by David Soyka Since you’re reading this, you’re presumably interested in reading fantasy (either that or somehow or another this page got linked to somebody’s “Free Tour” button). My guess is that most people take that to mean that you like stories about disenfranchised princesses and questing knight errants in made-up worlds populated by dwarves and sorcerers. Also, no doubt, there must be some universe-shattering struggle between Good and Evil. Now, don’t get me wrong, I like a big fat…
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A Look at Current Sci-fi and Fantasy Magazines By David Soyka Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. This installment of reviews is arriving a little late, so neither of our subjects this time around — September’s Fantasy and Science Fiction and the twentieth anniversary edition of Interzone — is likely still available at your local newsstand. Both venerable publications, however, sell back issues, so if anything here piques your interest, you should be able to get your…
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A Look at Current Sci-fi and Fantasy Magazines By David Soyka Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. Paradox describes itself as “The Magazine of Historical and Speculative Fiction”; the most current issue of Winter 2006-2007 (due to a change in bi-annual publishing schedule, the next issue won’t appear until October 2007), favors primarily alternative history. Sarah Monette’s “Amanta Dorée” posits a prostitute/spy with a secret in a nineteenth-century New Orleans where France maintains ownership of the Louisiana…
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by David Soyka So, you’ve finished your latest issue of Black Gate, and now you are wondering what other magazines feature fantasy in the short form that you might enjoy. Here are a few — hardly complete — suggestions. Interzone Editor/publisher Andy Cox’s resurrection of Interzone has made this self-proclaimed “Britain’s longest-running science-fiction magazine” a leading choice for edgy stories showcased in a striking visual design that pays tribute to the pulp tradition in a high glossy style. Given that…
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by David Soyka Fantasy Magazine, Issue 2 [Prime Books, edited by Sean Wallace, $5.95] Realms of Fantasy, August 2006 [Sovereign Media, edited by Shawna McCarthy, $3.99] Heliotrope, August 2006 [Fantasy Book Spot, www.heliotropemag.com] In an August 4, 2006 blog post, Charles Stross remarks that, Fantasy is, almost by definition, consolatory and escapist literature. Pure fantasy doesn’t really tell us anything about the world we live in… Of course, that depends on how you define “fantasy,” pure or otherwise, which, as…
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A Look at Current Fantasy Magazines By David Soyka Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. Apple has just announced its highly anticipated iPhone and, whether you really need one of these things or not, you have to admit it’s pretty cool-looking. Of course, it doesn’t matter much if it doesn’t work as well as it looks. Apple wouldn’t be the success it is without its ability to match good design with content people want, like portable music…
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A Look at Current Fantasy Magazines By David Soyka Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. Philip Roth can write an alternate history, Cormac McCarthy an end-of-the-world tale, Margaret Atwood a Frankenstein parable even as she claims she doesn’t write science fiction junk. No one calls Thomas Pynchon a fantasy writer, though whatever the hell he writes surely is fantastical. But they don’t become tarnished as genre writers when they write genre. But, times are changing. In the…
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A Look at Current Sci-fi and Fantasy Magazines By David Soyka Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. Greatest Uncommon Denominator is a new biannual that features decidedly strange stories, poetry, essays and artwork. The Spring 2007 debut, identified in an apparent attempt to be clever as Issue #0, has a cover page with the torso of a young boy whose stomach has a very large mouth with a lolling tongue. Gives you some idea of its savory…
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A Look at Current Sci-fi and Fantasy Magazines By David Soyka Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. The novel serialization was a grand tradition of newspaper entertainment that has long since fallen by the wayside. One reason why Dickens has so many plot turns is that he frequently wrote in installments, and leaving readers wondering what happens helps sell next week’s paper. The marketing value of this practice began to decline when the proliferation of inexpensive mass…
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A Look at Current Sci-fi and Fantasy Magazines By David Soyka Copyright 2007 by New Epoch Press. All rights reserved. As defined by the Greenwood Encyclopedia of Science Fiction and Fantasy, horror is “the creation and exploration of the emotion of fear or dread” (p. 392). According to Wikipedia, it’s anything “intended to scare, unsettle or horrify” with the element of “the intrusion of an evil…supernatural element…Some modern practitioners of the genre use vivid depictions of extreme violence or shock…
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