Category Archives: Uncategorized

How long does it take to find a market for a short story? As long as it takes. Most short stories don’t have a shelf life. If you don’t find a market for it after X months or years, it … Continue reading →

This is my 22nd wedding anniversary. As it happens, this year has the same calendar as 1995—it was a Friday afternoon when we went over to the courthouse and joined the queue of people who were there primarily to pay … Continue reading →

We didn’t expect to have (m)any trick or treaters last night because it was raining so hard from about 4 pm on, but a number of intrepid, costumed souls did make it. We probably had to go to the door … Continue reading →

My new short story “The Halloween Tree,” inspired by the Halloweens of my youth and a scary tree that lurked over the roadside near where I grew up, is available today in Volume Four of Halloween Carnival, the anthology of … Continue reading →

Time for a Tragically Hip listening marathon. I wasn’t living in Canada any more when they burst onto the scene, so it’s only been during the past few years that I’ve caught up with their discography, but they’ve become one … Continue reading →

The gulf coast is less than two hours from where we live, but it feels like going to a different country. Every so often—maybe once a year—we rent a place in Surfside to get away from it all. We spent … Continue reading →

October is here at last, and with it the launch of the Cemetery Dance anthology Halloween Carnival, edited by my long-time pal Brian Freeman. The book is coming out digitally in five installments, with a new volume featuring stories from … Continue reading →

Alan Parsons has released a remixed version of his classic instrumental “Sirius” (the lead-in to “Eye in the Sky”). I’ve used the original as my phone’s ringtone for as long as customizing ringtones has been a thing. The new one … Continue reading →

Some seven or eight years ago, I wrote a story called “The Bank Job” about a gang of friends who’d all had run-ins with the law. Not a very bright bunch, but harmless on the whole. One of them was … Continue reading →

I do some of my best thinking in the shower. Yesterday morning, while I was washing my hair, I came up with about four good concepts for the story I’m working on, things that will add depth and breadth to … Continue reading →