Publication: "Traffic Jam" in SpringGun

My flash fiction piece, "Traffic Jam" appears in the latest issue of SpringGun.

This was one of those wonderful stories to write, where you hear a voice in your head and the story comes out already able to walk forward. Originally it was several hundred words longer, and paring it down to fit within flash magazine guidelines (under 1000 words) made the story much stronger.

Open publication - Free publishing - More digital poetry

Clarion West Class of 2011: Publications and Sales, 2012

This has been a wonderful year for my Clarion West class. Here's a highlight of some of the big moments for my classmates, with a list of publications following.

Book Publication!

Corinne Duyvis sold her first book! Here's the announcement: "Corinne Duyvis’s debut OTHERBOUND, where a seventeen-year-old boy finds that every time he closes his eyes, he is drawn into the body of a mute servant girl from another world — a world that is growing increasingly more dangerous, and where many things are not as they seem, to Maggie Lehrman at Amulet, by Ammi-Joan Paquette at Erin Murphy Literary Agency (World English)."

Writers of the Future Amazingness!

2011 Westies also did stellar work in the Writers of the Future Contest. Nick Tramdack, Mark Pantoja, and Alisa Alering were all finalists, with Alisa Alering going on to win the 4th Quarter! She'll be at the Writers of the Future workshop in LA with Nina Kiriki Hoffman this year, and is eligible for the grand prize. I'll be watching the stream of the awards ceremony and cheering her on.

Editorial Prowess!

David Rees-Thomas co-founded Waylines: Speculative Fiction and Film. He and co-founder Darryl Knickrehm ran a successful Kickstarter campaign to fund the magazine, and the first issue will be out in January 2013.

Anthology Power!

One of the instructors at Clarion West is almost always an editor. Our wonderful editor in residence was L. Timmel Duchamp of Aqueduct Press. During her week of teaching, she gave us all a call for submission to a new anthology she was editing and encouraged us to submit. The concept is really interesting, one that I think my fellow English composition teachers would like: it is a collection of the untold stories behind famous characters, presented in a Wikipedia-like format. All in all, stories by seven of the Clarion West class of 2011 will appear in this anthology: Missing Links and Secret Histories: A Selection of Wikipedia Entries Lost, Suppressed, or Misplaced in Time. Cheers to Jeremy, Anne, Jenni (me!), Alisa, John, Cassie and Nick!

Here's a list of publications and other writing credits that have been sold or published in 2012. Check out these great stories! 

Alisa Alering

• "Keith Crust's Lucky Numbers." Flash Fiction Online. Forthcoming 2013. 

• "Madeline Usher Usher." Missing Links and Secret Histories: A Selection of Wikipedia Entries Lost, Suppressed, or Misplaced in Time. Ed. L. Timmel Duchamp. Aqueduct Press. Forthcoming. 

• First Prize, 2nd Quarter, Writers of the Future. 2012. 
• Finalist, 2nd Quarter. Writers of the Future. 2012.

• "Delicious." Every Day Fiction. 14 May 2012. 

Corinne Duyvis

• Otherbound. YA novel to be published by Amulet Press in 2014. 
• Represented by Ammi-Joan Paquette of the Erin Murphy Literary Agency
• Goodreads page
• Blog posts: "That Time I Sold a Book" and "The Timeline of That Book Deal Thing"
• Interview at Query Tracker

S.L. Gilbow

• "Alarms." Lightspeed Magazine. March 2012. 
• Author Spotlight 

Eliza Hirsch

• "A Map of the Heart." (Con)viction anthology. Forthcoming February 2013. 

• "A Dancer for Aonou." Kaleidotrope. Summer 2012. 

Cassie Krahe

• "Walking Home." Daily Science Fiction. Forthcoming. 
• Clarion West Submission Story

Jenni Moody

• "Traffic Jam." SpringGun. Issue 7. Forthcoming. 

• "Peter Rabbit." Missing Links and Secret Histories: A Selection of Wikipedia Entries Lost, Suppressed, or Misplaced in Time. Ed. L. Timmel Duchamp. Aqueduct Press. Forthcoming.

Jack Nicholls

• "Running Wild." Aurealis, Issue 54, September 2012.  
• Clarion West Week 3 Story

• "The Statues of Melbourne." Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine. Issue 56, 2012.
• Clarion West Submission Story

• "The Tale of the Aggrieved Astrologer." Beneath Ceaseless Skies. Issue #101. August 9th, 2012.
• Clarion West Week 6 story

Mark Pantoja

• "The End." Tales of World War Z: Fan Fiction and Stories of the Zombie Apocalypse. 4 July 2012. 
• Clarion West Week 2 Story

• "A Darker Cycle." Nihilist SF. Issue 1. 26 November 2012. 
• Blog post about the process of revising this story
• Clarion West Week 6 Story

• "Houses." Miette's Bedtime Story Podcast. 8 September 2012. 
• Clarion West Week 4 Story

• "Buck." Writers of the Future Finalist, 2nd Quarter. 2012. 
• Clarion West Week 5 Story

David Rees-Thomas

• Co-founder and Fiction Editor, Waylines: Speculative Fiction and Film
• Kickstarter project
• "Waylines Magazine: An Inside Look." Blog feature by Alisa Alering. 

Maria Romasco-Moore

• "The Great Loneliness." Unstuck. Issue 2. December 2012.
• Clarion West Submission Story

Jeremy Sim

• "Fleep." Waylines Magazine. Forthcoming. 
• Clarion West Week 5 Story

Anne Toole

• "The Red Bandit." The Digital Wall. 2012
• Reprint of "Night in the Library." Originally published in Crossed Genres. Issue # 3. February 2009.

