2012: Writing Year in Review

Written This Year

Novels: Zero, I'm sorry to say. I did a lot of editing on Fire in the Belly and Throne of Nightmares but grad school really prevented me from making much progress. I think I might have added another 10k words to King's Hand.

Shorter Stuff: Relatively more success on this front, perhaps because shorter stories are ideal for picking up and putting back down while dealing with horrible grad student things.
Flash: 5 (spoiler: I still suck at flash)
Short Stories: 12 (six of which I wrote during the Clarion Write-a thon, one I wrote today!)
Novellettes/Novellas: 2 (just finished the rough of The Ugly Tin Orrery!)

Consigned to the trunk of awfulness, never to return:  None yet this year, but there are two that I'm giving the stink-eye that might be vanishing once I have the brain power to look over them better and do more editing.

Best/favorite story of the year: Comes the Huntsman, no question. It was an intense story to write, and I'm still very proud of it. It was also published by Strange Horizons, which has been a personal dream of mine!

Considering last year I wrote well over 200K words, by any measure my productivity has been much, much lower this year. To the point that I started getting a bit weird about it back in October because I hadn't gotten to just write fiction in what felt like so long.

On the other hand I've written two drafts of a Masters Thesis, so I think that should count for something.

Publishing
Queries sent: 102
Rejections received: 72
Most rejections received: For just this year, A Crack in the Mirror is leading with 10. For all time (discounting Throne of Nightmares) Entangled had 18 when it was accepted for publication by Specutopia.

This was an amazing year for me for publishing. I had four sales, two of which were pro-level, and signed the contracts for five novellettes/novellas, only one of which I had already written. The two pro sales this year kicked me over to three total, which means I get classified as a professional writer. That was incredibly exciting as well, and Comes the Huntsman was the story that did that for me.

Published this year:

• Entangled in Specutopia (which seems to have vanished, I'm sorry to say)
• Comes the Huntsman in Strange Horizons
• The Jade Tiger in Penumbra

Slated for 2013: 

• Hyperion from Scape
• A return of The Jade Tiger in the Best of Penumbra Anthology
• Murder on the Titania from Musa Publishing
• The Ugly Tin Orrery from Musa Publishing
• The Curious Case of Miss Clementine Nimowitz and Her Exceedingly Tiny Dog from Musa Publishing
• Blood in Peyote Creek from Musa Publishing
• Do Shut Up, Mr. Simms from Musa Publishing

Stories put online this year: 

• Infection 
• The Last Lighthouse

Unless Specutopia reappears, once I've run out the six month exclusive period in the contract, I think I'll probably put Entangled online here to be read for free in February. It's a story that I really like and I don't want it to just vanish. 

Also, I'm hoping to get back to my little fanfic habit once the thesis is done and I have spare time again. I'll be working a real, 40 hours per week job for the first time in five years, but I'm pretty sure I'll still have more spare time then than I do now. 

Goals for 2013: 

• Finish King's Hand
• Finally get representation nailed down for at least one of my novels
• Work with Kat on our joint project and get it done!
• Write another birthday story in February for Mr. T.H.; an important goal for me because the one last year turned out so stunningly well I'm terrified another attempt won't produce anything at all good. 
• Keep the novellettes rolling in on time to Musa and be faithful to my contracts there.
• Finish editing the stories I wrote for this year's Clarion Write-a-thon
• Participate in the Write-a-thon again
• Be generally more productive than I was this year, since I'll no longer have a thesis hanging from my neck like a stone.
• Flash fiction - how the fuck does it work?

A relaxing day in Cambridge

Spent today bumming around Cambridge with our friend Dan. We've now hit the pub by his place (the Green Dragon) twice for dinner, and it's been pretty good both time. There is this thing they do that involves a steak covered with cheese and we really don't need to get more deeply into it than that.

