Ellen Datlow and ChiZine horror anthology Kickstarter
People, pay attention! There are only three days left to get behind this amazing project and it’s already over 90% funded. Editor extraordinaire, Ellen Datlow, is teaming up with ChiZine Publications to put together an unthemed anthology of short horror fiction called Fearful Symmetries, and the whole thing is happening via Kickstarter.
Three things that make this awesome:
1. Ellen Datlow
2. ChiZine Publications
3. UNTHEMED HORROR!
Seriously, an anthology of unthemed horror put together by Ellen Datlow will be amazing, no question.
As it’s being Kickstartered, there are loads of rewards for various levels of contribution, and some of those rewards are simply fantastic.
Go here now: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/191888411/fearful-symmetries-an-anthology-of-horror
Get on board, even the smallest donations help. Let’s make sure this thing happens.
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“Tiny Lives” at Daily Science Fiction
My short story, Tiny Lives, is online now at Daily Science Fiction. I’m really pleased to be published there, and not only because they pay very well. I’ve been a Daily SF subscriber for ages and they really do publish some excellent SF and fantasy fiction. My story is a bittersweet piece of modern fantasy.
You can find the story here – I hope you enjoy it. Leave it a Rocket Dragon rating at the end if you feel like it too.
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A new authorly tattoo
I’m no stranger to inking my skin. For a long time now I’ve wanted a writing related tattoo – a writer’s quill, in fact. I know several writers who have the quill or a variation of it, so it’s definitely a bit of a thing among writerly folk. In fact, myself and two friends all discovered a couple of years ago that we wanted a quill tattoo and decided we would get one together at the Australian Worldcon, as we were all going to be there. As it turned out, only one of us, who happened to live in Melbourne anyway, managed to organise it then. She got a very cool peacock-style quill on her thigh. It’s taken me until now, two years later, to finally get mine. The third among us, and he knows who he is, is still very slack on the whole affair.
Anyway, I wanted my quill to be unique, obviously, even though it was following a common theme. I wanted it to reflect me as a person and a writer, and to reflect my writing and style too. I worked on the design for a long time. I’m no artist, so I had to source suitable images and work in photoshop until I’d built the design I wanted. Then I took it to a tattooist of high repute, Karen Rand of Rand Family Tattoo. Karen did an amazing job of turning my photoshopped design into an actual tattoo. I couldn’t be happier with the finished result.
Along with the quill/writing aspect, you’ll see that there are obviously other influences at work – ravens, crows, bats, clouds, and so on. There’s actually a lot going on in this design, but tattoos being, at their core, intensely personal things, I’m going to go into too much detail here. Feel free to interpret it however you see fit. If you get me drunk at a con one day, I might be persuaded to talk more about it.
(Note: the fact that the tattoo is on my chest meant that there was very clear nipple action in the photos below which, when posted online yesterday, caused quite a stir. So I’ve spared you all the nipple in this version.)
These photos are obviously taken during and right after, to show the process, so the skin is very red. Once the tatt heals, all the areas that look red or brown will settle back to black or grey. I’ll try to remember to post a follow-up pic when it’s all healed.
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Tuesday Toot – Jodi Cleghorn and Deck The Halls
Tuesday Toot is a semi-regular feature here. An invite-only series of short posts where writers, editors, booksellers and other creatives have been asked to share their stuff and toot their own horn. It’s hard to be seen in the digital morass and hopefully this occasional segment will help some of the quality stuff out there get noticed. It should all be things that regular readers here will find edifying.
This time, it’s Jodi Cleghorn talking about something I can really get behind. Take it away, Jodi!
Who is Jodi?
Jodi (@jodicleghorn) is an author, editor, publisher and innovator.
By day (and sometimes night), she runs the many facets of eMergent Publishing (eP), a small press dedicated to nurturing next-crop authors, editors and visual artists.
Between the cracks she chases her own characters in a blending of themes and genres best described as “dark weird shit”. Fruits of these adventures include the collaborative epistolary serial Post Marked: Piper’s Reach and Elyora (Review of Australian Fiction—special edition), a horror novella set just off the New England Highway.
She’s occasionally known to loiter at her blog 1000 Pieces of Blue Sky.
What are you tooting about?
Deck the Halls: festive tales of fear and cheer, the first and most recent (I can explain) publication from eP’s Literary Mix Tapes imprint of conceptual anthologies. But first…that explanation.
Born From…
The origins of Deck the Halls are bizarre, to say the least.
