Dark Rose

Thanks to the sharp eye of Natalie Sin, who saw and read my story before I knew it had been published (yes, I'm that much of an airhead), I'm pleased to announce everyone can now read Dark Rose over at Yellow Mama.

This was written back in early March 2008, and has been through about nine different versions. With the help of The Prose Nest critique group (and Pharo in particular) over at Authors by Design it grew and slowly took the shape you pretty much now see over at Yellow Mama. It had been rejected three times before it found its home.

I gotta say, I love the picture Cindy assigned to it. Jeff Karnick kicks ass!

Last Post For The Week

This weekend will be full. This afternoon, I'll be watching hi-tech cars go round in circles at ridiculous speeds - and fixing a leaky tap in the shower.

Saturday and Sunday will be more fast cars and scantily clad women.

Saturday night is Presentation Night down at the cricket club to wrap up the season.

So this weeks word total for "A Kookaburra's Laugh" finishes at a dismal 907 - but then that's 907 more than I did the two weeks before :c(

I did write a new short story at just over 1200 words so it wasn't a total loss, and I managed to finish and submit two assignments. Somewhere in there I read and reviewed Tainted as well. Oh, and I finished revising Dreaming - which I must send off very shortly.

Last night I began reading MageSign. 5 chapters in, but I'm not saying anything until I write the review. That doesn't mean good or bad things about the book. You'll just have to read the review, or better yet, go buy yourself a copy on Amazon and we can have a book club discussion once we've both finished reading it.

And finally I can announce - Dark Rose has been accepted for publication in Yellow Mama's Issue #16 Halloween edition for 2009. My child vampire story has finally found a home. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank Cindy Rosmus for all her input in making the story better and for accepting Dark Rose into the Yellow Mama family. This was also my first ever request for a rewrite, and I found the experience to be a positive one because of Cindy's professionalism. I'd highly recommend submitting your stories to YM.

So, have a great weekend and I hope you manage to get some writing done, or have a great time which will recharge your batteries and creative juices so you can hit the keyboard running when the new week begins. Remember April starts mid next week so any March deadlines are now looming large.

Good luck with all your writing.

BT

More Progress

But not on Newland or as I'm starting to think of it "A Kookaburra's Laugh".

Last night I turned a new short story I wrote, into a screenplay for assignment 4 of module 2. It had to come out at 5 pages. Up until now I've used Word, with my own created template in place for formatting, to create these things, and so I used my past efforts to estimate how long a story I would need.

I was way wrong.

Assignment 3 needed to be 4 pages long. I used a 350 word story I'd created on Cafe Doom as it's basis and struggled to contain it to four pages. I figured I'd need a story under 500 words to make 5 pages. But this time I used the demo version of Final Draft 7 (apparently the lecturer doesn't have an issue with great big watermarks spread across the assignment submissions).

My new short story came out at a little over 1200 words. I figured I could format it up and once I'd discovered how long it was, I could decide on what to do with it from there. My guess was a little padding could go on it and it would work for the final 15 page script I'd need.

So I wrote it out and formatted it in Final Draft 7 and fell onto page five with the last bit of dialogue in the whole story - and I used a lot more direction and scene setting than I have in the past, but less actual scenes.

The good news is I'm now back to being in front with the diploma submission schedule. Module 1 has had assignments 1-3 completed, but only assignment 1 returned so far. Module 2 has had 1-4 completed (1-3 submitted and returned with grades). The assignment I formatted last night needs a final read through and then I'll submit it tomorrow. Module 1, assignment 4 is on POV and should be a walk in the park.

Nat might find this new story amusing as it details the struggle of a young man and his efforts to overcome his fear as he enters the local convenience store to purchase a box of condoms. Not particularly horrific in any way, other than to another 16 year old male who has gone through a similar situation - but I don't choose what pops into my head.

For the rest of today I'll be reading MageSign.

I'm a big Formula One fan and that season starts this weekend with the Melbourne Grand Prix (which I can't afford to attend :c() - so this weekend is a write off for doing any work. Still, all work and no play...

Negotiations continue with my rewrite of Dark Rose. This is the first time I've been asked to do a rewrite and I'm enjoying the back and forth comments with the editor. It's a good thing and just about complete with one final issue being raised and that a fairly easy one to fix. I've done the five changes it needed and sent back yet another version (I think this will make it version 4.3 or something). Announcement on where and when you can see it should be happening soon.

