A Seasons new year.

I promised y'all a twofer for holiday ficlets this year, didn't I? 

Last week I posted the Pipe Woman's Legacy and Elemental Keys mashup. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. 

I said I'd do one for Seasons of the Fool this week. It turns out that I did a ficlet for Seasons last year. I went back and re-read it -- and despaired, kind of. It was so hopeful. We we banking so much on the vaccines letting us return to our normal lives -- or I was, at least. But here we are, with variants come and gone (the original virus and beta) and one virulent variant (delta) now being supplanted by an even scarier one. 

I don't know that I can muster as much hope as I did last year. But I'm going to take a crack at it, because I promised I would. Here we go.

✨

Julia looked out the window of Dave's summer house in Michiana -- or rather, hers and Dave's since their marriage. It was New Year's Eve, but she wasn't feeling very festive. She had hoped for snow, but there wasn't any -- just some icy patches along the side of the road. The woods looked wan, devoid of their customary winter blanket.

Her grandparents' cottage -- the house where she'd grown up -- was dark. She and Dave had agreed that it made better sense to gather in the larger house this year. The whole family would be here tonight. They needed more space to spread out. 

Well, everybody would be here except for Randi. Her college suitemate had tested positive at the end of finals week, so Randi was spending most of her winter break quarantined at home in Chicago. Rich was fine, but his high school would be doing remote learning again starting next week. Little Raylee was still going to school for now. At least she was finally vaccinated. When she got her first shot, Julia had been the one to cry -- with relief.

Ed Starek had refused to get the shot; the virus claimed him in September. Now his house was up for sale.

The only lights she could see were in Ms. Elsie and Ms. Thea's windows. She glanced down at the two COVID test kits she held.

Dave came up behind her and put his arms around her. "I thought you were leaving," he said.

She leaned back against him. "I was." She weighed the test kits in her hand. "Do you think they'll do it?"

He chuckled. "That's the fourth time you've asked me. Just go. You won't know 'til you've asked them."

"I know." She sighed. "Let me get my coat."

Down the street she trudged, test kits in her pocket and mask firmly in place. She knocked on the door. "Just a minute," Ms. Thea called, the door muffling her voice. After a moment, the latch clicked and the door opened. "Julia," Ms. Thea said, her eyes smiling above her mask. "It's so nice to see you."

"I've missed you both so much," Julia blurted, her own eyes filling with tears.

"There, there, dear. Come in." Ms. Thea opened the door wider. 

"Are you sure?" she said, even she stepped inside.

"If you don't stay long, it's fine. They're saying fifteen minutes now, aren't they?" Ms. Thea gave her a hug and shut the door. "Else, look who's here."

"Oh, Julia," said Ms. Elsie, emerging from the kitchen. She donned a mask in a hurry and enveloped Julia in a hug.

Julia cried into her shoulder for a moment as Ms. Thea patted her back. Then she stepped away. "Well, about that fifteen minutes. Dave and I wondered whether you'd like to come over tonight for a little while. It'll be just the family. Randi's quarantining at home, but Rich and Raylee are here. And Tim and Jen are coming."

"Oh," Ms. Thea said, looking at Ms. Elsie.

"The only thing is that you'd need to do this first," Julia said, fumbling in her pocket for the test kits. She held them out. "I'm sorry. But we're having everyone do it."

The ladies smiled. "Put those back in your pocket," Ms. Elsie said. "We've already tested ourselves so we could go to the senior center tonight. They're moving up the clock so we can toast the New Year at eight!" 

"But I'd rather be with you and your family," Ms. Thea confided. 

"So would I," Ms. Elsie said. "It'll be a lot more fun than drinking sparkling cider with a bunch of old people."

Julia laughed. "I'm so glad you're coming."

Ms. Elsie said, "The cards were right, weren't they, Thea?"

Ms. Thea nodded. "Yes, indeed. The Tower is still falling, but the Wheel of Fortune is ever turning. We'll just have to be careful."

"That's the ticket," Ms. Elsie agreed. "We'll see you tonight, Julia."

Lynne Cantwell 2021

✨

These moments of careful blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Get vaxxed!

On balance, some book news.

Just last week, I promised that I would write about writing again, and here I am, doing it. You're welcome.

Authors are often asked where their story ideas come from. It's not a question most of us enjoy answering. Oh, sometimes we can pinpoint the moment or event where the first germ of an idea originated (the Transcendence trilogy, for instance, sprang from a wholly unplanned stop at the Newark Earthworks in central Ohio, and Seasons of the Fool came about because I wanted to write a novel set in the neighborhood where I grew up). 

But sometimes there's nothing in the real world to point to. Once in grad school, when I had a short story due, I wrote an opening sentence by stringing a bunch of words together and then wrote a story to fit the sentence. The story came out okay, but how would I explain how I got there? The Muse works in mysterious ways.

And so it is with my upcoming novel, which I drafted during NaNoWriMo this past November. I was pretty sure, when the first draft was done, that I'd written a steaming pile of crap. But after a couple of rounds of self-editing, I decided it wasn't as bad as I thought -- and could even be salvaged. So I sent it along to my editor late last night. And I now feel confident that The Payoff -- yes, at long last, the book has a title! -- will be published on or about Beltane, May 1.

The germ of the plot was a Facebook post or meme or picture -- which of course I can't find now -- about how readers would love to have a story about an elderly woman who solves mysteries or crimes or something. Hey, if there's a market for books where the main character is old, I'm happy to oblige. So the main characters in The Payoff are a man and a woman in late middle age who haven't seen one another in forty years. Deliberately. Because they didn't want to run afoul of an older woman who tormented them all through their growing-up years. Now this woman is back, and she's causing trouble for someone else who doesn't deserve it, and Our Heroes have decided it's payback time.

After the first round of editing, I sat back and thought about the novel's themes. I came up with three: balance, patience, and justice. Having those concepts in the back of my mind helped me shape my steaming pile of first draftedness into a novel that I'm pretty proud of. So I thought I'd talk about each of them in turn.

This week, the topic is balance. 

ElisaRiva | CC0 | Pixabay

(I could have gone for a pile of rocks beside a rushing stream to illustrate this post, but this image feels more true-to-life to me.)

The main characters are Janis Fowler and Jan Marek. Jan (who is male) has the ability to See people's futures; Janis can See people's pasts. Their talents cannot be called up on command; they happen when they happen. But over the years, each of them has figured out how to create circumstances that will kick their talents into action. 

In a way, Jan and Janis are a matched set. They balance each other. Together, they have a full picture of a person -- the experiences that shaped them, the choices they've made in critical situations, and how all that will play out in their future lives. Janis and Jan realized early on what takes some of us a lifetime to figure out: Choices have consequences.

While balance within ourselves is always worth cultivating, it isn't enough to ensure a peaceful life. We have to interact with others. Some of these others are seriously unbalanced; sometimes they have power over us, holding the tightrope we're forced to walk. One unhinged choice on their part and boom! Down we go.

If we're lucky -- if we live long enough -- we may get to see that person suffer the consequences of their bad choices. We might even be given the chance to deliver the consequences ourselves. And if we do it right, our balance can be restored.

