AKA…How The Husband Scared the Life Out of Me. Before I begin, per the rules, the Husband is fine now. Also, I’ve already talked to my MIL about this and she’s not finding out about it on social media.

Last night around 9:45pm, I heard a strange thud sound. I call out: “You okay?” and I waited about ten seconds. In that ten seconds, Isis freaked out—she is noisy, but not like that. I got up and hurried into the bedroom where I found my husband lying face down on the floor, unmoving, blood pouring from his face.

A lot of thoughts crashed through my mind at once. So many that a day later, I’m still processing them all. They included but aren’t limited to:

• …Why is he on the floor? Is he looking for something?
• …That’s not right.
• …He’s dead.
• …No, he can’t be dead.
• …He’s bleeding. Oh fuck, that’s a lot of blood.
• …Should I call 911?

All these thoughts happened at once in an instant. Then I reacted.

Folks, I am here to tell you if my husband is ever murdered and I find his body, I will most definitely be covered in his blood. There is an absolute panicked animal instinct to touch, to help, to wake up, your loved one when you find them like that. I don’t even remember diving to the floor before I was shaking him, yelling his name, shifting him from face down to face to the side so he could breathe. His blood was all over the carpet, his face, and my hands.

He didn’t respond to me for about twenty seconds. It was the scariest thing I’ve ever experienced. Then he made a noise and my heart skipped a beat. I was certain, until that moment, my husband had died.

I helped him up. He was still bleeding profusely from his nose where he’d lacerated the bridge of it. Dripping blood everywhere, I helped him to the sink and gave him a cloth to staunch the bleeding. There was so much blood: the carpet, the bathroom floor, him, me. I kept telling him “We have to go to the hospital.” By the time I was dressed and had discovered that our local walk-in emergency clinic was closed, he was calm and coherent enough to tell me he didn’t need an ambulance, but yes, he needed the emergency room.

I haven’t driven at night in over 2.5 years. I wasn’t going to let that stop me. The problem is that I don’t have good night vision because I had eye surgery about twenty years ago. It makes my depth perception wonky at night. Still, we made it to the emergency room about fifteen minutes away without incident. The whole time, the Husband was calm and coherent. I kept him talking because I didn’t know if he had a concussion and I couldn’t remember if you were supposed to keep a concussed person awake or not. (I opted for yes.)

Evergreen Emergency was amazing as always (this is the fourth time I’d been there—twice for me, once for Heather, and now the Husband). They immediately started processing him. He explained that he’d had an abdominal pain and had gotten up to walk it off…and that was all he remembered. While he was talking, his nose was still bleeding. I vibrated with the need to help but knew I couldn’t. I talked when he couldn’t. And, while they were checking him in, he passed out again, but had the wherewithal to use his words and warn us. I held him up, keeping him from falling out of the chair. That lit a fire under everyone’s butt and we were taken to a trauma room.

For the medically minded among you: The Husband has a cut and broken nose. The laceration needed three stitches. The break is a minor fracture on the tip of his nose. He has bruising around the eyes, the nose, and the lips where his teeth impacted them in the fall. At this time, the passing out (syncope) is believed to be due to a vagal reaction that caused his blood pressure to fall. He will be following up with an ENT specialist in a week to get the stitches out and to see what else needs to be done about his nose. He will also be following up with his regular doctor to investigate the abdominal pain and the passing out.

We were at the emergency room for about 3.5 hours. Pretty damn good in the grand scheme of things. During that time, I got a chance to wash the dried blood off my hands and wrists. It’s amazing how much the face bleeds when lacerated. It’s awful the way it gets everywhere.

A day later, the Husband is looking rough. Like he’s been in one heck of a fight. However, he’s feeling much better. I can see, for now, his profile has changed. There’s a distinct bump in his nose. We’ve also cleaned up the carpet. It was disturbing to walk around the blood stains. There was so much of it…the biggest splotch of blood was bigger/wider than my hand. A neighbor had a steam cleaner we borrowed.