It was a grey day, but it's basically been nothing but grey days the entire time we've been in the UK. The Cam was very swollen, up onto the natural banks in places, which is not good. The sluice gate at Jesus Lock was partially open, which kicked up an impressive sediment plume in the water. There was also quite a bit of standing water in the various commons we passed by, shallow little ponds with park benches and trees sticking up out of them.

There were quite a few house boats parked along the river banks, many of them complete with cats. One of the cats was a very seriously little orange tabby who came up onto the path to be petted by us. (We didn't see him later when we came back, post-rain-storm, but there was a cat flap in the door of the boat so we figure he was safe and dry). There was also a pretty grey and brown tabby who had a lot to say to us, and a very quiet black cat who seemed well aware of the fact that there were swans not five feet from him on the other side of the boat.

We did most of our walking when it wasn't really raining much, and sat out the worst of the storm while having coffee at a little Italian cafe.

Pictures here.

Congratulations, Maine

Same-sex marriage was legal in Maine as of midnight tonight, with couples lining up to receive their marriage licenses first thing in the morning. Maine was one of the three states that approved same-sex marriage by popular vote this year; the other states that have legal same-sex marriage were all made so by the legislature or judicial decision.

I'm really happy for the loving couples in Maine that will now be able to marry. Seeing pictures from Maine, from Washington have just put me in joy overload. When you see other people who are that happy, there is no way to avoid feeling happy yourself, and maybe getting a little teary-eyed because your heart just overflows.

And feel the tide turning.

Straw men

This is a term I've used in the past on my blog, and I bet most if not all of you already know what this is. But just in case, let's cover it briefly, because this is something anyone who has, say, ever watched a politician speak ought to understand.

A Straw Man is a logical fallacy. If you're not familiar with logical fallacies, there's an excellent summary over at the Skeptic's Guide to the Universe, which is worth reading. In summary, a logical fallacy is an incorrect argument, normally due to an error in logic or rhetoric, and either purposeful or accidental. There's a massive list of formal fallacies, because certain errors just pop over and over again in argument.

Straw man tends to evoke the image of soldiers bayonetting straw dummies, and it's used for a reason. In the straw man logical fallacy, instead of arguing against your opponent's actual position, you make up an entirely different, misrepresentative position, one that's normally a lot easier to attack, and then argue against that instead. Politicians do it all the time by putting words in their opponent's mouth or purposefully misinterpreting something they've said.

I've attempted to come up with some real world examples, but feel free to offer your own in comments, or correct me if I've made a mistake.

• Just about any politician ever who has claimed that anyone opposed to Law X just wants to maintain the status quo. George W. Bush did that when he argued for No Child Left Behind, Obama did it for the Affordable Care Act. While some opposition comes from wanting to keep things as they are no doubt, there were plenty of people opposed to both because they thought they didn't go far enough (hey, wouldn't it be awesome to have single payer?) or that it went about things the wrong way (way to require mathematically impossible rates of success in testing!) and cogent arguments to that effect.
• Arguing against feminism because we're all just a bunch of man hating bra-burners who want to put a matriarchy in place is one that happens all the time. So often, in fact, the Straw Feminist is a trope. 
• Just about anything to do with the Fox News fictional "War on Christmas." (Example here.) I would argue that the entire concept of the "War on Christmas" is a straw man, since it's a characterization of people wanting to destroy the holiday when basically the evil opposing forces (anyone who says "happy holidays" and atheists for the most part) most commonly want to make the holiday season inclusive for all faiths and/or feel that the government shouldn't be promoting a particular flavor of religion.
• A popular one currently is to characterize any discussion of regulations on guns as an attempt to ban all guns forever. I've gotten hit with that on both my post Sandy Hook massacre blog posts; note in neither do I say anything about banning guns entirely.

Logical fallacies are a powerful, useful tool. Two things you need to keep in mind however:

1. Just because an argument contains a logical fallacy does not mean that the conclusion will necessarily be false. Sometimes someone with shitty logic still gets to a correct conclusion. Also, sometimes people will purposefully commit these fallacies as a rhetorical device, so be cautious of that as well. 
2. Just because you know the logical fallacies does not mean you are immune to committing them yourself. I know I've fallen victim to their siren call in the past. So don't let it get to your ego, okay?

