Where we see the concrete world disintegrating

[sovay]

My story "On the Blindside" has been chosen for reprint in Rich Horton's Fantasy: The Best of the Year 2006. This really pleases me. I've talked about this story before, but it's still one of my favorites—I don't know if that's the right word, but there are stories to which I have more or less of an emotional attachment, and this is one of the more. It's also one of the stories that makes me wish I could write continuing characters, but it's been proven by experiment that I can't; the best I can do is tangential relations. Still. Thanks to Tim Pratt, who published the story in the first place. Even if it weren't also snowing, this would make for a good day.

Comments

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

Congratulations!

I'm very pleased to see Rich Horton editing year's bests; I remember him as a very civil and knowledgeable poster on rec.arts.sf.written several years ago.

[sovay]

Thank you!

I remember him as a very civil and knowledgeable poster on rec.arts.sf.written several years ago.

I've been reading Rich Horton's year-end summaries for various markets here—you may have to click back through a few pages at this point—and I would say he is still both of those things. I hope these anthologies do well for him. And not only because I'm in one of them, either.

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

"On the Blindside" has been chosen for reprint in Rich Horton's Fantasy: The Best of the Year 2006.

Congratulations!

It's also one of the stories that makes me wish I could write continuing characters

Sometimes I wish I weren't so stuck on doing it.

[sovay]

Thank you!

Sometimes I wish I weren't so stuck on doing it.

Why?

[greygirlbeast.livejournal.com]

Why?

It can be problematic, especially with the novels. I know my sales have suffered because readers who know the books are interconnected often feel they can't read a new book without first having read all those before it. Anyway. It's not been such an issue with the short fiction.

[sovay]

I hadn't considered the sales problem. (If anything, I would have assumed that interconnected stories would have led to more sales. I've always enjoyed seeing how characters and plots link up, especially when it's allusive. What happens instead—people don't pick up Murder of Angels because they can't also afford Silk?) I wondered if recurring characters occupied your head differently than one-shots.

[tim-pratt.livejournal.com]

Hey, thanks for sending the story to us. It's a big deal for us at Flytrap, too -- the first time a story we've published has made a Year's best!

[sovay]

You're welcome? You deserve more and many reprints.

[time-shark.livejournal.com]

Exxxxcellent! You rule as usual...

[sovay]

Heh. Thanks!

[ogre-san.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! Nice to share a ToC with you.

[sovay]

Nice to share a ToC with you.

Likewise. Congratulations!

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

It's also one of the stories that makes me wish I could write continuing characters

Hey, I have the opposite problem -- I can think of trajectories for my characters that go on and on and on, but not plots to put them in.

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

(Oh, and total congratulations. I thought that part when I saw the post while sitting in class, and by the time I got the chance to actually respond I forgot I hadn't said it already!)

[sovay]

(No fear. Thanks!)

How do you have trajectories without plots?

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

I suppose in the sense that I can see the charaters' gradual personal development over time, but not any set of events against which that development is set that I could excerpt out and call a story. This isn't universally true, but it's true of the things I write that seem most to interest people.

[sovay]

If I am reading you correctly: how do you know how the characters develop and not know what events cause that development?

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

When you put it that way, interesting question. I suppose mostly that the development I know about is a logical consequence of where they are now, or that I know that they're going to run in to some sort of influential circumstance but am not sure what. Of course this could all be subject to change when I discover what events they actually encounter.

[sovay]

When you put it that way, interesting question.

Hey, I try . . .

Of course this could all be subject to change when I discover what events they actually encounter.

At which point you will have plot, yes?

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Yeah, but that's harder than it sounds like it ought to be...

[sovay]

I'm not claiming it's easy. (I don't even know how it works in my own case: only that it does. Characters tend to evolve based on their own rules, not on whatever I may desire them to do. I'm seeing this a lot with the latest story.) Only that if you can trace a character through a particular trajectory, given that they do develop and that some event necessarily determines that development, theoretically you should be able to figure out what that event is. It's like algebra, only for creativity. : P

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Actually, in the cases where I know what will happen with the characters, I do usually have a better idea of the plot. Ah, well.

[ericmarin.livejournal.com]

Congratulations!

[sovay]

Thank you! I'm pretty thrilled.

[upstart-crow.livejournal.com]

Wicked! Congrats!

A very belated congrats too to the inclusion of Dybbuk in Love in the other volume. You know how I love that story. :)

[sovay]

You know how I love that story. :)

Yeah, I've had that impression . . . ; )

Thanks!

[larryhammer]

Yowsas.

---L.

[sovay]

That was sort of my reaction, yeah . . .

[nineweaving.livejournal.com]

Huzzah!

What a year you've been having, eh? And I'm delighted that Rich Horton is getting to anthologize--he's read everything.

But where's my snow?

Nine

[sovay]

If my brother's reports are correct, it decided to camp for the night in Hartford.

Thanks!

[jlundberg.livejournal.com]

Congrats!

[sovay]

Thanks! This definitely made my day.

[skotodes.livejournal.com]

You're getting published in the same book as Neil Gaiman!

[sovay]

. . . I am?

[skotodes.livejournal.com]

Well, there's a Neil Gaiman story on the list too. "Sunbird", specifically. So, um, aren't you? Or am I making some mistake that's obvious to everyone but me?

[sovay]

Or am I making some mistake that's obvious to everyone but me?

I very much doubt that: I just haven't seen a final table of contents for this anthology. Is it posted somewhere? In which case, cool!

[sovay]

Sorry: I'm an idiot: his name's on the cover mockup. You're right. This is still cool.

[clarionj.livejournal.com]

Congratulations again, Sonya! You've had an incredible few months here, it seems--with all the reviews and recognitions. I'm so glad. And Jon is looking into the books I'd ordered through Project Pulp so I should be getting your poetry collection soon. Now, where would I find "On the Blindside"? Was it in NOU?

[sovay]

Thank you! Writing-wise, I have been very pleased with my life lately.

"On the Blindside" was originally published in Flytrap #4, but Anna Tambour has very kindly reprinted the story online since then. Hope you like!