Jackal's Library

The Quest: Chapter 20

2011-04-03T23:02:00.000-07:00

I've noticed that, over time, the sting of criticism isn't as bad as it used to be. This is another chapter that required me to almost completely re-write it. In its original form Seraph goes into the pit, fights the monster, almost loses but doesn't, wins, and leaves. You could have skipped it entirely and understood the next chapter.

That is not the mark of a good chapter.

Something surprising needed to happen. Only one thing was a given, Seraph's survival, but everything I could change. I could even have made her lose the fight. You would have had to read the chapter then huh?

I found having the fight leave the arena added a good chaotic dynamic. =3 Interestingly, I found that even after I kicked Seraph and the Oni onto the warehouse floor I wasn't doing a lot with the crowd. Almost every interaction or observation of them I had to add back in after writing Seraph and the Oni's part.

I do love the way I ended this chapter, but I'm also sad that I had to remove one of my favorite lines that I've saved for months to put here. I'll try and add it to the next chapter, but I'm not going to force it. If it doesn't fit I'll just put it here for you guys to read. =)

Read This Chapter

The Quest: Chapter 19

2010-12-28T01:12:00.001-08:00

Celeste again. =)

I bet a lot of people thought that I was going to have the fight be in this chapter, right after the last little cliff-hanger, but I wanted to draw the tension out a little more. This is the last fight of the book, it deserves to be built up a little.

The phone call with Gabe was originally going to be when Seraph was alone in her cell, but Woodson complained that Celeste wouldn't let her keep a phone on her because she could call for back up or the police or any number of things that could ruin Celeste's day. I was forced to agree, but I felt the conversation with needed to happen, thus its new placement. It was also longer, but Seraph said things that I felt she wouldn't say in front of Celeste, so they were removed.

Celeste's particular method of healing is, of course, really illegal in this world. As well it should be. I needed to have Seraph be in better condition to fight the oni, but it wasn't in Celeste's nature to do anything that isn't in someway horrible. I liked how she didn't understand why what she was doing was upsetting. Celeste is truly a psychopath to her core. And I get another opportunity to horrify and mess with Seraph. Win-win.

The Quest: Chapter 18

2010-12-28T01:11:00.000-08:00

As with all the sans-Seraph chapters, this is plotgasming all over the place. We get more to see Kaelyndra step up into the role of sole ruling monarch. While not weak before, ordering the souls of her enemies to be tortured for information puts her firmly into the "do not fuck with" column. On the other hand, she pours a great deal of magic and property damage into trying to save her servant at the end of the chapter. Amira pretty much is there to show that Kaelyndra is, well, a nice person. There is a bit of advice I heard once, "If you're out on a date and the person is nice to you, but not to the waiter, they are not a nice person." Replace waiter with servant and you have a good stick to measure the royals in this world.

But more importantly this chapter has the execution of the goblins and a real introduction for Rhairen, who's name I AWAYS have to look up. >.>;;

I put a lot of thought into the execution method of the fay. If had to be equal parts brutal and elegant, not an easy combo, but I think I hit it on the head by making them kill themselves.

Rhairen is a bit of a mystery. I think I'll let her stay like that for now.

The Quest: Chapter 17

2010-12-28T00:54:00.000-08:00

Celeste is my darling character. I love her to pieces and always feel that I don't quite have the skill needed to nail her down. Woodson and I worked hard on working out just how she would react to things, what she would say and how she would say it. She is completely batshit, but and awesome, smart, sexy batshit. Whom you should never ever for any reason turn your back on.

I also have her in here to widen my monster base. By having her be Japanese (well, half, but don't mention that around her) I can put in all kinds of fun weaboo critters in my story (kitsune, oni, kapa, etc...), none of which Seraph will know, making them in jokes as well. Celeste lets me add layers and layers of awesome!

For some strange reason, Seraph doesn't like her as much as I do.

Bonus Content

2010-10-11T23:53:00.000-07:00

I posted a thread on Something Awful called "Tell me about losing consciousness and waking up in a hospital." I got a lot of great responses from it. But they required me to re-write what I had so far. Now, I felt what I had was okay (or at least I thought so), but I wanted to match up to reality a little bit more. BUT I saved it for you here! Enjoy.

