Category: Announcements

Diabolical Plots To Become Professional Fiction Market

written by David Steffen
Diabolical Plots has been continuously providing nonfiction content related to speculative fiction since I launched it in 2008. Reviews, interviews, “Best of” lists, relating to magazines, books, TV shows, games. It was founded by me in 2008 on a very simple Blogspot page. Anthony and I joined forces in 2009 and, among other things, moved to the much nicer site that is still used today, commissioning the iconic mad scientist artwork by the wildly talented Joey Jordan.
In January 2013, Diabolical Plots launched the fiction writers’ submission-tracking and market-finding tool, The Submission Grinder.
This post is to announce the news that Diabolical Plots will trying something entirely new, expanding to become a professional-paying publisher of original speculative fiction! We’re not open for submissions quite yet, but we wanted to share the exciting news and let you prepare your very best short stories that are 2000 words or less for submission. For full guidelines see <LINK TO GUIDELINES>.
And Diabolical Plots the fiction market now has a market listing on the Grinder <LINK TO GRINDER LISTING>. We’ve put in requests to Ralan for the same.
This is all a grand experiment to see what kind of interest we get from writers and from readers. At this point we’re aiming for a single original story of 2000 words or less once a month for a year. What happens after that depends largely on how much interest. We have set up a Patreon page <LINK TO PATREON PAGE> with some goals for breaking even and goals for expanding our offering to more stories. If we get enough support through Patreon or through PayPal (and support of the Grinder all goes into the same place so Grinder donors, thank you as well) and iwe enjoy doing this fiction thing, then we’ll keep on going after the year is up. If not, we will surely have learned from the experience , and we will have helped the twelve authors find a venue for their work.
So, thanks for all the support over the years, everyone. We hope you’re as excited about this grand experiment as we are.

“Catastrophic Failure” at Perihelion

written by David Steffen

My story “Catastrophic Failure” just went live at Perihelion today. It’s outside my usual comfort zone, hard SF, near novelette size, about a disaster on a Venusian mining crawler. Full of action and science fictiony goodness. If you get a chance to read it, let me know what you think.

The Submissions Grinder Proto-Newsletter

written by David Steffen and Anthony Sullivan

This is a copy of the newsletter sent out to users of The (Submission) Grinder who have opted in for the newsletter as of Monday, November 10, 2013. We have included it here to let people who might be interested in hearing about the upcoming newsletter feature, but who are not users or who have not opted in.

 

Hello Grinder Users!

“What’s this in my inbox?” you might be asking yourself right now. Well, if you’re getting this email, your address is registered to a user of the (Submission) Grinder and in your profile you have opted in to the Grinder’s newsletter. If you don’t want to receive any more emails from us, all you have to do is uncheck the “Newsletter” box in your profile settings. If you believe you have received this email in error, let us know.
So, this is our first newsletter. More of a proto-newsletter, I suppose you could call it, to give you an idea what we have in mind for these newsletters and to give you an opportunity to give us some feedback about what kind of content you would like to see in these newsletters. This will probably be a weekly-ish newsletter once we have it off and running, though it might be a while before that happens–this is an early audience check.
So, here’s a list of subsections that we have in mind for Grinder Newsletter.
1. Greeting–A brief hello from us folks running the Grinder, might include a wish for happy holiday (for instance), a link to this week’s Diabolical Plots article, a link to newly published stories by the folks behind the Grinder. This will generally be quite brief, but is mostly a place to say “Hello” to all you fine users.
2. Grinder feature updates–When we have a shiny new feature we want to share with you, we’ll mention it here so that you can give it a try.
3. Market Updates Based on Custom Genre and Pay Interests–This is the core of the newsletter: market updates delivered right to your inbox, pointing out new market listings and market listings which have opened, temporarily closed, or permanently closed in the time since the last newsletter. But even better, this section of your newsletter will be tailored to your personal market interests of genre and minimum pay rate. If you want to get only updates about pro-paying fantasy/science fiction/horror markets, that’s what you will get. If you want to get only updates about any General genre markets, that’s what you will get.
4. A list of upcoming submission and theme deadlines
5. List of fundraising Calls–There will be a section of publishing related fundraising calls, be they Kickstarter, Indiegogo, or any other medium. A lot of anthologies, magazines, etc, do this kind of fundraiser from time to time, so it is our hope that we can help raise the visibility of their efforts. We will post the ones that we come across on our own, but we will also happily take suggestions (once the newsletter is running, that is)
For instance:
Escape Artists Fundraiser: Escape Artists, the audio production company that brings you the fiction podcasts Pseudopod, Podcastle, and Escape Pod, is running short on money to an extent that they won’t be able to continue much longer at the current funding. Follow this link to find a post with a brief summary, a link to the full metacast, and links to different donation options. There are also donation incentives (extra stories) if you chip in before the end of November.
6. List of recently accepted (and recently published) authors–A list of names of the authors who have logged acceptances since the last newsletter and who have selected to opt for the Brag feature. In the future this will also include those who’ve been recently published.

