Authors Electric

It seems we've all become obsessed with having thousands of Friends. And it's not hard to grow obsessed when the system feeds the mania. You've barely opened your account when the deluge begins: Friendship requests from strangers who don't know the first thing about you--or care. They hope to sell you their own books or plots of land in Katmandu or phone sex if you're generous and swear you can land them a date with Bill Kirton, Peter Leyland or, dare they hope, John Logan. Even so, though the smarter part of you knows most of your 5000 Friends are utterly in it to win it--surely at least a few hundred will buy what you're selling...remember your birthday...or enjoy a ridiculous pun. But recently I concluded that, for me at any rate, FB's heartless algorithm was whipping my poor tired butt. Though I'd pruned my list from 3000 to 1000, almost none of my posts made their way into the Feed. Fewer than two dozen names responded to my posts. And, of that numb...

  No. no, Austin Powers! I don't mean shake your booty, I mean move your butt--as in relocate from coast to coast, state to state, possibly country to country. Lord knows, I've done them all for a grand total of some 30 moves. So you can imagine my consternation, as an expert on the subject, when I found myself hamstrung and befuddled in the middle of  a move: from Seattle to Tucson, Arizona.  With just three months to go before D-Day in August, and with a strong foundation already in place, my head had started spinning from thoughts of the puzzles I couldn't complete:   --How, on a limited budget, could I afford a professional mover and a junk remover?   --How could I adapt to the changes since 2014, when I moved to Seattle with only a steamer trunk and four boxes? Amtrak will no longer handle a trunk--or allow checked luggage for relocation. Plus, in the past eight years, I've acquired a slew of possessions I value--not the least of them being new books. ...

March 2020, two months after Authors Electric welcomed me, I wrote a blog called “Splendid Isolation.” It was named after Warren Zevon's song about the difference between being alone and being lonely. Feel free to hop over and read it if you haven't already. During that time, much of the world was trying to figure out how to combat the Corona virus. In Canada, we were doing the same. Even though there was a lot to deal with—closing borders, face coverings, shutting down businesses, our leaders worked together and appeared to be taking the right steps forward. There was so much to learn.  The pandemic also produced an explosion of neologisms. Phrases and words like: self-isolation; shelter in place; social distancing; flatten the curve; curb-side pickup became part of everyday news feeds and conversation. New acronyms cropped up too—PPE, WHO, Covid-19, HCQ. We were more digitally connected than ever before—in a way we weren’t during the SARS outbreak in 2002. I zoomed daily with...

How does a writer get an idea for a story? I’ve read several blogs where authors got annoyed when asked this question. I don’t get annoyed, but it does make me think. It’s not an easy question to answer.  The old maxim “Write what you know” comes to mind, but what does this really mean? Does it mean the author has lived his or her characters’ lives?  I’ve written erotic fiction, psychological suspense, and mystery, and though a lot of who I am has shaped my female characters, I have certainly not lived their lives. The protagonists have been strong women who have loved deeply, travelled the world, had sex with men—sometimes multiple men at the same time.  My characters are much more interesting than I am, and that’s how I want them to be.  You can infer what you like, but I believe fiction should be more than just thinly veiled reflections of authors’ lives. As writers, we should not limit ourselves to what we know.  I can assure you I have not experienced every...

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about writing of late, more thinking than writing, especially late at night. This makes me want to beat myself up mentally sometimes, makes me wonder why I can't sleep.  In the past, when want-to-be writers wanted to chat about writing, I obliged but with some trepidation. I don’t do small talk, and to wax poetic on the craft of writing seemed meaningless unless there was real life application. Were we writing a book together? If not, then what I had to contribute would probably be of little help. I’m not an academic, and theorizing about writing can never take the place of the act of writing itself. It’s a discipline that's learned while putting it in practice.  Writing is also a solitary endeavour, not a group effort. I say this even though I write with a partner every month. Bill Kirton (who also contributes to this site) and I compose stories together , but our individual pieces are written without prior discussion, so the act of writing ...

