Read some Hound

Thu 3 Sep 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 2 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

Just added the first two chapters of Hound to the site — the book has a great first line:

Death was, after all, the way Henry made his living.

And the rest is pretty good, too.

Publication day is 9/29 and events are being added: Sunday October 25th at the Mysterious Bookshop in NYC (which will be a big event, more info TK on that) and also that month at RiverRun up in New Hampshire.

You can check out all we have to read on the site in a couple of different categories: everything, novel excerpts,  short stories, and, er, the thus far empty container, reviews (those still have to be portaged over from the old site). And we’ll be adding more as time goes by. But in the meantime, Hound!


Uncle Wes’s new book

Sun 30 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , | 6 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

Kelly’s Uncle Wes, who long-time LCRW readers may remember as the author of an oatmeal cookie recipe a while back, just had has his first book published and even though it’s full of great stories it’s in a very different section of the bookstore than Kelly’s books!

Wes’s book is Cure Constipation Now: A Doctor’s Fiber Therapy to Cleanse and Heal (for Kelly this sort of like a real-life version of Mark Leyner’s My Cousin, My Gastroenterologist) and it just came out in paperback from Berkley. I’m very glad they chose to use a typographical cover instead of something illustrative.

Dr. Wesley Jones, to give him his full title, believes most people in the USA (and Western world) eat too much refined food and need more fiber. Here’s his bio:

He is the founder and senior partner of the Cape Fear Center for Digestive Diseases in Pennsylvania. He is chair of Curamericas Global, Inc., which provides healthcare to Central America, South America, and west African communities. He was awarded the FACP and AGAF awards for his work in the field.

Read more


Hounding around

Mon 24 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Hounding around | Posted by: Gavin

Having trouble posting the final cover of Vincent McCaffrey’s debut novel, Hound, which is at the printer now. Dur. Will do it later. In the meantime, Vince will be getting out from Avenue Victor Hugo Books for a couple of readings soon. A few more may yet be lined up as this bookselling mystery gets more and more love from the bookselling brethren. Stop in and say hi here:

* Also at the NEIBA author reception:

Amir Aczel, Uranium Wars, Palgrave Macmillan
Michael Buckley, Nerds, Abrams
Crispina ffrench, Sweater Chop Shop, Storey
Ethan Gilsdorf, Fantasy Freaks And Gaming Geeks, The Lyons Press
Joe Hill, Horns, Harper
Katherine Howe, Physick Book of Deliverance Dane, Hyperion
Maryalice Huggins, Aesop’s Mirror, Farrar, Straus and Giroux
E. Lockhart, The Treasure Map Of Boys, Delacorte
Loren Long, Otis, Philomel
C. Marina Marchese, Honeybee, Black Dog and Leventhal
Peter McCarty, Jeremy Draws a Monster, Macmillan
Jill McCorkle, Going Away Shoes, Algonquin Books
Louise Penny, The Brutal Telling, St. Martins


Videos, Ask, masquerading

Wed 19 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on Videos, Ask, masquerading | Posted by: Gavin

Remember those videos we posted with Alan DeNiro* and Elizabeth Hand? If you missed them before now you can catch them to IndieBound. Here’s Alan’s interview and Liz’s.

IndieBound is working the social web more and more. They have a new feature on Twitter:

Ask Indie Booksellers on Twitter anything you want to know! Go to AskIndies and the #AskIndies hashtag and a link to your book will be added for you automatically.”

* Alan’s first novel, Total Oblivion, More or Less, is out coming out later this year and it’s a mind-blowing experience. In some way it’s part of the whole post-apocalyptic group of books which sometimes seems like an admission that the author can’t imagine the future and has written a pre-historical novel masquerading as a post-historical novel; except this way they don’t have to research the past, either. But with Total Oblivion, while the past has invaded the present, this is in no way the past: it’s a lightly-outlined changed world where a teenage girl and her family embark on one of the ur-American stories: a trip down the Mississippi. More on it later — and it has a great cover which isn’t showing there yet — but add it to your wishlist now.


