First off, I have done A Thing: my short story "Candy, Shoe, and Skull; Sallow Flowers Plucked Like Chains" appears in this month's issue of Niteblade Fantasy and Horror Magazine.
And yes, it's the dark fairy tale issue.
If you know me, you understand why that is perfect.
I've read the magazine and there are some delightfully wondrous and oh-so-dark retwistings of fairy tale in these digital pages. So far my favorites, other than my own story (because: of course), are Eric J. Guignard's "A Kiss and a Curse," a Beauty and the Beast retelling of dire consequence, the narrative poem "Et je ne pleurais jamais les larmes cicatrisantes magiques; c’est seulement un mensonge joli: Arne-Thompson Index No. 310" by Elizabeth McClellan featuring a Rapunzel with agency and engineering on her side, and Rhonda Eikamp's "The Men in the Walls," which is also very, very dark. Well, they're all dark. This is, after all, the dark fairy tale issue. But there's a delight in these dark stories that my brain keeps turning over and over. I love the twists and shapes of these tales.
My piece, "Candy, Shoe, and Skull; Sallow Flowers Plucked Like Chains,"really came about because I kept picking at the notion of where fairy tales come from, then applied that to the modern world.
We're all just dark and twisty beings who don't understand what's going on.
There are two main theories in folklore studies about the origins of these stories of the people and the fact that so many cultures developed the same basic tales seemingly independent of one another. One notion is that these tales arise from the collective subconscious.
Bitten By Books is hosting an Urban Green Man anthology par-tay on Wednesday, October 2, 2013, starting at Noon CST. Drop by to chat with the editors, illustrator, and the many, many contributing authors of this great anthology of new fiction any time during the day or evening of October 2.
Oh, and did I mention there are prizes? Because there are prizes.
First off, if you RSVP that you'll attend before the event (here) and then you actually attend, you'll have 25 entries toward the $50 Amazon electronic gift certificate, provided by the publisher, EDGE Science Fiction and Fantasy Publishing. More entries can be earned the day of the event.
We'll be answering questions that you submit and discussing how we took this old myth and made it new -- yes, I said we. Because I'm one of the contributing authors! [inserted excited-but-not-annoying-and-completely-professional-noise here]
I'm trying to finish reading the anthology by Wednesday. I'm not sure if that's going to happen, but I'm excited to give it a go and at least finish the stories alongside my "Breath Stirs in the Husk" in the Earth section.
On Tuesday, the day before the event, I'll be posting here on Speak Coffee to Me how location, location, location really shaped my story ... and then creepily enough turned around and affected my real life. And for those of you who remember the days when I still posted bits of fiction here on the blog, it's the same location as The Trees (Jud, you're probably the only one still around from then who'll recall it).
Writers with romantic intentions, come hither. The fourth volume of New Hampshire Pulp Fiction is lounging languidly on a velvet divan, making eyes at you. It’s time to make your move.
Submit your stories of love lost, passion fulfilled and unrequited devotion — all deeply embedded in New Hampshire places and culture — to Elaine Isaak at nhpulpromance@gmail.com and perhaps you too can be a part of this local publishing phenomenon.
Story length: 8,000 words or less Deadline for submissions: July 31, 2013 Planned for release: before Valentine’s Day, 2014
Got a market notice you want listed in future Market Mondays on Speak Coffee to Me? Send along the link with the words "Market Monday Plz" to @EileenWiedbrauk on Twitter.
Gorgeous Krampus art from a book
I have absolutely no association with
other than drooling over the art: Krampus: The Yule Lord by Brom.
Specter Spectacular II: 13 Deathly Tales closes to submissions on Saturday, but don't despair you writers of the macabre! Also on Saturday, June 15, Kate Wolford will start reading submissions for a Krampus based anthology as part of a joint venture between World Weaver Press and Enchanted Conversation: A Fairy Tale Magazine.
Description: You know the Jolly Old Elf of Christmas, right? Of course you do. You can’t avoid him. Yet, Santa Claus isn’t just a kindly old expert at breaking and entering and leaving gifts he didn’t actually buy for the children of a house. At least he isn’t in Austria and many other parts of Europe. In these ancient places, where, perhaps, the old, old gods still add a touch of mischief, Krampus is the angry, punishing sidekick of St. Nicholas (Santa’s counterpart in much of Europe). Known for his willingness to punish rotten children, Krampus might even be considered Santa’s dark side or evil twin. Krampus is the sort of guy more and more North Americans want to explore. He’s definitely having a moment this side of the Atlantic. To that end, World Weaver Press and Enchanted Conversation: A Fairy Tale Magazine are pleased to announce a joint venture: An anthology of Krampus short stories. Although the book is yet to be named, we hope you’ll explore every possible Krampus angle via short stories. He’s a nasty old dude, and we hope your imaginations will get the better of you.
