
Larry
Hodges Science Fiction & Fantasy Page
March, 2010 Active Life Member, SFWA
•
Email
• Table Tennis Page
Science Fiction & Fantasy Sales
(37+3 resales+12 twitter sales)
•
Published Articles
(1208 in 101 publications)
F&SF Writing page
- all you need to know about writing SF & Fantasy
I'm a table tennis player/coach/writer/organizer and a science fiction & fantasy writer. My table tennis page can be found here.
I did the final rewrite and proofing of my SF novel, "Campaign 2100." The final version is 115,000 words, or 586 pages double spaced. I'm now sending queries to prospective agents. Meanwhile, I've had a rash of sales! I've had 21 since last summer.
Here's the Table Tennis Book Signing at the USA Nationals, Dec. 17, 2009. See six table tennis authors!
I've been on the cover of six science fiction or fantasy magazines:
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Magazines with my name on the cover - click to see full-sized versions! |
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My third book, "Table Tennis Tales & Techniques," 274 pages, came out in mid-February, 2009. Read the review! I'm in the U.S. Table Tennis Hall of Fame - call it my day job. Here's an online video the Washington Post did of me coaching.
I was interviewed online by Community Fridays on Friday, Nov. 7, 2008. The interviewer, Emma Larkins, asked for the interview after one of the panels I was on at the Capclave SF Convention.
Recent sales, since May of 2008 - see full listing (37 stories) at bottom of page.
"Mummy at the Bat" to Beyond Centauri, on July 15. I traveled a lot in 2008 and 2009 for my SF writing:
I've essentially been a full-time writer & editor for many years (1208 published articles in 101 different publications, and three books), focusing on the Olympic sport of table tennis, a rather unique niche. (I'm in the USA Table Tennis Hall of Fame, primarily for my work as a writer, editor, promoter and coach, although I've won a number of national and state titles; here's my table tennis page.) My first book, Table Tennis: Steps to Success, has sold over 28,000 copies and is in six languages.
I returned from a 14-year fiction writing break in 2005. Before that, four of my best were published in Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy Magazine, one of the nicer and higher paying fantasy magazines until it closed in 2000. Three of the best are online - see links below. Four of the sales were in what SFWA defines as pro markets. (Three pro SF&F sales, or a SF&F book sale to a major publisher, are required for active SF&F membership.) Early on, most of my best work was humorous fantasy. I've gradually moved toward more theme-oriented work, although often with a humorous side.
Workshops
I've attended a number of F&SF writers workshops. Workshops I've attended include:
Six-week
Odyssey Fantasy & Science Fiction
Writer's Workshop, June 12 - July 21, 2006, in Manchester, NHTribulations of the Past (and Future?)
Like many others, I went through a stage where I wrote and wrote, but nothing
sold. From around 1986 to 1989, I wrote countless short stories, none of which
sold. It's not easy, since the pro markets I was submitting to publish less than
1% of what they receive. Then, late in 1988, it all came together, and I sold
eight stories in the next two years. Recently I pulled out all the old stories
that hadn't sold - 47 of them! - and spent two days reading over them. They were
horrible! In the end, I found one good one (which I've since rewritten), three that are
possibly salvageable, and 43 that were ... well ... think
Fahrenheit 451.
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Non-Fiction
I've been a full-time writer and editor for many years, with three books and
1208 published articles in 101
different publications. (My first published article was in 1977, when I was 17.)
Table Tennis: Steps to Success
(over 28,000 copies sold in English, plus unknown number of foreign sales) has been translated into Chinese, Korean, Indonesian,
Malaysian and Hebrew and is now selling all over the world. My third book,
Table Tennis Tales & Techniques,
came out in
February, 2009.
My first book was
Instructor's
Guide to Table Tennis, an official
coaching book for USA Table Tennis.
Miscellaneous
I'm 49, and have a master's degree in Journalism, and a bachelor's in math
(minors in chemistry and computer science), both from University of Maryland. Besides table tennis, I also play
regular tennis, where I've achieved a 4.0 level. I spend most
of my free time reading fantasy & science fiction, history, and playing with my dog,
Sheeba. I'm also a
Baltimore Orioles baseball fan . . . unfortunately.
A Few Fun Links
My collection of table tennis books (198 of them!) I've got a growing collection of books on F&SF writing, and at some point I'll put together a page on that.
