Digital Vatican

You may or may not be aware, the Vatican is digitizing its collections.

Think about this a moment.

There are things in the Vatican collections which are entirely unique. Hundreds of years old. Fascinating and beautiful and even, dare I say, education and/or informational. And they're digitizing it. I cannot begin to describe my joy. 4000 manuscripts. It's too much to ever get to, I'm sure, but it's there and I'm happy. It's one of those things I think about sometimes; the Vatican contains so much history, which hardly anybody is able to scratch the surface of. Access is limited (though I confess I don't know the full details of this. I'm sure scholars are permitted to do research there. I'm sure showing up at the Vatican and saying "let me in, I'm Catholic!" though true, would not just let me in.)

The Oxford library (the Bodlein Library specifically) has also made some of its super old manuscripts available online, for free.

Another fantastically amazing religious book which is available to view online now is the Gigas Codex, which translates to "Giant Book", but is also referred to colloquially as the Devil's Bible. It's the "real" Bible, as it were, in Latin [of varying dialects], but also contains a big huge picture of the devil, and then other non-Christian-Bible style documents. Oh yeah, and legend has it that it was written by a monk who traded his soul to the Devil so the book would be finished in one night, like some kind of fucked up Christmas Carol. National Geographic did a neat documentary on it, and it really is a huge book. Like, coffee table sized.

Pope Francis actually puts quite a lot of emphasis on the Devil, mentioning him in speeches fairly frequently. I confess I haven't really paid attention to prior popes' speeches, so I'm not familiar with all of the content. It could be that secular media are just blown away that we Catholics still believe in such things, I don't know. This year in May was the 9th annual Exorcism and Prayer for Liberation conference in Rome, and Pope Francis has only been pope since 2013, so clearly the Devil has still been in mind.

Though I don't think you need me to tell you I think Pope Francis is a rock star. Calling out a Bishop for spending millions on his official residence? Not picking up the red leather shoes the former Pope Benedict had made for him? Auctioning his own Harley (and leather jacket) for charity?

Lazy Link Roundup™ October 20 2014

So I haven't had any rejections in a few days. It's kind of weird. I've submitted to Spacesuits and Sixguns, Betwix, Tin House, and Asimov's Science Fiction since last I reported. A couple of days I've subbed two in one day, but overall I have 26 submissions planned just now, even if they don't match properly to the days. This week's Chuck Wending flash prompt is only 500 words instead of 1000, so I may dash that out to bring the current total to 27. Another couple stories are almost done, but I know better than to try too hard with shorts.


In novel prep news, a couple of links I've perused lately. Not all of these are novel prep, but some are. It's almost always justifiable.

October Madness update, 10/10

Well, I'm slowly starting to run out of stories. I think I only have 6 left which are "done" and/or "ready". Have to spit-shine the others, which at one time I thought were ready. Funny how opinions change.

Let's see, on October 8, I sent a story to Apex. October 8 is also the day I received my first rejection of the month, from Fantastic Stories of the Imagination. That story will go out again before the end of the month.

On October 9, I sent a story to Urban Fantasy Magazine, and then jumped the gun (went to bed before midnight) to send a story to Buzzy Mag.

We've got people visiting this weekend, so I've already sent Saturday's sub to Shock Totem.

Honorable Mention

Almost every time Janet Reid has a 100 word flash contest on her blog, I enter. Most of the time I get nary a mention, which is fine. There's tough competition over there, and a lot of talented, thoughtful writers. But twice (!) now, I've gotten into "special recognition" categories. The first time was for "not quite a story but man oh man", and now in this most recent nod, the category was "Special recognition for entries that weren't quite stories, but if they were the start of novels, I'd want to read on". It's hard to write a beginning-middle-end in 100 words.

But, for your perusal, here is my entry in the "We Are Not Good People" giveaway flash contest (it's by Jeff Somers, and is the sequel to Trickster. I haven't read it yet, but I loved Trickster. So you should check 'em out.) The words to include were "cat, blood, spirits, magic, pants"

I was careful to set things up just so: salt circle, folded-pants with their customary dusting of cat hair, with an old fashioned dial phone resting on top. Music was always optional; the spirits didn't guide me one way or another, so I slipped a record on the turntable.

The witching hour. I pricked my finger and flicked my blood into the flame of a balsam candle. The record cut out and I waited in the silence. The magic's tidal pull rolled around me, and finally, the phone rang. I reached across the circle to pick it up.

"Hi Dad."  

Who knows, maybe there's a novel in that and maybe I'll send it to Janet Reid when it's finished. That's personalizing a query for ya! 


(for October Madness, I send a story to Shimmer yesterday, and to Apex regular submissions today.)

My October Subs so far

So far so good for the October Submission Game (title pending)!

On October 1 I submitted a story to Strange Horizons. They're following me on Twitter now, and I can only assume it's because I have, in my Twitter history, shared stories from their site, retweeted some things, and mentioned how I always love their stories which is why I sub to them. But it's hard not to read into, y'know? I tried to tell myself I wasn't that kind of writer. But we all are, if even a little. Ugh.

On October 2 I submitted a story to the Apex magazine Stealing the Spotlight microfiction contest (you have 'til the 15 to submit, in fact). 250 words or less, on five beasties they don't feel get enough spotlight. Super cool! I wrote a hellhound story. I feel like they fit into my Urban Fantasy "mythos" pretty well, and I can revisit the notions.

On October 3 (today!) I submitted a story to One Story magazine. I've gotten personalized rejections from them in the past, so maybe this one's the one! (heh, get it? The one? One story? I'll just let myself out....)


I also still have two pending submissions from prior to the game's start. I daresay if I get an acceptance (!) on one of them, I'll give myself a day of grace. Time to get some more pieces ready to submit, as right now it looks like I've got thirteen or fourteen or fifteen I'm "sure" of (sure is an iffy state of mind), and obviously that's just about half. I could write four more stories for the Apex thing (you can enter up to five, one for each beastie) and that could be fun.

October Submission Challenge (I'm not sure what else to call it)

Well, I sent in my first story submission for the October Submission Challenge. The story is one of my newer shorts, and I sent it to Strange Horizons.

Taking part in this....challenge? Game? Madness? has a couple of purposes for me. One, I'll put endings on some stories I've beein githering about for YEARS. Will they be the right endings? I guess I'll find out. But all these half finished stories laying about are kind of like having half finished coffee cups laying about. Nobody will consume them in their current state.

(ew. that was a terrible metaphor. Ah well.)

Anyway. It'll also keep my mind off the approach of NaNoWriMo. Or keep my mind in just the right stage to approach NaNoWriMo, which is to say I'll be thinking about my novel, but not obsessing it into the ground so I can't actually write it in November. I'm pretty sure I have my idea. One of the shorts I'm finishing has to do with it in a satellite fashion, which is interesting.

And, thirdly, if I submit prolifically, it will increase my chances of publication. Casting a wide net is much better than just dangling a couple of hooks, and I haven't lowered my submission standard. I will send only to magazines whose work I've enjoyed, who will pay me (the Submission Grinder helps immeasurably with this).