The artist who created the gorgeous image you see above is the insanely talented Muhammad Nafay. Please check out more of his breathtaking artwork on his Instagram or his page on ArtStation. Your eyes will thank you for it, trust me. 🙂 Then, once you’re finished soaking in all the pretty, read about my journey to finding the perfect cover art (and artist!) for my debut novel.
The Hunt Begins
My search began on websites that feature premade cover art. There are numerous advantages to purchasing art that is already created, the top two being: 1.) you know EXACTLY what you’re getting, and 2.) it tends to be more affordable, oftentimes around $60-75 for an eBook cover, a bit more for a wraparound paperback cover (if you’re doing a print book, definitely get the wraparound – believe me, it’s worth it). Below are some of the sites I searched, and they all had a wide selection of excellent work:
I had SOOOO much fun looking at all the amazing covers. I found potential book covers for several of my future books as well as possible cover art for novels people in my writing group were working on. I even made an account on SelfPubBookCovers.com so I could bookmark some of my favorite pieces and artists. The first two sites listed above are especially awesome because you can search by genre as well as by specific images you might be interested in. Like, a raven or an alien or a zombie or a tattered American flag. I kind of went a little crazy window shopping. 🙂 Alas, in the end, although I found some “maybes,” I didn’t find a cover that reached off the screen and grabbed me for this particular book. So, I found myself at the next step:
Choosing an Image
I am NOT a digital artist. I will flat-out admit that. If you’ve read this blog before, you’ve probably seen some of my little “illustrations.” To say they are basic would be putting it kindly. Thus, I knew I’d never be able to create my own cover art, but if I was going to commission a piece, I at least needed to be able to tell the artist what I wanted. Which meant I actually had to decide what I wanted. This was not easy and involved several weeks (possibly months) of me playing around in Krita (a free, open source art program I love because I think it’s fairly easy to learn).
I asked everyone who’d read my book about any ideas they might have for the cover image. Then, I made numerous sketches (including some very horrible ones that still give me nightmares – because seriously, a four-year-old could’ve done better #notkidding) and also tried creating some artwork using free-to-download images from Pixabay. Eventually, after all that tinkering, I wound up right back where I started, at the very first sketch I’d made. It was a really close call between that and a piece of vector art that looked pretty cool, but in the end Sketch #1 just felt right. It had the mood I wanted to convey.
Finding the Artist
Now that I had an image in mind, I could finally begin my search for an artist. As someone who’s been beta reading on Fiverr.com for the past few years, I was SUPER excited to contribute to the freelance marketplace as a buyer. There are so many talented artists out there, it’s unbelievable. I wanted to hire them ALL, and had to force myself to focus on the specific mental picture I had in mind and who would be best suited to deliver that image.
When I saw Muhammad’s portfolio for the first time, it truly took my breath away, and honestly, his artwork still does that every time I look at it. Some of the things that struck me about Muhammad’s work were his stunning use of color, his majestic skylines, and the cinematic quality that really makes you aware of how big the universe is. Another thing I noticed about his artwork was that it looked gorgeous and eye-catching even at a thumbnail size, which was really important to me. Also, as you can probably tell from the image above, the deer is an important symbol in my book, and coincidentally a few of Muhammad’s other pieces also had deer in them, so it just seemed like fate. I am beyond lucky he was able to take on my project, and I am absolutely blown away by the results. I gave him a childish scribble and a brief description of my novel, and in return he gave me perfection. 🙂
Lettering and Proof Copies
Once I had my beautiful cover art, I tried my best not to ruin it with awful lettering. I used Krita and KDP’s book cover template (pasted over the art as a new layer with the opacity turned way down) to make sure none of the words went off the page or ventured into forbidden territory, like the bar code area. I just wanted something simple that wouldn’t detract from Muhammad’s brilliant artwork, and I am happy with how it came out. I actually tailored my book description to the amount of space available on the back cover, and in all honesty, it forced me to pare down the word count and I wrote a better, tighter blurb as a result.
The final product, after deleting the template layer in Krita.
Next, I uploaded the book to KDP’s Cover Creator, chose an option that featured the whole cover image (and nothing else), selected a style that only had text (no space for an author photo), then simply deleted all of the text on the template. In other words, I cheated the system :). You do not actually want to use Cover Creator to design your cover – you just cannot manipulate text and images the way you can in a regular art program. The options are very fixed, and that is not a good thing.
Now that the cover and book text were uploaded to my bookshelf, I had one last step: ordering a proof copy to make sure the whole thing had not gone disastrously wrong. This is not as easy as it sounds, people. I’m not joking when I say that I almost accidentally published my book. When it’s late at night, and you’re starting to get confused, bad things happen. Like coming thisclose to hitting the “Publish” button by mistake. My finger actually hovered. Briefly. But something didn’t feel right. So, I did a quick search and found this helpful video which explains how to order proof copies without publishing your book. A true lifesaver!
Me, after receiving my first proof copy. For days afterward, I could not stop picking it up and looking at it. 🙂
My first proof arrived really fast, and as you can see from the rather idiotic grin on my face, I was satisfied with how the book came out. Also, as an added bonus, the cost of printing plus shipping and taxes for my proof copy is exactly $11.21. Which, for my fellow X-Philes out there, just felt like a little bit of icing on the destiny cake. 🙂
Coincidence, fate, or a global conspiracy? You decide. 🙂
I hope hope HOPE that I’ll be pushing that scary “Publish” button very soon. In the meantime, thank you for joining me on this crazy but wonderful journey to realize a dream that has been over 15 years in the making.
So, after getting my print book all squared away, I thought I was close to publishing my novel. I just needed to format my eBook, which, thanks to Kindle Direct Publishing’s proprietary software (called Kindle Create), was supposed to be a breeze even for a newbie like me. You just load your Word document into the program, polish up your book so everything looks pretty, and you’ll be good to go. Easy-peasy…right?
To be fair, I think Kindle Create IS reasonably easy to use, and for most people it would be a perfectly good tool to create a lovely Kindle eBook. For me, the problem came when my book showed a glitch in one device mode in KDP’s online previewer. All the other previews looked great, but this weird glitch really had me concerned, so I reached out for help on the wonderful KDP Community forums. Many people responded right away with thoughts and suggestions for getting to the root of the issue.
I tried everything they suggested as well as some of my own ideas. In the course of trying to solve this mysterious glitch, I removed all fixed fonts from my book, uploaded a Word document directly, reformatted my Word doc and tried again (I later learned I did a really horrible job of reformatting it), and eventually, as a last resort, actually learned a little bit about coding (I knew nothing prior to this experience), saved my book as a plain text file, and coded it myself from scratch using HTML and CSS.
Dark Days
When even THAT failed to fix my issue, I contacted KDP technical support for assistance. They were very nice and worked hard to figure out what I was seeing in that one wonky preview, but ultimately came up with bupkis, and left me feeling like they might not even believe that I had seen anything abnormal in the first place (despite numerous screen caps showing the issue). I’m not going to lie to you, people – things were looking pretty dark at that point. My life had been on hold for months, and I just had no idea how to move forward.
A Helping Hand
Desperate and out of options, I turned to the KDP Community again, and an amazingly kind, professional eBook formatter named Hitch came to my rescue and offered to look at my files and try to see what was going on. She did an absolutely incredible job combing through my eBook, searching for any dastardly formatting that might be responsible for the glitch.
