Opera Buffo

Moosewood!

2012-01-30T18:19:00.000-08:00

Growing up, I knew instinctually that there were two kinds of people in this world: normal people and vegetarians. I also knew without asking that the vegetarian existed in an unholy realm no Wagner should ever dare enter. Just as children of strict Catholic parents know they risk disinheritance if they leave the church, I knew that becoming a vegetarian might create an insurmountable schism between myself and my father.

And yet, I felt pulled to it. Like a theater-loving boy in small-town Texas checking out Sondheim scores at the library, I used my library card to access the stuff of temptation. I found secret treasures in the cookbook section. An illicit thrill prickled up my spine the day I brought home my first vegetarian cookbook, but I was able to hide the titillating vegetarian nature of the recipes from my family, for I had found an ethnic cookbook, charming all of us with exotic ingredients from faraway places. I'd found Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant, and it proved to be a gateway drug. It took me a while, but I found my way to become an herbivore.

Now, almost twenty years later, I've been revisiting the Moosewood collection of cookbooks. I've made something out of almost every cookbook they've written, and Sundays remains a favorite. The past three weeks, I've made almost nothing that wasn't a Moosewood recipe (or at least, Moosewood-inspired. If you've read this blog before, you know I can't stick to a recipe for love or money). I'm happy to say that we've eaten like kings.

Vegetarian kings. My dad would laugh his butt off at the thought.

Parenting

2012-01-02T21:37:00.000-08:00

A couple of weeks ago, I was walking with my eight year-old daughter downtown. We passed a store window full of fancy shoes and talked about the different styles. Then as we crossed the street to continue on our way to our library, a man began shouting at me. "Lady," he bellowed, "when I have kids I'm going to protect them from the sick culture you're inflicting on that girl. Bad! Bad! Bad!" He kept shouting until we were out of earshot.

My natural instinct was to push the guy out into on-coming traffic, but I just ignored him. I sort of wish I could have taken him out to coffee and told him just how dumb he was being--not just because he was wrong about me (or I think he's wrong; the reason we were downtown that day were to pick up a pair of shoes from the cobbler, thus instilling the value of repairing over replacing, and to visit the library and the history museum, which I think are pretty worthwhile cultural endeavors), but because he clearly doesn't understand what good parenting is all about.

A good parent knows that we can't protect our kids from our sick culture forever. We live in a country that bombards kids with messages about how to look and how to shop. If I simply kept my daughter under house arrest, or raised her in the wilderness without exposure to store fronts and advertising, I could expect her to enter the world as a very confused young adult. Or a very rebellious one.

Instead, we looked at those fancy-pants shoes together, and I pointed out the fur-lined heeled boots that I wouldn't wear because I can't stand the thought of adorable animals like foxes killed just for fashion. Even though I swooned over the gorgeous stiletto spectators, I had to explain that I'd never wear them because they'd hurt my back and worsen my foot problems, and that looking good isn't worth that kind of price to me. It was a worthwhile conversation about some of the real costs of fashion.

But that guy only saw two females talking about shoes. He didn't see the second-hand clothes or much-repaired clogs or bags full of library books. He didn't hear that thoughtful discussion about shopping or any of our later conversations about Oregon history or banned books. He let himself jump to conclusions.

Of course, if he knew more about us, he would have probably been horrified to know that we headed home to finish playing Resident Evil: Code Veronica.

Because a really good parent wants their kid to be ready for a zombie outbreak.

Up Close & Personal

2011-12-16T10:33:00.000-08:00

This year, blogging's been a struggle. It's hard to know what I should focus on, and that's only been compounded by a drive to present myself more professionally--and the fact that I blog about writing over on the Inkpunks blog. What the heck does a writer-mom-veggie-goofball blog about????

So my big decision is that I'm going to blog all my professional stuff over at Winniewoohoo.com. I'll blog about writing at the Inkpunks. And I'll blog all the goofball stuff here! Brace yourself for more recipes and silly hijinks.

This week I've been working hard to eat really great, healthy food and conquer some of my crazy cravings. This isn't easy! My family has roots in Missouri, and so I grew up eating good ol' country food: lots of pie, tasty casseroles, and my mom's amazing biscuits. If you're trying to cut calories, biscuits aren't always the best choice, but here are some biscuits you can enjoy calorie-free!

Birthday!

2011-12-07T19:57:00.001-08:00

I just have to say that my birthday was GREAT! I had many wonderful birthday wishes and I am now the proud owner of hand-printed CTHULHU UNDERWEAR. What could be better?

Keep the dream alive

2011-12-02T09:16:00.000-08:00

For months now, every day I've wanted to give up the writing game. This year's been hard: I've failed at every goal I've set for myself; I've derailed on dozens of projects; I've hated 90% of everything I've written, and I haven't advanced a lick in my personal or professional life. Last year, I was full of excitement and success and an easy relationship with the part of me that makes words. This year, there have been plenty of days where just getting out of bed in the morning is my biggest achievement. And the unfortunate truth is that on those days, the only thing that could really make me feel better, writing, is almost impossible. The more miserable I am, the more the words feel buried beneath a pile of immovable teak slabs.

On those days, reading most writing advice feels like a kick in the gut. Knowing that all my favorite authors kept on writing when they faced difficulties, producing thousands of words despite all adversity, is just a reminder of how weak and pathetic I seem. Thinking about that is sure incentive to give up.

Luckily, the fire to write is like any other fire: I've fed mine so much fuel over the years, that even smothered, the coals burn hot. Even when I feel like crap, that fire is still smoldering, churning over ideas and dreams. To get through these times, the best thing to do is to stop trying to shift the rocks and simply feed the fire. It'll burn through any obstacle, given enough attention and kindness.

Because I cope poorly with adversity, I might never be a successful writer. (Because of that, I might never be a successful anything, really--isn't that what the school counselor told me?) But I think about some of the great authors who've lived, people like Louisa May Alcott. Sure, she was tough and smart and funny--but when things went wrong, there were plenty of times when she climbed into bed and didn't get up for days at a time. She still managed to scrape by as a pulp fiction writer (until her amazing success with Little Women). She never gave up after her many set-backs.

So I think the single most important piece of writing advice you'll ever get--more important even than "Butt In Chair," which is 90% of everything a writer needs to know--is that you are the only person who can keep your dream alive, and you must do everything in your power to feed it and nurture it. You'll never be a writer if you let the dream die.

Networking, story by story

2011-11-14T13:20:00.000-08:00

I've sold fifteen (or so) short stories. Some went to pro-markets; some went to small. Some were flash, some were horror. Some were fantasy. Some were SF. One was a collaboration. Some were to invitation-only anthos; one was specially commissioned by an editor in a bad place.

And every single sale was valuable. Every one of them has advanced my career, even the sale that made me a mere $10 Canadian. Why? Because every story I have sold has added to my social network.

When you submit a story, it passes through the hands of slush readers before it reaches the editors with final say. Many of these slush readers will advance in their careers--and I know for a fact that yes, they remember your name. I just spent a weekend hanging out with a slush reader-turned-editor who remembered our first introduction, a story he rejected from his slush pile two years ago!

So there's the first seed your story plants in a potential network of relationships. Then you have the editors, who will not only be paying you and promoting you, but also shaping your work--and if they're good, sculpting and affecting your relationship with your words. Line edits from a good editor can teach you a lot.

And of course, those editors remember a writer, their work, their professionalism. With any luck they might ask you submit again, to another project, or they might pass along your name to other editors. When you make a good connection with an editor, you connect yourself to everyone that editor knows ... and sometimes that's a very large network indeed.

But the really wonderful connections you make, the ones that might surprise you with their value, are the connections you'll make with the writers who are published alongside you. A new friend was published in the same small YA magazine I was, and from reading my story, he realized our writing styles were very sympathetic with each other. He asked me to collaborate on a project together that will be really fun. That's an opportunity that wouldn't have existed if I hadn't sold that YA story.

I just yesterday received an invitation to submit to an anthology that came from a ToC-mate who is now editing. (That's the second time this has happened.) I just today received an invitation to a writing retreat that's being organized by a remarkable writer who shared a ToC with me in a very tiny, now defunct erotica market. At World Fantasy, an anthology ToC-mate shared tips about a new market with great rates.

And remember that tiny Canadian anthology with the wee paycheck? Every day, the people who shared the ToC of that anthology write me, email me, share their anthology invitations, share their good news about their promotions within the industry, hang out with me at conventions, and introduce me to their other friends: editors, agents, and novelists I admire in the field.

Let me reiterate: these are opportunities I wouldn't have had if I hadn't sold those stories. Going to conventions and doing volunteer work have certainly helped my career, but the deepest and most helpful connections I've made have come from the editors who've bought my stories and writers who have shared tables of contents with me in magazines and anthologies.

Your writing career will be different from mine. But I think most writers find that they do not become superstars writing short fiction. They find that writing short fiction strengthens their craft and enables them to build a strong network of friends who are at similar stages in their career. The skills developed writing short fiction give writers the muscles they need to pick their way up the rocky slopes of an ascending career. The friends writers make will help them over the roughest terrain--or if you're really lucky, help you cut a switchback here and there.

Story by story, friend by friend, the summit approaches.

Orycon schedule!

2011-11-10T13:59:00.000-08:00

OMG, Orycon is TOMORROW!!

*stops to hyperventilate*

I'd love to hang out with everybody possible, so if you're in town, please catch me after a panel or reading or something so we can chit-chat. Here's where I should be:

FRIDAY:

2 pm: "Drowning in Slush," a panel in Idaho

4 pm: Orycon Writers' Workshop, Executive Meeting Center

10 pm: "Erotic Bedroom Stories," a quick reading in Washington

Midnight: "Midnight Erotica Readings," Grant

SATURDAY:

11 am: "How to Prepare a Manuscript," another panel in Idaho

Noon: "Fantasy Magazine Reading,"Grant

2 pm: "Reading for Children," Hamilton

5 pm: "Stalking the Wild Anthology, Roosevelt

Midnight: "Midnight Horror Readings," Grant

Boo-yah!

2011-11-07T21:29:00.000-08:00

Well, the cat's officially out of the bag! Today Dagan Books announced that my book Dark Depths will be its very first novel! I am very excited to work with the crew over at Dagan, which includes the very smart Carrie Cuinn, editor, and the extremely talented Galen Dara, illustrator and art director. I particularly can't wait to see the illustrations that Galen creates for the project. The story is set in a magical world with some very interesting creatures and locales, so I think the final product will be visually astounding.

Look for it Summer 2012!

Ice, ice baby

2011-11-04T14:10:00.000-07:00

Limiting typing this week to the writing business (okay, and Twitter, because I have an addiction problem). This is because the middle finger tendon on my left hand--and I'm a lefty!--has a cyst on it. Yes, go Google tendon cysts. Better yet, Google bursitis, because those pictures are ewwwwww.

Anyway, trying to be as nice as I can be to my fingers, because I have a lot of typing to do! I've got a project I'd really like to complete this month, which might be challenging because I seem to be adding a new social commitment every three hours.

People like me! They really like me!

Character. Driven. Fiction.

2011-10-24T09:35:00.000-07:00

I've seen a lot of talk about the distinction between genre and non-genre fiction. As a college student, I definitely felt as if genre fiction, my favorite to write, was looked down upon as un-intellectual, un-literary. But by and large, I simply think there are two kinds of fiction, one of which usually wins the literary awards, and one of which a lot of genre fiction tends to fit into. One kind of fiction says: "The world has broken you. What are you going to do about it?" (Broken Character fiction.) The other says: "This world is broken. What are you going to do about it?" (Broken World fiction.)

Yes, I think the vast majority of literary, awarded literature is fiction about characters whose circumstances have broken them in some special and interesting way--a way that then reflects upon some larger issue of the human condition. Most genre fiction (romance, mystery, Western, SF/F/H) is about normal (ish) people who must overcome some kind of external obstacles. People get pissy over the distinction between "character-driven" and "externally driven" literature, and they're right to be. Both kinds of fiction are about characters and their motivations. Both require insight into humanity, an examination of how people function when things go wrong. You can learn from both.

Do I think one kind is better than the other? No. But I do think Broken Character writing might take a little more skill. Why? Because being broken brings out what's worst in a person, and it's hard to create a character who is believably broken who isn't so annoying the reader throws the book out the window!

On a much lighter note, I will be at the World Fantasy Convention this weekend. If you'll be at the convention, too, and would like to meet up or buy me drinks (hey, a girl can try!), here is my schedule:

Thursday, 10pm. How to Survive the Coming Zombie Apocalypse. (Panel)
Saturday, 3 pm. Reading from The Way of the Wizard. (Group reading/party)
Saturday, 6 pm. Edge Book Launch. (Group reading/party) -- I'll be reading from Rigor Amortis, so be prepared for some raunch. Or squick. Or just plain fun.
Saturday, 8 pm. Inkpunks 1st Anniversary Party! (Group reading/party)--I'll be reading "Curvature of the Witch House," currently up at Innsmouth Magazine. But more importantly, there will be drinks! And snacks! And hot, hot door prizes!
Sunday, 10 am. Crossed Genres Group Reading. Ease out of your hangover as I read a teaser from "A Tiny Grayness in the Dark," which is in CG's forthcoming Subversion anthology.

Hope to see you in the forthcoming merriment!

Thursday

10pm (Arrgh! Shouldn't I be DRINKING at 10pm?): How to Survive the Coming Zombie Apocalypse panel

Saturday

3: The Way of the Wizard -- group reading/party

6: Edge Book Launch

8: Inkpunks group reading/party

Sunday

10 am: Crossed Genres group reading

Playing around

2011-10-17T10:54:00.000-07:00

Last week combined illness and writer's block with the result of zero accomplishments (save sewing a Halloween costume for my daughter and crocheting a scarf for my own Halloween costume). I know it's not popular to admit to writer's block--I feel sometimes that if you say you believe in it, other writing types act as if you've just admitted to believe in the Boogey Man or something equally infantile. I think a better name might be "Brain Tantrums" or "Sick Leave for the Intelligence." Honestly, I've reached a point in my current work/home/jobbing life that I just don't have enough oomph. For the past three years, I've tried to limit myself to one day off a week, a day that I still usually wind up using for editorial work, and it's okay to sometimes admit that I'm tired.

So, I was sick, and then I was tired, and I took a few days off. I will probably take it fairly easy this week, too, focusing on fun projects, like a short story that I'm writing just for me. Or maybe some poetry. And yes, my favorite fun activity: decorating for Halloween! Maybe we'll make another batch of dried apple people. Last year's (pictured above) turned out great.

I would encourage you to do the same! We all have work and projects and things we have to do, but there's something about autumn that always reminds me that creativity is at its heart a fun activity. If you don't get enough fun in your system, if you don't let yourself creatively play, then your art really suffers.

So peeps--what are some playful creative activities you plan to enjoy?

Occupy Wall Street: Seeds & Deeds

2011-10-06T14:39:00.000-07:00

I've been following the activities of Occupy Wall Street for the last handful of days. It's fascinating and exciting, motivating the way nothing has motivated me for the last ... jeez, seven or eight years. That's right, dear blog--I used to be a social justice-seeking, politics-thinking, environment-defending lady. And then I gave up. Somewhere around the time of the Gulf War (boy, that march the day before the war started was amazing!), I started feeling like a whipped cur and crept down into the lair of apathy to lick my wounds.

But Occupy Wall Street has a lot going for it. It's stirring up people at a time when most people are seething silently, without words or hope. And while its message of general rage and dissatisfaction is being dismissed by many as an ineffective stance, I think that's a misunderstanding of the event's goal. I see this activity as an event that doesn't effect one particular change--it effects change in the hearts and minds of the American populace.

Other Occupy events, such as Occupy St Louis, which has targeted BofA as an agent of anti-populace economic affairs; and Occupy LA, which is targeting the Fannie Mae building for much the same reason, have actual targets. That's good! These are smaller, pointed actions that are directed at making a particular change within an egregious system. I'm happy to see them out there, fighting for these goals.

But Occupy Wall Street is much bigger than this. Occupy Wall Street is doing something remarkable: it is creating a real live community that functions using an advanced democratic and economic system. They are organizing a new kind of community, a new kind of social organization. And even if the movement ends with members drifting away to escape New York's winter weather, just the fact that they were able to create this one little community is amazing. It is a seed that will take root inside people and grow.

The United States was a pioneer in representative democracy--and the form for it was drafted close to 300 years ago, in an era where global and instantaneous communication was unimaginable. Capitalism was given form and structure at the same time. Alternative political economic structures, like the communism born from Karl Marx's writings, were created 150 years ago, when the telegram was giving the first hints of what a new, fully communicative society could be about. It is time for a new political economy, an economy that recognizes that the unimpeded flow of money and information is the essence of human freedom.

We learned from the totalitarian communist systems of the early 20th century that the government cannot be allowed absolute control of the flow of money and information. This creates corruption and the erosion of citizen power. And we're seeing today in the United States that when corporations control the flow of money and information, the government must pander to their concerns, resulting in corruption and the erosion of citizen power. We need a system that balances government oversight--because government is (or should be) the primary way to express the voice of the people--with competitive choices. Businesses can compete in wonderful ways. They can create wonderful things for us. But they cannot be allowed to crush us.

The sub-movements of the Occupy Together protests and the individuals inspired by the protests must try to find concrete ways to make our current political economical system function better. But Occupy Wall Street's job? It's to teach us how to create the next system, a system that right now lives as a kind of waking dream in New York, where people are sharing their possessions and skills and finding ways to create mass consensus. To us out here, it feels like Shangri-La. But it's real, it's real, it's real for them in Liberty Plaza.

Blast from the Past: The Kitchen Witch

2011-09-28T21:24:00.000-07:00

Today one of my very favorite pieces came out in the fall edition Three Lobed Burning Eye. And this got me thinking: Why do I love some stories more than others? For example, I had fun writing "Cold Iron and Green Vines," but I never felt particularly attached to it, even though it's a pretty enjoyable tale and it found a home in pro-level magazine. There are just some stories that resonate more inside me than others, regardless of their craft or skill-level.

As an exploration, I decided to dig out my very first accepted short story and share it with you all. It was published in the no-pay online zine The Abacot Journal, and it appeared in January 2009. (I wonder whatever happened to Alexandra Ash, the editor of this departed magazine? I hope she's still out there working with words.)

