Coming Soon: Of Flesh and Bone

It's almost here, folks! Of Flesh and Bone, the final book in the Touch trilogy is coming in July from Falstaff Books. And that means.... a brand new cover. (And it's especially shiny.)

Are you ready?

Delaney Green may have found her way back to the living, but her new body isn't going to last. Without magic, and still separated from Percy, she is forced to rely on the tangled memory of what might be to find a way to reclaim her bones. With the help of an old ally, and the reluctant assistance of new enemies, Del takes the final steps down a long road home. 

I will at LibertyCon this weekend (Jun 30 - Jul 2), but stay tuned for more details and some exciting announcements coming soon. 

Coming Up For Air

Every now and then you get a year that's just full of stuff - both good and bad.

This spring I've managed to deal with the flu, a lingering (think 2+ months) cough, a head cold, and a fractured rib.

I also finished up two drafts Of Flesh and Bone, the final Touch novella. Plus managed to crank out 13k in a week on the Monster Society novella that will be featured in the forthcoming anthology with Eric S. Brown and Robert Waters, in order to get it turned in a month early. (In addition to a brand new, never-before-seen novella, the anthology includes all of the short stories about the Monster Society previously published in The Grantville Gazette.)

I had a point, shortly after finally getting over the flu which knocked me out for two solid weeks, where I was frustrated because I felt like I hadn't gotten anything done. And then I sat down and looked at what I had written and realized that I already had almost 80k under my belt between Christmas and the middle of April.

(Oh, yeah. Did I mention finishing up revisions on the Epic Not Fantasy? There was that too and I am waiting on pins and needles for it to find a home so you can all read it because it might just be my favorite book yet.)

But, as we head into Memorial Day weekend - and near the middle of the year - I am trying to take stock of what I've accomplished and what's still to come.

My remaining big conference of the year is LibertyCon at the end of June. (I know, I know. I would love to make it to more cons too, but finances don't currently allow me to travel very far.) The plan is to be able to share both the Monster Society anthology and the completed collection of the Touch trilogy with y'all by then. And if that doesn't happen, then they should be available shortly afterward. (And Of Flesh and Bone will also be available as an individual ebook as well for those that have been buying the novellas as they have been released. The advantage of the collection is that it will be available in print, for those that don't like reading on a screen.)

In addition to both of those novel-length collections, I have two novelettes coming out end of June and early July. I've been teasing the cover of the first (Jacquelyn and the Sparkly Emo Vampire Goat) on Twitter and my Facebook author page, but I'll be doing a more detailed write-up here in a few days. [SparkleGoat is currently available for preorder on my Gumroad page, but I'm still finishing up some details on the second book, Mothers Last Child, and would like to put them both up here together.]

Suffice to say, if you are looking for more of my work, it's coming very soon. But, due to the repeated health issues and the sheer volume of work I've been tackling, I've not had much of a chance to talk about any of it here. Or much of anything else.

That's about to change though as I am working on getting all the pertinent covers and links, etc together. So, please stay tuned.

There's a lot of great stuff coming.

Make an Author Happy on Her Birthday

Hey, folks. So, today I am celebrating 38 years on this planet. If you want to celebrate with me, you can make me very happy by buying one of my books.

"Eleven stories about love, survival, and the depths of the human heart. Eleven worlds – some remarkably similar to our own, some dramatically different. From the clammy dungeons and mysterious rooftops in "The Spider Thief and the Sorcerer" to the muddy, voodoo protected shores of Lake Ponchartrain in "Legacy" to the highrise slums of Venus in "The Weather's Always Fine in Paradise", this collection of short stories will take you out of the everyday world and into the realm of 'what if'? What if magic and knowledge were things that could be leased and reclaimed? What if voodoo could open a woman's heart to the possibility of love? What if the things that mattered most were not things at all? Explore the possibilities in this collection of eleven stories from A.G. Carpenter."

Paperback available through Gumroad  or Amazon

Kindle version through Gumroad

Nook/eReader version available through Gumroad, Barnes & Noble, and Kobo

 "Delaney Green is one of them that don't burn. Possessed of the Touch - with the ability to not only see the future but manipulate it - she's been kept in an institution for most of her life. When the Salesman, a murderous entity with a connection to Delaney's past, starts burning girls to death, FBI Agent Percival Cox gives her the chance to leave the asylum behind. But he presents an even greater threat and she must risk flesh and bone in order to keep him from becoming a Power more destructive than the Salesman. "

Available on Amazon for Kindle

Nook/eReader version available through Kobo, and Barnes & Noble

"Delaney Green might be dead, but she don’t mean to stay that way. As she searches for a way back to the realm of the living, and the man she lay down flesh and bone for, Percival Cox and his team investigate a series of deaths and stolen souls. But Percy is not the man he used to be. If Del can’t find a way to stop him from waking his past, he could destroy everything, including himself."

