Keith Stevenson

Themes

2012-02-23T15:00:00.002-08:00

Jeldon

When writing a novel, it’s useful, at some point, to consider what themes have emerged in your story. I say emerged because I think in most cases writers don’t start out with a strong idea of the thematic intent of their work. They may consider what type of story they want to write, what the inciting event, main event, or denouement will be, or have a strong idea about character or world, but theme? Not so much. Certainly that’s been true for me in developing the Kresh novels, and now that I’m nearing the end of a consolidated first draft, it’s useful to think about themes. Useful, in particular when it comes to looking at a second draft and working out what story elements to strengthen, or link, or drop. It’s a weird symbiosis that by working to bring the theme – once you’ve identified it – into sharper relief, you actually make the story stronger. It hangs together more, simply because it’s more obviously ‘about something’. Saying it like that sounds prosaic, but I think it’s only ‘self-evident’ when you realise it is.

Of course understanding the theme of the story also helps you sell it to others – readers, publishers, whatever. Because it focuses your ability to explain what the story’s about. So what are the Kresh novels about? Interestingly, to me anyway, because I didn’t plan it this way – I was just following some bad stuff that happened to a particular alien – it’s about how societies are wounded by trauma, how they react to that trauma and how the actions of individuals can bring about necessary healing.

The Kresh society is guided by a desire to attain perfection. As a consequence Kresh born with defects or otherwise injured are euthenased. No-one questions this. When the war comes and the invading Hegemony deliberately mutilate large numbers of Kresh, the result is mass suicides and murders. The traumatised society is still clinging to the old ways but those ways are damaging it further. Jeldon is one of the mutilated excisees. Despite great personal suffering, he refuses to suicide or to be executed. Through his struggles he demonstrates the idiocy of carrying on with the old ways and helps to heal and transform his society.

The human-based Hegemony is ruthlessly aggressive. Their policy of attack and subjugate first is what keeps them safe and strong. That policy grew out of an early encounter with a deadly alien species that all but destroyed humanity. In that light their defensive/ aggressive response is understandable and as the memory of that trauma faded, those in control did all they could to generate and nurture a fear of outsiders in order to reinforce that response and ensure the continued safety of the species. Rhys was part of the Hegemony war machine until he was ruthlessly used and discarded by the leader of the Diplomatic Corps. Damaged, perhaps not in such an overt way as Jeldon, he sees that humanity has lost its moral compass. Teaming up with Jeldon he devises a plan to bring war to the Hegemony, not to destroy them, but to force them to see that their worldview is extreme and, ultimately, self-defeating.

There’s an obvious symmetry that’s emerged in the story which is really pleasing and, I think, the path is becoming a little clearer for me in how to go about the second draft.

24-hours

2012-02-19T12:12:00.000-08:00

A lot can happen in 24-hours. But writing, editing and publishing a book?! That's tricky. And it’s what makes if:book Australia's 24-Hour Book challenge so exciting. The other thing I'm excited about is that I’ve been selected to be Lead Editor on the project. It sounds like a lot of fun. And I'll be working with some very cool authors, including my fellow Serapeum alumni, Rjurik Davidson. Bring it on! Here's the offical word from if:book Australia —

The 24-Hour Book

24 hours.

9 writers.

1 book.

On 11 June 2012, if:book Australia will challenge a team of writers and editors to collaborate, write, and publish a book in a single 24-hour period.

At midday, nine writers (including Nick Earls, Steven Amsterdam, Krissy Kneen, and P.M. Newton) will gather at the State Library of Queensland and begin writing furiously. Their stories will be written live on the day, with work in progress posted online to allow readers to watch the story unfold and to submit ideas, suggestions and contributions across media. As the stories are completed, a team of bleary-eyed editors will take the text from manuscript to a book.

On the 12 June (at midday of course), the finished book will be available in both digital and print with a launch in the following days.

Digital tools have already made a tremendous impact on the process of writing and reading. We’re used to thinking about text written for screens, such as blogs, as instant publishing platforms: the act of making writing public is as simple as clicking a button literally marked ‘Publish’. Digital writing is also designed as a collaborative environment: writers, editors, designers, and even audience are all invited to take part in the creation of a complete document.

But what if we apply these concepts to making and reading books? Not just books for screens, but for ink and paper too?

How far can you push the technology? How far can you take the book?

if:book Australia presents: The 24-Hour Book

When

11 - 12 June 2012

Where

Watch the story unfold at futureofthebook.org.au

Who

Nick Earls
Steven Amsterdam
Krissy Kneen

P.M. Newton
Geoff Lemon
Rjurik Davidson
Christopher Currie
Angela Slatter
Simon Groth
Keith Stevenson (Editor)

Stay tuned to if:book Australia for more details in the coming months.

Back

2012-02-08T22:26:00.000-08:00

Many things have been happening. One of the most worrying was the sudden disappearance of the coeur de lion website. We use a wordpress platform and the whole thing just disappeared to be replace by the http error screen of death (not to be confused with the blue screen of death that was so popular with Windows Vista). It was with some trepidation that I went into the 'back end' of the site. There was an option to 'repair database' and all I had to do was click a button. It couldn't be that simple could it? Apparently it could. The site was back up in minutes. Praise be the wiley IT pro who put together THAT little magical bit of programming!

In amongst all this, I took delivery of Adam Browne's manuscript for Pyrotechnicon. I'd seen an earlier draft about a year ago and given Adam some comments a couple of months ago. He's worked tremendously in the intervening time and this latest draft is positively thrumming. There's wonders, word plays, delightful jokes and sly winks to the reader, all wrapped around a most engaging tale featuring one of the most famous of literary characters - Cyrano de Bergerac. So the next wee while will be spent in the enjoyable pursuit of reading this latest version. Then it's back to Adam for some minor tweaks before we get into the copy edit stage.

As a result, progress on the Kresh novel has taken a back seat. But only for a short while. I've got good momentum now and I know where I'm going, so it's all good.

The only slight wrinkle in my world is the minimal number of reviews Anywhere but Earth is garnering. It's darned hard to get anyone to review anything these days. There's been some great feedback on GoodReads but apart from that, not a lot. Oh well, one can only keep trying.

DRM-free

2012-01-27T19:13:00.000-08:00

In a refreshing move that hopefully will send a signal to other book publishers and sellers, all Angry Robot ebooks are sold DRM-free.

Ever since Cory Doctorow highlighted the craziness that is DRM (digital rights management), we've seen big publishers ram their DRM-locked titles down our collective throats. Not only is this contrary to the way books have been published, bought, and shared since year one, it's been a major drawback to the proliferation of ebooks and ebook readers. I love my Kindle, but I hate the fact that Kindle titles come DRM-locked so I can't share them with my friends. Coeur de lion publishing, is opposed to DRM and published its latest anthology Anywhere but Earth without DRM because we believe you should be able to read your ebook on whatever platform you choose. We also believe that sharing books is a good thing and will not affect the bottom line in any real way. If you treat people like responsible adults, that is the way they will act i.e. most people are not about ripping other people off.

