It sounds funny, doesn't it? Losing your job. Like you've misplaced it. Like you might find it somewhere, slid behind a dresser or lurking beneath the bouganvillas. Like it might trot triumphantly down the path after days spent hunting mice in the winter wheat, and curl around your legs, purring.

Friends, two weeks ago, my job up and vanished. Poof. Gone.

I got the call only hours after The Librarian and I closed on a house. My manager informed me that the private practice I worked for was folding, and we were all, to put it bluntly, sort of screwed. It wasn't our fault. It was a combination of financial strain and subsequent, unforeseen consequences of a more personal nature.

Personal for my boss, that is. Not for me. Well, not until I discovered my final check was going to bounce and my insurance payments already had.

The worst part of it all was realizing I had to burst The Librarian's bubble of newly-cristened homeowner happiness. I didn't want to do it. I did anyway. She was upset, obviously, but we've been through worse. (Like the time I quit a job, and tried to bridge the gap by working at an ice-cream stand. Good for my soul. Bad for rent.)

It's funny, though. I've never been afraid of change. I've never lived somewhere longer than three years. It's not always by choice, but once I find a routine, I start to feel restless. Life starts to feel too comfortable and I get bored. I need adventure, inspiration, change. I seek out reinvention.

I spent so much time leaping off the edge that being pushed doesn't scare me.

So I filed for unemployment. I applied to jobs. I worked my ass off to get us moved into the new house in shape. I set up my recording studio, because I have paying audio work lined up.

Today, though, I finally sat down to write.

For the first time since I discovered my dayjob was gone, I committed word to processor and made stitches in the story I've been working on for several years. This big complicated beast is finally taking a shape that makes sense.

This evening, I felt really good. I spent the day recording, writing, and doing housework. I cooked dinner with The Librarian and spent my evening recording a video for my Patreon. I wish I could do this every day.

For a little while, until someone hires me, I can. That's the upshot. That's the opportunity. I get to play full-time creative until the work whistle blows and calls me back to the land of dark rooms, half naked people, and machines that cost more than fifty new iPhones.

For now, it's time to get shit done.

So, of course, when it came down to commissioning a cover for it, I reached out to Starla Huchton. I was not disappointed.

Are you ready to see it?

Are you sure?

I KNOW, RIGHT!?!?!?!?!!?!?!!?!?!? It's so good!

So, without further ado, I present to you all...

UNLEASH

Craving a gritty, kickass heroine?

Coming in May from Lauren Harris, a Contemporary Fantasy for those who love guns, magic, & romance...

A deadly price for freedom. A power she can't control.

Helena Martin doesn't know who she hates more, the sorcerers who fired the magic-laced bullet or the gang-lord master who used her mother as a shield. Both hunt the remnants of her pack and the only way Helena can protect them is using her newly-unleashed magic to lead the two factions away.

With a coveted book of spells as bait, she flees Miami and heads for her mother’s Minnesota hometown. There, salvation comes in the form of a dog rescue willing to take in a different kind of stray. The illusion of a peaceful life is seductive but with sorcerers and bounty hunters sniffing around every corner, Helena fights to keep her past, her pursuers, and her unstable power a secret.

Then she discovers it’s not the spell book her enemies are after, but Helena herself, and the strange power she can barely control. When her master’s bounty hunters threaten her new home, Helena realizes that protecting the people she’s grudgingly come to love leaves her with one option: join the sorcerers who killed her mother.

Genre: Steampunk Adventure/Comedy

Release date: April 25, 2017

Formats: Kindle, and Paperback

PREORDER BELOW

Victoria, the Eternal Empress, has sat the throne of the British Empire for over 150 years. Her policies have brought peace to the world by suppressing the development of “dangerous technologies”, and where that has failed, her Imperial Troops, with their lightning rifles, have swiftly brought order. But there are still those who chafe at the yoke of peace.

When an evening’s entertainment in the British Protectorate of Bohemia unexpectedly leads to the destruction of the State Opera House of Prague, the eccentricity brilliant Professor Harmonious Crackle and his beautiful colleague Miss Titania Bang must team up with the Duke of Prague’s nephew and hunt down the evil genius responsible. Can they find him and stop him before he unleashes his new technology to terrorize the city and threaten the stability of the British Empire, and the Eternal Empress herself?

In a race against an unknown menace, this intrepid trio must search high and low and discover The Perils of Prague!

An excerpt from the book

"You're serious!" Miss Bang’s brow was creased in ire. The hint of fire blazed behind her eyes.

He blinked at her. "Of course, I'm serious. Such a joke would be in very bad taste!"

"I don't believe anyone ever accused my great-grandfather of having good taste," I commented ruefully.

The professor turned to me. "Your great-grandfather was actually quite a thoughtful fellow in his youth. He did throw the most excellent parties. I never did find out what made him such a misanthrope as he got older. I'd often wondered... Wait! Wait, I was going to tell you something. Something I'd just discovered." He looked down at the wing in his hand. "Yes! That was it! You remember the birds, the clockwork birds?"

I nodded. "Yes, Professor. It was just earlier this morning." I wondered if it was still morning.

Professor Crackle nodded vigorously. "Yes, they're a perfect recreation of the living creature. Or at least as best as I can tell, given the damage the sample sustained. If only I could examine an intact specimen."

Miss Bang spoke up. "You're drifting again, Harmonious."

"No, no, no, no! This is important. Did you get a good look at the singers? The male and female leads?"

"At the opera?" I asked. I wasn't quite sure where he was leading.

"Yes! Did you get a good look at them?" He seemed very agitated as he leaned toward me for my answer.

"Well, Professor, I am afraid I wasn't really concentrating on them for most of the performance. And when things livened up at the end, my attention was, well... on other things."

"And you, Titania?" He whirled to face Miss Bang.

"Other than the final song, they seemed quite capable, although somewhat uninspired performers." She paused in thought for a moment, touching one finger to her lips. "I'm not sure how to describe the final performance."

"Drat. I hoped one of you got a better look. Now we shall have to find what is left of them." The professor moved back to his workbench and put down the wing and his loupe.

"You want to go find their bodies, Professor? Isn't that a task better left to the police?" I did not fancy the idea of sifting through the rubble for pieces of the dead performers.

He turned to me. "Their remains, yes. But their bodies, I think not." He lifted the wing again and shook it to illustrate his point. "I think they were clockwork."

