An Excerpt from Facets...

Evening, All. On my way out of the door to work, but wanted to quickly post another excerpt from Facets. It's from a story called Epiphany. Read and enjoy, leave a comment...retweets or repostings are welcome.

Follow me on Twitter and Like me on Facebook! Check out previous chapters of Superstar and samples of my first novel, Facets: Stories of the Mundane and the Weird, here on the blog. Facets is available on the Kindle Market! Peace!

I love her.

            When I woke up this morning, it was as clear as crystal and impossible to ignore. I was in love with Adrienne McCarthy.

Of course, it would help if she knew.

            I’ve known her since her family moved in the house three doors down back in freshmen year. She’s short and brown haired with twinkling blue eyes and a personality to match. From the moment we met, we connected and had an ease around each other that was freaky, but way cool. It was like we’d known each other for years.

            We did just about everything together. So much so, people thought we were a couple. It became a running joke between us. Lately, I’d stopped thinking of it as a joke. I missed her when I didn’t see her and wanted to hold her close when I did. The need to tell her burned inside me, but I was afraid that she’d laugh in my face and I’d feel like a microbe. So, I kept it to myself.

            Last night, we went to this party to celebrate the end of the school year and Adrienne had on a killer outfit. (A halter, hip-huggers and stack heeled boots. Woo-hoo!) Her hair was up with a few well placed strands framing her face and she looked more beautiful than I’d ever seen her. We danced kinda dirty on the fast songs, but things got deep when a slow song came on.

            “May I have this dance?” I asked.

            “Oooh, check out Mr. Smooth.”

            “Always.”

            We started out at arms length. By the time the song was over, our bodies were pressed together, our arms were wrapped around one another and her head was on my chest. Time stood still and my heart soared. The music stopped and, reluctantly, I let her go. There was a long, quiet moment, pregnant with all kinds of feelings and words that neither of us knew how to express. It was all in our eyes, though.

            Unfortunately, my watch said that I was in danger of violating my curfew and getting ripped by the parental units.

            “D’you have to go?”

            “If I don’t, the ‘rentals will wig.”

            She pouted. Then her smile dazzled me as she said, “Fine. But you’ve got to call me tomorrow when you wake up. I’m serious!”

            “Okay, I will.”

            “First thing tomorrow!”

            “Yes, Mother.”

            She lightly punched my arm. “Whatever.”

            She walked me to my car and, to my surprise, she kissed me. It lasted all of three seconds, but it felt like forever enveloped us while our lips touched. It was over way too soon, and she bounced back to the party. But not without a last glance and a wave before going back in.

When I went to bed, I had a smile on my face at least a mile wide.

           

            As I grabbed the O.J. out of the fridge, I finally decided to tell Adrienne how I felt. It took me long enough, but, better late than never. Somehow, I managed to drop the pitcher just as I thought that and orange juice and glass were everywhere. That was really smooth. I need practice holding inanimate objects obviously.

I cleaned up the mess and picked up the phone. As I dialed, a quiver of fear fluttered inside me. I quelled it and chalked it up to fear over a possible rejection. Even so, I was still going to tell her. I had to. I had no other choice. I wondered what she wanted to talk to me about?

            “Hello?”

            “Hi, Mr. McCarthy. Can I speak to Adrienne?” There was a long pause on the line. The quiver became a buzz.

“Mr. McCarthy?”

            “I’m sorry, Jeff. She…she’s not here. Adrienne…died in a car crash early this morning.”


Click here to buy your copy of Facets

Random Artwork...

Here's some more of my pencil work. I finally started scanning in my art. I was trying just take a photo of it and post it, but you lose all the nuances and it doesn't reproduce as well. To be fair, Kim was trying to get me to do that years ago...goes to show, you should listen to the woman...just like Wesley Snipes said...

                                              
                                                                 Rhiannon and Marius

                                                              This one's called Family

                                                     This one's a little older. This is Marc
                                                                        and Ophelia
               

Kickin' It Ol' Skool...

