Confessions of a Former "Gadget Guy"

Just a heads-up: this will not, at any point, devolve into fan-fiction or fandom for Inspector Gadget. So if you came here for that, I'm sorry. 

I used to be a "gadget guy." I did, really. I won't ever claim to have been a "tech guy," but thanks to a couple of college roommates I at least knew how to add and partition a hard drive, among other things. I stopped being able to program once I got beyond learning BASIC, but I was okay with that. I still knew things. I still liked having the latest gizmos. I saw a reason to have the latest, newest, shiniest gizmos, even if that reason was mainly just to have them.

While I still like the flashy shiny things (except for those lens flares in JJ Abrams' films),  I have discovered that somewhere along the line my ability to understand the inner workings of such things got passed by, and that as such I seem to be slipping into more and more of a not-quite luddite mentality. A luddite light, possibly, or even an Amish approach to things, if the Amish had decided to come along in the late 20th Century instead of the late 17th.

(Contrary to popular wisdom, the Amish do not eschew all technology. Instead they periodically review tech things and decide which they should use, and which they should not.)

For example, I do not see the need for a 52 inch plasma TV with shake the ground surround-sound speakers. Which is not to say I don't want a home theater system. By all means, if I had a house and the money for it, I most certainly would, along with a movie-style popcorn machine. But I have neither the space nor the funds, and frankly I'm more likely to invest int the movie theater popcorn maker than I am the television. I am serious about my movie watching, but I am much more serious about my popcorn. Short of having an actual home theater, having a television that will kill you if it falls on you seems like overkill.

I do not own a smart phone. I don't even really want one. My cell phone is essentially a burner phone that I have because I spend a fair amount of time on the road, and because it became cheaper to have that than to have a landline. Also far less hassle, because dealing with Verizon was like trying to navigate Dante's levels of Hell if he'd been writing about office bureaucrats and paperwork instead of damned souls and torture. Though, really, those are kind of the same things, right?

I was also offered a GPS system recently. I turned it down. The only time I want a machine telling me directions are likely going to be places that are either off the grid, or where the grid is so convoluted as to render GPS mostly useless anyway. (Pittsburgh, I'm looking at you.) I like maps. Maps I have. I even have a compass. That really ought to be good enough.

Hell, I wear a pocket watch. (I have three, as a matter of fact. Including one I have to wind. I like the tactileness of it.)

I'm not sure when I started thinking this way. Maybe it's always been my approach to things. While I lamented the demise of Sharper Image, it was mostly because it was a great store to kill time in. I couldn't ever see myself shelling out the cash they wanted for the things they sold, no matter how nifty they were. (With the exception of the Stormtrooper armor in my local store. Some purchases speak for themselves.)

There is some technology I do embrace, and even some gadgets I'd spend the funds on if I had them. For instance, I would like a sextant, though I have only the vaguest idea how to use one and certainly no real use for it. And in all seriousness, I'd like a tablet. I have a use for that, though, and it's not simply an impulse buy. My last move and the endless boxes of books I had to schlepp up into my walk-up convinced me of the beauty of e-readers. But again, those are practical concerns. I'm not about to buy something just because it's new and shiny.

Even though that used to be me.

So when did this happen? I'm not entirely sure, and I have a couple of theories on that, but I think I've rambled on enough for one post.

Right now, I have to put a stamp on this envelope to mail out a check.

Swan Peak by James Lee Burke

One of the reasons I enjoy James Lee Burke's novels is that, in the midst of some great detective fiction, he also manages to weave some beautiful prose and philosophical observations. This book was no different, and if anything it took a more reflective tone than some of the others in the series. I also liked how in Swan Peak the author returns to the scene of one of the earlier novels in the series (and the first Dave Robicheaux novel I ever read), but does so in a way where, if you haven't read that earlier book, it doesn't take away from your enjoyment of this book.

