Lunch With the Jr. Editor
Lunch Today
Today for lunch I made a tough decision. And no, it wasn’t a decision between pastrami on rye, or the famous Ruben, no this decision was about taste, and class. You see the place I went to eat is a forbidden place. It’s a place shrouded in accusation and innuendo and rumor. My friends laughed at me and made me feel the fool when I revealed that I still ate there. This place is supposed to be morally, if not physically of limits. I should, apparently, pretend to hate it as much as my friends and associates do. But the problem is, I don’t. I truly enjoyed my time there leisurely eating my lunch over a book. It reminded me of afternoons back when I worked waiting tables. The subtle sounds of light lunches frying and boiling in the kitchen, the muted conversations of split shifters on break enjoying their own lunches and bitch fests, and other patrons like myself all made me feel more comfortable about being there. They were familiar sounds but by far not the reason I made the choice to stop there today. I went because I love it. I always have loved it and I decided, while driving through late lunch/early off/heading in traffic that I was going to go on in. I decided that I wasn’t going to stop going just because it’s expected of me.
What place? I can hear you screaming at me. Well it’s Denny’s if you must know. I know some of you, ignorant as I was on the subject, may not know that the corporation had some legal issues with discrimination. In 1993 the corporation was faced with some tough issues over discrimination. They wound up settling for something like $54 million dollars. Was this an admission of guilt? Maybe so, maybe not. Some, like pappy11 from My3Cents.com and Professor Randall Dunham of the esteemed University of Wisconsin in his paper “Denny’s & Racism: These Issues Will Not Go Over Easy” claim the discrimination is ongoing. For more information you are going to have to Google the issue yourself. You are all big kids now. I’m not here to do your research; I am here to tell you a story …
… Where was I?
Oh yes, I am supposed to skip my favorite breakfast anytime joint because some joker in Deep South Screw Up ‘Ville got jacked up in the restaurant one night. If I was going to stop going anywhere due to perceived discrimination it would be that IHOP joint, not Denny’s. Denny’s has better food and a better menu. I like the place better and that’s just it. I can either go to IHOP or one of the “other” joints but I simply don’t want to. I like Denny’s and I didn’t realize until today how much. I was feeling so nostalgic I didn’t even order the breakfast I went in for, I decided to give them a chance and I tried the Buffalo Chicken Wrap. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it.
I solemnly vow that I will not turn my back on my favorite establishments, if I like it, because of something that happened to someone else in some far away Podunk burg. I will continue to take advantage of your delicious 2-4-6-8 menu as long as you continue to offer it during those lazy late lunch afternoons when everyone important is too busy to see me there. Because I like the breakfast and it gives me a comfortable, soothing place to write. Be ready dear friends and fans you may be treated to a few more lunches with the Jr. Editor courtesy of the fine folks at Denny’s.
Oh, P.S.:
Buy our books!
Davin Kimble-Jr. Editor
And … the Winner is …
Winner. It’s a word we all love to hear. I know that I love to hear it. When someone says, “Wow, you’ve done a great job, you win. I get a little giddy to be honest. I, personally,( let’s not get this mixed up with any official stances on winning from my employer Open Heart Publishing or any of its subsidiaries.), feel that winning is indeed everything.
We here in the great state of Texas have an almost unhealthy obsession with two things. Our lawns and our football. Neither are about the grass or the sport played on it. Maybe the sport influenced the lawn obsession. If your grass looks like a football field, around here you are winning. And that, is what this is all about WINNING!. Unhealthy obsession or not it’s the bottom line.
Winners get all sorts of perks. The spotlight is on you and you have to produce the same winning heart and attitude. And when you do that successfully you feel even more the winner. Unhealthy cycle or not, we all want to be the winner.
Our current winner is Eric Trant. Eric took a resounding victory in our “An Honest Lie Volume 1: Encouraging the Delinquency of Your Inner Child” contest. And he will tell you it took some effort. Now he is beginning to reap the benefits of that effort. I asked Eric a few questions about what it took to be a winner.
Open Heart Publishing: In An Honest Lie Volume 1 you blessed us all with the gem of a tale Apple Tree. What was your inspiration for that story?
Eric Trant: My stories write themselves. I remember starting Apple Tree having no idea where I was going. All I knew is there were two boys running down a trail in the woods going somewhere important — to see an apple tree — and my muse latched onto their coattails and hung on until the end. My inspiration, of course, was my own childhood. We always had someplace to go, not much time to get there, and the places we reached were magical and far more important than all those places I go these days, in adulthood, in that same big hurry.
