write-a-thon

I finished a first draft of a new story, tentatively entitled The Crow’s Murder, today. It clocked in at 8300 words, which is technically a novelette, but I’ll probably trim enough to bring it down to official short story length, 7,500. I’m pleased with it, but there’s an angle that may let to WTFery on my writing group’s part when I run it past them. One thing I’ve done over the course of the past few days is track the progress of the story by taking pictures of early notes and saving snapshots of it from day to day. I’ll be using that in the Writing Fantasy and Science Fiction class and then looking at the story again when we get to the section on rewriting and revising.

So here it is. I hope it tantalizes you to read the rest!

I wheel the Colonel out into the day. He can walk, but prefers the dignity and slowness of the chair, in spite of its awkwardness, to having to struggle for every step. Dr. Larch will not let him have his artificial leg except when there are visitors. Otherwise it stays in the cabinet in the supplies room, along with all the rest, locked up so the patients can’t break or wear them down.

It’s just as well. Two days ago, when he surrendered it to me after a visit from his niece, the Col. said, “I knew every man of the three who owned this before me.” He slapped the brass surface. “And some fella will get it after me. Maybe someone I know, maybe someone I don’t. Do you think that ghosts linger around the objects they leave behind, the ones that accompanied them day by day? Because if so, I wouldn’t be surprised if there weren’t three ghosts riding this one.”

I didn’t answer and he didn’t expect me to. He knows my vocal cords were seared away in the same war that’s stole his leg, the same war that’s furnished most of the inhabitants of this asylum. Broken soldiers, minds and bodies ground-up by its terrible machines.

It used to be an injury was enough to get you out. Now if they can, they turn you into a clank, half human, half machine, and send you back to the lines. Nowadays we receive only the men who cannot be repaired, and here they sit or lie in their beds, waiting to die a slower death than the war would have given them, waited on by orderlies like me, other broken men who can function enough to pretend to work.

If you want to read the rest of the story, you can get it, along with at least six other stories, at the end of July by signing up to sponsor me in the Clarion West Write-a-thon. Even a small donation entitles you to the stories, so please do sign up!

This year, I’m again participating in the Clarion West Writeathon.

A lot of people are driving pledges with backer incentives. Here’s mine:

I plan to complete one story each week. At the end of the six weeks, all backers will receive copies of the stories written during the Write-a-thon along with a bonus story.

So I just wanted to point out – you get to pick the donation amount. In return, you’re getting at least seven Cat Rambo short stories, which, although they’ll be a bit drafty, I’d like to think is a pretty good value. 😉

You can sign up as a backer by clicking the Donate button on this page.

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!

It’s the start of another Clarion West season. As always, it was marked by the Locus Awards, which were a ton of fun and extra cool because they were my first chance to see the ARC (advance reading copy) of the book coming out this September. I’ve been to the house and met most of the students — they all have that glazed, not-sure-what-to-expect look in their eyes. And the Clarion West Write-a-thon is starting. This’ll be the 6th or 7th time I’ve participated in it, I think.

This year I’m using it to spur effort on the urban fantasy novel I’ve been working on, THE EASTER BUNNY MUST DIE! At Rio Hondo, they suggested a new way to begin it, so I’ve got to write that chapter, tweak the existing ones so they fall in line nicely after that, and then take up where I left off, in a grumpy healer’s cavern, confronting the Marlboro Man. Nuff said?

So I must tell you, that should you wish to support me in the Write-a-thon, even if it’s just a buck, you’ll be receiving snippets in the mail that will not be made available to the public – perhaps ever, perhaps not until the book is done. I hope you’ll support me (or perhaps some other fine writer working on Write-a-thon goals) this summer.

Love the Easter Bunny and want to find out what happens next? Support Cat on Patreon in order to have a say in what she writes next, as well as getting other snippets, insights into process, recipes, photos of Taco Cat, chances to ask Cat (or Taco) questions, discounts on and news of new classes, and more? Support her on Patreon.

It’s Friday and the Clarion West Write-a-thon is about to start. So in its honor, here’s a flash piece that appeared in my collection, Eyes Like Sky and Coal and Moonlight. The piece is called “Up The Chimney” and it’s a brief riff on an old fairy tale. Enjoy.

Up The Chimney

I should have known better. There we were dozing by the fireside, old Tom and me, and there’s a stranger telling some story of funerals and cats. Old Tom, he leaps up, whiskers abristle. Shouting “Then I’m the King of Cats” and disappearing up the chimney!

I’ve always been a skinny lad, and quickwitted to boot, so I leaps over the embers, which were dying then anyhow, and scramble after Tom. It’s my chance to get to Fairyland, I figure, and old dad, he’d always said, grab opportunities as they presents themselves.

If I’d known then what I know now, I’d have kept sitting there and waved Tom on his journey. It’s Fairyland, sure enough, but it’s a cat’s notion of Fairyland. Maybe there’s one for all the creatures, horses and rats and huntin’ dogs. But their notion here of entertainment is chasing mice, the whole kit and court does it for hours on a time, and then they drink cream and eat sardines. I’d give my soul for an honest pint of beer.

The women, aye, they’re pretty enough, but they’ll claw you to death sure as eagles fly, and they stink, more to the point. They reek of musk and blood, and in the evenings they all sit around grooming each other and purring, an unsettling sound that unmans me whenever I hear it.
King of Cats be-damned. I’d search for some other Fairyland, but where might I end up? A fish’s land, where it’s never warm nor dry, or a beetle’s, perhaps. At least I have my fireside here, with old Tom cleaning my ears while I wait for some new story to set me free.

(It’s not too late to sign up for the 2012 Clarion West write-a-thon and get snippets in your mailbox throughout the next six weeks! Even a $1 donation will count.)

As many of you know, I am working on a Big Fat Fantasy Trilogy and chunks of it have become my write-a-thon goal. I hope to have a complete rough draft by the end of July and am well on track for that. Interspersed in the narrative are little set pieces. I thought I’d share a recent one and mention that if you support me in the Clarion West Write-a-thon, you will get at least two more of these AND the first three chapters of the book over the course of the Write-a-thon, even for the smallest of donations. Only people supporting me in the Write-a-thon will see these pieces before publication.

If you donate, shoot me an e-mail or drop a comment here and I will make sure you are on the mailing list for the next one.