More Things Said During Crit Session

From notes found while cleaning:

“I love the idea that you get so gothy and morose that you just become a vampire.”

“He could have legitimate powers once he starts throwing up spiders.”

“I didn’t understand the importance of the vampires.”

“There were a lot of places where the characters were just going somewhere.”

“Don’t sigh at me.”

“If everything is possible, nothing matters. Blow it out of the park.”

“There’s no non-stupid way of putting it.”

“There’s some well-intentioned fascist vampires.”

“There used to be a chapter entitled ‘Vampire Training Montage.’”

“I always like more detail as to which organs are missing.”

April stories. Yay!

• Caren Gussoff’s “Section iii,” originally published in Abyss and Apex, was podcast(ed?) by Dark Fiction.

• Cat Rambo’s “Soft,” which she describes as “overly didactic science fiction flash,” appeared in Daily Science Fiction. 

• “The Fisher Queen,” also by Cat, was published in Fish. It’s an Excerpt from the Arthurian cycle set on the Outer Banks.

• And in more Cat Rambo news (yay, Cat!), “Dagger and Mask”–space opera assassin and pirate captain–appeared in The Other Half of the Sky.

• Emily C. Skaftun’s “Final Testament of a Weapons Engineer” was published in After Death. In it a dead man must prevent his children from stumbling onto the booby trap he set for himself.

• “Melt With You,” also by Emily (and permit me to squee, for this is me!), appeared in Clarkesworld. It’s a tale of religious war among garden decorations. Also available in audio.

March Madness: Stories!

It was an explosive month for horrific miscuers! Look at all this great fiction!

• Liz Argall had two amazing stories published this month. “Shadow Play,” a story of shapeshifting, memory, and the history of puppets, inspired by random banter with William Alexander over twitter, is at Daily Science Fiction. And “Mermaid’s Hook” is at Apex: Rescuing a sailor is not as easy as it sounds. Fellow miscuer Rashida Smith calls it “haunting and deeply satisfying.” And! Proceeds from this story go to the Leonard Pung Memorial Scholarship.

• Eliza Hirsch’s “A Song for the Season” is at Cast of Wonders in audio form. It’s a story of love and tragedy in a village setting.

• “Logic and Magic in the Time of the Boat Lift” by Cat Rambo (with Ben Burgis) is available in word form at Giganotosaurus and audio word form at Podcastle. Paraconsistent logic, oracular nuns, and were-gators in 1980s Miami!

• Cat Rambo also has an audio reprint, “Amid the Words of War,” available at Drabblecast. It’s a story about an alien POW turned sex worker.

• And E. Lily Yu introduces us to a new treatment for grief in “Loss, with Chalk Diagrams,” up at Eclipse Online.

Amazing, right? I can’t wait to see what we get up to in April!

Short month, happy reading

Okay, so I missed the end of February as it zoomed by (lousy short month!), but better late than never, here are your February publications by Horrific Miscuers:

• In Cat Rambo’s “Love’s Footsteps,” published in Daily Science Fiction, a wizard preserves his heart in order not to age, then regrets it.

• The month also saw audio reprints of two of Cat’s stories: ”Clockwork Fairies” is in Steampunk Specs, a compilation of 8 hours worth of steampunk, including stories by Christopher Barzak, Eileen Gunn, Margo Lanagan, Nick Mamatas, Cherie Priest, and Michael Swanwick. “RealFur” from Near+Far, a story about the best fur coat ever, is on Bizarrocast.

• Sandra M. Odell’s “David Milner Is” is in Tales to Terrify. It’s a story of what it means to be a good man.

• And, back to Cat Rambo, she’s been nominated for a Nebula Award! Check out “Five Ways to Fall in Love on Planet Porcelain,” which appeared in her story collection Near + Far.

Hear That? #19: Algernon & Laidlaw

Crossposted from Sandra M. Odell’s Write or Gnorw:

Hi there! Welcome to another installment of HEAR THAT?, a review of fine audio fiction on the internet. I know there are any number of quality audio fiction podcasts out there, so if you happen across one that you think I might like then drop me a line and I’ll check it out. This time around we have two stories from two very different podcasts, not about heroes but about real people.

CAST OF WONDERS #66 brings us “The Egg Game” by S.R. Algernon, read by Graeme Dunlop. S.R. Algernon began reading science fiction at an early age, and honed his writing in North Carolina. He currently resides in Singapore. Graeme hails from Australia, is the host of CAST OF WONDERS, and can be heard on many a fiction podcast.

“The Egg Game” is the story of a family vacation at The Sun Spot, a resort just outside of Earth’s atmosphere and certainly not what the main character hoped when his parents agreed to a vacation in space. The character and his younger brother devise a game involving falling eggs in the variable-gravity lift tubes, and an elaborate point system that takes a wrong turn when matters go from boring to worse. I kept waiting for “something to happen”, but it didn’t take long to realize the joy of this story is the realistic portrayal of young teens looking for a bit of fun. The action comes in the form of the science behind their game, and the eventual solution to the sudden crisis. The main character is intelligent, likeable, and knows he’s definitely in for it if his parents ever find out what’s going on. This is a great story for pre-teen and teen readers who are just dipping their toes into the waters of good, short science fiction.

