Arrant Nonsense

That's gotta be one of the nicest rejections I've ever gotten.

Paraphrased: Not quite right for us, but I rather like your writing style, please sub again. Signed personally by the editor.

I'll take that. This is the first time I've gotten one of these from the actual editor of this publication--all the others (of which there have been many) were simple form rejections.

Yeah. For a rejection? I'm actually kind of stoked about that.

The oddest things make me happy.

SocloseIcantasteit.

The A&tS fic has been sent off to Writers of the Future, now that it doesn't suck. This means I'm in way before deadline and have one less thing hanging over my head.

Of course, it wouldn't be me if it went smooth, and my label printing has been... problematic lately. *sigh* I wrote out the addresses by hand on the envelopes, after trying three times with two different programs to get them to print correctly.

I should dive into the Faerie Show fic next and figure out if there's anything more wrong with it. Then I can start shipping it around as well.

AND, I need to think of what's next. The Plot Bunnies are staying stubbornly in the Hutch and refusing to hop out and play. *taps foot*

Also, I can has new Buffy and Dresden comicses. I'm soooo behind on reading the things...

HAH.

I have beaten the A&tS fic into submission.

My protagonist has protagged.

He's failed miserably, of course, but, you know, it's that kind of story, so he was bound to.

I'll sit on it overnight and then read it over tomorrow to see if it hangs together as well as it ought. I'll edit it.

And then it can start going out again. Maybe this will be my Writers of the Future entry for this quarter...

Yay.

So, the comments I'm getting on the Faerie Show fic tell me that it kind of sucks like a Hoover. The idea is good; the execution is somewhat...problematic. I've spent most of today, off and on, beating it into some semblance of shape. I hope my new Writing Buddy doesn't look at it and go "Man, what the hell have I gotten myself into? This is terrible." Argh.

Also, no one hates the last 'graph but me.

And I realized that I use the scene with the Fae for a big ol' block of exposition. And I could probably handle that better. The problem is that I like that scene, and I also use it for the reveal of what one of the characters has hidden away until "the proper moment." I know, I know, they say "Kill your darlings," but I don't wanna. *stomps foot*

And I still have no idea what I'm going to do with the A&tS fic to make my protagonist actually, you know, protag. If he blows the museum up, then Merry won't much like him anymore, so that kills that next-to-last scene. I may have him steal something so he can examine it out from under prying eyes...and then get caught. This would be better than destruction, I think.

And I still don't have the Next Thing. None of the WIPs are talking to me, and the Bunnies are staying determinedly in the Hutch.

*cries*

As you know, Bob, I stuck an END at the bottom of the Faerie Show fic yesterday. I went over it today at CONduit. I figured out how to spell "faerie" consistently, using find and replace to fix the times I used "faery" instead. *facepalm* I also found a piece of a scene which was basically a repeat of a previous scene, so I had to fix that as well. I did some tweaking here and there on other stuff too.

The good news is, I still like it.

The bad news is, it's got the lamest last line ever. Seriously, guys, this is capital-B Bad. I'm going to have to come up with something a whole lot better than this if I want to send it to Writers of the Future.

Also, a title would be good. "Showing Faeries for Fun and Profit"? Eh, I don't know. There's precious little profit being made by my protags here, and this is normal, as those who show dogs and cats know full well. At the same time, hey, catchy title.

Is it twee? You bet your ass it is. Am I ashamed of myself? Not a bit. I own the twee-ness here. This is not meant to be anything other than what it is, and twee is a big fat part of it. Light and fluffy, hopefully somewhat humorous, and hopefully something that will leave my readers with a smile on their faces. Fortunately, it's way over wordcount for Clarkesworld, so nihilistic_kid won't have it inflicted upon him. However, it's different enough that I think another editor might look twice at it.

In other news, I may poke the A&tS fic a bit, just to see what comes out. This will, naturally, entail reading the damb thing again and incorporating whatever changes that Bob suggested that I agree with. And figuring out an emotional catharsis for the character will be a chore. Remember what I've said about being emotionally stunted? Yeah, that. *grumbles*

Also, I have to decide what's "next" on my writing list. I opened the Plot Bunny Hutch yesterday to see what hopped out, and they all stubbornly stayed put. Blah.

