MOXIE'S PROBLEM #Excerpt by Hank Quense @hanque99 #AmReading #SciFi #Fantasy

Scene Background:  

Moxie is on her way to meet her betrothed Count Gamel. Three apprentice knights, Percivale, Bore and Gareth are escorting her there. 

********************

Bors rode to the top of a hill and examined a flat, boulder-strewn summit. Beyond the boulders, a grassy knoll butted against a tall outcrop that would shelter them from the wind. Bors rode past the boulders, dismounted on the grass and removed the saddle from his horse, Escrow. He grunted in pleasure as a cool breeze wafted over him.

Percivale, Gareth and Moxie joined him on the knoll and they decided to camp there. Soon, all the mounts were unsaddled, hobbled and grazing nearby.

After tending to his horse, Escrow, Bors studied the boulders. Something about them seemed strange, almost unnatural. The rocks were in lines almost like the beads on his abacus. He ignored Moxie's latest outburst of whining and continued to examine the rocks. Dark gray boulders — dozens of them — covered the area in three lines with exactly twenty rocks in each line. A fourth rank, separate from the other three, contained five rocks.

"How dare you!" Moxie roared.

Bors grabbed his sword hilt and whirled towards the sound of her voice. Moxie stood ten feet away glaring at a boulder in the middle rank.

"What's goin' on?" Percival, also on foot, asked her. Gareth stood near Percivale, looking quizzically at Moxie.

"I'm a princess, you impudent rock. Apologize this instant or I'll break you into rubble."

Bors gawked at her. The memory of a story an old hunter once told him and his father flooded his brain and almost overwhelmed him with the danger they faced. His skin crawled.

Moxie picked up a fist-sized rock.

Bors gasped. Moxie was about to get them all killed.

Moxie bounced the rock off the boulder.

Bors ran to her and grabbed her arm before she could do more damage.

"The stone insulted me." Moxie frowned at Bors as if she suspected his motives.

"Why did you throw the rock?" Percivale asked.

"Moxie just attacked one of the rock-folk," Bors said in a quavering voice.

"I did what?"

"She did what?" Percivale said. "I'm confused."

Bors waved an arm around the boulder collection. "This is a rock-moot. I've heard about them. The rock-folk come together to settle problems and make new laws. And the stone Moxie threw was a rock-baby."

"The big one degraded me." Moxie sniffed and pointed at the boulder. "It made lewd suggestions."

"Rocks can't talk," Gareth said. "Leastwise, not so we can hear them."

"I can hear them. I’m descendent from the Ancient Ones. Royal Ancient Ones, of course. And the Ancient Ones were descended from the fairies.”

"We have to get out of here," Bors said. "Fast."

"Why is the ground shaking?" Moxie looked alarmed. She grabbed Percival's arm to steady herself.

"It's the rock-folk," Bors said. "They're gettin' all worked up over Moxie's attack."

Their mounts whinnied in fear at the trembling ground. They jumped and stamped their hooves and strained at the hobbles until they broke free. The four horses ran down the hill and disappeared into the forest.

A worried Bors said, "We have to get out of here. Let's grab the saddle bags and put some distance between us and the rocks."

A boulder inched closer to Moxie's foot and she shrieked.

Percivale made a face at the sudden pain in his ear from Moxie's reaction, but didn't move, as if frozen in place.

"Someone has to get my horse," Moxie said.

"I ain't goin' through those rocks." Gareth pointed to a group of rocks rolling to form a line between them and the direction the horses went.

"We have to leave." Bors pushed Moxie in the back. "That way."

"Unhand me! And what about dinner? I'm hungry."

"Dinner will be very late tonight, Your Royal Feyness." Bors kept his hand on her back, nudging her away from the builders. He grabbed Moxie's saddle bag and handed it to her, then picked up his own.

"You expect me to carry that?"

Bors dropped her saddle bags. "If you don't carry it, it stays here and gets crushed by the rocks. I'm not carryin' yours, you are."

Bors looked at Percivale who stood without moving, his face drained of color. Bors grabbed an arm and yanked Percivale backward. Percivale blinked and gave Bors a strange look. "Come on, Perc," Bors yelled. "Snap out of it and let's get goin'."

