I've spent a good part of the past week working on a map of my family...my fictional family, that is, not my real live family. I made a spread sheet on Excel tracing each of the six children who appear in the first of my linked stories, delineating the dates of their births and marriages, their children's births and marriages, down three generations.
Next to each of the separate genealogical lines I wrote the names of the completed stories in which the characters appear; I also wrote the dates when the stories take place and any world events which happened at the same time. WWII, John F. Kennedy's assassination, Woodstock, The Challenger disaster, 9/11, all impacted the world and thus the individuals I am writing about.
When looked at on one large sheet of paper I can see how the sweep of world events was important in the lives of the family members. I also saw a few gaps. I have no stories set in the 70's and 80's. I am thinking hard about that since twenty years in a family's life is noticeable in a novel told in stories. I may have to write one or two more tales to fill in the holes.
In the meantime, I still have unpublished stories circulating to print journals and e-zines, hoping to find a home. Happily one has just been accepted for publication in Writes for All, a new on-line magazine. I will post the link as soon as it appears.
Meanwhile check out a couple of my earlier on-line stories:
"Home Visit" which is in the Archives of The Boston Literary Magazine, Fall 2007 under Quick Fiction and "What They Tell Her" which is in the Archives, Fall, 2008 under Flash Fiction: www.bostonliterarymagazine.com/
"Distant Relations" which is in the Archives of The Write Room, November, 2010: www.thewritemag.com/
"How to Make a Life," which is in the current issue of SNReview at www.SNReview.org
"It's Him I Hate," in June, 2007 issue of WriterAdvice: www.writeradvice.com
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