It was a difficult year. I survived my comprehensive exams and began the long road of writing my dissertation (due in a month) on top of working and other pro commitments. Thank god for spending quality time with my lady. Despite the many roadblocks and challenges, I managed to reach most of my writing goals this year. First,

THE BAD NEWS FRONT:

REJECTIONS

As it stands, I now have 80 rejections since August (I have previously kept track of rejections August to August). To put that in perspective, I had a total of 55 for all of 2006 and 150 for 2007. This number, of course, increases with the amount of stories I put in
the market each year. I’ve also changed my submission process. Instead of getting a story back in the market ASAP, like the pulp writers of old, I wait until Sunday and, with more options now open (I normally get four rejections a week), I work on where BEST to fire a story instead of just dealing with markets that were available at the time. So far, it has been a much groovier system.

As of this year I’ll be counting rejections by the calendar year. So the clock goes back to zero in 2008. That means, in rough estimates, that 2007 had 150 rejections or so. Most were good, with the story just not being a good fit, as opposed to the old “learn to write, you moron!” rejections of yesteryear. Now,

THE GOOD NEWS FRONT

PUBLICATION

I sold my story Blood and Sawdust to Dark Recesses. This one was rejected twenty-one times before finding a home. The lesson here: if you believe in the story, never give in.

My story “A Different Shade of Knight” appeared in Bash Down the Door and Slice open the Badguy, edited by William Horner.

I also have three stories at semi and pro paying magazines that have made it to the “short list” and I should hear back in 2008 about if they made the final cut. Fingers crossed.

WRITING-PROCESS

I wrote close to thirty-five stories in twelve months. I managed to get fourteen of them in shape for the market. I currently have about twenty in states of revision. Last year, I wrote roughly fifteen stories and got ten of them out there. So that’s a pretty solid
increase in production.

Part of the reason for this increase was the “Three Month Challenge” that Justin and I undertook. For three months (March to May?) we attempted to write a short story a week. I succeeded in this task despite pretty formidable odds. I experimented with genre, form, character, and POV. The results were mixed, but net positive. After reviewing them
this past while, I’d say four were in need of one clean up revision before being sent to the market. Six were in need of medium to major revisions, and two were so bad and weird they may never see the light of day. Of these twelve, two are in the market, one is almost ready, and two more should be done by the end of January. I’ve also managed to make revisions more fun by remembering this is about making the story the best it can be, instead of an exercise in negativity about my failings in the first draft. It is a different
kind of fun than writing the draft, and certainly not pain free, but if it makes you write better stories I am ALL FOR IT. My enthusiasm for them has increased the more I do them. And, with twenty stories in need of revisions, that is a good thing!

On two occasions I experimented with writing whatever came to my head while listening to music (instrumentals: lyrics get in the way of my own words). I really dug this. All of the twenty-four sketches, vignettes and images felt like they were from me, but they were little story ideas I’d never considered, and never would without the catalyst of music. Maybe half of them will become flash fiction or short stories, the others going to seed, but I’m thrilled I found another route to story ideas. A real treat.

WRITING-FEEDBACK

In 2007 Rich Horton reviewed the 2006 crop of stories for Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine and included my work (”Disposable Heroes”) with Jay Lake and others as the best of the year.
(http://www.speculativeliterature.org/Reader/Horton2005/AndromedaSpacewaysInflig\
htMagazine.php )

I received excellent feedback from editors on some stories, even if they didn’t buy them. James Van Pelt’s kind words on my numerous submissions to his Hardboiled Horror anthology were often very moving and reminded me that even you can take positive points from a negative process (rejections).

WRITING-NON-FICTION

I sold the following non fiction pieces, all of which I am very proud of:

· “Steel Chair Through the Looking Glass: The Fractured Fantasy World of Professional Wrestling” Clarkesworld (December 2007).
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/ridler_12_07.html

· “The Price of Empathy: Thirteen Questions for Gary Braunbeck,” Fearzone.com,
http://www.fearzone.com/blog/gary-braunbeck-interview

· “Danger, Norm Partridge! An Alternative View on the Value of Workshops for the Young Fantasist.” Internet Review of Science Fiction April 2007 issue.

www.irosf.com.