OHP: Right I get that. I am only now remembering what it was like to be a kid with some where important to go. When they get there your magnificent tree is split into two branching sides. The left still held a fruit. Did you split the remaining fruit to the left side of the tree in reference to the Left Hand Path?
E.T.: Going through school, I remember my teachers always asking questions like that, regarding symbolism and what the author meant. Even back then, in high school, before I really got to writing, I always figured (I’m from Texas, so I “figure”) most authors don’t think about all that stuff. If they do think about it, the magic gets twisted and lost the way you might try to organize dandelion seeds that are still on the stalk. As soon as you touch that dandelion seed, it plucks off and floats away and that’s it, the magic’s gone. So I don’t think on these things, I don’t touch the thoughts after they’re thunk. I hold it up and say, “here it is, there you go”, and if that’s what it means to you, that’s your dandelion, and I didn’t muck it up by trying to make it into my dandelion.
So no, to me the branch was to the left for no other reason than that’s where it was in my head. I had to look up the Left Hand Path, even. When I first read your question, I thought you meant The Path Less Travelled.
But to you, to Davin, and maybe to other readers, sure, that apple’s the Left Hand Path. It’s whatever you need it to be.
OHP: In the end Melvin makes a terrible mistake. What do you, as the author, think would be the outcome of that mistake, for Melvin, Danny and the rest of the world?
E.T.: Oh, man, spoiler. Good things would come of it. I frankly never thought of it as a mistake, but rather another step in our journey, nothing more.
OHP: Your victory in the first An Honest Lie competition was a great one. It’s a long competition so what advice would you give the Authors of the upcoming An Honest Lie Volume 2: Delusions of Insignificance? A
E.T.: Thank you! I enjoyed the experience and the energy surrounding AHL Vol. 1 and allowed myself to be excited about my story, and quieted that little voice that’s in all of us saying, I’m not good enough, I’m not good enough.
That, for me, was the biggest roadblock. It still is: Shutting down my Inner Doubter. Last night I met a published author selling her books at a festival here in my hometown. My wife broke the topic that I write, and that I’m published, and she nudged me into talking with the author. I wasn’t going to mention that I write. It embarrasses me. I can discuss working out, or sports, or math, or programming, or woodworking, and none of that bothers me. But writing, that’s a private thing for me. Talking about my stories and what I write is almost like discussing the intimate details of my sexual preferences. It’s a tough thing to do! In public! I can write about writing, hide behind the anonymity of printed words, but to discuss writing, face-to-face, with other people listening and hanging on your words… So you ask for advice, and all I can shovel out is this: Quit being shy. Talk about your work. Talk about your writing. Don’t listen to advice on what you should write — everyone will tell you what to write, ignore them — but listen to what they say about authors they love and hate. You don’t need to discuss current works, but know your genre, have a few snips of what sort of work you write, and be proud of your accomplishments. That’s the advice I give myself every day. I took that advice on AHL Vol 1, and it worked out all right.
OHP: That’s great advice.I like the way you roll. Can we expect to see something from you for An Honest Lie Volume 3?
E.T.: Don’t forget AHL Vol 2! I have a story in there, too, and it’s my wife’s favorite story. She loves it, printed it out and showed it to all her friends at work. I’m thinking I have a few sales already made for AHL Vol 2.
OHP: Yes you wrote “One Small Step“. That is one of my personal favorites.
E.T.: Now, for AHL Vol 3… I sure hope I can get something in AHL Vol 3. Certainly you, the editor, will see something, and if it passes muster we might see it printed up for a nice hat-trick of short stories with Open Heart Publishing’s AHL series. I already have some ideas, and I am considering hosting a blogfest to generate submittals from my fellow writers online. Yes, you’ll see more of me.
OHP: That sounds great. We are looking forward to working with those we’ve already published and we are looking forward to reading some of the stuff ya’ll recommend. As the winner of the first An Honest Lie competition you will be the recipient of a book deal with Open Heart Publishing. Can you leak any information about what we can expect?
E.T.: Ah, the book, the book, my debut novel though it’s not the first book I wrote. I have several books in various states, from half-baked to well-done, from too-short to too-long. I have one, though, that I wrote in the Fall of 2009, in that just-right state. It’s still fresh enough to me that it’s not boring, but it’s edited enough that I can clean it up and submit it quickly. I’ve tried to talk about the book, and when people ask what it’s about, I stumble (see advice to talk about your work!)
