Wild Ways Teaser!
Two weeks from today on November 1st, The Wild Ways, the sequel to The Enchantment Emporium, hits the bookstores. Two weeks. Fourteen days. Um... and a bunch of hours and minutes and I know I could work that out but, honestly, no...
Anyway, with the permission of my wonderful editor at DAW, Sheila Gilbert, I bring you the first of two Wild Ways teasers -- one today, one next Tuesday. They're both from chapter one so it'll be a bit like having me read from the book at a convention only without the non sequitors or bad photos of me staring over my glasses. Formatting adjusted for live journal.
"No love, we're from Cape Breton
.
"But you say b'ye like you're from Newfoundland. How's it going, b'ye. You want another beer, b'ye? What's up with that?" Charlie glanced around the tiny table at the four men who'd asked her to join them for a drink between sets -- Fred Harris, Tom Blaine, Bill Evans and Bill McInna, although Bill McInna had told her to call him Mac. Not that it really mattered what she called him since after tonight's gig, she'd never see them again and they all seemed like the type to think call me anything you want but don't call me late for supper was a lot funnier than it was.
"They got the b'ye from us, didn't they?" Frank grinned and raised his beer. The other three returned the salute. "I mean, yeah, this here's the Newfoundlander's Bar…" The bottle became a pointer -- at the flags, at the photos, at the fish mounted on dark walls barely visible behind the Friday night crowd. "…but it ain't just the b'yes from the Rock heading west looking for a way to keep body and soul together, is it? Economy's in the shitter all through the Maritimes. DEVCO's closed the coal mines, steel mill's been shut in Sydney…"
"Used to make good money there," Tom sighed. He was the oldest of the four, late thirties Charlie figured, and the one with the strongest family ties to the east. She could almost see them stretching out and away, linking him with the people he'd left behind. It was one of the reasons she'd sat down. Her family, the Gale family, understood those kind of ties.
"Used to make good money," Frank repeated. "That's my point, isn't it? And those suits in Halifax are telling us we should just be quaint for the tourists; like the Rankin Family can put a roof on the house and oil in the furnace of the whole God damned place. Freezing our asses off in Fort McMurray, paying nearly three grand a month rent on a shithole apartment north of the downtown, complete with a leaky ceiling and rotten windows, that's the best option we've got left."
"And now they're talking layoffs." Bill glared at the wet ring his bottle had left on the tabletop. "Investments are down aren't they? Gotta cut the costs of gettin' the oil out of the tar sands so they'll find guys willing to work for less."
"It's how they built the fucking railroads," Mac growled.
Frank rolled his eyes. "Jesus, Mac, you're a welder; you're good. They bring in cheap labor from overseas and it's the rest of us poor buggers that'll be heading home and back on the dole."
"Don't be giving him any sympathy now," Tom said before Charlie could speak. "B'ye just bought himself a brand new F250."
"Needed something that'd fit the new ATV in the back, didn't I?" Frank laughed. "And who knows, maybe it won't be so bad going home. I hear rumors offshore oil's expanding again and we've got mad oil field skills."
Bill laughed with him. "Yeah, and the fishing's already for shit so when the drilling platforms break up and dump a few million gallons of crude who'll notice, eh?"
"How long can you tread water?" Tom snorted. Charlie knew he was quoting but she didn't know what.
"When my brother called…" Something in Mac's voice said this was important and Charlie wasn't the only one who'd noticed. Frank and Tom and Bill turned toward him, closing him in the circle of their attention, closing out the rest of the bar, their silence pushing back the ambient noise. They'd have closed her out as well, but Charlie refused to go. "When he called, he said he heard Carlson's trying to get permits to drill near Hay Island." Mac picked at the label of his bottle. The other three watched him watch his moving fingers.
Hair lifting off the back of her neck, Charlie froze in place, breathing slowly and quietly through her nose so as not to spook them. If they remembered she was here…
"Hay Island. That's the seal rookery," Tom said at last.
Mac nodded. "My brother says there'd be a couple hundred jobs on the rig and more in the refinery they say they'll build by Main-a-Dieu, but his wife, well, she's against it."
"Yeah, well, she would be, wouldn't she?" Frank's grin twisted into a curve that hinted of secrets.
Charlie had a Gale girl's objection to secrets she, personally, wasn't keeping and it struck her that this particular secret wouldn't be pried loose by smiling and looking interested -- no matter how few women there were in Fort McMurray. Prying free this particular secret would require a completely different skill set. She'd drawn her finger through a puddle of condensation and sketched out the first curves of a charm when a familiar hand landed on her shoulder.
