Back to Work

Although I still look for Joey's furry face when I come home, though I know it won't be there, I'm back at work. I still don't feel much like writing, so I'm editing. Nothing like one pain to mask another, is there?

So, I'm working on "Trading For The Stars" the first novel in a series which will chronicle the time of Colleen Yrden, whom we first met in "Pelgraff". This book takes place about 17 years before that, when Colleen first meets the Yrden Family. I'm about 1/2 way through my (hopefully) final proofing. After that, I have only the cover to work on, so I'll publish it by the end of September. I could probably have it up by next week, but I want to get it out in paperback as well, so I'm factoring in some time to do that.

Now, on the bright side, for those of you who have not yet picked up a copy of "A Throne At Stake". I'm using Amazon's 'countdown' feature. The book goes on sale for $0.99 Friday and Saturday; $1.99 Sunday, Monday and much of Tuesday; $2.99 on late Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday; then returns to $4.99 on Friday. If you want it cheap, now's your chance.

I'm hurrying to put this post out, to give you time to read it and react before the price goes up. Now, I only hope that Amazon's timer works, and the price change actually takes effect when it is supposed to (Midnight on Thursday PDT -- 2 hrs from now). Amazon has been known to not be on time upon occasion, but the change should be in effect sometime Friday morning, September 12th.

So, until next time,

Live Well, my friends.

Memories

Sounds: a whisper of a flap closing, a thump from the floor above, a clicking. Gone. Silence rules. And an emptiness has filled my home.

Only two weeks ago I could count on either an escort to see me safely through my front door – an escort that came from within my house to ensure my trip from car to door went without hitch – or perhaps merely a friendly face to greet me when I opened that door, a guard, a greeter, a presence that existed seemingly always and forever more. A presence, mostly silent, but always reassuring. No more.

Seven days from getting-old-but-still-okay to gone. Five days from concern to worry to dark despair. One day from desperate hope to none. Two days of waiting for the inevitable.

Joe E. Katt (RIP). 199? – 2014

Amazing how a cat can get under your skin, make himself almost indispensable to one’s feeling of wellness, become one of the family. Joey came on Christmas Eve, five years ago, from Death Row, from imminent death. Already a ‘senior’, I knew intellectually that he wouldn’t be with me all that long. However, I had hoped for more than five years.

Not sick, not in pain, just old, he simply stopped. And now I have only pictures and memories. And grief.

When it comes right down to it, memories are all we have in this life. Well, memories and hope, with the present squeezed in between. And the older we get, the more important the memories, for the hopes become fewer and less likely to materialize. And, as the end approaches, we hope to live on in the memories of others, just as others have lived on in our memories.

I’m sure I’ll find a place for Joe E. in one of my books. The Tlartox of "Ghost Fleet" were cat-like beings, and the four main Tlartox sported the colour and markings of two of my cats and two of those of a friend of mine – now all passed on. And some of their traits formed the basis for those of my alien characters. Now, every time I see the cover of Ghost Fleet, see the file name, or read the book, I remember. And then Shadow, Scheissmeister, Toodles, and Sabo live again for a time.

And I’ll take my grief and use it, too – for that is what writers do. We take from our own lives, from those of whom we are close, and from others whom we observe, steal or transmogrify portions thereof and use them to our purpose.

Thus, Joe E. will live again as well … in the future. Not today. I haven’t felt much like writing these past two weeks – or doing much of anything else productive. I don’t apologize for that. Death, grief, remembrance, and sorrow are a part of life, too. They all have their place.

And though I, too, am getting older, I still hope. I hope to come back next post to share something less sombre.

Take care, my friends, and Live Well. Create good memories. Pet a cat.

Green Things Growing

Ah, the smell of green things growing! It is not often, in recent months, that I get to a more rural setting. Yesterday, I did so, and with a light rain earlier in the day, and a cooling of the temperature from the heat of the past week, the sweet smell of something blooming came to me with a poignancy I have not felt in a long time.

Smell, they tell me, is one of our most powerful memory inducers. When I catch the aroma of burning grass, it takes me back to long ago – the 1960s – when we used to burn the grass after cutting it and allowing it to dry. Each house had a ‘burn barrel', and sometimes we burned the grass within.

