How It All Began Part 2

Here's another excerpt from my first novel, Outsider. (Part 1 was last week. I hope you've read it!)

          Sean heard the cell door behind him slide open and turned to see a guard standing in the doorway.  It was the same one who had delivered his breakfast.

         The guard stepped into the cell and surveyed the contents, his eyes pausing on the bulky gray pressure suit hung on the wall next to the door, although he kept Sean within his peripheral vision.  Sean had already inspected the suit, finding it to be nothing more than a spacesuit with built-in oxygen supply but few accessories.  He’d never seen one up close, but there wasn’t much to see so he’d mostly forgotten about it since his first examination.

         “We’re having a safety drill,” the guard said.  “You’ll have to put that on.”

         “Safety drill?” Sean repeated.  “On the last day?”

         “Just put it on.”  The guard took a step back while Sean approached the spacesuit, and Sean noticed that he glanced once down the hallway.

         Sean struggled into the suit, which resisted his efforts to fasten it.

         “Let me help you,” the guard said.  “Keep your arms in the air.”

         Sean obeyed while the guard tugged at the zippers.

         “Where’s your partner?” Sean asked.

         “Busy.”  The guard paused.  “But he’d hear me if you try anything.”

         “I’m not in here for murder,” Sean said.  “You’re safe from me.”

         Sean noticed that the guard kept an eye on his prisoner’s hands while he secured the suit.

         “I don’t understand why this is necessary,” Sean said when the guard reached for the helmet.

         “Just a precaution.  I’ll be back to remove it when we’ve landed safely."

         Once the guard had locked the helmet in place, he said something, but Sean couldn’t hear the words.  After the guard backed out of the cell, Sean turned toward the porthole again and this time his eyes picked up movement out there, although it was a few seconds before he became aware of it.  There was a small cluster of stars coming toward him, which couldn’t be right.  Sean squinted at the moving lights until he recognized them as another spaceship, but he couldn’t see much of it because only the cockpit lights were on.  As he strained to make out any details of the ship, he realized that it had picked up speed as it approached.  Although the sight made him suspect that this was more than just a drill, he couldn’t figure out who would threaten a prison ship.  There couldn’t be anything of value on board.  Unless it was a case of mistaken identity, it just didn’t make sense.  Nevertheless, he instinctively ducked when the ship passed overhead.  Then he straightened up and laughed.  False alarm.

         There was a distant roar, barely audible through the helmet.  Sean checked to make sure the helmet was secure and then he felt ridiculous, standing there like an awkward monster, but that didn’t last long.  The next thing he knew, he was on the floor as the ship rocked.  He tried to grab at the bunk bolted to the floor but he slid away from it when the cell tipped.  He bounced off the wall back toward the cot and managed to grasp a leg of it.  He was rolled back and forth for several seconds.  Then there was an orange flash and everything around him disappeared in a yellow-white glare that burned itself onto his vision.  Try as he might, shaking his head and blinking, Sean could not dispel the painful glow his immediate world had become, a world in which he felt himself falling.  He was no longer holding onto anything and flailed his arms around wildly, trying to find something to break his fall.

          There was nothing.

Thanks for reading!

How It All Began

Here's an excerpt from the beginning of my first novel, Outsider.

            When Sean Foster woke up, he lay very still on the cot, letting his eyes focus on the wall in front of him. He felt full consciousness returning, but he wouldn’t let himself turn over, not until he reminded himself that he didn’t know where he was.

            He rolled over and his eyes swept the room, taking in the metallic-gray walls, the steel door, the porthole reflecting the harsh light from the ceiling. If he could just concentrate hard enough, he might convince himself he’d never seen this place before. His eyes settled on the light fixture in the ceiling, a rectangle of plastic covering the two fluorescent bulbs that simulated daylight. He tried to put all of his concentration into staring at the bulbs, one of which was just beginning to flicker a little, but then his ears betrayed him by picking up the faint hum of engines. Abruptly Sean saw the cell for what it was, and he put the palms of both hands to his eyes before he sat up.

            It was stupid to think that’d work anyway, he thought as he looked down at his dull brown uniform.

            By now he knew the sequence: first brief terror, then anger, to be followed eventually by resignation. Once he reached that point, Sean slouched back against the wall, staring at the beige loafers waiting on the floor beside the cot. He knew it was no use asking the guards again for something to read; there was nothing to do but wait.

