This month has been so eventful (at least for my writing life; not so much otherwise) that I figured I should start posting monthly summaries. Partly for my own records, partly to (hopefully) inspire all the proto-writers who may be on the fence.
This has been my single most successful month in terms of sales. I ended up selling ten different pieces (essays and stories) to seven different magazines and anthologies. One of them bought four pieces at once, so feel free to call it seven sales altogether. A publishing credit is still a publishing credit, eh.
The wordcount varied quite a lot: from a mere 37-word microfiction to a 3,482-word sci-fi story, and everything in between.
The final thing I sold this month was a bit funny: following yet another “AI” scandal (Rat Bag Literary deleted a story they posted after a few too many raised eyebrows), I wrote a satirical essay addressed to “AI” sloppers. I pitched to the editor of foofaraw and he accepted it right away. Several drafts later, I sent it off (1,141 words altogether), agreed to make a few changes, signed the contract, and got paid! The whole process took just five hours, which was downright amazing – and my new personal record.
That, in turn, resulted in foofaraw offering me to write a monthly satirical column, and how could I possibly turn that down?! This will be so very, very fun. (And will also help me on my quest to collect 100 paid-for publishing credits! Currently hovering around 53 or so.)
One especially cool thing that happened this month was collaborating with Han Marin on the edits for my first-ever published novelette, “Have Hands, Will Hench.” Han is excellent and I highly recommend her for all your editing needs – you can find her over here. That editing process was quite the eye-opener and helped me level up my own writing even more. (Who knew I used the word “look” so often? Not me, that’s who.) The novelette will come out tomorrow, on October 1 – in e-book, paperback, and hardcover (!!!) formats. You can preorder it over here – the digital version is just $3.39!
On the filmmaking front, my sci-fi short film “How to Prepare for Time Travelers in the Workplace” (based on the first story I ever sold!) became a finalist at the eighth annual National Independent Film Association Awards (the final decision to come later) and won the award for the Best Science Fiction at the Indie Cine Tube Awards! This is my second-ever first-place ribbon, and both were for this eight-minute film. I’m still grinning and I don’t think I’ll stop for quite a while.
I’m still doing my Bradbury challenge – writing at least one short story per week. (My upcoming novelette was written during week 4!) It’s a great way to improve my writing muscle, and most of the tales I wrote have already sold, so it’s a win-win!
I also wrote a couple of new poems – they’re pending with a couple of magazines. It’s odd that there are so few people submitting speculative poems as opposed to speculative prose… (Or at least that’s how it seems to me.) That has some potential, eh.
And, needless to say, September also gave me dozens of short story rejections, but that’s just the nature of being a writer, eh. I quite enjoy playing Tetris with simultaneous submissions, which is why I’m also waiting for October 1 to kick off in just a few hours, when I’ll be able to start submitting my stories to 50 or so new submission calls, huzzah!
But that’s a story for another month…
Good luck with your writing, my friends.