Our house, at the time, backed up on a rather large ‘commons’. I well remember one day after someone had procured an industrial mower, the men of the surrounding houses had gotten together to burn the grass. We all raked it into long rows, and then set fire to them. My brother and I joined the men in this duty, and the smell of burning grass invaded everything. I'll remember that smell forever. I also remember the smell of the woods on a summer night, and the joy of air washed by rain in the summer. Each of those smells takes me back.

Winters lasted a long time at that latitude, and the cold, frozen months passed slowly. With the spring, however, the melting snow and warmer temperatures encouraged the dormant trees and plants to come to life in a frenzy of growth. Standing outside, with snow still in piles, one could nonetheless feel new life in the freshness of the air.

Decades later, in the Arctic, I experienced the same thing. I lived and worked in what was basically a very long double-wide trailer. Snow stuck to the ground near the end of September and didn’t melt until late May. Some patches lasted into July. Working on the Distant Early Warning Line, I learned to glory in the spring, when it came. Most of my time, I spent in the ‘module train’, a 100 metre long affair, which contained sleeping quarters, kitchen, dining room, entertainment facilities, an office, equipment rooms and power plant. Other than what emanated from the kitchen, the place had little to recommend it as far as smells were concerned.

Too many people smoked, and the smell of stale cigarettes permeated a lot of the rooms – quite unpleasant for a non-smoker like myself. Outside, for most of the year, the air was fresh and clean. However at –30 to –50 degrees, with nothing but ice and snow for hundreds of kilometres, the olfactory treasures of the area left much to be desired.

But not in the spring and summer. Those few ‘short’ months saw prodigious growth and glory. And I loved being outside – except for the insects. Clouds of mosquitoes sometimes reduced that pleasure significantly.

And what has this to do with science-fiction? Well, consider a space-ship. It seems much like my module train: an enclosed environment with little but living quarters, eating quarters, some entertainment facilities, equipment rooms and a power plant. And its occupants remain in it for the long months between arrivals at different planets or space stations. Outside: a quite unfriendly environment.

What might one miss in such a facility? Green things growing. In my book “Ghost Fleet”, my cat-like Tlartox introduced odours to the air through their ships, they type depending upon what sort of action – or lack of action – was coming. Grass smells to relax; the hint of blood to inflame the senses and get ready for battle. In “Courtesan”, my ship holds a ‘green room’, where people can sit amid plants – something they don’t see for long periods of time at a stretch. They called it ‘sanctuary’.

Life informs. One needs only examine it, and then use one’s imagination. What would you not like to be exposed to? For me: perfume. Imagine someone wearing too much perfume in an enclosed place, where you can’t get away from it. Thus, in “Courtesan”, one of my characters mentions to another that they – ship folk – don’t approve of perfume. There is no going outside for a breath of fresh air, and though the ship will have forced air circulation and filters, why make life a misery for everyone?

Yesterday, outside, I felt a sudden sense of freedom, of elation, as I breathed in the fresh air with the smell of green things growing. Right now, as I write this in my basement, surrounded by ‘house smells’, I no longer feel that. Though it is four o’clock in the morning, I suddenly feel a need to be outside once again, to regain – even if for only a few seconds – the lift I received earlier.

And with that, I’ll end this so I can take my own advice. Then I'll come back in and return to a space ship – do some writing.

Minds at War

I have a wide and varied CV. I’ve piloted a Spitfire, commanded a tank, a warship, and rode horses while in the military. And all this before I reached the age of 13, mostly from the seat of my trusty CCM 1-speed bicycle. Oh, and it helped me blast off for the stars, as well.

Hmm. Perhaps I should step back a pace or two. The old CCM wasn’t all that trusty, after all. Its chain had a certain proclivity for coming off, and nothing I could do would change that. One time, on my paper route, it came off whilst I ‘flew’ with a loyal wingman down a gravel road at high speed. It somehow jammed the wheel and the bike threw me, ending up with me having a fingernail torn off. Bleeding, scraped, and somewhat in shock, I gave over my paper-bag to my wingman, while I and my Spitfire limped back towards home – and eventually the Emergency Room at the hospital.

Then, later, the brake began to go. Remember, at that time with a 1-speed, you braked by pressing the pedal backwards, which would apply the brake to the rear wheel. In my case, I could stand on the pedal and the rear wheel wouldn’t lock; my bicycle would only slowly coast to a stop. I found it more efficient to put a foot down and drag it. So, perhaps I should exchange the word ‘trusty’ for something else. I’m a writer; surely my vocabulary might cover it. But, then again, I loved my bicycle. So, in my heart and my [flawed] memory, it remains my trusty CCM.

