Rain, cold, and cozy

 

Lovely morning today—thunder woke me, followed quickly by the gentle paw of a very nervous dog. I just buried into the covers and dozed, listening to the thunder and rain. Sophie lay next to me, as though mere proximity to me would protect her. When I got up, she followed right at my heels to bathroom and kitchen. When I opened the door to give her a chance to go out, she hung back and looked at me resentfully. When I settled at my desk, I looked out at a world as dark as though it were evening. Sophie may cower, but I love such a morning. I love being cozy inside and watching a storm.

The rain and thunder eventually went away but the temperature continued a downward slide. It’s in the fifties now and predicted to go to the mid-forties tonight, a huge change from yesterday eighties. I may have to turn on my fireplace. The one regret I have about my cottage is that it doesn’t have a fireplace, but there simply is not room for it. Every square inch of space is put to good use. Jamie met the need by getting me a desktop electric fireplace—it’s a miniature version of those TV screens you see that show a fire. Mine has a remote monitor. Jamie envisioned it on my desk, but that too is crowded—it looks great on a side table by the couch.

It’s definitely soup weather. Tomorrow I’ll make freezer soup again. I’ve collected several small icebox dishes of odds and ends. I think the soup will be more beef than chicken, given the nature of my leftovers. I know there is a good-sized container of beef gravy from my ill-fated experiment with short ribs. Two short ribs also, but I’m not sure I’ll fix them.

It’s been a week of leftovers, broken one night when Christian made Mongolian beef, served with rice, and tiny vegetables—broccoli, carrots, etc. We sometimes get so carried away with recipes we’ve found that we have to call a halt to new cooking and eat what we have. Tonight I’ve fished out the one salmon patty I knew was buried on a freezer shelf and will cook the green beans Jordan brought home. I’m the only one in our little compound who eats fresh green beans—go figure, but they all like canned better!

I’ve had a busy week—produced a 28-page monthly neighborhood newsletter, which effectively takes three days of my time. In between I’ve been proofing the pages of a reprint of my 1990s historical novel about Jessie Benton Frémont. I finished it but realized that somewhere about page 100 I hit my proofreading groove, so now I’m going back to review that first 100 pages. But my Kindle is calling—I have downloaded samples of four or five books I want to try. Ever buy a book you’re sure you’ll love—and realize twenty pages in you didn’t want to read it? Kindle’s sample program lets you try the prose, the style, get to know the characters. Another problem I have in bookstores—I buy a book, get it home, and realize I’ve already read it! If you order a book from Amazon that you’ve already read, they tell you that you already own that book. I sometime feel guilty about my heavy use of Amazon, because I’m a big advocate of the independent bookstore. But I can’t get past the convenience, especially for me as almost a recluse, of Amazon for everything from books to kitchen supplies and bug spray.

It’s a book kind of weekend, and I intend to take full advantage of it. Hope you can curl up with a good book.

A do-nothing day

Sophie watching me at my desk

See those eyes?

Sometimes I have a do-nothing day. I think it’s therapeutic, because it usually signals the start of an intense work period the next day. So today I had one of those days, partly because my plans for yesterday and today fell through and left me at loose ends. I’m not sure why that’s an excuse, but it is.

So I got off to a slow start this morning and didn’t worry about it. Lingered over the morning’s email and political news, spent far too long on Facebook answering messages and inserting my two cents much more often than it was called for. Then I decided I had to study all the unread titles on my Kindle. A friend mentioned Gabrielle Hamilton’s memoir, Blood, Bones, and Butter, and I had read the free sample last night. But in the cold light of day I convinced myself to read something I had already bought before moving on to that one. So I decided on The Chilbury Ladies Choir, mostly because it reminds me a bit of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society—how English citizens coped with World War II.

But before reading, I moved on to a delightful hour going through recipes I’ve put aside to try. Doing this is productive because I make myself take a long look at each one and admit with about half that I’ll never fix them. So the folder grows thinner. And I planned some good suppers for myself—tonight, a potato and wurst skillet, tomorrow salmon—King salmon is on sale this week, and I think I’ll make cucumber soup to go with it. Had a great debate with myself—decided I wanted lamb, but did I want a loin chop or ground lamb for burgers? Decided on the burgers because then I’ll have them all week.

Finally, after a lunch of cottage cheese over cucumber, chopped tomato, and sliced scallion, I settled down to re-read an article online that is pertinent to the book I’m working on. I’ve read it before, but now, with much research and background behind me, I find new meaning in it, new facts that take on significance.

