Drumming My Fingers

By Michael Seese

For a child, the longest night of the year is Christmas Eve -> Christmas Day. For me, it's...right now.

A few posts back, I mentioned my latest sprint. Agent Janet Reid offered up a new wrinkle to her really wonderful suite of ask-for-nothing-in-return services to aspiring writers. Called the "Chum Bucket," an homage to her "Query Shark" persona, she pledged that if you send a query to her on Saturdays between the hours of 7:00 and 8:00 p.m., she will respond. But, as she warned, "The queries need to be for real.  If I request something and you tell me it's not ready, or you were just kidding, I will come to your house and gnaw on you till you realize the error of your ways."

I had No Strings Attached close enough that I could taste the finish line, if I may horribly mix and mangle metaphors. So I dove in and finished it, then began the arduous task of proofreading. 118,580 words later, I was done. (No Strings is by far the longest piece I've written; for comparison sake, Dear Diary is 74,400 and Nightmares is 67,800.)

I was ready for Saturday night, and then she posted the following that morning:

ARRRRGGGGGHHHH!

Initially, she had said the experiment would run through August. Technically, Saturday is September. So I hope she extends it one more week.

So once again, I ask you, dear friends, to cross your fingers, burn some incense, and lob some good karma my way around 7:00 p.m. this Saturday.

Dear Diary

If you've been keeping up with this blog, you know that I've been doing some flash fiction lately. I described my entry of 3/13 as stream of conscience writing exercise. As I typed that, I recalled that I used that same term when I wrote my first book, Dear Diary, a few years back.

Drawing on my experience when I worked for NASA, I crafted a strange, silly, bizarre, twisting tale of an ordinary schlub who decides to leave his bland midwestern existence for the excitement of New York City. He gets a do-nothing job with an obscure government agency, and the fun begins.

(This is one of Ted's drawings, "Ascared Face," which goes on display at the Guggenheim Museum on October 17.)

Obviously, I'm biased, but I enjoy the book. Even today, when I read it, some portions make me laugh out loud. 

I had created a Kindle version of it a year or so ago. I had it priced at $9.99. And it sold exactly...um...zero copies. Of course that number pretty much matches my advertising budget and effort.

But all that has changed!

- I created a version for the Barnes & Noble reader, and put it for sale on barnesandnoble.com.

- I lowered the price to $2.99!!!

So if you have $2.99 that ain't doing nothing, please check it out. And if you're an Amazon Prime member -- which I think means you're cousins with Optimus Prime -- it's free.  Therefore, those of you who are Amazon Primes have no excuse.

Other than time...

And taste...

And dignity.