I just realized I hadn't formally introduced Collie here. no wonder she's been complaining so much lately. She's way over due for an introduction, especially as I'm trying to finish up her first book.
Collie Shimmer, who's real name is Columbine Goblinshimmer, stands just a smidgen above the 6' 2” mark, with hair colors that change from her summer honey blond, to a fall auburn, winter white, and spring dirty blond. Her fragile beauty belies her true strengths, but allows her to make an amazing amount of money as a model. She works hard to stay just below super-model status to avoid any truly close scrutiny. Modeling isn't her preference for work, but it allows her to travel the world without drawing any suspicions and the money helps save crucial pieces of her people's territories. Collie's real job as an Ambassador for Faeries the world over keeps her busy and her father happy. She helps keep the peace between the various faerie kingdoms, while working on ways for stopping the humans in their relentless pursuit to completely rape the planet.
Her best friend, soul sister, and servant is another faerie hybrid, Bambi, who is never far from Collie's side. The two work together on everything, and they use their closeness to keep humans at arm's length, opting to not correct the assumption that they are a couple and not interested in any one else. Which is crucial as neither is allowed to breed.
So that's the gist of Collie's story. She is an environmentalist which drives me bonkers as I'm not, so I have to do more research for her story lines that I do for Merie or Jess. But she is beautiful and I enjoy the mysticism of her world. Her wings are exquisite as well and trying to find someone to draw a correct picture of her is proving to be a challenge.
There is a short side story from Collie that I am looking at possibly publishing on Barnes & Noble or Amazon. I'll post a link here when I decide which site to post it on. The legalize is different between the two sites and I'm trying to be sure I'm not giving away any copyrights.
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Friday, April 22, 2011
Jess & Paul - A Brief History
Jess is my first character - and the one to start all this writing. She makes me laugh, cry, swear, and get blazing mad. I love her anyway and enjoy visiting her world.
Paul is her BFF. They met in college and have been inseparable ever since. Paul is a stockbroker, but is not out at work, and he's a Drag Queen (a Diva really), who not only looks fabulous is a dress and heels but has an incredible singing voice to back them up. It broke his heart to let Jess fall as far as she did, but he knew it was necessary to save her life.
Jess never blamed Paul for her fall, and is grateful that he let her go. She needed the fall to be able to come back, stronger in her sobriety and determined to get her life back on track. Her's is a complicated life, but she's thankful to still have it.
Jess will always be two things: first, a recovering alcoholic, and second, a psychic and she's not particularly fond of her "gift". Jess sees dead people, but not like other psychics. She can see them, touch them, talk to them, and they can respond in the same way. This has resulted in some painful encounters and some interesting battles when one of the dead insists on "borrowing" her body.
Her best girls, Molly and Maggie are also AA lifers, both work at the local hospital with Jess and aren't fully aware of her gift. Molly's a social worker - also a recovering alcoholic and former stockbroker. Maggie works as a billing coder with Jess in the bowels of the hospital.
There's always a hoard of dead clamoring for Jess' attention following her around and new ones pop up at the most inconvenient times. She's managed to corral most of them in her apartment, but every once in awhile one sneaks out. Rosie, a warm grandmotherly type, is one that can find Jess anywhere, and who Jess occassionally calls on for help from time to time. She's almost like Jess' spirit guide, almost, but not quite. Then there's Melissa, the constant whiner who makes Jess throw shoes through her semi-transparent head when she's pushed Jess too far Rosie chastises Jess on a regular basis about her language. Jess can make a drunken sailor blush with her swearing.
I hate to give out much more information than this as I'd like to have people read the book. One which Jess is insisting i need to get published soon...especially since a few of the other characters are insisting on their own story lines now too.
Stay tuned for a few more sneak peeks, and I may be putting some short side stories out on B&N or Amazon sometime soon.
Paul is her BFF. They met in college and have been inseparable ever since. Paul is a stockbroker, but is not out at work, and he's a Drag Queen (a Diva really), who not only looks fabulous is a dress and heels but has an incredible singing voice to back them up. It broke his heart to let Jess fall as far as she did, but he knew it was necessary to save her life.
Jess never blamed Paul for her fall, and is grateful that he let her go. She needed the fall to be able to come back, stronger in her sobriety and determined to get her life back on track. Her's is a complicated life, but she's thankful to still have it.
Jess will always be two things: first, a recovering alcoholic, and second, a psychic and she's not particularly fond of her "gift". Jess sees dead people, but not like other psychics. She can see them, touch them, talk to them, and they can respond in the same way. This has resulted in some painful encounters and some interesting battles when one of the dead insists on "borrowing" her body.