Percivale picked up his saddlebags and trotted away from the boulders.

A few minutes later, they descended the hill.

"Moxie, look out!" Gareth yelled.

Bors turned and saw a boulder thundering down the hill. A bow wave of dirt sprayed out on both sides of its path.

Gareth dropped his saddle bags and pushed Moxie out of the way. Both landed in a heap a moment before the boulder sped past them.

"Get off me, you blundering lummox."

Gareth picked himself up and pointed to the boulder now at the bottom of the hill and rapidly losing speed. "Must have been sentry." He went over to his saddle bags, partially crushed by the boulder.

"Are these rocks stupid or something?" Moxie stood with her hands on her hips. "Commoners are supposed to ignore royal misunderstandings."

"I don't think rock-folk are impressed with your royal birth," Bors said. "Let's get movin'.

"When do you think the horses will come back?" Moxie asked. "I can't carry my saddle bags all the way to Count Gamel's."

"Those animals ain't comin' back," Percivale said. "Not after the way they got spooked. They're inna next county by now." The color had returned to his face.

"Can someone please carry my bags?" Moxie asked in a pleasant voice while fluttering her eyelids. "They have my wedding dress in it."

Bors slung his own bags over one shoulder and said, "It'll do you good to get some exercise." He turned his back on her and walked east.

"We gotta get a lotta miles from here before we can stop for me to cook the rabbits I caught." Gareth tied two hares to a saddle bag. "We better start pickin' nuts and berries if we see any."

Bors shook his head. He wished the adventure would go back to being boring again.

Moxie huffed, stamped her foot and picked up her saddle bags. She followed the three knights while raining insults and curses down on their collective heads.

Moxie had never thought that life outside the castle could be so difficult. Her escorts made her sleep on the ground with only two thin blankets: one under her and one on top of her. She had to sleep in her clothes. The men made her get up at dawn. She had to eat cold meals when it rained. They made her ride the horse all day long. The knights were disrespectful of her nobility. They often ignored her commands.

It was if she was a peasant not a princess. And now they didn’t have horses and had to walk and non one would carry her saddlebags.

Moxie dropped the saddlebags to wipe her tear-filled eyes. Gamel better be worth all this misery she thought.

Do you enjoy untypical coming-of-age stories? Well, you won’t find one more untypical than Moxie’s Problem. Moxie is an obnoxious, teen-age princess who has never been outsider her father’s castle. Until now. The real world is quite different and she struggles to come to grips with reality. The story takes place against a backdrop of Camelot. But it isn’t the Camelot of legends. It’s Camelot in a parallel universe. So, all bets are off!

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Genre – Fantasy, Sci-fi

Rating – G

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Connect with Hank Quense through Facebook & Twitter

Website http://hank-quense.com/wp/

Bryan Taylor on How to Write Your First Novel in only 35 Years #Humor #Politics #Fiction

The Three Sisters was first written back in 1977 when I was in college. A friend of mine, Mari Trevalyan, who had gone to Catholic school which ensured that she would never become a Catholic, gave me a picture of three nuns that I had found.  They would look perfect on a wanted poster, I thought, so I created one advising anyone who found them that they could drive them into catatonic fits by playing them recordings of Anita Bryant.

Both Catholics and non-Catholics found this funny, so since she had given me another photo with two nuns and an elderly couple, I wrote a second piece about the Three Sisters taking the elderly couple hostage.  When fellow students asked me what was going to happen next, the Three Sisters were born, and each week I put up a new episode until the plot of the novel was born.  People began checking the wall outside my dorm where I posted them for the latest episode.  Catholicism became all the rage at this Presbyterian college.

I didn’t know what was going to happen from one week to the next, but managed to figure out a new episode for the rest of the quarter until the tale of the Three came to its conclusion.  All I had were the Xerox machines at the library, scotch tape and blank paper to write on, but I managed to get each new episode up on time.

