A Long Weekend, part 2: Threshold in Helmond

On Saturday September 1, the four of us -- my brother and his wife, a good friend and I -- went to see Threshold in Plato, a venue in the Dutch town of Helmond. My brother and I weren't exactly in top form -- the day after the night before -- especially since we aren't in our twenties anymore.

So we were rather a lot less present than normally at a Threshold gig: these guys are old friends (we're one of the few fans from the very beginning), and Petra -- my sister-in-law -- found that amusing, rubbing in it when we tried to be wild without really succeeding (she knows us but all too well).

Anyway, a surprisongly good show. Singer Andrew McDermot, or Mac for short, had left the band shortly before they went on tour, so the band asked one of their old singers to fill in for him at short notice.

Threshold and singers are, to put it mildly, an ongoing challenge. Bass player Jon Jeary -- one of the founding members -- also was their original singer. Jon wrote almost all the lyrics in the beginning, and while he's a great lyricist, he wasn't a great singer. Legend has it that on a gig he fainted while trying to hit a high note on one of the Wounded Land (their debut album) songs: not sure which one exactly, but I believe it was "Surface to Air".

So the band sought a good singer, and found one in Damian Wilson, who eventually sang all the songs on Wounded Land. However, for some reason (which escapes me) Damianwas replaced by Glynn Morgan on the band's second album: Psychedelicatessen. While Damian's voice was especially powerful in the higher regions, Glynn was a more allround singer: covering almost the whole spectrum. Or, as (keyboard player) Richard West later told me: he could hit both the high notes, and still have that grit and bite in his voice in the lower regions. They had tried to make Damian sing more grunting parts, but that only caused him to lose his voice for several days.

So while Glynn Morgan might not reach Damian's highs (although he sometimes came close, as I witnessed on some shows), his voice more than made up for that in the lower regions. However, he wasn't really happy with some of Threshold's complex lyrics (this would be a continuing problem), and -- as (guitar player) Karl Groom told me --he just couldn't (or wouldn't) sing the lyrics of "Part of the Chaos". That song was planned for the second album, but through Glynn's refusal/inability to sing it only appeared on the third album.

As it was, Glynn was a great singer, but not the right personality to stay with Threshold. Bad tongues might say that sometimes he was too stoned to perform 100%, and I'll diplomatically say the truth is somewhere in between. My personal impression: a very good singer with an almost incredible range, but a timid performer (not quite a front man type), and not really interested in the lyrics he was singing (also a recurring problem).

So, after the 'Livedelica' tour, Damian returned to the band to sing the Extinct Instinct album. Because Damian had less problems with the band's lyrics -- still mostly written by Jon Jeary at that time -- "Part of the Chaos" was included on that album (brilliant lyrics, BTW). Then he went on tour with the band, and reportedly freaked out during a gig in Spain. Point is, while Damian was -- and is -- a great singer, he was very timid on stage (Glynn was, too), rather insecure and needed to have his monitors amoed up quite high. This apparently didn't happen on that gig in Spain, and he, rather unexpectedly, became very angry and threw his monitor speakers into the audience. Which basically ended his second stay at Threshold.

So the band needed a new singer again: Jon Jeary was sarcastically referring to it as LSD: 'Lead Singer's Disease'. Andrew McDermott was the next singer. Roughly speaking his voice was somewhere between that of Damian and Glynn: a broad range around the middle, with no extremes in both the high and low ends. He debuted on Clone, whose music was still mostly written with Damian's vocals in mind. But Mac did a great job, and stayed with the band through the next four studio albums: Clone, Hypothetical, Subsurface, and Dead Reckoning.

Another shift took place in that Jon Jeary, up to that time the band's main lyricist, left the band, and keyboard player Richard West took over the role of lyrics writer (and with verve). Mac was a great studio singer, and a very good front man: in contrast with his two predecessors he wasn't shy of crowds, but actively interacted with them. The downside, though, was that Mac also never really connected with the band's (as always almost poetic) lyrics: he forgot half of them on tours, making up for that with pure bravado and crowd participation. And I will honestly admit that my brother and I had some great times when he reacted, often with wit, to our provocative shouts during gigs.

