2015: A Year in Review

My Stories

I wrote a few, and continued submitting many more for consideration for publication. Three were published this year:

1. "The Assassination of Alexis Tsipras" was so near-future that it may already be out of date. Why bother assassinating someone when he has already suicided all the ideals for which he claimed to stand?
2. "The Joy of Sects" was my favorite of my stories that were published this last year, though it is certainly not above critique. If you, reader, are eligible to vote for awards such as the Nebula or the Hugo, I would love it if you would give it a read and half a thought.
3. "After the New Dawn" is, even more than "Tsipras," the most Greek of the stories that I have published to date.

In addition to these, a fourth story, "Caribou: Documentary Fragments," was purchased by The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction for publication at an as yet undetermined date in the future, likely some time in 2016.

I have another story that has been provisionally accepted by another publication, though I will not publicize which until I have the contract and the editor's proposed changes. While I think the editors I have worked with to date would likely testify that I am fairly easy-going about making changes and responsive to criticism, the story in question is the most personal I have written, and thus one on which I will be more careful about accepting edits.

As of this instant I have 16 other stories out for consideration.

Other People's Stories

The sale of "Caribou" made me eligible to join the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), which I did. This makes me eligible to nominate and vote for the Nebula Awards, something I am actually taking fairly seriously. My list of Nebula nominations is nearly finalized, but I will not be posting it until it has been completed and submitted. Also, since I was a WorldCon member last year, I am eligible to make Hugo nominations this year, and I will. (Whether I bother paying for a WorldCon membership this year is an open question, largely contingent on whether I end up selling any more stories before then.)

According to Goodreads--which I am back to using regularly--I completed 77 books this year. Of these, my favorites (in order of when I read them, not of preference) were:

• Jeffery Renard Allen, Song of the Shank (literary novel with historical and speculative elements, about which I posted back in January)
• Claudia Rankine, Citizen (themed poetry collection that proved all too topical for the year)
• Liu Cixin, The Three-Body Problem (as far as I can tell, the best science fiction novel published in English in 2014)
• Richard Lange, Sweet Nothing: Stories (damn it I wish I wrote like him)
• Svetlana Alexievich, Voices from Chernobyl (non-fiction oral history by the winner of a well-deserved Nobel Prize)
• Kim Stanley Robinson, Aurora (the best science fiction novel published in 2015 that I have read so far)

The Stories of My Life and Others

Both my kids keep getting bigger and smarter. Some trying things have happened in my personal life which I am not prepared to share, and which will likely express themselves (or have already done so) in transmuted form in my fiction.

Politics (or, The Stories We Tell Each Other)

The events of this year, domestic (e.g. racial), international (e.g., military and migrational), and global (e.g. climatic), have nudged me out of my past demoralization, though in ways not yet ripe for broad dissemination.