• Writing Resources

    2014 Year in Review

    I sold three stories this year. (The first two can be read online, for free, if you are so inclined.) “Some We Eat and Some We Keep” to Robot and Raygun “Her Robot Babies” to Perihelion “Red Means Go” to On Spec Magazine (forthcoming) Recently I also learned that my short story ‘Digital Rights’, which was published several years ago after winning the Writers of the Future contest, now has an audio version courtesy of StarShipSofa! You can listen here (the story is towards the end of the podcast). Word Count I set a goal to write 130 000 words in 2014 (which was quite low compared to past years…

  • Writing Resources

    Another Novel Finished

    Yesterday I completed the first draft for my latest novel. No title exists yet so I’ve just been calling it the ‘Blue Bay’ novel to this point. At 158 000 words, I believe this is my longest first draft (aside from another novel that I have since discarded). I’ve been writing the novel since August of this year, at least a few hundred words every day, but the planning for it started a couple years ago. Overall I’m pleased but I’ve definitely noticed major errors, while writing, that will need to be addressed before I can begin the editing phase. (I generally do not make corrections while writing the first…

  • My Life

    Rewards and Incentives…

    When I left BioWare, several years ago, I thought my time best spent pursuing a writing career and so most of my “deliverables” were writing related. Each year end I planned what projects I wanted to work on over the course of the next year. For the most part I exceeded my productivity goals. I wrote dozens of stories and several novels. But I did not hit my milestones however. Time and again I failed to sell the number of stories I needed to. After winning a place in the Writers of the Future Contest I became even more aggressive with the milestones I wanted to achieve but after the…

  • The Lazy Designer

    Designer Checklists

    Ages ago I bought a book called “The Writer’s Book of Checklists” by Scott Edelstein. This was a reference manual for aspiring writers, with everything they needed to know summarized in handy checklists. For whatever reason the checklist format has always been appealing to me. As part of my efforts to create secondary, bonus content to encourage readers to consider purchasing the Lazy Designer directly from me, I decided it would be [fun|exciting|worthwhile] to create my own set of checklists for the Lazy Designer. At the end of this point is the first third of the list. I’ll add the others in later posts. If you would like the full…

  • Writing Resources

    Contributor Copies

    This was suppose to go up a couple days ago, but I was busy, so here you go. One of the cooler moments in writing is when you receive a contributor copy. Given that much of what I sell now is sold to online magazines, I’m not getting quite so many print copies as I once did, but last week I received my copy of Oomph, a superhero anthology that my story ‘Great White’ is in. There’s a great lineup of stories in this and the quality of the book itself is nice too. There’s also a Kindle version if you prefer electronic copies. I also received my “proof” copy…

  • My Life

    The Sad Fate of Ten Little Stories

    I’ve been busy with the novel. Really busy. I had hoped to finish it before my writing time vanished but I’m still three chapters shy of completing the rough draft. Since I’ve been so busy I’ve been neglecting maintaining my submissions. What I mean by this, is that when stories are rejected, I need to hunt out new homes for them and whatnot. I haven’t been doing this. In the mad plunge to finish the novel, several stories were politely declined and returned to me (and two novels). I took a look at the list today. In the past I’ve had a fairly large list of “things submitted”. This is…

  • Writing Resources

    Two Negative Sales

    Recently I learned that a publishing company that produces several magazines is likely going under. This means that two stories I had contracted with them will not be printed (as well as a third that I had revised significantly for an editor). Now I have to go and find a new home for them. So far there doesn’t seem to be anything appropriate, so they might sit in purgatory for a few months. This is the second time that one of these stories has actually been bought (with the magazine later folding)… it is earning a decent chunk of income without ever seeing print! I fear it might be some…

  • Writing Resources

    Holiday Stuff

    On the off chance that some of you are thinking of checking out my stories this holiday season, here’s a short summary. Probably the most gift-able item with my writing in it right now is Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader – Flush Fiction which contains my story ‘Proof in the Pudding’. I also have three stories upcoming in future issues of On Spec Magazine (not sure when exactly but I’d wager that at least one will appear next year). Subscriptions can be obtained from the On Spec website. Additionally, I have stories in back issues of On Spec magazine available: A Ragman’s Vow From the Sea Touch the Dead I also…

  • My Life,  Writing Resources

    Word Goal Reached

    This week I passed the 300 000 word mark for 2012’s writing effort. Most of this work has been on novel #5 and Lazy Designer #3 but I also wrote more stories this year than I have in any other one year period. I am light on words, compared to the past two years (last year for example I exceeded 430 000 words), but this was intentional. The youngest kid is home more with me for the remainder of this school year. Next year he starts going to school more regularly, so I’ll get a bit more time to write. The year after that I’ll get *a lot* more time…