James Dorr's Blog, page 113

Here’s One I Can’t Resist: Science Guys in Fiction!

It’s “Our Favorite Fictionalized Scientists, Methematicians, and Inventors in SFF” on TOR.COM by Stubby the Rocket.  It starts like this:  Sci-fi and fantasy writers love populating their stories with towering geniuses.  After all, [image error]nothing lends credence to a work of SFF like a brilliant mathematician or an ahead-of-their time scientist.  But as fun as it is to see characters inspired by historical figures, it’s even more fascinating when authors take the real person and reimagine them within the context of SFF.  Recasting mathematicians as demon hunters, analysts as steampunk spies, and even Greek scholars as superheroes. . . .  Hypatia, Mandelbrot, Newton, Tesla. Einstein (sort of).  But what’s neat here is not just the article itself but some of the links, as with my favorite, fifth on the roster, the team up of “crime fighters” Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage.

For all, click here — if you’re anything like me you won’t regret it.  And be sure to scroll down to the very bottom with its link to Kate Beaton’s “Hark! A Vagrant” archives.

Tombs, Tears, Dirty Little Horror Interview Now Live

And now, as promised (see November 9), Lindsey Goddard’s interview for DIRTY LITTLE HORROR is here!  As some may have noticed, these interviews have been sort of frequent of late, as if there’s almost been one every month, and, while I can’t guarantee when the next one might be, there is a reason.  The hope is the word may spread not so much [image error] about me but that there’s a new book lurking in wherever it is one goes to find new books:  my novel-in-stories TOMBS:  A CHRONICLE OF LATTER-DAY TIMES OF EARTH.  And thus some may read it and, if so moved, will hopefully think it worth reviewing on their own blogs, Amazon, Goodreads, et al., and so spread the word further.
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Of course, someone could just find it interesting too.  So for the latest, including the dirt on not just TOMBS but THE TEARS OF ISIS as well, on the lure of dark fiction, on writing styles and whether I have one (or at least can describe it), on creating collections, and more . . . press here.

Astounding Outpost: No Place to Hide Now Up for Reading, Voting December 1

We live in an amazing time, technology and humans are coexisting in a way we’ve never seen before. It also can be a terrifying time. What if humans and technology can’t coexist? What if the A.I. take over, or the computer viruses jump off of the net and into our biology? What if we’re just all living in a matrix? These are just some of the questions and ideas that have shaped science fiction and this call. Give us your visions of how it all plays out.

Send us your best 7500 word or less story that relates to Neural Nets, Uplinks, and [image error]Wetware. . . .

Such was the call (cf. November 2) and my response was to send them a rather short story, “No Place to Hide,” a tale of interstellar war and the horrifying fates of some who fight it.  Space opera, maybe, but also a tale that fit the bill as described above — or at least so was the decision of the ASTOUNDING OUTPOST editors!  But there was a catch concerning payment, that all dogs in this fight would not be equal.  Or as the acceptance email put it:  The voting to determine prizes will occur during the first week of December.  Be sure to let your friends and family know so they can vote for your story.

That’s right:  Vox populi est vox pecuniae.  Or, the tale with the most votes will get the most cash.  And now “No Place to Hide” has been published, and may be read by pressing here!

(So the moral is:  Read and enjoy.  Then on December 1 and for six days after please read it again and vote, vote vote!  Heck, this is America, have your friends vote too for “No Place to Hide.”  Your parents, your children.  Significant others.  Family pets. . . !

(And in the meantime, if you enjoy it scroll down to the end and please also consider leaving a comment.)

A Christmas Carnage Makes Deadman’s Cthulhu Christmas Special

‘Tis the season to be jolly . . . in about a month and a half!  But starting the jollity, at least for now, has come this email from Jesse Dedman:  Your story, [A] Christmas Carnage, has been selected for DEADMAN’S TOME CTHULHU CHRISTMAS SPECIAL.  The issue should drop on December 1st and [image error]will be available through Amazon in ebook and paperback.  With the email came a contract which has been perused, agreed to, and sent back earlier this evening.