Table Tennis Exhibitions at a local mall
Some political cartoons I put together in 2006
Me winning the University of Maryland arm wrestling championionship (Under 170 pound weight class, 1983)
Me finishing the 1977 Marine Corps Marathon (age 17, in 3 hours 53 minutes)
How a writer handles rejection (hilarious 2min 33sec video)
Science Fiction & Fantasy Sales (37, plus 3 resales, plus 12 "Twitter" sales) |
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| Story | Magazine | Issue | Notes |
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12 Twitter Stories |
Thaumatrope |
Dec
14,
18,
27,
2008; |
Twitter stories are 140 characters or less, about 20-25 words. |
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Tweet the Meat |
Dec. 21, 2009, Feb. 18, 2010; one forthcoming |
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Nanoism |
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| Mummy at the Bat | Beyond Centauri | Scheduled April, 2010 | The tongue in cheek yet poignant tale of a non-speaking, baseball-loving mummy with supernatural skills, and the difficulties he faces in trying to make it to the major leagues. |
| The Meteor Always Strikes Once | Beyond Centauri | Scheduled July, 2010 | The story starts with the main character's fortune from a Chinese fortune cookie saying, "A meteor will kill you in five minutes." It's possibly the only talking meteor story ever written. |
| The Meteor Always Strikes Once | Aoife's Kiss | Scheduled June, 2010 | See above - the story sold to both magazines at the same time, since they have the same editor and he wanted the story in both. (Different audiences - Beyond Centauri is primarily a youth magazine.) |
| In the Belly of the Beast | Flashing Swords | Scheduled Fall, 2009; magazine closed before publication |
A wizard with a unique method of slaying dragons is swallowed by his dragon prey. While in the dragon's stomach, he must protect and save himself, his daughter, and others, all of whom have also been swallowed, while keeping a terrible secret from his daughter. She hates her father, who abandoned her when she was a child; despises the inept wizard; and along with the others in the dragon's belly, is waiting to be rescued by a famous dragonslayer who is on his way. What she doesn't know (but reader does) is that all three are the same person. Features the only battle between a wizard and a warrior in the belly of a dragon in history. |
| Microsorce | Flashing Swords | Scheduled Fall, 2009; magazine closed before publication |
When the world's computers are run by sorcery, and the corporations are run by sorcerers, a hostile takeover takes on a new meaning. |
| Bonesy | New Myths Magazine | December, 2009 |
Bonesy is the story of a man whose skeleton came alive when he was a boy. At first they are great friends. Problems arise when the skeleton goes crazy . . . and wants out. |
| Eternity and the Devil | Dark Portals Anthology | December, 2009 | My name is on the cover! Basically a twist on the "Deal with the Devil" story. A physicist sells his soul so he can make discoveries that will benefit mankind. When the Devil shows up and takes him to Hell, the scientist escapes into the future in a time machine - and with numerous stops, goes a trillion years into the future, pursued by the Devil. At each stop, he is surrounded by billions of systematically tortured souls in Hell - including his long-suffering girlfriend, who he is determined to save. |
| The Dashing Dash | Calliope Magazine | December, 2009 | Hands down, it's the best punctuation.... |
| Dead Mass | Space Westerns | October, 2009 | This was a resale; see sale to Beyond Magazine below. |
| Memory of a Minefield | Hypersonic Tales | September, 2009 |
Has an audio reading! A woman tries to save her child. To do so, she not only has to live and relive her life, but the entire life of the universe over and over to do so! |
| A Tale of Two Wizards | Arkham Tales | August, 2009 |
My name is on the cover! It's the story of the two greatest wizards of the ancient world, Zuku and Death himself. The two face off along with their vast armies in a final, desperate struggle, but due to betrayal (Death offers Zuku's troops immortality, life insurance and other benefits), Zuku loses and is trapped in a bottle at the bottom of the ocean for 5000 years. En route to freedom, he battles a coke bottle recycling plant, a great white shark, and a jumbo jet, and finally meets up with Death in his new offices in the Trump World Tower in modern day New York City. He also finds his mom, her spirit trapped in a sword, and his dad, transformed into a sea turtle. They battle Death and his army - tottering old men after 5000 years, but still very much alive - in a battle that ends in the space shuttle. |
| Raiders of the Ballot Box | Atomjack | August, 2009 | A satire on the fixing of the 2020 U.S. Presidential election using self-aware computer viruses. About one-third of the story is from the point of view of one of the viruses. |
| An Earlier Inconvenient Truth | Hypersonic Tales | June, 2009 |
A satire on global warming and spoof of the documentaries "An
Inconvenient Truth," "Super Size Me," "Sicko,"
"Bowling for Columbine," and "Fahrenheit 9/11," all told from a
dinosaur's point of view, 65 million years ago.
