The Dragon Question featured on eBookDaily!
My Publishing Worlds
Where an idea begins ~ mine took me here
I am about to embark on writing the fifth book of the Standing Stones series. My daughter reminds me regularly this is the series that writes itself. It is an apt reminder.
It started with a friend wanting me to write a guest post for her blog. She gave me a set of possible topics, one of which was fantasy. I hadn’t written a fantasy before, but I’ve read thousands.
It was the only topic I thought I could write fairly well on. I had an idea, nothing particularly new, but I hadn’t seen it written about in the manner I was thinking, so why not?
My brainstorm idea: the rules that govern the world of a story create pathways that as the story proceeds limit the choices available to both the writer and the character. Those limited choices funnel the writer and the character to its ultimate conclusion. Nothing new, right.
But I’m a teacher, and examples are paramount in putting across expectations. So I immediately began thinking about a set of rules for a fantasy world: wielders of magic must carry with them a heavy flat stone which they must stand on in order to wield the essence that is the base of their magic and is embedded in the stone. What if there was a wielder that couldn’t carry his stone or found it extremely difficult? How would that act as a governor of his experience.
From there, I considered a series of questions.
- Why can’t he carry it?
- Are there alternatives?
- What caused this situation?
- What can he or she do about this if anything?
- What other rules apply?
- and the list goes on…
I got to the bottom of the parameters of this fantasy world and how it would guide the story and was so invested, I could not send her the post. I set it aside while I finished up a book I was writing.
I thought I might write a short story with this created character: Jahl Pratter and his struggle with fitting into the demands of being a wielder.
I began writing another book in my then current series and continued to let Jahl wait for when I had time to write that short story.
I got stuck, not just stuck: I lost faith in the book I was writing. I had to step away.
I started another book that had been running around in my head. Over the course of a couple of months, the conflicts of this new book became all to real to me, and I could not face it. Both my father-in-law and my mother were showing serious signs of dementia, a key component of that novel.
Both have since passed away, and 20k of words are waiting for me to come back. I can’t just yet.
I returned to the previous series’ book and struggled along before again setting it aside. Jahl beckoned.
I thought writing a short story might lubricate the wheels. And it was all laid out in my head. It wouldn’t take much time to write it.
At about 20K of words and no where near the middle, never mind the end, I realized I was writing a book, and it just kept writing itself. I was along for the ride.
Book 2 grabbed hold, and I said, “Okay, let’s roll.”
Before I had time to take a breath, Book 3 was in the works.
I stepped back to the fifth book in that earlier series I kept setting aside and finished it, quite satisfied with the result. I had hated it the majority of the time I spent writing it. It just never felt good enough. By the time I finished it, I quite liked it. One unpublished blog post produced four books.
I started a new fantasy series of standalone novels, Solstice Dragon World. After writing three of them, I returned to the Standing Stone series and wrote its fourth book as easily as I had written the first three. I love that series and have been thrilled to learn from my readers that I am not alone.
Standing Stone Book 5 is next on my agenda. I’ve been holding it off while I have finished my current series: Kavin Cut Chronicles, just weeks away from publishing the third in the trilogy.
I suspect Standing Stone’s Book 5 will be the end of the series. Of course, given its beginnings, I can’t be certain.
If you would like to check out any of my fantasy series, click the tab at the top of the web page labeled All Books. You’ll find links to all the main retailers where they are sold. Just click on the series title of each and work your way through the books.
Have I got a story for you?
I was busy writing Book 3 of the Kavin Cut Chronicles, and these two characters joined the cast. They were so intriguing.
One had been a minor character, a brief walk-on, but he left such a strong impression, I wondered if he would be back.
Lord Laurents was a charming, elderly fellow with a perpetual smile on his face, impossible not to like. Kambry certainly appreciated his quick grin and teasing words.
But when his wife, the stiff-lipped Lady Laurents showed up and other characters started to talk about her, I was sold on the idea that these two were not going to melt into the woodwork as easily in the third book as they had in book 1 and 2.
Chapter one of Book 3 had the Lady Laurents front and center. I was even more curious about how sweet Lord Laurents ended up with such a sour-puss for a wife.
They needed a short story focused on the two of them.
I stopped everything and spent a Saturday finding out what drew charming, sweet-natured Laurents to this “caustic” woman.
“A Sultry Buzz” was the result. I made it available to my newsletter subscribers, giggling the whole time.
Now that I know the Laurents’ secret, I grin every time I think about those two.
Here’s the first paragraphs:
Standing at the entrance of the room, Bernum Laurents folded his arms across his chest and narrowed his eyes. “I’ve been staying close to home, avoiding trouble and sitting in on the council meetings, and now you say I need to settle down?” He pressed the back of his head to the floral-papered wall and exhaled noisily.
