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Author Jennifer Quail

Fantasy, Steampunk, Science Fiction, and More

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This is not a blog.

Blog would imply that I’m going to write about me, which I suppose I am in the sense I am writing about things which interest me.  But this is not the kind of author’s blog where I’m going to talk about the process of writing and pretend to offer sage advice.  Nor am I going to talk about the seriousness of my craft and its significant meaningfulness and the deep emotional investment and trauma required by “the craft.”  Frankly I’ve got books to write and anthology deadlines I’m trying to meet.  And I’ve never met a successful full-time writer who writes fiction who is prone to deep philosophical discussions of the craft.

But they say that authors ought to have blogs, so I figured if I’m going to leap on the bandwagon, I might as well write about things that interest me and which might give any interested parties a look into how this particular writer’s mind works.  Topics may include but are not limited to why I always seem to like villains, painting and drawing as note-taking, food in fiction and my pet peeves thereof, what my adorable Corgis are doing, tales from the day job (where I often get to party like it’s 1799) and sometimes, excerpts and comment on my own work.  Writing and otherwise.

Featured Image: The Road After Dark, acrylic on black canvas, 2014.  This is my road as seen on a winter night, based on what I see when I walk the dogs.  Not necessarily as might be seen by others.

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Food and Fiction

Hopefully the folks who frequent this passes-for-a-blog and my author Facebook page have read some of my work. (If not, you can visit my Amazon Author page and see what strikes your fancy. Strange Roads is hovering at that 19 reviews threshold…) And especially if you’ve checked out A Kiss and a Promise you might have noticed I like writing about food. If you saw me on Jeopardy! you can probably guess I like food with my wine, too. One of my collection of degrees is culinary school, after all, and while I don’t get fancy all the time, I definitely like writing about food and cooking.

Given how many of my characters are Slavic, that’s probably not surprising. I’ve been working on expanding my story “Storm-Spun” (Tales of the Siblings Not-So-Grim) and keep wanting to veer off into things like the Slavic love affair with berry picking. 105699900_1135846986773986_1015250223524311536_n

When you find something edible in the woods and suddenly “I’m Katniss Everdeen, y’all!”

It IS berry season. I already have plans to torture characters with gooseberry picking (I have the scars to prove it), strawberry stands are open, and (see above) wild raspberries are ripening. I have “volunteer” sunflowers growing in my garden beds, and my gooseberry bushes produced almost nine pounds this year. The apricot, cherry, and pear trees are still too young, sadly. All of it had me thinking about what characters like Masha would be picking and preserving in a fantasy-Ukraine village, or what kind of fruit bushes and trees Eva would want from her real-world Crimean home to transplant to Denmark.

Of course, with Masha, I’ve run into a problem: when I’m writing a fantasy universe based on a Eurasia before the time of travel to the Americas . . . what would they really eat? Tonight for dinner I made a Moldavian fish casserole that involves a sauce of tomatoes (no), peppers (no), and is served over polenta (nope.) Sunflower seeds, the go-to snack of eastern Europe? Nope. North American native (though made into a commercial crop in Russia and re-imported.) All those fantasy Europes full of potatoes and pumpkins? They’re trading with the Americas somehow. No peanuts (South America.)

I ran into the opposite side of this working at the museum. I had to double-check native sources of sugar, to find that they didn’t in fact have honey. Honeybees are native to Eurasia and arrived, it’s thought, some time in the 1600s. They were alien enough some tribes referred to them as ‘white man’s flies.’ While there are maples native to Eurasia, sugar maple is a New World tree.

Maybe if I really want to make my characters do drudge work, they can try boiling birch sap. (I’ve done that research. Okay I ordered birch-sap drink from RussianFoodUSA. It’s not going on pancakes any time soon.)

I Get Interviewed by a Real Writer

As mentioned earlier, I did a very fun Zoom interview with Ken Levine, who probably wrote some of your favorite sitcom episodes (especially if you like Cheers.) The first half of the interview is live now on Hollywood and Levine!

We’re All Fine Here. How are you?

Now that we’re back to somewhat of a normal schedule, complete with having to go to work, of course I’ve got more motivation! Mostly, I’ve been procrastinating (and procrastibaking.) Hoping to get more writing done, now that I’m not sitting around running out of things to binge watch and discovering Audible. (Crime and Punishment is much easier read aloud.)

However I did some chatting in the new Zoom world. Coming later this week, I had the exciting and flattering experience of being interviewed by Emmy-award-winning writer and Jeopardy! fan (and Jeopardy! clue)  Ken Levine for his podcast Hollywood and Levine. It’s a lot of talk about Jeopardy, quizzes, and a few plugs (like my story in Tales of the Siblings Not-So-Grim) Maybe even a hint about what I’ll be working on now that lack of time provides motivation! The first episode will drop midnight, Thursday 25th. I’ll post a notice on my Facebook as a reminder when it’s live.

So Back to Trying To Finish Things

After another miserable NYCMidnight Short Story Contest first round where, for the third year straight, I drew Horror as my category (your randomizer is broken, NYCM), I’m back to trying to get things written that I want to write. For those who enjoyed “Storm-Spun” (and if you did, please review, and if you haven’t read it yet, please grab a copy!) I’m playing around in the same universe with the same characters.

Which of course means I’m looking up riddles. I’m thinking of borrowing this one:

In the marble walls as white as milk, lined with skin as soft as silk, within a fountain crystal clear, a golden apple does appear. No doors are there to this stronghold, yet thieves break in and steal the gold.

