The State of Play

Greeting from the mysterious mists of editing! I thought I’d just pop my head over the battlements so you know I’m still here; we might be down to chewing the shoe leather and eyeing up the rats for dinner, but the People’s Republic of Novel Revisions is still going strong.

 

No, I don’t know where I’m going with that either.

 

It’s been a busy few weeks. I’m in the midst of revising The Copper Promise and that has proven to be an oddly exhausting activity, at least mentally. It’s fascinating though; when Juliet gave me her pointers for smartening the thing up, it gave me a new perspective on the book, and now I understand rather more about the characters than I did previously. Which just shows how incredibly useful a very perceptive reader can be.

 

So yes! It’s very exciting, actually. One of my biggest jobs (ahem) is to reduce the word count as The Copper Promise is rather on the hefty side. On the face of it, to my delicate writer’s soul, this feels nigh on impossible. “I’ll never manage it!” I wail, chewing on my pens in Eat and worrying the Kenny Everett look-a-like who makes the coffee. “Every word is essential!”

 

Except it’s not, of course. I have spare words all over the shop, and scenes I am perhaps not utterly happy with, and so the Big Fat Chunky Word Count is being whittled down to a slightly more slippery number. It’s oddly satisfying, plus it’s enormous fun to be back with Wydrin and the gang. I’ve missed them.

 

In other bits of small news, Dark Fiction Magazine has reopened to submissions, and for our March episode we’re looking for stories inspired by folklore (a favourite subject of mine) so get scribbling! And yes, I am still doing the Everything and the Cat Project (even if one night of booze almost made me forget to upload the thing) and at the end of this month I’ll do a little post rounding up my favourite pictures so far. In the meantime, if you feel the need for random photos of trees and Lego in your life, you can follow me on instagram (username sennydreadful, as ever).

The Other End of the Year Post

Well, essentially 2012 was the year of The Copper Promise. As you might remember, it was around this time last year that I released the very first part onto the wild plains of Amazon; The Copper Promise: Ghosts of the Citadel was supposed to be the first in a series of short sword and sorcery novellas. They were supposed to be fast, written and released one after the other, and they were supposed to be short.

 

And then while I was writing part two, at the beginning of this year, several things happened at once to change that. Firstly, I realised that releasing each part after I’d written it just wasn’t going to work – maybe if it was a silly thing that didn’t really matter, I could get away with that, but TCP was growing more complicated, and if I wanted it to be good, I would need to be able to go back and polish. And that was the other major thing: The Copper Promise was growing. I loved the characters, who felt frighteningly real to me, and I loved the story, which had accidentally grown into some sort of weird epic/pulp hybrid.

 

So I threw out the idea of instant gratification and wrote parts 2, 3 and 4 in 2012. And then I redrafted, and edited, and then edited some more, and ended up with a book nearly twice as long as anything else I’d written (it’s still too long). And what happens to it now? Well, that is the question.

 

Thanks to some quirks of fate and a writing buddy who always seems to know what’s going on before I do (I’m looking at you, Adam) The Copper Promise ended up on the desk of the fabulous Juliet Mushens of the Agency Group, and in a sudden twist of awesomeness that I’m still getting my head around, I got an agent. Undoubtedly one of the highlights of my year was meeting Juliet for the first time (who is every bit as sharp and hilarious in real life) and hearing her quote bits of my book back at me. I mean, you wouldn’t think that would be weird, but it is. In a brilliant way. Next year proves to be very interesting indeed.

 

There were other things happening in 2012, of course. After ignoring it for a year I finally summoned up the courage to read and edit my Urban Fantasy book The Snake House, and much to my huge surprise I didn’t totally hate it. I also started work on a YA Fantasy book called London-Under-Sea (all weird religion, sea monsters and fishpunk) although that is on hold for the moment while I revise The Copper Promise. In non-book stuff Mass Effect 3 came out and proved that it is indeed the greatest video game series of all time, if not the greatest SF trilogy of all time, and I sobbed and cheered my way through it in an epically messy fashion. I finally watched Avatar: The Last Airbender and utterly fell in love with it.

