Before I get into the latest updates, I just wanted to take a moment to welcome all my recent subscribers. If you found me based on someone’s recommendation and aren’t really sure what you’re getting into here, allow me to briefly introduce myself.
I’m a speculative fiction writer that’s been selling fiction for about a decade. Prior to that, my publications were in non-fiction, and I also worked for a number of years as an editor. In the years since I started writing fiction for publication, I’ve sold over 50 original pieces of fiction of various lengths, mostly short fiction, but also a novella, and two forthcoming books. I’ve also been a finalist for the Nebula, World Fantasy, and Aurora awards for my story “Once Upon a Time at The Oakmont,” and in 2022 won Canada’s Short Works prize for my short story, “Splits.” You can find out more about me here.
This newsletter comes on the first of each month and my plan is to keep it free-to-read for as long as this platform allows. I include updates as well as a story-behind-the-story, and now and then throw in some extras just for fun. But if there’s something I’m not including that you’re interested in reading about, feel free to contact me with any feedback you may have. I also occasionally send exclusive bonuses to subscribers, most recently a free story, to show my gratitude for those of you reading regularly.
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THE RUMORS ARE TRUE
At the end of the month I’ll have officially completed 50 revolutions around our star. This, apparently, came as a surprise to a friend of mine who all this time had thought I was in my thirties, which made me laugh. It’s funny, but while the years keep coming, you still feel pretty much the same inside. Sometimes it’s strange to think that—if my parents and birth certificate are to be believed—I’m half a century old. Most days, I barely feel like an adult.
While some people dread aging, I don’t. I don’t know if that’ll change as I continue to age, but I doubt it. Aging is a privilege, and one I don’t take for granted. I’ve seen a lot of things in the past 5 decades. I look forward to seeing what the next ones bring. In the meantime, I’ll be celebrating this milestone with some people close to me enjoying one of my favorite activities: afternoon tea. And yeah, I know this sounds like a dowdy old lady thing to be into, but I’ve loved afternoon tea my whole life, so I don’t care. Besides, it gives me a chance to support a local small business, which is always a good thing.
Speaking of milestones, I noticed with a recent sale that I was at 49 original pieces of fiction sold (not including reprints). Since I was still 49 years of age, that made me wonder if I’d make my 50th sale before I turned 50. And guess what? I did it!
RECENT FICTION SALES
My most recent sale is for my flash fantasy story, “Feathers,” which will be published in Worlds of Possibility. This is a special thing for me as I had a flash story in the very first issue of Worlds of Possibility, so it’s a nice bookend to get one more published through them in their final year.
The sale responsible for getting me to that goal of 50 original stories by 50, brings me full circle to the horror roots I started in with my first sale a decade ago. This time the story is, “From the Ice and the Darkness” which will be included in Stars and Sabers Publishing’s Of Dread, Decay, and Doom anthology. This story is set in a Canadian sleepaway camp, in Winter, and is inspired by a camp I went to as a kid.
I also recently sold my story, “Fire & Flight,” to Plott Hound magazine, and it will appear in their inaugural issue. This story is a science fiction/fantasy piece in which humans genetically engineer a dragon. Here’s the cover of the issue as created by artist WOLFSKULLJACK:
And finally, I’m thrilled to say I made a sale to another dream market. This time it’s Analog magazine, which will be publishing my story, “A Game of Go.” This story involves a Smart Home desperate to leave the human boy it has been raising in good hands before it’s too late.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT…
On April 8, my SF/Humor flash piece “Twelve Things that Will Occur Immediately Following Your Invention of Teleportation” was published in Factor Four. This is my second appearance in this publication. Just two days later, this story was selected as Adria Bailton’s “Story of the Day,” which was really nice to see. I think people really welcomed a story with some humor in it during these troubling times.
This same story was also recently included in Myna Chang’s April flash fiction roundup, which you can read here in its entirety. Here’s what Myna had to say about it:
This is a delightful story! I smiled the whole time I was reading it, and appreciated the little burst of happiness.
And most recently (April 25), my story, “After the Suns Go Down,” was published in New Myths’ The Growers anthology. This SF/H with a little Western is about a family that settles on a new planet and soon discovers that life there isn’t quite what they imagined it would be. You can buy the anthology here.
