First Times

So, a lot has happened in the last few months. Oddity Prodigy has gone from a novel idea to an honest to god publisher. What began as a conversation between several of my friends has blossomed into a serious artist collective. The future of our creative endeavors is looking very bright, but first things first. If you haven't already guessed from the image above, yours truly was lucky enough to be the associate editor for Cat and Mouse Press’ latest anthology Beach Pulp.

I haven’t kept this a secret, but this is the first time I’m coming out and saying it. This is the first time that a publisher has sought out my direct help in putting a book together. I can’t thank Nancy Sakaduski enough for the amazing experience that it has been. I’m getting ahead of myself though. Let me start at the beginning. Just like every other good thing in my life, this story begins with my wife.

About 5 years ago my wife Marcella was working for the Delaware Center for the Contemporary Arts as the retail manager. She was passionate about getting artists for the shop and took her work very seriously. However, her heart just wasn’t in it. She was constantly taking her work home and her mood was often sour. She was torn because she loved the people and the place, but not being able to fully pursue her illustration was taking a harsh toll.  We finally had a serious talk about what we could afford and could she leave the job. We agreed on only one condition: she had to have an agent or a solid book offer for her to leave the position.

She threw herself into the search for that first break. She made contacts in the local writers and artists communities by attending the writer’s breakfast and the Newark Arts Alliance Open Mic nights. She also went, with me in tow, to every convention in the area she found out about.  At the Hockessin Book and Art Fair she met Joe Sakaduski, who mentioned that his wife Nancy was thinking of working on an illustrated children's book.  Nancy turned out to be the driving force and fantastic mind behind Cat and Mouse Press and the rest is national award-winning history.

I went along on those early searches just for moral support. I kept to the background, as I wanted the focus to be on my wife. As she is much smarter than me, my wife insisted that I start interacting as well. I have always wanted to be an author, for longer than I can remember. Marcella pushed me to try and make my dreams a reality, to join her in exploring creativity.

I still remember the first time I read at the Newark Arts Alliance. I read a passage from my Baron of London novel, which I hope to finish before the year’s out. The crowd laughed when I wanted them to and I got a round of applause when I finished. This was more due to the facts that Maria Massington fosters a very welcoming environment at the Open Mic and everyone knowing that it was my first time reading than my piece being revelatory. However, that reading gave me my first taste of legitimacy. I began writing in earnest and working with the Written Remains Writer’s Guild, which led to my first story being published in October 2018.

Then last year around this time I’m driving home from work and my cell phone rings. It’s Marcella and she tells me that Nancy wants to talk to me, and she gave her my number and to expect a call. Now, I had spent the first year of the mermaid book traveling around with them, helping set up the tents and making sure that they had everything they needed like food, water and the like. I also talked a lot about Kickstarter. Now I did those things not because I wanted an opportunity but rather because I really liked Nancy and Cat and Mouse Press. I also can’t help myself around my wife’s work. She is an amazing artist and I would love to see her work span the entire globe.

I expected the conversation to go something like, “I need a hand with setting up a Kickstarter for an upcoming book” or “We’re setting up some conventions and could use a hand”. Now, I’d been writing for a while and had some very good results, but I was still having a hard time thinking of myself as an author. So when she said, “I was wondering if you’d be okay with helping me put Beach Pulp together,” I said something along the lines of “I’d be happy to submit a story and if you like it I’d love to be published.”

Then she said, “No, I was hoping you’d be the associate editor and help me gather authors, read the stories…” And the rest I didn’t hear. It was the chance of a lifetime for me, and one of the first times I really felt like a literary colleague. The next 9 months was writing my piece “When Worlds Collide” for the anthology and asking several friends to submit pieces. The whirlwind that followed was reading over 50 entries and whittling them down to what became the table of contents. I was involved in every aspect of the process and I can’t thank Nancy enough for the amazing opportunity. The only downside is that the process is over and I find myself craving more.

Don’t worry about me too much though. I have big plans to use everything that I learned helping shape that book into some new projects. There are big things ahead for myself and Oddity Prodigy. All I can say is watch out, because Oh Snap! It’s Oddity Prodigy!

