Where I come from, Hydro electric power is at a premium. That’s because environmentally conscious legislators stick handled some ballyhoo through our august house of parliament mandating the use of high cost mercury filled light bulbs. These, said to last forever,—(they don’t)—force tremendous savings, resulting in surpluses that the aforementioned legislators give away to our neighbors so that the status quo is maintained and we can enjoy higher prices.
Bully for us. There’s always a silver lining.
While others bitch and moan over the obvious injustice—my Sensy Burner™ for example has been without tiny bulb since the kibosh on luminescents—good hearted optimists like me embrace the darkness. And a good thing too: Darkness, like paint stripper, takes away everything cracked and peeling.
Every year around my birthday, I meet up with my old friend The Muse for a little vin rouge and a lie or two. I love these meetings, especially since they date back some thirty odd years.
Muse and I have had our fair share of triumphs and failures that include, but are not limited to, expanding waistlines and thinning hair. None of these matter, because in the afterglow of what is time, space and many, many vintages, neither he nor I change.
If anything, we travel backward.
“You haven’t changed a bit,” one of us says each year, usually after the first bottle.
“I know, eh? Funny how that is.”
Sometimes, after rehashing an old tale with plenty of add-on embellishments compensating for faltering memories, one of us will start eating out of the other’s plate without any thought to the patrons sitting next to us. We can do this, we tell ourselves, because the grey hair and lined faces that announce us on arrival gradually fade as the hours wear on.
Youth, you see, has a way of getting away with things that time and sober thought cancel out. It’s true every time; this year was no exception:
“Madame? Monsieur?” the concerned wait staff interjects once the peas start rolling onto the floor. “I must give you a caution. We here at M**ton’s take the utmost pride in the atmosphere we present and we rely on our patrons to do the same.”
Muse clears his throat before blowing the pretty little table candle out. “There,” he says, affecting invisibility. “No one can catch us now.”
It’s not until the next morning when I wake up safe and sound in my own bed that I realize that I’ve time traveled backward. “How did I get here?” I ask my husband while trying to blot out the natural light that recuts all kinds of crevices into my wise old face.
“The train,” he replies. “Muse piled you on the first one going east.”
“That’s bold,” I comment, before realizing that there could be no other conclusion: neither The Muse nor I could make sense of the e-schedule as posted despite the tinkly lights showing the way.
“Where are you going?” I query my husband who, with keys in hand, makes a bee line for the door. “It’s not even noon yet.”
“Light bulbs,” he says pointedly. “Two out in the family room.”
I laugh as I wave him off.
For as much as I curse the light and the hydro that brings it, there is no escaping the reality of a new day and the bright things it possesses.
THANK YOU, O MUSE. UNTIL NEXT YEAR… AND TO OTHERS: HAPPY ST. PADDY’S DAY!
Adult, unapologetic and cognizant, I wish you good day! Let’s stay above it.
Spring is just around the corner my loves, and on the cusp of it and all the promises it carries, there is sun, snow melt and a city calling me out for a walk about. I’m doing it.
Happy Monday, One And All.
Back tomorrow…with a pint or two of the green stuff.
In the run up to the release of her debut novel HEUER LOST AND FOUND A.B. Funkhauser copes with the responsibility of really, really getting published…for real.
If I tell my friends one more time that writing picked me and I not it, I’ll probably get tee pee’d. But if casual pranks among friends comes with the territory, I’ll take it, because I mean every word. Over the course of the last twelve weeks, I’ve been asked to talk about everything from “process” to “voice” to “inspiration markers” and I’ve answered as best I can. I wrote, I said, because I felt I had to; I created characters and scenes because they ‘spoke’ to me and I transcribed; and I talked about myself—my hopes, my dreams and my fears—because this is what promotion is and promotion is key regardless of what my parents taught me about modesty and not trumpeting accomplishments.
