ChiZine Publications Blog

Women in Horror Month Feature: Carolyn Ives Gilman

2012-02-10T08:00:00.001-05:00

Throughout February, ChiZine Publications is celebrating Women in Horror Month (http://www.womeninhorrormonth.com/) by profiling our female authors and staff.

Carolyn Ives Gilman, twice a finalist for the Nebula Award, has been publishing fantasy and science fiction for twenty years. Her first novel, Halfway Human, was called “one of the most compelling explorations of gender and power in recent SF” by Locus magazine. Carolyn published Isles of the Forsaken with ChiZine Publications in 2011 and her upcoming novel Ison of the Isles will be released in April, 21. Her short fiction has appeared in Fantasy and Science Fiction, The Year’s Best Science Fiction, Bending the Landscape, Interzone, and others.

How did you get started with your writing?

When I was a kid, I wanted to be on stage. I loved live theater, but since no one was offering to make me a star, I took matters into my own hands and founded a theater company. But then I wasn’t content with the scripts available. I read lots of fantasy and science fiction in those days, so I started adapting my favorite books for the stage. My theater troupe of teenage potheads, born-again Christians, and Black activists staged the first musical version of Peter Beagle’s The Last Unicorn, years before the film. In our version, Prince Lir was a guy with a big Afro. We also did Evangeline Walton’s Island of the Mighty, The Hobbit, and The Thirteen Clocks. In the process, I learned some valuable skills. There is nothing like sifting a book for the crucial dramatic moments to teach you how a story is structured. And there’s nothing like seeing an audience start to snooze to tell you when you’ve done it wrong.

How would you describe your writing?

Genre-wise, my writing is a little hard to pin down. My latest books, Isles of the Forsaken and its sequel Ison of the Isles, are fantasies with a hard enough edge that they feel like science fiction or horror. My first novel, Halfway Human, was science fiction. My short fiction is all over the map, from surreal to satire. I also write historical nonfiction, and it bleeds over into my fiction, especially in the Forsaken books, which have an 18^th-century feel. This is because the 18^th century is the era I’m most familiar with as a historian, so it cut way down on the research. I already knew how you fire an 18^th-century cannon, so I didn’t have to look it up.

The things that tie my writing together are strong plot lines and characters I like to spend a lot of time with. I really enjoy plotting (as do some of my characters), and I can’t write about characters that don’t fascinate me. Not that my characters are all nice—some of them are shockingly despicable—but they’re still interesting, at least to me. I also tend to write with a certain concern for real-world issues. Life is too short to spend time writing books that don’t matter.

Who are your influences?

There are too many to name, and I get more all the time. Anyone who reads Isles of the Forsaken and Ison of the Isles will be able to see that I’m the bastard child of Patrick O’Brian and C. S. Forester married to Ursula Le Guin and Lois McMaster Bujold. Not to mention a little bit of Robert Louis Stevenson and Sir Walter Scott thrown in. People ask me if I’m influenced by George R.R. Martin, but I think that is more a case of convergent evolution. In future, I look forward to being influenced by China Miéville and Susannah Clarke, and in my dreams I’m influenced by David Mitchell. But at the same time, I’d have to say I get just as much inspiration from nonfiction and the real world as I do from fiction. A lot of the events in the Forsaken books are taken straight from North American history—even when supernatural beings show up.

Why do you write horror?

The best horror plays with fundamental issues. It’s about facing what terrifies us, what makes us queasy, what we hope isn’t so. Our world has gotten so full of things that unfortunately are so, we need some way to cope. One way is by facing evil unflinchingly, and affirming that it can be beaten, even if it’s only within the covers of a book. Another way is by ridiculing it, which acknowledges its reality, but steals its power to incapacitate us with terror. What we don’t want to do—and what a lot of TV and media horror unfortunately does—is to trivialize evil by making it cartoonish, or to desensitize everyone to it. Then people start denying its reality or its power. Those of us who actually believe in evil need to write about it, even if we do it in a coded or symbolic way, because it gives readers the tools to recognize it, and the hope to fight it.

I’m sorry to be so serious, but my answer comes from the fact that some of the most chilling things I’ve ever written have been nonfiction.

Horror's top creature features: who would you date, marry and kill?

Are you suggesting that date, marry, and kill is the natural progression of a relationship? Are you sure you don’t need some relationship counseling?

Seriously, I’d have to go with the zombies for all three, because they’d love me for my brains.

***

In fantasy novels, we hope for many things—vivid and unfamiliar landscapes, complicated and compelling characters, unexpected plot twists, high stakes and huge risks. Gilman delivers all of the above and more. This is a smart and engrossing political novel about imperialism and the clash of cultures in a fascinating new world. The best news? Apparently there will be more. Write like the wind, Gilman!

–Karen Joy Fowler, Nebula and World Fantasy Award-winning author of What I Didn't See

Preorder Ison of the Isles Here
Buy Isles of the Forsaken Here

ChiZine signs distribution deal with HarperCollinsCanada

2012-02-09T14:01:00.002-05:00

TORONTO— HarperCollinsCanada announced today it has signed ChiZine Publications as a sales and distribution client. HarperCollinsCanada will carry out all trade sales and distribution in Canada, as well as handle global digital distribution for the company.

“We are delighted to have such a quality publisher working with us,” said Leo MacDonald, Vice President of Sales and Marketing at HarperCollinsCanada. ChiZine’s reputation in the Fantasy and SF genre is second to none.”

"We're incredibly excited to be entering into this distribution deal with HarperCollinsCanada,” said Sandra Kasturi, co-publisher with Brett Savory at ChiZine. “Our titles fill a particular niche on their list, and HarperCollinsCanada's size and reach gives us increased exposure in the Canadian market, so it's win-win for everyone. We can't wait to get to work with them."

ChiZine Publications (CZP) is a World Fantasy Award-nominated independent publisher of surreal, subtle, and disturbing dark literary fiction hand-picked by Brett Alexander Savory and Sandra Kasturi, Bram Stoker Award-winning editors of ChiZine: Treatments of Light and Shade in Words. You can visit ChiZine Publications on the Internet at http://chizinepub.com/.

HarperCollinsCanada publishes fiction, non-fiction, and books for children, as well as religious and reference books. HarperCollins imprints in Canada include HarperCollins, HarperPerennial, HarperTrophyCanada, Collins, and Phyllis Bruce Books. These imprints publish many of Canada’s finest writers, including Emma Donoghue, Lawrence Hill, Dianne Warren, and Richard B. Wright, as well as writers from around the world, such as Hilary Mantel, Richard Ford, Lionel Shriver, Marilynne Robinson, and Kate Grenville.

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For further information contact Rob Firing, Publicity Director at HarperCollinsCanada Ltd., 419-975-9334, ext 141. Email rob.firing@harpercollins.com.

Women in Horror Month Feature: Caitlin Sweet

2012-02-07T08:00:00.005-05:00

Throughout February, ChiZine Publications is celebrating Women in Horror Month (http://www.womeninhorrormonth.com/) by profiling our female authors and staff.

Caitlin has been a writer since she was seven and her grade two teacher informed her that her stories were “too long,” and that one should never end a story with “And it was all just a dream!” Caitlin's third novel, The Pattern Scars, was published by ChiZine Publications in September 2011. At the moment she is making slow but encouraging progress on her fourth, a re-telling of Beauty and the Beast via Minoan Crete.
Photo by Rebecca Springett

How did you get started with your writing?

I was seven, in Miss Frew's grade two class. We had thin orange Hilroy notebooks, and we bent over them with pencils and erasers when it was story-writing time. I never wanted to stop. I wrote my first novel at 14 and my next at 15; I revised the latter during grade 9 Latin class. This teacher, Miss Kennedy of the electric blue eyeshadow, knew, and was totally fine with it (so long as I'd finished declining and conjugating).

That's the "when", but you asked "how"! That has to do with a childhood filled with incredibly supportive people (my parents, and teachers--for Miss Frew ended up coming around to my overlong stories) and books. Stories were everywhere, from the Greek myths my father told me at bedtime to the stacks of novels I'd bring home from the library, and I never wondered why I felt compelled to write my own.

I trace the "how" of my professional writing life back to 2000, when I posted some sample chapters from my then-work-in-progress on the Del Rey Online Writers' Workshop. It was the first time I'd shown it to anyone other than family and close friends, and the response was enough to propel me into the process of finding an agent--which I did. Three years later, that nameless work-in-progress was published as A Telling of Stars.

How would you describe your writing?

I always feel uncomfortable when people ask me this. So often, when someone says "I write literary fantasy," it sounds pompous. Same goes for "I write dark fantasy." Of course, "literary" and "dark" are two words that are applied to my writing all the time, by readers, agents and editors alike. "Lyrical," too. So, absolved of perceived pomposity (maybe!), I'll try to analyse why.

I write about other worlds, but many of the inhabitants of these worlds struggle and suffer in ways that I hope seem real--and meaningful, rather than gratuitous. Each of my three books features endings that are either ambiguous or downright sad (though at least a couple of main characters in my second do end up happy). I'm really aware of language and tend toward the poetic, or at the very least, the sonorous. (My first book, A Telling of Stars, was beyond sonorous--so much so that I'll even make up a term for what it frequently was: purple-prosèd.)

In three words, then: Literary, dark and lyrical. There!

Who are your influences?

Lloyd Alexander, whom I wrote rhapsodic letters to when I was 14, 21, 28 and 33, and who always wrote me back. Gabriel García Márquez and Jorge Luis Borges; I was fluent enough to read their books in Spanish, once (or, había una vez...). Ursula LeGuin. Homer. Aeschylus. William Morris. Judith Kerr (because yes, picture books about a forgetful cat must be influential, somehow).

Why do you write horror?

I wasn't even aware that I had written horror until someone read an early draft of The Pattern Scars and informed me that that's what it was. I've always defined myself as a fantasy writer--and, grudgingly (see answer #2, above), as a "dark" fantasy writer--so the horror label was both surprising and surprisingly satisfying.

Attempted definitions aside: my books have been getting progressively darker. This latest one even has some zombies in it! (I don't call them that, perhaps for the same sort of reason that the tragic, terrifying creatures of The Walking Dead aren't called that.) (Though, presumably, the inhabitants of post-apocalypse U.S.A. would be familiar with the word, which makes it feel a bit disingenuous when they don't use it.) (Enough with parentheses, already.)

While I thoroughly enjoy many stories with happy endings and clear-cut delineations between good and evil, I just can't seem to write them. Prickly, difficult, even desperate scenarios interest author-me far more.

Horror's top creature features: who would you date, marry and kill?

Date: The Creature from the Black Lagoon. He's been described as "an aquatic Romeo"--how could a girl not be curious? Then again, there's Spike, from Buffy. Does he count? Because if he does, no contest.

Marry: None of them. I'm pretty sure the divorce/s would be messy.

Kill: The enormous blue Muppet. I know he's benign when you're awake--but when I was seven I had a nightmare about him that still makes me shudder. But no--I wouldn't be able to kill a Muppet, even if this one did crash through the back of a bus to attack me. So...one of the obscenely large, randomly flammable fish that lay waste to the Amazon in Mega Piranha. (Watch it--without laughing. I dare you.)

***

“Caitlin Sweet's shimmering prose, already apparent in her debut novel A Telling of Stars, reaches new heights in The Pattern Scars, which is so replete with luminous images and an evocative atmosphere that even now, a week later, these sensations still haunt my memory as if they had been real, a country I visited and would return to again.

It should have been a relief to awaken from The Pattern Scars, after all its horrors. Yet the richness of the world, the complexity of the main character, and the intensity of her tragedy evoke memories that linger for a long time. It is the rare reader who could read this book and be unaffected—or unscathed."
–The Huffington Post

Buy The Pattern Scars Here

Women in Horror Month Feature: Gemma Files

2012-02-03T10:38:00.001-05:00

Throughout February, ChiZine Publications is celebrating Women in Horror Month (http://www.womeninhorrormonth.com/) by profiling our female authors and staff.

Though she was born in London, England, Gemma Files is a Canadian citizen, and has lived in Toronto for her entire life (thus far). Gemma has published two collections of short stories and two chapbooks of poetry, including Dust Radio, from Kelp Queen Press. Her first novel, published by ChiZine Publications, was A Book of Tong ues: Volume One in the Hexslinger Series and it was released in April, 2010. The second Hexslinger book, A Rope of Thorns, was released in 2011 and coming up in May 2012, the third is A Tree of Bones.

