May 26th, 2010

Fun and paranoia

So I spent my birthday weekend (also Queen Victoria’s) in Montreal, frolicking and getting tan and eating tasty food and sleeping in a king-size bed in a glamourous hotel (of course I dislike the recession, but there are some fringe benefits, like glamourous hotels costing normal-people prices for a while). Sorry for not mentioning it here (or anyplace electronic)–sites like this freaked me out about “locational privacy.” So a few people who wanted to spontaneously chat with me this weekend could not and I feel a bit silly about that, but otherwise, it was a very very lovely weekend. And bonus: now I’m 32!

Back in TO, further good things are afoot (and not even just being taken out for lunches and getting cards in the post). Kerry’s daughter Harriet is turning one, and to celebrate Kerry is having a best literary babies contest, with the prize being a subscription to the wonderous The New Quarterly lit journal. Go enter! For another thing, it is a skrillion degrees out, but just perfect in the shade if you are on a patio…I’m just suggesting. And I have an essay coming out in the summer issue of Maisonneueve, on newsstands at the end of June, which I’m happy about.

There’s always more to do, natch, and also the niggling worry of the potato bug I found in my stairwell, but really, Toronto in the summer is a beautiful thing. Hope you are enjoying it.

May 18th, 2010

Road Trips

I wrote this chapbook and Caryl Peters gave it the lovely cover.

My copies of “Road Trips” have arrived and they are so gorgeous. You can see the cover at right, and that does convey a lot of it, but it’s the paper, too, and the end papers (oh my goodness, those endpapers). And the interior illustrations! I have never had a book with images in it before! I tried and tried to take a picture of myself with the book (my great idea was to lie on the floor with the book on my chest and hold the camera up above me–not a win) but I think you are just going to have to take my word for it (or order one for yourself).

This is totally not going to become a blog with contant pictures in every post–I have just had a lot of really attractive pictures to post lately. Swears.

Something about the content, maybe: the two stories in this book are called “From an Eastern University” and “The Least of Love.” Both are road trip stories (natch), concerning people who know each other well (roommates in one, a couple in the other) trapped in a car together–really, that scenario is bound to be a story one way or another (except my road trip this weekend, which promises to be serene and full of witty conversations and delicious breakfast foods).

A lot about seeing this material in print make me happy. Both stories contain characters I’ve been working with for a long time (if you’ve read Once, you’ll recognize at least a few people), and I really do like travel/motion stories. And well…yeah, I’m happy about this little book!

May 4th, 2010

Road Trips Announcment

Frog Hollow Press sent out their announcment of my forthcoming chapbook, *Road Trips* today. I tried for a while to figure out how to post the pretty flyer here on Rose-coloured, but Blogger seemed determined to thwart my desire. And then Dan very nicely posted it on Thirsty, thus solving all my problems.

So take a look, if you care for such things. The cover is posted, too, and it’s super-lovely. Just a few more weeks to go–I’m hoping to have the book in time for my birthday!

Yay!
RR

March 19th, 2010

The Weatherboy

Now this is just lovely: the Rattling Books podcast of my story, The Weatherboy, as read by Gerard Whelan. I know, it’s bad manners to say something I wrote myself is lovely, but it’s actually Whelan’s delicate reading of the story that I’m in love with. It makes me so happy to hear the story doing things I hadn’t quite thought of, yet are perfect for it anyway.

This story originally appeared in echolocation 7, and I’m so pleased it’s getting another life.

RR

March 18th, 2010

Collectors’ Items

I am so pleased to announce that my very first chapbook, Road Trips is forthcoming with Frog Hollow Press. It’ll be out in May–maybe in time for my birthday! The book consists of two stories, “From an Eastern University” and “The Least of Love”, and I am very honoured to have them published in what will no doubt be a beautiful edition, as all FHP publications are. So exciting! If you too are very very excited, you can preorder from the title link above!

An open secret around here is that I have written a great many stories about a character named Isobel, and even thought I was writing a collection about her at one point, although that has not worked out too well (*yet*–I’m certainly not done trying). Anyway, “The Least of Love” is one of those stories. Quite often, people get excited when I tell them certain stories of mine are connected, but other times I explain the connections and they don’t care at all–a story begins on the first page and ends on the last for them, and that’s that. For the sake of those in the first category (if any) I thought I’d list the (published) Isobel stories here–then you can feel free to ignore and read the stories as standalones, or to track them all down and read in order. Or not to read them at all, that’s totally an option too.

