Happy Halloween, story intro

As a horror author I feel it's mandatory to post something on Halloween.  I'm currently working on a story that will hopefully be completed tonight, but in the meantime here's the beginning of my first ever published story, titled "I Knew we Kept you Around for a Reason".

The story came about in interesting fashion.  I had joked with my roommate about something irrelevant, and finished with the phrase that would become the title to the story.  I wondered what reasons might there be to 'keep someone around' and in my own twisted fashion, asked how can I make that into a scary story.  As I was writing it, I had come across a call for submissions for an anthology, School Days: Tales with an Edge.  I decided the story would fit well, and it helped define the overall tone of "I Knew we Kept you Around for a Reason".

For your Halloween pleasure, I present to you the beginning of "I Knew we Kept you Around for a Reason"...

“They are way too cool to be your friends.” Eugene’s older brother, Randy, really does love his brother, but it’s in that older brother kind of love that only manifests when he’s drunk, or when the two are older and able to share such emotions freely. However, there is truth in the jest. Eugene is a dork, a nerd on his better days, but the star quarterback and head cheerleader just invited him to a party tonight.

***

Earlier in the day, on his way to remedial math, Shawn dropped his cell phone in the hallway. Eugene was behind him heading to the adjacent class, AP calculus, and saw the phone. “Shawn, hey you dropped this.”

“Oh shit man, thanks. My girl woulda killed me if I lost this. It’s got pics of me n her… Never mind, it’s Eugene, right?”

“You know my name? Wow super!”

“Course I know your name bro, we’ve gone to the same school for ten years.”

Still bewildered by the notoriety, “Yeah, but we never spoke before. I mean, I’ve only seen you with the other football players and cheerleaders.”

“Never mind all that, you did me a solid, n I won’t forget.”

***

“So just like that, the most popular kid in school invites you to the hottest party of the year? Must have been some nasty pictures on that phone.” Still not believing his little brother was invited to a party Randy himself would have gone to during his high school years.

Not fully knowing who his new friend really is, Eugene defends Shawn, “No way, that’s not what he meant, Shawn wouldn’t do that.”

“Are you kidding me? Remember, I was a senior when you guys were freshman, and even back then I heard stories about him and girls in my class.”

***

During this Shawn was having a conversation of his own. “Babe, I’m tellin you, your plan worked perfectly. Seriously, the loser picked up the phone before it even stopped spinning.”

Pleased with herself, Lillian’s also surprised with Shawn, “I’m just glad you were able to remember his name. Do you think he’ll come tonight?”

Shawn barely hears the question of his cheerleader girlfriend as he watches her get ready for the party. “Huh? Oh, it doesn’t matter. He thinks we’re friends now. I hope he doesn’t show up, don’t think I could deal with him geeking up the party.”

“Honey, listen to me, we only have three months to make him trust you completely by prom night or it won’t work.”

***

“Little bro, I don’t think you should go to the party.” Randy stands in fron of Eugene, blocking the door. “Haven’t you seen ‘Carrie’.” He walks away laughing. At least change your shirt.” He calls over his shoulder.

Eugene turns around and heads upstairs thinking, They should like this shirt. Little does he know, no one would have found the humor that is “Geeks do it 2².”

***

“What the hell are you doing here, loser?” The center lineman has his giant hand pressed against Eugene’s chest, crushing his Star Trek intercom logo that he wears around his neck.

Shawn comes rushing down the stairs, “Back off Box, the los… he’s not a loser. Eugene’s with me.”  Getting in between the two, Shawn puts his arm around Eugene’s shoulders.

“Whatever you say cap’n.” Box walks away confused, but more interested in getting back to his drink.

“So Eugene…” Shawn has to mentally fight off the awkwardness of the moment. “Glad you could make it. You want a drink or something?”

“Thanks, but I don’t drink.”

“Sure you do, here you go.” He hands Eugene his own drink of Hennessy and coke. “Go mingle, I’m going up to Lillian, I’ll be back in a while.”

***

Eugene wakes up the following morning, with the room spinning, and a t-shirts worth of cotton in his mouth. He’s lying on top of his retro Voltron blanket completely naked. “Am I still a virgin?”

