Jeff VanderMeer's Blog, page 37

Philip K. Dick Award Finalists on Omnivoracious

The Philip K. Dick Award finalists were announced today, and I've got a short piece up on Omnivoracious taking a brief look at the nominees. Go check it out!

Philip K. Dick Award Finalists on Omnivoracious originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on January 10, 2012.

Blurb: Definition

Blurb, meaning words of praise on the back of a book, is a pathetic word that quickly devolves into an almost existential meaninglessness, not a shout into the void but a soft round brick shoring up nothingness. Blurb—rolly-polly already in its sound and to be taken as seriously as a beach ball or a random burble or a bubble; of air, of oil, of nothing that contains any sustenance. But the emptiness of a blurb is not truly empty: in that space exists a corruption self-aware with the horror of collusion: the blurb is attached parasitically to a book, sucking out all of the originality in favor of a comfortable banality and too-fulsome over-compensating injections of pus-like praise. This pus explodes all over the reader, who is influenced by this literary ectoplasmic spew in their perception of the text before reading a single page for themselves. A blurb is usually birthed bud-like by a fellow writer also feeding at the half-rotted hog-trough of publishing who hopes to benefit by association (another parasitical relationship) with the book at hand, and, long-term, to receive a foetid blurb in return. The blurb thus starts with a back scratch and ends with a mutual, world-encompassing reach-around, but it's the reader who gets screwed. It is not enough that the reader is subjecting him- or herself to the stupidity found in one's average book, but must also be inundated by stupidity on the outside. Biopsy a blurb and you find not just the stinking corruption of word-pus, you also find a grotesque yet accurate metaphor for distortion, warping, and group-think. In a way, a blurb is the essence of the worst of the literary world in concentrated, soul-deadening form.

Blurb: Definition originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on January 10, 2012.

Weird Fiction Review Returns: Lucius Shepard, Tanith Lee, Dr. Seuss, and More

Our Weirdfictionreview.com has come back from the holidays with a vengeance, with a full slate of great nonfiction, and a long story from Tanith Lee posting tomorrow. Here's what you can read today:

—An exclusive interview with Lucius Shepard about weird fiction

—Sonya Taafe on a weirdly surreal Dr. Seuss movie

—Our own ruminations on a couple of odd films

—Elwin Cotman on the urban hells of a Japanese anime creator

—Edward Gauvin on a great mid-century weird fabulist

As ever, we're featuring some great images on the main page's image slider. And if you were gone over the holidays, check out the archives, which include Sarban, Thomas Ligotti, Reza Negarestani, and much more.

Aeron Alfrey's great art for Ligotti's "The Red Tower"…

Weird Fiction Review Returns: Lucius Shepard, Tanith Lee, Dr. Seuss, and More originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on January 9, 2012.

The State of VanderWorld: Translation Grant News, The Situation, ICFA, and More

(Detail from The Situation…)

I am just now getting back up to speed, and still battling some intense tooth pain that I hope will be resolved soon, but there is some 2012 news to report…

–The Finnish Literature Exchange has awarded our Cheeky Frawg imprint two substantial translation grants: one for Jyrki Vainonen's collection The Explorer & Other Stories and the other for Leena Krohn's novel Datura. We plan to publish both in the fall of this year. Other Cheeky Frawg news will follow, but we have also reached agreement to do an ebook version of Jess Nevin's The Encyclopedia of Victoriana.

–The graphic novel version of my story "The Situation" is now complete, with the art by Eric Orchard, and will run on the Tor.com site later this month (I believe).

–Pod Castle will be recording my story "The Cage" for audio posting later this year.

–Ann and I will be teaching at Trinity Prep in Orlando in February, and will also have a bookstore event to be announced. In addition, we will be guests of honor at the Victoria Steampunk Convention being held in April.

–We will also be attending the ICFA conference in Orlando–Ann is on two panels and I am on a panel and have a reading. We also hope to meet with many academics about our work on the massive The Weird anthology and also on the topic of translations, in addition to beginning to move toward Weirdfictionreview.com accepting unsolicited critical papers for posting.

–Ann will soon announce two new anthologies she will be editing, and we are jointly editing a feminist SF/F antho, with more details on that shortly. I will have new book projects to announce in another month or so.

That's all I have to report for now. Please feel free to use the comments thread to tell me what you've been up to!

The State of VanderWorld: Translation Grant News, The Situation, ICFA, and More originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on January 5, 2012.

Happy Holidays–and Thank You (returning Jan. 9)

(Thanks to Jeremy Zerfoss for the WFR holiday e-card.)