Mac had a great run, but in the end it didn't last. My best guess is that while he was (is) a great singer -- especially in the studio -- he really wasn't 'connected' to Rich West's lyrics, and Threshold's intention in general. I think -- and I don't mean that negatively -- that Mac really wanted to be in a party band, while Threshold's aims are much more serious.

So now Damian is back. Supposedly temporarily, but if I've picked up the signs at the Plato gig correctly, it might be more permanently. To be frank: Damian was a revelation. His singing was still as good as ten years ago, but -- more importantly -- he was on all the time: not a shy singer, but a very active frontman, communicating with the audience, carrying the show. And he sang the 'Mac' songs with verve, which is quite a difficult thing, as these songs were written with Mac's voice in mind. But Damian carried it off, and my brother and I agreed that the only song where he didn't really reach Mac's performance was "Light and Space". But he easily exceeded our expectations in all other regards.

We were very positively surprised, and told Rich (West) so after the show. Unfortunately we didn't have much time to talk, as my brother and his wife had to return home in time because grandmother was babysitting their sons at their home, and wanted to go home relatively in time (not at the crack of dawn). So my brother and I intend to have a longer talk with the band on Friday September 14 at the Biebob in Belgium.

I wanted to go to the band's next show in Zoetermeer, but something got in between, on which more in my next post.

A Long Weekend, part 1: Friday August 31

While one part of the SF community was at Nippon Con in Yokohama, and another part at Dragon*Con in Atlanta, I stayed in The Netherlands. Not that it made my long weekend any less intense.

So here's the report of someone who didn't go (well: I was at both WorldCon and Dragon*Con last year, so I know what I'm missing).

Friday August 31 I went to Anvil who played in the new Dynamo club in Eindhoven, with my brother and various friends.

Both Anvil and the Dynamo club have quite a history in heavy metal circles. From its inception in the very early 80s, Dynamo quickly became the beating heart of the Dutch heavy metal scene. Actually 'Dynamo cafe' was only a part of Eindhoven's 'youth centre' building, which was a five story building. The bar was in the cellar, and the venue (which had a fire safety capacity of 75, but more often than not was filled with 300+ people) was on the ground floor.

Legendaric gigs have taken place there, and indeed Anvil was one of the bands to play there in the early 80s. At that time, Anvil was on the verge of a breakthrough: the band had released three very good albums in quick sucession -- Hard and Heavy, Metal on Metal and Forged in Fire -- and propelled by the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (who on their turn were propelled by the Punk movement) they were on the forefront of what later came to be speed metal.

Especially Forged in Fire is still a bit of a forgotten classic, but back in '83 it seemed that Anvil was leading the speed metal pack. Problem was, they didn't follow through, as they didn't release a follow-up to Forged in Fire until 1987. Strength of Steel was too little, too late, as by that time bands like Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, Slayer, and many others had overtaken them.

In retrospect, I also think they didn't quite have the quality and will to develop of the afore-mentioned bands. Anvil has released 13 albums by now -- the latest one being This Is Thirteen -- but none of the ten albums after Forged in Fire quite captured the energy and grit of the first three. Anvil never improved after that.

My brother remained a staunch fan throughout the years, and if they play in Holland we always try to take a look. So now they were playing in the *new* Dynamo (the old building was demolished, and now Eindhoven has a new 'youth centre', again with a hardrock cafe -- which is in the cellar -- and a venue. Typically, Anvil didn't play in the new venue, which can hold up to 600 people, but in the cellar, for about a hundred mostly old fans. Of which my brother and I were two.

The band has become a trio, and the second guitar player was sorely missed. Also, they tried to promote quite a few new songs from the latest album, while the majority of the audience came for the old classics like "March of the Crabs", "666", "Metal on Metal", "Winged Assassins", "Motormount", and "Mothra", which they all eventually played.

All in all, it was a very nice evening: after the gig there was an 80s metal party where we drunk and partied like we did 24 year ago. Of course, my brother complained that the DJ didn't have enough of the old classics, and the next morning I found out that I really wasn't in my early twenties anymore.

But that day, another gig was planned...

First Acceptance of the May email reading period...

