Announcement: Book deal & a new website

I can hardly believe this day is here, but I'm winding down this blogsite as of today. No more posts or updates will be going out.

Writer Alliance: Publishing Round-up!

I try not to do promo-type stuff very often, either for friends or myself, but I want to talk very briefly about my amazing online writer group. Good critique groups make all the difference in a long writing journey. I remember all too well the confusion and mild horror of sifting through one bad beta-read …

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On the peculiar joy of feeding trolls

Let's talk about Hairy Baguette.

Coming off submission: some thoughts

So much of an aspiring author's time (at least, for those aspiring towards trade publication) is taken up with querying. I can understand this, having been in the querying trenches last year (and the year before that). Doors open with agents, you might say, meaning it's natural to focus on such a big goal. Querying …

Query Construction: PAPERFLESH

A brief deconstruction of how I wrote the query/pitch letter for my current WIP. May be of use, or may not! Up to you 🙂

Best of British Science Fiction 2018 Anthology

"--Good." has been selected for the BBSF 2018 Anthology this year. It's a small thing in the scheme of things--just one story in a reprint market--but I'm still quietly happy and very honored to sneak on the list 🙂 Flash is sometimes a hard sell for big anthologies, and many flat-out don't accept fiction of …

Cardinal Query Sins: Wants Nothing, Does Nothing, Has Nothing

A Sinful Query Dear Agent Fullname, Light Yagami wants nothing more than to get through each day of his senior school year without dying of boredom. When a mysterious notebook finds its way into his hands, Light is intrigued by its magical properties. The notebook—called the Deathnote—has the power to kill anyone whose name is …

Examples of Successful Query Letters

via Examples of Successful Query Letters Original article by Ellen Brock, featuring an (older) version of my ANCHOR query, and the successful version of Essa Hansen's NOPHEK query.

How to Write a Query (with examples of real successful query letters)

via How to Write a Query (with examples of real successful query letters) Original article and video by Ellen Brock, professional independent editor, but her video also features the query for Anchor (my second MS), and for Nophek (a ms by my critique partner, Essa Hansen.)

Querying, submitting, and publishing: a daunting series of hoops

Here is an abbreviated list of hoops that a trade published book often jumps through (apologies to those for whom this familiar); finishing agent querying pitch to publishers request & first reads second reads acquisitions (itself a multi-stage process) offer & contract negotiations At every stage the book can die. For writing, it might never …

An introduction for writers looking to query literary agents

I wrote this as part of a general info post for a Facebook group I'm in. The level I’ve aimed at is introductory, so my apologies to those who are already well into the querying trenches; you can probably skip this. ### Basic Query Structure Info The query should be about a page in length, …

A long dark coffee-time of the soul (or, how I found a literary agent)

I remember greedily hunting down as many of these kinds of stories as possible when querying for the first time, so perhaps someone else will find my data points useful. Warning: this is a little bit long and has some of my usual swearing.

A year of short stories

About this time last year, I started trying to figure out how to write short stories (inspired in no small part by reading Darby Harn's short fiction via Absolute Write.) I wanted to know they worked, how the fit together, how writers managed to put complete arcs in such low word counts. Since last July, …