Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

You cannot shame the shameless.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

This fight is for everything.

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

The words do not have to be perfect.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

A Senator Walker would also be an insult to reason, rationality, and decency.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

You are here: Home / Authors In Our Midst / Authors In Our Midst: Horror, YA and A Work In Progress

Authors In Our Midst: Horror, YA and A Work In Progress

by | 78 Comments

This post is in: ,

I picked three works today. They are diverse, so a little something for everyone. If you want to be featured, send me your information and I’ll include you. Also, you can add your work in the comment section.

I have two playwrights that I’m going to feature next, so if you are a playwright and want to be included, now is the time to shoot me an email.

The previous Authors In Our Midst can be found here. I had a request from Tissue Thin Pseudonym, he’d love it if anyone would review his book Becoming Phoebe (featured in the first author’s post) and post it on Amazon.

Now on to our featured works:

41i5-aJLU-L._SX311_BO1,204,203,200_

Read about all of them below the fold…

Todd Travis (I write thrillers and horror, I have three books selling well and two more due this year) had a few and left it up to me chose, so I went with the first one.

Creatures of Appetites

It can be found here.

For fans of DEAN KOONTZ and THOMAS HARRIS, a tale of snowbound terror and suspense:

They call it the Heartland Child Murders.
Everyone else calls it a nightmare.
Locked doors don’t stop him.
He leaves no trace behind.
He only takes little girls.
His nickname…

The Iceman.

A deranged serial killer roams wintry rural Nebraska targeting little girls with a demented purpose that no one can fathom.

Special Agent EMMA KANE, a former DC cop and damaged goods now with the FBI, is assigned to baby-sit burned out profiler JACOB THORNE, once the best in the business but now said to have lost his edge, as they both fly to Nebraska to catch this maniac.

Thorne is erratic, abrasive and unpredictably brilliant, but what he and Kane find in the heartland is much more than anyone bargained for, especially when the Iceman challenges them personally, where it hurts most.

The clock is ticking and a little girl’s life is on the line.

======================

Anyway9781442429307 - Copy

From Hungry Joe:

Anyway – Arthur Salm

Find it here.

Reinventing yourself takes humor, heart, and a TON of footnotes!

Max is a good kid—but you wouldn’t know that if you met him at the boring family camp his parents dragged him to over the summer. There, Max reinvents himself as “Mad Max” and gains a bad-boy reputation for being daring, cool, and fearless. But when Max returns home, he finds it’s easier to be fearless with strangers than it is among friends.

Peppered with humorous handwritten footnotes and doodles throughout, Anyway* perfectly captures the viewpoint of a young teen doing his best to find his place in the world—and an ideal balance between wise guy and wimp.

======================

And finally, I thought this was fun – a work in progress from Major Major Major Major

One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, No Fish

On Tuesday, just before noon, the last fish was caught. It was a mahi-mahi. It was unceremoniously thrown off the gaffe and onto the deck of the boat, where it was unceremoniously beaten to death with an unremarkable baton and then cleaned with a machete. The fisherman hosed it down afterwards, and the bloody water poured out of the scuppers and into the sea. It was, he would later report, delicious.

Nobody learned a valuable lesson about overfishing or climate change, because this didn’t have anything to do with overfishing or climate change. Nor did anybody have a sudden epiphany about coral bleaching, or choose to devote their lives to reversing ocean acidification. There were no additional consciousness-raising efforts among schoolchildren to encourage them to grow up and become better stewards of the planet than their teachers had been.

No, none of this happened, because on Tuesday, every living fish on the planet simply disappeared. Poof. Gone.

The ecological and cultural devastation would, of course, bring the people of earth to their knees, though if pressed to talk about it pretty much everybody would start with the tsunamis.  Continue reading here

======================

That’s it for this edition. What are you reading these days? Hopefully the authors will show up and talk about their works and you can ask them questions.

