Tag Archives: word lovers

My Dic Pic (with apologies to Anthony Weiner)

My dic pic is huge!

Jaimie Spencer’s dictionary from This Plague of Days is real. If you’re reading my apocalyptic serial, you know that Jaimie has a dictionary obsession. That’s an obsession that, conveniently, I share with my young, autistic friend.  I have slang dictionaries, rhyming dictionaries, quotation dictionaries and dictionaries about poisons, fables, mythology, imaginary places, Latin, Spanish, French, Modern Thought and more.

Yes, I use online dictionaries sometimes, but I’m one of those people who browse from one word to the next and get lost in discovery. I love to find something I didn’t know I was looking for. That’s why the main dictionary I use for This Plague of Days is the one pictured.

Of all my dictionaries, this one is special. I picked up this dictionary at a yard sale. It was falling apart so I duct taped the binding. It’s the unabridged Webster’s Twentieth Century Edition from 1939 (original edition 1904). It’s packed full of words no one uses anymore. And just like Jaimie Spencer, I can get lost in it for hours. It’s the one book that contains all the others.

Some read This Plague of Days because they love zombies, twisty suspense and autistic heroes. People who are word nerds grok it, too.

If you’ve read any of the episodes or the complete first season, please do leave a review on Amazon.

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This Plague of Days will appeal to word nerds and horror fans, too

English: A multi-volume Latin dictionary (Egid...

English: A multi-volume Latin dictionary (Egidio Forcellini: Totius Latinitatis Lexicon, 1858–87) in a table in the main reading room of the University Library of Graz. Picture taken and uploaded on 15 Dec 2005 by Dr. Marcus Gossler. Español: Diccionario de latín (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I’m getting some nice feedback on the advanced reading copies of This Plague of Days. Expect lots of cliffhangers to keep the pages turning.

Excerpt

Jaimie awoke to yelling downstairs. The lamp on the nightstand still shone and the Latin dictionary lay open by his head. The last phrase he had read was an interesting one: ubi solitudenum faciunt pacem appellant. They create desolation and call it peace. To the boy, the words tasted soft and were as pleasing to his eye as they were black and dangerous.

and this…

Jaimie looked up the word quarantine. He thought the word beautiful. The q tasted sugary and uaran struck Jaimie as the essence of a firm avocado. Best of all, the word ended with –tine, the sound of a little silver bell.

Yes, this serial has some odd angles for a zombie apocalypse. Buckle up!


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