So Stupefying Stories was going to shut down after issue #25. As of this past March, two of my stories had been held by them, in limbo, for over two years. There was, let us say, some breakdown in their process. Given the magazine's imminent demise and my disinclination to be caught up in another pointless contract with them, I moved on.

And so, of course, Stupefying has resurrected itself and has plans to continue indefinitely. They got their act together. Ostensibly. But here I am, out.

Very rude of them.

Just as well, I guess. I understand the root cause of their troubles, but I doubt their time of caprice is over.

Much as I would have liked my two stories to have been published, there's a benefit to their being unaccepted again. I am unlikely to sell them elsewhere but I kind of don't care. I've been putting together volumes of my collected SF stories (for sale) and of course they can't be published using stories that are caught up in exclusivity clauses. Had Stupefying not gone off the rails, both my stories would already be out of exclusivity and available for publication by me. If Stupefying still had them, it might be another year or more before they showed up in the magazine (if at all), and my volumes would be delayed — and I want them all to come out by the end of 2023.

In some ways I've lost interest in getting published at all. I still want to be in Cirsova and StoryHack, but otherwise... eh. I know I won't sell any copies of my books, but I want to try, and I don't want to put them off, and I want the two stories to be included (because they're good).

So Wayward Scarecrow and Banana Man will be "previously unpublished" additions to their respective volumes, and that might even be a bit nifty.

Normally I wouldn't write an SF retelling of a fairy tale, but Shoreline of Infinity put out a call for such stories and, hey, why not? I picked a Grimm staple that was neither obvious nor obscure and sent it along. I titled my tale An Escalation of Wishes but frankly I prefer my second choice of title, Fishes and Wishes. It might get accepted.

If it is, it will come out in their special September issue. In August The Impossible Footprint will be published by Cirsova. So autumn is when I'd like to announce my SF volumes, which will be released on some regular basis over the subsequent year. Strike when the iron is hot! Even if Shoreline rejects me, that Cirsova publication will be significant, since I will be the cover story!

As reported in my previous post, way back in January, I finished the fifth Hamlin Becker story A Devil's Intuition. I'm planning a sixth. The fourth, His Own Ends, has been in the can for a long time, now. I wish StoryHack was active. I'm presuming that these stories will get accepted by StoryHack, which, I admit, is presumptuous; but StoryHack published the first three, so, hope? But the longer StoryHack is inactive, the more it messes with the timing of my volumes, which must include the Becker stuff.

Please, StoryHack... Arise!

I had intended to finish the second Hak Iri story Motive of Man, and indeed started work on it earlier this year. But in general, apart from the silly energy I spent on Wishes, I haven't been too enthusiastic about writing. Or anything.

Anyhow, part of my impetus was to have Motive ready for Cirsova's annual call for submissions at the end of the summer, but I've decided that The Unshrouded Stars would be a better submission. I wrote that for Cirsova in the first place and, fortuitously, Cirsova has a hankering for horror these days. So — perfect!

This relieves the pressure to complete Motive — which, again, was not ripping along — and also frees me up to resume the Becker stuff, which I really want to resolve before I get hit by a truck.

So that's my plan for the summer: (1) Finish Becker #6 and (2) Get ready to launch my SF volumes... which, by the way, are to be called Stellar Stories.

Oh. Some big news I almost forgot. I have fully regained my rights to the three books that Simon & Schuster published in the '90s. Not sure what I'm going to do with that, but it's nice that they're all mine again.