Happy to announce today that I have signed with Red Sofa Literary.
Jennie Goloboy and I are fine-tuning my proposal for a nonfiction book filled with worldbuilding games geared for writers. I couldn’t be happier about this development, and I’m looking forward to working with Jennie on this. More news as I get it.
Happy reading!
Popping in today to give you a quick preview of my story titled “Three of a Kind.” I designed this pastiche about internet furies based on three programming languages, and I’m including the first couple of paragraphs for each one. They get progressively stronger, language-wise, as the pieces go on to represent the fury and how they feed off of our rage. The structure also ties into the language in some fashion, which is clearer to readers familiar with those languages once you see the whole piece.
The anthology, called Gods, Memes, and Monsters: A 21st Century Bestiary, has been published by Stone Skin Press and is available from their store directly or wherever books are sold. Please do check this out as there are dozens of amazing and very fine authors in this collection including: Chad Fifer, Charlene Challenger, Chris Lackey, Dave Gross, David Barnes, Dennis Bolen, Dennis Detwiller, Ed Greenwood, Ekaterina Sedia, Emily Care Boss, Gareth Hanrahan, Greg Stafford, Greg Stolze, James Wallis, Jean-Francois Chenier, Jerry Schaefer, Jim Webster, JM Frey, John Tynes, Jonathan Blum, Jonathan Howard, Julia Ellingboe, Kathryn Kuitenbrower, Kenneth Hite, Kurt Zubatiuk, Kyla Ward, Laura Lush, Molly Tanzer, Monica Valentinelli, Myna Wallin, Nancy Kilpatrick, Nick Mamatas, Patrick O’Duffy, Peter Ball, Peter Chiykowski, Peter Dubé, Peter Freeman, Richard Dansky, Robin Laws, Rupert Booth, Sam Agro, Sandra Kasturi, Silvia Moreno-Garcia…and many, many more.
If you’d like an eBook, please consider picking up a digital bundle of PDF, ePub, and Mobi formats for Gods, Memes, and Monsters: A 21st Century Bestiary from DriveThruFiction.com.
Three of a Kind
by Monica Valentinelli
aWduaXRl
(Base 64)
“Ignite”
“…shots fired at yet another elementary school in Virginia just days after…”
“…though he’s a veteran political commentator, his surprising set of remarks have forced women’s organizations to withdraw funding from…”
“…when asked how should we get young people to care about major issues, she answered: Do what I did. Cast a little-known actress into the role of an iconic super heroine…”
I am one of three entities, sisters of spirit and flesh. When you first meet me, you won’t recognize me when you do, for I will be invisible. Yet, I am everywhere. Nowhere.
I am online on a website, in the comments, on forums and in chat rooms. I am lurking on your phone, spying on you while you talk to your friends, send your lover naked pics, bitch about your mom or your whiny best friend.
Can you see me now? My form becomes more solid each time you get angry; each time you get pissed off, each time you vent about something someone else said online.
6275726e
(Hexadecimal)
“Burn”
We are valkyries, succubi, poltergeists, imps, harpies, serpents and sinners who live on in bytes and pixels, feeding off your melting-cheese-on-the-asphalt rage, your hours wasted worrying about stupid bullshit, and your regret for diving into yet another flame war.
You’ve already met my sister, Ignite.
Thanks to the demon on your shoulder, the fires of your personal hell have been raging on in your mind.
I attack after Ignite, hit you hard every time you lash out and type a pissy comment, forcing you to stick around and wait for a response.
I can smell your fury burning through forum after blog after website. Burn, baby burn.
011000010111001101101000
(Binary)
“Ash”
Regret.
(I feed off of your guilt.)
When you were with my sister, Burn, your eyes were bloodshot, flames were shooting out of your nostrils, and your fingers flew across your keyboard. You posted hundreds of comments that’ll get lost in a matter of hours…
(And still completely searchable to anyone who cares.)
…which is the equivalent of thousands of Calories.
This year, my fan-facing activities will be related to Firefly and the GenCon Writer’s Symposium. There will be several books of mine available at the show, and you can read about those here. If you are a member of the press, please contact me privately so I can find time to spend with you. If I’m currently working on a project with you and you’d like to meet up, please feel free to send me an e-mail as my schedule is pretty full.
Thursday, July 30
10:00 a.m. – SEM1577156 Craft: Where to Start the Story ICC : Room 243
2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. – MWP Booth #1613
6:00 p.m. – SEM1577164 Craft: RPG Tie-In Fiction ICC : Room 243
Friday, July 31
2:00 to 3:00 p.m. – Signing in Author’s Alley
8:00 p.m. – ENnie Awards to announce the winners. Nominations for games I’ve worked on can be found here.
Saturday, August 1
11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. – MWP Booth #1613
7:00 – SEM1577146 WB: Monsters and Other Horrors ICC : Room 244
Sunday, August 2
11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. – Read & Critique – Room 244 with Geoffrey Girard and Delilah Dawson.
I am pleased to announce that, this Spring, a new addition to the Firefly ‘Verse will be hitting store shelves. It’s called The Gorramn Shiniest Language Guide and Dictionary in the ‘Verse, and pre-orders are now available.
The process and the approvals for this project was much different than what I’ve done previously for Firefly. All of my effort was strongly focused on writing the text, which is different from being a developer on a multi-book project where I get to see the text, layout, and most of the art ahead of time. Here, I spent a lot of time analyzing the show scripts, reviewing the language, and focusing on the individual words–some of which had alternate spellings! Plus, there’s a special interview in here with Jenny Lynn, the show’s translator as well, and I got the chance to hear some great stories.
I’m hoping that fans like you will be amazed to get a new, inside look at what it’s like to be involved with Firefly from a language perspective, and fall in love with the ‘Verse all over again. Thanks to my editors at Titan–I had a blast on this project!
GenCon Indy is less than a few weeks away, and that means its time to update you with my schedule! In the first of two posts, I’d like to share with you which of my books and games you can expect to find at GenCon. The books and games on this list are the titles I have confirmed that will be at the show–there may be others, but this is what you can expect to find. Most of them are fairly recent releases, too, and came out within the past two years.
The “G” in GenCon is gaming, so let’s start with those!
At the MWP booth, the entire Firefly RPG line will be available for you to buy. That means, you can pick up a copy of the following:
At the Onyx Path booth, four of the titles I’ve worked on will be available in print. They are:
Now onto the books! I will have a signing from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. in the Author’s Alley area of GenCon. During this time, I’ve confirmed I’ll be bringing copies of:
I may be bringing some other books, too, but right now I’m trying to keep the options limited for ease of carrying. There may be other books at the show, like Unframed: the Art of Improvisation for Gamemasters, Gods, Memes, and Monsters, and For Exposure: the Life and Times of a Small Press Publisher. Be sure to watch for them. I’d much rather spend my time signing books than selling them, so come say hello on Friday!
