Readercon 2023

Mon 10 Jul 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , , , , | Comments Off on Readercon 2023 | Posted by: Gavin

Readercon is back in Quincy again this year and while we’re not going the lovely Steve Berman of Lethe Press will have a few Small Beer titles available at his table so that when you hear Jeffrey Ford, Greer Gilman, Elizabeth Hand, Sarah Pinsker, or Susan Stinson read you can dash over and pick up one of their books.

Steve will also have 1 or 2 other SBP titles — and maybe a couple of copies of Kelly’s White Cat Black Dog?  — but he only has one table, so there won’t be the whole cit and kaboodle, he spoonered. These books will be there — email me ahead of time if there are any others you’d like to pick up there:

Liz Hand books


More Other Lands

Mon 26 Jun 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on More Other Lands | Posted by: Gavin

In Other Lands cover - click to view full sizeThanks to tens of thousands of enthusiastic readers, it’s time to send Sarah Rees Brennan’s In Other Lands back to the printer for another printing.

I’d say something like this little book has legs but there’s a mermaid on the cover — no legs — and there’s nothing little about it: the cover price is increasing to $19 because with the story that started it all, “Wings in the Morning,” included, it’s almost 500 pages of goodness. New copies should be going out to store in early August.


OKPsyche Launch: 9/14

Thu 22 Jun 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , | Comments Off on OKPsyche Launch: 9/14 | Posted by: Gavin

Delighted to say we’ve set up a launch reading for Anya Johanna DeNiro and her short novel OKPsyche at Moon Palace Books in Minneapolis, MN on Thursday, September 14, at 7 p.m.

OKPsyche cover - click to view full size


New York Review of Science Fiction Readings: Sarah Pinsker

Tue 13 Jun 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , | Comments Off on New York Review of Science Fiction Readings: Sarah Pinsker | Posted by: Gavin

Catch up with Sarah Pinsker’s new book, Lost Places, with this recent NYRSF reading hosted by Barbara Krasnoff. Sarah reads excerpts from her original novelette “Science Facts!” — I still think Science Facts! Stories would have been a great title for the book and then Barbara interviews Sarah:


Pride Ebook Bundle

Fri 2 Jun 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , | Comments Off on Pride Ebook Bundle | Posted by: Gavin

I’m proud, no kidding, to say we have 2 novels in this month’s Storybundle 2023 Pride ebook deal.

Get all 17 ebooks — including the first book in Laurie J. Marks’s Elemental Logic series, Fire Logic, and Susan Stinson’s sexy and surprising Martha Moody — and support Rainbow Railroad whose mission is to help LGBT people escape persecution and violence here.


2023 Warehouse Sale Is On!

Wed 17 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on 2023 Warehouse Sale Is On! | Posted by: Gavin

Here we go, it’s book bundle time! Order early — in case, fingers crossed, we run out!

 


Tomorrow

Tue 16 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on Tomorrow | Posted by: Gavin

Tomorrow I’ll post a link to our 2023 Warehouse Clearance Sale. Then I will lie back on the couch* and hope that the word spreads far and many books are bought so that our monthly warehouse charges drop. They’ve been just slightly too high and as I continue to be slowed down fingers crossed this works out.

* Inaccurate: already lying back on couch.


Brilliant Reds and Greens and Purples

Wed 10 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Brilliant Reds and Greens and Purples | Posted by: Gavin

OKPsyche cover - click to view full sizeWe received a lovely note from Isaac Fellman, author of Dead Collections, on Anya Johanna DeNiro’s forthcoming short novel OKPsyche:

“OKPsyche is a spectacular novel, like a shard of stained glass in brilliant reds and greens and purples. DeNiro shows us the impossible and the possible with equal honesty. The book is a chronicle of hope and hurt and freedom, suffused with anxiety and grace, and told in prose that just won’t quit. It’s major. You’ll remember where you were when you read it.”


Next week we’re going to run a sale

Tue 9 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on Next week we’re going to run a sale | Posted by: Gavin

Heads up!


