"Paper Bullets" (1941)

This movie is a mess.

It's like they took all the things that would connect up the different parts of the story and chopped them out, assuming the audience would just jump merrily from conclusion to conclusion.  Or something.  

The message of the movie is clear: don't shun the children of criminals for what their parents did, or else they might become criminals themselves.  And I can get behind that message.  In fact, it's a good message, and deserves a coherent story to present it.  Alas, that's exactly what it doesn't get in Paper Bullets (1941), which is also known as Gangs, Inc. because why not give it two titles?  People are already confused.  It's fine.

Also, I suspect that the title cards at the beginning got redone when it was shown on TV in the late 1940s, after Alan Ladd became a big star, because he really just has a small (yet pivotal!) part, but his name is listed at the top in big, bold letters.  Maybe that's when it was retitled too?  The poster to the left is completely and utterly misleading, by the way.  Alan Ladd's character is not a hardened criminal who can kill you by glaring at you.  Though I guess we do see a mugshot of him at one point -- actually, of one of his characters.  He sort-of is playing two characters, though we really only ever see one of them.

Like I said, it's a mess.  Let's dig in and get our hands dirty exploring it, shall we?

The whole thing opens when a little girl named Rita Adams is reunited with her dad, who just got out of prison.  They get to live happily together again for two minutes and forty-two seconds, and then her dad is gunned down at her playground while shielding little Rita behind him.

Rita grows up in an orphanage, where she makes friends with Bob and Mickey.  Bob is a smart guy and Mickey is a tough guy, and Rita is pals with both, though she likes Bob more.  We get one whole scene in the orphanage, which is only there to introduce the guys and show us that Rita has a birthmark behind her left ear because that will be important for exactly two seconds when our story lurches into Rita's adult life -- we know the next person we see is Rita because of that birthmark.

Adult Rita (Joan Woodbury) shares an apartment with her sweet pal Donna (Linda Ware), works at a munitions plant or something, and is dating a rich drunk named Harold DeWitt (Phillip Trent).  Her life is peachy keen for about four minutes, until she gets fired because her employers found out her dad spent time in prison.  Donna says it's fine because the rent is paid, but Rita is NOT fine with this.

While out cruising around with Rita, her drunken boyfriend Harold kills someone in a hit-and-run accident.  Harold's rich daddy's lawyer tells Harold to convince Rita to take the rap for him, even if it means promising to marry Rita.  The lawyer tells Rita that she will get off lightly and not have to do prison time, but hahahaha, not true at all.  She goes to prison.

When Rita gets out of prison twelve seconds after we saw her sentenced, her old friends Bob (John Archer) and Mickey (Jack LaRue) are waiting to pick her up, along with her bestie Donna.  Good old Harold is nowhere to be seen.

Mickey has a bit of juicy news for Rita: Harold's dad, Clarence DeWitt (George Pembroke) paid the lawyer to make sure Rita went to jail so Harold wouldn't have to marry her.  Naturally, this news prompts Rita to embark on a crime spree.  Like every sensible girl who's discovered she was double-crossed by the man who said he'd marry her, she dons a blond wig and starts robbing rich guys, poker games, nightclubs, and brokerage firms.  What else would she do with her time?

Donna never seems to glom onto the fact that Rita is a one-woman crime wave.  The blond bandit in the papers can't be Rita because Rita has dark hair, obviously.  Meanwhile, Rita's orphanage pal Mickey has become kind of a big deal with the New York mob, and he invites Rita and Donna to move to New York.  Donna is a singer, and he promises to find her a place singing in a nightclub.

Everything goes super well in New York.  We're only twenty-six minutes into the film, and Donna is a singing sensation!  Rita has plans to keep busy in the big city too, of course.  Heh heh heh.

Meanwhile, good old Harold's dad, Clarence DeWitt, has started stirring pots and claiming that the New York police are in league with the mob.  The police chief cooks up a great plan to prove this is not true and that it's DeWitt who is in with the mob.  His plan?  Have a sweet policeman wannabe named Jimmy Kelly (Alan Ladd) pretend to be mobster Bill Dugan (also Alan Ladd, but with messy hair) and infiltrate the mob to gather evidence.

This is a fool-proof plan.  Jimmy Kelly has never been trained in how to be a policeman, much less how to pass himself off as a mobster, but since he's identical to Bill Dugan, it'll be fine.  Never mind that Dugan isn't even in prison or some other city -- he's here in New York too, but obviously that won't complicate anything.

