Month: July 2012

Is it Love or Lust?

"Lovers with Flowers" by Oleg Zhivetin

“Blessed is the influence of one, true loving human soul on another.” – George Elliott

Human beings have always been in love with love, or at least the idea of it. It is an emotion that is difficult to define – prone to clichés and lusty panting in Red Rooms. The softer side of love, its true soul, is more challenging for a writer to communicate to their readers. Why is this so?

Perhaps, this is because humans are prone to negativity, fear, anxiety and all the adjectives and adverbs that present themselves so easily to describe these emotions. Our natural tendencies seem to go in the direction of chaos and upheaval. Many people like to read about these subjects, so the writers who can create these novels provide what their fan base wants: dark, turbulent stories of murder and mayhem. We are entertainers, after all, and there is nothing wrong with filling this need. Continue reading “Is it Love or Lust?”

Reviews Are Mixed. How To Deal by Arline Chase

Go Down, MosesQUESTION from the e-mail: I’ve always wanted to be a writer. Recently I finished my first book and got it published. Like most, I tried to promote it by getting book reviews. I got several three and four-star reviews, but many of the reviewers had a lot of negative things to say, too. Sure, they praise my story. They all like the action and suspense. But then they complain about my commas, and my “point of view,” and my characters all talking alike. I went to college. I got good grades on all my term papers, so I ought to know a little about how to write. This negative stuff is hard to hear. Half the time, I don’t even know what they’re talking about. How can there be “too many semi-colons?” You use them when they’re needed, right? Maybe I should just forget about this whole thing.

ANSWER: Good reviewers almost always talk about both the positive and negative aspects of a book. If they don’t, they are usually friends of the author who go and place a glorious, 5-star review just for friendship’s sake. So first thing I know from what you said is that these are “good, honest, unbiased” reviews, not the kind you pay for. They looked for things to pick on as well as nice things to say. That’s “fair and balanced” and tells folks right away that your reviewers are being honest with their praise. Every first novel gets hit hard by reviewers. Continue reading “Reviews Are Mixed. How To Deal by Arline Chase”

Featured Author: Kirk Alex

Kirk Alex grew up in Chicago. He found himself in the jungles of South-East Asia at age 19. He returned to the Windy City and bought himself a typewriter. “Little did I know that it would take years to develop a style, a voice, let alone get anywhere with it. Headed west soon after: LA, and that madness.”

Kirk Alex has worked as a furniture mover, delivered phone books door-to-door, driven a taxi, was a movie extra, a factory hand, painted apartments, and worked as a shipping clerk at a mail order video company.

“Bottom line: My Olivetti/LETTERA manual typewriter provided the only light at the end of the tunnel. Granted, it may have been a weak light, still, it was the only lifeline available. Without books/writing, I might easily have ended up in a straitjacket in a rubber room motel somewhere, or dead.”

Working the Hard Side of the Street

Late at night is when most of the craziness takes place in Hollywood; wannabe starlets, models, partiers and players are all out strutting their stuff. From the lascivious to the lugubrious, former L.A. Cabbie Kirk Alex has seen it all.

Every fare has a story and is a story in this collection of shorts. No one has a better front row seat for the action than a Los Angeles cab driver. Working the Hard Side of the Street contains eight raw and real tales from author Kirk Alex’s years as a taxi driver. In a city built on broken dreams, sometimes a nightmare will get in your cab.

 

This title is available from Amazon in print or Kindle format.

Pet Peeves: What Are Yours?

Curmudgeon

Pet peeves. The topic came up recently in a discussion with some other writers on Facebook. This one was specifically about the spoken and written language – English to be precise.

Now you need to know that I am over sixty. That makes me an official grey-hair (although I keep it red to match my fiery personality). My years have earned me the right to be curmudgeonly, a right I intend to exercise with abandon.

Along with those grey/red hairs come some attitudes and opinions to complement them – that is to say set-in-my-ways and fiery. And I likely have a pet peeve for every hair that hasn’t fallen out yet. Fortunately for you, the only ones I will rant about today have to do with English. Even so, some are likely to cause some smoldering resentment and maybe even a few flames of disagreement. Good! Continue reading “Pet Peeves: What Are Yours?”