Story of a story

Last year I wrote a 4,000-word science fantasy story. It originated in an idea I’d had centering around one particular moment in which the reader realizes that the main characters are not human but aliens. (The aliens find a crashed spaceship with dead humans in it, but the story turned out not really to be about that.)

I only submitted it twice because I felt that something wasn’t quite finished about it. It got rejected, of course.

This month I decided to revisit the story with the goal of making it shorter by about half. Short stories are easier to sell if you don’t have an impressive publication history; plus there are more venues for short fiction than long. So I read the story over, blushed a little bit at the boring introduction and apparently random conclusion, and set to cutting.

Cutting stories is one of my favorite parts of writing. It might sound painful to reduce the first 500 words of a narrative into three paragraphs 150-words long altogether, but the sense of realignment and purification that such drastic changes gives me is well worth it. In short, I enjoy muddling through what I wrote to figure out what I meant.

In an afternoon, I added a new scene yet still cut around 1,000 words from the story–that’s reducing it by a quarter. The next day I cut another 300 words and sent it to my insightful beta reader, who pointed out some places I could further condense. So I trimmed another 400 words, reducing the sprawling 4,000-word monstrosity into a much improved and more easily marketable 2,200-word story. That’s 45% shorter, by the way.

I also changed the title and all the characters’ names. It turned out to be about the alien characters all along. Story makeover complete.

Now to submit it!

Look! Publication!

I am very pleased to announce that my short story, “Others,” has been published at Residential Aliens. Here’s the first paragraph:

Edward spotted them as soon as he stepped onto the train platform. They, the Others, had a strange shimmer about them, a distortion of the air as if heat from the desert sands were pouring out of their skin. As far as Edward could tell, he was the only one able to see them: the other people on the platform, the regular ones, pushed past the two men and the woman, whose traveling dress was slightly shabby, without even a first glance.

Go here to read the rest of it. Enjoy!

Lest you think all I do is read

Lest you think all I do is read, here is a post about What’s Going On With Me.

I’m teaching three sections of composition, two of which are dual-credit at local high schools.  It’s hard to realize, but this is Week 8 of the semester, the halfway point.  My students are working on their third of five papers, a research-based report.  They’re actually doing quite well, on the whole.

I’m also gearing up for NaNoWriMo, which I’m quite excited about.  For the first time since, yes, 2006, I’ll actually be able to participate in November, rather than the often-kinder months of January, June, or July.  I’m planning a young adult fantasy novel called Edgewood.  It’s a book I already intend to market for publication.

Speaking of publication, one of my short stories is forthcoming in ResAliens, a speculative fiction ezine.  More info when it appears, so you can all pledge undying support in the form of purchasing the magazine.

Lastly, I’ve been writing curriculum materials for the SAT tutoring center where I work–namely the essays and articles for the critical reading sections, off of which multiple choice questions are written.  I trot out my big vocabulary and try to make my sentences as complex as possible.  Perhaps ironically or perhaps not, it’s the best paid writing I’ve ever done.

So I’ve been working and writing.  And reading, of course.  What about you?

Dear Editors

Dear Fiction Editor(s),

Please find attached my scintillating short story, “Most Poignant Title Ever,” of about 4,000 words, or whatever your ideal story length is.  My main character, a flawed but sympathetic scientist, makes the discovery of her lifetime when, by deducing her actual parentage, she grows a microbe under her fingernail that will cure the Claz’kon Plague, but not before her little sister succumbs to the disease.  Did I mention it was sad but also beautiful?  You will probably cry.

I recently graduated with a M.A. in Creative Writing, for which I wrote a thesis that astounded and moved my professors so much that one of them won the Worldwide Book Award, one of them retired to raise goats, and one of them has been institutionalized.  My previous professional publications include none, but if you publish my story, I’ll have something to say here next time, won’t I?

This story is a simultaneous submission because I can’t wait ten weeks each times ten magazines for someone to decide to buy it.  Thank you for your consideration, and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best,

~K

P.S. Today my WORD COUNT for my novel-in-progress is 32,430.  Admit it.  That impresses you a little bit.