How did you get started with your writing?

I graduated from Ryerson University with a Bachelor of Applied Arts in Magazine Journalism, so that was sort of the beginning of my professional writing career; but, I was first published at the age of 9. I sold a poem called "Earthquake!" to Cricket Magazine, and wrote a play called The Revenant in high school which was later performed at Brock University. The whole time I was writing articles and movie reviews for Toronto local eye Weekly, I continued to write and place short stories. My first official sale as an adult was to the now-defunct Canadian Horror anthology series Northern Frights (ed. Don Hutchison), with "Mouthful of Pins."

How would you describe your writing?

Hmmm. "Lush," I hear a lot. "Poetic." Also "overwritten," "meandering," "obscure" and occasionally "pornographic." I like to think that my strengths lie in dialogue and characterization, but my urges are always to the dark and creepy-sexy. I far prefer antiheroes to heroes. Paula Guran once said that my characters were mainly monsters rather than victims, but I managed to evoke some sympathy for them anyhow. I think that's a fairly good description of what I'm generally after.

Who are your influences?

Tanith Lee, Stephen King, Peter Straub, Clive Barker, Kathe Koja, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Poppy Z. Brite, Gwendolyn MacEwan, Susan Musgrave, Marjorie Bowen. More recently Sonya Taaffe, Nadia Bulkin, John Connolly, Jeff Long, Amanda Downum, John Langan, Laird Barron.

Why do you write horror?

Because, like Yukio Mishima, my heart's inclination has always been for Night, and Death, and Blood. Less facetiously, however, I think it began because I knew I didn't know enough about science to write science fiction and fantasy always somehow seemed too goddamn "happy" to interest me. Horror had a certain psychological realism, a rooting in the real world of shared fears, a consequential heft and weight. Then again, I tend to think of what I do as more like opera than anything else, so sometimes I just don't notice how grotesque it's actually gotten.

Horror's top creature features: who would you date, marry and kill?

I have a certain attraction towards mad scientists, but most of them would make absolutely lousy lovers, so--I could see going on a double-date with Herbert West, Re-Animator and his sidekick Dr Dan Cain (from Stuart Gordon's Re-Animator), because if nothing else, I could A) count on getting sex from Dan and B) might also be able to get Herbert to let me watch them make out, even if he wouldn't touch me himself.

In terms of marriage, I can't think of anyone more loyal and romantic than Im-Ho-Tep/Ardeth Bey, as played by Boris Karloff in Karl Freund's original The Mummy.

Even though he's my favourite monster, is quite handsome and has a sexy voice to boot, poor Jack Griffin (Claude Rains) from James Whale's The Invisible Man is just so butt-ass chemically insane that it'd be better by far to shoot him the minute you figured out where he was standing, or at least run away screaming when he started to talk.

***

“Potent mythology, complex characters, and dollops of creeping horror and baroque gore establish Files's Hexslinger series as a top-notch horror-fantasy saga.”

—Publishers Weekly

Women in Horror Month Feature: Helen Marshall

2012-02-01T08:00:00.006-05:00

Throughout February, ChiZine Publications is celebrating Women in Horror Month (http://www.womeninhorrormonth.com/) by profiling our female authors and staff.

Aurora-nominated poet Helen Marshall (manuscriptgal.com) is an author, editor, and self-proclaimed bibliophile. Her poetry has been published in The Chiaroscuro, Paper Crow, Abyss & Apex and the long-running Tesseracts anthology series. In 2011, she released a collection of poems entitled Skeleton Leaves from Kelp Queen Press. Keep an eye out for her short story collection, Hair Side, Flesh Side, forthcoming from ChiZine Publications in November, 2012.

How would you describe your writing?

The short stories I've written for Hair Side, Flesh Side take up the theme of art, memory and love. They're quirky stories: generally, I take an idea--a "what-if?"--and stretch it out as far as I can. What if someone found a lost manuscript of Jane Austen on the inside of her skin? What if, at the age of seven, every child received the body of a dead saint? What if, when people mimicked the position of a statue for a photograph, they froze that way? The results are sometimes comical, but just as often they end up feeling genuinely disturbing because there's a kind of realism to them.

Who are your influences?

Wide-ranging! I obviously read lots of genre material and I've found I have the most sympatico with authors like Neil Gaiman, Robert Shearman, Tim Powers and Peter Beagle. But I read lots of the classics as well--lots of dead white men--Shakespeare and Marlowe, John Donne, Geoffrey Chaucer, Byron and Shelley and the Romantics. I mean, on the one hand you can trace most of the origins of genre writing to those guys, but on the other, it's just good writing. There's a reason it has lasted so long. It resonates.

How did you get started with your writing?

Most of my early work was poetry because it was short and sweet and I could throw it out if it didn't work without worrying too much. People get scared of poetry, though. You've never seen a buyer run so fast as when you tell them you've got a poetry collection! (That being said, I recommend you all pick up my collection Skeleton Leaves which is marketed, beautifully, as "poetry that doesn't suck!") But it was genuinely good training: I find when I write fiction I still tend to structure my work according to a kind of logic of poetry, developing the emotional beats of a story so that the reader's relationship to a character is constantly changing. Short fiction shouldn't always be easy to read. It should be a bit of a guessing game.

Why do you write horror?

Horror is one of the pivotal emotions of our lives. When I was a kid, I was terribly afraid. All the time. And I didn't like it. I remember watching a movie when I was in grade school called Step Monster starring Alan Thicke, which was intended to be exactly as frightening, I imagine, as it sounds. But I remember vividly that the only way to beat the Trapopkin (the eponymous Step Monster) was to play the violin--why? I couldn't tell you for the life of me, but I suppose it makes as much sense as buckets of soap and witches. It was a triumph of my senior year that I chose to learn the cello instead. When something affects you that much as a kid, when you encounter any emotion that visceral, well, it sticks with you. Fear became fascinating. And there are still plenty of novels, easy novels for most people, that I won't read at night. Ghosts in particular--terrifying! I don't know why, but they are the one monster I can't get over and a proper ghost story will leave me shivering for days.

Horror's top creature features: who would you date, marry and kill?

I'd date the zombie since he'd like me for my brains. Cthulhu seems like marriage material: who doesn't want to wake up beside an omnipotent, devouring, tentacled Elder God every morning? Death to the wampyre!

***

Buy Skeleton Leaves here!

“Helen Marshall’s sinister and elegant vision permeates this beautiful book, leaving the reader feeling like they have somehow been transported to Neverland and back, bringing with them the shades of lost boys and their spectral mothers, trailing words flying from between dark stars. Gorgeous and heartbreaking.”

—Sandra Kasturi, author of The Animal Bridegroom

Huge interview with Tom Piccirilli

2012-01-29T20:58:00.002-05:00

"Me: Where do you see yourself going next? Or are you happy where you are, with what you’re writing?

Tom Piccirilli: For the time being I’m happy writing noirish dark crime fiction. One of these days I think I’d like to do a bigger novel that has less concentration on the crime stuff and more on other concerns, whatever they are. Family matters, relationships, and all that other shit that is the focus of so much modern literature. I think I’m finally at that point of my life when I see enough humor and darkness and oddity in the so-called “normal” everyday life that I don’t need the storytelling conventions of genre material. The guns, the double-crosses, the heist gone wrong. Maybe one of these days I’ll get around to writing that book, and then again maybe not. Part of the fun of being a writer is not knowing what’s going to suddenly become of interest to you somewhere down the line. You can’t guess at it, you just have to let it persuade you."

For this and a whole lot more insights, read Lee Thompson's interview with Tom Piccirilli.

Or learn more about Every Shallow Cut.

Every Shallow Cut nominated for a Spinetingler!

2012-01-29T20:51:00.003-05:00

Critically-acclaimed novella Every Shallow Cut, by Tom Piccirilli, has been nominated for a Spinetingler Award in the new category of Best Novella. Voting is open to the public and will be open until February 1. Congratulations, Tom!

Vote for Every Shallow Cut!

Learn more about it here.

Bearded Women has "wit and charm"

2012-01-29T20:49:00.002-05:00

"With wit and charm, [Teresa Milbrodt] beautifully weaves short stories about women who are as real as we, who are strong in the presence of adversity, and whose only desire is to live their lives, embracing those aspects which make them so different than those around them." - Living Peacefully with Children

Read the review.

Learn more about Bearded Women.

Rave review of Enter, Night!

2012-01-29T20:43:00.002-05:00

"[T]his novel helped restore my confidence that a vampire novel can be a character-driven tale about relatable people facing adversity caused by something terrible and beyond their understanding or control. ... I haven’t felt honest physical concern for characters in danger this powerfully since I read Cormac McCarthy’s The Road for the first time. I loved Rowe’s characters that much." - Bracken MacLeod

Read the glowing review!

Purchase Enter, Night!

Good review of Bearded Women

2012-01-29T20:38:00.002-05:00

Claire Miller of Bookshelf Bombshells writes that Bearded Women "forces the reader to examine the inherent privilege of passing as unexceptional... it is a book that urges us to experience the world in another’s life for a few brief pages. ...It’s good. You’ll like it."

Read the review here.

Buy Bearded Women here.

Hexslinger one of the best series of 2011

2012-01-29T20:33:00.003-05:00

The Hopeful Librarian's Jen lists her favourite books and series from 2011. Here's what she had to say about Gemma Files' Hexslinger books:
" I picked up A Book of Tongues on a whim from the library and was just sucked in to this wonderful, dark alternate Old West... this is one of the most creepy-fun series I’ve read in a long time. If anything, Rope of Thorns improved on the first installment."

Read the article.

Learn more about A Book of Tongues and A Rope of Thorns.

Shelf Monkey loves Every Shallow Cut

2012-01-29T20:27:00.003-05:00

Corey Redekop of Shelf Monkey loved Every Shallow Cut, writing: "Brutal, yes. Violent, sometimes. Unforgiving, oh yes, and spilling over with despair. It may be one of the finest literary recreations of depression I've come across. ... If I'd read it three days sooner, it would have been in my top reads of 2011."

Read the review!

Order Every Shallow Cut!

Locus interviews Claude Lalumière

2012-01-27T23:15:00.007-05:00

Claude Lalumière, author of Objects of Worship and The Door to Lost Pages, gives his insights to Locus:
‘‘As a writer, I’m always interested in things I don’t understand. One of the worst pieces of advice ever given to writers is, ‘Write what you know.’ That’s terrible, awful! It’s very important for me to feel that I’m writing about something other. If I already understand things, why would I want to write about them? I try to write about characters who are very different from me – teenage girls, gay married men, forgotten Jews. And I just try to get into the mindset of somebody other than me. That’s where it becomes fiction, where it becomes something that is beyond self-expression, which I sneer at. Fiction is an attempt at communing with the world, trying to bridge some gap.”

Read the excerpt. The full interview can be found in the January 2012 issue of Locus.

Learn more about Objects of Worship or The Door to Lost Pages.

Nexus: Ascension now on Audible

2012-01-27T23:06:00.002-05:00

ChiZine is pleased to announce our second title available as an Audible audiobook - Robert Boyczuk's Nexus: Ascension. The book is $24.95, or just $7.95 if you have an Audible Gold membership.

Nexus: Ascension on Audible

More information about Nexus: Ascension

The Pattern Scars a bestseller as Bakka Phoenix!

2012-01-27T23:02:00.002-05:00

Bakka Phoenix Books has released their bestseller list for 2011. Coming in at number 8 on the trade paperback list is The Pattern Scars by Caitlin Sweet. Pretty sweet indeed!

See the list.

Order The Pattern Scars.

Lengthy review of A Book of Tongues

2012-01-27T22:55:00.002-05:00

Eternal Haunted Summer has an excellent review up of Gemma Files' A Book of Tongues. It might be more accurate to call it an analysis, as Margaret O'Connell dives into specific scenes and talks about what worked and what didn't. Needless to say, spoilers within.

Click here to read it.

Click here to learn more about A Book of Tongues, and its sequel A Rope of Thorns.