THE KITCHEN WITCH

By Wendy N. Wagner

Elva Manotte hadn't spent the last fifty-five years practicing witchcraft just to be surprised by a naked man on her front porch. She had seen many more exciting things than that, and more horrible, and never flinched.

She raised the flag on the mailbox and petted the big gray tom circling her feet while she decided what to do. When a crow hopped out of the house and tugged at the man's brown hair, she made up her mind.

"Well, Marcus," she said, voice as rusty and croaking as the crow she addressed, "let's bring him in and see what we can do." The gray cat at her feet hissed at the idea, and darted back into the house.

If Elva's husband—God rest his soul—had been there to see it, he wouldn't have batted an eye. Elva was always picking up strays. He would have looked over the top of his newspaper, made an offer to drive to the store for supplies, then gone back to reading until she asked for help. As it was, his skull over the fireplace merely clacked its upper jaw against the mantle in a reflexive offer.

She lowered the strange man's head onto her bottle green couch and gave the skull a tender smile. "Ah, that's good of you, Sean. Don't worry yourself. I'm sure this is nothing I can't handle."

The skull made no response. There was no need, really. She was probably right.

"Now, what have we got here?" Elva sat back on her glider rocker—a fortieth anniversary gift from Sean, and never a better purchase—and took a look at her foundling.

He wasn't very old, early thirties perhaps, and thin as a rail. There was a white scar along his side. As far as she could tell, it was his only distinguishing mark. She watched a lot of crime dramas these days; she knew things like that were important.

The crow hopped onto the back of the couch and cocked its head, shining an eye down on the man's face. Elva knew the look.

"Don't even think about picking out his eyes, Marcus. He's not even dead."

The bird grumbled and fluttered on its perch. The back of the couch was scarred from his frequent use, and the back streaked white. Elva had thought about covering the thing with plastic, but settled for scrubbing it once a week. She'd use a spell, but by and large, inanimate things resisted her powers. She had hoped to outgrow that little weakness, but now that she was collecting Social Security, she had to admit it wasn't likely.

"Well, I ought to at least cover him up. Don't need him to get shock on top of everything else."

She went to the big cedar chest in the corner and drew out a quilt her mother had made in the twilight of her years, and spread it over the man on the couch. The quilt was all sunny yellows and oranges, in the neat squares that were all arthritis had left the old woman. Elva's mother had once worked intricate patterns with lyrical names and tiny geometric pieces of fabric, the craftswoman's mosaic. The quilts had sold for thousands of dollars, and one even hung in a museum.

But this one, warming a strange and naked man on her daughter's couch, was a gift of love simplified by the ravaging hand of time. Elva straightened it fondly.

She stood up with a smile, rubbing the small of her back, which always felt worn after lifting and stooping. The man hadn't been a light load for her, after all. She looked at the bird.

"Marcus, let me know if he wakes up. I'll be in the kitchen. He'll want something to eat, I'm sure."

The bird bobbed its head in the affirmative, and Elva left him. She had put up some jars of peach pie filling this July. Maybe she would bake. Yes, a pie. With crumb topping. Did she have any ice cream left?

These were the things that went through her mind, because Elva was a practical woman, and she knew wondering and fretting would do nothing for herself or the man. She could go through old books and guess at the cause of the man's stupor, using up half her magical supplies and risking demonic possession—or she could bake and let the comforting scents of cinnamon and sugar reach out to him.

For a woman who now received food stamps, the choice was easy. Besides that, Elva had always preferred kitchen magic. It was simple, surprisingly successful, and easy to hide. Work magic in secrecy, Elva's mother had maintained, and she had lived to be ninety-eight. Not every witch was that lucky. Elva's great-grandmother had died at age forty-six at the hands of Baptist lynch mob.

Yes, there was a good reason to stay in the broom closet, and broom closets are usually close by the kitchen.

Elva pulled the butter from the fridge and set it on the stove to soften. Then she opened the window, calling in a breeze, and set the rest of her ingredients out on the counter.

It was the kind of September afternoon she loved better than any other time. She was sixty-nine this year, but she still felt that she had not had enough fall days. She didn't want to live forever, but she wanted to see another thirty or thirty-five falls, even if it meant drinking a few unpleasant potions along the way.

Her fingers worked quickly without too much instruction from her mind. Elva was a good baker, with a lot of practice. Pastry dough was one of her specialties; the fire department had a standing order for an apple pie a week during the fall, and every club in town made sure to call her for help planning their bake sale.

She patted the dough into a ball and rolled it out. With a certain economy of motion, she flipped the circle of pastry into the pie plate, and turned her attention to the crumb topping.

If only Sean were here, she caught herself thinking, and shook her head irritably. It was true her husband had loved a good peach pie. But what was done couldn't be undone, especially if what was done involved an eighteen-wheeler and a two-speed bike. Sometimes it didn't matter you were wearing your helmet—although, she had to remind herself, the only part of Sean's body that hadn't been pulped was his cranium.

Elva pried the lid off the jar of pie filling. The smell of peaches and ginger made her close her eyes with pleasure. This was a good batch. Yes, Sean would have enjoyed it.

She poured the pie filling into the pan gently and shook the crumbs over it. Then the pie went in the oven.

It baked for an hour. That gave her time to tidy up the dishes, go out to garden and pick some dahlias for the table, refill the cat and the crow's food dishes, and fold a basket of laundry. She took a moment to run a brush through her close-cropped white hair and apply some cherry-flavored chapstick.

Then the pie came out of the oven, and she started the coffee.

It was an old percolator, loud, and with her head bent over yesterday's crossword, it was no wonder the man surprised her when he coughed at the doorway and said:

"Is that . . . coffee I smell?"

He had a nice voice, a little nervous, with an accent Elva couldn't place. He looked lost, standing in the kitchen doorway with the blanket wrapped around himself and his bare toes curling on the linoleum. She smiled, grandmotherly, at him.

"You're awake!"

"Yes." He looked down at himself. "And apparently naked."

She laughed. "I'll get you something."

She didn't have any men's clothing, of course, not after five years as a widow, but she found a pair of her own sweatpants that might fit, and a plain green t-shirt. She sent him to the bathroom to change while she poured coffee and cut slices of pie. It was still too hot to cut, but she encouraged it to cool with a murmured chant, and it was good enough.

He emerged from the bathroom looking sheepish but clad.

"Do you take sugar? Cream?"

He nodded to both and sat down where she showed him to. She sat across and stirred her coffee. The crow hopped into the corner of the kitchen and watched him, eyes reptilian, orange.

"What's your name?"

"Jesus." He took a sip of coffee, winced. It was still very warm.

He didn't look Hispanic, although he was dark enough. You could never tell. Elva prided herself on being open-minded.

"Mine's Elva. Nice to meet you."

"Elva." He looked around at the kitchen, its ten-year-old appliances shining under their coats of children's drawings, and the dishes waiting in the drainer.

Elva noticed his glance. "My grandchildren give me those. I baby-sit for them every Thursday."
"That's lovely." He took a bite of his pie (there had been no ice cream), and his eyes closed. "Oh my. That's wonderful."

Elva took a bite, too. It really was. It had been years since she'd made a peach pie this perfect. She would have to save a slice for the skull.

They each took another bite, chewing and swallowing slowly, taking their time to enjoy each meaty slice of peach and feel the tiny burn of the spices on their tongues. It was a wonder of contrasting textures and flavors, the embodiment of all that was sensual and all the sunshine of summer.

Elva swallowed. She brought her coffee cup to her lips and looked hard at the man. She took a drink without letting go of his eyes, and he flinched a little at her gaze.

"What brought you to my doorstep today, Jesus?"

He looked surprised. "Don’t you know who I am?"

She took another drink, brows coming together. He could see her mind working, and he shook his head.

"Look." He brought his palms up beside his face. There in center of each, bright as moonlight, a silver scar. Circles of long-ago pain. She thought of the scar on his ribs and put down her coffee cup.

"Why my door, Jesus?"

He shrugged. "The Lord works in mysterious ways."

"Trite." She pushed aside the mug and folded her arms across her chest.

He pushed away his coffee, too. "Elva. I came to you because of who you are, what you do. I was sent here. Because it's my job." He smiled, his coffee-colored crinkling with gentle humor.

"Your job. The Son of God has a job?"

"Duty, perhaps, is a better word."

"Duty." She stood up, the lines around her mouth folding themselves deeper. "I understand duty. I learned duty before I could walk. Protect people, heal the earth, keep the world from falling apart. That's the duty of a witch, and that's what we've been doing since the birth of humankind. I'm not sure we need help from a minor deity like you."
He stood, too. "I'm not here to help you. I'm here to stop you. Witches like you can only slow down what needs to be done now. It's time. I've come back to Earth to end it—to stop all the madness and unhappiness and sin."
"By destroying everything?"

"It's the only way."

Elva shook her head. "It's wrong."

"It seems that way, but it's for the best. You know it's true. Good people like Sean die, while murderers and child molesters walk free in the streets. This world is corrupt." His brown eyes, so mild and kind, began to brighten with the fervor of his words. "It is a pit of filth and despair. I will rub it out so that it may be reborn!"

"No!" She struck out wildly at his face, and he seized her wrists. His hands were like iron, crushing hard on her very bones. Elva cried out with the pain of it, and felt her knees giving way beneath her.

There was a scream, and fluttering darkness, and Marcus the crow was battering the man's head. The cat—slinking, silent creature—threw itself against the man's knees, all claws and fury.

Elva jerked her hands free and grabbed for something, anything, and her hand closed on the edge of the pie plate. She brought the whole deep-dish weight of it down hard upon Jesus's head.

He went down without a sound.

She stood there, gasping for air, her chest tight with fear and anger, looking down at the man on the floor. The pie plate had broken, and the beautiful peaches, golden with summer, clung stickily to his curling brown hair.

A ribbon of red rolled out on the floor, and the cat licked at it curiously. It looked up at her and meowed.

"Oh, Mr. Whiskers," she murmured, and scooped him up, pressing her face into his soft fur. She rubbed his broad forehead until his purr slowed her heartbeat. The crow hopped onto the back of a chair and bumped her with its inky head.

She looked at the dead man on the floor. "How could anybody eat my peach pie and possibly think the world ought to be destroyed?" She shook her head. "And now I'm going to have to clean this mess up, for Chri--" She stopped and swallowed a cold lump in her throat. "For crying out loud!" she shouted.

Then she rolled up her sleeves.

Elva opened the back door and ran a couple of two-by-fours up the back stairs. Then she found the wheelbarrow in the garden shed and rolled it into the house, and with the help of a few herbs, found the strength to heave the corpse into the wheelbarrow. She took it out to the compost pile and buried it under a thick layer of grass clippings and dried leaves.

She wiped off the tines of her pitchfork and looked up at the sky. "I know you'll be back. And I guess you've got to do what you've got to do. But not today. I want thirty more Septembers." She smiled weakly. "The fire department is counting on me."

She put her tools back in the garden shed and went inside without glancing back at the compost heap.

After a shower and a cup of coffee, she pulled out another pie plate and baked a second peach pie. She needed a little something after saving the world. And Sean still needed his slice.

Why my fat is my feminist issue

2011-09-22T15:06:00.000-07:00

I have mixed feelings about my fat rolls. I've been overweight my whole life, with one two- or three-year window of thin-ness, and by and large, I don't mind it. There are even things I love about being chubby.

When I was younger, my fat was a wonderful shield that protected me from prowling men, giving me the space to enjoy doing my own thing. I didn't have to deal with having a boyfriend, because I had no interest pursuing one and none of the males in my high school or college (or even post-college, by and large) would deign to notice a fat chick. I hung out with my friends and read and did homework. I got to be me. How many other teenage girls get to enjoy that? How many adult women? Heck, these days even superheroes have to devote their spare time to pleasing some man!

The thing about being thin and sexy is that you have to give up so much. You have to wear shoes that make your feet hurt. You have to turn down pie and pizza and toast. You have to put down the novel and go out for a run. And if the only thing motivating you is your appearance--and you're me--well, there's really no point. Someplace along the line, it hit me that I didn't give a fuck if people thought I was sexy or not. (Don't get me wrong--I love dressing up and wearing makeup and looking pretty. But it's for me. It's play.) I am a writer, a goofball, a beer drinker, a good friend, a cultivator of trivia. If that wasn't enough for other people, then I honestly didn't need to attract them to me in the first place.

And really, that's what being a feminist is about for me. It's about saying that it's okay for women to PEOPLE. We're not just portable vaginas. We don't exist to be sex toys. We are PEOPLE.

I know I could be healthier. And that motivates me to get out and go for a long walk and try to limit the baked goods to one serving a week and avoid saturated fats. After all, I don't want to invite disease into my life.

But I don't want to be thin and sexy, either.

Green Mars

2011-09-21T16:47:00.000-07:00

Guys, I don't have much an update. Why? Because I'm reading Green Mars. It's by Kim Stanley Robinson, one of my favorite authors (his story "The Lunatics," is a real standout in the Brave New Worlds anthology that John Joseph Adams put out). One of the most fascinating things about this book is the way that Mars itself becomes the main character, even though the story is a compilation of different narrators. What connects the wide variety of story lines is Mars and the planet's changes. It's riveting stuff!

Anyway, I'm off to go read. Here's hoping to finish tonight!

ARMORED

2011-09-16T16:51:00.000-07:00

So a couple of days ago, I sent off the contract for our Armored story, and then today I see this:

And I gotta say, I wish our story was a little more like that. But there is power armor and there are both animals and backflips, so it's pretty close.

Just Do One Thing

2011-09-08T13:33:00.000-07:00

When I first decided I was serious about writing, about four years ago, I struggled and flailed. It was so hard to have a part-time job and be a full-time mom and carve out time for a fairly new relationship and try to write, too. It was a huge task, too huge to really comprehend, let alone succeed at. But Kaz (my beloved) gave me a wonderful piece of advice, advice he had used to get back into a painting routine: Just do one thing every day. It doesn't matter what you do or how much you do it--the act of doing something that contributes to your goal will get the ball moving and make you feel better about yourself.

You can really use this advice to help you meet any challenge. Learn to cook? Just make one dish every day. Declutter your house? Just get rid of one thing every day. But right now I'm going to use it to meet a challenge that shouldn't even be a challenge. I'm going to try to do just one thing every day that makes me purely happy.

Let me explain.

See, writing makes me happy--just about nothing else in this world can make me as happy as losing myself in words for an hour or two. But writing is also all about goals and careers and the future, so even though it makes me happy, it also brings with it all kinds of heavy emotional overtones. Plus, sometimes writing makes me cranky. It doesn't always go well, right?

But playing my dulcimer? There's absolutely no reason whatsoever for me to play it. I don't want to be folk singer. I don't plan on performing anywhere. There is nobody else counting on me to play my dulcimer. It's just pure fun.

Crocheting and sewing: same thing. I can buy any hat or outfit I want, and probably for less money than if I made it! There's no real reason to craft. But it's totally fun, and I enjoy it with all my heart. And the last time I sewed? Well, I made The Kid a flower girl dress for my best friend's wedding. Nowadays, a stuffed penguin is wearing that dress and my best friend has already finalized her divorce papers.

Yes, I love writing. And I love my editorial work. I love it so much I have to slap myself silly and remind myself that there are other parts of my life and my self that deserve attention. Just one small bit of attention each day.

What are some projects you've been putting off or challenges you haven't known how to tackle? Can you use the "Just do one thing" method to help? I want to hear about it!

Jim Gordon 4VR!

2011-08-29T11:19:00.000-07:00

I'm going to say this while holding up a riot shield for protection: I did not like The Dark Knight.

Let me wipe the rotten tomatoes off my face before I continue.

The Dark Knight was full of exciting action and cool props. But most of the characters fell flat for me. The Joker in particular felt like a waste; he existed to simply shake things up on-screen, and there was no attempt to create a unified persona for this strange and iconic character. (Which in some ways was cool. He was essentially all chaos, all the time. But that was *all* he was.) Also, I just have to point out: that tongue-spasm-licking thing is SO over. David Tennant totally killed it in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

Batman/Bruce Wayne and the minor characters Lucius Fox and Alfred Best all suffered from Boringly Perfect Character Syndrome. They're never wrong. They're brilliant at everything they try. And as far as I can tell, none of them has a sense of humor. Christian Bale's Batman is icy cold and blandly good looking; I almost miss George Clooney's endless mugging. (Of course, who I really miss is Michael Keaton, who could take Batman's heroism seriously while gently mocking Wayne's role as a millionaire playboy.)

I might have mimicked my husband, who fell asleep during the film, if not for one character: Jim Gordon.

Every moment he was on screen, I believed in him. Gordon's struggle to balance his faith in Batman and his bitter fight to keep a crooked police department in line felt heartfelt. His actions were believable, his choices grounded. The character created in the Christopher Nolan re-launch of this franchise has many of the rich nuances of the character built in Frank Miller's Batman Year One. If you want to build a complex character within the framework of a simple action story, look to Jim Gordon.

This is just an off-the-cuff response to a movie that I wanted to like very much. I'm hoping to flesh out my Jim Gordon luv after another viewing.

The Road to Hell

2011-08-25T15:43:00.000-07:00

The highlight of our trip to Reno was a hike through hell--Bumpass Hell. The hike down into this remarkable region of mud pots and fumeroles was intense, with large portions of the trail buried beneath packed snow & slush. All three miles stank, because the hidden hot springs lurked just out of sight, sending up blasts of fragrant sulfur. The actual "hell" (which is the crater of a collapsed ancient volcanic giant) was so overpoweringly foul-smelling I finally understood the origins of the Bog of Eternal Stench.

But it was awesome!

The ground was baked dry and crusted with yellow and white mineral salts. Steamed poured from tiny cracks in the ground, spilling around rocks and carving out mouths opening into the super-heated depths.

Larger cracks, like this massive fumerole called Big Boiler (the hottest in the world!), send up huge clouds of steam and can be heard rumbling a good quarter of a mile away.

I'm sure I'll have more photos and Reno stories tomorrow, but this place was so cool I had to share it first. (Jee, it only took me three days. But it took that long to find the camera cord!)

Feeling convivial!

2011-08-15T15:56:00.001-07:00

WorldCon approaches!

