I could use your help please.

https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/2K2POB0126BYN

 

Tongue Tied is doing well. It has spent 28 hours on the hot and trending list, and now I have close to 800 page views. I'll keep everyone posted. I thought it would start strong, but my hope is that it continues to do well.  Wish me luck everyone.

I would like to have some strong writing look this year, and this may be a break for me.

 

Sometime today, I have to do three main things.  Every month I write a letter to myself reflecting on the past month and looking forward to the next month.  Today's letter will look back and 2017 (which was not a good year) and look forward to 2018. If you have never done this, I encourage you to. It puts perspective on your life. The second thing I want to do is work on a couple novel ideas.  The third thing I want to do is read.  Writers have to read, or else they are not going to get better.

 

I wish everyone a Happy New Year.  If you have not read about my novel campaign, take a moment to check the above link.  It won't take more than a minute or two, and it might do me some good.

Update on my book campaign.

https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/2K2POB0126BYN

I just wanted to remind you of this and to post an update. According to the stats I've looked at, Tongue Tied has spent (so far) seven hours on the hot and trending list. I think that is because of all of you who have visited the campaign. So far over 450 people have looked at the page. Thanks, all of you.

I have been reading the last few days. I read the first book in a trilogy about a girl who is sucked into the dreams of other people. Of course, this drives her crazy.  At the end of book one, she has learned to control it to a certain extent, and in book two she starts to work for the police department.  The first book is Wake and the second one is Fade. I checked the second one out because even though I liked the first one, I didn't like it well enough to buy the second one.

I've also picked up Turtles All the Way Down and a book by Dean Koontz and one by Stephen King. At Barnes and Noble today. I also picked up The Magic Strings of Frankie Presto, by Mitch Albom.  I'd never heard of it, but I have liked everything else of his, and it was on sale, so I thought I'd pick it up. I get these phases where I really enjoy reading. Usually, it's when I have some free time. LOL. We are in the middle of the fall and spring semesters of the college where I teach.

I need your vote

Kindle Scout has a contest where writers can submit their books for the possibility of getting a publishing contract.  I entered my book into it and would like for any of my readers to take a look at the link below to see if they liked the book. If you do, please click on the "Nominate Me," button.

Thank you.

The campaign for my book is now open. Go to the link and read the information about the novel. If you like it, click the Nominate Me button, which basically is a vote that Kindle should publish my novel. I would greatly appreciate all of your help.

https://kindlescout.amazon.com/p/2K2POB0126BYN…

A request for help

Hey everyone. Hey, everyone here’s the deal. I entered a contest for a Kindle scout publishing contract. On December 29, I will give you a link where you can go and get information about the novel I entered and read an excerpt. If you would please read it, I would greatly appreciate it, and if you like what you read — and only if you like it — would you recommend the book to Kindle? If you nominate the book and it is published, then you will get a free copy. The publishing contract pays me an advance and guarantees at least $5,000 in sales the first year. I could really use your help. Thank you.

By the way, the novel is a young adult fantasy similar to Harry Potter, but the school is not one about wizardry.  It’s about storytelling.

The Cafeteria Revolt.

A Little Bit of Heaven

I've been thinking a lot about my writing lately and I came to the conclusion that somewhere along the way I forgot why I started writing in the first place and for whom I wanted to write. When I began, I wanted to write children's and young adults' books. I have also really liked plays. I took a look at some of the writing books I had purchased over the years and decided I probably needed to re-read some of them. I came across a book called The Aspiring Writer's Journal, written by Susie Morgenstern. It's full of writing prompts designed for children and young adults interested in writing. I think I bought it when I was a full-time teacher in hopes that I could find some journal prompts to use in my English classes. In short,  I decided today that I would write on these prompts as if I were a kid or as if I were using the situations in my own novels.
I want to share my first one with you and ask you what you think. This prompt is entitled, "There's a Revolution in the school cafeteria."

