Steven Mace

I saw two very interesting television programmes recently. The first was 'Tropic of Cancer', a travelogue presented by Simon Reeve. He followed the imaginary geographic line of the Tropic of Cancer around the world, visiting various countries and meeting the people there. He started in Mexico and went from there to the Bahamas, before crossing to the African continent and visiting the Sahara and travelling from there to Libya. He then proceeded to travel through Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Oman, India, Bangladesh, Burma, Laos, Vietnam, Taiwan before finishing in Hawaii. There were so many issues arising from the programme- social problems, poverty, ecological and environmental problems. Most shocking was the moment when, at the end of the programme, Reeve visited a beach in Hawaii which was utterly polluted with litter and rubbish that had been washed up from the Pacific. Most of the litter was plastic, as plastic does not degrade but simply breaks up into smaller and smaller pieces...

I've sent a synopsis and three chapters of 'Copper Moon Rising' to the Darley Anderson Literary Agency- fingers crossed! I'm also sending some of my short stories to 'Black Static' and 'Interzone' magazines- hope to have positive feedback soon...

So it goes like this... "We do not accept e-mail submissions" "We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts or work from new writers. We currently have a backlog of huge swathes of material, so we probably aren't going to be free for...oh, a few years" Please submit your work on golden parchment and handwritten with a quill in 1.5 font, and in the blood of a phoenix...

My collection of short stories, 'Beyond Twilight' is now finished and I'm investigating the possibility of publication. It comprises thirteen short stories of horror, fantasy, science fiction and even satire. I'm also now working on the final draft for 'Copper Moon Rising'. Good news at last!

There has been a silence for almost three weeks, this has been due to the unfortunate occurrence of illness! I had almost forgotten what it was like to be ill, until the beginning of this month. It is probably the most ill I have been since childhood. I developed tonsilitis, complicated by the fact that I did not initially realise that was what it was. I thought it was a spring flu that I would shake off naturally. When my voice went and swallowing was like feeling razor blades at the back of my throat, I realised that I would have to go to the doctor. The initial medication was not powerful enough, and I still had dehabilitating symptoms. Finally, on Monday I was referred to hospital and put on a cocktail of drugs which would hopefully do the trick. Now I am in the midst of this super-course, and felt well enough to return to work. This has thrown a spanner in the works in terms of the Copper Moon rewrite and finishing off some short stories, but hopefully I will be able to ge...