That, right there, is The Payoff. 

***

I'll put the book up for preorder here shortly. I'll let you know when that happens.

***

These moments of balanced blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Keep masking up and social distancing! The end is in sight!

The return of the light.

Tomorrow is Yule -- the winter solstice -- and that means our annus horribilis is almost over. And not a moment too soon, I say.

It has become customary for me to post a holiday ficlet at this time of year, as a gift to all of you. As I thought about what to write, I realized what I wanted to know most was how the folks from Seasons of the Fool have done this year. Here's what I learned.

⛄

Elsie Weber-Dahl reached for the doorknob and paused. “Oh, drat,” she muttered, and reached for the top mask on the stack of brightly-colored fabric masks in the basket by the door. Affixing the elastic straps around her ears, she pulled open the door – just in time to see the delivery boy from Al’s getting into his car. He had left the grocery order on the snowy stoop, though. She waved, and he dimmed his headlights in acknowledgement before pulling away.

She sighed. It had been weeks since she’d been any farther than the end of their driveway. They hadn't even gotten a tree for Yule. She had really hoped to have a chat with another human being, but she hadn’t been fast enough. 

She shut the door partway and called over her shoulder, “Thea, dear, we need to bring the groceries in.”

“Yes, dear,” replied her wife, distracted. Elsie went to the kitchen to find out what the matter was. There was Thea at the kitchen table, her chin in her hands, studying the three-card Tarot spread before her.

Elsie rubbed Thea’s shoulders. “That Tower,” she said bitterly. The Tower was the worst card in the deck. On it, a bolt of lightning shot from the blue, destroying a brick tower and sending those inside it plummeting to the rocks below.

Thea sighed and nodded. “It’s still with us. But at least it’s in the rear-view mirror,” she said, pointing at the offending card on the left side of the spread.

“The present isn’t much better, though,” Elsie said. There in the middle sat the Death card – a skeleton on his horse, with everyone bowing to the ground before him. Elsie knew the card didn’t mean literal death – although with this virus wreaking havoc throughout the world, it certainly could. But what it typically meant was change – the end of things as we have known them – and that certainly fit the events of this horrible year, too.

“I know,” Thea sighed. “We’re still in the thick of it. But look here.” She tapped the card in the future position on the right side of the spread: the Six of Swords. Two figures huddled in a boat, their backs to the viewer, as the boatman punted them toward a distant shore. “Soon we'll be our way out.”

“They look so defeated,” Elsie said softly. Thea looked up at her and put one of her hands on one of Elsie’s, squeezing gently. Then she rose. “Let’s get the food in before everything freezes.”

The two elderly ladies donned their winter gear – coats, hats, and boots – and then took off their hats to get their masks properly affixed. “I’ll be glad when we don’t have to do this anymore,” Thea grumbled as she put her hat back on.

“We could skip them this time,” Elsie said. “It’s not like we’ll see anyone out there.”

“But we can’t be too careful, dear,” said Thea. “Not when the vaccine is so close.”

“I know, dear. I know.” Elsie blew out a breath and opened the front door.

As they brought in the last of the bags, Thea paused, her eyes on the cottage kitty-corner from theirs. A car with Illinois plates sat in the driveway, its sides splashed with road salt, and a light glimmered in the living room window. “Julia’s here,” she told Elsie as she followed her to the kitchen.

“Oh?” Elsie dropped her bags on the counter and hurried back to the living room to peer out the window. “I wonder if she brought the little one.”

“We could go over and see,” Thea said. The two women shared an excited smile. They hadn’t seen their neighbor in months.

“Let me put some cookies on a plate,” said Elsie.

A few minutes later, cookies in hand and masks in place, they walked to Julia’s cottage and knocked on the door. “Just a minute,” a muffled voice came from inside. Then the door opened and there was Julia, her own mask hiding her mouth. But her eyes and voice smiled as she said, “I had a feeling it would be you two.”

“We brought you some cookies,” Elsie said. “Fresh baked this morning.” 

A tiny person wormed past Julia and threw herself on Elsie’s legs, nearly knocking her over. “Ms. Elsie!” she cried. “Ms. Thea!” And Thea got a similar enthusiastic hug.

“Six feet, Raylee,” Julie admonished.

The little girl sprang back reluctantly from the women. “I'm sorry. I forgot.”

“We talked about this,” Julia went on, taking her daughter’s hand. “We need to keep the ladies safe.” Raylee hung her head. 

“It’s all right,” Thea said. “We won’t get sick from you hugging our knees.”

Julie took the plate of cookies. “Thank you for these,” she said. “I’d invite you in, but…”

“Sure,” Elsie said, too quickly. “Can’t be too careful.” She beamed at Raylee. “How have you been?”

The little girl sighed. “Okay.”

“Zoom doesn’t work very well for kindergarteners,” Julia explained. “It’s been a hard year. The school district tried a staggered schedule for in-person learning, but then some kids got sick. So we went back to Zoom.”

“I miss my friends,” Raylee said.

“You’ll see them again,” Elsie reassured her. “The vaccine is coming. Next year will be better.”

“No, it won’t,” Raylee said. “It’s going to be like this forever.” She turned away and flopped down on the couch.

Julia and the older ladies shared a sad smile. “Daddy will be here tonight,” Julia called to her daughter, who didn’t seem to hear.

“Are the older kids coming with Dave?” Elsie asked.

Julia shook her head. “Too much homework. Randi’s in college now, and it’s finals week. And Rich…” She looked away. “Freshman year of high school. He got behind due to all the upheaval. In-person, remote, in-person, remote…” She crossed her arms. “It’s been so hard. I’ve barely gotten any work done this year.”

Elsie’s heart hurt for Julia. She reached out to hug her, but stopped herself just in time.

“Well,” Thea said. “We should be going.”

“Thank you for coming over,” Julia said. “So nice to see you both.” Reluctantly, she closed the door.

As the ladies traipsed back to their house, Elsie said, “We have to do something for that child.”

Thea glanced back at Julia’s cottage. “I have an idea,” she said.

✨

The next morning was still quite dark, and very cold, when the Weber-Dahls approached Julia’s cottage. Thea rapped smartly on the door, and a moment later Dave opened it. His hair was thinner than Elsie remembered, but his eyes above his mask lit up. “Hello there,” he said. “I heard you stopped by. Thanks for the cookies.”

“You’re welcome,” said Thea. “Is Raylee up? We have something to show her.”

Dave laughed. “What, now?”

“Right now,” Elsie said with an insistent nod. “You, too. And Julia.”

Dave side-eyed them. “What are you two up to?” He shook his head. “All right. Give us a few minutes.”

“Dress warmly,” Elsie said as he shut the door. Then they went back to their house to wait.

A few minutes later, the Turners emerged from their front door, swaddled in winter gear. Sharing a grin, the ladies went out to greet them. “Good morning!” Thea called. “Follow me!” She stepped off smartly up the street, the others falling in behind her.

“What’s that?” Raylee asked, sidling up to Elsie – but not too close.

