An Introduction to Australian Horror
In honour of Australia Day, I was asked to write an article about Australian horror for This Is Horror in the UK — and it’s now up! The article surveys some of the standout horror published in the past two years by Australian independent presses: so much to talk about, so much incredible talent!
Australia is a land of extremes. One minute the country is ravaged by drought and bushfires, the next it’s drowning in devastating floods. The continent is a combination of enormous red deserts meeting sprawling metropolises meeting ancient tropical rainforests meeting endless coastlines. Some of the largest — and tiniest — deadly predators on the planet are hidden out in the wilds, but are also unearthed in suburban backyards. Over it all, the harsh Australian sun beats down. Casting the longest, darkest shadows.
And right there — right where the glaring light gives way to shade — a population of Australian horror writers thrives. It’s a great position to be in. Looking at stories published by independent presses in the past two years, we find that Australian horror can plunge wholly into the black, even more tragic and disturbing by contrast to the brightness left behind; it can be light-hearted but nuanced, love and joy limned in darkness; or it can tread both worlds, supernatural and terrifying and endearing all at once…
Read the rest here — and enjoy!
Damnation & Dames ToC announced!
Lindsy Anderson – The Third Circle
Chris Bauer – Three Questions and One Troll
Alan Baxter & Felicity Dowker – Burning, Always Burning
Jay Caselberg – Blind Pig
M.L.D. Curelas – Silver Comes the Night
Karen Dent – A Case to Die For
Dirk Flinthart – Outlines
Lisa L. Hannett & Angela Slatter – Prohibition Blues
Donna Maree Hanson – Sangue Sella Notte
Rob Hood – Walking the Dead Beat
Joseph L Kellogg – The Awakened Adventure of Rick Candle
Pete Kempshall – Sound and Fury
Chris Large – One Night at the Cherry
Penelope Love – Be Good Sweet Maid
Nicole Murphy – The Black Star Killer
Brian Grant Ross – Hard Boiled
Ticonderoga Publications is pleased to announce the line-up for the upcoming paranormal noir anthology Damnation & Dames, edited by Liz Grzyb and Amanda Pillar. The anthology brings you sixteen stories of murder and mayhem, monsters and mysterious femme fatales.
Damnation & Dames will be launched at Swancon 37, at Easter 2012 and will be available in trade paperback for $30, and as an ebook in Kindle format after this. The anthology will be available from Ticonderoga’s online shop at indiebooksonline.com, and internet bookstores such as bookdepository.com and amazon.com.
Hooray! Sale!
By now this news is floating all over the internetz, but HUZZAH! The oubliette streak continues! Spent the day offline, and got back on to discover that ‘Prohibition Blues’, which Angela Slatter and I co-authored, will be appearing in Damnation & Dames, a cool new anthology edited by Liz Grzyb and Amanda Pillar.
Our story is a rollicking run through the bayou, with werewolves and fae creatures and quick-tongued flapper chicks with amazing shoes… And that’s just the beginning!
This story will also appear in our collection Midnight and Moonshine, which will be published by Ticonderoga at the end of this year. We’re so glad to be able to give you all this little teaser-taster from the new book!
Business cards: Or, On How I am Spoiled Rotten
I’ve reached that stage in my writing career where business cards come in handy. Going to cons, sending contracts, mailing in hard copies of subs — these are but a few of the opportunities we have to share our professional details. So I put some together a few months ago, simple things that were meant to look like the pages of a book, but when they came back from the printer’s I was disappointed. They just weren’t quite what I’d had in mind… so I ditched them, because, well, ew.
Enter: Best Friend of the Highest Order (played by Angela Slatter)
Designer Extraordinare (played by David Pollitt)
Artist of Wondrous Wonders (played by Kathleen Jennings)
Plot: BF conspires with DE and AWW to secretly create a set of fabulous business cards the likes of which I could not imagine. Deals were struck, magic was worked, and beauty was brought to my mailbox in card form.
And behold! CLOCKWORK OWLS!!! Fonts fashioned out of twigs!!! Quotes from mine own stories!!!
Artwork (c) Kathleen Jennings
A treeful of mechanical owls graces the front of each card, and there are also various quotes from my stories (collect them all!) on each card. On the back, the awesome barn owl is featured.
Thank you, thank you thank, dear Brain, Badger, and La Belle Artiste!
xxxx
China Miéville: First in the Lair!
Greetings and welcome, one and all, to the inaugural Lair of the Evil Drs Brain, where we “invite” (i.e. conduct virtual kidnappings of) other writers and artists for a chat (which occurs right after they stop demanding to be released and saying ‘Who are you and why I am in a comfy wingback chair?’and ‘These are not my pyjamas!’).
Our first victim, errr, guest is the really rather clever China Miéville, he of such tomes as King Rat, Perdido Street Station, The City and The City, and the most recently excellent Embassytown. We all know he’s got a brain the size of a planet, with an IQ that has more digits than Warren Buffett’s bank statement – random thought: Genius Deathmatch, Miéville versus Stephen Fry? – and so in order to make him appear less intimidating and more approachable we gave him footie pyjamas and a cup of warm cocoa. See? Instantly fluffy and non-threatening.
And so without further ado or incriminating commentary, let us launch the Lair. *shattering of champagne bottle against the hull, sound of two Evil Brains crying at the waste of good bubbly*
Dr Angela: Welcome, China, and thanks so much for joining us in the Lair of the Evil Drs Brain. I’d like you to meet the other half of the Brain, Lisa Hannett. You will note that I am Ralph Wiggam to Lisa’s Professor Frink.
Dr China: I’m delighted and honoured to be invited.
Dr Angela: Lisa, if you’d like to start?
Dr Lisa: Thanks, Brain. China, I thought we’d start with a couple of questions about Embassytown, then move on to a couple general questions about your writing habits.
Dr China: Sure.
Dr Lisa: Ursula Le Guin lavished praise on the book in her Guardian review, which led me to think: are there echoes of The Left Hand of Darkness in Embassytown? Has Le Guin’s writing been a source of inspiration for your own work?
Dr China: Certainly, and certainly. I don’t know that I was specifically riffing off LHOD, but Le Guin has been a very big figure in my mind, yes, for a long time. Her anthropological approach and critical take on colonialism, her use of language, all the things you would expect. In a way, Embassytown was in part a reversed homage to her (I don’t mean an anti-homage, I mean a sincere homage reversing terms) in the sense that one of the most incredibly valuable pieces of furniture she came up with for SF is the ansible, allowing instantaneous communication. I wanted to posit a universe that was profoundly ansibleless, in which communications were the opposite of instantaneous, and the peculiarities of politics — especially colonial politics — rule at a distance and extended lag would mean a return to a kind of maritime empire style of the 18th and early 19th Century, which is why the immer is maritime-esque.
Dr Lisa: I love the concept of the reverse homage. And I’m really interested in the problems of communication — so, without knowing it, you’ve actually anticipated my next question… Which, incidentally, begins with a quote from David Malouf. Have you read any of his short stories?
Dr China: To my shame, no. Time-organisation fail. One of my too-many lacunae.
Dr Lisa: You won’t regret getting a copy of his Complete Stories. Brilliant, brilliant stuff. Anyhow, there’s a line in David Malouf’s wonderful story ‘The Only Speaker of His Tongue’ that goes: “When I think of my tongue being no longer alive in the mouths of men a chill goes over me that is deeper than my own death, since it is the gathered death of all my kind.”
Dr China: That is rather splendid indeed.
Dr Lisa: And I was thinking that this line resonates with the problems of communicating with the Hosts in Embassytown… With that in mind I wondered: do you think the transformation/degeneration of language is a symptom (or catalyst?) of dystopian societies in science fiction?
Dr China: Well, I guess in terms of a traditional trope, yes. The most obvious example to me would be Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban, but also I think of the language especially towards the end of the surpassingly strange and rather underrated (imo) Alfred Bester book, Golem 100. The thing is, that sense of language as a speaking of society, so the collapse of language mirrors and/or causes the social collapse is a strong and interesting idea to riff off in fiction. It is not, however, the way I think actual language works in the real world. (I’ve seen more than one person say Embassytown is a riff on the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, which I guess to a certain extent it is. But that doesn’t mean I don’t know that the S-W hypothesis is bogus. I do know that, and it is.) So — as a literary tradition, yes. Often brilliantly. But I wouldn’t want that to seem to be mapped out into actual sociolinguistic prescription.
