fairy skeletons.

All post

This week's Fiction Friday is an example of Twitter fiction - innovative storytelling done through Twitter in 140-character segments.

This particular story, written by Andrea Corbin, follows a "spacewitch" named Em in a short, fantastical journey. The prose is sharp, succinct, and evocative - really a treat to read. It's quite surprising how effectively this medium works to convey the story, working with and around the boundaries of typical writing pieces.

I feel there's no need for the excerpt I typically include, as the whole thing (having been Storified) is embedded below:

Hopefully you enjoyed that little bit of your Friday, and maybe... maybe you'll be trying some Twitter fiction of your own soon? (I know I want to.)

- Christina

Christina

A quick note of credit before we begin - this Fiction Friday pick was generously recommended by the lovely Kim Karalius, who is, incidentally, an amazing writer herself.

Tor.com, where this week's story was published, is one of the most highly regarded speculative short fiction markets out there. I've read and enjoyed some stories on the site in the past (some of which will probably pop up on future Fiction Fridays).

This gorgeous illustration for the story was done by Lars Leetaru.

Written by Maria Dahvana Headley, "The Tallest Doll in New York City" is a quirky, cute, magical story about what happens when the Chrysler Building, tired of admiring the Empire State from afar, decides to pay him a little visit on Valentine's Day. The narration is full of personality - I could almost say spunky - and it's richly flecked with details of the time period and setting. The writing style itself, despite being in first-person, is sort of cinematic, so it feels like you're reading the sweeping climax of a film. And the tiny threads of subplots are wonderfully woven in, making sure that everything is a backdrop for everything else, and every part of the story coexists with every other one, just like it does in a real city.

But really, don't take my word for it. Here's the requisite excerpt:

We joke about working in the body of the best broad in New York City, but no one on the waitstaff ever thinks that the Chrysler might have a will of her own. She’s beautiful, what with her multistory crown, her skin pale blue in daylight and rose-colored with city lights at night. Her gown’s printed with arcs and swoops, and beaded with tiny drops of General Electric.

"The Tallest Doll in New York City" is available to read here.

Despite the fact that I discovered it over three months late (it was a Valentine's Day story, after all), it's still a great story to read any time, and I do hope it makes your heart soar as much as it did for mine. Happy reading and happy Friday!

- Christina

Christina

The Diversity in Books Series, or DIBS, is my resolution and effort to add my voice to those who are spearheading the effort to diversify the publishing world. I may not know everything there is to know about this topic, but hopefully I can provide an introduction to the issue for readers and others who are interested and broaden everyone's horizons!

So today you might ask, why this new blog series? Why should you care about it?

Why is diversity in books important?

Here's your short answer: because people are still feeling compelled to write posts and articles like these. Frankly, that's kind of an embarrassment to the publishing industry.

Of course, it's a lot more complicated than that. It's an issue that has spanned generations of both little and large examples of struggle in our society, and most of all, it's an issue that needs to be talked about in this field and numerous others.

This post will cover diversity as a personal issue - I'm hoping to cover statistics in more detailed, specific posts in the future. Additionally, it's an issue that I can ramble about for a while, so bear with me.

First, let's define diversity as it's being used here. Diversity is the inclusion of elements, particularly characters, from different backgrounds - whether that means disabilities (I loathe that word, by the way), different races, different sexual orientations, different body types, or anything that I've missed, it denotes anything that's different from what's considered "mainstream". It also includes authors and settings that are diverse.

No, scratch that. I think a better definition of diversity is anything that seeks to eliminate the concept of "mainstream" by celebrating differences.

I'm Korean, and as a girl of color growing up in the United States with an unending love for literature, it's such a source of joy to me whenever I come across a new book with a Korean protagonist - or even a Korean side character. Stories like Slant by Laura E. Williams make my day pretty much because I can finally read about a Korean girl like me. Finding out about authors like Ellen Oh is unbelievably cool, because I have a precedent who tells me that I can be an author, too. I feel lucky just to have one character or author once in a while who is of my racial background. I'm sure that I'm not the only one who feels this way, and I'm definitely not the only one who feels this is unfair to minority readers. It's a feeling that's very difficult to articulate in this almost-xenophobic literary environment, especially for young people like me.