Anthology editor Kate Wolford ran a mini Krampus story contest for Enchanted Conversation last Christmas where there was lots of interest -- it was certainly the first time I'd heard of the Krampus! -- and gives her insights on what she's looking for in the upcoming anthology: “Krampus taps into a kind of ancient darkness that captures the spirit of winter. He also seems to lend himself to humor and horror and maybe, a bit of magic. I think the story possibilities are endless and intriguing.”
World Weaver Press is a publisher of fantasy, paranormal, and science fiction, dedicated to producing quality works. As a small press, World Weaver seeks to publish books that engage the mind and ensnare the story-loving soul.
Cross-posted from World Weaver Press as "Books & Pieces" where I'm in charge of their weekly round-up of news and factoids.
If you enjoyedJoss Whedon’s Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog there’s more Dr. Horrible in the works according to wired.com! Neil Patrick Harris and Nathan Fillion will both be returning for the sequel.
This is your brain on fiction. A New York Times article highlights recent research which shows the brain functions at a different level when reading fiction than it does when doing other types of reading. Particularly that it processes sensory details like sound and smell as if it was receiving real stimuli — all the more reason for to incorporate more and more awesome sensory details in a story!
Writer Jay Ridlergives us five reasons to love short story collections.
And speaking of short story collections, there are contests going on right now on two blogs for free copies of Susan Abel Sullivan’s first collection Cursed: Wickedly Fun Stories. Check out Fang-tastic Books and I’m a Reader, Not a Writer to find out how to enter.
Last night, the Hunger Games movie took in an estimated $20 million just from its Midnight showing according to Publisher’s Marketplace (via). Even Weather.com's lead story is Hunger Games related this morning.
The top ten sword fight scenesever were given to us by io9 this week (sci-fi and fantasy only). We have only one thing to say on the topic: My name is Inigo Montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die.
World Weaver Press answered the question this week: Just what is “speculative” fiction, anyway?
World Weaver Press author Susan Abel Sullivan stopped by the UK-based Becky’s Barmy Book Blog to give a fun little post about first realizing that she was a humor writer. On her own blog, Susan crafted an insightful post about her early love of monster movies.
Lastly, these little robot-dudes are so cool. And supposedly Amazon is going to have a whole warehouse full of them along with Walgreens and a few other American companies that already employ the inventory-finding bots.
I've been working for the past year with my friend (now-business partner) to build the necessary foundation to launch World Weaver Press, a small press focused on fantasy and science fiction in all its incarnations.
Yesterday we officially launched the company with the release of our first title CURSED: WICKEDLY FUN STORIES a collection of several short stories by Susan Abel Sullivan.
I don't know any better or more thorough way of announcing than the following, which came from yesterday's official announcement:
New York, NY (March 5, 2012) – World Weaver Press (Eileen Wiedbrauk, Editor-in-Chief) has announced the release of Cursed: Wickedly Fun Stories by Susan Abel Sullivan, their first speculative fiction collection as an independent publisher.
“Susan Abel Sullivan has written an engaging collection that appeals to both the young and young at heart,” commented Wiedbrauk. “I’m excited to be a part of bringing this collection to readers and thrilled to publish Susan as our first World Weaver Press author; she’s an asset to WWP and a writer not to be missed.”
Cursed: Wickedly Fun Stories is a speculative fiction short story collection featuring witches, werewolves, limericks that can change fate, and a sinister vine bent on murder and the destruction of Alabama. These stories draw in readers with their lighthearted tone and delight with their wickedly sly sense of humor. Cursed: Wickedly Fun Stories features pieces previously published in Andromeda Spaceways, Inflight Magazine, AlienSkin, and Beyond Centauri, as well as a never before published short.
Susan Abel Sullivan lives in a Victorian house in northeastern Alabama with two dogs, way too many cats, and a ghost. When not writing she likes to get her groove on by teaching Zumba classes. She is a graduate of the Odyssey Writing Workshop for speculative fiction. Her short fiction and poetry have appeared in numerous online and print publications, including Asimov’s Science Fiction Magazine, ASIM Best of Horror: Vol II, New Myths, Writers’ Journal, and others. She is currently working on a YA novel about the supernaturally challenged. Visit her website at susanabelsullivan.weebly.com or twitter @susan_abel.
