Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s short story King of Sand and Stormy Waters appears in the Autumn 2006 issue of Shimmer.

Questions about the story:

Where did the idea come from?
This was something I started a while ago. I had this image of a man standing by the sea and a single line, the title. It went from there.

How did the story change as you developed it?
Originally, it was a poem. It evolved from there. A lot of things changed, point of view, a real narrative structure, a name for the protagonist, etc.

You know the advice “Sometimes you have to kill your darlings.” Was there a scene or line that it really hurt to cut, but cutting it made the story stronger?
Well, the original, it was just a couple of lines, this poem. And I tried to keep the lines in the story but with every revision I began picking away the lines. The final line of the poem was “mythology must have ended like this” and I think that feeling of loss remained even if the poem disappeared.

How is this story like your other work? How is it different?
I try to explore magic realism, stories that distance themselves from traditional fantasy and stories that are less about Hollywood action sequences and more about character development. I think this story is traditional fantasy oriented but still retains the
character heavy emphasis I enjoy.

Questions about writing:

did you celebrate your first sale?
I think I giggled madly.

Does your work tend to explore any particular themes?
Growing up in Mexico, you have magic realism which is different from the fantasy most people in English speaking countries are used to. I discovered what would be considered traditional fantasy, writers like Tolkien, and it’s very, very different.

I found that with many traditional fantasy writers you would often be presented with a quasi-medieval European world and a hero going on a quest scenario.

When I write, I try to bring my Latin American heritage and some of the feeling of magic realism into the stories. This does not mean my stories are always set in Mexico, but I do want to bring this Latin American sensitivity and literary heritage into a fantasy setting. Often, I end up with the “too real for fantasy” comment from editors because of this. So you’ve got conflicting cultural and literary ideas right there and that can get reflected on my work.

What people have helped you the most with your writing?
My husband and my mom. He tells me when something sucks and she’s always cheering for me.

Favorite book you’ve read recently?
I’ve been reading Rayuela, by Cortazar. It’s very fun. It’s a non-linear book and it’s basically surrealist and it’s been very fun because I’ve been reading it in Spanish and I rarely do that these days.

Random Questions:

If you have a day job, what is it? What do you like about it?
I work for a post-production company. I like the people I work with and just the fact that I’m surrounded by monitors. It’s kind of neat.

Favourite food?
My mom’s cooking and sushi.

What are some of your hobbies?
I like to doodle.

All-time favourite movie?
Blade Runner.

What do you want to be when you grow up?
Something fun.

Quiz: How many writers does it take to change a lightbulb? Please explain your answer:
Oh dear. Zero. The writer would get into a fight about why we should change it in the first place. It works fine!

Stephen L. Moss’s short story, Oscar’s Temple, appears in the Summer 2006 issue of Shimmer. Send him e-mail at stevemoss@sbcglobal.net.

Questions About the Story

Where did the idea come from?
The pre-dawn ether.

How did the story change as you developed it?
The Aerids didn’t appear until about the fourth draft.

You know the advice “Sometimes you have to kill your darlings.” Was there a scene or line that it really hurt to cut, but cutting it made the story stronger?
I did a lot of cutting and it didn’t hurt a bit. Actually it felt rather nice. Like a smake might feel as he gazes at the skin he has just shed. Shimmer’s editors were wonderful in pointing out where the story could be changed and improved.

How is this story like your other work?
Weird stuff happening in the backyard is a common theme for me.

Questions About Writing

How long had you been submitting before you made your first sale?
On and off for years. I finally made a commitment to stick with writing and submitting no matter what. After that, the first sale came in about eight months.

Do you work with a critique or writers group?
Yes.

What authors, if any, have had the most influence on your work?
Larry Niven, Stephen King, William Gibson

Favorite short story you’ve read recently?
Okanoggan Falls, by Carolyn Ives Gilman. Another “aliens among us” story.

Random Questions

Do you believe in ghosts or the supernatural? Why?
Hell, yeah! Why wouldn’t I?

Fast food: Yea or Nay?
Pizza Hut has pretty good pepperoni. And those curly fries from Arby’s, oh man. Otherwise it’s all evil and should be outlawed.

Name one place in your hometown that you love to go to and would recommend to others to visit.
The Milwaukee Ale House. Great food, breat beer, awesome service, and a view of the river.

Is there anything that you would “sell your soul” for?
I would sell my soul to live next door to Tom Waits.

Do you have a secret skill that you never get to show off?
I can outstay any fellow party guest every time. I am the thing that wouldn’t leave.

Quiz: How many writers does it take to change a lightbulb? Please explain your answer:
Fifteen. One to change it and fourteen to muse about how much they would like to change it if they could only find the time.

Marina T. Stern’s short story, On the Edge of the World appears in the Summer 2006 issue of Shimmer.

Questions About the Story

Where did the idea come from?
I was trying to distill pure essence of heartbreak.