Jerry looked at the meat, if you could call it that, on his plate. It was breaded like a fritter or a chicken patty. A semi-solid pool, some kind of brown gelatinous substance quivering like Jello and shuddering, like what happens when you've seen something really disgusting which is what Jerry thought of the substance, smothered his might-be meat. It could have been gravy, but no one knew for sure. Jerry picked up something that he suspected might be a french fry, but it kind of drooped over like it was too tired to stay straight.

I much preferred tater tots which were at least recognizable and which were on average crunchy. I jabbed my spork at the tot and it ricocheted off my plate and hit a girl two tables away from us on the head and bounced away. The girl slumped forward head first onto the table, unconscious before her forehead even touched. As the nurse rushed to her aid, I turned away and pretended like I had seen nothing.

I redirected my attention to the tater tot and tried a different approach. Instead of an energetic jab, I tried to slowly push my spork into the impenetrable potato. My spork shattered into four pieces, one shard striking Jerry in the forehead and sticking there, a little trickle of blood dripping from the impalement point. However, he didn't seem to notice as he jammed his own spork into the wannabe meat. It screamed in agony.

This was a fun little exercise. One of the things I must do, I've decided, is to regain the fun I once had with my writing.  

Nothing Important Really

Hmmm. I just looked at my stats and realized that I haven't written a blog for 24 days. Well, it's not exactly the best way to build up an audience, is it?
I'm not exactly sure why I haven't written, but I do have my suspicions.  I think the root of my procrastination is my proclivity in starting projects and not really sticking with them until I finish them. This blog is a perfect example.

Another possibility is that I just don't have anything exciting going on in my life now. Well, not ever really. I've been a teacher, and I've tried to write some, but I really haven't been exciting since I was in college. Even then, I paled in comparison with many others who were shining examples of excitement and devilry.

I can remember doing butt slides in Meyers dormitory at Southeast Missouri. Back then, Meyers was strictly a male dorm. We could put soapy water on the hall floors and it made a wonderful water slide.  It was also customary that if we found out that someone on our floor had become engaged, which did happen a few times in college, we took that person kicking and screaming and threw him in Capaha Park Pond, paradise for ducks and their poop.

Before I went to Cape Girardeau, I attended a local community college. There, I first became involved in drama, and because of drama and one of my speech teachers, Dr. Richard Reney, I began to climb out of a shell that was so thick I had never seen much daylight. I never told Dr. Reney thanks.  I don't even know if the man is alive anymore.  I had him in class about 40 years ago. He would likely be in his late 70's or early 80's; I think when he retired he went back to New Hampshire.

Doc always had a strong Northeastern accent.
One of the simple joys for us at Mineral Area College was the Spades tournaments we had in between classes.  Now, there were some classic battles in spades.  We could play for hours. When I wasn't in school, I worked at Mohr Value which later became Walmart, but I still had time to enjoy the weekends. When I got my bachelor's degree, I had to grow up and start teaching.
v mentioned I'm still trying to be a writer. I am working on two projects at the moment. I'm doing a YA novel in verse. It's going okay, but I am a little slower than I'd like to be because I have not written poetry in a long while.  I have read some verse books, but I really want mine to be something more than prose broken into lines. I'm walking a thin line between putting in some strong poetic techniques and keeping it readable for a teen audience.  I want teens to appreciate the story and the language without thinking they are reading a literature book. My reading of verse books has turned me into a big fan of Steven Herrick.
Another writer whom I am really beginning to like is Neil Gaiman. He is delightfully strange. I've read Neverwhere and Ocean at the End of the Lane. I would like to get more of his books, but the libraries, both online and brick and mortar don't seem to have much of his stuff.
I'm also working on a screenplay, a low-budget horror one. I have about 15 to 20 pages to go in it. I don't know why I bother with screenplays.  In the middle of Missouri I don't think I will ever sell a script.

I think I will close for now. Before I go, I will make another recommendation. If you are a fan of fantasy and have not read Patrick Rothfuss, then do it.  He only has two books out, the first two in a trilogy he is writing.  If you like to get lost in a dense and remarkably well written 1,000 page fantasy, then pick it up.

