The Adventures of LitBoy: Bill Brent's Blog

I AM INWINCIBLE!

GAH.

I go for my usual half-hour walk around 5:30 p.m. It is my first time this week without any head covering, so of course I get hit by a raincloud about eight minutes in. I run most of the way back home. The rain stops. Frustrated but determined to do something with my now pumped-up heart energy, I yank our shovel out of the ground, where it has been propping up a new sapling purchased at last week's Plant It Hawaii sale; the young potted tree is prone to falling over until I can get it in the ground.

I start digging into the lava cinder soil in the corner of our front lawn, a hole I have been digging for the last several days. Eight inches down, I have hit solid rock, as with everywhere here, so I decide to go for width rather than depth. Something tells me that if I persist within this particular spot, I will be rewarded.

In frustration, I start banging the metal shovel head against the rock floor, chipping away at an angle. The floor starts to give, breaking up a bit to yield several chunks small enough to fit within my palm. I excavate the chunks, along with the copious lava cinder generated by my widening. Then I sense a larger, looser chunk of rock at the base of this hole -- the true mother lode here. By digging on all sides, and widening out the hole even further, I determine that this boulder is nearly a foot across and quite deep. If only I could get Madam Pele to give it up.

So I get a small trowel to prop this giant, loosening chunk on one side while I attempt to pry it out with the shovel. It is growing dark, and so far I have a few small rocks, several shovelfuls' worth of cinder, and one mosquito bite to show for my efforts. Yet I persist; this is no longer about a hole in the ground; it is about my frustration with the Hawaiian elements, and my fierce determination to move on with my life. I am tired of digging holes. I want this bounteous Hawaiian earth to sustain us, and I especially want to enjoy someday a tall glass of lemonade taken from the tree that I am resolved to plant within this niche.

Five minutes more, and I feel a small blister forming beneath these garden gloves. I dig into the earth with my fingers and yank at the boulder. It yields. The hole is now a good six inches deeper, enough at last to plant this lemon tree. It is dark now. Tomorrow I will return to put this tree into the hole and nurture it within Pele's stubborn yet fecund earth.

--BB ... Angry White Male?

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2008.05.08, 8:30 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

20.00 / $200.00 (10.0%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars and my annual goal of $200. Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

NOVEL-WRITING LOG: It was 40 weeks ago today....

Well, not really, but "somewhere around 300 days ago" wouldn't sound nearly as catchy. In any case, February 24 is exactly ten months after starting the right-brain novel last April 24, and I emailed the last draft to my writing coach for a final read-through on February 18. I may re-purpose it a bit to make it more genre-friendly, but basically it's done. I am quite pleased with it; I just haven't felt like blogging about it. I still don't, actually, but I have felt totally uninspired today, so I figured at least I could get the three-week-old weather report off the front page of this blog.

So at last I have joined the ranks of the untold thousands of writers with an unpublished novel manuscript lurking in a drawer somewhere (hard drive, in my case). So no longer am I merely and proverbially "working on a novel" -- I've actually GOT one! I still haven't decided whether this is a milestone or a millstone (ha). Both, I guess. Now to decide where and how to publish it.

I will probably go back to work on the LEFT-brain novel later this week. Oh, and I have had two short stories accepted into anthologies since the new year began. One is a rewrite of a story that originated in 1995; the other is an excerpt from novel #3 -- so maybe we'll call that the "middle-brain novel" (double-ha).

Go me.

Bill's Right-Brain Novel,
as of February 18, 2008:

50,422 / 50,000 (100.8%)

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2008.03.22, 10:30 a.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

20.00 / $199.90 (10.0%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

A Memoir of Sexual Self-Discovery, and a History of Religious Bowling

Probably I should break this entry into two or three separate posts, but lately it's tough enough for me to prod myself into doing even a monthly post to this blog. So today you get three for the price of one.

