RonVitale.com

Contact Me

Interested in interviewing me about writing, my fantasy novel "Dorothea's Song," what it takes to create and run a podcast? Drop me a line:

Phone: 1-201-467-4962
E-mail: ronvitale[at]yahoo.com

For the Media:

• Audio promo for "Dorothea's Song" (length: 1 min. 5 secs)
• PDF of "Dorothea's Song" (file size 1.27 MB)
• Listen to "Dorothea's Song"
• Follow me on Twitter: twitter.com/ronvitale

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About Me

Ron Vitale was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Influenced by the likes of Tolkien, Asimov, and the British Sci-fi television series "Doctor Who," Ron began writing for his own enjoyment at an early age, creating short fiction from his early Dungeons & Dragons role-playing sessions.

During his early 20s, he obtained a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature and French and then went on to obtain his Master of Arts in English, writing his thesis on a Jungian interpretation of Alice Walker and Margaret Atwood. After graduation, Ron entered the world of medical publishing, utilizing his editing and technological skills as a Manager of Internet Services.

In 1999, his role-playing article, "Fires in the Sky" was published in Wizards of the Coast's Dragonlance: Legends of the Lance newsletter and his fantasy story "Such Sinners We Are" appeared in the Winter 2000 issue of Welcome to Nod.

More recently, his fantasy story "Ghost Trails" was published on Ultraverse and his science fiction story "Toynbee's Gate" placed 5th out of 143 stories in the 2004 SFWoE contest (Science Fiction Writers of Earth contest) while his Magic: The Gathering articles have appeared on StarCityGames.com, Brainburst.com, Grimmoire.com, and MTGOntario.

In 2006, several of his Magic The Gathering articles appeared in Beckett Magic: The Gathering magazine and in Inquest Gamer.  He also wrote six web articles for Wizards of the Coast's Dreamblade miniatures game and has had over a half dozen "how to" writing articles published in the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America's Bulletin.

In October 2007, Ron published his short story collection "The Jovian Gate Chronicles" on Lulu.com that is also available on Podiobooks.com. "The Jovian Gate Chronicles" is a collection of four science fiction short stories that answers the question: What happens when humans cross paths with intelligent aliens who claim to be prophets from God?

While looking to find a publisher for his fantasy novel "Dorothea's Song," Ron is keeping himself busy by producing The Magic Sock Magic: The Gathering podcast, writing gaming and "how to" technology articles, and on learning how to be a good father to a rather curious preschooler and his baby sister.

Welcome

What is RonVitale.com? RonVitale.com (formerly www.losoil.com) contains various samples of my writing over the years.  I've rummaged through the old files and decided to archive everything from the first story I wrote when only a young boy in grammar school (complete with crayon drawings!) to my most recent commentary and writing articles.  Losoil.com was named after Mohan the Wise's (a character in my novel "Dorothea's Song") magical tower.  In Losoil, there are many wonderful and amazing rooms filled with many exotic items.  I thought the name "Losoil" would adequately reflect my own writings over the last several years and would be a good namesake for this Website.
Definition: Losoil The name, translated from the ancient elvish, means Snowstar. Losoil is the name of Mohan the Wise's magical tower that I dreamed up when I wrote the first draft of my novel "Dorothea's Song" when I was 16 years old. Interested in seeing my hand drawn maps from back in the '80s? Be sure to visit the "The Realms" pages. Remember, I'm not an artist, but a writer. Be kind--I was only 16 years old when I drew those maps and typed up the descriptions.
Mission Having written a wide variety of pieces in the last several years, I wanted to consolidate my work onto my own Website, and share my writing with others. In time, I hope to add more sections that describe my novel "Dorothea's Song" and my second book "Amelion's Song" (currently at the first draft stage). I also wanted to create a Website in a blog format so that I could easily react and respond to current events, interesting news, or whatever else might catch my fancy.  So, welcome to Losoil.com and I invite you to explore my work. I've always believed that writing is an exercise in sharing one's vision with the world. No matter how polished or articulate a piece of writing may be, the author's transferal of his/her vision to the reader in order to inspire and engender thought-provoking discussion is the quintessential goal.  Of course, writing can also be just plain old fun. Enjoy.

Reflecting

Life is a rather precious and special thing. That might sound a bit trite but with my daughter having been born only two days ago, it's a bit funny how life changes and priorities shift. Yesterday my biggest goal was bathing my daughter for the first time. Well, cleaning up her full head of hair in the attempts to comb out died mucus and blood from her birth. She cooperated rather well, crying as I had expected, but also urinating in the baby tub I had her in. I turned to look back at the rest of her tiny body (20 and a half inches long) and saw all this yellow "water." Then I realized that I had forgotten how babies pee at any drop of a hat or temperature (the water I had poured on her head was too cool).