How did the story change as you developed it?
On the editor’s request, I put in more background, to make the plot easier to follow.

You know the advice “Sometimes you have to kill your darlings.” Was there a scene or line that it really hurt to cut, but cutting it made the story stronger?

Actually, this is the part that got cut. I made up a whole novel as background for this story. As the novel evolved, the story that was its original core didn’t fit any more. I excised the original story, and let the novel go its own way.

How is this story like your other work? How is it different?

I write a lot of love stories that don’t quite work out. This one is different, in that the hero is more damaged, but nicer, than my usual heroes.

Questions About Writing

Who do you write for? Yourself or someone else?
I’ve done both, but the only ones that sell are the ones I wrote for myself. That probably means something.

What writing projects are you presently working on?
I’d like to finish that novel by the end of the summer. After that, there are a novel I’m working on with a friend, a cookbook, and a French phrase book.

What time of day do you prefer to do your writing?
Morning. If I don’t get started by noon, I probably won’t write that day at all.

Favorite book read when you were a child?
The Yearling, Old Yeller, Freckles of the Limberlost. Anything outdoors: anything with animals.

Random Questions

If you could trade places with anyone, who would it be? And Why?
I have a good life: loving husband, great pets, a small handful of friends I can count on. It wouldn’t be necessary to trade lives with anyone. If I could change anything, I’d like to be a dolphin trainer at Sea World. I always thought that was the coolest job in the world.

Watch much TV? If so, what shows do you watch? Which shows are guilty pleasures?
I only watch TV in the daytime if I can find a choice old movie. I favor romantic comedies from the ‘30s, or crime thrillers from the ‘40s. In the evening, I watch The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and House. That Hugh Laurie is yummy.

Favorite restaurant?
There are several. If I had to choose one, I’d say Café Orient. It’s a Vietnamese place where the chef remembers my husband’s allergies. I’ve never had a dish there I didn’t like.

Cat or dog person?
I have both, but I’m more emotionally in tune with the dogs. I’ve never met a person as saintly as my old Labrador, Bonnie.

If you had a working time machine what advice would you give a younger self?
Marry Tom. I broke up with him, and married him many years later. I could have saved myself a lot of grief if I’d married him sooner.

Quiz: How many writers does it take to change a lightbulb? Please explain your answer:
Only one. Collaborations never work out.

Tom Pendergrass’s short story, Urban Renewal, appears in the Summer 2006 issue of Shimmer.

Questions About the Story

Where did the idea come from?
This story was the result of a writing competition for my writing group, Codex Writers. The basics of the competition was to take a well known fairy tale or nursery rhyme and rewrite it.

How is this story like your other work? How is it different?
I’ve never written a story with a non-narrative format like this one, so that was a bit of a stretch. On the other hand, I spent almost a dozen years in the federal government, so the art of writing obfuscating memos is second nature.

Questions About Writing

Who do you write for? Yourself or someone else?
I write for cash. Please send more.

What writing projects are you presently working on?
I have one novel, The Final Transformation, that I am attempting to lure some unsuspecting publisher to buy. I am working on another novel currently.

What time of day do you prefer to do your writing?
I prefer mornings, however, given the requirements of my day job and family, I usually don’t start until 9 PM.

Favorite book read when you were a child?
There were so many that its hard to pick just one. Anything by Andre Norton or Robert Heinlein, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen by Alan Garner, Johnny Tremaine by Esther Forbes.

Random Questions

Cat or dog person?
I have two dogs, both Dalmatian mixes.

If you had a working time machine what advice would you give a younger self?
Bet it all on the Minnesota Twins to win the series in 1987. They were like 600 to 1 underdogs at the beginning of the season.

Winter 2006 Featured Author: Ken Scholes

Introducing Shimmer’s first Featured Author, Ken Scholes. Ken’s the author of the first story in our Winter 2006 issue, “Action Team-Ups Number Thirty-Seven,” illustrated by Karl Kessel.

Want to hear his story?

We invited Ken to read it for us. Listen now! on mp3. (5.3 MB)

About Ken

Read our interview with Ken.

Action Team-Ups Number Thirty-Seven – Ken Scholes started writing stories in the first grade. He started submitting stories in the tenth grade and then, after a long break, started selling some of them. He has work appearing in Talebones, Fortean Bureau, Aeon Speculative Fiction, Son and Foe and the anthologies Best of the Rest 3: Best Unknown Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2001, TEL : Stories, 44 Clowns and L. Ron Hubbard Presents The Writers of the Future, Volume XXI. His speculative fiction has won honorable mention in several venues including Year’s Best Science Fiction and he is a winner of the Writers of the Future contest for 2004. Ken is a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) and the Codex writers group.

