Kings of the Realm Unleashed

To end the weekend on a more positive note than yesterday's post, Kings of the Realm : A Dragon Anthology - which includes my The Other Ten Thousand - is now available to buy from CreateSpace and Amazon US.

I've seen an electronic copy of this one, and I'm glad to say that it's a very professionally put-together tome, impressively so given how new Lame Goat Press is to the publishing scene. I've only had time to skim a few of the stories and poems therein, but what struck me pretty quickly was the variety - thankfully, there's a lot more here than just Anne McCaffrey-esque high fantasy. Congrats and thanks to Christopher Jacobsmeyer for his work in bringing it together and of course for taking The Other Ten Thousand. I'll likely post again once my dead tree copy arrives from Amazon, but in the meantime, it's a safe bet that if you like stories about dragons then you'll get plenty out of Kings of the Realm.

Zombonauts, a Word of Warning

I've always tried to be positive about the publications my work appears in. The reasons why should be obvious, but let's just set a few of them down:

The vast majority of magazines, whether print or online, are put together through the effort and time of talented people working from a genuine desire to showcase good fiction to their readers. On the rare occasions I've thought an editor didn't entirely pull that off, it's usually been clear that it wasn't for lack of trying. I'd much rather focus on the positives than nitpick the negatives when the positives are the product of hard work and the negatives are genuine mistakes.

Truthfully, I don't want to get a reputation for biting the hand that feeds. Editors are always taking a gamble on the writers they publish, however good they feel the writer or the particular story to be. I don't want anyone thinking that the gamble will be an even bigger one because I might turn around and rip their publication to shreds.

And lastly, but far from leastly, I'm mostly been very happy with the publications I've been in. I read everything my work appears in, and it's rare that I don't find something - a story, a piece of art, an editorial - that blows me away.

With all of that said, there's one other thing that I don't want to be known for, and that's encouraging people to buy things that I know are utterly below par. So, after much thought, I've decided the only thing I can do is to come out and say that I can't recommend anyone to buy the Zombonauts collection out recently from Library of the Living Dead Press. Frankly, it's been thrown together with a lack of care that borders on contempt for writers and readers alike. There are countless spelling, grammatical and punctuation errors, in places twenty or thirty a page, to the point where I can't imagine anyone did even a cursory proof read (though bizarrely, a proof reader is actually credited.) It's a mess, and worse, it's a mess with a $15.99 price tag.

It's a shame, because there are some neat stories in amidst all the dumb mistakes, not least of them my own Fear of a Blue Goo Planet. Luckily, that one at least is available here for free, in an excellent podcast from the guys at Chaos Theory: Tales Askew.

Necrotic Tissue #9 Out to Buy

Since I can't come up with an interesting title, I've pretty much summed this post up already, but let's try and drag it out just a little longer, eh? Necrotic Tissue issue #9, featuring my story Caretaker in the Garden of Dreams as one of the 'editor's picks', is out to buy from the Necrotic Tissue website. If you squint, you can possibly make out my name there on the cover. I'm choosing to believe that this is the correct version of the cover, by the way, since the one in the shop spells my surname as Tellerman. Man, I hope I'm not going to have to get it changed by deadpoll...

Caretaker is a very weird, very nasty little tale that came to me in the same bout of half-awake delirium that produced the idea for my first novel, (which is extremely close to being finished by the way). I can't say too much without giving away the story, so instead I'll just mention what a pleasant experience it was working with the guys at Necrotic Tissue, who not only paid me more than I was expecting but did so before the issue came out, and even threw in a damnably stylish T-shirt.

Also, I now have my copy of the Zombonauts anthology, and I'm glad to say that it's a really nice looking book. I haven't actually read any of yet, (I'm still working my way through my copy of Theaker's Quarterly Fiction), but if you can't judge a book by its cover then what can you judge it by?

First Sale of 2010

Before we start, a belated happy new year to anyone who stumbles over this post. And is it a new decade? Well, what the hell, a happy new decade to you as well.

