I decided to start on science fiction research for the short story book first, as it seems I’m going to be working with two stories in the genre. As I slowly begin to process my story ideas, it seems both are getting away from the original intent, but I’m unsure if I am working from a place of fear or if I’m “being clever”. One story is clearly not science fiction, it is a pulpy boy adventurer story that happens to be set in space. I want to avoid the trappings of realism for that story, so science fiction is being clearly left in the cold on that one.

For the other story, I was thinking of instead writing what I suppose could be a period piece, a satirical look at utopian science fiction. Back when everyone thought flying cars were going to come along just after cell-phones. Either way, I can’t fall into my usual intellectually lazy trappings. If I’m going to parody it, I need to know it, so that is a call I’ll have to make after I read some books.

I should probably focus on short fiction to start with, as the sci-fi story itself would be 8-12 pages.