Email submissions here: whats 4 dinner solutions (at) live (dot) com

 

Reader Interactions

78Comments

  1. 1.

    Mnemosyne

    There’s going to be a Minneapolis book signing for Becoming Phoebe — hopefully JMN will have time to post the details here. I’m pretty sure it’s tomorrow, not today.

  2. 2.

    Iowa Old Lady

    I’m reading Chernow’s ALEXANDER HAMILTON and a YA novel called THE MYSTERY OF HOLLOW PLACES that’s really well done.

    On Tuesday, I’m supposed to get my editor’s notes for the YA novel I have coming out in late October.

  3. 3.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    I hope I’m the first to remark that there’s something similar about 2 of the AIOM Jucie nyms, but I’m sure I won’t be because I type slow.

    Mr. Q enjoyed Creatures of Appetites, which I have not yet read. Regular readers of my posts may recall that I’m a big fan of Anyway* and now recall that I’ve forgotten to email my cousin the youth section librarian to make sure they have copies, along with the Please Don’t Tell My Parents series. Buy all of those, and spread them liberally among families you know. (I get no royalty cut; I like them that much).

    I hope that one of the next edition’s featured playwrights wrote All Together Now, which is arch, funny and so completely genuine that I’m picking my brain for old local theater connections. Or an appropriately connected person to ask in another group.

  4. 4.

    Mnemosyne

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    I’m dipping into research. Since I like to write historicals, I get an idea of what I want the characters to be and then research that. People yesterday gave me some great leads for books about early post-revolution America, so I’ve ordered 3 of those from Better World Books and requested one via interlibrary loan. I have “French Refugee Life in the United States” pulled up on my Kindle, which is a 1939 book I got for free from Project Gutenberg.

  5. 5.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @Mnemosyne: That sounds like fun. I love research enough that I get carried away and stick stuff in that doesn’t really forward the story because it’s so cool and surely everyone would want to know it. Then I have to go back and take it out.

  6. 6.

    Major Major Major Major

    I’m going to have to check out Creatures of Appetite. I don’t know that Anyway* is quite for me, but I’ve got a nephew with a birthday coming up who might be a good fit!

    FYI: AdBlock blocks the Amazon link on http://arthursalm.com/ . Not sure how to fix that, but… so that’s a thing, just a heads-up, Hungry Joe.

  7. 7.

    Mnemosyne

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    I have to be careful with research, because it’s way too easy for me to get into it and then never write the book! Though it’s also sometimes reassuring to see that my silly plot ideas could have some basis in fact. There was a Virginia planter and friend of George Washington who discovered that his distant relative had died and he was the new heir to the title, so traveled to England to present his claim. He then promptly went back to the US and he and his heirs continued living there for the next 5 or 6 generations, but it was still interesting to see it did occasionally happen.

  9. 9.

    Schlemazel (parmesan rancor)

    @Mnemosyne:
    Sunday, April 3rd at 2pm, TTP be at the Har Mar Barnes & Noble in Roseville signing copies of Becoming Phoebe.

  10. 10.

    Schlemazel (parmesan rancor)

    I love the title and the cover art of ‘Creatures’. The description sounds interesting but I have a problem with slasher fiction so that might go in lower on my reading pile. But really all 3 sound like they deserve a read.

  11. 11.

    Hungry Joe

    A brief (I’ll try) note on ANYWAY*: After I left my job at the newspaper I sat down to write a dark, antic comedy — adult, funny, and ultimately depressing, that being pretty much my view of life. But I’d never written fiction, so I decided to see if I was even capable of making stuff up. I figured I’d try a short story for my (then) 12-year-old daughter. Near the end of the day I had four or five pages, but I’d barely started the story — it was all pretty much background, in the voice of a 12-year-old boy. I thought, Well, I could have him do THIS, and then have him go THERE, and that would lead to …

    I leaned back in my chair and screamed at the ceiling, “NO! I do not want to write a fucking children’s book!” But it was too late: I already had a rough, three-part structure in my mind, and I liked the sound of the boy’s voice. And I knew that was the key: Readers have to believe that voice. I put his little asides and comments in footnotes because I thought they’d be fun to read that way. (I swiped the idea from David Foster Wallace.) As for the realism — the book is intensely realistic — I had a mantra: Beverly Cleary, Beverly Cleary, Beverly Cleary.