WRITING-OTHER

I once again taught a one-hour seminar on character and plot at Napanee District Secondary School. A more rambunctious class than last year, but we had fun writing a horror story together (imagine constructing a story using improve format and Jeanne’s old saw about asking the next question: “I need a name! Ok, why that name? Is that
really a girl’s name? How about a boy’s name? Jamie? Jamie is both a boy and girl’s name, sure, so is she a tomboy?” etc . . .). We ended up writing a horror story about a tomboy originally from Australia whose best friend betrays her to become popular-so she kills him with a snake skinning blade! See, this is why I only teach high school once a year.

I was also picked by Jeanne Cavelos to be the moderator for the Odyssey alumni master class workshop, TNEO (The Never-Ending Odyssey) 2007. Itwas an honour to work with her and Susan Sielinski on making TNEO evenbetter than before, and to serve such a diverse and talented group of writers. It was a rocking week and I learned a lot and hope everyone else did, too. Thanks to all who attended for making my job as stress
free as it could be. And to my lady for keeping me sane on those long car rides!

WRITING GOALS FOR 2008

I’d like to have fifty stories in the market, or fourteen more by December 2008. I have four that are near ready to be sent (February) and then ten more to go. If I focus on some flash stuff first, this might be possible. After that, I’ll be switching to novels. Short story production will no doubt decrease but if I can keep fifty stories in the market at all times I should be ok!

Best to all for for a fruitful 2007

JSR

Through the magnanimity of Ellen Datlow I received a copy of Inferno in the mail just before Christmas. As I told Ellen at the time, I was primarily interested in the book for thehollowbox, who had been chomping at the bit to get his hands on it for months. So it will be a less-than-surprising Christmas present, and as per the agreement on Ellen's blog, pre-read. ;)

I am not what you'd call an experienced reader of horror by any means, and I know that a lot of you who read my journal aren't, either. Some of this stuff is heavy, and I say that having read Gary Braunbeck's In Silent Graves (The Indifference of Heaven in the UK), and greatly enjoyed it, even though "enjoyed" always feels like a strange word to use with Gary's work. It is an intense ride through areas of the psyche that most reasonable people generally try to avoid.

So I came to Inferno trusting in The Datlow (which, after Salon Fantastique and SCIFICTION, I did) and that the book had received several glowing reviews and knowing not much else. The trust was worthwhile, and I concur with Publisher's Weekly that this is some of the best SF/F of the year, assuming that it is okay with you that a story make a transition into "fucked up beyond all reason", as several of these do.

I knew a handful of the names in the collection -- Lucius Shepard, Jeffrey Ford, Joyce Carol Oates, P. D. Cacek (one of our guest instructors at Odyssey), Pat Cadigan -- but only a handful. And I'm pleased to have read the collection if only to be introduced to so many other amazing writers. Shepard and Ford delivered as they tend to -- Shepard's "The Ease with Which We Freed the Beast" is carefully crafted and as vivid as it is unsettling, which is a difficult juxtaposition to achieve. But some of the most memorable stories out of the collection come from writers I'd never read before -- Nathan Ballingrad's "The Monsters of Heaven", Laird Barron's "The Forest" (this will not surprise pantlessjohnny or thehollowbox, I'm sure -- I'd heard of Barron and wanted to read him but this was my first introduction), and Lee Thomas's "An Apiary of White Bees".

The writing here is just solid to the point of being instantaneously classic. I will pull, mostly at random, from Thomas's story, one of many passages in the collection that made me pause with appreciation:

Oliver didn't care much for the Cortland. It was a landmark, decorated with extravagance and taste, but without a single concession to warmth. His wife Amanda wanted it, so he bought it, and they lived here because she wanted that too, but it was hardly a home. A home should be filled with personal belongings and intimate, happy memories. And at least one person in that place should love you.