Boston apartment

Mon 17 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | 5 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

Ursula at homeKelly and I are looking for an apartment in Boston and we’re throwing it out here in case anyone knows anyone who knows anyone who can help. We have a couple of very specific criteria:

  • must have air conditioning
  • must be on the ground floor or have an elevator
  • wood floors
  • 2 bedrooms (can be tiny as long as living room is big)

We are looking to move in on September 1st and expect to be here for a year or two.

Our dream neighborhoods are Coolidge Corner, Fenway, and Jamaica Plain, but mostly it is important to be near or nearish to Children’s Hospital. (Small Beer Press will stay in Easthampton, though.)

We’re looking on Craigslist and are wandering around but, hey, aren’t questions like this what the internet is best at? Thanks for any help you can give!


Geektastic Rift in Wrong Grave shows Troll’s Eye View?

Thu 13 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | 1 Comment | Posted by: Gavin

Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd Cover

Kelly’s latest story, “Secret Identity,” can be found in Holly Black and Cecil Castellucci’s excellent new anthology Geektastic: Stories from the Nerd Herd. For bonus points, see if you can spot Kelly (and some of the other writers) on the cover.

There’s nothing else coming out for a bit, but there are a lot of single stories floating around. Previous to Geektastic, “The Cinderella Game” came out this spring in Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling’s Troll’s Eye View: A Book of Villainous Tales—which was just picked as a read of the month, or some such thing, on Salon.

A couple of other stories just came out in paperback: “The Wrong Grave” in Deborah Noyes’s The Restless Dead, “The Surfer” in Jonathan Strahan’s The Starry Rift, and “Louise’s Ghost” in Peter Straub’s Poe’s Children. In hardcover “Stone Animals” is in another Peter Straub anthology, the fantastic looking 2-volume Library of America irresistible American Fantastic Tales: Terror and the Uncanny from the 1940’s Until Now, which comes out in September and looks ripe to be the Halloween present of the season.

Over in the UK, Canongate have a different idea of the perfect Halloween read: they are buying UK rights to Pretty Monsters and will publish it in paperback on October 15, just in time for those who might want to read “Monster” or “The Wrong Grave” on the scariest night of the year. Canongate put out some really wonderful books — such as Ali Smith’s Boy Meets Girl and (maybe, not read it yet) Michel Faber’s The Fire Gospel —  and Kelly is thrilled. Yay! Some readers no doubt read the US edition (which won’t be out in paperback until June 2010) but for a lot of readers this will be the first time they’ve seen the excellent cover to the right there.

Francis Bickmore, senior editor at Canongate, has acquired UK rights to Link’s Pretty Monsters for an undisclosed sum…. Bickmore said: “I’m over the moon that we have lured the maverick literary genius that is Kelly Link to our list, just in time for Hallowe’en. She is one of the best kept secrets of modern writing.”

Also in the UK, a little while ago Sarah Waters had a piece in the Graniaud about ghosts and writing her latest novel and gave us a thrill by including one of Kelly’s stories in her list of ten best ghost stories — along with some of Kelly’s own favorite ghost stories, “The Woman in Black,” “The Haunting of Hill House,” “The Monkey’s Paw,” “The Yellow Wallpaper,” and so on.

“The Specialist’s Hat” by Kelly Link
All of Link’s stories are wonderfully odd and original. Some are also quite scary – and this, from her collection Stranger Things Happen, is very scary indeed. It’s the story of 10-year-old twin girls in a haunted American mansion, being instructed by an enigmatic babysitter just what it means to be “dead”.

Meanwhile in Australia, Text are splitting Pretty Monsters into 2 paperbacks and we just got copies of the first one, The Wrong Grave, and it is beautiful. The cover is marbled with silhouettes of crows and beetles and a stag — and they are carried over into the front matter. The second volume comes out later. It’s very exciting to think that it will be piled up in some of the great bookshops we visited in 2006 when Kelly taught at Clarion South: Pulp Fiction and Infinitas in Brisbane and Galaxy in Sydney.