And then about two, the day suddenly and unexpectedly darkened, the sky turned gray, and the wind blew hard. Well, of course, nothing would do but that Sophie and I curl up in the bed for a nap. First time in a long while that she’s actually stayed on the bed, pretty much motionless—a blessing. Even now, with the day brighter and the rain seemingly stopped, she is reluctant to let me out of her sight. If I go to the bathroom, she accompanies me; if I do something in the kitchen, she lies in the bedroom doorway where she is close.

Guess it’s time for me to fix that supper of knockwurst, potato—I’ll add a bit of kraut for good measure.

Death and taxes, and a lot of other things

No, no death. I just always thought death and taxes went together--maybe because both are inevitable.

It’s amazing what you can get done when your knee hurts when you sit down, stand up, or walk. I spent most of the day at my desk—okay, there was that nap—but I got a lot done. Yesterday I tried five or six times to post Murder at the Tremont House, #2 of the Blue Plate Café Mysteries, to Kindle. Finally gave up last night, and posted it successfully this morning. This means all three Blue Plates are available again as e-books. Check it out at  http://www.amazon.com/Murder-Tremont-House-Mystery-Mysteries-ebook/dp/B01AQULPHU/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1453085593&sr=1-1&keywords=murder+at+the+tremont+house+KIndle. Please don’t be surprised at opportunities to buy it for over $1,000 in paperback. I’m never sure why Amazon puts those extravagant prices on out-of-print books. But Murder at the Tremont House is no longer available in print, except used copies. If you want to pay a thousand dollars for one, God bless you—but rest assured I get no royalties from those used sales.

People keep asking me what I’m writing. I’m tempted to say, “Nothing.” But my answer is that I’m “managing my career.” It’s true—I pushed myself for several years to write two or three books a year. Now I’m concentrating on marketing, making available titles that disappeared when my publisher went out of business. I’m blogging more and arranging blogs tours for Desperate for Death, which debuted this month as an e-book. I have two guest blogs to write by the 25^th—wrote one tonight and was totally dissatisfied with it. Will start over tomorrow.

And I’m planning ahead for the debut of a totally different novel, The Gilded Cage: A Novel of Chicago. It will launch in print and ebook in April, I’ll do a blog tour (yes, I’m working with a tour company that knows historical markets whereas I know mystery sites), and fretting every day about how to spread the word about this novel. I consider it my “big” novel. It’s Chicago history from 1847 through the Columbian Exposition, the Gilded Age which much like our own saw a great division between wealthy and poor. Central to the story are the Potter Palmers (he of Palmer House hotel fame). While Potter built a fortune and became a leader in Chicago politics and society, his wife worked to turn philanthropy into good deeds. Pardon me, but I think it’s a good story, and I’m excited about it. More to come later.

I also started on taxes tonight, answering the basic questions on the organizer and putting my bank statements into order so I can go through them easily. A yearly chore that I dread, but once I get started, I know I’ll move ahead on it.

I’ve been watching the Democratic debate with one eye and listening with one ear. They haven’t sunk to the level or anger at the Republican debates but I am sad that they are attacking and accusing each other-Clinton and Sanders, while O’Malley remains the voice of calm. I liked it better when there was a sense of collegiality.

Okay, enough work for the day. I just got Julie Hyzy’s Foreign Eclairs, and I’m going to read. Sweet dreams, everyone.

The Creeping Disease of Inertia

Inertia crept up on me this weekend. After a week that seemed busy and crowded with people, I so looked forward to two days at home alone, getting work done. Saturday I finished reading emails and Facebook, read the newspaper such as it is, and then wondered what to do—all my work projects seemed on hold depending on someone else’s time schedule. So I read a mystery most of the day, napped, and made myself from-scratch noodles (not mac) and cheese—really good if I do say so. But by Saturday night, I felt inertia had crept up and taken charge, and I planned to stay home Sunday too.

The old me would have gone to church this morning and with my kids to the Boar’s Head Festival at our church tonight. The new me didn’t have the spunk to do either. Once again, I read emails, Facebook, and the newspaper—which is a little meatier on Sundays. And then there I was. What would I do? I pulled myself out of my funk and began to proof one of my older mysteries that my former publisher had taken down. By two o’clock, I had finished Murder at the Tremont House and will post it next week.

Then the files for the print copy of Desperate for Death came by email from the formatter, and I—finally!—got it submitted and am now trying to submit files to Kindle. It keeps telling me important information is missing and please check the items marked in red. Only I can’t find them. I think it may be pricing information but so far I see no place to include that. I’ll keep trying like an obsessed woman. But every time I start over again, I have to re-key all the book information—very frustrating.

