Friday, May 27, 2016

Speculative Fiction Links of the Week for May 27, 2016

Here is our weekly round-up of interesting links about speculative fiction from around the web, this week with lots of award discussion, a shocking revelation about Captain America, women in science fiction and fantasy, writing with disabilities, indigenous futurism as well as the usual mix of writing advice, interviews, reviews, con reports and crowdfunding projects as well as free online fiction. 

Speculative fiction in general:

Comments on Captain America:


Awards:

Writing, publishing and promotion:

Interviews:

Reviews:

Crowdfunding:

Con reports:

Science and technology:

Free online fiction:


Odds and ends: 
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Thursday, May 26, 2016

Carl Sagan's Hunt for Intelligent Life in the Universe (An Archangel Project short story) by C. Gockel

Release date: May 12, 2016
Subgenre: Space opera, space exploration

About Carl Sagan's Hunt for Intelligent Life in the Universe:

 

Sometimes intelligent life is right in front of your whiskers.
Hsissh is a member of The One. There are some newcomers to The One's homeplanet. They call themselves "humans," and they are, frankly, mentally deficient--they can't warp the quantum world with their minds. However, Hsissh is becoming attached to one of them, a Miss Noa Sato.

When The One decide they will wipe out the humans and Noa's life is on the line, Hsissh is forced to take sides ... he might find intelligent life where The One least expect it.

Excerpt:

 

Chapter 1: What Little Werfles are Made Of


“ … cells are made of proteins, proteins are made of molecules, molecules are made of atoms, atoms are made of particles … And do you remember what those are made of?”

“Waves, Third One!”

“Yes, you are waves manifest as matter. You can become waves again at any time.”

Sliding down the embankment, his ten legs not able to lift him, Hsissh reprimanded himself, Next body, no sleeping in a field frequented by lizzar. He knew better, but the rock had been sunny and wonderfully warm. And then one of the clumsy, wave-ignorant oafs had whacked him with its tail. Now this body was beyond reasonable repair and he had to move on. Finding a dry spot, he curled into a ball. Tucking his nose to his tail, he closed his eyes and … hesitated. He blinked. He didn’t want to let this form go … Shissh, his blood kin in her last life, had been urging him for years to give up this shell and the pain that was tied to it; to let his memories of their third parent become a dream.

“What’s that?”

His ears perked. It was the vocal utterance of a wave-ignorant Newcomer. Ish, one of the more scholarly members of Hsissh’s kind, had decoded most of the language and shared it in the waves. Hsissh hadn’t thought the Newcomers had spread this far north. He wondered what they’d found.

A sharp pain in his side made his body uncoil with a startled squeak. “Is it some sort of albino-mutant-ten-legged weasel?”


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About C. Gockel: 

C. Gockel got her start writing fanfiction, and she is not ashamed! Much. She received emails, messages and reviews from her fans telling her she should 'do this professionally'. She didn't; because she is a coward and life as a digital designer, copywriter and coder is more dependable. But in the end, her husband's nagging wore her down: "You could be the next '50 Shades of Gray' and I could retire!" Unfortunately, the author isn't much for writing smut. She is sad about this; she'd love for her husband to be able to retire and just work for her so she could nag him.

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Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Interview with Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam, author of Strange Monsters: a music and words collaboration


The Speculative Fiction Showcase welcomes Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam to discuss her new album, Strange Monsters, produced in collaboration with her partner, Peter Brewer.

Your album is called Strange Monsters: a music and words collaboration. What inspired you to take up this project?

My partner Peter and I collaborated on the first track, “The Stink of Horses” first, as part of a submission to a contest. Everyone involved had so much fun that we decided to do a whole album of audio fiction and poetry set to Peter’s original jazz compositions. 

I wanted to center the album around a theme, and I’ve always been inspired by several lines from a May Sarton poem, “My Sisters, Oh My Sisters.” The poem is about creative women whose domestic lives suffered as a result of their devotion to their art, and how that made them “strange monsters” in the eyes of other people. All of the stories and poems address, in some way, women struggling to make their own path, to eschew what’s expected of them domestically, romantically, creatively, or sexually.

The album is a collaboration with Peter Brewer. How did you work together over the writing and composition?

Peter’s my partner, so all the collaborating was done in-house, very close-knit. I wrote the stories and poems—most of them are reprints, so they’d been published already—and then we hired actors to read them. Once we had the recorded stories, Peter wrote the music on our old cranky piano. Every now and then he’d run something by me, but for the most part we each worked on our own.

This is an unusual and exciting format for a work of speculative fiction. Do you think there will be an increase in mixed media projects?

I think people have always been interested in experimenting with forms and mixing things up, and now, with crowd-funding and other alternative funding methods, it’s easier to do them. So yes, I think there has been and will continue to be an increase in mixed media projects. 

Which came first – the music or the words?