Great Picture, right? That's Luncheon of the Boating party by Pierre-Auguste Renoir. It's a great representation of his Impressionistic style and his talent. The rest of the post is gonna show a other paintings by other classic artists that I admire...I may even make this a regular part of the blog...





Another Renoir piece called On the Terrace




Now this is a painting by Claude Monet, who was name checked in Cameron Crowe's Vanilla Sky. It's called Lillies. The one below is called House of Parliment, Sunset.






Now this is Starry Night on the Rhone by Mr. Vincent Van Gogh. I'd heard about him, but didn't really get into him until a few years ago when I finally saw The Starry Night, which just happens to be down below.








Now, last, but certainly not least, is Georges Seurat, the father of Neo-Impressionism. He used a technique called pointillism, basically using dots of color to make his paintings. the above one, Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, is his most famous painting. The one below is The Lighthouse at Honfluer.




Now you can look up any of these artists and see their work, but the best place is at an art museum where you can truly appreciate the work and the love that went into it. Just sayin...

I Need You Tonight...

Hello, All! Today, I wanted to share an excerpt from my debut book, Facets: Stories of the Mundane and the Weird. It's a short short story called Need You Tonight. Just sit back, read and enjoy...and click on the link at the bottom of the page to buy your copy of Facets.

Tony Reynolds felt like a man who’d won the lottery. He was waiting by the bathroom for his date to come out. The woman his friend Cindy had set him up with cancelled at the last minute, sounding very sincere and apologetic on the phone. He wondered why she couldn’t have called before he arrived at the restaurant.

Couldn’t hurt to have a drink, he thought, so into the bar he went.

             About an hour later, he shuffled out of the bar and literally ran into the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen: Milky white skin, jet black hair, electric blue eyes and full sensuous lips, painted a dark red. Tony apologized and introduced himself. Her name was Adrianna. He invited her to join him for dinner and save himself from wrapping his car around a light pole. She accepted and, soon, they were seated.
             “You have very beautiful eyes,” Tony said. “Almost hypnotic.”
             “Thank you,” She answered.
             “You’re welcome.” The waitress came with a Scotch and soda for him and a red wine for her.
             “So, why is a beautiful woman like you out all by her lonesome? I’m sure you wouldn’t have trouble finding a date.”
             “A woman doesn’t need a man to go out and eat.”
             “I’m not saying you did. It’s just unusual to see.”
             She grinned and drank some wine. “Well, I may be small, but I can take care of myself. I know how to watch out for predators.”
             “I don’t doubt that you do.”
             “Besides, I’d been asleep all day and I woke up hungry.”
             “Really? You work nights?”
             “You could say that.”
             The entrees arrived. He had the Scrod and she had a very, very rare Porterhouse steak.
             “If I had my way, I’d eat it while it was still mooing,” Adrianna remarked. Tony watched her wolfishly dig into her steak. It was almost sexual the way she savored and devoured it.
             Oh, yeah, Tony thought, the night is definitely looking up.
             “You really get into your food,” He said out loud.
             “Well, I do enjoy a good meal.” Adrianna gazed deeply into his eyes and added, “And, like I said…I’m hungry.”
             He felt a hunger for something else entirely radiate from her stare and a shiver flashed up his spine.
             “Are you alright?” she asked.
             “I’m fine,” he smiled weakly. “Perfectly fine.”
             The rest of the meal was pleasant and over dessert (which she declined), Tony invited her back to his place for a nightcap. With a wicked gleam in her eye, she accepted…

…Which brings us back to Tony waiting for Adrianna to come out of the bathroom. She finally did and time seemed to slow down as she sauntered towards him, feline grace and powerful sexual potential readily apparent in the cadence of her steps. Adrianna’s eyes were a swimming deep shade of blue that drew Tony in and her face was bright with an almost predatory hunger. A glacier dropped into his stomach and an instinct screamed for him to run. Tony buried the feeling and asked her if she was ready to go.

