Category Archives: Publishing

Rejection!

I received a rejection letter today. It wasn’t of a literary variety, though, more of a monetary one, but it did get my brain thinking about rejection letters in general. It’s been a while since I’ve received one in regard to my work, not because I’ve been churning out some brilliant stuff, but because I haven’t been churning out much of anything. Short stories have always been difficult for me and I intend to self-publish most of my novels; eventually I might find one I’ll want to send out to be more traditionally published, though. Still, most of the rejection letters I’ve received have been fairly cut and dry. “Thank you for your submission, but we feel this piece is not a good fit for our publication. Best of luck with you endeavors/submitting it elsewhere.” Pretty standard, not very helpful or critical, but gets the point across. Generally, they give the impression that it wasn’t really a bad story, but it wasn’t a great story. They give the impression that almost anyone who didn’t get accepted got pretty much the exact same letter.

Apparently, though, not all rejection letters are created equal. My experience is fairly small; I haven’t sent out much, I’m ashamed to admit. But sometimes, especially in the good old days, rejection letters can get kind of personal. Check out this post from Cristian Mihai that’s collected a bunch of “famous” rejection letters from well-known authors. It’s pretty interesting stuff, and it almost makes me wish I did get rejection letters a little more scathing, because it almost feels like then they actually kind of care a little bit, you know?

Any good rejection letter stories out there?

When Writing Moves to the Back Burner…

Those of you who follow this blog will know that I was recently promoted in my field of work. It was a pretty big step up and, in this company, it’s usually a fast-track toward more promotions. They really weren’t kidding; I received some excellent news yesterday that I’m scheduled to attend their first management training of the new year in their Atlanta headquarters. This is a huge deal, and I’m extremely stoked to have the honor. It’s a thirteen day trip and, while there will be a lot of training and work to be done, there’s also a good deal of fun and networking involved, as well, and the company pays for travel and room and board. It’s a great chance to meet new people and hone my skills as a manager in the company, and hopefully speed up my transition in the next big step.

When I started working for this company two years ago, did I expect I would be making a career out of it? God, no. But it appears that it’s happening all the same. I’m glad for it; I like the product and the company and I really do enjoy a management position, as stressful as it can be. My only real gripe is the fact that all this success in the retail business has caused my progress in the writing business to take a huge blow. Between holiday retail madness and all these new responsibilities, the training course and the hopeful eventual next step, when do I find time to write? When do I find time to market my book? How in the world do I balance it all?

It’s going to be interesting. I was thinking about it yesterday and how, if I want to really strive to be everything they’re molding me to be, I need to really have my head in the game and focus on that job. This is the complete opposite position I was in last year, when I decided to drop one of my two jobs due to the first promotion, and really focus on my writing with the other job as nothing more than income. I can no longer do that. They’re paying for me to go and be a better person for their company; it’s the least I can do to dedicate myself to it a little more.

So what does that mean for writing? I’m certainly not going to quit; for me, quitting writing would be like quitting breathing. It’s just not possible. Even with the crazy holiday madness, I’ve been ensuring that I still manage to write at least a page of any given manuscript in progress every day. On days like today and tomorrow, which I blissfully have off, I hope to do a little more, as well as catch up with blogs and whatnot. But my dreams of pumping out two to three manuscripts a year are definitely going to have to go on the back burner.

And that’s okay. Life is all about accepting the changes that arrive and rearranging things to suit it. The writing will still happen; the books will still come. There’s plenty of time while I explore this unexpected but exciting journey my job is taking me on. Wish me luck!

Kill Two Birds with One Click!

For the Holiday Season, which is upon us in full swing despite the sad lack of snow outside of my window right now, you’ll have to forgive me a little bit of advertising. Or a lot more advertising to come, as I’m starting to try to get back into the swing of focusing on my writing career, suffering now due to the recent promotion in my actual career.

