The "R" word

No, not 'rejection.' The other 'r' word. Restless. Oh, wait, no. Wrong blog. Review. That's what I was going to do: review.

Last week and the week before, I was protesting (mildly, of course) the surfeit of vampires-slash-werewolves-slash-inhuman whatevers parading around disguised as heroes and what-not. Mildly protesting only, of course, because I really can't find a reason to protest any topic being written on, only the quality (or lack thereof) of the writing. Anything else should be chalked up to taste.

But it did get me going to the library website to see what I could find if I typed in "demonology" as a keyword. Actually, what happened was I looked up a book I wanted to re-read: Jessica Andersen's Night Keepers, which I liked a lot--Mayan phrophecy, end of the world, hot heroes, etc. What's not to like? Anyway, one of the key words led me to demonology as a topic. Okay, I'm good with that.

That led me to an unknown (to me) writer named Mike Carey. Carey, it turns out, is a comic book guy--or is that graphic novelist? In my world, a graphic novel is something you don't let anyone under 18 find, but whatever. Be that as it may, Carey's also written some non-graphic novels. I found two at the library: The Devil You Know and The Vicious Circle. The protagonist is an exorcist. No vampires, but there are ghosts and werewolves (more accurately, he calls them by the French loup garou or just weres, since of course they aren't all wolves), and more importantly to me, a rather unique mythology. And pretty good writing. I'm part-way through Vicious Circle, having finished The Devil You Know in almost record time. I'm not saying he kept me up at night like a new Karen Rose novel, but the protagonist is sufficiently tortured without being unbelievable (well, as far as that goes in the world Carey created), the problems that creep up and pounce are varied and interesting, and there is a slate of intriguing secondary characters who all keep things from going exactly where you think they are. The only challenging part (for me, at least) is that Carey's British, the books are set in London, and I'm spending a decent chunk of my time trying to translate. On the other hand, if I ever go over on vacation, I'll know a few choice words I maybe shouldn't.

Good beach read, especially since Carey posits that ghosts don't care for running water. I figure the beach is a pretty safe place to read.

What's that thing following you?

Okay, when I said I would post more pics on Wednesday, I meant this Wednesday. Really.

Sorry about that. I know you've been waiting with bated breath to see...well, what's to see?

Most--not all, but I'd guess an easy 99%--of pictures purporting to be of ghostly activity are of orbs. Like the one to the right of this cat. Yeah, the white, round, splotchy looking thing.

Orbs are tricky. There're always questions, so it's easier to trust pictures taken by people you know, who don't mind being asked: what was the weather like? Was there dust on your camera lens? Did someone spit at you?

In this case, this picture was taken by my friend who hosted the investigation last week. She gets lots of pictures, and one reason I trust her pictures is they don't always show activity. Or they show it in a different spot in the next frame (dust on the camera lens will result in an "orb" showing up in the same part of the picture every time--I've done it myself).

So, what's an orb? Generally an orb is accepted as evidence of spirit activity. Mostly it's assumed the spirit in question is a ghost, although a lot of researchers don't rule out other spirit activity as well--I tend to view it as a visible anomaly in the energy of an area. You can get lots of orbs on film (or in digital pics) at places like old cemeteries, especially at night, but of course the challenge is ruling out mist, dust, reflected light, and so forth. In the picture here, the brightness of the object in the room on the left led a couple of researchers to suggest it had been caught in motion.

In Emerald Ecstasy, one of the characters is a ghost. (In Dreamwalk, several are.) When the heroine finds him, though, it's because he appears to her as a person. Not a mist, not a whisp of light in the corner of her eye--a full person.

That happens, too. I've friends who tell stories of trying to talk to a person who faded away after just a few seconds. I've seen a couple of pictures (pre-photoshop days, folks) that simply could not be explained away. I've taken a couple myself that have orbs in them, but the truth is I'm not all that sensitive--I have an active imagination, but ghosts don't come up and talk to me (thank goodness!), and I rarely see anything with my physical eyes that can't be explained.

But pictures...the camera catches things we don't see, and since I'm inveterately curious about the world around us--seen and unseen--I'm grateful I get to see pictures that suggest a deeper reality.

Ghosties and beasties and things that go bump in the night

I'll post some pictures on Wednesday's post. Tonight, it's all about the EMF.