Having literally wasted 2015 moaning about my hip and leg pain, 2016 is the year I’m going to get serious again about my writing, so today was a good start. But just a start. I still have six mysteries to go, if I can find my way through the Kindle system. Still, it cheered me greatly to have done what I did today. I vanquished inertia, and now I look forward to a busy week filled with appointments that will get me out of the house and away from inertia.

Fool Girl

My short story, “Fool Girl,” is now available for Kindle readers. But there’s a backstory to this. I’m taking an online epublishing course, and our assignment for the second lesson was to post a short story to Kindle (pity the poor author who has no short stories—I don’t have that many, but what I have are collected in Sue Ellen Learns to Dance and Other Stories). I read the instructions, read them again, and decided I could never master all that.

Then I made myself work with two files open—the instructions and the file I wanted to post. Step by step, I followed the instructions. Sometimes I went backward; sometimes I decided it was impossible. But finally I had the story posted. You can find it at http://www.amazon.com/Fool-Girl-Judy-Alter-ebook/dp/B013YXZL3U/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1439751429&sr=1-4&keywords=Fool+Girl  Maybe by the time this posts the new cover will also be up—I just did that, and am actually feeling pretty proud of myself. I figured if I got it up as a lesson, I might as well put a low price on it and offer it for sale.

“Fool Girl” is based on a story I read in H. H. Halsell’s Cowboys and Cattleland. In truth, a young boy was at the center of the story but with my penchant for writing about girls and women of the West, I changed the protagonist and sent a lone girl out on the Texas prairie, with its danger of Comanches, to look for two lost work horses.  The story won a Western Heritage (Wrangler) Award from the National Cowboy Museum and Hall of Fame. I was almost as proud then as I am now of having posted it.

My goal, is to be able to post my next novel, Murder at Peacock Mansion, myself. We’ll see. Meantime, if you want a quick read, download “Fool Girl.” And if you find mistakes, let me know. I already know two places where my corrections simply didn’t post—there is a word “t” where it should be “at” and in about the author one paragraph is the wrong font and size. But I tried.

 

A marketing puzzle

One of the sad truths about the writing life these days is that writers spend as much time or more marketing their books than they do writing them. Or worrying about marketing and how to improve it. Gone are the days when your publisher handled marketing--all the author had to do was write, revise according to edits, and then smile and look pretty on book tours. Today we do all the work--and it's a big cause of worry. If I don't have many reviews on Amazon, how can I increase them? Is my blog attracting readers? Should I do some paid advertisings? Sponsor a giveway? Help!
I have a puzzle that is a bit different--I'm not at all worried about it but I wish I could figure out the secret so I could apply it to other titles. In the late 1970s Doubleday published a short novel of mine, Mattie, about a pioneer woman physician on the Nebraska frontier in the late nineteenth century. It was in the DoubleD series, which sold primarily to libraries and prisons, and as those books did, it sold modestly. It went out of print and was picked up by Leisure Books, which subsequently went out of business and the rights returned to me. I put it on Kindle at 99 cents, not expecting to have many sales. Within months, the book's sales ballooned--I got what I thought were large royalty checks, and they kept coming.
Today the royalty checks are a lot smaller, but that little book keeps selling and every week it gather two or three new reviews--it now has over 300, mostly 5-star. I do nothing to promote it because I'm not sure what to do. Perhaps it's the 99-cent price; I'm sure it's not the Spur Award from Western Writers of America, though I was mighty proud of that when I received it. The subject matter isn't in-your-face enough to sustain this long interest. A book of short stories, posted to Kindle at the same time, barely has any sales and maybe ten reviews.
I wish I knew the secret. I'd apply it to The Perfect Coed, which is the only other book I have control over. But it's a good dilemma to have.
Here's the opening paragraph of Mattie:
My mother was an unmarried mother, fallen woman, they called her back in Princeton, Missouri. They called her that and a lot worse names, most of which I didn’t understand at the time, thank goodness. It wasn’t just that Mama made one mistake—me—but I had a little brother, Will Henry, and neither of us had a father that we knew about. Will Henry was seven years younger than me, and you’d think I’d remember a man being around the house about that time to account for my brother’s appearance, but I didn’t. I used to wonder if Mama had somehow gotten caught in the great war just passed or if my father had fought in that war. For much of my growing-up years, Mama never told us if we had the same father or not. When either of us asked, Mama became flustered and impatient and usually just said, “I don’t want to talk about it.” There would be tears in her eyes that made me feel guilty and cruel, so I would abandon the subject