Snippet Posted

I posted a chunk of the beginning of my week one write-a-thon story, for which the prompt was "Everything was fine until the boys of Sigma Pi discovered steampunk," here. It is based on memories of the frat boys playing basketball in the back alley, although it also takes place 10-15 years in the future. There may be zeppelins in it somewhere along the way, but I know it also references the story I wrote my first week at Clarion, which appeared in Strange Horizons as Foam on the Water, and which appears in the upcoming collection as "Heart in a Box," which was its original title, but got changed due to unfortunate resonances with SNL skits about "thing in a box".

One of the Clarion West students, Rochita Loenen-Ruiz, wrote about her hopes and fears for the workshop for Fantasy Magazine here. Rochita's terrific story, Teaching A Pink Elephant To Ski, was published in Fantasy last winter. We've also posted about the Write-a-thon. Fantasy's been publishing a lot of CW alumni's fiction, including Darja Malcolm Clark, Maura McHugh, Katherine Sparrow, Rachel Swirsky, and Deb Taber as well as nonfic such as an interview with Nisi Shawl by Eileen Gunn. Many of them are participating in the Write-a-thon too! We've got an upcoming story by instructor Nancy Kress. Stop by and check us out!

Comments

Submitted by Cat on June 23, 2009 - 10:01am.

This week's story is progressing in small chunks each day. I'm having a lot of fun imagining the world and complicating my protagonist's life in a way Connie Willis would approve of.

<EM>

The Laundro-Mat was a coffee house set
in what had been, up unitl six months ago, an actual laundro-mat. The
owner Derek had flunked out of the corporate
philosophy department before starting the coffeehouse with a micro
loan. The loan had extended to such things as buying the place but not
to removing the old machines.

Derek had filled the old dryers
with Christmas tree lights, crammed into each and interspersed with
plastic charms and thimble-sized objects. Fred glanced into one
shouldering the entrance as he passed. A tiny Tabasco bottle, a
thumb-nail maneki neko – a white cat with one gold-colored paw upraised
in greeting, a matchbox sized green metal hearse. The lights twinkled
white and purple.

Vicki was sitting at one of the banks of
tables made by countertopping a row of washers. The floor underfoot
felt sticky and badly used, where once it had been gritty and smelled
of clothing perfumes. She was bleached blonde with orange stripes like
flames in her shoulder length hair. Her arms were covered with living
tattoos. Right now they were clockwork gears, coin-sized, turning and
churning on her olive skin.

You couldn't get food there but you
could have it brought it, if you didn't mind fishing through the
plastic basket of discarded menus. The Honda. Yummie Bites. Polar
Express. 300 Happy Rabbits. Centzon Totochin. Chow. Once you ordered,
one of the neighborhood kids slouched beside the detergent dispenser
would be dispatched to fetch the food and bring it to your washer.</em>

Write-a-thon participant Ruth Nestvold's story, Woman In Abaya With Onion, is up at Fantasy Magazine!

best,

Cat

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Submitted by Cat on June 25, 2009 - 2:49pm.

I posted yet another snippet, albeit a brief one, from the story here. The story is rounding 3k words - I suspect it will end up significantly longer, perhaps in honor of this year's teacher, John Kessel, whose teaching bears resemblence to that of my own 2005 instructor Andy Duncan (indeed, he even referenced Andy in lecture.) I realized that we have TWO Fantasy Magazine fiction writers, along with our Assistant Editor - Media Todd Vandemark in the class, and I beg pardon in advance for whoever I'm forgetting this time. :)

How's everyone else doing on their goals, who's gotten what done? Chime in!

See you Friday at the party!