(I was really hoping for some split-screen action where Alan Ladd confronts Alan Ladd for impersonating himself, but that clearly was too fancy for this B picture, so all we get is two photographs to compare.  Sigh.)

Because there are only four or five mobsters in all of NYC, Bill/Jimmy works with Mickey to collect bribes.  This gives Alan Ladd some chances to work on his Tough Guy act, as well as practice delivering barbed banter, which is the most fun this movie provides.  I never said the movie had nothing going for it.

We get treated to Leaning Alan Ladd...

...Hat-Tipping Alan Ladd...

...Smiling Alan Ladd...

...and Desk-Perching Alan Ladd!  You can collect them all!

Anyway, old man DeWitt gets a grand jury rolling to investigate a bunch of mobsters.  Rita decides this is her chance to get back at him for sending her to prison.  She takes to the radio, spouting allegations about DeWitt being in league with the mobsters himself.  Then she meets up with the mob bosses and says she can help them take DeWitt down or something, if only they'll let her be a mob boss too.

What mob boss in his right mind is going to turn down an offer like that?  Clearly, this chick is capable of running a big crime organization.  She knows how to talk on the radio, after all.  And she has a Plan for a way to blackmail DeWitt into doing what she wants, which involves some incriminating letters that Mickey stole fifteen minutes earlier in the film.

Rita wants to become a mob boss so she can make lots of money and build a nice playground for underprivileged kids.  I am not even joking.

Meanwhile, Bill/Jimmy and Donna have met up and gotten friendly.  They engage in some cute flirtation in Donna's dressing room, where Donna begs Bill/Jimmy to give up racketeering and get an honest job.  

Bill/Jimmy alllllmost tells Donna he's actually a good guy.

But he doesn't.  Which is probably wise.

This is the best scene of the whole movie, so pardon me if we lingered there a bit.

Bill/Jimmy gets to give the movie its original title: "Paper bullets" are votes.  Now you know.

Some plot happens.  The bad guys discover, accidentally, that Bill/Jimmy is really Jimmy, not Bill at all, through no fault of his own.  Three bad guys take Jimmy on a little ride, resulting in the absolute worst car chase scene in the history of cinema.

The police chief and a pal chase that car around, trying to rescue Bill/Jimmy.  The entire chase scene consists of shots of bored people inside the cars alternated with shots of black cars zooming around at night.

You can't tell which car is which or what is going on.  At all.  And this goes on for a little over two minutes.  Then, one car... goes over a cliff or something?  The only way we know it was the mobster car is that the police chief and his friend jump out of their car and look over the edge.

Since Bill/Jimmy was in that car, we can assume he has died.  That's certainly what Rita and Donna assume.

We, the viewers, are left to assume exactly that for nearly nineteen whole seconds before the police chief reveals, with a chuckle, that it's not true at all, we're just faking Bill/Jimmy's death.  Because of reasons.

Then Rita and Bob (remember Bob from the orphanage?) get married!  Bob is an airplane designer or something?  Totally decent guy.  No idea that his new wife and her best friend Mickey are mobsters.  That is, not until they've been married for a minute and a half, when a guy shows up with an arrest warrant and subpoena for Rita as they leave the Justice of the Peace's office.

There go her plans to build a big playground for underprivileged kids!

Mickey kills somebody for something, we have a bunch of courtroom stuff that drags on for at least three minutes, and then the police spring a surprise witness: Bill/Jimmy!  He's alive!

Donna is super happy to see him!  Mickey is not, and tries to shoot him (because he totally just waltzed into the courtroom packing a gun in a shoulder holster and nobody cared).  But that was just the evidence the police wanted to arrest Mickey too.  The mob bosses, including Rita, are all found guilty and sentenced to prison.  Poor Bob vows he'll wait for her and be faithful to her for as long as it takes for her to get released.  (At the clip this movie travels, that should take about forty seconds, but who's counting?)

I guess Donna got her playground built after all, even though she went to prison, because this is the movie's final shot.  I would totally play in a playground with a creepy sign like this on its gate, wouldn't you?

I spent way too much time taking screencaps of this mess.  I hope you enjoyed them.  At least Alan Ladd is super cute in it, and he gets a fair bit to do, too!

Either this movie is in the public domain, or it's so nonsensical that no one cares to protect it, because you can watch it on YouTube with no problem.  Just in case you like movies that make no sense!  Or you want to see a prototype of Alan Ladd's tough-but-actually-nice-inside characters.

