New site, new weblog, same old Ian

I'm setting this up to be my writing blog for the new site, a record of what I'm writing, what I'm having published, or just general thoughts about writing.

So I should probably introduce myself. You probably know at least some of this. There are far too many websites on the Internet as it is, so you're probably only reading this if you

1) know me
2) read a story by me
3) saw me ranting or babbling about something or other somewhere else

or

4) got directed here by mistake.

I'm hoping to integrate this site with the currently-under-construction http://www.irennie.com which should have the answers to some of this, but let me give the quick version here in case you came across this by accident.

My name is Ian Rennie, I'm an Englishman who is (depending on exactly when you read this) either sucking the last few breaths out of the dog-end of his twenties or stepping into the fresh light of his thirties and wondering what happened to being young. The evidence of that last sentence to the contrary, I'm a writer.

But then, everyone says they're a writer. What it tends to mean is "I think I'm creative and I had an idea for a sitcom once" or "there are thirty pages of a novel on a folder on my computer I haven't opened since 2005". There's a scene in the movie Orange County where someone pitches the TV show they're writing at a party: "It's ostensibly about vampires, but really it's a metaphor for the break up of post world war one Germany. Only, you know, funny". That's writers.

So I should be more specific. I write primarily science fiction. I've written short stories, comics, and novels. Thus far only the short stories have been published. I'm working on that. I've been really into flash fiction this year, ultra-short stories of around five hundred words or less. I think I've written about fifty this year, which isn't bad. Of these, I've had five published on http://www.365tomorrows.com and submitted others elsewhere. I also write novels, in the areas of science fiction, fantasy, and young adult fatasy. I'm putting together ideas for a fantasy romance novel called Jack In The Green.

I'm putting this journal together in part as a mnemonic so I can keep track of what I've been writing and where I've been sending it. I'm putting together the website for pretty much the same reason. This will also help me nag myself into submitting a story a week to at least one publication. The worst that will happen is rejection letters. That and drunk rants about the talentless bastards who get published when I don't, and how they're not fit to pay my bar tab, etc, etc. I'll try to keep those to a minimum. A minimum of zero.

I also want to talk about writing.

Until this year I hadn't had anything at all published, and I primarily write for myself and my wife's amusement. I electronically published a graphic novel a few years back, but that didn't really count as I made no money off it and did it really just to tell the story. That said, I've always wanted to be able to support myself by writing, and so this year I'm going to try and actually get properly published. I've made a start with short stories, and now I'm going to step into the slightly scarier field of shopping around for an agent and a publisher and all that jazz. I'm going to try and write up what luck I have, if any, here.

Anyway, this has probably gone on long enough for a first post. Hopefully I'll update soon, unless the inevitable happens and I entirely fail to update this journal, leaving it as yet another headstone in the blogging graveyard, buried under pure white unused potential.

Always end on a happy note, that's what I say.