To date, despite everyone’s best efforts, there is still no known cause for what I am seeing in that one preview. There was a lot of crazy stuff in my Word file (like, a LOT), but nothing that should cause the specific glitch I am experiencing, and nothing in the EPUB file, either. As frustrating as it is, we may never know the answer. BUT, after talking to an experienced pro who has formatted thousands of eBooks, I feel like there is a very good chance the eBook will render correctly out in the real world. In other words, I’m hoping, based on all of the available evidence (including the MOBI version showing up nicely on my Fire), that the glitch is limited to that one preview, and I am ready to move forward with publication. Phew!
The point of this post, however, is not to whine about my eBook woes, but rather to focus on the positives of what I learned as the result of my experience. I learned the basics of coding, which was really fun and massively useful (I’ll have a separate post about this somewhere down the line). I learned how important it is for me to get familiar with Styles/Headings/etc in Word, because not knowing these things can make an anthill-sized task into a Mt. Everest-sized one. And I learned that the indie publishing community is filled with wonderful people who care about newbies and want to help us swim rather than sink in the scary ocean that is Kindle Direct Publishing.
Formatting is not my strongsuit. At all. To quote one of my college professors: “I’m not going to mark you down on those last few pages, because obviously something happened and you didn’t intend for it to look like that.” So yeah, formatting and me? Hardly on the best of terms.
When I decided to go the indie route, I had to choose which aspects of the publication process I could handle on my own, and which I would have to shell out $$$ for. And, even though formatting has been the ugly, drooling, Dorito-breath monster in my closet for years, I decided to face the beast head on and at least TRY to format my own book before breaking down and hiring a professional.
Why, you ask? Two reasons:
1.) I am so painfully broke it’s not even funny.
2.) I felt that formatting was something I could actually learn to do well if I put in the time and effort. And, if successful, I would then be able to do it for all of my future books, thereby saving my (hopefully slightly less broke) future self some cash down the line.
As a format-challenged person, learning this skill was sort of like having a root canal minus the novacaine – something I have actually experienced, and yes it hurt like you-know-what. But after countless hair-pulling moments and a few pillow screams, I finally had a book that looked exactly the way I wanted it to. No weird spacing issues. No random alignment gaffes. Blank pages only where I intended them to be (and nowhere else!).
For some people, this might sound easy-peasy. For me, however, this was a Mt. Everest-level accomplishment. And since I know I can’t be alone when it comes to my formatting struggles, I decided to share some of the tips and resources that helped me, along with a few of the issues I considered while formatting my book for print.
Decisions, Decisions
If you decide to format your own manuscript, you’ll be in charge of choosing everything from the actual trim size of the book all the way down to the font size and type, line spacing, and how the first page of each chapter will look.
Some details that might affect these decisions:
-Book Length
-Genre
-Intended Audience
In my case, I have a novel for younger audiences (11-13 years), so an easy-to-read font was paramount. My book is also somewhat long, so I had to take the potential spine width into account as I looked at different trim sizes. The bigger your book’s trim size is, the larger the pages are and the more words you can fit on them. Which means a skinnier spine and a lower printing cost. However, books with extremely large trim sizes can be awkward and uncomfortable for readers to hold. So everything is about finding that right look and right balance for your specific novel. To gain one element, you might have to sacrifice another.
In my opinion, an ideal paperback has a trim size of 5″ x 8″. Because of my book’s length, I had to compromise on this a bit and go with 5.25″ x 8″. If you have a super short book, you might want to go the opposite way and choose the smallest trim size to make your book thicker.
Many professional novels have each chapter start on an odd numbered page, even if it would not naturally fall there. Because my book is long with fairly short chapters, this would have meant including a significant number of unnecessary blank pages. Since I do actually care about trees, I decided not to restrict myself in this way. I also elected to do without the standard header (alternating between author’s name and book title) on each page. Again, this was to save pages and keep the text easy to read.
My novel has the same trim size as the paperback edition of Divergent
One thing that’s really beneficial (and also kinda fun) is to take a bunch of books off your shelf and actually measure them. You’ll be amazed at the range of sizes. Flip through each one and sample how their chapter openers look, where the page numbers are, how they display the header and footer, what fonts are used. There are so many different styles! Make a note of which books in your genre have the best “look” and try to emulate that.
If you’re writing a science fiction novel, you might want to use a futuristic font for the chapter headings to give it that sci-fi feel. For a memoir, chapter titles might look cool in a font that looks like handwriting (as long as it’s legible!). If you’re writing a heart-pounding action adventure set on a global stage, you may want each chapter opening to have additional information like what country the characters are in, what time it is, and how many minutes are left until the bomb goes off!
Below are some links and tips to help make your book both beautiful and professional.
Resources
This is THE best video ever for formatting your print book in MS Word. This totally saved my life. The author explains everything and makes it all so easy a kindergartner (or me!) could do it. The vid covers common mistakes (and how to avoid them), mirror margins, gutter space, formatting chapter headings using styles, line spacing and more. The only things it doesn’t really touch on are drop caps (those pretty, extra big letters at the start of each chapter) and page/section breaks. But this will give you all the basics and you’ll be in great shape as you move on to some of the more intricate details.
Here is a link to KDP’s guide to trim sizes. It also discusses bleed (when you want an image to go off the edge of the page) as well as their recommended margins for different sizes of books. (Tip: go bigger than recommended for the gutter margin).
KDP’s instructions for formatting your print book. IMHO, the video posted above is much easier to follow, but there are a few elements here not included on that vid, e.g. the section break stuff, which is really important if you want certain pages NOT to have numbers on them. Page breaks are also important to learn about, especially when it comes time to format your ebook, so definitely don’t skip out on these lessons. The most valuable thing I got out of this page was the last part, which clearly explains how to export your final Word Doc(x) as a pdf, the form it must be in to upload it to your bookshelf.
How to create drop caps in MS Word. (FYI, drop caps RULE! They make your book look awesome and professional. Tip: To change the appearance of your drop cap, e.g. how tall it is, click “Drop Cap Options.”)
Have Fun Building Your Book!
Reading about all of these new terms can be overwhelming for a first-timer. It definitely was for me! Just remember that it does get easier. Any problem you have or anything you can’t figure out how to do, just call on your old pals Google, Bing, and YouTube and they will help you find someone who can answer your question. If you want to do something special, like add a map to the beginning of your book, or an image next to each chapter title, or a blank page with just a quote right in the middle, don’t give up simply because it seems too hard. Keep trying until everything looks exactly the way you envisioned. You deserve it, and so does your book. 🙂
I may not have gotten much writing done during the pandemic. Or much reading. Or much exercising. But I do have ONE claim to productivity over the last year and a half: I’ve been slowly, quietly getting my first novel ready for publication.
The idea of publishing independently has been knocking around in my brain since I attended a workshop on the subject roughly ten years ago. Since then, I’ve participated in several more workshops, read numerous indie-published books, and even interviewed an indie author. The more I learned, the more I liked what I heard:
Complete control over your content. Publishing at your own pace. Earning higher royalties. The freedom that comes with being your own boss. And, probably most important for me: the opportunity to share unique stories that traditional publishing doesn’t want to take a chance on.
One thing that has struck me about most of the indie books I’ve read: They’re special. They’re different. They’re not cardboard cutouts of every other book in their genre. Some of these books experiment with style, structure, or just explore a topic so different from anything I’ve read before that I doubt the authors could come up with a comp title even if someone offered them $50K. As a reader, I find this stimulating, exciting. I like different.
I am different.
Of course, traditional publishing had always been the dream, and letting go wasn’t easy. There will be no advance on royalties, no prestige of having my work get “chosen” by an agent, no NYT Bestseller List bragging rights.
But maybe, just maybe, with a TON of hard work, I’ll earn a small readership who appreciates quality writing that doesn’t quite fit the mold. And maybe, just maybe, one day I’ll get to have an even greater honor than being chosen by any agent or editor:
The honor of being chosen by YOU, the reader.