“This?” Elsie said, lifting the thermos she carried in her gloved hands. “You’ll see.”

At the corner, Thea turned left, toward the lake. “I knew it,” Dave said. Julia shushed him.

The wooden stairs down to the beach hadn’t been shoveled, of course, but Thea and Elsie helped each other down without mishap. The Turners followed, staying a safe distance from the elderly ladies. The breeze off the lake was sharp, but they had timed it well. They wouldn’t have long to wait.

“Raylee,” Thea called. “Remember how dark it was when we left the house?”

The little girl nodded solemnly.

Thea pointed toward the east. “What’s that?”

Her eyes widened. She turned to her mother. “The sky is orange, Mommy!”

Julia nodded. “It is, isn’t it?”

“Do you think it will stay orange?” Dave asked her. “Let’s see.”

So the five of them stood on the snowy sand, listening to the creak of the icy lake and watching the sunrise.

“This calls for a toast,” Elsie said, unscrewing the thermos lid. Thea produced paper cups from a pocket and held them out for Elsie to fill. 

“Hot chocolate!” the little girl cried as she received her cup.

As Thea finished passing out the cups, Elsie said, “Raylee, do you know what today is? It’s the winter solstice – the shortest day of the year. It’s been getting dark so early – have you noticed?” Raylee nodded. “Well, starting tomorrow, the days will begin getting longer again.” She smiled at Thea. “No matter how dark it seems, the dawn always comes.”

“The light always returns,” Thea said, smiling back. Then she raised her paper cup. “To the light!” They removed their masks and toasted the return of the sun.

As they walked back home, Raylee skipping ahead, Julia told the ladies, “Thank you so much. It’s been such a hard year. I can’t wait to get back to normal.”

“We’ll never see that normal again,” Dave said.

“No, we won’t,” Elsie said. “But who knows? Maybe our new normal will be better.”

Lake Huron sunrise | ehrlif | Deposit Photos

***

These moments of hopeful blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell. Happy holidays! Stay safe!

Wedding bells in Michiana. #lovewins

In honor of last week's U.S. Supreme Court decision on gay marriage, I am pleased to offer this vignette featuring some of the characters from Seasons of the Fool.

Allan Ajifo | CC 2.0 | christianbed.com

 
"Do I look all right, dear?" Thea emerged from the hallway into the living room of the tiny cottage, squeezing a pair of white gloves with both hands. She was resplendent in a skirt suit the color of beachgrass, her iron-gray hair swept back from her temples and fastened at the back of her head with a deep green clasp.

Elsie, in a matching suit of a delicate pink, broke into a smile. "You look wonderful, dear." Her hair, whiter than Thea's, was pulled back into a bun at the nape of her neck. She showed it off to Thea. "See the rosebuds? They were Randi's idea."

"So darling," said Thea. "That girl is going to be an artist for sure. Aren't we lucky to have such wonderful neighbors?"

For it was Randi's stepmother, Julia Morton Turner, who had insisted on planning the wedding. As soon as the Supreme Court made marriage equality the law of the land, Julia had been on their doorstep. "Do you two want to get married?" she had said, brandishing the day's copy of the Chicago Tribune with the news of the decision in big type across the top.

They did, of course. But neither of them ever thought they would live to see the day when they could do it without leaving home. "And anyway, a wedding isn't necessary," Elsie had told Julia. "We had one when we were handfasted, thirty-five years ago."

"Thirty-six," Thea corrected. "No, thirty-seven."

"But handfasting doesn't grant you any legal protection," Julia had said. "You're obviously committed to each other. Let's make it legal so there won't be any question." She threw up a hand as both Thea and Elsie opened their mouths to protest. "You're not going to talk me out of this, so don't even try. I'll plan the whole thing, and Dave and I will pay for everything. We can have the ceremony on the beach and the reception at our house. All you need to do is give me a guest list and show up."

"It's very kind of you to offer, Julia," said Thea. "But we couldn't possibly..."

"Please, Ms. Thea," Julia said. "Let me do this for you. For everything you two have done for us."

And that was that. Julia was true to her word -- Elsie gave her a very short guest list and picked a date in late September, and the younger woman did the rest. Today was the day.

Together, the women walked to the beach. When they reached the top of the staircase to the sand, Julia started a recording of Wagner's "Bridal Chorus." And by the time they reached the makeshift altar, they were both crying so hard that they could hardly recite their vows. But they did. And when they left the beach, Elsie Weber and Thea Dahl had become Elsie and Thea Weber-Dahl.

All through the reception, they beamed at their dear friends and family. "I never thought I would see this day," Elsie said over and over.

"Nor did I, dear," Thea said. "Isn't it wonderful?"

***

More wonderful news: At last, Firebird's Snare is coming this week! I'm aiming for an official release date of July 1st, but keep an eye out for my newsletter with the final word. And thanks, everybody, for your patience.

***

These moments of bloggy bliss have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

What's this #PublishingFoul thing all about, anyway?

You may have seen the image floating around Facebook or Twitter by now. I mean, I sure hope you have. It's this one -- the ref throwing the yellow flag on scammy publishers. At Indies Unlimited, we're using it to tie together all the posts in FOULED! -- our month-long March Madness effort to bring rotten publishing practices out into the open.

So far, we've had a guest post from none other than David Gaughran, who blogs a lot on the vanity publishing industry; one by IU minion TD McKinnon; a guest post by Sophie Jonas-Hill; and the first of four posts by Yours Truly on what you can do when you realize you've been had by a scammer. And there's lots more to come -- including a post this week that will include a survey that we hope every indie author -- both those who have been scammed and those who haven't been -- will participate in.

The survey is important because we're trying to get a handle on how prevalent these ripoffs are among indie authors. Because it sure seems as if being scammed is almost a rite of passage. Scratch any indie author, it appears, and you'll see a tale of a book gone wrong underneath.

I think this is true for several reasons. The first is that until Smashwords and KDP came along, if you couldn't get a contract from a regular publisher, paying a vanity press was the only way your work could see the light of day. And I think a lot of older people with stories to tell have not yet heard that there is another way to go -- or else they don't think they're capable of learning everything there is to learn about real self-publishing.

Another IU minion, Melissa Bowersock, suggested another reason why these stories are so prevalent: most people are brought up to believe the best about others. They themselves are trustworthy, and so they expect the people they do business with will be trustworthy, too. Of course, that doesn't always happen -- but hey, that's why you have a lawyer vet your contract, right? But your publisher probably has a more expensive lawyer than you do. And in any case, you can bet the contract is going to be written to benefit the publisher -- not you, the author.

A third reason why so many authors have been scammed -- and why so many continue to be scammed -- is that the victims are ashamed of having been taken in. We have a culture of individual responsibility in the US, and there's nothing wrong with that. But people take it to an unfair extreme. There are times when a smart, savvy person who does everything right gets conned by an expert con artist. It's not the person's fault they've been victimized. But when they're then told they were too gullible and it's their own fault they were taken -- when the victim gets the blame -- that's not about the victim. It's about the person making the comment. Likely that person is using their attitude of superiority to cover a fear that they, too, might have been scammed in that situation. Or maybe they think they're smarter or more savvy -- as if either smarts or savvy will protect anyone against a real pro. Either way, the end result is that the victim is victimized twice: once by the scammer, and again by friends and family who rush to tell them how stupid they've been.