Warning, the following is NOT beta read.

It was cold. As darkness receded from her mind like a changing tide, the first thing Seraph knew was the cold. There was pain too, but it seemed detach from her person, as if there was a wall between it and her. No, the pain was not important right now what Seraph need was heat. Why was it so cold? Where was she?

Seraph opened her eyes and saw nothing but lights and shadows. Slowly, as if her eyes had to warm up to the idea of working again, her surroundings came into focus. She was laying in bed in a sterile white room. The lights were dimmed and much of the room lay stubbornly in shadows, but Seraph could still make out the thin sheet that covered her, the guardrails on the bed, an empty chair to one side and a pressboard nightstand to the other. A curtain, hung from a track along the ceiling and pulled forward to hide half the room, was almost but not quite blocking a wall mounted TV. Seraph tried to raise her arm and found she couldn't. It was restrained, both of her arms were bound.

She was in an institution.

Mind numbing fear pushed her up right and almost out of the bed before pain finally stopped her. It felt like she had ripped her left arm off and the pain in her head made her want to throw up. She gritted her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut as she breathed through the agony. In through her nose and out through her mouth. In through her nose and out through her mouth. In and out. In and out, in and out.

The pain eventually released its grip on her, allowing Seraph to think once more. She was half out of the bed with one leg already on the floor. Clearly she wasn't tied to it, her right wrist was wrapped in a bandage that secured an IV line. The wrap had done its job well, the IV was still in place despite Seraph's earlier spasm. Her left arm was restrained at least- it was securely immobilized against her body. Judging by the pain radiating from her shoulder, it was probably restrained exactly as it should be. Her face was wet from tears, but she couldn't move her arms well enough to wipe them away. Lifting her head to take in her environment again, she saw that the door, far from being locked and barred, was slightly ajar, letting bright light spill in from the hallway. This was not a magic institution.

Seraph carefully laid back down. She was pretty hurt, yet bandaged up. This must be a hospital.

Why was she in a hospital?

Thinking back, Seraph clearly remember her evening with Mrs. Miller. She remembered Mrs. Miller giving her the ring... then leaving... then... she couldn't remember. What had happened after she got the ring? The ring!

The ring had been in her jeans pocket. Now, Seraph was wearing a standard hospital paper apron. Did the hospital have her clothes and the ring, or had they been lost? Seraph didn't feel the items once she found them, would that change if she really had lost one? If not, how would she get it back?

Next to her hand were the bed controls, featured predominantly was the 'call nurse' button. Seraph pressed it, at least some of her questions would be answered. After a moment she turned on the heating pad. There, two problems solved.

The Quest: Chapter 16

2010-10-04T23:40:00.000-07:00

Been awhile huh? Let me go back and re-read this, I don't remember what happens.

...

Oh, right! Well, I have two big bits of info here. The first is I finally kicked Seraph out of the closet. The second I kicked the gods out of a different closest- revealing them as real, active players... in whatever it is that they are doing.

The scene had originally set out to just out Seraph. I haven't been able to establish her as gay so far, but I didn't want to spring that on the readers in the second book when Seraph gets with her love interest. I would have liked to bring it up earlier, but I would have had to shoehorn it in there. So I decided to shoehorn it in here!

Of course I had a hard time making it fit, but really this was the only place for it. After this is the climax and the aftermath, so there's no time for her to chill and talk. I don't remember when I decided to make Brad gay too, but his coming out segue for Seraph bring it up as well.

The god thing was a last minute addition, but I like out it turned out. It covers Seraph's coming out with an exposition dump that really will be important later ( OR WILL IT?) and it does a little bit of world building, just to remind you that this... isn't the world you know. =0

(I know that's a quote, but I don't remember from what =P)

Going to also post some bonus content for this chapter! =D

Read This Chapter

Update! 9/21/10

2010-09-20T23:44:00.000-07:00

Hey guys! I have some news, I have a new beta reader, so we can hope new chapters are coming.

Here's something in the mean time: Fan Art!

From my lovely girlfriend, Sarah.

