secure this beckoning sunshine

( To control the future, control the present. )


this is why I tell stories (let it crumble) by Elizabeth Conall is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

( travel only as fast as a bicyclist with a trailer can go )



Green Revolution by Elizabeth Conall is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

Working on:

Leah Far-Sighted

Need to work on:

Leah Far-Sighted
untitled stories for October Fiction Fishbowl

on clear winter day
wind blows chill in curlicues
dry leaves spin around

snowflakes fall to damp the ground
earth too warm for sticky snow

This thing where I try to hold down a paycheck job and a full-time college enrollment and still write things that aren't for class? Isn't going so well. You may have noticed there hasn't been a Fiction Fishbowl yet this month, and there won't be. That's why.

Working on:

untitled story for Fiction Writing class

Need to work on:

Leah Far-Sighted
untitled stories for October Fiction Fishbowl
untitled story for Fiction Writing class

The fishbowl is CLOSED for prompts. Fills will be trickling in over the next week or so.

Most of the time, writing is a solo activity. A writing fishbowl (as ysabetwordsmith shows) is writing in public: 'under glass', as Harlan Ellison has been known to do, sitting in a bookstore window and writing an idea provided by an audience member.

This is my bookstore window.

The theme of this month's fishbowl is endings and beginnings. Please leave prompts about characters, settings, plot elements, and such related to that theme. I will write poems and short stories based on your prompts.

This is an exercise in crowdfunded creativity. An excellent way to inspire me to do a thing is to pay me to do it; if you like what you see and you want to see more, feed the storyteller.

There are several options for feeding the storyteller:

1) Sponsor the fishbowl. I have a Paypal button for donations. The recommended minimum donation is $1, because Paypal takes a fee from every transaction. Any Dreamwidth user who donates (make sure you mention your username) will be on my access list (where I post at-least-weekly excerpts from my works in progress) for two months. Anonymous donations are of course welcome, but cannot get that bonus.

If donations reach $50—keep an eye on the ticker—I will post a two-thousand-word prose short story; this month it will be "Dragon Phoenix Match", based on "Lady Isabel and the Elf Knight".

2) Sponsor a story. Each story will have a price tag, using the same semi-pro rate as above, rounded down to the nearest dollar. A two-hundred-word prose story will cost $5, a two-thousand-word story $50, comparable to what Duotrope Digest assures me I would make by selling the story to a semiprofessional market. Similarly, a poem of up to ten lines will cost $5, of up to twenty-five lines $10, of up to forty lines $15, of up to sixty lines $20, and a longer poem, we'll talk. When you sponsor a story (prose or poetry), tell me which story you want to sponsor—every time I complete a story for the fishbowl, I will comment to the prompter with the title, the medium, a brief summary, and the price—and I will immediately post it publicly to this journal, with your username listed as sponsor.

3) Spread the word. Link to this post from any social media, suggest that people come and leave prompts, and leave a comment saying you did so. If you link back and you leave prompts, I will use one of those prompts. If I see a new prompter or donor (anonymous people, sadly, do not count), I will post a free story; this month it will be the poem "this is why I tell stories (let it crumble)".

Whenever I write a story to one of your prompts, I will send you a private copy of the story, via Dreamwidth PM to logged-in prompters or email to anonymous prompters who give their email (anonymous prompters who do not leave contact information cannot get private copies of stories). Please do not share it with anyone.

At least one of the stories resulting from the fishbowl will be posted for free, so y'all have a better idea of what you're getting into.

At the end of the fishbowl, I will post a list of all the unsold stories, to simplify life for anyone looking to see if you might want to sponsor something.

This fishbowl will last until the evening of Sunday, October 5. Fills will appear over the subsequent week or so.

Leave your prompts here! This month's theme is endings and beginnings.

I am not done for the day yet, I think, but I made actual progress to the tune of 1288 words and I want to post while I'm excited. I finished chapter two! Including the "FIX IN EDITING :DDDD" scene!

Snippet:

"Sounds like your sister might be psychic," said Sanchez. "That's not a bad thing at all. Usually," she added. "I know one guy, he's attuned to Wall Street—he's made enough money off stock market gambling to feed a small town for a year, and he refuses to share."

Becca's fingernails dug into her palm. "Dragon. Little sister with the freak glowy healing thing. Little sister psychic. Little sister ran away because psychic. What's next? Sarah conjures thunderstorms? Mom moves mountains?"

"Well, if Muhammad won't come to the mountain," said Rae.

I stare at blank white page;
my words, not sage.



epode distich by Elizabeth Conall is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

Writing continues to suck, so there continues to be no snippet. I signed up for rainbowfic; maybe that'll get me going. 17543 words for the month.

This is a story from the universe of my novel quartet in progress, Blow That Trumpet Gabriel. Consider it canon.


( Jyoti stood alone )



By the Light of the Moon by Elizabeth Conall is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.