Top Five Sites for Writer Gifts

To be specific, five web sties from the top page of DuckDuckGo. But all offer writerly gifts for the word smith in your life.

1.  The Creative Pen

Twenty-five gifts for scribes including pens, books, and, of course, a Hobbit-themed blanket.

2 . The Write Life

Twenty-two gifts including an Awesome Trophy for dark loveless days on those drafts that seem to stink from front to back.

Pride and Prejudice Tote Bag

3.  The Write Practice

Twenty gift ideas including Edgar Allen Poe socks.  Keep them warm by walling them into the back of your closet. Mortar included. (Naw.)

4.  Helping Writers Become Authors

Among various sundry notions, there's an Aqua Pen for scribbling plot points in the shower.

5.  Amazon

From the commercial behemoth itself, select from a number of coffee mugs and/or signs threatening to put annoying people into stories and kill them.

On the topic of writing, nothing says 'Christmas' more than prostate cancer. My book, They Took My Prostate: Cancer Loss Hope is now available on Amazon in sturdy ebook format. Learn how I put the 'in' into incontinence, yet survived with carpet and furniture intact to tell the tale.   

New Amazon eBook #1 in Category

This is what first place looks like—at least for another hour:

Put another way:

I'll call it a day now and bask in the rankings, knowing that They Took My Prostate: Cancer Loss Hope is doing just fine. 

New eBook Rises in Amazon Rankings

Let the screen shots speak.

Out of all the books on cancer, I'm in the top hundred.

And this:

They Took My Prostate: Cancer Loss Hope ascends, thanks to all who pre-ordered. You could do likewise. Let's keep this going. Number one is not too much to hope for.

The Feel-Good Prostate Cancer Book of the Season

Hang the mistletoe, fling the tinsel, unleash the candy canes! 

Yes, nothing says 'holiday cheer' like a good book on prostate cancer. So if you can't stomach another slice of fruit cake, head on over to Amazon and pre-order a copy of They Took My Prostate: Cancer Loss Hope.

MaleProstateHealth.com

Discover what happens when a luckless writer in Los Angeles  realizes his career, money, and health care are evaporating at the same time that he is diagnosed with prostate cancer.

Why prostate cancer? Why Christmas time? Essentially, I didn't want 2017 to pass without publishing something, and the closest work available was my tussle with the Big C.

Janet Farrar Worthington, co-author of the #1 Best Seller Dr. Patrick Walsh's Guide to Surviving Prostate Cancer feels ". . . Mac is very funny. I believe his ability to find the absurd and keep his perspective even in the most awkward or discouraging situation is one important reason for his successful recovery."

Jean chuckles at the budget for Freakazoid!

In closing, television executive great Jean MacCurdy has battled cancer in her own family. She graciously agreed to read a review copy and comment on same. When I receive Jean's notes, I'll post here and at the Amazon page.





(Mistletoe Image: gardenvarietynews)

Famous People Born on My Birthday v.4

A lazy blogging day as I re-re-repost my birthday entry. What has changed since 2016? Sure enough, famed physicist Walter Heisenberg also vacated the womb December 5 in the Year of Our Lord 1901. (Walt Disney was born the same year.) A pioneer of quantum mechanics and a Nobel Prize winner, he could never balance his checkbook and was struck by a trolley while pondering a simple addition error in the middle of a Munich street. (I made up the last part.) Welcome to the club, Walter.

Harried today as I rush to prepare my prostate cancer ebook for a December 15 launch. Hours pass editing, formatting the sucker, perusing the final artwork changes—quite minor, an excellent cover—seeing if I can't do a limited pre-order, then cranking out one or two promotional videos. Nevertheless, I'm pleased by such chores and that's my birthday gift to me.

From December 5, 2011, I repost my birthday thoughts on fame and fortune. Since my last repost in 2014, what have I learned in two years? Age is a state of mind provided you're healthy, and it's cool being retired if your wife works a good job.

Note: My friend Randy reminded me that noted physicist Walter Heisenberg was also born on this day, but I'm not certain about that.






Thank you very much to all who have, so far, wished me Happy Birthday. In thinking of this day, I am reminded of several famous Americans who share my date of birth. I will list three and examine their accomplishments as compared to mine.

1. Martin Van Buren - b. Dec. 5, 1782

2. George Armstrong Custer - b. Dec. 5, 1839

3. Walt Disney - b. Dec. 5, 1901

4. John P. McCann - b. Dec. 5, 1952

1. Martin Van Buren succeeded greatly in becoming the 8th President of the United States but was hardly remembered even in his own day. He had a large bull frog stuffed and used as an ink well in the White House. However President Taft later sat on it by accident and they had to throw the thing out. That's about it.

2. George Armstrong Custer succeeded greatly as a soldier in the Civil War but had a mixed record fighting Indians. (1-1-2, I think.) He is best remembered for his  spectacular fail at the Battle of the  Little Big Horn. At first, everything was going well; then it all fell apart under an Indian tsunami. In later years, Custer had a park named after him as well as a monument and a movie where his part was played by Errol Flynn. That's a whole lot more than Van Buren ever got.

