MYTH-BUSTERS_AUDIOBOOKS

http://www.amazon.com/Creole-Knights/dp/B00G2TSMG2/ref=sr_1_1_bnp_1_audd?ie=UTF8&qid=1382891584&sr=8-1&keywords=creole+knights+audiobook

 

There are myths to audiobooks.  Did you know that?
 

MYTH #1: Audiobooks are too expensive.
 

Excuse me?  You can take advantage of Audible's 30 day free trial, download my book, and then cancel before the month is up, getting my audiobook and PAYING NOTHING.
 

Free is pretty affordable.
 

"All right," you say, "but what if I find I like audiobooks and want to listen to more?"
 

Any public library worth its salt is going to have an enormous audiobook collection of current sought-after titles.
 

And if they don’t have the exact title you want, they’ll borrow it from another library for you.
 

They’ll typically carry audiobooks in multiple formats, including audio cds, mp3 cds, and downloadable mp3s through apps like Overdrive and One Click Digital.
 

MYTH #2: Audiobooks are less intimate than print.
 

For young kids especially, listening comprehension exceeds reading comprehension. Do we not crawl before we walk and talk before we read?
 

When you listen to audio books it helps with vocabulary. More words listened to in context, more words learned!
 

One of my favorite kinds of audiobooks are memoirs,

and the intimacy of listening to an author read her life story to me while it’s just she and I alone together in my car is epic.
 

MYTH #3: I’ll miss out on something if I don’t read the print.
 

Audiobook narrators often breathe new life into books with their amazing nuanced interpretations, which goes quadruple if it’s read by the author and the author’s good at reading out loud.
 

MYTH #4: Audiobooks are for people who don’t really like to read.
 

Chances are if you know someone who reads more than you thought humanly possible, they are at least supplementing with audio. (Or they’re a witch.)
 

MYTH #5: I have no reason to listen to audiobooks when I can just read the print.
 

My number one reason for loving audiobooks is that they let me keep right on reading whether I’m walking, running, driving, or out-running zombies.
 

And I do a lot of some of those things. (Well, not so much the zombie thing.)
 

With audiobooks, any activity that requires the use of your eyes and hands but not your ears is now potential reading time.

How is this not every bookish person’s dream come true?! 
 

Audiobooks let you maximize your reading time and READ ALL THE THINGS YOU'VE WANTED TO READ.
 

And don't forget my FREE  

LUCIFER'S ORPHAN: JOURNEY OF THE LOST: 

Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,293 Free in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Free in Kindle Store)

• #12 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Literature & Fiction > Horror > Dark Fantasy

 http://www.amazon.com/LUCIFERS-ORPHAN-JOURNEY-LOST-ebook/dp/B00FVGDTN8/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1382715051&sr=1-1&keywords=lucifer%27s+orphan%3A+JOURNEY+OF+THE+LOST

W is for OSCAR WILDE_Lost and Found in the Past

Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde

(16 October 1854 – 30 November 1900)

was an Irish writer and poet.

After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s.

Today he is remembered for his epigrams, plays and the circumstances of his imprisonment, followed by his early death.

But not in my mythos. Oscar is all too alive, holding court in his own chambers deep within the haunted jazz club, Meilori's.

Here is an excerpt of Sam McCord visiting him for what may be the last time from CREOLE KNIGHTS:


I looked around me. Everyone was so caught up in their own words and thoughts that they hadn't even noticed my arrival.

Oscar, dressed as always as the most colorful of peacocks but as tall as an ostrich, was bending his head next to the hot sunset of Cora's hair.

He laughed. Then, he smiled and spoke to both the courtesan and de Morny in a gossip’s whisper.

"You ask what I stole from the good Captain. Why his words, of course. One evening I spied what he was writing to his beloved Meilori and quite brazenly used them in my letter to my wife, Constance, that I was writing at the same time."

Cora hushed, "You actually read one of his love letters to Lady Meilori?"

"Indeed and borrowed from it quite boldly. What were those words now? Ah, yes:

'What can I tell you by letter? Nothing that I would tell you in person. The message of love travels not by pen and ink. Your presence here would not make you any more real, for I feel your fingers in my hair, and your cheek brushing mine. The air is full of the music of your voice, my soul and body seem no longer mine but mingled in some strange way with yours. I feel incomplete without you. Always and Forever, Samuel.'"

 "Of course I signed my own --"

Oscar tilted his head, stiffened as he heard the chiming of my spurs. His eyes met mine. He turned pale.

"S-Sam, I meant no harm."

"None taken, Ostrich. In fact, I'm honored that a poet like yourself didn't feel diminished borrowing from an weary pilgrim like me."

Cora's fingers went to her mouth. "Sam, you look --"

"--like hell? You just came from the Demeter. Me? I came here through my night club in New Orleans ... a few years after that voyage."

Comte de Morny wasn't called the shark of Paris for nothing. His mind was quick. His eyes even quicker.

"How few would that be, Captain? Your face seems about the same. But your eyes ...."

"They've seen a few more sights than they wanted, Comte."

Oscar looked uncomfortable. "You can't blame them for being curious, Uncle Sam. It never hurts to ask."

