Ideas, Ideas, and More Ideas -- Ideas, Everywhere I Turn!

I can really relate to '80s pop icon Gino Vannelli, because for thirty-two years I've been lost, living inside myself.  Lost somewhere inside my own dreams, to quote.  From the moment that very bright light went off -- a supernova, as I recall it that misty summer night when I was fifteen and the certainty that I was a writer, would be an author, took hold in my blood, my marrow, my soul -- finding things to write about hasn't been a problem.  Ideas, as a famous writer said recently during a panel at World Horror Con, usually aren't; it's finding the right ones.  I'm not as savvy as some writers about separating the wheat from the chaff, the solid from the flimsy, the good from the bad. During that summer in 1980 when I had six unwritten story ideas and began to pull my act together, displaying early promise at the level of organization I live my life to today, I've operated under a strict 'write everything you create to conclusion' policy (maybe to my detriment in the bigger picture, but not when it comes to the actual joy of creating, which is more important to me than the rest of the trappings associated with any level of success in a creative field). Good, bad, or ugly -- and there have been more than a few ugly children born of these fingertips -- I love them all.  Some of the ugliest taught me more about story construction and writing through to the end of a draft than the good and prettiest, which were written and sold and garnered praise with comparative ease.

My 'career' started with those six unwritten stories (a hundred-plus pager that same summer starred all of my neighborhood friends as characters and kept said friends riveted as they waited to learn what happened next).  When those six were completed and stored with pride in a plastic file box I picked up at the local Woolworth's Department Store for $2.99, I found myself with six more unwritten ideas. By December of 1982 on the night I quit high school, determined to write full-time, I had two dozen. After a five-year break in which I barely picked up my pen, I returned to my old ideas with two dozen more that had floated in the ether of my memory for half a decade.  I've written almost daily since; at one point in 2005, the number of unwritten story ideas inside my card catalog swelled to a monstrous 260.

(THEN: A folder thick with old story ideas long-since written
in first drafts and archived in my filing cabinets)

The number grew so ridiculously inflated because for ten years I worked constantly writing nonfiction features, columns, reviews, and celebrity profiles/interviews for numerous national magazines and a handful of prestigious newspapers like the Boston Herald and Metro Boston, the city's subway newspaper, to pay the bills.  I continued to pen short stories and novels during that time and sold more than a few.  But by the end of 2007, I made the determination that I was no longer going to write nonfiction and focus solely on the work I truly loved: my own original stories.  The ideas never stopped coming at me and taking up residence inside my idea box, where I often imagined them howling at night to be released.  They still haven't, through dreams, snippets of overheard dialogue, or pure, simple daydreaming (the novella "Brood Swamp" that I am so proud of that concludes my recently published collection of stories long and short, The Fierce and Unforgiving Muse: Twenty-Six Tales from the Terrifying Mind of Gregory L. Norris, seized hold of me in 2005 while I stood at the kitchen sink washing dishes and staring into the deep woods beyond).  While the past four years have been wonderful in terms of creative output and raw numbers (in 2010, I penned 100 individual fiction projects to completion, a mix of novels, novellas, short fiction, flash fiction, and even one short screenplay), the idea factory inside my skull has worked to keep up.  I presently have 125 unwritten ideas on note cards in the box.  Since returning home from the western United States last month with three new ideas, another four have demanded I take notice of them and jot down their bare bones.

(NOW: Ideas completed in draft, notes logged in my organizer)

Two weeks ago, I woke from the most insanely captivating dream about a strange family that lived in a big haunted house at the end of a country road and almost immediately began to record the details on paper.  I won't say that "The Strange Family That Lives in the Big House on Lonesome Oaks Lane" wrote itself, but at every point in the bizarre story, which is, at its heart, about one unconventional family's love for its members, I found myself smiling and enjoying the characters, cheering them on to triumph over their travails. This past Sunday, while driving past our local golf course en route to the cinema, another latched onto me, and "Game of Golf" was born.  And just last night while preparing dinner, two clunky old cars traveling down our road unleashed yet one more story premise in this flash-flood of new ideas that surrounds me.  Story ideas...they're everywhere!

Read the End First!

Last December on a brisk, overcast Sunday afternoon, I moseyed into my Writing Room (I was penning fresh pages on my beloved lap desk in the living room at the time while No Country for Old Men played on the flatty) to find a Facebook IM waiting from Suzanne Robb.  Suzanne and fellow editor Adrian Chamberlin were compiling a new anthology for Wicked East Press, a brilliant themed collection that would examine the end of the world as imagined through different apocalyptic scenarios, each tale tied to a specific time zone and place.  At the very Eleventh Hour, an author who had committed to the book left the editors high and dry -- did I have anything in my idea catalog or file cabinets full of first draft manuscripts set in Islamabad at midnight during the end of the world?  If so, would I be interested in sending it along?

