April | 2026 | Seething Apathy

Well, next week I go out and toss my baby novel out amongst the wolves. I even wrote a pitch for it. Letme know what you think:

THE SHOW MUST GO ON

Chip, Lin and Joe pose as independent ghost hunters. Lin and Chip are married, and they present themselves as a couple. What Chip doesn’t realize is that Lin is having an affair with Joe. The trio, with the rest of their group, manufacture evidence of ghosts for profit.

An accident on set begins a series of odd events. Chip, the die-hard skeptic, waves away the incidents as coincidence, or other easily explained phenomenon. What he can’t explain away is the growing familiarity between Lin and Joe. Turning his attention to the couple, he discovers the truth. In a hot rage, he kills Lin, disposing of the body. Joe follows soon afterwards. Chip believes he’s gotten away with murder.

He finds out though, that there are such things as ghosts. Some of them are very angry.

What do you think? Does it make a good pitch/back blurb? I’m trying to put enough in there to tantalize but not give away the whole thing. I’m not a fan of writing blurbs because I want to commit the cardinal sin of blurbs and end on a question. You know the old sales adage: ‘sell the sizzle, not the steak’ – well, I’m the kind of person that holds out the steak and says “You want it or not?”. No – I am not good at sales.

On the brighter side, I did the editing done before the end of next week, so as far as deadlines go, I’m two versus 10 to the fiftieth power. I’m on a winning streak! I think next, I’m going to edit down Alien Voices and see if that one is ready for prime time, or self-publishing. Honestly, I think it’s going to be the latter, which I am fine with. As far as horror goes, I don’t think the subject matter is going to fly among the larger publishers. It means I still have to write a pitch/back blurb, but at least I can put that off near infinitely.

Tyro is suffering from diversion of attention, so I am tossing that deadline out the window. I’ll get it done when it gets done. I really need to focus on getting projects that I’ve done out there in the weeds. Also, ont sticking to the outline has both helped – I’m getting some fresh scenes that move the story along; and they’ve hurt – When I have nothing, I’m dead in the water. I’m also distracted as of late by getting the current novel ready to be put out. I can manage all of this, but there’s going to be a lot of self-reminders to be patient.

I think that’s it for now. Wish me luck next Friday. I have a pitch to memorize.

I did what they said could not be done.

I have travelled through the darkness and into the light.

I Made A Deadline!

The Sweetest Run Ever!

After weeks of checking my email, I finally got something from the people hosting the writer’s conference in Louisville at the end of the month. They told me to get my 10 pages from my novel together with a query letter (if I had one, which I didn’t) and email it. When I got the email, I had a week to get everything together.

Ladies and gentlemen – I am pleased to say that I got the ten pages edited and the synopsis finished and email a full day before it was due!

Yes, yes I will break my arm patting myself on the back because I have earned it. Long time readers of the blog know the problem I have with deadlines. I can’t meet them even if we were formally introduced.

But I made this one. I dug deep, shoved every distraction aside and worked when I had spare moments. I don’t know what made this one so different than the self-imposed ones, other than that the self-imposed ones aren’t ones I paid $85 dollars for. Maybe I need to promise myself something if I make a self-imposed one. Meet a deadline and go see a movie or have a pizza. Do something more than the grim satisfaction of doing a job.

Speaking of grim satisfaction of doing a job – Tyro has slowed down a little now that I am off the outline, but I am having fun in seeing her see a train for the first time. I like catching the wonder of seeing this black iron behemoth and not really knowing what it is. I also like describing it like an alien thing. I want the reader to have this ‘A-Ha!’ moment when they put it together. Of course, we can’t have trains without train robbery, so I am looking forward to writing that scene as well. I want to show her moving with more confidence and grace in this scene than in the previous one.

I’m just waiting to get to the conference and get my work evaluated. This will tell me if The Show Must Go On is ready for prime time or not. I feel it could use a couple more once-overs, but that could be just my self-doubt talking. I might read it once again after the editing and maybe add some things. I don’t know. I really would like an unknowing second set of eyes on it.

Other than the anticipation of the conference, there is very little going on here writing wise. I’m still working on several things at once and should try to find time to research World War One for the big horror novel. Maybe if I only took a four-hour nap at night…

Well, I’ll consider that later. Ta-ta for now!