I found a couple of blogs which discuss free science fiction. One of the reasons I plan to write science fiction short stories here on my blog is that I see little value in trying to get them published. The financial incentive is not worth the wait, and would not enough to allow me to quit my day job. Basically my goal is to build a fan base, people who are familiar with my work and might buy my novel when it is ready later this year.
The first blog I found is BestScienceFictionStories. Their post on The 10 Best Web Sites for Free Online Science Fiction Short Stories is very useful. Hopefully my site will be on the list soon.
The other is Auxiliary Memory where I found a post on Free Science Fiction. Free audio scifi books is a great idea.
2 responses so far ↓
1 Colum Paget // Mar 2, 2010 at 8:31 pm
> One of the reasons I plan to write science
> fiction short stories here on my blog is that I
> see little value in trying to get them
> published.
I think you are right about what you say about the cost/benefits of trying to get short stories published, and I say that as someone who’s tried to do so! Financially the short-fiction market is a total loss. Richard K Morgan gave up and just went and did the novel, that tells us something.
Unfortunately, much the same is true of the novel markets too, it seems. Very few writers manage to ‘give up the day job’ even with novels. Mr Morgan was only able to do so because Hollywood got involved.
On the other hand, the one thing that you do know if you get a short story published, is that you’ve achieved a degree of excelence, or at least, you’re good enough for someone else to go for it. You can’t really trust feedback from other sources, as people feel such a pressure to ’say something nice’. I’ve seen this in the online workshops, where everyone opens with ‘I really enjoyed your story’, even though they then proceed to tear it to shreds!
Colum
I have to say I think you are right about there being little point trying to get published
2 Colum Paget // Mar 2, 2010 at 8:33 pm
Oh, there’s a bit missing from the bottom of my last post. I was saying ‘go for it, like RK Morgan’, but that bit didn’t post.
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