April News

Hello, friends. I hope you are all staying safe and sane in these strange times.

First, ICYMI, my biggest news this month as I finally completed a first draft of Going Forth by Day, the sixth and final book of The Order of the Four Sons series. I shared a new excerpt earlier this month. I have started revisions this week. I'm hoping for a summer release. We'll see how it goes.

If you are looking for reading material, I received word this month that copies of my e-books are now available through libraries affiliated with Biblioboard as part of their Indie Author project. The books availble for checkout are: The Order of the Four Sons series, Our Miss Engel, The Winter Prince and West Side Girl & Other Poems.

If your local library isn't currently participating, Biblioboard has a form you can submit, requesting that your library be added so you can have access to indie titles. 

I had not been written or submitted any new poetry since November since I wanted to focus on finishing the novel. As it nears completion, I am looking forward to getting back to poetry.

I had other pieces that were scheduled to be published this month, but due to COVID, delays in printing were inevitable. Some of the publications are exploring offering online versions instead of print. I appreciate all the editorial and design folks out there working to keep art and literature flowing into the world-- now is the time that we need it most.

And thank you, dear readers, for all your support. Be well.

Poems for the Urban Soul: Concrete Oracles, by Matthew J. Lawler

Matthew Lawler’s collection of poems is, primarily, a love letter to Chicago. We are all irrevocably shaped by the places where we grew up. As such, these poems are also an urban anthropological catalogue, as well as an elegy, and a memoir. The collection opens with an opus about youthful, sun-drenched summers, playing basketball, smoking weed, trying not to get into trouble even as you test boundaries and try to figure out who you are.

These poems are unmistakably a young man’s journey, confronting gangs and violence, caught between the desire to be strong, to find acceptance somewhere, and to avoid terrible outcomes. Lawler introduces us to window washers, the homeless, bums, veterans, addicts, gang members, victims of violence, and brutal cops. There are suicides and absent fathers. It’s the great paradox of cities that people are most lonely when they’re surrounded by a sea of humanity. Lawler probes that idea by showing these relationships, how people try to connect even when it ends in heartbreak. But it also celebrates the deep love of platonic relationships between men, whether it’s between peers, mentor figures, (as in “The Drifter”), or depicting male family members like Uncle Len in “Everyday Heroes.”

This collection is a meditation on mortality. Aside from witnessing many friends die young, Lawler developed juvenile diabetes. Some of the poems detail his experiences with the onset of the illness and subsequent hospitalization. Nothing will give you an adult outlook like illness, which forces us to face our body’s frailty. “Broken Body” particularly resonated with me, describing his physical symptoms, being mired in “continents of sweat.”

Lawler’s bio said he started out with an interest in rap, and you can definitely see how these poems, with their rhymes and repetition, share DNA with rap lyrics. He also embraces old forms, like sonnets and villanelles. His work is blunt—he says what he means, there is no ambiguity.

As a city kid myself, these poems spoke to me of experiences that my cousins and uncles may have shared. I appreciated Lawler’s tenderness with subjects that are near and dear to my heart. If you’ve ever loved a city, if you grew up in one and still find faded graffiti on your soul, these poems are for you.

Concrete Oracles was published by Alien Buddha Press. It is available for purchase on Amazon.

Book VI - First Draft Done!

Hello, friends! Today is my birthday, and I got the best gift an author could ask for-- a complete first draft of my latest book.

Going Forth by Day is the sixth and final book of The Order of the Four Sons series. At the moment, it clocks in at 179,290 words. To celebrate, I thought I'd share a new excerpt with you.

My plan now is to let it breathe for a few weeks, then go in and do revisions. Then let it breathe again for a month. (Writing a novel sometimes is like making a very, very special loaf of bread-- you have to punch the dough down and let it rise.) Then, maybe, just maybe, I'll have a final draft done by July, and the book ready to roll before August.

Until then, here's a sneak peek-- SPOILERS AHEAD.

The geomancers expanded the laboratory, creating a wide space in which to conduct the Sarosh trials. They had drawn their usual painstaking series of symbols on the floor, inlaid four concentric circles of silver. The center circle was empty. Kate stood in one, the geomancers in another. In the outermost was Murphy. He had volunteered for the job. When others had protested, he had pointed out, very sensibly, “It can’t be Emily or Justin. If something goes wrong, we need them to take charge. I’m the one who backed Kate on this, so let me do it. Let me be the redshirt.”

He stood, arms crossed, watching as Dion got the bottle down from the shelf. Dion set it carefully down in the center circle and backed away. Once he was within the safety of the geomancers’ circle, he intoned, “Release.”

The curved neck of the bottle straightened, revealing an opening in the side. A little wisp of smoke floated timidly out. “My lords?” Its voice was very small in the wide room. “Didst thou summon Sarosh? What wouldst thou have of me?”

“You said before that you have no master or mistress at present,” Dion said.

“No, my lord,” the spirit sighed. “Sarosh is all alone.”

“Completely alone? You have no spirit compatriots to work your mischief with?”

“No compatriots, my lord.”

“We’ve brought you here to determine if you are worthy to serve us—that is, to serve Miss West.”

Sarosh rose hopefully and swirled about the inner circle. “To serve Kate West?”

“Yes. Do you swear not to harm her?”

If it was possible for the spirit to gasp, it would have done so. “Sarosh would rather be pitched into the darkest chasms of oblivion than to bring harm to Kate West! Sarosh would rather be confined to yon foul bottle again for a thousand, thousand years than to bring harm to Kate West! Sarosh would rather—”

“Just answer the question, spirit,” Dion said sharply. “There’s no need for your histrionics.”

Sarosh cowered. “Forgive me, my lord. Never, my lord.”

“And you will not bring harm to anyone else—either directly or by treachery?”

“Only at Kate West’s command.”

Throughout this exchange, Kate had been looking back and forth between the geomancer and the spirit. Now, Dion nodded to her. She took a deep breath and stepped into the center circle.

Again, Sarosh rose, coalescing more fully in the narrow space, a pair of eyes forming at the center, the rudiments of a face.

“Sarosh,” Kate said formally, the words borrowed from some of Doug’s notes on spiritism. “I would have you as my familiar spirit. Before these witnesses, do you swear to be faithful and obedient, to tell me no lies, to honor and serve me, from this day until either my death, or until I release you from said vow?”

The eyes floating before her flashed. Tendrils of mist encircled her, reached longingly for her. “Oh, yes, Kate West! Let me prove to you my quality. I will carry out thy every command to the syllable. I will serve no one but thee, faithfully and obediently, until you would have me no more.”

Kate wasn’t crazy about the next part, but she made herself say it. “And if you displease me in any fashion, you will accept whatever punishment I deem fit?”

“Yes, my enchantress, my lady, my mistress! Gladly, I would cede my fate to you.”

Kate did not turn around, but she could only imagine Murphy’s expression right now. “Let’s just skip the titles, okay? Kate’s fine.”

“Yes, my Kate,” Sarosh sang happily.

“Good enough.”

“But let it be so, in actuality if not spoken! Let it be so, and Sarosh will fly between high heavens and wide infernos! What feats would we not accomplish, thee and me?”

“Okay,” Kate held her hand out to the spirit. “Let it be so.”