Six Hundred Sixty Six Bottles of Blood on the Wall: Crossroads and Intersections

It’s been a long time since I’ve written something for Horror Tree. Once upon a time, I wrote weekly about the struggles and insights of a newbie writer still working things out and learning a lot by writing about writing for a lot of people who were probably experiencing lots of the same things I was. A couple of you may remember me, and wonder where I went, but most of you probably have no idea who the hell I am.

In the past I swore a lot, made a lot of inflammatory comments, had a lot of fun. I got a lot right, and I also got a lot wrong, but I was ALWAYS honest with myself, and my audience.

So it’s time to be honest once again and say that at least for now… I’m done. And I’ve been done for long time. I lost whatever it was I had, but I’m not sad or upset. If anything, I’m completely indifferent to it all. I just don’t care any more.

For the better part of the last year, my focus shifted almost completely to reading, and believe me, I have been murdering books and loving it. Feels great, especially seeing friends and other writers who started around the same time as me putting out good quality shit.

I beat myself up about my literary lethargy for a long time, but then I realized, what’s the point? A lot of the void writing filled in my life has been filled with other things (not an increase in drugs or alcohol, I swear), and I’m happy.

If I wanted to write, I’d sit down and write. You won’t hear me moping about how I lost my mojo or how I’ve had writer’s block for a whole year or some shit like that. Nope. No way. I’ve been living new aspects of my life and writing just hasn’t been a priority.

Do I have an hour a day to sit down and write? Of course. We all do.

Do I want to spend an hour doing that each day? No. Right now, I honestly don’t. Even writing this post is something I put off until the last minute.

Am I going to regret it? Probably. Maybe. I don’t know. I’ll worry about that when it comes.

Am I done forever? I sure don’t think so, but a lot happened to me really fast when I got started and I turned that initial spark of creativity into a goddamned juggernaut, and then my life, time, values, priorities, whatever you want to call it, went in a different direction. We all come to the crossroads, and we all make our decisions. I think I’ll be back in full swing someday, but until then there are a few things I’ve committed to permanently like a series of novels co-authored with Ken MacGregor, the first of which will drop later this year, and a few anthology invitations I have accepted and will not run from.

In a few of my old posts that are probably still floating around on this site I probably called everyone who doesn’t write every day a pussy, or talked out of my ass about output and excuses and god knows what else, but now I’m a little older and a little wiser and things make a little more sense to me.

What it boils down to is this: Do whatever the Hell you wanna do. If you see 10 good anthology calls you want to hit, hit ‘em, smash ‘em, give ‘em your best. If you only want to write novels or flash fiction or whatever, then do that. If you just wanna write for yourself and bury it on your hard drive, do it. If you just wanna read for a while, do that, and don’t beat yourself up about it. Make yourself happy, cuz ain’t nobody else gonna do it for you.

Don’t over commit, and remember it’s okay to say no to people.

But make sure you honor the commitments you make, especially to good friends, and you make sure you give them your very best.

This post here was prompted by a commitment I made well over a year ago to one of my best friends on this planet. His name is Rob Boley. He and a good friend of his, New York Times Bestselling romance/horror/erotica writer Megan Hart wanted to put together an anthology of novellas all themed around an Ouija Board. They recruited some serious talent in Chris Marrs, Brad Hodson, and the inimitable Sephera Giron. They threw me a bone, and I became a part of this book titled Intersections: Six Tales of Ouija Horror.

Nearly my only/entire writing output for 2016 is collected in my 20,000 word novella, titled “Ghosted.” It’s the single longest piece I’ve published to date. I also think it’s my best.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know everyone says that about everything, but I had something to say in “Ghosted” and I think I said it loud and clear while simultaneously and intentionally leaving all kinds of blurred lines. Anyone that knows me knows that I’m not too big on the supernatural, and I tackled this story in the only way I feel that I could have. I wrote a dating/relationship story, and god do I love writing dating/relationship stories.

So basically what this post boils down to is that at least for the indefinite future, I don’t have much planned on the writing front. Other than the novel(s) with Ken, I’ve got nothing else coming and nothing else submitted. I’ve made peace with that, and with the early 2017, yesterday, Friday the 13th release of Intersections, and the story I wrote, the talent I’m standing beside, and the product itself, I can’t think of a better way to walk away. At least for a little while longer.

In the last year, I haven’t plugged a single thing haha, so nothing would make me happier than getting as many eyeballs on Intersections as possible because I think we’ve created one hell of an anthology. Get lost in the words and decide for yourself: You can snag it on Amazon!

Rob and Megan read all the stories and decided to put mine at the beginning. I couldn’t be more honored. I always thought I made a better opening act than I would a headliner. Nothing more satisfying than dropping a jaw and having someone ask “Who the hell is that?”

I am Kerry Lipp.

I am proud.

I am happy.

I hope this one drops jaws.

And I hope, Intersections: Six Tales of Ouija Horror only gets better from there.

 

Keep reading, keep writing, and keep it real,

KL

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