I Danse Macarbe

In other happy news I was informed this morning a piece I wrote called "Snowbound," has been accepted for publication in Danse Macarbe's March issue going up this Friday.
I will link it directly at that time. I love Danse Marcabe it has this great Grand Guignol atmosphere.And it is one of the more respected electronic Horror Magazine publications.

Oh and another Kindle book just went up on Amazon.
Jingle Jangle

Kindle Me

I am slow to learn stuff, but I learned that authors can self-publish kindle eBooks at Amazon. They have editor kind of software and you can just send the stuff up there and it gets listed in Amazon. You have to format it properly with cover and all, but if you're willing to invest a little time you too can have a book up at Amazon. So I've decided to make some of my titles available for those who'd like to read them on Kindle, for a very small fee. Only 2 bucks, that's less than Vente coffee at Starbucks. I think that's fair considering the time I put in it. But anyway the first one went up tonight. You have to wait for Amazon to approve them before they go up. So I give you my first kindle book on Amazon The Voluntary Living
I'm working on more titles to send up to Amazon and I'm always writing like all the time, so I'll have a lot of stuff up there to chose frome in time. And you don't even have to own a Kindle to read it. Through a free download you can have a Kindle reader on your PC, or iPod, or whatever doo-hickey you use. So go look, and buy and enjoy!

A Second Horror Zine Anthology

I heard from Jeani Rector that there will indeed be a second Horror Zine Anthology book published this year. This means my story that ran there The Last Station in January will be featured in the book. And this is also cool because it's not one of those self-publishing jobs,like the first anthogy And Now The Nightmare Begins
the second will be released by a legitamate publisher BearManor Books. And we're going to get to vote on the title. And there should be some contributons from well known horror writers in additon to the stories publiished in the Horror Zine by us unknown writers in the book. Anyway, she sent me an agreement to sign which I sent back to her this afternoon. I'll fill you in on the title and stuff as details become available!

The Voluntary Living

A speculative piece I wrote went up tonight at Eastown Fiction.
I have to compliment the editors of Eastown Fiction on the professional and elegant design of their webzine.
The Voluntary Living

Joe Hill

I thought I'd link this article about Stephen Kings's son Joe Hill who has a new book coming out today called Horns. Of course since my mind always dips in the shallow end of the pool. Doesn't Joe Hill look exactly like you'd picture Stephen King's son. And doesn't his name sound like he could be a character in one of King's books?



Horns

Ann Rice Enhanced

I'm an afficiondao of Anne Rice. Today I read with interest the news that a twenty-six year old short story she wrote "The Master of Rumpling Gate, is going to be released as a video enhanced electronic book, or as they're calling them Vooks. I love that "Vook," doesn't it sound like something Boris and Natasha might say? Anyway I'm curious because I've never seen a VookI wonder what they exactly they entail.

On another front I just read and approved the final version of the PDF for The Painter. This is a project I'm really excited about, it's not a Vook but it's a beautiful eBook. I expect it should go up fairly soon

Sorry More Good News

I get to use this badge because I just sold a story to Short Story Me. The story is called "Bottle in Bordeaux." I've discussed it in another thread. It should go up in 4 weeks, and I humbly add, this one is damn good.

And now for some good news

That's how it goes, yesterday a rejection today an acceptance. I just recieved word that a scinece fiction piece I wrote called "The Voluntary Living," has been accpeted for publication in Eastown Fiction, not a paying market but still a good credit. And I'm happy this story is getting published because it's a favortie of mine. I await word on the publication date, but I've just sent back the contract.

Eastown Fiction

Rejection Blues

Every writer experiances rejection, sometimes it’s fair, sometimes you scratch your head. I ’m posting the rejection below anonymously because I wanted to pose two questions. Is it really outside the range of believable possibilities that a muder suspect might ditch a knife and part of thier victims finger in a nearby garage? Suppose the suspect was on the run and not a hardened criminal, maybe even a kid? Any number of possiblites. In the story that question isn’t answered, it just has to fall within the range of credible possibilities. My second question I know the police canvas neighborhoods, is it unbelievable for the police to search every house on a block? Particularly if they have the suspect in custody and might have a general idea of where the evidence was hidden?

Many thanks for sending “The Box” my way. This one came very close. I love stories that deal with paranoia, and I think that you did a wonderful job or portraying Sarah’s building dread as she grows to suspect her husband of murder. You created some awesome suspense and tension as she is about to get caught by Jason. The reveal was particularly devastating and nasty. I did feel that the story unraveled a bit in the final act. The part with the detective was slightly unrealistic, and I found it odd that a murderer would break into the garage to hide a knife and a finger. This explanation felt a bit forced (were these cops really going to search every home in the neighborhood?). “The Box” is a wonderful shocker, but I’m afraid that it’s not for us.

