I’ve been working on a new commission for a rolling ball sculpture. I’m very excited about this one. It will be my first large(r) sized steel piece built for someone else. I’ve done one other as a sort of test bed and learning exercise, and that one sits around and gets played with my friends and relatives. This one, once I’m done with it, it’s gone from my abode and off to a living room elsewhere in the city.
I have had to do a lot of work just to, well, do the work! This piece is going to be wall-mounted, so it was necessary for me to construct a “wall” in the basement from which to hang the piece and construct it. This necessitated all kinds of moving, cleaning, some mild destruction, electrical wiring and general hardware work. Things are moving forward now, and I wanted to toss up a few pics for those who have asked about its progress. It will be a rectangle frame roughly 4′x3′ with a motor-driven chain lift (sweet!) and it will use 1″ marbles. The whole thing will be made of plain steel. Other specifics will evolve as the project continues. If I did this right you should be able to click the photos and get some more info on them aside from just the captions.
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Building the frame.
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Welding the “legs” together.
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More frame construction.
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Finished frame!
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Leg detail
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Fun stuff!
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Try again.
It was time long ago for a photo gallery of my RBS work, but I suppose I hadn’t realized it. To amend that, I have put together a collection of my copper work. Just click above where it says “Rolling Ball” and you can feast your eyes on a number of my pieces all in one location. Now you don’t have to click all over the place just to find a few pics. You’re welcome.
In the midst of some not-so-great stuff happening (more on that in another post – totally going to ignore it for now), I have had one definitely awesome thing happen. As of today I am a physically verifiable paid and published fiction author! Sweet!
Now, this has all been in the works for quite some time, but I never mentioned much of it. I sent my story “Scratch” out in early July to an Indiana horror authors anthology. No dice, as it needed to be more toward the R- or NC-17-rated end of the scale. I sent it to another publisher shortly thereafter, RuneWright, to their “Best Served Cold” anthology, which was focusing on the idea of vengeance, which my story seemed to fit. I was pleasantly surprised and pleased to get an acceptance in August. I was very happy about that, but as acceptance by no means guarantees publication (and I’ve had the personal experience of a deal falling through in the past), I didn’t think it was quite time to start celebrating just yet.
On November 17th I got paid real money (five dollah!) for the story. I thought this was pretty awesome, not for the amount, but for the intent shown by the publisher and editor. Still, I remain overly cautious about these things. I’ve heard to many tales of disappointment. So even while I was rolling in cash and buying all the gumballs I could get with my five dollars, I was still hesitant to say anything. Part of this was due to the fact that the anthology had been scheduled to be released in August, and November is clearly not August. I was afraid I’d just keep hanging it out there for you guys, and then having to pull it back, and that’s only entertaining for about maybe one second, two tops. I do understand that small presses are often understaffed (to the tune of a single person handling all duties), making setbacks the norm. I just didn’t want to drag things out on the ol’ blog here.
I was further encouraged when I received an email at the end of November telling me my contributor copy was on its way. (Note: It’s a nice deal to get both payment and the contributor copy, as if you don’t, you pretty much wind up spending your little payment on your own copy of the book, which sort of means you didn’t really get paid, because the book usually costs as much or more than your payment, but I digress.) Still being incredibly wary (I’d waited a year for an accepted piece to be published whereupon the anthology wound up being canceled. I have my reasons for wariness!) I kept my mouth shut and waited. Today was a day of days, however, and it was with much glee that I went to my front door this afternoon, peeked through the blinds, and saw a book-shaped cardboard box sitting on my porch. I hurried out there, swiped it off the porch, brought it inside, ripped the tape off it, and here’s what I have:
And so, kids, it has come to pass that I, Tom Harold, can now honestly say that I am a paid, published fiction author. After a year of putting the word “pending” near those other words, it’s nice to be able to lay that to rest. Awesome!
Naturally, I am going to offer you the ability to purchase this sweet affirmation of my efforts. Follow the nifty link above or right here to navigate over to RuneWright and order a copy in either digital or traditional print format. I have not had a chance yet to read the other stories, but I am looking forward to seeing what else is in store.
You know its been boring around the life/office when you get a rejection notice and it almost kind of makes you excited. Like, “Oh, look! I have something in my ‘Submissions’ email folder! Who has sent me a thing?!” Then it turns out to be a rejection, and it’s been so long since any publisher has sent you any communication of any sort, that you’re almost kind of happy to get a “Not interested.”
