The Grand Tour

Foxfur comes out in two weeks!

I'm trying, for this release, to get some promotion out, because I'm really proud of this book, and I'd like to see it do well. Primarily, since I'm on a budget and can't afford to pay for ads, I'm going on bit of a blog tour.

If I've got my notes right, there's a preliminary (and slightly steamy!) post over at A. Catherine Noon's blog today, comparing writing and editing to a sub/Dom relationship!

The rest come as a blitz during the week of release:

• Leading up to the 13th (release day!) I'll be here, of course, with some talk about worldbuilding and the cultures to be found in Foxfur.
• On the 14th, I'll be featured at V. L. Locey's blog (where I'll talk a little about character development), and hosting Torquere's Livejournal community, where I've got several topics planned, including at least one spicy excerpt.
• The 15th sees me over at Lynn's, explaining the value of a great beta reader.
• On the 16th, I'll be at Torquere's blog, once again with a variety of topics in mind.
• I'm taking the 17th off, but on the 18th, I'll be visiting Mychael Black, where I'll talk about why Foxfur's first draft was entirely unpublishable, and what survived the rewrite process!
• And on the 19th, hop over to BA Tortuga's blog for a little chat about kink...

As you can see, it's going to be lots of fun, and there will be plenty of things for you to check out, as I'm fairly certain that none of those posts repeats any others!

But all those blog posts had to be written in advance (or at least the ideas for them sketched out) -- and some pictures dredged up, and my fellow authors begged for the slots, and...

I think I've written so much about Foxfur in the last week or so, in preparation for this publicity blitz, that I'm completely out of topics! Goodness only knows what I'll find to talk about next week. Maybe I'll do another grammar lesson. ;-)

Grammatical

As well as being friends with Lynn, I also happen to be her editor for most of her Torquere Press releases. The other day, I wrapped up my notes on her novel that's scheduled for release next year and sent her the marked-up file, along with the assorted paperwork that goes along with each release.

The next day, she caught me on Facebook and asked me a grammatical question. I answered, and she said, "I ought to take a class or something. I've forgotten all this stuff." (Mind you, Lynn majored in English, so it's not like she just didn't learn it.)

I chuckled and said, "I've been thinking of writing up some of the most common errors that I see and posting it. But the ones who most need it probably won't read it."

"I'd read it," she promised. I could feel her making big googly eyes at me on the other side of the screen. "Please?"

Well, all right. Since you said please.

Let's start with homophones and other similar-sounding words.

You know about them already. Stop relying on your spell-checker for combinations like: its/it's -- your/you're -- then/than -- effect/affect and their friends.

Do a search for both variants (yeah, I know, to/too/two has three, but I don't usually see this one screwed up outside of the occasional typo) and make sure you feel good about your choice. Look the rule up online if you have to.

I still have to look up the rules for lie/lay/laid/lain every. single. damn. time, myself, so it's not like I have any special knowledge, here.

***

Semicolons are not hard! There are two correct uses for a semicolon. Only two. Ready?

1) Joining two complete sentences that need to be linked. Note that they must be complete sentences. If you could not correctly replace the semicolon with a period, then you cannot use the semicolon. Example: I went inside; it was starting to rain.

2) The semicolon replaces a comma in lists if the list items have commas of their own. Example: Your dinner options are meatloaf, peas, and potatoes; chicken, broccoli, and rice; or soup and salad.

That's it. That's the only two uses for a semicolon in prose. For better (and funnier) examples and explanations, you can check out The Oatmeal's comic (http://theoatmeal.com/comics/semicolon) but that's the lot, right there. All the other uses I see ought to be a comma or a colon.

***

Dialog tags. Oh my sweet gods and little pink toasters, but it seems like almost nobody can use a dialog tag.

Tags have several rules, but they're not actually that hard.

The first -- and the one that gets broken constantly -- has to do with the choice of verb for the tag. I can't tell you how many times I've seen this:

"That makes me happy," he smiled.

Here's a rule of thumb for you: If the verb does not imply a vocalization of some sort when it stands alone (said, shouted, coughed, laughed) then you can't use it for a dialog tag. A smile does not make any noise, and therefore it cannot be used to deliver dialog. (Neither does a smirk or a grin.) The above example is more correctly rendered:

"That makes me happy." He smiled.

or

"That makes me happy," he said with a smile.

or

"That makes me happy," he said, smiling.

Don't even get me started on dialog tags that don't have anything to do with the dialog, e.g.: "I'll answer the door," he stood up. AAAAAAARGH. Either add a proper dialog tag (...he said, standing up) or make it two separate sentences.

