O | The Online Writing Workshop for SF & F Newsletter, April 2002
W | http://sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com
W | Become a better writer!
| - - CONTENTS - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
- Workshop Partner Information
- Workshop News:
Workshop enhancements
Locus Readers' Poll--vote for the workshop!
New membership options
Ways to pay for a membership
Scholarship fund
The latest member challenge
- Editors' Choices for March submissions
- Reviewer Honor Roll
- Publication Announcements
- Workshop Statistics
- Feedback:
Special reflection from author Cecilia Dart-Thornton
Tips from members (and others)
| - - WORKSHOP PARTNER INFORMATION - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
Online Writing Workshops's partnership with Del Rey Books ended on
April 6, 2002. We appreciate their support in the past year. The
workshop is now member-supported, and we appreciate even more those of
you who have paid your membership fees before the end of your free
trial month. We've set our rates as low as we can make them and still
(we hope) stay solvent. For more information on membership fees and
to extend your membership, go to
http://sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com/memberships.shtml
| - - WORKSHOP NEWS - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
WORKSHOP ENHANCEMENTS
We've got three upgrades to the workshop to announce this month:
1) Because we want to make it easier to recognize good reviewers and
help ensure that no one gets overlooked, we've added a new link at the
bottom of every review allowing anyone to nominate it to the Reviewer
Honor Roll. Even if you're not the author of the submission reviewed,
you can nominate a review that you feel is outstanding (for example,
one you learned a lot from yourself). Information about the
nomination will be filled in for you, so all you have to do is add
your comment. Nominations will be updated when the newsletter comes
out, as usual, on the Reviewer Honor Roll page at
http://sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com/honorroll.shtml
2) You can now search the member-directory listings for text other
than names. Just use the "entry text contains" option in the
pull-down menu next to the search box at the top of all member
directory pages. You can search for publication names, AIM IDs,
cities, etc.--everything but submission titles (which come from
another database), which can always be searched for using the
Submission Selector on the Read, Rate, Review page.
3) In our continuing effort to increase the quality of reviews on the
workshop, we've decided that reviews under 50 words will be allowed
but will not earn the reviewer a point. If you submit a review under
50 words, you will get a warning message giving you the opportunity to
revise your review by adding more helpful information and thus earn a
point.
_LOCUS_ READERS' POLL: VOTE FOR THE WORKSHOP!
Vote for your favorite stories, novels, etc. of 2001--and your
favorite Web site, too (at the bottom). You don't have to subscribe
to _Locus_ to take the poll (but if you do subscribe, you'll get a
free issue for it). The deadline is May 1, 2002. Need we say more? http://www.locusmag.com/2002/Issue02/Poll.html
THE LATEST MEMBER CHALLENGE
Some core members of the workshop have begun a monthly writing
challenge, open to all, in which writers submit stories or scenes on a
particular topic. Past topics have included pain, love, death, and
music. The April challenge is to write a story about parasites. The
May challenge will be magical realism. For the current challenges,
rules, and how-to information, see a page maintained by a member:
http://www.thermeon.net/checkered/Challenge.html Basically, just
submit a piece on the current month's theme, put "Challenge" in your
title so other challenge participants can find it, and give at least
brief reviews to as many other challenge entrants as you can. Search
for titles containing "Challenge" to see some of the challenge
entries. We at OWW think this is great, but we aren't in charge. For
more information and to participate in choosing the challenge topics,
join the Writing discussion list
(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/oww-sff-writing).
NEW MEMBERSHIP OPTIONS
In response to member requests we've added some new membership payment
options to our standard one-year and six-month memberships:
--Monthly-subscription membership: $5/month for 12 months, for those
who can afford a small amount each month but not $40 all at once
--Double discount memberships in both workshops: $40 for six-month
memberships in SF & F and our sister Horror workshop (save $10); $65
for one-year memberships in both workshops (save $15). Memberships
must be purchased simultaneously; if paying by PayPal, use the
"double-discount membership" payment links on the memberships page to
get the discounted price.
WAYS TO PAY FOR A MEMBERSHIP
In the U.S., you can pay by PayPal or send us a check or money order.
Outside of the U.S., you can pay by PayPal (though international
memberships incur a small set-up fee and international payments cost
us more too), send us a check in U.S. dollars drawn on a U.S. bank
(many banks can do this for you for a fee), or send us an
international money order (available at some banks). If none of
those options work for you, you can send us U.S. dollars through the
mail if you choose, or contact us about barter if you have interesting
goods to barter (not services).
We are looking into other ways to allow payment by credit card, but
haven't found anything that suits us yet.
Questions or suggestions? E-mail support@sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com
and we'll help you out.
