Monday, December 30, 2013

Here's to 2014

2013 was a pretty decent year for me. Not much happened in my regular life, which is usually a good thing. But there were a few waves in my writing life, all of them good.

-In February my short story "The Dark Familiar Shapes of Things" was published in Sky Warrior Books' anthology, Tails of the Pack, and I conducted a series of interviews on this blog with the other authors.

- My novella "Hour of the Lotus" was published by Dreamspinner Press. Recently I also learned it won a Rainbow Award for excellent cover art, which is most definitely has, courtesy of the awesome Anne Cain.

- My short story "Dog of War" was accepted into The Bedlam Book of Horror, a horror anthology. No release date as of yet.

- I completed my second novel, currently untitled (because I suck at titles) and finished the second revision on it. My third revision will begin in January, and then it will be ready to go to publishers.

- The sequel to "Hour of the Lotus" finally presented itself to me, and the roughdraft should be finished any time now.

- I found three stories (honestly, probable novellas) I'd stalled on and once my current projects are finished I'll be turning my attention to them.

So, my resolutions for 2013 are to complete those three rediscovered stories (and begin the sequel to my second novel). I'll also be showing up at a couple cons next year, Conglomeration 2014 in Louisville, KY, and possibly Gencon in Indianapolis, IN.

As 2013 draws to a close, here's a photo of something else that's ending: a dying star caught by the Hubble space telescope. There's a whole big universe out there, friends. Let's keep our eyes open next year and see what we can see.




Friday, December 6, 2013

Scooby Doo and the Blob Monster

I live in the Southeastern Midwest (ha) and there's a huge storm predicted to hit us in a couple hours. Usually these Snowpocalypse predictions turn out to be nothing, but it looks like this one might be for real this time. We woke up to ice-encrusted trees and it's snowing pretty hard right now.

The stressful part of days like this is trying to keep a 4-year-old busy while trapped inside. We made gingerbread houses this morning (no, you don't get to see them, they look hideous). And then over lunch my son wrote a story (well, I wrote it. He dictated).

I present you, "Scooby Doo and the Blob Monster".