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Today I went up to Bathurst and Bloor again, to pick up a bank draft—which took far longer than I’d expected, of course—and, while I was up there, I went into BMV, where I started poking around in the Horror section. Completely out of the blue, I found a book I’d been haphazardly “looking for” for almost fifteen years…The Punishment, by Doris Shannon. It’s a tight little Gothic thriller in which the main character slowly begins to realize her new step-family are murderous cuckoos descended from the Beans and the Bloody Benders, hereditary psychopaths addicted to sex and violence who propagate via incest, and tend to name themselves variants on “John” or “Kate”. My big problem in locating this book had been that while I remembered huge chunks of the plot, I couldn't recall its title, author, or almost anything else about it—though I suppose I must have subliminally retained a sense of what the cover looked like, because that’s how I recognized it. Score! And for only $2.99, too.;)
This led to a bit of prime philosophical musing about the nature of being a fan of horror culture in general—how, because what you’re attracted to falls into the same category as what most people tend to dismiss as trash (my Mom’s wonderful, morally certain refrain on the subject always being: But why would you want to read/watch/listen to/think about THAT, anyway?), it doesn’t tend to get archived with any sort of consistency or evaluated with any real sort of critical/analytical skill. Luckily, through my “Cool & Dark” columns, I now have a tailor-made outlet to examine things that have informed, inspired and intrigued me throughout my creative life; OTOH, a lot of the time, I know damn well that I’m directing people towards stuff they may find almost impossible to get hold of. But as long as they keep reading—and Greg keeps paying me the big bucks—I’m certainly happy to do it…indeed, that’s why you don’t see as much of this sort of stuff in here as you used to. Which brings me to my next logic-contortion…
More and more, as time and cash get tighter, I’m thinking hard about the selling-to-my-audience-directly option—a monthly PDF digest, as per greygirlbeast’s Sirenia, or an e-serial, as per Doug Clegg’s upcoming The Locust and/or David Wellington’s…um, everything, though—me being me—I’d probably throw a fair bit of reviewing on the fire, here and there. What holds me back from putting this plan into effect, in a nutshell, is technology: I don’t know nothin’ ‘bout setting up no PayPal accounts, and very little about how to administer the necessary delivery system, either. Steve could probably do layout…hell, I could probably do layout, if it came to that. But there’d have to be a page set up, and mailing lists, or whatever. I think I could probably publicize it through FearZone (right, Greg?), and the fact is, it’s not like I’m hurting for potential content. Five days of slacking notwithstanding, I just wrote over 30,000 words in two months; if I knew I’d be making money off this transaction, there’s no way I wouldn’t feel driven to pull as much out of my ass as humanly possible, on a damn consistent basis.
So: Who’s up for helping? Anybody? Bueller? Anybody?
Still no writing, BTW, or very little. This week has been all about trying to set my house in order, particularly so because as of tomorrow, Steve’s off to PDAC for all day and most of the night, ‘til Monday at the very latest. And Mom’s off the Sudbury next week, where she’s doing a play, which means she wants to see all she can of Cal before she goes. I’ll probably get Saturday night to myself, which is good; maybe I can jumpstart something then.
In preparation for that, therefore, the 2009 TBD List (Updated)—
TO BE SENT:
“Verse Found Scratched Inside the Lid of a Sarcophagus (Dynasty Unknown)”
“Clown, Considered as a Memento Mori”
SENT OUT:
“Strange Weight”, to Burning Effigy
“Ed Gein at Night”, to Not One of Us
“Jar of Salts”, to Lone Star Stories
“Hell Friend” and assorted unpublished poems, to Rannu Fund
“The Underneath”, to Shroud Magazine
ACCEPTED/TO BE PUBLISHED:
“The Jacaranda Smile”, Apparitions anthology
“Fin De Siecle”, Doorways
“at the moment I am living in a haunted house—”, Not One of Us
“Tantalus, Reaching Upwards” and “Minotaur”, on hold at ChiZine
“Marya Nox”, Lovecraft Unbound
“Ring of Fire”, “The Speed of Pain” and “Crossing the River”, Dark Arts Publications’ 2009 anthology (still untitled)
“each thing I show you is a piece of my death”, Clockwork Phoenix 2
RFN (The Default)
A Book of Tongues, Chapter Six and counting—work on consistently, 500/1,000 words per day.
