James Dorr's Blog, page 47

Murder/Machinery Release Date Set For April 3, Kindle Early Order Available Now

Thanks for your patience. I’ve finally settled on a release date! It’s true. The main reason I held off is because I want to send an ARC to Publishers Weekly and they require copies at least three months prior to release. There’s no guarantee they’ll review it, but it’s very good exposure if they do. So, I’ve penciled in Saturday the 3rd of April

So emailed Editor Cameron Trost Sunday regarding the upcoming mystery/science fiction anthology MURDER AND MACHINERY (see December 23, 3, et al.). So there’s now an official publication date set for April 3. My story in this is “Vanitas,” an 1850s-set saga of churches, circuses, music, and steam, originally published in ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S MYSTERY MAGAZINE in January 1996, as well as my 2001 collection STRANGE MISTRESSES: TALES OF WONDER AND ROMANCE.

The full title for the anthology itself is MURDER AND MACHINERY: TALES OF TECHNOLOGICAL TERROR AND MECHANICAL MADNESS, from Black Beacon Books. And if that weren’t enough, yesterday afternoon’s announcement continues: The Kindle ebook should be available for pre-order within about 24-hours. $2.99 USD pre-order price ($3.99 after release) . . . feel free to spread the word once it’s up and try to get our readership to take advantage of the discount.

To this I can now add, to see more and/or order (remember, it’s on a one dollar discount prior to actual publication), one can press here.

1,000 Words New Year’s Arrival To Help Start Off 2021

So it goes, the year 2020 now a part of history, my reading of the current book (the hefty 25 GATES OF HELL, cf. December 9, et al.) only a few stories short of the end, what should arrive yesterday, New Year’s Day, but a ready replacement. The new book is WORTH 1,000 WORDS (see November 29, 18), a compilation of tales published via email in FLASH IN A FLASH, itself a running collection of (guess what?) flash fiction.

Edited by Jason Brick and Dani J. Caile, WORTH 1,000 WORDS contains 101 stories in all, each at or under 1000 words as the title implies. Subjects vary, from general fiction to various genres, including horror — in this case, e.g., my story, “The Third Prisoner,” originally published in LVWonline.org for November 2008 as well as several other places including Brazil (in Portuguese!) in I ANTOLOGIA LUSIADAS (as “O Terceiro Prisioneiro,” Ediciones Lusiadas, 2009). How’s that for a world traveler? A crime story too, “The Third Prisoner” concerns a man, originally from Haiti, about to be executed as a revolutionary, but with a surprise to spring with his demise.

Of the book as a whole (to quote the back cover), you’ll meet newly established authors, career tale spinners, and a few big names . . . all delivering great stories in small packages. These quick peeks into the minds of master fiction writers bring you everything from sweet romance to spine-tingling horror in just minutes of your time.

Curiosity piqued? To see more, or order, press here.

TRIANA WISHES EVERYONE A HAPPY NEW YEAR

(It’s rainy and cold and Triana is going back to bed)

Another Royalty Celebrates Closing Of 2020

So it comes to an end, the year that is, with a new July-through-September royalty statement . . . though as readers may know, my practice is not to reveal either publishers or titles to avoid embarrassment on both sides. But this time there is one thing worth noting. As mentioned in my last royalty report (see December 10), publishers of anthologies — where what comes in is usually shared among multiple authors — will often hold onto minuscule payments until they surpass a specific total before sending them on. And the great thing this time, it actually came out above the bar.

So to close the the year out, a small amount has been added to my account at PayPal, enough perhaps to buy a nice lunch (if one isn’t too hungry). And that’s not a bad thing.

Vampiress Eudora Out On Sirens Call

She’s been around, “Eudora” has. First published in Nightscape Press’s 2013 BLOOD TYPE: AN ANTHOLOGY OF VAMPIRE SF ON THE CUTTING EDGE, Saturday — a day after Christmas — brought the word from Editor Nina D’Arcangela (cf. November 1, et al.): We’ve just published the Winter 2020 edition of THE SIRENS CALL eZine (#52), and we’d like to thank you for making it such a great issue! The eZine is available for free on our website. Please feel free to share it with your friends, family, or on any of the social media outlets you frequent.

The issue theme in the original call was the “Death of the Year” for the (finally, almost!) end of 2020, for pieces that pay tribute to the end of life in the most heinous ways possible. You may choose to honor death in dark fashion by horrifying with it, respecting it, or fighting it to the bitter end; and we do mean the bitter end as your piece should contain an unnatural death, mortal or otherwise. In this, Eudora, the title figure, is a vampiress. Or sort of, anyway. That is, she does tend to hang around Goth clubs, like vampire movies, have a somewhat odd past, and her boyfriends do have a way of dying before their natural times.

