"Broken Strand" - Apex #12

I thought that I'd post a G-mail chat that I had with a fan a couple days ago (posted with permission):

Laura: I just got the new Apex, read your story. Awesome.

me: thanks!

Laura: I liked it many levels.

me: wow. that's cool

Laura: pure entertainment (always an important reason to read, in my opinion). also thought-provoking.

me: jason always gets the darker side out of me. (that's the excuse i'm using for that story and the novella me and wrath wrote)

Laura: I heard about that on RLD. Congrats. I have a lot of respect for Wrath's work.

me: it was a blast writing with him

Laura: can't wait to see what you guys came up with. kinda skeered though. ha

me: you should be

Laura: no doubt. if it's not scary, you did not do your jobs.

me: oh, believe me, the job got DONE. even wrath thought that i am going to get letters of complaint over it.

Laura: I'll pray for wisdom and grace be given to you. to answer your enemies.

me: thanks

Laura: with logic that cannot be argued with

me: although, right now, "bite me" has been way up there on my list of retorts.

Laura: yeah ha. how can you argue with that?

me: exactly!

Laura: Back to the story

me: k

Laura: Broken Strand

me: yup. one of the rare times that i liked a title i gave a story, btw.

Laura: I did want to say that I thought it was significant that you made the power of choice an element of
righteousness. It grabbed my attention. and shook me by the neck.

me: it's an argument that wrath and i had one day, about why an all powerful God "couldn't" make a creation that conformed to his will.

Laura: yeah...not Stepford wives

me: his argument said this pointed to the fallacy that God was all powerful and mine pointed to the fact that without choice, it can't be good or love. we'd be pre-programmed automatans. (me and wrath do this a lot)

Laura: Also, I thought you did an excellent job of making your main character one that the reader could identify with, whether they were believers or not. Because as you said, we've all made bad choices.

me: yup. i try to be very conscious of letting my main character be a guide into whatever universe i'm creating.

Laura: Because like CS Lewis used to say, Christendom desn't need more Christians to write "Christian stories"...it needs Christians to write GOOD stories. Broken Strand was great. Nice work.

me: you truly, truly humble me.


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A Tale of Two Stories

Two magazines, featuring stories of mine, are available for order:

Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest #12 marks the first time I have made the cover of a magazine (this is like the twin coming out first being declared the older sibling - still, you never forget your first.) My story, “Broken Strand”, mixes religion, horror, and science fiction in a tale of a scientist who believes he can undo the "sin nature" of humanity via gene therapy. Hijinks ensue.

The issue also features new work by Brian Keene, Steve Shrewsbury, Alethea Kontis, Paul Jessup, and Michael West.

Here's a direct link to the issue in the Apex online store.

It's also available across the US and Canada in over 500 stores (namely B&N, Hastings, Chapters, and Joseph-Beth Booksellers) as well as the new Horror-Mall.com. Yes, I do plan on hunting down the issue at my local Barnes and Noble so that I can see my name on a shelf.


Doorways #5 features my story, “Just a Young Man and His Game.” This story takes place in the same universe as "Just an Old Man on a Bench" (first published on the Horrorfind web site back in the day).

Here's a video if you want to see what it looks like. Here's a direct link to the issue in the Doorways Publishing store.

If you want to order, it’s $6.75 + .75 for shipping ($1.50 if you’re outside of the U.S.) or a one year subscription is: (4 ISSUES) $20.00 + $3.15 for shipping ($6.31 if you’re outside of the U.S.)


You can send a check (if in the U.S.) to :

DOORWAYS MAGAZINE
247 N SYCAMORE ST
UNION CITY, OH 45390

Or send paypal payment to: bewisedesign@yahoo.com

Drop me a line and let me know what you think of the stories.


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If you want to make sure that I see your comment or just want to stop by and say “hi”, feel free to stop by my message board. We always welcome new voices to the conversation.

A Good Year So Far

(aka I'm letting my inbox recover from yesterday's post ...)

Well, 2008 is shaping up to be a serious breakout year for me. The year where I finally feel like I'm no longer just playing a writer on the Internet. My story "Snapping Points" is currently up on the MagusZine site (which also has a new story by Jason Sizemore).



Come March, you will find me in a couple of places. Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest #12 will have my story “Broken Strand” (as well as having stuff by Brian Keene, Steven Shrewsbury, Michael West, and Alethea Kontis – all sorts of Mo*Con alumni).
Doorways #5 will have my story “Just a Young Man and His Games” in it (and I’ll be sharing covers with Bob Freeman)
Mo*Con III will see the debut of at least two projects. The first is the novella co-written with Wrath James White, “Orgy of Souls.” I’ll have a separate blog about this one further down the road, which may double as my resignation letter from Christianity entirely as Wrath seemed determined to get me all kinds of fired.

The second is an anthology from the Indiana Horror Writers. I have two stories in there, “Soul Food” (a reprint of the first story ever published by me) and “Dark Night of the Soul”. They will sit proudly along stories by Bob Freeman ("Born Again"), Michael West ("Trolling"), Sara Larson ("Co-Dependency") and Tracy Jones’ ("The Coven") among others. Bob not only designed the cover but also the book trailer.



Later on this year will see the arrival of a couple of other new projects, some of them, once more, alongside Bob Freeman and Steve Shrewsbury (my story, "The Iron Hut" coming out in the Eldritch Steel anthology), that I'll announce closer to when they are coming out. One way to look at this is that I’m stalking Bob, Michael, and Steve. Another is that it’s nice to have your friends enjoying success alongside you.

