Maestri update

I somehow managed to squeeze in a normal amount of dedicated writing time over the holidays...so far. I did have to stay up late and find some nice, quiet space inside my home to hideaway with my Chromebook but I managed to finish up part 1 of Maestri. It ran longer than I had intended by nearly 10,000 words. I doubt that the second draft will do any kindness to that bloated word count, either. There are still a few parts that I feel the need to flesh out more, in order to properly frame the tale.

Not wanting to write a 200,000 word novel, though, I did revisit my outline. I discovered that I could condense a bit in the next two parts and combine them into one. So, instead of Maestri being comprised of 4 main parts (Prodigy, Apprentice, Maestra, Mentor) I have combined Apprentice and Maestra into a single part and re-titled Mentor into Maestra - with just a bit of plot shifting into the 3rd part as well.

I am hopeful that the finished product will remain well under 150,000 words. Part 1 is outlined to be the shortest section out of the 3, so it will be interesting as part 2 unfolds.

I am already outlining my next project for after I complete Maestri. It is a divergence from horror and into the realm of Science Fiction. Actually, I had already been planning a science fiction book in the universe of David Bennett/Maestri and my next project is a bit of an introduction into that. It will be a series of short stories titled The Parables of Alpha Arteris, which tells folklore from the 5,000 year history of Earth's first off-world colonization efforts.

Cheers to the new year!

If you want to get in on the ground floor of my expanding universe, please check out The Morbid Fascinations of David Bennett. It is the beginning of an expansive, multi-genre tale about the paranormal, things unseen, and the complex world of science.

Enjoy!

Available on KindleUnlimited, Ebook, and beautiful matte finished paperback with cream colored paper: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1701845431

Self Care

Writing is much like any other time demanding occupation. We need time to craft our work and sometimes with non-traditional jobs like that it can be hard for the people in our lives to give us the space that we require for our work. People who are on on the outside looking in really struggle to relate to what it's like for those of us who write. Instead of seeing it as a developing career they see us as pursuing a hobby. They get confused and feel unappreciated when we prefer to work on our craft rather than spend time with them.

Perception is key to this. We, as writers, (or anyone in a non-traditional job struggling to balance work and family/friends) need to communicate and demonstrate to those around us how important and how seriously we take our writing. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't but we need to learn how to communicate that significance. Be direct, explain it to them by relating it to their job or their passion. Let them know that they are every bit appreciated but you really do consider this a job. Tell them that writing makes you feel complete and it makes life a bit more worthwhile for you.

We can also invite friends or family to observe us for a day (this personally makes me really uncomfortable as I hate being watched while I work.) After experiencing a day in our shoes they may be a bit more understanding of exactly how constricting our schedule can be.

On the flip side of this we need to NOT try to please everyone. It isn't a crime to take time for ourselves to write.

With my first novel I constantly felt like I was ignoring my family. To some extent I still experience the guilt but, after my first book was published, my wife seems pretty supportive. Sometimes tangible goals are what it takes for the people in our lives to become supportive.

Many of my friends still aren't on board and think that I'm simply an aloof jerk who thinks he is better than them. It bothered me for a long time. I tried to go out of my way to spend more time with them but my family and writing life also suffered. No matter what I did I couldn't please everyone. Explaining to some of them what I was working on didn't work. In fact, it garnered a few eye rolls. So, I had to cut that guilt cord loose. I still love my friends but I have to take care of myself. It shouldn't be on us, as writers, to cater to everyone in our lives at the sacrifice of our own sanity.

This issue crops up for a lot of us this time of year.

Absolutely, don't feel bad for sitting out a gathering to recover your mental health. I am going to do just that next weekend. My wife's family will be hosting a Christmas gathering. It will be the 4th for our family. I can handle 3, but that's my limit. So, rather than being crammed in a small house with 25 bickering adults and half dozen screaming children I am going to stay home and write. My wife is understanding, not sure her family is but it is what I have to do to maintain my mental health. I am an introvert by nature and that kind of environment is destructive enough on its own -- being the holidays after so many celebrations already makes it that much worse for me.

