Having a little fun

Old What’s Her Face has the prettiest maple tree in our subdivision. I’ve been wanting to take a background picture for a week now, but it had been stormy.

I laid at the trunk and shot up through the branches. I wound up with four great pictures. One had an interesting cluster of leaves that dangled toward my phone. As wallpaper, that would be covered by the actual blog material. Two had varying levels of a sun flare that were also interesting. Wallpaper being what it it, those might have turned into light flare background and not left the Autumn colors I wanted.

In the end, I went with the simple but colorful one. How you read blogs will make a difference. It looks great on my iPad, but doesn’t show up at all on my phone. I like it and went with it.

We also decided to take the rest of the week off. We’re both feeling the strain in the workplace and have plenty of leave coming to us. Mine ties into the observed Veteran’s Day holiday, so I get more out of it than the hours I’m spending.

Then there was last night. About six months or so ago we bought tickets to see ZZ Ward. This was in the same small venue where we saw Larkin Poe last year. It was a great time.

She’s heavily pregnant right now, but it didn’t make any difference in the music. We had the balcony this time, but every seat there is great. If I had one gripe, we didn’t buy tickets to the drummer’s concert. Someone needed to adjust something so she was more of the main event.

She played her old songs, and some from her new album to give us a broad spectrum. I’m a bigger fan of her older stuff, but she teased a blues album coming out next year.

If you’ve never heard of her, she is worth checking out.

Maybe someday Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Ali Venable, or Samantha Fish will make their way out here. A couple of them landed in Salt Lake City and the West Coast. Boise is a happening place, so it will eventually happen.

Fairies, Myths, & Magic II

Let’s welcome a special guest to Entertaining Stories today. Coleen is a long-time friend and she has something to share with us today. This is her newest book baby, so feel free to use those sharing buttons. She also shares one heck of a great story hook. She also has a prize to be drawn from those who leave comments along her tour.

***

Thank you, Craig for the opportunity to share the news of my new book, just in time for the winter solstice and Yule.

Every Halloween, Craig joins me to celebrate the holiday. I think we’ve done this for eight years now, so I couldn’t think of anyone better to share my spooky Halloween tale with from Fairies, Myths, & Magic II, called The Changeling.

In this second book in the series, I start with late autumn and work forward into winter and Yule.

What do you know about the scary fairies? Celtic traditions share with us the fey, or Good Neighbors, are nothing to mess around with. During the darkness of autumn and into winter, the Unseelie Court of fairies makes its appearance. The darkness and lack of sunlight during this time of year spawned many a myth and tale.

Here’s a short excerpt from The Changeling, in Fairies, Myths, & Magic II:

“Alyssa, it’s time to come inside. Daddy’s home.”

Trish stepped outside and shielded her eyes against the red glare of the setting sun. She surveyed the backyard in a tight squint. The play area revealed two empty swings swaying in their own rhythm in the hot desert breeze. The door to the playhouse stood ajar, and the tiny curtains fluttered against the windows.

“Alyssa? Did you hear me? Daddy’s home.”

In the afternoon heat, Trish pushed the hair off her damp forehead and walked to the side of the house. Her footsteps crunched in the loose gravel. In the far corner of the yard, the wrought iron gate yawned open.

“What’s the matter? Where’s Alyssa?” David stepped outside and loosened his tie.

Trish jumped at the sound of David’s voice. “I don’t know. She was here before you pulled into the driveway. She was trying on her Halloween costume to show you how cute she looked. She went out back to play until you came home. You know, Alyssa never leaves the backyard.”

Bile burned the back of Trish’s throat. She gagged. Her breath caught, and terror sucked the breath from her lungs. Something wasn’t right. She felt it in the energy that swirled around her in a dense, vibrating whirlwind. It was the same sensation she felt before a monsoon hit and when electrical charges filled the desert sky with bolts of lightning.

David pulled her into his arms. “Shhhh… I’ll look in the front yard and down the street. She can’t be far. Meanwhile, check with the neighbors. You know how Alyssa loves Mrs. Craymore’s cat. She could be next door.”