As I’ve told the Husband, while I appreciate him giving me visceral experiences so I can write about them (and believe me, someone is going to find their most precious loved one dead in some upcoming story because I need to write away these demons), I never want him to do that to me again. I find myself breaking out into half-hysterical laughter and I’m so furious with him in a distant way that I can’t really explain. I haven’t cried. I couldn’t last night, I was the driver. I needed to hold it together. I think I have a stranglehold on my emotions right now because the thought of what could have happened is just too scary to contemplate.

The worst part about all this is that it came out of nowhere. There was no warning. He’s had abdominal pain before. He’s had scar tissue cramps before. They’ve never made him pass out. Also, he was sitting and did not have pain when he passed out a second time. There is nothing we can specifically do or fix right now to make sure this doesn’t happen again.

The Husband is fine now and I am ever-grateful for that. However, this event brings home how quickly life can turn on you; how quickly my whole world could’ve ended. I never want to experience something like this again.

3 Jun 2022 Update. In the Husband's own words: "so, after the ENT follow up today, swelling had gone down, apparent the tip of my nose bone is shifted to the right, and my vomer (a bone like at the base of the nose right above the teeth) is also broken and shifted to my right, both are causing my right nostril to be mostly blocked, I go back on Monday morning when they'll inject me with numbing stuff and then rebreak both to shove them back into the correct position and put some small cast things on."

Part of April and May was me taking it easy…kinda, sorta. I never stopped working, but I did change the work from writing to editing (mostly). I did have an in-person convention (Norwescon) and a virtual one (Nebulas). I taught one class and did two interviews. Editing-wise, I’ve been proofing older Shadowrun novels for ebook format—taking this at a leisurely pace—and have completed the final TOC selection for The Reinvented Detective anthology with Cat Rambo. I’ve also started preliminary work on a new anthology I’m editing—it will be announced in June and have a one-month open call July 15 – Aug 15.

It sounds like a lot, I know. But it’s really not that much compared to my regular schedule. I’ve also been able to do some puzzles and to read for pleasure. I’ve decluttered my closet and we’ve restructured the cat room into a more well-rounded cat-workout-podcast pod-convention storage room. I appreciate the space being more effectively used. I’ve gotten the mind break I needed.

June begins the busy season for me. I have one in-person event for the next three months. As with last year, I am torn about this. I’ve managed to avoid the plague thus far by being as careful as I can while still maintaining my publishing career. I’ve been vaccinated and boosted. I minimize my contact with people as much as possible. It’s harder now that half the world seems to have declared the pandemic is over. (Try telling that to the virus and all my friends who have either caught covid, are still suffering from long covid, or have had to take care of a family member with covid.)

There are a lot of things I miss. Wandering the mall just because. Taking road trips so we can find and explore hidden gems. Hell, just sitting in a coffee shop people watching while writing/editing/eavesdropping. I don’t know when (if?) we’ll ever get back to that point. I hope so. Mostly, I’m still here. Still working in the background. Still lurking on the sidelines. There are very rare forays into public spaces that don’t involve a surgical strike for a specific task. I’ve been to the mall twice in the last 2.5 years. Both times with the same person. Both times to hit specific stores then to leave.

One of the things I have appreciated with all the mask wearing and hand washing is the lack of con crud when I do go to conventions. Most times, I can avoid it. But because The Husband deals with money and cash is filthy, he was the one who usually got con crud. The last three conventions, not so. (Of course, for The Husband, the return to the office has included a return to the germ pool of working parents and careless co-workers. He caught a bad cold that set off his asthma in a way that I hadn’t seen in years and scared the pants off me.)

I have hope for the future, but I don’t think that is going to bear fruit for some time to come.

The Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) has partnered once again with Worldbuilders, an organization of geeks doing good that supports humanitarian efforts worldwide, to run their annual silent auction. This auction runs from May 9, 12noon, Pacific until May 16, 12noon, Pacific.
https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/auctionhome.action?vhost=wbi

Three items from me up for bid:
A 30-minute one-on-one virtual career session via Zoom with Jennifer Brozek, an award winning author, editor, and tie-in writer. Tell me where you want to go with your career and I'll do my best to guide you.
https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/item.action?id=342557558

Four seats in a one-hour virtual author kaffeeklatsch via Zoom with Jennifer Brozek, an award winning author, editor, and tie-in writer. Come talk about anything gaming or publishing related. On request, I will go get all my cats to show you.

Seat 1: https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/item.action?id=342557553

Seat 2: https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/item.action?id=342557555

Seat 3: https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/item.action?id=342557556

Seat 4: https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/item.action?id=342557557

Jennifer Brozek will do a tuckerization for the winning bidder (or as a gift from the winning bidder to someone else). Tuckerization will be in a new Shadowrun YA novella and possibly used in a later Shadowrun novel.
https://www.biddingforgood.com/auction/item/item.action?id=342557560

Please support this worthy cause.
Thank you,
Jenn

Time is always getting away from me these days, but not because I'm doing nothing. This Bubble & Squeek is mostly interviews with me (and with Cat Rambo) that have happened over the last month or so. Enjoy!

• Article: The Reinvented Heart anthology was listed in 52 New Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books for Your May Reading List on Gizmodo.

• Interview: With Scifi Pulse magazine. Jennifer Brozek discusses writing styles and creating engaging characters.

• Interview: Horror Tree Presents… An Interview with Cat Rambo and Jennifer Brozek.

• Interview: 2 Part interview with Signals From the Edge. The Reinvented Anthologies: Conversation with Cat Rambo & Jennifer Brozek, parts one and two.

• Interview: Author interview with Prachesta Magazine.

• Support: As always… if you appreciate my work and would like to support me, I love coffee. I am made of caffeine. This is the quickest way to brighten my day.

This Bubble & Squeek is brought to you by many many release, re-releases, and reviews! Plus, bonus pictures.

Print Release: Here's the public print release of  THE LAST CITIES OF EARTH anthology by me and Jeff Sturgeon.

Review: Literary Hub…March's Best Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books: THE REINVENTED HEART anthology by me and Cat Rambo. It's always a joy to be on a "Best" list.

Review: nerds of a feather… Here's a good review of THE REINVENTED HEART anthology. Didn't tick all their boxes but did tick a lot.

Re-release: Speaking Volumes has re-released my Bram Stoker Finalist YA novel...THE LAST DAYS OF SALTON ACADEMY. Come read how I murdered all my friends in a zombie apocalypse. Also, that cover!

Re-release: Speaking Volumes has re-released my short story collection…APOCALYPSE GIRL DREAMING. This is my first short story collection. And again, that cover!

Publication: After 5 months of wrangling with Amazon, 99 TINY TERRORS, is published there, too. (The physical version will show up eventually.) Here's the universal link.

Publication: My latest Shadowrun novel: ELFIN BLACK is in the wild! How do the powerful deal with being powerless? Badly. Then with malice and forethought. I'm so pleased with this novel.

Support: As always… if you appreciate my work and would like to support me, I love coffee. I am made of caffeine. This is the quickest way to brighten my day.

I’ve known Loren Rhoads for years online and I don’t know if I’ve ever told her that cemeteries fascinate me. Today, she tells me how she fell in love with this macabre subject.

The first time I visited a cemetery on vacation was an accident. I’d discovered a lovely book of cemetery photos — who knew such a thing existed? — in the bookshop at London’s Victoria Station. My husband Mason decided he would rather see beautiful, overgrown Highgate Cemetery than the Tower of London. Once we were there, surrounded by angels clothed in ivy, I fell in love with cemetery statuary.

One of my friends in San Francisco recommended I stop by the Rand McNally store and pick up a cemetery guidebook (my first!) called Permanent Parisians. At her suggestion, we’d already planned to work Pere Lachaise Cemetery into our trip to Paris, because Jim Morrison, Oscar Wilde, Chopin, and so many other famous people were buried there. Permanent Parisians led us to the cemeteries of Montparnasse and St. Vincent and the Paris Municipal Ossuary. That was an amazing trip!

