Today, SpaceX’s Dragon capsule docked with the International Space Station.  A huge step towards commercial passenger flights into space and galactic Empire!  And of course, the company hired specialists to help them achieve their goal.

On this day, mine father, who was sent to earth from

his dying planet, did give virgin birth to a lotus flower, which did spring fully formed from his head, and out of which grew the Tree of Life, which was burned to ash, and that ash mixed with the blood of the Titans, and given the breath of life, and then dipped into the waters of Styx by mine mother, and then didst the wizard burn the sigil of Life upon my chest, and thus was I born.  That’s my story, which though it grows by a sentence from year to year, I am sticking to it.

The way to become a published writer is to write (and to submit what you write).  Seems obvious, yet so many would-be writers produce that one story or novel and then rework it endlessly, or submit a story or three, get rejected once (or a hundred times), and decide to give up.

Ira Glass does a wonderful job of explaining the reasons we creative types set out to create our particular art, and why so many become disappointed and quit: http://writerunderground.com/2011/04/28/ira-glass-on-creativity-or-the-gap-between-our-taste-and-our-work/

I would add for writers specifically that the writers who are published are the ones who continued to write NEW stories, and submit those stories, and move past the rejections, until they were published.

Of course, today we have a wonderful short cut — self-publication!

I have repeatedly been asked for advice from writers who have written one story, or been rejected a few times, wanting to know how to proceed, how to become published.  And sometimes as part of my response I make the mistake of mentioning self-publication as a possible future option.

Don’t get me wrong, self-publication is a very valid alternative IF your writing is worth reading, and IF you believe you have what it takes to stand out from the sea of other self-published works.

But too often, the would be writer latches onto that option as the answer, because the rest of my advice — to write and submit and be rejected until you are good enough to actually be published — requires work, and a lot of rejection, and letting many of your stories die an anonymous and unnoticed death.

And often the amateur writer believes their writing to be perfectly wonderful and worthy of being read.  Unfortunately, it is hard to be objective about one’s own work.  I certainly see how bad my early stories are now, though at the time I thought they were completely awesome.  I would have self-published them if I’d had the option.  And now I am so glad I did not, that they were rejected and I was driven to try again, to try harder, to do better.

So please, if you want to be a writer, then write, and submit, and keep doing that until you are good enough that somebody other than yourself and your mother thinks it is ready for the world to read.  Persevere, and become a good writer, not just a “wroter” (someone who wrote that one thing and just keeps reworking that same one thing), or a self-published amateur, and someday you will have something published that is worthy of being read.

Please come check out my reading at Norwescon on
Friday, April 6th at 5pm (Cascade 1 room).

The Goonies look on in amazement as Randy reads from his novel

I will be reading from my current novel project, a humorous urban fantasy currently titled “The Family Wizness” — it’s like Dresden Files meets Arrested Development.  It is amazingly twice as awesome as it sounds, and at half the calories!

Because my novel includes a number of 80′s references and jokes, I will also be giving away a bunch of little prizes, bits of genuine, made in the 80′s nostalgia and cheesiness.  I’m really happy with the  items I managed to find and it will be hard for me to let this stuff go.  So I hope you come and join the fun.

(I wrote the following for the Cascade Writers Workshop, where it was originally posted)

In 1632, Jebediah P. Milford, Earl of Worster Shire, became famous for eviscerating any poet whose work he found displeasing.  Thus began the Milford critique method.

Okay, that’s not true.  What is true is that both giving and receiving good critique can be one of the best ways to improve as a writer (other than writing lots of words).  I could go into the real history and facts about the Milford workshop, or similar workshops like Clarion West, but you probably don’t care too much about that (and it is easy enough to lookup on the web).  What is important, and what you should care very deeply about, is how to get the most out of this critique method for the betterment of your writing, and indeed, the betterment of all humankind.

( Read the rest of this entry » )Originally posted at my Mirror Blog at: http://www.randy-henderson.com/2012/03/giving-and-getting-good-critique/

I recently answered a question about finding spec fic markets responsive to stories with a “green message”.  Here’s my answer, and it applies to stories with any kind of message — political, social, religious, sexual, even a rant against whoever canceled the latest Joss Whedon show.

I suggested two things:

First, you can search for appropriate markets for any spec fic story using http://www.duotrope.com/ or http://www.ralan.com/.

Second, generally speaking, all magazines are open to stories that have a green message (who doesn’t enjoy Kermit’s musings?), with the caveat that what magazines really care about is the story, not the message.  You can have the most important message in the world, but if your story is a thinly veiled excuse just to deliver that message, or if you deliver it in a “As you know Bob, all the reefs died due to global warming and pollution.” “That’s right Ed, if only we had done X we would not now have to try to repopulate the oceans to prevent a catastrophic collapse of the food chain” manner, nobody is going to hear your message over their own groans.

