Second Flash Story Accepted

More news about Daily Flash 2011: 365 Days of fantastic Fiction. Sarah and I will each have a second flash story in the Daily Flash anthology. "Dead Wood," my second story will be joining "Happy New Year" in the lineup. Sarah has contributed her flash stories "Co-Pay" and "Sweet Enough to Eat," to the mix.

We are going to be joining the company of a long list of Pill Hill Press regulars, including Chris Bartholomew, John Kelly, Todd Banks, Emma Kathryn and many others. Daily Flash should be a fun read, though I doubt that I can limit myself to only one flash story a day.

Guest Blogging on Chris Redding's Blog

Sarah has added a link to my blog for Chris Redding. Chris belongs to Romance Writers of America. Her books are a blend of romance and mystery. You can check out her site from the link in the side bar on this page.

On August 18 I will be guest blogging on her site for Recipe Wednesday. I have decided to do a recipe for Beulah's Maple Fudge. Her maple fudge is a favorite of Nessa's so it seems the perfect choice for a recipe from Circle of Dishonor. Now all I have to do is come up with a recipe that is authentic to 1879. After all, I can't have Miss Beulah cooking with something that didn't exist in 1879. Meanwhile, folks in my office are looking forward to taste testing different maple fudge recipes and deciding which one Beulah cooks up.

Daily Flash 2011

I found out today that both Sarah and I will have stories in the Pill Hill Press anthology Daily Flash 2011: 365 Days of Fantastic Fiction. I love flash fiction. This is why my writing credits include Flashshot, Drabble, the Phone Book and MicroHorror.com.

Short, odd, little stories are not as easy as they might seem to write. It takes hard work to get a whole story, beginning, middle and end, into 100 to 500 words. There is something special about writing these small stories that makes me come back to them again and again. I will probably always come back to writing flash. It is awesome to have a collection of more than three hundred flash stories in one book, particularly when both Sarah and I will appear in the same collection.

Circle of Dishonor

It has been a wild ride to publication. It seems as if I have been working around the clock to keep up with the flow of information sent to my publisher. Thankfully everything is done and the final edits to Circle of Dishonor have been sent to Pill Hill Press. Jessy Roberts, the editor, tells me that the book should be available in early August, maybe late July, depending on when the cover art is finished.

My part is over now. It is time to sit back and wait to see what my cover looks like. Meantime, plans are in the works for the launch party.

Photo Shoot for Author Photo

This is the author photo I have chosen for the book.

Sarah and I spent the day in Grayson, Kentucky and at Carter Caves State Park for a photo shoot. I have never done a photo shoot before, but that can be said of most of the things I've done in the past two weeks. I have gone from struggling with rejection to the crazy schedule of getting Circle of Dishonor published at an amazing pace. The excitement is fantastic. I didn't know I would feel this way about having the novel published. Most of the time my feet hardly touch the ground.

Circle of Dishonor Nearing Publication

My first novel, Circle of Dishonor, is scheduled for release in July. The final date of release is not set yet, but Pill Hill Press has a preview on their website. If you are interested in seeing the first couple of chapters before the book becomes available this is the link.

http://www.pillhillpress.com/circleofdishonorpreview.html

What was Meets Could have been

Historical mystery is not history, or even alternate history. It is that fine line of what was running alongside what could have been. Real people from the pages of history walk through a fictional world and sometimes we learn something about who they were.

In the story "Cornfield Crucifixion", Dr. Henshall comes to mind. The doctor was real, from the correct historical time and place, and is renown for his fishing and interest in the fishing industry in Kentucky. I use him here because he should be the physician working with my character at the time of the story. That being said, I also try very hard to make sure the history doesn't hit us over the head. This is about telling a good story. I hope those of you who have a copy of A Whodunit Halloween enjoy this step back into another time and place.

Why Stop in the Middle?

When I was asked why I stopped in the middle of working on my second novel to write s short story, the question surprised me. I hadn't really thought of it as stopping. The story idea was in my head, but it belonged in my character's life many years before the book began. I could have let it remain part of the character's back story, a few details that I knew about her and might never share with anyone.

When I'm working on a story, any story, my brain is puzzling over details all the time. Taking the time to write a novel doesn't mean there isn't another story cooking in the back of my mind at the same time. Sometimes the new ideas that pop up need to be written into their own story. It isn't a break. It is a trip of discovery that makes the character more alive inside my head.

Our minds are wonderfully complex. There's lots of room to explore a panorama of ideas. Sometimes the thoughts are all jumbled together in ways that make it impossible to untangle them and what ends up on the page isn't worthy of sharing with anyone. At the darnedest moments all reason escapes my head. I end up starring at a blank screen unable to write a single word. It is all part of the process.

Amazon Author Pages

The idea of author pages at Amazon is pretty cool. Having only one short story show up on mine is not so cool. If you like my story in the Halloween anthology you might pick up Low Down and Derby, a Kentucky Derby themed anthology from the Ohio River Valley Chapter of Sisters in Crime. It doesn't show up on the page but it is available on Amazon.

There is more to come. Pill Hill Press will be releasing a collection of flash fiction soon with one of my stories, and there is a new collection of stories from the Ohio River Valley Sisters in Crime coming together. This time the theme is Bourbon.

The big disadvantage of only publishing short fiction. It vanishes quickly. The trouble is, I love short fiction. It is like popcorn, and you can see from the photo on my page that I love popcorn. However, popcorn isn't everything. It is time for some meat and potatoes work. I am hoping that sometime soon my first novel will join this collection of Halloween stories. A second novel is in the works so stay tuned.