As the title may imply, “A Christmas Carnage” is based quite loosely on Charles Dickens’s immortal tale of A CHRISTMAS CAROL, and has a Carol in it, the narrator’s many-times great aunt Carol who has been dead, lo, these many years.  It is a reprint, having premiered in IN THE BLOODSTREAM (Mocha Memoirs Press, 2013) and also appeared in THE FIRST ANNUAL GEEKY KINK ANTHOLOGY (Riverdale Avenue Books, 2015, and, yes, it’s that kind of story).  Also, of course, it follows the DEADMAN’S TOME guidelines requirement of Genre:  Horror, Dark Fiction, Lovecraftian, including, if not a cameo by Cthulhu itself, a goodly dollop of Lovecraftian lore.  Also a chainsaw.

Zippered Flesh Goodreads Giveway through November 30

What horror anthology on body enhancements wouldn’t include gross-out fiction?  This book has it in spades.  But, this collection of stories goes far beyond that.  Here you will also find science fiction, surreal fiction, fantasy, and [image error]even a full serving of dark humor.  Disturbing, perverse, often gut-wrenching stories.

Nineteen chilling tales by some of the best horror and suspense writers today, including Graham Masterton, Jack Ketchum, William Nolan, Billies Sue Mosiman, James Dorr, and Jeff Menapace.  Definitely not for the squeamish!

It’s ZIPPERED FLESH 3 (see October 10, et al.) and two paperback copies are being offered for free in a Goodreads drawing!  The giveaway is open for the rest of November, till November 30, for readers in the US, Canada, and Great Britain according to the Goodreads site.  So here’s a chance, if you haven’t bought it already, to maybe cop a copy of ZIPPERED FLESH 3:  YET MORE STORIES OF BODY ENHANCEMENTS GONE BAD for nothing.  Interested?  Press here.

Tombs, Tears, Dirty Little Horror Interview Up for Next Thursday

A very quick announcement, a new interview of me by Lindsey Goddard is tentatively set for next Thursday, November 16, at

[image error] (how’s this for setting it fine) probably about 9 a.m. EST.  Not that it might not be actually announced here until a little later, as I generally email in early afternoon.  But . . . more news on TOMBS:  A CHRONICLE OF LATTER-DAY TIMES OF EARTH, the origin of 2013’s THE TEARS OF ISIS, a note about style — and maybe poetry?  Something to chew on in other words, exactly one week before Thanksgiving.

I also might mention that some of us may recall having met Lindsey Goddard before, along with her DIRTY LITTLE HORROR website where she shared with us a series of very funny horror-related pictures (cf. August 29).  One of which (why not?) is reproduced here.

 

WHC Halloween Haunts, No Place to Go Up October 21

So once upon a time, say a month or so before October, the Horror Writers Association was setting up a series of Halloween-related member columns to post, given sufficient participation, one or more a day in October up to the big night.  And so I wrote up a piece on how, in a university community with a lively arts scene, those of us too old for trick-or-treating and/or jaded on parties can always find things like mini spooky film festivals to help celebrate the season.  Calling it “No Place to Go for Halloween?” I wrapped it together with bio and social link material plus a raft of info on TOMBS:  A CHRONICLE OF [image error] LATTER-DAY TIMES OF EARTH, as participants were instructed to do (that is, to include information on latest books, projects, etc. — also, if desired, to offer prizes for those who commented and the like) and sent it in.
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Well. times were busy, and while I checked in at one point to see if my piece had been put on the schedule, I didn’t find it (or so I thought, though in retrospect it may be just that things weren’t final yet).  So I figured that maybe they couldn’t use it — no big deal, one can’t use everything.  So it goes.  And it being a busy time for me, I ended up failing to follow the feature myself after about the first week and a half .
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Silly me!  So yesterday afternoon (today being exactly one week after Halloween) I received an email from Coordinator Michele Brittany with contact information on those who had commented on my column.  It had in fact been used after all on October 21!
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And so, in lieu of having  announced it at the time, for those not members of the HWA or otherwise having missed “HALLOWEEN HAUNTS,” to see my part in it (and from there, if desired, to go to the other daily columns — just  click “HALLOWEEN” on the bar at the top) one may press here.

