You Know What’s Cool? Strange Horizons Is Cool

You Know What’s Cool? Strange Horizons Is Cool

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"After the Fall" by Malcolm McClinton
"After the Fall" by Malcolm McClinton

As an upstart n00bie writer in the fantasy field, I tend to be very fond of those editors who actively seek out and nurture upstart n00bie writers in the fantasy field.

I know, right? Shocker!

That’s one of the many reasons I adore Black Gate Magazine with radiant rip-tides of affection. The time and attention these editors bestow on their writers is mind-boggling. You think you’ve written something pretty okay, and then the editors get their scalpels and flensing knives and broadswords right into the meat of it, and your story suddenly becomes EPIC LIKE BEOWULF!

And that’s an experience I had recently with Strange Horizons‘ editor Karen Meisner.

Back in late July, Strange Horizons accepted my story “Household Spirits,” which went live online today.

In the interim between acceptance and publication, there was the Editing Process.

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Writing: Mistakes Are Future Tips

Writing: Mistakes Are Future Tips

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1793-notebook1Several weeks ago I waxed on about how useful I find my Paperblanks writing notebook. I fill one up about once a year, and recently found myself copying over some of the information I always jot down in the first few pages. One of the most important things I keep there is a list of reminders intended to help me be a better writer. On the whole, although I call these writing tips, most of them are mistakes I’ve made. I try to glance over them every few days.

Every writer’s going to have his or her own favorite mistakes; I’m listing the ones I’m most aware of in my own writing in the hope you’ll find some of them instructional. Maybe this list can even help you avoid them.

  • Don’t be too quick to reveal the villain’s plan

In my rough drafts the villains usually are way too obvious. Sometimes it’s good if the readers know exactly what the plan is because that creates tension, but I have a habit of just laying it all out as I’m figuring out the bad guy’s motives and as a result, crush suspense.

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Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.7 “Family Matters”

Supernatural Spotlight – Episode 6.7 “Family Matters”

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Poor Sam finds out that he doesn't have a soul.
Poor Sam finds out that he doesn't have a soul.

This week picks up right where last week’s episode left off: upon getting proof that something is wrong with Sam, Dean beat him unconscious. He awakens to find Castiel trying to diagnose him. Sam doesn’t think much of this tactic.

“You really that this–”

“What,” asks Dean, ” you think there’s a clinic out there for people who just pop out of hell wrong? He asks, you answer, then you shut your hole, you got it?”

Sam reveals that he hasn’t slept since returning from the pit. When Castiel answers how he feels – not just physical sensations – he says, “I don’t know.” And when Castiel digs for his soul, he comes up with … nothing. Looks like Sam came back from Lucifer’s prison without his soul.

“So is he even still Sam?” asks Dean.

Castiel replies, “Well, you pose an interesting philosophical question.”

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Novel Writing: Le Morte d’Arthur

Novel Writing: Le Morte d’Arthur

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Idylls of the KingNational Novel Writing Month is well underway for me. I’ve gotten a start on my novel, at the same time as I’m still getting the structure figured out. I’ll have some thoughts on my process, and what I’m learning, a bit later in this post; first, I want to write a bit about the subject I’m wrestling with, the Matter of Britain.

I’m writing an Arthurian fantasy. Like, I’d imagine, most people, I’ve been vaguely familiar with the stories of Arthur and his knights since I was very young. At different times in my life I’ve been more or less intensely interested in different aspects of the Arthurian tales and the way they developed over time; writing a story using that material, though, forces a new perspective on me.

I’ve had to think a lot about what precisely interests me about these stories. And which stories, in particular, have grabbed me? Why do they matter? Why do I want to write about them?

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Win a copy of Terror in the House: The Early Kuttner, Volume One

Win a copy of Terror in the House: The Early Kuttner, Volume One

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kuttnerHaffner Press has released the first volume of their new series The Early Kuttner, titled Terror in the House, and we have no less than three copies to give away.

