Genre fiction
My second publication for the year – Bathroom Break – is now up at PowderBurnFlash.
Feeling a little bored with having seen yet another movie where the kidnapper lets the victim go to the bathroom and she escapes through the window, I wondered if there was a way to write around that cliche and still have a satisfying, entertaining story, without that “groan” factor. I hope I’ve succeeded. Let me know what you think.
December 31st, 2010
I’ve published a lot of stories this year, as you can see from my bibliography. They’re all, for one reason or another, personal favourites, though some I might have thought a little less of have proven more engaging for some readers. I’ve tried a variety of styles and genres this year, from hard sci-fi to humourous horror and been published both in print and online.
Anyway, this selection is my favourite five online stories from the year:
Fledgling (The New Flesh)
Sunset Photographer (365Tomorrows)
Jacob’s Naked Aquarium (Bewildering Stories – selected for best of quarterly review, 3rd quarter 2010)
Zemogorgon (Pulp Metal Magazine)
Zombie-Eyed Girl (Flashes in The Dark)
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Overall, it’s been a good year, a banner year in fact – I’ve published more this year than all previous years combined – exceeding my own ridiculous goal (lesson: aim high). I still have so much more to work on and a set of new goals that will push me and challenge me – I will publish far fewer pieces, but look for longer stories, and different approaches.
See you in 2011.
Well, it’s Christmas here, but my special Christmas Eve story “Zombie Love for Morons” should be appearing in The New Flesh right about now.
I’ve always thought those “for dummies”, and so on, series had a kind of built-in problem, but they seem very popular (our library has around 150 titles – thinks like “Rugby Union for dummies” [well, duh], Golf Rules and Etiquette for dummies”, “SQL for dummies” [I mean, how many dummies are computer programmers?]). Zombie Love seemed like a good topic to parody that – but how to do it without getting too boring? Flash fiction, of course. How to write it as flash – ah, well, that’s the approach: have a read.
Happy Christmas, all.
Flashes in the Dark has published my story Akio Draws Manga. A shorter piece – under 800 words here – and an odd tale, perhaps a little supernatural, perhaps even a little sci-fi, but certainly psychological. Akio grabs a pen when he can, draws up quick, prescient sketches, while battling giant demons.
Don’t Sleep Downstairs is another of my Arizona stories, my on-going love of the place coming through, in its own odd way. With a bleak old farmhouse and a visiting painter I hope I’ve captured something of character and of the feel of the place. It was fun to write and I hope it’s fun to read.
Thanks to Lori and Bob at Flashes in The Dark for publishing the story.
Finding Keys, a 500 word story and another entry for the Halloween contest – themed space “not outer space, but the space between things” – has just come out on MicroHorror. Another story with the protagonist waking in a hospital bed – my other entry Airhead started the same. Both go in very different directions though.
All of my stories are special to me, for one reason or another, yet Fledgling is one of my personal favourites – perhaps the closest I’ve come to getting the whole thing right. If you were to ask me to recommend just one of my stories to read, this would be it.
My thanks to the editors of The New Flesh Magazine – William Pauley III and Brian Barnett for publishing the piece – I didn’t know if it was quite the right fit, but I guess it was. Also my indebtedness to Jodi MacArthur for her invaluable feedback on an early draft of this story.
Oh, what is magic realism anyway? I was looking for a way to describe this story quickly and that seems to describe it – real, but with the tiniest hint of magic.
Another action-adventure Sci-Fi piece in Antipodean Science Fiction. Giant Mushroom Envelops Small WA Town is a quick shoot-em-up set in Western Australia (not Washington), which seems appropriate in AntiSF. Giant fungal invasions remain high on my list of fears, and it’s cool to smother Western Australia too, though I have another story on the backburner, with nasty fungus further east.
Antipodean Science Fiction publishes 10 stories monthly, each story around 500 words long.
“Airhead”, my entry for the Spaces – Halloween contest run through October at MicroHorror is up now. Nathan limited entries to a maximum of 500 words, so this is even shorter than usual.
What would you do if you had the chance to right a wrong and save yourself at the same time, even if you knew somehow that the righting might be just a little evil?
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And my 101 word story “Morning News” appeared at Michael J. Solender’s Not From Here Are You blog on October 5th. The story was part of the “Dog Days of Summer” contest, and was a Special Jury Selection – it also appears in the downloadable eBook.
Triple V Publishing 