Really, that's all I got this week. There's other stuff I want to tell you, like how much I can't wait for you all to see the October issue of Fantasy (tentacles! monsters! best use of a tiny detail ever!), but obviously I can't give too much away.

So on those happy notes, I leave you with the recipe for The Best Pumpkin Muffins. This is the only muffin recipe I ever follow (honestly, I usually just make up muffins as I go), because they turn out so incredibly delicious. The texture is just phenomenal. Today's batch turned out a little bit too sticky (they welded their little orange bottoms to the wrapper), but that was entirely because I ran out of cooking oil in the middle of the process. Doh.

Delightful week...

2011-08-11T09:22:00.000-07:00

I've had a great time reading slush this week. Sometimes you get nice stories to read, and that just puts a smile on my face.

But of course the real excitement comes from the land of the living. Next week is our big trip to Reno! And that means packing lists. Oh, swoon! Honestly, half the joy of the trip is making up my packing list.

Needless to say, this blog post by Gail Carriger really spoke to me!

Rounding up the scraps

2011-08-01T16:52:00.000-07:00

[Note: I added this picture after I wrote the first paragraph, but I have to say, it represents a certain kind of excellent day. Like if I was a flesh-eating fiend in the nation's capital today, I'm sure I'd be just as cheerful as I was when this picture was taken.]

I gotta say, I was having a good day before I read the news. Anybody else as certain for the demise of the American way as me? It's like we've hit the iceberg and the shoddily crafted rivets are starting to pop down in hold. And they said she was unsinkable!

Anyway, we'll leave the doom and gloom for the papers. Here in the Opera Buffo world, we are enjoying the enjoyable things in life. Like solipsisms! (Insert wryly grinning emoticon here.)

Last week was actually brilliant. I took the family to see my fellow zombie-loving-hating pal, Tony Faville, read at Powell's. Since those wonderful booksellers were hosting a costume contest, I rope the kid into dressing up as a zombie--our first! I'm usually on the zombie slaying side of the equation, but I have to admit, staggering around undead was highly enjoyable. The Kid won the contest (we were the only two zombies, but she easily beat me with her distinct creepiness). Of course: there's nothing more frightening than a child zombie!

Here's a pic:

So cute and yet so creepy!

Of course the pants-wettingly good part of the week was the wonderful news that the story I co-wrote with my brother Jak has been sold to a really cool anthology! Getting to be part of another John Joseph Adams antho is kind of mind-boggling. And since this is a pro-level science fiction sale, this means I am halfway to the Science Fiction Challenge I posed myself a few months ago. So now I only have to sell half of a story someplace great. I also only need to sell half a story to qualify as an Active member of SFWA. I'd be even more thrilled, except that I have the hunch selling half a story is even more difficult than selling a whole one, which is pretty damn hard.

How hard is it to make a pro short story sale? Well, according to Duotrope, the acceptance rate at a magazine like Fantasy Magazine is right around 0.5%. And for the super-exclusive Asimov's, Duotrope reports a 0.09% acceptance rate!

(There is no rating for acceptances of half stories. I'll have to do some research on that one.)

Paper makes it serious

2011-07-20T20:16:00.000-07:00

You know, I don't submit short stories to F&SF very often. They only accept paper submissions--and it's not just that I'm super-lazy and don't want to print out my story and find an envelope and scrounge up postage money. It's that putting one of my stories down on paper? Makes the act of creation way, way too real.

Now that kind of logic shouldn't make a lick of sense; after all, I've sold eleven stories now; you'd think I'd have figured out that, yes, I am a creative person, and yes, this story business is the real deal. Uh-huh. Right. I still freak out. To actually print out a cover letter, I have to triple proofread my two short paragraphs, take a break, and then ask somebody else to read it over. Who finds tons of mistakes I missed. When I know I'm printing a cover letter, I can't even type my own address with any kind of accuracy.

Maybe it's because you have to sign the letter. It's like a check, or a contract. You're promising that editor something. You're signing away your life on that promise. What if that editor collects on it? You're cheerfully getting ready for work one morning, and there's knock on your front door, and when you open it, there's an editorial assistant standing on your porch, flames coming out his nose and carrying a pitchfork. Your story sucked. He's here to collect your soul.

I'm breaking out in cold sweats just thinking about it.

You know, I still have time. The envelope doesn't even have stamps on it. There's still a chance I could change my mind, sparing myself that ugly visit. I mean, what if I need my soul? Doesn't a soul imbue my life with some kind of mystical energy that if I lose, I descend into the same empty state of existence as Willy Loman? Am I going to have to work in sales?

Whew.

I managed to collect myself. I remembered that this writing business only calls for blood, sweat, and tears--soul is completely optional. I'm safe. This story is going out in the mail tomorrow!

Which means tonight I'm heading down to the crossroads. If my soul's not going to help me write a decent short story, I might as well get some kind of mileage out of it. I wonder what kind of deal Satan can give me ...

Bears in armor

2011-07-12T17:13:00.000-07:00

A few days ago, I came across some great words of guidance, quoted by some random dude on Twitter and attributed to my new hero of grumpiness and Dorito-fueled madness, Charles Wendig:

HARDEN THE FUCK UP, CARE BEAR*.

Now, you might think this is just needlessly tough tough-guy talk, but I am taking it to heart. I don't need to be a mean fighting machine--I need to protect myself. The hardness I need is armor, thick plates of it to protect my tender innards. I waste way too much time taking otherwise boring missiles, like rejections and mistakes, and then turning them upon myself, grinding my heart and mind into hamburger. Then it takes me tons of time to regrow those internal organs, and I'm tired & grumpy.

The nicest thing about my new motto is that is makes me giggle a little bit when I say it. I mean, who could fail to giggle when they think about Care Bears? Man, I loved those chubby little love bugs when I was a kid. And I feel okay invoking them as a spirit totems, because if there's anything I learned from watching The Care Bears Movie (or better yet, The Care Bears in Wonderland), it's that the Care Bears are ruthless in their attempt to bring joy & goodness into this world. They have a take-no-prisoners attitude that belies their cuddly exteriors.

My exterior is pretty cuddly, too. With some chain mail and a decent breastplate, I could probably make a great Tenderheart Byrnison ...

(*I've heard this is a chapter heading in Chuck's book, which I just ordered a few seconds ago and am still waiting to arrive.)

Gut check

2011-07-06T21:25:00.000-07:00

As lame as it is to admit, I still haven't gotten my mojo back after Virtual Tales' collapse. Losing my book -- even though it wasn't much of a book, and it wasn't much of a book deal -- seems to have sucked out some kind of faith I had in myself and in writing novels. Honestly, I think I've been battling a low-grade depression since I got the news.

Maybe noveling will work out and maybe it won't. At least I'm still writing.

Fun is okay!

2011-06-28T19:11:00.000-07:00

Last week was weirdly packed with fun. I went to a Harry & the Potters show; I ate out at an amazing vegan restaurant, where I enjoyed a blueberry gimlet and this amazing grapefruit juice/elderflower liquer/gin cocktail; I caught a marionette performance featuring a mad scientist and a biomechanical hare. I played games with my family! I planted a basil plant!

So all in all, it was pretty much a refilling the well kind of week. This week is already off to a more word-filled start!

Nyan Cat: Proof friends are the best part of this gig

2011-06-20T10:09:00.000-07:00

This blog post will best improve your mood if you play this video as you read:

I love this gig. Being a writer is the absolute shit. People have paid me--or promised to pay me--for putting words together. And sometimes I put words together and the things I've managed to say are actually awesome. I started a new story this weekend, and let me tell you: I love it. (I'll probably hate it before I get done editing, but that's just the way the editing process works. I mean, it's supposed to work like that.)

Not every thing about writer is terrific. There are times when I get frustrated by my inability to rock the words. There are times when the publishing industry pisses me off. And there are DEFINITELY times when the genre community pisses me off. Last week, I saw a lot of jackasses trying to explain why they weren't racist or sexist as they screamed and wailed in an attempt to defend the white boy status quo.

I tried to come up with a really good post about what I felt, and maybe I will figure out the right words someday. In the meantime, I think Ian Sales said it best in one of his comments on the SFSignal discussion on sexism: "If you support the status quo, you are sexist. End of story." You can replace "sexist" with "racist" for equal effect.

You know, every single one of us has unconscious biases that come out in our work. What we owe the world isn't our apologies, it's opening up our worlds to each other. When you know people of other races and you have positive experiences with them, you don't write bigoted work. When you know awesome LBGTQ people, you don't write work that excludes them. When you have a terrific boss that you admire who is a woman, you create fiction that reflects your understanding of women who are men's equals.

You have to open up your head, and you have to make friends. They will make sure that the process of mind-opening isn't as terrifying or painful as you fear it will be. (And yeah, it's scary. It's not easy being vulnerable!)

Plus, your friends, new and old, will help cheer you up when your words get rejected. They'll give you a pep talk when you aren't writing as fast as you like. They'll make sure you get back to your hotel room when you get sloshed at the con.

And they'll make sure you know about Nyan Cat so you, too, can have the song stuck in your head.

SO SAY WE ALL! -- An SF challenge

2011-06-10T15:50:00.000-07:00

Today, during an exciting chat with the rest of the Inkpunks about the state of science fiction, I threw down the gauntlet: I challenged us all to work hard to master the science fiction short story. By master, I suggested "achieve a SFWA-pro-level sale of an SF story." No matter what it takes, we're going to rock the roof off the science fiction genre.

I definitely think a lot of people are afraid to write SF -- because they're afraid of science. There's so much to get right when you want your story to fit within the parameters of reality. There's research to do! Embarrassment to be had! But that doesn't mean it's not something worth doing. Writing is one of the best ways to explore the nature of humanity, and what's more worthwhile than skewering the human condition with the most exciting crap technology can dish out? :D

By science fiction, we Inkpunks are restricting ourselves only to fiction that works within the generally accepted rules of nature. So the piece can be a mundane work or a near-future dystopian or a post-apocalyptic adventure ... it just can't have magic or elements that make zero sense within the boundaries of modern science. Zombies--the undead kind--are pretty much out. Witches, too. (What the heck am I going to write about?!?! Isn't everything I write about zombies or witches?)

If you're a writer who reads this blog, I throw the gauntlet at you, too. The world needs more great science fiction. It's science fiction that fed the hearts and imaginations of the mid-century American scientists who took us to the moon. It's science fiction that stirred the dreams of the great twentieth century inventors. Let's give the next century something to talk about!

PS: If you're already on-board the science fiction train, I know that right now the Science in My Fiction site is running its 2nd annual short story contest. Go send them something exciting!

AMAZING people being amazing

2011-06-06T21:49:00.000-07:00

Today was a wonderfully normal day after two weeks of struggling with health issues. It was nice to have nearly full command of my brain (still feel groggy and tired), and be able to go a day without a nap break. Since I'm still kind of dumb, I thought I'd just banter about the last few days. So, in no particular order or logic:

The amazing Snarke came by for some quality girl time (and lawksamussy, we were two girls in need of some girl time!), aka, Lunch At Burgerville + Marathon Chat. She blew my mind by bringing me a copy of Fuzzy Nation. Signed. By Mr. Scalzi, the Overlord of SFWA. I'm pretty certain there is no kinder person on the earth.
The amazing John Joseph Adams sent me many, many older issues of F&SF magazine. The next daunting task is to read all these babies, which will be inspirational!
Due to the encouragement of the amazing Molly Tanzer and the amazing Erin Stocks, I have picked up the cookbook Appetite for Reduction and have started cooking really healthy & delicious foods. I say "encouragement," but mostly I mean "mouth-watering posts on their blogs & Twitter that feature these amazing recipes." But it's nice to be returning to my whole-foods, healthy ways! It's been a while since I've been inspired to cook!
On a totally unrelated note, we had ramen for dinner. *looks shamefaced*
A new submission was made, for the first time in, like, months.
I had a major brainwave, erased the last 1500 painfully scraped together words of the novel-in-progress, and belched out 908 exciting wonderful words.
In a totally related note, put Richard Matheson's Hell House on hold at the library.
I've been listening to the podcast of my story "Cold Iron and Green Vines" over at Beneath Ceaseless Skies. It's so cool to hear someone else read my stuff!

Well, that's really about it. It's wonderful to be awake and healthy enough to be blogging at 10 at night!

Unseen Stage Fright

2011-06-01T21:27:00.000-07:00

Sandra Wickham said it today on Twitter: I think about my novel all the time. I can't wait till I it's time to write. Finally, I sit to write and I freeze up with stage fright.

Boy do I understand! After taking that my sick days, I feel paralyzed with fear, especially after reading through a chunk of pages yesterday and getting the work back into my head. What if I screw it all up? What if I've lost my touch? What if an evil interloper has strangled my muse and is going to pretend to be my muse, thus leading me to write 9 pages of chick lit inside the haunted house I've been struggling to create?

I read Erika's advice about getting started, and while it all resonated deeply inside me, I know me. I know there are only a handful of things that can turn off my stage fright: chocolate, gum, and massive doses of caffeine. Since it's evening, coffee is out of the question--I need to sleep tonight. But I can bribe myself with my candy bar (just a few squares! I'm not crazy, and honestly, I don't like more than a small serving of the super-dark stuff) and my two fresh packs of Orbit gum.

Yeah, wish me luck. These are the moments when I understand why so many writers have substance abuse issues.

Sick days?

2011-05-30T17:26:00.000-07:00

So I spent the entire weekend being sick, and now that I'm perking up a bit, I'm starting to feel the words revving up again. Does anybody else find that getting sick makes it hard to write? And if so, is there anything that seems to help?

Break it or burn it

2011-05-27T15:59:00.000-07:00

I had an astonishing revelation today: I've got writing burn out. And I've had burnout for a while now, like since October. Not only have I rarely felt that words-straining-at-the-seams feeling that used to inflict me with an itchiness to write, but every single day I've been able to write fewer and fewer words, and I feel more tired after laying them on the page. Needless to say, I decided I needed to be more serious about taking break time from writing.

I spent the afternoon cleaning and reading out of an anthology of French reading exercises. Why? I'm not planning to go to France any time soon. I don't know anyone who speaks French. The only reason to try to read a book in French is just because it's something I always enjoyed and it was something I had no reason to do. Absolutely free goofing off.

I've still got plenty of editorial work to catch up on, but this weekend? I'm going to go nuts. I might even play VIDEO GAMES. Nothing says "slacker" like sitting in front of the tv shooting zombies.

Sometimes it's hard for me to admit that writing isn't the end-all and be-all of who I am. I will still exist if I turn off the word tap for a couple of days. There's no shame in it.

Right?

Rescue Remedy

2011-05-24T17:57:00.000-07:00

Today was the kind of day that required some kind of serious pick-me-up: I had a blister, a stomach ache, a headache, and my brain was spinning in a post-work fog (this is the Noisy Season at work). A nap was out of the question, what with an influx of playful children racing around my front porch and yard (there's a reason I hate summer). I needed coffee and chocolate, stat.

I've reached a point in my life where I no longer like sticky-sweet chocolatey treats. More often than not, they leave me feeling queasy and unsatisfied, the bouquet of the chocolate overpowered by the fats and sugars. (Dear heavens, did I really just use the phrase "the bouquet of the chocolate"??) When I buy chocolate, I buy a Theo dark chocolate bar and nibble my way through a stick at a time. But I didn't have a chocolate bar handy. I had cocoa powder. So I whipped up a quick and dirty microwave cup of cocoa.

You've made cocoa a hundred billion times--or at least, I hope you have. There's something profoundly meditative about blending the dry ingredients (2 Tb cocoa powder, 2 tsp sugar, dash of salt, and if you're in our household, about a tsp of nondairy creamer) and slowly dripping in the liquid (I usually start with coffee). At first, the liquid beads up on the surface of the powders, finally seeping in and creating clumps. With a little stirring and a few more drops of coffee, everything turns into one awkward ball of fragrant mud. I always feel a little nervous at this point, because it feels like the ingredients will never come together, and I will have wasted all my efforts to make a lump of sludge.

But with a little more coffee and a bit more elbow grease, the lump becomes a paste, the paste becomes smoother, and soon there's something akin to chocolate syrup at the bottom of the mug. At that point I'll usually add a little more coffee or hot water, filling my mug halfway before topping off with soy milk and a spin in the microwave. A dash of vanilla--or better yet, a teaspoon of Kraken rum!--rounds off the flavor profiles.

I'm revising a story right now that's currently at the "lump of sludge" phase. I'm nervous and a little terrified that I've killed the poor thing. I can only hope that with a little more elbow grease, it will smooth out and turn into something delicious.

I might need a few more cups of Rescue Remedy first, though ...

Process & Practice: the Writer in Savasana

2011-05-20T10:38:00.000-07:00

It's been the kind of busy week that makes a gal's head spin: an article due, revisions coming back from various editors, career opportunities throwing themselves in my path, changes at the day job, invitations to fun social events five days of the week. And behind it all, the constant pressing knowledge that queries and submissions are out there, my work under evaluation and my future on the line.

Hey, it sounds melodramatic, but dang it, that's how it feels! You know it. You've subbed to big things before, things that could have a significant effect on your life. If you let yourself think about it, your brain might explode. You can't work, because the pressure and excitement sucks the words out of your brain like a Dyson vacuum cleaner--and we all know those things never lose suction. The only solution is NOT to think about these things and try to focus on the work in progress.

But if you're anything like me, burying my thoughts is hard. They have a way of knotting inside me and settling like lead into my gut. I've always had a lot of issues with my thoughts bursting out as physical manifestations, and it's part of the reason I spent a lot of time being sick as a young person. Interest in the mind-body relationship took me to yoga and yogic philosophy, and at one time, I actually planned to be a yoga teacher.

That's right. Me. The lady who creaks when she tries to touch her toes, the lady whose Reubenesque physique is more aptly associated with Polynesian royalty than fitness instructors. I was a yoga junkie--Bendy Wendy, beloved children's yoga class leader! And I quit yoga for the same stupid reason a lot of people quit writing: I forgot to focus onprocess, not results.

You see, I've always been a chubby kid, and I've always been sensitive about being overweight. And one day, after two years of reading and studying and pretzeling, I saw a picture of myself and realized I looked nothing like what a yoga teacher should look like. My limbs were stocky, my ankles blocky. A predisposition toward a pear shape gave me the requisite prominent ribs, but my thighs never got the memo that I was supposed to be skinny. My confidence crumbled. And one day, I walked into my yoga class and realized that every woman in the room, put together, would fit into one pair of my pants. (Hey, it seemed completely possible at the time!) I ran out of the building crying.