SCHOLARSHIP FUND
Also in response to member requests, we've established two ways to
help needy fellow members pay for their memberships beyond May 6:
--Give a gift membership to a particular member. Just send us a
payment by whatever method you like, noting who the membership is for
and specifying whether the gift is anonymous or not. We will
acknowledge receipt to you and notify the lucky member as well.
--Donate to our scholarship fund. We will be collecting donations for
the next 6 months or so, and using them to fully or partially cover
the costs of an initial paying membership for certain active,
review-contributing members whose situations do not allow them to pay
the full membership fee themselves. We'll give special attention to
dedicated members in foreign countries where exchange rates and the
local value of the U.S. dollar make $40/year pretty much impossible.
Charlie, our member liaison/tech-support person, will be making these
determinations along with other OWW staff, based on requests from
needy members and their workshop-participation histories.
Quite a few members have already given a gift membership or a donation
to the scholarship fund--thank you again for your generous help!
PICTURES IN THE MEMBER DIRECTORY
Did you know that you can include a picture in your member-directory
listing? It's easy--all you have to do is include the URL of the GIF
or JPG in your listing information (your image must be stored on a
different Web server). If you've added an image, did you know that it
can't be more than 200 pixels in either dimension? We've noticed a
lot of very oversized pictures in the directory lately, which take up
too much of the page in a piggish sort of way. So please make sure your
graphic is no bigger than 200 pixels in either height or width, or our
super-size-graphic sniffer will track you down. Tips: Make sure that
server allows access from other servers--some don't. Your picture URL
must start with "http://". The URL is case-sensitive (e.g., don't use
uppercase if the file is named in lowercase).
| - - EDITORS' CHOICES - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
The Editors' Choices are the submissions from the previous month that
show the most potential or otherwise earn the admiration of our
Editorial Board. Each gets a composite review by the Board, which is
published on the site and in the newsletter. We usually pick one
fantasy chapter or partial chapter, one SF chapter or partial chapter,
and one short story. (The volume of short stories is much less than
that of chapters, so we're not going to pick a fantasy story and an SF
story each month unless that imbalance changes. Mixed SF/F chapters
will be considered under whichever category seems to predominate in
the submission.) We also list two runners-up in each category, with
our comments.
This is our last month of Editors' Choices reviewed by the Del Rey
Editorial Board. Next month we'll begin our new Editors' Choices
program, which will be similar...but different. Stay tuned!
To view Editors' Choices on the workshop, go to the submission list
and click on "Editors' Choices" in the Submission Selector. Six
months of ECs will be archived there, with their editorial reviews.
In order to make sure that some of our most professional
members don't take too much attention away from other deserving
writers, we've decided that novels will be ineligible for EC
consideration if they have been chosen as previous ECs in any
six-month period (January-June and July-December). Runner-ups will
not be subject to this rule. So if a chapter of your novel has been
an EC, we won't put future chapters of it into the nomination process
for a while--but if those chapters are of EC/runner-up quality, we
will be acknowledging them briefly just to be fair.
Congratulations to this month's Editors' Choice authors and runners
up!
Editors' Choice, fantasy chapter/partial chapter: WHEN DRAGONS WAKE,
Chapter 2, by Cynthia Cloughly
Good opening hook that draws us into Nikko's situation. The different
cultures are nicely observed. The scene where Nikko's amulet glows in
response to the lossanstral (nice name!) reminded us of some of Andre
Norton's Witch World fantasies, wherein young protagonists gradually
discover that they Are Different and destined for great things.
However, we found the writing muddy. The author is trying to do too
much all at once. Pace the story, and be careful about repeating
ideas and images numerous times.
Gender roles in the Ard-Hiarn society seem strange and unfamiliar to
Nikko. We'd expect her to note at once that one of her guards is a
woman.
There were some omitted words. Examples:
". . .it [was] probably the best option."
". . .she realized the children [were] naked."
"When [she] ran from the tent. . ."
And some awkward phrasing:
". . .the woman put down the chunk of white rock she held on the stone
tablet" is difficult to parse. We suggest, ". . .the woman put the
chunk of white rock she held down on the stone tablet."
Some of us found the excerpt engaging, though a few of us were
bothered by the pacing and repetition. For the most part, we'd
definitely read on.
Editors' Choice, SF chapter/partial chapter: EQUAL OPPORTUNITY, Part
6, by Kathryn Allen
We had mixed feelings about this entry. The ideas are very intriguing,
the writing is professional, the storytelling is quite good and we
were interested to see what would happen next. On the other hand, we
wondered about the author warning us that the story was going to "get
complicated again" after this excerpt. The goings-on in this chapter
already seem plenty complicated, considering the two different
cultures and the many alien names and concepts. In addition, there
were too many neologisms. You will lose readers if they need to
consume a glossary just to be able to understand the text.
