The latest cover deadlines being met - back to writing again.
The desk is swept (well, mostly!) the mouldiewarps kicked out of the computer, and a new short story 3 pages underway - off to a nice start, even if the first page, amoeba like, sprawled everywhere before I captured the thread I wanted for opening.
(it wanted, novel like, to meander, and short stories have NO TIME for anything not directly related to the meat of the nut, period!)
Ahhh, a new character, a new setting, a new world.
Now to stamp down on all the raw impulse to peer askance - or wham! - novels are wont to happen.
(it's a short story, nail it THERE, muse!!)
originally posted by Memory
Oooh, new story 
I'm sure you'll be able to keep it tight, Janny. Look forward to reading it!
Memory
originally posted by Cheryl
Thanks for sharing that Janny. It must be exciting. Can't wait to read it someday and Traitor's Knot. I'm happy reader.
originally posted by Sandtiger
Glad the painting went well, and that the short story is off to a good start!!!
Sandtiger
originally posted by Blue
Have any of the other writers on this board suffered from this problem:
Starting out with a short story, and ending up with something that approaches novel length, and trying to do something novel length that peters out at short story?
Yours truly suffers greatly from this problem. It also does not help that, according to my high school English teacher, that I could read a 10 page short story and proceed to do an 8 page book report on it.
Needless to say, Janny, I feel for you!
originally posted by Deborah McNemar
I know what you mean, Blue. I wrote a five page short story for a writing class in college and now it's over five hundred pages. Turns out that short story was just chapter one.
originally posted by Memory
I find it very difficult to do short stories - I want to get in too much detail! I definitely haven't developed the technique yet for writing short fiction!
Memory
originally posted by Cheryl
That's a problem I am starting to have. When is a story a short story and when is it a full length epic novel. I think short stories would be hard. I wouldn't know when to stop. I need to read more short stories and get a feel for them. I just always want more when it comes to short stories.
originally posted by Auna
My favorite short story of all time is Eyes Do More Than See by Isaac Asimov. It's very short, but encapsulates what I believe to be the quintessence of short stories.
I think good short stories are the hardest things to write, and ones that leave an impact on the reader that is still felt weeks, months, or even years later are very rare. Eyes did that for me.
Even though he wrote science fiction, Asimov has a great variety and quantity of short, medium, and long short stories that you might want to read for examples.
Ah, another draft for a short story - complete. Quashed any impulse to let it run wild - 24 pages, and within target length. Now to polish, adjust, sharpen, finalize…
Next item ahead, once this is turned in - graphics for TK and US cover art for same. List getting shorter…and still on schedule.
I will have TK page proofs in a few weeks…one step closer.
Done, done done - short story fully polished and turned IN. 28 pages, total. Up to the editor, now
And the interior graphics for Traitor's Knot - all laid out and being inked.
Deadlines dropping like flies…grin.
Time to dive back into the oil paints.
originally posted by Cheryl
Congratulations Janny. Good job as always. Did anyone notice we are getting closer to the release time for Traitor's Knot. I'm a little confused was the date moved up till November or was that the US release date? Thanks
originally posted by Blue
Deadlines dropping like flies…grin.
Darn, I knew I should have sent you a flyswatter instead of the Riverton schedule!
Congrats on the short story… up to the editor, does that mean that you will [hopefully] have the name of the volume that it will be published in, and the release date soon?
Blue - well, the editor's gotta like it, first. Then, decide to buy it.
Invitation to write for any anthology does NOT mean automatic acceptance!
You always have to go the extra mile. Then endure the nail biting interrim.
Hopefully that will be short. (says Janny, looking at nails, which are SHORT SHORT anyway - can't play guitar with a mess of nails, and riding horses, they just crumble, anyway). So…not much margin for biting without drawing blood!
It's a solid story. I did my best. Now, let's see if it makes a place in publication.
Now, if that Riverton bus schedule had boarding stops in Florida, I'd take a tour someplace, meantime. (grin) You guys in Seattle think of everything. (Archie McPhee's for another)
originally posted by Demi
Hey Janny what do you think when you read your own stories after it's out in print. Do you percieve it the way you readers do or do you look at it from the writers point of view and how you could improve the story.
Demi - perfection doesn't exist.
Life isn't static.
As a living artist, you have to do the best you can, in the moment.
IF in hindsight, you see what you'd do differently now - you cheer, because that's the best indicatior you have that you have grown!
At least, I don't want to be one that just squatted on my last laurel. Get wilty and prickly, staying there. Best move on.
If I don't feel a story is my BEST EFFORT, I have the honesty to admit that up front, and I DON'T SEND IT OUT.
Now those would be the ones that would make me, as an author squirm. Knowing up front that I valued my readers' time so little, I'd foist my shortfalls on them.
Oh boy, off for a happy beer!!!
Watch this space.
originally posted by Darren
Janny,
Whats your favourite style of beer? Strong complex ones from Belgium, traditional wheat beers from germany or the light refreshing pilsners?
Depending on the climate I vary from a light asia style pilsner (anchor) to a germany wheat lager (lowenbrau).
Cheers in the true sense,
Darren
originally posted by Cheryl
If we got to have a drink with Janny at the convention I think she'd be surprised I'd order sprite I just don't drink much but maybe for that occasion I would. lol
Darren -
Beer - generally I prefer what amounts to a red ale.
Favorite beer of all time: "OLD BASTARD" brewed in a (now defunct) hole in the wall pub in Devonshire, England.
Easily available fall back that I can get in the States: Killian's Red, or Speckled Hen.
We buy a lot of microbrews in this house.
For dark beer, I really loved Guiness, but I'd have to stress, ONLY IN DUBLIN. It doesn't travel well, and the import version is next to undrinkable. (tastes burnt).
I am not one for the light pilsners and truly I hate wheat beer…the taste didn't jibe with me, and I just can't hack the sediment that comes in the microbrews.
The latest find: Sockeye Red - bottled in Utah, brewed for the Midnight Sun Brewery in Anchorage, Alaska.
The occasion for celebration: you will have a NEW STORY to read. Whoo Hoo, an acceptance on the lastest work.
'The Last of Her Kind" has been accepted for Fantastic Companions, edited by Julie Czerneda - and should appear sometime in 05.
A great company of authors included - and full details to follow!