scary stories

To tide you over until we publish our next Electric Spec scary story, check out: 12 novelists tell their scariest bite-size stories.

Happy Halloween!

working...

We, The ElectricSpec Editors, are working hard behind the scenes. I'll post an update about the new issue next week.
In the meantime, Happy Halloween!

and yet more notes

One we thing we love here at Electric Spec is originality. We want to read your original unique stories. Since there are no new stories this can be a bit tricky. For now, I'm going to focus on 2 different aspects that can impart originality:

1. What you write.
2. How you write it.

By "what you write" I mean the external plot. For example, vampires are not original. Men killing women is not original. What would we like to see? Epic fantasy that does not involve a quest. Macabre that does not involve killing people. Another avenue to originality is a mash up of two (or more) genres.
Note: ideally this external plot is echoed in the main character(s) internal plot arc. Think about what character can best tell this story; which character would have the most to gain or lose. I hate to use TV examples, but here I go: On the new show "Masters of Sex" the protagonist is an impotent shame-filled man who cannot seem to enjoy sex. This is the man who is studying sex. Would another character be as compelling? I think not.

How you write your story can make a rather tired plot fresh again.
In general, authors should be as specific as possible, especially for nouns. Don't refer to 'a guitar', refer to 'a Gibson SG' (or whatever is appropriate). Create a unique world. Always paint your story picture through the protagonist(s) lens. Descriptions should be from the character(s) perspective. Adjectives like 'beautiful' are relatively meaningless; how is it beautiful to the character?
If you've noticed I'm using the words 'character' and 'protagonist' a lot here, this is no accident. A unique character can make a tired plot fresh. A little girl assassin was fresh (the first time we saw it).

Another way to impart originality in the 'how you write' vein is voice. This concept is more difficult to pin down but it is the combination of vocabulary, sentence length, paragraph length, tone, and all the other writerly tools used to create a story. I've blogged about voice before here:V is for Voice and here:Spec Fic Tools II: Voice.
Good luck creating your unique story.

In the coming weeks I'll start blogging about the new November 2013 issue. Stay tuned for that. :)

read for our future

Just a heads up about a great lecture by Neil Gaiman in The Guardian last week: Why our future depends on libraries, reading and daydreaming.

more notes from the slush pile

By now, the deadline for the neat November issue of Electric Spec has passed. But, never fear, you can still submit--for the fabulous February 2014 issue.
We have started working behind the scenes on the November issue. We've been reading a lot of slush. I have some tips. I freely admit these are for our market. I apologize because many of these I've given in years past but apparently they're still needed. Thus, without further ado...
One Editor's tips:

• Do proofread your piece for spelling and grammar issues. We do not expect your piece to be perfect, but we do expect it to be readable. Note: MSWord's spelling and grammar tools are not sufficient.
• Do use forms of said or asked for dialogue tags. I'm not kidding. I went to a writers conference last month and I asked every professional literary agent and editor I met about this, and they all agreed: said or asked only. They also said it's even better if you can give dialogue without needing a tag, i.e. use distinctive vocabulary or cadence or other unique ways of speaking for each character.
• Do include a speculative element integrated into your story. If we can't find a speculative element, we won't be publishing it even if it's a very good story. If it seems like you stuck on the speculative element after the fact, we won't be publishing it. How can you tell if it's "stuck on"? If you take the speculative element out, the story should fall apart.
• Do include originality. Please try to put a unique twist on your story. I can't tell you how many stories we've read where a man kills his wife or girlfriend (or wife and girlfriend). I can't tell you how many vampire stories we've read. I can tell you it is extremely difficult to write a fresh vampire story.
• Do write the story only you can write. (Yes, this is related to originality, above.) What are you passionate about? What intrigues you? Put it in a story!
• Do have a protagonist.
• Do have conflict.
• Do have a story resolution. This can be a success or a failure. This can even be the emergence of a new conflict. The point is: something must change.

I guess that's it for now. Back to the slush pile for me...

notes from the slush pile

We are starting to work hard behind the scenes on the neat November issue of Electric Spec. Personally, I've been reading a lot of slush... Here are some thoughts in no particular order.

