Category Archives: Benjamin T. Smith

Short Story Rough Drafts

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All right, as of 07/15 I have finished six short story rough drafts.  That is since July 4th, so on that is roughly a short story every two days.

These short stories range anywhere from 1,000 – 4,000 words each, and they are all very, very rough.  I intend to revise them beginning tonight with the first entry for the NeaDNAthal anthology.  They’re allowing for two entries to that, so I will see if I can get another one out.  The first is a futuristic sci-fi tale, but I think the next one (If there is one) will be back in the past.  A steampunk tale, maybe.

Here are the working titles for the six rough drafts and where they are bound for:

“Subroutine” – Penumbra‘s Hitchcock theme.

“For All Mankind” – Wily Writers‘ Military theme.

“A Well-Ordered Garden” – Wily Writers‘ catch-all speculative theme.

“The Future in the Past” – NeaDNAthal anthology, entry number one.

“The Re-Gift of the Magi” – Crossed Genres‘ “Gift” theme.

“Enough” – Not sure where this is going just yet.  Happened to just spit it out one morning, so it needs a lot of refinement.

July 2013 Goal Progression

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So far, the rough drafts of three short stories have been finished.  Also, between the two novel ideas I was floating around I’ve settled on the older one of the two.  The world is a little bit more established and should give me plenty to work with as I try to speed through the rough draft process.

Things have been off to a bit of a rocky start this month, but we are picking up steam.

I will also need to make time to re-submit some tales (Such as “Code Amaranth”) to new markets.  For most of my tales (With the exception of “A Tuberous Anomaly” and “The Little Red Survivalist”) it is a long journey down Rejection Alley before arriving at the Hall of Acceptability.

“Code Amaranth” Rejected in Final Selection

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Back in April I submitted a short story titled “Code Amaranth” to the Future Embodied Anthology.  There were around 250 submissions total and the story made it to the final round of selection before being dropped.

While disappointing, it is heartening to know that the story did so well given the quantity of tales it was up against.  Here’s hoping it finds a home elsewhere!

“A Tuberous Anomaly” Deemed Acceptable

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The Fringeworks has some interesting anthologies coming out in the future, from high seas piratical tales to nazi zombies to, you guessed it, potatoes.  I wrote a Star Trek-inspired tale for this anthology called “A Tuberous Anomaly”, which features a human starship taking a shortcut through a star system with three suns.  Things are all rosy until somebody forgets to completely seal the ship from the suns’ light rays, and then the potatoes go trinary.  Think “Attack of the Killer Tomatoes”, but on a less violent scale.

It was deemed acceptable earlier this evening, and is supposed to be published later this year.  I’m looking forward to what other stories are included in the anthology!