            His thoughts were interrupted by a jarring sound of metal scraping metal. The door of the cell slid open slowly and two guards appeared beyond it, one holding a tray while the other rested a hand on his holstered gun.

            “Breakfast.” The guard holding the tray was husky, with no trace of flab, and he stood a few centimeters taller than Sean. He had a face resembling a wind-carved sand dune, topped by short, black hair. His dark eyes checked the cell, as they had every other time he delivered a meal here, but the scan had become cursory by now.

            Sean stayed where he was, knowing the routine. This allowed the guard to enter the cell and set the tray on the floor just inside the door before stepping back again.

            “Thanks,” Sean offered.

            “Yeah,” the guard said on his way out. After Sean heard the lock take hold, he retrieved the tray and sat back on the cot to eat. It was the usual, a couple of tasteless pancakes with a tiny squirt of syrup, a crumbling piece of toast that soaked up the egg pretty well, a cup of orange juice, and some weak coffee, each in its own little plastic container. Sean no longer noticed the food; eating was merely something to do. Today, however, he didn’t do much of it, barely managing to down the toast and juice before he had to give up. There was no use forcing himself, so he set the tray next to the door and returned to his position on the cot. The guard didn’t comment when he came to pick up the tray half an hour later.

            A few moments after that, Sean turned his head to look at the porthole again. He could still recall his mental images when his apologetic lawyer first mentioned space: purple aliens, flashy spaceships soaring past brilliant planets, glittering asteroid showers. It had all seemed exciting enough, but he had yet to actually see any of it. From his position on the bunk now, the glaring reflection of the ceiling light made the void beyond the porthole invisible. He didn’t want to look out again, but then he thought, twenty years, and that was enough to get him off the cot and across the short distance to the porthole. This might be his last look for another lifetime—at least it seemed like that to someone only twenty-four years old—so he might as well take advantage of it.

            As he bent toward the small glass circle, he caught a glimpse of himself reflected there: Sean Foster, a medium-sized young man whose light-brown hair needed a comb and whose brown eyes looked a little puzzled. Some hardened criminal, he thought.

            His image blurred into the void outside the spaceship. As usual, all he could see were stars. There were billions of them out there, more than he’d thought possible, but they were only a temporary distraction from boredom and, especially today, dread. It was the third day, so the ship must be nearing its destination. He pressed his nose against the cold glass, wondering without enthusiasm if he would see the prison planet before it became merely the ground under his feet. At the thought of a prison door slamming shut behind him, Sean felt fear crawl up his spine and over his shoulder blades to nestle in his hair. It didn’t matter what space was really like because he wouldn’t see it again for twenty years, maybe more if they forgot about him. He was so far from his lawyer, the courts, anyone who might care about him, that he might as well have ceased to exist. Sean had been caught off guard by his sentence, but he wasn’t going to let the horror of the prison term sneak up on him, too.

Please feel free to leave a comment. You can purchase Outsider or any of my other novels by clicking on the images on the right side of this page. Thanks again for reading!

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Why Sci-Fi

Ha. I chose science fiction just so I could have that cool rhyming title someday.

I've had people at work tell me they're astonished to find that I have all these stories of remote planets, spaceships and wormholes in my head. I guess that tells you how boring I am in real life, since they're so surprised by it.

But how did I choose science fiction as the genre for my series?

Part of it is because of Ray Bradbury, my greatest inspiration, but I can't attribute it all to him. For one thing, he didn't write only science fiction. He had a story to tell and he didn't particularly worry about the genre. Wherever the story led him, that's where he went. This is also true for me.

I've always been drawn to science fiction, though. Some of my favorite movies are in that genre and I like the freedom it offers. (That seems appropriate for Independence Day weekend, doesn't it?)

Besides that, I'd already ruled out a few genres. I don't have the money to travel around the planet so I can describe various locations effectively. I enjoy historical fiction, but I've never been particularly strong at history. I don't have the patience to write a romance. I didn't want to spend years on research.

Don't get me wrong: I did have to do research. I had to learn a lot about wormholes (thank you, Kip Thorne), spaceships, microgravity, etc. I have a lot of geeky physics books on my shelves. But once I'd done that, it was pretty easy (and cheap) to travel to distant planets: I just had to close my eyes (even that is optional) and dream.

When you think about it, the genre is only a small part of the equation. There have to be strong characters, a compelling story and a few ideas guiding the whole thing. If you don't have those, the genre will be irrelevant.