In December 2010 I created a shit storm on Facebook when I commented about my displeasure with the overtly Christian tone of the carols night at my son’s school. (He goes to a state school with a diverse ethnic demographic and I felt it totally inappropriate to push any one brand of religious fervour, when their Easter bonnet parade is included as a ‘cultural’ event on the school’s calendar, devoid of religious connotations).
I know, I know, Christmas is a Christian holiday… but, historically, it was many other things before the Christian’s got their pesky hands on it.
Rather than whinge—or delete the exploding Facebook thread (with people telling me, among other things, how intolerant I was)—I decided to publish a bunch of twisted, non-traditional Christmas tales. It’s apparently the sort of therapy an editor-writer-publisher seeks out in the wake of a social media implosion.
In The Beginning
The original idea was to rope nine friends into writing stories based on the lyrics of Deck the Halls (the idea of a troll for Christmas set my imagination on fire as I sat there in the hot, humid school hall!) and then publish the stories online on Christmas Eve. First, I contacted Jim Wisneski to get his blessings (I was riffing off his idea from 12 Days project) and then sent announcements out through the usual channels to see who was interested. I referred to the project as a Literary Mix Tape (a concept everyone immediately got and a name that’s stuck.)
Nine places became nineteen places, with the caveat everyone was to beta read for each other—I was too busy to edit. On Christmas Eve twenty twisted stories—rocking the dark and light side of the Christmas and New Year period—went up, one an hour, on a dedicated website. Christmas Day I made all the stories available as a free eBook.
Beyond Christmas
The ideas of writing to musical prompts and cooperative submission (a term later coined by Tom Dullemond) found traction. That traction spawned the official launch of Literary Mix Tapes (as an imprint under the eMergent Publishing umbrella) and three more anthologies: Nothing But Flowers: tales of post apocalyptic love, Eighty Nine and From Stage Door Shadows [I have a story in that one! – Alan]. Two years on I am still amazed that of all the ideas I’ve had over the years, this was the one that garnered the most enthusiasm. Many of the cornerstones of the LMT imprint, and the way each anthology is released, can be directly traced back to that very first Christmas adventure.
Redux
I felt the original authors deserved to see their stories in a paperback, so I rebooted Deck the Halls in 2011, opening ten (then twelve) new places in the anthology. Andrew McKiernan offered to do the front cover (based on Susan May James’ chilling story, “Bosch’s Troll”). This Thursday (6th December) a revised, revamped, extended and fully edited edition of Deck the Halls goes on worldwide sale as Deck the Halls: tales of festive fear and cheer.
DECK THE HALLS traverses the joy and jeopardy of the festive season, from Yule to Mōdraniht, Summer Solstice to Years’ End. The stories journey through consternations and celebrations, past, present and future, which might be or never were.
Along the way you’ll meet troll hunters, consumer dissidents, corset-bound adventurers, a joint-toking spirit, big-hearted gangbangers, an outcast hybrid spaceship, petrol-toting politicians, mythical swingers and a boy who unwittingly controls the weather.
Heart-warming and horrifying, the collection is a merry measure of cross-genre, short fiction subverting traditional notions of the holiday season.
At under $20 for the paperback (or $4.95 for the eBook) it’s a brilliant stocking stuffer or Secret Santa present. Better still, treat yourself to a copy and use it as an antidote to everything irritating, painful and nauseating about the holiday season.
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Dreaming Of Djinn and Urban Occult
I love being able to announce new forthcoming publications, so you can imagine how happy I am to be announcing two. This is a fine way to round out the year. Two new anthologies have bought stories from me and both will be published in the first half of 2013.
The first is Dreaming Of Djinn from Ticonderoga Publications, edited by Liz Grzyb, which will feature my story, “On A Crooked Leg Lightly”. The blurb goes like this:
Scheherazade’s One Thousand and One Nights stories have captured imaginations for a millennia. Fairy tales and fables abound, telling of the fantastic and mysterious, the comic and dramatic.
This anthology will explore romantic Orientalism through a speculative fiction lens. You might find lost cities, magical lamps, mummies, thieves, intrepid explorers, slaves, robotic horsemen, noble queens, sorcerers, outcast princes, harems, dancers, djinn, assassins and even smart-talking camels and cats, set in exotic Persia, Egypt, Arabia, the Ottoman Empire, or a modern incarnation of these. More information on the exact mysteries contained will be revealed shortly.