I also have to say that, whereas in most first person books it irritates me when the authors veer into other points of view, Burke manages to delve into the heads of multiple characters without it disrupting the flow of the book. He manages to make it feel organic, something few other writers accomplish when attempting the same feat.

That said, this one was a little disappointing in how little Dave and his partner Clete Purcel actually do in this one, and they almost seemed to be bystanders in their own story at times. There are also some signs of age in the characters, and although I admire Burke for keeping his characters grounded to their timeline, Vietnam has become less and less relevant as the years progress, dating the characters somewhat (not to mention you start doing the math on the age of the characters and, well, these are getting to be some spry senior citizens). All that said, where a lot of other series have worn tired and threadbare over the decades, all of these continue to be excellent reads, and when the time comes when the series comes to a close I will miss it.

Does This Come in Twain?

Let me get this out of the way up front: I don't have an e-reader, of any kind, and this is solely due to budgetary constraints and an unwillingness to pay money for something I can't really justify. That said, I want one, especially after my last move when I schlepped ten boxes of books down three flights and then up two flights of stairs. An electronic library seems like a good thing to me after that.

That said, as much as I see the appeal of them, I don't think books are ever going to go completely away. I say this as a response to a local headline about how Barnes and Nobles is in trouble. The article itself dealt more with the idea that a number of smaller local bookstores are still doing okay. This is where I think the future of books probably lies. They aren't ever going to go away. There will still be books. But they will revert back to what they were before the invention of the paperback: a specialty item, a luxury for those with the extra cash willing to spend it on a physical investment.

This also means there will always be a need for stores, of some form or another. Now, don't go buying or selling stock on my account. I do not have an MBA or anything else related to business. I do own stocks. Couldn't begin to tell you how they are doing at any given moment, other than the market is up, which means my stocks probably are, too. I do happen to think that if we move back towards books as a specialty item, the big box stores like B&N are going to have difficulties with that model. But it also strikes me as a perfect niche for smaller bookstores, although probably not as many of them and in smaller, more populated markets where they can sustain themselves.

Which brings me to the other reason I think there will always be bookstores, in some form or another. Bookstores have an advantage over online markets in one, key element: the ability to browse.  The one thing I am more likely to do in a physical bookstore, the one thing I find easier to do in an actual space, is to wander around and see what else strikes my interest. This is harder to do on Amazon. Oh, sure, Amazon recommends things to me and I check them out, but those recommendations are based on past history, and therefore don't fall outside of certain parameters.

Whereas in the store, I can wander into a section I might almost never read from, and still come across something that interests me. Case in point is the non-fiction book I'm reading at the moment. It happened to be on display at the front of the library. Had I not been in the library, had the book not been on display, it's unlikely I would have ever heard of it, much less read it. But there it was, and it's been an enjoyable and informative read.

It's like shopping for clothes. Sure, you could do it online. (Or at least, I could. I know my sizes, and men's apparel tends to run pretty consistently, although I understand it's not quite so straightforward for women.) But you are exposed to a greater variety, more likely to find that item that you didn't necessarily go into the store for but end up wanting to buy anyway. It's the physical presence of the object that inclines us to buy it as much as anything else. It's also something you can't duplicate online, not really.

Least not until Amazon starts randomly generating suggestions, and I don't see them ever doing that.

I'm not trying to predict the future, here. I did a little of that in the sci-fi piece I wrote back in high school, and looking at it twenty years later made me cringe. Not so much for the work itself, which wasn't all that bad if I made allowances for my age and the passage of time and experience, but for some of the "futuristic" ideas I put down on the page. Ideas which look hopelessly dated. But I do think I can say with a certain amount of confidence that there will continue to be a market for physical books, and that so long as that market exists, there will be bookstores.

And so long as there are bookstores, I will continue to wander into them.

