UFO Publishing will have a booth at BookCon in NYC this weekend. I’ll be on hand to sign (and, of course, sell) books. And if you ask nicely, I might even show you the draft/preview of my next book’s cover.
So stop on by. We’ll be in booth # 3175.
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Event Appearances, Publishing | Tagged: BookCon, UFO Publishing | 
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Posted by Alex Shvartsman
The Hook:
Ben shuffled into the college library, tugging his squeaky janitorial cart along like a coffin-on-wheels. The moment he entered the place, his right arm started aching, adding a small, but significant voice to the chorus of twinges, knotted muscles, and scars that composed his aging body.
Ignoring this as best he could, he took a big whiff of the place. He snorted and shook his head, gray ponytail flapping.
At the noise, heads popped up from textbooks and tablets as students stared his way. Ben gave them his best grumpy grandpa look until they turned back to their books.
Resisting the urge to massage his arm, he made eye contact with the young man behind the main desk. Jason, the work-study for the evening, flashed a relieved smile as he lurched out of his chair and headed the janitor’s way.
Ben tugged at his blue jumpsuit so his name, threaded in red on the left breast, displayed prominently. The spray bottle hanging on his belt quivered as the water sloshed within. Ben scowled and slapped it.
“Shaddup,” he whispered. “I can handle this.”
Josh Vogt says:
Enter the Janitor is the first in my humorous urban fantasy series, The Cleaners, which reveals the inner workings of the supernatural sanitation company that secretly keeps our world clean and safe. In it, Ben, the janitor in question, must discover the source of an imbalance between Purity and Corruption before it wipes out whole cities—while also keeping his new (and germaphobic) apprentice alive.
The opening of the novel intentionally mirrors the title, immediately bringing in the titular janitor as he strolls (or trudges, actually) onto the scene. With it being a bit of an oddball urban fantasy, I aimed for the beginning to accomplish several things at once. First off, I wanted readers to go, “Enter the Janitor? Really?” and then open to the first page and go, “Oh, well, that certainly delivers. I wonder if the rest of it does.” I also wanted to establish Ben’s character as quickly as possible, conveying his attitude and voice right off to indicate he’s far from your typical fantasy hero.
Alongside all that, the opening is meant to hint at a few elements out of the ordinary, suggesting at things lurking behind-the-scenes and tugging the reader to read on and find out what happens next. On the surface, you get what could be interpreted as an everyday event—a janitor on the job. But there are some clues in these first lines that this isn’t your average sanitation situation.
So, the hook gives readers what the title has them expecting…but then twists it slightly to get them questioning precisely what Ben is there to “handle” and how he intends to do so.
And everything just gets messier from there.
Buy Enter the Janitor on Amazon
About the author:
Josh Vogt has been published in dozens of genre markets with work ranging from flash fiction to short stories to doorstopper novels that cover fantasy, science fiction, horror, humor, pulp, and more. His debut fantasy novel, Forge of Ashes, adds to the RPG Pathfinder Tales tie-in line. WordFire Press is also launching his urban fantasy series, The Cleaners, with Enter the Janitor (2015) and The Maids of Wrath (2016). You can find him at JRVogt.com or on Twitter @JRVogt. He’s a member of SFWA as well as the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers.
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Posted by Alex Shvartsman
The fourth annual Unidentified Funny Objects anthology will contain 23 stories totaling approximately 86,000 words. Cover art by Tomasz Maronski. Interior illustrations by Barry Munden.