Oh, and my story "Rite of Passage" was just accepted by Space and Time Magazine. Like I said, not a bad year so far.


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If you want to make sure that I see your comment or just want to stop by and say “hi”, feel free to stop by my message board. We always welcome new voices to the conversation.

Big Pimpin' II

Fresh on the heels of me being the featured writer over on Apex Online, my story, "The Ave", is now up over on Horror Literature Quarterly. Subscriptions are free, so you have no excuses. (Click here to download.)

By way of a links salad, here are some recent blogs that have made me happy:

Heresies - I doled out blog homework assignments and my friend Rob Rolfingsmeyer has some really great thoughts on this topic (and his Listening to the Silence and his Spiritual Seasons)

The Dreaded "S" Word - my board moderator guest blogged for our church's blog site

Why Did Jesus Go to Parties? - I recently found a former mentor of mine online and I see that we haven't exactly drifted apart.

Miss Nikki and Li'l Mo - Alethea Kontis got our gift. Yay!

Now to return to my stewing over not being able to make it to World Fantasy this year.

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If you want to make sure that I see your comment or just want to stop by and say hi, feel free to do so on my message board. I apologize in advance for some of my regulars.

Life Catch Up and ANNOUNCEMENTS!

After what I hope is my final trip to the doctor for a while, my self-diagnosed case of post-MoCon SARS turned out to be cough variant asthma. Once again, she told me that I may want to consider backing away from the Internet when I have symptoms. After another battery of tests, including an MRI (MRIs suck and are much noisier than they appear on television), it also turns out that I have somehow managed to tear some cartilage in my wrist. I suppose that’s a decent result, since my doctor initially feared carpel tunnels. The downside is that I have to wear a wrist splint for a month … which truly sucks since I do the bulk of my writing long hand.

Speaking of me writing, I am pleased to announce that my short story, "The Ave," will be in the Fall issue of Horror Literature Quarterly this October. This story will be available as a free download, which is great because if there’s one thing I know about fans of mine, it’s that they are broke. In fact, go register now because the magazine is great (and I believe there is a new Tim Lebbon story up exclusive to subscribers. Plus you get access to previous issues, including a story by Nate Southard).

Also in the good news department, October is shaping up to be a great month since I will be the Featured Writer in Apex Science Fiction and Horror Digest. It will mean an interview as well as a reprint of a story of mine that you probably missed the first time around.

I will also be attending the Second Annual Apex Day in Lexington, KY, at the city's Joseph-Beth Booksellers. Apex Day features authors and artists who contribute to Apex Digest; there will be author readings, book signings, art displays and other presentations. Several authors will be participating, including Gary A. Braunbeck, Lucy Snyder, Teri Jacobs, Geoffrey Girard, Alethea Kontis, Michael West, and Douglas F. Warrick (not to mention, artist Carrie Rapp). Plus you get to hang out with the fine Apex staff, Apex editor-in-chief Jason Sizemore and Apex submissions editor Mari Adkins. The event is free, and will go on all afternoon and probably into the evening.

Time and Location:
Saturday, September 22nd starting at 2:00 pm
Joseph-Beth Booksellers (800 248 6849)
161 Lexington Green Circle, Suite B1
Lexington KY 40503

If you can’t catch up with us there, you can find us the following weekend (September 28 – 30) at ConText 20 in Columbus, OH. Apex Publications will be hosting a room party September 29th.

Also, my friend, J.C. Hay was recently interviewed. Go check it out. And writer Richard Dansky asked Alice Henderson to participate in Five For Writing, a feature on his website in which he puts five questions to different writers. Go check it out.


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If you want to make sure that I see your comment or just want to stop by and say hi, feel free to do so on my message board. I apologize in advance for some of my regulars.

I’m Not Really A Writer...

... I just play one on the Internet. At least that's the feeling I had up until this year. So this has been the year of Maurice, my coming out party of sorts. At long last, stories of mine have finally started coming out, giving tangible evidence of me being a “real” writer (as opposed to someone who writes a lot about being a writer and only has an Internet/convention presence). So I am doing a year in review before making any resolutions.

“In the Shadows of Meido” came out through IDW Publishing Comics. I was profiled in a local paper, INtake Weekly, and then asked to blog for them on a regular basis. My story “Family Business” came out in Weird Tales followed by “Black Frontiers” in the anthology, Voices from the Other Side: Dark Dreams II.

I got sucked into becoming the comic books review editor at Hollywood Jesus, thus having yet another excuse to have to keep buying comics. My oddest writing assignment of the year came with me writing for the American Tract Society. Blogging for INtake led to a regular column with them. However, since I can’t blog often enough, or in enough places, I also began blogging for Blogging in Black.

I ended the year with my story, “Since We Can Die But Once,” coming out in the DeathGrip: Exit Laughing anthology. Then seven of my reviews were picked up for the Hollywood Jesus Reviews 2005-2006. I was interviewed for two podcasts: one for Snark Infested Waters about my horror writing and the other for The Studio Upstairs about my work for Hollywood Jesus.

Not to mention, I’ve written the equivalent of two novels for this blog during 2006.

2006 was a good year. I have already had critical essay accepted for Cutting Edge (“The Passion of the Christ”) as well as a short story accepted for the Eldritch Steel: Swords and Mythos Sorcery anthology (“The Iron Hut”) due out in 2007. I’m officially up to the level of a nobody in the writing community.


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If you want to make sure that I see your comment or just want to stop by and say hi, feel free to do so on my message board. I apologize in advance for some of my regulars.