After that, I simply stumbled across cemeteries everywhere I traveled. My mom saw a sign for the Pioneer Cemetery in Yosemite while I was looking through the anthropology museum. Jack London just happened to be buried at the State Historical Park that bears his name. A friend was touring St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 in New Orleans and encouraged me to come along.

Other places had such an impact on history that I wanted to see them for myself. When Mason and I went to Japan for the first time, I wanted to see Hiroshima and the Peace Park. When my mom took me to Honolulu, I went alone by tour bus on Easter morning to see Pearl Harbor and the USS Arizona Memorial. I ducked out of a family trip to Washington DC to visit Arlington National Cemetery.

Then I started to get a reputation. Japanese friends took us to the old capitol of Kamakura to show me a monks’ graveyard. A friend who’d grown up in Westchester County said I shouldn’t miss the Old Dutch Burying Ground in Sleepy Hollow. Other friends gave us a private tour of the Soldiers National Cemetery and battlefield at Gettysburg.

By the time Mason and I went to Italy in 2001, we built our vacations around cemeteries. In Rome, I targeted the Protestant Cemetery, final home of Keats and Shelley. In Venice, I wanted to see the island set aside as a graveyard, where Stravinsky is buried. In Florence, we managed to score an hour alone in the English Cemetery, where Elizabeth Barrett Browning is buried. That cemetery had the most amazing iconography: hourglasses and ouroboros and a life-sized skeleton with a scythe.

Despite the occasional death figure, I don’t find graveyards at all frightening. As far as I’m concerned, there’s nothing better than sunshine and birdsong, green grass and trees, cemetery statuary and epitaphs. Especially these days, we could all use a moment alone with our thoughts, remembering what is important. As I always say, every day aboveground is a good day. Cemeteries help me keep that in mind.

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Loren Rhoads is the author of 199 Cemeteries to See Before You Die and Wish You Were Here: Adventures in Cemetery Travel. She’s also the editor of Death’s Garden Revisited: Personal Relationships with Cemeteries, an anthology of 40 essays from tour guides and travelers, genealogists and geocachers, horror authors, ghost hunters, and pagan priests about why they visit cemeteries. Death’s Garden Revisited is funding on Kickstarter from March 17-April 14, 2022.

For the Ides of March comes my latest Shadowrun novel, Elfin Black! It isn’t a direct sequel of any of my other Shadowrun releases, but it does have characters from Makeda Red, A Kiss to Die For, and DocWagon 19 in it. At least one with a major role (ahem, Imre Dahl).

TIES THAT BIND…

Mage Jonathan Leeds has built himself a comfortable life owning and operating an exclusive night club in London, far from the iron grasp of his family. But when his father, Gordon, abruptly summons him to the Seattle Metroplex, John finds himself a stranger in a strange land, thrown into the wilds of the ’Plex to manage a situation apparently only he can handle. Although he’d prefer to ignore his father’s wishes, John knows that no one—family or foe—says no to Gordon Leeds. At least, not if they want to live to tell about it.

But family obligations aren’t the only reason John is in Seattle. His patron back in England, Lord Callen Nassau, has asked him to look for a missing woman. John is only too happy to oblige, as the elegant elf noble is everything his father is not. But when Gordon’s and Callen’s tasks intertwine in unexpected ways, John is forced to question everything he knows about both men, and soon discovers not all that glitters is gold.

When the desires of these rich and powerful beings collide in the Sixth World, John finds himself a pawn in their vicious game. If he’s to escape the Emerald City in one piece, John knows he must take control of the situation—any way he can—or suffer the lethal consequences.

Happy book birthday to me! I’m very happy with this book. I’ve had it mind since I wrote “Dark Side Matters” for the Shadowrun: Drawing Destiny anthology. I hope you enjoy it.

Today, Rusty Zimmerman tells me what it’s like to put together a collection of game fiction that was written over many years. It’s a walk down memory lane.