They have an audio version, so you can just listen as they read it to you! Reading time is 5 min 17 sec. (Make sure to keep listening after the explosion - there's a short scene after that.) |
| Omen of the Oven | Necrography | Spring, 2009 | A psychic immortal witch, in a wedding dress she took from her lunch that day, cooks a child for her upcoming dinner date, with full details on the temperature and time needed, and herbs, spices and veggies that go with it. The front of the oven is caked with grime, but she keeps seeing images through the oven's window. Since she often sees the future, she keeps cleaning the window, trying to get a better look. And when she finally sees what's inside, she gasps in shock and horror. Then a hand from behind clutches her shoulder, she screams, and.... |
| Jackpot World | Space & Time | Spring, 2009 |
What happens if, on one hundred million identical universes, an
interdimensional traveling alien is mugged by Wayne, an armed and
unhappy criminal, and all of these aliens in all of these universes
transport the attacking Wayne to the same Earth in one universe - ours?
Yes, it's the dreaded Multi Accedo Scenario! "...the 'whammy' is so mind-blowingly delicious I would never dream of ruining it here or in any of the hundreds of millions of alternate realities where I am also typing this review." SFReader, April, 2009 "...a sly little SF tale of an alien named Songo from an alternate reality..." Tangent Online, Summer, 2009 |
| Reality Pills | Alienskin | April/May, 2009 | What if that psychedelic vision - say, of a charging Tyrannosaur - isn't a vision? |
| Dragon Cuisine | Aoife's Kiss | March, 2009 |
My
name is on the
cover! A young dragon prince rebels against an arranged marriage, as there is
another he wishes to marry. He leaves home, and starts up his own
kingdom in the far north. He battles spiders, bears and food (humans,
the cuisine in the title) with no problem, but falls victim to a
wizard's spell that slowly turns the giant dragon into a giant frog. He
faces many tribulations trying to find a suitable human princess to kiss
so as to turn himself back, all while hopping about and smacking
warriors with his tongue instead of the flame he's used to using. "Dragon Cuisine . . will tug at your heartstrings and leave you rolling with laughter in the aisles." Expressions, March, 2009 "This was a very different kind of story and quite interesting." SF Revu, April 27, 2009 |
| Defeating Death | Weird Tales | February, 2009 | This is the story of Paulie, a sorcerer's owl, a species of owl that lives out its life in the robes of mostly unwilling sorcerers. Paulie makes his home in the robes of the most powerful sorcerer in the world, where they battle each other, the postal service, and Death himself, all while trying to figure out why the rooms in their house keep disappearing. Oh, and there's a zombie in the guest room. |
| Pens and Pain | Alienskin | February, 2009 | What happens when an alien gourmet came to Earth to live off our pain, with the aid of a rather sophisticated pen? |
| Mummy at the Bat | Spacesuits and Sixguns | Was scheduled for February, 2009, but magazine closed. | The tongue in cheek yet poignant tale of a non-speaking, baseball-loving mummy with supernatural skills, and the difficulties he faces in trying to make it to the major leagues. |
| The Haunts of Albert Einstein | On the Brighter Side | January, 2009 | Poor Albert Einstein is destined to haunt his old offices in Princeton for eternity, surrounded by the ghosts of bickering physicists who simply will not shut up. What can he do to save himself from this fate? |
| Dirty Socks | Calliope Magazine | Winter, 2009 | All about socks and rocks.... |
| Ghosts of Cretaceous Park | Abyss & Apex | Second Quarter 2008 (May) |
Possibly the world's
first dinosaur ghost story. Billionaire brothers fight for control of a
ghostly dinosaur park, the scene of murder mysteries in the
present and 70 million years ago.
