October Author Updates

Life Updates: Had lots of trail time and fun with my baby cats in October, sans actually doing any October Halloween celebrating. You could say my costume was ‘tired millennial just trying to exist among the dead.’

In October, I spent a lot of time working on the last of my articles for Writer’s Digest. It was a bigger piece with lots of exercises that had me digging above and beyond for solutions to help writers find their characters’ voices. While it is one of the bigger pieces I’ve written for WD, it’s also one of my favorite pieces. I researched into different techniques and methods writers could use to bring life to their characters and stories. I also shared a bit about my own practice in shaping the voices of some of my more strange and unusual characters. (I’m looking at you murder smart house.)

I’ve also started remixing my author bio for pieces to be a bit more…interesting. I’m proud of all I’ve published and accomplished, but now I want to get real weird with my author bios. Maybe one says I build stick figures of dragons that fly me off to new worlds like some fantastical back alley doctor. Or that my mouth is filled with words all trying to claw their way. I haven’t used either of those in my bios but hopefully you get the picture.

With that WD project done and off to the printers, I was able to clear off pitching and that type of freelance writing from my deck of projects. Well, at least until I finish up with grad school. Pitching and writing articles for freelance clients is a nice addition to my income, but I need to start ramping down my workload outside of the paying gigs I already have. I love my job at the place I work as a marketing writer, the reviews I write for Lightspeed, and the short fiction pieces I submit. And that’s the paid work I want to focus on and continue as I start and work through grad school and continue my volunteer work with Strange Horizons, SFWA, and other organizations. Honestly, while I’ll miss writing for magazines and pitching ideas to editors. It feels so good to be lightening my load and focusing in on what’s important as I prepare for this major step in my life.

Speaking of short stories, I worked on two during the month of October. I worked on a fantasy musical sorta about a being made of rage and rock coming to kill all the rock gods in the world. It’s a shorter story at just under 5000 words and is a lot of fun. I spent a fair amount of time building out the playlist for the story and am excited to dive back in for edits in later moments once I’ve let the story cool.

The other story I worked on is much longer and is around 10,000 words. The novelette is kinda fun but more cathartic and intense with some moments in the story that make me feel good and have connected with critique readers. This longer story is about kids battling a creature and depression. It’s got The Faulty meets What Dreams May Come with a lot of horror and frights and resonance. I originally had a plan of finishing this story during the month of October, but instead I spent the month reading other stories about depression, suicide, and the effects of storytelling on mental health. I’ll spend November and December rounding out final edits and will hopefully have a finished draft ready for submitting out in the new year.

But I really don’t want to rush this story. It feels like it’s got teeth with tears, if that makes sense. Hopefully, all the work I put into figuring how to tell this story will shine through on the page and touch some readers.

I also recently set down with Gareth over at Interzone Magazine and talked about my recent science fantasy short story Building Blocks that came out in Issue 295 in September. In the podcast, we get into the inspiration of Building Blocks, editing magazines, and what I’m working on right now. It’s a great interview with some fun insights and laughs. Give it a listen if you’ve got the time.

Strange Horizons, the magazine I edit for, is opening to fiction submissions in December! I’m excited to dive into a new batch of stories and see what people have been working on. It’s always an exciting time when we open for new fiction stories. We’re well known enough that we get a great blend of short stories from well known writers, favorites, and some writers who have never published before.

Those are the ones I’m super excited for.

Very few feelings match finding, loving, and publishing a writer’s first short story. They are also the ones that usually stick in my mind the longest. I still think about Marla Bingcang’s Mushroom Head. Pretty sure when Bingcang sent it in, the author was still in high school.

Aside from short story work for the magazine and myself, I also worked on my horror thriller novel just a little. Mainly building out the research list, doing some loose plotting, and character/setting design work. Like I mentioned in my September Author Update, I’m considering using this novel as my grad school thesis. However, I may not wait and go ahead and write the book and focus on another book project for grad school. Either way, I’m marking my book work as low to medium priority right now. It’s still an important project, but other things grad school and work related are taking the forefront of my attention.

The other big news that came out in October was the Ignyte Award announcement. If you didn’t know, I was up for an award in two categories, best critic and best novelette for To Carve Home in Your Bones. While I didn’t win either category, I am still really excited for everyone who did win. I am also in the boat of thinking that being nominated is its own win. I’ll get into things more in a separate post, but I did want to say some things here:

This is my first ever award nomination. I’ve been on honors lists and recommended lists, but the Ignyte Award was my first ever major recognition of work and it’ll always be a huge moment for me in my career.

I even got a tattoo back in August to honor it!

In non-writing or editing news, I have recently moved away from Teachable and closed down my online writing school, At Home Pro Writers, for the moment. I am making PDFs for the students of the class and will most likely offer them to other writers who are interested, either through this website, my online store, or my newsletter. I still want to teach and share knowledge, but not through Teachable at the current moment. I am looking at other options for offering classes either online or in-person. So far, I am just in the knowledge gathering phase. I have no rush to get my online school back up and running. When I relaunch, I’d rather be in a prepared place than a rushed one.

I’ve been getting more active with the local Horror Writers Association branch in my area and am putting together a workshop and interview series. The first in my new interview series came out in October. I interviewed horror writer Victor H. Rodriguez. He’s a horror writer focusing in audio horror. I’ll be releasing a new interview through the HWA once a month. Next up, I have an interview coming out with Brianna Matloke. It’s been a blast getting to know other local horror writers! I’m also working on a workshop for the Seattle HWA branch doing a submission simulator with another member. Our aim is to offer horror writers in the area a behind the scenes look at how editors think about, decide on, and judge stories while giving them actionable feedback to improve their stories and writing.

In reading news, I read through Harlem Shuffle for my dive into descriptive writing. The Black literary crime novel was wonderfully done with lots of descriptive moments that created a sense of world completeness and connection. I may create a newsletter with some of my notes and thoughts on the book, but to sum it up: I learned a lot and the book is a top recommendation. I also read the Dead Take the A Train, which is for Lightspeed, so expect a review soon on that book. I also read through And Never Let Her Go, a true crime book by Ann Rule that helped me research into my horror thriller novel.

Finally, in October, I started a new segment of my author newsletter, Writing Skins, called Craft Chat. Craft Chat is all about talking about craft with other writers, readers, and people who dig story. There aren’t many posts yet, but if you miss my writing exercises, resources, and craft help, that’s the new hub for it.

Published Stories:

If you’re new to the website, consider subscribing to stay up to date with all my posts. I normally post once or twice a month and it’s always about writing and my author career. I’m Aigner! An award nominated writer of fantasy, science fiction, horror, and all things weird. You can check out my stories here.