New Addition to my Writing Pantheon

We welcome and beg mercy from Titivillus, the lord of typographical errors, delinquent letters, and superfluous language!

Legends say he lurks in monasteries, whispering into scribes' ears and filling his sack with the errors they make. No doubt we've all had run-ins with this mischievous "patron demon of writing errors," but perhaps by including him in my list of patron saints, gods, and spirits of writing, he will be appeased and leave us in peace?

He is known by other names throughout the world as well:


Chochlik Drukarski - Poland;
Tryckfelsnisse - Sweden;
Trykkleif - Norway;
Sætternissen - Denmark;
Painovirhepaholainen - Finland;
Gazapos - Spain;
A Nyomda ördöge - Hungary;
and Druckfehlerteufelchen - Germany.

No wonder, with crazy, unpronounceable words like those!!

Check out my whole list HERE, and, as always, feel free to contact me if you know of a writing-related patron, deity, etc. that I've left out.

Or read more about Titivillus at these sites:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Titivillus

http://www.waywarde.com/titivillus/titivillus.html

Evil & Villains

It turns out that Book 2 may turn out quite a bit darker than Book 1. That might raise an eyebrow or two among those who have been Beta-reading for me, since Eyes of Stone isn’t exactly fit for children in the first place. Well, guess what? It surprised me, too. I’ve finally gotten around to introducing my villain in my new book, and frankly I’m a little shocked at him. He’s a bad, bad man, and it’s only chapter three. Things can only get worse from here.

I love how my own writing can surprise me, how I can start out with one idea of how the story will go, then watch helplessly as it takes on a life of its own and goes marauding off in a completely new direction.

Writing Levi (new bad guy – one of them, anyway) got me thinking about the definition of ‘evil.’ Personally, I have always defined evil as ‘unmitigated selfishness.’ People who are evil, truly evil, have no concern for anyone else. Every bad thing they do is justified and necessary for realizing their own goals. But there’s more to it than that.

In doing some research on the subject of evil, I came across this: Dr. Michael Stone’s Scale of Evil. I mostly just copied this from his website/Wikipedia (links follow). I thought it was pretty interesting, and perhaps it will be useful to others who are working on their villains.



1. Those who have killed in self-defense, and who do not show traces of psychopathy.

2. Jealous lovers who committed murder, but that although egocentric or immature, are not psychopaths.

3. Willing companions of killers: Aberrant personality, impulse-ridden, with some antisocial traits

4. Those who have killed in self-defense, but had been extremely provocative toward the victim for that to happen.

5. Traumatized, desperate persons who killed abusive relatives or other people, but who show remorse for their crime and are not psychopaths.

6. Impetuous, hotheaded murderers, yet without marked psychopathic traits.

7. Highly narcissistic, but not distinctly psychopathic persons—some with a psychotic core—who kill persons next to them, with jealousy as an underlying motive.

8. Non-psychopathic persons with smoldering rage, who kill when the rage is ignited.

9. Jealous lovers with marked psychopathic features.

10. Killers of people who are “in the way,” such as witnesses. Extremely egocentric, but not distinctly psychopathic.

11. Psychopathic killers of people who are "in the way," such as close friends or even family members.

12. Power-hungry psychopaths who kill when they are "cornered.”

13. Psychopathic murderers with inadequate, rageful personalities, rage being the reason of their killings.

14. Ruthlessly self-centered psychopathic schemers who kill to benefit themselves.

15. Psychopathic cold-blooded spree killers or multiple murderers.

16. Psychopaths committing multiple vicious acts, with repeated acts of extreme violence.

17. Sexually perverse serial murderers: Rape is the primary motive and the victim is killed to hide evidence.

18. Psychopathic torture-murderers, where murder is the primary motive, and the victim is killed after a torture that was not prolonged.

19. Psychopaths driven to terrorism, subjugation, intimidation, and rape, but who stop short of murder.

20. Psychopathic torture-murderers, where torture is the primary motive, but in persons with distinct psychoses (such as schizophrenia).