The opening sequence of Charrha perusing human "pornography"
(actually, from the description, she seemed to be looking at photos of
Playboy bunnies--more cheesecake than porn, as nothing is said about
their being nude) was effective. We weren't sure how to take
Charrha's musings on Lyman's possible desire to have sex with her and
whether or not that would make him a pervert. It seemed to take a
while for her to entertain the notion that her own feelings would put
her in the same category. However, this may be something that was
explained in an earlier part of the story.
Coming into the middle of the story like this, we had some difficulty
figuring out where things stood with the aliens and the humans. Are
these aliens openly hostile toward humans? Why do they feel
comfortable making demands of their human hosts? It was unclear
whether this was a cultural artifact or something that had been
explained in earlier chapters.
There were some interesting linguistic discussions. An example:
"'There was no luh sound before the Hanlem came...'" Deraho said.
"'There were five calls, eight ends, and the swallow. That makes
fourteen sounds.'" This kind of detail gives a nice texture to the
worldbuilding.
There is lots of interesting stuff here for the reader who's not
afraid of immersion in other worlds (or of frequent consultations of
the glossary). Most of us would continue reading.
Editors' Choice, short story: Editor's Choice, short story: "The
Elephant's Graveyard" (Part 1) by John McMullen
Although all of the nominees were strong this month (and there were
many, many other good stories posted in the workshop!), this story was
a knockout--and also very different from last month's Editors' Choice
selection. Clearly, John McMullen is a writer to keep an eye on. And
we're not just saying that because we found The Collector in this
story alarming. We strongly suggest that readers read both parts, one
and two. This is a tightly plotted, intricate, twisty, detail-rich,
professional piece of writing. In fact, it's a lot stronger than many
published stories.
From the first paragraph on, McMullen sets the scene deftly, quickly,
vividly, as well as conveying character and hooking our attention. The
story never loses its tension--the pacing never falters. The only
quibble we have is the newspaper that The Collector manages to turn
into a weapon (surely they wouldn't have been so careless) and the
scene in which he severs the handler's optic nerve--there he may come
across a bit too reminiscent of Hannibal the Cannibal. Later on, he
seems much more like himself, and we aren't even sure how we'd suggest
changing that opening scene. It does exactly what it needs to do--it's
just that lots of other writers have done it first.
The alternating points of view work nicely, especially as it becomes
clear that they are connected even more tightly than we might have
suspected. It's odd: the most terrifying scenes in the story are the
ones where Shaw looks away--the things that he knows not to look at.
The story is full of imaginative and unnerving detail: Babs is a great
character, and so is Lina. The scene in which The Collector kills and
leaves Edouard is genuinely horrifying, but perhaps Lina needs to come
up again at the end. Like The Collector, we don't know her well enough
yet--she doesn't need to re-appear in the story, but it does seem
likely that she would be haunting The Collector as the story
progresses.
The SFnal details in the story are interesting, the war feels real,
and the terminology--mahouts, elephants, decanting--is convincing. The
issues raised by the story--memory, personality, permanence,
responsibility for one's actions in a war, "seeing"--are rich and
linger even after the reader finishes the story.
Perhaps it isn't quite clear why the army needs a mahout to come in
and kill Shaw--why isn't he locked away in a brigade somewhere? And
would they really use the missing woman's lover as the Elephant who is
going to come in and kill Shaw? You might heighten the sense that the
regular Army fears and mistrusts the Special Forces, to the point that
they're happier letting Elephants get rid of each other. Or else you
could simply suggest that it's the usual sort of Army wartime
inefficiency. Certainly there could be a little more sense that a war
is going on.
But don't tinker with the story too much; it's a wonderful piece of
work. Send it to Ellen Datlow at Scifiction--while it's impossible to
predict what kind of story an editor will or won't buy, the blend of
SF and horror is a good match for some of the work she's previously
published.
Runner Up, fantasy chapter/partial chapter: KVELDULF, Prologue and
Chapter 1, by Christopher Johnstone
Generally well-written throughout, with some of the prose nicely
evocative. The sense of time and place is good, but the dialogue needs
some attention--the author needs to be a bit more consistent with
speech patterns.
The lineup of opening titles and subheadings is overkill:
KVELDULF
No Wonders to Speak of
A Prelude
Enemy of Gods
Several comma problems mar the flow of the story as they accumulate:
"Pausing in midturn the innkeep, raised one thin white eyebrow, 'You
got somewhat to pay with.'" We'd advise the author to review the
rules for comma usage.
Kveldulf finds that he has come to an interesting fork in the road,
indeed, as "the smell of wet earth and hummus thickened." (Since
"hummus" is a chickpea paste, we suspect the author wanted "humus.")
Nice observations here: "But secrets do not fall like leaves--they do
not dance red and amber on the air. Secrets blanket the years: mute
and silent." "[He] saw in the near distance a thin trickle of smoke,
shot with the sun's last light." "By the front door several empty
casks wallowed in the mud."
