A Year of Writing Roundup

I spent many years dabbling at writing.

I chased what seemed interesting without an actual plan. I wrote only when I felt like it. I wanted to reach the next level. I wanted to learn to write well consistently. I knew that 2012 would be the last year before I turned 40. What would happen to me if I didn’t really try at least once?

The ghost of future’s past haunting me telling me I’d regret life or would pretend to be Hunter S. Thompson and never write.

I realized that if I really wanted a career in writing fiction that I would need to work at it as a second job. I resolved that for the year 2012 I would break through to the next level and to do that I needed to apply the lessons learned from my fifteen years as a technical writer to the task.

This required a higher level of discipline. I reduced my time spent on other hobbies. I ensured that work was done before play. I planned break weekends and date night with the wife to ensure I had a life that sustained long-term writing.

The year started out very well. Ellen Datlow released her Honorable Mention list for the best horror of 2011. Datlow is considered by many to be the gatekeeper editor for the horror genre. My story “Moonlight in Scarlet” published in Cover of Darkness made the list. I was over the moon as you might imagine.

They say any monkey can write

Thanks to the encouragement of friends, I started attending conventions for the purposes of learning the trade and making contacts.

And you thought your conventions were scary!

I started teaching a formalized version of a series of lessons I’ve gone through with friends at convention.

Interactive Writing Workshop:

XX Con (Seattle, February 2012)

Howlcon (Portland, July 2012)

Midwinter Gaming Con (Milwaukee, January 2013)

I had previously dabbled with working with role-playing games, but this year I moved forward in a big way. I worked on revisions for games that I played in college. It felt very surreal.

RPG Work:

V20: Hunters Hunted 2 (The Onyx Path, Publishing Date TBA)

Anarchs Unbound (The Onyx Path, Publishing Date TBA)

Secret Project A (NDA prevents me from discussing it yet).

Secret Project B (NDA prevents me from discussing it yet).

Editing:

I started an editing project with Mae Empson.

We’re going to be accepting submissions for The Future Embodied early next year.

Fiction Writing:

I wrote more fiction this year than ever before. I managed to make it into a new of awesome anthologies. Next year, I am eligible for active membership in the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. I need one more professional sale for horror to make it into the Horror Writers Association.

Here are some metrics. I should note that a majority of my written work for the later half of this year is still pending review.

Novels:

A Wicked Messenger (90,000 words)

Short Stories:

25 New Short Stories, 10 Edited/Revised Storied

New Stories Published in 2012:

Darkly Dreaming in Black Waters; Night Terrors II, (Blood Bound Books, January 2012)

Requiem; Dark Tales of Lost Civilizations (Dark Moon Books, March 2012)

Recovery; IN SITU (Dagan Books, August 2012)

The Embers Burn, and Gentle is the Arrow’s Stinging; A Quick Bite of Flesh: An Anthology of Zombie Flash Fiction (Hazardous Press, September 2012)

The Honey Offering; The Extinction Files (Alter Press, October 2012)

Lay Down Your Hair; Queer Fish: Volume 2 (Pink Narcissus Press, October 2012)

Asenath; Cthulhu: A Love Story (Loyal Stone Press, October 2012)

My Love is Vengeance; Bite from the Heart (Rainstorm Press, October 2012)

The Murmur of Lorelei; Beast Within 3: Oceans Unleashed (Graveside Tales, December 2012)

Story Reprints:

Omega; The Vampire Megapack (Wildside Press, March 2012) Reprint

The Application of Discipline; The Fourth Science Fiction Megapack (Wildside Press, March 2012) Reprint

Short Story Collection:

Twilight Temptations: Tales of Lust, Dark Desire, and Magic (Simian Publishing, January 2012)

Stories Sold for Publication in 2013:

“A Funeral Pyre for a Jarl” will appear in the anthology Horrific History from Hazardous Press (Publishing Date TBA)

“A Simple Job” will appear in the anthology Urban Occult from Anachron Press (Publishing Date TBA)

“Yellow is the Color of the Future” will appear in the anthology Atomic-Age Cthulhu from Chaosium Books (Publishing Date TBA)

“The Calm of Despair” will appear in the anthology Suffered from the Night: Queering Stoker’s Dracula from Lethe Press (Publishing Date June 2013)

“Unto the Breach” will appear in Dragonthology from Untold Press (Publishing Date TBA)

Murder on the Feng Shui Express” will appear in the Spring 2013 issue of Tales of the Talisman.

“The New Gods of the Lost Children” will be reprinted in The Dark Side of the Womb: Suffer the Little Children by Cruentus Libri Press. (Expected Publishing Date Spring 2013)