I say, “Fiction. Fantasy. Not high fantasy, no elves or anything, but there’s some magic in it. Not witch magic, but, you know, something that is imaginary. Magical dreams and this naked angel, and a blue-faced and expressionless God. It’s about two men who have had enough of this life. All they want is to get to the end as fast as possible and at their funerals their friends and family will gather around and say, Thank Got that’s over!
It’s about finding hope even in a hopeless situation. It’s about the fact that everything happens for a reason, even bad things — especially bad things, those things you think should never have happened to good people — and about going on even when there’s no place to go except the next step, onward ho.”
Here’s an excerpt from Evander’s Forge, the novel I plan to submit for publication:
http://diggingwiththeworms.blogspot.com/2010/06/blogfest-dream-sequence.html
OHP: Oh, wow. That’s fantastic, and you are getting rave reviews. We can’t wait to see more. Well we are looking forward to working with you in the future. How can your fans find more of your work?
E.T.: You can always check my blog: Digging With the Worms.
I’ve thought about changing the name to EricWTrant.com or something, but the name — Digging with the Worms — means something to me. The worms are my muse, and I feel like I owe them the respect, at least, of a blog of their own. I’ll probably get my own website soon, for the book and for my other writings. I don’t plan to only publish one book and quit, you know. I plan to be around for a while.
OHP: I’m a fan.
Davin Kimble – Jr Editor.
Eric Trant earned a BS in Chemical Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin in 1994, and is the son of a librarian and English teacher, who shared with him her love of reading, writing, and above all, storytelling. Each morning he rises well before the Texas dawn, and in the quiet writes thousands of words. He is self-taught.
Raised during his formative years in the East Texas Piney Woods, and then later in a small town on the Texas Gulf Coast, Eric maintains an avid fascination with outdoor living. Eric’s blended perspective of rural, small-town, and city lifestyles is at the heart of his stories, often leading the reader deep into the woods where as a child, he and his brother discovered so many wonders. He now lives near Dallas, Texas, where he continues to explore the world around him.
He holds a U.S. patent for a statistical outlier algorithm, and has received numerous technical recognitions as a semiconductor engineer. His most-prized award is a simple plaque reading Anyone can be a Father, but it takes someone special to be a Daddy. This plaque sits on his desk, in front of the embossed US patent.
Eric’s professional career covers a broad range of experience, including over twenty years of writing. As a freelance writer, he has dozens of short stories and five novels to his credit.
Inside the mind of Patrick Scalisi
Things are really humming in the Open Heart Publishing hive right now. The band is up and we are doing the dance let me tell you. We’re coming up on it fast so just a few things before I introduce you to our next author.
Remember you can pre-order your copies of An Honest Lie Volume 2: Delusions of Insignificance in our store and while you’re there you can see what all the hype is about and pick up some of our other books. Also, if you want updates about what’s to come follow us on facebook and twitter @ohpublishing
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And now allow me to introduce you to Patrick Scalisi. Patrick sent us a great tale called “The Registry of Lost Socks.” It’s a thrilling tale of lost and found and they way things get that way in the first place. You will never see lost laundry in the same way again. And now … Patrick Scalisi.
Open Heart Publishing: What do you feel is a delusion of insignificance?
Patrick Scalisi: This is definitely a misguiding phrase. I think most people — myself included — automatically see the word “insignificance” and assume the worst: weakness, a tendency toward introversion, etc. Thinking about the whole phrase, though, I think it takes on a different meaning; I think it means that a person is stronger than he or she may know — but hasn’t realized it yet. This is certainly true of Peggy Hawthorne, the heroine in my story, “The Registry of Lost Socks.”
OHP: What is An Honest Lie?
P.S.: An oxymoron for one — certainly one of the coolest literary devices in the English language. As a definition, I would say that it’s a lie we tell ourselves so often that we come to believe that it’s true. It’s the airs we take on when we’re in the company of others — the armor, the masks. It’s what we are when we’re with everyone but our most trusted loved ones.
OHP:Why do you feel the need to write?
P.S.:For me, there’s something endlessly fulfilling about creating a world from scratch. That would probably explain all the projects I’ve started but never finished. Starting something — be it a writing project or a book or a video game — always delivers the best rush.