Available from Amazon for Kindle

Nook/eReader version available from Barnes & Noble, and Kobo

Award Eligibility: 2016

Hey, folks.

My publication activity this past year is pretty simple.

I self-published a collection of short stories in February - The Weather's Always Fine in Paradise. Of the stories in that collection, two were previously unpublished. (The others were all reprints from my semi-pro/pro sales in previous years.)

These two are all shorts and eligible for awards where the criteria is "published between Jan 2016 - December 2016". 
Made
The Weather's Always Fine in Paradise

If you are interested in reading any of these for consideration, I am offering a free eBook copy on request. You can reach me via email annagrace(dot)carpenter(at)gmail(dot)com

Also published in 2016 was my Southern Gothic/Horror/Dark Fantasy novella - Of Lips and Tongue. If you are interested in a copy for consideration please contact my publisher, John Hartness, at Falstaff Books - john(at)falstaffbooks(dot)com or contact me at the email address above.

There are also several short stories that were published in the Grantville Gazette which I co-wrote with Eric S. Brown.
 - An Army of Scarecrows
- The Monster Society: Snowbound
- The Lost Monster

The Monster Society stories can be read for free via the above links. 

New Release!

Today I have good news. Of Lips and Tongue, the first novella in the Touch trilogy, is available on Amazon.

Delaney Green is one of them that don't burn. Possessed of the Touch - with the ability to not only see the future but manipulate it - she's been kept in an institution for most of her life. When the Salesman, a murderous entity with a connection to Delaney's past, starts burning girls to death, FBI Agent Percival Cox gives her the chance to leave the asylum behind. But he presents an even greater threat and she must risk flesh and bone in order to keep him from becoming a Power more destructive than the Salesman. 


 

Ups and Downs (Update 11.5.14)

It's November and that means that the NaNoWriMo hashtag is trending on Twitter and writers of every stripe are hunkered down working on banging out a minimum of 1667 words a day.

Of course, for some November is an awkward month to try and hit 50k in 30 days. The end of the month has the opening of the holiday season. For folks in school there are exams and the impending end of the year crush of papers and projects. But, many of us take up the challenge even knowing that we won't likely make the goal because life. 

I first participated in the National Novel Writing Month in 2008. It was a spur of the moment thing. Although I had heard of NaNo before, I had always missed it by a few weeks (or been months too early). As it was, I thought I had missed it again and was delighted to realize it was NOT in October but November. I had a rough plot and no idea how to write something that long, but I plunged in anyway and produced the really awful first draft of what would eventually take shape as the Steampunk Novel and I wrote more than 50k words in the space of a month. It was a huge achievement.

The following year I did it again. (That year produced the really awful first draft of what is slowly taking shape as the Magicpunk Novel.) And I haven't repeated it since. 

The first year I failed to meet the NaNo goal (2010) I was pretty bummed. I couldn't figure out what had gone wrong. Had I lost my mojo? Maybe I was running out of good ideas. Maybe I had plateaued. Or I was only destined to write two books ever. (And lousy ones at that.) 

After I wallowed for a bit, I had a revelation. Nothing had gone wrong. I hadn't lost my motivation or my mojo or run out of ideas. It was just a different year and different circumstances and although I had written a lot, I hadn't written as much as the previous years because life. 

I have been thinking about that again these past few weeks. I had a soft deadline to turn in a project mid-October. I got very close and then ran out of steam. 

Of course, I also went through a major move with my family that consumed more time and energy than I thought I had to spend. I also turned in major revisions on a novel in January. And wrote a different novel and revised it over the spring and summer. Then started the SuperSecret novella in September. 

I was being productive and writing even with a very tight schedule and plenty of life difficulties in the mix. (Seven weeks without running water, four rounds of bronchitis in six months, and multiple court dates being just a small part of the life stress I've faced this year.) Failing to meet a self-imposed deadline was disappointing, but it didn't signal Failure. It was life. 

