In the Good News Category Regarding the 2019 FWA Royal Palm Awards

While one story did not fare so hot, another story did!

CONGRATULATIONS! Your entry, The Pumpkin Spice Must Flow, Short Story, is a semifinalist for the 2019 Royal Palm Literary Awards competition!

This was done under the category of Published Short, thanks to it being in the anthology Strangely Funny V!

You know, this book! Still available on Amazon!

So yay! If it was good enough for Strangely Funny, it's good enough for the state of Florida!

The thing is, there's still a Finalist stage to contend for, and then finding out if the story achieves top status as a Winner (First, Second, or Third Place). So there's still a few more nerve-wracking months until we get there.

In the meanwhile, I get to display this!

In the Sad News Category Regarding the 2019 FWA Royal Palm Awards

Well, I just got back word that "Road Trip to Vegas" - my submission to the Short Fiction Unpublished category for the Florida Writers Association's Royal Palm Awards - did not make the Semifinalist cut for consideration.

'Tis a pity. I hoped it would have been funny enough and good enough to pass muster.

Maybe I didn't have enough Fourth-Wall-Breaking narration in it. Yeah, that's the problem. MORE INSANE NARRATIVE DIALOGUE COMING RIGHT UP!

/owstophittingme

Look, "Road Trip to Vegas" is kind of a personal work for me, based on one of the traumatic moments of my teen years undertaking a non-stop road trip that left some emotional scars. I wrote TWO stories based on that trip, the other one being "A Face In the Light" which interestingly enough earned a Finalist status in this same category last year (I am trying to find a publisher to submit it, so far I've had a couple of rejections so... sigh...).

I still think it's one of my better works. I'm sorely tempted to package it together with other humor stories and self-publish another story anthology. I just need to get about eight or ten more stories - I have six already, maybe seven if I pull some e-published works off-market to put it together - to justify a decent-sized book.

Meanwhile, if you're looking for some GOOD news... (wait for the next blog post)

Coming Soon: Strangely Funny VI

I am proud to announce a new humor-horror anthology is coming out this year, the next installment of Strangely Funny (this one is the seventh but it's numbered Sixth, we'll explain later)!

The editors forwarded the book cover, see below:

The story they accepted is "How a Vampire Gets A Tan," a sequel of sorts to the "Minette Dances With the Golem of Albany" published in Volume III. If anybody enjoyed reading that and the other Dhampyr story "I Must Be Your First," I hope you enjoy this follow-up as well.

I'll let you know when the book is available online for print and eReader!

Getting Back Into The Superhero 'Verse I'm Writing

I've settled on the plot ideas I've been bouncing around in my head since 2004. It's gonna be a story about a man who meets a woman during the war.

...

Okay, so I'm ripping off the plot of the Book With the Blue Cover (wherever it may be on our shelves). BUT DAMMIT I'M TIRED OF SUFFERING FROM WRITERS BLOCK.

(activates lightsaber before heading into battle) CHARRRRRRGGGEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!

As March Rolls Out, April Rolls In

I know I promised to find a work I had on the backburner and clean it up for possible publication through IngramSpark to see how the experience went.

Well... one month later and I haven't gotten anywhere near fixing that project and getting something going.

There's every excuse I can throw out there, but the basic answer is I am just not feeling it. I'm bummed and stressed about three to thirty things that don't even have to do with writing, and I'm bummed and stressed about that.

I'm looking back at about ten years of working on NaNoWriMo projects and finding not a one of them - whittled down to five solid candidates - grabbing my interest to get done.

Even with Camp Nano starting again this April, I am feeling challenged and unmotivated.

I am one of those poor souls in dire need of a Muse. Might be Thalia (for humor), maybe Clio (for history/non-fiction). It's a damn shame the Greeks never set up Muses for Sci-Fi / Fantasy fiction. :/

Anyone know the hourly rates of a good Muse?

It's St. Patrick's Day, You Know What THAT Means!

Well, I have gotten to 500 posts on this blog, and I'm getting there by way of neither librarianship nor writing.

I'm getting there by way of posting yet again on St. Patrick's Day clips from one of my favorite movies The Quiet Man:

Ahhhh, the Quiet Man.

Impetuous! Homeric!

I need to update my passport and save up more money to make a trip to Innisfree meself.

If I Can Clean It Up, I Have A Work To Publish this 2019.

If you note my habit of writing for November, I will on occasion finish a rough work-in-progress and win the NaNoWriMo prizes for crossing the 50,000 word mark.

Now that I've gotten a few side projects out of the way, I am re-tasking myself towards cleaning up that particular WIP and using a particular prize to get it out to the world:

A self-publishing discount with IngramSpark.

In case you're not a librarian or bookstore manager, Ingram handles a lot of book and AV distribution. With the growth of self-published works, they've jumped into that market - competing with Amazon's Createspace, you might have heard of that - and they bring to the table an advantage of providing print / ebook for market to libraries and brick-and-mortar stores (the stores are not obligated to display books, but you may be able to make personal arrangements with stores in your area).

As a distributor, Ingram has a decent reputation, so this may be something that can help a self-published guy like me find an audience.

We'll see. First things first, EDIT MY DRAFTS. :)