Time for my annual post on what I’m thinking about for Hugo nominations. As ever, I’ll caution that I have read a lot of short fiction, but that I am less up on the other categories. I have seen a fair quantity of movies, too, however. Let me reiterate something I said last year – though I participate with a lot of enjoyment in Hugo nomination and voting every year, I am philosophically convinced that there is no such thing…
Hand in hand with the new year comes brand new schedules from the major genre publishers like Tor, DAW, Ace, Angry Robot, Solaris, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, and many others. The Barnes & Noble Sci-Fi and Fantasy Blog has compiled a magnificent list of 95 Books Sci-Fi & Fantasy Editors Can’t Wait for You to Read in 2018, and I was surprised and delighted to see Black Gate authors well represented, including Myke Coke, Todd McAulty, and Patrice Sarath. There’s also plenty…
It’s always a delight when The Year’s Best Weird Fiction arrives, as I consistently find it one of the most eclectic and eye-opening of the Year’s Best volumes. All of them introduce me to new writers and fiction venues, but I don’t think any do it with the same regularity as Year’s Best Weird Fiction. The series is edited by a different guest editor every year; Canadian author Helen Marshall is at the reins for 2017. The series editor is Undertow’s…
Charles Yu, the author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe, named one of the best books of the year by Time magazine, also knows his way around a short story, with two collections to his credit, Third Class Superhero (2006) and Sorry Please Thank You (2012). He’s a fine choice to edit this year’s edition of Mariner Books’ The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy, which was edited by Joe Hill in 2015, and Karen Joy Fowler…
Get a dozen double issues of Asimov’s and Analog — a $96 value — for just $15.95! I was checking the subscription rates for Analog Science Fiction last week, as I was prepping an article on the May/June issue, when I stumbled on two curious new entries on the subscription page: Science Fiction Value Pack-8 — $6.95 Science Fiction Double Issue Value Pack-12 — $15.95 For a limited time Dell Magazines, publishers of Asimov’s and Analog (as well as Ellery Queen’s Mystery…
Asimov’s Science Fiction is celebrating its 40th Anniversary Year in 2017, and in her editorial this issue Sheila Williams reflects on the many milestones and anniversaries she’s had during her 35 years with the magazine. Alas, the magazines’ fifteenth anniversary was not a happy occasion. Isaac died on April 6, 1992, leaving all of us heartbroken. He’d told me several times before he died that one major reason he’d founded the magazine was to give new writers a welcoming place…
Asimov’s continues its 40th anniversary celebration with its March/April issue. Thirteen stories, half a dozen poems, and plenty of little asides about what the magazine means to the various contributors. It begins with “Soulmates.com” by Will McIntosh, a story about love in the digital age which reads like it was meant to be charming, but came off rather creepy. Both characters behave like vengeful stalkers at different points in the story and it all got tied up far too neatly,…
One of the biggest advantages that digital magazines have over print magazines is that it’s very easy to keep digital editions available indefinitely. So if you discover a magazine starting with, say, issue 52, it’s easy to go back and purchase every back issue at “cover price.” Which is why, during my month-long wait between new issues of Nightmare, I can wile away the hours by reading from their extensive backlist. My favorite story of the issue just happens to…
The March/April 2017 Asimov’s Science Fiction is the magazine’s 40th Anniversary issue. I can still remember buying the second issue off the racks in Ottawa back in 1977. I vividly remember Isaac’s editorial, which cheerfully encouraged young readers to write science fiction, and how much it inspired me to try my hand at it myself. I borrowed my parent’s typewriter, banged out a story, and mailed it in a few weeks later, dreams of being an SF writer in my head. I’m sure Asimov’s then editor,…
The last 2016 issue of Nightmare is now available. And it looks like a good one, with original fiction from Dale Bailey and Livia Llewellyn, and reprints by Brian Evenson and Priya Sridhar. Here’s Charles Payseur’s assessment at Quick Sip Reviews: The two stories in the December Nightmare magazine certainly show what makes speculative horror so captivating — revealing the uncomfortable truths and darkness that exists all around us, giving it physical form, and then making us face it. These…