Thursday, August 01, 2024

Gallus – A GSFWC Anthology of the Future – Launching Glasgow Worldcon 2024 

I admit it. I spend far too much of my time as a writer trying to work out what the fuck is going on? How do stories work? Which is why the first notes from the story that became Occupy Midnight are from 2018. I was “working” on a series of stories, all set in the Glasgow area, as is often the case, all featuring witches, as is often the case. I figured I had at least 4 stories, of which there are drafts of a couple of those, and scraps of others. And along the way, I was thinking, there could be an opportunity to combine them, like a bridge novel, or something?

Which is where the idea for “The Midnight Track of the Conference for Witchcraft In The Anthropocene,” came from. The idea of the Midnight Hour for witches, a Conference of Witches, and of course, the undeniable influence of the Anthropocene and related climate change, to collapse, that impacts our lives. Ideas persist, even while I stray, writing other things, getting on with life. Watching covid happen, watching COP 26 arrive at the very venue I planned to set my story in.

The idea did persist, but always felt just a little beyond me. Until late 2022. I’ve been a member of Glasgow’s SF Writer’s Circle for over a decade now. We did an anthology for the 30th anniversary of the group, Thirty Years of Rain, and another to raise money for charity in 2020, Flotation Device – both of which I have stories in. By 2022, we knew that the Worldcon was going to return to Glasgow in 2024, that it was going to take place at the SECC again. So, we decided to do an anthology for 2024.

And with that, I knew I had to write this story. A story set at a conference at the SECC, covering the idea of environmentalism/Anthropocene where COP26 had failed, and the wishful thinking that magic might save us all? I had to write this story and I had to submit for inclusion in this anthology. And so, I had the first version ready for critique by the GSFWC by January 2023. At that point it was called The Midnight Track and was maybe 3000 words.

With a deadline for submittals, for what would become Gallus, of Easter 2023, I took the comments provided by the GSFWC and reworked The Midnight Track. Complete scenes were thrown away, new characters added, a lot of tweaking and shifting towards something. By the time submissions came around it was now called Occupy Midnight, having played with a number of other titles along the way. At this point the story had a map, a timetable, a QR code, and was over 8000 words. To say I had dived into the deep end would be an understatement.

Through the rest of the year we were back and forth, the editors and I, trying to help me find the best version of the story. The story continually mutating, so that actually I wasn’t upset by the loss of the map, etc., they made sense to me in a previous version, but not this version. The closer we got to something special, I remained frustrated on how to pull off the ending. I think we got there. When it could take a fucking miracle to change the world, and with the best magic in the world not being enough, what do you do?

Gallus is a labour of love. I didn’t take this journey alone. As I’ve detailed above, the conversation for this started years ago, each of us coming up with our own ideas, bringing them together for this one anthology. Working together to get the best of ourselves, to celebrate Glasgow, to celebrate genre, to celebrate the return of Worldcon to Glasgow.

Gallus launch at Glasgow Worldcon, Friday 9th August 2024
Gallus open launch at Waterstones, Argyle St, Thursday 29th August 2024
Gallus: Twenty-five stories, a cover by one of the writers that in turn went through so many mutations to reach a joyful end stage, this book exists. Come and get it.

Gallus:
“A Scottish adjective – bold, daring, high spirited.”
Edited:
E.M. Faults, Briain M. Milton, Neil Williamson
Cover:
Jenni Coutts
Contents:
Out in the Sticks - C.J. Henderson
The Tale ae Wee Gwion - Hal Duncan
In The Dry Sea - Philip Raines and Harvey Welles
A Gift and a Curse - Annabel Campbell
Waking Nightmare - Laura Elise Jenkins
Gods of the Deepwood - Cameron Johnston
The Girl Who Cried - Heather Valentine
The Janitor in Black - Ian Hunter
The Grey - PS Livingstone
The Sarry Heid Free Press - Robin CM Duncan
When Greens Grew Legs and Walked Away - T.H. Dray
Flourish - Richard Mosses
The Badger - Ruth EJ Booth
A Most Promising Day - Alan Laird
Pearl and the World - E.M. Faulds
A Shepherd’s Responsibilities - Brian M. Milton
Earworm - Stewart Horn
Set Things Right - Sophie C. Baumert
On the Ocean Wave - Elsie WK Donald
The Pitfalls of Foresight - Don Redwood
A Visitor By Rainlight - Neil Williamson
Wayward Dolls - Jenni Coutts
The Last Captain of Vestelyn - Ewan Lawson
Data Slot 162 - M. Nesce Drake
Occupy Midnight - Peter Morrison

