Editing Rant: We Judge Your Emails (J is for Judge)

From the Internet Hive Mind (ICanHasCheezburger.com)

You reach out to an editor/publisher asking to submit a manuscript.

They respond with “We are closed at the moment. Here is how to monitor when we reopen.”

The proper response, if any, is to say thank you.

The improper response is ANYTHING OTHER than thank you.

Even worse when

  • punctuation is optional
  • capitalization is random (Example “I Already finished” “And i’m halfway”)
  • use of emojs … incorrectly
  • verb tense switches within two sentences of the email (At least I think they were sentences, punctuation was optional.)
  • misspellings
  • unclear wording.

No, really, even if we were open for submissions, your manuscript would bounce into orbit if your email communication is anything to go by.

Oh.

AND.YOU.ARE.RUDE.

Like I am going to go through the effort of keeping your fragile ego safe when editing. If you can’t handle, “sorry, we are closed” as an answer, ESPECIALLY when to get our contact information you went to our website where are submission guidelines are listed including the fact we are closed right now, you can’t handle being edited. I correct over 1,000 things EACH pass, and I do more than one pass and I’m one of three editors you will be working with.

Flash: H is for Hand

Mature warning: Dirty language and sexual play between married couple

For A-to-Z visitors: My site has erotica on occasion but hasn’t had any for quite some time. While visiting others, I ran across a spanking blog and remembered I always wanted to write a spanking scene. Feedback is welcome. Most of my blog posts deal with writing; if hard(ish) erotica isn’t your cup of tea, check out another letter of the alphabet. Thanks for dropping by.

Now onto H is for Hand.

The overpowering orange scent of the industrial strength hand soap took the edge off of Deb’s exhaustion. She was getting too old crawl spaces, as her electrical apprentices and journeymen continued to remind her. Direct them, boss them, teach them: they tell her. But sometimes, the only way to figure out the old houses is get into the dirt and grime. Closing her eyes for a moment, she sorted through the rest of her day now that she was home. Make dinner, something microwave like normal, toss the containers and wash the silver wear, curl on the coach with Aubrey for the news, check in on Facebook to see how the kids are doing and TenMax for the grandbaby, then off to bed to start the cycle all over again.

After turning off the water, Deb shook her hands and wiped them on a work towel. Is it good for another day? A quick sniff said no, so she made the trek to the laundry closet. While in the back of the house, she heard garage door open. Aubrey had arrived. Late like usual; they were working her husband to death.

She came to the bend where the door into the garage led into the kitchen-dining room area to welcome him back. He dragged himself into their house and dropped his briefcase inside the door, enough folders shoved inside to prevent it from closing. It was going to be another night of him in bed with piles of paper. At least he was home. Standing on tiptoe, Deb pecked him on the cheek, before asking “Burritos or kung pao?”

Aubrey swayed a moment, blinking. “Oh, um, what was that again?”

“Burritos or kung pao for tonight,” Deb asked, “or pizza, but that will take thirty minutes for delivery.”

“Oh, I guess that first thing.” He meandered over to the eating table and dropped his heavy frame into a chair, leaning forward with his hands covering his face.

“Burritos then,” she said. Just a couple minutes in the microwave the package said, so she cut a vent and shoved it in. “Salad?”

“Whatever.”

“Tough day?” Deb opened the fridge and pulled out the precut salad bag. Taking one look at the slimy mess, it got yeeted into the garbage. “No salad.”

“Meth raid by the cops had four kids in the house,” her husband muttered behind his hands. “We spent the day finding fosters. Then a meeting where they announced another set of cost-saving measures. I think I’m assigned to get the court-ordered separations for the children, but it might be Harry. It’s in the paperwork I’m finishing tonight. Oh, and Harry got the promotion.”

“What?” Deb spun around from where she was watching the microwave do its thing. “But you been killing yourself, doing all those extra hours, been there longer.”

Aubrey sagged back on his chair, his tie sliding to the side of his belly, his jacket flopping to either side. The steeper side of middle age wasn’t as kind to him as it was to her. At least her job gave her exercise instead of stress and coffee. “I asked around, Harry is younger, more powerful, dynamic, confident. True management potential.”

“Lazy, snide, sexist,” Deb ticked off things she personally had observed when the legal support team had come over for after-hours work at their home, since they were the only ones with enough space, “but a champion brown-noser. He would make a good union rep.”

Aubrey barked a laugh. Her husband knew what level of esteem she held the local union officials.

A ding had her plating the burritos and sliding them on the table. Before sitting to join him, she remembered to grab the salsa out of the fridge. Hot for her, mild for him. Tonight his heartburn will be acting up. He was going to pull apart everything he said and did for the last three months, since the Webster announced his retirement.