Either way, the holidays means gifts and, while I don’t have the resources to do much in the way of gifting, a really great gift to give your favorite independent author during this season is to buy a copy of their book for a friend. This way, not only do you make the author’s day by purchasing their work, but you’re also spreading the love to some other reader in your circle. It’s a gift that keeps perpetuating itself, too. The book reaches someone that the author might not have otherwise been able to reach out to, and, if they like the book, then they’re likely to reach out even further beyond the circle. It’s win-win!

Now, obviously, I’d want to encourage everyone to consider getting my own collection of short stories, Bowlful of Bunnies for a reader on your gift list. They’re short stories, so they’re sure to like at least one of them, and, if not, well, hey, maybe it will help them keep their Yule Log burning. See? Win-win!

So, please, if you’re wondering what you can get me for Christmas, there’s a real easy solution that might knock someone else off your list, too. Buy a copy of Bowlful of Bunnies, and it’ll leave me absolutely tickled and honored. And there might even be a gift for yourself in there, too. If I sell more copies, then I’ll be less tempted to make spammy promotional posts like this one in the future.

Win-Win-Win!

Art Nouveau and Aryneth.

One of the most notable after-effects of a trip to the Art Institute is that it never fails to inspire me to try my hand at art again. Now, writing has always been an obvious choice for me. I love it, I’m fairly good at it, I can’t imagine doing anything else with my life. However, I’ve also dabbled a little bit in other artistic forays, including drawing and such…nothing much, but I like to think I have a decent enough hand.

Decent enough to produce my own cover art? Probably not. Then again, I’ve been wondering about that recently, in light of seeing some covers out there that easily make me think, “I could do that/better than that,” if I may be so bold. While I’ll most likely turn all my cover art to friends more capable, the thought of at least sketching a draft for them to go off of has crossed my mind, and, heck, maybe with a little work, I could make it good enough myself.

In considering the potential covers for Serpent in a Cage and subsequent Aryneth novels, an interesting thought came to mind. I want something a little unique and different, and, to this point, I had been considering just a really simple, stark design, much like the designs for the A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin. But that wouldn’t be very different, would it? I got to thinking that I’ve never really seen Art Nouveau style covers for much of anything, much less fantasy novels, and thought that would be such a cool design.

What do you think? I’m a huge fan of art nouveau, though I’ve never tried the style myself. Last night, after my foray into the Art Institute, I got out my pencils and papers, pulled up some reference images on my Kindle, and started to sketch a few potential designs for SiaC. The one I really took to still needs a lot of work, but I’m really stoked about this approach, the cover to SiaC featuring a stunning design with Auferrix and a serpent in a sweeping art nouveau style, not dissimilar from this image.

Do you think this design is a good move? Would you be intrigued by a fantasy cover in this style, or turned off? I know it’s becoming pretty popular to see all sorts of characters done up in art nouveau style (I even own a nouveau Samus Aran shirt). Is it too much of a fad, or is the style classic enough that it can rise above the current popularity? Any thoughts would be welcome. I thought of taking a picture of the sketch so far, but it’s no where near completion enough, I’m afraid.

Faster, Pussycat, Kill, Kill!

Quite often, especially lately, especially in the insanity that is being upper management for retail during the hoilday season, I find myself wishing on thing more than others. I wish I could be a faster writer.

At the start of this year, when I really started to cling to the idea of self-publishing and really dive right in, my goal was to publish two books. With the idea of a collection of short stories to begin with, I was on a good, strong path, having published Bowlful of Bunnies about halfway through the year. I had several books in the works, and one was nearly halfway done, so it seemed like it would all fall into place that I might be able to finish a draft by November and get things edited and published before December 31st, easy peasy.

…mmm, well, turns out, not so much. I shouldn’t be surprised that I’m sitting here at the start of December with no second book in sight. Bowlful of Bunnies is the amalgamation of stories from as far back as eight years ago (though there was some new stuff in there, too); I’ve been working Serpent in a Cage for nearly ten years. I’ve started and restarted and restarted again too many books to count. Though I certainly have the imagination to think of several new books a year, I do not have the writing prowess to write several new books a year.

