David Steffen is an editor, publisher, and writer.
If you like what he does you can visit the Support page or buy him a coffee!
He is probably best known for being co-founder and administrator of The Submission Grinder, a donation-supported tool to help writers track their submissions and find publishers for their work . David is also the editor-in-chief here at Diabolical Plots. He is also the editor and publisher of The Long List Anthology: More Stories From the Hugo Award Nomination List series. David also (sometimes) writes fiction, and you can follow on BlueSky for updates on cross-stitch projects and occasionally other things.
I have some exciting news today–my first sale! Yay!
Pseudopod has decided to buy my story The Disconnected to publish as a podcast. It will be available for free download on their site. I’ll post a link when it’s available.
One nice thing about this sale is that it is audio rights ONLY. That means that I can still try to sell first printing rights to a professional print market.
A few stats in case people are interested:
Time since I started writing fiction: 2 years, 5 months
Time since I started writing short stories: 1 year, 1 month
Total rejections before this sale: 124
Total rejections since last sale: —(I’ll fill this in for future sales)
Time since last sale: —(I’ll fill this in for future sales)
Total rejections of this story before this sale: 8
Total responses from Pseudopod before this sale: 1
Juliette Wade is a writer of speculative fiction whose story Let the Word Take Me was published in the July/August 2008 issue of Analog Science Fiction and Fact. Her second published story, Cold Words, will also appear in Analog, in the October issue, on newsstands at the time of this interview.
Her stories are unique in that they draw heavily on her background in anthropology and linguistics. So many science fiction stories avoid the topic of linguistics entirely, either by ignoring it, or by hand-waving with gadgets like universal translators. Juliette’s two Analog stories are centered around establishing communications with alien cultures.
Besides her successful fiction career, she also maintains a blog focused on discussions of linguistics and anthropology of both the real world and fictional locations. Her blog is particularly interesting because she makes it so interactive. You can raise questions there and she also periodically runs worldbuilding workshops, about which I’ve heard very good things. Check out her blog at www.talktoyouniverse.blogspot.com
Juliette, thanks for agreeing to this interview.
David Steffen: In your own words, could you tell us a little bit about Cold Words to pique our interest?
Juliette Wade: The thing I love most about Cold Words is that it takes what seems like a pretty simple spaceport deal and turns it into something really exciting by putting it in the point of view of a 6’4” drug-addicted wolflike alien with ulterior motives. ÂBoy, did that add stakes and complications!
David: Cold Words is told from the point of view of a character who is not human. What particular challenges did this provide? Any advice for writers who would like to write from a non-human point of view?
Juliette: Creating Rulii and his voice was the biggest single investment of time and effort that went into the creation of the story. ÂI actually started with the characteristics of his language, picked a species that would match well with status language issues, then designed the sounds and structure of his language. ÂAfter that I figured out how I was going to reflect the structure of his language in English, and developed the prose. ÂThe step that followed was figuring out what kinds of metaphors he would use to describe his life, and the details of how he would live in the environment of his planet. ÂI kept finding new places, like architecture, where the Aurrel species and their environment would require unique details. ÂMy advice to writers who want to write from a non-human point of view is to be systematic, and make sure you’re grounded in what the character knows based on his or her environment and experience, so you can use only those things to express the character’s judgment of people and events. ÂOtherwise the human viewpoint will start to intrude.
David: You managed to get your very first fiction publication in Analog–which is on the top of many speculative writers’ “wish list”. Can you tell us a little bit about how this transpired? How long had you been writing before this sale?
Juliette: The Analog connection was very fortuitous, really the result of networking. ÂI’d met Deborah J. Ross when we shared a panel at BayCon in Spring 2007, and having heard about my interest in Linguistics, she introduced me to Sheila Finch, author of The Guild of Xenolinguists, at Westercon a month later. ÂSheila was the one who told me that Analog’s editor, Dr. Stanley Schmidt, enjoyed stories about linguistics. ÂBecause of Analog’s known interest in hard science fiction, I’d never before considered sending anything to them, but after her recommendation I gave it a try. ÂAnd it worked!
David: What was your first reaction when you first heard of the story’s acceptance? How did you celebrate?
Juliette: I got the letter as I was running out the door to take my kids to gym, and could barely drive. ÂWhen I opened it I found the first words were “I like ‘Let the Word Take Me’.” ÂMy heart was pounding. ÂIt was actually a conditional acceptance, because Dr. Schmidt wanted me to change some of the harder science aspects of the story, like whether the gecko aliens could stick to walls (they were too large to do so, according to the laws of physics). ÂI knew this was my chance, so I changed those aspects of the story and sent it back. ÂI agonized until I got confirmation that the story would be published. ÂThen I did a happy dance!
David: How did your reaction to the second sale differ from the first?
Juliette: I was thrilled, actually, because this time it wasn’t a conditional acceptance, and Dr. Schmidt said very nice things about the story. ÂAlso, on some level, I was really relieved because I could now be sure the first acceptance hadn’t been a fluke. Â ÂThe first one was an idea I’d had for a long time and it happened to land, but Cold Words I designed expressly for Analog.
David: Has being published in Analog helped her with other pro markets? Sales? Personalrejections?