It’s nice to see Angry Robot – which publishes a lot of Australian spec fic – believes the same thing.

2012

2012-01-27T13:30:00.000-08:00

I sincerely hope the world doesn't end this year. I don't think I have time to fit that in. Things to do in 2012... Firstly we'll be moving into our new house - finally! - in beautiful Wollongong. After that, I'll be writing a 'how to' article to appear in WQ (the Qld Writers' Centre magazine) all about podcasting and what you need to do to get a top quality podcast together and on the net. [My previous article for WQ on small press publishing is here.] Then in September, I'll be a guest of honour at Conflux 8, so between now and then I'll be mulling over my GoH speech. It's not so much, 'what should I talk about?' as 'what should I leave out?' as I'll only have an hour and there's so much that I could talk about, including small press publishing, what is good editing, good writing, how do the editor and writer work to make a story the best it can be, what are the pitfalls and dangers? Anyway it'll all be sorted by September. At the same con, we'll be launching Adam Browne's debut novel Pyrotechnicon, and there's lots to do on that between now and then. And then of course there's continuing work on the Kresh novel. It's going well. Really well, but I don't think it will be ready for a publisher before 2013, so those Mayans had better be wrong!

Jail

2011-12-14T17:49:00.000-08:00

Space drama and prison drama. My two favourite genres. So mixing the two HAS to be a winner. I'm looking forward to the Besson produced MS1: Maximum Security (click the link for Trailer goodness). I'm hoping for something with the humour and visual panache of The Fifth Element. And for it NOT to be like Fortress, which was pretty dumb.

Paul

2011-11-30T17:14:00.000-08:00

Paul Haines is an extraordinarily gifted writer and a good friend. Cancer however is getting the upper hand in what has been a very long and painful battle and Paul has now announced the end of his writing career.

Paul has achieved more in his writing than many others I know, and I've been privileged to work with him on co-writing projects as well as commissioning, editing and publishing his work. You can find information about all his published works on his website. If you haven't read any yet, you should.

2011-11-30T17:05:00.000-08:00

Yes, the next thing for coeur de lion is to publish Adam Browne's Cyrano de Bergerac novel Pyrotechnicon. I've been circling this one for a while, as I wanted to do a novel next up and Adam's been looking for a home for his work. I remember critting an earlier version years ago at our first ever Serapeum. It's come a long way since then and it's very good - balancing the witty wordplay and wyrdness that Adam does so well with an engaging and pacey plot and great characters. All the info is in our press release.

Conflux Eight

2011-11-13T16:47:00.000-08:00

I'm very honoured to be invited to be one of the guests of honour at Conflux Eight in Canberra on the weekend of September 29 and 30, 2012. I'll be there in my capacity of publisher with coeur de lion publishing, and we'll be making an announcement soon about something else we'll be doing at Conflux.

Festival!

2011-11-05T22:50:00.000-07:00

What a brilliant day at the NSW Writers' Centre Speculative Fiction Festival. Kate Forsyth and Centre Staff did a fantastic job and the whole thing went smoothly, including the launch of Anywhere but Earth. Richard, Alan and Margo read to a quiet crowd on the sunny lawn and afterwards we sold mucho books.

I also really enjoyed the two panels I was on. The Publisher's Talk was a great cross section of indy and mainstream publishing, and thanks to Leigh Blackmore for this picture of the panel.


L to R: Russell Farr (Ticonderoga), Me, Claire Craig (PanMac), Zoe Walton (Random House), Stephanie Smith (HarperVoyager)

In the afternoon, it was time for the Small Press Panel with Russell, me, David Henley of Seizure Magazine, my old mate Stuart Mayne, and Alan Baxter of Blade Red Press. I think everyone enjoyed themselves as much as me.

Today I'm finally relaxing after that long climb to get ABE out. It's been worth it, the view up here is great, but it's time to smell the flowers for a while.

Se-wrap-eum

2011-11-03T19:10:00.001-07:00

And of course I attended the Serapeum novel retreat a couple weeks back with fellow authors Rjurik Davidson, Andrew McCrae and Peter Hickman. Four days of intensive critting did just what I needed it too. Gave me some passion for the Kresh novel, made me question some key elements, and set me loose on a rewrite, which is going pretty well in terms of developing some real drive and momentum to character and plot. :)

Timeslip

2011-11-03T19:06:00.000-07:00

Of course the reason I haven't posted for so long is due to moving house and... launching Anwhere but Earth. Yes, it's big and beautiful and for sale in a variety of 'p' and 'e' incarnations here. And the official launch is at the NSW Writers Centre tomorrow.

Thing 2

2011-11-03T19:00:00.000-07:00

Woah! Where did the time go? I've seen that Rotten Tomatoes only gave The Thing 33% or thereabouts. Well for the lovers of the John Carpenter version, this The Thing was like a long overdue love letter. There may have been a couple of slow spots, but the majority of the movie recreated that fearful paranoia, expanded the alien backstory and created some beautiful set pieces which interlinked with key parts of the Carpenter movie in a way that brought a smile to my face. I'd give it 80%

Thing

2011-09-19T18:48:00.000-07:00

I am so looking forward to seeing the new movie The Thing . I loved the John Carpenter movie and this prequel looks like it pushes all the right buttons. The isolation, the paranoia, and the pant-browning horror of the monster.

Covered

2011-09-16T19:07:00.000-07:00

The cover and internal layout for Anywhere but Earth have been finalised and you can see the whole wraparound cover here. The book is off to the printer now and I'm waiting for the payoff that every editor/ publisher loves - holding the freaking thing in my hands for the first time!

Still nowhere to live as yet :(

However now that the proofreading is done I'm able to concentrate on reading the draft novels of my Serapeum buddies. Unwrapped Sky by Rjurik Davidson is on my Kindle right now, and at the 75% mark, it's rocking along. Next up is Andrew Macrae's monster truck novel which has been bubbling away for many years now, and 70,000 words just landed in my 'in tray' from Peter Hickman. Thankfully that's all!

