Shameless Self-Promotion: Chapter 6 of the next project

Hey all...

I'm going through a first pass of my next book, before an editor can get to it, and before beta reads.  But... I figure a little out-of-context taste of what I'm doing couldn't hurt.

So, all feedback is welcome.  Enjoy!

6.

Alex

     Don’t know what to expect as I pull up in the driveway.  That guy – whoever he was – doesn’t still have a car here, so bonus for that.  There’s nothing worse than finding some strange dude’s sports car on my street.  My darling wife’s car is still here.  Maybe not so much a bonus.  I’m not sure if I’m going to pack some stuff and hit a hotel, or tell her to pack her shit.  I’m not sure I want do either.

     I can’t get the last 10 hours out of my head.  The kiss in the bar.  Watching Sabrina.  Catching, I mean.  Catching Sabrina.  This morning with Lucy.

     Lucy and I went at it hard today.  The way she moved, how she looked perched up on me.  The natural tightness of her body, how her ass and tits defied gravity, but she clearly hasn’t spent a minute in the gym.  Not muscular, not fluffy, just the perfect body at the perfect time in her life.  You can’t replace youth, and she can’t be any older than 25. 

I haven’t been with anyone since I met Selena.  That’s ten years of being completely faithful.  I should feel bad.  Guilty.  But I don’t, not really.  I mean, she fucked up first.  I am absolutely justified. 

So why don’t I feel good about it? 

Ah, this sucks.  Every time I think I feel guilty, I can’t stop the image of watching… catching her bent over on the living room floor.  Every time I think Sabrina’s a whore, I picture Lucy, on top of me with her hands on my chest and her top teeth tugging at her bottom lip, and her body rocking back and forth with her dark curls covering her red face.

     I’m slow and deliberate as I turn the key.  I hope she’s sleeping.  I hope she doesn’t hear me.  Kind of wish I could just fast-forward past this.

Sabrina

     The key turning in the deadbolt lock wakes me from the power nap I was taking on the couch.  I check the clock on the wall – minutes to noon – and realize that it’s been close to six hours since I heard that little performance.  I probably shouldn’t be so fucking mad; he did walk in on a compromising situation, but I can’t help myself.  I can hear my heartbeat.  It sounds like explosions in my head.  I’m dizzy.  Gotta breathe.  Breathe.  Slow it down.  Inhale, exhale.  Why the fuck is it so hot in here?  Do I have a fever?  This is a hell of a time to get sick.

     Six hours.  Not a call.

     Six hours ago, I was hoping that the man I loved wasn’t dead, or didn’t leave me.  Now I wish he had. 
     Left, I mean.  I don’t want him dead.  I don’t think, anyway.
     He opens the door and glances at me before heading up the stairs to the bedroom.   I still don’t quite know what to say.  I’m hurt, angry, embarrassed, sorry, and have no idea which one is the right one to express.  I can hear him sifting through drawers and slamming them closed.  A few minutes of that and he heads into the kitchen.  I guess his night made him hungry.

     I figure I should take a look at the damage he’s done to the bedroom.  I get in there and see all my clothes, dumped in a pile all over our bed.  I check the top two dresser drawers.  They’re empty.  So are the laundry baskets and my side of the closet.  Everything I own in this bedroom is on the bed.

I rush down to the kitchen and see him leaning on the breakfast bar, drinking a glass of orange juice.  He looks at me, takes a giant chug and puts the glass down on the counter.

     I want you to leave, he says to me.

Alex

     I walk into the house and there she is, on the couch wearing her bathrobe, just sitting there, like she was waiting for me to get home.  I catch her out of the corner of my eye, looking up at me.  Something in her eyes, a look of anger, maybe a touch of regret.  It’s too much and I’m not ready yet to return the look.  I head to our bedroom and have a seat on the bed.  This is the first real breath I’ve had all day.  I stare at the furniture in the bedroom, all a deep brown cherry-wood, polished and lacquered.  They were her choice, and I have grown to like it.  I stand up in front of the dresser and before I really know what I’m doing, I’ve emptied the top two drawers.  I go into the closet, yank down all the hangers from her side and grab her laundry basket.  All her stuff, her sweatpants, her underwear, t-shirts, I’ve dumped them all onto the bed.  I hustle my way back to the kitchen; she’s not on the couch anymore.  I need a drink.

     I pour half a glass of orange juice and add a splash of vodka.  It helps me calm my nerves.  I take a gulp and notice her standing at the entrance to the kitchen, staring at me with this “what did you do?” look.

     I want you to leave, I say to her.

     Her mouth drops open a bit, a reaction to shock.  I don’t buy it.  There’s no way she didn’t see this coming after last night.

     “Excuse me?” she says.  Her voice is trembling, like she’s trying to hold on to her last bit of calm.

     I need you gone.  I can’t be here with you anymore.

     She bites her lip.  She’s holding back tears.  “And where do you expect me to go?”

     Not my problem, I say.  You probably should have thought of that before you brought your boyfriend home.

     She goes red in the face.  “He’s not my boyfriend,” she starts to say.

     I don’t give a shit who he is, actually.  This marriage is over.

     She can’t stop the tears now.  “And what, that’s my fault?  Where were you last night?”

     I pause; should I tell her?  It doesn’t matter where I was, I say.

     “Who were you with?”

     What are you talking about?

     “Don’t play stupid.  I heard you with a woman when I called you.  You forgot to hang up your phone last night, you ass.”

     It hits me; that’s why my phone battery died all of a sudden.  I didn’t hang up when I threw it down.  A momentary wave of relief comes over me; that was an expensive phone and I would hate to think I damaged it.

     Pot calling the kettle black, don’t you think? I say.

     “So what, you had to go get revenge?  Hurt me for hurting you?”  She huffs and puffs and wipes away tears.  “I hope the bitch was worth it.”

     Fuck you, I tell her.  I’m yelling now, I don’t ever yell at her.

     “Obviously not,” she says.  “Can’t believe it took this to realize you never really did it for me.”

