Summer went by way too fast, but at least it means the most wonderful time of the year is here: fall! All three days of it, here in North Dakota! I guess I shouldn’t complain, though. Usually we’ve had a solid killing frost by now, but our temperatures have been pretty mild. Montana is in the middle of a snow emergency as I write this, so I guess it could be worse! It won’t stop raining, though. Here are Abby and Murphy wistfully looking out the upper-deck patio door while it pours outside. Murph doesn’t mind the rain, but Abby doesn’t like to get wet.

Though I fiddled around with a couple of stories I’m working on, I didn’t finish anything or start anything new from scratch. I also haven’t finished reading The Best of The Best Horror of the Year. I blame my class for that. It was totally NOT because I’m a procrastinator who sometimes gets in moods where I can come up with the so many trivial tasks that need to be done instead of sitting down to write.

Speaking of which, I got more unpacking done. I mean, we’ve only been in this house a year, right? In our chaotic move, we had a lot of stuff that just got shoved into storage to deal with later. Crawling under the house and unpacking those dusty boxes was definitely more important than writing.

And working on the gating system within and around the house was also a very important taks. My house is starting to be more elaborate than the temple in Aliens vs. Predator. Of course, it’s all in the name of dog safety. Well, some of it is in the name of “let’s not have puppy pee in these areas, okay?” Like my writing room. I’m a monster, and untrained puppies (and Abby when she had her brief problem with incontinence) aren’t allowed in. It’s okay. Murphy is chill. He’ll just sleep right outside the gate. Meanwhile, we’ve got gates to keep them in the designated potty area, gates to keep them off the deck, gates to keep them on the other deck; gates to keep them upstairs, gates to keep them downstairs, gates to keep them out of the gym, gates to keep them out of the writing room….

It wasn’t ALL crickets on the writing front, though. I did receive notice that one of my short stories has been accepted at Dark Moon Digest. Links will be forthcoming!

And something that landed in my inbox that you writers might find interesting is one of the latest “What’s the Score” postings from Autocrit. Autocrit is one of my favorite editing programs. In addition to pointing out problems (generic descriptions, etc.), it gives your piece a “score” based on the problems in the text. Periodically, they run a famous work through the software, so you can see how it stacks up. One of Autocrit’s latest “What’s the Score” tests was on Stephen King’s Pet Semetary. It’s fascinating, and it also kind helps battle some of that “imposter syndrome” so many of us face. It’s great to see where the problems lie in published works and do a score comparison. You can check it out here:

What’s the Score: Pet Semetary

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Next Up: I need to get those three started stories finished in these last three months of the year in order to meet my goals. Think I can do it? Stay Tuned!

Well! I guess you can tell how my July/August went, considering I completely missed the August post!

Part of the problem is just summer in North Dakota. Our good-weather-season is so short that you want to try and suck every bit of life out of it that you can. And with this being the first summer in our new house, we were really trying to get as many home projects done as possible.

Of course, this little guy helped, too. This is our new “thing of evil” (as SK calls his Molly). His name is Murphy. Having a pup in the house is like having a super-energetic, super-mobile baby who poops on your floor a lot and tries to chew all your table legs off. Some day we will be able to sleep through the night again. Someday.

And now, of course, school is back in session, so that’s going to be keeping me busy. Yes, it’s only one class, but OY! WHAT A CLASS! It’s “Introduction to Literary Criticism.” I knew I was in trouble as soon as I got the required texts list and saw that it included The Great Gatsby. My dislike for Gatsby is almost more legendary than Gatsby himself. Yuck. And Gatsby was chosen because it is the text the theory textbook uses as an example in every chapter. . .EVERY CHAPTER!

On top of that, the syllabus for the class includes (in addition to the readings of both Gatsby and the thick critical theory textbook) TEN mini-papers (a single page, single spaced each, which might as well be a two-page paper), three longer papers (5-7 pages each), and a group project. I think I’m going to have my hands full!

And this is all on top of already trying to find that balance between working full time, writing as much as I can, and having a life. Whee! You realize I’m probably NEVER going to get this website design changed (as I keep hoping and promising and dreaming of), right?

And speaking of writing. . .

It’s been a bit of a struggle, but I’m still holding my own.

I’m a little dismayed by the number of “dead market” resubs I have to do this go-around. I have four stories that were out at magazines/projects that have ghosted or folded. It’s certainly the nature of the publishing world today, but it’s still a bummer when it happens. Even famous Weird Tales has died several times, only to later be resurrected (as it currently is; I believe they will once again open for subs in 2020). I need to get these stories re-subbed to living breathing markets as soon as I can.

As far as new stories go, I have three left to write/finish before he end of the year to make this year’s writing goals. One is the story that is 90% already written but the anthology closed early so I tabled the story in favor of other pressing deadlines. Another will be a story I started for a looming deadline and then realized I wasn’t going to make it unless a miracle occurred or I gave up sleeping. That one is about 50% done. The last one will be the only one I have to start from scratch. I should be able to make the goal no problem, but next year, I’m setting my sights a little lower and more realistic.