Great review of The Door to Lost Pages

2012-01-27T22:49:00.006-05:00

"The stories in The Door To Lost Pages have all been exquisitely crafted by Lalumière and readers cannot help but be drawn in to the worlds and lives he shows us. The stories are by turns funny, sad, bittersweet, and joyful. ...Anyone who enjoys at least slightly dark fantasy should enjoy The Door To Lost Pages." - Cathy Green, SF Revu

Read the review here.

Buy The Door to Lost Pages here.

Enter, Night is Geeks of Doom's #1 book

2012-01-27T22:45:00.002-05:00

Geeks of Doom have released their list of the top ten fantasy and horror books of 2011, and Michael Rowe's Enter, Night tops the list.

"The author has restored my faith in the belief that it is possible to present vampires uniquely and at times, the book feels like a love letter to fans of the bloodsuckers who miss the days when vampires used to eat their prey instead of braiding its hair and going vegan."

Read the list.

Buy the book!

Every Shallow Cut "heart-stopping"

2012-01-27T22:40:00.003-05:00

J. L. Comeau of Count Gore de Vol names Every Shallow Cut as one of his top ten picks of 2011, writing:
"Bleakness and anguish seethe on every page this heart-stopping story crafted in hues of utter desolation."

Click here to read the review.

Click here to purchase Every Shallow Cut.

Free eBook for Friday the 13th!

2012-01-13T13:11:00.000-05:00

In honour of Friday the 13th, how about a promo?

All CZP ebooks are FREE from 1pm EST (1300 hours... get it?) today for 13 hours (until 2am EST).

Go to http://chizinepub.com/ to see what's available, then contact Brett Savory on Twitter or Facebook or at brett@chizinepub.com and he'll send you the one you want!

One book per person!

Free eBook with Trade Paperback Purchases

2012-01-10T13:17:00.000-05:00

Starting now, whenever you buy a trade paperback from our website you'll be able to download the ebook version for free. You got it—right away and for free.

Since we started, we've offered 30% off the cover price of trade paperbacks when you order directly from us. That's not changing. We also embraced ebooks. We don't see them as a threat to our business, but as another way for fans to read our stories. We do our ebook creation in-house and offer them on Amazon, Kobo, Wowio and other sites.

Now, with the launch of our online shopping cart system, we decided to bundle an ebook into the price of trade paperbacks. When your purchase is complete, you'll be directed to log into the website to download a ZIP file containing the ebook in EPUB, MOBI and PDF formats.

Brett Savory, one of our co-publishers, put it this way:

We believe strongly in the ebook format. And believe our prices are fair for those who just want to read on their Kobo or Kindle. But we’ve said all along we’re in the story, not book, business. For someone who purchases a trade paperback, it’s fair they should be able to start reading the story right away on their e-reader, tablet or smartphone.

Sandra Kasturi, our other co-publisher, added:

It’s also a way for a small publisher to compete with the likes of Amazon. Amazon can offer deals on prices or shipping because of the volumes they’re working with. Shipping costs for the physical books are often prohibitive for smaller outfits, so we hope this offer makes us competitive and gives a reason for readers to buy directly from us.

Please note: This offer is only being done via the CZP site.

Islands I Have Known

2011-12-31T18:28:00.000-05:00

Carolyn Ives Gilman is the author of Isles of the Forsaken and its sequel Ison of the Isles. Below, she describes what inspired her in writing about island cultures, including islands "so haunted by the spirits of cannibalized children that they had to be abandoned."

The Forsaken Isles could be any islands, really—the Marshall Islands, or the Azores, or the Andaman Islands. Having said this, though, I have to admit some particular island landscapes did inspire the story. I first got the idea for Isles of the Forsaken in the Scottish Hebrides. I did my university year abroad in Scotland, soaking in a lot of Scottish folk songs, with their sweet, mournful tunes and their evocations of gallant lost causes of the past. Sir Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson would recognize things about the Forsakens.

Once I realized that an island nation would require a lot of boats, I did my research on sailing in the islands off the coast of British Columbia, which I toured in a two-masted ketch that became the model for the Ripplewill. But the islands I grew up on, and which kept creeping into the story, are the Apostle Islands in Lake Superior. You find them by going as far north as you can in Wisconsin, then stepping off the edge. They have been a borderland for quite some time. The Ojibway Indians told about a time when the islands were so haunted by the spirits of cannibalized children that they had to be abandoned. Though the child-haunted lagoon is now a marina for million-dollar yachts, I can testify from personal experience that not all the ghosts are gone.

Modern fantasies often forget the fact that, in traditional societies, magic emanated from the landscape. This is particularly true of islands. There is something different about a place that can’t be reached without crossing the water. The half-hour ferry ride to Madeline Island, which I have made every summer since turning five years old, is a transition. Crossing that cold, windy strait, you can feel all the tensions of modernity washing away, as if the lake were a barrier. Once you’re there, there is no high-speed internet, and cell phone coverage is spotty. The community is full of quirky, self-reliant people who can make an artwork or an electric generator from salvaged junk, for which reason they keep collections of derelict boats and washing machines in their yards. The every-other-month newspaper has ads for riprap and reports on the annual ice golf championship. Playing golf on the frozen lake isn’t the wackiest thing they do in winter, either.

There is a lot more to know about the Forsaken Islands than I was able to fit in two books. The story never even gets to the Outer Chain—but if you want to know about it, there is a novelette called “The Wild Ships of Fairny,” which appeared in Fantasy and Science Fiction in 1994. And, of course, there is the sequel, Ison of the Isles, coming out in April. In it, you will find lots more enchantment, lots more boats, and even some ballad-worthy causes.

Isles of the Forsaken is available in tradepaperback. Ison of the Isles is available for a limited time in author-signed, numbered hardcover.

Every Shallow Cut gets some year-end love

2011-12-31T18:05:00.002-05:00

The year may be ending, but the praise for Tom Piccirilli and Every Shallow Cut sure isn't.

Mike Dennis writes: "[T]his is not the first of his books that I’ve read. It is, however, the best. I’ve wondered why he’s not better known, why his books don’t sell in such numbers as to propel him into permanent status on bestseller lists. It might be because the American reading public is not ready for Every Shallow Cut. It’s a masterpiece far ahead of its time."

Read his review here.

And Jedediah Ayres at Barnes and Noble calls Every Shallow Cut "The most startlingly complete and complex character study I read this year".

Read his mini-review.

Visit CZP's page on Every Shallow Cut.

Briarpatch is "Urban Fantasy as you've not seen it before"

2011-12-31T18:00:00.002-05:00

"Emotionally fueled, Briarpatch explores what it means to live and love. ...This is Urban Fantasy as you've not seen it before. Recommended." - Mad Hatter Reviews

Read the mini-review. (second review on the page)

Order Tim Pratt's Briarpatch.

Eutopia now available on Audible!

2011-12-31T17:51:00.003-05:00

ChiZine is proud to announce that we will be making our books available as audiobooks on Audible.com. Our first available book is David Nickle's Eutopia. We hope to greatly expand our audio catalogue throughout 2012.

Check out the Audible page!

Or buy the print edition!

Isles of the Forsaken among the best books of 2011

2011-12-30T18:03:00.002-05:00

"[T]he book is so nuanced it catches you up. One moment you are struggling with exotic names and complex politics and the next you are swept away in what proves to be an utterly compelling creation. It was both maddening and a relief to discover that this is only the first of a series." - Sienna Powers, in January magazine's Best Books of 2011 - SF & Fantasy feature

Read the review here.

Buy Isles of the Forsaken here.

And pre-order Ison of the Isles.

Door to Lost Pages makes Cate Gardner's top ten

2011-12-30T17:59:00.002-05:00

Author Cate Gardner gave a quick shout out to Claude Lalumière's The Door to Lost Pages, naming it as one of her top ten novels for 2011.

See the post here.

Buy Lost Pages here.

Enter, Night named as one of the best vampire releases of 2011

2011-12-30T17:55:00.002-05:00

Paul Goat Allen of Barnes and Noble calls Enter, Night one of the best new vampire stories for 2011, writing: "Rowe’s Enter, Night was a 'vampire novel for the ages' ... powered by a darkly lyrical – and decidedly creepy – narrative."

Read his article here.

Buy Enter, Night here.

Sci Fi Fan Letter interviews Michael Rowe

2011-12-30T17:47:00.003-05:00

"> What’s the best/worst thing about writing?

The best thing is the finished product. The feeling of holding a book with your name on it is extraordinarily satisfying. The next best thing is when writing is flowing naturally and you love what you're doing. The worst part is everything else that it takes to get to the finished product."

Sci Fi Fan Letter grills Enter, Night author Michael Rowe about his writing process and tips for the trade.

The interview can be found here.

More information about Enter, Night can be found here.

ESC one of the "Best Damn Books of 2011"

2011-12-30T17:44:00.002-05:00

Ed Kurtz lists Every Shallow Cut among his "Best Damn Books of 2011". He writes: "I won’t sugarcoat it: this is a depressing read. But it’s a damn excellent one, too, and worth the open-mouthed, knee-hugging keening you’ll probably be doing after you’ve finished it."

Read the review! (scroll to number 7)

Buy Every Shallow Cut!

Fangoria reviews Enter, Night

2011-12-30T17:36:00.009-05:00

"Rowe's years as a matter-of-fact genre journo and social commentator have served him well here, as there's not an ounce of flab in Enter, Night. It buzzes with the energy of pure, brisk storytelling, which is not to say it's a base or dumbed-down affair. In fact its finely detailed character detours (including a richly told vignette about the various cycles of abuse that is stunning drama in and of itself) are concise and profound, poetic but never pretentious. Like every great writer toiling within terror, Rowe pays attention to people first, making sure we care about them, known them inside and out and understand their pasts and motivations. The horror of Enter, Night may be familiar and far from groundbreaking (think Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot with a dash of Steve Niles' 30 Days of Night) , but Rowe is a master teller of tales, and his strength lies in the practical beauty of his words. Hugely recommended." - Fangoria

This review can be found in the current print issue of Fangoria, on newsstands now.

Order Enter, Night!

Short but sweet review of Every Shallow Cut

2011-12-22T20:56:00.002-05:00

"Tom Piccirilli writes like a man on fire. His sentences bob and weave like classic pugilists. His characters are desperate in all the right ways. Every Shallow Cut demonstrates a master of gritty poetics at the top of his game." - Cameron Pierce

Read the review here. (scroll down to number 9)

Buy Every Shallow Cut here.

Isles "beautifully written and rich with meaning"

2011-12-22T20:46:00.003-05:00

Tahlia Newland has reviewed Isles of the Forsaken. She gave the book five stars out of five, writing: "‘Isles of the Forsaken’ is an excellent book, beautifully written and rich with meaning. It’s a unique and unpredictable story full of surprises, interesting characters and mysterious forays into the world of the spirit that lingered long after I put the book down."

Read the review!

Order Isles of the Forsaken!

And pre-order Ison of the Isles!

Great, in-depth review of Isles of the Forsaken

2011-12-22T20:39:00.002-05:00

Sneaky Burrito has a rather large review up for Carolyn Ives Gilman's Isles of the Forsaken, diving deep into character details and plot analysis.
"I like Gilman's writing style; she's good at sneaking in a lot of little details that make the world more believable and the reading experience much more pleasurable. ...All-in-all, I thought this was a great book and I'd recommend it to most fantasy readers out there."

You can read the whole thing here.

Order Isles of the Forsaken here.

And you can pre-order its sequel, Ison of the Isles.

Locus likes Tim Pratt

2011-12-22T20:33:00.001-05:00

"Introducing foul-mouthed, cynical modern humans into mind-bending alternate realms (some too peculiar to last for long), and then taking them back to the Bay Area, creates a fascinating background for their private quests. ...Final section ‘‘Everybody Gets What’s Coming to Them’’ defies both genre and general morality with a sly zest that takes Briarpatch well beyond the darkness of the opening. It showcases Pratt’s ability to interweave the most fantastic places and concepts with scenes that any Bay Area resident might know." - Faren Miller, Locus Online

Read the full review.

Find out more about Briarpatch.

2011-12-22T20:29:00.002-05:00

Backlisted has reviewed Michael Rowe's Enter, Night, calling it "a welcome shot in the arm for the vampire genre—because, apparently, it is a genre unto itself these days. Considering the glut of limp-wristed horror titles that want to address vampirism through forbidden love or unfortunate farce... Enter, Night has the potential to capitalize on aspects of the genre that have been forgotten as of late."

