Bread

How many bread products can one family have in their home?

Well, there’s bread, of course. We do the cheap wheat mostly, not the balloon wheat that melts in your mouth like cotton candy. It’s the butter-top or cracked wheat variety, but it’s pretty cheap and there’s no guilt in making a sandwich.

We currently have two kinds of bagels. That is rare, admittedly, but there it is. There’s the whole grain variety, softer, more like bread if you want to get into it. It toasts well. Better with butter (or whatever passes for butter these days.)

The “other” bagel is the onion. These are hard, like a bagel should be, and are really only worth the time to make them if there is cream cheese in the house, which there is, or was last time I checked.

Over in the corner of the pantry, three slices of sourdough are suffocating in their tightly wound bag. I’m quite certain they are beyond edibility, but there they are. I’ll throw them away when I get more bread.

We had burgers (which in this house means real burgers, Grillers and Chik Patties) the other night, so there are two cheapish buns left over from that. Those will go green before anybody touches them. Just like the hot dog buns peaking out from behind them. The two varieties look almost exactly the same, as if they were formed from Play Doh.* They just aren’t that good. It’s about the only white bread we ever buy.

I believe we have one English muffin left. (Does one capitalize the “e” there, you think?) They don’t last long in this house. I have observed that toasters have outgrown the standard muffin size. You have to give the toaster lever that hard upward flip and catch them in the air. Either that or risk self-induced shock treatment therapy with the butter knife. I rarely go the way of the knife. Hmmm… that’s true.

Of course we have three kinds of cereal, a couple of Kashi Bar boxes, bread crumbs, instant and tedious forms of oatmeal (I still love those Quaker cylinders,) a very stale bag of white-corn tortilla chips, Top Ramen (10 for a buck,) crispy taco shells and yes… Shake N Bake. These are grain-based, but mostly not bread. In fact, I don’t know why I brought them up at all. Sorry about that.

The tortillas are in the fridge, white flour and cold. Why do we refrigerate them? When I buy them at the store they are on a shelf with no climate control whatsoever. What happens to them during the drive home that makes them vulnerable to room temperature cooties? I think, late at night, these babies are probably my favorite go to snack… if there is cheese in the house.

Don’t even get me started on dairy products.

We are a big family, but come on, this is ridiculous. I feel like we should buy two or three vats of margarine and take all this stuff down to the shelter.

Can we eat all of it?

Do we?

Should we?

I’m full just talking about it.

* I just read that Play Doh was first created as wallpaper cleaner. Wild. I thought it was made to destroy carpets. The guy who invented it became a millionaire at 27. Bastard.

Reach

I am alone

I stand alone

I think alone

I dream alone

Even those who I love with every ounce, every breath

And there are many

Even those do not see the painful arc of my solitude


And still I reach

With all that I am and all that I have I stretch my fingers

Until the bones within them break

Until the skin tears

Until the life pours out

Until dust remains


I reach as a madman, heedless, mercury

Because the madness of solitude is much greater

Much more terrifying

Much stronger

Than the simple insanity that plagues me now

So I reach


Because there is nothing else to do


And I might smile for a time

If you’re younger than a the quad-decadian, you might politely tell that person how young they look, how you can’t believe they’ve completed four times around the track, when they don’t look a day over three… or maybe three and a half. The snickers later will be heard through tremors felt by moles in Mississippi.

If you’re older you most probably will scoff at that person’s misery, expounding on how young they are “by comparison” and how they should probably just shut the heck up unless they want to feel the wrath of a half-centurian slam, or mercy, the dreaded half-dozen donuts worth of decades stomp.

(diggin’ the made up words?)

Here comes the forty. It’s coming on hard and fast and six days, nine hours, twenty-seven minutes and several beers from now it will be upon me.

As I run towards this monumental moment I visualize it thusly:

I am running through the desert, barefoot, dressed in dusted rags, mouth hanging open, eyes dry and bulging, breaths drawing in ragged gasps. I’ve been running for so long I’ve forgotten when or how the journey, no the race actually began.

Stumble and nearly fall.

Snakes to avoid.

