MatthewWuertz

I thought the year was ending well based solely on how much writing I’ve produced lately. Today, I sold another fantasy short story to MindFlights, so the year is also ending well from another aspect (a rather important one at that).

I’m picturing the orc dialogue from Warcraft III in my head. With my science fiction story finished, my inner voice asks, “Something need doing?” Inner-click on the next draft of the fantasy story. “Work, work!” These seem like fairly productive days, a good end to 2009.

I've discovered a second writing "office" in our house. After we finish the bedtime routine with my daughter, my wife takes our infant son elsewhere, and I sit in Elora's room, leaning my back against the wall next to her door. She'll give me a big hug before this, telling me, "Night-night, Daddy. Sit? Sit?" She points to my usual spot, and I say, "Yes, I'll sit here, but you need to lie down and be quiet, okay?" To which she'll say, "Okay." And then I open a mini-laptop and begin to work. Elora's not quite two yet, so she's still learning how to sleep in a big-girl bed, but it gives me anywhere from a half-hour to hour each night for writing, and she feels comforted because I'm simply in the room with her. I really like my new office.

I finished a second draft on my latest fantasy story. It’s currently around 7500 words, so I didn’t chop that many from the rough draft. I’m going to set this one aside for a bit and focus on finishing the science fiction story first. I feel like I need to make sure my head’s clear when I start looking at overall pacing, so a little distance should help with that.

I finished a rough draft on a new science-fiction story.  Life is pretty busy at the moment, especially with the addition of a new baby, so I’m not writing much.  It’s pretty exciting at the Wuertz household!  Elora and William keep me on my toes.

To celebrate the publication of my short story, “fc01a9,” in Aoife’s Kiss, I’m holding a giveaway for a copy of the September Issue.  Details are posted on my blog here: http://matthewwuertz.blogspot.com/2009/09/aoifes-kiss-giveaway.html

In other news, I finished a rough draft for my latest fantasy short story, and it’s a little over 8,000 words long.  My rough drafts are typically the longest of all drafts, so I’m sure this will get cut down quite a bit over the next iterations.  It felt like I would never reach the end of this draft, so I’m really pleased that I finally finished it.
 

I’m still working on the first draft to my latest fantasy short story.  It’s currently approaching 5K, and I still have a little ways to go on it.  Optimistically, the draft might be complete by August, but I’m not sure if I can pull that off or not.

I’m happy to announce that I sold another fantasy short story to MindFlights.  "The Magicera's Confession" will be available online once it’s published.

I’m still working on the first draft of the new fantasy tale, and it continues to shape itself into something over 5K (though I’m not that far into it yet).  I’m trying to add much more fantastic elements into this story than previous tales in this particular series.  I also sat down earlier today and typed out an opening for a new fantasy short story so that I’d have it down.  It seems my fiction writing pendulum has swung heavily towards the fantasy side at the moment.

I’ve got seven stories that I consider “live” at the moment (seeking magazines to call home), and I think that’s a personal record.  Part of the reason for this is the varying turnaround time with markets along with the fact that I’m focusing only on short stories rather than trying to write short stories and novels.  After a very insightful discussion with my wife recently, I’ve gained a great clarity with writing short stories, and I’ve felt a lot of peace (which I never had when I was also working on novels).

My current project is another fantasy tale, a final story for one of my protagonists that will also bring closure to his series.  I have a sense that this could be over 5K when complete, but it will depend on my mood and the overall pacing I choose to set.  It will be a bit of a sad farewell, but perhaps he’ll return in a lesser role in another story someday.

I need to do a couple of quick fixes to the fantasy short story, and then it’ll be in submission somewhere.  I’m sticking with fantasy editing for now, working over an older story that’s currently over 6,000 words long.  I’m not sure what the next original project might be.  There are random ideas in my head, but I haven’t spun them into anything constructive yet.

The time travel story needs something more.  I’m not sure what to do with it just yet, so I’m pushing it aside for a while until I have a chance to think through things.  I’m still cleaning the fantasy story, but I think I’m close to finishing it.  After that, I’m going to clean up an older fantasy story that’s been hanging in limbo for too many months.

The past week and weekend gave me ample opportunity to work on my latest fantasy and science-fiction short stories.  The time travel story is at a place where I need to read it aloud and hopefully bounce it off someone for some feedback.  The fantasy story went through the big sweeping changes edit, so there’s still a lot of cleanup work left to do.  I think that by the end of March (if not sooner), both stories will be in submission queues somewhere.  Then I must consider my next project…

I started editing my time travel story last night.  I spent more time checking terminology than correcting the story itself.  Perhaps this story will kindle an interest in writing historical fiction, something I’ve only attempted once before.  I enjoy history, so I wouldn’t be surprised if I meddle in the genre at some point.

I completed a rough draft of my fantasy short story. I don’t think I have any humor in it at all, and it is quite dark in places. Dark, for me, does not mean that it fringes on horror. In my works, dark fantasy means that the protagonist is experiencing something quite unpleasant without ending up happily ever after. In this story, I think the protagonist ends up in a somewhat worse state of mind.
 

I'm continuing to work on a rough draft of my latest fantasy tale.  I think it's going well for the most part.  Progress is progress.

I’ve been pretty behind with writing projects for the past month, but as life is becoming more organized and we continue to adjust to a new person living with us, things will get better.  Today I submitted three short stories that have been waiting to go back out to fresh markets for several weeks.  Usually I can redirect a story back out within the same day of receiving a rejection, but I couldn’t keep up in December.  Time to get life (not just writing life) back on track.  Huzzah to 2009!

I’m writing sporadically due to a shortage of time. Apparently there are now fewer hours in the day, or so it would seem. When I do find available windows, I’m working on the new fantasy short story. This story is rooted in the lore of my standard fantasy world and may include a reference to Klevtrìth (the protagonist from the series of fantasy stories published in The Sword Review). It will likely be quite dark at points, at least in relation to my other works, but I hope readers find it engaging.

I’ve put the recently completed rough draft of the time travel story aside so that it can age like a fine wine.  Actually, I’m just hoping to distance myself from it long enough that I can edit objectively.  In the meantime, I began a new fantasy short story with one of my favorite protagonists.  He hasn’t seen the light of print yet, so he’s still unknown to the general public, but he’s very near to my heart because I expose a lot of my weaknesses through his character.  I'm looking forward to exploring him some more.

I’m excited about selling a science-fiction story to Aoife’s Kiss.  This is the first story I’ve sold that wasn’t fantasy, and it’s nice to have a sense of validation for writing in a different genre.  The story is titled “fc01a9” and will be published in September, 2009.  This was not the latest science-fiction story I finished; in fact, the two are completely unrelated.