Just the Facts?

Though the big news in my writing life of late is the acceptance-for-publication of my futuristic YA novel Survival Colony Nine, I'm also having a run of luck publishing creative nonfiction (under my moniker of J. David Bell).  To wit:

Late last year, two of my essays came out: "Watershed" (about a family excursion to sweep our local stream) appeared in Kudzu Review, and "Body Parts" (about illness, my own and others') was published in Blood and Thunder.

Later this year, my essay "The Last Days of the Frog Prince" (about my career catching frogs) will appear in the environmental journal Snowy Egret.  It's been a long time coming--it was accepted for publication back in 2011--but I think it'll be worth the wait, as I believe it's one of the best essays I've written.

Also later this year, my essay "Moon Man" (a love letter to my son, who was seven at the time I wrote the piece) will appear in The Lindenwood Review.

And finally, I just got word that my essay "Racist Like Me" (about my early experiences with race and integrated education) has been accepted for publication by a journal named--I kid you not--Toad Suck Review.

My guess is that my productivity in this genre will dwindle as I buckle down and focus on Survival Colony Nine and (with luck) other novels to follow.  But I really love the challenge of creative nonfiction, which requires the writer to tell the truth in the garb of fiction (as opposed to fiction proper, which requires the writer to make stuff up yet give it the aura of truth).  Two sides of the same coin, perhaps; maybe even two sides of the same brain.

Or simply two parts of what makes us writers, what makes us human.

February Fiction

I've got some new fiction (and nonfiction) out, so I thought I'd link to it here.  First, the fiction: a short story titled "The Fundamentally True History of Mary Shelley, aka 'The Creature,'" which appears in the online journal The Abstract Quill:

http://theabstractquill.com/?page_id=5

Now, the nonfiction.  There are two pieces, one titled "Watershed," available online (or in print form for a trifle) at Kudzu Review:

http://kudzureview.com/2.2.html

The other, titled "Body Parts," appears in Blood and Thunder: Musings on the Art of Medicine, and is, alas, available only in print form.  But again, it's priced so as not to break the bank:

http://www.ouhsc.edu/bloodandthunder/subscriptions.asp

Check 'em out, and let me know what you think!

On Looking at My Daughter's Breasts

Don't let the title of this post fool you: it's the title of a new creative nonfiction essay/memoir of mine, published in Quicksilver, and it's not what it seems. I think I mentioned in a previous post that I had lots and lots of pieces accepted at the tail end of 2009, and now they all seem to be coming out in a rush, so I'm posting them here as fast as they arrive. This one is the tiniest bit dated--my daughter's now eleven, not ten as in the piece--but the feelings expressed therein haven't changed.