On the other hand, it is a rejection, and it’s actually from a place that I thought would be pretty open to it. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong here, but I’m doing a bang-up job of it! (Remember, Tom, James Lee Burke got rejected eleventy-billion times for a novel that was later not only published, but nominated for a Pulitzer! This obviously means you are RIGHT NOW writing Pulitzer material!)
Pardon the disillusionment, there. Anyway, it has been extremely hard to write lately, especially painful because this month is November which means NaNoWriMo which means it should be full of fun and literary abandon, which I’ve practiced well for three years…yet this year is falling flat. I’d rather do almost anything rather than write right now, which makes me feel terrible, because what I’d really like to do is, well, write! It’s just that every word feels forced and lifeless. If this were a play, you’d walk out on it.
Still, man, there’s nothing to be gained by quitting. Nothing. Well, I’d have extra free time, but you know what I’d want to do with it? Write. (Hello, Joseph Heller, and thank you for that Catch-22.)
Honestly, I just wish I had a few decent new short stories completed to send out. And there are quite a few out to publishers with looooong response times, and I wish they’d be more mindful of MY schedule and get back to me within a reasonable timeline, which means in a lot less than 6-9 months. Oh well, what do I have to do but wait?
On August 25th 2010 I was very happy to receive an email that let me know one of my stories had been selected for a small press horror anthology. This was my second story to be accepted, the first having happened only a couple of months prior. It carried a bit more weight, however, because I was going to be paid for this one. I had purposefully sent the first story to a market that I knew had a high acceptance rate in an attempt to finally get over the hump and have something published. This time around I’d submitted to a tougher market, and I was pleased with my success.
A little over two months following that email I received a contract for the story. I happily signed it and sent it back. I did not with some humor that the contract stated the publisher now had rights to my story that could be exercised for up to one full year following the date of the contract. I remember thinking “Man, I sure hope it doesn’t take THAT long for them to get it into print!”
I was aware that things don’t always go smoothly or quickly in the publishing world, so I didn’t think too much about any sort of deadline that might come and go for the anthology’s planned release date. I believe I checked in on the publisher’s web site a handful of times, but for the most part forgot about it in the midst of whatever else was going on in my life at the time. It wasn’t until around March or April of 2011 that I got really curious again and did some checking to see what was going on. I found out the publisher had taken ill (it was basically a one-man show), and everything had been on hold for a while until he recovered. I was understanding of the situation and hoped that the publisher would recover fully. I continued to wait, and eventually turned my efforts to writing a batch of other short stories and submitting those to various markets.
Time has gone on, and as the one year mark has come round, I have, naturally, been hoping that this might mean a publishing date would be declared. I had seen on the publisher’s forum that publication was promised for all anthologies at some point in the not too distant future, that they were hoping for something before 2012 arrived.
Yesterday I was doing some random searches on other horror writer’s boards, and I saw one related to the publisher who had my story. I clicked the link and found out that the publisher had finally had to come to grips with the struggling economy and was canceling almost all planned anthologies, mine being one of the ones not making the cut.
So, here we are. It’s been over a year since I got my acceptance email, and nearly a full year since I signed the contract. These things happen, and I hold the publisher no grudge. I believe he had nothing but the best of intentions, and I wish his press continued success with the remainder of the work he is continuing. It is a fine community, and I won’t be removing myself from their message boards or anything like that. However, I now have my one accepted story turned loose again.
I guess this is the way of things. I think anyone who ever has submitted more than a handful of stories (maybe even just two or three) has a story like mine. I just got an email the other day from another writer who is in a worse situation in that the publisher who accepted her story has apparently folded the publication without any notice to accepted writers. She already signed the contract, so her story is still bound to the publisher, but she can’t locate the publisher anywhere on the interwebs, so now she has a saleable story that’s tied up for something like another six to nine months until the contract expires. It’s more than likely the publisher will not pop up in those intervening months and suddenly publish her work, so she just has to wait it out until she can submit it again. I guess I can count myself a little lucky for my own set of circumstances.
It is at this point that I check back on another accepted story of mine that is going into an anthology with a release date of August 2011. Yep, it’s nearly November, and the anthology is still listed as “in production” on the publisher’s web site. Again, I understand with small publishers that things happen, and they are not just working on my little anthology, but rather holding it as an addition to their other points of business. Still, I’m getting a not-great feeling from this. I joked to a friend the other day that I would be a writer who was destined to have stories accepted but never published anywhere. I guess we’ll see what happens. In the meantime, more stories need to be written and submitted. Some day or other this work has to start paying off, and it stands a better chance of happening if I keep at it.
