Honoring My Family History in Story

This is a photo of my 2x great-grandparents Hiram King Wicker and Emma Angeline Whitcher. I adore them. The genealogy work we have done shows them to have had fascinating lives, courting just after the civil war. They feel alive to me. 

My father and I have spent decades studying our family history and we have well over 1700 names of our known ancestors. It led me to develop a strong spiritual Ancestor practice as a means of honoring where I came from to better know who I am. And some of that shows itself in my work. 

[Don't be disheartened by my nutshell if you don't know your own ancestors or have a way of knowing them. I work with a lot of people who were adopted on ways of connecting to your line spiritually. You can still honor those who came before you without names. And you can honor a chosen line rather than blood. But I tangent away...]

Ancestors. Having so many of their names I wondered what I should do with them.

I created a catalogue of first names and surnames and I draw from them when I name characters in my stories. Sometimes it's a first name or a surname. Sometimes it's a main character or a small side character. 

It's my way of remembering of them, of pulling them into the present, however best appropriate to the story. There is always the ghost of my ancestors alive in my creations. Every time I finish a story I light a candle and thank the ancestors who inspired that name, for having had lived and continuing the line that ends in me, that I am alive to tell my stories.

Writing in Pandemic Times

I'm not going to lie, writing while the death toll is rising and people are getting violent over being asked to wear masks is hard. My work normally leans towards dystopian themes but this reality we are living in is too close to the way the horror in my stories start. 

I'm a hermit by nature and almost five years into isolated recovery from a near-death trauma. I don't mind the isolation (so far). But I keep thinking the same thing over and over again...

Science fiction is meant to be a cautionary tale, not a blueprint.

So watching the world unfold in the manner in which so many writers before me predicted humans would respond is more than a little disheartening and saddening.

I am currently isolating with my parents for a month, in a lake town closed for the season. Local people are still coming to the closed beach. I have been down there among them, hunting for fossils and beach glass, the only person in a mask. I was the only person in a mask among people shouting and spitting and laughing and I felt like I was living one of my own stories (and quickly broke through the crowd to go off to a more isolated stretch of shore).

I came back to work on a submission deadline and found it too sad to use that real-time experience as seasoning. I'm a sensitive person. I can imagine a great deal. But my joy in dystopian work comes from writing stories I think are real-enough but would never actually happen. I enjoy the What-If scenario when it isn't likely to occur.

I'm still writing, but my creations are more magical and modern right now. How can we change the world now to not-become-that? That kind of thing is living in my heart. How can we better the world with our crafts? Look at the numbers in which the world is turning to the Arts for relief. How can we tell tales but deliver a thread of hope?

Artists, keep making your art.

We have no idea how long this will last or what else will be asked of us. The flu of 1918 lasted two years. I'm watching the people at the park here being so careless with each other's lives that I am certain we have to be prepared for a marathon, not a sprint. The pure science behind how long it would take to get a vaccine that works out into the population tells that even that will take time. 

[But in the meantime, for a start, if people stopped littering the ground with their disposable masks, that would be great. Masks that might have virus on them. It's just health protocol. And we need to cut the strings when we're done. I've already seen birds with legs caught in them.]

We are our own heroes thrust onto an unwanted quest. Only we know if we will rise to meet it. 

[I'm just going to plug masks one more time. I'm chuckling as I write that but it is startling after isolating in solitude for three months to find myself in a crowd of people who are talking about this virus like it's not a big deal and won't touch them. Wear a mask to curb the spread. I think we're going to see the numbers go back up again. The flu of 1918 saw an increase that first fall season.]

May we all see the other side of this virus. 

Lag Time

It’s been a while. Since my last post I have had two more Outpatient surgeries with a Carbon Scar Laser to breakdown the thicker scar tissue on my legs limiting my mobility. With that came two weeks of intense recovery, which included pain as well as exhaustion and mental fatigue from the anesthesia.

It made writing practically impossible. That was severely frustrating, coming after two years of trying desperately to regain my form, discipline, and momentum.

Then the day came where I found myself with no submissions out for publication consideration. No one was reading my work. And I panicked.

