Happy Holidays!

girl cooties rock!

There's a new group on our planet called Girl Cooties. They are all about Science fiction for women by women. Their welcome page says If you’re interested character-based stories that examine who we are and how the big questions of science and society affect us in our daily lives, this is the meeting place for you. Yay!
And We have no interest in negativity or in tearing others down. Yay!

They formed to help address The Leaky Pipeline: Where are Women’s Voices in Science Fiction? question. The bottom line is fewer female SF authors are published and reviewed. Boo! Check out Dr. K. Kitts' article here.

Personally, I love SF--and,spoiler alert--I am female. If you love SF, Definitely check out the whole awesome Girl Cooties site here. Girl Cooties Rock!

And don't worry, here at Electric Spec we still love male (and agender, bigender, transgender, cisgender, basically all genders) authors and fantasy, and macabre horror, and all other kinds of speculative fiction.
Send us your stories!

story endings

Yes, we are still revelling in the fabulous November 30, 2016 issue of Electric Spec! But we are also starting work on the fabulous Februrary 2017 (!) issue.

I've been working on the slush pile...

There seems to be two different schools of thought on story endings. I've read some stories in slush which seem to sort of peter out.
Some people might say this is a sophisticated ending, an artistic ending. I'm afraid I would say this is not an emotionally satisfying ending. If you survey the stories in our 'zine we tend not to publish the peter-out endings.

The alternative school of thought is a kapow-whiz-bang! ending. I prefer these. I want authors to engage my emotions. Make me laugh! Make me cry! Make me say, "Aw!" I want authors to take me on a journey. Let's go somewhere. Let's have an adventure!

Of course, not all editors agree with me.

No one ever said writing was easy...

favorites

Here at Electric Spec we're still revelling in the stories in our November 31 2016 issue. They're all quite different, from Lenin's Nurse: Notes for a Dissertation by Chris Barnham to Gazer by Karen Osborne to The Yuru-chara of Hector, NY by Morgan Crooks to Childe Roland by Sidney Blaylock, Jr. to Mered's Lament by Chris Walker. (And yes, that may be the longest sentence I've ever written!)

What's your favorite? I must admit, I really enjoyed them all!

If you haven't read them all yet: do so!

It's also neat that we got so much behind-the-scenes info from authors, here on the blog.
Thanks, authors!

And soon we'll begin work on the 2017 issues...

It's alive!

It's alive! The fabulous November 30 issue of Electric Spec is alive!

Thank you so much authors, artist, editors, and tech folks! You rock!

Most of all, thank you readers! You rock the most!

Enjoy!

anticipation

The anticipation is growing as we approach publication of the Nov 30, 2016 Electric Spec issue!
You've already heard from authors Osborne, Barnham, and Crooks about their stories.
This issue also contains some entertaining fantasy.

In the realm of fantasy, Chris Walker brings us Mered's Lament, a traditional knight-hunts-dragon story that rapidly upends the genre. Hint: it's a rare day these days to find a damsel in distress.

If you can't wait for The Dark Tower movie, coming next summer, Childe Roland by Sidney Blaylock, Jr. might just tide you over with his creative take on the Robert Browning poem.

And to leave you wanting more, here's a sneak peek at our cover art:

from Author Osborne

Oooh! We're getting close now to the fabulous November 30, 2016 issue of Electric Spec! Continuing our series of author comments, today we are delighted to hear from Karen Osborne about her story "Gazer."

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I find it incredible that addiction is still such a taboo subject in our society. We’ve sent human beings to the moon and mapped the human genome, but when it comes to the struggle with the bottom of the bottle, things are apparently not as easy.

In our mixed-up world, someone who struggles with headaches needs -- and gets -- some aspirin, while someone who struggles with pain of a deeper nature often reaches for the bottle of booze or pills in order to heal less obvious wounds. Our culture doesn’t understand that kind of pain. Our culture takes that pain and makes it a moral failing, keeping the addict from feeling like they can reach out for help without being shamed.

That means that addicts can go around and around a bruising Moebius strip full of shame and loneliness for years before something convinces them they need help: you’re afraid of the pain, so you numb the pain, but the high keeps slipping further and further from your fingers, and the pain never really goes away. An addict’s pain is like a snowball falling down a mountain: by rock bottom, it envelops everything around it -- friends, family members, and sometimes the addict’s own life.

Recovering addicts will often tell you that if haven’t been down that hill yourself, you just can’t understand what it means to want that high so completely that you are willing to hurt yourself for it -- or the feelings that come afterwards when you choose to face your problems head-on.