     She says that and I feel my heart stop.  I get in her face, nose-to-nose, angry with her like she’s a guy.  I feel like I’m watching myself grab her face.  This can’t be me, I’ve never raised a hand to her in anger.  Get out, I watch myself say.  She slaps at my arms.  She’s always been tough, strong, and I’m not surprised that her hits sting my arm.  When the harmless slaps turn into punches, I let go of her face and with one arm I grab both of her wrists and push her back against the fridge.

     And I kiss her.

Sabrina

     I hear myself saying “you never really did it for me,” and I know it’s not true.  I know I’m pushing the wrong buttons and pushing them too hard, but so what?  What’s he going to do?  Even as he grabs my jaw in his strong right hand, I know my man.  I know he’d never hurt me.  But the pressure he’s putting on my face is starting to get uncomfortable.  He gets in my face and tells me to get out.  And I realize that maybe I don’t know my man so well.

     My heart’s pounding from fear or anger, I can’t tell which.  He’s telling me to get out of my house and he knows I don’t have anywhere to go.  And before that part of my brain that would say “No, don’t, this isn’t a good idea” gets a chance to speak, I start to hit him.  “Let me go,” I say.  I don’t think he’s hearing me.  I go from open hand slaps to punches, hard, to his arm.  He grabs my wrists in his hands and puts them up above my head, then pins me against the fridge.  He grabs my jaw again, and I don’t know when the last time I’ve ever been this scared.

     He kisses me, hard, passionately.  Everything stops.  My eyes drift closed and I feel him pressing his lips against me, the day-old stubble of his chin razing my face.  It’s rough and prickly and tickles.  I feel his tongue forcing its way past my lips and I let it in after putting up a cursory resistance.  I take a deep breath for the first time.  I hate him.  God this feels good.

     I bite his lip, not hard, not softly, and his hands loosen from my wrists.  I grab his face and push away, taking a breath to try and get the flush out of my face.  I slap him across the jaw as hard as I can and kiss him again.  I tear at his shirt and buttons pop and I’m raking his chest with my fingernails.  He moves his prickly face to my neck and bites down.  It hurts, but there’s no pain in my voice.  I throw my arms around his neck and dig my nails into his back.

     It feels so good.  I hate the cheating bastard.

Alex

     A grunt escapes my throat as she scratches my back.  The sting from air and sweat means she’s probably broken skin, but right now I can’t say I care.  Her skin warms in my hands, in my mouth.  She tastes great.  I throw off her bathrobe and rip off her tank top, and she moans at the sound of the cotton ripping.  I lift her off the ground and her breasts to my face.  She squirms in my arms and her feet flail in the air, and she lets out noises I haven’t heard before.  Holy crap, this is incredible.  Is this what she was like last night?

     I bite at one of her nipples and she pulls my head in closer.  She’s trembling.  She slips through my hands to the ground and works her hands on my belt and pants.  I slide her pajama bottoms to the ground, and she quickly shimmies them off her ankles.  Then my pants are around my ankles.  I kiss her again, hard and deep and pin her wrists behind her.  She wraps those strong dancer legs around my waist and I’m greeted by warm and wet.  I’m watching myself pin her against the wall and drive into her.  I want to give myself a thumbs up.

     We’re both making animal noises as we make love.  No, come to think of it, this isn’t making love, not at all.  I’m angry, and I can tell she is too.  We’re hitting the wall so hard that our cabinets are shaking.  A ceramic plate falls out and smashes against the floor.  There is very little love in this.

     She starts to squeeze me and I withdraw.  I don’t want this to end just yet.  I put her down and bend her over the breakfast bar and slide into her as she’s still trembling.  One hand’s on her back and I have her thick dark curls wrapped around my wrist.  I grab her hip and drive into her, hard. Fast.  Repeatedly.  She squeals, part pain, part pleasure, but I’m not going to stop.

Sabrina

     One minute we’re fighting, the next minute we’re screwing on the breakfast bar.  When I look at this in my mind later, I’m sure I’m going to laugh at how crazy this is.

     We’re going at it pretty hard.  There’s a broken plate at the cabinet and I think I knocked over a glass from the breakfast bar.  I’m holding on for dear life as he’s ramming me from behind and there’s a part of me that can’t help but think if this is what he did with her, whoever she is.  Did she get it this good?  Was he this savage with her?  And I’m surprised at myself to realize that the thought is what’s driving this.

     Did he bend her over something in her kitchen? Oh, God!

     Was he pounding her this hard?  Shit, yes!

     Did he slap her ass the way he’s slapping mine?  Fuck me!

     I don’t know if I’m thinking it or screaming it, but he’s going at it so hard it almost hurts.  So, so good.

     My knees are buckling again and I know I’m about to cum.  He brought me so, so close last time and stopped, the asshole, just to do this again.  I want this, need this, can’t let him know.  Hold my breath.  Don’t clench.  Feel my face going warm.  Oh, shit.  Gotta hold it.  Gotta hold it.  For the love of God, please don’t stop.  Oh, God!

     He pulls out and I let out that breath- Fuck yes- and my knees feel like jelly. I feel a warm trickle down my leg.  Oh, god, am I peeing?  How can I be peeing?  Wait, wait a minute.  This isn’t pee.  I’m not peeing.  That’s new.

Alex

     There’s a small puddle forming at my feet and I’m suddenly not so focused on the anger anymore.  Wow.  That’s definitely a new trick.  I take a breath and pat myself on the back in my head.

     Did she do that last night?  Did she do that for him?

     I see red and drive into her again.  I grab her by her hips and pull her into me.  She’s not even putting up any resistance, even throwing her hips back at me.  She’s moaning like a little whore, not even forming words.  Her knees buckle and her body trembles in my hands.  I can’t hide my smile as I grab a handful of her hair, and her breath catches in her throat.  The one word she says comes out as a long and raspy whisper: “Yes!”.  I haven’t seen her dick-drunk in years.

