Archive for the ‘Writing’ Category
A-Rod, MLB, and PED Suspensions
Folks, over the last week or so, I’ve been riveted by the current contretemps over Major League Baseball’s suspension of New York Yankees third baseman Alex Rodriguez (“A-Rod”) being upheld by arbitrator Fredric Horowitz . . . albeit not for the 211 games MLB wanted. Instead of 211 games, Horowitz reduced the suspension to 162 games — the length of a major league season — and further said that if the Yankees make the playoffs next year, Rodriguez would be ineligible for that as well.
I’ve written extensively in the past about Ryan Braun’s struggle with MLB over the same issues (go here, here and here for the three latest blogs on the subject), so if you’ve read my blog before, you know what I’m about to say.
But in case you haven’t, here goes:
I don’t approve of what MLB has done in paying off witnesses like Anthony “Tony” Bosch. I don’t approve of MLB purchasing stolen documents, either. And while I don’t approve of performance-enhancing drugs in the main, I think it’s wrong for MLB to go after one person — whether it’s Ryan Braun, Alex Rodriguez, or anyone else — with so much vigor that they’re willing to do practically anything to “get their man.”
Stooping to the defense of “we’ll do anything necessary to stomp out PEDs” is not good enough. It’s a witch hunt, just as Rodriguez has said on many occasions. And I think Hardball Talk’s Craig Calcaterra was right when he said:
. . . I would not, if I were running Major League Baseball, have permitted my investigators to purchase the stolen Biogenesis documents. Maybe that costs me valuable information. Maybe that blows my case entirely. But I see no end result, including the possible failure to punish A-Rod, that is worth an organization under my command breaking the law, which I believe happened in this case. I also do my best to get better sourcing for the information my investigators obtained than guys named, simply, “Bobby.”
Even with the knowledge that Rodriguez could’ve and perhaps should’ve taken a much lesser suspension last spring (he apparently was offered a fifty-game suspension, this being the standard length for a first-time offender), I still believe that MLB’s actions were completely and utterly absurd — not to mention wrong.
That the World Anti-Doping Agency has come out in favor of the tactics behind the Rodriguez suspension only adds fuel to the fire. As discussed in this article from A.J. Cassavell over at MLB.com:
“The ‘clear and convincing evidence’ found by arbitrator Horowitz in this case proves that non-analytical methods have an increasingly important role to play in uncovering those athletes who have breached anti-doping rules,” (WADA President) Reedie said. “Sharing information and intelligence is something WADA continues to encourage its own stakeholders to do in order to help protect the rights of the clean athlete.”
Um, even when “non-analytical methods” include intimidating and browbeating witnesses in the court of public opinion, then paying the very witnesses MLB just spent a fortune to vilify? Even when MLB is buying stolen documents of unknown veracity, then using them to back up their claims that the athlete in question — in this case, Alex Rodriguez — is guilty as sin of using PEDs?
How could any of those things ever be right, regardless of what Rodriguez actually did while a patron of Bosch’s Biogenesis clinic?
Granted, MLB wants to rid the game of PEDs — but why do it this way?
Because there is another way, and that way is called education. If you let all the players know exactly what these various banned substances do in the body — if they’re truly deleterious in their effects — that should take care of a good part of it.
And maybe that’s all MLB can do. Because as broadcaster Keith Olbermann has said many times, there will never be a way to remove everything considered a “performance enhancer.” (KO has famously referred to an player who was known to have taken monkey testosterone — back in the 1890s.)
Years ago, baseball players took amphetamines to cope with the rigors of a 162-game season, and no one blinked an eye. Then, some players coped with the same rigors of a 162-game season by taking steroids — legal and illegal — because that was the only way they knew to keep their bodies in shape to play. (Note that the first player who admitted he took a steroid — a then-legal steroid called androstenedione — was Mark McGwire, who had well-known back problems.) Finally, some players — such as the recently-retired Andy Pettite — admitted using human growth hormone (HGH) in order to recover from injuries faster.
