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Chapter One: A Tragedy Her sadness echoes. Her body trembles under the weight of her tears. Her nails clench into the steering wheel as rage overtakes her. How did this happen? How did I get here? These are the questions Jackie Anthonys asks herself as she prepares for a moment she’d hoped would never come… Here she was, finally alone, her hopes left unfulfilled, her pleas unanswered. The time has come, and from here on out, the woman who’d spent her entire life existing in a world of her own creation where she maintained all control was forced to face reality. This is their moment… their final moment together before she’s lost him forever. “Mom,” Her seventeen-year-old son Mason interrupts her thoughts. He sits in the backseat of her 1990 Jeep Cherokee in his boyfriend Liam’s loving embrace, laying his head down in Liam’s lap. Liam runs his hand slowly through Mason’s dark black hair, comforting the sad boy. Jackie braces herself before turning back, preparing herself for the sorrow she’s about to see on her son's face. Her eyes meet his, a dark brown like wet wood, eyes an inherent trait from her. Mason waits for her to speak, to guide them towards the step, but Jackie says nothing. She can’t. “Mom. I think there’s a storm coming,” Mason finally manages to say. He slowly lifts his head out of Liam’s lap and sits upright. He’s ready. Jackie turns her gaze forthright, her eyes meeting the landscape ahead. She watches as the wind scatters the sand that coats the beach. The sun is receding, taking cover behind the clouds as the storm inches its way closer to them. Jackie eyes a drop of water as it lands on the windshield with a rough TAP. She looks out to the waves. They’d been so gentle nearly an hour ago when they’d arrived, but Jackie’s procrastination had enraged them. They’d become contaminated with her dread, angst, and misery. They violently disseminated against the rocks lining the shore, almost as if trying to pull them in. Destruction was their end goal, attempting to drown everything that lay in their path, there were no exceptions. Mason was right. If they waited any longer they’d no longer have the chance. The window of opportunity was shrinking. Jackie’s pulled from her daydream when her phone begins to vibrate in the center console, she reaches her hand down through the mess of crumpled tissue, napkins, and fast food wrappers to locate it. On-screen reads a name far too familiar: Danny. Jackie silences the phone and tosses it into the glove compartment. “Mom,” Mason says. His tone more serious this time. Another drop of water crashes onto the windshield with a thud. “I’m sorry.” She says. She reaches beside her to the passenger seat and takes his remains into her hands. It’s time… P R E S E N T D A Y 2 0 1 6 Jackie sits at the dining room table; her mind entrapped in the words that line the pages ahead of her. She flips the page, taking little notice of her husband Danny as he paces back and forth around the kitchen. “Jackie,” he calls to her, pulling her attention. She removes her feet from the chair ahead of her and places them down on the floor. She looks up for a moment, giving him her attention. “We should go find her. It’s been three days,” he says. He uses his hands to wipe his pale face. “We’re her parents, we should’ve started looking for her the night she didn’t come home. What if something’s happened to her? What if?” Jackie interrupts him, “She’s fine Danny,” she says, returning her attention to the novel between her hands, “This isn’t the first time she’s gone days without coming home, and it won’t be the last,” she says matter-of-factly. Jackie’s arguments only infuriated and frustrated Danny further. “I’m going to go. I have to look for her. I promised my brother that if anything were to happen to him and Jessica, I’d take care of her and look at what’s happened,” he mutters. He retrieves his coat from a nearby chair and throws it on over his shoulders. “Look at what she’s become, and it’s all our fault.” Jackie’s eyes divert up from her book, encompassed by rage. Celeste’s actions are not her fault; how could they be? She never wanted to adopt Celeste in the first place. She’d told Danny several times that she wasn’t fit to be a mother, but more importantly, that she didn’t want to be a mother. Regardless of how often she’d said it, he’d never seemed to understand. Eventually, she’d begun to believe that he simply didn’t have the capacity or will to comprehend her words truly. She remembers the day of the tragedy like it was yesterday, even though it’d been nearly ten years. It began with three knocks on the door just as Jackie and Danny settled into bed. It was almost eleven at night. “Do you hear that?” Jackie had asked Danny. She was lying in bed while Danny pulled out extra covers from the nearby closet. “Hear what?” “Knocking. Someone’s at the door. Listen” “It’s probably just something hitting the house because of all the wind. Who in their right mind would be out in all this snow? It’s probably nothing.” Three knocks. Each making Jackie’s heart thump louder, and this time, they both heard it. Jackie sprung to her feet, leading the charge down the flight of stairs and through the living room towards the front door. Danny had followed closely behind, still unconvinced someone was outside. When Danny had pulled the front door open, he’d taken two steps back in surprise. Outside stood two officers, their hair damp and uniforms glistening with snow. Jackie had pushed open the storm door, which one of the officers had held onto, allowing a whirlwind of brisk air and snow to enter the house. “Mr. and Mrs. Anthony’s?” The first officer had asked. “Yes. That’s us,” Danny had said. “Is something wrong?” “Mr. Anthonys, are you related to Matthew Anthonys at all?” “Yes, that’s my brother.” “Mr. Anthony’s, I’m afraid there’s been an accident,” the officer had continued. In the distance, across the lawn next to the officer's cruiser, Jackie’s eyes caught those of a young girl. She brushed past the officer, still in her nightgown, and sprinted toward the young girl. The snow that’d met Jackie’s bare feet hadn’t even made her flinch. The adrenaline of seeing that familiar young face out in the cold had taken over her body. “Auntie Jackie,” the young girl had said enthusiastically when she’d seen Jackie approaching. She wore a pink coat and yellow gloves. “Celeste, what’re you doing out here?” Jackie asked as her eyes met the blue and red bruises across the face of the six-year-old girl, Danny’s niece. “The cops brought me,” she’d said as she brushed her dark blonde hair behind her ear. “They said I might stay with you for a little bit until mommy and daddy are better.” Jackie eyed Celeste’s messy hair, which was damp and dirty. She pulled a dried leaf from the young girl's hair and released it to the ground. “Come with me,” Jackie had said, extending her hand to the young girl. “Let’s go inside.” When Jackie and Celeste had made their way toward the front door, she’d found that Danny and the officers were no longer there. She’d entered the house carrying Celeste between her arms to see Danny and the officers standing in the living room. The officers had turned to her with a look of both surprise and horror. “We’re so sorry,” one of the officers had then said, “She was still asleep when we were in the cruiser, and we didn’t want to wake her.” Jackie’s attention had then turned to Danny, who had tears streaming down his face. She knew then that they hadn’t survived: Matthew and Jenna, Celeste’s parents. She hadn’t dared look down at Celeste. She couldn’t. What was she supposed to say to the six-year-old girl who’d just lost both of her parents? She put Celeste down on the old brown couch they used to have in the living room that Danny’s parents had given them before making her way over to her husband to comfort him. As she reached her hand out to stroke his shoulder, Celeste spoke. “What’s wrong Uncle Danny?” she’d then asked. Walking over and tugging at his hand. “Why’re you crying? Mommy told me that she was fine. She told me that she just needs a nap at the hospital and she’ll be okay.” Danny had pulled his hand away from Celeste as soon as she’d touched it. He turned around, wrapped his arms around Jackie, and buried his head into her shoulder. Muffled sobs escaped his body. “Thank you, officers,” Jackie had then said with Danny’s head still resting on her shoulder. “Someone from our department will be in contact regarding next steps. Again, we’re so sorry for your loss. We’ll show ourselves out.” “Thank you,” Jackie said, tightening her grip around Danny. “Celeste, why don’t you go upstairs? You can sleep with me and Danny tonight.” Celeste had gone upstairs while Danny told Jackie what had happened. There’d been a drunk driver who’d run his brother, his wife Jenna, and Celeste off the road. They’d landed in a ditch. Celeste had been the only survivor. They’d pulled her out of the car first, and as soon as she was out of the vehicle, Jenna had died. His brother, Matthew, had died instantly upon impact, but Jenna had managed to hold on until Celeste had been extracted from the scene of the collision. Celeste had been taken to the hospital and was very lucky to have only sustained cuts and bruises. “Did they catch him? The driver.” Jackie had then asked. “No.” Danny had told her. Months passed before Jackie and Danny had their first conversation regarding Celeste. Jackie and Danny had agreed before getting married that they didn’t envision children in their future, but it seemed that the death of Matthew and Jenna had changed something within Danny. In just a few short weeks, he’d transitioned entirely from the loving uncle to the adoptive father. Jackie hadn’t known what to say. She’d seen the pain that’d overtaken him, and she didn’t know how to tell him that this wasn’t what she wanted. He must know, right? She’d ask herself late at night. They’d had these conversations before they’d gotten married. She didn’t want to be a mother, and the fact that Danny hadn’t wanted to be a father was one of the things that had drawn her to him. As time passed, Jackie became further withdrawn from Celeste. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t bear to mother her. She didn’t have it in her; the guilt from not raising her own son was too much.