Time

2011-09-06T23:05:00.000-07:00

There's nothing like editing an anthology to put your writing off the rails. Kresh has stalled because I'm wrestling the 700+ page behemoth that is Anywhere but Earth past layout and final proofing and into final shape for printing. Mind you I've finished all but the final battle in Kresh and sent it off to my Serapeum crit besties, so I should have good feedback from them in early November to launch into the final straight. And the plan is that Anywhere but Earth will launch in early November which should leave me clear. Assuming I can move house between now and then. And not go totally mad because I have NOWHERE TO LIVE and the lease is up in less than a month. Light a candle for me.

ebooking

2011-07-18T01:18:00.000-07:00

Into the copyediting long haul on ABE and also learning the gentle art of ebook coding. Having cut my html teeth on dreamweaver it seems to be pretty straightforward, particularly using the mobi software, but we'll see. Lots of beta testing to follow no doubt. As part of my research I downloaded a couple of sf anthos via kindle. The Year's Best SF 16 (containing a story by my bestie Cat Sparks) is a really nice Kindle ebook. The page looks clean, the sections good and the hyperlinking works seemlessly. That one was by HarperCollins Eos. By comparison the ebook of The Year's Best Science Fiction 21, from St Martin's Press is a bit of a mess. The pages are all right indented in the author intro bits so there's a lot of screen that's blank, and the first paras of new sections aren't full out as they should be on the printed page. The title text font for stories (and hyperlinks) isn't to my taste - but that's a minor quibble - but whoever did the hyperlinks to the authors' names was either dyslexic, drunk, or didn't give a sh*t. For example John Varley is displayed as John Vauiey, Charles Stross is Crarles Stross, Paul Melko is Paul Malko and the year 2003 is displayed as 2,003 - embarrassment. Hopefully the ABE ebook will look more like the HC offering than St Martin's Press. We'll see.

order

2011-06-16T21:25:00.000-07:00

The structural edits on the - now - 29 Anywhere But Earth stories are done and next up is page proofing. In between I've been contemplating the 'order of stories' as they will finally appear in the anthology. It's been a really pleasing thing to do because it's let me contemplate the spread and the quality of accepted stories all over again. And it reminded me that there are a lot of strong pieces in there. It was only the work of a few minutes to come up with a running list, balancing length, theme, and feel to create some real contrasts of light against dark. I'm now sitting on that list for a couple of days to see if things shift in my thinking before I announce the final order. Then it will be time to bend my mind to a few nuts and bolts issues: ISBNs, page layout, print quotes etc. Slow progress, but progress all the same.

Mirrors

2011-06-07T01:46:00.000-07:00

My chick lit urban dark fantasy story 'A Mirror, Darkly' has just been released in ASIM #51.

This story has a very long writing history, which is par for the course with me, being written variously in Sydney and Glasgow and various late night/ early morning stopovers in Singapore and the like while I was going back and forth across the world when my mother was ill and finally succumbed to late onset leukemia.

An early version of it appeared in stages on my livejournal site. But it's moved on a lot since then and, I think, in better directions. Thanks to Simon Petrie for buying it and treating it right. I did have an offer from an earlier editor but they wanted me to get rid of most of the swearing and all of the sex, which - when you read it - would pretty much leave me with nothing.

I also have to tip a nod to the ubiquitous Mr Haines for some early encouragement. I took a leaf out of his book and invested a lot of truth in this story, leavened with a modicum of lies.

Oh, and you can buy it as a pbook or ebook here.

And because we authors like our little ego-boo...
Over at Simon Petrie's blog, 'Mirror' is described as, 'Keith Stevenson's slowly smouldering novelette of sex and aberrant reflections'. Nice!

Good Stuff

2011-05-25T15:43:00.000-07:00

Watching Source Code last night I was pleased to see a very well put together science fiction idea presented on screen. Parts of the movie had a Twilight Zone feel and Jake Gyllenhal acted his eyeballs out. There were moments towards the end when I feared it would veer into schmalz. Director Duncan Jones’s earlier movie Moon almost did that too – but again it was another solid sci-fi idea. However the ending was more than satisfying and the other characters in the movie were well played. An adult science fiction movie that doesn’t fail to entertain. It’s interesting to see the rise of this phenomenon, and it is now officially a phenomenon when you look at Moon and Inception. The latter has probably done more to cement the probability of more intellectually stimulating sci-fi movies seeing the light of day. But it is a satisfying trend.

Actually watching the upcoming trailers I was amazed to see how many movies coming up I really wanted to see. Captain America actually looks like it will be good, ditto X-Men First Class, shit even the next Transformers movie looks kind of cool in a Michael Bay OTT sfx kind of way. And then there’s Joss Whedon’s Avengers to look forward too.

Speaking of sci-fi and spec fic more broadly, the annual Aurealis Awards went off very well (in Sydney for the first time) last weekend. In fact it looks like the women really took home the majority of the awards – lift your game guys. Case in point: only three books made the science fiction novel shortlist, written by two women. They were all very good, but it’s pretty bad when there’s not enough good novel length sci-fi out there to round out a shortlist of five.

The TISF podcast is now well and truly over. I sold the podcast mic, to a podcaster who is just beginning her podcast adventure, so I know it will continue to be used well. A lot of pretty cool Australian spec fic writers mixed their spittle on that mic – hmmm, better not go there. As for me, I’m concentrating a bit more on me and ‘me and my partner’ stuff from here on in. Certainly the coeur de lion adventure will continue but I want to relax a bit more at home, read books I want to read – not because I have to review them – concentrate on the writing, yes, but also just do other stuff: learn the guitar, go for walks… I’m getting old – 49 last week. Okay not so old, but in the last year or two I’ve been through the whole ‘wow you’re actually going to die someday’ thing. Hopefully a long way off, but it’s important to concentrate on the things that give you energy and happiness. That’s where I’m headed.

Endings

2011-05-15T19:22:00.000-07:00

As the princess in Dune said, ‘a beginning is a delicate thing’ — or something like that. Well an ending is pretty blooming delicate too. After saying for months I was approaching the endgame for the Kresh, and then finding some — hopefully entertaining — business that my characters had to attend to before that, we are finally at the spot where weapons must be drawn. And that’s caused a bit of a problem. I’ve been writing this thing over such a long period of time, I’ve lost track of a lot of the detail: who said what, who knows what. But I kind of need that front brain so I can tie up all the loose ends. This has forced me to stop forward momentum and actually type up the 62,000 hand written words and read the other 120,000 typewritten words, before I get back into crafting an awesome denouement. Oh well.

Speaking of endings, I just posted the very last Terra Incognita Speculative Fiction Podcast. Thirty shows over two and a half years is not bad, and I want to thank all the authors who gave freely of their time, stories and vocal talents. I had a lot of fun doing this, learning how to use the technology, editing up the stuff and posting it and I think people enjoyed listening. But there comes a time when all the work starts to be a bit of a drag. That’s why I decided to end it. Time for something new.

My favourite TISF episode? That would have to be 'Come To Daddy' TISF #14 , a very entertaining story from my Serapeum buddy Brendan Duffy, with some cool raps laid down by another Serapeum mate, Matthew Chrulew. It was a lot of fun to edit.

