Blog – Page 19 – John Joseph Adams

Codex Q&A: Do you still geek out and “fan-slime” creators you admire?

In July 2013, I served as the “editor-in-residence” for the Codex Writing Group, which meant basically I was asking a month-long AMA (“Ask Me Anything”) interview. With Codex’s permission, I’m re-posting the Q&As here on my blog. The questions were all provided by members of Codex.

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Do you still geek out and “fan-slime” creators you admire? If so, what was your most recent “I can’t believe I’m talking to this person” moment?

I don’t think I’ve ever “fan-slimed” anyone, but I certainly have geeked out on the inside. (And may have been a bit awkward in their presence, but because I was nervous and a nerd, not because I was gushing at them.) My default social mode at conventions and the like where I might run into someone famous is, “Don’t bother them.” I figure I’ll end up running into them at some point naturally without actively seeking them out, or else they’ll take the initiative to come talk to me, or I’ll end up invited to the same dinner as them.

My most recent inner geek out was at the Nebula Awards recently when I found myself talking with Trevor Quachri, the new editor of Analog, when here comes Robert Silverberg, and then here comes Joe and Gay Haldeman. And so there we are talking in the lobby, and Bob Silverberg (he insists I call him Bob) suggests we go to lunch. So then suddenly I’m not just CHATTING with Bob Silverberg and Joe Haldeman, I’m HAVING LUNCH WITH THEM. So that was all very cool. As if that wasn’t cool enough, Trevor even insisted on picking up the check! (Ahhhh…expense account!) And then also, this cool thing happened.

On the flip side, at World Horror this year, I was the editor guest of honor. The opening ceremonies were in this big room with a bunch of banquet tables, and there was a finger-food buffet and there was a cash bar setup. As I mentioned elsewhere in this thread, I don’t drink, and I didn’t feel like spending three bucks on a diet coke, so I just took a seat and waited for things to get going. I didn’t see any familiar faces, so I just sat there by myself. Two young women ended up sitting at the table with me, and so we chatted for a bit. I introduced myself as just “John” since, I mean, it’s weird to say your full name when you meet someone, right? So they didn’t realize who I was. At some point, one of the con organizers came over and handed me a couple of drink tickets that I should have gotten earlier. After she left, one of the young women asked me why they just handed me those drink tickets, and I said, “Oh, uh, it’s because I’m one of the guests of honor.” And they were pretty flabbergasted, so that was kind of funny. But then, almost literally just as I was saying that, who joins us at our table but ANOTHER guest of honor — Ramsey Campbell. I had never actually met him, but I had published an original story of his in Nightmare, so I was pleased to meet him, and I did geek out a little just then. I always do find it a little intimidating to make conversation with, you know, legends, though.

Prior to all of that, one of my “geek out” disappointments was narrowly missing the chance to meet Neil Gaiman. This was back when he was GOH at the Worldcon in Montreal a couple of years ago. At that point, I had reprinted a couple of his stories, so I figured he might know who I was (otherwise I wouldn’t have even thought about bothering him). And I didn’t seek him out, but as I was exiting the green room one time, I saw him approaching, which was almost like spotting a unicorn, because even though he was a GOH, he was never seen walking the halls of the convention. (I still don’t understand how his handlers manage that. Does he have an invisibility cloak? Admittedly it’s probably pretty necessary, as he’d get mobbed as he tried to get from place to place.) Anyway, I saw him coming and was just about to say a quick hello and go on my way, but before he got close enough to extend a hand or anything, he got a phone call, so I just walked past and let him enter the green room in peace. I did end up meeting him a couple years later, and HE GAVE ME FIVE GOLD DOUBLOONS

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Codex Q&A: Do you ever get Editor’s Block?

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Do you ever get Editor’s Block?

I wouldn’t call it editor’s block, certainly, but there have been occasions where I had a hard time making up my mind about a story. What I do in those situations is usually solicit a lot of different feedback from my staff and slush readers, in the hopes that one of them will say something in their comments that will crystallize things for me and/or I’ll get enough of a sense of consensus that it will help me get off the fence.

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Codex Q&A: How quickly do you read?

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How quickly do you read? Ever timed yourself?

I don’t know how fast, but I’m not among the world’s fastest readers or anything. I don’t even know if I read particularly fast for someone who reads all the time. I think there’s a certain danger in reading very quickly if you’re an editor. Obviously when you’re actually editing a ms. you have to slow down, but when you’re doing that initial read, I think it’s also important to not blow through the story, because you need to stop and appreciate the language and absorb all the nuance etc., that I suspect most people will miss if they’re reading at speed-reading speeds.

Years ago, I was working at a Barnes & Noble, and one of the managers there was one of those people who can read a whole 400 page novel in like an hour. I was SO JEALOUS of that guy. I would love to be able to do that as a reader…though, as I said above, I’m not sure if that would actually be good for me as an editor.