The phrase "'What's up with Bess?'" has a decidedly contemporary ring
to it that doesn't fit the rest of the conversation. And the line
about "bad memories" seemed a little flat at the end of the chapter.
Having just read the prologue in which Kveldulf encounters the wolf,
it felt too recent to be an interesting reference. Nonetheless, an
interesting excerpt with some nicely imagined description.
Runner Up, fantasy chapter/partial chapter: AND THE MAID REMEMBERS
(Shinnal's Heir), Chapter 5 by Amy Alward
A professionally written chapter, with a good beginning that draws the
reader in with curiosity about what disaster has befallen the lad.
The author feared that we would have trouble with the darkness of the
submission, but that was not so. One editor did feel that "not much
seems to happen," but there are a lot of revelations in this chapter,
though not much action.
We 're told that "last night's explosion had left him with an almost
dexterous ability." "Dexterous" simply means skillful. We suggest
selecting another adjective.
A lovely image: "Gold and gray light stabbed through a briefly opened
door as he passed from the kitchens." But somewhat undercut by the
sentence which follows it, which tells instead of showing: "A dawn of
promise after a stormy night."
There were comma problems here and there throughout. Some examples:
"Her face was haggard and grim, Robin felt sure he looked the same."
"He took the tray from her, a stab of hunger reminded him of physical
needs." In both of these examples, two sentences or phrases have been
crunched into one and joined with a comma. It gives the odd effect of
the author having tried to end a sentence with a comma.
We found a few word usages problematic or incorrect: "The thick oaken
door stood before him irresolute in the dim gray dawn." The door
wasn't irresolute, was it? "completely cure the affects" should be
"the effects."
Robin find's the lad's piety getting on his nerves, but the boy
doesn't start to act pious until _after_ Robin makes the observation.
There were some nice moments. The sense of weariness came across
well. But the pacing was slow enough that most of us joining the
story at this point wouldn't read on, so make sure the previous
chapters set up this chapter of revelations to be really interesting.
Runner Up, science fiction chapter/partial chapter: LEX TALIONIS, Part
2, by Rhonda S. Garcia
Generally well-written throughout, and seemingly a nice set-up for the
rest of the novel. Good use of language and description.
We found a few instances of the narrative to be problematic:
"He had pretty average feet, he knew, he was only six feet tall." This
is not a sentence as it stands. Put a period between "he knew" and
"he was only six feet tall." And it's probably a good idea to give a
hint why six feet tall is considered short in this time/place.
We suggest that you replace "someone's" with "a" in the following: "It
was like looking at someone's picture of a person you've never met."
We're told that the doctor's "right hand went under him just in time
to save him from falling on his ass." While fine in dialogue, the
word "ass" seems jarringly colloquial in this piece of narration.
A moment later, the patient "spat something at him in a language he
had never heard before." A few paragraphs later she speaks again, and
we're told that "her Latin" is too fast for him to understand. Has he
now identified it as Latin (in which case he probably has heard it
before even if he can't understand it)?
We weren't too impressed with the doctor's behavior--he struck us as a
bit dense and tentative and we couldn't tell if the author intends him
to come across this way or not.
Despite a few missing words and typos here and there, this was an
enjoyable excerpt overall. We would recommend a thorough proofread
and would probably read on.
Runner Up, science fiction chapter/partial chapter: THE BRIEFCASE,
Chapter 1, by Steven McCrary
The writing was pretty good, with a nice opening and many good
descriptive details throughout. However, there was Too Much
Information. We found the passage longer and more thoroughly described
than it needed to be. Several times some of us wanted to reach out and
give Sam a little shove to get things moving. We advise trimming this
story down to the elements vital to telling the story. One way to do
so would be to eschew this sort of embellishment: "curiosity began to
pool inside him." "Fear began to slither up and course through him."
We're not sure that "posts" is an accurate description of stalks of
corn. (Why not describe them as "stalks?")
Sam's decision to "surrender any remaining tractor sales on this day
to the pricks at John Deere" indicates a level of animosity toward his
competition beyond what we'd expect from him.
His motel room is described as one of hundreds of "small temporary
dwellings." It's not the room itself which is temporary--its his stay
in it.
Sam is appalled at his reflection in the bathroom mirror: "His eyes
were deeply hollowed and lined. His skin looked pale to the point of
being cadaverous." He scrubs himself vigorously with soap and water,
after which "the cadaverous look was soon replaced with the more
familiar, if pasty and hung-over, appearance he had come to recognize
as Sam Jays." But what has he accomplished here? Scrubbing wouldn't do
anything for his eyes, while the dictionary definition of "pasty" is
"pale and lifeless looking." Washing won't change that.
