It turns out I won Author of the Year in the Reader’s Choice Awards at Bards and Sages Quarterly for my short story, “Respect for the Dead”.

Link: Reader’s Choice Awards Winners

I am stunned.  To have an editor select my story as one of 12-15 out of the hundreds submitted for consideration is a great compliment, but then to have the readers select my or my story as their favorite out of the 50-60 or so accepted authors in a year is mind blowing, and immensely flattering.

Thank you all so much for your support.

Dark Moon Digest number 9 is now available with my story, “The Oubliette”.

Being the first story I’ve ever written, with the most extreme ranges of editorial feedback, I’m so pleased that it’s finally seen print.  It’s been such a great learning experience, and seeing it in black and white finally is the sign all that learning has paid off.

DMD9 can be purchased from Amazon at this link.

There have been months of nothingness on this blog, I know.  I’m going to try to change that.  First off, with a project update.

I have another short story due for publication with Dark Moon Press.  The story is called “The Oubliette” and should be in Dark Moon Digest #9, which will be released sometime in October.

I’m also working on an anthology project.  I attended the annual writers conference here in Calgary, called When Words Collide, and made a frightening but successful sales pitch to an amazing Canadian publisher.  Somehow I managed to convince him it’s an idea worth looking into, so I have until mid-november to come up with a written proposal.  This is going to include the premise of my pitch, an explanation of why this anthology has a place in the market, and a detailed list of authors who would be a good fit for the anthology.  If I can convince him I know what I’m talking about, then the real work will begin.

Already I’ve run into an interesting little lesson:  The more successful I am in finding authors who write this type of fiction, the less valid my hypothesis is for filling a hole in the market.  ”Luckily”, it’s been difficult.  After a few dozen hours of research I’ve only found half a dozen solid names.  I’m thinking I’ll find about that many more when I dig a little deeper.

Yes, I am being intentionally vague talking about this.  I think it’s just good practice not to get into too much detail about a project in its infancy.

After six months of waiting, which is actually not too bad in the publishing world, the first quarter publication of Bards and Sages Quarterly has been released, featuring my story “Respect for the Dead”.

Here’s the link:
https://www.createspace.com/3760968

Don’t miss this great investment opportunity by purchasing lots of copies now.  They’ll be mad collector’s items when I’m famous.  If you don’t, you’ll be kicking yourself when you see them on E-bay ten years from now for thousands of dollars.  I guarantee it.*

*Disclaimer – not a guarantee. 

I know I haven’t updated in a really long time.  As I’ve had some new user registrations on the site, I thought it was about time I did.

First off, I have another short story being published by Bards and Sages Quarterly soon.  It’s called “Respect for the Dead”, and will be available in their January Issue.

I’ve also started a new novel length project.  I’m about 20,000 words into my first draft.  It’s a bit smaller scope than The Casino of Master Rule is, having only three main characters, one secondary character and a handful of cameos.  It’s also a much more personal story, focusing primarily on one woman in an abusive relationship.

Despite the subject matter, I’m not using this as a springboard to push some political agenda.  I had some friends and family take hold of the idea and run off in ten different directions that I hadn’t intended, thinking it’s going to become a “soapbox” story, and basically clear an hour off their PVR for my impending appearance on Oprah.  Sorry to disappoint, I said, but the focus of the story is the woman in the situation, not the grand scope of the societal problem itself.  I think it’s going to be a really good story, just not what everyone else is expecting it’s going to be from what little I’ve told them.

Not to fear though, it will have vampires in it.  Sticking to my 90% rule, there will be a vampire character that interacts with the MC, and will be the cause of several changes in her life (including her eventual conversion) but it’s not going to be an “all vampire, all the time, supernatural gorefest”.  There will be a lot of sex and violence in this one, but the vampire element probably won’t even come into play until about a third of the way into the book.

And that’s it… I’m working, writing, constantly subbing out short stories to try to find them all homes, and hopefully I’ll have this new book finished in the next 5-6 months.

Now I know what insanity feels like.  I’ve been working on my query letter and synopsis for the past few weeks, trying to get absolutely every word perfect.  My 230 word query is there.  Took me about a full work week.  Now just have to somehow make the 1800 words synopsis just as awesome.  I expect I should have it finished some time by Christmas at this rate.  But by then it’ll be extra awesome. I might even go so far as to say it will be awesometacular.

I know I haven’t touched this blog in many months.  Been really busy with full time work, part time school, writing short stories and submitting short stories.

That last one’s worth mentioning because it’s so very time consuming.  You wouldn’t believe just how much time and effort goes into magazine research, tailoring my submission to the individual magazines requirements, writing cover letters, checking and double-checking everything before hitting the submit button, and of course staring at my e-mail while constantly hitting the refresh button, waiting for a response.  Some of them are amazingly quick to reply but the average is generally about 3-4 months. There’s some that hold on to submissions for as long as 9 months.  Yeah… I don’t bother submitting to those ones.

