Dead on Arrival by Scotney Storm

Dead On Arrival by Scotney Storm

Where do you go to hide from Death?

When I bought my big beautiful bed, fantasies had fired off my imagination of a cornucopia of wild nights with an even wilder lover. We would twist, roll and pant through countless sexual dances until exhaustion claimed us.

Well, one part of my fantasy came true. I do twist, roll and pant. The Lover?   He is nowhere in the picture.   No, Death has claimed my lover’s place as we wage a contentious battle among my eight hundred thread count floral sheets.   He tries to take what I am unwilling to give. My life.

His arsenal is dastardly and well equipped. My chest roils with pain as a wall of sharp daggers pierces it. I struggle to breathe as fluid surrounds my heart and fills my lungs. He pulls me down into the dark depths of nothingness. I toss and turn, drowning in my big beautiful bed.

My need for air overcomes Death’s wily tactics. Today, like the day before, I declare victory in our long-standing fight.   Sometimes I am not sure the outcome will be in my favor. At times our desperate battle rages on for months with no relief. Other times it lasts for mere hours. I am never totally free of Death. He bombards me with minor skirmishes daily.   Peace? I don’t know what this is. Payne is my constant companion. It is a nagging reminder that every breath I take is hard-won.   So I ignore Death and make Payne my best friend.

The way I see it, if Death wants me so badly he’s going to have to chase my dying ass as Payne and I zip up and down the streets of Hell on my electric blue moped. Life isn’t easy, but the alternative is not an option.

Welcome to my new home, Hell, Texas, population 3,258.

Want to find out more about author Scotney Storm or Brooklyn Sinclair, the young woman who just moved to Hell?  Visit chroniclekeeperz.com.

The Power Of The Written Word

Painting, Konstantin Somov – Lovers in the Evening

I don’t know what made me start thinking one night about the books I had read which impacted my thoughts, behavior or life in some way.  Once I started I could not stop.  There aren’t enough hours in a day to write my complete list so here is a quickie.

Stephen King:

The Stand – After reading The Stand, I couldn’t move fast enough from people who were sniffling, sneezing or coughing.  Didn’t want to touch anything in public either.  Dogs and cars? Sometimes I give them a wide berth too (Cujo, Christine).

Salem’s Lot and Desperation – Small towns?  No thank you!  I don’t want to live in them, drive through them or pass relatively close to them.  Airlines have become my best friend.  Yeah, yeah…I know he wrote a book about that too.

Cell – Now you know why I don’t answer my cell phone.

Sol Stein:

The Husband – It taught me to have sympathy and understanding for the supposed bad guy.  Of course when it happened to me, all that empathizing went right out the window.  I tried to dust the floor with the guy!  The novel vaguely reminded me of Henry Miller’s, Sexus.

Elizabeth McNeill:

Nine ½ Weeks – I must have been about fifteen when I read it.  Boy, did it open my eyes to a sexual world I never knew existed.   Of course I had written erotica since the third grade.  So by fifteen I thought I knew it all.  From a writer’s perspective of course, not experience.  My book debut, Light My Fire, inspired by The Doors and Jose Feliciano, was an instant hit but almost an automatic suspension.

Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Browning:

My Last Duchess, Men and Women, The Love Letters of Elizabeth and Robert Browning, and Sonnets of the Portuguese – It is not so much the books and poems themselves that effected me but the tone and the sentiment that was conveyed in every line.  The love and influence the couple had upon each other is apparent in their writings.  I love poetry, but to this day, never having read those lines since my early high school days, I can still quote “How do I Love Thee” verse for verse.  I wanted a love like that.  Did I get it?  Well…    Their book of love letters also inspired me to write my own;  my first published book, To The One I Love.

Clive Barker:

Books of Blood – Talk about nightmares! This collection of short stories had me screaming in the night but I still came back for more.  Since all his books have the same result, I didn’t bother to list more than one.

Janet Evanovich:

Stephanie Plum Novels –  She taught me you can be destitute, have a broken-down car that probably won’t last more than a few weeks or months, have a ex-ho for a best friend, be resourceful, clueless and still get the job done.  Not to mention have two hot guys chasing after you.

Robin Cook:

Almost everything he’s published:   I learned don’t trust blood banks, organ donors cards, doctors, injections, genetic testing and HMOs.  And for Pete’s sake, never…ever…jog alone, let others breath on you, look at you, or stand next to you!  An ambulance you say?  No thanks, I’ll grab a cab.  His novels gave me “white coat syndrome” for sure.  Unfortunately I don’t regret the introduction.

