Got a rejection the other day from Fantasy magazine of my story “Triangle Man”, which is cool. Could probably do with another look and some reshaping before I send it off elsewhere. It’s a very odd little story and I’m not sure it’s actually fully bloomed, though I’m also not sure it ought to be fully bloomed, in order to work. Not disturbed at all. I also submitted my story “The Wager” to the Tesseracts11 anthology electronically over the weekend and with the health issues I haven’t gotten to a post office to send the hard copy. I need to …
Category: WRITING
Sort of Relieved, Hopefully More Relief on the Way
Right, not to raise alarums, but… … for the last while, I’m not sure how long but long enough to know it’s been more than a few weeks, I’ve been rather constantly aware of my heartbeat. It’s not skipping beats. It’s not causing me pain. It’s not speeding up or anything. It’s just there, in my chest. thumping away. Okay, sometimes it feels a little tired. But mostly, it just keeps doing what it’s always (for 32 years, anyway) been doing. Except that a lot of the time, I can feel it, right them, pumping blood. Sometimes, I’d swear, I …
Rejections #4&5
A couple of more rejections to note: #4. “Pahwakhe” from ChiZine, 2 December 2006 — they said it was “a fine story, it’s not quite weird enough” for their tastes. Some nice encouragement. This same story is still pending at HLQ. #5. “Soul Competency” from F&SF, today. Form letter, I think: “We’ll pass. There’s some fine writing here, but it didn’t grab my interest.” I’m trying to decide whether to submit it somewhere else as is, or maybe get it critiqued and rework it before sending it out again. But I think I might just send it out again, as …
Ogallala Finished
Well, except the basic proofread that it’ll need before I send it out. It’s another novelette, at 9,350 words. I was hoping to make the story a shorter one, but of course, big ideas and big characters demand a big story, I guess. I’ll have to work something else up, though, for Tesseracts. Right now, I’m looking at “Realer” and “The Wager” as the next best possilibities (since I think “Professor Whitney’s Resignation” will take too long to work up, and “The Crystal Methuselah” might be too edgy for this market), but each story is going to take at least …
It’s Snowing, It’s Snowing!
It was the first big dump of snow this winter, today, at least in Bucheon. I didn’t see much snow in Seoul, though. Lime wrote some kind of exam. Apparently every intern in half of Seoul, Incheon, Bucheon, etc. was in the same place, writing the same test. We met for coffee and… Then we had some pho after. It comes with hot Jasmine tea. There’s a good little pho place in Hongik, where we sometimes go. I hope she won’t mind me posting this pic, as it’s blurry. But she might. Then we wandered around, and finally had dinner …
The Ongoing Ogallala Rewrite
For those following the saga of the Ogallala rewrite — which means anyone reading this blog, as 50% of my recent posts are on the subject (here’s the most recent one) — I’ve just hit 6479 words, which, when we count editing for wordiness may be more like 6300 words. That leaves me with anywhere between 700-1200 words to wrap things up, which is encouraging. I’ve rather radically transformed the family drama part of the story, though in a way that makes it more conventional, more related to the world the characters are living in, more poignant and more frustrating …
Ogallala Rewrite Continues
I’ve just hit 2300 words in my rewrite of Ogallala, which puts me at just under halfway for the target wordcount. (I’m going to shoot for 6000 words, though 7000 will be okay too if necessary.) One of the things I learned at Clarion came into play in my rewrite, which is about characterization. Yes, some pretty strong objections were issued regarding the poor handling of science in the story. But of course, aside from some of my own goofs, I was also aware that some of the science involved was messed-up, because in one way the story is about …
Ogallala Rewrite
Inspired by Alfred Bester’s example, I’m going to worry less about exactly how the science works in the rewrite of this story. This will infuriate some readers, maybe — though I think it can be balanced if I work things just right. In the original draft, the science was actually quite faulty according to the dominant model we have now about icecaps melting, and the implications of the melt were totally misconstructed by one character, though not by accident. I think I can still work in some of that, but actually, I think I can do a better job of …
Cahoots Ad
That womens’ magazine I write for, Cahoots, has a new ad up. Check it out, pass it on. (PS I didn’t have anything to do with the ad itself. I’m just spreading the word.)
Head Above L’Eau
Just sticking my head above water to say I’m busy. I have sent out six stories today, to seven different markets (one was a simultaneous submission), and tomorrow I have a lecture to attend in the afternoon, and then some kind of Department variety show that I need to act as one of the judges for in the early evening. (The top three prizes are the equivalent of $100, $75, and, I think, $50 US.) The talent show almost got canceled because too few students signed up, but I managed to force some of the students in my English Through …