Ephemera & Tales

Each year since 2004 I've had a story to share for Halloween, because it's a significant date for me. By the skin of my teeth, this year's it's another Tawnholme story, for a little Halloween sweetness...

( Sweets for my sweet, by Alex Draven )

Each year since 2004 I've had a story to share for Halloween, because it's a significant date for me. This year's is another Tawnholme story, wherein things do not go ( According To Plan )

Each year since 2004 I've had a story to share for Halloween, because it's a significant date for me. This year's a taste of Tawnholme sweetness, although as it turned out, my weather forecast was completely wrong! Many many thanks to A, for helping me get this ready to share - all mistakes and misunderstandings that remain are my own sweet fault, especially as I have changed things since she saw it.

Happy Halloween, and happy reading!

( Unexpected callers, by Alex Draven )

So, as anyone who follows me on Twitter is no doubt aware, I spent last weekend at Nine Worlds, a 3 day geek-fest convention thingumy. It was good. I approve. Would do again.

Specifically, I got to hang out with fab people, both people I know and don't get to see often enough, and people I don't know who were shiny and interesting, and go to All The Things.

The sheer abundance of sessions was kind of overwhelming, in a good way, and I'm really appreciating people's write-ups of sessions I didn't get to go to - so many threads full of so many interesting things, but I don't regret choosing any of the things I did in the end go to (not even the slot where I didn't go to any of the five different things that I wanted to go to, and instead got a foofy coffee and ate a protein bar, and sat and chatted to friends, because that was good too.)

I do kind of regret not taking time off work, which means I missed several sessions that I would have liked to go to on Friday, and had to leave mid-afternoon on Sunday to get home. Note duly taken for next year.

The only thing I did get to go to on Friday was Tony Keen's session on Writing Fantastic London - part discussion of his list of key texts, running from Charles Dicken's Christmas Carol to the Rivers of London trilogy series*, part writing exercise, and part reading / discussion of some of the participants' writings. We had about 15 mins of writing time, which left one of the participants with an impressively polished and vivid short inspired by Crossrail, and generated lots of discussion about how the transport system ties in to the fantastic-ness of the city.

I was thinking about my own stuff, and Everything Changes is, I think, my London-est story with supernatural elements. The area around Kings Cross is both inspiration, symbol, and plot element in that one, and a lot of the session discussion brought up transport and transience, and migration and crowds as aspects of London that engender fantastic fiction, so - yes.

My own writing exercise results? ( under the cut tag )
_____
*<strike>I can type up if anyone wants it - I have a couple of new things on my to-read list from it., personally. </strike>
The reading list is online now: http://tonykeen.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/writing-fantastic-london-reading-list.html

<b>ETA - Shiny! - Bedlam, a story by Catherine Taylor, aka the nifty Crossrail story has been posted! text or Audio    Go, read! </b>

Each year since 2004 I've had a story to share for Halloween, because it's a significant date for me. This year is no exceptions, despite the best efforts of non-writing life to get in the way.

This is another Tawnholme story, but a very different mood from last year's - this year is more about sadness and stillness and the potential inherent in the turn of the seasons at this time of year.

Mellow Mist by Alex Draven

"So, hey."

Karl kicked desultorily at the fallen leaves, lying in damp, sodden drifts. It was cold, and damp, and the mist hadn't lifted even though it was mid-afternoon. The trees the far side of the clearing were soft-focus, and the far side of the valley a ghostly rumour.

"I came out here. I don't know what I thought that was going to achieve, but - here I am."

The trees didn't say anything back.

It wasn't exactly silent - the wind moving the branches, the distant thrum of traffic, the odd thump and crackle as birds launched themselves from branches or ripe crab apples hit the ground - but it was a lot quieter than Karl was used to. ( read on )

If you're interested in reading the previous stories I've posted as Halloween gifts they are:

Dream Come True (2004)
Thirteen Kisses (2005)
All Souls (2006)
Favour ($0.99) & two free snippets Soar and Raining Cats (2007)
Tradition (2008)
Everything changes (2009)
It’s not the dead that haunt graveyards (2010)
Here Comes The Rain (2011)

You'll find these and other seasonally appropriate snippets under 'seasonal : autumn' in the tags list

(If I was doing this as a promotional thing, I would have picked a less popular date, because there's an awful lot of fabulous fiction being released for Halloween - more of it every year - but I'm doing this because it's a significant date for me, so, thank you, everyone who reads this, and twice thanks to those of you who let me know that you did.)