             “I was born ready.”
             “Good,” He smiled. “I’m gonna make this a night you’ll never forget. Ever.”
             “I bet you will.”
             And as they walked out, Tony’s mind was on Adrianna and all the wonderfully nasty things he was going to do to her. If he’d looked in the mirror, by the door, he would’ve noticed that she didn’t cast a reflection.


Click here to buy your copy of Facets

Random photos

Night on I-94

A Little Conversation with...John Rozum

John Rozum is a very original writer. I’d never heard of him until I read Xombi back in the early 90’s, when Milestone Media debuted. The premise was cool: A man becomes a functional immortal when he has an accident with some nanotech that constantly rebuilds his body. Swirling weirdness ensued immediately afterwards. Outside of that title, my favorite of his is Midnight, Mass, about monster hunters, who are celebrities, who live in (big surprise) Midnight, Massachusetts, a small town that’s haunted by the supernatural every night. He’s also written Kobalt for Milestone, X-Files for Topps Comics and Scooby-Doo for DC/CN. Last year, He wrote a Xombi mini-series, illustrated by Fraizer Irving, that’s been collected as a trade paperback and, as a part of DC’s New 52, he’s writing the new iteration of Static Shock.

I went to his website to prepare for this interview and I discovered a creative side to Mr. Rozum’s creativity, I knew nothing about. I’ll just let him elaborate about it…

   

FOC: You're known primarily as a writer and I was surprised to find out you made collages and other artwork. How long have you been producing your artwork?

John Rozum: I’ve done artwork my whole life. In school I was the kid in class who dazzled everyone with their drawing skills, but let that languish after high school. I can still draw well enough to convey an idea, but working in an industry with so many amazing artists, my drawing skills are lacking to say the least. The collage stuff is something I started around 2000 and didn’t really look at as something I could do professionally until several years later. It’s a tedious medium to work in so my output is fairly small depending on how much time I have free from writing projects. I tend to alternate between realistic pieces and work that’s more influenced by children’s book illustration. I’ve also done some papier-mâché pieces and keep promising myself I’m going to try other sculpture at some point.

 FOC: Outside of your website, Johnrozum.com, has your art been displayed anywhere?

John Rozum: I’ve had pieces published in magazines and comic books, done a few commissions, and been in numerous group shows at a few galleries, primarily at Gallery 1988 in Los Angeles and Venice, CA.

A virtual gallery of my work can be found at: www.flickr.com/photos/31745900@N00/

FOC: Xombi and Midnight Mass are two of your best known works, but you've also written the X-Files, Scooby-Doo, Superman and Kobalt. Are Sci-fi and the Supernatural your topics of choice to write about?

John Rozum: They’re the genres that I first fell in love with and are the ones I feel most at home in, though I tend to write more horror, or fantasy oriented stories than all-out science fiction since math is not my strongest area and I generally want the science to work when I use it.

At the time I wrote the original Xombi series back in the mid-90s, nanotechnology was this pretty brand new idea, and I was really up on it. Various groups investigating it were really taken with someone wanting to incorporate it into a comic book series and I seemed to be asking a lot of the right questions because they sent me tons of information. But researching new areas of science in such depth for short story arcs is impractical over all. Supernatural beings and creatures from folklore are much easier because that material is so ingrained in me that I don’t have to do as much research and I know enough to credibly make up what’s not there.

The truth is I’m interested in other genres as well and the bulk of my projects tend to be infused with plenty of comedic elements which seems to be a connective thread throughout my work as frequent as monsters, yet tends to be overlooked. 

 FOC: What are you currently working on?

John Rozum: Such is the nature of industries that I’m currently writing in that I cannot make any comments at this point.

I can say that I’m currently putting together several cut paper collage pieces for upcoming shows at Gallery 1988.

 FOC: Will we be seeing any new Midnight Mass or Xombi stories in the near future?

John Rozum: I would love to return to both of those projects. There are still so many stories to tell with both those series that I’d really like to get to tell them. I know Frazer Irving would like to return to Xombi also, but I have no idea how DC feels about bringing it back.

