One outta two.
I received word yesterday regarding the fate of my two most recent short story submissions to the good folks at AHOY Comics. AHOY purchased my story "The Copperhead Strikes!," but passed on my story "Hitcore."
A split decision wasn't a surprise. Each month, there are always a bunch of short stories vying for a finite number of spots in the AHOY publishing empire. Submitting two stories at the same time means I'm competing with myself while simultaneously competing with something like four dozen worthy entries by other talented writers. That's not a winning path, and I'm not going to make that mistake again.
Because I really like "Hitcore." It was one of my most accomplished pieces so far, and while I don't know whether or not AHOY would have taken it on its own (quite possibly not), I didn't do it any favors by offering it within the same submission window as "The Copperhead Strikes!" Ah, well. "Hitcore" and its tale of the music business might appear on the blog at some point, but I may try to find another professional home for it first.
On the other hand, I'm absolutely delighted that "The Copperhead Strikes!" sold. Delighted. That story was a labor of love, inspired in part by positive feedback from an AHOY bigwig regarding my previously-sold Western "The Last Ride Of The Copperhead Kid." It's not a sequel--different characters, set in an unnamed American city in 1939 instead of in the old West--but the two stories are connected. If "Copperhead Kid" was my love letter to Westerns, then "The Copperhead Strikes!" is my homage to '30s pulp/radio heroes like The Shadow and The Green Hornet. It repurposes a fight scene I wrote for a Batman fanfic story, and pummels its way forward. And honestly, if I had to pick between "Hitcore" and "The Copperhead Strikes!," I woulda gone with "Copperhead," too.
(But I do REALLY like "Hitcore." I'm my biggest fan.)
All told, I'm still slightly behind the eight-ball in terms of stories sold out of stories submitted in 2019, with a not-bad/not-fantastic record of four out of nine. AHOY has purchased "Guitars Vs. Rayguns," "The Picture Of Amontillado," and "The Last Ride Of The Copperhead Kid," each of which awaits further word on a publication date, but I've been paid for all of them (you can read my announcements of those sales here, here, and here); "The Copperhead Strikes!" now joins that list. AHOY declined the option for "Dreaming Deadly," "Sword Of The Chosen One," "Montie Pylon Finds His Holy Grail," "The Greatest Thud Never Heard," and "Hitcore." That's still four more short stories than I sold in the entirety of my preceding four and a half decades of trying. More to come. One at a time, but more to come.
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