I am very please to announce that my story, “The Story of Daro and the Arbolita” will be appearing in Analog Science Fiction and Fact.

I know non-writers are probably not as familiar with the prestige of one market versus another, but there are definite “tiers” between the magazines. In the top tier of magazines, there are three known as the “big three”: Analog, Asimov’s, and Fantasy & Science Fiction. Those are the last three big print magazines; the ones you can actually subscribe to through the mail like a regular magazine, the ones you can still occasionally find on the shelf in a bookstore. Of the “big three”, Analog is the biggest, at least by circulation (they are over 27,000 subscribers).

In fact, Analog is the longest running science fiction magazine, going back to 1930 (known back then as “Astounding Stories”). If you are not a science fiction fan, you can trust that they have published every science fiction author you have heard of: people like Ray Bradbury, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, Philip K. Dick, Robert Heinlein, and a lot of others. Anne McCaffrey’s Dragonflight first appeared in Analog. Frank Herbert’s Dune first appeared in Analog.

All of this is a long way to say, I’m dead.

I died now.

Clearly this crazy, ridiculous world in which I have a story forthcoming from Analog is some sort of non-reality heaven simulation, and none of you are real.

You know, two things:
1) After the amazing writing year I had last year, I was really braced for a slump this year. It seemed like it could only be downhill. So far, that doesn’t appear to be the case.
2) There is a certain voice that says, “Hey, maybe you aught to cool it with these announcements, buddy. Be a pro. Act like you been there before.” But you know what? Screw that. I *am* a pro, and so whatever I do? That’s what a pro does.

Do you know what a pro does when he sells a story to Analog?