One year on from THAT phone call

As I wrote this month’s newsletter, I realised it is almost one year to the day since the very lovely Joni Labaqui informed me I was a winner of the Writers of the Future contest. What a whirlwind of a year it’s been!

Guest blog for the Writers of the Future contest

I was asked by the good folks at WOTF if I would write a blog about the inspiration behind my story, “The Stench of Freedom”. I was, of course, more than happy to do so. When I was submitting stories to the contest, I’d often read the guest blogs from former winners, trying to gather every bit of advice I could find and try and use it to craft a winning story. I hope there’s a morsel of useful advice in this article that helps someone else achieve their dreams too.

It is rather fitting, I think, that this blog has gone live almost a year to the day I received THAT phone call telling me I was a winner of the Writers of the Future contest! And if you’re interested in what links Swansea City Football Club, mid-week encounters in the opening rounds of the League Cup, and the Writers of the Future contest, read the separate post on my website to find out.

Interview on The Writing Community Chat Show

I appeared on the Writing Community Chat Show (WCCS) this month, where I talked with the hosts CJ Aggett and Christopher Hooley about my writing journey and inspiration, what my publishing goals are, what story ending I would change, and why I chose Radagast the Brown (from the Lord of the Rings) as the character from another series that I’d like to pinch and use in one of my stories (hypothetically, of course).

The WCCS is a great chat show which is aimed at building a supportive community for writers. In over 360 episodes, they have brought on some big name guests to share tips and writing advice (Julia Donaldson, Karin Slaughter, Mark Billingham, Ian Rankin and many others). If I recall correctly, they said I was the first writer to come on and talk about short stories, so I hope that different perspective meant I managed to impart something of interest to their regular listeners. Click on the link below to read the full post and access the interview.

Rejectomancy

The noble art of analysing a rejection and deciphering how close you were to (or not) to an acceptance.

This month, I submitted 7 stories and received 6 rejections. That now means I have breached the 100 rejection barrier, though based on this scale, I’m still only a level 5 Rejectomancer.

A couple of the rejections were personal (a comment from the editor) and one was a request for a rewrite, which I’ve not had before. Essentially, there were a couple things the editor thought should be changed if they were to consider publishing my story. While it is still a rejection, it is asking me to try again with their suggested revisions, although there are no guarantees the revised story will be accepted. Most (if not all) magazines ask you not to resubmit rejected stories, so it feels like progress.

Why I love “A Game of Thrones”

Inspired by the War of the Roses, it makes no attempt to gloss over the violence committed in the periods that inspired traditional fantasy settings, and is driven by human greed and vanity, with tumultuous politics, backstabbing betrayals and unexpected deaths. But beyond that, the A Song of Ice and Fire series (of which this is the first book) is special to me because it takes me back to my first great adventure with my wife, when we were penniless backpackers tramping across New Zealand.

Disclosure: To cover some of my running costs, I have incorporated affiliate links from Bookshop.org, whose fees support independent bookshops. If you buy books linked to my site or newsletter, I may earn a commission.

What’s got me hooked this month?

What I’ve been reading: Continuing my focus on reading more short stories, I finished Stories of Your Life and others by Ted Chiang this month, which is his first collection. It was excellent, a 5* rating for me. Ted Chiang is one of the most successful writers in speculative fiction, winning the major awards in science fiction several times, including the prestigious Nebula award with his first published short story, ‘Tower of Babylon’, which is a retelling of the Biblical tale of the Tower of Babel. There’s also the titular story, ‘Story of Your Life’, which was made into the film, ‘Arrival’ starring Amy Adams, about an alien race that sends various communications devices to Earth and a linguist’s attempt to understand their language and communicate with them. Although, I think my favourite was ‘Seventy-Two Letters’, which is an alternate history story set in Victorian London where the characters are trying to stop what appears to be the end of the human race due to an impending (and unreported) infertility. The story was inspired by the golem from Jewish mythology and the use of ‘names’ to give life, as well as taking the historical idea of sperm containing homunculi, tiny but fully formed human beings from which a foetus was believed to develop. Each of the stories is brilliant, and very different, the only really similar thing is how great they each are. I was left with a sense of awe at Ted Chiang’s intellect, imagination and also story telling ability. Reading his collection reminded me of the anecdotes I heard of the reaction of various bands and producers when they first heard the Beatles’ White Album; both a sense of wonder and despair, wonder at how great it was and despair that they’d never produce something as good. But putting creative angst aside, it is a great collection and I thoroughly recommend it. Ted Chiang has another short story collection out, ‘Exhalation’, which I will be picking up soon. I’ve just got quite a few other books on my To-Be-Read list first!

What I’ve been watching: I watched ‘Austin’, which is a British-Australian comedy about a picture book writer (Julian, played by Ben Miller) who retweets a post by a Nazi and gets ‘cancelled’ during a tour to Australia. During that tour, he discovers he is the father of an autistic man (Austin, played by Michael Theo) and the series explores how Julian (who is a bit of a narcissist) tries to use Austin as a way of rescuing his career, but actually genuinely bonds with him, as well as the impact Julian’s tweet (and his ‘cancellation’) has on his family, particularly his wife, Ingrid (played by Sally Phillips), who was the illustrator and co-creator of the picture books books. It was pretty funny and heart-warming and an easy watch (and only eight 30 minute episodes).

Memetime

It’s coming to the end of the summer holidays and it’s been a challenge keeping the kids entertained, finding places to take them and making memories, all with 6am wake ups and ever later bed times (and hats off to my wife who has done the lion’s share of it!). My children’s memories are, when it comes to stuff they want, ridiculously good, so this meme captures the many moments during the summer when our promises to do stuff tomorrow have come back to haunt us.

Until next time, keep dreaming.

Joel