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Other Cool Blogs: The Smithsonian

Erin Penn

Photo 164543210 / Flu 1918 © Satori13 | Dreamstime.com

1918-1919. An epidemic of Spanish Flu spread around the world. At least 20 million died, although some estimates put the final toll at 50 million. It`s estimated that between 20 per cent and 40 per cent of the entire world`s population became sick

I recently ran across a Smithsonian blog created in 2017 for a special report “The Next Pandemic”. It’s an interesting lookback to “How the 1918 Flu Pandemic Revolutionized Public Health”. Points brought up included realizing that disease does not respect borders, so WHO was created; and creating disease reporting systems. The impact of 2% of the planet dying to disease left holes, and passions to make sure those holes did not reoccur for future generations.

COVID has killed about 1%, although the hidden damage left behind from COVID likely is claiming a lot of people before their time, but not officially from COVID.

How will COVID change society? Studying the 1918 Flu Pandemic and it’s society impact can help indicate changes we might see in psychology, medical fields, political, and sociological. Besides, the Smithsonian Magazine is always a cool blog to follow.

Spinney, Laura. “How the 1918 Flu Pandemic Revolutionized Public Health.” Smithsonian Magazine. 9/27/2017 – – last viewed 1/2/2023.

Writing Exercise: Secret, Wall, Loss, Desire

Erin Penn

Photo by Pete Willis on Unsplash

In a Magical Words post from December 5, 2011, David B. Coe postulates that “the most effective, memorable characters” have four attributes: Secret, Wall, Loss, Desire.

Secret – The character has something they are hiding from the world, or the world has hidden from them.

Wall – There is a barrier separating them from the world. (I think this attribute is necessary for main characters to give them the focal point of the story.)

Loss – The world has taken something from them in the past or present.

Desire – They have something they desire that drives them. (The loss puts the breaks on.)

He goes out to more specification, and then gives a number of examples of works being published in 2011.

WRITING EXERCISE: Examine your present work-in-progress (WIP). Does your main character have any of these traits?

My attempt: Robyn from Mom Eyes. Her secret is her powers, especially some aspects of her powers. Yes, as a child she is sharing the information, but maybe she really shouldn’t. Wall – her powers are creating a wall, but she already had a wall because of … Loss – losing her brother and her mother impacted her teen years. She will never forget to be kind because of it. Desire – not to be alone. To prevent others from experiencing her loss if possible.

Flash: Pixie Power 2 – I rather not

Erin Penn 1 Comment

Photo by Colton Sturgeon on Unsplash

They passed two pixie dream girls at the corner, dressed for tricks. Their phones were out taking pictures. “You got us?” Bowser asked, as he was hauled along.

“No way girl.” “Ain’t no spill.” The females shouted at their backs.

Amie dropped his hand, turned around, running backwards. “Pixie power!”

A high tweet sang back.

Browser grabbed her sideways to keep her from running into a tree. Not the easiest manhandling, since Amie was the same height as him but he was nearly twice as wide.

After four blocks away, they fell against some steps breathing heavy. “Woman, you will be the death of me.”

“I would never.” Amie slid from where she landed against his shoulder into his lap, to look up at him from under her red hair. “Admit it, you love it.”

He pursed his lips closed and dug his fingers into her hair, pulling it off her face and combing it into a silken fall over his jeans.

She finger-flicked his stomach. “Admit it. Without me, life would be boring.”

“Boring isn’t bad.”

“No, then shall we do a Netflix and chill like the normies?” She stuck out her tongue at him. “Stay at home with popcorn and do a puzzle?”

A side smile entered his face as he traced a finger over her eyebrows. “That sounds like fun.”

“Fun?” Amie shot up out of his lap to face him. “Fun? Staying home? Doing nothing?”

“I’m sheepish, not pixie.” He pulled her close to lean against him, her face naturally falling to look out at the street instead of his face. “I like my pasture.”

The adrenaline-driven fairy sighed. “I dragged you so far away from it.” Amie patted Boswer’s leg. “I’m sorry.”

He kissed her cheek. “We don’t have a choice. You have to play your flute, and a world-class orchestra is the only thing that can keep up with you. That means a big city. A really, really big city.”

“What about your pasture?” Amie turned her face to his. Bowser tried to turn away to study the street, but she pulled his face back. “Don’t you want to go back to the burrow? You can, you know.”

