#E.D.E. Bell

[nanowrimo]

When Is a Small Press a Good Fit?

When it comes to publishing, many writers will think about big publishers first. However, there are a lot of different publishing options out there to explore. NaNo participant and author, Clara Ward, talks about their experience publishing with a small press and gives you questions to consider while you think through your publishing options!

NaNoWriMo inspired me to write. Signing with a small press gave me the support I needed to publish a book I love. 

I’d published books before—starting with NaNoWriMo sponsor deals in the early days of online publishing—but I never had the right skill set to promote those books. As a result, they never truly found their audience. 

In November of 2020, I poured my heart into a genre-blurring near-future tale of sailing across the Pacific and building a neurodiverse, queer, and possibly magical chosen family. In 2021, I titled it Be the Sea and asked myself: What am I going to do with that?

1. Are you looking for fame or family?

Small presses are as varied as the people who form them. If you read widely, you may already have a treasured book on your shelf from your publisher-to-be. Try asking NaNoWriMo friends who share your interests if they’ve discovered any surprising or emerging sources for great reads. (At the very least, you may find books you’ll love in unexpected places!)

Admittedly, a small press doesn’t have a fortune to spend on paving your path to fame. But I have never felt as seen as when my soon-to-be publisher, E.D.E. Bell at Atthis Arts, wrote back, “I’m really in love with what you are doing and would like to talk about it.” 

2. Do you have the bandwidth for working with others?

Even with the most supportive small press, you may have to push outside your comfort zone. I know authors who love the absolute control and freedom of self-publishing. For a time, I felt very comfortable just posting my NaNoWriMo fanfiction novels on Archive of Our Own. At most, I had one or two beta readers to offer feedback on those works. Whereas E.D.E. told me in one of our earliest conversations that in addition to our three rounds of editing we’d need “a good number of betas” to cover the range of topics we were working on together.

I was delighted! I knew what I’d written was ambitious, and I welcomed all the feedback I could get. But it turns out, each extra person in a process adds new challenges and delays. I had to stretch my empathy as well as my publishing timeline because, to quote E.D.E. again: “It’s a lot of emotion (as well as brain cycles) to go through...” Outside perspectives will only improve your writing if you are willing to work with them, to truly listen and learn.

3. Can you handle the two-way commitment?

No form of publishing is easy. The myth that authors write while others handle business and promotion is not true at the top, and certainly not with small presses. In my experience, working with Atthis Arts was like joining a team or chosen family. Beyond certain paid tasks, such as editing and sensitivity reading, I discovered a community of authors who freely offered coaching before my first public reading, social media boosting, tips for author webpages, and an extra pair of eyes on letters requesting bookshop readings or other events. While not all small presses work the same way, this supportive culture proved to be an excellent fit for me. Naturally, I wanted to give back whenever possible.

Small presses can only succeed with community. This month, as I promote the launch of Be the Sea at bookshops in Mountain View, Davis, and Sacramento, I will be introducing many Californians to my Michigan-based small publisher, Atthis Arts. When I stand up as a panelist at Norwescon in Washington state or at various science, library, or Pride events later in the year, I’ll be promoting more than Be the Sea by Clara Ward. I’ll give back by sharing my appreciation for small presses, the supportive and inclusive practices they can normalize, and the opportunities they open up for future writers and readers. 

Clara Ward lives in Silicon Valley on the border between reality and speculative fiction. Their latest novel, Be the Sea, features a near-future ocean voyage, chosen family, and sea creature perspectives, while delving into our oceans, our selves, and how all futures intertwine. Their short fiction has appeared in Strange Horizons, Decoded Pride, Small Wonders, and as a postcard from Thinking Ink Press. When not using words to teach or tell stories, Clara uses wood, fiber, and glass to make practical or completely impractical objects. More of their words along with crafted creations can be found at: https://clarawardauthor.wordpress.com

Photo by Hümâ H. Yardım on Unsplash

[brianmcnett-blog]

The most famous in my mind was Ray Bradbury's "There Will Come Soft Rains" told entirely from the POV of an automated house. More recently, my friend E.D.E. Bell has edited an entire anthology "As Told by Things" of short stories and flash fiction from the POV of inanimate objects. https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/40018610

My Creative Writing professor told me that I can't write a story from a point of view of an inanimate statue, they say that "a character have to have human characteristics like can move"

What do you think of that as a writer?