Little by little, I left my yoga practice behind. Dropping into Downward Dog was just too emotionally exhausting, and it was easy to push yoga time out of my schedule: I'd made a commitment to writing more, and I could justify any amount of time sitting in front of the computer.

What I forgot is how great yoga feels when you're doing it and not thinking about anything else. Like writing, it's easy to fall into a magical space where your inner essence is perfectly aligned with your activity, where you're just you, and nothing else matters. Whatever happens once you roll up your mat or click that "submit" button doesn't really matter. That you you find when you hit that magical space? That's the gold. You have to let the crap--the recycled pop-bottle mat carrier that everybody else is carrying to the studio; the rejections from the agents; the good reviews of your latest story--fall away from that place. You can't let it touch the you you've worked so hard to find.

In the last few months, I've started to forgive my body for being itself. I had a realization one day, and Regina Spektor says it best in her song "Folding Chair:"

I’ve got a perfect body, though sometimes I forget
I’ve got a perfect body cause my eyelashes catch my sweat

My body is perfect because it does the things it's designed to do. Instead of resenting its shape, I've started treating my body better, revisiting the healthy recipes I used to love, taking those long walks. Setting up a standing workstation, like Christie did. Even doing some yoga. It's amazing how the old lessons come back, all the training for clearing the mind wiping away the tensions my writing life piles onto my mind and body. After doing something physical, it's usually much, much easier to come to the keyboard. The monkey mind, with its constant need for reward, is settled. Instead of feeling neurotic about seeing results, you can enjoy the process of writing.

Book giveaway: Way of the Wizard!

2011-05-10T21:22:00.000-07:00

Mr. John Joseph Adams is giving away copies of The Way of the Wizard over on his Goodreads page! If you're interested in getting your hands on this fantastic anthology, featuring a story and a handful of headers by yours-truly, check it out!

How to Write a Bio--for SF/F/H writers

2011-05-09T10:12:00.000-07:00

I realized something the other day: most of the writers I know hate writing their bios. Every time a friend makes a sale, I hear a round of misery and sympathy on Twitter as they share their struggles to create a concise blurb that will encapsulate their career and draw readers' interest. But it doesn't have to be that hard! Writing your own biography is one of the easiest tricks you can put in your nonfiction writing magic kit. (And just so you know--I'm going to focus on nonfiction tips and tricks for my next blog post over at Inkpunks.com. If there's anything in particular you'd like to know, let me know and I'll try to address it in that 5/20 post.)

Start by collecting your material.

Many spec fic writers like to begin exploring their work's characters by filling out a character sheet, very like the sheets role-playing gamers use to create their gaming character. When you begin writing your bio, you need to construct yourself as if you were the character. (If you think about it, your persona as a writer is a fictional character. You're drawing this persona out of your real life experiences, but you're not selling yourself. You're selling Writer You. It's like an alternate universe self!)

Check out the character sheet I've linked to and think over some of the answers. Answering someone else's questions can really help reinvigorate your sense of perception. When I think about my personal identity, I think of my family, my core values, my favorite activities. But honestly, these are really, really boring. A bio about me would include: "Wendy Wagner is a mom who is constantly riled up about social causes and therefore must restrict her consumption of all news, save for Vogue and Boing Boing. 80% of the time, Wagner is thinking about coffee or eating sweets." Kind of a dud.

But when I look at the character sheet questions, I come up with thoughts like:

I was born in Eastern Washington. Great. Nobody cares.

I grew up in a town so small the Bookmobile came only ever two weeks. Quirky--and life-changing.

Our house sat across the street from the cemetery. Hey, I can use that for horror markets!

I don't have any pets. I better leave that out or no one will believe I'm a writer.

I have practiced using a shotgun in order to better prepare myself for zombie attack. If I rephrase that, that could be perfect for horror markets!

I used to believe the back door of our house opened into Narnia. Hey, I can use that for fantasy markets!

Focus on audience and market.

You'll notice that many of my thoughts about my character material were focused around markets. That's because there are different kinds of bios, and they all their different size and tone, depending on where you'll be sending your work. Here are some examples:

Basic bio, added to bottom of story or article. This bio usually runs 3-4 lines. It will have a clever opener, a line about your writing credits, a second line that includes any awards or critical praise, and a final line about where you live, where you blog, and/or something witty.

I write a new basic bio for every author spotlight I do for Fantasy Magazine, because I think it's fun and clever. My latest reads:

Wendy N. Wagner grew up in very rural Oregon, where she dreamed her family would abandon her to be raised by wolves. Her short fiction has appeared in Beneath Ceaseless Skies and the anthologies The Way of the Wizard and Rigor Amortis; her interviews and poetry have run in Lightspeed, Fantasy Magazine, Horror-web.com, and Abyss and Apex. She lives in Portland, Oregon with her very understanding husband and daughter, and blogs at www.inkpunks.com.

Because the author spotlight is nonfiction, I thought it was worthwhile to include my nonfiction writing credits in that second line. If I was doing a basic bio for a short story, I would leave that out. If I wanted to sound like a blow-hard, I could have said "Her short fiction has appeared in Beneath Ceaseless Skies (this piece is actually forthcoming, but it will be out before anyone reads the bio) and the anthologies Rigor Amortis and The Way of the Wizard. Publishers Weekly described Wagner's story 'The Secret of Calling Rabbits' as 'melancholy and deeply affecting.'"

I made sure that the hook--the clever first line--of that bio connected to the theme of my article. You don't have to do that, but I think it is a good idea to write a hook that is in the tenor of the market you're writing for. If it's a horror market, I'll usually reference growing up next door to the cemetery. If it's fantasy, I'll mention the Narnia connection. If it's for more general consumption, I'll talk about the summer I read 125 books in two weeks.

"I am a human" bio. This is the bio you'll use on your blog or webpage to make people like you, and it can short or long. The master of the short human bio is Blake Charlton, whose "About" paragraph on his webpage says it all:

Debut novelist and medical student, Blake Charlton is a new face in both fields working to establish a dual career in fiction and medicine.
Currently, Blake is writing fantasy novels, science fiction short stories, and academic essays on medical education and biomedical ethics.

Blake's extended bio is also a great example of the human bio, although he leaves out his writing credits. He has a bibliography page--which you should have on your webpage, too--but your bio will often be lifted wholesale from the about section of your site. So do yourself and anyone writing about you a favor: have it put together tidily in one spot.

I need to update my human bio now that Her Dark Depths is no longer forthcoming, but you can still read it here. It mentions a bit more about my past and how I got interested in writing, and the hooks are less focused on the particular market, and more on general interest items in my life.

The really big bio for guest appearances. You probably won't need this one until you win some awards and get invited to be the guest of honor at a convention or workshop. Most of these run 300-500 words, a full page about yourself. You'll want to focus on creating three or four paragraphs, instead of three or four lines. You can include more about your non-writing life, as well, so if you have an interesting day job that you feel okay talking about, this is a great place for that information. If you have a quirky hobby that has helped your writing career, mention it. If you were mentored by a famous author, mention it. If you went to an awesome workshop ... hey, you get it.

Now that you've got a sense of what each kind of bio requires, and you're certain about what flavor and tone your bio will need, it's time to begin crafting your piece. And like all nonfiction works, you'll need to focus on mechanical details. They are your only hope to be interesting.

What do I mean? Well, when we write spec fic, we have the advantage of creating a special, unique world populated by fascinating characters. When you're writing your bio, you are writing about a chump who can never, ever compete with the people you make up. I mean, think about it: who's more interesting, you or Wolverine? Or anybody from Game of Thrones? Even the most caricatured spec fic bad guy is about 95% more interesting than your average writer.* But you are lucky. Unlike that bad guy, you have words on your side. And there are some cheats that will can you sound much, much better those muscle-bound fictional heroes you're writing about right now.

Use active verbs. It's the same advice you've been struggling with in your prose, but it can make a huge difference. Look at my bio. I've got grew, dreamed, appeared, runs, lives, and blogs. There's not a lot of "she was," "she is" action. And that's good. Those constructions aren't bad, but in a short space, you don't have room for not bad. You're trying to make people share their beds (hey, most folks read in bed!) and hearts with you. Rock them!
Use a little colorful language. It's okay to sneak in a drop of alliteration or a fun idiom. In a short story, colorful language can be too distracting from the action. But remember, there's nothing going on in your bio. It's not an adventure. A dab of colorful language will not hurt. That's why I shared about being "raised by wolves" or I've talked about "preparing for the zombie apocalypse." These phrases sound fun. In real life, I'm not actually entertaining, but I'd really like my readers to think I am. Maybe I'll sound so fun to be with, my readers will buy me a drink at a con!
Variate sentence constructions. Easily the most important factor. If you start every line of your bio with "He was xyz. He does abc. He likes def," your bio will be boring. Make sure you have a variety of sentence structures: "A constant thrill-seeker, John Remy finds himself drawn to high risk rock-climbing. His work draws on his adventurous life, and his thrilling short fiction has appeared in Y & W. He lives in Town X, State, and blogs at blah blah." That's variety. That's the spice of life.

It's not hard to write a bio and you shouldn't be frightened of the process. It's a simple matter of doing your research, focusing on your market & audience, and playing your best tricks--which are the three base-points of writing non-fiction. It's actually pretty fun!

* Average writer. People like Blake Charlton and Mary Robinette Kowal are not average. Their regular lives are actually cool. I mean, CNN did a feature on Blake. I totally wish I could write his bio instead of mine.

Super Heroes

2011-05-02T11:55:00.001-07:00

Sometimes when I think about current events and the future of humanity, I get pretty damn depressed. Our natural resources are steeply depleted. We're overpopulating the globe. The weather just keeps worse. Sometimes I think that the future can only be a terrible god-awful hell, an apocalyptic wasteland full of bandits pillaging the earth for water and fuel. So ... basically Mad Max.

But the truth is that our world would already be in a state of war, starvation and hunger if it weren't for the brains of one man:

Fritz Haber.

Because he invented a process that would bind nitrogen from the atmosphere so it could be added back into soil, we were able to reinvent agriculture, radically increasing productivity. The agricultural boom has provided for the massive growth of the human population--population thinkers suggest that one-third to one-half the human beings currently alive on this planet would not have anything to eat without the Haber-Bosch nitrogen fixing process. By stretching our nitrogen resources, we have pushed back the some of pressures which lead to fighting and misery in animal populations.

[Yes, I'm aware of the military applications of Haber's work. But I think his fertilizer work has probably had a larger effect on more people.]

In many portions of the world today, people lead better lives than they did in the Dark Ages. There's much less violence, especially in First World nations. People live longer. People have more opportunities to explore their world and to be creative. And that's not because we have more resources. It's because we've had more education. We've drawn on the brilliant ideas of scientists like Haber. We've nurtured thinkers of all stripes to create a cultural climate of innovation and curiosity. It takes experts in the arts and the sciences and the humanities to make a culture that can create a new future.

Our world is better because of the work of an elite team of Heroes. Super Heroes. Super Thinking Heroes. They're scientists and writers and painters and philosophers and other folks who are committed to feeding ideas, nurturing thought, and stimulating the world around them to be a better place.

Here are pictures of some of my favorite core members of this remarkable League of Extraordinary Thinkers. Can you name them all?

Names:

1. Jane Austen

2. Albert Einstein

3. Karl Marx

4. Charles Darwin

5. Jules Verne

6. Rachel Carson

7. Beatrix Potter

8. Benjamin Franklin

I'll put up the answers tomorrow. In the meantime, just imagine: who are the thinkers today working to change the world? Do you know them? Are you one of them?

Edited 5/6: I've had some problems with the answer post, so I'm just adding the answers here:

a-5, the pioneering SF & adventure writer Jules Verne, whose imagination has stimulated generations of explorers and dreamers ; b-2, Albert Einstein, the man who gave us the General Theory of Relativity, one of the fundamental underpinnings of contemporary physics ; c-Beatrix Potter, whose illustrated children's books have been urging children to love nature and reading for more than a hundred years ; d-3, Karl Marx, a political philosopher whose realizations about the co-evolution of society and the economy led to the creation of the postmodern outlook--oh, and Communism; e-8, Benjamin Franklin, inventor, political philosopher and US Postal pioneer ; f-6, Rachel Carson, a marine biologist whose writings about pesticides' affects on the natural world challenged human ideas about the environment and our responsibilities within it; g-Jane Austen, a writer whose witty romantic novels skewered the social mores and structures of her times ; h-4, natural historian Charles Darwin, whose writings on natural selection changed our understanding of individuals within their environments ; i- .

Super big weekend

2011-04-26T20:21:00.000-07:00

Gosh. I can't believe how tired I am. People tell you getting married is hard work, but I hadn't believed just how worn out it would leave me. Who knew being a hyper-emotional mess for an entire week would leave a girl so tuckered out?

I'm not really sure why I was such a crazy emotional disaster, although I feel certain impatience, nervousness (what if they don't like my chili?!?), and excitement played equal parts. After all, it's not every day that I get to see my parents or meet a really awesome friend (who proved to be just as awesome in person as in her near-daily emails) or marry the most excellent man alive.

Now I just want to take naps, hold toes with my new hubbie (yes, he really does hold toes. It's enchanting!), and try to recoup some of my brainpower. I have so much writing to catch up on, it's not even funny!

Soaking & siphoning

2011-04-18T09:45:00.000-07:00

Have you ever noticed that once you commit to take a break from creative work and just focus on soaking up the world around you, everything is super-fascinating? Posters, stickers, photographs in Vogue, cheesy movies ... I'm not sure if I'm just hopped up on pre-wedding hormones or if the world is just being extra co-operative!

Off to sketch girls riding elephants and watch 80s horror flicks.

SFWA Northwest Reading Series!

2011-04-15T16:32:00.001-07:00

Just a reminder that Tuesday marks the first event in SFWA's new reading series! (7pm, the Kennedy School--Jay Lake, Kay Kenyon, & Brent Weeks will reading, drinking, and having fun with folks.)

I'll be there, sucking down beer and tater tots. :D

Schedules, rituals, & routines

2011-04-11T21:11:00.000-07:00

Last year I got to meet the fantastic, super-cool Blake Charlton. The man is an inspiration--he's going to Stanford medical school and putting out quality fantasy fiction. And he blogs and tweets and cracks up everybody around him, too.

Of course, the first thing everybody asks is: "How the heck do you manage to go to med school and still have time to write?" I asked it. He volleyed: "You're a mom. How do you do it?"

I honestly don't know how Blake does it, because medical school isn't like other school. Going to (normal!) school and raising kids are both lifestyles that can actually dovetail quite nicely with the writing life, because children and school both demand structure--a schedule, a regular routine.

A smart writer finds a way to settle into a regular writing schedule. You get used to writing at certain times, and your body helps remind you to sit down and pump out some words. It's a lot like the way that if you eat lunch every day at a certain time, you'll be hungry even if your schedule gets thrown off.

Kids thrive with routines. It's comforting for them to have clear expectations about their day. You can use that to your advantage if you're a writer. My daughter comes home from school and eats a snack--but then she very regularly takes some quiet time to herself. Sometimes she hangs out in her room and listens to a book on CD. Sometimes she watches a movie. Sometimes she just disappears into the basement and hides. But I can pretty much count on at least half an hour of downtime in the afternoon that I can use to catch up on weird writerly tasks (blogging or reading slush or something).

School kids often have a structured rhythm to their week, as well. I feel a sort of ticking clock during the week--a friendly pressure to get the bulk of my writing work done before the weekend. That nudging really encourages me to keep on top of my to-do lists.

Kids also need a certain amount of ritual. Rituals are related to routines; they help kids mark off time and make it meaningful. Rituals come at the small scale (the careful rite of bedtime activities, the same every single day) and the large scale (the comforting ritual of Thanksgiving family breakfast followed by time in nature) and even the sporadic (weddings and funerals).

Writers can use ritual to their benefit, too. Having a certain specified sequence at the beginning of your writing session can help you shift from the prosaic world into the creative realm. Doing something special when you start or complete a project can help you cut your ties to a project so you can move your energy into the next one.

For me, I can't imagine being a mom who wasn't a writer. In part, it's because in those brief months when The Midget and I lived alone, I realized that to be a good parent I would have to put aside all pretenses and be really and purely myself. If I was going to be psychologically healthy enough to take care of a kid, I was going to have to take care of myself and live my life purposefully, with intention and passion. I knew I was going to have to give her advice about pursuing her dreams, and I couldn't undermine those values by turning my back on hers.

Your children deserve parents who are the best possible people they can be. And if you are a writer, then you owe it to them and yourself to be the best possible writer you can be. It might sound overwhelming, but you can make it a part of your ordinary life. Getting the words out is just like remembering to brush your teeth before bed: a routine. A ritual.

What makes a murder?

2011-04-07T10:25:00.000-07:00

I write science fiction and fantasy, but I have a background in philosophy. For me, the most obnoxious part of my philosophical training was my coursework in ethics. We had to discuss many hot-button topics, and a great deal of the conversation was compounded by an inability to agree on our terms. It's difficult to have effective discourse when people's different backgrounds have given common words very different connotations.

The hottest topic in ethics class was abortion. I think it's a topic that exemplarizes the fractured communications that come from word connotation.

For some, abortion means murder. It's killing a person, and that's it.
For some, abortion can't mean murder, because murder requires personhood, and some people don't feel as if unborn entities qualify as people. They tend to see abortion as a medical procedure, primarily affecting the mother.
For some, abortion can't mean murder, because murder requires malicious intent, and some feel that the choice to end a pregnancy isn't a malicious one--it comes from some kind of hope to prevent suffering. These people often see abortion as euthanasia.

With these three major differences in word usage, how can people talk clearly about the same subject?

When you're writing fiction and ethical situations come up, think deeply about word usage. The words you choose and the attitudes your character has about them will deeply color your reader's experience of the work.