Too obvious?

And in other news, baileyback

Bailey isn’t speaking to me because I didn’t agree that 3:30pm was suppertime. When the silent treatment didn’t work, she went and got the Corgi as backup.

This is actually starting to feel a little silly.

First, if you don’t follow me on Twitter (please do) you may have missed the link to my interview on ABC 57 yesterday morning (or you were asleep, like sane people are at 6:45 in the morning.) Definitely follow me on Twitter for Jeopardy! livetweeting, dog photos, goat photos, and griping about how much writing I’m not doing.

Seriously, when Corina said “Your life is going to change” when we were setting up between episodes I didn’t know she meant “You may want a media manager.” I’ve done interviews for the local newspapers including a follow-up, and I now have  two different local-interest magazine requests pending, my undergraduate university’s alumni magazine, have done interviews on the local CBS and ABC affiliates, and have been asked do something for WNDU so I’ll have hit the big three network trifecta. Good thing it’s the slow season at work.

It’s mentally kind of draining, actually.

I’m sort of stuck on the easier (relatively) turnaround of short stories, but that keeps pushing book-length projects back. And of course, with a book, there’s always the question of . . . what do I do with it? Unpopular as this opinion is I really hate “indie” stuff. It’s too much work, it’s too much up-front expense, and if there’s one aspect I loathe it’s marketing. I realize even with real publishers that’s still mostly on the writer these days, but at least I’m not stuck doing every aspect. And of course, there’s the chances of getting lost in the shuffle.

Of course if I’m too busy doing interviews and chasing dogs trying to tire them out, I’ll never get anything done anyway!

Oh, if you aren’t following Smoking Pen Press’s newsletter check them out for at least one interview that isn’t ENTIRELY about Jeopardy! in their next edition.

We have a Winner! Actually Two Winners!

Maggie has chosen! (Because Bailey was busy stealing Maggie’s other toys.) Through the extremely scientific method of writing down all the names on slips of paper, burying them in the toy bowl, and seeing who got knocked out first when Maggie yanked her Bark Box Turkducken out, we have two winners of our drawing for paperback copies of Tales of the Siblings Not-So-Grim featuring my story “Storm-Spun”!

The winners are:

Susan Depping

Clarawayne Starrett-Wolford

Please contact me via Facebook or using the comment form here about where you’d like your book sent and if you’d like it signed to anyone in particular or to you!

Everyone else, thank you for all your shares and likes and comments! I may be doing more contests in the future, and as always a lot of my work is available via Amazon and Lulu! If you’re interested in a signed copy of any of the books, let me know via the comment form here.

Merry Christmas!

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How Eva in “Only Ever Slowly” might celebrate. Via “Blog Into English.”

Kind of a quiet Christmas here, but quiet can be good. (Especially when the beagle is comfortable enough to start howling.)

bailey

Silent Night…for now.

So Let’s See Who’s Still Paying Attention…

I know I’ve picked up plenty of followers thanks to Jeopardy, and I appreciate the appreciation! But of course, this sorta-a-blog and Facebook are really about the whole writing thing. So in hopes of keeping some of you folks around, I’m going to have a little contest!

I have in my hot little hands paperback copies of Tales of the Siblings Not-So-Grim from Hollow Hills.  This anthology, featuring stories inspired by fairy tales with not-so-downer endings, includes my short story “Storm-Spun”, a Slavic tale involving talking horses, magic spindles, and Koshki the Deathless (and some altered/fantasy-fied spellings, obviously.) As I would really love for people to read what I write I’d like to give away a couple copies, and find out if y’all are actually reading my Facebook page.

So here’s what we’ll do!

1. Like My Author Page On Facebook

2. Like and SHARE the post for this blog entry.

3. ?

4. Profit! Okay, maybe win one of two paperback copies of Tales of the Siblings Not-So-Grim, with my story “Storm-Spun”, signed by me. I may not be a famous author, but hey, I’ve got an entry on the Jeopardy Contestants Wikipedia page. (I would add stuff like where I’m originally from and went to school, but I honestly can’t be bothered figuring out how to edit it. Also it’s hard to cite things when, well, it’s me. I am my own citation.)

5. I will choose two winners at random from people who, again, like My Author Page , and like AND SHARE the Facebook post for this blog (and I’ll even give you an extra entry if you comment on it, too.) I’ll probably do something crazy like put the names on dog treats or tennis balls and let Maggie the Corgi and Bailey the Beagle (#dogsofjeopardy) pick. Since I like Christmas only slightly less than the Nostalgia Critic, and love stretching out the season I’ll do the drawing on Boxing Day (December 26, 2019.)

Winners will be contacted by Facebook message from the Author Page and announced here, if you want to be. Postage is on me for one book to your location (so sorry, you have to live somewhere the post office ships to.)

Winners are not obligated to leave reviews on Amazon, Lulu, or Goodreads, but it would be nice for me and my fellow authors if you wanted to!

 

 

5000 words a day doesn’t have to be one document, right?

So while I should be either really getting going on the novel-length story featuring Aleksandra and Mattias (who’ve so far cropped up in  three flash fics and a lot of notes) or maybe that food-theme fantasy sequel to “Storm-Spun” with a December 31st deadline.

Instead I’ve got two lines for what MIGHT be an adaptation of “Ghost Life” to something a little brighter and more upbeat:

“Our arrangement probably seems strange, or it would if anyone knew about it. For the record, his being dead since before we met has only been a problem in a few, tiny ways.”

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