We had talked about doing something as a group, and Cliff came up with a doozy. The Many Faces of Van Helsing is an anthology of vampire stories focusing not on Dracula but on the man that hunts him, Abraham Van Helsing.

Coincidentally, the anthology is slated to be published in May 2004, when Van Helsing, a movie featuring Hugh Jackman in the leading roll. The movie sounds like a remake of the 1987 classic, The Monster Squad, featuring Dracula, the Wolf Man, and Frankenstein’s monster. I’m going to make a leap and guess that the new film will be a bit more serious than the one of my youth. In any case, the timing of the anthologies release is fortuitious. There will no doubt be a marketing blitz promoting the new movie, which can only help the book. This may also have the effect of stiffening the competition as well.

A few of us from group have decided to submit something to the anthology, myself included. I first read Dracula while I was in High School and it was a memorable experience. Late one night I sat near an open window, reading by candlelight. While deeply entranced by the story, and uncommon (but not unusual) event occurred. A bat flew in my window and I shrieked like a banshee. We had bats flying into open windows every summer we lived in that old house. It shouldn’t have scared the wits out of me but it did. That was the power the Dracula story had on me.

Some people rooted for Dracula, but I was always more interested in the vampire hunters, Van Helsing and his ilk. Movies like The Lost Boys and John Carpenter’s Vampires, and the ever-popular Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When I read the theme of the anthology I was hooked. I knew, even if no one else in the group was interested, that I would have to write a story and submit it. Vampires beware. Van Helsing hunts you.

I’ve been negligent in updates lately, busy with work, home, and writing. The work stuff has settled down slightly and we’re interviewing someone on Friday to help out with the development efforts, which helps me immensely. Work around the house is finally down to a trickle. All of the flowers have been planted as well as the garden, and I’ve slid back into my weekly maintenence chores. That leaves writing, and I am very happy to have finally submitted Shaken, not Stirred to Analog. I’m relieved to have finally finished it and let it go. That seems to be the thing I have the most trouble with. Now it’s out the door, and I can go back to work on Mirror, Mirror, which will, among other things, get a new title.

Last night was the postponed critique of my short story, Shaken, not Stirred. The group had great feedback. I was unsure which direction I wanted to take the story. In its current form, it was too long for what it is. My options are to make it longer and more serious, or cut it shorter and get to the punchline quicker. I’ve decided to cut it short and keep the original intent of the story intact. I took out the editorial knife this morning and started chopping. Thanks to Raechel I also have a market to send it to. Planet Relish is an ezine that accepts what they call “feghoots”, which they describe as not just a short-short story with a joke at the end, but “a short-short story that ends in a very groan-worthy pun.” Once I trim out the fat, that will describe this story very aptly.

Trey mentioned the Turkey City Lexicon in a recent journal entry. The lexicon is a primer for SF workshops, but should be a must-read for any speculative fiction writer. I read through it before group last night, and noticed a few things that I do wrong. In truth, I’ve been noticing them more lately and have been working on them. There are two in particular that are vexing me.

The first is “Ing Disease”, with sentences such as “Having opened the door, Adam walked through it.” This is a common problem among beginning writers and I think I know why. In my case, I was trying to correct my use of active versus passive verbs. The other thing I’ve been struggling with is the proper use of possessive pronouns. The Purdue University Online Writing Lab has come in handy researching proper grammar. Take the example "The ships original blue…" from my story last night. It should have been "The ship’s original blue…". If I had turned it around "of the…", it would have read "The original blue of the ship", which would have told me that I needed to make "ship’s" possessive.

The key to learning is recognizing your mistakes. As long as you can do that there’s no limit to what you can do.

It’s an interesting genre. I’ve found myself reading more and more cyberpunk lately, most notibly William Gibson, Bruce Sterling and Neal Stephenson. I find it not only facinating but ripe with potential. I think that my current work in progress (and at least one other on the back burner) can be classified as cyberpunk. But what exactly is cyberpunk?

According to The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, cyberpunk is a “term used to describe a school of sf writing that developed and became popular during the 1980s.”

The word is believed to have been coined by author Bruce Bethke in his short story Cyberpunk, which appeared in Amazing Stories in 1983. It was subsequently picked up by writer and editor Gardner Dozois and used to describe a literary movement sparked by writers such as William Gibson and Bruce Sterling.

— The Unofficial Cyberpunk Home Page

That explains the start of the cyberpunk movement, but how about what it is. Like many speculative genre’s, there is no one specific, clear cut definition. To me, cyberpunk is a genre that explores the interaction of technology and man (in the generic sense of the word) in a not so distant future. This could be the measurement of the effect of technology not just singularly, but on a larger scale, such as a society. In fact, I think that both views are required for a cyberpunk story to be believable. Ironically, technology has changed so rapidly in the past decade that stories written in 80’s and early 90’s are now outdated, with many of the ideas explored come true.