Tuesday, January 02, 2024

A Loss of Direction (There is something in the way) 

I love to read. I love to talk about reading. Sharing what I read over the year, keeping note of it with my wee lists every year.

But at the end of 2022 I somewhat lost my way. Someone posted into my timeline that people who boasted about how much they read was problematic, and an attack on folk who don't read as much. Which is, clearly, fucking stupid. They may have had a point, in their own way, but it was a sweeping generalisation, and an attack.

Reading is part of my mental health. It is what keeps me going. Especially during the pandemic years. I know a lot of folk stopped reading or struggled to read. I read more. Which no doubt was reflected in other things I didn't do. But reading saw me through.

So, in 2023, I lost my way a little. I didn't stop reading. I kept going strong. I have to. But, I did spend less time talking about what I was reading, sharing what I was reading. And during the collapse of twitter, where every year I shared the best short stories I had read in a year, and tried to regularly promote what I was enjoying, then losing my way felt in a way significant.

This feeling, coupled with the current diffusion and general loss of confidence in social media, means that it is perhaps more important than ever to create our own wee spaces. For us to make an effort to say I read this! I enjoyed this! These people are doing good things and people doing good things are people that I want to share with people who enjoy good things.

Sure, yeah, a simplistic element in there. But kindness is punk, joy is life. The world is fucked up, but we can all be better, we can all embrace and share a sense of community that gets us through the day after day after day.

So, I'm planning to fill some of the gaps from the last few years. Going through my archives of notes. Which will give me some ready to go material for this remote resurection, while working out what 2023 was and where we go in 2024.


Do you still hear remote voices. A return, a New Year. 2024. 

Hello world. This is the voice of remote. 2024. We will endeavour to resume broadcasting.

Our last post was 2017. The rise and fall of social medias and so many other things. Years of weird and isolation. We need to find ways through and back, to connect and converse. To share and embrace.

So, 2024. Let us see what we can do.

During the pandemic years writing was hard. In 2023 I wrote 3 stories, which is a lot by my standards. One of those has been accepted, and will be published in an anthology in August. Another is out on the wait and see. And the third is needing to be rewritten before I'm ready to share and explore options. I have plans for other stories, fragments always loiter, always wait to talk to me in the darkness, whispering - so how about dragons and witches and weird things?

The 82nd World Science Fiction Convention (Worldcon) will happen in Glasgow in 2024 – Gin24 – Thursday 8th of August to Monday 12th August. In the early 90s there were a handful of Glasgow Comicons, spun off from the London Comicon of the time, those were my first cons. But those were small scale, and different beasts compared to something like Worldcon. The last Glasgow Worldcon was 2005, which was my first con of this type. I'll be back at the SECC in 2024 for Gin24.

It'll be a big event. A big year. Hello world, a happy new year to you. From Glasgow.


