Reader (and fine writer) sends me first feedback since publication of OBLIVION ANGELS

Got an email recently from a writer I published at Poverty House last year and asked if I could share it. Here it is; it speaks for itself. 

Hey Sheldon,

This is Corey Villas. You might not remember me, but you helped me with some edits to a micro piece I wrote last year called Tinderbox Blood about a boy who’s father was in prison and was forced to deal with a possum that was attacking his hound dog every night.
I just finished your new novel, Oblivion Angels, and had to reach out. 
First of all, congratulations on an amazing work. Although it was early in the story, Jamie’s death scene and that final sentence hit me hard, one that will stay with me for quite some time.
But further, I decided to take a break from writing mid-last year. I felt like I hit a wall face first. Even when new ideas would come, I felt no desire or urge to put pen to paper. Between the effort to write something worth writing, as well as the process of submission and rejections, I figured “why even fucking bother?” But your story has given me the feeling again, the feeling like I need to start back at it. A genuine desire again. It’s the first time I’ve felt that in probably 7-8 months. So for that, I thank you.
Again, congratulations on a magnificently raw and painfully beautiful work. It will always hold a special place in my bookshelf.
Corey Villas


I wasn't sure how to let Corey know how much this meant. And, dang, he bought and read it quickly. 

Thanks again, buddy.

A title change for my novel-in-progress, publication Tuesday of my new novel OBLIVION ANGELS

So I started a new novel. I swear, it's like every short story I start now veers too long and then becomes something more than a short story, because I don't think a short story should be thirty pages long. I love horror collections but those stories are way way too long. I truly believe they are novel attempts that faded out around that page count and were reconstructed to fit a short story narrative and then submitted to an anthology.

That's something else I've noticed; a lot of horror writers publish their stories not in journals but in anthologies. It always seems like somebody like Ellen Datlow or Ellen Datlow herself is putting together another anthology. It's surely some quirk of the genre I've just never noticed before now.

But those stories are too long. So once a story I'm writing hits around twenty pages I either stop and read it over a few times and see if I've just got wordy here and there or if it should have been a longer work. If it's the latter, I usually just drag it into the Various folder on my desk top for the time being or possibly forever. With others, I sort of like where it's going and can feel more of it swirling around in my head and fingertips and so keep working on it.

It's become easier for me to admit that I'm officially working on a novel. I had never been a novelist, really, until the publication of The Orchard Is Full of Sound. Before that book, I was solidly a short story writer and a hundred percent content with that. But after Orchard, I started a story that became Oblivion Angels; and now I've started started a story that's become The Old Power (originally titled Sister Hall). I'm at about page twenty-five on The Old Power and so it's only just been born as a novel. 

With this being my six novel (the fifth, Oblivion Angels, comes out Tuesday) I'm now at five novels and four story collections. Once this sixth is published (Lord willing) I'll have two more novels than collections and then there it is.

I'm proud of Oblivion Angels and really eager to see it come out with my publisher, Cowboy Jamboree Press. Adam Van Winkle, the publisher there, has published my last several books and will publish (if he likes them in manuscript) whatever books I write from here on. We have an agreement that CJ will have exclusive rights to all my prose books - fiction, essays, short stories, etc. 

But I also have a collection of stories presently in the works - Until the Going Down of the River. That manuscript is at just over a hundred pages right now, and I just finished another story to include in the draft called "To Open Hills," published by Wilson Koewing at his journal Bottle Rocket. You can read it at the Selected Writing page here at Bent Country.

The Opening Section of My New Novel-in-Progress SISTER HALL

Below is a link to the opening section of my new novel-in-progress, Sister Hall. I posted on Twitter about the novel, too.

I'll also post this on Poverty House later today. It's a short section, but it is the opening of the novel.

Here it is at Poverty House.

My short story "I Am War, Mr. Tolstoy" published today

My short story "I Am War, Mr. Tolstoy" was published today on my author's page at Cowboy Jamboree Press. 

I pull from some personal shit on this one more than I usually do with my stories (which is generally a pretty fair amount to begin with). It's subject matter I've not been brave enough to share until the past, maybe, two years. 

Also, I insert some Leo Tolstoy into this one, obvious by the title for starters. Tolstoy is my favorite stylist - not my favorite storyteller - but goddamn his style is impossible. Listen, for real, go read him. Not one of the novels, though Anna Karenina is a fine one if you can push through to the last two pages, where all the patience and pushing through gets a right fine pay off.

But start with the short stories. Start with "Alyosha the Pot" if you're just getting into him. Then move next to his short novel Master and Man. Just read Tolstoy is what I'm saying. He style is simple enough to be read in grade school. Thing is, you may not appreciate its themes and profundity until much later in life. But ain't that at least the start of a great relationship.

Hope you like the story. And I guess it's okay if you want to leave a comment here and tell me it was good or that it was so bad it nearly blinded you with horror while reading. Don't care. Just say something. 

David and Tom, Chaos and Hobart.

Went and got behind on sharing my Hobart Chaos Questions interviews here, so I'm going to post links to the last two here now.

I talked with David Joy a ways back there. He said things like, "I go back to eleven years old fishing the cattle pond on the Johnston’s farm. My Granny can be my Al." And chided me for calling what people wear outfits. 

David's Interview

And just yesterday I posted my interview with Tom Williams. Tom said things like, "I am going to eat the editorial offices of literary magazines and book publishers that have rejected me and my friends..."

Tom's Interview

Next up is Bonnie Jo Campbell. We wrote yesterday and she let me know that she'll have them my way at some point this week. Can't wait to see what this black belt storyteller offers up.

I Asked Leah Hampton Some Chaos Questions

Leah Hampton, the chimera herself, "sat down" for a Chaos Questions interview with me at Hobart. She is also the self-espoused Hobo Hampton, it turns out.

Productivity

The reason I've written and had published nine books in twelve years is because I write for recreation, for fun. It's what I do instead of going to the movies or having dinner out, or so forth. I don't mean it's my hobby; I'm saying it's the most fun thing I do, so I do it a lot.