My first three pages introduce the protagonist, a side character, a minion of the antagonist, and grounds in setting and place. You get the main plot and sympathy for the MC and SC, plus an intro to the emotional side plot. 1. Amalia and Clara drove to Sunday church service together that morning as they had for a year now. Amalia in a black linen dress with a lovely interlocking pattern of embroidered white flowers at the cuffs and bodice. Clara wore a gray sweater dress and a black crepe shrug. They both had on dark sunglasses, and not because they wanted to hide from anyone. The Nevada sun punished even the godly. They didn’t speak, parking and then walking to the front doors as the hilltop filled with cars for the 9 a.m. service. Fellow church members, God’s disciples in modern times. The community of Piles, Nevada lost Signor Tau Lasso a year ago on May 13. The tragedy had brought Tau’s daughter, Amalia, more into Clara’s life, and not just for the usual reason of mourning a father and mentor beloved by so many. The Word in Life Worship Center sat on a hill against a bright blue spring sky. Most buildings in Piles, Nevada were on a mound of dirt because the town was built over excavation sites and the residual of mine leavings. God’s house crested the largest pile, capped with a clay-colored composite roof gracefully sloping over the main sanctuary. A wooden cross perched jauntily to the side. That morning, a bit of cheap pink fabric had caught in the wind and wound itself about the crossbar, the loose material flapping gently in the wind. Clara paused, looking up askance. That should’ve been their first clue that something strange was in the wind. They walked on to the steady pounding of their grief. Clara recalled Tau’s funerial procession, but them so far behind that even though the coffin was buried a year ago they still hadn’t caught up with the reality. Grief had no prescribed span; it stayed with you until something else took its place, maybe not even then. Their grief was still fresh as the year before. This had been Clara’s first real experience with death. It was even worse in their case because Tau’s story had no true conclusion, not for Amalia. Not for Clara. They couldn’t finish his story in their minds, so how could anyone else? Little did they know, that was exactly what everyone else had done. The front doors opened, exhaling a floral scent so strong, Clara thought the cherry blossom air fresheners in the church bathrooms must’ve exploded. That should’ve been their second clue that the tone for this day was not what they were expecting. The church greeter was sweat-sheened toadie Kenny Susich. At first Clara wondered how even he could smell of roses. But no. Pink roses and peonies clustered on draped tables in the foyer. Amalia sneezed into her black hanky. Kenny’s broad face shifted into a concerned expression as he evaluated their somber attire. "You needn’t go into mourning yet, Clara. Your time will come. You may soon have one." His large globs of flesh constituting two breasts and a stomach pressed against the yellow fabric of his church branded T-shirt. He foisted a pink rose on her with a wink and a lecherous grin. "Have one?" At first Clara thought he meant the rose, which she tried to pass on to Amalia. She wisely refused any gift from Kenny Susich. Clara had acted automatically, not thinking about it first as she should have done. "Have one of what?" His arm pits sweat stained, wispy blond hair featherlight into a horn just over his forehead. Kenny’s light eyes were smaller still when he smiled, his grin displaying every tooth. Clara could count them if she wanted; she didn’t want. He laughed. She didn’t. Kenny struck a pensive pose: chin on his right knuckles, arm propped up as if taking a school photo though he was standing in the doorway, blocking everyone. "Don’t you know what today is?" It was the one-year anniversary of Tau Lasso’s death, Clara knew that for sure. She looked at her friend. Amalia didn’t seem to be in the mood to unpuzzle a conversation with Kenny Susich. She propelled them both forward. "What did I just miss?" Clara asked her friend. Amalia: "Mother’s Day, Clara. Of the two of us, apparently Kenny thinks only you can birth a child." She gave her friend a wary eye. “Better watch out for that one. He’s chosen you.” Children: the church’s entry hall was filled with them, galloping free in the only other place they could get away with it besides their own homes. Mothers and daughters. Mothers and sons. Mothers and their mothers. Mothers and graduates. Not only was it Mother’s Day weekend, but it was also the graduation celebration for all the high school seniors in the church. Children were hanging from the balustrades and the teens weren’t behaving any better. "But Did Kenny Susich just insinuate that you’re old enough to be in menopause?" Clara ground her teeth. In addition to having a jaw like a Tyrannosaurus Rex, she also felt any perceived insult or injustice against one her friends. She wound a long gangly arm through Amalia’s. Also like a T-Rex, Clara had small hands and feet that would’ve been lovely if not so incongruous with the rest of her body. Amalia waved it off, not even bothering to be insulted or argue the point. She was only 45 and Clara had just turned 30. "I’m surprised a goober like Kenny Susich even knows what menopause is." Clara dropped the pink rose he’d given her, hoping it would be trod over. But then she regretted it: that rose, all these roses, had cost the church money. Today wasn’t a day she wanted to celebrate, the anniversary of the death of Tau, father figure to Clara, beloved father to Amalia, but that didn’t mean she should spurn an investment of church funds. Soon she would find the invoice and see just how much that investment had been. It probably wasn’t possible that others’ joy sucked life from you, but Clara felt it then, the certainty everyone else was living and she and Amalia were stuck in the past, their days diminishing before their eyes.

HAMMERED STEEL CRIMSON FIRE – is two stories. One within the other. The true story of Brian Boru’s life from insignificant orphan to the only True and Rightful High King of Ireland, united in peace – book-ended, as you watch over Geoffrey of Monmouth’s shoulder, as he steals Brian’s life – His dreams, deeds, and glory; to fabricate a Hero for King Henry Ist – King Arthur of England. HAMMERED STEEL AND CRIMSON FIRE ~ 6 Book Series The Life of Brian Boru High King of Ireland 951-1014 Based on a true story High Concept, Commercial Fiction History, Biography, Adventure, Romance, Intrigue, Mystery, War (No fantasy) Braveheart of Ireland meets Uhtred of the Last Kingdom, and the Da Vinci Code (Solving the mysteries of the Real, King Arthur, and the nature and location of the original Grail) Concerning ~ A boy who would never be King, A “certain most ancient book” that would never be found, A thief in the night who would never be caught, The most compelling mystery never solved, The most successful and perfidious fraud ever committed, The two most famous, enduring, and beloved, imposters of all time, King Arthur of Britain, and the Holy Grail, And the truth. Fact: - Geoffrey, cleric, of Monmouth Wales, in 1136, penned the first account of 5th century King Arthur of England. Despite what 800 years of historians, nonfiction books, documentaries, and scholars, claim – there is absolutely no mention of 5th century King Arthur, Hero, Defender, Uniter of Britain, before Geoffrey – not one. - Though, for centuries, historians and archeologists have searched England, for any evidence, the real King Arthur lived; or of Camelot, his castle; Avalon, the place of his burial; or Camlann, the site of his great final Battle – though some has been, speculated or fabricated – nothing has ever been found. - To date, experts have declared Geoffrey’s account of King Arthur of Britain, a king who: united his people, defended, won, restored his country, for a period of peace and prosperity, and finally gave his life in a final battle for the homeland he loved – a figment of Geoffrey’s imagination, a literary device, a myth, or compilation of several men. They adamantly claim – there never was a real man behind the larger-than-life legend, nor could there have been. - However, Geoffrey states quite clearly in his introduction, his source for King Arthur of Britain – “a certain most ancient book”, given to him by Walter, Archbishop of Oxford. - Norse, Njal’s and Thorstein’s Sagas, with accounts of the Battle of Clontarf, known as King Brian’s War, reference a book for their recounting, called – Brjans Saga – Brian’s Story. One of the great mysteries of Norse Literature, is what became of it. Although many Sagas of this period survived – Brjans Saga was “lost.” - Scholar, Einar Olafur Sveinsson, and academic Donnchadh O. Corrain, experts on Norse Literature and History, claim there must have been such a book, referenced by Njal’s and Thorstein’s Sagas, based on their accounting of events, from the Irish perspective, leading up to the battle of Clontarf. They hope one day it will be found. - The few Norse and their allies that barely survived the apocalyptic battle for Ireland, King Brian’s War, on Clontarf field, Dublin, Ireland, Good Friday, April 23rd, 1014, and made it to their ships, headed for the closest landfall – the Norse longphort, just across the Irish Sea from Dublin and the battlefield – Anglesey Wales. Book 1 ~ INSTIGATOR OF IRELAND ~ The Twelfth Son ~ And so, it was . . . That all of Killaloe lay smoldering in embers and ashes, And the Shannon ran red with blood of the sons of Cennetig, And blood red, the hills, and meadows of Erin. In years to come, the old ones would say, looking back at the time of dragonships, That was the day the Banshee of Craig Lia, who loved the boy, The last, and least of twelve sons, found him trembling, burned, and broken, And drenched in his mother’s blood, And she drew him to her breast, and wiping his tears away, blessed him with her own, For she could see the days to come – the evil, the horror – the seas of blood rising! And vowed she would be with him – even unto the end. Then Avril, of the high crag – guardian of the crumbling ring fort of Beal Boru, Shee of the ancient ones – riders of the white horse, mound builders, chariot racers, Raisers of stones – and the child of the last Thracian King, Issued forth a keening wail . . . an oath of reckoning . . . a vow, Even as the thinnest veil of moss, covers the ancient bones of Erin, So too, the sprinkling of a priest, binds the Warrior’s heart, All that is needed – a single thorn, borne on the wind . . . Then she placed her mark upon, The heads of his enemies, The soul of a priest, And in the hearts of three women. Then raging in wild and savage fury, Scored their fates, into the face of her cliffs, By thunder, of hammered steel! And lightening, of crimson fire! For the courage in the heart of the boy, Destined – him to be the one . . . The Instigator of freedom for Ireland! Part ~1 The Boy, The Book, and the Thief in the Night ~ The Saga-teller ~ Hill of Tara, Ireland April 23rd, 1137 “Tell us a tale,” the people called out in the night, and drew back like the tides of the Red Sea, “Of myths and monsters . . . of demons and dragons!” The old man, gnarled and weathered as a druid oak, made his way to the top of the windswept hill, drawing near to the fire. Then placed his hand upon the ancient pillar stone, gently as