Best wishes to all, keep writing, and stay tuned for more posts about my publishing journey!
I scribbled these notes ages ago, and thought I’d better post them before 5b drops (May 28th, people! It’s almost here!!). Readers beware: this isn’t a proper review of Season Five, because I can’t really judge something that isn’t complete. So, instead I give you some random fangirl thoughts and feels! (Plus, since you’re such good DevilBunnies, a few Lucific recs to boot.) 🙂
Episode 1: Really Sad Devil Guy
Great opener! We get to see how Chloe and Luce are coping in their separate realities. I love the Chlaze partnership. It has been WAY too long since we’ve seen Chloe and Maze as anything more than frosty acquaintances. Having them be friends and even work partners was like a delicious peppermint candy. Too bad I got greedy and crunched it up. It was gone far too soon. Seriously, just one episode and then poof to the Chloe/Maze relationship? Such a bummer. Hope it’s back in 5b. Other things I loved about this ep:
-The wistful expression on Lucifer’s face when he looks out across Marina del Rey. That aching sadness in his eyes says more than words ever could about how long he’s been away from the world – and the people – he loves.
-The parallel case solving, with Lucifer in Hell and Chloe in LA. So cool! It was awesome how they went up and down between the two dimensions and sometimes when a scene started you didn’t know yet where it was taking place.
-Mr. Said Out Bitch! Of course he had to be in it, because it’s a season opener! But, on the downside…he’s dead now, so what does that mean for the Season Six premiere? Souls coming to Earth? A trip down to the underworld? I hope they found a creative way to include him in the final opener. 🙂
-The demon that came to talk to Chloe – he was so cheerful and happy and friendly, which was at complete odds with the fact of him inhabiting this horribly wounded dead body. He’s all chipper and like, “Hi! I’m a demon!” right after choking on a throatful of blood. He even apologizes for being “gross.” Hilarious. I think we need this demon back again. Though sadly it would have to be a different actor portraying him, since that body was apparently “too jacked to keep working,” lol.
-Speaking of demons, we learned that various “characters” who appear in the Hell loops are actually played by demons. Does this include the version of Uriel that Lucifer saw in his own Hell loop? Was that a demon torturing his own king? Just something interesting the episode made me think about!
-The ending was a twist! I’d accidentally been spoiled about the Michael thing beforehand (this is why I try to avoid Twitter), but the writers still fooled me. I totally thought it was Lucifer who came to save Chloe and Lee’s sister at the end. My jaw dropped a little at the reveal that Luce was still in Hell. Me loves to be surprised. 😀
Episode 2: Lucifer! Lucifer! Lucifer!
If you ignore the fact that it’s Michael and not Lucifer, this episode is actually really shippy. Chloe is flirting, concerned about his well-being, trying to understand the struggles he’s facing after being in Hell for so long. In short, she’s being a really sweet, awesome girlfriend. The makeout scene with Maze/Michael is hard to swallow because of how much it hurts poor Chloe. So glad she realizes in the end that it wasn’t really Luci, cuz he would never do that to her. Still, ouch! I like how Tom is playing Michael, using a distinctive posture/accent and the whole wimpy/whiny/bitchy vibe to really sell that it’s two different characters. I love, love, love Chloe shooting him at the end. 🙂 Too bad it didn’t take the sting out of Michael letting the whole miracle thing out of the bag (something I totally believe Lucifer would’ve told her himself if he’d had more time on Earth). Also, on a somewhat random note, the scorpion at this beginning of this ep looked very nice, and was the first of many superb special effects this season, making me wonder if the show got a bigger effects budget, or if it’s some improvement on the technology side of things. Whatever the cause, Lucifer seems to have upped its FX ante, and I am loving the eye candy. Keep it coming!
Episode 3: ¡Diablo!
My first instinct was that this episode was too goofy for dealing with the heavy subject matter of Chloe grappling with the whole miracle sitch. However, it’s a hard episode not to love, and it’s definitely grown on me with repeated viewings. For once it is Chloe and not Lucifer who is searching for the answer to personal problems in between the lines of their current case, so that’s a fun reversal. Too bad the person she thought had the answers was actually a psycho killer chick! As a huge Deckerstar fan, it was rough not to have a real reunion like the characters deserved, because it was already tainted by the miracle revelation. 😦 But instead of the longed-for Deckerstar, we did at least get some Douchifer, which was totally on my wishlist for S5 after being sorely lacking last season. Other highlights of this ep:
-Diablo – OMG, how could you not love this sweet, dumb-yet-somehow-smart actor taking his role way too seriously? It was so great how no one ever even called him by his real name. He was just “Diablo.” How could his costar kill him? How could anyone? It’s like shooting a litter of newborn chinchillas with an AK-47. You just can’t. Plus he solved the case! Diablo FTW, Dad rest his soul. 🙂
-The clown room in Hell. Do I even need to say anything here? Totally priceless.
-Dan, Ella, and Lucifer acting out a ¡Diablo! episode. Best. Scene. Ever. “Now I can…put my bra back on?” ROFL!
-Lucifer mentions being able to “listen to” Chloe’s conversation from well outside a room with the door closed, and also talks about Dan’s bone density like it’s something Lucifer can actually see. Are these hints at some devilish superhuman sensory abilities? My fangirl heart hopes so! 🙂
Episode 4: It Never Ends Well for the Chicken
I enjoyed this one as much as I could, given that it’s one of those eps. By those, I mean the noir-style, black-and-white, everybody-playing-a-different-character eps. A lot of shows do these. Smallville did one. They’re not really my jam. The fact that this one is Lucifer telling a story to Trixie about events that actually happened saves it a little bit, as does the fact that it moves Maze’s arc forward, but still, this type of episode is never going to be a favorite for me. (Ditto for musical episodes – not my style. At all.) I hope the people who do like this sort of thing enjoyed it!
Cool things about this ep:
-As mentioned above, these were actual events, not a dream or fantasy sequence (which most episodes of this type tend to be) so kudos on that.
-DB Woodside’s character was HIL-arious! Ditto for Kevin Alejandro’s prissy, super-wimpy counterpart. 🙂 Those guys must’ve had such a blast. In general, it looked like everyone was really having fun with their new roles, which was cool to watch.
-Sooooo nice to see Tricia back! Made me miss Charlotte (and Mum) so much! The love story between her and Lauren’s character was touching to watch, as was Rachel Harris’s character’s devotion to her beloved wounded war veteran.
-Lesley-Ann did a great job portraying Lilith. The friendship between Lily and Lucifer was sweet. I especially liked when they sang “Someone to Watch Over You.” It was very clear they’d been through a lot together and had a mutual respect for each other.
-I love that we got some Trixie/Lucifer scenes – there are never enough of these, and they’re always gold. Part of me was a little sad at the reveal that Trixie was just manipulating Lucifer to get information for Maze. It makes total sense, though – Trixie has outgrown her “complete adoration” phase when it come to Lucifer, so of course her loyalties would lie with Maze, who treats her as a best friend and doesn’t just call her “child” or “offspring,” lol. Plus, Trixie has always had a taste for cold hard cash. 🙂
We learned a lot about Lilith here, including that she was immortal until fairly recently, that she “chose” to have soulless children and send them to Hell to be Lucifer’s army, and that her immortality now resides in Lucifer’s ring. There are still so many questions, though! Like, I feel stupid for asking this, but what exactly is she? I mean, is she a previously-unkillable human like Cain? Or is she another sort of creature entirely? Do her children have fathers (or a father)?