3. Walt Disney succeeded greatly in animation, a pioneer in the field, creator of iconic characters—but not the word 'iconic' which has been seized upon by junior execs.—established Disney studios and Disneyland and is fondly remembered to this day. Nonetheless his body is frozen in a vault beneath Disney's Burbank lot and should Walt be reanimated and start making decisions again it could effect his legacy.

4. John P. McCann was greatly successful as a Hollywood atmosphere player. McCann was the ship-board stand-in for a Canadian actor portraying Errol Flynn in My Wicked, Wicked Ways. In addition, he is visible catching Dennis Quaid's jacket at around 1:19 in a clip from  Great Balls of Fire.
More successful in animation, McCann created the non-iconic character of The Huntsman. For the next fifteen years, he piggy-backed onto as many successful shows as his friends would allow. While the record is still being written, outsiders agree that McCann will be remembered by Bank of America and several other creditors who might reasonably feel aggrieved should he pass from the scene within the next several months.

Images: whitehouse.gov, Parcbench, fold3

They Took My Prostate and I'll Tell You How

Me at the hands of the medical establishment. (wallpaper cave)

And while cancer was sliced from me with digital precision, certain vital functions were diminished, leaving me in a grim battle with my own body. Not for the squeamish, this tale of a man, a prostate and destiny has already received kudos from author Janet Farrar Worthington.

Kind enough to read my manuscript, Janet is co-author of Dr. Patrick Walsh's Guide to Surviving Prostate Cancer, a great resource if you're smitten with the aforementioned disease. (I loath 'eponymous.')

Having spent considerable time writing about men's health issues, Janet said that I wrote "about the nitty-gritty aspects of recovering from this life-saving but difficult surgery—something few men are willing to do. . . . Reading this might help you get through it, too."

A short essay in ebook form, "They Took My Prostate: Cancer-Loss-Hope" will be available on Amazon December 15.

With annoying regularity, I will be promoting said book over the next two weeks. Tell your friends. Tell the indifferent. This is the can't-miss prostate cancer book of the year.

Update: Or, as Tom Ruegger says, the "feel-good prostate cancer book of the season."

Update: NOW the book is ready for Pre-Order, with copies delivered December 15. In time for Christmas, if you're a Yule sort of person, and not-in-time if you aren't. But December 15th remains the constant. Let's set that to rest.

Jungle Fighting in the Central Highlands

As a replacement, a friend of mine joined one of the units chronicled in this work shortly after the incidents described. Here's a brief glimpse of his life as an infantryman. A medic is mentioned who, I believe, survived the destruction of a platoon mentioned in the book.

Nine Days In May: The Battles Of The 4th Infantry Division On The Cambodian Border, 1967 by Warren K. Wilkins
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

An engrossing description of infantry combat as American units reacted to North Vietnamese Army ambushes and assaults, with young U.S. draftees battling a hardened enemy, often in hand-to-hand fighting.

Struggling in the dense forests of Vietnam's Central Highlands at a time when most Americans still supported the war, the U.S. companies and platoons generally possessed excellent small unit leadership. They would need all the help they could get as they clashed with the NVA under triple-canopy forests that often blocked out the sunlight as well as supporting artillery fire.

Wilkins touches on the U.S. strategy of attrition, and the political constraints that hobbled American forces, leaving them unable to pursue the NVA into their bases across the Cambodian border. Reduced to counting bodies, the 4th Infantry Division could never put away their foe. The fraud of body counts and the untouchable nature of enemy sanctuaries negated the courage and endurance of the men, eventually forcing 4th Infantry Division units to battle over the same ground again and again until the attrited Americans finally withdrew.

View all my reviews

Happy Thanksgiving!: Nostalgia Edition

Saturday Evening Post

Over the last 12 years,  I usually post something on, or around, Thanksgiving. So I shall continue doing so proudly, defiantly, without apology.

Thanks this year to being cancer-free on two fronts, having an employed wife, and teetering on the ledge of publishing an ebook detailing my struggles with prostate cancer. Also thankful that my mother-in-law survived open heart surgery. She proves that one is much better off with a working valve than without.

Gratitude is an under appreciated trait, and I strive to incorporate more of it each day. Best wishes to all.

T-Day Round-Up

1. 2016: Two days after Thanksgiving, I discuss the Cheshire moon and a new method of outlining for a fantasy novel I discarded in April. 

2. 2015: The Monday before I explain in some detail why you should review my books. Comes complete with explanatory video that hasn't expired yet. 

3. 2014: Hit the day square as I link to i09's Black Friday gift recommendations. (Looks like a rush cut and paste job.)

dishmaps

4. 2013: Day before featuring a short article I wrote for another publication that folded, explaining how we got football on Thanksgiving. 

5. 2012: Spot on as I invite readers to visit my review of Hitchcock over at Forces of Geek. (I didn't even check, but the review is probably long gone.)

6. 2011: Dead center as I link back to 2005. There are more comments than post. 

