Saturday, January 18, 2014

The Dismal Valley

I  like to think of myself as a fun-loving guy, albeit somewhat socially inept and a little bit of an anchorite. Nevertheless I've written some funny stuff, a few really HARD SF stories, and a bunch that were neither.  The few I've sold follow the same pattern (yes, sad to say, I write a LOT more stories than ever get published.)

Of late I've realized that my writing has drifted into a dismal valley since 9/11, which caused me to write BRIGHT RED STAR in which everybody dies.  Then I wrote GLASS BOX in which both the protagonist and his companion die.  Followed by CYBERMARINE which... well, it does not end well.  Then there was SCOUT where, as you probably guessed, the protagonist sort of dies. After that came TRUE FRIENDS where the dog might have been killed, and most recently TOMMY AND THE BEAST where alien, man, dog, and beast die.  Somewhere in valley was DECELERATION where I wiped out the entire human race. Even HAUNTED, my recent (unsold) novella collaboration with Cat Rambo turned out dark, for God's sake! 

I wonder at times if I am depressed, disillusioned (hard not to be when you write short fiction), or just a dreary person.  Maybe I need to get out more, talk to people, and have some fun instead of sitting alone in a semi-dark room, scribbling, scribbling, scribbling.

Which gives me an idea for a story.

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