Scrolling through YouTube one day, as one does, I came upon a video of a preacher telling his congregation a story I’d heard many times but never paid much attention to before.
The preacher was telling the story of a famous painting in the Louvre called Checkmate, depicting the Devil playing chess against a man while an angel stood watching. The Devil is laughing, and the man looks on in desperation at the board, perhaps knowing he’s lost. The preacher continued the story by saying that one day a famous chess master visited the Louvre, stopped at the painting, analyzed the game, and said: “Well, the king has one more move.” The message is one of hope: that even when you think you’re cornered, there is always a way out. In the preacher’s message, it was implied that the way out was through faith and through God.
And the immediate thought that came to my head, as an occasional chess player myself, was this one: Yes, but does that move put him in checkmate, therefore sealing his doom? The painting can’t be called Checkmate for nothing.
So, I decided to do a little digging, or a little Googling, if you will, and I found out that the story is not entirely true.
There is no painting in the Louvre called Checkmate. In fact, the original work this story is inspired by is not a painting at all. There are 19th-century engravings/prints by the German artist Friedrich Moritz August Retzsch titled Die Schachspieler (The Chess Players). The scene illustrates Faust playing against Mephistopheles (yes, the same demon as in Ghost Rider), inspired by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s work Faust.
Mephistopheles is an ambiguous character, for in many different interpretations, he is portrayed as the Devil himself. In the interest of clarity, and to mirror the preacher’s message, I will simply refer to him as the Devil, even though in Goethe’s work, he is the demon Mephistopheles.
I pulled up several images of the prints and carefully analyzed the board. I was surprised to find that the board itself is accurate: a regular 8×8 chessboard. The man is playing with the white pieces, which all appear to be angelic figures. The king himself has wings and holds a cross, extending his hand forward as if trying to resist the forces closing in on him. The Devil plays with the black pieces, and they all appear to be figures of grotesque demons and monsters. How fitting, right? Even his queen is depicted as a temptress with her exposed breasts, adding another layer of symbolism to the image. The entire board becomes a battlefield between good and evil.
But my main interest was in the positions of each chess piece on the board. After carefully observing each figure and doing my best to determine which one corresponded to each actual chess piece, this is what I found.
It appears the king does indeed have one more move: he can retreat to a diagonal square behind him. The Devil’s queen appears to be on d4 while the man’s king appears to be on d2. The Devil’s pieces are strategically arranged so that it looks as if the king is already in checkmate, but a square behind him, c1, is free. Another square, e1, also appears to be open, but if you look closely, what I assume is the Devil’s bishop on g3 would place the king in check if he moved there. So the king can retreat to c1. But that square is a trap.
Two of the man’s own pieces already stand on either side of c1, hemming him in. All the Devil has to do is move his queen to b2, and then it becomes a true checkmate. Even if it appears that the man could capture the queen with his king, the Devil’s pawn, represented in the image by a small snake-like dragon on a3, would capture the king immediately afterward, making that move impossible. So it appears the painter was correct in his depiction. The man is trapped.
It also seems to be his turn to move. He leans over the board, thinking, while the Devil reclines in his chair and watches with a satisfied grin, already knowing his opponent is doomed.
It’s a brilliant work of art! If there is any truth to this story, the chess master was right, but the story is incomplete. There is no hope. Even the angel seems to know this by her saddened face at the man’s predicament.
The angel’s presence is interesting. Why is she there? Is the man’s soul already forsaken? Or, is she the true symbol of hope? Or, perhaps, did she come to warn the man not to make any deals with the Devil, for he is a deceitful creature who will lead him to perdition. Perhaps the man didn’t heed her word. Perhaps, he obeyed his ego more than his faith, and the Devil took advantage of that human weakness, and when it comes to the Devil, that’s usually the way it goes.
This fall, it will be five years since I self-published my first book, Dark Was the Night. My plan is to re-release it in October with a new cover and a brand-new revised edition. Which is funny, because I think maybe fifty people were gracious enough to read it. Still, it’s a milestone, and it should be marked as such.