Nothing’s wrong with that, of course. Some people just aren’t quick writers. I still published a book this year. I’m going to shoot for two again next year, but if I’m just a book a year kind of author, that okay. The slightly frustrating part for me is just that I have so many books inside my head, but they come out at a snail’s pace and it’s all going to bottle-neck pretty soon here…

What are some of your tips, if you have any, for more speedy word wrangling? Are you a speedy writer, or a more languid wordsmith? When do you feel the words really fly for you, or do just let it go with the turtle-paced flow more often than not?

Either way, I have two days off right now, so here’s top hoping maybe I can push it a little bit further past my usual page-a-day. Wish me luck, and happy writing!

The 100 Books Project: Tune in Toyko.

“Oh, and Brad Pitt would not play me in the movie adaptation. Sandra Bernhard will.”


“Tune In Tokyo: The Gaijin Diaries” by Tim Anderson

The ghost of David Sedaris haunts the pages of Tim Anderson’s Tune In Tokyo. Okay, no, David Sedaris is (thankfully) not dead, but his own memoirs and experience in culture shock, especially in Me Talk Pretty One Day seemed to reverberate through the words written by Anderson, right down to the fact that Anderson, like Sedaris, is incredibly awkward, decidedly nerdy, and very gay. And while Anderson seems to trade out some of Sedaris’s wit and prowess with a little bit more blatant love for pole-smoking, the similiaries are still strong and make for a great, amusing memoir, while, at the same time, convincing me that, hey, if these two can do it, I can do it, too.

I mean, I’m pretty far removed from a sassy gay man in a long-term relationship living in a foreign country, but I’ve got a quirky story or two up my sleeve, too.

Anyway, though, enough about me. This is about Tune In Tokyo, not its ability to remind me of David Sedaris and wonder if I could write a collection of humorous vignettes about my own adventures in life and love. Tune in Tokyo is a great little book, filled with interesting stories that definitely reignited my interest in one day going over and visiting Japan. Having been a little bit of an anime nerd in my past, there wasn’t anything particularly shocking or surprising in any of Anderson’s culture shock adventure, but they were still quite entertaining and he writes with a deft humor that, while not always as on point as, say, David Sedaris, usually gets a grin out of me. One of my favorites is the tale of his visiting a student of his who is helping him with his Japanese, too, and the crises he meets as he tries to determine what is proper and polite in Japanese society and how it weighs against what he would like to do…and then an ultimate discovery that leaves him devastated after the fact.

In general, though, Anderson’s vignettes left me wanting more. Not necessarily in the sense that I wanted more of his work, but mostly just that I wanted a little more flesh to the stories. I wanted to know more about the cadre of friends that appear briefly on his adventures. Some of the stories end just as you feel they’re about to get started. You’re more often than not left with some misty haze of an experience rather than feeling as though the whole event has come about in a well-rounded and satisfying way. Having since taken a stab at a memoir-like story, I can understand that the worry about being too detailed and too drawn out can probably stay a pen pretty well, but I think Anderson could have given us more.

Ah, well. I guess I’ll just have to go there myself and take care of it that way, right?

Books read: 32/100.

And remember! There are still five days left in my Autumn Anthology Contest! The more entries I receive, the more likely the chances that the anthology will make it to print, so get those short stories and poems in! Pester your friends to submit their stories! Flood my inbox (ellis.engler@gmail.com) with tales that will make me not want to sleep tonight! You know you want to.

Oh, Here It Goes Again.

