Now that the dust has settled on my forthcoming collection, I'm able to stand back and look at it at something like arm's length. There was a flurry of activity just before I headed off to World Fantasy in Calgary, but now I think that hurry up and wait best sums up the process. In a few weeks I expect I'll be settling down to proof the entire collection, and the prospect fills me with equal parts delight and dread: delight because it will mean the book is that much closer to actually being a book, and dread because I worry about what I'll think when I see ten of my stories one after the other. I'm also not looking forward to the actual proofing process: in part because I've done enough proofing over the years to know how mind-numbingly boring it is, and in part because I've already read each of the stories several times (in addition to having written them), and having to do it again isn't the most exciting prospect in the world. Still, if years of being an editor have taught me nothing else, they've taught me that you can never proofread something enough times; there's never a point where you can afford to think 'Ah well, no need to bother, what could possibly be wrong?'
For those who are interested, here's the line-up of stories; ten in all, two of them (totalling 16,000 words) written for the collection. Original publication for the eight reprints follows the title:
'The Appointed Time' (Supernatural Tales 9, 2005)
'Endless Night' (Exotic Gothic 2, 2008)
'The Palace' (At Ease With the Dead, 2007)
'The Wide, Wide Sea' (Exotic Gothic, 2007)
'The Brink of Eternity' (Poe, 2009)
'Tourist Trap' (Shadows and Silence, 2000)
'Northwest Passage' (Acquainted With the Night, 2004)
'The Hiding Place' (Strange Tales 2, 2007)
The two new stories are 'After', based on a real life murder case in England in 1860, and 'Out and Back', inspired by pictures of an abandoned amusement park. I've seen a preliminary cover design, but there's a still a long way to go on that front before I have an image I can post. The book will be published as a hardcover, with a certain number of deluxe leatherbound copies. I'm due to get sheets for signing for these sometime next summer, which means I have a few months in which to develop a more authoritative and properly authorial scrawl. Wish me luck!
For those who are interested, here's the line-up of stories; ten in all, two of them (totalling 16,000 words) written for the collection. Original publication for the eight reprints follows the title:
'The Appointed Time' (Supernatural Tales 9, 2005)
'Endless Night' (Exotic Gothic 2, 2008)
'The Palace' (At Ease With the Dead, 2007)
'The Wide, Wide Sea' (Exotic Gothic, 2007)
'The Brink of Eternity' (Poe, 2009)
'Tourist Trap' (Shadows and Silence, 2000)
'Northwest Passage' (Acquainted With the Night, 2004)
'The Hiding Place' (Strange Tales 2, 2007)
The two new stories are 'After', based on a real life murder case in England in 1860, and 'Out and Back', inspired by pictures of an abandoned amusement park. I've seen a preliminary cover design, but there's a still a long way to go on that front before I have an image I can post. The book will be published as a hardcover, with a certain number of deluxe leatherbound copies. I'm due to get sheets for signing for these sometime next summer, which means I have a few months in which to develop a more authoritative and properly authorial scrawl. Wish me luck!