OHP:Have you ever contemplated becoming involved in a revolution?
P.S.:There’s a Billy Joel song called “Angry Young Man” that really sums up how I felt in adolescence. I was going to fight every battle I could: ageism, freedom of speech, censorship, the right of 16-year-old teens to see R-rated movies without a parent or guardian. I’d like to think I’ve mellowed a bit (“I believe I’ve passed the age of consciousness and righteous rage,” as the song says), but I’m still concerned with freedom-of-speech issues and censorship. These are two things worth revolting for.
OHP:Do you think writers should call Ernest Hemmingway, Papa?
P.S.:The man had such a patriarchal beard! But I think there are other, more important writers that might deserve that particular term of endearment. Speculative fiction — which are the genres I’m most interested in — owe a lot to Poe and his contemporaries. Plus, there are the true greats to consider: the Beowulf author, Chaucer, Milton, Shakespeare. Hemmingway is one of the pantheon, certainly. I’d be proud to call him cousin, or even teacher.
OHP:I agree completely. But I too am a fan of Speculative Fiction. Why did you decide to submit your work to An Honest Lie?
P.S.:I was not familiar with An Honest Lie or Open Heart Publishing until the publication was featured on Duotrope Digest. The theme of the anthology intrigued me, but I wasn’t sure if “The Registry of Lost Socks” would fit. I was actually on the verge of not submitting until I read the description to my girlfriend, and she convinced me to try. “Socks,” at that point, had been rejected from about 18 markets.
OHP: We thought it was a great read, creative and original. Besides writing, what other sorts of deviant behavior do you happen to enjoy?
P.S.:I’ve always been a real movie buff. I worked for Blockbuster Inc. for six years while in high school and college, which afforded me five free rentals a week. After I resigned, not having those free rentals was like trying to quit a meth habit. I also like to visit historical sites and museums, and I like to get outdoors to hike when I can. I recently discovered an activity called Letterboxing, which involves searching for stamps in waterproof boxes that have been hidden in public places. You keep a log of the ones you’ve found, but you also get to discover some neat places that you may have passed a hundred times but never explored.
OHP:Do atheists pray?
P.S.:Prayer by definition indicates an entreaty to a higher power. Most atheists would vehemently deny belief in any kind of god, but I suspect they have just transplanted a traditional deity for one of modernity: technology, science, communications, etc. The idea of praying to the God of Genetics or the Heavenly Host of the Internet is intriguing — very cyberpunk, very William Gibson/Neil Gaiman.
OHP:Besides short stories what other writing endeavors are you currently engaged in?
P.S.: My biggest writing project right now is a Weird Western collection of five short stories and one novella. The stories take place in a traditional Western milieu where cars have replaced horses. Right now I’m procrastinating working on it in order to do this interview. I’m on the third draft and would like for the collection to be complete in the next few months so I can begin searching for a literary agent. Besides that, I have another short story — a ghost story — that I’m trying to publish and an idea for a sci-fi/cyberpunk story knocking around in my head.
OHP:Are there any authors, besides yourself, that you enjoy reading?
P.S.: The first “big boy” author that I read was Terry Brooks, and he’ll always have a special place in my heart. The Sword of Shannara was a very formative novel for me, especially when I discovered the back-story behind how Brooks struggled to get it published. Since then, I’ve really come to like (in no particular order): J.R.R. Tolkien, William Gibson, Ian Fleming, Stephen King, D.M. Cornish, Jonathan Stroud, Frank Herbert, C.S. Lewis, Alan Moore, Terry Pratchett, Patrick Rothfuss, J.K. Rowling and dozens of others.
OHP:Who would you say is your writing mentor/hero?
P.S.: Definitely Stephen King. I’ve been writing since childhood, but never with much conviction or with any clear idea of what I wanted to do with my work. I told myself that I was going to be a famous author someday, but never made any strides to even become published. Around 2007, I read King’s On Writing, which is both a very clever autobiography and a writing manual. That book really opened my eyes. I realized that if I wanted to become a writer, I really needed to take it more seriously. I started writing short fiction and published my first story titled “Warded” in Twisted Dreams magazine in the summer of 2008.
OHP:Do you have a writing nemesis?