This sort of thing makes me crazy. And that's why I suggested to our admins that I do a series of posts on this subject. They expanded on my idea, and that's how we ended up with this month-long series.

The thing is that what these publishers do, for the most part, is legal. The vanity presses in particular are very careful to stay on the right side of the legal/illegal line. But just because a particular business practice is legal, that doesn't make it morally defensible. These guys have been playing an ugly game for decades. They've been stealing people's dreams by taking money from them without giving them any real success in return. We at IU aim to do our part to send this business model down the sewer, where it belongs.

***
News: This week, I'm packing for Arizona. I'll be at the Tucson Festival of Books next Saturday and Sunday, in the BookGoodies booth (we're number 112). I'll be signing books Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. Feel free to stop by and say hi, if you're planning to go to the festival.

More news: Seasons of the Fool is now up at Smashwords, and that means it should be available at iTunes, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo pretty soon. I'm knocking the price down to 99 cents through March 22nd -- so if you haven't gotten a copy yet, now's the time.

Still more news: The first draft of Sage's story is in the can. I'm hoping to publish it in May, with the second book of the duology coming fast on its heels in June. The series title is Pipe Woman's Legacy. Kinda catchy, don't you think?

***
These moments of anti-scammy blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

The Grumpy Cat calendar caper.

Who knew a brain fart would turn out to be so expensive?

Several weeks ago, while my daughters and I were killing time in a card shop after dinner out, Amy stopped in front of a section of Grumpy Cat merchandise and said, "Ooh! There's a Grumpy Cat page-a-day calendar! You could get me one of those for Yule!"

A quick bit of back story, for those of you who have been living under a rock for the past couple of years: Grumpy Cat, whose real-life name is Tardar Sauce, is a sweet little kitty with a permanently cranky expression. Her debut -- a photo with the single-word caption, "NO" -- went viral. It spawned lots more picture memes (many of them with hurtful captions -- I guess some people can't help but be jerks) and got her humans a book contract and a movie deal. Reports that she made $100 million last year are apparently exaggerated, though.

Back to the card store, and my daughter telling me she wanted a Grumpy Cat calendar. I expect I said okay. I mean, I probably did. And then I forgot all about it. I'm old, okay? If it's not written on my to-do list -- or sitting in my email queue at the day job -- I tend to...SQUIRREL!

Come Yule morning, as we finished opening our gifts, Amy said, "Hey, I didn't get a calendar."

"Did you want one?" I asked. And she proceeded to remind me about the Grumpy Cat calendar. "Oh, right," I said faintly. And then I perked up. "Not a problem. I'll just go back to the card store tomorrow and get one."

Of course, they were out.

So was Barnes & Noble. So was Calendars.com. Amazon had them -- all from third-party sellers, starting at $39.99 plus $3.99 shipping.

You got it. Scalpers had moved into the Grumpy Cat page-a-day calendar market.

My older daughter, Kat, suggested I try eBay. Lo and behold, somebody there had one for sale. I bid $20 and was immediately outbid. I increased my bid to $23 and moved into the lead. Go me! But the auction had another day to run, and I figured I'd be outbid again before it was over. So I went back to the Zon and bought the $39.99 calendar.

Keep in mind, the list price on this thing is 15 bucks.

You already know what happened, right? I won the auction -- after the one I bought from Amazon had already shipped.

So Amy's got her calendar, and now I have an extra. Anybody want to buy it from me? I hear it's quite the collector's item.

***
My heartfelt thanks to everybody who bought a copy of the Pipe Woman Chronicles Omnibus while it was on sale for 99 cents last week. And thanks, too, to the hundreds of readers who have already downloaded Seasons of the Fool since it went free on Friday. I hope y'all enjoy. And welcome to hearth/myth!

Seasons of the Fool is still free through Tuesday, December 30th, so if you haven't yet grabbed a copy, you've got time. Not a lot of time, mind you. Better run over to the Zon and get it now, before you forget....

***
These moments of grumpy blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Bringing in the Yule.

www.magickalgraphics.com

Happy Yule! Today is the winter solstice here in the Northern Hemisphere -- the shortest day of the year. I thought you might like a glimpse of how Elsie and Thea, those nice older ladies from Seasons of the Fool, celebrate the holidays.

***
When Elsie heard the car pull up in the driveway, her eyes widened in guilty surprise. Quickly, she stowed what she had been working on under the farthest corner of her loom.

And not a moment too soon. The front door of the cottage sprang open, letting in Thea, a Colorado blue spruce, and a few snowflakes. The taller woman briskly shut the door behind her and began to remove her hat.

"What a lovely tree," Elsie said.

Thea paused in the act of unbuttoning her coat. "I thought you were going to get the decorations out of the closet."

"I was, dear," Elsie said, turning pink. "I was. But I got sidetracked."

"Well," Thea said, softening, "we need the stand, at least."

"Yes, of course!" The plump woman shot of her seat at the loom and bustled through the hallway door. In a moment, Thea could hear her banging around in the closet. She smiled fondly as Elsie returned, triumphant, brandishing the tree stand. "Here it is!"

"Right in front of the window, I think," Thea said. "Don't you, dear?"

"I do." And the two ladies set about wrestling the tree into the stand.

"Oh, it's perfect," Thea said, clapping her gloved hands together, as she stepped back. "Come and see, Else."

"I would if I could get up," said Elsie from the floor. Both ladies chuckled as Thea gave Elsie a hand. "I might be getting too old for this," Elsie said in chagrin as she regained her feet.

"Nonsense," said Thea, and hugged her.

"It is a lovely tree," Elsie said again, leaning her head on Thea's shoulder.

Thea laughed softly. "It would be even lovelier with the lights and decorations, don't you think, dear?"

It was Elsie's turn to laugh. "Be right back," she said, and went to fetch them from the closet.

While she was gone, Thea deftly extricated a tiny box from the inside pocket of her coat and slid it behind a chair. "What got you so distracted, anyway?" she called to Elsie.

"Now, Thea," chided Elsie as she returned with a stack of boxes. "You know better than to ask such questions this close to Yule." She dropped the boxes on the footstool and began opening them: old-fashioned glass balls, hand-crocheted snowflakes, and the lights. Thea took one end of the strand of lights, and together they began to decorate the tree.

At last, it was done. Thea plugged in the lights and stepped back. The ladies leaned against each other, admiring their handiwork. "Happy Yule, Elsie," said Thea.

"Happy Yule, dear," Elsie said, and kissed her.

***
Baking is another of the ladies' holiday traditions, and kolaches (in Czech, kolačky) are Elsie's specialty. My own mother used to make them with a yeast dough. But Elsie uses a cream cheese dough -- and as it happens, her recipe is the same one I cut out of the Chicago Tribune many years ago.