Her best girls, Molly and Maggie are also AA lifers, both work at the local hospital with Jess and aren't fully aware of her gift. Molly's a social worker - also a recovering alcoholic and former stockbroker. Maggie works as a billing coder with Jess in the bowels of the hospital.
There's always a hoard of dead clamoring for Jess' attention following her around and new ones pop up at the most inconvenient times. She's managed to corral most of them in her apartment, but every once in awhile one sneaks out. Rosie, a warm grandmotherly type, is one that can find Jess anywhere, and who Jess occassionally calls on for help from time to time. She's almost like Jess' spirit guide, almost, but not quite. Then there's Melissa, the constant whiner who makes Jess throw shoes through her semi-transparent head when she's pushed Jess too far Rosie chastises Jess on a regular basis about her language. Jess can make a drunken sailor blush with her swearing.
I hate to give out much more information than this as I'd like to have people read the book. One which Jess is insisting i need to get published soon...especially since a few of the other characters are insisting on their own story lines now too.
Stay tuned for a few more sneak peeks, and I may be putting some short side stories out on B&N or Amazon sometime soon.
Monday, April 18, 2011
Time for my own "Coming Out", so come meet Merie
Now that I no longer work where I used to, I can finally step out of my writer's closet and say "I wrote a book!" on my various social networks and tell folks about my characters. Merie would not have been taken well where I used to work, for SO many reasons, but a big part of it being that in Merie's world, God's a woman and none of the world's religions are correct.
If feels great to be able to openly talk about my writing now. Several of the students where I used to work heard about Jess, some from the very beginnings of her presence. Many have laughed with me at the antics of Merie, Jess, and Paul.
So Merie and I are coming out together tonight. Mainly because even thinking about Merie (pronounced more like May-ree) and her world makes me smile.
Merie makes me laugh often - and usually inappropriately - during the workday. You see she gives me mental images of God, who is a woman, grabbing Satan by his curly, blond locks and shaking him like a rag doll all while talking to her Chosen or Satan himself. God has a definite love/hate relationship with Satan and while she could wipe him from existence, she keeps him around...perhaps for stress relief.
The Chosen were created by God to save humankind from itself and are most easily described as Angel/Human hybrids - without the wings. They are the protectors of humankind (which is on version 2.0). Merie is a "baby" in terms of Chosen, at a mere 413 years old, she's Jesus' half sister. And yep, Jesus, a big metro-sexual, is still around and preparing for his second-coming. He makes me laugh too.
God is beautiful, loving, scary and fierce. Picture a carmel-brown colored woman who looks kind of like the Greek's depiction of the Goddess Athena, only really, really TALL. God, is understandably, an awesome engineer and Satan (a.k.a. Stan) looks like an adult version of a cherub, standing somewhere around 6'7".
Every Chosen has special capabilities. Merie's special abilities allow her to manipulate the earth's energy (which makes moving really easy) and she can restore barren earth to agricultural viability. There's a catch though; she can only heal barren or human-damaged earth at God's command. To do otherwise could throw a wrench in God's plans and no Chosen wants to do that.
Merie's being sidetracked to determine how an area in North Dakota has been damaged by an oil leak when it was not in God's Plan. God gave humans free will because it was the right thing to do, but it keeps coming back to bite her in the butt. At least God has a sense of humor about it. And because it's a free will issue, God doesn't know the details of the who/what/when/where/why of it all. Merie keeps running into Satan, who keeps breaking out of his cage, and learns in the process that sometimes Satan doesn't lie and that sometimes, God is not only loving, but really funny too.
If feels great to be able to openly talk about my writing now. Several of the students where I used to work heard about Jess, some from the very beginnings of her presence. Many have laughed with me at the antics of Merie, Jess, and Paul.
So Merie and I are coming out together tonight. Mainly because even thinking about Merie (pronounced more like May-ree) and her world makes me smile.
Merie makes me laugh often - and usually inappropriately - during the workday. You see she gives me mental images of God, who is a woman, grabbing Satan by his curly, blond locks and shaking him like a rag doll all while talking to her Chosen or Satan himself. God has a definite love/hate relationship with Satan and while she could wipe him from existence, she keeps him around...perhaps for stress relief.
The Chosen were created by God to save humankind from itself and are most easily described as Angel/Human hybrids - without the wings. They are the protectors of humankind (which is on version 2.0). Merie is a "baby" in terms of Chosen, at a mere 413 years old, she's Jesus' half sister. And yep, Jesus, a big metro-sexual, is still around and preparing for his second-coming. He makes me laugh too.
God is beautiful, loving, scary and fierce. Picture a carmel-brown colored woman who looks kind of like the Greek's depiction of the Goddess Athena, only really, really TALL. God, is understandably, an awesome engineer and Satan (a.k.a. Stan) looks like an adult version of a cherub, standing somewhere around 6'7".