After I graduated from college and went to get a Master’s degree in 1979, I decided to fulfill my desire to write the great American novel since college always provides plenty of free time to avoid studying for exams.  I succeeded in writing the first version of The Three Sisters which could be an object lesson in how to write a novel no one would want to read.  This is one of those manuscripts that when you ask the executors of your estate to burn all unpublished works upon your death, you hope they really will.  Creative writing courses could use the first version to show aspiring authors how not to write.  The characters were poorly developed, the humor was obvious, and it lacked subtlety. I got a couple agents to read it, and luckily they declined to do anything with it.

When I moved to California in 1981 for my Ph.D., I had lots of spare time since I was going to college instead of working, so I decided to revise the novel.  The result was a vast improvement.  I was able to make the plot more realistic, thanks in part to the addition of Victor Virga, fleshed out the characters, and made changes that should have been there all along.

Nevertheless, I knew of no one in the publishing world, had never had anything published anywhere, and I was beginning to think more about writing my Ph.D. dissertation on the Economics of the Arts than getting published, so The Three Sisters was set aside.

It was 1983 now, and I couldn’t spend the rest of my life going to college to rewrite a novel that couldn’t get published. I completed my Ph.D. in Economics, became a Professor in Economics and Finance, became a stock broker, started collecting data on financial markets, and before I knew it almost 30 years had passed.

The novel had resided in my closet undisturbed throughout those years.  The only copy I had was the one I had typed on my Brother typewriter with the dancing ball before I ever owned a computer.   When I moved, I rediscovered the manuscript and decided to do something with it. Since it was now 2012, the solution was simple: outsource the nuns.  So I sent them to India to be converted into Microsoft Word after converting the original manuscript into PDF.

When I got it back I reread it for the first time in almost 30 years.  Being the author, it was difficult for me to independently judge it.  Although my friends from college still fondly remembered the adventures of the Three, I decided the real test would be to give a copy of The Three Sisters to someone who had never heard of them, so I cornered a couple friends, got them to read it, and was pleased to find that they enjoyed it.  There was hope yet!

One issue I had to quickly resolve was whether to attempt to rewrite the novel as I felt it should be today, or leave the manuscript largely as it is, “respecting” the wishes of the original author.  I decided it was best to minimize the changes in the manuscript because that was what I wanted the novel to be when I had written it.  If I wanted to revise the novel, add to it, and change the spirit of the novel, I could do that in a sequel, assuming it might be written, but I should leave the original alone.  That didn’t preclude making changes in the spirit of the original, but I didn’t want the ghosts of my characters haunting me for the rest of my life.

By 2012, the publishing situation had changed dramatically from 1983.  Now you can self-publish the book without an agent or the need to contact one of the main publishing houses.  You can produce a physical book, or go straight to an e-book.  On the advice of a fellow writer at work, I found a good editor, who provided extremely useful advice and encouragement, and now the book is off and running, and will be published in May 2013, just in time for me to send a copy to the new pope.

If it takes me another 35 years to write my second novel, it should be out by 2048, by which time I think all three sisters will hope we will have our first female pope, or maybe our second.  Pope Coito I sounds good to me.

Nuns just want to have fun! But when three former Catholic nuns have too much fun and get in trouble with the law, they become nuns on the run.

Driving back to Washington D.C. where they work at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Parts, the three sisters are arrested in Tennessee. After defeating the local deputy in strip poker, they escape from jail, and are pursued by the zealous Detective Schmuck Hole, who has personally offered a $10,000 reward for their capture on The 700 Club. Little do they know that when the three sisters visit the Washington Monument, their lives will change forever.

Set in 1979, The Three Sisters is a sacrilegious satire that skewers not only organized religion, but the government, the media, intellectuals, corporate greed and every other part of the establishment. Maybe not the greatest story ever told, but possibly the funniest.

Buy @ Amazon

Genre – Humor, Satire, Catholicism, Politics

Rating – R

More details about the author

Connect with Bryan Taylor on Facebook

Website www.threesistersnovel.com

Bryan Taylor & The Three Sisters #Excerpt #Humor #Politics

Like everyone else, I endured the Catholic Trinity of Confession, Communion, and Catechism during elementary school. I always referred to the Catechism as Everything You Needed to Know about Catholicism without Getting Your Knuckles Rapped. As luck would have it, just as soon as we started to learn those Latin phrases, the Vatican changed the rules and we had to relearn everything in the vernacular. It seemed as if the Vatican was just waiting until I had learned those Latin phrases so they could switch to using the vernacular just to spite me.