So, as I tackle another November and another novel project I can only remind myself that everyone has ups and downs. And there are times when you have to make that deadline (and I've done that a few times too), but you cannot blame yourself for all the things that happen because life. You can only buckle down and try. 

Some days this just means turning on the computer and hammering out a single line between eating dinner and putting the six year old to bed. Some days this means ignoring the urge to watch crappy TV and instead beat out a few chapters on that project you aren't certain is any good at all. 

But whether life is grabbing you by the short and curlies or everything is coming up roses, you can only buckle down and try. And, at the end of most days, you will have words. Some better than others, but the bad ones can always be fixed. 

As long as you try.

Publication and Wordage (Update 10.31.14)

First, a little publication news. I have a story available on QuarterReads. It's neat little site that has a collection of short fiction, each story is available to read for the low price of twenty-five cents. Mine can be found here: Call-Center


You can expect some of my other short stuff to be available there before too long. Once I get a chance to submit it and everything. 

Also, as I announced last week, Beast Within 4: Gears and Growls is available today! It contains my short story "Legacy" as part of an anthology of stories examining shapeshifters in a steampunk world, edited by Jennifer Brozek. You can purchase a copy here: Beast Within 4: Gears and Growls

This is one of my first stories actually published in print so I'm even more excited than usual about it's release. (And it's a really cool story. And I got to share the ToC with Ken Liu and Folly Blaine.) 

In writing news, I am still working to finish up the SuperSecretProject before NaNoWriMo begins. (Not that it's going to happen, but you know, words is words.) I am very close to the end and it's killer. And disturbing. I love this little book so much it's hard not to talk about it in more detail, but I can't because reasons. 

Once the SuperSecretProject is done (by which I mean the first draft is safely in the hands of The Agent for further review), I will be starting on a new project for the duration of the year. The goal is to knock out a bunch of it during the National Novel Writing Month. Not so much because I have to participate in NaNo, but it is a good excuse to stay on target with the daily wordcount. 

The new project is a Space Opera with a complex set of character that are simply terrifying me because I am very much afraid I will screw them up. But, my best stories tend to be those I fear I won't do justice to. So, come tomorrow, I will be running full tilt into the writing breach to try and finish my third project this year. Or, at least, get a good start on it before January. 

Happy Halloween!

Growth (Writing Update 8.7.14)

When I learned that Eggplant was going to close down and my little SF Western novella was coming back to me, I did what any author would. I emailed my agent and said "Help! Now what?" and flailed a bit.


I was really hoping he would get back to me with "Of course we can find a new home for this." Instead his response boiled down to "Egh. This needs some work." So, I figured I'd put it on the shelf for a bit and let it simmer. Maybe there would be new subplots I could work into the already tight plot structure. (It's a revenge western. In space. The plot is mostly "I'm looking for the bastard who killed my mother." and then lots of bodies dropping because folks are stupid enough to get between my very dedicated, revenge-hungry protagonist and her psychotic, cybernetic horse.) I would let it sit it for a while and then come back to it.


Naturally, as soon as I decided that was the plan of action, I immediately came up with a new solution. It wasn't the sort of thing I was anticipating. It involves the clever juggling of two timelines and the addition of a new character into past events. It also meant starting the story from a different place.


It also meant that my opening paragraphs - which I loved - would have to go. I didn't want to get rid of my opening. It was snarky and set the stage for the story in just a few words.


So, I balked. I shook my fist at my muse (who, being a right proper bastard, flipped me off) and tried to figure out some way to keep this thing that I loved about the original version and work it into the new version. But none was apparent. (Because my muse is a right proper bastard who doesn't compromise.)


Reluctantly, I resigned myself to the idea that if I were going to rework this book (because there's nothing quite like being told "This isn't quite good enough" to get my stubborn up) I would have to start from scratch. No clinging to the parts I loved. No hanging onto the turns of phrase or witty comebacks or lovely, gritty descriptions and noirish narrative. I would have to start from scratch.


And, as soon as I committed to that, I was struck from behind by a brilliant opening line. (Because my muse is also a right proper genius when he's not being a bastard.) A line that is just better than my original. Soooo much better. (And bear in mind, the opening for the novella as published was this: By the time I was born Mankind was dying on a hundred worlds and Earth, our legendary mother, was lost. Not lost in a metaphorical sense. Not lost to famine or plague or war or the inevitable destruction of Sol. Just plain where-did-we-put-that-mother-fucking-planet lost.) Not award-winning prose, but certainly solid. And I loved it, or I wouldn't have written it.