Mother slid her embroidery needle neatly though the pale, stretched linen. She sat with her back straight though the chair back was canted, a floral blanket covering her lap down to what he knew were thin, weak ankles. Her legs seemed to strain against the straps that crossed over them and held them in place. “Don’t be dramatic. You’re ready now,” she said, not looking up as she tugged the needle, one thumbnail holding the twist of thread in place for the rosette.
“I wouldn’t say I’m ready at all for marriage,” he said. He trod across the drawing room until he was only a few feet from his mother. A low hassock was the nearest seat to her, and he folded his lean frame up like a trestle table after giving the squat seat a glare. Why with all the chairs in the room had she chosen this one to keep close? He gazed at her strapped-in legs and instantly grew contrite. He’d loved to sit near her when he was a boy and had routinely chosen the lowest seats so she could feel tall once and awhile. She probably kept the hassock here just for him.
“You’re twenty-seven years old. It’s time you chose a life partner.”
“Okay, let’s follow that argument. ‘Time I chose.’ So why have you invited the caustic Joulette Dwantry to dinner? Why did you insist I attend? And why when I asked if you knew Miss Dwantry did you say it didn’t matter if you knew her, only that I got to know her?”
“I’m not allowed to make suggestions, Bernum?”
“Then the demand that I appear promptly at six in court clothes for a family dinner was a suggestion?”
“Of course, not. I want you to impress the girl.” She tugged the thread through again.
And the rest is their story. If you’re interested in reading more about these two, you have a few choices. You can join my monthly newsletter.
- Click the tab titled Sign Up at the top of my webpage and signup for my newsletter. The short story links are always in the newsletter about mid-way down.
- You can read Book 1 in the Kavin Cut Chronicles trilogy and click the newsletter link at the end of the book. And you’ll find the short story links about mid-way down the newsletter.
- You can read both books in the series and at the end of Book 2 click the link to sign up and get the short story in a few clicks and not have to wait for the newsletter to come out that month, as signing up from Book 2 includes an offer to receive “A Sultry Buzz.”
Writing this short story was such fun that I’m hoping to write one each month. October just started, so I’ll be waiting for that itching short-story-writing sensation.
I can’t make promises that there will be more, the situation with teaching and writing is not conducive to adding to my load, but I squeezed this one it. How hard can it be?
Don’t answer that. Let’s keep up the charade that I can eek out the time if I try really hard. And I’m going to try really hard. There’s a map I thinking about making, too. But we’ll see how that goes. That requires more time to eek out.
The Battle of the Fungus
Yes, I’ve been busy drafting the new Solstice Dragon book, redrafting said book, editing said book, approving covers for the new series, but my biggest endeavor for the last four months has involved FUNGUS. Yes, I know, all caps is screaming.
Fungus, I say!
It has taken over my sweet companion Cagney since just before Christmas. I could mention how it has kept us from all family visits, but though terribly important and frustratingly heartbreaking, that is a separate issue. (We haven’t see our daughter in six months!)
This is about the Battle of the Fungus.
It started a week before Christmas. That is, we realized there was a problem about a week before Christmas. In retrospect, it had made its advance into our lives at least two weeks prior.
Feral kittens and a curious dog. Need I say more?
Cagney was following the kittens under the house (pier and beam foundation).
I couldn’t find her in the backyard, and she was in such a hurry to get out from under the house and out of trouble with me, that she banged her back against the foundation beam and left a couple scrapes.
I cleaned the cuts with soap and water and thought nothing more of it.
Jump ahead two weeks with a plan to head south to visit the family for Christmas only a couple days in the future. Cagney’s hair is falling out in clumps where the scrapes were.
What the heck!?
It’s Friday evening, of course. We plan to leave Sunday for the trip. The vet is not open until Monday. I leave a message.
We get a return call early Monday, and they squeeze us in for a quick examination.
“Fungus. Your dog has fungus.”
Instructions: shampoo at least twice to three times a week. Keep her area clean, use bleach if possible. Wrap her bed in a sheet and change the sheet regularly. Give her these pills twice a day for 23 days. She should be good in three weeks, though some cases take longer.
Oh, don’t expose her to any animals or people until she is cured. Cured is when little hairs are growing where the skin is bare.
She’s highly contagious — To People and Pets!
No trip south.
Regimen #1
- Pill morning and night
- shampoo three times a week (approx. every third day)
- change sheet same day shampoo
- vacuum area every other day
- wipe down area with borax same day as shampoo
- no petting
- She’s not allowed to leave her designated area except to go outside
- escorted outside (no visits under the house allowed)
- lots of hand washing up to the elbows and wearing gloves when I bathe her
3 weeks: This fails miserably. The fungus is moving from her spine to her shoulders and ribs. She has completed the pills and is nearly out of shampoo.