"A clockwork man? How is that possible?" I looked to Miss Bang, but she seemed fascinated by the idea.

"But such intricate detail, Harmonious... and such a complex series of actions to perform upon the stage. They were actually singing. It wasn't a phonograph recording. Even with the latest equipment, one can tell the difference. I've never heard of an automaton that could truly sing."

"Yes!" The professor looked like a child who had been promised a new pony. "Exactly! Such perfect duplication of the living form! When I went down on the stage and examined the woman, she looked otherwise normal except for the side of her face. The flesh sagged under a weight. I think a piece detached from the underlying support structure and dragged it out of shape. I believe the same person who made these birds constructed the opera singers as well. But I need more evidence. We need to find what is left of those performers."

"So, we're going back to the opera house?" Miss Bang asked.

"Yes! Well, no! We're already there. I'm sorry about the little detour, my boy, but I'm certain your uncle is going to want to see whatever evidence we can find."

"Surely he will be worried about my disappearance? Perhaps it would be best to just drop me off first and I can explain your theory to Uncle Randolph?" Much as I would like to avoid his wrath, putting off seeing my uncle could only make things worse.

"After losing a major landmark?" Professor Crackle asked. "Don't be ridiculous! He may be worried, but he will have hardly a moment to think on it. No, trust me, even if you went back now you wouldn't be able to get in to see him. But if we can find something to prove it wasn't an accident, we'll be able to get right in to see the duke."

"And the police, Professor?" I asked, wondering what Inspector Janecek would think about the professor's clockwork people theory.

"Yes, we must get there before they do! The last thing we need is for them to tromp all over everything and destroy the evidence we need." He grabbed a pair of goggles off of a bench and strode through the door. "Come along!"

"But, but that's not what I meant!" I sputtered and hurried to catch up to Miss Bang as she swept out of the room in the professor's wake.

ABOUT DOC

Doc Coleman  began his writing career in 2010 with the Nifty Tech Blog, a tech review blog that demystifies technology by highlighting some of the best consumer products available. Doc soon moved on to writing fiction, with the short story "The Gift”, and stories for the online magazine Flagship and for The Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences’ podcast Tales from the Archives. His latest work is the first book of his steampunk series The Adventures of Crackle and Bang, The Perils of Prague.

Doc is a computer geek, a motorcyclist, a homebrewer, a podcaster, a writer, and voice actor. Sometimes, he even finds some time to relax, too.

UNLEASH will debut on May 23rd!

UNLEASH is the first full-length novel I'm self-publishing, and I'm thrilled to enter the field with a veritable battleaxe of a book. Seriously, I love these characters, and there's a big part of my soul in this book.

So what's it about?

Her fight for freedom has just begun.

Helena Martin doesn't know who she hates more, the sorcerers who fired the magic-laced bullet or the gang-lord master who used her mother as a shield. Both hunt the remnants of her pack and the only way Helena can protect them is using her newly-unleashed magic to lead the two factions away.

With a coveted book of spells as bait, she flees Miami and heads for her mother’s Minnesota hometown, where salvation comes in the form of a dog rescue willing to take in a different kind of stray. The illusion of a peaceful life is seductive but with sorcerers and bounty hunters sniffing around every corner, Helena fights to keep her past, her pursuers, and her unstable power a secret.

Then she discovers it’s not the spell book her enemies are after, but Helena herself, and the strange power she can barely control. When her master’s bounty hunters threaten her new home, Helena realizes that protecting the people she’s grudgingly come to love leaves her with one option: join the sorcerers who killed her mother.

Having spent the last two weeks on my parents' couch suffering from near-transfusion-level anemia, I'm finally 1) back in my own bed, 2) snuggling my own cat, and 3) trying to remember how a stove works.

 I'm sad to say I have not had the brain-power to write since the 11th.. Honestly, I didn't have the brainpower for anything but marathoning the entirety of Yuri! on Ice and wondering how many women in the past were actually exsanguinated by their own uteri.

2016 has been a hell of a year. The shadow of tragedy has been relentless, and today I mourn the passing of the woman who taught me that the word "heroine" is just as badass as "hero". My Princess, my General: Carrie Fisher.

The negatives have piled up this year, with shooting after shooting, the deaths of beloved idols, tragedies in Aleppo and Gatlinburg, and the political self-immolation of the U.S. and the U.K. (following campaigns that were emotionally and physically exhausting already). Living in North Carolina, I have even less to be proud of than the average liberal American.

Still, the new year is days away, and though I know the concept of 2016 is "an abstract human concept that can't bear ill will", it sure feels like this year has been out to get us. It's useful to think of it that way, because it means there's a possible end in sight, which keeps me from sliding into nihilistic oblivion.

New Years represents the mental and emotional reset that many of us desperately need. But like the chalkboards of old, things written in the past will never quite disappear, so we can't go into 2017 with a completely clean slate. We have smears and the ghosts of old words still haunting us. In January, the US inaugurates a dangerous man, and who knows what civil liberties will crumble after that?

If we can't completely erase the bad, however, we should also try not to forget about the good. I saw marches and outreach and rousing speeches, I saw people spurred into action rather than despair. I saw communities coming together after tragedy, and people celebrating not only the lives but also the causes of those idols who touched their hearts. There was Hamilton taking over broadway and the existence of Joe Biden memes.

On a more personal note, I managed to achieve almost all the goals I'd set for 2016. This was a two-fold achievement, as I had some tough objectives both personally and creatively.

I wanted to graduate my cardiac sonography program, pass my board exams, get licensed, and get a job. I did all those things.

I wanted to move back to Raleigh with my roommate and start paying off my school loan and my car. I've done those as well.

Creatively, I wanted to query Hellhound and finish the  second draft of SONG OF THE HERETIC, both of which I did.

The only thing on my list from last year I didn't accomplish was writing the third of the MILLROAD ACADEMY EXORCISTS books. Honestly, I chose not to work on that. Instead, I'm drafting a new book, which called to me much more and, as something I can pitch at agents, makes more sense for where I want my career to go.

I also did a lot of fun things this year, like visiting my Words of a Feather Podcast cohost K.T. Bryski in Toronto, visiting Tee Morris and Pip Ballantine in VA, being on the cover of Countless Hues of Crimson, and narrating two books.

So, I'm not going to wipe the slate completely clean on January 1st. I'm going to hold my breath, clap the erasers, and let go of all the bad stuff that isn't useful or important to remember. Then I'm going to write my plan for 2017.