I got, I think, three rejections this past week. I’m not sure. Maybe it was one the week before, and two this past week. I guess it doesn’t matter. Anyway, the good thing is that people are reading my work, even if they don’t like it or at least don’t want it. The thing is that it’s getting out there. I told a friend of mine today, “If you don’t submit, you a zero percent chance of getting published. Therefor, if you do submit, your odds of being published immediately increase, even if you’re up against three hundred other people.”
I was reading a great interview with novelist James Lee Burke today in Writer’s Digest. He said, “Never let a manuscript stay at home longer than 36 hours. It’s that simple. You keep it in the mail, and if you do not you are ensured to fail…because you’re not a player. The manuscript’s sitting in your desk drawer. It’s never going to be published. And that’s how you do it. And you’re always a player. In other words, you write it as well as you can, you let God be the judge of it, don’t worry about critics and rejection.”
I suppose I’m not super jazzed about getting rejections, but Burke received 111 rejections on ONE SINGLE MANUSCRIPT before it was published. It took nine years for “The Lost Get-Back Boogie” to find a publisher, but once it did it was nominated for a Pulitzer.
I don’t know if I have Pulitzer material in me, but I’m taking Lee’s points to heart all the same. My odds of getting published are far worse if I’m not putting my work out there, and I need the odds in my favor as much as possible. Even better, the more I write, the more I’ll improve, and those odds will rise even more. Not a bad deal if you think about it.
My stats at Duotrope’s Digest say that I now have written 14 pieces since June of this year, and that I’ve submitted 36 times (which leaves out one submission that Duotrope doesn’t have listed). This weekend I sent out two rejected stories to two new markets, plus I finished a story this evening, found a market, and sent that one out as well. Tomorrow begins work on another story. After all, I only have a week to write it. And who knows, maybe this next one will turn into something special, or maybe I’ll at least learn a bit more about perseverance and patience – both good qualities to foster when writing.
Since my last post, the writing has continued at a steady pace. It takes up a huge chunk of my free time, but I’m pretty positive I’m still at an average of one new story per week. I really need to compile a…wait…gimme a sec…okay, twelve. I’ve written twelve new short stories since I started, and I’ve sent out eleven of those. One is a little special, and I need to rework it and get it in proper shape. It’s hard to find time for rewrites. I have rewritten a few of them, however. Tonight I did a rewrite of a very old story that I’ve been sending out maybe three times in as many years. I think this time around I added a little bit of something to it that will make it more than a simple account of a scary monster attack. We’ll see. If it gets accepted, I’ll let you know.
On the subject of acceptance, if anything at all happens I’ll let you know. Actually, at this point I’ll just let you know if something gets accepted and goes into print. I had two stories accepted last year, and one of those is still “in process.” It’s been over a year, and the story still hasn’t printed, so in fear that I’ll be paving a road with “It’s coming! No, really! Really!!!” I have just decided to let news of acceptances go until something really happens.
That said, the rejections are coming in fast and furious! I just got three within the past eight or nine days. I have found it is true what people say, that it is easier to take rejection if you have multiple pieces in the mail, since your hopes aren’t pinned on a single piece. Plus, I found it very strange but cool to note that I felt much better about being rejected when I sent another brand new piece out.
Tonight I stayed up late and tended to submissions. I really do wish I had someone to take care of that end of business for me. Once things get rejected it’s a bit of a task to comb the markets over and find somewhere to send off the old stuff. Then, as tonight, there is the occasional task of doing a rewrite to try and help out something that seems like it needs it. However, I’m happy to say that I got one piece printed and packaged up for a postal submission, and I found two markets to send of email submissions to after that. This includes the rewrite on the one piece. Oh, and earlier, when this (very early morning) as yesterday evening, I put in a couple more hours on another new short story. I hope to finish that one up later today (after I’ve taken an eight-hour nap). Then that one will go out to…somewhere. Hmmm…I thought I had an idea for a place to send it, but I guess not, that was last week’s story I suppose.
