Finally, a week with more new submissions than resubmissions! Of course, two of these stories were written before this week. I just didn’t get around to the final edits until the other day.
Summary: 3 New, 2 Resubmission
“Blue Pearls” submitted to Crossed Genres.
“Alien Concept” submitted to Crossed Genres.
“Zombielock” submitted to Unidentified Funny Objects.
Resubmissions:
“Who Killed Zombie Robin?” resubmitted to Black Static Magazine.
“False Light” resubmitted to Lightspeed Magazine.
Weekends are always strange. There seems to be a lot more free time to write and yet often less gets done. There are errands to run and chores to do and other things to take care of that just don’t get done in the week. Before you know it, it’s night time and you’ve only finished one of two daily projects you wanted to tackle.
The rough draft for “Pearl Diving” has been finished at roughly 2,850 words, and the outline for “Putting a New Face on an Old Place” has been accomplished, although I think I’ll want to revisit that tomorrow before I get started on the rough draft of that. There are some soft parts of the plot that need firming up before I want to sit down and spend time on a rough draft. I don’t think the story will be all that long, either. Likely it’ll be right at 2,000 words or so, which is shorter than I originally anticipated.
Total Fiction for Month: 15,298
Total Salable for Month: 4,800
Total Fiction for Challenge Year: 65,521
Total Salable for Challenge Year: 15,744
“UnCivil Engineering” is finished! It has also hereby been renamed “Zombielock.” It came in at about 4,800 words. Edited it down quite a bit and got some critical feedback on it. It’s been fired off to Unidentified Funny Objects. Hopefully we’ll get some good results for it.
Also finished my final edits on both “Alien Concept” and “Blue Pearls.” Both have been sent off to Crossed Genres for their first-ever flash fiction themed issue. They’re accepting up to three stories, so I’ll have to cook up another between now and the end of the month. I don’t know that my flash fiction pieces are any good, but they’re a fun challenge. Developing a full beginning, middle, and end is a tough thing to do in 1,000 words or less.
Ok, on to today’s numbers:
Total Fiction for Month: 12,448
Total Salable for Month: 4,800
Total Fiction for Challenge Year: 62,671
Total Salable for Challenge Year: 15,744
I’m glad yesterday was as productive as it was, because today the ol’ day job interfered. Put in a twelve hour day and didn’t have a whole lot of time – or energy – to produce anything. I did start reading – and editing – “UnCivil Engineering.” It’s my hope to get it finished and out the door tomorrow at the latest.
Ok, on to today’s numbers:
Total Fiction for Month: 10,048
Total Salable for Month: 000
Total Fiction for Challenge Year: 60,271
Total Salable for Challenge Year: 10,944
In honor of both Women’s History Month and the Cranky Ladies of History project (And to promote their new anthology, Cranky Ladies of History), I present to you my Cranky Lady of History: Saint Joan of Arc (Or Jeanne d’Arc if you don’t like my anglicization of a French name).
Pretty much everyone knows the story of Joan on some level or another. She was taught in the history books I grew up studying, at least. So, I won’t go too much into her other than what the Catholic Church says about her:
“St. Joan of Arc is the patroness of soldiers and of France. On January 6, 1412, Joan of Arc was born to pious parents of the French peasant class, at the obscure village of Domremy, near the province of Lorraine. At a very early age, she heard voices: those of St. Michael, St. Catherine and St. Margaret.
At first the messages were personal and general. Then at last came the crowning order. In May, 1428, her voices “of St. Michael, St. Catherine, and St. Margaret” told Joan to go to the King of France and help him reconquer his kingdom. For at that time the English king was after the throne of France, and the Duke of Burgundy, the chief rival of the French king, was siding with him and gobbling up evermore French territory.
After overcoming opposition from churchmen and courtiers, the seventeen year old girl was given a small army with which she raised the siege of Orleans on May 8, 1429. She then enjoyed a series of spectacular military successes, during which the King was able to enter Rheims and be crowned with her at his side.”
I will leave the rest of her history out of it, but the link is here.
One thing you may not know is that Mark Twain wrote a book about the life of Joan of Arc. It was written in the latter days of his life and became a bit of an obsession for him. Originally it was published in Harper’s Magazine as a serial during 1895, with the book coming out in 1896. At Mark Twain’s request to Harper’s it was published anonymously because he feared it would be taken for a humorous piece, as Mark Twain was known for his satire.
He considered it his best work, and it was arguably the one he spent the most time working on. While his critics disagreed with him I consider it to be one of his best because it is so different from what he was known for. This was a book over 40 years in the making, when he first learned of Joan and became fascinated with her. I sometimes wonder if the eternal skeptic came up against an historical figure whose actions he could not explain in any rational way. Either Joan was completely crazy and was hearing voices, or she was touched by God. If the former, how do you explain her coming to be in command of an entire nation’s army? (All obligatory French jokes aside, the French military was quite powerful at this time. And, failing that, the egos of the nation’s military leaders were even more formidable, making them less likely to bend knee to a peasant girl of 17 years).