     She clenches up again, right at my moment of weakness.  Fuck, I’m gonna blow.  My entire body seizes and I let loose inside her.  My limbs go heavy and I feel my eyes roll back.  The kitchen is getting hazy, and where a second ago I was gripping her to pound her harder, I’m holding on now to keep from falling over.  My legs wobble and fail, partly because of the vigorous workout and partly because I let off twice in the last eight hours and I’m just not used to all this sex.  I pull out and she drips and oozes on the floor.

I’ll probably have to clean that up.

     We both take a few silent, heaving breaths.  We’re drenched in sweat.  I can’t muster up the same kind of rage I just had not too long ago.  Too tired.  Too relaxed.  I know, I hope, whoever that guy was he didn’t get this out of her.  This was for me.  This was mine.

After a moment, she stands upright and strides over to the pile of her clothes near the fridge.  I haven’t seen her naked like this in so long, I forgot how stunning she is.  Tall, long, lean, muscled legs, toned stomach, perky breasts, naturally tanned skin with freckles at her chest and cheeks.  She bends to pick up her bathrobe and shorts and I take notice of that ass of hers.  My red handprint is still visible.

“I’m taking a shower,” she announces.  “I’m sweaty.”  She walks away, out of the kitchen and upstairs toward the bathroom.

And then I hear her call out, “You coming?”

Happy New Year!!

Welcome to 2016!

I'm a little late, sorry about that, traffic was murder.  This is the right space to give a first of the year update on projects and life in general.

First and foremost, I (finally) completed the first draft of my next novel, with the working title Open.  Cue the champagne and balloons!!  It's part of the reason why this blog posting is so late as I took a break from writing anything other than my name over the last couple of weeks.  Now comes the largely fun task of rewriting and rewriting before I go into beta reads and edits.  The next six or seven weeks should be interesting.

I'm training for Tough Mudder 2016 in Whistler, BC.  It's one of those "focused goal" things I would like to do this year, finish the course in 4 hours or less.  Right now, it means lots of working out.

I don't have a whole lot else, but thanks for stopping by!

My Nerd Is Showing

The week before Halloween was Bellingham Comic-Con.

You hear a lot about the top-tier shows, like the ones in New York (NYCC) or San Diego (SDCC) or Seattle (ECCC -- EC for Emerald City).  Those last for three or four days, are packed wall-to-wall with celebrities touting movies and cartoons and all kinds of nerd paraphernalia.  These events are big and loud and well-publicized, as well as expensive and exclusive.

Bellingham Comic-Con is one of my favorite things about the town I live in.  Sure, it's not big and flashy like its big-city cousins.  IGN has never and likely will never set foot in there, and you're crazy if you think you're gonna see footage from the new Star Wars movies.  What it does have is passionate locals, be it the guys at Reset Games who sell retro video games (even though they admittedly weren't there this year -- FAIL), or the local comic book sellers who bring in boxes of current and classic comics to help fill out your collection, or the toy vendors.  It has creative local artists and writers, passionate about their work.  It has one or two famous artists who have worked with major comic publishers (Savage Dragon's Erik Larson and creator of Carnage, Randy Emberlin are regulars), and talented indies who are trying to break out.  And this year, it
had this guy:

YES.  That is a dancing Deadpool.  There are very few things that bring the awesome more than this.  Except maybe, this.

Dancing Deadpool leading a conga line around the convention center.  Yup, that happened.

There was honestly so much cool stuff there, stuff that people wouldn't have been able to access in NYC without either a press pass or paying through the nose.  For a small donation I was able to take these pics:

A blind dog dressed as an Ewok.

The most badass Jedi since Sam Jackson

Hero of the Rebellion

I'm not downing NYCC.  I'd like to go one day.  That said... this is still pretty freakin cool.

Age of Fitness

I'm finding that the unfortunate reality that I was warned about has come to pass.  It's hard to stay fit in your 30's.

Time was, maybe 10 years ago, I'd gain 10 or 20 pounds in the winter, then lose it in the summer plus five.  Summers in New York were hot and there was stuff to do, like copious amounts of basketball.  Beer made me sweat, not fat. And I could party all night on Sunday and do Monday with three or four hours sleep.  Those were the days. Now, I have to watch what I eat and how much, I have to do crazy intense workouts, I have to force myself to sleep (well, force is a strong word).  If I drink, I'm useless for two or three days after.  And I find myself fixated on my weight more than I ever have been at any point of my life (264, if you're asking).  I'm concerned of a family history of diabetes and high blood pressure, and I just want to get older and not feel like shit.

As my birthday came and went, I took a look at some of my habits and am actively trying to change them.

Diet:  I love sugar.  It's awesome and tasty and makes everything better.  I'm good about most of my diet, eating greenery and fruits and quinoa and stuff.  If you had known me five years ago, you know that this is a big deal.  I'm doing my best to cut baked goods out (goodbye, donuts and cinnamon rolls and anything delicious from Starbucks) and anything with added sugar.  I'm trying to limit bread to one slice per day with breakfast.  I want to not be lazy and juice more (I have a head not kale in my fridge that I should probably get to before it walks out).

Exercise: It's difficult to split time between writing, working a full time and per diem job, and having any kind of life.  Working out is one more thing to do that eats up time.  I hate to say it like that, but a fact is a fact.  As we get older, it gets harder to divvy up the time.  I don't even have kids yet and it's this difficult.  Or maybe I'm just lazy sometimes.  If it's important, you'll find a way, if it's not you'll find an excuse.  Sporadically, my excuse is I don't have the time, or I need to sleep, or I'll do it tomorrow.  That's got to stop.  This is important.

Sleep: Considering I work in sleep medicine when I'm not writing, I should know the importance of good solid sleep.  I don't get nearly enough of it and for no good reason.  Like I said, I don't even have kids.  I have got to force myself into bed when I get home, and I've got to stay there for at least seven hours.

I have a beard going right now because I promised myself I'd keep it until I got myself below 250 labs.  Now that I'm putting this out into the ether, I'd better get to it.