• Re. the cover letter:
  • Don't tell us to go to your web page to learn more about you. In general, don't order us to do anything. It makes us grumpy.
  • Don't write a looong cover letter. We don't care what happened to you in the 1980s, or the 1990s, for that matter. If you have dozens of publications, just pick the top five or so and emphasize those. When we pick your story we will ask you for a bio for our Authors page.
  • Do give us your name, the title of your story, and its word count. The genre would also be nice. Although if you get the genre wrong...this is not a plus.
  • Do not give us a summary of the story. If we can't tell what it's about, a summary in the cover letter isn't going to help you.
• Re. story length:
  • IMHO, it is really, really difficult to tell a story in less than 1000 words. Despite the current popularity of flash fiction, I've almost never seen it done well.
  • At the opposite extreme, while we do accept stories up to 7000 words... Does your story really need 7000 words? As an editor, I get pretty tired around about 5000 words. In the vast majority of cases, stories that contain 7000 words only need ~5000 words. Please carefully consider this.
• Re. format:
  Do follow our formatting rules: here. The main points are:
  • rtf format
  • in an attachment
  • double-spaced
  • 12 pt font
  • not a weird font. We like Times New Roman or Courier.

That's it for now. Good luck with your writing. We look forward to reading your story! :)

Ocean at the end of the Lane

I read an interesting book recently, The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman. In Ocean the nameless adult protagonist returns home to Sussex for a funeral, wanders onto his old neighbors' property and recalls a childhood adventure. It's a beautifully-written engrossing, terrifying adventure to be sure.

For a fantasy, there are some delightful references to modern science such as wormholes, alternate dimensions, the Big Bang and the like. Neat! But ultimately for this reader it was a sad story, seeming almost autobiographical, even while describing mythical powerful creatures.

All in all, I'm not sure I got this book. The protagonist seems to be remembering his childhood to gain some secret power/weapon/knowledge but he immediately forgets. Moreover, the reader's told he has remembered and forgotten it before. Apparently the protagonist--and by extension all adults (?)--are doomed to ignorance and powerlessness. Or...?

What do you think this book is about?

editorial miscellany

I see the submission deadline for the neat November 2013 issue of Electric Spec is sneaking up on us. It is October 15, 2013. Get your stories in if you want them to be considered for publication in 2013.

We've been getting a lot of submissions--which is great for readers. With a large variety of stories to consider you can rest assured that the issue will be awesome. However, this does mean it's been taking us a bit longer to get back to authors. Sorry about that.
I have a request: Please do not email us and ask us about the status of your story. We get enough emails without having to deal with extras.
We will get back to you as soon as we can.

Good luck!

recovering from the con

Phew! It was awesome to see so many of you writers and readers at the RMFW Conference this past weekend! I love hobnobbing with writers! I can't recommend this conference enough.

One of our guest super writers agrees. Check out Author Rob Thurman's blog "Writers Cons vs. Fan Cons". Suffice it to say: a good (and educational) time was had by all.

And, yes, Author and Editor Betsy Dornbusch was found in the bar and the hospitality suite...

Colorado Gold 2013

You all may or may not know all the editors of Electric Spec are members of Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers (RMFW). This weekend is the big annual writers conference. I highly recommend it. Editor and Author Betsy Dornbusch has several events on Friday Sept 20:

• 1 pm Visiting Author Panel with Margaret George, Rob Thurman, and Ronald Malf
• 3 pm The New age of Noir and Pulp
• Dinner table host with Rob Thurman
• 8 pm Book Signing: Friday Night. Open to the public.

Notice the book signing/selling at the Denver Renaissance hotel on Quebec St. is open to the public and it is very cool.

I'll be volunteering for various things, moderating panels etc., and teaching a workshop:" Stealing from the Best: A Sample of Different Writing Methods To Find the Best Method for You" with author Rebecca Bates at 8:00am Saturday Sept. 21.

I'm pretty sure our awesome associate editors, Nikki Baird and Chris Devlin will also be attending.

See you there!

what's horror?

I hope everyone's still reading and enjoying the awesome August 31 issue of Electric Spec. But in case you're starting to think about the next story you'll write...