Unidentified Funny Objects 4
“We Can Get Them for You Wholesale” by Neil Gaiman
“The Time-Traveling Ghost Machine of Professor Jaime Peligrosa” by Andrew Kaye
“Please Approve the Dissertation Research of Angtor” by Caroline M. Yoachim
“Match Game” by Esther Friesner
“The Transformation of Prince Humphrey” by Brent C. Smith
“In the End, You Get Clarity” by Laura Pearlman
“Project Disaster” by Tim Pratt
“Hello Hotel” by Piers Anthony
“Bob’s No Kill Monster Shelter” by Ian Creasey
“Board Meeting Minutes” by Oliver Buckram
“Armed for You” by Anaea Lay
“The Unfortunate Problem of Grandma’s Head” by Karen Haber
“My Mother Loves Her Robot More than Me and I Feel Bad” by Eric Kaplan
“The Worm that Turned” by Jody Lynn Nye
“Department of Death Predictions, Final Notice” by Tina Gower
“Champions of Breakfast” by Zach Shephard
“Keeping Ahead” by Mike Resnick
“So You’ve Metamorphosed into a Giant Insect. Now What?” by James Aquilone
“Confessions of an Interplanetary Art Fraud” by Michael J. Martinez
“Texts from My Mother about an Alien Invasion” by Tina Connolly
“Support Your Local Alien” by Gini Koch
“Topics to Avoid on a First Date with Yourself” by Jonathan Ems
“The Monkey Treatment” by George R. R. Martin
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2 Comments | Publishing | Tagged: fantasy, humor, science fiction, UFO4 | Permalink
Posted by Alex Shvartsman
I’ll be attending Balticon for the next four days, as I do every year. Here’s where you can find me:
FRIDAY
| 4:00 PM | Retelling Fairy-Tales Across Media | Garden |
| Alex Shvartsman (M), Sunny Moraine, Ruth Sanderson, Jo Walton, Melissa L Hayden | (50 minutes) |
| 9:00 PM | Dangerous Voices Variety Hour | Salon B |
| Sarah Pinsker (M), Michael Underwood (M), Alex Shvartsman | (50 minutes) | |
| Baltimore Science Fiction Society’s own readings series comes to Balticon once more! The Dangerous Voices Variety Hour takes its cues from such diverse inspirations as the popular 510 reading series, NPR’s quiz show: Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!, and Orson Welles’s original War of the Worlds broadcast. The hour long, free event features readings, irreverent author interviews, trivia, prizes, and more. |
SATURDAY
| 3:00 PM | Autograph – Saturday – 15:00 | Autograph Table |
| Larry Hodges, Alex Shvartsman, Grig Larson | (50 minutes) |
SUNDAY
| 10:00 AM | Exploring Publishing Platforms | Salon D |
| Mike Allen, Neal Levin, Mike Luoma, Alex Shvartsman | (50 minutes) | |
| Desktop publishing has come a long way. Learn the ins and outs of the various publishing platforms. |
| 11:00 AM | How to Start Writing | Derby |
| Michael Black (M), Paula S Jordan, Hugh J O’Donnell, Don Sakers, Alex Shvartsman | (50 minutes) | |
| Workshops, writing circles, and NaNoWriMo. How do you start writing, and how do you make sure you keep at it? Younger and beginning writers are encouraged to attend. |
| 12:00 PM | Putting a Pretty Face on Small Press | Parlor 1041 |
| Scott E Pond (M), Andrew Fox, Gail Z. Martin, Alex Shvartsman, Patrick Thomas | (50 minutes) | |
| Covers, often the bane of small press publishers. How do you put out a nice looking book without breaking the bank? What do you need to know when designing those covers and selecting cover art? What pitfalls should you watch out for that could mean the difference between looking pro and not. |
| 1:00 PM | Readings: Russ Colchamiro, Adam Ruben, Alex Shvartsman | Chesapeake |
| Russ Colchamiro, Alex Shvartsman, Adam Ruben | (50 minutes) |
| 2:00 PM | Starting your own Small Press | Pimlico |
| Dave Robison (M), Andrew Fox, Gary L Lester, Alex Shvartsman | (50 minutes) | |
| Taxes, registration, a company name… there are so many things to consider before you even start. Learn some of the things you should be aware of before you take that plunge into the publishing mogul pool. |
MONDAY
| 12:00 PM | What Do Short Fiction Editors Want? | Salon D |
| Mike McPhail, Bernie Mojzes, Alex Shvartsman, Joshua Palmatier | (50 minutes) | |
| What is the behind-the-scenes process of what happens at a magazine? From Slush to Sale panel |
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Posted by Alex Shvartsman
This week’s issue of Nature includes “Grains of Wheat,” my story of big pharma, chess mythology, and revenge. You can read it here for free. There’s also a link from the story that leads to a brief essay about the inspiration and writing challenges behind it, which I hope readers of this blog will find interesting.
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4 Comments | Acceptances & Publications | Tagged: flash fiction, nature | Permalink
Posted by Alex Shvartsman
Dark Expanse: Surviving the Collapse is FREE at Amazon for the next few days. Grab your copy!