Set the World on Fire

Mon 8 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Set the World on Fire | Posted by: Gavin

And now, with the release of the cover art for Kathleen Jennings’s debut collection, Kindling, all our forthcoming 2023 books have covers.

The art is by Kathleen herself and features a slightly different take on some of her trademark lino cut art. Kathleen will post about her side of the process on her blog, which I always recommend to see an artist in action.

Kindling comes out in October when the trees here in Western Mass will be matching the matchbox on the cover January 2024. It has a baker’s dozen of fairy tales and more. We’ll put the full table of contents online soon. In the meantime, here’s the rather striking cover:

Kindling cover


Heartfelt and Uncanny

Thu 4 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Heartfelt and Uncanny | Posted by: Gavin

OKPsyche cover Delighted to say report that we received a fabulous quote for Anya DeNiro’s forthcoming OKPsyche from Morgan M. Page, screenwriter of Framing Agnes:

“Tense and funny, heartfelt and uncanny, Anya Johanna DeNiro takes us on an hallucinogenic tour through the mind of a woman on the edge. Guided by strange angels or losing touch with reality — either way, it’s happening to you!”

And then I saw this lovely early review on Edelweiss from a bookseller, Sam Edge at Epilogue Books Chocolate Brews in Chapel Hill:

“An allegorical and lyrical short novel about a transgender woman struggling to belong in a near future populated by emotional support robots and a ceaseless slew of environmental disasters. DeNiro writes with a complexity that reflects the internal emotional struggles of her unnamed protagonist as she fights for happiness and a better relationship with her young son. A uniquely told and refreshingly weird story of self-realization and the courage it takes to love.”


Wristlet Delays

Wed 3 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on Wristlet Delays | Posted by: Gavin

In fun news we ran out of LCRW 46 so I’ve sent it back to the printer and once it’s back we’ll be able to catch up on shipping.


Get Lost

Tue 2 May 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on Get Lost | Posted by: Gavin

No, really.


3 Questions: Juan Martinez

Mon 10 Apr 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | Comments Off on 3 Questions: Juan Martinez | Posted by: Gavin

Earlier this fast-moving year, we celebrated Juan Martinez publishing his first novel, Extended Stay. We’d published Juan’s short story collection, Best Worst American, a few years before and we’re always going to celebrate a new book by an author we’ve published. I was curious about the title so I sent Juan a few not very serious questions — plus a request for some book recommendations. For an actual, decent interview, here’s Tobias Carroll’s on Vol.1 Brooklyn.

What’s his first novel about? Publisher’s Weekly summed it up this way:

“Martinez’s impressive debut — part of the University of Arizona’s Camino del Sol series, which spotlights Latinx authors — reads like a collaboration between Lewis Carroll and H.P. Lovecraft, from an idea by Stephen King. This is a fresh and stunning winner.”

Gavin: You may have covered this in another interview, sorry: have you ever lived in an extended stay hotel? 

Juan: I don’t think anyone’s asked, actually! I totally did live in an extended hotel during my first two weeks in Las Vegas: it was a Budget Suites of America that had lost its franchise rights, so they put a tarp over “Budget,” possibly over “Suites.” I may have stayed in an “of America.” It was rough. They did have free coffee and there was this real effort on the part of the manager to keep the place nice — the lobby, at least. And anyone who had lived there a while had clearly made an effort to keep their area kind of nice. I remember a window that had a bunch of lighthouses neatly arranged. You did what you could to make the place yours.

GG: Are there other meanings that should be read into the title, such as trying to get a dog to sit while you walk 20 yards with their ball?

JM: The title does have a bunch of other meanings — or does suggest some other meanings. I’ll take the dog one! There’s also the whole bit about one overextending a tourist visa to circumvent immigration policies (the siblings do this in the novel). But there’s also the whole experience of leaving your home country for another place: there’s a sense, at least for a while, that you’re just, you know, extending a visit, that the whole experience is temporary, that eventually you’ll make your way back to your “real” home.