Don't think for a moment that the people who love you want you to suffer to make them or anyone happy. The hardest thing for many of us to do is let go and learn to love ourselves as much as we love pleasing the people around us. You are just as important as anyone else. Take the time to heal yourself, especially this time of year.

Happy Holidays, and please give yourself the present of mental health.

Demotivated

Not unmotivated; that would indicate that I simply don't have anything pushing me to be creative.

DEmotivated; as in seeing so much negativity in my personal and professional circles lately that it makes me just shut down and not want to function on anything more than a very basic level.

Just a week or so ago I was trying to give advice on how to stay on top of your writing game during the holidays. Boy, I need my own advice at this point.

The bustle of the holiday season seems to have everyone's knickers in a twist over the past several days. Everywhere I go people are being terse and unfeeling in their interactions with one another. People tend to take one another for granted and never fully appreciate what it is like to be on the opposite end of the ferocity emanating from them. Mindfulness goes out the window and the holiday season invariably devolves into a hostile display of how unhappy this time of year actually makes us.

It's not all bad. There are a lot of good times around the holidays -- but it seems that GETTING to that happy place takes and emotional toll on a good many of us.

Social media is a prime example of this. As we get closer to the holidays the different subgroups on Twitter within the Writing Community have completely lost their marbles. Authors and reviewers are at one another's throats. Traditionally published authors and Independent authors are tearing into one another. There is so much punching down that I am beginning to feel like a well kneaded dough. I'm not even taking the brunt of it, because I have pretty much withdrawn into my shell until January.

So what is the point of me writing this meandering post, other than to complain about people being nasty to one another? How about using it as an opportunity to explore what life is like from the perspective of the person on the other side of the conversation. If you feel like someone is being unjustly snarky try to put yourself in their shoes for a few minutes before you bang out that witty retort. Instead of sucking the life out of someone's day maybe you can learn something about yourself and the situation that someone else finds their self in. It only takes a moment to ruin someone's day or week but taking an extra moment to contemplate the situation could save someone's bad day or week, instead.

Happy Holidays.

Be kind.

Limits and Boundaries

It's been a busy couple of weeks of writing. Sorry I'm not blogging more, but while I'm drafting time becomes a precious commodity. My approach is changing, a bit, this time around also.

Writing MFoDB was a lot like guerrilla warfare. I had to take my chromebook everywhere with me and try to find five minutes here and there to bang out a thousand words or so during the day. It was a case of a little here and there adds up to a lot. Unfortunately, this created quite the editing problem for me in the revisions. My writing style was choppy, disjointed, uneven and it took a WHOLE lot of work to piece it all together and make it cohesive. In the end I was very happy with the product but it was forged in fire, blood, and exhaustion.

After my first few days of working on Maestri it became clear to me that this approach was going to be unsustainable. I wasn't going to fight for scraps of time to complete my vision on this novel.

I have set up dedicated time to write and the rest of the world can just function without me for a couple hours per day. My wife has been great about accepting that I need distance and privacy to focus on my craft. I explained it to her like a computer being pushed to the limits of its RAM. That's how I feel. It all loads into my consciousness and any outside influence buffers out important, pertinent data involving my story.

Another way in which I have made this book easier on myself is by compartmentalizing it. I have divided the work into 4 distinct sections. This allows me to focus on one part at a time, knowing where my beginnings and endings are so the script doesn't wander away from me. I really hate it when my characters have too much free reign and become uncooperative.

I highly recommend finding a way to communicate to the people in your life that you absolutely NEED SPACE and privacy to work on your book. Writers, if the people in your life care then they will make that small sacrifice for you. Please don't do like I did this past year and run yourself into the ground trying to get your book finished. It really took a toll on my psyche. For a while, during edits, I was unsure whether I even wanted to move forward on book 2.

It's so easy to say "I'm going to write a book" but oh so much harder to actually find the time in your day. Don't put all of the burden of your hobby/career on your own shoulders. It is okay to ask people around you to help you out by giving you the environment that you need to be productive in your literary endeavors.

Take care of yourselves.

