I’ve been reading and writing a lot this vacation. It’s dandy.
Two days ago I wrote a short-short called “Ars Draconis.”
Yesterday I wrote a story called “Lunacide”. I’ve had the first sentence of this story for a long time, but could never figure out the rest: “It was 2016, and we were finally blowing up the moon.” So, yesterday, while the wife was at yoga, I took a lone table overlooking an emerald-green rice terrace, ordered a papaya smoothie, wrote the one sentence I had, and let the rest flow. I’m very satisfied with the results.
Today I wrote two stories: “Planetworld” and “Killipedes”. I admit that these were both written title-first. They’re both funny and deeply strange. I like them. I find it easy to write in a tropical paradise. I’ll send these pieces to Space Squid and EDF, though I don’t know which to where.
I recently read Raymond Chandler’s Farewell, My Lovely, and was deeply impressed. I quite literally writhed with joy while reading it. His language is delightful. His metaphors are renowned, and for good reason: “She was about as cute as a washtub.” “I lit a cigarette that tasted like a plumber’s handkerchief.” Even though I’ve never written noir or mystery fiction (too scared to try), I can admire his commanding style.
Now I’m about halfway into Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, which is pretty good. It has some pacing issues - I’m 300 pages in and almost nothing has happened - but the world he’s building is rich and interesting. I’ll happily read on.
Also, I neglected to upload the images for the next story. Nor did I get a guest column for next Friday. So I’m afraid the Tournament of Titillation will peter out with a final book review this next Wednesday. It was good while it lasted!