World Weaver Press is an independent publisher of science fiction and fantasy, dedicated to producing quality novels, novellas, novelettes, and collections and anthologies of short fiction. World Weaver Press seeks to publish fiction that engages the mind and ensnares the story-loving soul. Find out more at worldweaverpress.com or twitter @worldweaver_wwp.
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It's been an exhilarating and time intense endeavor, one I'm thrilled to be able to share with you today.
The short story is a humorous retelling of the Rumpelstiltskin tale which was previously featured in Enchanted Conversation: a fairy tale magazine.
The original reason I published this short story as its own ebook was two-fold: I wanted to teach myself how to do the technical end of ebook formatting while working on a short sample, and I wanted to give "Garbage-to-Gold Spindle--On Sale Now!" a more permanent home when Enchanted Conversation announced that they were closing as a magazine and converting their operation into a much more, ah, slim state of affairs.
Many other Smashwords titles are either discounted or free with the right coupon codes this week, so hop on over and fill up your eReader.
What I'd love to get this week (other than confetti) is a reader rating and/or review on Smashwords, Amazon.com, or BarnesandNoble.com -- all three sites have my short story for purchase but only Smashwords is selling it for free as part of ebook week.
So I don't normally post about when I make a submission to a journal or anthology -- there's all sorts of reasons why. Everything from the superstitious don't wanna jinx it to the vanity based don't wanna look stupid if I don't make it comes to mind. And I especially don't blog when a submission isn't picked up. However, this post isn't about making a submission to a market or the market's reply, it's about how damn, amazingly geeked my thirteen-year-old self is right now.
When I was about thirteen, somewhere in that seventh to ninth grade range, I read a lot of Sword and Sorceress anthologies. They were all short fantasy stories focused on heroines -- right up my alley. I particularly remember the S&S anthology with the cover at left. I'm absolutely certain that was one I owned not I borrowed from the library or theLiz.
Back then, Marion Zimmer Bradley was still editing these anthologies. After she died, the series went on a little hiatus and I lost track of it.
A year or two ago, I found out that the yearly series had been revived by Norilana Books, with Elisabeth Waters as editor. And perhaps what was even better was that I found their submission guidelines. I made a promise to my thirteen-year-old self that I would submit a story to S&S.
The month-long submission period came. And went.
I changed my promise to I'll submit ... someday.
I'm here to report that someday is today. My thirteen-year-old self would be reporting to you, except she's too busy doing a happy dance.
Of course I would love to be published in this anthology, but for the moment, the act of sending in a story is far more important. Sending in the story means that I'm now engaging a world that brought me joy as a reader.
I think I lose track of that sometimes -- we all probably lose track of that sometimes. In the race to get published, then the race to get more -- more readers, more prestigious markets, more publication credits -- it's easy to submit to markets that we've never read. Some would even claim it's necessary. But there's undoubtedly something warm and fuzzy about submitting work to a market that has, at any point in your life, brought you joy.
Titled "Garbage-to-Gold Spindle! On Sale Now!" the story is a humorous bout of correspondence from a mail order catalog to one Mr. Stiltskin. At only 1,800 words, it makes for a quick read.
Actually, brevity is the name of the game for this issue of Enchanted Conversations. None of the ten pieces published in the issue are longer than 2,000 words.
Reading over the issue, I have to say that I was impressed with the poetry (which I approached with unnecessary skepticism as I've often seen folk lore meet poetry in unflattering ways). Particularly impressive was the quiet and soulful poem "Other End of the Tale" by Gerri Leen. I was also impressed by another quiet and thoughtful tale, the opening short story "Little Rattle Belly" by Mae Empson. There's even a nonfiction essay on spinning and the history of linen toward the end of the issue, "Straw Into Gold," written by Elizabeth Creith. Also enchanting was the final story of the magazine, "The Duchess's Boy," by Louise Quenneville, wherein a gnomish duchess wisely states, "I know about making bargains with humans, and they are not to be trusted to keep their end of the agreement.
There's been a lot of internet chatter about Amanda Hocking and her self-publishing escapades this week. USA Today, The Huffington Post, Business Inisder, and her local NBC news affiliate gave her some air time (see video, though the first 30 seconds is just the anchors talking about wtf a Nook is).
"Rejected by countless book publishers" seems like a subjective phrase which *might* have just been blown out of proportion. Ms. Hocking got fed up with the system at age twenty-five. She submitted each subsequent novel she wrote to fewer and fewer agents (as per admission of her own blog).
Most agents will tell you that it's often not the first book you write that's the first book you sell. In Ms. Hocking's defense, she claims to have written 19 novels, many as a teenager. Now, no offense, but I remember what I wrote as a teenager and I teach teenagers writing and that teenage writing has about as much chance of making it with a publisher as I do of winning the lottery on any given day. Eragon = lotto winner.