Juliette: I couldn’t say. ÂI don’t think so; I’d been getting personal rejections for some time before the Analog sale. ÂAlso, since I designed Cold Words for them, I never sent it anywhere else. ÂMy other current stories are fantasy, so I don’t really think there’s much cross-influence.
David: Can you explain a little bit about how your world-building workshops work? Who is eligible to join? How do people join?
Juliette: Sure! ÂThe workshops are pretty informal and unscheduled. ÂWhen I think I’ll have time to hold one, I post a poll on the blog asking for expressions of interest, and if I get enough, I schedule one. ÂI get people to submit 500-word excerpts from the start of a story, and I pick five participants based on how helpful I think I can be to them. ÂAnyone can submit – there’s no requirement that the story be *about* linguistics or anthropology issues – but because of my interests I particularly enjoy working with people who care about the worlds they’re building and take interest in strengthening those aspects of their stories. ÂIn the last few months I’ve been too busy to propose a workshop, but I hope to have time for a third one later this year.
David: If we found intelligent extraterrestrial life, how difficult do you think it would be to establish communication? Would it even be possible?
Juliette: In fact, I think it would be extremely difficult and maybe impossible, particularly if we were trying to accomplish it at a distance with no context of alien physiology or environment. ÂThere are Earthly scripts we still can’t decipher, and we certainly have difficulty with the more complex communications systems of animals on Earth, like dolphins and whales, for example. ÂLanguages are fitted to the transmission and reception systems possessed by their speakers, and we could find some things out there that would be beyond our ability to perceive, much less decipher.
David: With your background in linguistics, do you have trouble enjoying SF stories that avoid the issue of language barriers?
Juliette: Actually, no, though I always enjoy the ones that try to take language on. ÂThe classic solutions, universal translators or language-deciphering AI’s, are so prevalent that I generally consider them to be an element of premise, i.e. I just have to accept that the method works, somehow. ÂThat’s not too difficult to ignore, and then I can get onto enjoying what the story is really about.
David: Do you write novels, as well as short stories? If yes, do you prefer to write one or the other? Which comes easier to you?
Juliette: Yes, I write novels. ÂI started writing them first, in fact, but I enjoy writing both. ÂI found that starting to write short stories really helped me grasp some of the larger structural aspects of directing a story, so they’ve helped my novels a lot, indirectly.
David: What’s your favorite way to spend your time, besides reading and writing?
Juliette: Being with my family. ÂGoing out to the children’s museum, or ice skating with them, or just reading books, maybe helping my kids learn to use the computer. ÂAlso, talking with my husband is one of my favorite things to do. ÂSometimes we discuss my writing, and other times his work or events in the world.
David: If you could give only one piece of advice to aspiring writers trying to secure their first fiction sale, what would it be?
Juliette: Be dogged, both in improving your writing and in finding ways to connect to the community of writers. ÂIf you believe in it, just keep going.
David: More specifically, since you’ve had repeated sales to Analog, what is your advice to writers who wish to break into that particular market?
Juliette: It’s hard to say. ÂI was lucky, in some sense, that linguistics is what I do and Dr. Schmidt happens to like it. ÂBut I do have two pieces of advice: Âdon’t *not* submit just because you think Analog is a hard market to break into. ÂLet the editor decide if your story is appropriate for them. ÂThe other is, keep in mind that Analog stories are very principled. ÂFollow the guidelines as far as making science (linguistic or otherwise) integral to your plot, and be maniacal about keeping scientific grounding and consistency. ÂThis is not to say that you need to explain all the relevant science, just that it needs to serve as a rock-solid foundation for the story to succeed.
David: What was the last book you read?
Juliette: Ship of Dreams, a pirate historical romance written by my friend, Elaine LeClaire. ÂActually the first romance novel I’ve ever read, so it was fun and a change of pace. ÂVery well written, too, with terrific historical detail – I heartily recommend her work.
David: Your favorite book?
Juliette: Hands down, my favorite book is The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin. ÂIt was the inspiration for my writing philosophy.
David: Who is your favorite author?
Juliette: In science fiction, Ursula K. LeGuin, for the depth and realism of her worlds and their people. ÂIn fantasy, I’d say Patricia McKillip, for her sense of story and her poetic use of language.
David: What was the last movie you saw?
Juliette: In the theater, it would have to be WALL-E. ÂA bleak vision of the future, but a wonderful story – and a testament to how effective body language can be in communication.
David: What is your favorite movie?
Juliette: I’m not sure. ÂThe Lord of the Rings series is certainly high on my list.
David: Are you currently working on any writing that you’d like to give a sneak peek at?
Juliette: I’m designing a new story for Analog, tentatively titled “At Cross Purposes,” where some human terraformers run into trouble with spacefaring aliens who have an unusual view of technology. ÂAlmost finished with a novel of linguistic fantasy, “Through This Gate,” involving a magic book that contains a world literally made from the delusional writings of a Japanese madwoman who has lived inside it since the 11th century.
David: Thank you for taking the time to answer some questions, Juliette. I look forward to picking up a copy of Analog to see your new story in print.
Also, thank you to Brad R. Torgerson for his contributions to this interview.