a grandfather caresses the face of a child. “I have no fairy tales,” he said. So, the people turned away, and went down from the hill. And the old man bent his head, so that his tears fell at the base of the Stone. But Eireann was listening . . .. And she summoned the wind and the waves from the edge of the world, over the Western Sea, and flung them into the cliffs, and hurtled her breath up and over the hills and valleys, tumbling in fits and torrents, and blew in their faces, and tore at their clothes, and fanned the flames of the fire, till sparks flew up into the night sky, to dance with the stars. Just then . . . The old man felt a tugging at his gown. A thorn in the wind, he thought, and tugged back. But the pesky thorn would not be denied and yanked harder still. So, he set his jaw, to give it a righteous thrashing – but . . . when he looked down, he saw, not a thorn bush but . . . a boy . . . a small boy, a thin and grimy and raggedy child, hair standing on end, eyes bright with longing. “Have, ye a true tale then, Sir?” the boy asked, “Of a real hero?” But he hesitated then, shivering in his thread bare rags, and looked down at his dirty feet, ashamed for he had no shoes. When he looked up again – ‘twas with eyes bright with tears . . . “Who was once an orphan child, that no one wanted . . . but, because he was brave, became something else, entirely?” The old man looked around the hill, but the child was alone, neglected and forgotten as the old stone. The strings of his heart tightened, even as his eyes stung. Fingertips traced along a scar upon his cheek, as if a touchstone to his memory, “Ah so,” he smiled, “I have a tale, of a boy who was brave. . .” He squinted then, and looked up into the night sky, searching the stars, and hesitating, as if he might have forgotten something – then, remembered. And looking down with a sly wink and a nod, “And a girl.” Then the old man looked out from Tara’s hill, to where moon shadows of clouds, raced in rippling waves over shimmering seas of grass. His rime-frothed hair, and cloak, and gown whipped madly about him, as sparks burst and swirled, blazing, but not as wild and brightly as his deep blue eyes. As though what he saw, belonged not to this night – but to another long ago. “The truest of tales,” he murmured, searching the stars, for just the right one, “The only kind told, by real heroes ‘round campfires in the sky.” But the people had gone down from the hill and turned their backs on the boy, the stone, and the stars. When the old man spoke again, ‘twas a fearsome thing – a rumbling, come from way down deep in the earth, up through the hill and the stone. The growling of a feral beast, to scold, and score, and shake the earth from its slumber, and wind blew over Hill of Tara, hurling his voice like rolling thunder, across the plains, over the mountains, and beyond the seas. “Oh, you foolish children, who seek what is not there, and never was – a reflection in the pool, a shadow upon the meadow, an echo in the hills – has no beating heart! Don’t you know, there can be no courage, nor valor, nor Hero, nor deeds worth remembering, nor story worth telling without truth. All else is chaff in the wind.” And Eireann’s breath whispered all around them, quickening every blade of grass, ruffling the leaves silver, and tumbling the clouds in moon-glow. . . “Listen well!” The old man roared, a mighty stag upon the mount. “For, I will tell you of a myth that is true, and of the monster who fed upon it, Of a boy who became a giant, and of the serpent who dragged him down to Hel, Of a light, a brilliant light, as bright as a blood-ember, glowing, And of a demon in the darkness, black as a tomb in a new moon, And of the shadow he conjured, that grew upon the wall, Twisting and writhing, and slithering through the cracks, Until it spread o’er the land, extinguishing the light, And with it came a pestilence, a poison, a plague, on the children of Eireann, To scorch and shrivel every meadow and flower, and dream and dawning, For every dew drop in Erin, turned to blood! And the most sacred of all fell on this hill, on this stone, on this very night . . . And it all began – the day the dragons came.” So, the people gathered once again around the Lia Fail Stone, the Stone of Destiny, upon the Hill of Tara. The crowning place of the ancient High Kings of Erin. The high hill between the Seas, where more blood and tears, lay shed, and dreams born and shattered, than any other. The old man put his arm around the shivering child and drew him into the folds of his gown. Then, borne up by the rushing wind, and the longing of a boy, he drew himself tall and straight as a yew mast, arms outstretched, cloak beating around him like billowed sails. His hoar-frost hair, a glowing banner of moonlight, whipped about like sea-frothed surf in the fury of a winter storm. Voyagers all – a ship in the offing – bound for the stars . . .. And the old man stirred the dying embers of their cold and empty hearts, searching for a Hero, as all men do. And set them ablaze with forgotten memories, and abandoned dreams, as his voice shattered the night, and shuddered the earth, even as thunder waves pounded the sea-cliffs to sand. . . “O’r the lap of the land, o’r Sea-kings’ road, From sea-eagles’ nest, on cragged mount, To fen of troll, in Hel-fires below, Dwell many thieves, Ring thieves, who steal a man’s silver and gold, Fiend thieves, who ravage homeland and savage loved ones. Demon thieves, who lie in wait to blood-eagle his soul, No matter, These treasures belong to the man and will fade soon enough. But – the most craven of all – are the Liar Thieves! Robbers of treasure that belongs to all men, for all time. Cowards, who claim another man’s glory, His courage, And his dreams, And the deeds that were his life, And call them their own. This I know. I saw. And I tell you now, the truth of it. For I, Sword-Dane, and Spear-Dane, and brother to God’s dastard, Was there in the beginning . . . the middle . . . and the end . . . I knew the boy, the young Rebel and Outlaw, the Warrior and the King, I held the book in my hands, I touched the blood-smeared names . . . And, I saw the Coward, thieving in the night!” Chapter 1 ~ PLAGUE RAVEN 1134 ~ Anglesey, West Coast of Wales ~ 3 years earlier Geoffrey of Monmouth, cleric to Walter, the Archdeacon of Oxford, perched on his stool like a plague raven gargoyle, casting a loathsome eye back and forth between the piles of musty manuscripts, and the trencher of spitted piglet carcass on the table before him. The corners of his right eye and mouth ticked spasmodically, like the twitching of maggots flicked onto red embers. And rightly so, for he drew nearer to a spit-scorching himself, every day. He’d exceeded his deadline for the King. There by, reneged on his contract, betrayed the trust, and spat in the face of the King’s generosity. Ah yes, and how had the First Henry put it? Coyly, with one arm about his shoulder, and his dagger in his other hand, the tip of the blade, darting about his face like a poison-fanged adder, as he walked him to window gesticulating East, over Wales to England. His broad sword and small mace jingling; and compliment of soldiers with all the aforesaid, as well as battle-ax, boar-spear, neck-cuffs, chains, and gaffing hook, helped to make his point. “You, Geoffrey, hold not only the outcome of my war with France – in your right hand – but my very life, and the future of all Britain, as well.” His eyes narrow-slitted, and glinting, “Do you think you can manage?” Geoffrey, his right hand usually occupied with himself, let go to wipe the sweat from his upper lip, and flap at his gown to fan the water running down his legs and moth-eaten stockings, into his scuff-worn sandals. Indeed, Henry 1st, King of England had decked the Tower of London, for Yule – with bowels and bollocks – for far less disappointment, than this. How his entrails would be removed to garland the Great Hall, and his cods to roast with the chestnuts, during the hymn singing, evoked in Geoffrey intolerable pain and a constant sweating, so that he wondered if he might be bleeding from every pore. He quickly crossed himself over the blasphemous thought, turning his gaze away from the waning sun’s rays, palely illuminating the three crucifixes hanging upon the stone chamber wall, above the fireplace before him. A thief on each side, and Christ in the middle, who loved scabby lepers, filthy Samaritans, and poxied prostitutes, diverted His gaze from Geoffrey as well. Glistening like a freshly boiled tripe, bald as a bladder and mottled as mange – pocked as a sea sponge, and as white and dimpled as a leavened loaf, needing to be punched – Geoffrey possessed the sweaty sheen about him of a cooling corpse, and the odor of a rancid sausage casings. His eyes bulged, black and bloodshot as festering buboes. Jowls hung swollen and hairless as milch cow udders. Nose inflamed and purple-veined, as a cankered teat with mastitis, he tended well with copious amounts of Sacramental red wine – the pilfered blood of Christ, meant for the poor. Pouring from a large pewter pitcher, he filled his Rhineland glass goblet, a parting gift from the King to the brim, and gulped greedily. Balm for his tormenting physical incarceration and mental self-flagellation, within the piddling tower chamber. With a pang of self-pity, Geoffrey acknowledged he’d seen horse stalls bigger and more congenial than this, and far less foul smelling. His chamber, a flue for the kitchen below, cow-pen, pigsty and stable just outside and up-wind, possessed stone walls stained with several hundred years of smoke and greasy soot, and infused with the smells of rotting rubbish heap, rancid swine slop, and pungent horse dung. In one corner, the stone floor opened to a steep and winding staircase down, contrived so that one Kingsman, with a sword in his right hand, could defend the tower against an upcoming horde of Saxons. Perhaps left-handed, he’d obviously failed his task, the filthy drunken Saxons having used his chamber for a privy for three hundred years, and the stench remained. In the other corner – a rudely constructed cot, lumpy with infested horse-hair mattress, home to bed lice, and other small vermin, attracting certain barn foul, which in turn deposited defecated remnants of said vermin, all over the contents of the chamber. Next to the bed, a small chest contained everything shabbily made and thread bare, he owned. And beside it, a wicker basket with his only other set of grimy linens, which the Archdeacon’s cat, following the Saxons lead, befouled on a regular basis as well. No, he’d had one thing and one thing only, of any value, his entire life – his mother’s little copper pot, he kept on the windowsill. Geoffrey sniffled. Every meal she had ever made for him, simmered in that pot, from nettle soup to mealy-worm gruel, and frog-broth when he burned with fever. She would cradle him in her arm while she stirred at it, telling him he possessed a poet’s heart and one day, he would be a great man, important to the King. And after she was gone, her cherished copper pot would be his, to remind him of her forever. Up until the day the King’s men burned the hovel down about her. She would not leave her only gift for him behind. And although she managed to fling it out to him, from the window, she succumbed to the flames. He scraped up what was left of her, after, with a scorched wooden spoon, and carried it with him