*** Quick Hits ***

NBA season starts in a couple of weeks.  To all my friends who are basketball fans, allow me to put in this piece of information:

The Knicks will be AT LEAST the #6 seed in the East this season.

I could cite their much improved defense, or the personnel moves that have players tailored to the offensive system they run.  I could talk about how underrated Robin Lopez is.  But I won't.

I'll just say 6 or better.

***

Went to Barnes and Noble today and decided to teach myself more about my craft.  I've been writing fiction for about 20 years now, published for 10, but I stilt want to learn more, hone my skills more, and be a better writer.  I'm starting with industry magazines (for probably the least glamorous industry on the planet.  I mean seriously...), but I'll work myself up to online seminars, going over stuff in the library.  I love what I do, so it couldn't hurt...

Adulting

Some days I think Peter Pan got it right.

Screw adulthood.  I want to play and not worry about time.  I want to have all my needs taken care of for me and not have to think about employment or taxes or any of that stuff.  Who needs to think about politics and religion and love and feelings?

It seems the difficult stuff was never in the manual.  Parents would offer vague warnings about savoring our youth and enjoying simplicity without directly stating what about adulthood sucked so much.  All we saw was a life free from stupid rules and chores and stuff.  So many of us were not schooled on the responsibility adulthood carries.  We were told bits and pieces, educated in math and science and history, but we weren't prepared for this life of bill payment and maintenance.  We were told that we were special, that we had something to offer the world.  Who would have thought they were merely referring to our time?

It was a conversation I had briefly with my sister-in-law on her birthday earlier this week.  Adulthood carries the responsibility of time management, of child rearing, of management of emotions, of deferring happiness for the sake of the bigger picture.  If I had that information at 8 or 9 years old, it would have been a one-way ticket to Neverland.  I'd have taken my chances with the Pirates.  We do grow up though.  It's not a process we can opt out of.  We do what we have to to accomplish what we want to.  Dreams are tailored to fit the reality of the the world around us, the world we wish to change.

If we're lucky, we are either born with or developing the skills we need to affect that change.

***

I never thought I'd live in a world where the Mets, Cubs, and Blue Jays are in the running for a World Series at the same time.  Meanwhile, my beloved Yankees are watching from home.  I'm not okay with this.

***
My grandmother's 96th birthday just passes.  Am I wrong to hope she can double it?

Back in the Mud (Vacation, day one: Brooklyn NYC)

So I'm on vacation.

I had been looking forward to it for the last little while.  I had been working my butt off for the last month specifically so I could do this.  I haven't had a proper vacation in far too long.  My girlfriend decided earlier this year that she wanted to go to Morocco.

I decided to go home to New York.

And while she's having an absolute ball in Morocco, experiencing the people and the culture up close and personal, I'm re-immersing myself in my hometown.

And she and I will meet up in London and exchange vacation stories.

Here's how my day one went.

After working all night on Sunday and traveling all day and night Monday, I arrived at JFK Airport on Tuesday morning, having spent six hours cramped in a middle seat behind the guy who wanted to explore the range of his seat back, next to a mid-20s woman who thought my arm made a great pillow, and next to a guy who would not stop man-spreading.  I hate flying while tall. 

I got to my sister's home, which serves as home base for this week, and hung out with my niece who has most of the week off from work.  We went for a run.

And periodically during the day, I slept.  Like a rock. A week of saying "no sleep til Brooklyn," and when I get there, I sleep.  Mission accomplished.

Today, while my girlfriend was camel riding in the desert, I did a whole lot of not much.  And I loved every relaxing second of it.  This is the first time I've been back home without an agenda: no sick parent to see, no funeral to attend, no birthday celebration, no guided touring.  This part of my vacation is about reconnecting with family and old friends.

Don't get me wrong, I have a plan in place to hit Coney Island (I haven't seen it since the redo), catch a Yankee game while the Red Sox are in town, get drunk with various combinations of friends, and even hit the playground basketball scene I haven't been around in seven years.  But for today, I slept.  It'll make for a boring story when I see my lady in London (more on that in a later post), but there's something to be said about being home and sleeping.

Can't wait for tomorrow!

Out With The Old, In With The New/Cool As The Other Side Of The Pillow

Happy 2015, y'all!

Yeah, I know, I'm about two weeks late.  Couldn't be helped.  My December was kind of epic.  I watched my best friend get married, moved into a new apartment, worked like a psychopath, had Christmas Eve Dinner, made Christmas Morning French Toast, had Christmas dinner, unpacked my last box just a couple of hours before getting trashed on New Year's Eve.  I needed a break.

But here we are, on the other side in 2015.  This is the year that we're supposed to have our hoverboards and the Chicago Cubs win the World Series (I'd bet on the hoverboard coming first).  It's a year full of promise, of expectation, of ambition.  Or of the same old resolutions.  Whatever.

I'm sure we've all made the promise to be better off financially, to be better with our significant others, and the promise that this will finally be the year we get healthy.  I know I did.  I think I made those promises last year, too.  Oops.

To be fair though, last year was awesome, for me at least.  I got to knock some items off my personal bucket list.  I did a small book tour for my novel The Favorite (shameless plug).  I did three book signings and a reading.  I got to see something I wrote on the shelves in a bookstore.  And it won an award.  I'm almost sad to see 2014 go in that sense.

2015 though, that's going to be a monster.  I'm going to finish the manuscript I've been working on for the last three-plus years (thanks NaNoWriMo).  I'm going to master this tricky marketing thing.  I'm going to bust my hump to do a quarter-million words of fiction this year (down from last year's million because, well, damn).  I'm going to read and review one book per month.  And I'm going to interview independent writers, artists and musicians as often as I can.  And I'm going to use this blog.  A lot.

Happy New Year.

                                                                 ***
I'd like to take this moment to give a shout out to the late ESPN anchor Stuart Scott who died last week of a particularly persistent cancer.  Mr. Scott, besides being a beacon of professionalism and having a style that is often imitated and never duplicated, was by all accounts a badass in the face of his diagnosis, training in MMA fighting while working and doing chemotherapy right up until the end of his life.  He is a legend in his own time and an inspiration to this writer.  After all, if a man facing terminal cancer can not only be at the top of his profession AND train his body in combat, then there is no reason why a healthy person like myself can't do anything they set their mind to.