It’s hard enough, while in recovery, not to feel useless every time I have to set a story aside to be finished later, or let go of a submission deadline I could meet if I only didn’t do any of the self-care I need to do. It feels like failure.

If I want any kind of longevity my self-care has to come first. I know this. It doesn’t mean I don’t push at the edges of what that means to see how much more I can do as I heal.

So I spent two weeks in a half-haze discerning which submission calls were realistic to attempt time-wise. I sent a few out and then had to stop. The quality was lagging. I didn’t want to compromise my writing out of fear. But now there are subs still out, still being considered. Every day that goes by without a rejection is a blessed day.

And I’m starting to have the energy again to work.

Stories are forming from the warming days. Characters are climbing out of the birdsong and their histories poke through the cold earth. There will be time to recover and time to write.

NaNoWriMo & Me

This year for National Novel Writing Month I am writing out a manuscript of my coma experiences and subsequent night terrors from my accident.

I am just on track. It is day 15 and I am at 25,600 words. But I am just on track. I need two good days of nothing but writing this week to get a jump ahead.

Writing in recovery is hard. And it's been hard to keep up with it when I keep falling asleep with my hand on the mouse. The want is there but the physical ability is not.

I'm not upset about it. I expected it. The goal is not 50,000 words. It's working on it every day. It's chasing the finish line. But I'm not where I thought I'd be, even after cutting myself some slack.

I feel worse off than last year.

And my wife reminds me that I have been undergoing surgeries this year, which is different from last year.

So there's that.

But I am on the track and plugging along. I hope that by putting these stories to paper, so to speak, they will release some of the hold they have on my every day. I appreciate the tool nanowrimo has been for me in my recovery.

And Lo, the Pinkie, It Doth Straighten!

This is my right hand after a skin grafting and almost two years of healing. The thick ridging is mostly smoother out. My new skin is thickening, though it is still thin enough to act as a barometer, changing color in hot or cold. But I want you to look at my crooked little pinkie. I had contraction bands on the underside, which didn't allow me to straighten it at all.

Considering that I almost died, that I almost lost my legs (I didn't), and the months it took me to walk independently again, a crooked little, fire-eaten pinkie seemed a small sacrifice. The most trouble it gave me was that any time I tried to type an apostrophe, a semi-colon came out. My pinkie simply couldn't stretch enough to reach it. That's what 'find and replace' is for.

I can still remember waking in the ICU to my hands bandaged up in tight balls, wondering if I would ever write with my hands again. ::shudder::

My surgeon, Dr. Joan Dolinak, is a miracle worker. Upstate Hospital in Syracuse has a new scar laser for burn treatments. She said she could break up the contraction bands and some of the thicker scar tissue. I just had my first treatment-slash-surgery on Thursday. After all my skin graft surgeries I was nervous about going under again. Dr. Dolinak promised me that I would be able to take the bandages off today and shower.

She was right.

I won't even go into the transformation in my legs except to say it was more than I hoped for and I wept. I sobbed. It was amazing. And when I took the wrap off my hand, my pinkie straightened IMMEDIATELY!!! It pulls from being immobile and I have some physical therapy work to do with it to get it to flex up again. But it is the most beautiful fire-eaten straight-ass pinkie I have ever seen.

My hands are my craft. My hand speak works my lips cannot put form to and for a while I was scared that their ability would be compromised. And it was. But I am doing my work, as well as my Work.

The rewards come. My semi-colons are apostrophes again. I even had to correct the over-reach I had unknowingly adopted because, for an hour tonight, all my lower-case Ls were apostrophes.

Look at that beautiful pinkie finger. Fire doesn't just have to be an ending. It can also clear the way for new beginnings. Imagine all the stories my hands have yet to write.

Can you? I can.

When Family Reads Your Work

While visiting with my family for the holidays, we talked about my latest published story, "The Keepers of Madleen," and they gave me their honest feedback, which I always appreciate. My dad said it was his favorite story of mine yet.

That doesn't suck to hear, especially as my skills improve with each story I write.

The best moment came when I told them that I had a bunch of stories set in the same world, weaving themselves into being within my head. I told them I could see it becoming a book of short stories. And then I told them what happens in the first moment of the very next story.