in her pot, always placing her gently upon the windowsill, so she could see the hills of the west-lands, she loved. Geoffrey snorted, then poured liberally, raising his goblet, and toasted the barren sill. Then sloshed down another draught. All in all, his world – up until Henry Rex had trodged up the Saxon stairs, stood perusing his realm, took a piss out the window, and deposited the rancid eel he ate in France, into his mother’s little copper pot, could be summed up in two words – awful and offal. A tear rolled down his cheek, at least he had been blessed with the poet’s heart she longed for. But that was two years ago. And after Henry had trodged back down the stairs, Geoffrey vowed to rid himself of the pot, its contents, and all sentimentality with it. No more copper in his life – shimmering, pale green, Rhineland glass, silver chalices and golden adornments, crimson silk and finely laced-linens hovered on the horizon before him. Even, as odious as the task of extracting a credible history had become, the plethora of manuscripts piled high around him, lay upon a beautifully carved and highly polished table of English oak. The King’s Oak. And everyone in England knew to pluck even a branch of the King’s Oak, meant being skinned alive and boiled in oil. The table, yet another gift from Henry, to grease the skids, he said, of the project, along with a silver ring inlaid with a large sapphire and engraved with the King’s initials, HR – Henry Rex. And no one doubted Henry’s ability at . . . skid-greasing . . .. He’d the reputation of procuring whomever, and whatever he wanted, in the class of human, flora or fauna, Abbess, novitiate, or mutton, in several kingdoms. Lucky Geoffrey, he reminisced, dabbing at his forehead with his sleeve, and pulling on the chaffing neck of his gown, receiving a commission from the racking, and disemboweling King, Henry I, to write a History of the Kings of Britain from the Trojan horse, to time remembered. “A gift to his people, from their beloved Monarch”. Henry gloated, displaying brown teeth, and purulent gums, “A beacon of inspiration for the ages! Something for them to revere me by!” But Henry lied. For his “Historia” was to be a scheming far more insidious than that – and he, Geoffrey – complicit. His innards grumbling, and outards shriveling, he considered what would happen if he failed to deliver the wherewithal for the King’s intrigue . . . "Concerning Geoffrey of Monmouth – Oath-breaker! Procrastinator! Renegar! Of the King’s good grace! Shall be taken to the Tower, forthwith. To be mutilated, drawn, and quartered! Each limb to the four corners of the Realm! Head on a pike, cods on a skewer, what is left, interred in an iron basket, to dangle above the castle gate, until his maggot-ridden flesh should rot, and bones fall to the ground to be eaten by worm-infested dogs, carried away, buried, and pissed on by drunkers and scabied crones, from this day, and henceforth!" Geoffrey poured another goblet full, the translucent pale green, shimmering in the firelight, his eyes stinging, a knot rising in his throat. What else could he do? Thanks to Walter, the Archdeacon, his superior and benefactor – from whom all moldy porridge, runty-piglets, and slatternly necessities in life flowed – The King of flogging England had promised him, upon completion of his task: The Priesthood, an anointing in Westminster Abby to Bishop, consecration to Archdeacon, with a position at Aslaf, and – his pending missive, Historia of the Kings of Britain to be published, to the far reaches of Christendom, ad infinitum. Not to mention, recognition and acceptance in the courts of Kings, with good food, fine robes, a feather bed, no doubt his choice of belly-warmers, and everyone genuflecting before him, and kissing his right hand all the time, bearing the bejeweled ring from the King. He, Geoffrey, lowly cleric from Monmouth, who would otherwise be trapped in the cave-infested, midden-heap of Anglesey, in the farthest foul dregs of west Wales, beyond the outer edge of the Roman Empire and civilization, and the closest landfall to the barbaric Irish. Even mighty Caesar, though he conquered the rest of the world – loathed to go to Ireland. And if he refused? His future loomed bleak. Nothing had ever come from puking Wales, beset with superstitions, ghosts of ghoulish Danes skulking in the mists, and wailings echoing throughout the hills of evil otherworldly demons. The last of the headless Celts, festering in tombs, and bansheeing about in vile winds, forever blowing over from the Irish Sea, with the fetid breath and blustering bowels of the Irish! Geoffrey sloshed himself another glassful, consumed with melancholy, tipped, and guzzled. And why should he alone, bear the burden of the fate of Britain? The fact of the matter – Henry 1st, King of England, Scotland, Wales, and Duke of Normandy – 4th son to bastard, William the Conqueror, and some whispered, father to at least 22 ill-conceived gammy get out of bowlegged sheep on both sides of the Channel. Though over-sexed and nonselective, remained incapable of producing, even one living legitimate son. Geoffrey grunted – that made Henry, 0 for 22 – an astounding feat in any wager hall in all of Christendom. And with a new wife, pronounced, pox-free, womb-worthy, sluice-sanctified, younger, and ever more virginal than her predecessor. And although, with everything considered, and the odds favorable for his success upon his return from war; many of his subjects lined up to accept the wager – against their King. In fact, Geoffrey mused blurrily, jokes aplenty were chortled in the shadows of every castle, ale house, and sacristy. And written on privy walls from Cardiff to Whitehall, inspiring him to wax poetic – a ditty concerning the new odds of the King managing a legitimate son, in his own bed. He sneered sadistically. A hymn of sorts, from the soon to be Archbishop, to his beloved benefactor – Henry Rex. Refilling and swilling, abandoning for a moment his besotted melancholy, and normally dour and petulant demeanor, he raised his goblet to the Crucified, jowls aquiver, and broke into an unholy, hand slapping, foot stomping, slurry of tone-death, song . . . “Whilst Henry was off fighting his wars and tending his wounds, His nobles, guards, and grooms of the stool tended his wombs, So, by the time he returned in the spring, His odds had taken an insufferable swing, His fields – over tilled – and amply slung, Well seeded – and deeply plumbed . . . Possessed a far greater square acreage, Then his entire Kingdom!” “Ha!” Geoffrey smirked wickedly at the poetic irony, tinging the glass goblet with his crusty brown, rat-gnawed, third fingernail. Thus, Henry’s once favorable odds for success – Now, down the privy – floating with Mum!” The fact of the matter – the King of England, brutally successful in all things base or unconscionable, waxed undisciplined in all things kingly or sanctified. Simply put, Henry I, the rutting old whore-hound, lived to run trash – in the hunt, and out. And now out of money for his wars, sporting a raging brothel disease, with only one legitimate daughter, and in dire need of his people accepting his eldest bastard son, Robert 1st Earl of Gloucester, as heir – he expected Geoffrey to rectify the rat's nest, of all his many bastards – in his family tree, buried in the roots, and stinking up the place. And he expected him to accomplish this feat, a fortnight ago, before he returned to England from France. . . any minute now, still steaming from battle, sword bloodied, pissed off, broke again, with a full bladder, itchy crotch, empty bollocks – the apparent curse of his Viking forefather, Ivar the Boneless – and a frustrated yearning to mutilate something! Geoffrey swiped at his tears and sweat, mixed with pigeon dung, dripping down his barren pate with a malodorous sleeve. Then deposited it again with two swipes across both cheeks. All the while, his stomach howling from hunger, and bowels convulsing in terror Hazily drawn back to the moment, sniffling, he remained wretchedly racked by two pressing problems. The first – the didn’t know whether to eat or shite. And the second – Geoffrey concealed a secret of his own . . .. As if on cue, a spasmodic coughing echoed through the tower, from the adjoining chamber, a croaking, huffing, gaging, hurling fit of what he knew to be a greenish slurry, of phlegm, a congealant, looking considerably like moldy bread pudding, spraying the walls, oozing from the pustules of fetid rot in the occupant’s lungs. Hocked up, and spit everywhere, except into the spittle pot. Followed by an intense wheezing and choking as air was sucked in, along with whatever congealed, yet un-hocked. Just when he thought his plight couldn’t get worse – the grunting of a wild boar rooting for truffles, combined with the wheezing of a heevy horse, filtered up the stair-well. Walter, the Archdeacon, with the paunch of a pregnant palfrey, flatulent and stiff with gout, lumbered up the winding stone stairs of the keep, bracing himself against the wall at the top, scarlet faced and puffing like a blacksmith’s bellows. In one corpulent fist he pressed a lace-embellished handkerchief to his copse of sprouting nose-hair, bearing the embroidered emblem of Pope Innocent II. In the other – an item of dubious origin, and malodorous construction, he dangled as far away as possible from his person. Geoffrey sucked his tongue against the back of his teeth, waggling his own itchy ballast against the stool, resentful for the piling on of his other piles – yet another manky missive, from the puffing little pisspot. Needing fortification, he funneled more of the sacramental red wine, first into his goblet, swigged it, and then sloshed it around in his mouth and through his sparse teeth. Puffing out first one cheek, then the other, and finally down his gullet, belching loud and long, with great satisfaction at the perceived quavering Crucifixes. Even by candlelight, and brined in wine, Geoffrey discerned the hideous thing could never have been any sort of a book, as might have been passed down by a family of nobles. Newborn calf-vellum meticulously tied into folio and bound with fine leather, in any reasonable way. Nor a manuscript of venerable worth, scrolled and wrapped in velvet, and embroidered with silver thread, as one would find in the collection of the Holy Church. Nor was it finely rendered in unborn translucent lambskin, illuminated in gold-leaf, embellished with silver trappings, and ensconced in a bejeweled reliquary from the library of the King. To the contrary, it appeared more like the hideous saddle bag collection of used privy papers, belonging to a vile Visigoth in the sacking of Rome. Sneezing convulsively, Walter waddled and wheezed over to the desk, dropping the repugnant midden heap, in front of Geoffrey, in a puff of dust, and other indistinguishable flotsam. Then snorted into his linen and lace handkerchief, blowing like a trumpeter swan, the congealant from each nostril. Inspecting it thoroughly, he continued, “Some foul relic of a waesucks, looking as though he’d been tossed from a godforsaken dragon ship, a century ago, showed up at the door. Had the manner of the churlish Irish about him, mumbling codswallup about a High King . . . as if there’s anything higher than a King! . . . soused old sarder, lying on the front steps like a worm-infested dog. Had him doused with a bucket of cold water . . . then hot piss, and sicked