2022 has been a weird year, writing-wise. I’ve spent nearly all my writing energy on a forthcoming comedy/fantasy/baking/isekai/eldritch-horror game co-written with James Beamon. (Look for that from Choice of Games in 2023, by the way!)
That and some freelance nonfiction accounts for nearly all of my written output this year, so it’s been easy to feel like I haven’t done anything. It’s a little surprising, then, to look through what I had published this year!
I had seven original short stories and one game released this year, as well as the first few chapters of a second game.
Here’s a brief run down, with links when available!
2022 Short Stories
“The Spread of Space and Endless Devastation” (Lightspeed, December)
“The Spread of Space and Endless Devastation” – Lightspeed, December, 2022
A 1200-word story about time loops, ships with feelings, found family / parenting vibes, and learning to let go even when it’s really hard.
No content notes as such but it has some heavy emotional notes at the end.
“The Labyrinth’s Daughter” (Corvid Queen, November)
“The Labyrinth’s Daughter” – Corvid Queen, November 28 2022
The daughter of the Minotaur lives on. Will she ever step out of his shadow—or the labyrinth? A fantasy story of roughly 1000 words inspired by the art of Leonora Carrington and the stories of Jorge Luis Borges.
(Content notes: violence, emotional abuse)
“Veracity’s Find” (Wizards in Space, November)
“Veracity’s Find” – Wizards in Space 8, November 2022
A woman living on board a world-spanning orbital station goes on a treasure hunt to get over a break-up. Will what she finds there help her or make her feel worse? More importantly, will Station ever keep its weird ideas to itself? A science fiction story of around 1600 words.
(Content notes: low self-esteem)
“What Not to Do When You’re Polymorphed and Stuck in a Time Loop” (The Sprawl, October)
“What Not to Do When You’re Polymorphed and Stuck in a Time Loop” – The Sprawl Mag, October 16, 2022
What do you get when you drink a polymorph potion and suck the essence out of powerful mages in a desperate attempt to get out of a time loop?
It sounds like the start of a highly specific and very strange joke, but it’s also the concept behind this weird little genre-bender of 750 words.
“The Nature of Stones” (Prismatic Dreams, June)
“The Nature of Stones” – Prismatic Dreams, All Worlds Wayfarer, June 2022
A quiet science fantasy story of 3000 words about childbirth, relationship conflicts, and negative self-talk, set on a planet where there’s no concept of gender and giant boulders drift slowly down from space to crash in the ocean.
(Content notes: brief suicidal ideation)
“The Calligrapher’s Granddaughter” (Haven Speculative, May)
“The Calligrapher’s Granddaughter” – Haven Speculative, May 2022
Set in 1800s Edo (now Tokyo), Japan, this story has snooty samurai, magical calligraphy, and a found family theme.
(Content notes: terminal illness, runaway child, threat of harm to child)
“A Difference of Opinion” (Kaleidotrope, April)
“A Difference of Opinion” – Kaleidotrope, April 2022
This far-future space opera features AI, drones, golden retrievers, and sly (or not so sly) references to the work of Ursula Le Guin and Iain M. Banks. Approximately 4100 words.
(Content notes: accidental poisoning… sort of)
2022 Reprints
I had three stories reprinted this year as well, one as an audio reprint:
- “How They Name the Ships” – 750 words, Flash Fiction Online. First published in Frozen Wavelets in 2020.
- “No Blood of My Heart, No Breath of My Lungs, But Love” – 1000 words, Podcastle (audio reprint). First published in Lamplight in 2021.
- “At the Edge of a Human Path” – 5000 words, Insignia 2021. First published in 87 Bedford in 2021.
2022 Games
“Trick or Treat or Trick or Treat or Trick” (Ectocomp, October)
It’s your first year trick or treating alone. Will it be your last?
Trick or Treat or Trick or Treat or Trick is a parser game about time loops and trick or treating, written for Ectocomp 2022 in October. It’s set in the 90s, hence the eye-watering cover art.
The game scored dead last, probably because it was my first time writing anything in Inform (the game engine I used) and I decided that it wouldn’t be challenging enough without introducing weird time loop mechanics. For some reason?!
I’ve fixed the (many!) bugs that were present in the competition release and introduced a hint system, which I hope makes this more entertaining to play. If you enjoy interactive fiction, or are curious what exactly it is, check it out!
“Library of Worlds” (Storyloom, Ongoing)
A demon lord in the library?!
Inspired by my love for isekai anime and my library career (sort of, anyway!), “Library of Worlds” is a cozy reverse isekai fantasy visual novel. That’s a lot of adjectives — basically, it’s a game where you talk to various characters from a fantasy world have been reborn in our own, but without the seriously high stakes and tension that are common to certain types of fantasy stories.
The first six chapters are now available to play, and I anticipate publishing another five each in January and February, bringing the story to its completion.
Also, check out that gorgeous cover the Storyloom art team put together for me. Wow!
The Storyloom site is in beta and all games are currently free to play, but getting to a specific title is a little tricky still. If you want to try this one out, I recommend clicking the link, signing up for an account, and then coming back here and clicking the link again.
2022 Submission Statistics
Seven stories and three reprints published in one year sounds like a lot.
Wow, I must be so successful! The sting of rejection banished from my writing practice for good!
Well, not so much.
My secret (it’s not very secret) is that I write a lot of very short fiction and I make a lot of submissions. That means I net more accepted stories than I would if I rarely sent things out, but it also means I get a heck of a lot of rejections.
Here are this years stats:
- Stories Started: 6 (all flash)
- Stories Finished: 3 (mostly flash)
- Words Written: ~150,000 (almost all in the choicescript game)
- Submissions: 220
- Acceptances: 15 (some from 2021 submissions, some for things that will come out in 2023 — or beyond)
- Rejections: 140 (9 personal, the rest forms)
- Pending: 42 (as of late December when I’m writing this post — most will likely be rejections)
According to Duotrope, which I use to track my submissions, my acceptance ratio for the year is just under 9%. (Duotrope doesn’t have every single one of my submissions, which is why the numbers above don’t add up properly, so my acceptance ratio is probably lower in reality.)
That’s actually about where it’s been since 2019, and my submission numbers per year are about the same too. To put things into perspective, this means if I’d only submitted the seven stories I had accepted, I wouldn’t have gotten any acceptances. (Yes, I know that’s not how statistics work.)
For most people, 217 submissions in a year is kind of bonkers, although I definitely know authors who submit more stories and poems each year! I’ve set myself a goal of 15 submissions a month since about 2020. For me, that’s a relatively easy task because:
- I write primarily flash fiction and short stories that are on the shorter side.
- I have a pretty decent stable of published short stories built up from my ~10 years of submitting (Just under 70 stories published as of December 2022) so I can send out lots of reprints.
If you’re a writer yourself, I’d love to hear from you about short stories you had published this year!