Author Archives: David Crampton

The Collector Gene

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A few nights back, I filled another journal with words. This usually takes anywhere from ten months to two years, depending on the size of the journal and how often I’m writing. They went much faster back when I was writing The Remembrance, but slowed down once I began The Glass Crown.

This one took six months to fill, and is the second one to bite the dust since I picked the Adam’s Name story back up. It was a gift from a friend, back when I was writing the first book. He was bummed, if I remember correctly, because I hadn’t gotten to any of the notebooks he’d given me by the time I finished. I assured him that I had plenty more stories that needed out of my head and onto the page. I wasn’t done, not by a long shot.

As time goes on, my desire to collect things is shifting from Transformers and comic books to unique notebooks and journals. The one that I filled last had pages made out of recycled cotton instead of paper. It had a suede cover and a celtic knot button to wrap the closure cord around. I picked it up from a shop at the Holly, MI Renaissance Fair called Under the Mango Tree. I’ve also got two books, gifted to me by my brother if I remember correctly, that are made out of the fibers of elephant dung. (Oh, wow, those guys are making them with lines on the pages now!) A while back, I was gifted one made entirely out of bamboo, from cover and spine to the pages.

When I’m in second hand stores, I have to restrain myself from picking up the ones with yellowed or wavy pages. Or when a favorite webcomic offers branded notebooks. Or when I go to a Ren Fair.

Yeah, I’m in trouble. :) Well, enough blathering. It’s time to fill the next one!

House Hunting

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So, we’re house hunting. Last week, due to sitcom levels of miscommunication, we looked at seven houses in one evening, with three of the kids along. The irony was thick and hearty, as this was exactly the situation that we were attempting to avoid, thanks to home buying experiences in my past.

I kept it together, tried to corral the kids (new house every 20 minutes, an infinite number of nooks and crannies to explore, so many shiny things to touch, how could they not go crazy?), and rode the roller coaster. There are a few things that I learned along the way that I’d like to share with all of you.

  • Pastels are not always the best choice for every single surface in a home. Yes, that includes the outside.
  • Moth ball smell is an immediate house hunting turn off.
  • Your favorite houses will either have a mold-infested (and probably haunted) basement or be built on a cliff. Neither of these is good for raising small children.
  • The several month long drought will pick that day to end, including the requisite downpours. This is not as bad as it sounds.
  • When it comes to emergency drive-through dinner, McDonald’s will always be loved by the kids and hated by your stomach.

Now that we’ve got a better idea of what we want, what we don’t, and a cross section of what’s out there, it’s time to get pre-approved. Wish me luck.

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Writing Journal

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From my writing journal on 16 July:

There’s no reason that a sword from a dream needs to stay a sword when it’s pulled into the real world. So, Chuck is led to a mirror by the little girl. He sees his dream self in his reflection. The dream self mirrors his actions precisely. He makes the dream self take off the sword and hand it to him through the mirror. When the sword enters the “real” world, it becomes a wooden cane with a brass dragon’s head for a handle. When Chuck finds his magic, as Michael did, he’ll turn it back into a sword.

This ended up being a point at which the two sets of conflicting characters glance off of each other, at varying rates of speed. I talked the above idea over with Nikki, and she said, “That’s exactly what I expected you to do.” This perturbed me for a reason that I couldn’t quite nail down, so I spun it again. Chuck is presented with the same option, but reacts in a way that is unexpected by those trying to manipulate him. And then the repercussions of their attempts ripple across the larger scene at a nice clip, providing a very nice buildup to something that I have outlined for Chapter 10.

Now that I’ve got that knot untangled, I’m getting words on paper again. I got some time out of the house yesterday, and made quite a bit of progress. As soon as I type it all up, I’ll update the word count so you all are kept in the loop, so to speak. :)

As I wait for more feedback from my alpha readers (hint, hint), I’ve gotten some good ideas about how to go about the novella rewrite from feedback that I’ve gotten already. Implementing some of them will really serve to tighten the focus of the story, and get you caring about the characters more quickly. That’s the plan, anyway.