I would just like to wish everyone happy holidays, and thank you for reading both here and at Weird Fiction Review (where we just published our last, very exciting, posts for the year.)

It's been a long year, but a productive one, and it has been enriched by knowing so many creative, talented, wonderful people.

This blog will be on hiatus until January 9. In the meantime, feel free to use this thread to tell me what you're up to.

Also check out Omnivoracious.com, where some of my pre-scheduled posts, including overlooked books from 2011, will run over the holidays.

Much Love,

JeffV

Happy Holidays–and Thank You (returning Jan. 9) originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on December 19, 2011.

Amelie Nothomb's Hygiene and the Assassin

The "bolt out of the blue" for me in 2011 was reading Amelie Nothomb's Hygiene and the Assassin,which, along with Michael Cisco's The Great Lover, will no doubt influence me for some time to come.

Europa Editions published the English-language edition of Nothomb's first novel in 2010; it was originally published in France in 1992. It concerns a Nobel Prize-winning misanthrope of a novelist named Pretextat Tach. Not only does Tach spout foul racist things, he also has a low opinion of women—his most bombastic and ridiculous statements concern them. At the same time, he has a sharp and penetrating mind, and as a conversationalist is a witty and disturbing match for almost anyone. When he'd diagnosed with cancer, he for the first time allows the press to visit to his home. One by one these interviewers succumb to Tach's verbal traps and leave in disgust, horror, or tears. That is, until a female reporter visits who has done more than the usual homework on her subject. The battle of wills becomes an entire war, involving Tach's creative output and the terrible facts of his past. Indeed, at the core of the novel is a vile act and an associated act that breaks conventions and taboos. Well, okay, so much of Decadent literature reached toward such things, but in a more modern idiom, there's a fresh shock of the transgressive. However, the novel is also intensely, darkly funny—at times laugh-out-loud hilarious. The observations about book culture and writers are, as they say, priceless.

What struck me about Hygiene and the Assassin is just simply that it takes on difficult and taboo subject matter and challenges the reader to pass moral judgment, perhaps even to toss the book across the room, and it also makes the reader uncomfortable even while you're laughing…and then later, challenges in a much bleaker way.

It's also a kind of demarcation point for those modern readers who, I think in part conditioned by the seeming "action" imbued by facebook and social media, which is actually not action so much as just more words…equate the actions in a book, the characters in the book, with actual real-world actions and people. Readers who think that the author is always endorsing the actions of the characters no matter what won't like this book. Readers who think that crimes on a page are somehow roughly e-equivalent to meat-world crimes won't like this book.

But I liked this book precisely because it was written without regard for what anyone might think. It isn't prettied up. It isn't given a nice wrap-up at the end to help the reader out. It just is what it is, telling the story it needs to tell. It's sharp, incisive, mean-spirited, and often speaks the truth. You get to choose how you feel about what happens. When so many books seem so eager to please the reader, and to reaffirm what the reader already knows, Hygiene and the Assassin was refreshing. It felt like something without all the edges sanded off. Now, certainly, some might say it's just sensationalistic, and perhaps they'd have a point. But at the moment I encountered it, the novel was an important reminder that writers need to turn their internal censors entirely off when writing to produce the best possible fiction. Nice is often just another word for mediocre.

Amelie Nothomb's Hygiene and the Assassin originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on December 19, 2011.

Osama by Lavie Tidhar, from PS Publishing

I've been meaning to do a post about Lavie Tidhar's fascinating and hypnotic Osama, from PS Publishing, and all kinds of things have gotten in the way, from dental surgery to sickness to deadlines. But with the holidays fast upon us, I'm blogging it now in brief at least—although it deserves better—so if you've missed it, you can consider buying it for yourself or for others.

Below the cut I've posted the publisher's description of the novel, which is slipstreamy and sly and affecting. One thing not mentioned in reviews is how effective Tidhar handles the short chapters that comprise Osama. They're not punchy or underwritten—they're just right and with few words wasted. He's also quite good in his characterization of Joe, the main character. The writing is beautiful without being fussy, cluttered, or overly lyrical.

You can buy Osama in physical or Kindle form on Amazon, or straight from the publisher. Rather think it needs a North American trade publisher.

