Tag: publishing

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Various things from Minicon weekend

First, I am pleased to say that my essay, “The Apple and the Castle,” will be appearing as one of the supplemental materials in the book, The Reader: The War for the Oaks. Get yours through the Kickstarter if you’re interested in gorgeous photos or me talking about what makes for a lasting fantasy classic, especially in the handling of setting.

Other good stuff happened besides me selling an essay. I was on a map panel that went pretty well, I thought, despite everyone on the panel being pro-map. (Panels often have a little extra frisson if the panelists disagree a bit more.) I want to particularly point out that while three of us writer panelists were traditionally published at one length or another, the two who were self-published-only were models of how self-published authors should conduct themselves on convention panels. They confined their remarks about their own books to the relevant and interesting, and they talked about other people’s work in on-topic ways, just as a good panelist ought. Later in the convention I encountered both of them, and one didn’t try to sell his book to me at all, while the other did–at a launch party I attended of my own free will, knowing that it was a launch party. Going to a launch party expecting someone not to be trying to talk up their book would just be dumb; that’s what they’re for. So as a result, I came away from it with warm positive feelings about both self-published authors, while I have no idea about the contents of their books, and I’m going to link them both here: Ozgur Sahin and Blake Hausladen. Well done, guys; that’s how to do it right. If this is what the rise of the self-published author brings programming at future cons, it’s going to be awesome. (I expect that this is not actually the case and self-published authors are as much a mixed bag as traditionally published authors. Ah well; at least I had a good panel.)

The middle-grade panel was less focused than the map panel, but several good names got discussed–Mer, everybody likes you–and our surprise last panelist got through her first panel ever without too much difficulty. (She was 14. First panels ever are hard.)

Alec’s and my reading went beautifully–not a huge crowd, but not a tiny one either, especially given that it was scheduled over the dinner hour. Timprov was a hero of the revolution in bringing us hot soup so that we were fortified before the reading.

A question came up in conversation at the book launch party, and I wanted to address it here, and that was: why don’t I post reviews of the books I get sent for review but do not finish? The dual entity known as James S. A. Corey was on Twitter just yesterday saying, “Writers: if people are bashing your work online, rejoice. It means someone has noticed it exists,” and I think that was the basic premise of the writer asking why I don’t post negative reviews: that negative press is still better for the smaller writer than no press. This is probably true. An individual post saying, “I stopped reading this on page one due to clunky prose,” or, “Rape scene chapter one, quit reading,” would still bring at least some attention to the book, and not everybody has the same taste in prose or the same distaste for chapter one rape scenes that I do.

However. I do not get paid for my reviews. My time is valuable, and my time is my own. Any time that I spend on writing reviews is my choice, and I don’t choose to spend that on books that didn’t hold my attention to the end. I am not long on time and energy. I would rather spend that time on my own writing, or on reading something else, or on staring at the birch tree outside my office window and willing the leaves on it to bud out, or on making my godson brownies, or…yeah. Things. “How long could it take?” Oh trust me. I bounce off a lot of books. It could take quite some time. Adding in discussion with people in the comments section, especially if those people want to try to talk me into reading a little further? It could really take quite some time.

Reviewers are good for writers, but reviewers do not exist to be good for writers. Reviewers are good for readers, but reviewers do not even exist to be good for readers. It is awfully nice that people send me free books to review. I am grateful. But what they are buying with the free book is the chance at my attention, and if they can’t hold my attention, they don’t get my time in the form of my reading or in the form of my review. Even if it would be useful to someone else.

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Query letters: a brief example

Someone who is fairly new to submitting short stories has asked me about querying when they are overdue, and I actually know something about it, so I figured I would answer where others can see. Querying can be stressful for writers but shouldn’t be. If you aren’t obstreperous about it, editors should not get mad at you, and if they do, it’s not your fault. So:

1. Look into their average response times. This information is available online. Wait a bit longer than their average before you query. So if you’re looking at a publication with a week-long response time, it’s okay to query at three weeks, but if you’ve submitted somewhere that routinely takes nine months to get around to responding to short stories, don’t query until a year or more. Don’t query at their average. Average means average. It means that some things take a shorter time and some things take longer. If you query at exactly their stated response times, they will roll their eyes and be mildly annoyed. If they say, “Please do not query before [stated time frame],” go ahead and query at the stated time frame; they said it, they should mean it.

(I probably wait too long to query, mostly, so don’t ask me exactly how long. It’s not a science. If you think a market takes too long to answer, you don’t have to submit there in the first place. On the other hand, if they’re taking much longer to reply to you than they do in general, they probably know that and should not get grumpy with you for a polite query.)