Nick Tramdack

• "Ligne Claire." Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine. Issue 57. 2012.
• Clarion West Week 1 Story

• "Triple Bind." New Myths. Issue 20. September 2012.

• "Legend of the Secret Masterpiece." Shanghai Steam: A Steampunk Wuxia Anthology. 2012.
• Clarion West Week 6 story

• "The Comeback." Phantasmacore. 27 April 2012. 

• Finalist, 4th Quarter, Writers of the Future, 2011. 
• Clarion West Week 2 Story

• "Cold Embrace." Ray Gun Revival. Issue 14, Vol.2. 2012. 
• Clarion West Week 4 Story

Alberto Yanez

• "Driving for Peanuts." Toasted Cake. Episode 23. 3 Jun 2012. 
• Text version available here on Alberto's website. 

• "Recognizing Gabe: un cuento de hadas." Strange Horizons. 16 Jan 2012. 
• Audio version at PodCastle, Episode 235. Read by Brian Lieberman. 23 Nov. 2012. 
• Clarion West Week 5 Story

Congrats to all of my Clarion West classmates on a great year of writing! 

The Next Big Thing

Last Wednesday I was tagged for "The Next Big Thing" by Eliza Hirsch. Here are my answers:

1) What is the working title of your next book?

I don't have a working title at the moment, other than "the story that takes place at a convention"

2) Where did the idea come from for the book?

In the wake of DragonCon, there's always tons of photographs and videos about that year's experience. This year I particularly loved this video:



It struck me that a convention would be the perfect setting for a quest narrative. They're a microcosm of all these different worlds and fandoms. Also, it's a great place to try on different costumes/ personas.

3) What genre does your book fall under?

YA

4) What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

My story features geek cultural icons, so it would be amazing if they made cameo appearances as themselves. I would be insanely happy if my book were made into a movie and George Takei played himself. 

As for my main characters, I would want them to be played by very new, unknown actors. I feel like more well-known actors sometimes evoke expectations in the audience based on their previous roles.

5) What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?

A young girl goes on a quest to experience and document moments of geek triumph at DragonCon in an attempt to reconnect with her alcoholic father.

6) Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

I will be seeking agent representation. 

7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

It's a current work in progress, but my goal is to have the first draft done by the summer. 

8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

In Freaked by J.T. Dutton, the main character goes on a journey to a Grateful Dead concert. I kept expecting for the story to jump ahead, for long periods of time to pass. Mid-way through the book, I realized that the journey was the story. Dutton's novel made me reconsider the role of time in a YA novel, and I'm trying to work with a similar short time frame for this book.

I'm also playing with voice. I remember reading Minister Faust's The Coyote Kings of the Space-Age Bachelor Pad and thinking "I bet this was so much fun to write." I love the narrative voice style in Minister's novel. Sometimes I have the cloud of Serious Writer hanging over my head and I want to write only the novel that will devastate you and change your life. So I keep reminding myself of authors like Minister Faust who write with purpose but have fun along the way.

9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?

Talking with my Star Trek club friends about DragonCon reminded me of the excitement I felt at going to my first convention. Like a lot of people I know, I wish I had been more comfortable with my fandom earlier. I missed out on years of having fun with people who like the same stories I do, all because I was trying really hard to fit into someone else's mold of who I should be. 

10) What else about the book might pique the reader’s interest?

I'm writing a novel about a geek girl for other young geek girls to see a kindred spirit in action. My goal is to make a book that is fun, but also has a steady undertow of emotional conflict. I can promise you Star Trek references  that go beyond the well-known episodes, a Browncoat code of honor, and superheroic feats.

That's it for me. What's your work in progress about? I'm tagging Ashley Cowger, so check on her blog next week to find out about her novel! 

Ready, Set, {Pause}, Workshop!

In workshops where there are a large number of participants, the critique from each member most likely has a time limit. At Clarion West, we had seventeen people plus an instructor critique each story. To make sure everyone was able to speak about the story, each person was allowed a maximum of 3 minutes for feedback.

As an incentive to keep within that time frame, we were each given four or so tickets at the beginning of the week. If you felt strongly about a story and wanted to keep going after the polite tap on the table (or awkward gong of a half-full aluminum water bottle), then you could rip up one of your tickets and keep going. But on Friday there were drawings for wonderful prizes, and your tickets were your chance to win.

Three minutes can feel like a long time if you're doing a presentation in front of a class. But if you're speaking about a story and trying to articulate what did and didn't work for you as a reader, then three minutes is never enough time.

Our first full-story critiques happened in week two. The first day of workshop I tried to cram in as much information as I could during my 3 minutes. I had a list of bullet points and I rattled them off, not really going into detail on any one point. I also wanted to appear competent to my classmates and instructor, and I think this often happens to writers during the first critique session at any workshop.

The critique room at Clarion West 2011

Then it was my turn. My story was ripped apart. Not unkindly. Not without caring words for what was working in the story. And in many ways the critique I received during that first round of stories propelled me to try my hardest during each submission cycle at the workshop.

But after the crit session had ended that day I didn't go to lunch with my classmates. I felt bombarded with feedback. I escaped to my room and stayed there for an hour in the quiet. During that time I thought about what was important to me as a writer. Which feedback had been most useful.

It wasn't the laundry list of things to fix. It was the moments when a classmate took the time to explore an area or two of my story, to really dig in deep. Or when they responded to an idea brought up earlier in the critique session. During these types of critiques my classmates usually spoke more slowly. Without the pre-listed bullet points, the critiques were more conversational. They reached me in a way that a list of Dittos couldn't.

