F. P. Dorchak

Speculative Fiction (New Weird) Author

JFK

The Man With No Name

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Well-Heeled Magic. (By Julien Bertrand (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons)
Well-Heeled Magic. (By Julien Bertrand (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons)
The Man With No Name.

Magic Man.

He who sports work boots and flannel.

Mows his lawn at night.

This is a character I’ve written about in two of my novels, Sleepwalkers and Psychic, and a short story, “Tail Gunner.” The Man With No Name (aka “MWNN”) is a character I had the idea for way back. He makes himself known through…well, interesting means, which I don’t exactly want to give away. I have at least one more novel planned for his appearance. It would be in line with the previous two mentioned books. And even then he won’t be finished with by any stretch. My intent was to have him pop up in various pieces of fiction—short stories and novels. A crossover character. I like that idea and it’s quite in keeping with what he does. When I wrote “Tail Gunner” it was cool how he seamlessly incorporated himself into the story (he was the carnival’s Ticket Taker). He got his second name, “Magic Man” when I’d been driving to work one morning and passed by this van with “Magic Man” on its side. It just fit.

Talking about “Tail Gunner”…it still affects me on a creepy level.

Shiver.

Chicken skin.

Every time I go to the gym and walk by that now-hurtful-decible-levels-screaming-music-for-Zumba/whatever room where I first met my tail gunner, I look to that overhead fan. Yesterday (as I originally wrote this post, May 14th) that fan was spinning in an empty room (it isn’t usually spinning in an empty room). My tail gunner must’ve known I was gonna write about this.

Anyway, back to the MWNN. He is perhaps the coolest character I’ve ever written. He gets around…knows stuff…is kinda Forrest Gumpish in a certain way (think “JFK”). And he hearkens back to some of my earliest writing (my fifth manuscript of the 12 in whole or in part in my novel-length repertoire; only five are/will-be published, counting my current WIP). Back to when I was hot and heavy into the dream of getting published. The “halcyon days,” if the term be used. I was literally in the middle of creating all these new manuscripts, one right after the other. I’d finish one…then uninterruptedly start the next one. It was a wildly creative part of my life and I loved it! Now, I’m going over previously created material and publishing the better of them. There is at least one other trunk-manuscript I’d love to rework and publish, my second manuscript, Village Idiot. We’ll see….

But, I digress.

As the MWNN is sometimes wont to do!

So, who is this man with no name?

Though his origins are detailed in Psychic, he’s very much a part of me…or I’m a part of him? He embodies a lot of how I like to think of my perfect self: wears flannel, jeans, and boots. Does what he wants, when he wants…by slightly funky means. Helps others out. Filters out the bullshit. Did I mention he wears flannel? Sometimes a trickster. Always has a sense of humor.

He explores places most people aren’t interested in going…or are afraid to.

He’s bad-ass enough without resorting to weaponry, martial arts, or whammy shots.

And I love that he mows his lawn and weeds his garden at night.

Drinks iced tea. Loves his iced tea.

He is…the best part of me.

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Pink Gloves

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Red. Black. Pink. (Walt Cisco, Dallas Morning News [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons)
Red. Black. Pink. (Walt Cisco, Dallas Morning News [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons)
“She turns.

Murder screams through her head.

It’s not her angst-ridden, desperate face that JFK and the public sees, but the calm, placid face of Jackie Kennedy.

Pleasantly smiling face.

Calmly twisting wave of a white-gloved hand. Hair…hat?

Pink.

Pink, pink, pink…outfit?

A kind of “coatdress”—pink…pink hat.

Red roses.

Red.

Pretty, red, thorny.

Pink.

She can still feel it, the threat—it wasn’t supposed to be this way—but it’s still there—she can feel it like an oncoming

(Blaaack…black, black….)

shockwave that has already happened.

Unstoppable.

Pink, red, thorny, black.

Please, Mister President, you have to get down!

Too late, it’s too late. Hot

(red)

splatters her pink face, pink body, pink life…not once, but twice…

Pink, pink, pink…

…husband bowls over…collapses into her…before a black

(black black black…)

terror drowns out her soul—”

—Psychic, Wailing Loon, 2014

The above comes from my newest novel, Psychic, about a hotline psychic who becomes embroiled in a government conspiracy that doesn’t involve JFK as you might think it would.