P.S.: I have an absolute loathing hatred for James Frey. What he did with A Million Little Pieces was such a blatant breach of the covenant between writer and reader that to me it counts among the capital sins of writing. If I had my way, the man would never be allowed to publish again. Yet people continue to defend him and his work, and he keeps getting publishing deals while so many up-and-coming writers continue to struggle. Yeah, I’m a little bitter about the whole thing — even though it happened like a million years ago.
OHP: What do you feel about the following quote “Imagination is more important than knowledge?”
P.S.: The two should never compete with one another; they go hand-in-hand. Often the best ideas come from a bit of knowledge gleamed: some new scientific discovery, an obscure bit of history, etc. Knowledge and imagination are the yin and yang of the creative process.
OHP: Where do you believe humanity is headed as a whole?
P.S.: That’s a pretty loaded question. In a nutshell, the whole thing is very strange. Every day, you read about terrible things happening all over the world: rape, murder, genocide, war, environmental disasters, and so on. But then you hear about some guy who stopped to help a woman whose car had broken down on a remote road; or a doctor who perfected bionic legs for a cat; or a celebrity who did something for charity quietly with a real motivation to help his or her fellow man and not as a publicity stunt. For all the bad things that are happening, good things are happening, too. The universe is constantly trying to keep itself in balance.
OHP: Where do you draw your inspiration from?
P.S.: The very best inspiration comes from asking “What if?” questions — and again this may have been something I gleaned from Stephen King’s On Writing that I found true in my own creative process. For instance, what if my laundry room was populated by sentient appliances that occasionally stole my garments? Most of my story ideas come from learning or reading about something and then asking a “What if?” question.
OHP: In your opinion, which is the more important discovery of humankind: plumbing or the written word?
P.S.: The written word, without a doubt, followed closely by the printing press. You know, I recently read an article about a British survey that ranked the iPhone as number eight among the greatest inventions of all time. The iPhone?! Do these people realize that without the written word, without the printing press, there would be no iPhone? And if we have to read a book (or use our cell phones) while visiting the outhouse, then so be it.
OHP: According to Anatole France “To die for an idea is to set a rather high price on conjecture.” In your opinion what do you believe is worth dying for? What do you believe is worth living for?
P.S.: I guess the best answer to this question is that individuality is worth dying for. You could say that justice, the arts, principles — that these things are worth dying for. But all of these concepts are really subjective. Are individual. My idea of justice may differ from yours, and so on. I do, however, believe that creativity is worth living for. Whether it’s the visual arts or music or the written word — when you find something that speaks to you, you know you have on some level touched the rest of humanity. And maybe even the divine.
OHP: Mark Twain once said, “You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.” What do you believe he meant by that?
P.S.: Every bit of stimuli that we encounter each day is an opportunity to spark our imagination. Artists get their ideas from everywhere, often from the most mundane everyday things. Our eyes — and indeed all of our senses — work hand-in-hand to make us the creative people we are.
OHP: Most people have two stories for doing anything: a plausible excuse and the real reason. Why do you really write?
P.S.: As Indiana Jones once said, “Fortune and glory, kid. Fortune and glory.”
OHP: Amen brother, Amen.
Davin Kimble – Jr. Editor
Patrick Scalisi is a magazine editor and aspiring author from Connecticut. His writing career began when he started composing stories about his favorite video games and movies on his mother’s word processor. Since 2008, he has published fiction in several outlets, including The Willows, Twisted Dreams and Space Westerns. He is also working on completing a novella. When he’s not writing, Pat enjoys watching way too many movies than are good for him, reading more books than he has shelves for and listening to music (his tastes range from classical to classic and modern rock). Visit him online at www.patrickscalisi.com
And Now … Our Fearless Leader Debrin Case
We here at Open Heart Publishing have had a ton of work on our plates but one bite at a time deadlines are being met and production is moving forward. With everything coming up on us in the next weeks I wanted to, halfway through; introduce you to our fearless leader, the Dictator of Deadlines, Debrin Case.
I remember when I first saw the friend request from An Honest Lie in my Facebook in box. I thought, “What the hell is an honest lie?” I’m glad I did the research because I was more than pleasantly surprised at what I found. There are so many small publishers out there, and I’m not one to point fingers, but Open Heart Publishing struck me immediately as one of the better ones. At the time Debrin was hiring and I was determined to get in on the Publishing business so I sent him an email. It wasn’t long before he got back to me and within a week he’d given me a call. I remember one of the first things he said to me was,
“I have to warn you I get a bit nervous around new people and when I’m nervous I cuss.”