To find out whether or not poor Eugene is still a virgin or not, you can purchase School Days: Tales with an Edge here at amazon.com and stay tuned for more from AzarRising

What I'm Reading Now 9/22/12

About 7 months ago I decided there's too many good books out there to waste time on bad books, so I set a page limit of 75.  This pretty much means if by the 75th page a book hasn't hooked me, I'm done with it.  Doesn't matter if the book is 150 or 700 pages if I'm at the 75th page and I don't care about the character or where the story is going, I'm putting the book down.In the time since I set that mandate, I've put many books down by page 75, which in turn has given me more time to read good books.

Currently I'm in a conundrum though, I'm reading Jailbird by Kurt Vonnegut.  The only other Vonnegut book I've read was Slaughterhouse V (which if you read my Top 25 Books page you'd know it's one of my favorites).  The conundrum arises because it's not that good of a book yet, but I really want to like it because of my feelings for Slaughterhouse (coincidentally also the name of the artist I'm listening to now) and by extension Vonnegut as the author.

I've broken my own rule and read past page 75.  Initially I read to page 76 (I know big commitment there) only because it was the end of that particular chapter and I was hoping the resolution would be enough to keep me reading. Didn't work, but I kept on reading hoping to find some merit in the book.  Now I'm up to page 150, about a third of the way through, and I'm getting bored with it but I feel part of it may be that I know I read past my limit of uninteresting books and I'm subconsciously telling myself to stop. On top of that, the next book on my to read list is a book I know I'll enjoy. So I leave it to you, my faithful few followers; do I finish this book I'm currently not enjoying? or heed my own advice and move on to greener pastures?

Niagara Falls

Niagara Falls

“I know it's clichéd and ironic to say this at a funeral, but Nate really was always full of life.”  Fabian says as he stands on the altar less than two feet behind my casket, and if he's half as sad as I expect him to be, he's hiding it expertly.  I wonder if he feels he needs to put on a strong facade for my mom.  Is it selfish to hope it is actually a false front and that he is genuinely upset at my death?  Probably, but this is my funeral, screw etiquette.   What else does my frat brother have to say?

“In college he was the de facto leader of our group, even after we'd grown into our own separate lives he was the one to bring us back.  When we'd be out he was always the center of attention, not because he was the most charming or funniest of us, although now that I think about it he probably was, but simply because being around him made everyone else feel better.  No one was allowed to be in a bad mood around Nate.”   You always spoke so well in front of an audience, but that's not entirely true Fabian, what I always said is if on any day nothing goes as planned...

“He always said “If your day doesn't go as planned, change the plan.” I don't think I truly understood what he meant until the day he died.”  I'll forgive you for interrupting me this one time buddy... jokes aren't as funny when no one else can hear them.  “People always say 'live each day to the fullest' but no one does, I won't even pretend that Nate did, but what he did do was make the most with what he was given.  He didn't come from a wealthy family, but his parents instilled in him from a young age strong morals that carried with him to his last day.  These morals drove him to exceed at every academic level, eventually leading him to succeed professionally, although none of us ever understood what exactly it was he did.”  That wasn't funny people, stop laughing.  I am... was a National Operation Manager overseeing the country wide vended business services for... never mind.  If you couldn't get it when I was alive, no point in trying now.  

“Nate was the first of us to meet our wives, even if he was the last of us to actually get married.  He met Amber on a trip we took our senior year of college, and they started dating almost immediately after.”  You old softy, you are sad.  Why else wouldn't you mention where the trip was to?  “They might not have gotten married right away, but everyone close to them knew that what Nate and Amber had was legit and would last forever.  Sadly, none of us knew how short forever was.  After years of dating, two of my best friends tied the knot.”  You hate that saying Fabian.

“Having dated for so long, and growing as close as any couple could, they decided the only place they could get married was at the same location they first met.” Again you're avoiding the location.  Not saying the place doesn't make the events any less real man.  I'm sorry this hurts so much, but I promise you'll be happy again, all of you here will.  “While they waited so long to get married they seemed to have rushed to have kids.  I'm sure if someone were to actually do the math, we'd see that their daughter, Courtney, was born less than nine months from their wedding, but we'll let them have that secret.”

