Here’s a list of my own credits that feature a GLBT character and who did/is publishing them. Just in case you’re taking notes or something.

That’s six of thirteen from a relative beginner, all but one horror. There are horror people out there buying good fiction that includes GLBT characters. Please don’t forget that.

My SF short story, Silver Veins, featuring my first attempts at writing an autistic main character, is now live over at Expanded Horizons. Teaser below, but you really should click through for the whole thing since it’s free to read…

* * *

Years, Trista thought. She stared out, through the foot-by-foot square window in her wall, and wanted to scream. She wanted to pluck the lamp from the table beside her and bash in the window, the only window in her quarters. She wanted to punish it until either her emotions bled out in sticky red on the walls, or the window gave way and the stars bled into her chambers.

She’d spent years on starships or space stations or off planet condos. For years, the same small square of technology and blankness had held her hostage. Her quarters were shaped to fit the people who lived in rooms like these. It was nothing, empty in its natural state, and there was not much more than that around her.

2009 PRELIMINARY STOKER BALLOT

This is the PRELIMINARY ballot. The FINAL BALLOT will be announced in a few weeks. Congratulations to all!!

Here’s the full ballot:

Superior Achievement in a Novel

AS FATE WOULD HAVE IT by Michael Louis Calvillo (Bad Moon Books)
SACRIFICE by John Everson (Leisure)
ETERNAL VIGILANCE II: DEATH OF ILLUSIONS by Gabrielle Faust (Immanion Press)
TWISTED LADDER by Rhodi Hawk (Tor/Forge)
VORACIOUS by Alice Henderson (Jove)
THE BONE FACTORY by Nate Kenyon (Leisure)AUDREY’S DOOR by Sarah Langan (Harper)
PATIENT ZERO by Jonathan Maberry (St. Martin’s Griffin)
QUARANTINED by Joe McKinney (Lachesis Publishing)
CURSED by Jeremy Shipp (Raw Dog Screaming Press)

Superior Achievement in a First Novel
DAMNABLE by Hank Schwaeble (Jove)
THE BLACK ACT by Louise Bohmer (Library of Horror)
SLAUGHTER by Marcus Griffin (Alexandrian Archives Publishing)
BREATHERS by S. G. Browne (Broadway Books)
THE LITTLE SLEEP by Paul Tremblay (Henry Holt)
SOLOMON’S GRAVE by Daniel G. Keohane (Dragon Moon Press)
DISMEMBER by Daniel Pyle (Wild Child)
SLIGHTS by Kaaron Warren (Angry Robot)
THE DEAD PATH by Stephen M. Irwin (Hachette Australia)
THE FOREST OF HANDS AND TEETH by Carrie Ryan (Delacorte Press/Random House)

Superior Achievement in Long Fiction,
MAMA FISH by Rio Youers (Shroud Publishing)
HUNGER OF EMPTY VESSELS by Scott Edelman (Bad Moon Books)
DIANA AND THE GOONG-SI by Lisa Morton (MIDNIGHT WALK)
DOC GOOD’S TRAVELING SHOW by Gene O’Neill (Bad Moon Books)
THE GRAY ZONE by John R. Little (Bad Moon Books)
THE LUCID DREAMING by Lisa Morton (Bad Moon Books)
DREAMING ROBOT MONSTER by Mort Castle (MIGHTY UNCLEAN)
LITTLE GRAVEYARD ON THE PRAIRIE by Steven E. Wedel (Bad Moon Books)
ROT by Michelle Lee (Skullvines Press)
BLACK BUTTERFLIES by Kurt Newton (Sideshow Press)

Superior Achievement in a Short Fiction
IN THE PORCHES OF MY EARS by Norman Prentiss (PS Publishing)
BLANKET OF WHITE by Amy Grech (BLANKET OF WHITE)
KEEPING WATCH by Nate Kenyon (MONSTROUS: 20 TALES OF GIANT CREATURE TERROR)
ONE MORE DAY by Brian Freeman (SHIVERS V)
THE CROSSING OF ALDO RAY by Weston Ochse (THE DEAD THAT WALK)
WHERE SUNLIGHT SLEEPS by Brian Freeman (Horror Drive-in)
THE NIGHT NURSE by Harry Shannon (Horror Drive-in)
PLAGUE DOGS by Joe McKinney (POTTERS FIELD 3)
THE OUTLAWS OF HILL COUNTY by John Palisano (Harvest Hill)
NUB HUT by Kurt Dinan (Chizine)