Thursday, April 06, 2017

Short Stories - March 2017 

Short stories read/listened to in March:
The Wind Shall Blow - Gregory Norman Bossert - www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/audio/bcs-183-the-wind-shall-blow/
The Greenest Gecko - Ploy Pirapokin @ - www.tor.com/2017/02/01/the-greenest-gecko/
The Peacock Cloak - Chris Beckett - clarkesworldmagazine.com/audio_10_15f/
So Much Cooking - Naomi Kritzer @ - So Much Cooking - Naomi Kritzer
Mika Model - Paolo Bacigalupi ; - www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2016/04/mika_model_a_new_short_story_from_paolo_bacigalupi.html
Trusted Messenger - Kevin Wabaunsee - escapepod.org/2017/02/24/ep564-trusted-messenger/
Saints beasts and zombies - Gary Kloster - escapepod.org/2016/06/07/5600/
Men of the ashen morrow - Margaret Killjoy - www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/stories/men-of-the-ashen-morrow/
Dragon's Deep - Cecelia Holland - Dragon's deep - clarkesworldmagazine.com/audio_02_17d/
Rain Ship - Chi Hui - clarkesworldmagazine.com/chi_02_17/
I was a teenage werewolf - Dale Bailey - www.nightmare-magazine.com/fiction/i-was-a-teenage-werewolf/
The House That Jessica Built - Nadia Bulkin - thedarkmagazine.com/house-jessica-built/
Applied Cenotaphics in the Long, Long Longitudes - Vajra Chandrasekera - strangehorizons.com/fiction/applied-cenotaphics-in-the-long-long-longitudes/
The Calculations of The Artificials - Chi Hui - clarkesworldmagazine.com/audio_10_16b/
Hoop-of-Benzene - Robert Reed - www.robertreedwriter.com/connectedstories.html
Alone - Robert Reed - www.robertreedwriter.com/connectedstories.html
Mere - Robert Reed * - www.robertreedwriter.com/connectedstories.html
Ramora - Robert Reed * - www.robertreedwriter.com/connectedstories.html
The House That Creaks - Elaine Cuyegkeng - thedarkmagazine.com/the-house-that-creaks/
Seasons of Glass and Iron - Amal El-Mohtar @ - uncannymagazine.com/article/seasons-glass-iron/
The Promise of God - Michael Flynn @* - clarkesworldmagazine.com/audio_06_16d/
Successor, Usurper, Replacement - Alice Sola Kim @ - www.buzzfeed.com/alicesolakim/new-fiction-by-alice-sola-kim-successor-usurper-replacement
The Sound That Grief Makes - Kristi DeMeester - thedarkmagazine.com/sound-grief-makes/
Postcards From Natalie - Carrie Laben - thedarkmagazine.com/postcards-from-natalie/
.Identity - E Catherine Tobler - clarkesworldmagazine.com/author/E.%20Catherine%20Tobler/
Rococo - Robert Reed - www.robertreedwriter.com/connectedstories.html
The Finest, Fullest Flowering - Marc Laidlaw - www.nightmare-magazine.com/fiction/finest-fullest-flowering/
Her Sacred Spirit Soars - S Qiouyi Li - strangehorizons.com/fiction/her-sacred-spirit-soars/
Ever Changing, Ever Turning - Yukimi Ogawa - lackingtons.com/2016/10/25/ever-changing-ever-turning-by-yukimi-ogawa/
Daddy's World - Walter Jon Williams - Daddy's World - Walter Jon Williams
The Algorithms of Value - Robert Reed - clarkesworldmagazine.com/reed_01_16/
Screamers - Tochi Onyebuchi - omenana.org/2016/11/09/screamers-tochi-onyebuchi/
Extraction Request - Rich Larson - clarkesworldmagazine.com/larson_01_16/
The Bog Girl - Karen Russell @ - www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/06/20/bog-girl-by-karen-russell
Vulcanization - Nisi Shawl - www.nightmare-magazine.com/fiction/vulcanization/