The full review is here.

Our page on Enter, Night is here.

The World More Full of Weeping has "incredibly powerful impact"

2011-12-18T23:22:00.002-05:00

"This is an exceptionally slim novella, with an incredibly powerful impact. ...The ending really got me, because it contains a display of emotion so raw and yet unexaggerated it broke your little loving heart." - The Book Smugglers

Read the review here. (scroll down)

Buy The World More Full of Weeping.

Gemma Files interview on Locus

2011-12-18T23:15:00.003-05:00

‘‘I have always had an urge towards the horrific. Often I say that horror is a ghetto inside a ghetto inside a ghetto, in terms of genre. There are science fiction people who like fantasy, and fantasy people who like science fiction, but there are not a lot of fantasy or science fiction people who like horror. On the other hand, there are horror people who like both science fiction and fantasy, and I’m one of them. (I don’t love all of it.) But horror is the place where people won’t go, the place where suddenly things aren’t good any more." - Gemma Files

Read this and more on Locus!

Gemma Files is the author of the Hexslinger books, which currently include A Book of Tongues and A Rope of Thorns.

Audio interview with Tone Milazzo!

2011-12-18T23:09:00.002-05:00

Tone Milazzo sat down with Adventures in Sci Fi Publishing for a podcast interview about his latest, Picking Up the Ghost. It is a must-hear for anyone interested in magic, ghosts, and writing.

You can listen to it here.

And you can find out more about Picking Up the Ghost here.

The Pattern Scars has "soul and heft and weight"

2011-12-18T23:04:00.003-05:00

"Sweet writes beautifully cadenced, hypnotic prose –- prose that has soul and heft and weight –- and paints a world rich in both emotional impression and exacting detail... [The Pattern Scars] is grim and bloody and soft and speckled with beauty." - Leah Bobet, Ideomancer

Read the full review here.

Order The Pattern Scars here.

The Advantages to Driving a School Bus

2011-12-12T18:50:00.002-05:00

John Mantooth is the author of Shoebox Train Wreck. Below, he shares a little insight into his writing process.

I probably shouldn't admit this: most of my stories were dreamed up behind the wheel of a school bus. See, on a school bus—at least in my state—drivers aren't allowed to listen to music or audio books, or really anything unless you count the incessant noise swelling from kids who have somehow mistaken the bus for an amusement park ride. The afternoons are the worst. It doesn't take long to realize there are a couple of ways to deal with the noise. One, you get angry. Stopping doesn't help. Tried it. The kids get quiet the first time, surprised that the ride can halt at this unexpected place on the side of the road. But as soon as the bus gets going again, so do they. Even louder this time, as if to challenge you, as if to say, what will you do now, Mr. Bus Driver. Stop? Go ahead. Try it. We can do this all day. The other option is to ignore them, to drive the bus doggedly toward each drop, knowing that every time you open that door some of them will get off, and the clatter of noise will dissipate incrementally, and incrementally is better than nothing at all.

The second option works better than the first, and soon the noises from the back become part of the aural landscape, sounds that are heard but don’t register. So, the mind wanders. What is there to look at, to see? Plenty, if you’re paying attention. My route traversed the back roads, the forgotten places, where three-legged dogs limped down to trash heaps sniffing for their next meal, where old women sat in front of highway fruit stands digging through purses for pinches of snuff, where half-naked children appeared in the doorways of burned out shacks, hoping to glimpse their older brothers and sisters as they climbed off the bus. Where life burns a little brighter, a little closer to the bone, even if that bone is splintered and sharp and painful to behold.

I probably make it sound worse than it really is, but isn’t that what writers do? Take reality—the very best and worst parts—and knead it like dough until it morphs into something else, be it soft or coarse, palatable or bittersweet. In the end, the exterior noise became secondary to the noise inside my head, as I blended these back roads with older places remembered from a childhood visiting my grandmother in the north Georgia mountains. The stories started to take shape inside my head. Soon, my favorite time of the day was climbing aboard the bus, hearing the familiar blast of sound from the back, seeing the landscape drift past, and letting my imagination work. The stories—many of them—reached a kind of critical mass inside my head, and I had to write them down. Yet, some are still there, tucked away in the recesses of my imagination, a cluster of moving images, real, remembered, and imagined, shuffling and reshuffling themselves into a cycle of flurry that won’t hold still. But that’s okay. Some of them, I’ll keep that way, for myself. The rest of them are yours.

Shoebox Train Wreck is now available for pre-order in limited edition, author-signed hardcovers.

Interview with Carolyn Ives Gilman

2011-12-11T00:39:00.003-05:00

Carolyn Ives Gilman, author of Isles of the Forsaken and its upcoming sequel Ison of the Isles, spoke with Fantasy & Science Fiction magazine about her recent novella, "The Ice Owl".

"This is also a story about the moment when you first realize that life is a series of deliberate choices for which you are going to be responsible. ... I am frustrated by how many stories indulge in the wish-fulfillment fantasy of a life that is guided by outside forces. Think of all the stories where the protagonist is fated to become king, or to save the world, or is thrust into a situation where there is only one right course of action. It’s all about the author’s longing for a return to an infantile existence. But life is not like that. We aren’t just acted upon by events; we have to create our own futures through our own decisions, for better or worse."

Read the interview!

Buy Isles of the Forsaken!

Pre-order Ison of the Isles!

Another glowing review of Enter, Night!

2011-12-11T00:32:00.002-05:00

Paul Bens at Haole Reads has posted a deep review of Enter, Night, writing: "Rowe manages to do what so many others writing “vampire fiction” fail to...he creates an astoundingly creepy, violent, atmospheric and frightening novel that not only pays homage to the literary and cinematic past, but also manages to restore the vampire to his former and deserving glory. Highly, highly recommended."

Read the full review.

Buy a copy of Enter, Night.

High praise for Bearded Women

2011-12-11T00:26:00.002-05:00

"I'm not even sure how to categorize this book. It's beautiful and touching with just a touch of sarcasm and wit. This collection of short stories has to be the best I have ever read." - Sara Thompson, Reading All Year Long

Read the review!

Order Bearded Women!

Shout-out to Eutopia on SF Signal

2011-12-11T00:09:00.003-05:00

A recent post on SF Signal had regular contributors rounding up their favourite SF offerings for 2011. David Nickle's Eutopia made the cut on Jessica Strider's list.

Click here to read the article.

Click here to read about Eutopia.

Profile of Michael Rowe in Fab

2011-12-11T00:03:00.003-05:00

Fab magazine has published a short, illuminating profile of Michael Rowe, author of Enter, Night.

"We share a love for Bram Stoker’s Dracula. 'It’s about this evil entity that comes to England to fuck with the virtue of British women. I think it has tremendous appeal for gay people because we are perceived as the same. It’s a wonderful commentary on both xenophobia and Victorian prudery,' he says."

Read the article here.

Find out more about Enter, Night here.

Enter, Night is 'the vampire fiction release of the year'

2011-12-11T00:03:00.000-05:00

"Enter, Night will seduce you with its dark lyricism and richly tapestried storyline and then it will gut you with its unrelenting horror. Michael Rowe has written a vampire novel for the ages, one that readers will not soon forget. Remember when you first read Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot? Prepare for a similar experience.

There are still a few months left to 2011, but I’ll say it right now – Enter, Night is the vampire fiction release of the year." - Paul Goat Allen, Barnes & Noble

Read the review!

Order Enter, Night!

The Pattern Scars a "beautiful nightmare"

2011-12-07T22:28:00.002-05:00

"Caitlin Sweet's shimmering prose, already apparent in her debut novel A Telling of Stars, reaches new heights in The Pattern Scars, which is so replete with luminous images and an evocative atmosphere that even now, a week later, these sensations still haunt my memory as if they had been real, a country I visited and would return to again." - Ilana Teitelbaum, The Huffington Post

Click to read the review.

Click to order The Pattern Scars.

Gemma Files to read at Fantastic Fiction

2011-12-07T22:19:00.002-05:00

Fantastic Fiction at KGB is a monthly reading series held at the KGB Bar in Manhattan, showcasing the best writers in speculative fiction. This month, they'll be hosting Gemma Files, author of the Hexslinger books. Admission is free, so if you're in the area, be sure to drop by!

Where: KGB Bar, 85 East 4th Street, Manhattan, NYC
When: Wednesday December 21, 7pm

More info can be found here.

And info about the Hexslinger books can be found here and here.

Double review of Major Karnage and Nexus: Ascension by Alex Good!

2011-12-07T22:11:00.004-05:00

Alex Good has reviewed both Nexus: Ascension and Major Karnage in a single post. He calls the former "Well-punctuated with dramatic set pieces and thrills that are often sharp and bloody, the whole thing culminates in a spectacularly messy, and thoroughly satisfying, finale", and the latter "shows how it doesn't take much of a twist to turn tried-and-true conventions to parodic effect."

Read the review.

Click here to buy Major Karnage.

And here to buy Nexus: Ascension.

Great review of Bearded Women

2011-12-07T22:09:00.001-05:00

" Bearded Women is one of the best debut short story collections I've read over the past few years and Teresa Milbrodt will be a writer whose future I shall follow with keenness, as she already displays more command over her stories than several veteran story writers. Highly recommended." - The OF Blog

Read the in-depth review!

Order Bearded Women!

Shouts out to In the Mean Time and Objects of Worship

2011-12-07T21:58:00.005-05:00

Spec-fic blog Bibliophile Stalker mentioned two ChiZine books in a recent post recommending short story collections. In the Mean Time and Objects of Worship are among the works suggested for people who want to get into writing short fiction.

"There's always room for subtlety and elegance, even in genres like horror, and Paul Tremblay understands this. What makes his fiction remarkable is that it creeps up on you, instead of being transparent and overt. "

"Claude Lalumière has the ability to combine two (or more) unrelated genres and craft this potent story that's greater than the sum of its parts. "

See the mention. (scroll down)

Find out more about Objects of Worship.

Or about In the Mean Time.

Words from James Marshall, Author of Ninja Versus Pirate Featuring Zombies

2011-12-06T20:38:00.001-05:00

I've had it with the world. That's why I wrote Ninja Versus Pirate Featuring Zombies. Poverty, pollution, war, unfair competition. It's never going to get better. Environmentalism? Occupy Wall Street? They're mild regrets the morning after. The dirty misdeed is done. Ninja Versus Pirate Featuring Zombies is an immodest bomb-proof clinic where the future is exposed, torn out, and stuffed in a bio-hazard garbage bag.

[Ninja Versus Pirate Featuring Zombies is available for pre-order in limited edition, author-signed hardcovers.]

ChiZine Holiday Guide

2011-11-24T22:42:00.000-05:00

It’s that time of year again. The holiday shopping season has begun! And CZP is here to help you find the right gift for that special someone. We’ve got it all—vampires, cowboys, aliens, and more. There’s something for everyone at ChiZine Publications.

Enter, Night

Sparkly vampires getting you down this holiday season? Cheer up with Michael Rowe’s Enter, Night—a return to the good old days of bloodsuckers as . . . you know . . . monsters. A three-hundred-year-old horror slumbers in Parr’s Landing, calling out to the insane and the murderous for centuries, begging for release. The novel follows one man cutting a swath of violence across the country, bent on the terrible resurrection of an ancient evil that would plunge the town and its inhabitants into an endless night. This “anti-Twilight” is sure to entertain during those long winter evenings.

Best For: Those not lining up to see Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part I in theatres this Thanksgiving.

Website: http://chizinepub.com/books/enter.php

Isles of the Forsaken

After you’ve finished reading A Dance with Dragons, pick up Carolyn Ives Gilman’s Isles of the Forsaken. The Forsaken Isles are on the brink of revolution. Three individuals are about to push it over the edge and trigger events that will lead to a final showdown between ancient forces and the new overlords of the land. “Once all the players in this drama are gathered together it is impossible to turn the pages fast enough to find out what happens next.” (Reading Reality)

Best For: Those looking for something to kill time until Season 2 of Game of Thrones.