Now, all three of those substances are banned from baseball — though there are some workarounds for amphetamines in small doses with a doctor’s prescription. (For example, some baseball players have been approved to have Adderall to treat ADHD and/or narcolepsy; Adderall is a stimulant.)
Considering MLB’s current zeal and their scorched-earth philosophy when it comes to PEDs, will energy drinks that give players a natural “high” be banned next?
Don’t laugh. The World Baseball Classic banned albuterol because it helps asthmatic athletes breathe, so it obviously gives asthmatic athletes an unfair advantage. (I hope you can see my eye-roll from there.) And MLB has banned certain types of over-the-counter cold medicines, mostly because they contain a small dose of some form of stimulant.
All I know is this: Shaming people into doing something never works. MLB needs to educate the players in order to keep them away from PEDs, rather than shame them.
Maybe then, they’d actually get what they want — a PED-free game. And they’d not look so much like villains in the process.
Wisconsin’s Winter Weather Nightmare
Folks, the weather here is brutal. I do not say this lightly.
Currently, it’s -13 F with a wind chill factor of -45 F. These are the worst conditions I’ve seen in thirty-plus years in any part of the Midwest — and considering I used to live in Nebraska, where it often gets colder than Wisconsin during the winter, that’s saying something.
Consider, please, that right now it’s warmer in Idaho than it is in Wisconsin. And that almost never happens.
This weather is not conducive toward much, I’m afraid. I’m trying to work, but am worried the power will go out. If it does, everyone in the outage area will be in deep trouble, as unlike our ancestors, we do not have wood-fired stoves or even pot-bellied stoves . . . we only have electric and gas stoves, which are much more dependent on external infrastructure than I like to contemplate under the circumstances.
Years ago, when I moved to Colorado with my ex-husband due to his military service, I was delighted to find that most Colorado apartments include fireplaces as a matter of course. That meant in a power outage, we’d not be in danger of cold. And even without a power outage, firelight is both calming and comforting, so it was definitely an excellent thing to have.
In Wisconsin, it’s very rare to find fireplaces included in apartments or homes unless you’re talking about someone very, very wealthy (which I’m not). But I’m betting many people — not just me — are wishing they had a fireplace right now, because the temperatures outside are so bad that everyone’s being advised to stay indoors unless absolutely necessary.
Now, what does this mean in practical terms? It means that I’m sitting inside a house that’s struggling to keep the temperature up high enough to sustain human life, along with nearly every other home and apartment in the Midwest. And the resulting power drain has to be straining the electric company’s ability to cope.
This is why the following sentence keeps coming to mind:
WELCOME TO WISCONSIN’S WINTER WEATHER NIGHTMARE . . . ENJOY YOUR STAY!
Sent the baseball story to F&SF
Folks, I’m glad that editor C.C. Finlay said in his post announcing his guest editorship for the July/August issue of the greatly respected Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (F&SF for short) that he wanted to see some humor, because that’s what I do best. And after first readying the other story for F&SF (all I can tell you is that it’s science fiction, as that one’s off to the Writers of the Future contest, as I said before), I wasn’t sure what I could polish up in time to send, under the circumstances.
Then I remembered the baseball story.
I wrote the baseball story a couple of years ago for a humor anthology. It didn’t work for the editor of that anthology, possibly because it was shorter than I’d envisioned and cut it down to fit the anthology requirements. But once I’d fleshed it out, I sent it to a few of my writer-friends . . . and they laughed.
Mission accomplished, right?
Well, partially. You still have to make sure you send in a clean manuscript, which is why the “dusting and polishing” phase is mandatory, and you have to make sure you conform to whatever the formatting is the editor in question wants.