A quibble: the narrator describes the car radio's "faded orange dial"
leaping from one static-filled frequency to the next. We wonder if
the orange object in question isn't actually the small pointer that is
part of the dial mechanism?
"Tense seconds past" should be "passed." "A tire tread pealed" and
"tire-peal" should be "peeled" and "tire-peel."
Despite a certain amount of overwriting, we were intrigued by the
events of the story and by the briefcase itself. The chapter ended on
an effectively suspenseful note and most of us would probably read on
to see what was inside.
Runner Up, short story: Editors' Choice, short story: A TALE OF TWO
MOONS, Part 1, by P J Thompson
This was a strong story, which would be a great deal stronger if the
tone didn't veer so frequently into the cute. The setting was
fabulous, the sense of history strong, and the repeated use of "moon"
imagery striking without feeling forced. Although it's Part 1 that was
eligible for the EC this month, we highly recommend that readers read
the second section as well: the strangeness builds and the ending is
loopy--loony--wonderfully odd, and also oddly moving. Is it a happy
ending? We don't know. But it was definitely the right ending, and it
surprised us. Perhaps Lunar is repeating family history--after all,
no one has seen his father for years.
The story could probably be cut down a bit--don't lose any of the
local history, but the subplot about Gus and the town angling for
location status could be sped up. The pacing in the first section is
slow in an amiable sort of way, but one editor said that he wouldn't
bother going to look for the second part, and that's a shame. There
may be too much sitcom-style "witty" banter, and it might be better to
condense the meeting with JK and the awkward party--throw all of those
people together, and forget the hamburgers. Make it feel disjointed
and crowded, lots of conversations going on simultaneously, rather
than a series of set pieces where significant characters come up and
have their say, one at a time. Skip the hamburger and get to the
Swedish meatballs.
Boil down your prose, too--there are a lot of places where you're
using two sentences of description where you only need one. A small
example: "Too much of the fleshpot, he guessed. Live fast, die young,
and leave a beautiful corpse. Maybe he could go for two out of three."
You don't need that first sentence at all. The paragraph beginning
"Lunar's heart threatened to burst out of his mouth, and he wondered .
. ." could also be cut down. A last example: "JK looked uncomfortable
and Lunar decided a rescue mission was a good way to feel useful." All
you really need is "JK looked uncomfortable." You don't need to tell
us that Lunar is going to go rescue him--we see him do it. In fact,
you may not need any of the dialogue with Maimie--Lunar can come up,
say "gotta go," and then we find out everything we need to know in the
scene where JK and Lunar talk about finding "the perfect woman." Go
through with a ruthless hand and cut out every extraneous sentence.
Point of view wavers a bit--we don't need to be in Gus's head, or in
JK's head either, for that matter, until the very end. And, at the
end, maybe give us a bit more of a sense of what JK is feeling: is he
envious? Is he happy or worried for Lunar? Is he going to miss Lunar?
"His ruddy blonde looks were creeping towards early middle-age and
there were pouches under his eyes which looked like a herd of
chipmunks had moved in during the two hour drive north from L.A. and
stored nuts beneath his eyes."
Ahem. 1. This should be "blond" rather than "blonde." 2. Chipmunks
don't come in herds. 3. "during the two hour drive north" implies that
this is a recent change in appearance, but we know his "blonde good
looks" can't have crept that rapidly. 3. We already know the nuts
would have been stored "beneath his eyes."
The description of Gus as having a "remarkably dead-looking toupee on
top of his head" is fine, until the effect is diluted by Lunar's being
"horrified" to realize that it was "actually a massive comb-over." His
horror continues into the next paragraph. Too much.
And again: "Dad had always been like a furtive woodland creature
through most of the time Lunar had known him..." Which was it--always
or most of the time?
Nice: "The sea of people parted and stayed back as he drew near
Rainbow, recognizing a significant plot point when they saw one."
Let us repeat: the ending is fabulous. Charon Peak, the radio voices,
the lights, the moon maidens--that's wonderful stuff. So is the disc
in the mirror of the bathroom. Just pare down the stuff in between,
and then send this to _F & SF_.
Runner Up, short story: Runner Up, short story: THE HARPS OF THE
TITANS by Cecil K. Woods
We liked this story a great deal, although there is always something
less than satisfying about a narrative in which the reader can see the
end before the protagonist thinks to look up. The real pleasure here
was in the back story of the Titans, which Martin uncovers with his
tools and acids. But even then, we know that the connection between
the old story and Martin's story will come clearer and clearer--war,
separation from beloved family members, unexpected and unlooked-for
dooms.