Then we're all going to kick its ass.

As far as I know, all of my creator friends voted against the hateful rhetoric of DJT, and this morning, we lost.

It hurts, and it's terrifying, and it's hard to imagine just what brought our country to this moment. Yes, Hillary won the popular vote, and the electoral college failed the intent of its purpose. The thing is, the race should never have been this close. The fact that it was means we have a job to do.

Fiction, film, drama, art have long been the voice of the disenfranchised, the tutor of the young, the friend of the lost an lonely, and the escape of those in need of a harbor. It is also the herald of hope.

Millions of people felt angry and scared and lost enough to vote for someone who handed them convenient scapegoat after scapegoat, who promised them protection from the other, preservation of a slipping grip on institutional power that may not be right and may not be palatable, but that is at least a familiar terrain to navigate with the resources they have.

So we have a job. Not only to comfort and give shelter to the aching hearts and trembling hands of our own wounded brethren, but to learn.

We have to address what caused that pain, that fear, which is so easily sharpened into anger with only the addition of a target. Is it poverty? Health? History? And how can we, as creators, address those fears as well?

We love the story of the disenfranchised. We love to support the underdog. We love to give them heroes who are one of their own. It works because, on some level, we all feel disenfranchised. We've all felt pain and fear and unfairness, and we've taken solace in the story of a person in our own shoes beating the odds, changing the paradigm, and finding that most important beacon of all, hope.

We have a job to do. We must humanize the enemy, let them be seen. Realize that they see themselves in our moisture farmers and kitchen boys and kickass princesses. We must provide the tools they haven't found, give them friends who are utterly unlike themselves in race, gender, religion, and values, but human and flawed and real.

In our work, we must show acceptance and sisterhood and love. We need to give people hope, and we do that through art. As creators, we can draw the maps to change, introduce the friends along the road, and provide a safe place for the experience of that shift.

We need diverse art. We need it for the sake of those who do not find themselves represented in the mainstream. We need it for those who would deny the humanity of people of color, of women, or the differently-abled, or our LGBTQ siblings. We need it for those who would demonize and dehumanize people of color, Muslims, Jews, immigrants, elders, or prisoners of war.

We have a job to do, and that is to teach through beautiful, inspiring, hilarious, erotic, heartbreaking example that we are all human, and we are in this together, and we have hope.

WHAT'S UP WITH ME

At last, I have graduated my sonography program and moved into the realm of society's economic contributors. In other words, I GOTS ME A JOB! I've settled into it well, and this past weekend, the Librarian and I have finally moved back to the city and into our own apartment.

What does this mean for my writing?

~I GET TO DO MORE OF IT~

I work at a cardiologist's office that's open four days a week, leaving me a good chunk of weekend time to write.It also means that going to conventions will be easier than ever--no haggling over weekend shifts or using up valuable vacation time just to squeeze in that extra day, especially since we get all holidays off already.

WHAT'S UP ON THE WRITING FRONT

I've got my contemporary fantasy novel HELLHOUND on submission right now, and SONG OF THE HERETIC is out with beta readers.

These were my two main goals for this year, but I've also decided to participate in NaNoWriMo this year, in order to launch a new project with my best friend and creative partner, L.A. Erickson. It's an Epic Fantasy series called THE WAR OF THE VANISHED SEA and I'll be writing the first book, WITCHBLOOD, during NaNo.

The final installment of THE MILLROAD ACADEMY EXORCISTS is outlined, and I plan to write it in the spring, around the time I hope to begin querying SONG OF THE HERETIC.

Are you doing NaNo this year? ADD ME!

WHAT I'M READING

I became friends with Gail a few years ago at the second annual Smoky Writers retreat. At that point, I hadn't actually read any of her books beyond the Finishing School series (which I loved), but the moment I got into Soulless, I blew through them. Needless to say, I've been excited about the release of the second book in the Custard Protocol. There are even some bits in there I recognize from Smoky Writers, including a wonderfully ignominious tale of death brainstormed one night in the hot tub.

This week, Gail shared the story of our trip to YA'llfest last November, where we met (and fangirled over) Mercedes Lackey. It's a great read about inclusiveness in fiction, and I think Gail summed up our reasons and reactions to encountering LGBTQ characters for the first time quite well. Read the post HERE.

WHAT I'M LISTENING TO

I've been listening to a lot of contemporary classical recently, because of SONG OF THE HERETIC. Even though I can't really write to music (too distracting), I tend to create playlists for all my books and listen to them while I'm in the car. It's great for brainstorming and envisioning s

WHERE I'LL BE

Librarian and I are headed to the Maryland Renaissance Faire this weekend, where we'll hang out with Tee Morris and Pip Ballantine and their BAMF of a daughter Sonic Boom. It's been a few years since I've been to Faire, but I'm looking forward to lacing up the bodice, strapping on my drinking horn, and sallying for for the Day of Wrong.

Over the easter holiday, I escaped the darkened halls of the cardiac ultrasound lab and made for the misty heights of Gatlinburg, TN on my yearly jaunt to the Smoky Writers Retreat. To the uninitiated, Smoky Writers is a retreat where 20 authors and two chefs descend upon a cabin in the SMoky Mountains and live by the mantra: words, food, booze. As you can imagine, a lot gets written and eaten and drunk. We do, in fact. We get drunk. Authors do that. Ask anyone.

Though school prevented me from attending the full retreat this year, I was able to go for the last four days, and it served the purpose it always does for me: a creative reset. Now, coming up on the last few months of a grueling school program, I desperately needed that chance to re-center myself as a writer and start figuring out what I wanted to do once school is over (besides find a job, obviously).

Actually, the question was put to me by my friend Philippa Ballantine one night after dinner. She asked, "So what about you? What's your writing plan?"

I could have sworn I had something coherent before she asked me. Maybe she mesmerized me with her Kiwi accent. It's possible. Either way, I babbled out some half-baked nonsense about querying longer work to trad publishers and self publishing short work--doing the hybrid thing--which is cool except for one crucial detail: I hadn't exactly worked out how.

So, this week, I got to that.

One little tidbit I gleaned from Starla Huchton (S.A. Huchton) and Piper J. Drake (P.J. Schneider) was that Amazon has this tricksy little logarithm that rewards authors based on a 90/60/30 day publishing time frame. That is, the more often you publish, the more visible the logarithm makes you. You see, I've self-published a few things, which is fine, except there was over a year between them, which did absolutely nothing for my numbers. If I'd waited until I had the whole series done and published them over a couple of months, it would have been tremendously better for visibility.

