Thousands of kilometers, Baconators, and how to fix Star Wars – Guest Post by C.M. Forest

Blog Post No. 499

Continuing the run up to the 500th post, this week we have a guest post by C.M. Forest, better known on this blog as jerk Christian Laforet.

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Alright, picture this: It’s early, like, the sun isn’t up yet early. The day is promising to be a hot one, but the chill from the night before is still in the air. I’m standing in front of my house, a small suitcase and a bag of books on the ground beside me and a Monster energy drink in hand (with a few more tucked into my suitcase). I’m anxious. Toronto is a four-hour drive (through some of the most boring landscape ever spewed from the Earth) and the event, a reading at a bar for a genre publisher, will not pay near enough to cover the costs of the trip. I can’t even say I’m looking forward to the event itself. I’ve always been an introverted person and the idea of standing before a group of strangers and reading aloud is not an appealing one. So, yeah, I’m anxious. And then I see the red pick-up truck turn the corner of my street and that anxiety begins to dissipate like the nighttime chill. A moment later, Ben is parked in my driveway, my bags are loaded and I’m climbing into his truck. Some sort of joke has already been cracked, as has my Monster, and with a last glance at my house, we’re off. And now I’m no longer anxious, but exited (and not just because Ben is a good-looking guy either!). I’m excited for the hours I get to spend with my friend with nothing but conversation to fill the time.

Leaving things behind

Blog No. 130

I love the format of a short story. There is artistry in writing a really good story that fits in a small space, but feels larger than it is. All of my humble beginnings in reading and writing began with short stories, even the genre I am most drawn to, SciFi if you haven’t guessed, was proliferated through the short stories published in the magazines in the 40s and 50s (and even earlier). I’ve written about it before, so I won’t go into too much depth, but I think, even with novels being the major way to make a living as a writer, I will still find time to write short stories for the rest of my life. It’s the same with this blog, almost. I have no idea what the future of this blog, or the format that it currently is in, will be.

Collection Update

Blog No 125

I’ve done a novel update this year, but I have to admit, I haven’t done any work on it since then. I really want to, but I have so much other work that has to be done now (or a few weeks ago) that I’ve had to put it on hold and focus. The one project that is sucking up the most time is currently The Collection. The fabled collection is a set of short stories that Christian and I have been working on since before this time last year. I know that seems like a long time, but since they are short stories, there seemed to be lots of little things that would get in the way (like the first Zine, Finders, updating the website, Christian putting out his book and many others). They were just short stories, we had tons of time. Now it’s a year later and we are still working on edits.