At confession, the two safest sins were disobeying my parents, the priest never doubt that one, and telling a lie. You could never lie about lying during confession. If I had lied during the past week, I was telling the truth, but if I hadn’t lied and I said I had lied, I had just lied and therefore was telling the truth about lying. We kids would compare our confessions each week to expand our repertoire because if we confessed to the same sins every week, the priests might think we weren’t taking confession seriously. We would also compare penances to see what each sin was worth and plan accordingly. When the priest would say, “Go and sin no more,” I wondered whether he was serious because if we really listened to him, he would be out of a job.

Nuns just want to have fun! But when three former Catholic nuns have too much fun and get in trouble with the law, they become nuns on the run.

Driving back to Washington D.C. where they work at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Parts, the three sisters are arrested in Tennessee. After defeating the local deputy in strip poker, they escape from jail, and are pursued by the zealous Detective Schmuck Hole, who has personally offered a $10,000 reward for their capture on The 700 Club. Little do they know that when the three sisters visit the Washington Monument, their lives will change forever.

Set in 1979, The Three Sisters is a sacrilegious satire that skewers not only organized religion, but the government, the media, intellectuals, corporate greed and every other part of the establishment. Maybe not the greatest story ever told, but possibly the funniest.

Buy @ Amazon

Genre – Humor, Satire, Catholicism, Politics

Rating – R

More details about the author

Connect with Bryan Taylor on Facebook

Website www.threesistersnovel.com

Alex Mueck on What Motivates Him to Write #amwriting #amreading #humor

What scares you the most?

Being boring.

What makes you happiest?

Helping others and making them laugh.

What’s your weakest character trait?

He is flawed in thinking life is one big joke.  When he takes his mission too far, there are ramifications, things back-fire and tragedy strikes.

Why do you write?

I know this sounds cliché, but I love it.

Have you always enjoyed writing?

Yes, I used to write stories, and then quit, but was encouraged by a friend to try again, and three books later, I am working on number four and five.

What motivates you to write?

I need to have something to do, and when I write it consumes me.  I rarely need any motivation to get lost in creating a story.

What writing are you most proud of?

Not sure, I have one particular piece, perhaps the more touching scenes that come in the second half, but feel there are too many spoilers in them, so I provided a few samples that is indicative of the humor style employed in this book.

What books did you love growing up?

Depends on the age.  When I was young Loved stuff from Ronald Dahl, Greek mythology stories,  to that three investigator series with Jupiter Jones, and even Encyclopedia Brown.  So I suppose the latter books led Agatha Christie and other mystery writers.  Later I branched out to several genres.

Who is your favorite author?

I honestly do not have one.  I like so many authors it is like picking the most beautiful girl.

What book genre of books do you adore?

Mysteries, thrillers, fantasy, horror, humorous fiction, biographies and historical accounts.

"“A historical fiction comedy that packs
as much heart as humor.”
—Michael Dadich, award-winning author of The Silver Sphere

When a Harvard history professor receives a thesis paper titled Jesse James and the Secret Legend of Captain Coytus, from Ulysses Hercules Baxter—an underwhelming student—he assumes the paper must be a prank. He has never read such maniacal balderdash in his life. But after he calls a meeting with the student, Professor Gladstone is dismayed when Baxter declares the work is his own. As he takes a very unwilling Professor Gladstone back in time via his thesis, Baxter’s grade hangs in the balance as he attempts to prove his theory.

It is 1864 as philanderer and crusader Captain Coytus embarks on a mission to avenge his father’s death and infiltrates the Confederate Bushwacker posse looking for the man responsible, Jesse Woodson James. Accompanied by the woman of his dreams, Coytus soon finds himself temporarily appointed to be the sheriff of Booneville and commissions his less-than-loyal deputy to help him carry out his plan.

But when tragedy strikes, the Captain is forced to change his immature ways and redefine his lofty mission—more or less."

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Genre - Humor, Historical Fiction

Rating – R

More details about the author

Connect with Alex Mueck on Facebook & Twitter