a tribute to my dad, is almost like having him here again.

Almost.

Another St. Patrick's Day and another beer tipped in celebration of the man I still miss so much.

I love you, Dad.