2023 Writing Log, Part 32
Sep. 9th, 2023 10:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rynling- I finished the first draft of Chapter 17 of The Demon King.
- I’m still working on Chapter 11 of An Unfound Door. It’s going to be on the short side, but that’s fine. It might be a good place to fill in some plot gaps later, if need be.
- I did another full edit of my Lovecraftian monster romance story “The Annotated Kitab al-Azif” and sent it off to Weird Horror magazine. It was rejected almost immediately. So I revised the cover letter and sent it off to Haven Speculative.
- I started work on another original horror story called “The Slithery-Dee Came Out of the Sea.” I’ve wanted to write this one for a while. I had a good sense of who the narrator is and what happens to him, but there was something missing that held me back. I finally figured out what’s going on: the narrator needs to be gay. He’s essentially a version of myself, and I’m gay, so there you go.
- I’m writing an advance review of a translation of Hiromi Kawakami’s short story collection The Dragon Palace. It’s an odd collection with a lot of (nonexplicit) monster sex, and I’m not sure who the target audience is. Besides myself, of course. I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m here for this book.
- I got started on a piece called “Ten Short and Creepy Horror Games on Itch.io” for Sidequest. I’ve been preparing for this all year, and I’m really enjoying myself. Haters gonna hate, but I love writing annotated lists.
- For the “Women Write About Comics Reads” August roundup, I got to write a bit about The Skull, superstar illustrator Jon Klassen’s new book. Not only is the art pure gothic gold, but the story is strange and spooky in unexpected ways. The roundup is live on the WWAC website (here).
- And for the WWAC comic roundup post, I wrote about Chris Kim’s graphic novel Adherent, a black-and-white comic that depicts the journey of a young(ish) woman across a postapocalyptic landscape. I imagine that this book probably has zero mass market appeal, but its publication was funded by the Canadian government. Damn that must be nice. Anyway, the roundup is on WWAC (here).
- I wanted to create a new icon for myself on Instagram, so I drew one. I don’t actually enjoy drawing myself, and I’m not super happy about the result, but I posted the portrait on Tumblr (here).
Other than that, I’m just riding out the heat wave and looking forward to fall.
- I’m still working on Chapter 11 of An Unfound Door. It’s going to be on the short side, but that’s fine. It might be a good place to fill in some plot gaps later, if need be.
- I did another full edit of my Lovecraftian monster romance story “The Annotated Kitab al-Azif” and sent it off to Weird Horror magazine. It was rejected almost immediately. So I revised the cover letter and sent it off to Haven Speculative.
- I started work on another original horror story called “The Slithery-Dee Came Out of the Sea.” I’ve wanted to write this one for a while. I had a good sense of who the narrator is and what happens to him, but there was something missing that held me back. I finally figured out what’s going on: the narrator needs to be gay. He’s essentially a version of myself, and I’m gay, so there you go.
- I’m writing an advance review of a translation of Hiromi Kawakami’s short story collection The Dragon Palace. It’s an odd collection with a lot of (nonexplicit) monster sex, and I’m not sure who the target audience is. Besides myself, of course. I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m here for this book.
- I got started on a piece called “Ten Short and Creepy Horror Games on Itch.io” for Sidequest. I’ve been preparing for this all year, and I’m really enjoying myself. Haters gonna hate, but I love writing annotated lists.
- For the “Women Write About Comics Reads” August roundup, I got to write a bit about The Skull, superstar illustrator Jon Klassen’s new book. Not only is the art pure gothic gold, but the story is strange and spooky in unexpected ways. The roundup is live on the WWAC website (here).
- And for the WWAC comic roundup post, I wrote about Chris Kim’s graphic novel Adherent, a black-and-white comic that depicts the journey of a young(ish) woman across a postapocalyptic landscape. I imagine that this book probably has zero mass market appeal, but its publication was funded by the Canadian government. Damn that must be nice. Anyway, the roundup is on WWAC (here).
- I wanted to create a new icon for myself on Instagram, so I drew one. I don’t actually enjoy drawing myself, and I’m not super happy about the result, but I posted the portrait on Tumblr (here).
Other than that, I’m just riding out the heat wave and looking forward to fall.
no subject
Date: 2023-09-11 04:50 pm (UTC)So many accomplishments!
no subject
Date: 2023-09-12 08:37 pm (UTC)Honestly though, it really is a hard sell, and I'm not sure why the press picked this particular collection to license for translation. It's highly reminiscent of actual premodern folklore, which doesn't make sense more often than it does. I guess each of the stories is short, so it's not a big deal if one or more of them just doesn't work. Still, I'm always mystified by decisions regarding what is and isn't translated into English.
I keep fantasizing that one day I'll magically be inducted into the publishing industry and suddenly understand everything
although often I suspect that even insiders don't know what's going on.no subject
Date: 2023-09-14 04:18 pm (UTC)