I’ve sold a couple dozen short stories over the years, and as a result I’ve worked with a number of editors.
Some of the most delightful editors I’ve ever worked with are Joshua Palmatier and Patricia Bray, who acquired my (collaborative) story “A People Who Always Know” for the anthology The Modern Fae’s Guide to Surviving Humanity, from DAW. Joshua and Patricia are smart, professional, insightful, clever–everything you’d want in editors. (They’re awfully nice people, too.)
And why am I telling you all this? Why, because this crack editorial team has an exciting new venture, and this venture has a Kickstarter, which opened today! Check it out!
The anthology is cool enough all by itself (and that artwork! OMG), but I’m even more excited about the new small press, Zombies Need Brains LLC. As you undoubtedly know, I’m a huge fan and supporter of small presses. My urban fantasy Nightcraft series (more on that in a moment) is coming out from Per Aspera; my novel Eel River is being published by Morrigan; and I just edited an anthology for Evil Girlfriend Media. Not to mention, I make most of my living proofreading and copy editing for a handful of small presses. No kidding, guys: the independent presses are not just our future, they’re our NOW. And new ventures like ZNB, with awesome editors and paying professional rates right out the gate? I’m 100% on board.
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In other news: speaking of Nightcraft, I did begin processing all the stuff Mark and I worked out over the long weekend. Thus far, I’ve got five single-spaced pages of notes and backstory, and I haven’t even started on the characters yet. It’s good, so far…but I may be another day or two working on this. It’s coming together nicely, though.
After this, of course, comes the rewrite itself. Heh. 🙂
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And while I was working on that, a nice young man came to the door, working to support the legalization of marijuana in Oregon. I interrupted his prepared speech to say Yes, I’m in, where do I sign, can I give you money? He didn’t quite know what to do with that…kept trying to explain and convince. No, really, dude: I’m in. Haven’t smoked in decades, but that’s a personal preference: I’d rather have wine. I honestly couldn’t believe Oregon defeated legalization last time around. I guess the whole state isn’t Portland…
I love small presses. Some of the gems I read in recent years came from small presses. My only regret is that independent bookshops are closing their doors all over the world. This particular combination would have been a great pleasure for me, to walk in a small, cozy bookshop and browse bookshelves full of small presses’ titles. Unfortunately, in my city (70,000 inhabitants) we have only three bookshops left. And to imagine the awful extent we reached, no movie theater. 🙁
Anyway, plenty of good things to read from you, Shannon! 🙂
I feel so lucky to live in a place where independent bookstores abound! Powell’s of course first and foremost, but there are many others. It’s good to remember that the rest of the world isn’t like this…then I appreciate it more. 🙂