These are in the order they happen chronologically in time for the characters, not the order they were written or published in. Places you can find them are beside the titles, should you care to do so.

“Dykadelic”–forthcoming in *The Milan Review” (May 2010)
“Fruit Factory”–*The New Quarterly* 102 Summer 2007; *Best Canadian Stories 2008* Oberon Press; *Once* Biblioasis 2008
“ContEd”–*Coming Attractions 2008* Oberon Press; *Once*; *The Fiddlehead* Summer 2009
“Christmas with My Mother”–*Earlit Shorts 4* Rattling Books December 2009; *Best Canadian Stories 2009*
“Far from Downtown”–forthcoming in *The New Quarterly* summer 2010
“The Least of Love”–forthcoming in *Road Trips* from Frog Hollow Press

So now you know, if you collect these stories, where you can collect them from, including a book that is itself going to be a beautiful collectors’ item.

If you, you know, dig that sort of thing.

RR

February 25th, 2010

“How to Keep Your Day Job” in *Room Magazine*

Hmm, I seem to have gotten confused about when this was coming out, but I’m quite delighted that it turns out to be now! You can find my short story “How to Keep Your Day Job” in issue 32.4 of Room (the issue isn’t on the site yet), available now, much to my delight.

I had an awesome day with the teens, in case you were wondering.

RR

February 2nd, 2010

In case you were wondering…

Sometimes I start off on things, and never let you know how they worked out. Probably, you don’t care, but for the sake of completeness–

1) I now mouse exclusively with my left hand on desktop computers (ie., all day). On laptops (ie., at night and on weekends) I occasionally succumb to the lure of the central touchpad with my right hand, but the (fuzzy heartshaped) mouse is placed to the left of the computer. I consider Alzheimer’s officially postphoned…for now.

2) I consider January’s “writing in the morning”s a failure, but not a dismal one. I *did* sometimes write in the mornings, not every day and never for very long, but as it would otherwise have been time spent asleep, I’m counting this one as a win. But I’m also pushing it forward as a February resolution.

3) My *new* resolution for February will be to limit my cereal consumption to two bowls per day. This will be difficult–I really like cereal.

4) Remember when I was teaching last year and obsessed with my teenaged students? We about to start all that again, as through the graces of the SWAT/Now Hear This program, I have been named writer-in-residence at Jean Vanier high school in Scarborough. If you went to Vanier, know someone who did, taught there, attended an OFSA badminton championship there, anything at all–I want to hear about it. For though I am very excited about this new adventure, I am also very nervous.

5) So the ground hog says, six more weeks of winter (warning: disturbing groundhog-nuzzling picture at that link). I should be sad, but I seem to have pulled out of my seasonal-affective funk from early January. Now I’m just really grateful that it’s been so dry and nothing is slippery underfoot. If that keeps up…well, I guess it can stay cold. If, you know, the rodent says it has to.

6) Remember when I wrote short stories? Well, I actually still do that, I just haven’t mentioned it in a while. Forthcoming RR publications included “How to Keep Your Day Job” in the summer issue of Room Magazine, “Sweet” in the summer issue of Canadian Notes and Queries and “Far from Downtown” in The New Quarterly. It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway, that I’m just thrilled to be working with such amazing mags, and very looking forward to seeing my work inside them.

There, now I think you’re just about up to date…
RR

January 2nd, 2010

So pure

Hey, the Puritan’s back! For those who didn’t know it well enough to know it had gone away, *The Puritan* that paused in publishing 16 months ago was an originally Ottawa-based print journal, and as of today is a Toronto-based online journal. A new online space for awesome stories, poetry, and interviews–hooray!

Thanks to the staff there for putting this (back) together, as well as publishing my little story, If This.

RR

December 23rd, 2009

Festive farewell

I just wanted to send a quick Merry Everything to y’all out there in blog land. I’m mainly dependent on the kindness of others for internet this holiday season (I am currently stealing wireless from somewhere to write this post) so likely there won’t be much action on Rose-coloured for the next week or so, although I can never really keep away from the interwebs entirely. But certainly, I wanted to wish all who care to celebrate a merry Christmas tomorrow, and to those who don’t, a very nice day!

I don’t know if any of you would have run into this, but my short story, “Christmas with My Mother” just got released as an audio download from Rattling Books Earlit Shorts 4. It was very weird to hear my work in another’s voice–brilliant, because Janet Russell gives the story a gentle and nuanced interpretation–but very strange since the only place I’d heard those words before was inside my own head. Add to that the fact that I wrote the story over a year ago and hadn’t even looked at in six months and the whole thing was something of a shock. I actually squirmed at the awkward moments in the story as I listened and once laughed aloud at a funny part (immodest? sure, but I also think that writers who don’t find their own funny parts funny should stop writing them.