Here’s looking at you, 2011
Last day of the year… so like many of you I’m feeling the urge to commit a bit of retrospective bloggery.
2011 sucked. Then it was awesome. Then it sucked again. Then it got better than ever… And so on. This was the rollercoaster year to beat all others, and it often felt like I was the poster child for the proverbial Chinese curse of “living in interesting times…”
At this time last year, I was staring down the barrel of writing the final three chapters of my PhD thesis. I had January to do it, so I became a hermit and wrote and wrote and wrote. After six years, endless hours of agony, a good dollop of joy, and the hardest work I’d ever done, I finished the draft. HUGE YAY! And then I discovered a Danish scholar’s brand new body of work on a topic that was unnervingly close to mine — so my head exploded. Rewriting ensued, as did tears, frustration, more tears — aka HUGE LOW. But as we know it all worked out, so I’ll move on.
At the same time, I was finishing my first collection of short stories, Bluegrass Symphony. Edits, writing, rewriting all happened while I was freaking out about my thesis… and while my lovely sister and her boyfriend were visiting from Canada (HUUUUGE YAY!!!) It all got done — with time to spare! — and suddenly I found myself with a complete thesis AND a complete book! (YAY!)
Thus armed, I applied for my dream academic job (in English and Creative Writing) — but didn’t get an interview (BOO!). But then discovered that nobody had gotten an interview, and so they would readvertise in a few months (YAY!) and so I still had a chance.
Along with my dear Brain, Angela Slatter, I signed a contract for a second collection of stories, Midnight and Moonshine — which we’re co-authoring (HUUUUGE YAY! We had so much fun collaborating on ‘The February Dragon’!)
I was nominated for three Ditmar awards (YAY! and I had a ball at Swancon) and Angela and I won the Aurealis Award for ‘Best Fantasy Story 2010′ for ‘The February Dragon’ (HUGE YAY!)
Had a massive teaching workload this year — four topics, over 200 students, marking marking marking until I thought my eyes would bleed. Even so, teaching was a bit YAY (because I had some wonderful students!) and a lot BOO (see: marking, eyes bleeding).
The dream academic job was readvertised (YAY!) I applied and had an incredibly strong application (YAY!) but failed to get an interview because of a technicality (not going into details, sorry). Saying ‘HUGE BOO’ here would actually diminish how much this experience affected me. This all happened in June right after I submitted my thesis for examination. So after that great high (thesis finished!!) the whole Job Debacle of 2011 was without a doubt the nadir of my year.
What do they say about reaching rock bottom? The only way is up? Well, that’s pretty much what happened in the second half of 2011. Bluegrass Symphony was published to great reviews and was launched by the ever-fantastic Sean Williams (YAAAAAAAAAAAAY!). My PhD thesis passed with two As, so I didn’t have to change a word (although I did change an accent on one of my Icelandic translations) YAAAAAAAAAAAY!
Then another job-related BOO: I quit my non-teaching job after working there happily for 4 years. Again, not going into detail here, but needless to say, it sucked.
But then another HUGE YAAAAAAAAAAY: writing time! And I got the Arts SA grant I applied for, so that writing time continues on, uninterrupted, well into 2012!
Up, down, up, down, up, down… Here’s hoping 2012 is a bit more even-keeled!
To sum up, in terms of dayjobbery, this year has blown. In terms of writing, however, this has been the most awesome year yet:
Bluegrass Symphony (Ticonderoga Publications, 2011)
Carousel
Down the Hollow
Them Little Shinin’ Things
Fur and Feathers
From the Teeth of Strange Children
The Wager and the Hourglass
The Short Go: A Future in Eight Seconds
To Snuff a Flame
Depot to Depot
Commonplace Sacrifices (first published in On Spec 2009/2010)
Wires Uncrossed
Forever, Miss Tapekwa County
‘Gutted’, Shimmer, Issue 13, April 2011
‘White and Red in the Black’, Dead Red Heart, ed. Russell B. Farr (Ticonderoga Publications) 2011
NEW STORIES SOLD
Midnight and Moonshine, co-authored with Angela Slatter (Ticonderoga Publications, collection of original stories) Forthcoming November 2012
‘Smoke Billows, Soot Falls’ (Chapbook), ed. Simon Marshall-Jones (Spectral Press) Forthcoming
‘Snowglobes’, Chilling Tales 2: In Words, Alas, Drown I, ed. Michael Kelly (EDGE Publishing) Forthcoming
‘A Girl of Feather and Music’, Postscripts (PS Publishing, UK) Forthcoming
‘Rapacis X. Loco Signa’, Bestiary, ed. Ann & Jeff VanderMeer, Forthcoming
STORIES REPRINTED
‘Tiny Drops’, Midnight Echo, Issue 4, 2010 — REPRINTED IN ChiZine, May 2011
‘Soil From My Fingers’, Tesseracts 14, ed. Brett Alexander Savory & John Robert Colombo (ChiZine Press), 2010 — REPRINTED IN The Year’s Best Australian Fantasy & Horror 2010, ed. Liz Grzyb and Talie Helene (Ticonderoga Publications, 2011)
‘The February Dragon’, co-written with Angela Slatter, Scary Kisses, ed. Liz Grzyb (Ticonderoga Publications), 2010 — REPRINTED IN The Year’s Best Australian Fantasy & Horror 2010, ed. Liz Grzyb and Talie Helene (Ticonderoga Publications, 2011)
BLOGGING
I started the Tuesday Therapy series here, which I’m enjoying immensely;
Brain and I have concocted the Lair of the Evil Drs Brain, which kicks off in January with an interview we recently did with China Miéville;
2 guest posts for the Shimmer blog which you can read here and here;
A guest post for Lee Battersby‘s ‘Treacherous Carrots” art series, which you can read here;
An essay on the weird illustrations of Beardsley, Niffenegger and Gorey for Weird Fiction Review, which you can read here;
And a brief piece on the Weird West in fiction for Random House’s Suvudu site, which you can read here.
Bring on 2012.
Happy New Year, all!
As the Weird Turns
Angela Slatter‘s editorial is up at the WeirdFictionReview site, and it’s full of awesome recommendations for weird summer reading. Here’s a little snippet to whet your appetites:
When I was a kid (yes,Virginia, dinosaurs walked the earth then), I read Saki’s “Sredni Vashtar” and have regarded garden sheds with an acute suspicion ever since. M R James was responsible for many restless nights, many dreadful dreams (“Casting the Runes”, “A Warning to the Curious”, “Oh, Whistle And I’ll Come To You, My Lad”, “A Warning to the Curious”, “The Treasure of Abbott Thomas”, “The Wailing Well” were but a few causes of night terrors). If James was the main course, then Stoker’s “The Judge’s House”, Jacobs’ “The Monkey’s Paw”, and Laski’s “The Tower” were the disturbing dessert. Lovecraft’s “The Outsider” still haunts my dreams — I sometimes wake convinced I have been climbing that long, dread staircase only to surface in a place I don’t belong…
Tuesday Therapy: Eating Elephants
So I’ve decided to start a new weekly segment on this website, called ‘Tuesday Therapy’. Basically, I’ve been thinking that Tuesday lacks an identity: in the whole scheme of the week, it kinda falls through the cracks. It’s not abhorrent, like Monday; it isn’t a promising hump, like Wednesday; and few of us celebrate its arrival the way we do Friday or Saturday. Apart from being a cheap night at the movies, Tuesday just sort of sits there feeling useless. Inferior. Overshadowed by more popular weekdays. Not even shocking enough to warrant disdain.
And the more I thought about it, the more I realised that writers — new and established — can often suffer from a case of the Tuesdays when they are evaluating their “success”. It’s not just newbies who sometimes feel like things aren’t moving fast enough, that their writing sucks — or is brilliant, dahling! but overlooked — that everyone else is a Friday or Saturday, universally lauded and showered with caviar and fine champagne, while they themselves are at home churning out words, reheating old pizza for dinner.
It’s hard not to get caught up in the trap of comparing yourself to others, particularly nowadays when we have such immediate access to everyone’s achievements thanks to the incessant stream of updates on Twitter, Facebook, email lists, websites, blogs blogs blogs… So, instead of trying to tell you all that it’s counterproductive to get caught up in such comparisons (even though it is) I thought I’d instead try to pass on a bit of weekly balm for your writing soul.