Here, that was not onerous; the editor wanted more-or-less standard formatting (double-spaced, Times New Roman or another font that’s unobtrusive, identifying marks as appropriate in case the story is printed out and the pages get separated, etc.). But sometimes it can be really interesting to get to that last phase — for example, if an editor wants a single-spaced manuscript with underlines around italics (yes, I’ve seen this, and as it’s actually how I tend to write e-mail because I’ve been writing e-mail since the Internet was first popularized — don’t tell anyone I’m actually that old, will you?), you have to give the editor what he wants or you have zero shot to sell a story to him.
(Or her.)
Anyway, the baseball story is off — and in case you’re wondering, it’s because of working on not one but two stories this past week that I wasn’t able to review anything over at Shiny Book Review. So do look for a book review (or maybe two, if I’m feeling ambitious) late next week . . . just in time for the deep freeze gripping much of the United States (and most definitely my home state of Wisconsin) to ease up a trifle.
So if you live anywhere in the frigid zone, do what I plan to do: Stay home, put up your feet, watch the Green Bay Packers game later today, then read several good books. That’s by far your safest option . . .
. . . but if you must go out, be sensible and have an emergency kit along for the ride (at bare minimum, the kit should include a blanket, some water, and some food in case of emergencies; if you have a candle, bring that along as well).
Finished a New Story . . .
Happy New Year, everyone!
Now that I’ve gotten the good wishes out of the way, it’s time to talk turkey. I haven’t blogged much over the past ten days because of the holidays. I had to take some time off, because the pace of the last year, post-bronchitis anyway, was almost too hectic to be borne.
But for whatever reason, idle time and me just do not seem to go together. So I had the idea for a new story — well, new to me, anyway, as it’s based on an unfinished story of my late husband Michael — about a week ago. I adapted Michael’s story and used about 3,000 words of it, then wrote 6,000-plus words around it to make it all fit.
Note I’m not giving you too many details of this story. There’s a reason for that — I was attempting to send it to the Writers of the Future (WotF) contest in order to make one, final try.
Those of you who’ve read my blog for a while know full well I’ve been entering that contest for eleven solid years. I haven’t sent in a submission every single quarter, no. But every year, I’ve sent in at least one story.
And every time, my entry sunk like a stone.
This year, my story was ready at 11:50 p.m. on New Year’s Eve PST, which is the time zone of the WotF website. (Note that it was 1:55 a.m. New Year’s Day CST, in my own time zone.) So I went to the WotF website, and attempted to upload my file.
. . . but nothing happened.
Why? Well, the site had inexplicably decided to stop accepting submissions early. Usually, they will accept up until 11:59:59 p.m. PST (that is, eleven fifty-nine and fifty-nine seconds), but not this time.
So after all that work, my lovely 8600-word story (I pruned 1000 words on the advice of my long-suffering friend and first reader) didn’t end up getting sent.
Talk about frustration.
I did, of course, let WotF know that their site did something hinky and I wasn’t able to get my submission in through no fault of mine. But it’s like spitting in the wind. They’re most likely going to say that I can send the story in for the next quarter (once it opens; the site is still not up as of this hour, though normally it would be as the new quarter has started and submissions usually start right away at the stroke of 12:00:00 a.m. PST), so I should just do that.
But as the first half of ELFY should be out in early April (meaning it could be out by the end of March, as publication dates can be flexible on either end), I most likely will be ineligible.
So this was my last try . . . in more ways than one.
For those of you who’ve never submitted anything to WotF, you might be wondering why this is. I’m still a writer who most people don’t know about, I haven’t made many Science Fiction Writers of America-eligible sales (two, now, though the first was shared with Michael so it technically counted as half a sale), and I certainly could use the exposure and help that winning any prize in the WotF contest could bring.
But once you’ve published a novel — whether it’s self-publishing or traditional publishing — you are ineligible.
That’s why my niece, Jennifer Lunde, is ineligible; she self-published her novel PULSE through Lulu back in 2010. That’s one reason my friend Jason Cordova is ineligible, though he’s actually eligible to apply for the SFWA as he has at least six qualifying sales to his credit by my count, as Twilight Times Books — which is as reputable a small press as they come, and is now my professional home as well — published his novel CORRUPTOR in 2010.