3 oz. cream cheese
1/2 cup butter (1 stick)
1 cup flour
1/16 teaspoon nutmeg
Fillings of your choice (see below)
Powdered sugar

Cream together the cream cheese and butter; work in the flour and nutmeg. Shape the dough into a roll about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Wrap in waxed paper and refrigerate for several hours.

When ready to bake the cookies, slice the dough into rounds about 1/4-inch thick and place on a cookie sheet. Spoon a small amount of filling in the center of each slice. You can either fold two opposite edges of each slice together in the center, or leave as is. Bake for 10 minutes at  400 degrees. When slightly cooled, sprinkle with powdered sugar. Makes about three dozen cookies.

For the filling: You may be able to find Solo brand canned filling in the baking aisle of your supermarket. The poppyseed and apricot are my personal favorites. If you can't find them, you could make one or more of these fillings (the cheese filling is excellent), or just use fruit preserves.

***
Two quick notes: The Pipe Woman Chronicles was featured today at Kindle Books & Tips -- it's just 99 cents at Amazon through Saturday. And from Friday the 26th through Tuesday the 30th, Seasons of the Fool will be free at Amazon. Happy holidays, everyone.

These moments of Yuletide blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Knitting silliness, or: why I don't have an Etsy shop.

It's my birthday, so I'll talk about knitting if I want to.

Neither the Lady Morgana nor this shawl will be available on Etsy any time soon.

I was poking around a yarn shop the other day when I overheard a conversation that I could relate to. Another customer was chatting with one of the clerks about how, when she wears something she's knitted for herself, people will not only compliment her, but they often want to know whether she ever makes things for other people. You know, for money.

The same thing has happened to me. In fact, one of my friends has suggested more than once that I start an Etsy shop for my knitting.

To be clear: I don't have an Etsy shop, nor do I ever plan to start one. It's not because I have anything against Etsy; I don't. But in my case, I don't see the cons outweighing the pros.

The biggest issue is cost. You can buy inexpensive yarn at a craft store, but I learned pretty quickly that stuff you make with cheap yarn looks...well...cheap. Nowadays, I buy yarn at local yarn shops, and at shows like Maryland Sheep and Wool. I don't typically go overboard and buy really expensive yarn (except for that qiviut blend I bought in Alaska -- but hey, I was in Alaska!), but even nice sock yarn can cost $20 per skein. And shawls, for example, take two skeins or more. For a women's sweater, you can easily drop more than $100 on a good wool yarn. And that's just the yarn -- it doesn't count needles or buttons or other supplies. Or my time. A sweater can take 40 hours or more to make. Let's say I'm charging $8/hour, which would be crazy cheap. But even at eight bucks an hour, that's $320. Would you pay $420 for a sweater? I didn't think so.

And knitting-to-order would suck all the fun out of it. Early in my knitting journey, I read a book about the women who knitted the first Fair Isle sweaters. They were turning out one of those beautiful sweaters a week. One a week! With fine yarn on skinny needles! That's a miserable production schedule. Just thinking about it makes my hands hurt.

Finally, I would lose control of the process. As it is now, I pick the patterns and the yarn colors that appeal to me. But if I took orders, other people would be picking that stuff. And in the past, whenever I have offered to make something for someone, they usually say they want it in black. Let me tell you something: I have knitted with black yarn. It's boring. It can also be frustrating -- the stitches are difficult to see if I'm knitting in low light. I swear that the next time someone asks me to knit something for them in black, I am going to drag that person into a yarn store and force them to pick a different color. It's not like they don't make yarn in every freaking color of the rainbow.

So yeah. No Etsy shop for me. I make more money writing novels than I ever would at knitting -- and the raw materials are significantly cheaper.

***
A couple of bits of business before I close for this week:

• As alert hearth/myth readers know, Seasons of the Fool's release date is this coming Tuesday, December 9th. The offer I posted last week still stands: I'll send you a copy of the book now, plus gift you a Kindle copy of the book when it's released, plus send you a signed copy of the paperback, if you'll promise to post a review of it when you're done. I've had some people take me up on the offer already -- thank you! :) 
• The street team is still in development. Holiday prep, family stuff, and my birthday all sucked up my time this week. Sorry. But the good news is that you still have time to let me know if you want to be in on the ground floor. I did come up with a name for it, though: Lynne's Woo-Woo Team. What do you think? I guess we'll need a secret handshake or a decoder ring or something. You guys work on that and get back to me.
• Oh, right -- Winter Tales is out! It's an anthology brought to you by the Five59 Publishing, the same folks who do the 13 Bites books. This new collection contains stories centered around the winter holidays, and it includes two short stories by Yours Truly. Hope you like 'em.

***
These moments of entrepreneurial blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

What's happening with Seasons.

This is a good news/bad news kind of post.

The bad news is that Amazon did not choose Seasons of the Fool for its Kindle Press program. So no $1,500 advance for me. Sad day, right?

But the good news is that it means I can now do anything I want with the book. So: Hey presto! It's available for pre-order at Amazon.com. If you're in the UK, it's also available for pre-order at Amazon UK. And if you're anywhere else in the world, just plug "Seasons of the Fool" into the search bar in your respective Amazon store and you should come up with the book. The new cover looks like this:

The book will be released Tuesday, December 9th. But if you'd like a copy sooner, I'm prepared to make you a deal. If you're willing to post a review of Seasons as soon as you've read it, send me an e-mail at lynne.cantwell7@gmail.com and I'll send you a copy of the e-book right now.

The "Look Inside" feature won't be available at Amazon 'til the 9th. But if you'd like to take a look sooner, I've posted an extended sample at Wattpad that includes both the text from the Kindle Scout excerpt and the part I read at the World Fantasy Convention last month.

The other takeaway for me from the Kindle Scout experience is that I need to develop a street team. I'm going to start a closed group at Facebook for that sometime in the next few days. If you're interested, contact me -- drop me a comment here, or message me on Facebook, or send me an e-mail at the address above -- and I'll make sure you're added to the team.

One other thing: We have a winner in the giveaway! Congrats to Becky Walters, who wins the Kindle Fire HD6. Becky, I'll get that off to you within the next day or so. And thanks to everybody who entered.

***
These moments of Seasonal blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Seasons: Going to the beach in Michiana.

Julia had finished her blissful dip in the lake and had stretched out on her towel to dry off. The water was cool, even in August, and the hot sun felt good on her body. In a few moments, the breeze had begun to lull her to sleep.

As she dozed, she became aware that the noise level nearby had shot up. But it was only when a young voice cried out, “Julia!” that she realized she knew the people responsible for all the racket.

-- from Seasons of the Fool

Summer is, hands down, the best season in Michiana.

Our house has never had air conditioning. It gets humid, sure, but usually it's stifling only for a couple of weeks in July and August. Other than that, the temperatures stay pretty reasonable, thanks primarily to the tree canopy that keeps the direct sun off the roof.

Even so, the house would get warm inside in the summer. My mother had kind of a crazy system for regulating the indoor temperature. She always woke up early anyway, and when she got up -- when the house was still filled with cool night air -- she would close the windows almost all the way. Then she'd run fans to keep the air circulating. Between all that and the tree canopy, the temperature inside the house stayed almost tolerable until mid-afternoon or so -- at which point the outside temperature would begin to drop, so Mom would open the windows again.