When it comes to murder, your characters will use the term in fascinating ways. Here are some possibilities:

War involves killing, but depending your outlook, deaths in combat may or may not be murder. Someone who believes the battle is justified will not usually use the word "murder;" a peace advocate probably will.
Killing animals for food is typically not considered murder, but if you're writing a character who is an animal empath, you'll almost certainly use that term.
Assisted suicide might be called murder by someone with a set-fate religious belief, but a concerned grand-daughter who's spent time watching her grandma battle with cancer would probably use the term "euthanasia" or "assisted suicide."
If a horrible accident happens--say your character's new invention explodes and kills a young child--the devastated family members might use the word "murder" if the accident was the result of particularly stupid behavior or if they don't like your character.

It's not always easy for us to step outside of our own word connotations to explore morality, but as writers, it's critical, especially if you're digging into unfamiliar cultures. If you're creating your own new planet full of its own fascinating cultural mores, you'll be glad you slowed down and dug deep.

Families We Choose

2011-04-04T10:34:00.000-07:00

Family. It's a weird creation, isn't it? It's this notion that something fundamental can bind people together, a binding that transcends borders and distance and age. That no matter what happens to you or who you've become, you can turn to your family and they will be there for you.

Most of the people I know have had to build or prune or reshape their families. From the simple and traditional (marriage is the classic way to claim a new person as a family member; adoption another) to more intense and unusual, most of us claim family members who aren't related to us by blood or marriage, and many of us have cut bonds with people who are related in those traditional methods. Some of my friends were expelled from their circles of kinship for reasons of religion or sexuality.

Since I'm gearing up for my wedding, family is on my mind. One of the major reasons my partner and I are marrying is to help him adopt my daughter. He's the only father she's ever known and we understand that we need to protect their special relationship. Our marriage is the first step toward taking better care of our family.

And of course having a wedding means inviting friends and family to be a part of the ritual. Sometimes it's hard to know where "friend" ends and "family" begins, especially in families where relationships are sometimes strained. Or where friends are exceptionally closely bonded!

I'm lucky to have so many wonderful people joining me to celebrate the new direction my family is taking. I know there have been times in my life where I've dreamed of moving away and starting fresh, with no ties, floating like dandelion fluff along the wind. But there is a pleasant weight to family, no matter the bad memories, the difficult times, and the hard choices. I'm glad I've chosen to keep them.

Going BRIDEZILLA

2011-03-29T21:15:00.000-07:00

Okay, I didn't think it could happen, but I have recently become that woman who only talks about "my wedding this, my wedding that, my wedding blah blah blah blah blah." OMG. It never stops. My kid has sprained her eyeballs rolling them about my wedding prattle. I am a marriage monster!

I can't really state anything in my defense, although I guess I understand how it happens. There are all these details about arranging this giant party, a party where everybody is going to be looking AT ME, wondering how my butt got so big. (Really. It's been a while since I saw Kaz's family, and I was a lot skinnier then.) That's actually kind of stressful!

And when I say there are a lot of details, I mean, there are a lot of details. Like, who knew these dresses required all these special undergarments? I didn't even buy a crazy foofy fancy one, but I'm still investing about a jillion dollars in Spanx. (Okay, the Target knock-off line. Jeez. I can't fool you guys for a second.) Apparently regular underwear makes a girl look "lumpy." I thought lumpy was just my natural look. But in order to minimize in-law mockery, I'm willing to go for the lycra.

As if restraining my bulges wasn't enough, there's restraining my house. My future in-laws plan to be in the Pacific Northwest for 9 days. Do you know how many family dinners that will mean? Do you know how clean my house will need to be? I can barely bring my kitchen up to safety standards, let alone Impress Your Mother-in-Law standards. Luckily, my mom and dad are short on time, so I don't think they'll make it over for any meals. My mom would eyeball the ceiling and push the food around on her plate, as if suspicious the over-looked cobwebs might have somehow contaminated it.

I might, perhaps, exaggerate slightly.

My family members are all wonderful, kind-hearted people. They won't judge or condemn me for spending more time noodling around on the internet and making up dirty fiction than cleaning my house and working out. They will have fun and help me have fun at my wedding.

Yeah ... still gonna invest in the lycra.

Housecleaning and stuff

2011-03-22T21:53:00.001-07:00

Uff.

I spent the afternoon working on moving my main webpage over to a Wordpress design. The old set-up was really irritating, and since I wanted to rebuild my bibliography page, this seemed like perfect timing. I also got my POP settings fixed so I can finally receive business email (wendy at winniewoohoo.com)!

I feel like a smart techno-girl tonight!

Hear the Evil

2011-03-15T21:25:00.000-07:00

The other day good chance brought me to an interesting blog post about sound, something that made me think about how we write about sounds.

As Rob points out in the post, we spend a great deal of energy getting rid of unimportant sounds in our world. Our brain is hard-wired for this task, and because of its hard work, the sounds that actually trickle into our conscious minds are highlighted for our attention. A sound might be attention-worthy because it's new and unusual, or at least something we haven't heard for a while. It might be attention-worthy because it's something we've learned is important. We've all had the experience of riding the bus and hearing someone else's phone ring--it's not worth getting worked up about unless the person has your same ring tone. You have habituated yourself to a quick response when you hear that sound, and your ears can pick it up even over the annoying chit-chat of fellow bus riders.

This has two effects on our perceptions of sound cues in fiction. For one, we automatically assume that a sound cue is meaningful. People don't reference sounds unless they really affect the narrative. If a character makes a noise, the reader will work hard to try to figure out how that noise changes the scene. As readers, we know that every sense reference is important, but because of our superior aural filtering systems (I think most people have very adept noise filtering powers, much stronger than our visual "ignoring" powers), sounds really pop for us.

Also, sounds stand out as more threatening. I'm not crazy here; we're hard-wired to be skittish about noise. Humans have weak night vision, and so night, our most vulnerable time, is also the time we have to most attune ourselves to our hearing. In the dark, every sound elicits a leery response. Every noise is analyzed for its threat quotient. When we force our readers to rely on auditory sense cues, we make them turn to their internal danger diagnostic and mull over their peril.

I think this is one reason why hearing is such an under-used sense in most fiction genres. Writers often limit themselves to auditory references that are linked solely with communication: sighs, grunts, purrs, groans. It's a method certain to keep readers in their comfort zones.

But what about writers who are eager to get their readers out of their comfort zones?

There is one genre that relies heavily on sound cues, and that's horror. There's a reason why haunted house stories are famous for their clanking chains and creaking floors: in real life, those sounds are actually scary. Writing them into our stories is one way to tap into simple, natural terror.

One way to take your creaks and groans and other eerie noises and give them a little extra mileage is to tinker with their placement in the text. Position your auditory references where your readers can't ignore them. Here's an example--a passage written with the same sentences, just reorganized.

I walked out to the front porch and realized night had fallen without my notice. The wind nudged the old swing, making it creak. Over the lawn, fireflies twinkled.

I could almost believe Mama wasn't dead.

I walked out to the front porch and realized night had fallen without my notice. Over the lawn, fireflies twinkled. The wind nudged the old swing, making it creak.

I could almost believe Mama wasn't dead.

There's not much difference in the two passages, but I personally feel as if the sound cue--the cliched creaking!--is played up by its placement at the end of the paragraph in the second variant. The first version of the exercise feels more tender; the second, a little more spooky. Maybe Mom's a ghost!

Of course, it's easy to think about silence and spookiness right now. I just spent four nights in the Quinault Rainforest, a place heady with dark clouds and darker forests. And I might be thinking a little extra about writing because I was on a retreat with a number of incredibly talented writers.

I can't say enough about the beauty of the last weekend, but I can say: it was a great place to start writing a ghost story. :D

(Picture stolen from John Remy.)

Neglecting my blog!

2011-03-06T22:22:00.000-08:00

If you're curious what exciting things have kept me away from the blog lately, brace yourself for excitement. My world has been rocking lately. Here goes:

Shopping for wedding stuff. Like corduroy pants--for Sweetie-Pie--and kraft paper. Plus, the top secret wedding favor shopping that involved a 45 mile drive and trips to 8 separate thrift stores. Including a Goodwill with a bins, where I thought we might be rendered for our parts by vicious shoppers.

Shopping for underwear. You wouldn't think this would be difficult, but you obviously don't live in my world. See, Sweetie-Pie remembered that his employer had a deal with Target that gave their employees 10% off purchases made on Target.com. So we thought we would make our annual bulk sock-underwear-tights purchase on the website and save a little scratch. Brilliant, right?

Apparently not! Target.com was out of children's underwear. They didn't carry the kind of undies my Sweetie likes. They not only didn't offer cotton briefs as an option in the women's department, but in response to a search for women's briefs (yeah, yeah, I know they're granny panties, but I like 'em!), the first item on their list were these Booty Pop Enhancing Panties.

Okay, I've seen myself in the mirror. My booty is popped. I don't need any more padding than I've grown myself--what I need are booty-shrinking panties. Or at least booty-restraining panties. But a search for that product brought up only the suggestion to check my typing. *sigh*

Eventually, we caved and went to a brick-and-mortar Target and bought underwear in person. Too bad I didn't check the package before Sweetie-pie washed them all. Turns out my 6-pack of undies was mislabeled, and when I started folding laundry, I was dismayed to find panties that could double as t-shirts in my laundry basket. They're only *4* sized too big!

Selling a story. In good news, I did sell a story to Beneath Ceaseless Skies, a really beautiful online fantasy magazine. The piece took a good chunk of re-writing, and I can't thank the editor, Scott Andrews, enough for his amazing advice, skills and patience. He might just be my new editorial hero.

I mean, editorial hero #2. Because obviously my boss is my hero. I'm not sure I ever want to put together anthologies or run a magazine, but if I find myself doing either, I want to do them just the way he does.

Which is why I'm pleased as punch to announce the re-launch of Fantasy Magazine! It's looks incredibly awesome!

Oh yeah. That kept me pretty busy, too.

But mostly, I've just been getting ready for the Rainforest Writers Retreat. If I was any more excited, I'd probably need adult diapers.

Which might be easier to shop for than cotton briefs...

Writer's Meh

2011-02-21T22:47:00.000-08:00

Meh.

I typically hate that word, but I can't think of any better description of my feelings toward making words the last few days. What's the point?

Scared by the garden

2011-02-17T16:37:00.000-08:00

I stepped out into the side yard today and took a look at my winter- and chicken-ravaged garden. YIKES! It's a disaster out there! Soil all over the place (because one old planter finally burst its seams and leaked dirt everywhere); chicken doodie landmines under every step and jet-launched leaves strewn about like the Nordstrom lingerie section after a white sale. Oof!

What is everybody else doing to get ready for the spring growing season? I haven't even glanced at any seed catalogs yet this winter!

Mogwais in Publishing

2011-02-07T21:31:00.000-08:00

You remember what happens to a mogwai when it gets wet, right? Can anyone forget the bubbles of fur shooting out poor Gizmo's back? Or the dozens of giggling furball baby mogwai?

That's what happens to a normal person's to-do list when they step into editorial work. And that's not necessarily bad--I mean, who wouldn't want lots and lots of cute giggling furballs to snuggle and play with? It's all a matter of mindset.

Jaym Gates brought this idea up on Facebook: once you put on an editorial hat, the days of tidily checking tasks off a to-do list is out the door. There's no done in a magazine, not as long as the magazine is still operational. Like dishes and laundry, the tasks replenish themselves almost as soon as you wrap them up. That's because the quest for great literature is never over. Every time you find a great story, deep down, you're hoping there's another one, even better, just waiting to be discovered.

Being busy is part and parcel of the game. I think some editorial folks take an obscene joy in their over-worked, stressed-out attitude. But that's not any more help than pretending the work will do itself. I might have just started in this business, but it seems obvious that plugging along bit by bit is the only way not to burn myself out or feel resentful.

As a former serial procrastinator, this is a new lifestyle for me. In college, I lived for deadlines. Plowing through a slug of work at the last moment was my method operandi. But getting old changed me. Or maybe it's just doing work I actually like. But at any rate, I'm not scared of the multiplying duties in my inbox.

I just have to remember not to feed 'em after midnight.

Goodness

2011-02-03T13:20:00.000-08:00

Today I am overwhelmed by the sense that I am doing what I am meant to be doing, that my passion has found me and every day is full of something exciting and magical.

I think I have found my place in the world, the place I've always been looking for, that dare-to-be-great sweet spot where my talents are useful and the things I can do count for something.

I want to hold my breath so I don't blow it away!
I want to shout out loud!

And then ordinary life, with its toothbrushes and dirty dishes, reminds me that this is all real.

Slaying the green-eyed monster

2011-01-24T13:38:00.000-08:00

You will hear it time and time again: jealousy among writers is bad; being jealous of other writers only proves that you are really insecure; being jealous of other writers' successes only wastes your energy. Those things are probably all true. But that doesn't mean I haven't spent the last several months boiling in a Hot Writing Jealousy Stew. When you're inside that stew, everyone you know seems to be succeeding while you spin your wheels in this business.

The thing about jealousy--or at least my jealousy--is that it's not actually jealousy.

I know, it didn't make sense to me, either. But wait, I'll explain. When my friends had great stuff happen, did I resent those happy moments and want to take them away from my wonderful pals? No. When my fellow ToC-mates got great reviews and my stories languished unmentioned, did I want to tear apart the reviewers and make fun of my fellow book-mates? No.

No, what I said was: Why don't you write anything good enough to get a glowing review? Why didn't you write anything good enough to get in Year's Best Fantasy? Why didn't you get into Anthology X? Are you falling down on the job? Aren't you working hard enough? You stupid loser! Get to work! I hate you!

I hate you. Whoah. Is that really something you should tell yourself every day?

Not that I realized I was saying it. But when I sat around feeling glum that I had no agent when my friends were hanging out with industry hot shots, or gloomy because I didn't meet X standard, I was actually telling myself all kinds of awful stuff. Jealousy was a symptom of some greater dissatisfaction with my life. Once I realized that, then I could do something about it.

You see, what I want most in this world is to write. And in my head, my day job & ordinary reality hold me back from writing. Every time I have a writing achievement, I feel more like a "real writer." The more achievements, the more I feel like I'm growing up and taking up my role as a full-time writer.

Here's the earth-shaking revelation: I spend more time writing than I do cleaning, taking care of my family or going to work. Combined. And that's not because I am winning things or publishing things or getting amazing reviews. But because I love writing and I've re-arranged my life to do it.

If somebody spends 40+ hours a week working as an accountant, wouldn't you call her a real accountant?

So why aren't I are real writer?

If my life dream is to be a writer, then congratulations! I've succeeded! I'm a writer and then some! I'm making overtime at this business.

And as much as I don't want to hear it, maybe what I'm unhappy about is that the rest of my life is calling to me, reminding me to live a little. Maybe knock off a day a week to catch up with reality. Even Stephen King takes the day off now and then.

I guess what I've learned about jealousy is that it's not a waste of time and energy. It's not a feeling your body has stirred up to sabotage your creativity. It's a message from within you. If you don't listen to it, you'll regret it. But once you let it speak its piece, it will leave you alone.

Which is a pretty good thing. Because if there's a second thing I've learned about the green-eyed monster, it's that I look pretty creepy with green eyes.

Mea culpa!

2011-01-21T12:26:00.001-08:00

I learned something important today, people: that if you're going to shop for 40th birthday presents for the man you love, you will need chocolate.

Okay, I know, I'm supposed to be dieting (you know, to keep fitting into that vintage wedding dress* I bought that just barely fits), but JEEBUS! Do you know how hard it is to find an affordable zip-front hoodie that doesn't have stupid graphics all over it? Do you know how much board games cost? I had start shopping for airline tickets to WFC as a kind of shopping therapy. Seriously, you can fly to San Diego and back for the same price as most board games. --Only a little hyperbole here.--

Anyway, I know I shouldn't have eaten the chocolate. And I'll probably regret it. Maybe I'll get up early tomorrow morning and go for a run.

Oh. Hey, I think I just sprained something laughing so hard. I don't get up early on Saturdays. I crack myself up. Which burns calories. WIN!

*Dress for a wedding, not "wedding dress." Remember, this wedding is a nylon- and high heel-free zone. It's no place for white lacy floofy shit!

The Guaranteed Results Writing Advice You've Been Waiting For

2011-01-17T21:25:00.001-08:00

I have seen a lot of rock-solid short story writing advice the last few days. Christie Yant blogged about what she's learned in a year reading and editing stories at Lightspeed. Mercedes Yardley posted about what she's learned reading slush at Shock Totem. I even attempted a post a week or so ago. But these tidbits of information aren't going to win you the instant success you're looking for. Neither of these ladies is laying it out straight.

Well, it's time for some straight dope. No lying. No cutting corners. This is what it takes to succeed writing short fiction in the spec fic genre marketplace. Follow the steps, and you'll be delivering your Hugo acceptance in no time.

1. Locate the nearest crossroads. From my house, I'd probably pick the on-ramp just west of the Ross Island Bridge, where Highway 26 touches I5 southbound. Another good alternative might be the intersection of Powell Boulevard (Highway 26) and 82nd Ave, since that street is also Highway 213.

2. Locate a living chicken. That's easy. My neighbor has three and they're usually eating birdseed underneath my birdfeeder.

3. Bring chicken to crossroads. This is tricky, since I don't have a pet carrier, and all animals need to be crated to ride the bus. But no serious problem--I'll just borrow one from my sister.

4. Wait until midnight. Luckily, Carl's Jr here on the corner is open until pretty late. I can probably keep myself awake drinking Mt Dew and eating french fries. The chicken would probably appreciate the fries a lot, too.

5. Call upon the powers of darkness. There are plenty to choose from. Satan's always a good choice, as Beezelbub is really into flies, which have those dirty little feet, and the Elder Gods are just really slimy. But if you're willing to put some research into it, I'm sure you can find the right evil demon or underworld-dwelling god to fit your own needs.

6. Light a candle. Or better yet, a bonfire. Evil gods like fire. So do good ones. Pyromania goes hand in hand with omnipotence, I think. It explains why so many men enjoy barbequeing.

7. Sacrifice your chicken and surrender your soul in return for literary success. Ahh, crap. I'm a vegetarian! I can't kill a chicken! Take my soul, please--I don't need it. Wait! Elder Gods! I didn't mean what I said about the slime. Come back!

Come baaaaack!

Damn it. Well, it looks like I'm going to miss out on next year's Hugo ceremony. On the plus side, though, my neighbor still likes me, and I'm totally wound up on caffeine.

