Amanda M. Blake's Blog, page 15
August 4, 2023
Haunting the Monitor: Friday Update
Bloody Ghost wants you to have a boo-tiful day.News:
In case you missed it, pregnancy horror drabble (100-word micro fiction) “Birth” was posted for Hungry Shadows’ Deadly Drabble Tuesday earlier this week. This one started its life as a poem but was actually shortened for the drabble call.
“A Bladder Full” actually won 3rd place for the July Crystal Lake Shallow Waters flash fiction contest (theme: Time Anomaly), which really surprised me. This month, creature feature “A Bug in the Design” is a finalist for the theme Small Town Strange. I see a lot of new-to-me names on the list of finalists, so I’m looking forward to the contest introducing me to different writers. You can only read them under the $5/month tier, but it’s totally worth it to have what amounts to an anthology of flash every month, and it’s a lot of fun.
Jacob Steven Mohr announced the Table of Contents for Dead Letters: Episodes of Epistolary Horror, an anthology of found media (also from Crystal Lake Publishing), and my moreishly titled “The Behavioral Patterns of the Displaced Siberian Siren” is a part of it. I’ve been trying to sell this story for a bit, and I’m really excited for this anthology in general. Some of the titles are really funny and intriguing. Check out the TOC for some of the other contributors.
In addition, it was announced through their Facebook page, so I assume it’s okay to share that my flash piece “Sight Unseen” about a monster in a fixer-upper is part of Dragon’s Roost Press’s Novus Monstrum anthology.
Look at that, though. A lot of announcements this week of things to come, mostly in the very smol fiction range, but it’s nice to have some momentum.
Also, I’ll periodically let you know that I now have a Ko-Fi page, if you want to caffeinate an indie writer. A chai latte or iced mocha is one of my only vices.
Works in Progress:
I’m still working through the first round of edits on Crooked House (T5), and it’s a little more involved than I anticipated. The first quarter involved a lot of cuts, but I haven’t needed as many in the second and third quarter. If I add anything significant, it’ll be in this third quarter or the fourth. I’m still weighing whether it’s necessary. I might just finish out this edit, then come back to add as needed.
I have one small short story to write between editing rounds. Then I’ll dive back in for the polishing pre-professional edit, which I hope moves a little more quickly.
Books I’m Reading:
IT by Stephen King
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder
Discount Armageddon by Seanan McGuire
Music I’m Listening To:
Sara Bareilles randomizer
Apocalypse and Chill by Delain
Arcadia by Eurielle
Arcadia by Lily Kershaw
Arrival soundtrack
Beauty and the Beast Broadway soundtrack
A Bit o’ This & That by Emilie Autumn
The Black Halo by Kamelot
Born This Way by Lady Gaga
Bram Stoker’s Dracula soundtrack
Breakaway by Kelly Clarkson
Things I’m Watching:
Scream series (finished)
CSI series
CSI:Miami series
Great British Baking Show: Junior Bake-Off series
Blacklist series (finished)
Black Butler series (finished)
Young Sheldon series (caught up)
Not Dead Yet series
The Huntsman: Winter War movie
Disenchanted movie
Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie
Poem of the Week:
hysteria
from the same root
as hysterectomy
defect of the uterus
emotional fit
of a tilted fist
abdominal dissension
no more trustworthy
than upset stomach
irrational these
emotional outbursts
with raised fists
and defections
vestigial as
appendices
post-appendectomy
can’t live with them
can’t live without them
and they can’t live without us
am I right
one root to another
what lunacy to need
lunatics
or leave them
to tidal devices
varied and variable
ephemeral as moonbeams
do what we can
as rational men
to ignore
August 1, 2023
Deadly Drabble Tuesday: “Birth”
My drabble “Birth,” is free to read at Hungry Shadow Press for Deadly Drabble Tuesday.
“In today’s trippy tale from Amanda M. Blake, some birthdays are not a cause for celebration at all.”
July 28, 2023
The Worms are Coming: Friday Update
News:
My story “Drip” is featured in That Old House: The Bathroom, which is a collection of stories that take place in a bathroom. One of the requirements of the call was that there be no gross horror, so it won’t be that sort of horror. I actually made a point to write Drip in a more poetic style, because there’s beauty in bathrooms, too.
Right now, it’s only available as e-book, because Ingram Spark is throttling indie publishers everywhere, slowing down to a bloody crawl and being pissants with their customer service. I don’t even use them, and I’m pissed. Like, I’m sorry, do you want Amazon to be the only game in town?
