The Story Behind "Better Than Anything"

Scroll down one post to read the story itself. Or click: http://theonethousand.blogspot.com/2010/04/better-than-anything.html

As I've stated before, this was my first published story, in a Barnes & Noble anthology called Between the Leaves, edited by Stuart Miller. It was an antho of writing B&N employees and although it only paid five copies, I had to submit a piece just to know if my work was too awful to even be included in a gimmie such as this one.

The first germ of an idea for this piece was the question, "What if your fingers could bend the other way too?" This occurred to me one day in high school while I was imagining what fun it could be to horrify a particularly weak-bellied English teacher. I pictured myself making a fist, slowly opening my fingers, and making all of my knuckles bend in the opposite direction so that I'd have a fist once again. This fist, of course, would employ the back of the hand as the palm, have the nails on the inside, and look pleasingly odd at the end of my arm. But that was as far as the idea went.

In my early twenties a couple of thoughts were bouncing around inside my skull which made their way, in one way or another, into a few of my stories. The first concerned my early love of comic books, coupled with my later disappointment in most of the writing. I was interested in writing comics myself because I wanted better writing. But I also wanted full control of the finished product. Since I couldn't draw, I decided that fiction dealing with the themes that I found so fascinating was the route to take. I wanted to play superheroes from an adult point of view: smartened-up, with characters that acted like real people. The second thought concerned television news, its increasing drive towards sensationalism, and its ever-growing prefabricated substance. By the latter I mean opinion polls, computer generated re-enactments or artists renditions, creating controversy where there was none and so on (All of which led to a decided lack of actual news). With this story I simply took it to the extreme.

The actual spark that brought all of these ideas together was a method suggested by Ray Bradbury in his book, "Zen in the Art of Writing" (If you want to be a writer, this book is required reading), in which he mentions making huge lists of words (The goat, The mailbox, The appendectomy scar, etc.) and considering what thoughts each word triggers. When something excites the mind sufficiently, you've got yourself a story idea. I was sitting on my car in my front yard, playing with this method mentally, and I thought: 'The Glove.' The rest is in the story.

Thanks And The Sofa

Hey, you guys, It's time once again to nominate your favorite contributors to StarShipSofa's wonderful Aural Delights show for The Sofanaut Awards. These are nominations so you can pick as many favorites as you like. I'm eligible in three categories. Just sayin'.

Best Main Fiction: The Loneliness of the Long Distance Diplomat
Best Flash/Short Fiction: A Hard Rain and Brothers and Sisters All
Best Fact Article Contributor: Fiction Crawler, Movie Talk Special - Watchmen

Thanks a bunch for listening! You can vote here:

http://sofanauts2010.questionpro.com/

Next, I want to wish all you Americans and ex-pats out there a wonderful Thanksgiving tomorrow and you know, I've had a shit year (debt, divorce and death, among other plagues), but I still have a lot to be thankful for. Family and friends like you guys, chief among them. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Lastly, I have totally sucked at plugging the Sofa lately, so let's remedy that right now:

Aural Delights No 110 Cory Doctorow

Editorial: by StarShipSofa Stories by Sean Keough

Fact Article: The Sofanaut Awards by Mark Bormann

Fact Article: With A Little Help by Cory Doctorow

Main Fiction: To Go Boldly by Cory Doctorow

Fact: Film Talk by Rod Barnett

New Titles by Tony C Smith

Narrators: JJ Campanella, Paul Caggige

Art Cover by Skeet

The Sofanauts Awards 2010 VOTE NOW!

StarShipSofa - Aural Delights No. 55

Nominations are over and the finalists are in! It's time for listeners to vote for their favorites for the first annual Sofanauts Awards! Voting is open until January 23rd. By the by, I'm a big fat finalist in the Best Fact Article Contributor category. Honestly, it won't bother me a bit if Amy or Jim wins, their stuff is great, but if you do like my goods the best, give me a vote. My "Sorry you didn't get in there"'s go out to all my fellow Sofa-sitters who didn't get in there. Sorry.


This Week, the StarShipSofa is proud to present a story by Ben Bova on Aural Delights No. 55. Blast Off!

Aural Delights No 55 Ben Bova

Editorial: Tony C Smith

Poetry: How I will Outwit the Time Thieves by Mike Allen

Flash Fiction: Magician by Jeff VanderMeer

Fact: Singularity by Cory Doctorow

The Process Diary by Paul Caggegi

The Sofanauts Awards: by Mark Bormann

Main Fiction: Inspiration by Ben Bova

Narrators: Chrispy, Mark Nelson, Annette Bowman

This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com. Download a free audiobook of your choice today at audiblepodcast.com/sofa

www.starshipsofa.com

A Hard Rain On The Sofa

Woo-hoo! I've got a flash fiction story on the Sofa this week! A Hard Rain, as you might remember, first appeared on this very blog. Once again, if you haven't voted for The Sofanauts Awards nominations, do so now. There's less then a week to go.