These types of critiques worked for me because I felt connected to my classmates. Oddly, I was able to separate my work from my self more easily when I felt like my classmate addressed me directly. Maybe because the sense of them wanting to help me succeed came through more clearly. Or maybe the whole experience just felt less overwhelming.

So I decided to do something different with my responses. I still only had a few minutes for each critique, but each time I sacrificed a few of those precious moments to make a connection with the person whose story I was critiquing.

"Hey Mark."
"Hey Alisa."
"Hey Jei."

I think some people may have thought it was silly, but after a while it caught on and other people started doing it, too. And in the end my critiques were the better for this moment of pause, of connection.

Books I've Loved: Lovely, Dark and Deep by Amy McNamara

Lovely package my copy arrived in - thank you Amy! 

I loved this book. Wren is a great character, and her interactions with others are believable. She's eighteen, spending a year after high school living at her artist father's house in the Northeast. All she wants is time alone to process life as it was and is - two very different variations. At heart she's a photographer, but she's put away her camera. Seeing the world is painful, and she feels like there's a false veneer she was led to believe all her life that has been stripped away.

Poetry is always just beneath the surface. From the title, I was a bit afraid Robert Frost would overshadow the story. But instead his appearance is a small one, with Larkin the poetry that Wren connects with as an extension of her own feelings. Poetry is not used as a gimmick or an easy spandrel. It is a realistic part of the world. Which is to say, it comes and goes at the moments when Wren needs the words.

Along with the setting and the use of the present tense, the poetry gives the book a feeling of suspension in time. This mirror's Wren's situation, and helped me to connect even more with her.

Wren's in the process of grieving over a lost friend, but her experiences are also related to depression. McNamara's writing provides a realistic window into how such an experience affects not only the person in the center of these emotions, but also everyone connected to her.

This is a big book, much thicker than most other YA novels on my shelf, but I never lost interest or felt the story flagged. This is one of those books that is a great companion, and I was sad to finish the story and place it on the shelf.

One last note: the cover art and binding are gorgeous.

*I received this book as a giveaway on Nova Ren Suma's blog, 99 distractions.*

MFA Flashback: The Bound Thesis

Once I defended my thesis, the graduation process was far from over.

I was elated to be done with the oral defense of my thesis. It was a wonderful experience, and one that prepared me for future job interviews. But the saga of the thesis copies had yet to begin.

As a graduate student, your thesis becomes part of your university's legacy. The library, your department, and often your advisor will want a bound copy of your thesis. You may say, "that's nice, I bet I could just whip up a cost-effective copy through a print on demand service." But no! Alas, the path through this final requirement is much thornier.

In order to graduate, you have to organize the printing and binding of your thesis. The format must be approved by the Graduate School, and must include strange formatting like 1.5" left margins. The student is responsible for printing four copies of the thesis on 100% cotton paper, and then the university library organizes the binding of each copy.

To make a long story short, I will say that organizing the printing and delivery of your thesis from the other side of the country is a fate I do not wish upon you. If you find yourself in such a situation, I hope you are as lucky as I was and have an amazing department mastermind on your side like Leah Aronow-Brown.

Once my printed, unbound copies arrived at the graduate school it marked the last hurdle needed to confer my degree.

Now I had to wait.

The binding process takes a long time. Usually, they will not arrive until several months after your graduation date. I graduated in the summer, and I received my bound thesis copies yesterday, in late November.

I wasn't sure what the bound copies would look like. I'd never seen one in person. So I began daydreaming about green cloth covers with gold embossed letters, artisan embellishments in the interior cover.

But the thesis copy is more of an academic document, bound to be shelved in a library archive. It is still lovely, but in a more sterile way.

The cover is black but looks kind of plum in a certain light

Shadow in a rare still photograph

This thing is thick - a solid 1 1/2 inches.
The page total is right at 150.

The side is printed with my last name at the top
and the bottom has the date of graduation, August 2012.

Woot!

Still, it's pretty cool to see my name stamped into a book cover.

As a general warning: thesis copies are expensive. Paying for them was a joint graduation present from my mother and father. Some of the copies are mandatory, like one for the library and one for your department. You cannot graduate until those copies are paid for and arranged.

But you also have the option of ordering additional copies. My family members wanted copies, so we ordered several. I wish I had made a separate version of my thesis for my family and a few friends, either through a print on demand site or as a xeroxed and hand-crafted zine. I could have designed a lovely cover for it no problem, and would have made sure to include an Acknowledgements page (which in the rush and stress of my thesis defense I forgot to include in the university version).

I'm submitting several of my thesis stories to journals, both literary and genre, so I don't want to put them up on amazon as a collection at the moment. But a private copy for family would not be considered publication.

I think I might go ahead and see if I can make a few copies of my thesis this way. There are still family members who won't get a library bound copy, and friends and advisors I'd like to thank for their help during my MFA years. Mark Pantoja's Kickstarter short story collection was beautiful, and sits proudly on my shelf. I'd like to have something lovely to give to my friends as well.

But I think it is also oddly fitting that my thesis, This Apocalypse Won't Last Long Enough, looks like a book that would survive the apocalypse and might be found in a government stronghold that a few straggling survivors use as a way station.

My First Novel: Stepping Stones in the Mire

I recently applied for a fellowship that had me rummaging through my files for a screenplay I wrote during graduate school. I began the screenplay during an Introduction to Screenwriting course and expanded it during an Advanced Screenwriting independent study. When I opened the file with the name of the screenplay I had worked on during grad school, it was as I remembered it - a bit of a mess but with some great visual scenes.