This has been my contribution to the Second Annual Favorite Stars in B Movies Blogathon hosted by Films from Beyond the Time Barrier.

Forgiveness vs. Vengeance: "Ben-Hur" (1959)

When I was young, Ben-Hur (1959) was one of my top ten favorite movies. As a child, I enjoyed the spectacle of big set pieces like the sea battle and the chariot race, but when I moved into my teens, I began to understand the themes and character arcs more. While it’s slipped down a few notches over the past couple of decades, it’s still one of my absolute favorites, a film I don’t have to be “in the mood” for— I can enjoy it any time. And every time I watch it, I find new nuances, new layers, new depths to the story and the characters. 

Ben-Hur tells the story of a wealthy Jewish man named Judah Ben-Hur, sometimes referred to as “the prince of Hur” because he’s so rich and powerful. Around the year 30 AD, Judah’s childhood best friend, Messala, returns home after years fighting with the Roman army. Now a mighty tribune, he wants Judah to help him quiet the unrest in the area, and help Rome govern Judea peacefully. This would mean informing on any troublemakers Judah might know about. Judah refuses, Messala leaves in a huff, and the next thing you know, he’s framing Judah for attempting to assassinate the Roman governor. 

Judah gets sent to the galleys as a slave without a trial, and his mother and sister are thrown into prison. His wealth is confiscated, his servants tortured for information about his activities, and his entire life is ruined. Or so you’d think. But Judah rises from this defeat to become even more powerful than before, and grinds his former friend Messala into the dust to repay him for what he did to Judah and his family. 

Revenge is obviously a huge theme in Ben-Hur. Messala has revenge on Judah for his refusal to help; and Judah has revenge on Messala for destroying the Hur family. The story could have ended there, Judah triumphant over his enemy, but it goes on to show how focusing on vengeance can hollow a person out, leaving them empty and confused after they have gotten their revenge. With Messala gone, Judah is purposeless, vacant, his soul eaten away by the hatred he’d harbored for so many years. 

Into this void come the words of a young rabbi, someone Judah’s one-time slave Esther has started following. This rabbi, or teacher, is named Jesus, and he teaches that people should forgive those who wrong them, should love their enemies, and should leave vengeance to God. Judah has had his revenge and found it bitter, and the rest of the film deals with the question of whether it’s possible for him to forgive those who did him wrong, even the dead Messala, and to forgive himself for his actions as well. 

The movie is based on a book by General Lew Wallace, who had served under General Ulysses S. Grant during the American Civil War. Wallace wrote Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ in the 1870s, finishing it while he was Governor of New Mexico and submitting it for publication in 1880. He began writing it after having a debate with a friend about Christianity. Wallace realized how little he knew about Christianity or the history of Christ’s life, and began to do research into that time period. It eventually led to his fleshing out a short story he’d previously written about the journey of the Magi. 

By focusing on a fictional character the same age as Christ, from the same area of the country, Wallace was able to impart historical detail to his readers about the world Christ lived in without fictionalizing the Biblical account of His life. I think Wallace’s experiences living in a country trying to knit itself back together after a civil war must have informed his decision to make the story revolve around two former friends who become bitter enemies. The lesson of finding peace through forgiveness would have resonated with the readers of the day, who were struggling with similar issues. In today’s fractured world, its message is equally poignant. 

When I was a kid, I loved Ben-Hur‘s epic excitement. When I got a bit older, I valued its excellent story-telling and character development. But now, it’s the themes of forgiveness versus vengeance that resonate with me. Who knows—in another ten or twenty years, this story might mean even more to me! In the meantime, I think I’ll watch it a few more times.

(This post originally appeared in the March/April 2015 issue of Femnista magazine.)

The Sunshine Award, March-style

Gill at Reelweegiemidget Reviews nominated me for the Sunshine Award several months ago, and I am finally finishing off my post for it!  Thank you, Gill -- I'm sorry it took so long to finish this.

The Rules:

• Display the award’s official logo somewhere on your blog. 
• Thank the person who nominated you. 
• Provide a link to your nominator’s blog. 
• Answer your nominator’s questions. 
• Nominate up to 11 bloggers. 
• Ask your nominees 11 questions. 
• Notify your nominees by commenting on at least one of their blog posts.

Gill's Questions for Me:

Who would be your dream interview subject and why? 

I'm going to limit this to people who are currently alive and say Harrison Ford.  He doesn't like to talk much.  I don't like to talk much.  It would be a really short interview in terms of words, but I'd love to just... meet him and tell him how much I enjoy his movies, and maybe ask him if there are any questions nobody ever asks in interviews, but that he's always wanted to answer.