ETA: I actually did a little research on the history of Lilith throughout various religious texts and early folklore, and there was not a lot of agreement on what she is, though I did find references to her being Adam’s first wife, and her having tons and tons of demonic children – in some accounts they are Adam’s, in other accounts the fathers are men she had sex with or stole “seed” from in their sleep. She is associated with owls and other night creatures/demons, and is often depicted with wings and sometimes with scales/reptile features. In some stories she is actually the serpent in the Garden of Eden, rather than Lucifer! Lilith was believed by many to prey on men for sex and to harm women (especially pregnant ones) and children in their sleep. In some versions she left Adam and the Garden because she refused to be anything less than Adam’s equal, which has made her a symbol of female empowerment. One last interesting tidbit: in one of the tales, God commands that 100 of Lilith’s children be slaughtered every day until she returns to Eden. In our Luci-verse, perhaps this could be the real reason she “chose” to send her kids to Hell? To protect them from God’s wrath? Hmmmm….
Episode 5: Detective Amenadiel
A fantastic ep, and arguably my favorite of the season! 😀 Chloe and Amenadiel have this great dynamic and we almost never get to see them spending time together, so this was a real treat. In this ep we also got more Douchifer (YESSSSSSS!! Bracelet Bros, FTW!), and got to see Amenadiel be a kick@$$ angel with an impressive show of power at the end there. I love the title’s double meaning, because Amenadiel is not only helping to solve a murder here – he is also solving a major problem for his little bro and Chloe. Amenadiel’s wonderful insight into the Deckerstar dilemma felt so refreshing and so right after all the agony both characters have been through thinking they were forced to have feelings for each other and that their relationship was all some grand manipulation by a higher power.
“You are the only mortal who sees him as he truly is.”
“He thinks you choose to be vulnerable with me.”
**cue Deckerstar fangirl squeals!!!!**
Episode 6: BluBallz
Aaaand our nice moment gets interrupted by a murder! Thanks a lot, Ella! I did really like the bait and switch at the beginning, when it looked like we were watching Chloe and Lucifer together and it was really just some random teenagers fooling around on the beach. And then it looked like the teenagers were going to get killed, but the weapon turned out to be a squirt gun. Very playful on the part of the writers. Fun stuff. 🙂
So, we got to meet one of Chloe’s exes. I didn’t like him at all, but I don’t think we were supposed to, lol! He just seemed very…empty. Like there wasn’t a whole lot beneath the handsome exterior. His “niceness” felt false, as if it were merely an act he was putting on to impress people while hoping they didn’t look too deep. As far as Chloe’s exes go, Dan has way more character in his pinky finger than this guy!
Still, jealousy is not anyone’s best color, and even Lucifer can’t quite make that green envy look good. I couldn’t really blame him too much though because he and Chloe just got together and yet she tells What’s-His-Face (seriously, I forgot his name) that she’s not in a relationship. Right in front of Lucifer. Ouch. Dang, Decker – that was cold. I mean, true, it was probably too soon to define their relationship as “dating,” but she could’ve said something closer to the truth, like, “Actually, I am involved with someone right now. It’s still really early, but we’re seeing where it goes.” I’m just saying, you could see why Luce got upset. And unfortunately, when he gets upset, he acts out in very ridiculous and childish ways.
Despite the silliness and stupidity of Lucifer’s antics, this episode actually had some major events:
-Tribe Night #2 (Love it like crazy, especially the Chloe/Linda talk about sex with Lucifer, and “nice” Maze barely surviving small talk with Karen)
-Dan sees the Devil Face (OMDOMDOMD!). Love how Michael was the one who orchestrated this event. Double love Charlie’s reaction to Uncle Lucifer’s monstrous side. 🙂 The baby loves it, ROFL! Charlie would probably really like Maze’s demon face too. That kid’s gonna need sooooo much therapy when he grows up. Good thing Linda’s his mom! 🙂
-Chloe and Lucifer finally, finally make it past their NUMEROUS issues and actually get together!!!! WOO HOO!!!!
Episode 7: Our Mojo
Great episode here! Definitely a S5 favorite. This one starts out all cute and fluffy, but quickly goes down a dark path as the team hunts a particularly vicious killer. Some shows do serial killers on a weekly basis and it gets old pretty fast, but on Lucifer these types of cases are a rare event, often reserved for multi-ep arcs like this one. When we face a serial killer on this show, I know it’s going to be epic and it’s really going to change things for the characters, so I am instantly on high alert.
Oh, poor Detective Douche. His graveyard breakdown talking to Charlotte was absolutely heart-shattering. Kudos to Kevin on that scene, and just in general for making us care so deeply about a character who could easily be unlikable given all the stuff he’s done in the past. Dan’s stolen evidence and gotten people killed and basically even put a hit on Lucifer in S4, and yet somehow we still love him and I’d say that’s in large part due to Kevin’s portrayal.
Then “angelic” Michael shows up, and the scene shifts from devastating to nauseating. I’m sorry, but Michael is just so icky! He’s like nails on a chalkboard mated with tin foil scraping across my teeth. If this character has any redeeming qualities, they’ve yet to make themselves known.
In this ep, Michael introduces himself as an archangel. I believe this is the first use of the term on the show and the first indication of “ranks” among the angels. On Supernatural they had four of these angels: Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and Lucifer. They were the most powerful angels and killing them required a special weapon (an archangel blade), as regular angel blades would not hurt them. In this case, since it was Michael referring to himself, I kind of brushed it off as him trying to sound really important and special. Yet, in the next episode, Lucifer also refers to Michael as an archangel. So I’m assuming Michael really is one. We’ve yet to learn what this means on the show and if any of the other angels carry that title.
The mojo swap was the fun part of this otherwise serious episode, but it did hurt to see Lucifer so distressed, and I think Linda had a point about Chloe not taking the issue seriously. I love how Lucifer compensated for the loss by getting his own badge and gun (ROFL!) and I love, love, love how Chloe used Lucifer’s gun to stop the super creepy killer guy.
Great cliffhanger ending with Dan holding the gun on Luce! Part of me suspected that Michael would send Dan to kill Lucifer, but for some reason I thought it would be with a supernatural weapon (possibly Azrael’s blade, retrieved from the other universe). The fact that it was just an ordinary gun makes me wonder if Michael really intended Lucifer to die, or if Michael somehow knew what we find out in Ep 8 – that Lucifer is once again fully invulnerable.
Episode 8: Spoiler Alert
Speaking of which…oh no, the vulnerability around Chloe is kaput! They hinted a bit at this in the previous episode, with Lucifer looking very troubled over the fact that he’s let his guard down so much. This set-up seems to indicate that he subconsciously decided to put his walls back up, and thus made himself bulletproof again, but I’m not sure that’s the case. I think other forces may be at work. In any case, I hope he gets the vulnerability back at some point, because without it, every fanfic I’ve ever read, written, or planned to write is kinda dead in the water. 😦
I’m glad we had a few light moments at the beginning of this one (Lucifer shooting himself and delighting at the lack of damage, Chloe’s expression when Lucifer happily agrees to her sarcastic suggestion to split up), because after that it gets DARK.
Chloe’s kidnapping and the search for her is so intense. Whenever I’m squirming in my seat while watching an episode, it means I’m really, really nervous about what’s going to happen, and I was writhing like a bag of snakes while watching this one!
