It's 🎃 season

October is pumpkin season, in more ways than one. I’m not usually one for flavoured coffees (mochas don’t count!) but a few years ago my brother introduced me to a pumpkin spice latte—a ‘PSL’ to its true fans—and now I’m hooked. I was more excited about my annual PSL binge than anything else this month. Although, this is the first year my kids want to go trick-or-treating, so maybe all that Halloween cuteness just pips it. I missed their Halloween disco at school because my train home from Cardiff was cancelled after an unexploded WWII bomb was found near the tracks. The odds of that happening on that day at that moment, I should have bought a lottery ticket. I can’t wait to see them dressed up and excited later on 🎃 👻

Nowadays, even traditionally published writers are expected to market, promote and sell their own books. Gone are the days of the publisher doing everything. To someone like me, an introvert with no sales background or skills (I could not sell a plane ticket to a castaway), this kind of fills me with dread. However, during the Writers of the Future workshops, I received a masterclass in marketing and picked up a few tips to help avoid awkward pushy sales pitches. While I wouldn't it’s something that excites me, I don’t feel quite so nervous about it now.

With the opening of the British Science Fiction Association awards nomination window, the starting gun is fired on awards season. I’ve had a pretty exciting year so far and I’m delighted, and somewhat still disbelieving of the fact, that I’m now an author with a list of published works eligible for awards. It’s quite amazing to think I’m even in this position, and I hope someone out there has read and enjoyed my stories enough to consider recommending them to others and to put them forward for an award. Competition is outrageously fierce, so my expectations are appropriately low. However, it’s just a great feeling to even be eligible.

My eligible stories are:

The noble art of analysing a rejection and deciphering how close you were to an acceptance.

This month, I was more focussed on writing a new short story and editing another, so I only submitted 2 stories. I received 3 rejections. I also passed 40 submissions for the year, which is 50% of my total submissions before this year. I think that shows my increased commitment to giving writing a good go and, even though my acceptance rate is lower than I’d like (i.e., not 100% 😂), I’m pretty content overall.

My book recommendation is “The Colour of Magic” by Terry Pratchett. It’s the start of the iconic, and hilarious, Discworld series, though it’s not everyone’s recommended starting point. I’m someone who HAS to start a series at the beginning, and I fell in love with Terry Pratchett’s stories from the moment he redefined the Big Bang Hypothesis in the opening prologue. And, who doesn't need more humour in their lives? This is also kind of a Halloween inspired choice, as it features trolls, dragons (but only if you believe in them), wizards and even Death itself. What more can you want?

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What I’ve been reading: The July / August issues of Analog and Asimov’s magazines, which arrived with me here in Wales around mid-September. I guess I could call it market research, but reading the short stories published by two of the top speculative fiction magazines is the most fun researching I’ve ever had. I haven’t finished either, but my favourite stories so far were “Hidden Achievement” by Shane Tourtellotte (Analog) and “In the Halls of the Makeshift King” by Tobias S. Buckell (Asimov’s). What’s quite inspiring to me is that I’ve noted a few former WOTF winners in the table of contents, including Tobias Buckell (Vol. 16), Robert Reed (Vol. 1), and a recent winner from Vol. 40, Lance Robinson, will have a story in the next issue of Analog, which I’m very much looking forward to reading next month. It gives me a sense of hope and optimism that I’m following in their footsteps and, with some luck, one day I’ll have a story in such prestigious magazines too.

What I’ve been watching: We’ve nearly finished watching season 5 of Only Murders in the Building. We’re not usually ones for crime shows, but this is more of a cozy murder mystery in the spirit of Poirot than gritty modern police procedurals. If you’ve not seen it, it’s based around an unlikely trio of sleuths who podcast about murders in their building. It’s clever, wonderfully written, super funny, and the chemistry between Martin Short, Selena Gomez and Steve Martin is brilliant. There’s a few A-list cameos this season, including Meryl Streep (though she first appeared last season) and Renée Zellweger, and I really hope it comes back for a sixth season. It’s one of those shows I’ll watch back from the beginning one day—probably when I have to deal with the time when the show is not renewed / comes to a natural end.

It’s not that I don’t enjoy summer, I do, but with my Scandinavian heritage, I prefer brisk afternoons and autumn colours, and I go from the colour of milk to lobster red in an hour!

But more importantly, once Halloween is over, the countdown to Christmas can begin, and that’s my favourite time of the year. (I’m already listening to ‘Magic Christmas’ on the radio 🤣!)

Until next time, keep dreaming.

Joel