At some point, though, I did make a conscious decision. I think it was about the time I discovered Sean aboard a spaceship heading to a prison colony. I'd been toying with several ideas, but that one seemed to speak to me the most so I went with it.

And I've never looked back.

Happy Independence Day tomorrow! Thanks for reading.

What to Expect

Now that The Other Side is published, I thought I'd tell you a little more about it. (Don't worry, I won't tell everything! There are some spoilers here, though, so read on at your own discretion.)

First of all, I have a new cover artist. Her name is Nicole Smith, of Jasper Design Studio. I wanted to try something new for this cover and she was eager to oblige. I think the resulting image captures some of what goes on in this novel.

So what does go on in this novel? Well, first of all, I want to caution you that this one is a little "out there." What I mean by that is that I stretched a bit, I pushed myself a little further than I thought I would.

When I wrote Outsider, I resolved that I would try to avoid certain "cliches" of science fiction. I even had Sean come up with some ideas about space ("purple aliens, flashy spaceships soaring past brilliant planets, glittering asteroid showers") and then I wrote "but he had yet to actually see any of it" because I didn't think any of my characters would. Some writers are able to make the more common aspects of sci-fi work admirably, but I was afraid I didn't have the skill to do so. Because of that, I vowed I'd never have humanoid aliens, gigantic spaceships or a huge evil empire ruling the universe. I mostly managed to avoid those, but I didn't manage to avoid one topic that I didn't think I'd ever approach: alien life.

I guess I should have known better when I had to come up with an explanation for the wormhole construction. Obviously, humans in the near future wouldn't have the capability for such a project, so I just wrote it off as aliens building them. That sealed my fate. I thought I could just ignore the builders, because they were too far away or too ancient, but it didn't work out that way. (Besides, there was the enigmatic Chapter 8 of Another Shot.) After a great deal of struggle, I decided to confront them ... which meant I had to figure out who/what they were.

How many books and movies have been created about aliens? How could I possibly do anything new with the idea? What did I want to do with them? I don't even know if I consciously thought all of these questions, but they were certainly present when I tackled this subject. I can't say I've done anything remarkably different, but I tried to avoid some of the worst cliches. Some of the problems I have with aliens in movies is that they're all humanoid, often cute (or murderous) and easily able to converse with humans. The two species interact with no trouble whatsoever. I realize that this is all creative license and I don't blame the moviemakers because a lot of those movies are entertaining to watch, but I didn't think I could write something like that. I didn't want E.T. or the face-grabbers of "Aliens." I didn't want Superman or little gray beings.

I'll leave it to you, the reader, to decide if I came up with something that works.

I will tell you this: I gave a nod to two of my favorite sci-fi movies in The Other Side, so see if you can find both of the references!

There are a few other things in this novel that I didn't expect when I wrote Outsider, but I'll leave it to you to discover the rest.

I hope you'll enjoy the novel! (If you buy it on Amazon, please be kind enough to leave a review.)

Thanks for reading!

Closet Spaceship Part 18

(NOTE: This post refers to events from In The Shadows. I hope you've read it!)

Everyone needs a private place, a place to think one’s thoughts and escape the world for a while. For many of us, that’s home … so it’s a place I don’t want to invade.

I’d always visited Reggie aboard the ship, whether it was Outsider or Penumbra, but there was a time, while he was recovering, that he wasn’t there. I didn’t think Cyril was ready to see me, so I avoided him, but that meant avoiding Reggie, too. I wondered if I should just leave him alone.

This left me with another problem, though: as long as Reggie was recovering, the others were living their private lives, too. I didn’t want to drop by their homes unannounced, but I couldn’t hang out with them on the ship, and I didn’t think I should overdo it with Sean.

I missed them.

I was working on the next novel, polishing it mostly, so it shouldn’t have been such a problem, but rewriting is a lonely business. I was dealing with words, not characters, and sometimes words don’t want to be wrangled without an exhausting fight.

I finally broke my own unwritten rule. Let’s face it, I’m sort of making up the rules as I go along, so occasionally there will be adjustments.

There wasn’t any snow, but it was still cold. I walked around a little, flapping my arms and shivering. I eyed the rocks circling one of the trees. I walked around the storage shed in the far corner. I thought maybe I shouldn’t be there.

Then the back door opened.