**Late announcement** I've applied to join The Random Complexity Writing Challenge instituted by Aerin the Mastermind. As part of the rules for joining I have to place the following on my blog:

RULES
1. Declare your intentions to join the challenge by putting up a post on your blog with this information. Fill out the registration form here. (Done!)

2. Write a minimum of 1000 words of fiction or creative non-fiction per month, from January through December of 2009. (You'd think this would be straight forward but I've only managed 907 so far this month. Unless you count my short story as well and then that comes to a little over 2000. Still a far cry from the 15k I wrote last month. I wonder if I can get writing assignments included in this...)

3. Post an update about your fiction on your blog, or on the Challenge blog (coming soon.) So, you can publish your writing if you want feedback, or you can just put up a post about the 1000 words you've written in the past month. (Moderator has the right to sniff out impostors, but mostly she trusts the honor system.) (I already do this so no great drama).

4. Your 1000 words per month can be in any form, but they must be created for this challenge. So, you could write two new non-sequential 500 word snippets for your previously begun WIP, or several hundred haikus, or a variety of short stories. You can use writing prompts. Fan-fic counts. Revisions count only if the original words were written as part of this challenge (so it doesn't count to merely edit your 2008 NaNo entry.) Creative non-fiction absolutely counts. Facebook missives and email correspondence do not count. (Hopefully I can start this in April - getting another 1000 words out this weekend will be difficult - you know, with the race and all...would this bit about "Creative non-fiction" - would that be writing assignments?)

5. Rules may be further explained, at any time, and entries are at Moderator's discretion.

Come join in with me. Fill out the registration form here.

Interesting Day

I've had a fairly productive day for a change - although I still haven't got back into Newland yet.

I've revised Dark Rose, cutting it by a paltry 40 or so words, but those words were the naughty over the top descriptive ones the editor asked me to kill, and resubmitted it. Hopefully that will now have a home and be published for Halloween this year. Once acceptance comes, I'll let you know where. (note the positive use of voice in there...;c))

I got stuck into writing the one-page plot summary of Newland required for my next assignment, and four versions later, I'm still not sure I like it, but I'm getting closer - I think.

I've made contact with Stuart Neville, author of The Twelve, an exciting new release from a first time author I've heard all sorts of good things about (Plus he's Irish, and it is St Pat's day and all). This is the guy who's blog I read from start to finish some time ago and have been keeping tabs on since. It's an interesting journey. Anyway, I'm hoping to be added to his list of reviewers. He's promised to forward my details to Random House so fingers crossed that all goes ahead.

Tonight I intend to continue my reading. I've only got 4 chapters and an epilogue to go, some 70 odd pages, so hopefully I'll be able to start drafting my review as well. I'll get that done by the end of the week - if all goes well.

Then I'm going to read a book of short stories (Maybe Tainted...) to cleanse my palette (so to speak), and do a review of that, before diving into Alan's second book MageSign.

The question then becomes, do I release both reviews together or one at a time? Alan - what would you prefer?

Back On The Bike

Today I intend to finish setting up my new laptop so I'll have a new base of operations.

Over the weekend I managed to complete the next assignment for Module 1 and have read the requirements for the next assignment for Module 2. Hows this for unrealistic:

In a week, I need to write a synopsis for Newland, a chapter breakdown and how I intend to handle a number of plot factors such as conflict, characterisation and other things. All within 500 words! I then have to do a summary on any sub-plots and themes - in another 500 words. Joy.

I have managed to read another 5 chapters in RealmShift so my reading is moving forward as well.

I've had a please revise and resubmit for possible acceptance for Dark Rose, so I'll be working on that this week as well, and lastly, I've had feedback on Dreaming. I need to tweak a couple of things on that and get that finished as well.

So, time to get cracking on my laptop so I can get stuck into everything else.

Here's hoping writing life is heading in the direction you want it to as well.

BT

Research Trip Bomb

It seems I didn't plan things too well.

On reading the finer details, you know, little things like the opening times, it seems my plan to visit one of my story's sites was a little wrong. Who would have thought that a bustling tourist destination would have it's historical information building closed Saturday, Sunday and Monday! Never having been a tourist, I didn't know the rare species only visited designated tourist spots during the week.