Writing and reading fantasy can be addicting, too, in its own special way. By cracking open a book or writing our own stories, engaging with a fandom or putting in a DVD, we can escape the world around us and our own very real physical and psychological pain. We can be heroes. We can win the battle. We can save the world. We can be the secret princess or the knight that saves the land or the very center of the narrative. A good story can be a heady, wonderful high, can’t it? Hasn’t everyone who spends their days on the factory floor or whipping spreadsheets into shape wondered, at least once, what it was like to be the Chosen One? "But, Karen," you might say, "that kind of escapism is mostly harmless."

What if it wasn't?

Be careful where you stand when you’re on the top of that hill...

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Provocative and very thoughtful, Karen! Thanks!

from Author Barnham

We're proud to announce another exciting story in the November 30, 2016 issue of Electric Spec "Lenin's Nurse: Notes for a Dissertation" by Chris Barnham. We're also excited to have comments from the author about the story...

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One of the interesting things about making stuff up is the way the characters you invent can take on a life of their own. And a loose end of a story written years ago can spin itself into a bigger story.

Many years ago, I published a story in the late-lamented Pan Horror series. It was called, "On the Fishermen’s Path", and told the tale of a young man’s holiday romance with a mysterious young woman who turned out to have a chilling backstory. At the end we strongly suspect that she was responsible for a series of grisly murders, and the young man in the story escaped becoming the latest victim only by luck.

Something in the story wouldn’t let me go, and long afterwards I found myself wondering whether there was more to the young woman’s story than I had written. I found myself reimagining the woman who disappeared at the end of "Fishermen’s Path". Where had she come from? Why did she do the things she did? What if she had been around a very long time, changing her name and identity, repeatedly turning up to bring havoc to the lives of the men who crossed her path? Thus I found myself writing a novel, ‘Among the Living.’ In this story, a widowed father, desperate for love and stability, falls for a wealthy, attractive, enigmatic woman who turns out to be have a dark and lengthy past. He tries to break up their relationship, but the woman breaks in to his home, attacks him and abducts his son. Warned off from involving the police, he sets out to track her down to save his son. The search takes an increasingly bizarre turn as he discovers connections to a series of other women, stretching back over four centuries.

As evidence mounts of the troubling links to these women from the past, the guy has to face the possibility that they are in fact the same woman; from the Elizabeth Barlow he knows, through Eliza Batho, mistress of the British Prime Minister in World War One, and finally back to one of history’s genuine monsters, Countess Elizabeth Bathory. A woman reputed to have murdered hundreds of people for their blood, using witchcraft to prolong her life. A woman who has kidnapped his son.

I was pleased with the book, but even then I found that my character would not leave me alone. "Among the Living" ended with her holed up in a cottage in the country, apparently safe from the authorities and free to reinvent herself again. But still she nagged at me. If she had lived a dozen lives, however careful she was she would leave traces. Surely someone would eventually stumble over those traces and maybe come looking for her. What would happen then?

This thought led to the story "Lenin’s Nurse". A diligent historian spots the similarities between Lenin’s nurse in the 1920s and Stalin’s assistant in the 1950s, and follows a thread that leads to a quiet cottage in the present-day English countryside. With results that he could perhaps have foreseen. Certainly if he’d read "Among the Living".

Maybe I’ve finished with this story now, and the character can rest easy. Only time will tell. After all, I wonder what she would do next...

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Thanks, Chris!

from Author Crooks

I know what you all have been waiting for... More info about the stories in our November 30, 2016 issue of Electric Spec. Well, wait no more! We will be presenting a unique science fiction story "The Yuru-chara of Hector, NY" by Morgan Crooks. And right now, we're presenting comments from Author Crooks...

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I don't remember what exactly inspired this story. I know the basic idea of virtual pets getting bodies came to me while I was driving and that I was taken enough by the concept to pull over to write it down. I suspect there was a radio program behind it but who knows. While writing the first draft I came across the concept of yuru-charas: in Japan, some municipalities create mascots to promote civic pride. That gave me Tama’s basic personality and outlook and the rest fell into place quickly.

One basic theme of "The Yuru-chara of Hector, NY," is responsibility. To what do we owe responsibility? What qualifies as deserving our attention and care? We owe this to other human beings, certainly. To pets, of course. Property and nature should be respected. Even certain intangible things like ideas need to be cherished. But what about virtual pets, digital assistants or online companions? Should we feel guilty when we eventually abandon a tamaguchi or pokemon? Should we be cavalier in our treatment of Siri?