When you get right down to it, one might consider this an early attempt at multitasking. Overtly, I delivered papers. I certainly went through the motions. But, while my body engaged in this action, my imagination had me soaring over the earth, and sometimes leaving it entirely as my bike became a rocketship bound for somewhere far, far off.

Later, I continued with this multi-tasking as I started to write poetry. I would compose while I walked my route – the trusty CCM no longer conveying me to the heights. Today, I still work on books in my head while my body does other, more mundane tasks. I can multitask in that regard.

HOWEVER, it has lately come to me that I don’t do so well at multitasking if the two tasks are in the same field, but of inimical forms. In other words: Writing and Editing.

I ran up an impressive word-count earlier this year – until I started to edit “A Throne At Stake”. And then it all collapsed. I’ve heard and read that the Editor Mind and the Creative Mind are two very separate entities. I believe it; I can’t just go from one to the other. So, if I’m engaged in editing, I can’t seem to jump back into my creative space for an hour and write my thousand words. About the middle of June my daily word-count began to drop and continued doing so until it reached 0 earlier this month.

In that time I edited and published “A Throne At Stake”, and then re-edited “Pelgraff” in order to put it out in paperback. I gave a preliminary edit to “Trading for the Stars”, the first book in my Colleen Yrden saga, and then I re-formatted “A Throne At Stake” for paperback form, as well as “The Steadfasting”. I need a new cover for “The Steadfasting”, and may have something in the works. “Pelgraff (paperback) is now for sale from Createspace, Amazon and other entities, and my proof copy of “A Throne At Stake” should be winging its way to me, arriving this week. I’m about ready to give up on the paperback stuff as soon as I give ATAS the final look-over. I want to get back to writing again, for I’ve written only about 8,000 words this month – a far cry from the 30,000 of last month or the 66k and 85k of May and April.

I wish I could truly multitask, but this seems beyond me. So, I ask forgiveness for my ‘laxity’ of late, and promise to try to do better in August. Hopefully, lack of dropping into my Editing Mind will allow my Creative Mind to spark again and take us all on another journey.

Ah, to have my CCM back again – though I suspect it might be a little small for me. Then I and my imagination might multitask once again, discovering new worlds, riding fire into the skies, and rescuing damsels in distress – something I thought little of back then. Grateful damsels, I trust. D.A.’s damsels, however, seem to be a pretty hardy lot who don’t need much rescuing, though they do accept a helping hand at times – but woe to those who get in their way.

Until then, I thank you for your patience – and thank those who have picked up a copy of one of D.A. Boulter’s works.

Happy reading.

A Break

Writing isn't always easy. Sometimes it gets depressing, sometimes tedious. At other times it just flows and there doesn't seem to be any stopping the words and ideas. Right now, I'm about played out for the moment. So far this year I've written the equivalent of 2-1/2 novels.

One, "A Throne At Stake", has gone up on Amazon. The others are in various stages of completion. But, as I said, I'm about played out. So, I've taken a short break -- yeah, a break. Right.

As I've had a request or two to put my books out in paper as well as digitally, I've begun looking into it. And it's another learning curve. I started with "Pelgraff" for a couple of reasons, one being it's fairly short. So, I followed the guides, sent in my files and received a nice fresh copy of it -- a proof copy. And then I discovered all the errors I had made.

Thinking back to when "Courtesan" first went live on Amazon Kindle four years ago, it seems little changed. It took me a lot of hours to finally get it up in a nicely formatted form. This looks the same. Well, more hours and proofing later, I've sent in a new file, and hope to get my second proof copy back next week -- if I'm lucky.

If it looks good, it'll go up for sale. I doubt that it will sell well, but if someone wants a copy in Trade Paperback, it will be there for them. I kinda like the feel of holding the copy in my hands. There's something about a physical book.

I think my break is about over -- I haven't written anything new in six days now. Hey, I deserve a week off every now and then, right? And if, during my week off, I choose to do some major editing and formatting, etc., in order to put up a book in paperback, well, it wasn't all a loss as far as authorship is concerned.