"Charlie, come on!" Tony, the drummer for Dun Good, had to lean forward and shout as the noise of the crowded bar rushed back in to fill the space around the table. "Break's over!"
Wiping out the half drawn pattern with one hand, Charlie set her empty bottle down with the other and shoved her chair back to a chorus of protests from her companions. "Sorry boys, music calls."
The music was, after all, why she was here.
By the time she picked up her guitar, grinning at the raucous welcome the band's return to the stage evoked, she'd almost forgotten how that secret had licked a fission of strange across her skin.
Almost.
Later that night she almost asked Mac what he'd meant but, by then, they were trading other secrets.
*
The drive south from Fort McMurray to Calgary took nine hours. Theoretically.
Actually, it took nine and a half, but only if they could keep rest stops to a minimum. Fortunately, in the last fourteen months of intermittent touring, they'd become old hands at covering the less well traveled parts of the western provinces and had two coolers of food stuffed in between the stack of amps and the box that held the snow chains and the 20 kilo bag of clay kitty litter no one wanted to remove, in spite of it being almost the end of July and nearly 30 degrees. It was Alberta. Why tempt fate. They had six drivers -- the band plus Tony's wife Coreen and Taylor's girlfriend Donna, who'd joined them at Provost just after they'd crossed back from Saskatchewan -- and, of the six, Charlie was, by no means, the most disdainful of posted speed limits.
Since Donna'd had no actual obligations during their last gig at the Newfoundlander's Bar, she'd drawn short straw as first driver.
They were on the road by eight, five of the six passengers completely unaware of the charms sketched under the grime covering the old school bus, charms that had ensured an almost miraculous absence of mechanical difficulty considering the vehicle's age. Charlie'd done what she could for the gas mileage as well but suspected it'd need a full circle of Aunties to drop it from Oh My God to merely appalling.
Of the three aunties she had available out west, Auntie Gwen had suggested they switch it to bio diesel, Auntie Carmen had sighed
damply, and Auntie Bea had said, "If you chose to ride in that death trap, Charlotte Marie Gale, rather than Walk the Wood as any sensible person with the ability would chose to do, do not assume we will ride to the rescue after the inevitable fiery crash."
The aunties were big believers in you made your bed, you crash and burn in it.
Anyway, with the permission of my wonderful editor at DAW, Sheila Gilbert, I bring you the first of two Wild Ways teasers -- one today, one next Tuesday. They're both from chapter one so it'll be a bit like having me read from the book at a convention only without the non sequitors or bad photos of me staring over my glasses. Formatting adjusted for live journal.
"No love, we're from Cape Breton
.
"But you say b'ye like you're from Newfoundland. How's it going, b'ye. You want another beer, b'ye? What's up with that?" Charlie glanced around the tiny table at the four men who'd asked her to join them for a drink between sets -- Fred Harris, Tom Blaine, Bill Evans and Bill McInna, although Bill McInna had told her to call him Mac. Not that it really mattered what she called him since after tonight's gig, she'd never see them again and they all seemed like the type to think call me anything you want but don't call me late for supper was a lot funnier than it was.
"They got the b'ye from us, didn't they?" Frank grinned and raised his beer. The other three returned the salute. "I mean, yeah, this here's the Newfoundlander's Bar…" The bottle became a pointer -- at the flags, at the photos, at the fish mounted on dark walls barely visible behind the Friday night crowd. "…but it ain't just the b'yes from the Rock heading west looking for a way to keep body and soul together, is it? Economy's in the shitter all through the Maritimes. DEVCO's closed the coal mines, steel mill's been shut in Sydney…"
"Used to make good money there," Tom sighed. He was the oldest of the four, late thirties Charlie figured, and the one with the strongest family ties to the east. She could almost see them stretching out and away, linking him with the people he'd left behind. It was one of the reasons she'd sat down. Her family, the Gale family, understood those kind of ties.
"Used to make good money," Frank repeated. "That's my point, isn't it? And those suits in Halifax are telling us we should just be quaint for the tourists; like the Rankin Family can put a roof on the house and oil in the furnace of the whole God damned place. Freezing our asses off in Fort McMurray, paying nearly three grand a month rent on a shithole apartment north of the downtown, complete with a leaky ceiling and rotten windows, that's the best option we've got left."
