Summary on Sunday

I've decided to resurrect my blogs in 2020. I have a fair few.

On Fridays, you'll find new installments to the tale of Sean the Vampire and his love / hate relationship with Doctor Death as they try to rid the world of baddies. 

I started this adult fairytale back in 2010. Consistency is the key to getting things done. There a currently four episodes. There's blood and guts and all kinds of perversions, so be warned.

It's been years since I've read. Life can really get in the way of even the most basic of wants and needs. I hope to read an average of one book a week in 2020. You will find what I'm reading and what I think about the books over at Nessa's Reading Room. Two books down so far.

Editing is not my favorite thing. It's like real work. But I am doing final edits on Revena's Revenge (my daughter, Erika, is my accountability coach and cheering section.) I'm a quarter of the way done. I will be self-publishing when they are all done. For a taste of Revena's world, there's the blog, "What Would Revena Do?" (big thanks to my friend, Mike Keren, for the spectacular idea.) There will be posta there on certain Wednesdays about life in Medieval Bavaria. 

This coming Wednesday, we will see an example of scrying. Right now, you can see the book cover.

If you'd like to receive my monthly email, Nessa's News, sign up over there on the right. In it you will find practical magic spells, herbal lore, ancients crafts, and other things that will not be posted online.

Bite Me, 2019

Back in 2010, I started a serialized, adult fairytale called Sean the Vampire. I posted three installments before life distracted me. Lifting its coma after ten years seems fitting as we move into a new decade.

Meet Sean the Vampire, his companion, the Ghost Toasty aka Doctor Death and their first victim.

Part 001 - And So It Begins

Part 002 - A Taste of Things to Come

Part 003 - Good-Bye to Bad Rubbish

Come back on Friday for a new episode.

May Day, May Day

A new knight murders a mother, 

so he becomes a priest, 

and because of that changes his name, 

and because of that loses his inheritance 

until a childhood friend recognizes him 

and tells everyone he's still alive. 

That's the start of May's short story. I wonder where it will go.

wasps

Sitting in the Georgia sand, grains fall through my fingers while wasps whirl in harmony around my head;

My parents drink and smoke with friends, jitterbugging to Elvis around the cramped living room of a gray Army apartment;

I sit off to the side, a crumpled tissue next to me, a forgotten piece of someone else’s life.

The steps to the dance evade me. I see them. They’re in my mind but my body never hears the music. 

My skin, a thin and cracked shell, blocks light and connection, holds in feeling.

Years of faith and hope can’t cope with the broken ability to follow the rhythm of others.

Book Review: The Prague Cemetery

I finished reading a book. It's been about 3 years since I've had the energy. Who woulda thunk it?

The Prague Cemetery
by Umberto Eco

I gobbled up The Name of the Rose when it came out in 1980.

It took me 15 months to get through The Prague Cemetery.

The narrative device of two men speaking to each other via journal entries in the same diary fascinated me but it got lost in the great preponderance of names from history. Every person named in the book, except the main narrator, was a real person. I looked them up.

The story of how the fictitious / fake Protocols of the Elders of Zion became a conspiracy theory and reality for some people that led to Hitler's atrocities while intriguing got lost in the excessive details. The exhaustive minutiae exhausted me.

I worked my way through to the end because the history was compelling but it was work.

Other books read in 2019:

Brief Answers to the Big Questions - Stephen Hawking

White Hot: A Hidden Legacy Novel - Ilona Andrews

Iron and Magic (The Iron Covenant Book 1) - Ilona Andrews

SAVE THE CAT! Writes a Novel - Jessica Brody