But, an interesting thing happened on the way to releasing this book.

I’d researched and researched my scenes, including this one. I knew that Jackie wore a pink coatdress and white gloves. Knew it. Yet, when I had my proofreader, Mandy, give me her notes, she’d pointed out that I’d written pink gloves.

Pink gloves?!

No way!

PINK?!

Very embarrassing.

But I went back in there, and sure enough, I’d written “pink…pink gloves.”

I don’t remember ever writing that, yet there it was. Anyone who knows anything about that day knows Jackie wore a pink dress with white gloves.

Writing mechanics and proofreading aside…this highlights something this novel trucks heavily in: alternate realities. It appears a very real alternate reality had (once again) made its way into my reality. Some alternate “Frank” (or, perhaps, Victor Black?) had weaseled into my world and changed that word to “pink.” I had no memory of that—at all—and it actually gave me cause for pause. That particular error just really made me think, gee, where the hell had that come from!

So, perhaps along the lines of my ring and grape episodes, this little morsel had seemingly come out of nowhere. Why? Of all the comments Mandy had given me, this one item really threw me for a loop….

Am I making a mountain out of a molehill?

Had I really made that error?

Had there really been one shot or two?

Guess we’ll never really know.

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Released: Psychic—The Ultimate Conspiracy Theory!

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© Psychic (F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design, coming mid-2014)
© Psychic (F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design, coming mid-2014)

A hotline psychic.

Ghost children.

A lost teenager.

JFK.

A man-in-black.

Remote viewers.

A Man With No Name.

The 1990s.

After 20 years, it’s finally making it out into the world!

Psychic.

I started with the idea and began taking notes and research and all that back in 1994. I started actually writing the book in earnest, in 2000. And now—in 2014—Psychic is finally released! My longest (published) work so far, at 328 pages. It has been a long, hard road, and (I must say) I’m quite happy with the result…looking forward to how it will be received!

Psychic is now available at both the  CreateSpace eStore and Amazon.com. It will be available at the following outlets in the following timeframes:

  • Amazon.com: 3-5 Business Days (already available!)
  • Amazon Europe: 3-5 Business Days
  • Expanded Distribution channels: 6-8 Weeks

I’ve talked about this a little before (I’m sure, in some other post besides this one, but can’t seem to find it…), but Psychic was not an “easy” book. No, not at all. Nearly all of my manuscript first drafts were “easy” in that I just wrote them out—without an outline—I’d just sit down, put my fingers to the keyboard, and out came the story. I like to say I “vomit out” first drafts (ask me about my “fish” story—I love to tell it!). First drafts have taken me about a month or less, but it would be in the next several years where I’d work and rework the heck out of those manuscripts. None of them was any trouble, though…it was just the necessary mechanics of putting in the time, the research, the effort.

Psychic was different.

To be honest, it was a slog. Even as I wrote the very first words, the first draft, it was like running through water…or (more like) a swamp. I can’t explain it. It was the first manuscript that took any real effort on my part. And the antagonist, Victor NMI Black…he actually scared me. Whether or not it was the actual character or the idea of such an evil man like him possibly existing out there (physically or nonphysically…). I remember taking a walk one day, in the brilliant Colorado daylight, thinking about this guy…how nasty and “evil” he was…and actually got nervous…felt…uneasy—even while chiding myself in broad daylight that he was just a frigging character in a novel I had created, and I had control over him….

But did I…really?

The very idea of this guy scared me. He was flat-out mean. It surprised me that feeling of momentary fear I felt during that walk. To the story, well, that will remain to be seen from its readers if I did the proper job of transferring that image into the novel,  but, to me, on a nonphysical, conceptual level, this character was extremely distasteful and scary.

It was like the idea of him was far too real.

Anyway, it’s not so much that I had “problems” with the story, the work, or anything “about” it, it’s just that it had a totally different energy about it. The novel involves messing around with the nonphysical in the physical. About fucking around with our sense of what’s real and what’s not. Our ability to utilize abilities that might well be considered out of our moral range. Not to mention such considerations, like, can facts change? If I really wanted to get all weird about it—all conspiracy theory on your asses—it was almost as if there really was some weird psychic conspiracy trying to keep this novel from coming out…actively and continually interdicting and meaconing me away from my efforts….

But I don’t really believe that.

