1977
He drove to a secluded, leafy spot, and looked at Cocoa covertly when they stopped. She patted her blonde wig, contrasting her chocolate skin, and popped her gum, pretending not to notice him pulling out a pair of nylons. Cocoa slammed his head against the steering wheel before he could act. He was out cold. Cocoa handcuffed him to the steering wheel. Vice arrested The Pantyhose Strangler. However, his car remains where he intended to assault and kill his fourth prostitute.
Writing
Superpowers Activated
So as I continue to work the mysterious magic of turning the words from the pages of my most recent novel into words on the pages of what will hopefully soon be my most recent screenplay (with the ultimate and even more hopeful goal of magically turning those words from the screenplay into magical images on a screen), I am tangentially listening to a screenwriting howto book by Viki King with the impossibly-sounding title of How to Write a Movie in 21 Days: The Inner Movie Method [about]
I’m just about done with the book and when I am it will have been the third screenwriting howto book I have read.
The first two, The Screenwriter’s Bible [about] and Save the Cat [about] I own; the one I’m reading now, I borrowed from Overdrive.
And you know what…
Sunday Songs to Spark the Spirit and Summon the Moves of the Dance
So for the past two months I’ve been stuck within the tedious and grinding and painful first phase of the developmental process for my next book (while I can’t say the first phase is my favorite phase of the entire book development process — to me the entire process of developing a book is tedious and grinding and painful — I can at least say it is the least tedious and grinding and painful of them all) when it recently suddenly dawned upon me that I am not yet ready to let go of the last book I that tediously and grindingly and painfully developed…
Which of course is The Good Kill, thank you very much.
At first I tried to fight through the desire to not let it go but it wasn’t working…
So Many Weird Grammar Moods Give Me the Blues
Weird moods such as…
As do weird modern remakes of classic Moody Blues mood music…
#newisnotalwaysbetter
NIGHT FILM – A Rapid Review
BOOK | FICTION | PSYCHOLOGICL THRILLER
NIGHT FILM
BY MARISHA PESSL
RATING: ★ ★ ★ ★
Night Film by Marisha Pessl is a haunting mystery with a complex, engrossing story and complex, intriguing characters, especially Stanislas Cordova, a creepy, reclusive cultish film director who I wish to the literary gods was a real person.
Seek Not the Enchantment
seek not the horned beast
for it will e’er elude thee
seek instead what’s true—
that of which it means to thee
for that is within thy grasp
Unprogrammable Me
I began writing The Good Kill in July of 2017 and worked on it just about every day in some capacity until March 31 when I completed the manuscript at last and in a rush rushed right out to the UPS Store (I am not sponsored by or own stock in the UPS Store, it’s just that it’s like twenty minutes closer than Staples, of which I am not sponsored by or own stock in) to get three copies of the masterly work of art (as regarded solely by yours truly at this point) printed out in a rush and then rushed two of them out to my editors who are AKA my worldly-wise and well-read and spirited sister and her dashing husband – yeah, dashing as in he’s pretty studly, but mostly dashing as in he’s continually dashing off after my worldly-wise and well-read and spirited sister as she leads them on yet another global adventure — and then rushed right back home where I sat and admired and stroked lovingly for hours and hours the third copy of the manuscript.
Leave Is In The Can!
It’s been over a three-year process but Leave is finally completed and I can’t tell you how happy and proud I am of it. I especially can’t wait until you can see it.
But first it has to go to the film festivals and we have already begun the submittal process. I will send out updates of the (many (hopefully)) festivals that pick it up.