My guest today is Cat Rambo, fantasy and science fiction writer and editor of Fantasy Magazine, a market recognized as being professional by SFWA (Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America). Check out her website at http://www.kittywumpus.net and check out Fantasy Magazine’s website at http://www.fantasy-magazine.com
David Steffen: Cat, thanks for coming. I really appreciate you taking the time for this interview.
Cat, what plots or types of stories are you tired of seeing?
Cat Rambo: I am tired of seeing retold fairy tales that don’t do anything new with the fairy tale, where they just kind of say, okay I’m going to retell Cinderella but it’s going to be a shopping sale at the mall and don’t do anything new with that.
I have a great fondness for sword and sorcery. I grew up reading sword and sorcery. I read Fritz Lieber and C.L. Moore and a lot of Michael Moorcock, but I think there again you have to do something new for me to be interested. I get a lot of stories that are sort of Conan the Barbarian revisited but they’re not as good as Robert E. Howard. Unless you are as good as Robert E. Howard it’s probably best for writers to steer their way away from that.
David: Do you prefer certain subgenres of fantasy such as urban fantasy, contemporary fantasy, high fantasy, etc?
Cat: I love urban fantasy. Paradoxically enough, given how much of it is out there, I don’t get a lot of good urban fantasy. I like stories that tend to work on more than one level. We have, for example, a story that was very popular with our readers last year, Elena Gleason’s Erased, which I was just looking at again. That story on one level is about someone’s boyfriend who is invisible and what do you do when you’re confronted with an invisible boyfriend. But on the other hand, at a deeper level, it’s about what do you do in a relationship when the other person is vanishing. So I like the stories that work on more than one level. The stories where you go away and you find yourself thinking about later and think “Oh, yeah, okay, it works like this too.”
David: Are there any big changes on the horizon for Fantasy Magazine?
Cat: Oh, onward and upward for Fantasy Magazine. We have a web comic that will be appearing soon. We have been reorganizing and getting a lot of people in to drive individual areas like TV or books, and comics. So there’s going to be a lot. We’re hoping to up the amount of content to put out something interesting at least two or three times a day.
David: Can you elaborate about the web comic?
Cat: It’s a fantasy comic based on a setting that will be familiar to a lot of our readers, which is inside a fantasy role-playing game.
David: Are there any features coming up in Fantasy Magazine that you’re particularly looking forward to?
Cat: Right now we’re running a series called “Game-mastering NPCs”. The first of the five part series was just posted last week, talking about the importance of NPCs (non-player characters) to a roleplaying game campaign. Also, I’m particularly looking forward to some articles by Genevieve Valentine.
David: Which were you first, a writer or an editor?
Cat: First and foremost, always a writer.
David: Do you think that being an editor has changed the way you write?
Cat: Not really. It’s one more thing nibbling at my writing time. I think every writer experiences that in some form or another.
David: Has being an editor provided you with extra skills that have been useful as a writer?
Cat: Yes. One thing about reading slush is that it gives you greater confidence in your own writing. It has really driven home the importance of making the first paragraphs of a story draw the reader in.
David: Has the economic crisis impacted the magazine at all?
Cat: Not really. Previously we hadn’t been drawing in as much advertising revenue as we could have. We’re making an effort to do better in that respect, so we may actually be doing better now than before.
David: SFWA added Fantasy Magazine to their list of professional markets earlier this year. Has this sparked any change in submissions, either quantity or quality?
Cat: Yes, in both respects. We’re getting 500-600 submissions a month now, as well as seeing submissions from some pro writers we hadn’t seen before. It’s been a good thing we have the new online submission process, which speeds things up significantly.
David: I have noticed in my submissions a large reduction in turnaround time since the new online submissions system was set up. How exactly does that system make things faster?
Cat: We were just using Gmail before, so every couple weeks we had to check the junk folder just to make sure that things weren’t getting lost there. And there was stuff bouncing every once in a while. Someone’s spam filter would eat our stuff. So it just makes it a lot easier to track what’s going on and you’ve got a system also where we can see which slushreader is reading and who is slacking and go prod them. *laughs*
David: What are your personal pet peeves when reading stories?
Cat: Personal pet peeves? In terms of the stories or in terms of the way they’re presented?
David: Like little grammar mistakes that you see too often, things like that.
Cat: Oh, “its” and “it’s” drives me nuts. I taught composition a few times and I always tell students that is the one error that will get under my skin. Its/it’s and they’re/their/there. Nowadays we have spellchecker, so there’s really no excuse for having too many actual misspellings but we still see alot of the it’s/its.
David: How about other things that bother you. For instance, some editors really dislike reading stories that begin with the character waking up.
Cat: I don’t like the beginnings that start out with kind of two heads talking in space where there’s no sense of location and you don’t know what’s going on. I don’t like beginnings that aren’t well-grounded and give us a sense of the story world.
I don’t like the endings, not so much the beginnings, where someone wakes up as the endings and is “Oh my God it was all a dream.” And it’s like “Oh, come on!”
David: It sort of makes you wonder “Why did I spend my time reading this?”
Cat: That’s it, it insults the reader: “Ha ha I tricked you and you wasted all your time.” I don’t like stories that take the “I’m cleverer than you approach” to the reader.
David: I’ve heard that some editors like a little humor, but so many people have different views on what’s funny. How do you judge a humorous piece in submission to Fantasy or do you generally steer clear of humor pieces?