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Final Stages

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I have a choice to make about the first Adam’s Name novella.

I can either go the traditional publishing route with it, or I can self-publish again.

If I think that the work is good enough, once the edits and rewrite are done, I have the option to  begin navigating the slush piles of the markets publish novellas. If I think that the work is not quite good enough, but as another step in my journey toward professionally publishable, I can self-publish, as I have in the past.  If I get a bee in my bonnet about the traditional publishing industry vs. building my audience through non-traditional publishing, I have the option of creating another project or two with Lulu (trade paperback, ebook). If I go that route, there are some things to consider:

Cover artist – I’ll need a cover. Unlike past books, I have a more specific idea of what I want on the cover, and what style of art I’d want used.  This would require a commission, most likely. I’d love to support an artist in this way, that’s for sure.

Professional editor – No matter which route I go, I’d want the piece to be professionally edited.  I could contract out for this, which might be a wee bit expensive, but I think it would be more than worth it. There’s also the option of my wife, who has two associate degrees, one in literature and one in writing. She is looking to be an editor professionally, and this might be a good feather in her cap.

Why do I keep putting things in hats?

If I self-publish, I’m going to need some cash, at least for the cover art. Kickstarter might be a good place to go to raise some funds, with copies of the novella, possibly also a chapbook, as rewards. I’d need to see if there are any details, tax wise, about how I need to represent myself (person or LLC or something) to make sure that I don’t end up losing the money that should be going toward the Kickstarter purpose.

Definitely needs some thought.

More Snippets

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The Nikki has a blog! She’s waxing verbose about the different aspects of her life (mother, wife, student, friend, etc.) in an attempt to break free of the shackles of academic style writing (among other things). Check out all of the hats she wears here!

Medical appointments abounded last week, I tell you what. Nikki threw her back out, we both got eye exams and ordered new glasses, and I drank a radioactive milkshake and then got my eating tubes x-rayed (these are different than the internet tubes). The after effects of barium are far more strange and uncomfortable than the chalkiness of the drink. I didn’t know that they had live X-ray machines that display live to a TV! It was pretty sweet.

I find myself, as I’m sure many are, worrying about money. As things go, we’ve got a roof over our heads and food in our bellies, so we’re better off than most of the world. We’ve got entertainment, transportation (as long as nothing breaks), and I’m employed.

I’ve started the next sentence two or three times, and I’m just not comfortable airing details. We’re riding the line close enough to worry every month, but not enough to lack an internet connection or have to sell our possessions. Others have it so much harder, but my family is what hits me in my gut.

Buying a house for a family of our size is cheaper monthly, in many cases by quite a bit, than renting. This is currently blowing my mind, and is bringing out a lot of personal demons regarding abandoning my dreams, permanence, and entropy vs. upkeep.

I’ve used my CPAP machine through the night three times in the past week. There is hope!

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Writing Journal

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From my writing journal on 7 July:

What should Chuck use as a cane? It should be multipurpose, but able to function well and reliably as a cane. A larger rifle or shotgun wouldn’t do it. It could be a regular cane or crutch, if they stumbled upon the ruins of a hospital. Will need to research the locations of hospitals in Gary.


Other options? A branch. That could be turned against him by the Left Hand.

Nikki suggests that I use a dream to let us know that the item is important, and have him pull it out of the dream or stumble upon it in a trance state. As Nikki’s ideas tend to do, it got me thinking. I already have Chuck dreaming about something that might work – his father’s sword from his dress uniform. He’s instinctively reached for it several times. But I’m pretty sure it would make a terrible cane. I need to let this one percolate a bit.

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Blinking in the Sunlight

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I tend to hermit.