I have to be honest with you: like every author who has ever put their work out there, I expected much more than just tiny ripples in the water. I expected waves. It’s delusional. We’re sold on the idea that if we put a book out there, we will all have our Stephen King moment or our J.K. Rowling moment or our Stephanie Meyer moment. God forbid any of us has our E.L. James moment. Trust me. As a writer, you want your stories to resonate with the soul, not our basic instincts. But if that’s the hand you were dealt, and it sells. Then by all means, write the filthiest thing you can think of, because the masses love it!
I don’t know when I finished writing my second book. Maybe a year ago. Maybe more. I haven’t been consistently sending it in to agents until recently, and even then, I’ve been slacking. If I thought my first book was a hard sell due to its length (only 45,000 words) and its graphic content and vulgar language, this one is another beast entirely. The story is loosely based on my grandmother’s story in El Salvador. Yeah, I know. Good luck with that, right? But I feel her story is that of many women, transcending time and space.
I’ve been pitching it to several agents for months now, and still no bites. This is a fictional historical family drama, and it’s 70,000 words long. Still, maybe a bit under for the genre, but I hate padding for the sake of hitting an arbitrary number the industry says will sell more easily. I don’t listen to the hype. I trust my instincts as a writer. Maybe that’s a mistake, but I won’t compromise the integrity of the story by adding artifice.
I don’t know how much longer I will keep pitching it before I give up, curl up in a fetal position and cry, and end up publishing it myself. But I feel this book deserves a traditional publishing route. But what do I know?
One interesting thing, though, is that I’ve been sending parts of it to small publications that charge a fee to read your work. And as luck would have it, I’m reading On Writing by Stephen King. King spends about 30% of the book retelling how his love for writing began, his humble beginnings, and how Carrie was his big break. He admitted to having padded his novel with “epistolary interludes” (diary entries, letters, bulletins, etc.) and such to hit that coveted word limit agents love so much. One thing I learned from reading about his childhood: Mr. King may be the authority on writing horror, but he’s also very funny! About 65% percent of the book is him genuinely giving good advice on writing. I kid you not, his advice is solid, and I recommend this book as much as Show, Don’t Tell: A Writer’s Guide by William Noble and The Elements of Style by Strunk and White, which every aspiring writer should read. The rest of the book is him retelling his horrific accident back in 1999. I’m still in the middle of reading that, and he’s lucky to be alive! The paramedic who rode with him in the back of the ambulance told him months later he didn’t think King would make it to the hospital. Again, I can’t recommend this book enough.
King says something that many of us who have written since a young age knew all along: you don’t need formal training to be a good writer. But you do need competency. And competency can’t be taught. You can’t learn it in any writing class. There is no secret formula hidden in any book. You’re either a competent writer or you’re not, and only through grit and grime can you become a good writer. King doesn’t mince words: he says you can turn a ‘competent’ writer into a ‘good’ one through hard work and discipline. But you cannot turn a ‘bad’ writer into a ‘competent’ one, nor can you ‘teach’ the raw, innate talent that makes a ‘great’ writer. He goes on to say, a ‘good’ writer cannot become a ‘great’ one. Great writers are born, not made.
He also offers advice on writing your query letters, what to say, and who to query. He’s adamant that you should never query any agent or publication that charges a fee to read your material. In his own words: “You should be especially wary of agents who promise to read your work for a fee. A few such agents are reputable […], but all too many are unscrupulous fucks. I’d suggest that if you’re that anxious to get published, you skip agent-hunting or query-letters to publishers and go directly to a vanity press. There you will at least get a semblance of your money’s worth.” And I smiled from ear to ear reading this. The tears, blood, and sweat I spent submitting to publications that charge a fee, have ridiculous submission guidelines, and require an account, a username, and a password to send in your manuscript. You need to subscribe, have read at least ten of their books, and specify which of their books most resembles your manuscript. King is right. All that work, and all that money, and nothing to show for it. Years ago, an agency charged me $3,000 US to publish my book. For all the money I’ve spent over the years submitting to places that charge a fee, I might as well have published with them and have my novel under a label.
