Skip to content
Five Ways
Subscribe to my newsletter and get a free story!
Share this:

On Scarcity

Moments of great beauty matter.
Despite the hard drive drama and sundry things, it's been a good summer, replete with old friends, exciting prep for this fall's book, terrific readings, and the usual Pacific Northwest splendor.
I’ve been scarce of late for two reasons:

1) My hard drive failed and so did the drive I’d been backing it up to, so the last three weeks I’ve been working on assorted laptops, an ipad, and actual, retro PEN AND PAPER. Which I actually use a lot, so that wasn’t too bad. But thanks entirely to Wayne, I’m back up on the main machine and now backing up to three locations, including off-site. Whee. Yet again I learn a life lesson in my forties that I should have absorbed two decades or more earlier.
2) Clarion West. I’ve been helping out in the classroom and coordinating some of the volunteers, which has occupied a chunk of time. A number of old friends have swung through town, including the ever wonderful Blounts and a rare Rachel Swirsky manifestation, which is always welcome. It’s also six weeks with two events each week, the reading and the subsequent party. Not that I’m complaining – last night’s was swell, and it was great to see so many people, including the passle of students, still valiantly producing stories and critting each other’s work. Next week Kelly Link and Gavin Grant will be reading, which should be FABULOUS, so I hope to see a lot of you locals there.

I am plugging away at the Clarion West Write-a-thon and got at least 2k per day done this week, which feels great! I have been very bad about mailing my sponsors so I am going to send two stories to everyone who donates in my name before the write-a-thon ends. There’s still time, and a sum as small as a dollar will net you close to 10,000 words of new Rambo wordage. 😉 Stretch goal, a la Kickstarter: If I get 20 sponsors, I will make that 15k.

Plus! ArmadilloCon at the end of this month. Yahoo!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Get Fiction in Your Mailbox Each Month

Want access to a lively community of writers and readers, free writing classes, co-working sessions, special speakers, weekly writing games, random pictures and MORE for as little as $2? Check out Cat’s Patreon campaign.

Want to get some new fiction? Support my Patreon campaign.
Want to get some new fiction? Support my Patreon campaign.

 

"(On the writing F&SF workshop) Wanted to crow and say thanks: the first story I wrote after taking your class was my very first sale. Coincidence? nah….thanks so much."

~K. Richardson

You may also like...

Flash Fiction: A Horrific Homage to the Seattle Kraken

Start the clock! Release the kraken! Let the hockey players sharpen their blades, let the audience stir restlessly and go one last time for popcorn and sodas and beer, glorious golden beer that tints the ice with its microbrewed haze.

Because there is a haze tonight, that’s for sure, folks. Tonight Seattle’s surrendered to the supernatural forces that have been creeping up like uninvited shoggoths in recent years. The world’s gone weird and wacky, and why not krakens, why not tentacles spilling out from the Space Needle, infesting the sky? It’s Seattle, after all; it’s raining so it’s not like they block out the sun.

Who’d have dreamed that magic and hockey would mix this way, a mash-up made of bloody sticks and smashed spell bottles? Seattle’s wizards have come out of hiding for this game, emerged from their lairs in Greenlake and Mercer Island, driven their Teslas over to park in interdimensional folds where they won’t get scratched like normal cars.

Only an hour’s worth of game, and then the magic runs out, deflates like a sodden pumpkin, milked for all that tentacle and terror juice. Will it be enough to keep Seattle entertained for another evening, keep it from imploding like Scherezade in reverse into ennui and coffee beans? Cities don’t resort to supernatural hockey games until they’re really in extremis and no one is really sure what this one will – or even can — achieve, given a world of murder hornets and sapient bananas and well, you remember the last few months as well as I do, particularly what happened to the butterflies.

The clock’s ticking. The skaters are moving back and forth over the ice, and things are stirring in the depths underneath it, things that will fuck a Zamboni up and shred ice like tissue paper. That’s how close the danger is to us all. That’s how dire things are.

Let’s stop now, before another spray of ice goes up, before another player gets a bloody nose and melts the ice with that, so things can crawl through from another dimension. It’s not too late. Where’s the entrance? Where’s the exit? Why does this ice hold me so fast?

...

Random Lists of January

Image that says 1) Tweet 2) ??? 3) Profit
Still working on 2015’s business plan
Things I have made so far this year:
Some words
A lot of ebooks
A loaf of bread
Quite a bit of yogurt
Danish pastry dough
Flaxseed crackers
Ricotta cheese
Cashew cheese
Several pots of coffee (seven to be be precise)

What I have written:
One blog post
One freelance piece
Several pieces of flash
Part of what looks like it might be a superhero novel

What I have read:
Lots of Internet articles
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin (reread)
The Broken Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin
The Kingdoms of the Gods by N.K. Jemisin

...