A Book of Tongues Apologia

Due to space and time constraints, CZP Publications were unable to allow me to include my original Apologia at the back of A Book of Tongues. So I thought I'd start my pre-release series of related promotional materials there--by proving I did actually do some research, though not a lot, and explaining a little bit about my "process" (ha ha). Enjoy.

A BOOK OF TONGUES: Apologia, References, Etc.

I began writing A Book of Tongues with one very selfish idea in mind: To keep myself occupied and amused while looking after my son, then less than five years old and newly diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder, in the wake of recently having lost my job. Though I’ve been a writer all my life, for the last twenty years my main focus had been short fiction with a side-order of reviews, articles and scripts; the very notion of being able to write a 100,000-word book by the end of the year seemed laughable—let alone end up with a narrative so large it spilled over into another 100,000-word book, slated for the year after that!

All of which means that from the start, the main audience I was thinking about was composed of me, myself and I. The epic romance of Reverend Rook and Chess Pargeter was an unabashedly fetishistic fantasia spun around things I enjoy, because I enjoy them: Blood, (gay) sex, magic. Bad people behaving badly. Ancient civilizations and not-so-dead mythologies. A vaguely steampunk-y alternate history setting whose twin visual precedents were far too many viewings of James Mangold’s 3:10 to Yuma and Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto. Yes, I did research here and there, but it wasn’t exactly deep—and the result, I’ll be the first to admit, is a lot like poetry reformatted on a ridiculously grand scale: Full of metaphor and analogy rampant (next time ‘round, I should probably invest in a search engine which automatically removes the word “like” from random sentences), a shadow-show of red-gold cut heavily with black, in which emotion and sensation very firmly rule over cold, hard fact.

At base, this book exists because I wanted to throw two equally screwed-up dudes together and see if they’d stick; all the girls are monsters (except when they’re also whores), all the boys are whores (except when they’re also monsters), there are pretty much no (really) good role-models of any sex, and I also moved the days of the Mayan and Aztec calendars around at will because I wanted to be able to have things happen on my terms, with cool-ass meta-commentary attached. For all of the above, shame on me: I may try to do better in future, though I know for a fact I will probably never live up to anyone’s expectations (particularly my own).

Still, I do hope you enjoyed at least part of what you found, gore, moral greyness and ass-fucking notwithstanding. If so, there’s more to come. If not, catch you on the flip-side.

For those who are interested, meanwhile, here’s an incomplete list of reference materials I stole from freely throughout: The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in the Wild West from 1840-1900, by Candy Moulton (Writer's Digest Books, 1999); Handbook to Life in the Aztec World, by Manuel Aguilar-Moreno (Oxford University Press, 2006); The Lost History of Aztec and Maya, by Charles Phillips and Dr. David M. Jones (Select Editions, Anness Publishing, 2004); Children of the Night, by Tony Thorne (Indigo, Orion Books, 1999); The Barbary Coast, by Herbert Asbury (Basic Books, 2002); plus a whole host of various Google-searched Internet sources, including BibleGateway.com (King James edition), Wikipedia.org (yes, I know), Azteccalendar.com, Olmec.com, Native-Languages.org, Atheism-about.com, and the Firefly cursing cheat-sheet page.

I was inspired by T.A. Pratt’s use of Aztec mythological tropes in Blood Engines, his first Marla Mason book, and Tess Gerritsen’s wonderfully graphic description of ritual sacrifice in her book The Surgeon. Not to mention Alexander Irvine, whose A Scattering of Jades set the pattern, and Kenneth Mark Hoover, whose Haxan stories do Weird West ten thousand times better than I ever will.

A massive retroactive thank-you also goes out to my tireless pre-Draft Zero readers: Sonya Taaffe, Francesca Forrest, and above all Valerie David, without whose aid and correction the character of Grandma would quickly have degenerated into Yoda gone Dine. I appreciate the time you all took, especially when life and issues interfered.

I’d like to thank my publishers and editors at ChiZine, Brett Savory and Sandra Kasturi, for enabling my lurid balderdash. Thanks also to all the friends who, over the years, continued to assure me I would eventually write novels: Michael Rowe, David Nickle, Sephera Giron, Mike Kelly, Marcy Italiano, Leah Bobet, Ian Rogers, Nancy Kilpatrick, Bob Knowlton, Peter Halasz, Monica S. Kuebler, Jason Taniguchi, Donald Simmons, Sarah Ennals, Andrew Specht and many, many others. If I’ve forgotten to mention your name, please take it as wrote.

Next time: Character generation, with photos of the original models. I'll try to get it up ASAP.

