L.S. Johnson's Blog, page 5

Tales for the Camp Fire

As newsletter subscribers already know, I am beyond chuffed to have been involved in bringing this book to life. 24 horror authors, all linked in some way to California, donated their stories to create this wonderful book. All profits go to support the North Valley Community Foundation, which is focused on helping Butte County recover and rebuild from last year’s Camp Fire. You can preorder now at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07Q4Z32VP. Bay Area folks, we’ll have copies at the HWA tent at the...

the view from march

INTERVIEWER
You have said that writing is a hostile act; I have always wanted to ask you why.

JOAN DIDION
It’s hostile in that you’re trying to make somebody see something the way you see it, trying to impose your idea, your picture. It’s hostile to try to wrench around someone else’s mind that way. Quite often you want to tell somebody your dream, your nightmare. Well, nobody wants to hear about someone else’s dream, good or bad; nobody wants to walk around with it. The writer is always tri...

FOGcon

Wow, it has been a while. This is, perhaps, one of the side effects of having a newsletter – you start putting all your news there, rather than here. (You know you can sign up for it, right? I’m sending them about once a month …)

But this weekend is FOGcon, where I will be attending panels, talking shop, and generally unwinding from a crazy February. (If in doubt, look for me close to the bar – it’s been that kind of a month.) I’ll have books for sale at the Borderlands table in the Dealer Ro...

F Is for Fairy cover

So it dropped a few days ago, but here for your delectation is the cover for F Is for Fairy. I have a story in here; I have, in fact, the first story, the A story. Here is the opening:

Her Names

They were twelve, and between them they encompassed Dawn, Dusk, Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, Seed, Blossom, Harvest, Maiden, Mother, and Crone; that is to say, they were complete. Thus, when a thirteenth fairy emerged from the breath of sun upon earth they were to a one confused. None of them had exp...

omni vs. head-hopping

I’ve been reading Louise Penny’s Gamache series with a kind of fascination – not for the mystery element, which is fine, but for the POV.

It reads to me as omni, though I know plenty of other folks call it head-hopping, and they’re not exactly wrong. The image that I couldn’t get out of my head all through Still Life was of rocks being skipped across the water – just these brief, rapid dips into people’s heads. At times it’s poignant, at other times distracting – until you start to see how...

goodbye, 2018

we got in last night after a difficult flight (baby of maybe 12-14 months, screeching and cawing and crying for four hours with hardly any breaks … dear baby, I nearly joined in …) and this one crawled into my lap the moment I sat down, licked my nose, and held me tight. meanwhile our older sir just purred and purred for hours, purred while eating, purred while in the litter pan, purred while his people got into bed, and then settled, purring, in a spot where he could watch over us. that sof...

See you on the other side

This week has been a week of winding down. The Painter’s Widow is drafted, though I am dissatisfied with it as I am dissatisfied with all very rough drafts. Next year’s writing plans are being adjusted as work and life commitments start coming in. The news is keeping me up at night. But enough, enough. It’s time to go. See you all in 2019.

the library at mount char

This book.

I put it on my TBR list when it first came out, but, well, the TBR list is long and money is tight … so when it went on sale I grabbed it, buoyed by the fervor on Twitter, and it delivered.

Here’s the thing. About halfway through I realized: this is the most realistic depiction of divinity that I have yet encountered. By divinity I’m thinking Greek pantheon-esque, those beings who are at once like-us and inscrutable, fuckable yet operating on a vastly different moral and emotional...

end of the year, 2018

I’m starting the painful process of migrating to a different email messaging service to reduce costs. This is an excellent problem to have, but I’m archiving old newsletters and tagging my list before I move it over and it’s also just work, the kind of work no one tells you about when you start this author journey.

But in going back through the 2016 newsletters (so long ago! such a different time!) I found this snapshot of my WIP list, and it made me reflect on all that’s happened between the...

2018 Award Eligibility

This has been a year of planting, not harvesting, but nonetheless I had a few tales published:

Short story

“All That I Left Behind (We Are),” in The Fabulist.

“A Harvest Fit for Monsters,” in Nightscript IV.

“From Court Visionaries of the Imperial Age,” in Zetetic: A Record of Unusual Inquiry.

“Sabbaths,” in Syntax & Salt.

Novelette

“X Is for Xavier,” in E Is for Evil.

Novella

Leviathan

 

I’m also reading for awards, but I am a little, ahem, inundated at the moment (at last glance I had nearl...