Writing

Writ­ing about writing.

Moving Home

Posted on by Patrick

Since it did­n’t get accept­ed for the AE Sci­ence Fic­tion micro chal­lenge, I’m revamp­ing my short sto­ry “Mov­ing Home”, expand­ing it a bit, and plan­ning to sub­mit it to some mar­kets when it’s polished.

The “micro” in micro fic­tion was def­i­nite­ly a chal­lenge; the sto­ry had to be less than 200 words, includ­ing the title.  When I fin­ished the first draft, it was about 300 words, which meant I had to trim it by a third.

If I’d been smart, I’d have saved the orig­i­nal 300-word ver­sion, but I just start­ed to hack and slash, remov­ing colour and com­bin­ing thoughts.  It was a good exer­cise — it forced me to choose my words very wise­ly — but I think I had a bet­ter sto­ry before the slicing.

Now, though — now I’m try­ing to recov­er what I sub­tract­ed, and it’s not there any­more. Well, it is, but it’s not exact­ly the same.  I’m chas­ing les mots justes and they’re elud­ing me.

Just one of those things, I guess. At least, with­out the 200-word lim­it, I can tell the full sto­ry. I’m not sure how long it’ll end up; I guess I’ll know that when I’m done.

 

Some sage writing advice

Posted on by Patrick

…from none oth­er than Neil Gaiman.

You being lazy and unmo­ti­vat­ed and not writ­ing allows anoth­er writer, who does sit down and write, to get pub­lished in your place. Mag­a­zines and pub­lish­ers only have so many pages, so many annu­al pub­lish­ing spots. You’re let­ting some­one else who wants to do the work get published.

So very true.  Write faster, Johan­neson.

Via Neil Gaiman’s Tum­blr site. (Tum­blog? Tum­blma­ba? Twit­terkiller? Nev­er sure what to call those things…)

“Exit Interview” reviewed

Posted on by Patrick

A web­site called Dia­bol­i­cal Plots has tak­en it upon them­selves to review pret­ty much any­thing and every­thing that Dai­ly Sci­ence Fic­tion pub­lish­es.  In the last week or so, they got to the August 2011 sto­ries, which include my short sto­ry, “Exit Inter­view”.

In short: they liked it.

When I was asked to review “Exit Inter­view” by Patrick Johan­neson (debut 8/3 and reviewed by Anony­mous), I was pleased as I clear­ly remem­bered read­ing it the day it arrived in my inbox–always a good sign. I enjoyed it as much read­ing it a sec­ond time.
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They also point­ed out that no less a lumi­nary than Mike Resnick — Mike Resnick! — has sold a sto­ry to Dai­ly SF. That’s some esteemed com­pa­ny to be in, methinks. (For those not in the know — Mike Resnick has been nom­i­nat­ed for more Hugo Awards than any oth­er sci­ence fic­tion writer.  Includ­ing Grand­mas­ters like Asi­mov, Clarke, and Heinlein.)

So.  How’s your day been?

They liked it

Posted on by Patrick

That went well.
As they say, “That went well.”  The Face­book com­ments for my sto­ry “Exit Inter­view” were all very pos­i­tive. (Whew.)

You can click the lit­tle wee screen­shot to see ’em, if you want.

On tap for tonight: Write Club. (Fol­lowed up, almost cer­tain­ly, by a farewell to a cou­ple of our writ­ers, who are going to Guelph* and Chi­na, respectively.)

____
* I think it’s Guelph, anyways.

Íslendingadagurinn

Posted on by Patrick

This week­end my wife and I went up to Gim­li with my moth­er for the 122nd annu­al Ice­landic Fes­ti­val.  I had­n’t been to the fes­ti­val in many years — it’s on a long week­end in sum­mer­time, so it tends to attract wed­dings, fam­i­ly reunions, and oth­er events — but this year Mom called us up about a week and a half before the week­end and said, “Hey, you want to go?”

We said “Sure!”

Con­tin­ue read­ing “Íslendin­gadagurinn” →

Coming Soon

Posted on by Patrick

If you want to have my short sto­ry “Exit Inter­view” emailed direct to your inbox, you’ll need to sign up for Dai­ly Sci­ence Fic­tion, and soon.  My sto­ry’s com­ing in ear­ly August.

(If you don’t sign up, all is not lost; sto­ries show up on their site about a week lat­er, and I will for sure post a link to it here, and on Face­book, and on Twit­ter, and prob­a­bly Google+ …)