His oversized black-on-black eyes darted over her much more human-appearing face. He pressed his lips together.

“Come on.” Amie tweaked his black nose. “Talk to me, mutton-chops.”

“I rather not.”

The pixie shifted back, gaining some sobriety. “Why not?” This time her purple left eye and green right eye studied him, for the first time in a long time. Dark circles hid under his large black eyes. White wool stubble scrambled along an angular jawline. Curls from too long scalp-hair matted, and the center of his eyebrows hadn’t been plucked in weeks. “What don’t you want me to know? What can’t you tell the truth about?”

As fairies, there could be no lies between them, but omissions were a popular coin to protect secrets.

(words 488, first published 10/22/2023)

Pixie Power Series

  1. I feel a sneeze (10/15/23)
  2. I rather not (10/22/23)
  3. I am just boring (10/29/23)

Geeking Science: Just the Facts

Erin Penn

“Just the facts” is not enough to convince people, even if every “rational” person you know believes them. Between confirmation bias and tribal communities, facts attacking a worldview can be as scary as weapons waved in the face – especially if the person sharing the facts is screaming them. Historically, isolating from the tribe with a new idea could mean death from the elements and world, so preference is given to close community over being able to say “I told you so.”

While the below video isn’t a scientific study, I found it a useful reminder that not everyone thinks like me.

Autism spectrum means my ties to community are really, really loose. I know I need a tribe, but, unlike most, it is a “fact” in my head not an emotionally deep understanding – so other facts can offset it. I vote against a group; I can stand and be that single voice. I think that is why autism variations have been perpetuated genetically, the ability to move against the tribe has saved the tribe enough that the universe marked it as a “good” mutation. Which, when all the spears are pointed at you because you spoke up, doesn’t mean as much for the individual. I got a lot of pinholes over the years and cried a river of tears.

The hint at the end is very useful: make sure when trying to change a person’s worldview, to first present a “we share a tribe” position first.

Remember this as we enter another COVID-Flu season. Remember this as we enter another Presidential election season in the United States. Remember this for the Ukraine-Russia conflict. Remember this for the Hamas-Israel government actions.

Remember we are all one tribe. One planet. One humanity.

Book Review (SERIES): Blood Moon Over Bourbon Street

Erin Penn

Amazon Cover

Blood Moon Over Bourbon Street series by Theresa Glover

  1. Caitlin Kelley, Monster Hunter
  2. A Touch Too Much
  3. Trouble In Mind

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for BLOOD MOON OVER BOURBON STREET

All Caitlin Kelley wanted was a vacation in New Orleans. See the sights, check out the voodoo shops, drink a hurricane at Pat O’Brien’s, eat beignets at Cafe du Monde, the whole deal. Rest, relaxation, and…well, there isn’t a good word that starts with “R” that means getting her drink on, but that was in the plans, too.

Until she saw a monster at the airport and ended up smack dab in the middle of the New Orleans supernatural underworld. Now she’s dodging black dogs, hunting nightmares, dealing with confusing feelings about a nun and a cop at the same time, and killing demon spiders. All the demon spiders. Oh, and a giant panty-stealing ape swiped her underwear.

If her vacation doesn’t kill her, Caitlin Kelley is going to need a serious break when this is over!

MY REVIEW for LOOD MOON OVER BOURBON STREET

Blood Moon Over Bourbon Street collects the three Caitlin Kelley novellas (Caitlin Kelley, A Touch Too Much, and Trouble In Mind) into one volume.

The uneven energy of the three novellas doesn’t work as well in one volume as it did spaced over several years of the original releases. Novella 1 sets up a darker than normal Bubbaverse Monster Hunter, but still rife with the humor found in this shared universe with all the fantastic monsters. Novella 2 shows Ms. Glover is a much more complicated writer – stringing together multiple plotlines and character developments, with reoccurring villains – than is normal for the Bubbaverse – but the humor still is over the top even as the darker, more complicated situations are explored. Then Novella 3 takes everything on a trip sideways where the consequences of never getting a vacation, a break, or even a moment have finally piled up beyond what the very human Monster Hunter can handle.

Ms. Glover has brought her own unique stamp to the Bubbaverse with this collected works. Her psychological horror roots show strong, even through the humor.

