Oo! Look, you can get an anthology I’m in for cheap. Jason Sizemore, proprietor of Apex Books says:

For one week only, the following Apex Book Company titles are on sale for $10.00:

Unwelcome Bodies
The Next Fix
HebrewPunk
Aegri Somnia
Gratia Placenti
Orgy of Souls
Mama’s Boy and Other Dark Tales
Beauty & Dynamite

Make Alexander Hamilton proud. Spend ten bucks and buy a book!

Now, I do have to warn you, just in case you don’t know, that Gratia Placenti is horror. This is not safe for parents — and by that I mean my parents. But the rest of you, have at it. Here’s the teaser from my story, “Tomorrow and Tomorrow.”

The moment Tuyet walked into the Dagenais’s compartment, she knew something was different. The usual pack of dogs swarmed around her, distracting her, before she figured out that the compartment smelled different. Not bad–not like the times they had left everything piled in the sink for her as if they were having a contest to see who could goad the other into doing the dishes. Nor the time they’d fired the dog walker and didn’t bother to walk the hoard of dogs that Hélène kept. But they paid her to come once a week to wipe their counters, load the dishwasher and tidy the compartment. So she’d kept her head down, asked herself what Kant would have done, then said screw the philosophy and wiped up the dog shit and urine.

Kant would not have done that.

I was actually online before there were blogging platforms, but I started my blogger account four years ago today.  That’s right kiddies, I remember when I had to hard-code HTML both ways, uphill in the snow.  Not like you young whipper-snappers today with your fancy CMS and CSS and LJ and all the other new-fangled acronyms.

My first post also includes this:

I’m also terribly excited because the day before the Iceland call, I got an email from The First Line¹ telling me that they want to publish my short story “The Shocking Affair of the Dutch Steamship Friesland.” This is my second short story sale, and I’m starting to feel like a real writer.

Funny thing, that.

1. Just because I’m very fond of them and want to see the magazine do well, I’ll remind you that “The Shocking Affair of the Dutch Steamship Friesland,” wound up in their Best of anthology this year. You can also listen to me read it if you prefer your fiction in audio format. [↩]

Arachne Jericho wrote to me the other day and asked if I wanted a copy of my fiction sampler in mobipocket format, readable by Kindle.  Heck, yeah!  I’ve put it on the Free Fiction page, but am such a geek that I had to also tell you about it too.

Now, the totally ridiculous thing is that I write on my Palm.  But what did I do the moment I had the file? Put it on my Palm so I could look at it.  Such a geek, me.

I love, love, love Subterranean Press and am so delighted to have finally landed a sale there. This actually happened a couple of weeks ago, right before Launchpad, but I was sitting on the news until I finished revisions.¹ Which I just did and had accepted today. Hurrah!

Here’s the opening bit as a teaser. I’ll let you know when the story is up.

Mundari Vineyard 2045, Nashik (India), Shiraz
Black cherry, plum, and currant flavors mingle with aromas of sweet tobacco and sage in this dependable offering from India.

The sun peeking through the grapevines felt hotter on Bharat Mundari’s neck than twenty-four degrees. Another perfect day. Bharat scowled and worked his way down the row of vines, thinning the grapes so the remaining Shiraz crop would become fuller and riper.

Not that there was a point in having healthy vines when he couldn’t pay his weather bill. Without rain, the grapevines would weaken under the stress, and stressed grapes made poor wine. No one bought flawed wine.

Just to keep things in balance though, I should tell you that the night I got home from the Campbells, I had a rejection note waiting in my inbox. Doesn’t matter. My life is very, very good right now.

1. There’s a funny story here, which I’ll tell later. [↩]

In a moment of personal triumph, I’ve just managed to get my 14 year old nephew to give me a story critique ala OSC’s wise reader model.

He went through my revision of “American Changeling” and let me know what he found dull, unbelievable, or didn’t get. And which bits he thought were cool.

Score!