Troll's Eye View: A Book of Villainous Tales Cover

The Restless Dead: Ten Original Stories of the Supernatural Cover

The Starry Rift Cover

American Fantastic Tales: Terror and the Uncanny from the 1940's Until Now Cover


Bearfest

Sun 9 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Bearfest | Posted by: Gavin

Easthampton Bear FestEasthampton is having an artbear invasion and it is really cheery to look down from the 11.05 morning zeppelin ride into the office (can’t quite get there for elevensies) and see all the people taking their pictures, reading the signs, sitting on their knees, and so on. They’re really well done—although don’t think we will get one for the office at the auction. Who’d a thunk they’d be so popular?


One day one day

Wed 5 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on One day one day | Posted by: Gavin

Gillian Welch performs at the Newport Folk Festival.Gillian Welch will release another CD and we will get the drinks in and crank up the music player (pre-apocalyse: some kind of electronic music machine; post-apocalypse: add some time for winding up the Victrola).

Until that long awaited day—and, hey, Gillian, if records and CDs and so on are no longer your thing, no worries!—NPR have posted a recording of her set at the Newport Folk Festival. No cover of “Black Star” this time, but enough to keep us happy. Besides, at the other end of the spectrum, the cover of “White Rabbit” is pretty decent.

Also available on that site: a whole lot of good stuff (surrounded by many so-so’s. No doubt YMMV).

Neko Case, aw. Also: Mavis Staples, Iron and Wine, Sonic Youth, Metric, many more.


Award Season: World Fantasy nominees

Tue 4 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , , , , | 1 Comment | Posted by: Gavin

Kessel, Baum PlanHey, lovely news today from the World Fantasy Award people. John Kessel’s terrific mashup “Pride and Prometheus” from the January 2008 issue of F&SF and reprinted in his collection, The Baum Plan, picked up another award nomination, as did the last volume of The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror, and Kelly & Gavin were nominated for Small Beer & Big Mouth (what a pairing!).

Congratulations to all the nominees! It is an honor to be nominated. Before posting the whole list, here’s a quick gender breakdown to follow up on previous award posts:

  • 26 men
  • 21 women

Novel
The House of the Stag, Kage Baker (Tor)
The Shadow Year, Jeffrey Ford (Morrow)
The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman (HarperCollins; Bloomsbury)
Pandemonium, Daryl Gregory (Del Rey)
Tender Morsels, Margo Lanagan (Allen & Unwin; Knopf)

Novella
“Uncle Chaim and Aunt Rifke and the Angel”, Peter S. Beagle (Strange Roads)
“If Angels Fight”, Richard Bowes (F&SF 2/08)
“The Overseer”, Albert Cowdrey (F&SF 3/08)
“Odd and the Frost Giants”, Neil Gaiman (Bloomsbury; HarperCollins)
“Good Boy”, Nisi Shawl (Filter House)

Short Story
“Caverns of Mystery”, Kage Baker (Subterranean: Tales of Dark Fantasy)
“26 Monkeys, Also the Abyss”, Kij Johnson (Asimov’s 7/08)
“Pride and Prometheus”, John Kessel (F&SF 1/08)
“Our Man in the Sudan”, Sarah Pinborough (The Second Humdrumming Book of Horror Stories)
“A Buyer’s Guide to Maps of Antarctica”, Catherynne M. Valente (Clarkesworld 5/08)

Anthology
The Living Dead, John Joseph Adams, ed. (Night Shade Books)
The Del Rey Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy, Ellen Datlow, ed. (Del Rey)
The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror 2008: Twenty-First Annual Collection, Ellen Datlow, Kelly Link, & Gavin J. Grant, eds. (St. Martin’s)
Paper Cities: An Anthology of Urban Fantasy, Ekaterina Sedia, ed. (Senses Five Press)
Steampunk, Ann & Jeff VanderMeer, eds. (Tachyon Publications)

Pretty MonstersCollection
Strange Roads, Peter S. Beagle (DreamHaven Books)
The Drowned Life, Jeffrey Ford (HarperPerennial)
Pretty Monsters, Kelly Link (Viking)
Filter House, Nisi Shawl (Aqueduct Press)
Tales from Outer Suburbia, Shaun Tan (Allen & Unwin; Scholastic ’09)