I promised I'd get right back to Suzanne just as soon as I ran an eye over my manifest of completed stories.  A quick scan showed that I hadn't written anything appropriate, nor did I have an idea sitting in my card catalog of unwritten projects that would work -- the guidelines were that specific.  However, they were also that fantastic and I love a literary challenge so, within an hour, the germ of an idea whispered in my ear.  I didn't have a lot of time -- the book was due to be turned into the publisher in less than a week.  I committed, knowing some of the bylines already associated with Read the End First, fine scribes like Craig R. Saunders, whose contribution "Red" I'd read first the previous summer during a for-fun manuscript exchange.  Other notables included John McCuaig, Patrick D'Orazio, Ms. Robb, David Dunwoody, Dave Jeffery, Emma Ennis, the delightful Darren Gallagher, and the Sniders, Henry and Hollie, great friends and talented writers alike (Hollie has become one of my favorite contemporaries, her tales layered and luscious and always such a treat).  One day later, I had the scope of what I wanted to say in my story, "The Midnight Moon," about a young professional man living in Islamabad who laments lost dreams on the night that a shift in the orbit of Earth's moon leads the lone satellite too close to its primary planet, Midnight +5 GST.  I wrote the story quickly, fired off my edited draft, and closed that gap in the anthology's twenty-four hour story cycle.  End was just released, and the book -- blurbed and foreworded by a stellar lineup that includes Jonathan Mayberry, Graham Masterton, Joe McKinney, Marianne Halbert, and Joe Schreiber -- not only meets the build-up in anticipation, but mightily exceeds it.  A page-turner from cover to cover, I was lucky to get many of my fellow authors (and Gary McCluskey, who created End's gorgeous cover art) to share the back stories behind their excellent contributions to the end of the world.

DA Chaney on "Elemental Bonds": The idea for “Elemental Bonds” came to me as an ‘anti-love’ story premise. Instead of portraying the main characters in a loving and deeply profound relationship, I wanted to explore the idea of revealing people who weren’t even fond of each other. Folks who were opposites thrown together in life, but more importantly, in death, as well. I had to then deposit the characters into my desired time zone. In looking up ship tours in the Antarctic, there were some hidden gems. Not only were there vacation packages for voyages through the area, but also an ecological research facility called “Palmer Station” with photo’s, descriptions, history, weather conditions, and even a live outdoor video broadcast with a fifteen second relapse feed!  I took some liberties, especially with a fictitious cruise line route that would place my characters close enough to where I needed them to be and with a hypothesized layout for Palmer Station’s internal structure but otherwise, that’s how the story came together. The title comes from two places. It indicates the creature type highlighted in the story and the emotional bond between my characters. It is also a nod to a quest-line from the World of Warcraft. It was truly a delight to write my piece for ‘Read the End First’ and I’m very glad I was able to be a part of a collection of stories brought together for the purpose of proposing the final moments of Earth.

Adrian Chamberlin on "Resisting RagnarÖk":  "The Sons of Loki took the name of the Gods in vain, used us as justification for their murderous rage. They wish to see the world burn. And burn it will...they have invoked the slander-bearer of the gods, the Father of Lies, for their own purpose. The world shall tremble."

"One of the joys of participating in this anthology was being allowed to choose your own apocalypse. I asked Suzanne for a timeline that crossed Iceland because it's a country that fascinates me. I originally started posting Icelandic Proverbs as a weekly Facebook status updates for a giggle: "Pissing in your shoes won't keep your feet warm for long," and "cultures live and die, but the cheese is immortal" kept me amused, but then reading more of the country sparked a love affair with a land I've never visited, and spurred a desire to write a story using Iceland as a setting. Coupled with my interest in Norse mythology, Ragnarok was the obvious apocalypse. But a futuristic one? THAT was the challenge, so the first thing to do was to check out when the next total eclipse was due: that would be the wolf swallowing the sun. I liked the idea of a religious terrorist sect that plotted destruction in the name of a Norse god, and stealing a weapon that took its name from the World Serpent, so the metaphorical becomes literal. Now I want to visit - I have until 2029 to save before Iceland meets the doom I foretold. Should be enough time to save for about four beers in a Reykjavik bar, I think..." 

Darren Gallagher on "The Only Place to Die": "When I was asked to write a story for "Read The End First" and only had a few time zones to choose from, I agreed even though I had no idea what I was going to write about. Then I remembered an idea that I'd gotten a few weeks before. It was about a man sitting on a boat in the middle of the sea at night, reminiscing about a lost love. So with the -11 slot free, it was the perfect setting for my story, "The Only Place To Die." It was a story I wanted to put a lot of emotion, atmosphere, and descriptive writing into. And with the backdrop of the Aurora while comets rain down on the earth, I think I managed to do just that. I hope everyone enjoys reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it."

Suzanne Robb on "The Barrier Between Here and There": "The idea for this story came to me many years ago when I was in an Old World Pre-History class at University.  My professor talked about this mysterious wall that at the time was a point of tension because of land rights.  No one could prove how old it was or how it was made with such exact measurements.  There were also bones found of what archaeologists thought might be some sort of "rat alien" proving there were settlers there prior to the Maori. I imagined a whole race of gruesome creatures with strange bones and wondered what if there had been a war between good and evil and at the end a barrier was built in order to keep them at bay.  What if the barrier broke?"