Some years ago, another writer, whom I respected said to me, “You have a distinct voice.”  She had read a couple of my books, and at the time, I was writing erotic fiction. Her words caught me off guard.  “Oh?” I felt somewhat ambivalent toward her statement. “I guess my writing’s become predictable.”  “I don’t mean that,” she said. “I mean you have a certain way of telling a story.”  She was offering a compliment, but in that moment, I couldn’t fully appreciate what she was saying. I took it to mean she had read enough of my stories to notice a recurring pattern, a particular style of writing. I filed away her words in my brain, confident I’d eventually understand them more clearly.  To have one’s own style isn’t a bad thing, right?  I’ve been reading erotic fiction for years, so it’s not a stretch to think I’ve adopted stylistic details from authors I’ve admired. At age eleven, I read Pauline Réage’s Story of O . I didn’t understand all of it, but it made...

This is my first post of 2021 here, so I'd like to wish a Happy New Year to readers!  When I was thinking of a topic to write, I came across a post on a friend’s Facebook page that made me laugh.  The caption read: For the next time you think the 80s were cool.  Yeah, it was the decade of big hair and outlandish fashion.  The reason I found it funny was because I used to be a slave to fashion. My jeans had to sit above the waist, not below it. They couldn’t be too faded or too dark. They had to conform nicely around my butt and not cut off the circulation in my legs. I preferred the skinny fit over a baggy, loose pair, and if there were holes in them, they had to look as if they'd been ripped accidentally, not deliberately. The pressure of buying a pair of pants!  I wanted "the look" with Jordache jeans. Didn't we all? Looking back now, I pity my younger, insecure self. I was pretty shy in the eighties, and fashion gave me a sense of belonging. The eclectic styl...

2020—It started with so much promise. January 23rd, I wrote my first blog for Authors Electric, celebrated Chinese New Year with my family a few days later, and left for a two-week holiday with a girlfriend to Cuba shortly thereafter.  Life was good.  No … I take that back.  Life was great.   Fast forward eleven months, and here we are.  I don’t need to tell you how 2020 has devastated the lives of so many all over the world. Life with Covid is not coming to an end any time soon even though we have a vaccine. Each day brings an increasing number of cases, further lockdowns, and a new strain of Covid-19 is now upon us, just in time for Christmas. It’s not good, but I choose to remain optimistic, so I don’t want to talk about Covid. Let’s talk turkey instead—three turkeys to be exact.  Early November, I thought I’d get a head start on the holidays by purchasing a few Christmas food items. I don’t go out to buy groceries. I order online and drive to the superm...

At the start of December 2019, I gave myself a gift of learning. I'd seen numerous ads for MasterClass while searching for interesting gifts for the holiday season.  If you're unfamiliar with MasterClass, it's a streaming platform of online courses that started in 2015 with a simple pitch: Famous people teach you about the thing that made them famous. At the time, the courses that interested me most were from writers: Neil Gaiman, Margaret Atwood, Malcolm Gladwell, Joyce Carol Oates, just to name a few. MasterClass, however, includes instructors from all walks of life—from Dr. Jane Goodall who teaches Conservation to Helen Mirren who teaches Acting to Annie Leibovitz who teaches Photography.  You can either purchase a specific course along with its instructional videos and workbooks, or buy an annual membership which gives you unlimited access to all the classes, including new ones that are added during the year.  I decided to pick up an annual subscription and a second ...

By the time many of you read this post, the second and final US presidential debate will have aired. It’s highly unlikely the debate will sway the outcome of the election on November 3rd. Still, I anticipate it to be a spectacle. Don’t worry, this is not a political post.  I’m only bringing it up in the context of the first debate, which occurred September 29th.  Earlier that evening, I had signed up for a virtual lecture series put on by the Center for African American Poetry and Poetics, hosted by the University of Pittsburgh. That night’s talk was entitled “Looking for Language in the Ruins.” Among the speakers was JJJJJerome Ellis, an Afro-Caribbean composer, performer, and writer.                                                                        ...