I understand that I'm lucky. I live in a neighborhood with a fairly high Asian population, so racist comments certainly aren't as severe as they might be in other places. I can honestly say that I've never wanted to be anything other than Korean. I love being bilingual, celebrating the holidays of my culture, and being proud about my country. But I've never been able to shake the lingering feeling that even books, some of my favorite parts of life, are biased against me.

That needs to change. I can't stress it enough. Readers can't stress it enough.

The thing is, the landscape of the book world is lagging pretty far behind that of the wider one. I hate to say it. Shocker - the world has been changing very, very fast. And a significant part of a generation is growing up thinking that stories should only revolve around one or two types of people. Thankfully, with these rapid changes, it's becoming more and more okay to be vocal about issues people are passionate about.

Lately, there's been a lot of positive discussion on how Caucasian, cisgender, heterosexual, etc. etc. characters are dominating literature, especially young adult fiction. We're starting to face the fact that we live in a world with people of all forms, and books that only portray a small fraction of those forms are a disservice to that world. This certainly isn't a new topic of debate, but it's finally being recognized, bit by bit, by mainstream outlets, and that's a wonderful start.

The recent #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign, which you may have spotted around social media, brought what is hopefully a powerful spotlight on diverse literature and authors. Please see what that was all about here, because although the social medial campaign may be over, the discussion is most definitely not.

In the coming weeks, I hope to spread awareness about the issue even further with the DIBS initiative. Please don't hesitate to correct me or share your thoughts (kindly, though), because this is an endeavor to support anyone and everyone.

And remember:

What are books if not a reflection of reality?

What is our reality if our books marginalize diverse people?

And, really, is that a reality we want to live in?

Christina

(I know it's Saturday, but please do bear with me. You won't be sorry, I promise.)

Flavorwire has just announced their 2014 Short Fiction Contest, and I'm planning on entering. In preparation, I read the 2013 winner, and dang, it's awesome.

"The Art and Science of Growing Back Your Arm", by Kim Winternheimer, is a powerful, haunting short story that puts a speculative twist on what you think might be reality. The premise is just strange enough to make you look twice at it, but not overbearing. The writing style is deceptively simple yet meaningful - sort of like the best contemporary novels. And the ending - I won't give anything away, but it hit me like a punch to the gut.

Here's an excerpt, because I might as well let the prose speak for itself:

I think about the world pockmarked with kids who have growth problems I won’t ever see. I think about the boy in our building at home, who cries and wails even though he’s easily two years older than me, and the girl on the news who cut up a bunch of animals in our neighborhood. Is that something they could grow into fixing? Or is it worse than that? I wonder if we all have a little bit of growing to do on the inside and why there aren’t any adults at camp doing any growing. I wonder what Mr. Bobby would say my mother needs to grow back, or if she’s fully whole, and why, to me, that seems so much more difficult to understand.

"The Art and Science of Growing Back Your Arm" is available to read here.

You're welcome for the link (if you haven't clicked it yet go go go), and happy not-really-Friday!

Christina

Recently, I've been perusing a website called Merry Sisters of Fate. It's basically an archive of short stories written by young adult authors Brenna Yovanoff, Tessa Gratton, and Maggie Stiefvater written weekly since 2008. (Sadly, it's discontinued now.) While I've read and enjoyed Brenna Yovanoff's Paper Valentine and Maggie Stiefvater's The Scorpio Races and The Raven Boys, I haven't gotten a chance to read any of Tessa Gratton's books yet - though I want to!

Obviously, the story being featured today was read off of Merry Sisters of Fate, but oddly enough, it's a guest story contributed by Lauren DeStefano. (I've been eyeing her book Perfect Ruin for a while now, and this story just makes me want to read something book-length of hers even more.)

Also, Lauren DeStefano's tweets basically make my life.