I can tell you that my story contains assassins and djinn and palaces and market bazaars and all kinds of dark magical goodness. I’m very happy to have scored a place in this book. Here’s the full ToC:
Marilag Angway – “Shadow Dancer”
Cherith Baldry – “The Green Rose”
Alan Baxter – “On A Crooked Leg Lightly”
Jenny Blackford – “The Quiet Realm of the Dark Queen”
Jetse de Vries – “Djinni Djinni Dream Dream”
Thoraiya Dyer – “The Saint George Hotel”
Joshua Gage – “The Dancer of Smoke”
Richard Harland – “Tale of the Arrow Girl”
Faith Mudge – “The Oblivion Box”
Havva Murat – “Harmony Thicket and the Persian Shoes”
Charlotte Nash-Stewart – “Parvaz”
Anthony Panegyres – “Oleander: An Ottoman Tale”
Dan Rabarts – “Silver, Sharp as Silk”
Angela Rega – “The Belly Dancing Crimes of Ms Sahara Desserts”
Jenny Schwartz – “The Pearl Flower Harvest”
Barb Siples – “The Sultan’s Debt”
Pia Van Ravestein – “Street Dancer”
DC White – “A Dash of Djinn and Tonic”
No cover for this one yet, but I’ll be sure to share it when it comes around.
The other publication I can reveal today is Urban Occult from Anachron Press, edited by Colin F Barnes. As you can see, this one does have a cover, with artwork by Sarah Anne-Langton.
The blurb for this one says:
“Urban Occult is a horror/weird anthology due for release around February 2013. The exact date will be announced closer to the time. It will contain fifteen stories of the weird and the strange events set within urban environments. We have a rich collection of authors spanning the globe.”
My story in this one has strange amulets, time-bending and lost love.
The ToC for this one is:
Gary McMahon – “Just Another Job”
Gary Fry – “On the Horizon”
K.T Davies – “Wonderland”
Jennifer Williams – “Spider Daughter Spider”
Alan Baxter – “A Time for Redemption”
Saran Anne-Langton – “The Strange Case of Mrs West and the Dead”
Chris Barnhem – “The Other Woman”
Adam Millard – “Elevator”
Julie Travis – “Pieces”
Jason Andrew – “A Simple Job”
A.A. Garrison – “A Kind of Love”
James Brogden – “Remover of Obstacles”
Nerine Dorman – “Probatio Diabolica”
Mystery Writer 1 – TBA soon
Mystery Writer 2 – TBA soon
Mystery writers! Exciting stuff.
So keep an eye out for these. I’ll blog again when they’re available.
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“Salvage In The Void” now published at Kasma SF and free to read
I’m very pleased to announce that my science fiction short story, Salvage In The Void, has been published at Kasma SF Magazine and it’s free to read online. Not only that, but the story has been illustrated in fantastic style by Jose Boreas. I honestly couldn’t be happier with it. This story features those spacefaring friends, Peevy and LaVey, an engineer with a phobia about deep space and his synthetic hound. These guys first appeared in my story, Trawling The Void, which was published in Midnight Echo issue 6, the science fiction/horror special. Salvage In The Void follows on directly from the events in Trawling The Void. And I have in mind at least one more adventure for Peevy and LaVey, and possibly more after that. I’ll post an excerpt below to give you a taste and a thumbnail of the artwork. You can go to Kasma SF to read the rest and see the art in all its glory. And while you’re there, stick around and read some of the other stuff – it’s an excellent online magazine (and this is my second feature there.)
Salvage in the Void
by Alan Baxter
“I don’t know how long I can bear this,” Peevy said. Deepfear churned his stomach as he absently stroked the SimHound’s head. “I didn’t want to die back there on a doomed ship, but I don’t think I can take this.”
LaVey whined in sympathy, looking up to lick a kiss across his master’s cheek. Peevy hunched in the cramped pod, the demi-sphere of radiation-shielded plasglass at his back. He felt the black out there, a yawning void trying to suck him into icy depths. He tapped and flicked in the holographic cube before him, called up images and charts. “I know I can manage the ‘fear, LaVey,” he said as he worked.
LaVey huffed in agreement.
Peevy read speeds and vectors, tried to correlate the information with on-board charts. There was very little in the way of accurate cartography so far out on the edge.
As the mind-numbing enormity of space became ever more apparent Peevy trembled more deeply, ‘fear tightening his chest, constricting his throat. “It’s so much easier to manage on-board ship,” he said.
LaVey whined softly, sitting close to his master, resting his chin.
*****
A sharp beep brought Peevy out of a fitful doze. LaVey, curled at his feet, looked up.
“A ship!”
LaVey sat up, barked in excitement.