Cyberpunk today is a prediction of tomorrow. That’s what makes it fun.

I’ve decided I need to start tracking my daily word counts. Setting specific goals is fine and dandy, but if I don’t write every day I slip, and my goals quickly are forgotten. I may stick some sort of table to the left with the running total.

As of today, I have 100 words on a new story tentatively called Mirror, Mirror. The hour or so of writing I get in at lunch isn’t doing much to satisfy my creative palette. There are simply too many distractions at work. Phone calls, meetings and bosses have little distinction between work and lunch when you’re at your desk.

I haven’t decided when I’ll post my daily word count, but I’m leaning towards end of day, just before bed. I’m going to get up an hour earlier, with the hour at lunch, and potentially another hour at night, depending on my contract schedule. A few hundred words a day, while not as much as some can produce, adds up if done consistently. And isn’t that the key to writing, after all? Consistency?

Ironically, this is the second draft of this post. The first got eaten when IE::Mac and MoveableType decided to agree to disagree as to who I was and if I was logged in.

I currently have four complete short stories in first draft condition sitting on my desk, all in need of revision. One sat there for months until I finally forced myself to submit it to group. I tend to finish a first draft, make a few minor revisions and then move on to the next one. This is far from productive. Some, like the one noted above, would do well sent to the group for critique. Even in their first draft state, they will be able to provide critical insight that will help me in the second and third drafts, until I ultimately have a polished piece ready to submit to the market.

Thus far I am falling fall short of my goal of one submission per month. I need to focus my attention on finishing these drafts, polishing them up, and sending them out. That’s my current and immediate short-term goal. I want to have a second draft of “A Cup of Tea” (was “A Tea for Two”) finished this weekend and pending a final read from Dena, ready to send out next week. Following that I have “Temperament” in desperate need of a critical eye. By that time, “Shaken, not Stirred” will be back from group with valuable feedback and I can begin its revisions as well. By mid-May I should have two stories in circulation and a third sent to group.

Revision is the mark of a writer and so far I have been falling short of that mark. While my original goal may have been a fair bit too optimistic, I think that if I remain focused that I will be able to get those submissions out, and that will feel pretty darn good.

The war against Iraq has begun. Any day that sees force used to achieve peace is a sad day. I don’t want to get into the politics or my opinions on the war, because I am quite opinionated about it but I prefer friendly discussions, not preaching from a pulpit.

I stumbled across a link to Where is Raed?, a blog from someone inside Baghdad. I’m in the process of reading through it now, but it’s interesting and enlightening to see things from the eyes of someone who is living in Iraq.

War is hell, as the old saying goes. The safety of the coalition soldiers and innocent civilians will be in my thoughts.

I woke up early today and decided to use the time to sort through some of my old stories and update my story idea journal. I’m a bit frustrated with the direction the current story headed, and I wanted to go through what I already had, and what ideas I had, and possibly start on something with more promise. Imagine my surprise this morning when I stumbled across a story I had forgotten about. Shaken, Not Stirred. It’s a short little science fiction tale, first draft quality, but may be worth revisiting. At one point I had started to rewrite it, but it fell to the wayside and I forgot about it. I have a few stories in need of revision before I start submitting them, and a handful of ideas to explore in new stories. Either way, it feels good to shift attention to something a little different. The current WIP is feeling quite stale and clichè

As a software developer, using acronyms is like breathing. You just do it. Eventually, you don’t even think about it. Sometimes the acronym assumes a life of its own. These special acronyms are elevated to the status of buzz words, even though they really aren’t words.

I’m working on my next article for Ars Technica, an XML primer. XML is one of those special acronyms, recognized by many but understood by few. As a buzz word, it is thrown around almost casually, as sort of a badge that says “See? I fit in, too”.

Hurling buzzwords is also geek meeting ritual, used to establish one’s position and rank. Entire conversations can be carried on without breaking a sweat.

Person 1: WTF?
Person 2: RTFM, n00b.
Person 1: STFU.

Of course, this is an extreme that usually only takes place in the ether of the Internet. Across IRC and IM (two more legendary acronyms), exchanges such as the above. This has also led to the phenomenon of this “Internet Speak” protruding beyond the digital divide.

XML, HTML, SQL, IRC, IIRC, WTF, AIM, IM, RPC, OOP, WTF, RTFM. The list is endless and evergrowing. We constantly change technology to improve our lives, but at the same time technology is changing us.