This first installment of Tuesday Therapy is a piece of invaluable advice that my dear Brain (Angela Slatter) gave me the other day while I was fretting about All the Writing Things That Have to be Done and Dammit They Must Be Done NOW NOW NOW.
“Brain,” she said, ever wise, “You can only eat an elephant one bite at a time.”
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought about this since then, and how much better it has repeatedly made me feel. Totally freaking brilliant.
Please feel free to share brief snippets of advice with me via email (lisa dot hannett at gmail dot com) or DM me on Twitter (@lisalhannett), and I’ll include them in an upcoming segment of Tuesday Therapy. The more, the merrier!
Lair of the Evil Drs Brain…
…immortalised by the uber-talented Kathleen Jennings.
Brain and I are amassing content for The Lair as we speak — stay tuned!
While you’re waiting, check out Kathleen’s website. Her newest illustration, the wind-up tiger, is absolutely frickin amazing.
The Flensing of the Baxter
Over at The Word, Alan Baxter tells the tale of joy and woe of having his story flensed by the Evil Drs Brain:
flense
verb, flensed, flens·ing
1. to strip the blubber or the skin from (a whale, seal, etc.).
2. to strip off (blubber or skin)…
I wrote a short story recently that I was really pleased with. I spent a while going over it, polishing it, getting it just right. I sent it out into the world. And it came back. And again. And again. The rejections stacked up. It’s cool, I’m used to that. Every writer is. We have hides that make rhino skin look like tissue paper and a solid fuck-you-attitude that keeps us working in the face of constant rejection. It’s the only way to work in this game. After all, it’s not necessarily the story – it could be the editor just doesn’t dig that vibe, or the publication ran something a bit similar recently, or the publisher’s cat swallowed a bee and she’s sore at the world and takes it out on a good story. That last one is unlikely, but anything’s possible.
But once something has been bounced a few times in a row, you can start to see the common denominator. It’s the story, schmuck. It ain’t good enough.
So I went to my friends seeking help. In this particular instance I was fortunate enough to get the Evil Drs Brain* on the case. Given that it was a dark and twisted fairy tale vibe, I asked Angela Slatter* to have a look at it for me. She read the story, liked it, but took her flensing knife to it with abandon. I got it back and sobbed quietly for a few minutes, then manned up and listened to her advice. It was good advice. She’d seen flaws I hadn’t, picked up things in the story that needed to work differently. She’d identified character inconsistencies I would never have seen.
The story was greatly improved, but it still needed something; we could both see that now. Angela sent it over to her other brain, Lisa L Hannett*. Lisa added her flensing knife to the mix and my story was further eviscerated, but she saw the things that needed fixing.
Read the complete post here.
Where Do You Get Your Weird?
Weirdfictionreview.com: Your Non-Denominational Source for The Weird
http://www.weirdfictionreview.com
Weirdfictionreview.com launched today, a website devoted to The Weird and created by Luis Rodrigues. The project is the brainchild of editing-writing team Ann & Jeff VanderMeer. Hugo Award-winner Ann VanderMeer until recently edited Weird Tales Magazine and has co-edited several anthologies with her husband. Jeff’s last novel, Finch, was a finalist for the Nebula Award and World Fantasy Award. Together they edited the just-released The Weird: A Compendium of Strange & Dark Stories (Atlantic/Corvus), a 750,000-word, 100-year retrospective of weird fiction.
The site kicks off today with the following features:
—Exclusive interview with Neil Gaiman about weird fiction:
—First episode of exclusive “Reading The Weird” webcomic by Leah Thomas:
http://weirdfictionreview.com/fiction/2011/11/01/reading-the-weird-web-comic-episode-1/
—Translation of Thomas Owen’s short story “Kavar the Rat” by Edward Gauvin:
http://weirdfictionreview.com/fiction/2011/11/01/kavar-the-rat-thomas-owen/
—The full Table of Contents for The Weird compendium, with notes:
—Weird Gallery, Featuring the art of New Orleans artist Myrtle Von Damitz III:
http://weirdfictionreview.com/nonfiction/art/2011/10/31/myrtle-von-damitz-iii-gallery/
Come back later this week and next for: “Weirdly Epic: A Century of First Lines,” exclusive interviews with Kelly Link and Thomas Ligotti, a feature on artist/writer Alfred Kubin, Kafkaesque entertainments, China Mieville’s “AFTERWEIRD: The Efficacy of a Worm-eaten Dictionary,” and a feature on classic Weird Tales women writers. An ongoing “101 Weird Writers” feature will also begin next week.
Weirdfictionreview.com will initially focus on features related to The Weird compendium, but its primary mission over time will be to serve as an ongoing exploration into all facets of the weird, in all of its many forms — a kind of “non-denominational” approach that appreciates Lovecraft but also writers like Franz Kafka, Angela Carter, and Shirley Jackson – along with the next generation of weird writers and international weird. Writer Angela Slatter serves as the managing editor.
Lair of the Evil Drs Brain
So, what is the Lair of the Evil Drs Brain?
Basically it’s Angela Slatter and I talking to each other and other people about stuff. Writing stuff.
Topics will include:
- Steampunkery
- Fairytaleosity
- Phat Phantasy
- Where you write and how you get in the mood?
- Should a muumuu by mandatory for blogging?
- What happens when stuff doesn’t turn out the way you planned?
Think of it as a spec-fic Hamish & Andy’s Gap Year. On second thoughts, don’t.
Stay tuned.
Bluegrass Symphony launch: In Which I Gush and Share Photos
Sometimes I feel soooooooo lucky, and last night was definitely one of those times.
It’s actually hard to describe how awesome everthing was at the Bluegrass Symphony launch. Jude at the SA Writers Centre was incredibly lovely, and helped to make sure the atrium was ready for the event to kick off at 7pm — and what a space! We are so fortunate to have such a gorgeous Writers Centre here in Adelaide, with such a great venue for book launches. Thanks to Dr Chad, Brain and Badger, the wine flowed all evening, the sushi platters were never empty, and the festivities were photographed for posterity — if it hadn’t been for these three, I would’ve been a giant ball of stress all night. Instead, I was a butterfly, flitting from group to group, chatting, laughing, and feeling so special. (Thank you so much, Angela, Chad, and David!!)
Russ came all the way from Perth to sell books (thanks again, Russ!!) and the wonderful crowd kept him busy all evening — by the end of the night he’d sold all the hardcovers he’d shlepped to Adelaide, plus most of the paperbacks he’d mailed ahead of time. SO COOL! And between sales, Russ acted as MC. He got the proceedings under way by giving a lovely speech before introducing the incredible Sean Williams, who launched the book. And when I say launched the book, what I really mean is gave the most unbelievably thoughtful, generous, flattering, mind-blowingly perfect speech ever in the history of book launches. Ever. From now on, any time I feel like my writing is crap, I’m going to relive all the perfect moments from Sean’s speech… And I keep saying perfect because, frankly, it was. Sean captured the essence of Bluegrass Symphony so beautifully in his descriptions, and this was nowhere clearer than when he compared the ‘vibe’ of the stories in my collection to Johnny Cash’s song, ‘The Long Black Veil’ (the lyrics of which he read out, like a poem, and I had goosebumps the whole time!):
Ten years ago on a cold dark night,
someone was killed ‘neath the town hall lights.
There were few at the scene, but they all agreed,
that the man who ran looked a lot like me.
Chorus ~ She walks these hills, in a long black veil.
She visits my grave, when the night winds wail.
Nobody knows, nobody sees, nobody knows, but me
The Judge said son, what is your alibi,
if you were somewhere else, then you won’t have to die.
I spoke not a word, though it meant my life,
for i’d been in the arms of my best friends wife.
Chorus*
Now the scaffold is high, and eternity’s near.
She stood in the crowd, and shed not a tear.
But some times at night, when the cold wind moans
In a long black veil, she cries over my bones
Chorus ~ She walks these hills, in a long black veil.
When the cold winds blow, and the night winds wail.
No body knows, no body sees.
No body knows, but me.
Oooooooh, reading the lyrics again just now gives me shivers! Thanks so much, Sean! (and Johnny!)