The 'fun' thing about self-publishing, is that I get to do everything: writing, editing, proofing, formatting, designing covers -- I do most of my own now. I have someone who helps with proofing, but I try to get the manuscript to her with as few errors as possible. So, what you see is pretty much all my work. If it pleases, great; if it doesn't, then you know whom to blame. Yep, me.

Well, I guess I should get some of that sleep I've been missing. Then go to work -- yes, I have a job, I'm not a full-time writer.

Next week I hope to report on progress.

Till then,

Live well.

Perception

I think it was early-1960s, Grade 3 or 4, when my teacher took the class into the hall. She had us line up and, one by one, we had someone test our eyesight. You know the charts – “Please read from the top line…” Yeah, well I ‘failed’ that test. And, ever since then, I’ve had to wear corrective lenses for distance seeing.

Glasses are a pain. Here and now, I recommend to all my readers that you never have to wear lenses. (NB – I haven’t seen, nor heard of the notation ‘NB’ used since my early school days – anyway, take note that I did not recommend that you not wear them should you need them, I merely recommend that you don’t need them. Yeah, I know, as if we have a choice.)

Requiring corrective lenses alters one’s perception. Without them, things in the distance become fuzzy to me, not sharp and delineated. But that’s not what I mean. Requiring lenses means that my perception of the world changed. I couldn’t, for example, just jump into a lake like the other boys. First I’d have to find a safe place to put my glasses, then remember where it was so I could retrieve them after coming out. This also meant that I would have to come out basically where I went in – or at least return to that spot.

Glasses changed the level of spontaneity. One couldn’t just go home and say, “Hi, Dad, lost my glasses again. Could you pick up a new pair for me on your way home from work tomorrow?” Glasses cost money, and money wasn’t something in plentiful supply. Thus one didn’t do things that might cause the glasses to be broken or lost.

On top of that, glasses changed my perception of myself. Wearing glasses back in the mid-1960s wasn’t ‘cool’. I think that has somewhat changed in the last 50 years, but I’m not sure, as I don’t have a plethora of glasses-wearing 8-year-old friends. Actually, I don’t have any 8-year-old friends, but that’s beside the point. Let us just say that I’m no longer in the loop.

It took some years for me to become comfortable with wearing glasses. It no longer bothers me at all, but then again, more and more of my contemporaries are beginning to join me as they age.

On top of the myopia, I’m sensitive to light. A bright summer’s day means I have to wear tinted lenses as well, else suffer headaches. This, of course, changes my perception about what is a ‘nice day’. A nice day, to me, has quite a bit of cloud cover, if not overcast.

While I’m at it, I’ll admit that I like fog. The possibility exists that I like it because it reduces everyone else to my state. No one, not even those with the most acute vision can read a licence plate 30 metres away in a dense fog – and nor can I without corrective lenses on a fine day.

For all of us, perceptions change with circumstance. Mine (and others of my ilk) just experience it more sharply. Glasses on: all okay; glasses off: possible danger – especially when driving at night. Sunglasses on: all is fine, it’s a nice day; sunglasses off: headache on the way, it’s a lousy day.

These are things that only the empathetic can see. Until I wore glasses, I stood with the majority. The next day, I found myself in a minority, and my perception of everything changed (though my vision did not).

In the earlier years of movies and television, the producers relied on conventions to give hints to audiences. In westerns, if a man wore a white hat, we perceived him as the ‘good guy’. If he wore a black hat, the bad guy. If he wore all black he was the obvious villain. Then came Paladin (Have Gun, Will Travel). He wore black, but was the putative ‘good guy’, though really a gun-for-hire, a mercenary. And we were forced to change our perception – our eyes ‘lied’ to us. They told us that Paladin was the bad guy, while his actions told us differently.

War movies from that era told us that the Germans and the Japanese were the bad guys – most often murderers without morals, most often stereotypes. Then came “The Enemy Below”, where the German U-Boat commander was treated as sympathetically as the American Destroyer commander who fought him.

Both the above came out in 1957. And perceptions changed.

One of the great things about books – either writing them or reading them – is that they can give you alternative perspectives on life or at least aspects of it. You can see from the point of view of someone of the opposite sex – or someone entirely alien, though the aliens usually portray some aspect of humanity. A great thing about writing books is that – as author – you can play around with conventions, and make things not as they are perceived to be.