Reggie backed out and closed the door. When he turned around, I was startled to see him leaning on a cane. He took a few steps toward me, but I darted to join him so he wouldn’t have to go any farther than necessary.

“I’m sorry,” I said, “I didn’t know—”

“Forget it,” he said. “I’m bored as hell anyway.”

“Are you supposed to be walking?” I asked. I knew he’d been badly injured, but I’d managed not to think about it. The cane made it impossible to ignore, though.

“Sure,” he said. “Thought I was so smart: I lost the cane so even Cy couldn’t find it. So what’s he do? Buys me another one, damn it.”

I checked his expression to see that he wasn’t angry at his brother.

“It’s mostly for balance,” he said. “So why are you here? Not much to see, is there?”

“Rewriting,” I said, as if that explained everything.

It didn’t. Reggie looked puzzled.

“Take your favorite book,” I said. “Now read it ten times in a row.”

He nodded. “So you’re bored as hell, too.”

“Pretty much.”

He laughed. “We’re just a couple of winners, right? Got it made.”

I smiled. “That’s right. Top of the world.”

“Give it a while,” Reggie said. “I’ll get back, so will you.”

“Yeah, I know.”

And he was right: The Other Side is coming soon. Stay tuned!

Closet Spaceship Part 17

I sat on a bench, trying to look as non-threatening as possible. I was wearing a coat because even though it was spring, it was also Chicago and there was a definite chill in the air. I was hoping that was only literal, not figurative.

He almost walked right past me. I saw his steps falter, then sort of stumble to a halt, but at first he didn’t look at me. I think he knew he could just keep walking and I wouldn’t say anything.

He sighed before he turned to face me.

“Hi, Sean,” I said.

I don’t know if I would have tried again if Reggie hadn’t asked me to do it. I’ll never know if Sean said something to him or it was his idea, but I told him I’d try.

“Thank you,” I said.

This startled Sean. “For what?”

“For introducing me to them.”

“I didn’t really—I mean, that’s not how …” Sean looked confused and sat down on the far end of the bench where I sat.

“Okay, not on purpose,” I said, “but you were interesting enough for me to stick with you, and I got to meet them because of it.”

“Reg is my friend,” Sean said. “He says you’re okay, but …”

“You should listen to him,” I said, trying to lighten the mood.

It didn’t work.

“You should leave him alone,” Sean said.

That surprised me. “Why?”

Sean thought about this for a while. “I’ve never met anyone like him. He’d do anything for anyone.”

“I know,” I said.

“So leave him alone. You don’t need to make a spectacle of him.”

“I’m not,” I said. “I have every respect for him, for the whole crew. Don’t you think people need and want to read about people like that?”

“I don’t care,” Sean said. “Leave them alone.”

“So you’re not mad that I wrote about you?” I asked.

Sean scoffed. “Why would you think that?”

Sometimes it seems I don’t know anything. (More often than I want to admit, actually.)

“Uh, well, I was trying to figure it out—” I said.

“After I shut the door in your face,” Sean said. “I’m sorry about that. I shouldn’t have done it.”

I didn’t know what to say, especially since I agreed with him. “Okay.”

“It’s not about me,” Sean said, “especially since it looks like you stopped writing about me anyway.”

I must have scowled at him because he explained, “I looked them up. Your books, I mean. I didn’t read them, but I read the cover blurbs.”

“You’re not mad I stopped writing about you, though?” I asked.

Sean rolled his eyes. “No. No way.”

“Sean, bad things are going to happen to them,” I said. “That’s the nature of what they do. Do you think if I stop writing about them, those things won’t happen?”

Whoa. If a tree falls and no one hears it …

“I know what they do, what it means,” Sean said, “but … he’s my friend.”

“Oh,” I said as I finally got it.

Sean cares about the crew and respects what they do, but that doesn’t mean he has to like it. He knows the dangers involved, maybe better than most people, so he’s a little angry that they put themselves in so much danger. But he can’t be mad at them—

I stood up. “Sean, it’s okay. I understand.”

I took two steps, but then I stopped.

“Do you think we can see each other again?” I asked. “Maybe if I let you throw something at me?”

One side of his mouth twitched a little. It was as close as he could come to a smile at the moment, but I appreciated the effort.

“I don’t know,” he said.

I was trying to be strong, but it stung a little.

“Give me some time,” Sean said.

“Okay,” I said. “Thanks for not refusing outright. And thanks for not telling me how many books there are. I’ll work that out as I go.”

