don't tell mom the babysitter's dead

[intertribal]

Innsmouth Free Press released their Multi-Ethnic Issue today (Lovecraftian stories set outside typical milieus, with non-typical casts), and my story, "Red Goat, Black Goat" is included.  Hence the Uxia icon!  The story's a variation of the old "babysitter horror" trope, except in Indonesia, where things are a little different.

So you know, have a read if you are so inclined. 

(Look, my name's on the cover along with people who are way more famous and awesome than I!)

PDF of whole issue (pretty, shiny!)
Just my story, online

Comments

[islas-j.livejournal.com]

Congrats!

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Aw, thanks!

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

More famous, I will grant. More awesome? I doubt it.

Also, what the hell *is* Gracie Law doing here?

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

Icon recognition fail on my part. But the first line stands.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was like who the heck is Gracie Law?

And :)

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Pretty dang scary story you wrote there! That's primal scary stuff--haven't been scared like that since I was nine and terrified of the salt monster on Star Trek. The choking on the goat hair was the most scary part.

Also, this type of story fuels that feverish need to plan for the contingency where you're called to babysit for kids in a house with a Goat Nurse in it. How can I not make the same mistakes Kris did. Oh wait. She didn't really make any mistakes .... Auuggggghhhhhhhh!

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

OH YAY I'M SO GLAD YOU WERE SCARED :D :D Remember: don't leave your kids in a house with a Goat Nurse in it. Moral of the story, parents.

Thanks for reading!

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

that looks pretty sweet. will read later when not dying. apologies for dying.

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

also, congratulations!

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

haha, thanks.

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

read it (as mentioned)! i, uh, don't really have much in the way of a reaction, though. it was immersive (apparently that is not a word that means what i want it to mean, but i think you get it) and well-written, but i couldn't really suspend disbelief. sorry!

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Ah well. I don't expect you to like anything I write these days anyway, tbh. Sorry I keep missing your calls by the way - I had my phone on vibrate for class and then went out to dinner and never turned it back to something audible. What's up?

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

Aw. But I feel like I should, or something. I mean I should 'get' it, at least. No big deal about the call. I was just kinda in a weird mood, desperate to get outside, talk to people, get caffeine. I settled for going to a cafe by myself (for like an hour before they closed, lame), which helped.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

I wish you did too. My mother isn't really a fan of what I write now either. So I don't know.

I wouldn't have been able to do anything yesterday anyway, so that's probably for the best (my entire week is insanely booked...). First day I can do anything is Saturday, lol.

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

Hm, yeah, I do feel like it requires a certain taste, that it just doesn't resonate with me--which makes me also not want to say anything negative, because that seems undeserved for something so obviously skilled. But like...when it comes to works of art, whatever mix of 'purely' aesthetic and other sensibilities may be part of one's taste/standards/whatev, I am kind of picky. Excepting maybe pathos-filled 'junk food' books, movies, etc. (and I don't really read much/any of that sort of thing anymore, so it's hard to say), there isn't a lot I get into, and less that I really find worthwhile. If you want to write something that is so deeply packed with universal meaning that I/anyone would have to simply be dense not to get it, I admire your ambition, but it could also be said that your expectations are quite high, even arrogant. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but you don't have to be so hard on yourself.

I have to go to a wedding on Saturday, but otherwise I'm free.

Did I ever tell you the Augustine quote I adore?

"Once for all, then, a short precept is given thee: Love, and do what thou wilt: whether thou hold thy peace, through love hold thy peace; whether thou cry out, through love cry out; whether thou correct, through love correct; whether thou spare, through love do thou spare: let the root of love be within, of this root can nothing spring but what is good."

(Latin: "dilige et quod vis fac."; falsely often: "ama et fac quod vis."
Translation by Professor Joseph Fletcher: Love and then what you will, do.)

It seems to work for me even for loves like 'philosophy' is a love of wisdom.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Right, sure. I have gotten good feedback about it from horror writers that I look up to, and to a certain extent that "means" more. But at the same time, obviously, I care about your opinion for other reasons. I guess sometimes I get drawn into feeling like, "how can she be friends with me if she doesn't like what I write?" which obviously is flawed. I guess... I'd prefer it if you didn't apologize for not liking it? IDK, b/c then I feel like it implies my intent was to have you personally like it, and I have failed, and you know, I get that enough from rejection letters that magazines send out: "This didn't work for us, sorry, better luck next time!" And I don't want to feel like I have to write something for your liking in the same way that I sort of have to write something that editors like. This is probably a case of me reading way too much into one word and you don't mean me to be inferring any of this, but... yeah, just please don't apologize. I get bad vibes from it.

The whole "deeply packed with universal meaning that everyone has to get it" is not what I meant by bigger, non-executable stories, btw, b/c I don't really aspire to that. I don't even really think it's possible.

