Category Archives: Professional

career, outward projection of you and your works

Brawling Cowboys, Furtive Gamblers & Other News from the Western Fictioneers

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Troy D. Smith teaches history at Tennessee Tech University. He also writes Western short stories and novels.  Smith recently won the 2011 Peacemaker Award for Best Western Short Story for “The Sin of Eli,” which appeared in the Western Fictioneer’s first anthology, The Traditional West. He is also a past winner of the Spur Award, and current president of Western Fictioneers.

I appreciate the invitation to do a guest blog here at Booklifenow. While I have never been known to shirk an opportunity to talk about myself and my writing –as we all do, if we want to get anyone’s attention –I decided to use this forum to talk about Western Fictioneers, and the very exciting new project we have coming down the pike soon.

Western Fictioneers is the only professional writers’ organization devoted exclusively to fiction about the American West. We have some of the most exciting new authors in the genre, and many (if not most) of the veterans whose traditional westerns line book racks around the country. We present an annual award called the Peacemaker for best novel, short story, and first novel. We have also begun publishing anthologies; our first, The Traditional West, is one of the biggest such collections ever offered to the public, and one of the most critically acclaimed. It contains both the Spur and Peacemaker award winners from this year, and several of the Peacemaker finalists.

We are now embarking on something never before attempted in the western genre, and only tried a handful of times elsewhere (and not quite in the same way.) WF is producing a new series of novels, under the overall banner of Wolf Creek. They are set in the early 1870s, in the fictional town of Wolf Creek, Kansas. Each of the authors involved –seventeen at last count –has created one or two characters who live in or around the town. Each book is a collaborative novel, with five or six authors participating and writing chapters from the perspective of their own characters, usually interacting with one another. We have a large cast of supporting characters as well, which the authors will “share,” making the project an ensemble piece not dissimilar in structure to the HBO series Deadwood.

As series editor it is my job to make sure it all fits together smoothly –and so far, due to the professionalism and talent of our members, it has been a far easier task than I expected. In fact, I am quite proud of how our first volume –Bloody Trail –has turned out. It will be released on September 1, with a new title to follow every three to four months.

In Wolf Creek, you will discover, everyone has a secret. Tensions from the Civil War remain high, as the town had been founded at the height of the Bleeding Kansas years by abolitionists. With the arrival of the railroad, however, there has been a population influx –many of them ex-Confederates. A seedy “helltown” nicknamed Dogleg City has grown up on the south side of town, filled with brawling cowboys and furtive gamblers (and far worse.) Corrupt politicians and criminally inclined saloon owners compete for control of the dark side of town, while decent men and women try to make lives for themselves –and professional lawmen try to keep the peace. A nearby fort has been established to protect the town, and the surrounding farms and ranches, from hostile Indians. The possibilities for compelling stories –especially from this top-notch bunch of writers –are endless.

We have created a “house name” as principal author of the series: Ford Fargo. No secret is made, however, of who the writers really are –they are listed in the table of contents. In any given volume you may see one of your longtime favorites, or you may discover new writers whose style you like as well. We have been working on this “shared world” for months, and are very excited to announce it now to the general public. I predict you’ll be pulled in as completely as we have been; if this series is half as much fun to read as it has been for us to create, we’ll be in good shape.

More details will be forthcoming soon from WF at our website, www.westernfictioneers.com … and much more detail is available to our readers right now, at a special website we have constructed for our series: http://wolfcreekkansas.yolasite.com/.

 

Locus Awards Weekend

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 Keffy R. M. Kehrli is a science fiction and fantasy writer who lives in Seattle. His fiction has been published in Fantasy Magazine, Escape Pod and Beyond Binary: Genderqueer and Sexually Fluid Speculative Fiction. He also edits for Shimmer Magazine and can be found at http://www.keffy.com

 

 

Last weekend (June 15-17), I attended Locus Awards Weekend. The Locus Awards have been held in Seattle since 2006. This year, they were sponsored by Locus Magazine, 123-Awards.com and NW Media Arts. NW Media Arts also sponsored a two day workshop (with James Patrick Kelly and Connie Willis as instructors) on Friday and Sunday at Richard Hugo House.

For those of us who didn’t do the workshop, the weekend started on Friday evening. Attendees were treated to a reading by Connie Willis and James Patrick Kelly, followed by a short meet and greet. One of the things I really enjoy about Locus Awards Weekend is that the event is small enough that I have a chance to talk to most of the other attendees.

 

On Saturday, there were two 45-minute panels in the morning, followed by a short memorial for Ray Bradbury, a book signing (with books available to purchase from the University Bookstore), and the awards banquet.