Haffner’s archival-quality hardcovers  — including the legendary Kaldar: World of Antares by Edmond Hamilton, copies of which now sell for $2,000 and up — are some of the most collectible books in the genre, and Terror in the House promises to be popular indeed. Here’s the book description:

Henry Kuttner was a frequent contributor to the pulp magazines that specialized in the weird, supernatural, horror, and science fiction genre. Beginning in 1936, with the minor classic “The Graveyard Rats,” Kuttner launched a steady stream of short stories aimed at Weird Tales, Mystery Tales, Thrilling Wonder Stories, and others… Kuttner set several stories in Lovecraft’s “Cthulhu Mythos” and several are presented in Terror in the House including: “The Secret of Kralitz,” “The Eater of Souls,” “The Salem Horror,” The Jest of Droom-Avista,” “The Frog,” “The Invaders,” and “The Bells of Horror.”

He contributed reams of copy to the weird-menace (a sub-genre of horror where a seemingly supernatural plot is resolved with a pedestrian ending) pulps, Thrilling Mystery and Spice Mystery… Terror in the House is the first volume in a set collecting many of Kuttner’s earliest stories, most of which have never been reprinted.

Terror in the House is 712 pages in hardcover, with a preface by Richard Matheson and introduction by Garyn G. Roberts, Ph.D. It is edited by Stephen Haffner and illustrated by Harry V. Parkhurst, and has a retail price of $40.

How do you win a copy? Easy! Just send an e-mail to john@blackgate.com with the title “Kuttner Contest,” with a one-sentence review of your favorite Henry Kuttner short story. Three winners will be drawn at random from all qualifying entries, and we’ll publish the best reviews here on the Black Gate blog.

All entries become the property of New Epoch Press. No purchase necessary. Must be 12 or older. Decisions of the judges (capricious as they may be) are final. Not valid where prohibited by law. Or anywhere postage for a hefty hardcover is more than, like, 10 bucks. Seriously, these things are heavy and we’re on a budget.

Black Gate at World Fantasy Convention 2010

Black Gate at World Fantasy Convention 2010

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Well, I’ve finally returned to the Black Gate rooftop headquarters here in St. Charles, Illinois, after a weary week of travel. We had the largest team gathering in the magazine’s history at the World Fantasy Convention in Columbus, Ohio last weekend — including several Contributing Editors, half a dozen bloggers, and over two dozen writers and contributors. I started the magazine ten years ago and have been attending conventions for decades, and there were several long-term staff members I met for the first time, including the distinguished Ryan Harvey and John R. Fultz.

Team Black Gate
Team Black Gate: editor John ONeill, contributing editor Bill Ward, author and blogger James Enge, Jason Waltz (Rogue Blades), managing editor Howard Andrew Jones, author and blogger John R. Fultz, and author and blogger Ryan Harvey.

All of us were invited to take part in a podcast on Sword & Sorcery organized by the charming Jaym Gates — stay tuned for the broadcast location and date.  Our Saturday night reading was a rollicking success, as nearly two dozen Black Gate authors read from work sold to the magazine over the past ten years, including James Enge, Frederic Durbin, E.E. Knight, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, L.E. Modesitt Jr, Darrell Schweitzer, Donald S. Crankshaw, Howard Andrew Jones, Martha Wells, Ryan Harvey, Robert J. Howe, John R. Fultz, Myke Cole, Renee Stern, Steven Silver, Michael Shea, S. Hutson Blount, Janet Stirling, F. Brett Cox, and Frederick Tor.

I also got the chance to meet with other contributors including Mike Resnick, Jeffrey Ford, David B. Coe, Ellen Klages (and her charming sister), and Charles Coleman Finlay.  It was a delight to finally meet artist Jim Pavelec in the Dealer’s room, as well as fellow editors Adrian Simmons (Heroic Fantasy Quarterly) and Mike Allen (Mythic Delirium), and make several new friends, including long-term reader Matthew Wuertz. I made the trip with Jason Waltz, publisher of Rogue Blades Entertainment, who shared our table and turned out to be a stalwart traveling companion.

Due to the sheer size of the convention there were also BG writers wandering the halls I somehow managed to miss completely, including Jeremiah Tolbert and Rick Bowes. Ah well, maybe next year. There’s a reason it’s called the World Fantasy Convention. No matter how much you try, life is too short to see it all.