Ravines to jump over.

A cactus with blood-stained needles, arms reaching, bending towards me.

And then there is the wall, that 40 year wall, the barrier with a single door. It reaches like a mountain into the clouds hanging thick above the sand. East and west the opaque wall stretches, but I cannot see the end, only the fading and vanishing of the wall’s substance in the hazy distance.

But there is the door, a silver door, and I have the key.

The wall marks the halfway point in my life, if I’m lucky.

That probable center-cut cleave in addition to the murky light beyond the wall are the reasons this milestone is driving me nuts, more than any before, and I know somehow more than any to come.

What?

My Very Talented Family

We can't choose our family. But if I could, I would choose my own.

If you look to the left, you can see a photograph of the painting my sister Cecile did for the cover of my upcoming novel, Dalia's Fire.

Thank you Sissy. It's beautiful.

Reviews for 22 in Time. Get yours at www.lulu.com/caseyfreeland

These were unsolicited and worth reposting, I thought...

Incredible Stories!

8 Feb 2008

by Simon Scott

This writer has what it takes to accelerate his prose to a professional and yet, entertaining level. This collection of relatively short fiction does nothing but gratify the readers preconceptions of what short fiction should be. With little to no format or grammatical errors, this piece truly stands apart from much of the other works published through lulu.

It is clear the author has taken the time, effort, and patience to create something entirely unique and offers a hefty contribution to the craft. While I did not always understand certain plot choices (such as the ending to story 1 which can be read in the preview) or certain stylistic choices (such as ending stories with single sentences), these issues in no way inhibited my experience with Freeland's writing. The stories are fantastically woven with a mixture of old world prose and style, combined with a new world flare and creativity. For someone truly looking for a blend of crafts and genres, then look no further than 22 in Time.

I would and will recommend this piece to my friends and colleagues and look forward to future works by this incredible author.

A book well worth reading...

3 Feb 2008

by Dillon Langlands

It's not often I come across a gem like this. 22 in time is both adorable and heartfelt. The value lies not in its ability to make you smile, but that there are so many diverse stories within that no matter what kind of reader you are - there's plenty to enjoy. I would recommend this book to both old and young readers of any level and trust me, the stories just keep getting better as you read on.
22 in Time is a diverse collection of short stories priced shockingly low and ready for your bookshelf.

Unreview of Stephen King's On Writing

Generally, I'm not an overenthusiastic fan of how-to-be-a-writer books. Some can encourage and instruct but most clog the mind with concepts from a writer with one or two writing credits and a whole lot of extra time on their hands. Certainly exceptions of brilliance wait patiently for my discovery. This book proves that theory. But King has written more than one or two books, even more than one or two dozen.

Of course I consume every syllable of each Writer's Digest including the cheesy classifieds in the back touting Contests, Computer Software and yes, Manuscript Boxes. I am always hoping to find that golden key or tattered pirate's map with a big red "X" under the palm tree. There's a secret to it all and I'm determined to find it. I never do. I never will.

Instead, I found this work by one of the most prolific writers in human history. The listen - yes another audio book - was worth every second. I don't want to mess with any aspiring writer or established writer by adding anything to what already exists there and thereby taking something away, except to say that the audio version is read by the man himself as it could only be. For that reason it is the best way to experience the work.

Let me add one more thing. It's not a how-to-be-a-writer book. That's part of it I suppose, but most of it is about Stephen's decades-long journey as a writer and a human being.

As far as I'm concerned, it's priceless.

Supersonic, Technotronic, Hydrophonic Preview

You can now read the entire manuscript online!

Check out "22 in Time" at

http://www.lulu.com/browse/preview.php?fCID=1335588

Cracking of the Egg

I find myself impatient for the cracking of the egg

While making french toast. They number eight.

But while I slam the first, I'm already thinking about the last.

I want to be there now, I don't want to wait.

In my mind, all eight eggs are in the bowl with the cinnemon, milk and sugar... the bread is already covered with the concoction. No wonder I'm anxious for it to be done. In my mind, it already is.