So, I was gobsmacked after hearing Sean speak — so much so that I pretty much lost the ability to string coherent thoughts together — which meant that my list of ‘Thank yous’ was somewhat abbreviated… Really, I wanted to thank everyone, and I did thank them all (you all) in a rambling sort of way… but by the time I got up to the lectern, I was just so overwhelmed and happy that I managed about half a dozen official thank yous before I went into general ‘gush’ mode. Even so, I somehow managed to maintain my composure long enough to read the opening of ‘The Short Go: A Future in Eight Seconds’ (which you can listen to here) and then basically spent the rest of the evening, smiling, hugging dear friends, having great wine, and signing books.
I think I can safely say that last night wins the prize for Most Awesome First Book Launch EVER.
Without further ado, photographic evidence of the awesomeness that was:
Beauty shot: Bluegrass display (photo by David Pollitt)
Russ selling books... (Photo by David Pollitt)
...and doing introductions. (Photo by Alex Hender)
Sean speaks brilliantly... (Photo by Alex Hender)
...while the crowd looks on. (Photo by Alex Hender)
Signing! (Photo by David Pollitt)
More signing (and pretty hairband!) (Photo by Tully Barnett)
Gloating with Jason and Brain! First ones to receive our contributors' copies to the Year's Best 2010! (Photo by David Pollitt)
Clickety click!
Today has been a hodgepodge of crazy busy-ness, so it somehow seems fitting to post a hodgepodge of links in the hope that, in your own crazy busy days, you might find a moment to clickety click:
- Support ChiZine: “ChiZine.com has been free to readers since its inception in 1997. We want to keep paying our writers pro rates, and we want to keep ChiZine free and accessible to everyone who wants to read it. No donation too small! (Or too big.)” The uber-mega-huge-all-proceeds-go-to-ChiZine Volume 47 includes my story ‘Tiny Drops’, which was first published in Midnight Echo 4. Read, enjoy, donate!
- Shimmer‘s Issue 13 Reader’s Choice Poll is online! Whichever story gets the most votes will be published online so that everyone can read it. As the folks at Shimmer have put it: “Help your favorite author get his or her story the readership it deserves!” *Ahem* my Issue 13 story is called ‘Gutted’ *cough, cough* Shimmer will also randomly select one responder to get a free copy of the issue of their choice — just give them your email address in the last question so they can get in touch with you if you’re the lucky winner. Votes accepted until June 30. (So, that’s ‘Gutted’, by L.L. Hannett…)
- Electric Velocipede has a new website and it rocks! Check it out for yourselves.
- She Never Slept.com has posted a lovely review of Scary Kisses, in which Heather Royston waxes poetic about ‘The February Dragon’ (and also has some excellent things to say about Felicity Dowker’s ‘Bread and Circuses’ and Kyla Ward’s ‘Cursebreaker’). Huzzah!
- And last, but certainly not least, dear Brain (known ’round the traps as Angela Slatter) has some excellent news involving a monumental ToC in a monumental book of horror published by a monumental editor. Congratulations! Can’t wait to read this book!
So much fun, I lost my voice
I arrived in Sydney late on Friday evening after a full day’s work — a full week’s, really — ready for a weekend of fun, friends and celebration. This was my third Aurealis Awards, but the first time I’d been nominated, so I was pretty excited. Angela (aka Brain) had a barrowload of nominations this year too, and we’d both celebrated our birthdays last week, so we decided to splash out and treat ourselves to a swanky weekend at the Marriott in Circular Quay. What a brilliant decision on our parts, if I do say so myself. I took stacks of pictures of our lovely room, the awesome bedside reading lights, our decadent room service breakfasts, the incredible city view from our 21st-floor window… but you’ll have to imagine what it all looked like, unfortunately, since my computer and phone are currently not on speaking terms. Stoopid technology.
Saturday m
orning, we went for a walk down Pitt Street to window-shop. Well, I say window-shop, but instead it turned into a bit of a splurge… After showing incredible self-restraint by not going into Kinokuniya; and by not buying the beautiful dandelion paperweight that I really had no use for but was so so pretty I wanted it, precioussss; and by doing nothing but admiring the incredible antique jewellery calling out to me from every shop window (every one, I tells ya!) I happened to look across the mall we were in and see a papierie. ‘Let’s go there,’ I said, wiping the drool from my chin. It looked so much like a shop I remember visiting in Florence years ago in which all the most beautiful handmade leather books and journals were sold, all of which I had no hope in hell of affording at the time.
Long story short: we went to the shop, which just happened to be called Florentine and sold handmade leather books and journals (and what Laura Goodin so accurately dubbed ‘pen porn’)…. And after speaking to the sweet shop assistant for nearly a half hour, walked out with a birthday present for myself (pictured left), a couple of bookmarks, a handpainted card which is destined to be framed and hung on my study wall. It’s probably very good for my bank account that I don’t live in the same city as this shop!
Treasures in tow, we meandered over to Circular Quay for a bit of a wander. I’d only been to Sydney briefly before — an evening boat tour ten years ago; a couple of conferences at Sydney Uni — so I’d never had a chance to see the sights. The weather was perfect on Saturday, so the walk around The Rocks was filled with tourists and buskers and general hubbub. Angela played tour guide as I gaped and took photos, then we headed back to the hotel for some lunch. We’d gone back intending to laze for the afternoon, but instead wound up being quite productive: brainstormed more ideas and plots for Midnight and Moonshine and I may or may not have giggled and clapped my hands with glee as we plotted. We’re only three stories in, but already I love this world, these characters, these tales!
Photo by Cat Sparks
Then in typical Brains fashion, we primped and hair-straightened and bejewelled before heading to the Independent Theatre for the ceremony. Ubiquitous photographer extraordinaire Cat Sparks nabbed a bunch of excellent shots of the attendees before everyone melted (it was, ahem, a tad warm in the venue for one with Northern blood), and you can check out her Flickr stream here. The awards ceremony went off without a hitch: huge congratulations to Specfaction for all their hard work! Garth Nix was a charming MC, the theatre added the right amount of special to the occasion, and the slideshow (designed by Cat and, if I’m not mistaken, brought to life on the night by Rob Hood) was so well-designed — and so funny! — that it was a delight getting to see it in person. (Loved the dancing skeleton!!) Of course, the night got even more delightful when Angela’s The Girl With No Hands won for Best Collection, and then even more exciting when our ‘February Dragon’ tied with the lovely Thoraiya Dyer’s ‘Yowie’ for Best Fantasy Short Story! I was so shocked that I rambled something I hope resembled thankful sentiments and was back in my seat with a nice chunky award in my lap before I’d fully realised what had happened! Throughout it all we got Twitter updates c/o Alan Baxter, so we got to enjoy the ceremony live and online simultaneously which was a first for me. Man, it’s cool living in the future!
Most of you know the full list of winners by now, but here ’tis anyway:
Best Children’s Fiction(told primarily through pictures): The Boy and the Toy, Sonya Hartnett (writer) & Lucia Masciullo (illustrator)
Best Children’s Fiction (told primarily through words): The Keepers, Lian Tanner
Best Young Adult Novel: Guardian of the Dead, Karen Healey
Best Young Adult Short Story: “A Thousand Flowers”, Margo Lanagan
Best Illustrated Book / Graphic Novel: Changing Ways: Book 1, Justin RandallBest Horror Novel: Madigan Mine, Kirstyn McDermott
Best Horror Short Story: “The Fear”, Richard Harland
Best Anthology: Wings of Fire, Edited by Jonathan Strahan and Marianne S Jablon
Best Collection: The Girl With No Hands and other tales, Angela SlatterBest Fantasy Novel: Power and Majesty, Tansy Rayner Roberts
Best Fantasy Short Story: “The February Dragon”, Lisa L Hannett & Angela Slatter and “Yowie”, Thoraiya Dyer
Best Science Fiction Novel: Transformation Space, Marianne de Pierres
Best Science Fiction Short Story: “The Heart of a Mouse”, K.J. Bishop
Peter McNamara Convenors’ Award: Helen Merrick
Kris Hembury Encouragement Award: Jodi Cleghorn
Photo by Tehani Wessely
Congratulations to all the winners!!
And thank you to all the judges!