Down These Dark Streets is a Shadowrun first-ever; a collection of a writer’s short fiction, gathered up from across all the various sourcebooks, setting books, rule books, magazines, and where ever else it first showed up.  A lot of Shadowrun fiction is spread out in intro pieces, short, punchy, stories that separate big chapters in sourcebooks, and that sort of thing, and The Powers That Be took a shot at gathering mine all together between one set of covers.

Readers can follow along as a handful of threads and characters weave from story to story, a sort of universe-within-a-universe that started with my very first piece of Shadowrun work, intro fiction for Attitude, two editions and *mumble* years ago.  The protagonist of that short piece shows up as part of a team in some later intro fics I published, that team shows up alongside Jimmy Kincaid in Dirty Tricks, Jimmy Kincaid’s entangled with Ms. Myth and the Shadowrun Fifth Edition crew in his novels, their nemesis Rook first showed up in some adventure intro fic, etc, etc. 

I’ve long felt like Shadowrun works best when the shadows feel small, tangled, and reputation-centric – everyone knows everyone, word gets around, and when you’re looking for reliable talent, the odds are good they’ve worked together before.  I wanted that feeling, and a sense of continuity, even in my seemingly-unrelated pieces that were initially scattered across books (and even editions).  Getting to see them all side by side in this book was a lot of fun.

What else was a lot of fun?  Writing intros!  In addition to a sappy love letter to Shadowrun that kicks off the whole collection, each and every piece has a small writer introspective from me.  In them, I talk about what the original pitch for the story was, I talk about cover art (sometimes changing cover art!) that inspired the piece, or I just share my thoughts on how it came together and what I think about the finished product.  Having the chance to open up and ‘chat’ with readers was a lot of fun, and I hope I’m not too cringe-worthy when I talk about what fun, and what an honor, it’s been to get to do what I do.

Also included among the already-published sourcebook and Game Trade Magazine-exclusive pieces are four brand new, never before published, short stories.  Some of them spun out of the ‘enhanced fiction’ line before finding a home here instead, but the largest story in the collection was written just for this book.  It’s a novella-length Jimmy Kincaid story, set as an ‘in-betweener’ in his novel trilogy, fitting in there any place before his latest novel, On The Rocks.

Assembling this collection was a good time, and the short walk down memory lane for the dozen years, now, I’ve been writing Shadowrun stories.  I was very excited to get to share a little bit of the creative process with readers, I was excited to hear there are paperback and hardback versions available right off the bat, and I’m excited for the future, to hear what fans think of the whole kit and caboodle. 

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Russell Zimmerman got started in writing as a freelancer for wargames like Warmachine, and since then has contributed to dozens of projects including fan-favorite fiction in Shadowrun and writing the international award-winning PC game Satellite Reign. His most noteworthy work has been for the Shadowrun role-playing game and associated properties, but he's spilled some ink in the universes of Vampire 20th Anniversary, Earthdawn, Wrath & Glory, and Mutants & Masterminds, and more!

Life is exciting. Time is a construct. Schedules get changed. Things get forgotten. This post is about all of those. Due to life being as it is, we have the wonderful opportunity to have two release celebrations for the same anthology! THE REINVENTED HEART anthology had its ebook version released on time yesterday (Mar 10, 2022) and, due to supply chain issues, its print book version will be released on May 31st .

The Reinvented Heart is released in eBook form now.
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Reinvented-Heart-Jane-Yolen-ebook/dp/B092JNGX85

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-reinvented-heart-jane-yolen/1139229735?ean=2940165273438

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/the-reinvented-heart

Apple: https://books.apple.com/us/book/id1562923075

The print copy will be released on May 31st. It can be pre-ordered now.
Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-reinvented-heart-caezik/1139312391?ean=9781647100421

Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=9781647100421&ref=nb_sb_noss

What happens when emotions like love and friendship span vast distances — in space, in time, and in the heart?

Science fiction often focuses on future technology and science without considering the ways social structures will change as tech changes — or not. What will relationships look like in a complicated future of clones, uploaded intelligences, artificial brains, or body augmentation? What stories emerge when we acknowledge possibilities of new genders and ways of thinking about them?

