“Storm-yarn” in issue 9 of inkscrawl!

Published on by Sara Norja Category: poetry, publication

The newest issue of inkscrawl is up – and with it, my poem “Storm-yarn”. I’m really looking forward to reading the other poems in this issue – guest editor Bogi Takács has got together some really exciting poets! And a nice big issue. Yesss.

I wrote “Storm-yarn” in August specifically for the submission call for this issue, but the original inspiration comes from a story I started in 2007 (!). I never did finish the story – it wasn’t really very good – but the notion of knitting up a storm came from there. I wrote a short poem-draft based around the idea in December 2012, but it went no further till Bogi announced the topic for issue 9 (Atypical Weather), and my brain started ferreting around for ideas. “Storm-yarn” bears no similarity to the poem from 2012, but the same idea of yarn and storms is there – and now it’s finally out in a form that I’m very happy with.

Sunday recs: Stories + novels

Published on by Sara Norja Category: books, linkage, novelette, review

Sunday recs! Featuring three delightful short stories, and two excellent novels.

Tomorrow When We See the Sun by A. Merc Rustad (in Lightspeed) – a weird and cool space opera. A dark atmosphere but so beautiful. Merc’s worldbuilding is great, and I especially love how they use language. Poetic writing in prose <3

And the Balance in Blood by Elizabeth Bear (in Uncanny Magazine) – such a delightful novelette!! In contrast to Merc’s story, this one is hopeful and has lots of funny bits. This story reminds me that I should get round to reading Bear’s novels.

Wing by Amal El-Mohtar (in Strange Horizons) – a lovely short piece from 2012, lyrical and strange. Mystical books, yay.

***

Then for the novels: I’ve got longer reviews/squee for these on Goodreads, but I just really want to recommend two novels from this autumn that I read recently:

Black Wolves, Kate Elliott’s newest novel – set in the same world as her Crossroads trilogy, but you needn’t have read the trilogy to enjoy this one. (I greatly enjoyed the references to the trilogy, though!) In fact, I didn’t even like the Crossroads trilogy as much as Elliott’s other stuff, but omgggg I adored Black Wolves. So, so good. A must-read if you’re into epic fantasy. It does some pretty bold things with structure, but I think it works very well. And there were so many great characters. Lots of women being awesome, and a very interesting portrayal of a fantasy society in the process of great societal changes. So great. I wish I could re-read this book again with new eyes, but I’m sure I’ll enjoy rereading it in any case.

Sorcerer to the Crown by Zen Cho – which I just read over Christmas. A riot of a book, vastly different from Black Wolves, but that was probably a good thing since I’d just finished BW before starting SttC. Zen Cho’s got a really good Regency thing going on: I’m so happy there’s more stuff in the general vein of Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell! This was a light read on the surface, but Cho also deals really well with issues of e.g. racism and colonialism.

I’m really looking forward to the next parts of the trilogies for both BW and SttC!

Finnish story “Vierain silmin” in Usva!

Published on by Sara Norja Category: announcement, finnish, publication, short stories

I just noticed that the Finnish ezine Usva has published its folklore issue, which includes my story “Vierain silmin” (‘With Strange Eyes’). You can read the whole issue here – well, if you can read Finnish, that is. (I recommend downloading the PDF – it’s got pretty pictures and the text is formatted more nicely.) I can’t wait to read the rest of the stories, they look great!

“Vierain silmin” is set in the Finnish city of Turku, and is a weird urban fantasy thing about the otherworldly perils that may befall a person wandering into a park at night.

Anyway yaaay! I’m just so pleased to have another story out in Finnish. I feel more confident with my Finnish-language creative writing these days; I still write more in English, but I feel that I can write in Finnish too (even poetry!), which makes all the difference.

Some story notes in Finnish, because well, you have to know Finnish to read this story:

Eli suomeksi (en tiedä olenko ennen kirjoittanut suomeksi tässä blogissa, oudon tuntuista!): kirjoitin novellin alun perin kilpailua varten, jossa etsittiin Turkuun sijoittuvia spefinovelleja. Olin hurjan iloinen, että uskalsin myöhemmin lähettää sen Usvaan. Sain Usvan toimittajalta Anne Leinoselta todella hyviä kommentteja, joiden perusteella muokkasin novellin sen lopulliseen muotoon. Käyn Turussa säännöllisesti jatko-opintojeni takia, mutta kaupunki on kuitenkin aina jollain tapaa vieras, ei koti – eli oli mielenkiintoista kirjoittaa sinne sijoittuva novelli. Siinä näkyy jonkin verran “minun Turkuani”. Tosin itse en ole (vielä?) törmännyt kummallisiin rituaaleihin Kupittaan puistossa. 😉

Poetry sale to Polu Texni

Published on by Sara Norja Category: announcement, poetry, publication

I’ve sold a poem to Polu Texni – “Witch’s Lens”, due to appear around the Spring Equinox next year. Yay!

I’ve been lax with posting lately, alas, for the busyness has continued. I haven’t been writing as much after Nanowrimo, which is sad, but I have been tinkering a bit with my poetry collection. I really need to get that revised by the end of the year.

I should also probably make an awards post, but doing that is pretty daunting because my impostor syndrome keeps telling me it’s preposterous for me to do such a thing. Silly brain.

Nanowrimo epic win!

Published on by Sara Norja Category: discussion, nanowrimo, novelling, personal babble

No Sunday recs today – I’m too wiped out by a) finishing up a (not great) draft of an academic article in the morning, and b) writing around 5,000 words of my novel and thus WINNING NANOWRIMO YAAAY. This counts as an epic win because not only did I get over 50k, I wrapped up the whole story, too.

