Author: Joseph Carrabis

A Hawk Waits

The patience of The Wild always impresses me.

Especially when waiting for a meal.

I’ve seen creatures from the very small to the very large become quiet, become so still they are whispers against the wind…

then move with a ferocity and tenacity which is terrifying.

One of my proudest (read “most vain”) moments was realizing I could move faster than a wild animal could follow.

Part of which came from realizing what types of motion their eyes were designed to capture, something which goes back to my studies of Jerome Lettvin’s Frog’s Eye Concept, a fascinating discovery probably lost in time (MIT 1959 What the Frog’s Eyes Tells the Frog’s Brain).

Basically, we see what we’re trained to see.

In some ways, this is obvious. A trained surgeon sees disease where untrained people don’t, a trained plumber sees a leak in the making where the untrained see a sweating pipe.

Take this a step further and we learn our training affects our decision making; the brain changes incoming sensory data to fit expectations, likewise, our expectations cause us to only perceive certain data.

Adds a whole new level to Believing is Seeing, doesn’t it?

I make use of Dr. Lettvin’s Frog’s Eye Concept in The Inheritors

The Librarian closed the hatch. She reached over and opened it again. “Bertrand?”
The Librarian’s pale, hairless, babe-like head and pulsing eyes poked up through again. “Yes, Resa?”
“You can see after images, can’t you, when something’s hot enough?”
“Yes, Resa.”
“Can you see anything here?”
“No, Resa.”
“Are you sure? I think…I thought…someone was here, something which produced enough heat to keep me warm in the night.”
“No, Resa. Who do you think it was?”
She hesitated. “I thought it was the Christian Devil.”
“I would not be able to see it, real or not, Resa.”
Resa focused on Bertrand’s eyes, looking to see if the Librarian joked or not. “What do you mean, you wouldn’t be able to see him, real or not?”
“That creature’s origins are from a belief system different than our own. It cannot exist for us because we have no reason for it to exist.”
She nodded. “Yes, of course. You wouldn’t react to him. You have different mythical systems and no meme to contain it. The Frog’s Eye Concept.”
“Dr. Jerome Lettvin. Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 1959. “What the Frog’s Eye Tells the Frog’s Brain.”

As noted earlier, Believing is Seeing.

 

Terry Lohrbeer Interviews Me on Kickass Boomers!

Yes, I’m a Boomer.

I’d like to think of myself as more of a Budda-Boom than a straight Boom and, at my age, I’ll take what I can get.

In any case, Terry and I had a great time and covered lots of my history, writing, creating, and letting people know life begins when you want it to, not because somebody tells you it should.

Listen on Terry’s Kickass Boomers site.

 

A Tale of Six Publishers – Part 2

Make sure their in-house stylebook/author’s guide suits your work, human editors beat machine editors, and definitely make sure the editor they assign you is familiar with your genre

(oops! this was suppose to go out last week. my bad. sorry.

Part 1 of this series covered my entry into the world of noveling, and the first quote-publisher-unquote who wanted my premier novel, The Augmented Man. I shared three critical issues to ask any publisher before signing with them:

  1. Marketing – how would the publisher get word of my book out to potential readers?
  2. Distribution – how would the publisher get my book into potential readers’ hands?
  3. Career Development – what would the publisher do to help me become a better author?

This post deals with publisher #2 and critical issue #3 from the list above

Nutshell takeaway: Publishers interested in developing you as an author put their own money into it. You’re an investment. They work with you to develop your craft and help you learn how to improve your craft because they know, in the end, they’ll make more money from an author with developed talent than an author with stalled talent.

 
I became careful investigating publishers due to my experience with publisher #1. Investigating before entering into any kind of agreement with an unknown entity (organization or individual) is called due diligence. I was learning that the publishing landscape changed since my 1980s-based experiences, and due diligence became one of my tools in seeking out publishers.