The Morbid Fascinations of David Bennett will be FREE in ebook format from Amazon for Kindle to celebrate the upcoming Friday the 13th! Get it free from 12/10-12/13.
https://www.amazon.com/Morbid-Fascinations-David-Bennett-ebook/dp/B07ZG4N2XB

Making Progress

The past ten two weeks have been incredibly hectic here but, somehow, I have managed to make progress on Book 2: Maestri. I'm now over 12,000 words into draft 1. I know, it doesn't sound like much but it actually is. I'm roughly halfway through Part 1: Prodigy. I've also been tweaking the outline for Part 2: Apprentice. The final two parts of this book are pretty much outlined but I am waiting to finish those plots once I see where my characters lead me in the first half of the book.

I wanted to answer a question that I have gotten quite a bit about this book. The title: Maestri - what does it mean? It is the plural of Maestro, quite simply. It seems not a lot of people are familiar with the pluralization of the word. The definition that is pertinent to the usage here is: a great or distinguished figure in any sphere.

I will leave it at that for now. I wouldn't want to give it all away.

My writing has evolved with this second book. I sequester myself much more than I did while writing my debut. The intensity of this novel requires an extreme focus. I owe it to this book to make sure that I bring my vision to life in exactly the way that it deserves to be treated. I will take my time with it, but my pacing is perfect right now. It's not something that I am rushing, nor dawdling around with.

If you want to know more about where Maestri is heading, then check out Book 1: The Morbid Fascinations of David Bennett.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1701845431

Writing Around the Holidays

It's that time of year again. For me, it's a bit different. It's the first holiday season that I have been a writer. The whirlwind that has been 2019 has impacted me in so many ways that I can't even describe it. I want to thank everybody for a great year.

One thing I see mentioned constantly on social media is the amount of anxiety about writing during the holiday season.

So, let's take a collective deep breath and think about how we can approach this.

Everyone's situation is vastly different, but odds are that your free elements of the day are still going to be free. Sure, you might be mentally distracted by the challenges of organizing family gatherings and buying gifts but I'm willing to bet you still have a good 15 minutes when you are getting ready for bed where you could jot down even 100 or 200 words. I know, that's not much at all is it? It actually is, though. Those few words, added up over the next couple of weeks, can actually be a sizable chunk of your manuscript. Beyond that, though, it keeps your brain in the game. You won't disconnect from your story and will find it easier to reconnect to your WIP once all the craziness has settled and we're left with the bleak January landscape looking back at us through the window.

If that is too much for you, then try to just edit a few pages here and there. It keeps you familiar with your WIP and, again, keeps your brain in the game.

If THAT is still too much with your hectic schedule then just try to find some moments here and there to simply READ your WIP. It will help keep it fresh in your head.

Some people may have an easier time of just picking their work up after a few weeks or a month or more off. I'm not one of them. If I have to I will keep my chromebook in the bathroom just so I can escape in there and write for a few minutes.

I hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday season.

If you have any thoughts on this PLEASE feel free to share them in the comments!

The Silence of Trying

After posting the prologue last week, here's the rough draft of Chapter 1 of Maestri:

Chapter 1: The Silence of Trying

It was all too much of a distraction - the too white walls, the maddening flicker of the wonky light overhead, the sleet pelting the large glass window that allowed the whole world to peer up into the practice room. The wide open view down onto the street was the most irritating. She could feel the eyes of strangers looking up toward her as they heard her club the keys on the antique Steinway. They must have thought it sounded like a baby elephant was stomping the poor piano to death.

In truth Arabella was much more talented than she gave herself any credit for. Despite only being able to use the left side of her body she had a way with music that most able bodied people never would, even if dedicated to the craft for a lifetime. The teenage girl had only been playing for four years but had surpassed her teacher two years past. Since then she had studied the great works of composers ranging from classical to contemporary, practiced styles from jazz to death metal to renaissance and beyond. There wasn’t an area of music theory that confounded the astute girl. Then again, she didn’t do much else with her free time. 