Buoyed on adrenaline and waves of incredulity, I floated through the post-ceremony cocktail party. I quickly texted the good news to my family and friends (someone snapped a photo of the ‘texting corner’ as Kate Eltham, Angela, myself and a couple of other people huddled near the bar to send messages) and downed a couple glasses of champagne. Managed to catch up with a bunch of friends — and, happily, to congratulate many of them for their wins! — before we headed over to the after party at Ridges. By the time we got there, I could feel my voice going… It’s amazing what incessant squeeing can do to your vocal chords! As always, it’s so lovely to chat with Kirstyn (CONGRATS again, K!!), Jason, Rob and Kate; I got a chance to meet with Talie in 3D instead of just on FB, which was also a treat; and for the first time in, well, ever, I got a chance to chat with Tansy and to congratulate her on her Best Novel success. (Note: I’m reading Power and Majesty as we speak and really enjoying it!! Wondering how quickly I can get my hands on Book II…) Shared squeeeees with Angie Rega, Helen Merrick, Jason Fischer (and his lovely wife, Kate), Sean, and Cat before my voice up and left me — so Tehani snapped one post-melt shot of the Brains before we snuck away before midnight. And, as is our wont, we ordered late-night room service to cap off our Aurealis Awards weekend!
Angela’s flight left early on Sunday, but mine wasn’t until last night. We had one more morning of decadence (mmmm, French toast!) and then the Brains were separated 
once more. Once Angela was safely on her way to the airport, I strolled back down to Circular Quay and whiled the morning away walking. I headed over to the Art Gallery of NSW and spent hours delighting in the 19thC European and Australian paintings. Said hello to Rupert Bunny’s work, which I fell in love with last year when his exhibit came to the Art Gallery of SA; visited the pre-Raphaelites, which I do without fail any time I enter an art gallery; wandered to the contemporary Australian galleries to pay my respects to Nolan and Boyd and Gleeson; then traipsed downstairs only to find that the gallery had commissioned a new installation piece by Richard Long, which made me so very happy. I missed out on the Archibald Prize exhibit because the line was sooooooooo long and my feet were sooooooo sore, I decided to pass on it. From there, I took my time walking through the Domain and over to the Botanic Gardens, where I had lunch with a greedy miner bird. I spent the rest of the afternoon walking walking walking (in homage to Richard Long) and then caught a cab to the airport. Ensconced at my gate, I powered through 2/3 of Power and Majesty before dozing on the plane home.
Until next time, it’s back to reality.
Got to give my voice a chance to recover…
Fairy Tale Girls Should Always and Never Do What They’re Told
Lately, I’ve been thinking about fairy tales.
There was a fantastic panel at Swancon – with Ellen Datlow, Richard Harland, Jenny Blackford, Amanda Pillar, and Brain (aka Angela Slatter) – in which the panelists were kicking around many ideas about fairy tales: the evolution of the form; classics and modern retellings; questioning the theory that these tales are intended to be cautionary. This last point got me thinking about the lessons such narratives were supposed to impart, and to whom they were meant to be addressed. I asked a question of the panel about the irony of women’s roles in these stories, but since my thoughts weren’t fully formed on the matter I couldn’t articulate what I meant clearly – not to mention the fact that it was getting on in the day, I hadn’t consumed nearly enough coffee, and I’d spent all my energies being articulate on the Steampunk panel immediately before the fairy tale session. So I began a train of thought, but it was not quite resolved that day.
This post is a lengthier musing on this issue of the ‘cautionary tale’ – still not completely formed – in which I realise that fairy tale girls are stuck in a paradox that most can do nothing to escape. This discussion clearly sprouts from my interest in fantasy world-building, particularly in making sure the logic of the fantasy world works. My thoughts have evolved in a couple of steps:
(a) Fairy tales may or may not be cautionary tales for readers/listeners;
(b) Any lessons these stories contain reflect the social and moral worldview of the tellers, so we’d expect ‘lessons’ geared toward 18th century children to be different from those directed at 21st century children;
(c) If the fairy tale world is to function logically, it should also be evident that the characters within the story are also being ‘cautioned’ in some way. There must be a cost for the fictional characters’ actions, otherwise the lessons for children in the real world will not have any effect. In other words, the characters have to follow the fairy tale’s rules – or obviously break them – if the ‘lesson’ is to be made clear to the readers.
This last point got me thinking that, in so many cases, the girls in traditional fairy tales have little hope of becoming anything but objects in a lesson. This is not a new idea; not by a long shot. Anyone who has read Angela Carter or the collections of fairy tale retellings Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling have edited will know I’m not blazing any new trails here. But what strikes me is that, within the logic of their own worlds, it remains pretty clear that even if girls triumph over whatever challenges the tale-teller sets for them while the story is being told, they’re still ultimately doomed to fail in the future.
Clever girls, beautiful girls, law-abiding girls will inevitably become angry, vain, greedy women; and if they don’t, if they try to be independent, they’ll die.
Let me clarify what I mean with a couple of examples.
Let’s say there are a few ‘lessons’ children are meant to learn from ‘Red Riding Hood’: don’t stray from the path; don’t listen to strangers; be smart and pay attention; think before you act; and so on. For the sake of brevity, I’m going to simplify things here because there’s no space to discuss the various incarnations of this tale over the years in a post like this one. But in many versions, Little Red meets the wolf who has eaten her grandmother; she manages, due to her cleverness, to get out alive. That’s all well and good, until we start thinking about poor Granny. Granny is a great role model for lively girls like Little Red. Granny is an independent woman who’s obviously had children, and is now living it up in her little cottage on the other side of the woods. She doesn’t need Grandpa – there’s no mention of him – all she needs is a bit of company every now and again and she’s content. We can imagine that Little Red will turn out to be like her Granny: she hasn’t strayed from the path; she’s a survivor; she’s going to wind up independent and happy. Except, according to the world’s logic, by living alone (i.e. without men) Granny has strayed from the path; by being a clever girl Little Red has also strayed from the conventional narrative path in which damsels in distress are rescued by men. What the story seems to be telling us is that if Little Red grows up and decided to live without a man, as Granny did, then she’ll get eaten sooner or later. (Was Granny so desperate for male companionship that she opened the cottage door to a wolf? Or was she vulnerable because there was no man around?)
If we think of Snow White, another unsettling idea emerges. ‘Purity and truth will make you beautiful’ says the teller of this tale. ‘And these traits will also bag you a Prince.’ Poor Snow White is beguiled by her stepmother’s magic; she’s forced out of civilisation and into the woods; she needs the hunter’s help, she needs a prince’s kiss – but as long as she’s beautiful and pure, she won’t need intelligence. (Is Little Red uglier than Snow White, I wonder?) Snow White will succeed because of her looks and her true heart, and she and her Prince will live happily ever after.
But what about her ‘evil’ stepmother?
She must have been a girl once. And with her obsession with ‘Who is the fairest’ I’d wager she must have been quite the looker in her time. She managed to nab herself not just a Prince, but a King – and if magic was involved in this transaction, why couldn’t it have been the ‘magic’ of her beauty? The logic of this world tells us that a woman’s appearance can entrance, enchant, and act to save her life – why couldn’t it help a mature woman to attract a King? Stepmother could have been just as pure and true as Snow White when she was a girl; when she was lovely; when she earned a powerful man’s love. So I can’t help but think that, actually, in this world – where beauty leads to marriage, and women are stripped of their names (I’d be bitter if I was only called Stepmother, and Snow White is a description not a name) – the ‘evil’ stepmother is really just Snow White twenty-five years in the future. Remarried (her dashing Prince killed in the wars, perhaps, or gored on a boar’s tusk); no longer pure (or so speaks the squalling brood of heirs she’s produced); and her looks fading, more wrinkles appearing every time she looks in a mirror to ask, ‘Who is the fairest?’
As far as I can tell, the moral of these stories is: do what you’re told, girls, and you’ll serve a purpose in the short-term but ultimately you’ll die a crone; don’t do what you’re told, and you’ll die sooner. Either way — and this is imperative — don’t you dare get old.
We’ve already got enough imperfect women in our world.
Loves, New and Old
1) Podcasts
So, I’d listened to the first two episodes of ‘The Writer and the Critic’ (aka Kirstyn McDermott and Ian Mond sharing news, opinions and reviews about mostly-speculative-fiction books) and then in the madness of finishing the PhD of Doom I apparently forgot about anything that wasn’t directly related to medieval Icelandic literature.
However.