Some good news:  My short story, “The Oubliette”, has been picked up by Fortress Publishing and will be appearing in the second issue of their recently launched magazine called “The Realm Beyond”.  Issue #2 is set to be released this July Confluence in Pittsburgh.

For the next year I’m going to continue to concentrate on short stories to build up my publishing credentials. Once I have a few more acceptances for short stories, I’ll try again with another round of novel submissions.  I’m hoping that once I have a few small successes under my belt that people will be willing to take a closer look at longer works.

Merry Christmas everyone!  Belated though it may be…

I know I haven’t been all that active on here lately.  Been really busy with work, writing short stories and current submissions.  Mostly work.  The difficult part of the submissions process is in the research and preparation; then it’s a 2-8 month waiting game for them to get back to me.  A few markets are opening their doors again this January, so I’ll be plenty busy getting everything in order for them.

Christmas was good.  Spent some time with my family, had a lot of turkey and opened a bunch of presents.  I’ve wasted a good dozen hours playing a game I got for Christmas called Demon’s Souls, which is (without exaggeration) the most difficult RPG I’ve ever played.  I have never died in a video game this often.  I suppose I should be using this time to write but I’m on holiday for another day at least and would really like to make the most of my goofing off time.  I’ll get serious on wednesday.

Got a couple new short stories prepared, for which the early feedback/reviews have been pretty good, and two more in the works so I’ll have lots to submit in January.  It’s an uphill climb as I know I’m competing with so many hundreds of other talented writers but the more I do it, the better I get.  I’ve gotten most of the newbie submission mistakes out of the way now so hopefully things will be quicker and smoother in the future.

Have a happy new year everyone.

Working on something new now.  I’m expanding my short story, The Oubliette, into a novel length work.  I always felt that there was a lot more story to tell there and some of my readers agree, so that’s what I’m spending most of my time on these days.  I’m only about seven thousand words in but it’s coming along well.  I’m pleased with what I have so far.

Posting will likely slow in the next little while.  I only really make blog updates when I’m between projects and have nothing better to do.  This book will probably take me a good six months so there won’t be much here in the interim.

I had a friend point out to me that I’ve been spending a lot of time on agent research and queries, and not a lot of time on writing anything new.  Yes, it’s true but there is a method to my madness in this.

• I’m a bit of a uni-tasker – the opposite of a multi-tasker.  Maybe it’s a reflection on the training I’ve had in the IT world or maybe it’s just the way my brain works.  I like to pick one task at a time, focus all my efforts on it and when it’s as complete as it can possibly be, move on to the next one.  By investing a whole bunch of time and effort on agent research I’m compiling a list of quality, respectable agents that are interested in the genre I write and it’s a list I will always have.  Sure there will be updates that need to be made, as sometimes agents change houses or break off and start their own, but by putting in all this effort now I can save myself the effort in the future.  If this novel doesn’t happen to pan out then when it comes time to market the next one, I’ve already done all the work.  I will already know which agents are good and will have eliminated all the bad ones already.  I may just have to do a bit of spot research to find out which house they’re currently working at.
• In a lot of ways, it’s also a time management issue.  Agents generally take a long time to get through the flood of queries that ends up on their desks.  This is understandable as the influx of queries can sometimes be thousands per month for some agents.  By putting in all the effort I can now on agent research and getting queries out the door, I can spend the next few months writing new stuff while waiting for agents to get back to me on the queries I’ve already submitted.
• Last but not least, I really want to get this book published and the only way to make that happen is to query agents.  Sure I can write fifty manuscripts but if I’m not sending queries out the door then they’ll all just be collecting dust on a shelf somewhere.  Or taking up space in my hard drive in this case.  It’s like anything else in life – I can’t guarantee success but by not making the effort I can certainly guarantee failure.  By getting my short story and novel queries into the hands of people that might possibly be interested in my work and want to publish it, I’m moving forward down my chosen career path.

I expect I’ll be at this for another month or so.  There are still hundreds of agents out there I need to investigate and that takes a lot more time and effort than most people understand.  In the meantime, the ideas are still piling up in my brain.  Once I get all this administrative work done I’ll be back to pouring it all on the page again.

So after posting my query letter up on Absolute Write I realize it needs yet another overhaul.  It’s already been through probably about six revisions, all vastly different, but that’s the nature of the business.  Like the book that’s never really done until the day it sees print, the query letter is always going to be a work in progress until I sign a contract with an agent.

This doesn’t necessarily mean my previous query was bad or wrong, in fact it was good enough to generate some interest from one agent that I’m waiting to hear back from (fingers crossed!), but it can certainly always be better.  After half a dozen solid responses on AW I now have a lot to think about in terms of how I’m going to approach the next revision.

So for the next little while I’m not going to be sending out any more novel submission packets.  I dropped a bunch out the door yesterday and I still have a few floating around out there awaiting response.  The next week is going to be spent overhauling my query and sending out batches of short stories.  I’m still waiting on a response to my first short story but I have others ready to go that I should start shopping around as well.

