Living the Fictional Dream

Yesterday, I got the proofs for my story, “Bridge Club,” that will come out in the October issue of A Thousand Faces. I spent a few minutes reading the story all over again. It was actually more enjoyable reading it with a little distance between myself and it. A little like reading something new.

A lot of times, after a write a story, I grow to hate it. I guess it depends on how much time has passed since the writing, but after a while, I just can’t stand those old stories any more. Maybe it’s because of my growth as a writer, or maybe it’s just my hyper inner critic (I notice a lot of writers have one of those!), but it tends to happen. But “Bridge Club,” I still really like. (The same with “The Widow and the Stranger” — I don’t get tired of that one, as far as my own stories go.)

Anyway, back to my original topic, I love getting the proofs for a story that’s been accepted. It turns a nebulous acceptance into something real and concrete, like the story is actually going to happen. I’ve had around a dozen stories accepted now, and it never gets to be old hat. Maybe it’s not quite as earthshattering as it was the first couple of times, but I still get that “squee” feeling when the acceptance comes in the in-box. It’s not why I write, but it is why I send stuff out on submission — well, that and the “squee” that comes when I talk to other people who’ve actually read the stories.

I currently have three stories coming out this fall and a fourth slated to come out next March, so that should be a nice line-up of sqeeage for the upcoming months. As always, you can read about it here when they are available for public consumption!

Before I wind things up, I just want to shout out a quick congratulations to my writing group mate, Jens, who just had a story accepted by Every Day Fiction, too. It’s a quirky little piece staring his 19th century steampunk adventuring duo Blankenship and Dawes called “Chrono-Conundrum.” I’ll definitely link to that one here when it’s available.

Happy Friday, all! Here’s hoping we all get some good writing done over this holiday weekend!

It’s time for another random installment of my links posts. I’ve been doing a lot of reading this summer, so I thought I would post links to some of the really good stories I’ve discovered lately. If you’re in the mood for some quality short fiction give one of these a read (or a listen, if it’s a podcast):

• “Directions,” by Caleb Wilson — a quirky flash piece with great atmosphere. Talk about visuals! In retrospect, perhaps the twist at the end should have been obvious, but I was so caught up in the scenery that I didn’t see it coming.
• “Giant” by Stephanie Burgis — A flash piece that looks at a subset of fairy tales (princess-stealing giants) from the giant’s point of view.
• For Fear of Dragons,” by Carrie Vaughn — There’s a virgin and a sacrifice, but if you think you know where this story is going, you don’t. Not until the very end!
• “The Other Magic,” by Gere McClellan — A sweet fantasy romance. My favorite part was the interpretation of the “job” of sorcery.
• “In Lieu of a Thank You,” by Gwynne Garfinkle — I didn’t know what I would get when I clicked on this story, but after I read the first line I couldn’t stop. The old fashioned voice of the narrator was compelling and I was immediately hooked and wanted to know what had happened.
• “Looking for Friendship, Maybe More” by Corie Ralston — Don’t let the title stop you. This story is hilarious. I also enjoyed its use of email/message board format, complete with fonts and font colors.
• “Ghosts and Simulations” by Ruthanna Emrys — This story uses speculative fiction to look at death, dying, and what people will do to keep their loved ones in their life.
• “Rain” by B. Teuscher — I wasn’t sure what to expect when I started reading this flash piece. The beginning was all about description and atmosphere. But as the story continued, I got invested in the main character, and the ending almost made me cry.
• “If We Were Briar Roses” by Brian Dolton — This story starts out like a love poem, and then, suddenly, the plot is made clear and you look at the poetry again with new eyes.
• “The Mixture” by K.C. Ball — A flash story that begins quietly, but has a surprising heroine.
• “Mail” by Kevin Shamel — Mail carriers and time travel… need I say more?

Podcasts… the short story equivalent of an audio book. Snippets of fiction read aloud that can be listened to on the website or downloaded to your iPod or iTunes to listen to later.

I’d never really thought about this before, but it’s a cool idea. And, from a writing perspective, how amazing would it be to hear the words you write read aloud? Very, is my thought!

I took a screen writing class while earning my master’s degree. As part of the class we wrote two-page scenes and the professor brought in two actors to perform them. Watching my words come to life like that was amazing… Listening probably would be great, as well.

The other good thing about fiction podcasts from the writer’s point of view is that they seem to love reprints (or, at least, the ones whose guidelines I looked at did). It’s not often in the print and e-zine world that you can sell the same story twice!

I’ve been researching short fiction podcasts (with the help of some recommendations from my friend Stephanie), and I’ve come up with a few that seem interesting. I haven’t listened to all of them yet, but the ones that I did listen do had some great stories. If you’d like to try out a fiction podcast, you could start with one of these:

• Pod Castle — fantasy.
• Escape Pod — science fiction.
• Pseudopod — horror (pay attention to that warning on the first page).
• Drabblecast — speculative fiction/weird tales.
• Well Told Tales — horror, sci-fi, crime/hardboiled, pulp.
• Clonepod — sci-fi/fantasy.
• Bound Off — literary fiction.
• The Great Beyond — sci-fi/fantasy (though this one doesn’t seem to be updating very regularly).

If you do check some of these out, let me know which ones are your favorites.

I just got word that the North Point e-zine has closed its doors. It never really got off the ground, I suppose. It seems to have been plagued by problems and scheduling issues from the get-go. I’m sad, though. Any fiction outlet closing is sad, and I liked the couple of stories I was actually able to read at North Point.