Deb watched as Aubrey pushed his food around his plate. Over fifty, with an extra hundred pounds, the only saving grace was being well over six foot. She remembered when the extra heft was all muscle, but the broad shoulders had sunk under the weight of years to settle around his middle, filling up cheeks and chins. A permanent stoop pressed his spine, bowing his head. Where had her dynamo gone?

Likely the same place as her brat. How long has it been since she sniped at him? The twins? Matilda slowed things, but the twins dug the grave and buried everything that was them as a couple to be parents. What had she used to call him?

“Well, if you aren’t going to eat, Daddy-o, ain’t no need for you to be sitting here.” Deb stood, grabbed her empty plate and his half-eaten one, and took it to the kitchen area – shoving his into the fridge for later and hers in the sink.

Aubrey, slow on the uptake, still exhausted, blinked. “Wait, what?”

Placing a hand on her hip and thrusting the generous curve to one side, Deb curled her lip. “Whatever for Daddy-o? Why should I wait for anything, old man?”

“Old man…” Aubrey raised his eyes from the table, looking at his wife.

Having his attention, she reached behind her head and pulled out her hair band holding her braids back. Grabbing one, she drew it in front and undid the bottom rubber band, unweaving the braid, adding an extra three inches once completely down. Then Deb did the same with the other, before tossing her head to the side, with a flounce of hair. “I calls it as I see it.”

“Brat,” her husband whispered.

“You can’t call me that,” Deb stamped her foot.

A smile creeped across his mouth. He said firmly, “Brat.”

“No, no, no,” Deb shook her head, her wavy hair flying, “You can’t call me that.”

“Girl, I can call you what I want.” Aubrey stood, slowly, like a mountain rising from the ocean to the sky. “Come here.”

“No!” Though the shout was defiant, Deb took a hesitant step back.

Aubrey’s shoulders drew back, displaying his broad chest. Sure, the weight soften all the edges, but her husband still did all the yard work around the house and helped out with Habitat for Humanity at least once a month, carrying lumber while she worked the electrical for needy families. Under that fat, the muscle remained and his chest, while not displayed to its best because the lack of visible abs, doubled-back in her memories to the monster of a man he once was, and would always be in her thoughts, held at bay by love and kindness.

“Come.” Aubrey pointed to the linoleum in front of him, his voice growling. “Here.”

Deb curled her lips. “Make me.” The petulant whine mimicked a thirteen-year-old perfectly. Having raised three of them, she was quite proud of the improvement from the last time she bratted.

“Don’t make me come for you.” Her husband dropped his hands to his belt. He sucked in his belly, then deliberately untucked the tang through the buckle. The leather whispered out around his body through each belt loop.

Licking her lips, Deb considered what was about to happen.

Aubrey wrapped part of the long belt around his hands, doubling the leather, then snapping it together.

She jumped. “Now hold on, cousin.”

Aubrey had taken a step forward, but froze at their safe word. Deb couldn’t believe that after thirty years it came back so easily to them both.

“Brat, what is the issue?” His voice changed from the deep rumble to all business.

“As much as I would love the belt, I’m not sure I’m up to it yet.”

He nodded. “I can understand that.” Aubrey’s lips tilted, “But you are going to be spanked.”

“No doubt.” Deb shivered, and her husband’s eyes dropped to her breasts. She looked down, surprised to find the nipples visibly distended through her bra. “But let’s keep it to hands tonight. We can work up to paddles and leather another day.”

Aubrey raised his eyebrows, and his voice dropped in pure satisfaction. “Another day?”

Deb nodded. “Yeah, why not? It’s not like we are going to wake the kids anymore.”

“An excellent point.” He tilted his head to the side, “I will like that.” He smiled at her, and she beamed back. “Now, where were we?”

The woman drew in a deep breath, nodded her agreement to them restarting the scene, and shouted at him, res-stomping her feet, “You aren’t the boss of me!”

“Oh, that is what you think,” Aubrey slapped the leather belt on the table, before reaching out a hand quick as a snake and grabbing her wrist. “I’m not only your boss, I’m your master.”

Deb shivered for real at that proclamation. The words dug down through years and years of housekeeping and childrearing to the woman she once was, looking for a master to her mistress. A partner, which he had been since the moment they met, but also a power. Ying and yang together. His yank had her sliding across the floor, to fall across his lap.

“Not in this lifetime.” She proclaimed, while squirming to help him pull down her pants.