Every Chosen has special capabilities. Merie's special abilities allow her to manipulate the earth's energy (which makes moving really easy) and she can restore barren earth to agricultural viability. There's a catch though; she can only heal barren or human-damaged earth at God's command. To do otherwise could throw a wrench in God's plans and no Chosen wants to do that.
Merie's being sidetracked to determine how an area in North Dakota has been damaged by an oil leak when it was not in God's Plan. God gave humans free will because it was the right thing to do, but it keeps coming back to bite her in the butt. At least God has a sense of humor about it. And because it's a free will issue, God doesn't know the details of the who/what/when/where/why of it all. Merie keeps running into Satan, who keeps breaking out of his cage, and learns in the process that sometimes Satan doesn't lie and that sometimes, God is not only loving, but really funny too.
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Ready....Set...Write! Yeah, right!
So here I sit, Diet Pepsi and Chocolate on hand (doesn't everyone have Diet Pepsi and Chocolate for breakfast?) ready to write something fantabulous for the Grand Rapids Region Writer's Group for my first blog entry and my brain goes "Yeah, right. I'm taking a nap." and hands the reigns over to Jess, Paul, Collie, Merie, and Myrtle. Let the chaos ensue!
I even tried the tactic of hitting FaceBook to get them to back off to no avail. Instead, I now have notes for 2 more books, three more scenes written for existing stuff, and none of it edited or even in one spot. Too bad I don't make enough at the day job to afford an assistant, I could really use one today. And to top it off I have a fund raiser to appear at this afternoon, found a Drag Queen in town that I just MUST meet - she's GORGEOUS! - and luckily a friend of mine is FB friends with her, and I got myself volunteered to help with IT stuff for the next Network Neighborhood Bash. This is all on top of my normal workload, upcoming IT training session (I'm the leader/presenter), planning for a 2-day local tech event organized, manned, and pulled off by volunteers who all have full time IT jobs.
The chocolate is gone now, the Diet Pepsi is about 1/2 drained, the dogs have finally stopped barking, Jess is still chatting, but much quieter now, and I'm still trying to figure out what to write for the GRRWG blog. Something will come...I hope.
I'm also thinking about the latest news from my newly assigned mentor, an established, published author, and dreading the fact that not only do I need this blog, I now also need to set up a website for myself. I work in IT all day long, the last thing I want to do is do more IT work when I get home. I wonder if I can teach the dogs how to code in Ruby, Pearl, PHP, or HTML5. They're certainly smart enough, but they're pretty lazy. I'd try to teach the cats, but they're cats, they don't even deign to work...unless it's to unravel what's in my knitting bag.
The last of the Diet Pepsi is drained (I wonder if I can get money for product placement on a blog?...hmmmm....) and my brain has walked by, yawning, stretching and heading for a coffee pot. Perhaps it'll finally cooperate and come up with something novel for my first assigned blog spot.
I even tried the tactic of hitting FaceBook to get them to back off to no avail. Instead, I now have notes for 2 more books, three more scenes written for existing stuff, and none of it edited or even in one spot. Too bad I don't make enough at the day job to afford an assistant, I could really use one today. And to top it off I have a fund raiser to appear at this afternoon, found a Drag Queen in town that I just MUST meet - she's GORGEOUS! - and luckily a friend of mine is FB friends with her, and I got myself volunteered to help with IT stuff for the next Network Neighborhood Bash. This is all on top of my normal workload, upcoming IT training session (I'm the leader/presenter), planning for a 2-day local tech event organized, manned, and pulled off by volunteers who all have full time IT jobs.
The chocolate is gone now, the Diet Pepsi is about 1/2 drained, the dogs have finally stopped barking, Jess is still chatting, but much quieter now, and I'm still trying to figure out what to write for the GRRWG blog. Something will come...I hope.
I'm also thinking about the latest news from my newly assigned mentor, an established, published author, and dreading the fact that not only do I need this blog, I now also need to set up a website for myself. I work in IT all day long, the last thing I want to do is do more IT work when I get home. I wonder if I can teach the dogs how to code in Ruby, Pearl, PHP, or HTML5. They're certainly smart enough, but they're pretty lazy. I'd try to teach the cats, but they're cats, they don't even deign to work...unless it's to unravel what's in my knitting bag.
The last of the Diet Pepsi is drained (I wonder if I can get money for product placement on a blog?...hmmmm....) and my brain has walked by, yawning, stretching and heading for a coffee pot. Perhaps it'll finally cooperate and come up with something novel for my first assigned blog spot.