In Like a Lion

Ah yes, March. A month of many things, including its fair share of sayings. As I sit down for the first blog post in far, far too long, I am inclined to sidetrack along musings of other months and their sayings. Only nothing really comes to mind (other than the Dog Days of August, which lack the Shakespearean provenance of the Ides of March), so it would be a really short aside.

As it is, my concern with March is more vested in the old adage of it being "in like a lion, out like a lamb" or vice versa. For those of you who might live someplace where you've never heard this expression - perhaps someplace tropical where the weather is always warm, it has to do with the weather. (Also, I hate you. Just a little.) If the weather at the beginning of March is harsh, i.e. cold and wintry, then it will be nice and spring-like at the end. In theory. Around here that's never really much of a question. March is a winter month in my neck of the woods. Heck, sometimes so is April, although that's thankfully rare.

Groundhog Day is mostly a formality around here, too. It's always six more weeks, regardless of what happens with the over-sized rodent.

With the opening of March, though, comes something else: Spring Break. Which I have never, ever taken anyplace even remotely like what you used to see on MTV. Or still see, for all I know. I have about as much interest in doing something like that as I do in having my internal organs removed. Possibly even less so. No, my Spring Break is now, and for the most part always has been, a time to relax in the comfort of home and catch up on things that I have either let slide or that simply piled up on me.

Think of it as New Year's but with a week to actually implement resolutions. Not that I make resolutions, but you get the point.

So, this week I am going to tackle some things that have been let go for far too long. In part inspired by some others around the web (more on that sometime soon), and in part the culmination of realizing things won't happen unless I actually do them, no matter how much I may have been experimenting with other, less active approaches.

I am trying to keep goals reasonable, as I know full well that unrealistic goals are one of the reasons resolutions so often fail. But they are reachable, doable goals, and more importantly, some are short term and some are long term. And unlike the merry month of March - yes, yes, I know, that's meant to be May - I do not intend to go gently into that next month.

The main goal, the overall aim, is to not only go in like a lion (or some other, slightly more hard-working animal, as lions are actually somewhat lazy, even by cat standards), but to keep on going.

One of which is resuming writing here on a semi-regular basis. (See? Short, doable goals.)

Now, if I can just figure out a way to turn "April showers" into something equally inspirational.

Sequelitis for the Writer

Over the course of the past few months, I have read a number of books that were parts of a trilogy. Specifically, the first and second books. In both cases (I'm not going to name the series, but if you want to hunt around Goodreads and find the reviews, go ahead) the first book in the series blew me away. It was a great read, fantastic storytelling, original concepts, etc. Everything you could hope for in a book, particularly when in both cases these were the first books by those authors that I had read. In one case, it was the first book by that author (though the author was working in collaboration with another, more established author). Things were good.

Then I read the second book, and things became less good.

Some of this is simply a case of expectations. As a reader, if the first book is good, I expect the rest to be. After all, if the author did it once, they should be able to do it again. (Presumably. The writing profession has it's share of one-hit wonders, too.) I don't expect to always like every book an author puts out - though I hope to - but that's okay. Everyone has off moments. What I do expect is that if an author takes the time to plan a trilogy, then they've put the time in to think it through and carefully craft it. Such is not always the case, but such are my expectations.

Also, having started with such a phenomenal book, there is probably pressure on the author much the same as pressure is put on a successful film when it moves into sequel territory. The need to go bigger, or more complex, or to in some ways shake things up because the first one broke so much new ground that it's impossible to follow it otherwise. Or they go in the other direction, and the sequel is a formulaic copy of the first.

That happens, too, but for both of the series I read it was more the first trap. Nor did it work out well for either series. The first series introduced an essentially useless macguffin in the second book that opened up massive plot holes and seemed a sad throwaway device. The second series padded out the center section of the second novel by adding in police procedural details that were at worst wholly unnecessary to the plot and at best could have been dealt with in much shorter passages.

Nor is this the first year this has happened with books I've read. I really enjoyed the first volume of Dean Koontz's Frankenstein series. The second book was not only disappointing but downright silly. Enjoyable, but at nowhere near the level of the first one.

