Just found this list and boy is that a kick in the butt for Trek fans. Number 10 is especially painful. I think I’d like to add to the list the following: Star Trek doesn’t have Wookies. Nobody in Star Wars has contracted every STD known to man for sleeping with every green, blue, purple, and tentacled alien woman… Yeah, I’m not that funny… (Don’t click the read more, there isn’t any more after this!)
SBS Magazine is now a public magazine. What that means is we are open to submissions from anyone, provided it follows the guidelines. Check out the website here for more information. With the magazine being public, that means anyone reading this blog is more than welcome to submit (again, if you meet guidelines)! Feel free to spread the word about us too! We’d like this to be a successful project with a regular publication schedule (biannual would be nice). We’re shooting to have our first issue out come this December. And yes, it will make a great Christmas gift! If you have questions you can email me, or send an email to the email provided at SBS. Anywho! (Don’t click the read more, there isn’t any more after this!)
This is a bit old, but it really caught my attention. Apparently this guy (David Lassman) decided to see if some of the big publishers would recognize Jane Austen’s writing if it was submitted to them, and if they’d accept it. What surprises me isn’t that Austen was rejected–I sort of expected that considering her style is a big antiquated–but that most of the publishers didn’t even recognize the writing, including one publisher who has been printing Austen’s works in new editions and the like. I was also surprised that this guy wasn’t brought up on charges of plagiarism, but that’s not really what matters.It’s scary in a lot of ways. These are publishers bringing us new authors, supposedly representing the great literature of today, yet they didn’t notice Jane Austen or even have a little suspicion about it? Perhaps most of them didn’t read it, and, in fact, one of the publishers admitted that they probably hadn’t read it before rejecting it out of hand. But for those that did read it, how could they say the writing was good and reject it and not be aware that it isn’t original writing?And what does this say about the industry? It likely suggests that publishers are so swamped with garbage that they’ve gotten to a point where they can’t give manuscripts the attention they deserve anymore, especially good ones. It confirms my suspicions that one might actually need an agent in this business to get anywhere with some of these publishing houses, because if they aren’t reading manuscripts that might be the only way to get out of the slush. But some of these publishers have rules regarding unsolicited submissions, so are they overloaded with solicited submissions then? Or have they become bored with the writing of today and perhaps take two seconds to look at the cover letter before simply rejecting something?What do you think about this?
There’s not a lot to say about this day. For Americans it has a lot of importance, being one of the few days in our history where were literally grabbed and shook violently awake. Those metaphorical hands brought our attention to the fact that we’re not perfect, we’re not entirely safe… With this day in mind I would like to send an enormous thank you to all our troops, wherever you may be. Without you this country would be nothing. I don’t care what anyone thinks about the war. Our troops deserve our respect, no matter what war they are fighting. I hope they bring you all home soon and safe. And to the families of those killed in 9/11, I hope you can find a little joy in this day, even though represents so much grief and terror. And to our fire fighters and police officers, thank you for all you have done to make this country as safe as it is at home. Thanks to all of you who responded to the attack and tried to save what lives you could. We will never forget.
Over at io9 they have an article about Heinlein’s use of form letters for correspondence. Say what? I’ve heard of form letters for publishers and editors, but for correspondence? Did the guy really get that much fan mail? That’s just amazing! I hope I get that much fan mail some day! Anywho! (Don’t click the read more, there isn’t any more after this!)
I’m now starting to work in a new direction. Well, that’s not entirely true. What is happening is I am switching a bit on where I’m placing my focus. I’ve spent a lot of time focusing on short stories. While I don’t believe that is an entirely negative thing I have noticed that this focus has sucked away the time I spend on other projects–namely novels. True, I want to write short stories, get some published, and be known as someone who writes good shorts, but I also want to write good novels and, well, with my spending so much time on shorts it’s hard for me to get a lot of practice in on writing novels. I’ve only finished one novel–WISB–and really, I should be writing more novels. Let’s face it, the short market isn’t as viable as it once was. Novels are the big career makers and I want to have a career at this–this being writing,of course. I want to go on tours and meet new people and do autographs and have people tell me “hey, I read your book and it was good” even if it’s only one person saying it. Yet I’ll never finish any of the many novels I have in the works if I don’t take a moment to actually finish them.The Lies of Venicia is about 1/3rd finished, maybe 1/5th depending on where the story goes. I’ve started a novel for young readers–The Mysterious House of Mr. Whim–and I’ve barely dug into it. I have many other novel ideas in the works, some partially written, some that began as short stories before I realized they were something more, but put to the side because I couldn’t devote the time they deserved to finish them. That said, I have at least ten novels in various genres that I could be writing, fixing, editing, formatting, and submitting to agents. That’s what I should be doing. I know, short stories are great, and I won’t stop writing them, but I have to focus on the novels long enough to get one in submittable condition.Additional to this, I’ve noticed that I’ve spend so much time writing shorts that I’m not editing them, or putting enough focusing into the editing. This is creating some issues in the writing that are now coming to my attention. Some stories feel strained, others feel like they are missing something important, or have too much going on.So here is what I’m going to start doing: All short story writing is officially on hold except in the following cases: Finishing stories that have been started, but still need finishing. In the event that some super crazy awesome idea comes to me that I must write down or I’ll die, or implode, or explode like a supernova, thus causing irreparable damage to the inner solar system…you should beg me to write the story then, for all our sakes… Assessing all the shorts and novels I have to find those I feel are most promising for publication. Weeding out stories that were written so long ago that they aren’t worth working on anymore due to my style having changed or my writing having matured. Editing stories that have been finished to make them publishable. Submitting those stories and keeping my shorts in circulation until they are published, since that is one of Heinlein’s rules. Writing the novels that need to be finished. The Lies of Venicia, The Mysterious House of Mr. Whim, The Spellweaver of Dern, for starters. Also, planning these novels as necessary. I feel like this is an appropriate change to the way things have been going. I can still push the short story market, still bring in new material, and also focus on finishing a few other projects that are simply being set aside and ignored, which isn’t fair in some respects to you guys–my readers–since some of you might be waiting for me to finish The Spellweaver of Dern. So, that’s what’s going to go on here!
