world con Archives - Annie Bellet

Posts Tagged ‘world con’

Anticipating Anticipation (Worldcon)

I’ve been getting zero writing done due to moving and now to travel plans. First Alaska, then I’m home for two days and finally off to Worldcon in Montreal.

I’m super nervous about Worldcon. I know absolutely no one going, I’ll be totally alone. I’m not so worried about the travel part of it since I survived traveling in Europe by myself no problem. I’m just not sure what to expect and what will happen while I’m there. I’m also slightly sad because this will be the longest my husband and I have been apart, pathetic as that sounds (sigh). I know I’m probably freaking out about nothing and that once I’m there I’ll be fine. There will be things to do and probably people to talk to. But I can’t seem to help being a little nervous. I’d unrealistically hoped to have sold a story or two by now so I’d at least be a SFWA member and have an icebreaker that way, but I likely should have started subbing to markets before Feb of this year if I’d truly wanted that to come about from the real world standpoint. Oh well.

I’m going to take Kim Stanley Robinson’s advice and just go and enjoy myself (I had the good fortune to be able to talk to him about Worldcon this last Spring). And bring a notebook.

I also have little simple business/calling cards now. They’re very basic with name, email, link to this blog etc… I wasn’t sure what to put as the title part, so I just went with writer and editor. I’ve actually been paid to edit things professionally (unlike writing fiction so far…sigh) so I figured I should put that on the card. But since I’m writing full time I added that anyway. Someday I’ll be able to change that to “Author”. Someday.

Speaking of that ‘someday’, I have a story into the workshop at Worldcon. It just came back with a rejection, though again a nice one. I’m close, I can feel it. I haven’t gotten a form letter for the last seven or so rejections, however, they are still rejections. I also have two stories that seem to be in serious contention for publication and are being held for “further consideration” whatever that might actually mean. I suppose for 6 months of submitting, this is good progress. It feels slow sometimes and whenever I talk to my family I get frustrated because they don’t seem to understand that a writing career can and likely will take years until it’s paying at all and likely will never pay all our bills, ever.

I don’t know. I think I’m just at a slump. Once I get home from Alaska and Worldcon I’ll dig into Chwedl. I always feel better when I’m writing. Maybe I’ll take a notebook on the boat in Alaska and do a short story or two. I’ll have nothing but time, after all. Time to worry about Worldcon.

News Quickie

Apparently they are doing a workshop at Worldcon. I sent in two stories, so far I’ve heard they’ll likely have a spot for at least one of them, so we’ll see. My NorWesCon experience was nice and positive and very helpful.

So I’ll get to be workshopped by some more pros, which is awesome. Hopefully they can tell me how to get my stories over the “this is really good, but no thanks” hump…

Insomnia and a Story a Week

Well, my mission to revive Short Story Monday is failing so far. I seem to be sleeping only about every other day which is doing wonky things to my brain. Between that and packing to move, my writing productivity has dropped far too much. I got my third chapter out for the novel chapter exchange with my friend an entire week late, for one. This has to end.

This morning when I couldn’t sleep I worked on a new short story and managed about 1000 words I don’t totally hate. I think I need to let the rest percolate in my head for another day. Hopefully tonight I’ll get some sleep and that will allow me the brain power to finish it. The story is somewhat different from anything I’ve tried before, so no idea if it will work or not. I think the beginning is super rough, but my beginnings are always the worst part. Which is really unfortunate, since beginnings are the first thing people see when they’re reading. I truly have to work on that. It’s what editing is for, right? Right?

I realized though that this story might qualify in terms of theme and feel for the Shine anthology, which means I’d have to get it done and through draft form by the end of July. It’s entirely possible, depending on how many drafts it is going to take. I’m hoping not ten, I think I can reasonably do four drafts in the timeframe, depending on where my beta readers feel the story is at. Of course, I haven’t written the end yet, so my normal predilictions for disaster or ambiguous endings might disqualify it from that anthology, but I’ll worry about that when I get there. I can always try a happier ending version.