I tried a couple times to improve my reading speed just because there’s so much that I’d like to read but will never have time for, but none of that seems to have helped. If anything, I think I’ve slowed down as a reader. When I was younger and first really devoting myself to reading, for a while there, I was reading a book a day at least, and a couple of days I read more than one book (my crowning achievement was three in one day). Of course, that mostly just meant I had no life and I more or less spent all day reading the book in question. Still, it feels like I must have read more quickly back then.

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Codex Q&A: What’s your editing ritual?

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What’s your editing ritual? Do you squeeze a dozen rubber duckies before sitting down before the slush pile? Do you have a hundred interns bow down before the inbox? Surely it can’t be anything banal…

My only real ritual is that I get myself trapped in this cycle of:

1. Email
2. Twitter
3. RSS Feeds
4. (repeat)

So you get up, read and respond to email, then move onto Twitter, then move onto RSS feeds, and then by the time you’re done with all that, there’s more email, and more twitter, and then more RSS feeds…

Otherwise, my process is fairly chaotic, depending on what my deadlines are looking like and what I feel like working on. I keep telling myself that I need to make a schedule so that I’m sure to get certain things done on a more regular schedule, but making that schedule is just one more thing on my todo list that I haven’t gotten to yet.

When I read submissions, I read them on my iPad Mini, using the Kindle app. The Moksha Submission System we use has a feature that will forward all recommended stories to my Kindle (or in this case my Kindle app), so I just open up my Kindle app and all my subs are in there. The system renames them for me, so a story will look like this on my Kindle:

LS – Keyes – 5500 – Flowers For Algernon

Unfortunately, Kindle doesn’t let you really reorganize your library in any useful way (except you can sort by date or alphabetical); you can’t create folders and sort subs that way, for instance.

Usually when I’m settling down to read, I’ll sit on the couch in the living room, or lay in bed, or most often I’ll use the chair I have in the closet in my office. The closet doubles as my podcast recording studio. These days I’ve taken to standing while recording, but previously I had been recording while sitting, so I got a nice comfy chair that fit in the closet nicely. Now it’s basically just my reading chair.

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Codex Q&A: How do you feel about authors interacting with readers that leave comments on their stories?

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How do you feel about authors interacting with readers that leave comments on their stories? (Assuming they’re not flying off the handle if there’s a negative comment.) I’m always unsure if I should be replying or interacting with people that comment on my stories since I don’t see many other authors do it.

I think it’s generally fine. Readers seem to really like interacting with authors, so it’s always a cool thing for them to trade comments with authors directly. I think maybe you wouldn’t want to reply to every comment or anything, but I think it’s generally fine to pop by and just say something like “Thanks for all the kind words” or something of the sort. And I think it’s certainly fine to respond if readers leave comments that have questions or are looking for clarification (if you feel like explicating something that you may have wanted left vague in the text).

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Codex Q&A: How do editors feel about serial stories/ shared worlds?

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I’ve often wondered how editors feel about serial stories/shared worlds. Obviously, short stories need to stand on their own, but I’m always paranoid that editors will see a unified setting that they’ve rejected before and think, “Oh, god, not again.” I’m aware that this is probably a fairly self-centered interpretation of what goes on behind the screen, but still: Do you ever feel this way? Do you prefer seeing writers create a broader collection or stories, or do you just take each one as its own thing? Or do you rarely even notice?

I can’t speak for all editors obviously, but personally I *like* series stories. Obviously not all the time–I wouldn’t want Lightspeed to be comprised of nothing but different series stories–but I really enjoy serial story telling (which is probably why I enjoy ambitious TV like Breaking Bad and The Wire so much). A series of short stories is probably my favorite way of consuming such serial stories.

I’ve actually got a couple of series going in Lightspeed:

Carrie Vaughn’s “Aetherian Revolution” stories
Sean Williams’s “Twinmaker” stories Matthew Hughes’s “Kaslo Chronicles” stories
Marc Laidlaw’s “The Tales of Gorlen Vizenfirthe”

I actually just started “Series Archive” pages for such stories, so that it’ll be easier to find the other stories in the series if you want to read the others. If you click through those links above, that’ll take you there. The Twinmaker series only has the one story so far, so it’s not a true series yet, but the next one is coming up in August, and I have two others in inventory.

Speaking of Matthew Hughes, he’s one of the reasons I really fell in love with series short fiction. Back when I was working at F&SF, he wrote a series of stories about Henghis Hapthorn, Old Earth’s Foremost Freelance Discriminator (a Sherlock Holmes type), which were these “Dying Earth” type science-fantasy stories, in a universe where every several thousand years, the fundamental ground rules of the universe arbitrarily switch between rational cause-and-effect and “sympathetic association” (which is vulgarly known as “magic”). So I’m really excited to be able to do publish this new series by him in Lightspeed.

