A Cause For Celebration

Back in 1996, in the midst of one my earlier attempts at writing and submitting stories, I wrote a story called A Cause For Celebration. Inspired by the movie Independence Day, it told of a world wide alien invasion that grinds to a sudden halt when the extraterrestrials discover they have mistakenly attacked the wrong planet. The story is told from the view point of some random bar patrons, drowning their miseries and watching things unfold on TV. Of course, the story didn't sell and after two or three rejections, I pushed it aside and soon after stopped even trying to write (the general idea was explored again in 100 word Micro I posted earlier in the year).

Still, there was something about the story that I liked. While events of epic proportions were unfolding, it focused on just a handful of everyday folk and their own personal views, using the alien invasion more as background. About a year ago, when deciding to give "this writing thing" another shot, I dusted off that story and changed the background events. Rather than an alien invasion, it was now a plague overrunning the Earth, transforming people into zombie-like hordes of the infected. What remained the same was everything else: people in a bar discussing the impending end of the world. I began sending the story out again...and again it got rejected. A lot. I was on the verge of shelving it forever when it finally sold to The Nautilus Engine.

Aside from any references to the virus and zombies, this is the exact same story from 1996. When you have a chance, read it and let me know what you think.

A Cause For Celebration.

Remembering October

October was an easy month to sum up:

(fiction) Words written: 0
Rejections: 0
Acceptances: 1

See? Easy. The reason I wrote nothing is the same reason why I have opted to not participate in Nano this year. Some of you may recall me mentioning a movie website I maintained. Well, that site got hacked and that disaster coupled with my hard drive crash from early in the year meant that I lost quite a bit of material. Thus, I have been working to update all those older movie reviews in a new format. This means writing about 3k (on average) words each for the 44 reviews I had on there. That is what I've been working on and what I will be working on for the rest of the year. This blog may be in run silent, run deep mode until January, but I'll pop up from time to time.

I hope Nano is going good for those giving it a go!