I had the coolest thing happen to me a couple of days ago, and I’m still buzzing from it. Back in June, I had a short story accepted for an anthology; my first short story sale. At the time I thought cool. I found a home for Fiddler (the story’s title). I did a little happy dance, and then moved on. Earlier this week, the publisher of the anthology, Bayonet Books, published the collection of shorts on Amazon for pre-sale. One of those also ‘cool things’. And I did my part, posted links, let folks know, etc. Now the cool…
Rick Shaw Posts
One of the hardest aspects of crafting a novel, for me, is the motivation to plow through the middle. I write what I see in my head. In that, I’ll see scenes that drive a story to the conclusion I know is coming. There is, however, and equally essential need for the connective tissue that weaves or bonds all the parts, the foreshadowing, the red herrings, and the ‘oh shit I didn’t see that coming’ moments that make turning the page not only compelling but emotionally mandatory. I have, among the folders and odd scraps within my drives, five novels…
Imagine, if you will, two stories. With a common premise. Interdependent upon one another. Authored a year apart. The second, done as a challenge by my well-intentioned band of lunatics. The Tunguska Deception has been my personal insanity since December, with the successful completion of 2016’s NaNoWriMo. My current challenge is stitching together these two stories, each approximately 50,000 words. The first never intending to have the second timeline as a companion/partner. Add to this, the mounting pressure of a small, but mighty and vocal, fan base clamoring for more since the publication of the first two chapters in the…
The Fervid Imagination and Writing Process of Rick Shaw – by M. Talley Rick Shaw has been part of the Southern California writing community for over a decade. Though I have known him for roughly five years, we both attended the Santa Barbara Writers Conference for the first time in 2005, when it was held at Westmont College in Montecito. When I read Rick’s work, I think, this is a guy who could actually make money off his books. His genre writing (sci-fi, horror, crime/mystery, etc.) is commercial, not in the sense of watered-down, generic speculative fiction, but in the…