I wanted to take a moment just to reflect. Reflect on life, mine, my family's and the interconnected web around us. Learning to be a father all over again, is different, new, and a change. I had never imagined in growing up that I would be a father to a daughter. The challenges (just different than being a father to my son) are interestingly vast as I can relate to my son since I'm male. But the gender gap between my daughter and I is interesting to note as I fear that a pink wave of Barbie will soon descend on her. It's bad enough that my son is in love with everything Disney, including the Princesses! Now in a few short years my daughter will be caught up in the rush too. I half joke about that, but what I am serious about is the father daughter bond. I did not have a sister and didn't grow up hearing my sister talk about a father/daughter dance or fears of her getting pregnant when a teenager. Being a boy, fears of pregnancy are still "out there" as a boy can experience that moment but not physically. The issue is still not part of you and I think that life will be a bit more introspective as the immensity of fatherhood--to a girl--washes over me.

I was driving back from the store yesterday and I realized that the Supreme Court might change the law and make illegal the right for women to have an abortion. And I didn't know what I felt about that. Would I want my daughter to have the right to choose even though I'm against abortion? And then thoughts sparked alive in my imagination, linking up to weave a web of life in front of me, stretching out far into the future. I realized that I needed to champion women rights to help fight for my daughter's well-being. For her to choose what she wants. I just hadn't thought of life from that perspective before when my son was born. Yet maybe these thoughts will temper me and the reflection will enable me to grow to learn more about who I am not and become more--in the hopes of being a better father for my daughter. These thoughts are what I'd like to reflect on, keep close, hold tight within me, and relish my new role as father to a beautiful daughter.

An Open Letter to My Son

Dear Son:

I wanted to share this story with you.  Hopefully, one day you’ll grow up, go through my writings and stumble over this little gem.  As your dad, I thought you’d like to learn a little bit about me.  Let me freeze the moment in time: You turned 2 years old a few weeks ago.  Last night your mom put you to bed and you had some separation anxiety problems.  Being out of daycare for a week has thrown you off your schedule and you’ve been afraid to go to bed at night (or to take a nap).  Good news first: I heard that you did great on going to your first day back to daycare and that you had slept until 7:15 a.m. this morning.  I wish I would have known that last night so I would have had some hope.  Unfortunately, life doesn’t work that way.

Five Years

Yesterday was our five year wedding anniversary.  For all of you who are married (or even thinking about marriage one day), this blog is for you.  My sincerest and deepest love and thank you I send to Karen.  What I have learned in the past five years is that without a supportive partner who is my best friend, I would not be where I am today.  Marriage is many, many things and as I am a novice in this area, I will simply say that I know this: I don’t know much and have so much yet to learn.

Being in a committed relationship is not all fun and joy.  There are times when you argue, are angry, confused, and tired.  But when you can talk with your partner about your triumphs, successes, or even failures—how wonderful!

Let’s flashback.  Ten years ago, when I first met my wife, I was finishing up my M.A. in English and had such hopes for my writing.  I not only wanted to be a novelist, but I wanted to have everyone see what a great writer I was.  The struggle still goes onward and I have seen very little success, but I keep trying. I remember early on in our relationship in which I’d talk about “what I want to do with my life” and how I railed about my current job right out of graduate school.  I went off about how frustrated I was and how I wanted to do more with my life.  I wanted to step sideways and not walk the rat race path like everyone else.  Little did I know how difficult it would be to work, write (and be rejected), and help raise a child.

Digging Up the Past

Earlier today I went through a bunch of boxes in the basement, searching for junk to throw out.  In the course of my grabbing old computer equipment, reams of old drafts to stories, and other junk just lying around, I came across some of my undergraduate writings for the school newspaper.  To the left is one of those pieces.

Ah, you have to love the idealism of youth.  It's funny because when I reflect back on my undergraduate years I have a lot of great memories.  I remember how my college encouraged us to be creative and to run events on campus.  No matter if it were starting a new club, showing horror flicks at night by candle light, or a sleep out for the homeless--we had some great times.

Often, our complaint was: "Not enough people are helping."  I'm ashamed to say that outside of the articles on writing that I've had published for the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Workshop, I haven't done much in the area of community service since college.

But I wanted to share with you the memories of my past and how I struggled to convince others to volunteer and to get involved.  I still do that today in my hobbies and it's nearly 15 years later.

I've noticed that I try not to reflect back on my earlier works.  I know this will sound terrible but I really dislike reading my old works.  I'm afraid that I may have made a mistake (I only glanced through the newspaper clipping shown here) and it's stuck forever in print.

Ah, one of my funny little quirks. 

In other news: I did go to the Dali exhibit today and I hope to put together some pictures and discuss the experience over the next few days.  Take care.

More Coming Later

I'll make this brief.  I'm headed to the   Salvador Dali exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of art today.  I hope to have a nice report in the next few days. In the meantime, I simply wanted to say that I've five manuscripts out in the mail.  An article, my novel "Dorothea's Song," a science fiction short entitled "P2P," a dark fantasy story "Follow Me," and another fantasy story "The Coin Collector."
I've been pressed for time lately and having off today has given me a huge push to clear off my desk and get organized.  I'm hoping to write a longer blog later today.  Let's just say that I found a piece of writing from nearly 15 years ago and I was going to share that with you.  Nothing major, but I think it'll be fun to share. Be back later...