Remember, Remember

I haven't forgotten.

Usually on September 11, I'll post my favorite picture of Lower Manhattan post terrorist attack, one taken from Jersey and depicting the Tribute in Light, where high-intensity lamps are shone skyward from the footprints of the World Trade Center.  The lamps are aimed and positioned in such a way that it looks like two towers of light standing watch over the city, a haunting afterimage of what was once there.  The picture I have of that has the lights hitting cloud cover and stopping.  It's quite pretty.

I didn't do that this year.

Every year on September 11, I wax poetic about the loss of life we endured that day, about how my city came together and for a few weeks.  The city was more humane, more human.

I didn't do that either.

It's not because I forgot.  I could never forget.  Neither could anyone who was cognitively alive that day.  Or anyone who has any kind of documentary channel.  I remember the before, and that memory pains me for the after.  I didn't do my usual thing because somewhere along the line thirteen years later, as I relocated 3,000 miles away, September 11 became just another day.

I don't mean that to disrespect the families who lost loved ones in that attack, as this will never be just another day for them.  However these days I'm living in an area where, beyond a passing mention about the terror attack, it's been just business as usual.  They didn't show on TV or play on the radio the reading of the names of the lost.  September 11 birthdays aren't some tragic cosmic joke.  The people I know here only ask me about it when they find out I'm from New York.  And in the course of day-to-day interaction without the shawl of grief and mourning, it's just another day.

The site has been built over.  One World Trade is now complete.  The 9/11 museum immortalizes the event and the aftermath.  Lower Manhattan looks like this now:

And the world keeps spinning.

Retrospective on The Fab 5

I have a confession to make.

Over the last three or four years I've been distancing myself from my first novel, The Fab 5.  I had what I thought was a good reason.  My grandmother, 84 years old at the time, read it.

The Fab 5.  Available on Amazon and B&N.

I never intended for her to read it.  I didn't write it for her.  And it never occurred to me for even a half a second that she would.  It's a street-flavored basketball story following five lifelong friends from Flatbush.  So when I wrote about some of the realities of living in a neighborhood not too dissimilar from the one in which I grew up, there was a heavy dose of, shall we say, colorful language.

                         Castillo’s face went purple, and I swear I saw steam come out of his ears. “Yo,

                   f*** you, you b****-a** monkey n****!”

                          Shiver stood up straight, shocked by the comment. He got right in between

                   Jay and Castillo, getting nearly nose-to-nose with him. “What did you say?”

                   Shiver said, as angry as I had ever seen him.

                          Jay forced his way back in between Shiver and Castillo, and forced them both

                    back. He held Shiver back, and turned to face the Puerto Rican kid. “F*** it,” he

                    said with a heavy sigh. “Get your squad together, Miguel.” Shiver stopped resisting,

                    and joined the four of us in a shocked look at Jay. “If it’s gonna shut his little

                    punk a** up, then fine, let’s beat him again.”

                         Castillo smiled as he walked past Jay. “Don’t go nowhere,” he said as he

                   walked toward the other side of the park. As he walked past Shiver, he said under

                   his breath, “B**** n****.”

And so on.  That is from page 18.  While some people were able to relate to and even appreciate the authenticity of the language -- if you grew up in a rougher neighborhood in New York, I suppose you would too -- I had some friends tell me they created the first literary drinking game in history for every time I swore in that book.  

Up until that point, the only book my grandmother had ever read was the Bible.  Sure, she read newspapers and magazines and such, but The Bible was all she read that came in a hardcover or paperback.  For the record, she still has both.  She had never read a novel.  

Until her youngest grandson gave her a signed copy of The Fab 5.

So several weeks later, when I did my good grandson thing and visited her after work, she looked at me sternly through her glasses like she always did and said in a thick Jamaican accent, "I read your book, Franklyn."  And suddenly every cuss word I wrote, every questionable situation I conceived flooded my head.  I mean, I referred to a certain female character in the five most unflattering ways you could in one line.  (I guess the fact that no word in that line was more than five letters can be considered impressive, if you squint one eye.)

My mouth hit the ground.   "You read it?!  Jeez, Mama, you weren't actually supposed to read the thing!"  I composed myself and cleared my throat.  "So what'd you think?"

She turned her attention to the word search puzzle she was doing and let the question hang for a while.  "I liked it," she said, I'm sure to be polite.  "Too many bad words though."

And just like that, my enthusiasm for promoting my first novel kind of tanked.  I was embarrassed that my grandmother read it.  There's no way there's a market for this thing, I thought.  And that was that.

Fast-forward to 2014.  I'm scrolling through Netflix and stumble across a documentary by Bobbito Garcia called Doin' It In the Park, which followed the streetball scene in the five boroughs, and suddenly I realize exactly how wrong I was.  Bobbito's respect for the sport that I played and loved was oozing from the film, and I saw elements of my book -- the gamesmanship, the competition, the trash-talking, the court culture and such-- played out in reality and motion.

I realized then that The Fab 5 did have value, and did have a market.  Was it perfect?  Not by any means. It's not even my best work; my second novel is leaps and bounds better, and all writers criticize their previous projects.  But it was an accurate depiction of what my world was like at 16, 17, and 18.  You had the park.  You had your crew.  You had a ball.

I may be more actively promoting my current novel, The Favorite, but my earlier work is (in my very humble and obviously biased opinion) very much worth the read.

And keep a bottle of Jack nearby in case you want to play the drinking game.

Stay-cation Daze

I don't usually take vacations.

Don't get me wrong, I take time to go places.  I take time to be sick.  I go back to New York at least once a year.  But very rarely do I ever unplug, go off the grid like I have the last couple of weeks.  I mean, I was still connected at my father's funeral last year.

