{"id":7196,"date":"2023-01-12T13:14:33","date_gmt":"2023-01-12T18:14:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/?p=7196"},"modified":"2023-01-12T13:15:28","modified_gmt":"2023-01-12T18:15:28","slug":"story-acceptance-the-stone-mother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/2023\/01\/12\/story-acceptance-the-stone-mother\/","title":{"rendered":"STORY ACCEPTANCE: The Stone Mother"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n<p>December went by in a bit of a blur &#8211; and not just because of the holidays!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Early in the month, I received an email from Cassandra at Quill &amp; Crow inviting me to send a story to the 2nd volume of the Bleak Midwinter series. <a href=\"https:\/\/thecrowshoppe.com\/products\/bleak-midwinter-the-darkest-night\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Volume 1: The Darkest Night<\/a> was already out and she needed someone to fill a spot in Volume II.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Even with the holidays and freelance work and finishing issue 4 of the zine, I had to say yes to the invite!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, I worked on a story seed for <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/book\/the-stone-mother\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Stone Mother<\/a>, one I\u2019d been wanting to tackle for a few months. I rough drafted, edited and polished the story and it was accepted all within the span of about a week!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">ABOUT THE STONE MOTHER<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>In times forgone, when previous generations feted her with ritual and pageantry, the glen was fruitful and lush, with no households left wanting. The villagers threw meal and bread to her to keep their cattle hearty and, in return, The Stone Mother made their harvests bountiful. But their belief in her lapsed. They abandoned her and turned away their gazes. And for that, Bl\u00e6cloch now suffers.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">ABOUT BLEAK MIDWINTER: SOLSTICE LIGHT<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Hope begins at the first sign of light\u2026 The second part of a special double-feature anthology from Quill &amp; Crow Publishing House, Bleak Midwinter: Solstice Light pulls us out of the cold, dark winter night and into the morning light. A dark fiction anthology with lighter horror elements, this anthology still honors the Gothic themes of dreadfulness and despair, but ends with a dash of hope.<br><br>Featuring stories by Sarah Von, Amanda M. Blake, A.R. Frederiksen, Erin Keating, Jacqueline West, J.S. Larmore, Mary Rajotte, Victoria Clapton, Seluna Drake, and S.C. Fantozzi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"720\" height=\"1140\" data-attachment-id=\"7167\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/book\/the-stone-mother\/solsticelight_shop\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"720,1140\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"solsticelight_shop\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop.jpg\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop.jpg\" alt=\"Stark white book cover with a skeletal tree in the middle and ominous vines around the edges\" class=\"wp-image-7167\" srcset=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop.jpg 720w, https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop-600x950.jpg 600w, https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop-200x317.jpg 200w, https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop-360x570.jpg 360w, https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop-38x60.jpg 38w, https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/wp-content\/images\/postphotos\/solsticelight_shop-57x90.jpg 57w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 720px) 100vw, 720px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">PRE-ORDER SOLSTICE LIGHT<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>You can pre-order the book <a href=\"https:\/\/thecrowshoppe.com\/products\/pre-order-bleak-midwinter-solstice-light\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">directly from The Crow Shoppe<\/a> (the anthology  launches<strong> January 17<\/strong>), and also pick up <a href=\"https:\/\/thecrowshoppe.com\/products\/bleak-midwinter-the-darkest-night\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Volume I<\/a> while you\u2019re there!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Even though it was a whirlwind writing this piece, I really love how it turned out so I hope you\u2019ll check it out along with all the other stories, each with a dash of hope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Me?! Writing folk horror with hope?! I\u2019m as surprised as you are \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>December went by in a bit of a blur &#8211; and not just because of the holidays! Early in the month, I received an email from Cassandra at Quill &amp; Crow inviting me to send a story to the 2nd volume of the Bleak Midwinter series. Volume 1: The Darkest Night was already out and&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":7167,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[613],"class_list":["post-7196","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-coming-soon"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v24.8.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>STORY ACCEPTANCE: The Stone Mother - MaryRajotte.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/maryrajotte.com\/blog\/2023\/01\/12\/story-acceptance-the-stone-mother\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"STORY ACCEPTANCE: The Stone Mother - MaryRajotte.com\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"December went by in a bit of a blur &#8211; and not just because of the holidays! 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