I set into work revising it for a few minutes and then something ticked in my brain. Wait - what was that other file in my screenplay folder?

I went back and there was a title I didn't recognize. I opened the document and I remembered - I'd spent weeks rewriting the screenplay during the stint when I'd wanted to switch my graduate thesis focus.

This version - the revision of my graduate screenplay - was really good. The scenes were specific, the characters three-dimensional, the push of the story more likely to grab a reader or viewer and pull them in. It was surprising how big the distance was between the two versions. There was a leap from idea to execution, from mucking about and finding the story to telling the story with confidence.

Photograph by clrcmck
Used under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License

I'm working on my first novel, aided by goals with my writing buddy, NaNoWriMo word counts, and nudges from writing friends. What I've found interesting so far is that I can already tell the difference between my original story concept and where the novel is headed. I spent quite a while brainstorming about this story, but nothing clicked until I sat down and started writing.

My worst enemy in this writing process is the voice inside my head saying that this is all crap. And of course this book will need to be revised. Of course. That's when the book is really going to start to sing. I can't catapult myself from one shore to the other via the clean air. I'm going to have to wade through the water.

Looking at an early and late draft of my own writing at this point, when I'm feeling adrift in a big project, has given me the drive to keep going. I'm confident that I can revise this novel and make it cohesive, deeper and brighter than this first draft. The strange trick is freeing myself to write without beginning that revision process too early, starting off an endless cycle of editing myself out of the story before it is even written.

How's your novel going?

Waylines Magazine: New Market for SF Stories and Films

David Rees-Thomas was in my Clarion West class in 2011. He's a wonderful fellow - a sharp reader, a lovely poet, and a good friend. He's been a Managing Editor at Ideomancer for a while, and he's decided to start his own magazine along with Darryl Knickrehm, whom I do not know but who has stellar design skills.

The new magazine is called Waylines: Speculative Fiction and Film. They're looking for submissions of short stories and short films. Their website is professional and easy to navigate, and they will pay $40 per story. It's a great market, and I'm looking forward to reading the first issue. 

There's also a Kickstarter project, where you can get very cool postcards and such along with issues of the magazine. 

Here's their Kickstarter video. It's short (under 3 minutes) and is really well-done. 

I'm going to back this project on Kickstarter because as a writer I want to support great new venues for the fiction I love to read and write. And I know this is going to be a wonderful magazine.

Here's a quick peek at their Kickstarter progress, in case you'd like to contribute, too.

MFA Flashback: Visiting Writers

J.T. Dutton and Me, 2010, Photo by UAF staff photographer

One of the best experiences during my time as an MFA student was the visiting writer series that my department sponsored. Even though we were in Alaska, my program brought amazingly talented and accomplished writers up to visit.

The visiting writer would give a lecture on Thursday afternoons about their craft interests and areas of expertise. These lectures were open only to MFA students and English faculty, so they were cozy affairs where you really got to  know the writer and ask questions. And the writer had time to respond to those questions slowly and with care. It was almost like taking a seminar class with the visiting writer.

On Friday evenings the writers gave a public reading open to the entire campus and community, followed by a book signing where the local bookstore provided copies for sale.

But there's another element of the visiting writer that takes place earlier in the week, around Wednesday or Thursday.

Second and Third year MFA students have the opportunity to participate in a one on one manuscript discussion with a visiting writer. The visiting writer only meets with a few students (there isn't much time for more), and there are usually around six visiting writers each year. So meeting with a visiting writer is a once in an MFA experience for most of the grad students in my program.

My thesis advisor asked me if I'd like to meet with YA author J.T. Dutton, and I was ecstatic at the chance. I emailed her around twenty pages of the novella I'd been working on, and wrote the date for our appointment in my calendar.

I was terrified of meeting Dutton. I was afraid she'd throw my manuscript in my face and tell me I was a horrible writer and that I shouldn't have wasted her time with my silly story.

Instead, she gave me one of the best critique sessions I've ever received. She went over some language and pacing edits with me that snapped the opening of my story to life. It was amazing to watch my story wake up from my lumbering prose just by a few scratch marks through extra words, a few arrows to rearrange sentences in the paragraphs.

Next we moved onto larger discussions about story, and about writing YA. It was the first time I had met someone who wrote YA fiction. So many of my favorite books are considered YA, but for some reason I had never entertained the idea of writing YA as something that MFA graduates did. But J.T. Dutton's novel Freaked was based on her MFA thesis at UAF. I think I had a prejudice that YA fiction couldn't be serious, and that only serious writing mattered.

At the reading on Friday night, J.T. read a passage from the end of her novel, and it is a reading that both my partner and I remember to this day as being an amazing experience. It was a beautiful passage about being at a Grateful Dead concert and the feeling of being in the crowd.

Freaked and Stranded by J.T. Dutton

J.T. told me something important during my one-on-one critique session. "This is a novel," she told me. "A YA novel."

That story is still with me, and I haven't written it into a novel just yet. But I know that I can, and that it can be as sad and serious as I want and still be a beautiful YA novel. And it can also be funny and geeky and talk about Star Trek, and those aspects might even make it a much better story.

Big Ideas and Permissions

“Writing a novel is like driving a car at night. 

 You can only see as far as your headlights, 

but you can make the whole trip that way.” 

- E. L. Doctorow

I'm slowly growing more comfortable with the idea of stepping into a novel without a detailed outline. I've tried making an outline using the feminine journey in the back of 45 Master Characters, but I always get hung up. Why? Because I haven't spent enough time with my characters and their story to know who they are.