I was afraid from early on in the ep that the real Whisper Killer might be Pete. It’s always the nice guys, right? I was really hoping it wasn’t, because he seemed so sweet and so perfect for Ella, but once he gave her that key to his house, I knew for sure it was him. My heart breaks for poor Ella, but at least she’s alive (the writers had me scared for a minute there), and the team finally did figure out where Chloe was with a little help from a very intoxicated Dan. Plus we got our first reference to events from the episode “Boo Normal,” which was cool. 😀
Of course, not all’s well that ends well. Ella is an offscreen wreck, Chloe is insecure about Lucifer’s feelings for her (as a viewer, I have NO doubt whatsoever that he loves her, but I understand how it feels from her perspective: she’s been unceremoniously dumped – twice – for reasons totally beyond her comprehension, and that would give anyone serious misgivings), Michael’s scheming as always, Dan’s barely clinging to sanity, Maze is once again in hardcore betrayal mode, and Amenadiel’s having a time-freezing panic attack.
I initially thought Chloe’s frozenness had something to do with Lucifer starting to say the “L” word, like he inadvertently set some sort of apocalypse in motion by saying it, but thankfully I was wrong. Poor Amenadiel just doesn’t want Charlie to die. 😦 What parent wouldn’t stop time for their kid if they had the power to do so?
Re: Maze: It hurts to see her fighting alongside Michael, but honestly, can you blame her? Lucifer treats her like complete crap. He is totally insensitive to her feelings, as if she is not capable of emotion or attachments, when she has shown very clearly (through her bonds to Trixie and Linda) that she is capable of those things. Lucifer uses her when he needs her, but otherwise casts her aside like she’s worthless. So yeah, no wonder she sides with Michael.
Which makes it a more even fight, and what an EPIC fight it is! OMD, once again I bow to the show’s FX gods. That broken glass scene was especially phenomenal. Truly breathtaking!
And then, as if we needed even more drama heaped on top of it all, God shows up! All I can say is: a) I did NOT see that coming at all, and b) what appropriate casting :D.
So, I have no freaking idea where all of this is going, but for me that makes it way more fun. I hate spoilers and love surprises and I’m so ready for the next chapter in this incredible story. Can’t wait for May 28th!
If you need something to keep you from squirming like a bag of snakes while you wait, check out these two awesome and totally epic Lucifics (As always, please read the content and age-level warnings before you start reading the actual stories. The second one, in particular, has very graphic and adult content.):
Summary: What if Kinley’s poison still managed to find its way into Lucifer that night? Can Lucifer and Chloe learn to trust each other again, or will Lucifer run if he can recover?
Summary: After a five month absence, an amnesiac Lucifer returns from Hell, mysteriously cursed to fulfill Chloe Decker’s every desire—the first pull from an apocalyptic house of cards. As natural order shows signs of structural collapse, Lucifer and Chloe must discover how to free him from his bonds, and solve the puzzle of his reappearance. Meanwhile, their newest murder investigation draws them deep into an exploration of BDSM. Harbingers, Hell, devilish hijinks, and kinks. What’re a beleaguered Devil and Detective to do?
Enjoy, and I’ll be thinking of y’all on May 28th! 😀
I wish I could say that I’ve been one of those people who used the downtime of quarantine to become massively productive. I wish I could say I holed up and penned five epic novels, got completely ripped, and launched a successful business or two. I tip my imaginary hat to the people who can say that – you have my respect, my awe, and my envy.
I could give a list of excuses for why I’m not a pandemic wunderkind. I have many legitimate ones. Like the fourteen cats and kittens someone dumped on our property back in April, when all the vets and shelters were closed. (You can read all about this crazy event here.) I could point out that I have extra responsibilities helping to care for a family member suffering from a debilitating illness. I could complain about how draining and complicated a simple trip to the grocery store has become.
Like I said, I have many valid excuses. But the truth is, I have struggled just to get normal daily tasks done. Tasks that were hardly a burden before this all happened suddenly seem exhausting after so many grueling months of fear and uncertainty. I turned forty last month. I felt sixty-five. This situation has aged all of us, I think. When I wake up each day, I try very hard to be happy. Once in a while, it dawns on me that I didn’t used to have to try.
I’ve had a few pandemic-induced nightmares, all of them variations on same theme: I’m out in public, walking around shopping or whatever, and suddenly I realize I’m not wearing my mask. It’s horrifying. I quickly grab the collar of my shirt or coat and try vainly to cover up my nose and mouth but it’s never enough. Everyone around me is wearing their masks like good citizens, and here I am, completely naked – and not in a fun, nude beach kind of way. Oddly, no one appears to be judging me. But I am judging myself. I am judging myself sohard. I wake up feeling relieved the event never actually occurred, and grateful, because to date I haven’t lost anyone to COVID. The shadow creeps ever closer as more of my community members begin to fall victim, but for the moment I am lucky. The people who’ve watched their loved ones die via iPad screens, those are the folks who have real nightmares.
As this pandemic has dragged on, many things have slipped through the cracks in my life. This blog is one. Writing is another. Exercise would also have to be included on that list. I tried to put on my aerobics DVD one time during the lockdown, only to discover the disc was broken and wouldn’t play. Months of sloth-like inactivity later, I mustered the energy to hunt down a thirty-minute workout on YouTube. I barely survived the ordeal and for days afterward hobbled around with every muscle screaming like I’d been in a serious car accident.
I miss blogging. I miss connecting with other writers and fans. I miss being in some form of decent physical shape. I really, really miss writing on a regular basis.
It is time, slowly and with many faltering steps, to rectify all of these things. There is reason to hope, even under this oppressive cloud of darkness. The scent of spring is in the air, faint but undeniable: promising new vaccines, a new American President, more people doing the right thing and wearing their masks. The end is still a long way off, no question, but it is in sight. And in the meantime, like Luna Lovegood says in the final Harry Potter book, “We’re still here. We’re still fighting.”
It happens around the same time every spring – a pair of purple finches, darting around the pillars of our wraparound porch, tufts of dried grass clutched in their little wedge-shaped beaks. They usually build their nest in the northwest corner, and we get to watch in delight as their fledglings transform from helpless, naked little T-Rexes into graceful ballerinas of the sky.
One year the birds were so successful they immediately reused the same nest to raise a second brood. Another year the nest blew down before they’d even laid their eggs. That time, the finches rebuilt elsewhere, seeming to have lost faith in their most trusted nesting spot. The following year they were back again, as if nothing bad had ever happened.
Which brings us to this year. 2020. This crazy, scary, nothing-will-ever-be-the-same-again year. The purple finches came right on schedule, just like always. Their presence was an achingly welcome sight. Here we were in the midst of a lockdown, a pandemic, facing uncertainty in almost every aspect of our human lives. And yet, for these birds, it was business as usual. For some reason, they built their nest in the northeast corner this time. For obvious reasons, we watched them more avidly than ever before.
The new nesting location quickly became a concern. There was an enormous pine tree right beside that corner of the porch that was literally tearing our house apart. It had to come down before any more damage was done, and the operation was going to be long and loud. We knew the finches already had eggs in the nest, and quite possibly newborn chicks. We dreaded what would happen on tree removal day. If the mother bird had to stay off the nest for too long, the brood would surely perish.
On the morning the pine was scheduled to come down, I woke up early, my stomach twisting like an anxious boa constrictor. All day long, I winced and cringed at every scream of the chainsaw, every testosterone-fueled bellow from the cutting crew, every ground-shaking thump as another section of the tree struck the earth. I kept looking at my phone, calculating how many hours they’d been at it – one, two, three, four. Every time I checked, my heart dipped a little more, as the chicks’ survival chances went down, down, down.
In the midst of the chaos, I peeked at the nest a few times, only to find it empty, of course. When the job was finally done, the crew left, their truck’s massive tires cracking over plywood placed on the lawn in the vain hope of protecting our grass. I held my breath, waiting for the mother bird to return. I let out a huge sigh when she landed back on the nest about fifteen minutes after their departure.