Only Their Shining Beauty Was Left - Fran Wilde - www.shimmerzine.com/only-their-shining-beauty/
Secondhand Bodies - JY Yang @ - www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/secondhand-bodies/
The Witch of Orion Waste and the Boy Knight - E Lily Yu - The Witch of Orion Waste and the Boy Knight - E Lily Yu
Black Like Them - Troy L Wiggins - firesidefiction.com/issue39/chapter/black-like-them/
Our Last Guest - Rowan Hisayo Buchanan - granta.com/our-last-guest/
A Heap of Broken Images - Sunny Moraine - clarkesworldmagazine.com/moraine_05_16_reprint/
Away from home - Luo Longxiang - www.acast.com/clarkesworldmagazinesciencefictionfantasy/away-from-home-by-luo-longxiang-audio-
Jonas and the Fox - Rich Larson - clarkesworldmagazine.com/larson_05_16/
The Giving Up Game - Rowan Hisayo Buchanan - www.thewhitereview.org/fiction/the-giving-up-game/
Tough Times All Over - Joe Abercrombie - clarkesworldmagazine.com/abercrombie_05_16_reprint/
Astronaut - Maria Dahvana Headley - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/astronaut-maria-dahvana-headley/
Dove Hunter - Rowan Hisayo Buchanan @ - www.triquarterly.org/issues/issue-144/dove-hunters
Our Faces, Radiant Sisters, Our Faces Full of Light! - Kameron Hurley - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/our-faces-radiant-sisters-our-faces-full-of-light-kameron-hurley/
God Product - Alyssa Wong - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/god-product-alyssa-wong/
Alchemy - Carrie Vaughn - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/alchemy-carrie-vaughn/
Persephone - Seanan McGuire - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/persephone-seanan-mcguire/
Margot & Rosalind - Charlie Jane Anders - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/margot-and-rosalind-charlie-jane-anders/
Anabasis - Amal El-Mohtar - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/anabasis-amal-el-mohtar/
More Than Nothing - Nisi Shawl - www.tor.com/2017/03/08/more-than-nothing-nisi-shawl/
The Last of the Minotaur Wives - Brooke Bolander- www.tor.com/2017/03/08/the-last-of-the-minotaur-wives-brooke-bolander/
Somewhere in Slovenia - Graham Wynd - www.close2thebone.co.uk/wp/?p=3367
Divided We Stand - Tim Maughan - thelongandshort.org/forecasts/divided-we-stand
The Revolution, Brought to You by Nike - Andrea Phillips - firesidefiction.com/the-revolution-brought-to-you-by-nike
The Stone Lover - Marta Randall - www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/the-stone-lover/
The Worldless - Indrapramit Das - www.lightspeedmagazine.com/fiction/the-worldless/
It Happened To Me: My Doppelganger Stole My Credit card Info, and Then Stole My Life - Nino Cipri @ - firesidefiction.com/issue39/chapter/it-happened-to-me-my-doppleganger-stole-my-credit-card-info-and-then-my-life/
In The Shade of the Pixie Tree - Rodello Santos - www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/stories/in-the-shade-of-the-pixie-tree/
Suddenwall - Sara Saab - www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/stories/suddenwall/
Foster Homeland - Shastri Akella @ - www.guernicamag.com/foster-homeland/
Waiting Out The End of The World at Patty's Place Cafe - Naomi Kritzer @ - clarkesworldmagazine.com/audio_03_17b/
Two Ways of Living - Robert Reed - clarkesworldmagazine.com/audio_03_17/
Real Ghosts - JB Park - clarkesworldmagazine.com/park_03_17/

