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Baby Book Underway

Dear Readers:

2019 has started strong, and I have a new story underway.

It’s a baby book with children’s illustrations.

The ever-so-skilled Katerina Dotneboya (Pokeweed artist) has agreed to do artwork on this venture.

It’s an ocean tale complete with critters and vivid, seafaring imagery.

Be on the lookout for updates regarding this and other exciting things in the coming weeks!

Thank you to all my readers & supporters,

Brian

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YA-hoo Fest! on 9.29

Hey! If you’re in Chattanooga on 9.29, stop by this exciting festival to hear some amazing authors speak about their craft! Or, you can simply visit & hang out with me.

I’ll be moderating Session 5: ‘Writers Talking Craft’ with Dave Connis, Randy Ribay, Maggie Thrash, and Jeff Zentner from 2:15-3pm that day. These are some heroes of mine in the YA realm. You won’t be disappointed!

Description:

Chattanooga’s Celebration of Young Adult and Middle Grades Literature

Includes:

Readings, Book Sales,
Panel Discussions,
Author Signings,
Food Trucks, Vendors & Fun

Link to register for this FREE event: https://www.yahoofest.org/

See you there,

Brian

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Kentucky-like Bahamas

Here’s a poem from last year’s trip to the beach. A large inspiration being a UK article citing how parts of the Kentucky River mirror the Bahamas of present-day (with limestone formations dating back 450 million years to the Ordovician Period):

 

If Kentucky wasn’t landlocked…
it’d be located somewhereabouts

Nassau

betwixt the Bahamas and the blue Caribbean

Limestone sediment and
formations similar to millions of years ago

Geologists see it
and caves in both

distant cousins

The earth as one piece
and then as many

Jostled about much like

family

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Pre-Orders for Pokeweed

My debut novella, POKEWEED, is now available for pre-order. When you purchase my book, it will ship your way on September 20th. Here’s a video teaser –

 

Prior to this publication, I wasn’t savvy to how important pre-orders were, but they ultimately determine a book’s well-being. Therefore, the more copies I sell during the pre-order period, the better its chance of living, breathing, and growing.

Writing this novella was amazing, and I’m so grateful for all those whose input went into it before publication at Black Rose. Thank you, Katerina Dotneboya, for the exceptional artwork created from halfway across the globe!

Some of my literary heroes read my work beforehand and shared their blurbs with me. They’re on my website & will be printed on the inside of this book.

I’m currently developing my first children’s picture book as well. I am so fortunate to have found a community of people who share my passion for writing both online and within the Chattanooga community.

Here are the two central link(s) to preorder POKEWEED: www.blackrosewriting.com/childrens-booksya/Pokeweed & http://ow.ly/d3cJ30lO2MS

Please share. I am so, so grateful.

#brwriting #pokeweed #throwforwardthursday

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Mothering

Mothers are the lifeblood of our best days on earth. It’s a role not chosen but gifted. And those willing to rise to the occasion shape the planet one laboring gesture at a time. From the act of childbirth to Sunday school to wiping a bloody lip, they exhibit selflessness. And in an age where we can command gadgets to relay anything at a moment’s notice (our every whim really), this is a fresh example.

It still takes nine months for this gift to arrive. The virgin Mary to our own parental DNA, they are all embedded with the will to survive, to nurture. We cry and are comforted. The diaper is changed before a nasty rash settles in. Food and sustenance are supplied by our caretakers. We bask and rest in summer months filled with sunshine and endless amounts of Vitamin D.

My own is someone I cannot even begin to describe. She deserves more than tangible gifts on a single Sunday in May. I laugh when websites suggest gifts for me to send her way on Mother’s Day. What could I ever share with her that equates to the gift of life? Can a person come remotely close to delivering something so substantial as their own date of birth?

My own wife, and best friend, is developing our own gift right this very moment. A date stated as her own date of birth in late summer. She glows with the radiance of new life beneath her. The stomach nests baby much like a mother hen caring for her own. Inside great things are at work, and I marvel at what is hidden, what kicks and jolts the epidermis after some watermelon is munched down.

The skin of life stretches and new cells form. But unlike a yawning biology class, this is visible and mystifying. God’s own world growing before the naked eye. I watch and am comforted by the unknowable development. Something man cannot alter or create in a million lifetimes if he tried. The embryo that makes us all and hatches new wonders minute-by-minute. Time is paused and clocks are rendered useless while mothers do what only they can.

