Posts Tagged ‘Marge Simon’
Aimée et les filles à les caissettes, “Casket Girls” (cf. April 10), is now available to all readers in DAILY SCIENCE FICTION’s archives. Just go to the main site at www.dailysciencefiction.com and press “Recent Stories” on the left to find it, or, alternatively, one can reach it directly by pressing here. And while you’re at it, for those who don’t mind delving deep into the musty archives of years long past, two other 
stories of mine dwell within: “Naughty or Nice,” the tale of a Parisian vampiress’s Christmas adventure, and “Killer Pot” about, um, skin treatments for the twenty-first century — but with Victorian roots as well. Or, maybe the best thing to do is just read it. For these anyhow, go back to the DSF main page and this time put “Dorr” (or “dorr”) in the box on the right where it says “SEARCH.” (Hint: Don’t use “James Dorr” or “James S. Dorr” — through the magic of modern electronics you’ll get a scroll of every author with the name James, or in one case even just the initial J; similarly, while the titles of the stories will work, in the case of “Killer Pot,” you will first get a story called “Coffee Pot” — go figure).
Speaking of goofiness, it came to pass that after “Casket Girls” went to subscribers, fellow poet, artist, and sometime-commenter Marge Simon emailed me with the beginning lines of a poem honoring (in an admittedly silly, good-humored way) our Aimée, with an invitation for me, if I wished, to add a few more lines. I did and sent it back, she added a few more, I added a few more and thus “Aimee, the Casket Girl” was written. But that’s not all. We tossed around a few places we might send it, I suggesting one that had published another sort of silly poem of mine with an illustration by Marge a while back (see “Well-Dressed Vampiress Finds a Home,” July 27 2012). So it is that yesterday Barbara Custer of NIGHT TO DAWN e-mailed Marge back, “I’ve published James Dorr’s work before . . . [l]ove the one you did together and got a good laugh. I’d like to publish it in NTD 27.” And not only that, Marge may be supplying an illustration to go with this one too!
For horror poets and poets in general here are two announcements that may be of interest. The first is from the Horror Writers Association via David C. Kopaska-Merkel and the Science Fiction Poetry Association (excerpted from the HWA’s press announcement):
“To celebrate National Poetry Month, the Horror Writers Association will be holding their inaugural HWA HORROR POETRY SHOWCASE in April 2014. Open to all poets, the SHOWCASE will be accepting submissions throughout the month of April with four poems chosen by HWA member judges to be honored on the HWA website.
“We are looking for more than ‘blood, guts, worms,’ etc. Just being ‘icky’ isn’t enough. Poetry to fifty lines. Free verse preferred; no forced rhyme or cliches. Unpublished poems only (though previously published poets are, of course, welcome).
“Submissions will be accepted via Submittable from April 1-30, 2014 and all rights will remain with the poets. In addition, at the judges’ discretion, an electronic chapbook of qualifying poems will be considered for publication under the aegis of HWA. Each poem chosen for publication will be paid $5.
“For the 2014 SHOWCASE the judges will be Marge Simon, Peter Adam Salomon, and Jonathan Maberry.”
Then April is also the month of WRITERS DIGEST Poetry Editor Robert Brewer’s Poem-A-Day challenge (see November 1 2013, et al.), in which he supplies poets with a daily prompt to use as a springboard, resulting (for those who take the bait) in thirty new poems at least drafted by May. In my experience, some of these will be crummy, some good, and a lot potentially good with a bit of judicial rewriting — but rewriting is part of the game anyway. Perhaps more to the point, a number of poems I’ve written for these challenges have ultimately resulted in sales.
Brewer offers a similar daily challenge each November as well as, for the off-months, a weekly poetry prompt every Wednesday. For more information — or to try it out (it’s run as a part of Brewer’s regular blog, so more goodies may sometimes be found there too!) — poets may press here.
“Hunks” is now live in WHITE CAT MAGAZINE’s summer edition (cf 
May 29, 14), complete with a backstory set in the steamy, primitive jungles of French Guiana. Just can’t get away from that hot weather, can we? And not only that, in the same issue there is a story by long-time writer/artist/poet buddy and frequent blog commenter Marge Simon, “The Skyman’s Daughter,” for more yummy reading, dessert one might say, after you’re done with “Hunks.” (And there’s also even a Joe Lansdale story — how much can one take?)
WHITE CAT’s home page is at www.whitecatpublications.com, or, to taste “Hunks” directly, just press here (and dig in).
jamesdorrwriter 