Henry Snider on "Stormfront": "As I was drawing a blank as to what to write, I asked Suzanne to give me the hardest time zone to place in the hopes the location would provide the story.  With only a small cluster of islands to work with and a local population rivaling that of the typical Walmart on any given day, I ended up with "Stormfront."  Early on, while writing the story, I had trouble because of constant noise right outside my window.  Then, two sentences later, my problem became the focus of the story.  Funny how things work out that way."

R.B. Payne on "Kaupe, God of the Cannibal Dog-Men": "While in Hawaii, I became aware of a legend about an ancient god and his army of dog-men that fought many battles and nearly conquered all of the Hawaiian islands. In the end, he was defeated but the legend had it that he still lived in the clouds above O'ahu and was waiting to return. As I sat and looked across the white sands of Waikiki Beach, I wondered... what if Kaupe returned today amidst the tourists, hotels, and shopping arcades? That was the genesis of the story and I took it to an apocalyptic level where there were few human survivors left and no communication with the 'outside' world. It was an entertaining story to write and I hope the readers of Read the End First really enjoy it."

Rebecca Snow on "Best Intentions": "Aside from knowing that Garfield always packed Nermal in a shipping crate and sent him to Abu Dhabi, I knew nothing about the area before being asked to write a story for the +4 time zone.  With the help of friends who had been there and lots of research, I was able to piece together a reality the characters could inhabit.  I had a lot of different ideas for an apocalypse, but I was limited in my knowledge of the people.  I restricted the story to mostly public spaces and something we all have... atmosphere."

Craig Saunders on "Red": “I wrote 'Red' in one sitting (not including the barbaric edits!) with the barest of research. I hate research, and when the topic of a time zone came up I nabbed Japan early on, because I lived there for five years. Any excuse to avoid research! Shinigami (Death) is a central feature of the story, as is a mysterious disease. I won't go into too much detail, but I loved setting what was basically a show-down in a wasted Japan...it's old school Samurai meets the apocalypse, I guess you could say!” 

Patrick D'Orazio on "What Rough Beast?": "When I received my copy of the book I found myself amused at the commentary that Joe McKinney provided, because he uses the same poem in his analysis as I did to craft the name of my story, "What Rough Beast?"  He also talks about how the old tales of the apocalypse would have morphed into new tales, with new beasts, had they been written today.  Well my tale actually takes a step back and is far from being 'ripped from today's headlines' it actually revisits that baffling book of the bible, Revelation.  I chose Bethlehem, and more specifically, the Church of the Nativity, which is built over the place where it is believed that Jesus was born.  So why wouldn't the birthplace of Christianity play a part in the demise of the world?  I thought it made sense, at least within the twisted passageways of my mind."

Stephen A. North on "Like a Man": "Had nothing, no idea at all, until Suzanne told me my time zone. I thought Rio would make an interesting location, and it would have weather similar to what I'm familiar with (Florida). I'd also been curious about the Hollow Earth Theory, and have an interest in the various species of humanity. While reading up about Rio I found out that they have a problem with exploding manhole covers. All of those things came together in my brain, and next thing I knew, Neanderthals were back."

Patrick Shand on "That Guy Who Writes Zombie Novels": "That Guy Who Writes Zombie Novels" is my love song to small presses. I primarily write comic books and young adult novels, so 2011 was an odd year for me - I spent a good portion of it writing and submitting creepy tales to small press horror anthologies. I thought it fitting that my final tale of the year would be very much about indie publishers and the mindset of a writer trying to make lasting statements through short stories. There's a bunch of me in R. T. Spike, but he's also an amalgamation of a bunch of wonderful authors and editors who have worked on anthologies with me. On the horror side of things, I wanted to tell the tale of the least fun zombie apocalypse ever. See, the recent zombie craze has had legions of people imagining the epic kills they'd score if the dead went all Kirkman - but what if the zombies still had all of their smarts, emotions, and memories... but just couldn't control their urges? That, to me, is sad as hell. I hope "That Guy Who Writes Zombie Novels" makes you all sorts of depressed, while also tickling your funny bone. I like my apocalypse with a heavy heaping of chuckles, and I hope R. T. Spike and I delivered.”

Dave B. Jeffery on "Ice Rage": “When I was first approached to contribute to the anthology I found myself stumped for a storyline. Having just finished several zombie stories for other anthologies I did not want to do another post-apocalyptic piece using this angle. I mulled it over and, if I'm honest, came close to turning the offer down as I didn't feel I could bring anything fresh to the table. As such, the idea for “Ice Rage” came by complete chance. I watched John Carpenter's The Thing and Niles' 30 Days of Night within the same week. I made a decision that a horror story with the savagery of 30 Days of Night and the human dynamics of The Thing would be something I'd be interested in writing. Given that both stories were based in frigid climates, I began to consider this within the context of the anthology and came up with an apocalypse based on another ice age. That damn 30 Days of Night movie kept at me to the point where I wanted to do an homage. Vampires were out, of course, so I needed an alternative supernatural creature; one that could survive -79 temperatures. Well, the Yeti came to mind almost immediately and then the story just flowed! A bunch of angry Yeties and Ice Rage was rolling. So, in short, my contribution is 30 Days of Night -- with Yeties!”