...is a story called "The Ships Like Clouds, Risen from Their Rain" by Jason Sanford.

(The other 17 stories that are held over are still under discussion: both the holiday period and an error during the printing of the premiere Black Static issue slowed things down. Please be patient: we are considering these stories *very* seriously.)

In our correspondence about the story, I mentioned that I thought it would have fitted nicely in Interzone #208: the special sensawunda issue (fiction edited and selected by me). Jason then said he wrote the story inspired by that very issue.


Well, that alone made the issue worthwile, IMHO.

Anyway, more updates on acceptances as we make them.

The Writing Game

This week I have been rather selfish: I tried to ignore most other things and concentrated on writing.

Ever since I joined Interzone my writing productivity dropped from about two stories a month to about two stories a year. So keep that in mind when someone asks you to join a magazine as an editor.

Don't get me wrong: I adore Interzone and greatly enjoy co-editing its fiction. I actually give it priority over my own writing, hence my drop in short story production.

Anyway, this week I rrealised that I've become a much slower writer. This is mainly because I find it near-impossible to shut down the editorial part of me. A couple of years ago I just wrote the story first, relatively fast, and worried about rewriting and polishing later. And while this produced more prose, I'm not sure if it was decent, or even good prose.

Also, I was less self-critical, or didn't have enough experience to be critical enough, most likely both. (Apart from the point that a writer is too close to his/her own story to really look at it objectively. It's extremely hard, almost impossible to avoid: you know what you mean, even if it's expressed poorly, because you know what you intended to say when you wrote it, and even on repeated rereadings this intented -- not apparent -- meaning almost always comes to the fore, masking the poor expression. If I could look with more objectivity to my own writing, the way I do with stories of others, then I'd write much better stories myself.) So I basically wrote first, and thought later (a rough generalisation, mostly true though).

Now I find myself thinking throughout the writing: adding extra details, plot twists, character motivations, and other layers while removing stuff that doesn't work (wrong ideas, poor phrasing, extraneous words, and more) at the same time. A bit like writing, editing and rewriting at the same time, if that makes sense. It slashes my word count down. On the other hand, I think -- Quod Erat Demonstrandum when I send it out -- that the actual prose that stays on the page is better.

At least, I certainly hope so: if I don't improve over time then writing becomes, if not pointless, quite frustrating: I want to be better in the next story, not stay at the same level, or become worse. Of course, the next story may be at the same level, the following one maybe even worse, and only the one after that better: progress often isn't a straight upward curve. As long as the general trend is up I'm fine.

To illustrate with two rough examples: the original version of "Transcendence Express" (written back in 2002) had about 7800 words. The version that got published in HUB #2 (the last print version, unfortunately) has about 4200 words. Between those two versions, it got bounced twelve times, and rewritten several times -- I estimate 5 or 6 times -- in the process, often after editorial comments.

Conversely, "Qubit Conflicts" (written in 2005) originally had about 2800 words, while the published version has about 2100. It received six rejections before Clarkesworld Magazine bought it, and two rewrites (the last one on Nick's instructions).

Of course, I leave it up to the reader to decide which of the two is the better story (I can't give an objective opinion), but it shows the general direction my writing is taking: I'm trying to get it right the first time around. OK, still not quite succeeding, obviously -- as six bounces and two rewrites of which one by editorial decree show -- but heading that way.

(Rejections will always be inevitable, but I try not to be rejected on quality anymore.)

(And I only sold one story at the first try, which was also the very first story I sold. It's been downhill ever since...;-)

Thing is, early in my writing career I tended to be highly enthusiastic about the first draft of a story, not quite critical enough, and subsequently rewrite or polish minimally (if at all). Then send it off to the top markets, getting the inevitable form rejections.