Website: http://chizinepub.com/books/isles.php

A Rope of Thorns: Volume Two of the Hexslinger Series

The adventures of Asher Rook and Chess Pargeter continue in the second volume of Gemma Files’ award-winning Hexslinger series. Chess Pargeter, bent on revenge over Rook’s betrayal, kills his way toward “Hex City” and his former lover. All will have to shed yet more blood as they face down the mysterious patron demon, known only as the Enemy . . . along with every other enemy Chess has already made along the way. And the best part is Volume Three, A Tree of Bones, will be out this spring!

Best For: Those looking for a healthy dose of cowboys, magic, and demons this Christmas.

Website: http://chizinepub.com/books/rope_of_thorns.php

Hair Wreath and Other Stories

If you’re a fan of subtle and creeping horror rather than buckets of gore then The Hair Wreath and Other Stories is for you. Halli Villegas weaves her strange stories into a wreath of memories, rife with an atmospheric and ominous creep redolent of Shirley Jackson. “Slippery, evocative, tasty.” A sure-fire spinetingler!

Best For: Those looking for something to curl up by the fire with.

Website: http://chizinepub.com/books/hair-wreath.php

Nexus: Ascension

Described by Publishers Weekly as the stuff of an epic nihilistic hangover, Nexus: Ascension is perfect for the discerning science fiction fan. After returning from a thirty-year trade mission, the crew of the Ea wake from cryonic suspension to find that their home world is dead—infected with a virulent and deadly disease. In a desperate scramble to save themselves, the crew members of the Ea must come to terms with the death of their world—and enter a deadly struggle for survival against an enemy they can’t hope to beat.

Best For: Those looking for something to fill the void of losing Battlestar Galactica.

Website: http://chizinepub.com/books/nexus-ascension.php

Major Karnage

No Christmas is complete without big guns, massive explosions and a deadly threat from beyond the solar system. . . . In Gord Zajac’s Major Karnage an invading armada of aliens threatens to destroy the Earth, and it’s up to retired . . . well, committed Major Karnage to stop them—as long as he doesn’t accidentally blow his own head off first. This “oversize comic book adventure” is well worth a read. Plus, if you’re looking for more Karnage-y goodness, check out “A Karnage Kristmas.”

Best For: Those looking for a screw-ball, alien invasion story this Christmas.

Website: http://chizinepub.com/books/major-karnage.php

Bearded Women review at Scholars & Rogues

2011-11-13T18:27:00.002-05:00

Hot off their recent interview with Teresa Milbrodt, Scholars & Rogues gives us an excellent review of her collection Bearded Women.
"I recommend it highly – and I look forward to whatever this gifted writer brings us next."

The full review is here.

More information on Bearded Women can be found here.

Picking Up the Ghost audio trailer

2011-11-13T18:21:00.002-05:00

Tone Milazzo has released an audio trailer for his book Picking Up the Ghost.
You can listen to it on his website.

Picking Up the Ghost has recently been put on the long list for the 2011 Cybils Awards, nominated in the "Fantasy and Science Fiction - Teen" category. Congratulations, Tone!

Read more about Picking Up the Ghost.

Door to Lost Pages "weird and wonderful"

2011-11-13T18:17:00.002-05:00

"Readers looking for something weird and wonderful may find it in this sequence of linked stories. ...While the narration swings from whimsical and hopeful to violent and despairing, the sense of wonder remains throughout." - Victoria Truslow for NJ.com

Read the review. (third on the page)

Check out The Door to Lost Pages.

Chasing the Dragon now an audiobook!

2011-11-13T17:26:00.002-05:00

Nicholas Kaufmann's Chasing the Dragon is the first ChiZine title to be made available on Lambik Audiobooks. The audiobook is narrated by Alex Foster, and can be purchaed as an MP3 or M4B for only $6.99.

Buy it here!

Or if you'd prefer a print or ebook copy, go here.

Westlake Soul and Ison of the Isles now available for pre-order!

2011-11-13T17:16:00.002-05:00

ChiZine is proud to announce that our first two titles for 2012 are now available for pre-order.

Westlake Soul by Rio Youers and Ison of the Isles by Carolyn Ives Gilman can be pre-ordered in a limited edition, signed hardcover edition. Like our previous limited editions, only 150 of each book will be available in this way, so order quickly to reserve your copy!

Order Westlake Soul:
Darkfuse
Cemetery Dance

Order Ison of the Isles:
Darkfuse
Cemetery Dance

Kind words for Bearded Women

2011-11-12T23:03:00.002-05:00

"Freakish in mind or body they may be, but Milbrodt's characters have the same problems as everyone else. . . . The characters are worth knowing, and the insight they provide into unusual lives is worth pondering." - Tzer Island

Read the full review.

Order Bearded Women.

Two profiles of Michael Rowe

2011-11-12T22:55:00.002-05:00

Michael Rowe is getting quite a bit of press in relation to his newest work, Enter, Night. The Winnipeg Free Press promotes him as a local success story, while Outwords praises him as a pioneer of queer horror. In both articles, Rowe gives his thoughts on Enter, Night, writing 'niche' fiction, and LGBT issues.

Read the Winnipeg Free Press article.

Read the Outwords article.

Learn more about Enter, Night.

Teresa Milbrodt interviewed by Scholars & Rogues

2011-11-12T22:51:00.002-05:00

Scholars & Rogues has a lengthy interview up with Teresa Milbrodt, author of Bearded Women.

S&R: I get the impression that you know your way around the ancient Greeks. Have you always enjoyed reading mythology or are we seeing the result of research done expressly for this book?

TM: One of my college professors classified my work as “Midwestern mythic,” which I thought was a fitting term. Mythic themes and magical realist plot lines have always been a fascination of mine. It’s fiction, so why be constrained to the boring old real world all the time?

But to actually answer your question, I loved reading Greek mythology when I was a kid, and I’ve returned to those tales since the characters in them are both interesting and skeletal. In other words, there’s already a backstory and history for mythological figures, but at the same time there’s a lot of space for a writer to flesh out exactly who these people/gorgons/cyclops are and bring them to three-dimensional life. Plus I wanted to explore what it might be like to go through life with snakes on your head.

Order Bearded Women here.

Cashtown reviewed at Roundtable Reviews

2011-11-12T22:43:00.003-05:00

Tracy Farnsworth at Roundtable Reviews called People Live Still in Cashtown Corners "dark and gripping", giving "Kudos to the author for taking a fictional story and making it seem incredibly real."

Read the full review. (here there be spoilers)

Why not visit Cashtown Corners?

The New York Times gives props to ChiZine!

2011-11-12T22:36:00.002-05:00

We feel honoured to have been mentioned in this recent NYT article about dark fiction.
"The best work in dark fantasy and horror fiction these days is being published by small presses, haunted literary boutiques established (mostly) in out-of-the-way places. ...devoted to the weird, to the strange and — most important — to good writing."

Read the entire article!

ESC cuts close to the bone

2011-11-12T22:32:00.002-05:00

"Every Shallow Cut is a new entry in a classic but too-rare form that cuts close to the bone. As such, it’s unflinchingly successful." - Thomas Roche, Boiled Hard

Read the in-depth review.

Buy Every Shallow Cut.

Pattern Scars mentioned on Jeff VanderMeer's blog

2011-10-29T20:05:00.002-04:00

"The hard-to-classify dark fantasy by Sweet is a gorgeously designed trade paperback—the publisher, ChiZine, has really come into their own." - Jeff VanderMeer

Check it out!

Buy The Pattern Scars!

Cashtown Corners is "excellently effective enhanced literature"

2011-10-29T19:57:00.002-04:00

An interesting review of People Live Still in Cashtown Corners comes to us from Vook. The review is of the eBook version and focuses on the ways in which the book has been enhanced for a digital format.
"It’s art. Good art. Not emotional art. But art that did something to my brain I didn’t expect. I enjoyed it. I had an experience. ...That’s one example of a piece of excellently effective enhanced literature."

Read the review. (spoiler warning)

Get the print or eBook version of Cashtown Corners here.

Isles of the Forsaken on Reading Reality

2011-10-29T19:53:00.002-04:00

Marlene Harris of Reading Reality loved Isles of the Forsaken, writing that "it is impossible to turn the pages fast enough to find out what happens next."

Read the review.

Order Isles of the Forsaken.

CZP Titles Now Available at the Apple Bookstore

2011-10-17T18:42:00.000-04:00

Hey all you iPhone and iPad users! You can now buy most CZP titles on the Apple bookstore. Currently available:

Bearded Women by Teresa Milbrodt
The Fecund’s Melancholy Daughter by Brent Hayward
The Door to Lost Pages by Claude Lalumière
Eutopia by David Nickle
Every Shallow Cut by Tom Piccirilli
Napier’s Bones by Derryl Murphy
In the Mean Time by Paul Tremblay
People Live Still in Cashtown Corners by Tony Burgess
The Hair Wreath and Other Stories by Halli Villegas
Sarah Court by Craig Davidson
Major Karnage by Gord Zajac
Nexus: Ascension by Robert Boyczuk
Cities of Night by Philip Nutman
The Thief of Broken Toys by Tim Lebbon
A Book of Tongues: Volume One of the Hexslinger Series by Gemma Files
Katja from the Punk Band by Simon Logan
Chasing the Dragon by Nicholas Kaufmann
Chimerascope by Douglas Smith
Monstrous Affections by David Nickle
Objects of Worship by Claude Lalumière
Filaria by Brent Hayward
The Choir Boats by Daniel A. Rabuzzi
The Tel Aviv Dossier by Lavie Tidhar and Nir Yaniv
The World More Full of Weeping by Robert J. Wiersema

With more to come soon.

Cashtown Corners at Spinetingler

2011-10-12T19:21:00.002-04:00

"...it looks like the psycho-noir is experience a bit of a renaissance for those readers willing to seek them out and People Still Live at Cashtown Corners [sic] is a worthy addition." - Brian Lindenmuth, Spinetingler

Check out the review (but watch out for a spoiler warning!)

Check out People Live Still in Cashtown Corners.

Book Den on Pattern Scars

2011-10-12T19:17:00.003-04:00

Book Den gave The Pattern Scars by Caitlin Sweet a 7/10, saying: "If you love a good fantasy story, you should check out The Pattern Scars. It's a dark and different tale that I really enjoyed."

Read the review!

Order The Pattern Scars today!

Yet another great ESC review

2011-10-12T19:08:00.002-04:00

"Piccirilli, until this book having reputation of excellent plotter, this time dropped the plot altogether aside, writing an excellent jazzy prose. This is, in general, a poem in prose, stanzas about despair, anger and fall into the abyss. ...This novella cuts like the sharpest knife." - Ray Garraty, Endless Falls Up

Click here to read the review.

Click here to buy Every Shallow Cut.

A Book of Tongues nominated for a Spectrum Award!

2011-10-10T17:00:00.002-04:00

Gemma Files' A Book of Tongues has made the shortlist for the 2011 Gaylactic Spectrum Awards. These awards recognize outstanding horror, SF, and fantasy works with significant LGBTQ themes. Congratulations, Gemma!

Click here to see the complete shortlist.

Click here to buy A Book of Tongues.

Chicks Dig Books digs Sarah Court

2011-10-10T16:57:00.002-04:00

"Davidson’s prose is stark and understated... He makes you feel each character’s despair, and he holds nothing back. With elements of dark humor and subtle horror, this is an unforgettable piece of writing. " - Chicks Dig Books

Read the full review.

Order a copy of Sarah Court.

Monster Island podcast with Tone Milazzo

2011-10-10T16:51:00.002-04:00

The Monster Island Resort horror podcast recently sat down with Tone Milazzo, author of Picking Up the Ghost. It's a must-listen for anyone interested in Milazzo's unique urban fantasy style.

Listen to it here!

Buy Picking Up the Ghost here!

Feature interview with Caitlin Sweet

2011-10-10T16:43:00.006-04:00

"Trying to write a third novel was fraught, for various personal and artistic reasons—and when I finally emailed the manuscript to my agent, in the fall of 2009, he didn’t know what to do with it. He said no major publisher would touch it, as it didn’t fit any of the three bestselling fantasy models: young adult, epic, and paranormal romance. After I’d rolled myself out of a self-pitying foetal ball, I decided that I’d investigate the small press scene. Thankfully, the experience of Dave Nickle (who’s also a Goodreads author) led me to ChiZine Publications." - Caitlin Sweet

Read more of Caitlin's personal story at Jeanz Book Read n Review.