Cheers. Until next time.

Rant

author page

I'm a baseball fan, and so far, my Cardinals have not started out well.  They are 2-4, and their supposed ace got beat today 8-0. I'm hoping I'm wrong, but it could be a long year.

I'm reading a good book right now by Linda Seger, whom I admire very much. I haven't gotten too far, but it's called Jesus Rode a Donkey. Saying that you are a liberal Christian Democrat in today's hateful, close-minded society is akin to dropping the F bomb in public, but I have decided that I don't have to be ashamed of my religious and political beliefs, and I also don't have to be ashamed to say that when it gets right down to it, our political system is anathema to what Christ proclaimed while on earth.  I wonder how many pompous religious leaders on both sides of the political spectrum remember that Jesus condemned the religious leaders of his day. I'm liable to lose friends over this viewpoint, but you know I don't care. Well, I will say no more about that.

I just kind of had to get that out of the way.  I'm so tired of people trying to shove their viewpoints down my throat.  If I'm wrong, God will let me know. I don't need to hear it from self-righteous hypocrites who are no better than I (or worse for that matter).  I know there are some people who believe that just because you are a democrat, you will go to hell. Therefore, they believe that I will go to hell. As a Christian I believe that Jesus is the Savior of the world.  That means they are wrong. Well, honestly, I will say no more about that.

I don't care if my political and religious views alienate every potential customer for my work that I have out there. I'm just not going to stifle myself because people don't like my beliefs. Honestly, I think you have the right to believe what you want as do I.

As you can probably guess, I'm in ranting mood. Nothing in particular caused it. It's been a general feeling of dissatisfaction growing within me for a while now.

I'm in kind of a creative lull here. I have some stuff to work on, but I have been swamped with my school work, and I have been sick for about three days.  I also don't feel incredibly creative because I have had terrible trouble with insomnia.  It's making me feel like a zombie. I am also getting sick of the general inertia of writing.  I'm always waiting around, waiting to hear from agents, or contests, or producers or publishers, and then getting bad news and having to wait around for another long stretch of time. Many writers would say that those are the times I should be writing and I agree with them. I do write when I can. The problem is when do all the rejections finally convince you to give it all up.  I'm 58. I've published a few things, but I've never what I would call made it. I have a new grand daughter.  Why shouldn't I just give up and accept the probability that I have finished my run at attempted authorship.

I know there are all kinds of platitudes out there about never giving up, but I also knew there's a time when someone should.

Feel free to comment on any section of this blog; just don't try to ram your beliefs down my throat or I'll delete your comments.

Light at the End

I recently published a screenplay about bullying and suicide.  It's a difficult subject which we all need to deal with. I wrote this screenplay at a time when I was very mad about the way some people were treated.  I also remember when I was bullied. I hope you'll take the time to look at the sample chapters and if you like them purchase it.

Light at the End on Amazon

Light at the End on Barnes and Noble

Light at the End on Kobo

Here are three links that you can use to purchase Light at the End.  You can get this on iTunes or Google Play (if you have an Android). As far as I know, you just have to do a search on iTunes and Google play by title and author to find it there. I hope you'll give it a chance and write some reviews on it.  Depending on what version you get, the pages vary from about 70 to 90. It's a fast read.

Here's what the cover looks like.

What a difference a pill can make

In my last blog (which hardly anyone read) I wrote about my bipolar disorder.  I have always thought crazy people were interesting, but people don't seem to think I am.  I'm not sure what my problem is.  Maybe they are tired of me trying to sell my books.  I'm not going to quit trying to do that, I'm sorry to say. Sales are slow.  I wish some of the people who have bought one or the other would write a good review if they liked it so that I could write a blog and quote what wonderful things people believe about my book. On the other hand, I might also have to accept the fact that both of them suck.  That might be true too.  However, that is not the main reason why I am writing.