21. Psychopaths who do not kill their victims, but do subject them to extreme torture.

22. Psychopathic torture-murderers, where torture is the primary motive. In most cases, the crime has a sexual motivating factor.


My villain falls somewhere along the 19-21 range. How about yours?

TV show site for Most Evil

Most Evil - Wikipedia

Last day to submit to the Angry Robots!

It's March 31st, and you have precious hours left to submit your magnificent, wonderous, amazing, ground-breaking sci-fi/fantasy/horror novel to Angry Robot Books.  I got a request for the full manuscript, and so can you!  Good luck to everyone who entered; may all of our inboxes be flooded with gushing emails of adoration and publication offers.

Angry Robot Submission Guidelines


Don't like robots?  Well, here is a list I've put together of some other publishers who also accept submissions sans agent, and links to their guidelines pages.  Bear in mind I write predominantly fantasy & horror, so this list is mostly related to those publishers who work with those genres.  I plan to submit my MS to some (or possibly all) of these, should the Robots find Eyes of Stone lacking.  Good luck to all!

PYR Publishing

DAW Books

TOR Books

ACE/ROC Books

Otherworld Publications  (Not currently accepting submissions, but they do from time to time)

Bell Bridge Books

Farrar, Straus, & Giroux

Black Rose Writing

EDGE Publishing

Baen Publishing

The Mary Sue Litmus Test

Is your character a 'Mary Sue?'  Find out!  I found these quizzes online and while I wouldn't say they're 100% accurate, they'll definitely help you refine your characters.  Most can be applied to both original & fanfic characters, although they are geared more toward fantasy/paranormal fiction.  Some of the stuff is pretty obvious (is your character named after you, does he/she consider her exceptional beauty to be a curse, etc.), but other questions really surprised me.  Who knew that being abused as a child contributed to Mary-Sue-ism?  While I never really considered any of my characters to be 'Mary Sues,' these quizzes definitely made me take a harder look at them.  I even made some changes to my MC based on some of these tests, and I think the whole story is better for it.


http://www.springhole.net/quizzes/marysue.htm

http://www.katfeete.net/writing/marysue.html

http://www.ponylandpress.com/ms-test.html

There are lots of other tests like this out there, but I like these the best because they don't require me to do any math.  I click yes or no and it tells me at the end how saccharine and predictable my character is.  Enjoy!

Writing gods

I've compiled a list of all the writing gods, mythological figures, and patron saints associated with writing, the alphabet, poetry, storytelling, etc. I could find.  I've been creating jewelry based on each of them, as an homage to all those aspiring authors, linguists, archivists, scribes, etc. who have come before me.  At first I meant to make a necklace, but as my list grew, it ended up being a 3-foot chain with dozens of pendants on it.  I sometimes wear it while I'm writing in hopes of inspiration, but it's so heavy now that I just leave it up in my library, hanging from a sconce as part of the decor.


So far, I have a total of 31 gods/patrons/etc. from all over the world (I've lumped the Muses together as one 'goddess').  It's taken me months to compile, and I'm sure I'll be adding more later.

If anyone knows of any others, let me know and I'll be glad to add them to the list!

Here is my current list, in alphabetical order.  I've included their alternate names, regions, and some have items/symbols/animals they are associated with:


1.  Athena (Greek)/Minerva (Roman) – goddess of wisdom, the arts – owl


2. Bragi/Bragr (Norse) – God of poetry & eloquence


3. Brigit/Brigid/Bridgit (Celtic) – goddess of Inspiration, Poetry, Healing, Smithcraft and Martial Arts. Brigit’s cross, Brigit’s knot


