Today (or May 16th rather) is angelaina’s birthday. Since she’s a gazillion hours ahead of me in the time zones, I’m putting this up early.

Happy Birthday, Angela!

Thought I’d post a snippet from my fantasy novel Dark Caravan that I’m rekeying/rewriting. This is from Chapter Three and the young prince, desiring to discover what the princess he’s betrothed to is truly like, has arrived in the guise of the foppish Sir Kip.

Yes, this requires the word Awesome! ;)

In my last post, I found a couple of Beefheart fans in Vaughan Stanger and Josh Rountree, and I think I might have a Magic Band convert in Rochita.

Cruising YouTube I found this odd little tune by Captain Beefheart that I’d never heard. This shows his disjointed sound well. Here’s

“Space-Age Couple” 

For Mother’s Day I put up a bit of weirdness about Frank Zappa. A protégé of his was Captain Beefheart, aka Don van Vliet. Beefheart makes Zappa look almost normal, as he is beyond bizarre.

His 1969 album Trout Mask Replica is one of the strangest albums ever made. People either avidly hate this record or see it as the work of true genius. I love it!

Beefheart spent eight months rehearsing his band, then went in and recorded these 28 songs in four hours. Zappa was the producer. Such song titles are: “Neon Meat Dream of an Octafish,” “Hair Pie: Bake 1” and “Pachuco Cadaver.” This is some very strange stuff.

This morning I found this fascinating documentary of Beefheart on YouTube. Here’s Part Three, which gives a great idea of what the album Trout Mask Replica was all about. If you’re curious you can click on the other five parts from there. But this shows a detailed look at the man behind the dadaist weirdness that set him apart from everyone else.

Beefheart is in the upper right with top hat in the pic. Is this an odd-looking group of “human beings” or what?

Just got my print copy of The Sword Review #27, with my story “The New Elementals” in it. Also fiction by B.A. Barnett and Nancy Fulda. This is kinda cool.

Also, if you haven’t seen it, there’s a new LJ community that began yesterday that I joined called Query Eagles. This morning I wrote a query letter for my fantasy novel Dark Caravan and put it up on the site. Seems to be getting a good response. HERE If you have an interest in this community, go join up!

All’s well on this fine Monday.

I’d like to wish a Happy Mother’s Day to all those moms out there. And just so I don’t come off as the sentimental fool that I truly am, I’ll tell you this story:

Frank Zappa is one of my fave musicians/composers. He appeals to my sense of the bizarre and his influence led to my early interest in intellectual weirdness/avant-garde. When Zappa got his first record deal back in 1965, the name of his band was The Mothers. But the record label wouldn't go for that as they thought it meant mother fucker. Actually, it did. In LA at the time to call a musician a “mother fucker” was a compliment. It meant he was hot. But even though Frank didn’t use the F word, the label still wouldn’t go for it so they had him change the name to The Mothers of Invention.

What do you think of these Mothers?

Not a bad week. 5 rejections and 1 sale. And 28 subs out there at the moment.

Another short story written this week, this one called “Old Man Walking...” A paranormal urban street story. That’s one story written a week for the past three weeks. I really want to keep up this pace!

I’m also finding rekeying/rewriting my fantasy novel a good way to stay in the writing mood. I’m mostly just cutting exposition, so it’s not like I'm fighting alligators with one hand tied behind my back--the creative work is basically done. My goal is to crank out a 1000 words a day on the rewrite and so far I’m doing just that.

Now I have to get after this week’s Strange Horizons story to review. I liked the story in Dog vs. Sandwich this week, and enjoy having it as an ongoing. There was a time when I wouldn’t talk about my biz at The Fix until it reached fruition, but I’ve been reviewing short fiction for almost two years now so I don’t see the harm. I like some stories, don’t care for others. No biggie.

I will keep mum about my interviews at The Fix, except to tell you I have two fascinating authors and one author/editor to be up soon! Stay tuned.