Going to Swancon last week and attending a great session about podcasts (with Kirstyn, Helen Merrick and Jonathan Strahan) reminded me how many awesome Aussie podcasts there are at the moment! As soon as I got back home I had a little look-see on iTunes, downloaded the remaining W&tC episodes that I’d missed (and, Kirstyn, your “Hello future people” comments were eerily accurate!), along with a bunch of Galactic Suburbia shows, some Coode Street episodes with Jonathan Strahan and Gary Wolfe, and Helen and Tama’s Pangalactic Interwebs. It is a teensy bit weird listening to them out of sequence, and listening to the news updates after the fact – but, all in all, I am SO HAPPY these creative and intelligent people are casting such amazing pods for our edjamucation! Kirstyn & Ian make me laugh out loud – so much so that I had to stop listening to them while at work because I was giggling like a loonie at my desk – and I’ve now got so many novel recommendations from GS that I fear my poor bedside table is going to collapse under the weight of all the new books I have to get. (Yes, *have* to get.)
Three cheers for great specfic discussions!
2) Being PhD free (aka Getting My Life Back)
Sure, I still have to officially submit the thesis for examination. But as far as I’m concerned, the writing – the hard slog, the tears, the agony – is finished. Which means, of course, that all that time I previously devoted to researching, thinking, agonising, and eventually writing the thesis can now be dedicated to other, much more enjoyable things. Like reading! In anticipation of the ‘Game of Thrones’ series, I’ve been re-reading George R.R. Martin’s series, and it’s a joy to just read something for fun! I also stocked up on Aussie independent press books while in Perth, and am now working my way through Dead Red Heart, Scenes from the Second Storey, More Scary Kisses and also the first two books in the Twelve Planets series. Well, I started that one with the second book, I admit: Tansy Rayner Roberts’ Love and Romanpunk accompanied me on the plane home from the convention, and it was delightful! I can’t wait to read Sue Isle’s book (#1 in the series), which is currently top of the teetering pile of books on the abovementioned overloaded bedside table. I’m also reading a fabulous collection of short stories (not speculative fiction) by Simon van Booy called Love Begins in Winter; I’m only one story in but already there have been some devastatingly beautiful phrases that have made me sigh with happiness (unlike the sighs of angst, woe, and omgihatemythesis that accompanied the reading I was doing earlier this year for research purposes…) Being sans PhD has also opened up waaaaaaaaaay more time for me to hide away in:
3) The Writing Oubliette
As I mentioned in my post-Swancon post, Angela and I have started working on Midnight and Moonshine, our joint collection. We are really excited about this book and, at some point in the near future, we intend to do some joint blog posts about the collaborative experience of writing short stories… But for now, I just want to revel in the fact that I actually have a bit of time to dedicate to this project, and working on it doesn’t make me feel guilty about procrastinating because there ain’t no more stooopid thesis to drag me down! Obviously I’m still getting accustomed to this – it still doesn’t seem entirely real that I really, really, really do have some time now – and so I have to keep saying it aloud (or, in writing, as the case may be) to convince myself that it’s true.
I also have to get used to writing like a writer again, instead of writing like an academic. This wasn’t a problem for me while I was in the “I’ll be done the thesis one day” stage; for the past two years I’ve been writing and publishing stories and working on drafts of my thesis chapters without one feeding too much into the other. But since January – the month in which I did nothing (nothing) but work on the thesis – I’ve been so focused on finishing this massive research project that any time I went to work on a story the prose sounded like a research paper. (Ask Brain: she’ll vouch for this fact. Dry, dry, dry!) I was still getting loads of fun ideas for short stories, but my brain was in a completely different space in terms of making these ideas into stories. And, to be honest, since it has taken me until, well, now to finally get rid of the research I have only recently been able to start writing like a writer again.
So starting to work on ‘Wyrmwood’, which is going to appear about halfway through Midnight and Moonshine, has been an excellent way to get my story-writer head back on straight.
The words are back!
The author sighs in relief.
Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror 2010
Liz Grzyb and Talie Helene, editors of the inaugural Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror anthology, have just announced the table of contents — and, I’ve got to say, I’m squeeeeeeeeeeeeing over how many awesome stories are in this book! And squeeing over how lucky I feel! (And how gorgeous is this cover?!?!)
RJ Astruc: “Johnny and Babushka”
Peter M Ball: “L’esprit de L’escalier”
Alan Baxter: “The King’s Accord”
Jenny Blackford: “Mirror”
Gitte Christensen: “A Sweet Story”
Matthew Chrulew: “Schubert By Candlelight”
Bill Congreve: “Ghia Likes Food”
Rjurik Davidson: “Lovers In Caeli-Amur”
Felicity Dowker: “After the Jump”
Dale Elvy: “Night Shift”
Jason Fischer: “The School Bus”
Dirk Flinthart: “Walker”
Bob Franklin: “Children’s Story”
Christopher Green: “Where We Go To Be Made Lighter”
Paul Haines: “High Tide At Hot Water Beach”
L.L. Hannett: “Soil From My Fingers”
Stephen Irwin: “Hive”
Gary Kemble: “Feast Or Famine”
Pete Kempshall: “Brave Face”
Tessa Kum: “Acception”
Martin Livings: “Home”
Maxine McArthur: “A Pearling Tale”
Kirstyn McDermott: “She Said”
Andrew McKiernan: “The Memory Of Water”
Ben Peek: “White Crocodile Jazz”
Simon Petrie: “Dark Rendezvous”
Lezli Robyn: “Anne-droid of Green Gables”
Angela Rega: “Slow Cookin’ “
Angela Slatter: “The Bone Mother”
Angela Slatter & LL Hannett: “The February Dragon”
Grant Stone: “Wood”
Kaaron Warren: “That Girl”
Janeen Webb: “Manifest Destiny”
The editors will soon begin reading for the second volume of The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror — visit the Ticonderoga Publications website for more details. The anthology is scheduled for publication in June 2011 and will be available in hardcover, ebook and trade editions. You can pre-order this book at http://indiebooksonline.com.
Aussie Author Month! Or, What DIMIA *should* have asked…
Last year, as many of you know, I became an Australian citizen. For five years I had to jump through all of Immigration’s hoops in order to prove I was fit to stay here: criminal background checks, character checks, interviews, blood tests, chest x-rays, mugshots… You name it. They’ve got copies of my mail, family photographs, passports. They’ve got statutory declarations from my bosses, my PhD supervisor, my friends. Honestly, I am so on the grid in this country, it’s not even funny. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Immigration has recordings of my weird sneezing habits (I sneeze a lot. Usually in series of 3, 5 or 7. I’m sure if you ask the folks at DIMIA they’ll play you the tapes – after you’ve filled out at least seven hundred forms, and paid a substantial fee.)
But after all the testing – including the multiple choice “Become an Australian Citizen” quiz I had to take last year to finalise the process – there is one thing those wily folks at 55 Currie Street neglected to ask me. And, frankly, this question should’ve weighed heavily on their list:
Who are some excellent Aussie authors?
(Take note, DIMIA. This question is so much more insightful than, “What is Australia’s official language?” or “In this country, do we vote by raising our hands?” How is that supposed to determine whether or not I’m suitable for citizenship?? Err, sorry. That’s a rant for another day.)
Ahem.
April is Aussie Author Month, a cross-genre collaboration that aims to support and promote Australian writing and raise funds for the Indigenous Literacy Foundation* (click here to make a donation to the ILF). It’s such a worthwhile cause, I wanted to be a part of it.
So, in honour of Aussie Author Month, I’m going to answer Immigration’s unasked question and gush a bit about some of the Australian authors that inspire me and make me proud to be among their company. (This isn’t a complete list; it’s an indicative one. I’m bound to add to it as soon as I click ‘publish’ on this post because that’s when I’ll realise I forgot this one and that one and, crap! That one too! Still, here goes.)
All-time fave:
- David Malouf, Complete Short Stories, Ransom, and An Imaginary Life. I love Malouf’s writing with a white hot passion. LOVE. I know I’ve just elicited a round of groans from everyone who was force-fed Fly Away Peter in high school. But I read Malouf by choice; I’d never heard of Malouf until I moved here (which is more a comment on my reading habits at the time than on Malouf’s international celebrity) but I have adored every word of his that I’ve read since. An Imaginary Life changed the way I think about characters – forever – and Ransom is so beautiful it made me sob. And his short stories are superb. Every single last one of them.
