Another end-of-year wrap-up that nobody asked for.
I’m not going to bore you with some tale of woe about all the personal life challenges 2025 brought to me and my loved ones. We all face those, year in and year out, and some years are tougher than others, and in the end, it’s all relative. Suffice it to say that I’m a fortunate person and I try to be grateful for all of life’s blessings.
So instead, I will bore you with a listicle about my year in writing.
Continue reading “The year in numbers”Don’t let these goblins creep into your writing.
Peak scary season is upon us, my goblins and ghouls, friends and fiends. Whether you’ll be doling out sugary treats to the little monsters that knock on your door this Halloween night, partake in an adult-oriented costume party, or binge on classics like Young Frankenstein or Rocky Horror Picture Show (I highly recommend either, or both if you’re in the mood for a science fiction double feature), know that after tonight, it all comes crashing down like a sugar high, and we all must end our revelries and return to our writing. (Although some of us may prolong that inevitability by celebrating well into el Dia de los Muertos. Why not make a weekend of it? They’ve already got Christmas decor in the aisles of Dollar General and Hobby Lobby.)
Even after all the hoopla subsides, we writers must come to terms with some scary goblins that can haunt our work year round. Here are five scary creatures that may hang around well after All Hallows Eve, like toilet paper on the stately elm in the front yard of Mr. Henderson, who always handed out those filling-yanking sticky, taffy-like things wrapped in waxy orange and black paper.
Continue reading “Friday Five: ghastly, ghoulish gaffes that can haunt your writing”What I’ve learned from the past six months of reading submissions for a literary magazine
For the past six months or so, I have volunteered as a first reader for a literary magazine. In this role, I’ve been one of the first people to read some 150 flash and micro-fiction submissions to this magazine. They come from writers of all kinds. There are the newcomers seeking their first acceptance, the veterans with several publications and awards to their credit, the MFA graduates and PhDs, the college professors, the undergraduates, the college dropouts, the writers of science fiction, horror, humor, crime, romance, fantasy and just about every other genre, including literary, and writers from every continent except Antarctica. I’ve read pieces submitted for contests as well as regular submissions to the magazine.
The experience of reading all of these submissions has taught me a lot about writing and the submission process, and I hope these five lessons will help you, too.
Continue reading “Friday Five: lessons from a lit mag first reader”Why verisimilitude matters in all forms of fiction (with examples)
Note: If you don’t want to wade through this entire post, feel free to go directly to the examples near the end of this post. – AC
I was reviewing some early chapters of a work in progress recently when I discovered a problem with the text that–while perhaps insignificant to the overarching plot–could ruin the story’s credibility and my credibility as a writer if I didn’t fix it.
The novel is set in the early 1980s, and music plays a significant role in it. In one early chapter, I reference a song that, when I was writing the chapter, I was certain was ubiquitous on FM radio during the time frame of this portion of the novel. But as often happens when I rely on my increasingly foggy memory, I did not remember correctly.
Continue reading “A boring realist’s thoughts on keeping it real”‘I wanted to create a literary space that is informative yet also entertaining’
If you want to keep up on what’s happening in the world of literary magazines, you should be reading Becky Tuch‘s Substack newsletter, Lit Mag News. This bi-weekly newsletter lives up to its billing as “a resource for all things lit mag,” and in a sector awash in newsletters about the writing craft, Lit Mag News is a must-read.
Each issue features “the latest goings-on in the world of literary magazines,” Becky explains on her about page. Those goings-on include information about new magazines, calls for submissions, contests, job and fellowship opportunities, grant opportunities, trends in lit mag publishing, and “controversies, scams, and the occasional smidge of lit mag gossip.” The writing is always conversational, often entertaining, and delivered in a breezy and easily digestible manner.
Continue reading “Friday Five: writer, editor, and Lit Mag News creator Becky Tuch”
