My 200-word story "Tramp Stamp" is featured today at the very awesome Dark Sky Magazine. It is, as you may have guessed, about a tattoo. Speaking of which, I've started watching Prison Break and the main character has the blueprints of the prison as well as other clues tattooed on his entire upper body. I'm about halfway through the first season and enjoying it, but am curious to know whether it stays enjoyable through the next several seasons (because I'm assuming they actually break out of prison in the first season). Anybody?
The Beast Inside Me
I am absolutely thrilled that my essay "Shorter Is Better" (or: "Participating in the Downfall of Literature") appears today in The Daily Beast. And that, well, is all I really have to say, except a big thanks to Jessica Purcell, my publicist at Norton, and Lucas Wittmann, the Books Editor at The Daily Beast. Enjoy!
We Are All Protagonists In Our Own Stories
The new issue of Foundling Review is live, a special tribute issue to Writers' Bloc which unfortunately closed its doors back in August. I was scheduled to have a story in the next issue which never came to be, and the editors at FR were kind enough to include my piece "The Lonely Life of a Tertiary Character" alongside work by Jack Frey, Eugenia Tsutsumi, Edward Rathke, Lisa Marie Basile, and Katie Manning. I'm not really sure where the inspiration for this piece came from except I've always remembered a deleted scene from the first Austin Powers movie, a heartbreaking scene that tries to remind us how even trivial henchmen have lives too. And by the almighty power of YouTube, I present it to you here:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag_AFraxj-4
Pillar Of Salt
My wife and I just got back from our New York trip, which I'll write more about on Monday. But I wanted to mention that the new Postscripts is now available. Actually, it may have been available for awhile now but I just got my contributor's copy Tuesday. And boy oh boy what a beautiful piece of art it is. Tray cased, signed limited edition, I'm almost afraid to crack the spine. The anthology features stories by Lucius Shepard, Jack Ketchum, Steve Rasnic Tem, Alex Irvine, Catherine J. Gardner, and a slew of others (there are 32 total), including one by little ole me. My story is called "Pillar of Salt," and here is what one of the reviewers said about it at Tangent Online:
Barbara is a housewife; her husband, Raymond, is a mailman and his boss, John, is coming over for dinner with his wife - what can be more banal? “Pillar Of Salt” by Robert Swartwood allows us to be a fly on the wall at this dinner and to hear a story of a letter being delivered to the previous occupant of their house, who was also a postman. He suffered dire consequences when he opened a letter which was addressed not to him, but to a man named Jonas Cotton. If any letters bearing that name do turn up they must be turned over, unopened, to John.
It sounds simple enough: just don’t open the item, but along the way we learn of the problems with the marriage, things that happened in the past and so forth. Before the story ends we know a lot more about Barbara’s motivation. There’s also a twist here. I sort of liked it.
I can understand where the reviewer is coming from. This is a story that was rejected multiple times. Either editors really liked the beginning but didn't care for the end, or they didn't care for the beginning but really liked the end. So it was an immense pleasure to learn that Peter Crowther liked both the beginning and end.
You can read the rest of the review here and order this massive anthology here.
Oh, and I made mention of something exciting on Twitter and Facebook earlier today, but if you happened to miss it, here's a sneak preview of Monday's post:
International, Baby
Being a writer nowadays means being 10% writer, 90% marketer (give or take a percentage). I'm not a fan of that business model (I just want to write), but, well, you have to go with the flow. So when there's publishing news that potential readers might (or might not) be interested in, it's a writer's job to share it. Anyway, my two e-books The Silver Ring and Through the Guts of a Beggar are available at Amazon UK. Which means -- yes, that's right -- I have officially gone international. Both sides of the pond, booya! (Sorry, it's late, I just got done writing an introduction for a top secret project that I put off longer than I'd planned, and I need sleep badly.)
So yes, if you live in the UK, and you own a Kindle, and you don't mind spending a few pounds (translation: clams) for some fun reading, then you can check out The Silver Ring here, and Through the Guts of a Beggar here. That is all. Good night.