Friday, April 15, 2011
Musing about MaryJanice Davidson
One of the writer's from my local group was on TV yesterday, touting her latest book, which made me do a "happy chair dance". Best part of that is she'll be my mentor, yippee!!
So, what's this got to do with MaryJanice of Betsy, Wyndam, Fred, and Jennifer Scales fame? I was having a bit of a self-pity party as it wasn't me on TV and I was wishing MaryJanice was next door so I could dash over with some warm Snickerdoodles as a bribe and pick her brain for a bit. MJD was most kind in answering all of my questions at her book signing in Lansing for Me, Myself, and Why?, but now I have more questions, and she's not anywhere near me - geographically speaking.
Tracy, MJ's busy assistant, is also incredibly wonderful, answering all sorts of questions I've emailed her. One of these days, I'll have to find a way to be at a conference where they will be at so I can thank them with something appropriately and wonderfully chocolate.
In the meantime, I'll skulk about for the rest of the day while mulling over what to blog about on the GRRWG site tomorrow, and perhaps re-read the first Betsy book for a good laugh tonight.
So, what's this got to do with MaryJanice of Betsy, Wyndam, Fred, and Jennifer Scales fame? I was having a bit of a self-pity party as it wasn't me on TV and I was wishing MaryJanice was next door so I could dash over with some warm Snickerdoodles as a bribe and pick her brain for a bit. MJD was most kind in answering all of my questions at her book signing in Lansing for Me, Myself, and Why?, but now I have more questions, and she's not anywhere near me - geographically speaking.
Tracy, MJ's busy assistant, is also incredibly wonderful, answering all sorts of questions I've emailed her. One of these days, I'll have to find a way to be at a conference where they will be at so I can thank them with something appropriately and wonderfully chocolate.
In the meantime, I'll skulk about for the rest of the day while mulling over what to blog about on the GRRWG site tomorrow, and perhaps re-read the first Betsy book for a good laugh tonight.
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Writing and WOOT
What does writing and the WOOT site have in common? Ever since officially joining this "new" writing group, I've been a bit obsessed with writing again. This has caused me to not check woot.com on a daily basis as I've done for the past several years. Which in turn made me miss out on a deal for some more Topsy-Turvy planters and I'm a bit bummed about that.
I have a big garden planned again this year, and hanging tomatoes means I have more space in the yard for other plants. It means more work, but more produce so it's a 6-of-1, 1/2-dozen-of-the-other situation. More yard work = less writing time. In theory anyway. More yard work means I also sleep in less during the sunny months, which may ultimately mean more writing time.
Is it possible to have too many hobbies? Maybe so as I still have a full-time techie gig, which requires a lot of my time during the summer months to help out educational customers doing big upgrades. No matter how I look at it, I either need more hours in a day, or some minons to help out. Winning a big lotto wouldn't hurt either.
I have a big garden planned again this year, and hanging tomatoes means I have more space in the yard for other plants. It means more work, but more produce so it's a 6-of-1, 1/2-dozen-of-the-other situation. More yard work = less writing time. In theory anyway. More yard work means I also sleep in less during the sunny months, which may ultimately mean more writing time.
Is it possible to have too many hobbies? Maybe so as I still have a full-time techie gig, which requires a lot of my time during the summer months to help out educational customers doing big upgrades. No matter how I look at it, I either need more hours in a day, or some minons to help out. Winning a big lotto wouldn't hurt either.
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Gone for too long...
Another month has flown by without me posting or writing much. I've been super busy at work - including doing some weekend work - and somehow I've found I've "volunteered" my mooching expertise to help with this year's Network Neighborhood Bash. I just can't pass up a chance to see Drag Queens, Belly Dancing, and Fire Dancers all in one place! Plus it really is a fun event for the GLBTQ and friendlies in the area.
AND...I've officially joined my local writer's group, so I'll be volunteering to pick up a spot on their blog. AND..I have a tech event to plan, a presentation to get ready for in May, and I'm traveling somewhere around 300 miles just on Monday and Tuesday of this week for work. Maybe it's time to invest in the latest version of Dragon and get a digital recorder. I wonder if there's one that can eliminate the wind noise from inside my truck cab? Hmmm....
Oh, and I started Belly Dance classes...as an absolute neophyte, but it's just too much fun to pass up!
AND...I've officially joined my local writer's group, so I'll be volunteering to pick up a spot on their blog. AND..I have a tech event to plan, a presentation to get ready for in May, and I'm traveling somewhere around 300 miles just on Monday and Tuesday of this week for work. Maybe it's time to invest in the latest version of Dragon and get a digital recorder. I wonder if there's one that can eliminate the wind noise from inside my truck cab? Hmmm....
Oh, and I started Belly Dance classes...as an absolute neophyte, but it's just too much fun to pass up!
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