Spencer Rhys Hughes

Writer, Actor, Curator of Cool.

[thesrhughes]

I like finding secret stranger messages. #quickbuck #cometomaine #maine #message #bill https://www.instagram.com/p/BnEG8FHhrZ9/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=5xhaqbxqruxx

[breannacarroll-blog]

Publishing for Fun and Profit

So there was a list going around tumblr for a while that made it to my dash of literary journals that accept open submissions (and will pay!), but upon inspection about half of them were closed indefinitely, and I found quite a few other places that looked interesting through further research, so I wanted to post my own list. 

I tried to focus on things that paid professional grade (at least 6 cents per word), were friendly to speculative fiction, and specifically encouraged diversity and writing about marginalized groups.

(Please note that as of right now I have never submitted or been published with any of these, so if anyone has experience with them, good or bad, please feel free to message or reblog this with your experiences.)

Speculative Fiction

Strange Horizons — Speculative fiction (broadly defined) with an emphasis on diversity, unusual styles, and stories that address politics in nuanced ways. 8c per word. Up to 10,000 words, under 5,000 preferred. Responds within 40 days. LGBT+ positive.

Fantasy & Science Fiction Magazine — Sci-fi, fantasy, horror, etc. 7-12c per word. Up to 25,000 words. No response times listed.

Asimov’s Science Fiction — Primarily sci-fi but accepts fantasy and surreal fiction, but no high fantasy/sword and sorcery. Prefers writing that is character driven. 8-10c per word. 1,000-20,000 words. Responds in about five weeks.

Evil Girlfriend Media — Horror and urban fantasy centered on female empowerment and defying gender stereotypes. $100 flat payment. 4,000-7,000 words. No response times given. LGBT+ friendly.

Beneath Ceaseless Skies — Fantasy with a focus on secondary worlds and characters. 6c per word. Up to 10,000 words. Average response time 2-4 weeks.

Fantastic Stories — Speculative fiction with an emphasis on diversity and literary style. 15c per word. Up to 3,000 words. Responds within two weeks. LGBT+ positive.

Fiction Vortex — Serialized fantasy and speculative fiction. $300 for featured stories, $50 otherwise. 3,500 words or less. No response times given.

Shimmer — Speculative fiction with an emphasis on diversity, strong plots, vivid characters, and beautiful writing. 5c per word. 7,500 words or less (will consider longer words with query letter). Usually responds within two weeks. LGBT+ positive.

Clarkesworld Magazine — Sci-fi, fantasy, and other speculative fiction. 10c per word up to 5,000 words, 8c per word after. 1,000-16,000 words. Responds within days usually, gives a tracking number.

Apex Magazine — Speculative fiction of all kinds. 6c per word, +1c per word for podcast stories. Up to 7,500 words, all submissions over will be auto-rejected. Responds within 30 days.

Heliotrope Magazine — Speculative fiction of all kinds. 10c per word. Up to 5,000 words. Responds within 30 days.

Lightspeed Magazine — Speculative fiction of all kinds, with creativity and originality in terms of style and format encouraged. 8c per word. 1,500-10,000 words, under 5,000 preferred. LGBT+ positive. Submissions temporarily closed for their main magazine but is accepting for their People of Color Destroy Science Fiction special.

General Fiction

The Sun Magazine — General fiction, likes personal writing or writing of a cultural/political significance. $300-$1500 flat payment  and a one year subscription to the magazine for fiction (also accepts essays and poetry). No minimum or maximum lengths but over 7,000 words discouraged. Responds in 3-6 months. Physical submissions only.

One Story — Any and all varieties of fiction, “unique and interesting” stories encouraged. $500 payment plus 25 contributor copies. 3,000-8,000 words. Usually responds in 2-3 months.

Camera Obscura — General fiction. $1000 for featured story, $50 for “Bridge the Gap” award, no payment for other contributors. 250-8,000 words. Response time vary, running just over two months as of now.

Flash Fiction 

Daily Science Fiction — Speculative flash fiction (including sci-fi, fantasy, slipstream, etc.). 8c per word. Up to 1,500 words, but shorter stories given priority. Response times not listed.

Vestral Review — General flash fiction. 3-10c per word depending on length to a max of $25. Up to 500 words. Response within four months.

Flash Fiction Online — General flash fiction. $60 flat payment. 500-1,000 words. Response times not listed.

Novels/Novella

Riptide Publishing — Any LGBTQ manuscripts between 15,000 and 150,000 words. Currently especially interested in lesbian romances, trans stories, asexual/aromantic stories, romances with a happy ending, and genre fiction such as urban fantasy. Also has a YA branch.  LGBT+ positive.

Crimson Romance — Romance stories of all kinds, currently seeking LGBT+ stories with a focus on emotional connections and relationships, especially m/m romance. Novel (55,000-90,000 words) or novella (20,000-50,000 words) length.  LGBT+ positive.

Kindle Direct Publishing 

Kindle Direct Publishing — Allows you to set your own prices, create your own cover art, and make royalties off of each sell. Any and all genres are welcome and if you’re prolific and smart about how you’re publishing you can make pretty good money.

General Guide to Kindle Publishing — Gives a good rundown of the publishing process on Kindle.

101 Guide to Kindle Erotica — Great guide with lots of resources about how to make money publishing erotica on Kindle.   

Publishing Comics/Graphic Novels

Here is a list of potential comic companies and what kind of open submissions they accept.  

Here is a list of literary agents who accept graphic novels. 