What’s your favourite blogathon that you have either run or taken part in? 

I have REALLY loved co-hosting Legends of Western Cinema Week for the past five years!  Speaking of which, I need to get in touch with my usual co-hosts and see if they're ready to start planning this year's event :-D

You have the choice of a film festival to attend in 2024 in an all-expenses paid trip, which do you choose…? 

I would love to attend the Lone Pine Film Festival someday!  So many amazing westerns were made in that area.  I had the pleasure of visiting their museum years and years ago, and would love to go back one day.

What film-inspired present would you buy for me if you had 50 dollars (or your own currency) to spend…? 

I really enjoy reading scripts, so I would try to find you a script for a movie or show that you love :-)

Imagine that you are moving house, which actor or actress would you choose as your next door neighbour? 

Hugh Jackman.  He's reportedly extremely nice and non-intimidating.  He bakes bread.  He likes to do jigsaw puzzles.  I bake bread and like to do jigsaw puzzles.  He reads books.  I read books.  I'm pretty sure we could start a book club together, where we do jigsaw puzzles, eat bread, and talk about books.  Fun times!

What’s your favourite film franchise? 

The Peter Jackson/New Line Cinema Lord of the Rings films.

Which year is your favourite in film, and support your answer with your top 3 movies from this time…

So, this question stumped me for a long time.  Every time I would pull up this post to work on it, I would get to this question and give up.  I just couldn't figure out a good way to answer it, because I love so many movies from so many eras!  My list of 100 favorite movies has movies ranging from 1921 to 2023!  How to choose one year?

I finally decided to go through that list of 100 favorites and tally up what year each movie is from.  And that gave me an answer for this question at last, which is: 1995.  There are six films from 1995 on my list of 100 favorites.  And that makes total sense, because I was 15 in 1995 and really starting to take notice of movies and study them, and that was about when I made friends with some other avid moviegoers. My top three favorite movies from 1995 are While You Were Sleeping, Sabrina, and Toy Story.  The first two are in my top 20, so I think that's a really good answer, even if it took me forever to figure out!

Recommend a film to me that you think would easily fit in my blog. 

Gill, you enjoy quirky and underrated movies.  Have you seen Ishtar (1987) yet?  My college bestie and I watched that over and over and over together, and it is a really fun ride.  I can still sing snippets of some of the songs.

Without saying who the murderer is, which Agatha Christie inspired movie would you change the murderer in… 

I've never seen a movie version of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, but I'm sure there is one, and I figured out who the murderer was about halfway through the book, which annoyed me a lot.  So changing it up for a movie version might be a jolt of surprise awesomeness!

What’s your favourite film related biopic? 

I love Beyond the Sea (2004), a charming, not-meant-to-be-strictly-realistic biopic of my beloved Bobby Darin.

Who was the first celebrity who responded to you on social media and who was the last…?

I don't really interact with any celebrities on social media, aside from authors.  I suppose the first would be Laurie R. King, who graciously let me interview her when I was doing a read-along of The Hound of the Baskervilles a few years ago on my book blog.  Most recently, Katherine Reay replied to a comment of mine on Instagram.

Well, there we have it!  My answers to Gill's questions at long last.

My life has been very, very full right now, and I have not done much blog reading for the last couple of months.  But I'm going to go ahead and nominate people for this anyway, and make myself catch up on reading some blogs by reading their latest posts and commenting on them with a link to this!  

So, my nominees are:

Classic Film and TV Corner

18 Cinema Lane

I'm Charles Baker Harris (and I Can Read)

The Midnite Drive-In

Movies Meet Their Match

Musings of an Introvert

Phyllis Loves Classic Movies

Sidewalk Crossings

Silver Scenes

Taking Up Room

The Texas Lass

And here are MY 11 questions for my nominees:

1. What's the first movie you have a memory of watching?

2. Have you ever written a fan letter to a celebrity?  (If so, did you get a reply?)

3. What are the three funniest movies you have ever seen?

4. What movie do you really want to change the ending of?

5. What movie do you wish had a sequel, but it doesn't?

6. Who were were favorite actor and actress when you were a teen?

7. Who are your favorite actor and actress now?

8. Does anyone else in your family love movies?

9. If you could pick an actor/actress to play you in a movie, who would you choose?

10. Do you ever watch a movie in the theater more than once?

11. Are there any movies coming out in 2024 that you are looking forward to?

Have fun!  Play if you want to ;-)

"White Warrior" (Cheyenne, Season 3, Ep 13)(1958)

"White Warrior" is the second episode of Cheyenne (1955-63) I ever saw.  I mentioned recently how, when we moved to North Carolina when I was 12, my whole world expanded thanks to a local video rental store with a fantastic collection of classic movies, particularly westerns.  That video store also had a lot of episodes of classic TV shows on VHS, including two each of Cheyenne, Bronco, Maverick, and Wanted: Dead or Alive.  One of those episodes of Cheyenne was this one, and it's the ep that made me fall in love with this show.  