I made a face. "Unless you ask for hurt."

Oscar looked pained. "I would not have had you heard me talk about Meilori, Sam. I know when she left you seven years ago --"

Cora looked shocked. "S-She left you? But you and she are so much in love."

Oscar snorted, "Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same."

Cora frowned, "You two are married? And still she left you?"

I shrugged. "She seems to think my heart left her first."

Cora's long fingers tenderly touched my cheek, staring up at me. "No one who could see the loss in your eyes would believe that."

Oscar sighed, "One of the many things you learn in prison is that things are what they are and will be what they will be."

DeMorny cocked his balding head. "Meaning?"

"Meaning that selfishness is not living as one wishes but demanding that others live that way as well. Meilori wanted Sam to be both what he is and what she wanted him to be. An impossible demand."

"Maybe," I said. "Or maybe I threw away a treasure because I wasn't smart enough to find a way to keep it."

Oscar's sad eyes bored into mine. "Ordinary riches can be stolen or lost. Real riches cannot. In your soul, Sam, are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you. Not even by you. The love you still have for Meilori is one of those things."

I grasped his shoulder firm. "That's why I come here, Ostrich. You help put things into perspective for me."
***

S is for SAMUEL MCCORD_The Last of the First

Captain Samuel McCord.

The last of the first Texas Rangers. They do not acknowledge his existence. They will not even mention his name.

But should they run across a foul, horrific crime, they will send a Ranger to his jazz club in New Orleans to request his assistance.

No Ranger ever to have made that trip will agree to make a second.

- Spurgeon's Macabre History of the West.

***

Renfield and I both walked through the wide doorway of Marie Laveau's home. The dark quiet within quivered like the grasp of dying fingers. It took a moment for even my eyes to adjust to the near total darkness. I figured Renfield was having no such problems. My stomach tightened.

It was said the Angel of Death had a list of names, places, and dates. My name could be matched with this place and date. But I doubted it.

I knew deep within myself that when I died the last death, I would die it alone. All alone. Still, I figured I'd see her soon for that last time. And if your name is next to mine, I guess I’ll see you too.

Marie still liked thick Persian rugs. The one we walked on had a different pattern than the first one I had seen. This one seemed like an ornate design of a snake's hungry open maw. Subtle Marie wasn't.

I heard throaty chuckling from the first doorway to our right. We turned as if walking to our deaths. Maybe we were.

It was a darkened drawing room, filled with impressive looking books that crowded the bookshelves lining the two opposing walls. I knew she had read each and every one.

Her crude dialect was all an act. She was sharp as Renfield’s canines. An elegant mahogany desk was at the far end. And behind it sat Marie Laveau. She glowed like a crucifix in the presence of evil, her face gleaming like an instrument of dark grace.

A long boa oozed slowly across her wide shoulders and along her arms. Despite being over two hundred years old, Marie was still a striking woman -- even without the snake. Despite her years, Marie looked no more than forty.

She smiled no warmer than her snake. "Dere was a time when your hair was darker."

"And my heart was lighter."

Renfield frowned. "All that shortwave screaming? Just a trick?"

She cackled. "More like a slap of water thrown in dat fool's blue funk face. The only way he crawls out of dat night club of his is to find some way to get hisself killed, disguised as helping innocents. Hah! Fool Ranger, dat don't fool nobody."

"Fools me."

"Dat ain't so hard no more."

"Reckon not. What did you want?"

"To spit in your face, white man. 'Cause of you I can't die."

I shook my head. "You chose the path that led you here long before I met you."

"It was 'cause I pointed out da Gray Man to you dat he cursed me!"

"Maybe. But the path you were already on would have cursed you somehow."

"Easy for a white man to say. I was a woman of color. Not many choices for me back then. Fear. I had to make the whites fear me."

Renfield looked sick. "There was another path, Marie. You could have chosen --"

"Don't you dare say it, vampire! Lessen you want my curse."

"I already am cursed, Marie."

Her smile was colder than even her snake's. "I could improve on it, leech."

"No, you won't," I sighed.

"You gonna stop me?"

"You'll stop yourself. You've always been a good woman, Marie."

"Fools before you have died thinking that way."

I shook my head. "DayStar only tortures the good ones."

The glow around her shifted to a sick, bright green. Her snake and she exchanged eyes. It made my flesh crawl. It took everything I had to keep my face from showing it. I don't think I succeeded.

It was unnerving to see slit snake eyes staring at me from her face. And somehow it was worse seeing her human eyes blinking at me from the skull of her snake.

"I knows now why your Meilori left you."

"DayStar told me."

"He told you a lie."

"And the truth?"

Her smile grew wider. "I'm keeping to myself."

Her snake eyes glowed. "Dere! Dat's the look I's been waiting to see. I ain't gonna tell you, Ranger. But knows this: dere's a new order coming, and you won't live out its first day. Now, get out of my home! Both of you! Go!"

We left, her cackling following us out into the night. I tried to tell myself Marie had been lying. But I knew deep down she'd hadn't. Damn.

Renfield glanced at me, his eyes uneasy. "So she's one of the good ones, huh?"

"Good's always been a matter of comparison."

