Black Gate

Something is crawling into Cresy’s bedroom each night… something not human.

The Thing was here, in her room again, shuffling softly by her bed. She could hear it, and it made her afraid. And more than anything, the fear made her angry.
        I am the Hangman’s daughter, in her mind, her voice echoed from the walls. I am strong. I am not afraid of you!
       After what seemed like an eternity, Cresy sat bolt upright in her bed, and the sounds of the city came back to her. But this time, this time she saw it. A black shadow by her window, curved, hunched over. It was built like a therian — small, like a child, but with long arms and huge hands, hands built for strangling. Its eyes glowed, featureless yellow orbs. And in the light from those eyes, she could see its face, and she could see that it had no lips. Just skin, stretched across its jaws, as it tried to scream, and couldn’t.

Chris Braak is a novelist and playwright from Philadelphia.  His first novel is The Translated Man.

“The Hangman’s Daughter” appears in Black Gate 14, coming in February.  You can read an excerpt here.

The complete Black Gate 14 Sneak Peek is available here.

Art by John Kaufmann.

For best viewing:

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To read earlier chapters:

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We kick off Part II of the Black Gate 14 Sneak Peek with an excerpt from the issue’s lead story, Diana Sherman’s “Dark of the Year.”

“Dark of the Year” is the tale of a man wandering through a landscape ravaged by sorcerous war, desperately searching for a dying man or war-mage who can read his granddaughter’s true name, in the last few days before the Shadows come… before the Dark of the Year.

Diana Sherman has been published in Talebones and Polyphony, and a has sold a play to The Exquisite Corpuscle anthology from Fairwood Press.

Art by Mark Evans.

You can read the excerpt here.

Matai’s grandaughter doesn’t have a name, and soon, she will be susceptible to the Shadows when moondark comes.  Less than a fortnight distant, when the year turns on the longest night.  The Shadows and their darklings will come creeping through towns and cities, calling for children to come.  Most will be safe, their ears cottoned against those whispers by the knowledge of their own true names. 

But the orphans with no womb names, they’ll be gone of a morning.  No sight nor sound of their passing.  But someday, some other dark night, you might spy a lost child creeping through the village, a darkling servant now, whispering and beckoning.  You know them by their black lips, burnt by the Shadow that stole the souls out of their mouths.  That, and their angry eyes.

The complete version of “Dark of the Year” appears in Black Gate 14, on sale in February.

Stay tuned over the next few weeks, as we post excerpts from each of the stories coming in BG 14.

I just stumbled upon this spin on a subscription plan to support Clarkesworld Magazine, which has been providing its content online for the past three years. For a $10 or more donation, you can become a citizen; although the privileges of citizenship are still being defined, the folks at Clarkesworld suggest it might include discounts on their print publications, as well as the satisfaction of supporting an endeavor that publishes authors such as, in the current January issue, Peter Watts and Megan Arkenberg. Clarkesworld hopes to naturalize 400 citizens out of the 10,000 or so it counts as regular readers to reach its financial goals.

On another note, Torque Control has published the 2009 BSFA (British Science Fiction Association) Awards shortlist. The nominees for short fiction are:

“Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest; Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast” by Eugie Foster (Interzone 220)
The Push by Dave Hutchinson (Newcon Press)
“Johnnie and Emmie-Lou Get Married” by Kim Lakin-Smith (Interzone 222)
“Vishnu at the Cat Circus” by Ian McDonald (in Cyberabad Days, Gollancz)
“The Beloved Time of Their Lives” [pdf link] by Ian Watson and Roberto Quaglia (in The Beloved of My Beloved, Newcon Press)
“The Assistant” by Ian Whates (in The Solaris Book of New Science Fiction 3, ed. George Mann)

I just saw some news via SFSignal and SciFi Squad about plans to create and animated version of Harlan Ellison’s A Boy and His Dog, with a tentative 2012 ETA. As a fan of the Hugo-winning 1975 film with Don Johnson (yes really, Don Johnson) and the original Nebula-winning Ellison novella, I think this could be a terrific project. For those of you unfamiliar with the story, it’s a post-apocalyptic tale featuring a misogynist young man and his super-intelligent telepathic dog, with a skewed, satirical edge that one expects from the best Ellison.

It isn’t really clear if the film, to be helmed by David Lee Miller, is taking the original 1975 script as its starting point, or planning a fresh adaptation of the Ellison novella. Either way my rule of thumb has always been that the more post-apocalyptic films, and the more movies based on works of the giants of the field, the better off we as a society are. Plus it just looks cool.