Simple, solid, and masterful -- like most of the stories in this collection. With the caveat that there are a couple of stories in the collection I have not yet read -- I've been mostly catching them late at night, trading reading for sleep during the pell-mell craziness of this particular holiday season (I am currently writing this from a hotel room in West Palm Beach, Florida -- my brother is getting married tomorrow) -- Pat Cadigan's "Stilled Life" stands apart from the rest for me. This certainly is no judgment of the quality of the other stories -- the nice thing about a well constructed anthology is that there will be, hopefully, something for everyone. And this one was something for me. But I also think that it is one of the finest stories I've read this year, and among the best short stories I've ever read. A study in friendship and the frantic way that we can attempt to escape the human condition, it is smart and funny and intense and beautiful and unnerving all at the same time. I am not, generally, a Cadigan fan -- again, no judgment here, just my taste, aka what the hell do I know -- but I will follow her work more closely from here on out.

So in closing, there are a number of stories here that are individually or as a group worth the price of the collection, which, aesthetically, is also very fine -- it's a much more handsome book than I was expecting, in a world of increasing trade paperbacks. I do maintain that I would prefer, if possible, to do the majority of my reading on a medium that does not kill trees, but if books should exist (and they should), I think they should look and feel like this.

So that's my synopsis of Inferno, and thanks to Ms. Datlow for sending it my way via the fine folks at Tor. Though I will never be primarily a horror reader or writer, I do enjoy reading widely, and it helps to be able to put my trust in an editor that will provide a prime expreience of the genre being sampled. I do think that the experience of horror is an individual peak in a reading experience -- really fine horror is an unmatchable phenomenon. I owe my openness to its basic symbolic function to Jeanne Cavelos (and Odyssey), whose explanation of the heart of horror led me to write "The Bearer" while at the workshop -- and it has been an element of my writing consciousness ever since. These are important parts of the human condition to be aware of, important dimensions of experience -- and if you're curious, Inferno would be a good way to open that door.

My guest-blog post for Jeff VanderMeer is now on-line; here’s the direct link. Check it out, in between stuffing yourself with holiday leftovers, and feel free to leave a comment there or here.

Best winter solstice wishes to all,

I will be celebrating with Matt Scudder, the gang from Mystery Science Theater 3000, and Omond Solandt! Whatever your traditions, may it bring a smile to your face and a little joy to the world.

To you and yours, have a great holiday season. Now to write!

JSR

As I noted on my News page, World Fantasy Award-winning author Jeff VanderMeer has temporarily turned over his blog Ecstatic Days to his wife Ann, the new editor of Weird Tales, and she has invited upcoming WT authors to write guest blog posts. My guest post should run on Jeff’s blog sometime late next week, around Dec. 27th. I rambled for a few paragraphs about why, even though I’m a scientist, I prefer writing fantasy. So check it out next week–great for curing or intensifying those holiday hangovers. I will pry myself off the sofa and announce it here when it does run.

Between September 2005 and September 2007, I primarily read short stories. The goal was to widen my mind to the possibilities of the form and investigate it across genre, era, and style as much as possible. In short, I wanted non-credited master’s class in the form.

It was an incredibly worthwhile experience, introducing me to a host of authors I had only heard of and, I hope, helping me in my craft. So today I’d like to share a virtual anthology of some of the big hits from those two years. Here are ten great short stories I otherwise would have never stumbled across if I had not begun this journey. They were what I referred to at the time as “The Stand Out of the Week” story, and are followed by general comments on why I dug them. I hope you dig them, too.

1. Howard Waldrop, “Der Untergang des Abendlandesmenschen.” Dream Factories and Radio Pictures. Pulpwestern heroes head to Berlin in the late twenties to kill Nosferatu, and end up working alongside the Nazi party elite who think the vampire is a Jew. Wild, controversial, and bizzaro in form and intent with a tragic ending (the good guys don’t KNOW who the Nazis are until it is too late). Waldrop doesn’t write like anyone else.