I have been very worried lately because several scary symptoms had been hitting me all at once.  I'm not usually a hypochondriac, but these were really getting to me.  For one, I could not dig myself out of a depression I was in.  My doctor had even doubled my dose of my antidepressant, but it just seemed like, if anything, I felt worse. Nothing interested me whatsoever. I looked forward to very little every day. I've never been suicidal, but there have certainly been several days when I didn't care about anyone or anything.

The second problem I had was a severe tremor in my hands that was so bad I couldn't even hold them still long enough to open things: bread bags, cheese sticks, candy bars. My hands shook violently. I was so frightened I began looking up the symptoms for Parkinson's disease.  I thought I truly was in the beginning stages of it.

The last problem I had was severe insomnia.  Every night I would fall asleep after tossing for a couple hours and then awaken at two in the morning to just sit there until the sun came up.  I was more than a little nervous about these symptoms.

I expressed my concerns to my doctor.  One of the things she did was prescribe a sleep medication.  The problem was it had the exact opposite; my sleeping was worse after I took it than it was before.  But she did something else too.  She slowly changed my medication from Prozac to Lamictal. 

I feel as if God has performed a miracle in my life. I am not depressed anymore, and one thing I've noticed is that my mind is sharper and I don't feel so much like I am in a fog anymore.  Not only has my depression left but a lot of my creativity is coming back. I've even noticed I feel a lot more alive and energetic in my ITV class.  It is as if I have experienced a resurrection. I've gone back to doing the things I love like reading and writing. I am completely redoing Fall of Knight, and I like where it is going.  I've had some good feedback on the first few pages, and I went into my Final Draft outlining program and started to outline the entire novel.  I know exactly where it's going to go and how all the pieces are going to fit together.  I'm proud of my work even if the novel never gets published.  I only regret that I didn't change my medication when I was about ten years younger. Best of all, I regained my all-night sleeping as soon as I stopped taking the new message. I don't know how or if all these things are related, but it sure seems that way to me.

There's a lesson here for anyone who might be taking medication for mental illness. Sometimes, you just need to change what you are taking.  I have been taking Depakote and Prozac for years. Fortunately, I have had other times in my life when the combination of meds seemed to stop working, and I recognized it this time. I thank God sincerely for revealing this to me and for introducing me to my doctor here in Poplar Bluff. Don't be afraid to talk to your doctor if you notice changes in the way you feel.  Frankly, I don't know how much longer I could have gone on the way I was going.

As I said earlier, I am not going to quit trying to sell my books.  Below are links to each one. If you have already bought one, please leave a review on Amazon.  If you have not bought one, give me a try. Thank you.

Link to buy Deliver me from Evil

Deliver me from Evil is actually a Christian thriller/horror novel. If you have ever read Frank Peretti, you can understand where this one is coming from although I am not saying that I am anyway as good a writer as Frank Peretti.

Link to buy Walt Michaels Is a Weenie

Walt Michael Is a Weenie has a "Sandlot" flavor if you remember that film.   It also resembles the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series.  Actually, Walt Michaels Is a Weenie came out once before, and if I'm not mistaken it was published quite a while before the Wimpy Kid books.

My experiences with bipolar disorder

This is one of those posts that I'm writing because I just feel the need to write it. In the early 90's I was diagnosed as suffering from Bipolar Disorder II.  Though not as catastrophic as Bipolar Disorder I, II did, in fact, make my life a mess. I won't go through all the things I did when I was suffering from the illness and not getting treated, but they involved drinking too much, jumping from job to job, being rude and obnoxious to the people I loved, and feeling if not suicidal, at least desperately unhappy.  Desperate is a good way to describe it. I knew something was wrong with me, but I didn't know what it was. When someone finally told me I had a mental illness that could be treated, I breathed a sigh of relief.

Once I began to take medication for my illness, I finally settled into my life. I stayed in education until my retirement, most of my years of teaching being in one school, the school I graduated from.