But... sometimes in order to grow we have to let go of the things we have already done well in order do to new things better. And, yes, that also means sometimes we do things worse. But worse is always fixable and we can't do better if we don't let go of doing things the same. 

Wordcount: Dust and Stars - 355

Lessons Learned from Writing A Sunset Finish

Thanks to A.G. for letting me guest blog today. My first novella A Sunset Finish came out a little before A.G.'s novella Brass Stars did last year. It's thrilling to get something longer than a short story published, and not quite as daunting as writing a novel. She asked if I'd do a Lessons Learned theme for the guest post. It was a great idea since I learned quite a bit writing A Sunset Finish.

1. Research pays off. I've lived all of my life in New Mexico and near many Pueblo Indian reservations, but I didn't know enough pueblo folklore to write A Sunset Finish off the top of my head. I was somewhat fortunate when it came to the music and dance aspects of the story because I had studied some local Native American music in college. But even my music experience was limited. To make up for the gap in my knowledge, I took trips to ruined pueblos, attended dances at the Pueblo Cultural Center and visited the libraries frequently. My favorite book for study was Dancing Gods by Erna Fergusson. While gleaning the information from it about pueblo ceremonies, I also found myself thinking up different short stories and a possible alternative history book. Two of the short stories I thought of during that time of research have already been published and another one is on the way this summer.

2. Watch out for repetition in longer stories. I sent A Sunset Finish to three places before it found a home. One of the editors who rejected it told me that it was well written except for being so repetitive. I had no idea what she was talking about. So I boohooed to my best friend who said, “Well, I thought that too, but a lot of published stories are so I didn't say anything.” After that, I read it with a different eye. Indeed, I had several chapters in there that were rehashing the same emotions or the same mysteries. I cut most of the scenes where Bruce's dad appeared and about half the dates between Stephanie and Bruce. It was accepted at the next spot I sent it to: Jupiter Gardens Press. Looking back on stories I've read, I now believe several novels would be better as novellas if the repetitious scenes were cut out :)

3. Don't waste time watching rankings. After A Sunset Finish was released, I was introduced to the world of rankings, which I had largely ignored. I made it to my publisher's best seller list, and then I was addicted. Watching rankings cuts into precious writing time and can be depressing. This month I've made a huge effort to not look so often and only focus on new stories. My production has gone up, even though I find myself looking more than I should.

4. Self-promotion is hard. I think most writers are introverts; I know I am. But now we are expected to tweet and blog and Facebook all the time. I really enjoy swapping blog posts with people like A.G. where we talk about the craft. I see it as a definite benefit to growing as a writer. But time blogging is also time not writing new stories. There needs to be a balance. I see some writers promoting every day, and I honestly don't know how they do it and still get their next novel out on time. I admire them, but for me, I need time to let my head settle on a story and crank out the words until it's done.

Thanks again for having me here, and please come and check out A.G.'s post on my blog at enchantedspark.com coming in June.  

Heart (Writing Update 3.12.14)

A while back I blogged about just wanting to write stories. (I was going to link to it, but now I don't remember where I mentioned it. So, we'll just leave it at "I talked about this before.")


That's still true. Deep down, all I want to do is write stories. I'm not interested in pushing any sort of agenda or commenting on political structures or belief systems. I just want to write stories.


That being said, lately I've been more and more invested in writing stories that are true to human nature. Not so much because I have some great insight into the way humans deal with each other, but because I think there is a universality to human experience. No matter what our gender or sexual orientation, no matter what we believe (or don't), no matter how we choose to align ourselves politically (or not), there are certain things that speak to everyone on a very basic level.


That's where I've been trying to write lately, in that gut-level humanity that makes experiences outside our own still seem familiar. It's challenging, but rewarding too.


I mentioned last time that my would-be-short-story was morphing into a novella. So far I'm just over 11k words and still working hard. My characters have a complex relationship that is playing out over a wild quest to try and save the MC's brother from the knives of the Assassin's Guild. (It's a kind of renaissance fantasy with a light touch of humor and lots of spiders and magic.) I'll need to go back through with the Mighty Bat of Revision in one hand and the Editing Machete in the other, but overall I really like the story and the way the characters are growing.


Once I'm done, I have plans to work on the super-secret side project some more, and finish writing up the sequel to BRASS STARS. Because a writer's work is never done. At least, not until she runs out of ideas. (And that's not happening any time soon.)

