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It’s really turned into the year of workshops & short fiction around here—not making as much progress on launching the next series (yes there are now multiples waiting in the wings . . .) as I’d like, because there’s just too much going on between the different author societies, festivals, magazines, etc., but it’s not a bad problem to have!
Coming up in the calendar (full event postings in the appropriate section below):
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“Collaborating with BC Children’s Authors & Illustrators” webinar on Wednesday, June 7 from 12-1 pm for the BC Museums Association (Update: watch the replay here! )
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“After ‘The End’: Building Brighter Futures in Apocalyptic, Dystopian & Speculative YA” presentation as part of the 3-5 pm themed programming block “The Good, The Bad, and The Imaginary: Utopias and Dystopias in Speculative Fiction” on Friday, June 23 at (Re)Imagining Tomorrow: Agency and Possibility in Literature and Media for Children and Young Adults Graduate Student Conference in Children’s & Young Adult Literature, Media & Culture hosted by University of British Columbia Master’s of Arts in Children’s Literature & iSchool in Vancouver. (Update: Read the program, register, check out the official slide deck with notes/reference links, and check out the extended edition slide deck here for bonus content covering additional themes and topics!) )
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“Choosing a Publishing Path” workshop on Sunday, September 17 from 2-4 pm at Write on Bowen Festival of Readers & Writers on Bowen Island
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“Read Local, Teach Local: New Releases by BC Authors & Illustrators!” on Friday, October 20 from 9-9:45 am at BC Teacher-Librarians’ Association Fall Conference at Kwantlen Park Secondary School, Surrey, BC
And I’ll likely also be at Word Vancouver in September on Saturdays. Events earlier this year included presentations to the BC Librarians’ Youth Services Institute, Word Vancouver, and Abbotsford Arts Council, along with my usual Creative Writing for Children term-length workshops.
In short fiction, “Children of Earth” was published (in both text and audio formats) in the April edition of Fantasy Magazine (and longlisted in the Commonwealth Short Story Prize), a spinoff “micro-trilogy” of novelettes, Spectres of the Old World, was published from January to February, two new short stories were accepted to a HWA-qualifying podcast and a SFWA-qualifying small press anthology and a third short was award awarded honourable mention in the Writers of the Future awards.
My latest attempt at restocking my short story folder is going poorly—a really fun high fantasy concept absolutely ran away with the wordcount and is stubbornly turning into yet another novel (or new series), so at some point you all can look forward to a deluge of new releases. Another part of the holdup is that there has been a bit of traditional/legacy publishing interest in some of these works in progress. I like to use Twitter “pitch parties” to practice writing hooks and test market interest/create buzz, and happened to get an (agent) full request on CAVE STORY WIP (a MG Ghost Story) and interest from a (Harlequin romantic suspense?!!) editor on SONGSTRESS WIP (a Fae murder mystery/UF), so it’ll take a bit of time to chase down those leads and see if they’re worth pursuing further.
All that said, I’m hoping there’ll be a bit of a slowdown over summer (though there is the possibility of some summer camp workshops . . . and maybe I should actually see my family at some point . . . ?) and ideally I might have a bit of time to get back into revisions/release planning/drafting on at least one (or all three!) of the novels on the go. I’m definitely not up to Kelley Armstrong/Seanan McGuire levels of productivity here, but it’d be cool to have a major release year with a whole bunch of fun reads all at once! Something to look forward to. :)