You may not have noticed, but I cuss a lot

People who have read my blog for a while may have noticed that I use rather... salty language. In the past, I've been accused of having a mouth like a trucker. Can't say it's wrong. And think about this - I actually cuss way less than I did about five years ago. Having a little niece that I adore to bits has had the effect of making me more aware of what I say and how I say it, as has just being a writer.

But here's something else you should know. When I cuss in writing, I mean it. The occasionally f-bomb might trip unthinkingly from my lips, but those four letters don't just type themselves. I have in the past actually gone over my blog posts and carefully rearranged the bad words, sometimes adding, sometimes subtracting.

Because words have meaning. And curse words have a great emotional, emphatic load to them, which is why I use them.

My opinions are my own, and when I'm on my own time and my own dime, I will express them in the way I find most effective. On my blog, no one else gets to dictate the terms of this debate. And if someone determines the worthiness of an opinion based solely on their judgment that the language is sufficiently elevated, they have my pity. Pretty prose can be window dressing for an ugly idea, but no matter how much frosting and fondant you put on a cake made from manure, that doesn't change the fact that it's still something that passed through the anus of a large mammal.

It drives me batty when I see people mix up your/you're and they're/there/their, for example. But if the worst criticism I can think of someone's argument is that their grammar is terrible (presuming that their grammar is not so horrific that I can actually understand what they're saying) then I have already lost. "Oh yeah? Well, you're ugly!" stopped being a worthwhile debate tactic upon leaving grade school. It just means that you actually have nothing of worth to add but still want to wave your verbal fists in impotent, angry disagreement.

You don't like my opinion? Fine. You don't like my opinion because I scorched your delicate ears with my use of the f-bomb? I mean this in all sincerity: get the fuck over it.

A baseball bat is never an acceptable debate tactic

Check this one off on the list of internet firsts for me - I had a complete stranger state he'd like to "challenge me" with a baseball bat to my head because he didn't like my opinion on Wayne LaPierre being a horrible person. (Well, actually, he didn't like a straw man of my opinion about gun control, but that is a subject for a different time.)

Straw man or no, why does the initial reaction involve talking about perpetrating blunt force trauma on a complete stranger and not a I think you [optional: you moron] are totally wrong and this is why?

This should go without saying, but it's not okay to engage in a public violent fantasy just because you disagree with someone. And immediately trying to excuse it by adding something to the effect of, "but I totally wouldn't because I'm not actually a violent person" doesn't make it any better. You still said it. You can't put the toothpaste back in the tube or unring the bell, pick your metaphor. Someone taking about baseball bats in one sentences and being a totally nonviolent person hahaha in the next is really not something that inspires me to trust the latter of the two opposing statements; it's smarter to assume the worst because otherwise you could potentially, I don't know, get hit in the head with a baseball bat. 

If you didn't mean it, why the hell did you say it?

Frankly, at that point it just feels like a pathetic little fig leaf. Maybe it should be followed up with a "wow you're humorless can't you take a joke?" since that's classic. I can almost see that as something you'd joke about with people you know. I've "threatened" to punch a friend or two of mine in the cock, for example, and it was all good because everyone involved knew it was a joke. Because we're all friends.

I am under no illusions that this person would actually take a baseball bat to me. To begin with, they don't know me, let alone know where I live. And frankly, talk is incredibly cheap, particularly on the internet where you can say shit like that and never have to look the other person in the eye. That said, it still upset me. It made me angry enough that my hands shook.

"Joking" or "speaking metaphorically" about hurting someone else isn't a way to engage them in reasoned discourse salted with facts or even hyperbolic posturing. Bullshit talk about violence feels incredibly personal because things like that happen to real people, and it reads as an attempt at intimidation. It adds nothing to discussion. It cuts discussion off with an opening position that is hostile and devoid of reason.