Bearing that in mind, I looked at the rest of my year.

I can't do a lot of heavy writing until August, when my program officially finishes, so my plans run heavy toward the latter half of the year. I'm already querying HELLHOUND, and I'll be finishing the third draft on SONG OF THE HERETIC by graduation and hopefully querying that as well.

That will leave me with a clean slate starting in August.

FIRST, I will knock out the final Millroad Academy Exorcists novella, SWING BENEATH MAGNOLIAS. That will probably take up most of my writing time in August, and then will go off to beta readers.

September through November, I'll be continuing the book I started at Smoky Writers. It's a new property that's been a lot of fun to worldbuild and research. The series is titled Witchblood, and though I have titles for later books, the first one shall simply be referred to as Witchblood I until I have something that suits.

NaNoWriMo is usually a great way for me to pound out the last part of a book, and since this will (hopefully) be shorter than my usual imp-crusher, I might even get done on time. Hahahaaaa. *cries*

Somewhere in there, I'll release both SWING BENEATH MAGNOLIAS and an Omnibus version of The Millroad Academy Exorcists.

THAT LEAVES DECEMBER. I waffled for a bit, partly wanting to take the month off, partly knowing that I'll be working a new job by that point and probably trying to earn all the kudos by working over the holidays. With my life already thus destroyed, why not complete the hermitude with a little bit of writing? Decision made. Recklessly. Eight months before the fact.

Whatever, I'm excitable and--more importantly--flexible. If at any point someone gives me a book deal, all this could go happily off the rails to its doom.

I've been wanting to write a set of interwoven novellas/short stories about soulmates finding each other by swapping bodies randomly. I tested out the first few paragraphs of this on Katie Bryski and Rosemary Tizledoun at Smoky Writers, and it seemed to go over well.

But see, here's the part that makes me cackle: I was always planning to write the novella and short stories separately, then weave them into one book. BUT THEN I REALIZED I COULD RELEASE EACH STORY SEPARATELY. THEN ALL TOGETHER AS INTENDED.

WOOOHOOO! 2016 Writing Plan!

Of course, since it's me, I planned out the writing until next April. But I like planning things. I like calendars and check lists and stickers. It makes me feel responsible and organized and basically keeps me from running around with my head on fire all the time.

Seeing the projects I get to write coming up, I'm really excited about this year. Just have to finish school.

SO, friends. If you've made it this far, tell me what your writer's plan is! Are you a planner, or do you like to write what comes to you next?

Welcome to the cover reveal for THE GIRL IN ACID PARK, book two in The Millroad Academy Exorcists series. I've been sitting on this cover for about a year, ever since it was created by the inimitable Starla Huchton.

I'm so excited to release the both the cover and the preorder link today! Book one hit #1 in three Kindle categories, which is sort of like making the indie pub honor roll, so I'm hoping for good things with this book.

Without further ado, THE GIRL IN ACID PARK.

Unlike her best friend Hiroki, Georgia Collins can't see or talk to dead people. But she recently discovered she can help ghosts move on--no exorcism required! Unfortunately, so did the national media. Her underground blog is not so underground anymore and the Millroad Catholic Academy students with their scandals on exposé are less than thrilled about Georgia's journalistic success. 

But Georgia has never been one to let things blow over, so when the police request paranormal assistance on a new murder case, Georgia decides to make the unwanted spotlight work her way and agrees to help...except she didn't expect Hiroki to refuse.

Missed book one? Join my mailing list and get EXORCISING AARON NGUYEN, for free!

As I mentioned in my January update, I've gone back to school for Echocardiography.

Woo, education! Woo, eventually not starving! Woo, learning how to wipe butts that aren't my own!

Let me explain that last one. I'm currently in the final week of my clinical prerequisites to qualify for the program, which included a Nursing Assistant lab where I practiced things like "assisting patients in ambulation" and "bowel training" and "attaching a condom catheter".
 

While the class practiced skills like foot-care, feeding, and bed-baths on each other, the level of intimacy required for certain skills exceeds most people's comfort threshold, hence the hottie in the upper left corner. That's my man(nequin). Trust me. He's even creepier up close. He's also missing his other arm, which is totally not my fault.

Anyway, these mannequins have switchable nether regions. That makes sense, right? One mannequin, two nether regions, endless teaching possibilities. Unfortunately, these mannequins were old, and had a couple of literal screws loose. So, I was carrying one with a partner when my mannequin underwent a shift of identity and forcibly ejected his(hir?) plastic penis onto the linoleum.

"MAN DOWN!!"

I yelled it before I thought about it, earning a few confused stares. I proceeded to giggle by myself for the next five minutes, because no one else found it funny.

Which is fine, because I thought it was hilarious. Then again, I still think farts are funny.

At least mom laughed. Thanks, mom.

ELYSIAN SPRINGS ANTHOLOGY

Besides satisfying a prerequisite for my Echocardiography program and providing me with blog fodder (blodder?), the experience of this Nurse Aide class sparked an idea that has gone way beyond what I intended.

We were going over the effects of aging on the body and I just sort of wondered: what happens to aging superheroes? What sort of retirement/assisted-living/nursing home would be able to accommodate people with powers? Who would work there? Who gets to tell Wolverine he's on a puree diet?

Thinking it just a funny thought, I posted on facebook: Anthology about a nursing home for aging superheroes. Who's with me!?

I was, quite seriously, not prepared for the reaction.

Remember that time I became an assistant editor at IGMS? I'm still doing that. It's given me the chance to deconstruct what makes a good story, and also given me confidence in my ability to be a part of a professional publication.

Which is good, because now I'm editing an anthology, and I've got almost thirty contributors who've already pitched stories. Good thing I've got some experience in the submissions department. Even better, I've got a bunch of extremely talented friends to draw from.

ELYSIAN SPRINGS: The Super-Skilled Nursing Home for Ageing Superheroes is an anthology that combines humor, tragedy, and superpowers. I've got twenty-something amazing pitches, a ten-page comic commissioned from Jason Strutz and Jeremy Whitley, and several iterations of cover-art from Pieter Wessels. Headliners include Tee Morris, Gail Z. Martin, Misty Massey, and Jared Axelrod.