[heywriters]

“Screw writing “strong” women. Write interesting women. Write well-rounded women. Write complicated women. Write a woman who kicks ass, write a woman who cowers in a corner. Write a woman who’s desperate for a husband. Write a woman who doesn’t need a man. Write women who cry, women who rant, women who are shy, women who don’t take no shit, women who need validation and women who don’t care what anybody thinks. THEY ARE ALL OKAY, and all those things could exist in THE SAME WOMAN. Women shouldn’t be valued because we are strong, or kick-ass, but because we are people. So don’t focus on writing characters who are strong. Write characters who are people.”

— Words of great wisdom on strong female characters~ by madlori (via laughingskeleton)

[thesrhughes]

Short: The Oracle as We Burn

New Post has been published on http://thesrhughes.com/short-the-oracle-as-we-burn/

Short: The Oracle as We Burn

Background

A little while ago I had a rough writing day, a day where I started a bunch of short/flash projects but never took any of them very far.  A day of one-to-three sentence beginnings, where the middles and endings slipped through my fingers.  But a lovely treasure of a human being advised me to stitch all these failed attempts into a patchwork of a story, and so I did.  What emerged from this stew of beginnings is…well, weird, to say the least.  Weird and dark and chopped up.  It features non-linear time, characters-as-archetypes (or vice versa), and a strange hunt for The Boogeyman.  In terms of linear-event-narrative, well, it’s not the clearest piece I’ve ever written, I’ll give you that.  But it’s a bit of fun.  Check it out!

The Oracle as We Burn

I can’t remember – it started after we imbued the drugs with magic – the unspooling of ourselves skulls blooming – expanding into each other teeth first – the first time I saw us in the broken mirror – when did the halls here unravel? – how long have we splintered outside of time? – who made the mask? –

she flicks the ash from her cigarette she flicks the ash from her cigarette I ask “what does that mean?” she unseams her lips “it’s just a cigarette, it means nothing” but then they came for her under blood and not long after they burned the witch

Out there in the woods, a tree unfurls its roots; they are nooses. Its branches are bone. It claws at the clouds until sunlight spills out. Its decades aren’t carried in the rings of its trunk, but in the bodies hanged up unrevenged. How many children have hanged there? How many boogeymen have added to its collection of bones?

The sun slices itself open along the horizon and the sky curdles with its blood. That’s when they came.

we shot up in the corner, beneath the unflinching gaze of digital vitreous we fell // we fall– today is forever and the syringe is always full

I can’t remember remembering, memories shuffle together, 52 card pickup. Out there in the woods, gnarls of knotted bark blink their blackened eyes. Overhead, the CCTV blinks its squishy lens. Cataracts, cataracts.

When the Ragged Man comes over the cracked stones, when the skyscrapers drown, when the apocalypse pulls its punch, flip the coin. It tumbles to its zenith upward and pauses and you will know. When the Ragged Man comes over the desert, prepare.

we introduced alchemy to the manufacture of our recreational pills and powders – we studied the dust-dead languages – we stared into the squirming void and memorized the texture of its skin – when fighting monsters, do drugs – do not become, that’s for later – when you stare into the abyss – this overdose is nothing, we have only collapsed into the corner of the next room –

She shrieks with white phosphorous, a flare against the black. The last I saw the Oracle, she tumbled, sparking, into darkness, her last wails the mourning of dead gods.

He didn’t exist until we feared him into existence. We told the stories around campfires and flashlights and flickering candles and the universe heard our whispers and provided. When the first child went missing, I can’t remember.

there is a house at the end of the lane go there by night, you won’t find it by day (and when you arrive we think that you’ll find you ought to have just stayed away.)

strange attractors, fractal magic, loose change cointossed, observing the zenith; I see him now, we see him, we watch him lumber through tragedies licking his lips; life, uh, life finds a way; Jung, Feynman, Curie, Radium Girl; over a long enough time period, everything does indeed happen—

we midwived the boogeyman by begging the universe to make one this is sometimes how magic works

sometime after we put the magic in the drugs, we unraveled; I don’t remember she flicks ash and the molecules tumble like coins through the air. 52 card pickup, the Oracle burns in warcrime flare; she screams the truth and tumbles into darkness like breezecaught ash.  She flicks the cigarette.  They come to make her into an inferno. She burns forever because every moment crystallizes into itself infinitely – our teeth are the same teeth, now, and our skin is the same skin, and we exist overlapping each other – our Venn diagram is a circle – we no longer remember – splintering outside of time, we see crystals, moments – memory serves no purpose – it all happens simultaneously, forever – how many hanged?– 52 card pickup, missing children, Oracles, boogeyman, darkness, distance and time, starlight— what is a Tulpa?

who put on the mask, first? possessed by the whispering dark, who put on the mask? when did the first child disappear? we can’t remember – it happens, y’know?

They came for her under bloody skies as the day killed itself for night.

