2011: The Year of the Roller Coaster

Image courtesy of Fotolia

2011 was a year with more ups and downs than a roller coaster for me, and I know I’m not alone in feeling that way. The job hunt was not going well, I got way behind on a lot of bills, got broke, and ate a crap-load of Raman noodles. All while waiting for student aid to come in. I finally got a student job at the college right when Fall Term started. YAY. It’s part-time and does not pay much, but it’s something. And I’m learning a great deal about the administration side of how a college works, information I’m sure will be useful when I finally get to be a professor.

As for writing, 2011 saw my first paid short story, “Nowhere Land” from Literary Mix Tapes “Eighty Nine” anthology. This was one of my best stories to date. Another of my best, also appeared in a 2011 anthology: “The King and His Twenty-Three Subjects,” a fantasy story appeared in the Florida Writer’s Association all-dialogue anthology “Let’s Talk.” I also wrote my first collaborative story, an apocalyptic short story titled “The Blight” told completely through emails with my friend zombie-master Jim Bronyaur. Speaking of zombies, I published a story in the Zombie Survival Crew’s anthology “Undead is Not An Option” about four foul-mouthed teenagers whose zombie role-playing game “Crunch Time” suddenly becomes a real struggle for survival against the undead horde. I started the year publishing a science fiction story that I also posted as Friday Flash and submitted to their Best of Friday Flash Volume 2, and hope to hear about that soon. Literary Mix Tapes also gave me a great writing start to 2011 by publishing my story “Sophie Solitaire: Confessions of an End-Time Girl” in the “Nothing But Flowers” collection.

I started an e-mag, The Were-Traveler this year. The first issue was released on Halloween. I’m looking forward to continuing it.

I taught my first class…a lecture for PINAWOR on the benefits of social media for writers. They were very social media shy writers, so I’m not sure I made much headway with them. But I learned what I ought to do and ought not to do the next time I make a presentation.

I fell short in some areas of my writing:

• I wanted to have my first e-book collection released by the end of the year. Stuff came up. Mostly school work.
• I did not blog as much as I wanted to, even though I got an award for Versatile Blogger. *smh*
• I did not complete my novel that I started during NaNoWrimo 2010. I worked on it a little. Added a few words here and there.
• I left a few stories hanging on the back-burner that really need to get finished as they are going in the collection.

All in all, an okay year.

But okay is not good enough. I want to be better than okay.

And for that, you’ll have to read my upcoming post about how I plan to set 2012 on fire!

Win A Copy of ‘Undead Is Not An Option’

Includes my story "Crunch Time"

If you’ve been over to the #Horrorchat13 site, you’ll have seen there is a post over there where Jim Bronyaur and I are going to be giving away a copy of “Undead is Not an Option” to a lucky winner. This anthology published by Zombie Survival Crew features stories by both myself and Jim.

There’s even better news.

I’m going to be giving away two signed copies in the weeks to come on my website as well.

The rules are simple.

1. Leave a comment on this post between now and July 2nd.
2. On my birthday, July 3rd, I’ll be the one handing out the presents. I’ll do a random drawing of two names of folks who have left a comment. 
3. Those two folks will get a copy of the book signed by yours truly mailed to them sometime in July. 

If your name doesn’t come out of the hat, don’t despair. I hope to have another copy of the book to give away in the future when the e-book version is released, at which time I’ll do another drawing and offer up another signed copy of the book and also give away an e-book version. 

That being said, have you checked out all the neat stuff posted on the #Horrorchat13 site for the beginning of Zombie Month? If not, you should. Here’s the linky: #Horrorchat13 Blog

#HorrorChat13 and shiny new paperback books…

Courtesy of horrorchat.info

Jim Bronyaur and I just finished doing the first ever #HorrorChat13 Friday on Twitter and it was awesome. Lots of folks stopped in to talk with us about the Friday the 13th movies and horror in general. A bleeding, festering meme got started and a good time was had by all. Jim and I had a private chat on Saturday about what we’ll be cooking up for the future and I’ll just say this: You don’t want to miss it! It will be BLEEDING, FESTERING AWESOME. In caps, it’s that good. 😀 If you’d like to read Jim’s post about it over at the HorrorChat13 site it’s here and there’s a transcript of the whole thing right here.  Next month we are going to be talking about zombies and speaking of which…

In other news, I received a package from UPS today…guess what it contained?