It is 8:30 in the morning and I'm sitting in a beautiful sitting room and writing on my laptop. It is lightly snowing outside, blanketing the ground and making everything feel like Christmas. I haven't had a really white Christmas in several years, so getting to just enjoy the beauty of the landscape is incredible. The reason I'm sitting here writing is because for Christmas this year I got my wife a sloth interaction at the Animal Adventure Park in Harpursville, NY. When I told my mother about it, she immediately insisted on getting us a night stay at a bed and breakfast for the night prior. Now, neither my wife nor I have ever stayed at a a B&B before, so we had no idea what to expect. I actually pulled past the entrance on my first attempt to follow the GPS here. We glanced at each other, unsure of whether we were at the right place. I agreed to run up to the front door and check. I found that we were, that I had missed the actual driveway and come up their personal driveway, got the car parked and we got in and settled in short order. My biggest worry right now is that both my wife and I are spoiled forever on B&Bs. The house is an old farm house, and wonderfully appointed. The stairs are old and solid. The rooms are lavish. And the owners have mountains of cookies available for when my willpower fails me. The rooms in the house are all named after characters from Clue, and ours is Miss Scarlett. A four poster bed dominates the space, with a chaise lounge and pull out spare bed. A large antique trunk sits at the foot of the bed, reminding us both of the one that my wife's grandfather gave her which sits in the same place back at our house. But, to get back to the topic of this post. Though this has only been for a single night, it has been a prolific writing experience. Last night my wife and I sat on the side porch and I was able to write almost 500 words in less than an hour. That may seem like a small number, but for a writer who usually agonizes over every letter, I was moving at light speed. The story, which I am working on for inclusion in the upcoming Oddity Prodigy debut anthology Oh Snap! It's Oddity Prodigy! was giving me a bit of trouble. Once I settled into the seat though, the words just began to flow. I always thought that the idea of a writer's retreat, while novel, would never really work for me. I usually have a difficult time writing in my ideal setting of my desk in the studio. I am pleasantly surprised to admit that, despite my hesitance, this has been an amazing experience. I am confident that I will be returning the Bainbridge House in the near future for an extended stay. After all, 2019 is fast approaching, and I have quite a few stories to tell.

 The picture above is of a section of my bookcase. The books shown there were mostly hidden behind me in my author photo on Amazon. The only difference now is that the book on the far right is the anthology that holds my first publication. The book it sits next to has seen better days. It is a very well loved copy of The Sword of Shannara by Terry Brooks. I've read it so many times that I have 4 copies of it. This one NEVER gets opened anymore. It's not that it's fragile, which it is. It's not that it's falling apart, which it is. I never open that book because it is the single most important book in my library. It's the book that made me want to become an author.  Now, when I say that, I mean it literally. That exact copy, which may or may not have been accidentally taken from a library, is what made me want to start writing. I've always been a huge fan of Terry Brooks, with his world of Shannara always being my favorite of his creations. I've had this copy for longer than I can remember, and it is very special to me. When I was young, I hid in the worlds of fantasy and science fiction. I'm told we moved around a lot, so I imagine words were easier to stay friends with than people. Even now, when I read about Shea Ohmsford and his brother Flick, I empathize. For someone thrust into a new school every few years, it must have felt like I knew something of what they were going through. The Hadeshorn, The Vale, having to venture into new dangers and under constant attack from shapeless enemies. Then just when you think you have your footing you're thrown into a new challenge. The stakes always seemed to get higher. Facing down the evil Warlock Lord, shrouded in shadows and unknowable, was how I must have felt being the new kid yet again.  Now, I know this sounds melodramatic, and it is. But I always had the world of Shannara. Allanon the druid was the father figure I always wanted, but never had. He wielded terrifying powers and kept secrets, but also everything he did was for the good of the Four Lands. He expected so much from Shea, but hated having to ask it. I've talked for years about being an author, and it was always because I wanted to create a world that people could escape to. I wanted to be like Terry Brooks. Looking up at that bookcase I finally feel like, in some small way, I have become a little like Terry Brooks. I hope to keep publishing and creating, and perhaps one day someone will escape into a world of my own making, and a book that well loved and worn will sit on their shelf. I only hope that they can put a book of their own next to it, take a picture, and send it to me.

 On Saturday, October 6th I read an excerpt from a published piece for the first time. The event was standing room only, and a procession of extremely talented writers had already read. As I looked out at the smiling faces of the crowd, I couldn't help but think back to how all this started. Almost three years ago I stood in front of a podium in the Newark Arts Alliance with several printed pages. The room was packed with people, and I was more than a little nervous. This was the first time I would be reading my writing at an Open Mic night. I had made the mistake of telling my wife that I might be interested in doing just that the prior month. We had been going to Open Mic night for several months at that point.

 She was networking among the literati, and I was there just for moral support. My wife has always been the smarter of the two of us when it came to chasing dreams. She was in the last days of working as the retail manager for the DCCA, which is now the Delaware Contemporary. It would be only a few weeks later that she made the connection that would lead to her National Award winning book, The Mermaid in Rehoboth Bay.

 I remember her saying, "You wrote that, and you're proud of it. Get up there and read it!" So there I was, reading in front of a room full of people. And they liked it. They laughed at the parts I wanted them to laugh at. When I sat back down, I felt a hundred feet tall. It began several months of readings from my work. The camaraderie and kindness of everyone at those nights bolstered my confidence, and I began writing again.  It was at the end of one of those evenings when Joanne Reinbold approached me and asked a rather innocuous question.  

 "Would you be interested in writing a short story with those characters and in that setting?" 

 I thought about it for about a millisecond before replying, "Absolutely, I would love to!" I never thought that conversation would have taken me back to that podium.

 I certainly never thought I would be reading The Black Dog of Cabra from an actually published anthology.  I have so many people to thank for that night. Joanne Reinbold and Weldon Burge for their invaluable assistance whipping the story into shape.
The Written Remains Writer's Guild for being so inclusive and bringing me into its fold. My beta readers Jacob Jones Goldstein and Steve Myers, whose insight and support have made me a better writer. And of course my wife, Marcella Harte Conlon, without whom I would not be where I am today. I love you, sweetheart.