Order The Pattern Scars from our website.

Isles of the Forsaken and Briarpatch at Barnes & Noble

2011-10-04T20:46:00.000-04:00

Starting today and lasting until October 17, you’ll find Isles of the Forsaken (Carolyn Ives Gilman) and Briarpatch (Tim Pratt) on display tables at Barnes & Noble. If you’ve been thinking about getting one (or both) of these books, now’s the time. Buying these books off the tables shows B&N that these books rock and you want to see more CZP titles in their stores.

Find your local B&N at: http://store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/storelocator/stores.aspx

And even if you already have these books, stop by the table, pick up the books, draw attention. Tell the clerk you love those titles. Let B&N know CZP has the best books, the best fans and the best authors!

The fourteen-year history of ChiZine.com in 14 minutes and 53 seconds

2011-10-03T09:14:00.000-04:00

From Word on the Street, CZP Co-Publisher Sandra Kasturi explains the history of ChiZine and ChiZine Publications.

Even though you are watching this online, we would appreciate you applauding when Sandra is finished.

CZP Prix Aurora Award Nominees

2011-10-02T09:43:00.000-04:00

Only ~~three~~ ~~two~~ ~~week~~ ONE DAY left to vote in the Aurora Awards. This year, we’re delighted to announce that CZP and The Chiaroscuro/ChiZine.com are well-represented.

If you haven’t heard of the Auroras, they are an annual award recognizing the best in Canadian science fiction/fantasy prose, poetry, music, art, fan organizations and more. Winners are determined by voting, which is open to all Canadian citizens and permanent residents.

Our nominees

Best English Related Work: Chimerascope by Douglas Smith. A short story collection of sixteen tales, introduced by Julie Czerneda, who calls them “stories you can't forget.” Bestselling author Robert J. Sawyer names Doug “quite simply, the finest short-story writer Canada has ever produced in the science fiction and fantasy genres.” Chimerascope was also a finalist for the Sunburst Award.

Best Artist (Professional and Amateur): Erik Mohr for his cover art for all CZP books. Keep in mind, this is not a nomination for one item or a collection, but for consistently turning out great covers for a variety of novels and collections. Head over to the Books page on the CZP site and take a look. Click on each book for a larger version of the cover.

Best Fan Organizational: Helen Marshall and Sandra Kasturi, chairs of the first Toronto SpecFic Colloquium. A day-long event, it was the first of its kind (that we know of) to bring together authors, editors and readers in a format to allow lectures, readings and discussions of genre fiction. If you weren’t able to attend the Colloquium, you can still watch the presentations from the event on our YouTube channel.

The second Colloquium will be held October 15th at the Toronto Underground Cinema (tickets are still available). Due to popular demand, the Colloquium has become an annual event.

Other nominees for you to consider

Best English Short Story: CZP’s marketing director Matt Moore has been nominated for “Touch the Sky, They Say”, which you can read for free on AE: The Canadian Science Fiction Review.

Best English Poem / Song: We have this category covered.

“Waiting for the Harrowing” by CZP’s managing editor Helen Marshall, which appeared in issue #45 of ChiZine.com.

“Let the Night In,” by Sandra Kasturi, CZP co-publisher and ChiZine.com’s Managing Poetry Editor, appeared alongside other CZP authors, staff & friends in Evolve: Vampire Stories of the New Undead.

“The ABCs of the End of the World” by Carolyn Clink, Poetry Editor at ChiZine.com, from A Verdant Green.

“Of the Corn: Kore’s Innocence” by Colleen Anderson, Poetry Editor at ChiZine.com and an editor/slush reader for CZP, was published in Witches & Pagans #21.

Best English Related Work: Although we’re all rooting for Chimerascope, you might also consider Tesseracts Fourteen, edited by John Robert Colombo and Brett Alexander Savory, CZP Co-Publisher, which contains some great stories and poems by CZP authors, friends and staff.

How Do I Vote?

The Aurora site describes the registration and voting process a lot better than we can here. Just know it is open to Canadian permanent residents and citizens, and there is a $5.50 fee to vote (unless you are going to SFContario, in which case the fee is waved).

As always, thanks for your support of CZP!

Good review of The Pattern Scars

2011-09-28T23:27:00.003-04:00

Popcorn Reads liked Caitlin Sweet's The Pattern Scars, writing: "The Pattern Scars sweeps the reader up... This is not light reading by a long shot but it’s worth every minute of it if you’re into dark fantasy."

Read the review!

The Pattern Scars is now available!

10 Questions with Claude Lalumière

2011-09-28T23:04:00.003-04:00

Writing about Writing sat down with Claude Lalumière, author of The Door to Lost Pages and Objects of Worship. He offers a fascinating insight into his writing style, his position on sexuality in fiction, and his Lost Myths project.

Check out the interview here!

Buy Lost Pages or Objects of Worship!

Short-but-sweet review of The Thief of Broken Toys

2011-09-28T23:01:00.002-04:00

"Lebbon has created a heartbreaking story with The Thief of Broken Toys. The loss and longing of Ray are painted so adeptly that I felt that heaviness in my chest, tears threatening to show themselves. Very subtle in its horror, but it is indeed there. One of the best, I’ve read this year." - John Boden, Shock Totem

The review is here. (third review on the page)

Our page on The Thief of Broken Toys is here.

Rope of Thorns is "everything you hope for in a sequel"

2011-09-28T22:56:00.003-04:00

The Turned Brain loved Gemma Files' latest Hexslinger novel: "Really 'Rope of Thorns' is everything you hope for in a sequel, but so rarely get. The plot is advanced, a greater understanding of characters is granted, new and interesting characters are introduced. Files' prose remains a delight to read, the cadence of her sentences captures the wild west setting perfectly, and the images she paints are a fascinating mix of frontier practicality and magic bred surrealism."

Read it here.

Order A Rope of Thorns here.

Chimerascope on Canadian Science Fiction Review

2011-09-28T22:48:00.002-04:00

"Reading Smith’s stories is like taking a series of guided tours through strange places — you don’t expect any bombshells to be dropped on you but you do expect to see something new and memorable. Chimerascope delivers that in spades and is well worth the price of admission." - Helen Michaud, The Canadian Science Fiction Review

Read the review here.

Learn more about Chimerascope here.

SpecFic Colloquium Blog: Daniel Rabuzzi

2011-09-22T10:51:00.012-04:00

“Benedick: Well, you are a rare parrot-teacher.

Beatrice: A bird of my tongue is better
than a beast of yours.”

-- Much Ado About Nothing, (Act I, scene 1: lines 138-140), William Shakespeare, c. 1600.

Fairy tales, myth, legend and other traditional story genres have long provided women (almost universally it seems, though that hypothesis needs to be tested) with subtle and subversive vehicles for self-expression.

If men controlled and commanded the power of words in the front room―consider, for instance, the etymology of “parliament”―women crafted a contrapuntal commentary in the back room. The counterpoint continues to this day in modern speculative fiction, not least in the many explicitly feminist retellings of traditional tales of the marvelous. The power and appeal of the old stories as ways for women to contest male speech or to reshape discourse altogether seem undiminished (if anything, they may be growing). Most intriguing, woman-centered fairy tale themes and motifs thrive today not only in written form but influence, often strongly, popular music and the visual arts.

Since the 1960s, feminist and/or post-modernist scholars have studied vigorously and with great insight both the original fairy tales and myths of the world and literary adaptations of the same. See work by, for instance, Ruth Bottigheimer, Maria Tatar, Steven Swann Jones, Marina Warner, Cristina Bacchilegia, Kay Stone, Vanessa Joosen, Valerie Paradiz, Jack Zipes, Daryl Cumber Dance, Donald Haase, Helen Pilinovsky, Elizabeth Wanning Harries, Lewis Seifert, Marcelle Maistre Welch. (I will include a bibliography in my full-length SpecFic Colloquium paper). Their findings have become a core part of feminist theories of reading, poetics and literature generally, and have―somewhat more tentatively―been connected to the work of scholars exploring issues of race, ethnicity, colonialism and class. Among many others, see work by Sandra Gilbert & Susan Gubar, Elaine Showalter, Patricia Meyer Spacks, Oyeronke Oyewumi, Valerie Lee, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Susan Sellers, Toi Derricotte, Sheila Rowbotham, Cheryl Wall, Margaret Ezell, and Beverly Guy-Sheftall.

Over the past few decades, writers of many stripes have continued to revise and re-fashion fairy tales (and/or folkloric elements more generally) to make feminist points, in a project that goes back at least to Marie-Jeanne Lheritier de Villandon’s “Les Enchantements de l’eloquence” and Madame d’Aulnoy’s Histoire d’Hypolite in the 1690s. To name a handful from a long list:

Nalo Hopkinson, Sonya Taaffe, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, A.S. Byatt, Jane Yolen, Midori Snyder, Ursula K. Le Guin, Sylvia Townsend Warner, Tanith Lee, Angela Carter, Terri Windling, Kate Bernheimer, Theodora Goss, Joan Aiken, Virginia Hamilton, Robin McKinley, Ellen Kushner, Cat Valente, Margaret Atwood, Emma Donoghue, Erzebet YellowBoy, Nnedi Okorafor, Patricia McKillip, Malinda Lo, Theodora Goss, Bharati Mukherjee, Jeanette Winterson, Delia Sherman, Helen Oyeyemi, Gail Carson Levine, and Margo Lanagan.

Even when folklore or fairy tale do not frame or focus a modern work of fiction, themes from folkloric traditions crop up in “mainstream” works more frequently than is sometimes acknowledged. Toni Morrison’s work comes to mind, and that of Dacia Maraini, to name just two. Modern poetry is also full of fairy tale references, even that published far from the usual fantasy genre outposts.

“Imaginary gardens with real toads in them” fascinate so much that a growing number of journals and sites devote themselves to the sub-genres: The Endicott Studio for Mythic Arts (founded 1987), SurLaLune Fairy Tales (1998), Cabinet des Fees (2005), Fairy Tale Review (2005), Goblin Fruit (2006), Enchanted Conversation (2010). And then there are the anthologies, above all the Windling & Ellen Datlow series begun in 1993 with Snow White, Blood Red.

At the SpecFic Colloquium we will talk about the resurgent interest in fairy tale and myth, specifically the desire to write and read them “against the grain.” I particularly want to learn more about traditions other than the various European ones and about current literary practice that is not Eurocentric.

Most of all: I want to explore how the renewed excitement for fairy tales―and especially the subversive elements of fairy tales (pace fans of Disney)―has spread into other popular media, in particular music. Just as women have (re)shaped the fairy tale canon on the page over the past several centuries, they appear to be doing the same in the musical realm.

Male composers have freely used motifs from fairy tales and myths to create some of the dominant pieces in the Western canon. Think of Mozart’s The Magic Flute, Haydn’s The Fishwives and The World on the Moon, Mahler’s Wunderhorn sequence, Maeterlinck’s The Blue Bird and Princess Maleine, Stravinsky’s The Firebird, and―towering over them all in its attempt to produce a Gesamtkunstwerk, a myth updated to encompass and overwhelm all other works―Wagner’s Ring.

In the past few decades, female musicians have been (re)claiming those themes, reworking them into works of their own, often in opposition to the dominant male canon, sometimes (most subversive of all!) indifferent to the male perspective―creating music that is not defined or definable in terms of male categories.

Working in and around a wide variety of musical forms, and with a wide sweep of perspectives, the following artists nevertheless appear to share an underlying approach in terms of deploying fairy tale and mythic motifs in their music: Angelique Kidjo, Bjork, Missy Elliott, Grace Jones, Enya, Tori Amos, Annie Lennox, Sarah McLachlan, Rihanna, Kimberly Perry, Mediaeval Baebes, Alison Krauss, The Dixie Chicks, Anoushka Shankar, Goldfrapp. Yes, an idiosyncratic list. . .very far from complete. . .and begging to be queried and to be added to!

Surely one major impulse came from the British Neo-Folk movement of the ‘60s and ‘70s, led by Sandy Denny of Fairport Convention, Annie Haslam of Renaissance, and Maddy Prior of Steeleye Span. Stevie Nicks further propelled Faerie onto the concert stage and into popular music (and I think Diana Ross, Chaka Khan and Patti LaBelle did the same, each in her own inimitable style). Sometimes the fairy tale overlay is explicit, self-referential even, as with many of those working the (all too often twee) Celtic Twilight angle. Other times it is less self-conscious, and more oblique.

