Surprise, surprise! Here we are, still at the same old website. I have waved the white flag and admitted (partial) defeat.

I feel like I tried out a thousand web hosts. I think it was really only eight or ten, but it felt like more. Do you know how sick I am of building test sites? Gah!

I really didn’t like any of them. Most of them are too expensive. All of them are boring. They offer hundreds of templates but all of them look exactly alike. And most hosts don’t offer enough customization to make your website stand out. The exception was Squarespace. They almost had too much customization and I was a little overwhelmed by it. I couldn’t justify the price, though. If I was more than just an unknown starving artist, then I would definitely go for Squarespace, but I just can’t justify the price right now.

Of course, cookie-cutter sites seem to be the thing right now. I Googled several famous authors to look at their websites for inspiration and I was shocked at what I found. If you blurred out the book covers so that you couldn’t read who was who, then you wouldn’t be able to tell the websites apart. Seriously, check out these sites:

http://www.neilgaiman.com/

https://www.deankoontz.com/

https://www.evanovich.com/

https://www.stephenking.com/

https://www.jamespatterson.com/landing-page/james-patterson-home/

The only thing that makes Neil Gaimen’s and James Patterson’s websites stand out is they’ve got big old pictures of themselves on the page. Take those out and the page is pretty generic.

I guess that’s the trend these days, and I get it: keep it clean, easy to read, easy to navigate, focus on the books. Perfectly understandable. BUT, I don’t see any reason why the site can’t reflect a little of the author’s personality, too. I don’t want to go all glitter-blinkie Geocities on you, but I do want you to know you’re at MY website when you visit here!

JK Rowling’s website is a great example of the kind of website I’d like to create: https://www.jkrowling.com/

To that end, I’m staying with WordPress. I’ve purchased their paid hosting and, as I have time, I’ll be seeing what I can work out here. I love my current theme, but it’s going to have to go. My biggest problem with it is the “stay updated via RSS feed” text and link at the top of the page; it doesn’t work, and you can’t edit it. On top of that, this theme is ancient and no longer supported. So I’ll have to find some other theme I can work with within the customization parameters allowed by WordPress.

Enough with the website drama! On to the good stuff.

I’ve got two book recommendations for you this month (besides my stuff, of course). If you are a reader who prefers books with a literary bent, I recommend There,There by Tommy Orange. Mr. Orange was a guest at our writers conference this year and he was amazing! His book focuses on the stories of several different Native American characters whose lives all converge in an epic event at the end of the book. If you love work by David Truer or Louise Erdrich, you’ll love There,There by Tommy Orange.

On the genre front, I read Wastelands 2: More Stories of the Apocalypse, edited by John Joseph Adams. This is a great collection and includes authors both well-known (like George R.R. Martin & Orson Scott Card) and lesser known. I love anthos that include authors you know are going to hit it out of the park AS WELL AS letting you discover some new favorite authors.

In no particular order, my favorite stories in this collection were:

“The Tamarisk Hunter,” by Paolo Bacigalupi;

“Deep Blood Kettle,” by Hugh Howey;

“Animal Husbandry,” by Seanan McGuire;

“Ellie,” by Jack McDevitt;

“Dreams in Dust,” by D. Thomas Minton;

“Monstro,” by Junot Diaz;

“Biographical Fragments from the Life of Julian Prince,” by Jake Kerr, and

my favorite: “When We Went to See the End of the World,” by Robert Silverberg.

Definitely a thick collection with a variety of stories, so I’m sure you’re going to find several you really love.

That’s it for this month! Don’t forget to head over to Amazon and buy these latest collections that include my stories:

 

You can also follow me on Facebook!

Until next month, stay spooky, my friends!

https://giphy.com/explore/the-most-interesting-man

The best-laid plans, and all that…

I didn’t expect to still be posting a blog here. I parked my website here a year ago, intending to move it somewhere else…eventually. So when the year anniversary of that “temporary” parking neared, I decided I’d better get on it and find a new website home.

As you can see, it hasn’t quite worked out! The first host I tried didn’t allow enough customization. The second host allowed a wonderful amount of customization, but the pricing was sketchy. The price that led me to sign up was not the price after I created a site; I literally had one window open that said one price and another price within their editor. And when I sent an email to their customer service, I got back an email saying:

“XXX web host pricing may vary depending on time, currency, geographical location and eligibility. Eligibility is a combination of individual factors which are being defined by XXX’s Team responsible for preparing and advertising our Premium offers, at their sole discretion. At this point, we’re unable to give you any further insights regarding the particular mechanisms behind the Premium pricing in your location.”

I don’t know much about how the web hosting business works, so I don’t understand a lot about their response. Why does pricing vary depending on “time”? Do I get a better deal if I sign up after midnight? And Eligibility? The two different prices were on the company’s own website, not a promo email, and neither was a “sale” price. So what do they mean by “eligibility”, and specifically, eligibility determined by team members? Do I need to friend one of them on Facebook and exchange funny cat videos to get better pricing? And then that last part, about not giving me any further insights, that just sounds like they’re telling me to bugger off. So I did.

So I’m still looking. I found another provider that I’m trying to test out, but we’ve almost swung to the other end of the customization scale, and this host almost allows too much customization. I haven’t used HTML or CSS in years, and I don’t remember much, so too much customization means I can really screw things up good. Plus, the host is definitely on the expensive side (for my taste; for someone who wants absolute customization power, I think the price is worth it).

So I’ll keep looking and building test sites, in between work, school, and writing. Hopefully, you’ll be visiting a redesigned new site by next month.

On the writing side of things, I’m excited to announce that my short story, “Indian Uprising,” will be appearing in the Third Flatiron anthology, Hidden Histories. More information will be coming soon!

See you next month!