Would you like a date with her?

To find out, perhaps, you can check her out free in a really huge issue of THE SIRENS CALL (“Eudora” herself doesn’t make her appearance until Page 182, and even more stories follow her too!) by pressing here. And see her explain it in her own words: “Some say that I’m worth it.”

TRIANA WISHES ALL A HAPPY AND A PEACE-FILLED CHRISTMAS

(Triana identifies with the one asleep on the right)

Murder And Machinery Update: Publisher Proof Now In Editor’s Hands

Today brought an email from MURDER AND MACHINERY Editor Cameron Trost (cf. December 3, et al.): Just a quick update and photo to let you know the proof copy of the anthology has arrived. It’s looking pretty good. Just a little adjustment to make to the TOC layout and I’ll do a final line edit.

My part in this, we might recall, is a steampunky tale of music machines and suspected ghosts, at least by the more superstitious in town — but a spectral woman has been seen pacing the roof of the church. And a terrible accident involving a circus. The title is “Vanitas” and it first appeared in ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S MYSTERY MAGAZINE for January 1996, and is also in my own 2001 collection, STRANGE MISTRESSES: TALES OF WONDER AND ROMANCE.

Publication is currently slated for April, with more to be here as more details are known.

Of Myth, Moons, And Memory: Pulp Literature, Moons Of Saturn Sample Up, Discount Offered

In ‘Moons of Saturn’, James Dorr takes us on a remarkable journey from the technological to the mythical to the sublime. Weaving together space exploration, Greek mythology, and love, Dorr offers a genre-blending tale of television and spacecraft, illness and hope, blood and absinthe.

Enjoy a taste here, from Pulp Literature Issue 28, Autumn 2020. And from now until the end of 2020 save 20% on anything in our store with the code XMAS2020 !

Therewith the tease for PULP LITERATURE’S Fall edition, featuring my story “Moons of Saturn” (see below, December 19, et al.), up now on the publisher’s blog, with a special twenty percent off discount should one wish to buy the issue itself to finish the story. Plus other stories worth reading as well — and/or other issues and books, as far as that goes. “Moons” itself, originally published in TOMORROW in July 1993 as well appearing in my collection THE TEARS OF ISIS, is the tale of two lovers watching NASA footage of the 1980s Voyager Saturn missions on TV, and the woman’s “seeing” details that also connect with myths, both old and new, while her own health is rapidly declining.

Or, to see and sample it for yourself, press here.

Discordant Love, Sending, Final Proof Comes For 2021 V-Day Release

And so, Monday’s email from Editor Dickon Springate: Find attached an advanced Word Doc version of the finished anthology, which I am now sending out to all contributing authors for their final last minute edits and approval.

Please review the attached version and reply with any comments or last minute corrections or your story.

The plan is to get this to the printers as soon as possible in the new year, so while I hate to put you on the clock after such a horrendously long wait, but in order to have a chance to hit the revised deadline any adjustments arriving to me after Saturday 2nd January cannot be guaranteed to go into the finished article.

The book is DISCORDANT LOVE BEYOND DEATH and my story “The Sending” (see November 15, et al.), originally in ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S MYSTERY MAGAZINE for December 1997, as well as reprinted in my 2001 collection, STRANGE MISTRESSES: TALES OF WONDER AND ROMANCE. The story tells of the love of a woman for a lighthouse keeper, but with an obstacle. The lighthouse keeper has been deceased for about a century.

But not to worry, enter some 1930s, early-Depression era gangsters and the woman could join him sooner than she might have planned. But she does have the gift, an ability to communicate beyond the grave (as she’s been doing now), and maybe a few other things going for her. In any event, “The Sending” is one of a number of stories of loves with bit of a dark edge to them and, my okay having gone back later this afternoon, the somewhat-delayed DISCORDANT LOVE should be on track to be out on Valentine’s Day 2021.

More here as it becomes revealed.

Moons To Star Christmas Week On Pulp Lit Blog

Just a quick note from Genevieve Wynand of PULP LITERATURE (see just below, December 13, et al.) on a wintry Saturday: I just put together the blog post for ‘Moons of Saturn’. I believe it will be scheduled for Tuesday of this week.­­ This, I think, should consist of the start of the story — a sort of a “tease” to get you to want to see the rest too — plus some other information about the magazine.

“Moons of Saturn,” as we may remember, is a reverie about the Voyager space probe flybys of that planet forty years ago, seen through the eyes of a fanciful young woman, Phoebe, and the man who loves her. More on which, with link, should appear here Tuesday if all goes as scheduled.