Update! 6/22/10

2010-06-22T02:03:00.000-07:00

Okay I know the last time I uploaded was in April and I swear that more chapters are coming. There are three, yes three, chapters in beta right now and two of them are with my final reader. The delay with this was not me taking the time out to write the sans Seraph chapters (I only wrote one of two anyway) the delay came from re-writes. Chapters 16 and 17 are now the most re-written chapters, but I will get more into that when I talk about them in their author's comments.

I just wanted to say that more chapters are coming.

I've even started outlining book 2.

On another note, I'm thinking about writing book reviews for the various lesbian novels I read. Hopefully they will be somewhat entertaining to read. I also might overhaul the website design and make it less graphic heavy.

The Quest: Chapter 15

2010-04-23T03:02:00.000-07:00

And Lord Follyn is dead. I've had people tell me that they don't believe he's really dead.

...

~~NOT TELLING!~~

I've changed my mind. I really don't want people to walk away from this chapter thinking Follyn is going to come back. He's not. Sure his body is missing right now, but that's it, it is his body that's missing. He is dead. I promise you this.

Oh, but I introduced a Winter Court sidhe, think she'll show up again? Fun fact, while I knew who I wanted this character to be, I wasn't sure what gender to make her. I had good reasons not to go with either one. I finally decided on female because, while the two main characters are women, all but one of the major supporting cast are male. So I added her as a... her to balance that.

Read This Chapter

The Quest: Chapter 14

2010-04-21T00:51:00.000-07:00

And here we see how Gabriel ended up in his chair. There is more to this back-story, but I won't spoil that here. What I would like to point out is fight in the motel room in Chapter 2 might have a little more meaning now- as this incident is referenced in it.

See? I planned ahead for this!

As for the vision, the purple-green stone is alexandrite. Although the internet has been really stupid about being able to tell me how large the biggest alexandrite is, I am pretty sure the don't get as big as the one in my story. Particularly ones cut into shapes. Anywho, a stone that size would be worth more than just about any other shiny rock on the planet, and its magic!

Edit: I didn't have a name for the doctor while I was writing this, because he wasn't that important, so I just wrote 'Dr. Something'. I told a friend about this and she suggested that I call him 'Dr. Sumtin'. XD

Clearly I went with it, and since none of my beta readers caught it I call it win.

Read This Chapter

The Quest: Chapter 13

2010-03-16T00:14:00.001-07:00

The chapter had the most rewriting of any chapter. Even more than the first chapter which previously held that title. I have to give thanks to my beta readers here, Woodson and Adora (Steph didn't get to read the fail version of the chapter). So thanks you guys, for not letting me put out a sub-par chapter.

Fun fact the ring is made off platinum and palladium. And now you know!

Update! 2/4/10

2010-03-04T08:15:00.000-08:00

Alright, I've got two chapters coming down the pipe but after that there is going to be a bit of a wait. I'm going to write all of the sans Seraph chapters in on go, but release them as I had planed spread out between Seraph's chapters. But that also means that when it comes time to release the sans Seraph chapters, they'll be already written. =)

Also, I've decided to go with Ascension of the Dying as "of Death" apparently seems like I'm trying to hard to be cool.

Update! 2/27/10

2010-02-27T19:37:00.000-08:00

Okay, so I finally came up with a good name for the first book! I've been calling it "The Quest" but I never really liked that as a stand alone title. So the new title?

"Echos of the Past"

Or if you want to be exact. "The Oaken Heart Trilogy: Echos of the Past"

The next two books have names now too! ...ish.

Book 2: Rebirth of the Endless

Book 3: Ascension of (the dying) or (death)

See, "Ascension of the Dying" keeps the "Verb of the Noun" theme that I have for the other two, but "Ascension of Death" is f'king HARDCORE. I have to say I like it a bit more. So I'm not sure yet. Of course, with how quick I am getting through these books, I'll have the next 5 years to figure out which I want to use.

The Quest: Chapter 12

2010-02-07T15:56:00.000-08:00

Ah, transition chapters. Not the most interesting but necessary.

Not a lot to say about this one, but it is interesting to note that this the first time we see the visions from Seraph's point of view.

I have another chapter coming down the pipe, so hopefully I will be picking up speed on this.

Read This Chapter!

