Three Bites

April 12

Hello, darlings. Last night I went to a new writer's group. They'd invited me to audition several weeks ago, and liked my stories well enough to see how I'd do in person. I accepted their invitation before I found out about Meg's acceptance to Columbia, which pretty well limits my ability to participate in a writing group. I decided to go anyway, though; I wanted to meet them.

I'd hoped to hate them. Then the time limitations wouldn't bother me.

Alas, they were really good. Personable, talented, insightful. A great group. But even if they want me, I'm a short-timer. Ah, well. More contacts are always good, right? And I got some very helpful feedback on "Birch Stakes." They might let me attend meetings until I leave; they might decide I'm not worth the investment of time. I don't know yet.

Elsewise...

Kelly Link's name has been coming up in my hearing a lot lately-- on the Rumormill, in conversation, and so on. I took that as a hint, and tonight I took my copy of the '99 Year's Best Fantasy and Horror to Pergolesi and re-read (with great pleasure) her story The Girl Detective." (which is also available here, at Event Horizon) (also highly recommended from that Year's Best antho: Denise Lee's haunting story "Sailing the Painted Ocean" and Neil Gaiman's wonderfully twisted "Keepsakes and Treasures: A Love Story"; and other stuff, too, it's a really great volume of the series). "Girl Detective" is such a weird, luminous story! Re-reading it, especially in my present very poetical state of mind, made me pay close attention to motifs, repetitions, concrete details, language. The story has all kinds of depths and nooks and jewels in it, and it got me inspired to write fiction. Not Kelly-Link-ish fiction-- I'm not capable of that kind of writing, I don't think-- but definitely fiction infused with some of that same attention to the concrete.

So, armed at first only with a couple of neat images, I wrote a story tonight. "Three Bites at a Cherry," about 3500 words. I'd expected it to be quite a bit longer, but then the ending presented itself unexpectedly yet assertively, and I accepted it graciously (the story has many fewer adverbs than that last sentence does, fear not). There's something to this story. I like it a lot. I don't know if it's successful, but it's about some stuff that's been on my mind, lately, and it's good to have wrestled that stuff onto the page. It's a love story, of a peculiar sort. I'm fond of it, and pleased at being productive tonight, which I didn't really expect.

This week's almost over! I'm glad. It's been odd-- today really lingered and dragged, and I fear that tomorrow will, too. No Good Friday the 13th off for me, and I have quite a lot of work to get done tomorrow. But I'm going to have great fun this weekend, I expect.

For now, though, no fun. I have to take out the trash.

Sorry this isn't more eloquent or vibrant. I used up all my eloquence and vibrance in "Three Bites."