Meanwhile…

According to the May Table of Contents, “The Squeeze” will be going up over at Every Day Fiction on the 11th. It’ll be a funny little story to start your week. Unfortunately that’s right in the middle of my vacation, so I won’t be around to really see the response. I’ll do my best to check in, though.

Yes, I’ll be going on vacation next week, starting on Wednesday. The wife and I are California bound. We’ll meet up with friends in LA and drive up to San Francisco. As per local law, I will be wearing flowers in my hair.

This weekend will be crammed with chores and preparation for the vacation, but I will find some time to go see the Wolverine film. I believe we have some free passes around here somewhere, and this seems a good time to use them.

The formula for superhero films is always that the more characters you add, the worse it gets. I don’t get why the studios still haven’t learned this. Wolverine seems to be adding as many unnecessary characters as possible to an already complex origin story, virtually guaranteeing disaster. Wolverine is one of those characters who can be fun even in a bad story, so I think it should still be at least moderately entertaining.

Every Day Fiction in it’s infinite wisdom has accepted a new flash piece from me entitled “The Squeeze.” It’s another light, humorous piece. They had me do some rewriting on it, and it came out much better afterward. It comes in under 300 words, but packs potent amusement (but probably only for certain demographics – we shall see)! 

Thanks to Stephanie for helping me with a final tweak that was bothering me!

Expect to see it sometime in May, I would guess.

FORT WORTH, TX. Author Alexander Burns today announced the sale of book rights to HarperCollins Children’s Books for his prose book, “The Pizzasaurus.” The book follows the adventures of a young boy and his friends as they confront a deadly menace to their community and pizza parlors. Mr. Burns utilizes nearly thirty years of experience consuming pizza and doodling dinosaurs to bring to light the perils of such a grotesque combination.

Said Mr. Burns at the announcement briefing, “I can only hope that this book will shed some light on this serious problem. The problem of dinosaurs eating all our pizza.”

“I think it’s a remarkable piece of work,” said Neil Gaiman, whose HarperCollins-published “The Graveyard Book” won the 2009 John Newbery Medal. “Very much a fantasy a young child can identify with.”

When asked about the inspiration for the work, Mr. Burns replied, “Uh, I don’t really remember. I wrote it when I was like nine. Mrs. Mitchell, my fourth grade teacher, liked it, though.”

“We’re very excited to begin this relationship with such a fresh voice,” said Susan Katz, President and Publisher of HarperCollins Children’s Books. “I’m well aware of the outcry concerning young boys and pizza. We feel like this is an important step forward for a topic largely kept out of the public eye.”

Illustrations for the book are expected to be produced by renowned French illustrator Françoise Mouly.

HarperCollins will publish the audio edition of the book on CD and digital download simultaneous with the hardcover publication.

The good folks over at Every Day Fiction have created a new branch of their site, a blog for writers to write about writing. I offered up an article for today’s entry, so you can cruise over to there if you’d like.

http://www.everydayfiction.com/flashfictionblog/

If you have anything you’d like to say about writing, feel free to submit! They are voracious for content! And keep an eye on that space, I will likely have more to add there in the future.

Just a couple of things I wanted to mention today:

OMG! The Book of Awesome Stuff has re-opened to submissions. If you are a writer and have a batshit-crazy story you don’t know what to do with, send it in! Stephanie and I both have weird stories accepted there. It should be an interesting anthology. A portion of the proceeds go to charity.

Speaking of Stephanie, she’s gone mad and started posting a writing prompt every day over at her site. They’re great prompts, and should provide some good starting points/inspiration if you ever want to knock out a piece of flash fiction or get yourself out of some writing funk.

And speaking of knocking out a piece of flash fiction, I wrote a little something today that I think is pretty funny. We’ll see if Every Day fiction thinks so! It’s the shortest (complete) thing I’ve ever written at only 140 words, but I think it works.

Check out that cover! Our friends Jordan and Camille, from the barren tundras of their frosty homeland in Canada, have produced excellent work.

Yes, the Best of Every Day Fiction 2008 Anthology is finished and ready to order, both in a handsome hardcover edition and a paperback. You’ll find my flash crime mystery “Aftershocks” as well as 99 other awesome stories.

You can purchase it here!

Just discovered today (thanks for the head’s up, KC!) that “Aftershocks” has been selected for The Best of Every Day Fiction 2008, a print anthology due out by the end of the year. Awesome! Only 100 stories were chosen, so this is a real honor. It’s going to be a fantastic book. Several friends and friends of the blog have been included (some of them several times over).

Once it becomes available for purchase I’ll let you guys know.

Whoa, someone has pointed out to me that “Aftershocks” has managed to crack the Top 10 over at EDF. I’m blushing! I doubt it’ll be there long, but it’s pretty cool nonetheless.

My light, funny flash piece, Apotheosis Cake, is live over at Every Day Fiction. Check it out! There are already several excellent comments! Don’t these people sleep?

http://www.everydayfiction.com/apotheosis-cake-by-alexander-burns/

Oh, I just noticed the EDF Authors page is down. If you’re interested in my previous stories there, they can be found here and here.

So Every Day Fiction has released their Table of Contents for October, and it is exciting!

My story will be on the 20th. I like that this particular story falls on a Monday; it’s a light, funny piece, so maybe it will help the bleary-eyed Monday grumps perk up their day.

Anyway, Erin’s “A Million Faces” falls just a few days after mine. Shortly before mine will be KC’s “In His Prime,” and in about a week or so we’ll be treated with Kevin’s “Outlast the Stars.” Sprinkle in a few names such as Sylvia Spruck Wrigley and Sarah Hillary and you’ve got an all-star month.

Oh, and today’s XKCD is quite excellent.

Post Post Script: Oh, and it is also Banned Books Week, apparently. Go read some Mark Twain or something. Few things that infuriate me more than attempts to ban books.