Jacob Answers Questions

1. Where did you come from? A little village called Runtford, near the castle.
2. How old are you? I don't know -- you will have to ask Rachel. She remembers ages and birthdays and other similarly useless facts.
3. What are your strengths and weaknesses? Quick mind. Impartial judge of people. Reader of men's characters. Able to spot a lie. Strong sense of right and wrong. Not a lot of patience for silliness. Prone to action (regardless of logic or insurmountable odds) if my sense of right and wrong dictates it.
4. How did you meet Rachel? When I was a boy, there was a bull in a fence behind the blacksmith shop. Everyone knew to leave that bull alone. I was heading home one day, and I saw the bull pawing and snorting. Then I saw this little girl, smaller than myself, standing in the pen like fool. I looked at that pale face that should have been rosy, the dark curly hair, and the big frightened eyes. She was going to get trampled for certain. I couldn't leave her there. I darted into the pen and dragged her to safety.
5. How did you meet the princess? I had been in a cell for weeks, plotting some way of escape. The best I had been able to do was locate the resting place of a set of cell keys. How I was going to retrieve them was a different story. It seemed impossible. Then I heard shuffling footsteps of someone feeling their way through the dark; I was sure one of the prisoners from another tunnel had gotten free. I could hardly believe it. If only I could convince this prisoner to get the keys, we might both have a better chance. But then it turned out that the footsteps did not belong to an escapee after all. They only belonged to a wandering princess. Ha...I knew I couldn't expect much help from that quarter. So that's how we met.

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A Hard Goodbye

"You're more poet than anything." I folded my arms and glared at Ian. He sat perched on the edge of the roof, dressed like an adventurer. I coveted every part of his outfit -- the breezy shirt made of course cloth, the sturdy breeches, the leather boots that laced up to his calves, the dagger on his hip. Tomorrow he would set sail to a life I craved more than anything. But did he appreciate his opportunities? No. And I hated him for it. "Do you despise poets, Ingrid?" His voice was sad, but a grin twisted at the corners of his mouth as he finished his question. Those blue eyes of his cut in my direction with a teasing flash. "They don't DO anything." My thoughts and emotions ran in torrents, but I could see his flowing smoothly and quietly. Even in his uneasiness about the morrow, his face was a peaceful as a child falling asleep in his own bed. ...

The Countdown: Eight Days

Eight days. Do you know what that means? Barely over a week. Tomorrow will be one week from the announcement date. Are you excited? I am. So, today, I want to talk to those who wrote something for the contest, whether or not you entered it in the end. What made you start writing your story? What was the first inkling of an idea that tickled your brain? What was it that you liked about your premise? As you wrote, did you have a favorite character or a favorite scene? And are you glad you wrote it down? Do you feel like you learned and grew in your ability as a writer as you tried out things for this contest? And, if your story isn't included in this year's Rooglewood anthology (either because you didn't submit it or because it didn't fit with the other four stories selected), what will you do with it? Will you market it elsewhere? Or will you lock it away in a drawer?

Goodbye and God Be With You

It's rather fitting that some things come to a close on this day -- the last day of the year. I submitted my last entry into the Rooglewood contest this morning. I can hardly believe it took me until the day of the deadline to send it in because I'm usually earlier than that. And, even with the extra time I took, I still felt a little bit like maybe I could have done better if I had more time. But there was no feeling of regret when I hit "send." Mostly it was just a prayer that Rooglewood would hear the heart of the message when they read it and that maybe, if I win, they could help me bring the full potential out of my little story. And there was also a feeling, after working on these stories for more than six months, that it felt good to close that chapter and move on to the next one. I did it. I wrote them. And I'm really proud of them. Last year, the act of hitting "send" on my contest entry catapulted me into an anticipatory state....

The Pen of a Ready Writer

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