The look of surprise/shock that crossed both of their faces was the best gift I could have gotten. It meant that my story was effective!

Keep writing. Keep creating. It's a tough road but it keeps going.

So do I.

So can you.

NaNoWriMo: Daughter of Margaret

It's National Novel Writing Month and if you are doing it then you are also feverishly pounding words into the keyboard, praying that at the end of fifty thousand words some of them make sense. I started participating years ago for the discipline of it, to train myself to do distance running, rather than a series of sprints.

I've tried a different genre of fiction each year, from science fiction to classic fantasy to urban fantasy to literary fiction to supernatural horror. And this year I went a different route. This year I'm working on non-fiction.

I'm writing out the story of the worlds I crossed while comatose. I'm drawing the ways I was able to maintain a positive outlook after I woke up. I'm being vulnerable and sharing a deep truth I would be a fool to ignore. Why waste a good life-defining experience with denial?

I'm writing a lot. The more I flesh out the more my brain remembers. I think if I wrote out every detail of my coma memories, it would tell a year-long tale, far longer than the three weeks I was under. That's disturbing, but also true. I accept it and move on. And it's why I'm writing it.

Maybe after giving it breath, some of it will fall away.

If you're doing NaNoWriMo, you can find me as Daughter of Margaret. I allowed myself a moment to write this out because I'm totally including it in today's word count. But now it's back to my non-fiction. The title is still a work in progress. It doesn't have a name yet.

Recovery Road

It's been a year since the accident that almost took my life. How could I not be thinking about that tonight? In many ways it's been a very long year. And in another way, I don't feel like I have a lot to show for it.

Except I can walk, talk, write, make myself food in the kitchen, put my shoes on by myself, use the bathroom, wipe myself, check the mailbox, climb stairs, cough, etc. I had to relearn all of it. And I did, like a champ. From the outside now, I move slowly, but you wouldn't necessarily know something so almost-devastating had happened to me. Most days that is enough to make me happy.

My recovery has taken me longer than I expected. The more honest answer is that it has taken a lot more out of me than I expected. When I get most frustrated, my brain sighs heavily and says, "You were a pillar of fire."

I was not in a fire. I was the fire.

I spend most of my time preparing-to-do-things, like getting clothes ready to put on, or getting ready to wash up, or getting ready to make the bed. And then I can do one thing to cross off my list. I keep making plans of five things to do a day, but I forget to start the list with all the things I already have to do before any of the extras can get done.

If I get one extra thing crossed off, one new thing done, I call it a win.

And then, at the end of the day, when my exhaustion-induced-naps are over, I write. But two months ago it would have been, "I try to write," so I will embrace the improvement. And my writing spurts sound more like my old voice, and more easily so on my first try. It's not that I had any damage to my brain. But when your body is still using processing points to remember how to step up on a curb, it doesn't want to divert power to imaginary world-building.

And I learned that even then, it's not about desire. It's not about want. It's about can't.

So you have to ride it out. Or you could fight it, but I'm pretty sure that will just tire you out more, requiring more naps than now, and if now is very frustrating to you, it's probably not the best choice.

I have managed to write a few new stories and submit some of my pre-accident ones. Within the last month the story muse has been singing faster than my healing hands can type, so I'm getting better at choosing what to work on and catch-in-the-moment. Better discernment is a good skill to have.

I like to note my silver linings. They make the pain worth something.

I even found a story I sent out the morning of my accident. I couldn't recall the storyline. Once I read it I remembered having the idea for it and drafting it, but I couldn't remember how I ended it at all. How many writers get to say they read one of their own finished stories for the first time and didn't know what was going to happen?

Three of my recent submission responses were we-really-liked-your-story-and-held-it-for-further-consideration-but-it-didn't-fit-with-our-other-selections, and two of my responses were sales. That feels really good. I am not back to where I was, but I am back on track. I lost momentum for a while but I didn't lose my creative mojo.

A year ago I was on fire and they thought I was going to die. Today I am putting pen to paper and birthing a new world. These are good things.

The Fingers Work!