Her system never worked for me. As a night person, I always get up too late. By the time I've rolled out of bed, it's already starting to warm up outside. My own system involves turning on the fans full blast and hoping for the best. And if it's really awful, I'll go to the lake for a swim.

I took the photo up top last summer at Stop 39, the beach that's closest to our house. About those stops: My parents told me there used to be a bus that ran along Lake Shore Drive from Michigan City, Indiana, to New Buffalo, Michigan. But at some point, a storm washed out a chunk of the road. So now Lake Shore Drive only goes to Stop 41 and there's no bus service at all to my old neighborhood.

Anyway, I never knew how spoiled I was, growing up with a beach so close by, until I went swimming in the Atlantic for the first time. To me, as a kid, a crowded beach was one where seven or eight families had their groups of towels laid out; it was never so bad that you were jockeying for enough real estate to put down a single towel, the way it can be at the ocean. Of course, the beaches in our neighborhood have no parking nearby, so it's just the locals. That cuts down on the crowding quite a bit.

I played a little fast and loose with the facts in Seasons of the Fool when I gave Dave a summer job as a lifeguard. It's been decades since any of the villages in Michiana have hired any. Which is kind of surprising, and dangerous, because riptides do happen in Lake Michigan. We learned as kids not to go in the water when a rip current is present -- but not everybody knows that, or knows that if you get caught in one, you should swim along with the current and eventually it will take you to shore. (That's your public service announcement for today. You're welcome.)

All good things must come to an end -- including summer, and this series of blog posts, and the Kindle Scout nomination period for Seasons of the Fool. We've got just another couple of days for folks to vote for the book. If you want a free copy, now's your chance to get in line for one -- and if you know someone else who would enjoy it, please let them know to click here and vote!

I'll keep everybody posted on the outcome via Facebook and Twitter. (Fingers, toes, and eyes crossed....)

The Rafflecopter will wrap up at the same time as the Kindle Scout nominations do -- so now's the time to enter. Up for grabs is a Kindle Fire HD6 in your choice of color. Rafflecopter doesn't play well with Internet Exploder, so if you're having trouble with the form, try it in another browser (either Firefox or Chrome or something). Good luck! And please tell your friends!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

***
These moments of swimmingly warm blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Seasons: Spring in Michiana.

With a sigh, Julia picked up her spade again and went back to turning over the soil in the flower bed. The conversation with Ms. Thea had brought reality back to her with a vengeance. Maybe physical labor would keep her from wondering yet again why she hadn’t heard from Dave since that text he’d sent, promising her that he would call.

She doubted it would work, but she couldn't think of an alternative.

-- from Seasons of the Fool

I feel like I've been talking about snow and cold weather a lot in this series of posts. Apologies in advance, because I'm going to do it today, too. It's just that it stays cold a lot longer in Michiana than it does in DC, where I live now. In fact, I used to have a sweatshirt that said, "Indiana -- Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, Winter, Winter," with a cartoon of three guys up to their noses in snow.

Cute, but SO not happening.

I remember paging through the Sears circular in the Sunday paper and pining for the short-sleeved dresses and pastel spring coats featured there for Easter wear. My mother would laugh at me, because she knew there was no possible way it would be warm enough for me to wear any of them.

But spring does come eventually, even to northern Indiana, and even if it's not nearly as colorful as it is in other parts of the country.

What I'd have seen, if I'd been really tall.

I was stunned during my freshman year of college when the trees on campus -- cherry, dogwood, ornamental pear -- exploded in blossoms. At home, our tulip trees would bloom, but they were so tall that we couldn't see the flowers. And one of my friends had a dogwood tree in her yard, which bloomed, of course. But one isolated tree just doesn't have the same impact as an entire campus full of pink and white.

That first spring in Bloomington, I dashed outside with my camera at my very first opportunity. While I was snapping photos like mad, I ran into a high school friend who was doing the same thing. We shared our wonder and amazement. But a further surprise awaited me: the trees kept blooming. For weeks. This was unprecedented. Back home, the end of winter was characterized mostly by dirty snow and mud, with an occasional daffodil. I began to get an inkling of why people looked forward to spring.

I've now lived on the East Coast longer than I did in Michiana. But every spring, when the trees here bloom and the landscape explodes in color, I'm still a little bit surprised.

***
The trailer is up for Seasons of the Fool. I think it turned out really well, if I do say so myself. You can go here to watch it, or click below. I've also posted it on my "Book Trailers" page.

And please don't forget to post your nomination for the book at Kindle Scout. Nominations close Wednesday, Nov. 26 -- which coincidentally is the last day you can enter the contest for the Kindle Fire HD6. The entry form is below. If you have trouble with it, try using a different browser than Internet Exploder.

Good luck! And tell your friends! I'd love it if we could make this book Hot and Trending all the way through the 26th!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

***
These moments of flowery blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Seasons: Winter in Michiana.

Julia glanced out the window. It was snowing so hard now that she couldn’t see the trees at the back of her property. She went to another window, trying and failing to see the Stareks’ house across the street. She thought maybe she could see a glimmer from Ms. Thea and Ms. Elsie’s through the murk, and wondered how the ladies were getting on. Then she thought of Dave – although really, she hadn’t stopped thinking about him since running into him at the store.

She picked up her phone and texted him: You OK?

-- from Seasons of the Fool

I've lived here in DC so long that sometimes I wonder what it would be like to live again in a place where it snows.

Oh, DC gets snow. Sometimes we get a pretty good-sized snowfall. Some years, we even get a lot of snow. But those winters are a far cry from the winters of my childhood.

Michigan City lighthouse (Russell Sekeet | flickr.com)

The school bus would pick up the kids in my neighborhood and then take Lake Shore Drive west, through Duneland Beach and Long Beach. Through the bus window, we got to see Lake Michigan in all of its moods: calm, with few waves; stormy, with high surf; and frozen.

And we almost always went to school, regardless of the weather. Here in the mid-Atlantic, if there's a couple of inches of snow in the forecast, the powers-that-be will give the kids a day off -- even if the snow hasn't started falling yet. It's faintly ludicrous. I mean, I get that part of the problem is logistical. a lot of kids have both parents working these days, and if school is going to be canceled, the parents need to know in time to arrange for somebody to stay home with them. But the other issue is that DC doesn't know how to handle an honest-to-goodness snowfall. Instead of sending the plows out as the storm is underway -- which is what happens north of here -- the highway departments around DC will wait 'til the storm is over, and only then begin digging us out.


To be fair, where I grew up, we got a lot more practice -- particularly on our side of the lake, where we would often be treated to the winter phenomenon known as lake-effect snow. Here's how it works: when the wind blows out of the northwest, it picks up moisture as it blows across the lake. The moisture-laden air cools as it moves over the land, the water in the air condenses, and it snows. A lot.

Here's a satellite picture of Lake Michigan so you can see how that works in practice. The area circled in blue is Chicago, more or less. See how you can see the ground on that side of the lake? Yeah. Now look where the red circle is. See how it's all white there? That's Michiana.