1967 AD 1967 BC 1945, 2001, 2296 AD 666 BC, 999 AD the broken mirror and our reflection when you stand outside of time you do drugs, y’know? this does not count and Thank God It’s Forever

They came for her as she flicked ash. They came for her under sunlight suicide. She said it meant nothing.

death is nothing at all – it does not count – (we) have only slipped away into the next room – nothing has happened – everything is happening – everything happens forever – in the next room, we splinter – an overdose is nothing at all – the magic in the heroin now – we do not count – the Oracle is in the next room and we scream in phosphorous – this is nothing at all forever, we are the wise ones, the witches burnt – the children missing – the bodies hanged – the boogeyman himself, licking his lips – the truth is –

Our last memory (if “last” exists beyond its placeholder as a mere word, which it no longer does, not to us, but if it did, then our last memory) is a flare into darkness forever, a crystal scream. We burn into a star, time and distance, at daylight’s death. We spasm and jerk and foam around the lips and the magic turns our blood into phosphorous. We are so high forever and now our teeth chatter truth—

will we ever come down?  will we know if we do?

the trees claw the clouds until warcrime chemicals rain our wails upon us. we are the witch and we are the ones who burn her. she flicks ash//we flick ash. we say “it doesn’t matter” but the truth –

the first child. the fifty-second child. the scary mask, the oracle, the forever scream of the dying sun. the truth is a wail into dark, a desperate flare against the void. time and distance, every star a shriek. from the shadows, the boogeyman comes. I remember, now, when we put the magic in the heroin. now, under the cataracted glare of the bloodshot camera, which is also then, now.  now, we splinter, falling into each other teeth first. our skulls bloom and our meat sprays into rose petals. we go round the prickly pear. we see, now – we are the boogeyman and we are the children he takes away. our house is at the end of the lane. we are in the next room, the room next to you. we splinter, outside of time. you know how it is. you remember. because after we splinter, we fall together again, teeth first.

[fragmentedink-archived]

Symbolism

I thought I might not be the only writer out there who likes to put symbolism in their stories so I found some things and what they represent!!

Animals

Alligator - stealth, survival

Ant - diligence, industry, community, remarkable strength, hard working, success, patience

Antelope - action

Armadillo - boundaries, self protection

Badger - aggressiveness, passion and drive

Bat - rebirth, longevity, joy, good luck

Bear - gentle strength, dreaming, introspection, power, protection

Beaver - builder, accomplishing goals

Bee - divine messenger, love, service, gathering, community

Bird - enlightenment, perspective, swiftness, vision, prophetic knowledge

Boar - nature-based wealth, prosperity, success, protection, courage

Buffalo - prayer, abundance, survival needs met, good fortune, healing

Bulls’ horns - a good symbol in meditation for motivation

Butterfly - rebirth, the soul, transformation, the three phases of life

Cat - feminine energy, mystical power, used to keep the wearer safe in travel, wholeness

Chameleons - ever-changing future, inconsistency

Cheetah - speed, focus

Cougar - power, swiftness, balance

Cows - red cows are a symbol of hope, inspiring symbol for nurturing efforts

Coyote - trickster

Crane - longevity. A pair of cranes symbolizes “Long Marriage”

Cricket - good luck charm, singing, Spring, fertility

Crow - sacred law, gateway to supernatural, shape shifting, illusion

Deer - graceful gentleness, sensitivity, compassion, kindness

Dog - companionship, health, service, loyalty, protection, future prosperity

Dolphin - manna, joy, childlike play, helpfulness, breath of life, harmony, intelligence, self connection

Donkey - fertility, easy childbirth, efficiency, health, well-being, and luck

Dove - peace, innocence, fidelity, love, gentleness, kindnes

Dragonfly - good fortune, magic, vision, dreams, luck, and ancient knowledge, illusion

Dragon - wisdom due to long lives and potent magic, royalty, Emperor, eternity, courage, strength, rain, Spring

Eagle - courage, spirit, bravery, strength

Elephant - commitment, strength, astuteness

Elk - stamina, pride, power, majesty

Fish - miracles, providence, sea/water magic, good luck and prosperity, foresight, fortune, salmon in particular, are associated with knowledge

Fox - camouflage, adaptability, integration, tricksters, shape shifters, and possessors of great magic

Frog - healing, cleansing, messages, health, honesty, fluidity, purification

Gazelle - awareness

Giraffe - grounded vision

Goat - tenacity, diligence, can help to achieve goals, endure criticism, and stay safe. Goat’s fur or foot - an anti-evil talisman.

Goose - safe return, love of home

Grasshopper - nobility, prosperity

Hawk - nessenger, strength, foresight, truth

Hippopotamus - emotional depths

Horses - power, stamina, speed, transportation and communication - A black horse with a white marking on its forehead is lucky

Hummingbird - joy, pure love, celebration of life

Ladybug - delight, trust

Lamb - filial piety (dutiful respect or regard for parents).

Lion (baby) cubs - inspire mercy and gentleness.

Lion (grown) - inspire strength, courage

Lions - pride, nobility, cunning, courage, just laws, fairness, the sun, images can protect sacred ground.

Lizard - dreaming, foresight, ancient secrets

Lynx - secrets

Monkey - benevolence, drives away evil

Moose - self-esteem, assertiveness

Mountain Lion - wisdom, leadership

Mouse - frugality, rebirth, scrutiny

Opossum - strategy, diversion

Otter - medicine (woman), balanced feminine energy

Owl - deception, wisdom, clairvoyance, magic

Ox - evil spirits that disturb lakes, rivers, and seas

Peacock - wholeness, dignity, beauty, recognition, self assurance, pride

Pig - rebirth and rejuvenation

Porcupine - innocence

Rabbit - fear, fertility, moon magic, speed, swiftness, longevity, courage, strength