    I was lucky enough to get picked up by the Nancy Gallt literary agency. (Percy Jackson, anyone?) We had a bunch of offers, which my agent parlayed into a one-day auction, and I ultimately signed with Simon & Schuster. ANYWAY* came out in hardcover in 2012 and paperback in 2013. I’m currently working on another book, same age group — because apparently I never really matured much past age 12.

  15. 15.

    JPL

    @Hungry Joe: What a nice story and I’m pleased that your talent was recognized. Now I want to know what did your daughter say after she read the book.

  23. 23.

    Mnemosyne

    @Major Major Major Major:

    You left out the homoeroticism with Queegqueg.

    Full disclosure: the only thing I know about Moby Dick is that Dana Scully named her dog Queegqueg, and then it got eaten by a giant crocodile.

  24. 24.

    Hungry Joe

    @JPL: My daughter helped me out quite a bit. She made me make a couple of name changes because I had too many characters with “old-fashioned” (her words) names — Annie became Allie, for example, though I changed it so late in the process that I still think of her as Annie. And a couple of times she indicated that no, that’s not how somebody would say it — they’d say it THIS way. In short, she pointed out where I was being dumb.

    I don’t think she’s ever read the book itself — just the second-to-last draft. She’s in college now, so I suspect it’s not high on her list.

    As for Bella Q … she’s been way beyond supportive. If you ever get a chance to have coffee with her, do NOT pass it up. It was one of the more pleasant afternoons of my ever-lengthening life.

  26. 26.

    Mnemosyne

    @HinTN:

    It’s crazy detailed, and once he stops being the Secretary of the Treasury, you kind of want to jump forward to the duel, so I started getting a little impatient with the detail. It does keep you engaged, though.

  29. 29.

    Ruckus

    @Mnemosyne:
    Ahhhh, I see you found the second part of the bane of humanity. Plus, as you pass over your fifth multiple of 12, plus some, you discover that you’ve covered a fair bit more ground during the remaining parts and some of them might not have been all that bad.

  30. 30.

    cosima

    My oldest daughter is currently going through major anxiety over publisher angst. She was offered a contract by a publisher that seems very niche and in my research of it a publisher that seems to move next to zero copies of books for most of their authors. If you read reviews on Amazon most of them have the qualifying “I received a free copy of this book for an honest review” statement. The contract, while seemingly fairly generous in its royalty payments, offered no advance. So, if you sell 10 copies (giving away 1000 for “honest” reviews), it’s a whole lot of nothing.

    She has just received a message from an agent who wants to talk to her on Tuesday at such & such time, because she “loves” her book (YA historical fiction). I looked at the page for those agents and their featured books were very definitely not really something that I think would be a good fit for my daughter’s book, though a few of them got the “blah blah bestselling author” thing on the cover, so there is that going for them. Not sure what it takes to become a bestselling author to tell you the truth.

    As a mother I want to be able to offer sound advice, but have zero experience to offer in this area. My gut says hold out, hone your book (or other books), keep waiting. But maybe the niche publisher or the agent will give her something good that gets her foot in the door.

    Is it better to hold out & wait, avoiding the small niche publisher, or better to get her foot in the door? The contract isn’t asking for her first born or anything, but does want the option of her first 3 books.

    Help?

  32. 32.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @cosima: I’d talk to the agent. The fact that an agent wants to talk to your daughter is a good sign about the book. The agent can get the book seen by big presses who will get the book into B&N. No guarantee, of course. I had an agent who couldn’t move my book and then I went small press.