Confession time. I didn’t wear a Hawai’ian shirt to the Locus Awards this year. Of course, while we were eating lunch, Connie Willis came around to enforce the Hawai’ian shirt rules. People without Hawai’ian shirts were entered into a drawing to choose from a small selection of supposedly tacky shirts. My own sense of style is so warped, however, that I found everything on the table somewhat disappointingly tasteful. Yes, I realize that there are things wrong with me.

The awards announcements were fairly quick. Locus Award short lists aren’t announced at the awards, so despite my inability to remember to go shopping for a Hawai’ian shirt, Catherynne Valente had asked me to accept for her if she won in any of her categories and it turned out that she won three, all in a row. I was a little bit nervous during lunch that I’d completely botch her speeches if I had to go to the podium, but luckily the audience was pretty laid back.

Saturday evening was the Clarion West Party, which is always fun. It’s always great to meet the year’s incoming Clarion West students before they’re exhausted from too much critiquing and not enough sleep. Of course, I ruined the effect of Former Clarion Students Tell The Incoming Class That Doom Awaits Them by standing near the cake and telling the few students who wandered over that really it’s not that bad.

Just in case you were avoiding the internet last week, here’s a list of the 2012 Locus Award Winners:

 

Science Fiction Novel

Embassytown by China Miéville (Del Rey; Macmillan)

 

Fantasy Novel

A Dance with Dragons by George R. R. Martin (Bantam; Harper Voyager UK)

 

First Novel

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern (Doubleday)

 

Young Adult Book

The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente (Feiwel and Friends)

 

Novella

Silently and Very Fast by Catherynne M. Valente (WSFA)

 

Novelette

“White Lines on a Green Field” by Catherynne M. Valente (Subterranean Fall ’11)

 

Short Story

“The Case of Death and Honey” by Neil Gaiman (A Study in Sherlock)

 

Magazine

Asimov’s

 

Publisher

Tor

 

Anthology

The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty-eighth Annual Collection edited by Gardner Dozois, (St. Martin’s Griffin)

 

Collection

The Bible Repairman and Other Stories by Tim Powers (Tachyon)

 

Editor

Ellen Datlow

 

Artist

Shaun Tan

 

Non-fiction

Evaporating Genres: Essays on Fantastic Literature by Gary K. Wolfe (Wesleyan)

 

Art Books

Spectrum 18: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art by Cathy Fenner & Arnie Fenner (Underwood)

 

You can find the shortlist at the Locus Online announcement here: http://www.locusmag.com/News/2012/06/locus-awards-2012-winners/

What’s in a Name?

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We name the world around us. As children we name our toys and imaginary playmates. As gamers and internet users we name our accounts and individual avatars. As writers we agonize over the name of each character.

It’s no wonder so many writers give themselves a name. I liked the idea so much I gave myself two—a different identity for different genres and points of view. My guess is that a good portion of the readers here use one as well.

There’s a lot of reasons to rename yourself. For Dirk Diggler in Boogie Nights he imagines seeing his name in big neon lights—perhaps no different than many of us picturing our name on the cover of a book. “I want a name, I want it so it can cut glass, y’know, razor sharp.” Razor sharp. Or maybe we just want something more arresting—simplified if we have long names, more floral if your real name is too common; dark, mysterious, comedic…unique.

Some may hide behind a pen name to protect their real identity or their professional career. Others may want to create different names for different genres—it might be prudent for a writer of erotica to create a pen name for their foray into children’s lit. Stephen King came up with Richard Bachman so that he could publish more than one novel a year, and his son—Joe Hill—turned away from his celebrated family name so that he could work and succeed on his own merits.

Creating a pen name allows us to create a new identity, a new character that may or may not look like us, live where we do, or do what we do. It’s a new layer, a new story to tell.

It might also be a new complication.

As a writer, artist, or creative professional in any medium, your promotional efforts are your own blood, sweat and tears. In this highly-connected world we live in, one of the truest paths toward successful self promotion is through social media channels. Attempting to create a name for yourself that is not your own poses many problems. Suddenly, you have an identity that is not you—at least not directly – and if you’re already active in these circles you need to start making choices. Do you create a new Twitter handle or Facebook account? Do you keep the pen names quiet? Tie them to your real name? If you’re already promoting yourself through a blog, do you want to set up another site for your pseudonym?

What about conventions and other “real world” events? Will you answer when that pen name is called out? Are you ready to sign that made-up name when people ask for your autograph? Are you robbing them of an opportunity to meet the real writer behind the words?