First sale of 2010 goes to editor Seth Crossman at OG's Speculative Fiction, and my story Today the War Ended, Tonight the Sky Burned. What can I say? I was going through a phase of long titles. Today the War Ended is the closest I've come, (and probably the closest I ever will come), to writing a seasonal story. It's about war, of course, and what it does to lives, about sacrifice, and more than anything about love and its limitations. It's a small, sad story that I'm immensely fond of, and I'm glad to see it end up with Seth, who quietly goes about producing one of the most consistent small press magazines around.

This, by the way, will be my third appearance in OG's Speculative Fiction, after The Other Ten Thousand in issue #9 and The Ascension of DeepRED in issue #15. Here's hoping it won't be the last.

Zombonauts Lives ... FTA Anthologies, Less So

I discovered a couple of days ago that the Zombonauts anthology from Library of the Dead Press, which includes a reprint of my Fear of a Blue Goo Planet (podcast what seems an eon ago by Chaos Theory: Tales Askew) is now out to buy from Amazon.com. This unquestionably good bit of news was slightly spoiled by the fact that I found out not by my contributor copy turning up, or my payment for that matter, but because I happened to search for it in a moment of boredom. In fact it's been out since the back end of October, although apparently those early copies were plagued with a few (possibly undead-related) problems, hence the delay in contributor copies, etc. And hey, it's a neat-looking book. I realise this fact doesn't really come over from the miniaturised version here, so have a look on Amazon and appreciate it in all its gory glory. And check out the equally neat back cover while you're there. And, y'know, consider buying a copy.

I won't do any more plugging until I've actually seen it myself. But come on ... Zombies. In space. You know it makes sense.

A somewhat less cheering bit of news arrived the day after, when Kate Sanger e-mailed to let me know that the final two From the Asylum anthologies will not be seeing the light of day. Apparently spiralling costs got the better of the projects, and they will never be more than TOCs and a pair of awesome covers. This is particularly sucky news for me because I was in both of them. Still, you win some, you lose some, and what comes around gathers no moss, or some such philosphicalness.

No, it's still really sucky news.

Friendly out in Theakers # 31

A few snippets of news as the year grinds to a close. First up, the new issue of the ever-wondrous Theaker's Quarterly Fiction is available for free download or purchase from Lulu. Not only does it contain my story Friendly - a wildly batshit tale of interplanetary relations and disturbing alien sportsmanship - but one can also find a tale by Alison J. Littlewood, going by the name of Day of the Bromeliads. I was introduced to Alison through the oft-mentioned-here Mr Rafe McGregor, and have since had the pleasure of catching up on a lot of her previous work - which is uniformerly great and well worth tracking down, perhaps via her website. I can't say much else about the issue, since I'm waiting for my dead tree copies to arrive from Lulu, but the cover is tremendous and TQF is never ever less than entertaining.

Not really news as such, but I finished my copy of The Death Panel, as published by Comet Press and containing my Rindelstein's Monsters, and by heck it's a good collection. Of thirteen stories, five knocked my socks off, and of the rest only one failed to float my boat, (not my own, I hasten to add). In fact, hey, I'm just going to come out and say it: David James Keaton's Nine Cops Killed for a Goldfish Cracker is the best short story I've read in ages, Keaton's the next damn Charlie Huston, and - if you have the faintest liking for hard-boiled crime or horror - you'll be screwing yourself if you don't pick this one up.

Now, since I'd like to actually get in a little writing while I'm here, the other news'll have to wait a day or two...

The Death Panel Open For Business

That other bit of news referred to in the last post is that The Death Panel - containing my Rindelstein's Monsters - is now out to buy from the publisher, Comet Press, and all good internet book retailers. Or at least Amazon and Barnes and Noble, (I haven't researched this very thoroughly!).

Truth be told, it's been out since the back end of last month, but I don't like to plug things unless I can hold them in my hands and behold their glory with mine own eyes. Perhaps the wait was unnecessary in this case, because right from the off I had a feeling that The Death Panel was going to be awesome. And lo and behold, it really is. It's a beautifully put together little tome, and you'd be hard pressed to guess it's come from a small press with only two previous titles behind them.

I can't honestly claim to have read the whole thing cover to cover since it arrived on my doorstep yesterday, but I've done some serious flicking, and I can say with confidence that Rindelstein's Monsters - my possibly bestest ever story - is in damn fine company.

And that 'Murder, Mayhem and Madness' tagline? That isn't just for show.