“It’s a small vessel,” Peevy said. “What’s it doing all the way out here? Looking for the Clara Halo? It ‘s…” He cast a haunted look at the SimHound. “Dead. They ‘re all dead.” LaVey gestured with his nose at the comm.
Peevy keyed up a comm-link, took a deep breath to calm himself. “Vessel callsign VSC7811, do you read me, over?”
Man and dog sat still in tense expectation. Nothing but a soft hiss came back over the comm.
“Vessel callsign VSC7811,” Peevy said again, “This is Chief Engineer Peevy, recently of the USV Clara Halo, sole survivor. My pod has limited range and supplies, please respond.”
More crackle and hiss. Peevy’s eyes were wide as he looked at LaVey. “Can’t they hear us?”
LaVey shook his head, lips forward in concern. He tipped his head, flicked one ear.
Peevy read the dog’s body language, their bond deeper than anyone ever understood. “You think they’re ignoring us?” He growled with annoyance. “Vessel callsign VSC7811, this is Chief Engineer Peevy, sole survivor of the USV Clara Halo…”
“We hear you, engineer.” The voice was gravelly.
“Oh, thank everything in the deep, wide black! Please, can you pick me up?”
A guttural laugh came across. “Hold your horses there, engineer. United Spaceways Vessel, huh? You’re a company man.”
“Yes. But the Clara Halo is gone.”
“Really? Well, I don’t want any contact with the company or the Democratic Alliance of Planets. I’m sorry.”
“What? Wait! I don’t want to drift in this pod forever.” His stomach lurched at the thought. “I’ll die of starvation or lack of oxygen before I find anyone.”
“Why is that my concern, engineer?”
“Simple human kindness?” Peevy ventured weakly.
I’ll also add a permanent link on the Dark Shorts page.
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An interview and an ebook
A strange little double header of news today. Firstly, I’ve been interviewed over at On Fiction Writing, wherein I answer questions like Has a book every made you angry? and Which four literary characters would you like to invite to dinner, and why? and What was the first story that ever made you afraid? among others. You can find the full interview right here. It’s a good bit of fun.
Secondly, the ebook edition of The Red Penny Papers: Vol III, Issue 1, Fall 2012 is now available at Smashwords for FREE! That’s the one that contains my story, Crossroads & Carousels, as well as fiction by Cat Rambo, M Bennardo, Jamie Mason and Katy Gunn. It’s available in any e format you can think of there, so have at it. While you’re there, you might like to pick up my supernatural noir novella, The Darkest Shade Of Grey, also published by Red Penny Papers, and only $1.99.
Enjoy.
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Tuesday Toot – Jason Nahrung
Tuesday Toot is a semi-regular feature here. An invite-only series of short posts where writers, editors, booksellers and other creatives have been asked to share their stuff and toot their own horn. It’s hard to be seen in the digital morass and hopefully this occasional segment will help some of the quality stuff out there get noticed. It should all be things that regular readers here will find edifying.
This time, it’s Jason Nahrung. Take it away, Jason!
Who is Jason?
Jason Nahrung grew up on a Queensland cattle property and now lives in Melbourne with his wife, the writer Kirstyn McDermott. He works as an editor and journalist to support his travel addiction; in particular, an abiding love affair with New Orleans.
He has an on-again, off-again relationship with short fiction, but when they’re on, the stories are invariably darkly themed, perhaps reflecting his passion for classic B-grade horror films and ’80s goth rock.
His most recent long fiction title, the Gothic tale Salvage (Twelfth Planet Press), was released earlier this year.
His next publication will be the outback vampire novel Blood and Dust, a bloody piece of Australiana hopefully out in time for Christmas. Ho ho ho!
Jason lurks online at www.jasonnahrung.com.
What are you tooting about?
Salvage, and the fact it’s now available at Amazon for Kindle,and through other e-sellers, too. The story was developed over three years, one week per year, during an annual writers retreat on the island that forms the backdrop.
Melanie and Richard head to the island to try to save their rocky marriage, but Melanie meets Helena, and consequently has to reconsider her ideas about love, death and happiness. And stay alive. Because Helena’s got a few secrets of her own …
There are shades of the story ‘Carmilla’ and the movie ‘The Long Weekend’ in there. There’s a bit of Fraser Island, a bit of Bribie. It’s a slow burn, kind of like slipping into a warm bath, only to realise that not all the ripples are yours: that there’s something else in there with you that’s not … quite … right.
It’s gratifying to see the book available in digital format; others are on their way. The digital realm is probably a good fit for a novella-size read, so I’m glad it’s out there, testing the waters and sharing some melancholy love!
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