 

Other, more random moments of 2012: I saw two sets of friends get married and danced at their weddings, I wore a corset for the first time and didn’t die, I oversaw new episodes of Dark Fiction Magazine, and I attended Bristolcon, which was brilliant. I got hugged by a wookie in Wales, saw my name in the acknowledgements of a real, live book (twice, technically) and partially helped nag my lovely boyfriend into taking up writing regularly again.

 

And that’s all I can really remember at the moment – no doubt I’ll have left something significant off the list, but all in all, I reckon I can chalk 2012 up as a goodun’. Wishing you all a fantastic new year full of excellence and joy!

 

Rejections, a New Perspective: Or Developing Your Crusty Carapace

I haven’t mentioned it all that often on this blog, but these days I edit the audio fiction website Dark Fiction Magazine, and over the last year or so reading submissions has given me a new perspective on the short story market.

 

I know what it’s like to get rejections. I even have one from Black Static which I’m quite proud of, just because it came on a slip of paper and this somehow made it seem ancient and special, and I’ve lost track of how many I’ve received by email. It’s a very painful process, and I have ground my teeth and cursed the gods and the demons and all the little goblins in between, but after a while it doesn’t hurt as much. There are those markets, of course, which you’re desperate to break and each “no thanks” email is a kick in the writerly-ball-sack, but eventually you do start to form the beginnings of a crusty carapace that protects you from the worst of the agony.

 

Now, as the editor of DFM I’m the one sending rejection notices, and for a writer that is a very odd experience indeed. I feel bad. I feel conflicted. I occasionally cackle with the power of it all and stroke my evil cat. Mostly though, it’s a sobering process because it demonstrates exactly how complicated a rejection can be. I have, for example, said no to plenty of stories that are actually very good, but not right for DFM, or not a good fit for the upcoming episodes. I struggle with this a lot, because I don’t want to say to these writers, “you are crap”, because even though the email will say this isn’t quite right for us, it always feels like you’re being told “you’re crap”. Often though there simply isn’t room for everything good that hits the slush pile; last year we did five episodes (four stories an episode) and next year we’ll probably do four episodes, and that just doesn’t leave much space. Every story has to be very, very good and every story has to fit the episode – that leads to a lot of rejections.

 

There’s a lot of crap too, of course. For every story I agonize over there’s probably another two that get chucked pretty swiftly. Most of the time someone’s had an idea for a story and hasn’t quite got the craft to tell it yet, or, being a genre magazine, the story falls into common genre patterns, such as “It’s horror! Stick loads of blood and guts and possibly some uncomfortable sex in there!” I do, admittedly, have very high standards for short stories and a lot of submissions will come a cropper, and that’s as it should be; I want DFM to host the best weird fiction, after all. Some stories we receive just aren’t SF, Fantasy or Horror at all (which puzzles me a little – the website banner is a giant green zombie person, so you’d think that would be a big clue) and some are just too long or obscure.

 

If knowing how these things work hasn’t quite made rejections easier for me to stomach, it has at least made them easier to understand, and a year of chomping through the slush pile has taught me an awful lot about editing as well as writing. For 2013 we’re going to announce the themes of the episodes beforehand, giving writers more of a chance to refine their stories for the magazine, and hopefully this will lead to me sending fewer rejection emails. Plus the cat finds all the cackling puts her off her lunch.

Holy Link Post, Batman!

Busy week, no sleep, too much sugar… my brain isn’t sensible enough to give you a big fat blog post today, but I do have a series of links I should wave about, and one of them does include a big fat blog post:

 

I have been guest blogging over at Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review, where I talk in a meandering sort of way about fantasy maps and my own journey as a fantasy reader.

 

The Dark Fiction Magazine Halloween issue is now complete, with excellent stories from Lou Morgan, Emma Newman, Adrian Faulkner and Joshua Malbin – all with a watery theme. I strongly recommend giving your ears this spooky and slightly damp treat.

 

The cover for Adam Christopher’s The Age Atomic has been revealed and it’s a corker.

 

Nanowrimo continues on its coffee-sodden way; I’ve popped up a rough synopsis for London-Under-Sea if you’re curious.

 

And that’s it! Hopefully next week I will have a more coherent set of thoughts for you, but for now it’s back to the word count.