It seems like such a small thing but it made him more real to me, more human, more accessible than the other interviewers I’ve had to deal with. I didn’t get the job then but Debrin and I remained in contact. When the time came he called me first and I appreciate it.
Debrin is a man with a focus and a plan and he does a fantastic job of bringing us all together to accomplish our goals. He may seem gentle and unassuming on the surface, but don’t be fooled he has an iron will and a remarkable depth of talent. He graces the Pages of An Honest Lie Volume 2 with a tale called Learning to Pray. today though we are going to talk to him about Open Heart Publishing and what exciting things are in store for us. But I’ll let him tell you about it.
Open heart Publishing: So you are the man who started it all. I feel I would not only be remiss if I didn’t ask, but I might get a few less than pleasant emails as well, so, what do you feel is a delusion of insignificance?
Debrin Case: I feel it would be a travesty for me to interpret the meaning of this year’s theme or the masthead . This is something I would rather leave to the interpretation of the individual reader as opposed to defining it and ruining all of the fun.
OHP: I can understand that. What is An Honest Lie?
D. C.: Like a Delusion of Insignificance, I feel it would be a travesty for me to interpret the meaning of this year’s theme or the masthead. This is something I would rather leave to the interpretation of the individual reader as opposed to defining it and ruining all of the fun.
OHP: Looks like we are going to be sticking with the party line on that one. But I asked him! No angry emails! Open Heart Publishing and the An Honest Lie anthologies are becoming pretty popular pretty fast; tell us something about where you are planning to take them in the future.
D.C.: AHL is heading into its second volume and wow what a great collection of authors we have found for our readership this year. It does my heart good to see a new cast of amazing authors to work with for volume 2, and as we get ready to embark on volume 3 it can only get better. As to what else to expect from Open Heart Publishing, the best advice I have is to keep checking us out. A wonderful collection of short stories from C.B. Calsing entitled All Along the Pacific will be available later this year, the winner of AHL Vol. 1 will be announced, yet another wonderful opportunity project, and of course Volume 2 of An Honest Lie should be available by late October.
OHP: I can hardly wait; it’s looking pretty good right now. Is your desire to publish other writers as strong as your need to write?
D.C.: Absolutely, in some ways it is even stronger. They are both important sides of me and my own personal missions of creating accessible fiction, and to promote and find new authors.
OHP: I’ve read some of your work and I know what’s waiting in the wings as far as Open Heart Publishing goes, I find your imagination fascinating. Where do you draw your inspiration from?
D.C.: Like all artists, and the rest of humanity, my inspiration is an amalgamation of everything I intake into my life. Whether this is through food, drink, music, movies, T.V., books, internet, conversations with strangers, moments of road rage… etc, in the end everything I do is a byproduct of everything I have consumed.
OHP: so many bathroom jokes and waste to writing comparisons to make, so little time. In your opinion, which is the more important discovery of humankind… plumbing or the written word?
D.C.: Definitely plumbing. Though I would like to believe that the written word has changed the world far more vastly than any other human invention, it has also brought about more debacles, damnations and epiphanies than any other invention before or after. Yet, it is in fact plumbing that has done more in the ways of health, safety and the unity of mankind than was ever dreamed of before. Just like pants that go on one leg at a time, so too do we discover that everyone goes to the bathroom and perhaps this could be the very medium by which world peace could be achieved.
OHP: People miss the simplest things sometimes. Are you a writer or a publisher first?
D.C.: I am dictator first, everything else is highly suspect.
OHP: Are there any authors, besides yourself, that you enjoy reading?
D.C.: There are thousands of authors out there besides myself that I love to read. Too many to list and to many egos to inflame or deflate by a mere mention or deletion from that list. I am a voracious reader, and in fact often read books without trying to discover anything about an author before I devour their work.
OHP: Who would you say is your writing mentor/ hero?
D.C.: My writing heroine is Ariel Gore, her book How to Become a Famous Author before You Are Dead is like a bible to me. I read it far more religiously than I ever read any assumed to be “Holy” text. If you are an author or a publisher and have not read this book, then stop reading this article now and hit Google, or whatever search engine you prefer, and find out more about this amazing book right this second. Seriously, you won’t regret it.
OHP: I haven’t read it yet … I know, I know. Do you have a writing nemesis?
D.C.: I sure do, and I have to see that bastard every morning when I get out of bed and wander my way into the bathroom. If you never realize that you are your own worst critic and at times your own worst enemy then perhaps you need to reexamine your artistic endeavors.