Back to the vet. They shave her thick coat to about a quarter inch length, which by the way was called “a grooming” and looked like it was done with a hatchet and cost more than any haircut my husband and I have had combined.
I purchased another bottle of vet-recommended shampoo.
Regimen #2 (after the second vet visit and some internet research)
- shampoo three times a week (approx. every third day)
- change sheet same day shampoo
- vacuum area every other day
- wipe down area with borax same day as shampoo
- no petting
- she’s moved to a back hall 5×9.
- I wipe down walls, floors with borax
- escort outside
- I purchase more shampoo (brand I found at Walmart) along with a spray anticeptic/antifungal for between baths
- Purchase and install child gate for hall
- spray her spots with anticeptic/anti-fungal spray on days between shampoos
- hand washing like a crazy woman
She gets worse. Shoulders, neck, flanks, rear, belly and armpits are now infected.
I do further internet research, more thorough and highly motivated. We have now gone three months since the initial outbreak.
I learn the following:
- This can take up to six months to eradicate
- shampoos must contain Ketoconazole (1%) & Chlorhexidine (2%) (the brand we’re using has lower percentages of the medicine)
- area must be cleaned daily (bleach recommended)
- start with shampooing every day first week
- medicine (pills) should be taken for at least six weeks (not 23 days!)
- dogs with longer hair should be shaved at once
- change bedding every day
- fungus is carried in the fallen hair shaft
- pets often reinfect by rubbing furniture, food bowls, etc.)
Regimen #3
- shampoo every other day
- change sheet every day (wash and dry on allergy mode)
- vacuum every other day (she’s barely losing hair)
- wipe down area (floor, walls and gate) with Clorox bleach wipes
- spray with antiseptic/anti-fungal on day not shampooing
- vacuum on bath day: walls, floor, and bed beneath sheet
- purchase dog trimmer and shave her down to a quarter inch, maintain as needed. Clean shaver with soap and water (Can’t use stronger disinfectants on the working parts.)
- disinfect bowl and cone of shame (she has other issues) with bleach wipes every other day
- escort for outside breaks
- I’m a hand-washing maniac
She’s no better, but she’s no worse after two weeks. Maybe I see improvement in some areas. But there’s two spots which just won’t improve.
What am I doing wrong?!
I have this friend at school with whom I chat once a week about our dogs. She’s been in on this debacle since the beginning. We rehash everything that has happened since day one. We’re both feeling a bit frosty about my vet.
I mention how we had to wait an extra hour to pick Cagney up after her shaving because she had to be blow dried.
We both scream at the same time. BLOW DRIED!
That night I blow dry Cagney after her Monday bath.
It takes an hour and a half! I have grading up the yin yang to do, and I’m about to cry. But I blow dry her with my pink Conair on warm, high speed. Neither of us are enjoying the process.
By the way, I can crouch now for at least an hour without my legs cramping. Just sayin’.
Add blow drying to regimen #3.
By Friday she looks less raw.
By the next week (last week) she has baby hairs growing.
I shave her again. So much easier to shampoo and blow dry.
This picture was taken today. The spots are visible, though blurred. That’s the hair that is coming in making them look less defined. This picture is an accurate match to her colors.
Pink skin is showing in most areas, though there is some dark pigmentation. It will hopefully fade. Her ears have always been that color. 🙂 The fungus never traveled beyond the bend in her neck.
Today is bath day. It will take about two hours from start to finish. Maybe three weeks from now she’ll get to roam the house again and wait at the sliding glass door to greet us when we come home.
I really miss seeing her there perked up and pleased as all getout to have us home.
We threw out all her beds except the rectangular flat one because its easy to wrap in a sheet and was cleanable. I can’t wait to buy her a new comfy bed for the kitchen and another one for my office.
I’ll post an update when she’s cured. I hope this is useful for anyone else dealing with a pet with fungus.
UPDATE: She is still dealing with fungus. We did have one three-week period fungus free, but then her feet became infected. May 2020
UPDATE: Feet recovering, inner ears now involved. Aug. 2020
UPDATE: Feet had a relapse. Bleach water bathing of each foot, ear drops, pills, more baths, deep sanitation of the back hall, and…..drumroll……….She is fungus free! Sept. 2020.
Thousands of baths, clean sheets, and ten months.
UPDATE: Belly, right side of face and flanks now spotted with fungus. October 1, 2020. We went four weeks fungus free. That is our current record since December 2019.