Cat: I like humor. I love a good funny story. I love, for example, the Terry Pratchett books which I think are just wonderful, or the Jasper Ford Tuesday Next stories. I like humorous pieces that don’t depend on cliches. If it’s a joke that’s been told before, I’ve heard it before, so I don’t really want those. Good humor is very hard to write and it’s far too scarce in the submission pile.
David: What was the last book you read?
Cat: It was a really cool Japanese murder-myster that Ann Vandermeer turned me onto. I just did a workshop with her and she recommended it. It’s titled “Out”, written by Natsuo Kirino.
David: Your favorite book?
Cat: I will go with a classic and say Thomas Mallory’s Le Morte D’Arthur which is one of my desert island books.
David: Who is your favorite author?
Cat: I will be slightly pretentious and say James Joyce because I do love what James Joyce does with language.
David: What was the last movie you saw?
Cat: We went and saw The Hangover which I thought was a lot of fun. We love Zach Galifianakis. We’d seen him in a documentary called the Comedians of Comedy and he was so hysterical in that.
David: I saw that last week as well. There are a few moments in that movie that are sure to be nominated for the MTV Movie Awards’ WTF award.
Cat: *laughs*. It just had so many moments like that where you were just like “Oh my god where are they going to go with this”
I kind of want to go so Land of the Lost simply because I loved it when I was a kid. I like Will Ferrell but I”m just not sure the combination is going to work. I like Will Ferrell. I have liked him in a great many things, and then I have seen him in many things where I’ve said “Well okay that’s not as interesting as it could be.”
David: What is your favorite movie?
Cat: I really love the Wizard of Oz.
David: I just wrote a story specifically for a Wizard of Oz horror anthology called Shadows of the Emerald City.
Cat: Oh cool, what a neat idea. I had just been reading John Kessel’s The Baum Plan for Financial Independence. Which I think kind of pokes gentle fun at the economics of Oz which is kind of a funny way to do it.
David: Do you have any upcoming publications that you’d like to tell us about?
Cat: Indeed I do. I have a collection coming out with Paper Golem Press. The title is “Eyes like Sky and Coal and Moonlight.”
David: That’s a catchy title.
Cat Rambo: That’s the title story.
David: Is it a collection of reprinted stories or all-new writing?
Cat: I think It’s about half and half, there is about 50 percent new stuff, and a couple Strange Horizons stories, and the Weird
Tales stories. Kind of the best stuff that’s appeared in publication. I’m really happy about that, because somethings appears in small magazines then sort of vanishes like a leaf on the wind. It’s nice to get a chance to put stories I’m really pleased with out in front of folks.
David: If you could give only one piece of advice to aspiring writers trying to get published, what would it be?
Cat: Be persistent. More than anything else you have to cultivate the hide of a rhinoceros, put your head down and keep plugging away.
David: Do you have any works in progress you’d like to tell us about?
Cat: I am finishing up a young adult novel called Phat Fairy. It is my reaction in some ways to reading the Twilight series.
David: What did you think of the Twilight series?
Cat: I thought that they were decently written but I thought they were just an appalling message for young women. You have this utterly passive heroine whose main motivation is nailing her man. I really didn’t think they were a good message for young women at all. I have a goddaughter who will at some point be reading YA fiction, so I wanted to make sure there was at least one book out there with a healthier message. Though I am not trying to write a message-driven book either.
David: Thank you for taking the time to answer some questions, Cat, and letting us get a glimpse into Cat’s world of writing and editing. Also, thanks to Frank Dutkiewicz, Brad Torgerson, and Gary Cuba for your contributions to this interview.
Stay tuned for more interviews! I’ve got a full schedule, at two interviews a month, lined up through mid-October!
My guest today is New York Times bestselling author Alethea Kontis. She co-wrote the Dark Hunter Companion with fellow New York Times bestselling author Sherrilyn Kenyon. Her short fiction has appeared in multiple professional publications, such as Orson Scott Card’s Intergalactic Medicine Show, and Realms of Fantasy. Not only that, but she’s published a children’s book titled AlphaOops: The Day Z Went First, with a sequel upcoming. Besides her fiction, her essays can be seen at several professional magazines and have been collected in book form, the first volume of which is called Beauty & Dynamite.
David Steffen: I’m sure you answer this question all the time, but I have to ask: your name is so unique. Is there a story behind it?
Alethea Kontis: “Alethea” is the Greek word for “truth.” As all Greeks know, words have power. My name is as much of a curse as it is a blessing, especially when my grandmother continually reminds me to lie to her friends about my age. (Sorry, Nana!)
My mother discovered the name as the family settled down to watch “Kung-Fu” on March 15, 1973 — my older brother’s 9th birthday. (West is currently a 4th-degree black belt in Taekwondo.) In that particular episode, Jodie Foster played a precocious girl named Alethea Patricia Ingram.
I discovered the details of this event only a few years ago…after I had already been a buyer at Ingram Book Company for over six years. Oh, yes. Words have power, my friend.
David: You’ve written so many essays, and I’ve enjoyed the ones I’ve read. They flow so naturally that they’re effortless to read, yet at the same time are very focused on each particular topic. Do essay ideas just slap you across the face, demanding to be written or does it take a more concerted effort? How does essay-writing compare to fiction-writing?
