Publishing Annoucement

Learning to navigate wordpress is a bit challenging for those of us who are, er, technologically challenged, but I’m learning. My hope is that wordpress will be the central information spot for those interested in my writing. Today, I will be attempting to share some information on the publishing of one of my short stories and my on-going attempts to get my book, a murder mystery set in a Florida swamp, published.

Finding an agent is a slow process, but in the meantime, I have had some success on a smaller scale. My latest news is the above mentioned short story, Tin Can Tourists, which adds a new twist to early Florida tourists, many of whom camped in their cars or tents, cooking their meals in cans held over the car’s engine.  These makeshift meals soon became picnic events, and the article offers up a closer look at one such gathering, as well as a detailed description of my aunt’s 1938 “housecar”.

DeSoto County Historical Society

P.O. 1824

Arcadia, FL 34265

http://www.historicdesoto.org/

Ask for “Recollections II” (NOT the first book). I’m page 28-30.

$8 for the book (It’s a non-profit, so I get no pay, but it’s a credential)

I cannot live on credentials alone, however, so I also write copy for an SEO company. It’s challenging work in that I write about different aspects/services of various businesses. With permission from the company I work for, this is one example of what I am doing (I wrote most of the text for this website):

http://www.allgeorgiatowing.com/

Each company has a different format and formula but I won’t be sharing what I know of them, since I consider that information confidential and exclusive to the company. Rest assured, it is not terribly complicated, but it is very important to deliver the work exactly as requested: Don’t offer web page writing when a blog page was ordered. Each serves a different purpose.

As promised with every blog, a short story:

The guys are working on an upper floor of a building that fronts the waterfront and come home with funny stories of the fishermen who gather there each day, but today’s was the biggest fish story of all:

The dolphin were chasing bait fish through the bay, swimming after the smaller fish, changing direction the instant they did, and leaping in graceful arches through the air in an effort to close the gap.

Dotting the bay are houseboats and live-aboard yachts, an interesting mix of the very wealthy and the working poor, sometimes alcoholic independent usually hippie who lives cheaply in a leaky tub that barely floats.

The yachts come and go. The houseboats stay. The boys refer to one of the old salts as the “Rich Bum” because unlike the other owners of broken down barges, this one owns a fancy dinghy. He uses it to row to the pier’s bar at 8 am each morning.

As the men watched from above, one of the dolphin leaped high in the air, still chasing the bait fish, and landed, with a loud smack, into the Rich Bum’s dinghy. A yuppie on a yacht (Hey! That could be a drink!) saw what happened and hollered at Rich Bum, who finally understood what the man was trying to tell him and jumped into his dinghy and tried to roll/pull/push the fish out.

Dolphin are very large and while not particularly slippery, they’re smooth and bulky and hey, when you got a dolphin in your boat, you know you have a challenge on your hands. Apparently, it’s even harder at 8 am, after downing a few beers. Yuppie on a Yacht watched for the longest time and then finally rowed over in his matching rowboat to see what he could do. Whatta guy, huh?

The fish, of course, didn’t budge (think dead deer weight and you pretty much have it in a nutshell), so Rich Bum had to sink his dinghy. The dolphin swam off without a backward glance, seemingly unaware of the precarious position it had just escaped.

I guess the moral of the story is that the fish and the wealthy don’t give a boatload of water about the Rich Bum’s assets.

The End

I look forward to writing future posts and introducing readers to each other by linking websites (if I ever learn the art of linking). When I do, please take the time to check them out. For different reasons, I find their voices an interesting addition to the world, and I hope you will, too.

As always, thanks for reading. Please feel free to invite all your friends to subscribe to my blog. A strong readership impresses potential agents!