So, to circle back to how long I will try to submit my second book to an agent. Ironically enough, the simple fact that I have this blog, My Foolish Quest to Get Published, I’m probably shooting myself in the leg. But I’ll give it till Christmas. Then, I’ll self-publish. No shame in that. Not everyone gets to ride the pony; some of us get to trail behind the cart, swallowing dust and coughing up a storm. At the end of the day, we’re all getting to the same place.
This past summer, we planned to take the family to Disney World while the kids were still young enough to feel the magic and old enough to remember it. But with the political climate being what it is, and as a Hispanic family, the idea of crossing the border felt like tempting fate. We didn’t want to risk the trip and end up deported to Tijuana, or is it El Salvador now?
So, we decided instead of visiting Disney, to explore our great big country, Canada. We’ve been here for decades, and we haven’t seen much of it, which is a shame because it’s a beautiful country. We could have gone either West or East, and we chose East because it was closest and cheapest. So, we packed our bags and our kids into our minivan and drove the 790 km (or 490 miles, for any US folks reading this). It’s a two-day ride stopping in Fredericton, New Brunswick, for the night.
Forget Disney! We traded Mickey Mouse for maritime history, lighthouses, and the wild Atlantic wind.
Arriving in Halifax, I had a whole itinerary planned, and one of the main stops was visiting the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic. One of the main attractions there is the Titanic Exhibit. They have many replicas of the boat or its parts, as well as several authentic items. You can stop and read firsthand testimonials of crew members and passengers who survived. Accounts of the crew members of the RMS Carpathia, the first ship to reach the survivors of the Titanic, or the CS Mackay-Bennett, the ship tasked with recovering the bodies from the cold seas, are especially poignant.
Scale model of the RMS Titanic at the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic.
A haunting recreation of the ship’s last minutes, surrounded by lifeboats that held only a fraction of the souls left behind.
The shoes of 19-month-old Sidney Leslie Goodwin — once known only as ‘The Unknown Child,’ until DNA finally returned his name to him 95 years later.
Words from those who lived through it, trying to describe the indescribable.
Testimony from the men who recovered the bodies, a side of the Titanic story we rarely hear about.
Brass button from a Titanic officer’s coat, recovered from a victim’s body by the crew of the cable ship Minia.
Every recovered body had its belongings placed into a numbered mortuary bag like this one, a dignified attempt to help families identify their lost.
Three lives, three fates: a mother searching for a better life, a father fleeing with his sons under a false name, and a wealthy man who never made it home. The Titanic didn’t care about class, money, or motives, the sea claimed them all the same.
Panel describing the 1985 discovery of the Titanic wreck, nearly 4 km below the surface, and the scientific and ethical debates that followed.
Replica of the bow rail as it appears today on the ocean floor, covered in rusticles after 113 years of decay.
It’s a small exhibit, but a significant one considering that Halifax is the city where several of the retrieved bodies are still buried to this day. Visiting the cemetery that is now their eternal resting place, the Fairview Lawn Cemetery, is another must if you’re ever in Halifax. Sadly, several of the people buried there were never identified, or their bodies were never claimed by any relatives. You can find crew members, men, women, and even children. On the children’s tombstones, visitors have placed toys. My children left toys as well, touched that someone so young was buried there.
The tombstones are placed in such a way that they form the bow of a ship. You can either visit on your own or have a guided tour. There are 121 souls buried in the Fairview Lawn Cemetery; many of the graves are marked with the single word “Unknown,” along with a number indicating the order in which they were recovered. Sadly, the crew of the CS Mackay-Bennett didn’t arrive on site until several days after the tragedy. By that time, many bodies were badly decomposed, despite the frigid waters, and beyond recognition. Also, their priority was to identify the first-class passengers first. Arguably, the most valuable passengers at the time, and therefore, many of the “Unknown” graves are most likely those of third-class passengers.