 FOC: Are there Any plans to collect the two Midnight Mass minis into trade paperbacks or the original run of Xombi?

John Rozum: I don’t know of any, though there seems to be a lot of interest in both. It may be something that depends on how well the recent trade paperback collection of last year’s Xombi series sells. People who would like to see the previous run, and/or Midnight, Mass. collected should contact DC and let them know this is something you want to see. Snail mail vs email seems to lead to stronger results.

The Xombi Trade paperback is available on www.amazon.com or at your local bookstore

You can check out Mr. Rozum's original artwork at www.johnrozum.com and go to your local comicshop to find his other work or to Graham Crackers comics online at www.grahamcrackers.com

                      John Rozum

Cover to the original Xombi series (Art by John Byrne)

                             The cover to the latest tradepaperback

Cover to the 1st Midnight, Mass series (Art by Tomer Hanuka)

Cover to the 2nd Midnight, Mass series (Art by Tomer Hanuka)

This is a book I just found out about that Mr. Rozum co-wrote

with Kody Chambelain called the Foundation... (Art bt Paul Azaceta)

 

 

 Three examples of Mr. Rozum's artwork (All artwork (c) John Rozum)

A Little Conversation with...Caroline Jones-Washington

Welcome to the first of a regular segment called "A Little Conversation". This is where I ask different artists and writers I admire some questions about their creative talents and the fruits of said talents. Also some personal stuff, just to shake it up a bit.
My first guest is a longtime friend of mine, whom I've known from grade school to graduation. She's an early supporter of mine and even helped me publish an early version of Facets. Caroline Jones-Washington is an accopmlished author with three books under her belt: What She Won't Do For Love, Mood Swings: Poetry and Essays and the third one? Well, I'll just let Caroline do the talking about that one...

FOC: What drove you to become a writer?

Caroline: After the death of a friend, I wrote my first poem about her and I realized a had talent for it. Soon after, I began writing short stories.

FOC: Who's work makes you want to sit down and write? Who's work influences the way you write?

Caroline:I love to read Maya Angelou and Nikki Giovanni and lately I been reading more street lit, and enjoying it.

FOC: What's your most current work?

Caroline:My most current work is entitled Original Sin. It's about a young lady named Mia Moore whose oldest sister causes her to have more drama than she would like.  

FOC: How is Lulu as a publishing alternative? Advantages? Disadvantages?

Caroline: Lulu was easy to set up and, as a writer, I control publishing costs. The downside to this is that the company is small and not well known ,so all marketing is up to you.

FOC: Any wisdom for new writers?

Caroline: If you love it do it. Write from the heart and be original.

FOC: What was the last good movie you saw?

Caroline: It was an independent movie called Neo Ned. The only major star was Gabrielle Union. (Jeremy Renner of the Hurt Locker also starred) She plays a mental patient that falls in love with a skin head.(significant pause) Yeah.

Original Sin can be purchased through Lulu at www.lulu.com

What She Won't Do For Love and Mood Swings can be purchased at www.barnesandnoble.com

If you're interested in Neo Ned, you can look it up at www.imdb.com




Caroline Jones-Washington




Cover for Original Sin






The covers of her other two books...

A Rae of sunshine...

I posted a short story about the Darquewatch and a character of mine named Rachelle Duplaix. She's been knocking about in my head since about 2005 and I did my first sketches of her around that time. By the time 2009 hit, I basically knew what she looked like and who she was. The short story addresses who Rae is, but I think this pic says what she looks like best.

Persons of Interest...

One of my favorite TV shows right now is Person of Interest. I'm a fan of J.J. Abrhams (Lost, Fringe) and Johnathan Nolan (Memento, The Dark Knight) who have joined forces to bring this drama to TV. The principal characters are Mr. Finch and Mr. Reese, played by Michael Emerson and Jim Caviezel, respectively and I like the show so much, I did a drawing of them. I'm particularly proud of it myself.