Somehow, the greater poignancy stems from the uncertain fate of the
Harps, rather than Martin's uncertain fate: perhaps if we had a bit
more of a feel for his wife, Jenna, and his children (strangely absent
from his thoughts), and his life back home, we would feel worse for
him. It might also be nice to know if his colleagues back home thought
he was crazy for going to Old Dunbar, and even, since he mentions
Gondin colleagues, perhaps you could show us how world politics have
affected academic politics. Perhaps Gondin professors have been
rounded up and sent home, on suspicion of spying. Or perhaps he is
corresponding with a Gondin expert who had hoped to come to Old Dunbar
as well.
One editor says: "The writing was professional and evocative. The
story proceeded with the inevitability of a fable, with Martin
remaining oblivious as his situation grew ever more dire. The world
was different enough from our own to be intriguing. I'd like to have
had more time to spend exploring it and its mysterious Titans, and
would hope the author plans to visit it again in future tales. One
quibble: I did find the ending a little anticlimactic. Not sure how
I'd change it, but I wanted something more after the obvious build
up."
There are lots of interesting world details that could be better
fleshed out. For example, time appears to be marked by sixes. This is
an interesting detail, and since this world clearly isn't ours,
perhaps you could give us more--are the people six-fingered? Are there
six moons in the sky? Six gods?
Martin is also unused to planes--this detail seems a bit odd. If the
Continentals have planes, why don't the Lawlee use them as well?
The harps are described as "two silent, black edifices" when Martin
first sees them. "Edifice" is a term applied strictly to buildings.
Although we're told that they're seventy feet high (so they use "feet"
as a term of measurement on this world?), it might be nice to be
reminded a few more times of the size. Perhaps if Morlan or Trivanna
places their hand in a letter? And it seems a bit odd that Morlan is a
"boy." How old is he, really? Surely at least he's in his late teens.
Consider giving Trivanna or Morlan a bit more story--a line of
dialogue or two--about a relative at the front, or even speculations
or gossip about Gondin atrocities.
And also consider music and noise: we have the sounds of the planes
overhead, and the bombs. These suggest a little the way that modern
noise has replaced the music of the harps. But does a restorer
restring the harps, or is that outside of Martin's field of expertise?
It might be nice to have him restring just one string, to hear just
one note, or even to dream of the music that the harps once made. Or
even to ponder the kind of music that the harp once made. (The story
needs just a little more flesh--hopefully, one or two of the
suggestions above will be useful.)
The term "cherry picker" has a contemporary, "this-world" feel to it
which jarred a bit. So does "weekend."
Nice bit of description when Martin tosses a newspaper into the
fireplace: "The letters crumbled away, revealing the words
'SOMMERSPORT'S FALL EX-' beneath for a fleeting moment before
blackness stained through and the flames sighed with pleasure."
| - - REVIEWER HONOR ROLL - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
The Reviewer Honor Roll area of the workshop recognizes members who
have given useful, insightful reviews. After all, that's what makes
the workshop go, so we want to give great reviewers a little
well-earned recognition! (Some months we also award a prize to a
special reviewer.) If you got a really useful review and would like to
add the reviewer to the Reviewer Honor Roll, just use our online
honor-roll nomination form--log in and link to it from the bottom of
the Reviewer Honor Roll page at
http://sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com/honorroll.shtml. Your nomination
will appear on the first day of the next calendar month.
This month's Reviewer MVP is Larry West, who has earned a huge number
of review points and also garnered Honor Roll nominations galore
this month. We will be sending Larry a copy of novel WARCHILD by Karin
Lowachee, workshop alum and winner of the Warner Aspect First Novel
Contest for 2001. (WARCHILD was an Editors' Choice on the workshop,
too!) Congratulations and thanks, Larry!
The Honor Roll will show all April nominations beginning May 1. Some
advance highlights from the April month's honor roll:
Reviewer: Larry West
Submission: WATER HEALER, Chapter 5 by Susan Embleton
Author's comments: "Larry is such a great help with the grammar in my
writing. (A weakness of mine.) He also points out things for me to
think about, but doesn't try to rewrite my work. He adds a touch of
humor to the review that is refreshing and instructive. He also adds
when he has the same problem, which makes me feel a lot better to know
that I'm not the only one messing up. He also points out things for me
to think about, but doesn't try to rewrite my work. My writing always
improves after one of his reviews, and the one for this chapter was no
exception. Thanks!"
Reviewer: Sarah Prineas
Submission: "The Harps of the Titans" by C.K.Woods
Author's comments: "Sarah reviewed this story when it was first
posted, offering encouragement mixed with valuable pointers at which
parts of the plot were unclear. When I revised it, she went beyond
the call of duty and did a thorough re-review--picking out my
grammatical errors and awkward wordings with wit and intelligence. I
cannot thank her enough."
All nominations for the month can be found starting May 1 at:
http://sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com/honorroll.shtml
| - - PUBLICATION ANNOUNCEMENTS - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
Nigel Atkinson's story "An Exhalation of Butterflies," originally
published online in _The Night Land_ webzine, has been accepted by UK
print magazine _Interzone_ (http://www.sfsite.com/interzone). It will
also be appearing in an anthology from Wildside Press
(http://www.wildsidepress.com) in 2003.