2. Be brief, neutral, and to the point. Use the salutation you’d usually use in addressing the editor or editors, whether that’s “Dear Editors” or “Dear Dr. Chao” or “Hey Chris.” Here’s the basic form I use:

I’m writing to check on the status of my short story, “This Is Awesome And You Should Buy It.” My records show that I submitted it on 1/2/13[, and your system gave it the tracking number #123ABC]. Is it still under consideration? Thanks. Best, Marissa Lingen

Obviously, if they don’t give tracking numbers or if you didn’t save that information, leave that part out. If you don’t keep precise records, I suppose you could say, “I submitted it in January of ’13,” but the more information you can give them about what the heck this story is, the better chance they have of being able to track down whether they responded or are still thinking about it.

Earlier in my career I felt like I should add all sorts of hedging stuff about whether it had maybe gotten lost in the ether, you know, these things happen, I totally understand, or, like, anything that might have happened like that…yeah. No. You don’t have to do that. Emails do go awry, and so do postal letters. That’s what you’re trying to find out. They know that. Just ask.

3. Try not to read too much into a long response time. I know. Trust me, I know. If they always answer within a week, and it’s been a month…or if there’s a submission tracker that shows that everything around your story has gotten an answer and yours hasn’t…it’s so easy to spin fantasies about how the editor has fallen in love and is just trying to find space in the budget. And sometimes that’s true! And sometimes the editor just had time to read the twelve 3000 word stories that came in around yours in odd gaps of time and did not have enough time to read your 6000 word story. Or yours is the first in a long run of stories they are not getting to. Or else they were absolutely sure they hit send on that rejection letter they wrote, and instead they hit save. Or they are trying to figure out exactly how to phrase their very constructive encouraging rejection letter, because they really want to be constructive and encouraging to a promising young writer, which is important, but, from the standpoint of you, the promising young writer, not nearly so important as the acceptance letter, contract, check, fame, glory, and impending awards ceremonies. Editors take the time they will take. The query is just there to make sure they’re still taking it. Breathe. Be matter-of-fact. Send it.

4. Once they answer, a brief thanks is fine, but you don’t have to get into a long discussion unless the answer is, “Yes, we’re buying this, and here are the edits we want.” “We show that we rejected that two months ago,” should get, “Okay, thanks for letting me know,” or “Okay, thanks for your attention.” Similarly, “Yes, that’s still under consideration,” can get a reply of, “Okay, thanks,” or “Glad to hear it, thanks.” Longer replies give you more of a chance to trip over your own feet. Do not get tempted by them. If the editor says something specific such as, “Yes, my mother was attacked by a herd of rabid moose, and I’ve fallen behind while I help her convalesce,” resist the urge to say, “Moose bites can be pretty nasty, you know,” as every nerd the editor knows will have said it, and in this field that will be a lot of nerds. But it’s fine to say, “I hope she’s back to full strength soon. Thanks for letting me know.” But again, keep it brief, keep it professional.

If the editor is a personal friend and you already know that their mother was attacked by a herd of rabid moose–or if they have been quite open about it on Twitter and you follow them–then wait a little longer before querying about your story. On the other hand, it is still entirely permissible to query about your story. You are still a professional, and so are they, and one of the hazards of the modern internet is letting too much of the window on each other’s personal lives interfere with work stuff. Are they still working as an editor of their magazine? Then query. Politely, briefly, professionally–waiting a bit longer than you otherwise would, to account for the moose attack–but query. The bit above, about how you should address the editor as you otherwise would, can modify your query letter as much as it otherwise would. If you would address it “Dear Editors” or “Dear Dr. Chao,” you should probably not write, “How’s your mom? I hope they hunted down the last of the moose herd, those foaming drooling bastards.” If you’d usually write “Hey Chris,” you can use your own judgment about making things more casual, but if you’re not close with the editor in question, just stick to the business basics.

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Writing Process Blog Tour

My dear friend Michael Merriam asked me to take part in a Writing Process Blog Tour. He answered these questions about process last week, and next week some more of my friends will answer them.

1) What am I working on?

When I told Michael about a week, week and a half, ago that I’d answer these questions, I thought, boy, that’ll be an interesting one, I can’t wait to read the answer and find out! At the moment, I’m worldbuilding and plot-building like crazy on several novel projects, waiting to see which one shakes out to be the next novel I write. Probably the strongest contender at the moment is Wielding the Stars, which has a giant jeweled magical orrery and riots and rebellion and fire and flood and…actually not flood I think. Hmm. We may have to go back to the flood later. (This is not to be confused with going back to the Flood later.) It also has load-bearing mythic bears, which are sort of getting to be a thing for me. But I could do any of a number of other things. That number might be five. Unless it’s not. Really, it’s quite a lot of possible projects, and the thing is, the one that jumps out and grabs me might not even exist yet. Novels are like that.

