It’s that time! Looking back, it was a chaotic year. I worked harder at self-promotion, I had ten stories come out, but my year was really marked by teaching.
I taught:
- English 101 – two semesters, online to prison inmates
- Plot for Teen Writer’s Symposium
- Art and Business of Short Stories at the Skirball Writer’s Center
- Getting Political in Your Science Fiction for Literary Cleveland
- Three Sentences to Unlock Your Plot for Literary Youngstown Festival
- Plot for Medina Author’s Festival
- Four Week Plot Intensive for Reach Your Apex
- Four week Short Story Workshop for Heights Libraries
Not to mention all the panels I did at conventions! I feel like I was more of a public speaker than ever this year.
Goals
My goals for this year were:
- Submit at least one of my trunk novels to a Big Publisher
- Submit my short story collection more places
- Submit my poetry chapbook more places
- Continue querying agents in the hope of getting one
I submitted a novel to Tor.Com, so I think that counts for the first one.
I submitted my short story collection to three places with no responses. I spent a lot of time looking for places I even COULD submit a short story collection. I set up a reminder every month to check 7 different small presses that have “We might open to submissions eventually” on their websites.
I submitted my poetry chapbook four places. (Ditto lots of searching for presses.) I broke my rule about not submitting to places with a reading fee, and did not get accepted.
I queried one small press that requested the full MS. That is still pending.
I submitted my football memoir to 7 places, getting 2 full requests. I had given up on selling this years ago, but as I looked for presses for short stories and poetry collections, I kept finding places open to memoir! Maybe it’ll finally go somewhere?
I queried 28 agents, got 1 full request, and received 26 form rejections. One query is outstanding. I honestly thought I’d queried more than that. I started with 5 queries in January and sent two more queries out every time I got a rejection.
Poetry
I had NO poems come out this year. At all. Dang. I submitted poetry 38 times for 0 acceptances and 0 personal rejections.
I struck out on poetry completely. Is my poetic voice out of step with the gestalt? Or am I just spending too much time on other things? Could be both?
Short Stories
I had ten short stories come out this year. Yes, these are all eligible for the awards. Well, not the 42-word one.
“Live to Eat” in ADI – eating disorders as generational trauma! Oh, and, like, what if we could stop eating? Not too subtly inspired by my Crohn’s disease and parenting problems.
“Up the Mountain” in Phenomenons 3: The Wind and Fire – Lipstick Lilly’s adventures continue! This time, we worked closely to make sure this shared-world anthology has an over-arching plot.
“Don’t Taunt Robot Mermaids With Laser Eyes” in 42 Stories – an anthology of 42 stories exactly 42 words long with 42-character titles. I riffed on my story “Seeing Clearly” which I was shopping around at the time.
“She’s a Rescue” in F&SF Summer 2024. Juno just wants her dad to trust her to fly the ship, but her mom gets in the way. You can get it at Barnes & Noble, Mac’s Backs, or Weightless Books
“What We Telepath When We Telepath About Love” a Raymond Carver send-up, in For a Friend.
“A Tight Fit” in Tales of the United States Space Force – big science machines and rescues in near earth orbit.
“The Good Twin” on Simultaneous Times Podcast May 15, 2024: For our 40th birthday, my sister and I gave each other migraines.
“Variant Cover: Pantone Sunset” in Escape Pod May 5, 2024: a robot retail worker starts reading comic books and that changes everything.
“Rail Meat” in Clarkesworld January 2024 – a professional thief takes a turn at being human ballast for atmospheric racing yachts. Reviewed by Malda Marlys on bsky: “at least four different genres crashed together at high speeds into both scathing indictment of the excesses of wealth and satisfying romp.”
“The Handmaiden Alchemist” in Analog January 2024 – a young woman uses the power of chemistry in 1520s France. With footnotes! My last Clarion 2013 story to sell!
Rejectomancy
I submitted 102 stories for 6 acceptances for an easily-calulated acceptance rate of about 6%. (5.8%) Last year’s downward trend continues. eep.
Novels
The big novel news is of course the Galactic Hellcats re-release! WOOT WOOT My baby is alive again!
I had submitted it to four-ish publishers, very sloppily. I hadn’t kept track! Was I afraid? I kept hoping to sell it to a bigger house… got a full submission to Tor, but when they rejected it, I gave up and went with the small press with the neatest covers. Lethe! Also, they agreed to print the sequel, too!
Galactic Hellcats 2 comes out next year!!!!!!!!!!
In addition to all the querying and submitting, I wrote a full draft of a new novel I’m calling “Mars Strike” which is with first readers, and I started a weird project I’m calling “Multitude” which might be a novel, novella, or a novelette. Not sure yet. I’m going to submit it as my MFA Thesis, probably.
Comics
I signed a contract, but the project is still under development. Vague update is vague.
ALSO, an artist asked permission to turn one of my stories into a comic and did an amazing job! I can’t wait to tell you where to get it. Here’s a peek:
Games
I wrote an interactive fiction this year called “Don’t Open This Book.” This Itch.io link for you, my loyal fans, however it will be featured soon on Indiepocalypse, so support them (trigger warning: 1990s Inspired Site). And, why yes, it IS eligible for the Nebula, so glad you asked.
Also, I have been working hard on a dating sim for Galactic Hellcats called “Galactic Hellcats in Love.” I hope to release it early next year. Play as Andrei or Autumn, and pick among 3 girls or 3 boys to date and evade bad guys with! I’ve contracted an artist for backgrounds, Susan Schaffer, and this is the first one she gave me. The characters are placeholders, drawings by me from my game “Space Princess Coronation.”
In conclusion
I over-committed this year. I had my 50th Birthday and maybe I’m feeling the pressure of time? The year after your first major award nomination, you can’t help but wonder if it will ever happen again.
For my self-promotion, I got an “author” page for Facebook, revamped this website, hired a publicist, started a newsletter, and made a press kit. I want to do everything I can to make Galactic Hellcats 2 a big success. So the over-commit is not going away any time soon.
My plan to avoid burnout:
- Focus on events that sell books rather than saying yes to everything
- Skip teaching next semester
- Focus on the social media I enjoy most – Instagram and Bluesky – and let the rest slide
- Blog when I feel like it, not every week
Goals for next year:
- Sell the heck out of Galactic Hellcats 1 and 2!
- Attend a mainstream fan convention (Fan Expo or DragonCon or both)
- Finish Galactic Hellcats in Love
- Finish a draft of Multitude
- Revise Mars Strike
- Keep looking for an agent, sending out two queries every time I get a rejection
