When I last posted, I was almost to the breaking point over my novella, and writing in general. After a year where I pretty much rearranged everything in my life to accomodate writing, and after almost three solid years of it with no significant breaks, I was burned out. I thought that diving into a novel or novella would be the solution, but everything I wrote was a mess. You don't need the details - just trust me on this, it was shit. I needed some perspective and space.

Also, the erotica story brought up some very personal issues that I won't go into here - but next year, I'll post an entry about writing erotica in general, how/why it's (for me) far more difficult than writing science fiction or fantasy, and what that means to me as a writer.

I'm still taking a break, but I'm calmer now. I haven't "lost it" - whatever "it" is - nor have I decided to abandon writing altogether, a la some kind of pseudo lj-death. But I want to spend some time daydreaming. I cannot stress how important it is to just dream about what you want to do, to let the ideas flit around, grow some weight, mutate and change. My trying to write a novella this month was the equivalent of planting a garden, then eating the sprouts before they had a chance to bear anything truly edible. I just ended up with a lot of dirt in my mouth, and on the page. In a way, though, I'm still writing. The novels and novellas are always in the back of my mind, twisting around, biding their time.

Why am I thinking of yellow wallpaper at this moment? ;)

Speaking of fruits and flowerings - I did send off a few submissions this month. Today I sent "Brimstone Orange" off to Pseudopod for consideration for podcasting (Pseudopod is the horror sister of the sf/f podcast site Escapepod. And tomorrow I send off my erotic novella "At the Edge of Ellensburg" to Susie Bright's "Best American Erotica 2008", for consideration for inclusion. The most I can hope for is that she picks a portion of it to reprint - but even that would be enough. I still haven't been paid for publication, and I have a feeling that the very nice three figures I was supposed to get last July will never come to me. So, a reprint sale of even a couple thousand words would help me feel like less of a failure for it having been published to begin with. I feel like a sucker for assuming I'd get the check in the mail with no problem. Ha. I work in publishing, I know how it is. And yet, still I dream the dream....

This year has been pretty good, but I think next year will be better, in all things.