The thing I’m actually working on in any focused way is a short story called “Drifting Like Leaves, Falling Like Acorns,” which has some vets with PTSD who have been given little genetically engineered soothing psychoactive companion frogs. It also has quite a lot of rain and jurisdictional disputes. It is science fiction unless it is fantasy. This is a problem because my filing system for unsold stories calls for them to be put in folders labeled “SF” or “Fantasy,” so I do, but the postnuclear fantasy series I just guess. I could be wrong. I’m just the author, you don’t have to listen to me.

2) How does my work differ from others of its genre?

Mine has a giant jeweled magical orrery. And genetically engineered psychoactive soothing companion frogs. Like that. Stuff.

Also I have more grandparents in my work than most people. I have more old people in general.

When asked to talk about theme or political concerns, I tend to curl up in a ball and emit disgruntled noises, so let’s focus on the frogs, shall we?

3) Why do I write what I do?

Because if I sing it instead, my voice gets tired, and I get squeamish about things under my fingernails, so sculpture is right out.

Because I have trained my brain to poke at things, and then I feed it all kinds of input, and this is what comes out. I was kidding above with the singing, except not entirely kidding, because what happens when I have bits of story that I don’t get to write down is that I sort of hum them under my breath, I sort of live with them and hum them, and they nag at me, and so I write them down. There is a thing about habit-formation and that is that once you have formed the habit, that is the habit you get.

Also this is the stuff I like. I don’t get to write all the stuff I like, because I like quite a lot of stuff, as you will notice if you read my book posts. But honestly I like this kind of stuff quite a bit. It makes me happy. I think it is good for me to think around corners about things, and I think it is good for other people too, but I don’t write medicine, I write things I like.

4) How does your writing process work?

As far as other people are concerned, the interesting part of this answer seems to be “non-sequentially.” I get bits and pieces of scene and start writing down the bits I know. I accrete more and more bits I know until there is enough to make a whole story of whatever length. I work from the “incredible disappearing outline” theory, deleting the bits of notes as I write the actual scenes that correspond to them. This is the same for long and short and very very short.

Oh, and there’s the bit in the middle of long things where I get lost and have to spread it all out and think about it a great deal and realize I forgot to plan something crucial when I was doing all the planning, so then I have to figure that out. It would be nice if this was not actually part of the process every time, but sometimes a bit of realism is called for in describing one’s process.

Tune in next week to hear from the following interesting people on their own blogs:

Alec Austin is a game designer in the San Francisco Bay Area. He’s worked as a nuclear reactor operator and media researcher, and has published a D&D adventure and articles in addition to over a dozen pieces of short fiction. His most recent publication, written with Marissa Lingen, is “The Young Necromancer’s Guide to Re-Capitation” in On Spec, by which you can discern that his work is uplifting and full of good cheer. He’s currently working on a science fiction novel. He can be found at alecaustin.livejournal.com.

Mary Alexandra Agner writes of dead women, telescopes, and secrets. Her latest book of poetry is The Scientific Method; her stories appear in Oomph and the Journal of Unlikely Cryptography. She makes her home halfway up Spring Hill. She can be found online at http://www.pantoum.org.

Merrie Haskell says of herself: “I write for all ages. My first book, THE PRINCESS CURSE, was a Junior Library Guild Selection in 2011, and was nominated for a Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Children’s Literature in 2013. My second MG novel, HANDBOOK FOR DRAGON SLAYERS, won the Schneider Family Book Award (Middle Grades) in 2014. THE CASTLE BEHIND THORNS, also a Junior Library Guild Selection, comes out in June 2014. My short fiction for adults has appeared in NATURE, ASIMOV’S and so forth.” She can be found at www.merriehaskell.com.

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The Stuff We Don’t Do

Here is my latest Nature (Physics) Futures short, The Stuff We Don’t Do. It’s also available as a podcast. Go, read or listen, enjoy.

I’m pretty proud of this one. My inner angry 16-year-old is right about things sometimes. Thanks to Timprov for being the most local and immediate of the three positive inspirations for this story. Bonus points to anyone who can spot the other two–or, for that matter, the most notable of the negative inspirations.

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The Glorkian Warrior Delivers a Pizza, by James Kochalka (and a few other things)

Review copy provided by First Second Books.

You know how I said that Zita the Spacegirl could be enjoyed by all ages? The Glorkian Warrior…is not so much all ages humor. If you think peanut butter-clam pizza is funny, then this will probably be about your speed. It is silly, it is extremely silly, it is sillier than that. It has a Super Backpack who is the voice of reason–the Super Backpack Super-Ego, if you will. It is entirely possible that my seven-year-old goddaughter will be too mature for this book. I feel sure that it has an audience, because this kind of alien goofy banana joke humor always has an audience, but it’s the kind of audience that likes Gonk-goes-bonk jokes.