And speaking of anthologies, all acceptances and rejections for UFO4 have gone out. I’m waiting on one rewrite request, and on all the contracts to come in, but I expect to announce the TOC early next week!
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Posted by Alex Shvartsman
This weekend I’ll be attending Albacon 2015 (well, technically it’s called Albacon 2014 1/2 because this year’s official Albacon is hosting the World Fantasy Convention later this year. But for all indents and porpoises….)
Anyhow, here’s my event schedule for the next three days:
Friday
2pm in Troy: Getting the Word Out
8pm in Latham: Ice Cream Social
Saturday
11am in Latham: Humor in SF
12:30 in lobby: Signing
1:30pm Reading (30 min)
2pm in Troy: Anthology Editing 101
4pm in Troy: Social Media
Sunday
No events scheduled for me — I shall roam the halls, and engage in wacky shenanigans.
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Posted by Alex Shvartsman
Kickstarter posted a series of brief Creator Basics videos on their YouTube channel, where Lisa Lucas, Daniel Jose Older, Farai Chideya and yours truly get to dispense some wisdom about preparing to launch a Kickstarter project in publishing and journalism fields.
This is pretty basic information (as advertised in the series’ title!) but if you are relatively new to Kickstarter and are thinking of creating a campaign, it’s a good start-off point.
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Posted by Alex Shvartsman
It’s been a while since I had the time to write an update, so here’s a brief rundown on some recent writing and publishing news.
The May issue of the Fantastic Stories of the Imagination has reprinted by story Icarus Falls (cover art above), which was originally published in Daily Science Fiction last year. It’s definitely one of my strongest stories, so if you haven’t read it yet, please do! FSoI is also running a crowdfunding campaign right now. They’re a worthy magazine, so please take a look and consider backing. There are lots of great fiction rewards available!
I also recently sold an original flash fiction story, “He Who Watches” to Fireside Magazine. This will be my first time appearing at Fireside, which is a very nice market as well, so I’m excited to have broken in.
I’m also excited that StarShipSofa, possibly the world’s top SF short fiction podcast, has selected a whopping six stories from my collection to produce for their show. The following stories will appear at StarShipSofa: Doubt, The Dragon Ships of Tycho, Ravages of Time, Price of Allegiance, The Far Side of the Wilderness and Dominoes Falling.
And speaking of the collection — it is very kindly reviewed in the May issue of Locus Magazine. They talked about a dozen or so individual stories, drawing the following conclusion: “At any length, Shvartsman is an entertaining writer who can take on many voices and make them his.”
Finally, I’ve been hard at work on UFO4 and hope to announce the final TOC by next week!
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Comments Off on New Sales and Publications | Acceptances & Publications | Tagged: Fantastic Stories of the Imagination, Fireside, Locus, StarShipSofa | Permalink
Posted by Alex Shvartsman
The Hook
I was mucking out the dragon’s garage when the witch’s text popped up on my phone.
BRING ME A BIRD
“Ugh,” I said to Moonfire. “Here we go again.”
Tina Connolly writes:
Seriously Wicked is a lighthearted YA novel about a girl who lives with a “seriously wicked” witch. Cam’s voice just popped into my head one day and the whole novel spilled out.
Now, there was lots of rewriting, of course! I wrote the first draft of this book before Ironskin. Seriously Wicked was my fifth completed novel, and the first what I thought of as a “really-truly” novel, a full-length novel I believed in and loved. Still, Seriously Wicked was my fifth novel, and Silverblind (my most recently-written novel, that came out Oct 2014) was my tenth. So, I like to think I’ve learned a little bit.
And one thing that happened with Seriously Wicked is that I rewrote the beginning. Again and again. Oh, right, and did I say again? Yes. Again. I kept coming back to this book between later novels and rewriting the whole novel, but particularly the beginning, because as we all know, your opening has to work very very hard to set the stage and tone and characters and hook the reader and everything else.
For fun, I thought I’d show you how much better the beginning got over time:
Draft 1. Book title: HOW I STOPPED THE WITCH WHO ATE MANHATTAN
Chapter One: Introduction To Me, aka CASH
Look. Say you’re a girl. And say someday you grow up and decide to be preggers. When you’re carrying around an innocent little baby with blue eyes and a kinda smooshed nose that everyone says someday she’ll grow into, then for the love of pete, do not under any circumstances say you just gotta have pickles dipped in chocolate.