Halloween Shorts Part 1: In the Wolf's Glen by Andrew Reid

Happy Halloween, everyone! May your pumpkins be bounteous and your skeletons ripe with gore. In celebration of the most wonderful time of the year (shh) we have an excellent creepy story from the marvellous Andrew Reid. A bit later I'll pop up a story by me, and then this afternoon I will direct you over to Dark Fiction Magazine, where more Halloween treats await. Enjoy!

(You can also go here for an audio version, read by the author!)

InTheWolfsGlenPOST.doc Download this file

New Flash Fiction Competition at Dark Fiction Magazine

Just a quick note to tell you that we've opened a new flash fiction competition over at Dark Fiction Magazine! The theme this time is Hidden History, and the deadline is the 13th of July. I bloody love reading fresh flash fiction, so please do get your entries over to us as soon as. 

We'll publish you and everything!

It'll be ace!

Go go go!

Dark Fiction Magazine Special Edition: Stories of the Smoke

Just a quick note to point you in the direction of Dark Fiction Magazine, where you can now listen to four stories from the excellent Pandemonium anthology, Stories of the Smoke. The collection is jammed packed with excellent brain fodder so putting this episode together was a genuine pleasure; I strongly recommend reading every single little bit of it.

Random Story Thursday: Six Months, Nineteen Days

A short story for you, my little crickets, on this soggy grey Thursday.

(Note for the curious: technically this story is set in the same world as this one I recorded yonks ago for Dark Fiction Magazine, although you don't need to have heard that to get this. If you get me. You get me?)

Six_Months_Nineteen_Days_final.doc Download this file

Dark Fiction Magazine: 2012 and Beyond

After a wee winter holiday, Dark Fiction Magazine is back with us, bristling with awesome science-fiction stories. Launch your ears into the future and go have a listen (for free) here.

 

The reason that I’m posting about it on my blog (other than the fact it’s just great, obviously) is that this is the first episode where my partner Marty and I have steering the Ominous Ghost Ship that is Dark Fiction Magazine.

 

We’ve been involved in the past, with both writing and narration, so when Sharon Ring and Del Lakin-Smith, the awesome chaps that founded the place, decided to take more of a backseat in order to pursue their own projects, Marty and I sort of shuffled forward to take the helm. Marty likes twiddling about with audio stuff (I’m fairly sure that’s the correct technical term) and I like reading through lots and lots and lots of stories (no, honestly, I do) so it seemed like the perfect fit.

 

Getting our first episode out has been an interesting process, and a huge learning experience. There were times, when self-imposed deadline after self-imposed deadline whistled merrily past my ears, that I wondered, “What on earth are we doing? Do I not have enough stories to wrangle as it is? I think my head might fall off.” But in the end, seeing the episode go live and knowing those four science-fiction stories will be amusing/alarming/entertaining earholes all over the interwebs was a lovely feeling, and I look forward to doing it again soon. So big thanks to: Marty, who not only handled the audio side of things but also did all manner of technical web stuff I didn’t understand, to our fabulous narrators and subs reading teams, who did an ace job as ever, and to Del and Sharon for letting us play with their toys.

 

A Round Up: Dark Fiction Magazine, Pseudopod and the Cambridge Film Festival

All right, not a very catchy title for the blog today, but a lot of stuff has happened this week and I’ve utterly failed to write about it, so it’s time for a quick catch up.

 

First of all, the finalists for Dark Fiction Magazine’s Epic Flash Competition have been announced - a big ol’ congratulations and a hearty huzzah to all those picked. I helped out with reading the submissions this time round and it was an amazingly difficult process. There were so many cool ideas and top stories, sorting out which ones should go forward to be judged by James Barclay was very tough indeed. Well done to everyone who sent in a story - you all rock. If you want to read the (officially "woobie") little short I wrote when inspired by the competition, it's still up on the blog over here.

 

I’ve been on the narration duties over at Pseudopod, the podcast that brings scary fiction to your lugholes. If you would like to experience the extra creepy thrill of listening to my sarf-lahdan accent read a story, Blue Eyes by Jay Caselberg is up at the moment, and a very unsettling piece of fiction it is too. Go listen!