Superior Achievement in a Anthology,
MIDNIGHT WALK edited by Lisa Morton (Dark House)
POE edited by Ellen Datlow (Solaris)
HARLAN COUNTY HORRORS edited by Mari Adkins (Apex Publications)
HE IS LEGEND: AN ANTHOLOGY CELEBRATING RICHARD MATHESON edited by Christopher Conlon (Gauntlet Press)
LOVECRAFT UNBOUND edited by Ellen Datlow (Dark Horse Books)
DARK DELICACIES 3: HAUNTED edited by Del Howison and Jeff Gelb (Running Press)
BUTCHER SHOP QUARTET 2 edited by Frank J. Hutton (Cutting Block Press)
GRANTS PASS edited by Amanda Pillar and Jennifer Brozek (Morrigan Books)
MIGHTY UNCLEAN edited by Bill Breedlove (Dark Arts Books)
BRITISH INVASION by Chris Golden, Tim Lebbon and James Moore (Cemetery Dance Publications)

Superior Achievement in a Collection,
A TASTE OF TENDERLOIN by Gene O’Neill (Apex Book Company)
SHADES OF BLOOD AND SHADOW by Angeline Hawkes (Dark Regions Press)
MARTYRS AND MONSTERS by Robert Dunbar (DarkHart Press)
IN THE CLOSET, UNDER THE BED by Lee Thomas (Dark Scribe Press)
A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FIENDS by Michael McCarty (Sam’s Dot)
GOT TO KILL THEM ALL AND OTHER STORIES by Dennis Etchison (Cemetery Dance)
DARK ENTITIES by David Dunwoody (Dark Regions)
SHARDS by Shane Jiraiya Cummings (Brimstone Press)
UNHAPPY ENDINGS by Brian Keene (Delirium Books)
YOU MIGHT SLEEP… by Nick Mamatas (Prime)

Superior Achievement in a Nonfiction
WRITERS WORKSHOP OF HORROR by Michael Knost (Woodland Press)
STEPHEN KING: THE NON-FICTION by Rocky Wood and Justin Brook (Cemetery Dance)
CINEMA KNIFE FIGHT by L. L. Soares and Michael Arruda (Fearzone)
ESOTERIA-LAND by Michael McCarty (BearManor Media)
MORBID CURIOSITY CURES THE BLUES edited by Loren Rhoads (Simon & Schuster)
THE STEPHEN KING ILLUSTRATED COMPANION by Bev Vincent (Fall River Press)

Superior Achievement in a Poetry Collection
CHIMERIC MACHINES by Lucy A. Snyder (Creative Guy Publishing)
MORTICIAN’S TEA by G. O. Clark (Sam’s Dot)
DOUBLE VISIONS by Bruce Boston (Dark Regions)
VOICES FROM THE DARK by Gary William Crawford (Dark Regions)
BARFODDER by Rain Graves (Cemetery Dance)
STARKWEATHER DREAMS by Christopher Conlon (Creative Guy Publishing)
TOWARD ABSOLUTE ZERO by Karen L. Newman (Sam’s Dot)
NORTH LEFT OF EARTH by Bruce Boston (Sam’s Dot)
GRAVE BITS by Todd Hanks (Skullvines Press)

Yea gods I love that word. It makes the thrifty woman in me and the writer in me tingle. From Jason Sizemore re: Dark Futures:

There were a few last second additions.

Okay, I’ll tell the truth. I had accepted these stories and forgot to list them in the final ToC. Rest assured, I received much grief and worries from nervous authors who thought I’d changed my mind about their submission.

“Black Hole Sun” by Alethea Kontis & Kelli Dunlap
“For Restful Death I Cry” by Geoffrey Girard
“Tasting Green Grass” by Elaine Blose
“Endangered” by Robby Sparks
“Nostalgia” by Gene O’Neill
“Beautiful Girl” by Angeline Hawkes
“Father’s Flesh, Mother’s Blood” by Aliette De Bodard
“Terra Tango 3″ by James Reilly
“Love Kills” by Gill Ainsworth
“Memories of Hope City” by Maggie Jamison
“Do You Want That in Blonde, Brunette, or Auburn” by Glenn Lewis Gillette
“Marketing Proposal” by Sarah M. Harvey
“The Monastery of the Seven Hands” by Natania Barron
“A Futile Gesture Toward Truth” by Paul Jessup
“Hydraulic” by Ekaterina Sedia
“Alien Spaces” by Deb Taber
“Virtual Babies” by Maurice Broaddus
“Personal Jesus” by Jennifer Pelland
“Meat World” by Michele Lee

Me at first: Squee!!

Me later: No, seriously, squee. Did you see some of the names on that list? They’re award winners and finalists. Seriously, squee!

This post over on Suvudu about not querying before the book/story is ready inspired this post.

We all make mistakes, it’s the smart people who learn from them and the not-so-smart that keep making the same mistakes over and over. And even wiser people can learn from the mistakes of other people, provided they know about it. So here’s mine.

1. Querying a novel before finishing final edits on it

I was close, over halfway into my final proof and I figured I’d be done by the time anyone got to me. I mean it takes two week to two months minimum for agents to get back to you, right? Except that within two hours I had five partial requests. No, it doesn’t take weeks or months, not always. You have to be ready for that.