The other rule has to do with punctuation. If you are not going to use a dialog tag, then the sentence ends with the end of the dialog. You should, inside the quotation marks, use whatever sentence-ending punctuation makes sense. Period, question mark, exclamation mark. And then the first word outside the quotation marks should be capitalized, because it's the beginning of the next sentence. "Are you coming?" He looked back, waiting for a response.

If you are going to use a dialog tag, then your sentence is not finished yet. Replace your period with a comma. (Note that question marks and exclamation marks, as they convey more information than simply "end of sentence", should be left alone.) The first word outside your quotation marks should be lowercase, however, (unless it's a name) because the sentence is continuing, no matter what punctuation you used to finish off the dialog. "Yes, of course!" she answered.

***

A participle is a verb that modifies a noun or noun phrase, which is a very stuffy definition and much easier exampled than explained: "I'll answer the door," he said, standing up. In this example, "standing" is the participle, modifying our speaker.

Unfortunately, I see a lot of participles being used as the next action, rather than a modification of the current one. For example: He stood up, walking to the door. In this case, the noun phrase being modified is understood to be the first whole first clause: "He stood up". And since you cannot walk to the door and stand up at the same time, this is incorrect.

An easier way to keep track of it is this: If you're going to use an "-ing" verb, try slipping a "while" at the front and seeing if it makes sense. For example: He stood up (while) walking to the door. This does not make much sense, and therefore is incorrect; the correct way to write this would be: He stood up, then walked to the door. Or possibly: He stood up and walked to the door. They have moderately different emphases; choose the one that best suits the situation at hand.

On the other hand: He walked around the room (while) staring at the ceiling. This does make sense, and so you can correctly say: He walked around the room, staring at the ceiling. (He should be careful not to bump into anything, though.)

***

Pronoun confusion! This is not a hard rule of grammar, but part of Torquere's style guide. As such, you have somewhat more leeway here -- but I've found it makes for much smoother reading (even if not necessarily writing). The rule here is that each pronoun set should only have one antecedent per paragraph.

Wait, "antecedent" is one of those fancypants grammar words, so let's back that up a smidge for those of you who had better things to do with your brains than storing 8th grade grammar lessons:

An antecedent is the thing that a pronoun refers to. If I have a scene with Joe and Mary, then most likely all the (he/him/his)s in the scene refer to Joe, and all the (she/her)s belong to Mary, and so Joe is the antecedent of "he" and Mary is the antecedent for "she".

But Torquere, being a publisher for mostly m/m romances (or sometimes f/f or m/m/f, but in all cases at least two people of the same gender), runs more often than most into this sticky situation where you could easily have two antecedents for the same gender pronouns. For example: Jerry shivered as he took off his shirt. Who do those pronouns belong to? I can see several different interpretations here: Jerry is taking off his own shirt; Jerry is taking off someone else's shirt; someone else is taking off Jerry's shirt; or someone else is taking off his own shirt. Without further context, there's no way to tell which interpretation is correct.

So the rule Torquere has is that in each paragraph, all the pronouns of a particular gender must have the same antecedent (and that antecedent must be made clear by the context).

I will say that this is a very difficult rule to abide by strictly, and since it's a house rule, I don't follow it 100% -- I'll skim past the occasional slip as long as all the antecedents are crystal clear. (Other editors are extremely picky about this rule, though. Your mileage, as they say, may vary.) But I've found it's an excellent rule to keep in mind for the sake of clarity, anyway. You may know perfectly well what you're trying to say -- but are you completely certain that your reader will?

***

There. Those are the grammatical mistakes that I trip over most often. I hope that's at least vaguely helpful! Any other grammar questions you've stumbled over and could use some help with? Please ask!

Covered!

It's been a while since I've attempted to post via email, but the actual blogger editor still doesn't work for me at the Day Job, so we're giving it a try. If the image doesn't come through, I'll post it as soon as I get home tonight.

Because I really can't wait to show off my cover for Foxfur!
 

The models are so perfect (especially Cheng, the one in the foreground), and I adore that cute little 3-tailed kitsune by the title! Isn't it gorgeous?! Many, many kisses blown to Brandon, my cover artist, who was very patient with my endless requests for tweaks and adjustments.

Foxfur will be coming out on November 13, so you can expect to see some more about it from me in coming weeks!