@ = particularly enjoyed
* = previously read

Wednesday, March 01, 2017

Short Story Reading - February 2017  

Another month of short story reading, feels as though on some level I'm deliberately reading more shorts because I'm tracking what I'm reading. But I always do go through phases - I've been picking at a couple of year's best anthologies, and not necessarily most recent editions thereof. And been listening to more fiction podcasts. Ideally I would provide links and comments each month to provide context and back to what this list is. This month I've managed to link to the story, or author/book story was from. I had intended to go back and do last month's list and report with this list, but it is time consuming to put all this together.

Lot of good stories, a lot of fine stories, some average. Which is why it would be nice to share more opinion/response - though as always YMMV and tastes are individual. The most I've managed is to mark the stories I particularly enjoyed and particularly recommend reading with a "@" and as with last month where a story just didn't click with me to the point I gave up reading it I've marked "(x)".


  • Even In This Skin - AC Wise
  • Clickbait for Paranormals: Filipino Vamps Hate This Aswang's Dieting Tips - Find Out Why - Sarina Dorie
  • To sleep in the dust of the earth - Kristi DeMeester
  • Sun Magic, Earth Magic - David D Levine
  • A Drop of Ink Preserved in Amber - Marina J Lostetter
  • The Venus Effect - Joseph Allen Hill
  • Interchange - Gary Koster @
  • Hurricane Heels: Divider - Isabel Yap
  • Milla - Lorenzo Crescenta & Emanuela Valentini
  • Black, Their Regalia - Darcie Little Badger @
  • Old Domes - JY Yang @
  • The Very Pulse of the Machine - Michael Swanwick
  • The Big Black Snake - Joanna Walsh
  • And after... - Joanna Walsh
  • Das Steingeschopf - G. V. Anderson
  • The Jeweled Nawab Jungle Retreat - Priya Sridhar @
  • Asassins - Jack Skillingstead + Burt Courtier @
  • A Future Far Too Bright - Yosef Lindell
  • A World Alone - Lauren Rudin
  • Can't Beat 'Em - Nalo Hopkinson
  • A Menagerie of Grief - Kelly Sandoval
  • The Speed of Belief - Robert Reed
  • First Light at Mistaken Point - Kali Wallace
  • Reclamation - Ryan Row
  • Tagging Bruno - Allen M Steele
  • Finnegan's Field - Angela Slater
  • Razorback - Ursula Vernon
  • Nine-Tenths of the Law - Molly Tanzer
  • Fatherbond - Tom Purdom
  • Your Body, By Default - Alexis A Hunter @
  • In Memoriam: Lady Fantastic - Lauren M Roy
  • The Low, Dark Edge of Life - Livia Llewellyn @
  • The West Topeka Triangle - Jeremiah Tolbert
  • The Catastrophe of Cities - Lisa Goldstein @
  • Good Night Moon, Good Night Air, Good Night Noises Everywhere - Aimee Ogden
  • Extra Pickles for the End of the World - James Reinebold
  • Dangers of Darlings - Jez Patterson
  • Goes Both Ways - Shannon Fay
  • A Bottle of the Good Stuff - Zack Conley @
  • The Broken Pieces Make Her Sparkle - J D Pendergast
  • Fight of the Century - Peter A Schaefer
  • Snowfire - Jay Lake and Ruth Nestvold
  • First Blink - Arasibo Campeche
  • Reap - Carie Juettner
  • Seven Salt Tears - Kat Howard
  • The Whole Crew Hates Me - Adam-Troy Castro
  • Everyday is the Full Moon - Carlie St George @
  • The Meiosis of Cells And Exile - Octavia Cade
  • The Universe As Vast As Our Longings - Benjanun Sriduangkaew
  • Apollo - Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  • Next Station, Shibuya - Iori Kusano@
  • Out of the Woods - Marissa Lingen
  • Think of Winter - Eleanna Castroianni
  • Crimson Birds of Small Miracles - Sean Monaghan @
  • The Uncarved Heart by - Evan Dicken
  • The Garden of Ending - K J Kabza
  • Still Life With Abyss - Jim Grimsley
  • Old Paint - Megan Lindholm @
  • Chitai Heiki Koronbin - David Moles @
  • Nightside In Callisto - Linda Nagata
  • Sudden, Broken and Unexpected - Stephen Popkes @
  • Cup of Cold Comfort - Stephanie Burgis
  • Winter Timeshare - Ray Naylor
  • The Thule Stowaway - Maria Dahvana Headley
  • The Visit - Subashini Navaratnam
  • Can Anything Good Come - Suyi Davies Okungbowa
  • The First of Her Name - Elaine Cuyegkeng
  • The Story of Kao Yu - Peter S Beagle
  • Archibald Defeats the Churlish Shark-Gods - Benjamin Blattberg
  • The Old Dispensation - Lavie Tidhar (x)
  • Little Widow - Maria Dahvana Headley @
  • Four Haunted Houses - Adam-Troy Castro
  • The Atonement Tango - Stephen Leigh
  • Prosthetic Daughter - Nin Harris @
  • The Universal Museum of Sagacity - Robert Reed @
  • Left Behind - Cat Rambo
  • Coyote Invents The Land of the Dead - Kij Johnson
  • Half the World Over - Joanna Walsh
  • Summer Story - Joanna Walsh
  • New Year's Day - Joanna Walsh
  • The King in the Cathedral - Rich Larson
  • Grey Wings - Karl Bunker
  • Drones - Simon Ings
  • Events Preceding The Helvetican Renaissance - John Kessel
  • The Virtual Swallows of Hog Island - Julianna Baggott

  • Thursday, February 02, 2017

    Short Story Reading - January 2017 

    I have had the intent of keeping track of what short fiction I read for a while, the last time I tried I failed quickly. Ideally I'd add commentary and links, particularly as some of these pieces were very good and should absolutely be read. That'll maybe follow.  For the moment I'm sharing to at least get a ball rolling.


