Portally-Portalness

Hey guys.

Remember this book?

The Land Beyond the Portal was my first published book-child. It came out in 2011. It features a young amnesiac, snow, devious villagers, a missing child, and an evil old dude named Litchfield.

A lot of readers really enjoyed their journey through the portal. So much, in fact, that they begged me to write a sequel.

Well, I never have thought of a way to continue the story of Laura (the aforementioned amnesiac) and her friends. But last week an author friend of mine suggested that I write a short story that connects to this novel in some way.

So I did. I finished the rough draft this morning. It's called "Rochelle's Pizza Run," because if you'll remember, Rochelle Peltier was practically dying for a pizza when The Land Beyond the Portal concluded. (Now you probably want one, too.)

It's a rare thing for me to complete a story that I begin, so I'm quite pleased I was able to do that with this one. It has all the literary value of a receipt from Walmart, but by golly, I finished it, and that's what matters the most.

I have no idea when it will be published. I just thought I'd let you know it exists.

Now go order a pizza. You know you want one.

New Name

No, I have not renamed myself. I am still J. S. Bailey. Or Jenn. Or whatever.

This blog was previously Where Daylight Fades. It shall henceforth be known as Brain Problems! (at least until I think of something else) because, well, I'm a writer, and we're all a little insane in some way or another.

By the way, edits and cover design begin for Servant next month! And there's this new subscribey-box-thing above the picture of my computer and shoes on the right-hand side of the screen so you can receive my new posts in an email.

Also, I will be SIGNING BOOKS in Indiana and Kentucky within the next few weeks, though not at the same time, because while I may be insane, I have not developed the ability to clone myself.

Brain Problems, Servant, Cool Stuff, and More!

I have been a bad blogger lately. Well, technically I've been a good blogger since I do two posts a month over at www.obeythemuse.com, but THIS blog has unfortunately been neglected for the past several months because my brain is perpetually fried.

I realized what my brain problem is, aside from being fried. Actually it has a bunch of problems. Imagine turning on your radio and having about fifteen stations blast out of it all at the same time. You've got a jumble of classical, oldies, NPR, country, R&B, and everything else assaulting your ears, and you can't make any sense out of it so you curl up into a ball and cover your ears while hoping it all goes away.

That's my brain.

It's too full of stuff. I get overwhelmed. Then, to avoid being overwhelmed by the never ending maelstrom of thoughts, I end up playing spider solitaire or going outside and burning stuff, which is really quite relaxing.

The thing is, important stuff doesn't get done when I'm out torching sticks and broken fence pieces behind the house with the gleefulness of a manic arsonist. So at times I must force myself to accomplish Important Things, which include 1.) Writing my novel, 2.) Promoting my work, 3.) Making connections on social media, 4.) Writing some more, 5.) Setting up events, and 6.) More. This does not include household stuff and exercising, which are also Important Things.

But you know what? I recently accomplished an EXTREMELY Important Thing.

I wrote another novel.

It's called Servant, and will be the first book in a series about a wimpy wannabe hero named Bobby Roland who has a run-in with a group of people who have been chosen by God to drive demons out of those who are possessed. Bobby also has gut-wrenching premonitions of tragedy that haunt him day and night. And he likes to eat bagels, but despite his addiction he's still skinny as a rail. He's also socially awkward, so he's kind of like the author who invented him. (cough cough)

What's cooler is that I am going to be a very brave person and self-publish it. I've already talked to an editor and a cover designer, so it's my hope that Servant will be released upon the unsuspecting world by the end of the year.

More updates will come. In the meantime, happy reading and all that good stuff.

Writing Tip

Writers: don't tell me a character is beautiful. Show me that they're human.

Amish Vampires in Space

(Wow--three months without a new post. I'm sorry, guys. I'M SORRY!)

So today I'm going to tell you about a book I just read: Amish Vampires in Space by Kerry Nietz.

When I first heard about Amish Vampires in Space, I was just as skeptical as the next person for reasons that should be quite obvious if you know anything about the Amish. The title and cover scream "camp." Just look at that girl's face. LOOK AT HER. And at the body lying on the floor. And at the chicken hidden on the back cover.

So imagine my surprise when I learned that AViS, as this book shall henceforth be called, was supposed to be a "serious" novel. That's right. Nobody is making fun of the Amish. Nobody is making fun of vampires. This book is played totally straight.

I couldn't contain my curiosity, so I did the logical thing and bought myself a copy.

In the distant future, different planets in the galaxy have been "terraformed" so they will be suitable for human life. Several generations ago an Amish settlement was established on a planet called Alabaster. (The Amish shun technology, but it's okay for them to travel in a spaceship as long as a non-Amish person, or "Englisher," is the one flying it.)

One Amish man named Jebediah Miller secretly monitors Alabaster's sun with some glass instruments passed to him from his father, and Jebediah makes an unpleasant discovery: Alabaster's sun is expanding. The climate is getting hotter, and crops are failing. He knows that if he doesn't do anything, everyone and everything on Alabaster will die.