GG: What is it about horror that pulls you in?

JM: I love the nightmare logic of horror: how surreal horror can get, how it helps narratives navigate and blur the border between the world of the senses and whatever’s beyond that. I’m also just grateful for horror — I read so much of it, so much Peter Straub and Stephen King and Ramsey Campbell when I was a teenager and super sick — and I wanted to go back to that feeling of deep immersion in darkness. It was just such a wonderful way to navigate my own trauma back then, and now, even. Horror is just so good at that.

GG: One bonus question: Have you read anything good recently?

JM: I’m halfway through Elizabeth McKenzie’s The Dog of the North & Rebecca Makkai’s I Have Some Questions For You — they’re both excellent! As is Nathan Ballingrud’s The Strange. I also can’t say enough good things about George Gissing’s New Grub Street, a brutal novel about writing and money and the publishing crisis. It’s a 19th-century novel but it turns out things were right back then too.

GG: Thanks, Juan!

Pick up Extended Stay from Women & Children First or Bookshop.org.


Richard Butner in NYC: 4/10

Fri 7 Apr 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | Comments Off on Richard Butner in NYC: 4/10 | Posted by: Gavin

I know New York City is pretty much dead on a Monday night and everyone sits on their stoops just wishing there was a place they could go to get a decent cocktail and listen to some good stories. I am delighted to say that this coming Monday will be much less boring than normal as Leopoldo Gout, Karen Heuler, Randee Dawn, & Richard Butner get together at the Someday Bar for the #YeahYouWriteSTRANGE reading. Doors open at 6 p.m., it’s at 364 Atlantic Ave., Brooklyn, NY 11217, there’s no cover, just weird fiction!


White Cat, Black Dog

Tue 28 Mar 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on White Cat, Black Dog | Posted by: Gavin

We’re celebrating as today Kelly’s new collection White Cat, Black Dog comes out!

Kelly will be reading at the Brookline Booksmith tonight, followed by a q&a with Holly Black and at Greenlight Bookstore on April 4, followed by a q&a with Carmen Maria Machado. There are also a couple of online events — including one with Leigh Bardugo on Friday, March 30.

Link to Kelly's event page


The Curator

Fri 10 Mar 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on The Curator | Posted by: Gavin

Owen King expanded his story “The Curator” — first published in LCRW 31 — into a novel which came out this week. He’ll be at Book Moon next week, Thursday, March 16, on his way to his in-person reading and then Q&A with Kelly at 7 pm at the Odyssey. Maybe we can get him to sign some LCRWs, too.

Here’s part of The CuratorDexter Palmer’s review of The Curator in the NYT and then Kelly’s comments:

“[The Curator] has its own smooth lyricism and evocative imagery, helping the book’s pages turn quickly. King has a knack for colorful metaphors and thoughtfully considered perspective. This novel is richly imagined, its surface pleasures deliberately subverted by the bleak suggestion at its core: that a successful organized attempt to reduce inequity will have to overcome not just the inertia of a nation’s politics, but human nature.” —The New York Times

“The Curator feels a little like Owen King somehow brought a curiosity cabinet to life. There are terrors here, but also marvels and delights, and a set of the most interesting characters I’ve met in some time. Put The Curator on the same shelf as other classics of the uncanny and uncategorizable, like Susanna Clarke’s Piranesi and Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast. I loved it.” —Kelly Link, bestselling author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Get in Trouble


Ayize in Locus & @ City Lights

Fri 3 Mar 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , | Comments Off on Ayize in Locus & @ City Lights | Posted by: Gavin

Pick up this month’s Locus and you’ll see on the cover there’s an interview with Ayize Jama-Everett — there’s also an interview with Nisi Shawl and a review of Sarah Pinsker’s Lost Places, and so much more — which covers his novels, comics, the craft of writing, Black joy, and more:

Screenshot of interview header

And City Lights just posted their excellent reading and Q&A event with Ayize Jama-Everett & Tân Khánh which I recommend for a relaxed and fascinating chat:


Closed to book submissions

Wed 1 Mar 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Closed to book submissions | Posted by: Gavin

We have slowed down our publishing schedule and as of today, March 1, we are closed to book submissions for the foreseeable future.


