November 1st is here and that means NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month. As someone who is a short story writer, I often look at my friends writing the long form with some envy. They have their own month and I don’t want to be left out so I tell myself that I will finally write one of those novel ideas I’ve been noodling on for forever. Just when I think I’ve picked one and made a decision, the weight of  my backlog of revisions, rewrites, or markets I want to submit to smacks me like a…

I should have known I was in for a rough day when I woke up to rain. Not that rain is unusual, but I’d never seen it rain in Santa Monica before. It was a nice rain, though, the kind that you don’t mind walking to work in. After a weekend spent riding buses and enjoying the company of good friends (not that I’m complaining), I found myself in a deficit of spoons, though. If I were practical, I would have come back to the hotel right after work and gone straight to bed. Instead, I went for tea…

It’s a good feeling to put the word END after the last paragraph of a manuscript. This story was born week five of Clarion but I couldn’t make it work then. A little bit of time away and with four days of sporadic effort, it’s a story. Rough around the edges like any first draft but I expect those will be caught when I sent it to beta readers later this week. Shitty first draft or not, I’m pleased with how it’s turned out so far.

Project: Sex/magic story, now with more poly love, a plump dominatrix, a Chicago swinger’s club, and one pissed off magician.

One good thing, maybe the only good thing, about being so far removed from friends and family is that there isn’t much social life to speak of. That means on Friday night, after a post-work nap, I made some serious story progress. If all goes according to plan, I’ll make draft on this by the end of the weekend. Next I only need a title.