I left the cemetery with a heavy heart for all those men, women, and children who were never claimed, never identified, never made it home.
Several months later, back home in Montreal, I saw that a new Titanic Exhibit was coming to town. This exhibit was different in that it was an immersive experience. Divided between reality and fiction, it included several props from the James Cameron movie. It contained information that the Halifax one didn’t. Like the Morse code exchanges between the RMS Titanic as it was sinking and several other ships that fateful night. One of the very first ships to answer the Titanic’s distress call was the German steamer Frankfurt. That ship was at 153 nautical miles from the sinking Titanic (282 km or 175 miles). The Titanic’s senior wireless operator, Jack Phillips, famously answered the Frankfurt to “Keep out…You fool!” because he knew the ship was a lifetime away. He was under so much stress and inundated by messages from other ships that had also answered the Titanic’s SOS.
Scale model of the RMS Titanic on display at the Montreal immersive exhibition.
Recreation of a first-class stateroom on the Titanic — luxury frozen in time, just hours before it all disappeared beneath the Atlantic.
Replica of the clock that stood at the top of Titanic’s Grand Staircase.
At the wheel of the Titanic — a full-scale recreation of the ship’s bridge, where calm seas hid the disaster waiting in the dark.
The calm, star-filled sky the passengers saw on Titanic’s final night. No waves, no wind, no warning.
Replica of Titanic’s boiler room doors where firemen and engineers worked through the night to keep the ship powered, even as she sank.
Jack Phillips worked here until the power failed. He stayed at his post, sending distress calls long after he was ordered to save himself.
A genuine deck chair recovered from the Titanic’s wreck site. The White Star Line blanket is a modern replica.
Still, with a patchy reception and not much to go on, the captain of the Frankfurt decided to turn her around and head full steam ahead to the coordinates of the Titanic. They arrived roughly 12 hours later to an empty sea, wreckage and floating bodies. The Carpathia had already rescued all of the survivors. And she wasn’t the only one. Many ships that night answered Titanic’s call for help, and many arrived at the site to find they had arrived too late. It’s a testament to the solidarity of the ships at sea at the time. Even knowing they were almost certainly too far away, many ships answered the call and did not hesitate to act. They all kept their wireless operator listening and on standby in the hope that the Titanic would show signs of life. They all headed into a dangerous part of the Atlantic known for icebergs, full steam ahead in the dim hope that they might save someone.
At the end of the exhibit, on clear plastic panels, are the classes and names of all the people who died that night. Comparing the victims between them, the first class passengers mainly had men die. Middle-aged men mostly. In the second class, you see that mostly men died as well, but also a few more women. Arriving at the panel of the third class passengers, your heart can’t help but sink at all the names. Almost all 709 third-class passengers died. Only 172 were saved. That’s barely 25%. In contrast, the first class passengers had a 62% survival rate.
One of the things that is painfully obvious on the third-class panel is the number of children who didn’t make it. Entire families were decimated, and James Cameron’s movie depicts those reasons in vivid detail. Several crew members didn’t open the gates to allow the third-class passengers to reach the upper deck. Several were foreigners who didn’t speak English and didn’t understand the crew members’ instructions. Several lost their way in the labyrinth of the lower levels, not knowing how to read the signs in the halls indicating how to reach the upper levels to save themselves. For those who managed to get to the upper deck, it was too late. They ran out of time. In one of the most unforgivable decisions in maritime history, the White Star Line sent the Titanic to sea without enough lifeboats for all its passengers. The reason being: they would obstruct the view of the first-class passengers, and they were deemed unnecessary on a ship that was supposed to be unsinkable.