"To who?"

I made a face. "DayStar?"

"Oh, then I guess that makes me a bloody saint."
***

DIALOGUE IN THE DARK_

Cassie and Angie

(http://readingwritingandlovinit.blogspot.com/ )

have a new challenge for their I'M HEARING VOICES blogfest :

Dialogue Introduction:

Have two characters introduce each other using only dialogue—no backstory, no internalization, just dialogue between the two. Max 250 words.

Mine, DIALOGUE IN THE DARK, is 225 words.


“Still sitting at your table where you killed my beautiful pawn I see.”

“See? That’s make one of us. I thought you had come into my club.”

“Why?”

“All the lights went out. You are the living Dark.”

“And the Father of Lies.”

“You’re evil all right. Just not Evil itself.”

“That is right. You do not believe in my Enemy so I cannot be what I most assuredly am.”

“If I promise to miss you, will you go away?”

“Always a joke with you, isn’t there? And always tugging on that glove. Haven’t you noticed how good it feels to kill with that cursed hand of yours?”

“Each life, even a twisted one, is so fragile, and therefore precious, that killing should never feel good.”

“It must feel good to God. He does it all the time.”

“Don’t you have a lie to sow, a saint to corrupt?”

“What makes you think I am not doing those very things now?”

“You can have known me so long and ask that question?”

“You have no chance, you know. I will utterly destroy you when I grow bored.”

“Reckon so.”

“But you will not relent, will not surrender.”

“Reckon not.”

“Have you not noticed how much you and I are alike?”

“That thought keeps me up nights.”

“Good. If not victory, it is at least revenge."

***
{The character sitting at the table is, of course, Samuel McCord, just having killed Vivian Hightower from the CHARACTER ON THE COUCH part of this blogfest. The second speaker is his Hannibal Lector, always stronger, always smarter, always losing the true battle.}
***






http://www.amazon.com/CREOLE-KNIGHTS-ebook/dp/B004ZMJ8LG
***
Another movie I am eagerly awaiting :

FRIENDSHIP BEATS SEX!

FRIENDSHIP BEATS SEX!

Yes. It surprised me, too.

I keep track of what countries visit me and what key words on Google led them to me.

SEX. DOMINATRIX. SEDUCTION.

They were all popular. But every day my post “WHY FRIENDSHIP?” is a magnet for visitors.

FRIENDSHIP.

We yearn for it,

For we are the Hollow People.

Science will tell you that. Inside an atom is a nucleus, composed of flying neutrons and protons.

The nucleus is orbited by electrons, travelling so fast, they seem to form a solid shell. In between them? Empty space.

Squeeze all the empty space out of each of our atoms, and we would be but a handful of dust.

Like an atom’s nucleus, many of us fly through life so fast, we project the illusion of solidity.

But like the atom’s nucleus, we are hollow.

Walk the streets of any large city and look into the eyes of those you pass. Slip through the veneer we put up to keep the predators at bay,

and you will see the hollowness of their spirits,

yearning for friendship, for connection with a kindred spirit.

To no longer be hollow.

That is why friendship plays such a large role in all of my novels, as in this scene from CREOLE KNIGHTS when Meilori’s is re-opened after Hurricane Katrina :

I was standing by the oak door and appreciating the colorful exit of the sun, off to see what the other half of the world had been up to. There was a rustle of satin cloth to my right.

I looked away from the sky and saw Sister Magda already by my side. She was one of the few people who could sneak up on me. Personally, I thought she teleported.

Looking more like Diana the Huntress than a nun, she smirked, “Teleport? Me? How far males will go to protect their prides.”

“Hello, Magda. You know there are goddesses who are envious of your beauty.”

She smiled, and it was a sight De Vinci would have been hard put to do justice to on canvas.

“I insult you, and you compliment me. Is there no end to the depths of your depravity?”

“Apparently not, since I’ve irritated the hell out of the mayor, the governor, and the President, his teeny tiny self. And I’ve not even let out a third of the secrets I know about them.”

We both laughed. Grief was an undercurrent to it. But so was a deep friendship.

I tried to ignore the grief and to lay fast to the friendship. It was a way to live. A good way I think.

Her smile faded. Mine did, too. Shit, here it came.

“I have come to talk to you of Renny.”

I sighed. “I’ve stayed away these past days. I’ll keep on being scarce.”

Her fingers lightly touched my cheek. “You are a fool.”

“I hope you’re not expecting an argument from me.”

“Do you know what keeps my Renny going?”

“Reckon I do. Your love for him and his for you.”

She sighed as if it were a wound. “That and one thing more.”

“What more could there be?”

“You believing in him. Your friendship.”

“I - I don’t know what to say.”

“Say that you are glad to see him when he comes in later tonight, that you have missed him.”

“I have missed him.”

“Then, tell him so.”

“Do you think it is such a good thing for him to come here?”

“No, it is a terrible idea. But it would be a worse one for him to stay away from his best friend.”

Her long forefinger prodded into my chest. “Can you ‘reckon’ that?”
Seeing the fire in her eyes, I forced out, “If I can’t, I’ll lie and say I can.”

***
NINE DAYS LEFT!
***