Hopefully, the paperback will be available soon.
After such a great last week with some dream acceptances, this week had a few gut punches (although one of those gut punches came in the form of a great personal rejection).
My acceptance rate right now is about ten percent of what I submit, which doesn’t seem to be atypical, and most of it flash/near-flash length for lower pay. There’s no guarantees, there’s no coasting, at least not for me at this time. Ninety percent rejection is just part of the game, and it doesn’t bother me much anymore. I give myself up to thirty minutes of mourning. Then I take what didn’t work for one publisher and try to figure out who to send it to next. One of those rejected pieces was already marked for another market if it didn’t make it.
Some writers simultaneously submit, and maybe that would make more business sense, but it seems a bit of a gamble for me, especially if you sim sub for drastically different pay rates and the lower pay rate accepts it first, but you don’t know if the other market will accept it at all. I’d rather just write a lot and send things out one at a time so I know exactly what I’m getting into.
Works in Progress:
I finished writing and editing the last patch of short stories for some August submission calls.
Now I’m a chapter into my first of two edits on Crooked House (Thorns 5), which I need to send my editors in August. It’s the shortest of the Thorns novel, which doesn’t mean it’s short. I do love the process of cutting a novel, though, even more than short stories.
After Crooked House, I’ll tackle the double edits of a short novel/novella, which will include a slight rewrite. But that won’t be for a bit, since Crooked House will take up a lot of time.
Books I’m Reading:
IT by Stephen King
Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder
Discount Armageddon by Seanan McGuire
Music I’m Listening To:
American Idol cover singles
All I Ever Wanted by Kelly Clarkson
All of Me by Mandy Harvey
“Mystery” by Hugh Laurie
Things I’m Watching:
Scream series
CSI series
Great British Baking Show: Junior Bake-Off series
Blacklist series
Young Sheldon series
Triangle movie
Snow White and the Huntsman movie
Old movie
Poem of the Week:
i don’t think i ask for much
cool sheets and empty room
empty bed under the covers
until my toes wiggle not
scrabble against the fitted
a long sleep in a cold room
cold cold empty empty room
cold cold empty empty dreams
not a single scream in the dark
or in the sweat-stained tangle
of the desperate savior of a dawn
every night i am denied
every night i am pursued
every night the darkness writhes
with shadow and blacklight forms
floating in the air in my eye
i am why we can’t have nice things
July 21, 2023
Friday Update
News:
I’ve been trying to figure out how to use this site, since I’m not much for writing articles unless inspiration hits me over the head with a mace, and I’ve set aside lyrics for poetry lately. I think I’ll try this weekly round-up so that it doesn’t just feel like a promotional machine.
This week, I received two eagerly anticipated acceptances, but I won’t be able to talk about them until the table of contents is officially released. After a rash of rejections, it’s been a real ego boost to get some good news. I’ve actually had some good rejections, too—short-listed but not quite right, personalized notes. A lot of ‘always the bridesmaid, but never the bride.’ It’s nice to blush.
However, what I can tell you is that I’ve been accepted in a dream market, Medusa Publishing Haus’s Queer Saints Volume II. The idea behind the anthologies is that queer people are allowed to be messy, unpleasant, and downright villains, instead of having to be the Good Queer with healthy, idealized (read: unrealistic) relationships.
I submitted to the first volume with no luck, but I’m thrilled to be part of the second volume. The story, “Caregiver,” centers an estranged adult child returning home to take care of their aging parent. It was a really rough one to write, with nothing supernatural to filter the bad feelings, so you probably won’t enjoy it, but perhaps you’ll be moved. QSII comes out on Halloween 2023. If you go to the link above, you’ll see the rest of the TOC and story descriptions. I think this is going to be a helluvan anthology.
In addition, my short story, “A Bladder Full,” is part of the Crystal Lake Publishing Shallow Waters flash fiction contest, with the theme of Time Anomaly. So I wrote my absolute worst nightmare of not being able to find a bathroom when I need to pee, then made it worse. I share it now instead of next week because I think voting starts next week and ends Friday morning. The stories aren’t free to read, but I consider the $5/month tier worth reading a short anthology of horror flash every month.
Works in Progress:
Earlier this week, I finished the arrangement and editing of the horror short story/poetry collection that I’ve been working on since Fall 2021 (but mostly the last six months). The indie press call I finished it for isn’t until October, but it’s good to get it done early, since I don’t know when I’m going back to work. And before that, I finished the edits on a very short horror novel, so I’ve got two manuscripts prepped and ready to go for any potentially appropriate calls.
