James Dorr's Blog, page 159

Science Fiction Authors: 8 Useful Inventions You’ll Want to Take on a Trip to Mars

Just a short item, because . . . well, why not?  Now that Labor Day is over, are you ready to plan some serious traveling for next summer’s vacation time?  Or maybe just for some background details for that next SF story.  And what about salads?*  Jared Jones comes to our rescue today with “A Trip to Mars Will Require People to Use these 8 Bizarre Inventions” courtesy of UPWORTHY.COM, which those with a yen for wandering can find here.

(*See item #4)

Devilish Trickery — Proof Sheets Returned

The holiday weekend over, it’s time to get back to work on a dim, rainy day that may spell the end of summer too.  This time it’s nothing spectacular, nothing hard, just the routine of life, in this case another proof copy, received yesterday from Stephanie Buosi of Erebus Press, which, corrections checked over and okayed, a few more added, a little clarification of dashes and hyphens discussed, went back in the email about two hours ago.  The anthology is HOW TO TRICK THE DEVIL (cf. September 2, August 16 and 8) with my story in it “Lobster Boy and the Hand of Satan,” a lesson in what not to do when trick-or-treating on Halloween.  As of last notice, HOW TO TRICK THE DEVIL was scheduled for release by the end of this month and, so far, it looks like it should be on schedule.

A Labor Day Holiday Weekend Memory. . . .

As the hours grow late and the Labor Day Holiday Weekend dies down, here is a memory for readers to take with them.  Found in my e-mailbox this afternoon courtesy of Bobbe Cummins and Facebook, please to peruse “13 Seriously Disturbing Pictures of Children’s Nightmares” via BUZZFEED.COM, a photographic essay by Joshua Hoffine right here.

I especially like Nightmare #4, “Meet the Wifey,” noting particularly the deadpan look on the face of the child.  But #6 (“Bon Appétit” — I’d almost like this one better without the figure on the right, though), #11, and #13 (doesn’t the doll to the right of the closet look creepy as well?) are also nice.

Which ones are your favorites?

Labor Day Weekend Brings Art Fair, Spoken Word

It also brought sunshine and low-to-mid nineties heat — summer had come at last! — with the only rain Sunday, literally, just a few drops.  And that came just after my reading had ended.

Could that have been a message?

Well, probably not, but mine was the only presentation listed as a reading of horror.  This was on the Spoken Word Stage presented by the Writers Guild at Bloomington (cf. July 26, May 31, et al.) with partial support by the Bloomington Arts Commission, as part of Saturday and Sunday’s annual local 4th Street Arts Festival.  This is something the Writers Guild has participated in for the past five years, including an information table, a “Poetry on Demand” station (with donation jar) where member-poets create poems for the public with final drafts done on manual typewriters (and, no, given the subject matter of so much of my work, this is one I don’t participate in), and the aforementioned Spoken Word Stage with work read by local and semi-local poets and prose writers in half-hour sessions.

The sessions I got to I thought were fun, with poets perhaps outnumbering the essayists and fiction writers more this year than in years before, but in general giving a good idea of the range of writers and work produced locally.  Mine was the one session actually labeled by genre, as “horror fiction,” which might have kept the hypothetical crowds at bay, though it was more likely that I had the next-to-last Sunday, 4 p.m. slot (that is, when people were starting to call it a day, stopping by perhaps to rest their feet, we being one of the few venues there with a sunshade and chairs, rising again on realization of what they were hearing and scurrying all the faster to their cars — would that we writers actually had that kind of power!) and, in any event, some people did show up and stayed for the stories.

And so, I opened with “The Calm” (cf. below, October 5 2014, et al.) from my early collection, STRANGE MISTRESSES:  TALES OF WONDER AND ROMANCE, a Lovecraftian tale set in northern New York at the time of the French and Indian War, originally published in NEW MYTHOS LEGENDS (Marietta Publishing, 1999).  This ran perhaps a little longer than I had rehearsed, though it might also be that we started a couple of minutes late, but not to worry.  For my closing story I had pre-selected two, both from THE TEARS OF ISIS, anticipating perhaps a time problem (things running a couple of minutes late at events like this is not exactly unprecedented) and so chose the shorter, “Bones, Bones, the Musical Fruit” (cf. March 29, January 26 2014, et al.),  originally published in BONE BALLET (Iguana Publications, 2005) and concerning the problems endured by artists who craft musical instruments from human bones.

It all seemed to go over well enough.

Splatterlands, Grey Matter Press Sale through September 11

Another day, another deal.  This one’s from publisher Grey Matter Press and is good for 40 percent off — that’s forty percent — all paperback titles through this Friday, September 11th in exchange for keying in the discount code 2NDANNIVERSARY when checking out.  The occasion, as the announcement put it:  “Two years ago today, in 2013, Grey Matter Press released its first volume of dark fiction, DARK VISIONS:  A Collection of Modern Horror — Volume One. That volume went on to be nominated for the prestigious Bram Stoker Award® for Superior Achievement in an Anthology only five months later.  . . .  And today, in celebration of our five year anniversary, fiction fans can fill their Labor Day Weekend with dark thoughts while saving 40% off the trade paperback cover price of not only our first Stoker-nominated volume [but] any other volume in the Grey Matter Press catalogue of exceptional fiction.”   But it’s for one week only, starting Saturday September 5 and ending Friday September 11, so now’s the time to decide, and buy.