I recently reread "The Fall of the House of Usher" by Edgar Allan Poe. You can read it for free here, among other places. Check out the beginning:
DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country ; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher.
If one of my critique partners started a story with a lot of telling setting description, I'd recommend otherwise. I'd say, this is a cliche.

Of course, you can't say that about "Usher" because it was written before all those other stories. When you're one of the first, you can't be a cliche. :)
"Usher" is the quintessential gothic horror story, the story that influenced all others that came after. What exactly is gothic fiction? Some say it's the mode of literature that combines elements of romance and horror. The name gothic supposedly refers to the medieval or pseudo-medieval buildings in which the stories take place. What is horror fiction? This one is harder to pin down. The Horror Writers Association says horror is fiction that elicits fear and/or dread in the reader. Thus, horror can be about or include anything as long as it elicits the desired emotional reaction(s).

I had a professor once who defined horror as fiction that tries to subvert your perception of reality. It tries to make the reader question everything.
What is real?

Are you a horror reader? A horror writer? What do you like best about it?

Betsy twitter chat tonight

Editor and Author Betsy Dornbusch tells us:

I'm doing a twitter chat tonight, 7 pm our time. The hash tag is #sffwrtcht

I'll talk fantasy, books, EXILE and THE SEVEN EYES series, Night Shade, Electric Spec. Feel free to drop by and lurk or ask. @BetsyDornbusch

(That's U.S. Mountain Time.)

read on!

Huzzah! The awesome August 31, 2013 issue of Electric Spec is live!

As the letter from the editors says,
...of the stories in this issue: you're gonna love 'em. Get this--zombies hungry for artificial babies in "Little Miss Saigon" by Malon Edwards. In C.R. Hodge's "Queen Meabh," a Scottish spirit kick's some archeologist ass. And if you wanna go totally post-apocalypse, step down into the fall out shelter in "For Want of Stars" by Beth Ceto. Speaking of a post-disaster world, what to you do when indescribable death machines kill everyone else but ignore you? Find out in "Amelia Amongst Machines" by David Brookes. Finally, look how complicated your love life can get when it gets too "spirited" in David W. Landrum's "Someone."

Read on, brothers and sisters!

Thank you very much behind-the-scenes folks, including our authors (Yay!), our artist (Yay!), our tech guys, and our associate editors (Yay!). We couldn't have done it without you.

Drop us a line in the comments, here, and let us know what you think of the issue. What's your favorite story?

new issue soon

Our awesome August 31, 2013 issue of Electric Spec is almost here! Huzzah! Thanks to some very good authors, we have some very good stories to share with you:

In "Little Miss Saigon" by Malon Edwards we get a whole new perspective on a mother's love; I'll give you one hint: zombie.
In C.R. Hodge's "Queen Meabh," an archeologist's field project does not go as planned; I'll you a hint here: possession.
For a post-apocalyptic adventure, "For Want of Stars" by Beth Ceto fits the bill.
Ever wonder what happens when death machines kill everyone but ignore you? Find out in "Amelia Amongst Machines" by David Brookes.
Hhm. I'm sensing a bit of a negative theme.
Fear not! We close out the issue with a romance in David W. Landrum's "Someone." Of course, as you might expect this romance has a speculative twist...

Check them all out, August 31 in the usual place: Electric Spec

your brain on fiction

You may or may not have noticed we had a little bit of technical difficulty at the end of last week with our marvelous May 31, 2013 issue. We think we've resolved this. If you see something weird please email the submissions email.
We are all working hard behind the scenes on the awesome August 31, 2013 issue. In particular, I wanted to give a shout out to our excellent copy-editor Chris Devlin. You rock, girl! Thanks for all your help on the issues.
Stay tuned next week for some more specific bragging about the new issue. :)

Now, on to the topic at hand. Annie Murphy Paul wrote a fascinating article "Your Brain on Fiction" published in 2011 in The New York Times. The gist of it is: The brain, it seems, does not make much of a distinction between reading about an experience and encountering it in real life; in each case, the same neurological regions are stimulated. Wow! Isn't that cool?

