We Who Still Labour, the 4,800-word urban fantasy I wrote for The Blackness Within, a British anthology, has come home with it’s tale tucked between it’s legs. (Pardon the pun.)
It was a swell rejection, though. The editor said some nice things about the story and then explained that he wouldn’t be taking it because he thought my interpretation of Moccus, the Celtic god upon which the anthology is based, was “too benevolent”.
He went on to say he liked the way I wrote, though, and if I had something darker and “not set in the States or Great Britain”, he would love to look at it.
I don’t, of course.
I had never heard of Moccus until I spotted the advertisement for the anthology and I don’t know diddly squat about any place outside the U.S.A., not enough to write about it with any measure of comfort.
But, hey; it was nice of him to offer.
We Who Still Labour is set at the North Junction Diner, a hole-in-the-wall place outside Coshocton, Ohio, and it involves the reincarnation of Moccus, Celtic god of fertility and the hunt, a couple of escaped convicts, a feisty waitress named Darlene Comer and fifty Landrace pigs.
How could anyone say “no” to that?
BTW, the “u” in the titular Labour was because the story was intended for a Brit market. I suppose I need to Americanize it before I send it out to make the rounds here.
Crazy, that sounds somewhat like a story I’ve had in mind for years, but mine has Balder, from Norse mythology. Post-Ragnarok, he quite literally falls out of the sky and into the life of a young woman on a “finding herself” style road trip. It’s one of those stories I’ve started a few times but never finished.
Good luck finding a home for yours!
Great minds, huh?