Lynda E. Rucker's Blog, page 9

Let the Cat In and a paperback reprint

First news of 2022, I am interviewed on this podcast, Let The Cat In, by Australian writers Kaaron Warren, Aaron Dries and Joseph Ashley-Smith. We had a ridiculously good time chatting, I could have gone on for hours, and it has reinforced my determination to get back to Australia at some point, see more of that amazing country, and hopefully get in a whistle-stop tour to see all the lovely writers there I know. (Okay, hopefully see them all for longer than a whistle stop.)

Second thing is so...

DEAD OF WINTER: Ghost Stories for Christmas

Last month, author Helen Grant had the idea for several of us to record ourselves reading a ghost story by candlelight for Christmas. David Longhorn (who in addition to writing edits the fine publication SUPERNATURAL TALES), Sean Hogan, and I stepped up and we bring you The Dead of Winter: Four Chilling Stories for the Christmas season. Wait till it gets dark, light a candle yourself, pour a libation, sit back, and give it a listen.

“Der Geisterbahnof” in BEYOND THE VEIL

My story “Der Geisterbahnof” is in the new anthology Beyond the Veil, which is out this week. Over at the Flame Tree Press blog, you can see my comments on the story’s origins as well as those of several other contributors.

Order Beyond the Veil from the publisher, Amazon, or your local friendly brick-and-mortar bookseller!

PRISMS and BLACK STATIC

I’m delighted to be able to announce that the anthology Prisms, edited by Darren Speegle and Michael Bailey, is now available for pre-order from PS Publishing. This anthology got pushed back a few years, so my story “Encore For an Empty Sky”–a rare jaunt by me into science fiction–has been waiting for a while to see the light of day. That fine cover is by British Fantasy Award-winning artist Ben Baldwin.

As you can see, the lineup is wonderful:

WE COME IN THREES – B.E. Scully ENCORE FO...

Crooked Houses: Second Printing

Last year, one of my favorite presses for weird and strange literature, Egaeus Press, published a book of haunted house stories, Crooked Houses, that included my story “Miasmata.” But the print run sold out within a week, so if you didn’t act fast, it was gone! Now I’m happy to be able to announce that there is a second printing and you can order now–but act fast again, because with just 250 copies, this one will go fast too!

Crooked Houses includes stories by Steve Duffy, Helen Grant, M...

Happy New Year

News and such coming soon, but for now I just wanted to share this poem that I just ran across, “Lochan” by Kathleen Jamie, which speaks to how I am feeling these days and perhaps how you are too.

Maybe in 2021 I will start to write poems again (which would be for the first time in 15? 20? more? years).

I want to say “Here’s to a better year than 2020,” and yet I can’t help thinking there’s no way to express that that doesn’t sound like a curse.

Black Static #77 is out

The new Black Static is out! Issue #77 contains my column “Notes From the Borderland,” this time focusing on Christmas ghost stories.

There is fiction by Philip Fracassi, Steve Rasnic Tem, Françoise Harvey, David Martin, Shannon K. Gaerity, and Eric Schaller. Cover art is Ben Baldwin; Joachim Luetke also illustrates a story. Other columns are by Ralph Robert Moore, Gary Couzens and David Surface and there are a whole load of book reviews by various reviewers as well.

As ever, if you like dark f...

British Fantasy Award nomination

I am surprised and pleased to announce that I have been nominated for a British Fantasy Award in the nonfiction category for the column I write for Black Static, “Notes from the Borderland.” This is only the second award nomination for my writing I’ve ever received–in 2016 I was nominated for and won the 2015 Shirley Jackson Award for Best Short Story with “The Dying Season”–so as you can imagine, this is very exciting for me!

The full short list is available here, and it’s wonderful to see s...

My weird dark shadow and a new short story

A couple of weeks ago, I participated in an author’s panel on Zoom moderated by Kate Jonez of the publishing company Omnium Gatherum. Unlike many people, I have been slow to warm up to Zoom in These Pandemic Times, but I really enjoyed chatting with my fellow authors Simon Bestwick, Tom Johnstone, and Mark Kirkbride. I am a weird dark shadow because of (redacted for boring) issues getting up and running and didn’t set my lighting properly! The panel was partly to celebrate the release ...

Black Static #76 out now

Just a quick note to say that Black Static #76, the September/October issue, is out now, and includes my column “Notes From the Borderland.” It’s a bit of an odd one as I wrote it in the late spring for the summer issue but that issue got pushed ahead and it is very much about where the world was at the time it was written. I could have done something different for this issue or revised it, but, well, I rather liked it. However, I shall be back on track seasonally speaking with the next issue!

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