Yeah, it’s personal…
- This whole exercise is completely subjective, so it will come as no surprise that Angela Slatter appears on this list. Why try to hide it? Why shuffle her down to, say, #8 or #10, as though to pretend I am more blasé about her writing simply because she’s my dear friend? I mean, sure, we share a Brain and all. But the long and short of it is: her writing rocks. You should all know this by now. And if you don’t, then visit her website poste-haste. Get your hands on her stories. Experience the magic of her worlds, her lovely turns of phrase, her amazing characters all for yourselves. Go’on now: the list will wait.
- While I’m at it, let’s lay all the cards on the table. I’m a fan of Peter M. Ball’s short stories. Horn and Bleed are fantastic novellas, but for me Peter’s shorter pieces are precisely to my taste. Reading ‘On the Destruction of Copenhagen by the War Machines of the Merfolk’ or ‘Saturday Night, with Angel’, or ‘To Dream of Stars: An Astronomer’s Lament’ … Well, it’s like Pete crawled into my head; found exactly the type of prose I find appealing; the bizarre but also familiar settings; the poignant scenarios; and mashed all these elements up and turned them into stories that fill up my inner happiness metre.
Enchanting settings, memorable characters:
- Garth Nix’s Old Kingdom trilogy and Sean Williams’ Books of the Change have stuck with me over the years because I read them within the first year of moving to Australia. They encapsulate my experience of getting to know the landscape, the country, and the wild imaginations people have here! They were, and still are, so refreshingly different to many fantasy trilogies. The bells, the necromancers, the paperwings (to name but a few) in Nix’s series captivated my imagination to such an extent that I wrote about Abhorsen in my Honours thesis; and Sean’s setting! The desert, the sea, the elemental magic – it was South Australia as I want to envision it (and still do, years and years after I read these books!) And aren’t we lucky that these two have paired up to write a series together! Can’t wait to read it!
- Margo Lanagan – umm, everything she’s written. I have to read her short stories in small doses because they are so good I might OD with joy if I tried to read them all in one go. Tender Morsels deserves all the favourable attention it’s been getting – the World Fantasy Awards were designed for insanely wonderful writing like Margo’s.
Recent treats:
- John Harwood, The Séance (Victorian/Gothic ghost story; both chilling and lovely!)
- Eva Hornung, Dogboy (A reinterpretation of the ‘boy raised by wolves’ story, set in Russia; incredibly moving)
- Kirstyn McDermott, Madigan Mine (Supernatural/psychological thriller; such fine writing, and still so visceral at one stage I felt queasy – which, in my books, is a good thing. It’s a sign of how engaged I was in the tale; I couldn’t put it down, even when my blood phobia kicked in!)
- Trent Jamieson, Death Most Definite (Nicest protagonist you’ll have met in a while, plus Bonus! story with rollicking pace!)
- David Sornig, Spiel (Rosa Stumm is real. Rosa Stumm is a fake. Is it all a game? You decide. Some beautiful writing and an intriguing story.)
On the horizon:
There’s still sooooo much Aussie writing I want to read; soooooooo much of it is stacked on my bedside table! To name but a few that have tantalised me, taunted me, and which will be read:
- Jack Dann, The Memory Cathedral
- Tansy Rayner Roberts, Power and Majesty
- Kaaron Warren, Dead Sea Fruit (I’ve got the gorgeous hardcopy! Oooh how it wants to be read!)
- Lian Hearn, Blossoms and Shadows
- Lucy Sussex, My Lady Tongue & Other Tales (picked it up for a bargain a month ago…)
- Scott Westerfeld, Leviathan
- Justine Larbaliester (Um, need to read everything of hers!)
- Alan Baxter (ditto)
Such excellent authors, such excellent books — now all I need is an oubliette in which to hide and real them all!
*The Indigenous Literacy Project aims to raise literacy levels and improve the lives and opportunities of indigenous Australians living in remote communities. It supplies culturally appropriate books to over 200 remote communities across Australia, is trialing an early literacy project aimed at 0-2 year olds, translates books into local language and works hand in hand with remote communities on literacy projects. ILP was established in 2006 by educator and bookseller Suzy Wilson and is an initiative of the Australian Book Industry. It works in partnership with the support of many organisations including the Australian Publishers Association, the Australian Booksellers Association and the Australian Society of Authors.
Ditmar Awards
Yesterday I spent much of the day off the internet — out and about doing Saturday sorts of things, like errands and scribbling and trawling through bookshops — and when I finally logged on I had the great surprise of discovering that I’m nominated for *three* Ditmar Awards!!
Holy crow!
I’m so happy to find ‘The February Dragon’ on the list for Best Short Story — Angela and I had a great time writing this story, so it’s incredible to see that people are apparently enjoying it! And I’m also really stoked to be considered for Best New Talent! Again I say: holy crow! Talk about talent on this list … it’s so bizarre seeing my name up there with such amazing nominees. I feel so lucky!
The third nomination is lovely and also completely unexpected. People have had many positive things to say about the cover I designed for Angela Slatter’s The Girl With No Hands collection (it’s hard to go wrong when the basis for the design is an adapted Leon Bakst illustration! I mean, who doesn’t love a bit of 1930s Russian ballet?) and I’m delighted that the design seems to suit Angela’s wonderful stories. But I wouldn’t call myself an artist the way Shaun Tan is an artist! I designed this cover so that Angela’s unbelievable collection would, hopefully, have some beautiful and eye-catching packaging; anything else is a bonus! And, really, it’s not false modesty to say it’s lovely for this cover to be considered, but really doesn’t stand a chance in winning. I mean, it’s up against Shaun Tan, people. The man won an Oscar. ‘Nuff said.
The complete 2011 Ditmar Awards ballot goes a little something like this:
Best Novel
————————————————————————
* Death Most Definite, Trent Jamieson (Hachette)
* Madigan Mine, Kirstyn McDermott (Pan Macmillan)
* Power and Majesty, Tansy Rayner Roberts (Voyager)
* Stormlord Rising, Glenda Larke (Voyager)
* Walking the Tree, Kaaron Warren (Angry Robot Books)
Best Novella or Novelette
————————————————————————
* “Acception”, Tessa Kum (Eneit Press)
* “All the Clowns in Clowntown”, Andrew J. McKiernan (Brimstone Press)
* “Bleed”, Peter M. Ball (Twelfth Planet Press)
* “Her Gallant Needs”, Paul Haines (Twelfth Planet Press)
* “The Company Articles of Edward Teach”, Thoraiya Dyer (Twelfth Planet Press)
Best Short Story
————————————————————————
* “All the Love in the World”, Cat Sparks (Sprawl, Twelfth Planet Press)
* “Bread and Circuses”, Felicity Dowker (Scary Kisses, Ticonderoga Publications)
* “One Saturday Night With Angel”, Peter M. Ball (Sprawl, Twelfth Planet Press)
* “She Said”, Kirstyn McDermott (Scenes From the Second Storey, Morrigan Books)
* “The House of the Nameless”, Jason Fischer (Writers of the Future XXVI)
* “The February Dragon”, Angela Slatter and Lisa L. Hannett (Scary Kisses, Ticonderoga Publications)
Best Collected Work
————————————————————————
* Baggage, edited by Gillian Polack (Eneit Press)
* Macabre: A Journey through Australia’s Darkest Fears, edited by Angela Challis and Marty Young (Brimstone Press)
* Scenes from the Second Storey, edited by Amanda Pillar and Pete Kempshall (Morrigan Books)
* Sprawl, edited by Alisa Krasnostein (Twelfth Planet Press)
* Worlds Next Door, edited by Tehani Wessely (FableCroft Publishing)
Best Artwork
————————————————————————
* Cover art, The Angaelien Apocalypse/The Company Articles of Edward Teach (Twelfth Planet Press), Dion Hamill
* Cover art, Australis Imaginarium (FableCroft Publishing), Shaun Tan
* Cover art, Dead Sea Fruit (Ticonderoga Publications), Olga Read
* Cover art, The Girl With No Hands (Ticonderoga Publications), Lisa L. Hannett
* “The Lost Thing” short film (Passion Pictures), Andrew Ruhemann and Shaun Tan
Best Fan Writer
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* Robert Hood, for Undead Backbrain
* Chuck McKenzie, for work in Horrorscope
* Alexandra Pierce, for body of work including reviews at Australian Speculative Fiction in Focus
* Tehani Wessely, for body of work including reviews at Australian Speculative Fiction in Focus
Best Fan Artist
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* Rachel Holkner, for Continuum 6 props
* Dick Jenssen, for cover art of Interstellar Ramjet Scoop
* Amanda Rainey, for Swancon 36 logo
Best Fan Publication in Any Medium
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* Australian Speculative Fiction in Focus, edited by Alisa Krasnostein et al.