"And now they're talking layoffs." Bill glared at the wet ring his bottle had left on the tabletop. "Investments are down aren't they? Gotta cut the costs of gettin' the oil out of the tar sands so they'll find guys willing to work for less."
"It's how they built the fucking railroads," Mac growled.
Frank rolled his eyes. "Jesus, Mac, you're a welder; you're good. They bring in cheap labor from overseas and it's the rest of us poor buggers that'll be heading home and back on the dole."
"Don't be giving him any sympathy now," Tom said before Charlie could speak. "B'ye just bought himself a brand new F250."
"Needed something that'd fit the new ATV in the back, didn't I?" Frank laughed. "And who knows, maybe it won't be so bad going home. I hear rumors offshore oil's expanding again and we've got mad oil field skills."
Bill laughed with him. "Yeah, and the fishing's already for shit so when the drilling platforms break up and dump a few million gallons of crude who'll notice, eh?"
"How long can you tread water?" Tom snorted. Charlie knew he was quoting but she didn't know what.
"When my brother called…" Something in Mac's voice said this was important and Charlie wasn't the only one who'd noticed. Frank and Tom and Bill turned toward him, closing him in the circle of their attention, closing out the rest of the bar, their silence pushing back the ambient noise. They'd have closed her out as well, but Charlie refused to go. "When he called, he said he heard Carlson's trying to get permits to drill near Hay Island." Mac picked at the label of his bottle. The other three watched him watch his moving fingers.
Hair lifting off the back of her neck, Charlie froze in place, breathing slowly and quietly through her nose so as not to spook them. If they remembered she was here…
"Hay Island. That's the seal rookery," Tom said at last.
Mac nodded. "My brother says there'd be a couple hundred jobs on the rig and more in the refinery they say they'll build by Main-a-Dieu, but his wife, well, she's against it."
"Yeah, well, she would be, wouldn't she?" Frank's grin twisted into a curve that hinted of secrets.
Charlie had a Gale girl's objection to secrets she, personally, wasn't keeping and it struck her that this particular secret wouldn't be pried loose by smiling and looking interested -- no matter how few women there were in Fort McMurray. Prying free this particular secret would require a completely different skill set. She'd drawn her finger through a puddle of condensation and sketched out the first curves of a charm when a familiar hand landed on her shoulder.
"Charlie, come on!" Tony, the drummer for Dun Good, had to lean forward and shout as the noise of the crowded bar rushed back in to fill the space around the table. "Break's over!"
Wiping out the half drawn pattern with one hand, Charlie set her empty bottle down with the other and shoved her chair back to a chorus of protests from her companions. "Sorry boys, music calls."
The music was, after all, why she was here.
By the time she picked up her guitar, grinning at the raucous welcome the band's return to the stage evoked, she'd almost forgotten how that secret had licked a fission of strange across her skin.
Almost.
Later that night she almost asked Mac what he'd meant but, by then, they were trading other secrets.
*
The drive south from Fort McMurray to Calgary took nine hours. Theoretically.
Actually, it took nine and a half, but only if they could keep rest stops to a minimum. Fortunately, in the last fourteen months of intermittent touring, they'd become old hands at covering the less well traveled parts of the western provinces and had two coolers of food stuffed in between the stack of amps and the box that held the snow chains and the 20 kilo bag of clay kitty litter no one wanted to remove, in spite of it being almost the end of July and nearly 30 degrees. It was Alberta. Why tempt fate. They had six drivers -- the band plus Tony's wife Coreen and Taylor's girlfriend Donna, who'd joined them at Provost just after they'd crossed back from Saskatchewan -- and, of the six, Charlie was, by no means, the most disdainful of posted speed limits.
Since Donna'd had no actual obligations during their last gig at the Newfoundlander's Bar, she'd drawn short straw as first driver.
They were on the road by eight, five of the six passengers completely unaware of the charms sketched under the grime covering the old school bus, charms that had ensured an almost miraculous absence of mechanical difficulty considering the vehicle's age. Charlie'd done what she could for the gas mileage as well but suspected it'd need a full circle of Aunties to drop it from Oh My God to merely appalling.
Of the three aunties she had available out west, Auntie Gwen had suggested they switch it to bio diesel, Auntie Carmen had sighed
damply, and Auntie Bea had said, "If you chose to ride in that death trap, Charlotte Marie Gale, rather than Walk the Wood as any sensible person with the ability would chose to do, do not assume we will ride to the rescue after the inevitable fiery crash."
The aunties were big believers in you made your bed, you crash and burn in it.