the hounds on him, but he refused to leave until you were given this . . . this . . . sheer bloody evil . . . Heard you’re compiling a record of Kings.” Walter sneezed, spasmodically, beflummoxed by vapors in the air. . . “As if that old boothahler would know anything of Kings! I was afraid he’d die on the doorstep, let loose of his pesty bowels, and spread the plague . . . Anything to get rid of him . . . the filthy, pribbling old stank!” He turned and fled the chamber, groaning and wheezing, his slack rear sally-port flapping like wet laundry, in a stiff March breeze. At the top of the stairs, he called back to Geoffrey, “The crazed old laggard kept mumbling something about . . . the grayest . . . or gravest . . . rubbish like that . . . King that ever lived! . . . Can you imagine that . . . by Satan’s hairy ass! . . . If he’s ever been close to a real King, I’ll drink the piss pot next time . . . the gorbellied old gudgeon.” And with that, the dried-up old chitterlings, puffing and grunting, lumbered his gout-oozing legs, and dying bagpipe effluvium back down the Saxon stairs. Geoffrey sighed heavily, closing his eyes, and bowed his head, sanctimoniously, feigning prayer. Then with a momentary air of abject concentration – heaved a rancid belch, before reluctantly studying the loathsome pile of middlings upon his desk, nose twitching, striving to separate the fetid reek of the bundle, from the fomenting dregs of Walter. His entire face puckered in disgust, ultimately deeming his latest acquisition far worse – reeking as a kilted Celt’s saddle blanket, and rank and worn as the womb, of the brothel-bred, third wife of Claudius. Whatever would he want with a grayest or gravest King? Just what he needed, an account from one half-dead old scrote, to another half-deaf! Requiring further sustenance, he poured another brim full, sucking greedily, until breathless, eyes watering, belching like a bloated toad. Well, he had to admit, it would be original . . . an old and dignified King. If there was one thing, that the piles of manuscripts in front of him, and the piles in his ass, for the last two years, bore witness – in the entire privy-porridge before him – old kings, as well as dignified kings, didn’t exist. And for good reason; they were a miserable, sadistic, gold-grubbing, mank-mongering, brutish bunch. In fact, all Kings, he had found so far, waxed more of the: brutal-torturing, limb-quartering, treacherous-poisoning, eye-gouging, bowel-extracting, tongue-lopping, burning at the stake types. Hated by not only their enemies, and own people, but by kith and kin as well. And deservedly so, all of them tormenting him now with their tediously unremarkable lives. Apparently unworthy of any sort of a mention at all – the boring, abysmally inconsequential bastards! . . . What’s he supposed to do, make the rubbish heap up? He fought to swallow the lump in his throat, a fuzzy moment of melancholia, washing over him. Casting a furtive glance towards the wall, he wondered if he were being condemned to Purgatory by the all-knowing, ever-present, all-powerful Crucified Christ. In all the stacks of manuscripts and books on his desk, and four centuries of dredging up every old geezer: Gildas, the Venerable Bede, Nennius, Welsh Annals, Anglo Saxon Chronicles, and God help him – the fomenter – Ireland’s Patrick! . . . even flogging Beowulf! – Who all claimed to make record of the history of Britain, after the Romans fled; none of them mentioned a King of Britain by name, who rose to defend against the barbarians, won battles, restored peace, and united the Kingdom – not fetching one! Henry’s command: “I need a King! A great Warrior! Defender against invading Saxons, and Franks, Sacker of Ireland, Guardian of Christendom, a Uniter and Protector of his people, and Bestower of Peace and Prosperity! A Hero among men – a shining light upon the hill against the black plague of filthy Barbarians!” Then, affably placing his arm around Geoffrey’s shoulder, he slid it further along, until locking his head in his clenched elbow, just at his throat. He squeezed, teeth grinding, voice growing ever more menacing and thunderous – “What I need now, cleric – succinctly . . . is Precedent . . . to invade Ireland! . . . the ignorant little pissants would rather give their gold and silver to God, then to their King, and stubborn too . . . I’ll have to slaughter them all, to get it. And to butcher fellow Catholics – which I might add, has never been done before – even Irish Catholics – I need a Papal Bull . . . and that I need, that before my doddering, moldering, bribable, English Pope, is supplanted by the German anti Pope. He growled menacingly, “Which means you’ll have to hurry, or we’ll all be gagging on head cheese, and sauerkraut!” Henry Rex, wild-eyed, red in the face and raging, bellowed into his ear. . . “No one seems to understand the stress I am under – the bloody bastards! It costs, to make war on everyone, in this country and out, and on both sides of two seas. Do you see my predicament now – Geoffrey – hopelessly insignificant, smelly little flea-infested cleric of Monmouth?” King Henry the 1st, pressed his cold wet lips, and putrid hot breath against his ear, snarling like a baited bear – “Precedent Geoffrey. He’s in your piles somewhere – find him!” Geoffrey swayed on his stool, his face puckering to fight the tears, and raised his blurry glass, delivering a swaggering toast, to the eminent specter of the King, who would soon appear at top of the stairs. “Well, come on up Harry, you boneless little bastard, and have a good and close looksee at my piles, why don’t you” . . . he garbled, gulping and welling up with melancholy, eyes brimming, throat tightening even as visions of flames engulfed him . . . the sounds of his fat crackling, the smell of his own searing flesh and singeing hair, what was left around his ears – his carcass, and little stunted pink and hairless chestnuts, crackling on a stick over the brassier of some cankered toothless hag, gummed to death, hawked out, and frog-gulped by a filthy mongrel dog, and cast off as a hairy, toothy turd. Gasping for air he slammed the goblet down on the table. It shattered in his hand. A drop of blood oozed from a tiny, imperceptible sliver of glass in his palm. Sniveling, his breath catching, he held his hand up for the three wavering Crucifixes to see, lower lip quivering, “As if any of you give a rat’s ass!” Well, he’d checked his piles. There was no such beloved British King, Defender, Uniter, Protector, Sacker of Ireland, named in all bloody Britain . . . not bloody flogging one! Geoffrey sniveled and wiped again. First his nose, then his eyes on his threadbare crusty-sodden sleeve, smearing pigeon dung anew, from cheek to crevasses of jowl. He could see it now . . . Henry’s ghost clanking up the stone stairs in his bloodied armor, spurs clinking across the wooden floor. He hovered at his shoulder with his steel-studded mace, swinging in a calculated arc, that if moved the width of a ferret’s fanny, would crush his skull . . .. “Well, let the fusty-lugging Henry come.” He drooled. If he was to be carried away to the Tower of Whitehall. any moment upon the Rex’s return, he might as well enjoy himself. He raised the pitcher, in toast, to the three blurry crucifixes – “To imposters and thieves all – and last suppers!” Then swilled his well-deserved draught to the dregs, just to spite them, wine running in rivulets down the corners of his flaccid lips. With soused and reckless abandon, he would deny himself no longer. He cast all thought of deadline and disembowelment out of his mind and pulled the wooden trencher closer. He studied the roasted little corpse before him from every angle. . . the sheen of grease, the curling of the rind around the edges, the shimmer of seeping fat. De-spitting it, his mouth watered at the bloody oozing of juice, from the gash along the belly, as he rubbed his thighs together tingling in anticipation. Tucking the white linen tablecloth into the crusty neck of his frayed woolen gown and pushing up his sleeves; he commenced the only thing that felt good all day – tearing limb from ribs, skin from breast, popping joints, excoriating bones with his teeth and tongue, his cheeks twitching like a toad-stuffed weasel. A teeth-sucking, fingernail-tooth plucking, messy business. When he realized, rather stuporously, bits of flesh, and juice splashing around the trencher upon his own ink-blotched, scratched-through, pigeon-dunged, manuscript. His bowels convulsed again, clenching in spasm, at the reminder of his own work. Two years’ worth of heartburn and bowel-bloat, a hodge-podge of wizards and dragons, Trojan Horse to Vortigern hog-swill. In a drunken quandary, he surveyed the table covered with antiquated lore, on loan from some stogy self-righteous Venerable or another. All of whom he had to bow on his knees and kiss their rings, and pimpled, hairy asses, in return for their sacred manuscripts. Always on the right hand . . . well he knew where their right hand had been, the same place he kept his! A flood of self-pity washed over him – strangely followed by something else . . .. He spied the only missive, whose mutilation wouldn’t mean his own fat, bursting and oozing in runnels of grease, into the fire. Reaching out, he stabbed his greasy knife tip into the pile of grimy rags and gaffed the Visigoth’s privy-papers closer. Upon blurry-eyed inspection, he thought it was quite possibly the most befouled pile of scat he had ever seen. It appeared to be slovenly wrapped in tatters of squalid linen, begrimed with sard knows what, and carelessly leather bound in tough old cow hide. As if a child had fashioned it from a sharp rock, a dull blade, and cured it in reechy curds. Black as pitch from smoke, green with mold, and rodent chewed along the edges; it appeared to be warped from sea water and cured with salt-scum. And for a moment . . . he could almost see . . .not blurry like everything else in the chamber . . . but clearly . . . the image of it . . . the old book washed up on a distant shore, mixed with flotsam of pink foam, and the blood and gore of mutilated bodies . . . the waves tugging and flipping the pages . . . and running the ink . . .transforming the words . . .. He rubbed at his eyes, just as quickly, the image went away. A drunken belligerence followed. He would show Walter, the King, and the old scutters on the steps, just what he thought of his newest acquisition. His brain wallowing in wine, and the room swaying, he roughly sheared the tattered covering away with his grease smeared blade. Then sliding the tip underneath, severed the layers of contracted thin leather thong, wrapped around it, binding the leaves of calfskin together. As he did, the roar of wind from over the Irish Sea throttled through the window, blowing open the shutters, banging them against the stone wall, and careening through the chamber, fanning the flames of the brasier, sparks flying, all around him, whipping loose velums from the Venerables, around the chamber, in a maelstrom, swirling in a vortex of ancient texts. Geoffrey grabbed at them, trying to keep them from igniting, or being sucked out the window. Geoffrey froze . . . He heard something . . . a voice? A wave of dread washed over him, and even – guilt, as if he were somehow – trespassing . . . or worse – violating . . . and even more than that, before the scowling crucifixes – profaning. He quickly crossed