"In a world without global terrorism Joe, a private detective, is hired by a mysterious woman to find a man: the obscure author of pulp fiction novels featuring one Osama Bin Laden: Vigilante…"

"Joe's quest to find the man takes him across the world, from the backwaters of Asia to the European Capitals of Paris and London, and as the mystery deepens around him there is one question he is trying hard not to ask: who is he, really, and how much of the books is fiction? Chased by unknown assailants, Joe's identity slowly fragments as he discovers the shadowy world of the refugees, ghostly entities haunting the world in which he lives. Where do they come from? And what do they want? Joe knows how the story should end, but even he is not ready for the truths he'll find in New York and, finally, on top a quiet hill above Kabul—nor for the choice he will at last have to make…

"In Osama, Lavie Tidhar brilliantly delves into the post-9/11 global subconscious, mixing together elements of film noir, non-fiction, alternative history and international thriller to create an unsettling—yet utterly compelling—portrayal of our times."

Osama by Lavie Tidhar, from PS Publishing originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on December 16, 2011.

Shared Worlds SF/Fantasy Teen Writing Camp: 2012 Guests, Registration, Donations, SW Book

Shared Worlds, the teen SF/F writing camp I help run along with Jeremy L.C. Jones out of Wofford College, South Carolina, has several announcements!

First off, our 2012 guest writers will include: Julianna Baggott, Tobias Buckell, Will Hindmarch, Karin Lowachee, and Naomi Novik. Ann VanderMeer will be our visiting editor guest. I will also be attending as an instructor.

Second, we're now open for registration for the 2012 camp, to be held July 22 through August 4.

Third, we now have a dedicated donation page. Donations help offset expenses, allow us to offer more need-based scholarships, and are tax-deductible.

Fourth, a PDF of the Shared Worlds student writing book from 2011, designed by Jeremy Zerfoss, is now available on the SW website. If you download it, please consider making a donation to Shared Worlds! Thanks to Prime Books, who will be helping provide the print version in the next month or so.

Many thanks to Amazon.com for a grant that help ensure Shared Worlds continues to thrive. Thanks for donations from, among others, Warren Lapine and Michael Chabon & Ayelet Waldman. (Donate! You'll feel good!)

Below the cut, find more on our guest writers for 2012…

Julianna Baggott: Critically acclaimed author Julianna Baggott recently signed a movie deal for the movie rights to her forthcoming YA science fiction series Pure. Baggott has written in many different genres and teaches at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida.

Tobias Buckell: Caribbean-born author Tobias Buckell currently lives in Ohio. He has written a NYT bestselling Halo novel and several critically acclaimed SF novels including Crystal Rain. Buckell is a returning guest to Shared Worlds, having taught here in prior years, and he is also an accomplished short story writer.

Will Hindmarch: Chicago resident Will Hindmarch is a highly respected game creator who has worked for, among others, White Wolf. Hindmarch has also published fiction and poetry. He is the designated world-building expert for Shared Worlds and has participated in every year of the camp.

Karin Lowachee: Born in South America, Karin Lowachee grew up in Canada and worked in the Arctic. Her first novel Warchild won the 2001 Warner Aspect First Novel Contest. She has been a finalist for the Philip K. Dick Award and won the Prix Aurora Award. Orbit Books published her latest, The Gaslight Dogs.

Naomi Novik: A New York resident, Naomi Novik is the author of the bestselling Temeraire dragon fantasy series, optioned by Peter Jackson. She has won the John W. Campbell Award and the Compton Crook Award. Her short fiction has appeared in several anthologies.

Ann VanderMeer: For five years Ann VanderMeer served as editor-in-chief of Weird Tales magazine, winning a Hugo Award for her efforts. In addition, she has edited ten anthologies over the past four years, including Best American Fantasy, The New Weird, Steampunk, and the forthcoming The Weird.

Jeff VanderMeer: Critically acclaimed writer Jeff VanderMeer has won the World Fantasy Award twice, once for his fiction and once for his editing. He has also been a finalist for every major award in the SF and fantasy fields. His latest novel is Finch. He reviews books for the New York Times Book Review, among others, and has lectured at the Library of Congress and MIT.

Shared Worlds SF/Fantasy Teen Writing Camp: 2012 Guests, Registration, Donations, SW Book originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on December 15, 2011.

Lisa L. Hannett's Bluegrass Symphony: Ann VanderMeer's Intro

I first met Lisa L. Hannett when I taught at Clarion South in 2009, and I was impressed with her originality and her prose. (She also looked like she could kick my ass, although that's neither here nor there.)

Flash-forward just a couple of years and she has several short story sales and a collection, Bluegrass Symphonyout. The collection is just the opening salvo in what promises to be a great career. As I said in my blurb for the book, she "shows a stylistic flair and depth of story…Her fiction is smart, confident, and in her own voice."