I've got three novel ideas, and I keep switching back and forth between them, unable to commit to pursuing just one. NaNoWriMo is about to start, and the days between me and the 10,000 word goal by November 15th are steadily disappearing. I'm kind of in novel freak out mode.

I have two wonderful writing friends to thank for pulling me out of my pre-novel funk.

Alisa Alering sent me a wonderful article by Bruce Holland Rogers about deciding on your Big Picture: why you are writing this novel. Each of my novel ideas has a different practical and creative purpose in my writerly big picture. One is a YA, one is literary/ experimental, one has a good feeling of forward motion. The YA would be writing for a great audience that I am eager to connect with, and would give me the satisfaction of finishing a story that I've been writing on and off for years. The literary one might never see the light of day, but it would give me the opportunity to unlock some stories and language I've been keeping stowed away. And the one with a good feeling of forward motion feels like one I could finish, that would prove to myself that I can write a novel, and would have enough of a structure to not melt into disparate parts after draft zero is done.

So what is most important to me in this first novel attempt?

My guideposts

With these in mind, my choice of which novel to write is much easier. I'm going to write the one with the sense of forward momentum, the short story idea my thesis advisor asked me about three years after it was workshopped in her class, about a body-modified raven and a lost girl searching for something that others are trying to hide.

The second writer push that happened this week was that Ashley Cowger gave me permission to write a crappy first draft. I'm constantly trying to persuade myself that it is ok to just write, get that first draft on paper, because I know I'm going to revise the story twenty or more times before I ever submit it anywhere. But the impact of having an accomplished writer whose work ethic and creative work I deeply admire tell me that it's ok to just follow the story where it wants to go the first time through is amazing. I really feel like a giant weight has been lifted off of my chest.

After all, one of my guideposts is to prove to myself that I can write a novel. It doesn't have to be the best novel in the world on the first draft, but it does need to be done. And if I'm not judging my writing every step of the way, then done is a goal I can accomplish.

So I'm going to pass this writing gift on to you, one day before the start of NaNoWriMo, in the almost November time when everyone's itching to write a long story.

It's okay to write a crappy first draft. 

I'm going to do it. Lots of writers do it. 

You have our permission. 

Now start writing. 

Using Pinterest as a Writing Resource

My mom got me hooked on Pinterest.

We were at the local craft show two years ago, and my mom said she had seen some of the ideas for monogrammed gigamabobs online. "You aren't on Pinterest? I'll send you an invite."

At first I was only friends with some family members and the random people that Pinterest automatically selects for you when you first sign up. But then I started following some of my writing friends, and even my favorite literature professor from my undergraduate days. And now it's a story brainstorming activity that I spend about 15 minutes a day doing. It's relaxing, and continuously inspiring. I have more story ideas than I could ever write, and I find more every day.

How Pinterest works is this:

Your homepage is an all visual bulletin board that's constantly changing. You can click a little button at the top of each post to pin the image to your own board. You create boards to keep your pins organized.

If you see an image you love and repin it, you can start following that person's pins. It's like making your way through a labyrinth, constructing it around you as you go.

How I organize my boards:

I have two different strategies for brainstorming on Pinterest.

The first is for character and setting ideas. A lot of the boards I subscribe to are art and travel that have the kind of feel that draws me in - funky, off, lovely. Usually these images spark a story in my mind.

I'm not worried about pinning them publicly, or sharing them here. I think everyone is inspired by images in a way that is specific to who they are. Let's say we both wrote a story based on this image:

Source: Uploaded by user via Jenni on Pinterest

I think that little girl's next step would be in two totally different directions.

So by compiling an idea box, I feel like the general well of ideas is never empty. I still get ideas from other places - cool documentaries on PBS, links sent to me by friends, strange dreams. But I like having this little alcove of images to keep my sense of story working.

One of the exercises young writers are given is to go to a public place and observe others. I used to do this often in college, and I'm still prone to stare a second longer or listen a bit longer than I probably should, but now that I'm working I spend most of my time alone in an office or at home with my cats. So I practice eavesdropping on images while I unwind from a long day.

The second way I use Pinterest is to brainstorm for a current work in progress. I have a dedicated Pinterest board for my current novel project, A Thousand Tangled Thoughts. Some of the pins on this board are research-based, while others evoke a certain mood I want to convey through the story. Most of these images I've found outside of Pinterest via Google image search or have happened upon while doing research. I added the Pin It bookmark to my browser's bookmarks toolbar, and whenever I find an image that goes with my book I click on it and it adds the image to my Pinterest board.

Sure, I've got the obligatory tasty foods and geeky stuff boards, but those are mainly to keep the occasional Batgirl fan art or recipe for raspberry cordial that pops into my feed. But I've focused my subscription feeds over the past year so that the images that show on my page are mostly story inspiration.

It's like watching a secret camera feed of a bunch of people's dreams, but they're all cool people who like misty landscapes and girls in quirky-beautiful clothes. And unlike dreams, these images are captured clearly, so I can use them for inspiration whenever the story is ready to be told.

Con*Stellation XXXI: Perseus

This year I dove into Con*Stellation, spending more than twenty hours there over the course of the weekend. I went to many panels, attended the art auction, nibbled on cashews at the Friday night reception, and hung out in the dealer's room with my fellow Trek club friend Laura.  Here are my favorite moments from Con*Stellation XXXI: Perseus!

Friday

The Science Fiction Writers and Cake Appreciation Society Reading

First up on Friday was the reading by members of the Science Fiction Writers and Cake Appreciation Society. Last year one of the stories was bought by an editor of a pro magazine.