Anyway, the book is well worth reading. As is studying the life of Joan herself from non-fiction sources.
If every day could be like today… Well, we could still do better, but it would be much more amazing than some of my days have been of late.
“UnCivic Engineering” is done. The rough draft and the first revised rewrite, anyway. I put another 2,700 words in on the rough draft and came up with a total rough draft of around 4,200 words (Approximate. I typically write rough drafts by hand). The first revised rewrite was written in the afternoon from about 1:30 to 5:30, and it came out to around 5,063 words. That’s even longer than the rough draft was, but I know why. Even though both versions contained the same number of scenes, in the rough draft I was just dropping the characters into each scene without any kind of transition. One scene they’re running for their lives, the next they’re up on a roof wondering what to do, the next they’re on a different roof. This time the scenes flowed into one another. I think the added transitions are an improvement to the overall flow of the story, but a lot can still be cut out. That’s what tomorrow afternoon will be dedicated to. I want to go through the story scene by scene, then paragraph by paragraph, then line by line. The fat needs to be trimmed out and anything humorous needs to be maximized.
I’m pleased with the results for what they are, though. A rough draft that needed to be rewritten, and a rewrite that will need a bit of revising.
Ok, on to today’s numbers:
Total Fiction for Month: 9,263
Total Salable for Month: 000
Total Fiction for Challenge Year: 59,486
Total Salable for Challenge Year: 10,944
“UnCivil Engineering” is coming along nicely. Basically, it’s turning into a series of “Let’s Try This” Wily Coyote moments, where the main characters are doing different things to deal with the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse and fulfill their epic goal of cutting down on their commutes to work. If anyone here has worked in or around New York City or Atlanta or any other major metropolitan area knows how annoying the travel time can be, with or without the zombies (And some would argue that their fellow commuters might as well be zombies).
That could be where this story originally came from. I lived on Staten Island for a little over two years, first commuting into Manhattan and then commuting to Long Island. In both cases the travel time was at least two hours one-way. Traveling into Manhattan called for a train ride, a ferry ride, and a subway ride to get to my destination. Traveling to Long Island required an automobile. I’m not sure which was worse, but neither were fun. With the Manhattan commute I could read a plethora of books, which I was happy to do. My guilty pleasure during that time was the Gaunt’s Ghosts series of Warhammer 40K books by Dan Abnett. Excellent series if you’re looking for straight-up action with characters that eventually grow on you.
On the other hand, the Manhattan commute led to a lot of pushing and shoving as people fought each other to get on and off the train/ferry/subway. So, that could be annoying.
Anyway, on to today’s numbers. Still not to the daily goal I want, but the day job kept me longer than planned:
Total Fiction for Month: 1,500
Total Salable for Month: 000
Total Fiction for Challenge Year: 51,723
Total Salable for Challenge Year: 10,944
No, you are not reading the title wrong. This is the first entry in the Writing in Public Challenge, Month 2. I wasn’t feeling the best over the weekend, so I spent much of it resting up, brainstorming ideas without committing anything to paper, and getting some of my goals for the month organized. Today was the official start to the month.
Starting this month I’m breaking up fiction writing into two subcategories: short story writing and novel writing, which will be combined into the total amount for the month and year.
With all that said, today was pretty awful for actual fiction written. I outlined the revision for “Sublease,” but that was about it. I also spent quite a bit of time reading articles on writing by Rachel Aaron (Of “The Legend of Eli Monpress” fame) and watching a great interview of sci-fi/fantasy author Cat Rambo that . All of that is no excuse for the lack of words today. The only thing I can blame – other than general laziness – is my lack of writing over the weekend. It’s always a mistake when I go cold turkey for even a day or two. If writing is an addiction it’s about the easiest one to break. The day job can interfere with writing, but that’s still no excuse. The time is there. It just needs to be utilized.
Anyway, here are the lackluster numbers:
Total Fiction for Month: 000
Total Salable for Month: 000
Total Fiction for Challenge Year: 50,223
Total Salable for Challenge Year: 10,944
Writing Goals (Any titles listed are working titles and – thankfully – subject to change):
Reading Goals:
Here are this week’s totals. A couple of new stories finished, but mostly resubmissions:
Summary: 2 New, 5 Resubmissions
“Harmonious Bedlam” submitted to Crossed Genres.
“Unit Zero” submitted to Penumbra.
Resubmissions:
“Sand” resubmitted to Fablecroft’s “Insert Title Here” Anthology.
“A Necessary Sacrifice” resubmitted to Betwixt.
“Paper Planet” resubmitted to Asimov’s Science Fiction.
“The Heart of the Wendigo” resubmitted to Straeon.
“Who Killed Zombie Robin?” resubmitted to Nightmare Magazine.