Also agents (and successful traditionally published authors) point out that most writers do rounds and rounds of queries--sending out ten queries a week for months--before they find the right fit for a successful agent-novel-author experience. It's about finding an agent who is passionate enough about your book to want to sell it as much as you do, not finding someone to schlep paper for you.
Anyway, I bring this all up because I have my doubts about how the news media is portraying her "perseverance." But that's just me.
But it turns out she didn't need to persevere or gain a sound understanding of the publishing industry. She'd already done "market research" by browsing the Wal-Mart book rack (Ididn't make that up), she wrote YA paranormal because she it was what she saw the most of. She knew it was hot, so she stuck it up on Amazon, B&N, and several other epub platforms and made it available POD through Amazon's Lulu. Less than a year later she's self-published eight novels and one novella out and, according to her blog, sold over 900,000 units. Priced at $0.99 or $2.99, Ms. Hocking makes 30% or 70% of that as profit, respectively. According to her local news station, she's made enough to buy a house in cash.
Ms. Hocking is twenty-six and impatient. IMHO.
I don't mean to misrepresent her. It appears that she already feels enough of the internet is doing that. So I won't take some of the pot shots that I could. But I'm the kind of person who believes in the strength of patience, perseverance, and education. Formal education is helpful, but education is out there in thousands of different forms, you only have to ask for and accept it. Reading agent blogs daily is a form of education. Researching publishing is a form of education, learning grammar and style is a form of education. Knowing you need a good copyeditor is a form of education. Learning about things like book bloggers before you jump into the world of epublishing is a form of education. Reading books on craft, being part of a workshop, finding a critique partner, subscribing to publishers marketplace, reading in your genre, reading out of your genre -- these are all forms of education, patience, and (if you keep writing with all you're learning) perseverance. A classroom with a teacher in it isn't necessary to learn.
I'm twenty-seven, only one year older than Ms. Hocking, and I think that if there had been an easy way for me to throw my work into the sales arena when I was twenty-two, I might have done it. But I'm not that impatient now. And I shudder to think of my work when I was twenty-two given all I've learned in the interim.
Ms. Hocking also writes on a recent blog (to clear up things "the internet is saying ... about me"), that she feels a "tremendous sense of urgency, like if I don't get everything out now and do everything now, while the iron is hot, everything I've worked for will just fall away." This also leads to the feeling I get from looking at all of the facts (those presented by her in interviews and those presented on her blog) that her ebook sale boom is the result of impatience.
The SF/F/H writer list serve I'm on is in a tizzy contemplating the viability of the e-publishing-- the phrase "future of publishing" has been bandied about so much that it's ceased to hold meaning for me. Those who seem the most interested are people who are writing "between genres" or in not easily defined areas of the market who don't feel the traditional publishing market is open to them. Meanwhile the listserve's many voices are not really paying mind to the fact that Hocking is writing in a market that's not just hot, it's hott: YA paranormal romance.
Ms. Hocking's first novel has a good concept, but its market niche is one that is begging for content. My local Barns & Nobel has devoted an entire shelving section to "Teen Paranormal" -- more space than "Christian Fiction" gets . . . and on the conservative west side of Michigan, that means something. This is the one genre where publishers can't put out enough material to meet the demand.
Believing that you can epublish in a different genre and take off the same way is a mistake. IMHO. What sells and what doesn't is always hit or miss. No one knows what the next big seller is going to be. But let me present a case to back up my opinion.
Consider this: as much as I am a part of the cult of Firefly, I knew the moment I saw the first episode why it had only lasted one season (obvi, I was watching on Netflix). A space western could have been one of those things that exploited the interstices of genre and boomed, but it exploited the interstices of two declining genres -- dying genres, if we're going to be morose. The space opera and the western haven't been doing well in print or on screen. Speculative fiction has been there, but all you need to do is look at the declining number of episodes each new cast/crew of Star Trek made to see the writing on the wall.
So just because the internet is a way to publish in a declining genre without the editors fearing the decline, doesn't mean success will come your way. There's a guy out there trying to raise $3,000,000 to get Firefly back on the air (or air on the internet). Will his internet grass roots movement catch fire? Grass fire? Prairie fire? He wants people to pledge $40 per season to see the show online. Maybe he'll make his goal. Maybe he won't. But he's got one giant plus on his side: people have already seen the show. It's been on air, on TV, on Netflix, and in traditional theaters (Serenity). This "unproducible" TV show was produced -- your "unpublishable" novel hasn't been published.
