Factions of a dWARf: Blurb and Chapter 1 excerpt

Blurb: In 1565, a dwarf conquistador sired a daughter with a Timucuan princess. Four centuries later, ancestral ghosts unleashed by a genetic memory drug possess Alice, a dwarf member of a fertility cult. The ghosts wreak havoc on Alice’s personality, but they also help her machine gun her way through rival cult factions and succeed her mother as the cult leader.

Note: I use an experimental technique for text to speech readers — the colon, in my text, would be replaced by a voice code (possibly the color code of the colon) and indicates speakers other than the main character. Ereaders ignore the colon, as is.

Chapter 1 (excerpt)

dWARf’s log— Whoredate XX-XXX

A portrait of light and shadow hangs on the wall and while I slept, someone hung the lady. She was framed. Mom said she had a surprise for me today; before she and Vane tramped off to The Castle, Ybor’s cyber-gothic dance club. One must surmise, the painting pertains to the surprise. Smoke graces the beauty built for noir as it rises from the gun and my thoughts shoot to Vane, forty-five caliber thoughts.

Only the glint in the portrait’s eyes reminds me of me. I’m no beauty. Girls like me can’t dream of being Snow White; we’re stuck being the dwarf. On a silver screen, Vane could pass for a Golden Age queen of noir. Me… I’m built more for another role 🙂 Lumpy Footstool.

I should wake Mom and ask her about the painting, but I rather poke digits into my digital diary. The painting can wait. Mom wants her little fish to nibble at the bait, but I’m reluctant to give her the satisfaction. Her trap tangles me in a no-win situation. She’s evil and I bet she’ll make me dangle on the hook until I ask. Mom!

—

I hope Vane left you with a hangover and I hope she’s got a worse one.

:She did, and she probably does.

Who had the privilege of driving you two boozy floozies home?

:The Blonde Manatee.

The who?

:Daryl Hannah, on steroids.

You must mean Lil, the giant blonde who wrote an essay about mermaids.

:Yes, and she’s just one of my students at my beck and call and if you don’t keep your voice down, I’ll call up my legion of coeds to come squash you. Why did you wake me up?

I know all about your mutant warriors, Professor Z, but who’s the woman in the picture?

:Oh, I forgot.

Ow! Why did you smack me in the nose?

:I mistook it for your snooze alarm, let me sleep.

‘Til when?

:Nine.

It’s six minutes past that hour, now.

:Dick weasels, Alice! Why didn’t you wake me up earlier? I expect a guest. She said, she’d arrive at ten.

Now, that you’re up, tell me about the painting. I sensed you set a curiosity trap, so I considered not asking. After my morning chow and my morning chores, I changed my mind and put faith in you having a hangover. Who’s coming?

:You’ll obtain an answer upon time of her arrival. Let’s talk, while I eat. Grab me a banana, perc my coffee and I’ll meet you in the dining room. Make extra coffee. Our guest may wish for a cup and I may need a double. Don’t forget the water and the aspirin. We can discuss the portrait after you serve me a jizz of joe. Hop to it.

Yes, Master, lowly daughter bring Queen Mom emergency hangover kit. Night after Vane, standard issue.

—

Will you keep it here?

:No Alice, treasures belong in safer places, not an unguarded house. I’ll sit. You can stand and examine. Give me the banana.

Okay. You gonna dawdle, or tell me who the portrait portrays?

:She’s the Russian Belle, and she taught Tampa’s mafia boss, Charlie Wall, how to pimp. Charlie had a head for numbers, but he lacked insight on the rube. Madams turn rubes into rubies.

I can’t imagine why you’ve told me this whale of a tale, but many girls can cast a stupidity spell and transform geniuses into witless penises.

:You perceive the key to men, but a Madame must also hold keys to her whores. Own the store, whores owe, and you own the whores. The warehouse can hold drugs, but a smart Madame utilizes safer wares. Examine Belle’s dress and tell me what resides on her left breast.

A spider web stitch.

:You begin college, next week; you will join my sorority soon, but Lambda Lambda Pi differs from the other Greeks—it has roots to an ancient cult.

Belching baloney. Vane’s just a foot short of being Rasputin and she’s suspicious enough to belong to a cult, but I don’t consider you cult member material. Dwarfs don’t belong in cults.

:Forget Vane and remember dwarfs can walk in line with the norm; a short stride still reaches the same destination. For centuries, many cultures considered dwarfs as sacred and magical. Cults often feature a dwarf.

Even if that’s true, I still sense a prank and I’m expecting a sucker punch, not a punchline.

:How can I make you believe me? I showed you the stitch and you’ve seen what Dahlia sews onto her dresses. Dahlia tailors gowns for the Red Carpets of Hollywood and Broadway; consequently, you should ask why she also designs for someone such as myself.

Dahlia showed me her stitch, but I still expect a hoax.

:I predicted your disbelief, so I called a celebrity in whom you could trust.