Raccoon - dexterity, disguise

Raven - magic

Robin - growth, renewal

Rooster - courageous, warlike disposition, warmth and life of the Universe

Scorpion - the “fire within” that often needs careful tending

Seal - inner voice

Sheep - sacrifice

Snake - cunning, evil, supernatural power

Spider - destiny, fate, weaving

Squirrel - gathering

Swan - grace

Tiger - courage, bravery, fierceness, strength, being in the now

Turtle - mother earth

Weasel - stealth

Whale - record keeper

Wolf - teacher, A Guide to the Sacred

Zebra - Individuality

PLANTS

Aloe- Healing, protection, affection

Amaryllis- Pride

Anemone- Forsaken

Angelica- Inspiration

Apple blossom- Preference

Arborvitae- Unchanging friendship

Aster- Symbol of Love, Daintiness

Basil- Good wishes

Bay- Glory

Begonia- Beware

Bittersweet- Truth

Black-eyed Susan- Justice

Bluebell- Humility, kindness

Candytuft- Indifference

Red carnation- My Heart Aches, admiration

- White carnation- Innocence, pure love, women’s good luck gift

- Pink carnation- I’ll never forget you

- Yellow carnation- Disdain, disappointment, rejection

Chamomile- Patience

Chives- Usefulness

Chrysanthemum- Cheerfulness

Clover, white- Think of me

Coreopsis- Always cheerful

Coriander- Hidden worth

Crocus- spring, Youthful gladness

Cumin- Fidelity

Cyclamen- Resignation and good-bye

Daffodil- Regard

Daisy- Innocence, hope

Dill- Powerful against evil

Edelweiss- Courage, devotion

Fennel- Flattery

Fern- Sincerity

Forget-me-not- True love memories

Gardenia- Secret love

Geranium- oak-leavedTrue friendship

Gladiolus- Remembrance

Goldenrod- Encouragement, good fortune

Heliotrope- Eternal love

Holly- Hope

Hollyhock- Ambition

Honeysuckle- Bonds of love

Horehound- Health

Hyacinth- Games and sport, playfulness, rashness

– Blue Hyacinth- Constancy of love

– Purple Hyacinth- Sorrow, forgiveness, regret

– Yellow Hyacinth- Jealousy

– White Hyacinth- Loveliness, prayers for someone

Hydrangea- Gratitude for being understood; frigidity and heartlessness

Hyssop- Sacrifice, cleanliness

Iris- A message

Ivy- Friendship, continuity

Jasmine- white- Sweet love

Lady’s-mantle- Comforting

Lavender- Devotion, virtue

Lemon balm- Sympathy

Lilac- Joy of youth

Lily, calla- Beauty

Lily, day- Chinese emblem for mother

Lily-of-the-valley- Sweetness, purity

Lotus Flower- Purity, enlightenment, self-regeneration, and rebirth

Magnolia- Love of nature

Marjoram- Joy and happiness

Mint- Virtue

Morning glory- Affection

Myrtle- Good luck and love in a marriage

Nasturtium- Patriotism

Oak- Strength

Oregano- Substance

Pansy- Thoughts

Parsley- Festivity

Peony- Bashful, happy life

Pine- Humility

Poppy, red- Consolation

Rhododendron- Danger, flee

Rose, red- Love, I love you.

Rose, dark crimson- Mourning

Rose, pink- Happiness

Rose, white- Purity, heavenly, I’m worthy of you

Rose, yellow- Jealousy, decrease of love

Rosemary- Remembrance

Rue- Grace, clear vision

Sage- Wisdom, immortality

Salvia, blue- I think of you

Salvia, red- Forever mine

Savory Spice-  interest

Sorrel- Affection

Southernwood- Constancy, jest

Sunflower- Adoration

Sweet pea- Pleasures

Sweet William- Gallantry

Sweet woodruff- Humility

Tansy- Hostile thoughts

Tarragon- Lasting interest

Thyme- Courage, strength

Tulip, red- Passion, declaration of love

Tulip, yellow- Sunshine in your smile

Valerian- Readiness

Violet- Loyalty, devotion, faithfulness, modesty

Wallflower- Faithfulness in adversity

Willow- Sadness

Yarrow- Everlasting love

Zinnia- Thoughts of absent friends

Color

Red: Excitement, energy, passion, love, desire, speed, strength, power, heat, aggression, danger, fire, blood, war, violence, all things intense and passionate, sincerity, happiness (Only in Japan)

Pink: love and romance, caring, tenderness, acceptance and calm.

Beige and ivory: symbolize unification. 

Ivory: symbolizes quiet and pleasantness. 

Beige: calm and simplicity.

Yellow: signifies joy, happiness, betrayal, optimism, idealism, imagination, hope, sunshine, summer, gold, philosophy, dishonesty, cowardice, jealousy, covetousness, deceit, illness, hazard and friendship.

Dark Blue: Symbolizes integrity, knowledge, power, and seriousness.

Blue: Peace, tranquility, cold, calm, stability, harmony, unity, trust, truth, confidence, conservatism, security, cleanliness, order, loyalty, sky, water, technology, depression, appetite suppressant.

Turquoise: calm. 

Teal: sophistication. 

Aquamarine: symbolizes water. 

Lighter turquoise: a feminine appeal.

Purple: Royalty, nobility, spirituality, ceremony, mysterious, transformation, wisdom, enlightenment, cruelty, honor, arrogance, mourning, temperance.

Lavender: femininity, grace and elegance.

Orange: Energy, balance, enthusiasm, warmth, vibrant, expansive, flamboyant, demanding of attention.

Green: Nature, environment, healthy, good luck, renewal, youth, spring, generosity, fertility, jealousy, service, inexperience, envy, misfortune, vigor.

Brown: Earth, stability, hearth, home, outdoors, reliability, comfort, endurance, simplicity, and comfort.