 

2. Charles Grant, “Lost in Amber Light,” The Black Carousel. Grant is a master of pacing and word choice. Chilling tale about a twenty something trying to break out of the inertia of his family life, and getting a carnival ride of sex and death for his troubles. Reminded me of Melanie Tem’s “Fryday,” (The Ice Downstream) another favorite. Great stuff.

3. Joyce Carol Oates, “Aiding and Abetting,” I am No One You Know. Ok, I’m now a convert to the Church of Oates. This story was just beautiful and chilling.

4. Charles Beaumont, “A Point of Honour,” The Howling Man. Beaumont is back and he is kicking ass! The Standout of the Week! A chilling tale of peer pressure for kids on the low side of the road, and succumbing to the irrational because the alternative is so unattractive. Thanks again to Mike Kelly for handing me one of the best guides to short fiction a guy could ask for.

5. Patricia Highsmith, “Mermaids on the Golf Course,” Mermaids on the Golf Course. A taught, creepy tale about how trauma can make you the shell of yourself. Lots of stuff left offstage, pieced together because of their absence. I think I might have to own this woman’s short stuff and not just borrow it. Hot damn, that’s weird suspense!

6. Bernard Malamud, “Benefit Performance,” The Complete Stories. A vicious family story of ego and arrogance in the face of happiness. Kicked ass.

7. Annie Proulx, “People in Hell Just Want a Drink of Water,” Close Range: Wyoming Stories. Great story that I read for a writing class years ago. Proulx is a very sharp and very dark writer.

8. Robert Aickman, “Your Tiny Hand is Frozen,” The Wine Dark Sea. In the introduction, Peter Straub said this collection grows from story to story in intensity and feeling and dear god I can’t even imagine what Aickman will throw at me after this stunner. As always, I have to read Aickman slowly, his stories do take a bit more time to get comfortable with, but the payoff is worth it. This story has one of the best endings to a horror tale that I’ve read. Never saw it coming. A true original

 

9. Joel Lane, “The Bootleg Heart,” The Lost District. The Standout of the Week. A painful tale of lust and loneliness that is told in such a quiet voice that the pay off is amplified to the extreme. Lane knows how to write somber tales and make them come alive.

10. Lucius Shepard, “Delta Sly Honey,” The Ends of the Earth. A very rich, densely packed and scary Vietnam story about death and decay.

Dang. That’s pretty dark stuff. I was positive there was a Muppet movie fan fic short story somewhere on this journey . . .

Have a good weekend.

JSR

With Naomi Novik's recent announcement about the Organization for Transformative Works there's been a renewed energy in discussion of fanfiction and its impact on the specluative fiction community. I'm not really going to comment on the OTW -- I tend to concur with John Scalzi on its feasibility and potential danger to the fanfiction community itself. But particularly given my involvement with the BetterEULA project and interactive elements in storytelling in general, the discussion got me thinking about the intersection of reader participation and speculative fiction, and, of course, virtual world and video game space. No, video games can't solve all your problems. Just most of them.

I have to get this out of the way first: I don't generally like fanfiction. I don't read it, I don't write it, and when someone promising devotes a disproportionate amount of their time to writing fanfiction rather than creating their own worlds (and especially characters) I tend to get a little bit sad.

Further, I could not write about Harry Potter. Harry Potter is not mine. I think that characters are almost always foils of their authors in some intrinsic way, and I would no sooner march around with someone else's character -- especially uninvited -- than I would try on another person's skin. It is creepy to me on that level and I can honestly say always has been. I must be a freak, but I have simply never had the inclination to puppet someone else's creation.

I have, however, participated in shared worlds, in small doses. And I fully recognize that whether or not fanfiction tweaks my particular melon, its sheer proliferation indicates that there is a powerful human drive at work here, and smart authors and publishers are wise to ride that wave rather than trying to push it back in the bottle.