The Reinvented Heart presents stories that complicate sex and gender by showing how shifting technology may affect social attitudes and practices, stories that include relationships with communities and social groups, stories that reinvent traditional romance tropes and recast them for the 21st century, and above all, stories that experiment, astonish, and entertain.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Foreword by Cat Rambo
HEARTS
Poem: They: A Grammar Lesson by Jane Yolen
Retrospect by Seanan McGuire
Lockpick, Locked Heart by AnaMaria Curtis
Touch Has a Memory by Lisa Morton
Ping-Pong Dysphoria by Madeline Pine
In Our Masks, the Shadows by Sam Fleming
Ships of Theseus by Felicity Drake
With All Souls Still Aboard by Premee Mohamed
More than Nine by Beth Cato
HANDS
Poem: There Is a Hand by Jane Yolen
The Shape of the Particle by Naomi Kritzer
No Want to Spend by Sophie Giroir
Little Deaths and Missed Connections by Maria Dong
Sincerely Yours by Lyda Morehouse
Photosynthesis, Growth by Devin Miller
No Pain but That of Memory by Aimee Ogden
Go Where the Heart Takes You by Anita Ensal
MINDS
Poem: Mars Conquest by Jane Yolen
The Star-Crossed Horoscope for Interstellar Travelers by Fran Wilde
Canvas of Sins by Mercedes M. Yardley
If My Body Is a Temple, Raze It to the Ground by Lauren Ring
PerfectMate™ by Xander Odell
Etruscan Afterlife by Rosemary Claire Smith
Our Savage Heart Calls to Itself (Across the Endless Tides) by Justina Robson
Afterword by Jennifer Brozek

I am super proud of this anthology. I've enjoyed the heck out of working with Cat Rambo and am happy to being working with her again on THE REINVENTED DETECTIVE.

Early in my writing career (and even now), I was fascinated by editors who talked about slushpiles as they went through them. I learned a lot—both good and bad—about the submission process. The Reinvented Detective will be the 22nd anthology I’ve edited or co-edited. (Though, I don’t think it’ll be the 22nd anthology released. The publishing industry is complicated.) I figured that if I got something out of that kind of information, I should past it on and share some of my thoughts as I read 20-40 subs a day. I tweeted these out on my Twitter account: @JenniferBrozek.

Note1: These “Editor Tips” are not picking on anyone in the slushpile. Some submissions reminded me of issues as I went through. If you submitted a story, do NOT assume a tip is about you. Please. I’ve read a lot of slush (Apex Magazine, Edge of Propinquity, 22 anthologies…) and my thoughts are linked to all of them.

Note2: These are my opinions. I’m made them as generic as I could with an effort to not name names. These are based on experience and my likes/dislikes. “No shit, there I was stories” need to be in person with a libation in hand.

1. From the Slushpile: While you won't be rejected for a typo in your second sentence, it doesn't look good on you as a writer. Spellcheck is not your friend. It is a double agent who will let you write "barley" when you mean "barely." Do not trust it!

2. From the Slushpile: If the story is so generic that I can't tell what genre it is supposed to be, the writer has not done their job. Body language and descriptive word choice is worldbuilding. Details matter—even more so in short fiction.

3. From the Slushpile: If you use track changes in your document, please remember to accept all changes before you turn in your story. I really don't need to see your edits. This happens way too often.

4. From the Slushpile: If the guidelines say original fiction only and/or no reprints, that means NO REPRINTS. If the story has been sold/printed/posted anywhere, it does not qualify per the guidelines. If the writer still submits the story, it does nothing but wastes the editor’s time.

5. From the Slushpile: When the guidelines ask for a specific type of story, especially genre (IE: SF), a writer’s story, no matter how good it is, will not qualify if it is the wrong genre (IE: Fantasy). It is a waste of time on both sides to submit it.

6. From the Slushpile: Don’t begin a short story with historical backstory or an infodump. Begin your story in a way that catches the attention, necessary details can be sprinkled in later like spice. Trust the reader to keep up.