2013 In Review

2013 was a year that felt like I spun my wheels. A lot.

I was deep in the query trenches for the bulk of the year, trying to find an agent for The Steampunk Novel. That search also led to two different R&Rs (one in June and one in November), taking even bigger bites out of my limited writing time and reducing my short story output drastically.

In fact, this is my slowest year to produce new shorts since I started W1S1 in 2011. In fact, by my count, I only finished two new stories this year. (Although, I did revise several things, including two which sold. More on that in a minute.)

So, lets look at my submissions stats for the year. (These numbers cover micro-fiction through novella length. The numbers on the agent quest are larger. Much larger.)

Submissions: 44
Rejections: 37
Acceptances: 4 (There are still a few out there that haven't come home yet.)
Publications: 4

The acceptances were:
"The Spider-thief and The Sorcerer" (forthcoming, Crowded Magazine, April 2014)
"Vessels for Destruction" (forthcoming, Nature Magazine's Futures)
Brass Stars (Eggplant Literary Productions, November 2013)
"Love Like Dysphoria" (Southern Gothic, New Lit Salon Press, October 2013)

The publications were:
"Caught" (Stupefying Stories Showcase, June 14, 2013)
"In the Cool of The Day" (Abyss & Apex, July 2013)
"Love Like Dysphoria" (Southern Gothic, New Lit Salon Press, October 2013)
Brass Stars (Eggplant Literary Productions, November 2013)

The two new stories written for the year were "Made" (a contemporary fantasy with a cowardly vampire) and "Kraken" (creepy flash about a man becoming a monster). And I revised "The Spider-thief and The Sorcerer", Brass Stars, and The Steampunk Novel. (I've also been working on "All That is Precious" and "Damsel", but those are not done yet.)

Looking back I think it was a productive year, but more time was spent on improving my craft by refining existing work and less on creating new work. And that's okay. But this year... this year I want to start putting more out on submission again. Which will mean not only refining my work, but getting new words on paper in the first place.

(More on how I intend to accomplish that shortly.)

Happy Twelfth Night, folks! 

Postcard Giveaway!

That's right, I'm giving away two autographed postcards featuring the cover art from BRASS STARS.

Rules are as follows.

1. There will be two winners, to be drawn at random by an uninterested third party. Each winner will receive one autographed postcard via USPS First Class Mail.

2. To enter simply leave a comment below.

OR

3. Tweet a link to the Eggplant page for BRASS STARS. Be sure to include @aggy_c in your message so I see it.

4. If you want more than one entry, you can tweet once per day, each day that the giveaway is running (8 AM, Monday, December 30 - 12 AM (Midnight), Friday, January 3).

I will post the winners names sometime on Saturday and they can then contact me via email to provide mailing information.

Good luck!

NOTE: It seems there may be an error with the comment form. If you are trying to leave a comment and can't (for whatever reason) you can email me instead (annagrace dot carpenter at gmail dot com) Please remove the extra spaces and replace the dot/at with the appropriate symbols.

The Oxford Comma Can Kiss My Arse (But Details Matter)

I am not Oscar Wilde. I do not deliberate for hours over comma placement. Nor do I stress over whether I need more or fewer commas. I know that I tend to under-use the comma, but it's not something I lose sleep over.

Before BRASS STARS was released there was a round of copy edits. Not really an arduous task, but one thing was immediately clear. The copy-editor knew the proper use of the Oxford comma and he wielded it mightily.


Changes were made with only minor grumbling on my part. (Mostly to the tune of "Maybe I should have done this when I wrote it." and a small chorus of "Fucking hell I do hate commas.")


But (and this is the important thing) it made the book better.


Currently, I'm revising a longer novel. Not a novella of a mere 90 someodd pages, but a full on novel that pushes 500+ pages. And by revising, I mean retyping from a paper copy while making notated changes and adding content where necessary. It's... tedious. But I'm more aware of the commas left out of the last pass. Commas I would normally not stress over. But, having just done this sort of tweak for publication, it's on my mind. So, as I see them (and certainly there are still some that I miss) I have been fixing them and, in future, I will likely try and put them where they belong in the first place.

Sometimes I see young writers (and by this I mean folks new to the craft, not young people) referring with some disdain to "the rules" of writing. Not "Don't start with a prologue rules" but things like "Pick a tense and stick with it". Story, I've heard it said, is more important than clean writing.