But, you protest, those things are ephemera. They are designed to be discarded, programmed for disregard. And maybe that's true but somehow the question I kept circling around was not whether Tama suffers from her experiences but how Sam seeks a way to give that part of her childhood the dignity it deserves. If something is important to us at one point in our life than maybe it warrants attention and respect.

The other theme is, of course, dealing with the various losses involved in growing up. Of all of the protagonists in my stories, she's one of my favorites. I'm sympathetic to her impatience for the future to start even as I understand the regret she experiences. What I don't think she's fully dealt with are the consequences of placing one of her friends (no matter how artificial) into a box and walking away. In gaining a solid form, Tama makes Sam confront that abandonment.

---

Fascinating! Thanks, Morgan!

post Production Meeting

The Production Meeting tasks have been completed. Huzzah!
We selected 5 really neat speculative fiction stories. Huzzah!
I'll blog more about them later in the month. "Yeahs" should be hearing from us today or very soon. "Nays" should have heard from us already. It was extremely difficult to winnow down the list of excellent stories in hold-for-voting. You should feel good if your story was in hold-for-voting. If your story didn't quite make it into hold-for-voting, you should still feel good. You won't succeed if you don't try! Good luck next time!

We will have some really neat cover art!

We are tentatively going with the advertised November 30, 2016 publication date.

In Editor's Corner I'm going to include chapter one of my new novel The Quantum Cop. Exciting!
We're also going to interview Editor and Author Grayson Towler about his writing and his new novel The Dragon Waking. Exciting!

Stay tuned for more info about our upcoming stories! Hopefully we'll even have some author blogging!

Ranking Stories

Behind the scenes at Electric Spec we finished slush. Hooray! (Thanks for sending in your stories!) Now we're in the phase where we have to rank stories in preparation for our Production Meeting. Each editor ranks the stories from #1, the best, and on down to however many stories we have.

I always find this step to be very difficult, because all the stories in Hold-For-Voting are good. I don't know how the other editors do it, but I rely mostly on my gut at this step . Do I like it? Is it fresh, original? Thus, for me, this step is very subjective. Is this fair? Unfair? I know not.

The previous step, putting the finalist stories into Hold-For-Voting is more objective ( for me, at least). I try to discern if the story is objectively good. If so, in it goes.

I will compile the stats for each story and the total rankings will assist us at our upcoming Production Meeting.

Next week I'll give a report on the Production Meeting. And then...I'll start blogging about the exciting new issue!

slush tips: plot

The slush is up somewhere around our chins...
The most important thing (or second-most important thing) in a story is plot. Basically, you don't have a story if you don't have a plot. Plot is particularly important in speculative fiction because readers expect a plot. There are many definitions of plot, such as: the sequence of events and happenings that make up a story. I prefer to think of it as the actions the character(s) take to solve the story problem(s) and the resulting resolution.

A literary professional told me recently the number one "plot" they see in queries is the wandering protagonist. She said this is not, in fact, a plot and they never request these manuscripts. It's worth repeating: someone wandering around is not a plot. On the other hand, someone seeking something for some specified purpose is a plot. A quest, then, may resemble someone wandering around, but it is a very different animal.

Some people say there are only a few basic plots, such as

• the quest
• overcoming a monster
• rags to riches
• comedy
• tragedy
• voyage and return
• rebirth

Obviously, there's some overlap here and many stories combine more than one of these ideas.

I don't care what you call it or how you classify it, just show us your plot.

Next week I hope to start updating you on our next Electric Spec issue, the notable November 2016 issue.

slush tips: character and voice

As you probably can guess, we're hip deep in the slush. I've been glad to see a lot of stories that have their facts right and that use similes and metaphors. :) Thanks!

One of the most important things a story needs is character. We editors are in disagreement about if character is the most important thing or the second-most important thing, but it's definitely important. Your story must have a character that acts. It's also important that the character drives the story, rather than having the character serve the story. This is accomplished by creating a fully-fleshed out person, complete with loves, hates, desires, passions, goals, flaws, and every other quality a person has. Of course, readers will not see all these qualities on the page, but we should get the impression that they're there somewhere in the background.

I admit I cheat when creating characters. I often base my characters on people I know. Surprisingly, these templates never seem to recognize themselves. Personally, I think it's because we create imaginary 'characters' out of the real people in our lives--which may or may not agree with how the people see themselves.
Uh oh. I'm getting a little too philosophical? Cynical?