Gray: Security, reliability, intelligence, staid, modesty, dignity, maturity, solid, conservative, practical, old age, sadness, boring. Silver symbolizes calm.

White: Reverence, purity, birth, simplicity, cleanliness, peace, humility, precision, innocence, youth, winter, snow, good, sterility, marriage (Western cultures), death (Eastern cultures), cold, clinical.

Black: Power, sexuality, sophistication, formality, elegance, wealth, mystery, fear, evil, unhappiness, depth, style, sadness, remorse, anger, anonymity, underground, good technical color, mourning, death (Western cultures), austerity, detachment.

[thesrhughes]

I don't know what compelled me to take this photo but I'm kinda glad I did... #street #view #nyc #streetview #neon #garbage #why

[thesrhughes]

new project freewrite

Samantha's dad used to beat the living spirit out of her, mostly because he could if she remembered right. Then one day, at the breakfast table, he keeled right over on the linoleum and started spitting up rainbows all over the floor, twitching and sputtering and gagging. For a second she felt like a witness to some biblical miracle, like she was an apostle to her mother's massiahhood. But then she started puking, too.

When she woke up some unknown time later, they told her that her mother had died, and that Sam, herself, had suffered some brain trauma. The doctors diagnosed her with this and that and whatever other longnamed disorders they could invent, but Sam knew better. That was when she first met Shadow. That was when she first understood the Frequency. That was when she first figured out the truth of things. And fuck what the doctors said, anyway, for all the good they did her.

[chromolume]

it’s all you americans talk about… liminal space this… cryptid that

[sasstricbypass]

america is big, we got.,.,.,. its a lot happening here

[darkbookworm13-deactivated20240]

It’s at least 3,000 miles just from the East Coast to the West, depending on where you start.

If I try to drive from here in Maine to New Mexico, it’s 2,400 miles. 

From here to Oregon, 800 miles from my current residence to my relatives in NJ, then another 3,000 miles after that. 

A brisk 8 day drive that meanders through mountains, forests, corn fields, dry, flat, empty plains, more mountains, and then a temperate rain forest in Oregon.

The land has some seriously creepy stuff, even just right outside our doors. 

There is often barking sounds on the other side of our back door. 

At 3 am. 

When no one would let their dog out. 

It’s a consensus not to even look out the fucking windows at night. 

Especially during the winter months. 

Nothing chills your heart faster than sitting in front of a window and hearing footsteps breaking through the snow behind you, only to look and not see anything. 

I live in a tiny town whose distance from larger cities ranges from 30 miles, to 70 miles. What is in between?

Giant stretches of forests, swamps, pockets of civilization, more trees, farms, wildlife, and winding roads. All of which gives the feeling of nature merely tolerating humans, and that we are one frost heave away from our houses being destroyed, one stretch of undergrowth away from our roads being pulled back into the earth.

And almost every night, we have to convince ourselves that the popping, echoing gunshot sounds are really fireworks, because we have no idea what they might be shooting at.

There’s a reason Stephen King sets almost all his stories in Maine.

[scottislate]

New Mexico, stuck under Colorado, next to Texas, and uncomfortably close to Arizona. I grew up there. The air is so dry your skin splits and doesn’t bleed. Coyotes sing at night. It starts off in the distance, but the response comes from all around. The sky, my gods, the sky. In the day it is vast and unfeeling. At night the stars show how little you truly are. This is the gentle stuff. I’m not going to talk about the whispered tales from those that live on, or close, to the reservations. I’m not going to go on about the years of drought, or how the ground gives way once the rain falls. The frost in the winter stays in the shadows, you can see the line where the sun stops. It will stay there until spring. People don’t tell you about the elevation, or how thin the air truly is. The stretches of empty road with only husks of houses to dot the side of the horizon. There’s no one around for miles except those three houses. How do they live out here? The closest town is half an hour away and it’s just a gas station with a laundry attached.   No one wants to be there. They’re just stuck. It has a talent for pulling people back to it. I’ve been across the country for years, but part of me is still there. The few that do get out don’t return. A visit to family turns into an extended stay. Car troubles, a missed flight, and then suddenly there’s a health scare. Can’t leave Aunt/Uncle/Grandparent alone in their time of need. It’s got you. Roswell is a joke. A failed National Inquirer article slapped with bumperstickers and half-assed tourist junk. The places that really run that chill down the spine are in the spaces between the sprawling mesas and hidden arroyos. Stand at the top of the Carlsbad Caverns trail. Look a mile down into the darkness. Don’t step off the path. just don’t.

[kaasknot]

The Land of Entrapment

[jumpingjacktrash]

here in minnesota we’re making jokes about how bad is the limescale in your sink

pretending we don’t know we’re sitting on top of limestone caverns filled with icy water

pretending we don’t suspect something lives down there

[ceruleancynic]

dammit jesse now I want to read about the things that live down there

meanwhile in maryland the summer is killing-hot, the air made of wet flannel, white heat-haze glazing the horizon, and the endless cicadas shrilling in every single tree sound like a vast engine revving and falling off, revving and falling off, slow and repeated, and everything is so green, lush poison-green, and you could swear you can hear the things growing, hear the fibrous creak and swell of tendrils flexing

and sometimes in the old places, the oldest places, where the salt-odor of woodsmoke and tobacco never quite go away, there is unexplained music in the night, and you should not try to find out where it’s coming from.  

[jhaernyl]

@gallusrostromegalus

[gallusrostromegalus]

The intense and permanent haunting of a land upon which countess horrors have been visited, and that is too large and wild for us to really comprehend is probably the most intense and universal American feeling.