Next we have PSEUDOPOD #319, “Cell Call” by Marc Laidlaw, read by George Cleveland. Marc is a writer, gamer, thinker, and game designer who currently works at Valve Software. George lives in Tamworth, New Hampshire, and serves as the Executive Director of the Gibson Center for Senior Services in North Conway. And as an added bonus, he is the grandson of President Grover Cleveland.

“Cell Call” is the story of a man attempting to manage his new cell phone while finding his way home in the rain. Flustered by the phone, the weather, and his wife’s irritation, he misses his turn and ends up someplace unexpected. Here is a story about subtle terrors, the kind that curl around you when you think there is nothing wrong. Much like “The Egg Game”, the main character is not a hero, he’s just an ordinary guy who loves his wife, and Laidlaw’s understated use of setting and very realistic dialogue lent itself well to the chill down my spine as the story progressed. Definitely worth the listen.

And that’s a wrap for this installemtn of HEAR THAT? Drop me a line and let me know what you thought. Did you agree with the recommendations? Think I was way off base? Even better, if you liked what you heard with these podcasts, post a comment on the forums for either podcast, or donate a few dollars to keep great fiction alive and well on the web.

That’s all for now, gentle listeners. Until next time, kee your ears open!

Happy 2013, y’all! Here are some HM publications/news to get the year started.

• Sandra M. Odell’s “The Poison Eater” appeared in the anthology Deep Cuts from Evil Jester Press.

• Eliza Hirsch’s story “A Map of the Heart” came out in Con(viction): Anthology of the Con.

• “The Passing of Grandmother’s Quilt” by Cat Rambo appeared on Every Day Fiction. It’s a flash piece about the grieving process.

• Issue #16 of Shimmer came out this month, with editing by Keffy R.M. Kehrli.

• January’s issue of The Colored Lens contained stories by TWO miscuers. Kris Millering’s ”Those Who Do Not Reap” is about aliens, alien sex, and how stories grow. Emily C. Skaftun’s “A Fairy Tale” is a cautionary tale about firefly hunting, magic, and relationships.

• The stage version of Liz Argall’s “Dear Ms. Moon” was/will be performed January 26th and February 2 as part of Pulp Diction. If you missed the shows you can read or listen to the story.

• And finally, Bloodchildren: Stories by the Octavia E. Butler Scholars, is available now, with stories by ANOTHER TWO miscuers! Not only will you get Caren Gussoff’s new novel start, “Free Bird,” and Erik Owomoyela’s “Steal the Sky,” but the proceeds from the book support the Carl Brandon Society, which helps more awesome people attend Clarion and Clarion West. The anthology is only available until June.

Remember, remember! The month of December!

In all the excitement about the end of the year I kind of forgot that December is also a month. And yet, Miscuers still published things!

• One of them is a book! Sandra M. Odell’s The Twelve Ways of Christmas was released by Hydra House. Publishers Weekly calls it “a bewitching enterprise.”

• Caren Gussof was part of a GalleyCat crew who rewrote the mostest purplest vampire book ever, “Varney the Vampire.” It’s free at https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/266802

• Caren’s story “Anything Chocolate” is also live now at Toasted Cake. Yum!

• Cat Rambo’s story “Events at Fort Plentitude,” which originally appeared in Weird Tales, was podcastified by Tales to Terrify. It features a frontier rife with fox and snake women, frozen soldiers, and flying demons.

• Emily C. Skaftun’s “The Red Sno-Cones Are Not for Sale” appeared at Every Day Fiction. It’s a ”chilling” tale of ice-cream trucks gone bad.

Crit Session Quotes For 12/29/2012

In our last meeting for 2012, we critted stories from Kris Millering, Cat Rambo, and Emily Skaftun. In attendance were Liz Argall, Sarah Hirsch, Tod McCoy, Kris Millering, Erik Owomoyela, Cat Rambo, Vicki Saunders, Emily Skaftun, and Eddie Smith.

Here’s a scattering of what was said, but by request I have not attributed the quotes.

• If there are monkeys on a planet, we need to know that immediately because we love monkeys!
• That would really sock it to the tree, so to speak
• Write a different story. Got it.
• I wanted more apple magic.
• I needed more rage on the part of the tree.

Afterwards, we had a joint outing to the theater and saw Geek Out, which included adaptations of “Black Box” by Jennifer Egan; “Instructions: by Neil Gaiman; “The Lifecycle of Software Objects” by Ted Chiang; and “The Unwritten” by Mike Carey, done in collaboration with literature-based music group, The Bushwick Book Club Seattle.

Crit Session Quotes for 12/15/2012

Welcome to new members Jei Marcade and Rachel Sobel!

We critted stories from Huw Evans, Caren Gussoff, and Tod McCoy. Here’s a scattering of what was said, but by request I have not attributed the quotes.

• I found this exquisitely disgusting.
• There are a lot of people with names.
• Ditto Cat on wanting to be smacked harder.
• Wow, you guys are really fired up about flour.
• Land is really judgmental.

Crit Session Quotes for 12/1/2012

We critted stories from Emily Skaftun and Lily Yu. Here’s a scattering of what was said, but by request I have not attributed the quotes.

• “We are not dissimilar from a blue lobster.”
• “There needs to be more murder in the story.”
• “Here’s MY version of how I would rewrite your story…”
• “The manic departure from sensible decision making” (describing Seattle encountering a snow storm)
• “The dinosaurs are such a great metaphor for love.”
• “So I was like, fuck it, I’ll add some dinosaurs.”