Shenanigan Report: A Teaser at the End

"Learning to make art is learning how to be human." - Gallowglas, from Dead Weight

"If Man is ever to solve the problem of politics in practice, he must approach it through the Aesthetic, because it is only through Beauty that Man makes his way to Freedom." - Frederick Schiller

Upcoming schedule:

July 9-12 - Summer Writing Retreat - Roseville, CA & Zoom.
We still have spots for both in-person and virtual attendance.
July 19 - Poetry Unleashed - Sacramento, CA
July 21 - Book launch - Tears of Rage 5 & Dragon Bone Flute 3
July 24 - 28 Comic Con International - San Diego, CA
July 31 - Final Friday Social Hour - Zoom
Aug 1 - Reading as a Contact Sport - Zoom
Aug 27-31 - World Science Fiction Convention - Anaheim, CA

I hope to see you at something soon. Who is going to Comic Con in San Diego or WorldCon in Anaheim? Join us for the Final Friday Social Hour

For the continued schedule through the end of the year:
https://mtoddgallowglas.com/schedule/

Life of a Literary Underdog

I'm house-sitting for a friend. This is where we're having the Summer Writing Retreat. Again, we still have some room. Come jumpstart your creativity.

It's been pretty chill here the last week. Getting some work done, though I'm scattered due to juggling so many projects and dealing with some personal issues that keep cutting bits of my heart out. Yay for a great therapist and good friends who are keeping me in the happy crazy place where I can keep creating, as opposed to the sad crazy place that consumes all my creative energy.

Getting ready for a couple of big trips and book launches. Still floors me that I'm going to these Hollywood networking parties, the next one right before Comic-Con. Part of me is super excited for this next stage of my creative career. On the other side of that coin, I've been in places where I thought things were going to take off, only to have them come to nothing. Aaaaand.... Hollywould is famous for that kind of thing. So... Making the script as tight as I can. Believing in the project with all my heart. BUUUUT... Not getting my hopes up. I'll dream big, write my best stories, but keep my feet on the ground.

In the background, work continues on the Wyrd Frontier.

Thanks for being part of my adventure!

Market Updates

Every week, as I have books appearing in new markets, I'll post those updates here.

I'm also going to be partnering with other authors on various platforms to reach new readers. I'll be sharing those here. The Dragon Bone Flute has been chosen as a feature in Fae, Fate, and Forbidden Magic. Hope you find some great new reads.

Media Consumption

Reading:

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett for Reading as a Contact Sport - While I'm still mostly enjoying the story, I'm seeing some fundamental flaws in the construction of it that are stalling me out. I'm going to finish it. Just might take me a while.
Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Diniman - This month's book for Reading as a Contact Sport. Started this one. The opening premise is kinda meh for me. With everything I've heard, I hope it grows on me. It might be a case of it being overhyped.
The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff - revisiting this to work on not practicing Taoism. I had trouble with one of the chapters in this. Definitely did not age well. One chapter strikes me as decidedly not Taoist. I need to reflect on my understanding of Tao and check my own baggage before further commentary. But, rest assured, I will be making commentary.
To Be Taught, If Fortunate by Becky Chambers, listening to the audiobook narrated by Brittany Pressly. I liked most of this book. The last bit, 15-20 minutes in audio, fell really flat for me. This is a great example of a story that didn't find an ending; it just kinda stopped. The story wandered into a place where it didn't have anywhere to really go but also where it couldn't land. (Which is a bit of a pun if you read the story.)
Beyond the Abyss by Heather Silvio - This is by a friend of mine from grad school. It's a collection of stories and poetry we'll be talking about in the retreat this weekend.
Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi - This is a book on networking and relationship building. I figure I should work on improving these two things if I'm going to navigate Hollywood successfully.

Watching:

Still keeping tabs on WWE, cause it's my guilty pleasure. Also, it's a great study of long-term storytelling and narrative in combat.
Kneecap - This is a movie about the rise of the most popular Irish hip-hop/rap trio from Belfast. Yeah, Belfast, Ireland, has a banging hip hop scene. This group does a lot of their rap in Irish. (The language is called Irish, NOT Irish Gaelic.) Their popularity is one of the contributing factors to the younger generations of Northern Ireland studying their own language.