Amazon Cover

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for CAITLIN KELLEY, MONSTER HUNTER

Who let the dogs out, indeed?!?

All Caitlin Kelley wanted was a chance to relax in New Orleans. Is that too much to ask?

Obviously so. Between the strange man/not man/something she chased through the airport and the monster terrorizing the French Quarter, this vacation is anything but Easy, Big or otherwise. Throw in her wisecracking companion Marty, a shadowy government agency that’s probably either in league with the bad guys or is even worse than the bad guys, and a creature roaming the streets of New Orleans that may or may not be straight out of the pages of Thor, and this novella is jam-packed with action, innuendo, and ass-kicking!

MY REVIEW for CAITLIN KELLEY, MONSTER HUNTER

Working my way through the Bubbaverse (somewhere over 60 short stories and novellas) and found this amazing New Templar.

A monster hunter going on vacation to New Orleans. Nope, nothing could possibly go wrong there. Except as soon as they land they run into a nightmare, and discover the monster hunter of the territory has been killed, and hired to track down a demon dog by a … old southern lady? Oh, and there may be a Collector out there too.

Much more complicated and interwoven than is typical of the Bubbaverse, Caitlin Kelley still has the humor and monsters signature of the world-universe.

Funny, action-packed, and well-written.

 

Amazon Cover

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for A TOUCH TOO MUCH

She’s crushing on a nun. There’s a hydra in the French Quarter. And a giant gorilla just stole her underwear.

This is not Caitlin Kelley’s best day. Much to her chagrin, it’s not her worst day, either. The newly-minted official Monster Hunter for New Orleans just wanted to drink a few (okay, many) hurricanes, eat more beignets than should be humanly possible, and otherwise enjoy her New Orleans vacation. Instead, she’s found herself relocating to The Big Easy, dealing with cops and federal agents, hunting down a walking nightmare, and representing all of humanity in a supernatural conference to determine the fate of the world. And did I mention she has the ultimate in unrequited crushes – a nun?

MY REVIEW for A TOUCH TOO MUCH

Ms. Glover continues to put her own unique spin on the Bubbaverse-NewTemplars, bringing her blend of humor and story-telling on the stage of Monster Hunting in New Orleans.

Come for the food – run from the monsters.

The nightmare of the first book revisits the second book. In a shared-universe where most of the writers write “the monster of the chapter” – resolved-and-move-on (except for the season’s big guy), Ms. Glover has created layers and interweaving while still throwing more monsters at a reader than a D&D game – hydras, nightmares, goddesses, locust, flying monkeys, and sentient gorillas with underwear fetishes (don’t ask, just read).

Read for the monster hunting, stay for the storytelling.

Amazon Cover

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON for 

There’s a dragon in the Crescent City, and that’s not a metaphor.

Caitlin Kelley has chased literal nightmares through the streets of New Orleans, had her underwear stolen by giant gorilla, and played politics with a bunch of supernats with enough power to snuff her out like a match in a hurricane. And none of that compares to the demons she carries around inside her every day.

Now her personal demons and the monsters outside herself are all crashing down around her as she tries to hold her team, her adopted city, and herself together against all odds and all reason. Maybe the dragon isn’t the real problem after all.

Can Caitlin pull herself together in time to save New Orleans from a dragon and the evil wizard that enslaved it (yeah, really)?

Can Caitlin drag herself out of her own head long enough to hold her team together in one of the toughest battles they’ll ever face?

Can Caitlin keep the Black Dog at bay for just one more day?

Yeah, dragons are easy. Living is hard.

MY REVIEW for 

Well, that went down a dark path I completely did not expect. Come for the monster hunter, stay for the psychological evaluation.

What is horror without a complete mind f-k? If you ever wonder why people with depression, who are being swallowed by the darkness, can’t reach out, no matter how many people love them and want to help, no matter how much they know they need help, this book will help fill in the gaps.

This one is not a comfortable read. It is still laced with the humor of the Bubbaverse, contains all the amazing monsters and magic and action you could ever want. But if you have ever dealt with friends struggling with depression or heard the siren call yourself of the rocks of “you will never succeed” to bash against, the read will not be comfortable. Considering how much monster hunters see and do, the physical damage, the soul damage, they take, seeing one struggle with the big semicolon may be unexpected, but it is very real.

Come for the fiction, stay for the reality.