Kaz's Summer Camp Week 7

::Looks at calendar.:: Yep. It's still Tuesday. How'd that happen so fast?

So, ladies and gentlebeings, it's time for the Kaz's Summer Camp update.
(Yes, I know, I missed last week. Bad Jen. I claim excessive OU work. And that's the story I'm sticking to...)

No surprises, due to a rather complicated essay that kept my brain all tied up, (also there were wasps! In the walls! Then crawling all over the floor in their final death throes!) not a lot of fictional writing got done last week.

However - targets:

1) Hunting Ground: Glanced at the edits, didn't do much on it. Did try and find a potential market for when it's ready but can not find one that quite fits.

2) Emerald Eyes: Stands at 2339 words. Now know where it's going as the end is all written out, but the middle is still somewhat, er, lacking.

3) Kill the Wizard: no progress. Kill the story? Possibly. ;-P (Also I've got a shiny idea for an entry for the Pratchett prize thing in December so am quite tempted to do a binge writing month next month to bang out the first draft which will leave plenty of time for edits.) Yep, sounds like a plan. So, new target = Aqua Vitae. Smuggling and sea monsters and a watery apocalypse!

4) Taurus: 1500 new words. (I know, pathetic!) However have done a lot of plot fiddling and there's an actual decent motivation for the secondary bad guys/problem causers. Plus it seems to be going quite well on Authonomy (which is nice!) and I've had some useful feedback for purposes of editing. But enough work avoidance, back to the word-mines!

Taurus!

Can haz Authonomy now! W00t!

Ahem. Hi. Sorry about that.

So, if you're an Authonomy peep and feel like having a wander over to read a thrilling tale of kick ass chicks, Minotaurs and mermaid-pirates, have finally uploaded the first five chapters of Taurus here. Crits welcome. :-D

(Am waiting for Authonomy to approve the cover art. But it's lovely. Really. And courtesy of fellow Autho member Bradley Wind.)

The pitch:
Karis was content to live a life of raiding the waters around Marigan. Until a distress call from her human sister brings her against the might of the Gethine Alliance and the secrets they’ve uncovered in the ghost city of Sagara.

Amy Morgan was only supposed to recover a sword from a maze. One pack of Minotaurs later and she finds herself caught up in a new world where mermaid-pirates hunt the seas, her friends are captured and there’s all manner of trouble waiting for her if she can find her way home.

Kassia was looking for adventure, but an expedition to Sagara gives her more adventure than she ever imagined when she finds something that the violent Gethine Alliance has spent years searching for.

But surviving the Alliance’s attentions is easy compared to what’s waiting for them back on Earth.

That link again...

Kaz's Summer Camp Week 5

Must be Tuesday again! So here's the Kaz's Summer Camp update! :-D

Weird thing? It feels like I've written a lot, but I've also been editing and deleting a lot so the technical word counts of many and various have actually dropped. Happily, they have better words in, but still...

So:

1) Wicked Sisters - done. That's so last month! :-D Therefore, new target #1 is edit Hunting Ground story and send off somewhere.

2) Emerald Eyes - 500 new words, and the plot is getting a wee bit unexpected. I have absolutely no idea how it's ending now, it's all gone from plotter to pantser.

3) Kill the Wizard - no progress.

4) Taurus - 2000 new words, plus a metric ton of edit-fiddling. I now declare it ready for Autho! Woohoo! Just got to write the pitches and upload. (Then try not to spend too much time playing on Autho when there's a million other things to do, like bang out the next few chapters.

Which does mean new target #4 is write another 40k of the all new and improved Taurus!

Though I'm about to enter another assignment deathmarch week so immediate progress might be slow...

More fun on t'internet

Been having fun listening to podcasts this week.

Over on Podcastle, and highly recommended, is the beautiful tale: And Their Lips Rang With The Sun by Amal El-Mohtar, gloriously read by N.K. Jemisin (I could listen to Jemisin read things all day!)
This originally appeared in print in Strange Horizons so you have the bonus option of reading it there or listening to it here!

Alt fiction have added another couple of podcast panel things...

There's the Publishing Panel with John Berlyne, John Jarrold, Jon Weir, Peter Crowther, Jenni Hill & Stephen Jones and a panel on Blogging and the Internet with Alasdair Stuart, Lee A Harris & Vincent Holland-Keen.
Only downer is most of the questions from the audience are inaudible, otherwise fascinating listening.

Over at the Happiness Patrol, Sam Stone and David J Howe join regulars Lewis, Tara and Dale to talk about the Dr Who finale. Also there are secret volcano lairs. :-D

Moving away from the podcasts... for a damn fine piece of fiction, try
The Six Skills of Madame Lumiere by Marissa Lingen to be found in the latest issue of Beneath Ceaseless Skies.

On the non fiction front, over at Fantasy Magazine, Genevieve Valentine tells you Ten Things You Should Know About Eclipse. Fun stuff.

For more educational matters, over at Clarkesworld Sarah Goslee's Packing for a Very Long Trip talks about space agriculture. Awesome!

In the department of 'Bet you didn't know that!' over on the Bitch Magazine blog, Ashley McAllister talks about Melvil Dewey and female librarians in From the Bitch Library: Outing the Father of Librarianship.

Over on Deadline Dames, the fabulous Lilith Saintcrow talks writerly solitude in By Yourself.

Elizabeth Moon tells you why Women Writers Are not Pets. She also does an excellent summary of the ramifications of the Gulf oil spill.

Oh, and Liz Williams has got a stunning deal for anyone wanting to read more of her fiction...

Mmmm, lovely!