John McCuaig on "EMP": "Sometimes I feel as though we take too much for granted, even as I type this reply do I praise the wonder of electricity and the power of the internet as I stab away at the keyboard? Every time I open a newspaper I read about a raft of new inventions and ideas designed to improve our lifestyle. Do you ever wonder if we are pushing things too fast and too hard? What would happen if one day all technology was ripped away, how would we then react? Could the majority of us even survive without our creature comforts never mind the basics of heat and light? E.M.P is a story of the ultimate experiment gone wrong, mankind is thrown back into the stone age, and like clockwork, every few hours a powerful wave returns to remind us of our frailty."

Brooke and Scott Fabian on "Not With a Bang": "In late 2011 the news cycle was dominated by the story of an Ohio man who opened the cages of his private zoo before killing himself.  Sadly, the horrific task of catching, and mostly dispatching, escaped exotic animals was inherited by the local authorities.  Images of dead lions and tigers lined up in neat rows ricocheted from one media outlet to the next. The whole event had a kind of "end of days" quality that both entranced and repelled us. We decided right then that our story would take place at the Anchorage Zoo.  There was one problem -- the threat of escaped animals is not particularly horrifying when the world is dying.  Still, those images of animal carcasses where genuinely disturbing and curiously...moving.  We agreed to write a sweet story about the end of the world. Like Life is Beautiful, but in a zoo. It is our hope that Not With a Bang is a toned down apocalypse story that any reader can relate to." 

Emma Ennis on "Hammered and Nail": “When the good Ms. Robb emailed me asking for my chosen timezone for Read the End First, I think I was in the midst of a particularly bad bout of homesickness. This, I imagine, was the main reason that prompted me to begin my annihilation of the world in Norway - one simply cannot initiate the apocalypse from one's beloved home country... well, all excepting Mr. Wayne Goodchild of course. Henceforth, 'Hammered and Nail' poured its foundations in GMT+1. For some time I'd had a single word scribbled on a page of one of my many notebooks, surrounded by a lot of blinding white space - 'tetanus.' It had been on my poor jaded mind for a long time to cook up a tale as horrible as haggis, with tetanus at its core. This was primarily due to a grotesque picture I had come across on the web, of the state of 'opisthotonos' induced by the disease. When Suzanne mentioned the premise of Read the End First there was no doubt in my mind as to how the world would end: Tetanus. It was that simple. All it took was one Lars Jensen, a rusty nail, and a fear of needles, and the end was nigh. Hey, don't look at me, blame the Norwegians!

Wayne Goodchild on "The Heavens Reflect Our Labors": "I'm sure many people secretly (and not so secretly) wish for the destruction of their hometown. With Read the End First, Suzanne Robb finally gave me a legitimate chance to utterly destroy Scunthorpe in 'The Heavens Reflect Our Labors'. The title comes from an old motto relating to the vast steel works that dominate the town, and how the glow from the various furnaces would light up the night sky. The steel industry and subsequently the works are slowly dying, so there is less instance of this sort of thing happening nowadays, and I wondered what it might be like if the world itself realized this and staged a different type of 'industrial revolution'. I'm really interested in how people typically despise their place of birth, even if it's nowhere near as bad as they make it out to be, and decided to put all those feelings into one man - Dave Moore, the "hero" of the story. Is he our one hope for salvation, or destined to be consumed by the new world he finds himself in? Who knows! Well, you will once you've read the story. OR WILL YOU?"

Sean M. Thompson on ""The Time of the Shaman": "My story was merely an attempt to find some kind of common theme among Siberia, and the other regions [in that time zone]. One of the things I discovered was that shamanism, if you went back far enough, could be found in most of the regions. So, I went from there.  Likewise, I enjoy writing about the soul. I'm not sure if I even believe in the concept of a soul, as an agnostic/hedonist/believer in animism/paganism, but it sure is fun to picture groups of silent masked people in robes with all sorts of translucent ghosts flying around them."