Who?

:You’ll find out when she arrives, but I’ll give you a hint. She’s a famous movie star and you admire her.

I don’t admire many if any, movie stars.

:You mistake starlets for bimbos and forget many possess a brain.

Not many.

:While we wait for her to arrive, we’ll talk in greater length, on the subject, of Belle Orloff and Charlie Wall.

I saw a documentary on the Tampa mafia, so I heard about Wall.

:Let me familiarize you with the Russian Belle and then I’ll expound further upon their connection.

She’s either a hooker or a Madame; inasmuch you mentioned how she taught Charlie how to pimp.

:Yes, and she owned a brothel in Jacksonville.

She must have done well; those clothes didn’t come cheap.

:We call that a Widowmaker dress. All proper for a funeral parlor or a saloon.

The gun makes a nice accessory for murder.

:Yes, it does, but let us move on to what links Charlie to Belle. After a night, in Belle’s brothel, Charlie got the boot from his military school. Belle recognized Charlie’s potential and taught him tricks of her trade.

The documentary said he ran a gambling operation.

:Numbers made Charlie—the Bolito King, but the Russian Belle taught him how to rule the underworld. You need more than sluts, slots, and suds to run a Black Market; big winners bring in the rubes and you need a slick whore to work the winners. That’s where the stitch and Lambda Lambda Pi comes into play.

So the slick whores belong to Lambda Lambda Pi and they all where the spider web stitch. A slick slut society.

:Close enough. We prefer to call ourselves the Hands of Fate and we rock the cradle of history. The sister of Constantine the Great and his wife acted as our first founders. Both tried to poison—doorbell. Go see. I’m sure you will trust a famous woman more than your own mother.

Hedy Lam—-

:Yes, and you’re Alice; the dwarf I’ve heard so much about. She may have you beaten you by an inch, Zinka.

Recurent Punishment for Childhood apraxia of speech

I may have solved an ancient mystery — why I was mute as a child. Prior to the Civil War pushed the South was richer and more educated but it took more than a century for the South to recover and that explains the lack of resources my parents had to get help for their mute child which is me.

I’ve been punished several times for a problem present since birth. My early mutism apparently retarded my social development. In my original novel (the second in the series due to my writing a prequel) the main character is unable to talk thru most of the book and mutism will play a role in the third novel if I manage to write it. This post is an, about the author, post and shows why mutism plays a role in my novels. Writing this post also helps me keep a record of when I discover new info about my problem Discovery came when I searched for speech disorders among Native Americans. Apraxia may be slightly higher among Native Americans according to this link.

It seemed likely that my speech impairment descends from my, difficult to understand, grandfather and his Native American ancestry. My family can likely claim to be the last of the Timucuans and speech problems are rather high among my maternal grandfather’s family. I have a long list of punishments stemming from this childhood ailment which snowballed into a social anxiety disorder and I will make this plea once again, Stop the torture of dumb retards, like me. Dumb as in mute and, retard as in slow.stunted development, are not derogatory terms.

Stop the torture of Dumb Retards, like me

The Nazi doctors and Fort Hood shooters of the US military medical corp and Veterans Administration have reaped recurrent torture upon this particular retard over the course of several years. I may have finally found a decent doctor, but only time will tell and doesn’t excuse the unnecessary torture subjected upon me. The term ‘retard’ refers to myself and I don’t consider the term derogatory because it just means delayed development which may cause stunting and dumb refers to my mutism.

Please, Tom Cruise and the Church of Scientology come to the aid of the dumb retard known as M Brace DeFreak against our common enemy — the insane psychiatrists of this world. I’m sorry for my dislike of the book/movie, Battlefield Earth, my subsequential attitude for your group. You guys just don’t seem too open to poor wretches like me.

What happens when a kid suffering apraxia grows into a socially undeveloped adult? Does he get harassed by Black dudes in a Wal-Mart parking lot for not giving off the appropriate social cues? Yes. Does the Navy Nuclear Power Program do even more harm? Yes.

Apraxia to Social Anxiety to Nuclear Meltdown

I’ve been working on an ancient mystery — what caused my childhood mutism and the social anxiety and the nuclear meltdown (in reference to my stay in the US Navy nuclear power program). Couldn’t apraxia cause such a chain reaction? I suspect it could. If you have a child with delayed speech development (such as apraxia) — you’ll need to monitor their social development because the verbal delay is somewhat likely to cause a social delay. Thanks to the doctors of the US Navy and the Veteran’s Health Administration — my life has been hell and I want to breathe some of that hellfire back. Quit hurting the dumb retard that is me.

