Daryl

Hello, my name is Daryl and I'm a storyholic. I've always read, and when I get drawn into a tale I can't leave it alone until I know how it ends.

Writing is how I sort out my life and my feelings. I journal nearly every day, whether I do any "real" writing or not.

I'm mainly here to meet other writers, to make new friends, and find (and maybe inspire) some new levels of creativity. It's easier for me to stay motivated if I have a small, regular, dependable circle of trusted writing friends who review keenly but gently and who help goad each other along.

Speaking of reviewing, I am happy to read things and offer my own opinions on them if I have time, for whatever my opinions are worth.

If you ask me to review something, please tell me up front what kind of review or comments you're looking for. Some pieces are very personal to the author and are meant only to be read and appreciated for what they are. Others could be works that you're considering for sale and publication, which you might want read with an eye for detail, flow, grammar, spelling, continuity, etc.

Knowing what you want helps me do a better job for you and, I hope, helps prevent those awful experiences of reviewing with red ink and a razor when you only wanted a gentle reading, or vice-versa.


A bit more about me:

Interests and hobbies: reading, writing, animals, t'ai chi, Nature, photography, growing vegetables, trying (unsuccessfully so far) to escape the corporate treadmill.

Religion: recovered Christian, now a pantheistic animist/Taoist with Zen Buddhist leanings.

Marital status: happily remarried.

Favorite foods? The list of things I don't like is far, far shorter. I've never managed to swallow a bit of durien fruit. I've tried, unsuccessfully I'm afraid, to become a vegetarian. I refuse to eat anything that's still alive, endangered, or cuddly looking. Thai and Vietnamese foods are my overall favorites. I also like ice cream way, way too much.

Favorite books, genres, and authors: most of Charles de Lint's "Newford" stories, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Robert Silverberg, any decent sci-fi or fantasy or horror, erotic horror, speculative fiction in general. I also like real-life travel adventures like Eric Hansen's "Stranger in the Forest," and Jessica Maxwell's hilarious "I Don't Know Why I Swallowed the Fly". I love Spider Robinson's early "Callihan" collections (before he ran dry and kept writing them anyway) and, of course, Douglas Adams' "Hitchhiker's Guide" books. I'm also a devout fan of ZBS Productions' "Ruby" and "Jack Flanders" stories -- if you haven't listened to "Ruby 1," you've missed out!

Music: also omnivorous. I'm afraid I still can't take screechy opera (sorry, Athena!), and I got exposed to more than my share of country/western music as a child so I still avoid most of that. No hip-hop/gangsta stuff either, please. I like world music, especially Middle Eastern, Irish, and Scottish. My steady fall-back diet, though, is rock-and-roll, especially space rock by bands like Hawkwind and Underground Zero, plus Pink Floyd, of course. David Bowie, Toni Childs ("Keep the Faith," available through Toni's MySpace site, is an INCREDIBLE album!), John Fogerty, Moody Blues, Nazareth, old Black Sabbath, even Iron Butterfly nearly always make the list.

Other things I love: warm days, thunderstorms, and snuggling in with a good book while it rains outside.

Hates: warmongering politicians, bullies, rude people -- the usual. Oh, and anybody who abuses animals. I've got a contract to design and build a very special place in Hell for those folks.

I'm sure there's more, but if you're not already bored to death and still have questions, you can always write to me and ask.