The lizard story went over rather well. I think. I got a lot of "why's" as to the tech level and why it had to start on another world, and why lizard boy would be attracted to a human and vice versa. Easy things to fix. And most everybody avoided talking about "the scene."

And then I had my one-on-one with Walter and Leslie. Mostly, they wanted more scene setup (i.e. treating the setting as a character, which I understand but acknowledge is probably my weak point) and overall structure. And Leslie was the second person today who suggested I might try mainstream, since I'm touching on some rather big and touchy topics. Something to think about, but I have a hard time writing anything set in the here-and-now.

And then came the issue of themes. . .and I didn't *really* realize until today how very similar my stories are, and the novels included. Most people here didn't have recurring themes, just a couple of us. Which sort of creeped me out after the session; it makes you wonder how much of yourself you really put into your stories. Looking at my novels I can see all kinds of different aspects--Eryk is the cynic and strong one, Nadeer is the one terrified to use his talents, Maddren is the mentor, Lerryn is the one who really wants to communicate and can't, and Orossy's the one who wants out of his lifestyle but doesn't know how to do anything else and can't or won't ask for help. And if you keep having these themes, you must be trying to say something. . .

Leslie pointed out that I often have these big, deep subjects, but sort of pussyfoot around them or draw away. It's also a tactic I used in my creative non-ficiton pieces. That seems much harder to work on; how to really get myself in there. Which, I think writing this last story helped; if I can make myself write something like that, everything else should be a lot easier. And once I tweak it, I think I'm going to send it off to Zyzzyva, a west coast literary magazine. Leslie said the editor likes touchy issues and will occasionally take genre as long as the issues are there.

K.K.'s recruiting people to help him get rid of a bottle of rum tonight. I really, really need a drink. . .