Hey folks, it’s been a hectic month. I’m busy working on the final draft of my suspense novel, with plans to start a new novel in November.
If interested, check out the interview I did for the October 2011 issue of Something Wicked Magazine:
They’ve also put up my short story, “The Watcher in the Corner”:
I wrote the story in first person, which is something I do about one percent of the time. The story fits well with the Halloween vibe that’s going around the country.
Something Wicked is a great mag, one of my favorites (if not the favorite). They have a knack for filtering out the more contrived stories (writing to market, etc), which some mags have trouble with.
I’m happy to note that I’ve also been interviewed for the magazine, and I go into a bit of detail concerning how the piece was developed. The interview will appear on their website on October 18th, and is already included in the Kindle edition on Amazon, which you can get for a great price here:
“The Watcher in the Corner” is probably one of my more unusual stories. It’s also crafted in first person, which is rare for me.
All revisions to my novel INVASIVE are complete and the manuscript is in my agent’s hands. I’m not one to sit back and chill though (at least when it comes to writing). I’ve just finished a 6,000 word thriller titled, “Lost Planes, Lost River”. It feels good to write a first draft again. I’ve got a couple other short stories out there in the final rounds of consideration, so we’ll see how that goes in the next few weeks.
I’m expecting a busy fall. A bunch of my work is set for publication, and I’ll be doing at least two interviews. And of course there’s the matter of my other novel (AKA “my baby”), which is in its fifth draft. It should be polished within two months. The beta responses have been excellent, and that’s always a good feeling. I’m lucky to have a doctor in the mix as well in order to verify medical jargon/situations.
Stay tuned for updates, including news on a killer hardcover version of an anthology due in October.
Wait…did someone say “bears”? Why yes, they did:
This healthy Glacier National Park black bear popped up on the trail next to me at about twenty feet. Click the image for a huge version.
It seems like something out of a science fiction novel, doesn’t it? For the month of August I camped in several national forests and Glacier National Park. On my first night in the mountains, I was treated to a spectacular sunset. Many of the clouds took on vivid colors, and even the rain came down pink. I’d never seen this phenomenon before and was mesmerized by the beauty.
OK, so maybe there’s a touch of orange and red in there too. But pink is close.
So why spend all that time in the wilderness, tossing and turning in a tent as all kinds of critters patter by in the night? For scenes like this, of course. This is an area I visit every year. I’ve been tempted to reveal the location, but there are people I know who would kill me (and people I don’t know) if I gave it away. I can say the area is in Montana, and it’s where the first group of mountains rise above the prairie coming from the east. There are several ranges here, one of them a distinct “island range”. We’re looking south in the image towards Yellowstone, as this is part of the eighteen million acre Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.
As spectacular as the view was, the aural experience was just as good…the rustling cottonwoods, the faint chewing and hoofing of horses in a nearby pasture, the whisper of a fast-moving river in the distance. But sometimes what is left out is most important of all. And in this case it was the absence of motors. Airplanes, cars, motorcycles, lawnmowers, weedwackers, gone. You don’t notice how dominating those noises are until they’re removed.
Eventually the storm drifted east over the prairie, losing its colors. There’s something about light in the mountains. It’s cleaner, more vibrant, even restless. I wasn’t surprised as it faded above the flatlands. There’s magic in the wilderness and those peaks, enough for clouds to absorb when they pass over.
The fall issue of Ghostlight Magazine is out, and with it my story “The Red Aspen”. It’s a tale of dark suspense featuring Forest Service Ranger Matt Jenson as he searches for his missing ex-girlfriend in the wilds of Northern Minnesota.
You can pick up a digital or hard copy here.
Ghostlight Magazine does great work. You can’t go wrong checking out an issue. The cover reminds me of fall, too (my favorite season in Chicagoland).
