Winter is coming...
But first, some lovely things that have happened this Fall.
RECENT NEWS
October was a busy month for me and lots of cool stuff happened, that I’ll mention throughout this newsletter.
I’ll start by sharing some fun book-related news. Luck was really with me recently because I won not one, but two contests where the prize was a brand new book. These arrived last month. My prizes were two new collections, Limelight and Other Stories by Lyndsey Croal and A Place Between Waking & Forgetting by Eugene Bacon. This is not the first time I’ve won books, but it has been a while, so I’m excited to dig into these.
If that’s not enough, while at the World Fantasy Convention I was given a book bag and one of the books I received was R.S.A. Garcia’s new novel The Nightward. You might recall that R.S.A. Garcia was a fellow finalist for the Nebula award, and wound up winning for best short story, so it’s a special treat to get a copy of her book.
I’ll speak more on the other cool stuff that happened at the World Fantasy Convention further down.
RECENT PUBLICATIONS
October was a good month for publications. First up was my Lightspeed magazine debut, with my sci-fi flash piece, “The Life You’ve Given Me, Rusty.” This is the first to be published of the three stories I’ve sold to Lightspeed this year, and so far people seem to be liking it. You can read that story here.
Next, my SF story, “Decorative,” was translated into Farsi and published in MetaphorSpace. “Decorative” was first published in the anthology, Compelling Science Fiction Short Stories (Flame Tree Publishing), and earlier this year was reprinted in Radon Journal, where you can read it in English if you don’t read Farsi.
Then on October 22, The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2024 – edited by Hugh Howey, was published. As you know by now, this anthology includes my story, “Once Upon a Time at The Oakmont,” along with 19 other terrific stories. (One of them happens to be “Window Boy” by Thomas Ha, which was also a short story finalist for the Nebula award.)
Speaking of publications, it’s that time of year when we share our eligibility posts for those reading for awards voting. You’ll find my complete 2024 eligibility by clicking the button below. Thank you for your consideration.
FORTHCOMING PUBLICATIONS
I was recently invited to write a non-fiction piece that combines my love of Star Wars with my love of history for Harvey Hamer’s A Long Time Ago… series. This piece was so much fun to write, and I can’t wait to share it with everyone. It’ll be out on December 1, so keep an eye out for it. In the meantime you can read some of the other guest authors’ takes on Star Wars and history here.
Year’s Best Canadian Fantasy & Science Fiction, Vol. 2 has been a bit delayed but should be out this month. There will be an official launch during Can*Con with some of the authors and editor Stephen Kotowych, but I’m not able to be there, unfortunately.
WHAT I’VE BEEN UP TO
So last month I attended my first ever World Fantasy Convention because since it took place in Niagara Falls, NY it was only about an hour away from where I live. I was originally supposed to be on one of the panels, but due to a scheduling conflict that didn’t happen.
I did however get to participate in my first mass autographing session and signed some copies of my novella Lost Cargo for people. I also had several people stop by to say hi, or to tell me they loved one of my stories, so it was just a great thing to participate in. I also got to sit with fellow World Fantasy Award finalist Tobi Ogundiran, who was up for Best Collection. This was our first time meeting, and we hit it off, so it was really nice to get this time to hang out and chat while signing books.
Tobi and I got to hang out again on the final day of the convention when we had breakfast with literary agent, Arley Sorg, and author Martha Wells (finalist for Best Novel) and her husband. It was a lovely time with some equally lovely people. Martha shared some behind-the-scenes stories about the forthcoming Murderbot series coming to AppleTV next year. I’m not going to repeat any of that here, but suffice it to say, while I was already excited for this show, I’m even more excited now.
I didn’t end up going home from the awards with a trophy—the short story win went to Nghi Vo for “Mammoths at the Gates”—but I had a great time with a whole slew of amazing people, some of whom I’d met before, and some new to me, but that I look forward to seeing again soon.
INTERVIEWS
I mentioned in my last newsletter that I’d been interviewed for HWA’s Latinx in Horror series. The interview came out on October 4, but if you missed it, you can read it here.
THE STORY BEHIND THE STORY: “Things Most Meaningful”
Spoiler Alert: Be sure to read or listen to the story before the following.
A lot of the attention this year has gone to “Once Upon a Time at The Oakmont” due to its multiple award nominations, but this month I wanted to highlight “Things Most Meaningful,” which was longlisted for the British Science Fiction Association Awards. It ultimately didn’t make the short list, let alone win, but it was still a nice surprise to see it get that far.