The bread is cooked, sliced, syrup-ed, ate, the kids are already contentedly sitting in the living room, rubbing their deliciously-sugared stomachs.

And although none of this has happened and I am still cracking that first egg, in my mind it has already occurred.

No wonder I'm impatient! I'm experiencing the same mundane task for the SECOND time.

I have a niece and a daughter who are the same, as impatient, and they are forever skipping to the end of their experiences, maybe because they have already experienced them once in their head, the actual event really just serving as verification.

I am known to chastise them for this trait, as if it has nothing to do with me at all.

What a hypocrite.

Of course there is the obvious, anti-profundity that I must smell those roses, lest I find myself on the other side of this life, looking back at all the time I spent looking forward.

But that's not the point at all, at least not right now. Because that point, that thought, is an impatient look ahead, to when I die of all things. That is the ultimate impatience, isn't it? Being impatient to die.

I'm not of course.

I'm just trying to figure out how to get the most out of cracking these eight eggs, watching the Country Crock melt in the pan, feeling the goop between my fingers as I lay out these pieces of heaven-coated bread.

Maybe that's all it takes.

Maybe it really is the thought that counts.

You Will Never Stand Alone

In the sunrise of the you and me

that came to be

One dark and stormy night

I said, "Hold on tight."

Nerves of a boy, love of a man

And all for you like some written plan

Those first nights were a free fall

a hypnotic call

Like taking terror in fierce embrace

a treacherous race

Swoons and laughter follow tears

of joy battling the bubbling fears

of lovers past

If you knew how soon you were mine

when drawn the line

You would have sought higher ground

though none be found

The vertigo of me without you

Throws me from cliff into blue

Still today all those years awash

I feel the crush

That boyish empty dark theatre fear

you won't be here

I can only offer my soul and bone

And a promise you will never stand alone

that mold is cast

Unreview – You can Get There from Here by Shirley MacLaine

This book, first published in the middle 70’s details MacLaine’s years first fighting for the McGovern Campaign and then traveling with 11 other women to and through China during the end of Mao tse-tung's rule of that country. I have one of those old publications. $1.95 for a paperback. Can you believe it?

During the first half of the book I spent most of my time drawing correlations between the election battle between McGovern and the incumbent, Richard Nixon and the recent political climate in the U.S. today. It was amazing to read something more then three decades past that seemed so relevant to the events happening now and in recent years. For that reason alone, I’m glad I read this book and I recommend it highly.

But, then, let’s switch gears to her tour of Communist China. The personal journey was fascinating and I feel I got a lot out of her experience. There were lessons in there, lessons I have strove – especially recently – to learn and model the future me around. I spoke about simplicity before. Red China, in her experience anyway, was the model of simplicity. And while I love my country, I appreciate all the advantages I enjoy as a citizen and I refuse to spend my life feeling guilty for my place of birth or the fact that I was born a white male, I still had to pause and consider just how far I was willing to go with this “live simple” thing I’ve been considering.

The problem comes about with either her ignorance of the mass executions and deaths by starvation caused by this man, or her unwillingness to address it in a book that clearly wants to tell the American people they are getting it wrong and a more communal way of life may be the true path to happiness. Tens of millions are estimated to have been executed or otherwise died due to this man’s policy. It’s horrendous and whatever became of China afterwards, it cannot be forgiven any more than we can forgive Hitler or Stalin. It’s disgusting.

Still I hope that she was naïve in her assumptions when she wrote the book. And like I said, it is an extremely interesting study of the political and world climate thirty years ago. And she is a wonderful writer.

And I continue to battle internally for a place of peace in this world. Maybe I’ll get it right somewhere between five and ten minutes before I take the last road.

New Stories in Preview

I've updated the preview for 22 in Time:

First, a young family escaping the weight of society finds themselves buried under the storm of all time with a mysterious visitor who's been mortally wounded.

Second, an old woman spends the last bargained moments of her life revisiting her one pure act.

Finally, a philanthropist goes public with her fantastic past and risks her life and her love.

