Cover for “Eye Witness: Zombie” Anthology
I am quite excited about this anthology from May December Publications. It is being released soon and contains a story of mine that is derived from the same world as Comes The Dark. I won’t reveal the connection, but suffice it to say, there are a couple of characters that appear in my trilogy that also appear in my story, “A Soldier’s Lament.”
This one should be out in the next month or so, and my copy is on its way from the publisher. I can’t wait to get my hands on it!
Patrick D'Orazio's Blog 
Awesome, Pat!
September 21, 2010 at 7:37 pm
Hello! I’ll be appearing alongside you, not Eye Witness Zombie but in Doomology, so I thought I’d drop by and say hi. Doomology will by my first publication and I’m super excited, but that’s nothing to what’s going on in your world–wow, when it rains it pours, eh? Congratulations on the novel, and all the short stories.
I have a question for you. Do you write many stories (not novels) simply when an idea strikes you, or do you mainly write stories when you find a call for entries? Personally, I’ve never written anything especially for a specific market, nor do I see myself doing so in the near future. The question is always at the back of my mind: if they don’t want it, then what? Is it general enough to fit other markets? Of course, if I happen to find a market that fits something I’ve already written, that’s great! I’m just curious since your previous blog entries seem to indicate that you mostly write stories for specific anthologies, and this is very different from my own methods.
Anyway, I just wanted to drop by and introduce myself, and I invite you to stop by my blog sometime:
sciencefictionmommy.blogspot.com
I blog about parenting my toddler as well as all the exploits of my writing. Hope to see you there sometime!
September 22, 2010 at 2:43 am
Eileen,
Thanks! I have seen your posts on the Library message boards in the Doomology section. My handle over there is ‘sloggoth’.
I have written several stories that were for my own satisfaction-ones that I was motivated to create with no promise that they would ever end up in an anthology because they weren’t ‘built to spec’ as it were. I have gotten very lucky with one of them, in that an antho opened up that was perfect for it. I have not heard back on that one though, so we shall see how perfect it was for it in the end.
I have started tackling open anthos and trying to come up with specific ideas for those anthos. I have considered it a challenge for me to see if I could write something based on the criteria they want. It has been a mixed bag for me. Sometimes I hit the mark and sometimes not. But since I am fairly new to all of this, and had been writing my novel over the past few years (I really, really overwrote it at first), I was not used to writing short stories. I have tried to diversify my writing-not just tackling zombie stories, which is what my novel is about, but also doing other types of horror, comedy, science fiction, etc. I am hoping tackling submission calls will pave the way toward new novels and alternate paths for my writing. At the same time, I can understand what you mean-when the muse hits you, you have to go with what feels right and works for you. What you write may not work for sub calls out there currently, but the hope is always that you can submit it somewhere down the line…or revamp it slightly to make it work. I think as I mature as a writer, there will be more stories I write that aren’t for any submission calls, but are ones I just felt compelled to write.
I will check out your blog-while my kids are older now, I can appreciate the challenges that go along with having kids and writing-my son, who is ten, loves creating new stories because I write, and I am helping him write his novel about werewolves currently. It’s great that he is old enough that we can interact that way and that he enjoys what his dad does. 🙂
September 22, 2010 at 8:20 am