Gnomething to Write About!

After another eventful doctor's visit, I headed outdoors to huddle behind my camera before settling into my mermaid noir story for the evening. (After dinner of course! Can't write on an empty stomach.)

The Write-a-thon is still going on through the end of July. There is still time to sponsor me and help raise money for Clarion West Writer Workshops, the speculative fiction workshops every budding writer dreams of attending. 100% of your donation goes to the foundation. (Hey, that rhymed!)

While I deftly maneuver my fingers over the keyboard, please enjoy some gnome photos. Another favorite character you can pop in a fantasy story any time. As always, happy writing and happy reading to all! And please check out the fundraiser page!

The Dark Side of the Mermaid

 



There's a darker side to mermaids, Virginia. Yes, there is! As I've found out since I started work on goal #3 for the Write-a-thon, creating a few new short stories. My romantic love story started out with the paramour of the main male character being a mermaid and he discovers this, after imagining what the woman attached to the beautiful singing voice looks like. But then, without warning, my darker side struck. And now I'm writing a mermaid murder noir! LOL It's very different from anything I've written thus far.

And yesterday, I was visited by my muse. She gave me the perfect names for the two female leads. As I woke up, I heard a female voice whisper, "Magda. Delphine." I rushed to look up the meaning of both, knowing the former is a religious name, but discovered it also meant: One who comes down from the tower. Now this is absolutely perfect symbolism for a succubus, but completely unplanned. As is Delphine, which means "dolphin" in French and is the name of the lovely murdered mermaid. Splendid! Thank you, my muse! Thank you!

As promised, I'll share with you my work in progress, unedited. Here's an excerpt from my untitled short:

“There’s a dead mermaid in the bathtub. N-not in my apartment, but in the one above mine. I didn’t even know there were such things as mermaids, until today. And I-I’m still not sure what I really saw, but I took a picture of it with my phone.”

He slid his phone to me across the desk, which is when I saw his perfectly manicured nails and that got me thinking about other things, but I didn’t have time for that now. I had a client to serve, not myself, though if I had my way, he’d end up in my bed before this investigation was over. I stared at the photo of the young mergirl curled up in a fetal position in a dirty white bathtub filled with water and what looked like sea salt, pounds of sea salt soaked in blood, but it wasn’t hers. There wasn’t a mark on her. Her dark brunette hair spun through with streaks of bright poppy, had been trimmed recently, it looked, from her blunt bangs. Though judging by how translucent her skin looked and the fact that I could see her veins and tendons and muscles, she’d been out of the sea for more than three days, so perhaps, her killer had cut her hair after abducting her.

 "You say you took this photo today?”                                                                                  

“Yes. She’s in the apartment above mine.”

I raised one arched eyebrow at him.

“I know what you’re thinking and I don’t normally go sneaking around my neighbors’ apartments, but she was special.”

“Special how?”

“She had this voice. This amazing singing voice. And I heard her singing.”

“And you fell in love.” Typical story. Guy hears a little mermaid sing and instantly she becomes his paramour. I nodded my head and pinched my lips together, trying very hard not to focus on the intoxicating heat rolling off his body and the sound of his heartbeat in my ears. I needed an energy boost and soon. I shifted in my chair, tucking my tail tighter beneath me. It was almost undetectable in the skirt I wore. I don’t even think this delicious human recognized me as a succubus, he was so shocked at discovering a mermaid in a bathtub. Better to not reveal myself to him. This poor whelp had seen all he could handle for today.

“She’s dead.”

“Yes, I can see that.” I set his phone down on my desk and took another sip from my mug. “I’d offer you some coffee, but as you can see, I can’t afford a secretary and there’s no coffee machine in my office. My apologies.” I flashed my best apologetic smile and uncrossed my legs. “Have you shown this photo to anyone else? Your friends? The police? Your girlfriend, perhaps?”