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FIRST, I want to pass along a link to an online excerpt from ENTANGLED LIVES, the erotic memoir anthology that features my true story along with six other erotic memoirs, including MARILYN JAYE LEWIS, IAN PHILIPS / GREG WHARTON, and "Adam Greenaway" (the pseudonym for a well-known gay author who chose anonymity for his self-disclosure), BILL BRENT (moi -- just including the name for the search engines), AMIE M. EVANS, ROB STEPHENSON, and RACHEL KRAMER BUSSEL.

This piece, excerpted from Rob Stephenson's "Exuvia (1977-1980), is featured on the VELVET MAFIA website:

CLICK FOR "EXUVIA" (NOTE: for mature readers only.)

This excerpt contains depictions of gay male S/M sexual activity. What I love about it is how Rob describes the rush of discovery and sexual power from an activity that is not genitally focused.

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SECOND, here is a plug for a new book from editor Russ Kick and the great folks at THE DISINFORMATION COMPANY, who publish a series of encyclopedic books that challenge our cultural assumptions. This one is provocatively titled EVERYTHING YOU KNOW ABOUT GOD IS WRONG, and it contains my article, "Martin Luther Goes Bowling," all about the little-known connection between bowling and religion. For instance, there is substantial evidence that bowling, as we know it today, originated in part as a ritual in German churches several centuries after the death of Christ. The original bowling pins may have been some combination of walking stick and club that the parishioners used to defend themselves against "heathens" (robbers) enroute to Church.

Want to know more? HERE'S A LINK TO THE BOOK.

The book contains a plethora of articles by well-known authors, most if not all of which explore little-known facts concerning religion, religious fallacies, or other meditations on the topic, including one of my favorites, "Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do With God," by my blogging pal GRETA CHRISTINA. That one's a freebie, in fact, because you can read it on her blog, RIGHT HERE.

A few other articles of the dozens in this anthology: Richard Dawkins shows us the strange, scary properties of religion; Neil Gaiman turns a biblical atrocity story into a comic (that almost sent a publisher to prison); Erik Davis looks at what happens when religion and California collide; Mike Dash eyes stigmatics; Douglas Rushkoff exposes the trouble with Judaism; Paul Krassner reveals his "Confessions of an Atheist"; and best-selling lexicographer Jonathon Green interprets the language of religious prejudice.

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LAST BUT NOT LEAST, I've been putting up new items for sale in my online bookstore, BooksFromHawaii. Browse, if you wish, and see if there's something you like!

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Thanks for tuning in, and in case I don't post again before the Solstice, Christmas, or whatever your celebration of choice may be, have a wonderful and life-enriching holiday.

Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2007.12.08, 11:05 a.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

80.99 / $199.90 (40.5%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

WIN-WIN: Thinking My Way Outside the Economic Box of the American Artist / Entrepreneur

Want to make an easy $25 and help support my work?

Through October 30, Capital One, my savings bank, is offering $25 to anyone I refer using the following code:

AM3Y4KYDF

You can open a High Yield Money Market Account:

- online HERE,
- or by calling 1-800-555-4904

Simply provide the code AM3Y4KYDF when you open an account online or over the phone. I get $15 per referral, so actually, you get the better part of the deal! And CapitalOne pays a great rate on savings accounts regardless of balance, currently 5.00%. More details at: CAPITAL ONE .

Normally I would not make a commercial announcement like this via my blog or email newsletter list, but I have been extremely satisfied with my CapitalOne savings plan. Plus, at this point I am doing my darndest to think creatively about how to stay afloat in the current economy. So I don't mind trading a tiny bit of pride and running the risk of offending someone here in order to help make ends meet. We all know friends, family, and colleagues who've taken a hit. I have, too. So this is one small way I'm fighting back. I don't intend to do this kind of thing very often, but I've decided that Fall, starting this year, is going to be my annual fundraising drive.

Not to worry — I'm not in dire straits at the moment, but you know what they say about an ounce of prevention. And, as a disenfranchised artist in this culture (please note the clever double redundancy in that phrase), I am choosing to be proactive rather than reactive with regard to my financial situation.