himself, sloppily missing each intended mark. Then let the pages loose. Rattled, and wild-eyed, he reached for the pitcher again, raised, tilted, and swilled long and hard, sucking at the empty brim, until slamming it down on the table, swiping at the crimson dribbling down his chin. This time, he would be master of his own destiny, rejecting the prompting to leave the book intact. He stood over it, inspecting it with all the cunning of a drunken butcher and grunting like a lusty bull; he thrust the tip of his knife into the heart of the book. He stabbed, and gouged viciously, piercing deeply, and in increasing rapid succession, as if slaughtering a tough old sow, that wouldn’t fall to her knees. The vellum pages, brown with age and welded together, seemed unwilling to give up their secrets, clinging to the leather covers, as if bound and sealed by some unfathomed covenant. Then standing to gain leverage, he put his full weight into it, prying the lacerated calf skin, open, until he had enough to grip. Flopping his weight upon it, he wrenched the covers down, splintering the spine apart. The sinew binding the leaves together ruptured. Until it lay, like a deboned chicken, filleted and flattened, a broken thing. The vellum, stiff and crusted together with what appeared some sort of mold, muddied, and darkly stained, quivered in shreds, so that various strips of flayed skin lay in mess of disparate layers, indiscernible as pages in form or content. The mutilation left him breathless, heart pounding and exhilarated, for once in his life, he reigned as the only Master and subjugator of his realm. The brutality serving to whet his appetite even more. He slid the eviscerated carcass under his trencher of piglet, so that its insignificance, might further serve his appetite. It felt good to let the bits of torn flesh and ruptured tendon fly, and the juice splatter, and the grease run all over the grimy old pages – the one bit of flotsam in his life, no one would miss. He belched, cheeks puffing, lips flapping, spitting out the bones, once slurped and sucked of marrow, upon the old book. He let the fat drip, and bloody juice ooze off the trencher on to it. The thickest grease, salty and sweet, running down through his fingers, he savored before it could get away, plunging each appendage into his mouth, one after the other. Circumventing each joint, he licked, working his way down to the fist and finally backing out, while sucking it clean. His lips pursed around each one, as pink and puckered as the tail-end of a winking she-goat in heat. Then wiped, first the front and then back of his slimy fingers, off on the pages, smudging charcoal, and soot, and foraged on, until the last, canted beam of setting sunlight withdrew from the arrow-slitted window. There! The goose flesh rising, like a plucked chicken, on his hairless arms, in mid-mastication of the suckling creature’s heart. He strained to see in the dimming light, his mouth slack and gaping, like the wanton lips of the Sheela-na-gig of Rattoo. With a taper, he lit a candle and moved it closer, straining to see in the darkening chamber, struggling to find again, the melding and morphing phrase of words that had caught his eye – now illusive . . . He pushed his trencher and assorted bones, and the worst of the bloody juice off the dismembered pages, carelessly onto the rest of the Venerables’ manuscripts. Then moved the candlestick closer, until the incandescent light, illuminated the scourged and bloody skin before him. With grease-slicked fingers, he tried frantically, to smooth out the mutilated vellum, to make sense of it. Upon closer inspection, he found it to be a muddle of mismatched drawings, words, and images, faces and places, creating a riddle of sorts, in a jumble of bits and ragged pieces. Utterly sloshed, eyes blood-shot and blurry, he thought he had seen a phrase, a run of words that intrigued him. But try as he might, he could not get them back. He licked his corpulent thumb with a thick tongue, again and again, and shoved the tattered, pieces back and forth, smudging the inked words and images, desperate to find the right combination to patch together an entire page . . . Dragon heads with tongues extended . . . mouths dripping with blood . . . flames leaping high, consuming cots of a ringfort . . . shooting out from a round tower windows . . . enfrenzied horses, eyes wild with fear . . . hideous monsters, bearded, with fangs . . . a chariot flying through the air, one wheel landing . . . the face of a beautiful little girl . . . a small boat with oars and mast . . . swords dripping with blood! He flipped down a strip of tattered vellum – not dragons but Dragonships! And the monsters – Northmen in pointed helms and chainmail, with battle-ax, and broad-sword – all rendered in the primitive hand of a child. There . . . from the fractured spine of the book, protruded the tip of a quill, feathered in variegated stripes of white and dark gray, and stained a faded and rusty pink. He tugged at it, and out it came, along with a legion of – wispy milk-weed seedlings – of all things. Hovering around his head, on his face, in his eyes. He swatted at them. To no avail, as they swirled around him, floating on the drafts, luminous in the quavering candlelight of the chamber. The tip of the quill, darkly stained, had been carved into a point. Inspecting it for sharpness, he tapped it against the vellum, a fine dark-rust colored powder fell upon the page, the pungent odor – moldering blood. Distracted, he sucked at the back of a broken tooth, spit on the tip, of the quill, wiped it on the page, then used it to pluck a stubborn bit of bowel sheath out, from between his festering gums and blackened teeth, all the while inspecting the page before him. Then slurped the bit of sheath, off the tip, fondling it with the tip of his tongue, savoring, and swallowed. Strangely, the rust-colored powder had fallen into a pool of grease, upon the aged manuscript before him. There . . . beneath the grease . . . words he could barely make out. He wiped at the pool, smearing it with a large suety thumb. It immediately turned to a bright crimson streak of what appeared to be fresh blood. He swiped again, and beneath the bloody smear – words appeared – still illegible. He reached for the pitcher – empty, save for a few drops, and frantically shook the last of the Sacramental wine upon the letters. It pooled over the stain on the page, stripping away grease and grime, time, and ages until – there they were . . . Again, came the wind, blasting the shutters open, hurting them into the wall, rupturing the hingers, in an explosion of wooden splinters, and whirling around the chamber, sweeping the pages of the Venerable ones up and hurtling them around, the flying sparks igniting them into flames! As they flew up, swirling around the tower, and out the window. But Geoffrey, paid no mind. For upon the flayed calf skin before him, streaked with crimson blood – lay the fragment of words that had eluded him, in all the venerated piles of manuscripts. Words of the pleading old scutters on the doorstep, Words the stone-deaf Walter didn’t hear, Words for which he had been searching desperately, for two years, Words that might just keep his fat from sizzling in Henry’s fire, The very words to seal his future, filled with gold and silver, crimson and lace, and Kings kneeling before him, to kiss his ring . . . Written in blood . . . Bound and sealed in blood . . . And redeemed only – by the blood of Christ . . . “. . . the greatest High King who ever lived . . ..” (Geoffrey continued bookend for end of book I) Geoffrey froze . . . mind racing in reckless abandon . . .. He began to pace back and forth, across the chamber, eyes locked upon the blood-stained, wine-blurred words, his besotted brain, sloshing around inside his skull, with him. Is it possible, he possessed the only book in the world with a record of, “The greatest High King that ever lived!” He savored the words slowly. It was true, that on the West Coast of Wales, rumors were heard in drunken ale halls, and scratched on the walls of privies, and murmured in the cobwebs and shadows of the superstitious Welsh. He’d heard tall tales of an Irish King, that all the people loved, who fought great battles, against Sea-raiders, and Irish traitors, to achieve what all knew to be impossible – peace in a united Ireland. “Ha!” He sneered, “As if anyone would ever believe that!” Only to be betrayed by his very own his wife, and stepson, enticing a huge Viking army to come and sack the Isle, steal the treasure, kill the King, and all for the very hand, of his cuckolding wife of astounding beauty! What was it the Sagas called her . . . the “balm in bed for her many Kings!” Rubbish! But they were just tales, murmurings, gossip, who would believe that an Irish King accomplished what no British King or Roman Emperor had? Ridiculous! Still . . . he could drop the High – sounded too Irish . . . The Greatest King who ever lived?” “Well,” smirked Geoffrey . . ." I’ll give old Henry Rex what he wants . . . a Hero for Britain, who invaded Ireland. and every place else!" Once the British had a Hero of their own, who would give a ferret’s fart, about an extinct Irish Hero? Certainly not England, and France, and the rest of the world! Geofrey giggled -" I'll give Henry his Hero - a bloody Emperor of all Britian! Geoffrey grabbed up the hem of his moth-eaten gown, and diddling a tone death tune, began to dance around, like a princess in anticipation of the ball. He dipped and whirled, toes pointed, lifting his skirts, in a dance for joy. As the shutter’s blew open again, and the wind hurtled in, sparks flying from the nearly dead brazier, igniting the flying pages, and the smoke and ashes and sparks flew out into the night. Geoffrey, giggled, and pranced about, in wild and reckless abandon . . . Twas then the voice came again . . . murmuring . . . “Geoffrey . . . Geoffrey. . . What profit it a man . . . if he gain the world – but lose his soul?” Geoffrey wheezed and grinned coyly. This time he knew the answer . . . and he picked up the pitcher of red-wine and tipped it sucking at the brim . . . but it was dry. And he looked at the words of the page of the old book, where the last of the Sacramental wine, pooled across the words, that would give him all. . .. And he took his knife and spearing the page of vellum, ripped it out of the book, and holding it up so that the Crucifixes might witness, licked the page, the last drop of Sacramental wine, the ink, and the words, until they could barely be seen. Then grinning and drooling at the Crucifixes, eyes glinting black and empty and red as coals, For he knew the answer to the riddle . . . And he queried . . . “What does it profit a man, to gain the world – but loose his soul? . . . . . . “Why 30 pieces of” . . .. and he hesitated then, for he knew the scripture well – 30 pieces of Silver, was the price Judas received, for betraying Christ to the Romans. Then, feigning piety, he stood at attention, and saluted the image of Christ on the wall . . . and the two beside him, thieves, nailed to a cross for stealing a bit of bread, who would, before the end of the day, be with Christ in Heaven. Then sweeping his arm across the table, hurling the Venerable’s manuscripts around the chamber, pages igniting in the brazier, then snatched up by the wind, swirling, in a vortex of smoke and ash, sparks and flames – he reached for the only thing left on the table . . . a strange looking pouch, of indistinguishable material, shabby, and slightly hairy, and warty looking. Yet when Geoffrey shook it, it jingled like the bells, of the Sacrament in Winchester Cathedral. Because he had already chosen – crimson silks, lace, silver and gold, the company of Kings, fame, fortune, glory, and copies of his Epistle read round the world – ad infinitum. Geoffrey grinned, with his darkly, ink stained, slack lipped, lips and drooling, as he held the strange bag up to the Crucifixes . . . eyes lit up, red and glinting, as the handmaiden of Lucifer . . . “Why” . . . he giggled – “It profit me . . . 