Only after slowly improving, receiving critiques from my fellow online Orbiters, getting a few personal rejects, and getting more serious about rewriting (murder your darlings, indeed) did it slowly dawn on me that I was doing some basic things wrong, to wit:

1. Don't send your (slightly polished) first draft to the most suitable top market: it will get bounced, and then you've effectively killed that story's chance at that market; so:
2. Repress the urge to immediately send it out, but put it on hold for at least a month, or more; then:
3. Look at it with a fresh perspective, and savagely rewrite it; after which you:
4. Send it to your critique group (if you don't have one, join one: there are plenty), and take *every* comment seriously. Some might be wrong, but these are always less than you think at first. And the ones that hurt the most are most probably the ones that are on the money: overcome the writer's ego and address them;
   
5. Then let it rest for another month or so, and re-evaluate it again, and rewrite.
6. Polish, polish, fine-polish, fine-polish, and make it gleam (you'd be surprised to find how many editors are won over by good prose);
7. And only then carefully target your market from the top down.

"But this takes so much time!" I hear some of you say. Indeed, this way it can be six months or a year (or longer) from the first draft to the point of actual submission. Let's say a year(*). Still, be patient.

Because getting it bounced repeatedly takes even longer. Compare my two examples:

• "Transcendence Express" (now available as a podcast on Escape Pod: it wasn't when I wrote this yesterday, so chalk one up for synchronicity) bounced twelve times: time between finished first draft (August 2002) and acceptance (January 2007) was four years and five months;
• "Qubit Conflicts" bounced six times: time between finished first draft (March 2005) and acceptance (September 2006) was one year and six months;

So those six to twelve 'extra' months for rewriting etc. will most probably be a good investment timewise as it might considerably reduce the time between first submission and acceptance. More importantly, it might make the story land at a much better market.

YMMV, and other disclaimers, but this is my personal experience.

(*) Obvious exceptions are stories written for a specific anthology or theme issue. But even then use as much time as possible before the submission window closes: your story will only improve.

Party in Denmark

In happier news, I was in Denmark the past weekend. I flew in on the Friday morning to do a presentation for a Danish customer, then on the Saturday travelled onwards to the little village of Store Sjorup, where Ralan Conley (I distinctly remember a picture at WorldCon of both Ralan and me drinking beer at the Asimov's party, but can't find it back. So the picture below will have to do) was celebrating his 60th Birthday.


I must say, I was treated like royalty. Ralan's oldest son, Michael (or Mikael, I'm not sure), picked me up from the station of Langå, and after a few stops on the way -- he was picking up things for the party, such as sound equipment -- we arrived in the charming little village of Store Sjørup. I received a very heartly welcome, and the party was on!


One of Ralan's friends -- Niels and his wife Disa (pictured above) -- have a local brewery called Wintercoat, and they supplied beer: Indian Pale Ale and Yellowjacket. I personally preferred the Yellowjacket, and of course it is pure coincidence that of Yellowjacket one more barrel was consumed than the Indian Pale Ale.

Another huge compliment to Ralan's wife Karen (I hope I remembered that right!) who tirelessly provided copious amounts of superb food. Only at midnight did Ralan himself start making hotdogs, but by that time my tastebuds were desensitised by so much Yellowjacket that I don't know if these were great or not.

The next morning, after some hair of the dog, Ralan showed me around the picturesque North-Danish countryside, before I was treated to a great lunch, after which he dropped me off at the Billund airport.

A great weekend!

Now, before I log off, a short reminder that August is fundraising month for Ralan. I already donated $30, so do join in (even if it's only a dollar) and support the best genre market list (I own several sales to market info from the Webstravaganza).

"Winning Mars" -- the novel

Jason Stoddard is putting up "Winning Mars" -- the novel version of the story that appeared in -- the sold out -- Interzone #196 for free on his website here (warning: 500 kB PDf file).

As it is, there have been complaints throughout the genre community that SF has become too dark and predominantly pessimistic (arguably greatly influenced by the zeitgeist): even most American SF at that (like: weren't the British supposed to be the gloomers'n'doomers?).

"Winning Mars" (and its sequel "Saving Mars" -- Interzone #200, also sold out) goes against that stream and depicts a bunch of cynical entrepreneurs who use a competition combined with a reality TV show to get teams competing for a race to be the first on Olympus Mons. The race itself works very well, but to me it was the behind-the-scenes, cynical cutthroat negotiations to raise the money that made the story outstanding. The high point being the scene where Jere Guttierez, Evan McMaster (the show's producers) and Ron -- Jere's father -- are confronted with US government agents who want to take over the project for political reasons (or otherwise cancel the launch): Jere is already mentally calculating how to turn that setback into a profit, when his father explodes:

“No fucking way!” Ron said. His face was almost purple. He levered himself up out of his chair and went to tower over the seated agent. The standing one tensed, but didn’t move.