So, I’ve taken a little bit of a break from writing and from the blog to have some well-spent time with a friend, which I have a feeling I’ll be doing a lot of on the weekends if this new schedule that gives me Sundays off stays consistent. From what I hear, this is typical for the position I’m going to be taking a different store, so I’m pretty stoked about that. While there’s more work and demands and probably a likelihood of having to more on any given week, a certain regularity to when I’ll need to be there will be kind of nice. I’m definitely excited for it…

…but I’m also excited that it’s Monday and I have at least the week to try to get back into the swing of writing and get some work done there, too. It’s definitely going to be an exciting week on that front; I got a letter from Amazon regarding my first royalty check coming through, which should happen any time this week, so I can officially say I’m a published, paid, professional writer. Booyah.

I’m still running my Autumn Anthology contest, though I realized that ‘anthology’ was spelled wrong in the title of that particular post, which probably doesn’t help my street cred too much. That’s okay, though; I’m embracing my laziness about actually fixing it. There’s also been an exciting change! I will be accepting all of your short stories and poetry fit for a thrills and chills Halloween-esque anthology! Honestly, as I told the Writing Poetry Group on Facebook, I’m surprised I didn’t think of poetry. I think I’d love to accept any images, too, especially for a potential cover. So, send me your stories, your poems, your artwork or photography for consideration! You have until September 30th to submit! I can’t wait to see what you come up with, and be sure to share the contest with your friends, too!

Other than that, I’ll be plugging away at Serpent in a Cage, reading a lot (as usual!), and trying to get a grasp on what I want to do for NaNoWriMo. I really want to be proactive and go out to the get-togethers they were holding last year in Naperville that I was too shy or spastic or busy to attend last year. This is definitely going to be the year I finish NaNo! I am determined. Besides, it’ll be good to have a finished draft just in case it looks like neither the anthology or SiaC are coming out by the end of 2012 (since I did that whole ‘going to publish two books this year’ plan and everything). I know there’s another round of RoW80 starting soon, so I’ll have to access my goals there, too.

I’m also looking forward to catching up with everyone and their blogs, but if I’ve missed something good and interesting over the weekend, let me know! How’s everyone getting on? I can’t wait to get to work this week.

The “Look” Challenge.

Over at Frame Tale, Kate did a challenge post that she had come across that I just had to give a stab at myself. I love these little games, where you get the chance to showcase a little bit of your work. It’s also pretty useful for those days when you don’t have much else to write about, either.

So here’s how it works:

Take your current manuscript and find the first instance of the word “look”. Then post the surrounding paragraphs as an excerpt of the book on your blog. Lastly, tag five more blogging authors who you think would be a good choice for the game.

What I have typed of Serpent in a Cage right now is a hot mess; I’ve been doing my thing where I inflate the paragraphs to whittle down into more concise words later, but it didn’t seem fair to skip it entirely since a variation of the word “look” appears in the first page. However, I didn’t want to leave it at just a really rough draft, so I’m including Bowlful of Bunnies to it, too. Which also has a variation of “look” right at the beginning. Perhaps something I need to look into not doing so much…

Anyway, without any further ado, here’s a little snippet of Serpent in a Cage‘s rough draft, built around the word “look,” which so happens to be the beginning prologue, heavy and dense as it is in its current unedited state:

      “When she pulled her arm back, tearing the blade away from the soft, warm body, she just wanted it to be over. She wanted to collapse and close her eyes and finally rest, letting the weight of her steel drag her down to the floor, where she wouldn’t have to get up again until she was good and ready. The sweltering heat of the fire was almost as suffocating as the thick smoke that filled the air and choked her lungs, made her eyes sting and start to water. Overhead, the rafters strained with a loud, threatening crack, struggling to keep the roof held under the intensity of the heat. Underneath, there were pitiful groans from the scattering of bodies left for dead. It was a nightmare, something out of a hideous dream, and she just wanted to fall back and let it finally end. Close her eyes and perhaps, when she opened them again, it turned out it was all just a figment of twisted imagination after all.
      But she couldn’t stop. She had to keep focused, she had to keep moving. She had to find the others and make sure they were safe. Auferrix Ferrore gave her sword arm a quick jerk, shedding off some of the wet blood from the blade before it started to stick. Splatters of it landed in the fire and hissed like serpents.
      “Kadue!” she lifted her voice, calling out over the chaos and destruction. Smoke rushed into her lungs, and she gasped from the sudden pain, fighting against a cough. Scanning the area, looking for him, was useless; her eyes were so damp from the stinging smoke that they rendered her blind. She staggered forward, exhausted but determined. If only she could find a way out! In the fresh air of the cool evening, she could collect her thoughts and her wits. She could breathe and begin to see more clearly.
      The smoke was so dense, so thick, that she didn’t even notice the big, hulking man in front of her until she had practically collided into him. She stopped just short of contact; he has his arms lifted over his head, ready to plunge his axe down into a figure on the ground. Panic swelled inside of her as she realized she had no idea if the attacker was one of her own or one of the enemy, but if she did not act, the person on the floor would be just as dead. She moved on instinct, trusting her gut feeling and praying to the gods that she was right. It was justice; it was defending those who could not defend themselves, not matter what their position in this crazy war might be.
      “Firae, give me strength,” she whispered, as she always did before she braced herself for an attack. The axe started to fall, but it didn’t get far. Every action except the bulging of the man’s eyes stepped suddenly as Auferrix drove her blade firmly through his shoulder blades, through his heart, and then out on the other side. The tip dinted against his armor, and she yanked her blade out again.
      A moment passed where the man seemed to be suspended only by the last thin thread of Life, and he fell into a crumpled mass at Auferrix’s feet. She looked down on the poor, lifeless bastard, feeling only a small bit of pity while the heat swelled behind her with a crackle of fallen wood. After nudging the body with her toe, he thrust out her hand to the cowering person she had just saved, hoping she had slain the right one.
      “Come on,” she ordered, firmly, but hurriedly. The smoke had cleared enough that she could now recognize the face gawking up at her. Not his name, but definitely the person, the owner of the tavern they were in, the owner of the tavern burning down into a bloody rubble around them. She closed her eyes a moment to thank the gods and pushed her hand closer when he didn’t grab it. He was in a state of shock, that much was clear, having expected to be cleaved in half by the man between them. Auferrix barked out her next words to get him back to reality. “We have to get you out of here.”

And, as a bonus, here are a few paragraphs surrounding the first instance of “look” in Bowlful of Bunnies, which happens at the beginning of the first story, Dragon Rising, which means it’s nothing special because it’s exactly what you’d read in the book preview, lol:

     Possum, Rabbit, and Prairie Dog had all gone to the river to do the washing, and I had followed to watch them. The sun was bright in the cornflower sky, and hot, so after they had dunked the clothes in the gentle rushing stream, after they had scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed, they laid them out on the big flat rocks that had been soaking up the sun’s heat. There, the clothes would dry, basking like salamanders, and the girls would splash around in the water themselves, laughing and playing, tossing handfuls at each other until they were drenched and cooled. Then they, too, settled down in the long grass, turned their browned faces toward the sun and soaked it up.
     Quiet and still, I crouched next to a boulder too tall and round to be used for drying, underneath a fern for further shelter. I curled my tail in, which was the only way I could prevent it from twitching happily at the serenity of the scene. They had no idea I was watching; the three of them were such pleasure seekers that they had none of the carefulness and caution of their friends, who would have surely caught me. Rabbit was perhaps the most skittish of them, and her bright brown eyes flicked my way on occasion, her pert little nose wrinkling as it tried to pick up the scents carried on the wind. Mostly, though, it was just the sweet grass and the soap still floating by on the river, the fresh linen and the lavender flowers from up the hill.
     She looked at me at least three times, straight at me, without seeing me. My ears pressed back with the pleasure of my successful camouflage. The others wouldn’t even believe me when I told them that I was peering into the intimate, quiet respite of these three bright-eyed girls, knowledge so valuable that I would instantly be skyrocketed up in their ranks. If only Deer and Fox had laundry duties today! They, out of all the girls in the village, were easily the most eagerly sought after. Next time, perhaps I should try my stealth in the kitchens or the temples to see what other wonderful things girls did when they were alone, but I couldn’t imagine anything as splendid as their splashing and laughing, their hair catching in the sun as they tossed it freely around.
     And then they began to talk.

