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Showing posts from May, 2012

“Things Every Southern Woman Should Know How to Make”

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Alice clicked on the headline, mildly curious about what yet another stranger thought should be in her kitchen repertoire. Pictures of China plates mounded with crispy fried chicken, greens, cobbler, and a pile of biscuits a mile high flooded the screen, all set off with a pitcher of sweet tea beaded with condensation. The table was set; an apron draped off to the side next to a box labeled “Gramma’s Recipes” in fine calligraphy. She closed the browser and put away her tablet. She was born a Georgia peach, but she couldn’t make a cobbler to save her life. Did that mean she wasn’t southern? Or maybe just not “Southern.” For Alice, there was no recipe box full of family traditions. Her younger years were filled with rental homes in different states and her father’s voice coaxing her toward a text book rather than a cookbook. Metalworking and fabrication held more interest than learning to flambé or sauté. Did it make her less of a woman that her cooking skills consisted of fresh salads...
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The Content of YA Books and Maturity

There’s been some talk about the content of teen books lately. About the violence, sex, cursing and other content that some find unsuitable for their children. Some kids aren’t old enough to read these books. Some are. Twelve is a very transitional age. Some kids are more mature than others. And some of these books are probably really written for the older teens.     When I was twelve, I read a wide range of things. My mom bought me the classics in paperback, and my grandma had a selection of leather-bound books like THE COMPLETE WORKS OF SHAKESPEARE. I read everything from Hans Christian Anderson to Jack London to Jules Verne. I read more. DRACULA, many novels by Stephen King, Anne Rice, and Dean Koontz. My mother’s historical romance novels. (I learned the answers to Jeopardy! questions from some of those historical romance novels.)    The topics in these books weren’t new to me. Violence was in the news; death was on my bus route when a guy on a motorcycle...
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Poetry: You Never Went Back

The sesame seeds stuck to your teeth Started the chain reaction Laughter, like an infection spread like Rome’s consuming fires. An accident, that first giggle became a epidemic as the next table caught the fever. My laugh arced like electricity across the room. Composed, you stood Outcast, you turned to go. I offered frantic protests amidst hiccuped chuckles.
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It's Got Layers!

No, I don’t mean a clove of garlic, or head of lettuce, or that other veggie often served up bloomin’ style. I’m talking about stories, be it a short story or a monster, 1000 page novel. A story with layers has depth. It makes the world you created real for the reader, and if it’s done right, will boggle my mind. If someone one day says, “That Brandi Lynch chick writes crazy layers!” I think I could die happy. Well, I’d jump up and down a lot. What makes these awesome layers? Details. Stories beneath the story. They don’t even have to be explained or resolved in the end. For example, Robert Jordan’s WHEEL OF TIME series. There are so many details and interwoven stories in those books that 13 books hasn’t been enough to cover them all.   I sink into the world Mr. Jordan created, and I can believe that at one time, somewhere all those sculpted palaces and strange hairless-cat creatures existed. I can see it, walk the streets, smell the bread in the cities or the cook...
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From the Casual Webcomic Reader: The Awesomeness that is Unsounded

A girl with a lion’s tail and an attitude to match it. An eloquent, somewhat outdated, badass zombie spell caster. Smugglers. And the local authorities chasing them all. Welcome to Unsounded . I tumbled into this world because I was lurking around the website of author and outstanding artist, Ashley Cope. I’d found her artwork some time ago while feeding my Final Fantasy art jones, and when I saw her gallery , I was overwhelmed. A mixture of game art and her own characters, the level of badassery is beyond my comprehension. Each piece has a depth to it, especially those of her characters like Murkoph. Maybe because they have backstories (a lot of them are RPG characters), they feel deeper to me. I don’t know all the stories, didn’t know any of them before I read the little explanations underneath each one, but it was like I could feel a story behind them. I knew Murkoph wasn’t scarred just to be scarred. I knew there was a story behind each one. And behind that grin.   E...
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Poetry: Summer Morning After a Heavy Rain

Writhing Earthworm on a hot sidewalk Heat drying Your protective slime I toss you into the grass For those I have used As bait.
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Everything’s Connected: Or the Roundabout Ways I Discover Things

I don’t listen to the radio much. Less than three hours a day, and the first hour is mostly a talk morning show. (I love the morning show, but not much music is played.) I pretty much listen to the one station, and every so often, I’ll hop on Pandora or I Heart Radio and listen.   So, how do I find new music? In so many ways. I have picked up lovely new tunes through many various avenues. For example, thanks to Jeri Smith-Ready’s SHINE, I am now a fan of Glasgow band, Frightened Rabbit. All it took was a mention, and I got curious enough to search iTunes. Now I’m in love, hehe! I discovered the awesomeness of Within Temptation in a similar fashion. I was sitting in the car bored, waiting, and I pulled out my phone to look up anime music videos on YouTube. As an already confessed Final Fantasy fiend, I searched out FF videos. I came across a FF: Crisis Core vid set to Within Temptation’s Angels , and was blown away. I got chills watching that video, and I had to hear more...
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The Writer's Voice Contest Entry

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Okay, now that I can breathe, yay! There's an awesome contest going on, and I got in by the skin of my teeth! Here's the details: “The Writer’s Voice” is a multi-blog, multi-agent contest hosted by Cupid of Cupid’s Literary Connection, Brenda Drake of Brenda Drake Writes , Monica B.W. of Love YA , and Krista Van Dolzer of Mother. Write. (Repeat.) . We’re basing it on NBC’s singing reality show The Voice, so the four of us will serve as coaches and select projects for our teams based on their queries and first pages. And here's my entry! INSATIABLE YA Contemporary Fantasy 68,000 words Query: Every night when the houselights go down, seventeen-year-old kinetic Charlie Brimm secretly feasts on the brilliant auras of the human crowd around him. Their music-heightened, upbeat energies replenish Charlie’s own rapidly depleted energy, keeping him alive and healthy—if not completely satisfied. Then Charlie meets bard-faery and rock singer, Len. On...
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