Echoes in a Hollow Space

The talented and lovely mnfaure has put out a general challenge to writers as part of the 7-7-7-7 challenge, so I decided to play along. I’ll follow her lead and rather than challenging seven specific writers, I’ll just say that anyone out there who wishes to join in should feel free to.

The Challenge

Go to the 7th page of a work in progress, go 7 lines down, post the next 7 lines, then challenge 7 other writers to do the same.

My entry turns out to be part of a letter to the editor of a paranormal magazine called The Between Times—maybe not the most riveting part of the novel, but hopefully at least slightly amusing:

I wonder if you’d like to do an article about the Chupacabra that’s bothering my chickens? Well, I’d better close for now. I am a big fan of your magazine. I have been reading The Between Times ever since I discovered it on a trip to San Francisco three years ago to visit my son’s grave. That was the issue on life after death and I found it to be a great comfort. Keep up the good work, and let me know about that Chupacabra article. I’ll even write it myself if you like, though I’m no creative writer.

Sincerely yours,

Ramona Hansen Tattinger, Hansen Ranch, Dos Lunas County, California

This was seven lines in the ms., but seems to have a different shape in the post. Anyway. Happy writing!

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

So, a humorous comment by mount_oregano led me on a little journey around The Internet and I stumbled upon this Analyzer called Gender Guesser. I plugged in some words from Venus In Transit, the same novel I used for yesterday’s meme, and discovered I am a European male. Here are the results:

Total words: 330

Genre: Informal
Female = 215
Male = 501
Difference = 286; 69.97%
Verdict: MALE

Genre: Formal
Female = 303
Male = 370
Difference = 67; 54.97%
Verdict: Weak MALE

Weak emphasis could indicate European.

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

Look! Actual content!

I got this meme from sartorias who got it from Should Be Reading.

To play along, just answer the following three (3) questions…

• What are you currently reading?
• What did you recently finish reading?
• What do you think you’ll read next?

I’m about 75 pages from finishing Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness and dipping into Help. Thanks. Wow. by Anne Lamott. I’m really enjoying both of them. I know some people poo-poo Harkness, but I’ve enjoyed both of her books. They just draw me in and keep me reading, no mean feat these days. And Anne Lamott manages to be spiritual, hilarious, humanitarian, and egalitarian. I love her.

Before those I read Giving Up the Ghost: A Story About Friendship, 80s Rock, a Lost Scrap of Paper, and What It Means to Be Haunted by Eric Nuzum (back at the end of October), which was a very interesting memoir about a troubled and lost youth finding a way to prevail. I read so slowly these days, what with all that’s going on, that I think I only finished 16 books in 2012. My reading time is very scattered and precious. However, October was something of a banner month. I also finished Delusion in Death by J. D. Robb (my ultimate comfort read author) and Serpent in the Thorns by Jeri Westerson, a medieval noir detective story. I didn’t like this second book as much as I liked the first in her series (Veil of Lies), but well enough that I’ll continue reading them.

What will I read next? Haven’t a clue. Many lovely books await me. I suspect it will all depend on the mood I’m in when I’m finally finished with the current book.

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

The page 58 meme:

Pick the nearest book to you. Turn to page 58. Skip down 7 lines to the first full sentence. This describes your life so far.

From Riveted by Meljean Brook:

“Less than an hour remained until first watch began.”

I do feel as if I’ve spent an enormous amount of my life just waiting around…

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

The rules:


1. Go to page 77 (or 7th) of your current ms

2. Go to line 7

3. Copy down the next 7 lines – sentences or paragraphs – and post them as they’re written. No cheating.

The last time this was going around I was slowly, painfully working on Shivery Bones and I still am (sorry to say). I refuse to post the same excerpt, so I went back to the novel I was working on before that, Carmina. There’s no page 77, so here’s page 7. Carmina and Susan are speaking. Carmina is the one speaking that first line.

“Do you realize how rare it is for anyone to confront their own demons?”

“No. I confronted mine, and Jeremy confronted his, but I can’t speak for anyone else.”

“I can.” All humor drained from her voice and face. “I don’t just make them see and feel what they’d rather not when I sing, you know. I see and feel it along with them.”

