Imagining the Impossible

The search for an agent continues. As a working writer, my time is often limited to weekends. Jobs, as many of you surely know, expand to fill the time between Sunday evening and Saturday morning. They’re showing no signs of slowing down.

I was excited that I had an entire weekend with no plans. I was going to spend it redoubling my agent search, and writing up yet more stories. I’d run into an agent’s page that actually asked for other finished works, published or not. I would’ve thought all agents would be interested in how prolific prospective clients might be.

Then I woke up sick on Sunday morning. I don’t get sick often, and this wasn’t head cold sick. It was a profound dizziness and nausea that happens to me from time to time. The only thing you can do is hold your head still and try not to move your eyes. Not very conducive to looking for agents.

Of course this had to happen on what was one of my only free weekends so far this year. An entire day stretched before me in which I could not read, watch television, or use the internet. It’s very hard to sit still and not move your eyes. I couldn’t really sleep because I’d just awoken from a full night’s sleep dizzy as hell.

If it had been a work day I would’ve had to call in sick. How sad that a sick day comes on a weekend! My weekends are my busy time for writing.

My affliction (don’t worry, it’s not catching! This isn’t coronavirus here) involves being unable to read or write. Even now I need to take it easy and avert my eyes from the screen as I type. (I learned keyboarding the old fashioned way, with typewriters in high school.)

It’s a beautiful sunny day around here. I should be outside. Or at least writing what I imagine it must be like. Writers are good at imagining the impossible.

Comments

Dusty

My, this thing is dusty. My fans—hi, Mom!—perhaps believe me to have perished in the pandemic. No, it was nonfiction’s fault. Since the pandemic began I’ve had two nonfiction books published and have written a third. With a nine-to-five job something’s got to give. Unfortunately it’s been fiction. Well, the groundhog didn’t see his shadow yesterday, so it must be safe to come out. I shuffled away the rejection notes and began submitting again. I’ve got a backlog of weird stories and maybe some new publishers have emerged? The thing is, don’t you just hate it when you’re in the mood to submit and some lit journal has its window for submissions firmly shut? My last story, “ The Hput, ” was published about three years ago. Oh, I’ve submitted since then, but with no traction. Well, it is winter. I’ve got a lot of stories lined up. I’ve been sending them out again, dreaming of making a dime at what I love doing best...

Creative Righting

Rejection of my writing is a rejection of my imaginative world. That’s why I was cheered by the acceptance of one of my stories this week. That makes number 31. I’ve been working on a lot of fiction lately, even as nonfiction book number 6 is going to press. The ideas are still there, and bizarre as ever, but publishing venues just aren’t welcoming. The other day I had lunch with a professor whose wife is also a professor. She just had her first novel published, and so he pointed me to her indie publisher. I went to their website to learn that they’re closed to submissions. I have to admit that my latest accepted story, “Creative Writing Club,” was probably given the green light because I know the editor. That seems like a pretty dicey way to get any notice, doesn’t it? You have to know the right people even in the low circulation world. My fiction is difficult to classify. It’s got speculative elements to it. ...

Patterns

There’s a pattern I’m noticing. For fiction publishers. Even if you aim low you’ll find it a struggle. Part of the reason is the pattern. Lots of websites list publishers. The smaller, hungrier presses either eventually close or get to a place where they require an agent to get in. That’s the kiss of death. Although my stories have won prizes, and been nominated for prizes, I can’t get an agent interested. I’ve queried well over a hundred, so the agent route is one of diminishing returns. This too is a pattern. Back to the smaller presses. I check many lists. What I write, you see, is highly idiosyncratic. It’s literary but it’s weird. Publishers don’t know what to do with it. If a smaller press published stuff like this, I’d find it. The pattern includes writers who never get discovered. Ironically, a number of editors of fiction literary magazines (mostly online) tell me they enjoy my wor...

K. Marvin Bruce

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