I had a novel. I pitched it. And Solstice said “yes.” Now I have to sell it. *yikes*
SHAKIN’ LIKE A SPANIEL
With the ‘yes’ came the validation—the idea that maybe I had something decent after all—and with it an in-body experience that gave volcanism a whole new meaning for me. “Here she comes, Miss America” was the first thing that came to mind when I opened Summer Solstice Editor-In-Chief Kathi Sprayberry’s contract offer email last November.
Was this really happening? Will you marry me? Yes! Oh, yes! I will. I do…and then I slobbered like Miss America. For all those years I denounced the phony tears under the big tiara, this was the payback: Her tears were real after all, and so were mine.
SELL, SELL, SELL
I had my publisher, and with it my marching orders. In the space of a few weeks I had a website, a blog, a book trailer and a half century’s worth of tag lines, log lines and elevator pitches that would make Don Draper notice. I belong to “Promote Your Book” sites on Facebook, am mastering the fine art of twitter blasts on requisite Hash Tag Days of The Week, and long to upload THE BOOK onto Goodreads. There isn’t a coffee house in my county that doesn’t know me, and my former embalming instructor is dodging me because he knows I want the alumni list and going after said list is wildly inappropriate. I have compiled lists of local media to acquaint; public libraries with bulletin boards to be pinned, and arts and letters events that I will definitely go to, provided I lose that last five pounds that separate me from my party clothes.
Who knew this adventure would take me to such exciting places?
This weekend, I turn 50, and instead of handing out my shiny new postcards at the monthly breakfast I attend, I will have to entrust them to another to do the deed: my husband insists on spiriting me away to celebrate—sans postcards.
Maybe if we come home early???
Sigh.
ABF
March 11, 2015
A.B. Funkhuaser is a funeral director, wildlife enthusiast and classic car nut living in Ontario, Canada. Her debut novel, Heuer Lost And Found, combines adult, paranormal and dark humor in a fiction set to hit the market April 23, 2015. Presales begin March 26, 2015.
A visceral journey of two people: one living, one dead.
“Ever closer, ever farther, I will see you again one day, in the good place.”
Unrepentant cooze hound lawyer Jürgen Heuer dies suddenly and unexpectedly in his litter-strewn home. Undiscovered, he rages against god, Nazis, deep fryers and analogous women who disappoint him.
At last found, he is delivered to Weibigand Brothers Funeral Home, a ramshackle establishment peopled with above average eccentrics, including boozy Enid, a former girl friend with serious denial issues. With her help and the help of a wise cracking spirit guide, Heuer will try to move on to the next plane. But before he can do this, he must endure an inept embalming, feral whispers, and Enid’s flawed recollections of their murky past. Is it really worth it?
“Heuer? What kind of a name is that?”
Aside from a word rhyming with “lawyer,” Heuer is a man. German born, a U.S. citizen, he is layered, complicated, bitter and possessed of a really weird sense of humor. Dying alone and seemingly unlamented, he wakes as a preternatural residue, forced to live with his decomposing body over a one week period until he is finally found by a neighbor he despises. “If there’s a hell, it’s right here, and I’m standing in the middle of it.” Following his body to the funeral home, he is relieved to find Enid Krause, funeral director and former lover. Charged with the task of preparing his body for burial, she is less than gracious, declaring his dramatic return after a twenty year absence, unwelcomed and unappreciated. Crestfallen, Heuer doesn’t know what’s worse: dropping dead and not being found, or being found and being insulted.
Long ago, before dinosaurs roamed the planet, a young woman sat down at her desk to write. Situated in the darkest corner of the Ontario Legislature and hidden beneath the main staircase in the north wing, the woman, attached to the research unit of the third party, had every prospect before her. They were in third place; they could only go up. Years later, they did. But that’s for another blog. Lady writer-in-waiting had miles to go and a mountain of human experience to conquer before she could get anything near an arc or inciting incident.
it is a gem in the early stages of pre-discovery. Monochromed with tons of natural light, it sports a large centre fireplace, plenty of comfy seats and croissants to live on to the end of days. I am well acquainted with Ray’s.