Hollie Johani-Snider on "Blood and Soil": "Blood and Soil" came to me when I was researching for another story idea involving World War II, Zyklon B, Nazis and the New York Museum of Natural History. I know, not your typical story combination. And yes, I'm still working on that one too. Anyway, the story title of "Blood and Soil" came about from this research and is an actual German ideology focusing on an ethnicity based on two factors -- descent of people (Blood) and their homeland (Soil).  The real theory celebrates the relationship people and the land they live on, placing more value on rural than urban living. Naturally, I had to twist this. I'd been reading a lot on the expeditions to Mars and the colonization theories, and found out Jupiter's moon, Titan, could be a possible place for human colonization. So, I figured these Germans are a fanatical branch of the Nazis who want to cleanse the Earth of anyone who doesn't celebrate the "back to basics" way of living through an arranged mining accident, then take those they valued off to a secret colony.  People are chosen by these fanatics for their skill set in forming a new, superior race, not on their ethnic background. And poor Ethan has the nasty job of setting these wheels in motion. As for why Yellowknife? Why not? It's relatively remote, has a great source to introduce a toxin, and already has some Superfund issues."

And the talented Gary McMahon, on his beautiful cover art: "I have to admit when Suzanne (that's Ms. Robb to you people) said she needed a cover for a ' for the love anthology', I thought she meant porn so I said 'yes' right away.  Heh, just kidding, let me start over. Apocalyptic fiction (pre- post- whatever) is probably my favorite genre of fiction. I Am Legend, The Stand, even the War of the Worlds are all favorites of mine. The concept behind Read the End First couldn't be any cooler for someone like me to illustrate. Suzanne gave me a few suggestions of what she and co-editor Adrian Chamberlin were looking for. Mostly they wanted to get the point across that these stories would run the gamut for end of the world fiction and didn't want to show a single specific world's ending. The idea was to do this fairly quickly before I went in for hernia surgery. That didn't happen so much of it was finished in a Vicodin haze. Hopefully the viewer first sees the bright colors of the Earth breaking apart. From there my plan was that the viewer would (looking left to right) see the moon crashing into the Earth and see the procession of midnight clocks all swirling down to the 'end of time-end of life' black hole. Originally it was to have Lovecraftian tentacles writhing out of it. That looked too busy and too specific so it became an Evil Death Skull. Finally, it needed a title that was bold but again, not too busy. The blocky white type seemed to work and the touch of destruction in End was enough to fit the mood of the cover. Oh, and it's all digital, all Photoshop. That's the end of the art lesson for today."

Long Live Jonathan Frid

There are points where we turn in one direction, and our entire life alters -- had we gone the opposite way, our worlds would be completely different.  For me, the major turning points involve a September night in 1975, seated in front of the television; a trip to the movies with my group of high school friends on a balmy late August night in the summer of 1980 that amounted to the biggest permission slip of my life: to be what I wanted most, a writer; quitting a thankless job I loathed for a creative career and literary lifestyle I love, July 1991; my first writing retreat, Wentworth Mountain, October 1993. Before the first of those times when my life turned in the correct directions, leading me to this present morning in the then-unthinkable year of 2012, there was Dan Curtis's brilliant and dreamy daytime soap opera, Dark Shadows, which ran from 1966-71.

Set in fictional Collinsport, Maine, DS followed the week-daily travails of the cursed Collins Family, whose extended membership included werewolves, ghosts, witches, Franken-humans, Lovecraftian old gods, and bloodsuckers.  Most celebrated among the drama's paranormal players was Barnabus Collins, the 175-year-old vampire played so seductively by Jonathan Frid.  Sporting the best windswept haircut ever, an onyx ring, and a silver wolf's-head cane, Frid's Barnabus was suave, mysterious, and supremely handsome.  Barnabus Collins didn't turn me gay but, at so early an age, his masculine elegance unleashed powerful emotions that helped me to understand and embrace my sexual identity -- not so easy a thing given the time in which I grew up.

On April 13, 2012, Jonathan Frid passed away, less than a month before the premiere of the new Tim Burton big screen parody of Dark Shadows, in which the late, great actor reportedly boasts a brief cameo.  General consensus regarding the film is that we fans of the original will either love it for what it is, or hate it for what it isn't.  Regardless, until I join Mister Frid beyond the veil in whatever afterlife awaits, I will always love him for contributing mightily to what has been a very happy, well-lived life -- and part of me will ever be in love with the immortal character he brought to life in the role of Barnabus Collins.

Old Dog, New Tricks

(ten of my 'retired' Sheaffer fountain pens)

Most of the music I love is readily available on the Oldies channels now that songs from the '80s are officially considered 'classics'.  There's very little new that I like on the radio anyway, satellite or FM. Ditto for TV shows.  I'm a creature of habit.  An old dog.  It is what it is and I'm okay with it, mostly.

For thirty-two years, I have written with the same wonderful Scheaffer fountain pens I began collecting in 1980 at the age of fifteen, after a daily sum of fresh story pages that hasn't been repeated since and likely never will -- fifty in total -- transformed my right hand into a claw.  The Sheaffers are elegant, comfortable and, given our long history together, beloved.  They glide across the page. I only get writer's cramps from them when I have the rare thirty-page day.  But as I learned in 1991 while flying to Chicago to attend my very first writing conference, cabin pressure at 30,000 feet tends to force all the ink out of the nib, making for a heck of a mess.  Given current TSA regulations regarding pointy things in carry-on luggage in our post-9/11 world, now they're even more impractical to fly with.  With eight full days far away from home during my recent trip west, I knew I needed to learn a new trick -- and fast. And with the state of publishing ever fluxuating, I also figured it wouldn't hurt to adapt to one or more creative changes.

