The girl floats in darkness, her hair fanning out delicate as seaweed. Her skin is clammy and white, broken by purple bruises like orchids in the snow. She has not been in the black water for long. Ragged cuts line her cheeks and arms, but there is no blood. A flowing dress wraps around her, hiding any further damage. Her arms are bound in front of her at the wrists. Cloudy, color-drained eyes stare up at the moon. Her jaw hangs limply open, and water laps in and out of her mouth.

Languidly, the current of the stream pulls her along, over silt, stone, and shining fish to places she never saw when she was alive. Tree branches reach out with grasping hands as she passes, but the river has her.

Her journey continues.

Something I wrote a few years back. It’s on my LJ, but I wanted to dredge it up and get it on Fragments of Shadow, just ’cause.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

So, Neil Gaiman said this in an interview about ten years ago:

I was always so relieved that anyone wants to publish anything I’ve written. In many ways I feel like the biggest challenge hasn’t come yet. Because, if pressed, I would confess that what I’m really scared of is that one day somebody will knock at the door and they’ll have a clipboard. They’ll say, “Mr. Gaiman?” And I’ll say “Yes.” They’ll say, “It says here that you get to make stuff up and get paid for it.” I’ll say, “Yes.” “And it says here that you can do anything you want. You can go and do fantasy and you can do real fiction and you can do TV, films, whatever you want.” And I’ll say, “Yes.” And they say, “Well it’s over. It’s done. We’ve caught up with your game, Sir. You are going to have to go and get a real job. And work normal hours.”

Yes, Mr. Croup and Mr. Vandemar show up and they say “It’s over. You are now going to have to get a real job.” I will have gone to that point, seemingly expecting that this writing thing would go on for ages. I’d then think, “Well, it’s a fair cop.” I would go off and have to get a real job and get up the morning and wear a suit. I suppose I’d secretly make some things up in my head for myself before I went to bed at night, or before I go to sleep anyway lying in bed, sort of making up little stories. But I’d never be able to tell anybody. That’s the thing I’m scared of.

I mean, I know these fears are fairly universal, but it’s somehow comforting to see someone like Neil articulate them.

You can also read the full interview.

Oh, and go read the Graveyard Book. It’s wonderful.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

This post is going to be a kind of manifesto in a sense, and just plain catharsis in another, It’s probably also going to be pretty scattered. Mostly, this is about my mindset and the emotional and creative frequency I’m currently on. If you’re not interested – and really, I don’t blame you – maybe you’d like something else?

I’m Going to Suck

First thing you need to know? I’m a shy and insecure person. I’m not nearly as bad as I used to be, but I am. I have never really been able to fully invest myself in anything I’ve done creatively, because I always have the little voice in the back of my head… They’re going to laugh at you. Nobody will like it. Even now, every time I send off a draft to my editors, he’s there… This is it. This is the one. They’re going to read this and you’re going to get an email that says “whoops, we made a huge mistake. I’m not sure why we even hired you in the first place.” I stress out and live in fear of people thinking my work sucks and, by extension, so do I.

Fuck that.

Everything I do isn’t going to be gold, and I have to be OK with that. But just because I produce something that sucks once doesn’t invalidate the other things I’ve done or the potential I have to produce something amazing in the future. Honestly, I think getting the suck out now might even raise my chances of producing that amazing thing.

I’m a Writer

Someone asked me what I did the other day, and I told them the truth as I see it.

“I’m a writer, and a web designer,” I said.

“Oh,” he said, “anything I might have read?”

“Probably not,” I shrugged. “All of my actual published work is in tabletop RPGs.”

“Oooh. I thought you meant a real writer.”

Yeah. And again, fuck that. I don’t need validation from anyone to know that I’m a writer. I’d be a writer even if I didn’t have a pretty regular gig doing it. I write. As melodramatic as it sounds, I couldn’t survive without writing. Without it, I wouldn’t be whole. I’m proud of my work for White Wolf. I love role-playing games, and I love that I get to take part in shaping and building a world I’ve been immersed in for over half my life. I will never be ashamed of that.

