Writing is such sweet sorrow...

Feeling very frustrated at the moment. Three of my leading stories are out of circulation because I'm unhappy with them in their current forms. The thing is, the rewrites aren't going well at all. In fact, it's like pulling teeth. The problem is the endings. They just aren't satisfying on any level. I don't know if it's because I'm tired (getting up at 6:30am every morning with the baby is pretty draining, especially when you've a full day of work ahead, too!) or because my degree studies are demanding so much of my mental power (what's left of it, anyway!), but the burst of inspiration which set these stories in motion has fizzled out and left me fumbling about in the dark like a fumbling-about-in-the-dark-type-person. I can't remember the last time I sat down to write feeling refreshed, invigorated, and with all my synapses snapping away like good synapses should. What happened to the guy who wrote a 120,000-word novel in thirty days? Anyway, I'm changing jobs in two week's time so hopefully things will all change for the better.

On the plus side, I've just sold my story "The Midnight Men" to Canadian magazine Dark Recesses Press. The editor, Bailey Hunter, informs me that an artist will be producing an original illustration to accompany my story. I can't wait to see it!
My longest story to date "Medea's Children" is still at Orson Scott Card's Intergalactic Medicine Show (trying saying that after one too many Pangalactic Gargle-Blasters!). It's been there for almost seven months now. I queried after three months and was assured that it had made it through the first cut and was being considered by Mr Scott Card himself. Four months have now passed since then and I'm beginning to wonder if I will ever hear anything back. But the sub-editor said I would hear "one way or the other".
Seven months! Can my nerve hold out...?

Coming soon:
GROGHOL'S STAFF - Will appear in Scifantastic issue 5 (Jun/July)
THE MIDNIGHT MEN - Will appear in Dark Recesses Press issue 4 (July)
DEATH'S HEAD - Twisted Tongue issue 3 (Aug)
GUARDIAN - From the Asylum, later in the year

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