I think that when you write for your professor, you should write to make them happy, but obviously that's bollocks. You can write a story from any point of view you like in order to tell your story.

[wildcards1407]

Travel Documents 130: Rogue Artists

by E.D.E. Bell , Cat Rambo et. al.

Genre:   spec-fic anthology

The Dust Cover Copy

To heal. to mourn. to redeem. to live.

Rogue Artists presents seventeen speculative fiction stories of art used for change, in celebration of the 2022 Origins Game Fair, themed: The Art of Gaming.

Featuring

2022 Guest of Honor Cat Rambo, E.D.E. Bell, Marie Bilodeau, Donald J. Bingle, Jennifer Brozek, C. S. E. Cooney, Sarah Hans, Carlos Hernandez, Chris A. Jackson, Addie J. King, R. L. King, Daniel Myers, Aaron Rosenberg, Tracy R. Ross, Jason Sanford, Michael R. Underwood, Gregory A. Wilson

The Scene

Worldbuilding

Got your bag? Got your sketchbook? Got your water bottle? Okay, great! Time to enter this impressive gallery of an anthology.

Many types are art are explored in these works: the art of tattoo, sketch work, and stage. The art of song, and the art of paint. Even the art of gallery curation. Some tales between these pages will enchant you. Some will make you shiver and move on quickly. Some will comfort disturbed souls…and some will disturb comfortable egos. What I can promise you is that each story hung in this gallery has the power to move you.

The Crowd

Characterization

In this work, you’ll meet so many characters worth remembering. Sami, who mourns a planet and heals by painting. Mischievous Art playing tricks with a pencil and Mona who brings magic out of the grayness of loss. An incredible acting troupe who act as one and create in the face of repression. Sweet Olena and sorrowing Amina. So many characters with so many different lives, and all of them united by the power of art. As usual, I won’t dive deep into any single piece of an anthology, but the careful curation of these works walks us through a fascinating gallery of the human heart and soul.

Writing Style

My particular favorite in this collection was Art In, a fun Oceans-11 style heist tale with a magic twist. Another absolute treasure is Seven Stones To Throw, which finishes the collection with a gentle paintbrush and a smile. But every one of these stories has something great to offer. The only stories I had any issue at all with were The New Pointillist Manifesto and A Matter Of Value, which both struck me as that guy at the gala opening who insists on rambling away at you while drinking too much of the wine on offer. But hey, that’s expected when you go to the gallery. The careful curation of this collection starts the series with catharsis and new beginnings, leads us deep into humankind’s desires and the parts of ourselves we don’t always want to look in the eye, and gently leads us back up into the light refreshed from our journey.

The Moves

Plot

Some stories move at a fast clip and some are as leisurely as a day spent painting in the garden. All are nicely timed. Again, good curation has created a careful beginning, a fast-paced early series, a deep and occasionally dark middle, and a final story as sweet and quiet as a Sunday afternoon.

Overall Rating

A gallery of metaphor and narrative well worth exploring. Enjoy.

[madscientistjournal]

I Didn't Break the Lamp: Interview with E.D.E. Bell

Today, we’re talking with E.D.E. Bell, author and publisher, who has a story in I Didn’t Break the Lamp!

DV: Tell us a bit about yourself!

E.D.E. Bell: I am a fantasy author and small press editor in Ferndale, Michigan, just outside of Detroit. I arrived here by a winding road, leaving my career in government-related engineering work to do something I think is really important to our collective and individual growth and healing: create and promote art. I enjoy running our small press with my partner, best friend, and spouse–Chris Bell, and with the support and patience of our three children and resident cat. As a vegan and an often-thinker, I like to write in ways that either inspire compassion or challenge our views on harm, repression, and violence. While I’ve always enjoyed big epic fantasy, I’ve developed a real passion for short fiction. It is a tremendously powerful art form.