But here's the thing. I do think that unbridled fanfiction is actually harmful to an IP. Here's why.

1. Fictional worlds and fictional characters have themes and trajectories that fanfiction writers do not know about. Any author participating in even cursory worldbuilding has notes and copious information that doesn't make it into the main stage -- it is backstory in its simplest terms. By ignoring or operating without these background rules a derivative work is attempting to redefine a character or place in their own terms; they are inherently attempting to alter the IP without the owner's knowledge or, often, express agreement.

2. The more you let someone do something illegal, the more they will start to feel entitled to do so. Turning a blind eye will only work for so long before you start getting major problems, and by then there's no way to correct the situation without royally pissing off some of your most devoted fans. When you allow someone to spend a significant amount of time creating something, you are allowing them to invest, and if you spontaneously take away that investment, they are, pretty rightfully, going to be ticked off and never buy your work again.

3. Fanfiction dilutes an IP. It is not, as some have postulated, simply "expanding" a universe. It is not "transforming" anything. It is creating a myriad parallel universes in which things the original author did not intend happen all over the place. This is not immediately and inherently harmful, but when someone starts to invest in reading these parallel universes, they are storing up situations that did not happen. It's very similar to using cheat codes in a video game. A little bit of it isn't going to hurt anyone, but when it is systemic and sustained eventually you are going to lose the entire concept of what the original game was, because a game, like a world, is defined by its limitations or parameters, which fanfiction and cheat codes generally exist to remove.

All of these considerations are purely in terms of the integrity of the story itself, and don't even take into consideration the potential and historic legal pitfalls that exist when you allow fans free rein over your world.

But I assert that by looking closely at what fans are getting out of the fanfiction experience -- and it appears to be an awful lot (what do they want? A sandbox! when do they want it? Yesterday!) -- it is possible to provide them those advantages and satisfactions without falling victim to the many dangerous pits surrounding the relinquishing of IP. Video games allow interactivity every day without surrendering their creative rights. If you play your cards right, with a little sensitive attention you can turn fanfiction energy into an engine that drives a fanbase, builds a community, and satisfies your readers when you're not laying a book in front of them.

Containing fanfiction has already been attempted. In fact, a year ago someone caught on to monetizing it in a serious way. How it's working out for them monetarily I have no idea, but I tend to concur with those on Making Light who said they would likely burn through their cash and then pop like a soap bubble. It looks like they've made a soldiering attempt to build some community there, but it looks like trying to build a community around a mall, which has never panned out very well.

Outside of video game territory, the primary shared world I participated in was Pern fandom. Anne McCaffrey, way ahead of the curve (because, like new models for online magazines, I believe that interactivity in fiction is ultimately the wave of the future, and that includes derivative work), saw what her fans were doing and gave them some guidelines to behave by if they were sharing her world. It wasn't handled perfectly, through little fault of hers, but it was a hell of a lot better than anything else of its kind that I've seen.

Here are, in my opinion, the critical things that Pern fandom did:

1. It split the universe, deliberately creating a definably separate parallel universe for the Pern world where specific world-altering events did or did not happen. This separated the sandboxes of McCaffrey's Pern and her fans' Pern without changing major sensory features such as landscape, world mechanics, or environmental feel. This was a stroke of genius that prevented Pern from going the way of Darkover. Bulletproof? No, but close enough.

2. It gave fans rules by which to create their characters, even employing some basic random number generation. This is like pouring a nice fat dish of agar for your community. Using some very simple game mechanics, it ensured that participants had an even field and some baselines to play by -- and also an achievement ladder that they could climb. The Pern fangroup also provided an entire system by which new fangroups, or "Weyrs", could be created. This egalitarian mindset helped ensure that Pern was, for the most part, an amazingly peaceful, pleasant place to be.