In "White Warrior," Cheyenne Bodie (Clint Walker) is leading a wagon train.  I really love wagon train stories (so much so that I wrote one), so that alone would probably make this episode a favorite.  There's something so compelling for me about a group of people who have decided to leave home and family and familiarity behind them and are setting off into what they hope will be a better world.  But they're also stepping out into the unknown, with uncertainty and hard work and a lot of possible dangers around them.  Also, one of my great-grandmothers was born in a wagon train while her family headed to their new home in the Dakota Territory, so that might be part of why they fascinate me.

Anyway, the wagon train Cheyenne is leading has a couple of total creeps in it, Eli Henderson (Peter Whitney) and Matt Benedict (Morris Ankrum) in particular.  Eli Henderson is a trader who wants to bilk settlers and American Indians out of whatever he can by selling them subpar and sometimes illegal goods.  Matt Benedict is a harsh, hateful man who pushes his son Neal (Chuck Courtney) to bully others in order to prove what big and powerful people they both are.  Cheyenne has plenty of trouble keeping the two of them from creating havoc even before the titular character arrives.

A handful of Apache warriors meet up with the wagon train and want to trade with Henderson.  While Henderson is wheeling and dealing with them, Cheyenne notices that one young man riding with them (Michael Landon) is a Comanche captive, not an Apache.  He trades a horse for the captive because he knows the Apache warriors will most likely brutally torture and then murder him when they get back to their own people.

Cheyenne frees the Comanche and learns that he speaks English.  He also notices a distinctive scar on the young man's wrist.  Some of the people on the wagon train, egged on by Henderson and Benedict, demand that Cheyenne get rid of the Comanche because they are sure he will kill them all in their sleep.  Why?  Because he's an Indian, and they don't trust Indian.  When Benedict snarls, "He's an Indian.  There's too many of them, anyway," Cheyenne retorts, "That's exactly how they feel about us. Only, they got better reason."

Then Cheyenne drops a little bomb on their let's-hate-the-Comanche party:  the captive he freed isn't Comanche by birth, but by adoption.  The captive confirms this reluctantly -- he is a young white man named Alan Horn who was captured by the Comanche when he was a child and adopted into their tribe through a blood ceremony that left the scar on his wrist.

The settlers still aren't cool with this, even after Cheyenne explains he knew Alan had been adopted by the Comanche because the same thing happened to him as a boy, only he was adopted by the Cheyenne instead.  This is a big part of why I love this episode: we get to hear more about Cheyenne's backstory here than we do in any other episode I have seen.  He was rescued by the Cheyenne after his family was killed by raiders, and they adopted him into the tribe.  But, when he was in his teens, about the same age as Alan, he had to decide for himself where he belonged.  And Cheyenne Bodie decided he wanted to rejoin the white world, even though he never would quite feel at home there or find total acceptance because of his Indian upbringing.

Cheyenne gives Alan Horn the same choice.  If he wants to rejoin the Comanche, Cheyenne will send him on his way with a horse, water, food, and a knife.  If he wants to try living with the white people, Cheyenne will help him find a place in that world instead.  And that is another big reason why I love this episode -- Cheyenne never pushes Alan to decide one way or another.  He lets him make his own choice.  He never even tries to persuade him that one society would be better than the other.

The way this show as a whole treats American Indian characters was pretty revolutionary when it first aired in 1955.  That was the height of the popularity for western shows and movies, and the vast majority of those portrayed the American Indians as nameless, faceless, remorseless enemies.  Of course, there were exceptions.  And, of course, Cheyenne's being raised by a native tribe is often used as a way to make him seem exotic and special.  But the show insists on treating Indian characters with dignity, as intelligent individuals.