Each year since 2004 I've had a story to share for Halloween, because it's a significant date for me. This year is no exceptions, although I'm posting a little early because circumstances will prevent me from getting online on the day, and I'm determined not to skip.

This year's tale is a Tawnholme story, which means it's a contemporary, roughly 'real world', story set in a fictional UK town, and I think it's a little smoky and a lot sweet - a good pair to 2007's Favour, in fact. Many thanks to Pen for last minute editing services; any remaining mistakes are entirely my own fault, especially as I've worked on this since she saw it last.

( Here Comes The Rain, by Alex Draven )

If you're interested in more, here's a list of the past stories.

Dream Come True (2004)
Thirteen Kisses (2005)
All Souls (2006)
Favour (2007) (for sale) & Soar and Raining Cats (2007)(free sketches)
Tradition (2008)
Everything changes (2009)
It’s not the dead that haunt graveyards (2010)

You'll find these and other seasonally appropriate snippets under 'seasonal : autumn' in the tags list

(If I was doing this as a promotional thing, I would have picked a less popular date, because there's an awful lot of fabulous fiction being released for Halloween - more of it every year - so, thank you, everyone who reads this, and twice thanks to those of you who let me know that you did.)

jjhunter issued a speculative fiction fest challenge, to write a short story describing an ordinary day in the life for an ordinary woman and her family coping with illness somewhen in the future. It's quite a specific set of prompts, but it sparked off with the song I was listening to, and turned into this, which I post as it stands, as a rough sketch.

(It's a stand alone, although it could be the same world as these snippets, not least because it's inspired by music from the same source - thank you Deathboy, for your music as both band and individual!

*****

First of March

"So, here we are - the first of March and the sun's shining." Kal tilted the camera towards the viewscreen behind her, and smiled. The automatic polarisation on Ella's bedside viewer abruptly killed the contrast, but she could still see the light burst bleaching out most of Kal's viewscreen. "We made orbit right on schedule." Kal returned the camera to dock, and the light levels settled back down again. "I love you, lady. Have a good day." Kal touched two fingers to her lips, and blew a kiss to the camera, and then the screen went dark.

"Love you, too," Ella whispered, and flopped back in the unmade bed, allowing herself the luxury of a minute or two's silence to feel herself missing her wife.( Read more... ) so - what do you think?

Every year since 2004, I've posted a story for Halloween, because it's a significant day for me. This year's offering is an idea that's been rattling around in my subconscious for years, which sparked against a recent visit to a local civil cemetery, to become this story.

It’s not the dead that haunt graveyards
by Alex Draven

( Read more... )

If you're interested in previous years' stories, here's the list:


Dream Come True (2004)
Thirteen Kisses (2005)
All Souls (2006)
Favour (2007) (for sale)
Soar and Raining Cats (2007)
Tradition (2008)
Everything changes (2009)

(plus, there are the two zombie stories. They are seasonally appropriate, but they do come with a 'you click on the link, you take responsibility for your own sanity' warning - the titles are terrifyingly accurate on these two - Zombie Incest Wrongness and the infamous necrophiliac plushy gangbang story)

(If I was doing this as a promotional thing, I would have picked a less popular date, because there's an awful lot of fabulous fiction being released for Halloween - more of it every year - so, thank you, everyone who reads this, and twice thanks to those of you who let me know that you did.)

I've just been updating some pages over at the GLBT Bookshelf wiki, and discovered that they've added some new category pages, including a set of geographical sets: Latino Interest, UK/European Interest, Aussie/Kiwi Interest, US/Canadian Interest, Asian Interest

There's not a huge amount listed on those pages yet, so if you're an author who uses the wiki, there's the opportunity to add your relevant titles while the lists are still short enough to be palatable, but for readers it's a little underwhelming.

Someone posted a plea to authors - wow - that's a month ago already? Anyway - a plea to authors, namely


I am totally one of those authors, and I apologise, so this is my 'not dead, still plugging along' post.  Specifically, my day job is trying to take up all 26 hours of the day every day, which isn't leaving a lot of time or mental energy for writing.

The ideas are still coming, though, and I'm making lots of notes and scribbled pen-sketches that hopefully will come together into actual stories as soon as the pressure's off a little. I wish I could tell you when that would be, because that would make everything less stressful, but the available evidence suggests that as soon as I say 'work will get less busy in x days' the law of sod will roll into effect and make me a liar. 

I don't want to lie to you, so I'll make you no promises about the timing, just that I'll keep on keeping on, and eventually there will be more stories for me to share with you.