There is a smidgen of truth to that assessment. Clean writing will not save a dull story. But messy writing will kill even the most interesting tale.

So. Why do I say the Oxford comma can kiss my butt? Because when I start a story, I don't worry about the minutiae of the writing. I use fragments and drop in semicolons where they plain don't belong because I'm writing a draft and the only thing I'm worried about is the story.

BUT, once I start revisions, the details matter. Not just the details of the story or the characters, but also the details of the writing. The basic mechanics of the sentences and paragraphs and chapters. Do not make the mistake of thinking that the bigger picture of a story can survive a death of a thousand little errors. It cannot.

Write your story however you feel necessary. And then polish that baby 'til every little comma shines. 

Writing BRASS STARS: Influences

As a human being, everything I bump into on a daily basis has some influence - good, bad, subtle, obvious. Every book I read, every movie I see, every song that trickles across the radio, even billboards and conversations overheard at the gas station, they all filter through into the dark sticky space of my creative subconscious.


But some things have a more direct influence.


As a kid there was one brief year when we had cable, and I used to watch reruns of Bonanza, Big Valley, Gunsmoke and The Rifleman on Saturday mornings. (This was back in the days when The Family Channel was cool.) Then in the evening I would watch gems like The Avengers, Star Trek and The Man From U.N.C.L.E. At the time I had no plans to write a story that would combine both Science Fiction and Western, but looking back it's clear where the seeds of Brass Stars were planted.


Of course, Brass Stars is not as bright and happy as the westerns I watched when I was young. Maybe because in college I discovered a director named Sergio Leone and actors named Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef, and Charles Bronson. Then I discovered a related genre - the samurai film - and the brilliance of Akira Kurosawa and Toshiro Mifune.

I also discovered SF like Pitch Black and Alien, where the heroes are not always who you think and the ending may twist your expectations so hard you get whiplash.


The specifics get hard to pin down. I see a little bit of Last Man Standing (a retelling of Yojimbo set in a border town in the 1920s), a little bit of The Quick and The Dead, even a little bit of that horrible movie about Mars with Val Kilmer in it.


But that's how influences work. They seep into the deep parts of your brain and come back out colored by your own experience and belief and perspective.


There's more coming every day.

Writing BRASS STARS: Dust, Sky and Religion in Space

The early drafts of Brass Stars (and there were two and a half before I got to the one that was published by Eggplant Literary Productions) didn't have much in the way of religion. Tashn wasn't much a believer in anything except revenge and it didn't seem necessary to develop a system of belief for the other characters who popped in and out of the story.


There was, of course, mention of the crucifix her mother had given her, but Tashn never put much stock in it. She carried it for two reasons. One: because her father believed it was strong medicine that would protect her in the future as it had in the past and it was a small concession to his outlook on the world. Two: because it was a constant reminder of what had happened - a concrete little piece of the injustice done to her and her mother.


But that was the extent of the mention of religion, barely more than speck of history from the long-lost Earth.


Then Jackson became a central character and a foil of sorts to Tashn's quest for vengeance. He was on a mission of his own: redemption. And that meant I had to think harder about what sort of belief system might exist in the dusty edge of space.


The result was, at first glance, a kind of Yin/Yang or a dichotomy between flesh and spirit.
The idea of Sky: the invisible, eternal and all-encompassing thing sometimes called Space. Boundless and intangible, its appearance changing based on the perspective of the viewer, but never its nature.
The idea of Dust: the physical, palpable and corruptible matter of the universe. The building blocks that every visible thing is made of and to which we all return.


It was a simple idea.

But on paper it was complex. Tashn knew and acknowledged the existence of both, but rarely in a meaningful way. John Crow relished the nature of Dust, the needs generated by the physical and the satisfaction that came from sharing in the tangible. And Jackson looked to something transcendent to make up for his own corruption.


And that corruption and redemption, much like Tashn's need for revenge and Johnny's need for love, played out in the physical realm but reflected something that was more than just flesh and bone.


I tweaked and fiddled and put stuff in and took it out and finally decided to let it all ride. I'd chosen not to use a specific existing religion or spiritual system because I didn't feel it needed to be one special thing or another, so why would I try and make it into one special thing or another?

And that was that. Dust. Sky. Redemption. Judgement. Loss. Love. And a merciless young woman with a score to settle. All the makings of a good story.

Goals

Last December I proposed the following goals for myself during 2013.