The point I'm making: could this Amanda-Hocking-success-story happen for a writer not working in Teen Paranormal? Yes. Would I bet on it? No, I'd bet against it. And I'd make a big wager.
What I do see as worthwhile, competent epublishing ventures or --go forth and epublish now:
Authors publishing their out of print backlist (or like JA Konrath, publishing the backlist and then writing more books in the same series and epubbing them)
Authors publishing short story collections of work previously published by magazines or anthologies (Chuck Wendig).
It's very, very, very hard to convince a publisher to lose money on your short story collection -- because "short story collection" to a publisher is a bit like taking a lighter to money just to watch it burn. The publishers who do pub short story collections do so because they are dedicated to art -- and usually have dedicated grant money. But if you can say look at my short stories published in magazines X, Y, and Z, now collected in one place for a low low price then hey, maybe I'll buy that. Literally.
I'll post Monday on the how to be a professional and a self-epublished author information a publicist recently gave me after a discussion of the above news articles and blog posts. It was all good information that I was going to put here, but this post has gone on far too long.
When fiction writers get to the end of their MFA they're expected to produce a project that is "book length," but they face the decision: do I make a collection of short stories or do I write a novel?
The short story collection tends to be the favorite in practice while the novel is what everyone says they'd like to do until they face having to do it.
There's points in favor of each.
Short Story Collection
The reason I say the short story collection tends to be what most people do is because it's what MFA workshops have set you up to do. In workshop you write and submit short stories, you get feedback, you find things to change and you make them better. Now, all you need to do is edit those stories on your own and you're halfway to a collection.
For people whom revision is easier than drafting, this is a the option of choice.
For people who can't get their minds around the length or structure of a novel, then the collection is, without question, the way to go. Often MFA programs don't have coursework on writing novels, or it's not as in depth as the course work on writing the short story.
Often, the collection seems like the ready-made option. Particularly when you have that moment of realization where you realize that the path of least resistance to your degree is to brush off a group of desperate stories whose only connective tissue is that you wrote them and call them "collected." It seems like a cop out to me, but a reasonable cop out. Particularly if your style/subject matter hasn't changed much while you've been in the MFA program. Then your stories are probably much more cohesive than mine as I tried a bunch of different styles and then switched gears from realism to fantasy.
Also, the "MFA project" asks you to present the fruits of your education. It is not specifically designed to ask you to produce something that anyone would ever want to publish as a book.
Which brings me to: short story collections are hard to sell.
There are three main ways to get a short story collection sold. (1) You win one of the short story collection contests that have publication attached to them like the Flannery O'Connor Award, the Iowa Short Fiction Award, or the AWP Award Series (there are a couple others but they don't come to mind). (2) You get a contract for a novel in which your agent convinces them to buy your collection as a "bonus"--mostly this is a "bonus" for the writer and a grudgingly accepted ultimatum for the publisher, and another reason why agents are so cool. (3) You get 3-12 stories published by The New Yorker and some publisher wants to collect and reprint them. There are other ways, but those are the three big ones. All other ways are extremely hard sells.*
Now consider how many MFA thesis collections are out there in the world and you're suddenly wondering why you'd want to put energy into a collection when you could be putting it into a novel -- or at least that's what I'm wondering.
The Novel
The big thing the novel has going for it is that it can be sold. That is, it's likely that (all prose being considered equal) someone will want to publish it. All that time, effort, and editing will result in a bound, typeset version of something with your name on it. Even if the cover sucks it's still your book.
The big downside to writing the novel as MFA thesis is that the MFA is not geared toward getting you to produce a novel. As mentioned above, it's the short story that's the perfect size and shape for weekly workshops, not the baggy monsters. Therefore, you'll likely be generating new material and editing it in a shorter span of time.
Then there's the whole has anybody taught you how to write a novel? question which seems to trip people up. I've heard quiet a few people say that they won't try to write a novel (including well published short storyists) because they just don't know how to put one together. Although if you look outside your MFA you can almost always find someone to teach you or materials to use to teach yourself. (Screenplay structure, as I understand it, is where to start looking.)
Then there's the not to be overlooked notion of having an idea big enough to fill a novel.
Where I'm at
See, I thought I had a plan (a novel). Then I had another plan (a story collection)--a plan I put in writing this time! And now I don't know if that plan is as good as the new-new plan (a novel, different from the first novel which I now know I couldn't sustain).
The new-new plan is, albeit, new and shiny. But I might be in the throws of saying hey, if my short story collection idea is going to be as much work as my novel idea then why don't I write the novel, have more fun, and end up with a more viable product at the end?