I've found three reviews,
all very positive: "...pretty much a shaggy dog story (or perhaps a shaggy dino story), but it does its job assuredly." The Fix, June 3, 2008 "Five stories, the picks of which are . . . and Larry Hodges' 'Ghosts of Cretaceous Park', the comic tale of a nasty real estate developer getting his comeuppance thanks to a dinosaur's ghost. One is thoughtful, the other more light-hearted, but both reach their intended targets." Reading By the Moon, June 1, 2008 "The newest issue of online magazine Abyss And Apex is #26 with some well-written stories, all of which got a Very Good from me." SF Revu, May 30, 2008 |
| Counting Sheep | Beyond Centauri | January 2008 | My name is on the cover! An autistic man constantly counts sheep and never sleeps--but is he more than he seems? |
| Happily and Righteously | Blood, Blade & Thruster | December, 2007 | Story was third in the Blood,
Blade & Thruster "Conspiracy" short story contest. If you believed
assassins and deadly green aliens were trying to kill you, and you were
right, wouldn't you die happily and righteously?
"Do not read this story while under the influence of any mind altering drugs . . . Scratch that. Only read this story while under the influence of mind altering drugs." -Nathaniel Lambert in online comment |
| There Once Was a Cowboy | Space Westerns | November, 2007 | First place in the Space Westerns Limerick Contest! Does this count as a short story sale? Well, it's short, it tells a story, and it's a sale! |
| Ping-Pong Ambition | Sporty Spec: Games of the Fantastic | November, 2007 | A table tennis player gets stuck in a ping-pong ball for 10,000 years,
where he studies to be a genie - only to discover a
surprising truth.
"Ping-Pong Ambition is a fun take on the genie-who-gives-three-wishes story. The tropes are familiar, but the light tone and twist ending make this an entertaining read." The Fix, Jan. 27, 2008 |
| Forever Underfoot | Afterburn SF | September, 2007 | For billions of years, two tiny gnome-like creatures have run the devices that keep the universe running - time, gravity, light, entropy, etc. However, a terrible accident and a clumsy human cop lead to disaster. Can the one surviving gnome save the universe from eternal limbo while learning the truth about himself and the universe? |
| Men Sin | Capital M | May, 2006 | Capital M is the official magazine of Metropolitan Washington Mensa. I sent it to them since the story centers around a Mensa meeting. (Mensa is an organization for people with IQs in the top 2% of the population.) A Star Trek parody. |
| First Cat | Twisted Cat Tales | February, 2006 | What happens when Earth is attacked by interdimensional beings, and the only one who can save the planet is the befuddled U.S. president's temporarily super-intelligent cat? |
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Then there was that 14-year break from writing science fiction & fantasy. . . . |
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| Dead Mass | Beyond | Issue #19, 1991 | When your ship is out of power, and you absolutely have to get going in a hurry or everyone's going to die, what do you do? Ma to the rescue!!! |
| Rude Awakening | Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy | Summer 1990 | A short "flash" piece. After you die, if you want to be frozen and revived by future generations, better think things through! |
| Time to Diet | Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy | Spring 1990 |
My name
is on the cover!
A dieting story about a flying carpet pilot with an impossible problem. "We lost a good production assistant over this story, she thought it was insulting to every fat person in the audience. What do you think? As a diabetic, I'm a perpetual dieter, so I loved this." -Marion Zimmer Bradley in table of contents |
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Nuts and Bolts |
Owlflight Magazine |
Fall, 1989 |
What do you do when your telekinetic computer declares war on you? |
Gremlin Gambits
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Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy (Reprinted in a German Anthology) |
Summer 1989 |
My name
is on the
cover! The life of a writer when his computer is infected with
practical-joking gremlins. (Hint: You'll need peanut butter.) "Don't we all wish the writer's life was this easy! But this chap had his own troubles, even with a magical word processor - jkjkjkjkjkjkjkjkjk." -Marion Zimmer Bradley in table of contents |
| Falling Apart | Marion Zimmer Bradley's Fantasy | Winter 1989 | The "Featured Story"!
A sorcerer's apprentice goes where he's not supposed to go, and
literally falls apart. How will he put himself back together again? "This story is indescribable - anything I said would have the words, but not the music. We all laughed until we thought our heads would fall off. Read it and see if you agree."
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| Old Tuna | Dark Starr | March 1989 | When the world is conquered by aliens, what happens to the dogs? |
| The Fish That Roared | Starsong Magazine | January 1989 | You'll never look at goldfish the same way again! |
| Horse Dreams | Atrocity Magazine | December 1988 | What do horses dream about? |
| Non-Fiction | |||
| Articles | 1208 published articles in 101 different publications (circa March 1, 2010) | ||
| Books | Table Tennis Tales & Techniques, 2009 | ||
| Table Tennis: Steps to Success, 1993; revised 2006; 28,000 copies sold, in six languages | |||
| Instructor's Guide to Table Tennis, 1989; revised 2000 | |||