K. Marvin Bruce

  We’ll take another brief break in The Space between Atoms here—the story will continue and it will take some twists and turns, but for now I wanted to point out that Ghostlight is available on Amazon and the latest issue includes my short story “The Pain of a Caterpillar.” This particular story was an attempt to write a fairly straightforward horror story.   Most of my writing falls between genres, which is why I struggle as a writer.   (Either that, or my writing sucks.)   This one tries to stay close to the expectations of something definitely being wrong. It is actually based, partially, on my own living in Scotland.   The town where it’s initially set, Breck, New Hampshire, is a place I made up as the setting for many of my stories.   I actually have a novel underway about the town and why it’s so weird, but I haven’t had any luck yet in getting my novels published. In any case, “The Pain of a Caterpillar” derives from my own insect phobia, and also...

Write and you’ll get advice.   Some years ago I signed up for Medium, a social network with many writers.   Now I get daily advice from the website, sometimes helpful, sometimes not.   You see, there’s no wrong way to write. Days after receiving the happy news that Ghostlight had accepted “The Pain of a Caterpillar” for publication, The Colored Lens emailed to say they were seriously considering “Meh-Teh” for their next edition.   It’s not the same as an acceptance, but a struggling writer takes all the signs of hope offered. Rod Serling, about whom I’ve written before, had a quote about writing that has stuck with me, although I can’t remember the exact words.   He noted that only writers understand the pain of rejection in the way with which we’re all so familiar.   As usual, he said it much more eloquently.   Still, having someone say “Maybe” is better than the more familiar “No.” I call myself a struggling writer becau...

Every great once in a while something extraordinary happens.   As I mentioned in my last post, I really hadn’t submitted fiction for publication for almost three years.   (I had a couple of non-fiction projects going.)   About three weeks ago I began submitting again. I have a backlog of stories ready to go.   That backlog is now one story less.   “The Pain of a Caterpillar” was accepted, to my great delight, by Ghostlight: The Magazine of Terror .   I’ve finally broken the magical number of twenty short stories accepted for publication. The truly remarkable thing, however, was the alacrity with which it was accepted.   I have been writing fiction for over forty years and never had a story accepted on the same day it was submitted before.   I was absolutely thrilled. As a writer, fewer things make you feel as validated as acceptance.   You have to go through an awful lot of rejection to get there.   This particular ...