I am a confessed Kar Schroeder fan. His Virga sequence is remarkable – absolutely the kind of retro, yet hyper-advanced concept I love to become immersed in. Engine of Recall is a collection of his short stories from across his career. The worlds Schroeder creates are amazing – ships jousting at near-light-speed, artifacts orbitting pulsars, and so on. I’ve read the first three Virga books, and am looking forward to reading the fourth, and then reading more of his back catalogue.
Author: Sean Monaghan
Writer. Voracious reader.
First round of tutoring complete
This is just a general “what’s up” post. If I understood Facebook, I’d probably post this there.
I mailed back the student portfolios yesterday, so, barring something showing up unexpectedly, I now have a few weeks to study up and prepare for the next portfolio, and to work on some stories and other writing.
The novel – The Rotated is complete and I have submitted that to the editor. I have another YA novel I wrote a while back but had put aside. So, with more confidence having completed the adult novel, I’ll be coming back to that – Octane (working title) – for rewrites and revisions.
I’ve had two story rejections and one poetry acceptance in the last few days. It has been nice to have had some stories published recently – quite a cluster really – and have the poetry contest placing, but rejections still feel huge and hard. I do seem to get more acceptances these days, but still the rejections feel a bit off-putting. Questions come up like “What’s wrong with my story?” when really it’s just that that particular editor is perhaps looking for something different, or the style didn’t quite gel (or maybe that there is something wrong, but hey). So, those stories will continue to circulate until they find the right editor or so much time passes that I will look over them and wonder what I was thinking to write such schlock.
S.E.T.I. – The Geometry of Night
There are two ambient acts called S.E.T.I. – both, as I understand it, take their name from the original S.E.T.I. Institute, as in Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence. Websites such as Wikipedia or allmusic seem to confuse the two and lump their releases/activities together.
One S.E.T.I. is made up of Taylor Deupree and Savas Ysatas, and they released several albums. While the two artists still collaborate, they no longer use the S.E.T.I. moniker.
The other S.E.T.I. is Andrew Lagowski, who uses other names (his own, Legion) as well as S.E.T.I., and still does perform/record as S.E.T.I. – he’s performing on May 24th at a festival in Germany.
The Geometry of Night by the Lagowski S.E.T.I. has had a lot written about it – just search the web, far more than I can do justice to or need to duplicate here. It has been around for a while – first released in 1996, but still available. The music is complex and often quite rhythm driven, though never really danceable. The rhythms drive the mood. The bass lines, the melodies, the choirs, the strings: it all swells together into something dark and brooding, though somehow uplifting. While I only listen to the album as a whole – it builds and swirls and demands this kind of extended listening – my favourite track is Mare Crisium: five minutes of sound development before any beat kicks in. This is precise and finely crafted music. Writing to this is energising and vital and gives a real vibrancy to my words.
You can stream the music from last.fm, or better yet, stream or purchase the download from bandcamp
Time of Death – flash fiction in Alien Skin
My conceptual sci-fi/horror story “Time of Death” has just been published in the April/May issue of Alien Skin Magazine. This has some pretty bleak humour to it, so is both fun and sad. Alien Skin does not archive – so this story is only available during April and May this year. After that the link above will go to another story (in the June/July issue, the August/September and so on), so get in now and read it quick.
New Shoes, Old Eyes – poem gets 3rd place in local contest
My poem submitted for the Urban Care – Poetry on Palmy contest has come third equal and, yay, there’s a prize-giving this afternoon. It’s great to get a place, but also neat to have something in the real world – so much of my writing now is here on your screen: I’ll be mixing with real people today. The competition was to write a poem about our hometown Palmerston North (New Zealand). The poem will probably be published at some point, but here are the first few lines:
New Shoes, Old Eyes
Returning to your frigid grid
Of fragile kerbs
And surly kids
Where turbined hills
spill spun white glass
…
If you’re in Palmy and happen to read this beforehand, the prize-giving is at 4pm at Square Edge.
I Puncture Him All Over – new story on Macabre Cadaver
Continuing on with a busy week of stories coming out. My fairly bleak short story I Puncture Him All Over has just been published on the ever-varied Macabre Cadaver. It’s a more brutal and graphic story than I normally write, but stylistically I’m very happy with it. My thanks, also, to editor Emmanuel Paige for his suggestions which have helped to strengthen the story from the original version I submitted.
My short “reading for writing” review was to be on The Engine of Recall by Karl Schroeder, but I’ll do that next week, assuming normal service resumes.
Social Media for the Undead – new story on MicroHorror
Heck with it – this is a busy week for stories of mine, so I’m abandoning my regular features, such as they are, to broadcast announcements. A new story – Social Media for the Undead – has been published on the MicroHorror site. This is a quick, fun piece of flash fiction. Well, ironically fun I suppose, perhaps loaded and pointed, but anyway I hope you enjoy.
Normal service will resume as soon as possible.
Butterfly Kisses in House of Horror issue 10
My longer horror story (ie, not flash) “Butterfly Kisses” has been published in issue 10 of the extraordinary House of Horror. S.E. is a masterful and enthusiastic editor and the site is full and busy and entertaining. Thanks to Shane, who selected the story for the issue.
I know Tuesday is usually music to write to – I was going to review The Geometry of Night by S.E.T.I. – but I’ll do that later. I figure announcements and self-promotion can over-ride. Unless something unusual happens I’ll review Geometry on Friday.
Clarity Moss 1862 – new Venus Vulture track on ReverbNation
I’m gradually in the process of releasing new ambient tracks during the year, while I focus on writing. The new track Clarity Moss 1862 is a quiet seven minute excursion with some occasional drum patterns and low-key melodies. Hopefully interesting enough to be engaging, discrete enough to be ignored.
Clarity Moss is a fictional character, of Slovenian and Irish ancestry. As a child she came to Canada via the US in the early 1800s and went on to become a bookseller and keen amateur natural historian. She did a lot of work cataloguing of fish species in Canadian rivers, some believe the most comprehensive work of the time. The notes were never published, but found amongst her letters and documents by her children after her death in 1862.
The track, as with the others on the ReverbNation page, is available to stream or download for free.
(Thursday is usually my “reading for writing” day, but really I’ve been reading two things lately: student portfolios, and a review book which is kind of embargoed until the review comes out, so next week then. I’m going to take a little break from the blog over Easter – back on Tuesday)
Stone Goddess – podcast
My story “The Stone Goddess” originally published in Horror Through The Ages, the first anthology from Lame Goat Press, has been read by Barry J Northern in the new Lame Goat Podcast. Barry does an excellent job – his pacing and tone is wonderful and really does the story justice.
Barry is creating a fantastic archive of podcasts from Lame Goat publications – “Lacerta” by Jodi MacArthur, “Beserker” by Deborah Walker and “Their Dark Master” by Mark Anthony Crittendon, with more to come.
Sean Monaghan - Writer 