As soon as her khakis slid below the curve of her buttock, he popped her lightly. “Be still.”

“Oh,” she responded with a startled voice. “How dare you!”

“Oh, I dare.” Aubrey rubbed a hand over both cheeks, studying them. They were larger, more broadly spaced than the last time he spanked his wife. “These cheeks of yours need to be as rosy as those bratty lips.” He smacked the right side again, the one with the mole hidden under the soft arc of her derriere. He adjusted the curve of his hand to catch air, then popped her a third time, this one resulting in a moan from Deb and a perfume he had forgotten in the years of paperwork he had been buried under.

“I…” Deb gulped, “no, don’t daddy-o.”

“Are you going to stop being a brat, little girl?”

She kicked her legs in response, moving the pants lower. “I’m not a little girl.”

He smacked her twice on her right cheek. “You are a brat.” He said and then switched sides and released three rapid hits in succession on the other ass-cheek, the final swat hard enough to leave a handprint.

“Ouch!”

Aubrey started rubbing her reddening rump, making his wife moan from her newly sensitized skin. “But, I was also wrong.”

Deb bit her lip, was it time for another sarcastic response? Yeah, it was. “What else is new?”

Another few swats made her breast tingle as each hit pulled her against his legs, stretching her shirt against her nipples, dragging fabric. Her ass was completely warmed.

“Nothing, because you are not only a brat,” Aubrey ran one finger down her rear, following the crack, then dipped into her slickening honeypot, “you are a slut, and you know what I do with sluts?”

“I bet a big daddy-o like you fucks them.” Deb perked up. “Right up against the dining room table.” Had they ever done that in this house? On this table?

He pressed a second finger into her channel and rotated.

“Oh, god,” slipped out in a groan from Deb. While they still had sex a couple times a month, they hadn’t done anything like this since … since the twins were born. “don’t stop.”

“I don’t plan to.” Aubrey stood, lifting her easily. It wasn’t that she was small, but that he was just that much bigger. Her husband manhandled her over the table, putting one chair under her weaker leg for extra support. “Stay put.” He said, pressing her down hard against the maple-wood surface.

“What, where are you going?” She asked, trying to twist around as she heard his footstep hit the living room carpet. She couldn’t move really well, with her pants and underwear halfway down, and, besides, she was fairly positive he would be coming back to give her a fucking she would remember for weeks, so she didn’t move from position. Before she felt totally abandoned, he was back, placing a pillow on the chair seat beneath her knee and she sighed in relief. Then yelped as he smacked her bottom.

“Better, it was fading to pink.” His hand moved to the other side for some more swats. “Yes. There it is. The perfect shade of red.” Aubrey dragged his hands down her legs, removing her pants and panties completely along with her work socks. Her hardened-toed boots, no steel for electrical workers, were in the garage since she didn’t want to track dirt in the house. His large male hands then cupped her buttocks and squeezed hard enough to hurt.

… and yet not hurt.

She groaned as he lifted her higher.

“Ask for it.” He ordered.

“Are you kidding me?” Deb mouthed off.

“Correction,” Aubrey’s voice graveled like their driveway. “Beg for it.”

“No.”

He slapped her hard on her posterior. “Say: master fuck me.”

“In your dreams.”

“Oh, we haven’t even started on my dream.” He spanked her again. “Beg.”

She heard his zipper lower. Behind her, she felt his member rub over her heated skin and down, close to where she was ready to receive him. “I …”

“Words brat. I want them.”

“Fuck me. Fuck me hard. I want to cum until I scream.”

He withdrew his dick and slapped her butt a few more times.

“Say please.”

She waited as he lifted her again and lined his penis with her entrance, breaching it, but not  fully entering. Her womanhood wept at the stimulus of the promising threat.

Leaning forward, to whisper in her ear, because he was that much bigger than her, “Beg. Say: master fuck me.”

Deb tried to shove back, to get him inside her, but he held her easily under his weight, as he always had been able to. “Please,” she whined, not sure if she was still pretending. Sweat pooled on her brow.

“Please….” Aubrey whispered, blowing on an ear.

“Fuck.me.master.now.please.pleasepleaseplease.”

He slammed into her hard enough to move the table, pulled out, and did it again. Sheathing himself completely. Her spanked ass stung as his flesh met hers, the slapping sound as loud as his previous spanks.

“More!” she shouted.

He took her at her demand.

Having slid from under the light fixture in the center of the dining area with each energetic pounding, the table hit a wall before he came hard.

She had screamed her release twice before he had finished.