Not now.

<checking outside my office…the rest of the house…all locks are locked—it is oh-dark-thirty right now….>

Sure, such considerations and stories make for great promotional copy, but the reality of it is that each book is different. Each book has its own energy, and given the nature of the story, what I experienced was and is totally in keeping with the nature of the story’s energy. The whole absolute weirdness of it all. In fact, while working on the formatting of the manuscript for upload, my formatter, Pam Headrick (of A Thirsty Mind), sent me a strange e-mail: “Wow, Frank, what did you do?” She mentioned that there were all kinds of “odd anchors” and “strange text placement,” to which I replied I’d forgotten how I’d actually had problems with the file months ago (after a system upgrade) and had to save the file in a slightly different format to get it to work. How the system kept hanging and saves took, like, 15 minutes!

Find your happy place…find your happy place….

Psychic is “an extension” of Sleepwalkers. I could call it a series, but I don’t know that that would be quite right. Sleepwalkers is quite a different book than Psychic. Sleepwalkers is a pleasant metaphysical road trip, funny, philosophical, even a bit Richard Bach-ish, while Psychic is a nasty trip on the wild side of psychic activity. More dense. I’d use the term “complicated” but am finding that term overused and trite. And the only character common to both novels is the Man With No Name. Granted, perhaps less has been made of calling a collection of books “a series,” but I just prefer to think of them as “related.” Maybe I’m just resistant to the whole “series thing,” given how trad publishing is glutting the market with them, I don’t know (and I’m really resistant to being told what to do—real or implied). So…

I’ll bill Psychic as the ultimate conspiracy theory, and leave it as that.

It’s an alternate reality not only to Sleepwalkers (and deals with the Man With No Name’s origins) but to our “known” reality. Deals with the dark side of life we may never really know about…what goes on in the shadows of our so-called truths….

It’s about obfuscation.

The evil men can do.

Perceptions.

Probabilities.

Metaphysics.

Have you ever felt a different version of you (the “you,” here and now, not in some other reincarnational existence) did something else? Behaved differently? Maybe even died earlier than the you reading this, now?

What do we really know about our reality? Our facts? How aware are we of what we think we know? How much of what we hear and read are true—or were true at some point?

Do we notice when things…change?

Or do we dismiss the seeming inconsistencies in our lives and immediately discount them, because they don’t make sense with everything else we think we know and see in our lives? What we think is a solid “fact”? Hey, I put my ring right there—where the hell is it?

Psychic says, don’t discount this stuff. Do not ignore. Pay attention. The devil is in the details. Do you absolutely remember something that is different from what everyone around you is remembering? I’m telling you, no, you may not be crazy.

Pay attention.

One might well ask: so what? What does it all mean and why should I care? Can we actually do anything about any of this? Can we effect any real change in a world that seems to be running amok?

The easy answer to that is that I’m an eternal optimist. I’ve plugged away at this novel for 14 years of my life, 20, in one way or the other. I always believe we can effect good and positive change in the world…and I believe once you’re made aware of “things,” made aware that, yes, facts really can change—that each and every one of us can change them—it opens up a new, exciting world for all of us. And…

What do you believe?

Will Psychic change the way you believe? How you perceive the world? Your life? That’s up to each reader. Life is all about beliefs.

What we believe drives how we behave.

In the end, Psychic is “just” a novel. It’s fiction. Victor Black…fictional. Yes, there are lots of facts in there, even a few facts from my own life. Weirdness, like the ring scene (yes, that really did happen, as did another similar experience, “The Grape“). And the “rototiller” and “Woomera” scenes. Facts, as you’ll see, aren’t always what they appear to be…if they ever were.

I do have a bunch of people to thank in getting Psychic released, and they’re all on my Acknowledgement page in the book, but I have to spotlight a couple of them: lots of thanks to Karen Duvall, of Duvall Design for the cover, to Pam Headrick, of A Thirsty Mind Book Design, for formatting the files…and to Joyce Combs and Mandy Pratt for copyediting and proofreading! With all the back and forth I’ve done, initially setting the novel in milieus, like 2005, then updating it for the likes of (man…the years, they pass by oh-so-quickly…) 2007, 2010, 2012, and even 2014…I finally settled upon 1994. Adding and removing all the details  for each of those years was time consuming, to say the least, and it was here that Mandy did a great job keeping me on track and proofing my work!