Typically, the last year of a President's term is bad for the stock market. I have managed to save a couple hundred dollars each month over the past several years by starting a ShareBuilder plan. Right now, I'm looking at cashing out a couple of very small but somewhat volatile investments while the market is still strong, and placing the proceeds in my savings plan.

Meanwhile, I'm doing my best to paddle against the stream in other ways:

- I'm clearing space by donating items to my local thrift stores and selling the more valuable stuff on eBay starting next week, HERE.

- I have been keeping a tiny little online bookstore at Amazon.com for five years now.

- I'm rewriting MAKE A ZINE!, my very first book (1997), for a second edition release next year from Microcosm Publishing.

- Royalties from my how-to book on sex are lagging a bit, and I'm taking up the slack by helping to produce a second volume of stories from the Literotica.com website.

- Paddle faster. I'm getting older, so I'm trying to work smarter, not harder. However, I just took on a small gardening job, just to make sure I can cover a bill or two.

And I'm still finding time to write:

- I'm a featured contributor to the seven-author anthology, ENTANGLED LIVES, just out on Alyson Publications. Details are HERE.

- I've just completed the first draft of a novel of modest length (about 50,000 words);

- and I'm about seventy percent into a second, longer novel.

- I've just signed a contract for a new short story to appear in a big-time erotic anthology. Due to the publishing industry's volatility nowadays, I don't pre-announce things anymore, so details on that to come, once it goes to press.

Here are some other ways to lend support:

- by donating via the Tip Jar to MY BLOG, RIGHT HERE. The Tip Jar is in the upper left hand corner.

- or by purchasing a gift from me for yourself or someone else via Amazon, HERE.

- or from me via eBay, HERE (opening by Sept. 20).

- And, of course, you can buy a copy of ENTANGLED LIVES, if that's something you would enjoy. You can send me a ten percent commission via Amazon by using THIS LINK.

Finally, any other Amazon.com purchases you make (aside from links via this blog) can also help me out. You can file the following code for future reference and paste it in at the end of whatever Amazon URL you are using:

/tag=billbrentauth-20

...and then reload the page, so that Amazon knows to send me a commission. (Now how's that for trickle-down economics?)

Thanks so much for reading this, and I truly appreciate your support of my work, whether or not you can help with the financial thing at this time.

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2007.09.13, 8:25 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

53.06 / $199.90 (26.5%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

Memoirville.com features an excerpt from my ENTANGLED LIVES memoir

Smithmag's memoirville.com is running a feature on my new anthology, ENTANGLED LIVES, beginning today. You can read the interview with me and the other contributors HERE.

Memoirville's editor selected an excerpt from my memoir to feature on the site, which you can read HERE. [Note to family and friends: this features sexually explicit content from my direct experience, so you are hereby advised to skip it if you don't want to view it.]

You can buy a copy of ENTANGLED LIVES via Amazon, HERE, and I get a 10% commission on the sale. If you do read the book and want to review it at Amazon.com, please do so. It would really help.

In related news, I have finished the first draft of my "right-brain novel" and am hard at work on revisions with my writing coach, TONI AMATO.

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2007.08.28, 3:40 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

53.06 / $199.90 (26.5%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

NOVEL-WRITING LOG: It was 20 weeks ago today....

Well, actually, only seventeen-and-a-half weeks, but that wouldn't sound nearly as catchy. In any case, today is exactly four months after starting the right-brain novel on April 24, and I just emailed the completed first draft to my writing coach. The story will need plenty more effort, but at least now:

- the action is continuous;
- any superfluous characters have been cut;
- and any glaring redundancies or contradictions in plot or narrative seem to be gone.

I will probably start making some changes as soon as I come up for air, which could be tomorrow or sometime next week. In any case, I have a lot of other responsibilities over the next week, so I am going to focus on those for a bit.

Go me.

Bill's Right-Brain Novel,
as of August 24, 2007:

47,931 / 47,931 (100.0%)

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2007.08.24, 7:15 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

53.06 / $199.90 (26.5%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

"Down the Dark and Sweaty Path of Extreme Sex"

...is how my sex-and-drugs memoir is described on the back cover of Entangled Lives, which just arrived here yesterday. It's available at Amazon.com for under $11 a copy,as well as through many other fine venues. However, if you order a copy through this page, I get a ten percent commission. That's, like, a dollar. Still, it's better than nothing. Just click on one of these LINKS! (They all go to the same Amazon page.)