Sean nodded. “Thanks for trying again.”

“I think it’s worth it,” I said.

Teasers

WARNING: This blog post contains some minor spoilers. If you haven't read Another Shot or In the Shadows, you might consider skipping this one. (The obvious solution is to read them now!)

I just watched a trailer for the new episode of "The X-Files," which will air next Sunday, Jan. 24. It's one of those shows that my significant other and I enjoyed for years. We loved the creativity of the storylines, we enjoyed most (but not all) of the conspiracy theories, we laughed at the corny jokes, but mostly I think we enjoyed the relationship between Mulder and Scully. The trailer makes me think the series will keep those strengths and add some new elements. I'm looking forward to seeing what they can do with it.

It occurs to me that some of you might be thinking of The Other Side in the same way. Will it have the same characters? Will it have the same chemistry? Will I crash another spaceship? Will I be able to do anything new? (I am very aware that crashing another spaceship would not be new, and I think I've managed to avoid it this time!)

Unfortunately, The Other Side won't come out right away, due to some extensive rewriting, but I haven't said much about it ... so maybe it's time to give a few teasers.

First of all, this novel will include the return of Sean Foster. He won't be a major factor in the story, but he will make an appearance. I hope that's good news for you.

We'll need to see how Reggie Hawkins is recovering from what happened near the end of In the Shadows. How inactive has he been? How long can he stay that way? What's his brother like?

If you recall, Lamont's crew had a mission for In the Shadows that they didn't get to fulfill: investigate the new wormhole. This time around, they're going to take a look ... and there will be some unexpected results. What is on the other side?

You'll see a little more of Gwen Radcliffe and pay a return visit to T.J.'s Bar. And you might want to review Another Shot before you read this one, although it isn't necessary.

I think that's all I'm willing to divulge for now. I hope it's enough to keep you interested while I try to finish the novel. I'll keep you posted!

Thanks, as always, for reading my blog. Feel free to leave a comment.

Onward

Happy 2016!

I've done some of my year-end tasks: changed the calendars, taken down the Christmas lights, put away the tree ... oh, and run some year-end sales reports.

Whew. That added a solemn note to my day. If you include all formats of my novels (paperback and Kindle), I sold 78 copies in 2013, my first year at this. That was with only one novel out.

In 2014, I had two novels out and I sold 36 copies in all.

In 2015, I had three novels out and I sold 16 copies in all.

Ouch. Sixteen copies all year! That's not the direction I saw things going. It was easy to feel gloomy about that, and I did for a while.

But then I took a step back. When I first released Outsider, I thought I'd probably sell about three copies (mostly to family). I've sold a few more than three, so I think I can be proud of that.

Besides, sales weren't really the point. I started writing Outsider because I thought it was fun. As I went along, I realized I cared about my characters and wanted to explore them some more, so I wrote a few more novels. At some point in the continuous rewriting of Outsider, I decided it was time to stop doing that, so I published it. I really wanted to share my characters with other people. And I've done that. It's pretty amazing to me that Lamont and Reg and Sean can live in other people's heads, not just in mine. They can do that if people share copies of the novel or check them out of a library, which won't show on a sales report.

So I'm going to do what I was doing before I ran the reports: go back to making The Other Side as good as I can make it. I'm going to fix the problem chapters, determine when I think it's ready and then publish it.

That's what I do. I write and rewrite. If I sell some along the way, that's great. I really appreciate all of you who have bought a copy or two! It would be nice if we could make 2016 better than 2015 ... but if not, that's okay. I'll be working on the fifth one!

Voice

I took an unintentional vacation from writing recently when a virus took root in my throat like some evil alien weed. I felt like a character in a horror movie, although some people probably thought it was a bit of a comedy when I lost my voice and could only blink apologetically at people. My co-worker suggested "interpretive dance," but I made do with sign language and occasional notes on scraps of paper.

It's amazing how much you miss the ability to talk when you lose your voice! I, like many people, completely take my voice for granted until it's not there anymore. Not that I have the most important things to say, but I did miss the ability to express my indignation/joy/irritation/relief/various other emotions when they occurred. Whether anyone else missed it is another matter entirely.

And thus I gained at least some understanding of the fascination for Facebook, Twitter, etc. Typing those little epiphanies and sending them out into the world is a way of expressing ourselves, letting others know that we're here and we have something to say. I know that most of the stuff I post on Facebook is probably ignored, but I post it anyway because it's my way of declaring my existence: I'm Diane and I'm here!
(Did you hear me, Horton?)