Funny animals

2011-01-10T22:03:00.000-08:00

Every now and again, you just have to talk about funny animals. Like this guy. I was looking through old pictures--okay, I was looking for cute family photos for a slideshow to have on at the wedding, I admit it!--and I found Chubbles here.

I don't know if you can see it in this picture, but this ground squirrel had rolls on his rolls. He was easily twice as large as the next biggest ground squirrel, and his double chin wobbled when he walked. He had bat-wings made of pudge. Of all the squirrels at this park, he was the one aggressively tasting garbage around the parking lot. He tested a cigarette butt, but deemed it unedible. He came right up to me and begged for food.

I know shouldn't have fed him, but I could resist. When I gave him a piece of rice cake, he zipped off and gave it to the attractive lady squirrel hiding in the grass.

Yep. Damn cute.

The first step

2011-01-03T11:42:00.000-08:00

Today I typed the first scene of my next book. (Novel #5 if you're counting.) The five minutes before I actually started typing were brutal. A thousand million doubts leaped into my mind: you don't have enough pre-writing done; you haven't done enough character-building; this isn't the right story; this setting is too dark for the market; why don't you keep doing research on that other project you want to start, that wonderful adult, gothic, tree-licious project that will be so much more fun to write/potentially be critically acclaimed/make a better movie/have a cooler title/ impress more people.

I almost succumbed to the desires to eat a big chunk of chocolate or wash dishes, but I pushed them away. Okay, I didn't actually push away those desires. I actually bellowed "By the power of Orbit gum, I can do this!" and then typed "Chapter One."

Aren't you glad you're not my neighbor? Mine are pretty certain I'm insane.

But 3 sticks of gum later, I have 900 new words about a kid I think I'm going to love and a planet I'm already glad I don't live on. There are still a few doubts malingering around in the back of my brain, but at this moment, I don't feel like I need to listen to them. They'll probably wait at least another 6,000 words before attacking again, at which point in time I will probably need to invest in my favorite flavor of gum: Mint Mojito. It's the little bribes that really get you through these things.

I do feel like today is an auspicious day to start writing this particular book. Today is J.R.R Tolkien's birthday, and I love his books--not for the writing, which can be awkward, but for their amazing sense of place. Tolkien was a master worldbuilder, a creator of place and peoples with a depth like no other. And this book that I'm starting came not from a situational idea or a character, as most of my other projects have begun, but from the thought of a world. I fell in love with a shot in a movie and I wanted to create a world around it.

Little by little, the place evolved. I struggled to make the place make sense and I struggled to figure out what kind of people would (or even could!) live in this cruel environment. I can't say that my main character came easily. I was struggling with her even last week. But a few nights ago, I was in the bath, and a scene played out in my mind. And I knew I had her. The one and only girl who could power this story.

This morning all I had to do was push aside my self and my world and put that girl on paper. And by the power of Orbit gum, I have begun!

Are you getting ready for any new challenges this year? Maybe this will turbo-charge you the way it charged me:

2010: Stats

2010-12-31T21:20:00.000-08:00

So here's a report on my booklife, strictly by the numbers:

Short story submissions: 43

Poetry submissions: 2

Novel submissions: 1

Short story acceptances: 6

Poetry acceptances: 1

Novel acceptances: 1

Queries (for agents): 21

Story headers for anthologies: 57

Author spotlights: 3

Author interview: 1

New stories: 10 submittable

New poems: 1

Novels: 1 drafted and revised for submissions; 1 revised with editor for publication.

Slush-read for the Glasswoman Prize.

Began reading slush and related stuff for Fantasy this month.

2011 starts in 2.5 hours. I'd better get cracking if I'm going to top 2010!

Slush it to me!

2010-12-29T18:05:00.000-08:00

Confession time: I started reading slush at Fantasy magazine, and I have to say that I like it. 80% of the time, I wind up reading the entire story, because I'm a neurotic jerk like that. I want to know what happens, damn it!

But I've learned something from the process that I desperately hope I can take to my own writing. I've learned after achieving a certain level of craft, there's really one one thing you need to make from my pile of slush to the editor's desk. It's not using fancy metaphors or exotic language. It's not something you could put in a cover letter. It's not anything you could learn in an MFA program. It's just one small thing. Can you guess what it is?

Don't be boring.

Now once the boss-man gets your story, your prose probably gets scrutinized and the publishing schedule gets looked over. Lots and lots of criteria rolls into place. But the biggest hurdle for an unknown writer is making it to the editor's desk in the first place. And all you have to do is manage a reasonable proficiency at writing--while not boring people like me.

There's a lot that goes into not being boring. I brought up some requirements back in March in my post "Lessons from Free Fiction." I back every last claim in that piece, and if I was your critique partner, I would rip through your piece and point out every ugly incidence. On top of those recommendations, I would suggest working on your world-building and character creation. If they're unique and interesting, a slow story can still rock my socks.

Anybody else have any good suggestions to cut the boring right out of your short fiction?

Blogging becomes tricky

2010-12-27T14:45:00.000-08:00

There's actually a lot going on in my writing world, but I'm not really able to blog about any of it. I started querying for Novel #4. I'm doing some editorial work. I sold a story, but the anthology is in this weird limbo. I sold a poem, but I'm not sure when it comes out.

On the plus side, I started the notecards for Novel #5 last week. The holidays have slowed everything down, but this afternoon I hope to get more work done and start the first page next Monday. It's a YA project and I hope it pans out. I love the world it's set in.

I don't have any big plans for New Year's Eve, except lunch with a friend and hopefully baked brie for an exciting evening appetizer. Anybody have any favorite baked brie recipes?

True North

2010-12-20T14:04:00.000-08:00

Do you know what a lodestone is?

A lodestone is a naturally magnetized piece of the mineral magnetite. In the picture above, you can see the paper clips sticking to the chunk of ordinary-looking rock--it's a lodestone.

In medieval China, navigators developed a compass using the lodestone. Because it will point north, many people associate lodestones with telling direction and finding one's way in the world.

Almost eight years ago, I had lost my way. My plans to go to graduate school clashed with my new role as a single mom (at this point, I was a hugely pregnant emotional mess); I felt alone and I had no passion for anything. After two years of almost rabid environmental campaigning (letter writing and marching and organizing protests about agricultural issues), I felt depressed about the future of the world and powerless to do anything about it. And while I'd always dreamed of being a writer, I felt guilty that the only story ideas I had involved dragons, fairies and vampires. I was ashamed of everything about myself.

At the time, a friend of mine was planning a birthday party, and since she was interested in paganism, I stopped by a magic and herb shop. Nothing seemed like the right gift for my friend, but a display of lodestones caught my eye. It felt like a sign, like an offering from some mysterious spirit. I bought one and kept it in my underwear drawer.

I didn't think much about it, taking it out once in a while to wonder at the tiny iron filings clinging to the stone's black flanks. It wasn't a beautiful stone, but its heft in my hand and magical magnetism fascinated me.

Weeks passed and decisions that had tormented me became easy. I quit my job. I wrote a children's book. I moved in with my mother. I set aside grad school plans and began a novel. Life wasn't easy--I had to move to Portland and take on odd jobs to pay my student loan, while mooching a home from my sister and sucking the food stamp teat--but somehow, I knew which direction I was going. I knew I needed to be a writer.

Sometimes I still take my lodestone out of my underwear drawer and study it. The superstitious part of me deeply believes that this little charcoal-colored stone pulled me back onto my life path. The more rational part believes that my lodestone is simply a beautiful symbol for the love of story that has always been inside me, hidden beneath the chatter of a busy young life. My time alone turned off that chatter and let the truth tug at me.

We must all look for our own true north. For me, it lies in a land of myth and mystery, of fantasy and horror. It lies in the darkest forest of the Realm of Words, the place on the map labeled "Here there be dragons." There are other places in that realm, good places, wonderful to visit. Maybe you pull you.

If they do, you should let thtem.

Picture by Ryan Somma.

Waves & runs

2010-12-14T17:03:00.000-08:00

Hi, blog! I just wanted to let you know that I am still alive but I've started some editorial projects that are very absorbing. If you need a bloggy treat, hit up my interview with Blake Charlton over on the Inkpunks blog!

Family & friends

2010-12-06T21:18:00.000-08:00

I spend a great deal of time talking about work and writing and the career. And those are really important parts of my life. But this year, I've learned something important: it's the people I love who make my life hold together.

This year, the relationship part of my life blossomed like it's never blossomed before. I made new friends with a remarkable group of people: the Inkpunks, a crew of writers who are incredibly supportive, talented and large-hearted. I have gotten to know a lot of people online, but of them all, this crew has created a special and incredible bond. I am so glad they added me to their lives!

One of the Inkpunks is a remarkable lady who asked me to critique a story for her. I read it, then she read one of mine, and soon we were inseparable critique buddies. Amazingly enough, these first stories we read for each other were purchased by the same editor for the same anthology--our first pro sales. Now we don't just read for each other: we talk every day. Seriously, a day without talking to Christie is weird and empty--and totally unusual.

My very special family has played an extra-wonderful part of my life this year. My wonderful partner, Kaz, asked me to tie the knot after I came back from my trip to England. After a week of single parenting, he not only didn't hate me, he was ready for more! (Which he'll get to try out again this March when I go to the Rainforest Writers Retreat.)

I have so many treasured people in my life, but I often push aside being social. Sometimes the thought of spending time with people is overwhelming. It's easy to say "I'll get together someday." It's easy to say "I've got a deadline coming up." But life doesn't always offer you a someday. This November, another Portland writer I know had a major health disaster. We'd met a time or two and I always thought that someday we'd get together and have coffee again. There was plenty of time for it. But he could have died that weekend, and all those someday's would be gone.

We're having coffee this Friday.

Life is busy. I know my life is only going to get busier. After all, there are a lot of projects on my horizon--and some of them are pretty big. But this year, I'm going to do a better job making time for the people I care about. They are a pretty wonderful part of life.

Tell me a ghost story

2010-11-29T10:03:00.000-08:00

I had a strange experience at work yesterday. I was sitting in the box office, facing my friend and chatting, when I felt someone lay their hand on the back of my head. I could just see a shadow from the corner of my eye, so I turned around to see who was touching me ... and no one was there. I immediately broke out in cold goosebumps.

Oddly, I've never thought the museum was a creepy place, even though many other co-workers (especially folks who've had to stay in the museum at night time) swear there's something eerie about the building. Some have seen strange men who vanished on 2nd glance; others have experienced strange noises or mysterious cold spots. To me, the place is just a mid-century building with an extensive building.

Although I've had a few paranormal-y experiences that I still haven't properly solved, I'm the first person to look for a scientific explanation for these things. Despite my fascination (okay, obsession) with all things creepy, ghoulish and undead, I have yet to be convinced that any of it is real.

And yet, I was immediately freaked out by this phantom touch, which could easily have been the result of some kind of pressure change. Maybe someone opened a door in the building and the resultant breeze ruffled my hair in a way I've never experienced.

I'd like to say that when it comes to ghosts, I'm a tabula rasa. I don't believe in them, but if anyone could come up with a convincing explanation for them, I would probably accept them. But to be honest, ghosts are my very favorite topic. I love reading about them. And writing about them. (Living with them, however, is another story. Eek!)

But what about you guys? Any experiences that might sway me either way? Or scientific tidbits that might help clarify my thoughts?

No-well, no-well...

2010-11-24T21:28:00.000-08:00

Ever feel like the universe is trying to tell you something?

This year has been a year with a big word count--about a dozen new (completed) stories, 40+ story headers (brief introductions), a couple of author spotlights over at Lightspeed, novel revisions with my editor, and then a 1st draft & a re-write of a novel. With the exception of about four days off after I finished the first draft of Novel #4, I've been writing 6 or 7 days a week all year long.

But last week, I finished polishing Novel #4 and I just ran out of words. My word-well went completely dry. I thought I'd start work on my Secret Santa story and drew a blank. It was ... creepy.

I thought I'd push through the emptiness, but so far, I've had zero success. And the wisdom of the universe is encouraging a break. Friday, the wonderful Sandra Wickham posted a great post about recharging your batteries on our Inkpunks blog. And then yesterday, a trip to the SFWA page gave me a blog post from Jeff Vandermeer about the importance of rejuvenating the imagination. Is somebody trying to tell me something?

If so, it's not anything I like to hear. My imagination has always been my constant companion. Daydreaming and storytelling are my fall-back entertainments, the happiest moments of my day. And writing has become my stress-reducer, feel-alive, depression-fighting past-time/drug of choice.

Not writing creeps me out.

I had a hunch I needed a break after September's writing explosion. I felt worn out, the words tired and dry. But digging into the novel revision helped. There was so much great energy packed into the book that it just pulled me out of my funk. When I reached the end, I realized I'd burned through all my energy and then all my reserves. The pretty lights and colors in my mind had gone dark.

Now that I've accepted the fact I can't just stir up new ideas out of nothing, I'm kind of excited. I took a trip to the kids' section of the library, loading up on fairy tales and spooky stories. Brain food. I can't think of a better time to step away from the computer and get down to nibbling.

Secret Santa

2010-11-22T15:44:00.000-08:00

My friends--the good folks over at the Inkpunks blog--are doing a really fun Secret Santa project this year. We all drew names (our organizing genius, Morgan Dempsey, drew for me since I wasn't at World Fantasy) and now we'll write stories for each other. We each created a story prompt so we get a story that is uniquely tailored to our interests.

This is a fun challenge. It's easy to blow off writing a story for a theme anthology when it's not a topic that you'd normally choose--it's impossible to blow off a Secret Santa request. I mean, how could I let one of my friends down? These aren't just ordinary nice people. They're people that will crochet you a scarf when they've met you once. And send you chocolates when they've never even laid eyes on you. And beta-read your query letters. These are the kind of friends you don't let down!

So even though the prompt I got is a pretty big stretch for me, I'm eager to get started on it. I'm not sure if I'll wind up with an awesome story. But if I don't, luckily, all my friends like chocolate. I can at least sweeten them up before they read the darn thing!

In slightly related news, it feels great to say I'm excited to write a new short story! The book is done! My brain is in full recovery mode! I'm beginning to feel like a human again.

Touching bases

2010-11-16T17:15:00.000-08:00

Oh yeah, I went to a con. And I just got a short story acceptance, but the details are too convoluted to share right now. And I've got, like, 7 pages left on this draft.

Yep.

Still alive!

The Hunger Games, FTW

2010-11-08T09:27:00.000-08:00

This weekend, after blitzing through the trilogy as fast as I could convince anyone to lend me the books, I finished Mockingjay. They're action-packed fun reads. For me, that makes them enjoyable lit-candy. But if I was a thirteen year-old girl today, these books would resonate in a powerful way.

You see, the protagonist of the series, Katniss, is under scrutiny almost all the time. In several sections of the books, she's being filmed and broadcast across her country, and she knows all too well that any wrong move will doom her death. For kids growing up in the Facebook-reality TV-instant messenger world we live in, they must really identify with this girl.

We're warned every day that what we post on our social networking sites can derail our abilities to find & keep a job. Google Buzz is being sued for privacy invasion. A college kid used Twitter to share videos of his roommate having sex--and the roommate posted his suicide note on Facebook before jumping off the George Washington bridge.

If you were a teenager hearing all of this, you'd be a little scared. For those of us who grew up in the 70s & 80s, TV is about entertainment. The Internet is a great way to find information and catch up with friends. But to us, they're still virtual. Their power is removed from us, kept an arm's length away by the security of the screen.

Today's kids see the Internet and the real world as extensions of each other. To them, the screen is perfectly permeable.

While I read The Hunger Games trilogy, I thought about how unfair it was that Katniss's actions in a ridiculous TV game show should be held against her, her family and her nation. When my daughter reads it, it will make perfect sense.

Isn't that terrifying?

Babes on wheels

2010-11-02T22:59:00.000-07:00

The coolest thing that has come out of revising this novel is all the research I've done on regular life as a wheelchair user. I can't believe all the amazing stories I've read and wonderful online resources I've discovered!

My book is about two families, and one of the families is modeled after a wonderful couple I've gotten to know over the last three years. The mom is a veteran with a foot injury, and the dad is a cool stay-at-home dad. My fictional version of my foot-injured friend is a wheelchair-bound (paraplegic) mom.

She started as a very minor character, but in the revision, she became a vital force of the book, and provides the second point-of-view. She does a great deal of sleuthing in this piece, and luckily, she has full use of her arms. She drives (a specially modified soccer mom van), she's a good shot and she is also incredibly hot.

Here's what she was working on today:

I found this awesome video on the blog Climbing Stairs in a Wheelchair.

When I first set out to learn what Ellen's life would be like, I had no idea how much research I'd pour into her, but I was inspired by the great parents who come into the Museum and play with their kids. I feel so lucky getting to see these folks in action!

November already???

2010-11-01T21:30:00.000-07:00

After the magic of October, I'm not sure I'm ready for the grindstone of November. But sometimes a girl just has to knuckle down and get shit done! I'm not doing NaNoWriMo, but I am wrapping up the 2nd draft of the book and then? NaQueWriMo! Let the queries begin. :D

Halloween weekend? W00t!

2010-10-29T10:56:00.000-07:00

Well, Nanowrimo is out of the question. *sigh* I'm making terrific headway on the revision, but that terrific headway has turned into a major retooling of the last third of the book. I'm excited, but I'm also a little stunned. The good ideas in this book just keep bludgeoning me over my head--if they're not careful, they might give me brain damage!

I have a bunch of great plans for this magical weekend--dinner & a movie (Ichabod Crane! The Disney version of "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" WITH Bing Crosby as a narrator!) with a good friend, a walk in a cemetery ... I'm really excited!

Earlier this year (okay, even this week) I was incredibly bummed about missing the World Fantasy Convention. My writing clan will be there, and there will be some great events, including a party with some Rigor Amortis readings. But I'm feeling a lot better. It doesn't hurt to know that I'll be doing my own Rigor reading in just two weeks!

Final week of October

2010-10-25T10:29:00.000-07:00

Since I'm deep in the bowels of this final edit, I'm going to try to limit my online activities this week. That means I should be spending ONE hour a day instead three slacking on the Internet ... ha ha ha.

(It also doesn't help that everybody I know will be at World Fantasy, so I'll pretty much be talking to myself, feeling like an absolute loser.)