All of which is a roundabout way for me to make the following plea: Authors, if you're going to write a trilogy, and the first one gets really good reviews and press, please, please, PLEASE, do not f*** up the rest of them.

I don't think that's too much to ask.

People You Should Already Be Reading

[Note: Last week(ish) in the blog I answered some questions about what I was working on, because I had been "tagged." Think "drive-by" but with less shooting. That was Part I. Which you have read. (And if you haven't, go do so, and I shall wait. Done? Good.)

This is the second part.

We're also going to pretend this is my Thanksgiving, "I am thankful for being able to read these people," post. Which it kind of is.]


Part the Second
Wherein, somewhat less accordingly to the rules, I shamelessly pimp other people's work. Not because I hope they shall do the same for me some day (though, *ahem*, that would be nice) but because they truly deserve it.

Question #10: Tag, you’re it!

This is the part where I am supposed to "tag" five more authors. Unfortunately, and oddly reminiscent of high school, I have a small social circle. Somewhat consequently, most of my writer friends have already been tagged, as it seems I was tagged last. Which is beyond oddly reminiscent and downright eerily similar to high school. I may start having bad flashbacks any moment.

But this is not high school, this is the internet, and unlike high school I can't burn the internet to the ground. (Not that I did that, I add. Nor can anyone prove otherwise.) So, instead, I'm going to cheat.

I'm not going to tag anyone, but I am going to point you toward five writers I know, all with stuff you not only can buy but that you should buy. Because these guys work hard, write great stuff, and with one exception don't get enough press. But the exception is worth buying anyway.

These are in absolutely no particular order, other than the order in which I thought of them and/or remembered I wanted to steer people to them.

 Reagan Summers - Also does vampires in Alaska, but honestly does them much better than I will. (I did have the idea long before I met her, I swear. I work slow.) And more importantly, she does her vampires much differently. And MOST importantly, you can buy - and read - both of her books now.

Tiffany Allee - Whom, in full disclosure, I have not read yet. BUT, other people I know have read her, and say nothing but good things, and she also has books you can read and buy.

Abner Senires - Sci-fi serial goodness. Much of which is online, but there is a book you can buy. Which you should. (You may notice a theme here with these descriptions.)

Damien Grintalis -  Debut novel Ink is out soon. Which I got to read it before any of you. So there. However, perks of being a beta aside, you should read this. Especially if you have tattoos. And then you'll never sleep again. You cannot buy this yet, but when you can, you should.

Diane Dooley - Sci-fi, romance, and sex. Yes, I said sex. Do I need to say more? She has two books out, and you should buy both of them.

Alice Loweecey - Ex-nun PIs and mysteries. What more do you need to know? These ones are even in your local bookstore. Might even be in the library. So no excuses like "but I don't have an e-reader." (Which, admittedly, I don't either, but you do know you can still read e-books anyway, right? RIGHT??)

Alex Adams - Whom, again, I have not yet read. (Check back in a week or so.) BUT - again - there have been many great things said about her book. End of the world stuff, getting absolutely fabulous reviews. Really, you should of heard of her by now.

Also, she's sort of kind of a neighbor, so the more books you buy, the richer she gets, and the more people I have to turn to when the crazy thoughts overtake me and I wind up muttering to myself and in need of a place to stay. (Just kidding, Alex. ... You can stop the emergency packing now, really, I'm kidding.)

.... and that's it. This is, I know, by no means a complete list of all the people I know with books out, I tried to constrain it to those whose authors I know personally, and, for the most part, people I've read, so that you can take these recommendations seriously.

And if, for some reason, you have *zero* book budget right now (though, I have to ask, do you really need to eat?) - Christmas is coming. They all make lovely gifts.

Er, their books do. Not them personally.