All this, and I'm still writing and narrating. I have so much coming down the pipeline, and all of it is super exciting.

I'm working on getting a balance between work, school, and writing this semester, which has been just as challenging as usual. This semester I have twelve hours of coursework, which includes Anatomy and Physiology, Conceptual Physics, and Statistics. *shudder* Statistics.

These are three classes that are not in my usual area of comfort, so it's twelve hours of brainhurt.

So, it's a mixed blessing that my hours at work have dropped significantly. That's good because it leaves me with more time to focus on studying. ON THE OTHER HAND, I'm most likely going to lose my insurance at the end of the quarter.

Through it all, I'm still trying to finish the rough draft of Song of the Heretic. Later this month is the Smoky Writers retreat, where I had hoped to write the second novella in the Millroad Academy Exorcists series. I'm still planning to write that at the retreat, but I'm also uncertain whether I'll be able to get SOTH finished beforehand.

It was hard in January to get myself to sit down and write as often as I wanted to--partly because of school stress, partly because I was brain-tired, and partly because I prioritized different things.

This month is all about getting those priorities balanced. Fitness and social life are other factors that affect the organization, particularly given that socializing requires me to drive an hour away from home.

So, who's with me? Who else is going to use February to sort out their writing-life balance?

I love setting goals. Like, I love it a stupid amount. Big goals that break down into little goals with smaller steps that have little check-boxes next to them. I'm a To Do List junkie--the type of person who spends probably a little too much time scheduling and creating those pretty little check boxes (which I still draw in proper kanji stroke-order, because Japan). I browsed amazon for the perfect day planner (it has a to-do list section) and I have a gigantic desk calendar to help me keep track of important dates and monthly goals at a glance.

That said, I'm not that great at sticking to these schedules, but I like to have them anyway. They remind me where I'm going and give me something to set my sights on in the distance. They're my way of dreaming about the future, of showing myself that dreams are within walking distance if you're willing to take the steps, even if you take them slowly, or out of order.

2014 was an interesting year. I remember telling Abbie at our writing retreat in March what I hoped to have done by the next retreat: SONG OF THE HERETIC drafted, the second Millroad Academy book drafted, and a good start on my next novel-length work.

I'm about 20 scenes from the end of SONG OF THE HERETIC, which is, surprise-surprise, about the length of two books, and while I have the next Millroad Academy Exorcists novella outlined, plus two other novel-length works outlined, I haven't started writing anything else. I have had about three more novel ideas, though. Someone stop me.

Writing isn't the only thing I've been up to, though. This year's goals have several categories, so I'm going to do what I do best. I'mma make a list.

Writing Goals for 2015

• Finish SONG OF THE HERETIC's rough draft
• Edit SONG OF THE HERETIC
• Query SONG OF THE HERETIC
• Write rough draft of Millroad Academy Exorcists, novella 2
• Edit and release the second MAE novella
• Write rough draft of HELLHOUND
• Release Case of the Copper Condor on Tales from the Archives
• Don't suck as an Assistant Editor

School Goals for 2015

• Get an A in Anatomy & Physiology
• Don't fail Statistics
• Don't fail Conceptual Physics
• Get into Echocardiography program
• Don't fail at Echocardiography program
• Study regularly
• Find the awesome

Narration Goals for 2015

• THE BEST KIND OF THIEF by Amy Sparling
• THE BEST KIND OF PROM DATE by Amy Sparling
• SHADOWS ON SNOW by Starla Huchton
• MAE book 2
• [redacted] for Abigail Hilton

Personal Goals for 2015

• Continue journey for optimum health
  • Paleo diet
  • Exercise regularly
  • Chill
• Make an effort to go more places and see more people
• Remind self that dates are not a totaly waste of time
• D&D/Pathfinder
• Be more awesome

I think that covers it. Notice that "blog regularly" wasn't in there. Hah. I know better.

What are your goals for 2015? If you had goals last year, how did you do? Did you achieve them? Leave a comment below!

Though the second Smoky Writers retreat isn't until February this year, 2015 started with some really awesome news. Are you ready for it?

Are you sure?

As of this week, I'm the newest assistant editor of Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show Magazine!

I've been writing "Lady Lauren's Panacea", the magazine's fantasy book review column for the past year and a half, and I received the offer in the midst of my promotion for EXORCISING AARON NGUYEN's KDP Select Free days. For the foreseeable future, I will try to do both.

So what's this Smoky Writers Retreat?

So glad I manufactured that question! It's a retreat started by Alex White, author and podcaster extraordinaire, which takes place in the Smoky Mountains and was created for us to have several days of focused writing time, broken only by several delicious meals that we don't have to cook. The evening holds readings from that day's work, followed by games, drinks, and long soaks in the hot tub.

It's like being a writer and a rockstar at the same time. Is it February yet?

Back in School

Yeah, so living with mom and dad is more and more acceptable for millennials like me, and when you've got an English degree and no desire to go back to answering phones, you're basically stuck with Starbucks and house rules. To be fair, the house rules include wine o'clock and no rent, so I'm okay with them.

So I'm back in school for a degree in Echocardiography, which is ultrasound on the heart. THAT'S RIGHT, I'MMA MAKE THE BIG MONEY. Or at least enough to get my own place and, like, feed myself properly.

Anyway, I'll finish by Summer 2016. Then I'll be singing that Roxette song nonstop. "Listen to your hea~rt..."

I'm still slinging espresso for the morning crowd at my local corporate java joint, but in the afternoons, I'm balancing my time between writing, narration, and 9-12 course hours worth of classes. If that sounds like a lot, it is. Don't worry, though, I'm now at nearly 120k for the rough draft of SONG OF THE HERETIC, which isn't anywhere near as close to being done as I had hoped for that sort of word count, but I'm hoping to finish by the end of the year.

"But, Lauren! What are you studying?"

Oh, fine, I'll tell you. (These conversations with myself make me feel so important).

I'm going into a field called Echocardiography, which is at its most basic, ultrasound for the heart. It's an interesting field and there are jobs in it everywhere around the US. Half the people I know have had echocardiographs done. In that line of work, never want for a job.

The coursework itself starts this coming fall, but I have a few prerequisites to fulfill, since the course requires a Bachelors degree. While I have the former, my English/Classics double major didn't require me to take college algebra, conceptual physics, or A&P, so I will be taking those in the spring.

JOY.

