Sale! Shoes-to-Run to Asimov's

This is my third sale to Asimov's. Shoes-to-Run is a triumph of rewritting and workshopping. Thanks to everyone who helped out, particularly the folks over at Codex and Sean Markey who, as always, doubled as critiquer, motivator and submitter.

And now that I've reached my fifth pro sale, I can confess the Plan. The Plan is simple: when I sold my first story to Strange Horizons, I decided I wouldn't try for a novel until I'd sold ten pro stories. Eventually, I did try for the novel before then and the novel flopped. Hubris! I won't do that again. So, now that I'm 50% there, I think I can make the Plan public: I won't try for a novel until I've sold my tenth story. That looks achievable right now and, either way, I don't want to put myself through the trouble of writing something longer than a short until I'm good enough to pull it off.

Also, I just came back from Villa Diodati 3 and have all kinds of stuff to say about the workshop. But I won't say them now, because Villa Diodati deserves its own post and I can't really take more time off sleep. There was a 5 day vacation in the Canary Islands after that, which will also get a post. Hopefully. I'm kind of busy these days.

"Counting Down to the End of the Universe" sold to Shimmer Magazine

This story was written during my darkest moments, just before The Big Exam, when I hardly had time or energy to write.

Sean Markey, aka "The Enabler" forced it out of me and I will forever be grateful for that. I needed a study break and he provided the prodding I needed. Spiritual constipation is bad for the soul and I hadn't realized how badly I needed to write until I was forced to stop.

Sean Markey also helped me rewrite and edit the first drafts.

The result is a combination of birds, clockwork and tumors of which I'm extremely proud. You can't go wrong with tumors, now, can you?

The Shimmer pre and post sale editing process was the most intensive I've ever encountered. I learned a lot from editing that manuscript with Beth and, just for that, I'm extremely grateful. I mean, how many times does one get to have one's work tinkered with by one of the best editors around? Plus, I'd been trying to crack Shimmer for a long time.

This story has made me happy on a many levels. Good story, good. I wish all my babies behaved like that.

"Clapping for the Fairies" sold to Helix SF

Helix SF has agreed to buy "Clapping for the Fairies", a second person, choose-your-own-adventure, lesbian horrortale written for the Liberty Hall Shimmer sponsored contest.

This is the second story I've sold to Helix (check out Pretty Little Thing) and I'm happy that it's found such a good home.

Godtouched to be translated

It appears that Ennea wants to publish the translation in Greek of Godtouched.

Ennea is published on Wednesdays with the Greek newspaper Eleftherotypia. Ennea has around 200.000 readers and is possibly the Greek Comic and SF mag.

Yes, I'm getting published in Greek. I'm immensely proud. I still don't have details about the issue I'll be in, but I'll post about it as soon as I know.

Anyone speak Greek? I'd love to have someone read the translation and tell me how it correlates to the original.

"Family Values" accepted by COSMOS

Yay!
This story grew out of Liberty Hall Flash. I'm very fond of it because it was a joy to write (unlike some of my more obscure stories which take months of revision) and it sold really fast. I wouldn't define the story as satire, but it does have a strong humor streak.
This is my second pro sale.