I can't describe for you the entire catalogue of effects for bipolar, and even if I could, yours might be completely different. Mine manifested itself mostly with depression and anxiety. It was everything I could do to get out of bed in the mornings. A fourth of the time I was manic. Manic is life at full speed ... no probably speeded up beyond that, artificially fast. Manic, I believed I could do anything and that I was indestructible. I did a lot of stupid things when I was manic. It also gave me delusions of grandeur making me think that I was something special and that what I was doing (in my case I was freelancing and teaching at the same time) would turn into gold. One day my ship would come in.  I fancied myself as the next Stephen King. Well, I wasn't and I'm not now either. The biggest problem with the manic part is that sooner or later, if you are bipolar, you will crash and crash hard.

With bipolar disorder there is rarely any in between. I was either depressed, and this was most of the time, or so manic I had trouble functioning and concentrating. I would just wake up and get hit with a mood. It wasn't anything I could control. I also had problems with rapid cycling -- going from one extreme of emotion to the other several times in one day. I know people get depressed and I know they have good days, but what people who are ignorant about bipolar disorder don't understand is that we have these moods for no reason and they can change for no reason and it's all beyond our control.

My life has been a struggle, and I'm not telling you this to evoke pity or anything like that. In fact, my main motivation in writing this is to tell you that despited the struggle, I love life. I started out taking Lithium and imipramine. This combination of medications stabilized my moods. I didn't have the ups and downs as I used to. It was such a wonderful feeling that I couldn't even imagine before. I know naysayers will tell me that if I had had faith or if I had done this or that, I would not have needed to take medication. I say to you naysayers that if you truly have a mental illness and not just a temporary situational depression, you will not be able to lift yourself up by your own bootstraps and if you tell mentally ill people this, you are doing them more harm than good. Mental illness has enough of a stigma attached to it without people saying that we should just get over it.

I know because once or twice I have gotten to feeling better and I have quit taking my medicine. I crashed again. HARD.

Notice, I mentioned in the previous paragraph that I started out taking Lithium and Imipramine. I don't take this anymore. The hard part about treating bipolar disorder is that for some reason that I can't or doctors can't explain , the medicine that works for you stops doing its job sometimes, and you start experiencing the same symptoms you had before you took medicine. I'm fortunate in that I know my own illness well enough that I know when I need to make a change in medication. Usually, I can get adjustments before I do something stupid.

Winters are hard on me no matter what medication I am taking, but generally I can outlast them. I can't even begin to describe for you the restlessness and disappointment that hit me every winter. I know it's coming.  It will start between Thanksgiving and Christmas and it will last until Spring. When the sun starts shining more and the temperatures warm, my mood will start lifting. This depression and restlessness worsen my already existing bipolar. I know that I will generally have to take a higher dose of medication in the winter.

This winter is one of the ones that has been especially tough on me. My doctor increased my dosage of medication, and it wasn't working. In addition it was causing me some noticeable side effects. Now, again, I am going through a medicinal transformation. Every time I do, I keep positive, thinking this mixture, my bipolar cocktail I call it, will be the one to end all others. I'm going to be taking Lamictal and Depakote. Now, my doctor has to be careful with me because lamictal and depakote if not prescribed correctly can react in such a way that I could die. We are going to have to be very careful.

I have been making the change slowly to avoid this very problem, but I'm already beginning to see some differences. My thinking seems clearer. With my other medication sometimes my thoughts seem muddled, kind of like I was in a fog, drifting along with any current that came along. But I have noticed that there is kind of a disconnect from my brain to my mouth. I have trouble at times coming up with the right words in my classroom or I mispronounce things or I completely lose my train of thought. At other times I have some dizziness. I tried Lamictal once before, and I think this is maybe why I stopped taking it. At any rate I am going to have to ride this change out to see where it takes me.

I struggle day in and day out, but so far the things in my life that I love far outweigh my desire to quit struggling. If I had not given medication the chance, I never would have seen that. If you know someone who is depressed or if you are depressed, please let someone check you out. You might be surprised at how relieved you are to know that you have a mental illness that can be treated successfully.

Link to purchase a copy of Deliver Us from Evil

Link to purchase Walt Michaels Is A Weenie