More Graffitti-ish, Less Playground-like

I have been "tagged." And while this is meant to be something along the lines of a playground game of tag amongst writers, I can't help feeling I've been whitewashed in the dead of night and then covered in garish neon hues arranged in abstract forms.

I was tagged by this guy:  http://misfitmusing.blogspot.com/ who, amongst other things, has some of the most eclectic yet also coolest hobbies I know. Seriously. Old cars, singing groups, and bees. You should check him out. (Plus he is often funny and witty.)

There are two parts to this tagging business. I shall deal with Part 1 now, with Part 2 to follow a little later, because this was already getting pretty long.

Part the First
In which, according to the rules, I answer some questions about a current project.

1. What is the working title of your book?

Well, it had a working title centered on the name of the town where the action takes place. Only, as I started to work on it, I realized that I had named the town after the wrong yearly calendrical event. Which is somewhat embarrassing and I've not yet figured out how I want to fix it. Yes, I could use the right event, but sadly, it sounds much less cool than the wrong one. So for right now, it's got the awesome title of [Series Character] Book #3. 

Catchy, isn't it?

2. What genre does the book fall under?

In an effort to be trail-blazing and/or entirely unpublishable, I've discovered I write in that interstice between Sci-fi and Urban Fantasy. I had an idea once that boiled down to "What if you took the characters of a UF book and dropped them into a neo-noir near-future setting?" Then I wrote on it. Then I wrote another book on it. And now I'm working on another one.

It does lean more sci-fi than UF, for the most part, but there are elements.

As I said, trail-blazer or forever unpublishable.

3. Which actors would you choose to play your characters for the movie rendition?

Jeremy Irons. But a younger Irons. Not too young. Die Hard 3 Jeremy Irons. Maybe Daniel Craig, if he could summon up a little more inner villain/anti-hero. That's my lead.

For the female lead, I'm tempted to list actors I want to meet. Which is terribly unprofessional. But, that said, Eva Green, because a number of her characters have just enough edge to them.

4. What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

Insomnia (the Nolan version) but with one vampire, a pack of werewolves, a more twisted killer than Robin Williams can ever hope to be, and all set slightly further into the future than where we are now. So robots and cybernetics and the like.

No flying cars, though.

Yes, I know that was more than one sentence.

5. Will your book be self-pubbed, e-pubbed, or represented by an agent?

The day I decide to self-pub is the day I decide I'm done. (No offense to those for whom it works, but it's not my route.) While I think e-pubs play a valuable role in the market, I still want an agent. It means something to me, not least of which is, someday, I want to actually see my book in print, on paper.

And don't tell me print is dead, because they've been saying that for decades. Books will be around, trust me. (Even if you don't, that's a longer blog post.)

6. How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

I'm still working on it, so I'll let you know. Chronologically, this one has been in the works for a couple of years, but there were other projects and some personal stuff that snuck in front of it.

Also, I tend to work slow.

7. What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

Ideally? Cross William Gibson with Jim Butcher. If you don't know who either of those are, I don't want to talk to you.

8. Who or what inspired you to write this book?

It was honestly watching Al Pacino stagger around in the film Insomnia and thinking to myself, "What if I took my lead vampire and sent him there instead of Al?" I frequently borrow (or steal, if you want) ideas from other works. I think if we're all honest, a lot of us do this, usually under the hubris of "I could do that better/more interestingly."

Which is what's led to a couple of my projects.

9. What else about your book might pique a reader's interest?

Pique is a great word.

Seriously, though, if vampires, werewolves, and robots wrapped up in a psycho-killer mystery set in a neo-noir near-future (think Bladerunner but less rain, more daylight, and, again, no flying cars - or a slightly less cutting-edge technobabbly William Gibson, whom I adore but would never consciously strive to emulate because I'm just not quite that egocentric) - if none of that has piqued your interest, I'm not sure how else to sell it to you.

Though there is some sex, so maybe that?


Part two to follow shortly.