You also can’t sign contracts with a fake name. If your goal is anonymity you will need to seek out legal advice to somehow prepare this aspect before you’re confronted with a sale (which leads to contracts, which leads to exposing your real name to the editor and publisher).

If you’re highly inventive about your pseudonym’s life and experiences be prepared for some backlash. It’s very possible you can create confusion by the story you tell about your fake identity, and you may turn readers—or worse, editors and publishers—off with your fake personality.

These are all manageable concerns, but I suspect most of us spend more time thinking about what the name should be than how having one will affect your career. Don’t ignore this aspect—it’s possibly the most important consideration.

I recently made the decision to switch away from my pen names and publish under my own. A number of factors played into this: not giving each identity enough promotional time; seeing that publishing credits for one name meant very little for the other; realizing that most of my connections on Facebook (with my real name) had no knowledge of my pseudonyms; and not knowing if I should tie my personal artistic efforts to a pen name or the real one.

But it took another artist to laugh at my assorted names for it to really click—I was not doing myself any favors. He also pointed out that my real name was infinitely more memorable than the others. I can’t argue with that. In the end, isn’t that what really matters?

Hello, my name is Bear. Who are you?

On Mentoring

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Jennifer Brozek is an award winning editor, game designer, and author. She has been writing role-playing games and professionally publishing fiction since 2004. With the number of edited anthologies, fiction sales, RPG books and non-fiction books under her belt, Jennifer is often considered a Renaissance woman, but she prefers to be known as a wordslinger and optimist.

Read more about her at her blog: http://www.jenniferbrozek.com/blog/

To Mentor or Not to Mentor—Is that the Question?

 

I have to admit, when I started mentoring—taking on editorial interns—it was not for any altruistic reason. The simple fact was that I needed help. I had overbooked myself on anthologies to edit and I needed several sets of eyes to make certain nothing slipped through the cracks.

Of course, that meant I had to teach my interns what those cracks were. In doing so, we both came up with ways to ensure a measure of quality for every anthology we put out. Until I had to teach what I did to someone else, it never occurred to me that I could make it easier on myself by improving and documenting my process. That was the first lesson I learned as a mentor.

I lie. My first lesson I learned as a mentor in the publishing industry is that there are a lot of people who want to learn what I do. They are all willing to do the labor for free because they are gaining real world experience in a profession that interests them. Also, thank goodness for having a standard set of questions for the editorial intern applicants to answer. I was able to compare and contrast the 25+ applicants.

In the end, I chose three interns to work with. Those three interns taught me more about what I do than I ever thought possible. That is why I keep mentoring today.

 

Mentoring is a Partnership

 

There are many things a mentor does but it mostly boils down to answering these three questions:

  • What do I do?
  • How do I do it?
  • Why do I do it that way?

 

These three questions demand clear and concise answers. This is not a parent-child relationship. You cannot say “Because I said so” or “Because that’s the way it’s always been done”. There must be a reason for what is done, how, and why.

Invariably, the next question that enters the picture is: How can we make this better?

It is easy to do things the same way when it is just you. You are in your own head. Humans are creatures of habit. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Of course, until you have another mind involved, you may not realize your process was broken. Or, you may have realized it was less efficient but, meh, you’re the only one you inconvenience.

Once you get a mentee, the desire to do everything the “right” way rears its far-too-perfect head and that’s when things are either proven sufficient or proven broken.

 

Mentoring is Like Parenthood

 

Nothing makes me prouder than to see one of my former interns succeed. It makes me feel like I did something right. I gave my interns the right kind of information, the right direction to go, and the right drive to succeed. It is even cooler when they go on to do something spectacular.

For example, Erika Holt had no professional editing experience when I brought her on as my intern. However, she took on the critically acclaimed zombie erotica anthology, “Rigor Amortis,” (co-edited with Jaym Gates) while she was interning with me. I was happy to lend an ear and my two cents when she needed. Now, Erika has gone on to a position I wish I could have. She is an assistant editor for Nightmare, the new pro horror magazine by John Joseph Adams. In this case, the student has surpassed the teacher. I am so pleased—and a little envious.

 

Mentoring Benefits Everyone Involved

 

I can’t recommend becoming a mentor enough. The process of mentoring allowed the mentor to pass on experience and knowledge while getting to look at what they do through fresh eyes. The mentor learns as much as the mentee about communication and clarity. The mentee gets to go out into the cruel world a little bit more fair warned and fair armed. Finally, the mentor gets to watch the mentee’s progress as they take what they have learned and grow their career.

Everyone has something they can teach another. The question is not whether or not to mentor, it is what to mentor and to whom.