Ken’s background includes service in two branches of the military, a degree in history, a brief stint as a clergyman, an even briefer stint as a label-gun repairman and over ten years experience managing nonprofit organizations. Originally from the Puget Sound area, Ken currently lives in Gresham, Oregon, with his amazing wonder-wife Jen, two cats, five guitars and more books than you’d ever want to help him move.

Visit his website.

The Story
Here’s how the story begins (click the thumbnail to read the first page):

Action Team-Ups Number Thirty-Seven, by Ken ScholesThursday, 3:32 p.m. The dentures I lost on reconnaissance last week have come back to haunt me. Cavanaugh made a big show of it, waving them beneath my nose in the cafeteria line. Smug bastard. If I were ten years younger or if he were forty years older, I’d have shown him completely new uses for tapioca pudding. Regardless, I have my teeth back and that made lunch slightly more tolerable.

Want to read more? Electronic copies of the Winter 2006 issue are still available; see our Purchase page for more information.

Read all about our previous Featured Authors!

Ken Scholes, Winter 2006 Featured Author

Issue 4: Summer 2006

With a magical cover by Chrissy Ellsworth, Issue Four presents nine stories. We’ve got Amal El-Mohtar’s first fiction publication, Angela Slatter’s “Bluebeard,” (which received an Honorable Mention in the Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror), and seven other treats.Please click on any of the thumbnails below for a quick peek at a select choice of first pages.

Delicious Reviews

Shimmer is the type of publication that you’re proud of reading in front of your peers. It is journal-sized, with an attractive, simple front and back cover layout. The interior has a clean, professional design. The font is eye-grabbing and large enough for most eyes to read without hassle…. Shimmer has some of the best dark fantasy and horror to be found in the small press. More people need to be exposed to this magazine. — Tangent Online

Buy your copy today!

Table of Contents

	Bluebeard,by Angela SlatterHer breath smells like champagne, but not bitter as you might expect.Something inside her turns it sweet, I’m not sure what. She’s a sugar-candy kind of girl, bright and crystalline as she reclines on the sofa—a chaise longue, more correctly. Her hair is spun like golden sugar, her eyebrows so light they may as well not be there, her lashes so contrastingly black that they must be dyed, her skin pale pink, and her mouth a rosebud pout, filled with small pearly teeth. Around her neck curls a long string of beads, wrapped twice and still long enough to hang to her waist. The dress is diaphanous, shimmering yellow, damp in places with traces of her last client. She is nothing if not lush. She catches me looking and smiles.
	The Crow’s Caw,by Amal El-MohtarTwo crows clasped the thick leafless branch of the maple tree with their sharp-toed feet and watched the three men seated far below them. It was nearing springtime, and the world was wet and shivering in the cool hour before dawn. The men had spread out a large wool blanket over the damp grass and now spoke in low voices.
	Oscar’s Temple,by Stephen L. MossDeputy Mayor Walker Brooks tripped over an alien on his way to take out the garbage. He lost his grip on the bag and dropped it right on top of the visitor.“Sorry,” Walker said. He wasn’t all that surprised to find an alien living next to his garbage cans; it seemed like every day there was a new species profiled in the papers or making the rounds of the talk-show circuit.

Always Greener, by Paul Abbamondi

Ross Galeman sits on his roof and watches the rain. It crashes down on his neighbor’s lawn and sounds like a victory song from ages long past. With dazed eyes he follows each raindrop. He starts inside the shapeless grey cloud, then falls with each pebble-sized drop, plunging to the freshly-mown grass below. Though it’s well after two in the morning, he’s never been more focused.

Lucy and the Centaur, by Chrissy Ellsworth

Interview with Kevin J. Anderson and Rebecca Moesta, by Ken Scholes and Jen West

Gnome Season, by Michael Livingston

I bagged my first gnome when I was nineteen. A late bloomer, I suppose, since my grandfather always said that he shot his first when he was just ten.

On the Edge of the World, by Marina T. Stern

From the shore, I can see the islands on the edge of the world. The distance between the shore and the islands is too great to swim, although they look near enough to touch. We have a saying in my village: Do not fly higher than you are willing to fall; do not sail farther than you are willing to swim. I know the saying, although I can neither fly nor sail. I was born without wings and without a boat.

Urban Renewal, by Tom Pendergrass

MEMORANDUM TO: Felix Shodclaws, Special Assistant to the Mayor
FROM: Reginald Armbruster, Deputy Assistant to the Special Assistant for Urban Renewal
SUBJECT: Task Force Report Recommendations to Resolve “Old Woman in Shoe” Issue

The Urban Renewal Task Force completed on 11 June the site survey of the riverfront property in the Mayor’s “Strive to Revive” proposal. There is enormous potential of the site for the proposed luxury marina/condominium complex.

A Fish Tale by Beverly Jackson

My daily walk with my old dog and solitude is crowded by the hunkered rows of fishermen along the Mad River levee, come to chase steelheads they say are running now.