Gabbing with a Girl of Spirit: Black Gate Interviews Ysabeau Wilce

Gabbing with a Girl of Spirit: Black Gate Interviews Ysabeau Wilce

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yspicA few years ago, I lived and worked in Edgewater, a northerly Chicago neighborhood  just blocks from fantasy writer Ysabeau Wilce’s house. She once confessed to having walked her dog past my bookstore on Broadway and Bryn Mawr. The unutterable excitement!

I didn’t know then that the anonymous, red-haired, dog-walking passerby was the very same woman who wrote “Metal More Attractive,” the story in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction that made me write my first ever fan letter as an adult.

Not to mention, she’s also the author of Flora Segunda: Being the Magickal Mishaps of a Girl of Spirit, Her Glass-Gazing Sidekick, Two Ominous Butlers (One Blue), a House with Eleven Thousand Rooms, and a Red Dog.The fact that I get to interview her today? Just tickles me!

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Short Fiction Roundup

Short Fiction Roundup

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apexmag11101The November issue of Apex Magazine has gone to press (can you still use those kind of terms for on-line publication), and edtor Catherynne M. Valente has presented the unusual theme of an Arab/Muslim issue.  A reader comment about Pamela K. Taylor’s “50 Fatwas for the Virtuous Vampire” (because it doesn’t matter what part of the world you may be in these days, the undead sucking blood have somehow or another become cultural icons) describes the story as “[b]oth savagely funny and gut-wrenchingly moving.”

In other news, Word Fantasy Award winning editor Susan Marie Groppi is resigning her “in-chief” role at Strange Horizons. Reviews editor Niall Harrison is assuming the post, and is stepping down after five years from the helm as features editor of  Vector to take on the job.

Marvel’s The Monster of Frankenstein, Part Four

Marvel’s The Monster of Frankenstein, Part Four

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fm13The 20th Century adventures of Mary Shelley’s famous monster continued with a guest-star stint in Giant-Size Werewolf #2. Doug fm14Moench scripted and Don Perlin provided the artwork. Moench gets to make his familiar point about judging by appearances (as he did several times in his Frankenstein 1974 scripts for Monsters Unleashed) with an opening sequence in which a hippie and an African-American are discussing the injustice of unfounded prejudices when they encounter the Monster and immediately flee in terror at his appearance. The Monster subsequently overhears a conversation between two winos about eccentric millionaire Danton Vayla who has discovered the ability to transmigrate souls. Intrigued, the Monster sets off for Los Angeles (by freight train) in the hopes of gaining a new, normal body for himself.

The story then shifts gears to pick up a plot strand from Marvel’s monthly Werewolf by Night title where Lissa Russell has joined a Satanic cult, The Brotherhood of Baal in the hopes of finding a cure for her werewolf brother. Lissa quits the cult after learning that they practice human sacrifice. The Brotherhood abducts Lissa and scrawl Manson-style graffiti on the walls of her home. This sends Jack Russell in search of his sister. He soon discovers that Danton Vayla (who resembles Anton LaVey in name as well as appearance) is the leader of the Brotherhood of Baal and about to sacrifice Lissa as part of the same ritual that the Monster’s soul is to transmigrate into the body of a handsome young cult member. One lengthy Werewolf-Monster scuffle later and Vayla lies dead, the cult is ruined and Lissa is freed.

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A Review of Jhereg by Steven Brust

A Review of Jhereg by Steven Brust

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jheregJhereg
By Steven Brust
Ace (224 pages, $2.50, April 1983)

I’ve played in a lot of tabletop RPGs, including a couple of homebrewed systems and homebrewed worlds. I’ve never encountered one that goes into the culture-changing potential of resurrection, though. It’s treated as an acceptable break from reality, a way to keep things fun, one that has little effect on the world besides providing a way for the campaign’s archnemesis to keep coming back.

Jhereg, by Steven Brust, the first book in his 12-volume Vlad Taltos series, takes the notion of reliable magical resurrection and creates a society around it.

Vlad Taltos is an Easterner and a gentleman, which isn’t a common combination. Easterners are an underclass compared to Dragaerans. The Dragaeran clan called House Jhereg allows anyone, even Easterners, to buy in — a distinct advantage, since it allows them access to the Dragaeran Empire’s sorcery. Unfortunately, the Jheregs may be the most egalitarian family in the Empire, but they also operate a lot like the mafia. Citizenship is not cheap.

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