That guy who basically said I wasn’t a “real” writer? He didn’t mean to insult me. He was surprised that it annoyed me.

Pretension

Society frowns on the kind of earnest and thoughtful intensity that creates its most enduring, beautiful works. It’s interesting, because it’s almost like a kind of institutionalized discrimination. People who try are weird. Pretentious. Even when you make it, even when you earn society’s “acceptance” of your weirdness, you’re separate. Celebrity is, in a sense, another kind of segregation. It’s still a matter of us and them.

Pretension is such a dirty word. Except all writing is pretense. Everything worth doing is pretentious. You’re damn right I have aspirations “above my station.” You’re damn right I’m going to stretch and reach for things.

And I may miss. I may fall off the ladder I’ve built for myself. But that’s just an opportunity to stabilize the foundations and build it higher before I climb back up.

I’m done apologizing for that.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

Good lord. It’s been too long since I made a proper post.

I’m never going to get around to redesigning my site. The cobbler’s children have no shoes, and all that. So, for the moment, I just went ahead and installed Wordpress and a theme that doesn’t make my eyes bleed.

Let’s see: Quick updates this time.

Writing

I’ve been writing like a madman for the last month. By the 4th, I should have written 64k since March began. I’ve been sick for most of that time, too, which is slowing me down more than I’d like.

Shadows in the Dark: Mekhet, Night Horrors: Immortal Sinners and New Wave Requiem have all been released and very well received. I’m really proud of NWR in particular, since it’s actually convinced longtime Masquerade fans who dismissed Requiem to give it another look.

Gaming

My group will start playtesting Geist as soon as I finish this mad dash of writing. The Hunter game and the Mage game are on hold until we get through that.

Miscellaneous

We might have a new cat soon. His name is Hoshi, and he’s adorable.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

I'm on Twitter. Follow me on Twitter.

I won't do that thing where it posts my tweets here, I might embed them in the sidebar over at Fragments of Shadow, when I get around to finishing the redesign.

John Updike is dead from lung cancer.

The quote above is from "A&P," my favorite of his short stories. I haven't read the Rabbit series in years, and it's been even longer since The Witches of Eastwick, but he'll definitely be missed.

...Crap.

Get these free stickers over at Ziraxia!

http://www.ziraxia.com/stickers

There's also a special offer so you can get another set of stickers with all the Ziraxians and 20% off your order if you buy a shirt (or two, or more).

Do me a favor and repost this for your friends lists, I love these stickers, and want to get them out there far and wide.

Forrest J. Ackerman has passed.

Thank you, uncle Forry, for everything. For Ray Bradbury, for Famous Monsters of Filmland, and even for Sci-Fi. But most of all, thank you for being a truly kind person.

Kat and I met Forry at DragonCon. Kat was wearing a spider-shaped poison ring that was, essentially, a replica of the one Lon Chaney Sr. used to wear. The one Forrest had, with a picture of Chaney in it, and a dab of his makeup.

Forry came over, and sat down next to Kat, and complimented her on her ring, and showed her the real one. They talked for almost an hour, about everything and nothing, and for the rest of the weekend, every time we saw him, he’d wave at Kat, point to his ring, and wink. He truly loved what he was doing, and his enthusiasm was contagious. It’s no wonder all the things he championed caught on, with a cheerleader like him.

He’ll be missed.

This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

This is a good example of why I work at Ziraxia. Where else would I get to do this?

This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

Joe, the new guy at work, made this video for the Daily Wombat shirt over at Ziraxia. Remember, you can buy the shirt at Ziraxia!This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

Thank you for allowing your ridiculous, homophobic fears to run rampant.

You have succeeded in banning something that was already illegal. You have destroyed what rights I had regarding my relationship with my girlfriend of fourteen years in your knee-jerk reaction, your “HOMO BAD!” flailing.

Perhaps next time you could have a more open mind or failing that, read more than the intentionally misleading summary of the law intended to drive an outmoded, “God-fearing” agenda that has no place in a society with a true separation of church and state.

Crap.

This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

Worlds are colliding. I’m working four jobs right now.