Also, the Latine Roundtable I was part of last month is now uploaded to YouTube, so for anyone who couldn’t tune in live, you can check it out here.
FORTHCOMING PUBLICATIONS
I have 14 different things coming out in the relatively near future. There’s something for everyone: science fiction (including solarpunk), fantasy, horror, middle grade, flash fiction, short fiction, two books—even a Spanish translation! Check it out.
THE BUSINESS OF WRITING
Writing (and reading) fiction can be a lot of fun, and because of this, people sometimes forget that for some of us, this is also a business. It’s not uncommon for artists to be asked to give their work away for free—or for “exposure.” Just recently Meta claimed the books they stole to train their AI are worthless (while also somehow saying they couldn’t train their AI without them). Incidentally, I’m one of the authors whose work they trained their AI on, in violation of copyright law, I might add.
I’m a firm believer that art has value and that artists should be paid fairly for their work. Didn’t the 2020 Covid lockdown alone show us how much we depend on art? Imagine how that lockdown would’ve gone with no books to read, no TV to watch, no music to listen to, etc. Not for me. And yet, we’re constantly being told in various ways that our contribution to society has little if any value, often by unscrupulous people who while saying this also desperately seem to want what we’ve made through our own creativity and skill.
When this happens, we must be willing to advocate for ourselves and our work. Take contracts, for instance. I’ve signed a lot of them over the past decade. I’ve also walked away from a couple of sales due to contract clauses I couldn’t live with. And on occasion, I’ve negotiated changes to contracts, only signing after these changes were made to my satisfaction.
I’m writing this primarily for the newer writers who may be reading. Generally, I shy away from giving advice to new writers because not every piece of advice will work for everyone and advice can quickly become outdated. But if there’s one piece of advice that has stood the test of time, it’s this: learn to read a contract.
Even if you have an agent or lawyer to look them over, it’s ultimately your name on the paperwork, so you better be sure you understand what you’re signing. Know that it’s okay to ask for clarification on clauses. It’s more than okay to ask for changes if you feel you have a legitimate reason for it. And if a publisher refuses to make changes that are reasonable, and insists on clauses that exceed what’s industry standard to a predatory level, it’s also okay to walk away. It might be a tough decision, especially if you have a shot at a publication in a dream venue, but dreams can easily turn to nightmares.
It’s up to you to protect yourself and your intellectual property. And trust me when I tell you you’re better off walking away from a sale than working with a predatory publisher.
So how do you know when to push back? Well, for starters, it helps to be part of the writing community. Having other authors to ask questions of, really helps. If you qualify, you can join an organization or group like Codex or SFWA, but even just making some friends online in other venues has great benefits for various reasons. Dream Foundry is another great community open to everyone, with a particular focus on helping new writers. You can find out more about them here.
In terms of what a standard contract may look like, SFWA offers many examples that can be accessed by all writers, even non-members, and those can be found here. There’s also a SFWA contracts committee that can help with questions or concerns an author might have. Another great resource on how to read a short fiction contract, and what to do if something in a clause doesn’t feel right, is this Dream Foundry video featuring The Submission Grinder’s David Steffan. I highly recommend watching it, and maybe even taking a few notes as you do.
All this to say, you worked hard on your art, and you deserve to be fairly compensated in a manner that respects your rights as its creator. Stand your ground. You’ll only regret the times you didn’t.
THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY: “The Procedure”
As always, read the story first, as spoilers follow.
Well, since I’m getting older this month, it just makes sense to discuss a story involving older characters given an opportunity to live longer.
The inspiration for “The Procedure” came from reading an article about some billionaire (I no longer remember which one) funding research into life extension, with the eventual goal of immortality. I remember thinking, “Why would anyone want to live forever?” It sounds awful to me, but to each their own, I guess.
The idea is worse if you consider what happens when not everyone gets to live forever (or a longer-than-average span). I mean, immortality in fiction is a pretty common trope—taking just vampire stories into account, for instance. And in a lot of those stories, the immortal has to watch everyone they love age and eventually die, while they remain untouched by time. Ugh. No thanks.
And let’s face it, if this technology were to ever become available, it would not likely be within everyone’s reach. Already, life extending solutions like, oh I don’t know, basic medications, aren’t necessarily within everyone’s reach. So this is rife with potential for abuse and exclusion.
