West of Mars

Ever wonder what West of Mars means? Why I spend precious hours a day working on Win a Book?

All that and more (but not why I’m about to launch a third blog) can be found at the Self-Publishing Review.

So put on your Martian antennae (read the interview!) and say it’s your costume when you drop on in.

And so back to Booking Through Thursday I come. That’s because I have to weigh in on today’s question. Ready?

“What words/phrases in a blurb make a book irresistible? What words/phrases will make you put the book back down immediately?”

There’s no pretty way to say this, so …

I ignore blurbs.

Well, until I loathe what I’m reading and look at the blurbs and think, “What sort of crack is this famous author smoking?”

Or “No wonder I don’t like this. I don’t like YOUR books, either.”

Or “I’ll remember this when I’m tempted to read YOUR book.”

… you get the idea.

And now that I know how important blurbs are said to be, and how some agents/editors want a list of suggested friends and/or contacts who can be approached for blurbs even before a book is contracted… it seems like a racket. In some ways, it’s false advertising at its best — like when I realized that critique partners had blurbed each other’s books.

Blurbs are nothing more than ads that clutter up the front cover of a perfectly good book. And as such, I ignore them. I choose books for a variety of reasons, but “Because so-and-so had a quote on the front cover” isn’t one of them.

(however, for my book blogging friends whose blurbs magically appear, without their notice on a book, that’s a different story. Those weren’t solicited statements. No one said, “Hey, how about a cover blurb?” And thus, they seem more genuine to me.)

As I ramp up to bring you even more bloggish bookishness, it dawns on me that I talk a lot about books, but my characters? Are books important in my fictional world?

Let’s take a look and see.

1. Trevor famously said: “I tried to read the set list once.”

2. The truth is that he might read something short. If it would hold his interest. (Believe it or not, but erotica would NOT. Why read about something you should be doing?)

3. Mitchell loves his guitar magazines.

4. He’ll also collect coffee table books about guitars, musicians he likes, or almost anything having to do with music.

5. He also reads Sports Illustrated and mountain bike magazines.

6. Daniel’s the reader in the band. Particularly current event non-fiction. Or history. (I have an outtake saved up about this last one)

7. Eric will read. He likes science fiction and military novels. Spy. Espionage. What’s often called MAN fiction.

8. Kerri likes art books. (You’ll actually see this book again. Stay tuned.)

9. Kerri will read women’s fiction, but her real love is stuff like Christopher Moore or Brian Wiprud. Comedy. Satire.

10. Sometimes, the band will pass those books around. You gotta fill those empty hours on the bus or at the venue somehow.

11. Val loves a good romance, or any tear-jerker.

12. Chelle LaFleur doesn’t have much of a life beyond her local music scene and the Trumpet newspaper she writes for. She’s well known at her local library branch.

13. The Deadly Metal Hatchet guys? They’re another Thirteen all their own…

Last night, I finished The Real Minerva, written by Mary Sharratt. It had been on my wishlist for awhile, and then it sat here for an embarrassing long period of time after someone at BookCrossing sent it to me.

It was okay. In a way, it was similar to Sue Monk Kidd’s The Secret Life of Bees, in that you had a young teenager who runs away, meets a woman who upsets the order of society and is branded an outcast, and learns important things but comes out okay in the end.

Of course, the similarities end there.

This was an interesting book. I think I could have lived without delving into the point of view of a truly despicable character, although I see why Ms. Sharratt wrote it that way. It’s not the choice I would have made.

I’m glad I read it. Yeah, I’d recommend it, but not over some other books I’ve read.

Next up for me: Hank Phillippi Ryan’s Air Time. I’m overdue to start this, in fact — but that’s nothing new.

Your turn. Talk to me about what you’re reading.

Bunnygirl’s reading The Pillow Book by Sei Shonagon.

Alice Audrey just finished the first three books in the Black Dagger Brotherhood, JR Ward’s series. But she doesn’t say what’s next…

Patricia is reading The Ghosts of Belfast, written by Stuart Neville.

Robin is gloriously reading nothing!

“Shame it had to end like this,” Kerri said, looking out at the quiet beyond the stage. Usually, this sort of quiet was reserved for late, after the band had showered and was getting ready to move on to the next town.

Mitchell grunted agreement and squeezed her hand.

“Dumbfucks,” Trevor said, an unlit cigarette dangling off his lip. A breeze blew the scent of scorched sod their way.

“Who?” Kerri asked. “The fans, or Hammerhead?”

Mitchell snorted. “Fucking Howard,” he said. “Get a break like this one and fuck it up. What an idiot.”