7. From the Slushpile: While every anthology may have its theme, many of the choices are subjective and based on the Editor’s likes and dislikes. Sometimes it is good to know what kinds of stories the editor loves or hates. (IE: I love “hidden world” stories. I hate “hurt the woman/child to turn on their power” stories.)

8. From the Slushpile: Beginnings are extremely important. Hooking the reader with emotion, a provocative thought, or interesting action allows the writer to pull the reader along as the story unfolds. Start with what is important.

9. From the Slushpile: Endings are as important as beginnings. Learn when and how to end a story without cutting it off too quickly or stringing it out too long. This is the last impression the story will leave on the reader.

10. From the Slushpile: I don’t care how avantgarde the writer wishes to be, writing a story with little (or no) punctuation is going to be a HARD sell. It is difficult to read and even more difficult to edit.

11. From the Slushpile: Stereotypes and cliches are not usually a good look in a story. They are often too familiar, trite, and boring. If the writer is going to use one, make it different and interesting.

12. From the Slushpile: Cover letters should be simple and to the point without extraneous information. Also, don’t say “aspiring author” in a cover letter. The writer is an author by the mere fact that they have submitted their work. Doesn't matter if they are unpublished.

13. From the Slushpile: A short story title is a promise from the writer to the reader. Don’t make the short story title too generic. Make the promise and give the reader something to look forward to.

14. From the Slushpile: Sometimes a brilliant first line/first paragraph is all that’s needed to keep me reading through the parts that need to be edited. Though, a brilliant first line won’t save a story that isn’t right for the anthology.

15. From the Slushpile: Flashbacks in a short story are hard to do well. More often than not they are infodumps or backstory that could be told in better ways. Consider that for future stories.

16. From the Slushpile: Using specific, named media/personalities (TV shows, movies, songs, actors, politicians, CEOs, etc…) or modern day slang in a short story can date them quickly. Try to avoid this unless this is part of the anthology call.

17. From the Slushpile: Humor and sarcasm are subjective. Understand the reader is not in the writer’s head and may not understand what was meant. Deploy with care.

18. From the Slushpile: Seriously, learn how to write a simple, effective cover letter. All the writer actually needs: Writer’s name, the story’s title, word count, (optional: anything else specifically asked for,) thank the editor for their time. The end.

19a. From the Slushpile: Now that I’m done reading slush for The Reinvented Detective, here is a controversial topic: reading stories from writers the editor has met. There is a certain joy or pain that comes from name recognition in the slush pile. This emotion can bias the editor towards or against the writer.

19b. Often, if the editor knows the writer in a favorable context, it will make them more patient with the story they are reading. More willing to consider edits. This includes reading stories from writers who have been in classes, workshops, and/or kaffeeklatsches with the editor. Or bought them a drink/meal and picked their brain.

19c. The converse is true. Editors can be more impatient with stories or less willing to entertain edits if the writer is known in an unfavorable context. Especially if the writer is a known “repeat offender” (virtually or in person) for whatever reason.

19d. That said, if a story does not stand up against its peers in an anthology, it doesn’t matter how much the editor likes the writer, the story must be rejected as it is unsuited to the work in progress. I speak as someone who has rejected Ed Greenwood and Seanan McGuire. (Ya'll know I adore both Ed and Seanan. Ed was one of my first co-authors and taught me a lot. Seanan...one of my best friends.)  

19e. Editors want to publish you, /if/ the story is good and suits what they need. Editors love finding new talent or that story that wins the awards. Editors are human with likes, dislikes, and inherent biases. I try to be as fair and professional and transparent as possible.

19f. I hope this peek into my editorial thoughts has been helpful. Don’t forget that you can pre-order/buy The Reinvented Heart anthology, edited by me and the ever-talented Cat Rambo, now. (https://www.arcmanorbooks.com/reinvented) The Reinvented Detective will be released in 2023.

 
Here’s a cat picture (a blast from the past) to sooth author anxiety.