[thebibliosphere]

here in minnesota

We’re fucking what now

[shortkingmoon]

colorado is a strange sort of place, a passing-through kind of place, a place that holds just as many people who stay as leave. the highways stretch like ley-lines or the lines of old palms; 25 north and south, 70 east and west, 76 and 470 and 285 curling all around and tangling in the middle like loose thread

the mountains are their own place, the plains their own, too, with the hogback and the foothills in between like a strangely-comforting barrier, “this far, and that’s enough. this far, and you’re still close to home. this far, and no further.” the people in the mountains rarely make the plains; the people in the plains rarely make the hills, and the people in the middle rarely leave the developments which spread outward every year like creeping moss.

[heywriters]

Summertime in California, when it’s 110 and you wake up in a sweat at 7am and can’t fall back asleep regardless of how much sleep you actually got. You open a door or a window and smell smoke. The air is hazy, the sky is orange, the sun bright red. You go back inside. You stay inside. You don’t worry about the fire, it’s probably miles away. The smoke lasts for days and even after a shower you can’t get the smell out of your nostrils, can’t get the taste off your tongue. You hope your neighbor doesn’t mow his lawn, you hope no one throws a cigarette out a window on your road, or lets a loose chain drag behind their truck. 

The wind picks up, you get nervous. a helicopter passes low overhead, you get anxious. You wait for sirens. You watch more helicopters carrying heavy sacks of retardant, tanks of water, and keep testing the way the wind blows. Somehow, the fire misses you this summer.

Wintertime in California. The yellowed, crackling grass that looks like miles of sand dunes turns gray and falls loose from the baked earth. You pray for rain but you beg that it doesn’t come with lightning. Still, you don’t expect rain because every winter is “dry.” Snow falls somewhere in the mountains where someone skis then comes back and tells you it wasn’t much. No rain means more fire in the summer.

Then, after New Year’s, it rains. And rains. And gushes. The ground is baked stiff and won’t absorb water after an hour of moderate rain. The water rises. It fills streets, houses, threatens levees and dams. After days of this the ground finally softens. The plants, their root systems shriveled and mostly washed away by the flooding, can’t hold the dirt in place. Where it has no choice,the earth gives way to landslides.

The Sierra Nevadas, riddled with abandoned gold mines and in some place stripped by hydraulic mining. The water is always tainted with mercury and alkali. Occasionally a mine collapses and a sinkhole appears. If the house shakes you ask your friends and neighbors if they felt it too, but then you forget it happened. You actually sleep through most tremors.

Everyone knows at least one old mining song. School projects and field trips are to Fort Sumter and the missions. Cracking adobe that predates the country. You can tell vultures apart from other birds of prey easy because they’re the ones you see most often. Orchards that go on for miles and towns built on top of old olive orchards—occasionally a business or private home has kept a few to remind you. They don’t plant them. Those are the original trees.

You’re hiking and you find a massive flat rock with fist-sized holes bored into it. Trees and fenceposts that look like they were used for target practice with a machine gun. You hear what sounds like a lawn sprinkler go off and you get as far away from the rocks as you can, watching where you step.

Sacramento is a concrete jungle of one way streets and sky-blocking towers before endless miles of ugly industrial wasteland. San Francisco is a twisting maze of clogged overpasses where you drive three miles an hour and watch a dense blanket of bonechilling fog climb over the hills and obscure everything before you enter the city and keep your foot pressed flat to the brake at the steepest intersections. LA is a fever dream, a knotted nightmare of traffic you can never escape, air you can’t breathe even when there’s no fire, and someone’s always playing Norteño, which sounds exactly like polka but with melancholy Spanish lyrics.

The Central Valley gets funnel clouds that touch down even less often than snow falls, but you remember once as a kid getting sleet in the Valley and thinking that’s what snow was then later hudding in the school cafeteria because of a tornado warning. You remember visiting the ocean and bringing home kelp and colored glass. In the mountains you found a sticky pinecone the size of your head and a snake with miniscule legs. An owl with a broken wing was brought to your classroom, there are giant statues of golden bears at the state fair, and someone’s always going missing from Modesto.

But in the springtime, the hills are orange and purple and you realize that oak trees are actually green once a year. The heavy wind makes the grasses sway in waves and it sounds like waves and you’re nowhere near the ocean anymore, but it’s right there, endlessly green and almost sentient. The hills are moving. 

[rockosedits]

Bojack Horseman in Rocko’s Modern Life!

[thesrhughes]

That font selection, tho...

[moramew]

A small list of random ass sites I’ve found useful when writing:

Fragrantica: perfume enthusiast site that has a long list of scents. v helpful when you’re writing your guilty pleasure abo fics

Just One Cookbook: recipe site that centers on Japanese cuisine. Lots of different recipes to browse, plenty of inspiration so you’re not just “ramen and sushi” 

This comparing heights page: gives you a visual on height differences between characters

A page on the colors of bruises+healing stages: well just that. there you go. describe your bruises properly

McCormick Science Institute: yes this is a real thing. the site shows off research on spices and gives the history on them. be historically accurate or just indulge in mindless fascination. boost your restaurant au with it

A Glossary of Astronomy Terms: to pepper in that sweet terminology for your astrophysics major college au needs

[moramew]

Adding to this since I’m working on a shifter au one-shot:

Canine Body Language

Feline Body Language

[moramew]

More:

Cocktail Flow: a site with a variety of cocktails that’s pretty easy to navigate and offers photos of the drinks. You can sort by themes, strengths, type and base. My only real annoyance with this site is that the drinks are sometimes sorted into ~masculine~ and ~feminine~ but ehhhh. It’s great otherwise.