If you had told me in undergrad that I would be taking A&P, Math, and a Physics course with a lab all in the same semester, I probably would have lit myself on fire. Strangely enough, I feel pretty good about it--mostly because the physics classes are conceptual. What changed?

I realized that, if I'm going to support myself while writing, I need a career.

I quit my job last year so I could get my head on straight, and I'm glad to report that my Jedi Training has been going well. (For those not keeping up, "Jedi Training" is code for my battle with anxiety, depression, and panic attacks.) In fact, it's been going well enough that I feel open to a lot of things I've not felt open to for a long time. I'm going out. I'm writing consistently. I'm dating again. I'm gearing up to build a lightsaber...

No, I am actually going to build a lightsaber. (Who else saw the trailer for Episode VII? DAT X-WING SCENE.)

I feel at peace with myself enough to admit I need a career to support my writing, not just a part-time barista gig or a soul-sucking phone center job. I need something I can do for the rest of my life that affords me the lifestyle and experiences I want in life, but that leaves me the time and energy for writing and a life beyond.

Wookie balls, that was hard to admit. It took my parents voicing their worry that I won't be able to support myself when they're gone for me to really step back and think about a career in addition to writing or narration.

The biggest road block was my own belief that I wasn't good at anything else.

I can't say how long I've felt this way, but it's so deeply internalized that I had trouble figuring it out. Once I did, it sort of pissed me off. I was putting up roadblocks for myself because past experience had me believing I couldn't apply myself consistently enough to do well in math or science. But all that was before my Jedi Training. All that was before I even really learned to apply myself to writing, and you know what?

Writing taught me discipline that I have been able to apply in other areas of my life.

But in chair; hands on keys; words on page. It's the mantra of writers. It means you have to do the work if you want to be good. After realizing that talent and youth alone wouldn't get me published, I spent years learning craft. I'm still learning craft. I don't think I'll ever stop learning it. That was my weakness in writing, and did I put up a roadblock because past experience told me my books were too long and my pacing was problematic? Hell no! I applied butt to chair and brain to book. I studied.

And so it has proved this past semester with Medical Terminology and Psychology. I'm doing very well in both, and I'm actually looking at the upcoming classes as a challenge rather than something to fear. I'm not going to let my own past experiences hold me back.

Besides, I'm visualizing all the awesome things I can do with an actual grown-up salary.

Like visit Prague or Scotland or Greece. Like rent a Winnebago with Abbie and spend a month traveling around the US, writing, eating, and podcasting. We could call it Tales from the Winnebago. I could afford to get my kitty all his shots. I wouldn't have to worry about whether I could afford to go to conventions.

But I don't plan on working 9-5.

That's never been me. I don't think it will ever be me. Some hospitals will actually me longer shifts on fewer days--10 hours 4 days a week. That's a whole extra day of writing per week. Which means I can guiltlessly take one of those days off to relax, which is something I don't really do at the moment.

Life's not scary anymore. The fact that I have a goal, a concrete job ahead of me, has given me the sort of peace of mind I never really expected to have. Knowing I will have the safety of a career to keep me afloat has taken the pressure off me to make money from writing. At least, for the moment.

We creative types have this fun habit of pressuring ourselves far too hard to be creative, of letting the anxieties we feel about our work and our worth pile up like bricks to block us from our goals. There's a concept I like to call a Guilt-Rebellion cycle, which I first remember encountering described when my best friend's dad talked about how he felt too ashamed to return to his local church precisely because he'd not been for so long. Sometimes, showing up to the page is like that. We haven't shown up for days, weeks or months or years even, and the mere act of showing up forces us to face our failures to show up in the past.

I used to have this habit whenever I started going to the gym. I would go very consistently for a few weeks, and then I would miss a day. After I missed that day, I wouldn't beat myself up about it, because I'd been doing really well in general, and one day wouldn't be too bad. As long as I didn't miss another day, everything was fine. Of course, if I did happen to miss another day, the self-flagellation began and I returned to the gym with diminished spirit.

Sometimes that was enough to spark me back into consistency. Sometimes, though, the self-flagellation would spark a sort of inner rebellion or despair, sometimes both, and I would skip another few days. Of course, I would feel secretly guilty for skipping those days, and that guilt would drive me deeper into the hole, where either the rebellion or despair would see me reaching for the car keys because, dammit, I was too tired to cook and I felt sad and even though I secretly knew having a chicken club, fries, coke, and vanilla cone from MacDonald's would drive me deeper into the clutches of guilt, it also felt like a treat. Also, for whatever reason, it felt easier than microwaving a bowl of soup.

I'd let this guilt-rebellion cycle compound until, eventually, returning to the gym felt like a walk of shame. Walking through those glass doors became so much harder than just driving down the street, pulling on cross-trainers, and hitting the machines.

I'm still an inconsistent exerciser, but I am trying not to be an inconsistent creative. I'm trying to show up at the page, if not every day, than at least half the days of the week. I'm managing it, though it is sometimes hard to avoid distraction. The key is avoiding the guilt-rebellion cycle.

This is what one of my guilt-rebellion cycles looks like on any given day:

• I fail to write on a day when I'd meant to
• I feel that failure as disappointment or guilt
• Negativity activates the instinct to armor myself
• Defensiveness appears in the form of rebellion
• I play Candy Crush
• I feel ashamed of playing Candy Crush instead of writing
• I feel too tired from the shame to write
• I rebell
• I play more Candy Crush
• I am ashamed
• I am a worthless millennial
• I will never be prolific again
• I run out of lives in Candy Crush
• My life has no meaning and there's work tomorrow and I am in despair and have had too many cans of Vanilla Coke Zero to sleep.
• Bubble Witch looks interesting...

It is a vicious cycle. So how do we avoid that first step onto the spiral slide? I definitely don't always succeed, particularly on days when I've already had to work, but I've found it easier to at least show up to the page by keeping my goals clear and focusing on progress rather than perfection, and always making certain to observe my habits without judgement and adjust the time constraints on my goals accordingly.

Over the next few posts, whenever those might be, I hope to talk about some of the tools I've found useful in beating this Guilt-Rebellion Cycle, setting goals, and staying on track.

Note: Above all, this year has taught me that taking care of myself is paramount in keeping my creativity at its peak. Getting control over my anxiety and, more recently, identifying and taking steps to correct endocrinological imbalances that affected my energy level, have been instrumental steps toward giving me the extra energy I need to be creative.

Pee and Tip!

(Two things that happen after too much Viking's Blöd.)