1: Find an Agent Who Can Sell The Steampunk Novel
2: Finish the Novellas I started This Year but HAVEN'T FINISHED
3: Write another Novel or Two
4: Sell my Short Stories

Two of those (#2 and #3) were things I could control. And with that thought in mind I finished up BRASS STARS and put some good effort into ALL THAT IS PRECIOUS and SURVIVOR. I've also revised The Steampunk Novel (and am currently delving into another revision round) and started work on the rewrite of THINGBREAKER (a magic-punk thriller).

#4 was one that required a combination of doing the work I could to ensure I met the goal, and waiting for the alignment of the stars that ensured my story hit the right desk at the right time. (Remember, the best way for that to happen is to make sure that a story is on someone's desk to be read, rather than sitting in a drawer gathering dust.) I used the fantastic Submission Grinder over at Diabolical Plots to help me tackle the short stories, sending each one out to a new market as soon as it got booted from the previous one.

In addition to a handful of short stories I wanted to find homes for, I was still trying to meet the goal of selling a longer work (novel or novella) that I had set for myself in 2012. So, I did pitch contests on Twitter, summarizing both The Steampunk Novel and BRASS STARS in a microscopic 130 characters. I got requests for both, but ultimately they turned into rejections.  

I dug in deeper, researching publishers that took novella length, speculative fiction and submitted the MS for BRASS STARS to Eggplant Literary Productions.

In the meantime, I was having some success with the shorter work. I placed "Love Like Dysphoria" with New Lit Salon Press in their Southern Gothic anthology. And later in the year, I sold "The Spider-thief and The Sorcerer" to Crowded Magazine. (And last week I sold "Vessels for Destruction" to Nature Magazine's "Futures" column.)

I'd also been working hard at goal #1. Starting in December of last year, I'd been querying agents with The Steampunk Novel. Dozens and dozens of queries sent out over nearly eight months. Hours worth of mindnumbing research on AgentQuery and QueryTracker trying to find every single agent who might be a good fit for my alternate history/fantasy/steampunk/murder mystery mashup.

I got requests to see more. And a lot of rejections - most from the initial query and some after partial or full requests. A lot of rejections.

Then I got a letter from Raechel Henderson of Eggplant Literary saying "Yes! I love this and here's a contract." (Okay. She didn't quite say that, but it's close.) And suddenly BRASS STARS was scheduled for publication. Only a few days later I got a phone call from an agent who'd been looking at the full MS of The Steampunk Novel. He was interested and wanted to know if I could do some more revisions.  

Hell, yes, I could do some more revisions. So we talked and brainstormed and I started in on those just this past weekend. Along with still working on The Magic-punk Thriller. And all the "OMG! I have a book coming out Monday!" madness that precedes a release day.

"And this is all great, but what is the point here?" you say.

The point is this. I'm sitting here, realizing that I have successfully accomplished one of the things on my List of Things To-Do. (Admittedly, the Sell a Novella goal was for 2012 so I'm almost two years behind, but it has been done.) I'm also realizing that the list never gets any smaller.

Writing goals are not destinations, they are mile-markers. It's not like saying "I want to visit Australia" and then going and being like "Well that was hot and those koalas sure were cute but now I've DONE that so cross it off the list." Every goal I reach reveals a new one. 

Every story written makes room for a new one. Every sale is a step up to the next. Every goal achieved gives way to another one down the road.

The list never gets any smaller. It just gets different.  

P.S. My SF Western novella, BRASS STARS, is available now from Eggplant Literary Productions: http://eggplantproductions.com/e-books/brass-stars-g-carpenter/

Cover Art for BRASS STARS

Ever since I first saw the sketches for the cover art, I've been waiting on pins and needles to see the finished version. And today it arrived in my in-box. I can't tell you how thrilled I am.

The artist is the amazing Lex Paul. More of his work can be found HERE and HERE

More info about my novella (including a free excerpt) can be found at Eggplant Literary Productions: http://eggplantproductions.com/e-books/brass-stars-g-carpenter/

And, if you want to know more about Eggplant Literary Productions (and check out some of the other awesome books they've published), be sure to browse their site: http://eggplantproductions.com/

"Brass Stars" - Sneak Peek

Eggplant Literary Productions has the official page up for Brass Stars. It includes the blurb and an excerpt from the novella.


You can check it out here: http://eggplantproductions.com/e-books/brass-stars-g-carpenter/


The full novella will be available Monday, November 18th.


Stay tuned for more updates (and the awesome cover art).