8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks #8

Today’s snippet comes from an early chapter in my forthcoming novel The Golden Fleece Affair. Here we see a little different side of Lady Dru. Having learned how to shoot a submachine gun when in the Soviet Union on her previous adventure, told in The Moscow Affair, she has occasion early on in her new adventure to use one again.

She, her partner, Karl, and Jake Branson, Mr Hall’s Man Friday, are being pursued by a mysterious black Hudson Hornet. Now, on a narrow and winding road, sandwiched between a semi and the Hornet, the big black mystery car tries to run them off the road. But Dru is ready. She cocks the submachine and sticks it out the window. Then the fun begins:

The Hudson hit us and kept accelerating. The jolt caused me to hit my head and see stars for a moment. Branson was struggling to keep us on the road. I saw a man lean out the passenger side of the Hornet. He had a gun. I pulled the trigger on the submachine gun.

The windscreen on the black sedan shattered and the wind blew the glass back into the car. The behemoth drifted over to the side of the road, up onto the angled cut through the earth, hit a boulder, flipped end over end, came back down onto the road, rolled over onto its roof, and burst into flames.

If you write or read Dieselpunk, join in the fun: 8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks.

[Originally published 22 February 2015 on www.cwhawes.com.]

8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks #7

Today’s snippet is from The Moscow Affair, my published Lady Dru novel and gives a little picture of Karl, who is Dru’s soulmate. Because he’s married, he is usually very reserved when in public with Dru; something she complains about, but is resigned to.

They are at Cardington waiting to board the airship Deutschland for Moscow and decide to eat lunch before boarding. At the restaurant, Dru orders stout and a Ploughman’s Lunch, while Karl orders ale and Bangers and Mash.

“What,” I said, “no elaborate French dish with Bordeaux?”

“Ja,” he replied, “Ich bin eine Hessisches heute.”

I gave him a smile. “And all the other times you eat, you’re from Paris?”

“Oui.”

He reached across the table and ran a finger over the back of my hand.

“I wish we were staying longer,” I said. “I’d love to hear the swing band and dance.”

If you write or read Dieselpunk, join in the fun: 8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks.


[Originally published 15 February 2015 on www.cwhawes.com]

8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks #2

Today’s snippet is from The Moscow Affair (published in November). In the novel the character Dunyasha is a Russian baroness, who has lived in America since a child to escape the Bolshevik Revolution. Now she is back in Russia trying to overthrow the Communists in the wake of Stalin’s death. Even though married to the Baron Bobrinsky, she and the Baron have a very open marriage and in fact don’t see much of each other. Dunyasha has fallen in love with Dru, but Dru doesn’t feel the same for Dunyasha. At this point in the novel, a young Czarist fighter, whom Dunyasha cares deeply about, died in a battle. He was a poet and the poem below is his last, which he had written for her but didn’t get the chance to give her:

Amongst the trees of this muddy spring
I sit foxhole deep and zeal fades away.
Again the rain so gently falls today
And to this gun, a babe to the breast, I cling.
We wait, listening for the word he brings
Which tells if we shall go or we shall stay.
And yet, it matters not. We just obey,
Day in, Day out, the orders of our King.
Foxhole deep in mud I sit thinking thoughts
Of her and all the choices wrong I made
Which put me here and left her, longing, there.
The things we do for love of king, I swear
We should think over again the things we were taught
And give our love to no one but a maid.

Tears were in my eyes by the time she finished the poem.

There are more snippets over on Dieselpunks.org. Check them out and if you are into dieselpunk, you might even want to join the fun!

[Originally published 11 January 2015 on www.cwhawes.com.]

8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks

Last Sunday, I participated for the first time in the 8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks.org. The exercise was fantastic. I met great people and got tremendous feedback. Check it out if you are into dieselpunk and maybe looking for a little feedback on your writing. Or just check it out for fun.  8 Sentence Sunday on Dieselpunks.org.

Characters have a way of appearing in a story. Especially, I think when one is a pantser. In my published novel, The Moscow Affair, such a character strolled onto the stage and stayed there. She is Avdotya, the Baroness Bobrinsky, known to everyone as Dunyasha. She and Lady Dru become best of friends.

Here is a snippet from my forthcoming Lady Dru novel. Dru has just said she is so very glad Dunyasha decided to join the expedition.

“I almost didn’t,” Dunyasha replied, “but this one --”, she hooked a thumb in Klara’s direction, "was most persuasive. Besides, I couldn’t live with myself if anything happened to you.”

“So you decided to join us just to play mother hen,” I said.

“Someone has to. You get yourself into the damnedest predicaments. Doesn’t she, Karl?”

Karl smiled and said, “That she does. Sir Galahad would have to put in overtime.”

[Originally posted 4 January 2015 on www.cwhawes.com.]