Reading through the names of the third-class victims, two families stood out to me: the Skoogs and the Rices. Large families with many children. After a bit of research, this is what I found about them:
The Skoog Family
Wilhelm Johansson Skoog (40) and Anna Bernhardina Skoog (43) boarded the Titanic in Southampton with their children Karl Thorsten (11), Mabel (9), Harald (5), and Margit Elizabeth (2).
The Skoog family, photographed before their youngest child, Margit Elizabeth, was born. Wilhelm and Anna Skoog are pictured here with three of their children: Karl, Mabel, and Harald. Their fourth child, Margit, born in 1910, does not appear in this photo. All six family members perished in the sinking of the Titanic.
The Skoogs were emigrating from Finland to start a new life in America. They had lived in Sweden for a time before deciding to make the journey overseas, booking third-class passage on the Titanic’s maiden voyage. The family was last seen together below decks after the collision, reportedly trying to make their way toward the forward companionways. The ship’s complex layout and the chaos of the night made escape for third-class passengers especially difficult. No member of the Skoog family survived, and their story comes only from fellow passengers who remembered seeing them that night.
The Rice Family
Margaret Rice (39) was a widow from Athlone, Ireland. Her husband, William, had died in a railway accident, leaving her to raise their five sons alone: Albert (10), George Hugh (8), Eric (7), Arthur (4), and Eugene Francis (2).
Margaret Rice with her five sons — Albert, George, Eric, Arthur, and baby Eugene. This is the only known photo of the entire Rice family together. All six sailed third class on the Titanic. None survived.
Margaret decided to emigrate to Spokane, Washington, where her brother had settled. She booked passage on the Titanic at Queenstown (now Cobh) in third class. Survivors recalled seeing her holding her youngest, Eugene, during the sinking, with her other sons clustered around her. As the Titanic’s bow went under, she was reportedly seen moving toward the stern, possibly in search of a way to the boats. None of the Rice family survived.
And there are countless more stories like those. As you make your way through the exhibit, it’s painfully apparent to us now, 113 years later, the awful mistakes made that night by the captain and crew. And still so many questions left unanswered. On the day the Titanic sank, the ship received many warnings from other ships about icebergs present in the area. The captain of the Titanic, Captain Edward John Smith, was notified several times of those messages. However, he still didn’t slow down the ship. The ship was navigating full steam ahead.
First-class passengers paid the wireless operators to send personal messages to family members, so instead of focusing on the warnings from other ships, they were busy sending greetings from wealthy passengers. Why was this allowed?
And finally, countless people complain that many ships sank before and after the Titanic with many more losses of life, so why the obsession? And I have no clear answer. But maybe because it was her maiden voyage, perhaps because it was her captain’s last voyage. Maybe because the mere fact that she was deemed unsinkable is a symbol of Men’s untamed arrogance and defiance towards nature, and how easy it is for her to remind us that we are at her mercy.
Titanic’s story will live on, I imagine long after we are gone, as a reminder that we are only here by God’s good graces, and that human nature is not infallible, but that in our hour of need, instead of only looking towards the heavens for salvation, we look to those around us, because many people tried that night to save as many as they could; as the panel of the crew members who died that night can testify. Apart from the captain, his senior wireless operator, several officers and other crew members, the entire engineering team sank with the ship that night. True to their post, working the engines and electrical circuits to try and keep the Titanic’s lights on for as long as possible. Many eye-witness accounts report the ship was still completely illuminated as the dark waters engulfed it.
One thing is for sure: as you stare at all the crew members who died that night trying to save passengers, you walk out of there with a deeper level of respect for those who roam the seas, and for the risks they take so that others may live.
And maybe, for them, we can turn to the Man upstairs once in a while and pray:
It’s done! It’s finally done, my second book. After countless hours, days, weeks, and months, after 66932 words, I’m calling this a novel. I know it’s still under the coveted 70,000-word mark, but what can I tell you? I’m done.
