I’ve been working on this site for a couple of hours, at least. I added cover images to the short stories and nonfiction pages and added a Catalysts page. Hopefully, it’s easy to navigate and looks all right. There will be more changes coming up in the next few days/weeks, I’m sure. Pamela said I should add an image to the front page so I’ll probably to that at some point (of course, that image will probably end up on every page, so I guess I better make it a good one).

One of the things I noticed as I worked on the bibliographies was the small amount of credits considering the decade since “Icarus Falling” was first published in Greg Gifune‘s Burning Sky: Tales of Science Fiction Terror. Even more glaring to me is that once “The Growth of Alan Ashley” was published in Borderlands 5, it seemed that the only names one sees is Borderlands or Dark Discoveries. Now, I’m not complaining, I’m going to explain. Or at least try to, because I’m sure the following is going to read a lot more like excuses than reasons (and that’s primarily because they are).

In 2003/2004 I saw my career take off. In January 2003, I had three small press pubs, then I made the sale to Borderlands 5 in June (which was published in November) and sold two more stories, one to a small press webzine, the other to the first issue of Dark Discoveries. In 2004, I sold another story to James Beach at DD and found out Borderlands 5 sold its paperback rights to Warner Books. James also liked the idea of me writing a column for DD. From the Borderlands came out that fall from Warner and my column, American Gauthic, began appearing in Dark Discoveries.

In 2003/2004, my personal life fell apart. After eight years with the same woman (though we were teenagers when we met), a child together, and being married for three years, the marriage began to crumble. I came to this realization in May 2003 but had nothing. In March 2004, we finally separated. Guilt riddled me. Between a new job at a bookstore and having returned to college in January 2003, and trying to be a good father to my daughter (who was five/six at the time), I was spread thin. I wrote, but not a lot. And much of what I wrote seemed to just die on the page.

Luckily, the column was pretty easy to write and I had plenty to keep me busy with rewriting. Catalysts first came about in 2005 and was finally published in 2007. In January 2007, I met my wife, Pamela. Not long after, the words began to flow again.

Of course, now I also have a pretty busy day job teaching.

So, where’s that leave us now? Well, I’m getting myself on track again. I have a bunch of first drafts (and a few second, third, and fourth drafts) for short stories here that I hope to work on, as well as a few ideas for some new stories. I have Alice on the Shelf at a publisher right now and coming out this year. And I have a novel whose first draft I worked on from April 2008 until this past February that I’m currently reading before I begin at least two edits/rewrites. Oh, and my column American Gauthic will be appearing sporadically in Dark Discoveries.

And I have some more plans, too. None of which concern you right now, you nosy people.

So that’s the story right now, folks. Talk to you later.