    Your daughter can always ask the small press to modify their contract. They’re unlikely to budge on the royalty but the option clause is a different matter.

  33. 33.

    Mnemosyne

    @cosima:

    It may be worth talking to the agent — YA is so strong right now that it’s possible that the agency is trying to start a YA division. If that’s the case, it might work out for your daughter to be one of the agency’s early “stars,” or she might get stuck with someone who doesn’t know the market. A conversation should be free, and if it’s not, your daughter should run far, far away.

    I don’t know about the publisher, but if there’s a possibility of an agent, it might be better to hold back and not get tied down to one publisher just yet.

  34. 34.

    cosima

    Thanks for helping. I’ve pointed my daughter in the direction of this thread so that she can follow up herself with comments/questions. We’re in the UK, so it is getting near my bedtime (if not after it!).

  35. 35.

    Hungry Joe

    @cosima: Has she been trying to land a literary agent? Here’s a quick how-to:

    1) Find books that are similar, and see who the authors’ agents are. (A lot of times they’re mentioned in the Acknowledgments. You can also message the author. Target those agents first. There are also lists of literary agencies, by genre. Don’t waste time & energy by sending a query for a non-fiction book on how to make origami swans to an agency that deals mostly with fantasy and s-f. 2) Send out query letters to half a dozen agents … but first, read up on how to write a query letter. It’s the most important writing you’ll do. 3) Follow the agency’s submissions guidelines to the letter. Amateurs don’t; professionals do. 4) Have another half dozen queries ready to go. When a rejection comes in, send out another query. 5) Expect rejections — everybody gets them. You only need one hit.

  36. 36.

    cosima

    @Hungry Joe: She’s sent a LOT of queries. Lots of them run by me. She’s had several agents ask for the first 50 pages, several ask for full manuscripts. Had an agent ask for specific revisions, which she provided, but then (pretty certain) she didn’t hear back from them.

    She’s an anthropology major (graduated), has done some archaeology interning, but teaching right now while her boyfriend finishes law school in VT. This writing thing is, for her, completely self-driven. If you’d asked me while she was living at home, I’d have thought it would be one of the last things that she’d ever have done.

    I consider the request for a discussion from the one agent to be good. And I consider the contract from the niche publisher good, too. It’s validating & encouraging, and I am thrilled for her on both counts. However, I’m really not going to be much help to her going forward with this (did give the contract to a lawyer friend to look over, though). This thread came up at just the right time. Thank you for your suggestions!

  37. 37.

    Kristine Smith

    The contract isn’t asking for her first born or anything, but does want the option of her first 3 books.

    Is your daughter pitching 3-4 books, so that the publisher is buying a series? An offer for a 3-4 books series, where money is paid for each book, is the usual way it works. Option clauses cover ‘the next book,’ the book that comes after all the contracted-for books have been written and turned in and accepted.

    You try to keep the definition of the option book as narrow as possible–the next book in the series, or the next featuring x-character, or something. Otherwise, if it’s too wide open, the publisher has the right of first refusal for the next book the author writes, which keeps the author from offering a different type of book to another house, etc.

    I have never heard of a 3-book option. That to me means that any three books/proposals she thinks up, they have first crack/right of first refusal. No. That’s unpaid labor.

    Agent. A *good* agent.

    More info about option clauses here, assuming that is indeed what is being discussed and not a multibook contract.

  38. 38.

    Hungry Joe

    @cosima: Yes, those are good signs, for sure.

    A multi-book option with no advances, i.e., no money up front? I dunno; what’s in it for her? I’d shy away from that.

    I probably don’t have to say this, but just to be safe: Remember that agents make a living by selling their clients’ books. Unless you’re self-publishing, NEVER deal with any agent or publisher who asks you for money.

  39. 39.