Which brings me to my second topic: voice. Voice can be a tricky concept to understand. Partly because there are two different meanings. Meaning one: each character should have a unique voice. Each character should show his voice via his/her/its unique combo of syntax, diction, vocab, personality, etc.

Meaning two: the author's voice. Author voice is the author's individual writing style, created by their unique combo of syntax, diction, punctuation, character development, dialogue, etc. Some authors showcase a different voice for different works. For example Charlaine Harris's Sookie Stackhouse series is much different from her Lily Bard Shakespeare series. On the other hand, some authors have a distinctive voice in all their work, e.g. Connie Willis. Personally, I love a strong voice. For example, I love Connie Willis's voice, so I know in advance that I will enjoy any Connie Willis work.

Consider wowing us with your unique voice--be it of you or your character.

The submission deadline for the November 2016 issue has passed. But we are now taking subs for the Fenruary 2017 issue.

facts

We, The Editors, are working hard on Electric Spec slush. I must admit I have a pet peeve: I get quite annoyed when a story contradicts facts. I try to stay objective if a story contradicts facts, but I don't know how successful I am. Probably, not very successful.

You're thinking But, wait a minute. Stories are fiction. They're supposed to be made-up. They're not supposed to be true. This is a good point. But...

Know facts! Use facts! If your story is set basically on our Earth in basically our society with basic humans, you need to get basic physics correct. You need to know what gravity and electromagnetism are and basically how they work. You need to know about the sun and the moon and other planets and stars. You need to know approximately where the continents and countries and basic landmarks are. If you get any of this wrong with no explanation or confirmation my peeve will be activated. By confirmation, I mean more than one character or situation is involved in this difference from our world; somehow indicate this difference is intentional.

An aside on explanations: Don't over-explain. A pitfall of alternate history can be a lot of exposition about what exactly is different in history and what the ramifications were, etc. etc. In this case, don't explain, show.

Of course, all bets are off if your story is set on another world with other creatures, or if there's magic or other extenuating circumstances (unreliable narrator?) involved.

The submission deadline for the November 2016 issue is October 15, 2016! Send those stories in!

similes and metaphors

I've been taking particular notice of similes and metaphors lately. They can elevate a piece of writing from good to great. Recall, a simile is when two things are compared directly, often using words such as 'as' or 'like.' A metaphor is when two things are compared directly, but without using 'as' or 'like.'
Similes and metaphors should be unique to your characters and worlds and can be very effective in helping build both.

Similes and metaphors are extremely useful in descriptions.
Consider: The sky is blue. Kind of boring, right?

In comparison, let's look at a couple similes...
The sky is as blue as a mother's tears.
The sky is as blue as mermaids' scales.
Wow. Those bring to mind two totally different images and are much more descriptive than the declarative statement.

Consider using similes and metaphors in your writing!

FYI the next Electric Spec submission deadline is coming up: October 15, 2016. Get those stories in!

stay positive

Here in the U.S. Rocky Mountains there's an awesome writer's group called Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers and they just had their awesome annual conference filled with fun, information, networking and all kinds of neat stuff.

Some of the excitement may be wearing off... RMFW members and others may need a pick-me-up.

Writing is hard. Stringing one word after another is hard. Revising is hard. Proof-reading is hard. Finding markets is hard (An awesome resource is ralan.com). Submitting is hard. Getting rejected is hard.

I'm here to say: Keep the faith! Stay positive! One of my favorite Jesse Jackson quotes is "...it is not their aptitude but their attitude that will determine their altitude."
Nice!

Some people say you can train your brain to be more positive. Tips include:

• Express gratitude
• Repeat positive affirmations
• Challenge negative thoughts

Here, at Electric Spec we sincerely appreciate all your submissions.

Good luck!

Why Manuscripts Stand Out

We have a special treat today. Our Associate Editor Minta Monroe has some advice for authors. For those of you who don't know her, she's the author of The Mound Dwellers and 2 collections of short stories, Home, Sweet...Death and Crossing Over.

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Recently, I’ve been binge-reading a bunch of manuscripts by authors seeking publication (that’s all of us, right?) They’re all very well written, but some of them stand out, and others do not.

So I took the opportunity to study this—because we all want our manuscripts to stand out in a positive way when they reach the editor’s desk. The reasons why some of them *do* stand out didn’t become apparent to me until I noticed that certain elements of the exceptional manuscripts were missing from the rest.