Bad hair day...great book day.

That’s right! I’ve received my copies of Zombie Survival Crew’s Undead Is Not An Option, which has my insane RPG/Twitter story Crunch Time in it. I’m going to be publishing a post here soon that will give you a chance to win a copy. If you simply must have it now and don’t want to wait, you can purchase it at the Zombie Survival Crew Merch Shop.

Speaking of shiny and beautiful new paperbacks, the PB edition of Nothing But Flowerswill be launched by editor/author Jodi Cleghorn tomorrow. My story Sophie Solitaire: Confessions of an End-Time Girl is in that one. Jodi is launching her other flood charity project in paperback edition, 100 Stories for Queensland, tomorrow as well. The books will be available on Amazon or you can purchase them on Jodi’s sites by clicking on the titles. The proceeds from the purchase of these books goes to help people who were affected by the flooding in Queensland, Australia.

You could help some people out buying these books, and you’d have some quality stories to read, too.

Talking Scary Stuff & Zombies

Courtesy of horrorchat.info

Just a little quickie post to catch you up on what’s happening.  Got some pretty major stuff going on…so you might want to grab a pencil and jot some of this down.

Sometime last month Jim Bronyaur and I started talking about Twitter chats. One thing led to another and voila!—we started our own chat. It’s called #HorrorChat13 and it’s going to be THE PLACE TO BE on the 13th of each month on Twitter. Our first chat is this month at 9 pm. Since that happens to fall on a Friday, we’re going to be talking about…yup, that’s right…those gruesome and timeless murders at Camp Crystal Lake. We’ll probably talk about some other stuff, too, since it’s our first chat. So drop by and say hello, won’t you? Here’s the website, and you can also click on the banner above to get there: Welcome to #HorrorChat13

In other news, the folks over at Zombie Survival Crew have put together a book trailer via YouTube for the upcoming anthology Undead Is Not An Option. If you watch, you’ll see that Jim and I have stories in this anthology. I’ve gotten to know a couple of the other writers in the book and I can tell you it’s going to be chock full of sick ass zombie mayhem. You can order a copy here: Undead Is Not An Option.

You can view the book trailer below:

I will have a contest coming up to give away some copies of the book. One way you can register to win is by joining my legion of minions…er…I mean friends on my Facebook page: Maria’s Secret Scary Empire.

Stay tuned for more information…

Classes, collaborations and other craziness…

I’ve been long absent from this little blog.

But I’m back. From outer space. I just walked in to find you here with that sad look upon your face. Okay…enough disco drama.

What’s up with me?

Well…I’m almost through with this term at school. I’m finishing up my project for Creative Writing class. It’s a 5 k short story called “Drowning in Shallow Water.” It’s literary. It has heroin junkies. And the best damn description of a dragon tattoo, ever! I’m also working on a flash for a class contest. There’s money involved. And cake.

I’m also giving a class. I’m giving a lecture on April 23rd about the benefits of social networking for writers. I’ll be wearing my “tweet me” tee-shirt and trying to sell Twitter and Facebook to writers who are reluctant to use these outlets. Should be fun. I’m not going to make a dime for it. I’m doing it because of my pure love of Twitter and other social media.

I’m writing another story for the Literary Mix Tapes crowd. Jodi Cleghorn has done it once again, assembling an incredible cast of talented authors to tell some speculative fiction stories related to the year 1989.