But if I'm really lucky, by the end of the week I'll be jamming java and rocking a rough outline for my next book! I'm looking forward to hearing all about everyone's upcoming Nanowrimo projects. Pass along your best survival tips--I'm eager to listen, even if it takes me a while to get back to you.

It's not a cliche--it's true!

2010-10-20T15:51:00.000-07:00

"I don't believe in ghosts, but I'm afraid of them." --Edith Wharton

Back in January, I dubbed this year "The Year of Science Fiction." I planned to catch up on my reading, play around writing a few science fiction short stories and soak up as much science and technology info as possible. Some of that's been going well. I've read some great stuff this year! But the writing ... nope. That's pretty much tanked. I've written a handful of SF pieces, but there's just something missing in them. They haven't been fun, and they haven't gleamed with the fun, manic energy of a piece that comes together in that just-right way.

And it hit me today: I've been violating the #1 cliched piece of writing advice: Write what you know.

Not that factual knowing, but what you know. Like a belief, something honest and true that you can feel in your bones.

Well, I'm a lot like Edith Wharton. Deep down, I don't believe in the future--but I'm absolutely, positively afraid of it. The other day, I read a really enjoyable story over at Lightspeed ("The Taste of Starlight," by John R. Fultz). It's a great story, full of gore and a highly depressing ending, but for me, it was too cheery. I can't bring myself to believe we'll ever leave Earth. I think we'll wipe ourselves out first. Or devolve. Or something else incredibly god-awful. But space travel and colonization, tropes I've always enjoyed in novels and tried to use in my own pieces, are things beyond the knowing of my inner universe.

What we know, you see, is a system of symbols and emotions and ideas that are leached out of the things we read and do. Our inner universes are built out of our experiences in both the real world and the imagination. The creative endeavors we create are the logbooks of our explorations that those inner worlds.

That's one of the reasons why, when an author finally hits his or her stride, their books begin to sound more alike. They have found what needs to be explored inside them, and it is infusing every word they create. This doesn't mean all their books and stories are exactly the same or even that they're all set in the same places. It just means that the iconographies of the texts begin to hint at each other.

My inner world doesn't include the normal stuff of science fiction, even though I love science and I adore science fiction. Somehow my world gelled around other landscapes. (I'm not giving them away because then you wouldn't need to read any of my future books or stories!)

That doesn't mean I won't write science fiction--and by that, I mean scientifically reasonable futuristic fiction. I just have to write the right science fiction. The bad news for all of you guys? Some of those stories might make "The Taste of Starlight" read like a children's matinee. There's a lot of ugliness in the future I see.

But ugly or not, I think I'll be happier writing science fiction now. It's like I threw out a travel guide someone else bought for me, and now I'm setting out on my own trail.

I've got my helmet light on. I'm ready for the monsters.

Nicknames

2010-10-18T19:11:00.000-07:00

Lately, I've been calling my kid "Evangelion."

Her actual name is Fiona, but when she was little, I called her my "inky binky biddy baby" (I know, yuck!), and it just sort of evolved from there. I actually call her "Inga" about 75% of the time, or more frequently, "Ee." Evangelion was a natural spin-off, I guess.

Nicknames are a big part of my world. For example, I grew up being called Winnie. That was just what my dad called me, a secret identity. I went through a phase where I hated it, and then I recently started liking it again. And by recently, I mean in college, when I saw The Shining for the first time. Winnie suddenly seemed like the coolest name in the whole dang world after watching Shelley Duvall take on Jack with that baseball bat.

On the other hand, my brother wound up changing his name. He always hated his real name and the nickname my dad gave him. But one day he invented a character for an RPG--and found his real identity. He got all his teachers to call him by his new name and eventually convinced my parents to help him change it legally!

Fiona loves her name and tolerates all the weird things I call her. I suppose that Evangelion doesn't sound too bad compared to the pet-name I gave my mom: Skoonamagawa.

So if you're doing any writing, keep nicknames in mind. They say a lot about the characters who use them and the characters who created them. The nicknames I use for my family members probably show that I'm a goofball who ought to have her mouth taped shut.

Raising the bar

2010-10-12T20:19:00.000-07:00

I've been doing some thinking since the post before last--you know, the whiny, terrified about the seriousness of writing short fiction. And I haven't changed my mind. I'm not ready to crank out short stories at the pace I've been hoping for, at least, not ready to crank out GOOD stories. I'm not Jay Lake, who shot for a story a week and actually produced something good. Maybe I just don't have enough vision.

But this is the perfect time for a slow-down. I'm wrapping up the 2nd draft of my novel and Nanowrimo is lurking in the wings. The big family season, with its power-trifecta of Halloween, Thanksgiving & Christmas, has arrived, demanding a major chunk of my attention. And the book list is piling up. There is something wonderful about settling into winter, sinking down into a mellower and more absorbent frame of mind.

Maybe I just need to recharge my creative batteries.

Here's one place I plan on hitting to rev up my scary powers: The David GraveYard. These guys are Portland legends, normal people who have transformed their home into the ultimate Halloween display. I can't wait to check them out this year!

Speaking of checking things out, don't miss today's awesome post over at the Inpunks blog. Morgan Dempsey is an exceptionally clever blogger!

Macabre fun

2010-10-08T19:36:00.001-07:00

And since I promised everyone a taste of Halloween goodness, here's a link to some amazing skull images!

Also, I don't know about you guys, but I'd love to try making a sugar skull like this one:

(from By El Comandante [CC-BY-SA-3.0 or GFDL], from Wikimedia Commons)
This year I might just try to whip up a batch--I saw a recipe last year for EZ Kids Sugar Skulls, which used Marshmallow Fluff (they've got a vegan variety at the food co-op!) and almond paste. That would make a batch of skulls you'd actually enjoy eating!

Ugly thoughts

2010-10-07T14:02:00.000-07:00

I don't know if it's because I've never seen myself as a short fiction writer--I mean, I used to have zero interest in short stories--but I never really thought of my short stories as anything but a game. They're play, the kind of fun thing you noodle around on to see how things work, the way a car mechanic builds go-karts. They're not real. They're toys. Practice. And when I sent them out in the world, I just wanted to show them to my friends. Oh sure, I sent them to the big markets, too, because that's just what people do, but mostly I was just happy that editors I liked, editors I knew, were getting to play the word game with me.

I sometimes forget that those short stories are the stuff careers are made of. Those editors I know and like so much at second-tier markets? They're dreaming of stories that will launch their magazines to pro status. And the big guys, the people I sent stories because you're supposed to send things to them--well, they're paying attention. Your name gets around in this little industry.

It's easy to forget in all the supportive kindness of the spec fic community that everyone in it is in business. And it's a serious business. Underneath the smiling faces, the successful writers are sleek word-killing machines. Sharks.

I am not a shark.

I don't know if I can make it in this business. But I do know it'll be a hell of a long time* before I send out another short story.

*Appended: In the hyperactive world of Wendy, this means like, a month. Or maybe 3 weeks.

Brain scrub--stat!

2010-10-06T19:53:00.000-07:00

No, I haven't been freaked out by reading (ok, RE-reading) Rigor Amortis. Nope, this is a much, much worse thing to have happen to my brain. Brace yourself.

I was walking along Monday afternoon, admiring the beautiful autumn day, the lovely leaves, the cute baby passing by, the friendly orange cat--when out of the blue the most preposterous, horrific thought crossed my mind: "Wouldn't it be sweet to have another little baby?"

Those were the exact words. I actually stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and slapped myself in the forehead as if I could knock them out of my brain. Jeebus. I can't even imagine living with myself if I had another kid.

It's not just the environmental factors (OMG POPULATION CRISIS, people--put your freakin' legs together!) or the expense thing (kids are powered by money, I think). It's not just the fear of sibling rivalry or the endless mess, or even the forty weeks of misery. It's idea of living in absolute terror for four long years.

I say four, although it's an approximate. I mean, you live through the agony of pregnancy, where the least little mistake could make the little critter shoot out three or four extra limbs or a harelip. A morsel of bad sushi could annihilate the poor thing. Then it finally gets here. There are germs and SIDS and colic and random viruses just waiting to pounce on the tiny, undeveloped immune system. There are all the food issues--dare I breastfeed after I've had Pad Thai, for fear of peanut allergies? There are all the fears that I'll drop the slippery, squirmy thing after I've given it a bath.

And those are just the infant terrors! Toddlerhood with its wobbly legs and attempts at running and climbing--that's where the real hell begins. Everything is a lethal weapon in the toddler's hands. Death is a second away at any point in time.

Just typing this stuff is making my tummy hurt. I am too big a sissy to be a parent. I feel damn lucky I made it this long, and you better believe that I have raised a child who is obsessed with safety. She's the school safety bully. Don't let her see you doing anything dangerous or you'll get your ear chewed off.

Well, luckily that thought passed. But in different "baby" news, I am feeling a bit like an empty nester. I'm pretty sure I feel exactly like a baby-sitter feels when she learns the kids she watches have gotten too big to need a sitter. I'm not quite sure what to do with myself!

You see, the last couple of months I've gotten to enjoy a truly, awesomely fabulous experience: working with John Joseph Adams on a couple of his projects. If you're like me, you've read all his anthologies and love them. (If you're not like me, you can keep it to yourself.) Somehow, a miracle happened and this guy, my hero, let me work on story headers for the coolest, most awesome anthology of all time: Brave New Worlds. This book is going to be amazing and I can't wait till it comes out, which is something like next January.

But now my work is done and it's been sent off to the publisher and I am just sitting here, twiddling my thumbs. I guess it means I'll have plenty of time to get ready for Nanowrimo!

I think I'll write something scary. But not as scary as thoughts about babies.

Yes, I am geeked out about this!

October!!

2010-10-04T10:06:00.000-07:00

We really kicked off October right: we spent Saturday at Rasmussen's Farm out in Hood River. Rasmussen's is great because it has amazingly good apples & pears, as well as goofy, silly pumpkin patch fun. Also, they make a delicious caramel apple.

At Rasmussen's, they have a barn filled with tableaux of punkin & gourd art. This year I saw my favorite ever pumpkin:

What a cutie!

I promised to share some of my favorite October-ish treats this month, so I thought I'd put up a link to an article about some of the most inspirational--er, creepy--place on the planet. I'd like to check out a few of these places, especially this one:

EEEK! It's October!

2010-10-01T09:55:00.000-07:00

Sweet jeebus, today is a big day. For one, it's the first day of the month I call Halloween season, my absolute favorite. There should be scary movies in my mailbox and I've already put a ton of ghost novels on hold at the library. I'm also shooting for blog updates throughout the month featuring my favorite creepy stuff on the web.

Today's favorite creepy item is easily my favorite. It's RIGOR AMORTIS, the zombie anthology that began as a joke, was nourished by love and grew into the sexiest monster you'll ever meet. You can expect me to talk about it a lot. It's cute and I'm completely in love with it (you can tell I just got my contributor copy, huh?).

Another big thing that starts today is the new Inkpunks blog. Some of my most treasured writing friends--the friends I most trust to read my stories and help me edit them--have banded together to write about life as part of a virtual writing community. We'll all be bringing our specialties together to shine a light on life as writers just breaking into the biz. Expect great anecdotes, tips and the occasional recipe. What? Even struggling writer-types have to eat!

Well, that's all the news that fit to print. Here's wishing everyone a fantastic Halloween season!

Keeping the faith

2010-09-27T19:50:00.001-07:00

A writing life is busy. I knew that when I signed up for it, but living it is a whole new realization. I sat down almost exactly 7 years ago and started writing my first (completed) novel. This weekend, I chatted back and forth with the marketing department of that novel's publisher, making decisions about the cover. In between those moments, a lot has happened. I've written two trunked novels (they will probably never see the light of day), completed the first draft of a fourth, submitted plenty of short fiction, sold some short fiction, and "minioned" my way through some great editorial projects.

There have been a lot of rejections and setbacks along the way. I've had about 27 rejections this year, which isn't bad--unless I'm having a bad day. Then all those nos start to sting. If you've ever sent words out into the world, you know what that feels like. But my hide is beginning to get thicker. I can even look at some of my pieces and think "that's not very good" without feeling too badly about it. There was a time when I couldn't stand to trunk a piece. It hurt to say that there was no hope or home for something. But now I can look at things and shrug. Sometimes not working is okay.

Part of this detachment comes from my approach to writing short fiction. Some people are short story writers because they are in love with short fiction. Some people only write short stories. And for some people, short stories are just a kind of writing laboratory. That's me. I don't know exactly what I'm going to learn from a piece when I set down to write it. I still don't know what lesson I should have got out of some of my pieces. But I am certain I am learning. I can't say that every story I write is better than the ones before--but I know that I am better. I think I am failing in new and different ways every time I sit down to write. Seven years ago, I couldn't have even imagined the mistakes I make now.

I read something great in an interview with Paolo Bacigalupi that struck a nerve in me today:

For me I actually knew that I had a great deal of talent. I knew that I was a really great writer in high school. My writing teachers were amazing. When I went to college I could write essays and all that stuff—really tight, clean stuff. And having the raw ability...it was meaningless, ultimately. It was the willingness to write four novels and fuck them all up and keep going that was the definer. It wasn't the ability at all. Yeah, the willingness to accept failure and not let it stop you, and to not let that define you....

[Quote taken from this interview--Read more: http://techland.com/2010/09/27/paolo-bacigalupi-this-is-what-it-takes-to-write-a-novel/3/#ixzz10my5MqlF]

I was just like him when I was young. I look back on the short stories I wrote in high school, and they're good, full of fun action and clean dialogue and great description. And my college essays were epic. I couldn't lose when it came to putting words on paper.

But when I was ready to take on writing, I had to learn how to fuck up. Until you've blown it--and blown it badly--you'll never cut through the blithe ease of your talent. You'll never look for new tools or dig down inside you for something more. More meaningful, more powerful, more funny, more sad, more ugly ... whatever. You have to want to look for more.

Because the truth is, words are too shallow on their own. And no matter how hard you work, you're just making busy-work until you break through that superficial surface and feel the currents of meaning swirling beneath yourself.

Will I get there? I don't know. But I've got my ice pick ready.

G**gle-y Gadgets

2010-09-24T09:35:00.000-07:00

Somewhere down the line, I became a Google freak. I have gmail. I use gchat. I use Google Notebook (now defunct, sniff) to store many important pieces of information. I use Google Calendar, which between coordinating the family's schedules and a top-secret upcoming project that involves my favorite members of the Internet, has saved my bacon more times than I can count. And I can't rave enough about Google Docs, which not only helps file-sharing, but really does work as a good emergency word-processing tool. Hey, emergencies happen.

But then again, Google makes me nervous. There's the Google-Verizon Internet-twisting deal. The author-crushing Google Book Settlement. And I don't even like to think about the fact that Google is the world's biggest provider of information, what with the search engine and youtube and satellites and maps and YIKES!!! It's just creepy that one organization has become such a critical gateway to knowledge.

But creepy or not, they're dead useful. So I'm not sure what to think. But I do know the more I think about it, the more inspired I get to write dystopian fiction!

Seasonal Treats

2010-09-20T21:30:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite things about fall in our neighborhood is all the squirrel-tacular activity. Those little gray rodents scurry everywhere, racing up trees, scooting across front porches, digging up flower beds and veggie patches in a mad attempt to cache the autumnal bounty.

Our neighborhood is loaded with black walnut trees, so the squirrels find plenty of goodies. And the combination of black walnuts and squirrels causes one of my favorite fall phenomena. I don't know if you've ever tried to open a black walnut, but they are encased in a wonderful-smelling green husk that takes a great deal of scraping to reveal the shell and the exceptionally flavorful nutmeat inside. (I learned this the hard way at a time when I was fiendishly poor and decided to add roadside walnuts to my menu. Best banana bread EVER.) The green husk contains a compound that stains everything a deep dark brown, close to black, a stain so powerful it was used as an ink base and hair dye in Colonial times.

To remove the husk, the squirrels use their amazing teeth, gnawing and scraping at each walnut for five minutes or so. Their paws and mouths become stained dark brown in the process. I wish I had a picture to share the cuteness. It's like squirrel lipstick. It's beyond cute. It's squeee-dorable.

It's easily my favorite fall treat, better than pumpkin pie, better than apple sauce. Nothing says "autumn in Portland" quite so perfectly.

Anybody out there have a fall favorite? Since it's my favorite season, I'm eager to hear!

Awesome Rigor video!

2010-09-17T10:49:00.000-07:00

Check it out! It's too big to fit in my columns. :D

Two of the images are from stories of mine. Maybe you can guess which ones?

Building new routines

2010-09-16T09:35:00.000-07:00

I recently made a big life change. Not huge, not major, but big enough to make me really uncomfortable: I cut one of my days at the dayjob. There's no way we'll stare to death, but there will be serious belt-tightening measures around the joint.

The hardest thing for me is knowing that I don't have the spare cash to just waltz into my favorite coffee place and order a whatever latte or a cup of coffee and slice of pie. Going to coffee shops ranks highly on my list of favorite fun activities, and one of the few I've kept over this last year. Gardening has slipped by the wayside as too time-intensive. Gaming and movie-watching have fallen to a once-a-week treat, shared with the Sweetie-Pie--we can do one or the other one night a week. But I've been able to swing by the coffee shop on my way to pick up the kid from school or camp or a friend's house on a fairly regular basis. It's so nice to sit in a warm, delicious-scented space and just read or noodle out new story ideas.

This week has been difficult because I've been pushing myself really hard--AND I missed my night off with Sweetie-Pie. We have company coming this weekend (which of course I resent, because that's just the way it is when I'm struggling to figure out my writing and financial life) and I didn't want to fall behind. Last night I managed to take care of a little business and then gave in. I had to nip my resentful feelings in the bud! So I made margaritas and took them down to the basement and "helped" Sweetie-Pie play Silent Hill 2. Chips and salsa may have played a hand.

Now today I feel okay. I might take an afternoon bath to meditate up some new story ideas, and I'm going to try really hard not to feel like I'm wasting time. After all, I *do* have get clean once in a while!

Super-fast update!

2010-09-14T22:15:00.000-07:00

I really know I've been neglecting to blog, but I got sucked into a Twitter challenge to submit 10 short stories by October 1st--which means I need to produce some short stories and/or polish up some older ones. And I've been doing an extra blast of minioning, too.