Ron poked a finger in his chest. “We’re not going to Mars to plant fucking flags!”

“Dad . . .”

“Shut up.” Low and deadly.

“Did the fucking pilgrims come to plant fucking flags?” Ron said. “No! They came to get away from bureaucratic fucks like you! You assholes had your chance. How many billions did we give to you shitpoles? What did we get for it? Our lunar rovers in Chinese museums! A bunch of rusting hardware crash-landed on Mars. Thanks. Thanks a lot. Now it’s our chance!”

Ron's diatribe ignites popular opinion, and the launch and subsequent show go through. This -- for me -- was the turnaround point in the story, made me cheer inside, and somehow redeemed the cynical executives Jere and Evan because they, if even for the wrong reasons, got people on Mars.

Note that I haven't read the novel version, but I would be rather disappointed if that scene had been cut. To me, "Winning Mars" was one of the very best stories we published in Interzone that year, and I thought it was a crying shame that it wasn't reprinted in any YBSF.

Also, Jason's choice and rationale make me wonder: if a highly talented writer like Jason thinks the '2-year process of conventional publishing' is too slow (and do keep in mind that he runs a new media advertisement agency with offices in L.A., New York, and Shanghai, and that things go much faster in that business), and that his day job basically means he thinks that the average advance of said conventional publisher ('gigantic advance (LOL)') is financially irrelevant to him (and I sympathise: I won't be quitting the day job, either), then the conventional publishing industry has just lost a great, forward looking talent.

I don't know: on the one hand many publishers may say that "Winning Mars" -- the novel is either not good enough/ready for publication, or that they have better titles out/in inventory. Fair enough. On the other hand, though, I can't help but wonder: conventional (novel) publishing is losing a writer (with considerable short story credits) who is operating, very successfully, in the very forefront of the electronic frontier. Somebody who will, much sooner than later, find a different way of publishing (and making it available through a common creative license on his website is probably merely the beginning).

I know he's not the first to make a novel available for free on his website (Cory Doctorow, Charlie Stross, Peter Watts immediately come to mind, and there are plenty of others), and not even the first one to publish his novel before he sold it to a print publisher (John Scalzi with Old Man's War comes to mind). But I strongly suspect that Jason might not be interested in getting a novel published by conventional means at all.

Whose loss is this: Jason's or that of the conventional novel publishers? Well, I can only speak from personal experience: both Interzone #196 (with "Winning Mars") and Interzone #200 (with "Saving Mars") sold out, very fast. Faster than any other issues of the 'new' Interzone.

Realms announced

Realms: the First Year of Clarkesworld Magazine is on presale at Wyrm Publishing here. If you pre-order it now you get it for $9.77 (instead of $13.95).

I'll be picking up a copy at World Fantasy, as I find overseas mail from the US to Europe capricious and slow (or very expensive and fast).

It's a good way to support an upcoming publisher, and at about 40 cents a story it's cheaper than Amazon shorts (and yeah, cheapskates can check them all for free at Clarkesworld Magazine. But don't go complaining if another market dies due to lack of support).

And the cover art, like those on the chapbooks, is -- as usual -- great.

The Gordian Knot--

--She has been cut.

Yesterday I sent out 16 (reluctant) rejections, and have winnowed down the 500 submissions of May to 18, the first four of which will be sent to my colleagues tomorrow.

So what's in there (for those still keeping count)?