Busy in 2020 by an order of 4 maybe 5
I thought an update was do. I’ve been writing, editing, redrafting, planning and preparing paperbacks.
This won’t be a long post, more of a list of what is in the works.
- The fourth book in the Solstice Dragon World, To Harbor a Dragon, is now up as a pre-order set to upload at the end of April. A paperback version will follow shortly after the eBook goes live.
- The third book in the Solstice Dragon World, Dira’s Dragon, is in the works to be available in paperback, tentative deadline is set for mid-March.
- My new series Kavin Cut Chronicles is moving along nicely. Covers are in the works next week with Ryn Katryn Digital Art. (Loraine has done all my covers. I love her work!) I expect the first to publish about May with the pre-order coming out in March.
- The two Kavin Cut Chronicles that will complete the trilogy should be out before summer ends and in eBook and paperback.
- A fifth book for the Standing Stone series will be hitting the drafting board sometime in August, I expect, and will be out before the end of the year.
- The Standing Stone series should be out in paperback by summer 2020.
- If all goes according to plan, this will be the year I publish four perhaps even five books in twelve months, a new record: One Solstice Dragon World, three Kavin Cut Chronicles and one Standing Stone. All will be in paperback shortly after the eBook publication.
So that is the plan, subject to change, of course. The fifth Standing Stone is the one that has the greatest wiggle room. It may have to wait until January 2021 for publication, though the pre-order will definitely go up between October and December 2020.
This year is off to a wonderful start. I hope yours is as well. May you find plenty of lovely books to read, lots of adventure in your world and contentment where it counts the most.
My plans for 2021 are very fluid, so if you have a particular series you wish me to focus on next year, post it in the comments. My fans definitely have pull with me.
In search of inspiration
Some days are more inspiring than others. I find myself sitting at my computer with several tasks to do.
- write monthly blog post
- post to Facebook, reply, repost, respond
- get lost on Twitter, reply, retweet, comment, post
- write 1,000 to 3,000 words to current book
- review edit back from the editor
- redraft book back from beta readers
- outline: next book in current series, new series, previous series, new idea
- approve cover layout/changes, final
- come up with idea for a cover (I once told my cover artist I had no ideas for the cover I was booking with her, and ten minutes later, I emailed her and said, “I have the whole series’ covers figured out.”)
- create ads
- write monthly newsletter
It’s a never ending search for inspiration that is worth writing and (please God make it so) worth reading. I look at every action in the course of the day as a possible relevant topic
- trim the dogs foot hair (otherwise she is constantly fighting slippage on the wood and linoleum floors)
- trim dogs toenails
- sort mail
- clean kitchen
- fold clothes
- be a passenger in the car
- shower
- dry hair
- put on makeup
- treadmill, free weights, stair steps, walk
I rarely get a zone-out moment to myself. Sometimes my brain demands I cease all efforts to create. So I grade homework, essays, etc. It really doesn’t replenish the creative stores. Actual time to just vegetate does not exist in my world.
What would I do if I could?
- sit on a porch and listen to the rain fall
- walk up and down the pathway in our backyard along the carport and admire the wisteria blooming
- cloud staring (I wouldn’t even look for shapes, just stare.)
- put on nail polish and take my sweet perfectionist time at it
- learn how to whistle
- learn how to play my ocarina
- learn how to tie all sorts of knots
- make that t-shirt quilt (my husband then would stop asking what I’m planning for that stack of clothes building up in our daughter’s abandoned bedroom.)
- sand my face with my micro-abrasion tool
- dust the entire house
- try different eye makeup styles (there are tenth graders whose eye-shadow looks ten times better than mine. I’ve been asked if I even wear makeup.)
- read all the writing-related books I have
- read more fiction
- complain (I don’t even have time to complain. Big moment here. I think I just complained. I need more practice. I’m not sure that’s an actual valid complaint.)
- vacuum the entire house, even the walls and ceiling. (You know when you have a baby, and someone gives you the plaque that says its okay not to clean the dishes, dust, fold clothes, etc., because you have a baby. Authors just plug writing into the baby slot — have a book to write.)
Back to inspiration.
I’m big on questioning. Whatever the “mindless” activity I’m involved in, questioning has always been my go-to “slide into what to write next” approach. I just keep asking questions until the character or narrator or my “planning” brain starts answering.
You’ve caught yourself doing it, I’m sure.
A question comes to mind because someone said something, others answered, and you didn’t get your chance. So you self-question. “When did you graduate high school? Have you ever broken a bone? Where did you meet your spouse/special someone? If you could be any age, what would it be?
And there you are telling your story even if nobody is listening. The only difference for me is I’m listening and at some point, I say, “Hold that thought,” and sit down at the computer and write.