So there you have it. Apparently, “look”s appear pretty quickly in my work, and I hope you all enjoyed this…look (ah-ha!) of Serpent in a Cage. Don’t forget, I’ve got a really cool scary story/mystery contest running until the end of September. I’ll even give you a new prompt with the following picture, found at favim.com, accompanied with the word “clandestine“:

And, lastly, I have a few new subscribers! Hooray! So a shout out and a thank you to Meghan Elizabeth, Amber West, and Cheryl Moore! So good to have you all along!

An Autumnal Antholgy Contest.

After giving it some thought, I’ve decided that I’m going to go ahead and do it. I’m going to hold a writing contest. This thought seems new and strange to me, though, really, it shouldn’t, since I produced an anthology for my writing group in college, though that wasn’t so much of a contest as all of us submitting our best work to show off. Still, the idea of asking people to submit their work so that I can cleave their blood, sweat, and tears into a collection under my publishing brand seems like a pretty weighty and presumptuous task. But you know what? I’m going to do it anyway. I know I leap at the chance to try to get into these sorts of things when they crop up; why wouldn’t other people be the same?

So I’m here to announce the opening of my contest to build a great Autumnal anthology of stories in horror and mystery genre. The idea was inspired by my roommate, who suggested I put together a collection of stories to be released on Halloween after yet another inspiring episode of SyFy’s FaceOff. Knowing fully well how I work, I knew I couldn’t put together a few stories (much less more!) by the time Halloween rolled around, so I thought perhaps I could get one or two stories out, and the rest can be filled in with the works of other people. I really love the idea of throwing together an anthology of stories, and I knew I wanted to do one eventually, so why not now?

Why not now, indeed! So here’s how it works. Submissions will be accepted between Wednesday, September 12th and Sunday, September 30th. I know this isn’t a very long contest, but hopefully it’s not so short that my readers and fellow writers won’t have something to submit. All submissions must be in short story format, though there will be no word count limits. Anything from flash fiction to just short of a novella will be considered. The only restriction is genre. This is a Halloween collection, so please submit your best scary stories, ghost stories, murder mysteries, or anything else that might be suitable for a collection intended to thrill and chill.

Submissions will be reviewed through the first week of October, and the slated publication date for the anthology will be October 31st, 2012. Unfortunately, at this time, I cannot offer monetary compensation for winners of the contest, but I will gladly reward winners with several print copies when they are ready (I would offer ebook copies, but I’m still not sure how to do those free yet). Hopefully, this is a great chance to get some work published and out there, even if in a small and fledgling little compilation.

Please email submission to ellis.engler@gmail.com in a Word doc or Text file. Every day of the contest (or just about), I’m planning on posting a prompt if you’d like inspiration. I’d love to have the submissions be inspired by the prompts, but it is not a prerequisite for eligibility. Stories that do take advantage of the prompts, however, will likely have a higher chance in consideration.

Submit as many stories as you’d like. If you really want to wrestle the challenge and get mega accolades, take on the challenge of writing a story for each prompt! This aspect of the contest is inspired by the contest Morgan Dragonwillow ran a while ago; I think I made it through a week before I fell out of the “story every day” part, but, boy, even if that anthology didn’t take off, a lot of really great stories came out of it! So challenge yourself, even if you’re not going to submit, because you never know what might come out of the efforts.