And Now for Something Completely Different: Terror Toys for Your Children

This is sort of in the category of “The Devil made me do it,” but after running across the picture of “Struts” (number 7, think about it awhile) or, perhaps especially, “The Face Bank” (number 2), I couldn’t resist sharing it:  “7 Scary Toys That Still Freak Us Out as Adults” by Diana Vilibert, via THE-LINE-UP.COM.  Dolls are there, to be sure, but [image error]unlike “Chucky” these are ones that are not quite human.  Or not quite horses.  Or . . . well, look for the not quite Mr. Potato Head — these are all toys to be sure that came after my own childhood, spent more prosaically amongst electric trains and model airplanes.  Who among us fondly remembers Erector Sets?  But these little items are something else, for more on which press here.

Dreaming Saturn Opens Hyperion & Theia, Available Now on Amazon, Elsewhere

Sometimes this writing business plays out like a detective story.  A mysterious tag on an unknown Facebook page, or more properly speaking just a notice that there was a tag.  You follow it down.  An Amazon link.  And then it begins to come together. . . .

The inaugural volume of the HYPERION & THEIA anthology series features stories, poetry, and art that encapsulate festive revelry and otherworldly reversal:  Gods and Goddesses of old prepare for destruction.  A demonic circus delivers a haunting finale.  The Shebeast lurks in the forest and pulls at heartstrings.  Alien diet supplements wreak havoc in near-future San Francisco.  Three women conspire to break an oat[image error]h with a wicked witch.  The Herculaneum Scrolls reveal the role of ancient aliens.  A Roman warrior and a warrior turned slave venture into the territory of a Queen of ancient Egypt.  Two cowboys track dark magic in the Wild Wild West.  Ghosts stuck in the mortal realm high off drugs.  You are a lone radio jockey after the apocalypse.

Thus saith the blurb found.  The plot revealed:  HYPERION & THEIA, VOLUME ONE:  SATURNALIA (cf. October 2, et al.), edited by Leah T. Brown and Elizabeth O. Smith and illustrated by Marga Biazzi, has as of October 18 (or 17, according to Amazon) been published — at least in electronic format, but with indication that a print edition should follow.  And, just as my “Golden Age” was the closing tale in ZIPPERED FLESH 3 (see October 10, et al.), a long poem of mine originally published in DARK DESTINY (White Wolf, 1994), “Dreaming Saturn,” is the opening entry in this book.  For more on which (including links to Amazon and others) press here.

More will be revealed as it becomes known.

Early Start for November: Astounding Outpost Takes No Place to Hide

It was one of my first professional sales, by SFWA’s rules at the time, a just under 2000-word outer space tale about humans revived to be wired into spaceships called “No Place to Hide” to the now long defunct SCIENCE FICTION REVIEW.  The issue was dated Summer 1991.  And the story was good, it had been reprinted once or twice (notably in FANTASTIC STORIES PRESENTS: SCIENCE FICTION SUPER PACK #1, cf. November 30 2014, et al.), and then the call came from ASTOUNDING OUTPOST:  We live in an amazing time, technology and humans are coexisting in a way we’ve never seen before.  It also ca[image error]n be a terrifying time.  What if humans and technology can’t coexist?  What if the A.I. take over, or the computer viruses jump off of the net and into our biology?  What if we’re just all living in a matrix?  These are just some of the questions and ideas that have shaped science fiction and this call.  Give us your visions of how it all plays out.

Send us your best 7500 word or less story that relates to Neural Nets, Uplinks, and Wetware.  Submission is open until October 28th.

So out it went a week before deadline and yesterday afternoon came the acceptance:  Thank you for your submission.  We enjoyed your story and have selected it for publication.  It will appear on the website during the month of November and also in the anthology that will be released on December.

And so it lies, a first sale for November, to publish some time this month though I don’t know when yet — so watch this space for more news when it comes with appropriate link. Yes, it will be a freebie, a lagniappe if one will. And yes, please read it when the time comes, because payment comes in the form of a contest, readers will be asked to vote for their favorite during the first week of December (at more or less which time the stories will also be published together in an anthology too, I believe to be in Kindle at least and possibly paper), and the high scoring winners get the most money.  So look for an announcement and link on this blog as well when the magic time comes.