 

In a change from all the short stories and editing, I wrote a little article about Silent Running and WALL-E for Take One, the magazine of the Cambridge Film Festival. It’s out now and you can read it here, or if you happen to inhabit the actual Cambridge, you should probably be able to pick up a print copy! This pleases me enormously.

Epic Fantasy Competition at Dark Fiction Magazine, and the Art of the Very Very Short Story

Pop on over to Dark Fiction Magazine and you'll see a rather nifty flash fiction competition has just been announced: they’re looking for epic fantasy stories of a thousand words or under, and there are actual cash prizes! So you are cordially invited to dust off your broadswords, polish up those magical artefacts and get your dragon on. Full details (and a rather excellent picture) can be found here.

 

I do love the perversity of fitting an “epic” fantasy tale into less than 1000 words. I was lucky enough to have my flash fiction piece “Milk” selected for DFM’s Twelve Days of Christmas Special. I had to work really hard to get the story down to a very zippy 1000 words and because of this it remains one of my favourites- it’s as tight as it can possibly be, and every small piece of it pleases me. It doesn’t hurt of course that the very lovely Kim Lakin-Smith read it out for me and did a fantastic job. If you’d like to hear it (don’t worry, it isn’t actually that Christmassy) nip over here and press play.

 

Being a big fantasy fan I’d love to give this competition a go myself, but since I’m helping out DFM with their slush reading at the moment, I suspect I’m not really allowed. ;) However, I am very excited to see what people can cram into that neat little word-space, and I think we’re going to see some very interesting stories.

News From Dark Fiction Magazine

As some of you will know, I've worked with Dark Fiction Magazine a number of times in the past, both as a narrator and as a writer with stories featured in a couple of episodes (the flash fiction short "Milk" read with grace and aplomb by Kim Lakin-Smith remains one of my proudest moments). These days I'm helping out a bit more, so I'm here to tell you that the magazine is open again for submissions of previously published stories- fantasy, horror, science-fiction, weirdness and terror and thrills, they're after them all!

I also have this message sent direct from the Dark Fiction offices themselves (carved into the bare rock of a mountain, you know, and staffed by the evil flying monkeys who thought the Wicked Witch wasn't wicked enough)

You already know that Dark Fiction Magazine are always on the look out for fiction of the creepy and fantastical variety- did you also know that we’re after artwork, too? And voices. Not in a steal-your-voice-in-exchange-for-a-nice-pair-of-legs way (we’re not Hans Christian Anderson) but we do like to have a good variety of interesting voices for our stories, so if you’re an artist or a narrator who could see their work being featured on DFM, please do send us examples of your work via our submissions site.

Hurrah! Get submitting.

The Year that was Writing Dangerously

So it’s that time of the year where we blog about the last twelve months, summing up the triumphs and the achievements and so on. Well, to be honest I’ve always been incredibly bad at remembering what happened in what year (I know, useless isn’t it? I have a great memory for pointless facts and a terrible one for the actual timeline of my life) so this blog post will be the vaguest sort of summary of 2010, including some of the things that I’m reasonably certain happened this year.

I started and finished The Steel Walk, a sword and sorcery novel about an ex-prostitute turned swordswoman forced into protecting the unwanted child of an evil family, whilst fighting off the evil machinations of the Green Council and their dreaded “dead walkers”. It was a book that didn’t go exactly according to plan, but it taught me lots of lessons that I’ll take on with me to the next book. And I did finish it, always the hardest bit.

Short story wise I’ve had a reasonably successful year, achieving way more than I ever thought I would. I’ve had a tiny wee piece of flash fiction published in Black Static as part of the Campaign for Real Fear- picking up a copy in Alt:Fiction and seeing my name in print was particularly exciting! I’ve been published twice in Hub Magazine and received some fabulous feedback on the stories. I’ve found homes for other stories in the From the Dark Side and Farrago anthologies, had a spot on the Un:Bound blog for Barleycorn (one of my favourites) and recently became involved in Dark Fiction Magazine where I had a lot of fun reading out Sarah Pinborough’s Do You See? I even had two of my own stories included, the second of which was a Christmas ghost story read out by Kim Lakin-Smith (who did a beyond fabulous job!). It’s been a good year for me and short fiction, and I owe a huge thanks to everyone who took a punt on an unknown writer. I hope I can keep it up in 2011!