So no. It's not okay. It's never okay.

This is the most damning thing, I think. I haven't done it recently, but I'm 99.9% certain in the past I have said things along that vein, most likely related to wishing I could punch a politician or two in the face. I've now come to the conclusion that if I have made even vaguely threatening statements before, that was wrong, and I deeply regret it.

Joking with your friends is not the same as showing your ass on the internet and talking about a complete stranger that may some day soon read your statement. Words have meaning. I've committed to not saying things I don't mean.

And I'm going to grow the fuck up.  

Liveblog of the 2012 Doctor Who Christmas Special

Yes, I am in England, which means I get to see it before most of my friends HAHAHAHA

Needles to say, SPOILERS.

Slimbridge Wetland Centre

So, it actually stopped raining for about an hour and a half, which is amazing. I know I like to give the UK a lot of shit about being rainy and having no sun or blue sky, but this year has been kind of ridiculous and now I'm regretting all that teasing I've done.

But yes! Sun! Or at least lack of rain! Fresh air! We went to Slimbridge Wetland Centre, which is a little reserve for aquatic birds. I'm not much of a bird person (though I think my parents would love it) but I still had fun seeing all the pretty and exceedingly talkative animals.

Have some photos.

By the way, this cute little guy? Is a Nene, which is a goose from Hawaii. Apparently they breed them here in captivity and send them back to Hawaii. But if you go to Slimbridge, get used to this sight. They're always there, watching you with their cute, black button eyes. And there are always two of them. Weird. Eerie. Cute.

The Woman in Black

And I don't mean the movie with Daniel Radcliffe. I meant to see that when it came out and never got around to it, then I heard it was a bit crap anyway. I think I will see if I can catch it on Netflix or something now so I can compare it to the play.

Since the play is what I saw.

Mike and I decided that we wanted to go see a show while we were in London, since we'd never gotten to do that before and were staying the night. We stopped by Leicester Square around 3 in the afternoon, which I was a little worried about since I heard you should go early. We checked the list of shows and decided to go for The Woman in Black first, since it's been a long time since we've seen anything that wasn't a musical.

I'm really happy we spent the money to see it, and so was Mike. There are only three characters in the play - Arthur Kipps, the Actor, and the Woman in Black. I'm amused that the Woman in Black isn't on the cast list for the website, which really is in keeping with how they presented her in the play, where she isn't supposed to actually exist except as an ill omen. At the end she got to do her bow by appearing behind the translucent curtain across the stage briefly, with spooky lighting.

The play was scary. I haven't actually seen a scary play before, and didn't expect it to actually be as scary as it was. There were a lot of jump scares in the play, which I did sort of expect, but the real fright was the continual build up of dread, which the jump scares just served to punctuate. Dread would build,  then there'd be a loud noise and people in the audience would scream, then sort of try to laugh off, but then the dread would just start again. It was excellent.

I was actually having some sleepiness issues because I'm still fighting through jetlag. I fell asleep during  intermission (trying to power nap since I was fading fast) and was having a hard time waking up... until the first scary thing happened about three minutes into the second act, and then I was awake and the thought of sleep didn't return until we were on the way back to the hotel.

This also reminded me that I just really like to watch plays rather than musicals, and I should do it more often. Hopefully it'll be something I can do regularly once I'm settled in to the new job. Plays are very different from movies, and in a way that I thoroughly enjoy.

I see that there's also a tour, but it looks like it's just staying in the UK. I hope there's a production of the play in Colorado at some point soon. I really think that Kat and Ivona would like it, and I'd love to see it with them.

Liveblog of Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale

So apparently this is a thing. Which I have been lucky enough to find on British television at 0200, and how can you say no to cannibal Santa Claus?

We join our show, already in progress. Any mistakes in detail, please forgive because it's early in the morning and the movie is subtitled in English with dialog in Finnish.