If I have no luck with the collection after a year, I might try selling the pieces individually, then, once all exclusive rights expire, put out the collection on my own. Same with the short novel. They’re really short enough that doing it myself doesn’t break the bank quite like my Thorns novels do.
Right now, I’m writing another patch of short stories, some for submission calls, some just to have on hand for future calls.
After that, it’ll be time to tackle the double edit of Crooked House (Thorns 5), since my editors are expecting it in August.
Poem of the Week:
(In the absence of lyrics, I’m going to start sharing my favorite flash poem posted to Twitter/Tumblr within the last week.)
There is no witch in 313.
She’s just an eccentric old woman,
no hen nights or pagan coven.
There is no witch in 313.
Kids here can be so mean.
So she doesn’t say hi
or look you in the eye.
There is no witch in 313.
I couldn’t recall when I’d seen
Aggie last but kids get sick
or move to New Brunswick.
There is no witch in 313.
She didn’t do anything to Janine.
Forked fingers don’t cast a curse
or compel ravens to disperse.
There is no witch in 313.
Yes, I promise I’ve been
to her apartment by myself.
Only weird knickknacks on the shelf.
There is no witch in 313.
And if you see a reddish gleam
in my eye whenever I pay her a visit,
it’s just a trick of light, isn’t it?
There is no witch in 313.
June 30, 2023
“The Thing That Crawls” – UNSPEAKABLE HORROR 3
I submitted to UH2 (and possibly the first UH) way back when and wasn’t ready, so it’s really exciting for me to be in UH3 now.
My story in this answers the question ‘what’ and ‘who crawls, twisted and broken, at the foot of your bed at night?’
To close out Pride Month, check out this wonderfully curated queer horror anthology, Unspeakable Horror 3: Dark Rainbow Rising.
June 15, 2023
OUT OF CURIOSITY AND HUNGER paperback
The paperback is now available for OUT OF CURIOSITY AND HUNGER! (Cover and wrap by Rooster Republic Press)
Content warnings are on my website menu above and on the copyright page of the book.
June 13, 2023
OUT OF CURIOSITY AND HUNGER out now
My SPLICE x VERY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR creature feature is loose upon the world. Still working on getting the paperback ready, but as for all my short novels, it’s 99c for the e-book.
Amazon: https://amazon.com/dp/B0C7PGK147
Universal link to all other vendors: https://books2read.com/u/m2q7Wk
June 3, 2023
“All-Nighter”
I had a vivid memory of college essay all-nighters and the weird way I felt on the other side of them, felt this intense compulsion to capture it.
At the end of an all-nighter
I am deadmanwalking I am shambler
I am three bottles of coffee
and sugarmilk buzzing hornets
through my bloodstream and still
eyelids droop like broken shades
At the end of an all-nighter
words blur and syntax stops
making sense in every sentence
no matter how many times I
repeat and repeat and repeat
to proofread a misktae is always
left behind after the paper is graded
but all that matters now is that
it is finished ended entered submitted
At the end of an all-nighter
the sunrise looks wrong and
the shadows in the bedroom
are in the wrong place when
I’m deep in the covers cave
to hibernate until next class
At the end of an all-nighter
I am a god I can see all things
the mist of fluorescent light
and the parts of things the
pixels of the fabric of reality
static shifting so prettily
At the end of an all-nighter
I am an olddeadgod preparing
to be resurrected with the
embalming fluid of new coffee
June 2, 2023
“Eat His Heart”
I honestly wasn’t sure what I could do for the Shakespearean-themed Tragicomedies issue, because I enjoy Shakespeare, but the only play I know (and mostly understand) backward and forward is the comedy Much Ado About Nothing, and how do you make that horror?
So I considered my favorite line over and over again and thought about how easily Much Ado could have been a tragedy. Throw in my favorite kind of supernatural, and while I’m sure some scholars of the play might turn in their graves, I love the way “Eat His Heart” eventually emerged. Also, I got to do all the wordplay my giddy heart could wish.
You can read it for free at the Crow’s Quill site.
May 30, 2023
Cover Reveal: OUT OF CURIOSITY AND HUNGER
Here’s my beautiful cover for OOCAH, from the premade collection at roosterrepublicpress.com. It doesn’t represent the featured creature itself, but I wanted something both naturalistic (like old anatomy drawings) and distorted. I was enchanted by the many legs and the weirdness of the mouth parts.