Artist
Kinuko Y. Craft
Janet Chui
Stephan Martinière
John Picacio
Shaun Tan

Special Award—Professional
Kelly Link & Gavin J. Grant (for Small Beer Press and Big Mouth House)
Farah Mendlesohn (for The Rhetorics of Fantasy)
Stephen H. Segal & Ann VanderMeer (for Weird Tales)
Jerad Walters (for A Lovecraft Retrospective: Artists Inspired by H.P. Lovecraft)
Jacob Weisman (for Tachyon Publications)

Special Award—Non-professional
Edith L. Crowe (for her work with The Mythopoeic Society)
John Klima (for Electric Velocipede)
Elise Matthesen (for setting out to inspire and for serving as inspiration for works of poetry, fantasy, and SF over the last decade through her jewelry-making and her “artist’s challenges.”)
Sean Wallace, Neil Clarke, & Nick Mamatas (for Clarkesworld)
Michael Walsh (for Howard Waldrop collections from Old Earth Books)


LCRW & Chuao Special

Tue 4 Aug 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 4 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

LCRW 24We just mailed out the last of the subscriber‘s copies of LCRW 24 (thanks to the amazing intern team of: Michael, Paul, Felice, Kristen, and Abram!) and subscribers did not in fact get the Spicy Maya bar we promised: instead we sent out the Firecracker because it is at once fantastic and also weird and wonderful. It’s a dark chocolate bar with chipotle (mm), salt (mmm), and popping candy. What?! Yes. Feeling the popping candy go off in the middle of the deep dark chocolate is like eating the stars at night.

We have one bar left then new subscribers will get something else. And sharp-eyed readers will note that in the pic to the right there is a coupon from Chuao Chocolatiers especially for LCRW subscribers for 20% off online purchases: LCRW and the unexpected extra chocolatey goodness bonus! We recommend moving phasers to Stock Up.


Michael wants to provoke you

Thu 30 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 2 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

Go read this great angry rant by Michael about the choices we all make every day, their ramifications, and the importance of reconsidering them every so often. What’s your footprint? The starving musk oxen of today are the abandoned water-starved cities of tomorrow:

You’ve probably heard by now about the Bush Administration covering up evidence of melting icecaps.

20,000 musk oxen starved to death in the arctic because of a phenomenon called a “rain on snow event”. Rain falls on snow, turns to ice. Oxen come by and try to dig with their hooves for the grass under the snow. But they can’t break the ice. So they die.

…

Learn the rules of recycling in your town, and follow them, for real, all the time. If you work in a different town than you live in, learn those rules too. Hassle your co-workers about it. If they see you picking their plastic and aluminum out of the trash enough times, they’ll quit throwing it away out of guilt. I’ve seen it happen. No, you should not feel guilty for making other people feel guilty. Guilt is the only thing that’s going to get anybody to change.

Then check out one of Michael’s takes on the future post-collapse: take a trip down the river in  “Starlings” on Abyss and Apex.


The Hortlak, part 2

Thu 30 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | Comments Off on The Hortlak, part 2 | Posted by: Gavin

Frank Marcopolis completes his podcast of Kelly Link’s story “The Hortlak.”

Here’s Part 1.

If you like the free audio stories, check out Frank’s site. He’s podcasting some of his own stuff as well as Edgar Allan Poe, Mark Twain, Charles Dickens, and others.


Following Ray

Wed 29 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 3 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

Ray Vukcevich, Meet Me in the Moon RoomI emailed Ray Vukcevich recently about another of his stories from Meet Me in the Moon Room selling to a Japanese magazine (“No Comet” will be either the third or fourth, can’t remember) and he mentioned that he’d just had a story published on Smokelong Quarterly (don’t like the name). His story, “A Funny Smell,” is a short blast of displacement, philosophy, faith, and laughs—a typical Vukcevichian moment—and there’s an interview to go with it.

The ToC at the bottom of the page (smart design!) listed a Dan Chaon story, “The Hobblers,” and Dan’s always worth reading so I read that—the time dilation and emotional weight was a little similar in effect to some of Ray’s stories—and then the interview with Dan.

Await Your Reply CoverSince I’d read a couple of stories by two guys I knew I thought I should try some people I didn’t, so I skimmed through a few and liked “Me and Theodore Are Trapped in the Trunk of the Car with Rags in Our Mouths and Tape Around Our Wrists and Ankles, Please Let Us Out” by Mary Hamilton which has a brilliant opening, “I built a bridge and named it Samuel.”, and continues in a mad rush that works and “Rats” by Z. Z. Boone (spoiler: the rats don’t make it).