Alethea: I was raised in a family of storytellers. And when I say that, I mean that we put most voice actors and stand-up comedians to shame. You only have as much time as everyone plans on sitting around the dinner table, and you only have the floor for as long as your voice carries over everyone else’s…so whatever you choose to impart to the group, it better be GOOD. Every time I sit down to write an essay, I imagine myself around that table. As long as I have the floor I’ve got to have a great beginning, I’ve got to keep my audience engaged, and I can’t take forever to get to the point.
Someone asked me once if one needed a diverse and interesting background to be a writer. I think everyone has a diverse and interesting background; writers just exploit theirs. Everyone has stories to tell; you step in them like puddles every single day. For whatever reason I seem to have this abnormally remarkable life — these are just the stories I step in.
David: Do you prefer to write by yourself or with another writer (like the Dark Hunter Companion). What sort of unique challenges or benefits arise when working together?
Alethea: The Dark-Hunter Companion is the only collaboration I’ve done to date. Sherri and I had a unique arrangement with the Companion that could have been as much a disaster as it was a triumph. I started out with a stack of novels, a notebook, a glorified outline, and an anticipated word count. I re-read the whole series (many for the 3rd or 4th time), took notes, and then wrote the entire encyclopedia as if I was just another smart-mouthed character in the Dark-Hunter universe. I handed the manuscript over to Sherri, who then pulled out some spoilers, put in some teasers, and altered a few things that could only be altered by She Who Keeps Entire Worlds in her Head.
When I got the manuscript back for copyedits, our writing style blended so perfectly I honestly couldn’t tell where my words left off and hers began. Everyone was pleased with the end result — the fans most of all. It was a fascinating experience.
David: What do you think has been the most significant event to advance your career?
Alethea: My life suddenly flashes before my eyes: My parents telling me I couldn’t major in English. My English teacher telling me no child would want to read my fairy tales. My friend Gail telling me to just write my picture book idea “so you can read it.” Orson Scott Card telling me to just write the novel. Tom Piccirilli taking me to task when he found out I hadn’t submitted a finished manuscript. Kevin J. Anderson slapping me in the face when I denigrated my own writing.
If I had to pick only one event, it would be the Baen dinner in the fall of 2003, where David Drake found out I lived only a couple of miles from Andre Norton and ordered me to go visit her. “She has no idea what she means to this industry,” he told me, and he was right. My correspondence and friendship with Miss Andre is something I’ll treasure forever.
David: What is your favorite thing about writing?
Alethea: Making my mother cry.
When I wrote stories as a kid, making my mother cry was a mark of excellence — I knew then that I had something powerful. My mother was always my first reader and (“get a real job” major aside) my biggest advocate — up to and including calling a particular university and bullying them to accept my application essay despite the fact that I was a few hundred words over the limit. (I was accepted to said particular university, but ultimately could not afford to attend.)
While at Boot Camp in 2003, I called Mom from the campus of UNCG and yelled into the phone, “ORSON SCOTT CARD SAID I’M A GREAT WRITER!!!” I could not have offended her more. There was silence on the other end, and then a very cold, “Alethea, we’ve been telling you that for years. So now you’re going to believe some guy just because he’s some big fat best-seller?” It was then that I officially realized my mother hadn’t actually been spoon-feeding me a load of crap, as most mothers are wont to do.
She forgave me. Six years later, she’s still my first reader. And she still tells me every time I make her cry.
David: Do you have a particular writing process you go through for every story, from story conception to drafting?
Alethea: Because I was raised a storyteller, I’m what they call an “Athena writer” — the stories all but spring fully-formed from my head. I mentally work through my plot points and dialogue and edit as I write. The words need to be in order, and they need to be the right words.
As a result, when writing fiction I average only about 500 words an hour and only a few thousand a day at my most productive. But I rarely go back and rewrite, and my first drafts are very, very clean drafts.
David: If you could only give one piece of advice to aspiring writers, what would it be?
Alethea: Do the thing that scares you.
David: What’s the last book you read? Your favorite book? Your favorite author?
The last book I read (all the way through): The Strangely Beautiful Tale of Miss Percy Parker, by Leanna Renee Hieber. (For the record, I loved it.) Favorite book and author — ha! I could no sooner choose a favorite star in the sky.
David: What was the last movie you saw?
Alethea: Last movie I saw: UP. I think I only cried more after seeing Big Fish.
David: I know you’re very active on the convention circuit. What upcoming convention appearances do you have planned?
Alethea: I’ve just finished six weeks of the heaviest schedule I’ve ever had (including Penguicon, Mo*Con, Hypericon, and BEA). The rest of 2009 is fairly light — I’ll be at Necon in July and, of course, Dragon*Con on Labor Day weekend.
David: What do you like best about conventions? Do you suffer from stage fright–if so, how do you get up there in front of all those people?
Alethea: I’m a raging introvert, but I have no problem with stage fright. My Aunt Ernestine (actress Ernestine Mercer) taught me how to say “TA-DA!” when I was a baby — a feat I had turned into a lucrative acting career by he time I was eight. I was on stage all through high school…which trickled down to only helping out on student films in college…and then after I graduated, the hermit took over and I slipped into borderline agoraphobia.
