Mary Soon Lee's Blog, page 12
September 2, 2020
story in Analog
My short story "The Boy Who Went to Mars" is in the current issue of Analog (September/October 2020). I believe this is my fifth story to appear in Analog, with the first one dating all the way back to 2003!
July 10, 2020
Fireside Quarterly
I am delighted to have a short story, "Redemption," in the Summer 2020 issue of
Fireside Fiction, edited by Kate Dollarhyde.
By my count, this is my 97th short story to be published!
Fireside Fiction, edited by Kate Dollarhyde.
By my count, this is my 97th short story to be published!
June 30, 2020
Elgin nomination for Elemental Haiku
An unexpected but happy piece of news: my book Elemental Haiku has been nominated for the 2020 Elgin award :-) :-)
... for anyone wondering, Elemental Haiku is my book of science poetry containing haiku for every element of the periodic table.
... for anyone wondering, Elemental Haiku is my book of science poetry containing haiku for every element of the periodic table.
April 25, 2020
The Sign of the Dragon
Of all the things I've written, the one I care most about is The Sign of the Dragon. It's non-standard. It's epic fantasy, but instead of being a novel, it's told in over three hundred poems, mostly free verse, though there are rhyming poems in the mix, and prose poems, and poems that are mini-plays/scripts. It has familiar elements (dragons, demons, battles), but sometimes the major events are not shown, or are shown from the perspective of a minor character. And sometimes a poem focuses on small things: bees, a cleaning woman at her work, writing a letter to a friend. The hero, Xau, comes from a country colored by Chinese elements, but as seen through the filter of someone who grew up in London in a mixed-race family.
Anyway. Odd or not, it matters a great deal to me, and during the coronavirus pandemic I wanted very much to publish it sooner rather than later. And now -- yay! -- Xau's whole story has been published as an ebook: The Sign of the Dragon. With luck, an illustrated print edition will be published in 2021.
N.B. Many of the individual poems had already been published (including sixty in CROWNED: The Sign of The Dragon Book 1), but there are over 200 previously unpublished poems in the ebook.
Anyway. Odd or not, it matters a great deal to me, and during the coronavirus pandemic I wanted very much to publish it sooner rather than later. And now -- yay! -- Xau's whole story has been published as an ebook: The Sign of the Dragon. With luck, an illustrated print edition will be published in 2021.
N.B. Many of the individual poems had already been published (including sixty in CROWNED: The Sign of The Dragon Book 1), but there are over 200 previously unpublished poems in the ebook.
April 16, 2020
Instructions for Time Travelers (Daily Science Fiction)
My short story Instructions for Time Travelers has just been published by Daily Science Fiction, my seventh story to appear there :-)
March 31, 2020
Mithila Review
The latest issue of Mithila Review is now online -- free -- because of the pandemic. The issue includes an interview with me, plus two of my poems: an astronomy poem, How to Question Asteroid 16 Psyche, and a Greek-myth rhyming poem, Patroclus.
Sending good thoughts to all.
Sending good thoughts to all.
Mithila Review
The latest issue of Mithila Review is now online -- free -- because of the pandemic. The issue includes an How to Question Asteroid 16 Psyche) and a Greek-myth rhyming poem, Patroclus.
Sending good thoughts to all.
Sending good thoughts to all.
March 16, 2020
Reading
Ever since I can remember, reading has been my favorite solitary pastime, but I also enjoy reading aloud to my family (to my mother, when I was a child, to my husband, to my children). The world is stressed at the moment, but reading still provides both distraction and solace. The following is a poem that I wrote, years ago now, about reading aloud to my son. Sending good thoughts to any who read this.
Aloud
by Mary Soon Lee
(first published in Main Street Rag)
I read another chapter
yesterday evening,
aloud,
to my son,
as we sat in the front yard,
not the best chapter
in the book,
not the one that put
tears in my words,
nor the one where my son
held up his hand for me to pause
because he couldn't stop laughing,
but still enough
that while I read
and he listened
there was nothing else at all
I would rather
have been doing.
Aloud
by Mary Soon Lee
(first published in Main Street Rag)
I read another chapter
yesterday evening,
aloud,
to my son,
as we sat in the front yard,
not the best chapter
in the book,
not the one that put
tears in my words,
nor the one where my son
held up his hand for me to pause
because he couldn't stop laughing,
but still enough
that while I read
and he listened
there was nothing else at all
I would rather
have been doing.
February 20, 2020
Rhysling nominations
I've had two poems nominated for this year's Rhysling Award. Curiously enough, both poems feature cats. This may reflect the fact that I write a disproportionately large number of cat poems. And that, in turn, may be because my cats often lie on top of me while I am deciding what to write....
The poems are "To Skeptics," first published in F&SF, and "Witch," first published in Polu Texni.
The poems are "To Skeptics," first published in F&SF, and "Witch," first published in Polu Texni.
February 10, 2020
Valentina Tereshkova
I just received my subscriber copy of the March/April issue of Analog, containing, among many other goodies, my poem "How to Go Twelfth" -- which is my second (!) poem about Valentina Tereshkova to appear in Analog. Valentina Tereshkova, now in her eighties, was the first woman in space.
