New Short Story for Free Download!

If you hadn't seen yet, I released an eBook version of my short story "Cry 'Bout A Nickel." I blogged an excerpt earlier; go here to download it.  It's a two-step download process; please let me know if it's too cumbersome for people who don't know me to bother. Again, download "Cry 'Bout A Nickel" on …

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What if “Carrie” were YA fiction?

My awesome editor came to our first meetings about my novel The Puppeteer with the expectation that it would be "Young Adult" literature, a goldmine of a subgenre within the publishing industry.  Without trying to quash my vision, she explained to me what was expected of a YA title. I told her, hold the phone, I hadn't …

A Scary Way to Start Your Day

I woke up at 3:45am this morning with the sensation that someone was tapping on my ankle.  It had been a dream and there was no one there, but I was reminded of this other rude awakening, a frequently-retold but never-committed-to-writing tale of my unquiet solitary sleepitude <---(made-up word)   I came to wakefulness gradually and …

But wait, there’s a twist …

When the film "The Sixth Sense" took the world by storm, I started to notice within a few years a change in the way that the writer/punter class talked about their in-progress novels and scripts. "It's about this guy who does this thing, and he gets into this situation ... but then there's a twist …

“It’s ‘Mr. Rock,’ bitch!” Chris Rock breaks himself down

Boy, does Chris Rock look different. He's been my favorite stand-up forever (though now he has competition from John Mulaney).  I've devoured all of his previous specials, and the man had a visual brand - goatee, close-cropped black hair, fly suit. Seeing him take the stage in "Tamborine," his first special since 2008's "Kill the …

5 Legit Reasons Millennials Prefer Texting over Calling

"I called the guy, got his voicemail, and as I was leaving a message I saw that the guy had just texted me, saying 'Please text.'  I couldn't believe it!" The dude sharing this story was two years older than me, and one year shy of being a Millennial.  I am one year past the Millennial cutoff.  …

Top 10 Stephen King Kills

A lot of people get killed in some pretty brutal ways in Stephen King's stories.  In honor of several gruesome kills in my upcoming novel The Puppeteer (one of which is an homage to a kill on this list ... you'll have to read to figure out which ...) here are my 10 favorite / worst / …

The era of the “Rock Star” is over, and that’s okay

"Her name was Bullwinkle."  That's the opening line to The Dirt, the 2001 autobiography of the rock band Mötley Crüe written by all the band members with an assist from pro ghostwriter Neil Strauss. I'll spare you the gory context, but suffice it to say to me and a small collective of wannabe rock-n-roll miscreants I chose …

On being an adult throwing food at people

Some of my best memories are of throwing food at people. Not as a kid, but as an ostensibly grown-ass adult. There was Eric, who was a great friend, but very verbal and who could go on a tear when he got passionate about something.  Sitting in our little group of collegiate drama nerds at …

Is sarcasm an excuse for awful comedy?

Seriously, people, Daniel Tosh does not mean it. I'm not even saying that's an excuse.  There may well be moral turpitude in telling outlandishly awful jokes about rape, spousal abuse, and body dysmorphia, whether you mean it or not.  But the same way as you can objectively say that Hamlet is about a prince in Denmark (whatever …

Novel Exceprt: Nightmares and Siblings, “The Puppeteer”

My fascination with dreams and sibling relationships are key motifs in my upcoming New-Adult horror novel, The Puppeteer.   This excerpt is from Chapter 7. ***  She sat bolt-upright in bed, gasping for breath, wondering if she had screamed aloud.  For a second, Sarah didn’t know where she was.  Her eyes looked for the closer-in dimensions of …