So we didn't end up going. Instead we diverted to rummage through some book stores looking for old tomes to gleam some much needed personal information from the times. Result, nothing! Well, not quite nothing. It's true I didn't buy a single book and became very disheartened as time went on but it has germinated a new idea. I think I will have to move my time frame forward a little. Currently my story is set in the late 1830s but very little detail has been written about the time. There are vast sweeping overviews which one would think allow a fictional writer to have his or her head, but the overviews must be extremely liberal with what they claim. Now I'm not saying that the history books are taking a little "poetic" license but some of the claims of what the original pioneers had or were able to purchase once here, seem a little "out there" would be a kind way of putting it.

I need to settle my mind on a couple of questions which should be possible once I gain entrance to the historical trust site on location. Tomorrow, I'm spending time in the State Library to see if I can uncover more there. We'll see.

It may seem like I'm pandering and allowing myself to be bogged down in minor details. I don't think so. If I get the flavour wrong, or the setting in one or two of the major settings, it could ruin the whole book. Should a story be able to stand on its own anyway? One should hope so, but I'm not writing a story that could be set anywhere in an imaginary universe, this is set at a specific time and in a specific place. If I propose a hotel existed in a place and find out later that there wasn't one there till 15 years later, then I won't be happy. I'd like this book to have wide appeal when done but I'm realistic to know that its possibly biggest audience will be the folk who live in these places. Some of them are big historians, one of them gave me this idea to begin with. If they start saying how many things are wrong with it, then the bad publicity could ruin things before they begin.

On another bad note: Dark Rose has been rejected again. This one piece seems to be bouncing in and out quicker than any other story. Should I use the old three strikes and you're out philosophy? I'm not sure.

I think I'll print it out and sit down for a good read through before making any further decisions.

Story title: Dark Rose
Market: The Edge of Propinquity
Status: Rejected
Comments: "Thank you for submitting "Dark Rose" to The Edge of Propinquity webzine. I am sorry but this story does not meet our needs at this time."

This is a form rejection sent personally, but I'm worried because I thought this story had all the elements they were looking for. I'm beginning to think parts of it come across as contrived. I think that because I was trying to listen to well meant advice from TPN members. I think I may have gone too far. It may have pleased them but I'm not sure it pleased me.

Next step: The above comments are why I'll now print this out and read through it a few times with different hats on. I may try a couple of beta readers who have asked to read some of my work in the past.

I've written a request to the administration of my diploma asking for a please explain in regards to my grades for semester one. From all the investigations I've done, I think I should have gained 2 Credits instead of the Credit and Pass marks I did gain. We'll see what they say.

No writing and no reading accomplished this weekend which is disappointing. No word on Issue #2 of SA50s+ either, which should have been out for close to a week by now.

I've been asked to help another writer out with short piece they're working on. I've already given them a huge amount of feedback on it so it'll be interesting to see where that goes from here.

So I've printed my story. Time to cast a really critical eye over it and see if I can pin down what's causing it to bounce.

Good luck with your submissions.

BT

The Rejection Pile Grows Further

Not a great day. I've had an upset stomach for the majority of the day which has laid me low. Too much moving around only stirred things up. So I spent the day watching a favourite series on the DVD player.

When I finally got around to checking my email I found a rejection.

Story title: Dark Rose
Market: Necrology
Status: Rejected

Comments: "While we found your work interesting, we receive far more submissions then we are able to publish. We are declining your submission; however we would like to see further submissions for you in the coming future."

An earlier comment from the same market for a different story: "Your work is interesting, but we did not feel it fit our current needs. We would like to see further submissions from you in the coming future."

Result: Although it sounds encouraging, the rejection letter is nothing more than a form rejection.

Next step: As there has been no real feedback and I still like the story, I've submitted it to a new market. It now awaits judgement at The Edge of Propinquity. If at first you don't succeed, keep sending your work out to new markets. Remember - there is a market for everything.

Good luck with your submissions

BT

Dark Rose Dies

Dark Rose was rejected from Midnight Echo :(

That was very disappointing. She has now been submitted elsewhere.

I need a title for The Idol Con. Yet another comment has come back about it from one of my readers. It's one of those problems that you look at for ages and end up playing the same words over in your head. I need to go for a walk and not think about it or work on other things. I have a couple of weeks left before I have to submit it. Hopefully something will occur to me before then.

System Failure has been sent out for comment and I'm slowly editing chapter 1 of Tigers Eye, while revising the first and second chapters of Voodoo. Things are moving forward.