Let people say whatever they want about you. I bet the other stones in the river told the gold it was weird, too.
— Lauren DeStefano (@LaurenDeStefano) April 23, 2014

Anyway.

The story being highlighted this Friday is titled "The Sometimes Mermaid". It's a magical, oh-so-slightly chilling piece that I love, especially for its atmosphere and perfect ending. The first paragraph is really the best lead-in, so here's that excerpt:

Atticus lived a hundred years, married twice, and loved only one girl. She became more a legend than a girl as the years went on. Her straw-blonde hair took on, in transit from one telling to the next, the pale white of a spirit. Her denim cutoffs and wicked grin became a billowing Victorian petticoat, her soggy daisy crown a shimmering tiara.

"The Sometimes Mermaid" is available to read here.

Here's to hoping you love it as much as I did, and that you all have a great Friday!

Christina

I'm delighted to announce that another one of my works has found a home in a publication! Today it's Canvas Literary Journal, a magazine written by teenagers that is based in Rochester, New York.

Canvas is a magazine produced by teenagers from the Writers and Books program. My work is set to appear in the Spring 2014 issue, which will be their first ever venture into print. I'm so excited that my writing is going into print for the second time!

For writers and artists ages 13-18 - I would advise you to submit!

The story I sent in is called "Breadcrumb Nightlife", and to be short and sweet, it's about a ghost girl and a lost boy and a glittering corner of a too-big city. I hope that some of you get to read it, because it'll be available online once the issue is released.

Happy reading and writing to you all!

Christina

Hello! Looks like I can actually have a Fiction Friday up on time-ish this week, with two stories for your reading enjoyment.

"Snakebit" by Amanda Downum is a haunting, gritty speculative short story, on the long side for quick fiction but very worthwhile all the same. This selection is another one from Strange Horizons - I find that I really dig what they publish. "Snakebit" specifically has a deeply rooted sense of wistfulness and place. Its atmosphere and descriptions are superb, and the hints are gorgeous, just subtle enough to not be confusing but not horribly obvious. Here's a small excerpt, which shows you what I mean:

The rain had stopped, but clouds slid low across the sky, snagging against the distant silhouettes of grain elevators. Sodium lamps glazed wet asphalt with marigold light. Lanie drew a deep breath, tasting rain on concrete and bitter exhaust. By the time they reached her truck she'd gathered enough courage to ask her question.

You can read "Snakebit" here.

Next up is Mari Ness's "Undone", from Apex Magazine. This is another professional speculative fiction market that I'm looking forward to exploring more of, and "Undone" was a great introduction. I'll give you a hint: it's a fairy tale adaptation, but that element of it crept up on me so quietly that I didn't realize it until the piece had ended. Again, the prose is delectable, but it isn't overbearing. An excerpt, ladies and gentlemen, because you really do want to read this piece:

In the summer, they attach feathers to his other arm, and dress the rest of him in delicate white silk dripping with pearls, to draw the eye away, they explain. His arms remain heavy by his side, even as the feathers shift beneath the summer winds.

"Undone" is available online here.

Hopefully this is a nice addition to your Friday!

Christina

I have two bits of very exciting news.

Remember when I was freaking out about my regional gold key in the Scholastic Art and Writing Awards?

Some background taken from the website:

The Scholastic Art & Writing Awards has an impressive legacy dating back to 1923. Over the years, the Awards have grown to become the longest-running, most prestigious recognition program for creative teens in the U.S., and the nation’s largest source of scholarships for creative young artists and writers. A noteworthy roster of past winners includes Andy Warhol, Sylvia Plath, Truman Capote, Richard Avedon, Robert Redford, Joyce Carol Oates, Stephen King, John Updike, and many more.

Yeah, okay, pretty darn big, right?

I was pretty happy with my gold key at the regional level. I got a pretty pin in the mail and a nice letter and good feelings - what's not to love? I was hoping for an additional award, but I was also preparing myself to be disappointed. After all, apparently less than 1% of all submissions receive higher honors.

