THE SEM10TIC STANDARD

R. Leigh Hennig. Horror author. Editor.

Now that the contracts have been finalized, I can happily disclose that I’ve sold stories to Flame Tree Press and Love Letters to Poe!

“Thicker than Water” will appear in the upcoming anthology Strange Lands Short Stories, scheduled for international release on October 17, 2020. “Piano Man” will be published in Love Letters to Poe in March, 2021.

Expectations are something I think a lot about when writing stories.

When thinking of plot, I imagine a scenario and all the possible ways in which characters might react, or what could happen as a consequence. I try to throw out all of my initial ideas, because those are the ones that are most obvious, which tends to make them the most boring: the reader will expect those initial ideas, reactions, or scenarios.

Here’s a collection of sites, essays, books, stories, and other things that you should check out.

Rather than read what a White guy has to say on racism in America, I think it’s appropriate only for me to do two things: first, say that Black Lives Matter. Second, to list those resources of, for, or about Black voices so that you can go and hear their voice, read their stories. Not mine.

Black Lives Matter

July 05, 2020

Hard to believe how much the world has changed in just a couple of months.

I think we’ll resume more thoughtful content in the next episode, but for now a short update and some stray thoughts will serve fine.

I READ STEPHEN KING’S THE INSTITUTE AND ROBERT GLICK’S TWO CALIFORNIAS RECENTLY.

The former isn’t that great, while the later is outstanding, and the reason for that is characterization.

For the past ten weeks, I’ve been participating in a critique group of sorts for members of the Horror Writer’s Association, of which I am a proud member.

Created and lead by Moaner T. Lawrence, “Fright Club” members respond to weekly prompts, critique those of their peers, and meet once a week to discuss things relevant to horror, writing, and other things within that orbit. Upon completion of the ten weeks, members are inducted to a closed group to further their work and discussion, working together to build a community of dedicated writers.

Moanaria’s Fright Club

March 16, 2020

I wrote a flash piece that came in around 955 words, submitted it, and was selected for publication.

Today, CLP announced that I would be sharing first place with another author, Denver Grenell. Neato! Congratulations to Denver. If you haven’t heard of CLP, check them out, support them on Patreon, and maybe see about submitting something yourself.

The borderland’s press writer’s bootcamp

Along with about sixteen others, I spent the weekend workshopping and learning from F. Paul Wilson (Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award); Thomas F. Monteleone (Horror Writers Association Lifetime Achievement Award); Ginjer Buchanan (Sr. Editor, Berkley Putnam); Douglas E. Winter (author); and Chet Williamson (author)

Baltimore

January 31, 2020

spies

December 24, 2019

Your sound bar is spying on you.

Christmas Eve, 2019. My wife is wrapping gifts, my kids are playing with the dog, reading, and generally doing whatever kids their age do. How do I spend my Christmas Eve, you ask? By reviewing my firewall logs, of course.

Sleeping beauties

December 16, 2019

Reviewed: Sleeping Beauties by Steve and Owen King

Let me start off by saying that I’m a pretty big Stephen King fan. Christ, I even have a tattoo that was inspired by The Dark Tower. Now that the bona fides have been established:

Restart

December 15, 2019

I guarantee everything. I guarantee nothing.

For the time being, it should suffice to say that my intentions with this blog are to satisfy my occasional itch to ramble. Maybe I’ll update weekly. Maybe monthly. Maybe yearly. Will there be any theme? Primarily fiction, though if the mood strikes me, you may just read a rant about the oversubscription ratio of ports to packet forwarding engines within Juniper switching fabric.

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