I still think that cover is blah. Baby blue for a sex book? And what's with the lipstick on a rather raunchy title? Still, it looks better in the pulp, as it were, with a gloss varnish that adds a bit of pizazz that the image here (and at Amazon) cannot convey. You can find out more about the project and its contributors at Entangled-Lives.com.

Regardless of the cover, I'm very glad that Entangled Lives is out. It's the first truly new thing I've had out in print for close to three years, and at a whopping 12,000 words, it is by far the longest literary work I've had published to date. And I still like my story. Literature such as this usually gets branded with the "confessional" label, but I've never felt like my self-revelatory work was confessional, more like brutally frank. Perhaps the difference is largely semantic, but there's a difference in attitude, too.

I'll post some stats on the novel writing soon. Right now I just want to post this so I can get some sleep.

If anyone out there does purchase a copy, please consider posting a review at Amazon.com. Even a few lines of commentary can make a difference in sales. Thanks!

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2007.07.11, 11:15 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

43.55 / $199.90 (21.8%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

NOVEL-WRITING LOG: 21 days and counting

I haven't done an update to the novel-writing log in close to a week, so here goes.

Today was a rough day, and perhaps the closest I've been to full-blown depression in quite a while. I woke up feeling a vague sense of dread, and no, it wasn't just because this is the day my interview was supposed to broadcast over the Internet. (Actually, that didn't happen, since they moved up the broadcast by a week and didn't tell me. So it has already aired, and archived, even ... so if you're curious, you can hear it by clicking here: HealthyLife.net, Bill Brent interview with host Ann Sanders).

Anyway, I got up, made myself some strong coffee, sat on the living room couch with my mug, and cried intermittently while reviewing memories of my early life.

Suffice to say that I am cleaning up some very old business that isn't part of my current life, so that I can let it go and move into the next phase with clear, creative purpose, unclouded by the past judgments of unqualified others. Or, as I like to say:

You cannot be a fierce force if you are always apologizing for it.

So when the going gets tough, the tough (er, um, that's moi, sports fans) ... well, we crawl back into bed, since even sitting at this keyboard can be overwhelming at a moment of nearly intolerable malaise.

And then the tough ... well, we grab ourselves an empty Mead notebook and a comfy pen, and we write a thousand charmed and golden words into the right-brain novel, and all is well again.

Ha ha. Bet that's not what you were expecting me to say just now.

In other words, the tough kicked major butt today. I thought I would lie down and take a nap, but then I could see the wall of fear — that I would have nothing to say, but even worse, that I wouldn't even try. God, I hate resignation. Gah. So I stared at that blank page and tore down the wall. No room allowed for hesitation or doubt. Forty-five minutes later, maybe an hour (I wasn't keeping time), I had filled over ten double-spaced pages in my college-ruled, no longer empty notebook.

And now they're typed, even! So I can include them in today's word count.

In other news, I uprooted a fairly well entrenched Albizia sapling during yesterday's early evening walk and dragged it back home. It took me several return visits to wrench the root out of the earth. Dang, the taproot on this thing must be four feet long. It is still attached to the remaining piece of trunk, so the whole contraption would make an impressive single-tail whip. These trees are horrid, invasive aliens that destroy our native growth forest. Meanwhile, they grow into expensive pests that damage the roads with their root system and cost a lot to remove if you don't yank 'em while they're young. Maybe I will have a picture of my vanquished invader to post soon, but no promises.

Here's today's tally:

Bill's Left-Brain Novel,
as of June 26, 2007:

68,919 / 90,000 (76.6%)

Bill's Right-Brain Novel,
as of June 26, 2007:

20,918 / 50,000 (41.8%)

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2007.06.26, 6:55 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

43.55 / $199.90 (21.8%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.

SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION, summer 2007 edition

Greetings—

I'm taking time out from my novel-writing challenge to let you know about several things:

(1) Interview — Internet broadcast:

Here is the link to the show that was broadcast June 19, 2 p.m. Pacific time. It is now archived for anyone to listen to:

HealthyLife.net, host Ann Sanders interviews Bill Brent

— Ann Sanders, the host of "Sextra" (a weekly series), interviews me as the author of The Ultimate Guide to Anal Sex for Men (Cleis Press, 2002). We discuss anal sex for men (straight, gay, bi) and their partners.

Ann was great fun to talk with. The sound quality could have been better, but I think it is enjoyable nonetheless.

The link to the interview remains up for at least two months, I am told, so the show will be available for listening through at least mid-August 2007.

Please note that I get a 10% commission on any of my books ordered through the Amazon links in this newsletter, so please help support my cause!

For starters , here's the link to The Ultimate Guide for Anal Sex for Men:

The Ultimate Guide to Anal Sex for Men

– By the way, I'm very pleased that the popular website for A Different Light Bookstore just made my book a permanent feature of their Health and Body section. Thanks to the ADL staff, and especially to all their customers who have helped to keep my book on top!

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(2) I have a new book out! Get all excited!

Actually, it's a wicked and wise sex-and-drugs memoir that is part of a seven-author collection titled ENTANGLED LIVES: Memoirs by 7 Top Erotica Writers. You can check out the promotional website for the book at Entangled-Lives.com.

My memoir is titled "This Insane Allure," and I'm quite pleased to have been selected by editor Marilyn Jaye Lewis to be part of her stellar lineup of writing talent – again, you can check out the Entangled Lives website for details!

I am especially proud of this project since it includes my most ambitious purely literary work published to date. Part 1 of my story originally appeared in a somewhat different form under the title "Wounded," in the anthology Roughed Up: more tales of gay men, sex, and power (M. Christian and Simon Sheppard, eds.; Alyson Books, 2003) and then in the annual Best Gay Erotica 2004 (Richard Labonte, ed.; Cleis Press, 2004). This is the first publication of parts 2 and 3.

Entangled Lives is now available through Amazon, here:

Entangled Lives: Memoirs of 7 Top Erotica Writers

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(3) My short story, "September Shower," has been reprinted.

It originally appeared in Best Bisexual Erotica, volume 2 (which I co-edited with Dr. Carol Queen in 2002). Now my story is part of a new anthology titled Bi Guys (Ron Suresha, ed.; Southern Tier Editions / Haworth Press, 2006).

This is a fun, sex-drenched romp (I would call it erotic burlesque) involving a three-way scene between a woman and two men, set in a giant shower stall at a sex party. The location bears a suspicious resemblance to the party house I managed in San Francisco from 1994 to 2000, heh heh. (Actually, the house is sort of a character too, since I describe an idealized version of the place in elaborate detail. So my story is somewhat of an homage, too.)

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Want to support my cause even more directly? Then do your summer book-shopping with Bill Brent! Browse my bookstore on Amazon Marketplace and buy something for yourself or as a gift! Note that I ship every book via Priority Mail at no extra charge.

And, as always, you can make a donation to help support this site and my future work directly via the Tip Jar at the top of this page.

 

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Wishing you a beautiful day,

Bill Brent

[this page last updated: 2007.07.24, 3:30 p.m. Hawaii time]

LitBoy.com is a professional blog. Keeping it online costs me $200 per year. That's before paying me for my writing, photography, or anything else I do here. If you enjoy this blog, please use the Tip Jar at the top of this page. Your two-dollar minimum donation helps keep this banner-free site alive. It's quick and easy!

43.55 / $199.90 (21.8%)

This meter displays this year's contributions to date in U.S. dollars (after the funds processor takes its cut). Make a donation, watch the meter rise! Usually I post your contribution on my next blog post.

All original materials here on LitBoy.com (writing, photos, drawings, graphics, etc.) belong to Bill Brent. If you want to re-use something here, please ask. Higher resolution images are available.