At the beginning of April, I visited Tee Morris and Pip Ballantine (Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences), friends I made through podcasting. In addition to being successful podiobook authors (indeed, Tee helped create podiobooks.com and had one of the first podiobooks out there), they then published with a small press (Dragonmoon Press), and are now traditionally published by an imprint of the Big Five.

They have the agent, the book deals, the awards. And they still have a foot in the DIY camp.

On their podcast, The Shared Desk, they talk about writing, their projects, and general tomfoolery, and they run short stories written by fellow authors they've invited to share in their traditionally-published story-world on their Tales from the Archives podcast. Think of it as a "Tales from Mos Eisley Cantina" for their own series.

It was really cool to stay with them and get a glimpse into the lifestyle of not one, but two career writers, and also be around for their new book's Facebook launch party.

Annual Harris/Hilton (Roach Toaster Tour - 2014)

After coming home from Tee and Pip's, I had a couple days to catch up on writing and...er...clean the house before my friend Abigail Hilton (The Prophet of Panamindorah; The Guild of the Cowry Catchers) arrived for our annual retreat. Last year, I visited her in Florida, which was fantastic. This year, she came to visit me!   (Listen on the right.)

Abbie and I also met through the podcasting community. Like Pip and Tee, she has a few podiobooks out, the second set of which is a five book full cast labor of love that aired its final episode while she was here! Guild of the Cowry Catchers was actually how I found out (and became a fan of) Abbie.

Funny thing is, Abbie started out trying to traditionally publish Cowry Catchers, but never really found a home for it. I guess when you write 250,000 word novels about anthropomorphised gay pirate animals fighting oppressive dragon priestesses, it's a little hard for publishers to figure out where to shelve you (I am oversimplifying the story, obviously, for the sake of the lulz, but you can get the first book on the right for FREE).

So Abbie self-published her work as a full-cast podiobook and, like, actually paid people. As a traveling nurse anaesthetist, she also had the means to commission beautiful illustrations for her books.

She showed me her excel spreadsheet and explained how she keeps track of her expenses and gains (which was all very businessy and intimidating-looking because, as we see from my blogging schedule, I am not consistent).

What was evident, however, is that between Cowry Catchers and her other self-published works, she's making enough per month to perk up my ears. Of course, with the amount of money she's thrown at the books' illustrations (which even she says are probably unnecessary), she's just starting to break even on the Cowry Catchers books.

Still, after self-publishing, Abbie doesn't seem likely to look back at traditional publishing, and she was actually one of the folks responsible for my decision to self publish my novella EXORCISING AARON NGUYEN.

Ultimately, my goal is different from Abbie's--she is happier having a job that can support her, and writing during her breaks between work. She likes the stability of that, and never intends to make writing her primary paycheck-bringer.

I, on the other hand, want to be able to support myself (at least mostly) on my writing, which is getting harder and harder for strictly-traditionally published authors to do.

Learning from Both Camps

Tee and Pip entered the business a couple of years ago and have been building their audiences through both traditional and independent venues for more than five years. Hard times or good, they are examples of the kind of author I want to be--capable of both being traditionally published and still having fingers in the DIY scene, splitting their time between writing and having a blast as a family.

I'm entering the publishing game in the middle of a shifting of rules, and what hanging out with them taught me is that I still believe in traditional publishing and want that to be my primary form of publication.

What hanging out with (the far more organized and practical INTJ) Abbie taught me is that I need not only look at self publishing as a plan B, but do that while putting a time limit on my submission of novel-length work to agents and editors. That way, I won't be letting work I'm proud of founder if the traditional folks don't think it's right for the market.

A few times, Abbie told me, "If you keep knocking on [the publishing house's] door, they will eventually let you in." Which is what I'd like to believe as well. All the same, she's convinced me to start building a summer home in indie publishing.

WIP STATS

PROJECT: SONG OF THE HERETIC
WORDCOUNT: 47k (ish)
FEELING: Still excited. It's getting easier to write the scenes at a good pace.
PROJECTED COMPLETION: July

"Abbie taught me is that I need not only look at self publishing as a plan B, but do that while putting a time limit on my submission of novel-length work to agents and editors."

The first thing...

was the November 24, 2013 release of the audiobook, HAVEN: A STRANGER MAGIC by D.C. Akers, narrated by me. If you're looking for a serialized middle grade fantasy, check it out!

The second thing...

was Smoky Writers 2014, which was the writing retreat in January, planned by Alex White (author of The Gearheart). I wanted to use the trip to get momentum back on SONG OF THE HERETIC, which I had not managed to get much done on during NaNoWriMo, and the trip absolutely surpassed my expectations. Hands down, it was the best trip I have ever taken. I've never felt so productive, so accepted, nor so well-fed. And the company could hardly be beaten (except, possibly, by the expanded lineup for next year).

We recapped on Episode #28 of The Shared Desk podcast (click below to listen - explicit language alert).

TL;DL? Let me tell you just a bit about it:

Eight writers and two cooks venture into the Smoky Mountains for five days. Our mantra?

FOOD. BOOZE. WORDS.

We had a couple of ground rules:

#1 - You MUST write.

#2 - Quiet Time until 5PM.

#3 - At 5PM, each person reads up to 10min of their day's writing. No critiques.

The schedule was... 

8:00 - breakfast

9:00 - writing

12:00 - lunch

1:00 - writing

5:30 - readings

7:00 - dinner

8:00 - hot-tub/games/shenanigans.

When I tell you that I gained 5lbs on that trip, it's because I couldn't stop eating. Five days worth of amazing meals courtesy our two chefs. It was like being royalty...

On the way home, my friend Bryan Lincoln and I got caught in a snowstorm that caused us to take nearly 11 hours for what had been a 6-hour drive there. His flight got cancelled, and I ended up dragging him back to the farm with me.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU PUT TWO WRITERS IN A CAR FOR 11 HOURS, THEN GIVE THEM THREE DAYS TO HANG OUT?

They brainstorm and outline a pair of interlocking, independent stories about Steampunk Artificial Intelligence. (Listen to the madness and hilarity below).

So, after the retreat and subsequent mini-retreat, it was back to work.

The third thing...

was the change I felt to myself. Something shifted at that retreat--clicked in a way it never had before. Maybe it was realizing that I could be accepted in a group of other writers I like and respect, and treated as an equal and not as the impostor I feared. Maybe it was getting back into the swing of my writing and realizing I wasn't as tired, that I really could get back into the game.