But maybe there’s a silver lining in the fact I couldn’t get my story into the WotF contest.
The venerable magazine Fantasy and Science Fiction (F&SF) has announced they’re going to have a guest editor, C.C. Finlay, for it’s July/August 2014 issue (details can be found here). Better still, Finlay will be accepting electronic submissions — a first for F&SF — between January 1 and January 14 of this month.
Mind you, F&SF has never been interested in anything I’ve sent them, just as WotF has never been interested, either. But it’s a New Year, I’m an optimist, and I believe my time is now.
So what are my plans at this point for my poor, beleaguered story? If WotF won’t accept it, I will send it to Mr. Finlay in the next few days.
Wish me luck?
Writing and Cross-Promotion
Folks, I thought it might be interesting to write a blog about just what promotion is — and maybe a little bit about what it isn’t — while I also talk about a few of my favorite writers in the process.
Promotion tends to consist of a number of things. It can be as easy as Tweeting something on Twitter (if you do that), or sharing something on Facebook. It can be more complex, as when you write a guest blog for someone else . . . of course, the latter action is far, far more personal, and may grab a reader that much more easily.
Going to a convention, if you have something of your own to sell, is also a promotional experience. And even if you don’t, if you’re out there networking, that’s still considered under the heading of promotion.
Now, what’s not considered promotion? Going to unrelated websites and putting up a bunch of links to your work — spamming them, in short — as that’s completely unprofessional and extremely counterproductive, besides. (You could even think of this as anti-motion rather than promotion.)
Another thing that would not be a good idea from a promotional standpoint is one I’ve only rarely seen — thank goodness, as it’s again highly unprofessional. But here goes: when someone mentions inside a review that his work is better than the work that’s supposed to be under discussion, that’s just really bad form. (More anti-motion at work.)
Promotion is many things, but it’s not supposed to be either unprofessional or “spammy.” What you’re trying to do is get the word out, that’s all — which is why if you’re talking about your favorite authors, you could be said to have promoted them.
So if you have friends whose work you admire — and if they, too, are on Facebook, Twitter, or any number of other social media sites — you can help to promote them, providing you’re not being obnoxious about it.
It’s in that spirit that I wanted to let you know, again, about a few of my favorite authors. In no particular order, here are some of the authors I’ve either enjoyed reading or have enjoyed working with during the past two years (trust me, there’s many more, but I decided to stop with six):
Katharine Eliska Kimbriel, NIGHT CALLS (reviewed at SBR on 9/21/2013). Ms. Kimbriel, a noted author of hard science fiction, wrote a winning historical fantasy in NIGHT CALLS featuring levelheaded farmgirl Alfreda (or “Allie”), who must get a handle on her own magic in order to help her pioneering community, or die trying.
Stephanie Osborn, the Displaced Detective series (books 1 and 2 reviewed at SBR on 7/13/2012; book 3 reviewed at SBR on 7/19/2012). Ms. Osborn’s Displaced Detective series featuring Sherlock Holmes as brought to the present day by hyperspatial physicist Skye Chadwick is a must-read for anyone who loves hard SF, Sherlock Holmes, or just plain good writing.
Dora Machado, THE CURSE GIVER. I edited THE CURSE GIVER, and enjoyed every minute of it. There’s Bren, who’s trying to save his people and has fallen under a curse, and Lusielle, the healer he initially saves, thinks he must kill (but fortunately refrains), and finally ends up falling in love with. There’s a phenomenally complex plotline twisting through all this that needs to be read and enjoyed . . . all I can say is, don’t miss this complex, epic tale of revenge, romance and redemption.
Aaron Paul Lazar, THE SEACREST (reviewed at SBR on 12/14/2013). Lazar is noted for his mysteries, but THE SEACREST is a straight-up romance (albeit with a few mysterious touches) about Finn and his first love, Libby. They first have a teenage romance, are riven from each other due to misinformation, then come together in a way that you need to read if you’re any kind of romance reader at all. In short, if you enjoy Nicholas Sparks, you really owe it to yourself to give Aaron Paul Lazar a try.