Obviously, though, not all series are going to work for me. There are some stories I like the first one, but then the author tries me again with another, and it doesn’t quite work for me, or maybe I just don’t necessarily want a whole series of stories in that vein, etc. It’s all a case by case basis. I have on occasion, though, encouraged authors to write more stories set in a milieu of theirs.

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Codex Q&A: When and how do you like to see a writer publicize a sale on social media?

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We’ve got a thread going now about when it’s best to publicize a sale on social media: on acceptance, on contract, on publication, some combination of all three, it depends, or never. Do you have a preference, as an editor? When and how do you like to see a writer squee about a sale?

As an editor, I don’t have any particular preference when a writer announces such things. Except, of course, ideally the author will help promote their story once it comes out, so I guess my one preference would be to AT LEAST be sure to announce it when the story is published, and to let readers know how they can find it. But whether or not they announce it before that time isn’t particularly relevant to me. I think the real trick is how to do so without annoying/making jealous all your writer colleagues. I’m not sure what the solution to that particular conundrum is, but I expect it’s really only much of an issue for folks who are particularly prolific.

But I will say that, maybe even more important to worry about is the “I’ve got good news and I can’t tell you what it is” sort of posts, as those are probably more likely to cause colleagues to start panicking that they haven’t heard the same mysterious good news and so they must be a horrible failure, etc.

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Codex Q&A: Do you have separate pools of slush readers for Lightspeed’s Fantasy and Science Fiction submissions?

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Lightspeed asks authors to determine whether a story is fantasy or science fiction. Do you have separate pools of slushers for these two categories?

I give every slush reader the option to either read both SF and Fantasy or just one or the other. The vast majority want to read both, but I can think of at least one reader who wanted to read only fantasy stories (someone I inherited from Fantasy Magazine). The only real separation of the slush teams is Lightspeed and Nightmare, though there’s a good amount of crossover between those.

Is it a problem if authors pick the ‘wrong’ category (I sometimes have stories that could arguably be either fantasy or sf)?

No, not a problem at all. It’s not even a problem if you submit it to the “wrong” magazine (i.e., Lightspeed instead of Nightmare). I instruct the slush readers to just evaluate the stories on their own merits, regardless of that kind of stuff. So they might make a note in their comments that the story didn’t really feel like SF but it’s definitely genre, and they liked it, so they say I should look at it and decide for myself.

Personally I don’t really care much about the genre distinctions, or even enforcing them rigidly…but Lightspeed‘s format is such that we have a number of slots (rather than a word count) to fill every month, so I do have to decide whether a story feels more like SF or feels more like fantasy for that purpose. And the thing is, some readers DO care about the distinction–some only like SF or really only like Fantasy, so I want to make the magazine as welcoming to them as possible as well, and thus I like the “slot” system since that means no issue will be 90% fantasy or something and thus disappoint the SF-only reader.

I’ve got one in inventory right now that the author submitted as SF but it felt like fantasy to me; however, it’s a trope that HAS been treated as SF in the past. I actually thought about taking this particular story for Nightmare too, so it was one of those that just could be called SF, fantasy, or horror (or maybe all three?). Stories like that are tricky to place. Ultimately, for that one, between SF and fantasy (eliminating horror from the equation since I bought it for Lightspeed), I’ll probably slot it in wherever I’ve got less inventory when it comes time to schedule the story.

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Codex Q&A: What’s your advice for slush readers?

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What’s your advice for slush readers? Do you have recommendations for how I can avoid brain damage or avoid killing my soul, or is it already too late? Recommendations to avoid burnout? Time-management techniques? Do you have a spiel you give your new slush readers? Do you just assume they’ll burn out eventually and quit?

Well, I read slush at F&SF for nearly nine years, and I seem to have escaped without brain damage (mostly). For my Lightspeed slush readers, I think there’s less likelihood of burnout just because I use a larger team, so there’s less slush you have to tackle every day. When I was at F&SF–for most of my time there–I was the only person reading the slush, so I had to deal with all of it.

I don’t have much advice for avoiding burnout. I don’t think there’s really anything you can say or do; you’re either going to get sick of it or you’re not. I will say, though, that if you find yourself getting sick of it, you should probably do the right thing and quit, since it’s not really fair to the writers whose stories you’re reading if you’re burned out.

FWIW, I think reading slush is absolutely the best thing you can do to grow as a writer, at least when you’re still learning. (I don’t know that it would help established writers much.) Forcing yourself to read like an editor can really change the way you think about stories, and can change the way you start writing them. Most of the things you’ll learn won’t be conscious, concrete lessons; instead, it’ll be more like learning by osmosis.

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***Codex Q&A: Could you elaborate on what you mean by “commercial” and “literary”?

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We can’t possibly let you escape without elaborating on what you mean by “commercial” and “literary”, you know.

Hmm…not sure how to break those down any. I suppose you could substitute “commercial” with “accessible” and “literary” with “critically-acclaimed” or something like that. Does that clarify at all?

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