I submitted a story to the Florida Writers Association anthology “Let’s Talk.” The stories are required to be all dialogue. There will be 60 stories chosen to be in the anthology. Out of these, ten will be judged the best and placed in the front of the book. The judging for this year’s anthology will be done by W. Bruce Cameron, bestselling author of “8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter” and “A Dog’s Purpose.”

In other news, some of you know already that horror author extraordinaire Jim Bronyaur (whose new book “In the Corner” just came out) and I are going to be collaborating on a book sometime in the near future. Before we do that, however, we are also making plans to write a short story for the anthology contest “E-Pocalypse: E-mails at the End.” Should be a lot of fun. And whatever we come up with is sure to be twisted as hell.

In publishing news, my story “The Apprentice’s Mother” was accepted for publication in the anthology “Sunday Snaps: The Stories,” put together by Susan May James to benefit charity. Authors used Susan’s photo prompts (the “Sunday Snaps”) on her blog as inspiration. I chose the picture of the creepy door knocker for my story.

And soon…very soon…the Zombie Survival Crew anthology “Undead Is Not An Option” will be released. It features my story “Crunch Time.”

So… Until next time…

It’s been awhile…

Just realized I’ve been very lazy in the blog posts department.

Sorry. Life’s been kind of challenging, as it can get sometimes. I’ve been suffering from the kind of exhaustion that only copious amounts of coffee seems to cure. Thyroid medication has been increased, so there is hope for an improvement in this area soon. Plus, I’m eating better and exercising more…and that should help to raise my energy levels, too.

There’s been a lot going on.

I’m working on two (well…really, three) projects right now. I can let you know about two of them at this point anyway.

Project Numero Uno is my literary short story for my Creative Writing class. It’s called (tentatively) “Drowning in Shallow Water” and it takes place in Tampa Bay, Florida, where I live. The story centers around Dalton Shay, a poet/writer coming to terms with his addiction to smoking heroin. Dalton’s character is actually loosely based on a person I used to know.

Project Numero Dos is a short story that was sitting on my back-burner for awhile called “Nightjar.” Some writers insist that their back-burner stories are dead and they can never revive them. I don’t find this to be the case with me. At least I’ve been able to go back and complete a couple of back-burner stories.

“Nightjar” revolves around a shapeshifting sorceress seeking revenge on the magic-hating, off-world invaders that executed her husband. I started it, then put it aside when I got stuck in a place with no clear idea on how to move forward with the plot. A few nights ago I went to bed, and as I normally do when I lay down to sleep, I let my mind wander…and lo and behold, the way forward was revealed to me. My muse likes to get me in bed sometimes. 😉 So, I’m interested to know: Do you have back-burner stories? Do you ever complete them?

Publications: My story, “The ABC’s of the Apocalypse” has been released in the anthology “Cosmic Catastrophes” by Static Movement. Currently, I’m looking to either submit it again somewhere or find a way to bring it to audio and perhaps also post it as a Friday Flash. It is one of the best stories I’ve written so far.

Aoife’s Kiss magazine (through Sam’s Dot Publishing) has published my science-fiction poem “Before I Was Numb” and they used it to advertise their March issue. I describe it as “android angst that rhymes.” This poem is my first-ever sale. I will receive $5 and a contributors copy of the magazine.

Soon to be published is my short story “Crunch Time.” It will be published in Zombie Survival Crew’s “Undead Is Not An Option” zombie anthology. I’m very proud of that story, too, although it is probably the most profanity-laden tale I’ve ever penned.

It’s Spring Break this week and I’m trying to catch up on some writing projects that I know will probably get put aside once school starts again. I hope to find enough free time here and there to say “Hi” to my friends on Twitter and Facebook and update this little blog a couple times.

You can also keep up with what’s going on in my writer world by visiting my Facebook Author’s page and clicking “Like.” I’m going to be having some give-aways and contests in the future and you don’t want to miss out! Click here: Maria’s Evil Facebook Empire.