Black Gate

After covering this industry for several decades, I don’t get surprised all that often. But I was surprised when I read this Facebook announcement from author Shveta Thakrar:

I’ve been sitting on this a little while, but today is a good day for an announcement! I have sold my nagini story, “She Sleeps Beneath the Sea,” to Faerie Magazine, and it will appear in the “Midsummer Night’s Dream” issue, out next month!

I am BEYOND excited. I have adored this magazine for so many years, and now I get to be in it with a story starring mythical beings from my heritage! [Editor] Carolyn Turgeon worked with me to get the text just right for the magazine, and I can’t wait for you all to be able to read it!

I had no idea Faerie Magazine published fiction. It describes itself as a quarterly print magazine “that celebrates everything magical and extraordinary.” I found this description of the latest issue on their website:

Issue #31 is our “Midsummer Night’s Dream” issue, with all kinds of nocturnal delights … moon goddesses and bioluminescent bays and fireflies, enchanted slumber and night-blooming flowers and nourishing night creams… and much more!

Shveta was kind enough to send me tear sheets of her story, and I was astounded at the beautiful artwork. Not only is the magazine wonderfully designed, but it has full color artwork and photos throughout. Here’s a sample of two of the four pieces accompanying Shveta’s story.

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Grimdark is a new quarterly magazine of dark fantasy. It hasn’t been around around all that long, but I’ve been impressed with what it’s done in a short period of time. Editor Adrian Collins summarized the ‘zine’s aesthetic in the first issue:

Grimdark Magazine started out as the identification of a gap in the niche ezine market coupled with an obsession with grim stories told in a dark world by morally ambiguous protagonists.

In his review of the first three issues, Fletcher Vredenburgh seems to like what he sees:

From a swords & sorcery perspective, the biggest — and potentially most interesting — new publication out there is Grimdark Magazine… grimdark fantasy is nihlistic/realistic storytelling that moves the genre forward/destroys the genre, and features characters with realistic motives/who are utterly vile. Whether you like or hate the fiction coming out under the rubric, Grimdark Magazine, by its very nature, is going to feature S&S…

Each issue is packed with original stories, interviews with some of grimdark’s leading lights, and reviews… There are scads of other short stories (not all of them fantasy), some of which I enjoyed quite a bit. The author interviews provided nice insights into the hows and whys of what they’re doing. The interviews also make obvious that grimdark isn’t any sort of cohesive artistic movement, just a bunch of dark stuff by a bunch of grim people.

At only $2.99 a pop, I’ll be keeping up with Grimdark Magazine…

The latest issue went on sale on June 28, and contains new fiction by Matthew Ward, Tara Calaby, Mike Brooks, and Richard Ford, as well as novel excerpts from Alex Marshall and Mark Lawrence, a book review, interviews with Peter V. Brett and Brandon Sanderson, and an article by BG author John R. Fultz. Here’s the complete Table of Contents.

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Beneath Ceaseless Skies 176 has two new short stories by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam and Karalynn Lee, a podcast, and a podcast reprint by Michael J. DeLuca:

The Girl with Golden Hair by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam
“Where are all the people?” she asked. I neighed, unsure. Why would they hide in their caves when two strangers appeared?

Court Bindings by Karalynn Lee
The sparrow had too diminutive a mind to realize it could serve you longer by taking time to eat and sleep.

Audio Fiction Podcast:
The Girl with Golden Hair by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam

Audio Vault:
The Nine-Tailed Cat by Michael J. DeLuca
Introduced by the author.

Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam’s short fiction has also appeared in Clarkesworld, Lightspeed, and Interzone. Her previous story for BCS was “Everything Beneath You” (issue 164). Karalynn Lee had one previous story in BCS, “Unsilenced” (Issue 105).

Issue 176 was published on June 25. Read it online completely free here.

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Issue 41 of Curtis Ellett’s Swords and Sorcery Magazine, cover-dated June 2015, was published today. Each issue of Swords and Sorcery contains two short stories, and is available free online. This issue includes new fiction from Kevin Cockle and Cameron Huntley.

“Wind Song,” by Kevin Cockle, is a story of aerial warfare pitting magical flying machines against dragon riders. Cockle’s novel Spawning Ground is due out in 2016. He has also written numerous short stories, and co-written a short film, The Whale, with Mike Peterson. This is his first publication in Swords & Sorcery.

“The King’s Blacksmith,” by Cameron Huntley is the story of a young craftsman who must decide if his devotion to his art is worth the cost. This is Huntley’s first story in Swords & Sorcery but his work has previously been seen in The Dream Quarry and Goldfish Grimm’s Spicy Fiction Sushi.

Read the current issue here. We last covered Swords and Sorcery Magazine with Issue #40.

Swords and Sorcery Magazine is edited by Curtis Ellett, and is available free online. Fletcher Vredenburgh reviewed issue #40 in his May Short Story Roundup.

See our mid-June Fantasy Magazine Rack here, and all of our recent Magazine coverage here.

The seventh issue of the online-only Fantasy Scroll Magazine is now available. It is cover dated June 2015, continuing with the new bi-monthly publishing schedule. Fantasy Scroll publishes all kinds of fantastic literature, including science fiction, fantasy, horror, and paranormal short-fiction. In his editorial, Iulian Ionescu gives us a sneak peek of the contents, and news on an upcoming project:

This issue starts strong with a longer piece by Pauline Alama, “No Tale for Troubadours.” I love fantasy stories with strong female protagonists and Pauline does a great job of growing not one, but two of them in this story of friendship, war, and peace. “Hell of a Salesman” is the next story by Hank Quense, a humorous parody that takes a stab at the position of sales manager and everything around it. I’m not sure it’s a parody, or a description of what really happens inside a sales department…

Axel Taiari follows with a science fiction piece called “Beyond the Visible Spectrum,” a nice story told from the perspective of an alien invader. “Little Sprout” by Rebecca Roland is probably the shortest story we’ve ever accepted. There’s so much creepiness packed in such a short length that we just had to have it… Back by popular demand, we have the second installment of the story of Shamrock, the graphic novel authored by Josh Brown…

Another piece of buzz, before I let you go, is the news about our year one anthology. It is currently in progress and scheduled to be released sometime in September of 2015. So, it’s just a few months away and I’m very excited about it.

Here’s the complete table of contents.

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The June issue of the online magazine Nightmare is now available.

Fiction this month includes original short stories from Maria Dahvana Headley and Dale Bailey, and reprints from Kaaron Warren and Stephen Graham Jones:

Original Stories

“The Cellar Dweller” by Maria Dahvana Headley
“Snow” by Dale Bailey

Reprints

“The Changeling” by Sarah Langan (originally published in Creatures: Thirty Years of Monsters, September 2011)
The Music of the Dark Time” by Chet Williamson (Originally published in The Twilight Zone Magazine, June 1988)

The non-fiction this issue includes the latest installment in their long-running horror column, “The H Word” (“Why Do We Read Horror?”), plus author spotlights, a showcase on cover artist Okan Bülbül, an editorial, and a feature interview with Lucy A. Snyder.

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