The words came first. Peter wrote the music to accompany the stories. 

Many authors and poets have their own personal soundtrack for writing. What would yours be?

I always listen to music when I write. Mostly instrumental. I gravitate toward a lot of movie soundtracks. The Fountain soundtrack by Clint Mansell has been a go-to for years now. Joby Talbot’s The Dying Swan soundtrack. Recently I’ve been writing about rock stars, so I’ve been listening to rock instrumentals. When I’m writing creepy scenes, Brian Eno is always a good choice. If I want something prettier, Maria Schneider. For something fast-paced, Lindsey Stirling or Elliot Goldenthal’s Frida soundtrack. 

Are there any contemporary composers and writers you particularly admire?

I’m a big fan of writers in the literary fantastic vein: Aimee Bender, Karen Russell, Kelly Link, Jonathan Lethem, Sofia Samatar, Etgar Keret. I greatly admire Jonathan Lethem’s Promiscuous Materials project, where he offers up older stories and song lyrics and invites others to use them as inspiration. Poets who delve into popular and magical spaces, like Tim Seibles, W.S. Merwin, Matthea Harvey, Amal El-Mohtar.

As for music, I gravitate toward the dramatic. Operatic vocals, like My Brightest Diamond and Wild Beasts. I’ve always been greatly moved by Pink Floyd’s music and their story. Folk singers who aren’t afraid to be raw: Tracy Chapman, Ani Difranco. AURORA is a new Norwegian singer I’ve been listening to a lot lately. Daughter, for the ethereal trance their music puts me in. Prince and David Bowie come to mind as talented artists who paved their own paths.

Which areas of Speculative Fiction interest you most?

The ones that straddle borders, that place as much emphasis on beautiful writing as on plot. The areas that aren’t easily classifiable but sometimes go by slipstream, magic realism, the fantastic, interstitial. 

Poetry is sometimes a neglected medium in genre fiction. What made you choose it?

I’ve always been part-poet, part-fiction writer, so it only made sense that the album be part-poetry, part-fiction.

Many of the first fantasy stories and sagas appeared in metric verse, or verse forms. Song lyrics have huge popularity. Is there scope for longer works?

Sure, but I think it’s been obscured in modern society. It’s likely a question of our needing to push through until it finds its place again. 

What have been your influences?

I’m constantly influenced not only by the work from writers I love but also by musicians, visual artists, dancers, filmmakers. I’m always seeking out new and interesting work. Recently, I’ve been influenced a great deal by My Brightest Diamond’s music. Her lyrics create these other worlds that always inspire something in me. Contemporary artists I’ve stumbled upon over the years influence me greatly: Kathleen Lolley, Katy Horan. Films that cross boundaries effortlessly or utilize the fantastic as metaphor: TiMER, Melancholia, Miranda Julie’s The Future, Monsters, Velvet Goldmine, everything Darren Aronofsky’s made.

As for literature, as a kid I was greatly affected by fairy tales and weird stories. I was ravenous for Louis Sachar’s Wayside School books. They were so bizarre and fun and clever. In middle school my mom bought me the graphic novel Black Hole and my sister bought me Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, and both of those books showed me how dark and intriguing fantasy could be. In high school we were assigned Margaret Atwood’s Handmaid’s Tale, and that was one of the first experiences I had with seeing feminist issues explored in a book that could be considered science fiction. I’m influenced by books, too, that don’t entirely distinguish between poetry and story, like Anne Carson’s Autobiography of Red or José Saramago’s Blindness. I strive to always house a bit of the poetic in my fiction.

 CDBaby | Amazon | iTunes


About Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam and Peter Brewer:

 

 


Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam's fiction and poetry has appeared in over fifty magazines and anthologies both literary and speculative including The Toast, Clarkesworld, PRISM International, Lightspeed, Hobart, and Everyman's Library's Monster Verse. She's had stories reprinted in French and Polish, for numerous podcasts, and on the popular science blog io9. She earned an MFA in Creative Writing from University of Southern Maine's Stonecoast Program and created and curates the annual Art & Words Collaborative Show in Fort Worth, Texas. She is active on Twitter @BonnieJoStuffle and on her website www.bonniejostufflebeam.com.


Peter Brewer is the owner and operator of Easy Brew Studio. He holds a BM in Jazz Studies: Trumpet Performance from the University of North Texas and an MM in Jazz Studies: Composition/Arranging from the University of Oregon. He has performed with many groups, including the UNT 2 o'clock lab band, Cas Hailey, Amanda Palmer, and Donny McCaslin. His arrangements and original pieces have been performed for the Oregon Jazz Ensemble featuring musicians such as Dan Balmer and Steve Wilson. Peter grew up in Kansas City, MO, with a family of musicians who taught him to appreciate sound. 


Bonnie and Peter live in north Texas with their literarily-named cats Gimli and Don Quixote.
 

