THE QUERULOUS PROCESS OF QUERY LETTERS

Outside, it's a beautiful sunny autumnal day. I'm wearing a brand new pink shirt, celebrating Pink Out for Planned Parenthood day, and currently sitting at the Cascade Park Library where I just finished rewriting Chapter -29- of Ghoul World. An extremely long chapter, I took several days to complete it. Today, 143 people visited this blog. It's the biggest number to visit this Beatnik, Silent Generation Boomer's blog about an old writer whose goal is to get someone other than himself to publish one of his novels before he dies. I'm now circulating three rewritten novels to agents while completing the third rewrite of my recently completed science fiction novel. Still to be rewritten is the novel I used as my thesis for a Master's in English (with an emphasis in creative writing). It's called Delinquent Lives. Also, something is stirring in me about an entirely new novel. Who knows? I recently recommitted myself to sending out more query letters to agents. I realized that every time I enter my office, I flinch to see the 4x6 yellow cards upon which I record my queries and their results. Rejection is always a painful thing to experience. Two rejections of queries came my way last week. For the fun of it, I sent one query over the Atlantic last night to a British agent.

BEATNICK BOOMER HAPPY ENOUGH WITH FEATURED READING SELF

The reading at Paper Tiger Coffee last Wednesday, went very well, I thought, and thanks again to Joyce Colson for inviting me to be a featured reader there. I read poems from my checkered past with women and about women I've read about too or whose stories I've heard something about. All mixed together, of course, to protect the innocent. The fine line drawing to the right is by Christopher Luna who I was so glad to see at the reading. He's been very kind to me and appreciative of my work. I enjoy that he refers to me as the Henry Miller of Vancouver. The poetic lines around my head are from the last poem I read that night. 

The third rewrite of Ghoul World is speeding along. Couldn't be happier with how it's turning out. No more responses to work or inquiries I've sent out. Fingers forever locked in a crossed position.

I've met a young writer named Lindsey Kurtz and heard from her about a local prose-writing group here in Vancouver. So am connecting via Facebook with her and her writing friends.

SILENT BOOMER TO BE FEATURED POET AT PAPER TIGER ROASTERS

This coming Wednesday, September 16th, 2015, the Silent Boomer will be the featured poet at Joyce Colson's Paper Tiger open mic event that occurs at Paper Tiger Coffee Roasters at 7:00 PM. Location is at 703 Grand Blvd. Vancouver, WA. It's an every third Wednesday of the month occurrence. Don't forget...open mic and good coffee too. George is going to concentrate on poetry about women and the psychology of some damaged women he's known and on some of the ways that men relate to them. Some poems will be pretty scary.

THIS AND THAT...A LITTLE BIT OF

Holy Jumping Jehoshaphat! Last two days of rewrite of Ghoul World, I've done two chapters each day. Will begin Chapter -15- tomorrow. Moving right along. I thought Colbert's second show was stronger than his first. His sendup of Trump during his first show was silly and juvenile, nearly, but his second night's political bit sounded more like the style he originated at Comedy Central. More sophisticated. Oh, listen to Mister Sophisticate, George Thomas, or Silent Boomer or ex-Beatnick hippy, and whathaveyou. 

Had a great time at the recent National Beat Poetry Festival: Portland PDX version. I mean it was grooving and moving, loud and packed.

For our 15th wedding anniversary, my wife, Mertie, took us to

Jimmy Mak's jazz club to listen to jazz and eat dinner. She did this because every time we've walked past Jimmy Mak's since arriving in Vancouver, I've said, "We gotta go there sometime." So, she got us there. What a sweetheart she is. I got her Crystal earrings and a Glen Campbell DVD because, lately, she's been saying, "We gotta have some Glen Campbell in the house." Secondly, because the 15th wedding anniversary is the glass or crystal anniversary. I've used Mak's in my Ghoul World novel, but the club in my book doesn't look anything like the real place, but, of course, it's two hundred years from now. 

BETNICKING WITH THE STARS

Honesty is painful. At my Barnes & Noble reading, no one showed up. I read well several of my best poems. If that doesn't attract people, there is nothing I can do about it. I'm wondering how long I'll stick to the open mic forums.

The third rewrite of Ghoul World is preceding at about a chapter a sitting, sometimes sliding over into two days, but I'm encouraged by the work. Will begin Chapter -9- the next time I sit down to write. No new rejections to report. 

Lastly, TV's "Star Trek: the next generation" taught me an interesting thing about plausibility. I'm always worried about being plausible, right? In the Star Trek segment I watched, the Enterprise fakes out an adversary by allowing them to destroy an unmanned ship, thinking they are killing a starship full of their enemies that the Enterprise is charged to protect. Starships are shown time and again to have the power to monitor another starship for "signs of life". It's SOP to monitor another ship for life. Yet, just to accommodate a plot line, an Enterprise adversary's starship doesn't seem to have this power. Why do I fret over such things? Maybe readers don't care as much as I do?