Trish wrapped her arms around David’s waist. Her tears soaked his shirtfront. “What if someone took her?” Her voice sounded small in the descending eventide.

“Don’t jump to conclusions. Come on, go check with the neighbors, and I’ll meet you out front in a few minutes after I look around.”

David gently wiped the tears from Trish’s eyes with his fingers.

“Find Alyssa. I’ll check with Mrs. Craymore.”

Trish hurried down the street in the opposite direction.

~ ~ ~

Do David and Trish find their daughter, Alyssa? And what do the fairies have to do with her disappearance? Learn the answers and more in Fairies, Myths, & Magic II.

About the Book:

In this second book in the Fairies, Myths, & Magic series, step into a world where dark fairies, and other magical beings converge in a collection of poetry and short stories inspired by winter and the celebration of the winter solstice.

From Autumn’s scary fairies to the forgotten female characters of Yule, prepare to embrace the magical winter solstice myths from around the world. Meet Frau Holle in the Wild Hunt, Befana—the Christmas Witch of Italy, and the Japanese goddess Ameratasu who controls the springtime. Prepare to embrace the Scottish trows, The Irish Goddess of Winter—the Cailleach Béara, and Snegurochka—the Snow Girl.

Learn how to make Yuletide rituals part of your celebration by embracing the symbols of Yule by decorating with evergreens and crystals.

Fairies, Myths, & Magic II Links:

Colleen’s Amazon Author Page: https://www.amazon.com/Colleen-M-Chesebro/e/B01N9MV2RX

Amazon Universal Link: https://mybook.to/FairiesMythsMagicII

About the Author:

An avid reader, Colleen M. Chesebro rekindled her love of writing poetry after years spent working in the accounting industry. These days, she loves crafting syllabic poetry, flash fiction, and creative fiction and nonfiction.

In addition to poetry books, Chesebro’s publishing career includes participation in various anthologies featuring short stories, flash fiction, and poetry. She’s an avid supporter of her writing community on Word Craft Poetry.com by organizing and sponsoring a weekly syllabic poetry challenge, called #TankaTuesday, where participants experiment with traditional and current forms of Japanese and American syllabic poetry.

Chesebro isan assistant editor of The Congress of the Rough Writers Flash Fiction Anthology & Gitty Up Press, a micro-press founded by Charli Mills and Carrot Ranch.

In January 2022, Colleen founded Unicorn Cats Publishing Services to assist poets and authors in creating eBooks and print books for publication. In addition, she creates affordable book covers for Kindle and print books.

Chesebro lives in the house of her dreams in mid-Michigan surrounded by the Great Lakes with her husband and two (unicorn) cats, Chloe & Sophie.

Find Colleen here:

Word Craft Poetry: https://wordcraftpoetry.com

Colleen M. Chesebro, Author, Poet & Unicorn Cats Publishing Services: https://colleenmchesebro.com

Facebook Page: Colleen M. Chesebro, Poet & Author: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100085941528913

LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/colleen-m-chesebro-6b856b237

The best month of the year

It’s October, and I love it. Things are cooling off after the outrageous summer we had. Leaves are starting to turn, and everything feels right again.

I was an October baby, so maybe that’s part of it. Old What’s Her Face made me some pumpkin cinnamon rolls for breakfasts. They’re nothing fancy, just the Pop & Fresh kind, but it was sweet of her.

I’ve been working my way through a variety pack of pumpkin beers from Elysian brewing. The Dark ‘O the Moon Pumpkin Stout is really good.

Pumpkin isn’t the only Fall flavor in my world. Mom sent up some of her homemade chokecherry jelly. I would have preferred syrup, but I had it on a pancake this morning anyway. It’s a taste of Fall from my childhood.

We’ve been fiddling with Halloween themed shows to watch. RL Stein has a more adult themed series of films on Netflix. Old What’s Her Face loved the first one, but I had a tough time getting into it. It’s a long month, so there could be something good coming up.

