Writing: To Shine or Not to Shine

It's been a while since I posted anything on my own writing. Partly because I'm in a slow stage and partly because well, I guess because I've been plugging at one story for a bit and revisiting an old novel. Earlier this year I polished up the long running story (long running in that it took me 15 years to write) and sent it off to the Shine anthology being edited by Jetse de Vries in the Netherlands.

It's an intriguing anthology because the point is that the future is bright, not the dystopian worlds so often shown in SF and fantasy, and especially in short stories. The subgenre (or maybe getting back to the grassroots genre) of "mundane SF" looks at the world within the next 50 years, on our planet (mostly) and with a possible, believable extrapolation of future science and technologies. No bug-eyed aliens, no extra worlds or space-faring races.

For Jetse's anthology, he also wanted a future world that was better than this one. My world starts out worse but with a hopefully uplifting future, so it didn't fit. But there have been discussions of late, on the SF Canada writers' list, as well as at Worldcon about all the dystopian SF that's being written. How, some editors were asked, do you get people to write something uplifting that takes place in the near future?

A good question and I think one reason we are writing so much dystopian fiction is because of the inundation our culture receives of news stories about the terror and horror and pollution and the fall of civilization. In some ways, today is no worse than it was fifty years ago. In other ways, it is worse. There are more pollutants, more severe forms of crime (even if there is less crime), more illnesses and allergies. Or is there? Some yes, but we have 24-hour news channels, and as they say, no news is good news.

With the constant fear-mongering, the visuals of graphic crimes, the devastating natural disasters, the "wars on terror" we find our mindset dwelling on THE END, or the present and how to survive it. We have no faith of a good future. We have no pretense that there will be endless resources. We'll run out of water, oil, food and space. So how indeed do we write utopian fiction?

This discussion and Jetse's comment to me has got me thinking. My own fiction is often dark but not always. Yet I've never sold the two humorous pieces I've written, but then they're fantasy more than SF. Still, part of bringing our future, our tangible world to a brighter place is to not succumb to the gloom and despair but to hope and work towards a dream, not a nightmare. I'll consider this as I write some of my future fiction.

So with that in mind, Jetse de Vries is planning some contests for the pre-release of his anthology, Shine. Here is what he said:

Shine is slated for an early 2010 release, and until that time I will keep
several features (‘Optimistic SG around the World’, ‘Music that Makes You Feel
Optimistic’, etc.) running on the Shine blog, while adding new
ones.

First, I will be running a number of stories that came very close, but
didn’t make the final cut for a variety of reasons (I’ve tried to walk the
tightrope of getting maximum quality while also obtaining great variety in tone,
content, characters and setting). This to promote Shine and optimistic SF
in general. I’ll probably be setting up a new site for that.

Second, I will be holding a competition where people need to guess the
correct ending of a certain paragraph—choosing from four alternatives: three
bogus, one real—and this for 16 paragraphs, each from one of the 16
accepted Shine stories. Extra points for guessing who the author is. I’m
working on interesting prizes. Depending on the actual launch date
of Shine, I intend to hold this competition in November or December
2009.

Jetse de VriesEditor, SHINE anthology & OUTSHINE Twitterzine

OUTSHINE guidelines: http://shineanthology.wordpress.com/outshine-submission-guidelines/
Shine: http://shineanthology.wordpress.com/ Personal
blog: http://eclipticplane.blogspot.com/

New Writing Sales

I just received word today that my SF story "Ice Queen" will be in the Warrior Wise Woman anthology by Norilana books. It's due in June. http://www.norilana.com/norilana-ww-guidelines.htm shows the cover for the book.

Sometimes my emails don't seem to make it across the water so I checked with the editor of the Mammoth Book of the Kama Sutra and my story "Janukurpara" (the knee elbow position) will be published in that anthology. It's about to go to the publisher and has been edited so I presume it will be out in a couple of months.

A good weekend over all for publishing. Just when I was doubting once again, a somewhat roller coaster state for many writers.

Clarion Daze II

Of people, we had a range, no one yet that famous in their careers. There were a few needy princesses, the quiet shy ones, the nerdy ones, the confident ones, grass roots cowgirls and nature lovers and I think at that time, only one of each sex who were parents. There was also the name dropper, the obnoxious person who never read peoples' stories and barely wrote anything the whole time. Clarion critiques are set up thusly.

If your story is being critiqued, someone will start to the left or right of you and it will go around the circle with everyone making comments. You don't say anything until the end. On the brutally bad days, many people would say the exact same thing and we started to say, if you're saying the same thing just say "ditto." It could get annoying. So the name dropper who stopped reading stories always positioned himself about half way around from the person getting critiqued. He'd listen to what everyone said and then expound like he was god and knew all the answers. We even had a meeting, of course too nice to say it directly to his face, but saying everyone should be reading all the stories. Name dropper even condescended to come and tell me that he thought I had potential. Lovely of him, considering he wasn't an instructor.