That story is also included in this year’s Best Canadian Short Stories, which also came in the mail yesterday–merry Christmas to me! So there’s two ways to get that story, should you care to. I would like to point out that, despite the title seeming to perfectly coincide with the season, this is very much not a Christmas story, and might not be ideal reading for those of you cuddling down to read in the glow of treelights (or it might be exactly appropriate–depends on how you like your glow). But just FYI.

Other than that, there is very little literary going on around here, but lots that is good–family, old friends, a cake made almost entirely out of pudding, that ornament of a stocking I made in grade 2, 90s nostalgia music, and many hugs. That’s how I like my glow–I hope yours is however you want it to be.

Merrily,
RR

December 14th, 2009

Self-publishing online: any takers?

What do you think of putting stories or novel excerpts up on your blog? I was recently asked by the writer, editor, and teacher Allyson Latta what I thought of writers publishing their fiction on their own websites and blogs–if it would interfere with work being published elsewhere or cause other problems.

The short answer is yes, it’ll cause some problems as some journals consider a piece published if it has appeared on the internet except in closed writers’ forums and critique groups. And that makes sense to me. Journals don’t make much money and every sale counts, so if by some happy circumstance someone hears RR has another story out (and wants to read it) and web-searches the title to find the journal ordering information, only to discover that the whole piece is on a blog… Well, that’s one less sale for the journal.

So even though not every journal explicitly states that they won’t consider blog-published works, I consider that implied. When my stories are published in online journals, that counts absolutely as a publication, so why shouldn’t it count if I put it up there myself?

Of course, if I wanted desperately to put my stories on Rose-coloured, I might not be so swayed by my perceived impression of journal editors desires. The fact is that my stories, and most fiction, are a terrible fit for the blogosphere. 1000 words is pushing it on the long skinny column of a blog post, and many of my stories are 4000+. I can’t speak for most blog readers, but for myself, I prefer my blog posts meaty, but not that meaty–a few bits of insight, some links and recommendatiosn and points to ponder and we’re done. I’m not ready for an hour of deep reading when I surf the blogs, and thus (with typical egocentricity) I assume no one else is either.

That said, I’ve seen some wicked cool uses of the blog medium in publishing fiction. Like The Montreal Fiores, Dave Fiore’s collection of short and short-short stories about that city. These pieces are brief and punchy and engaging: perfect for the web. And then there was Jim Munroe’s ingenious Opening Act of Unspeakable Evil, a novel in blog form, which Munroe posted to daily until the entire story was up–and then he published the physical-form novel (sadly, the original roommatefromhell.com has been hacked, but the novel’s still available). That project hooked people in because, like on all the best blogs, there was a reason to come back every day–suspense, engagement, and a reader poll to determine the nature of the spin-off project. But that’s a limited-time thing: no one wants to scroll all the way back to post 1 and read the whole 88 posts upside down, so those who missed the initial fuss buy the novel.

What I’m saying here is that, to my mind, there’s nothing wrong with publishing on the internet if you are clear on your goal and know what you are doing. Messieurs Fiore and Munroe both have some serious experience with self-publishing, and are aware of not only how to craft something that people want to read (and buy) but to get it to them. And having done so in the past, they have fans who are eager to see what’s happening when they start new sites or post new stuff. I think that’s awesome.

Less awesome to set up a site to put writing if the writer is unsure who, if anyone, is going to read it, or how to get them to want to. That’s just basically going to disqualify the work from consideration in certain publications, without accomplishing anything cool–the piece is just going to languish there without an audience. I would discourage folks who don’t have a clear sense of how or why to self-publish on the web; it is really not that easy. Publishing companies, even small ones, are so idolized for a reason: they do a lot of hard work editing, polishing, formating, printing, promoting and distributing pysical books *and* online versions, that most writers simply aren’t equipped to do ourselves. I’m very sure I’m not.

So I guess my advice to anyone thinking over putting their stories or novel chapters on the web would be to think carefully why they want to and how it will work. Because there’s nothing wrong with that idea when it’s done well, but when it’s not…better to have saved that energy for writing, or reading.

Anyway, I’m posting this here rather than just emailing Allyson because I’m really not sure what other people think, or whether my feelings on the matter are common. Would anyone care to weigh in?

RR