For the last two months, I have been working more steadily, using it as a form of Occupational Therapy for my still-healing hands. The worst damage to my hands was my right index finger, and the meaty spot between that and the thumb. It was an open hole that required a skin graft (before that, I could see the bones of my right index finger).

Each week I can work longer before I need to stop and stretch my hands out. I still make myself write out my notes by hand. I think from the outside, my handwriting looks fine, but it's not quite where it used to be. I am working my way back towards my sloping, beautiful cursive.

I have to be honest though... those first days in the hospital ICU, I was afraid I would never be able to use my hand again. So I have gratitude for how much I *can* use it, and everything else that comes will be an added bonus.

Still, there's a truth to the notion that you don't know what you really care about until you almost lose it. The things that I love flipped through my heart, and I spent one night, unbeknownst to me until months later, regaling my hospital appointed babysitter- I had taken a nosedive out of bed high on the coma drugs- with all the stories I still had in me that I wanted to write. She told me I said it was what I needed to live for.

"I'm not done yet," I said. Nothing else has been more true.

It Only Takes a Moment

Altar by my friend Rahdne, sending prayers for my healing.

Well, I didn't see that coming.

Halloween night, I had four published anthologies on my shelf with stories I wrote in them, two more acceptance letters for other anthologies, and a string of submissions out. I had finally found my momentum after two years of hard work. The rhythm of my work felt right and I was excited about what the next year would offer.

By midnight that night, I was being airlifted to Syracuse Upstate Hospital's burn unit. It was a freak no-fault accident. I had multiple graft surgeries to harvest and replace skin to my damaged legs and hand. I was transferred to rehab to relearn things like walking and washing myself.

I spent Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years in the care of an amazing group of doctors and nurses. I mostly kept my chin up, looking ahead to what needed to happen next, and then next, and then next, so that I could go home. And I did. Which is a larger story that will be told.

I'm still in recovery. I have physical therapy to work my knee flex, so that I can do normal things like climb stairs, step over obstacles, and step into my tub. My grafts are healing well, but it will still be a year, they say, before this part of this journey is done.

I am grateful for my life. For the health I have, and for the care I need to get better.

But my heart hurts. Every day feels like another week off-track. I feel like all the momentum I built up with my writing is slipping away. It's just a feeling, just a worry. I am a writer. It's what I know and what I do and every day I can feel my healing fingers itching to type away. The damage to my right hand was serious enough that writing more than a couple hours a day is still difficult. So I've been taking notes and organizing projects and letting go of the stories I was working on whose submission deadlines have past.

There will be stories from me. That will never be a problem. For the time being, my personal story is the one that needs my attention. Healing muscles and tissue first. Working words and fingers second.

Is There a World Outside My Computer?

I have been working on five stories this month, all due in four days. I'm in good shape. I have the next three days heavily scheduled out with a current schedule that affords me time to immerse myself in my worlds and still be present in my home- although my cat Mara might disagree. She has been denied lap more times than she feels is justified.

It was hard to get disciplined, but easy to stay that way. I have found my groove. I worried I wouldn't, but chased it anyway. If I get all my submissions done by Friday, I'll actually be able to enjoy my holiday weekend.

Oaths and Statistics

You have to get your feet wet.

A little over a year ago, I made a public statement on land sacred to me, that I was going to take a leap of faith, believe in myself, and send my writing out regularly. I am happy to look back at that moment and be able to say that I did it. There were a few months where there were lulls in submissions calls, but during those times I kept working on the next story, never ceasing to string words together. I built worlds.

In the last year, I wrote and edited over a dozen stories, of varying lengths. I sent them out into the world and received a passel of rejections, which indoctrinates me into the Every Writer Club. You know what helped with that? I shared my favorite rejection form letters with other writer friends. It’s not personal. Most of the time, you are one of hundreds of writers vying for a dozen spots.

But, in that same year, four of my stories were accepted!

I still doubt myself and my words. It comes with being an artist. But I have a trust now that I didn’t have before I opened myself to accepting rejection into my creative process. I trust that each story that doesn’t hit the mark is a learning experience to make the next story, or rewrite, better. And I trust that a rejection doesn’t mean my story is bad, but that it simply hasn’t found the right home yet.