3. It allowed participants a huge degree of freedom in their choice of expressive media, whether that was text storytelling, live (text) roleplay, craft-making, textile-art, or even game creation (MU*s). There was very little in terms of expression you could request permission for from the fandom and be told "no". And resultingly some players created some amazing things -- cookbooks, sculptures, costumes, and more.

4. It actually grew the world by requiring that players created their own characters rather than manipulating the characters of the author. "Canon" characters were off limits and could not be given dialogue or represented in more than a passing reference fashion. This kept McCaffrey's novels further distinct and commoditized while presenting a very reasonable and acceptable alternative for fans that encouraged them to have personal investment and engage creatively with the world.

The cohesiveness of this system meant that fans were provided a clear, sanctioned, fun playground to exercise their creativity in. Not only was McCaffrey protecting her IP, she was encouraging some amazing creativity amongst her fans. She was having them engage in some of the most compelling elements that would later feed the explosion of massively multiplayer online games -- in a simple, clear way and in her own world, encouraging them to create characters to which they would form indelible lasting attachments.

Could players break the rules? Sure. And they did. There were a few major kerfluffles in the fandom that I was aware of, and all of them resulted in lack of maintenance from McCaffrey directly on the system. Fan systems do need to be maintained and at large capacities become organisms that need attention if they are to avoid going feral. Some Weyrs did go feral, and a few of them were even put down for it -- all stemming from the groups engaging in activities for long periods of time (years) that the original creator did not know about. Once McCaffrey did know, she felt that her world theme was compromised, and felt compelled to take action to correct it. This drove away a not insignificant number of fans, as their investments were taken -- and illustrates the importance of maintaining a communication line between the IP originator and the major arteries of the fan groups.

But despite these hiccups, relatively few people actually deliberately ignored McCaffrey's wishes. Why would they? She'd given them the core of what they wanted. And if anyone did piss in the sandbox by defying her, the entire community would typically rise up and smite them down -- McCaffrey didn't even have to lift a finger. Fans generally have a great deal of respect for the creators of the works they wish to occupy; if they are treated with respect in return, they'll do tremendous things for you.

Authors and owners of secondary worlds have started to crawl their way onto the Internet, some of them kicking and screaming. The next step is for them to give some focused, competent attention to their fans and the careful growth of community. I think it is no coincidence at all that some of the most prolific fangroups concern worlds created by women. Fan groups need to be nurtured and understood -- while still treated with firmness when they go astray.

Would I build on McCaffrey's foundation? Sure. In lots of ways. But that foundation does exist and, rather than allowing the fan community to run wild and untended, it behooves the owners of IP to take a proactive role in letting them into their worlds. Reader creativity and participation is here to stay, and, properly leveraged, it can be one way that books can effectively compete with live media. As usual, the solution exists in looking for potential rather than burying our heads in the sand until the explosion comes.

In Michael Shermer’s book The Borderlands of Science, he dedicates a chapter on genius: what it is and how does it function? In doing this research, he formulated six points for cultivating the skill set that geniuses seem to have. I think these points are excellent for writers, grad students, and anyone else interested in doing their best in creative and intellectual work. The comments in brackets, about how this could apply to writing, are mine.

1.Be sensitive to the important problems in a field to be solved, and ignore those that are unimportant or unsolvable (Read current stuff and pay attention to the debates but don’t let them weigh you down. You may not be able to save the short story from the prophecies of death that have cropped up since the end of the pulp era, but you can always write a better story by knowing your genre and reading outside of it to give it a fresh approach)

2. Educate yourself with as much knowledge of a subject as is available, and if a skill is involved, practice, practice, practice (Make reading lots of fiction a regular part of your daily diet; workshops and writing books can be critical to success, but you have to translate their value into success by writing, writing, writing)

3. Respect both the knowledge of the experts in the field, but do not be afraid to challenge anyone or anything. There are no sacred cows (Learn from the masters by reading the greats, but be wary of hero worship. Old writing hands will give you excellent reasons why not to use first person or start a story in a fantasy tavern or ever use a therapy session in a story, but if you think your story needs these things, go forth and prove the old hands wrong. If you fail, write another story.)

