Market News: Science Fiction Collection to be published in 2015

I am over the moon with the news that a large selection of my reprint and original science fiction short fiction, spanning about 6 years, will be collected in a book by Cohesion Press (the same publishers of my young teen fantasy novel, Guardian of the Sky Realms). A lot of details are still to be sorted out, but a great wad of short stories and a novelette are in the publisher's hands, and the lights are green for next year. Stay tuned, folks.
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Market News: ‘Of The Color Turmeric, Climbing On Fingertips’ and ‘Hills’ sold.

Extremely pleased to have 'Of The Color Turmeric, Climbing On Fingertips' sold to Night Terrors III anthology, a pro market by Blood Bound Books. The anthology will be published in 2014. This is my first pro sale, and things can only get better from here, now that I have reached that milestone.

I want to take this opportunity to thank all my friends, online and otherwise, who strongly supported and believed in me, including me in their writing communities, and often in publications, representing faith in my writing. They far outweigh those who didn't. This sale is a validation of my friends' faith.

Additionally, a dark, humorous flash fiction piece, 'Hills', has been accepted by AntipodeanSF – which is a bit of a rite of passage in Australia, again a validation. This short piece will be published in issue 185 in November 2013, and shortly thereafter I will read my piece for radio/podcast. Something I look forward to.

All in all I am very pleased. Three significant market acceptances in 1 month, continuing my 1+ acceptance per month rate for the last 3 years.
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Market News: They Can Never Find Out

My WWII horror story, They Can Never Find Out, has been accepted by Static Movement, for their print anthology, Dark Dispatches. Couldn't resist showing their cover – pretty good, I think.
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Published Short Story: The Bond, in Penny Dread Tales: Gears, Coils, Aether & Steam (Volume 1)

Happy to say that my Steampunk short story, The Bond, has been published in Runewright’s new anthology, Penny Dread Tales: Gears, Coils, Aether & Steam (Volume 1), edited by Christopher Ficco, and excellent cover by Laura Givens.

This was a most satisfying short to write, and also was picked up blindingly fast, which is much appreciated. Buy it! Enjoy it!

Aurealis Magazine – Poor PR

Something interesting for you Australian specfic writers, or those who are interested in Aurealis Magazine. Their editor has retired and they are closed to submissions. Those who submitted prior to the closure are totally in the dark – every query gets a stock standard blurb which makes no statement on the status of pre-closure submissions.

Their PR is poor indeed.

I sent an email query to the editor email address as well as another, generic address. When I got the following, I sent an email back to a ‘Stephen’, and got exactly the same blurb back. They are clearly not reading their email AT ALL.

Here is an image of the blurb. Try to work out how it responds to a query about what the status of pre-closure emails are about:

With the retirement of current editor, Stuart Mayne, the publishers of Aurealis, are taking the
opportunity to restructure and improve the magazine. The new look Aurealis will be in place by the end
of 2011. In the meantime, AurealisXpress, our monthly e-bulletin for subscribers will continue. We
will be open for story submissions again around the middle of the year. Updates will be published in
AurealisXpress and on the website http://www.aurealis.com.au.

All orders (books, back issues etc.) will continue to be processed as usual.

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The Value of Dreams

This is just a small posting. In my experience dreams often instill the kernel of an idea in my creative writing (but I should note that I am one of those unfortunate people that rarely remembers his dreams). However, last night I had a fitful sleep – it really consisted of several disrupted sleeps, and in one of them I dreamed that I was dreaming and that what occurred in it would make an absolutely fantastic story for my monthly short story challenge (for those who don’t know, I am a member of a small writing group where we all optionally take part in a writing challenge, based on a painting, song, poem, concept, whatever).

Now the denouement of this post – on waking, and thinking closely about the story idea, I realized it was absolute crap. So much for the value of dreams… sometimes.