But what is he when he's at Home? Other Novel Ideas.

I've had people in my Real Life tell me that they're confused about what I'm selling at the moment.

I post on my personal pages about what I'm working on, while at the same time inviting them to look over A Pius Man. 

So, it might be a good idea to clear things up.

To do that, I think it's time to allow you a glimpse into my dark, dark mind.

Coming soon to A Pius Man: Catholic FAQs, Feedback, etc.

Since I have the next few weeks of blogs scheduled, and the blogs written, I thought I would give you a preview of what's to come.

February 22: "But what is he when he's at Home? Other Novel Ideas" -- Basically, for anyone who loses track of all the various and sundry projects I'm working on, this is a comprehensive list.  No, it's not just A Pius Man.

March 7: Catholic Cannibals: Snarky Theology -- Lent starts the week of March 7th, so I thought I would start by kicking the explanations into full gear.  I'm starting with WHY I have no intention of trying to actively convert anyone.  Why?  Because in my Church, we eat people.  Involves CS Lewis and Lewis Carroll.

March 14: Snarky Theology: FAQs about Lent.  Pretty much everything it says.  If Catholics shouldn't eat meat on Fridays of Lent, what about fish? Do fish grow on trees now?  Why do we fast?  I am taking questions as of now.  So if you have them, now's the time to ask them.

March 21: Snarky Theology: Evolution, Who knows and Who cares... Some people believe creationism.  Some believe in evolution uber alles.  I believe that it really doesn't matter.

March 28: Jesus Freaks Scare Me -- They do, they really do.

April 4:  This entire week will be dedicated to  Murder at the Vatican, the Church Mysteries of Sherlock Holmes.We will have a guest blog from the author, a brief Q&A session, and my review.



April 11: This week shall appear much the same as April 4th, only the book is Infinite Space, Infinite God II.

April 18: Extremists, Atheists, and Jesus Freaks-- being fair and mentally unbalanced, I want to play whack-a-mole with a few anti-theists.   Paging Mr. Dawkins ...

This last project may or may not happen.  For Easter week (April 25), I have considered a week of "Evil religions, From Islam to Christianity" .... as usual, it's not what you think it is.  These blogs I have yet to write up, but I would like to the "Evil Religions" posts the whole week.  We'll see.  There's Islam, Christianity, Judaism.... though I may be able to break it down regionally.  We'll see.  Why everything you know about the evils of religion is wrong.

Keep in mind, these blogs may be interrupted by stupid news from the Vatican, or by breaking news by a publishing industry outpost.  If I get a contract with a publisher, this schedule might be a little thrown off, due to my dancing in the streets.

However, I would like to ask, once again, for any questions you may have.  Or, since I'm currently taking suggestions, does anyone have any articles you would like me to write up?  Anything you'd like me to comment on, or make fun of, or get my utterly sideways viewpoint on it.  There's no pressure, I have enough blogs to last me a while, but input is always appreciated.

Building Character: Scott "Mossad" Murphy.

**Spoiler alert.  Be sure to read O Little Town of Bethlehem and Tinker, Tailor, Goyim, Spy before reading the blog.**

Two of the short stories posted on this site have, thus far, been about Scott “Mossad” Murphy.  Mysteriously, they all seem to fit with the end product of Murphy in the novel. I think it helps that I essentially wrote a short biography for Scott, like I have for all of my other characters. The character becomes alive in my head, and all I need to do is drop him into a situation and let him play.

Though it wasn't until I wrote Tinker, Tailor, Goyim, Spy that I realized how much of a stiff Scott really was. But, then again, I don't know too many party animals who want to be accountants when they grow up.

And by the time of O Little Town of Bethlehem, I only just managed to hint at Scott's isolation. Not only did he not fit in anywhere in Israel, even his own office, he had just killed or arrested most of the people he had spent the previous three weeks with. At that attrition rate, it's hard to keep a long term friendship going.

And then I started considering how much the character of Scott Murphy fit with the end product in the novel.  Despite all of the new things I discovered about his character, and the more his past has developed in front of me, the puzzle pieces of his life still fit together.
[More below the break.]

Music to Write to, Now Playing-- Two Steps To Hell.

Currently, I'm writing through the wonderful world of fight scenes.  Mostly, I'm working on "something completely different."  However, this is music to write to....

Okay, it's music to write fight scenes to.

This is a cut from the album I'm listening to.  Please, ignore the title, though.  I suspect someone just picks the names at random from a dictionary.

 Enjoy.



[Note, if you've been here before and noticed that some vids are missing, well, Youtube got to them.]

Disasters to Marvel At, the Revenge: A Brief History in Comics.

(This post is dedicated to all of those comic book fans who are single this Valentine's Day. If you're interested in a romance-themed blog, check out last week here.)

We interrupt this week's blog post (originally on writing) to bring you this update.

Which reason do you like?

Thus far, the most read post this blog has been "Disasters to Marvel At: A Comic Discussion," where I reviewed about five years of Marvel comics' story lines, and came to the conclusion that they were gimmick-ridden, hackneyed plots, and that Disney should make Joe Quesada walk the plank off the top of 666 5th Avenue. 

I wrote it in November.

 In January, Joe Quesada was "promoted" from Chief Editor to "creative consultant." 

In the Catholic Church, the Vatican also has a tendency to "promote" certain bishops to come to Rome.  And they're never heard from again, because they're put into the deepest, darkest little cubicle the Vatican has.

So, Joe Q's promotion pretty much sounds like a way of saying "We'll put him someplace where he can't hurt anything."

Why would I say that?  Let's take a (very) brief look at the kind of stupidity coming out of Marvel lately.

Bad Romance: How to be a Cynical Romantic.

“[T]hink about it ... You know how good this is? .... How right it feels?  .... How easy it was? .... It just isn't f**ked up enough to really be you and me.”  ~Harry Dresden, in Jim Butcher's short story "Love Hurts."

In case the readers of this blog have not caught on yet, I'm a little strange.

At which point, I can just see each of you recollecting every other instance of borderline schizophrenia that I have described in my blogs on writing, and answering: “Duh.”

In this case, I have two very strong streaks in my personality. Lots of cynicism, and lots of romanticism …

On the one hand, I believe that all people are essentially good ... on the other, I believe that groups of people are stupid.

I believe in meeting someone, and being in love with them for the rest of my life ... and I go into first dates wondering how fast the phrase “let's just be friends” will appear in the conversation.

I believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth, and in Jesus Christ His only Son Our Lord ... and on the other hand, if one more person mindlessly spouts random Bible passage without knowing ANYTHING about the context or the meaning, I will be sorely tempted to hurt them.

And my problem is that I see nothing contradictory about the above statements. “Good” does not equal “smart;” and when people get into large groups, the average IQ only goes down. “Belief” doesn't automatically mean “theology scholar;” and if someone becomes a monomaniac about a favorite passage of Revelations (which reads like the author is on magic mushrooms), it's hard to do anything about it.