Read these short-shorts at http://www.lulu.com/browse/preview.php?fCID=1335588

The Point (from Home for the Holidays)

Even though it may not seem that way, I am actually working towards something here with the last three or four posts. The Christmas decorations, the "angsty" poem, Across the Universe and pool ownership. There is a common thread within my ramblings.

Quite simply it's simplicity.

I am surrounded by sounds and noise, events and schedules, demands and needs. And the ladder I climb only gets me further and further from the ground.

I look up that ladder to those above me. I look at their faces as they gaze down urging me up to join them. It's a wide ladder and there is plenty of room. But from where they are, near the clouds, the air is thin and the thoughts are scattered. The hand they use to beckon me is shaking and their eyes only reveal hunger for self-medication and distraction. No happiness. None.

But I'm already on the ladder. What can I do?

I can't go back down the way I came. You try to go back down and you will step on somebody's knuckles. The next thing you know that person will have flung you into the air by your ankle.

I could stay where I am, I suppose. Good money, great job, benefits, respect, the whole nine yards... maybe even ten. Why would I leave all of that behind? There are men in my industry who have been there for twenty years or longer and are perfectly happy with their position, not concerned with going any higher on those corporate rungs.

I'm not really talking about work.

I'm talking about life.

Simplify life. Just looking at those two words together lowers my pulse. Simplify life. Life should be full, no doubt, with family, friends, travel, education, expression. That will never change.

But a simpler life is one that is not fully occupied with the stuff of life, the things one can acquire and with those things be surrounded. Stuff. No matter how you look at it, being surrounded by stuff is still being surrounded.

So simplify.

Clear out the cubbies of life, the garages of existence and the nooks and crannies of reality. And then really clean out the cubbies, garages and nooks and crannies. Clean it all out until the gravity of the items no longer pulls, until the thoughts of them are gone and all that is left is quiet.

If not peace.

I think that's what I am working towards...

"I want a house with a pool!" - Casey, 1985

All U.S. homeowners can be broken down into five categories:

#1 – People who have a pool and love it. (Those people can go straight to hell.)

#2 – People who have a pool and hate it, but pretend that they love it.

#3 – People who have a pool and hate it and don’t care who knows.

#4 – People who don’t have a pool and wish they had one.

#5 – People who don’t have a pool and don’t want one.

Here’s the evolution of the pool. #4, #1 (usually lasts about 30 days), #2, #3, #5.

If you are at #4, do yourself a favor and either jump to #5 or rent. I’m at #3 and can’t wait! It’s been a long, difficult journey.

Unreview - Across the Universe

This is not the type of movie that spends a whole lot of time occupying the larger screens in the area where we live. Its structure is loose, its storyline chaotic and its message unclear. As the movie lit up at 10:05 last night, I only knew some interesting people had decided to use Beatles music to tell a story.

I really needed to get away from reality for a couple of hours and I thought this was just the medicine.

It was.

You might need to be a Beatles fan to love this movie. At the very least you should be familiar with the characters in Beatles songs.

Other than that, go in with your heart on your sleeve and your weary mind open and you should be just fine.

It’s sad, sometimes painfully.

It’s funny, sometimes uncomfortably.

It’s strange, sometimes uncomprehendingly.

It’s love, in so many beautiful ways.

But mostly it was a great distraction from the world that pushes so hard this time of year, yells in your face for recognition and demands so very much.

Hanging out with Jude, Max, Prudence, Lucy, Rita, Mr. Kite and Sadie was heart filling.

The Storm

The biting cold, storm growing bold
As the wind beats down the spirit
All huddled down, on soaking ground
Sadly gathered we bow our heads

Three days now gone, is death’s sweet song
And my tired ears still hear it
The wailing cries, the failing sighs
And the flesh as its torn to shreds

My hands gone numb, my mind gone dumb
My fear has formed into granite
Cold water pours into the sores
And yet no nerve gives reaction

The biting cold, storm growing bold
As long as our lives will fan it
Now I grow dim, an endless swim
But death brings no satisfaction

