About Jennifer's Sites
Corpus Delicious (A Dystopian Novel-in-progress)
Lilithe “Lily” Sylvia D'Adame, a Quality Control
Engineer at a factory that manufactures a liquid nutrient for an entire
country, goes into hiding with her lover Adam after they realize she can no
longer maintain a legally acceptable weight, thus risking imprisonment or even
execution.
In Corpus Luminous, solid food is illegal – in fact,
most people have never even heard of it, let alone experienced it – and fat is
taboo. “A-hh,” the national nutrient, is strictly controlled and carefully
doled out to maintain a slim citizenry. Public consumption of A-hh is
considered a perversion; everyone sips their A-hh alone, hidden away in
Nutrition Stations – even privately, taking in sustenance is viewed as
shameful, albeit necessary.
While underground, Lily and Adam, a former judge for
The Board of Acceptable Body Weight, hear rumors about Corpus Delicious, a
country that embraces, with gusto, fat and public eating of exotic substances.
The two lovers go in search of this fascinating land
and discover a delicious new world.
Fat Woman Walking (A Body Memoir-in progress)
In Fat Woman Walking, the writer explores her relationship with her aging body, her struggles to lose and keep weight off, her skewed body image, societal concerns about prejudice against people of size, and racism.
A short excerpt titled “In Memoriam (A Nightmare).”
I mourn my thin body
even before it becomes fat again.
Even as my hipbones jut
out and my knees knock together, I think about the body that could have been,
although it still is.
Because, deep down, I
know where the scale is headed.
The old too-full gut
returns, stomach a small, rounded ball, jutting out.
The acid reflux jerking
me out of my sleep.
The daily walk becoming
a slipshod and haphazard occurrence, the lack of energy and puffy eyes the
re-new normal.
The daily naps on the
sofa in front of the TV, the late-night prowl in front of the refrigerator and
pantry, the junk food runs.
Ennui and heaviness.
The groaning jeans or
shorts.
Yes, all too familiar.
How do I break this
cycle of yo-yoing?
Like This Page (Random blog posts)
Everyone likes to be liked, right? Well, the writer hopes that readers will also like this page.
Get it?
Never mind… Onward…
In a way, Fat Woman Walking emerged from this
site – in fact, there are a lot of posts on LTP having to do with weight
issues. Some of these posts have been moved over to FWW, although many
remain on Like This Page.
You know, procrastination.
But, mostly, this site is eclectic and offers no common
theme, other than the random musings of the writer, for example…,
In 2014, the writer was going through some old papers
and found an assignment she had written in 1984 for a Death and Dying class,
taught by Joy Ufema:
her own eulogy, titled, “I Died on December 5, 1984, at 8:30 p.m. – What If?”
In 2014 that eulogy seemed a bit dated – a lot had
happened in 30 years – so she updated it by adding another eulogy to herself: “I Came, I Saw, I Kicked A$$ – and I Didn’t Die on December 5, 1984, at 8:30 p.m.”(How My Life Has Played Out Since My Eulogy...) [Note: These Advanced Obituaries have been moved here, to Why I Write.]
Luna Drive (A novel-in-progress)
You will never look at the moon quite in the same way.
Many, many years ago, Jennifer wrote a novel and
titled it Stratum (Seriously).
It was supposed to be a “literary novel,” populated by
complex characters, filled with angst, unhappiness, family secrets.
All were deeply flawed and terribly complicated.
Unfortunately, they were also humorless and somewhat
unrealistic.
That didn’t stop the writer from submitting excerpts
of Stratum to Goddard College as part of her application for the Master
of Fine Arts (MFA) program.
In late 1991, despite her work’s major flaws, she was
accepted into the program (graduating in 1994).
Armed with a hard copy and floppy disk (no World Wide
Web back in those days) of her flawed novel, she arrived for her first day as a
new MFA student, ready to “fix” her manuscript.
“Um, no,” said her advisor. “I suggest you start a new
work from scratch.”
Okay, she got the implicit message: the manuscript
sucked.
No way, no how could this mess ever be
considered a “literary” work, no matter how much surgery was done on it.