30 pieces of . . . Gold!” Chapter 2 ~ WOLVES AT THE EDGE OF NIGHT King Brian’s War ~ Clontarf Battlefield ~ Dublin Ireland ~ Good Friday April 23rd, 1014 124 years earlier Young Latean, attendant to the High King, thrust his foot up and down with all his might into the mutilated face of a youth not much older than himself, but the mass of gutted wound-slurry would not let loose of his ankle. A ghastly claw, white and bloodless, tethered him to the battlefield of blood and gore – the specter of death haunting the corpse’s eyes, plotting to drag them both down to hell. He swiped at his eyes with a blood-soaked sleeve, and kicked frantically until his shoe slid off, talon and all, then staggered on up the battlefield, towards the tent at the top of the hill. He bore a message for the Ard Ri, he’d sooner cut out his heart than deliver – but deliver it he would. The gory dead conspired to trip him up, their severed heads and limbs scattered among their own entrails. The dying moaned out to him and tore at his clothes. He slipped and fell, again and again, crawling on his hands and knees, retching, and gasping for air. Blood, warm and cold and clotted as blood pudding, oozed through his fingers. Smoke and ashes seared his lungs. Scarlet spurted from sword slashings and dripped in stringy rivulets down from tree branches overhead, upon his face. The salt from the blood, mixing with the salt in his sweat-soaked tears, ran into his eyes, stinging and blinding him so that he could not see. All around him, the great oaks of Tomar Wood grew black with ravens, as corpses twitched and writhed from hill to sea. He struggled to stand, and clinging to a sapling, looked back down the battlefield, his stomach revolting at the sickening stench of burning flesh and ruptured bowels. The pallor of death had spread over the land, strewn with corpses, gray and bloodless. For it was all on the field – all the blood in the world, oozed and gushed, and seeped onto the mud and trampled flowers of Clontarf meadow. To the West, the last of the sun, blazed like a dying ember in a windblown fire. To the South, black smoke churned, and carcass-flames leapt up from the walls of Dublin Castle into a scarlet sky. To the East on the seashore, Danes, drowning in chainmail thrashed at water’s edge, flickering silver and blue, in scarlet foam, like a bucket of bait-herring. Their dragon ships, born out and away by the high tide and offshore wind, drifted empty and rudderless. All around him, the edges of the earth, burst into flames. And all the while, Erin’s treasure, in a river of crimson, flowed down the battlefield, across the strand, and into the Irish Sea, staining the dark green, like red wine spilled onto a silken gown. For bestowed overall, meadow, man and beast, a blessing – an Irish blessing of blood, borne, on a crimson, rain-soaked wind, up from the frothing sea. Latean wiped at his eyes with a blood-soaked sleeve, looking up to the Heavens, wondering at the hand, that could offer such a benediction over the end of all dreams. At the top of the hill, wound-ravaged warriors encircled the High King’s tent. The last of the original Dal Cassians, Brian’s boys from the beginning, now gray with age, scarred, and battle battered. They listed back and forth against the gusting wind, leaning upon gore-slurried spears – splintered shields locked together, dulled swords encrusted in blood-clotted scabbards. Still, they stood bravely at the ready, loyal to their Chief until the end, their silhouettes, etched in torrents of red rain, lashed sideways upon the outside walls of the tent. Ghosts, and blood of ghosts born over the battlefield, on banshee winds hurled up from the wild Irish Sea. In front of the tent, a terrible pain stabbed at his heart – a scene more sorrowful than bearing. “Amergin,” he whispered. Three battle weary warriors struggled at the ends of ropes, around the neck of an enfrenzied gray war-horse – the King’s stallion – his valiant battle companion for more than thirty years of warring. The beast, crazed with pain, thrashed between them, dragging, and tossing them like wet rags, desperate to be free. Oblivious to his war wounds, he skittered and reared, trying to bolt. Broken shafts of spears pierced his shoulders and flanks. Deep slashes laced his powerful chest. Arrows pierced his heaving belly as streams of blood trailed down over his legs, strafed with sword cuts. The aging stallion screamed, fierce and blood-curdling, charging towards the tent. The whites of his eyes shot with blood, as he tossed his proud head. His thick muscular neck, flexing and twisting, snake like. His massive rump bunched and coiled to bolt, rearing, and pawing the air. A profuse white mane and tail, blood-drenched and muddied, churned about him like the fury of tempest-tossed waves, spraying spirals of blood over his restrainers. Even as scarlet foam blew from his nostrils – barbed arrow tips twisting in his lungs. Still his great heart would not give in, he too, fighting to get to his beloved master.

Opening Scene - Introduces the protagonist and setting, establishes core wounds Sooner or Later You can run on for a long time, Run on, duckin’ and dodgin’, Run on for a long time, Sooner or later God Almighty’s gonna cut you down. — Traditional American Gospel Mrs. Evelyn Doherty had a standing appointment with Madame Theresa every Wednesday at one-thirty PM. She was a faithful client and never missed a scheduled reading, unless she was on vacation or unwell, which rarely happened. “Are you ready, Evelyn?” Madame Theresa asked in a tentative, encouraging voice, one finger resting patiently on the back of the final card. The Tarot were laid out in the familiar ten card Celtic Cross spread. A silk cloth lay draped across the table, a tangle of purple and yellow wildflowers dancing across an azure background. The Tarot cards, tawny with age, seemed to drift and stir as if floating in a pool of silken flowers. Mrs. Doherty leaned forward and pressed her eyes closed in concentration, her lips turned downward with anxious trepidation. In her right hand she palmed a smooth calcite stone that she favored for her weekly readings, pale blue like a robin’s egg. She was a devoted spiritualist and in the hierarchy of her small, comfortable life, Madame Theresa held a position just below President Nixon. The answer to her troubles, she knew, depended on this last card. She need not have been concerned. Although the hidden card remained a mystery to her, Madame Theresa was quite confident in the outcome. Her parents christened her Thérèse, after Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, The Little Flower. Madame Theresa was her professional name. After her mother died, her father favored his nickname for her. At night, holding her close, watching the rhythm of her small body rise and fall with each breath, he might lean over and whisper in her ear “ti flè an mwen” in his native Creole — little flower of mine — but Tess was the name she grew up with. Thérèse was as foreign to her as the Saint of Lisieux herself. She studied her client from across the table. Tess recognized the familiar cropped navy blue jacket with white trim, the same prim, light-blue ruffled blouse underneath. The jacket’s elbows were shiny from wear. Mrs. Doherty wore her hair in a tall beehive hairdo. A thick braid wrapped around the middle held it in place. She was an ardent devotee of L’Oreal’s Smoky Pearl hair color and under the soft pendant lamp her hair shimmered with a blue-gray glow. The column of hair was leaning to one side and several stray wisps were trying to escape. Tess suspected Mrs. Doherty wrapped her head in a scarf while she slept. Staring into the top of the glowing bouffant, she resisted the urge to reach across and part the nest of hair and peer within. She imagined revealing a tiny, hidden universe; milky-white clusters of secret thoughts and emotions tangled in a quick, chaotic rotating dance. She was as familiar with Evelyn Doherty as a therapist is with a patient, tending to her needs, acting as her emotional advisor. She knew how to interpret her expressions and quiet mannerisms, and, if she was honest, to manipulate her naive, uncomplicated fears and desires. Growing up an only child, her father taught her how to wield her empathy with precision. Working alongside him in the sideshows and small-town carnies, dressed in her adorable sailor suit, spotting and luring the marks. An innocent compliment, a sympathetic look, calculated to arouse a desired response. Pay attention. Listen carefully. Two bits for a reading. Two bits for a glimpse into the supernatural. A good night’s work rewarded with Italian ice, her favorite flavor cherry red. He trained her to go after women mostly, preying on their superstitions and maternal instincts. Draw them in. People are fragile, they yearn to tell their secrets. Find their weakness. Reaching out with her slender fingers, taking hold of their hand, she led them to her father’s tent. She would wait outside, listening for the signal, a metallic tap followed by a low harmonic pitch, the ringing sound that meant the mark had handed over their money. Don’t be hasty. Never argue. Even the dullest mark can turn on you. Watching her client’s expression, her patience turning to irritation, Tess suspected that even inside the demure, well-mannered Mrs. Evelyn Doherty there was a secret buried inside her that even Tess herself was unaware. Mrs. Doherty opened her eyes at last and nodded. Tess revealed the final card. “Ah, the Seven of Cups.” “Is that good?” Evelyn asked, eyes opening wide, an uncertain smile on her lips. “Oh very good. Cups, as you know, represent emotion, and the Seven of Cups here symbolizes confidence. Confidence in your emotional life.” Tess pointed to the individual symbols on the Tarot card. “Look inside the cups. You see the snake, that’s passion and desire. The tower here, that’s strength. And the treasure, that’s abundance.” She traced her finger over the card in the sixth position. “Now, the Four of Wands, that’s the spiritual stability we discussed, combined here with the Queen of Swords.” Tess closed her eyes and lifted her chin in quiet meditation. “Yes. Yes, I’m quite sure. Patience and confidence.” She tilted her head to one side, as if listening to a distant voice. “Lester’s not having an affair. It’s clear from the cards chosen for you. Be patient, give things time to resolve themselves. You say he’s been tired lately, uninterested?” Evelyn nodded, the tiny lines at the corners of her eyes squinting in concern. “You know, it’s not unusual for older men to lose interest from time to time. Perhaps he’s working too hard? Too much on his mind?” Tess had seen pictures of Mr. Doherty. If he was stepping out, he was paying for it. And he was too tightfisted for that.

