A Stone's Throw

practice your aim. you never know when you'll spy 2 birds at once.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Blood Everywhere

In recent months I've had a novel of mine, 'Bloodletter', requested by several editors at some respected publishing houses. I made it clear to them that it needed another edit before it could be sent out, and everyone is fine with that. So now that I have enough time on my hands, I'm preparing to launch into the edit.



Currently I'm in pre-edit mode, one made up mostly of research. Now while I really enjoy research, sometimes it gets a bit grueling. Especially if the subject is of the plague variety. Researching on the internet is like going through the rabbit hole - you never know where it will lead. And this is certainly the case when you start googling about blood and sacrifices and the like. You start to get blood on the brain. I toggle between pages about the Ebola and Lassa virus, read up on ancient cutting practices, search for translations of dead languages on rituals.

Grisly stuff. But at the end of the day, even though I've had had to wade through a great deal of blood, coming up with a finished product is worth it.

Just hope the editors agree. Hah.

Monday, April 04, 2011

2011 Retro-Blog

Alright, so I have no great excuse for no blogging for awhile. I admit it. SO, to get caught up, I'm going to do a little retro-blog from where I last left off. And after this, I promise I will be much more regular about my postings.

So, what's been going on?

November -- I attended the World Fantasy Convention in Columbus, Ohio, with my friend and fellow writer Dale Carothers. A great time was had by all, especially at the bar and the party rooms. It's amazing the amount of wheeling, dealing, and carousing go on at these events. The discussion panels were cool enough, though at some of the panels there was a little too much self-promotion going on. I mean, really? You're on a friggin panel, stop trying to sell your most recent whatever. But I met a lot of great people - writers, artists, editors, publishers - and will make every effort to attend the Con again in the near future.

Towards the end of November, I flew down to join my family in Tampa where we all embarked on a cruise to Mexico. Cruises are to lazy people what bacon is to meateaters. Room service, housekeeping, pools, spas, restaurants, fine dining, buffets, lobster tails, ice cream sundaes, pizza,... is there a trend here? This was my second cruise in the Carib, and I enjoyed every second of it. Well, every second except that it was too short. The highlights: Incredible Indian food, scuba diving, exploring a Maya city, 24/7 food, and of course family.

And then a return to home and the beginning of the dark days of Winter.

December lowlights: Living in South Dakota. 2 blizzards. A low of -45. 1 flat tire.

Highlights? My story 'To Sleep With Pachamama' was bought by Bart Leib for an upcoming anthology called Subversion. I started reading slush for John Joseph Adam's Lightspeed Magazine. And most promising - a request from EDGE Publishing to see more chapters of my novel Denizen's Ascension.

January arrived with all the grace of a 800-Ib brick of ice. It didn't take long to make the decision to flee SD. Where would I go? TBD. All I knew was that I had to get out of there. So all that had to be done was sell, give away, or toss just about everything I had. Easier said than done.

In the midst of this somewhere I sold my story 'The Last Days of Humberto Guerra' to Bill Tucker's upcoming anthology Zombies Without Borders.

March arrived and I was homeless, truckless, unemployed, and a great deal more excited about the future. It's not often that can be said. But I was leaving SD and knew great things were ahead of me. I will not miss much of SD, though I will miss my friends. Luckily, the world has given us cell phones, email, Skype, and blogs to make things easier.

I quickly jumped from Sioux Falls to Omaha (shout out to the Indian joint downtown!) to Wisconsin where I met up with great old friends. Hospitality is always in fine form at the home of Jamie and Len Davis. Didn't get to see everyone I hoped to, but that's the nature of things.

Post-WI, I fled the North for the warm winds of Florida to spend great times with family.

And now as I type is the beginning of April. What comes ahead I don't know, but I'm excited to find out. AND, I promise to blog about it.

- Caleb