Saturday, November 04, 2006

Out of the Gutter

I am absofrickinlutely honoured to be listed with this crowd as part of Out of the Gutters. The idea is "an anthology of grim, fierce, uncomfortably realistic crime fiction and more."

"The most succinct description of what I’m after is “well-written, fucked up stuff"" - that's what it said in the email I received, telling me about the project. It was a concept that produced more ideas than I had time to write.

Some of the others in this? Duane Swierczynski, Victor Gishler, and Charlie Stella - and that's barely scratching the surface of a fine list of writers.

Short stories are something I've struggled with. They seem to come effortlessly to some others much to my dismay. Unlike novels where I couldn't plot to save my life, with short stories I must have most of the storyline in my head, worked out, before I start. Otherwise, I'm liable to go off on some tangent of interest and explore the character more than the confines of a short story allow.

It took a long time, but I can actually say I had fun writing this one.

Now, if I can just squeeze in time to write my lunatic farmer story...

7 comments:

s.w. vaughn said...

WOOT! This is SWEET, Sandra! Congratulations!

Man, I clicked on the link and went, whoa! This is my milieau! (Okay, I didn't actually think 'milieau' -- more like 'good shit here!).

Already dropped a line to Mr. Louis with a (hopefully) quick clarification question, and am planning a submission right now.

Woot, and woot again, for well-written f*ed up stuff!

(Don't forget your cheap cold sore treatment now... LOL. Curse you, spamming scumbucket! Get off Sandra's blog!)

Sandra Ruttan said...

Thanks SW - and you never know, that might be a public service for someone who doesn't know how to deal with cold sores.

Would that make me a distributor of medical advice? Just another thing for the resume, I guess.

(Seriously, the cold sore treatment is a new spam. The ones I don't under stand are the ones that say, "Good Job!" and "Nice site" and "Very nice" - which always hit my back blog.)

anne frasier said...

congratulations, sandra!!!

very cool!!!

Mindy Tarquini said...

OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!

*stops running in circles*

That's great, Sandra. Congrulations and all that.

*commences circle-running again*

OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!OMG!

Daniel Hatadi said...

Go, Sandra, go!

(what's happening to M.G? She's like, OMGing all over the place!)

Sandra Ruttan said...

Thanks Anne and MG!

(says calmly) Now MG, come sit down, take a deep breath, that's it. We don't want anyone to get hurt...

Sandra Ruttan said...

Daniel,

I think she might have had a religious experience.

She'll get over it.

And thanks!