Hannah Wolf Bowen's workshopped story "Love Song" appears in the April
issue of _Ideomancer_ (http://www.ideomancer.com).
Siobhan Carroll's poem "Mrs. Wolf" will be published in the spring
edition of On Spec magazine (http://www.icomm.ca/onspec).
Catherine Darensbourg has won first place in a synopsis-writing
contest sponsored by Web site The Source
(www.thesource.com.au/contest_winners_synopsis_feb_2002.htm).
Stella Evans has made her first sale, a fantasy short story called
"Weeping Iniga", to _Fortean Bureau_, forthcoming in August. She
says, "This story was workshopped, and without the comments of
reviewers, it would never have taken a final, saleable form."
Mark Fewell's vampire story "Rule Three: Fire Kills" has sold to
Night2Dawn (http://www.night2dawn.com) for publication in July.
Simon Haynes' short story "Sleight of Hand" won an Aurealis Award
(http://www.sf.org.au/aurealis) in the category of short fiction
(horror). Simon told us, "This particular story wasn't workshopped,
but everything I learnt from the online writing workshop went into it."
Celia Marsh has been accepted as a student at this summer's Clarion
Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Workshop
(http://www.msu.edu/~clarion). Both of her writing samples--"Taste of
Salt" and "Church of Chain and Roses"--were workshopped.
Ruth Nestvold's story "Princes and Priscilla" is online now at
_Strange Horizons_ (www.strangehorizons.com).
Sarah Prineas has sold workshopped story "The Illustrated Dragon" to
_Strange Horizons_ (http://www.strangehorizons.com) for tentative
publication in June 2002.
Stephen R. Sobotka Jr.'s story "SRT-22" will be featured in
_Sabledrake Magazine_'s "Action" issue within the next month.
Mikal Trimm's short story "Neighbor, Neighbor" will be published by
online magazine Peridot Books (http://www.peridotbooks.com) in May
2002. His poem, "Automaton" has been accepted by poetry Webzine
_Sidereality_ (http://sidereality.com) for their July edition.
Alumni member Mike Weatherford's latest self-published novel is THE
WIZARD OF SKYE (http://users.codenet.net/mweather/mybooks.htm). He
says, "I enjoyed my time with the Del Rey writing workshop. I learned
some very interesting things, and much of it helped improve my
writing. Anyone who was a member of the workshop between November 6th
and May 1st can download WIZARD free between the time I post it
(target date is May 3) until the end of this year."
Steve Westcott's book RELUCTANT HEROES will be published by Pegasus
Books in the UK (http://www.pegasuspublishers.com).
Amber van Dyk sold slipstream short story "Scatter Heart" to
_Chiaroscuro_ (http://www.chizine.com/scatterheart.htm).
| - - WORKSHOP STATISTICS - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
Number of members as of 2/20: 8273
Number of submissions currently online: 1684
Percent of submissions with 3 or more reviews: 64.4%
Percent of submissions with zero reviews: 1.4%
Number of submissions in March: 1108
Number of reviews in March: 4566
Ratio of reviews/submissions in March: 4.12
Estimated average word count per review in March: 414
Number of submissions in April to date: 459
Number of reviews in April to date: 2349
Ratio of reviews/submissions in April to date: 5.12
Estimated average word count per review in April to date: 479
| - - FEEDBACK - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
SPECIAL REFLECTION FROM NOVELIST CECILIA DART-THORNTON
Amazing but true: It was by sitting all alone in a room that I
launched my fabulously successful international writing career. Of
course, it helped that I was actually typing on a keyboard, and that
the keyboard was in fact connected to a computer/monitor/modem, which
were all in turn connected to the head-bone--I mean, the Internet.
The story of how I evolved from an aspiring writer to a published one
has by now passed into the realms of mythical saga and become, in
Australia at least, a legend in its own lunchtime. (Anyway, in some
parts of Australia.) (Okay, okay; among some of my friends.) (Well
all right, if you have to be *pedantic* about it; in my dreams.)
(Look, stop interrupting will you? I'm trying to write a serious
article here.)
One day in 1999 I dialed up a now-defunct Web site called "Inkblot" or
possibly "Inkspot" and read an excited message about a new Online
Writing Workshop for Fantasy and Science Fiction writers. It so
happened that at that time I had in my possession a rather large
manuscript of approximately 470,000 words, which I called the
Bitterbynde trilogy. The three books were finished, but because I had
put so much of my heart and soul into writing them, I was extremely
hesitant about showing them to anyone. At the first sign of criticism,
I, like a vulnerable and soft-bodied hermit crab fresh out of its
shell, would have been cut so agonizingly that (metaphorically
speaking) I would have gone seeking the nearest form of marine life
that subsisted on freshly-shelled hermit crabs, tied a napkin around
its neck, sprinkled myself with a little salt and pepper, and arranged
myself nicely on a plate with a sprig of parsley for garnish.