    [ ] An Eligible Boy - a Iain McDonald *
    [ ] Goddess, Worm - Cassandra Khaw
    [ ] Ipoh Girls - Cassandra Khaw
    [ ] Interred with their bones - Morris Tanafon
    [ ] The voice-activated lift - Pippa Goldscmidt
    [ ] Bodies Stacked Like Firewood - Sam J Miller
    [ ] A Tower For The Coming World - Maggie Clark
    [ ] The Forgotten Taste of Honey - Alexander Jablokov
    [ ] Checkerboard Planet - Eleanor Arnason
    [ ] Choose Poison, Choose Life - Michael Blumlein
    [ ] The Death of Paul Bunyan - Charles Payseur
    [ ] The Inheritance - Amelia Gray
    [ ] A Trump Christmas Carol
    [ ] Follow the White Line - Bo Balder
    [ ] Of sight, of mind, of heart - Samantha Murray
    [ ] Cat, I Must Work - Jo Lindsay Walton
    [ ] Eating Science With Ghosts - Octavia Cade
    [ ] Topaz marquee - Fran Wild
    [ ] Shadow Weave - Yoon Ha Lee
    [ ] Cabin Creek - Madeline Ffitch
    [ ] Wooden Boxes Lined With The Tongues of Doves - Claire Humphrey
    [ ] Abduction of Europe - E Catherine Tobler
    [ ] The Leaning Lincoln - Will Ludwigsen (x)
    [ ] Twenty lights to "The Land of Snow" - Michael Bishop
    [ ] Project Entropy - Dominica Phetteplace
    [ ] Words of Creation - M. K. Hutchins
    [ ] Where I'm from, we eat our parents - John Wiswell
    [ ] Better Than Bones & Dust - P. M. Dooling
    [ ] The People in the Building - Sandra McDonald
    [ ] Water Scorpions - Rich Larson
    [ ] Astrophilia - Carrie Vaughan
    [ ] Perils in Pets - Jez Patterson
    [ ] I've come to marry the princess - Helena Bell
    [ ] Shooting Gallery - J B Park
    [ ] Plea - Mary Anne Mohanraj
    [ ] The Compromise - Karin Terebessy
    [ ] Sympathies - Kat Otis
    [ ] Soulmonger - Paulo da Silva
    [ ] Liane - Jay Lake & Ruth Nestvold
    [ ] Man of the House - Pamela Ferguson
    [ ] Justice System in Quantum Parallel Probabilities - Lettie Prell
    [ ] The Ghost Ship Anastasia - Rich Larson
    [ ] A Series of Steaks - Vina Jie-Min Prasad
    [ ] The Most Famous Little Girl in The World - Nancy Kress*
    [ ] Re: Upcoming Restroom Changes - Nicky Dryden
    [ ] Souls - Mari Ness
    [ ] In The Pines - K M Carmien

    * - indicates previously read.
    (x) - indicates unfinished because it didn't engage.

    Some of these were read in text form, some listened to as podcasts, but I'm not differentiating for purposes of list.

    Monday, October 10, 2016

    My next work in progress? 

    I love weird twitter, the unpredictable, the absurd, the way that so many single tweets can feel like stories I want to read/write.

    ourmagickfuture (Magick at Scale)

    Witch Scientist Publishes Manifesto for Expressive Occult Music
    5:14 AM Oct 10th via Smidgeo Posteo https://twitter.com/ourmagickfuture/status/785332539632283648


    Saturday, October 08, 2016

    The Witch At The End Of The World: Spook Riders 

    My story The Witch At The End Of The World (currently available in Thirty Years Of Rain), like so much of what I write is influenced by music. In this case the characters sing as they travel. Suicide's "Ghost Rider" is one of the tracks they sing, it felt right, the idea of these riders traveling through the land of the dead. The living haunt the dead lands, the end of the world. During the writing and editing process of this story Alan Vega of Suicide died, so this started to feel like some small tribute. I also link here to The Young Gods cover of the same song, another version that was going through my head, electronic stripped to acoustic, in turn in my story stripped to a cappella.