The Quest: Chapter 11

2010-01-19T23:27:00.000-08:00

Holy shit, I haven't updated since September? I'm sorry! But I don't want to turn this blog into a apology fest, so that's the last time I'll tell you bastards "I'm sorry."

So here's the chapter. The gremlin is notable for being the first monster that Seraph is able to identify. Seraph does have a respectable amount of knowledge of magic jazz, but it hasn't been show cased because she's been running into really, really rare creatures. Unfortunately for the Fae, they've been on the decline for last thousand years or so and as such a bunch of different species are gone or nearly gone. As for the Native Americans, well, they didn't fair much better in my alterverse than they did here, not to mention that Skin Walkers are kinda a taboo subject, so they wouldn't necessarily have come up in your basic 'Native American History, Culture and Magic 101' at the local community college (which Seraph hasn't been to).

Some of the 'monsters' that Seraph would have a really solid grasp of- ~~vampires, werewolves,~~ (voodoo) zombies, goblins, ogres, dragons, pegasus, unicorns, gryphons, dwarves, trolls and the like, haven't shown up. Some of those will be in these books, some wont, some that aren't on the list appear. So there are some critters coming up that Seraph does know, as well as a bunch more she doesn't.

I love the trick that Seraph pulls on the Rat Lord. It isn't original, I know, but I love it anyway.

The darkness that chases Seraph out of the sewer is a (not terribly) original creation of my own, one of the few in this book.

JUST before posting this, I added the bit about The Lord of the Rings being an 'alternative-history' book.

Wikipedia Posted:
Alternate history or alternative history is a subgenre of literary fiction, though it often uses the tropes of science fiction and historical fiction that is set in a world in which history has diverged from the actual history of the world. It is sometimes abbreviated AH. Another occasionally-used term for the genre is "allohistory" (lit. "other history").

Heh.

Read This Chapter!

Bonus Content!

2009-09-16T23:23:00.000-07:00

I am still writing. That's all I will say about that.

What I have for you today is a little bit of fan art. Not the first bit of fan art, but the first bit I will be showing you. So here it is:

Seraph by Whitney

Enjoy. ;)

The Quest: Chapter 10

2009-07-28T14:55:00.000-07:00

Please don't kill me. I know I took forever on this one, but it's up now and that's what's important, right?

...

Anyway, another action scene for our heroine. This time she is fighting kelpie, which are a fairy monster. Which is why her crowbar (iron) worked better than her ax (steel). Next chapter we get to meet the Rat Lord and learn his story.

Read This Chapter

The Quest: Chapter 9

2009-05-21T22:47:00.000-07:00

Oh for heaven's sake people-

Treat
Pronunciation:\ˈtrēt\
intransitive verb
1: to discuss terms of accommodation or settlement: negotiate
2: to deal with a matter especially in writing: discourse

Treating- to create a treaty.

Shesh.

Okay, so this is a long one, but since there are only four chapters that deal with the fae, I have a lot to pack in.

These are the chapters that don't have Seraph in them.

You might even say they are... sans Seraph?

No? Oh come on, it was a little funny.

Fine.

Anyway, you guys can blame Woodson for the cluster of names in this chapter, in my first draft, there was only one lord talking in the counsel scene and I didn't list off the missing lords. By the way, thanks Elf Name Generator! You rule!

I don't know how to say Hjorleifr either. I just liked the way it looked... I just call him H.

One of my beta-readers expressed surprise that the fae would act with out any evidence at all. And really there is none. But you have to remember, this whole thing takes place about 400 years before the Spanish Inquisition, so the rules of evidence were a little... looser than they are now. It was perfectly normal and expected to act on hunches at this time.

I changed something that I am going to have to go back and retroactively change, the fae no longer call Atlantis the 'homelands' they call it the 'oldlands' I like homelands as a phrase, but it kinda reminds me of Fables. And I don't want to copy.

Next chapter... The sewer level! It's the best level!

Read This Chapter

Bonus Content!

2009-05-11T19:43:00.000-07:00

Here is the promised bonus content!

Seraph thinking about the sewers and there danger, taken out because it was redundant:

Her childhood quota of horror movies had been filled with slasher, zombie and sewer monster flicks. In the Pipes was a classic and made an entire generation fear the garbage disposal.