I wrote a lake-effect snowstorm into Seasons of the Fool, just to make the book as authentic as possible. However, I did not include the other fixture of winter life in Indiana: high school basketball.

For the uninitiated, basketball is almost as big a deal in Indiana as high school football is in Texas. For many, many years, Michigan City had just one high school -- Elston Senior High -- and the whole town would get behind the team every winter and cheer them on to victory. We even won the state championship in 1966. I was in third grade that year, and I still remember the signs at my elementary school in support of our Elston Red Devils.

By the time I got to high school, we had a second school in town: Rogers, whose mascot was the Raiders. (I wanted them to be the Rogers Ramjets, but nobody ever listens to me.) Unfortunately, splitting the student population also split our roundball talent. Elston still routinely won sectionals -- our longest streak was 24 years in a row, from 1952 to 1975 -- but we'd often get knocked out at regionals by one of the South Bend teams. However, in 1975 -- my senior year of high school -- Elston made it all the way to semi-state before losing to Lebanon. We were devastated, of course.

But I got over it the following year, when I was a freshman at Indiana University. The Hoosiers brought home the NCAA championship in 1976.

Like I said, basketball is a big deal in Indiana.

***
Back to the present day. I had a great time this weekend at the World Fantasy Convention here in DC. I met lots of cool people, did a reading for the new book, and came home with a bulging satchel of brand-new books. Rest assured that a number of them will be Rursdays eventually.

Next Saturday, I'll be gallivanting again -- this time to New York City for the Self-Publishing Book Expo.

As you know, Seasons of the Fool is up for nomination at Kindle Scout through Wednesday, Nov. 26th. And as a thank-you to you guys for putting up with me this month, I'm running a contest to give away a Kindle HD6. If you win, I'll even let you pick the color. The entry form is below; if it doesn't work for you, try using a different browser than Internet Explorer.

Good luck! And tell your friends!
a Rafflecopter giveaway

***
These moments of wintry blogginess have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Seasons: Halloween in Michiana.

“Maybe this isn’t a good idea,” Ms. Thea murmured behind her. “It’s so close to Samhain. The veil is already thinning.”

“Maybe it’s the best idea,” Ms. Elsie replied quietly.

The conviction in her voice gave Julia the courage to step into the labyrinth.

At the moment her toes touched the path inside the ropes, everything changed.

- from Seasons of the Fool

As (I hope!) you know by now, Seasons of the Fool is up for nomination at Kindle Scout. The nomination period for my book closes Wednesday, Nov. 26th, which gives us four Sundays between now and then. Four Sunday blog posts...four seasons...I'm sensing a theme here....

Darron Birgenhaier | flickr.com

We've established that I'm old, right? When I was growing up in Michiana, trick-or-treating was an actual thing. We would get dressed up in our costumes and traipse around to the neighbors and hold out our little buckets or bags, and they would give us candy. It wasn't until I was a little older that people started getting spooked by stories of razor blades in apples and the like. And then came the stories about crazy, trippy people handing out drugs instead of candy, and, well, that's when most parents instituted the practice of checking over one's haul and tossing out anything that wasn't wrapped.

Urban myths die hard. Just last week, I opened a bag of miniature Milky Way bars and found one that had missed the wrapper machine at the factory. I debated whether to throw it out. But it was in a factory-sealed bag and it didn't look like anyone had injected anything into it, so I ate it. So far, I'm still here.

The thing I remember most about trick-or-treating in Michiana was it was cold. Late October near Lake Michigan is not for the faint of heart. My mother used to buy my Halloween costume a size bigger than normal, because it was pretty much guaranteed that I'd have to wear my winter coat under it. And yes, sometimes we would already have snow by Halloween; I remember stepping over snowbanks to get to people's doors.

I have a confession to make, and it's in relation to this: A few days ago, advice columnist Prudence posted a letter from a woman who complained that poor kids were getting all her good candy. "Halloween isn’t a social service or a charity in which I have to buy candy for less fortunate children," the sniffy woman said. "We already pay more than enough taxes toward actual social services."

Prudie, bless her, shut her down. "Stop being callous and miserly and go to Costco, you cheapskate," she said. I wanted to stand up and cheer, because I was one of those 99-percent kids who would go trick-or-treating in better neighborhoods to get better candy. I mean, come on -- it's common sense. Who wouldn't rather get a bunch of candy bars than a bagful of Smarties?

Ms. Cranky One-Percenter, I have the perfect solution for you. Next year, band together with your neighbors and get everybody to agree to hand out nothing but Necco wafers and Laffy Taffy. I guarantee that the following Halloween, your neighborhood will be a ghost town for real.

***
Partly to take my mind off the Kindle Scout thing, I'll be out and about this month. Next weekend, I'm attending the World Fantasy Convention. I'm doing a reading (from Seasons, natch) on Saturday the 8th at 3:30pm. If you're planning to attend WFC this year, I hope you'll stop by.

The following Saturday, which would be Nov. 15th, I'll be in New York to attend the Self-Publishing Book Expo. I'm not speaking or reading, but I'm looking forward to sitting in on some panels and learning some new stuff.

And as a thank-you to you guys for putting up with me this month, I'm running a contest to give away a Kindle HD6. If you win, I'll even let you pick the color. The entry form is below; if it doesn't work for you, try using a different browser than Internet Explorer.

Thank you, and good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

***
These moments of bloggy nostalgia have been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Scouting Seasons.

Here's the big news I promised you last week: Seasons of the Fool is one of the first books accepted into Amazon's Kindle Scout program. And I'm asking for your help.

First, let me explain what Kindle Scout is, as it's brand new. Amazon is accepting never-before-published manuscripts for this program. It's posting the cover, description, and an excerpt for each book for one month only.

Readers will have the chance to peruse the offerings and nominate their favorites. You can have up to three favorites at a time. But it's not a one-time thing; Amazon intends to post new books to the program all year 'round. When the month is up for one of your favorites, that slot will open up so you can nominate another book. You can click here for more reader info for Kindle Scout.

But what's the point? Well, books that do really well will be picked up by Amazon's new Kindle Press. The author gets a $1,500 advance and a five-year contract.

So what I'm hoping you will do tomorrow -- the link won't be live until then -- is go to the Kindle Scout page for Seasons of the Fool and use one of your nominations for my book. If Seasons is accepted by Kindle Press, you would get one of the first copies free. I'm going to send a reminder email tomorrow to the folks on my mailing list, so if you're not on the list yet but you'd like a reminder, you can click here to sign up. Or you can use the "No spam. No, really" form at the top of the column to the left -- they both go to the same place. And I'll also be posting reminders in the usual places (Facebook, Twitter, G+) throughout the month.

To further entice you, here's a little more about the book:

~~~

A Fool's journey begins with a single step...

Julia has fled Chicago for her grandparents’ old cottage–a refuge from her failed marriage. But she may have to testify against her husband, who defrauded his wealthy investors. And she’s falling for David, an old friend trapped in his own troubled marriage. 

Seeking guidance, Julia finds a labyrinth in the woods–and the elderly women who own it have their own reasons for wanting her to walk it. 

What Julia learns in the labyrinth could change all their lives, if only she would take it to heart.