The last couple of weeks, I've been off.  No day job, no writing, very little in the way of shameless self-promotion.  I needed a break.  It's not even like I went anywhere of importance: I rediscovered my liver, and went on a local boat cruise; went to Pike Place Market with my girlfriend; sat on my butt and watched the All-Star Game.  There was a fun picnic and a beach day where I had an unfortunate skin reaction to lake water (itchy, itchy, itchy!!!).  And I have to say, there's definitely something to this whole vacation thing.

The last time I took this much time off, I went to the Dominican Republic for a week or so and had a blast.  There's a story in there about how my brothers and I were mistaken for members of the 2012 Super Bowl Champion New York Giants, which I will happily recount another day.  I can't begin to tell you how relaxed I felt afterwards, except that I feel the same way now.

There is something to be said about recharging your batteries, putting yourself on airplane mode, so to speak.  A couple of weeks away and I'm ready to get back to the grind of the paying job and the fun of writing.  I'm ready to get the rest of this year going.

I'm back.

Vilage Books Event (4/19/2014)

A couple of weekends ago I had my first speaking event at Village Books in Fairhaven.

I gotta say, that was a cool experience.  For a guy that doesn't enjoy public speaking -- I go out of my way to avoid them, mostly -- it was a lot of fun!  Best part?  The Favorite was sold out! 

If you live in or near Bellingham, visit Village Books and pick up a copy.  If not, you can order it here. 

Also, take a look at the reading from the event!

Part 1
Part 2

The Best Second Job, Ever. (No, seriously)

I'm at my job right now as a sleep tech with my one patient sleeping like a baby.  While I'm watching this person, I'm scouring the internet, looking for free review websites, looking for pay review websites, looking for bookstores that support indie authors.  I jot down numbers and email addresses and email my new list of people, asking what their indie book policies are, and if they'd be willing to carry my novel.  I'm taking the reviews I do have and cobbling them together in a press kit while cursing myself for not having enough scratch to hire a publicist.  I'm designing flyers for my first (ever) author event and trying to set up more in one of the stores that cautiously agrees to buy one copy of my book as a tester to see if it sells.

When I get off my 12-hour shift at 7:00 in the morning, I go home, try to eat something with at least one healthy ingredient and get back on the internet for another hour.  I send out a few more emails, a few more requests, and obsessively check my inbox for a reply from the previous day, or from earlier in the night.  By 9 I'm wiped and head to bed, but I keep my phone nearby on vibrate so I can hear it when and if someone eventually calls back.  I wake up at 3:00 in the afternoon and call the numbers from the previous night; it's my first opportunity to reach them since they opened while I was sleeping.  I speak to the book buyer, or whomever will actually listen to me, and I pitch them my book.

This is my experience at being an author.  This is my second job.

I'm completely untrained, totally inexperienced, an winging it as I go.  The only instruction I have is a three year old copy of The Indie Author Guide and my own notes as to what hasn't worked.   I'm my own marketing department, sales division, budgetary committee.  I'm my own press room, advertising firm.

It's more of a daunting task than I expected.

So why do it myself?  Why not go the traditional route?  A few reasons.  For starters, the traditional publishing industry has changed dramatically than what you may remember.  I hear stories of authors putting together their own book tours, contacting news media on their own... basically doing everything I'm doing now.  So if the only difference is the name of the company on the spine and the percentage of royalty you get (I hear it's low by the way), then why not do it yourself?

And if the truth were to be known, I rather enjoy it.

For the first time in my adult life, success or failure is completely, expressly in my hands, AND directly affects me.  This isn't like being productive at the desk that we sit behind at work (incidentally, I need to periodically check on my patient while I rant).   In that environment, there is a higher margin for error, and your best efforts make your bosses' bosses' bosses  rich, not you.  I'm happy to know that I only go as far as my abilities take me.  I like this.

Don't get me wrong, I like being a writer more, and there is a distinct difference between the two, but this is great!  I'm getting a list together of today's emails, moving south to see who wants to join Village Books in Bellingham and Edmonds Bookshop (both in Washington, and yes I'm name dropping).  This is the best second job you could have.]

It's about 4:00 AM now.  I've got my new list to create, new numbers to pull, and a flyer design to refine.

Laughably shameless

First of all, I'd like to very belatedly wish you all a happy new year.  I've been so busy the last couple of weeks that I haven't had a spare moment to write in this blog.  For those of you who don't know, my new novel, The Favorite recently became available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble and I've been shamelessly plugging it for all who can see and hear.  Seriously.  Shamelessly.  It's embarrassing.

I mean, really, how many of my friends didn't know this was coming?  I've only been talking about my novel, The Favorite, self-published with the help of iUniverse, Inc. for six, seven months now?  You had to believe that at some point, I would release my novel, The Favorite, available wherever books are sold online so I could finally stop talking about it. 

Anyway, the thing I've learned about this whole experience: I'm really bad at advertising.

The Favorite... Cover Reveal and Sneak Peek

Okay, I don't have a hard release date yet, but this is the cover to my upcoming novel, The Favorite, which will be available online wherever books are sold.

This is the cropped version of the front.  Classy, huh?

And this is the full-on hardcover dust jacket.

And... here's a sneak peek of the prologue.  Enjoy!!

Prologue

Last night…

The tapping of the smooth silver ballpoint pen against the notepad sounded like a metronome gone out of control.Crumpled balls of paper littered the handsome wooden desk, a graveyard of bad ideas growing larger as the pad of paper in front of him grew thinner. The paper’s watermark – a green-tinged lion’s head

logo – stared at him, mocking him, daring him to try again to write something poignant. Or even just intelligent. In fact, at this point, the lion would even have settled for something merely coherent.

He reached for the tiny bottle of vodka from the mini-bar and emptied the last of the clear, caustic liquid down his throat. He felt his face flush as the liquor burned a path into his stomach. He closed his eyes and enjoyed drifting off to drunkenness. When his mouth and throat cooled he reopened his eyes. The

lion still looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to begin this manifesto, this great work that would make her understand why. He tentatively put the pen to paper and scribbled out the letter’s opening line.