Speaking of Alt:Fiction, I am pleased that I got my arse out of the house for once and attended a proper convention, meeting many lovely people and hearing so much writerly wisdom that I was filled with huge optimism and enthusiasm as well as dread and terror at the size of the task in front of me. Mostly, I just loved geeking out about books for an entire day with a bunch of like minded people.

I started writing Dead Zoo Shuffle in November with Nanowrimo. DZS was a big challenge for me; it was science-fiction/crime, and written in the first person, neither of which I had tried with a full length novel before. I got through 50,000 words in a month, and of course I’m still writing the bugger. Mainly I’m pleased with how much this book is making me think- trying to figure out the plot of a crime novel at 9.30am in Starbucks really sets you up for the day.

So at the beginning of 2010 I christened it “The Year of Writing Dangerously”, and in many ways it was. I formed a routine and forced myself to stick to it, and wrote more words in one year than I ever have before (the quality of those words is quite another thing, of course). I wouldn’t have had such a fun and groovy year without the help of a number of people, so since I’m here I’d like to say a quick thank you! Firstly, to my partner Marty Perrett (@Boxroom on twitter and go here for his website-http://boxroomboy.co.uk/ ) who has provided endless support and chocolate in the face of my erratic enthusiasm and changeable moods, whilst also putting together some amazing creative projects of his own. Thanks as well to Adam Christopher (@ghostfinder on twitter and go here for his blog-http://www.adamchristopher.co.uk/ ) a friend and writing buddy who has beta read for me all year, always giving useful advice and a kick up the arse when needed. I also owe Adam specifically for his ability to remind me of the right writing competition at the right moment, and for singing my praises to others. I’ve been lucky enough to meet a whole gang of marvellous people on twitter too, including Sharon Ring (@DFReview) and Del Lakin-Smith (@dellakin_smith) in charge of Dark Fiction Magazine http://www.darkfictionmagazine.co.uk/, and Neil C Ford (@nubenu) who was kind enough to lend a struggling writer a netbook, enabling me to construct my coffee shop related writing routine. Thanks also to the lovely Adele (@Hagelrat) at the Un:Bound blog http://hagelrat.blogspot.com/, and the charming Alasdair Stuart at Hub magazine http://www.hubfiction.com/ who were kind enough to give my stories a home. And a general hug and slurred drunken “love ya!” to all the fabulous twitter peeps who have kept me sane and entertained this year- you know who you are!

So if this was The Year of Writing Dangerously, what is 2011? The Year of Getting My Arse in Gear and Finally Editing Something?

The Twelve Days Anthology from Dark Fiction Magazine

So it's here, on the darkest and spookiest day of the year- twelve stories to captivate, amuse, and give you the shivers. My story "Milk" is the first one on there, narrated by the lovely Kim Lakin-Smith (go find out more about that talented lady here: http://www.kimlakin-smith.com/ ) and I am tremendously proud of it. I've been full of the flu for the last two weeks so I wasn't able to read the story out myself (I sound rather like a bucket full of poorly frogs) but this turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as Kim's voice suits the story so well I actually fidgitedy about with glee while listening to it. I'm also proud of "Milk" simply because I rather like it myself for once, and I don't often have a lot of affection for my own work.

Go here to listen to some excellent short fiction: http://www.darkfictionmagazine.co.uk/episode/twelve-days-anthology/

I'm working my way through them all now, and it is a marvellous little treat of wintery goodness.

Dark Fiction Magazine's Twelve Days Anthology

So Nanowrimo is over, Dead Zoo Shuffle is half way through, and hopefully I'll be back to blogging again regularly. Phew!

Just a quick note today to do a brief snoopy dance of Christmas joy- not because I've actually done all my Christmas shopping (pressies bought = 2) or because I remembered to buy an advent calendar, but because my short story "Milk" has been chosen as the "maids a milking" section of Dark Fiction Magazine's Twelve Days Anthology.