As she melted into the dining room table, Deb heard him raise his zipper. He reached over her, then the leather belt dragged over her body – from her scalp, the soft leather slithered down her neck and spine and across her ass until the end fell off her body to slap the floor. She listened as he gathered it up and put it back through his pant loops.

“Now brat, I seem to remember you liked to shower; the lotions still in the medicine cabinet?”

“Um, hummm.” Fuck, when had she gone nonverbal?

Aubrey lifted her and carried them to the primary bedroom and their attached bath.

***

Deb stumbled into kitchen in the morning to find Aubrey making scrambled eggs instead of being off at work. She was running half-an-hour late herself, but there was enough setup work at the site, she really didn’t need to be there for another hour. Going to where the table had been moved back to its normal position, she found the pillow still on one of the dining room chairs and sat down gingerly on that chair.

Aubrey watched smugly as she lowered herself down, sighing.

He slid a plate of eggs and fruit, with a fork in front of her, then returned to the stove, cleaning up the morning cooking. Hot tea whistled in the kettle, moments afterwards, it was in front of her with honey and creamer added to perfection.

Gods, she forgot how much she adored him in aftercare mode.

“Do you need anything else?” he asked, as he pulled her hair until her head tilted back for him to kiss her thoroughly.

“I love you,” she muttered against his lips.

He pulled back, his eyes sparkling, and rubbed a thumb against her lips. “Love you back.”

“We need to do that again,” her eyes searching into his, looking for the wounded soul she knew still lurked, “soon.”

“A weekly date?” Aubrey smirked, “Maybe one with a weekend recovery so you don’t walk funny in front of the guys.”

“Oh, you think you are that good?” She smiled as he stepped back.

A proud proprietorship of their mutual relationship shaped his features, stealing her air with the confidence he emitted. “Oh, I know I am.”

“Yes, absolutely.” Deb laughed. She reached for her tea, took a sip, and sighed contentment. “I love you so much.”

“I love you too.” He glanced at the microwave clock, before returning his attention to her. “Are you good?”

“Very, very good.” She took a bite of the scrambled eggs, which had been peppered precisely to her tastes. “These are brilliant. Thank you.”

“Don’t do the dishes.” Aubrey ordered. “Leave them in the sink, and I’m bringing home pizza and a movie tonight.”

Deb smiled “Yes … master.”

“Brat,” he said as he reach down to pick up the overstuff briefcase from where he dropped it last night, before striding into the garage, shoulders back and spine straight.

(words 2,933– first published 4/9/2023)

G is for Give Your Characters Trouble

Meme created by Erin Penn

During several of the Craft of Writing courses at the SAGA Writer’s Conference (sagaconference.com next one scheduled for July 2024), the Faculty describe many things to give your characters: a solid background, emotions, friends and enemies, goals. But most of all, Trouble.

When things slow down, blow up their lives. Physical and emotional bombs – mix and match appropriately to genre. “I’m pregnant.” changes everything as much as a car explosion, especially when the character saying it is male. Explosions. Obstacles. A child who is sick at school and needs to be picked up ASAP, while the hero needs to stop a vampire coven before they wake at nightfall.

Every three chapters or so stop and brainstorm five to ten things of “What is the worst thing that can happen?” Pick one or two things from the list. And give your characters a gift that keeps on giving.

Below is a previous meme I made when I was offering advice to a young writer. Since all writing is in the author’s head, making problems can be difficult for young authors. It’s like they are attacking their alter egos. Until you can distant yourself from your characters, Giving Trouble can be challenging. But Giving Trouble is absolutely necessary.

Meme created by Erin Penn

Magical Words: F is for Fast

Photo by Jonathan Chng on Unsplash

Writing fast, especially to a deadline, is required to go “pro” (i.e., actually attempt to make a living through words). A to Z for April is just a taste of the day-in day-out delivery required to pay the mortgage and bills for the roof over the head and the food on the table.

In the December 6, 2011 Magical Words post “Abandoning Standards,” Diana Pharaoh Francis, discusses abandoning her normal methods to get the Zero Draft done so she can turn in her book on time … in January, just a month away. Her answer – concentrate on getting the action down on paper.

Or, if I was following this advice, get my dialog down. I don’t see action first, I hear people talking. Whatever you need to do to get words on screen so you can edit them.

Forget the deeper characterizations, themes, set design – all these can be added during the second pass to flesh things out. First pass, get the plot down through action or dialog or whatever gets you beginning to end the fastest. Live life in the fast (writing) lane.

Again the URL for the post is: http://www.magicalwords.net/diana-pharaoh-francis/abandoning-standards/ – be sure to catch all the comments. Many of the responders are other pros making a living at writing, and the hints are wonderful.