Category Archives: Writing

Bits of Pieces

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This is going to be a sort of general update post. It’s not that a lot is happening, but some things are happening, things that, for a change, don’t have a lot to do with the daily grind of getting all the things done that I have to get done before I can do the things that I wanted to do in the first place. If you understand that—and I’m betting that most of you do—you’ll get how even a few changes can nudge the needle past So? all the way to Hey! Worth Noting.

First of all, after floundering for a bit (okay, five months), I’m starting to make some headway on the sequel to Black Kath’s Daughter. I still have a long way to go, but forward motion, believe you me, is an improvement. And if everything works out the way I think it’s going to, I’ll finally make a proper connection between the Amaet who was the bane of Tymon’s existence in The Long Look with the Amaet who is the creator of The Arrow Path and the bane of Marta’s existence in Black Kath’s Daughter. And vice versa, truth be told. The working title is: Power’s Shadow. Subject to change, being a working title and all.

The Yamada novel (To Break the Demon Gate) is still on track at PS Publishing for release early next year. So is the Prime Books collection of Yamada stories, Yamada Monogatari: Demon Hunter. One interesting thing when working with a smaller publisher is that sometimes you actually have some input into the cover design. Not always, but sometimes. I found the image we used for the first mockup of the Yamada collection, but the consensus (and I agree with it) was that it was both too modern and too “horror.” Yes, there are demons in the Yamada stories (and ghosts, and youkai, and…well, lots of such things, and anyone who’s read them knows that already) and they can be dark at times, but definitely not horror, so that’s not going to work. We’re still looking for something with the right atmosphere, and finding just the perfect thing is going to be tricky. When the cover is set I’ll put it up here as soon as the publisher okays it.

A couple of final notes—“In the Palace of the Jade Lion” from Beneath Ceaseless Skies #100 got a Recommended from Rich Horton in the October  Locus Magazine. It’s not as if that’s the first time I’ve gotten one, but it’s always cool. And the most recent Yamada story, “Three Little Foxes,” is due to go live up at BCS in the next few days. I’ll post a link here when that happens.

Friday PSA

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Okay, so it’s more of a self-serving announcement. Maybe we need a new desgination for that. Maybe SSA? Anyway, here’s the deal–Scott Andrews at Beneath Ceaseless Skies has just released The Best of BCS, Year 3. Here’s the ToC:

  1. The Ghost of Shinoda Forest · Richard Parks
  2. Dying on the Elephant Road · Steve Rasnic Tem
  3. Bread and Circuses · Genevieve Valentine
  4. Walls of Paper, Soft as Skin · Adam Callaway
  5. Mr Morrow Becomes Acquainted with the Delicate Art of Squid Keeping · Geoffrey Maloney
  6. Butterfly · Garth Upshaw
  7. Red Dirt · Ian McHugh
  8. The Nine-Tailed Cat · Michael J. DeLuca
  9. Letters of Fire · Margaret Ronald
  10. Fleurs du Mal · J. Kathleen Cheney
  11. Gone Sleeping · Heather Clitheroe
  12. Dirt Witch · Eljay Daly
  13. Silent, Cold, and Still · Kris Dikeman
  14. The Angel Azrael Rode into the Town of Burnt Church on a Dead Horse · Peter Darbyshire
  15. Playing for Amarante · A.B. Treadwell
  16. The Suffering Gallery · Matthew Kressel
  17. In the Gardens of the Night · Siobhan Carroll
  18. Beloved of the Sun · Ann Leckie

 From the BCS web site: “The Best of BCS, Year Three  features such authors as Richard Parks, Garth Upshaw, Margaret Ronald, Matthew Kressel, Geoffrey Maloney, and World Fantasy Award-winner Steve Rasnic Tem.

It includes “Walls of Paper, Soft as Skin” by Adam Callaway, named to Year’s Best Dark Fantasy & Horror 2012, edited by Paula Guran, as well as three stories named to the Million Writers Award Notable Stories of 2011 and four given Honorable Mention in Year’s Best Science Fiction 29, edited by Gardner Dozois.”

 

Special offer going on– buy The Best of BCS, Year Three from Weightless Books between now and Oct. 19 and get a free copy of Best of BCS, Year One or Best of BCS, Year Two.

You can also pick it up at all the usual places, Amazon, B&N, Smashwords…..here’s the thing–proceeds from the sale of The Best of BCS, Year Three go to pay BCS authors and artists for their work and keep the magazine going. Two subjects near and dear to my heart, it has to be understood.

Okay, commercial over. Thanks for your patience.

 

Ghosts: Recent Hauntings

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I noticed several other contributors announcing the receipt of their copies of Ghosts: Recent Hauntings yesterday. I also know that all mail coming here has to pass through the city PO before it’s sent off to the outposts, which adds a day’s delay, so I was reasonably sure that my own copies were waiting for me at the PO Box today. Sure enough.

My story’s in here somewhere. Let’s see… Neil Gaiman, Elizabeth Hand, Jeff Ford, Tim Powers, John Shirley, Peter Straub, Joe R. Lansdale, James Van Pelt, Nisi Shawl, Ekaterina Sedia, Steve Rasnic Tem, Melanine Tem, Sarah Monette, Maureen McHugh, Margo Lanagan…ah! There it is, “The Plum Blossom Lantern.” Nestled safely(?) between John Langan and Stephen Jones. Paula Guran’s managed to collect quite a few talented people in here. Not sure how I managed to sneak in, but it’s too late to check tickets now.

Well, whether I deserve it or not, that story does. It’s one of my favorites of my own ghost stories, and I’ve written quite a few. See what ya’ll think. And you might as well read the rest of those guys while you’re in there. Just sayin’.

Well, Aren’t YOU Little Mr. Sunshine Today

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Thinking about a passage from THE JEWEL HINGED JAW by Samuel R. Delany (also one of my writing bibles in my wannabee stage). The subject was the truism that “Writing is one of those crafts where, the longer you practice it, the harder it gets.” That specifically applies to anyone who’s trying to improve. We all know of writers who find a good-selling niche and are content to stay there, and more power to them. Even staying in one place is hard work. But, as the Red Queen pointed out, “You want to go anywhere, you have to run twice this fast.” As with Theordore Sturgeon, Delany then asks the next question, and comes to the very logical but rather depressing conclusion that, sooner or later, you’re going to hit a wall you can’t climb, break through, or go around.

In short, Delany posits that all writers eventually hit the limit of where their talent, imagination, and energy will take them. Like the weightlifter who trains all his life and eventually manages 600 lbs, but will never lift 625 if he trains from then till Doomsday. The bones and muscles simply can’t bear it. What then? There are a few options, none of them very good. Repeating yourself is one. Silence is another, and it might be the most common. A lot of writers, and you can probably name a few, came on to the scene in a flash only to quietly disappear a few years later. Sure, sometimes it was simply that they didn’t sell enough books and no one would publish their next one. These days there are other options, but not everyone can bring themselves to go the self-publishing route. Yet be that as it may, not every writer who’s disappeared from the field has done so because of commercial failure. Maybe not even most. A good many of them were simply done.

That is, if you accept Delany’s reasoning. Personally, I’m going Zen in a riff off the Enlightened Master Douglas Adams: Linear Progress is an illusion. Linear Progress in the arts, doubly so.

And there is no wall.