“No. No one. I live alone and I thought about going to the police, but I-I wasn’t sure they’d believe me. Since that mockumentary on television and everything …”

I hope you've enjoyed this as much as I've enjoyed writing it. Tune in to see what happens. I'll be posting more excerpts as I continue. If you like what you've read here, please consider sponsoring me for the Clarion West fundraiser. It runs through August 1st. 100% of your donation goes to keeping these wonderful speculative fiction workshops by Clarion West going. Just to be clear, I am not participating in a workshop, this is just me plodding away at my keyboard and raising a little money for a foundation I believe in.

http://www.clarionwest.org/members/sekhautet/

As always, happy writing and happy reading!

Write-a-thon 2014, Day One

I'm  sitting in my kitchen with my laptop looking out at our backyard and the pool, thinking about mermaids.

I watched the new special, Mermaids: The New Evidence, on Animal Planet. I'd enjoyed the first mockumentary too and was excited to see this one. It did not disappoint. My writer's mind went whirring and then tonight, I looked up mermaids in this book I have, Fabulous Creatures and Other Magical Beasts, written by Joe Levy. This beastiary is filled with a plethora of creatures. I adore beastiaries and snatch them up whenever I can afford to do so. They are excellent inspiration for story ideas.

I've been kicking around the idea of doing a short story or novella about a young man who falls in love with a woman he's never met. She lives in the apartment above his and spends a lot of time in the shower and has a beautiful singing voice, but he's never laid eyes on her. And yet, he's fallen in love with her, tucked in his bed, late at night, imagining her face, her beautiful face that surely must be as enchanting as her voice. This is what I'm going to start writing.

Mermaids are dear creatures to me for two reasons. First, I've always loved the water and felt at home there. My mother had me swimming before I even entered kindergarten. I remember fondly taking lessons at the local YMCA in the summer. I was fortunate enough when I moved at age five to have a pool in my backyard. I swam every day in the summer and often imagined myself as a mermaid with perfect, long flowing tresses. Of course, that never happened, but I did learn the joy of swimming laps and have found that to be not only great exercise, but a good stress reliever as well. When I'm in the pool, the entire world melts away and my busy monkey mind is soothed. It's become a form of meditation to clear my head. I always feel better after going for a swim.

My second reason is a beautiful family legend. When my great grandmother, Babushi, came over from Poland on a ship, she claimed to see a mermaid nursing her babe on a rock before they reached Ellis Island. Babushi took this as a sign that coming to America was a good choice. And it was. My grandparents owned their own butcher shop for awhile and later my grandmother ran her own catering business after they moved from New Berlin to Whitefish Bay. Grandma Lesniak worked hard and saved her money. And she helped my father go to college. She strongly believed in education. My mother, Rosalie, was the first child in the family to graduate with a college degree. And she did it with a 4.0 average at fifty! I am the second generation of our family to have graduated from college, with honors as well. Sadly, my grandma passed away a few months before I turned six, but I know she watched me walk across that stage to collect my diploma that sunny day in May. She would have been proud to read the stories and poetry I've had published. I know she would have been so happy to see my first anthology I got featured in. I was too!

Two hundred and twelve other people are participating with me. So far I've raised $394, not counting the new donations made after this last week's report. I'm more than thrilled to be sponsored by anyone for any amount. Every penny helps Clarion continue to provide speculative fiction workshops. All of your donation, every cent, goes directly to Clarion. I am just a writer plodding along faithfully on my laptop. *grins* What do I get for taking on this six week fundraiser feat? Well, I get more motivation to write and I get to meet new people in the industry and network. Maybe, I'll get a few stories written and a few published, alone the way. And I know I'll get a lot of blog entries done too.

If you'd like to sponsor me or read about my writing goals and follow my progress on here or my nifty sponsor page, that'd be just ducky. You can also sponsor other writers or even a whole zoo of writers on the sponsor page!

Click here.

And don't forget to check in with me. I'll be posting more about my experience and sharing a new story too.

As always, happy writing and happy reading, my demon hunters! And a big thank you to everyone cheering me on and everyone that's generously sponsored me!