CBC adaptation—two two-hour episodes, three-pager outlines for each; needs to be done and sent ASAP, with no more fucking around.
“Signal to Noise”—3,000/5,000 words maximum—finish in time for Ad Astra (March 27 to 29), so that it can be packaged as a fifty-cent flyer, as per Rue Morgue’s Festival of Fear.
Year Zero rewrite—deadline? Work on as required.
“History’s Crust”—no longer deadlined, especially since I haven’t yet heard back about “Strange Weight”. Goal set: 10,000/15,000 words maximum.
Next “Cool and Dark” column—due by end of month.
To brainstorm/outline: “Bone Woman” idea (forensic anthropologist excavating mass grave-site keeps finding one “extra” bone per corpse, eventually realizes they all fit together to form one huge monster—begins to believe this “explains” why people in neighboring towns considered this town’s residents to literally not be human, sparking this particular massacre under cover of ongoing genocide); “Trap-Weed” (the selkie vs. shark-were story, done in the style of Patrick O’Brian); “The Drowned Town” (poem).
ON THE BACK-BURNER:
The Clot (next novel pitch—transdimensional possessive ghosts/zombies vs. dysfunctional costumed vigilantes and tac-nuke-wielding Toronto SRT team; psychic and magical contamination causes people to develop actual superpowers)
The Mercy Seat (next screenplay—ghost-driven riot in a women’s prison, now with extra religious mania, cyber-crime and not-so-vague manga influences)
“A Feast for Dust” (sequel to “Sown From Salt”, with all that entails)
“Chorazin” (sequel to “Armoring…”; child vampire takes refuge with dreadful sire, then decides conflicted Renfield would be better off with freelance ghouls)
“Kryptonite” (the Cornish sisters meet Mac Roke, fallout from “Crossing the River”)
“Montezuma was a Man of Faith” (sequel to “Kryptonite”, Samaire Cornish POV, drunk and looking for Daddy in Mexico)
“Helpless” (sequel to “Maps & Legend: Dead Voices on Air”)
“Hungry Ghosts” (sequel to “The Narrow World”)
“Oil of Angels” (sequel to “Words Written Backwards”, now incorporating “Chimera” and much of Last Things)
“Trouble Again” (gay mercenary werewolves, oh my!; definite Loonie Dreadful territory)
“Those Others” (Amazons vs. Lilim)
“All On That Day” (American Gangster vs. goofer-dust golem)
“Under These Rocks and Stones” (Euwphaim Glouwer’s revenge against Glauce Druir comes to fruition)
This led to a bit of prime philosophical musing about the nature of being a fan of horror culture in general—how, because what you’re attracted to falls into the same category as what most people tend to dismiss as trash (my Mom’s wonderful, morally certain refrain on the subject always being: But why would you want to read/watch/listen to/think about THAT, anyway?), it doesn’t tend to get archived with any sort of consistency or evaluated with any real sort of critical/analytical skill. Luckily, through my “Cool & Dark” columns, I now have a tailor-made outlet to examine things that have informed, inspired and intrigued me throughout my creative life; OTOH, a lot of the time, I know damn well that I’m directing people towards stuff they may find almost impossible to get hold of. But as long as they keep reading—and Greg keeps paying me the big bucks—I’m certainly happy to do it…indeed, that’s why you don’t see as much of this sort of stuff in here as you used to. Which brings me to my next logic-contortion…
More and more, as time and cash get tighter, I’m thinking hard about the selling-to-my-audience-directly option—a monthly PDF digest, as per greygirlbeast’s Sirenia, or an e-serial, as per Doug Clegg’s upcoming The Locust and/or David Wellington’s…um, everything, though—me being me—I’d probably throw a fair bit of reviewing on the fire, here and there. What holds me back from putting this plan into effect, in a nutshell, is technology: I don’t know nothin’ ‘bout setting up no PayPal accounts, and very little about how to administer the necessary delivery system, either. Steve could probably do layout…hell, I could probably do layout, if it came to that. But there’d have to be a page set up, and mailing lists, or whatever. I think I could probably publicize it through FearZone (right, Greg?), and the fact is, it’s not like I’m hurting for potential content. Five days of slacking notwithstanding, I just wrote over 30,000 words in two months; if I knew I’d be making money off this transaction, there’s no way I wouldn’t feel driven to pull as much out of my ass as humanly possible, on a damn consistent basis.
