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.

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.

Horrific October Publications

Or rather, publications by Horrific Miscuers. They may or may not themselves be horrific.

• “Casanova Clay,” a poem by Liz Argall about dirt, hands and work awaits you at Apex Magazine. 

• Cat Rambo steals the month once again with two (2) ebooks! A SEED ON THE WIND is part of the Fathomless Abyss series, and HALLOWEEN QUARTET is an experiment.

• And Emily C. Skaftun’s “10 Things to Do in Los Angeles After You Die” was published by Every Day Fiction. It’s a zombie love story tourist guide.

It’s a book!

In September, Horrific Miscuers did a lot of strange things. Liz Argall wrote a love song to meat pies. Starlight Moonrocket, IV, Esq., who may or may not be associated with this group, has opened The JOURNAL of eXuBeRaNtLy Bad FICTION for submissions.

And Cat Rambo has a new book out! Near + Far, published by Hydra House, is in the old Ace double format, with a NEAR side, and a FAR side that both have gorgeous covers (but I’m only going to show you one of them. Mwa ha ha!).

To read more about it from Cat’s blog, go here.

To just order a copy from Hydra House (you know you want to) go here. It’s also available from Amazon and the other usual sources.

Stories and awards, oh my!

I know you’re all busy being at WorldCon, or wishing you were at WorldCon (as I am). Here are some recent Horrific Miscue words to ease the pain.

• J.M. Sidorova’s “Deus Absconditus” is up at Giganotosaurus. It’s about drug addiction, massage and creationism. Whee!

But wait, there’s more!

• Two of our members have been nominated for World Fantasy Awards: E. Lily Yu for her short story “The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees,” which appeared in Clarkesworld, and Cat Rambo for her work on Fantasy Magazine. Please join us in crossing your fingers and toes for them!

Summer Reading

I have been remiss in posting, so here’s a whole summer’s worth of Horrific Miscue words to read!

• Liz Argall started a web comic called Things Without Arms and Without Legs. Things! Things! If there is no spoon, why does it taste so nice?

• Tod McCoy was published in an anthology called Bronies: For the Love of Ponies. Join Kazka Press as we explore the simple love between a man and his pony, a woman and her pony, and the world and their bronies and pegasisters. The foreword is written by Kij Johnson, and the anthology includes her Nebula-winning story “Ponies.”

• Sandra Odell’s “Parting Is Such Sweet Sorrow” is up at Kasma Science Fiction. This is a story of zombies, choice, and what it means to be human, as seen through the eyes of Willy Shakes, everyone’s favorite bard.

• Cat Rambo has two recently podcasted stories: “Grandmother,” a space opera story, is up at EscapePod, and “Coyote Barbie,” a humorous short originally published in Expanded Horizons, is up at Toasted Cake.

AND . . .

• William T. Vandemark’s “Alkahest,” originally published in Brain Harvest, is also up at Toasted Cake. If you  have 8 minutes and the inclination, check it out.

Go! Read! Listen!

What happened to May?

The month may be long gone already, but the words live on.

Notably, J.M. Sidorova’s “Galileo Day” is live at Albedo 2.0. It’s an alternate history story that takes place seventy years after Galileo was acquitted, in a 1633 in which cathedrals are fitted with telescopes, and monasteries throughout the Holy Roman Empire are busy doing science.

More to come in June . . . I trust.