Guest Post: Lynn Townsend

Y'all know Lynn, right? I mean, I talk about her all the time around here. She's one of my favorite writers, quite aside from being my friend, and we've found that we work together spectacularly well. Which is good, since I've become her de facto editor whenever Torquere takes something she's submitted.

Speaking of which, she released a new short story this week -- a really fun one about a guy who's spending a lot of time in a graveyard and... well, I'll let her tell it:

***

My husband doesn't usually read my work; he says it promotes marital harmony, and honestly, I'm not sure he's wrong about that. I do tend to argue with him when he compliments me - it's a bad habit, I'm working on it!

Sometimes, though, when I'm stuck, I'll bounce ideas off him. He's good with that. I tell him what's going on in my story and where I'm stuck, and he'll come up with some suggestions; one of them nearly always involves the use of high-yield explosives, so... sometimes he's less help than one might hope.

For this particular story, I don't even remember what we were talking about; but I described the scene where Dariel's thinking about his sister, who snuck out and was killed in a car accident...

To which he said, "Well, he's a more concerned older brother than I ever was... when my little sister wanted to leave at night and I was supposed to be looking after her, I usually gave her a ride. On my way to wherever it was that I wasn't supposed to be."

I'm an only child. Sibling relationships are weird to me and I don't understand them.

Find out more about Dariel's family in Blood Cries Up:

Since the death of his sister, Dariel's been haunting her grave. Then he meets Zach. It's love at first sight -- unfortunately Zach is a ghost. An accidental possession results in Zach moving into Dariel's body, but before they can fully figure that out, they learn that there's more to Zach's death than the suicide it had seemed -- much more. With the help of the cemetery cat, Dariel and Zach will have to confront the diabolic Isaac Caine and return Zach's soul to its proper resting place.

Author Bio: Lynn Townsend is a geek, a dreamer and an inveterate punster. When not reading, writing, or editing, she can usually be found drinking coffee or killing video game villains. Lynn's interests include filk music, romance novels, octopuses, and movies with more FX than plot.

Contact:
Blog: http://paidbytheweird.blogspot.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LynnTownsendwriter
Twitter: https://twitter.com/tisfan
Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Lynn-Townsend/e/B005OQA0AA

What I Know

"Write what you know."

It's a funny thing for me to say, isn't it? I mean, I'm a mostly heterosexual, cis-gendered woman, and yet I write mostly m/m romances and erotica. Many of which are sci-fi or fantasy, taking place in worlds that have never existed. I am certainly not writing what I know.

Or am I?

I know how it feels to touch a man's body. I know the slide of muscle under skin, the scrape of late-night stubble, the almost surreally smooth texture of an erect penis. I know the scents and the tastes.

I know what it's like to fall in love. To think about someone obsessively and wonder if they feel the same. To feel my body responding to their nearness. To see the colors of the world actually brighten when my love is returned.

The things that I know inform everything I've ever written.

I know what it's like to want to protect someone you love.

I know how it feels to be afraid and mistrustful.

I know what it's like to make assumptions, and then have them kick you in the face.

I know about wanting to keep part of yourself hidden.

I know how it feels to crave something to the point of addiction.

I know about wishing someone would notice you, even though they're out of your league.

I know how it feels to be utterly exhausted, clinging desperately to the only thing that's keeping you going.

I know what it's like to mourn, and to be betrayed.

I know what it's like to be angry and proud, and I know what it's like to have my world turned upside-down.

And in writing all these things, I've learned even more -- mostly about myself.

What do you know?

Spicy Brains

I missed last week, too, I know. Here's the thing: September sucks.

I mean, it's great that it's starting to cool down again, and fall is pretty much my favorite time of year, but here's the thing... I have a Day Job. And at the Day Job, we mostly do government contract work. And mostly (currently, exclusively) for the US government.

The US government has a fiscal calendar that runs from October 1 through September 30 of the following year. I have no idea why, really, but it does. What that means is that the majority of our contracts end around the end of September, which means we (at the Day Job) have to wrap up the work (which is sometimes a bit of a scramble) and package it up and deliver it (which is always a scramble). And even the customers with contracts that aren't ending generally want a lot of reports and data packages around that time so they can include it in their end-of-year reports.

So pretty much all of September -- especially the last half of it -- are always slammed for me at the Day Job. Which has the effect of eating into everything else I do in a domino effect of exhaustion.

But! Yesterday I sent out two huge packages, and once it was done, the rest of the afternoon was fairly calm. And we're in hurry-up-and-wait mode on a couple more packages, so the next day or two look to be fairly quiet for me (not so much for others) and I thought: tonight, I will Be Productive!