Sure, she could go sit out in the living room and watch her foster mother get drunk while watching cooking shows on t.v. Hell, sometimes that was entertaining...for a while. Lynn would get giddy at the sight of new dishes that she longed to try, at first, but as the show progressed and the wine glasses emptied one after another the late thirty something’s mood would deteriorate until she was dwelling on the fact that she couldn’t cook worth a damn and didn’t have anyone in her life to cook for. The next few hours would be spent draining any additional wine bottle unfortunate enough to be located within her pantry while she cursed Amelia for walking out on her five years ago. She had adopted Arabella to fill that void but it took less than four months before that fullness had drained from her now empty heart. It wasn’t the kind of love that the upper class banking executive desired. Unfortunately, Lynn’s reputation as something of a selfish tyrant within the entire Atlan Valley financial industry prevented anyone from taking any kind of romantic interest in her. The conservative community also made it more difficult for a lesbian to find suitable company without being judged and having her professional life jeopardized by a long term relationship. Though Lynn felt inclined toward taking that risk for true love, time after time her partners hadn’t been willing to potentially sacrifice successful careers for her.

Arabella had grown tired of witnessing her stepmother descend into her fugues on a weekly (sometimes more often) basis. She preferred to sit in the large practice room, in full view of the public, and bang away at some random tune. Her own compositions would come out to play at night, never during the day. There was far too much discomfort in knowing that strange ears outside might hear the notes that poured out of her broken heart.

The music stopped and a sigh escaped the young girl’s lips. She turned her head toward the large window and considered wheeling herself over to the edge of it to shut the blinds. It was always such a tangle that Ari usually gave up and accepted the audience of passersby on the street below. Today was different, though. She was in a mood. 

It was the end of Spring break and tomorrow she would have to go deal with people much more up close and actually interact with the assholes. There were few students or faculty at the academy Arabella cared for, and they weren’t worth the effort of dealing with stares and snide comments from the classrooms and halls full of ableds at the school. The mocking was monotonous and unoriginal, anymore. At the beginning of the year there had been some witty new insults, a few that even made Ari chuckle to herself, which then became more fodder for the cretins who made fun of her disabilities.

The chair moved quickly over to the wall next to the window. Navigating the unwieldy contraption close enough that she could reach the blind cord was a challenge and Ari accidentally scuffed the eggshell paint next to the window with a grey smudge from the rubber of the front wheel. Whoops. Lynn would notice it and be sure to lecture the poor girl yet again about how she had no business trying to do things for herself. Then the lecture would devolve into a guilt trip about how thoughtless Arabella was to deprive Lynn’s prized ficus of its much needed sunlight shining through the oversized window.

Half lifting herself with her good leg, Ari grabbed the cord to the blinds and tugged on it hard enough that the blinds obediently flopped closed. The room was bathed in refreshing darkness but now she had to roll herself over to the opposite wall to flip the lights on so she could see her sheet music. Another sigh.

Arabella turned her chair and pushed with her left arm, aiming herself toward the darkened doorway that lead to the main living room. The switch was low enough that it would be a quick trip. About halfway across the room a motion in the darkness caught the girl’s attention. She turned her head and allowed the chair to roll to a gradual stop. Ari swore that she had seen some motion on the stairs the made their way up to the third floor. Something beyond the white bannister and between the bars had most certainly moved. Hallucinations weren’t a part of her disability and Ari was quite keen about sensing things. It seemed to be a heightened sense that compensated for a blind eye, deaf ear, and half of a paralyzed body.

There it was again. Ari was unsure what she was seeing but it was definitely something. Her skin prickled at a slight cold breeze blowing over the hair on her arm. She could only describe it as a darkness within the darkness, like there was a shadow hiding within itself on the steps. 

For a moment the girl wheeled herself back, slightly, then actually pushed herself forward in the direction of the stairs -- curiosity getting the best of her, despite a growing concern that someone was in the room with her. Arabella pushed her chair a couple of times then allowed it to slow. From a distance of just a few feet she now looked carefully between the rails of the banister. She didn’t see anything yet there was a motion there. Something moved! What the hell was it?

Ari pushed her chair again closer to the railing. There was a movement on the fourth step up, nearly at level with her face. She could see through it but it was almost like a darkened silhouette that followed her movements. It wasn’t tangible, yet it was there in front of her.