DV: What inspired you to write “Duality” for I Didn’t Break the Lamp?

EDEB: The idea of imaginary creatures was very inspiring to me, and rather than big adventures or meaningful friendships, I gravitated immediately to some sort of psychological insight. There were just a lot of layers to that concept, and I really enjoy fiction that can be interpreted different ways. When I wrote down the idea of knowing what someone else was thinking, my first question was, would the friend be a reliable narrator, if you will, or unreliable? In that moment, the idea of both clicked in, and from there the story just started to pour out in what I admit were very satisfying ways. Once that happened, I started to chuckle at myself how deeply “me” this story actually is. My stories often involve split worlds, conflicting identities, or the burden of not living one’s truth. So, yeah, I have issues. I know. A fun side note (another layer!): as someone who has worked with imaginary numbers in math and electrical engineering, imaginary numbers are essentially a duality to their real counterparts, that we have defined in order to understand it. Oh, I could go on.

DV: The idea of “dual friended” as you present it in your story has some parallels to the idea of an angel and a devil on ones’ shoulders, but also the riddle of one entity always telling the truth and their counterpart always lying. Do you think the dual friends are more like the former, the latter, or something altogether different?

EDEB: Engineers (even former engineers) never answer a straightforward question with a straightforward answer (“yes and no” is our refrain), and the way my brain has always functioned (or not), everything works on layers and facets and dimensions. I especially love when a story is written such that a reader can interpret it as they will. I think you’ve provided two very interesting interpretations, and I think there are many more. (Like, I’m thinking of a few major ones.) I’d love for the reader to decide what the dual friends mean to them, or what they might mean to our narrator. Or if they were even … real.

DV: Your narrator is also an artist. Were the pieces they create inspired by real world artists?

EDEB: I have always viewed writing as art (hence the name of our press) and so those lines, like many lines for me, are blurred in my mind. That said, the pieces were not inspired by visual art as they were by concepts of secrets and burdens. Once this story started forming in my mind, I landed quickly on the idea of visual art, because all the other elements of the story are inherently non-visual, and even more so, they are hidden. Imaginary friends, secrets, truth, and lies. The opposite, er, the duality to that, was the idea of those concepts being not just visual, but hugely and publicly visible. This, of course, could also be viewed as a metaphor. One thing about my writing is I love to create on many layers, and almost everything I do is designed to be viewable in facets. Honestly, my mind is a complicated place!

DV: If you had an imaginary friend growing up, what was their name, and what were they like?

EDEB: You know, I didn’t consider this until you asked it, but my parents told me I had two imaginary friends when I was very young. As my memories of them are vague, but I’m sure that they were quite complex, I will leave them in their plane of existence and not try to pull them out by giving them an inadequate description. But if they had a piece in writing this, well, hello!

DV: What’s on the horizon for you?

EDEB: We have had a very busy year! We’ve published a paranormal road trip, a ghostly thriller, a middle-grade high fantasy, a middle-grade adventure, and now a gorgeous new graphic novel set on Kickstarter (which concluded in July). There are three projects really close to my heart these days. The first, A Spatial Surprise, is a sci-fi novella written by 12-year-old Symthasree Sarojini Koganti that I hope will inspire hope and creativity in all of us. Next, Five Minutes at Hotel Stormcove, a collection of multi-genre short stories and flash fiction featuring, well��you, Mad Scientist Journal’s own Dawn Vogel. And then, most personal to me, is my own fantasy novella serial Diamondsong. Dime’s story focuses on themes such as non-violence and identity, so it’s a quiet and subtle story in a time where things can be very loud. It has a small but loyal following, but I’d love for more people to give it a look. We’re currently running a Kickstarter for that serial. All the links to these titles on retail sites are posted at atthisarts.com, and signed copies of Diamondsong can be ordered at edebell.com.