I am currently only doing a trade paperback book. I find that e-books really aren’t selling all that great (for me), so am putting off creating those for later. So, don’t despair, at some point in the future, I’ll do the e-book version.

Where do I go from here?

I do still have some unreleased work in the various dark places within which I keep things like these, and will be revisiting yet another one. This one will be #7 in my list. Yeah, the “unnamed” one. We’ll see how that one goes and whether or not it will get released. After that one, I may get back to work on the one I started in 2011 (#11), but that’s so far into the future and who knows what the “facts” will be by that time…where I will be in my probable and alternate realities…but I do have a ton of work to keep me busy for a number of years, and would even love to compile a collection of my short stories….

With any of my work, feel free to pass on any of the graphics from my blog posts, tweets, Pinterest, et cetera (though I ask that you render proper attribution). If you need a book or a speaker at your local library, book club, or writer’s group, either in person or via phone/Skype, please, feel free to contact me, at fpdorchak “at” fpdorchak dot com (or leave a comment in a blog post). Post reviews at your favorite websites (if you’d like a book for a book review, please contact me at the above email). Need to fill a blog post? Interview me! Direct me to a library and I’ll send them some free copies. If you come up with any ideas, again, contact me at the above e-mail address. If you’d like a signed copy, send it to the following address: F. P. Dorchak, P. O. Box 49393, Colorado Springs, CO 80949. Take my books to work or the gym and flaunt their covers! Tweet and blog about them! Any way you can all help out to get the word out is hugely appreciated! Mention me to radio shows. Local writer conferences. Reader groups. Send my social media links.

As always, thank you for all your support! I can’t thank you all enough! Publishing is a team effort, and I always manage to find a great team—but part of that team is also the readers! I love what I’m doing and all the support I’m getting from all of you!

And again…pay attention to the details of your lives…let nothing escape your notice, however “insignificant” those details may appear.

What does it all mean?

I think that’s up to each of us to figure out.

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Psychic Cover "Flat" (© F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design, 2014)
Psychic Cover “Flat” (© F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design, 2014)

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Psychic Cover Reveal!

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© Psychic (F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design, 2014)
© Psychic (F. P. Dorchak and Duvall Design, 2014)

Here is the front cover to my new novel, Psychic.

I decided to do the cover early, this time. I’m still polishing the manuscript, which, I think, still has a couple of months to go. But I’ve had such a hard time visualizing what I wanted for the cover since the very beginning of this manuscript’s creation…and, with the help of Karen Duvall, of Duvall Design, we came up with a great image, huh? I really love it.

Psychic is about a humble and angst-ridden hotline psychic who gets embroiled within a remote viewer government conspiracy, headed up by one shady, evil, Victor NMI Black. It’s an action/adventure that shows the origin of The Man With No Name (MWNN), a character from Sleepwalkers, and interlaces an alternate history storyline with John F. Kennedy. The story takes place in 1994, where JFK is 77 years old. The date is also significant, since the official remote viewer organization the government had used (in our present-day reality) was officially disbanded that year. I use a present day organization, The Monroe Institute and morph it into an alternate location, called the JFK Center, where my story’s remote viewer activities take place. The story is heavy on probabilities…the different roads that actions and people can take…or not. I play around with time…time travel…paradoxes…how scary, nefarious people can come into other people’s lives and simply take them over. How much of what you read in the news is real…or fashioned. Can “facts”…change? This is an intricate story…a gritty story (much grittier than Sleepwalkers…but it is part of the Sleepwalkers “universe”; I expect at least one more novel to come out of this universe)…and gets into the “backgrounds” of our lives and how things may—or may not—come into being in our everyday lives, however nasty those things may be….

Check out my Psychic Pinterest board for images related to this novel!

Many, many thanks go to my “cover girl,” Karen Duvall, of Duvall Design. And I hope you’ll all join me when Psychic is unleashed upon the world, and enjoy what I’m billing as the ultimate conspiracy!

Feel free to freely use the cover graphic in any (legal and tasteful) ways possible, just properly attribute ownership!

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The Way Forward

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Graham Chapman: I think all righthtinking people in this country are sick and tired of being told that ordinary, decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired.

All: Yes, yes…

Graham Chapman: I’m certainly not! And I’m sick and tired of being told that I am.