7. 2010: Same day posting as I wish everyone well and include a Simpson's image. (Posted 338 times that year.)

quotes

8. 2009: A salute to my friend Bernadette for running a 5k. Also a hat tip to a young man I know who dropped 100 pounds in a year. (This was my high-water year for posting—365 times. That's what unemployment will do.)

9. 2008: Another spot on post, little more than a 'happy' with WB characters as pilgrims. First T-Day in our condo.

10. 2007: Day before, with a mention of running as this was my peak marathon era. A message from dear friend K who passed away in 2012. Bittersweet.

11. 2006: A few days after, as we dined up in the Bay area with in-laws. I was training for the Phoenix Marathon that January and ran at every opportunity.

12: 2005: On the nose as I mention a Turkey Trot completed that day with chums from Team in Training. We were training for the Honolulu Marathon in early December. Two of those chums, Nick and P.J., subsequently married and now have a pair of fine children.

SEPTA

Happy 242, USMC!

Birthday greetings to all Devil Dogs past and present as I repost an offering from earlier this year.

USMC League

MCRD San Diego Back in the Day

Everything must begin somewhere. And in the United States Marine Corps, my enlisted tour commenced with yellow footprints. Drawn on the asphalt of the recruit depot with heels close together and toes angled out to 45 degrees, they are where I, along with seven other guys from our suburban Chicago neighborhood, stood to begin military service. Then we marched somewhere, boxed up our clothes and mailed them home, coming to the realization that our new life would be different from drinking beer behind a bowling alley.

The Vietnam War was winding down, at least for the United States, though the North Vietnamese would launch a huge attack against South Vietnam toward the end of March as we conducted infantry training at Camp Pendlelton. (In September, now a Private First Class, I would find myself in an Army hospital called Camp Kue on Okinawa, sharing  a ward with American advisors who'd been wounded helping the South Vietnamese forces stop the communists.)

In 1991, I visited the footprints on a vacation to San Diego with my girlfriend. (Now My Fine Wife or MFW.)

In 2002, I stood on a hill in Vietnam called Con Thien with a Vietnamese guide who told me about the obliteration of his village by B52s, bombing the NVA advance.

In 2008, I was back at MCRD finishing up a marathon with Team in Training.

But on a Friday night, January 14, 1972, I stood on yellow footprints. Oh, right before we boxed up our clothes, this happened:
(The following scene is rather accurate, except there's no C&W music. Just buzzzzzzz.)

h/t: amp1776

Apocalypse Story a Fast-Paced Revelation

Father Elijah: An Apocalypse by Michael D. O'Brien
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

At peace in a desert monastery, a psychologically-scarred monk is summoned by the Vatican to witness to a powerful international figure feared to be the Antichrist.

Based on Catholic eschatology, the story centers around the trials of Father Elijah, who reluctantly sets out on his mission only to find himself reliving the loss of family, friends, wife and child. As dark forces close around David Elijah, his friends and supporters, the monk struggles to complete his charge, grappling with issues such as the savagery of Man, free will, and the healing love of Christ. At the same time, the society around Father Elijah transforms at a bewildering pace, as lines dissolve between spirit, prophecy, and reality.

Set at the turn of the millennia, the book is paced like a thriller, with sharp dialogue driving the action forward; complex characters hold your interest. Overall, a fascinating exploration into the nature of evil, the power of patience, and the possibility of redemption.

View all my reviews

Bring Me Thrilling Pulp Art

ComicsAlliance

Researching art work and illustrators for my next ebook—due out by Christmas. And while the pulp style might not gel with a non-fiction work on cancer, I've both horror and fantasy detective tales cutting air in the on-deck circle. Both could don pulp covers with gleeful pride. Starting a Pulp Pinterest page, lets me collect interesting compositions, tone, color, subject matter. But there's more to the style than hot babes, gun-toting detectives, and leering Nazis.

We Heart promoted Mexican pulp art a few years back. What's the difference with our home-grown pulpists? Well, We Heart felt "the Mexican market had an appetite for weirdness that outdid the Americans on nearly every level. The violence was ratcheted up, but it was the incongruous elements such as sci-fi, psychedelia, the supernatural, dinosaurs and robots into the mix that set the plots apart."

They weren't kidding. Monster Brains gathered together a wealth of Mexican pulp cover art. Here's a few samples:

Monster Brains

Gunfire against retro robots gone berserk seems futile, but we often reach for the familiar in times of crisis.



 

Monster Brains

Here is death writ large with grave robbers, a corpse who apparently died hard, and great eyes hovering over the landscape for reasons obscure.

Monster Brains

Trouble heading your way, bud, with human-faced birds flying out of the windmill and over the leafless tree. What gruesome fate awaits you, cowering man?











In addition, We Heart added that "the heroes of the Mexican books were not hard-bitten detectives or all-action paragons, but rather common men who found themselves right up against it in a struggle for survival . . . ." I guess the Yanks were a little more aspirational.

No matter. I want pulp covers for my next two books. Mexican, Yankee, any old artist, but I'm having pulp. The search commences for an artist who can deliver. Don't be shy. Offer recommendations. Should your artist be selected, I'll credit you in the Forward of a book guaranteed to be read by dozens.

Auture