Then I went back to Dan’s interview which mentions he has a new novel out this September (Await Your Reply) and I would be remiss not to point out here that there is a sort of tuckerization in there that will jump out to people that us and make them laugh.

Lies Will Take You Somewhere CoverIn his interview, though, there’s a link to an essay published on The Rumpus, “What Happened to Sheila.” Which is heartbreaking and should be read. And there there’s a link to Sheila Schwartz’s novel Lies Will Take You Somewhere which came out in April from Etruscan Press and which PW called “a strong debut novel.”

For a taste of Sheila’s work I followed the link (still on Rumpus) to a story by her, “Three Cancer Patients Walk Into a Bar” which is tough and wickedly smart. Sheila’s writing is an acquired taste but it’s good, strong stuff and I recommend you give it a shot.


something from next winter

Tue 28 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | Comments Off on something from next winter | Posted by: Gavin

Here’s something fun: an early shot of the front cover of Holly Black‘s creepy and wonderful first short story collection The Poison Eaters and Other Stories which Big Mouth House will publish in February 2010:

And here’s the table of contents with the place of first publication in (parenthesis):

“The Coldest Girl in Coldtown” (Eternal Kiss)
“A Reversal of Fortune” (The Coyote Road)
“The Boy Who Cried Wolf” (Troll’s Eye View)
“The Night Market” (The Faery Reel)
“The Dog King”
“Virgin” (Magic in the Mirrorstone)
“In Vodka Veritas” (21 Proms)
“Coat of Stars” (So Fey)
“Paper Cuts Scissors” (Realms of Fantasy)
“Going Ironside” (Endicott Journal)
“The Poison Eaters” (The Restless Dead)
+ one more story.


Sara @ Bookcourt

Tue 28 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , | Comments Off on Sara @ Bookcourt | Posted by: Gavin

The Times just did a piece on the history of Bookcourt in Brooklyn, a great place where we had Carol Emshwiller and others read, including a slideshow of the family’s apartments above the bookshop — not enough books! But then, they have a store full of them.

One of our long-time volunteers, Sara Majka, recently read there on at the launch party for the latest issue of A Public Space and you can see her, Samantha Hunt, and editor Brigid Hughes in this taping of the evening:


How did 100,000,000 women disappear?

Mon 27 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on How did 100,000,000 women disappear? | Posted by: Gavin

From The Star:

How did 100,000,000 women disappear?Two researchers crunching population statistics have confirmed an unsettling reality. Siwan Anderson and Debraj Ray noticed the ratio of women to men in developing regions and in some cultures is suspiciously below the norm

In India, China and sub-Saharan Africa, millions upon millions of women are missing. They are not lost, but dead: victims of violence, discrimination and neglect.

Even if you think you know this story it’s worth reading.


Matt maps the everywhere

Thu 23 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 1 Comment | Posted by: Gavin

InterfictionsLast week Matt Cheney posted an mp3 of his reading of his story, “A Map of the Everywhere,” which was published in the first Interstitial Arts Foundation anthology, Interfictions. Check, one-two-three. Check, one-two-three. You are good to go:

I’ve been meaning for a while to record a reading of my story “A Map of the Everywhere”, first published in Interfictions, because when I’ve done a reading of the story, the response has often been somewhat different from the response to the text on the page — many people have told me they hadn’t realized the story was humorous until I read it aloud. Here, then, is an mp3 of me reading the story. It’s not particularly high quality — the microphone I have is one step up from something in a Cracker Jack box. I’m also a better reader with an audience. And there are some glitches in the first minute or two. But for what it’s worth, here is “A Map of the Everywhere“.


Keep it green, chum

Wed 22 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 3 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

From The Regulator, another great bookshop in North Carolina:


Ursula at home

Tue 21 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | 19 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

Ursula, born Feb. 23, 2009, arrived home toUrsula at homeday. Yay!