My slush pile had gotten huge. I had -- no kidding -- more than 20 submissions for Torquere's Christmas short story line, so I waded into that and Got It Done. (If you are reading this and your story was rejected, let me say this: There were more than twenty stories, and there are only three release dates in December. There's no way I can handle more than nine or so of them in a month, and I agonized really hard over the choices. There's a good chance that if your story went through a couple of rounds of beta-reading and revision that it would be a solid contender for next year's Christmas collection.)

And then I did some crocheting, which doesn't sound particularly productive, but the piece I'm working on now has a hard deadline (it's a gift for a child's birthday that's in a couple of weeks), and then there's another piece in the queue that I've been commissioned to do, so that's going to be moderately urgent, as well.

And then... O Best Beloved... Then... I wrote.

See, earlier in the day, E. M. Lynley had put out a call for submissions that tickled a thought in my brain. It's a twisted fairy tale call, and I had this story idea a while back for re-imagining "The Gingerbread Man," but it had never quite gelled. I mentioned this on Facebook, and several friends concurred that I needed to write this. And then a bit later, while I was crocheting and turning the thought over in my head, I figured out what my opening hook was.

So I turned off the overhead lights and put the lamp on its dimmest setting. I lit a gingerbread-scented candle. I used Freedom to turn off my internet access for an hour, and Isolator to block out everything but my word processor. And I wrote for one hour. At the end of which I had just over 800 words. Wow. Considering how little writing I've been doing for the last few weeks, I'm very impressed with myself, honestly.

And now, as your reward for having waded through all that, a snippet from last night's writing!

***

Jonas remembered when he was fourteen, Dad had taken him aside, fidgety and uncomfortable, and Jonas had realized he was about to get The Talk. A couple of his friends had gotten The Talk from their dads already, and Jonas figured he already knew pretty much everything he needed to know from them -- plus there had been those films in Health Class that had managed to be simultaneously vague and gross -- but it was one of those things that everyone had to endure, like homework, or letting your aunts pinch your cheeks. So Jonah sat on his hands and studiously avoided meeting his father's eyes, waiting.

Only Dad hadn't really given him The Talk, not the way Jonas' friends' dads had given it. Dad had coughed a few times, cleared his throat and then coughed again, and finally said, "Look, son... There are things a young man just needs to learn for himself, and anything I try to tell you isn't going to do any good. So I'll just say this: a man acts responsibly, and with honor. You know what I'm trying to say, son?"

"Sure, Dad."

"Good. Then we're done-- Oh, one other thing. If you bring a girl back here to the house-- Well, I expect it's better than going out to the park and getting caught, but if you do, it's probably best if your mother doesn't know anything about it. Eh?"

By this point, Jonas' face had been aching with the force of his blush. He nodded quickly. "Yeah, sure, Dad."

(It wasn't until later that he had realized that he couldn't bring anyone to the house for anything more illicit than playing video games anyway, because he shared a room with John, and there was no threat or bribe on Earth that would be big enough to put a lock on the eight-year-old's mouth if he caught Jonas kissing a girl.)

Editrix

I hope you're all taking prime advantage of Torquere's anniversary giveaways! (http://glbtromance.blogspot.com/2013/08/10-years-wow.html)

Other changes are happening there, as well. The GM (er, that's general manager, not game master) looked at sales and determined that when Torquere releases short stories in conjunction with an anthology (that is, we release an anthology, and then we release all of the stories in the anthology separately as well, so readers have their choice of just buying the ones they want, or buying the whole collection) then both Torquere and the author make more money than when we release a short story by itself, or an anthology without the option of picking up the stories separately.

Why this is, I'm not sure. Possibly because doing the joint sale manages to hit both readers who like short stories and readers who like anthologies? No idea, but the numbers are pretty clear.

So the standalone short story is off the table, at least for now. For 2014, we're going to be offering only anthologies, one a month, and each release will offer the anthology as a whole, or the short stories individually.

And I am no longer the Sips (short story) Editor, but the anthology editor. Well, I'm still the Sips Editor now. The change won't happen until around mid-November, when I'm done editing the last of the December Sips. Which means that my "edited by..." credits are going to be getting quite a bit longer. (Because standalone stories of any length don't show an "edited by" credit, but anthologies do.) Or maybe I'll start calling myself the Editrix!

...Okay, probably not.

In case you're curious, the calls for the first eight anthologies (through August 2014) are up at Torquere's website, at http://www.torquerepress.com/specialcalls.html.