Birth without a death in sight is peace-filled, and worry is thankfully forgotten. Thanks being given to the Divine and for the mothers who created us into a world made better for it.

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It’s a Girl!

You might’ve seen the previous posts, but it’s true: Leah and I are expecting a girl this August. She is due to arrive on Leah’s birthday (Aug. 11th) no less.

We spent this past weekend at Mom’s in Monticello to celebrate with family and close friends. As we’ve learned this info., it is now much more real.

There is growth.

There is a child on the way.

 

We are naming her after my babysitter- Zella (Rose), which means ‘blessed.’

All of the complimentary Kentucky checkboxes were marked this past Easter weekend:

  • cake
  • fried chicken
  • guns
  • a couple of proud mamas

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New publication in September!

I hinted previously that there could be a new book coming down the pike this year.

THERE IS!  It’s one I’ve had quite a fun time with, as it really defies classification.

Here’s my best effort to label it –

 

  • an illustrated, Young Adult, Western novella set in 1880s Appalachia rather than, well, the West.
  • a coming-of-age story, with historical significance, as it centers upon a family caught in the disastrous, bloody French-Eversole Feud near Hazard, Kentucky.

 

With the current landscape of modern high school libraries shifting away from books involving shootouts, I was nervous to promote such a book for teen readers. However, the strong historical significance won out for me, to tell a story about this ‘not-so-famous’ Kentucky feud, which unlike the Hatfields & McCoys (happening due east of Perry County), spawned not from the greed over a hog, but something much more closely tied to every Appalachian – land, the coal within.

I look forward to sharing more details, as they develop, and I gladly welcome any of my more talented writing peers to offer to blurb for this book well in advance of its intended release, which is:   9.20.18.

Happy Easter Weekend to everyone!

 

Brian

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Monticello Beauty: a hometown meditation

Things which captivate me still, regarding my hometown, Monticello, Kentucky:

 

Blackberries growing along the edge of Sally Burnett Road

Cheeseburgers simmering on Main Street’s Pool Hall grill

Turtles stepping on one another to get pellets at Conley Bottom Resort

Shane Blevins shooting a 3-pointer, the subsequent swish

Cornbread recipes shared at Mill Springs Mill

The word ‘Pull!’ being shouted in a field, followed by shotgun blasts

Horses swimming in an open pond in summer

Church bells ringing at Elk Ridge Baptist Church

Harold Turpin preaching 1 Corinthians 13

Baptism with six friends in a creek one, crisp October

Dennis Wheeler leading a choir on Sundays

Cardinal couples darting from branch to branch at the park

A skier dropping a ski between New Fall and White Oak Creeks

Lake Cumberland reaching into the trees after a rain

Losing a teammate to that same pool one year

Kelda Stringer sharing the Wayne County Outlook with all

The doughboy looking on

Dad driving like Steve McQueen between Delta and Hwy 92

The roar of a Chevy Nova getting me to Bell Elementary

Grandma’s suppers on Tuesday nights

Family reunions at the Memorial Park shelter house

Bus rides to and from Cave Street with Ingrid Coffey

Basketball double headers on Fridays

Kickball tournaments in the Miniard auditorium

 Veteran’s Day parades and our pride in hometown heroes

Open lunch at South Creek Mini Mart

Paul Stringer reading Harper Lee aloud

Jimmy Cooper obsessing over his desk

Mountain View Camp and Chrysalis – God’s very movement

Menville Dishman on our family doorstep, inviting us back to church one more time

 

 

(*image by Mitchell McGuire, Art Deco rendering/design)

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Being an enigma is far from bad

Every finger print differing for a reason

Consider the differences in the Grand Canyon

And Mount Everest

Trenches and peaks falling and rising in varying proportions

A cave remaining dark all day

And snow lingering on precipices, up high

A bat needing a home during daylight hours

And man craving rest in the darkest reaches of night

Differences are awe-inspiring

Sameness is bland

Leonardo da Vinci was anything but mad

Van Gogh while mad was anything except boring

Hobbits were constructed in the mind of a world-builder

And Billy Graham preached like his soul was on fire

These are the attributes of difference

These are the joys of deliverance

From a world lacking season

From a dish missing salt

Difference is good

Mysterious