Ah, but! If you are looking for something for a small relative who has that sort of sense of humor, and you don’t want it to be toilet humor, this is not generally scatalogical. It’s very silly, and it’s sometimes gross, but the places where it’s gross are neither sexual nor scatalogical, so you can go forward with it, confident that the parent will not kill you for teaching the kid new poop jokes.

I read this very short graphic novel in something like ten minutes flat after sending my agent the latest draft of my latest novel and doing the page proofs for my latest Analog story with my latest writing Alec–wait, no, same Alec I’ve always written with. I just got caught up in all the latests. I also read my latest (arrrrgh! but it’s a good latest along with all the other good latests in this paragraph) story in the latest (I CANNOT STOP) issue of On Spec, also collaborative with Alec. This one is “The Young Necromancer’s Guide to Re-Capitation,” and we’re pretty pleased. You can get it from the nice folks at On Spec, I expect.

Anyway, after all those latests, I am feeling a bit like a puppet with cut strings, so a very silly, very short graphic novel was much more what I was up for than the large and heavy biography I was otherwise in the middle of reading. More when I can. Stay warm; that’s my big goal tonight.

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“I’m so mad, I’m not going to sing my aria!”

(Supernerd points to those who get that joke.)

My story The Suitcase Aria is up at Strange Horizons! Go, read, enjoy! There is also a podcast that I will confess I have not listened to, because I am terrible at listening to podcasts and I have not been well enough to put energy into extra things like, um, listening to podcasts, so please tell me how it is, those of you who are good at podcasts.

The things I find strangest in this story, the dual-purpose canals under the Berlin Opera House, are absolutely true. I made up several other bits, but that was not me, that was history.

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first of the year

Yesterday Alec and I sold our short story, “Calm,” to Analog.

I am always relieved when I make my first sale of the year, even though I know that the turning of the year is entirely arbitrary. Still, just as my grade school friends and I would greet each other melodramatically in January (“I haven’t seen you all year!”), I have a bit of “I haven’t sold a story all year!” until I do. So now I have! Onwards.

(Also Alec and I have such fun writing these things together that it’s always nice when someone else enjoys them too.)

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(and other stories)

Tired Tapir Press has now put out an ebook of my short stories for children: Dragon Brother. Most of the stories in it have been published in various children’s magazines in the genre. There are a dozen ten stories in it. (That’s what I get for trying to go from memory late in the evening.) My adult stories are coming soon from Tired Tapir, but there are more of them, so they will take a bit longer.

I have lots of stories, so we decided to go with the collection model rather than the individual story model. I have no idea what people will think of it, but honestly, short stories do not get you fame and fortune regardless of which model you’re using, so–stories, I have ’em, you can have ’em too.

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End of year state of the Mris: the writing version

2013: it was full of stuff. Good stuff, it turns out. Quite a bit of good stuff. Go team.

In the “clear signs of progress” category, I passed my hundredth short story sale mark, which was cool and weird. I cannot really make reflexive Minnesotan noises about how really it’s not so many, because it is: so many. So. Major thing there. Also in the same category, I now have an agent, and she is awesome, and I am pleased and hopeful about what this means for the future.

I sold nine stories this year. I have four stories sold and still yet to come out (one from 2012, the rest from this year). New stories that came out this year included:
“The Radioactive Etiquette Book” in Analog
“Armistice Day” in Beneath Ceaseless Skies
“Milk Run” in Analog (co-written with Alec Austin)
“The Troll (A Tale Told Collectively)” in Daily SF
“On the Weaponization of Flora and Fauna” in BCS
“Ask Citizen Etiquette” in Asimov’s (technically a 2014 publication date)
“The Ministry of Changes” in Tor.com
“Things We Have in the House for No Reason” in Analog
“Unsolved Logical Problems in Time Travel (Spring Semester)” in Nature

There were also some lovely reprints, in Twenty-First Century Science Fiction and Year’s Best SF and Fantasy 2013 and anthologies of Clarkesworld and Daily SF sales from previous years.

And the writing. I really hit my stride on new stuff, writing twenty stories, one novel, and serious parts of other novels and stories. All the short stories are revised, and I have a plan for revising the novel. In addition to that, I’m kind of hoping to hit the new project hard once I’ve done the revisions. It’s pretty clear after twice going through it that when I have to be on the vertigo meds, I can still write–I can still write things people like, even–even including myself–but it’s harder. So there’s a balance to find (sorry, had to) between keeping myself safe and getting good work done. Ideally I’ll be able to get enough momentum on the novel to carry me through the last horrible phase before going on the meds and the first horrible phase on them. We’ll see. If not, I will dig my heels in and just make it work. I’ve done it before and can do it again. But gosh, these last six months when I didn’t have to dig my heels in and could just write happily have sure been nice. Hoping to use it as a running start on next year, because this year has been awfully good.