She used her birthday money and bought a Traeger Grill. She loves her gadgets and had to have the one that connects to her phone via wifi. She likes the idea of adjusting the temps while out doing other things. This meant she had to name it. She called it “The Chamber of Barbecue Secrets.” I figured you guys would get a chuckle out of that, I did.

Things are going to get busy at Entertaining Stories, too. I’m taking the entire Hat Series out on tour. This involves having written a bunch of unique posts, so they’re all worth reading. I’ll reblog everything here in an attempt to drive traffic to my hosts. There are going to be some free days, so if you’ve wanted to get into this series, this is a good month to dive in. One volume per week, and it all kicks off at Teri’s Bad Moon Rising event. Promoting a paranormal series in October feels like the right thing to do.

It’s important to support your hosts. If any of you feel so inclined, share the posts from their sites. This could boost their traffic and net them some new followers.

I’ll be watching the comments all month, so let me hear from you along the route.

I sent the second to last chapter of Good Liniment out to my critique group, and Lanternfish is in the hands of my formatter. This means starting all over again when I publish Lanternfish, and getting ready for Good Liniment in the late winter sometime.

Are any of you excited for Fall, October in general, or Halloween? Let me hear from you.

A day off

I got to sleep in a whole hour this morning; 5:30 yay! I started my day with a cruise through social media, and a lot of bulldogs in my lap.

It was about 60 degrees outside today and bright sunshine. Pretty awesome. I went to lunch with an old work colleague, and enjoyed catching up with her. We could have had sloppy rain or even snow, so it was a nice day. The Boise area is awash in Autumn colors, so that only enhanced the day.

Otherwise, I pulled down my novella, The Hat, and looked at it with fresh eyes. It’s been fermenting in cyberspace for weeks now, and this is on purpose. A bit of distance seems to provide a more accurate vision.

I changed a few things, but not much. This was a first editing pass, not a deep search for problem words or anything like that. There is something different with this story, and I want to discuss that here.

In my novels, I usually reach a point where I’m sick to death of them. I’ve spent so much time with these characters that it wears me out. By the time they’re published I love them again, but it’s a cycle I’ve always gone through.

This story still excites me as much as when I first started. I suspect this has something to do with the length. It’s a novella, so I can read through it in one day. I also love a good buddy story, and this one fits that description.

I’m going to avoid the term “character driven” when I market it. I always thought it was a pretty good descriptor, but some bloggers have turned this into something bad. They claim it’s author-speak for a story with no plot or focus. (Psst, don’t tell anyone, but this is character drive fiction.) If you’ve enjoyed any of my characters in the past, you’re probably going to like these guys too.

I used some light-duty graphics in this story. One of the challenges when editing is keeping the graphics where they belong after rewording things. This may drive my formatter crazy, but I’m willing to pay extra to keep them. Don’t know how they’ll transfer when I share it with beta readers. I write in Pages, but email out in Word format.

I also started Sean Harrington working on some Lisa Burton promotional posters for this one. I have some fun ideas for them, and can’t wait to see the results of his magic.

All in all it was a great day. Got some decent work done, got to visit with an old friend that I also share a birthday with, now I get to watch the World Series. Can’t complain at all.

Should have gone elk hunting

Today was a rare day for me. My son and I went grouse hunting. Regular readers will know that finding and getting the grouse is the smallest part of days like this. It's the excuse to leave the house and head for the National Forest.

The joy is in a beautiful Autumn day, valuable time with my oldest son, and the chance to step away from my paycheck job and writing.

The grouse were almost absent. We saw one, and my son harvested him for his supper. This was at the very end of the day. (He has to clean his shotgun, I don't. Joke's on him.)

The morning arrived cold and crisp, as it should. We saw a few deer at the lower elevations. Then we spotted a herd of about 40 elk. I keep a small pair of binoculars in my truck, so we checked them out. The old herd bull gathered quite a harem, and he was working awfully hard to keep them happy. You know he was a big one when you can see antlers from three quarters of a mile in the pre-dawn.