The temperature was dropping in the room by a marginal amount. Arabella wasn’t sure if she should be scared. The one emotion that had been missing from most of her life was a sense of fear. It came with the territory for someone who has spent considerable amounts of time plotting ways to end her own life. A bit of warm breeze seemed to waft up from the shadow within a shadow on the step, brushing Ari’s hair in such a way that it felt a bit like the warm caress of a hand on the side of her face. The sensation was so utterly alien that she shook in her chair. It was at that moment the panic hit and she tried to wheel herself backward. The chair wouldn’t move. Ari reamed hard on the wheel but it wouldn’t budge. The brake had somehow locked on it and she couldn’t move! She struggled and gasped for help, trying to climb out of the chair to get away from whatever was in the room with her. The chair flipped over, and Arabella with it. The resulting thud on the floor resounded throughout the entire second floor of the home. 

The presence seemed to move off the stairs, through the rail and down toward Ari’s face. She tried to scream, but of course no sound escaped her paralyzed vocal chords. All she could do was flail and try to drag herself away from the malice. She felt the presence descend upon her. The heat of it approached her back as she pulled her body toward the door.

The living room door opened and light flooded into the room. Lynn gasped in shock as she flipped the light on, quickly making her way over to her distressed foster daughter lying on the floor. Reaching a hand down to help scoop the girl up while using the other to right the chair, “Oh, Ari! You’re going to scratch the hardwoods! Are you alright?” 

The concern for Arabella genuinely seemed secondary and the girl reacted as such. Instantly gone was the panic of whatever had spooked her, replaced by the massive inferiority complex that always manifested within her anytime her foster mother was near. Ari let her body go boneless, it was about the only way she had of being passive aggressive with the older woman.

Once Ari was back in her seat, Lynn quickly inspected the maple hardwoods in the room while her foster daughter plaintively flailed for her attention. Lynn barely even noticed.

Exasperated, Arabella wheeled herself back over to the piano and slammed her hand down on a chord so dissonant that it made Lynn jump to her feet. “What the hell is that for?”

Grabbing a pad of paper and her pen from atop the Steinway, Ari scribbled out as best as she could with her left hand. She didn’t know whether it was her naturally dominant hand but her penmanship raised serious doubts about it. After completing her scribbles she tossed the notepad over to Lynn, who spent several seconds deciphering the scratches.

There was something on the stairs. It scared me.

“What? No, there’s nothing on the stairs. Crazy girl, there’s nothing there at all.” Stamping her heels across the maple wood, Lynn likely scuffed the floor far more than Ari may have during her fall. She walked up the first few steps and looked around the room. 

Arabella wheeled herself over to the edge of the banister and pointed to where she had seen the shifting darkness. Her emphatic gestures were nothing more than wasted energy in Lynn’s presence, and Ari quickly quieted her motions. Another sigh. It was so damn hopeless. Despite the years together she could never get through to her foster mother. It didn’t matter what the topic was, Lynn’s personality existed solely to dismiss any matter that she didn’t want to put the energy into dealing with. This time was no different.

“Well, Ari, there’s nothing here at all.” Lynn studied the girl in the wheelchair from her vantage above the banister, gazing hard at the child. “Is this because you have to go back to school tomorrow?” 

Ari’s disdain for school was common knowledge to most of Atlan Valley at this point. She proudly owned the record for most suspensions by a disabled student in the school’s illustrious thirty year history. The previous record was zero, but Arabella was setting the bar high with a running total of four. She looked down, now realizing that it was pointless to waste the effort on trying to express herself to the older woman.

Lynn eventually wandered back out of the room, closing the door behind her but leaving the light on. The aroma of merlot lingered well after she was gone.

Left alone, yet again, in her silence Arabella went back to the piano and began to play one of her own compositions. It wasn’t her best. The notes were slow, sad, meandering, and rhythmless. The song was a perfect reflection of its creator.

_____________

Interested in knowing where this story is heading? Look for Maestri, available on Amazon around August 2020.

Want to know the beginning? Check out The Morbid Fascinations of David Bennett on Amazon now available in kindle (unlimited) and paperback. https://www.amazon.com/Morbid-Fascinations-David-Bennett-ebook/dp/B07ZG4N2XB