I immediately went inside to assure my mom, who’d been fretting over the nest just as much as I, that the bird had returned. Despite the good news, I also shared my fear that four-plus hours was simply too long for the female finch to have been off the nest.
“She wasn’t,” my mom said.
“What?” I asked.
“She wasn’t off the nest for that many hours. She came back in the middle and sat on those eggs. In the midst of all that sawing and yelling, that brave little bird came back.”
A huge grin broke across my face. I rose up on my toes and peered out over our lacy curtains at the tiny gray-brown bird dutifully seated on her nest. The commotion of the tree coming down had made me nervous, and I understood what was going on. I couldn’t imagine the courage it took for the mother finch to fly right into the epicenter of all that chaos and sit on her clutch when every instinct must’ve been screaming at her to flee. She might’ve been a dainty, delicate little lady, but she had the heart of a lion, for sure.
A bewildered squirrel investigates the stump of the fallen pine. Luckily we found no evidence of a nest in the branches.
With the tree crisis in our rear-view mirror, our family went back to enjoying the peace and quiet as we watched the nest for signs of new life. A few days later, there was a dramatic uptick in activity, with the mother bird frequently flying off for brief periods. Whenever she was sitting on the nest, she constantly leaned down to tenderly nuzzle something underneath her. Though it would still be several days before those ugly, reptilian heads popped up, we knew our little avian friends had made their debut.
Momma Finch was a quick hunter-gatherer. She’d light off for a short bit, then return just as fast with a regurgitated snack for the brood. I loved watching her groom the chicks and nudge them gently with her beak before flying away once more. As the babies grew, so did her job – feeding them, keeping them warm, cleaning up after them.
“Does the father finch help her at all?” my dad asked one evening as we watched the mother deliver her last feeding of the night.
“Not really,” I replied. “He hardly ever shows up.”
My dad laughed and rolled his eyes. “That son of a gun!”
“He helps a little,” I amended, feeling the need to defend the guy.
In truth, I rarely saw the father bird, but the few times I did he was a sight to behold. Vivid red feathers splashed his head and chest, making his mate plain and dull by comparison. I have no idea how he spent most of the day, but the rare times he did arrive at the nest, it was quite the spectacle: excited screeching, frantic flapping. The chicks were obviously beside themselves, but it was their mom whose brown wings were beating so hard they blurred. It was she who screeched the loudest, turning into a chick herself as he fed her a little bit of regurgitated seeds or fruit.
Ah, I get it, I thought. She takes care of the chicks, he takes care of her.
Of course, she was fully capable of feeding herself, but what new mom doesn’t need a bit of pampering, a little “me time,” a small reminder that someone appreciates all of her sacrifices?
He did that for her, and she loved him to pieces for it.
A male Baltimore Oriole snacks on an orange.
As the baby birds began to fledge, we looked forward to their first flight, and fretted over whether they might fall out of the next too soon…and land right in the waiting jaws of our porch cat, Joey, who’d taken to sleeping right under the nest.
As it turned out, though, the cat wasn’t what we needed to worry about.
I came in from my chores late one afternoon to find my mom standing anxiously at the window.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Have you seen the mother bird lately?”
I frowned. “I saw her feeding them at around 11, but not since then. Why?”
“She’s been gone all afternoon,” Mom told me. “It’s not like her to leave them for so long.”
We spent the next few hours peering out the window, our anxiety spiking each time we saw a hungry little head waving above the nest and no mother bird there to feed it. My mom started voicing her fears that something bad had happened to the female, that she was injured, or possibly worse.
I didn’t want to believe it, and kept looking outside even as dusk fell, still hoping for the mother bird’s triumphant return. One time as I stood on my toes, scanning for any sign of her, I noticed a small, motionless shape lying out on the highway. A bubble of dread blossomed in my heart as I slipped on my sandals to go investigate. The bubble grew as I approached the flattened form of what was obviously a bird that had been struck by a car. It was nearly dark then, and I had to get very close before I was sure.
It was the mother finch. She was dead.
I walked slowly back to the house and delivered the news.
“The fledglings will die,” my dad said sadly, gazing out at the nest.
“Can you take care of them?” my mom asked me desperately, knowing I’d raised baby birds in the past with some success.
I bit my lip. “I can try if I have to, but first let’s see if the father bird starts feeding them. They’ll be better off with him than me.”
As darkness continued to fall, I was practically glued to the window. Come on, Poppa Finch, I silently begged. They need you, now. They’re your babies too.
Just as I was about to turn away in defeat, a flash of vivid scarlet caught my eye. My heart skipped and I pressed my nose to the glass, not caring that I was making a greasy smudge. It was him. He had finally come.
I imagine he was quite shocked when he arrived at the nest that first night. Here he was, expecting to find an ecstatic wife flapping happily for her treat and instead he got a nest full of loud, hungry chicks with no momma bird in sight. Whatever was going through his head, instinct kicked in and he immediately began to feed the chicks.
“He’s here!” I exclaimed to my parents. “He’s feeding them!”
The relief in our house that night was sweeter than music. Of course, we all knew one feeding wasn’t going to cut it. This male finch was going to have to recognize that his mate was never coming back. He was going to have to step up in a way he never had before and take care of these chicks full time – feeding them all day, every day, and cleaning the nest, too.
The next week was an anxious one as we catalogued the male finch’s activities. He didn’t feed the chicks as often as his wife had, but he seemed to give them more food when he did come. Possibly he had a larger crop than she did. He was definitely more efficient, depositing regurgitated fruit and seeds in each wide screaming mouth with almost robotic precision. He made sure everyone got something, every time. No small feat, especially considering that the brood was an extra-large one. Normally, the finches had three or four chicks per clutch. This year, they’d had a whopping five.
Poppa Finch takes care of the brood.
The father finch didn’t sit on the chicks, or spend nearly as much time nuzzling them as his mate had, but that was okay. He gave them what they needed. He gave them life. And when the time came, he took them safely out into the world. They didn’t leave the nest all at once, as they had in previous years. It was staggered–first two, then another two, then finally the last little straggler. Maybe he had to split them up because he was a single parent, and flight training five birds at once was just too daunting. He did a good job, though. Much to our relief (and Joey’s disappointment) not a single one of them fell into feline clutches.
Now, they’re all out in the great big wild somewhere, maybe still with their father, or maybe already starting to form families of their own. Maybe one of them will be back next year with a mate, ready to start the cycle anew.
Already, their mother must have faded into the backs of their minds. They’ve probably forgotten what she looked like. They were so young when she died, it’ll be a miracle if they have any memory of her at all.
I hope they do, though. Probably not anything concrete, or solid, or tangible, but maybe just a feeling they get when they’re perched on a branch with summer breeze rustling through their feathers, and their eyes are just starting to close. A sensation of warm feathers blanketing them in protection, or the gentle phantom touch of a beak nuzzling them. Or maybe they’ll hear a call in the distance, and for one second it’ll take them back to that nest where everything started. Back to her.
However it happens I hope for just a moment before they fall asleep each night, some deep-down part of them remembers a love that braved chainsaws and falling logs and yelling men to keep her babies safe. A love that was greater than fear, stronger than instinct.
Viewing Season Four – or Series Four, as they call it on Netflix – of Lucifer was a unique experience in several ways. It was my first time getting to see a canceled show come back to life on a new platform, and also my very first time using a streaming service. I had no idea what to expect going into this adventure, and was equal parts excited and nervous.
