Man, I've been out of the SFF scene for over a year now. The last short fiction I submitted to a market was in May 2011. I don't regret my hiatus–among other things, I got a master's degree and an amazing job–but getting back into the flow is going to be work.

I understand now why people give up writing seriously. At this point, it would be easier to just keep sliding, write a 300-word blip a month, and pretend that I've still got it, while never finishing anything, never submitting anything. Dreams and goals are exhausting. I already work 50 hours a week on average–when I get home, I just want to chill. My day job has far more potential for success than my writing. The market is so tight anyway–maybe I'll wait to see where publishing is going first.

Sound familiar?

When those thoughts pop up in my brain, I recognize them instantly–they're every classic excuse for not pursuing a dream. They're seductive. Or rather, they're like gravity–persistent, and inevitable, and omnipresent, and it's so much easier to give in and let yourself fall.

But I will not let myself fall. I will not give in, and I will not give up.

My comeback plan hangs on a dilemma right now–novels or short stories? I'm really a novel writer–all my shorts try to turn into novels–but it's so much easier to workshop shorts, to get feedback from fellow writers and slush readers whom I respect and admire. That dynamic exchange of feedback is a powerful motivator.

First I guess I should catch up on the stacks and stacks of to-be-read books around my apartment. Library books are going to take priority, then half-finished books I own:

1) Brown Acres: An Intimate History of the Los Angeles Sewers (Anna Sklar)
2) Beyond the Deep: The Deadly Descent into the World's Most Treacherous Cave (Stone & Ende)
3) Un Lun Dun (China Mielville)
4) The City & The City (China Mielville)
5) Antonio Gaudi (Juan Bassegoda Nonell)
6) Angel of Darkness (Caleb Carr)
7) Territory (Emma Bull)
8) Spin State (Chris Moriarty)
9) Indigo Springs (A. M. Dellamonica)
10) Flesh & Fire (Laura Anne Gilman)

Going to keep it at ten for now. It looks more manageable. Those top two are novel research, and I already renewed them once, which I guess answers my dilemma of what to work on first.