Helen Lowe's Blog, page 116

Lines From “Leaving the Red Zone”: Aftermath, Part 2

Over the past few weeks I’ve been sharing some of the wonderful lines and stanzas from Leaving the Red Zone —thepoetry anthology (edited by James Norcliffe and Joanna Preston, and published by Clerestory Press) that commemorates the fifth anniversary of the February 22, 2011, earthquake.

Today, I share the second of a two-part focus on the anthology’s “Aftermath” section — which is also the final section of the anthology and of this post series.

—

from “Aftermath”

“…
We are already on the oth...

Around and About on T’Interwebs, aka What’s Happening This Week

Women in SF&F — yep, I can do this thing!

Coming up later this week, Thursday 14 US EST, which means Friday 15 here in the southern hemisphere, I have a guest post featuring as part of Fantasy Cafe’s “Women in SF&F Month” — which has been running now since 2012.

To read the intro for this year’s post series, click on:

Introducing Women in SF&F Month 2016

You can also check out last week’s programme and this week’s schedule of guest and posts, here:

Women in SF&F Month: Week 2

But I’ll link he...

58 Eridani: The Game Behind The Story, Part 2

~ by Andrew Robins

To read Part 1 of “The Game Behind The Story”, click here.
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58 Eridani: The Game Behind The Story, Part 2

My goal in writing the 58 Eridani game log, and in serialising it here on “ …Anything Really”, was to capture the sense of the game we played, while adapting the delivery of the story to a new medium.

58 Eridani turned out to be a game that was heavy on problem solving, and relatively light on action sequences. Also, most of the problems the party faced required social...

Just Arrived: “Children of Earth and Sky” by Guy Gavriel Kay

UK/AU/NZ cover

It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these posts, mainly because it’s been a while since I’ve had a new book arrive in my post office box with a satisfying ker-thud.

As regular visitors here will know, I am a dedicated reader of longstanding when it comes to the writing of Guy Gavriel Kay so as soon as I saw that my NZ publisher, Hachette NZ, were also releasing this book, I was quick to ask if I could have an advance reading copy (it’s not out here until May.)

The cover, a...

“Fantasy Heroines That Rock My World” on SF Signal: Heroine #15

The 15th instalment of my “Fantasy Heroines That Rock My World” series posted on SF Signal yesterday—this time featuring Amat Kyaan from Daniel Abraham’s A Shadow In Summer (Book One in The Long Price Quartet.)

As I say in the post, when it comes to kicking butt and taking names as a Fantasy heroine:

“…I don’t think you can go past her. In fact, in my humble opine, she totally rocks the A Shadow in Summer story – even if, despite being a leading character, she is not the book’s main protagoni...

Where Ideas Come From

I’m one of those people who converse with checkout operators—because why the heck not?—and recently one of those conversations canvassed the “what do you do?” question. When I replied that I was a writer, the next questions was, “Where do you get your ideas from?”

Like Ursula Le Guin, I am very much of the view that ideas are pretty much everywhere, and that my ideas for stories come from a subconscious processing of life’s giant database. However, as I said to my checkout interlocutor, “If a...

A New Review: “Helen Lowe’s Daughter Of Blood may well be the best and most complex epic fantasy novel of the year”

USA

UK/AU/NZ

Last week I posted “reviews to date” for Daughter of Blood — only to promptly receive another one courtesy of Risingshadow.net.

Clearly the review dust is “still” settling—but rather than waiting another two months for the next roundup, I am posting the headsup and link today.

Spoiler Alert:
Just one warning: there are spoilers, albeit relatively smallish ones, in terms of the story summary. So if you are a spoiler-averse reader, then maybe wait until you’ve read the book before...

Lines From “Leaving the Red Zone”: Aftermath, Part 1

Currently, I’m sharing some of the wonderful lines and stanzas from Leaving the Red Zone —thepoetry anthology (edited by James Norcliffe and Joanna Preston, and published by Clerestory Press) that commemorates the fifth anniversary of the February 22, 2011, earthquake.

Today, I share the first of a two-part focus on the anthology’s “Aftermath” section.

—

from “Aftermath”

“$30 billion
7.8 billion litres of spilled
…………..untreated wastewater
535,000 tonnes of silt
181,000 damaged homes
40,000 c...

My Love Affair with the Long Names of Fantasy Fiction: How It All Began

USA

UK/AU/NZ

Long names are one of the love-hate elements that distinguish Fantasy fiction, i.e some readers adore them, while others have the opposite reaction. They have also been known to incur the mockery and derision of those outside the genre.

As readers of The Wall of Night series may know, I have paid my dues to the long names of the Fantastic tradition, which in and of itself probably tells you that I am one of those who *heart* their contribution to the genre.

In terms of where my l...

58 Eridani: The Game Behind the Story, Part 1

~ by Andrew Robins

58 Eridani: The Game Behind the Story

I have always been a fan of the game Traveller. It probably dates me, but when I was first getting in to role playing games, Traveller was the only real option if you wanted to play a serious role playing game in a science fiction milieu.

I loved Traveller mainly because of its rich setting. There were so many different worlds to explore, and the game came with a rich backstory. Plus zipping around in spaceships was cool – and if those...