The Serial Garden and the copyright office

Fri 17 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on The Serial Garden and the copyright office | Posted by: Gavin

Joan AIken, The Serial GardenJust had a fun (seriously) couple of phone calls with the Copyright Office about Joan Aiken’s The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories. The question was about who had compiled the collection, which was, happily, easily answered, as Joan herself had put the book together before she died. Which means, of course, that the in-house editing job was much easier than otherwise—and thanks to Joan’s estate’s agent, Charles Schlessiger, getting the stories was almost easy, too.

The copyright is owned by Joan’s children but the copyright to the whole book isn’t theirs, as there is an introduction by Garth Nix and illustrations by Andi Watson. Who knew that they would tweeze thigns apart so finely?

This seems as good a time as any to mention that Joan’s fans should pick up a copy of the May/June issue of The Horn Book as there is a piece worth reading by Lizza Aiken about her mother, Joan.


LCRW and the spice

Fri 17 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 6 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

Spicy Maya Bar SetThe new issue of LCRW is about to go out and we are last-minute getting the chocolate in (in summer we can’t keep it around here because 1) Gavin will eat it and 2) it will melt). So we’re ordering a bunch of chocolate and this time round we are getting in the even better stuff. Last time we asked if anyone minded a low-price (er, cheap) bar that time so that we could go great this time. The readership said Sure! and we sent out IKEA Food dark chocolate bars! So this time we’re taking the savings from that time (and any subscribers since then are just lucky!) and ordering Chuao Chocolatier‘s Spicy Maya Bar. This is one fantastic chocolate bar which we’ve only tried a couple of times: it’s more of a birthday present than an everyday bar.

So, anyway, if you want to subscribe to LCRW and get a chocolate bar each time, now is maybe the best time ever to do it. We’re going to order something like 100 bars (hope the delivery person isn’t a chocolate fiend) and once they’re sent out (and once we’ve tried a few around here) that’s it with the Over The Top excellentness and it will be back to the regular goodness.


First Hound review

Wed 15 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on First Hound review | Posted by: Gavin

Publishers Weekly gives Vincent McCaffrey’s debut novel a good review. We’re having fun getting this out to readers and we have a lovely pulpy cover in the offing:

Hound Vincent McCaffrey. Small Beer (Consortium, dist.), $24 (280p) ISBN 978-1-931520-59-1
McCaffrey, the owner of Boston’s legendary Avenue Victor Hugo Bookshop, succeeds in conveying his love of books in his intriguing debut. Boston bibliophile Henry Sullivan, who leads a lonely life in pursuit of rare books, attracts police attention after the strangulation murder of Morgan Johnson, the widow of a renowned literary agent—and Sullivan’s former lover. Not long before, Morgan retained Sullivan to appraise her late husband’s book collection that she was planning to donate to Boston University. Johnson’s husband’s relatives, each with a financial motive to have done her in, make up the small circle of logical suspects. Meanwhile, the reappearance of an old girlfriend forces Sullivan to consider another missed opportunity at happiness. Indeed, the crime-solving remains secondary to the author’s sensitive portrayal of his middle-aged protagonist’s search for meaning, suggesting this novel could’ve worked as well as straight fiction without the whodunit plot. (Sept.)


Charles Brown

Wed 15 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | 1 Comment | Posted by: Gavin

It has been a long sad couple of days since hearing that Charles Brown had died on the way home from Readercon. Part of that sadness and grief is selfishness: Charles was a character worth knowing and for family reasons we could not go to Readercon this year so we missed our last chance to see him.

Kelly says she fell in love with Charles when she discovered he had put out a Georgette Heyer fanzine. It was probably that that persuaded her to accept Charles’s offer of 2 Hugo Awards for one of her Nebulas. Charles had more Hugos than we’d ever seen in one place but he didn’t have any Nebulas. Suffice to say at some point a box arrived at our house and now we have 2 Locus Hugos and somewhere in the Locus HQ is one of Kelly’s Nebulas.

Charles wasn’t the easiest person to get to know but one of his best qualities was his continued openness what was happening in his sphere of interest. On first meeting, and second and third, he was a odd, gruff, cold, and a bit terrifying. This was a guy who read books by our favorite writers before their editors read them. But he was interested in what we were doing with LCRW and Small Beer and that meant at some point we gained a seat at some of those endless convention tables: eating with Charles and co. was always at the very least fascinating. That continued openness meant that Charles and Locus never stagnated. He wasn’t skipping from new thing to new thing, but he was open to reading and writing about the YA explosion, urban fantasy, and other aspects of his beloved field that achieved new prominence.