4. Look for new ways to solve old problems and try something no one has else has ever done . Think outside the box. Do not fear ridicule. Listen to your critics, but do not let them dictate your thinking. (Experiment. Mash genres, styles, approaches into ugly and beautiful hybrids. Know full well that when you work outside your comfort zone you will be using muscles you don’t normally exercise so you may drop the ball, and your crit group will make this clear to you if you can’t see it yourself. But, if you just stick with what you know, you’ll never grow, and the reason your current sharp skills are sharp is because, once upon a time, they were weak but showed the glimmer of promise and you spent some blood, sweat and tears to get them strong. Et tu with new skills. Listen to the good advice of editors, crit groups and friends, but remember that in the end the story is yours and yours alone and sometimes that means sticking to your guns. Just be damn sure that the reasons for this are to make the story better, not to protect a wounded ego.)

5. Communicate your new ideas with others in the field. Intellect dies in isolation. The conflation of old ideas into new configuration comes from outside stimulation. (Have a crit group or first-reader you trust, or a go to workshops or writing events to get your engine running with others of like interest)

6. Generate lots and lots of creative products to give yourself an extensive variety from which to select those most likely to survive and reproduce in the cultural marketplace. (write lots of stories, find your voice and your strengths, don’t worry if some stories are too weak at the moment, they may become stronger at a later date when you have a new idea or greater skill set. And get those stories out to editors! Send them a knock-out blow every time. If it bounces off one, fire it at another. Only send out the stories you believe to be your best so that when they are rejected you have no doubts that it was less about the story as opposed to it being a good fit for the magazine. The more effort you can put into closing that “doubt gap” is worth it in the long run. But never ignore an editor’s advice out of turn. If you reject their suggestions or observations, make it a “considered” rejection.)

So, there you are, the keys to the garden of your own genius. Go forth, amigos, and cultivate. And buy the book, Michael Shermer, The Borderlands of Science: Where Sense Meets Nonsense (London: Oxford Books, 2001)

To celebrate the premiere issue under new editor Ann VanderMeer, Weird Tales magazine is running a trial subscription offer at half price. It’s three issues for $10–view all the details here. If you act soon, you could get the first issue of Ms. VanderMeer’s editorship, #347, which has my short story “Excision” in it. There is also a brand-new Michael Moorcock Elric novella scheduled for early next year. For my money, Elric is the most interesting sword & sorcery hero because he’s actually an angst-ridden antihero. I’m very curious, given Ms. VanderMeer’s literary background, to see how the magazine evolves under her lead. There are plenty of magazines for literary fantasy, but not many at all for “normal” fantasy written with a literary sensibility.

This trial offer ends Dec. 21, so snatch it up before it’s gone. I did.

Writing is a hard gig. So much of it is tied to negativity: rejections, near misses, limited successes, a pay rate that hasn’t changed since the pulp days. Generally, publication is the greatest measure of success. And rightly so. But looking at publications at professional and respected markets as the only measure of success can be hazardous (note that I said “only measure” of success). I’ve been working at this craft for just shy of a decade and my average for stories published per year has not increased since I started, though I now publish in better paying pro and semi-pro markets. In almost any other field, this ratio of input to successful output would be a sign of failure: over one hundred and fifty rejections to one story sold in a year.