How many miles must Ray’s go before an inciting incident of its own brings Toronto and region to its doors? I wondered over a frothy cup of late winter hot chocolate.
I for one rue the day. Ray’s Cafe is MY place; its plush banquettes upholstered in a way such that a writer with laptop can stay all day and not accumulate bottom feeder sores.
Ah, but I’m selfish.
Ray and Melissa welcome me and let me stay. Heck, I can set myself up and read out loud on a stool if I want to. Melissa even let me park my newly printed postcards with book deets and flattering photo of the author on the sideboard near the recyclers. And there are plenty of other business cards to keep mine company.
Please give it up for our next guest author, A.b. Funkhauser!
A.B. Funkhauser is a funeral director, fiction writer and wildlife enthusiast living in Ontario, Canada. Like most funeral directors, she is governed by a strong sense of altruism fueled by the belief that life chooses us and we not it.
A.b. Funkhauser Funeral director stories always attract interest. The ones I’ve read are mostly memoir, which is really brave for the authors that penned them.
A.b. Funkhauser Oh my god Marissa. Do you have a couch? The book was born out of a grief journal.
Margaret Madigan First, it’s always good to like your own pix. I always hate mine, so I’m happy when others like theirs. Second–bahahahaha! Only the lamp knows!!!
A.b. Funkhauser Mine is a fiction with lots of dark humor. You have to laugh in grief or you stay in the pit.
Monique Nadeau Massabki I worked in funeral service for twelve years and I’m married to a funeral director…we’re all demented.
A.b. Funkhauser We’re always critical of own looks Margaret Madigan. You’re beautiful.
Wren Michaels I don’t think I’ve read a funeral director story. I’m intrigued…
A.b. Funkhauser I had a great time making the trailer Christine. The back door you see is from the funeral parlor I used to work at. I fell down those stairs a few times.
Wren Michaels I keep telling Margaret that but she never believes me. She’s beautiful!
What’s a Heuer? Beyond a word rhyming with “lawyer,” Heuer the lawyer is a man conflicted. “Ever closer, ever farther, I will see you again one day, in the good place.”…See More
Wren Michaels The only funeral director story I know is My Girl and I loved that movie.
A.b. Funkhauser I know that if I don’t break from it every three months or so, I feel like breaking. That’s the work.
Margaret Madigan Funeral directors and the funeral industry is severely underrepresented in fiction…
Wren Michaels Wow I’m so in on this story. Sounds like quite a ride!!
A.b. Funkhauser I was also told at school to leave the work at the door. We all try to. Leave it at the door when we go home. But then, that’s when I started writing.
Monique Nadeau Massabki It’s almost impossible to leave that work at the door. However, I know that it’s great fodder for writing.
A.b. Funkhauser I think we’re underrepresented because of our mandate. We are tasked to protect our families–the deceased and the survivors. I chose fiction so that no one would ever think that I was writing about a real family. It’s important that everyone understand that first and foremost.
A.b. Funkhauser Lol Monique. My husband and the majority of my friends are outside the business so that makes it a little easier for me. You on the other hand have it right next to you! xo
A.b. Funkhauser Enid and Heuer are wunnerful. Flawed, anxious, neurotic, selfish
A.b. Funkhauser The trouble is in parsing out what’s real and what isn’t How things were, how they are remembered and how they’ll be represented in future.
A.b. Funkhauser Enid and Heuer each have different recollections of the past. What is true, in the end, doesn’t matter at all.
A.b. Funkhauser Intrigue is a part of it to be sure. There are paranormal elements and things that are outright whimisical. I have a rat character for example. He speaks Latin and is immensely charming.
A.b. Funkhauser There is a rich oral history in the business that is communicated from old timers to youngsters. I’m somewhere in the middle now. The stories I hear go back to the 1930s. Embalming without electricty (I did it once with a bulb syringe–tough on the hands) Amazing stuff. I want to tell these stories.
