There are stories that come to me in bits and pieces over weeks and months. There are other stories that come to me all at once.
A “Word Shaped Like Bones” was one of the latter.
Not all of my short stories involve me wrestling with inner demons, but this one definitely did. Maureen is non-neurotypical, obsessive, intensely tactile, and probably not a lot of fun to be around. I wanted, in this story, a protagonist who was unlikeable enough that the reader might understand why she was sent to the stars on her own. And then I put her in a situation where she has no choice but to cope with her own demons.
This story was actually written about five years ago, and I put it away until last year, when I revised it and then sat on it again. I had my own decaying bodies in my starship with me, all of which needed to be dealt with.
But when the call for Women Destroy Science Fiction came out, I thought it couldn’t hurt to toss Bones in there. At least it could start gathering rejections.
And when it came back with an acceptance…I could hardly believe it. I still sort of can’t.
And it’s significant for me because I, too, absorbed the idea that women didn’t write science fiction. Despite the fact that my favorite SF authors as a teenager (Suzette Hadin Elgin, Melissa Scott, and Anne McCaffery) were women, I had this idea in my head that they were outliers. Beloved outliers, but outliers nonetheless.
And now, I am friends with so many science fiction writers, and a large number of them (possibly the majority, if I decided to count) are women. I had a lot of internal deprogramming to do—a process that is still ongoing, but that I like to think I’ve made large strides with.
I am proud to have helped destroy science fiction!
My story is online for free, but if you like it I encourage you to buy the ebook or subscribe to Lightspeed and show your support!