  I Didn’t Break the Lamp: Interview with E.D.E. Bell was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

[mspencerdraws]

It’s launch day!

Alia Terra: Stories from the Dragon Realm is a book of three all-ages queer fairy tales highlighting nonbinary characters, aromanticism, and personal acceptance, written by Romanian author Ava Kelly (avakellyfiction), edited by E.D.E. Bell of Atthis Arts and illustrated by me! If you’re unfamiliar with Kickstarter, this particular campaign will allow you to pre-order this book, get some extra goodies if you want, *and* each pre-order will help boost the number of illustrations in the book! Spread the word! If you know someone you think might be interested, every share and recommendation makes a huge difference. Kickstarter link HERE.

[straydog733]

I am happy to announce that The Glitter and Hope StoryBundle is now available for sale! This is a curated collection (hand-selected by Cat Rambo) of up to eleven books, including The Traveling Triple-C Incorporeal Circus, all centered around hope in dark times, and available for Pay-what-you-can.

Hope can find its origin in friendship, whether on an alien planet or a New York street corner. It can come from writing, in a myriad shades as multi-colored as the ink in which it’s inscribed. It glitters at the bottom of Pandora’s box, waiting to escape. Waiting to provide comfort and light and renewed vigor for the fight.

The base bundle is made up of these four books.

Diamondsong – Escape 01 by E.D.E. Bell

The Burglar of Sliceharbor by Jason A. Holt

Modern Surprises by Joan Marie Verba

The Traveling Triple-C Incorporeal Circus by Alanna McFall

And with a purchase of $15 or higher, you unlock seven more titles as a bonus. This is a great chance to experience some new authors and spread the word about Triple-C.

The bundle is only available for 22 more days, so get it now while you can, and tell your friends!

[jacensolodjo]

“Pay what you want! You choose how much you want to pay for these awesome books. You decide how much of your purchase goes to the author and how much goes to help keep StoryBundle running. Pay at least $1 and get Diamondsong - Escape 01 by E.D.E. Bell, The Burglar of Sliceharbor by Jason A. Holt, Modern Surprises by Joan Marie Verba, and The Traveling Triple-C Incorporeal Circus by Alanna McFall.

If your purchase price is $15 or more, you get SEVEN more books: Diamondsong - Capture 02 by E.D.E. Bell, Tales of the Captain Duke - Vol. 1-4 by Rebecca Diem, The Voyage of the White Cloud by M. Darusha Wehm, Community of Magic Pens by Atthis Arts Anthology, Carpe Glitter by Cat Rambo, Missing Signal by Seb Doubinsky and The Legacy Human - Singularity 1 by Susan Kaye Quinn!”

[greeniezona]

I’m back from ConFusion and I am happy to report that I had a fantastic time! My anxiety was all ramped up because 1) it was my first sff convention and 2) I decided to bring the whole family! And had no idea what it might look like for a 14-year-old and a 10-year-old. But it was great! All four of us were pretty much able to navigate our own paths according to our interests. I went to some great readings and some very interesting panels, the kids had gaming sessions and pizza parties, and my husband found a few sessions he was interested in and spent some real quality time with our youngest. It was small enough that we were always bumping into each other so we didn’t have to work very hard to stay in touch, but big enough that everyone always had something to do. . . Anyway, my picture! I brought along Every Heart a Doorway to get Seanan to sign it, which I did. I brought along the Trans Space Octopus Congregation because I knew Bogi would be there, but I supported eir on Patreon so my copy is already signed and personalized, so I never ended up taking it out of the room. Love After the End was just the book I brought to read in the car (I am really enjoying it!) and Five Minutes at the Hotel Stormcove is the ONE book I bought at the con. Sadly, most of the authors I fell in love with at readings only had short stories in magazines, so they didn’t have books to sell. But I enjoyed the editor of this book, E.D.E. Bell on a few panels, plus there is also a short story included by Marsalis, who I also enjoyed at the con. Plus, I got them both to sign it. It was my most awkward interaction at the con, BUT THEY HAVE PROBABLY BOTH FORGOTTEN IT BY NOW, RIGHT? . . Before the con I realized I hadn’t brought anything to take notes in, so we made an emergency detour to Meijer. My ten-year-old and I picked out identical notebooks (except his is one size smaller), and he got really excited about the idea of buying identical stickers to decorate them in the artists’ alley. It took MUCH deliberating, but we both loved the silly ice cream cone. 😜 . . That’s it! Do you go to sff or other bookish conventions? https://www.instagram.com/p/B7jloBlA513/?igshid=6qwr22niyzxh