My advisor recently asked me to crunch numbers and find out where I'm at so that we can think about how best to spend my time. She didn't commit to one side of the debate or the other, but the mere suggestion of number crunching had me thinking all weekend.
The question is not as easy to answer as one would think. I've known a lot of people who said they were going to write a novel for their thesis project. It was only logical, and when it came down to it, logic changed and the logical thing to do was a collection. And now I don't know where I'm going to land with four months until it's due.
*This, of course, makes me laugh. Like any of those three are particularly easy.
There’s been a blog hiatus for Speak Coffee. It’s only been about five days so … so maybe you haven’t noticed. A girl can only hope. It’s been partially due to deadlines, partially due to some sort of sinus bug that I first thought was just a tidal wave of allergies. Anyway, thanks to some finished submissions, some naps, and some colossal decongestants I’m back. Lit Magazine Giveaway, still going!
So. I was watching TV and a preview for the new Robin Hood with Russel Crow came on. I didn't get a good look at the woman's face in the movie but her voice really struck me. Looking it up I found the voice belonged to Cate Blanchett. That woman could read a software user agreement to me and I'd listen to the whole damn thing.
That's when I decided that if I had my choice of anyone in the world to read my stories aloud, I would choose Cate Blanchett.
This is something that’s been on the brain lately because a friend of mine told me that I read my stories well. I –- like everyone else alive –- prefer a celebrity's voice over my own. Or maybe I’ve been thinking about it because I discovered PodCastle and I’ve been listening to short stories online.
I’ve been a long time NPR lover … an NPR junkie? Maybe. I was at one point. Point being that I adore their audio essays. (And if I someday write/perform one I would be so excited. Life goal excited. Talk about it in my Christmas cards excited.)
So when I discovered PodCastle I was really happy. PodCastle produces audio recordings of actors reading fantasy stories which you can listen to on demand online or download to a portable device. There was something about PodCastle story 101 "Kristen, with Caprice," that put me in mind of the kind of fiction I'd hear on NPR.
I'm sure there has to be at least one person out there scratching his head about how I got from NPR to fantasy fiction. The answer to the head scratching is that this fantasy isn't swords and dwarves. PodCastle -- and just about every other respected fantasy venue -- produces some really amazing fantasy fiction that's best described as "realism gone astray."
I point this out because there's a feeling out there (particularly one I've picked up in the academic world) that all things fantasy or science fiction are elves and space opera. And -- while I occasionally enjoy a good elf or space opera -- that's just not how the genre, or the market is right now. Of course, this would be better known if everyone just listened to PodCastle.
PodCastle also has sister sites, the science fiction Escape Pod and the horror PseudoPod.
So, if you could choose anyone to read your stories aloud who would it be? The obvious choices are the most memorable voices known to man: Sean Connery and James Earl Jones. Obviously, Cate Blanchett ranks at the top of my dream-recording list. In my mind, while I’m writing, she’s already narrating almost everything I write. So, who would it be for you?
Journals love it when you've read the journal before submitting your story. It's better all around because you're more likely to know what the magazine does and doesn't publish and so you don't waste your time, or theirs, sending your gritty urban story to a place that really only likes lyrical pieces influenced by nature.
This is where I come in. I'm swimming in literary journal back copies, and I plan to share the wealth with a lucky follower chosen at random. The winner will get a boxed assortment of journal back copies (all from within the past four years) mailed to your door! Or, to be more specific, any door in the United States specified by the winner. I'll even let you request titles if I have them.
How to enter:
Become a follower of the blog. (See the sidebar)
Leave a comment to this blog post with the title of your favorite short story and (if you remember) where you read it (physically or the name of the journal/collection, etc).
(optional) Post and/or Tweet about my contest and leave a link to your blog and/or twitter feed in your comment.
That's it! I'll contact the winner on May 17 (14 days from the posting of this contest) for their US mailing address.
(picture is a sample of the magazines lying around my apartment, not necessarily the prize package ... though I suppose it could be if you wanted)
To get things started I'll tell you some of my favorite short stories and my memories of reading them.
The short story that has perhaps stuck with me the longest is "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" by Ursula Le Guin. We read it in Ms. Hall's 11th Grade English and it left something in me that I don't think any other story had left with me before. It's the same feeling that tells me I need to know what's going on in the world even if I'm not a world player, and I need to do my part even if my part won't have a noticeable effect.
"Where Are You Going Where Have You Been" by Joyce Carol Oates wins my award for creepiest damn story ever. Poe has nothing on this woman. This story gave me nightmares and I was 21 when I read it and I really shouldn't have been getting nightmares from fiction at that point. Then a few months later my father got all nostalgic and wanted to go to an A&W drive in and he couldn't figure out why I was all sorts of creeped out.