“Rub it in,” a voice said behind them. The three turned to look, finding Howard the Hammer standing off to one side. “I didn’t think they’d really do it.”

Mitchell glared at him, a rumble deep in his throat.

“Okay,” Howard said, blowing out a breath. He shook his head quickly, a familiar gesture that utterly failed — as usual — at getting his dark wooly hair out of his eyes. “I sorta wondered what they’d do. But I didn’t think… didn’t believe…”

Mitchell let go of Kerri’s hand and crossed the distance to Howard. He stopped in front of him, chest to chest. “Do you fucking know how much shit you’ve caused here? Who do you think is gonna get charged for resodding this entire fucking lawn?”

“I’ll pay you back,” Howard said, shifting from foot to foot.

“Not good enough,” Mitchell said. “We didn’t even get to fucking play tonight, thanks to you.” He gestured widely, meaning Howard to see, Kerri guessed, the fact that Mitchell should have been wearing skin-tight black jeans and a guitar instead of knee-length baggy camo shorts and a black tank top. “Our manager’s going to have to fucking bend over and grab his ankles for months before we’ll be allowed here again. As for you? You might be done, man. This will follow you around. I bet right now, as soon as you get near that production office, you’re going to be handed a list of shows that’ve been cancelled. Assuming JR hasn’t just decided to pitch you off the tour in the hopes that people will get that this wasn’t my band behind this shit. Because every single news source out there is saying this happened at a ShapeShifter show. That’s what this was. A ShapeShifter show. With special guest, Hammerhead. See how that works?”

Howard winced: face, shoulders, arms. Even his legs bowed with his chagrin.

Kerri itched for a pencil and sketchpad.

Trevor strolled across the empty stage, slowly. He turned to Howard. “I had plans tonight. You fucked me up.”

“I… I’m sorry.”

“This is only the start of being sorry, man,” Mitchell said. “You might have just effed up your career for life. Even if you fold Hammerhead and start another band, you’ll always be the asshole who told a worked-up crowd to set the field on fire.”

“Not to mention the only other person who’s managed to get a ShapeShifter show cancelled,” Trevor called from center stage. “This band doesn’t cancel.”

“I’m in good company?” Howard offered weakly, then bowed his head when he noticed Mitchell’s face. Kerri knew she’d have to get him away from Howard, and fast. Not that she blamed him in the least. It wasn’t supposed to have gone this way. It should have been a routine show, spiced up by whatever Trevor had planned.

Trevor, who suddenly seemed a lot more middle-of-the-road than he could probably stand being. Whose hijinks always had something behind them, some point he was trying to make, a statement he wanted others to get. Trevor pulled his shit deliberately. He’d never encourage twenty-three thousand people to rip up a lawn and set it on fire — if only because they’d be looking at the flames and not him.

Mitchell took her hand again and they crossed the stage to join Trevor. Kerri bent her knees slightly and kissed Trevor on the cheek.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said to her, putting his fingertips over the spot her lips had just touched. There was no wiping off, no screaming about cooties. Kerri made note of that.

Mitchell took a swipe at the back of Trevor’s head. None of his anger at Howard came through. “Come help me fix this mess, will ya?”

Trevor flicked his unlit cigarette off the edge of the stage, into the security area between where the fans should have been and where the band should have been. “I fucking hate cleaning up after dumbfucks,” he muttered.

As they matched Trevor’s speed off the stage, Kerri looked back for one last glance at Howard the Hammer. Head bowed, shoulders sagging, he looked like someone who knew his dreams had gone up in the same flames as the lawn.

Sometimes, you meet someone — in real life, online; doesn’t really matter — and you just get each other. I think in this case, it’s the music connection.

Ri at Music Savvy Mom got the shuffle I sent her Thursday night. A young woman went missing on the 17th, down in Virginia. While my favorite real-life band took the stage, Morgan Dana Harrington left behind her car, her purse, and her cell phone.

And vanished. No word of her since.

Her family’s offered a $100,000 reward for information to help bring her home. There are Facebook groups devoted to her. There’s a flyer.

And now, over at Music Savvy Mom, there’s a shuffle. I made it Thursday night, pulling songs that I love to work out to, songs that just seemed to fit. As I worked on it, I realized it wasn’t just a message for Morgan to stay strong and come home. I realized it was every bit as much for her parents.

Go see. And please, help spread the word. I’ve never met Morgan. Probably never will. But as a Metallica fan, she’s part of my community.

And so, I care.

Well, so far it hasn’t been a great reading year for me. Between Win a Book, my own books, this place, and life in general, reading has taken a back seat. Bummer.