The Online Writing Workshop, however, saved me. I could post a small
part of a chapter online, to be read and critiqued by others, and if
anyone out there in cyberspace said horrible things about my creation,
it wouldn't automatically be suicide material! After all, none of
those so-called "workshop members" were real, were they? They were
just little bits of electricity flicking around circuits in some
computer. (Leave me to my illusions, okay?)
So, I took the plunge and posted part of Chapter 1. The first
"critter" was one "James Allison." I'll never forget. He said such
beautiful things about my writing that I started to breathe again,
(having held my breath ever since I posted, and turned a nasty shade
of puce). This was followed by other wonderful comments from Charlie
Finlay, Michelle Thuma, Nancy Proctor and a whole range of others.
By this time I was absorbed in reading what the other workshop members
were writing. And loving it! I was astounded at the sheer volume and
quality of imagination, powerful prose, originality, humour and depth
of passion I was discovering among the postings. Yes, of course there
were those who still had a lot to learn but they were getting there,
and I felt a kindred spirit with all of them. For the first time, I
was amongst a huge group of people (or cyber-flickerings) who were as
intense about writing F/SF as I am, who really *understood* the
desperate need to produce and create. I critted them and they critted
me, and I started to suspect they were real people after all, and some
of the comments some of them made about my work were kind of hurtful,
and these were sometimes valid and sometimes not, but I learned to be
able to handle both the criticism and the praise, and to judge what
advice was valuable and what was dross.
My first posting won the "Editor's Choice Award" for January, 2000. To
say that I was elated is an understatement.
Not long afterwards, the exposure my work got on the workshop and the
contacts I made helped me get an agent. The agent, based in New
Jersey, showed my manuscripts to Warner Aspect, a division of Time
Warner Books in New York. Within days Warner had bought the entire
trilogy for a large quantity of American dollars, and decided to
publish it in hardcover--the first time they had ever done so with a
new author! So, I was published for the first time in the U.S.A. and
Canada. Australia, New Zealand, and the U.K. followed, then Holland,
Belgium, and Russia.
Amazon.com listed Book 1 of the Bitterbynde trilogy, THE ILL-MADE
MUTE, among its top ten fantasy books for 2001. Locus magazine also
listed THE ILL-MADE MUTE among its top ten best reads for 2001. Having
officially reached bestsellerdom, THE ILL-MADE MUTE has been nominated
for "Australia's Favourite Book of the Year." It has also been
nominated for the World Fantasy Award.
Two years on, I have "graduated" from the workshop, but I am still in
contact with many of the wonderful e-friends I made there. They turned
out to be real after all! I met them in Philadelphia at the 2001
Worldcon, and all are doing well. Links to their Web sites can be found
on my own site at http://www.dartthornton.com
On behalf of every aspiring F&SF writer who has ever felt lonely, who
has ever longed to meet like-minded writers, who has ever needed help
with their writing, I'd like to say THANK YOU to the Online Writing
Workshop, which helped me realize my dream!
TIP: Formatting submissions in HTML using FrontPage
Copying and pasting the text of a submission into Microsoft FrontPage
makes HTML formatting very easy; then you can copy the HTML from there
and paste it into the submission form on the workshop. It's much
faster than adding HTML tags manually. The Netscape browser has a
simple free version of FrontPage, and FrontPage Express comes with
Windows 98 and Microsoft Office. It can also be downloaded free.
--Submitted by member Marc Daneker
TIP: Making the workshop work for you!
1) You can get crit points by critting.
2) Crit points allow you to post submissions.
3) Critting others helps you to learn.
4) People you crit may crit you back.
5) The crits you get in return help you learn.
6) Learning helps you to write better.
7) Writing better makes people want to read your writing.
8) People who read your writing may crit you.
9) Following their advice, when it's good, helps you to write better.
10) Vicious cycle; repeat until you're getting six-figure advances.
--Submitted by Sarah Bear Kindred
TIPS APPRECIATED
Got a helpful tip for your fellow members? A trick or hint for
submitting or reviewing, for what to put in your author's comments,
for getting good reviews, or for formatting or titling your
submission? Or a writing tip? Share it with us and if we agree it's
useful we'll publish it in the next newsletter. Just send it to
support@sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com and we'll do the rest.
See you next month!
The Online Writing Workshop for Science Fiction and Fantasy
http://sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com
support@sff.onlinewritingworkshop.com
| - - Copyright 2002 Online Writing Workshops, LLC - - - - - - - - -|
Visit our newsletter page to subscribe!
[an error occurred while processing this directive]