Saturday evening I went ghost hunting with a couple of friends. The friend whose house we were investigating sent pictures of orbs, hooking the rest of us quite easily.

We were armed with cameras--both digital and 35mm, a digital recorder, a video recorder, and an EMF reader. An EMF reader is a handy little device that measures electromagnetic activity. And it's a lot of fun to watch it jump out of its skin when something interesting is happening.

The one I was using was borrowed from a friend, and it was pretty basic. I like the digital kind, but the one with lights turned out to work okay.

I tend to be very skeptical of all things ghostly--I like to think it makes me better at ghost hunting. Mostly, I am better at believing what I see, hear, feel, etc than what someone else does. I, after all, know that I'm not delusional or overly ... imaginative. ('overly' being the operative word here) And I'm skeptical of technology's ability to record things that elude our physical senses. It's not that I don't believe in it, it's just that a healthy skepticism is a handy thing.

But I've seen enough things I couldn't find a logical explanation for, to accept that sometimes you just gotta go with it. Including EMF readers.

The problem with EMF fields is they can blip for all sorts of reasons--a computer, for example, might set one off (I've seen it happen). An electric light. Other things. So when you're standing in the middle of a room, not moving, and the light that's been a steady green for several minutes starts flashing...slowly...up into the red in answer to a question, I take notice. Especially when the same person's been asking lots of questions and the light didn't budge. Definitive? Of course not. That's why questions in ghost investigations tend to involve lots of things that can be checked--possibly--afterward. Name. City of birth. Date of birth. Date of death. Things like that.

Someone said once that believing is seeing. Sometimes, though, seeing is believing and that's okay too.

Or you can just find it entertaining. Disbelieve it all--as one friend of mine does (he sort of believes, but that's more because he believes in me). But when something goes bump in the night, who you gonna call?

Victim or Villain?

I'm talking about vampire press, of course. Is the poor, misunderstood vampire a hero, struggling to rise above his base nature (let's face it, drinking the blood of anything, much less a human, isn't really at the top of Miss Manners' cultural graces list. You want to argue it's civilized, go right ahead.)? Or is he--as classically portrayed--a villain, intent on seducing every maiden (and probably a few men) in his path, draining her (his) life force until she (he) is nothing but an empty, lifeless shell? Or worse, a new recruit to the hordes of blood-sucking fiends?

And how was he created? Did he willingly participate in his own debauchery? Was he cursed? (I don't know if there are any vampire curses in the world of books. Lori Handeland has a couple of werewolf curses that work really well, but I'm not sure about any vampires being cursed into being.) Was it accidental? Open yourself up to the moment and, bammm, ouch?

As I've said before, I don't understand the appeal of the vampire. I like them as villains. Maybe they're more appealing as heroes if you don't think too hard about what they're doing. Terri Garey pointed out the other day, commenting on my guest post at Writers at Play, that perhaps the bite is symbolic of other penetration...fair enough. I have no problem with people using their mouths, tongues, teeth, to create pleasure. So maybe if you don't think about the fact that they're draining blood in the process....

So maybe I can get the seduction part. But heroic?

"So, Mr. Overbite, what do you really want out of life?"

"Well, Ms. Lovely Neck You've Got There, my primary ambition is using my superhuman strength to save ordinary humans from the packs of demons roaming the planet."

"Very noble, Mr. O. And how do you respond to the charges that your real motives are less than pure? You know, the whole 'I vont to sahck yor bluhd' stereotype?"

"I want only what's best for everyone, Ms. L. By the way, would you like to join me for dinner and a drink?"


Note: one of my all-time favorite books: Bloodsucking Fiends, by Christopher Moore. You want darkly funny portrayal of all things evil, go check out Moore's early works. Skip the recent stuff, go straight to Practical Demonkeeping, Bloodsucking Fiends, and The Lust Lizard of Melancholy Cove. Okay, don't skip it, just don't start there. He's best experienced from the very beginning.

Guest Blogger: Tracy Jones -- Tyler's Trek

This post is a little (okay, a lot) off the usual track. But when the chance came up to spread the word about this event, I jumped at it. After all, I rationalized, I write romance--and sex--and frequently romance and sex leads to having babies. And this post is about one of my favorite babies--Tyler Jones. Tyler is my friend Tracy's absolutely adorable, and somewhat mischievous, 18-month-old son.