Anyway, Alan Horn does find some acceptance in the wagon train, particularly being befriended by Clara Bolton (Randy Stuart) and Lyle Gordon (Richard Garland).  But others are determined to drive him out, especially when he reveals that he overheard Eli Henderson making a deal with those Apache warriors to sell them rifles and ammunition, which is against the law.  Matt Benedict even tries to convince his son Neal to kill Alan Horn just because he was talking to a white girl.

Cheyenne believes and trusts Alan, and of course, the bad guys are stopped, the good guys are rewarded, and the wagon train is able to safely continue on the way to their new homes.  This is a fifties show with a lot of kids in the audience, after all.  But that doesn't keep it from taking a deeper, harder look at issues like trust, kindness, and belonging.  The show as a whole doesn't shy away from difficult subjects, and that's another reason that I love it.

In fact, Cheyenne is one of my top favorite western shows of all time, despite my only having seen two episodes of it as a teen, and then all of season one when I was in my twenties.  I now have all seven seasons on DVD and have been having a jolly time making my way through the show.  I'm only halfway through season two, but I jumped ahead to rewatch this episode so I could review it this weekend.

Michael Landon's star was on the rise when he guest-starred in this episode.  In a matter of months, he would be starring on Bonanza and become a household name.  His performance here is understated and lovely, showing his inner conflict mainly through his haunted eyes and hesitant words.

This review is my contribution to the 10th Annual Favorite TV Show Episode Blogathon hosted by A Shroud of Thoughts all weekend long.

I've been crushing on Clint Walker for more than thirty years, so here is one last shot of him looking particularly good in this episode.

Upcoming Book Releases

Yes, that title is plural for a reason!  I have several new releases and rereleases in the works for 2024, and it is long past time for me to be talking about them here.  Life has been kinda... extra... the last couple of months, and things like blogging have gotten shoved to the back burner a bit.  Part of that mayhem has been that I have a LOT of book projects I'm working on all at once, so let me give you a quick run-down on what is on the horizon for my books!

First off, I'm releasing my Sleeping Beauty retelling, The Man on the Buckskin Horse as an illustrated paperback on April 30!  It will also be available (with the illustrations!) for ebook -- you can pre-order the Kindle edition here already.  The illustrations are all by Skye Hoffert, whom I commissioned to do character art for My Rock and My Refuge.  It was such a joy to work with her again!

This is the novella that won the Rooglewood Press retelling contest and was included in their 2016 anthology Five Magic Spindles.  The publication rights have reverted back to me, and I am excited to be able to finally make this book an official part of my Once Upon a Western series!

Info about book launch goodies and so on will be coming after Easter, so be on the lookout for that.

Okay, that's announcement number one.  Here's the next one:

I will be releasing a collection of ten short stories this summer!  There will be two stories related to each book in my Once Upon a Western series, all either prequels or sequels to those books.  You've been able to read some of those stories before, but three will be brand-new, and several others have only been available to my author newsletter subscribers previously.

Speaking of which, if you haven't signed up for my author newsletter yet, you can do that right here.  It's a much faster way to find out about my book news than waiting for me to have time to post things on my blog ;-)

Okay, piece of news number three:

I have signed a deal with ONE Audiobooks to produce audiobook versions of my entire Once Upon a Western series, including the short stories that I'll be releasing this summer!  This is a dream come true, and I am really excited about this additional way for people to access my books.

(This is the same company that I wrote A Christian Reader's Guide to Jane Eyre for last year, which should be released sometime this spring.)

And now, my fourth and final announcement:

Last fall, I was invited to be part of a multi-author series called the Cornerstone Series which will be a set of sixteen novellas, each retelling a fairy tale, but focusing on a side character from the fairy tale.  So, imagine a Cinderella retelling that's about the fairy godmother, or a Snow White retelling that focuses on the huntsman, that kind of thing.  (Those are examples ONLY -- I don't know if any of the authors are writing anything like that.)  The series will be all non-magical fantasy novellas, which means there may be fairy tale creatures like unicorns or mermaids, or other fantasy elements, but there will be no magicians, witches, wizards, or sorcerers.  

My book, A Noble Companion, is an Ugly Duckling Retelling that focuses not on the ugly duckling himself, but on a childhood friend.  It is set in a fantasy version of Spanish California in the early 1800s where there are talking animals and a dragon.

I'll be revealing more about A Noble Companion in the coming months, and it will be released November 12.  You can already pre-order the ebook on Amazon if you want to.

Okay!  That's all my news!  Are you breathless?  I kind of am. That's a LOT to be working on in one year!!!  Drop a comment below and tell me which of these projects you're the most excited about :-D