I'm not sure I feel the same way about my novels, though. I didn't release them to let everyone know that Diane McCallum exists. I think I released them to let everyone know that Sean Foster, Ben Lamont, Reggie Hawkins and several others exist. The characters had a story to tell and I wanted to share that.

So I'm their voice (even when I'm mute), and as long as they have stories to tell, I plan to pass those along.

Work on the fourth novel continues!

Closet Spaceship Part 12

When I first told Reggie about my visit with Sean, he laughed.

I sat in the conference room, watching him fill a cup with coffee. By the time he sat down next to me, he’d grown serious.

“You sure that was Sean?” he asked. “Doesn’t sound like him.”

I rolled my eyes at him. “Am I sure it was Sean? Really?”

“Okay, okay.” He took a drink. “Never seen him run from anything before.”

“You talked to him,” I said. “What’d you say?”

“I said you’re an ax murderer.”

My eyeballs were getting a lot of exercise. “What’d you really say?”

“I told him who you are, is all. What’d you do?”

“I waved an ax at him,” I said. “I guess I can’t really blame him. If some strange woman appeared outside my door and said she was from the past, I’d lock the door, too.”

“Yeah, but I told him you’re okay,” Reggie said. “There’s got to be something else.”

He took another drink.

I thought back to the conversation, trying to remember when Sean seemed to get scared.

“I told him I’m your friend, then I told him to call you …” I was thinking out loud.

“What’d you say after he talked to me?” Reggie asked.

“I don’t remember. Uh, something about people in 2015 knowing him.”

“Huh.” He took another drink.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “Maybe that’s it! I said people in 2015 knew him and they might think he was fictional. What if he thinks they don’t think he’s fictional?”

When I get excited, I tend to bundle a lot of words together and fling them outward all at the same time. It makes me spend a lot of time rewriting, but that’s when I’m writing—it’s a little hard to rewrite what I say.

Reggie looked puzzled. “What?”

“He thinks people are reading about him,” I explained. “That’s got to be intimidating, right?”

“But what about during his trial? Everybody was reading about him then.”

“Oh.” This was enough to deflate my theory.

“Listen, you know him better than anybody,” Reggie said. “Keep thinking.”

It’s not easy being a writer. (Wait, it’s never easy? Okay, sometimes when the words are flowing, maybe. Other times, not so much. But I still love it.)

I sat back in my chair, thinking about all the articles written about Sean at the time. I guess that wouldn’t be fun, having your name plastered all over the place followed by the words “criminal” or “smuggler” or “convicted.”

Yet that hadn’t affected Sean. He’d been himself when he met the crew, not bitter or ready to slam a door in their faces. And now it was done …

“Okay,” I said.

“I figured you’d get it,” Reggie said.

I nodded. “And you got it a long time ago.”

Reggie shrugged.

“He thought he put all of that behind him,” I said. “And those articles were just about superficial stuff, not the real Sean. He reads fiction: he knows what a writer can do, digging around in a character’s head all the time. So I’m bringing back the past and revealing more about him than he might want to have known.”

I wanted to find Sean and apologize to him.

“I’m not really evil,” I said. “Am I?”

Reggie laughed. “Nah. Don’t worry, he’ll get over it.”

I hope he’s right.

(Happy Easter.)

Closet Spaceship Part 11

I have mixed emotions about Sean. It’s true that he introduced me to the crew, and he did give me an exciting story to start out the series, but there’s also the fact that he’s not a full-time member of the crew, although Reggie wishes he was. It’s not that I have anything against teachers; I’m married to one, after all. It’s just that he’s chosen his own path and it diverges from the crew, at least most of the time.

Wait--most of the time? Does this mean you’ll see Sean again? Yes, it’s true: he will make an appearance in the future. I could never dump him in the recycle bin, never to be seen again, mostly because he’s a good lens through which to see the crew, but also because he can be their sounding board. You might have noticed that Reggie will say things to Sean that he would never say to his crewmates. And sometimes Sean can put into words what others are thinking but don’t want to say out loud.

I spent a lot of time trying to decide if I should see Sean … or rather, if he should see me.

But then I wondered what he could say to me. It might be worth hearing, so I decided to give it a try.

Not long after the events of Another Shot, he came home to his little apartment to discover me sitting on the floor outside his door. He stopped about a meter away.