History of the Alternate Present

Tue 14 Feb 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on History of the Alternate Present | Posted by: Gavin

Please send cakes, high-altitude balloons, plaudits and so on to Ayize Jama-Everett to celebrate the publication of his latest novel, the fourth and final LHeroes coveriminal novel, Heroes of an Unknown World.

We asked some writers for their thoughts on the book and they sum up the books better than I can:

“The Liminal Books deserve a place on the bookshelf alongside ambitious fantasy series like Marlon James’s Dark Star Trilogy and N. K. Jemisin’s Broken Earth Trilogy. Big, ambitious, wildly inventive and full of heart. Heroes of an Unknown World displays the voice and verve that are staples of Ayize Jama-Everett’s work. Dive in, you will love what you discover.”
—Victor LaValle, author of The Changeling

“Ayize Jama-Everett is a towering talent and one of the best genre-writers working today. His final installment of his masterfully told Liminal Series; Heroes of an Unknown World is a taut, textured feast for the minds of any ravenous reader who’s looking for something fresh and exciting to experience.”
— John Jennings

“A rollicking, irreverent action sci-fi filled with anime-esque feats, a deep appreciation for culture, and sparkling humanity. Jama-Everett’s final book in the Liminal series is the kind of grandiose battle against despair I’ll gladly sign up for. Put on your favorite record, crack this one open, and tell the darkness: ‘Fuck off!’”
— Elwin Cotman

 


Lost Places: May Pub Date, Second Star

Thu 2 Feb 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on Lost Places: May Pub Date, Second Star | Posted by: Gavin

Lost Places coverWe have moved the publication date of Sarah Pinsker’s forthcoming collection, Lost Places, from March to May 2.

In better news, the book just received its second starred review, this from Booklist:

“Pinsker’s latest collection includes her Hugo Award–winning story ‘Where Oaken Hearts Do Gather,’ a folklore-esque mystery told through the annotations and comment chains of a song-lyrics website, and new story ‘Science Facts!’ in which a group of girls on an orienteering trip step into a forest that holds some eerie secrets. . . .  The stories are queer, hopeful, and eerie, celebrating the rebellious spirits of both immortal-feeling youth and resilient elder protagonists.”
—Leah von Essen

 


The Patreon I Didn’t

Wed 1 Feb 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on The Patreon I Didn’t | Posted by: Gavin

Recently I’ve been finding that after sending some emails, instead of them being sent, they mysteriously end up back in Drafts. I’m using a gmail account (why did webhosts give up offering email?) and Apple’s Mail app on my 2020 Mac laptop if anyone has any clue. I am guessing the years and years of email have added up and the system is just slow so that when I hit send, it is not live-saved so goes to Drafts. Which sounds as if I know what I might be talking about. But I don’t.

Anyway, back in 2014 I was thinking about starting a Patreon — I liked the way Clarkesworld and some other people were using it and thought it could be a good additional support for the press, as well as being fun. I made a video (somewhere) and apparently wrote this up as an email. I’m always wondering whether we should do this or that thing, buy AOL, sell our New York skyscraper HQ, drive across the country hand-delivering our books, etc., etc. I do like the line below about every dollar being a 92 cents we don’t have to pay on rent. (There is a fabulous anonymous reader out there who sends us a month’s rent ever year: what an amazing surprise, what a gift that’s been!)

Turns out we published 5 originals, 2 Peter Dickinson reprints, a chapbook by Greer Gilmans, plus 2 ebooks of Howard Waldrop’s Old Earth Books collections that year (12 ebooks). We didn’t, suffice to say, ever launch a Patreon and now since I’m thinking about what else I can do to slow everything down here to my new slow levels, we won’t be any time soon. But this amused me, so maybe it will amuse here:

———————————————————

We publish weird and awesome books. We’re the publisher of first resort for half a dozen or so of the best books every year and we’d like to send them—either in print or ebook form—to you!

