Arrant Nonsense

This makes me feel like a fraud and a failure, but I'm looking at the thing and realizing that I simply do not have the time to do the idea the justice it deserves. Not only that, but it's going to be much longer than the guideline limit. My outline is completely inadequate, and I haven't properly explored in my head who these characters actually are and what makes them tick. When I'm ten thousand words into a project like this, that is a problem.

So. I will write this, because now that I'm partway into it, I desperately want to. It is a cool idea. It might even be a novel idea. But there are other things with deadlines I can actually hit that need my attention, so I need to scribble them first--and then give this the attention it needs without a deadline I can't hit hanging over my head and three other projects demanding my time.

And it's not like the story or the outline will disappear into the ether if I set them aside for a bit. I can still be noodling it even while I'm doing these other things.

So. My writing schedule looks like this, now:

Blurring the Line: up to 5000 words, horror, due Oct 31.

The Lost Worlds: up to 20000 words, steampunk post-apocalyptic horror, due, uh, well. It doesn't say. "Extended until filled." I'll probably do this last.

Temporally Out of Order: up to 6000 words, SFF, due end of November. Once they open and give us the guidelines, I'll do something with it. Maybe an Alex story, that would be hilarious.

Time for another one of these, I think. There are a few that have caught my attention over the past few days, and here they are in no particular order.

Horror Novel Reviews is holding a contest. The topic is open, so long as your story does not exceed 4000 words and contains elements of the macbre, horror, or SF. Deadline on this one is May 10, so get cracking if you want in. Payment is $50 and two copies of the antho.

The Baen Fantasy Award closes on June 30. They're looking for under 8,000-word adventure fantasy in any fantasy subgenre. Grand prize winner will be published on the Baen website, paid industry-standard professional rates, and will receive a package of Baen books as well.

Dark Regions Press is looking for stories in the 10,000-18,000 word range for their "I Am the Abyss" anthology. They want horror or dark fantasy stories about a character dying and going to the underworld, whatever that is. This one closes Oct. 1. Payment is five cents a word, plus a copy of the antho, plus royalties, plus a print of the spread that artist Les Edwards will create of your version of the underworld.

Cohesion Press is looking for stories of under 5,000 words for their "Blurring the Line" anthology. The submission window for this one is August 1-October 31, so you've got some time. They're looking for fiction that blurs the line between what's real and what's not. Payment is AUD.08/word.

As always, read the guidelines carefully. Some of these want the story formatted a particular way, or anonymized, so pay attention to that.

Now. Go forth and write!

Haven't done one of these in awhile.

But before we begin, Maurice Broaddus is doing a crime urban fantasy antho. Of course I have to write new casefic for Ben, and I have a premise and a couple of opening paragraphs, and with any luck I should be able to bang out a first draft in a couple of days. Wish me luck.

Anyway. I scribbled this thing for a ten-word contest I barely remember entering. You had to put (I think) at least four words from this list in the story. I, naturally, being a pedant, used all ten. The words were:

LITTER ENTRANCE SAFE SPIRITUAL SPOTLIGHT BOOKMARK CATASTROPHE RAZOR FAULTY ULTIMATE

And I wrote this:

'Til Experience Change Thy Mind

Leaflets and bookmarks littered the bloodstained entrance to the Spiritualist's Convention. The carnage had been confined to the Main Hall, where they'd been holding the Spotlight Séance when catastrophe struck. I threaded through the shellshocked crowd and stopped short in the doorway to the room.

The bodies were sliced open with razor precision, and the red-soaked carpet squelched under my shoes as I took hesitant steps inside. Information was sketchy; every living witness reported something different. "We thought it was safe," one of them blubbered. I snorted. Safe, at a séance. What a stupid and faulty premise, one they'd paid the ultimate price for.

My nostrils flared, finding another scent under the copper stench of blood, of a wild creature not of this world and not of the next either. I picked my way past the chaos to the stage and peered under, ignoring the eviscerated medium.

It snuffled, cringing and shivering, and covered its head with over-long, hairy arms. Just a baby. "Trapped," it said.

"I know," I answered gently. "You couldn't get out, and you were afraid."

"So many. So big."

"Would you like to go home?"

It nodded. "Please?"

"Of course."

I spoke the spell that would send it back--and would also, incidentally, kill it. Couldn't have it blabbing about soft prey to whatever else was on the other side of that gateway, could we? "Amateurs," I growled, slamming the portal shut.