2. Querying before the novel was awesome.

This one I’m still split on. I queried a novel that got some really great, really flattering reads, but ultimately every agent on my list passed on it. The few people who read it liked it very much, but ultimately something about it just missed the mark when it came to being marketable. In retrospect I see now how I can improve it, and I am working on it. But I’ve already been through my agent list so even if I finish editing it I have very few places left to submit it. At this point I’m not sure if the failure was due to the problem I now see the novel having, or if it’s due to a tightening marketplace where before and agent would have worked with me and now they just can’t. I go back and forth on whether this is a mistake, or just how things worked out, and I still don’t know.

3. Playing nice.

Oh, I mean it. I’ve always known what I wanted out of my writing career, but there was a period where I was too busy trying to ingratiate myself into the community and the people I perceived as being “higher than me” in the genres I write in. I bit my tongue. I took advice I didn’t think was right, I focused on projects that depended on other people or were aimed at markets that I didn’t really trust. I played nice with people whose aims were different than mine and I sought their approval rather than the advancement of my career as I wanted it.

Ultimately I don’t think anything really bad came of this, but it did waste some time and distract me from my goals. I still try my best to be polite, but I find a gap growing between myself and some genre community circles. The bigger the gap it seems, the more people get mad at me when I don’t try to play as nice with them anymore. But I can’t. I have to focus on walking my own path.

4. Settling for any sale rather than a good one.

It happens. You see other people getting acceptances, you get antsy to sell your latest work, you go for what you think is an easy sale instead of a good sale. But even if you do get a yes (which is never guaranteed) you risk realizing after the fact that you aren’t really proud of the company your story is now keeping, or the check you got or contributor copies you got were less than spectacular. Or no one seems to read the bugger and you end up feeling like you’d been better off just putting it up on your web page or something.

Or, the story never makes it to print because the publish collapses and you had a feeling it was going to, but you really wanted to put another sale on your list.

Sometimes you can’t control any of these things. But sometimes you can face these problems and say “Yeah the book ended up being junk, but at least I was well compensated.” Also, experience has taught me that there’s a correlation between how much I’ve been paid (or the prestige of the editor/press/project at least) and how classy the sale ends up being.

Maybe this is something all writers have to learn on their own, because there are feelings associated with “satisfying” and “unsatisfying” sales that are so personal and subjective that everyone is going to be different. But it’s something that is good to keep in mind.

5. Only writing when inspired.

Yeah, I did it, and let my tell you something it goes away. Seriously you CAN train yourself to almost always be ready to write when you sit down to do so. It took me six years to write my first book, but five months to rewrite it almost completely. Practice writing regularly. Some people say every day, but I understand that’s not always possible. But by sitting down regularly to write you can train your brain and your Muse to be ready to make words when it’s writing time.

Now, some days the words come strong, and some days you’ll struggle, and some days you’ll delete everything you did the day before and start over. But you cannot fix what isn’t written and you cannot make writing habit if you don’t sit down and do it. Set realistic goals (1 page a day, 5k a week, whatever) but for gods’ sake throw out the idea that you have to be inspired to write and just sit down and do it. It will get easier.

*ETA: I’m not the only one blogging about this this week. Here’s Best Seller Anya Bast’s take on the topic.

That’s right, in December 2009 Rot was on Horror Mall’s Digital bestseller list and Black Ink XXX, featuring my short story Carnivorous, is on the Best Selling Books list! Can I get a woohoo?

I understand that writing is not a priority when it comes down to survival. Food, shelter, water, medicine. I know these are the core things I need to survive in this world and most other things can be overlooked.

But I don’t want to just survive. Food, water, shelter, clothing might keep my body alive and functioning but writing is what my soul feeds on. Stories are what I need to be really alive, not merely functioning. For a while now, okay, for most of the year so far I’ve been living in a state of survival. I need to be alive. I need to live and be able to look back when the world and bodily things fall away and see that I went through life with reason, passion and purpose. Life is burns too fast. It’s very easy to waste an hour, a day, weeks and years. It’s very easy to look back and think of wasted time, taken for granted and squandered away.

Sure everyone needs, and deserves a little squandering. But waste builds up like toxins in a life. Waste begats waste where as for me writing is opening the windows to a spring breeze to let all that potential in.

Yeah, there are more important things in life that isolating myself and striving to write that perfect tale. But it’s not about the end result. It’s about the strive. It’s about wanting more, and working for more and bringing that into all parts of my life. Writing is the core of more, which is why it’s the song my soul sings.

I haven’t been singing for a while now, and I hurt because of it. I’m ready for not a hummed tune, or a half remembered bubble gum pop chorus. I’m ready for a full-ensemble orchestra.

So life, fuck you and your drama. Your trauma. Your emergencies and insomnia. Fuck you and your demand for functionality and priorities, for cost cutting and need judging. Fuck your games and your rules and your black-lined moments of hope.

I refuse to merely function. So I’ll be in my room. Writing.

Details here.