That number might increase with the editing needed. And I hope it does. Will my editing add another 4000 words? I doubt it. But who knows? I might include an unnecessary mini side story to pad the damn thing and please the agents or publishers that will be reading it.
So, what’s the story about? The story is set in El Salvador and spans over sixty years, loosely based on my grandmother’s life. I say loosely because this book is the product of the stories my grandmother used to tell me, and since my grandma has been dead for 20 years, my memories are now a bit dimmed. Had I known I wanted to be a writer in my late teenage years, I would have written this while the woman was still alive. But what can I say? I was young and stupid back then, thinking I had the stamina and courage to tread the Amazon jungles or the Serengeti plains in hopes of studying animals and working for National Geographic. At least, that was the dream of a young delusional woman.
I don’t even remember when I started writing this book, but given that my first book was published in September 2021, it took me at least two years to write this one. Which is a huge improvement from my first one, which took me over a decade.
So, what now? Well, now I edit, which is arguably my favourite part. It’s easy to come up with a story, to think of characters and plot, but to actually sit down and write all of that down in a clear, concise, organized manner, well, that’s a horse of a different colour!
After the editing is done, I will then start sending my baby to the slaughterhouse. To be dissected, mocked, and judged by agents and publishers alike. I know I said in one of my posts that I would not deal with agents. But that’s because horror stories are tricky to sell. This is more of a drama or a period piece, with only a few scenes that are remotely violent. It has a slightly better chance of selling and, therefore, a somewhat better chance of an agent being interested.
So, let the editing begin! And if there are writers in the same position as me right now, may your coffees be strong, your editing run smoothly, and your stories be picked up by someone for the love of God! Cheers!
The lights have always flickered in our house. We never thought much of it. It’s an old building constructed in the 50s. Faulty wiring, old cables, anything could explain the flickering. But things took an unnerving turn about a year after we moved in. The flickering continued, but then other strange occurrences began.
The most significant one that happened to me was when I was a stay-at-home mom. My then-four-year-old daughter had just started kindergarten, and that morning her daddy went to drop her off on his way to work. At around 10:00 a.m., I was in the kitchen drinking my coffee. I was sitting at the table, and when I got up to head to the kitchen counter, I felt what I thought was my daughter’s tiny arms wrap around my legs. The feeling was so real that I forgot she was at school for a moment, and I looked down, hand extended, ready to caress her head, but no one was there. The reality that I was alone hit me like a ton of bricks, but I didn’t get spooked. I wrote it off as a young mom, nervous about having her baby girl alone at school for the first time.
Not long after that, my husband and I started to hear familiar voices calling our names, even though it had never been the case. I hear my husband and my children calling me. My husband hears me calling him. To this day, this still happens, and I cannot tell you the number of times we have all walked up to a family member to ask if they called us. After a while, it’s disconcerting, to say the least, because the voices are crystal clear and loud.
After my parents moved upstairs (we own a duplex), my father always said he heard a baby crying at night long after my kids were out of the baby stage. And we are friends with our neighbours, and none of them has babies. They have kids, but they are in the double digits now. My husband and I have heard the cries as well. As a mother, I didn’t think this to be unusual. I always thought I heard my children crying at night. Then I went to see them, and they were sound asleep. I never thought much about it. I always thought it was due to a lack of sleep.
But recently, my eldest daughter and I heard my youngest crying. He’s a toddler. The sound was so distinct, clear, and piercing as if he had hurt himself, that both my daughter and I rushed to his room to find him in a profound sleep. This incident spooked my daughter as it was the first time she heard the cries at night. That evening, I sprinkled holy water in every room of my house.
What’s interesting about these occurrences is that they also spread to my parents’ apartment upstairs. There is a rocking chair in my parents’ room that rocks on its own. This summer, my father even claims to have heard a child’s mechanical lullaby playing as the chair rocked.
The haunted rocking chair.