Dark Rose

Has also been submitted this morning to Midnight Echo. Submission dates for this publication also end at the end of this month so you need to be quick.

It's Finally Finished

"Too Late the Rain", the short story that I've been working on solidly for the last month, which was first penned back July 2007, which has had an extra 1470 words added and at least 9 versions later--is done!

Some of my fellow critique group members believe otherwise. We have a difference of opinion on the ending. We'll see. I've had positive comments back from previous submissions of shorter versions but have never quite managed to find the right home for it. Fingers crossed I now will.

Still waiting on comments for "Dark Rose". As soon as I do receive any, or come Wednesday night, which ever happens first, I'll decide which story I'm sending to AHWA.

Another version of "Mobile" has been done, but I'm waiting for any further comments before I resubmit this one to the crit group. Deadline is 30th July, so I still have some time.

"Grimoire" has been revised some time ago. Rather than re-post this to the crit group, I'm sending it out the door as soon as I target a suitable market. I'll keep all future submissions to TPN under 5000 words.

My poetry assignment is still not quite there. Playing around with a few lines of the second poem before I submit it. Not far away. I expect this assignment, and the next, to be submitted before the end of this week.

I've emailed my teacher friend from the states, so we should start critiquing each others work again soon.

So I have a busy week of submissions ahead of me. At least four pieces to go out the door. Next week there's a good chance of at least another three following them. Plus the revision of my manuscript begins and I need to find an article for SA50s+.

Wish me luck--as I do for all your submissions.

BT

Assignment 6 Done

Module 1, assignment 6 has been completed and will go out the door either tomorrow or Monday. Depends on when my wife or I remember to go to the post office to send it.

At 18 pages long, it's one of the longest I've done so far.

Each of the two modules in the first semester has 8 assignments. My kids have 7 weeks of school left this term so I suppose that also means I have 7 weeks of this semester left. Once this assignment goes out the door, I have 5 assignments left to do in a little over 6 weeks. Somehow I ended up in front - cool!

This assignment started way back as part of assignment 4 in module 1. I wrote a 600 word story beginning from a prompt. In this assignment, I completed the story, then changed it into a one act play and then polished it, extracting an 800 word, dialogue-rich fragment. If I was to put the play on, I think I could just about recite all the lines by heart already. I was out in the backyard reading it out loud to see if it sounded right. BJ (the puppy) was looking at me very strangely.

Dark Rose received input from another Aussie writer today. The majority of his comments were good but he did think it needed a bigger twist. Time is against me to add that bigger twist at the moment. His suggestions were interesting though so I've added them to the folder for future reference.

No additional crits on the latest version of Too Late the Rain which is disappointing.

I'm up to date on all my current crit requirements so I managed some reading last night, which was nice for a change. I'm now almost halfway through John Saul's "Suffer the Children" - an excellent book but I think my increased knowledge in writing is damaging my enjoyment. I'm starting to pick up areas of the writing that could be done better. Good for my writing, but bad for my reading enjoyment. Over all though, the book is still a very good story. I'll post a review on my normal review page when I'm done. As it's an old book, I won't post it to HorrorScope.

Well that's it from me for tonight.

Good luck with all your writing endeavours and may all your submissions be successful.

BT

Drinkers - aka Dark Rose

It's done. Dark Rose (as Drinkers is now called) is ready for market. A couple of subtle changes from the last revision and she is now ready to be unleashed onto the Australian market. Cool.

I've also written the first draft of a new short story. I know I said I wouldn't be writing anymore new ones for a while but this didn't start out specifically as a new short story. A couple of assignments ago, I had to write the first 600 words of a descriptive short story. A day or two ago, I received information for entering into a local short story competition. My next assignment requires me to use a 600-800 word, dialogue rich, fragment of a story.

For the last few days I've been pondering what to write for the short story. I'd already decided I would use an 800 word fragment of another story I wrote, sometime ago called "Confused Love". In this assignment I need to provide a draft and a good copy. I figured my old story would suit that bill as I'd only written two versions and it definitely needed further revision to be useful for the assignment.

Then I had an idea. I took the first 600 words of my assignment from a couple of weeks ago and expanded the story that my lecturer thought I may not be able to expand upon. True, I changed the focus and the direction a little - well, a lot actually. In the end, I came up with a dialogue rich story that also fits into the word limit of the local competition. So, in writing this story, I've achieved two things - 1) I have an entry for the competition, or will have once it's been polished and 2) I have a piece to work with for my assignment.

