Announcements

I’m going to be in a year’s best!

/ Shane / 4 Comments

So, the table of contents for “The Year’s Best YA Speculative Fiction 2013” was released today…guess who’s going to be sharing a TOC with Neil Gaiman?

That’s right! My story “Random Play All and the League of Awesome” from OOMPH: A Little Super Goes a Long Way was selected as one of the best young adult stories printed in 2013. Obviously that feels pretty good (especially receiving the email out of nowhere), but now that I see the full table of contents, it’s a little overwhelming! People I know, people I admire, and people I didn’t think to have my name alongside.

Did I mention Neil Gaiman? I am *literally* listening to The Ocean at the End of the Lane RIGHT NOW.

Here’s the full table of contents:

Selkie Stories Are For Losers  –  Sofia Samatar
By Bone-Light  –  Juliet Marillier
The Myriad Dangers  –  Lavie Tidhar
Carpet  –  Nnedi Okorafor
I Gave You My Love by the Light of the Moon  –  Sarah Rees Brennan
57 Reasons for the Slate Quarry Suicides  –  Sam J. Miller
The Minotaur Girls  –  Tansy Rayner Roberts
Not With You, But With You  –  Miri Kim
Ghost Town  –  Malinda Lo
December  –  Neil Gaiman
An Echo in the Shell  –  Beth Cato
Dan’s Dreams  –  Eliza Victoria
As Large As Alone  –  Alena McNamara
Random Play All and the League of Awesome  –  Shane Halbach
Mah Song  –  Joanne Anderton
What We Ourselves Are Not  –  Leah Cypess
The City of Chrysanthemum  –  Ken Liu
Megumi’s Quest  –  Joyce Chng
Persimmon, Teeth, and Boys  –  Steve Berman
Flight  –  Angela Slatter
We Have Always Lived on Mars  –  Cecil Castellucci

I am so excited right now, you have no idea. I guess you’re supposed to act all gracious, like you’ve been there before and whatnot, but screw that! I’ve got over 300 rejections, I’m savoring the wins for all they’re worth.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be over here, shouting from the rooftops.

“Copy Machine”, now in Polish

/ Shane / 1 Comment

Following last month’s translation into Galician, my story “Copy Machine” is now available in the Polish magazine Szortal (pronounced “shortal” for us English speakers).

One more step on my way to world domination…

And That, My Children, Is Why We Can’t Go to Space Anymore

/ Shane / Leave a comment

I’m happy to announce that my story “And That, My Children, Is Why We Can’t Go to Space Anymore” is available today at Every Day Fiction!

I really love this story, and I think you will too. It’s very short (despite the title length), but it still manages to explain everything from the truth about the moon landing, to the reason NASA’s budget has been slashed in recent years, to whether or not God keeps kosher.

Give it a read and let me know what you think, either here, or join in the discussion on their site (I promise to obsessively check both comment sections).

Whiffing on a big milestone

/ Shane / Leave a comment

I had been keeping my eye on the fact that I was coming up on my 2,000th post here on the blog. You know how they say to keep your eye on the ball? Okay, so, this is actually my 2,004th post on the blog. Whoops.

In any case, 2000 is a pretty big number considering how short lived most blogs are. On the other hand, it sure feels like I’ve written more than 2000 of these things (you have, you idiot, 2000 and FOUR of them!) WordPress doesn’t appear to have a way to count the total amount of words I’ve published, but if we pick a nice conservative number of 200 words per post (I suspect I’m well above that…I do tend to go on), we’re talking about a minimum of 400,000 words (again, I think that’s low, but that’s not even counting stories I’ve written in that time, papers at work, etc.)

And yet my wife still says she can’t get a word in edgewise.

So here’s to another 2,000 opportunities for me to go on, and on, and on, and on…

 

…and on…

 

…and on…

 

 

…and on…

Art & Words Show – Happening Right Now!

/ Shane / 1 Comment

Oh my gosh, I almost totally forgot! Right now, as I type this, the Art & Words Show is happening!

As a quick refresher:

13 stories and poems have been selected, along with 13 works of art, for display at the show. Now that the selections have been made, the writers and artists will swap. My story will be given to an artist who will make a painting, picture, or sculpture to represent that story. Meanwhile, I will receive a work of art and I will write a new story to accompany it. All of the resulting art and stories will be displayed in the gallery, including a reception and reading of the written works on Saturday, September 27.

And that’s today!

The first story I wrote for the Art & Words Show was “Copy Machine”, which I’ve since sold, so you can read it online. (I was given a sneak peak of the visual interpretation, done by Bob Crow, and it’s great!) Let’s hope my 2nd story, inspired by Stephen Daly’s drawing, “The Wheel” sells, so you can all read that one as well. 🙂

“The Wheel” by Stephen Daly

 In any case, I’ve got two stories hanging in an art gallery, which is quite alright by me. Wish I could be there for the opening!