Granted, it was not a particularly detailed response, but it was his first critique and I’m pleased as Punch that he did it. Even better, he liked the ending and told me why. I am a very happy aunt right now.

I finished this story tonight. It’s 1800 words of Icelandic ghost story.

It’s in a password protected post, but it’s the usual password. Don’t know what that is? Drop me a line and I’ll tell ya.

And here’s the teaser.

In the lee of the Bægisa farm house, Guðrun watched the wind blowing through the horses’ manes without feeling the harsh cold herself. Faxi had huddled in among them, her gray mane dancing like a shroud on the breeze. All the horses stood with their backs to the wind and Hákon’s horse looked like she belonged here.

Her fiancé took one of her mittened hands in his and squeezed. “I have to go.”

She leaned against him. “Must you really? The sun has barely moved.”

He pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her. His breath was warm in her ear. “If I could stay with you forever, I would, but I need to be back to conduct services tomorrow and I don’t want to ask Faxi to cross Dark River after the sun sets.”

Shortbits reviewed Clockwork Chickadee and closed with this line.

This is a fun little steampunk parable whose apparent moral lesson (pride comes before the fall) is somewhat subverted by the cold, calculated nature of Chickadee’s schemes.

What’s interesting to me is that I thought about putting an actual moral at the end, but decided not to because it defused the story. I asked some early readers what moral they would put and they all said, “Well clearly it’s [x].” Except [x] was different for every one of them.

So, now I’m curious. What do you think the moral of the story is?

Coffee Sensibility: Part IV

When my eyes fluttered open, a shock coursed through me that rivaled the strongest cup of Java. I found my head cradled on the lap of my manager, Mr. Purvis, duckwrangler508. Keith.

“You?”

He regarded me with tender eyes. “Did you never guess?”

“Guess? How should I guess when I know you only as kpurvis@coffee.mult.or.us.net?” I sat up, shaking with barely suppressed emotion. Simple spyware would have sufficed; how dare he trifle with my feelings in this manner! “Am I to be fired now?”

“It’s not like that.” He laughed out loud and I shivered. How often had I wondered what duckwrangler508’s “lol” sounded like? “I was too embarrassed to ask you out.”

This was the reason his eyes followed me everywhere, that he came so frequently to the internet café, that I received so many memos? With a rising sense of violation, I pushed myself to my feet, suddenly conscious of the unnecessary hours he had spent in the internet café, scrutinizing me and gauging my reaction to his advances. My indiscreet blushes must have pleased the coward.

I turned my back and picked up a mug with shaking fingers.

“Sophia?”

“Miss Vanhese, please, Mr. Purvis. I am your employee and I hardly think further intimacy is appropriate.”

Had he argued his case at that moment would I have relented? Perhaps. But the door to the internet café opened and a wave of customers came rushing in, braying with laughter. In the edge of my vision, I saw him deflate and walk away.

Pushing my feelings to the side, I forced myself to concentrate on my customers and their endless pleas for coffee. The hour passed in a daze; each order from a customer was a welcome distraction from the anguish assailing my heart.

My laptop chimed.

I saw a new email in my box marked urgent. duckwrangler508 - RE: plz

How could I face him? I deleted it unopened and, lest I be tempted, emptied my trash folder, consigning him to a random memory.

The bell above the café door rang as the last customer left with his steaming cup of Maui Moka, light on the chocolate. In that precious moment of quiet, I recognized that my earlier anger had not been directed at my Ducky, but at myself for the deceitful role I had played. Why had I pretended to more knowledge than I possessed?

I surrendered to a bout of frenzied weeping. How I longed to seek him out, but even should he accept my apology, our differing stations must keep us apart. Did not the district employee handbook frown upon fraternization such as this? To pursue a relationship with my manager would surely raise questions about my character.

At the sound of approaching footsteps, I gathered my sensibility and prepared for the next invasion of customers. The bell rang. In the unexpected silence that followed, I heard the sound of the door’s lock clicking into place.