X-Mas Abounds

We're about a week late, but the Christmas lights went up outside today. As great as they look – we use the big traditional multi-colored jobbies – our neighborhood is already full of lighted houses, so we're just barely keeping pace. A lot of folks are doing the major MAJOR lights this year with lawn ornaments the size of my truck, tinny music coming from somewhere, lights chasing themselves around the house and animated animals at every turn. I'm not against this stuff. As a matter of fact I'm a little envious, which might be the point actually. We're just a bunch of guys stretching our testosterone muscles by putting pretty lights and little animals on their front lawn. That's worth laughing about.
So, I was sliding into the notion that we too should have a $100+ lawn ornament. Our neighbor has gone nuts this year. Two doors down, as I write, two wire deer, one inflatable 5' polar bear, a flashing and fake blue and white tree, a horn toting angel and several other assortment of seasonal stuff are battling for dominant attention in their little yard. The flashing sign on the house says "Season's Greetings." I think it should say "Season's Greetings… or else!"
I'm being cruel, I know. They are good neighbors, despite the Dobermans. Hearts in the right place and all. I just can't help but get the feeling that they are punishing us somehow because we didn't attend their neighborhood barbecue this summer.
So, let's get back to our yard, then. Big, colorful, Christmas-Story lights. And we need something for the yard. I was actually leaning towards the 6' Grinch. What the hell was I thinking? But my youngest, Mr. 6-years-old, went with me and we chose two small, lighted penguins who waddle a bit and wave one wing in unison.
They are just understated enough to be a statement.

Short-Story o' the Day

His giant purple eyes crawled across the sleeping fiend, as he considered ways to sever her head from her body without waking her up, or in fact disturb her in any way.

Not that she looked like a fiend. In fact to any eyes other than his own he would bet a gold piece they would see a little white-skinned girl with long and looping deep brown hair and an easy upward curve of her pouting lips. Of course the observer would be thrown off by teddy bears, princess-covered blankets of pink and the most adorable Hello Kitty nightlight he had ever seen. It was adorable partially so because the thing coated that half of the room with a soft pink and white hue. It was plugged into the rose-colored wall next to the white and gold painted night stand which held a half-gone glass of water and Minnie Mouse lamp that no doubt exploded with some poor rendition of “It's a Small World” every time the fiend turned it on.

Even the most diligent fiend detectors would be lulled as the central heat and air vent pushed the sugary drifts of girl breath, strawberry shampoo and pure innocence across the room.

But he was no ordinary hunter. Almost three thousand cycles of the world had passed before Bug's round, purple eyes and lately he had become convinced he was the oldest, and therefore the wisest creature in creation. He had killed most of the rest of the old ones, not out of anger or even hunger. He wasn't a monster.

As human population had grown, especially in the last couple hundred years, finding the fiends had become increasingly difficult, and not just because the needles were now buried in a much bigger haystack. Humans had become so noisy that listening - as the old ones did - for the heartbeat of the fiend-afflicted humans had become a frustrating and emasculating experience. And surveillance technology, especially in the last fifty years had magnified the difficulties of passing unseen into and out of fiend nests.
So when a fiend was discovered, the old ones would rush it like an angry wasp swarm and great, violent, utterly silent battles were fought over the single, life-giving force innocently sleeping in the next room.

And he won those battles, time and again, until one day he landed near a home on a farm in Australia and realized no one was coming to challenge his claim.

Not that Bug was a violent creature by nature. He certainly possessed the equipment to be violent, more than violent in fact. He could be downright vulgar if he chose. But about half a millennium or so ago, something exciting turned in Bug's brain. At first just a subtle tick, a passing wonder about the beings he chose for sustenance and sport, the years stacked up and the tick multiplied into a twitch. Soon the twitch eased into a compulsion and the compulsion mutated into a full-blown obsession.

His tail, long, spiked and almost metallic in the Hello Kitty glow, slid of its own volition up from the pink, shag carpet and across the princess blanket from foot towards the gilded, scalloped headboard. The barbed end stopped near the girl's bare shoulder, rose like a snake, pointing at the girl's heart. A fiend lived there, inside her chest, and black saliva dripped involuntarily down Bug's chin.