As a writer, you are creator, nurturer, adoption manager, and undertaker. I have new goals this year, and prayers that my computer can hold out until I get paid enough for a story to replace it. Wherever you are in your own process, may your time be fruitful and productive.

Happy Hunting!

Good News Cometh

I have a sci-fi story and a fantasy story to edit. I have an urban fantasy story to clean up and another urban fantasy story to bring to life. So of course, I started working on an original fairy tale instead. 

Sometimes the muse bids us to follow another wind. And sometimes looming deadlines overrule the whims of the muse.

*

Yesterday morning, I woke to an e-mail in my inbox. Since they’re mostly rejections, I was ready to steel myself for a few minutes of sadness and tears, before moving on. But when I opened it, I almost didn’t understand the words:

“I am happy to tell you that your excellent story has been accepted…”

Cue tears of disbelief, hand over my mouth in joy. The contract will come next month. The YA anthology the story has been accepted in should be published this October. More info to come!

And, this morning I learned that a story I signed a contract on last summer is moving forward with it’s publication. That’s two stories due to be printed this year!

It doesn’t mean I get to relax. I have to maintain this momentum. More hiccups and hurdles will come. But so will the good news. 

Silver Linings

I have five stories out waiting to be read and accepted or rejected. One story has been out since September, almost seven months now. On the publisher’s webpage, several authors have posted about signing contracts and getting published, only to never receive payment or their contributor’s copy. The publisher has responded each time publicly, assuring that they did so months ago. But they have yet to respond to my story. And it’s unlikely I would sign the contract if they did. It’s a shame. It’s a good one that would have meshed perfectly with their project.

But otherwise… other authors have been posting their rejections to projects I submitted. It’s nerve-wracking, and ironic, as artists and creative types tend to be sensitive by nature. And wounded by rejections over creations we consider to be our children. It’s enough to make some people give up. To decide that at some numbered rejection, their story isn’t good enough and they set it aside.

We forget that there’s also the audience to consider. Sometimes we shop stories around to the wrong places, because we don’t know better. I’ve had my fair share of those. I’m new to the business and not so savvy about that end of it. So there are bound to be hiccups and bumps along the road.

What matters is that I get up, dust myself off, and keep going. What matters most to me, about this journey, is that I didn’t think I had the heart for so much “no” and I am encouraged to find that the fortitude to do it anyway, because it is in my nature to do so, lives inside me, beneath that hurt.

I have this ritual I do every morning before I open my author e-mail account. I tell myself that rejection is part of the journey. If I get them it’s because I’m putting myself out into the world. And I believe that eventually, after a slew of rejections, the acceptance letters will come. So I welcome the rejections.

Still, every morning I don’t have a rejection in my inbox is a good one. It means one more day my story is being considered. When your career boils down to a daily game of chance, it’s all about the silver linings.

What keeps you going, on your uncertain path? 

Fundraisers, and Why Artists Ask You to Back Them

Photo by Sarah Lyn Eaton

Steps in Being a Writer (as I have discovered them in my personal journey, so take it with many grains of salt)

1) The first step in being a writer is to write.

2) The second step is to finish something.

3) The third step is to let someone else read it. This is the stage for beta readers, where I want to know if the story makes sense? Did you enjoy it? Did you care about the characters?

4) The next step is a hodgepodge of waiting for feedback and getting sick waiting, of wanting it and not wanting it at the same time. It’s where the artistic crisis of faith comes into play and you doubt every word you wrote and you’re not sure anyone will like your story, EVER. That feeling never truly goes away, for any artist, but it does lead you to…

5) Believe in yourself, that this is your path, or let it go and find another. Which you’ll consider for half a day, seriously, until you remember there is no other path.

6) Accept that no story will ever be perfect from the gate and learn how to edit yourself, how to craft your story the way you want to tell it. I often have multiple people reading during this stage, where I get a little more insistent with my questions. If all you give me is “I liked it” you might as well kiss me with death-lips. I’m glad you liked it. But there are a lot of good writers out there. I want you to want to read it again. And I repeat this step until I am satisfied.