This year was my first time taking part in the reading. I read snippets from "Sister Winter," my week 6 Clarion West story. I was afraid that reading short snippets from a long piece, instead of an entire really short piece, would work badly, but a few of the other writers told me afterwards that they had really enjoyed my story. So I was really glad I had decided to read that one. 

The organizer of my local sf writing group is Lin Cochran, who is also a Clarion West alum.(She attended the first two Clarion Wests - so cool!) She read her story that appears in the recent anthology of Alabama authors, Summer Gothic, and it was lovely.

Lin Cochran reading from Summer Gothic

Louise Herring-Jones read a witty and hilarious excerpt of "slug porn" that has me wanting to try some humor writing. It worked so well as a piece to read aloud to a group. She's also a wonderful convention friend - waving you to sit up front with her at panels and making sure you've met everyone in the conversation circle. Louise had some extra copies of Mirror Shards 2 on hand, so I bought one from her to get a better feel for what sf anthologies feel like. I think I'll make it one of my writing goals this year to submit to a themed anthology. 

Panel: "Non-Traditional Routes to Publication"

Late on Friday evening I went to a panel on self-publishing. A lot of the conversation centered on e-publishing, including perils and format limitations. Images seem to be especially tricky, and are better left out unless printing a specialty coffee table book where people expect to pay higher prices. Createspace seems to be the go-to place for print self-publishing.

Two of the panelists were L.R. Barrett-Durham and Grady Glover, authors of the Fear and Trust series. They are two of the nicest people I've ever met, and were always ready to hang out and talk about writing and how to publicize your work. But the biggest tip they had to give me wasn't anything they said - it was about how to be really friendly to (sometimes shy) strangers.

L.R. Barrett and Grady Glover
Photograph by Laura of SF Collectibles

Saturday

Filk Concert: Cat Faber

Cat Faber

On Saturday I went to a mid-day filk concert by Cat Faber. She has such a wonderful stage presence, and I loved listening to her songs. I wish the concert could have been outside; her lyrics are the kind that make me want to stare up into leaf canopies and daydream.

My favorite songs she performed were "If the Last Spaceship Leaves On Time" and one about a mouse finding a giant chocolate bar and pretending to be magnanimous when he offers the leftover almonds to his friends (after having consumed the entire chocolate bar by himself).

Usually music doesn't make me think of story writing. Literary readings help dredge up solutions to my story problems, but music mostly helps me block out background noise. But Cat's songs had me spinning fantasy yarns in my head from the start. I think I might try listening to her CD when I have writer's block to transition into the feeling of storytelling.

Filk Concert: Marc Gunn - Firefly Drinking Songs

Marc performed several awesome Firefly inspired songs, and it was easy to see that he's a real fan of the show. My favorite song was "Freedom Costs", an anthem for the independence fighters.

All of the songs he performed were amazing, lilty and soulful at the same time. He took the time to speak out the chorus with the audience before the sing-a-longs, encouraging us to join in.

Con*Stellation is a very intimate con, so taking pictures or videos of people on a panel feels like walking up to someone and taking a picture in their face. But there are tons of good fan videos of Marc performing at DragonCon on Youtube, so check him out.

Sunday

Autograph Session

I almost didn't go back to Con*Stellation on Friday, but I'm very glad I did. I had spent around ten hours on Friday and Saturday at the convention, and by Sunday morning I was really tired. But I drank some coffee and that made me feel more like heading out.

When I arrived at the con everyone in the lobby was gathered around the television, watching Felix Baumgartner's dive to earth. When he landed, he knelt on the ground and everyone cheered. It was so cool to watch this moment surrounded by science fiction fans, writers, and NASA scientists. I hope there are more universal cheering moments in our near future.

Felix kneeling after his record jump

At the autograph session I got to sit down and talk with David B. Coe/ D.B. Jackson. That's one of the best things about a small con - there wasn't any huge table between us and a line behind me hurrying me up. I just sat across from him at a small two-person table.  I'm really excited about reading his new book, Thieftaker, and diving into his epic fantasy as well. 

Jackson was a really wonderful literary guest of honor, and was very warm and enthusiastic when I spoke with him for a few minutes after he signed my books. Somehow we wound up talking about Alaska, and a trip he had taken to Denali. 

I have lots of notes scribbled in my notebook from Jackson's panels, but one of my favorites is one I had heard from another person a while back, but hearing it this time it clicked.

One of the panels Jackson was on was an interview, and Eric Flint asked Jackson why he chose to write about Boston during this era. He answered that there is a parallel between the setting and the main character - the character is the embodiment of the city. It is something I'm going to keep in mind while I'm working on my novel. 

Con*Stellation XXI was a great con, and I'm so thankful it takes place in Huntsville. It gave me a great chance to reconnect with my local writing group and to also meet professional writers both in person and by introducing me to their work. I hope it lives on for many years to come. 

Con*Stellation Time Again!

Art by David O. Miller

This weekend is my local science fiction convention, Con*Stellation. I had a wonderful time last year at the 30th Anniversary con, and I'm looking forward to a great convention this year.

On Friday evening at 7:00PM the local writing group, the Science Fiction Writers and Cake Appreciation Society, will be reading stories in the lobby. There will, of course, also be cake.

I will be reading a short story. I am not yet nervous, but it is only Wednesday.

Staying Part of the Conversation

I like to listen to other people.

It's the kind of personality trait that's praised in books on making friends, corny quotes in email forwards, and in high school and undergrad might give the impression of sophistication.

When I was still in high school, I was invited to Capstone Scholar's Day at the University of Alabama. I had to spend a day on the campus taking part in various activities in order to secure a small scholarship.