“Do I know you?” he asked.

I smiled. “Not really. Let’s just say I’m a friend of Reggie.”

At first he smiled back, but then he looked puzzled. I guess I don’t exactly fit the bill of the person you’d imagine as Reggie’s friend. He made no move toward me.

“He didn’t tell you about me?” I asked.

“No,” Sean said.

I stood up, which made him take a step back.

“He would’ve told you if I’m dangerous,” I said. “But call him if it’ll make you feel better.”

He took another step back, pulled out his phone and pushed a button on the face. Then he turned his back on me and I heard a one-sided conversation, although it wasn’t too hard to guess what was being said on the other side.

“Hi. Yeah. Um, there’s this woman here. Yeah. Yeah.” Sean glanced over his shoulder at me. “Really? Yeah. Are you sure? But how come I’ve never heard … From the—Reg, come on. Really? If you say so. Yeah, sure. Okay.”

Sean put his phone away and turned to stare at me.

I could only take it for a few seconds before I giggled and spread out my arms a little. “Not what you expected, huh?”

“Seriously?” he asked. “From the past?”

“That’s right. You might be surprised to know that some people in 2015 know who you are. I mean, I think they think you’re fictional, but still …”

Sean looked a little pale.

“I think you’d better sit down,” I said, stepping away from the door. “If you want me to stay out here, I will.”

He continued to stare at me as he stepped closer to the door. I noticed that he didn’t have a key in his hands, which were both clutching at the strap of his backpack as if it was a safety line.

“Um, a key usually helps,” I offered.

“Key?” he asked. “For what?”

“The door.”

“What door?” His shoulder bumped against it so he glanced at it. “Oh.”

He bent down to peer at a little rectangular panel on the right side of the door. Seconds later, the door popped open.

“Wow.” I stepped forward. “Retinal scanner?”

Sean stumbled through the doorway into the apartment. He half-shut the door and stared out at me.

I stepped back. “Sean, I’m not a ghost or anything. I won’t hurt you. Do you want me to go away?”

“Actually, yes.” He closed the door.

Well, I didn’t expect that. So much for what he would say to me.

New Video

This week I mailed off two copies of In the Shadows to the Library of Congress for mandatory deposit. I didn't think they would get there right away because of all the nasty weather on the East Coast, but when I checked this morning, they'd arrived! That means they're in the Library of Congress! That still makes me grin like an idiot, even for the third time.

Here's another thing that makes me kind of happy: I made an actual video! It's on Youtube and everything. (You don't even want to know how long it took me to put this together.) Here it is:



I hope this will help get the word about Outsider to more people. Please be sure to share it with everyone you know! Here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VihpR0pKQXE

What do you think? Is it passable for my first video? Should I try to make more? (Feel free to leave a comment below!)

How to Write a Novel

I hope you laughed when you read that title. There isn't one correct way to write a novel any more than there's one correct way to read one. You can read it on an e-reader, on your computer or on paper. You can read it all in one sitting, one chapter a day or one page a month.

I've read some descriptions of how other authors write. Some of them have the whole thing mapped out, with timelines and character studies and everything, before they even write. Some mystery writers start at the end and work their way to the beginning. Most of them know what's going to happen before they begin.

Not me.

That shouldn't surprise you too much. After all, I write for fun and I just don't see the fun in creating a bunch of outlines and lists before I start the story. Writing should be a voyage of discovery, as exciting for the writer as it is for the reader. I use a map when I go on vacation, but not when I write a novel.

I usually start out with a compelling scene. For Outsider, it was the image of Sean floating in space alone after his ship was attacked. For Another Shot, it was the spaceship Outsider crashing. (Sorry about the spoiler, but you really should have read Another Shot by now, right?)

Once I have that scene in mind, I write it. I take the image in my head and describe it to the best of my ability. Then I sit back and wonder how this thing happened. What led up to it? So I go back and write whatever it takes to explain why Sean was in a prison ship or why the spaceship crashed.

The most important thing I do is to listen to my characters. If I stay true to them, they will lead me through what happens next. When I first started, I didn't know them very well so we took a few wrong turns, but as they became more familiar to me, they guided me through each scene and eventually through the whole story.

So believe it or not, I have no idea what's going to happen in the novel until I write it.

How's that for fun??


Please keep mentioning my novels to your friends, family and acquaintances. Sales are at a standstill and I'd like to drum up a little interest before I release In The Shadows. Thanks for your support!