Somehow, I knew after coming home from the retreat that 2014 was going to be my year, because I had decided to make it my year.

Some background...

Last year, 2013, was really hard. I quit my job, moved back in with my parents, and was (finally) diagnosed with a generalized anxiety disorder I'd been battling since high school. I started medication, started a new job at Starbucks, and tried to reassemble the pieces of a life I'd felt had all but fallen apart.

Somewhere in there, I recorded two audiobooks, edited, formatted, and released EXORCISING AARON NGUYEN, outlined SONG OF THE HERETIC, and finally put THE MARK OF FLIGHT into a drawer indefinitely (ouch). By the time NaNoWriMo rolled around, I was exhausted, and then it was Christmas season at work.

Finally, on Christmas Eve, we welcomed my niece Peyton into the world - the first of a big string of great things to come.

A New Year...

Luckily, the medication was doing wonders for me. It really feels like night and day, comparing how I felt before to how I feel now. Suddenly, the person that's been lurking beneath that constant sense of dread and stress has come to the surface. I used to cry whenever I talked about anything even vaguely serious (even if it wasn't something I thought merited tears, I couldn't stop them). Now, tears are confined for really serious things. Like tornadoes and laughing while moving boxes up three flights of stairs in the rain and getting that first picture of my niece.

After the retreat, I knew I needed to continue with all the good the medication was doing. Luckily enough, I wasn't expending all my energy in incessant fight-or-flight. I had the mental and emotional capacity to take a good look at myself and realize that there were other factors in my life keeping me from being fully committed to my writing.

I wasn't healthy. I'm nearly 5'3" and, at roughly 157lbs, heavier than I'd ever been. I was really athletic in high school, and during my early 20s, fluctuated in weight quite a bit. My healthy weight--when I'm active and muscular and fit--is generally between 115 and 125, and while I wasn't expecting to get back to that, I set my initial goal to get past the 147lb-barrier I hadn't been able to break for over two years.

I'm up all night to get healthy...

J/k! I'm trying to get adequate sleep. That, and change my diet. I think changing how I ate was the most important step in losing weight. For four weeks, I didn't really work out that much, but my mother and I did the SUPER SHRED diet, and both of us dropped 10lbs. I moved on to the sustainable basic SHRED diet and started following Cassey Ho's workout calendar on Blogilates. I dropped another 5lbs, which I've gained back in muscle, and a total of 2.5" off my waist. The best part is that it hasn't been too difficult.

I also started running, which I used to think I'd only do in the event of a zombie apocalypse...

Progress on the book!

In addition to getting my life in order emotionally and physically, I'm getting my work-ethic together mentally. I'm up to about 40k on SONG OF THE HERETIC, a lot of which is hand-written draft at this point because my left wrist is sprained and--yes--I'm typing all of this with my right hand, which is cramping. Anyway, I'm trying not to worry too much about length (that's what she said?) and just letting the draft come out as it will.

Luckily, I've had excellent feedback from my alpha-reader Adryn.

I wrote two books before this one, and rewrote each of them at least once. I have to hope the fifth time's the charm. But I'm not hoping, because I'm hurling myself at this book with all the ferocity I have, because I believe in it. I think it's good. It's exactly the kind of thing I want to be writing, and I think there's a place in the market for it.

2014 is going to be my year, because I'm going to make it my year. SONG OF THE HERETIC is going to be the book, because I'm going to make it the book.

It's that time again. Time to bust out the notecards, stock up on coffee and Jameson, and warn those who usually share your physical space that things are 'bout to get weird between you and your word processor. Bolt down the restraints, set out the typo blindfold, and get used to calling your capricious muse "Sir" (or "ma'am" or "Master Hiddleston", you know, whatever), because you are about to enter the role of literary masochist.

National Novel Writing Month is here.

 Overwrought metaphor aside, are you participating in NaNoWriMo? Add me!

A few weeks ago, I polled the folks on my Facebook Fan Page about which Millroad Academy character you'd like to see a 5-10 page comic on and the results went something like this:

• Georgia: 1
• Amanda Barnes: 1
• Hiroki: 3
• The Bishop: 4

I was a little surprised by the Amanda Barnes write-in, but she does actually have a fairly well-developed back story. I actually thought that Hiroki was going to win, but the Bishop one-upped him. Well, I guess he'll be glad to have won something. (Too soon?)

If you haven't read Exorcising Aaron Nguyen yet, the comic will contain some spoilers. Luckily, the book is on Smashwords right now for $0.99! I've informed Amazon, but as of right now, the price there is still $2.99. I'll keep you posted over the next few days. The sale ends Sunday, so BUY, YOU FOOLS /gandalf.

I've decided to make this comic an exclusive freebie for folks who subscribe to my new releases mailing list, which you can sign up for below. I only send out mail when I've got something new out, or something free to give you, like the comic or a short story.

In other exciting news:

1. I got a part-time job at Starbucks! Yay, money and free coffee and still enough time to write and do audio.
2. I finished the final edits on my second audiobook for Audible.com today, called HAVEN: A STRANGER MAGIC, which should be out in a few weeks. 
3. I'm training for a 5k? No really. I hate running, but I think this mini marathon called "Run or Dye" looks like fun, so tomorrow is Week 1, Day 2 of my training with the "Couch to 5k"  app.
4. I started a low-cholesterol diet with my parents, because my mom's cholesterol levels shocked us at her last checkup. Cutting out as much saturated fat and cholesterol as possible. Seirously? Today I said "hold the bacon" for, like, the first time in my life.

Have you started anything new recently? Which of your characters would you create a comic for? Do you like running? 

 ...and dropped the beat. "Brick House" started playing, and my Uncle was doing the Robot while Caroline busted out her best dance and cheerleading moves.

Epic.

The best thing about the wedding besides the part where Caroline got married (and maybe Uncle Doug's sweet new moves) was being in a beach house with my extended family. My dad's side of the family is huge: he is the eldest of four siblings, and though many of my cousins were not in attendance, there were still between 13 and 18 people coming in and out of this massive three-story house.

For me, I learned that my problems with Darth Metus are not unique to me. It seems this Sith Lord has plagued the women in my family from my grandmother, Nana Jean, down the line to me. My aunts, my female cousins - almost all of us have had to deal with the Dark Side, and the encouraging thing is knowing they faced down the Sith and won.