Progress

2011-05-06T21:57:00.000-07:00

Things are really popping now, Jeldon-wise, with some major plot points being revealed. We're in the end game which will lead to a simultaneous battle between the opposing Kresh on their homeworld and a major space conflict between the Hegemony and the Jantri - and whoever else they can round up - in the unforgiving environment of tenspace. This is just as well as my sometime writing buds are firming up plans for our semi-annual novel crit workshop 'Serapeum' for the last week in October. The line-up this year will be Rjurik Davidson, Andy Macrae, Peter Hickman, Paul Haines and little old me.
I'd like to get the novel finished to get to them by 1 July. This means some major keyboarding as I've pretty much written the last half longhand. Of course the parrallel story of poor, unloved Rhys and how he gets to join Jeldon against the humans will not be done, but at least I can give them an idea of how it fits in. Full steam ahead!

Hiatus

2011-04-26T19:16:00.000-07:00

A break from writing during Easter. Hey I’ve been doing it pretty solid since my last break at Christmas so I reckon I was owed it. During the break I’ve been editing stories for Anywhere But Earth and reading Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series. I just finished book five over the break. To my mind it’s a fantastic tale, filled with real humanity, lots of incident and maintains the tension about the main protagonists' overall quest. I have a lot of respect for Stephen King and the dedication required to finish the seven books is an interesting tale in itself and one that demonstrates a useful lesson in stick-to-it-ness.

Apart from writing I went to see Suckerpunch the other week. I thought Zac Snyder’s take on Watchmen was the best movie experience of 2009. Suckerpunch carried high expectations and leaving the cinema I wasn’t sure how I felt. Part of the reason was that I watched it at Imax and I’m finding that the Imax screen is just too big to provide an enjoyable movie watching experience. Instead of being immersive, I find close-up action scenes become jerky and confusing. As to the film itself it’s part action movie, part arthouse and part music video. With the benefit of distance, I think on the whole that Suckerpunch was a good movie. The plot really rewards post-watching deliberation and has a lot more to it than flashy graphics. Also I think Snyder is to be applauded for being ambitious enough to try something that had the potential to confuse an audience that was mainly there to see big explosions and cool fights. There is a serious intent behind Suckerpunch and hopefully Snyder will be allowed to continue to demonstrate his vision to the cinema public. Tonight is a guilty pleasure of another sort. I’m going to see Thor J

Space

2011-04-15T21:07:00.000-07:00

I haven't blogged for a long while, mainly due to the fact I've been coming to grips with a new job. But that doesn't mean nothing has been happening.

Work on The Way of The Kresh Book Two continues. It's slow and methodical progress and I'm finding myself in a very fortunate place. Knowing where the story is ending up, I'm letting the characters and situations lead me at present and finding some suprises along the path to my ultimate goal. It's a really nice, no pressure, creative space to be in and I feel privileged to be here. This is where the real creativity occurs, before the painful rewrites and backtracks and the inevitable scrabble to get published.

Meanwhile over at the coeur de lion site, I've just announced the author line up for Anywhere But Earth. So I'm beginning the editing process now. I'm doing this onscreen and trying out a few new features that Word 2007 has to offer. Hopefully it will be painless for me and the authors.

Episode 29 of the TISF podcast has also just debuted, with Chuck McKenzie doing a great reading of 'Like a Bug Underfoot', though if you don't like swear words you may want to give this one a miss. I've decided to hang up the podcast mic after Episode 30. That's two and a half years of programs and I find I'm a bit 'been there done that' about the whole thing. It's a lot of work and I'm at a place now where I've mastered the skill of podcasting and it's not new and fun anymore. This is why I gave up editing Aurealis Magazine too. I think two to three years is my maximum attention span for a project. Hopefully, however, with TISF I've left something that will stand as an archive of the voices of today's Australian speculative fiction community. That's a good feeling.

Editors

2011-03-16T19:09:00.000-07:00

Apparently they may soon be dead as a species. Thanks to the ever-burgeoning self-publishing market, particularly since ebook sites like Smashwords have made it so easy and cheap.

I can see the advantage for writers. No more rejections, just get your excellent stuff out there were it can be read. There is a downside to not having editors, however. I haven’t made a longitudinal survey, but I have read a couple of these self published ebooks now and I do speak from the very recent experience of reading over three hundred short story submissions over the last twelve months for the upcoming ebook and print anthology Anywhere But Earth.

There is an art to editing work and also in collecting short works together in a book. While there are many authors who produce good, publishable stuff, I’ve worked with enough authors and had my own work probed and polished enough to know that a good editor is invaluable for clearing out the unnecessary, the poorly expressed, the badly structured in a work and really making it not only a better story, but a greatly improved reading experience for the poor consumer.

The self-published ebooks and the story submissions I have read over the last year were all open to being improved by an editor. In short, they weren’t as good as they could have been. With the very odd exception, the individual stories didn’t sing as well as they could post-edit. And for the ebook collections, the parts of the whole weren’t shown to best advantage either. As I mentioned there is an art to selecting and arranging stories in a book. You have to consider the groupings, the emotional highs and necessary quieter segments, the avoidance of thematic repetition; all that good editor stuff.

None of that is going to change the rising tide of ebook self-publishing. And for the most part, people will carry on, thinking ‘close enough is good enough’. Except it’s not. That’s what I worry about. That the reader, confronted with work after work that hasn’t been touched by an editor will eventually be turned off the reading experience altogether. That’s the point where we all lose out.

Work

2011-03-02T01:52:00.000-08:00

Yes, real life intrudes. A new job is really focusing my attention right now, but the writing regime is progressing with Rhys and Jeldon back on homeworld. Hey, they just took a guy's head off. Not much time for anything else, except to put out a huge shout for Shaun Tan's Oscar for The Lost Thing and a huge groan for the lack of Oscarage for Inception, the most challenging sci fi movie I've seen in years.

Ditmar time

2011-02-13T18:06:00.000-08:00

Dear reader. It is Ditmar nomination time again. Allow me to humbly submit for your sophisticated consideration such things as I have been busy producing in the 2011 Ditmar Awards eligibility period. And if you feel them worthy of nomination to go into the Ditmar voting shortlist, that would be peachy!

William Atheling Jr Award for Criticism or Review
The William Atheling Jr Award is for the writing or editing of a work or related work of criticism or review pertaining to the genres of science fiction, fantasy, and horror.

Keith Stevenson, for Science Fiction and Horror Reviews, in Aurealis Magazine #43 and 44 (Chimaera Publications). (Review Aurealis #43 and Review Aurealis #44)

Best Achievement
This award recognises an outstanding achievement related to science fiction, fantasy or horror and not eligible in any other category of these awards.

Terra Incognita Australian Speculative Fiction Podcast, Keith Stevenson (producer/ presenter), a monthly podcast of "the best Australian speculative fiction read by the authors who created it". (TISF website)

And the nomination form is here.

Cost

2011-02-02T19:14:00.000-08:00

Related to DRM is the issue of ebook costs. Horror writer/ publisher Shane Jiraiya Cummings is hosting a grand discussion about ebooks over on his website, and inviting publishers, authors, editors, readers and anyone else with a point of view to pitch in and discuss the epublishing phenomenon. The discussion is running for the whole of February and I've jumped into the debate on ebook pricing with a little piece entitled:

“Do you know what you’re paying for, and are you happy about that?”

