IAN: You look great tonight, babe.

KAT: Thanks.

IAN: I love that top.

KAT: I know, that’s why I picked it.

IAN: You have great teaser cleavage.

KAT: Teaser cleavage.

IAN: Yeah, it’s subtle but alluring. Not trailer cleavage or full-length-feature cleavage, just teaser cleavage.

KAT: You are such a nerd.

IAN: Hey, you married me. Happy New Year, Peaches.

I’ll be posting my year-end review in a couple of days, following by my annual collection of favourite reads, but for now I thought I’d share some pics taken over the holiday.

A real update is coming soon, I promise.

• Currently reading: The Big Bounce, by Elmore Leonard

Simon Strantzas was kind enough to direct me to a message board where Mark Lynch, one of the contributors to Shades of Darkness, is doing a story-by-story review of the book. He read “Leaves Brown” recently and here’s what he had to say:

And then I’m up to Ian Rogers, a writer I’ve not heard of before but which I’ll keep an eye open for more of. Minor quibble of shifting character viewpoints aside (and you could argue because of the protagonists’ “gifts” that this is not only acceptable but a valid contributory to the story) I enjoyed this very much indeed. His dialogue’s pretty much effortless and he gives us some appealing characters we’re happy to spend time with. The tale’s a postcard piece, really, but that doesn’t matter. Postcards can be enjoyable, don’t need great narrative leaps. Its got strength without pyrotechnics. I think we’re gonna see an awful lot more of this guy.

So thanks to Mark for the review and to Simon for pointing it out. You can read the other reviews here.

Still out on my ass. The day after I got over my flu, my wife brought home the stomach variety and guess who she passed it on to? Good times.

At least I’ll be on holidays in a few days. We aren’t going anywhere, except for a short visit to Oshawa to see my parents, and then we’ll be back in Peterborough to do nothing except watch movies, Season 4 of Lost on DVD, and catch up on my eggnog.

There was supposed to be a journal posting last weekend, but I’ve been out on my ass with the flu since Saturday night, and this is the first time I’ve been lucid enough to write anything that didn’t sound like the ravings of a man doped up on Tylenol Cold and Flu.

To bring you up to speed, on Saturday, before I got sick, I sent off my 400th short story submission. That’s 400 for the six years I’ve been sending out stories. A nice little milestone that doesn’t really mean anything except to me. I’d celebrate with eggnog, but I’m on clear fluids only for the next few days until I’m back to full strength.

I also meant to post recommendations of some Christmas books if anyone was still looking for presents for family or friends. Nothing says lovin’ like a book. Lasts longer than a movie or a CD and generally leads to more discussion afterward, in my somewhat biased opinion. Of course, it’s a little late in the hour to be offering present recommendations, but maybe if you’re searching for a Boxing Day prezzie for yourself, or if you’re like me and you do most of your shopping at the last minute, you’ll be interested in checking out one of these excellent books.

I don’t tend to pimp books written by friends, not because I see it as a conflict of interest — good stories are good stories, regardless of who writes them — but because I have too many friends who are good writers and not enough time to tell you about them all. From time to time I like to point the spotlight at one of them, but it’s hard to do that without feeling like I’m not giving props to the rest.

There is no easy solution to this, but there are compromises, and in this case I’ve decided to list a bunch of books that I have read in the last few months that I enjoyed.

Beneath the Surface, Simon Strantzas

I hate picking a favourite story in a collection. It’s like a father being asked to pick which one of his kids he loves the most. That sounds like a cop-out, but it’s really not. All of the weird tales in BTS are decent. I call them weird because while the stories could be called horror (I’m not one of those guys who gets hung up on labels), there is really something else going on here. Some less describable. Something that gets into your head long after you’ve finished reading. Which is what I like in a story.

Omens, by Richard Gavin

I started reading Omens almost immediately after I finished BTS, and I found Gavin’s prose to be somewhat similar to Strantzas. Beautifully ornate without being obtuse or pretentious. This is a difficult thing to pull off when you read the purple prose of so many Lovecraft wannabes. Gavin has succeed where so many of those “Lovecraftian” writers have failed. His work is truly worthy of the adjective. Omens makes a nice double feature alongside Beneath the Surface.

The Hoax, by Adrienne Jones

If Christopher Moore is the king of comedic speculative fiction, then Adrienne Jones must be the queen. Humour is one of the hardest things to write, and Jones is a true pro. The book isn’t always funny, sometimes it’s downright scary, and Jones balances both these extremes with true skill. After I finished The Hoax I immediately jumped online and ordered her other two books. If you want something completely unlike anything you’ve ever read before, pick this one up.