To whom it may concern…

He had barely formed the final “n” when he tore the page from its pad. To whom it may concern, he thought. Brilliant. Just brilliant.

He tossed the balled up sheet of paper to the side and started again, dating the top of the page. He went over in his mind how letters were supposed to start, with Dear Someone, or Dearest Whomever. He wrote: I don’t even know your name.

He smiled as he finished writing that one line. He cracked open another tiny bottle and sucked it down. He was drunker than he had been in a long time, but at least the words were flowing.

My name is Michael Dane. I’m your father. A little Darth Vader-esque, he thought, but it worked. If you’re reading this then I’m dead. 

He paused a moment after he wrote that; the finality of those words made his stomach gurgle. Doubt, nervousness and fear crept into his mind for the first time since this crazy thing started. He wondered if this whole deal was such a good idea after all.

Drunkenness helped him rediscover his resolve. He had no choice after all. He wrote: And of course you’re reading this, because I know I’m going to die.

Metamorphosis

It snowed the other day in Bellingham and I turned myself into a shut-in.  This was the view from my patio.

So weird, isn't it?  I lived in New York for the first 30 winters of my life, and we'll say that New York's winters aren't known so much for their mercy. The Blizzard of '96 is still legendary for it's inch per hour accumulation over 2 days. Yet the first -- and likely last --two-inch snowfall in Bellingham this winter has me freaking out.  It's the biggest fear of my life: I've acclimated.

NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Oh the agony, I've gotten used to quiet nights and nature, to occasionally seeing deer grazing out my bedroom window.  I've gotten used to friendly people and cheap rents and getting a cab when I need one.  I've learned to live without the subway. So, so sad.

There was a point, exactly half my life ago, when the thought of living outside the five boroughs was like forced exile, and gave me hives and cold sweats.  I thought I would die on the block where I grew up.  (No, not in the negative way, either.  I thought I would grow old and die there once. ) I thought it was my inalienable right to be an a**hole if I so chose.  Not that I ever did choose, but still.  Now, I've grown accustomed to space, to mild winters, to kind hellos and cordial goodbyes.  I've gotten used to spoken conversations instead of grunted greetings and handshakes.

Now, I'm conscious of other people's presence.  I wave hello and smile to strangers, despite a lifetime of instincts to the contrary.  I've forgotten how to scowl.  I go back to New York at least once a year to get my re-up of my New York-ness.  I've been back two or three times this year already, and it didn't take.  My god, what's next, tourist neck?

What's happening to me?!

How I Spent My Summer Vacation

So, I spent much of the summer radio silent on this blog, poking my head out only once or twice to call for men to better to the women in our lives and so on.  It's not like I stopped writing, or stopped caring, I just got busy.  This has been a very interesting summer on a lot of levels, and while I usually don't talk too much about personal life details all that often, I'll get nice and personal right about now.

My summer began with the grand adventure of dating.  Those of you who know me best know how much I hate the dance of getting to know someone, and pretending to be the sexy version of myself so that I can have the privilege of buying dinner and paying for a movie so that maybe, sometime down the road, we can possibly have sex at some point (Yes, that IS sarcasm, but it's bleak out there).  I was reminded that things tend to work out better when I don't try to be the sexy version of me, or the smart version of me, or whatever version I think someone will like.  I tried being myself, a move I haven't done in a few years.  The result? I get to hang out with an amazing girl on a regular basis.  We're sappy and cute and disgusting -- in public, no less -- and it's kind of cool.  Don't get me wrong, if I were to watch a couple like that from a distance I would probably projectile vomit all over the place (I'm a hypocrite.  I'm also probably bigger than you.) but it IS nice to be so comfortable with someone you don't really worry about what the rest of the world thinks about it.

Midway through the summer, my brother and his wife announced that they are expecting a baby (everyone after me... awwwww).  And then then world got like, hormonally crazy.  People I knew are dropping babies like crazy.  I haven't seen an epidemic like this since my days in the Diamond District! (Seriously, don't drink the water.)  In a few days, a wonderful couple I met through my brother are expecting their own bundle of joy, and after the story I heard about the kid's sonogram pose, I acquired the nickname rights and hereby dub the soon-to-arrive person "L'il Baby Cool Breeze."  I also expect to not hear from those parents until the kid is 6 with that nickname.

Of course, no story worth living is completely happy, and toward the end of the summer I said goodbye to my father.  Without airing business, I will say that while we weren't as close as I would have liked to be (and I take a portion of the responsibility for that), I loved him, respected him, and will miss him dearly.  I hope he was proud of his children, because we all turned out pretty damn good.

The positive to that story is in several parts; number one, it reunited my family under one roof for the first time in a while.  Six boys, two girls, with spouses and children and baby bumps all over the place.  It was chaos.  I was in heaven.  Secondly, my brother took my dad's SUV in order to have a vehicle to drive their kid around in (sidebar: newborns live the life.  They get valet service, chauffeur service, room service, free rent, AND they get adored for it.  It's their world, we're just living in it.).  He's living in Louisville, Kentucky now, one of those places that no one ever thought any of us would move to on purpose, and he's happy there.  Go figure.  Anyway, getting the car there meant one thing: Road Trip!  I logged my first ever road trip, getting to see Pittsburgh and pass through some very pretty country on the East Coast.  Definitely one of my better memories.  Lastly, my father's death made it necessary to do something I was looking at doing anyway.  Last minute flights are expensive, so in order to do the flight back to New York, I had to take a loan.  But since I was going to take a loan out to publish anyway, I did that.  My next novel, The Favorite, should be out by the end of the year!

This summer has been a big one for me.  I can't think of one that's had this many stories in it worth telling, and summer don't end until the Yankees are done playing, so who knows what more can happen?  If the Yankees make the playoffs though, I'm going to be hard to deal with.

Better Things To Do.

We've all been there before, when we're faced with that daunting difficult, sometimes unpleasant task that has to be done.  It's staring you in the face and waiting to be tackled.  The sheer enormity of the thing is enough to keep you busy for an entire weekend, or leave you sore for a couple of days.

