Good Morning Internet

I am extremely excited to announce that my pro­posed ses­sion for SXSW Inter­ac­tive 2011 is now listed on this year’s Pan­elPicker web­site. It’s called “Why New Authors Should Think Like Indie Bands”. Here’s the offi­cial description:

The pub­lish­ing world is wrought with uncer­tainty. Tra­di­tional book sales are down, dig­i­tal pub­lish­ing is in its infancy, and pub­lish­ing houses, faced with shrink­ing bud­gets, are forced to shy away from pub­lish­ing nov­els writ­ten by new, untested authors. The rules of the indus­try are chang­ing. Before approach­ing agents and pub­lish­ers, new fic­tion authors are work­ing to self-publish and grow audi­ences with social media tools. When they approach a pub­lisher with a new novel and a built-in audi­ence, they take note. On this panel, hear from lit­er­ary agents and authors describe the way the indus­try is chang­ing and why it doesn’t mean doom-and-gloom for unknown fic­tion writ­ers. They’ll share suc­cess sto­ries, prac­ti­cal advice, and opin­ions on the future of publishing.

I really hope that my ses­sion makes it through the com­mu­nity vot­ing process, which counts for 30% of the final deci­sion, along with a 30% say of the staff and 40% of the advi­sory board. If you’re plan­ning on going to SXSW, I’d cer­tainly appre­ci­ate it if you include my ses­sion amongst those you vote up for next year’s con­fer­ence. If you’re not plan­ning on attend­ing, I still sug­gest you check out the Pan­elPicker and help shape next year’s SXSW Inter­ac­tive con­fer­ence. There are some really excit­ing ideas in there, and I hope you think mine is one of them.

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• I’m lead­ing a panel at SXSW Interactive!
• The year of adven­ture continues

Wake up and find the chil­dren, their bod­ies told them.
The rear half of the house belonged to fire.
Melissa, their youngest, raced out­side with the dog.
The hall­way belonged to toxic, inky smoke.
They found Ramona, frozen in bed.
Adren­a­line made lift­ing her effort­less.
The fire roared hun­grily.
Out­side, they hud­dled.
They watched.
Together.

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My dad always told me that car­ni­val games were rigged.
I won Melissa’s stuffed bear in only six tries.
In her base­ment, she said she was preg­nant.
Impos­si­ble, we were vir­gins until last month.
She cried and I held her.
She called from the doctor’s.
She couldn’t see me.
Her mom said.
I begged.
Wait.

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“With­draw as much money as the machine will let you.“
From the knife, I could tell he wasn’t jok­ing.
“Are you sure you want to do this?“
He jabbed my neck to say yes.
Acci­den­tally, I entered the wrong PIN.
The knife probed my back.
I tried once more.
Crisp twen­ties emerged.
He fled.
Richer.

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I recently did a series of flash fic­tion for my work­shop class. A few of them turned out pretty good, I thought, so I’ll post them here. This par­tic­u­lar exer­cise starts with a ten-word sen­tence, fol­lowed by a nine-word sen­tence, and so on down to one word.

It was bright, even for a Sat­ur­day morn­ing in June.
Erica’s beauty gave me and my plan new strength.
Thank God I made it with enough time.
“Speak now, or for­ever hold your peace.”
“Yeah, I’ve got some­thing to say.“
All faces snapped around, hor­ri­fied.
What’s-his-face glared.
Erica’s eyes sparkled.
I spoke.
Per­sua­sively.

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