Doing the Clarion Write-a-thon again this year, having some fun and some frustration with it.
It's been a busy summer with some competing priorities. My planned six stories have morphed into a short stories and work on the novel manuscript. I did finish a revision pass, which was huge and made me very happy. But also, juggling is not my strong suit and has left me feeling a bit like I'm churning in circles.
So. An incentive!
Donate $10 - $25 to Clarion's Write-A-Thon (link here: https://secure.qgiv.com/event/clarionwestwriteathon/account/1298108/) and I'll cameo you in a short story in my space opera-esque universe. (Not an ongoing character, but a walk-on.) You can even ask to be a specific species (I have several, below) or for something outrageous to do in the story, and if I can, I'll work it in!
This is less about me raising money and more about making me actually write words, to be honest. But it's for a cool cause; the money helps support Clarion's six-week training for genre writers from around the country and the world.
Existing species, all sentient:
Spacer: Humans 1,000-years from Earth, collective culture adjusting to no longer living on a colony ship.
Peqe: Imagine a peacock crest made of axolotl-like filaments on the shoulders of a muscular, bipedal, furred dinosaur with a jaw full of black teeth the length of your arm and retractable talons. Uh, and they're matriarchal. Prefer to stay on their home planet where they know they are superior and not one will tell them otherwise. Shockingly small population, rigid class system, new religion with widespread adoption.
Phren: Egalitarian, polyamorous community-minded people who look stunningly like the peqe, only without crests. Neither species appreciates the comparison. The Phren share their planet with:
Wjorx: the most terrifying creature in the solar system; jungle-dwelling and rarely seen but apparently two to three times the height of a phren with fangs the length of a human leg. They'll dine on a phren from time to time, which does not seem to upset the phren as much as one would expect.
Modeel: cuttlefish-like spacefaring creatures inside a fantastic robotic shell. Bioluminescent discharge is both protective and emotive. Very into mining and space-faring trade, with an equally strong faction at home that is becoming increasingly violently anti-pollution.
Larsivians: Crocodilian, bipedal, with a powerful ridged tail that might take off your head if you say the wrong thing to the wrong person. Larsivians worship many religions, have many cities and villages, hold many philosophies, range from laid-back and semi-feral to mob bosses to hustling business types. They're known for their poetry, emotion-forward language, and ability to argue six sides of a single argument. Most populous creature in Se Solar System, with the possible exception of...
Aupoin. Grizzly-sized tardigrades, for lack of a better description. Live in underground colonies on nearly all the planets. Very service-oriented and apparently insular; known for their root-weaving art.
Gruide: Heron-esque, only flock-based like geese. Least space-faring of the lot and the least interested in anything off planet, but required to be part of the system's government. Resent the heck out of it, especially when it becomes clear the Peqe have in fact hunted them for meat in the past.
Kertueon: Hive-based creatures, reminiscent of locusts and praying mantis, but larger than humans. Utterly terrifying to most humans, yet startlingly civil.
There are also non-sentient creatures on all of the planets, and I haven't fully worked out the ecosystem on a few of them and need bulk some of that out a bit, so if you have a critter you just wanna be, ask.
BTW, I have ARTWORK of some of the species coming and I am SO STOKED ABOUT IT. It's amazing!