Note: This is a terrible opening. I have no idea who CASH is. Also, as a reader, I don’t want to be accused of being A) a girl, B) preggers, and C) liking pickles and chocolate. The only thing good I can say about this opening is that putting these words down on the page made all the other words follow in a flood.
#
Draft 2. Book title: WITCH GIRL HEARTS DEMON BOY
Chapter One: Hot Seat
If you think your life stinks because you have to take out the recycling or vacuum your room or something normal like that, then listen up.
Every morning before school I got to start by collecting the dragon’s milk and mucking out her living quarters. There aren’t many dragons left, if any, but there’s one for sure living out back in the detached RV garage, big and warm and smelling of regret. The witch says one girl dragon doesn’t make any more noise than a chicken, and those are legal in the city, so so far she’s gotten away with it.
Note: Significantly better, but the opening sentence is still a bit aggressive (READER LET ME MAKE ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT YOU), and then we talk about dragons for awhile and I’m starting to wonder how long this is going on. (Note: It goes on for PAGES. Cam tells you about EVERY SINGLE ONE OF HER MORNING CHORES.)
#
Draft 78 (approximately). Book title: SERIOUSLY WICKED
Chapter One: Girl on Fire
If you think your life stinks because your musical mom makes you practice violin three hours a day even though you’re tone deaf, or your athletic dad makes you stay on the high school diving team even though your best dive is a bellyflop, then listen up.
Here’s what it’s like to live with a witch.
Every morning at 4:55 AM I drag my weary butt out of bed and head straight for the choreboard. The choreboard is a shiny list of magical tasks the witch wants me to do to “understand true witchery” or something, and if I haven’t done every one by the time I leave for school, it magically slices my thumbs with papercuts.
Note: Not really better. Going backwards, I think. Ever heard the advice not to start with your character waking up? Okay then.
#
Draft 233 (approximately). Book title: SERIOUSLY WICKED
Chapter One: Girl on Fire
4:55 in the horrible, horrible A.M., and once again I was staring at a whiteboard framed in gilded wood carved with toothy serpents. A peeling office label on the bottom proclaimed: Chores by Which One Must Understand True Witchery.
The toothbrush dangled from my mouth while I pressed the label back down, picked up the dry-erase marker, and marked off, “Werewolf pup—feed and take outside” with a big red X.
Then yelped as the choreboard gave me a papercut on my thumb.
Note: I rather like this setting, but it brings up weird questions (how does a choreboard give you a papercut? It’s magical, okay? GO WITH IT) and you don’t want the reader having weird papercut-related questions on the first page. Also, she’s still basically just waking up and going through her chores. I do like the juxtaposition between the whiteboard/office labels and witchy things.
#
And then finally (FINALLY!) we get to the real one. The final one.
SERIOUSLY WICKED
Chapter One: TRUE WITCHERY
I was mucking out the dragon’s garage when the witch’s text popped up on my phone.
BRING ME A BIRD
“Ugh,” I said to Moonfire. “Here we go again.”
Note: I kept the most important chore (mucking out the dragon’s RV garage) and then we jump RIGHT TO THE CONFLICT WITH THE WITCH. No detailed explanation of every single one of Cam’s magical chores. No weird musings about papercuts or pickles. It still establishes the humor in the story, which partly comes from the juxtaposition of magic and mundanity: dragons living in garages, a wicked witch who sends her demands by text (the witch is a big texter.) It still establishes that Cam has to work. A lot. And then: Cam brings the witch a bird and the witch tells her she’s planning to take over the world. Just a normal Tuesday.
Buy Seriously Wicked on Amazon
About the author:
Tina Connolly is the Nebula-nominated author of the Ironskin trilogy from Tor Books. Her next book, Seriously Wicked, comes out May 5th from Tor Teen. Her stories have appeared in Women Destroy SF, Lightspeed, Tor.com, Strange Horizons, UFO 3, and many more. Her narrations have appeared in podcasts including Podcastle, Pseudopod, and Beneath Ceaseless Skies, and she recently recorded the audiobook for Alex Shvartsman’s Explaining Cthulhu to Grandma, which is available on Amazon. She runs the Parsec-winning flash fiction podcast Toasted Cake.
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If you’re an author with a book coming out soon and you wish to participate on The Hook, please read this.
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Posted by Alex Shvartsman
Alex Shvartsman's Speculative Fiction 