Lighting Candles, Robotic Girls, and Other News
Woot! The new issue of Flytrap Magazine is online now, and it includes my short story "Lighting Candles"!
There are also a whole bunch of other stories by fabulous authors like Jenn Reese, Greg van Eekhout, Melissa Marr, and many more.
Here's a quick excerpt from my story:
"Oh, I’ve never seen his real face," my youngest sister says. "He only comes to bed in the dark, and he turns off the electricity at night, so…." She shrugs and takes another sip of coffee, just as if she’s reporting a normal relationship quirk.
I stare at her, my coffee mug cooling in my hands. "And you never even thought to light a candle?"
"I can't," Jane says simply. "He told me the first night - it’s not allowed."
Not allowed? I share a wide-eyed can-you-believe-this look with our other sister. Bree sits back, looking horrified but letting me take the lead, as usual. I am the eldest sister, the one who’s always had to take the bad-guy role to keep us all afloat...
Read the rest of the story here. If you've ever felt a fleeting moment of sympathy for the evil older sisters in fairy tales, you might enjoy it!
(But I also want to add a quick note: this is an adult magazine, not MG or YA, so the stories - including my own story - are generally aimed at adults. I don't want to mislead anybody who came to my writing through the Kat books!)
I hope you enjoy the story if you do read it! I'm looking forward to reading all the other stories - I've already devoured Jenn Reese's story, and I'm planning to reward myself with the rest now that I've got my latest freelance audition sent off. You can read all the stories online or buy the issue as an ebook if you'd prefer to keep them on your e-reader.
In other news, MrD is back in school today after a ten-day Half Term break, and we're moving back into normal life. It was...let's just call it "challenging"...to get my latest freelance audition revised over the past ten days, but oh, it really was nice to spend so much time with my fun five-year-old. He's working on epic narrative pictures now, many of them in preparation for books he plans to write. One direct quote from this past week, as he worked on his latest book-prep picture: "Mummy, in this picture I'm drawing you as a robotic girl who does Judo. With kicking!"
Excellent! :)
But now that he's back in school, I've sent off the audition package (wish me luck!), and I'm diving back into writing as much as possible. I had so much fun writing more of the Kat novella (tentatively titled "Courting Magic") this weekend! My hopeful plan for the month is to divide my writing time between my big MG novel rewrite (Family Magic) and "Courting Magic"...and on March 25th, the day that Stolen Magic comes out in paperback in the US and Canada, I'm going to include an excerpt from "Courting Magic" in my newsletter! (If you're not already a newsletter subscriber but you'd like to be, you can sign up here - I send out newsletters veeeeery rarely, and only to make big announcements, so I promise you're not going to have your inbox flooded!)
And over on my Facebook page, we're on Day 3 of March Magic, the daily productivity party I'm hosting throughout March. (You can read the full description here.) Even if you didn't join us over the weekend, please feel free to join in any day this month - you are all very much invited! :)
There are also a whole bunch of other stories by fabulous authors like Jenn Reese, Greg van Eekhout, Melissa Marr, and many more.
Here's a quick excerpt from my story:
"Oh, I’ve never seen his real face," my youngest sister says. "He only comes to bed in the dark, and he turns off the electricity at night, so…." She shrugs and takes another sip of coffee, just as if she’s reporting a normal relationship quirk.
I stare at her, my coffee mug cooling in my hands. "And you never even thought to light a candle?"
"I can't," Jane says simply. "He told me the first night - it’s not allowed."
Not allowed? I share a wide-eyed can-you-believe-this look with our other sister. Bree sits back, looking horrified but letting me take the lead, as usual. I am the eldest sister, the one who’s always had to take the bad-guy role to keep us all afloat...
Read the rest of the story here. If you've ever felt a fleeting moment of sympathy for the evil older sisters in fairy tales, you might enjoy it!
(But I also want to add a quick note: this is an adult magazine, not MG or YA, so the stories - including my own story - are generally aimed at adults. I don't want to mislead anybody who came to my writing through the Kat books!)
I hope you enjoy the story if you do read it! I'm looking forward to reading all the other stories - I've already devoured Jenn Reese's story, and I'm planning to reward myself with the rest now that I've got my latest freelance audition sent off. You can read all the stories online or buy the issue as an ebook if you'd prefer to keep them on your e-reader.
In other news, MrD is back in school today after a ten-day Half Term break, and we're moving back into normal life. It was...let's just call it "challenging"...to get my latest freelance audition revised over the past ten days, but oh, it really was nice to spend so much time with my fun five-year-old. He's working on epic narrative pictures now, many of them in preparation for books he plans to write. One direct quote from this past week, as he worked on his latest book-prep picture: "Mummy, in this picture I'm drawing you as a robotic girl who does Judo. With kicking!"
Excellent! :)
But now that he's back in school, I've sent off the audition package (wish me luck!), and I'm diving back into writing as much as possible. I had so much fun writing more of the Kat novella (tentatively titled "Courting Magic") this weekend! My hopeful plan for the month is to divide my writing time between my big MG novel rewrite (Family Magic) and "Courting Magic"...and on March 25th, the day that Stolen Magic comes out in paperback in the US and Canada, I'm going to include an excerpt from "Courting Magic" in my newsletter! (If you're not already a newsletter subscriber but you'd like to be, you can sign up here - I send out newsletters veeeeery rarely, and only to make big announcements, so I promise you're not going to have your inbox flooded!)
And over on my Facebook page, we're on Day 3 of March Magic, the daily productivity party I'm hosting throughout March. (You can read the full description here.) Even if you didn't join us over the weekend, please feel free to join in any day this month - you are all very much invited! :)