Books are very cool. Ebooks are cool, too, but they are not pbooks (a term I’ll use from now on to differentiate ebooks from books made out of dead trees). Ebooks are very different from pbooks and that difference goes a lot deeper than some people realise. And you can pay quite different prices for the various formats. This is such a new market, no-one’s really nailed down what value to attach to what format and how that value should be reflected in the cost to the consumer. Authors, publishers, and retailers all have their own ideas, and it’s a topic I want to look at a little deeper. So what are the options for you in 2011 if you want to read a book?
Read the rest of the post...

DRM

2011-01-27T19:29:00.000-08:00

Digital Rights Management has been much in my mind lately, particluarly after the launch of the booki.sh site and this and other posts scattered around the internet. It really boils down to ownership and the increasing move away from ownership when it comes to ebooks to 'licensing' or, worse still, now 'access'. It means you buy a thing but you never own it, and that stinks. It goes way beyond copyright law, and if you don't believe me, read Cory Doctorow on the topic.

I think it's time for everyone to get sensible and rethink the whole DRM thing. Ownership and the rights of the consumer are being increasingly eroded, based on the assumption that consumers are all evil rip-off merchants. We're not.

Covered

2011-01-23T17:35:00.000-08:00

While we're talking about excellent Science Fiction, over at coeur de lion publishing, we've just revealed the first image mock up cover for the upcoming anthology Anywhere But Earth that I'm currently editing.

It has a nice retro feel and, I think, nails that sense of wonder we're trying to get at for the collection.

Wow!

2011-01-18T14:26:00.000-08:00

Sara Creasy is an old friend and colleague of mine from the Aurealis Magazine days, and an awesome editor and writer. It only seems like 8 years ago we were sitting around, talking about the novels we were going to write (and yes, I was talking about the Kresh even then). But Sara obviously had more sticktoitness in those intervening years, because that novel she was dreaming of - Song of Scarabaeus - was published in the US by Eos in April last year. And a very good novel it was too, full of kick ass SF action, excellent world building (literally!) and solid characterisation. (Don't believe me? Read my review.) So it's particularly gladdening to hear that Sara's writing has been recognised elsewhere with a shortlisting on none other than the Philip K Dick award for 2010. I feel very chuffed for Sara and kind of tingly/ sparkly that I had a little bit of contact with that novel when it was in its formative stages. Go Sara!

A gift

2011-01-17T19:37:00.000-08:00

Surfacing from a dream on Sunday morning with an image of what Jeldon and Rhys might find hidden on the Kresh homeworld could say two things about me. Firstly, I have no life. And/ or secondly, that old subconscious has been working away as usual and thought it would throw me a gift for the weekend. I'll choose 'Box B', thanks.

This literally came out of the nowhere that is somewhere. I can't say too much about it because it's quite a big spoiler about the plot, but not only has it suddenly made my protagonists' journey that much more interesting, it also has repercussions for book three (if it ever sees the light of day) and says a lot about just how callous the Hegemony's operations have become.

In any event, it's all going down in writing over the next couple of weeks while I chart the journey across Jeldon's homeworld :)

Opportunity

2011-01-11T20:44:00.000-08:00

A two week gap in the novel while I enjoyed the holidays, but instead of getting a bit rusty writing-wise, it gave me a chance to reflect on the latest action and what's coming up. That meant a slight rewrite of a scene where Jeldon is confronted by non-excised Kresh. I'd realised that he wasn't active enough in that scene and needed to do more and it feels better now.

Now I'm closing in on what I think will be the second last section of the story, where Jeldon and Rhys go to the Kresh homeworld to discover the hidden Kresh rebels and organise a counter-attack on the occupying Hegemony forces. I've been kind of dreading this section as it was only ever inferred in the short stories I wrote about the same events and I only just decided that Rhys should accompany Jeldon as I was working through the previous section so it felt like a big blank canvas: off-putting and, well, empty! But the break has given me some perspective now and I'm starting to get excited about the possibilities. Firstly it's a chance for Rhys and Jeldon to really get to know each other and for us to see their interactions. Secondly they're going into occupied territory on the Kresh homeworld. Jeldon had a taste of life under the Hegemony before he escaped, but just how much worse have things gotten in the intervening time? I feel I really want to show what's happened there. Also the pairing of human and Kresh in a setting where together or individually they will be in danger from Hegemony, rebel Kresh and/ or traitor Kresh makes me think there must be heaps of possibilities for jeopardy and action. Now I just need to work out what all of that will be and write it. Simple!

Aspect

2010-12-21T14:28:00.000-08:00

One of the main themes in The Way of The Kresh is how the Kresh species is forced to adapt its common response toward Kresh that are maimed or disabled. Whereas before these 'imperfect' Kresh would be euthenased, this isn't really a sensible option after the Hegemony mutilates so many of them. My main protagonist, Jeldon, is - of course - a key figure in changing this, but to show such a change you have to demonstrate it in various ways. It can't be just a one off event where every Kresh turns to the other and says, 'you know, I think we may have been wrong all these years.'

That means I have to show Jeldon being challenged and then accepted by his own on several occasions. Which could be boring and repetitive. That's where aspect comes in. While the underlying effect of each scene will be the same (and reinforcing), and may contain some of the same actions e.g. the challenge, the counter and the acceptance, each scene can be made fresh and still - hopefully - exciting by picking out a particular aspect to look at the action differently. So in the latest challenge scene I showed it from the point of view of my secondary human protagonist, Rhys. As he hadn't seen this before, and knows little of Kresh society, he was able to bring something fresh to the events as they unfolded.

That got me thinking about focussing and pulling out aspects in other scenes. There are some scenes that just have to be shown. You may have scene A, the set up, which is going to lead to a really awesome scene C. But to get there and for it to make sense to the reader, you really have to show them scene B, which is actually quite static and boring but necessary. But scene B can be brought to life if you choose to tweak or magnify a particular aspect. One obvious way is to set scene B in some setting that is jawdroppingly awesome, so even if the action is pedestrian the reader can look at the pretty pictures. That's okay but gets a bit wearing if repeated again and again. The poor reader gets 'shiny bauble' fatigue. But there's other ways to polish, e.g. by showing the scene through a character that may have some emotional baggage attached to events or setting or the other characters involved. That's a good one because you're also deepening reader understanding for your character and making them richer and more real. It's always good if a scene can be doing at least two things for the reader, like progressing the plot and explaining a character's motivations.

It may take a little more thought and maybe even some back tracking and rewriting, but if you can freshen the repetitive or the mundane in your writing, it's certainly worth it.