We’re having a “snow day” (cold day?) here, so what better way to spend it than updating the blog?

North Dakota is famous for its cold weather, so imagine our surprise when pretty much everything shut down today (January 29^th, as I write this) because of extreme cold. When North Dakota and Minnesota shut down for extreme cold, you know it’s got to be like a scene from “The Day After Tomorrow.”

I’m using the day to do some editing and complain about the weather on Facebook.

I’m editing a new story I wrote in January for a deadline of the 31^st. Yes, I know I’m cutting it close, but I’ll make it. The really great news is that it will be the SECOND of two new stories getting sent out, and January is only just ending! Go me!

Of course, you know I like to write short stories, but they have always been my favorite form to read. They are like a snack, and mixed-author anthologies are like a buffet; you get to sample all kinds of different stories from different writers.

My first read of 2019 was the short story anthology, The Best American Short Stories 2018. The editor for this edition was Roxane Gay, which made me even more excited for it because I’m a big fan. I even had the opportunity to take a fiction workshop she gave a few years back.

My favorites in this anthology were, in no particular order:

“Suburbia!” by Amy Silverberg;

“Items Awaiting Protective Enclosure,” by Tea Obreht (this is dystopian, by the way, and my absolute favorite of the collection);

“The Art of Losing,” by Yoon Choi;

“Boys Go to Jupiter,” by Danielle Evans.

My second read of 2019 was Best New Zombie Tales, Volume 1, edited by James Roy Daley. It’s a great collection with a variety of interesting takes on zombie lore.

My favorites, in no particular order:

“Wings,” by Jessica Brown;

“The Man Who Breaks the Bad News,” by Kealan Patrick Burke;

“Paradise Denied,” by John French;

“Pegleg and Paddy Save the World,” by Jonathon Maberry;

“Groundwood,” by Bev Vincent.

Next up, I’ll be diving into some of the books by authors coming to the local writer’s conference and trying to read my way through my pile of “The Best New Horror” anthologies. I haven’t quite decided what story I’m going to work on next on the writing front, but I do plan on brainstorming a bit on a Halloween project and see where that goes.

Until next time!
Carpe Corpus,
Brenda

How about that! I’m ending the year on a good note and actually getting things done ahead of time! Don’t get your hopes up that it’s going to happen very often, because it won’t.

First, I want to start by reminding you that Test Patterns: Creature Features is available for your reading pleasure. It includes my story, “From Little Acorns Grow.” It’s available in both paperback and Kindle. Pick up your copy today!

And Welcome to Miskatonic University is available for preorder directly from the publisher. It includes my story, “Wyrd Science.”

On the new writing front, I was able to meet my goal (just by the skin of my teeth) in getting one more new short story written and sent out before the end of the year. Now I can start thinking about what I want to accomplish in the coming year.

Speaking of 2019, there’s a lot of good stuff (well, HOPEFULLY good stuff…MAYBE good stuff) happening in television and movies this year.

We’ve been promised a new season of Stranger Things in 2019. Of course, by this point, the kids are all grown up and the scariest thing they’re dealing with now are mortgages and property taxes, but still… Stranger Things Season 3.

The other television series I’m looking forward to is the remake of Rod Serling’s Night Gallery. I love Twilight Zone, but Night Gallery was my favorite.. I’m just hoping the new writers can do it justice. Night Gallery coming to SyFy.

And, in case you’ve never heard of the wondrous Night Gallery, here’s the Wiki for the original series. Night Gallery Wiki.

There are a lot of great movies coming in 2019 (including IT part 2), but there are two I’m both looking forward to and feeling very skeptical about.

The first is Rise of the Living Dead, Cameron Romero’s prequel to his dad’s Night of the Living Dead. His dad essentially invented the modern zombie, so he’s got some big shoes to fill. It’s a must-see, for sure, but I’m expecting to be disappointed. Rise of the Living Dead.

The second is another remake of The Blob. I absolutely loved the originals (cut me some slack, I was a kid), but I didn’t care for the 80s remake. To be fair, I really should watch it again before I watch the latest one. Maybe I’ll see if I can do a whole blob-a-thon before I watch the newest. I am a little worried that everyone is touting this one as being more sci-fi, but that might be okay. A lot of people classify the Alien franchise as sci-fi, but it is one of the scariest franchises ever (at least Alien and Aliens are, anyway). So this is also on my must-see list. Of course, it does have Samuel L. Jackson in it, so that’s an automatic point in the “win” column for it. The latest Blob.

World War Z 2 WAS on my must-see list, but it looks like it won’t be released until 2020. Just gives us something to look forward to besides political ads in 2020!

* * *

Don’t forget to follow me on Facebook and visit my Amazon page!

I am working away in earnest to finish up a few things before the end of the year.

Before we embarked on the adventure of buying a new house and moving, I had set a goal of finishing at least one new short story before the year was over. At the time, I thought I was setting the bar low…HA! HA! HA!

I WILL achieve that goal (the first goal met in a while, woot!) with a new sci-fi comedy story I’m working on. The publications I intend to send it to have a deadline of the end of the month, but so far I’m on track (knock on wood, rub the rabbit’s foot, and anything else that brings me luck).

I’m also finishing up my first college course. I’m working on the final project, a revision of all the works produced in class, but that also is progressing smoothly.

Once those tasks are complete, I have a new goal for the new year.

Thanks to a writer’s workshop I took this year (and writing for my college class), I’ve realized I waste an awful lot of time when I should be writing (says every writer everywhere).

Ray Bradbury once advised that a short story writer should write one short story a week! That would be impossible for me, but my current rate of one or two short stories a year is ridiculously pitiful.

So, for 2019, I’ve set a goal of writing eight new short stories.   

Don’t forget to check back and see how I do.