Ziraxia/Red Alert: The same, though I’m changing schedules next week to make Howl-O-Scream work better. We’re doing well. You should buy a shirt here :) Current Writing Gig: Stupidly behind, but almost done. I feel like crap for being late. If you see this, W, Sorry! Howl-O-Scream: Tuesday is dress rehearsal. House looks good this year. Come visit me in Club Muse! Third Eye Games: Doing the website, that’ll be moving here soon.

On top of all that? My mouth is a shambles. The braces I had as a child ate all the enamel off my teeth and now I’m paying for it. I have a root canal tomorrow afternoon. And thousands of dollars worth of work beyond that… With no insurance or idea where I’m going to get the money to pay for it all. Any rich uncles running around out there I don’t know about?

This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

Horror must be highly orchestrated. If anything is off, it can turn into comedy, and all the tension you’ve built up can disappear in a puff of smoke.

All they changed was the score.

This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

My cat Groucho, my constant companion since he was a kitten 19 years ago, has been ill for a while. He lost a lot of weight over the last month. He’s been fading, despite my best efforts to help him gain weight, to recover. His whole life, he’s been a kitten. Playful. Loving. Last night I spent the entire evening writing with him in my lap or following me around the apartment as best as his wobbly, weak legs could carry him. I knew it was coming. I told him my goodbyes and made sure he knew how much I love him. This morning, I checked on him and he lifted his head up and meowed to me. I kissed his head and petted his purring flank, and went to work.

He passed away in his sleep this afternoon.

Farewell, little one. I miss you.

This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

Unnoticed and silent, they watch. Their eyes have seen a thousand secrets, and yours are no exception. They are the Shadows that dwell among the Kindred, and everyone knows that the darkness has eyes in the Danse Macabre. Seek their wisdom under cover of night, and discover what awaits the wise and the patient.

A Clan book for Vampire: the Requiem.

The cover is a placeholder, the real deal will be way more interesting, though if that’s who I think it is, she’s quite interesting in her own right. I didn’t write a huge amount of this, (only about 10%) but I’m really looking forward to its release, since they’re my favorite clan in Requiem and it will mark my first published work in the World of Darkness.

This entry is crossposted from Evil Spy. Go to the original.

The comic Kat and I were working on has been stalled at the same point for too long. It feels stale and lost. So we’re setting it aside. It needs to be largely rethought.

That said, we dusted off a manuscript I started at USF, and reworked it into a comic idea that we’re both really excited about. We’ve been working on it for only a few days and it’s already farther along than the other project ever was, in a way.

I have too many projects going on at once, again. I need to step back and reevaluate exactly what parts of my creative life are important to me. I’m not going to cancel things, just put them into something resembling priorities.

Obviously, if I owe you something, you’re priority number one. Which, of course, means that White Wolf, Third Eye Games and Ziraxia are first tier. Everything else is basically up in the air.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

Last night was a lot of laying in bed staring at the ceiling. I expected, with all the stress finally subsiding to a dull roar, to get a decent night’s sleep.

Not so much. I was suddenly wired in all the wrong ways. I couldn’t stop thinking about a whole lot of nothing, but I was too tired to get up. Blah.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

First draft done, and sent off. Now I can try and get some work done on my personal projects and 3EG before I get started on the next one.

In other news, my grandparents are settled into their new home in Arkansas. I miss them terribly, but I know they’ll be happier up there. It’s funny, because I’ve been so busy that I haven’t been able to see them much, but it was comforting to know they were at least nearby.

And I’ve seen Dark Knight twice now. Good doesn’t even begin to cover it. This year has easily produced the best comic films ever.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

And there has been for three days… I’m updating from my iPhone because if I don’t, I won’t update at all. Current secret project is still a few thousand words out.

I have so many projects going on at once that I’m starting to lose track of what goes where. It’s time to take a step back and get myself organized.

I need a method of synchronizing docs between multiple computers… Maybe it’s time to try google docs again.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

This one will only make sense to the WoW geeks amongst you.

It's on hyperspecial this week for only $12.99 through Monday! Buy it and lower my stress level a notch. Thank you.