One of these activities was a leadership test. They placed us in one of those classrooms with the stadium seating, broke us up into groups, and gave us a sheet of paper with a conceptual problem to solve. A panel of five or so people sat at the front of the room, watching us and making notes. Two people in my group decided they would do anything to be seen as the leader. One snatched up the piece of paper and started reading it aloud to the rest of us, the other gestured and talked loudly, restating the other person's points. At first I tried to be part of the conversation, but the charade of it all felt so gross to me. I eventually sat back in my chair and gave up. If that's what it took to win an extra few hundred dollars for a leadership scholarship, they could have it.

This experience and others like it made me hate group work for years. When I first became a teacher, I vowed I would never make my students do group work. But my teaching mentor, Sarah, convinced me otherwise.

"When it comes down to it, we're all on this planet together."

That moment changed many things for me. I gave my students group projects and saw how they benefited from the exchange of ideas and feedback. I tried to reach out more to my fellow MFAers, and I made some amazing friends.

It's the reason I sought out the type of bellydancing that is only truly alive when performed in a group.

But it's still hard for me to be part of verbal conversations that include more than one person. There's that pulling for the sheet of paper, for control. I listen. The points go to the person who has made the most noise.

Writing is my way of speaking without having to elbow someone else out of the way. I want to be part of the conversation, but I'd prefer if it's just you and me talking together instead of a crowd.

This long ramble started with me thinking about two rejections I've gotten this week, both asking to see more of my work in the future. "Please keep us in mind."

These types of rejections fuel me. Especially when the letters mention aspects of my story that have spoken to the editor.

Even when I'm getting rejections, I'm still part of the writing conversation. I'm growing my voice, word by word, so that I can speak through my stories. I want to make friends with a reader, maybe someone kind of like me.

They'll hold the sheet of paper, but they'll also listen.

Novel Buddies & Goal Charts

Novel Buddies

My MFA friend, Ashley Cowger, and I have decided to become novel writing buddies this year. She's written a few novels before, and this is my first one. We're going to set word goals and hold each other accountable. Not in a threatening way, just in an "I know what your goals are - how's it coming along?" kind of way.

I've always kind of felt like writers go to some remote, secret space when they embark on a novel. So it's nice to have this mutual word playground. We're building our own castles, but we can talk to each other while we pat the sand into shape.


Commonplace Book

I still have my lovely notebook for keeping ideas, random journal entries, and bits of inspiration. But I wanted to get a notebook specific to my novel project. And I needed for it to be light, so that I would actually carry it around with me. I can't really take my laptop to work and write on my novel during my lunch break (I tried - too stressful). But I want this novel to be a part of my life for the time I'm working on it. I want to fall into the story and then write my way out.

So I did some browsing and found a great little journal :

         

It was super cheap ($3), has tight binding, good paper quality, and is small - not quite as wide as the tip of my forefinger. I can throw it in the back pocket of my purse and have it with me if inspiration strikes.

Here is my prediction: novels are like people. The more time you spend just hanging around, just being with them, the better you get to know them. Listening to their story before you tell yours is how you make a friend.

Taking this commonplace book with me reminds me to listen:

Researching, bringing words and themes from different sources together

Goal Charts
Here's our goal: 10,000 words by November 15th. I started out with a daily word goal of 150. I kept it up for two days.

Goal chart for the novel project's first deadline

But even though I stopped writing words on paper, I didn't stop writing. I've been twisting the story this way and that in my head, trying to find the angles that catch the most light. At one point I became so frustrated that I swore off this novel idea, started working on something else, and that's when the lightbulbs started going off.

All of those little X marks where I didn't write, they still kept my mind tethered to the story. And they made me honestly evaluate how I've been spending my time.

My daily word goal is up to 210. I'm getting a really good feel for how not terrifying writing a novel can be, at least, drafting a novel. And while I can't allow myself too many reverie breaks, I feel more centered and motivated now that I know my novel a little better.

A New Job Begins and a Piece of Paper Arrives

Last week I started a temporary job as a full-time administrative assistant. It's a wonderful position - great co-workers, a quiet but productive office, and it's on a university campus. In my mind this type of job has one really wonderful feature - I can leave it behind at 5PM and spend the rest of my time writing. 

But last week I was so tired that I didn't write at all. On Thursday I came home from work and fell asleep by 7PM, woke up for an hour, then went to sleep for the night. I'm hoping that my body readjusts fully this week, and I can have my wits about me enough to step into my stories.

One definite plus is that I've been able to read much more. I read an entire book in one week, something I haven't done since grad school. It was a shortish book, only around 200 pages, and it was a memoir, but that's still a step forward. I have to take a one hour lunch break in the middle of the day, and I spend most of that time reading. It's strange - my room of my own is my office. 

I'm considering taking my Eee PC with me and trying to write a little on my lunch break. No big goals, just a hundred words or so. Enough to push me into my novel project every day, so that my brain can work on it in the background as much as possible. 

On Saturday, a large envelope arrived in the mail. No padding, the edges torn. Mail from Alaska always comes in a bit chewed. Thank goodness the contents were in great condition:

My Diploma!

I know it's silly, but damn am I proud of this sheet of paper. Maybe proud doesn't describe how I felt when I held it for the first time. Maybe - excited. The kind that shakes the fibers of your heart a bit. 

I've felt in-between for a long time. It's nice to be out the other side. 

Being Shy on the Enterprise

Season 3, Episode 21 - "Hollow Pursuits"

I loved this episode. It's a character-driven short story with a protagonist we've never seen before - some shy guy who everyone (even Wesley Crutcher) calls "Broccoli."