Kate Paulk, IMPALER (reviewed at SBR on 4/17/2011). Ms. Paulk has a gift for historical fantasy; while she is also good at writing funny fantasy (KNIGHTS IN TARNISHED ARMOR), IMPALER shows her full range as a novelist — it’s an exceptional read that combines equal measures of historicity and heart, and makes Vlad Tepes into a sympathetic character despite his flaws — or maybe even because of them.
And finally, I edited Florence Byham Weinberg’s ANSELM: A METAMORPHOSIS last year and was intrigued. Here’s a story about a rather faithless, feckless young academic, Eric, transported into the much-older Father Anselm’s body. The original Anselm was and remains an evil man who’s out only for his own pleasures, but Eric grows and changes, becoming far more spiritual and thoughtful in the process.
So there you have it — some SF mysteries, a romance, a couple of historical fantasies, and a literary fantasy. All exceptionally well-crafted books. All must-reads in their various ways.
All authors I keep an eye on, to see what they’re going to come up with next.
In that vein, please also go check out Jason Cordova’s novel of near-future suspense, CORRUPTOR . . . let’s hope he writes a sequel one of these years!
Guest Blog at Murder X 4 Is Up . . .
Folks, when writer Aaron Paul Lazar asked me if I was willing to write a guest blog for his shared blog site Murder x 4, I leaped, yelled, and said yes . . . though of course only the last part was verbalized as I didn’t want to scare the dogs.
Aaron asked me if I had anything Christmas-themed that might be interesting, and as my relationship with my late husband Michael started around Christmas of 2001 — and as I have two of his stories up at Amazon right now that are desperately in need of new readers, “A Dark and Stormy Night” and “Joey Maverick: On Westmount Station” — I decided to talk about that. And because Murder X 4 is a writer’s blog site where they often talk about the process of writing, I asked if it was OK to talk about everything I’ve done to keep Michael’s words and work alive.
Fortunately for me, Aaron said yes.
Those of you who’ve known me a while, or who’ve faithfully read my blog posts since I was coerced — er, convinced to start blogging will most likely know why I’ve done my best to keep Michael’s work alive. Even though it’s now at least partly mine, and at least some of the choices I’ve made might not be the choices he would’ve made, I had to try.
Michael meant everything to me, and in many ways, he still does. So I just couldn’t bear the thought of his work not getting any chance to find a readership . . . bad enough he was dead, but did his work have to die out, too?
Not everyone is going to like what I’ve done. I know that.
I also know that some people have told me along the way that Michael is dead, I’m not, and that it doesn’t really matter if his work stays alive. Michael, had he lived, would’ve undoubtedly written more things, and he might not even have wanted these particular works to stand.
But I knew Michael very well, and the people who’ve told me this other stuff did not. Michael did not give up, not on himself, not on other people. He was trying to figure out how to get action into his novel about Joey Maverick (MAVERICK, LIEUTENANT) at the time of his passing; he and I were both wracking our brains to figure out what he could add that wouldn’t blow his premise completely out of the water. (That premise being “quiet heroism,” which I discussed in today’s guest blog.)
Michael definitely would’ve kept trying to figure it out, and I can’t believe he’d have let these adventures rot.
But he almost certainly would’ve found other ways toward the same ends . . . and I truly wish he were alive so he would’ve found them, rather than me doing my poor best toward getting whatever I possibly can done.
Still, as a good friend of mine told me a few nights ago, the important thing is to write something Michael would’ve liked and enjoyed reading. Michael would like what I’ve done, by that logic, and even if he quibbled with me as to how I got things done, he’d still like it that I did it.
That’s why I’ve kept trying, both on his behalf and my own.
Anyway, please do go read my guest blog, and see what you think of my efforts. Then come back here, if you would, and tell you if it makes any sense . . . I just know it’s what I have to do, or else I’ve failed.