Somewhere in the midst of all this research, market investigation, overhauling my marketing material and updating this blog I should also maybe think about writing something new as well.  I’ve been so busy trying to figure out how to properly sell the projects I’ve completed that there hasn’t been a lot of time left over to come up with any new ones.  I’m kind of a uni-tasker though; I don’t like to move on to something else until I feel like I’ve properly finished up my previous tasks.  Spending another week or so to really give these projects the attention they deserve will free me up later to be more creative.  I still have other stories to tell but I want to give my completed works the best chance they have of seeing print before I move on to something new.

So after spending all that time in heavy research mode, I followed it up by spending all weekend preparing submission packages.  I now have six envelopes containing a query and two page synopsis, and another eight larger envelopes that also contain 1, 3 or 5 sample chapters.  All varying depending on what the agents had listed on their individual pages of course.  I’m now off to the post office with my biggest mail drop yet.  I’m expecting it’ll be around $50, easy.

As a semi-side note:  I’ve read that only about 48% of authors included in their query what the submission guidelines told them to.   I’ve spent a lot of time in painstaking research and double checking my submissions to be sure they’re within the guidelines.  I know I can still be rejected for 100′s of other reasons but at the very least I’m one foot forward over 52% of the competition who can’t be bothered to put in the effort.

Spent the last four days diligently researching agents. Heavy duty research.  Seriously, I made my Internet Explorer cry.  Two sites I stumbled across that were a big help in my “background checks” were Preditors and Editors, and Absolute Write.

• Preditors and Editors – An alphabetical listing of pretty much every agent out there and has a few neat little point form notes about each agent and agency.  Things like what groups and associates they’re a member of, whether they’ve made any verified sales to legitimate royalty paying publishers and a few miscellaneous notes, usually based on feedback from other writers.  The notes are the key.  Agents that charge a fee, promote in house editing and other conflicts of interest, or have other dubious business practices have a great big “Not recommended” typed in red font next to them.  I was performing searches for agents that handled horror novels and cross checking them against P&E helped me avoid a number of submissions to places that were fraud agents.  The notes on the ones I have left were greatly encouraging.
• Absolute Write Discussion Boards (The Water Cooler) – I couldn’t believe the information available here.  I’ve had an account for a few months now and I’m still reading and learning new things.  There’s a whole section of the forums called “Bewares and Background Check” where members would share their experiences with specific agents.  There’s even feedback from some of the authors they represent, so not only do I get feedback from people trying to attract the attention of a particular agent but I also get the insiders look from authors already represented by some of them.  It’s a goldmine of information.  The members all seem like great people too.  I suppose I should get around to posting some time.  I think I’d fit in well there.

So now that my dozens of hours of painstaking research are complete I now have a minor case of carpel tunnel and whatever the computer version of tennis elbow is.  It was however time well spent.  I now have a good list of professional agents, any of which I’d be happy to do business with, that I’d like to submit my manuscript to; enough to keep me busy for a while.  Now it’s time to see if any of them bite.  One day I’ll hit upon that 1%.

Haven’t been updating much for a few weeks. Been a little slow creatively and now I’m looking for a job again. Got a lot done administratively over the last few weeks (lots of research and new submissions, plus a contest entry) but now it’s time to go find myself an income. Once the money’s flowing again I should be able to get back into the creative mindset. I’m always at my most productive with a cash incentive.

Meanwhile, I still have short stories and one completed novel to continue submitting. I’m also still waiting to hear back on previous submissions and from the agent that requested sample chapters. She looks like a great agent at a great agency, so I’m hoping that she’ll be interested in seeing more. Now it’s just a waiting game.

Haven’t been updating my site so much since Christmas.  Been working on polishing up my short stories and getting them out the door.  Plus there was some serious seasonal procrastination going on; family in town, turkey, presents, etc., but the ideas haven’t stopped flowing.  Should have another novel length project on the go pretty soon.

Got another couple short stories in the works.  A vampire tale of spurned love and a sci-fi story, oddly enough.  Never thought I’d write any science fiction but have some good ideas floating around in my head that I think need to be put to paper.

Haven’t heard a word back about my last short story submissions.  Going to be a while with Christmas and all.  Probably not even reading them for another few weeks.

Finished a short story called The Oubliette.  At some point it should be posted here for you to download.  It might not be too soon as I don’t think I should post it publicly and until it’s been sent off to a few magazines for submission.  Once it’s made the magazine rounds, then I’ll post it freely on my site.

Have two more short story ideas in the works that I’m going to get onto paper as soon as I can, then I’m back to work on my second novel.  It’s been sitting at a prologue and one chapter for months.  Accursed day job getting in the way of creativity.

Now that the site is (mostly) complete I’m going to go back to working on some actual fiction projects.  While I’d like to write another novel it’s probably in my best interests right now to focus on some of my short story ideas as it’ll be far easier to get my novels published if I can build a resume of the short stories I’ve sold first.  I have a couple short works planned out in my head, both vampire stories, that I think have a lot of potential.