Frozen Blood, by Joel A. Sutherland

One of the strongest first novels I’ve read in years. Sutherland has a confident voice and doesn’t meander around the plot like most insecure first-time authors. The story is tight and fast, and extremely dark in both tone and atmosphere. Maybe it’s because I remember the big ice storm back in the ’90’s, but this book really managed to get under my skin.

So those are my Christmas recommendations. Buy them for friends or for yourself and enjoy them. I know I did.

• Currently reading: Last Night at the Lobster, by Stewart O'Nan

Since I’m quite fastidious with my records of stories in and stories out, I can actually participate in this meme with a high degree of accuracy.

Age when I decided I wanted to be a writer: 18
Age when I wrote my first story: 18 (not including the shite I wrote in school)
Age when I first submitted a short story to a magazine: 25 (to a paying market)
Age when I sold my first short story: 28 (“The Tattletail” to Dark Wisdom)
Total number of submissions: 396
Total acceptances: 29
Thickness of file of rejection slips prior to first story sale: 14
Approximate number of short stories/novelettes/novellas sold for cash money: 15
Poems sold: 3
Age when I started writing my first novel: 31
Age when I started writing my first completed novel: *insert gentle sobbing*
Age I finished that novel: still crying over here
Age I started my second novel: kick a guy when he’s down, that’s nice
Age I finished my second novel: mercy, please
Age when I sold a first novel: I’ll let you know
Total number of novels written (discounting duds): big fat zero
Books sold: see last answer
Books in the process of querying: see last answer
Short stories in the slush: 29
Short stories written this year: 7
Age when I became a full-time novelist: hopefully not too old
Age now: 32

Damn, that’s brutal. Started off okay before that kick in the stones about age when I finished my novel… yikes. Nothing like negative reinforcement to get me back to work, though. One of my hobbies is to find out a) how long an author took to write his/her first novel, and b) how long it took them to sell it, and c) how old they were when they did. Sometimes it makes me feel better, sometimes worse. Go figure.

I’d also like to add that my first week sans internet was not nearly as painful as I thought it would be. One more sign that this is the right choice for me.

Since being offline means I might not be posting as much here, I decided to make this an all-inclusive entry. Here’s everything I’m reading, watching, and listening to these days.

Okay, I just finished reading an older Elmore Lenoard book, LaBrava, in anticipation of his newest novel, Road Dogs, coming out next year and featuring a character from the book, as well as the return of Jack Foley from Out of Sight, one of Leonard’s best books which was in turn made into one of his best film adaptations.

I also read Chuck Palahniuk’s Survivor, his follow-up to Fight Club. I own all of Chuck’s books, but I’ve never gotten around to reading them all. Shame on me, especially for this one because it’s really good, about a cult leader dictating his life story into the flight recorder of a 747 he’s about to crash into the Australian Outback.

I’m waiting anxiously for the release of The Dark Knight on DVD next week. Apparently the latest X-Files movie abortion was released this week, but I couldn’t give a damn. Huge fan of the show, but the movie was terrible. Worse than the weakest episode of the TV series. The only theatrical flick I’ve missed lately that I wanted to see was Zack and Miri Make a Porno, but I figure it’ll be on DVD soon enough, and it’s not like it’s the kind of flick that you simply must see on the big screen. Actually, considering that I would’ve probably ended up stuck in a theatre full of annoying teenagers, it’s probably better to wait for the DVD.

What I’m really looking forward to is the release in January of a completely restored and uncut version of My Bloody Valentine. This one has a special spot in my heart, so to speak, seeing as how my sister and I were raised on horror movies, and this one in particular was filmed in my family’s neck of the woods, in Sidney Mines on Cape Breton Island. When Kat and I were on our honeymoon tour of Nova Scotia, we stopped in Sydney Mines so I could take a look at the mine my family helped restore for the film. It’s long gone now, but the site remains. Here’s a pic:

Doesn’t look like much now, but at one point it was a big-ass mine stalked by a gas-masked killer carrying a pick ax. Memories…

Some linkage:

Paul Tremblay on 4theluv markets

Caitlin R. Kiernan on self-publishing

Brian Keene on avoiding bad markets as well as one more reason why you don’t need to join the HWA to be a successful horror author

All right, gang, I hope this post keeps you sated for another week or two. Kat and I are putting up the Xmas tree today, and if there’s the same trouble we had last year, there might be another post tomorrow, with a picture. We’ll see…

• Currently reading: Spook Country, by William Gibson