So...as we all know, I've been having a hell of a time with Experimental Film, and while I think I'm in a far better place than I was, some strategic decisions needed to be made about my ostensible October, 2013 deadline. I wasn't sure if I could talk about this yet, but as of last night I've been given the go-ahead, and here's how it's going to be:
Instead of delivering Experimental Film for October, I'm delivering a book called We Will All Go Down Together: A Novel in Stories About the Five-Family Coven...ie, CanCon gone very, very dark, somewhat like Alice Munroe, but with witches, magicians and the Fae. This collects many of the stories I've come to call my “Toronto the Weird” pieces and organizes them into a loose sort of narrative which highlights the fact that the same characters and touchstones show up in a surprising number of them.
The book will therefore package not only (for example) “The Narrow World,” probably the oldest entry in this roster (which first appeared in Queer Fear II and was reprinted in The Worm in Every Heart), but also all the subsequent Five-Family Coven-related stories which have appeared in various anthologies, magazines and what-have-you since then, most of which very few people aside from me have ever seen contextualized in terms of their shared universe—after which I'll add in on top five entirely new pieces, never before published, the latter three of which will (hopefully) bring closure to various ongoing sagas. I'm putting together the initial manuscript submission package right now, and I have to tell you, it's been really exciting to watch it take shape.
My work-schedule until October, therefore, will basically go like this—
Finish “In Scarlet Town (Today)”
Draft and write “Hexmas,” the final short story supplement for the upcoming Hexslinger Series Omnibus eBook, to be released in December, 2013
Finish “Furious Angels”
Finish “History's Crust”
Draft and write “Helpless”
Draft and write “Hungry Ghosts”
Draft and write “Under These Rocks and Stones”
Write various supplementals for We Will All Go Down Together (an introduction, an article about the Five-Family coven, a family tree, a timeline); integrate all material into manuscript.
Also: Write various other stuff, as needed. But this is the core, the stuff that has to happen. And it gives me such an amazing thrill to finally be embarked on it, especially after all the various fits and starts and contortions Experimental Film has been putting me through. Especially since, as it stands now, We Will All Go Down Together in its raw form is already up over 100,000 words.
Let me be clear, though: None of this means Experimental Film ISN'T going to happen, just that I need more time in order to do it the way it deserves to be done. And because of CZP being wonderful enough to let me substitute a project I was always going to do with them anyhow, everyone wins: a new Gemma Files book comes out next June/July, to be followed by the novel Experimental Film was always meant to be—the one I've been blundering towards all this time, but finally believe I've cracked, in terms of outlining/writing.
In other news, school just ended, and summer school starts on July 2nd. Got Cal all up my grill 'til then, and after, though in hopefully smaller doses.;)