All it took was one panic attack in the grocery store for me to say, “NONE OF THIS NONSENSE, PLEASE!” From that point on, I concentrated on consciously participating in a healthy amount of social activity and pulling myself back out of my shell. I am definitely not the mealy-mouthed frump I was five years ago. Five years from now, people will have to put on sunglasses just to look at me.
David: Any convention stories to share? Strange people you’ve met?
Alethea: Ha! Plenty. There are…um…more than ten in Beauty & Dynamite alone. My very first convention was Dragon*Con in 1996. From the minute I showed up on the front steps, it felt like I had come home. And all those misfits I’ve met? They’re all as close as family now. I love every single one of them. Some of them even dubbed me their Princess, an honor I have accepted with all the appropriate grace and aplomb. I now have a collection of tiaras…but that I blame on Jill Conner Browne.
David: Do you have any newly published stories or soon-to-be-published stories that we should watch out for? If so, what can you tell us about them?
Alethea: This year, keep an eye out for “The Giant and the Unicorn” in Shimmer Magazine’s steampunk Clockwork Jungle issue. I’ve got “The Witch of Black Mountain” coming out in Apex’s Harlan County Horrors anthology and “The God of Last Moments” in Maurice Broaddus’s Mo*Con anthology. I’m also working on a piece for Doug Warrick and Kyle Johnson’s Nick Cave anthology…which I really need to get home and finish. And, as always, keep watching the blog for the next humorous installment in the Adventures of Lee.
David: Any exciting works-in-progress in the pipeline right now? What can you tell us about them? Can you give us any sneak peeks at any of them to pique our interest.
Alethea: I’ve just finished the unabridged, novel version of “Sunday”, my fairytale novelette that appeared in Realms of Fantasy in October 2006. If you’d like a sneak peek, the story is available on the Anthology Builder website.
David: I’m keeping a running “wish list” of guests for interviews. Is
there anyone in the speculative fiction industry you would love to see
interviewed?
Alethea: Ha! I’ve been interviewing folks for the Ingram Genre Chicks column for over five years now, so every time I think of the answer to that question, I just hunt down the prospective victim and interview them. Neil Gaiman? Charles Vess? Anne McCaffrey? Easy-peasy. What I love best are the interviews that surprise me. I go back and re-read Naomi Neale’s (aka Vance Briceland) or Joe Hill’s answers whenever I need a pick-me-up. Heck, Edmund Shubert’s still makes me laugh so hard I cry. I know I’ll never look at penguins the same way again.
Good times.
David: Alethea, thanks for taking the time to answer all my questions. It’s been fun. I’ve been meaning to make it to some cons this year. If I end up making it to Dragon*Con I’ll be sure to look you up on the event list. I would love to meet you in person!
It was 1 year ago that I sent out my very first submission, my first novel to Tor. And what a year!
1 novel finished before the year started.
19 short stories written to completion within that year.
31 venues received my submissions.
91 rejections on those stories.
Almost to the century mark for rejections. Lately the trend seems slightly more positive–I’ve actually gotten a few “almost” replies, and one that’s being held for consideration for an anthology. I’m hoping that’s a continuing trend and not just a shallow peak. Here’s hoping! Who knows what the next year will bring.
I am a little bit curious what the big 3 digit rejection will be, the big one oh oh!
Just like “he said”/”she said”, beats can be used to good effect as speaker attributions. A beat is an action or description in the middle of dailog in a story. But both can be used too often, and in the case of beats, beats that are too generic can get old fast.
Unique mannerisms are less likely to get old. nods and smiles have their place, but if someone is nodding/smiling/scowling after every single line, it may be too much. If no one ever has any facial expressions, that’s probably not enough.
Keep in mind, if the dialogue is between just two people, you don’t need an attribution after every line. You can assume that the speakers are alternating, in which case you can have 3 or 4 (short) dialogue paragraphs with no attribution and it can flow very smoothly.
To me, beats serve three main purposes:
1. attribution: lets you know who is saying what.
2. characterization: actions speak louder than words, this can betray a lie, show nervous habits, convey more subtle communication between characters, any number of other things.
3. pacing. A longer beat conveys a longer moment of time between speech.
An example of beats used for pacing:
Alice glared at Tom and slapped the countertop with her hand. “Tell me what you know.”
Tom didn’t look up from the dishwater. “I can’t.”
“You can’t? That’s baloney and you know it. This is important. You could save her life.”
He rinsed a handful of silverware and set it in the drainer with a clatter. “It’s not that simple.”
“What’s not simple?”
Once Alice and Tom start talking, she has no beats because she doesn’t hesitate. As soon as he speaks to her, she has a response. She’s very upset at Tom, and she isn’t pulling her punches.
Tom, on the other hand has beats before both of his lines, and long ones at that. The beats slow down his responses, giving the impression of hesitation without actually saying “he hesitated”. The second beat is longer than the first, implying a longer hesitation. His words make it clear he doesn’t want to talk, and his actions support that by slowing his pace.
In this case the particular actions aren’t even that important. Are clean dishes vital to the story? Probably not. He’s fixating on them, using them to try to delay the conversation.