My romp in this roundup is a single story in a single volume, SPLATTERLANDS (see, e.g., February 1, January 28 2015; August 27 2014; November 22 2013), which, to quote the publisher’s blurb, “reawakens and reimagines the hypertensive writing style and controversial themes indicative of the original Splatterpunk movement.  Containing the work of some of the freshest voices of our modern time, it is an anthology of deeply intelligent short stories whose extreme themes and graphic depictions of violence and terror are intended to have a lasting effect for years to come.”  So get a literary history lesson as well as a great read!  My own tale is one of working-class aspirations and love betrayed titled “The Artist,” or, as reviewer L.D. Johnson of SPLATTER CAFÉ put it early this year, “[t]his brilliantly written tale is about a man who loves his art and his wife, but his wife, unable to comprehend the beauty of art starts to drift away and into another man’s arms.  A sculptor of meats, Vince creates these wonderful meat sculptures for dinner parties and banquets.  Dorr’s elegant writing of this twisted tale settles deeply into my psyche.  He turns the act of revenge into a work of art with Vince’s final masterpiece.  It will be his greatest creation ever!”

And hence, somewhat of the theme as well of my own Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing collection THE TEARS OF ISIS, of art and destruction, for which see two posts below, September 4, for its own Labor Day discount of 20 percent — but only through the holiday itself.  (So okay, I’m pimping, but if I don’t who will?)  Or for SPLATTERLANDS and other Grey Matter Press titles for the whole week, and at 40 percent off, press here.

King Kong/Fay Wray Romance on Grievous Angel — a Lagniappe

The word came Friday even though it had been up for a couple of days: “On the Other Hand” (cf. July 26, March 30), my poem on why the tragic romance between King Kong and Ann Darrow, a.k.a. Fay Wray, could never have worked out, is up and alive with three other poems by poets Annie Neugebauer, John Reinhart, and Miki Dare on GRIEVOUS ANGEL.  GREVIOUS ANGEL is the poetry and flash fiction division of British editor Charles Christian’s URBAN FANTASIST, for which this week’s manifestation can be found by clicking here.  Also the poem’s title, “On the Other Hand,” is a tip of the hat to actress Wray who made that the title of her autobiography which, in turn, begins with a letter of forgiveness addressed to Kong.

PMMP, The Tears of Isis on Twenty Percent Off Labor Day Weekend Sale

Kicking off the last remnants of summer, Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing has announced a 20 percent off Labor Day sale to last through the entire holiday weekend.  Key in the code phrase WORKUNTILYOUDIE at checkout for 20 percent off the order total.

Needless to say, THE TEARS OF ISIS is one of the books on sale, for which one can conveniently press here.  From there one can also check out other titles in the Perpetual Motion Machine store or, if one must, press here (on which page press “Anthologies and Collections,” then scroll down, to find THE TEARS OF ISIS on the right).  Or subsidiary publisher Dark Moon Books which is also offering back issues of DARK ECLIPSE and DARK MOON DIGEST (of which I have a tiny bit of skin in the game in the form of stories in DARK MOON DIGEST 6 and 7, for January and April 2012), for which one may press here.

Ill-Considered Expeditions, Andromeda’s Children Arrive

As all expeditions must come to an end, ILL-CONSIDERED EXPEDITIONS (see August 28, et al.) and, a few days ago, ANDROMEDA’S CHILDREN (August 25, et al.) arrived at my mailbox.  Rescued from its darkest interior, both have proved to be beautiful books and, at least to the extent I’ve gotten into them, promising reads.  My stories are “Ice Vermin,” mapping never-before explored parts of early Twentieth Century Siberia, for the former and “Golden Age,” of preserving longevity in the near future, in the latter.

Both can be found on Amazon now, for which for EXPEDITIONS (“a voyage of discovery for all concerned as successive teams of hapless explorers fall foul of the elements and monstrosities lurking in shadowy caves, hidden temples, icy tombs and even alien planets”) click here, and for ANDROMEDA’S CHILDREN (“a timeless mix of traditional, modern and comic visions that explore what makes us human — or not”) here.

