As you may or shortly will know, I have resumed work on The Victorius Revolution, the novella-turned-novel I started last summer for the Clarion Write-a-thon.  It’s been really quite liberating, for a lot of different reasons.  First of all, I had already charted some of the plot as backstory to a different novel, and I had spent a little time with the protagonist in earlier drafts of that novel, so I wasn’t starting from scratch with all that.  Second, the story itself marks a return to a very comfortable form for me, a sort of thinking man’s action movie, after a couple of years of experimenting with different voices and genres and formats, all of which was very helpful in terms of growing as a writer but was also very hard, as I was doing things that come less naturally to me than some other things.  Third, and perhaps most important, when I started the project I gave myself license to relax and have fun with it and really just cut loose, to write the thing in my own voice, if that makes any sense.

Best of all, I’m pleased with the results.  And I’ve decided to take the plunge and self-release it when it’s finished.

Nobody really knows what’s up with the future of publishing.  I’ve done a fair bit of reading and thinking about it (Kristine Katherine Rusch in particular has been extremely helpful), and while I’m not above going the traditional publishing route should that avenue offer itself, I think the distribution tools that are available to writers nowadays are sufficiently game-changing that it’s worth it to roll the dice and self-release as an indie author.

So here’s my plan: Continue reading “My Indie Writer Business Plan” →

I have always been a rebellious sort, and in the absence of an external authority against whom to rebel, I will often rebel against myself, and start not wanting to do the things I know that I should be doing, that I want to be doing, even, but I’m just so bloody cussed sometimes that I can’t help it.  Take, for instance, the novel I have recently resumed writing, The Victorius Revolution. Continue reading “Writing, Revising, Rebelling” →

I started the original draft of Cowboys and Indians almost a year and a half ago, in December of 2010.  I remember the date because I had just written the first 60k words of Company Girl for NaNoWriMo and I needed to take a break before I went back and finished it (which I did; it is currently trunked and awaiting a rewrite).  It’s either a rewrite or a sequel to one of the first short stories I ever wrote, called The Ghost Burn, which was one of my application stories for the Clarion Writers’ Workshop.

Pardon me.  I just realized that it’s been almost exactly two years since those frenzied weeks and had a small headsplosion at all the things that have happened since.  I’ll be back in a moment.

… Continue reading “Cowboys and Indians” →

Well, Turing Test is coming up on 25000 words, and though the end is in sight it’s still a few thousand words away. Which leaves me with a long novella that’s still well short of even the most liberal interpretation of the word “novel.”

Which is alright, because I’ve come to realize something in the last few days.  Turing Test is probably not going to be a standalone story.

There are a few reasons. Continue reading “Narrative Crept” →

So for the last six weeks or so I’ve been working on a rewrite for a novelette I wrote at the beginning of the summer, another in a series of shorter works I’ve been breaking off of GoATDaD and the Army of Monkeys, the massive narrative tapestry and hydra-headed monster I’ve been wrestling with off and on ever since I decided to become serious about being a writer.  The original version was about 9000 words long, and was fairy well-received when I workshopped it with my crit group (Horrific Miscue Seattle, as lovely and talented a collection of spec-fictionating badasses as one might ever hope to work with).

“You could probably sell this if you already had a name,” somebody said, which I thought was pretty funny, and a really nice compliment. Continue reading “Narrative Creep” →