I have limits on how much social interaction that I can usually handle. Pre-kids, I’d just make sure that I drove myself to whatever was going on, so that I’d always have the ability to leave if I needed to. After kids, most of my social interaction buffer was eaten up by trying to keep up with the constant barrage of interaction that kids require. The idea that I needed to go out and spend time with more people, instead of going out as a way to get a break from all of the people in the house… inconceivable!

I’ve made some attempts to combat the hermit urge over the last few years, but I haven’t been consistently successful. There was the get together at my house, then there was the Round Table at the bar… Single events that didn’t form a pattern. I lapsed back into hermit mode.

Then came my trip to Cleveland. I’d actually been feeling the need to go down there and visit, instead of having to force myself. I wanted to catch up and visit and get input and feel that being creative could be an actual career, and all the things that are great about visiting with Gil.

When I was invited to my friend Mike‘s birthday party in Frankenmuth, I felt the same way. This was something that was outside of our normal operating budget, and so I used a babysitting gift certificate that I’d gotten for Christmas, sold a nearly-working netbook that was collecting dust, and we were on our way! It was amazing to see Mike, Erica, Mike R. and his wife and daughter, Sara, and to meet Erica’s friend from OMG way back. My only regret is that we had a sitter stopwatch, so we had to leave right after the meal. It would have been nice to visit my brother and my grandmother, who both live very near there, but I will take what I can get.

I’m hoping that this desire to reconnect continues, but I’m terrified of jinxing it.

Let’s recap!

Though we’re all past our LARPing days, we still can’t resist talking about our characters.

I did not eat six hundred chickens, no matter what they’re saying on Facebook.

OMG I drive a family car!

Does anyone want that last piece of chicken before we ask for more? Yeah, Mike does.

Serious girl is serious.

Mike really did eat six hundred chickens.

Phone Geekery 3

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HTC and Android are now fighting over my phone, and I’m a pissed off consumer who’s stuck in the middle.

Originally, my phone shipped with Android 2.3, with (the very slick) HTC Sense running on top of it. Recently, HTC released an upgrade to Android 4.0, the much-touted Ice Cream Sandwich. (Never mind that 4.1 AKA Jellybean is about to be released.) It also released a built in update to its HTC Sense.

What’s the purpose of the new version of Sense? Is it to take advantage of the new user interface that Ice Cream Sandwich provides? Is it to add a shiny finish on top of the OS that’s brilliantly designed to take advantage of the hardware present in both smartphones and tablets? Ha!

No, you silly dreamer. It’s to make 4.0’s interface look JUST LIKE 2.3’s interface. It’s purpose is to undo nearly all of the awesome that comes along with 4.0 so that HTC’s end users don’t get confused by the changes to their phones.

HTC upgraded the operating system my phone, and then added extra software to un-upgrade it. On top of that, it doesn’t work. At least three times a day, when exiting an app, Sense reloads itself. I’m not sure if it’s crashing, if it’s becoming unresponsive and timing out, but the result is the same. Irritated end user.

Wouldn’t it make more Sense (see what I did there?) to actually design that shiny polish for Ice Cream Sandwich? Of course it would! It makes so much sense that they’ve already done it. Can I install this piece of awesome software on my phone, since I’d rather have the changes that come with the new OS?

No, you silly dreamer. That’s only available for new phones that ship with Android 4.0 pre-installed.

*sputter*

This is yet another reason why people root their phones. Listen to me, phone companies and service providers. Your shininess is appreciated, but if it doesn’t work, it’s not welcome. That phrase you use? “Value-added feature?” It’s not adding any value for me. It’s right up there with the provider’s mandatory pre-installed junk apps that do nothing but slow my phone down as they inevitably crash and burn, or pop up helpful notices that cannot be dismissed or acknowledged or what-the-hell ever. I shake my cane at them and tell them to keep that crap to themselves.

So now I’m faced with the rooter’s conundrum. Do I root my phone, void its warrantee, and have the device function like it should? Or do I leave it alone, preserve the warrantee, and deal with the dumb? I suppose there is the third option of contacting HTC and finding out what they can do for me. Maybe I’ll give that one a go.