So Jebediah uses a forbidden piece of technology to call for help. The whole colony is (reluctantly) rescued by a cargo spaceship that is the futuristic equivalent of a giant FedEx truck. They will be taken to another, safer planet to reestablish a colony there.

Only something bad happens once everyone is on board: cargo that was picked up from a different planet contaminates a crew member and turns him into something that can best be described as a vampire. Then he bites other people and turns THEM into vampires. And the chaos gets worse and worse.

In the end, the Amish have to decide whether or not to follow their "Ordnung's" rule of nonviolence and let themselves be slaughtered, or to forsake their law and fight back.

I only had a few issues with this book. First of all, Kerry Nietz uses a writing style that is choppier than I am used to. Also, I wish that I could have learned more about some of the characters and their backgrounds, especially crew member Singer, who acts as a liaison between the Amish and the rest of the crew. I am also curious as to why a colony would be established in a system with a sun so close to the end of its life cycle.

In all, AViS sends a good message: it's okay to break the law of tradition if lives are at stake. Get it? Vampires? Stake?

I'll stop now.

Amish Vampires in Space may be purchased here.

Outlaw by Ted Dekker

Author Ted Dekker's latest novel, Outlaw, releases today; and I had the pleasure of reading an advance copy. I have neither read nor reviewed an ARC before this, so bear with me.

I was unsure of what to think when I heard that Outlaw was going to be released. Early reviews stated that it is "different" than Dekker's other works, which, generally speaking, are "different" to begin with. (It is not often that I read novels that contain talking bats, demon-possessed serial killers, vigilante priests, people drowning in lakes only to be born anew, etc. Comprende?)

Those early reviews are right. In Outlaw you will not find serial killers who have Noxema fetishes or break people's bones or stuff like that. There aren't any vampires or deadly epidemics that kill everyone, either.

What you will find is the story of a young woman named Julian Carter who is shipwrecked and "saved" by a tribe of islanders. Her infant son, Stephen, is presumed lost at sea. Julian's part of the story is written in first-person, and my heart broke for her as she is abused by the tribe, who is not welcoming of outsiders. In fact, those who wander into the valley they call home are never permitted to leave. Those who escape are killed.

Julian is permitted to live among them under one condition: that she "marry" one of the princes vying for control of the valley and produce a son for him.

This is gut-wrenching stuff, folks.

Dekker's trademark weirdness kicks in about halfway through the novel. It turns out that the first half of the book is Julian's handwritten account of her first few months with the tribe, and her son, Stephen (who didn't drown after all) was presumably reading it. He's twenty years old now, because eighteen years have passed since Julian was taken captive. Now it's up to Stephen to rescue her from the tribe...or is it?

Unfortunately, I didn't identify with Stephen very well. After being separated from his mother he had a VERY unusual upbringing, and some of the conversations he has with his mentor left me scratching my head a bit. There's a lot of philosophizing. Or is theologi-phizing? And then it gets trippy. REAL trippy. What started out as a reasonably "normal" story turned into something far different by the end.

Was this my favorite Dekker novel? No. Was it my least favorite? Definitely not. For those who can appreciate a touching story and food for thought, Outlaw is a must-read.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The story of how I, Julian Carter, and my precious two-year old son, Stephen, left Atlanta Georgia and found ourselves on a white sailboat, tossed about like a cork on a raging sea off of Australia's northern tip in 1963, is harrowing.

But it pales in comparison to what happened deep in the jungle where I was taken as a slave by a savage tribe unknown to the world. Some places dwell in darkness so deep that even God seems to stay away.

There, my mind was torn in two by the gods of the earth. There, one life ended so another could begin.

Some will say I was a fool for making the choices I made. But they would have done the same. They, too, would have embraced death if they knew what I knew, and saw through my eyes.

My name is Julian and this is my story. But more, it is the story of my son who was born to change the world.

From deep in the impenetrable jungles where New York Times bestselling author Ted Dekker was born and raised, comes OUTLAW, an epic adventure of two worlds that perhaps only he could write. Full of harrowing twists, sweeping violence, and wild love, Outlaw takes us beyond the skin of this world to another unseen.

http://www.amazon.com/Outlaw-ebook/dp/B00BSEQ3SK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1382462351&sr=8-1&keywords=outlaw+ted+dekker

Deprived

I love Google Street View. You know, when you go to Google Maps and hover the little man over the map, and if you stick him on a street that highlights in blue you can see what it would have looked like if you'd been standing there the moment that the Google Street View car went through.

When I was a child, I would pore over maps for hours, memorizing roads and names of towns and wondering what it would be like to be there. Google Street View has enabled me to finally see some of these places without requiring me to leave the comfort of my chair.

So I "went" to Peru...

Where they evidently have lots of sand.

And pretty mountains.

And I went to Chile...

...and then I look at the place where I live...

...and realize that I am deprived.