1. In 2005, I read 147 books. I did not finish 54 of them.

2. In 2006, I read exactly the same number of books. Holy smoke. I did not finish 48 of them.

3. No wonder my TBR mountain range numbers hover around the 550 mark (counting what’s on my nightstand and held aside for my book club to read). I brought a LOT of books into my house during those two years. I’m still trying to read most of them, too.

4. In 2007, I snapped out of my writing funk and sprang into motion. That was the year the agent offered representation on Trevor’s Song — and vanished. I read 97 books — and considered myself a slacker.

5. In 2008, with the first Demo Tapes book published in November, I read 87 books by others. A full 21 of them did not get finished.

6. Yes, it’s true. If a book doesn’t grab me, I don’t force myself to finish it. I had a writing professor in college who encouraged me to follow this practice. Reg was awesome. I listened to more than those words of wisdom.

7. This year, 2009, I have two books in print. Two books to promote. I’m getting ready to start Demo Tapes 3, and I’ve promised myself that when I finish writing the first draft of the follow-up to Trevor’s Song, I’ll make you guys happy. Plus I’m working on another manuscript, too.

8. So far in 2009, I’ve read 68 books, 18 of which I haven’t finished.

9. I see a trend here. Do you?

10. However, I continue to lust for books written by others. My wish list (which doesn’t include most of the list I kept in graduate school and for the first few years right after) has over 1900 books on it.

11. 1,921, to be precise.

12. Nope, I don’t expect to read them all. I figure at this point, it’s serendipity. The books I’m meant to read will find me.

13. I hope my books find you.

It dawned on me that we haven’t seen Chelle around these parts in eons. The music reporter for the (of course fictional) Trumpet newspaper, she’s always got an opinion that may or may not mirror my own. That’s the fun of fiction, after all!

Now, you all know that Chelle here won’t be spreadin’ no rumors to you. Not through this here Trumpet newspaper. That means what I got to say’s important, so listen up.

Boys and girls, we got us a problem here in our city. A darn big problem, one we all gotta come together and chase out of town.

I’m talkin’ about junk. I’m talkin’ about all that garbage, most of it moldin’ up a storm, that’s been sittin’ out on our sidewalks ever since this city started cleanin’ up after them floods. Yeah, THOSE floods. The ones that saw more’n half the city leave and not come back. The one that saw most’ve the rest of us livin’ in trailers. The only reason Chelle’s still in her home is ’cause she’s on the thirteenth floor of a building on one of the city’s only hills.

Which means Chelle looks out over a lot of junk. Wanna know a secret? Junk ain’t pretty.

Once upon a time in this city we all love so much, we had men drive these ugly brown trucks up and down the street. They’d stop beside every single driveway, or pull into the driveways of the millions of apartments this city used to have. Two men would pop outta those trucks and they’d haul all our junk away. Who knew where, and who cared. The simple point was that our stuff went away.

Now, these days, it sits on the curbs. Some streets’re so cluttered anymore, cars can’t get up and down ‘em. And sidewalks? For-get it. If there’s room to walk, the mold on everythin’ll do your lungs in right fast. Who needs the piggy flu when we got mold to take a population down?

That’s why Chelle’s callin’ all her readers to stand up and get busy. Let’s all take November first and clean up. Start with the candy wrappers left from the night before. They won’t mold overnight, Chelle’s hopin’.

Once you got all them, fill a trash bag with some of that there moldy junk in front-a your house. But then don’t wait for some garbage guy who ain’t gonna come. He’s too busy lookin’ for a new job, Chelle hears. Them garbage guys went on strike right before the floods and there ain’t no sign of ‘em comin’ back.

So let’s do it ourselves, boys and girls. Pick up one bag of that trash and take it yourself to the dump. Between now and then, Chelle’s gonna find out where that dumpin’ place is, and she’ll let you know.

And come November first, don’t you be surprised if Chelle herself walks up to you and hands you some swag courtesy of some of Chelle’s favorite bands. ‘Cause sometimes, we gotta clean up our city ourselves and show we got some civic pride.

You heard it first and you heard it here: No more junkin’ up our city!

Yep, a Sunday Scribblings for you while I am causing other trouble. Be sure to leave a comment wherever you visit!

I’ve got a confession to make. While reading my book club’s latest selection, Laura Fitzgerald’s Veil of Roses, I got SO crazy with what was going on that …

I skipped to the end of the book to see what happened.

Yep. I peeked. I cheated. I couldn’t take being left to dangle in the story. I couldn’t trust the author to take me — and her characters — in the direction I really wanted them to go.

I haven’t done this in years.