She was crushed; back in those days, she actually
cared what the literary establishment thought (current attitude: “Pound sand”),
so she soldiered on and wrote a new deeply flawed novel.
She filed Stratum away – both hard copy and
floppy disk – where the book has languished ever since, and she pretty much
forgot about it.
Fast forward to the future. The internet now existed,
and Jennifer was now perusing Godaddy’s domain name auction site, looking for
nothing in particular, except for high-paying keyword domains for
bargain-basement prices, when she saw it: LunaDrive.com.
The term hit her right between the eyes. From a
commercial standpoint, it’s a crap name with zilch monetary value, but she
wanted it anyway.
In the domain name biz, buying loads of crap names
will send one to poorhouse fast, a fact that has taken her years to learn
(still learning, but getting better), but she wanted this name – she just
didn’t know why.
Side note: she has sold her fair share of crap domains.
Just saying.
She stalked the domain for days:
To bid or not to bid.
Surprise, surprise: in the last hour of the auction,
no bids had been placed on it. She was about to let the name go into the BIN (Buy
It Now) category, when, suddenly, she knew why this domain was important.
She placed her bid.
No surprise: she won Lunadrive.com.
Luna Drive would be the new title of Stratum. Not only does the
book have a shiny new title, but it will also be re-purposed, already started
with Chapter 1 (maybe – she’s not ruling out switching chapters around) Current
opening chapter: Bird
Watcher of Luna Drive.
She had envisioned this novel as an “important”
literary novel, when, in fact, it has pot boiler snark written all over it,
full of Flannery O’Connor-esque
characters, but not literary at all and a lot more fun.
More like Monk or Desperate Housewives, perhaps a combination of these wacky shows (Jennifer especially loves Monk...).
Yeah, Monk meets Desperate Housewife...
Precious.
Okay, okay, Jennifer finds Flannery O’Connor’s work,
albeit literary, quite delicious, but this writer is too lazy to go back
and plant all kinds of “symbols” into what will likely be a minor work of
fiction.
No longer will she worry (or care) about so-called “literary
merit” – she’s just going to have fun and write what she wants to write
and read, and potential readers can take, or not take, what they want from it.
When Jennifer taught Creative Writing, she always reminded
her students to keep their audience in mind.
For kowtowing to the literary establishment, that may
be true.
But Jennifer has come full circle: Now she would say,
The hell with it! Write what you want! If
it doesn’t work out, so what! Put it away, get it out again years later,
re-envision and re-write. If it still doesn’t work out, so what again!
Caveat: if you’re writing for a class, you
may have to care what your teacher/professor thinks (You know, those pesky
grades), but, in the end, it’s your work, and once you collect that grade, your
ex-mentor can, well, pound sand. Go ahead, prove her wrong about your work!
Become rich and famous with that 1,000-page dragon-slaying or vampire saga!
There will be no dragons or vampires in Luna Drive – although
Jennifer won’t rule out revising an existing character (Lizzie) who may think
she’s a vampire and another character (Irene) who capitalizes on Lizzie’s blood
lust.
Oh, yeah, that could work...anything involving the
moon opens up a lot of vampiric possibilities.
For better or worse, she may post more chapters on LunaDrive.com
and not worry about its worthiness or care what the literary establishment
may think –
She’s just going to have fun!
So there!
Memoir Madness: Driven to Involuntary Commitment
This site offers select excerpts from Jennifer’s memoir Memoir Madness. The complete version is available on Amazon.
Blurb:
Christmas Eve, 1968, from lunar orbit,
Apollo 8 astronauts deliver their Christmas message, a passage from Genesis.
On earth, 18-year-old
Jennifer Semple embarks on her own odyssey, happening on the steamy streets of
Hollywood, where heads, hippies, drug dealers, freaks, strippers, groupies,
college students, Jesus Freaks, counterculture gurus, drag queens, rock stars
and wannabe rocksters, Svengalis, and con artists converge during one of the
most volatile periods in history.
After Jennifer’s boyfriend
abandons her and cops threaten incarceration, her legal guardians convince the girl
to return to Iowa, to “get her head on straight.”
Instead, Jennifer is
committed to a mental institution in Cherokee, Iowa, where she is introduced to
a world of questionable psychiatric treatments, doctors, psychologists, and
social workers.
