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1. The Phoenix Crossroads (fantasy)
http://www.silverthought.com/mcbray
This was my first published short story of speculative fiction. It was the result of a Writer's Digest online workshop focusing on fantasy and science fiction writing. Set in a fantasy world not unlike ancient Greece, it's about two unhappy people and a town with a most unusual landmark. It's called the phoenix pit and it has remarkable effects.
2. Soulless (science fiction)
http://www.silverthought.com/mcbray
Jeff Soesbe wrote a short story published in Byzarium called "Cat, Owl, Cigarette". It's a beautiful bit of flash fiction that really struck me as a writer. I thought to myself, Soesbe was probably inspired by a real relationship, then likened real people to animals, BUT one could also imagine him choosing two, seemingly random, unrelated creatures and tossing them together in a story for the fun of it. I asked myself if I could do the same thing. My next thought was...so a robot and werewolf walk into a doctor's office...they're there for their soul implants... This story was born!
3. Grandmonster (horror)
http://www.wilywriters.com/blog/?p=1
If there is any kind of formula involved in my approach to short story writing, then I can say many of them marry my true life experiences with something of a crazy speculative nature. This is the perfect example. I combine something from my childhood...with a monster. Grandmonster is currently included in the book called FUTURE IMPERFECT: Best of Wily Writers, Volume Two.
4. The Artist (horror)
http://www.misanthrope-press.com/pa
The Artist is inspired by my childhood, which was full of drawing. It was my favorite thing to do. The story is also my idea of an X-File. It's about a child, whose drawings come to life! Unfortunately, "Title Goes Here" (yes, that's the publication's actual name), is not free to read. You can download the PDF for $3.95.
5. Genesis (science fiction/ super hero)
http://infectiveink.com/?p=352
I'm a comic book nerd. There's no way around it. One day I got to thinking, what if their were super powered young people alive during the civil war era?
6. Showtime with Sasha
http://beta.coastalcourier.com/multimed
In addition to speculative fiction, I also write weekly movie reviews for the Hinesville, Fort Stewart and Richmond Hill newspapers. The reviews appear in print and in video format. The "show" is called Showtime with Sasha. Above is the link to my review of "We Bought a Zoo."
Vol 2 of "Schrodinger's Mouse", ezine of original science fiction, is now live! And yes, that's my artwork on the cover, thanks for noticing!!!
Follow the link to get my review on the film, "Salmon Fishing in the Yemen". It's a keeper!
Enjoy!
http://infectiveink.com/?p=352
~Sasha
You can now buy a copy of FUTURE IMPERFECT: Best of Wily Writers, Volume Two, which includes my short story GRAND-MONSTER.
SCIENCE FICTION
FANTASY
HORROR
The futures of which we’re now dreaming are taking on new twists and turns of the imagination. One could easily say that each of the stories in this volume take place in the future where magic has returned, technology has abandoned us, aliens have invaded us, or we ourselves have evolved—or devolved—beyond our ability to predict.
This volume collects Year #2’s best of the best speculative fiction published in 2010 at WilyWriters.com.
More info coming soon.
E-mail entries to ninthagentcontest@gmail.com. Please paste everything. No attachments.
WHAT TO SUBMIT
The first 150-200 words of your unpublished, book-length work of women’s/upmarket fiction. You must include a contact e-mail address with your entry and use your real name. Also, submit the title of the work and a logline (one-sentence description of the work) with your entry.
Please note: To be eligible to submit, I ask that you do one of two things: 1) Mention and link to this contest through your social media—blogs, Twitter, Facebook; or 2) just add the Guide to Literary Agents Blog (www.guidetoliteraryagents.com/blog) to your blogroll.
Please provide link(s) so the judge and I can verify eligibility. Some
previous entrants could not be considered because they skipped this
step! If you tweet this news, just include my handle somewhere in the tweet (@chucksambuchino).
CONTEST DETAILS
1. This contest will be live for 14 days—from June 12 through the end of Sunday, June 26, 2011, EST. Winners notified by e-mail within three weeks of end of contest. Winners announced on the blog thereafter.
2. To enter, submit the first 150-200 words of your book. Shorter or longer entries will not be considered. Keep it within word count range please.
3. This
contest is solely for completed book-length works of women’s/upmarket fiction.
This category, as defined by our agent judge Weronika, is “any high-quality fiction that is written for women and/or written for book clubs and/or is women-centric; may be general women’s fiction (Jodi Picoult or Nicholas Sparks), women-focused suspense (Laura Lippman), etc. This does exclude any category romances and romantic suspense, so please so not send those.”
4. You can submit as many times as you wish. You can submit even if you submitted to other contests in the past, but please note that past winners cannot win again.
5. The contest is open to everyone of all ages, save those employees, officers and directors of GLA’s publisher, F+W Media.
6. By e-mailing your entry, you are submitting an entry for consideration in this contest and thereby agreeing to the terms written here as well as any terms possibly added by me in the “Comments”
section of this blog post. (If you have questions or concerns, write me
personally at literaryagent@fwmedia.com. The Gmail account above is for
submissions, not questions.)
PRIZES!!!
Top 3 winners all get: 1) A critique of the first 10 pages of your
work, by your agent judge (priceless!). 2) A free one-year subscription to WritersMarket.com ($50 value).
MEET YOUR (AWESOME) JUDGE!
Weronika Janczuk is a literary agent
at Lynn C. Franklin Associates.
Awesome books represented by Weronika and other agents at Lynn C. Franklin include:
Miserere: An Autumn Tale, by Teresa Frohock (June 2011, Night Shade Books)
The Pursuit of Other Interests: A Novel, by Jim Kokoris (2010; St. Martin’s)
My Guantanomo Diary: The Detainees and the Stories They Told Me, by Mahvish Rukhsana Khan (2008; PublicAffairs)
Free to Love, Free to Heal, by David Simon (2009; Chopra Center Press)
http://beta.coastalcourier.com/multimed
http://www.misanthrope-press.com/pa
Another full 52 pages of amazing fiction this issue, as well as another phenomenal cover by Chris Orapello!
Our lead story this issue is "Rosemary, for Remembrance" by Ann Claycomb. As usual, the cover art is an illustration specific to this piece.
Issue Eight also includes stories by Nick Jackson, Lorraine Sears, Samantha Herne, Tom Ribas, Georgina Kamsika, Sasha Janel McBrayer, and Christopher Butera. We also have two interior art pieces, also story-specific, by Teresa Tunaley.
Based on what you’ve seen on the Internet and in queries, what do you think newer writers aren’t focusing on enough? Or too much?
To be honest, the number one problem with submissions is that the writer isn’t ready yet. After I’ve weeded out the illiterate and the insane (and while this is a rather large proportion of submissions, it doesn’t apply to anyone who will be reading this interview), most writers just need more practice. The problem is, unlike learning to play the piano, I can’t simply say, “Fifteen hundred more hours and you’ll be there,” because the very next project may be the one, or the writer may need to write half a dozen more novels before she is ready. The best I can give aspiring writers is to write every day, read a book about writing once a month, and spend time talking to other writers and learning important skills like how to write a query letter.