Over the last fifty cycles of life on Earth, the obsession, while it hadn't destroyed him, had forced him to give up his life's work and spend every waking moment - which was every moment in his case - searching for the singular answer and reward to a singular question. Ten years had passed since he chose a human victim because of the fiend parasite living inside him or her. And even tonight, when starvation had almost ruined him and he had almost forgot how to listen for the buzzing, whining sound of a fiend, he was more concerned with his obsession than his next meal.

This girl didn't seem particularly creative, which disappointed bug. Creativity and passion had become his benchmarks for midnight visits. Artists of all kinds, in addition to being suicidal and collective abusers of every drug imaginable, were most recently prone to massive coronaries, heart piercing and beheadings. But Bug chose his victims carefully because a creative mind was a mind full of late night dreams.

In all his long, strange and wonderful life, Bug had not experienced a single dream. He knew they existed, had read about them in darkened libraries and book stores around the world. He had listened from the roof to husbands and wives discuss their dreams over coffee and an English muffin. He watched the eyes of sleepers slide right and left in dream-filled R.E.M. frenzy. And soon, obtaining one of these chaotic, wonderful dreams became his obsession. Since he could not sleep, he deduced that if he could properly kill or consume the dreamer, he could, if only for a blink, experience the dream.

As the old ones lost their incestuous battles and Bug lost all interest in culling the fiend population, the monsters overwhelmed the planet and now he could hardly crawl across the street without hearing or smelling one of them. Most recently he had begun to consider the fact that killing off all of his kind was a mistake, that he had thrown off the balance of supernatural environmental ecosystem and the algae blossom of fiends could never be undone.

He stepped back in surprise when he glanced again at her angelic face and saw her eyes were open and she was staring calmly into his. All hope of stealing her dream lost, he was doubly pained because humans were not supposed to be able to see him in the midnight hour. Something had gone phenomenally wrong.

He shuffled back on his hind legs. Her curved mouth blossomed into a full toothy smile.
"Hi," she said. A small hand emerged from the princess blanket and gave a four-fingered wave. "We've been waiting for you."

Bug couldn't respond, not because he was shocked into silence, which was nearly true. He was quiet because his kind was always quiet, completely without voice or rumbling stomach or popping knuckles. Nothing. So he simply stared at her, his eyes a perfect circle of purple, his tail hovering above her heart. But he projected the question towards her.

We? he asked.

She laughed, delighted and sat up in her bed, showing off her white flannel nightgown decorated with tiny blue roses and green leaves. He thought it looked lovely.
The tail, still on its own, followed her movements as if her heart was made of magnet and his tail really was a steel whip of destruction. But suddenly its prowess and lightning-quick killing force seemed as flaccid as canned spinach.

"You know the we." She waved her finger back and forth, her smile now beaming with joy. "You call us fiend... fiend and little girl. We have so much to be grateful for." Her voice was tiny, but it echoed, or seemed to overlap itself. Bug quickly realized he heard two voices speaking in unison. The first was the delicious sound of the girl and the second was an airy whisper coming from the same throat like a surfer riding the vibrations out her mouth.

"There are millions of us now. Without your kind to battle we have multiplied in greater numbers than most of us imagined possible. Without your obsession with dreams you may have still been able to keep us at bay, all by yourself. So while we are grateful for many things, you Bug are the one thing we hold most dear."

But I am your enemy, Bug thought.

The girl jumped up onto her bed as if she were about to use it as a trampoline.
"No, Bug. You were the enemy of the fiends. But we are not fiend, nor are we human. We are what is next and it is to you we owe that evolution."

She no longer sounded at all like a little girl. In fact she seemed to have grown taller and her dark hair, once laden with curls now laid flat against her as if someone had dumped water over her head. Before his purple eyes she grew taller yet, her pale skin dark as if the pink-white light from Hello Kitty had just decided it didn't want to have anything to do with her. Her nightgown melted away exposing black skin. Her eyes became red pinpoints of light and her once innocent mouth seemed suddenly filled with more than two rows of tiny, pointed teeth.