    Kristine Smith

    Many writers, esp. indies, argue that agents aren’t necessary as long as you do your research. Some folks don’t want to negotiate for themselves–they want a buffer between themselves and the editor, or they fear they will undervalue their work and not fight hard enough for the right things or fight too hard for the things that don’t matter as much. Research that niche publisher. Start with a place like Writer Beware.

    You can also hire a literary attorney to vet a contract. Some writers prefer to go that route rather than go with an agent.

  41. 41.

    gene108

    Currently reading Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold.

    I wish I could write like her.

    She conveys so much meaning in so few words.

    I feel inadequate, when I try to write anything in comparison.

  42. 42.

    gene108

    @efgoldman:

    I only ever read the Classics Comics version. I don’t think I missed much .

    Had to read Billy Budd by Melville in the 11th grade.

    I am never reading anything else by him.

  43. 43.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @gene108: She’s one of my favorite writers, though I like her scifi better than her fantasy. She’s a thoughtful writer. For instance, I heard her say she has five books planned for the Five Gods series that Chalion is in.

  45. 45.

    gogol's wife

    @HinTN:

    I’m reading it out loud to my husband as he cooks dinner, and it’s great but sometimes you just want to switch to a crimmie.

    We’ve made it to page 226 out of 900+.

  46. 46.

    gogol's wife

    @gene108:

    No, try Moby Dick, it’s much better. But it helps if you’re a grad student trying to avoid her dissertation for a whole summer, I’ll admit.

  48. 48.

    cosima

    @Kristine Smith: The book that she submitted was/is intended as a trilogy, so I can see that she likely pitched it as such, hence the wording of the contract they’ve sent her.

    I’ve messaged her links to the page that you linked (re: options) and this thread, so hopefully she’ll jump in here & speak up. Nearly midnight here, so I’m off!

    Thank you to everyone for their help — much appreciated. So much love for the BJ crowd (now that I live in the UK I’m mostly a lurker, not a lot to contribute to comment threads, not that I could keep up even when I did live in the US).

  49. 49.

    TheMightyTrowel

    @gogol’s wife: is also one that stands up to a reread well. I’ve loved Moby Dick since i was an adolescent. Read it at least once every 18 months since then. Right now, as a tenth anniversary gift from mr trowel he’s letting me read it aloud to him 1 chapter a day. Such alliteration, very whale pen15!

    Eta-fywp doesn’t like anatomical terms. Noted.

  50. 50.

    debbie

    @cosima:

    Is it better to hold out & wait, avoiding the small niche publisher, or better to get her foot in the door?

    Good grief, there is no shame in going with a niche publisher. The “name” publishers are all conglomerates and soulless. Do you honestly think she would get the kind of attention she deserves from S&S? The big houses are factories, they’re where midlist books go to die in obscurity.

    Also, keep in mind that most niche publishers were publishers/editors/marketers at name publishers before they set out on their own.

  51. 51.

    debbie

    @TheMightyTrowel:

    I have started that book so many times and failed so many times. I’m pretty much reading all of the time, but this one I cannot get into.

  52. 52.

    TheMightyTrowel

    @debbie: get an unabridged audio book. It reads aloud beautifully. You get a better sense of the playfulness of the language throughout.

    Here’s a free version read by cumberbatch, tills Swinton and others. I’ve heard twill of an excellent Patrick Stewart version too.

  55. 55.

    Todd Travis

    Just saw this, weighing and thanks for sharing my book.

    I’m a big fan of Thomas Harris, Dean Koontz, so my books, especially Creatures, is beholden to them. I don’t view them as slasher fiction as much as I do psychological thrillers / horrors, and in particular I’m a big fan of King’s recent Mr. Mercedes.

    I’m just finishing up with a sequel to Creatures right now, in fact.

    Re agents, I’ve had them, I think indie publishing is far more profitable and satisfying… I’ve had offers on Creatures, in fact, but turned them down because they were crap offers.

    Indie publishing is where it’s at, these days.

  58. 58.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    Thanks to Schlemazel for posting the info on my signing tomorrow, since I sleep all day.

