Monkey Mind

I've been reading my blogmates' entries about lockdowns with interest and sympathy and some fear. We are doing better here in Arizona, quarantine-wise. This sunny southwestern state has lifted its mandatory restrictions (though mask-wearing is widespread and still required by most public buildings and businesses). Outdoor temperatures hover around 90º F for a high every day. My husband and I are fully vaccinated now, and I've actually gone out to eat with similarly vaccinated friends a couple of times. I've been asked to do a book talk at an outside library venue early next month and I said I'd love to. I see light at the end of the tunnel, though I expect I'll be wearing masks around strangers for the foreseeable future. 

It won't be long until our weather becomes so hot that doing anything outdoors for any length of time is impossible. I can only pray that when it happens we haven't become so cavalier in this state we have to lockdown again as well.

I'm already half-crazy as it is. 

When I was lunching with author friends yesterday, discussing our works-in-progress, as one does, I had to admit that I'm suffering from a bad case of monkey mind.  I have a finished manuscript awaiting acceptance, and in the meantime I'm trying to start another project – "trying" being the operative word, here. I've begun three different stories: another Alafair Tucker mystery, a fourth Bianca LaBelle Hollywood mystery, and a third novel that is so different from anything I've ever written I expect if I manage to finish it and find some way to get it published, I'll have to use a pseudonym. I can't concentrate on any of them for very long. I can't concentrate on anything for very long. 

I'm alarmed by my inability to stick with a thought. My poor mind jumps around from one thing to another like a monkey in a tree. I'd tell you more about it, but I have to do something else. Maybe later...

By the way, a lovely interview with me appeared April 9th at Marshal Zeringue’s Campaign for the American Reader in which I answered this very question and a few other fascinating queries about Valentino Will Die. You’ll be surprised at who I identify with…

Strange Days

 I (Donis) came very close to missing my day to post. I literally didn't know the date – and I don't mean just what date I'm supposed to post. These days, I often don't know what day of the week it is,  or the date, and sometimes I even forget the month. As I posted two weeks ago, I am now fully vaccinated and could carefully begin integrating into the world again, but I find I have forgotten how to do that. The idea of going out to lunch with a friend fills me with trepidation. I suppose the only way I'm going to get over that is to actually do it. If I can find a brave friend who is willing to go with me. Who should I ask? I've kept in touch with friends by email, Skype, Facebook and Zoom, but I haven't seen any of them in the flesh for over a year. Have they changed?  Sometimes I feel as though I've aged ten years during the last year.

This feeling  hasn't been helped by the fact that I've been a bit ill lately. Nothing serious, I think, just allergies, but bad ones, with knockout sinus headaches, fatigue, swollen eyes, even occasional nausea and vertigo. The irony is that this allergy attack began exactly two weeks from the day I had my second COVID shot, so I didn't even get to celebrate my new immunity. 

I'm feeling better now, thanks for asking. I've done a couple of Zoom classes for local writers' groups and written several articles and guest blogs to promote my February release of Valentino Will Die. Just today (March 31) my guest article for Marshal Zeringue's My Book, The Movie blog came up.I got the chance to pick the guy I'd like to play Rudolph Valentino if my book Valentino Will Die were made into a movie! And it took a while, but I think I've found my fictional silent screen adventuress Bianca LaBelle. Check it out here to see if you agree with my casting. 

In my waking life, I'm living in a timeless, immobile place on the earth right now, but in my dreams I've been traveling the world, looking for something. Monday night my husband and I were searching around the Italian hills on a Vespa. I was in South America, looking for I don't know what in the Amazonian jungle. Last night I was hiding from the Nazis in the German forest with a group of other women, looking for a way out, or waiting to be rescued. These are strange days. I don't know know what I'm hunting, but I'm certainly scouring the world to find it.

Hamster on a Wheel

As usual, I'm under a deadline and feeling desperate to finish the second installment of my new Bianca Dangereuse series, which is ironic because I just finished the launch events for the first installment, The Wrong Girl. But that's the way it is on the writing merry-go-round. At this point I don't have many launch events left to do - a couple of local talks on Mar. 11, which is the day before I fly off to San Diego for Left Coast Crime, one of the premier author/reader mystery conferences! I'll be on a panel called Hooray for Hollywood: Tinsel Town as a Setting (and what a setting it is!) on lucky Friday the 13th at 4:00 p.m. along with fellow mystery authors, multiple-award-winner Kellye Garrett, Sherri Leigh-James, and Phoef Sutton. I don't get to go to many conferences, so I'm crossing my fingers that everyone who lives in my house stays healthy and nothing weird happens so that I have to change plans at the last minute, which has happened to me far too often.

Speaking of weird things that interfere with one's writing but must be dealt with - February is going to be very doctor-y around here. My husband is having minor surgery on the 12th (pacemaker replacement), and I'll be chauffeuring him to surgery, the follow-up appointments, and a couple of eye-shots (yes, if you have certain eye problems, the current treatment is to get shots in you eyeballs.) on Feb. 17th, 19th, 25th, and 27th. He actually was scheduled for a different minor surgery last Monday, but (long long story) it ended up getting cancelled at the last minute. We're looking forward (irony alert) to having that rescheduled.

Ending on a much more fun note, I recently got to do a Page 69 Test for The Wrong Girl, my mystery set in 1920s Hollywood. What is the Page 69 Test? It's a test to see if page 69 of your novel is representative of the rest of the book. Marshall Zeringue posted my page 69 test - and guess what? Yes, page 69 is an important turning point for the main character in The Wrong Girl. You can read my page 69 test, which of course includes the entirety of page 69, here - https://page69test.blogspot.com/2020/01/the-wrong-girl.html