So: Who’s up for helping? Anybody? Bueller? Anybody?
Still no writing, BTW, or very little. This week has been all about trying to set my house in order, particularly so because as of tomorrow, Steve’s off to PDAC for all day and most of the night, ‘til Monday at the very latest. And Mom’s off the Sudbury next week, where she’s doing a play, which means she wants to see all she can of Cal before she goes. I’ll probably get Saturday night to myself, which is good; maybe I can jumpstart something then.
In preparation for that, therefore, the 2009 TBD List (Updated)—
TO BE SENT:
“Verse Found Scratched Inside the Lid of a Sarcophagus (Dynasty Unknown)”
“Clown, Considered as a Memento Mori”
SENT OUT:
“Strange Weight”, to Burning Effigy
“Ed Gein at Night”, to Not One of Us
“Jar of Salts”, to Lone Star Stories
“Hell Friend” and assorted unpublished poems, to Rannu Fund
“The Underneath”, to Shroud Magazine
ACCEPTED/TO BE PUBLISHED:
“The Jacaranda Smile”, Apparitions anthology
“Fin De Siecle”, Doorways
“at the moment I am living in a haunted house—”, Not One of Us
“Tantalus, Reaching Upwards” and “Minotaur”, on hold at ChiZine
“Marya Nox”, Lovecraft Unbound
“Ring of Fire”, “The Speed of Pain” and “Crossing the River”, Dark Arts Publications’ 2009 anthology (still untitled)
“each thing I show you is a piece of my death”, Clockwork Phoenix 2
RFN (The Default)
A Book of Tongues, Chapter Six and counting—work on consistently, 500/1,000 words per day.
CBC adaptation—two two-hour episodes, three-pager outlines for each; needs to be done and sent ASAP, with no more fucking around.
“Signal to Noise”—3,000/5,000 words maximum—finish in time for Ad Astra (March 27 to 29), so that it can be packaged as a fifty-cent flyer, as per Rue Morgue’s Festival of Fear.
Year Zero rewrite—deadline? Work on as required.
“History’s Crust”—no longer deadlined, especially since I haven’t yet heard back about “Strange Weight”. Goal set: 10,000/15,000 words maximum.
Next “Cool and Dark” column—due by end of month.
To brainstorm/outline: “Bone Woman” idea (forensic anthropologist excavating mass grave-site keeps finding one “extra” bone per corpse, eventually realizes they all fit together to form one huge monster—begins to believe this “explains” why people in neighboring towns considered this town’s residents to literally not be human, sparking this particular massacre under cover of ongoing genocide); “Trap-Weed” (the selkie vs. shark-were story, done in the style of Patrick O’Brian); “The Drowned Town” (poem).
ON THE BACK-BURNER:
The Clot (next novel pitch—transdimensional possessive ghosts/zombies vs. dysfunctional costumed vigilantes and tac-nuke-wielding Toronto SRT team; psychic and magical contamination causes people to develop actual superpowers)
The Mercy Seat (next screenplay—ghost-driven riot in a women’s prison, now with extra religious mania, cyber-crime and not-so-vague manga influences)
“A Feast for Dust” (sequel to “Sown From Salt”, with all that entails)
“Chorazin” (sequel to “Armoring…”; child vampire takes refuge with dreadful sire, then decides conflicted Renfield would be better off with freelance ghouls)
“Kryptonite” (the Cornish sisters meet Mac Roke, fallout from “Crossing the River”)
“Montezuma was a Man of Faith” (sequel to “Kryptonite”, Samaire Cornish POV, drunk and looking for Daddy in Mexico)
“Helpless” (sequel to “Maps & Legend: Dead Voices on Air”)
“Hungry Ghosts” (sequel to “The Narrow World”)
“Oil of Angels” (sequel to “Words Written Backwards”, now incorporating “Chimera” and much of Last Things)
“Trouble Again” (gay mercenary werewolves, oh my!; definite Loonie Dreadful territory)
“Those Others” (Amazons vs. Lilim)
“All On That Day” (American Gangster vs. goofer-dust golem)
“Under These Rocks and Stones” (Euwphaim Glouwer’s revenge against Glauce Druir comes to fruition)