Tie-A-Tie: a site centered around ties, obviously. I stumbled upon it while researching tie fabrics but there’s a lot more to look at. It offers insight into dress code for events, tells you how to tie your ties, and has a section on the often forgotten about tie accessories

[moramew]

Even more:

Types of High Heels: A page describing twenty five different types of high heels. It gives a description and pictures. Shake it up from just “stilettos and kitten heels”

Random Job Generator: Exactly as it says. The site offer more generators like characters, plots, or town names.

Glossary of Hosiery Terms: Figure out what is what on a pair of stockings.

Men’s Dress Shoe Guide: A quick guide describing the eight most common types of men’s dress shoes. Pics included.

Types of Women’s Coats: Descriptions and pics of various different types of coats.

[8writingblock8-blog]

WRITING REFERENCES

[powells]

Console-free Camping

If you like to play The Last of Us, then try Rot & Ruin by Jonathan Maberry

If you like to play Beyond: Two Souls, then try The Girl With All the Gifts by M.R. Carey

If you like to play Call of Duty: Black Ops (Zombies), then try World War Z by Max Brooks

If you like playing Grand Theft Auto, then try American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

If you like playing Sid Meier’s Civilization, then try A Game Of Thrones by George R. R. Martin

If you like playing Final Fantasy, try playing Fullmetal Alchemist by Hiromu Arakawa

If you like playing Mass Effect, then try Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

If you like playing Alice: Madness Returns, then try Madness So Discreet by Mindy McGinnis

If you like playing Halo, then try Starship Troopers by Robert A Heinlein

If you like playing Portal, then try House Of Stairs by William Sleator

If you like playing Mario Kart, then try The Lovely Reckless by Kami Garcia 

If you like playing Dark Souls, then try Anna Dressed in Blood by Kendare Blake

If you like playing Life Is Strange, then try We Are Okay by Nina Lacour

If you like playing Stardew Valley, then try How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff

If you like playing Fable, then try Young Elites by Marie Lu

If you like playing Borderlands, then try Velocity by Chris Wooding

If you like playing Dishonored, then try Airman by Eoin Colfer

If you like playing The Oregon Trail, then try Under a Painted Sky by Stacey Lee

If you like playing the Elder Scrolls series, then try The Naming by Alison Croggon

If you like playing Red Dead Redemption, then try Vengeance Road by Erin Bowman

If you like playing Bioshock, then try  Dark Life by Kat Falls

If you like playing Fallout, then try Razorland by Ann Aguirre 

If you like playing Assasin’s Creed, then try The Way of Shadows Night by Brent Weeks

If you like playing Dragonage, then try Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

If you like playing The Legend of Zelda, then try Graceling by Kristin Cashore

If you like playing Until Dawn, then try Ten by Gretchen McNeil

If you like playing Sonic, then try Maximum Ride by James Patterson

If you like playing Overwatch, then try Bluescreen by Dan Wells

If you like playing Uncharted, then try Passenger by Alexandra Bracken

If you like playing Pokemon, then try Fantastic Beasts & Where to Find Them by JK Rowling, and Newt Scamander

If you like playing Mario Party, then try Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

[gamingallnight]

This is amazing!!

[scaliefox]

I have to reblog for two reasons:

1)This is actually a good way to get people into reading.

2)That passive aggressive joke in the last one is pure genius. 

[thesrhughes]

Welcome home. . . . #nyc #xxx #poison #art #streetart #graffiti

[averageblackteen-deactivated201]

Reblog if Black Lives Matter to you

Where are those woke white people at!?

[neesie09]

The amount of notes this doesn’t have bothers me…

[tangdynastie]

Tumblr has 30-50 million active users. Why does this not even have 1 million notes?

[gayngelofthelordlovesdean]

I have over three thousand followers and so far only two reblogged this I’m disappointed

[badass-dora-milaje]

✊🏽✊🏾✊🏿#BLM

[thesrhughes]

I've been staring at this cursor for almost half an hour. The page is blank. The cursor beats it taunt at me, a chant of my failures. The horror, the horror! #writing

[crossconnectmag]

Surrealistic Paintings by Leigh Whurr

Leigh Whurr a.k.a. Oddly-Spliced is a digital artist from Birmingham, UK.

Describing or explaining my work is rarely simple since the very appeal of this type of imagery lies in how it may touch a place that words or logic cannot immediately reach.

There is logic to be found, but it is spliced with my own subjective reality. It is an instinctual drive and so any statement about my work usually requires some degree of philosophical leverage, as well as a certain amount of self-analysis. Painting digitally seems like a natural extension of a contemporary approach, although I do not feel this should impinge on the content of the work itself in terms of how it should be received.  It is, to me, simply a more efficient and enjoyable way of producing art.

If you aren’t following Cross Connect, you’re missing out.

posted by Margaret via

[thesrhughes]

News!! (Sad News)

New Post has been published on http://thesrhughes.com/news-sad-news/

News!! (Sad News)

Squidlings, I bring bad omens, sour news, sad news…

The Bad News

My sweet, tentacular friends, it has come time to announce that The Furies series is unlikely to see its third installment published.  This decision has been in the works for some time.

Let me first apologize, and then explain myself.  This has been a difficult and trying balancing act, and, unfortunately, I don’t believe I can pull it off.

