_

Okay, so it wasn't horror-movie scary, but it was breath-takingly nerve-wracking.  And thus, of course, I spent all afternoon on it, because why shouldn't scary things also be drawn out?

I submitted queries for The Novel to agents.

My short stories have been making the rounds for years, but they're not my career goal.  I had to write short stories for years in college, and while getting my name out in the spec-fic community, having at least one pub credit for my query letter, and making a tiny bit of money were all good motivators for putting stuff out there, I'm very rarely inspired to write stories that only take 5,000 words or so to tell.  I like tens of thousands of words.  Or panels, or moving pictures, or all of the above.  In today's publishing world, one cannot make a living writing short stories.  It could, of course, be argued that making a living writing novels is just as far-fetched, but it is at least possible, and I am a determined creature.  I've been working on becoming a published novelist for more than half my life.

As if that's not enough, I have a phone interview for a job I really want the day after tomorrow.  I hope my nerves calm down by then, especially since the wait for an agent to reply is as long or longer than the average wait for a short story market.

Wish me luck!

With three_weeks_for_dw  going on, I figured that since all the content of this blog is already solely posted to Dreamwidth, I should write about why I chose dreamwidth to put my blog on in the first place.  It could be seen as a weird choice for a budding writer who wants to get her name out there.

I chose Dreamwidth because I believe in Dreamwidth's mission, as simple (and as complicated!) as that.  I believe in free speech, in open source, in fandom, and in people working together as a community.

Censorship is one of the world's evils.  It's a subtle, nasty chipping away at those rights and freedoms I am unwilling to surrender for temporary safety.  We say, oh, we should censor/ban Mein Kamf, or books written by the Klu Klux Klan, or explicit pornographic material.  And I say, and once you've done that, what next?  Anything German, anything southern, anything sexual?

This does not mean that I agree with Hitler, white power, or think explicit works should be without warning.  I am saying that those works must be allowed to exist and be available.  And that they should exist and be available alongside works like The Diary of Anne Frank, Sister Outsider and Gender Outlaw.  Whether or not one reads them--and what one takes away from reading them--is up to the reader and, I hope, their teachers/professors/parents/family/friends.

As for fandom, I believe that given how much media influences our lives, we can't afford not to engage with it in all its forms.  Media of all kinds is a big influence on my life, as a person and as a writer, and it's always exciting when someone tells a good story well, no matter if it's a movie, a book, a play, or a fanfic.  I've also never agreed with the idea that fanfiction somehow stains its source material.  Fanfic has only ever been a good thing in my life.  There are a number of tv shows I would never have watched, comics I'd never have read, and movies I'd never have seen if not for fandom.  Since I tend to buy what I like, eliminating fandom would also eliminate the money I spend on those works.

I am not necessarily what one would consider an activist.  I don't attend rallies or write a political blog.  However, I do believe that politics are personal, and in my writing and in my life I try to make those little choices that reflect who I am and what I stand for.  So my blog is on Dreamwidth, I write women, disabled characters, characters of color and LGBT characters in my speculative fiction, and I speak up when hatespeak comes up in conversation.

That's why I'm on Dreamwidth.