But the world of art ain’t fair. We know this. So using that equation as a fair measure of ones ability can lead you toward bastardized thinking about your efforts. Buying your stories is out of your control: that’s an editor’s job. All we can do is write more stories to have more chances at sales, and make them better stories so that they have a better chance. Stories can be rejected for any number of reasons that have nothing to do with quality (but for god sake do not ignore the advice of editors when they give it to you!). So, as I keep pounding the keys and working to make each successive story better than the last, I like to remind myself that the war of art is a two-front war. There is the Bad News Front, filled with rejection, bad luck, and the unfair nature of the beast. There is also The Good News Front, aspects of your efforts that remind you of the value of your conduct in this battle. If you only see the Bad News Front, you’re missing the full spectrum of conflict here. For me, the Good News Front includes:

1. Positive feedback from editors: I’ve noticed that most of the rejections I get now also include encouraging words from editors about some aspect of my story. So while I work on my limitations I am also aware of my capabilities.

2. Stories still being considered for purchase: I have two stories on an editor’s desk at a pro rate magazine. No final decision has been made yet. But, it shows I’m still playing in the big league, even if I am an underdog.

3. Selling non-fiction that relates to writing: I’ve enjoyed some success with selling a short informal history of writing workshops in the 20th century, conducting an interview with my favorite contemporary author Gary Braunbeck, and my recent piece on pro wrestling as a form of fantasy. Each has earned me cash, kudos, and helped me make contacts with people I respect in the genre world. This helps build professional credibility, which is also a goal of mine.

4. Story Production: Since December 2006, I’ve completed thirty-four stories. Twenty are in various stages of being revised or thrown out, but that’s roughly two stories a month. Damn. Looking at these numbers helps remind me of my dedication to my craft and proves I’m not as lazy as I sometimes think I am.

5. Story Experimentation: Along with my comrade in arms Justin, I attempted to write a story a week for three months (helping to explain a lot of the above output). I wrote tons of stuff outside my comfort zone: pulp SF, mimetic sad stories, fantasy/alternative history, YA, experimental POVs, stories without dialogue. Some were awful, some need plenty of revision, and some were among the best things I have yet written. I also wrote fourteen vignettes to music this past week which was a real creative headtrip for me. Stretching my repertoire is also a sign of commitment to the craft.

6. Story Revision: Revisions can be brutal depending on how you look at them. If you only see them as an exercise in exorcising all the flaws of your draft, as a collection of your failings as a writer, then revisions feel like hell. I try to balance this with the mindframe that I am trying to make this the best story possible, of using my skills at a different stage of writing to bring out the best there is from the first draft and get rid of the junk. In short, I’m hunting for diamonds amidst the coal, and though I might get dirty I am still finding MY diamonds.

7. Story Release: Those fourteen stories sent to the market represent 38% of all the stories I have out there. Damn. That’s pretty good for one year. I think my previous year’s effort was maybe six stories. While I certainly agree you have to make the story the best it can be (see above), unless you release them into the cultural marketplace you are missing an important step in becoming a pro. Unless I dislike the story, I keep it in circulation, finding it a home no matter what. I sold a story this year that had 21 rejections over five years before it found a home. Perseverance is critical, as that example showed.

8. Rejection Reflection: When rejections do get me down, I look at my rejection file and see all the markets that have turned to dust while my career marches on. Again, perseverance is critical.

9. Finding niche markets: Ralan and Duotrope are invaluable resources for finding markets, but I’ve also found many on my own. I sold a serialized short story during Halloween to the local paper in Kingston that earned me $500.00. I’ve queried magazines that have similar subject matter to my stories and created opportunities for publication that otherwise would not exist. Whenever I think I can’t find a new market for a story that’s been kicked in the face over ten times, I surprise myself by discovering one off the beaten track and create another possibility for publication

10. Story Reflection: I’ve received a few reviews over the years, mostly positive and some very cool. I don’t look at them much, but they offer a reminder when the rejections for the year are entering the three digit range that, yup, I got talent and know how to use it and, gosh darn it, some people like my work.

Publication is just one part of the war. Think of it as the decisive moment of battle, where victory comes to fruition. The key to that victory is in the story you wrote, but supporting its final thrust are all the component pieces of the Good News Front, holding up against the rejections and injustices (perceived and real) of the battlefield so that, in the end, your perseverance pays off.

Huzzah.

JSR