Category Archives: Publishing

Discussions about the business of publishing.

Apropos of Not Much

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This is the jacket copy from my first novel, The Long Look. Why? Because I always liked it. And just because.

“Everything you know about evil magicians is wrong.

Tymon the Black is the latest in a long succession of magicians to suffer under a curse called “The Long Look.” He gets glimpses of future horrors, horrors that will almost certainly come to pass unless he acts. When one such glimpse prods him to arrange for the murder of a headstrong young prince, he sets a cascading chain of events in motion that could lead to a future even more terrible than the one he tried to prevent.

Now all he has to do is hang on to a friend, train an apprentice, prevent a prince obsessed with revenge from destroying himself and his entire kingdom, help a princess come to terms with guilt and grief, make sure a wedding happens, make sure a war doesn’t, and send a creature of ultimate darkness back to the void from whence it came.

All in a day’s work for the world’s most evil wizard? Not quite. There’s also a goddess to contend with, and there’s nothing like attracting the interest of a goddess to upset the balance of any evil scheme. No matter. No one ever said that the life of a fiend was an easy one.

THE LONG LOOK is a fantasy novel with a unique blend of action, introspection, speculation and humor that should keep any reader both involved and confused, but don’t worry. It all makes sense. Eventually.”

Have a Little Faith, Will Ya?

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Feeling dogmatic this morning, so avoid if you ain’t in the mood. Time again I hear two classic questions about writing and submitting stories, most recently on another board– how do you know when something is good enough to send to markets? How do you know when it’s time to take a story out of circulation and trunk it?

Considering how self-evident those answers are, I should be amazed that people keep asking them, and yet I can understand the frustration. The true answers may be obvious, but they’re next to impossible for a beginner to apply, by definition. It makes sense that they keep looking for easier, more relevant to their current state of development answers. Unfortunately, I don’t think there are any. Continue reading →

“…Any Club That Would Have Me for a Member…”

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The subject came up in another context but it got me thinking about it. New magazines have always popped up fairly frequently in the field. Most don’t last long. This was true back in the mimeograph days and it’s even more true now, when web publishing basically means anyone with a little time and the notion can put up a web page and call it a magazine. This in turn will spawn the writer on the make’s natural prey–the market listing.

I don’t know about you all, but when I’m scanning the list of new markets at Ralan’s or wherever, the number of potential markets I find worth bothering with is very small. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again — I’m picky. It’s probably some deep character flaw that makes me think I have the right to be picky. I mean, who the hell do I think I am anyway? But there it is. Actually, it’s even worse than that–I think every writer should be picky. Value what you do, or no one else will. Aim higher, even if you think the target is out of range. Maybe it is, but maybe it isn’t. So all that said, I’ve been thinking about what separates a venue worth considering and one that, well, just isn’t. Continue reading →

Time for Some Name-Calling

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Literary movements come and go. “New Wave” was a little before my time, but I can remember Cyberpunk, Splatterpunk… I was associated briefly with “Crackerpunk” by virtue of 1) being a Southerner and 2) writing sf/f, but no one (including especially its proponents) took it very seriously and it went away quicker than most. Now we are within a period with a feast of Movements: Slipstream, New Weird, Interstitial, New Romantic Underground, New Space Opera, Mundane Science Fiction, Mannerpunk, and I’m sure I’m missing some. It is a time for Manifestos and Movements because, as China Mieville once pointed out, “Manifestos are fun.” Seems like the right attitude to me, from the pov of someone invariably on the outside looking in where these things are concerned. Continue reading →

Barking at Nothing

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I sent out a couple of stories yesterday. There used to be something eternally optimistic about sending a manuscript out. Now it’s that plus the culmination of far too much research and poking about. Good markets — like this is news — are scarce.

I’ve had this same conversation numerous times before with some of my gloomier colleagues. The few really good markets have their pick and, if they sometimes don’t choose wisely, that’s their own fault. It’s not that the material isn’t being handed to them by the shovelful. Unless your name is of such magnitude that it alone will sell magazines or pull pageviews (or at least the editors think so) you take your chances with the hundreds or so others who sent in stories that month. Then you manage to get through anyway, and your story is bought and published in a good venue. Many happies and much joy.

Then what? Continue reading →