This Week, StarShipSofa is pleased to present Aural Delights No. 54. Blast off!

Aural Delights No 54 Joan D Vinge

Editorial: Tony C Smith

Poetry: Light Across An Impossible Lake by Mark Rich

Flash Fiction: Hard Rain by Matthew Sanborn Smith

Fact: Arthur Gordon by Amy H Sturgis

The Sofanauts Awards: by Mark Bormann

Main Fiction: A View From A Height by Joan D Vinge

Narrators: Kate Baker, Julio Flavio, Diane Severson

Advertisement: This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com. Download a free audiobook of your choice today at audiblepodcast.com/sofa

www.starshipsofa.com

For Me To Know And For You To Find Out

Here's an odd little thing to heap atop the mountain of odd little things that make my psychology: For the past few months I've found that if I tell people what I'm working on (literarily speaking), I end up not doing it.

I used to be a self-help freak, reading all the books, stopping well short of actually doing anything, but I read again and once more that you should never tell people what you're going to do because it sucks all the energy out of it for you. Now I never bought into the magical aspects of the modern self-help movement, but I believed that a lot of the mumbo jumbo parts could easily be reinterpreted as the workings of the subconscious mind. Have I lost any of you yet? When did you give up on this post to check your e-mail for the hundredth time?

Anywho, I think that telling people what I'm working on might fill a psychological need for me that fulfills the same role as the need to show the work itself. If I want to write my story about the Jolly Green Giant and his penchant for wearing women's underwear, telling you that I'm doing it might satisfy my brain as much as actually writing it and showing it to you. So the thrill is gone and I am left a husk.

What I don't know is why this started happening only recently, or maybe it happened and I hadn't noticed it, hence my struggles with my archenemy, Process Five.

In summary I won't be telling you what I'm working on anymore. I'll just tell you when I've finished something, sent it out or had it published. We'll see how that works.

Meet Me On The Sofa

I'm on the StarShipSofa this week with Fiction Crawler #3. Aural Delights No. 51. Blast off!

Aural Delights No 51 Jeff VanderMeer

Poem: Fading Signals by Mikal Trimm

Flash Fiction: The Pilots by L. E. Modesitt Jr

Fact: Fiction Crawler No 3 Matthew Sanborn Smith

New Titles: Charles Stross, Christopher Moore, Russell Kirkpatrick

Main Fiction: The Third Bear by Jeff VanderMeer

Narrators: Diane Severson, Travis Kennedy, Mark Nelson

This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com. Download a free audiobook of your choice today at audiblepodcast.com/sofa

www.starshipsofa.com

And here are the links to the great stories I mention on the show:

Night of the Living POTUS by Adam-Troy Castro

Shibuya no Love by Hannu Rajaniemi

'Tis the Season by China Miéville

BLIT by David Langford

Deadnauts by Ted Kosmatka

Connie, Maybe by Paul E. Martens

Fiction Crawler 2 On The Sofa

Hey, everybody! Listen to my lilting voice once more on this week's Aural Delights. I'm quite the Paolo Bacigalupi fan and I'm very happy to have his story on the show as well. Blast off!

Aural Delights No 45 Paolo Bacigalupi

Flash Fiction: Reality 2.0 By Ian Creasy

Flash Fiction: I'm a Stranger Here Myself by Mack Reynolds

Fact: Fiction Crawler No 2 by Matthew Sanborn Smith

Main Fiction: Pump Six by Paolo Bacigalupi

Narrators: MCL, Lawrence Santoro, Grant Stone

www.starshipsofa.com

Did I Say War?

I take my lumps like a man. Two weeks ago I said I was going to kick Process Five's ass. That hasn't actually happened. Not even a little bit. I haven't given up, but that deadline will soon disappear in the rearview mirror. I was so full of fire, too! Feel free to harass me.

Did I mention I won Fantasy and Science Fiction's Competition #76? I don't think I did. Check out their October/November issue to see my entry. I just sent in six entries for Competition #77. You should too.

I sent Fiction Crawler 2 to Tony at StarShipSofa the other day, hopefully that will be on Wednesday's show, but we never know the future until it happens.

That's all for now, folks. Beddy-bye, as it's up for work in about four hours and some change. I wish you all a wonderful Monday.