A.b. Funkhauser Thanks, Wren Michaels Being older has been key to my writing. I tried in my 20s, but it was awful stuff. I needed to live.
A.b. Funkhauser I also needed miles in order to unpack my own personal tropes. Nostalgia as harmful is a big one with me. Go back by all means, but don’t stay too long.
A.b. Funkhauser Who is Enid? She is a boozy funeral director, married with kids on the cusp of the change. Eeks. She wears man shoes to do her job and she has the whiskers to match
A.b. Funkhauser HEUER is part of a series titled “Unapologetic Lives” I’m working on the fourth novel right now: POOR UNDERTAKER. It runs from 1947 to 1975.
Margaret MacKay Hefferman Isn’t a.b.’s book trailer great. You can see it on youtube if you haven’t seen it already. and don’t forget to like it as that will get more people to watch. The book trailer course was fantastic.
A.b. Funkhauser Heuer? That’s easy Marissa Campbell I’m intrigued because I’m in love with him. But the love is a guilty one. He is an anti hero in every sense. He likes deep fryers, longer hunting seasons, and hasn’t seen a vegetable in years. When he dies and reemer…See More
Marissa Campbell The trailer is fantastic Margaret! As is the book! I’ve had the pleasure of seeing the one and reading the other
Monique Nadeau Massabki Brilliant! Not just one novel about undertakers but an entire series. I have several (too many?) funeral director friends who will like this.
A.b. Funkhauser With Enid, there is a lot not to like. There may be times when you want to lock her in a closet. But I hope you understand her.
A.b. Funkhauser She and Heuer were lovers back in the 80s and it didn’t end well. Then one day, she comes into work, hungover, and sees his name on the chalk board. Her manager Charlie throws her the keys. She must go to the coroner’s office and get him. She is expected to embalm him too. That’s hard. It’s unthinkable.
A.b. Funkhauser Thanks Monique. Characters come and go. But the building remains. At one point it is sold. It becomes a Euro Style resto bar and grille.
Marissa Campbell It’s heartwrenching and tragic just reading it!
Marissa Campbell Do you use your reliable memory for visuals or do you seek out pinterest or movies or the internet to ‘create’ the visage of your characters?
A.b. Funkhauser What is love? They break up, yet when he dies, he comes back to her. I know some embalmers (not many) who have “cared” for their parents. For them, it is an ultimate act of love. I could never do that. But I wondered what that would feel like, and so, Heuer was born.
Wren Michaels I love pnr books and this is a totally intriguing storyline out of the ordinary pnr style. Soundstage awesome.
A.b. Funkhauser I cast the “movie” in my head. I saw Leo DiCaprio at his various ages. But for voice and personalities, the characters are all composites of people I’ve known, or people I wanted to know. My friend Scooter believes he is Heuer. He isn’t. There is actually some of me in there.
A.b. Funkhauser Heuer returns Margaret MacKay Hefferman in book three: THE HEUER EFFECT. It’s 1980 and they’re alive and vital and young, doing terrible things to each other. And yes, Marissa Campbell it’s a little bit dirty.
Wren Michaels I have a severe love/hate relationship with my smartphone
A.b. Funkhauser Book Two is called SCOOTER NATION. It takes place two years after Heuer Lost and Found. It’s the same gang at the parlor with a few notable exceptions. Essentially, they are part of a business community terrorized by a local gang of scooter bound octogenerians. The funeral home aligns with local businesses in self defense.
Robin Eastcott The book sounds fascinating — possible book club selection
A.b. Funkhauser Thank you Christine Haase for the million dollar question: Heuer, as in lawyer. Heuer the lawyer. And he was.
A.b. Funkhauser Yes! Releasing April 23, 2015 through Amazon andwww.solsticepublishing.com Both ebook and paperback. Presales begin March 26. I’ve got a lot of book selling to do. Whew!
Dawna Lovejoy I’ve been told i should start a blog. How do you manage yours? Like do you have any problems with remembering to update it?