* Bad Film Diaries podcast, Grant Watson
* Galactic Suburbia podcast, Alisa Krasnostein, Tansy Rayner Roberts, and Alex Pierce
* Terra Incognita podcast, Keith Stevenson
* The Coode Street podcast, Gary K. Wolfe and Jonathan Strahan
* The Writer and the Critic podcast, Kirstyn McDermott and Ian Mond
Best Achievement
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* Helen Merrick and Andrew Milner, Academic Stream for Aussiecon 4
* Amanda Rainey, cover design for Scary Kisses
* Kyla Ward, Horror Stream and The Nightmare Ball for Aussiecon 4
* Grant Watson and Sue Ann Barber, Media Stream for Aussiecon4
* Alisa Krasnostein, Kathryn Linge, Rachel Holkner, Alexandra Pierce, Tansy Rayner Roberts, and Tehani Wessely, Snapshot 2010
Best New Talent
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* Thoraiya Dyer
* Lisa L. Hannett
* Patty Jansen
* Kathleen Jennings
* Pete Kempshall
William Atheling Jr Award for Criticism or Review
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* Leigh Blackmore, for Marvels and Horrors: Terry Dowling’s Clowns at Midnight
* Damien Broderick, for editing Skiffy and Mimesis: More Best of Australian Science Fiction Review
* Ross Murray, for The Australian Dream Becomes Nightmare
* Tansy Rayner Roberts, for A Modern Woman’s Guide to Classic Who
The official ballot paper, including postal address information, may be downloaded as a PDF format file from: http://ditmars.sf.org.au/2011/2011_Ditmar_Ballot.pdf
Votes can be sent via email to: ditmars@sf.org.au
Online voting is available at: http://ditmars.sf.org.au/2011
Huge congrats to all nominees! See you all at Swancon!
Aurealis Awards Finalists Announced!
The 2010 Aurealis Awards have just been announced and I’m so excited to see so many incredible finalists in each category!! HUGE congratulations to all the nominees — I have enjoyed so many of the stories and novels on these lists, it’s such a delight to see them recognised.
And of course I’m stoked to see that ‘The February Dragon’, which Angela and I wrote together for Scary Kisses, has been given the nod for Best Fantasy Short Story!*squeeeeeeee!*
Without further ado…
2010 Aurealis Awards – Finalists
CHILDREN’S FICTION (told primarily through words)
Grimsdon, Deborah Abela, Random House
Ranger’s Apprentice #9: Halt’s Peril, John Flanagan, Random House
The Vulture of Sommerset, Stephen M Giles, Pan Macmillan
The Keepers, Lian Tanner, Allen & Unwin
Haggis MacGregor and the Night of the Skull, Jen Storer & Gug Gordon, Aussie Nibbles (Penguin)
CHILDREN’S FICTION (told primarily through pictures)
Night School, Isobelle Carmody (writer) & Anne Spudvilas (illustrator), Penguin Viking
Magpie, Luke Davies (writer) & Inari Kiuru (illustrator), ABC Books (HarperCollins)
The Boy and the Toy, Sonya Hartnett (writer) & Lucia Masciullo (illustrator), Penguin Viking
Precious Little, Julie Hunt & Sue Moss (writers) & Gaye Chapman (illustrator), Allen & Unwin
The Cloudchasers, David Richardson (writer) & Steven Hunt (illustrator), ABC Books (HarperCollins)
YOUNG ADULT Short Story
Inksucker, Aidan Doyle, Worlds Next Door, Fablecroft Publishing
One Story, No Refunds, Dirk Flinthart, Shiny #6, Twelfth Planet Press
A Thousand Flowers, Margo Lanagan, Zombies Vs Unicorns, Allen & Unwin
Nine Times, Kaia Landelius & Tansy Rayner Roberts, Worlds Next Door, Fablecroft Publishing
An Ordinary Boy, Jen White, The Tangled Bank, Tangled Bank Press
YOUNG ADULT Novel
Merrow, Ananda Braxton-Smith, black dog books
Guardian of the Dead, Karen Healey, Allen & Unwin
The Midnight Zoo, Sonya Hartnett, Penguin
The Life of a Teenage Body-Snatcher, Doug MacLeod, Penguin
Behemoth (Leviathan Trilogy Book Two), Scott Westerfeld, Penguin
BEST ILLUSTRATED BOOK/ GRAPHIC NOVEL
Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Nicki Greenberg, Allen & Unwin
EEEK!: Weird Australian Tales of Suspense, Jason Paulos et al, Black House Comics
Changing Ways Book 1, Justin Randall, Gestalt Publishing
Five Wounds: An Illustrated Novel, Jonathan Walker & Dan Hallett, Allen & Unwin
Horrors: Great Stories of Fear and Their Creators, Rocky Wood & Glenn Chadbourne, McFarlane & Co.
BEST COLLECTION
The Library of Forgotten Books, Rjurik Davidson, PS Publishing
Under Stones, Bob Franklin, Affirm Press
Sourdough and Other Stories, Angela Slatter, Tartarus Press
The Girl With No Hands, Angela Slatter, Ticonderoga Publications
Dead Sea Fruit, Kaaron Warren, Ticonderoga Publications
BEST ANTHOLOGY
Macabre: A Journey Through Australia’s Darkest Fears, edited by Angela Challis & Dr Marty Young, Brimstone Press
Sprawl, edited by Alisa Krasnostein, Twelfth Planet Press
Scenes from the Second Storey, edited by Amanda Pillar & Pete Kempshall, Morrigan Books
Godlike Machines, edited by Jonathan Strahan, SF Book Club
Wings of Fire, edited by Jonathan Strahan & Marianne S. Jablon, Night Shade Books
HORROR Short Story
Take the Free Tour, Bob Franklin, Under Stones, Affirm Press
Her Gallant Needs, Paul Haines, Sprawl, Twelfth Planet Press
The Fear, Richard Harland, Macabre: A Journey Through Australia’s Darkest Fears, Brimstone Press
Wasting Matilda, Robert Hood, Zombie Apocalypse!, Constable & Robinson Ltd
Lollo, Martin Livings, Close Encounters of the Urban Kind, Apex Publishing
HORROR Novel
After the World: Gravesend, Jason Fischer, Black House Comics
Death Most Definite, Trent Jamieson, Orbit (Hachette)
Madigan Mine, Kirstyn McDermott, Pan Macmillan
FANTASY Short Story
The Duke of Vertumn’s Fingerling, Elizabeth Carroll, Strange Horizons
Yowie, Thoraiya Dyer, Sprawl, Twelfth Planet Press
The February Dragon, LL Hannett & Angela Slatter, Scary Kisses, Ticonderoga Publications
All the Clowns in Clowntown, Andrew McKiernan, Macabre: A Journey Through Australia’s Darkest Fears, Brimstone Press
Sister, Sister, Angela Slatter, Strange Tales III, Tartarus Press
FANTASY Novel
The Silence of Medair, Andrea K Höst, self-published
Death Most Definite, Trent Jamieson, Orbit (Hachette)
Stormlord Rising, Glenda Larke, HarperVoyager (HarperCollins)
Heart’s Blood, Juliet Marillier, Pan Macmillan
Power and Majesty, Tansy Rayner Roberts, HarperVoyager (HarperCollins)
SCIENCE FICTION Short Story
The Heart of a Mouse, K.J. Bishop, Subterranean Online (Winter 2010)
The Angaelian Apocalypse, Matthew Chrulew, The Company Articles Of Edward Teach/The Angaelian Apocalypse, Twelfth Planet Press
Border Crossing, Penelope Love, Belong, Ticonderoga Publications
Interloper, Ian McHugh, Asimovs (Jan 2011)
Relentless Adaptations, Tansy Rayner Roberts, Sprawl, Twelfth Planet Press
SCIENCE FICTION Novel
Song of Scarabaeous, Sara Creasy, EOS Books
Mirror Space, Marianne de Pierres, Orbit (Hachette)
Transformation Space, Marianne de Pierres, Orbit (Hachette)
Winners of the 2010 Aurealis Awards and the Peter McNamara Award will be announced at the ceremony (sponsored by Harper Voyager), on Saturday the 21st of May. Details for the event can be found at www. aurealisawards.com.
See you there!
