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A Couple More

 It looks like there may be a little more space between the atoms since I have a bit of news to share this week.  My story “Planet Heaven” has appeared in Sein und Werden—check it out.  This is an irreverent tale that I wrote years ago.  It was rejected for making fun of religion, but I know whereof I speak.


Right on the heels of this happy appearance came the news that my tale “Between the Sheets” has been accepted by Yellow Mama for its Valentine issue.  Love and horror often go together, but this is very gentle horror.  Unsettling rather than terrifying.


“Planet Heaven,” however, came from my somewhat common experience of being raised religious only to wonder about those who’d been raised in other religions.  Why were they damned to hell just for being born elsewhere?  Why couldn’t true believers just sit down together and talk about it?


The story, although set in space, isn’t really science fiction.  I grew up reading sci fi, and it has (or had, at least, in those days) a specific orientation that focused on the future.  My story is more a parable about the present set in the future.  It’s free, so go ahead and read.





Perhaps one of the reasons I classify myself as a struggling writer is that my work doesn’t fall easily into a genre.  Traditionally this is called “literary fiction,” but mine has a more speculative element to it.  Speculative often puts you into the realm of horror and science fiction, but they both have conventions I don’t often use.


Editors and agents often have trouble with literature that doesn’t fit.  I try to get a sense of what an editor likes and if something that appeals to her or him flows from my fingers I tend to send it along until they start rejecting my work.  Then I move on.


“Between the Sheets” is my twenty-fifth story accepted for publication.  It will be, like most of my work, difficult to classify.

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