How hard would it be to set up Netflix? What if it didn’t work and I couldn’t see the show I’d been waiting so many months for? Of course, I had planned to get all the technical stuff sorted out and watch a few other Netflix shows as a test run before the Lucifer premiere date, but you know what happens when you make plans. In short, Neil Gaiman laughed.
As is usually the case with my life, I found myself right up against the deadline, scrambling to get the service set up the day before the new season was scheduled to drop. I didn’t know how fast or slow I would watch Season Four as a whole, but I did know I wanted to watch that first episode on the same day as everyone else…assuming the darn technology would cooperate.
I am happy to say that despite certain glitches, it all worked out just fine, and I settled into a cozy mattress for one of the happiest experiences this fangirl will probably ever have: Lucifer: Season 4.
Going into this new season, my main fear was that the Netflix version of the show would be very different from the one I knew and loved. However, when the first ep opened up with the familiar scene of Lucifer singing in Lux, followed by the entrance of Mr. Said Out Bitch – who is by this point a Lucifer season premiere requirement – I started to relax. I quickly realized that it really was going to be the same show I always adored – just with a few extra naked butts and swears thrown in to great effect.
My other concern was the length of the season – only ten episodes? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t complaining – I was beyond grateful to have any new episodes at all. But I did worry whether the writers could do a fully developed, satisfying season in just ten fifty-minute scripts. The writers on Nikita actually did an absolutely amazing six-episode final season which blew me to smithereens, but that was a different show and different writers, so I was still leery about what Lucifer would be able to do with such limitations.
Much to my delight, the short season worked beautifully. In fact, I think in some ways it worked better than a longer season because it forced everything to be so tightly focused. There wasn’t any room for filler. Every moment of every episode had to drive the plot and the character arcs toward their final destinations.
I love how all the characters have their own struggles and challenges in Season Four. Chloe struggles to accept all of Lucifer. Lucifer has to decide who he truly wants to be and whether settling for a great person who loves and accepts him is enough, even if that isn’t the person he really wants to be with. Ella battles with a crisis of faith, while Dan faces off with grief, personal demons, and an actual demon for good measure. Linda and Amenadiel wrestle with all the fears and joys of becoming parents to the universe’s first-ever angel-baby. Maze fights to find her own connection, and Eve has to swallow the hard truth that the person she loves does not love her back in the same way.
It is an amazing, emotional, and ultimately satisfying journey for all – viewers included.
Burning Questions:
1.) Did I supersize my Season Four experience with the bonus eps from Season Three?
Answer: No. I love the bonus eps – truly – but I feel like the ten episodes of Season Four were absolutely perfect, as-is. Trying to fit the bonus ones in, IMO, would’ve messed up the flow, just like in Season Three when the showrunners had to shoehorn in several eps taped in Season Two. So, I let it be. I just figured, why screw up perfection?
2.) Did I binge-watch all ten eps in a highly-caffeinated ten-hour marathon?
Answer: LOL, no! I actually watched them way slower than I originally imagined I would. The whole season took, I think, maybe three months? Maybe a little longer. I really wanted to savor each ep, especially since in the beginning I had no idea we’d be getting more. I only watched a new episode when I was alert and able to fully enjoy the experience. I even took my own mid-season break after Episode 5, which turned out to be perfect timing, since Episode 6 takes place several months later. Starting with Ep 2, I quickly got into the habit of re-watching the previous episode right before viewing the next one, which made each night like snuggling in for a two-hour Lucifer movie! It was awesome!
My personal favorite episodes:
“Everything’s Okay” – Pretty much my dream opener following the Season Three cliffhanger. We get to see Chloe interacting with the REAL Lucifer for the first time. He finally gets to show off all his powers in front of her. I spent the whole episode reveling in the fact that she finally KNOWS. In shows where there is a secret between the main characters, I personally think two seasons is where the cut-off should be on that type of storyline. After that, the other person needs to find out, or else the whole show is just boxed in and unable to move forward. With this episode, we move into exciting new creative territory. And I was thrilled to be along for the ride.
“Someone’s Been Reading Dante’s Inferno” – Chloe finds out about the vulnerability thing at long last! Yay! The scene where she holds the axe to his chest…**shivers** so intense, so emotional, so good! Plus, she turns her back on Kinley at the end of this episode, choosing instead to side with her friend and partner. You go, Detective!
“Expire Erect” – Do I even need to say anything about this episode? An instant classic, and definitely the one I’ve re-watched the most. Fun, danger, excitement, craziness, and h/c, with a Chloe/Lucifer reconciliation at the end. Nuff said.
“Devil Is as Devil Does” – Super intense, especially the artfully staged scene in the bad guy’s office with Chloe and Eve on either side of Lucifer, the angel and devil sitting on his shoulders.
“Save Lucifer” – Lucifer is physically turning into the monster he views himself as. Chloe has to find a way to save him. What’s not to love? The moment when he admits he wants to forgive himself, thereby taking the first step toward self-love? A-mazeballs.
The ones that were hard for me to watch (And by this I just mean from an emotional standpoint. They were EXCELLENT episodes):
“Oh, Ye of Little Faith, Father” – Lucifer finds out about Chloe’s betrayal. She admits she’s not sure she can accept him as-is, Devil-face and all. Amazing scene, but also a heartbreaker for Deckerstar shippers such as little old me. We all wanted Chloe to do what Eve does in the next episode – kiss him right on his red, crusty face. But it’s okay that Chloe doesn’t get there right away. Makes it all the more satisfying when she finally reaches that place of acceptance.
“Orgy Pants to Work” – I feel bad for Lucifer, struggling so hard between the two incompatible sides of his life. Just as he decides to do the right thing and embrace his goodness, the bad guy gets away and murders a cop, pushing Lucifer hard in the opposite direction. Amazing yet painful ep. My only complaint would be when Chloe is walking past Lucifer after Rookie Joan’s death, there is no physical contact, not even a sympathetic look from Chloe, though the Devil is obviously devastated. I think she should’ve touched his hand or something. But that could just be the shipper in me talking.
“Super Bad Boyfriend” – Despite the many moments of humor, this was a definite heartbreaker of an episode. Lucifer dumping Eve was hard to watch. I mean, I wanted him to, it was the right thing for all involved, but still rough. I really like the Eve character – she reminds me a bit of the fake personality Candy put on in Season Two, but in Eve’s case it’s 100% real. She’s giddy and excited and naive and genuinely wants everyone to be happy and fulfilled. She just isn’t right for Lucifer, and that is a big, nasty-tasting pill to swallow. But that wasn’t even close to the most painful part of the episode: watching Amenadiel weep for his newfound young friend, watching the angel lose his faith in humanity. Not to mention the final scene of Lucifer admitting his own deep-seated self-hatred. After this brilliant episode, I needed a Band-Aid. Ouch!
More favorite moments:
-The way Chloe just shows up at the crime scene acting totally normal in the premiere – and the way Lucifer spends like five straight minutes just staring at her like WTF? ROFL!
-Maze’s dating montage. I think I died laughing.
-Amenadiel finding out he’ll be a father after spending a fruitless day searching for his purpose on Earth.
-Trixie and Maze make up. We needed this, and they did too.
-Trixie goes to the penthouse to check on Lucifer. 🙂
-Amenadiel comforts Dan, telling him Charlotte is in heaven. Also when Amenadiel talks about Chloe’s dad in the present tense, reminding her that her father is also in heaven. So beautiful. There were several scenes this season that made me believe DB Woodside might actually be an angel. When he cries after Caleb has died, it just rips right through your heart.
-Dan in Linda’s office, finally letting go of some of the anger and actually allowing himself to grieve.
-The bar fight, AKA Lucifer kicks ass in time to great music.