The rest of the story, I'll let Tracy tell you.

As many of you know, my son Tyler was born almost 3 months early last year, at 28 weeks gestation. He weighed only 2 pounds, 13 ounces and still had a lot of developing left to do. He spent a long 8 weeks in the NICU before being allowed to come home. Today, he is a happy, healthy toddler who keeps us on our toes constantly! I credit so much of his progress and well-being to the doctors and nurses at Winnie Palmer Hospital here in Orlando. We are lucky to live in this area so that Tyler stayed there. The hospital is amazing – it has the 4th largest NICU in the country and is capable of taking care of the sickest and tiniest patients there are. I've got living proof :)

On September 26th, I will be participating in the Miracle Miles run, along with numerous friends and family, to benefit the Winnie Palmer NICU where Tyler spent so much time. Please take a moment to visit our website, which describes Tyler’s NICU journey in video, pictures and words...and shows the miracle that the doctors and nurses at Winnie Palmer perform every day.

http://www.tylerstrek.webs.com/

I am collecting donations in support of Orlando Health's Miracle Miles event to benefit their NICU. Too many babies are born too early…and each one deserves the same chance in life that Tyler got. My fundraising goal is $10,000 – I really think I can reach that…every $1 helps! There is a guest book – be sure to stop in and show your support.

Corporate Sponsors – A minimum donation of $500 reserves a space on the team t-shirts for your logo. If you are interested, please forward me a high-res image along with any additional wording. Let me know if you have any questions.

Thank you all for your support over the past 18 months. It never fails to amaze me how many people Tyler has touched already in his lifetime - I hope he realizes one day how big that is!

Tracy

Vampires, Mummies and the Holy Ghost

Today is "lack of personal responsibility day." I am holding Terri Garey completely responsible for the fact that Jimmy Buffett's "Vampires, Mummies and the Holy Ghost" is running through my head. (I guess I should be glad it isn't "It's a Small World," hmm?) Terri writes these fabulously funny paranormals featuring Nikki Styx, the world's hippest medium, and she invited me to do a guest spot over at Writers at Play today (the post should be up any time)...and asked me this loaded question: vampires, werewolves, or ghosts?

Check out the blog for my answer, if you haven't guessed it already.

Also, I'm holding the weather man (out of the kindness of my heart, I won't give his name) responsible for my "what happened to common sense" mood. Really, do I need to know it will be 91 in my little corner of the city, and just 90 in that corner over there?

And it's Monday. Looks like it's going to be an interesting week...

Friday Fiction

I do read. Not as much as I used to, and not as widely as I'd like, but I do get a few books in here and there. Usually a blend of fiction and non-fiction, favorite authors and "I really ought to try."

I write, as you know, erotic romance and what I've decided to call "paranormal romantic suspense" (I'm sure someone else has already called it that, but what the heck, so I'm a little slow.). I thought about calling it "literary paranormal horror romantic suspense" but I thought that was probably overkill, and besides, I'm not sure it's really very horror-filled or literary. So the few pages that are will just have to be ignored by the commercial-fiction majority.

Paranormal, though. Hm. The problem with paranormal, as I remember every time I judge a contest, is that it really covers a lot of ground. Trying to read one popular author this past week, I remember that some of it is really familiar ground, and I still don't know why some of it sells. Vampires, for example. I will freely admit to enjoying JR Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood books, once my CP bludgeoned me into reading them. Truly, though, it's because I thought they were interesting characters and had a lot of chemistry, as well as some deviations from the typical "I vant to suck your blohd" schtick. The one I tried to read this week, not so much. Two chapters in, I gave up and put it on the stack to return to the library.

The story I'm working on right now--Dreamwalk--and the one that's more or less plotted out--Resurrection--don't have vampires, or werewolves, or any of the more typical paranormal elements. What they have are smart, talented people who accept that what you see isn't necessarily what you get in the world around you. Which is pretty much how I look at life. But then, how do I push them? If my heroine (in Dreamwalk, she's a ghost hunter) finds the unexpected to be, well, expected, how do I turn her world upside down?