I will end this teaser with album cover images to bolster my suggestion about the inroads of fairy tale into modern pop music, and to spark the conversation when we meet in Toronto in October.

See you there and then!

***

The 2nd Toronto SpecFic Colloquium will take place on Saturday October 15, 2011 at the Toronto Underground Cinema (186 Spadina Avenue). Register now at http://chiseries.ticketleap.com/specfic-colloquium/.

***

Daniel A. Rabuzzi's first novel The Choir Boats, put out by Chizine Publications, debuted at WorldCon 2009 in Montreal. His short fiction and poetry have appeared in Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, Shimmer, Sybil's Garage, Chizine, Abyss & Apex, Mannequin Envy, Goblin Fruit, and Scheherezade's Bequest.

Daniel majored in the study of folklore and fairytales as an undergraduate at Harvard, with a minor in comparative lit and history. He spent two years on fellowships at the University of Oslo's Institute for Folklore Studies, collecting oral histories in Norway and in England (with results published in journals of folklore in the U.K., Sweden and Denmark). He earned a master's at The Fletcher School at Tufts, and then a Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins in early modern German gender and cultural history. In all, Daniel spent eight years in Norway, Germany and France. He is married to the woodcarver and artist Deborah Mills, who also illustrated his book. They live in New York City.

In Spring 2012 CZP will publish The Choir Boats sequel, entitled The Indigo Pheasant.

SpecFic Colloquium Blog: Peter Watts

2011-09-18T12:19:00.004-04:00

Modern mythologies, you say.

Forget the usual suspects. Forget gods and yeti and the other, more overt fantasies that clog bookstore shelves where hard-SF used to be back in better days. Forget Lost and X-Files (ah, I see you have already—good, good). At least try to forget that absurd paradigm that places "people of faith"—those who worship magical sky fairies and believe they'll go to Space Disneyland when they die—on an exalted rung of the human hierarchy, rather than sending them off for therapy with the other nutbars. Forget the good ol' days the good ol' boys from the Tea Party reminisce about: the times before gummint regulation strangled Murrikan innovation with all those nanny-state laws about clean water and child labor, back when Mexicans stayed on the right side of the border and every nigger knew his place.

Forget "Change We Can Believe In". The only change you can really believe in takes place in very small increments, takes thousands of generations to get noticed, and was pegged by a dude called Darwin back in 1859.

They're all worthy myths, if by "myth" you mean a fictional construct that resonates so strongly the gut just knows it speaks to some metaphorical Truth even if its factual claims are batshit crazy. They all benefit someone, somewhere; some even increase the reproductive fitness of whole societies (generally by uniting those societies in a bloodthirsty campaign to eradicate the competition, but nobody said fitness was pretty). Still, in the grand scheme of things, they're pretty small potatoes. Religion may be ubiquitous across the planet, but the fact that believers keep killing each other over whether the messiah wants us to cast away our sandals or gather sandals together suggests a certain lack of commonality. Lost and The Obama Administration stopped resonating the moment it became obvious they didn't have a clue what they were doing, and their appeal was always pretty limited anyway.

You want to dig your teeth into a real myth? Something that has 100% market penetration across the whole damn species, a myth as powerful now as it was before we even were a species? Here's one: the myth that there isn't a big honking hole in the middle of your visual field.

Here's another myth: the sky is blue. In fact the sky is colorless; there's actually no such thing as color outside the imaginations of human minds.

And another: that you have even the slightest control over your own actions, that you are anything but mech made of meat.

The fact is, pretty much everything we perceive is a myth; it feels real, we know it's real, and the fact that our gut "knowledge" happens to contradict the laws of physics gives us way less trouble than it really should.

I'll be going into this a bit on October 15th. I'd invite you to join me — even reassure you that the whole talk won't be a complete downer, that I plan on leavening the nihilism with the occasional joke — but really, there'd be no point.

I have no more influence over your actions than you do.

***

Peter Watts (www.rifters.com) is an awkward hybrid of biologist, science-fiction author, and (according to Homeland Security) tewwowist. Described by the Globe & Mail as one of the best hard-sf authors alive, his work has been translated into a dozen languages. His first novel (Starfish) was a NY Times Notable Book, while his sixth (Blindsight)— a philosophical rumination on the nature of consciousness with an unhealthy focus on space vampires — has become a core text in such diverse undergraduate courses as "The Philosophy of Mind" and "Introduction to Neuropsychology". It also made the final ballot for a shitload of domestic genre awards including the Hugo, winning exactly none of them (although it has, for some reason, won multiple awards overseas). This may reflect a certain critical divide regarding Watts' work in general; his bipartite novel behemoth, for example, was praised by Publishers Weekly as an "adrenaline-charged fusion of Clarke's The Deep Range and Gibson's Neuromancer" and simultaneously decried by Kirkus as "utterly repellent … horrific porn". (Watts happily embraces the truth of both views.)

Watts' 2009 novelette "The Island" was reprinted a dozen times and finally won the damn Hugo, possibly because fandom wanted to give DHS the finger. "The Things" seems to be racking up the hits as well: an unabashed piece of fanfic which is nonetheless sitting in several Best-of-Year collections, and has already won a couple of awards. His most recent novel (Crysis: Legion) once again transcends boundaries, elevating the Video Game Tie-In to the giddy status of "not-horrible potboiler." (His sidequel to Blindsight is currently overdue.) Both Watts and his cat have appeared in the prestigious journal Nature.

SpecFic Colloquium Blog: Mike Carey

2011-09-12T10:01:00.002-04:00

I confess to being out of my depth when I talk about myth. But I think most people are. Certainly most of the definitions that come down to us seem to be inadequate. Some anthropologists argue that myths necessarily deal with the doings of gods and superhuman figures. Others suggest that myths describe the creation of the world or the nature of primary natural forces, or that they justify transient or arbitrary social orders by rooting them in an ancient and immemorial past.

But for any rule, it’s easy to think of a dozen exceptions: which suggests to me that there’s something wrong with the rules. Ruskin’s definition – that myth is “a story with a meaning attached to it other than it seems to have at first” – is at least honest about its own inadequacy.

But we believe we know a myth when we see one, and we’re usually right. There are tell-tale signs. One of them is timelessness: myths usually tell of a time before the memory of anyone living, and before the records of any human culture. Another is persistence: myths survive because they’re tenacious. Often, they originate in societies that have no written language, but then are transmitted through many generations until finally a culture comes into being which can capture them in a permanent record–although we suspect that by that time, the original stories may mean something different to those recording them than the meanings they held for their unknown originators.

From certain angles, at least, all of this seems to be a long way away from the stories told in modern fantasies–but I think there’s a continuity, or at least a very promising and telling set of correspondences, with my own work and with the work of many of the fantasists I love best. Our stories aren’t myths by any regular definition, but maybe they serve some of the same functions as myths and are best understood in the light of that tradition.

The talk I’m going to deliver at the symposium takes its title from a poem by Wallace Stevens, Some Friends from Pascagoula, which both begs the listener for a story and at the same time provides the story that it’s asking for. “Speak of the dazzling wings” is a command that obeys itself. And myths, I think, are the stories that enact themselves–the stories that happen all over again, or for the first time, or both, in the very act of being told. I think that may turn out to be one of their functions–to take us out of our own belated time into a dawn time that’s also a mental state.

I’m still in the process of putting my messy ideas together, but I hope to refer to Lord Dunsany, China Mieville, Italo Calvino, Gene Wolfe, George Orwell and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I’ve got a feeling I’m going to need all the help I can get.

I’m going to take a crack at R.D. Laing, too. His introduction to his own extended essay, The Politics of Experience, begins with the assertion that “Few books today are forgivable.” I want to try to prove that the books we lovers of sci-fi, fantasy and horror adhere to and write are among those few.

***

Mike Carey was born in 1959 in Liverpool, England, where both his parents worked in a bread factory and Mike "got [his] first glimpse of hell." He began writing the Eisner-nominated Lucifer monthly -- a story about the devil's quest for autonomy in a deterministic universe -- for DC/Vertigo in 1999 after working on several projects for Caliber Comics and the British the sci-fi anthology 2000 AD. Lucifer has been described as "a work of genius in the dark fantasy genre" and "the best fantasy comic around." Other writing credits include Hellblazer, Batman: Gotham Knights, Flinch, Sandman Presents, My Faith in Frankie for DC/Vertigo, and Ultimate Elektra for Marvel, and the Felix Castor series. In the introduction to the 2001 collection Lucifer: Devil in the Gateway, Neil Gaiman describes Mike Carey's stories as "...elegantly told, solidly written" and Carey himself as "...easily one of the half-dozen best writers of mainstream comics and climbing."

SpecFic Colloquium Blog: Matt Moore

2011-09-09T14:29:00.002-04:00

On the subject of modern mythologies, my first thought was the term is a contradiction. "Mythologies" implies ancient religions—tales of ancient cultures' pantheons of gods that convey lessons on right and wrong, identity, why the world is how it is. But in modern times, what stories do we have? There are folks tales or favourable interpretations of history, but a few myths do not make a mythology.

Giving this subject more thought, however, I see that our modern age is in fact rife with mythologies, full of pantheons of heroes and villains.
Sports fans recall "glory days" of their teams, the roster full of offensive dynamos or impassable defensive player with near-superhuman abilities. Hard done by towns stick by their hard done by sports teams, regardless of their record, with near-religious devotion. And fans of rival teams argue with the religious fervour of true believers.

Professional wrestling takes mythologies to another level. Two wrestlers begin a rivalry, but unite against a common foe and forge a powerful friendship. (Gilgamesh and Enkidu anyone?) All the while, fans gravitate toward heroes or villains based on traits they admire or emulate—sportsmanship, bravado, mercy, vanity. And these careers can last for decades, forging long, complex stories.

Comics are modern mythology due to both the pantheon of characters and the devotion of fans. The committed track the histories of characters with the fervor of biblical scholars, able to tell you if Jason Todd ever met Gentleman Ghost and rising a cry of heresy if an off-hand comment contradicts an event from 15 years ago. Unless, like the Great Flood, some crisis (or "Crisis") wiped the slate clean to start over again.

Science fiction and fantasy universes, like Star Trek and Star Wars, present mythologies growing more complicated with each new episode, film, novel, comic or game. Fans discuss the canonical authority—a religious concept—of each medium. Is the Dark Horse or Marvel version of Star Wars accepted as correct in the event of a conflict? That is to say nothing of the near-religious rivalry between these two groups. If violence was as tolerated today as in ancient times, I have no doubt blood would be spilled at many science fiction conventions as Star Wars and Star Trek fans face off, each declaring the other as heretic.

Yet this all begs the question: Why? In ancient times, why did so many tales—of Thor battling Jörmungandr, Zeus' conquests, the various incarnations of the sun god Ra—come about? Looking at them, we see tales of morality, caution, identity. Lessons to entertain, explain the supernatural and reinforce cultural norms. What's more, they were interesting.

Western monotheistic religions are no less worthy of study or interest, and certainly contain lessons of morality, but with a smaller cast of characters. Perhaps as a people we need large, complex cast of heroes, villains and everything in between so we can align ourselves with one. This allows us to be a part of something larger than ourselves, but still consider ourselves special and distinct. In the past, cults and sects arose to worship different deities—sometimes the lesser known ones. Today, there are those who extol the virtues of Guy Gardner over Hal Jordan or proudly sport Aura Sing costumes.

And such large pantheons full of heroes, villains and everything in between reinforces the notion that the world is not as clear-cut as good and evil.

With electronic communication making it easier for tales to be told, I have no doubt more and more mythologies will arise, be debated and either grow or fall. Just like in ancient times. My hope is they provide us with comfort and a sense of belonging in such a large world.

***

Matt Moore' short fiction has appeared in a variety of print, electronic and audio markets including On Spec, AE: The Canadian Science Fiction Review, Cast Macabre and the Tesseracts Anthologies. His short story "Touch the Sky, They Say" has been nominated for this year's 2011 Aurora Award's Best Short Story category. He blogs at mattmoorewrites.com.