I’ve done well at DEP zines, sold to three of them, but this is my first sale to the newly founded Mindflights. I really didn’t know if my story “Kickball” would be right for them as it has a street gang and drugs and a wizard’s severed head being rather rudely kicked around (hence the title), but it does have a positive anti-drug message at the end. Mostly, I just like the gangbangers using the wizard’s head as a kickball though. Fits in with my sense of the absurd.

This is sale #8 for 2008.

Also, my review of the April stories in Dog Versus Sandwich is up at The Fix. HERE

For those of you who saw my post over the weekend on my short fiction log, here’s my latest entry:

Many are blogging about Ironman and since I really don’t like going to the theater I’ll have to wait for it on DVD, but I have read issues of Ironman in the past. I had a few of the first issues in the 60s. Those would be worth quite a bit today if I still had them in mint condition. Alas, I don’t. But in the mid-80s is when the Ironman comic came alive! Coincidentally, I started reading comics again then and Ironman is a fave of mine.

There was a year where Tony Stark became an alcoholic. At first it was rather funny as he flew around bumping into walls as such, but then it turned dark. He gave the Ironman suit to his black pilot Rhoady to wear and fight crime while he became a skid row lush.

Captain America came down to skid row and chewed his butt out for being such a loser. Telling him: “What’s your problem, Stark? You’re rich, women adore you, you’re a success at everything. Why do you sit here in this fleabag motel room swilling cheap booze from a bottle?!”

Didn’t do any good. Finally Tony had an epiphany when he delivered a bag woman’s baby in the cardboard box she was living in. He discovered his problem. He was confusing the suit with the man inside it! (Many of us are guilty of that at times, I think. I know I am.) So Tony Stark went to get his Ironman suit back, but Rhoady wouldn’t part with it. See, Rhoady was making the same mistake Tony had: confusing the suit with the man inside. Those were some powerful issues!

Since October of 2004 I’ve kept a log of every short story I’ve read. This helps me in a lot of ways. Especially as a reviewer so I can find if I’ve read a story(s) by a given author. I did a guesstimate on stories logged, and at 11 stories per page average and 111 pages that’s roughly 1,200 stories. Not all that many for the time frame, but they do add up.

Behind the cut are a few listed. I use the 1-5 rating system. Not all of the stories I read do I make comments on, but I listed ones that I did. And yes, at the end I listed a few authors on my flist for published stories of theirs. And yes, I mostly picked out stories I liked here. I’m not always so kind, as a couple of entries show.

Those who know me, know what a huge Elvis Costello fan I am. Pardon the poor quality of the video, but here’s his first TV appearance when he’s quite young!

Alison

Wanna read a really cool space opera/romance? I’ve grown tired of SF over the last few years, leaning toward fantasy, dark fantasy/horror and assorted weirdness, but I really enjoyed this well-done space adventure by E. Catherine Tobler, published by Baen’s Universe last February. You can read “Waking Ophelia” HERE

Since I’m admitting my deep dark secrets this week, I’ll toss out another. For the past 12 years I’ve been a faithful viewer of ABC’s One Life to Live. I don’t watch any other soap--just this one. I seldom miss an episode!

“Waking Ophelia” received a rather negative review from none other than Lois Tilton, who called it an “Icky romance.” I’ll admit that no new turf is tilled in this story, but it did move me with its expressive language and deft characterization. What is it about our field that is often so cold and inhuman? Inquiring hearts want to know...

I seem to be blessed with a surge of creativity since the move to San Antonio. Must be all this clean living. Austin was a good exercise in decadent living, not that I needed the practice. Personally I like being tied to this computer and never going anywhere. I decided not to go to ArmadilloCon this year. I’m certainly not the same guy I was back when I was a working musician. Back then I never stayed home. I was always out doing weird stuff. Guess I got that out of my system.

Finished short story #82 and #83 in the past week. Also, 31 stories out there now vying for oxygen in the slush pile. And two really great interviews I was lucky enough to get coming out soon! Can't tell you who they're with yet, of course. And I have Dog Versus Sandwich and Strange Horizons as ongoing assignments at The Fix. That should keep me busy.