The other day, I was in the kitchen with my youngest when I heard my mother’s voice coming from our backdoor. But my son heard it too, and we both turned our heads to be greeted by the dark emptiness of our back window. My son even called out for his grandma, but no one answered. But among all these strange events, the most disturbing one my husband and I have both witnessed is the sound of someone walking in our bedroom when there was nobody there. What’s unnerving is that our toddler has slept in our room since birth, and to think someone is walking around in our room while he is sleeping is creepy. What’s more peculiar is that it only happens when we are in our basement. The footsteps have sometimes been so loud that they have sent us flying to our bedroom to make sure no one was there. And sure enough, nobody was.
Our bedroom where we hear the footsteps. This picture was taken before my son was born. Today, his toddler bed is right next to ours.
The house was blessed by a priest the year we bought it. I’ve also sprinkled holy water many times. Whatever is causing these disturbances isn’t bothered by the presence of a plethora of crosses and religious items in the house.
My teenage daughter and I have both speculated on who might be causing these disturbances, and we have both agreed that it might be a child. I’ve never felt real fear in my house, spooked perhaps, but nothing that even comes close to a scene from The Conjuring.
So, you might expect me to tell you I’m done writing my second book. Sadly, such is not the case! But I am almost done. Ten thousand more words to go, and I’m going to call it a novel.
So, fall is upon us. My favorite season. The air smells fresher, the streets are less crowded, and the grey days of fall bring with them this calmness that is hard to describe. It’s like a veil has been pulled over us. And also, fall brings my second favorite Holiday, Halloween.
This year, I will be doing another giveaway. I’m just late setting it up. It’s already October, for crying out loud! Again, it will be a draw for a copy of my book, Dark Was the Night, and a little extra gift from my Etsy shop. Yes, I have an Etsy shop where I sell homemade goods. Here is the link if ever you’re interested: Body & Light.
What’s new with me? Well, I am still working full-time. Still not enjoying it. I would rather write all day, every day. But the steady paycheck is very much needed, and I work from home, so it’s ok. And also, I’ve been wanting a fourth baby. I know, crazy, right? But since I’m probably too old for a fourth baby, I decided to settle for a fur baby.
Meet Pampinella! It’s a mini mix breed. According to the seller, she is half Netherland Dwarf, half Mini Rex. So, now, with three kids, two birds, and a bunny rabbit, my plate is pretty full!
So, let me get back to Halloween for a second. I want to publish more on my social media accounts because, let’s face it, it’s good for sales, and why have a page and not do anything with it. Might as well shut the whole thing down.
Anyway, this October, I will publish something spooky every day until November 1st. The Day of the Dead. To stir your interest, I’ll start by telling you that I believe my house is haunted, and the strange occurrences that have happened to me and several of my family members will be shared with you in an upcoming post. So, if ghost stories are your thing, stay tuned!
So, this ends this post. Hopefully, the next time I update this thing, my book will be finished!
So, I’ve been MIA for a while on my blog. I know. I suck at this. I should be more present and post more updates. But life gets in the way. You know? What’s that? You don’t know? Alrighty then. Moving on.
Times are hard, folks. You don’t need me to tell you that. But in my family, it was determined after Christmas that one income was no longer feasible for us. So, after 13 lovely years of being a stay-at-home mom, I decided to return to work full-time. I didn’t think I would get any bites by sending my CV. But lo and behold, I did! I went to some interviews and got hired! Hooray! Yay, me, right?
Working is a necessity. With three kids to feed and two in private schools, we were biting off more than we could chew. I would much rather write and be with my kids, but that is a luxury we can no longer afford.
Why are my kids in private school, you might ask. That’s a long story that I might tell one day. But today is not that day.
So, off to work, I go, but luckily, I don’t have to go far. I work from home. The pay is decent, the work challenging, and the newness of it all flickered what little embers of an ambitious career were left in me before I laid eyes on my firstborn child. Yes, folks, children do change you. They change you as a person, your life, your dreams, and most importantly, your perspective.
