The Independent Writer

BUSINESS OR MARKETING PLAN WRITING: $135/hr

BUSINESS WRITING OR ARTICLES: $65/hr

EDITING (Line editing or proofing):

5 cents per word (or $300 for a 60,000 word manuscript)

GHOSTWRITING and CONTENT EDITING: $65/hr

MANUSCRIPT EVALUATION: $100

RESEARCH and FACT CHECKING: $55/hr

REWRITING: $55/hr

SPEECHES: $75/hr

Contact me at: http://www.claytonbye.com/modules.php?name=Contact

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Richard Bartholomew's little brother sat on the bottom stair and studied the line that bisected the rock-walled basement.

"What's the speed of dark?" he asked.

Trying to ignore the sudden knot of pain in his stomach, Richard answered. "Doesn't have a speed, Tim," he said. "Darkness is just the absence of light."

Shadows, almost life-like in their furtive movement, crawled a few more inches away from the walls. Richard pretended not to see them.

"Light moves fast?" Tim asked.

"Nothing's faster," Richard said.

Small windows atop the western wall glowed with that special golden light which always seems to be reserved for crisp, autumn evenings. These tiny glass squares of life cast beams of airy gold into the spreading gloom. Billowing ribbons of dust danced along the slender rays, entertaining the watching boys, distracting them until the darkness closed in, until the colour of the light changed and took on the hue of blood.

Suddenly, Richard heard his mother's voice within his head. "I've had enough. One of you has to go."

She'd stood as a rock in the middle of the hall, blocking the way out to the world. Had taken her purse up before speaking, dug out the keys to the old Motor Cart. Then, casually, as if instructing him to do something as mundane as washing the breakfast dishes, she'd made her wishes clear.

"You decide," she'd said. "But I want somebody gone by dark."

Mother had locked them down-as she always did when going out. The rumble of the engine as she eased down their gravelled drive reminded Richard of distant thunder. A cold shiver walked up and down his spine. Bile rose in his throat.

Richard wiped the memory from his mind and joined his brother on the steps. He could feel the younger boy tremble. The cool, dry basement air was sour with the scent of Tim's fear. A centipede scurried across the floor, its serpentine movements and glossy red skin the perfect harbingers of this night.

"How do we get out of this?" Richard asked himself.

Action was required. Becky had proved that. Nobody gets to refuse mother. Not even once.

Tim had Becky's eyes. Richard had been able to keep her alive in his mind because Tim had her eyes. Grey. With striations of blue and yellow.

"Wanna try busting a window, Tim?" he asked.

Tim looked up at Richard with his copies of their sister's long-dead orbs and said, "Can't bust those rocks. So what good is it gonna do?"

"We can't just sit here and wait for it, Tim. She don't take no for an answer. We gotta get out."

"Window's too small," Tim said. "Ain't no way to change that."

Both boys allowed their gaze to follow the lines of the walls. The basement had nothing in it but the stairs on which they sat, four bare rock walls, a hardened earth floor and a couple of rows of six-inch windows. They'd already tried to force the door at the top of the stairs. Hadn't managed it. Not even when there had been three of them.

"Can you make me not afraid, Richard? Can you make it so I don't have to go into the dark?

Richard started crying.

"Watch the windows, Timmy," he said. "Let the sun fall on your face."

Tim got up and walked over to one of the diminishing beams of light. He turned toward the window from which the beam originated, then stepped into the path of the reddening light.

"Richard!" he exclaimed. "It's still warm.

The older boy didn't have the heart to tell Tim that the warmth would fade, that there was no way to escape the darkness. Their problem wasn't the speed with which darkness travelled, he thought, but one involving the very nature of darkness.

Richard hung his head, tears darkening the soil below. He didn't know how to explain that the dark was already here. It had always been here.

Copyright © 2007 Clayton Clifford Bye

The Janissary Tree
By Jason Goodwin
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
May, 2006
ISBN-13: 978-0-374-17860-4
ISBN-10: 0-374-17860-7
Mystery

Istanbul in the year of 1836. This mystical city, known in earlier times as Byzantium, Constantinople, even the second Rome, is brewing a revolution. You can taste it in the air. The Sultan, an aging man fond of drink and certain western ideologies, is about to issue an edict that will force the modern world upon his people. A valued collection of Napoleonic jewels has been stolen from the palace. In seemingly unrelated incidents, a young woman about to become a full member of the harem and an officer, one of four missing members of the New Guard, are found murdered. Someone has left a disturbing poem on the Janissary Tree-that infamous landmark the vanquished Old Guard once hung their enemies upon. And Russia, anticipating more turmoil, is preparing to advance on the city.