I was quite prolific during the six-week stint and wrote at least a story a week. Few wrote more than me; maybe just one person. Some couldn't write at all, getting writer's block or freezing up in fear of the critiquing. If you went in with any sort of ego you were bound to have it completely deflated. I went with little, knowing I had a lot to learn. I had always said that if we were all standing on a ladder I was probably near the bottom of the ladder. I climbed more rungs than the rest and maybe hadn't even passed the rest of them but I made large improvements to my writing.

I should mention that computers were still fairly rare and expensive. Of the class only about seven people had computers. Hillary Rettig was so fast on her typewriter that she had to use a manual. Yes, typewriters. I was so envious of those who had computers and could write and re-write without having to put a new sheet of paper in every time. It meant for very long nights of writing and rewriting should you make too many errors on a page. I came out of Clarion and bough my first computer secondhand from Kij then.

Of our writers, Octavia Butler died a few years ago. Connie Willis has won more Hugos and Nebulas than almost any other writer. She even had back then and I doubt she remembers any of us except maybe a few bright stars. Tappan King, I don't know what happened to him: if he's still an editor he's not a name that shows up in most coventions, or Locus or other internal newsletters. Ursula was always a star. I wrote to her for a while as she was interested in what we were doing but I stopped bothering her after a few years. Samuel Delaney has since had huge flaky writer issues, not even showing up for some venues so we're lucky he was there for our workshop. He has written a few things since then but not much. Ed Bryant writes for Locus and we became friends.

Of the people in the workshop; Janet has published one or two things but she doesn't submit that much. I don't know if Clelie ever published stories but she's a consummate poet. Our Clarion year spawned a lot of editors. Gordon Van Gelder was first part of St. Martins Press and now edits Fantasy & Science Fiction magazine. Michael Stearns still edits for Harcourt Brace and went from California to NY. I lost track of him. Kathleen Alcala was editing for some university I believe in Seattle but I'm not sure. Kij Johnson edited for Tor, then Dark Horse Comics, Microsoft and other places. I did copyediting and now also edit for Aberrant Dreams, and once for Twilight Tales.

Of our group in publishing, well Kij is the most prolific and awarded writer and has written two published novels so far. Kathleen Alcala published a collection of short stories in the magic realism style. Kij and I were surprised when we googled Dean Shomshack and found he was a multiple GURPS and other gaming supplements author. We remembered him as the revenant man from one of his stories. I think one or two other people sold a story or two. Richard Terra died recently, at a fairly young age. So I guess in that sense I haven't done too bad, still publishing a poem or story here or there. Unlike other Clarion years who spawned a lot of big name authors, we went more under the wire in editing. I don't know what happened to half of the people in our class. Kathryn Drennan probably published a lot but she was a Hollywood screenwriter married to J. Michael Straczynski. No idea if they're still married or where she went.

Was Clarion worth it? I'm still not sure. Some days it seems it was. Other days, it seems I learned more since then. Who can tell? I edit, I write and Clarion did help me forumlate a novel, which I never sold. Some day soon, I hope, I'll get back to writing one of my novels. No one is ever going to discover me without my own hard work. So it goes. Clarion. Unforgettable times if nothing else.

Maybe Science Fiction was Always in My Blood

I was researching Mars to write my SF story (which I did finish in the nick of time for the Baen contest), and it got me to thinking (plus mentoring and talking about fantasy and SF) about my first awareness of "out there" as a child. I was maybe nine or ten and we lived near the edge of the city at that time. I grew up in Calgary in the northwest part and Spy Hill was a hilly range to the north of us. It was farmland with some horses or cows but mostly just rolling hills. As kids we'd wander up there and shoot bow and arrows or just walk around. As teenagers we went up there to smoke illicit things.

But between those times, Spy Hill was a bit too far away and our street (we were three or four blocks from Spy Hill, not that far) still had some undeveloped lots. One was really the street behind us but if I walked up the alley I could reach the grassy knoll with foxtails, dandelions, bluebells and quackgrass growing on it. In early evening (because I can't fathom that I managed to get out later in the night) I'd go up there alone and lay down in the grass.

The sky was amazing in those days. Being near the edge of the city, with not yet the amount of light pollution from all the surrounding communities, you could truly see the Milky Way and the depth of stars. I would stare up in peace and quiet (something my wartorn home life lacked a lot) and wonder about life on other planets, what was out there and just how far did infinity go. I desperately wished for the UFOs to go by so I could catch a glimpse and just maybe they would save me from my life.

It was a peace, a beauty so resolute that I look on this memory now and feel as if it was never real, as if I only made it up. But I remember it so clearly. It was such a difference from the dysfunctional family I lived in, my island of calm that I don't think I ever shared this special place with anyone. It was my sanctuary, my secret garden of plants and stars, and remembering this today actually brings tears to my eyes that I had these moments of beauty that kept me sane.

And maybe that was the first seed that had me move into the worlds of speculative fiction, to catch the wonder and austerity of the universe, real or imagined.