Clarion West Write-a-thon Progress: How Deep Is Red

Summer wound down, and we entered heat-mad August, days of sweat and sunshine, so hot you didn’t really want to move. But somehow, when evening started falling and the air cooled off a little, your energy would return.

And sometimes one of the places to burn some of that off was by driving up to the Michigan dunes, building a fire and getting drunk on the beach. I went up one evening with Anna, and a bunch of other friends from high school. I didn’t particularly like them or want to hang around with them, but Anna wanted it, and she made me promise to come.

It was what I had expected. A lot of beer and a couple of bottles of Jaeger getting passed around. We knew a spot that was technically private property, but the owners of the house far above were rarely there to disturb us. We sat on the soft sand around a fire made from the wood we’d brought and I watched the stars far out over the lake, wondering when I could gracefully excuse myself and slip away.

That was why I was the first person to see them. Somet, out in the water, coming towards our fire. At first I thought they were fish, or seals, or something, not people. But as the heads came up out of the water, I realize they were human. Women, three of them.

Last week, the guest posts were Kim Mainord with “Your Mileage May Vary”, Sandra M. Odell on fantasy podcasts, Ken Altabef on using Inuit mythology in his work, Rhonda Eudaly with “Writing is Only Glamourous Until This Face Appears,” and Raven Oak talked about “Linguistics in Fantasy — To Thee or Not to Thee”.

This week, we have John Johnston III musing on Fictional Characters, Pete Sutton will talk about succesffully crowdfunding an anthology, Jamie Mason will wax philosophical about Candadian zombies, Mercedes M. Yardley will discuss finding your literary voice, and to wrap up the week, J.T. Gill will tell you why reading fantasy makes you smarter. I’ll also be posting snippets from the sequel to Beasts of Tabat, which I’m working on right now, keeping you informed of any recent SFWA developments, and talking about point of view and being inside a character’s head. And finally — for online writing class news, either sign up for my mailing list at the bottom of this post, or keep checking this site.

What else is coming up in March and April? There’ll be some giveaways, including audio copies of my collection Eyes Like Sky and Coal and Moonlight, both hard and e-copies of my collections and the new novel, and some cool surprises. 🙂 You’ll also see “Documents of Tabat,” a number of small pieces of fiction, each of which ties into the book (they’re interstitial pieces from an earlier version of the novel), starting March 24 and continuing on weeks through April 21st. I’ll point you to the GoodReads giveaways when they come up, and at the end of the week, I’ll include a wrap-up of the various places I’ve guest posted and any places reviews or other mentions have occurred.

Some of you reading this have been with me since I first started writing stories set in this world; others are new to my words. Either way, I hope you’ll enjoy the novel that I’m finally getting the chance to lay before you, and I hope you’ll share some of the fun of the next couple of months.

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