This movie has inspired me to include a bit of Irish in each Shenanigan Report. So... Let's learn to say hello.

First, don't try to attribute English spelling and pronunciation to Irish. Totally different language family that happens to use the Roman alphabet.

Hello is dia duit. pronounced: dee-ah gweech - the "g" in the second word is very soft.

The response is dia is Muire guit. pronounced: dee-ah-is (like one word) muir-ah gweech.

I'll have more for you next week!

Storytime

For this week, you get a teaser for Legend of the Dragon Bone Flute

The Widow

THE WIDOW

I’ve been expecting you. Come in. Come in.

I heard down at the well that you’re looking for anyone what’s had a brush in with the lad with the magic flute. Yes, good master. I’ve seen him, heard him play, watched with my own eyes the wonders that his playing brings.

The young man came through the village several weeks ago, and as he passed my house, he asked, “Good woman, why do you weep?”

I told him as much as I’ll tell you now. My husband joined a militia of men who set about to rescue the princess from the Bandit King, Randyll Flynn. I’m sure you’ve seen the broadsheets going up in every town, village, and hamlet throughout the kingdom. Save the princess. Become a king. It’s like one of those old stories come to life, a grand adventure for them to live out, especially with tales of that lad with the magic flute wandering around, reminding them of tales of the fiery-haired lass summoning dragons and cooking knights alive. With their blood spinning about like they were young men, they went off with the plan to rescue the princess. Oh, the ones that were married, such as my husband, would be rewarded with some castle or title or something from whichever of the unmarried among them earned the reward of the crown. A few days after the menfolk headed out, we find all their heads on sticks just outside of the town. All but one. The eldest of them. Him was tied like a hog and left alive so that he could speak the warning so that no others would seek after such foolishness.

It saddens me to say you can’t speak to that man. Even though them bandits left him alive to warn us, they beat him something fierce for his troubles. He didn’t last out the week, poor thing.

I told my husband not to go. Begged him. Said we had ourselves a good fine life. Ain’t no need for us to seeking to better ourselves when we got so much. When a family has three good fields for growing, a good solid cottage with no leaks in the roof, a sow with a swollen belly, and a cow for milking and her calffor eating or selling, that family has no business looking to reach so high. But some folk, mostly men, the occasional lady, but mostly men can only ever dream of what they have not rather than see the greatness in what they have.

But that wasn’t all, next night, we wake up to find our livestock gone or dead. They killed the animals something brutal, with no rhyme nor reason as to which animals they killed, only that they cut them up gruesome and scattered the remains over the whole of the village. I think my sow might have been among them, but can’t be sure. The calf definitely was. Found its head on my doorstep. I believe they did lead my cow away, but dead or just gone matters little to me now. The only animals that remained to us were some of the mousers about and the chickens the bandits didn’t bother to catch.

So, not only did we grieve for our men, we were force to wonder if we might have enough food to make it through the winter.

And then, though winter is still month upon month away, our troubles continued a few nights later because of our winter snows. You seem like a well-traveled man, with your worn cloak, dusty boots, and that great sword on your back. I’m sure you know of how harsh winters get here in these highlands, not so harsh as those towns up by the Wild Hills up north, but we still see a fair share of snow. More often than not, winter snows cover the windows and doorways. Years and years ago, in the time of I think my grandfather’s grandfather, the town determined that they would build chimneys so wide that a man could crawl up trough them, even making a bit of a ladder out of the cobblestones within them. Well, seems them bandits know something of our ways, possibly beaten out of that elder man when they had him prisoner. A few nights later, they got past our barred and locked doors by climbing down the chimneys. Those that were awake, they robbed at knife and sword point, those what slept through the intruder’s visit woke to find they no longer had any bit of coin what might have been saved and tucked away. All the money what my husband and I earned and saved by raising swine and cows to sell at market year by year gone. Every penny. Every crown. With it gone, I could not pay the rents when come midsummer.

So that’s the story I told the lad as he comes wandering by my cottage two days later. At that point, I found myself wondering when it was they’d come and burn my cottage with me in it.

“Dry your tears, good woman,” the boy said, as he say down next to me.

He reached into his pockets, and when he brings his hand out again, he shows me a small pile of gleaming silver coins.