So that was something I had to tackle in my story, though rather than make it simply that the powers-that-be would choose who gets the treatment and who doesn’t, I made it so the individual’s genetic makeup is the determining factor, which is perhaps—if slightly—more fair.
But the story asks questions I believe should be considered were this technology ever available in real life. Sure, you can live longer, or potentially forever, but why? What’s more important, the quantity of years or the quality? And I feel that we often fail at that quality factor.
Just taking into account the way medical science has already extended our lives, consider that it wasn’t all that long ago that human lifespans ran to the teenage years, or early twenties. Now we might live to be in our nineties. Some of us may get to be centenarians. But how many of us get to live that long with our bodies and faculties intact?
We’re of course working on solutions to those problems even now, which is great, but in the meantime it seems the emphasis is on living longer, not necessarily better.
Years ago my parents had a friend who was a little older. This man’s mother was still alive and over one-hundred years old at the time. Because she was no spring chicken, her doctor had her on a special diet. This meant—among other things—that she couldn’t enjoy her favorite sweets. Furthermore, because of cognitive decline, she couldn’t understand why she wasn’t allowed to enjoy these little pleasures.
Under the care of her daughter, the doctor’s instructions were followed to the letter. After all, it was for her health, right? So she could live…longer? But her son felt differently. The way he saw it, his mother was over a century old. How much longer did they want her to live? And why not let her enjoy her final years and treat her to some chocolate or cookies now and then? Needless to say, he’d sneak her some of these whenever he visited, as soon as his sister turned her back.
Personally, I tend to agree with the son. Others’ mileage may vary, and everyone’s entitled to their opinion. As for me, I don’t need to break any aging records. I’d rather have quality of life than quantity. I know it’s easy to say when you’re not staring death in the face. Maybe if I were diagnosed with an incurable terminal illness within the next five years, I’d suddenly do anything to hold on to life. But I think expecting or hoping for an average lifespan is a very different thing than exceeding an average lifespan by decades, centuries, or more. Being an immortal just sounds tedious to me.
For the purposes of this story, the characters are given a chance to extend their lives by a couple of centuries, presumably with decent quality of life included. They are already exhibiting some signs of age, but are young enough that these are relatively minor annoyances. They could drastically slow the aging process at this point in time and go on like this for much much longer than normal. The concern here is whether they’ll get to do that together.
These are people who’ve already been together for most of their lives. They don’t have much family besides each other, so their presence in each other’s lives is a constant that would surely leave a hole were one of them to die before the other.
A reader might argue that surely one of them will die first, regardless. And that’s true. But there’s a difference between that likely inevitability, and being certain that this is the case, knowing exactly which one of them will outlast the other, and by how much it’s likely to be. You could also argue that treatment or not, one of them could die in an accident the very next day. And that’s also true, but that’s a factor they can’t predict with any accuracy.
Regardless of these things, the reality they’re faced with in this waiting room is that there’s a chance one of them will qualify for the procedure, and one won’t. In that case, it’s very likely that by getting the procedure, they might wind up living long over a century beyond their partner. They’d also remain relatively young while watching their partner deteriorate at a much faster rate. It wouldn’t be a journey they’d take together. The procedure would effectively set them on separate paths for the first time since they met as children.
I chose to end the story with both characters discovering that they have the genetic mutation that would allow them to extend their lives, and yet, lying to each other about the results.
Why did I do this? I wanted them to make a choice about what mattered to them most. They could live much longer, but what was the point when the person they’ve shared their life with might not be there? Sure, they could’ve shown each other their results and then decided, but both of them know their partner well enough to also know they’d insist on their getting the treatment without them, out of love.
It’s that same love that leads them to tell a white lie. They don’t want to take the chance. They’d rather have a shorter life (which could still mean another fifty years even) with the person they love, than to go on for so much longer on their own. The receptionist, being so much younger as well as part of the company providing the procedure, doesn’t understand their choice. How could she, when she hasn’t lived their shared life?
In the end, I think they made the right decision. What do you think? I’d love to hear your thoughts. What choice would you make were you given the same opportunity?
“The Procedure” was originally published in January 2024 in Abyss & Apex.
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P.A. Cornell