What does this mean for authors? It means we really need to show, not tell. Words with odor associations activate the smelling portion of our brain. Words with motion associations activate the parts of our brain associated with moving. Words associated with textures or other tactile sensations activate the parts of our brain associated with touch. Let's use all the amazing words and mental associations at our disposal. :)

What's your favorite sensory word? Use it!

editing

The Electric Spec Editors are working hard editing stories for the awesome August 2013 issue. I thought I'd give you all a glimpse behind the curtain...

As authors make sure you remove as many spelling and grammar errors as possible before you submit your work of art. Do use the spelling and grammar tools of your word-processing software BUT don't rely on them exclusively. A lot of spelling and grammar issues can slip by. In particular, a misspelled word can be auto-corrected to become another word. Try reading your work out loud to separate yourself from your work and catch these gotchas. As an editor, I don't have preconceptions of what a piece says so it's easier for me to spot problems.
Be careful with word choice. I know authors who love their thesaurus, but not all words are created equal. Consider what a word really means. And is it consistent with your world and character? This is also something editors look at.

Probably the most common thing we edit for is length. IMHO, rarely does a short story need to be 5,000 words or more. I know Electric Spec accepts longer stories but those extra words are almost always padding--and padding that obscures the true beauty of a story. One of our editors (his name rhymes with Dave) is a master at revealing a story jewel hidden underneath the fluff. We call him The Slasher and all try to emulate him.
Related to this is where the story opens. Often a story opens with a lot of setup or backstory. Often this isn't needed.

An editing trick I've discovered over the years is line spacing. White space on the page or screen is your friend because it imparts drama. It lets the reader focus on a particular sentence. Go ahead, try it. When something important happens, put that sentence in its own paragraph. I often recommend the climax--especially the emotional climax--of a story get its own paragraph.

See?

Didn't you focus on the above line? Of course, the opposite holds as well. Readers focus less on stuff in a long paragraph.
A similar idea for dialogue is to break up dialogue with beats, small physical actions or expressions. Here's an example:
"I love you." She swallowed. "And I've never said that to anyone before." versus
"I love you. And I've never said that to anyone before."
Isn't the first version more dramatic? Breaking up the dialogue makes the reader focus more on the individual lines.

Authors selected for the awesome August issue should be in the process of sending back their contracts. Once we receive the contract, the Editor begins editing. If our proposed changes are minor, we'll post the story in a preview and ask the author to okay it on the webpage. If more significant changes may be necessary we generally go back and forth with the author giving suggestions, etc.

Be sure to checkout the new issue August 31!

uniqueness and action

We, the Editors, had our production meeting this past weekend. This means our awesome August 2013 issue is well on its way to creation. All the authors who were in hold-for-voting and not selected have been emailed. Remember, if your story made it to hold-for-voting, your story is publishable. Kudos, for almost making it into the issue! I think some selectees have yet to be emailed--but it's coming soon.

IMHO, we had an extra tough time selecting which stories to include in the issue because we had a lot of strong finalists. I thought I'd pass along some discussion points for your consideration. At Electric Spec we really like unique stories. This means your story will have a better chance with us if it has a different take or unusual twist in it. Try to subvert our expectations. For instance, if a man falls in love with a ghost woman, you might expect the problem would be that the love-interest is a ghost; but what if that's not the problem? One clever way to create something unique is to combine multiple genres, for example, zombies and artificial intelligence. I think you get the idea. The bottom line is if two somewhat similar stories are in final contention and one has a unique twist and one doesn't ==> we pick the unique one.

The second issue that was a deciding factor at the recent meeting was: does the protagonist act to solve his/her/its problem? (Notice this means the protagonist has a problem.) In other words, the main character has to do something to change his/her/its circumstances. For example, if evil robots are running rampant across the countryside killing everyone and the protagonist is saved when they're cut down by a virus --> not great. On the other hand, if evil robots are running rampant across the countryside killing everyone and the protagonist tries to lure them away from a settlement to save the people there ==> very nice. Especially if you add in a unique twist like the protagonist is a little girl and some other stuff...
I think you get the idea here, too.

