Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, #CharactersGettingIdeas, creativity, Fiction, genre fiction, Thoughts, Wordle, Writers, writing on November 9, 2022| Leave a Comment »
My Wordle story has run into a minor hiccup: After a couple of weeks, I realized that the main characters should probably be gender swapped. That means going back and reworking what I have so far, and rethinking how the story should move forward. I’ve run a test version past the source of the Wordle story seeds and she approves, so yay.
Now I just need to make it happen.
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, book bans, Fiction, open minds, Thoughts, Writers, writing on October 22, 2022| 1 Comment »
This quote has made the rounds but deserves to be repeated.*
When books are run out of school classrooms and libraries, I’m never much disturbed. Not as a citizen, not as a writer, not even as a schoolteacher … which I used to be.
What I tell kids is, don’t get mad, get even.
Don’t spend time waving signs or carrying petitions around the neighborhood. Instead, run, don’t walk, to the nearest non-school library or the local bookstore and get whatever it was that they banned.
Read whatever they’re trying to keep out of your eyes and your brain, because that’s exactly what you need to know.
— Stephen King
* Although I do still find book banning disturbing, it is quite helpful to get a list of exactly what to read next.
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, climate, creativity, drabble-adjacent, Fiction, genre fiction, nature, ocean, writing on October 21, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Author notes: Let me say up front that there are a lot of things wrong with this story, technically speaking:
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Meteor Descending
Ironically, the first human words Ololilon puzzled out were from a menu. He’d come across the wreck while riding the current.
Metal loomed from the dark, a gaping hole in its side. Oli swam past a deck chair and through a gap in the torn metal, pushing deep into the remnant.
Few would have been able to decipher the fading text. Even in the Cold Deep time has meaning. And this fallen star had been resting on the ocean floor for lifetimes.
But Oli’s eyes were adapted to the dark. Each shimmering wavelength told a tale, and this story was one of horror.
Chicken, peas and rice meant nothing to him, but oysters and salmon? Cousins and neighbors. Consumed.
But while this message was one of horror, it also bore hope.
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“Teacher, my podmate says aliens aren’t even real.”
Ololilon’s classroom was full. Spawning season had ended and it was a perfect time to teach the juveniles English. They would need it.
“Their meteors are real enough. And if we can learn how to speak with them,“ Oli said, tentacles swaying with emotion, “perhaps we can keep them from killing us all.”
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, creativity, Fiction, genre fiction, inspiration, Writers, writing on October 19, 2022| 1 Comment »
I’d planned to finish a drabble for today but got distracted, first by day-job work and then by a funny little project that popped up out of nowhere. A fellow Wordler compared my daily solution to hers and noted similarities in our starting words, then said it sounded like the opening of a story.
Challenge accepted.
So I’m writing her a story, adding a few lines each day, working in the words from her games. The process is fun and funny, and as with a 100-word drabble, it’s just another way to make constraints work for you.
Today she asked if I had a story in mind or if if the plot was purely spontaneous.
I had to admit that I was just winging it.
It’s more fun that way.
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, applied sci-fi, Fiction, future, genre fiction, problem solving, Thoughts, Writers, writing on October 17, 2022| Leave a Comment »
What can science fiction do for you? Help you think. Here’s an interview on Marketplace, better known for its discussions with economists, professors and policy wonks, with writer Neal Stephenson.
How sci-fi can make us smart – Marketplace
We’ll talk with Stephenson about how he thinks about big, complex issues like climate change and what this genre can teach us about the future and solving problems in the real world.
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, Fiction, inspiration, Thoughts, Writers, writing on October 14, 2022| Leave a Comment »
You know you’re a writer when you look down to see that your sleeve is soaked in blood* and think, “For your next action story, remember the sensation of blood-saturated fabric as it cools against the skin.”
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, cli-fi, creativity, Fiction, free fiction, genre fiction, inspiration, Thoughts, Writers, writing on October 11, 2022| 1 Comment »
Tuesdays don’t have to be all bad. You may remember I mentioned a call for optimistic fiction about our climate future. Here is the resulting free collection.
Imagine 2200: The 2022 climate fiction collection | Fix
This year’s three winners and nine finalists bring new perspectives to the vital genre of climate fiction, with short stories that offer visions of abundance, adaptation, reform, and hope. Join us in celebrating an uprising of imagination with 12 stirring, surprising, and expansive looks at a future built on sustainability, inclusivity, and justice.
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, creativity, Fiction, genre fiction, Jo Miles, Nature's Futures, Writers, writing on September 29, 2022| Leave a Comment »
My afternoon disappeared with a giant sucking sound, so please enjoy this story about hope, the power of community, and doing what you can where you are.
Her branches reach for the stars (Jo Miles in Nature: Futures)
Lieutenant Auri Murr knew the exact moment when her grandmother died.
She was on duty in engineering when Grandma Shanna’s dappu-wood bead on her kin-necklace cracked: a sharp, dry, quiet sound, unmistakable to anyone from Darmindu Colony. It could have woken Auri from a sound sleep.
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, books, Fiction, knowledge, Thoughts on September 24, 2022| Leave a Comment »
“Don’t join the book burners. Don’t think you’re going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever existed. Don’t be afraid to go in your library and read every book…”
― Dwight D. Eisenhower
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Posted in Writing, tagged #365Ways, #365Ways2022, Fiction, historical fiction, inspiration, Writers, writing on September 23, 2022| Leave a Comment »
Hilary Mantel, celebrated author of Wolf Hall, dies aged 70
The Booker prize-winning author of the Wolf Hall trilogy, Dame Hilary Mantel, has died aged 70, her publisher HarperCollins has confirmed.
Mantel was regarded as one of the greatest English-language novelists of this century, winning the Booker Prize twice, for Wolf Hall and its sequel, Bring Up the Bodies, which also won the 2012 Costa book of the year.
…
Writer and broadcaster Damian Barr said her death is “such a loss”.
“With every book she redefined what words can do,” he tweeted, adding: “She’s the only person I ever interviewed that speaks in whole, flawless paragraphs. I can’t believe we won’t have another book from her.”
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“The pen is in our hands. A happy ending is ours to write.”
— Hilary Mantel
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