Keeping busy these days. I suggested a reading forum for my Clarion buddies and a good four or five people have jumped in. We’re reading stories from big fantasy and sci-fi mags and commenting on them. It’s good to know that I’m not alone in scratching my head on some of the stories. I’ve always wondered if it was just me that thought many of the stories in them were crap–now I know I’m not alone.

My first big post-Clarion story is coming along but not as fast as I would like. Right now my verdict is that it’s going to be long and relatively boring. I have the outline fleshed out; I have the cast of characters, timeline of events, and how the story unfolds. There’s a story in here somewhere. It’s just must tougher trying to isolate the parts that will make it compelling and moving and then writing it so it’s…well, compelling and moving. I started another one that’s coming along much more freely but I’m not sure it’s very unique. We’ll see which gets done first. Both stories are somewhat dark, somewhat hopeless.

I went through a good Bruce Springsteen phase over the past month or so, listening to “The Rising” a number of times. It’s a complete joke that this album lost to Norah Jones for a Grammy a few years back. I like Norah Jones as soothing background music but “The Rising” is something else entirely. It’s the perfect remedy for a post 9/11 broken heart. That got me listening to more of the boss and I’m finding that I like him more than I realized. A number of his lesser hits like “Dead Man Walking,” “The River,” and especially “Atlantic City” hooked my brain. Good stuff.

But the most exciting news for me on the music front is my overdue discovery of both Uncle Tupelo and Son Volt. I’m a Wilco fan but I find that Jeff Tweedy tends to write lots of whiny songs and I find myself fastforwarding through a lot of Wilco’s stuff. Uncle Tupelo, though–good God, this stuff is good. Did they make a bad song? And where have I been not giving them a listen? I’ve only given Jay Farrar’s Son Volt albums cursory listens but there’s a lot of stuff that sticks–”Strands,” “Drown,” and “Windfall” all spring to mind.

I’ve only got one story out right now and I should be hearing back on it shortly. This needs to change. I need to get more stuff out, pronto. Hopefully things will settle down enough with winter setting in that I can pump some of things out. It’s tough deciding what needs a post-Clarion overhaul and what just needs a little massaging. Some of my older stories have been received fairly well by the Clarion crit group–sadly only four guys, though. Can’t figure out why the group hasn’t preserved more of its vibrancy but it’s a little disappointing. Still, four more people reading my stuff is great so I can’t complain.