Dead Ends & Unearthing Resonance

My latest article is available on Hellnotes. This month's topic is on how to make your endings resonate with your readers. So pop on over and check it out:

Dead Ends & Unearthing Resonance

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Some Gum under the Desk

Over the weekend, I saw Tim Burton's updated version of Alice in IMAX 3D, and I was sadly disappointed. Visually the movie was stunning; the actors performed well enough; and through a good part of the beginning, I thought for sure Burton hit this one out of the park. Unfortunately, it was just a long foul ball. By the middle of the movie, the plot had become hardly serviceable, and the characters were losing their luster. By the end, I felt cheated and annoyed.

I have to wonder, though, if it was even Burton's idea to have a third-act battle. It seemed so pointless to the story that it reeked of some uncreative think tank crying out, "We have to have a war scene! People love a good war scene! Think of the children, man! Look at Lord of the Rings ... at Avatar!"

I did, however, enjoy the trailer for Tron Legacy, which surprised me because I didn't care for the original movie or the game. It was the soundtrack and the lightcycle scene at the end that left the biggest impression on me ... I amuse easily that way.

Here's the trailer if you haven't seen it.

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Scribd Goes Mobile

Scribd has started a new service that allows you to send any of their more than 10 million documents directly to your choice e-reader or smartphone.

Here's the details from Publishers Weekly:

Scribd's Going Mobile, Moves to Open Content

And lookey here ... I have some free short stories that are available on Scribd for you to try:

• Garbage, Inc.

• The Leaves Fall in Springtime

• All Too Cozy

• The Flowers

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The Three Requirements of Dialogue

My latest how-to article is now available on Hellnotes. This month's topic is all about dialogue, which I cover in more detail than a normal person really should.

Check it out, and let me know what you think:

The Three Requirements of Dialogue

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Some Stuff

I spent the past weekend in Manhattan, visiting family and enjoying the sights. I had the pleasure of taking my daughter to see Neil Gaiman perform with the Knickerbocker Chamber Orchestra. They did a rendition of Sergei Prokofiev's Peter and the Wolf. It was a wonderful production, and my daughter and I enjoyed it very much.

After dropping the kiddies off, we headed over to Keat's on 2nd Ave for some cocktails and karaoke. If you missed my butchering of Empire State of Mind, then you missed a real treat. Oddly enough, I've frequented Keat's plenty of times, but this was the first time I realized that right next store is the steak house Palm Too. Haven't heard of it? It's the restaurant Stephen King refers to in On Writing when he discusses description. What a weird and smallish world.

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Happy 201st Birthday, Edgar Allan Poe. Some articles of interest regarding His birthday.

Nevermore? Mystery birthday visitor to Poe grave is no-show, breaking tradition

Poe and the Philadelphia Gothic: An Interview with Ed "Philly Poe Guy" Pettit

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A New Gig

It's official. Meet the newest writer for the Bram Stoker Award-winning newsletter Hellnotes. The title of my monthly column is Gray Matter, and it will focus on the craft of writing horror fiction, a subject I absolutely love to discuss. I've recently submitted my first article, and it may be available as soon as tomorrow for your viewing pleasure. I'll post it on the right under a section called Gray Matter when it becomes available.

If there are some particular subjects you would like me to focus on, please let me know.

I suggest you include Hellnotes into whatever your choice RSS reader is, but I'll also be posting the articles on this blog, as they become available of course.

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During the Great Blog Shift, I forgot to put back those free short stories available on Scribd. They're back.

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Typewriters vs. Computers

I imagine you're all busy sticking to your resolutions, Dear Readers, so I'll keep this post short and with a sugar substitute.

I've managed to plow through the first draft of my apocalypse novel, and though there's some good stuff there, most of it won't make the second draft. Better stated: My first draft is Crap. That's okay though. It's how I write. Some writers can put down a first draft that is almost complete. Look at Kurt Vonnegut. Guy would only write a page or two a day, but when the manuscript was finished, the book was finished. And while Vonnegut is an exception, I sometimes wonder if his discipline, at least in part, comes from a typewritten mindset. My first two drafts, sometimes even the third, are complete rewrites. By about the third cut I got something I can work with. I can't say for sure why that is, but I suspect it has to do with the ease in which manuscripts can be edited on a computer versus a typewriter. Maybe the seduction of the keystrokes, like some writers suggest. Or perhaps a computer is like a thruway, and a typewriter is like a horse & buggy. You can drive the same thruway a hundred times before you realize you pass an airport. On horse and buggy you know the color of every stone you pass.

So what do you think, Dear Reader?

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