Saturday, February 20, 2010

Short Story Tally

Over the last few years I've managed to sell most of the short stories I've finished. There weren't many to begin with, but I like to figure out on paper what I've sold, what I have left, and what needs to be finished every so often, so here it goes.

Sold:
Dust
Requited
Scales
Phase
This Dark is Mine
After
First Moon
Ithuriel's Kiss
End of An Era
To Rest

See? That's not many. And that would be between the years of 2002 and now. Actually To Rest hasn't seen print yet. It's in that "Forthcoming" limbo. It's funny that "First Moon," is the only one of them that sold the first time I sent it out, and it's erotica. I realized only later that maybe I should have changed my name. Oops. Figures.
Now, here's what I have left that's finished and not published yet:

The Life of Memory
Red Red Scream
Getting Fixed
Wings of Brothers

Not bad really, I guess. Red Red and Getting Fixed are both vampire stories about the same characters. They will someday live in the book I write about them. If I get to that point. The Life of Memory is sort of a Sleeping Beauty story, and so a hard sell, besides the ending is a little wonky still.
The last catagory is of course short stories I haven't finished yet. It's not as long as it used to be:

Atonment
The Never

And that's it, for short fiction. I know that at my age, or almost my age, James Patrick Kelly had over 50 short stories published, and the Charles DeLint had over 50 books published. I suppose that's why they don't have day jobs, right? But I don't write quickly. I'm faster than I used to be, but still. I'm much better with technology than I used to be too. I never thought I'd actually write stuff on the computer. Twenty years ago I wrote in a spiral bound notebook, and then re-typed stuff on eraseable typing paper with an electric typewriter. Then I'd revise and type again. I don't suppose much has really changed except for the erasable typing paper (which, twenty years later feels like parchment and smells a little like cat pee). The computer makes it faster. Now I find myself writing trasitions, connecting scenes on the keyboard because I want to get through them quickly. That still feels like cheating. This still feels like cheating.
But I'll do it. I'll cheat as much as I can to get the story down.

No comments:

Post a Comment