“Things Most Meaningful,” like many of my flash fiction pieces, got its start during a Codex contest—in this case, Weekend Warrior 2023. It came as the result of not one but two prompts, the first of which was to write about building or making something, and the second which was to write about your favorite possession.
But it also starts way back in 1985 with a true story from my childhood. When I was growing up, my dad was always building things. Everything from functional furniture pieces to decorative arts and crafts. He’s the kind of person who’d see the potential in what someone else might consider trash. While he didn’t work in a mill, like the father in my story, he did come home from work one day with a block of wood. Something about it spoke to him. Maybe it was the color of wood, or the pattern of the grain. Who knows? I didn’t ask that question at ten years old.
I remember him working on it, first slicing about a third or so section off from the top. This was to become the lid for a box he said he was making. The rest would be the box itself. That’s when the real work began.
My dad sanded off the rough edges, then drew a design on the box. Finally, he started carving out the design and hollowing out the interior of the box. Slowly, what he’d seen in that block of wood began to take shape so that I could finally see it too.
I don’t recall how long it took him to make the box, but I do remember the care he put into crafting it. I remember how it looked finished to me, but he continued to work on it. I remember him getting the finish just right. And finally, when he was satisfied, he presented this gift to my mom, for her to keep things in. It’s been her jewelry box ever since.
It was this box and the love my dad put into it that perhaps inspired this story even more than the prompts did. I changed a few things for the purposes of my story, but the seed from which it sprouted is this memory from my childhood.
Initially, like my mom, my main character keeps jewelry in her box, but eventually she starts to keep other things in it, and the box, imbued with a special kind of magic, holds it all.
It’s so easy for us to miss the “little things” in life that in retrospect turn out to be the big things. We take so much for granted and often focus on the negatives. I didn’t want that for my character.
I’ve written some dark stories in my day, and I do believe there’s a place for these, but when the pandemic came along, a time that was difficult for many of us, I decided to start writing some more uplifting stories. Similarly, editor Julia Rios wanted to publish positive stories, which is why they created Worlds of Possibility.
Worlds of Possibility happened to come along while this iteration of the Weekend Warrior contest was taking place. I thought my little story might be a good fit, but I hadn’t even submitted it to the contest yet, which meant I had no feedback from the other contestants. But I didn’t want to miss the submission window, so I sent it in, hoping this early version was good enough.
In the end, it was good enough for Julia Rios who bought it just ten days after I wrote it and published it virtually unchanged.
Fun Fact: The walnut tart in the story is inspired by a real recipe passed down from my maternal grandmother to my mom, and now to me. It’s one of my favorite deserts, which is why I include it here.
My character winds up using the magical box to store her memories and positive emotions—the things truly most meaningful to her. I, personally, have a very good long-term memory, so I recall many events, people, and more from decades past that are important to me. I might not keep these in a box, but I often infuse my stories with snippets from them. Several things from my past are peppered throughout this story, amidst other elements that are entirely fictional. The weeping willow on the way home from school, for instance, is based on a real tree I passed every day when riding my bike to and from junior high. I love the art that Ana Rubio created for it. The tree in my memory is just like that.
“Things Most Meaningful” was my attempt to get readers to think about all the good things in their lives. We all have struggles, but I try to end each day by thinking about some of the things that went right and be grateful for these. These are the things that can carry us through the dark times, so it’s important to keep them somewhere safe, where you can go back and draw strength from them when needed. The box in my story takes this to a literal extreme, but it’s something we can all do in our own way.
I was very pleasantly surprised when in March of 2023 this little story—that actually didn’t even get a great score during Weekend Warrior—became my first story to make Reactor’s “must read fiction” list. It later also went on to be recommended by both Adria Bailton and Eugenia Triantafyllou.
When in January of this year I learned “Things Most Meaningful” had been longlisted for the BSFA awards, I was floored. I’d never expected my little feel-good flash to rise to such heights. This was further enhanced by the Worlds of Possibility anthology landing on the Locus recommended reading list in February.
I’m thrilled that this story made it out into the world and that it touched the hearts of a significant number of people. That’s exactly what I hoped it would do, and that beats any award. I hope it’s found a place in your heart too.
“Things Most Meaningful” was originally published in 2023 in Worlds of Possibility. It was reprinted in the Worlds of Possibility anthology later that same year.
Thanks for reading. Feel free to share this newsletter and subscribe, if you haven’t already done so. Next month will be my year-end recap—and considering the year I’ve had, you won’t want to miss it!
P.A. Cornell
Congrats on all the wonderful things in this post - and thanks for mentioning my newsletter! I also can't wait to share your picks!