~~~

Thanks so much in advance for your help.

***
This moment of bloggy entreaty has been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

Catfish, anyone?

We'll get to our top story in a moment. But first, the news!

The Land Sea Sky Trilogy is free through tomorrow at Amazon. Thanks to everybody who has downloaded it already -- you're all my new best friends. And a note to those who don't have a Kindle: if you'd like to read the series, drop me an email or leave a comment here at the blog, and I'll do my best to fix you up.

Also, watch this space next week for some very interesting news about Seasons of the Fool. I'd tell you now, but...well...aieee...no. No. Next week. Come back then.

***

Since becoming an indie author, I have learned many new things. One of them is a new definition for catfish.

Back when I lived in Huntington, WV, the only kind of catfish I knew about was the kind that lives deep in rivers and streams. They eat the junk on the bottoms of such waterways (which is not always the healthiest stuff -- hence, the term bottom-feeder). Catfish also taste good, or so I've been told. I don't think I've ever tried one.

Anyway, thanks to the advent of teh intarwebz, catfishing has taken on a whole new definition. According to the Urban Dictionary: "A catfish is someone who pretends to be someone they're not using Facebook or other social media to create false identities, particularly to pursue deceptive online romances." Or, apparently, to post book reviews.

This is not to be confused with an internet troll, who purposely posts incendiary statements to get people riled up. And it's also not the same as a stalker, which is defined, in internet terms, pretty much the way it is in real life.

I'm making the distinction among these terms for a reason. This week, an article popped up in the book section at The Guardian by a trad-pubbed YA author named Kathleen Hale. In her article, Hale admits to stalking a reader who left her a one-star review. At first, she simply checked her Twitter feed obsessively for tweets from the woman. But eventually Hale went so far as to contact the woman repeatedly by phone, and even -- creeper alert! -- traveled to her house to confront her. (The confrontation apparently didn't happen; no one answered the door, so Hale left a book on her doorstep. The book was Anna Quindlen's A Short Guide to a Happy Life, a copy of which, Hale said, she just happened to have in her purse.)

The story takes a side trip to "Stop the Goodreads Bullies" Land. Hale says she landed on their list of Badly Behaving Authors simply by writing about tough subjects in her book. But she also makes an oblique reference to having responded to the one-star review, and to being attacked online thereafter. She appears to use this as justification for her subsequent behavior.

I was not involved in any way, shape, or form with any of this; I am simply an outside observer who is coming to the whole thing very late in the game. But these, for me, are the takeaway points:

1. Reviews are for readers. Reviewers are (ideally) giving their honest opinion of the book. Some readers look at the one-star ratings first, because the reviewer's deal-breaker might be a deal-maker for the reader. As the author, yes, it sucks to get a one-star review. But the smart author either reads them, takes any honest criticism to heart, and uses it to do better next time; or doesn't read them at all. The last thing an author should do is respond to a bad review. (In fact, I make a point of not responding to reviews at all. It's not that I don't love the good ones -- I do! and I'm grateful for them! -- but I just think it's best to leave the reviewers to their reviewing and to keep my mouth shut.)

2. Using an alias online is not a crime. In some instances, it's necessary -- just as it's prudent for some authors to use a pen name. The use of an alias doesn't make you a catfish, even if you use that alias to post pictures of pets you don't actually own and vacations you haven't actually taken.

3. Stalking is never okay. No justification for it will ever pass muster.

4. Maybe I'm cynical. But it occurs to me that Hale writes fiction -- dark comedy, according to the blurb for her novel -- and so there's an outside chance that she meant for her tale to be darkly humorous, and perhaps not completely factual.

Moreover, her article appeared just as we're beginning the run-up to the big holiday book-buying season. Coincidence?

I really hope that's what's behind this -- that it's either an attempt at humor that fell flat, or a bald grab for eyeballs for Hale and her book. Because the only other alternative I can think of is that the author has some personal issues. And if that's the case, then I hope her publisher is getting her some help.

***
This moment of bloggy definition has been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.

More Foolishness.

I've been a writing fool this weekend. Earlier today, I put "The End" on the first draft of Seasons of the Fool. This draft is just shy of 52,000 words -- about 14,000 of which I wrote in two marathon sessions yesterday and today. So I'm pretty tired of sitting in this chair right now. But I knew I needed to update y'all about my progress, and give you a little taste of where I'll be taking you guys when the book comes out.

People who get all excited about beach vacations tend to look at me funny when I say I can take or leave them. The reason I'm so blase about the beach is that I grew up there.

I took the photo above last summer, about five blocks from the house where I grew up. The body of water in question is not the ocean -- it's Lake Michigan. And the area in question is called, collectively, Michiana. It straddles the Michigan-Indiana state line, starting at the southern tip of the lake and extending about 35 miles east to South Bend.

The word Michiana is also part of the names of the two villages (and at least one unincorporated area) located right on the lake. I grew up in Michiana Shores, Indiana; the other village is Michiana, Michigan. Michiana Drive is the dividing line between the two villages, and it's also the state line. You can stand in the middle of Michiana Drive and have one foot in Michigan and the other one in Indiana -- which my kids and I have done on multiple occasions.

Here is a picture of my daughter Kitty demonstrating the technique. Note a few things:

1) She is in no danger of being run over. It's a quiet little neighborhood, particularly after the summer people have gone home. (More on that in a sec.)

2) We are in the woods, and wildlife abounds. See the deer on the far left of the picture? We were on our way down to the beach when Kitty stopped for her photo op. On the way back, we saw the guy who lives in this cottage feeding a deer by hand. Might have even been the same deer.

3) The villages were first developed in the 1930s as summer homes for people from Chicago. The original cottages, and many of those built later, used the same faux log cabin siding as the house in this picture. You can see more examples of the style at county-line-road.com. (The blogger is a tad confused when she says Michiana Shores is in Michigan.) To be clear, the house I grew up in was never a faux log cabin; when my father built the place, he used dark brown asbestos siding, and we've since gone to beige vinyl siding.

My point -- and I do have one -- is that I've set Seasons of the Fool in this little neighborhood where I grew up. I've been deliberately vague about which side of the state line Julia's faux log-cabin cottage is located on; clearly, it's confusing, as evidenced by the mistake the nice lady made at the link above; and it doesn't make any difference to my story. But I've included the important things: the beach, the trees, the cottages, and the view of Chicago on a clear day.

I also left out the time zone madness. Michiana Shores is on Central time, the same as Chicago; Michiana, Michigan, is on Eastern time, the same as South Bend. And in the old days, South Bend didn't change to Daylight time in the summer, whereas Michigan did. (This tripped me up the first time I had a cell phone at my mother's house; I'd set an alarm, but my phone switched from an Indiana tower to a Michigan tower at the wrong moment, so my alarm never went off.)

And I've just realized that I left out the wildlife. Ack. What was I thinking? I should add a deer.

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This moment of beachy blogginess has been brought to you, as a public service, by Lynne Cantwell.