You know how they say that the first sentence of a book is the most important? That writers really need to “hook” a reader in the first pages, really from the first word? Well, as it happens, I just got a few books in the mail, books that are getting great reviews and I really […]
Uhh… yeah, you want these books.
World Fantasy Award nominees Aickman’s Heirs and Skein and Bone are on sale over at Undertow Books. I tend to buy collections based on maybe one or two stories or authors. The quality of these books, by that standard, is just amazing. Aickman’s Heirs, edited by Simon Strantzas Winner of the Shirley Jackson Award. Finalist for the […]
Toni Morrison on Finding Time to Write
I saw the following on Toni Morrison’s Facebook page. She’s explaining where she finds time to write. “Very, very early in the morning, before they got up. I’m not very good at night. I don’t generate much. But I’m a very early riser, so I did that, and I did it on weekends. In the […]
The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe
The Dream-Quest of Vellitt Boe is told in Lovecraft’s world, though a world where the cosmic horror is not mysterious and threatening but familiar and, erm, threatening.
The Best Writing of the Week – Tender is the Night
Do you ever read books simply for the prose? In an attempt to improve my writing I do this a fair bit and am now reading F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Tender is the Night. It was there I came across the following description that, as it happens, is also the best written thing I’ve read all […]
The Wonderful World of Michael Swanwick
I don’t remember what the first story I read by Michael Swanwick is. But I do remember the feeling I got as I read it. It’s the same feeling I got when I first read stories by Neil Gaiman, Kelly Link and Lucius Shepard. That amazing, wow-this-is-talent feeling. Michael Swanwick is one of many authors […]
Amazon’s Best-Selling Books for Each of the Last 15 Years, Rated
Amazon has been around since 1994, and their first book bestseller list appeared in 1995. The book most popular that year on Amazon, and probably nowhere else, is quite perfect (but you’ll have to wait to see what book it is). Looking at the best seller lists for the past 15 years gives us a […]
Nightmares by Subscription – A Review of Nightmare Magazine Issue 44
Nightmare Magazine is one of the better things you can infect your Kindle with every month. This month was no exception. In the current issue of Nightmare Magazine, there are four stories; two reprints and two originals. The originals are The Old Horror Writer by Adam-Troy Castro and Sawing by Lisa Goldstein. The reprints are […]
The Paper Menagerie – Book review
You should have read one of Ken Liu’s stories by now. You really should. Ken Liu is one of the brightest new stars of the science fiction and fantasy fields. He’s won all the awards and had stories in all the main magazines, often reprinted in “Best of” anthologies. So yeah, you should really have […]
Windowsill Cowboy – Short Story
Here’s a short story I wrote in about 15 minutes at a drink-and-write event that Willona Sloan held at last year’s Reykjavik Literature Festival. This is what 7 years of writing practice gets you. Enjoy. Windowsill Cowboy Thomas sat on his favorite windowsill in the living room and looked out at the sun set over the […]
