As I mentioned earlier, my Clarion mates have put together an anthology, Under the Needle's Eye. It's FREE today and tomorrow only. It includes short stories and novel excerpts from the writers in our workshop (mine is a sample of Angelfall). We got together 11 years ago and spent 6 intense weeks in Seattle, improving our writing. Our anthology includes authors who've written stories that have been a finalist for the Hugo, nominated for the Nebula, listed in the Year's Best Fantasy, Year's Best Science Fiction, finalist for the Cybils' Award, and been part of an anthology that won Canada's Prix Aurora Award. It's a great group of people and I'm very fortunate to be part of the gang.
Here are some quotes from our critiquing sessions back in the day. Ah, this brings back memories:
You do a good job of working the story into the info dump.
The idea of Canada as a major power is a wonderful, fantastical notion.
I presume it was a challenge having to write in first person omniscient.
The word "wife" short-circuits the whole love-story aspect.
I ditto all the negative and insensitive comments so far.
I read this story at 2 am, and all I could think was, why don't these people just go to sleep?
Basically this is Hindus, in space, on heroin.
I just have to out myself as a former party clown.
I don't like stories that promise to tell me something and then tell me to wait — and I'll say more about that in a minute.
It takes balls to imagine you're a woman.
The first twenty-seven pages didn't really grab me at all. (This was a short story)
I thought you were brilliant, but obviously you weren't.
hehehehe...