Sean

(SPOILER ALERT: If you haven't read Another Shot yet, you might not want to read this post.)

I think I always knew that Sean wouldn't stay with the crew.

How many times have you seen a movie or read a book where the main character gets snatched from his/her surroundings and thrown into a completely foreign situation? After a bunch of adventures, the character decides that this is where he/she belongs, no matter what his/her original plans might have been.

It always troubled me a little. I mean, sometimes the writer goes to great pains to let us know that this character is much better off this way, instead of in the dreary life that was abandoned, but sometimes it's not clear. And I always wondered what that character might have achieved in that original life.

So, being the stubborn person I am, I decided that my main character would not only have a good goal in life (teaching), he would also continue to pursue it, even after meeting Lamont's crew and acknowledging the importance of what they do. Sean didn't really fit in with them anyway, no matter what Hawkins might think, and it wouldn't have made a lot of sense for him to stay.

Some of my readers have expressed surprise at Sean's fading into the background. "Isn't the series about Sean?" they ask.

Well, no, not really. Sean is our introduction to the crew and he's a major character of the first novel, Outsider, that is true ... but he was always just one of the characters. Anybody who's willing to destroy the ship that her first novel was named after is going to be willing to jettison a major character. Call me brave or call me stupid ... it seems more true to the story that way.

Don't worry, though. You haven't seen the last of Sean. He's sure to pop up sometime in the future.

Closet Spaceship Part 9

   I walked down the corridor in search of Nick, who was hiding out in the dining hall.  When I peeked through the doorway, I saw him slouched in a chair, holding a cup of coffee as if it were a pistol pointing in my direction.

   I raised both hands.  “May I come in?”

   He shrugged.

   I walked in and sat across the table from him.

   “You could just shoot me,” I said. “Although not with that.”

   The coffee cup clanked onto the table.

   “What do you want?” he asked.

   “I don’t know,” I said. “To talk to you, I guess.”

   “So talk.”

   “That’s not what I meant. You want me to go on for a few minutes about writing or something like that? No, you don’t.”

   “No, I don’t,” he said. “What do you think I did?”

   I smiled. “I mostly said that to get you to stop. But there is something: you—”

   “Listen,” he interrupted, “I did exactly what I told the captain. It’s not my fault I got so far away from the landing site. S**t, they act like I really was sightseeing. Reg won’t shut up about it.”

   He was referring to an incident in the first novel, when the captain and Hawkins arrived at the ship’s landing site with some angry colonists in pursuit and didn’t find Outsider there as they expected because Nick was busy trying to evade some colony ships that wanted to shoot him down. (If you want more details, read the novel. What else do you expect me to say?)

   “I know what you did there, Nick,” I said. “You had two ships on your tail, so you did what you had to do. Nobody faults you for that.”

   “So what, then?” he asked.

   I chuckled. “Sean told everybody he gave you the slip.”

   “So what? He did.”

   “Not exactly, did he? I believe your exact words were, ‘Get the hell away from me before I put a few holes in you,’ weren’t they? Oh, and something about a dumb kid.”

   Nick looked uncomfortable. “He tell you that?”

   “No, dummy,” I said, “I was there, remember? You can deny it all you want, but I heard what you said. He didn’t give you the slip; you sent him away. Not that he minded. He would have gone anyway, so maybe you should have been a little more patient.”

   Nick scoffed.

   “I know,” I said. “Patient isn’t exactly in your character profile.”

   “S**t,” he said.

   “Listen, Nick,” I said. “I’m not going to tell anybody. I’m not here to get you or anyone in trouble. I’m not going to run to the captain every time somebody ignores an alarm or does something stupid. He probably already knows anyway.  That’s not why I’m here.”

   “So why are you here?” he demanded. “Why don’t you just leave us alone?”

   “Because I’m a writer,” I said, “and because you won’t leave me alone.”

   He looked puzzled. “What do you mean?”

   “You don’t get it,” I said. “If you want me to stop coming, get a boring job and be boring yourself. Then we can leave each other alone. Until then, we’re stuck with each other.”

   It’s true: I’ve tried a few times to leave the crew behind, but it didn’t work. Someday I might stop writing about them, but they’ll never leave me completely.

   “Go on,” I said. “I know there’s a poker game upstairs.”

   When Nick left, he was walking, not running, so I suppose that’s progress.  We’ll see.