In September of 2007, I started this blog with a bit of writing advice. A little over a year later, I discovered how little I knew about writing after hearing children’s writer, Lin Oliver. In April of 2014, I figured I’d gotten enough publications that I could share some of the things I did “right”. I’ll keep that up, but I’m running out of pro-published stories. I don’t write full-time, nor do I make enough money with my writing to live off of it, but someone pays for and publishes ten percent of what I write. Hemingway’s quote above will remain unchanged as I work to increase my writing output and sales, but I’m adding this new series of posts because I want to carefully look at what I’ve done WRONG and see if I can fix it. As always, your comments are welcome!
ANALOG Tag Line:
There are Quantum Ghosts, then there are ghost ghosts…"Weird physics" happened in northern Minnesota a long time ago. What if there were echoes of the past in the iron-rich soil of the Iron Range and Gitchigumi?
Elevator Pitch (What Did I Think I Was Trying To Say?)
A recluse and her AI salvage boat discover echoes of the past in quantum ghost images of a girl shooting baskets in a long abandoned town on Ojibwe Gichigami
Opening Line:
“It was a good thing Mary Croft didn’t believe in ghosts.
She and Henry, the AI half of their team, were the only certified AI-Human magnetic dredge operator on the North Shore of Lake Superior at the moment.”
Onward:
“They worked for Great Lakes Recovery: Dredge & Dock, Inc, and this tour, the company had trusted them with a publicity stunt. They’d transferred Henry into the cabin of a two-hundred-and-fifty-year-old, completely refurbished ore tugboat named EDNA G. Built just after the end of the Industrial Revolution, the last steam-powered boat was retired in the late 20th Century. Crewed by Mary and Henry, it was paraded up and down the shoreline of three of the Great Lakes, celebrating the company’s commitment to the continued recovery of the planet, and the amelioration of the climate changes wrought by the Industrial Revolution. It was a corporate bonus that her family could trace back to the Deep South and included freed slaves, military genius, and a prominent member of the team that successfully midwifed the birth of the first true Artificial Intelligence.”
OK – so THIS IS HORRIBLE! I went from an intriguing first sentence…into a dull, boring, partly unnecessary monologue! What was I thinking? Granted that I needed background. The reader needs to know where the story’s taking place, but this is what is called an “infodump”.
What if I started the story a little bit earlier? She can maybe be talking to her mom…(which she actually is avoiding until the end)…I could probably shorten the story even more, making it more marketable if she talked to her in the first place…I don’t know. I need to see how that works. It might shorten the story as well as integrate the action better; rather than having her mom make a 350 mile trip from Minneapolis up to the North Shore.
What Was I Trying
To Say?
There are things we can’t understand when it comes to quantum mechanics, how it works, and what we can expect are gradually coming into focus, but for most of us – especially those of us who have SOME science background with physics, it’s almost as scary as “ghosts”. And I discovered today, that quantum mechanics has its OWN ghosts: “In the terminology of quantum field theory, a ghost, ghost field, ghost particle, or gauge ghost is an unphysical state in a gauge theory. Ghosts are necessary to keep gauge invariance in theories where the local fields exceed a number of physical degrees of freedom”. That would have been IDEAL to use in the story – as long as I can translate enough of it for me to get the gist of what a “quantum ghost” is…
The Rest of the
Story:
Here’s another terrible mistake: “Mary had enjoyed the steady thrum of the ancient engine and the absence of conversation as they cut across Lake Superior to the North Shore.” Using past tense, I’ve (probably earlier even) tossed the reader out of the story. Reading it today, after a long separation from it, this phrase certainly threw me out of the story. How much farther will it throw someone who has no investment in it?
The rest of the story concerns a little reconciliation between Mary and her mom; and the possibility of reconciliation between Mary and an old friend of hers; all of which give it a “Human side”, which doesn’t really provide anything more for the story itself.
In February of 2021, I got this rejection from the editor at F&SF, Sheree Renée Thomas: “I appreciated the mining details in this futuristic tale, but I found it tough to follow your worldbuilding in the exposition, as well as Mary Croft's character development (specifically, what was she and what was she doing, what was her actual relationship to the AI since the intro says they worked together for a decade but the robot introduces himself to her later), and so I'm going to pass on it for The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. But I wish you best of luck finding the right home for it, and I hope you'll keep us in mind in the future for your other new stories.”
End Analysis:
I allowed the story to wander and not “tell the story”. While details are fine – see Sheree Thomas above – inane detail is NOT. It didn’t add to the story and (from what I read). Didn’t contribute to the forward momentum of the tale. EVERY WORD HAS TO PULL THE STORY AND THE READER FORWARD! This did – in places – but not enough to sell it. I need to change it so it invites the reader in to experience the world of the story.
I’ve got to be more focused – now that I’ve done a bit of research on quantum “ghosts”, the story makes more sense. I don’t have to do lots of “sciencey stuff” IN the story (my target is ASIMOV’S or ANALOG or F&SF. I hit all of them up before, but the story’s new and different. Maybe they’ll take it this time!
Can This Story Be
Saved?
Oh, FOLKS! This
plays into another story I’m writing right now…
If I can integrate these subjects into the existing story, maybe I can resub this one and stand a better chance of saving it. It’s also helped that I read a semi-recent 30th Anniversary collection of the best stories from 1977 to 2006. I confess it was enlightening in ways…I’m not sure I LIKE entirely. But enough of the stories stood out to me as exceptional (and I REALLY disliked some of them and my opinion was that they were there for name-draw only…), it was overall a really good read. I can see why most of the stories were award winners. I learned, and once I do a revision, I think I’ll take a submit the story again. So, YES. It can be saved!
Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_(physics)#:~:text=In%20the%20terminology%20of%20quantum,of%20physical%20degrees%20of%20freedom. , https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65139406 (3/31/23; 10:24 am) ChatGPT banned in Italy over privacy concerns -- 2 hours ago, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/in-a-first-physicists-glimpse-a-quantum-ghost/ ; https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/in-a-first-physicists-glimpse-a-quantum-ghost/
Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_(physics)#:~:text=In%20the%20terminology%20of%20quantum,of%20physical%20degrees%20of%20freedom. , https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65139406(3/31/23; 10:24 am) ChatGPT banned in Italy over privacy concerns -- 2 hours ago
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