“How awful!” Susan had been an empath all her life, buffeted by the unguarded emotions of others, and sometimes their thoughts. “Why do you keep singing?”

Carmina’s vivid eyes grew bleak, her face exhausted. “I can’t help myself, darling. I am compelled whether I wish it or not.”

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

You are the Hanged Man

Self-sacrifice, Sacrifice, Devotion, Bound.

With the Hanged man there is often a sense of fatalism, waiting for something to happen. Or a fear of
loss from a situation, rather than gain.

The Hanged Man is perhaps the most fascinating card in the deck. It reflects the story of Odin who offered himself as a sacrifice in order to gain knowledge. Hanging from the world tree, wounded by a spear, given no bread or mead, he hung for nine days. On the last day, he saw on the ground runes that had fallen from the tree, understood their meaning, and, coming down, scooped them up for his own. All knowledge is to be found in these runes.

The Hanged Man, in similar fashion, is a card about suspension, not life or death. It signifies selflessness, sacrifice and prophecy. You make yourself vulnerable and in doing so, gain illumination. You see the world differently, with almost mystical insights.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

Pick up the nearest book to you. Turn to page 45. The first sentence describes your sex life in 2012.

The nearest book to me is a blank journal. Page 45 is like every other page in the book. That would be blank.

Reaching slightly further afield I pick up Rapture in Death by J. D. Robb:

Eve awoke with the cat stretched over her chest and the bedside ‘link beeping.

That sums it up nicely also.

How’s your sex life?

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

My fairy name is Fidget Jupiterglitter
She is mysterious and secretive.
She lives in rotting woodlands near poisonous toadstools.
She is only seen in the light of a shooting star.
She wears red with white spots, like toadstools and has deep mauve butterfly wings.
Find out your fairy names with The Fairy Name Generator!

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

Well, that’s true enough, I suppose.

You are The Tower

Ambition, fighting, war, courage. Destruction, danger, fall, ruin.

The Tower represents war, destruction, but also spiritual renewal. Plans are disrupted. Your views and ideas will change as a result.

The Tower is a card about war, a war between the structures of lies and the lightning flash of truth. The Tower stands for "false concepts and institutions that we take for real." You have been shaken up; blinded by a shocking revelation. It sometimes takes that to see a truth that one refuses to see. Or to bring down beliefs that are so well constructed. What’s most important to remember is that the tearing down of this structure, however painful, makes room for something new to be built.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.

What books are currently on your desk?

I don’t have any books on my desk. There is a cat on my desk. However, on the table next to my reading chair there are these books:

Fairy Paths and Spirit Roads: Exploring Otherworldly Routes in the Old and New Worlds by Paul Devereux. This is a semi-anthropological exploration of landscape features which may be the remnants of “spirit roads” used in ancient religious rituals. Devereux gives directions on how to get to these places and any folk traditions that still cling to them.

The Creole by Ray La Scola. A historical romance from the 1960s.

Lover Revealed by J. R. Ward. A paranormal romance. Great escapism.

By Oak, Ash, & Thorn: Modern Celtic Shamanism by D. J. Conway. A how-to-do-it guide—which generally makes me very skeptical when dealing with something which disappeared two thousand years ago. BUT, I’m fascinated by the hints and fragments of Western shamanism that still exist and how Ms. Conway brings those together to make a coherent, modern tool for self-exploration. Not that I expect to become a shaman. I’m a writer. That’s as close to shamanhood as I expect or want to get. But I have been working on an idea about a prehistoric Western European shaman. There’s only so far Mircea Eliade is going to take a girl.

Inside the Live Reptile Tent: The Twilight World of Carnival Midway by Bruce Caron and Jeff Brouws. Beautiful picture-book exploration of this world.

The Assassin’s Cloak: An Anthology of the World’s Greatest Diarists by Irene Taylor and Alan Taylor. A compendium of diary entries for every day of the year on a wide range of subjects and perspectives. I like looking at the entries on the same day that they were written. It’s fascinating to see what someone else was experiencing on that day.

Mirrored from Better Than Dead.