Hello Everybody, Pasted below is my opening scene for my story. It introduces the victim, a suspect, and The Zenith, the location for most of this tale. All feedback is greatly appreciated. Further in this first chapter a pivotal character is introduced and the protagonist comes into the story at he beginning of chapter 2. I'd love to share more, but keeping it to the opening scene for now, Cheers guys! Day One: The Zenith was synonymous with death, particularly during times of war. Murder was unprecedented. Serving as a gateway for all walks of life, passing from one kingdom to the next, The Zenith was a peaceful place for centuries. Permanent residents occupy the modest settlement inside the great fortress’ walls, while temporary accommodations are available for those with short term plans or simply passing through. Whatever their path or direction, The Zenith is a sanctuary for all comers. The murdered girl changed all of that. ***** Rain pounded down, saturating anything uncovered on the Upper Level, transforming the Rim Road to slush. Sarmras, a humble peddler and a regular visitor of The Zenith, trudged through the mud toward the Southern Gate, burdened by the weight of a backpack, containing his possessions. Each footstep sinking deeper into the road than the next, his feet becoming harder to retrieve with every lunge. “I can’t get out of this place soon enough”, he said to himself, bringing his eyes up to determine how much further. The colossal wooden gate was near, but currently locked, as was the custom for both entry/exit points during the moonset hours. The Kosolm Mountains dwarfed The Zenith from two sides. Above and around the peaks, portentous clouds could be made out, their presence obvious by the lashing they were handing to the famous citadel below. Sarmras hoped the emerging dawn might part the dreariness and end the persistent rain teeming down on him and his burden. He needed to justify his decision to leave this early, if even to himself. The mountain range ran from coast to coast, creating a natural border. The immense alps too tall and too cold at their apex to traverse on foot. The Zenith was the only way through to either kingdom by land. Once at the gate, he could dry off as an appointed registrar would set up and the nomad could sign his departure record into the visitors’ ledger, something he had done many times. He passed frequently from realm to realm, acquiring and trading wares from both kingdoms. Hauvnath, the kingdom that lay north of The Zenith, and Dimyrr to the south, which was where he was headed this time. Completely soaked, Sarmras arrived at the girl’s feet. He’d seen her multiple times during his visits, and remembered Silete by her distinctive long white hair and a skin that was paler than bones. She was faced down in the mud. He assumed, given his encounters with her were in The Tavern, she was drunk and passed out. Silete’s clothes were sodden, clinging to her skinny frame. Sarmras turned her over to check on her welfare, quivering from his gruesome discovery. Her eyes had been cut out, both sockets now filled with wet mud from The Zenith floor seeping down her pallid face like dark tears. He reeled away in horror, the momentum and weight of his pack caused him to fall backwards into the mud. Not caring that everything he owned was now covered in remnants of the Rim Road, he looked at her closer. Sarmras noticed her fingers on both hands had been sliced off. Struggling to regain his feet he whipped his head around but could not see anybody else at this early hour. He knew how The Zenith functioned. If there was trouble, a Prefect should be notified. Dropping his heft into the slop Sarmras ran away from the victim, in search for help. He knew a Prefect needed to be woken at once so they could bear witness to the crime and decide any course of action to follow.

Robert Pfaff, Shrunken Heads, Book Reports Book Reports: The Art of Fiction (Gardener) 1. I have loved John Gardener since I read Grendel in high school. He validated my instincts. For example, I like to break the rules but have always believed that you have to master the rules before you can break them well. Learning a musical instrument or a foreign language teaches you the same idea. You must understand and appreciate structure before you can manipulate it. 11. 1) He debunks certain myths like “Write what you know.” It’s a good departure point for a first book, and my first book is a memoir. But I prefer to write about topics that inspire me to learn new topics, even when it requires years of research to acquire a credible grasp of the subject matter. 2) He embraced the idea of crossing genres, and blending thematic element, which has been on my mind a lot (and often the subject of online debate). I struggle with the concept of genre. My marketing research tells me that genre exists from the summit, as boxes. There are clearly westerns, romance, murder mysteries, etc.…. From a lower altitude, the idea of genre starts to blur. For example, one of my comparables was Karen Robard’s “The Last Victim,” pitched as a ‘romance supernatural suspense thriller.” At the granular lever – the decision-maker’s level, the idea of genre appears to depend on buzz words that appeal to an individual agent or editor. To use one example, I discovered that an Author’s Salon representative with a major publishing house who asked for my manuscript at the conference also purchased the rights to a “supernatural suspense” novel in 2013. I would not have unearthed that information by searching under the genre “horror” on Publisher’s Marketplace. I had to experiment and analyze multiple, related keywords. 3) The concept of the novel as the fictional dream became important to me: shorter, action-based scenes that use vivid imagery and senses to tell the story and induce empathy in the reader, without tripping over false allegory. I make use of one brief allegory in the novel, because psychoanalysts are prone to “deconstruct” simple nursery rhymes or myths to an erotic extreme. This hyperbole fits squarely within the character’s mentality. III. I read the book when I first started this program more than six months ago, and reviewed my notes before I answered these questions. I do not recall anything that directly contradicts what is taught in this course. His approach is less prescriptive – he does not adhere to a particular kind of plot structure, but the “nuts and bolts” six-act, two-goal plot structure taught in the Authors Salon is what I needed to learn at this time. Writing the Breakout Novel (Maas) I. Overall, his insights into how the publishing industry works and what agents and editors are looking for is the overall best lesson gleaned from this book. II. 1) He validated both how I defined the protagonist and the antagonists. The protagonist is the person who has the most to learn from the events that transpire. The primary antagonist is not a one-dimensional serial killer, but a complex, oddly sympathetic monster who believes “it” liberates souls from bad brains. The “red herring” antagonist is a complex, sympathetic young woman at first, troubled by delusions about replicas and robots. 2) He inspired me to move the backstory into the novel as a murder mystery subplot. In the first two drafts, five of Leonard’s former patients and lovers were “missing,” but never participated in the plot. Now they have left the wings and play important roles in driving a subplot that I believe makes for a tightly coiled plot. To save his daughter’s soul from the vengeful spirits, he must risk everything tracking down a serial killer that both 1) has wielded the vengeful spirits embodied in Marta determined to possess his daughter but also 2) holds the mystical secret to her salvation. 3)) His emphasis on bringing the reader deeply as possible into the character’s experience, whatever the point of view, and his emphasis on credible setting within a given historical and cultural setting. In this respect, I have studied down to the historical weather reports – and through subscriptions to The Boston Globe archives – to provide a surreal narrative and its supernatural elements with historically accurate underpinnings. III) Again, I read this book six months ago when I first started this course, and I do not recall direct contradictions. Perhaps the only exception that qualifies is that he validated my initial, first-person “flash-back” approach to writing this novel from a point in the future, as a series of first-person letters from father to daughter. I see where that is discouraged as less marketable in the Author’s Salon modules, but not prohibited. Write Away (George) I. The best image that comes to mind is how the best novelist allow the story to blossom like a flower bud throughout the narrative, planting clues without tipping your hand. II. 1) She embraces the “issue-based” approach to novel writing – suggesting that you write about your passions, both political and philosophical. She does discourage storylines that have a thematic agenda. What asks you to write about what “riles you up?” 2) The chapter (11) on “Tricks of the Dialogue Trade” was exactly what I needed to help distinguish one character’s voice from another, with examples provided above. 3) The emphasis on Unity in all aspects of the novel beyond theme stood out to me. As a result, I have striven to ensure that all scenes in the first 100 pages adhere to a unified cause-and-effect, and conversations between characters echo the unity as well. 4) I will also add the hero’s journey based on Joseph Campbell’s archetype. The ordinary and often flaw protagonist steps over a threshold that takes him on a journey to his inner depths (the approach to the inmost cave) facing many “ordeals,” with “enemies and allies,” until he reaches an epiphany, which leads to his “resurrection,” and then returns with a “reward.” III. It seems that the reading assignments complement the course modules, so I do not see major contradictions. She does promote a standard “three-act” structure, but acknowledges variations exist and that there are no “hard and fast rules.” The Writing Life (Dillard) I. The ultimate trade off that a committed writer must make between creative autonomy and that likelihood that no will care and your sacrifices will not matter struck me hard at this crossroads in my life. II 1) The questions that every write must ask: Can it be done? And can I do it? Resonate with the hurdles I faced when I first waded into this book three years ago. 2) She places an emphasis ion trusting your instincts, suggesting that if your gut signals you to keep something in the book rather than hold back gave me the confidence to trust y instincts when my inner critic told me, do you really need to that paragraph. I allowed me to say I may not need it, but I like it, and I think it will appeal to the reader. 3) The trade-off between a propensity for the metaphysical and the “commercial claptrap” to borrow her phrase, represents an endless challenge for me. She suggests that when drawn to the metaphysical, its best to provide the plot with the most realistic underpinnings possible. This led me to explore topics that not only gave me the realistic underpinnings I needed, but taught me that the horrors of the real world are far more perverse and sinister that I summoned from the musty basement of my imagination in the first two drafts. III. Yes, her approach is less structured and systematic that what is taught in the modules. However, she is describing the challenges that writer’s face, and not writing much of a how-to manual.