    Friday, September 30, 2016

    Book Launch #30YoR 

    Well, tonight is the big night. The Glasgow launch of Thirty Years Of Rain, the 30th anniversary collection of work by members of the Glasgow Science Fiction Writer's Circle. A cross genre collection of stories and poems, old and new.

    The book is already available from Lulu and Amazon. But in the Sauchiehall St branch of Waterstones tonight, from 7pm, there will be a chance to hear readings and get books signed by a number of the authors. With a number of authors in Glasgow, I fully expect the presence of Elsie WK Donald, Ruth EJ Booth, Heather Valentine, Brian M Milton, Ian Hunter, Cameron Johnston, Stewart Horn, Fergua Bannon, Hal Duncan, Elaine Gallagher, Kenneth Kelly, Jim Steel, Neil Williamson and myself. (Actual quantity of authors present may go up or down)

    Inevitably, as with all GSFWC events, we will end up in the pub. Hopefully see people there.


    Tuesday, August 30, 2016

    On Writing "The Witch At The End Of The World" 




    [I came across the above image after completing the final version of The Witch At The End Of The World, for me this captures some sense of what I was thinking of, this looks like it could easily be one of my apocalyptic witches. The image is by costume designer Agnieszka Osipa]

    Writing can be difficult. Many writers will tell you so. And there are so many ways to self-defeat, block and distract. For me I got so bogged down in a loop of submissions and rejections, token editing to try and add polish upon polish to things I had already written, that to write something new started to feel impossible.

    With “The Witch At The End Of The World”, or “Papa Okid In And The Witch At The End Of The World” as it was originally called I was trying to break that cycle. I decided to write something different, something that would be easy, that would brush away cobwebs and give me a revived compulsion to write. And it did… eventually.

    I was going for a fantasy story. Something epic. Compared to my usual near future pseudo-science fiction mixing dalliances with horror. Though more Moorcock or Harrison, was how I saw it. It was an end of the world story – something evil, a group gathered to defeat evil. You know the deal, how it works. The Magnificent Seven, with witches, and a great big alien spider queen witch. Ride into the occupied city, Paris I decided, and fight monsters, defeat the big bad. Yay.

    Except my characters decided they absolutely had to ride to this magic tree before they went riding into a snow bound alien tainted Paris. Then they decided that the city thing and the alien witch thing bored them, they’d rather sing and sit around and drink strange tea. So that is what happened. Kind of.

    The original themes are still there. A group gathering to ride against evil; ideas of the end of the world, of fallen civilisations, the Anthropocene and how fucked we all are. This is dark stuff, except, hopefully, it doesn’t entirely feel that way.

    One of the hard things, one of the reasons the story took so long to write, was finding the voice. Initially I had envisaged this guide bloke, someone desperate enough to go to a difficult place and ask for help – Papa Okid In, or Papa Oki Din as he became. But his voice didn’t work for me. I rewrote the opening scene an infinite number of times, I know, I counted them. Each a variation, on a turn of phrase, on a first step, on finding that damn voice that made the damn story talk. Then I found it, and I won’t say from there that it wrote itself, but oh Iggy, it became so much easier.

    I am a member of the GSFWC (The Glasgow Science Fiction Writer’s Circle), a support group of writers. Offering critiques and advice and support to each other. The GSFWC has now been going for 30 years, to celebrate that they have put together an anthology – Thirty Years Of Rain. I decided this story would be my submission, I decided this anthology would be my impetus for finishing the thing that I had been fighting with on and off for a year.

    Thanks to the patience and support of the anthology editors, the final version of The Witch At The End Of The World has been included in Thirty Years of Rain – which will have a launch night in Glasgow's Sauchiehall Street Waterstones, on the 30th of September, from 7pm. I'll be there, along with a number of the other authors included, hope to see some of you there too.

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