Museum of All Things Awesome and That Go Boom ToC Revealed; The Paris Horror Picture Show

“Edited by Joanne Merriam,” the blurb begins, “THE MUSEUM OF ALL THINGS AWESOME AND THAT GO BOOM is an anthology of science fiction featuring blunt force trauma, explosions, adventure, derring-do, tigers, Martians, zombies, fanged monsters, dinosaurs (alien and domestic), ray guns, rocket ships, and anthropomorphized marshmallows.”  Or see below, this year, May 5 and February  16.  So late yesterday the announcement came, that the table of contents has been set, including my story at number 6 in the lineup, “Bubba Claus Conquers the Martians,” a homage to perennial 10 All-Time Worst Movies listee SANTA CLAUS CONQUERS THE MARTIANS (as set in the “Bubbas of the Apocalypse” universe) originally published by Yard Dog Press in HOUSTON, WE’VE GOT BUBBAS in 2007.  And one more thing, a tentative publication time has been set for spring 2016.

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

    Khadija Anderson, “Observational Couplets upon returning to Los Angeles from Outer Space”

    Xochitl-Julisa Bermejo, “Photograph of a Secret”

    Kristin Bock, “I Wish I Could Write a Poem about Pole-Vaulting Robots”

    Alicia Cole, “Asteroid Orphan”

    Jim Comer, “Soldier’s Coat”

    James Dorr, “Bubba Claus Conquers the Martians”

    Aidan Doyle, “Mr. Nine and the Gentleman Ghost”

    Tom Doyle, “Crossing Borders”

    Estíbaliz Espinosa, “Dissidence” (translated by Neil Anderson)

    Kendra Fortmeyer, “Squaline”

    Miriam Bird Greenberg, “Brazilian Telephone”

    Benjamin Grossberg, “The Space Traveler and Runaway Stars”

    Julie Bloss Kelsey, two scifaiku

    Nick Kocz, “The Last American Tiger”

    David Kopaska-Merkel, “Captain Marshmallow”

    Ken Liu, “Nova Verba, Mundus Novus”

    Kelly Luce, “Ideal Head of a Woman”

    Tim Major, “Read/Write Head”

    Katie Manning, “Baba Yaga’s Answer”

    Laurent McAllister, “Kapuzine and the Wolf: A Hortatory Tale”

    Martha McCollough, “valley of the talking dolls” and “adventures of cartoon bee”

    Marc McKee, “A Moment in Fill-In-The-Blank City”

    Sequoia Nagamatsu, “Headwater LLC”

    Jerry Oltion, “A Star Is Born”

    Richard King Perkins II, “The Sleeper’s Requiem”

    Ursula Pflug, “Airport Shoes”

    Leonard Richardson, “Let Us Now Praise Awesome Dinosaurs”

    Erica L. Satifka, “Thirty-Six Questions Propounded by the Human-Powered Plasma Bomb in the Moments Before Her Imminent Detonation”

    G. A. Semones, “Never Forget Some Things”

    Matthew Sanborn Smith, “The Empire State Building Strikes Back!”

    Christina Sng, “Medusa in LA”

    J. J. Steinfeld, “The Loudest Sound Imaginable”

    Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam, “The Wanderers”

    Lucy Sussex, “A Sentimental, Sordid Education”

    Sonya Taaffe, “And Black Unfathomable Lakes”

    Mary Turzillo, “Pride”

    Deborah Walker, “Sea Monkey Mermaid”

    Nick Wood, “The Girl Who Called the World”

    K. Ceres Wright, “The Haunting of M117”

    Ali Znaidi, “A Dolphin Scene” and “Australian Horoscope”

Then also an oddity of sorts for today, behold “The Paris Horror Show” by Messy Nessy at MESSYNESSYCHIC.COM, courtesy of Joan Hawkins, Jenn Newman, and Julie Ahasay via Facebook.  The wonders!  The art!  The gore!  For which, to see for yourself, press here (and, if desired, see as well on these pages December 9 2014; also for my poem “Animal Eyes,” based on Paris’s Grand Guignol, May 26 this year with ancillary material May 31, 28, and 23).

Contract Sent Back for Cemetery Riots; Proofs for How to Trick the Devil On Their Way

Two short updates for “the writing life” — the little things that are done between selling the story and seeing it published.  Yesterday, with admirable speed, the contract and payment (on acceptance, also admirable!) arrived from T.C. Bennett of Awol From Elysium Press for CEMETERY RIOTS (c.f. August 27), the latter of which went to the bank today while the former, signed, went into the mail.  Then also today Stephanie Buosi of Erebus Press sent this concerning HOW TO TRICK THE DEVIL (see August 16, 8):  “In the next upcoming days I will be sending you back your edited short stories.  If you could take a look at them and get back to me with your approval as soon as you can, I would greatly appreciate it.  I will be sending them as a .docx file, please let me know if you would prefer to receive it as .doc instead.  Also, I am still waiting for author bios from a few of you.  If you have not already done so, please send me your brief bio, 200 word maximum, sometime by next week.”

The stories in question are “Lobster Boy and the Hand of Satan,” a contemporary tale of carnival grifters originally published in CYBER PULP’S HALLOWEEN ANTHOLOGY 2.0 (Cyber Pulp, 2003) for HOW TO TRICK THE DEVIL, and for CEMETERY RIOTS the heretofore unpublished Victorian-set story of “The Re-Possessed.”