I'm telling you right now - I have a national gold medal for my short story "Service or Steel", in the Science Fiction/Fantasy category. Also, I have a national silver medal for On the Midnight Streets!

National. Gold. And silver.

*waitwhatslowdown*

The National Awards Ceremony is at Carnegie Hall on June 6, and my family's saying that we'll probably be able to go. This is very cool. I've never been to New York.

Also I am freaking out. I will be freaking out for a very long time. *exercises restraint in the freaking out* *fails*

(PS: If you go to my features page, it's been updated with these very shiny awards!)

Christina

Hello, everyone - I realize it's Sunday (or perhaps even Monday for some of you?), but I'm here with a belated excuse for a Fiction Friday.

Strange Horizons is a prominent professional literary magazine in the SF/F community. It publishes some all-around great work, and while I was digging around in its archives, I found a shivery, delightful piece called "Longfin's Daughters", written by O. J. Cade.

The thing that usually gets me about short fiction is the prose - lately I've been finding that if a story's writing style is lackluster, I'll lose interest. But combined with an eerie setup, the toothsome array of words was too wonderful to ignore. If anything about eels, sisterhood, slippery narration, or a flow like a fairy tale sounds up your alley, "Longfin's Daughters" will appeal to you. And even it if doesn't, I'd suggest that you give it a try.

Here's an excerpt:

(Her memory was a sheet of blank paper, thin and crisp like apple skin and translucent enough to see shadows of writing beneath—equations and diagrams that wriggled and squirmed out of their neat lines and tidy arcs into chaos.)

"Longfin's Daughters" is available to read here.

Enjoy, and feel free to leave feedback in the comments!

Christina

Well, I've missed so many Fiction Fridays that I might as well bundle up a whole slew of selections for you all in one post. My apologies - but please do enjoy the writings I've found today, in a variety of different genres!

First off is a bit of a throwback - a dark psychological story called "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, first published in 1892. We read it in school for our gothic literature unit, and unlike most of the other gothic short stories given to us, this one manages to be disturbing without supernatural elements. (Though Edgar Allan Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death" was brilliant.) The narrator's slow descent into insanity is chilling (made more so by the fact that she thinks she is completely stable) and a valuable lesson in narration/character development in a short story. There certainly isn't much plot, but the progression of the narrator's phases renders it almost unnecessary. Here's an excerpt from a description of the wallpaper itself:

It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide -- plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.

"The Yellow Wallpaper" is available to read here.

Over at WhiskeyPaper, a new favorite literary magazine of mine, I enjoyed this set of three stories by Katie Cortese, consisting of "Camping Christopher Creek", "A Geologic Survey of Love", and "Mead or, Mulberry Wine?". Cortese has a keenly observant writing style that is believable at the same time, which I admired. She makes the most mundane places and people whisper with a crystalline beauty. My favorite sentence of all from these three is probably this one from "A Geologic Survey of Love":

He is a music major satisfying his science credit and cannot fathom what I love about the turgid origins of volcanoes and salt-glittering caves, the calamitous shifting of tectonic plates moving secretly, eternally, beneath our feet.

Lackington's is a speculative prose magazine that I recently have been browsing through. One story, "Mon pays c'est l'hiver" by Amal El-Mohtar, really stuck out to me.

The gorgeous accompanying illustration for the piece, done by Paula Arwen Friedlander.

The writing style is graceful and bone-deep, perfect for cold nights and warm afternoons. When I first read the piece I could practically taste the yearning in every sentence. I was speechless. It's a genuine, breathtaking treasure of a piece, as you can see from the excerpt below:

Home is the sharp sheet of a frozen sun against the eyes, the taste of cold air crackling into the throat, the solid stud of ice beneath boots, a musical weight in measured steps scraping the ground beneath them; home is the white whirl of a granulated sky spiralling against lips and cheeks, falling in small kisses against a wrist unguarded.

Wow.

I really hope these three pieces light up your Friday and inspire you to scour the world for more great stories! Happy reading!