Publishers Weekly wrote: "Hannett's first collection shows off her fondness for lush imagery, unsettling concepts, indirect prose, and multilayered plots…a collection for fans of weirdness, wonder, and oft-disturbing twists." (There's more info on the publisher's page for the book.)

Falling roughly into the category of dark Americana fantasy/horror, the collection has a definite cohesive mood and tone. Ann VanderMeer wrote the introduction, which I'm happy to reprint here, so you can get a better sense of Bluegrass Symphony. You can also read Lisa's blog entries about the collection here.)



***

I was first introduced to the work of Lisa Hannett when she sent me a story to consider for Weird Tales. It was about a talking mechanical crow at a strange carnival, beautifully written and hard to forget. I didn't take that story but I knew she was a writer to watch. She continued to send me stories and then I had the good fortune to work with her in closer circumstances at Clarion South (remotely from home while my husband had the good luck to actually be in Australia). Eventually we connected on a story that fit Weird Tales and we've worked together on various other crazy yet inspired projects ever since.

I've always enjoyed Lisa's fiction because her characters are alive with passion and fury and her worlds are teeming with excitement and movement. Her use of language can make even the most horrifying scenes beautiful, so that you won't, you can't, turn away. That's a rare talent.

The stories in this collection are no different. Bound together by a common environment, they tell the tales of a land that brings to mind the American South. But make no mistake; these aren't your familiar back roads of Tennessee or Alabama. It's not even a trailer park way down in Mississippi. Instead we're transported to towns like Alabaska, Two Squaw and Plantain, which reside somewhere deep in the wilds of Tapekwa County. People live and work and love there just like we do, except . . . that they don't. Not really.

This is a land of wolf boys, minotaurs and shifting (yes shifting, not shiftless, although there's quite a bit of that, too) redneck people who are just trying to get ahead in the world. Mothers who only want to protect their daughters and daughters who cherish their mums. A brother who thinks he can save his beloved sister from a fate she's running toward as fast as she can. Reverends who perform special magic ceremonies with the help and the sacrifice of willing flesh. And you know, it's all for the good of the community, of course.

The relationships between fathers and daughters, the lengths each will go to redeem the other, play an important role: "It's a strange kind of love, what they share. I knowed its like meself, so it's easy enough to recognise. One what makes folk sacrifice anything to get what they's yearning for. One what makes a little girl reckless enough to go into the forest alone, just to save her daddy. One what makes that daddy suffer all manner of indignities, if it means she'll always be his. His alone."

And yes, some of the superstitious country folk have mysterious ways and some of the cowboys would just as soon hold a shotgun on you as raise a can of beer with you. There are menfolk who treat their womenfolk like worn out possessions. There are womenfolk who use magic to get what they want (or at least what they think they want) from their men. But there's also something very strange going on. Stranger than you might think.

These stories are about more than people just trying to get something from one another. These stories are about power and redemption, transformation, and sacrifice.

Where does that power come from anyway? Sometimes from the "usual" ways: from eggs that the special hens lay, or blood soaked towels or tentacles sprouting from a young man's chest. Just the usual, right?

Did I mention the twiggy folk? They are there to help you get your heart's desire. Right? Of course they are. You've just gotta trust them. Because they know better than you what you really need. And they will make sure you get it. Hesteh says, "But paths don't jest go one way: what you lost gotta come back to you some day, sure as spring follows winter."

As for what you might think is an "all-too-often used" subject, Hannett has included the most provocative, unusual take on a vampire tale I've ever read. Lisa has a way of twisting and turning all the usual conventions. "In his mouth I tasted the incoherent feathers of our unborn baby's thoughts. I sampled my agony, distilled in his venom." She makes them her own. She's good at that, she is.

This collection of stories will make you think twice before taking a walk in the woods. It's full of twisted magic and talking squirrels. Rodeo shows that happen in less than ten seconds. A Beauty Pageant that ends in an impossible way. And as Ada says in "From the Teeth of Strange Children", "There's so many dangerous critters in this land . . ."

But what about those talking squirrels anyway? Go read—and you'll find out.

–Ann VanderMeer

Lisa L. Hannett's Bluegrass Symphony: Ann VanderMeer's Intro originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on December 15, 2011.

An Interview with Haruki Murakami

Omnivoracious just posted my interview with Murakami, which was fun, especially asking him this question:

Time Magazine recently provided a list of your novels ranked by the number of cat appearances in them. When you were a beginning writer, is this one of the future realities you anticipated, and do you find it funny or odd that someone was tasked with counting Murakami cats?

An Interview with Haruki Murakami originally appeared on Ecstatic Days on December 14, 2011.