-Final scene between Chloe and Lucifer. Gorgeous and achingly sad. Glad it’s not the end after all!
-Ella on ecstasy AND cocaine. Basically the whole opening scene of “Expire Erect.” Gotta be the best in medias res opener ever.
-Maze serenading Eve. I’ll second Lucifer on this one: “I’ll be damned!”
-The devil-wing reveal. Did NOT see that coming. Love the way they cut between Chloe hearing the prophecy for the first time and Lucifer building up to showing the wings to Linda. Great stuff.
-Another great end-of-episode twist – the final moments of “Everything’s Okay,” when we learn that Chloe is up to something and, despite the sweet moment she just shared with Lucifer on his piano bench, everything is very much NOT okay.
-Linda and Amenadiel naming Charlie after Charlotte – could not be more perfect.
-Chloe sees those pretty white wings. Finally! Probably what we’ve all been waiting for the most, and it more than lived up to expectations.
Honestly, there are way too many funny, wonderful, and bittersweet moments to mention them all, but hopefully that gives you just a little taste of what I loved about Season Four! All in all, I felt it was an amazing gift to the fans, and I hope you enjoyed it every bit as much as I did!
Way back in December 2018, we took a look at perfectionism and how that might be crippling your writing and keeping you from reaching your goals. But that’s only one of many possible roadblocks that could be standing in the way of you finishing (or even starting!) your novel. Whatever your personal hangups are, trust me, you are not alone. There are probably thousands of other authors out there struggling with the exact same issues. I myself have been there more times than I care to recall. But no matter what the hurdle was – chaotic life circumstances, lack of time, a dry spell where the ideas just wouldn’t come – I always made it through to the other side, and you can, too!
In the spirit of making this the BEST WRITING YEAR EVER, I’ve compiled a short list of tried-and-true tips to help you find (or rediscover) your writing groove in 2020:
1.) Give Yourself a Gold Star (You earned it!)
I know this sounds silly and a bit juvenile, but in the past six months I’ve taken to putting a sticker on the calendar each time I get some writing done on a given day. Not only does this act give me a tangible reward each time I write, but it also helps me identify trends in my writing schedule that I would never have noticed otherwise. When I see that I’ve only written three days or less in the last week, I know I’m shoving writing to the side too often, and need to prioritize it more. On the flip side of that coin, nothing beats the feeling of looking back on a week with five or six stickers and knowing that I’m really getting the work done. (I haven’t managed a seven-sticker week yet, but it’s always something to strive for!)
Super-cute picture of my writing group! Photo courtesy of SK Mabry.
2.) Find a Writing Buddy (or Several!)
Just like with exercise routines or attempts to quit smoking, you greatly increase your chances of sticking to a writing schedule if you don’t have to write alone. Your writing partner could be someone you exchange chapters with online as a means of keeping on track, or someone you meet up with in person at Tim Hortons for a weekly writing session. Some great places to find writing partners: online CP match-ups, writing-related message boards, workshops, local writing groups. Don’t have a local writing group? Not a problem. Writers are solitary creatures by nature, but it’s easy enough to lure us out of our caves with the promise of food and being around others who share the same intense passion. Use your local library to put out a call for anyone interested in starting a writing group, and you may be surprised by how many people you connect with, and how invaluable those relationships become. To paraphrase the ghostly voice in Field of Dreams, “If you build it, they will come.”
What big eyes you have…to read more books with!
3.) R-E-A-D
The follow-up to the classic advice “Write every day” is, of course, “Read every day.” I know this sounds counter-productive, and it may have some of you rolling your eyes and thinking, Read every day? Are you serious? I can barely scrape enough time together to write a few measly words a week, and now you want to add more reading to my to-do list? Ugh! My short answer to your rather long-winded complaint: Yes. You should read more. Reading not only sharpens your skills as an author and editor, but it can actually make you write more because it’s sending constant sparks of inspiration down those writerly neurons. I’m never more excited to get clattering on that keyboard than when I’m reading something awesome!
This little bugger tries to stop me from writing – but I don’t let him!
4.) Be a Problem-Solver
You’re not writing. You want to be writing. So, what’s stopping you? Being able to identify your own personal writing roadblocks and find solutions to getting over those humps is key. My CP, Anna, has trouble writing at her house because there are too many distractions like laundry, cleaning, etc. Her solution: she takes her laptop to a coffee shop. I sometimes have difficulty writing because my cat, Del, is jealous of my computer (if you have a cat or dog, you know exactly what I’m talking about). He sits underneath the table where I’m trying to work and cries (loudly) for attention. My solution: I take my laptop to the living room and sit on the couch, where he can happily curl up beside me while I write. If you check your email too much instead of writing, consider working on an older machine not capable of going online (yeah, these devices still exist – my laptop, which proudly features Windows Millennium Edition, can attest to this) or even try writing in a notebook instead of on a computer. My point is, if you can figure out what’s holding you back, you can overcome it.
Self-forgiveness. So incredibly hard. So incredibly worth it.
5.) Forgive Yourself
This may be the most important tip of the bunch, and quite possibly the hardest to pull off. We all have bad writing days, weeks, even years. We all have times in our lives when there’s too much personal drama going on, or our work schedule is crazy, or we just plain can’t find the motivation to get words on the page. This is just part of being a writer. Frankly, it’s just part of life. If you beat yourself up every time you don’t write (or every time you try to write but all the words that come out seem to suck), then you are forgetting something very important: that was yesterday. Today is a new day, a fresh start, a clean slate. Forgive and forget any perceived failures. Wash away lingering doubts and let them swirl down the drain at your feet. Today will be better. Today, you will write.
Happy 2020, everybody! Get writing! (I know you can do it!)
Just wanted to share with y’all that I have a story in the new book Chicken Soup for the Soul: The Forgiveness Fix, which came out today. I had a lot of fun interacting with other contributors at the Twitter book release party this afternoon. As always, there are many amazing stories in this volume. Chicken Soup for the Soul is on a mission to change the world for the better, one story at a time, and it is such a special experience to be a part of that journey.
My story in this book focuses on the idea of trying to understand other people – even the ones who aren’t always kind to us. Because everyone has a reason for the way they behave, and if we take a minute to figure that reason out, or even just imagine what it might be, we become a lot more compassionate – and a lot less angry – in the process.
Like, that guy who tailgated you on the way to work? Or the lady who was screaming at the poor cashier in the grocery store over an expired $0.50 coupon? We have two basic options when we encounter these types of situations:
1.) We can end up fuming over tailgate guy and coupon lady all day, and then complain about them to our families when we get home that night, effectively spreading the misery around to even more people.
Or
2.) We can remember that the tailgater and the coupon screamer are human beings, just like we are. And that they probably have pretty serious problems in their lives which cause them to take their stress out on others. Maybe tailgate guy is in a rush to get home and take care of his terminally ill mother. Maybe coupon lady just lost her job, and every single cent is worth fighting for.
The point is, you never know. And if you ever found out, chances are, you’d be a lot more sympathetic towards that person. That’s what happened to me when I accidentally found out some things about an individual I considered to be my enemy in high school.
In life we encounter a lot of different people, some of them so angry, or bitter, or rude that it becomes easy to forget one simple fact: everyone has pain. Everyone has stress. Everyone has secret suffering they hide from the world because it would be too hard if people knew the truth. That goes for bullies, tailgaters, and grocery store screamers too.
I hope reading this book will take you on a journey that starts with cruelty, hurt, and misunderstandings, and ends with the healing power of forgiveness, and a reminder that everyone deserves – at the very least – the benefit of the doubt.
as the HERO flies... 