What’s this Littsburgh stuff? You all thought I was West of Mars!

Well, I am BOTH. Littsburgh is the literary hub for us publishing folk in the city of Pittsburgh and maybe you missed it, but West of Mars definitely refers to the only city or town of Mars in the United States. The question I usually won’t answer is how far west of Mars I am, but that’s because I hate it when people show up on my doorstep. Of course, showing up on my back deck is even worse, so don’t do that, either. And before you go, “A-ha! I’ll use the garage,” know that’s where the boy’s bows are stored. Just sayin’.

So because I’m both West of Mars and a proud part of the Littsburgh community, Nick and Rachel and Katie were more than glad to feature me with a quick four-question interview about my story, “Undaunted,” in the Running Wild Anthology of Stories.

I know I’ve done other interviews and stuff about it already, but somehow, seeing myself up on Littsburgh, being an active part of the writerly community… it’s darn cool.

Check it out. If you haven’t picked up a copy for yourself, what are you waiting for?

Trevor Wolff did not blame others for his own issues, thankyouverymuch. Not that being ugly was an issue; issues, you could fix somehow. Ugly, you were just stuck with.

It’s free everywhere but Amazon (sigh — but feel free to report it!):
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For all that boy had been through, Trevor never stopped seeking the joy in life.

It’s free everywhere but Amazon (sigh):
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“We can make that sappy shit happen ourselves. But how often do you get to take on the bad guys and save the world?”

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Things were about to get good; getting kicked out now would not be smart.

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“A flag,” Trevor repeated. “A ShapeShifter flag. For our fans to pledge their love and shit to. You know… one nation, all for one, buy the inevitable shitty records and defend them to the death when people let themselves think mean words about us. A flag.”

It’s free everywhere but Amazon (sigh):
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I sat down last night to write a post. It’d be my usual Says the Editor type of post, pithy and fun and the sort of thing that one of you would submit to the Passive Guy so I could get the free promo and pack my schedule and work my tail off and redo my family room, now that the windows are taken care of.

But something funny happened.

It happened last week, actually. I sat down, put the laptop on my lap (go figure. They tend to work better from that position, or else I have weird arms), and … opened a Word file I hadn’t touched for almost one entire calendar year. I believe the date on the file was April 14, 2014, actually.

Yes, your editor friend found her way back to her fiction.

Oh, I’ve done this off and on over the past couple of years. I’ll start to work on something, start to write — I have a whole other project I’ve played with, off and on, for awhile now — and then get distracted or overwhelmed or just plain worn out. Staring at a screen all day doesn’t exactly make me want to stare at a screen all evening. Playing with other people’s words doesn’t exactly inspire me to turn off that editor part of my brain and do the sort of crappy first draft that’s necessary for my own writing process. Running the kids from activity to activity doesn’t exactly… You get the idea. It’s a full life I lead. It’s a good life and I’m happier than I’ve been in a long time.

But I’d be happier if I was writing, creating, letting characters run amok in my brain instead of it being full of the daily struggles of worrying about taking care of a house and two kids and myself and a business and all the other stresses of life. In that vein, I had it easier in the old incarnation of my life. And yes, the further away I get from the old incarnation, as I fix the problems I was left to discover, the more relieved I am that life took such a drastic turn.

I do miss writing. I miss my characters. And heck yeah, I miss those royalty statements. Even though I love editing with a passion I thought I’d never feel, it is an engagement with a book in a different way than when I’m engaging as the writer. The book I’m editing right now blows me away with its vision and creativity — as do they all, but this one in particular makes me shake my head in amazement at the quality of the ideas and the ability of the author to go to these places. There are many times a day when I sit back and envy and admire my authors and their storytelling abilities.

At some point, I’ll find that elusive balance between editing all day — the challenge of seeking out weaknesses and trying to build a better infrastructure, better word choice, better sentence structure, deeper characterization — and my own writing — that head rush of watching characters do what I wasn’t expecting, the lip-pursing moments when I fight for the right word or idea.

But for now, like so many of my clients, I struggle. And I remind them that I feel their pain even as I put them first. Not just because it pays my bills. But because it fulfills me in a way writing can’t.

Just as writing fulfills me in a way editing can’t.

It’s Read an E-Book Week! And, as I do every year, to celebrate, I’ve discounted all my books so you’ll be extra tempted to pick them up and join the Trevolution.

My catalog is getting bigger, deeper, even though I’m doing more editing than writing these days.

The best part of this new age of publishing, I think, is that your books can be on sale forever. They never go out of print. And weeks like this are perfect for reminding you of that.

Older, newer, it doesn’t matter. You can pick them all up at Smashwords and whoa, Nelly! Look at that discount!!

Yes, even my newest release, not even six months old yet. Broken, the short story you just gotta read.

So what are you waiting for? Go get some copies and read an e-book this week!