However, I’m especially (and selfishly) sad because now the flash piece that they accepted from me will not be published. Or, at least, not yet. I will have to find new markets to submit it, too. I’ve have stories rejected before because the market was closing its doors, but it’s a special bummer when the story was actually accepted!

This has been a great week for me! “The Dragon Thief” was published, and I’ve had two more stories accepted — one by A Thousand Faces and one by Perpetual Magazine. I’m really excited by both of these acceptances. The story I sent to ATF was one that I came up with on the spur of the moment, and ended up working out better than I had ever hoped. The one accepted by PM is a story I wrote quite a while ago and had about dispared of ever finding a home for. And the PM editor said such nice things in the acceptance email. What a great week!

And in honor of what a good week this has been, I’m going to share more links with you. Hopefully, y’all will find something here that piques your interest!

First, if you like flash, you need to go check out “Visions of Hummus-cide” at Bewildering Tales by Stephanie, one of my writing group pals. If you weren’t a hummus-convert after Buffy the Vampire Slayer (”Attack the Mayer with hummus. … He’ll never see it coming.”), this story will bring you over to the cause.

Next up is the mid-June issue of All Things Girl. The update includes part two of their interview with Stephanie Meyer (author of the Twilight series and The Host — which, if you haven’t read them yet, you definitely need to).

And here’s a fun one for all you writers out there — The Random Title Generator. If you’re out of creative ideas, try some of these automatically generated titles on for size. Perhaps you’ll create your next great story after being inspired by titles like “Shakespeare, As Written by a Dinosaur,” “My Friends Call Me Fuzzy Banana,” and “Always Share Your Moonlight”!

Finally, if you want to find out what’s going on in the world of television, you should check out my two favorite TV columnists over at TV Guide’s website: Matt Roush and Michael Ausiello. When Matt recommends something, I always know to pay attention, and Michael always has the latest scoops and a smattering of spoilers. However, apparently Michael is actually leaving TV Guide, so you’ll have to check him out there fast!

And I’m out… for today. Happy clicking!

Today is a day for sharing. Hopefully, you’ll find these links as fun and/or interesting as I do!

First of, I want to give a shout out to Alex, one of my fellow writing group members. He wrote a flash fiction mystery, and it went live on Every Day Fiction this morning.

Second, Jens, another Writer’s Ink member, has redesigned his blog. Check it out. The new graphics are awesome. My favorite is the space ship, but the dinosaur is cool, too. Apparently, the preferred viewing browser is Firefox. Also of note, Jens is going to start putting original flash fiction on his site regularly, so that will be worth checking out!

Here is the link to mystery author Carole Nelson Douglas’s website. If you enjoy mysteries, genre-bending, and strong female protagonists, you should definitely check out her books. And I’m only slightly biased from the fact that I worked as her personal assistant for three years during college and early grad school! (Talk about having one’s eyes opened to what the real life of a midlist author is like!) If you enjoy urban fantasy, I highly recommend her newest series about a heroine with a mysterious past named Delilah Street. The first book is called Dances with Werewolves.

If you’re looking for something good to read in the speculative short story line, I’m going to point you over to Strange Horizons. I’m sure most of the short story writers who drop by heard of SH long ago, but I thought some of the nonwriters who pop by every now and then might be interested. SH is actually considered a professional market for short stories because of their pay rates, but you can read the stories there for free. I have read many interesting science fiction and fantasy short stories there, so it’s definitely worth a spin around the archives.

If you write, but you’re in need of some inspiration, you should check out my friend Melissa’s website, Cafe Writing.

If space westerns are your thing, you’ve got to take a look at SpaceWesterns.com. This site has quality short fiction. I’ve never been disappointed by a story there. Jens has a story there, and I really love some of the space westerns with female protagonists, like A Llama’s Tale and The Clone-Wrangler’s Bride.

Residential Aliens is a speculative fiction e-zine with a spiritual slant, which I know will appeal to some of my dozen blog readers. I particularly enjoyed the story “Morning Coffee.”

And, finally, in a departure from the writing theme, I want to recommend two blogs that focus on Fort Worth, my hometown. West and Clear includes notes about current events, Fort Worth news, and lots of current happenings. Occasionally, Stephanie, another Writer’s Inker, even contributes reviews. Fort Worthology focuses on urban development in Fort Worth, and is always chock full of the latest information on many of the construction sites around the city — especially those associated with “new urbanism” and the downtown area. Kevin, the author of FWology, is Writer’s Ink support staff. Kevin also includes a lot of his own urban photography on the site.

So, the next time you have some free time and need something to check out on the web, try one of these sites. You won’t be disappointed.

In addition to my own writing, one of the things I want to talk about here is other stuff that I’m reading. There is no shortage of reading material these days (which is part of the reason that it’s so hard to get started in the writing business, but that’s another blog entry), so I want to share with y’all some of the good things that I’ve found — both online and in print. One of those things is the e-zine All Things Girl, which just released a new issue. This e-zine is written by women for women, and I’ve enjoyed their interviews and fiction every time I’ve stopped by.

If you’re a fan of Stephanie Meyer, author of the Twilight series, definitely check out the new issue, which features an interview with Meyer. The interview focuses on her new book, The Host, which I’m dying to get a copy of. It also touches on the Twilight series, as well as some of the behind the scenes writing and publishing stuff.

While you’re there, visit the “Writings” section, too. I particularly enjoyed the story “Cinnamon Red Memories” by Tamara Palmer.

If you’re a writer and want to submit to ATG, they have three more themed issues coming out this year: Spice of Life, Harvest, and Naughty & Nice.