Archive for September, 2023
My bad. The prompts came this month pretty well on schedule, but it’s been a busy time for me on other projects so it’s my delay that brings this on the fourth Sunday this month. So it goes.
So the prompt I’ve chosen for actual “Bloomington Writers Guild Third Sunday Write,” but a full week late (also I prefer to read the prompts cold, to allow for a still-spontaneous response — so this goes for reading/commenting on other people’s responses as well) is:
1. What would you do with a bushel of apples?
I’d throw them, I’d whack them, I’d practice my pitches,
I’d pass them like footballs at Halloween witches.
I’d pound them, I’d mash them, to cider both hard and soft;
Saturday nights I’d spend drinking (burp!) in my loft.
Most though I’d save for when the circus is in town,
toss them in front of the big parade,
and watch while the Elephant, squishing them underfoot,
slips and falls down!
At the top I also added this (which I’ve sort of put at the top here, too): Sorry to be on this so late — it’s been a busy, busy week (and maybe I’m feeling just a little bit goofy). . . .
Some things move swiftly. We have an announced publication date for THE RABBIT HOLE, VOL. VI, with my story “Marcie and Her Sisters” (see just below, September 14, et al.), for late October. And as of now we have a release of the cover as well.
Of THE RABBIT HOLE, to continue the call partially quoted below, [w]hat we’re looking for are odd, unusual stories where the journey can be the destination, or the destination the journey, anything at all — happy, sad, good, bad, or even indifferent. Stories can emphasize whatever floats, or sinks, your boat. Just remember to keep it weird as befitting a trip down the Rabbit Hole. And as for my story, keeping in mind the odd, the unusual, quoting myself now from May 31, “Marcie and Her Sisters” decide one day they might marry zombies — or do they? In any event, the journey (ah, now!) is not one wholly filled with flowers and butterflies. Oh, no! Nor is the narrator entirely reliable. . . .
In other words, a love story. Perfect for Halloween when days are chill, the nights growing longer — and “Marcie” is only one of a total of 39 stories in nearly 350 pages! At least as in the contents of Thursday’s “semi-proof.”
(And to add a small note, THE RABBIT HOLE VI has charity ties as well, with an option for royalties to go to the Against Malaria Foundation.)
Came the email Thursday morning: Attached is a pdf file containing the semi-proof of THE RABBIT HOLE VI. I call it a semi-proof because the pagination will probably change for both the e-book and the paperback. Also, I may still have to make some adjustments where one line of a story or bio runs over to be an entire page (a bit of a waste). Anyway, that’s my problem. What I need from you is the following: Well, pretty much the usual, corrections of any errors found (only two, it turned out, and one of them a citation), double check the spelling of my name (contents page, bio, as well byline on the story proper). . . .
And so, done Thursday evening, back it has gone a bit before supper.
The story: “Marcie and her Sisters” (cf. May 31), originally published in the movie-oriented anthology REEL DARK (BlackWyrm Publishing, 2015), and now being revived by The Writers’ Co-op for their sixth annual THE RABBIT HOLE anthology, under the theme “Destination: Journey.” In a simple sense [to quote the original call] the journey itself being the destination can be taken literally or as a metaphor for life. On the other hand, as a non-sequitur it can mean almost anything — think Kafka, Bierce, Serling, or Lovecraft — and we’re really looking forward to your interpretation, because falling into the Rabbit Hole is always a strange and different experience.
In this case, think of a tale with maybe a tiny nod to Woody Allen’s HANNAH AND HER SISTERS, but this time with zombies. Or are they really?
Or who are we to believe anything that Marcie might have to say?
Maybe we’ll all find out together in THE RABBIT HOLE, VOL. VI, currently slated (if all goes well) for a publishing date of late October — just in time for Halloween. With more to be here as it becomes known.
Royalties. Yes, they keep dribbling in (cf., e.g., June 24 et al.) — in this case actually for sales for 2023’s first six months. And despite, in the publisher’s own words, [s]ales were abysmal, but some — few — of you have money coming. Although I’m not really quite one of the “few” since, despite this latest take, it remains in the pot until there’s enough there to justify postage to send me a check.
Yes, “check” — as the publisher (who as is the custom will not be named here, nor will actual amounts, to avoid embarrassment all around) explains, PayPal surcharges are high enough these days to cut more than the stamps would.
But it all adds up, still. And these are for short stories, in this case collected for several different anthologies, but the point is that they’re shared with other contributing authors as well. Each of us with our own mite. But as I pointed out (the publisher asked for us to acknowledge receiving the report — after months and years sometimes addresses change), with poor sales especially it’s neat that there’s anything there at all.
And that’s the point, sort of. Few of us in the writing game make that much money — especially not from continued short fiction anthology sales — but there’s still bragging rights. Art, even for just art’s sake, is worth pursuing. And little dabs of money, repeated, given enough time may grow into piles.
It wasn’t supposed to be, this evening’s Bloomington Writers Guild’s First Wednesday Spoken Word (cf. July 5, May 3, et al.), due to the Labor Day weekend’s Annual Bloomington Arts Fair with its spoken word stage, except that a re-organization this year caused the spoken word stage part to not be held. There was still a Writers Guild booth at the Fair as well as its popular “Poetry on Demand” feature, but also as a result, the usually skipped otherwise-directly-following September Wednesday’s “Spoken Word” was reinstated in compensation, this time to be an all “Open Mic” session.
Following me so far? So also, in August, because of a later-evening event including Guild officers Joan Hawkins and Tony Brewer, the normal “First Wednesday” that month was cut short by omitting the Open Mic portion that evening (thus, also, no report here last month as I wasn’t a participant either).
So it evens out, sort of.
Or anyway, the”All Open-Mic Bloomington Writers Guild First Wednesday Spoken Word” session this evening at downtown Bloomington’s Backspace Gallery, perhaps in part due to its late-minute, cobbled-together nature, drew only ten people but of which eight were readers, which made for an appreciative if smallish crowd. And the smallness in turn meant that everyone had a chance to read twice which in my case, due to my having missed June’s regular session (a competing engagement) as well as the August non-session, and thus having two of my ongoing five-part “Casket Suite” tales of the plucky New Orleanian vampiresses, les filles à les caissettes — a.k.a. “Casket Girls” — still unread, I was able to read, first, a very-short part 4, “Shades of Difference” in which les filles discuss the color red and why it’s the vampiresses’ favorite color. And then in the “encore round,” the final fifth part, “What’s in a Name?” where Aimée laments that although she wishes to be loved by all, there are still some who insist on holding her being a vampire against her.
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(Note: Aimée, of course, takes pride in her raven-black hair; thus the illustration here perhaps being an informal portrait of Lo?)
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