7) The fourth step is to send it out, pray to whatever deities you believe in, and cultivate fortitude. There will be way more rejections than acceptances. If, like me, you aren’t sure about the market for your stories, you might start with smaller non-professional paying anthologies, magazines, and e-zines before submitting to professional markets. Seriously, I thought I understood how many rejections might come my way. I was wrong. If you’re lucky, you’ll get helpful feedback with your rejection. But when publishers have to sort through hundreds of stories in a timely manner, you can’t expect it.

This last step is where dreams can wilt.

I started sending stories out to non-professional paying markets while I practiced my story crafting. It’s very common to be offered $30 for a 6000 word story when the going rate is .06/word professionally, which would be $360. That’s a $330 pay cut for the experience and exposure. And I get it. Start-up publishers would like to pay more but can’t, though they still want the talent to come in build their reputation.

So far, I have sold my stories for a split share of royalties, because at the end of the day, if someone wants my story, I want them to have it. That’s the reason I chose this path. To share my stories. Not to make money (hopeless artist). But I am hoping that along the journey, that will happen as well (hopeful artist).

It’s what we all hope.

I submitted a story for consideration to an e-zine that can only pay $15 a story right now, but I had an early story that fit their theme and I would be happy to be included- and ecstatic to get $15 for my writing right now! A lot of publishers hope you will sell them your story for exposure, which is good, but it’s like asking a band to come play for a night in your club for exposure, or asking an artist to paint a mural on your building for free because people will see their work. And it is exposure. Which you can do once in a while. And most artists I know do it more than once in a while. Because the path is more important to us. Too bad the taxman didn’t feel the same way.

The last 6000 word story I wrote was the child of three days of story crafting and world building and question answering and outline/draft typing, stopping only to eat and sleep and clean the cat litter. It was followed by five days of exhaustive editing and fleshing out. I kept track. I was working ten hour days to finish a story that will maybe, eventually, earn me money. The more I write, the shorter each step gets, and the better my work gets, which will hopefully mean more stories will sell. It’s a strange teeter-totter.

Where the Fundraising Part Comes In

Many writers and young publishers have turned to the world of fundraising to procure the funds needed to produce a new book, hopefully including payment to the authors, too. Fundraising is similar to ways in which artists have historically been aided. Those patrons who enjoyed the art, music, literature, or theatre, etc. but could not do it themselves would pay artist’s bills while they produced for the pleasure of the discovery.

To be an artist means you make difficult choices as you pursue your craft, each step of the way fighting society’s expectations of and for you. So why should you give some of your well-earned money to artists? Because what would this world be like without art? Without Beethoven or Eric Clapton? Without Shakespeare or Tony Kushner? Without Walt Whitman, Maria Ranier Rilke, or Mary Oliver? Without Meryl Streep or Sir Ian McKellan? Without Vincent Van Gogh, Mary Cassatt, Kandinsky, Michelangelo, or Andrew Wyeth? If you go to the movies, you already support the arts!

And you could help support and encourage the birth of my next story.

A link to the kickstarter campaign for Mobbing Midnight: An Anthology of Crows, and the update where I answer the question "Why Crows?"

The way these campaigns work is, if you feel inclined to donate, you become a patron of the arts and what is known as a “backer” with several rewards that include offering you a reserved copy of the book by helping in advance. The money is not taken from you until the campaign is over. If we don’t reach our goal, you don’t lose any money, the book doesn’t get funded, and we probably publish it anyway, because our stories are our children and we want to set them loose in the world. And then we hope for royalties after the book sells.

You could be a revolutionary. Donations start as $1 but for just $12, it also gets you a copy of the finished book, plus a book mark featuring art by Jennifer Campbell-Smith. You may think even a dollar doesn’t matter, but to a starving artist trying to find their way in the world, every dollar counts. You can’t lose. Either you ultimately don’t have to fork any money over, or you become one of the people who made the birth of a new work of literature possible (something you could brag about). 

As 2014 tips into 2015...

I've been writing for years, finding my voice, finding footing in the stories I wanted to tell. This last year was the first that I seriously started submitting my work to strangers. Throwing myself out there is not something I do. So that is amazing. Accepting that I may not be understood or valued, and believing in myself is not something I did well in 2013. But I had to, in order to embrace the rejections that came back to me.