Here are 5 things I’ve noticed so far. Manuscripts that stand out…

• …use sensory detail. As a reader, I want to go on the journey with the characters. I want to see, feel, taste, hear, and smell all the things that they notice. Not only does this help to make the setting feel real, but also the characters.

• …have characters who feel real. What the characters look like doesn’t matter nearly as much as what they are feeling, or how they act, or why they choose to act in the way they do. They’re active characters rather than passive. They actually do something—and it’s interesting—rather than talking about it.

• …have lots of conflict. Once we readers care about a character, we *really* care when trouble comes knocking. We are rooting for the character, and we want him/her to solve whatever problem crops up. But will he/she solve it in time?

• …have twists and turns and surprises. Readers want to be surprised. We don’t want the expected answer. We want new and marvelous adventures that we haven’t been able to predict.

• …have a nice balance of pacing. Sometimes the action is fast, when exciting events are happening. And sometimes the action is slow, when the characters are introspective so that the reader gets to understand why they are doing the things they are doing. It’s not all of either one, but some of both, and they need to be balanced.

This is just the beginning, but here’s the bottom line: even the most brilliantly luminous story ideas will fall flat without these 5 elements.

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Thanks, Minta!

W00t! W00t!

W00t! W00t! We're still celebrating the latest release of Electric Spec! Thanks again, everyone who helped make it happen. We appreciate it.

What's your favorite story? The Dead Life? The Lightship? Song of the Brethren? The Quiet Death? The Inmates are Running the Asylum, and the Asylum is Running the Ship? I really like them all--but I guess that's not much of a surprise since I helped choose them.

I'm also tickled that we got to hear from so many of our authors this time here on the blog. Here are the links in case you missed any of them: T.A. Hernandez, Neil Davies, Dean Giles, David Cleden.

What's next? We're accepting submissions for the notable November 2016 issue! Please send us your stories! The deadline for this issue is coming up...October 15, 2016.
Next week we'll have a blog post from Associate Editor Minta Monroe with some tips for writers.
Cheers!

from Author Cleden

We hope you're continuing to enjoy the new issue of Electric Spec. For your reading pleasure here are some words by Author David Cleden about his intriguing story "Song of the Brethren."

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For most of us, a sense of place plays an important role in our lives. We may talk about being drawn back to the place where we grew up, to where friendships were made (or broken), to where our familial roots are. Sometimes the place where we feel we truly belong is not where we start out; we have to journey through life to discover it. And sometimes the journey of discovery leads us right back to our beginnings.

For a long time, I've wanted to explore the idea of what would happen if that bond to a place was as strong as it could conceivably be. Maybe even a matter or life and death. How would it feel to be physically tied to one particular place for an entire lifetime? What would be the penalties for breaking those ties--and the motivations of those who decided to ignore them?

Those ideas, without shape or form, were still tumbling around in the great void of my skull when I remembered something from a long-past family holiday. My eldest son was only a few months old and we'd gone for a family walk up a valley in the beautiful wilds of Dartmoor in the UK. As we stood under a twisted, wind-blown tree on the side of valley, my infant son (who was strapped to my chest in a baby-carrier) became absolutely entranced by the dappling of the sunlight through the leaves above him. He couldn't tear his gaze away. It was as though that tree was the most wondrous, magical thing he had ever seen. (It was). For one brief moment, he seemed to have a special bond with that tree and nothing else mattered to him.

Back home, and wrestling with a little patch of garden behind our house, it also struck me how easily the wrong things are determined to grow in the wrong places. Tufts of grass constantly thrust up through the gravel path, yet zilch in the little patch of lawn where we'd appreciate it more. And brambles! Oh don't get me started on brambles. If ever there was a plant destined survive a nuclear winter...

Anyway, the story ingredients seemed to jell in my head during one intensive weeding session in the garden. With a little care and attention and application of various seasonings, it matured into the dish that I'm delighted the fine editors at Electric Spec have chosen to serve up amongst a whole host of gourmet treats. I hope it sits well on your palate. (But always remember, not all poisons taste bitter. Some disguise their true nature with an unnatural sweetness. Bon appetit!)

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Very interesting! Thanks, David!

We're alive!

We're alive! Huzzah!
Check out the new issue of Electric Spec

Thank you very much to everyone that worked hard to make this issue happen. Thank you Authors Hernandez, Davies, Cleden, Giles and Nichols! Thank you Artist Errigo! Thank you Associate Editors Cooper-Towler, Monroe, and Devlin!

Most of all, thank you readers!