The Starter Guide for Professional Writers is Complete! Completely Complete!
After a grueling morning formatting session, I am pleased to announce that the Starter Guide for Professional Writers has been submitted to CreateSpace for approval and will be going to the Kindle Store, Smashwords, and Omnilit within the next few days. I’m mostly exhausted, but also pretty pleased. Because of a number of illustrations among the text, I have to do the ebook formatting very carefully–wish me luck! But the print files are as clean as I can make them, and no errors...
Read MoreFor Everyone Misspelling My Name: Thank You!
Yet another misspelling–on an address label, of all things–has sparked this…let’s not call it a rant. Let it be, rather, inspiration. All my life, my name has been misspelled, mispronounced, and just generally misunderstood. Mispronunciations I can understand. In a quick conversation, the balance of probability suggests you were just introduced to Theresa, rather than a more uncommon variety. Given the sheer number of people who read Teh-rez in the French...
Read MoreBook Reviews: Hear No Evil, Citizen Science, and The Grey Star
A sort of rapid-fire round of book reviews this week, thanks to Christmas reading!1. Be the Change: Saving the World Through Citizen Science by Chanda Clarke Though short (33 PDF pages), this was very readable and informative–it’s designed to teach the principles of citizen science/crowdsourced science to people who have never heard of it before. Now, I’d heard the term before and had vaguely positive associations, but couldn’t explain it to you if you asked me....
Read MoreNews
“No news is good news.” A cliche tells you very little, almost nothing on the literal level. But from my choice of cliche, you might infer that I am suffering writer’s block on this blog post, either from lack of interest or lack of content, and yet I am rather content. This is not untrue. I’m going through a phase where blogging and social chit-chat do not seem particularly easy for me. My opinions and experiences have not seemed worth writing much about, certainly not...
Read MoreNews for the New Year
It seems absurd to get jet lag from the 1-hour flight from Milwaukee back to DC, even if the flight did include a harrowing forty five minutes waiting on the runway for nonspecific technical anomalies to be repaired. But I’ve definitely been feeling laggy these first few days of 2014. But never mind. The sun is up, a sudden rain last night washed away every spot of snow in the District (this is downright creepy to a Midwesterner), and I’m sort of up for blogging. I hadn’t...
Read MoreConflict-free, Fair Trade, and 3D Printed: How Consumer Electronics can be made Ethical and Ecofriendly
As a writer, I’m acutely aware that my chosen profession is not exactly eco-friendly. Many trees have died for my journals and publications–although a handful of books are now being printed on recycled plastic, making them both waterproof and a potential solution to overcrowded landfills–and it seems like even when I move away from hard copies poor planet earth can’t win. To say nothing of the conflict minerals that go into phones, computers, and other electronics. So I...
Read More“The Queen’s Arrival” in Liquid Imagination, and a Christmas Gift Idea
My mythic fantasy piece “The Queen’s Arrival” has been reprinted in Liquid Imagination Issue #19. It’s actually been up nearly a week, and I apologize for posting the link so late–though as you can see, things have been busy. I’ve only just got around to making my Christmas card & gift list and am starting to scrape together time, ideas, and money to fulfill it. Speaking of which: If you’re lost on gift ideas for a writer in your life–surely...
Read MoreChicago TARDIS (November 29-December 1)
I’ve just returned from DC after a week away–back to Wisconsin for Thanksgiving. Seeing my family again drove home just how much I missed them, but also how much I enjoy living on my own. It’s a balance between different sources of comfort and stress, I suppose, especially after as rough a year as this has been (you didn’t miss anything; I’m not giving details on this blog, at least for a while yet. Suffice to say this was the first time I’ve seen some...
Read MoreIt’s Been a Grand Weekend
Especially for Whovians. Also those still mourning the passing of John Fitzgerald Kennedy–now that’s a morbid cosmic coincidence. And somewhere between joy and tragedy lie the Hobbit fans, with the Battle of Five Armies also falling on November 23rd (warning: may be spoilers through the wikia link). For me, it’s also been the culmination of several weeks of intense labor, interspersed with perhaps more procrastination than strictly speaking necessary. And also with my awesome...
Read MoreReview: “Collegium Sorcerorum: Thaddeus of Beewicke” by Louis Sauvain
Another prize from the LibraryThing giveaways program, this one even came with a courteous letter from the author himself. I’m always one to be impressed by presentation, and the presentation of this book was fine indeed: I was especially impressed by the dozen or so illustrations by Sean Bodley scattered throughout the text. The back matter was also quite impressive: 40 pages of Dramatis Personae (not as excessive as it first appears if these characters continue to play a part in this...
Read MoreAbout Therese
Therese Arkenberg's first short story was accepted for publication on January 2, 2008, and her second acceptance came a few hours later. Since then they haven't always been in such a rush, yet her work appears in places like Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Analog, Daily Science Fiction, and the anthology Sword & Sorceress XXIV. Aqua Vitae, her science fiction novella, was released by WolfSinger Publications in December 2011.
She works as a freelance editor and writer in Wisconsin, where she returned after a brief but unforgettable time in Washington, D.C. When she isn't reading, writing, or editing (it's true!) she serves on the board of the Plowshare Center of Waukesha, which works for social, economic, and environmental justice.