I may have finally stumbled onto a good doctor after a string of Nazi doctors and Fort Hood shooters — look up his profession and see who the US military considered competent enough to treat mentally wounded veterans. Speech problems appear to stem from my grandfather’s ancestry and I considered his Native American ancestry as the likely choice.  Sequoyah invented the Cherokee Syllabary for which to write the Cherokee language and I seemed to remember that Sequoyah invented the syllabary due to difficulty children had in writing the English language. I’m still not sure if Native Americans have a higher rate of language difficulties, but I’m sure my family has such issues. While researching language disorders among Native Americans, Google showed containing the term, Apraxia’. It happened to be in the Native News of a Seminole newspaper.

Stealing My Ancestors Bones

The Seminoles may have kept a few native girls when they helped wipe out the native tribes of Florida, but I believe my Native American ancestor’s name gives me and my kin more claim to the bones — she had a Spanish name. Seminoles; such as Cowkeeper, hoped to wipe out the Spanish and the native tribes allied with them. My Native American great-great-grandmother probably opted to marry a White man because her tribe was wiped out so my blood quantum may not reach the level for membership to a tribe; even though it is likely I have other Native Americans roots, but the thieving, murdering, claim my ancestral bones and my land.

Luck for the Seminoles; after about five monstrous visits to the Veteran’s Clinic; I finally found an apparently found a doctor who might keep me off the warpath. I still suggest John Cena keep his White Elitist ass out of Florida because one good appointment after many horrible ones, doesn’t keep him safe from the wrath of the Timucuan.

Protecting The Mute

Many of the mythology characters that I have an interest in — act as protectors of children. In my third novel, my main character will act as guardian to an unusually quiet girl she may not be completely mute but she’ll be distinctively quiet. I lived an extended period of my childhood as a mute and there is a temperamental side that has always protected my inner child — the mute.

I write about a fertility cult and sex obviously plays a role, but many fertility deities double as guardians. The guy in the story will be a mute, too. My main character will probably be conflicted about how to handle the guy. Guys don’t fare very well in hands of my cult, but this guy will be somewhat different.

Theoretically Voice Coding A Novel

I have an idea to adjust the text to speech function according to the character speaking, but I lack the power to influence the reader industry. My idea is to use a color coded colon to distinguish the characters. The main character in my novel could use a previously prescribed default to limit the markup. Here’s an example:

The main character says this and can possibly be left unmarked.

:The secondary character is marked by a color coded colon and theoretically a color coded period could act as the end mark to switch the voice back to the default.

I don’t need a separate narrator because my novel uses the first person perspective, so others would probably use a color coded colon to mark all characters. Reducing the markup is the Ideal strategy. The colon is used by playwrights, but I’ve found it best not to skip a space after the colon renders and the color code eliminates the use of the actual name. Characters still need an introduction such as, “What’s up, Harry,” but that’s no big deal.

TTS apps tend to voice out things such as underscore which is the reason I used the colon, but I’m sure alternative methods exist.

Almost Certainly Blackballed by Literary Agencies

I decided to send out one more query and the traffic on my blog shows someone went to a badmouthing post, in the day between submission and rejection. The literary agent who stirred my wrath got rightfully dismissed, but I figured I would receive blowback. It could be that the rejection came because my novel doesn’t work, but it seemed coincidental that someone browsed that post in such a short period of time.

I would prefer publishing the best book possible and I considered the traditional route offered an improved quality. Paying an editor when you don’t know if the book would make money even if it was a masterpiece — seems pointless. I don’t have money to waste. Self-editing has limits and finding someone attuned to my style may be problematic; even though, my style probably fits Chuck Palahniuk or Tom Robbins category. Finding someone with editing skills and fitting of such a style it isn’t easy without money to throw around or a literary network of friends.

The reason I stopped editing was the lack of concentration made it more likely I would cause more harm than good. Editing the same material over and over again causes extreme burnout. I’ll probably search for suitable beta-readers, but the process is likely aggravating and aggravation isn’t something you want from an unprofitable hobby. Mistake in by blog doesn’t concern me much, but the book needs quality editing — what a pain.

Invasion After Invasion

Florida history is filled with invasions and no family has seen more than mine. Even the Seminoles are invaders to my land. My ancestor’s tribe was obviously more native than the Seminoles because her Spanish name indicates she belonged to a Spanish allied tribe; the Seminoles hated the Spanish and helped wipe out their native allies. My Spanish ancestors are documented her long before the Seminoles split off from northern tribes, so while I come from the blood of Spanish Conquistadors who invaded this land; I also have that Native American blood that entered the region before the Seminoles, but not necessarily before the Spanish. The Yamasee and other tribes invaded Florida before the Seminoles

Bloody invasions have been replaced by passive-aggressive invasions, but the invasions continue. I’m alien to the foreign masses who inhabit my native land. I call myself a Timucuan because the Spanish primarily settled in Timucua provinces. Apalachee, Ais, and others are also possibilities, but I accept the most likely tribe as my own. The invasions and the resulting philos-aphilos has inspired my novels, but the alienation has damaged my motivational spirit, so two novels sit in the last stages of editing. One may even be finished, but I have a tendency to dabble.