String

2010-12-19T13:56:00.000-08:00

I'm thinking about string in relation to the novel. As in 'how long is a piece of'. While I have the general shape of the plot that's been mapped out for yonks, I'm down in the nitty gritty of events at present, not all of which I'd thought out in detail. But present circumstances require things to occur just out of logic and I have to write them (and keep the story interesting). Part of this is due to the fact that at the beginning of this draft (which will be the first full draft) I decided that I would stay with my protagonist Jeldon every step of the way and not 'jump' at a chapter end to, for example, a few days later when the next chapter starts. I'd done a lot of that when I was writing the series of Kresh short stories, because that is what short stories do, they cut to the chase. But novels are more expansive and when I really started writing the novel and I came to those short story gaps, I had to think about what populated them and this often lead to some really nice discoveries and broadening and deepening of the story, setting and characters. It has become one of the more enjoyable creative aspects of the current draft. The flipside is that while I know where I'm going, I don't necessarily know how long it's going to take me to get there. I thought I was on the home run, but now - as a result of the situation Jeldon finds himself in - I realise I have to write a whole other adventurous episode before we get to the final part. I'm not sure how long that's going to take or how long it's going to end up. Hence the string.

The other thing about writing so fully this way is that I know a lot of this stuff is going to end up on the cutting room floor. But that's fine too, because what remains will be informed by a fuller understanding on my part about just what's gone in to making the story what it finally is. The nice part about not having a particular deadline is that I can take that time and discover the unfolding of the story as it comes. So I'm in a good place right now.

Break and spruik

2010-12-12T15:39:00.000-08:00

Last week, I had a break from the novel, due to a few things that disrupted my ability to write early in the morning. That and feeling the need for a lie in until 6.30. I don't particularly like breaking off in the middle of writing. There's always the worry that you will lose momentum of forget where you're up to. But as I have more than 170,000 words behind me, there's already a lot of stuff I've written that I've forgotten about, so as long as I know where I'm going, which I certainly do, it's not much of a worry.

It was also nice to have a rest. But I'm back into it now with renewed verve. Not just because of the rest but because on Saturday I attended the annual picnic organised by Cat Sparks. It was a convivial gathering mainly of spec fic writers both large and small all talking about their work - sales and disasters, what they're working on, who's reading who - and so on. While it's nice to catch up with others, this kind of gathering always reawakens my competitive edge and while I wouldn't say it within anyone's earshot it makes me want to write better, bigger and more successfully than those around me. I'm somewhat embarrassed to admit to these feelings but competitiveness has to be a good thing if it gives me renewed energy for my project.

On the coeur de lion publishing side of things, X6 got a nice plug from Max Barry on the First Tuesday Book Club. I could listen to this all day -

Characters

2010-12-01T13:17:00.000-08:00

Jonathan Franzen was recently interviewed by Leigh Sales on ABC's Lateline:

LEIGH SALES: I recently read an interview with Vladimir Nabokov from 1967 in which he's told that E.M. Forster says his characters often take over and dictate the course of a novel. And after a scathing critique of Forster, Nabokov says "my characters are like galley slaves". Are yours galley slaves?

JONATHAN FRANZEN: I'm with Nabokov on being intensely irritated by that remark of E.M. Forster's. It's as if to say, you know, "I'm such a special genius that my creations have such enormous vividness, such passionate life that I really have no control over them".

That's a weird thing for a fiction writer to say because it first of all can't possibly be true. But also it would seem to suggest that that kind of writer is abdicating a responsibility for meaning, because what the characters do has everything to do with what the story means and if it's like you're letting the characters say "well no, sorry, I don't like the story you're trying to tell".

You've somehow - if you could do it, which I don't think you can - you would be abdicating the primary responsibility of the story teller which is to create something that means something.

Franzen makes some good points, and I am a huge Nabokov fan. I'm guilty of saying I'm just 'doing what the voices tell me.' There's a certain amount of romanticism in believing there's some external muse talking to you. But if you want to be harsh, yes, I agree with Franzen, it is a w*nk. Although there are some elements of writing in general and characterisation in particular that lead to the kind of distancing that can be mistaken for - or identified as - an external muse.

Firstly a lot of creative invention springs seemingly fully formed from our subconscious, or certainly that's the way it works for me. I know my mind is working on story points and questions at a level below my awareness of it, and sometimes it will throw up one of those 'aha' moments that seems like it came out of nowhere when in fact it really came from deep inside.

Next, when creating a character, and in order for it to be believable, it has to have a consistent operating mode. It's entirely valid for a writer to say, 'my character wouldn't say that', or 'my character would never do a thing like that.' Inconsistent characters lead to bad and confused writing, but thinking about characters as fully formed individuals who have a 'vote' in how the story will unfold implies that they exist externally to the writer when in fact they're simply aspects of the writer's own personality. Again, it's easy to fall into Forster's of thinking.

Finally (though I'm sure there are other elements in play that lead to this type of dissociative thinking), and to paraphrase Ibsen, conflict is the essence of all fiction. If I have a number of characters in my head, then the writing really becomes interesting when they are in conflict. That involves a bit of doublethink to enable the author to argue both (or even more) sides of an argument through the mouths of opposing characters, which again can lead to a feeling that these voices are in some way distinct, external and not originating from the same place.

EM Forster is clearly wrong, but it's easy to see why he might think that way. Maybe Nabokov should have given the guy a break.

Ego boo

2010-11-25T15:26:00.000-08:00

Last year I took part in a small film by broadcasting student Max Rowan called Independent Inkwell about small independent presses in Australia. The documentary was show on TVS (Sydney's community TV channel) a couple of months ago, but it's now available for viewing on YouTube. I've embedded the video at the coeur de lion website. It was fun to do and I don't think I come over as too much of an idiot.

Talking real

2010-11-25T15:12:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking a lot about dialogue lately. It can be such an economical conveyer of emotion - no need for internal monologue or character description if your character can sum up their reaction or current emotional state in just a few words - and it can force an immediate shift in reader attention - well, I was thinking about that over there but, whoah!, what did he just say???

Of course in the wrong hands it can be at best bland - 'that's a nice digital watch' - and at worst clunky - as in 'do people really talk like that?' Dialogue has to be true to character as well, and I'm working to try to differentiate between the many voices in my head when I put them down on the page. Part of that comes from thinking about the character, what they're like, how they're likely to react and - consequently - what they're going to say. But the best dialogue comes when you as writer take time to listen and give your character space to speak for themselves. That's what happened this morning. My two main protagonists have finally come together in the Kresh novel. What on earth are they going to say to one another and - more importantly - how does the conversation get started? When faced with this kind of situation, I find the best thing to do is not think about it. So I had my blank page beside me but I didn't force anything. I just waited, looked at the newspaper, checked the email. Then I picked up my page to put it away for the day and finally the first exchange came and it was just that sort of left field, true to character set of words that I was waiting for. Now we're ready to talk.