A couple of years ago Kelly and I spent the night on the Murphy bed in (beside?) the Locus library. Although before sleeping we spent a long time cranking the shelves back and forward and being awed at the collection, pristine, of course, and the dedications within the books. Going to the Locus house was like going to a tiny museum and being led around it by Charles was always great fun.

In talking to Amelia at Locus she said that his death was a shock but not a surprise which captures it completely for me. He looked terrible over the past couple of years but then, he’d looked terrible over the last couple of years, so we figured he would keep on going for a while yet. Charles tried to be a curmudgeon but his joy in life kept overcoming his curmudgeonliness. It was great fun to eat and drink and talk with Charles whether it was at a fancy restaurant or at a “Locus suite” at a convention.

I love the picture of him that Locus posted and have ganked it for this. He will be missed and we will raise a toast to Charles and what he accomplished whenever we meet friends who miss him too.


Read the new LCRW before it gets printed

Fri 10 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | 2 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

LCRW 24 cover by Matthew Kirby

Current Issue: Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet Number 24

Current location: at the printer.

Current availability: paper edition will mail out next week to subscribers and bookstores. However, the DRM-free PDF ebook is available now.

Additionally: we’ve dropped the price of the LCRW ebook to $4 from this issue on and also for the back issues (more of which should be available later this month). The price has been changed at Fictionwise, too, although that may take a little while to percolate through the system.

US/Canada $5 International $8 Ebook $4

And what’s in this death and radishes issue? Familiar and unfamiliar names! A lack of radishes. A comic by Abby Denson.

As ever one of the aspects we are most pleased about is the number of authors we were previously unfamiliar with. We aren’t the fastest readers out there, but we read everything we’re sent and are regularly delighted to be able to bring new authors to the fore:

Fiction

Alexander Lamb, “Eleven Orchid Street”
Liz Williams, “Dusking”
Jasmine Hammer, “Tornado Juice”
J. W. M. Morgan, “Superfather”
Dicky Murphy, “The Magician’s Umbrella”
Alissa Nutting, “Leave the Dead to the Living”
Eve Tushnet, “A Story Like Mine”
Dennis Danvers, “The Broken Dream Factory”
Anya Groner, “The Magician’s Keeper”

Nonfiction

Gwenda Bond, “Dear Aunt Gwenda”

Poetry

Neile Graham, “Machrie Moore”
Marina Rubin, “Bordeaux, And Other Mysteries”

Comics

Abby Denson, “Heady’s Crush”

Cover

Matthew Kirby


Mystery Contest Winners

Wed 8 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Mystery Contest Winners | Posted by: Gavin

We are pleased to announce after, oh, a brief delay, the winners of the The Manual of Detection Mystery Contest we instigated some time back. Many fine mysteries were submitted, and we’d like to coat each of them in gold and jewels and stage heists around them, but we promised only five winners, each of whom will receive a signed copy of Jedediah Berry’s novel. Here are answers to the mysteries they posed:

Sue asked: Every time I take the subway, I always notice a cluster of pigeons hanging around. However, all of these pigeons are fully grown. Whatever happen to the baby pigeons? Why don’t we or I see them anywhere? Does the pigeon self replicate? Or is the answer to my question so mundane that my brain cannot grasp it?

All pigeons send their children away to act on soap operas. How else to explain the phenomenon described by Marta, below?

Marsha: Are there more teapots or people?

If we knew the answer to that question, we would have retired by now. Why do you taunt us?

Kaethe: Why did my grandfather carefully pull back his suit coat before he shot himself in the heart through his vest and shirt?

Because he was a gentleman, and because he was carrying the gun in the inner pocket of his coat.

Marta: When soap opera children go upstairs and come back down in a month and they are adults….WHAT HAPPENS UP THERE?

All children on soap operas are played by pigeons.

Keith: Why is it that, in the movies, vampire hunters always hunt vampires at night? Why don’t they wait until dawn and do it during the day?