Keep it simple, stupid

Every short story writer knows some essentials, because when you're working within a 3500- 5000 word count, as most webzines and publications today seem to require ,and most are happier with a 3500 or under max, a short story writer has to try to make every word count. A short story will usually start in the midst of action, or with dialogue. There's really no space for preludes and a lot of background. I know from own experiance, for example, with one story I sent out I received the same criticism almost verbatim from several different publishers "the action didn't start until the fourth paragraph." Imagine? But no rule is hard and fast, and sometimes you have to trust your instincts. Though, there's one adage I think always applies" give them a great finish and they'll forgive anything." That's a bit of a genrealization, but if your story has an amazing surprise, or a catharis, or line that brings the piece together with great clarity at the finish you may be able to get away with a little more expostion in the body of the work.

Some very good reading

If you’d like to read some very good new fantasy short fiction check out my pal Cody Standford’s site The Gryphon & Tiger Story Company. I promise you will be enchanted. And enjoy the fine art work there too!

The Gryphon and Tiger Story Co.

Anticipation

I just heard I might get the finalized version of my ebook of The Painter on Monday afternoon. All I have to do is aprove it and send it back and it should go up very soon, like later next week. I am keeping my toes crossed, I mean my fingers. Fingers and toes.

Pehrpaps anticpation is a good theme for a story? I'm trying to think of an idea for the next story now, but of course it has to be a leetle more specfic. ;)

The Horror Factor

In addition to Duotrope’s Digest The Horror Factor is another resource for finding publications to send your dark fiction.

http://horror.fictionfactor.com/promarkets.html

Never Say it's Raining

When you start writing you learn new things all the time. There’s a saying that goes “God is in the details,” and that’s what writing is about. It’s about the details. While reading a review of Ramsey Campblell’s short story ”The Hands” this morning I came across an interesting passage; the critic praised Campbell because rather than saying something like “It was raining,” Campbell showed it with a line about a wet sign post. It’s the little things like that, all the little things, that make a story better. This is a technique I plan to incorporate into my future endeavors. Like today for instance the sun is very bright, but I wouldn’t say “it’s sunny,” I’d say, “he put on his sunglasses.”

Stuff on the horizon

In addition to the Painter, I have another story coming out which I’m very excited about called “Dinner with Henry.” It will be published at The Piker Press on March 8. I’m excited about this because the editor there Sand Pilarksi liked the characters so much in “Dinner with Henry” she asked me to turn it into a series. So now I’m working on the second installment. I had another story published at The Piker Press on January 25 called,” New Night”.

Here’s a link to my page at The Piker Press.

Me at Piker Press


Another coming attraction I’m very excited about is a story I wrote entitled “Pandora’s Surprise.” has been accepted by Pill Hill Publishers for their latest anthology Pandora’s Nightmare: Horror Unleashed. This will be in print book form and it should be coming out this spring.

Pill Hill

And let me show you one more now. This one that was published in The Horror Zine in January called “The Last Station,” and it was their featured story for January 2010.

http://www.thehorrorzine.com/Fiction/January/Bruce%20Memblatt.html

Hail Ceaser

Tonight was a bit of a difficult night for me because my good friend Caesar left for Florida for possibly two months. Let me tell you how I met Caesar. I live in New York City and I do a lot of writing on my laptop in the Starbucks on Sixteenth Street and Eighth Avenue in Chelsea. In fact, you can find me there almost every night. Naturally, going there every night you meet people who do the same. A lot of writers inhabit this Starbucks. So I know everyone there. It’s sort of like Cheers, if you’re familiar with the old TV show. So one night a few months ago Caesar sat down at my table and we hit it off. Caesar is a young guy, only twenty three years old, and well I’m a little older than twenty three, but we developed a wonderful friendship. And Caesar knows everything about wines. Everything. Every night he sat by my table and taught me about wines. And this is the tie in, because it gave me an idea for a story, which I just finished, entitled Bottle In Bordeaux. It’s about a vineyard owner and wine taster ,among other things, who loses his sense of smell, but in this characters case his sense of smell is of utmost importance because it’s so keen. In fact, the character has his nose insured for five million dollars by Lloyds of London .I actually got the idea for the character from a news story. There is such a person. I’ll link the story. But there are so many ways you can get ideas for stories, and looking through news articles is one way and ,of course, having a great friend like Caesar.

The nose

First Post

Greetings and welcome to my blog. I’m rather new at this so bear with me.I am a writer of short stories, In this blog I plan to detail my current and some past writing projects. Currently I have an eBook coming out very soon, which will be published by Gypsy Shadow Publishers entitled “The Painter.”
Coming soon The Painter