In my book Ghost Fleet, I decided to have no ‘villains’, though some might read it differently. All my characters, no matter on which side of the war they fought, or for what reasons, followed logical – for them – paths which coincidentally (I don’t believe in coincidence) put them in conflict with others. How can you hate the enemy when you understand and can empathize with him?

And now, I have just completed a new book, “A Throne At Stake” where I play with perception and convention a little more. It has taken me some time to get the book just where I want it, but I have succeeded at long last. I’m quite pleased with it – though I’m just one reader, and my perception of it may differ from all others. Nonetheless, I can now relax, take off my glasses, and bask in the good feeling of accomplishment.

So, it's off to bed for me, my trusty cat at my side ... on my back ... wherever he wants to be. I think he perceives me as furniture.

You Never Know

I’m now approaching the time of life when a man (or woman) begins to wonder things like: ‘Was it all worth it?’ ‘Did I make a difference in any way?’ And, of course, ‘How will I be remembered – if at all?’

As a writer, I hope to be remembered by my works and words. This leads me to wonder if any will read or remember them next year, if at all. It also makes me desire to make the most of those I do write – to give meaning to my existence. And, naturally, I wonder if I’m up to the task.

Years ago, I worked on the Distant Early Warning Line of radar stations in northern Canada. There, I watched the radar screens, waiting to give warning of the approach of Russian bombers either by dint of a report, or by the silence which would mean we had been destroyed.

As you all know, the bombers never came. And that left a lot of free time on my hands, with little to occupy it. Now, each site had a small library, and I read voraciously. Soon I finished all the – in my opinion – top tier books we had on hand. Then the second tier books. And, still being up there, that started me on books I’d otherwise not give a second glance.

I recall reading one – in my opinion – trashy novel. I no longer recall it, or its author. Nor do I even recall the genre. But I do recall that I wouldn’t want to be known by that book. That doesn’t sound good, does it, one author trashing another’s work? And, why would I do this here, on my blog, when I wouldn’t want another to do this to me? Good question, that. And I have an answer.

In the middle of that ‘trashy book’, I came upon a sentence – a single sentence – which said exactly what I needed to hear at that moment. I fear that I cannot recall the sentence, nor of what it spoke to in me. I only remember a sudden feeling of peace, of enlightenment. This unknown author will never know what he (or she) did for me in that time of my need. He, or she, will never know that words composed by him (or her) helped a fellow being.

Perhaps that book earned out its advance; perhaps that author made a decent living. Perhaps not. Perhaps that author had only that one book published, and his or her dreams of a writing career were dashed by a lack of sales and a lack of a publishing company willing to risk again. And, perhaps, that author one day wondered if the effort put out had been worth it, never to know that I would reply, “Yes, absolutely.”

A dozen years ago my mother passed on. As executor of her estate, one of my duties entailed closing her bank account at the local Credit Union. The woman with whom I dealt made things easy for me. I really appreciated it. No doubt, she thought she was just doing her job as best she could. For years after that, every time I saw her in the bank, I recalled the kindness of a stranger, and I mentally thanked her.

Near the tenth anniversary of my mother’s death, I found myself again in the Credit Union, and the woman was my teller. I decided that the time had come to thank her personally, and not just mentally. It took less than a minute to explain that I had never forgotten and how I had appreciated her actions. She looked at me and said, “You know, I really needed to hear that today.” She retired shortly after that. Had I waited, I would have lost my chance.

So, what am I saying here? You should thank people while you are able? Well, you probably should; it might make the world a better place. But, no, such is not the purpose of this post. No, the thing that comes to me is that we never know what will ‘make a difference’ to another. It might be just doing our job, it might be a smile to a stranger, or it might be a word of encouragement made in passing. It could be something so simple that we never give it a second thought, but to the recipients, in whatever place they find themselves, that action, that word, the doing of our job, might make all the difference in the world. And you and I will likely never know.

So, when I again ask myself if I made a difference, I’ll have to say I likely did – sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse. Was it all worth it? Probably. Will I be remembered? Does it really matter? As long as I continue to live, to write, to interact with those around me, I rest assured that something of what I do will carry on. And I guess that will have to be enough for me.

D.A. Boulter

PS: Don't forget to check out my progress from time to time (found on the "News" page), and, if you wish, read an excerpt from a forthcoming book, "Not With A Whimper".