Before submitting to publisher #2, I asked around in writers groups, message boards, talked with the people I’d be working with, et cetera.

One anomaly occurred: Someone praised the publisher on one board. Their praise was so over-the-top I asked if they worked for the publisher.

No, they didn’t.

But when I looked through the publisher’s staff, there the praiser was. In charge of acquisitions. Meaning they’d have the deciding vote on whether to send my work up the chain.

So I asked via the message board if this individual worked for the publisher.

Well, yes they did, but they got the job slightly after they responded to my initial query.

Okay, such happens. Several 1980s trade-technical authors put me on their letterhead because I was so well recognized in the industry.

Onward and Upward.

Publisher #2 read my The Augmented Man and asked if I had other books ready to go.

Specifically, they asked if The Augmented Man was the first in a series.

“No, it’s not.”

Could I make it into a series?

“The protagonist completes his growth arc at the end of the novel. I’m not sure how to develop him further from there.”

Did I have other books available?

“I have Tales Told ‘Round Celestial Campfires and Empty Sky ready to go and two others ready for editing.”

They sent me a contract for a five book deal.

I was thrilled. I was ecstatic. I was humbled. I was honored.

Now let me tell you how I was damn near screwed.
Continue reading “A Tale of Six Publishers – Part 2”

Busy Days in Raccoon Town

We are known by the Old Ones.

In our backyard, they gather for their feasts.

Being known by the ancients can be wonderful.

And wonderfully terrifying.

As I noted in The Shaman

CHAPTER 123 – THE FROG
I drive back from the Y, late Fall, late morning, and come around a curve as a frog hops into the road.
I swerve, drive on, complete the curve, pull over, stop.
The frog continues its journey into the road.
Others will not care if this one completes its journey or not. Some might see its movements against the wet tar of the road.
Two cars come around the curve in my rearview mirror.
I get out of my car, trot back up the road, find the frog dead, crushed and flattened, three-quarters of the way across.
I grieve. I should have acted sooner. I know what is important and what is not.
I cry, ask Frog’s forgiveness for not taking care of its shadow.
Sunlight comes over the hillock blinding the curve, shines on the grasses opposite me, steaming where the frog might have been.
A mist rises.
Shapes.
Coming forward.
Old Ones.
The First Ones.
The Ancients.
The True Ones of which all else is Shadow and Myth, a harmony of human and animal energies so I can understand.
A’blig’moodj, The Frog Prince, the one of whom one of my teachers is a shadow, walks forward, holds its hand up to me.
Behind him, beside him, Wolf, Bear, Stag, Eagle, Lion, Hawk, Moose, Whale, Dolphin, Salmon, Oak, Ash, Thorn, and more lost further back in the mist.
A Council of All Beings.
A Council of All First Ones.
A’blig’moodj’s mist forms around me. It takes my hand. I hear it inside me. “Do not grieve, Gio. This one was old and could not survive another winter. It is good he comes Home now.”
I fall to the pavement, shaking, terrified. To be in the presence of such energies. My bodies can not stand.
A’blig’moodj lifts me, holds me, stands me beside him. “You are known to us, and we thank you.”
It returns to The Ancients.
I crawl to my car, unable to drive, barely able to breathe.
To be known by The Ancients.
And live.

 

My “The Bone and The Bear” now on Tall Tale TV

I love it when a favorite piece gets published.

The Bone and The Bear took a while to find a home, and find a home it did.

Note to authors and writers – to all creatives for matter – keep at it. Sometimes it’s exhausting finding the right one – in love, in life, in publication – and there’s always one out there.

You can hear The Bone and The Bear on any of YouTube, Facebook, on the Tall Tale TV website, and as an MP3 podcast.

Chris Herron, publisher of Tall Tale TV, thinks so highly of my work he even created a YouTube playlist of my stories he’s published.

Nice to be honored like that, isn’t it?

You can also listen to it here (again thanks to Chris Herron):

Enjoy!