And I refuse to fail.
Short Story Sale Announcement…
Finally, it can be publicly announced . . . the short story I sold in October was bought by the STARS OF DARKOVER anthology, edited by Deborah J. Ross and Elisabeth Waters. This is set in the long-running Darkover universe created by late author and SFWA Grandmaster Marion Zimmer Bradley.
Looking at the table of contents, it’s fairly obvious that I’m the only author who doesn’t have a number of professional short story sales to my credit and who doesn’t have at least one book out as of yet save one. The other person who doesn’t seem to have a number of stories out is Gabrielle Harbowy, an editor with a number of well-received anthologies to her credit.
Now, as to what my story “At the Crossroads” is about? I figured that judges have never really been talked about in the various Darkover anthologies, yet MZB herself had mentioned an extremely important and influential Renunciate judge, Fiona n’ha Gorsali, at the very end of THE SHATTERED CHAIN. My story is about how Fiona got to her high position on the Courts of Arbitration (that MZB described her as having), as Fiona was the first woman ever named to that court.
Because THE SHATTERED CHAIN is set after the Terrans have recontacted their former colony after many millenia apart, that gave me a time frame to deal with that seemed fertile with possibilities. I picked one . . . no, I’m not about to say what just now (maybe later) . . . and rolled with it.
And fortunately for me, Ms. Ross liked my idea enough to work with me and help me get it done.
So now you know . . . and I’m very excited about it. (Between this and getting Michael’s stories back out and of course getting my novel ELFY ready to go as well, it’s been a very busy end of the year!)
Michael’s Two “Joey Maverick” Stories Available at Amazon
Folks, it’s official — both of my late husband Michael’s two “Joey Maverick” stories — “A Dark and Stormy Night” and “On Westmount Station” — are available at Amazon as of 9:07 CST Sunday December 1, 2013. These stories both previously appeared at e-Quill Publishing (one in 2010, the other in 2011), and in addition “A Dark and Stormy Night” appeared at the Written Word Online Magazine in May of 2005 (but was not archived).
This means “A Dark and Stormy Night” has been published three times, and “On Westmount Station” has now been published twice. (I know, I know; it’s boring and mundane to count it up this way. But these are the only stories I’ve worked on thus far that have actually been republished, and I like to think that my husband would be happy with my efforts on his behalf.)
If you’re wondering what I actually did with these stories (as in: Did I edit them? Did I write anything into them?), here’s a brief rundown:
For “A Dark and Stormy Night,” I added about 1400 words, mostly dealing with internal monologue (what Joey’s thinking about as he acts) or beefing up a few (romantic) scenes to make it a little clearer as to Joey’s motivations. I also edited the final version, proofread it, did my best to format it, actually sent it out to two different people to format it for me, and after all of that ended up posting the file I’d started with anyway . . . just a little work, all told.
For “On Westmount Station,” I did a lot more writing, as I added at least 5000 words to the story, doubling its original size. This included writing subplots, adding additional interior monologue for several characters (as “On Westmount Station,” unlike the first Joey Maverick adventure, has multiple POV so multiple characters are sharing the storytelling load), came up with several all-new characters and gave a completely different spin on what Joey is doing while he waits to ship out at Westmount Station than what Michael had to begin with. I also edited it, again tried to format it, again sent it out to two different people and again ended up using the file I started with as I just liked it better. (I still intend to do something nice for the people who tried hard to help me. Just haven’t figured it out yet, that’s all.)
Now, for those of you who read any of Michael’s work years ago — this means the Baen’s Bar crowd, as Michael showcased his novel MAVERICK, LIEUTENANT there many moons ago — you’re obviously going to know what I did. But you might not know why.
The main reason I added subplots and action and characters to “On Westmount Station” is because of something Jim Baen said to Michael on Baen’s Bar. What Baen said was very succinct: “Where is your plot, sir?”