Fabian chokes up at her name, his first real sign of what he's dealing with internally.  “Forgive me if this sounds cruel, but Courtney's birth really was the beginning of their problems.  Understand, I loved that girl as if she were my own...”  No one's blaming you man, no one's judging you. You're doing good, not much more to tell.  “She was an angel, but she wasn't long for this world.  I don't know why, but she was taken from them, from all of us too soon.  His health problems started before she was even twelve months, and she passed on her second birthday.  The unimaginable pain Amber and Nate must have gone through was too much for Amber's body.  She soon became sick, almost like her heart couldn't go on without her angel and two short years later, on what would have been Courtney's fourth birthday she left Nate also.”

This is it Fabian, you're almost at the end, stay strong get through this and go home to your wife and kids, and love them like I never had the chance to do.  “Being Mr. Sunshine, Nate tried to hide the pain he was in, but he couldn't fool any of us, a complete stranger could have seen the pain he was in.  For two years Nate put on the face of a man who was content with his allotment in life.  What none of us knew, but we should have been able to guess is that he decided to 'change the plan'.  Exactly two years after his wife's death, and four years after his daughter died Nate took his life.  The spot he first met Amber, and where he shared his nuptials with her, will always be the placed he jumped out of our lives, and I can't blame him.  No one should have gone through what he did, but you'll forgive me if I never return there.  Thank you, and cheers.”  You seriously snuck a beer onto the altar?  Good for you sir, I'll have one ready for you when we see each other again, which hopefully won't be for many, many years.  “Here's to Nate I hope you found your happiness again.”

I wrote this story nearly three times before I had this finished piece.  The first two times were variations of people going over the falls in a barrel which seemed to easy of a pick.   I know more about the first person to go over the falls than I’d care to, and attempted to create the first married couple to do so together, but again it all seemed like the easy way out.  However, it wasn’t all for naught because it led to the story you just read. 

While it is a rather depressing story, I feel at the core there’s a great lesson, and the main character said it beautifully, “If your day’s not going as planned, change the plan.” I was impressed with myself when I wrote that one, hope you were too, and see the meaning behind the words.

Free Thoughts 8/21 (my 30th birthday)

In honor of the greatest day of the year let's take a look at some of the history of the AzarRising blog this past year:

Obvious places like US and Canada rank as some the most frequent visiting countries, with some surprising spots in the top 10 like Latvia, Sweden and Israel.

Also worth noting are some of the odd Google searches that resulted in a visit; "Azer Uma Rising" (not even sure what they were looking for but they spelled my name wrong) "Alex Azar wife" (either someone knows something I don't or I've got a secret admirer) and my personal favorite "Azar sexy" (and mind you this was searched more than once)

That's it for now, I'm going to return to my stress free birthday, but stick around there's plenty of reading material.  As always keep reading, and enjoy.

AzarRising Pages

Hello everyone,

I just wanted to remind you all of the pages that I have available on the blog along with the posts I make.

The first page is a list of all the rejection letters that I've posted (including a brand new one) as a show that all authors have been rejected, and even though I've been published several times it still happens.
Rejections

The next two are lists, one of my Top 5 most overrated things, and my 25 favorite books.  I'm looking to do more lists, so please feel free to suggest a topic.
Overrated Top 5   and Top 25 Books

The next page is my "bookstore" which has links where you can purchase each of my books (which should have an update in October, *hint*hint*) Show your support and purchase a book, or if you really love me, you can track down the AzarRising Mobile Bookstore (my beat up Dodge) and purchase a personalized signed book for cheaper.
AzarRising Bookstore

And finally is the ever growing Alphabet Project page.  Here you can find links to each of the posted stories of the project (up to 'M' as of this writing, 'N' coming soon)  Once completed these 26 stories will cover a wide breadth of genres and emotions.  Two of the stories are actually going to be published shortly, and the ultimate goal is to publish a book collecting all 26 in a single volume.  Enjoy it for free while you can...
Alphabet Project