113 pages, 17 chapters. LibreOffice says I’ve got 51,565 words, the Nanowrimo website says 51,871. But whatever the precise wordcount – it means Nanowrimo success, and I actually finished this novel draft too, typed “the end” and all. Feeling dazed but very pleased. This is the most coherent Nanowrimo draft I’ve ever managed! A lot of that is thanks to the fact that I was using a lot of elements from the old version of the novel – but in the end, this novel is very distinctly its own thing.

I think I’m getting a bit better at plotting too, which is encouraging. I tried many different tactics for plotting before Nano, but in the end something like the “tent pole” method worked best (see this excellent post by Chuck Wendig). I figured out the most essential plot points – both external and internal – before Nano and especially after the first week, when I stopped to plan things out properly. Then, as I wrote, I figured out the stuff that needed to come in between those plot points, and by the end was outlining chapters in even more detail. This method worked for this draft, at least!

Oh yeah, how weird was it to actually divide the novel into chapters during Nano? REALLY WEIRD. But it seemed to work for this draft, surprisingly enough.

I think that with some editing (well, plenty) this might become Something. And that makes me very happy. I’m so glad I didn’t abandon this old idea – which was what I was on the verge of doing at the end of October. I’m so glad I managed to have enough energy to write every day (or very nearly every day) during a month that has mostly been horrendously busy, and dark, and stressful.

Nanowrimo saved my November.

Sunday recs: Sunshine

Published on by Sara Norja Category: linkage, short stories

The world’s a horrible mess right now, even more than usual. As an antidote for all the hate and attacks worldwide, here is a story to read that gave me the warm fuzzies. Reader, I hope it brings you joy too.

Shimmering, Warm and Bright by Shveta Thakrar (in the current issue of Interfictions). I read this story today and it made me feel so content. It’s written so beautifully, such loving attention to language. Despite the difficult issues dealt with in it, the positivity shining through (pun intended) made me feel hopeful. More anti-grimdark stuff like this, please!

An Alphabet of Embers cover reveal!

Published on by Sara Norja Category: announcement, flailing

Squee! Cover reveal day for An Alphabet of Embers, an anthology of unclassifiables, edited by Rose Lemberg and including a story by yours truly!

Look at the pretty!

And here is Sofia Samatar’s blurb for the book:

“An Alphabet of Embers pulses with passionate lyricism. These tales burn, rage, comfort, and light the night. Each piece gives off its own particular glow; together, they illuminate a startling new landscape of speculative fiction, of world literature, of language.” -Sofia Samatar, World Fantasy Award winner

This is going to be an amazing thing, and I’m not just saying that because I’ve got my own cow in the ditch (as we say in Finnish). Really happy to be part of this project. Publication in early 2016!

Sunday recs: Bone Swans

Published on by Sara Norja Category: linkage, review

I just finished Bone Swans, a collection of stories by C.S.E. Cooney – very highly recommended!

A great collection of stories, poetry singing along with the narrative (and often included, too, to dazzling effect). C.S.E. Cooney’s writing just has this amazing energy and panache to it. I love it. How they’re written – the juicy, glorious language – is such an important part of her stories. This collection is really diverse, with a range of narrators and styles.

My favourites were “Martyr’s Gem” and “How the Milkmaid Struck a Bargain with the Crooked One”, stories I’d enjoyed already previously. I just adore pretty much every character in “Martyr’s Gem” – especially lovely Shursta! The oral culture is done so well, too. The storytelling bit always gives me the shivers.

“How the Milkmaid Struck a Bargain with the Crooked One” is an awesome fairytale reworking. The narrator is such a joy, and I love how this version plays out. It’s set in the same world as some of Cooney’s other stories, too, such as “The Last Sophia” (in Strange Horizons) and her two Dark Breakers novellas – all of them highly recommended too! It’s so cool to see a writer doing several stories in the same world.

I was also really impressed by “Life on the Sun” and “The Bone Swans of Amandale” (so creepy in a great fairytale way!). The final tale, “The Big Bah-Ha”, appealed to me the least, but I think that’s mostly because I’m creeped out by clowns and so couldn’t enjoy the story as much due to subject matter. However, that was basically my only quibble with this collection.

You should also check out all of Claire Cooney’s poetry because it’s awesome.

Nanowrimo time!

Published on by Sara Norja Category: discussion, nanowrimo, novelling

Sooo it’s 1 November, and obviously that means NANOWRIMO. I’m swamped with PhD and translation/language check work, but despite that, I’m doing Nano again. Since 2008, I’ve only not done it for one year (2013), so I guess I’m a bit hooked. 😀

Nano is just a great way to get a writing project done despite busyness. The group support of the Nano site just really helps me get stuff done. There’s something about that word count bar…

Yep. This year I’m sort of continuing what I did during Camp Nanowrimo in April: rewriting an old novel (…originally my first Nanowrimo novel, in 2008, ooops) that really couldn’t survive in its old form. The plan is for this to be the last time I rewrite this thing. If this attempt doesn’t work, I’ll just trunk the thing.

But based on how quickly I got my word count for today done, I suspect this might even work! Changing from 3rd to 1st person was probably a good choice. Now to get the final plot nailed down as much as I can, to make writing during busydays easier – and then some more writing, because really, it’s been ages since I wrote this much and I’d forgotten how much fun it is.