Photo: Norman Rockwell's "Merry Christmas, Grandma!" at addictinginfo.org (Not my kinda site, but it had a good photo of this painting). Is Christmas ever this old-fashioned and homey?
"So Many Reasons to Celebrate the Season," my most recently-purchased story, about how a best-selling author deals with a collapsing marriage on Christmas Eve, was published by On the Premises (Link: www.onthepremises.com) on March 10th, in Issue #19. Use the link above, then click on "Latest Issue (March 2013)" and then click on "So Many Reasons to Celebrate the Season," four stories down on the page. Check out other good stories in that publication as well. It's all free. When you're done, please go to this blog entry and leave a comment. Let me know what you think. Thanks!
For those who care about such things, this story is especially important to me because it is the first non-genre piece I've sold. This means that it's not science fiction, or horror, or mystery, or speculative fiction, or a specific genre like that. It's a more everyday story, very contemporary, very today. And it's about relationships, about how they end, and about not lying to yourself about them. It's a tough lesson to learn that your life is crappy, and that you're full of crap as well, but that's what happens here. But I digress: this is especially rewarding because there aren't any tropes of a genre that the writer can fall back on. For example, in a horror story, you expect some blood, some terror, some fear. In a mystery, you expect a puzzle, a whodunit. In both cases, the writing itself doesn't have to be all that good, in a way, as long as the blood and terror keep coming, or as long as the reader is hooked so much on the whodunit that he doesn't notice how terrible the writing is.
In a non-genre story, it isn't that easy. There are no bloodletting scenes, no whodunit, no YA romance, nothing that a genre writer can fall back on when nothing else is working. It's just a real-life guy and his real-life problems. Characterization is more important here, and so is the conflict and the reality. So when something like this sells, the writer feels a little more confident because this type of writing can be much harder to create than a genre piece.
So if you've taken the time to read it, thank you; if you haven't, please do. And please comment below. Let me know what you think, good or bad. Let's have a discussion about it. As long as your comments are politely stated (and a specific example from the story would help), I promise to publish them. Please, and thank you.
As usual, thanks for reading my stuff. I appreciate and respect the time you sacrifice to do so.
Congrats on being published...again!
ReplyDeleteHaving read a few of your stories by now, I can honestly say this has been my favorite one. It kept me interested from start to finish, it was intense at times, humorous, and left me wanting more. As a constant reader I think that indicates it was a good piece of writing (at least to me). I also like the idea of Mental John. I think we all have that inner voice inside us who is sometimes shocked or appalled or pleased with our outward behavior. And during what time of the year is our behavior sometimes the most outlandish? Definitely Christmas. 'Tis the season to put on a fake smile and pray it will all be over soon. Come to think of it the entire holiday season should be decorated brown instead of red/green or silver/gold.
By the way, that Rockwell pic is creepy. Are they coming over to celebrate the season or frighten their relatives to death? :)
Thanks, Diane. These are awfully kind words. I also like Mental John; creating that sub-character was a very different writing avenue for me to take.
ReplyDeleteAnd, yeah, despite how much I love everything Rockwell, I also found that a little creepy. But that's the point of the story, right? Isn't fake happiness creepy? Just take a look at Stepford Wives or Body Snatchers, and...Yup. Definitely creepy. You ever hear someone so fakely happy they're at the brink of hysteria? Now that's creepy!
Thanks for taking the time to click a few things and read my story.
Wow. Congratulations. That was funny and sad and poignant -- the best and trickiest combination -- rolled into one. The dark conversations going on inside the character's head made me laugh aloud. Sunsets are great except for the fact that the sun is going down? Seeing the dark side of everything feels frighteningly familiar.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Vivian. That was very kind of you to say. Thanks for taking the time to read the story and then to find the comment blog entry for it. I know that time is the most valuable thing we've got. If I was offered either more time or more money, I'm not sure which I would take.
DeleteI really liked that line, too. It's a good representative of our tendency to look at the dark side of a good thing. But I'm sorry to hear that it's such a familiar thing for you!
It is for me, too, I have to admit. And I don't often balance it with a positive thing first, either.