The Light of Foreign Places out now!
Rod Santos (sacredmime) and I had a story published this weekend. This is the blog post I did for Dreamspinner press to help publicise Myths and Magic, their latest anthology.
Myths and Magic: “The Light of Foreign Places,” by Rodello Santos and Damon Shaw
October 16, 2010
A little excerpt to whet your appetites…
…Heart hammering, his nerves taut as the hemp tendons of the city itself, Jai Honrein Sandalwood Morningsun clutched the balcony rail of his cabin and searched for the lights of foreign places. The night air sped by him, cool and calming. Surely such balmy air should bring rest and lazy half-smiles in the darkness? But Jai was young, and thrummed that night, his nerves afire. Standing next to him, his lover Honeysmoke thrummed too, but for reasons more to do with the dream-weed in her pipe. The purple wisp she exhaled was snatched by the wind.
Striyn only sped thus when its destination was close, and all within the wooden walls of the snake-city were on vigil: the ropemakers in their rigging; the tattooists and costumiers on Spine Street; the gardeners in their airy, silk-screened vivariums; even the belly rollers of the snake themselves, deep beneath the sewage pipes, sang as they rolled ever forward.
Nobody yet cracked open the crates of dried flowers, or snapped the top of even one flask of festive wine. The Captain, Long may Striyn Preserve Her, had forbidden excess noise or waste. Who knew, besides their centuries-old captain, when the snake would stop? Who knew who might be listening out there in the jasmine-scented darkness?
Jai knew someone was out there. On horseback, perhaps, cantering on hooves of velvet over the grass. Grass! Green and wasteful and wet, mashed by the belly rollers, smearing the planks…. Jai shook his head, unbelieving. He had thought sand would grate behind his eyelids forever…
I chose this excerpt because it sums up how I felt writing this story with Rod. After sending him a chunk of words, I would take the dog out for her evening ramble and imagine the enormous head of a wooden snake city blocking out the stars. We did not know how the story would end while we were writing. Anything seemed possible.
I met Rod at an online writer’s group called Liberty Hall. He was one of the big guys, with a few publishing credits to his name, and I was an earnest and enthusiastic beginner. I was desperately excited when he seemed interested in collaborating. We have written two stories together so far and have doodled around with ideas for a couple more.
But collaborations aren’t easy. When your hard work comes back sliced and cut, or twisted, or gone entirely, you just have to trust the other author knows what they are doing and let it go. During the process, I had to take a couple of deep breaths and remind myself that this wasn’t my story, that it was going to be better than I could do alone, and that Rod’s work is always impressive. I’m glad I did.
And of course, the other side of that coin is you have to have the confidence that when it is your turn to write, you know best. I cut a large chunk of Rod’s work one day. He had Jai escaping his cabin and sliding down a trapeze rig to the outside in a breathless chase sequence with Honey in hot pursuit. I couldn’t see how Jai could get back into the snake to get to where he needed to be in the next scene, so - Kapow! Out it went. Rod took it very well.
It was a mix of having the courage to choose where the story was going when we had not discussed something and it was my turn to write, and being open enough to say, phooey, it’s only words, and his are going to be as good, if not better than mine. Let them go.
As you can imagine, the story changed a lot as it was written. At one point, Duphal was female but disguised in male drag to escape her traditional role. The snake Goddess, Striyn, granted her wish and transformed her into a man in a magical triumphant finale. Honeysmoke was the captain of the guards for a while. She was also about nine feet tall, until Rod shrank her to human proportions. She only began prophesying and smoking dreamweed in one of the last drafts. And the story only became a true romance in the very last drafts, too.
Jai met his love in all versions, and they were both male, but the story had a much wilder feel for a while. Jai was the hermaphrodite incarnation of Striyn itself - his transformation into asexual Godhood beginning after his first true-love kiss. (The image of the flower after that kiss is one of the few fragments of that draft to survive.) Jai would become Captain. There would be war with the foreign city. Striyn would burn and shed her skin, emerging anew…
Rod’s calming influence tamed those excesses. He made it a more human story and more touching. If it was up to me, Striyn would have swallowed her own tail until she disappeared into a groovy new dimension where - hey, we could have robots that steal the dreams of the snake dwellers and only Jai can defeat them because - Shaddap Dame. Yes Rod.
Here’s to many more. I hope you enjoy the tale.
Damon Shaw has been published in Flash Fiction Online and A Fly In Amber Magazine .
He has stories forthcoming in Anywhere But Earth, a sci-fi anthology by Coeur de Lion Publications, and in Daily Science Fiction.