Seraph thinking about the manhole covers and sewer grates, taken out because I decided that Seraph felt the spells were a good thing:

The sewers were their own deterrent. The combination of monsters and sewage was enough to keep everybody that didn’t need to go down there, out. Seraph had heard that some states out west had started locking the manholes in a fit of oh-god-won’t-somebody-please-think-of-the-children public safety hysteria. She was glad that the precaution hadn’t made it to Maine yet, locks made breaking and entering so much harder.

Update! 5/11/09

2009-05-11T19:35:00.000-07:00

Alright, so maybe a month between updates isn't best... I'm sorry!

To all two of you.

But there is good news, I do have chapter 9 with its last beta reader so it should be up soon! And I have started on chapter 10. I will try my best to have that in beta in the next few weeks. To make up for it, I'm going to post a couple of paragraphs that I cut from chapter 8 that are kinda funny...

Well... um...

Chaper 9 is coming soon! I swear!

The Quest: Chapter 8

2009-04-07T23:35:00.000-07:00

This is a short little transitional chapter. It is a bit shorter than my normal chapters, but I didn't want to add it to a full length chapter (which the next sewer chapter should be).

The next two chapters with Seraph will be in the sewers, so you guys will get to see lots of this place.

Wow, I thought that I didn't have a lot to say about the last chapter, but I really don't have much to add to this one. Well, I have a small bit of changed content, but I want to put that in a bonus content update.

Read This Chapter

Update! 4/2/09

2009-04-02T14:13:00.000-07:00

Retro editing is my friend.

Quick update on the story, Chapter 8 is on its last beta reader, so as soon as I get that back, I'll be posting it. I promised someone action in this chapter. I lied, there is no action in this chapter, nor the next.

I've started writing Chapter 9, and it looks like it is going to be a long one. After having outlined the Fae chapters, I see that they are all a bit longer than any of Seraph's chapters, so I may have to cut them up a bit and move them around. We'll see how that works out.

As to retroactive editing: some may have noticed that I changed the Chapter 7 blog, if you didn't: I changed the Chapter 7 blog.

And now you know.

...

The other half is violence.

The Quest: Chapter 7

2009-03-19T22:48:00.000-07:00

"I am not crazy."

That is one of my favorite lines in this book (well, so far), it makes me smile every time I read it. An evil smile. >]

I don't drink really coffee and have used a coffeemaker all of twice, maybe, in my lifetime. So when Woodson (an avid coffee addict) was beta reading this chapter he pointed out that most coffeemakers don't have a buzzer.

Well, in this world they do, NO COFFEE FOR YOU UNTIL THE WHOLE POT IS DONE!

Humph.

In our next chapter, we get to find out what's in the sewers! But not see it, Seraph just talks about it. Sorry.

Oh, wait, I'm not sorry. =P

Read This Chapter

Bonus Content!

2009-02-15T19:09:00.000-08:00

Okay, so I totally lied about when I would get this up, but here it is anyway.

The is transcribed the conversation between Seraph and Gabe from chapter 2 as it appears in my notes/ outline. Seraph's side is on the left side of the slash and Gabe's on the right. Smilies added for flavor.

GLASS OF WATER TO THE FACE!

WTF / WTF w/ u?

How find? / Drunk call

How get in? / Door unlocked

Lock it on way out / No. Camping?

Went. Back. / Drinking!

Ah do wut ay want! / Ruin Life!

Mine to ruin! ARG SHUTUPSHUTUPSHUTUP / ???

Some people thought it was funny. So here ya go.

...

By the way, still think that you can steal my notes to find out what happens Karen? =P

Update! 2/13/09

2009-02-13T19:08:00.000-08:00

Okay boys and girls, as some (most) of you already know, I decided to hold off on starting chapter 7 until I finished the outline for the first book. Well, I finished! Seraph's part anyway, the chapters that focus on fae are still being worked on, but I can still get started chapter 7.

I also plan to get some Bonus Content up tonight or tomorrow.

Bonus Content!

2009-01-31T00:03:00.000-08:00

For all (one) of you who read my blog, here is some bonus content just for YOU!

Removed from chapter six:

"So," Gabe said. "What now?"

"I donno." Seraph shrugged.