And yet some people liked what I had to say. And some people even sent me contracts, to share my work with others. So many steps forward, despite the push back. Every one of those steps is a beacon guiding me forward.

That's where my dream lies. It's the only path for me. I believe in fairies. I believe in Santa Claus. I believe in things I cannot see. I believe there are those out there who will feed from my stories.

May you find your passion in 2015. May you dive into what you need to do to see it through. There is only one you. Only one person in this whole world who sees what you see. I rang in the new year the way I want to live every day after... writing. Working on words. Thinking of my family. Wishing my loved ones health and happiness.

This last year has been solitude, work, loss, reunions, poverty, illness, surgery, births, love, work, success, rejection, love, and love...

May the next year be better. May my work be fruitful. May you find what you're missing. May you find it within you.


Here's a link to a separate blog post I wrote about my Great-Grandma's NYE diary.

Goodreads Giveaway!!

Check out this giveaway on Goodreads for a chance to win a free copy of the anthology What Follows that my story "The White Sisters" appears in! There are three chances to win!

A link to the publisher's website, which links to the giveaway on Goodreads!

We do hope that if you win, you write a review of the book for Goodreads, as well as Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Word of mouth is a writer's bread and butter. Hope you all are having a happy holidays!

The Art of Rejection

Actual rejection letter received.

I have a pile of them. And the hard truth is, they’re never going to stop. It takes great fortitude to pursue a career where a great majority of it involves facing, accepting, and processing rejection.

I’m in the midst of a spree of people like my stories! I’m getting at least to the last ring of consideration before the rejection which helps buffer the blow. It means I’m working in the right direction. But still, when that rejection comes, the third one in as many years from the same playwright festival, it dampens the joy. I still drop into what am I doing wrong?

I have received three story rejections in the last twenty-four hours and I’d be lying if I said the rejection didn’t sting. Oh, it wounds. They were positive rejections, as such a thing exists, encouraging me to try again. They liked my stories. They held them longer for consideration. But ultimately, they were not a good fit with the other selections made.

But there are going to be people who don’t like my work. There are going to be people who hate my voice and my message. What do you do with that when you are made of so much mushy insides?

I accept the rejection. I embrace it and understand that I am never going to be good enough for everyone. It’s just true. So I don’t have to try to be. I just have to be good enough for me. Trust me, no critic will ever be harder on my writing than me.

It means I have to be vigilant at shopping around for the right places for my voice. They’re out there. I’m not going to give up. So don’t give up, either. You are the only you in the world, with your tone of word and your point of view. If you don’t tell your stories, who will?

SEND

<send>

There is this rush of adrenaline when it’s done. I don’t think that will ever go away. You write a story and it’s a creation of yours. You’re attached to it. If you’re not, you might be in the wrong profession. And then you let it loose. You send it out into the world.

Will it be good enough?

Will they like it?

Did I polish it enough without losing my intention?

The reality about writing is that every draft you discard is still alive inside you. Every character you create and then cut out is a shadow in the story, something that was. And it’s very possible at the end for it to get muddy in your brain. It’s why having beta readers is SO important! But despite the story itself, out in the big world, there are other hopes.

Is this the right market for it?

Is it a good fit for the project?

Will my story find a home?

And you hope. And you dive into the next project and try to forget that you’re waiting to hear. And you finish the next story and you send it out. And your heart skips a beat as you hit the button. And you flush with terror and adrenaline. And you hope.

<send>

Writing Goals

Today I sat down and made a list of what my goals in this process are:

• Write every day.
• Finish a story.
• Submit stories regularly for consideration for publication.
• Get rejections.
• Get used to rejection.
• Work on my story crafting.
• Get better rejections, like "not a good fit" instead of "your story is crap."
• Receive 50 rejections.
• Get a story accepted into an anthology.
• Get a story accepted into a pro-rate magazine.
• Get paid for a story.
• Get paid a professional rate for a story.
• Get paid royalties.
• Become a better self-editor.
• Finish a novella and submit it.
• Finish a full-length novel and submit it.
• Meet Neil Gaiman.

I can't think of anything I've forgotten.