I have ten pieces out for consideration right now. Two of them are to publishers who take five or six months to respond, so I guess I won’t have any less than two out through most of the rest of this challenge I’ve set for myself. The most I’ve had out so far at once is eleven. I could very well have eleven out again by tomorrow if I wrap up this new one tomorrow (and I hope to).
Oh, there’s also been an update to my writing plan. It was going to be a story a week through the end of 2010. This has been extended. I was watching my Charles Beaumont documentary, and in it Ray Bradbury says he told both William F. Nolan and Beaumont, “Write a story a week for a year, you can’t go wrong. You begin to write quality.” Well, I want to write quality, and I’m not a man of half-measures when goals arise, so I’ll be writing an average of one story a week through I guess it’ll be June of 2011.
That’s enough for now. I’m tired, and there’s more writing and hopefully some sculpture work to be done tomorrow.
September 25th,2011
Writing |
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Back in June I looked at the calendar and had a horrible and depressing realization. The year was half over and I’d written not one single new story yet. I was pretty displeased, because writing is one of the big things I’ve been focusing on in my life over the past couple of years. Although, up until June of 2011, it seemed clearly that writing was only one of the things I’d been talking about focusing on, because there sure wasn’t any writing going on!
I was bereft, or at least rather put out about the whole state of affairs. Something had to be done. Here I’ve been wanting to write fiction so much, been talking about it, been reading it, and yet I hadn’t been DOING it! What can be done in such a situation? Let’s think that over for about two seconds. Oh, I know! How about, you know, writing!
Once I made that gigantic mental leap it was just a matter of getting the work done, sitting down and moving my fingers and making something happen on the screen/page. Right about this time I was reading the blog of Alex J. Kane, a burgeoning science fiction writer who has been making an honest and concrete effort to get his work out into the market. Alex made note of a web site by a writer named Dean Wesley Smith, and some of the thoughts he related of Smith’s seemed very positive and progress-oriented, so I went there and read some of Smith’s writing on the subject.
To cut things short, Smith was very energizing. He basically just said, “Write, then submit it! That’s it!” There was obviously a little bit more to it than that, but really not much, and when you get right down to it, those are the two steps needed for getting published: write story, submit story.
In view of this I decided that what I wanted was to have a bunch of finished short stories to my credit, and by a bunch, I mean something farther up there in the double digits. I already have a handful, maybe ten or so, but I wanted to add greatly to that number. I wanted to prove, I wanted to make it plainly, ridiculously obvious, that not only do I want to write fiction as a large part of my life, but that I’m not hesitant at all about doing the work to make that happen.
Beginning around the middle of July I started writing, just as Smith instructed. I didn’t sit around and worry over each sentence, each paragraph, each period, adjective, verb, and on and on until I worried myself to a halt. What I started doing was writing. Writing whole sentences, paragraphs, beginnings, endings, whole stories! And then I sent them out. I didn’t worry about having sixteen of my most perceptive writer friends pick them apart so that they shone brighter than polished stainless steel. I just made sure they didn’t have any horrible spelling or grammar errors and the like, made them look the best I figured I could make them at that point, and fired them off.
The goal is to write one new short story per week for the remainder of this year. I want to be able to say that I have at least 25 new short stories to my name by the end of the year. (I’ll fit in an extra somewhere to bring the total up.) So far it has been, well, work! But it’s fun work. I’m really enjoying it. It’s not always easy, but somehow I’m learning something, someTHINGS. I may not be known or admired or even have much of anything published by the time this effort is done (wouldn’t feel bad to have a sale or two, though), but I will have gotten better at writing, and maybe my December something will change, maybe I’ll sell to a pro market, or maybe I’ll just be writing stuff that’s still not so publishable, but is a lot closer to being publishable.
They say it takes a million written words for a writer to sharpen their instrument, hone themselves into a writer’s writer. I want that million words. I’ve written three novels in NaNoWriMo over the past three years. That’s far more than the 150K words that each year’s 50K minimum would put me at. I’m probably around 200K from that alone, maybe even 225K. Then we have the other short stories I’ve written since 2007. That gets me closer, maybe to 240K. That’s nearly halfway to 500K, and Smith said he started seeing some positive results at 500K. I’m nearly halfway there, and if we figure I’m writing stories that average about 4K each week, then by December I’ll have something like 340K (the last story actually went to 8K, so I may well go over).
So here we go, kids. It’s time to stop fooling around just talking about writing and make the writing happen. It is going to be fascinating to see how this all plays out, don’t you think?