Links To The Crawled

We had a few problems posting the links to the stories I mentioned on The StarShipSofa page, so here are the links in case they're still not working when you get there:

I Bought a Little City by Donald Barthelme: http://www.newyorker.com/online/2007/07/09/070709on_audio_antrim
Ex Machina by Margaret Ronald: http://www.strangehorizons.com/2007/20070528/machina-f.shtml
Last Contact by Stephen Baxter: http://www.solarisbooks.com/books/newbookscifi/last-contact.asp
Aficionado by David Brin: http://www.davidbrin.com/aficionado1.html
Footnotes by Charles Coleman Finlay: http://home.earthlink.net/~ccfinlay/footnotes.html
The Rapeworm by Charles Coleman Finlay: http://www.brianjhatcher.com/NA.pdf

Fiction Crawling

I've got a new bit on the Sofa this week, the first of a regular feature called The Fiction Crawler in which I recommend great free fiction you can find online. Give it a go:

Aural Delights No 40 Lawrence Santoro

Poetry: Judy Resnick by Laurel Winter

Flash Fiction: When The Whistle Blows by Daniel Schwartz

Fact: Fiction Crawler No1 Matthew Sanborn Smith

Main Fiction Intro: Lawrence Santoro

Main Fiction: So Many Tiny Mouths by Lawrence Santoro

Narrators: MCL, Lawrence Santoro Diane Severson,

Advertisement: This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com. Download a free audiobook of your choice today at audiblepodcast.com/sofa

www.starshipsofa.com

I'm On The Sofa Again

No, not the psychiatrist's sofa this time, but the StarShipSofa. My first piece of non-fiction, Jim Sawgrass and the Family Bulbs is on the Sofa's Aural Delights No. 36. Lot's of other great stuff on there as well (Paul Di Filippo is one of my favorites). I hope you enjoy the show!

Aural Delights No 36 Paul Di Filippo

Poetry: Bottles by Greg Beatty

Flash Fiction: Moon Over Baton Rouge by Atalanta Pendragonne

Article: Jim Sawgrass and the Family Bulbs Matthew Sanborn Smith

Main Fiction: Bad Beliefs by Paul Di Filippo

On The Sofa With Jeff Carlson

Narrators: Grant Stone, Julie Davis, Diane Severson

Advertisement: This podcast is brought to you by Audible.com. Download a free audiobook of your choice at audiblepodcast.com/sofa

www.starshipsofa.com

74

Number 74 has hit the pavement. Jim Sawgrass and the Family Bulbs, my first non-fiction piece, which grew out of an e-mail I sent to some friends a couple of years back. And yes, according to the rules in my head, this does count as a story.

Moving on.

A Little Landmark

Back in ancient times, before I even wrote story #1 (Lives and Times, for you curiosos) I took a creative writing class at the local college, Indian River Community College. The guy who taught the course, I think his name was Lowell Stone, once said that you should have at least six stories in circulation at all times. Six! Holy Crap! That's a lot of stories. I couldn't imagine the amount of work I'd have to do to have six stories in circulation at the same time. Well, I eventually reached six and then a few more.

Today, with A Hard Rain, I realized I now have twenty stories in circulation at the same time. I feel good about that. I like to think it's a testament to my hard work. Of course, you could view it as a testament to my stories piling up because they hardly ever sell, but I'm going to stick with the hard work thing.

On The Sofa, 4th and 71

The title of this post sounds like an insane football game, doesn't it?

First off, on the StarShipSofa this week:

ME!

http://www.starshipsofa.com/podcast/Aural_Delights_No_31_Mary_Rosenblume.mp3

Aural Delights No 31 Mary Rosenblum

Poetry: Interstellar Tract by Bruce Boston

Flash Fiction: Sunday Dinner by Matthew Sanborn Smith

Main Fiction: The Rainmaker by Mary Rosenblum

Narrators: Paul Caggegi Julie Davis Dale Manley

Dale Manley read my story Sunday Dinner (first seen on this blog, faithful readers) and I thought he did a great job. Made my mouth water just listening to it. If you're not familiar with the tale, it's a story about a guy who sniffs magazines. And if that doesn't entice you, well friend, you are unenticeable.

Next up, Happy 4th! I didn't do anything very fourthy today, just worked for extra pay. I'll be celebrating that on the 11th when the money's in the bank.

Only 929 to go! Story #71 went out the door today. It's called Dritty Does. And he does, too. As for me, I feel myself picking up speed.

One of the greatest science fiction films is going to soon become even greater. A full length version of Metropolis was found in Argentina: http://film.guardian.co.uk/features/featurepages/0,,2289177,00.html?gusrc=rss&feed=media

I, for one, can't wait to see the restored version.

At this moment, life is good. I've got the weekend off, I'm eager to write and I'm going to have some Maple Walnut Ice Cream. I have to put that in capitals because it's the official ice cream of displaced New English everywhere.

Take A Seat On The Sofa

Check out the John Scalzi episode of StarShipSofa podcast, just posted today. On it, Tony reads my review of the Android's Dream. www.starshipsofa.com

Ooooo, Pretty!

I did a bit of renovation on this old dump, as you can see. I also added links to my published stories over to your left (and down). Most of them are freebies, but there are a couple in mags that have to be purchased if you so choose. Next to the titles are the mags in which the stories were published.