Sweet!

* * * * *
In response to a comment I received from Karen, whose first line of the comment goes like this: "It would be interesting to read some of your stuff on-line."

Firstly, thank you for the interest Karen. Now, I currently have a number of examples of my work available. To view pieces I've had published electronically please visit my bibliography. You will find links to everything I've currently got floating around the net in there. None of it is dark fiction however. I also have a couple of examples of my early work listed here. One is my very first effort at writing a short story. The second is my first effort at entering a contest. The contest piece is dark fiction.

They are early efforts though and I've improved somewhat since then. I have put them there as reminders to myself of where I came from.

So why don't I post some of the later work I keep writing about? Because I want to get paid for it. If I post it onto my website or this blog, I'm giving away my first publication rights. Why would an editor want to pay me for a story everyone can read for free? I won't do it. Everything I write will one day turn up on my website - promise! But if I can sell it a few times first and make some money for the effort I've put into it - I should be entitled to do so.

So, if anybody wants to see examples of my stuff, have a hunt around my website. There's plenty there; from a drabble published by AntipodeanSF - to my 600-word start to a story included in my application for enrolment into my diploma. I'm yet to expand on that one. One day...

Thank you everybody for reading. It's nice to get the occasional comment, too. It's also nice to see little red dots popping up all over my counter map. People from all over the world now visit this blog to partake of my ramblings and occasionally to visit the website. Although the website doesn't get updated as often as this blog, it does contain a lot of stuff writers of any form of fiction will want to know about. I encourage all of you to visit at least every now and then.

Well, that's it for Mother's Day, 2008. I hope every mum out there received wonderful presents and had a great day - like I said before, you all deserve it!

Good luck with your submissions.

BT

Been A Productive Two Days

I've been busy.

I've finished this weeks assignment (the one on grammar, etc), I've revised Too Late the Rain so it is now ready for submission to TPN. I've revised Grimoire so that too is ready for TPN. I've just finished revising Drinkers, which has now been renamed Dark Rose.

I've also received an entry form for a local writing competition where the theme is open but the word count is for 2000 words or less. I need to work on one of my other stories - maybe a fantasy one this time round to prepare me for getting back into my manuscript.

I haven't received word back on my request for information about my next article for SA50s+ yet, which is a little annoying but there's plenty of time before I have to submit an outline.

Good luck with all your writing.

BT

Dilemma

As those of you who read these ramblings often would know, I've been feverishly working on four short dark fiction pieces over the last month or so. Winged Shepherd of Innocence has already been submitted to PARSEC. Drinkers, Too Late the Rain and Grimoire are the other titles. I have three weekends left before the 31st of May (not including the weekend that includes the 31st). This is important as my critique group (TPN) begin their schedule on a Saturday (Sunday in Australia). It is also important to note that two of the targeted markets have their submissions close on the 31st - and they are Australian based.

Now the "fly in the ointment" comes when my crit group has a word limit for posting. At 5000 words, it's fairly generous. Anything over that limit and it must be split over two weeks. There's my dilemma. Grimoire is over 5000 words. That means I need four weeks to get the three stories critiqued. Four into three doesn't go very well :(

I've posted the question on the forum and now await their decision if I can break the word limit for one week. They've all read the story in its two parts before, so they know what they're in for. We'll see. If not then Drinkers and Too Late the Rain will be submitted to the AHWA short story competition and Midnight Echo--not necessarily in that order.

This is a big step for me. Nobody in the Australian horror scene has seen anything from me before. The judges and editors of these two markets will be the first. Some of them I interact with on HorrorScope, others on an email group I'm involved with. They are published authors, respected in the Australian scene. I have befriended them and now they will judge me against other published Australian authors and a few international submissions. There will be other new writers submitting, but I'm guessing few will be Associate Editors of HorrorScope and AHWA members and unpublished within the genre.

If these submissions fall completely flat - I'm guessing they'll be looking at me somewhat differently. I'm confident these pieces are good stories but I don't know if they'll be good enough.

This is the self-doubt all writers experience on releasing their baby's into the harsh world of the marketplace. Big bad editors and competition judges can be pretty scathing in their assessment of a piece.

But they may also love it and want to pay you money for it. They may just want to publish it so others can fall in love with your words as well. If you don't submit, you'll never know.