So at our local $ store, I picked up a pair of thick rollerball pens, black.  As stated, I hadn't written fiction in anything but the Sheaffers, of which I own some three-dozen, in decades.  To my surprise while seated at a restaurant in the Newark, New Jersey airport, my dollar store pen moved with the grace and ease of my beloved fountain pens; during the first of two long layovers, I put down seven pages of "Golden Skull," a story that dates back to 1982 and almost to the start of my passion for writing, a novella starring Jonathan and Grace Martin, the husband and wife supernatural sleuth team who starred in numerous creepy adventures during my teen years.

Upon returning home from the trip, I promptly completed "Golden Skull" and returned to the $ store, where I snagged a healthy supply of the rollerballs.  The price of replacement ink cartridges for the Sheaffers has skyrocketed in recent years -- as high as six bucks for five tubes, each tube delivering roughly twenty pages.  The first of the rollerballs just began to dry up after almost a hundred.  While I still adore my Sheaffers and have used them off and on since World Horror Con, I've gone out of my well-established comfort zone and found something else that worked, which is good business given the economics. Of course, I still get looks of bemusement whenever most people learn that I write first drafts with a pen.  Talk about old school!

World Horror Con, Part Two

(with the delightful Aric Sundquist and a bit of EJP bling
--photo credit Charles Day)

Salt Lake City is a beautiful destination, nestled in the palm of a snow-capped mountain range, filled with energy and newness and a hip urban vibe.  I woke early the next morning, Friday, feeling some of that energy and newness despite long flights and a longer drive to attend World Horror Con 2012.  Showered. Dressed. Moseyed downstairs to the hotel's restaurant with my Italian leather valise and plenty of projects to work on.  Ate a monstrous breakfast buffet and then set about integrating into the wildness that was WHC.

Throughout the course of the day, I manned the EJP booth, where I got to meet fellow scribe and Evil Jester Digest luminary Aric Sundquist.  We talked the writing life while such famed bylines as Joe R. Lansdale and John Skipp wandered the Dealer's Room aisles.  Aric is super-passionate and our enthusiasm for the writing life is clearly cut from the same cloth.  Also had a nifty chat with Ryan Daley, senior contributing writer for the big, bad Bloody Disgusting-dot-com, a Web-based horror news giant that routinely attracts a million monthly readers.  Wrote some more.  And then some.  By the afternoon, I seriously needed a nap and indulged.  When I woke up, my roommate, Charles Day (EJP owner and all-around awesome guy) reminded me that I and the gang were due to flock to one of the city's eateries, the Blue Iguana.  We set off on foot on a sultry late afternoon, eventually found the restaurant, and waited to be seated -- a running theme in SLC's downtown due to the aforementioned vibe and enthusiasm.

(with Aric and, right, the talented Hollie Johani-Snider at the
Blue Iguana Restaurant, Salt Lake City)

Back at the hotel, preparations for an EJP book party that would have included Muse were kyboshed by weird scheduling and a different sort of party atmosphere.  Local SLC media, alerted by me to the convention's presence, expressed great enthusiasm for my book and the con in general (most were unaware -- seriously, WHC, you need to make better efforts at publicity).  Even so, Muse made the local papers.

Saturday morning, I woke up feeling refreshed and focused.  Another big breakfast downstairs and then I set about working on my new novel, The Zoo, and more of the ancient novella exhumed from my card catalog, "Golden Skull," which was proving to be delightful.  Spent part of Saturday snuggled in bed with tons of pillows behind my back reading through my fresh copy of Muse and feeling every bit the proud parent.  While the Bram Stoker Awards unfolded downstairs, I ordered perhaps the best cheeseburger in history from the hotel restaurant and spent the night in bed writing and watching a movie on the room's flat-screen TV.  Sunday, I met filmmaker David C. Hayes for breakfast and we had ourselves an old-fashioned Hollywood pitch session over my script, "Bully." David's panel on screenwriting at ten that morning was fantastic.  I left both it and the panel on writing groups hosted by Henry and Hollie Snider invigorated and inspired.

Early Monday morning, Peter Giglio and I packed up for the long return drive back to Lincoln, Nebraska.  While motoring out of Utah was a dream, the moment we hit Wyoming serious trouble in the form of prairie snow challenged our progress.  By the Green River (setting for my western romance "Incident at Yellow Rock"), the conditions degenerated to near white-out and well past dangerous.  Buttes hovered out of focus like giant ghosts.  We passed three horrific crashes, including an eighteen-wheeler hanging precariously over the edge of a steep precipice.  The going was slow and tense; eventually very late that night, we rolled into Lincoln.  I passed out, woke up to a sunny travel day home, and departed again for New Hampshire.