On the reading front, I barely got started on The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism. I’ll probably try and continue on with it, reading it in tandem with the text for the class so I make sure I understand what’s going on, lol.

I finished Weird Tales: Seven Decades of Terror. I enjoyed ALL the stories from the 20s, which I guess says a lot about me as a writer as well as a reader (darn these new-fangled stories, get off my lawn). My favorite stories were:

“Rats in the Walls,” HP Lovecraft
A lush weird tale, classic Lovecraft;

“Bells of Oceana,” Arthur J. Burks;

“The Eighth Green Man,” GG Pendarves;

“The Crowd,” Ray Bradbury
Hmm, maybe *that* explains the ridiculous theory of ‘crisis actors’?;

“The Dead Man’s Hand,” Manly Wade Wellman
HA! What a name! I had to look him up, because I don’t remember running across his name before, though I surely have and just don’t remember since his Wiki states, “Wellman once estimated his output of stories and articles at about 500, of which about 80 were in the fantasy & science fiction genres.” He still sounds like a persona, given his biographical history includes that he became the adopted son of a powerful African chief;

“The Rhythm of the Rats,” Eric Frank Russell
Lest you think I just like stories about rats, there was another rat story in the anthology that I didn’t care for;

“Turn, Turn, Turn,” Nancy Springer
Everyone deals with grief in their own way, lol.

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Next up on the reading list: The Best of the Best Horror of the Year.

Until next time, stay spooky!

Well, rats!

Remember that story I was working on last month, the one set in space? The submission call for that one was supposed to close at the end of July, and I had another story I wanted to write for a call that closed at the end of June, so I put the space story on hold and wrote the June one. Of course, in the meantime, the end-of-July call closed early. Oh, well. The story is 90% done, so I’ll finish it and send it to another publication. Such is the writing life!

I managed to finish the June deadline story on time and get it submitted. It’s not as “supernatural” as the stuff I normally write, but it’s a really gross one that will definitely help if you’re trying to diet. That’s what makes it really scary: it’s a hundred percent plausible!

I also revised my “the characters are too mean” story and sent it off. We’ll see what kind of feedback I get this time.

(PS: to any editors who might be reading this, I know you can’t always give feedback on stories, but when you do, it’s highly appreciated by this author, even if it’s negative feedback. I may not agree with the feedback, but I always appreciate the opportunity to review my work in light of the feedback and potentially improve upon it.)

On the reading front, I finished New Poets of Native Nations (edited by Heid E. Erdrich). Some of my favorites:

• Layli Long Soldier: “38”
• Tommy Pico: “from Nature Poem”
• Natalie Diaz: “American Arithmetic” AND “The First Water is the Body”
• Trevino L. Brings Plenty: “Part Gravel, Part Water, All Indian” AND “Blizzard South Dakota”
• Sy Hoahwah: “Glitter”*
• Karenne Wood: “Amoroleck’s Words” AND “My Standard Response” AND “The Poet I Wish I Was”

*I like poetry, but I’m not a big reader of it. About 15% of what I read is poetry. Of that, I find that I generally like about 25%–or less–of the poems I read. And for a line or stanza to actually move me is really rare, but Sy Hoahwah’s Glitter did that with the stanza: “The Great Magnet / points the iron in my blood / towards the woods.” Beautiful.

I’m going to try to read two books at once this next round. On the genre front, I’m currently working through Weird Tales: Seven Decades of Terror. The book is organized by decade, and it is absolutely fascinating to see how writing and storytelling has changed over the years. I’m really enjoying time traveling through this book! I hope to have it finished by the next blog update, and I’ll list my favorite stories then.

The other book on my immediate to-be-read plan is Complete Idiot’s Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism in preparation for the fall semester. I figure if I can get an overview now, it will help when I have to dive into the four-inch-thick textbook for the class. #SummerRead #BeachRead, am I right?

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That’s it for this month! Don’t forget to get your copy of these awesome anthologies that include stories from yours truly! #SummerReadsForReals

May was definitely a crazy month.

I’ve been working on a new story that’s a little outside my comfort zone. It’s not exactly hard sci-fi, but it’s a little harder than what I normally write. It’s set in space, and it requires quite a bit of fact-checking in order to make sure the science is accurate or, when it’s not accurate, it’s at least believable.

I wrote the story, researching as I went, and ended up with a story of 8000 words. Then, during my first pass at revision, I realized I had left a plot hole. So now my revision has really become a decent-sized rewrite. And I’m writing this story with a specific market in mind, so there is a deadline!

I’m also working on a rewrite of the story that a publisher commented “the characters are too mean.” It’s a good story, so I’m going through and rewriting the characters so they aren’t quite so hateful.

AND, I have several other calls for submissions that I’d like to write stories for because the themes are really fun or interesting, but I seem to be losing ground on writing rather than gaining!

