OCCASIONAL NOTES
Backstory -- The estimable Fr Gulligan ("Mike" to his friends) would only go so far in relieving me of hands-on involvement with this site (which I was about to abandon for any number of reasons before he took over). "One page." It was not a request. My mind's ear heard ghostly childhood echoes of "if I can go to the trouble of making dinner, the least you can do is eat it." Here is my latest report.

NIGHT FUNNELS, THE NOVEL (update: 5/11/10)
When your own story-worlds keep sprouting intriguing (to the creator, at least) pseudopods, do you just let them? Or do you don your overalls, get out the machetes and hedge clippers, and try yet again to shape them back into the semblance of a story? This has been my dilemma with Night Funnels. As of a few months ago, it once again it had a beginning, middle and end. And once again a generous crew of readers took a crack at eyeballing a "finished" manuscript -- including some very young readers this time. And so it was that the Emperor's New Pseudopods were exposed in their awkward, blubbery nakedness.
    One more time the author takes a deep breath, sighs, fires up the trusty chainsaw and makes a mess. Then he switches tools to knitting needles and makes plans to switch venues to a lounge chair on a huge bathtub steaming the Pacific, where he hopes the salt air will spin itself into a yarn with just the right amount of finality.

NIGHT FUNNELS, THE NOVEL (update: 1/21/09)
Novelizing a story (Rich Horton says it's actually a novelette -- see his comment below) that first appeared in Gabe Chouinard's S1ngularity zine a few years ago hasn't been quite as easy as I'd fantasized. Duh. I thought I'd just whip it out. Silly me.

First, it just got too big for its britches: 95,000 words and still not concluded. It sat around in that state for a couple years, doing penance for overgrowing itself. When next I took it up, I had a freshly sharpened machete in hand. Ouch...that was painful. But now a "complete" 66,000 word manuscript finally exists. Complete here means that the story now has a beginning, middle and end. Complete does not mean that the manuscript is baked and that frosting and candy sprinkles have been applied. A number of generous spirits have read and commented upon various recent drafts and other generous spirits have committed to doing the same. I am hugely appreciative. Progress.

ABOUT THE ORIGINAL "SHORT" STORY
On the Speculative Literature Foundation website, Rich Horton reviews online sources of fiction. About S1ngularity and Night Funnels, he says...

Gabe Chouinard started this webzine last spring [2002], but quickly ran into trouble (he's had some rather wrenching personal problems, according to his blog). He is currently pondering whether to continue it. I saw three new stories, all quite interesting: Gavin Grant's "Softly, With a Big Stick", Michael Jasper's "Gunning for the Buddha", and E. T. Ellison's "Night Funnels". These total some 15,000 words, with the Ellison story being novelette-length. I liked "Night Funnels" best: it's an odd story set in a very colourful fantasy world, where "funnel fairies" pour ideas into people's heads at night.

Kelly Link and Gavin Grant, editors of fantasy for 17th Annual Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, made a similar observation in their discussion of fantasy stories published online.

S1ngularity came and went -- although editor and agent provocateur Gabe Chouinard claims it will rise again. The most interesting story published there was E. T. Ellison's Night Funnels.

Thanx for those encouragements, folks!

BARBIE'S NEW JOB
An additional short story has been installed in Orphans Eleven: Until Next Tuesday (behind the ZINE button). What kind of a story? I'm the wrong person to ask. What I know is that it began as a birthday story for my youngest sister, Mary Jo. The design requirements were dictated by my dear mother: it had to involve a chair, a stuffed polar bear and a stuffed bunny. That it does. The tale has evolved somewhat...the latest edition is now online.

ETE