FEEDBACK

So, what do you think? Does the newsletter, as described, sound like a useful feature of the (Submission) Grinder? Are there other shiny ideas that you’d like to suggest to us? Just reply to this email or use the Grinder’s Contact Form to tell us what you think. I will also post this to Diabolical Plots so that other people who may not have signed up for the newsletter yet can see what we’re offering–feel free to comment on that post as well (or, again, use the Grinder’s contact form)
Thanks so much for using the Grinder.
best wishes to you and yours,
David Steffen and Anthony Sullivan, Grindmasters

“Could They But Speak” at Perihelion

written by David Steffen

This story was published about a month ago, but I haven’t gotten around to posting about it until now.

A previously unpublished story is now published at Perihelion, free to read, and it even has an illustration. It’s the story of Gunther the Dachshund who is one of the first and most public recipients of the Awakening procedure that allows animals to talk. He’s become a canine rights advocate since the procedure, but now it appears that someone is making an attempt on his life. Gunther and his agent (formerly his owner) Daniel must solve the mystery of who tried to kill him.

If you get a chance to read it, do let me know what you think.

Cheers!

,David

“Reckoning” at Stupefying Stories

written by David Steffen

My flash fiction story “Reckoning” is now posted on Stupefying Stories for you to read for free. It’s the tale of southern fire-and-brimstone Preacher Paul and his encounter with Death. This one’s been around for a little while, though I think a recent complete rewrite of the ending is what helped push it over into purchase territory.

The story began from the opening joke:

“The Day of Reckoning is upon us,” Preacher Paul said.
“You reckon?” Jake answered.
“I reckon.”

 

I hope you enjoy! Feel free to leave a comment here.

“I Will Remain” in After Death anthology

written by David Steffen

The After Death anthology, edited by Eric Guignard with my story “I Will Remain” is now available for sale. It’s anthology of stories that take place after death, one of my favorite topics to contemplate and write about.

I have good company in the anthology, Deborah Walker, Steve Rasnic Tem, and David Tallerman to name just a few.

My story’s about an English dog who remembers being a man, but it’s not as
straightforward as it might sound–I just don’t want to spoil it because it’s a story that I think will work better without foreknowledge of it.

If you get a chance to read it, let me know what you think!

“Coin Op”

written by David Steffen

I’m a bit tardy in posting this, but in February Daily Science Fiction published another of my stories: “Coin Op”. It’s a comedy, based around sex. It is definitely mature content, so if you don’t care for that sort of thing, just skip it. And feel free to let me know what you think of it. Here it is.

Enjoy!

“Marley and Cratchit” published on Escape Pod

written by David Steffen

Just a brief note to share good news of a new published story–“Marley and Cratchit” at Escape Pod, a secret history of A Christmas Carol. I tried to write it in a Dickensian style and make it fit into the original while still going somewhere unexpected. I hope you enjoy it. Please feel free to leave a comment hear with feedback.

 

“Door in the Darkness” published in Stupefying Stories

written by David Steffen

My story “Door in the Darkness” just went live in Stupefying Stories issue 1.9, edited by Bruce Bethke. I’ve been very excited to find this magazine, as Bruce’s style is right up my alley of what I like to read and what I like to write. Sharing the table of contents with me is my good friend Gary Cuba, who Bruce describes as a fan favorite, so that was a nice surprise.

I wrote “Door in the Darkness” after reading “Twilight” by Stephenie Meyer. My entire aim was to write a supernatural romance story where I didn’t hate the characters. I like the way that it turned out. If you get a chance to read it, do let me know!

Also, (adding this a week after the original post), just noticed that the Amazon “Look Inside” feature for the magazine lets you see the first section of my story, though it’s cut off by the digital preview.