4. Brahma (Hindu) - supreme god of the East Indian trinity; brought knowledge of letters to human race.


5. Cadmus (Greece) – brought alphabet to Greece


6. Cangjie/Ts’ang Chieh (China) – Invented Chinese alphabet/characters


7. Fu-Xi (China) – Invented Chinese alphabet –8 trigrams of earlier heaven, calabash


8. Ganesha (Hindu) – god of wisdom, intellect, art; lord of beginnings & success; patron god of writers


9. Hermes (Greek)/Mercury (Roman) – Inventor of the written alphabet, god of writing/literature, speech, travelers, treaties, dreams


10. Inanna/Ishtar (Mesopotamian/Sumerian) - Goddess of Words, Language, Syntax and Meaning. Stole tablets of destiny – 8-pointed star/rosette, lion, knot of reeds


11. Itzamn/Itzamna (Maya) – invented writing & the calendar. Mayan calendar, compass; north= white; east= red; south= yellow; west= black


12. Manjushri (Buddhism) – bodhisattva of writing, poetry, and knowledge – sword, lotus, lion


13. Muses (Greek) – Calliope – epic poetry/literature, Melpomene – tragedy, Euterpe – lyrical poetry/singing, Thalia – Comedy, Clio – History, Erato – erotic poetry, Polyhymnia - Sacred hymns/sacred oetry, eloquence Theatre masks, scroll & quill, boots, writing tablet, flute, ivy


14. Nabu (Babylonian) – god of wisdom & writing – tablet, stylus


15. Nisaba (Sumerian) –Invented writing – Hair, crescent moon, corn; - rhodochrosite


16. Odin (Norse) - god of wisdom, poetry. Inventor of Norse alphabet - raven


17. Ogma/Oghma (Celtic/Irish) – god of knowledge, eloquence & poetry – Ears & tongue linked with chains of gold & amber


18. Philyra (Greek)/Merope (Roman)/Klymene/Clymene/Hesione – goddess of paper, writing, healing and perfume. Invented/taught humans to make paper


19. Quetzalcoatl (Aztec) - serpent god; founder of Aztec culture; patron of priests, the inventor of the calendar and of books, and the protector of goldsmiths and other craftsmen


20. Saga (Norse) – goddess of sagas


21. Saraswati – (Hindu) – inventor of Sanskrit; goddess of creativity, wisdom, speech, learning, arts; patron deity of writers, poets, students, artists, musicians, etc.,


22. Sequoyah (Native American) - invented alphabet for the Cherokee and taught his people to read. First with pictographs and symbols adapted from English, Greek and Hebrew letters, altered to represent spoken Cherokee language


23. Seshat (Egyptian) – goddess of writing & history, inventor of written characters and mathematics, measurer of time, patron of architecture & libraries, record-keeper of the gods - Papyrus, Palm stem, 2 horns facing down/crescent moon


24. Sint-Holo (Native American - Cherokee, Chicasaw, Choctaw, Creek) - God of Language, Intelligence/Wisdom, Writing, and the Alphabet. Horned serpent


25. St. Frances de Sales (Catholic) – patron saint of authors


26. St. Jerome (Catholic) – patron saint of librarians, archivists, and translators


27. Tahmurath (Persian) – demons taught him the art of writing in 30 different languages in return for sparing their lives


28. Tenjin/Tenjin-Sama/Sugawara no Michizane (Japan) – god of writing, poetry, scholarship; taught humans how to write – bull, ume tree, Tenjin Temple


29. Thoth/Tehuti/Djehuty (Egypt) – god of wisdom, reading, writing, oratory, & scribes. Inventor of hieroglyphics; “lord of the holy words.”


30.  Titivillus - lord of typographical errors, delinquent letters, and superfluous language.  He lurks in monasteries, whispering into scribes' ears and filling his sack with the errors they make. "Patron demon of writing errors." Also known as: Chochlik Drukarski - Poland; Tryckfelsnisse - Sweden; Trykkleif - Norway;  Sætternissen - Denmark; Painovirhepaholainen - Finland;  Gazapos - Spain;  A Nyomda ördöge - Hungary; and Druckfehlerteufelchen - Germany.




31. Wen Chang (China) – God of wisdom, education, & literature – Pagoda

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