He can be contacted at http://damonshaw.livejournal.com/ or mailed directly: damonshaw (at) hotmail (dot) es
Myths and Magic: “The Light of Foreign Places,” by Rodello Santos and Damon Shaw
October 16, 2010
A little excerpt to whet your appetites…
…Heart hammering, his nerves taut as the hemp tendons of the city itself, Jai Honrein Sandalwood Morningsun clutched the balcony rail of his cabin and searched for the lights of foreign places. The night air sped by him, cool and calming. Surely such balmy air should bring rest and lazy half-smiles in the darkness? But Jai was young, and thrummed that night, his nerves afire. Standing next to him, his lover Honeysmoke thrummed too, but for reasons more to do with the dream-weed in her pipe. The purple wisp she exhaled was snatched by the wind.
Striyn only sped thus when its destination was close, and all within the wooden walls of the snake-city were on vigil: the ropemakers in their rigging; the tattooists and costumiers on Spine Street; the gardeners in their airy, silk-screened vivariums; even the belly rollers of the snake themselves, deep beneath the sewage pipes, sang as they rolled ever forward.
Nobody yet cracked open the crates of dried flowers, or snapped the top of even one flask of festive wine. The Captain, Long may Striyn Preserve Her, had forbidden excess noise or waste. Who knew, besides their centuries-old captain, when the snake would stop? Who knew who might be listening out there in the jasmine-scented darkness?
Jai knew someone was out there. On horseback, perhaps, cantering on hooves of velvet over the grass. Grass! Green and wasteful and wet, mashed by the belly rollers, smearing the planks…. Jai shook his head, unbelieving. He had thought sand would grate behind his eyelids forever…
I chose this excerpt because it sums up how I felt writing this story with Rod. After sending him a chunk of words, I would take the dog out for her evening ramble and imagine the enormous head of a wooden snake city blocking out the stars. We did not know how the story would end while we were writing. Anything seemed possible.
I met Rod at an online writer’s group called Liberty Hall. He was one of the big guys, with a few publishing credits to his name, and I was an earnest and enthusiastic beginner. I was desperately excited when he seemed interested in collaborating. We have written two stories together so far and have doodled around with ideas for a couple more.
But collaborations aren’t easy. When your hard work comes back sliced and cut, or twisted, or gone entirely, you just have to trust the other author knows what they are doing and let it go. During the process, I had to take a couple of deep breaths and remind myself that this wasn’t my story, that it was going to be better than I could do alone, and that Rod’s work is always impressive. I’m glad I did.
And of course, the other side of that coin is you have to have the confidence that when it is your turn to write, you know best. I cut a large chunk of Rod’s work one day. He had Jai escaping his cabin and sliding down a trapeze rig to the outside in a breathless chase sequence with Honey in hot pursuit. I couldn’t see how Jai could get back into the snake to get to where he needed to be in the next scene, so - Kapow! Out it went. Rod took it very well.
It was a mix of having the courage to choose where the story was going when we had not discussed something and it was my turn to write, and being open enough to say, phooey, it’s only words, and his are going to be as good, if not better than mine. Let them go.
As you can imagine, the story changed a lot as it was written. At one point, Duphal was female but disguised in male drag to escape her traditional role. The snake Goddess, Striyn, granted her wish and transformed her into a man in a magical triumphant finale. Honeysmoke was the captain of the guards for a while. She was also about nine feet tall, until Rod shrank her to human proportions. She only began prophesying and smoking dreamweed in one of the last drafts. And the story only became a true romance in the very last drafts, too.
Jai met his love in all versions, and they were both male, but the story had a much wilder feel for a while. Jai was the hermaphrodite incarnation of Striyn itself - his transformation into asexual Godhood beginning after his first true-love kiss. (The image of the flower after that kiss is one of the few fragments of that draft to survive.) Jai would become Captain. There would be war with the foreign city. Striyn would burn and shed her skin, emerging anew…
Rod’s calming influence tamed those excesses. He made it a more human story and more touching. If it was up to me, Striyn would have swallowed her own tail until she disappeared into a groovy new dimension where - hey, we could have robots that steal the dreams of the snake dwellers and only Jai can defeat them because - Shaddap Dame. Yes Rod.
Here’s to many more. I hope you enjoy the tale.
Damon Shaw has been published in Flash Fiction Online and A Fly In Amber Magazine .
He has stories forthcoming in Anywhere But Earth, a sci-fi anthology by Coeur de Lion Publications, and in Daily Science Fiction.
He can be contacted at http://damonshaw.livejournal.com/ or mailed directly: damonshaw (at) hotmail (dot) es