Also, a related point about point of view. To me, I want to see the story through the eyes of the character using the prose as a lens. What I mean by that is that so many things, down to scene descriptions, and in this case, beats, are opportunities to characterize.
In the case of my example dialogue, whoever is the protagonist notices Tom’s actions in close detail during the argument. Let’s say Alice is the protagonist. She notices when he sets the handful of silverware down because she’s eager to continue the argument and she’s frustrated at his hesitation. If she was just asking how his day was, she might not be scrutinizing every detail of his dishwashing. In that case I might have used different things for beats, something appropriate to the occasion.
X-Men Origins: Wolverine was an okay movie. It had its moments, in particular I liked some of the casting choices, but overall it left enough continuity questions and major plot holes that it really just bothered me.
One of my favorite scenes in the whole movie happened in just the first few minutes, where it shows Wolverine and Sabretooth fighting in every American war since the mid-19th century, each of them of course in period uniforms and with grainy photography of each era.
Overall it was okay, but some of the character motivations were thin at best, there were several characters that were clearly only included so they could be part of merchandising later on. That aspect wasn’t as bad as X-Men 3 (thank God) which included dozens of characters that were only on camera for seconds, just long enough to say their name and show their powers.
The movie follows James ( who we know in later movies as Wolverine or Logan) played by Hugh Jackman and his brother Viktor (who later becomes Sabretooth) played by Liev Schreiber. Never mind that Liev Schreiber looks nothing like the Sabretooth of the first X-Men movie. You would think that they could have at least died Liev’s hair the sandy brown color, but apparently that was too much to ask. On the other hand, Liev did make a good Sabretooth, albeit one who didn’t look right. And apparently mutton chops are a genetic trait–their dad had them in the opening scene, and both of them have them as adults also.
Anyway, it follows their lives as brothers, and how Wolverine became Weapon X with the adamantium laced skeleton that makes him nearly indestructible. Together they join a strike force led by William Stryker, who you might remember from X-2. You might also remember Stryker having a southern accent which is oddly absent from this movie. Despite that, I did like the casting choice for Stryker. He had a very smooth convincing voice which is perfect for the character.
The action was good, but there was just too much of it sometimes. A movie about Wolverine has to have lots of action, but he pretty much ended up fighting every character he meets, even if they are on the same side. Granted, this is a tried-and-true comic book tradition, throwing two “good” characters together and making them think they’re enemies for an episode, and then they’re shown to be friends at the end at which point they apologize and unite against the enemy they both came to fight. But just because comic books use that device doesn’t mean that movies should.
I really liked Ryan Reynolds character, but he wasn’t in enough of the movie to make it worthwhile. He had some good wisecracks while he was on screen though. And it was good to see Dominic Monaghan, though his role wasn’t a huge one.
Keep reading if you’ve already seen it or you don’t mind some spoilers
SPOILER ALERT
SPOILER ALERT
But there were some MAJOR problems. First and foremost–the final scenes take place on Three Mile Island, and the action actually ends up causing the meltdown. That’s a bit contrived but not the worst plot device I’ve ever seen. But the thing that bothers me is that NONE of the characters suffer from radiation poisoning whatsoever. Wolverine has some excuse for this, because of his healing factor, perhaps he’s immune to radiation sickness. Stryker, however, is entirely human, he was on the site, and not only does he survive the movie, he’s alive for X-2 that happens maybe twenty years later with no apparent ill side effects. Explain that to me! Did the makers of the movie really not realize that a nuclear meltdown is not a healthy thing to be around.
Another MAJOR problem–they didn’t do their chemical research. At one point in the movie, someone uses a drug to fake a death, to supposedly slow their heartbeat down so it’s unnoticeable. That’s fine, but the drug they used was hydrochlorothiazide, which is not a heart medication, it’s a diuretic. That’s right, all it does is make you pee. (Thanks to my wife the pharmacist for pointing this out). The only way it could affect your heart, and even this is a stretch, is if you peed so much that you lost too many electrolytes and your heart went into arrhythmia, which is not what happened here. Two minutes with Google could have given them a medicine that at least slowed down heart rate–that’s just lazy!
Another big one–the use of adamantium is inconsistent. In X-2 I believe it was an alloy, not a pure metal, and once it hardened it was impossible to melt again. But in this movie Stryker finds it in it’s hardened form and yet is somehow able to use it as if it wasn’t–continuity error! Then Stryker creates a gun that shoots adamantium bullets, and assumes they will be able to puncture Wolverine’s skull–but you need something harder than adamantium if you want to puncture it!!
Another big continuity error–in this movie Stryker has the ability to steal powers from one mutant and give them to another mutant. If he knows how to do this now, he should know how to do it later in his life, but somehow he doesn’t in X-2. He’s the sort of man that would use any weapon in his arsenal whenever he can–I doubt he would have held back in X-2 if he knew how to do it.
This was inspired by a Facebook post where someone said “not everyone who calls themselves a writer is a writer”.
When is a writer a writer? To write: to form (as words) by inscribing the characters or symbols on a surface.
So whoever puts symbols surfaces is a writer? No. Writing does not make you a writer, or anyone who is literate would be a writer. A person would become a writer when they pay with a check or write a grocery list. That’s writing, not Writing.
