Crop Top Summer!!!
Hey team! It’s officially crop top summer! I have a few updates for you below about awards, books, and some media I’ve been enjoying! But first—a crop top shot.
Locus Award
Look, ma! We won a Locus Award! Charles Payseur and I won Best Anthology for We’re Here: The Best Queer Speculative Fiction 2020. Thanks to everyone who voted for us! I definitely encourage y’all to check out the rest of the nominees and winners in all the categories—so much good work is being done.
[prevously: screenshot of a tweet declaring best anthology winner to be we're here, edited by C.L. Clark and Charles Payseur]
Best American SFF 2022
Stoked to be able to announce that my story “The Captain and the Quartermaster” was selected for The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2022 by this year’s editor, Rebecca Roanhorse. The story was originally published at Beneath Ceaseless Skies and there’s an audio version, too. If you get the Best American, though, you’ll also get a little behind-the-scenes about the story. Pre-order here!
The Faithless Progress
The Faithless is moving into production! I turned in copyedits last month, and should get the first pass pages toward the end of the month. That means we should also be getting ARCs underway soon…dundundun. I really can’t wait for you guys to read this one. I’m really proud of it—new feelings! new characters! new scandals! new magic!
No news about the cover yet, though, so stay tuned!
Book 3 Progress
Book 3 of The Magic of the Lost series, which I’m tentatively calling The Sovereign, is moving apace! Making good progress, just about at the halfway point and picking up momentum. I should finish this draft in the next couple of months. I’m even doing Camp Nanowrimo just to keep the motivation strong.
That’s one of the odd things about this novel-ing business. The first half seems to take forever—trying to understand where the characters are in their heads, what they want, what their plans are for getting it and how they’re going to mess everything up. But after I get to a certain point, it’s a bit like tipping over the crest of a hill and I just have to keep showing up (which isn’t always easy).
My Current Process
For those who are curious (NB: this changes whenever I need it to; I try not to be too wedded to one method just in case it…stops working. The best process is the one that gets the words out.):
First, I look at where the characters are and whatever tentative scene past!me thought would go next. Sometimes, past!me was wrong and I chuck it. Either way, I riff in a notebook about how the protagonists feel and what the story needs next. This means asking myself logistical questions (eg, how does this army get here?!), letting the characters rant, or making a list of all of the locations I have available to me. Then, I use one or two scene-setup exercises, depending on how much I’m struggling to bring it to life.
The first exercise comes from Mary Robinette Kowal. It’s pretty simple. Just answer a few questions:
- What’s the principle action of the scene?
- Where does it happen?
- Who’s there?
- What’s the time of day/mood?
- What does the protagonist want?
It’s great for visualizing the scene better and getting some concrete sensory images on the page.
The other is from Donald Maass’s Breakout Novel books, which I’ve mentioned before. I look for the “inner” and “outer” turning points in the scene, the moment in the scene where things change for the protagonist. I think about how they see themselves/the world before the outer turning point, and how they see things after the outer turning point. There’s also the “setting goals and setbacks” exercise, which I really recommend, since it gives scenes some momentum.
Between these exercises, I have a rough outline of the scene, and usually a bit of dialogue or narrative for the scene already. Usually, this process also sets up the next few scenes (scenes are actions and actions beget consequences and consequences beget reactions, etc etc), so I’ll go through the process for several scenes at a time and then write through them all. Then I start the process all over again!
What else am I up to?
Reading
- The Impossible Contract by K.A. Doore - if you know me, you know I need nothing more in life than lesbian assassins
- The Theif by Megan Whalen Turner - I met Megan at Cymera and embarrassingly lost my mind but she also signed my book so there
- The Oleander Sword (yes, I know I took a picture with it last time but life happened!)
Watching
- First Kill - this was so silly but really fun
- Heartstopper - also fun, very adorable
- The Expanse - ugh, Avaserala. I love you.
Games
My buddies and I finally finished our first legacy game together! We played King’s Dilemma and I loooooved it. I came in second place but only because I was so noble…if I hadn’t been noble, my side would have been executed…but SOMEone stole all the glory for themselves…haha. Anyway, highly recommend this game if you have a group of friends you can play with regularly. It took us a year to get through because we only met up sporadically.