Retro-fit ahead

2010-11-17T18:33:00.000-08:00

The Way of The Kresh has a major and minor plot line and I've been methodically working through the major line - following Jeldon in his travels to reclaim his homeworld - for a couple of years now, but this morning major and minor plot lines collided, an event which I approached with a certain amount of excitement and fear. Excitement because I'm closing in on the final section of the story. Fear because 1. I've been writing this story from inside Jeldon's head exclusively for a long time, and 2. it means I have to shift pov to my minor plot line character - disgraced Hegemony pilot Rhys - and show him at a point that is quite far along his personal story without actually having taken that trip with him in any real detail. But so far, I think it's working and it also means I get to comment on Jeldon from an external point of view. The downside is that when I go back to fill in the minor plot line, I may have to retrofit Rhys's actions from this point on.

As a result, all kinds of thoughts about how Rhys got to where he is, not just physically but emotionally and morally, are firing off in my head. There's so much to do and see, talk about and think about for both characters that I'm letting them spark off each other and recording what happens. Good times.

Loving the alien

2010-11-09T17:15:00.000-08:00

For a long time now, I've been inside the head of my protagonist in The Way of The Kresh. Jeldon is outwardly very alien - a cross between mollusc, insect and crustacean physiology - but just how alien is the inside of his head? The answer is 'not very' and that's because it's really the only way I can use him to drive a story and still have that story understandable to a human reader. We can all create totally alien characters whose motivations and resulting actions are a complete mystery, but how satisfying would that be as a central feature of a sustained narrative? Not very, I suspect. So Jeldon has emotions and reactions that we can identify with, but those emotions and his personality have been constructed and affected by the society and environment he inhabits. Really what Jeldon is, is a foreigner; someone from another country where they do things differently, but someone who we still have enough points of reference in common with to be basically understandable.

If you want to be grand about the whole thing, you could say the Kresh society in the novel is a way of holding up particular mores that exist in our society for inspection. That's certainly been the case for a lot of SF, but it hasn't been my prime driver. Those societally discursive elements that are emerging as I write are a product of the situational tension I wanted to create for Jeldon early on to make him interesting to readers. That's a pretty cool thing and it seems to be supporting my emerging thesis that if you get the character right and sufficiently complex, a great many other elements of the story will emerge from that.

Your main character has to stand out. There has to be an immediate point of difference for the reader to latch on to. So, the Kresh society is very insular. While it exists within a loose collection of worlds that have trade ties - called the Lenticular - they prefer not to rely on or have much else to do with outsiders. Jeldon is different. He's one of the few Kresh to leave homeworld and travel to other planets. And he's the only Kresh ever to do it on his own. That instantly makes him an oddity in his own society and creates tension between him and others of his kind. It also provides him with opportunities that other Kresh do not have when the shit hits the fan.

The other reason why Kresh - other than Jeldon - don't travel off-world alone is that the Kresh share an empathic link with each other. There is an underlying worldmind, not a hivemind - they're not telepathic, but an underlying emotional patterning which is comforting to Kresh. They always know what the emotional temperature of their surroundings are, how they are viewed by others, how their words are received. Being somehow outside of that makes them uncomfortable. Not Jeldon. So he's considered strange. But that element of his psychic make up means that when the human-backed Hegemony invade homeworld and begin to systematically mutilate Kresh, removing the hood which provides this empathic link, then where most Kresh are unable to cope and commit suicide, Jeldon is already hardened to the loss, although that's not to say it doesn't deeply affect him.

One might think that would make Jeldon more attractive to his fellow Kresh. Here's someone that can keep it together when terrible things happen. But to keep the ball in the air and keep that dramatic tension going for Jeldon, Kresh have a deep mistrust of any physical deformity or injury among their kind. Those who are disabled by injury or birth are euthenased. Although Jeldon can still function even without his empathic hood, he is now seen as an outcast, someone that should be executed if they do not have the decency to commit suicide. This element of the novel, which was really just put in to create dramatic tension for Jeldon has assumed wider proportions within the story now, given the widespread acts of the Hegemony. Hating the disabled is okay within the framework of Kresh society (I know it's not really okay but we have to respect other cultures, don't we?), but when an external force comes in and disables the majority of the population, that framework must change or the society will fail. So a relatively simple character element has become one of the main conundrums of the story which must be resolved through the action. Everything's connected - which is how it should be.

Superficial

2010-11-03T15:50:00.000-07:00

I've been working off and on (more off really) on a particular story since 2004 and I haven't really brought it home yet. 'The Superficial Contact of Two Bodies' is a far future tale of love, betrayal, death, redemption and the end of the universe. I haven't been able to finish it to my satisfaction (not yet) but I love it, because I think it has the potential to juggle a lot of different elements - a satsifying science fictional universe, an interesting and at times exciting plot line, and at the centre a complex and very human character. The title is taken from a quotation, as a lot of my titles are, and is a cynical reference to love, which - hopefully - through the frame of the story, can be seen to be ironic. Clearly I'm not giving up on it, mainly because of the human character aspect. Paul Haines is a friend and also a writer whom I greatly admire, not least because his blisteringly honest work shows characters that are fully-fledged three-dimensional people. They are neither good or bad, but both and neither. They encapsulate contradictions and demonstrate that for all we'd like to believe, we are not - when it really comes down to it - rational creatures. That's something I believe in deeply and something that I want to see in my own work, because it's what excites me and what I think excites a reader. To be presented with a tale where the protagonist appears wholly real, and to partake in their most secret moments is an exciting thing. So work continues.

I also read a lot of unpublished stories from writers when I'm reading for anthologies, as well as reading a lot of independent press stuff through my reviewing work. A lot of these stories don't (IMHO) spend enough energy in investing their characters with real life and complexity. Writing's a difficult craft and there are lots of things to think about. Does the plot make sense, how's the pacing, is this going to hold reader interest, how's my dialogue, etc. But I believe if authors took time to really think about their characters and invest them with as much living, breathing reality as they possibly could, then a lot of the other elements of story would flow naturally from that investment. In a way it's like saddling up the right horse and letting it pull the cart as it will, rather than focusing too much on an aspect of the cart, the wheels, the seat etc. and then grabbing a nondescript horse out of the stable and sticking them together. If your character is as real as you can make them then the world around them becomes real by how they interact with it. The plot starts to make sense because your character's actions must make sense to them. They speak realistically because that is how your character speaks.

My story will only work when I get the character exactly right. When he lives and breathes and acts in my created world. He's waiting for me to finish that story. I know that because he already has a life.

For the Win!

2010-10-31T15:21:00.000-07:00

I've just heard that Margo Lanagan's story 'Sea-Hearts', which appeared in the coeur de lion novellanthology I edited called X6, has won the World Fantasy Award. Maybe it's that I was up very late last night, but I can't help feeling euphoric and slightly disconnected to reality. This is the fourth award the book has won this year.