And then you just remembered that load of laundry that needed to be done, because there's no way you can do this without your favorite green boxers.

So you do six loads of laundry, your green boxers are among the last to be cleaned and dried.  You take a shower so that you can be clean when you change into your boxers and when you're done your bathroom routine, your task is still there, waiting for you, demanding its due.

Oh crud, is that the time?  I gotta get to the Post Office before it closes!

You hop in your car, take the freeway the one exit to the Post Office, wait in line for twenty minutes to get to the counter and ask for a book of stamps.  Because, you know, the stamp dispenser won't take your debit card.  You get your stamps, drive back the way you came, park your car and get ready to do your task.  You roll up your sleeves and as you're about to jump in, you realize that you forgot to stop at Walmart to get Peanut Butter M &M's.  It's essential; not having Peanut Butter M & M's damns this task to failure, and the notion that you were about to get started without them is sheer lunacy in and of itself.

So you get in your car, drive to Walmart and grab a bag of Peanut Butter M &M's, and while you're at it, some tortilla chips and salsa.  You stop at the electronics section and stare mindlessly at the Hi-def TV's that are infinitely better than the brand new one you got last Friday.  You drag yourself away from the continually running loop of Finding Nemo and head toward the register, picking up a box of Raisin Bran on the way.

You pull into your driveway, get inside and put your stuff away, leaving out the delectable sweets you went out specifically to purchase.  As you nosh on the smooth peanut butter and chocolate candy and prepare to finally begin that arduous task, your cell phone rings.  It's your buddy, dying to recount the details of the date he went on with that buxom, triple-jointed hot-dog vendor girl he met while drunk three Saturdays ago.  You listen intently, absorbing every sordid detail and making the appropriate insensitive commentary about his new object of affection, and congratulating him on meeting the future mother of his children.

You hang up and no sooner do you head toward the vicinity of this daunting task, your phone rings again.  It's your girlfriend, offering an evening of... well you don't know what because you're in the car again before she has a chance to finish.  And as you drive to your uncertain fate, you debate whether or not you tell this story to the people this task would have mattered to.

Or.

Do you say "I'm sorry I haven't written in my blog lately. I've been busy.   I promise, I'll make time to write in it more. "

"Urban Legend" Research Blog, Part I: So You Want To Be A Hero...

So I've decided to write about a vigilante hero.

An idea popped into my head borne of my lifelong love of comic books.  You see, when I was sixteen, me and a group of like-minded friends formed Fallout Studios and Magic Pencil Comics.  If you've never heard of either of those, you're excused.  It was a year-long creative project that frequently devolved into marathon video game sessions (Damn you, Virtua Fighter!).  But there were good ideas in that collaboration, several good ideas in fact, and if our sixteen year-old selves lived in the digital age of now, I firmly believe our ideas and digital distribution would make us wealthy teenagers.  Oh well.

Back to the point.  I decided to research how you could practically be a superhero.  This is part one of those results, which is looking the part and being protected.  Seattle has Phoenix Jones, and if you look at his getup, well, Bruce Wayne he's not.  Shockingly, you can play dress-up as a hero for cheaper than you would expect, and the protective gear you would need is pretty common.  Several sports -- major ones at that -- have protective equipment that has evolved from the need to protect the wearer from the impact of abnormally large men moving nearly at freeway speeds, while still being able to maintain mobility and range of motion.  The drawback?  Play hero in the winter or you'll likely die of heat stroke.

First thing's first... the underlayer.

This Nike Padded shirt is obviously football gear.  Dense foam around the rib area helps cushion the compound impact of a 260+ pound man wearing pads and a steel helmet launching himself into your own pads.  The padding makes it less likely to break your ribs in that event.  It's probably a little less useful for stabbing and small arms fire, but there's a solution for that I'll be getting to.  Anyway, this shirt goes for about $80

The Combat Hyper String Girdle, also by Nike ($80), seamlessly adds padding to the all-important kidney area, and when combined with the shirt, extends protective padding through most of your important soft bits.  It also protects the thighs, home of wonderful things like your femoral artery.  While it may not be so good against knives and small arms fire, (a) it's better than nothing and (b) most people trying to kill you will be aiming for your exposed and unprotected chest.

Which brings us to the next logical thing: how to stop bullets.  The Executive Travel Vest ($899) is a Kevlar suit vest, designed for bodyguards and VIPs, designed to stop small arms fire.  Lightweight, breathable, flexible, it allows the wearer to walk around as if he's not wearing a bullet-resistant vest.  It doesn't offer much against knives or assault weapons, but how many criminals have access to AR-15's anyway.  Yes, that was sarcasm.

Football also provides us with Stainless Steel Shoulder Pads ($300), which in this combination, theoretically should take care of the stabbing, shooting problem.  On top of that, it adds an imposing, bad ass figure to said vigilante hero. They don't need to be spiked -- this isn't a Raiders game after all -- but if they can stop prevent a linebacker who runs a 4.6-40 from crushing you with an impact equivalent to being hit by an SUV, they can stop a bullet or a knife.  They naturally have a chest protection element, and allow athletes to move around, so this is of course a natural fit.

You're going to want to protect your joints and Reebok makes elbow and knee pads for hockey that fit the bill.  Lightweight and sturdy plastic protect your elbows and knees from bone jarring impact with the ground... or some punk's face.





Now the one element in a crime fighter's protective gear that is absolutely indispensable is that it has to look cool and menacing at the same time.  To round out the gear and add the cool, menacing factor, we turn to motorcycle equipment.  The Icon Chapter 1000 jacket ($699) is heavy duty leather designed to protect the upper body from road rash in the event of a crash.  Motorcycle jackets also have protective padding in the elbows for the same reason.   And that brings us to the final element in this experiment...

Now what better way to conceal your identity and protect your head than a motorcycle helmet?


There are drawbacks to this get up, of course.  I'll get into that next time, as well as how I'd modify the gear to help mitigate the drawbacks.