With six copies of Muse in my luggage, it felt like I was carrying bricks.  Clearly, the TSA thought something was amiss, too, as I discovered that they'd searched my bags and left me a 'Dear John' letter on top of my neatly-folded undergarments.  I returned to family and home -- and an enthusiastic muse despite his never leaving my side during my adventure to the wild, wild American West.  The jet lag was worse than anything I had ever experienced during the years I routinely flew to one event or another, but I came back with three new story ideas, an invitation to submit to a magazine, a short story anthology, and interest in my screenplay. I also came home ready to write -- and have written nonstop!

World Horror Con Report, Part One

My bags were packed.  All deadlines met and turned in.  House immaculate. Writing Room clean and sparkly, left in the perfect state -- all I'd need to do upon my return home would be to fill out contracts and a back cover copy sheet for "Mason's Murder," my recent novella sale to MLR Press.  I woke well before dawn on Tuesday morning, the 27th of March for what would be an exciting kickoff to an eight-day adventure that would lead me through numerous states, almost across the entire country to celebrate, among other things, the publication of my monstrous collection of original short and long fiction, The Fierce and Unforgiving Muse: Twenty-Six Tales from the Terrifying Mind of Gregory L. Norris (Evil Jester Press). Ultimately, the plane and car rides would culminate in Salt Lake City, Utah for World Horror Con, a destination first discussed in November of 2011 at local, lovely Anthocon, a fledgling conference for genre writers held in my very own backyard.  After months of anticipation, I was ready to depart.  Manchester, NH to Newark, NJ.  A two-and-a-half-hour layover, then Newark to Chicago, IL.  Another two hours in Chicago, then on to Lincoln, NE where I would spend a few days with good pal Peter Giglio, EJP Senior Editor.  From there, a twelve-hour drive through Nebraska and Wyoming, then on to Salt Lake City.  A very long and circuitous route, yes, but an adventure, and I've had many in the past thirty-two years as a writer.

My last flight anywhere was in 2005 when, following a week on Kiawah Island, the plane did steep circles around LaGuardia Airport for an hour to deal with a traffic jam, leaving me swearing off that mode of travel for good (clearly, I reneged).  After my trip through security -- removing shoes, belt, and dignity -- I boarded my plane in Manchester for the relatively short flight to Newark.  En route, I dreamed of my upcoming Space:1999 novel project for August and September (my Big #1,000, which I hope to complete during the five-day writing retreat to Starr Island off the coast of New Hampshire).  For the first of my layovers, I nestled down in Newark and wrote some seven pages of a very old novella idea, "Golden Skull," starring the Martins -- Jonathan and Grace, a well-to-do couple of supernatural sleuths whose antics and adventures I first began writing while in high school.  This final installment in their series divides its time between Upstate New York, Seattle, and fictional Brackenridge, New Mexico.  I wasn't visiting New Mexico on my vast itinerary, but it seemed a fitting project to work on. I had a blast reuniting with them as I waited for my next leg of the trip.

The flight to Chicago was one step short of apocalyptic, akin to the pilot episode of the TV series Lost.  We hit turbulence somewhere east of Chicago unlike anything I have ever experienced -- so bad, in fact, that the young woman three rows up from me vomited across the back of the seat in front of her.  People screamed.  Though belted into my seat, my lower back suffered several jarring jolts that left me sore for days after.  Eventually, we made it to Terra Firma (Fox's late science fiction show Terra Nova played on the overhead screens during the flight).  Chicago to Lincoln.  I walked off the third plane of the day and met Peter Giglio, who had a copy of Muse waiting for me.  Long last, I held my beautiful offspring; the rest of that Tuesday was considerably more enjoyable.

Peter and I dined at an upscale chain called Noodles, where I enjoyed incredible Japanese noodles with seared steak, sprouts, broccoli, and cilantro (not an herb I was familiar with before) and took in the five p.m. showing of The Hunger Games, which I loved.  After a solid night's sleep, we spent our Wednesday writing (I worked on my new novel The Zoo and more of "Golden Skull") and forayed out and about, gathering supplies for the long drive west.  That night, we watched Eric Shapiro's brilliant feature film Rule of Three before lights out.  At four in the morning, we departed for Salt Lake City, crossing Nebraska through long miles of mist; Wyoming through equally long spells of stark yellow sunlight.  I saw antelope, tumbleweeds, buttes, and hundreds of miles of barren prairie broken up only by sagebrush and cattle fences.  It was a part of the world I'd only visited via photographs and I felt richer for the experience as a writer and human being.