Lieutenant Barclay pisses Geordi and Riker off by being late to his post, and delivering his engineering analysis in stumbling sentences. He spends his time on the holodeck hanging out with variations of the crew - a much shorter and squeakier Riker, Troi - goddess of empathy in flowing robes, and a wonderful caricature of Wesley as Georgie Porgie.

But outside the holodeck the ship is crumbling, and Barclay's creativity is needed to solve the mystery of the sudden ship malfunctions.

The previous episode, "Tin Man", also dealt with an outsider. A prodigy empath, who seeks the solace of alien creatures that communicate at Ent-like speeds so that he won't be overwhelmed with their voices inside his head.

But while the main character in "Tin Man" was too far removed from the rest of the crew to evoke empathy from the audience, Barclay is a Starfleet officer. He's what many people - including myself - would probably be like if transferred from real life onto the Enterprise. Picard would be terrifying as a boss. And even if given the chance to show your skill, then Wesley pipes in, telling you your half-spoken idea is incorrect.

So it's no surprise that Barclay's perilously close to holodiction. Geordi's the only person in the real world who feels as real to Barclay as the projections on the holodeck. But Geordi surprises Barclay with an admission:

"Listen, I know how you feel. I fell in love on the holodeck once, but you've got to know when to let it go."

Anytime there's holodeck shenanigans it can be easy to brush off the episode as silly. Look - there's Picard, Geordi, and Data as a very rowdy set of Musketeers! (Everyone on the Enterprise looks better with long, flowing locks, apparently.)

But if you look back through the crew's use of the holodeck, Barclay really isn't that different.

Remember Riker's perfect woman, impossible to replicate without the complex interactions of the Bynars?

And what about that moving scene between Worf and K'Ehleyr, when he proposes marriage after they've made love in the rush following a satisfying holodeck battle?

And of course Geordi falling in love with a woman he'll never meet, the holodeck representation of his intellectual peer. Together solving an engineering quandry that's nerdy, sensual foreplay.

So we might expect for the crew to understand Barclay's desire to escape. If there weren't holodecks on board, he'd be reading books. I bet he'd have great discussions with Picard.

Early on in the episode, when the stakes are low, everyone's taking potshots at Barclay. Geordi forcing himself to be civil to a crewmate - it isn't a scenario I had expected. It's interesting, and it opens up space for this exchange:

Barclay: Being afraid all of the time, of forgetting somebody's name, not, not knowing...what to do with your hands. I mean, I, I am the guy who writes down things to remember to say when there's a party. And then, when he finally gets there, he winds up alone, in the corner, trying to look comfortable examining a potted plant.

Geordi: You're just shy, Barclay.

Barclay: Just shy...Sounds like nothing serious - doesn't it?

Watching episodes of The Next Generation, especially in sequence night after night, the Enterprise can begin to seem like a perfect environment, where the threats are almost always from external forces. The crew will come through in the end, thanks to teamwork and individual competence.

But I like having life on the Enterprise be a little less perfect. It makes the crew feel more open to failure, more vulnerable to even small dangers. After all, they're out in the far reaches of space, often very alone.

The world they live in is made more realistic by showing that it is a place from which people need to escape.

Barclay on the holodeck, after deleting all but one of his programs

Submitting Early

Shadow taking a rest from the submission flurry

Literary journals are opening back up to submissions as the school year gets underway, and I've been pushing myself to submit each of my lit stories to at least two markets.

I think there's great value in submitting early. Whether it is to a literary journal soon after they open to submissions, to a fiction contest, or to a themed issue, submitting early has some concrete advantages.

First of all, I'm much more likely to actually make the deadline if I submit early. I have a spreadsheet where I track deadlines, and sometimes I wait until the night before a market closes to look over the story that I had planned to submit. Most often when I wait until the last minute to submit, I realize that there were revisions I wanted to make to the story before sending it out. And that one night before the deadline is never enough time to revise. I find myself at 11:30PM, halfway through writing a scene that feels like it is finally pulling the story together, wishing I just had a few more days. I work on the story until after midnight, but it still isn't finished. In the end I wind up putting the story aside and not submitting it at all.

By submitting in the fall, I'm also more attuned to different markets. I've signed up for Duotrope's weekly newsletter for fiction markets, and each week I get an email with the fiction markets that have reopened to submissions. Going through the available markets chunk by chunk, as they open to submissions, is extremely helpful. I've already found several journals whose aesthetic I absolutely love, but whose name I had never heard before. There's just so many journals out there, that even using Duotrope's search subcategories returns an overwhelming number of possible journals. 

When submitting to literary journals, I find that I get a much faster response when I submit early. Thanks to Submishmash, I can tell when my story is in-progress. That doesn't tell me a lot about where my story is in the slush pile, but at least it lets me know that my story has moved forward a spot. Of my ten submissions that are currently open in Submishmash, half of those are marked "in-progress" instead of just "received." The earliest submission I made was on August 22nd and the latest September 5th. I've already had one response that was incredibly fast - just a few days.

In the past few years when I've submitted stories in March, near the close of the literary journal reading period, it often takes months for journals to respond and sometimes a whole summer, or a year. I know these journals get an insane amount of submissions, and in most cases I am submitting to journals that do not require a reading fee. Response times are expected to be slow, and with good reason.

But submitting early seems like a good best practice. It's kind of like introducing myself to an editor or agent on the first day of a convention, instead of the last. I have more time to make sure my submission is in perfect shape and that I've followed the journal's particular rules, and the journal readers are fresh from their summer vacations and ready to read new stories. We're meeting each other at our best to see if we're a fit. And if we don't fit, that's ok - it's part of the process. But I know I've met my half of the challenge with my best foot forward.