While incarcerated, she
corresponds with a new boyfriend and interacts with other patients: a
psychopathic predator; a 17-year-old unwed mother; a teen cutter obsessed with
rats; a young married mother enthralled with “10 ways of suicide”; and a mentally
challenged man, a 25-year resident, among others.
Finally released, she
flees Iowa, escaping to Pennsylvania.
Years later, Jennifer,
seeking another kind of release, has returned to Cherokee, this time
voluntarily and as a visitor.
“I was driven to Cherokee,”
the memoirist says, referring to a northwest Iowa regionalism synonymous with
being committed. “Writing this memoir has driven Cherokee from me.”
Strong Liquor (Short Stories, Essays, Poems)
Jennifer envisions an anthology that focuses on the effects of alcoholism on family, work, and social life.
She was drawn to the stunning title, but the website needs
serious technical work and filling out of content.
Suddenlys (Flash Fiction and Essays)
Suddenlys.com publishes flash fiction and essays, 1-1,500 words (give or take).
Jennifer discovered “Flogging the Dolphin” in her spam email and decided to publish it as a “Found Story.”
She did not bother asking for permission because she
doubts very much if a scammer will bother coming after her for copyright infringement.
But she did offer Bramble Degan Katherinevbt a
publishing credit, quite possibly his/her first ever!
On a more serious note, a shaky Jennifer wrote “Nocturnal Visitor,” an essay about a Latino man who pounded on her door at 3:00 a.m.,
calling into question her self-avowed liberalism when she refused to open her
door to him.
Jennifer would consider publishing flash fiction and
essays by others. See Guidelines for Submitting to Suddenlys.com
The Fat Lady Sings (A Big, Fat
Novel)
A family reunion – need we say more?
But we will:
The Invitation:
WHO: The Mallorys, Bacons,
O’Flahertys, etc.
WHO: Danny O’Flaherty!
WHAT: Family Reunion.
WHAT: Command performance. Be
there.
WHEN: June 20, 1990, from 10:30
a.m. to ????
WHEN: From the beginning of
your existence to ????
WHERE: The Lake.
WHERE: Wherever you go,
wherever you live.
COST: A favorite dish, plus
$25.00 per couple, $7.50 per child, to help defray the cost of renting The
Northwest Quadrant of the Winnehaha Pavilion.
COST: More than you’ll EVER be
able to afford.
RSVP: Sally Millhouse, (712)
555-1234
RSVP: Or ELSE!
SPECIAL NOTE: We’ll be sitting
for family portraits!
WHY: We want to dig out the
secret spaces in your memory, we will make you face your past.
Typed on the “Directions” sheet:
THE REASON FOR THIS GATHERING IS BECAUSE THE LAST
FAMILY REUNION WAS BACK IN 1972 WHEN PAPPA MALLORY, ROSIE, AND AUNTIE WERE
STILL ALIVE. LET’S GET TOGETHER & SHARE MEMORIES!! PLEASE CALL OR RETURN
THE ENCLOSED R.S.V.P. AND INCLUDE AUTOBIOGRAPHIES FOR THE FAMILY HISTORY. 250
wds. ADULTS, 100 wds. KIDS.
Not to be missed: the entire family, including the
dead, will be there.
Jennifer has been working on this Tour de Force since
forever.
This version is very rough (and incomplete), but Jennifer
is currently working on revising this crazy family drama and adding some new angles.
Will the new and improved version be successful?
Stay tuned.
Side note: this fat novel kind of galloped away from
her, so in the early aughts she compromised and carved out a collection of
short stories: Are You Ever Going to be Thin (and other stories) – available on Amazon.
About The Querist:
The Querist presents George
Berkeley’s 18th century queries, one query at a time.
This site also offers
queries from our own 21st century.
These queries raise
questions, big and small, from the past and the present.
Although most of the
queries are topical and unique to their times, perhaps we can understand how
history tends to repeat itself.
Although the text here
simply raises questions, answers may be found in the query itself and, perhaps,
within the querist.
Yeah. This is an oddball site.
Jennifer can’t explain how she fell down this rabbit hole.
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