SpecFic Colloquium Blog: Stephen Michell

2011-09-04T20:41:00.013-04:00

I was at a party a weekend or two ago, drinking Sleeman Original and eating delicious catered food. The ramblings of a blond-haired British gentleman caught my interest: he presented the idea that dreams create a culture's mythology. I liked the idea. The image of a whole society dreaming: a giant gelatinous mass of faces and eyes, grand and petite, awake, hungry, breathing.

The myths of Bronze Age Greece are the most prominent in my mind. The stories of Heracles, Perseus, David, and poor, perpetually-disembowelled Prometheus, are stories that invoked a sort of idolatry within ancient Greek culture. The characters and events of myth were idealized versions of their own society; men with colossal strength, women with boundless beauty, courage, honour, all were hopes, aspirations, dreams perhaps, of the society.
Indigenous North American mythology, though perhaps more abstract and unusual to our Greco-derived sensibilities, is still characterized by the same sort of idealism: stories of Raven, Coyote and Nanabush abound, all of whom are synonymous with the Trickster. These tales tell of journeys across vast landscapes, spiritual interactions with animals, and a greater understanding of nature and the universe: an expression of our society’s dreams, waking or with eyes closed.

I’m not mad. I am, however, a touch disconcerted. When I pause to think of my own mythology, of the tales and stories that echo some aspect of my hopes and dreams, and I draw a blank. Perhaps the heroes of our day are celebrities, writers and actors, great minds of art, or perhaps they’re innovators, brilliant thinkers, or money makers―I don’t know. But it makes me wonder: if Western Civilization is partially derived from the thoughts and wonders of ancient Greece, where then stands the contemporary Cyclops? What lake or labyrinth hides the modern Minotaur, the killer Kraken, the monsters of today?
. . . Perhaps they’re reading this, or perhaps they’ll be attending the 2011 Toronto SpecFic Colloquium―you should be.

***

Stephen Michell is a student at the University of Toronto as well as a fledgling writer, with his first publication in Neo-Opsis Science Fiction Magazine. Working as a writer in Kensington Market, he has much time for self-reflection, and believes he has nearly “found himself.” He is currently reading Crime and Punishment, and enjoying it, though he still contends that Red Dragon offers the best first sentence he’s read. He is also sort of on the market for an agent. Say hey to him at the 2011 SpecFic Colloquium; he’ll be the guy quietly drinking coffee, digesting the words and wonders that are spinning around him.

Eutopia "thoughtful, accomplished, recommended"

2011-09-04T17:32:00.002-04:00

"Eutopia accomplishes what the best horror fiction strives for: gives us characters we can care about and hope for, and then inflicts on them the kind of realistic, inescapable, logical sufferings that make us close our eyes a little at the unfairness of not the author, but the world — and all the while with something more to say for itself than the world is a very bad place.

Thoughtful, accomplished, and recommended." - Leah Bobet, Ideomancer

Read the review!

Find out more about Eutopia!

Great Briarpatch review

2011-09-04T17:26:00.002-04:00

SF review blog MentatJack posts about Tim Pratt's upcoming Briarpatch: "This is my favorite Pratt so far and I’d recommend it to anyone who likes their fantasy mixed with contemporary reality, but is searching for something more (and weirder) than the typical urban fantasy."

Click here to read the review.

Click here to preorder Briarpatch.

Interviews and views from Simon Logan!

2011-09-04T17:13:00.002-04:00

Two pieces today for all you punk lovers. First, Terribleminds gives us a juicy, meaty interview with Katja from the Punk Band author Simon Logan.

"Q: Your work and writing philosophies seem to embody a punk aesthetic. How can writers embrace that, and why should they? (Or, perhaps, why shouldn’t they?)

A: For me the attraction of the punk aesthetic is to properly reflect yourself and your energies and interests in your work. Be inspired by what other people are creating but focus on creating that inspiration within yourself rather than just replicating what others have done."

You can read the interview here.

Second, Ed Gorman's blog has a large quote from Logan in which he announces a sequel to Katja!

Read it here.

Buy Katja from the Punk Band here.

Isles review in Geek Speak

2011-09-01T22:39:00.002-04:00

"There’s a lot to like about [Isles of the Forsaken] ...it’s beautifully written. It’s complex and ambitious in scope, which I always appreciate. Even better, it’s actually about something other than “The Vampire Gets Laid, Volume 10,000,” which, let’s just say, I’ve been seeing a lot of lately." - Kate Nagy, Geek Speak magazine

Click here to read the review.

Click here to buy Isles of the Forsaken.

ChiZine shoutout on The Ranting Dragon

2011-09-01T22:33:00.002-04:00

Fantasy news site The Ranting Dragon listed two upcoming ChiZine books in its post 'Most Anticipated September Releases' - Briarpatch by Tim Pratt and The Pattern Scars by Caitlin Sweet. Congratulations, you two!

Read the post.

Preorder Briarpatch...
or The Pattern Scars.

Great review of The Choir Boats

2011-09-01T22:28:00.002-04:00

Reader's Refuge got their hands on Daniel A. Rabuzzi's The Choir Boats, and loved it: "This is exactly the sort of story I love. The world Rabuzzi creates in The Choir Boats is fascinating. I love Yount, its customs, and its history. My only complaint is that I didn't see enough of this new world."

Click to read the review.

Click to buy The Choir Boats.

Tahlia Newland reviews Isles of the Forsaken

2011-09-01T22:23:00.003-04:00

"This is a book not to miss. I recommend [Isles of the Forsaken] to all fantasy fans. If you liked Graceling, you will probably like this one. I cannot fault it in any way, so I give it 5 stars." - Fantasy author Tahlia Newland

Read her review here.

Learn more about Isles of the Forsaken here.

SpecFic Colloquium Blog: City Myths

2011-08-31T05:58:00.012-04:00

By David Nickle

Could it be that a vampire is prowling the Entertainment District smugly preying on binge-drinking sons and daughters of Etobicoke, from the saddle of a 24-speed hybrid mountain bike that during daylight hours he stores next to his taxpayer-subsidized coffin somewhere deep in St. Lawrence?

Is there a Minotaur lurking at the centre of the Path, dangerously over-caffeinated on Starbucks House Blend and drunk on undeserved self-satisfaction? Has the zombie apocalypse come to Scarborough, and everyone's just somehow failed to notice?

Yeah, urban mythology. It means different things to different people. Writers of horror and fantasy—and their legions of readers – are intrigued by the confluence of traditional myths . . . ghosts, vampires, zombies, or the Gods . . . and the complexity and richness of life in the big city.

I've never shared that fascination. And for evidence, I point to the bulk of my work in horror and fantasy so far. I tend to see creatures of myth in the woods, the more sparsely-populated rural communities, and the dimly-lit, superstitious past.

But that's not to say I don't have a healthy respect for urban mythology. I'm setting this down a couple of days after my local MP Jack Layton received a hero's send-off, after his death from cancer. I remember Jack in the flesh: an ambitious, optimistic and energetically affable man. As a reporter, I knew him and liked him and respected him. I had never, however, mistaken him for a paragon. And that's what he is now: an addition to the pantheon that makes up Toronto's breathing, not-quite-real (but that's the point, isn't it?) mythology.

As a journalist who writes about many things Torontonian on a daily basis, I'm intimately concerned with this mythology. It's how, when I'm feeling the need to generalize and not think about things too deeply, I'm tempted to understand my city. It's a narrative.

So I understand that the Entertainment District (where I don't really spend much time) is populated at night by drunken Etobians, even though that may not be entirely the case (Mississauga parents have a lot to answer for, as do the founders of Liberty Village, and—okay, I admit it—likely my own neighbours here on the Danforth). I've navigated the Path (a network of underground retail tunnels here that connects downtown office towers in such a way that denizens need never step outside) like the labyrinth that it is. There's no minotaur there, but sometimes I feel like I should bring a spool of thread to find my way out of it. And as for Scarborough? People from other parts of Toronto make zombie apocalypse jokes about the east-end former city. People from Scarborough are of the view that there's nothing former about Scarborough, and the only thing standing between it and Elysium are a couple more subways and a little respect, thank you very much.

Suburbanites are a horde of socially conservative proto-fascists who are probably homophobic. People from the former City of Toronto are a bunch of libertine communists and probably gay. Suburbanites don't like that about downtowners. Downtowners don't like that about suburbanites. If Toronto is Heaven, there's a war in it—Mayor Rob Ford and Margaret Atwood are the generals—and bicycles and motorcars are the artillery.

And in the end, there's just not much room for vampires and minotaurs, angels and demons. The city has already made its own mythology, with the materials at hand.

***

David Nickle is the author of the novel Eutopia: A Novel of Terrible Optimism and numerous short stories, some of which are collected in his story collection Monstrous Affections. In 2010, Monstrous Affections was awarded the Black Quill Reader's Choice Award for best dark genre collection.

His fiction has been published in magazines, anthologies and online, and been adapted for television. He lives and works in Toronto.

Introducing the Second Annual Toronto SpecFic Colloquium

2011-08-24T13:13:00.007-04:00

Speculative fiction forges, challenges, remakes, and disseminates the mythologies that explain and name who we are today and what we might be tomorrow. Whether by means of technoscience or the fantastic, speculative fiction investigates how the boundaries between the familiar and the mysterious dissolve and bleed into each other, its stories expressing the hopes and fears of modernity in distinct ways and from surprising perspectives.

The 2011 Toronto SpecFic Colloquium will focus on Modern Mythologies. In a series of talks and readings, leading speculative fiction writers will discuss, pose questions about, and encourage you to consider the importance and power of the stories that define humanity in the present age . . . from the aliens hiding among us to the gates of Hell ripping open in our backyards.

As part of this, the good folks at ChiZine Publications have agreed to run a series of blog posts tackling the theme of “Modern Mythologies.” A range of guest bloggers from the industry will give their own personal take on the 2011 Colloquium’s theme. Aliens among us, masquerading as humans. Vampires hunting in our alleys at night. The singularity evolving steadily within fibre optic cables and the code of the internet. Fey waging their eons-old feuds beside us in our cities. Vigilantes confronting sociopaths and psychopaths through claustrophobic streets and crowded skyscrapers. Ancient gods and goddesses hoping to regain power and status in a secular, skeptical world. Post human cyborgs thinking and acting faster than we can comprehend. Hell boiling up into our homes and suburban neighbourhoods.

And, of course, we encourage you to register for the main event, to check out the videos of the Aurora-nominated 2010 Colloquium, and to add your own thoughts and comments to the discussion!

--Helen Marshall, co-organizer of the Toronto SpecFic Colloquium

***

The 2nd Toronto SpecFic Colloquium will take place on Saturday October 15, 2011 at the Toronto Underground Cinema (186 Spadina Avenue). Registration opens on March 1, 2011 at http://chiseries.ticketleap.com/specfic-colloquium/.

***

Aurora-nominated poet Helen Marshall (manuscriptgal.com) is an author, editor, and self-proclaimed bibliophile. Her poetry has been published in ChiZine, NFG, Abyss & Apex and the long-running Tesseracts anthology series. "Mist and Shadows," published originally in Star*Line, appeared in The 2006 Rhysling Anthology: The Best Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Poetry of 2005. She recently released a collection of poems entitled Skeleton Leaves from Kelp Queen Press and her collection of short stories Hair Side, Flesh Side is forthcoming from ChiZine Publications in 2013.

Another great ESC review

2011-08-23T22:22:00.002-04:00

The 'Nerd of Noir' at Spinetingler writes: "...if you’ve got the stones and stomach for it, steel yourself for a shot of some single-malt, black-as-space shit. If the Nerd were a particularly lazy Gene Shalit, he’d review this beast thusly: 'Every Shallow Cut cuts deep.' "

Read the review.

Order Every Shallow Cut.

Strange Horizons reviews Fecund

2011-08-23T22:11:00.004-04:00

Matt Hillard at Strange Horizons has written an excellent, in-depth review of The Fecund's Melancholy Daughter.

" The Fecund's Melancholy Daughter is a very effective piece of storytelling, but the story it tells is an unconventional one. Some readers may be disappointed by the relatively brief time in the spotlight the fragmentary narrative gives each of the many viewpoint characters, and others may wish there was a little more room in its mosaic for positive parts of the human experience like joy and love, but those willing to engage with the novel on its terms will find this to be an intriguing and well-written fantasy from a very promising author."

Read it here.

Buy Fecund here.