And there is also my fantasy novel I'm rewriting at the pace of a few hundred words a day. A good summer project, I think.

I have much to read as well. The most recent Year’s Best collections I received in the mail and The New Weird anthology. And hopefully the Spurs will go all the way to win the championship again this year!

Where do I get my story ideas? I did a lot of hallucinogenic drugs in my developmental years!

Truth told, I did so much LSD back in the 70s and 80s that I was under a Federal quarantine for many, many years and was forbidden to go outside because I was an air-traffic safety hazard. I never saw God, but I did glow in the dark after sundown. Which made me popular at rock concerts, when I could sneak out and get into one.

I’m better these days and fairly straight-laced. But I do catch myself somewhat effulgent on the night of a new moon and on Jerry Garcia’s birthday. Which makes no sense as I never was a Grateful Dead fan. Chalk it up to an “occupational” hazard.

I went through my various lists of short story ideas today. I subtracted and added and ended up with a master list of 61 stories to possibly work on in the future. Correction, it’s now 60. I wrote a story this afternoon!

I’ve had this harebrained idea for a while about this woman in the far future who is planning a family. So far, she and her husband have committed to theoretical children, as it fits in best with their modern transdimensional lifestyle. This way they can see how the hypothetical children--twins in this tale--turn out and decide if they want to do the real thing, or convert them to the real thing. This is the far future so anything is possible, like magic, ya know.

When the automated storyteller on the conceptual crèche breaks, the woman--Darling is her name, but she’s anything but darling in the end--must resort to telling the neonate-notions a bedtime story orally. Her bedtime story is an apocryphal tale of how Billy the Kid is enlisted by Queen Victoria to stop Napoleon in his conquest of space. Tom Edison, HG Wells, Jules Verne, Benjamin Disraeli, and Jack the Ripper all make a cameo. See, Darling has never been a good student of history and has all her “facts” messed up. Dates, time periods, technology, etc. In the opening scene Pat Garrett is about to kill Billy the Kid as history records it, but a cell phone call saves his life.

I completed a 2100-word first draft this afternoon. I might never be able to sell it, but it was fun to write. Sure beats the hell out of sitting around thinking about writing a story!

will couvillier asked this question last evening on his LJ:

Several people chimed in HERE and I noticed the responses fell into two basic groups. The listing of various worn out tropes (werewolves, FTL, time-travel, etc.) and those who thought it’s all in the execution, that even a tired old idea can work in the right hands. I’m in the latter, but this got me to thinking about a similar topic:

Do you prefer fiction (short stories usually) where the speculative element is greatly downplayed or only appears at the end of the story, i.e. as a surprise or as if only to make the story speculative it would seem? Or do you prefer speculative fiction to immerse itself in the fantastical element from the very first scene?

Obviously both are valid approaches when done well. Personally I prefer speculative fiction that knows it’s speculative fiction, makes no bones about being so and plays with the tropes. What do you think? Do you write (or have written) stories both ways?

Found this pic, loved it, wanted to share it withcha.  See them all HERE.

Now having a few interviews under my belt, I think I’m getting the hang of my new gig at The Fix. One thing you might have noticed is that I tend to fade into the woodwork in my interviews, keeping my questions short and concise, letting the interviewee have the spotlight. It’s their moment not mine. I see my job as one more of coordinator than anything else. Yes, I try to learn as much as I can about the person being interviewed, but with the best subjects I really don’t know how much my preparation matters. I’m sure it does, just saying that a great interviewee can take the lamest questions and make the interview interesting. Oh course, the converse is true as well and that’s where I think interviewing skills come into play. Luckily all my interviewees have been fascinating people. Fascinating people give good interviews despite the questions asked of them.

Anyway, here’s my humorous, outlandish example of how I think a great interviewee can make the lamest questions fascinating. If you’d like to answer the questions behind the cut in the comments section yourself, please do. It’s a slow Sunday.