But there's no excuse for failing my blog! I'm just so boring (glued to computer night and day) that it's hard to find a mote of entertainment to share with anyone. I promise I'll try harder to be funny this week!

The Week of Massive Productivity

2010-09-07T22:04:00.000-07:00

My online writing group dubbed this THE WEEK OF MASSIVE PRODUCTIVITY. So far, I'm off to an okay start. There are some deadlines coming up in my world, so I've been cranking up my editorial minioning, and last night there was a surprise request from the cover artist assigned to the cover of Her Dark Depths, so instead of writing, I spent a chunk of time trying to figure out important details like my heroine's shoe style. (Heroine: boots. Villainess: gladiator sandals.) Tonight I'm just catching up on the blogging universe, because HEY! it's important, too. Sometimes I miss luxuriating over a good blog entry.

Another thing I haven't spent as much time on lately is my garden. But I got caught up this weekend. I even took out the worm bin and harvested the (really incredible mound) of worm casings. I like to harvest the casings the lazy way: tip out the bin onto a sheet of cardboard and leave the mound of casings out in the sunshine for a while. The worms crawl down to the bottom, leaving a top layer of uninhabited poopy goodness.

I was puttering away, planting some fall kale and waiting for the worms to settle, when I realized I needed to refill my watering can. Coming around the corner, I startled a number of sparrows from the bird feeder. It put a big grin on my face. Oddly enough, the sparrows didn't fly up into the trees when they saw me--they landed on the neighbor's roof, lining up on the rain gutter and staring down at me as I worked. The sound of their little claws on the metal gutter made my neck hair prickle.

After a few minutes, the birds went back to the feeder, and I finished with the kale and chard. And a connection fired in my beleaguered brain. Why had the sparrows been watching me so carefully? And why were they chirping so happily on the other side of the house, as if they were eating something especially delicious? Something uniquely tasty and squirmy?

I darted around the corner, startling seven sparrows from the mound of sunning worm poop. One fluttered around the inside of the actual worm bin, scooping up one last red wriggler who'd been hiding in the corners. The sparrow at least looked embarrassed to see me.

I hurried to return the worms to the safety of their bin, begging Sweetie-Pie & the Midget to help with the refilling process (I needed a lot of shredded newspaper). The birds settled onto our roof in the hopes we would abandon the delicious worms, and after a few minutes began to protest mightily. I felt a moment's remorse. After all, the worms might be my very useful friends--but sparrows are adorable!

Cleaning up ... and gearing up!

2010-08-31T21:13:00.000-07:00

Next week marks the first day of school, and for me, the first day of fall. Whoah. Summer shot by like a bullet train, and productivity forgot to buy a ticket. I haven't gotten much done the last 2.5 months. My rewrite isn't done. I've made very little progress on short fiction. I've kept up with my minioning, but only by the skin of my teeth. And in the last few weeks, I've added a new set of goals (that I'm not quite ready to reveal) that only deepens the workload. But. No matter! FALL IS ALMOST UPON US!!

My pals (#seshat) over on Twitter are gearing up for a week of Massive Productivity. I don't know about you, but before I can kick up the work level, I need a (slightly) clean workspace. It's pretty hard to chug out words when the computer keeps grinding to a halt with slow-down issues and memory problems. It's time to clean house. Get rid of all those old music- and image-editing programs that I'm never going to use. Dump all those extraneous back-up back-up copies. Double-check that the ACTUAL back-up copies of documents are up-to-date. You know, all that boring junk that a lazy computer user never gets around to.

I also plan to finish all my current minioning duties so that next week (barring catastrophes!) I can throw myself into the rewrite with all my heart. I am so excited!

VACATION!!!!

2010-08-25T18:00:00.000-07:00

Oh yeah, I'm so excited! Tomorrow I leave for a trip to my mom's house! We're planning a mass invasion, with my brother, my sister and her children and my crew all descending upon my poor lovable parent at once.

I'm really eager for the vacation, but it's going to need to be a working one. I am really behind on my minioning!

Upon my return, I hope to post a bunch of pictures, including an image of my wedding dress, which came in the mail yesterday!

Quiet week until now!

2010-08-20T09:16:00.000-07:00

Woof, sorry to keep the silence all week! My kid brother came over, and as you all know, when you have company, you have all the pressure to have a good time and get away from it all as anyone actually on vacation--except without the free time to really enjoy any of it. Arggh!

So the most fun thing I've done this summer is work on Rigor Amortis:

As soon as Jaym brought it up, I was hit over the head by a story idea. Luckily, it's a flash collection that took multiple submissions, so when I had another great notion, I was able to send that along, too! I haven't written much flash, so I'm really pleased with my stories in here. I hate to admit it, but my story "Unparted" has made me cry every time I've read it!

I also feel an unseemly pride in the collection, since I reached out to a couple of writer pals and urged them to submit things--and they did, and they are now my ToC-mates. That's how everything came together in this book, friends telling friends and connecting friends together. It's a very indie, warm-hearted project and I'm beyond proud of how it turned out.

He's just like my mom

2010-08-09T22:29:00.000-07:00

As we grow up, girls always hear that when they grow up, they'll marry a man just like their father. Apparently, I misunderstood.

I'm marrying my mother.

I'd always been amazed by the similarities between my Sweetie-Pie and my mom. They're both dreamy, big-hearted, artists with a love of comfort and beauty. Neither is that concerned with chocolate. Both are incredibly generous, going out their way to help friends and family members. Both have arguable taste in loved ones. My dad? Ummmn, not exactly a hunk. And me? Bossy and gassy. I don’t know how anybody fell in love with me, let alone an amazing guy like Sweetie-Pie. He's obviously a gem.

The fact that his sparkling facets matched many of my mother's was cute, but not concerning. Until one day I came home and discovered Sweetie-Pie had purchased 23 boxes of breakfast cereal.

Yes, *23* boxes.

That's when I knew it had happened. I had found the one man on the planet who actually was just like my mother.

My mom grew up Mormon and once she got married, spent the next twenty-five years of her life living in remote areas. Having a full pantry wasn't just mandated by religion anymore: it was a survival skill.

Visiting my mom is heavenly. Whatever you could possibly want to eat, she can whip up a version of it using canned or frozen ingredients. From fruit salad to gravy to cake, she's got you covered.

And now we're starting to shape up our pantry, too. We're not quite to Mom's level, but after I introduced Sweetie-Pie to the wonders of Disaster Preparedness, he became a conscientious stock-piler of all things caloric. Right now if disaster broke out, we'd be set for about three days of tasty eating (a reasonable amount). After that, we'd be reduced to catching rainwater to cook our quinoa, filling up on canned green beans.

I hope it never comes to that. My fingers are firmly crossed that if disaster unfolds, an east-bound road is clear enough for us to drive to my parents' house. I'm pretty sure nothing short of a direct nuclear blast would stop Mom from baking some kind of pie.

One musing on the future of other creatures

2010-07-30T17:34:00.000-07:00

Humans are the new great evolutionary pressure. Only lifeforms that adapt to live with us or upon our leavings will continue existing. As we tinker with every system on this planet, pushing the world into arrangements more perfect for human life--or rather, for those living the American imperialist lifestyle--we destroy the people and organisms that do not seem to serve our purposes.

The fight to preserve the natural world will not succeed unless it is waged against the juggernaut of 21st-century Western culture.

Like a vacation, I guess

2010-07-29T18:01:00.000-07:00

Well, my in-laws left this afternoon, leaving our house quieter, less full of mayhem and but somehow more full of potato chips. I think they have a plot to make me even chubbier ...

But on the good news side of things, I have 2 stories coming out in the new Rigor Amortis anthology! I feel really good about it, especially since I arm-wrestled a couple of friends (the charming Aussie-turned-Londoner, Dom McEiben & the amazing Ed Morris) into submitting. My friend & muse, Galen, is doing some illustration work on the book, too! It's sure to be a riot, since it's ZOMBIE EROTICA!! I'm not sure when the release date is on that book, but I'll keep you posted.

Peace out!

Cherries, Fruity Pebbles and love

2010-07-20T23:01:00.000-07:00

I'm having the kind of week where paragraphs just won't come into my mind. So in no particular order, here is a list of odd-ball thoughts and activities going on in my world.

We picked a gajillion pounds of cherries on Saturday. After snacking on cherries, baking with cherries, freezing cherries, juicing cherries and cleaning up cherry juice, I am now the only person in the family who will still eat a cherry.
I am once again snacking on Fruity Pebbles before bed. I'm a lazy snacker, and I'm trying to eat less wheat (hey, you'd encourage it if you lived downwind from my house), so rice cereal is a lovely treat. It's also a become a wonder bond with my lovely friend Geardrops. This week has been so nice--now that she's unemployed, we've had way more time to chat!
In the past five days, I've had four rejections and two acceptances. And no, I can't tell you who the acceptances were for. Not until August 6th.
Wedding planning continues. I'm not sure what's worse: finding a place we like or trying to imagine an outfit that I'll look exceptionally cute in. My party-expert sister, Kristina, looked aghast when my answer to the question "What do you envision yourself wearing?" was answered with "A cardigan!" Welcome to Fred Rogers' wedding, gang.

Well, those are the top thoughts in the cobwebs of my brain. There are a few other stragglers--"How DO Chinese restaurants get the tofu so chewy on the outside and creamy on the inside" topping the list--but at least these all make sense.

May your week be productive and your Pebbles fruity!

Easing off the metal

2010-07-16T16:09:00.000-07:00

Now, normally, my writing work schedule is "Put the petal to the metal, dude!" But recent events are nudging me toward a slightly more break-a-licious sort of schedule. And by recent events, I mean that school got out and now I have a kid to entertain all the time. Anybody else think Japan's got the right idea with that year-round school business?

But seriously, I have found that my brain likes to cycle between inputting information, ideas and images and outputting literature. I'm probably lucky I've made it this long before the old noodle blew up on me.

Anyway, taking suggestions for summer books and movies. I'm looking for delicious science, art and historical stuff--nonfiction being the mental equivalent of pumpkin pie. That stuff puts bulk on, fast!

The headshot process

2010-07-12T15:37:00.000-07:00

The email that sparked all the terror was brisk, businesslike and perfectly unassuming: Sheri Gormley, Virtual Tales' awesome (and adorable!) publicity coordinator asked for my bio and headshot for the company's website and the back cover of the book. Bio, okay. HEADSHOT? As in a picture? Of me? Why not just an extra shot of one of the werewolves--they're much more photogenic!

But you don't argue with the people who are putting your book together. You instead turn to your brilliant artist significant other, the one with the nice camera, and begin to wail about the situation. And that's how I came to spend the morning of the 4th of July in our yard, frightening my neighbors with my six pounds of makeup and three changes of ensemble.

Sweetie-Pie took 110 pictures. Most of them looked like this:

But some looked like this:

And a few just reminded me how quickly I was going gray:

But thankfully, there were quite a few pictures that I really, really liked. I decided that a couple were better for online images, like my avatar on Twitter and this new Google Profile image. But some seemed positively book worthy!

It wasn't easy to pick which picture I liked best, but after extensive polling--in fact, 62 people jumped into the fray, and took a survey on my main webpage--one image was a clear winner. I drew up my bio and sent off the picture, and THIS shot will wind up gracing my book's cover:

I'm not one hundred percent certain that this picture isn't WAAAY too sexy for a boring old fantasy writer, but you can't argue with what the people demand!

As American as Ernest Hemingway

2010-07-05T21:27:00.000-07:00

When I think of American literature, I think of Ernest Hemingway. Sure, there are other, more boring literary Americans: Hawthorne and Melville spring to mind. John Steinbeck begs to be mentioned, too. But can any other writer so magically capture the spirit of America?

Papa was a man of massive talent, over-flowing with talent. (Just as the United States began as a nation overflowing with resources and possibilities.) He spent much of his life exploring foreign countries (that's the US all right, always sticking its nose in other countries' affairs!). He was a physically powerful, rugged individual who devoted his free time to consumption, be it booze, women or trophy animals. And he utterly destroyed himself, finally committing suicide in 1961. (Here in my analogy, all I can say is: o_O)

But beyond being a man infused with the American spirit, he was also an amazing artist. He earned the Nobel prize in 1954 for the novel The Old Man and the Sea. His words have influenced the following generations of American writers more deeply than almost any other compatriot--his style has been aped or rejected or lauded in almost every writing instruction book I've ever picked up.

So I celebrated the 4th of July, our American national holiday, with a dessert inspired by Papa. Hemingway spent a great deal of time in Florida and the Caribbean, where he may have become enamored with the wonderful treat of Key Lime Pie. I whipped up a very basic Key Lime pie and gave it a red-white-&-blue flair, with a blueberry garnish and an ad hoc red berry sauce. The red berry sauce is especially American, since it is made with Concord grapes--a truly American grape varietal!

Here's my recipe for the sauce:

Ad Hoc Red Berry Sauce
1/2 C fresh or frozen strawberries & raspberries, defrosted if frozen
1 tsp sugar
1/4 C Concord Grape Jelly

Thoroughly mash the berries and stir in sugar. Heat grape jelly until liquidized and pour over the berry mixture. Stir together and chill until cold.

So go out there and celebrate your favorite American authors! If Hemingway leaves you cold, and you're desperate to escape literary fiction, try enjoying some great Speculative Fiction writers. Whip out some Ursula K. Le Guin. Try Octavia Butler if you've never read her work. Or try my favorite, Sheri S. Tepper, another fantastic feminist SF/F writer. Craving something darker? Anne Rice, Stephen King and Peter Straub are all patriotic choices.

Whatever you read, enjoy it with a slice of Key Lime Pie!

Do I even exist? Dealing with Web Withdrawals

2010-06-28T17:09:00.000-07:00

After a week with a pretty limited online presence, I feel weird. I haven't connected to most of my online friends. I haven't posted on my blog. And nobody's retweeted me in a good eight days! I feel almost invisible.

I'm pretty sure that sensation is a good sign that taking a break is the right thing to do. When you get to the point when your virtual validation is more important than your real-life experiences, you have a problem.

Of course, my problem is that I'm an aspiring writer with a day-job in a different field. At this stage in my life, it's significantly easier to connect with people in my industry online than it is in person. But then again, there are always exceptions!

The highlight of last week was a great Tweet-up with Blake Charlton. Blake is a Renaissance figure in spec fic these days, spending the summer promoting his first book, Spellwright, while on sabbatical from his work as a Stanford medical student. Wow. Let me tell you, a beer and reading with that guy makes you feel like smarts are rubbing off on you! Anyway, I'm very glad I had a chance to meet Blake and hope to see him again soon. Maybe when his second book comes out!

1st hummingbird of the season!

2010-06-21T13:54:00.000-07:00

After the mysteriously gorgeous winter, I shouldn't be so irate at spring weather that's brought hail to my doorstep in the middle of June. But I can't help it. Last week, it was so gloomy and miserable that it took an otherwise mediocre week and flushed it down the toilet.

But this week, there's hope.

There's a glimmer of sunshine between the clouds, and I actually saw a hummingbird drinking from a brilliantly pink flower today. We have hummingbirds year-round here, since they can get by eating bugs, but it doesn't feel spring-ish until I see them slurping up nectar from a real flower. So it's coming! Spring is near!

Coping with sensitivities

2010-06-16T21:09:00.000-07:00

Call me a sensitive person.

It's okay. I have finally reached a point in my life where that word doesn't bother me--because I am. Sensitive. I have a remarkable sense of smell (which sharpened during pregnancy to a point where I could identify individual customers at work when they walked through the front door, a floor below my desk). I have perceptive taste buds that can taste the gag-inducing flavor of dish detergent on my hashbrowns no matter how well I rinsed the baking sheet after scrubbing it. I have good senses and love giving them new wonders to enjoy.

I must also have a weak filtering system so information from these great senses goes straight to my brain. Lots of noise drives me crazy. Ladies with perfume give me headaches and make it hard for me to concentrate. Too much color makes me agitated and stressed. There's no tuning it out. It's all or nothing, and sometimes it's exhausting.

I also got hit with all the other kinds of "sensitive," the kinds that nobody wants: a sensitive tummy, easily irritated by stress and booze and the kinds of foods it decides it doesn't like this week. A sensitive disposition, easily startled or made to cry. Sensitive skin that breaks out in hives when exposed to the kinds of chemicals it doesn't like. A sensitive immune system that is easily launched into hyper-mode when exposed to molds & dusts. And even, lamely enough, a sensitive respiratory attack that launches into coughing and wheezing fits at the least drop of mucous.

Those are the kinds of "sensitive" that gives the word a bad name.

There was a time in my life when I would have given anything to have thicker skin, especially in college, when my coping skills were at an all-time low. But now, 80% of the time, I love being sensitive. It's like having super-powers that help me better understand people and more fully enjoy the world in which I live. Yes, there's a disadvantage to being so moved by good writing that I sobbed my way through John Joseph Adams' The Living Dead anthology. But you better believe it helps me create better stories. And I love that.

Sometimes the real world irritates the hell out of me. As I've gotten older, I've gotten more skilled at controlling my environment and finding approaches that allow me to minimize negative or overwhelming stimuli. But it's impossible to get rid of it all. Bad days do happen when noise and upset and dark emotions swamp me like storm waves overpowering a little fishing boat (hey, where's the small craft advisory when I need one?!?). Even good stimuli can be too much for me, sending me into a full crash.

A complete crash is bad. It's a pure black depression, exhaustion, despair, emptiness. It's like a sensory deprivation tank built out of unhappiness. I wouldn't want to stay there long, and luckily, my system has developed an auto-eject function: inner misery will often switch over to a cold! In fact, right now, after an exhausting week, I can feel blackness dissipating with every sneeze.

It's a weird relationship, body and mind, senses and soul. Everybody has their own troubles balancing them, and everybody has to find their own solutions. But I think you can't go wrong with a hot bath and the love of a few good friends. They've gotten me this far!

Sometimes, you deserve a treat!

2010-06-14T13:02:00.000-07:00

I don't know about you guys, but I'm pretty sure that all work and no play doesn't really suit me. And as loyal blog readers, I don't think you should suffer through another post about my culinary endeavors or another tedious discussion of how far behind I am editing this book. That would be mean. You guys deserve better than that.

In fact, I think you've earned:

Meet the sloths from Amphibian Avenger on Vimeo.