The valide, the Sultan's mother, who has thrived in the violent world of Ottoman politics, suspects a coup is underway. Her son's seraskier, the head of the armed forces, is only concerned with putting on a good review the day of the edict, with showing people that the backbone of the empire is unbreakable. The Sultan? He's keeping his opinions to himself but has sent for a man named Yashim Togalu.

Yashim is called the lala, the guardian. This is a title of respect given to men who have been charged with the responsibility of caring for families and households of rich and powerful people. These men are trusted with women and children because they are all-without exception-eunuchs, men who have been castrated at an early age.

We are told that an ordinary lala is something between a butler and a housekeeper, a nanny and the head of security. But Yashim is anything but ordinary. He's unattached, a free lance. Yet he moves through streets and palace hallways with equal and anonymous ease. An accomplished linguist, a man who knows how to gather information with quiet efficiency, and someone who truly understands the power structure of the world he inhabits, this unusual eunuch is the perfect spy.

Immerse yourself in Jason Goodwin's The Janissary Tree as he peels back the skin of the Ottoman onion to give us an exquisite taste of the complicated soup it was. Already an acclaimed historical author, Goodwin brings the 19th-century Turkish Empire alive in a most visceral way. When Yashim prepares stuffed mussels, I'm there. Descriptive visits to the Janissary Tree, the market district, the Soup Maker's Guild and various other destinations make both the city and the Janissaries seem so real I begin to imagine these elite soldiers are waiting around every fascinating corner. And the people! Here is a book with a cast of characters so intriguing the last page is turned with sadness.

Jason Goodwin has written a great novel. In particular, Yashim the Eunuch helped me to experience a culture so intimately I was at once appalled, enticed and intrigued. He also managed to forever change my perception of the Turks.

I want more.

Copyright © Clayton Bye, 2006

By Tim Fleming
Eloquent Books, 2008
240 pp., $29.95, Hardcover
ISBN: 978-1-606-93401-2
Historical Fiction

Timothy Fleming claims to have spent a lifetime researching the CIA's impact on post-World War II America. His blog, Left of the Looking Glass seems to back up that statement. But it's his book, MURDER OF AN AMERICAN NAZI, that makes me believe it's true.

Reading like a documentary or a piece of non-fiction, Fleming's historical novel reveals an America that we've all seen hints of but never want to believe could exist. Here is a story full of real world people, events and CIA operations anyone can discover on the net-if they have the right names, places and code names, all of which Fleming gives us. It's a story about an American shadow government made up of greedy conglomerates, CIA enforcers and Nazi recruits.

Woven throughout the eerie tale is the life of one Marie Hannah Kanermann. Born in Dachau (a German concentration camp) as it is liberated by the Allies and raised in the U.S. by the friend of her dead mother, Marie grows up fighting the secret government with words and actions.

Both her story and that of America after World War II unfold through the words of a retired cop, Don Hayes, as he tells one of his friends about the murder that never was: the death of ex-Nazi and CIA operative Walter Dornberger.

Impeccably written, Timothy Fleming's novel feels just too real to be fiction. Perhaps it's the sparseness of dialogue. Maybe it's the fact most of the people mentioned in the book really existed. Could be that I've seen one too many American wars started for falsely stated reasons. All I can tell you is that if you can wade through the complex strings of accusations laid out in the first half of the book, you won't be able to put it down through the second half.

MURDER OF AN AMERICAN NAZI is a book meant to make you think. My opinion is it will also keep you from sleeping.

Hell of a job, Mr. Fleming.

Copyright © 2009 by Clayton Bye

The Legend of Juggin Joe
By Joseph Yakel
ISBN: 1-4116-2588-9
Printed in the USA, www.lulu.com, 2005
Humour/Romance/Fiction

The copyright page of The Legend of Juggin Joe had me hooked before I took in a word of Joseph Yakel's marvelous story... "While some ah the general geographic locations in this here legendary tale may be fer real, the events an' characters contained within are a work ah fiction, the product ah the author's vivid 'magination. Any similarities betwixt these here events an' characters bearin' tah real events er other folks, either livin' now, er passed tah the Great Beyond, may be knee slappin' hilarious, but don't git'cher shorts in a bind, cuz they's jes' purely coincidental, nonetheless."