Not Sure?: Mrs. Havoc-Jones.

Mrs. Havoc-Jones: Well, I meet a lot of people and I’m convinced that the vast majority of wrongthinking people are right.

From Monty Python, “Right-Thinking People,” at  Monty Python.net

Apologies for the lack of posts, but, wow, 2013 had been a rough year!

For one thing I had several physical issues rear their wonderful heads, some corrected, some “the new normal,” and a couple “heady” issues also joined the party, not the least of which was parting ways with my agent of five years.

But, I’ve also had some really cool stuff happen!

Like going Indie with my work and releasing two novels, The Uninvited and ERO. I also had a couple radio spots, one Internet, one traditional/local, and was interviewed on a podcast. There was and is lots of work involved in not only bringing these two works out into the public, but also over the cumulative 12 years of working, reworking, reworking, and agenting them. There are so many opinions and points of view and you-name-it out there on what one should or shouldn’t do, it makes your head spin, your stomach turn. I realized going into this that all I can do is all I can do. There is no longer (if there ever really was) one way to publish anymore. But, even now with all the Indie options, there are still all the pundits and “right-thinking people” ranting and raving about the right way to this and that. Sure, there’s some really good information out there, but what it comes down to (IMHO) is you could staple your working manuscript pages together and pass it around (replete with whatever typos and grammar issues remain unchecked), and if it strikes a chord in everyone’s soul, hits the Big News of the Day, it will become an unimaginable hit. There just is no one, right way, anymore. But, the Internet and social media gives everyone’s voice an outlet (yeah, even mine). Many will never strike the gold vein, so the rest of us must do certain things to bring our work to the people. Make it the best possible read. And most appear to imply you must do ALL of them. NOW.

Exhausting.

Me? I feel you just need to do what you can with the resources you have. Yes, it costs money and time, and there are even those out there who chide that if you can’t afford going Indie, then don’t. Defining “afford” can be time or resources, so there is some element of truth there, but even a small circle of influence on your part might be all you’re looking for, so, if so, do it. Not everyone wants to be BIG.

I’m still working on my next release, Psychic, but it’s been like slogging through a swamp. It’s like I’m a totally different person each time I go through the thing: How the hell didn’t I see that before?! Yes, I’ve had a freelancer go through it before, but, still…I’m changing turns of phrase, word choices, you name it. I’ve also had to change the structure some, since it involves an alternate history with JFK (yes, the JFK) still walking the Earth, and he’d now be late into his 90s, so I had to back up the story a few years into the 1990s. It looks more like a second draft than a 12-years-later draft #356.7, but, it’s getting there.  It was tough creating the first draft, back in 2000, and it’s been a hard fight ever since. Some books are just like that, but it’s all about putting out the best product. Psychic is book two in a proposed three-book series that started with Sleepwalkers. I’m hoping to bring Psychic out sometime this year….

And…I still am looking into creating a newsletter, so, if interested, sign up at the “Newsletter” to the upper right on this page. Thanks!

So, here it is, 2014. Wishing everyone out there the very best in the coming year! Let’s all make the world a little better!

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11/22/63 – Not What You Think!

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11/22/63
11/22/63 (Photo credit: cdrummbks)

Stephen King is, hands down, my favorite author, and this Force of Writing proves his power. It brought tears to my eyes.

I’m not going to give anything away, but it’s not exactly about what you may think it’s about. And that is one of the reasons why I love most of his work (not his angry, mean stuff, like Full Dark, No Stars, which I chose not to finish…and it was a hard decision…)–specifically, his nonfiction and supernatural work. For the most part, whatever he writes about, he makes you care about it, both the characters and the story. This story (yes, it’s long…but is it, really?–and the research!) simply draws you in. Makes you wonder just where the hell he’s going with it. Yellow card? Black card? Green card?  WTF?! He weaves and creates entire lives in ways few authors do–or are allowed to, in today’s publishing world. It’s simply magic. Could he have cut a couple hundred pages?  Perhaps…but then 11/22/63 wouldn’t be the incredible piece of storytelling it is. It actually seems to me that the length of the story itself is directly analogous to its effect on the reader. Getting lost in another world…another’s LIFE.  And how can anyone say that the life of a loved one is ever too long?

Because when it’s over…you’ll miss it.