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Monday, May 23, 2016

Eons Semester (Book 8 of The Rim Confederacy) by Jim Rudnick

Release date: May 14, 2016
Subgenre: Space opera, military science fiction

About Eons Semester: 

 

"Jilted by his Royal fiancee, captain Tanner Scott is assigned to Eons and the newly constructed RIM Naval Academy buildings and the duty is anything but a reward. His days are full of squabbling University professors and construction types all nitpicking for changes to plans and additions and extra and the boredom of detail is a horrible side-effect.

As he learns, there is more to looking after a successful construction project than being at the top of the heap and the machinations of the Issians who run Eons and it’s mind-readers comes to him for help. He knows that the Baroness is somehow also involved but the openness of the Master Adept and her Inner Circle that controls Eons is what is so surprising to him.

As the Naval Academy is finally ready to open and the heads of state of many of the RIM Confederacy planets arrive, the protesters against the Issians make their play to publicly humiliate the Inner Circle and their own plans to strengthen their ranks via the death of twins and Tanner must find a way to quell the uprising…”

Excerpt:



On Tavira, the moon that lay above Eons, in the capital city of Aporia, in a Secure Medical ward, an Issian lay in restraints and sometimes fought them but they were too too tight to give even an millimeter. She was a youngish woman, in her thirties but had long ago given up any kind of care and concern for her look or her body too. Half-conscious and always in a drug-induced stupor, the woman lay quietly on the bed.
Her hair, now tangled and knotted and even missing in some spots along her one temple, should have been blonde but was now brown with dried blood and puss from an open sore. It hadn’t been washed or cleaned in months.
Her toenails, were long as were her fingernails, curled and dull yellow as the keratin was thick and unkempt and if anyone ever got close enough she would try to rake them with those nails. But that was before the dosages were upped and she hadn’t tried that in weeks.
Her teeth were once shiny and white and now were yellow and brittle and even a few were missing; for some reason she would worry a tooth with her tongue and do that long enough and often enough that she would spit out a tooth onto the plain steel ward floor. They fed her via a gastric feeding tube that had been inserted through a small incision in the abdomen into the stomach and was used for long-term enteral nutrition. She hadn’t tasted food in almost a year but she just didn’t care at all.
Her eyes were light blue but such a light tone as to be almost white; each had a huge iris that took up almost the whole of the eyeball—the coal black pupils were large too. Staring at her many had found was treacherous—one could easily fall right into her brain some said. And what a brain it was—she was an Issian twin with all the anxiety that that might mean.
Her gown, if it could be called that, lay on her frame like an old tarpaulin on rough ground. She had the usual female parts but not a single one would be called a curve.
She was anything but attractive—in fact she was anti-attractive to anyone who could see the real woman.
Of course, that never happened up here in the Issian Secure Ward.
No one came.
No one visited.
No one cared.
In fact for a full sixty feet around this ward room, no one was ever allowed to enter, except the medical robo drones that the ward staff used to tend to her. Once a week a real live Issian Doctor attended who read charts and nodded and did nothing.
There was nothing to do—she was a twin.
And now change was coming and as yet, no plans had been made for this twin…

 

Amazon 

 

About The Rim Confederacy series:

 

 

 

About Jim Rudnick: 

Being a youngster in the 1950's meant that I was a voracious reader in what has been called the Golden Age of Science Fiction. That meant that for me, my heroes were not on the hockey rink or gridiron - but instead in my local Library where at 12 I had a full Adult card (thanks Dad!) and took out more than 5 books a week.

Everyone from Heinlein, Norton, Leiber, Pohl, Anderson, Simak, Asimov, Brackett, Van Vogt and more....I fell in love with and eventually owned Ace Doubles of my own. While I never knew who wrote the Tom Corbett - Space Cadet series, I fell in love with them and they had a place of honor on my own bookcase too!

With that kind of an introduction to Science Fiction, it's no wonder that when got my writing work done, I turned my own fictional side of my brain to writing same. It's one thing I know to write - and a totally different matter to release same to the world - something that I've just started to work on....suffice it to say my own works are rooted in that Golden Age and it's that era that I'd like to one day be known as a teensy contributor to in some small way…
 
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Friday, May 20, 2016

Speculative Fiction Links of the Week for May 20, 2016

Here is our weekly round-up of interesting links about speculative fiction from around the web, this week with lots of awards, including the Nebulas and plenty of other SFF awards, women in science fiction and fantasy, tributes to the late Darwyn Cooke, reactions to the cancellation of Agent Carter as well as the usual mix of writing advice, interviews, reviews, con reports and crowdfunding projects as well as free online fiction. 

Speculative fiction in general:

Awards:

Tributes to Darwyn Cooke:

Writing, publishing and promotion:

Interviews:

Reviews: 

 Crowdfunding:

 Con reports:

 Science:

 Free online fiction:

 Odds and ends:
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