AND. Starting tomorrow: I will take ONE HOUR out of each day, minimize all my windows but the WordPerfect one, and WRITE, dammit. And I expect you all to beat me if I don't. I'm going to set my kitchen timer and tell Da Boy and the Hubby to leave me be, and everything, possibly move to another room. Because, seriously, I shouldn't take over two months to write something like this, y'all. Five hundred words a day, and I could have had it banged out in a week and a half. I'm feeling rather monumentally stoopid right now.

My gmail inbox remains stubbornly empty. Alas and woe.

Last night's "Lost" rocked my socks. Give me more of that, baby. And I noticed that they'd named the physicist "Faraday," and I thought, Did they just go there? They totally went there! HEE. And bookishwench wrote a lovely little ficlet from Penny's POV, here. Go forth, and shower her with praise.

The Hubby red-penned the A&tS story for me while he was on his trip. I hope I can beat it into some semblance of, you know, not sucking.

I may have a bunny for a new story. *eyes WIPs* Because I shouldn't finish those, no, I should start something completely different. *headdesks*

LTUE is over and was, from my POV anyway, a rousing success. I got feedback on the A&tS story (the first five pages of which apparently don't suck, but that may have been a function of my dramatic and entertaining reading of it as much as anything else), and Bob Defendi has agreed to have a look at the rest of it for me. I also figured out how to fix a problem with a big patch of ugly clunky boring as hell exposition that's been bugging me for a long time, and that came from a panel on dialogue I wasn't even planning on attending and did anyway because it was early and I was bored. So, yay for that.

I got the books signed I wanted signed. I took copious notes. A couple of plot bunnies hopped out of the grass and were immediately sequestered into the Hutch. I have swag, including the very first Schlock Mercenary t-shirt.

I also had an interesting conversation with a guy who writes in the Baen Books 1632 universe, which is a shared 'verse always looking for new writers. I shall read these books and see if they spawn anything, because they pay well (pro rates) and there's a certain amount of prestige attached to it. I'm not sure how well I'd do writing in a book 'verse, since I've never done it before, but you never know 'til you try, right?

Also! I got a call last night from Joni Labaqui of Writers of the Future. And, for the third time in a row, I got an honorable mention. This was for the BearFic. Always a bridesmaid... Ah well. Guess I need to figure out what I'm sending them next. The Giant Bugs story needs an edit, as does the A&tS story before I actually send it to Bob. Some of this will be done tomorrow during the Daytona 500. Yay NASCAR!

And it doesn't suck nearly as much as I remember it sucking. There's some stuff needs tweaking here and there, and maybe I'll run it past the Hubby one more time, but it may be nearly ready to go out again.

There's just that one paragraph that's really, really bugging me. Boring, crappy exposition. Needs fixing. Badly.

Having moved my business to the front room, I think I have an ending to the BearFic that won't make my Writing Buddy's head go desky. As he pointed out, there's no percentage in my crew going public with this thing. In fact, there's a negative percentage in it. So, I think I've solved that problem. And given myself a better ending, that doesn't feel like there's WAY more to the story, and made it feel less "Serenity"-ish. Yay. *waves hands in a vague victory-ish way*

Now I need to beat the ArtFic into some semblance of logic and readability. I've had a couple of suggestions (from my Writing Buddy and from bigsciencybrain) that will help with that, I think. Part of my problem is that I'm going for the "unreliable narrator" here...and not pulling it off. I think it can be salvaged. Maybe.

And the next Writers of the Future deadline is sneaking up quick. I need to either figure out what I'm sending to it, or write something new for it. The Giant Bugs story is being...problematic. I don't have enough Plot here. And I'm calling it the Giant Bugs fic, but they're not even the main focus of the story. AUGH.

I've decided to work on a "previous" thing. The A&tS story is terribly, terribly flawed, and I need to figure out what the hell is wrong with it...and if it's even fixable. I've been wanting to do something with an unreliable narrator for a fair bit, and this may be my chance at it.

Part of the problem is that I think his capitulation here is entirely too easy. I fixed one problem with the final painting *headsmacks* but there's another one that needs addressing. But now that I've (finally) got it printed out *glares @ printer* I can look it over a little easier than I can on a computer screen.

And I really ought to do something with the Horse Needs Clothes story as well. It's been languishing on my hard drive for...a long time. I've had lots of people tell me that he needs to live at the end instead of die--but what happens then? If I can start sending it out, then I'll be a whole lot closer to my goal of "twelve stories done this year."

AUGH. *Barbie voice* Writing is hard.