All the details are here: http://www.darkfictionmagazine.co.uk/blog/twelve-days-anthology-the-winning-stories/

I've also been lucky enough to have another one of my stories included in Dark Fiction Magazine in Episode 2: Dystopian Desires. If you haven't heard it yet, On the Last Wave is here: http://www.darkfictionmagazine.co.uk/episode/issue-2/

Obviously, I'm dead excited about this because it means my name is appearing next to some authors who I really admire- a truly fab christmas present. ;)

So much news my head may fall off!

I have so much exciting news this week I hardly know where to begin… So let’s start with this!

Dark Fiction Magazine (www.darkfictionmagazine.co.uk) is pleased to announce the launch of a new service for fans of genre fiction. Beginning Oct 31st (Halloween), Dark Fiction Magazine will be launching a monthly magazine of audio short stories. This is a free service designed to promote genre short fiction to an audience of podcast and radio listeners. A cross between an audio book, an anthology and a podcast, Dark Fiction Magazine is designed to take the enjoyment of short genre fiction in a new and exciting direction.

Dark Fiction Magazine publishes at least four short stories a month: a mix of award-winning shorts and brand new stories from both established genre authors and emerging writers. Each episode will have a monthly theme and feature complementary tales from the three main genres – science fiction, fantasy and horror.

Co-founder Del Lakin-Smith said: "I love reading short stories, and with the increased uptake of mobile and portable devices this really is a growth area. But like many I find I don't have as much time as I would like to read, so I tend to listen to many podcasts on the go. The idea of replacing my podcasts with high quality, well performed audio short stories is something I find highly appealing, so Sharon and I set about making that a reality."

Sharon Ring, co-founder of Dark Fiction Magazine, said: “From technophobe to technophile in less than two years; I spend a great deal of time working online. To while away those hours, I like to listen to podcasts and drink copious amounts of strong coffee. Now, while I don’t recommend you drink as much coffee as I, I do recommend you check out what Del and I have created. We love podcasts; we love genre fiction; we built a site to bring the two together.”

The theme of Dark Fiction Magazine’s first episode is The Darkness Descends and will feature four fantastical stories:
‘Maybe Then I’ll Fade Away’ by Joseph D’Lacey (exclusive to Dark Fiction Magazine)
‘Pumpkin Night’ by Gary McMahon
‘Do You See?’ by Sarah Pinborough (awarded the 2009 British Fantasy Society Short Story Award)
‘Perhaps The Last’ by Conrad Williams
Lined up for future episodes are Pat Cadigan, Cory Doctorow, Jon Courtenay Grimwood, Ramsey Campbell, Rob Shearman, Kim Lakin-Smith, Ian Whates, Lauren Beukes, Mark Morris, Adam Nevill, Gareth L Powell, Jeremy C Shipp, Adam Christopher, and Jennifer Williams, among others.

With a team of dedicated and passionate narrators, a central recording facility and a love of genre, Dark Fiction Magazine delivers a truly outstanding aural experience.

Dark Fiction Magazine will also be producing special editions with seasonal stories and topical issues, competitions, flash fiction episodes and novel excerpts. Each episode aims to shock and delight, to horrify and confound as Dark Fiction Magazine takes its listeners on an aural tour through the world of genre fiction.

Dark Fiction Magazine is a collaborative project, created and developed by Del Lakin-Smith and Sharon Ring. For further information, contact Del or Sharon at
editorial@darkfictionmagazine.co.uk

You might have noticed my name on the end of a pretty impressive list there, so unsurprisingly I am quite chuffed. But not only have I got a story coming up in later episodes, I am also doing some “reading out loud” duties- Nerve-wracking indeed, but I can tell you now that the story I got to do my Jackanory voice on was aces. As soon as it actually launches I will be straight on here to do a little snoopy dance for you all.

In other news, the lovely people over at the Un:Bound blog have let me taint their marvelous pages with a new short story at part of their Writer Wednesdays. This odd little thing has long remained one of my favourites, even though I sense it may be an acquired taste- I’d love to know what you think!

http://hagelrat.blogspot.com/2010/10/writer-wednesday-barleycorn-by-jennifer.html