Raima Larter's Blog

It's September, which always feels like the start of the year to me. It brings new pens and notebooks, sometimes even new clothes--but the main thing is that summer is over and my attention is no longer diverted to all those outdoor activities and distractions that keep me from writing.

Still, the summer brought a few publishing successes, including for a brand new story of mine, The Pack, that was published at the end of July by the Literary Fantasy Magazine. You can read my strange little dog tale here, but if you like what you see, you might want to purchase the entire issue, which is available either as a paperback or e-book.

I also started a process of re-publishing some of my short stories that had disappeared when the literary magazines that published them went out of business. First up was The Black Forest, which is now available as a low-priced (99 cents) Kindle e-book. I also just published Master Gardener in this same format. I'll be offering these as free downloads now and then, but if you want to buy them now, they are as cheap as Amazon will allow. As always, if you do read them, please leave a review--pure gold for authors.

The big publishing news this summer was about Silver Rush, my first installment in a new series of novels and novellas. A Goodreads Giveaway contest just concluded for this book, and I'll be sending out some signed paperback copies to the lucky winners. If you didn't win, or didn't submit your name to the contest, you can still buy the book--it's available as either a paperback or e-book. You can also order the paperback from your local bookstore through the Bookshop website.

All these publication successes are possible only because I have submitted my finished work many, many times, persisting even when editors and publishers reject it repeatedly. As an example, The Pack was submitted to 13 different places, all of whom turned it down, before I tried the Literary Fantasy Magazine. Most of the 13 places I submitted to were science fiction publishers and while I really didn't think my story was fantasy, I gave it a try -- and the editor accepted my story in less than 24 hours. I'm so glad I didn't give up on this story, which is truly one of my favorites. If you believe in your work and have done your best with it, it's really just a matter of finding the right home for it.

To help me stay on track with submitting pieces this year, I'm participating in the Rejection Competition with a number of other writers. The idea is to log every rejection you receive each month and compete with the other writers to get the most rejections--which, of course, means you submit a lot. I just received a rejection and when I logged it on the spreadsheet, I moved into 3rd place and am now on the leaderboard. Yay! And just to show you the extent of this, that was my 53rd rejection this year, which shows you how many times I've submitted (over 60). I am aiming to submit 75 times this year and am on track to reach that goal. Onward!

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My short story, Master Gardener, was published by Mulberry Fork Review way back in 2016. This online literary magazine, like so many others, eventually went under, taking my story with it. As I explained in last month's post, this has happened to nearly a third of all my published stories, so I have decided to rescue these from whatever black hole on the internet they fell into, and re-issue them as low-cost Kindle singles.

Master Gardener has been re-published, as of today, in this new form. You can get it for just 99 cents at this link. Please consider leaving a review or rating if you read it!

In honor of this new release, last month's re-issued story, The Black Forest, will be available as a free download this coming weekend. Access this link to download your free copy anytime from Aug. 21 - 25, 2025. Start and end times of the free download period are midnight Pacific Time.

Finally, one more bit of writing-related news: my novel, The Kiss Catastrophe (published 2024) just received a fantastic review by the Speculative Fiction Writers Association. Thank you to SpecFic Writers and Dana Cain for this great review!

The Kiss Catastrophe is still available in paperback, hardback or e-book form, either from Amazon or Bookshop. If you haven't read it yet, I hope you will--and, as always, will leave a review. Thanks!

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I wrote a story that was published back in 2018 by Chantwood Magazine, a press that has since gone under....taking my story with it. The same thing has happened to about a third of my early stories, so I've decided to rescue these from oblivion by publishing them as Kindle singles.

The Black Forest, the story originally published by Chantwood, will be released as a low-priced (just 99 cents) e-book this Wednesday. You can order it now and it will magically appear on your device in a couple of days. I hope you like this modern-day fairy tale as much as I enjoyed writing it!

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My latest book, Silver Rush, a novella set in the 1850s Western US has been published today! It is available in paperback and as an e-book. Please consider leaving a review on either Amazon or Goodreads. The book is currently available only on Amazon, but once it percolates through the system, you should be able to find it in other locations. I'll keep you posted.

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I've been participating in StoryADay May all month and we are nearly done--two more days to go! I've managed to write something every day, which is the first time I've done this in all the times I've attempted this challenge.

This year, I followed some of the prompts provided by Julie Duffy, who organizes this challenge, but if the prompt didn't resonate with me, I used my own prompt. I have a few up my sleeve that I can pull out when I don't know what to write about it, and they did not fail me this time.

The image above is the chart I've been using to log my progress. So far, I have written over 20,000 new words this month and have started 14 new stories. I've also written a few scenes for one or another of the books I'm working on. I'd set these book projects aside to do this challenge, but if I had an idea for something that would fit in one of the books, I let that be my writing installment for the day.

This feels great, because not only do I have a lot of new pieces to work on, I've also made a bit of progress on existing works-in-progress.

I'm ready to move on to June, though, I have to say. Generating new material is fun and rewarding, but I'm now ready to look back over some of this stuff and start the revision and editing process.

One last thing: my novella, Silver Rush, will be published very soon--in less than 3 weeks! You can pre-order the e-book at this link. The book will also be available in paperback. You can read more about this novella and the series it inaugurates here. I'll be in touch about this again when we reach publication day!

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April is just about to wrap up and May is right around the corner. What are you planning to do with a whole new month? Maybe you'd like to join me in a writing challenge, Story A Day May, in which those of us participating will write a draft of a short story every day in the month of May.