"You don't know? How can you not know?"

"I was told to get the thing, not what to do with it after. I don't know."

"Have you heard anything else from... you know?"

"Anything from the voice in my head?"

Gabe winced.

"Nope. I would'a mentioned that," Seraph said.

"You know," Gabe fidgeted in his chair. "I'm not really comfortable calling... it the voice in your head."

"O-okay..." Seraph drawled. "I don't really see what we can do about that."

"I think we should name it," Gabe said.

"No."

"Come on."

"I am not naming the voice in my head."

"But talking about the 'voice in your head' sounds crazy."

"And naming it is not a healthy coping mechanism."

"Bob. We should call it Bob."

"No, we shouldn't."

I was going to have them ( and by 'them' I mean Gabe ) settle on either 'Mab' or 'Puck'.

I was thinking about Puck because he was male and I don't want people to try and guess who the voice is, and if they start thinking of the voice as male, that is another red herring in the way. Even though I clearly state that the voice is female in a previous chapter ( I see that a lot of people tend to miss things like that ).

I was thinking about Mab because I was fairly certain that at some point Seraph would try to get Gabe to stop by reminding him that the voice was female, in which case he would pick a female name.

And of course, both are clearly fae names.

In the end I just removed this whole section. *shrug* It's funny, but I don't think it really fits like I wanted it to.

The Quest: Chapter 6

2009-01-30T19:13:00.000-08:00

Seraph stared at him. "There are no such things at werewolves."

That's right, there are no such things as werewolves, or vampires, in my books. An urban fantasy with no werewolves or vampires! What will they think of next? The horror!

Heh.

I didn't want to do what has been done, and done better, a million times before me. And worse (I'm looking at you, Twilight).

So, this was a exposition explosion! I will always try to make my talking heads chapters funny, this is my promise as an author.

I haven't gotten to it yet, but rest assured that the fae histories and such things will explained, as I have bastardized them quite a bit.

Lets see, anything else about this chapter? Hmmmm- The different spellings of fae are not a mistake. Mitch Hedburg is a great man who is missed. Cliff-hangers are fun... to write. And Vicodin is the shit.

Read This Chapter

The Quest: Chapter 5

2009-01-01T23:43:00.000-08:00

For those of you who don't know what a skinwalker is- wikipedia is here to save the day! Click here to enlighten yourself.

Now, I know full well that it is unlikely that a native Navajo anything will be spending much of its free time in Maine, but it's my book and I what I say goes. Skinwalkers kick ass, and in this case, Seraph's ass.

This will be the first of many hospital visits by Seraph. I hope she still has insurance.

Read This Chapter

The Quest: Chapter 4

2008-12-21T22:15:00.000-08:00

And now for something completely different!

I was going to have this be chapter 3, but chapter 2 ran long- so I could either make it a really huge chapter (twice as long as all my other chapters) or make it two (which I did). I wanted this to be as early in the book as possible for two reasons:

1. I wanted to make it clear that there were two main characters for the reader to follow.

2. I wanted to get all of the really silly things said as quickly as possible so that the reader could get over them.

So yes, my fairies are from Atlantis. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Also, Leif Ericson, Vineland and the Abenaki are all real and historical. Look them up and you will learn both where and when these events take place! =D

Read This Chapter

The Quest: Chapter 3

2008-12-20T20:43:00.000-08:00

I blame the delay for this chapter on the holidays. It took myself and my beta readers forever to get around to this, mostly my second grammar checker (you know who you are), who just now finished it and sent it to me. Meanwhile she has chapter 4 on her plate and chapter 5 is in the hands of my first grammar checker.

This chapter had a revision right after I finished chapter 5- as it turns out all of my friends can tell me at length the difference between a kitsune and a tanuki but not a single one of them knows what a medicine bag is. So I had to add a paragraph to explain and foreshadow. And I did not want to foreshadow the bag. *sigh* Oh well.

My favorite part about this chapter? The next chapter- because it focuses on a new character! You don't get to find out what happens to Seraph until chapter 5! HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHA!

I've always wanted to do that.

Read This Chapter

Into the Woods

2008-12-03T02:02:00.000-08:00

This story holds the title of 'first completed story by me' if one doesn't include the 'What She Has' trilogy, and 'True Story' then it is also, the ONLY completed story by me.