And, of course, Michael took grave exception to this. (Had Jim Baen said instead, “Where is your action, sir?” Michael would’ve understood. Sometimes communication hinges on these tiny things.) Because Michael’s novel had plenty of plot — but after the opening novella (“A Dark and Stormy Night”), there wasn’t a whole lot of verifiable action to be had.
Even though Michael was quite distressed by Baen’s comments — I remember this clearly — he took them to heart once he understood (via another friend of ours, a professional writer and editor) that what Baen actually meant was action. And that while our friend felt Michael could still sell his novel as it stood, perhaps it might be a good idea to look for places action could be added.
As Michael had a very strong belief that many military men and women often had careers consisting of “quiet heroism” — that is, they did important things, but most of the time the public either didn’t know or care what they’d done — this action had to take place in such a way that it wouldn’t call attention to Joey Maverick. Because Michael’s further conceit was that Joey Maverick’s one known piece of heroism was going to be during “A Dark and Stormy Night” (where Joey takes command of the low-tech sailing ship he’s been crewing on during an emergency, and rescues a whole lot of people and not-so-incidentally meets the love of his life in the process), that made it tough to figure out where to add some action in.
Michael and I were still brainstorming and trying to figure this out at the time he passed away, very suddenly, in September of 2004.
So here I was, a newly-made widow, desperately and deeply grieving the loss of my husband, and I had what I knew to be an excellent novella. I added 1400 words to it mostly to make it a legal collaboration so I could more easily sell it — but “A Dark and Stormy Night” probably would’ve been just fine as it was. (I’ll be honest. I like the version I’ve worked on better, but the original is quite good.)
But figuring out what to do with Chapter 1 of Michael’s novel was much harder (yes, this is my roundabout way of saying this is where I got much of the backbone of “On Westmount Station”). All Michael had Joey doing was picking up his ship assignment and forming up his temporary troops, admittedly with great flair and elan. But it would be hard to make a stand-alone story out of that, which is why I thought long and hard about what to do next.
Over the course of a year, I added material, came up with new characters, and figured out just what could threaten a space station (at least in part) but be kept quiet enough that no one would hear about it but a few of the higher-ups in Joey Maverick’s command . . . and, of course, the men and women who helped Joey stop whatever the problem was in its tracks. Once I had all that, I wrote the scenes, integrated them into what Michael had, sent it to my first readers (my long-time writer’s group, Barfly Slush) and then tried to sell it.
But I couldn’t find any buyers.
I even tried the Writers of the Future contest with “On Westmount Station,” as I felt it was the best work I’d ever done. (I made sure, of course, that it was OK to submit it despite it being a collaborative work with my deceased husband.) But it sank like a stone there, just as everything else I’ve ever sent to Writers of the Future has always done.
Soon after “On Westmount Station” was rejected, I offered it to Lawrence at e-Quill Publishing and it was accepted. And there it stayed until I dissolved my relationship with e-Quill in 2012.
Now, as to why I brought them back out? It’s simple. They’re really good stories. Michael worked hard on “A Dark and Stormy Night,” and it consists of some of his finest work. And I’m extremely proud of what I did with “On Westmount Station,” as I feel it’s exactly what Michael would’ve done . . . if he’d have only had time to do just that.
Some people have told me over the last few years that I shouldn’t waste my time on keeping Michael’s stories alive. He’s dead, I’m not, and if Michael were still alive he probably wouldn’t be still trying to get these stories published — whether it be independently (as I have now) or through a publisher.
I disagree — and disagree very strongly — with that assessment, mostly because I know how persistent Michael was. I also know that Michael, like myself, would never give up on his stories. And finally, I know that Michael wrote very well and deserved to get a chance for his stories to find their audience.
All of that is why I kept trying to get the stories back out and available for sale.
And now, they are.
Please, do go take a gander at ’em. Let me know if you enjoy them. And spread the word . . . ’cause if you can do all that, I plan to bring out more of Michael’s other stories in the years to come. (Promise.)
Barb Caffrey's Blog 