Four small satellite bulls stalked the outer fringes of his harem. Whenever the herd bull chose a particular cow to get amorous with, the satellite bulls slipped in and tried to romance the remaining cows. This pissed the old boy off and he ran them into the sagebrush, circled the cows, and it all started over again.

We watched them for a long time. Idaho has a lot of elk, but you don't see a display like that every day. We eventually pulled up to the hunting area and parked. Old What's her Face made us a baggie of Scotch Eggs for breakfast. Our forest is a pine forest, but the underbrush was a riot of Fall colors.

There were elk at every bend in the road. We saw cow/calf pairs, groups of three and four, almost all day long. Grouse were completely absent. Turkeys were everywhere though. We only saw one other guy, and his tent was completely surrounded by turkeys. We laughed at the idea of some Fall turkey hunter, deep in the woods and hunting hard, while the turkeys invaded his camp.

There were more deer too, and one was a small buck. He would normally draw attention, but the elk outclassed him.

Our mule deer will usually stand for a picture. Elk don't. I'd love to post a picture for you, but they were either too far, or disappeared into the forest too fast.

We had some great father/son time too. He's looking forward to the next job site, but today we were both available. We visited my favorite apple tree, but they were all too far to reach. This usually means the deer and bears ate all the ones I could reach. I decided I'm too old and fat to go climbing in trees.

I have a post up over at Story Empire today. I wrote it a week ago and used the scheduler. This one is about working your blog tour. It's aimed toward authors, and some of you may want to check it out.

In a way, this day was provided to me because the scheduler lets me keep fresh content out there. That's a scary thought.

Anyway, today is my grandson's eighth birthday. We're all getting together tonight for some cake and ice cream. Hope all of you had a wonderful day too.

It’s Time to go Hunting

It’s time to go hunting, and this is my shotgun.

Old Betsy

It’s that time of year in the Northern Hemisphere. Things are cooling off and the flies are trying to get inside. I wrote a guest post for October, and the little buggers are all over the place. Every time the old dog wants in or out they rush the door. I want to work on my critiques today, but I think this issue needs to be addressed.

I bought the unlimited ammo upgrade, and no license is required. “You hear that, flies? I’m here to chew bubble gum and kick ass, and I’m all out of bubble gum.”

My favorite time of year

I love Fall. The weather changes, but still provides glimpses of Summer and Winter. The occasional 90 degree day could be in the same week as the first frost. (Note: I can’t wait for the first frost, so we can get rid of these flies.)

Leaves start changing, and we’re getting the first hints in the Boise area. Geese are forming into huge flocks. Rumor has it they’re supposed to fly south, but many stay here all year. The neighbors’ sunflowers all died and drooped. The local squirrel has been having a great time with them.

I can usually find a few cheesy movies to watch this time of year. I like the really dumb ones. Watching for you, Little Shop of Horrors, and tell Young Frankenstein he’s on deck.

One of the best new things about Fall is pumpkin – everything. We’ve already worked our way through a bag of pumpkin M & Ms. My wife bought me a bag of pumpkin Oreos, and they’re pretty good. Today I had a pumpkin spice latte. I never drink fancy coffee, but pumpkin spice was enough to draw me in.

We went to the Boise Co-Op so I could look for pumpkin beers. Pumpkin beers are one of my favorites, and I’ve been enjoying them for weeks already. The Co-Op always has a broad selection of things, so we drove downtown.

I wound up with about five different ones. My beer palate is in the neighborhood of porters and stouts; those black thick beers that use roasted grains. Lo and behold, I bought a pumpkin porter and a pumpkin stout. If someone ever brews a pumpkin dopplebock I’ll buy several cases and move to the mountains for a week.

My wife hasn’t even started baking yet. She usually whips up a pumpkin goodie or two, and she’s an outstanding cook.

Maybe a bowl of pumpkin soup, a pumpkin porter, with pumpkin bread for dessert. Then I can watch an old Bruce Campbell movie as the evening entertainment.

What’s your favorite season? What’s your favorite thing about Fall?