One of my favorite fun stories (because this list needs some fun right about now) is "Two Twenty Two" by Baird Harper that I first read in the Mid-American Review -- an issue that is in the mix for the contest if you're interested. There's a certain teenage irreverence to "Two Twenty Two" which reminds me of Joe Meno's Hairstyles of the Damned.
There was also "Cake" by Patrick Tobin which I first read in Best American Non-Required Reading, because -- duh -- the term non-required totally peaked my interest and well cake, who doesn't like cake? What I remember of the story was that I was in love with the author's use of numbered lists within the story.
I was lying on a blanket on the green lawn of Kenyon College one June when I first read "Boar Taint" by Bonnie Jo Campbell in an issue of The Kenyon Review. I started to read it because her contributor's note said she was from Michigan and I was like hey, I'm from Michigan too! I kept reading because the female character had grown up in Ann Arbor -- me too! -- but I finished reading with a whoa. It's a deceptively big story, and it would eventually anchor the end of her collection American Salvage.
Then there's "Remembrance Is Something Like a House," by Will Ludwigsen. I came across this story in the Interfictions 2 anthology and it remains the only short story to ever make me cry, it's that moving. (Recorded as a podcast here.)
I started this list thinking I'd write down just two stories ... but obviously I got carried away. Let me know your favorite short story (or poem! b/c we're equal opportunity here at Speak Coffee)!
Recently I've done a lot of harping about things I don't love about fiction and particularly short fiction. So I wanted to point out a short story that I am absolutely in love with.
I recently got my hands on a copy of Interfictions 2 published by Small Beer Press. The stories in this anthology sort of defy genre categorization. The editors call them "interstitial fiction" although I really haven't quite grasped what they mean by that.
I hadn't gotten far into the collection when I read Will Ludwigsen's "Remembrance Is Something Like a House" and was swept away. I was actually tearing up -- possibly even crying -- by the end of this story and not because Ludwigsen kills puppies but because I found it moving. I cry at movies, I cry at novels -- occasionally I even cry at 30 second TV commercials -- but this was the first time that I have ever, ever cried at a short story. Bravo.
The story is about a house that "walks" from Ohio to Florida to confront the last family who lived within its walls. The story is narrated from the house's point of view, yet I'd like to make very clear that this is not a talking house.
Amazingly, when I went to look up Ludwigsen to see if there was a webpage to link to, I discovered that the entire story is available as a PDF. Joy!
Not too long ago Jud asked in the comments of a post if I was going to be putting up on my website any more audio files of readings. I had one recorded, but I was having trouble with my FTP system. This weekend I downloaded a new FTP client (it's the Cute FTP free trial -- anyone know of a free/shareware FTP client that's not buggy and lasts longer than a month?) and updated the site.
New: an audio file (.mp3) of yours truly reading "Just a Fantasy" an eight part short story about Dawn, a young woman who moves to Chicago with her boyfriend after college and then proceeds to encounter life, fantasy, regret, first graders and rock bands.
The recording quality is less than stellar but my equipment is also less than stellar. I read this piece on campus last fall but the recording was not done on site.
The "Things I've Been Asked Lately" series of posts (TIBAL) is exactly what it sounds like. People ask me questions in real life, on the blog, or on the forums I follow and I endeavor to do my best to answer them. This is, of course, all IMHO.
How Many Short Story Submissions Should I Have Out At Once?
As many as you can juggle.
Whenever I get asked this, people seem to have expectations that there is a magical number to aim for. Often they expect it to be ten. Sometimes four. And as best I can tell the number correlates with the amount of time they've invested in writing for publication.
The number of stories you can keep out, of course, depends on the number of pieces of fiction that you have finished and ready to be published. Not sort of ready or close to ready, but ready to go to print right now. Magazine editors do not make substantive edits; they are content seekers. They will copyedit and they will occasionally make edits to the prose or story (and often the title), but they'd really rather find work that doesn't need all this extra tweeking so that they can get back to their families and work at their paying jobs.*
[*Magazine editors are rarely ever paid for their work.]
In an ideal world, you only submit to magazines that you have read several issues of.
I say the ideal world because, honestly, I do not have the time or the money to subscribe to that many journals and read them all. I choose a couple each year to whom I give money for a subscription (often coupled with a contest fee), and I occasionally browse online content.
