[Updates from The Writer's Desk]

Fall (and cooler weather, thank god) are fast approaching and the next few months are packed. It’s overwhelming at times, the things I have stacked on my plate, but I have to remember I asked for all of it.

Submissions for GIVE: An Anthology of Anatomical Entries are due at the end of this month. We’ve been blessed with an interesting mix of body parts/organs/tissues and story lines and have only a few duplicate parts showing up. Six of these stories have already been accepted. We have many more decisions to make!

I hope to have my writing collection Last Night While You Were Sleeping sent off for proof printing at the end of this month and finalized by October 31st. What started out as twelve short stories has blossomed into twenty; all written within the last five months and of ever escalating weirdness. I don’t know where my head has been.

Three stories of mine are also floating around in the submission ether. 1. An entry for a historical fiction wizard anthology. 2. A really depressing collection of flash pieces detailing the last moments of five individuals caught up in natural disasters for a charity anthology. 3. A long, sad poem about the Lady in White ghost for a Gothic anthology.

I’ll be participating in the zOctober event this year. I believe I’ll be on the event page hanging out on Friday, October 24th. There will be a supporting post up about finding inspiration. Also!! I’ll be debuting a video I made with a handful of zombie volunteers for a funny zombie song I wrote years ago. This should be a lot of fun.

There are at least two unannounced collaborations in the works. I can’t even begin to think about these right now. Just. No. I need a break.

Unexpected happenings have challenged me this week, but, when they aren’t difficult, they are interesting and exciting. It’s so easy to exist in the same routine. I need to be thankful for the upset, respectful of the process, and keep moving forward as I have for so long.

My sister and I will be attending Rose City Comic Con in Portland at the end of the month. I’ve never been and it will be good to take a short trip. We’ll of course be at Crypticon this May and should have three new books on the table. The antho, the writing collection, and hopefully this one (which is soooooo overdue I can’t even deal). I also hope to have a couple authors from the GIVE anthology hanging out at our table (one of them being my co-editor as well).

After we publish GIVE in early February and allow it some time on the market, T.J. and I will choose a date to open submissions for its companion anthology TAKE (horror/sci-fi/dark humor organ donation stories from the recipient’s perspective).

Anyway, between all this and running a busy design company…I should probably end this post and get back to work.