Is this going to be a wedding extravaganza? Halley's also going to a wedding on Saturday and I wonder if it's the same one. I'm probably around on Sunday as well, regardless. I have to write a response paper over the weekend, but the biggest challenge there is going to be finishing the goddamn infuriating book (infuriating b/c the subject matter is infuriating, not b/c the writer is, except he's a really pathos-y journalist so that makes you even more infuriated to read about the infuriating things he's writing about).

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

Okay, what I meant by "sorry" was more just a recognition of the fact that I am your friend, and thus my opinion might matter to you, and I don't want my opinion to be hurtful, but I also can't really be dishonest. It's not about your intent, and I am quite certain that you don't write for my benefit. But I have no objection to not apologizing--feel awkward doing it anyway, I guess because it seems like I'm apologizing for having the reactions I have, and I don't really feel sorry about that; it's the consequences of communicating those reactions to you that concern me....

As for universal meaning, that was a point more related to my reaction to your writing as one individual (individual vs. universal, subjective vs. objective sorta thing) than to your talking about bigger, non-executable stories. I really had no idea what you meant by that, exactly, though now I have a better idea, thank you. I do think it's possible to some extent and in a certain sense. It requires certain things of your readers, like sincerity/interest and literacy and possibly other, less obvious things, so it can't be everyone, but at the very least, some writing gets much closer than other writing.

I don't know. It's Joey Morrison's wedding. Lexi's older brother. Yeah, I need to get started too...sadly we don't read anything as long as a book. But they're (well, some of them) pretty intense readings--I mean logically demanding. Will def. get back to you on dates.

Sorry I'm probably writing like a robot. My grandma is visiting and making me do things, and it stresses me out. Like a lot. That and other things. The more emotional I get, the more logical my writing sometimes.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

OK, well, glad we got that cleared up.

Yeah, I figured as much - I just wanted to make sure that was clear. Now you have a better idea what I meant? Huh. Ok. That's probably true, that some writing gets closer than others - in trying to think through examples, however,

Nope, different wedding then. Unless Joey Morrison is marrying the family friend of Halley's, which I suppose is possible. My readings are long but not all that logically demanding, tbh. Like the book we're reading now, Overthrow (the infuriating one) is pretty much just a chronicling of the US overthrowing foreign governments, and the thesis is basically "the US is like the world's biggest asshole, the end." Then there was Clash of Civilizations, which... is provocative. But for tomorrow we're reading Edward Said's response to Clash of Civilizations, which is just lolzy ("Huntington tried to give his argument a little more subtlety and many, many more footnotes; all he did, however, was confuse himself and demonstrate what a clumsy writer and inelegant thinker he was."). IDK man there are people in my class who have never heard of realism as a foreign policy model and thought Huntington didn't give enough credit to "the history of fighting between Islam and the West" when that is like his entire point, and it's just like :(

Errgh... how many things can your grandma make you do? Is this Vegas grandma? I'm sort of drunk, so that's where I'm at right now.

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

in trying to think through examples, however,

...?

lol @ the people in your class. (and yeah, Said is snarky) people in my class are...who knows. there's "Killing innocent people is morally acceptable" guy in my ethics class. But actually i like my ethics class, because as far as i'm concerned, in ethics, what matters is the backgrounds of the people talking more than their intellectual ability. and at least for NE, it's a pretty diverse class, in terms of race, politics, religion, age, disability, and gender. probably socioeconomic class too, although i doubt anyone there is really wealthy.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

lol, yes, that's exactly what happens when I try to think through examples. I fall off the comma cliff. I don't know what I would have concluded when I wrote that... but thinking now, I have trouble thinking of writers that I feel get really close to "truth." I'm almost tempted to say Heller in Catch-22, and McCarthy in The Crossing... but it's hard to say. I guess I'm not sure what the truth looks like. Is it like child pornography, you know, I can't define it but I know it when I see it? You'd probably disagree with that.

I actually like the people in my poli sci class too. There was a disturbing side-comment today about Japanese civilians deserving to be atomic-bombed... but it's actually a fairly participatory, earnest class. So does that mean what's useful in understanding ethics is where participants in the discussion are coming from in terms of background?

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

also, this is what i think when i read the title. somehow i think this association is probably wrong...

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Haha, no, I named it after a Death in June song that I don't think has to do with anarchism (but it's incomprehensible).

[timesygn.livejournal.com]

Congratulations on the story! I look forward to reading it.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Thanks, hope you like it!

[timesygn.livejournal.com]

(story = read)

Yum! Nice one. (I particularly liked the ur-goat-babysitter figure lingering in the shadows with her goat legs poking out from under her dress.)

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

Thanks muchly!