In the event that I feel there is not enough material submitted to warrant an anthology, I will instead choose to honor those who did offer up their work in some way on the blog.

In the meantime, let’s start with the prompt that started it all, from the Pirate episode of Sy Fy channel’s wonderful special effects make-up show, Face Off. The following image is the brilliant work of Sarah Elizabeth. And, the “inspirational” word to go along with it, to be used by itself or in conjunction with the image, will be “urchin.”

Happy writing! I can’t wait to see what everyone comes up with!

RoW80 Check-In: More Like a Catch-Up.

“‘I smell Ssark on the wind,” Tayahyla said, her face made of stone. ‘That reek is unmistakeable, a hunting party, though a small one. Still, we’d better move quickly before they start taking to the idea of Human flesh to break their fast.’”

As you may have realized, not only did I skipp Sunday’s Round of Words in 80 Days post, but I’ve also missed a few regular days of posting in between. Sometimes, it happens. Sometimes, it happens especially because a person’s life is so busy she barely has time to do anything else except what’s going on. There’s been socialization. There’s been print copies to review. There’s been a trip to Michigan to plan. There’s been a lot of stuff at work. Oh, yeah, and there was a Labyrinth party.

Needless to say, I’ve been pretty busy. RoW80 is the writing challenge that “knows you have a life,” and that’s definitely become evident these past few weeks for me. So particular goals have gone right out the window, and I’ve been working more on vague projects instead. Here’s a look at what I’ve got going on and, once things settle a little, will have coming up:

-Serpent in a Cage: I’m plugging along at SiaC as usual. I’m just heading into a battle scene, which moves things along nicely, but shortly after this is another battle scene, and then that leads us into the BIG battle scene, and I wonder if it’s almost too much action. There’s stuff happening in between, though, so I guess I’ll see when it’s written! Since my trip requires a six hour train ride, I’m hoping to really blow through the rest of this chapter later today when there’s little else to do but watch the scenery fly by.

-Bowlful of Bunnies: The second print proof for BoB came in yesterday and it is perfect, so I’m estatic and excited and wish I had more time to sit down and actually formulate a marketing approach for it, but I’ve had no such time. I know I want to do some contests, maybe a give-away, that sort of thing, so planning that is on the agenda for my little “retreat,” too. It’s currently available at the CreateSpace store here for $5.99 USD, with eventual Amazon listing to follow in a few days. It looks phenomenal. I couldn’t be happier. And I’ll bet you’d be hard pressed to find cuter page markings than these ones, too.

-Potential Anthology: In a conversation with my roommate, the subject of a special, brief Halloween horror anthology came up briefly, and I’ve been toying with the idea of making it a contest instead of just a collection of whatever I could clomp together before October 31st. I still need to hash out a few details, but I would love to know if this would be something anyone would be interested in. You could submit whatever, there’d likely be a Kindle and print version, and there may be daily or occasional prompts for inspiration, ala the contest Morgan Dragonwillow ran not too long ago that had left me so inspired. Thoughts would be appreciated! If I decide to go for it, I’ll likely have more information available next week.

Those are the main three writerly things that have been occupying my mind in the (very) rare moments lately when I have time. Even today is jam packed with stuff (laundry! cleaning the cat box! job interview! packing! get to the train station on time!), but I’ve made myself take some time to do a little scribbling and a little reading, because I’ve missed the chance to do that and I’m so looking forward to this train ride at four so that I can do nothing but just sit and relax. Ahhhhh.

Still, I won’t complain. It’s been an awesome last few weeks, and I definitely can’t gripe about a day that includes the arrival of a perfect print proof and a phone call I’ve been waiting about for an interview for a promotion, with a brief little “mini-vacation” to follow. Life’s pretty good right now. A whirlwind, but I’m willing to let it sweep me up.

Needless to say, I haven’t been able to keep up with my fellow RoWers lately (though you can do so easily here). How is everyone else doing? Are you planning to get in some Happy Writing?