G.A. McKevett:

Savannah Reid Mysteries – Her books leave no doubt that a curvy girl can have a crazy family, a cheap boyfriend/husband, loyal friends and still kick ass, mentally, intellectually and physically.

John Sandford:

The Lucas Davenport Novels – Don’t get me wrong, I certainly wouldn’t pass up Virgil Flowers, but my ultimate book boyfriend is none other than Lucas Davenport.  He’s large and in charge with a side of nasty.  Rich, intelligent, good-looking; he is a cop that’s not afraid to get his hands dirty or scuff his Ferragamo shoes.  What’s not to love?

Amanda Quick, Emily Bronte, Johanna Lindsey, Emily Dickinson:

Mistress, Jane Eyre, Love Only Once, The Gorgeous Nothings – What girl or woman who reads romance classics and regency romances hasn’t imagined herself  in flowing gowns of ruffles and lace?  Sometimes I am embroiled in a tryst with a dark domineering hero, at other times my imagination runs along the lines of a more genteel setting of balls, tea rooms and quiet longing.

Robert Frost:

The Road Not Taken – Let’s face it, most of us have, at some point, considered the choice of the road not taken.

James Weldon Johnson:

God’s Trombones: Seven Negro Spirituals in Verse – When James Weldon Johnson is mentioned, one of his works that quickly comes to mind is Lift Every Voice (The Black National Anthem).  My favorite however is God’s Trombones.  I still get caught up in this beautiful portrayal of God in The Creation.  The poem also reminds me of Auguste Rodin’s sculpture The Thinker because of the line, “With his head in his hands, God thought and thought, til he though, ‘I think I’ll make a man’.”

The names and titles above barely scratch the surface.  I read more than four hundred books a year so you can only shudder at the thought of what stimulates my actions and thoughts.

Tell me what novels, short stories and poems move you to live, think and act certain ways.  I’d love to know.

What We Want

What We Want by Dawn Gena

We are tenacious, strong, intelligent and resourceful.  

We are the love of your life, the bane of your existence, the center of your world and catalyst of your downfall.

We bear your children and more often than not; raise them alone.  

We fight beside you in wars, on and off battlefields.  

We have overcome the heavy yolks thrown around our necks by society only to have new ones forged by the hands of the cold, calculating and desperate.

We wear numerous hats while living many roles.  

We are rich, poor and everything in between.

We are the colors of the rainbow and Mother Earth.

We are women.

No matter the country, the century, the day of the week…

We all want one thing.

Love.

Frozen, A Writer’s Nightmare

Frozen by Dawn Gena

My chest hurts.  

Breathe.  

I must remember to breathe.  

But I can’t.  

I am frozen.  

Eyes shut tight.  

Body locked.  

Brain shut down.  

Not even sweat has the courage to appear upon my brow.

This is a death not so painful, yet excruciating in its corruption.

This is a life not lived.

This is my life.

Frozen. 

To The One I Love, The Book Trailer

I think book trailers are a wonderful thing.  If you are familiar with Chronicle Keeperz, you know that there is or was a trailer for every book published.  I figured, why break from tradition.  So here it is the trailer for To The One I Love.

Hey!  Why not check out my website!    dawngena@com

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• Trailer Time: Why Bother? (caressingthemuse.wordpress.com)
• Love, Friendship and Murder in Rachel Caine’s Haunting New Book Trailer (io9.com)
• Film Trailer Editing Analysis (spark112.wordpress.com)

 

A Big Kiss Thank You!

Thank you readers!

To The One I Love by Dawn Gena

I want to thank everyone who has downloaded or purchased the romantic prose novella, To The One I Love.  Thanks to you all To The One I Love is #1 in the contemporary poetry category and #6 the love poetry category in Kindle Store at Amazon.com.

A big kiss to all my readers.  Without you this couldn’t have happened.

Related articles

• At the Cafe (adelegenevieve.wordpress.com)
• A Poem of Thanks (thesanctuaryofmyheart.com)
• Love is Poetry (sued51.wordpress.com)
• For the Love of Poetry (twistedpositions.com)
• She only loved through poetry and prose. (itsherlife.wordpress.com)

 

Dawn Gena, Writer

Short video.  Visit dawngena.com

George Lucas or Martin Scorsese would more than likely laugh at my little video but what can I say?  A few authors, including yours truly,  were asked to create some form of media that expressed something about them.   Here is my effort.   Ha, ha, ha…

Visit me at dawngena.com to learn more of what’s going on in my world.