Turning, I saw Mr. Purvis standing at the door, with his back to me. He turned the sign to “Closed.” In his hands, he held a slip of paper; it was pink.

Coffee Sensibility: Part III

A thousand tortured thoughts flew through my mind as I waited in the vacant chatroom. Where was my beloved duckwrangler508? What if my reply had been lost in cyberspace? What if the address were wrong and he waited elsewhere, convinced I had spurned his attentions? What if a customer wanted coffee before he arrived? What if Mr. Purvis noticed that I was not working?

Before my fears could spiral beyond control, a familiar handle entered the room.

duckwrangler508

I smiled to see him there and blushed as I realized he had arranged for a private room.

“hi” appeared upon my screen in deep blue Times New Roman. Bold, of course, suggesting classic masculinity and yet, the font itself gave the impression of subtle restraint.

I hesitated; no girlish exuberance of pink or purple would do. I pulled on a forest green Garamond, then in a coquettish whim, added italic for a feminine slant.

“hi,” I typed back.

duckwrangler508> were u waiting long?

exitreal297> no I jst got here

duckwrangler508> thnx 4 meetn me

exitreal297> happy 2 ive enjoyed yr emails

duckwrangler508> im glad

The immediacy of real time paralyzed me with sudden awkwardness. Gone was the leisure to review each sentence, to consider and ponder possible misinterpretations. What could I say to express my raptures of delight?

exitreal297> cool

I hit enter and instantly wished I could call the letters back, even as they appeared on the screen. I hoped he would not think me too forward.

duckwrangler508> my name is Keith

His name! My hand rose unbidden to press against my chest as if in an effort to keep my heart within.

A new line appeared. duckwrangler508> can i ask yrs plz?

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes! My fingers shook upon the keys and I accidentally hit the caps lock key. Thankfully I caught my error and backspaced, before sending, “Sophia.”

duckwrangler508> Sophia thts a pretty name

exitreal297> thnx

duckwrangler508> yr msgs hv meant a grt deal 2 me

exitreal297> rlly?

duckwrangler508> yeah

exitreal297> u dont need much, do u

duckwrangler508> just u

How tempting it was to read deeper meaning into those five simple letters.

duckwrangler508> r u set up 4 vc chat?

Voice Chat? I swallowed nervously. Things were going so fast and yet I had little time before the lunchtime rush of customers arrived. To hear Ducky’s voice meant more to me than I could say, but did I dare risk it? I glanced at my manager. He was staring at me, as if daring me to step outside the lines.

Why had I not waited until I was at home before responding? Oh, the woe, the heartache, the sharp pangs of remorse I suffered as I stared at his invitation.

I dropped my eyes, and stared at the cursor blinking accusingly on the screen.

exitreal297> sorry

duckwrangler508> 2 bd

At the same moment, I heard, “Too bad.” As I frantically reached for the volume control, I realized the voice came from across the café.

My manager stood and faced me. “You have a lovely voice.”

Beyond him, I could see his computer screen with a chat room glowing upon it–the same chat room I had shared with my beloved Ducky. There could be but one answer.

A rushing grew in my ears louder than the hissing steam of a latte, the room swam with black specks like Indonesia Toraja Sulawesi grounds spilled upon the floor and I swooned from my seat.

Stay tuned for tomorrow’s exciting installment.

I bit my knuckle in dismay.

How could I meet duckwrangler508@blatzoid.net for a chat in real time with my manager sitting in the café with me? And yet–how could I deny my longing to be with duckwrangler508?

It had begun innocently enough. I subscribed to the newsgroup for a new inventory system, which my manager had installed on our system, and dutifully skimmed each digest I received. Several times, I saw duckwrangler508 answer the questions of others, and each time he helped them with kindness, consideration and humor. I admired his gentle graces from afar, too shy to introduce myself. Then one day he posed a question no one could answer and by strange chance I had once experienced the exact problem he described–what was more, I knew how to resolve his dilemma.

