Regarding Greyhounds, and WIP Excerpts

It’s an absolutely lovely day here in sunny New Mexico. Blue sky, a light breeze, and 74 degrees.

My muse, however, has been very persistent and I spent most of the morning writing. By about noon, the greyhound decided I totally sucked because I hadn’t taken him for a walk. Never mind that the backdoor had been open and he’d been free to sun on the lawn all morning. (This, because, the flies haven’t come out of hibernation or back from Florida or whatever it is that flies do when they aren’t tormenting horses or loitering on dog shit.)

At one o’clock, I’d run out of words and it was time to get up and move and stop growing my ass. I put on the hound’s harness and out we went into the warm sunlight.

Halfway down the block, the greyhound’s tongue is a pink, wet ribbon, flopped out of his long snout, his head is down and he’s drooping like an orchid in the desert. My delicate little flower. “You’re trying to kill me,” he seems to say.

“Puh-lease. There’s no point in killing you. It’s not like you’d make good eating.”

Tomorrow? We’ll go through the exact same routine.

Here’s my response to a Lucky Seven tag on Facebook, via Maureen O. Betita. Supposed to post 7 lines, from 7th paragraph, on 7th page from current WIP. As usual, I cheated. This comes from chapter one, even though there is a prologue, but I’m so appalled that I’ve written a prologue, I can’t bear to make it more real by posting excerpts. And it’s more than seven sentences, because…I can’t follow instructions. Neener-neener-neener.

***working title, Lost in Paradise***

“Some help here, huh?” said Eowyn, Kelly’s seventeen-year-old niece.

Kelly grabbed the garbage bags, noting the contents–more coffee filters and cups–and hefted them into the dumpster.

“You’re late,” noted Eowyn.

“Nonsense. A bookseller is never late. She arrives precisely when she means to.”

“Ugh.” Eowyn marched ahead of her and opened the door. “You know the Lord of the Rings movies are the bane of my existence. Before them, only real nerds teased me about my name.”

Kelly strolled through the doorway, ahead of her niece. “I can’t help it. I was compelled by–”

“Wisconsin called. They want their genre cheese back.” Before Kelly could reply, Eowyn asked, “So how was the booksellers’ conference?”

****

Mischief managed. Have a great Friday.