Members of the Vampire Hunters Labor Union must abide by a number of strict rules. Hunting vampires at night, despite rumors to the contrary, is not one of these rules. They hunt at night because that is when they choose to hunt.

So, Marta, Marsha, Kaethe, Sue, and Keith: thank you and congrats! Please claim your prize by sending your mailing address to smallbeerpress@gmail.com.


Lexiphilia

Tue 7 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | 1 Comment | Posted by: Gavin

The Demon's Lexicon CoverKelly is currently hooked on Sarah Rees Brennan’s The Demon’s Lexicon (Gwenda has promised a post on it later this week) and says, “It’s very Buffy-like. In fact, like Diana Wynne Jones crossed with Buffy. Your mileage with the cover may vary, but everybody ought to love this book.”


more birthdays?

Tue 7 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | 10 Comments | Posted by: Gavin

A Working Writer's Daily Planner 2010: Your Year in Writing CoverWe are putting the final finishing touches to our daily planner and one of the fun things we’ve been doing is looking up birthdays of writers (and, er, others) who we like and adding them (H. P. Lovecraft, Gary Larson, Edith Nesbit, Molly Gloss, and so on).

Any suggestions?

We need a citation for the date—although we’ll accept Wikipedia (as long as you didn’t just change it!)

A Working Writer’s Daily Planner 2010: Your Year in Writing
Small Beer Press
August 2009
9781931520584 · Trade paper/spiralbound · 6 x 9 · 160 pp · $13.95
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Ian McDowell’s unique antho

Mon 6 Jul 2009 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Ian McDowell’s unique antho | Posted by: Gavin

Want a handwritten story by Kelly about a “rapidly expanding cat”? There’s just over a day left in Ian McDowell’s auction of to benefit his father which includes that and some other exclusives. Here’s the auction and here’s Ian on the book:

Hand-written fiction by NEIL GAIMAN and othersIn 1989, Ian McDowel (MORDRED’S CURSE, MERLIN’S GIFT, “Geraldine” in Poppy Z. Brite’s LOVE IN VEIN) wrote CRAZY CREATIVE WRITING: STORY STARTERS AND WORD BANKS, a reproducable workbook for teachers of grades 1-4, which was published in 1995 by Carson-Dellosa, an educational pubilshing company based in Greensboro, NC.  The book consisted of 30 “Story Starters” — that is, the first paragraphs of stories, such as “Donna was in her room, playing a game on her computer.  Suddenly, a big fat toad hopped out from under the bed and jumped on the monitor.  “Give me a kiss, Cute Stuff,” it said.  “I’m a prince.”  The reader was then instructed to WRITE WHAT HAPPENED NEXT on the ruled lines following the first paragraph, and use as many words as possible from the provided “Word Bank” while doing so.  Each Story Starter was accompanied by an illustration and 12-16 blank lines on which to write, as well as the aforementioned Word Bank.

I’m Ian and will stop talking about myself in the third person now.  In the later 90s, I started pestering various professional writer friends to complete a page in one of my contributor’s copies of this book.  Quite a few complied.  NEIL GAIMAN took the story of the Frog Prince described above.  POPPY Z. BRITE took the story of Abe, the boy who’d always wanted to join the army, in a VERY perverse direction.  Caitlin R. Kiernan wrote a lovely mini-story about Hannah, who woke up one day to find she’d turned into a horrible monster.  Kelly Link wrote about Julia and her rapidly expanding cat, turning it into a mini-epic.  Other contributors included Mehitobel Wilson, Phillip Nutman, Rain Graves, and Rachel Manija Brown.

The stories are short, but they’re original pieces of fiction which will never be published anywhere (I’m pretty sure they can’t be, as the begining of each story, the part I wrote, was Work-for-Hire and presumably still owned by Carson-Dellosa, who would not be pleased with the decidedly adult direction some of these authors took the material).  Neil Gaiman’s, for instance, is 150 words long, and like most of the other contributions, imaginative and laugh-out-loud funny.  Each contribution is in the author’s own hand writing.  You can’t have a more limited edition, or a more unique collectable (and yes, I know “more unique” is a barbarism) than this.


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