Not that anyone cares, but how has this affected my writing? Greatly! I have so little time to write now, and it’s a bummer because I have so many ideas for articles popping into my head; all I can do is write them down in a little notebook. I can’t waste what precious time I have writing articles. I’m concentrating on my second book and want to finish it before the year ends. That’s my resolution for this year. To complete and submit my second book for publication.
I don’t know when I’ll update this blog again. Hopefully, soon, but who the hell knows? In the meantime, I invite you to check out my first book, Dark Was the Night. Sold almost everywhere. Batteries are not included. Because you don’t need any. Hihi.
So, I entered my book, Dark Was the Night, into a contest. It’s The BookLife Prize for Fiction. Once you sign up, you receive a Critic’s Report from a Publisher’s Weekly reviewer.
I know this is a long shot, and I don’t hold any pretenses of even coming close to winning. But my Critic’s Report is not shabby, if I may say so myself.
“Plot/Idea: 9 out of 10 Originality: 9 out of 10 Prose: 8 out of 10 Character/Execution: 9 out of 10 Overall: 8.75 out of 10″
“Assessment:
“Plot: Full of drama, intrigue, and intense emotion, Dark Was the Night grips readers from the first page and doesn’t let up until the hard-hitting conclusion.
Prose: The author is clearly a gifted writer, able to convey debilitating fear, create tension, and to elicit a visceral response from readers. There’s a fine balance of detail, dialogue, and action as the chilling story unfolds.
Originality: This is a highly original work with memorable characters and a distinctive plot line.
Character/Execution: The author does an excellent job with characterization, particularly with Lucie, whose paranoia and fear dominate the book.
Blurb: Gripping and suspenseful, Dark Was the Night will keep readers on the edge of their seats.”
So, if this report tickles your interest, I’m happy to announce that I will host a giveaway of my book until the end of the month. That’s right, until Halloween, which is quite fitting since my book’s story takes place on Halloween Night.
What can you do to participate, you may ask? Well, it’s simple, just like this post. All those who liked it will be automatically included in the live draw that will take place on Saturday, November 5, at 4:00 pm EST on my Facebook page:
So, I’ve been MIA for a few weeks now. Partly because we’ve been renovating our bathroom the whole summer. But mostly, it’s because I’ve been seriously lacking the motivation to keep my social media pages up to date. I’ve not even been writing my second novel, and I’m halfway through, but I haven’t written anymore. Which bums me out because I wanted to finish this summer.
But life just takes over. How do other writers do it, I wonder. Many of them can write for hours without interruption. But it’s not possible when you’re the primary caregiver to your children and two feathery friends while your husband is working. I have three kids. And at the end of the day, I just want to grab a snack and fall asleep on my couch watching Netflix. I often joke with my husband that I need a maid, a cook, and a nanny for me to write like a real writer.
So here I am, dusting myself off, taking a deep breath, and diving back in. Because I need the followers. I do. How else will I convince a publishing company that I can sell books? A meme is making the rounds in social media right now saying that most published books sell fewer than 5000 copies while only a handful become bestsellers. It’s actually true. How depressing, right? I’ll be lucky to sell 500. How many copies have I sold, you may ask? I’ve stopped counting. I’ve even stopped promoting it. But if you’re new here and are interested, I self-published a book last year. Here it is:
So, anyway, back to the renovations. If you’re like me and like renovation shows, here are before and after pictures of my bathroom. And yes, that awful olive color was my choice. So we decided to tile the whole place up, making it seem bigger and brighter.
Shower BeforeBeforeAfterShower After
Despite all this, I have been writing. Mostly for Collider. It’s an entertainment website that keeps you updated on the latest news in movies and TV shows. Here are the articles I’ve written for them if you’re interested.
I would like to say I’ll keep updating regularly, but that would be a lie. For those of you who’ve stuck around, thank you. I’ll most likely do another giveaway of my book for Halloween. So stay tuned for that!
My Foolish Quest to Get Published 