Category writing

Feb 12 2015

The Gift Horse is still available as an eBook

gifthorse-frontcoverMy debut novel was written over the course of several years; I have laughingly called it “my stress relief book” because when I had a bad day at work, I would stay up late at night and make sure my main character, Angie, had a worse day! Anyway, while I don’t view it as my best work, I have a strong affection for this twisted tale of misguided affection.

Here’s the “blurb” from the back cover:

If Angela Donalson – a young woman, orphaned, living in poverty, with brains and ambition – were granted three wishes, she would want wealth, an education, and a family.

Marc Avery has always had everything he ever wanted. Now he wants a girl for his pleasure, a girl no one will miss.

When, in a bizarre twist of fate, Angie is abducted and held at Avery’s remote Tennessee estate, she initially tries to thwart her captors. Unable to gain her freedom, Angie finds herself trading her morals to meet the challenges presented to her each day. As she comes to know the man behind her abduction, and comes to recognize that he can provide her with more than she ever dreamed possible, Angie faces dilemmas which will determine not only how she lives, but if she lives at all.

Combining a dynamic plot, remarkable characters, and a setting in the deep South, Pamela J. Dodd takes her readers for a wild ride on The Gift Horse.

After I did some minor edits to the original published version of Trinity on Tylos, which is now exclusively an Amazon Kindle title, I decided to do the same thing with my debut novel, The Gift Horse. Before I put it out to pasture, I really would like to do some web 2.0 marketing for it. However, the nice folks at Booklocker suggested that I pull the print version but leave the eBook alone. Since The Gift Horse is available on multiple eBook platforms (pdf, Nook, as well as Kindle) folks who want it should not have any trouble purchasing it. Of course, the few print copies that are still around (I have a few in a box somewhere) are all that will be printed. So, if you own one of the print copies, it might be worth something some day.

Until then, the original tale is available for $2.99, which is less than the price of a deluxe hamburger.

Feb 1 2015

The Star Spangled Banner

Americans are looking forward to the Super Bowl tomorrow. Some will watch the game, because they love football. Fans of each team will hope for a year’s worth of bragging rights. For some, its an excuse to buy a $100 worth of chicken wings from the local Beef O’Brady’s. Then there are fans of those enormously expensive commercials. Probably few people will tune in to see Idina Menzel sing the national anthem, but I might be among them. That lady can sing!

However, she will be hard pressed to beat the version that Whitney Houston did a generation back. Take a look at her performance:

Jan 24 2015

Mama a/k/a “Shorty” Blackstock

Mug shot 49 book

For whatever reasons, I took a look at the Piedmont College alumni website recently, and they have online yearbooks! Wow. That is kinda scary for me, as I was in four of those, but it was seriously cool to see fairly clean copies of my mother’s yearbooks. Mama was from Auburn, Georgia, and she went to college for two years (1948-51) on a basketball scholarship. As an austerity measure, the new president at Piedmont discontinued women’s basketball, so mama left the school (in debt, she told me once) and worked in Atlanta to pay off her debt. Afterward, she attended Georgia State University, while playing semi-pro women’s basketball in Atlanta in the early 50s. She never finished college, because, as the youngest and only unmarried daughter, she was called home to help with aging parents.

While back in Auburn, she had a blind date with a guy named Dodd, and they married a year or so later. The Dodds had three daughters, and I am the eldest. I graduated from Piedmont, and one of my sisters went there for her first two years of college. Piedmont is still a fine institution, and I know because I took a graduate class there a couple of years ago.

Mama was known as “Shorty” because she was six-one, which wasn’t too common 65 years ago.

Here are some screen shots from the ’49 and’50 Piedmont College yearbooks:

Front and Center

Mama, at six-one, always got to hold the ball in team shots.

Piedmont women on defense in 1949 yearbook.

Caption in the 1949 book reads “Hold that Line” so no one is identified, but that has got to be Mama in the center of the picture.

Candid from 1950

This is one of the few pics where Mama looks like me.

Dec 23 2014

Ghosts of Christmas Past

Christmas Card

I love Christmas Cards

Warning, this post is not about books.

Each year, I write a letter to friends and family, but I try to avoid bragging or writing about things everyone knows anyway. I really hate those sorts of letters. In my letter, I try to present a humorous take on the previous year, and I always include a few photos, usually of my son (who is kinda cute) and my husband, who is rather dignified, but certainly good looking. Since I am the family photographer, it can be difficult finding a picture of me, but I try. I put the letter in a traditional card, because I really like getting cards, and the only way to get some is to send some.

However, each year, I update my card list, and there are several addresses that are deleted or altered, because the recipient died, or Mr. and Mrs. becomes one or the other, because one of them passed on. This morning, I opened a few more cards, and one of the ladies had written a note that she misses her husband so much. The card I sent her was one of the ones that I had to alter, and I never hit the delete key without thinking about how difficult it is to go through the holidays with an empty chair, a lonely meal, or a side of the bed that is no longer occupied. While this is sad, it is also life.

Thankfully, some folks are still having children, and those will bring joy to those of us fortunate enough to have them. I’m very blessed to have an almost two-year old granddaughter. Lately, I have taken an old kid-craft version of the nativity, and put it within her reach. She can point to the “baby” which is merely a folded piece of felt with a wooden head glued on it, and she can also identify the “mama” and the “daddy” which are made of sticks, cloth, and glue. This little wood and cloth scene has some “hay” and a “star” for her to talk about as well. While she can’t form sentences, she does seem to realize that this object has some significance. Perhaps, next year, I can show her one with a bit more detail, and explain why there are holidays to celebrate.

In the years to come, I will take out some photo albums, and show her those who have passed from this world, as well as sharing photos from more recent times. Hopefully, she will grasp the importance of family. Christmas can be sad, because of those I have lost, but it is also very happy, because I have a future to build as well.

Dec 8 2014

The Martian— a quick review and some commentary

The MARTIAN coverOften, I choose to read indie published books rather than those from the “big six” publishers, because I find the content of indie books to be a bit more raw, unpolished, and (sometimes) unique. Yes, I am disappointed from time to time (as in my previous post) but I keep trolling for new authors and books. However, recently, Goodreads sent out a newsletter and the science fiction book of the year was Andy Weir’s The Martian. The blurb caught my eye so I bought it, but didn’t begin immediately, as I was slogging through a book on SEO (search engine optimization) at the time. Over the weekend, I began The Martian, and I was hooked. Like from the first page, I was seriously into the story.

The plot is not a new one. An astronaut is marooned on Mars. His fellow crew members are on the way home, believing that he is dead. But, this astronaut is determined and a heck of an engineer, so he keeps finding ways to use what is at hand to survive. After a while, the NASA folks figure out he is still alive, so they are trying to figure out how to get him home. Yes, it is really suspenseful. But sometimes it is laugh out loud funny, because the main character is quite a character.

Actually, this book was so engaging that I began to question my quest for good indie books. If the big guys are publishing this kind of science fiction, then I should be looking at the best seller lists again. So, after finishing the book, I did a wee bit of research and learned that Weir’s book was originally self-published via Amazon’s Kindle Direct (yeah!) and only after it sold thousands (at 99 cents, because that’s Amazon’s minimum price) in the first three months did big publishing come calling. Now, it is the basis for a movie starring Matt Damon.

The book is cool. Weir’s evolution as a writer is seriously cool. Many of the self-published and small press published writers, including yours truly, would love to have this sort of rags to riches experience. The impediment to that is having a really great book. The Martian is such a book. So, my suggestion is read it now and try to wait for the film version. Gravity won an Oscar, so the way is paved for another near future space adventure to do well at the box office.