I blame the new house. Home ownership is a time-suck. Okay, maybe it’s a little bit me, too, because I am professional procrastinator…but I think it’s mostly the house.

I am just as behind on my reading as I am on my writing. I’m working through New Poets of Native Nations, edited by Heid Erdrich, and I’m really enjoying it. It’s taking longer to read though, because poems are meant to be savored instead of devoured.

One thing that I did accomplish last month was to finally watch a movie I had been dying to see: Life.

I never see movies in theaters because few of them are worth the money, hassle, and discomfort of the theater experience. Life would definitely fall into that category. WARNING! SPOILERS AHEAD!

First, it really echoed Alien way too much for my taste. It seemed like a bad prequel or something.

Second, the main plan (the firewalls) was excellent. Brutal, but excellent. However, people still made stupid decisions. AND, they KEPT making stupid decisions. Each time someone would make a huge sacrifice with a good decision, someone would undo it with a stupid decisions.

Third, though the alien did scary things (crushed a guy’s hand like it was dust, shoved itself down a guy’s throat), the alien itself wasn’t scary looking. I guess maybe that’s more plausible. Just because something looks scary doesn’t mean it’s dangerous, so if we did run into something dangerous “out there,” it would probably look harmless. Still, I prefer my monsters to look monstrous. Calvin was clear, so he was like some gossamer starfish or something, and that’s a little harder to take seriously, especially when he walked like a starfish (walking like a spider would have made him ten times scarier). When he wasn’t attacking someone, he looked like something out of the My Little Pony universe.

Another big problem that limited the scariness was that they named the damn thing Calvin. It was cute at first, but once the monster was supposed to be a threat, it was silly. You cannot deliver lines like, “Calvin’s trying to get in,” or “Where is Calvin now?” and have them induce the same level of fear as they would if it was, “IT’S trying to get in,” or “Where is IT now?”

All in all, I was very disappointed, especially for something I waited so long to see. I would have been more disappointed if I had jumped the gun and went and paid to see it in the theater.

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That’s it for this month! Hopefully when you come back next month, I’ll have all my stuff caught up. Yeah, right. We both know that’s not going to happen.

Stay spooky!

April was definitely not a good month for goals. Too much life, too little writing.

I didn’t have a new short story in development, but I did work on revision of a story that was rejected with the comment: “the characters seem awfully mean-spirited.” Yikes! Not the intent, for sure. The story centers on several men in a neighborhood who are good friends and like to bust each other’s chops. One of the friends is dealing with the supernatural (of course), and his friends give him some (what I thought was) good-natured ribbing about it. Apparently that’s not how it came across, lol, so I’m trying to adjust their tone a bit. Nobody wants the reader to hate the (non-villain) characters!

Though I didn’t get new writing done, I did manage to get some reading done. I read The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 24. My favorites stories were:

“The Curtain,” by Thana Niveau; I think this one got me on a reptile-brain level because I have a love/hate relationship with water. Not only have I never learned to swim, but that whole “throw them in and they’ll automatically learn” myth? Nope, not true. I’m not sure what age I was when it happened, but I was younger than three. I fell out of one of those floaty-rings in the deep end of a busy Florida pool. Nobody saw me, and I had to walk across the bottom of the pool to the shallow end. Do you know how long that walk is for the stubby legs of a less-than-three-year-old? Been scared to death of being *in* water ever since, but I enjoy being near water (on dry land).

“Between Four Yews,” by Reggie Oliver; You’d almost think this one was written by Lovecraft himself. I love that there are authors keeping more than the just the mythos alive, but that are also keeping the voice/style alive.

“Celebrity Frankenstein,” by Stephen Volk; This was the story I enjoyed the most. It’s clever and a new take on the Frankenstein’s monster trope, and it is a pertinent and funny allegory for our current social media society and celebrities who are famous for the sake of being famous. I loved it.

*****

For my English class this semester, we read “Sweet Tooth,” by Ian McEwan. The novel is NOT my cup of tea at all, but I did enjoy learning about one of the topics of the novel: the CIA once sought out creative writing programs and authors. Their intent was not to tell writers what to write, but to make sure the “right” writers were published and promoted and got their stories out to the public. That was certainly interesting to learn. Below is a link to an article about the program:

https://www.thenation.com/article/cia-tricked-worlds-best-writers/

The CIA is supposedly still involved in this sort of thing, through a program called Operation Earnest Voice. Of course, now the program focuses on social media and “social media influencers.” This program is still in the realm of conspiracy theory (it’s unproven), but given the CIA’s past involvement with creative writing AND the current modern phenom of things like Russian troll farms on Facebook, I believe it’s plausible that the CIA is still working the propaganda machine on social media.

Hey! Maybe that’s where I will find my next new story?!

*****

Okay, I’m off to finalize edits and get to work on something new.

Until next month, Carpe corpus!