There be pirates, there be...

Ooh-Arrrgh, me 'earties, I've been pirated. I've found a Spanish website that's offering Burying Brian download as a free PDF file.

And I don't know whether to laugh that someone actually thinks my writing worth stealing, or to cry that someone is illegally giving away a book that took five years of my life to create.

The website is completely in Spanish, and as far as I can see there's not even a method to contact them and complain (I'm sure I could whip up a half-decent bemoan at them using Google Translate).

Take that! There are penguins in Spain, aren't there?

On the legitimate publishing front, my story, The Women Who Point at Men's Hearts, has been taken for the winter edition of Sein und Werden. This was originally written for one of the Shock Totem flash competitions as The Man Who Pointed at the Sun, and didn't poll a single vote (oh how genius so often goes unnoticed, eh? :-)

Also, The Perils of War and Death According to the Common People of Hansom Street is now published in Black Static issue 31, which I understand is imminently available to the unwashed masses.

For you, short story, the war is over

It’s nice to report that top UK dark fiction Magazine Black Static has accepted a short story of mine for publication. This will mark my third appearance in Black Static, although as yet I don’t know what issue will carry the story.

The story, War and Death According to the Common People of Hansom Street, is one of the most subtle pieces of writing I’ve ever produced. I wanted to explore warfare on the smallest, most personal level, to suggest war itself is mostly made up of little individual wars that may take many forms—both internal and external.

What resulted was a story with no real protagonist, no real plot and instead consists of a number of linked, real-time vignettes set over a very short period of time. It’s filled with ordinary people, none of whom want to be heroes but rather just want to live out their lives. I also added an ethereal character (loosely based on Death itself) whose appearances are often fleeting and deliberately vague, and whose induced confusion is an extended metaphor for how I imagine living in grave situations during warfare must feel to such ordinary people.

I’ll be interested to read any comments on this when published. I imagine opinion will be somewhat polarised—people will either ‘get it’ or not, will probably like it or loathe it. Because of this I feared I might struggle to place this story, and so I’m doubly pleased that Black Static saw its worth and decided to take a chance on it.

Mentioned Honourably

I picked up a couple of Honourable Mentions in Ellen Datlow's Year's Best Horror. Whilst there were 608 HMs in all, and it could be argued that they are 'close but no cigar' entities in that the stories mentioned didn't make it into the actual anthology, my inclusion never-the-less made me smile.

Ellen datlow

I suppose we cling to any nod that we're heading in the right direction. And there is, of course, the thought that Datlow is amongst the top editors in her field.

First mention was for my story This is Mary's Moon, published in Black Static issue 22.

The second was for 'Ruth Across the Sea', published as a flash fiction winner in issue three of Shock Totem.

This is Mary's Moon and Black Static issue 22

Black Static issue 22 is now available.

In this issue is my story "This is Mary's Moon", the 'sister story' (in that it grew from the same seed before going its own way) to my tale "The Spring Heel", published in Haunted Legends anthology and itself gathering favourable reviews.

The artwork, by Dave Senecal and shown above, is rather special.

Also included is Pete Tennant's fabulous review of Burying Brian, in which Pete says such nice things as: "…the gentle humour that informs this work, the self-mocking way the characters have about them and the beguiling prose with which Pirie captures their actions and attitudes." and "…you marvel at Pirie's ingenuity and his ability to continually find some phrasing that will put a smile on the most curmudgeonly of faces…"

And as if that's not enough of me, there's also an interview in which I discuss amongst other things the battle of the sexes. If you want to know who won, and the fight was dirty I can say, then you need to buy Black Static 22.

It's available at: Black Static

How long?

Dear me, is it really that long since I wrote anything in here?

Tut, I say; tut and procrastination.

The biggest news on the writing front is that not only does the next (hopefully) issue of Black Static include a short story of mine named "This is Mary's Moon", but it also carries an interview with me, and has a review of Burying Brian.

Even jokingly I'd never dare suggest to them they rename it the Steven Pirie edition. :-)