A.b. Funkhauser I’m definitely going to have a launch party at some point. You bet. I’m also going to have a FB event too. Marissa Campbell is an inspiration. I’m going to copy her idea.
Marissa Campbell A.b. Funkauser has offered an ADVANCED pdf version of her book Heuer Lost and Found … who wants it??
A.b. Funkhauser HI Dawna. With the blog, I just jump in, but I only write when I feel the muse. I don’t have a theme per se. One day, I’m on about Leonard Nimoy, the next it’s my trip to the flea market. I refuse to put pressure on myself. It has to be fun, and it is.
Nicki Lou Welcome!! It’s really interesting to here a bit of the story behind the author
Alison Cronyn-Murphy Definitely on my reading list. I am excited about the paranormal elements.
The COUNTDOWN PARTY CONTINUES UNTIL 8 PM EST SUNDAY, MARCH 8. Visit Marissa’s page and chat with other authors about their published works and works in progress. 😀
I’ve been dancing around for weeks here on the blog and finally, at long last, I can release DAS BOOK TRAILER. Months in the making, I can say, without a hint of irony or fiction, that HEUER LOST AND FOUND, THE TRAILER, is all mine and made with my own two hands. Another milestone on the path to publishing. The learning curve has been incredibly steep and it is only the beginning, but I’m ready…I think. 😉
NOW AND FORWARD
Adult, unapologetic and cognizant, I wish you good day.
Ever had a guilty pleasure? Sure you have. For me, it’s the documentary. Grainy, gritty and often featuring hand held footage that makes the brain slosh against the walls of the cranial vault, they are exciting because they represent things I know relatively little about. Because of this requisite lack of knowledge, I’m drawn in, wanting more, abandoning the Netflix et al to dig out particulars from Wiki and Google after the show ends.
When I was young, it was Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom that turned my crank, documenting week after week, the exploits of things furred and feathered on the Savannah, Serengeti and in the Amazon to name a few heavy hitters. A few shows come to mind when looking back. Time lapse photography
Beautiful and deadly.
charted the life and death of blossoms in one instance and funky caterpillers that napped under thick ice in another. Watching the little beasty reborn one spring after another was a lot to believe and yet, there it was. Likewise, the remarkable Cheetah, topping 93 miles per hour—but only to a maximum of two minutes—culminating in a killing, combining grace, elegance and gore in one fluid motion.
That I love animals (except arachnids; these freak me out) regardless of genus and species is given; that the comely Cheetah’s exploits drove me to the fridge to sate my hunger each and every time was the sum total of the guilty pleasure heretofore mentioned in paragraph one.
Which brings me to the McMillan Tac 50, a tapered long barrel of a .50 calibre sniper rifle so powerful as to be able to punch through concrete walls and take out three targets at once and at a distance of one mile or more. I had no idea.
“Come on,” my husband yelled from the top floor bedroom. “It’s sniper night on (the watchamacallit discovery-type channel, but not Discovery, I do not think *scratching head)”
Now before I’m lumped in with Michael Moore, who has every right to express his opinion, I want to tell you that I, too, have firearms experience. Although I haven’t seen American Sniper to which which my friend Gilda, a.k.a The Smartest Woman in the World (more on her later), gave a five star endorsement, I can appreciate the swirl of excitement both positive and negative that surrounds the film. Handling a firearm is overwhelming. Powerful, dangerous, it is also a precision instrument requiring careful cleaning and tending lest it jam and explode in the operator’s face.
Like many kids of my generation, it was not uncommon to take hold of Grandpa’s .22 calibre rim fire varmint rifle and shoot up spent pop cans off a rotted old log out back of the cottage. Though we’d never taken a firearms course and had never heard of things like PROOF and SAFE, the idea that we not point the thing at one another was kinda inherent. Likewise, the natural bracing that came with the squeeze of the trigger. To big shots, a .22’s recoil is laughable, but to a 12 year old it was real enough.