A voice like the cough of death came from the thing before him.
"And to show you honor we have decided to give you a gift, the gift of your desires, of your obsession."

She reached out to Bug, her arms suddenly thirty feet long, and wrapped black clawed fingers around his lemon-shaped head. She, it smiled, and a tar-like tongue whipped in and out of her mouth like a snake tongue tasting the air. He felt, rather than saw, the long nails of her thumbs dig into his purple eyes. Before he could pull away they popped like giant grapes and Bug was stricken blind. He felt no pain, only the despair of losing his sight.

"Do not fear, Bug. You were never able to dream because you could not close your eyes. Such a simple thing, really. Now your eyes are closed forever and you cannot help but dream."

And in his mind he saw Hello Kitty holding a blue rose and dancing with princesses on a sea of blue and gold.

Unreview – Dark Rivers of the Heart by Dean Koontz

I have slowly and completely fallen in love with the writing style of Dean Koontz over the last few years. He has become the writer I most would like to emulate. I think not just writers, but human beings should strive for qualities like his fearlessness, humor and heart. I don’t agree with all of his philosophies, but enough to feel connected to him through his work.

I can’t say I’ve read a bundle of books from the man. The affair began with One Door Away from Heaven about five years ago. I then discovered the Odd Thomas novels, the first of the Frankenstein books and The Husband. I just finished Dark Rivers of the Heart. This is only a small, chaotic sampling of a man’s work that spans decades and dozens of creations. The latest is the oldest and the longest of my Koontz have-read-this this.

It was fun to read him from 13 years or so ago and feel the first steps of uneasy but fearless building of his talent to what it is today. It’s not unlike what I experienced when I read Gunslinger from King or Sword of Shannara from Brooks, or even Tokein’s Hobbit. The talent is phenomenal, almost too much to bear. But it still has a rawness and a necessary arrogance painted over its hidden insecurity. It’s when they are their greatest, I think. Not most successful, but most real to themselves, in a panicky sort of way.

I’m getting excited. I’m old compared to these gentlemen and when they started, although I think Tolkein didn’t publish The Hobbit until he was 45 and wrote it in his 30’s. But I’m getting excited anyway because I feel my skills as a writer are still developing, getting sharper, easier and more natural. And I am very close now to where these men were when they created their first great works. I can’t say Dark Rivers of the Heart was one of Koontz’s first great works. As a matter of fact, I think his first novel appeared 20 years before that. But he’s the one who started this train of thought, so I’ve got to go with the comparison no matter what, don’t I?

So, again, the man has inspired me to go forth and write. And as I work through the creation of Novel #6 and get ready to release Novel #2 for broad consumption, I am grateful to be able to reach, however vainly, for talent such as his.

Dark Rivers of the Heart is long, evil, breathtaking and heartbreaking. I listened to the unabridged version and the thing was 16 disks long. It took longer than it should have to get used to the narrator’s voice. But even with that, I highly recommend it!

Click the Link for a Preview of "22 in Time"
http://www.lulu.com/content/1335588

Preview "22 in Time"

Help yourself to three tales from "22 in Time" in my preview, one from each section of the compilation (Once Upon a Time, Today is the Day and The Future is Ours.)

"22 in Time" is a sudden-fiction chronology of Past, Present and Future Stories of Humanity ...a little boy must wish the wrong wish to save his own life...an old woman uses her dying moments to see her estranged son...a tiny girl named Mouse savors the last moments of her fragile freedom...a king exacts final revenge on his wicked son...
Note – This collection includes stories published originally in "Becoming Dad."

Professionally, my writing experience includes a decade of commercial/promotional writing for a six radio station cluster in a small market and two years writing a 500 - 1000 word weekend article for an 80,000 circ. Scripps publication. Personally, I've written hundreds of poems, dozens of short stories and five books. This and "Becoming Dad" are the two that have seen the light of self-publication. I have a third, a supernatural thriller, coming out in early 2008. I live in northern California with my lovely wife, four kids, two dogs, one cat, two turtles and a really big snake.

Click the Link for a Preview of "22 in Time"
http://www.lulu.com/content/1335588