I don’t know what the temperatures have been like where you are, but around here (west central Texas), It’s been hot. You know it’s been hot when the highs are in the low to mid nineties and it feels cool. Most of the last month has seen temperatures aourn one hundred four to one hundred six, with some days hitting one ten or more.
What has that to do with autumn? Continue reading
Today, as I’m writiing this, is August 28. There are several notable birthdays today. Joseph Shridan Le Fanu (1814-1873) wrote some excellent ghost stories. Then there’s comic great Jack Kirby (1917-1994). Science fiction author Vonda N. McIntyre (1948-2019).
The the one I want to focus on is Jack Vance (1916-2013).
Vance was a master of both science fiction and fantasy, and much of his work was a blend of both. He also wrote a few mysteries, which Subterranean Press collected in an omnibus about a decade or so back.
Vance’s crowning achievement was The Dying Earth, a sequence of stories set in the far future, where the sun had become a red giant. The physical laws of the universe have changed, and magic works. Continue reading
Back in the last part of June and into July, I submitted six stories to six anthologies. These were themed anthologies, and to be eligible to submit, you had to sign up for some writing workshops that focused on these anthologies.
I have gotten responses from the editors of four of them. I haven’t heard from the editors of the toher two yet. One of the anthologies was coedited, and the other was edited solely by one of the coeditors. In other words, that editor was involved in two anthologies.
I also know that editor was been slammed with some things that are taking up most of said editor’s time. This editor is also a writer who is posting daily to a closed group how they are doing in a challenge. The other writers taking part in the challenge, which is can you write as many or more words than this writer in a given period of time, are the ones getting the updates.
So far, I’ve gotten rejections from the editors.
However, I’ve also gotten positive feedback on what I submitted as well as some information ofn what didn’t work for some of the editors. That’s a win, as far as I’m concerned.
I’m not sure where I’m going to send the stories I’ve gotten back. I might put them in a collection myself. We’ll see.
There were a lot of birthdays yesterday, but I was up late getting things ready for the first day of class today and wasn’t able to get a post up. Fortunately, I don’t have to do that tonight.
And that’s a good thing because today, August 22, is the birthday of Ray Bradbury (1920-2012).
I had seen some of Bradbury’s paperbacks in the children’s section of the public library in Wichita Falls when I was in fourth grade. They were the editions with a sktech of Bradbury in front of a horzontal illustration of something in the book. They were on a spinner rack with some Twilight Zone collections, James Blish’s Star Trek novelizations, and other books. I remember that was the rack I found Planet of the Apes on.
But I digress. Continue reading
Today is August 20 as I write this. It’s H. P. Lovecraft’s birthday. It’s also my mother-in-law’s, but I’m sure that’s just coincidence.
Lovecraft (1890-1937) is a legendary figure in the horror and weird fiction fields. I doubt he needs much introduction here.
It took me a while to warm up to Lovecraft. His brand of fiction didn’t appeal to me when I was a teenager.
Before you pick up stones to stone me, know that he is now one of my favorites. I’ve not read all of his works, but I’ve read quite a few. And the more I read, the more impressed I am with the fictional universe he created. Continue reading
Today is August 16. This will be a short post because I was in new faculty orientation all day, and my brain is tapioca. I do want to point out the birthdays of two people, Hugo Gernsback and Diana Wynne Jones. Continue reading
This was announced a couple of days ago, but I missed it.
Starship Sloane Publishing is reviving Galaxy Science Fiction.
A bit of history. Back in the 1940s, the top science fiction magazine was Astounding Science Fiction, edited by John W. Campbell, Jr., although arguments can be made that Thrilling Wonder Stories and perhaps Startling Stories were more entertaining. Planet Stories was still being published, but other than an occasional story by Leigh Brackett, it wasn’t publishing many stories of note. Amazing Stories was stumbling along, the Shaver Mystery not yet upon us.
All that changed at the end of the decade when two new magazines came on the scene. One was The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, which appears to have ceased publication.
The other was Galaxy Science Fiction. Edited by Horce L. Gold, it was as different from Astounding as it was possible to be. Whereas Campbell focused on the science, wanting reigid adherence to known scientific principles as much as possible, Gold stressed soicology over physics, psychology over engineering.
Many of the classic stories by Fredril Pohl and C. M. Kornbluth were published there, as were stories by Robert Sheckley and Phillip K. Dick.
The first issue is free as a PDF download.
Starship Sloane Publishing also relaunched Worlds of If last year.
Today, August 8, is the birthday of Jerry Pournelle (1933-2017). He was one of the people, along with David Drake, who helped make military science fiction popular.
There were others before him, of course, but Pournelle’s anthology series There Shall Be War and War World helped push the genre to higher popularity. His CoDominium series set a high standard, and he was working on his Janissaries series when he died.
Additionally, he was a frequent collaborator with Larry Niven. Together they wrote such books as Lucifer’s Hammer, The Mote in God’s Eye, and Footfall.
I admit I’ve read very little of Pournelle’s solo work. I read King David’s Spaceship years ago and liked it. Other than a few short stories, most of his work that I’ve read was in collaboration with Larry Niven. I’ve got msot of his books, but I haven’t gotten to them yet.
He was an important figure in the field for many years and deserves to be remembered.
I’m doing a writing challenge to write 2024 words per day, on average, in 2024. I got behind at the beginning of July and stayed behind the entire month up until the last day of the month. I ended the month with an average for July of 2025 words. I am still about three and a half days behind where I need to be for the year. If I can pull ahead this month, it will give me some cushion going into the fall.
I finished half a dozen short stories and a novella, plus I started another novella. I need to carve out time to publsih the novellas. The short stories are under submission.
I posted a couple of days ago about starting a new academic job. Classes start two weeks from tomorrow. I don’t have a schedule yet of when I’ll be teaching, other than it will be in the afternoons and probably only three days a week. Visiitng faculty, which is what this position is, don’t have to serve on committees, do public outreach, or other such activities.
What does this mean for the writing?
It means I am going to have to manage my time a lot better than I am now. I not only can do it, I need to do a better job of not wasting time. I am going to double down on writing. I will still have some time in the day to write. I just need to make sure I reserve that time for writing.
Version 1.0.0
Before I start this post, I want to point out that the title ends in a question mark. It is not intended to be a statement of fact.
But it is a valid question. The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (F&SF) hasn’t had a new issue in over six months. Questions aren’t being answered. Last year some authors claimed they hadn’t been paid for their stories.
The question has come up over the last week.
I saw a post from Sean CW Korsgaard on Sunday saying his enjoyment of GenCon had been dampened a little when he saw the news about F&SF and SFWA. (There seems to be some drama going on behind the scenes at SFWA, but I’m not going to address that here. I’m not a member. Not my circus, not my monkeys.)
Sean didn’t elaborate or answer any questions about what was going on. Continue reading