Joseph Devon's Blog, page 15

The JD Art Contest Winner

So here's the winning entry. Please click on it to view it full size.

This entry is from Saher Imran and, as far as I'm concerned, needs zero introduction. However if I don't type something up here the home page of this site goes bonkers, so I'll babble a bit.

I fell in love with this as soon as I saw it, and every judge who I showed it to replied with, "Wow!" (or a similar succinct superlative)

Saher has taken one moment from my words and turned them into an iconic image. The attention to...

Fan Art Contest: Honorable Mentions

The votes have been tallied. The phone lines are closed. The intricate network of satellites set up to collect opinions has been dismantled. I have my winner for the Second Annual Joseph Devon Fan Art Contest.

But that's for next week.

This week is for the honorable mentions.

First we have another entry from Jackson P. Some of you might remember Jackson's genre bending entry, "Cupcake," from earlier in the contest.

I include Jackson's work partly as a joke, but partly in earnest. A lot of people ...

Art Contest Update

Just to keep you in the loop, I have not forgotten about the Great Annual Fan Art Contest…or whatever I called it. I have been sorting through entries, narrowed it down to a handful of finalists, and hope to have a judgement soon.

Here, however, are some entries that in no way in hell are going to win:

Remember that scene where Gene Autry had his face duct-taped? Me Either.

I know this trick, people. I've cleaned out my Unpublished Drawer by mailing stuff off to any possible place that is...

New Short Story: Your Princess is in Another Castle

Another new short story is up. And, again, it's based on a short-fiction challenge from Chuck Wendig. This one was nuts. Just plain nuts. The goal was to mash two genres together, which maybe doesn't sound that bad, as far as these challenges go that's kind of standard. However the genres were hyper specific sub-genres. Not just "Gothic" but "Southern Gothic," for example.

Here was the list to choose from: Southern Gothic, Cyberpunk, Sword & Sorcery, Femslash, Black Comedy, Picaresque.

I...

Places I Want to Live

My sister and her family are currently on a road trip, which means that she's constantly texting me for entertainment, which means I wind up on crazy-ass trips through the internet looking for fun links.

The best so far has been this list of View larger map

Yes. I'm a third grade boy who can't stop laughing at dick jokes. Somehow I also write works of serious ...

Writing Someone Else's Story

I am once again attempting to put a short story together for one of Chuck Wendig's weekly flash fiction contests. This week's contest is about guns and crime. Which is a nice fit for me. I can certainly get up to some fun with guns, murder, crime and a nice macguffin. And the 1,000 word limit adds a nice spin on things. It's like creating an amuse-bouche with words (props to me for fitting the words "macguffin" and "amuse-bouche" into one paragraph).

There's also a certain thrill that comes...

I Spent a Weekend at a Haunted Sleep Away Camp for Ballerinas

My cousin is getting married next week and his bachelor party was last weekend. Due to planning difficulties and time constraints, his brother had very little choice in where this party would be hosted. The bachelor wanted a rural setting, just him and twenty friends in the woods with a grill, meat and beer.

We ended up renting this place:

Looks nice, doesn't it? Picturesque?

Yeah.

Well the fucking place is haunted. And possessed. And possibly built on top of the ancient burial grounds of an...

Review of Crime and Punishment

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

My reading of Crime and Punishment was the start of what I hope to be a revisiting of numerous Russian classics. I read all the big guns (barring War and Peace) many years ago and, quite frankly, got NOTHING out of them. I was confused, bored, confused, unable to wade through the thick writing, confused and, lastly, confused.

I should probably address my confusion. I am, in real life as well as in art, an absolute clod at...

Interview up at Freda's Voice

I've started making the rounds on the internet to promote Persistent Illusions. There should be a number of reviews and Q&A's and a few marble statues depicting me standing over a slain lion cropping up over the next few months. You know, the usual stuff.

Freda from fredasvoice.blogspot.com interviewed me last week and the post is now live. Ever wonder why my grammar seems distinctly non-English or what my favorite book is or what advice I'd give to new authors or what I look I like with...

Art Contest is Done

See? I told you it would take me awhile to get my head together and officially end this thing. Technically the submission deadline for the Second Annual Fan Art Contest was last Saturday. A few extensions were granted…because I forgot to announce it was over. And because I'm nice. And sort of lazy. Also I like Cookies n' Cream ice cream better than anything except for Heath Bar Crunch.

So the entries are in, except for the extensions granted, and I'll get them together and run them past...