"Describe the first story you ever sold to any publication. What was the title of the story? The name of the publication? The plot? The public reception to your work?"

I sold my first story ten years ago. I was eighteen at the time and I was spending most of my time avoiding the question of employment and trying to steal my friend's girlfriend. Looking back, I'm surprised I took any time out from that to write, but I did. The story was called 'Burning with the Cursed' and the role playing magazine Australian Realms bought it. This despite the fact that it had been years since I had done any gaming and had no desire to do it again. But I found the magazine in the local newsagent, and the art was pretty cool, and they were looking for writers, and I wanted to be a writer, so I wrote a story about an alcoholic mercenary and a woman who was possessed by a sword that fueled her desire for revenge to the point that she basically went around the world killing magicians. It was absolute rubbish and they wanted a sequel.

I never wrote that because, as it occasionally happens, the magazine folded before the first story was printed. It was a shame, but shortly after I had a few stories and a bit of poetry published and sold, so there was no turning back for me; but I've still got that first acceptance letter and the memory that the fiction editor at Australian Realms was quite helpful and supportive. He probably suspected that I was eighteen and knew fuck all about writing and girls.



From douglain