Am I anxious about what I'm about to expose my work and myself too? Hell yes, but what am I putting all this effort into if I'm not going to try and put my work out into the public eye. Besides, I'd like to get paid for the amount of work I've done on these stories at some stage.

Now you know that I have the same issues as you do. Time to bite the bullet if you haven't already. Time to submit your carefully nurtured baby into the harsh world of publishing and see if it can stand among its peers.

Good luck.

BT

Apologies

I'm sorry I didn't blog yesterday, it's been a bit hectic round here and I've gotten a little behind on my web commitments.

I need to update the website too.

I received another assignment back from Mr Stone and surprisingly got another B. More surprisingly, I got a few really good comments and only one strange one.

Haven't received assignments back from Ms Inverarity though. She was the lecturer who informed me that I was a little behind in my work. Now I've caught up and she's two behind in marking them.

I've almost finished the latest assignment for her - the one on punctuation and grammar. Still struggling with a couple of sentences. I'm working from home tomorrow so I should be able to get it done.

Still haven't heard anything back on Winged Shepherd. Results aren't in till the end of May and notifications could take as long as mid June. Not expecting great things here as I've spotted some mistakes in the submitted version. Live and learn.

I need to do a final revision of Grimoire tonight but I need to do a final revision on Drinkers as well. Too Late the Rain has been shredded on TPN but I've got a new draft marked up. Just need to rewrite and submit for critiquing one last time. Not sure which one I'll send into the short story comp on AHWA. Whichever one I don't send in, will go to Midnight Echo. The others will start doing the rounds of the horror markets.

Optus has finally connected my Internet connection. It is heaps faster and well worth the wait. Their customer service is crap and the wait for installation was bad (one delay after another) but the service itself is very good - so far.

I'm up-to-date on all my crits and have an outline to research for SA50s+, things are moving forward.

Time to do some work...

Good luck with your submissions.

BT

Ready To Roll

Been busy today.

"The Winged Shepherd" has been pretty much rewritten and polished. I've submitted it to TPN for final comments before posting it off to PARSEC. Today is the 13th so it needs to go either tonight, or at the very worst, tomorrow night. I think it's pretty much done, so it shouldn't be too much of an issue.

"Drinkers" has been finished. That will go up to TPN after I finish posting this, as this weeks offering.

"Too Late the Rain" has been finished. That will go up to TPN next week.

Both of these pieces have grown, so only one can be entered into the AHWA contest. The other will be submitted to Midnight Echo. Currently I don't have a piece to submit to the flash fiction (<1000 words) competition.

I've added another piece to the examples page on my website. This is an interesting piece of history. It is the very first piece I ever wrote. It's not exactly a story, more a narrative, which is why it never went anywhere. The second piece I wrote was "Wake-up Call" which was published by AntipodeanSF.

I've updated my submissions spreadsheet. Now there's a dismal sight. Currently it reads as:

Published: 3 pieces
Accepted to be published: 2 pieces
Out to market: 1 piece
In progress: 9 short stories (including those three mentioned above)
Abandoned: 10 projects (fiction and non-fiction pieces included)

Plus I have two novels and two novella's in progress, and the outline of another story tucked away that I may or may never write.

I'm considering working on Tiger's Eye once these three pieces are out the door but then I want to research a new idea I have. Tiger's Eye (the first draft) has been written and won't go anywhere so, I'm in no hurry with that one.

I have to look into my next two assignments this week as well, finish another review for HorrorScope, take my wife to "Prom Night" and prepare for the arrival of our new puppy - see link at the bottom of the blog.

The good part about this week - no painting!

So in the next seven to ten days, I'll be submitting at least three pieces out to market - how about you?

Good luck with your writing.

BT

Painting

I hate painting - have I said that somewhere else on here???? :)

Last night I finished a rewrite of "Drinkers" so it's ready for a final look over by the crit group and then it's out to market.

Finished a rewrite of "ill wind" and have renamed it "Winged Shepherd of Innocence" - cool title I thought. This would have gone to TPN as well but I've run out of time. Working on the poem at the front of it now and then it's off to PARSEC.

Article for SA50s+ has gone in and has been accepted, now just waiting on the published issue to arrive.

I'm up-to-date on my crits but still haven't done the two reviews for HorrorScope - must get to that soon.

Have gone through the crits for "Too Late the Rain" - some interesting comments. Have taken out the thoughts that I think will improve the piece and ignored the rest. Once I've revised it, that too will go to TPN before submission.