[cyclopscats]

5 minutes at hotel stormcove !! it’s a collection of stories from about 60 different authors and it was all organized and edited by E.D.E Bell who i had the pleasure of meeting at a convention where i bought the book. i would definitely recommend!! there’s a lot of interesting stories in there and it’s very inspiring and motivating to read through for when i want to create. the stories all revolve around the hotel stormcove and take place within 5 minutes :)

It's Show & Tell Time!

What’s the most recent thing you’ve read, and would you recommend it?

[gemcitycomiccon]

#GemCityComicCon is pleased to welcome @edebellauthor to our 2019 show! E.D.E. Bell was born in the year of the fire dragon during a Cleveland blizzard. With an MSE in Electrical Engineering from the University of Michigan, three wonderful children, and nearly two decades in Northern Virginia and Southwest Ohio developing technical intelligence strategy, she now applies her magic to the creation of genre-bending fantasy fiction in Ferndale, Michigan, where she is proud to be part of the Detroit arts community. A passionate vegan and enthusiastic denier of gender rules, she feels strongly about issues related to human equality and animal compassion. She revels in garlic. She loves cats and trees. You can follow her adventures at edebell.com. #GCCC19 #comics #comicbooks #convention #creator #author https://ift.tt/2HQYaPp

[jaymzeecat]

The Scattered Bond on Kickstarter has just 11 days to go! The campaign is about 2/3 of the way funded, get on it! I really want to read these books. :)

[madscientistjournal]

Our Final Alumni Post Here!

With the closure of Mad Scientist Journal, this will be our final post sharing what our alumni have been up to on this site. Going forward, check out our Facebook and Twitter for occasional alumni news!

Recently, Atthis Arts announced the table of contents for their anthology, Community of Magic Pens, and it’s chock full of MSJ alums, including E.D.E. Bell, Andrew K. Hoe, Jennifer Lee Rossman, Lorraine Schein, Holly Schofield, D.A. Xiaolin Spires, and co-editor Dawn Vogel. You can preorder this book here!

Flame Tree Publishing has announced the lineup for their Bodies in the Library anthology, which includes classic tales and new stories from Deborah L. Davitt and Wendy Nikel! You can preorder this book here!

Finally, Deborah L. Davitt and co-editor Dawn Vogel have stories in issue 50 of New Myths!

Our Final Alumni Post Here! was originally published on Mad Scientist Journal

[hopeclip]

#GuestPost by #NewRelease The Banished Craft author E.D.E. Bell @edebellauthor

#GuestPost by #NewRelease The Banished Craft author E.D.E. Bell @edebellauthor

How to cope with not feeling accepted

Acceptance: When to Reveal your True Self

The subject of acceptance comes up often these days. I think as a people we are recognizing the stress placed on individuals who fall outside of their social circles, and that forcing people to conform is not as healthy for individuals or for society as once believed. Now, I may not be the best person to offer advice…

[mspencerdraws]

I painted these portraits (of myself, @avakellyfiction and E.D.E. Bell of Atthis Arts) for an upcoming project. In case you hadn’t guessed, THERE WILL BE DRAGONS! Alia Terra: Stories from the Dragon Realm is a book of three all-ages queer fairy tales highlighting nonbinary characters, aromanticism, and personal acceptance, written by Romanian author Ava Kelly, with illustrations by me, Matthew Spencer. The Kickstarter campaign to bring these stories to illustrated book form launches May 25th! Check it out! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/atthisarts/alia-terra (I have been busy!)