As you may have gleaned, we have some great stories for the awesome August issue. Stay tuned this month for more info!

politics in fiction

I read an interesting book recently, Flashback by Dan Simmons. Set in the future, it's essentially a murder mystery with a disgraced ex-detective being forced to solved the murder of a powerful man's son. The title refers to flashback, a drug that most Americans are addicted to, in which you flash back to memories from your past. As you can imagine, this doesn't bode too well for the U.S. economy, etc. In Flashback the U.S. and most of the rest of the world's civilizations have been destroyed.

This future world Simmons created is extreme. Evil Muslims have been waging a holy war on the whole world. Clever sneaky Japanese still have advanced technology but also have a brutal feudal style culture of ritual suicide and worse. (If this sounds racist to you, I agree.)

Furthermore, in this world, Simmons writes the U.S. was totally bankrupted/destroyed by its entitlement programs. Europe was destroyed by its socialist policies. In addition, Simmons states multiple times that anthropogenic climate change is a "hoax". He mentions one lab repeatedly where this nefarious research took place and which is the site of horrific research in the novel. (Never mind the hundreds of other universities and labs that do research in this area which are never mentioned.)
To make a long story short, Tea Partiers would love this book.
Before reading this novel I had no idea what Mr. Simmons' personal political views were...but I have a pretty strong feeling I do now.

Should you include strong political views in your novel? In my opinion: caveat scriptor. I'll put it another way. Has Electric Spec ever published a story with such blatant political propaganda? No.

Stay tuned next week for an update on the Awesome August issue and our production meeting!

ambiguity

I read an interesting book recently, The Dress Lodger by Sheri Holman. It tells the story of a disadvantaged mother in 1831 England and what she does to protect her baby in the midst of a cholera epidemic. "Dress lodging" refers to a whore renting a fancy dress so she can attract fancier johns. It's a very dramatic story and well-written. Moreover, it has an interesting point-of-view, with the author often addressing the reader. I don't think it will be too much of a spoiler to reveal some people do die of cholera.

However, the ending is ambiguous. A positive life for the dress lodger is suggested for the audience, but we have no way of knowing if it will come to pass. When a novel or story has an ambiguous ending, it's up to the reader to decide what will happen. Even more than usual the reader plays an integral part in an ambiguous-ending story.

What do you think will happen to the dress lodger? A happy ending? Death via cholera?
Whatever you decide it says a lot about you. :)

Does Electric Spec publish a lot of ambiguous-ending stories? Savvy readers know the answer to that question, but I'll give you a hint: No.

similes and metaphors

First a little business. We've passed the submission deadline for the August 2013 issue of Electric Spec. If you got your story in: Hurray for you. If not: we're now accepting submissions for the November 2013 issue. Good luck! In general: thank you authors! We wouldn't exist without you. :)
Please don't email us and ask us what the status of your story is. It clogs up our email and makes it that much slower for us to read the actual story submissions.
We're having the next production meeting at the beginning of August, so all submitters--including those in hold-for-votting--will hear back from us by about August 7.

Now, on to some fun stuff: similes and metaphors. Similes and metaphors are an important part of your writing arsenal. Every single author should be using them; they make stories richer. Similes and metaphors are easy to get mixed up (I know I do). A simile is when an author directly compares two things using a word like "like", "as", "than", or a verb such as "resembles". :) A metaphor is when an author describes a subject by asserting that it is the same as an unrelated object. So, notice a simile differs from a metaphor in that the latter compares two unlike things by saying that the one thing is the other thing.

The important point for writers to remember--especially speculative fiction writers--is your similes and metaphors need to be consistent and compatible with the character and the world. Moreover, they can be used to create those characters and world. Think about it. A rural character in a macabre tale will use much different similes and metaphors than an alien in a science fiction tale. Ooh! I just got an image of a hillbilly on an alien world... :)

In terms of tips, it's rarely a good idea to have more than one simile and/or metaphor in one sentence. It's rarely a good idea to use a mixed metaphor or simile (unless you're going for humor).
Does anyone have any favorite similes or metaphors they care to share?

Now your homework assignment: look at your most recent work and make sure you have some similes and metaphors. Then, make sure they are unique to that story, to that character, to that world. Good luck!