(me and, clockwise, Peter Giglio, Rick Hautala, Holly Hautala
Hollie Snider, Marie Green.  Photo credit: Henry Snider)

We pulled into Salt Lake City just after five and began to connect with friends, old and new.  It was my absolute pleasure to greet Charles Day, EJP founder and all-around great guy, the Sniders (Henry, Hollie, and son Josh, who quickly earned my esteem for his wit, intelligence, and recent bragging rights to his first published writing credit, complete with paying contract!), Marie Green and her lovely daughter Kate, and the Hautalas -- legendary novelist Rick and his wife, Holly. Despite a hideous check-in at the WHC welcome table and a rushed kick-off ceremony in the main panel room, ten of us moseyed on foot to dinner at a local eatery, the Red Rocks Pub, where we were packed in like sardines but treated to a decent meal.  Even better was my long and wonderful conversation with Henry Snider, a true gentleman in this writing biz.  From there, it was back to the hotel on a sultry night.  While others departed to various con parties and meet-and-greets, I rode an elevator with the Hautalas up to the sixth floor, promising them I was off to snog my Muse.  I did for another few pages, then passed out, exhausted.  There was much more to follow in the days ahead and I desperately needed to recharge very depleted creative batteries.

Spring Cleaning

Eight months ago, I set about assembling a sizable collection of original stories, short and long, for my publisher and editor at Evil Jester Press. Early this month, I turned in my final thumbs-up on the manuscript's galleys and the book has since been released in both digital and print versions.  For two fantastic days last week, a special promotion put The Fierce and Unforgiving Muse: Twenty-Six Tales from the Terrifying Mind of Gregory L. Norris at the #1 spot on Amazon Kindle's Short Story Collections best seller list (it made it to #9 overall in the Horror category), where it leapfrogged over both Kipling's Riki Tiki Tavi and the collected works of Mark Twain.  Muse was with me intimately for a long time in the physical and spiritual senses; I set out to create a 'greatest hits' vibe with it and, so far, the early reader reviews have been stellar.  But while writing the collection, dust and cat hair collected, as did the latest contracts and pay stubs in piles, files of longhand manuscripts, and contributor copies, too.  A wild sense of mayhem cropped up in what I consider the heart of my home in a way that's rarely, if ever, been allowed.

As most of my friends and colleagues know, I love a clean living space -- and a spotless work environment even more.  An uncluttered home in the physical world does benefit the cerebral, making it easier and more enjoyable to put down the beginnings, middles, and ends of work I'm proud to have bear my byline.  That, and I'm a compulsive neat-freak, always have been.  But during the creation of so much fresh material for the collection (and the numerous other projects I worked on in and around Muse), the condition of my writing room suffered. With my baby published, yesterday I poured a tall iced hazelnut coffee, called up a spooky old flick on the computer screen, and set about putting things to rights to a degree my home office hasn't seen since last November.

New storage boxes I fell in love with finally found their correct places, as did new strings of cheery white and blue mini-lights, replacing ones that went supernova in January.  Every surface and object in the room got dusted -- our two wonderful rescue cats spend their days lounging in here while I write and edit, so my Writing Room needed to be 'shaved' as well.  All the latest contributor copies (I had nine anthologies containing my short stories and novellas released from December 2011 into March of 2012) went into the archives, floors got scrubbed, the rug vacuumed.  All of my artwork -- and there is plenty, especially on the 'Muse Wall' of celebrity autographs beside my desk -- got a polish, as did the windows, lamps, and light sculpture.

I filed all of my paperwork, and then spent another half an hour or so filing files containing more than a few months' worth of the latest manuscripts -- some, the original drafts of novellas and short stories penned specifically for Muse.  Indoctrinating them into my lateral filing cabinet drawers, which contain some thirty-three years of manuscripts, felt liberating and uplifting.  While I have yet to hold the print version of my baby (that's still some forty-eight hours from now), it felt like I had completely put the collection to bed -- and done something with this book that would make any writer supremely happy.

Files filed.  Not one stitch of stray paperwork -- or paper -- anywhere to be found.  Dust dusted.  Crystals and lamps and objects d'art sparkly.  Lights lit.  Order and organization reestablished. Spring cleaning done.  I've spent the last several months working on this monstrosity of a collection -- Muse weighs in at a very hefty 170,000-plus words and, as my wonderful senior editor jokes, would be suitable as a weapon of choice should one come up against the living dead and find themselves needing a blunt object with which to bash in skulls.  I've also done plenty of soul searching and reevaluating since the last weeks of 2011, mostly about the kind of writer I wish to be and the literary life I've always wanted to live.  Spring cleaning in the bigger picture this year has been singularly productive and I hope that literary life will continue with a minimum of roadblocks and red tape.

In forty-eight hours, I depart for a week-long adventure, most of which will be spent at World Horror Con with fellow scribes I adore and industry folk I'm eager to meet.  The Muse book party will be held next Friday night in the pair of rooms across from Saturday night's Stoker Awards venue -- pink champagne, sandwiches, and butter cream cake are on the order, along with a reading from the book (I am thinking of sharing the shortest story contained within the covers, "Veneer," which I wrote during my most recent visit to New York City).  I plan to work on several manuscripts while traveling and during down times at the con, including a novel, a novella, and a short story.  And when I come home, it will be to a clean, bright, and welcoming office where I'll pen my latest literary adventures as I wait for the next of 2012's real-time ones.