Which brings me back to the McMillan Tac 50. While I’ve never seen .50 calibre ammunition up close and for real, I could easily infer from the doc that these are mighty big buggers. As is the recoil. One user in the doc basically said that it’s not a weapon you enjoy being behind after 10 or 12 shots. I get that. I felt the same way after two weeks of night shifts at the funeral home. But it’s a job, and those who do it, do it because they want to. And so I was really surprised to learn that a Canadian sniper holds the record for long distance shoot to target: one and a half miles. I dont’ know what to make of such information other than to say that I’m intrigued.
Who invents weapons? Chemists? Genies? Engineers? Alchemists? Rocket scientists? Professor Snape? I’ll let you know, once I pry myself away from Wikipedia.
Adult, unapologetic and cognizant, I wish you good day. Let’s stay above it.
Author and fellow B7 Sista Marissa Campbell is throwing a Countdown Cover Party on Facebook this Sunday, March 8 from 12 noon to 8 p.m. EST to celebrate the September 8 launch of her first historical novel AVELYNN through St. Martin’s Press. During that time, Marissa will be hosting authors and offering free give aways every hour.
A Bit About Marissa
Marissa Campbell is a published freelance author and co-author of the award-winning, spiritual self-help book Life: Living in Fulfillment Every Day. Her debut historical fiction, Avelynn, is due out September 8th 2015, from St. Martin’s Press. Currently hard at work on the second book in the Avelynn series, she is a proud member of the Historical Novel Society, Romance Writers of America, Writer’s Community of Durham Region, and local critique group B7.
When she is not writing, she is busy looking after her wonderful children, spending time with her fantastic husband, hanging out with her awesome friends, teaching yoga, dancing, laughing, and having fun!
One extraordinary Saxon noblewoman and one fearless Viking warrior find passion and danger in this dazzling and sensuous debut
It is 869. For eighteen years, Avelynn, the beautiful and secretly pagan daughter of the Ealdorman of Somerset, has lived in an environment of love, acceptance, and equality. Somerset has flourished under twenty years of peace. But with whispers of war threatening their security, Avelynn’s father makes an uncompromising decision that changes her life forever.
Forced into a betrothal with Demas, a man who only covets her wealth and status, Avelynn’s perception of independence is shattered. With marriage looming, she turns to her faith, searching for answers in an ancient ritual along the coast, only to find Alrik the Blood-Axe and sixty Viking berserkers have landed.
In a year of uncertainty that sees Avelynn discover hidden powers, stumble into a passionate love affair with Alrik, and lead men into battle, Avelynn must walk a fine line as her deceptions mount and Demas’ tactics to possess her become more desperate and increasingly brutal.
Avelynn and Alrik are caught in the throes of fate as they struggle to find the way back to themselves and onwards to each other.
In the spirit of brave self-promotion, I continue today’s post (see Heuer AdvanceReview) with an interview given by yours truly to the ever intrepid Bernard Foong. It’s another first for me, and another reason to do a victory lap around the neighborhood (after I shovel the sidewalk), because self promotion goes against everything I was taught growing up. Careers in politics, the car business and funeral service notwithstanding, I have managed to stay under the wire…until now.
Heuer, Heuer. What have you done?
Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
That’s always a bit tough for me. I was raised in another time where shouting out accomplishments was
An expression of the author’s feelings through a doppelganger.
considered rude. But I’ll try. I’m a Pisces that celebrates the Year of the Snake, but unlike dear vain snake, work extremely hard not to be mendacious. (Laughs) I have a furtive imagination, love art in all its forms, and cannot live without music playing somewhere in the background. If forced to choose between comedy and drama, comedy wins…every time.
What do you do when you are not writing?
That’s easy! I’m outside. Unlike you, dear friend, I live in the four seasons (hint of jealousy here) and have the coats, boots and sunscreen that goes with them. I have a large wild flower garden that I tend in summer, and a very long driveway I shovel in winter. And I love classic cars, particularly those from the muscle era. Summer and autumn are for road tripping to see the shows. I try to get to the Woodward Dream Cruise in Detroit, Michigan every other year.