But here, alas, is the point of my downfall. The solution was not mine. I had spent many hours on the phone with my tech support liaison struggling to resolve the error, though the final solution turned out to be a simple one. The details are not important here, but know that I presented the answer to duckwrangler508 as if it were my own. He responded with effusive thanks both on the group and in private correspondence. If only I had stopped there, but I did not. Emboldened by my success, the next time he posted a quandary, I took it to my tech support liaison and then presented duckwrangler508 with the solution given to me.

It seemed I now faced a beverage of my own making, a cup of instant coffee that threatened to destroy the grounds of our relationship. duckwrangler508 wanted to chat in real time. What was I to do if he asked me a question I could not answer? Should I set aside the mask of netspeak and reveal myself? Would he be repulsed that I was not a computer savant, but merely a barista?

And yet- he had been thinking of me. A flush of pleasure crept through my veins as I realized my last message had been unrelated to computer issues. Was it possible my dear Ducky–as I called him in my most private thoughts–felt towards me as I to him? Before conscious thought could dissuade me from my choice, I pressed the reply button, and let my fingers dance over the keyboard.

“duckwrangler508,” I wrote, “b 2 meet u anywhere u say. exitreal”

With my heart trembling in my chest, I sent my missive spinning through the Web. Had I sounded too eager? Should I have delayed replying so as not to appear as if I waited on him?

I left my laptop connected to the Web and tried to focus upon my work. I had not long to wait. It seemed my Ducky was as anxious as I was, for he replied instantly with an e-mail reading simply, “now? here?” and a link.

I glanced at Mr. Purvis, still engrossed in his work. All the customers had left the café in the mid-morning slump–surely Mr. Purvis would not begrudge me this small outing–and so, with a small shock at my own audacity, I wrote, “yes. c u there.”

I hit the send button and clicked upon the link Ducky had provided.

A new window opened and I waited through the agonizing second while the chat room loaded. The hourglass upon my screen let fall its sand with maddening slowness; each pixilated grain repeated the same vanishing descent so the pile at the bottom grew no larger while the top grew no smaller. How like the fruitless tasks that filled the hours of my life with meaningless purpose. Is it any wonder I was beguiled by the sense of worth I gained from my beloved Ducky?

The hourglass vanished and the chat room lay before me, empty.

Tune in tomorrow for Part III.

Having decided that the cellphone story was, in fact, dull, I’m going to reneg on my promise to finish it via email. It fails because my initial idea was for a high adventure serial, but that was in the scenario where I could send 1000 character texts instead of 160. Action sequences build no momentum in such a short span.

If I come up with an idea that will work well in that format, I might try it again. Meanwhile, I’m offering instead this very silly five-part serial.

Coffee Sensibility

A story in Five Parts

by Mary Robinette Kowal

The bell rang over the door to the internet café. Filled with regret, I closed Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility and lingered for one more moment in the 1800s. A customer pushed through the door, pulling my unwilling mind to the present. Ah, to have been born in a time of gentility rather than be surrounded by jittery professionals whom I could barely convince to savor their coffee.

I made the double lowfat-latte with Kenyan beans, enjoying the moment of isolation created by the hissing steam. The customer took no note of the perfect layer of foam atop her latte as she made her way to the bank of computers along the wall. No doubt she would surf the web, paying little heed to the intricacies of the Kenyan.

And yet, I must confess I felt some attraction for the Web and what it held. Ignoring the book I had been so eager to read, I turned to my laptop with a mix of apprehension and excitement and opened my e-mail. Would I find the very thing upon which my hopes depended, or would my longing be dashed as though a Grimac espresso machine thrown from the heights? I watched as mail downloaded with alacrity from the server to my inbox.

I deleted the endless spam, forwards and offers to transfer money from an offshore account, till at last I saw it. My heart beat faster, and my hand trembled so the mouse vibrated upon the screen. There, amidst a wasteland filled with vagaries of communication lay a single glorious epistle.

duckwrangler508@blatzoid.net had written back.