In other news I queried on Delilah again, since they’ve had it now for 4 months. Still considering it, apparently. This is a good thing, I think. But damn I’m impatient. It could be my first sale… meep. I just want to know. I hate wait. (Yeah yeah, wrong profession, move along now…)

I’m starting to mini-panic about World Con. I don’t know what I’m going to do there. Sure, go to panels and all that, but I’m going to be all on my own. Will I have the courage to talk to strangers? Will they even care what I have to say? So much easier to hide at home, but I’ve been dreaming about going to Montreal and to a World Con for years and now I can have both at once. Even if I won’t be able to afford to eat while I’m there, heh. I guess I’ll go and try to let things happen as they happen. I’m sure it won’t be nearly as scary as I think it will be. Probably.

I haven’t been staying nearly far away enough from Clarion West blogs as I should. Whoops. Slightly depressed now. I really wish I were there. I’m ready, even if apparently my writing isn’t. I figure I have about 30 weeks until I have to have something new ready for next year’s application. Last year I took a real gamble with the story I chose because even though I love it, I’ve gotten very mixed response to it from “this is really cool, I couldn’t stop thinking about it (the gist of comments from a really well-known author!!!)” to “this doesn’t make much sense, why is everyone crazy and what’s going on?”… I guess I chose poorly. Next year I’ll try to send something (or two somethings) that get a more universal okay.

First Term and Future Plans

Heh, wordpress looks strange again. Grr.

Anyway, I survived first term of graduate school. It was underwhelming. Hopefully next term will go better.

I’ve decided to attend a couple of cons (specifically geared towards spec fic/writing/etc…). The deadline for the workshops for the first con I’m going to is the 14th of this month, so I’d better get my ass in gear. I think I’ll send them Bladebearer because it’s a complex little story and has some weird problems I could use perspective on. You can send two pieces, so I’m tempted to send in the first 3 chapters of Casimir Hypogean. I still hate that novel, but maybe feedback on it would somehow make the path clearer. Or at least give me a few better ideas of what is going so wrong with the whole thing. I’d have to write up a synopsis, however, which could prove problematic since I’ve never written one. It’d be a learning experience. Well, we’ll see how far I get this week. Otherwise I’ll send Monsters as my second piece.

The second con is World Con, which is in Montreal this year. I’ve always wanted to go to Montreal, and I think Chwedl will be in at least polished draft form by then and (cross fingers?) ready for agent hunting, so it’ll give me something to really peddle around at the con. Plus the panels should be informative and I’ll get to vote for the Hugo winners. Which means my summer will be full of reading the nominated books, never a bad thing.

I’m also, this month, polishing Space Bones and Delilah for my application to Clarion West. I’m terrified I won’t get in and I’m terrified I will. It’s like a perfect lose lose situation. But really, I want to go. I think it would be fantastic and horrifying and awesome all at once. Besides, then I could stalk EBear in person (note, this is a joke, unless you consider reading someone’s lj stalking…). I’m just jealous that she has a cat. Seriously. Stupid renting with no pets rule. Moving on… I think that the two aforementioned stories have the best shot of showing how I write. They’re also now the most polished of my spec lit pieces and Delilah is still one of my favorite things I’ve written ever. It might be a risk considering the very Christian overtones and the linear inevitability of the plot, but I hope that the characters and stylistic tones will override that and punish the reader with its awesomeness. Seriously, I like that story. And Space Bones has grown on me. I wrote it mostly for the title at first, but after about four drafts I finally feel a connection to what is going on in the story and to the characters. Hopefully this will all translate into the Clarion peeps thinking I’m whatever they’re looking for.

By the end of December I hope to have the draft of Chwedl complete. Then comes the editing and pain, but I already see things I can do to help it along. This novel, to repeat myself, is nothing like Casimir Hypogean. It’s such a breeze to write and the language flows nicely instead of feeling forced and choppy as all hell. I wonder if I haven’t written the world of Casimir Hypogean too bleak, its characters too unsympathetic. After all, why should a reader care about chars who hardly care about themselves? It’s a strange dilemna. More reason probably for why I should edit up those first 3 chapters of the rewrite and send them off for critique. Maybe the novel is dead and I’m still pining for a ghost of a thing that shouldn’t be. It’s hard to tell such from my close perspective.