I have started this challenge a couple of times in the past and have always gotten at least one or two stories out of it. This year I am hoping for many more. I'm always optimistic at the start of a challenge, though, so I'll check back in during May and let you know how it's going.

If you'd like to join

me, sign up here. It's free and you'll get daily prompts in your email to help you succeed!

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My forthcoming novella, Silver Rush, is now available for pre-order as an e-book. Publication day is June 17, 2025, and if you pre-order now, the book will magically appear on your device on that date!

This book will also be available as a paperback on the same day, and I will post a note when it comes out. You can also follow me as an Amazon Author and they will send you a message whenever I publish new items (including this one!)

Silver Rush is the first book in a new series I am launching. The book series, Silverton, will be all about the fictional mining town of Silverton in the territory that will become Idaho partway through the series. The second book in the series will be a revised edition of Belle o' the Waters, one of my first novels. Although a few copies of that book are available at booksellers, the book itself has gone out of print, so I'm planning to re-issue it this fall with a new cover. If you'd like to read

it sooner than that, let me know, as I still have a few signed copies in a box in my closet. I'd be happy to send you one!

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I'm pleased to announce that I have another book coming out this summer. Silver Rush is the story of Maggie and Silas McPhee as they navigate the sometimes chaotic and dangerous world of late 1850s America. A war is about to break out, but Silas, a doctor in Boston, wants to seek his fortune in the West where he hopes to test his new method for extracting silver from ore and, at the same time, get away from the impending war. When Maggie discovers her hopes for starting a family are not in van she must decide a course of action. It's risky and the still-young country is wild and dangerous--will she follow him?

This book is due out in mid-June and is the first of a planned series set in the fictional town of Silverton in what will become the state of Idaho. More details and pre-order information soon. Stay tuned!

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Is there a silver lining in all this? Not sure..but holding onto hope.

For more Wordless Wednesday, check the main site.

For more of my photos, see Flickr.

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Here we go, almost the end of another year, so it's time for my annual writing report. This post will be a little longer than normal, since I have a few categories to cover. In summary, though, I'm happy with the way things went this year in my writing life. I've spent a lot more time writing, thanks to the support of other writers and teachers.

I'm sure some people think that writing is a solitary venture, and it does involve a lot of time spent alone, but without the support of the writing community, I would get almost nothing done. So--thank you to all who have accompanied me on my writing journey this year! You know who you are!

Submissions: I had a goal to submit 50 times this year and I managed 46...so far! There's a few days left in the year, though so I still hope to reach this goal.

Short Stories Published: It was a pretty lean year, with only one story published. I can trace this to a paltry submission rate in 2023, when I only submitted 23 times. (Hence this year's more generous goal!) Thank you, Gone Lawn, for publishing my strange little story, We Have Always Lived on the Earth.

Books Published: I'm very proud to report that my first science fiction novel was published this year. The Kiss Catastrophe came out in paperback, hardback, and e-book form in early June. You can buy it in all three formats on Amazon, but the paperback is available on Bookshop where you can order through your local bookstore. I also have signed copies if you'd like one! Just send me an email (raima.larter@gmail.com) or find it in my online store.

Time Spent Writing: Last year I noticed a distinct and disturbing downward trend in the amount of time I'd logged writing. I keep track of my writing time, as I do for other things that it's easy to fool myself about, so I knew that my sense that I wasn't writing, even though I wanted to, was real. I have done better this year, as can be seen in this graph. There's still a ways to go to get back to those impressive numbers (achieved during the covid pandemic....probably not unrelated!) but I'm happy with the upward tick in the trend.

Reading: Writers must read; there's no way around it, and reading books was also something that fell off for me in recent years. So, I've made an effort to read more and my local library has been a huge help in that regard, since I'm out of bookshelf space at home! I signed up for the Goodreads Challenge this year with a goal to read 25 books--and I crushed that goal. 32 books read so far, with another about half finished and likely to be added to the total before the calendar turns over to 2025 in a few days. Some favorites this year have been City of Dancing Gargoyles, by my friend Tara Campbell, a strange post-apocalyptic world peopled by some odd but very engaging characters (yes, some are gargoyles); Sea of Tranquility, by Emily St. John Mandel (finally read it and wish I had done so sooner! Fantastic time-travel tale); and a whole slew of books by Alexander McCall-Smith who I'd never heard of until this year when I stumbled on his books at the library. These very cozy reads were just what I needed this year, and help explain how I smashed my reading goal. If you like humorous BBC programs, you'll love these light tales.

Other Writing-Related Activities: I continued my volunteer work as Nonfiction Editor for Utopia Science Fiction Magazine. We are still going strong and were excited, this year, to increase our pay rates for writers to what is considered the "professional level" for scifi magazines. I also took a few classes, mostly at the Lighthouse, Denver's fantastic writers center, but also a few online. And I've spent quite a bit of time meeting (usually via Zoom, but sometimes in person) with several groups of writers for help critiquing each others' work and just generally supporting one another on the journey. Thanks to all of you; you know who you are!

In the Works for Next Year: I am currently working on copy edits for a novella, Silver Rush, which I plan to publish next year, probably early summer. This novella is a spin-off featuring characters from my earlier novel, Belle o' the Waters, and follows the saga of Maggie and Silas McPhee as they travel the US in the 1850s, each seeking a different goal (hint: Silas is looking for silver!) I will have more to say about this project soon.

That's it! Sorry for being so wordy...but it was a pretty good year, at least in my writing life. I hope your year was good, too. On to 2025!

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