“I don’t know how much you lost,” the young man said as he put them into my hand, “or the price your lord demands for rents, but they are yours.”

I tried to decline, thanking him, but he refused to take them back.

“I’ll just earn more at the next town I go to.”

“I must give you something in exchange,” I said to him.

He smiled at me. It’s been a long while since a man smiled at me that warmly.

“Three nights,” he said. “I’m tired of traveling. You remind me of my mother, though she was a tavern hostess rather than a farmer, but still. Give me a few meals, what ever you can, and a dry place to rest, and we’ll call it a bargain true. Otherwise, I’ll be on my way without taking the coin back.”

So, I agreed. I cooked him meals. He slept on a pallet by the fire. All the while, he remained warm and sweet. Every moment, he remained warm and friendly.
The morning after the first night, I woke to him playing his flute just outside the door. He stood facing the distant mountains, leaning forward a bit, as if trying to send his song specifically in that direction. The song went on and on until I had prepared breakfast. I tell you, sir, his playing helped ease my heart as it ached for my husband, and my stomach as it turned in worry in thinking about the long, hungry winter I had to face alone. In the evening, he played for near on an hour as the sun set. Again, he faced East, leaning toward the mountains.

The second morning was the same. The young man played and played, and just as the breakfast porridge finished boiling, I heard cries of surprise from outside the cottage.

I rushed outside and found a parade of animals coming through the village. In the midst of that odd, mismatched herd, I saw my cow and sow. Yes, I knew what they looked like. I tell you, sir, that a farmer knows the look of their animals, this one especially. So I tell you, truth and honor, that I saw my cow and sow. As we stared and gaped in shock and wonder, each animal went to it’s own pen and stood waiting to be fenced in again.

What? No disbelief? No ridicule? No scoffs at the impossibility of it all? Not even a snicker of contradiction. Well then, you certainly are a surprise. Ah, you’ve seen him before. That would explain your interest. I thought you might be just hunting rumors. You aren’t the first.

The first group of bandits came through looking for the large, fair-haired lad what played the flute a few days after our livestock returned. You heard me true. I said, “large, fair-haired lad,” and I meant, “large, fair-haired lad.” In the time since the lad come and go, I’ve heard talk of the scrawny lad of flaming hair. I’ve also heard that it was the read-headed lass come back from across the years. Even heard tell it was Randyll Flynn himself what took up the flute for to try to win the heart of the princess fair. Plenty of rumors whispering about in people’s ears, but the truth I know is the fat lad with hair the color of straw come to this village, play that flute, and our livestock come back to us.

He played one more time, the night after our livestock come home. All through the night he played. I sat with him and listened, for deep down I knew this would be the last I’d hear him, and I so loved his playing. It made me forget all of my woes and sorrows, if only for a short while.

Round about midnight, I see shadows and dark moving between the houses. I nearly jumped up and ran into my house. What else could it be but bandits back for some new malicious mischief? The lad’s song stopped me. As his fingers danced on that instrument, I could almost hear the commands coming from it, almost as if the music had become words. “Bother these people no more. They have suffered enough. They have nothing for you. You’ll find no profit here. Tell your fellows.” For hours and hours, from that darkest hour of the night through the wee hours of the morning and into dawn, the lad played, and those bandits stood transfixed until the sun shone its light over the western horizon, and then they wandered off unto whence ever they come.

The lad stayed long enough for breakfast before leaving. Only liberty he ever took with me was to kiss my cheek just a fore taking his leave. Good lad. Sweet and kind.

Didn’t I tell you?

Oh, I suppose I lost myself in the telling of the story.

“Samal,” he said when I asked his name, “but my friends call me, Sam.”

No. Not Killian. He never spoke of or mentioned a Killian. I never thought to ask him where he was from or how he came by the flute. I was just so grateful for his music and his favor I only thought to ask him how he came to be so kind.

“I learned my manners from my mother,” he said. “She helped keep a tavern, and I saw all manner of men there. I decided I didn’t want to be the sort of man my mother would complain about.”

I hope whatever is the reason you seek him, should you find him, that you treat him decent. If you mean him ill, I hope you never find him. If you’re a man of honor, I hope you protect the lad from the world.