Sales and Re-Sales

So now it can be told: My story "Hell Friend" will appear in Clockwork Phoenix 3, which makes two years in a row. Coincidentally, So now it can be told, Part Deux: Ellen Datlow has accepted "each thing i show you is a piece of my death", from Clockwork Phoenix 2, for reprint in Year's Best Horror #2. My co-author/husband Stephen J. Barringer and I are both far beyond pleased; it's the sort of peer recognition which means an incredible amount, and a wonderful way to cap off 2009 proper. Crazy, amazing year, especially given where I was this time in 2008.

Meanwhile, I'm also chuffed as hell to note that (as promised) asakiyume has written up a very flattering preview of A Book of Tongues in her LJ, hoping to aid in the general push to get more people ordering copies. You can find it here (http://asakiyume.livejournal.com/330688.html#cutid1). So thank you very, very much, Francesca; you've made me blush. Which is also a pretty damn good way to feel, first thing on a cold Toronto morning.;)

The Emperor's Old Podcast

Last year, I sold a website called Spoken Ink--which specializes in short stories read by solid British actors--the rights to adapt "The Emperor's Old Bones" for podcast/download. And now, just in time for Christmas, you can listen to a sample and/or download the rest here:

http://www.spokenink.co.uk/catalog?genre=3#174

The actor playing Tim is named Martin Ball, and I like his quality a lot--he definitely gets the innate dark humor of the piece, as well as the sadness Tim himself seems no longer completely able to feel. I'd love to hear the rest of it, sometime.

Update, Plus New Story Post

Hi, all. If you've wondered where I've been, I'm now almost two weeks past having gotten a much-needed breast reduction, so it's all been about itchy, itchy recuperation 'round my place, lately. However, there have been a few new developments in departments unrelated to my boob-size, too:

First off, it's decided...I'm going to Brighton for World Horror Con 2010! This means I'll be physically present for the official releases of both A Book of Tongues and EVolVe, Nancy Kilpatrick's latest vampire-themed anthology, which contains my Renfield-centric short story "When I'm Armoring my Belly". As this marks only my third trip to England since birth (I was born within the sound of Bow Bells, making me an unofficial Cockney), I'm naturally extremely excited.

Meanwhile, the next Dark is Better post is finally up: "Heart's Hole", in its "Time, the Revelator Remix" version, which restores almost 2,000 words' worth of subplot and character development I had to cut before it was first published (in Tightrope Books' In the Dark anthology). Follow the link through, or go straight to it by cutting and pasting this (https://sites.google.com/site/heartshole/). Enjoy!

New Story Post: "Jack-Knife"

"Jack-Knife: A Melodrama Inspired from Life, in Fourteen Vocal Tableaux" is the second of my uncollected stories to be hosted through Dark is Better. First published in Shivers IV (Cemetery Dance), it owes a great deal to my entirely predictable adolescent interest in Ripperiana; I wrote it initially wit the idea of submitting it to the Canadian Broadcasting Company as a radio play, inspired by my mother's participation in sound-horror series like Nightfall...but strangely enough, they proved none too keen. I wonder why?

Dark is Better: "Dead Voices on Air"

The first uncollected story to be officially posted at Dark is Better is "Dead Voices on Air (A Landscape with Maps & Legends); check the sidebar to click on through, then click on the story's title in that site's "Table of Contents". This piece was directly influenced by web-based storytelling like "The Dionaea House", as well as my own longstanding love of folk music and fairytales. It also introduces a bunch of my Five-Family Coven characters, who have since permeated my burgeoning Toronto the Weird universe. Enjoy!

New Post, New Offers

On Wednesday, I finished Draft Zero of A Book of Tongues; today was mainly spent editing it, and tomorrow it gets sent off to my ChiZine publisher/editors (along with others), who hopefully will have advice for me on where best to cut 20,000 words out. Seems like a lot, but as my husband points out, that's basically just 1,000 words per each of the novel's 22 chapters.

Meanwhile, I've also been busy trying to shore up my professional 'Net-presence, something that's fallen woefully behind because of my tight writing schedule this year. One of the first things I've done, aside from spruce this place up a bit, is to post the entire text of my IHG award-winning story "The Emperor's Old Bones" (see sidebar, or cut and paste to access it directly here http://sites.google.com/site/theemperorsoldbones/) as a sort of combination calling card and standards/practices demonstration model for the typical Gemma Files (tm) product: If you find this isn't the sort of thing you like, you may very well want to avoid the rest of my stuff on principle. In other words, folks, this may be triggery...but then again, what'd you expect? It's horror.

Finally, you'll note that the same sidebar provides handy links for ordering my collections, the latest anthologies I've appeared in, and both seasons of The Hunger TV series on DVD. There's also a new site, Dark is Better, where I'll be archiving my uncollected fiction and even posting brand-new stuff. More as this evolves.

For now, thanks for stopping by. I intend to be here a lot more often, from now on.