As much as I loathe to admit it, this is, in large part, a financial decision.  While I’ve been working on selling stories, writing a podcast, and working alongside agents and editors to break into the trad-publishing scene (and the promise of a decent advance), the penniless work of The Furies has fallen by the distant wayside.  With so many other paying opportunities, and so many ideas overflowing my skull, there seems to be less and less time to work on the story that was supposed to be No Peace.

The second reason for this announcement has to do with my own drive.  Not long ago, my agent advised me to take some time off from my current Big Fucking Project and work on something else.  I went to the last draft of No Peace and…felt quite uninspired to begin the revising/rewriting process.  Instead, I ended up tooling around with other back-burnered projects and tried to hone my short story craft (I’m still bad at it.)  For 3-4 weeks I circled No Peace, but never got around to starting a new draft.  I took this as a sign.

The third reason is that, paging through the extant draft of No Peace, I struggled to figure out how to fix it.  The extant draft felt like one-and-a-half stories crammed into a single story line.  It was overcrowded, too long, and littered with too much detail.  It was the War and Peace of contemporary fantasy fiction, and I had no idea how to shorten it.  The current draft is objectively oversized (coming in at just around 600 pages) and the idea of gutting it to a normal size seemed like a tremendous amount of work…not to mention the labor of writing a second draft of such a gargantuan tale.

Reading the extant draft, I struggled with the weight of the thing–that is to say, the poignancy and prescience of the tale.  It lacks a certain ‘now-ness,’ being a book series set in an increasingly distant past, focused on issues that somehow seem less pressing at this particular cultural moment.

Lastly, it’s been several years since the release of No Grave, and No Peace still only has a first draft.  To put this into perspective, the release version of No Grave was the third revision pass of the sixth manuscript draft.  Considering my issues with length, prescience, and story with No Peace‘s extant draft, it seems silly to believe the path toward its publication would be any less fraught.  And, being blunt, I just don’t have the time to engage with that volume of work without a very different professional and financial situation.

A Silver Lining?

There is the simple silver lining: maybe, one day, given more financial stability and more time to actually sit down and write, I may return to these characters and this story.  If I do, it’s likely I’ll want to rewrite the first two books entirely, having honed my craft substantially since their release, and take it forward from there, updated.

But that is but one possible future, and it can’t be promised.

And so, the more complicated silver lining: I’ve learned a hell of a lot about writing books.  Though, sadly, I still have a lot to learn about short stories, apparently…

While plodding turtle-like through the extant draft of No Peace, I also churned out a number of other manuscripts.  Some were never finished.  Others have been read, rewritten, revised, and edited.  I’ve met agents and assistants and editors and editorial assistants and have had the whole lot of them tear my work apart like feral, froth-mouthed dogs.  This has been a keen learning experience.

I wrote an entire draft of a cyberpunk comedy while drinking.  I’ve been told that it’s hilarious but also utterly unpublishable in its current form.  I wrote four drafts of a story about an author whose self-destructive tendencies accidentally tear a hole in reality.  It’s an autobiography, obviously.  It also still needs a lot of work to be anywhere near publishable.  I’ve written fifty short stories and managed to get 5-6 of them published by people who aren’t myself.  I even wrote a podcast.

And, then, there is my work in Oceanrest.

Which brings us to…

The Future, Dark & Screaming

I’m trying not to make promises, even though promise-making is the heart of storytelling.  Every story is a series of promises we make to a reader, and every twist, reveal, or conflict is a choice to make good on that promise, or to break it, or to subvert it.

I’m subverting this entire thing by promising not to make any promises.

But here’s a promise: I’ll obviously keep writing.

(See what I did there?)

My current project, praying to break into trad-publishing, praying to take this semi-profitable hobby into a fully-fledged profession, is a little world-building venture I call Oceanrest.

I’ve written eight manuscript drafts of Oceanrest Novel #1, a novel my current agent swears we’ll be able to sell if I can shave off just a few more words.  I’ve written two manuscript drafts of Oceanrest Novel #2, because hope springs eternal.  I’ve done a skeleton-outline of Oceanrest Novel #3.  Oceanrest Novel #4, if I have my druthers, would be an updated version of the first novel I ever wrote, a project I worked on parallel to No Reflection but never felt was quite “right.”  I have five drafts of it already, and I feel like I only figured out what it was “about” on the last one.

But what makes Oceanrest special to me, as an author, is that it’s conceptually non-linear.  It’s a setting, a town, a world, where any number of stories could unfold.  Oceanrest #4, my first completed novel ever, would take place in the year 2000, for instance.  Oceanrest #1 takes place today, and #2 takes place about 15 months after that.  I have a brainstorm for a story that would take place in the 19th century.

What I need, right now, as an artiste, is flexibility.  I have faith in my current work because I’m giving myself flexibility.

And because, hopefully, my agent is right.

“Well,” you say, “we hate you, now.”

Please don’t?

If you adored the characters and storyline of The Furies, know that those characters and stories still live in my head.  If things go well in my life, The Furies will see rewrites and re-releases, and eventually continuation…but I can’t promise that, now.  I don’t have the resources.

But Nicole and Angie and Jimmy Sacrifice and Tristan and Alex and Harley are still tearing around in my skull.  Matthew Crowe and Charles Goodwin still pull marionette strings between my neurons, beneficiaries of corporate structure and privatized surveillance culture.  Parts of them will likely end up scavenged and mounted on other faces, attached to other names.  Human pain, coping, and overcoming will remain woven through my every tale.

Stick with me, please.  I promise to tell more stories.  I promise to take you on terrifying journeys.

Stay tuned.