• Two alternate histories: one in a fin de siècle US, and one in a late medieval UK. I actually like more exotic settings, but that's the way things worked out this time. However, we do have two alternate histories in inventory set in a world dominated by China and Aztecs by two different writers, who are strangely different and strangely the same. I hasten to add that they developed those completely independent from each other;
• Four near-future SF stories: one a thought-provoking political thriller, one a haunting post-apocalyptic drama where people are trying to maintain a shred of civilisation, one that redivides a re-united Korea into a whole different group of have's and have-not's, and one high-tech, pulling-all-the-stops extravaganza that will have the mundanistas (hi, Geoff, Julian and Trent) either moaning, ecstatic, or both;
• a science fantasy with a distinctive Vancean flavour that wears more masks than clothes;
• Three fantasy stories: a wry, bittersweet search for treasure and origin, a journey in a surreal world full of pain and mystery, and a madcap, absurd battle for something that is evocative by definition (which might also be filed under the humourous stories);
• Four humourous stories: one where a spectre is daunting Manhattan, one where our hero is desperately searching for his brain (no, actually he's searching for all seventeen of his brains), one where genetic engineering gets monstrously out of hand, and one that's so full of wit and (self-)references that it might well be the snake that swallows its own tail;
• an adventurous SF tale on a swampy planet where some things go slower...
• Two sensawunda stories: one that gradually builds up to an awe-ispiring climax, and another one that hits the ground running, sets off the fireworks, and never looks back;
• One razor-sharp fable that some may find sick.

Later on, I hope to post which ones we finally accept, with story titles and my one sentence description, to whet your appetites for future Interzone issues.

Triangulation: End of Time on sale!

While a large part of the genre world has congegrated at the (sold out) San Diego Comic Con, or is busy getting their Hugo votes in, the anthology "Triangulation: End of Time" has been launched at Confluence in Pittsburgh. It's also available at Lulu.com here, both in print and electronic format.

Update: also at Amazon here.

It contains my story "Near Absolute Zero", portraying the end of the Universe in a dread, existential setting. (Programming will return to more optimistic tunes the moment Escape Pod will put "Transcendence Express" online, or when Ahmed A. Kahn releases his SF Waxes Philosophical anthology with my story "The Third Scholar".)

There are lots of other stories in there, from Asimov's writers Ian Creasy, Matthew Johnson and Tim Pratt; soon-to-be Interzone author Sue Burke, and Trent Walters -- one of the three ediots of Interzone's mundane SF issue next year -- and many others.

Check it out!

To trunk, or not to trunk?

Most short story writers have them: stories you've written that you think are quite OK (or better than that), but that still don't sell. They get rejected: with forms, or quite often encouragingly with personal notes that come down to: 'close, but no cigar'. They keep getting rejected, until the markets you thought were suitable for it have been exhausted.

Of course, in most cases this probaly is because your piece of genius isn't quite so good. And while this is a very tough call to make for a writer, sometimes your story gets bounced not because it sucked, but because the markets weren't ripe for it.

*Ducks as an avalanche of rotten tomatoes comes in*

I know: in the utmost majority of the cases it is because the story just wasn't good enough. But there are a rare few ones where it *is*, or at least that is what you -- the tunnel-visioned writer -- can't help but believe.

So you don't totally trunk your story, but keep it on hold, and stealthily wait until the right market comes along. And as you regularly check Ralan and Duotrope and other sources, sometimes you come across one, and bingo! (Well, not quite always. But sometimes: I've had it happen to me once before).

I have four such stories: stories I can't help but keep believing in myself (and I have trunked over two dozen: most were learning experiences, and some I know are sub-par. Quite sub-par). That number has now dropped to three (and another one had a near-miss: this one has the added disadvantage of being 15K long).

Indeed, a sale!

Thing is, in this case it took some time before the coin dropped. Ahmed A. Kahn -- whose short-short "Elevator Episodes in Seven Genres" is now out in Interzone #211 -- is editing a second anthology (the first one, Fall and Rise, is out from Whortleberry Press) about SF and philosophy, tentatively called SF Waxes Philosophical.

It took me a while to realise that one of my 'on hold' stories was steeped in philosophy (and much more besides). Also, as far as I know Ahmed only mentioned this anthology on the Asimov's boards and his own journal.

Anyway, I sent the story to Ahmed this Friday, and it was accepted a few hours later.

And while payment is one copy of the anthology, it's not bad to be in the company of Mike Bishop, Steven Utley and Matt Hughes.

So that leaves three stories that I still think should be published. Here's one for writerly doggedness!