Am I going to reveal anything else about The Legend of Juggin Joe? Not a thing that could spoil the many surprises awaiting you. What I can do, though, is honour Joseph's Yakel's wonderful accomplishment with a few comments given in the country dialect I learned as a child:

I ain't heard nor read ah backwoods story such as this'un since I was ah knee-biter sittin' on ah stump in muh Gramp's wood shop. One 'o muh uncles had dug ah bottle o' whiskey out from unner the ole school bell thet was plum in the middle of ah shavin's pile. Ever'body knowed the preacher wouldn't be havin' none. Me neither (legal whiskey, white lightnin' an' other wonnerful surprises thet show up in real whiskey jugs were still some ways down the road for me). Anyway, Gramp's took us on ah trip thru the Great Depression with ah voice thet made us shiver an' laugh an' cry. Then, as the whiskey run low and Gramp's spirit rose high, he finished up by recitin' ah perfect stream o' poems like The Cremation o' Sam McGee an' The Shootin' o' Dan Magrew an' My Madonna.

The great leveler come fer Gramp's ah few years back, but muh heart still about busts when I think o' the stories what rolled off his tongue like cold spring water after ah day in the fields. Gramp's taught me to play the mouth organ an' carve the wood an' tell stories an' be a man.

Joseph Yakel reminds me o' Gramp's. He writes like a down-homer, an' his form o' mountain speakin' pulled me into his world faster'n any team o' horses or tractors I ever rode coulda got down to the first curve o' Gramp's driveway. An' as I spent hours feeling as if'n I was back in muh own childhood, this story teller done reached me deep.

Be ya highlander, flatlander, or city dweller what's caught between, ya gotta get yerself ah copy o' this book thet God-instilled talent or somethin' more drinkable musta inspired.

I done taken my hat off to ya Mr. Yakel

copyright © 2006 Clayton Clifford Bye

Gilded Folly
By N.D. Hansen-Hill
Cerridwen Press, 2005
ISBN: 1-4199-0409-4, ebook
Science Fiction & Fantasy

Jeremy, Fitz, Phil, and Dacey: an artist, a doctor and two cops who find out in rather terrifying ways that a couple of friends they've known for ten years are aliens. These are not just your everyday television variety of alien. Rom and Wick are likeable, nanobot maintained, brainwashed, drug-triggered warriors with incredible powers and a mission of which they're not aware. If you want some idea as to how messed up these two are, then think in terms of the modern remake of The Manchurian Candidate.

Rom is on earth to kill a third alien named Glys, a world-hopping female who's living in exile. He doesn't know this. The only time hints of his true nature come out is during the strange sleepwalking episodes he has on a regular basis.

Wick is more aware of his assignment, and in an attempt to keep his enemy close, he long ago made the choice to befriend Rom. But a valiant struggle against his own programming has left Wick determined not only to prevent Rom from becoming a murderer but to save him from the certain death that will come as he completes his assignment. This is not a small problem.

Glys is aware that both assassin and protector exist, but she has managed to stay clear of both. And while her memories of their former world appear to be more intact than the those of Wick and Rom, ten years on earth have also affected Glys deeply.

When Rom is suddenly activated, the four humans and the three aliens find themselves in a situation none of them could ever have envisioned. Not only will the character of each be tested, so will the bond each member of the group has with the others.

Gilded Folly is a complicated study of friendship. I say complicated because N.D. Hansen-Hill performs this study in the midst of a well-written, fast-moving Sci-Fi/Fantasy novel. Putting us inside the heads of all seven characters, the author doles out information through their experiences and realizations in such perfect snippets that you're not just kept in suspense, you want to tear through the pages to find out what the hell is going on. Strangely (tongue in cheek, here), you also get to learn a lot about each character

I confess to becoming a bit weary of the constant switching of focus. This was early in the book, though, and my concern didn't last. When I realized the real story wasn't the one I expected, that this was a novel about people trying to come to terms with who they were (as individuals and as friends) while also dealing with one of the most bizarre situations you'll come across in literature-let's just say it made my day.

Hansen-Hill has enough talent and skill she could have opted to write a terrific but more traditional novel. That she was gutsy enough to write a book about relationships within the framework of an already unique story? Right on!

As an independent author who tries to read as many self-published or micro-published authors as I can, I've run into books that make me shake my head. THIS IS NOT ONE OF THEM.

I encourage you to buy a copy of Gilded Folly and take the time to really read it.

Copyright © 2006 Clayton Bye