    If anyone gets this far and wants to review Becoming Phoebe, my email address id eeyore1968 at melnacholy-donkey dot com.

  59. 59.

    a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)

    @Hungry Joe: You’re too kind, and you’re making me blush – I had more fun than you did. Not that I’m competitive.

  60. 60.

    Miss Bianca

    Hey, I’ve been out riding all day, and I’ve missed everything too…I’d love to review for TTP…

    I am reading, let’s see, in no particular order:

    “A Lycanthropy Reader: Werewolves in Western Culture”, a collection of scholarly essays, to go along one of the Lays of Marie De France, “Bisclaveret”, one of the earliest French werewolf stories;

    “A Civil Contract,” one of the few Georgette Heyer Regencies I haven’t read yet – this one apparently provokes very strong feelings either pro or con, and I can see why!

    “Lord John and the Hand of Devils,” a collection of novellas by Diana Gabaldon;

    Just finished “Cordelia’s Honor” and am about to start “The Warrior’s Apprentice”, by Lois McMaster Bujold. I am hooked, damn all your eyes, both jointly and severally, all ye on BJ who cried the Vorkosigan saga up to me!

    Also just finished Vicki Delany’s “Unreasonable Doubt” (Isn’t she one of the authors featured/lurking here?), which I really enjoyed – fast read, gripping story, good characters. I may have to hunt up the rest of that series!

    Also about to start Naomi Klein’s “Shock Doctrine” and a book that our very own Adam L. Silverman drew my attention to, “The Holy Grail”, by Norma Lorre Goodrich. Oh, and beta-reading a manuscript for a writer in my writer’s group. Oh, and reading/editing stage copies of “King Lear” and “Love’s Labour’s Lost” for our local “Shakespeare in the Park” productions.

    And doing some writing myself….

  61. 61.

    Todd Travis

    @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): @a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q): re playwrights, one of my good friends (who encouraged me to publish my novels on my own) is a playwright and screenwriter, he actually published a lot of his plays and made them royalty-free, in fact, so that colleges and schools could do them without paying.

    I told him about this Authors in the Midst, hoping he’d email it about it and let folks know about it. He’s more about movies, these days, but I dig his plays.

  69. 69.

    Dan Barbier

    Creatures of Appetite by Todd Travis is one of my favourite Serial killer novels. Can’t wait for the next one.

  72. 72.

    Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism

    @Iowa Old Lady: Last I heard, she’s waiting for inspiration to strike for the Mother’s and the Father’s books. In the meantime, there is of course Gentleman Jole and the 5 Gods universe novella “Penric’s Demon”.

    @Mnemosyne: You have Georgette Heyer’s Regency World, right? It was a tragedy when her library was broken up.

  73. 73.

    Prescott Cactus

    Getting close to finishing Orwell’s 1984. It gives great insight into many thing that we are experiencing today. Some subtle, some hitting you over the head. Written 67 years ago it’s amazing he captured many aspects of todays society spot on.

  75. 75.

    2liberal

    i bought and tried reading BULLETS from last time in this series but didn’t make it past a couple of chapters – just too much over the top. For me it was just unreadable. Can’t recommend that entry in the series. I live in Arizona and the idea of local cops casually committing murder in a public place is too unbelievable.

  76. 76.

    Todd Travis

    @2liberal: yeah, kinda like cops shooting a 12 year old with a toy gun, I mean, that NEVER happens.

    or choking a man to death and then claiming the man’s own weight killed him.

    Or pulling a woman over for smoking in the car, arresting her for it… and then claiming she committed suicide in her cell, despite the fact she had a large family, friends, and a great job waiting for her and no history of probable suicide.

    Yeah, local cops NEVER kill anyone unless they really, really deserve it. Especially illegal immigrants, I mean, that never happens. So unbelievable that would happen, I’m sure Sheriff Joe is a sweetheart of a fella in AZ.

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