For a car enthusiast, Woodward is the Holy Grail.
Do you have a day job as well?
Yes, although I am on hiatus and that has paid off, as you see (big grin). I’m a funeral director, licensed to practice in Ontario, Canada. For me, it ranks as one of the best jobs I’ve ever had next to seeing to my family.
When did you first start writing and when did you finish your first book?
I began writing in 2010 in response to the loss of a dear friend. In funeral service, the families we serve ask how to cope with the pain. One way to manage is to seek out others—groups, counselors—those who have walked in their shoes and really know how it feels. Another approach is to write a grief journal. My friend and I went through school together, and during that time we became sympats where comedy was concerned. We laughed at the same things. It didn’t take long for my journal to take a comedic turn before straying off into outright fiction. I finished Heuer five years later.
How did you choose the genre you write in?
The characters decided it for me. They are bossy, incorrigible and I completely adore them. They were impossible to ignore.
Where do you get your ideas?
I put a foot out the door and live day to day. You wouldn’t believe the kind of trouble you can get into at the grocery store.
Do you ever experience writer’s block?
Absolutely, but it’s more likely because another story or character is nagging at me. My first teacher called this popcorn writing, where you just push away from the current project and go on a tangent with a wild horse scene. It’s exciting and informs the other projects.
Do you work with an outline, or just write?
I mull for about a year, and then churn out the first draft during NaNoWriMo in November. I don’t plot per
I do on occasion take walks through cemeteries.
se, but I do know where I’m going before I begin. This is also where some of those popcorn scenes find a home. After the first draft is complete, I return to the previous project in line to revise and refine. It’s a whole system that works for me. You see why I had to go on hiatus?
Is there any particular author or book that influenced you in any way either growing up or as an adult?
Absolutely everything Kurt Vonnegut ever wrote. From him and Dr. Seuss, I learned the value of having outrageous character names. My current fiction includes a hysteric named Sigrid Bork. I love her.
Can you tell us about your challenges in getting your first book published?
I worried a lot about having one book followed by writer’s block to shut me down for good. So I decided to
Exteme excitement resulting in blurred vision.
get some manuscripts down—four to be precise—so that I’d have a body of work to play with when pitching to agents and publishers. The last four years were dedicated to pure creation without pressure to produce to a contract. It was sensational. During that time, I plugged into Twitter pitch parties on the recommendation of a writer friend, and that’s when things really started to happen. I queried, synopsized, wrote dozens of tag lines and met hundreds of amazing people who got me to Solstice Publishing. Now I have to learn about and engage in—boots first—marketing, which is very challenging because of the way I was raised (see question one). I’m enjoying Twitter parties and blogging. Frankly, I didn’t know I had it in me. A great surprise.
If you had to go back and do it all over, is there any aspect of your novel or getting it published that you would change?
Nope. It was all organic. I tripped, I fell, I studied, and I applied. I got better.
How do you market your work? What avenues have you found to work best for your genre?
It’s early in, so stats aren’t there, but I will direct a lot of applause to the writing groups I belong to—The Booklin 7, Writers Community of Durham Region, and amazing teachers at Writescape—for plugging me in with others dedicated to the same goals. Marketing is a learning curve and a steep one, so look to others engaged in the same activity; ask questions and try things on. Tweet, Tweet, Tweet. Blog, blog, blog, and follow your publisher and agent advice. Support other writers by reading their work, reviewing and attending their promotional events. If you want society to know about you, you must socialize.
Have you written a book you love that you have not been able to get published?
I love them all, but can only dedicate my energies to one at a time. The others? Their day will come.
Can you tell us about your upcoming book?