And it be full of smut.

I wish I could remember when I wrote this, it has to be at least two years old. Oh well.

Read This Story

What She Gets

2008-11-30T22:46:00.000-08:00

Oh, is there a story behind this.

So I wanted to make all the parts about the same length right? Well EditPad (I didn't have Word at the time) told me that the first two were about I hundred lines, so I write a hundred lines of pure smut. THEN I remember that the other stories were every other line. Oops. So the smut was twice as line as the other two. Heh.

Then I went to upload it to deviantArt and found this: "...which graphically describe sexual acts in detail are not suitable for submission..."
Huh. Oh. Okay then. I guess it is not going up after all.

A friend said I should be a smart ass and censor it.
"One upon a time,
*bleeeeeeeeep*
The End"

Bah.

Anyway, I found that taking out all the truly graphic smut left me with a file that was the right size. BUT this isn't deviantArt, so you guys get the full smut packed version!

Read This Story

What She Needs

2008-11-30T22:22:00.001-08:00

Well, to be perfectly honest, I wrote this just so that I could segue into part three.

Ya know, I am copying these out of my deviantArt page, and I see that I wrote this in 2006. They are 2 years old! But I still like 'em.

Read This Story

The Quest: Chapter 2

2008-11-24T21:45:00.000-08:00

I firmly believe that the drunk call should be used more often as a plot device.

Nobody can argue with you like family, huh? I think that I might hate my characters, while I was writing this, I thought, 'Wow, that sounds dickish, they should say that!' as I gleefully typed.

Also, right around book two, this chapter will have new meaning... but you will just have to wait until book two to learn what that is! =P

The first couple versions of this chapter didn't include a physical description of Seraph. I don't like stopping the narration to talk about what the characters look like for no reason, it wasn't until I realized that I had a perfect opportunity to have her look in a mirror did I feel I could add what she looked like.

Read This Story

The Quest: Chapter 1

2008-11-18T00:30:00.000-08:00

So I have finally started this damn thing, but this just means that my friends get to listen to me talk about it EVEN MORE.

HA.

Fun note, the working title for this story, before I broke down and named it Oaken Heart and The Quest, was Arbor Day Rule. Because, in the Grand List of Console Role Playing Game Cliches rule 107, the arbor day rule, clearly states:

"At some point, you're going to have to talk to a tree and do what it says."

Which is what this book is all about. Although, there is not a lot to say about this chapter. About all I've done is introduced Seraph (the main character), Gabe and to a lesser extent Brad.

Oh, and I drove Seraph insane.

...

That's a plot point.

The voices want you to keep reading my story.

Read This Chapter

What She Wants

2008-11-13T23:16:00.000-08:00

Okay, it was 4am and I woke up with this story dancing in my head, so I crawled out of bed and wrote it in notepad and went right back to bed. When I woke up the next morning, I had forgotten about it until I went back on my computer after work.

I kept the lack of punctuation and capitalization because I liked how it made the piece feel.

An interesting side note about this story; the people I showed it to had one of two reactions, they either thought it was a pretty woman style story in which the woman is saved, or they thought the main character was going to get murdered in some horrible fashion. The older and more social of my friends with real world experience thought death and the shut in who played magic during lunch thought pretty woman.

Read This Story

Something in the Closet

2008-11-08T20:51:00.000-08:00

So I wrote this at 4 in the morning during a night shift job. I was reading How to Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy & Science Fiction and felt the need to write something myself. This is what I came up with.

It is hard to write a story with no pro-nouns. I didn't want to use 'he' 'she' or even 'I' because I felt that would take the reader out of the mind of the protagonist, and what I really wanted from this story was for the reader to feel like they were re-living a being afraid of the monster in the closet. I considered using 'you' but I always felt that was... condescending. So I didn't use it even when it might have worked, or even made the narrative smoother.

Not my best work, but I like it. I might go back and revise it later.

Read this story.

Website Creation

2008-11-05T21:01:00.000-08:00

Now I have my website up!

Or some of it.

Or a page.

Oh well. At least my internet is back up so I can fully set myself up for disappointment!