My company is an extraordinarily small independent press with no real budget for marketing and promotion and, we have to face it, Australia is a loooong way from the publishing centre of the universe, but that such a small (though not in size) book from a one-person operation has been able to make such a big impact within the speculative fiction arena is really fantastic. Of course the amazing stories my authors gave me are the major cause of our success, but I feel a bit of reflected chuffedness about the whole thing. And, yes, maybe just, the right to pat myself on the back once of twice.

Trust

2010-10-28T16:42:00.000-07:00

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about an element of creative writing that isn’t often spoken about. It’s the writing equivalent of ‘ask and ye shall receive’. And really it’s what I like to think of as a matter of trust. I’ve been writing for quite a number of years now and in the past I’ve become disheartened with a work in progress because I couldn’t figure out a plot point or I didn’t know where the story was going, and as a result I’d get tied up in knots and things would grind to a halt.

Somewhere along the line I learned to trust myself. Maybe once I had a few stories under my belt. The kind of trust I’m talking about is having faith in your creative ability, in believing that your unconscious side – which is really where all the cool creative stuff happens – will offer up what you need when you need it. After I noticed what was happening, I began to see it more and more (which may simply be the observer effect) but it also made me less prone to worry about my work and seize up.

The Kresh books I’ve been writing for quite a number of years have two plot strands centred on two very different characters. I knew that at some point towards the end the story these two strands had to interact, but I had no idea how that was going to happen. I’ve had no idea how that would happen for the best part of 14 years. I should have been worried, but I wasn’t. I knew my unconscious would be working on the problem and would deliver the solution. That’s what happened just a couple of weeks ago, walking to work and musing idly about my story. The solution came fully formed and entirely organic in the way it brought the two strands together. Like most ideas of that ilk, it was obvious. But only after the fact.

Trust also works at the micro-level, line by line. There are times where I have no idea what I am going to write next. I may have a goal for a scene in terms of plot but haven’t worked out how that goal will be achieved. So many times now I’ve written a word I didn’t know I was going to write and that’s carried me into a scene or an image or an exposition that does just what I needed done.

I don’t think I’m particularly special as writers go. I think this is an effect that occurs and can be encouraged in just about anybody. The trick is to recognise it and believe it will happen. Trust. It’s a wonderful thing.

Kresh - Progress and Process

2010-10-26T16:20:00.000-07:00

The Way of the Kresh is my (now) two book space opera, currently ‘in progress’. That progress has been fairly non-existent at some stages in my life, but progress now is steady to the point that I’m at the 170,000 word mark and closing in on the finale in the next few months.

Mind you, it’s been a long time coming. Kresh began as a glimmer in my mind on a Melbourne tram ride home from the 1996 Aurealis Awards ceremony held in Justin Ackroyd’s original Slow Glass Bookshop in Swanston Street. I penned a three part short story, which appeared as online fiction on the Nuketown website, which is still going although they don’t publish fiction any more. It was followed up by a five part serial ‘The Kresh War’, again published solely on Nuketown. At some point, I decided I had enough for a novel and started researching and doing background work, because the hero of my little story is Jeldon, who is a nine foot tall bipedal, chitin-covered ‘lobster man’ (for want of a better term) with a cobra-like hood that gives him, like all Kresh, an empathic ability. I even sketched a picture of Jeldon and worked out how the chitinous plates all fit together, how the Kresh reproduce, defecate, what their mythos/ religion is, and how their society is ordered and functions. All standard SF worldbuilding fare.

I got feedback on an early section of Kresh from a special workshop run as part of Aussiecon III in 1999. In between I completed another novel, Horizon, which is currently lying in the bottom drawer, but despite a number of attempts I never really got past the first section of Kresh. Not until I hit on my current process. It’s simple really. Start writing at the beginning and don’t stop until you get to the end. Don’t go back and polish, don’t get side tracked. At 5.45am every weekday morning, I get out of my warm comfortable bed, make a cup of tea and type on the laptop, or – more recently – write in a spiral bound A4 notepad. The target is 500 words or two pages of handwriting, and regardless of how motivated or otherwise I feel, how well the words flow or don’t, how much of an idea about where I’m going or what’s going to happen next that I have or not, that’s been pretty much it for the last two years. Right now, for what I need to do, it’s the only way that works for me.

A Mirror, Darkly for ASIM

2010-10-25T21:36:00.000-07:00

My 'chick-lit' urban horror story 'A Mirror, Darkly' has sold to Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine and is due to appear in issue #51 in April/ May 2011. This is my first short story sale for far too long. My last story, '... They First Make Mad' (which you can hear as part of the Terra Incognita Christmas 2009 podcast) was published in Agog! Fantastic Fiction way back in 2002. Though I haven't exactly been slacking off either in writing or publishing in the intervening years, just not at short story length.

'Mirror' had a significantly geographic birth and early development, conceived in Broome, parts of it were written in the UK and on a couple of international flights, including during stopovers at Changi International Airport. It's set in Sydney, my recently adopted home, around the Erskineville area and parts of it are liberally lifted from a very boozy party I went to in Glebe, although the house that is 'blessed' with the mirror in the story is based on one in Summer Hill.

'Mirror' also contains a fair bit of swearing, sex and blood. Thankfully Simon Petrie, who selected and is editing the story, is neither squeamish nor a prude.

Web presences

2010-10-25T21:18:00.000-07:00

In our lives we all adopt and adapt different personas. And in the 2010s those personas have a digital manifestion - indeed must have such a manifestation - if they are to be known beyond small circles of friends. As a publisher with coeur de lion publishing and a podcaster with Terra Incognita, I've developed visual representations and digital homes for those personas. But probably the most important persona (to me) has lain fairly dormant, at least in any outward way. That's my persona as a writer, which is mainly what this blog will be about, although I'll be touching on happenings in publishing, podcasting, reviewing and other areas in which I'm involved.

Keith Stevenson

Themes

24-hours

Back

DRM-free

2012

Jail

Paul

Next

Conflux Eight

Festival!

Se-wrap-eum

Timeslip

Thing 2

Thing

Covered

Time

ebooking

order

Mirrors

Good Stuff

Endings

Progress

Hiatus

Space

Editors

Work

Ditmar time

William Atheling Jr Award for Criticism or ReviewThe William Atheling Jr Award is for the writing or editing of a work or related work of criticism or review pertaining to the genres of science fiction, fantasy, and horror.

Keith Stevenson, for Science Fiction and Horror Reviews, in Aurealis Magazine #43 and 44 (Chimaera Publications). (Review Aurealis #43 and Review Aurealis #44)

Cost

DRM

Covered

Wow!

A gift

Opportunity

Aspect

String

Break and spruik

Characters

Ego boo

Talking real

Retro-fit ahead

Loving the alien

Superficial

For the Win!

Trust

Kresh - Progress and Process

A Mirror, Darkly for ASIM

Web presences

William Atheling Jr Award for Criticism or Review
The William Atheling Jr Award is for the writing or editing of a work or related work of criticism or review pertaining to the genres of science fiction, fantasy, and horror.