Episode 51: Earth

In 2016, I wrote a story. I submitted it three times in late 2016, and three times it was rejected. And I gave up on it because, even though this was my first year of trying to be a successful author person and I still clung to some very bad stories that really should have been rewritten or abandoned, I realized it was just… not good.

It was called Creatures Of Earth, and it was about alien documentary filmmakers who came to earth and gently made fun of a human they abducted. There was no real story. There was an attempt, with the human being angry at her fiancé right before the wedding, but it had nothing to do with the rest of the story. It was not as funny as I thought it was.

So it was rightfully abandoned. Then along comes 2020, and an anthology call about humans and aliens, and about how humans are the weird ones in the galaxy.

Instantly, I remembered Creatures Of Earth. It couldn't possibly be as bad as I thought. Maybe I could tweak it a little bit… except no. It was not fixable. But the idea had merit. So I rewrote it, four years after I wrote it the first time.

It is still about alien filmmakers Dominic and Frank, coming to earth to film the wildlife. And it is still about angry, drunk human Teagan, feuding with her fiancée right before her wedding. But it's more now.

Now it's about two species finding common ground. Two individuals from across the galaxy with nothing in common except the fact that they just pissed off the person they love most in the universe, sharing a moment of connection and understanding.

It's also about gay aliens, the importance of having an omniscient narrator, and the difficulties one faces when trying to hire necromancers on the weekend. But… but mostly the other things.

I love the story because, aside from being a nice story, it shows how far I've come personally in the last four years.

Episode 51: Earth is available now in We’re The Weird Aliens!