Nick Mamatas (nihilistic_kid) and ellendatlow are editing an anthology called "Haunted Legends" for Tor Books. They're having an open reading period from July 15 to July 31.

Haunted Legends, to be published by Tor Books, seeks to reinvigorate the genre of "true" regional ghost stories by asking some of today's leading writers to riff on traditional tales from around the world. We don't just want you to retell an old ghost story, but to renovate it so that the story is dark and unsettling all over again.

Classic tales of the Jersey Devil, the spirits of the Tower of London, ghost lights, and phantom hitchhikers continue to capture the imagination. The Haunted Legends difference is that our contributors will tell the stories in ways they've never been told before.

We pay 6 cents a word, up to 8000 words.

Details here.

I am so going to write something for this. This is a chance to get published in a book with a some "name" authors. And it pays pro rates, too--a lot of anthologies pay peanuts.

Via specficmarkets, which I notice many of you on my flist are not members of, but you totally should be.

The National Space Society (NSS) and Hadley Rille Books announce the RETURN TO LUNA Short Story Contest.

WE ARE LOOKING FOR: Science Fiction stories that show the adventure of lunar settlement. We want to feel the romance of life there, the wonder of the lunar frontier, of its magnificent desolation. We prefer near future (50 to 150 years from now), realistic stories about human lunar settlement. We want good characterization and well-written, tight prose. We want to feel what it's like to live on the Moon.

Length: 2000-6000 words
Deadline: June 15, 2008
More Details: At link above. ^

Payment appears to be publication and a membership to the National Space Society, and they'll submit all the stories they publish to the relevant "Year's Best" antho's.

What are you waiting for? Go forth and write!

And just made me way more interested in writing that faery tale remix for CatsCurious Press.

jimhines has found out that a couple of movie companies are interested in looking at the book after it's published.

Now, that doesn't mean that they'll actually option it, or if they do option it that a movie will actually be made. But interest in the project, before it's even published? That's huge.

Now I have to find a fairy tale I can actually connect with...

Remember the CatsCurious Fairy Tale Contest? I've been thinking about doing an entry for that, especially since one of the panels at LTUE gave me fodder for doing so.

And then I read The Tinder Box, by Hans Christian Anderson. And, boy, I almost typed "Angerson" there, and how Freudian is that? Because, dude had issues, man. I remember liking this one as a kid, but now? Not so much.

Seriously, the first thing the protagonist in this story does is whack off a witch's head with a sword, which just seems harsh, since all she asked him to do was what he agreed to in the first place. And then the last thing he does is kill the judges, councillors, and the king and queen by "toss[ing] them many feet high in the air, so that they fell down and were dashed to pieces." And the princess is apparently not disturbed at all by this and goes off and marries this guy, and they live happily ever after. Even though he's got obvious anger issues and scary scary dogs. Pit bulls ain't got nothin' on these critters.

Yeah, I got nothin' funny for this one, folks. Creepy, maybe. Not funny. And this is a story for kids? Daaaaammmmn.

Coach's Midnight Diner is open for subs for their new anthology. They are a hardboiled genre anthology with a Christian slant, which I know will interest some on my flist. They're looking for unpublished short fiction under 10,000 words. Submissions tentatively close May 1, 2008, and they will pay $100 apiece for three Editor's Choice stories. The other (approximately) eighteen authors will get their names on Amazon, bragging rights, and a contributor's copy.

What are you waiting for? Go forth and write!

When I should be writing. I poke Ralan's to see if there are new markets for...stories I haven't written yet. Hah.

Dark Recesses is running another Deja Vu horror contest. Theme is zombies, 1000-2500 words, deadline is April 30. No entry fee, pays 5 cents a word to the winner.

Eclipse Two, an annual print anthology, is open for subs during the month of February. No theme, anything between 2500-10000 words, pays 6 cents a word.

I have more words in the Giant Bugs story. Making very slow progress. But it definitely helps that I have a final scene in mind, along with the last line. Yay.

Why, yes, mermaidrain, I'm looking at you.

CatsCurious Press is looking for 5,000-10,000 word retold fairy tales. The catch is that the entire thing must be in the protagonist's POV--and it has to be funny.

And then, Jim C. Hines will take that story, and write a counterpoint to it.

Not only that, but the winner gets paid pro rates. And you have ages and ages to write it; they're not taking subs until January, and will continue to take them through the end of March.