When most people speak of a writer, they are speaking of someone who has written something in particular, especially a book. But does one become a writer simply by writing a book? I’ve written a book. Does that make me a writer? It’s sitting in submission at a publisher at the moment. I’ve written more than a dozen short stories, does that make me a writer if none of them are published? What about a writer who’s been too afraid to show his work to any other person? Are they still a writer, or does their fear of rejection take away that title?
Does someone have to like your writing to make you a writer? What if you’ve shown your writing to some people, but none of them have enjoyed it in the slightest. Must we seek a seal of approval to call ourselves writers, or should this writer declare his title regardless if anyone cares for his work?
Are you a writer once published? Most people would agree that people who make their primary income from writing are writers. But what if you’ve published a single short story? What if you’ve been published only at semi-pro markets? Token markets paying a half cent a word? No pay at all? Does that make you any less of a writer? Many of history’s greatest artists were not appreciate in their time, does that mean they only became artists post-mortem? Until then they were just losers with paintbrushes, and somehow became artists as a side effect of decomposition?
When the subject comes up, I tend to call myself an “aspiring writer”. Not because I really think there’s much difference, but because that one word avoids the inevitable and awkward follow-up question: Where can I see your work? But once I publish a short story, is that the time to call myself a writer or do I need a longer bibliography? Perhaps there should be stages of writership, novice, apprentice, journeyman, master, grand master. I could try using these as my writing career develops, but unless these terms go into wide usage, people will just think me a weirdo. Which is fine, I am a weirdo and proud of it, but the terms don’t provide clarity if no one knows what they mean.
Once a writer, always a writer? What if I won a short story contest in grade school and never write again? Does that mean I can always carry the title? If people ask, I can show them the story collection with the byline “David Steffen, age 7”. Does that entitle me to call myself a writer? What of J.D. Salinger, who has not published an original work since 1965? Most people would call him a writer because his wild success of “Catcher in the Rye”, but what if the book had been less successful? What if it had been a single short story? Would he still be considered a writer today?
Many similar questions apply to painters. Monkeys can manipulate paints on a canvas, but does that mean that monkeys are artists? I suspect that painters would be insulted by the idea–no lower species could be capable of art. Yet I’ve seen some abstract art that looks remarkably similar to monkeys fingerpainting. Does that mean that that artist is not an artist because a monkey could do the same?
A common trait I’ve noticed in many stories written by many people who’ve never written before (and I wasn’t exempt, I wrote my share of these)–cinematic descriptions. Movies have an advantage in a certain way: you get descriptions for free. In just a moment you can show a scene that would take pages and pages to describe adequately in words. The stories I like the best use the narration as a filter to see through the eyes of the protagonist.
I think the reason many beginners try to write that way is that they want to describe the scene exactly as they see it, to make sure the reader sees exactly what they do. But a reader doesn’t HAVE to see the same things as the writer. Each reader brings a little something of their own when reading the story. It’s sort of like never stepping in the same river twice.
Trying to imitate cinema in prose rarely works very well, IMO. Prose can never imitate cinema well in this respect, and concentrating on this weakens the other aspects that prose can be better at. Cinema allows you to watch amazing events happen, but well-written prose allows you to experience it. Instead of describing every detail of a scene, describe only those details that the protagonist would actually notice. Several birds with one stone that way, characterization and description, as well as pacing. A person walks into a building they’ve never been in before–what do they see? A warrior might note the number of guards and their weapons, their level of alertness, and so on, in order to judge the military preparedness of the castle as a whole. A thief might note the number of windows, count the candlesticks, shadowy corners. An aristocrat would notice the material and cut of other people’s clothing, to judge their relative social worth, might note the furnishings as a measure of status but would be very unlikely to note the servants at all. A peasant who’d never been in a castle at all would be overwhelmed, noting fragments of everything but not quite understanding the relative importance of one versus another. If all of these things were described by the same person, then you 1. probably spent so much time describing it all that the pace has been totally killed. 2. have lost an opportunity at characterization, because describing everything is as bad for differentiating character as describing nothing.
Also, using the amount of description for pacing is a useful tool. A thief running from guards in hot pursuit is going to notice much less than a thief casing a potential target. This might seem obvious, but I’ve critiqued a lot of stories that halt in the middle of an epic battle to describe a scene or describe backstory, so when this happens I picture the character standing in one place and staring into the depths of his memory. Oddly, these stories never end with his reverie being interrupted by a sword through the gut.
Just for fun, I did a Google search for my name to see where I rank these days. I’ve now moved up to #5, and even passed up one of my unsavory name-doppelgangers that has thwarted me for a long time–the web page is titled “Is David Steffen and elitist bigot?”
1. President, Biomedical Computing in Texas
2. convicted murderer from a case back in 1983
-I think I can safely say that I am absolved of all guilt in this case–I was less than 2 years old.
3. Generic WhitePages.com search for my name
4. Internet Broadway Database (IBDB)– a fellow who works in marketing
5. Me!
6. Is David Steffen and elitist bigot?
I have some exciting news today–my first sale! Yay!
Juliette Wade is a writer of speculative fiction whose story 
X-Men Origins: Wolverine was an okay movie. It had its moments, in particular I liked some of the casting choices, but overall it left enough continuity questions and major plot holes that it really just bothered me.