I've changed the writers link on the right side of this page. It now has a partner and both go to pages maintained by Chuck McKenzie. Check out his site along with many other Australian writers. The second link is to Australian publishing houses - very cool resource. I'll also post both links on the web page.

Still painting the bedroom :(

I hope your writing is going well - keep those submissions going out the door.

BT

Whoops

Sorry it's been so long since I last updated. Work has been insane to the point that I've gotten home very tired.

Last weekend was our cricket GF in which we fell apart and got rolled big time. My last ever game of cricket was not particularly memorable - enough said.

The club was nice enough to organise a cake and a card for my birthday which was nice and there were some touching and heart-felt words within it from some of the younger players I've mentored this year.

"Too Late the Rain" should hit the Critters queue tonight and "Drinkers" has gather a few crits from TPN.

I've gathered a new piece to do my next assignment on but haven't yet received feedback on my last one.

I haven't made any time to work on "An ill Wind" yet either. Must do over Easter.

Thank you to MoleCat for leaving a comment. And for your suggestions and help on the blog improvements. I'm yet to make my way over to your blog but if you'd like to swap links and each host the others link - I'd be more than happy to.

OK - that's it for tonight. Short and sweet but I'm yet again ready for bed.

Good luck with your submissions.

BT

Eye Opener

I have just finished reading through some of my earlier work. "An Ill Wind" and "Confused Love". The first was originally written in July 2007, the second in August 2007. The premise for both is pretty good although "Ill Wind" (as in "ill wind" - might need to come up with another title that looks better in electronic print) is a stronger, more disturbing piece (or at least could be). "Confused Love" has been sent out to market once and came back with the comment of the reader not being able to really get into the story. "Ill Wind" has been critiqued by one individual some time ago with comments such as "All in all, a pretty good concept and certainly a tale that could be extremely riveting. I just think you have a lot of polishing to do on it."

After rereading them tonight, I'm left shaking my head and wondering whatever convinced me to let others see this work. I have been working hard on "Drinkers" and Too Late the Rain" recently and have done a number of revisions before releasing them to others. I up loaded the latest version of "Too Late the Rain" to Critters earlier today, even though it was originally posted on the queue nearly six weeks ago. It's due for crit next week and although I'd made changes, I didn't want others to see work of mine that I felt to be inferior.

Now the self doubt kicks in. If "Confused love" and "An Ill Wind" need huge amounts of work and I now realise that nearly 12 months down the track - what will I think of "Too Late the Rain" and "Drinkers" 12 months from now? Are they really as good as I think they are. I once thought the earlier two stories were pretty good too.

In the end, those I ask to critique my work and the market will be the true judge. As writers we continue to learn and to grow in our craft. The down side of that is when we look at old works, we instantly see the bad points, the silly structure we employed, the strange use of words.

I banished my self doubts by resolving to rewrite "An Ill Wind" and submit it to it's target competition before April 15th 2008. I have a month to seriously improve it. So be it. "Confused Love" will be turned into the script that it was originally thought up as.

"Drinkers" will be critiqued again next week as will "Too Late the Rain", then both of those will be going out the door. "Drinkers" to Midnight Echo and "Too Late the Rain" to the latest AHWA competition.

I will get additional writing credits from paying markets this year.

I hope you manage the same.

Good luck with your submissions.

BT

Drinkers Version 3 (now known as Dark Rose)

I completed an extended rewrite of my new short story "Drinkers" last night. I took into account most of the changes suggested by members of TPN, omitting only those that asked to insert some passive phrases.

The biggest comment I received was on it's length so "Drinkers", like "Too Late the Rain" before it, has now doubled in size.

I'll post it back to the crit group tonight after cricket training (if I get a chance).

I have one and a half chapters left to go on my crit of one members novel. This isn't a completed work. Only up to chapter 8 has been submitted for critique to this point. I still have a short to do for FF member and I'd like to comment on part two of another short by another TPN member.

I have also offered my services as a type of mentor for another TPN member who is about to start submitting work into the big bad world of the editors.

I want to do some more lay out changes on the blog. When I post a review, it looks cluttered in its present format so some tinkering is required - stay tuned.

I'll post my review of Black Static tomorrow on here and the web site.

I forgot to post out my assignment today so I'll do a final check on that tonight and send tomorrow.

Not a lot else to report at this time.

Hope your writing is going well and all your submissions are accepted.

BT