Aeryn Rudel's Blog, page 53
August 23, 2017
One-Hour Flash – The Writing on the Wall
If you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, you know I write a lot of flash fiction. I never set out to be a flash fiction writer, but about five years ago, a friend of mine introduced me to a weekly contest held on the forums of a horror magazine called Shock Totem (Thanks, Andy!). The contest was simple: someone posted a prompt, usually a photo, and then you had one hour to write and edit a story of 1,000 words or less. The authors would then read, comment, and vote on the stories,...
August 16, 2017
Which Work Do You Read? – A Poll
As some of you know, my current published works reside in two very different camps. First, there’s the work I do for Privateer Press, which includes two novels, a handful of novellas, and a whole bunch of short stories. All that fiction is set in Privateer Press’ Iron Kingdoms setting, a steampunk-esque fantasy world. Then there’s my other work, which is, of course, my own IP, and is primarily horror (with a smattering of sci-fi and fantasy). That’s mostly short stories, though I’m currently...
August 9, 2017
Read “Cowtown” at The Arcanist
My story “Cowtown,” a flash piece (1,000 words) that mixes comedy, horror, and a dash of sci-fi, was recently published over at The Arcanist. The story is free to read on The Arcanist’s website; just click the cow below to check it out.
A little more about the publisher. The Arcanist is a new market that publishes sci-fi and fantasy, but their definitions of those two genres are broad enough to include a bit of horror, as evidenced by my story. They’ve really put their best f...
August 1, 2017
Submission Statement: July 2017
July was a much better month mostly because I finally ended my six-month-long acceptance drought. That alone is enough to crown July as my best month of the year. Here’s the nitty-gritty on my submission endeavors in July.
July 2017 Report Card
Submissions Sent: 5 Rejections: 2 Acceptances: 1 Publications: 1 Other: 0Again, I’m getting an average of one submission per week. I keep telling myself I need to double that.
RejectionsOnly two rejections this month, but both are noteworthy.
Rejec...
July 20, 2017
Acts of War: Aftershock – Crucible Guard in Acts of War
Last weekend Privateer Press held its annual convention Lock & Load in Bellevue, Washington, and announced a whole bunch of exciting things for the Iron Kingdoms, the setting for the tabletop miniatures games WARMACHINE and HORDES. I was at the convention signing copies of my new novel Acts of War: Aftershock, and perhaps not too surprisingly, the novel serves as a bit of a preview to one of those exciting announcements.
If you watched the keynote from Lock & Load, then you saw Privateer Pres...
July 18, 2017
The Rejection Scorecard
As some of you may know, my professional career with the written word (such as it is) started in the tabletop gaming industry, where I worked as an editor, a game designer, and a writer. With over a decade working in that environment, it should be no surprise that I derive great satisfaction from creating needlessly complex rule systems for just about everything. So, let’s take some of that game design philosophy and apply it to submissions and rejections!
Before I get into this, a quick disc...
July 12, 2017
Acts of War: Aftershock Now Available
If you’ve been following this blog over that last 30 weeks or so, you’ve seen me document the process of writing, revising, and editing my novel Acts of War: Aftershock. Well, today, all that work comes to fruition. Acts of War: Aftershock is now available in eBook and print formats from all the usual suspects.
War Has Come Again to Llael
On the heels of inflicting defeat upon the Khadorans at Riversmet, Lord General Coleman Stryker marches deeper into enemy territory to prepare a major assa...
July 7, 2017
Acts of War: Aftershock – Excerpt #3
The release date for Acts of War: Aftershock is right around the corner, and here’s one more excerpt to whet your appetite before the book drops on July 12th. This time, we’re going to focus on one of the primary antagonists for the novel, Assault Kommander Oleg Strakhov, and a mysterious new character who has a big role to play in this book and the next.
Rynyr, Khadoran-Occupied Llael
Lukas di Morray had never known such pain. At least that’s what his mind told him; it insisted his sufferi...
July 5, 2017
Submission Statement: June 2017
My acceptance slump continued in June, though I did have one publication. I have two new stories I started sending out last month, so they’ve been piling up the rejections with all the usual suspects. Let’s have a look.
June 2017 Report Card
Submissions Sent: 5 Rejections: 4 Acceptances: 0 Publications: 1 Other: 0Roughly one submission per week in June. Not bad, but I’d like to double that in July.
RejectionsFour rejections this month, all of the form variety.
Rejection 1: Submitted 5/22/...
June 26, 2017
Dunesteef Does “Scare Tactics”
The audio fiction magazine Dunesteef has published an audio production of my horror story “Scare Tactics.” They really nailed the voices, and I’m very pleased with how it turned out. It’s free to listen, so click the link and check it out.
Episode 194: Scare Tactics by Aeryn Rudel
Lindsey is a paranormal investigator, but she has an advantage on most, because she has the demon Adramelech captured in a Raggedy Ann doll, and it does her bidding, which makes casting out the demon really simple....