What I try to do is that whenever a rejection letter (or email) comes in, I take a look over the story and then send it out to one to three other markets. You can see how this tends to increase the number of submissions out. For a while, I would keep upwards of thirty-five submissions out between five stories and three poems. I let this slide at the end of last year and now I have 11 submissions out between three stories and one poem.
Whatever you do, you need a damn good way of tracking all this.
I have a two-fold approach. First is the submissions tracker on Duotrope.com and the second is a three ring binder that contains a sheet for each story title. On the sheet I have marked possible markets, (then when it gets sent) a date next to the actual market, and a big fat line through it when it comes back with a 3x5" slip of paper.
I will say that it used to be a lot more work to keep multiple story submissions out. Now many of my submissions have never touched an envelope. I go to a magazine's website, use their database uploader, type in all my information and send off the story with a click of the mouse. If I've sent them the wrong copy of a story, I can just withdraw it, also with the click of a mouse. Even those magazines to whom I'm sending hardcopies have fairly streamlined processes: I can find all their wants, desires, open reading periods and contact information right on their websites. And websites like Duotrope.com organize the magazines so that I don't have to sift through webpages in a Google search to find the right one.
So much easier than using the four inch thick Publisher's Market Place. (Yes, I did used to use that. Research with it took days.) Although I hear they have a CD/computer version now. But I never used the copy that came with a CD because I always checked mine out from the public library because of the expense.
This week my interesting internet finds lean more toward the blogging side than the short story side, but don't let that stop you from checking out the first item on the list "Dear Doris."
A story in answers: Dear Doris by Adam Davies from FiveChapters.com. The form made me start reading but the story has stuck with me for the past week. I find myself thinking about it as I fall asleep where my half-conscious mind tries to fill in the gaps between the answers because it believes, really believes that this piece of fiction was an interview with a real person.
Wylie-Merrick Literary Agency has a really nice tutorial on point of view from the writer's perspective not the agent's. Point of view is one of those things that's simple but not simple at all. This blog post does a good job of starting that discussion and, even though it's a long post, it goes no where near finishing that discussion.
Forgotten Bookmarks is a blog put together by a rare book seller who finds all sorts of things stuffed inside the books he buys (and I think other people send him pictures too). It's a really interesting FOUND art type project.
Pimp My Novel delivers the 10 Commandments of Blogging(for authors) and linked to this news tidbit: CBS has greenlighted a pilot of "Open Books" a comedy that revolves around a book editor and her industry friends. There's the fear that books might make boring TV, but the project is being driven by Gail Lerner who worked on "Will & Grace" and "Ugly Betty" so it should be funny, right? Or maybe it'll show how the book industry is just another face of MODE.
From agent Jessica Faust on the BookEnds blog: writing what you love and loving what you write, "Be True to You."
From Margosita on Trusting the Process while embarking on the MFA thesis project. You never hear the MFA process as a "hand holding" adventure -- surely if they promoted it that way few people would sign up -- but along with the educational aspects of an academic study of writing and the process of writing the MFA thesis project provides many helpful (possibly necessary) tool for completion of the first novel: a deadline, a support group, a mentor, a critic, an editor and someone who doesn't think you're weird when you freak out about the project.
Lynn Viehl has edited and re-released her collection of short stories Sink or Swimfree to readers and available at her blog.
Viehl is so f-ing prolific that she offers oodles of short stories and her own "on writing" materials for free 365 days a year. She's also so prolific that she has to use several pen names to keep up with herself (Lynn Viehl, S. L. Viehl, Rebecca Kelly, Gena Hale, Jessica Hall).
Her blog, if you've never read it before, is frequently funny, (usually) patient and always candid.
A short story collection called Federations is coming out from TOR shortly. This collection of news works of science fiction has many of the heavy hitters in the field (e.g. Lois McMaster Bujold, Orson Scott Card, Anne McCaffrey, L. E. Modesitt, Jr.) and there are four stories currently available for download before the collection comes out in print.
True to previous statements, I never say no to a free book. In workshop last week I carted off several back copies of literary journals I'd never heard of. One of the editors working on our literary journal came to class with "swap copies" or "sharing copies" or whatever they call 'em, that were several years old and cluttering up the lit journal's office. He'd brought as many as he could easily carry in one hand in hopes that someone would at least take one.
Oo! Free books! I cooed much to his surprise.
Have I read them yet? No. Have I read the free books I got at AWP? A couple.
What can I say? I'm a book-magpie. Even if I don't read them I want them to line my nest on the hope that I will read them. And I will. Hopefully.
anthologies. They were all short fantasy stories focused on heroines -- right up my alley. I particularly remember the S&S anthology with the cover at left. I'm absolutely certain that was one I owned not I borrowed from the library or 
