3 posts tagged “"beth"”
In the past ten days or thereabouts I have:
- Sent A SHADE OF YELLOW to Clarkesworld Magazine.
- Sent EMPIRES AND GLASS to the Writers of the Future Contest. I think it's a better story than STATUES,
so hopefully it'll net a better result. What's scary is that by
the time I hear back from them, I will have finished university.
o.O
- For a little while now I've had the vague idea of writing a story
about Samhain/Halloween, where the holiday is a character, but hadn't
quite figured out how to tell it. Naturally, it was when I went
to Starbucks with the intention of getting some uni work done that the
story finally slapped me in the face and demanded to be written.
That was about a week ago. I've since polished it up and sent it
away to Fantasy Magazine. It's only a little story, just over
1,000 words, and is called CHICA, LET ME TELL YOU A STORY.
Yeah, that title could probably be better, but when you read it and
then read the story it does make sense. I think. Also I
couldn't think of anything better.
What particularly interested me, when I was skimming through wikipedia for a history of the holiday, was the idea of Samhain/Halloween as a door for nasty dead/fey creatures to step through, and that became a core part of the story and the character. Trying to write about a person who is also a door was... interesting, but I think it worked. And I am definitely returning to this characters-as-doors thing in the future.
- I found out about 10 days ago that the deadline for Shimmer
magazine's pirate-themed issue had been extended from January 31st to
Februrary 28th. As I hadn't had time by the end of January to
write a story for it, I was rather happy at this news -- and last night
finished the short story for it, ROSEILDA'S TALE.
I'm hoping to submit it by the end of the week, or thereabouts.
It fits into the same world as two of my other short stories, A SHADE OF YELLOW and A FAY OF STEAM. I have a vague idea that I'll collect them all into a novella-length thing at some point.
- The novella-without-a-proper-name, "beth", is coming along in the
background. I haven't written much for it in a few days; the next
part needs a little more time to germinate in my head, I think.
At any rate, it's currently over 10,000 words, and there's potentially
a lot more to go. Once I've figured out the Bone Queen's tale,
that is; the rest of the story will hinge on that.
While basking in the glow of my own writing-productivity makes me feel good, it doesn't really do
much for those source-analyses that need to be done for Thursday's
class. Must stop procrastinating one of these days. (as if)
I am loving this story.
I've stopped for the night now, as I've hit a less-interesting point (traversing the rest of the desert where nowt happens, and reaching Fall) that I'm too tired now to figure out how to tell, but the ideas are still swirling in the back of my sleepy mind.
Bizarre-o happenings in China are story-licious. I may work that into "beth", or make it something else. We'll see.
Added: Oh yes, forgot to mention. I got my stitches out today, from my little surgery wounds, and some of stitches had grown into my skin. Which was so much fun when the nurse had to remove them. It was like a joke about changing lightbulbs, only different - How many nurses does it take to remove one of Alex's stiches? 3! Stupid knot had disappeared into my skin, and had to be tugged out with a needle. And two of the other stitches had cut into my skin, leaving two thin lines of scab across the surgery wound.
Actually it hurt less than it sounds - stung, really, and only once badly enough to have me crying out. One of the nurses was distracting me by talking about uni stuff. She was really sweet - called me "Poor darling" and then got really embarrassed at having called me that.
And now I have even more scabs to not pick. *twitch* This ain't easy, y'know.
My wiki-fu has unearthed books about young Captain Jack Sparrow. Only the fact that they're young adult, which generally is too simplistic and infodumpy in style for my taste, is putting me off ordering them. Oh, and not forgetting that my book shelf is already full of novels I need to read and I have several things already lined up for my next amazon.co.uk order. *is so not a book-buying addict*
Finished the second chapter of my "beth" story, posted here under friends-lock. At the moment I'm aiming to get it to 30,000 words, and I have enough vague ideas floating round my head about the story that I think I'll manage it. What I'll do with it then... not entirely sure. Oh well! I've having fun writing it; that's the important thing right now.