Some of our books sell by the truckload, some don’t! But: they’re all hands down page turners each in their own unique way. Note: none of them is the most unique, because as you know uniqueness can’t be quantified.

Why Patreon? Well, we never did set up a subscription option for our books—the LCRW sub gets in the way—and we never managed a Kickstarter (there was that lunch I was going to do and then the crosscountry tour—but that’s a different post) but we do manage to put books out on a semi-consistent manor, so, hey, why not? Sign up, get books!
​
​FAQ
​
​Q. You sell books, right?
A. Yes! And this way you will get them slightly before anyone else!
​
​Q. How often do you publish books?
A. For 2014 we are on track to publish 7 books, 1 chapbook, 2 issues of our zine, LCRW, and ebooks of each (10 ebooks).
​
​Q. Is it worth backing this at the one dollar a month level?
​A. Yes! Support us at $1 a month and suddenly our office rent has just dropped by $0.92! (After Patreon’s cut) Less rent: more $$ and time for ads/publicity = more books sold = happy authors = universe collapses into itself at the sight of a happy author.
​
​


Cozy!

Tue 24 Jan 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Cozy! | Posted by: Gavin

Isabelle Popp put up a very tempting list of books over on Book Riot, 20 Must-Read Cozy Fantasy Books, which included Karen Lord’s Redemption in Indigo along with many other inviting reads:


Two for Texas

Thu 19 Jan 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., | Comments Off on Two for Texas | Posted by: Gavin

Two items popped up this week from the grizzled weird part of Texas: first, Tobias Carroll interviewed Robert Freeman Wexler, Skulls, Detectives, and the Texas Surreal in Vol. 1 Brooklyn (“There’s a point early on in Robert Freeman Wexler‘s novel The Silverberg Business where you might have an idea of where things are heading. . . .”) then Vick Mickunas’s WYSO Christmas Day interview popped up online — although I think the audio file will actually appear in a day or two.

 


SBP BS Bestsellers

Fri 6 Jan 2023 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , , | Comments Off on SBP BS Bestsellers | Posted by: Gavin

2022 was an odd year for the press. I am working at 1/4-speed, we published fewer books and while we did 2 issues of LCRW the mailing has been delayed into the new year as the Book Moon peeps are doing inventory.

In BookScan news — the BS above — here are our top 14 bestsellers of 2022. I imagine many readers of this post will have read a good number of the books on this list. Sometimes our books hit right away (In Other Lands), sometimes they grow and grow (North American Lake Monsters), sometimes they go away and come back (Travel Light). 

2023 will be a good book year. Looking forward to it.

SBP BookScan bestsellers


Book Moon Please Reduce Our Inventory 1-day Flash Sale!

Sat 31 Dec 2022 - Filed under: Not a Journal. | Comments Off on Book Moon Please Reduce Our Inventory 1-day Flash Sale! | Posted by: Gavin

1-day flash sale


CSA = Crazy-Sexy Agriculture

Fri 30 Dec 2022 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , , | Comments Off on CSA = Crazy-Sexy Agriculture | Posted by: Gavin

Just added LCRW Cooking Columnist Nicole Kimberling’s fifth column for LCRW which was originally published in LCRW 31:

Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet No. 31 coverI think whoever invented the idea of paying a local farmer for a whole season of vegetables in advance, must have been some sort of subversive genius. . . .

[read on]

 


Starred Review for Lost Places!

Wed 21 Dec 2022 - Filed under: Not a Journal., , | Comments Off on Starred Review for Lost Places! | Posted by: Gavin

We’re sending out review copies of Sarah Pinsker’s collection, Lost Places, coming in March, and now we get to share the good news that it has received a starred review from Publishers Weekly!

PW review of Lost Places


« Later Entries — Earlier Entries »