Heuer Lost and Found is adult, unapologetic and cognizant with a hint of dark humor. At 237 pages, it is a
Everything is sentient; everything is a potential character–at least where I’m coming from.
compact study that rocks ’n’ rolls with the help of an erudite Latin speaking rat and a wise-cracking floor lamp with ulterior motives. They’re off beat and badly needed to help my protagonists: a dead, unrepentant cooze hound lawyer, and his very much alive boozy lady undertaker who he used to know back in the Eighties.
Is anything in your book based on real life experiences or purely all imagination?
I think all fiction is informed by real life experiences, but I have yet to meet sentient rats or floor lamps. (laughs) The funeral home in Heuer is actually a composite of four different establishments, none of which survives today. As to the characters, some guy buddies insist that they are Heuer, but they’re not. There’s actually a little of me in him, but I guess it’s to be expected if I’m the one behind the keyboard.
What was your favorite chapter (or part) to write and why?
SPOILER: The very end, because it’s where the Kleenex box comes out. When that happened, I knew I’d got it right.
How did you come up with the title?
From the short story. Heuer actually made it into three separate shorts before becoming a full-fledged novel character.
What project are you working on now?
POOR UNDERTAKER is the fourth in the series “Unapologetic Lives”
Poor Undertaker is next in the series, which tracks the ups and downs of the Weibigand Brothers funeral establishment. Its every bit as much a joy as the first, second and so on, because I see this remarkable building go through all its incantations. At one point, it’s actually bought up and is not a funeral parlor any more.
Will you have a new book coming out soon?
We’re at least a year away, I think. Scooter Nation is next, but I’d like to give it another go over before setting it free.
Are there certain characters you would like to go back to, or is there a theme or idea you’d love to work with?
Absolutely. My series is non sequential, so the character that dies in one is born again in the next. They’re
SCOOTER NATION is the second in the series and is definitely more Gonzo in nature.
never far away. There are a number of themes I return to, but some of my favorites include: the negative impacts of nostalgia; the problem with prying; insular people coming out into the light; finding kindness in peculiar places; and letting go of that thing you need so that you can keep it forever.
What has been the toughest criticism given to you as an author? What has been the best compliment?
I’m an upbeat person, so if I’m criticized, I turn it into a plus by learning something from it. The best compliment I ever had came from a teacher who said my voice was “strong and unusual”. That really made my day.
Do you have any advice to give to aspiring writers?
Get it all down before trying to make sense of it. It’s a journey and often a very long one. Enjoy every leg of it knowing that there’s more just ahead.
Is there anything that you would like to say to your readers and fans?
Observe, listen, and do not ignore the excellence to be found on HBO, Netflix, Showcase, etc. This is your university.
No stranger to this blog, author Bernard Foong (A Harem Boy’s Saga I, II, and III) had a look, and in advance of Heuer’s debut April 23rd, here’s what he had to say:
5 star review:
Author A. B. Funkhauser strikes a macabre cord with her book “Heuer Lost and Found”.
Written from
Bernard Foong is an international best selling author.
the perspective of an undertaker, she gives her readers a ringside seat at the Weibigand Mortuary where Enid, a middle aged woman with a taste for scotch, arrives on a Monday morning still in a stupor from the night before. Initially, the reader learns a bit about Enid and the history of the mortuary, its original owners and their heirs who continue to operate the family owned business, along with all of its eccentric employees. Early in the day, a call is received and there after a not so typical day in the life of a mortuary begins. Heuer, a well known middle aged attorney has been found dead in his apartment, where he laid for several days. The story now moves between present day and flash backs to a time when Heuer, Enid and others in the story are intertwined in one way or another. Heuer appears as a ghostly spectre to enchant us with his own take on his past, and his current impressions of what is being said and done as his body is prepared for burial. I for one like this book. I found it to have a similar feel to the HBO series “Six Feet Under”.
Ms. Funkhauser is a wizard with words and did a fine job of weaving this story of Greek, German and English speaking families that bounced back and forth throughout the entire book.
Hooray! And thank you, Bernard Foong.
Drop by #1lineWed for more Heuer and some excellent one liners from incredible authors. 🙂
A. B. Funkhauser, Author 