Being an artist is about introspection, and introspection is not as easy as getting your temperature taken, on the contrary it is more akin to exploratory surgery on a primitive battlefield where the doctors are still blissfully unaware of the concept of infections caused by dirty hands.
OHP: Indeed! I know how much work goes into producing an awesome literary product; do you have any advice for aspiring publishers out there?
D.C.: Keep to your deadlines. Nothing else matters above your word and keeping to your deadlines.
Is your life in shambles, can’t pay the rent, need a new car… tough shit, keep to your deadlines.
The world is doomed, the wrong political candidate won the election, there is a race of mutant rats overthrowing your city… ah well, stick to your deadlines.
An author needs an extension on their piece, an artist is having issues, your printer is going away on holiday, who cares… Keep your deadlines.
OHP: Why do you feel the need to write?
D.C.: Communication. Communication and communion with the rest of the human race is the endeavor of all people the world over. Whether this is via speech, interpretive dance, collages, decoupage, crochet or writing the need is the same it is in its presentation where we discover all of the dissimilar ways in which we are so similar.
OHP: Besides short stories what other writing endeavors are you currently engaged in?
D.C.: Tons of them. Currently I am working on 4 different books, and I am preparing 3 more volumes to be published this year by Open Heart Publishing.
OHP: It has been a pleasure picking your brain. Just a few more questions; what do you feel about the following quote “Imagination is more important than knowledge?”
D.C.: I believe Einstein was more accurate than he could have ever dreamed, and as the day’s move forward into months, then years, decades and eventually eons we will see just how far down the rabbit hole we can go while taking what we perceived of as reality along for the ride.
OHP: According to Anatole France “To die for an idea is to set a rather high price on conjecture,” in your opinion what do you believe is worth dying for? What do you believe is worth living for?
D.C.: I believe that everything is worth living for, I have yet to find one truly worthy reason to die and for this reasoning alone I am currently refusing any model of living which concludes with such an outmoded way of thinking.
OHP: Mark Twain once said that “You can’t depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus.” What do you believe he meant by that?
D.C.: There is a bigger picture in all things with which you may be blissfully unaware at any given moment. As such you aren’t always seeing or understanding what is actually going on at any moment. Pay close attention to everything and all of the details. No matter how unusual, bizarre or even downright ordinary things may appear… they aren’t. They never are.
OHP: Most people have two stories for doing anything… a plausible excuse and the real reason, why do you really write?
D.C.: I write, therefore I am.
Or is it; I am, therefore I write?
Or is it simply, I enjoy telling a story whether good or ill conceived and in the end I want to get paid for it?
Yes to all of the above, and then a whole bunch more that I am quite sure would quite easily become a philosophical debate about the existence of bubblegum on the dwarf planet of Pluto and how that is causing certain politicians’ to vote no to better funding for public education art programs.
OHP: There is a great deal of talking going about your book “A Children’s Book of Necromancy”, I hear that anyone that reads it can become quite powerful and even learn how to raise the dead. Is this true?
Absolutely, Davin. “A Children’s Book of Necromancy,” is absolutely the most important coloring book ever to be published, and I personally promise with absolute barnum sincerity that anyone who reads this book will be able to raise the dead.
If you want to know more about this amazing volume visit the official website here, and you can also visit us at Animefest 2010 in Dallas,TX where you can meet myself and Darcy Melton (the illustrator).
OHP: We are coming up on the publication day for An Honest Lie Volume 2: Delusions of Insignificance very fast. Do you have any plans for a third volume?
D.C.: Yes I do, but you will have to wait until next year to hear more.
Debrin Case has been making the story more interesting since 1970!
Debrin Case holds a B.A. in English Literature and is currently the founder/publisher of Open Heart Publishing, a company that promotes, showcases, and opens doors for new authors with its annual anthology
“An Honest Lie,” but also for children through its charitable project called, “The Opportunity Project.”
Additionally, Debrin oversees intuitive writing workshops, writes grants for charities (non profits and artistic endeavors), and is an experienced storyteller, ghost writer, and fiction writer.
Previously held the positions of editor for Hedge Wizard Press, and also co-editor for Red River Review.
When asked of the validity of his tales he will normally reply,
“My stories are 50% bullshit… and the rest is questionable, but at least they are honest.
http://debrincase.com/