But if you tell a gripping and moving story about your character, who just happens to be affected and their world shaped by whatever issue you are concerned with, if you let us experience first-hand the negatives you worry about rather than pointing them out to us, etcetera – in short, if you tell a dramatic story about a character we care about and sneak your message in like a message ninja – then really what you should be looking at is not magazines that support a green (or whatever) message, but rather the magazines that support stories of whatever sub-genre and length yours is.

Moreover, if you focus on magazines that are known for supporting green (or whatever) messages, well, you’ll be preaching to the choir anyway. So really, you should be looking for ways to get your message out to readers who don’t already know and agree with everything you’re likely to be wanting to share.

At least, that’s my experience/ impression/ knowledge bestowed upon me by the aliens who live in my sock drawer/ best advice.

I continue my quest to make good spec fic books and spec fic magazines easier to find, despite bookstore tendencies to do otherwise.

This time, I targeted Saladin Ahmed’s “Throne of the Crescent Moon.”

While not as difficult to find as some books, it still takes only a minute to make it stand out even more.

First, I found a few copies on a table far from the Fantasy section.  I made them easier to see in passing:

Hiding in the corner

Ah, Much Better.

Next, I found something lacking on the Scifi/Fantasy New Releases shelf, even though the in store locator system said it should be here:

No Ahmed in the As, but two stacks of Cards?

So I remedied that:

So Much Easier to Buy When It Is On the Shelf

Finally, I went ahead and searched for his book on every search screen I passed, so that anyone who came along behind me would first see his book (at least until the screen timed out).

I Need to Find a Good Book and ... Huh, What's This?

Again, all of this took only a minute or two as I passed these spots anyway, but sometimes that makes a difference between a good book being missed, and being bought.

And speaking of buying, you can buy Ahmed’s book here.

My story “Surviving the eBookalypse”, a satire about the future for books and their authors, is now live on Escape Pod: http://escapepod.org/2012/01/19/ep328-surviving-the-ebookalypse/

I wrote this story during Clarion West, partly as a response to a doom and gloom speech I heard on the future of the publishing industry. But folks like Mary Robinette Kowal and Cory Doctorow reaffirm my belief that we who create or consume the fiction, we have power to affect the course of things.  eBooks are really not so different from paperbacks if we push for the right to truly own what we purchase.  Books as objects can return to being lovingly crafted pieces of art, to be collected and displayed proudly in order to impress your date/guests.  Er, I mean, to show your love of the written word.  And in the end, all of us time-conscious readers will still want someone to filter out the good from the ocean of crap for us and will pay a little extra for that service.  Sparkly vampires aside.  So I believe the future of the written word remains bright.  And if I’m wrong, I will happily accept patronage offers.

Interesting note: the recorded pod cast is actually from an earlier version of the story, and the online text is from the updated version, which I see as a happy accident because A) I went back and forth over the beginning and am still not sure which I like better (though the printed version is tighter), and B) it is a record I think of how my writing (or at least editing) improved over the time between versions.  Although the very beginning of the story is the main difference, there are also a number of small differences that demonstrate opportunities to eliminate unneeded words and poor sentence structures.  The story synchs up pretty quickly (once Andre enters the library) so if you listen and follow along with the text, you’ll spot the differences.

Thank you to Roberto Suarez for his podcast reading.

Cheers, and I hope you enjoy it.

I’m looking between my computer screen with the shiny first chapters of my new book, and out the window at the shiny snow-covered yard, and smiling big.

I love the way snow makes everything look pristine and magical, hiding the ugliness of pavement and blemishes in the scenery, just waiting for me to come out and play, and be creative. Yeah, later my fingers may freeze and ache, and I might run into problems with driving, or worry about power outages, but right now it is all pure awesome.

And likewise, I love when I start a new writing project. The blank white page, pristine and perfect, waiting for me to play and be creative, and then that magical feeling as I fill the page with words, and those words start to shape into a story. Yeah, later, my fingers may freeze on the keys as I will struggle with the middle bit, and I’ll agonize a million times over that beginning, and might run into problems driving all the way through to the ending, or worry about losing my muse.

But right now, it is all pure awesome.

Our Snowy Back Yard

WTF? How are BACKLISTED EBOOKS $9.99?  Do I get an eMassage with that? Seriously.

I can understand the publishers having to raise prices for Mass Market print books due to the changing publishing, supply, distribution and market factors. But BACKLISTED EBOOKS?  Yes, there’s a certain amount of work to convert books nicely into eformats.  And if they were NEW books, there are costs associated to editing and formatting the book, etc.  But seriously.  BACKLISTS?  Of cheap-fun pulp mass market paperbacks converted to EBOOKS?  I love books, and support books, and am all for supporting authors, but many backlisted genre paperbacks are not great works of art I will be reading over and over, especially in eBook format, they are disposable consumable entertainment, and surely they’ve sold through by now, so really, what’s the justification for $9.99 eBooks?

All you’ve done is made me NOT buy those books now.  Unless I find them in a used book store.  Now, let’s see what we have available for a SANE price …