So, I did it! I just posted the final edited chapters of my Trouble Texas Style series. All four books are now update-to-date and even time/date stamped for those who want to read chronologically. And I don’t know about ya’ll but I am pretty chuffed with the crisp, clean, new look of this website.
Of course, I only managed to get one new chapter up this week. But I am halfway through the next one. Another Will & Mercy one…
Then Jaycee and Rex have a visit to Houston. Have any of ya’ll figured out that I have done it again? Guess who James Travis Tyler is related to…
And just wait until you meet Reb’s mother, Celestine Rainbow Moonmother. And two of her husbands.
Things are a bit quiet right now on Chad’s ranch. Well, as quiet as they get with a fourteen-year-old. Except, of course, after Grace goes to bed and Mommy sneaks into daddy’s room…
By the end of this week, everyone should be moved into place. Then for a few chapters, things will ‘calm down’ and they will focus on relationship building. The eye in that center of the storm.
Before the shit hits the fan…AGAIN.
On practical matters, I will be updating the Books page this week to look cleaner as the others.
And if you jumped into Trouble Texas Style without realizing it, there is a prequel that centered on Rex and Jaycee. On Lit, it was called Night Walker’s Woman. But halfway through I discovered that the term more accurate to Native American culture was skinwalker. So, I need to change that title. I will be editing that and posting it to the Books page, which is where my finished works can be found.
I have four other books that have recently been edited that I will also post there this week. But I’ll tell ya’ll more about them as I post them.
A final word about how very much I appreciate ya’ll. When I left Lit, I honestly thought I would be writing for myself and perhaps a handful of devoted others. I have been overwhelmed with the response to this site. I can’t tell ya’ll how much that means.
Besides the dozens (hundreds?) of people running around in my CRAZZY mind, I write because I believe the storytellers are the ones who have always shaped our world, more than politicians. Storytellers have the ability to paint a new tomorrow with words of hope. But they also have the ability to normalize things like misogyny, racism, nationalism, greed, hubris, and other human faults.
Right now, things may look bleak. Heroes and heroines may be on the run. It may even look like the ‘bad’ guys are winning.
But doing the right thing can make a difference.
No matter who you are, what you have done, or had done to you. You don’t need to be a politician, a CEO, a police officer, or anything else. No matter how dark the times, at the heights of slavery in the US, in Nazi Germany, in Cromwellian England, even a handful of people ‘doing the right thing’ has always made difference. And I believe that each and everyone of us can do that now.
How? Aren’t things to bad? What difference can I make?
- Buy a homeless person a meal, give her your old coat, take him a sandwich. But above all else, listen. Take two minutes to smile or talk to her. One of the toughest things about being homeless (or poor at all) is the way people look down on you. Give them back the dignity that has been robbed by society.
- Correctly gender a transperson. We cis-people take our privilege for granted. Living in the body that looks like the one in your head is a matter of genetic luck, just the same as the color of your skin or being born into wealth. No one should have to ‘pass’ to deserve the basic dignity of the correct pronoun. Oh, and if you aren’t sure…ASK. And if you get it wrong, apologize. Without making excuses.
- Make friends with people from other ethnicities, religions, and cultures. Do you know this is the single best way to combat your prejudices? When you step out of your comfort zone and begin to see that they are people just like you, then those assumptions and stereotypes diminish naturally.
- Pick up trash. Especially on our beaches, lakes, and streams where those things, especially plastics can end up in our waterways and kill wildlife.
- Teach your children that bullying is never okay. By modelling acceptance, understanding, and respect for others in your own life. Yes, that includes online, too.
- …hundreds and thousands of other ways every day.
Doing the right thing is not about politics. It is not even about being a good person. Good people do bad things. And sometimes, even bad people do good ones. But if enough of us do the right thing, regardless of politics, religion, nationality, ethnicity, sexuality, gender, sex, or anything else…this world will change. If only in our homes or our communities.
As much as I am enjoying writing this series, I can’t wait to get to the next. Reconciliation, Texas.
But I got a ways to go for that and I won’t cheat ya’ll or these people in my head by rushing that.
Now off to get some stuff done.
Goddess bless you each and everyone,
Tara
Tara Cox - Literary Erotica 
Thank You Tara!
You are most welcome. Thank you for reading and taking your precious time to comment.
Under the Texas Trouble tab where you have the 4 stories – a suggestion. Add a fifth tab that will contain all 4 stories in the order they should be read.
Bill
That is really useful suggestion, but since none of them are complete yet I’m not sure how exactly I would do that. I have date & time stamped them for those wanting to go the chronological route. Let me consider how that works during this works in progress stage. But once finished it would be: 1) Soon to be edited & renamed prequel 2) Tight Fittin’ Jeans 3) Love in the First Degree 4) Ready to Run 5) Goodbye Earl. I hope that helps some? If not, let me know.
I saw the date and time stamps 😊 but there are a lot of stories to bounce thru to see which would be the next (with more stories to come) All of the stories in reading order would be like a book jumping between characters and scenes. Good stories – keep writing.
Yes, my beloved techie partner had already pointed out to me the advantage of online publishing is that I can not only publish the books individually. I can also put them together in a format similar to Ice & Fire. Once they are finished, of course.