I eased the mouse over the subject line, caressing the letters, RE:?4u. I wanted to lengthen the anticipation that filled my bones with a throbbing like a thousand pounds of Guatemala Heuhetenango Organic beans being ground at once.

My reverie was broken as the door to the internet café swung open and my manager, Mr. Purvis, strode in. He was a tall, heavy-set man, florid in his complexion, whose gaze now fixed upon me like a double-shot of Jamaica Blue Mountain espresso. I minimized the window, embarrassed that he had nearly caught me with personal correspondence.

Flushing, I wiped down the counter as he crossed the café. Mr. Purvis donned a headset and logged onto a computer directly opposite me; he stared intensely at the screen but at any moment I feared he might look up.

I tidied for another minute until I could stand it no longer and opened the illicit window. With but a single click, the message blossomed upon my screen.

“hi exitreal297,” I read, shivering as I imagined his fingers upon the keys. “ive been thinking about yr last email. would lv 2 chat real time. what do u say? duckwrangler.”

Chat in real time? The screen dimmed, and the café spun like the burrs of a grinder. Did I dare?

This month, Clarkesworld magazine is offering my story, “Clockwork Chickadee,” as one of their two fiction offerings. Plus, “The Secret in the House of Smiles” by Paul Jessup, and non-fiction by Ekaterina Sedia, Jeff VanderMeer and Neil Clarke.

The teaser:

The clockwork chickadee was not as pretty as the nightingale. But she did not mind. She pecked the floor when she was wound, looking for invisible bugs. And when she was not wound, she cocked her head and glared at the sparrow, whom she loathed with every tooth on every gear in her pressed-tin body.

The sparrow could fly.

The story is available in two flavors, written or read aloud. Clarkesworld is offering audio fiction now, and my story kicks that off.

They’ve got a comment thread, so do let them know what you think.

So, I’d read about these cellphone novels in Japan and thought that it was completely insane to consider writing a novel on a phone. And then I was waiting for the train, my palm pilot was in the bottom of my bag with produce from the farmer’s market burying it, and I thought, “Why not?”

So, I pulled the phone out and started writing. I use the word loosely, you understand.¹ Anyway, if you are interested in being part of my experiment, drop me a line with your cell number and I will periodically text you an installment in “The Case of the White Phoenix Feather.”

I have to warn you that these will be extremely sporadic installments and that all of them will end with a cliff-hanger. I’ll start sending them randomly, next week. You may get one a week, or one a day. I should also warn you that I’m writing with no idea of where this is going.

Here’s the first line.

Without preamble, Virginia leaned across the spotless white tablecloth and smiled. “When I said the ninjas were no match for us, I meant it. Lou will be back with the White Phoenix Feather before the dessert course. Now quit gaping and finish your soup.”

Edited to add: This will be a short story, not a novel. I’m not that crazy.

1. 
   If I get frustrated and give up, I will write the ending in a more traditional medium and email it to you. [↩]

I managed to finish this story at WisCon. Yay! It’s 5800 words of urban fantasy.

It’s in a password protected post, but it’s the usual password. Don’t know what that is? Drop me a line and I’ll tell ya.

And here’s the teaser.

Half-consciously, Kim put a hand up to cover her new nose ring. She knew it pissed her parents off no end that she could tolerate cold iron and they couldn’t, not like there was that much iron in a nose ring.

It still made her break out sometimes, but didn’t burn her like it did them. “Kimberly Anne Smith,” Mom’s voice caught her in the foyer as surely as if she’d been called by her true name. “I’ve been worried sick. Do you know what time it is?”

“11:49.” Kim dropped her hand and turned to face Mom, her Doc Martens making a satisfactory clomping sound on the hardwood floor. “I’m here. Home before midnight. No one with me.” Sometimes she thought about bringing friends home to show them what her parents really looked like after their glamour dropped.