Oh, sometimes I’ll look at the last sentence, or the last page — usually if I’m bored for some reason. Sometimes, I’ll keep referring to that last page to get the final number of pages in the book, and sometimes, I’ll catch a sentence here or there. I try to avoid anything that’ll give the ending away.

Not this time. I HAD to know. So… I peeked. Knowing the outcome took the edge away; you know that edge, the one where you can’t stand not knowing if the Happily Ever After is going to come or not. The one that actually hurts and keeps you from reading. Instead, you skim and, in this case, miss out on some incredibly poignant writing. I couldn’t let myself do that. I had to absorb all of this book.

I’ve spent a lot of time the past few days trying to figure out why I had to do this. Why the temptation to look was so absolutely overriding. And this is what I came up with:

Fitzgerald’s protagonist, Tami, comes from Iran. She’s been repressed and she knows it. Coming to America is her chance to escape all that, to reconnect with the fuzzy memories of the time her family spent here when she was young. She comes seeking the answers of who her mother had been back then, a woman who wore a pink bikini. The mother Tami knows… she can’t wear things like pink bikinis. And if she could, Tami’s not sure she would. Who is this mother in the picture? Tami needs to know.

Tami feels the pain of her repression. She says things like “Freedom means not even being aware you’re free” (p. 62). and “Feeling the sun on one’s body should be a basic human right afforded to all” (p. 185).

Such sweet sentences. Poignant. Piercing. Holding a weight of truth beyond much of anything I’ve read of late.

This is a woman who is fully aware of the horrors of the life she lives. When she doesn’t understand a free sample at Starbucks and coincidentally a pair of cops show up to feed their addiction, she panics, convinced she’s going to be arrested. Time and again, she compares the ease of life in America with the repression in Iran.

Her scars from this lifestyle, if one can call it that, are palpable. And Tami is so very likeable, we want to see her rise above this repression she came from. We need her to. This isn’t merely a story of a woman coming to America to find a husband. (In fact, when the idea of mail-order brides is raised, it’s quickly dropped.)

No, this is a story of good versus evil. Of the freedoms of democracy versus the evil oppressors of the world.

No wonder I had to peek.

(Stupid FTC shit since I suppose this is a review: I got this book through Paperbackswap.com so my book club can read it. I had no intentions of doing anything other than discussing it with those great ladies and adding it to the list of books we’ve read on the HBC page here. But the book demanded some exposure here on the Meet and Greet, and I’m all too glad to provide it. Oh, yeah. The buy links here and elsewhere on West of Mars? They all go to Powells.com so I can hopefully make a few bucks and buy books to give away. To you guys. My readers, not the FTC, who ought to read this book.)

(Another side note: I usually agree with Publisher’s Weekly reviews. That’s why I read them. However, I don’t agree that this book has a disposable plot — because for me, the plot becomes secondary to what’s really going on. I’m disappointed the reviewer couldn’t see that.)

Yep, it’s supposed to snow this week here at West of Mars. Well, outside the house with the purple trim, that is. It darn well better not snow INSIDE.

Snow’s on my mind. So’s my fiction. One plus one equals… thirteen!

1. Since everybody’s favorite fictional band, ShapeShifter, is from a mythical part of the West Coast, they didn’t grow up the way I did: with snowy winters.

2. All four boys (uhh, that’s Mitchell, Trevor, Eric, and Daniel for those of you new around here) didn’t see snow until they were on their first tour.

3. Mitchell and Trevor immediately became experts at the Art of Snowball Bombing. You know: when the person you nail isn’t expecting it.

4. Snow on the head and dripping down the back of a neck loses something when the person you’ve just bombed has long hair. The boys figured out pretty quick that nailing each other in the nuts was way more fun.

5. On the other hand, despite taking many snowballs all over his body, Eric prefers building snowmen.

6. Kerri, who grew up in a snowier climate, isn’t as enthused as the boys in the band are. Not about playing in the snow.

7. But warming up afterward? With someone like Mitchell? Hoo boy. Yeah.

8. Val, Daniel’s longtime love, hates the snow. She hates the bulky winter clothes. Hates lug tread on snowboots. Hates anything not sleek and sexy.

9. But shearling lined boots and gloves and fur coats… now, if you’ve GOT to be somewhere cold, that’s the only way to go.

10. Even being caught in a blizzard isn’t enough to dampen the boys’ love of snow. They were in Denver, where they’re used to snow. No big deal, they were told.

11. They played to a full house that night. No big deal, indeed.

12. Until THEY tried to leave, anyway.

13. Maybe one day I’ll write that story. In the meantime, leave lots of comments so I can return all your visits. Maybe all the typing I’ll have to do will keep my poor fingers warm.