Christina

I have some more publication news to announce! My short story "You Will Know" is set to appear in the next issue of the sci-fi zine Stories from Space Camp. The issue's theme is "Bodies", and it's a UK-based print publication.

The story was a rather old one, and it centers around Remy Wilson, a survivor of a bomb that has destroyed her town. There's a slightly creepy twist ending thing at the end involving the body enhancements of a cyborg which you may want to watch out for if you purchase the zine.

I love getting stories published and hope that those of you who get to read this one enjoy it!

Christina

I'm so, so thrilled to announce that I've received my first blog award, the Liebster Award, from MorningTime4 over at The Ups and Downs of My Not-So-Average Life - thank you so much, Morning!

(Actually, I've taken a very long time to do this - hence the "much-belated" in the post title.)

The rules:

Each nominee must link back to the person that nominated them!
Answer the ten questions given to you by the nominator!
Nominate 10 other bloggers who have less than 200 followers!
Create 10 questions for your nominees to answer!
Let the nominees know you have nominated them by going to their website and notifying them!

Now, on to the questions - have fun getting to know a little more about me ~

1. Thing you are currently fangirling/obsessing about?

A: ALL THE THINGS. Actually, I have equal obsessions with certain books and certain TV shows. I'm an avid watcher of Sherlock and Downton Abbey (and most recently, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries). I love Jane Austen. I read The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater a little while ago and I'm still reeling from how beautiful that was.

2. Your quirkiest habit?

A: Talking to myself. All the time. I have a really hard time getting to sleep even on the best of nights, so I've developed a habit of talking to myself when I'm awake to soothe my nerves. Also, when I was around seven, I used to have these horribly vivid nightmares - which resulted in negotiations with the nightmares. (Strange as it is, that's not an exaggeration. I used to have bad dreams about a villain in a book I was reading but eventually made friends with him by just talking. Note to self: it seems I have more social skills when talking to imaginary evil people than I do in real life.)

3. Your dream travel destination?

A: Right now it's actually London. Literary landmarks, Big Ben, classy accents... what's not to love?

4. Guilty pleasure?

A: Hmm... well-done romance in books? That just makes me feel all fuzzy - it also makes my feels hurt. (Or perhaps surfing Tumblr at night when I can't sleep would be more accurate. That's usually what happens when talking to myself gets boring - I follow lots of poetry blogs and fandom blogs and I have way more fun on that website than I probably should.)

5. Who was the last person you waved hello?

A: I think that would be my younger brother.

6. Favorite YouTuber?

A: I don't actually watch YouTube videos much, so I really can't say :(

7. Your favorite fruit?

A: I love raspberries so much it's kind of unhealthy. Also apples. And strawberries. (I like a lot of fruits.)

8. Have you ever watched the movie version of a book before you actually read it?

A: I watched the movie version of Emma with Gwyneth Paltrow in it and I haven't actually finished the book yet. *I got all the spoilers!* But in general, I try to read the book first, especially now that YA movie adaptations are becoming a huge trend.

9. Your favorite store?

A: The bookshop near my house, hands down. Every time I go, I might intend to spend ten minutes there - but of course, I end up staying for at least an hour. Always.

10. Harry Potter or Percy Jackson (if you have read the books? If you haven't, then just say which one you would rather read based on the series titles...)?

A: I'm actually going to have to say Percy Jackson on this one. (Unpopular opinion, I know.) I read the Harry Potter series when I was around seven or eight, so I've 'grown out of it' since then, and even though I'm not a huge fan of the Heroes of Olympus series that comes after Percy Jackson, I liked the original books. It's interesting that I'm asked to compare these two series because I've always felt a parallel between Harry-Ron-Hermione and Percy-Grover-Annabeth, but when it comes down to it, the latter trio is much more endearing to me. That said, neither of these series are my favorite thing in the world, really - I'd much rather read the Infernal Devices or the Fire and Thorns trilogy or the Grisha trilogy (...and so it goes).

Questions for the Nominees: