Far better writers than I have suggested the "wait a bit" method of editing.  Write your story, run it through a tidying-up edit run (or two!), then put it in a drawer for a few months.  Bring it out after you've had time to move along in your thinking, and run through it again.

Still look decent?  Fix the typos and sloppy bits.  Now you're ready to share it with a few reasonably objective friends or relatives.

OK, so I don't follow this strictly.  But still, here I am a little under a year later, having another look at "Five Dollars and An Axe", the sequel to "Faithful Unto Death".  No murders in this one, but lots of good detail about life on the farm just before and during the depression.  Ralph continues to be quite a fellow to be admired (as indeed he was).   Scandals?  You bet.  Hardship?  Plenty.  Grasshoppers?  Yep.

U of Michigan is no longer accepting any new fiction submissions, which is a little upsetting.  Call me old-fashioned, but I just don't wanna self-publish.  Who do you have to sleep with to get an agent?  Why does one have to jump through a mess of hoops just to hire someone to peddle a manuscript to one of the mega-publishers? 

Gotta still be some good independent publishers around!

 Ralph in the later years.

Hattie, Ralph, Josie in chairs, various descendants and spouses gathered around.  Wonder who took this photo?

http://www.foxspirit.co.uk/books/anthologies/noir/drag-noir/

Go here to order your copy.  Or even better, go to your friendly local independent bookstore and ask them to order you a copy.  Get one for your mom while you're at it.  She might surprise you.

Almost forgot!  Here's the cover.  Why does it make me think, "Michael Jackson"?

Go get yourself a copy of "Drag Noir"!

It contains a lot of well-written stories; granted, some are pretty dark  (what can you expect with "Noir" in the title?) but all have interesting twists on top of the gender-bends.

Good stuff, if I say so myself.  My story is somewhere in the middle of the thing.

Gonna be at IHS this week for juried Holiday Author Fair

The event is this Saturday, noon until 4:00 pm at the Indiana Historical Society (near the corner of Ohio & West St).  There are about 30-40 selected authors at the event, all based in Indiana (most but not all of the books focus on Indiana history--hey, midwest is close enough, right?).

This is their big Holiday "do", should be fun!

"Faithful Unto Death" goes to Marion County Library book/author fair

We spent part of a day meeting and greeting other authors and the public.  There are a LOT of self-published Christian writers and they all appear to have attended this event.  Plus a few actual writers who had some good stuff to show.  (Meeyow!  But still....)

Unfortunately we didn't realize until too late that the library copy of "Faithful" was right on the rack behind me, in "New mysteries"!

Rita Rose, who wrote a delightful teen book about the world's tallest woman (who lived in rural Indiana), was in attendance.  Book review reads,

Sandy Allen was the Guinness Book of World Records holder as World's Tallest Woman seven feet seven and 1/4 inches. Sandy died in August of 2008, after having helped with her friend's book about her high school years--and how she redeemed them through a life of service to young people. This book is an inspiration and insight into the life of different; people this one a lively, bright and interesting lady who scorned the title of freak and lived out her life in dignity.

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Great book, and I recommend it to adults as well as teens.

Chatting about arsenic poisoning.

Benzonia/Frankfort book event

The turnout wasn't as grand as we'd have liked, but those who attended were very interested and lively, and it was great going back to Benzonia and looking around again.  We easily found Anna's tombstone and got a MUCH sharper photo that shows the inscription better than our old one.  The old Thacker house (once the Baily house and who knows who else owned it) is crumbling away on the verge of the hill.  No doubt it's the favorite haunted house in the area, and why not?

Anna's headstone

The source of Charlotte's "Frankfort Water".  It's full of sulphur and iron, can't tell what else.

The spring is still pumping out the water, open to the public and it is indeed drinkable, though rather bitter.  We brought a jug of it home for book event "show and tell" and find that as the sulphur dissipates the water is more palatable.  Now its' just mineral water.

Frankfort lake shore.  Beautiful town!

Here's the layout of the Benzonia cemetary.  Not very useful unless you have a key--we'll try to pinpoint the number of Anna's site and see what the chances are of finding out who really placed the stone there.

Inside of the Benzonia history museum, which is housed in the former Congregationalist Church.  The main doors are upstairs, go figure.  Maybe symbolic of what you have to do to get to heaven.  Or the foundation has settled.