Jeff VanderMeer's Blog, page 99

Brian Evenson's Immobility

My blurb for Brian Evenson's latest, and the initial description, with cover.

"Immobility is a shock to the system. It makes you wonder why you ever read any other noir. The style is brilliant, becoming strangely less concrete the more we find out, as if the words are somehow disintegrating with the character. The inversion by novel's end, the so-called twist, is perhaps the most perfect and natural I've ever read—so good that no matter how hard you try to figure it out ahead of time, you'll f...

Ann and Stephen Up For Hugo for Weird Tales

The Hugo nominations are out, and my wife Ann and Stephen Segal are up for Weird Tales again. Congrats to all of the nominees.

Because I'm just that fast, there's an Omnivoracious feature up already with an interview with novel finalist Catherynne M. Valente.

(Ann's on facebook–go give her some luv!)

Catching Up

(My crappy photo of the totally awesome ARCs for the British Commonwealth edition of Finch.)

Ann and I have had to deep-six the European travel this summer because of book deadlines, but we're still going to have a pretty active year. In addition to teaching at Clarion San Diego and Shared Worlds, which will include readings, you can find one or both of us at these events (details listed in the sidebar):

- University of Central Florida Literary Festival, April 16-17, Orlando (Ann and I are...

Sequel Planned to the Kosher Guide: The Goyim Guide

The Kosher Guide to Imaginary Animals has been so popular already, despite not officially being released until tomorrow, that we've already been commissioned by Tachyon to do a sequel, aimed at a more general audience.

—Will include 90 entries on different types of "tainted meat" throughout history.

–Copious and mouth-watering illustrations by John Coulthart, who designed the first book.

–Evil Monkey's discussion with Ann and with a third party, Mord, pictured below.

–Extended recipes discussion ...

Finch and Coulthart's Finch Cover (Vote!)–Up For Spinetingler Awards

My novel Finch is up for the Spinetingler Award for Rising Star (4 to 8 novels published)…heh. I almost feel young again. My friend Brian Evenson's Last Days is also up–congrats to all the nominees.

From here it's a straightforward voting shoot-out, so I'm going to break my general rule of not lobbying for awards and suggest you go vote…for the books you like the most.

BUT I have to say–and I feel passionately about this, more passionately than about any award nomination at any point in my...

Clarke Awards Coverage

I just posted a piece on the just-announced Arthur C. Clarke Award finalists at Omnivoracious, including quotes from some finalists. (Also don't miss my interview with SJ Chambers about monster mashups.)

I hope to interview the other nominees or feature their books between now and the awards announcement.

Here are some snippets I couldn't use in the piece.

China Mieville on the most pleasing response to his The City & The City:

"This book was an attempt to write something very faithful to the p...

Evil Monkey Takes a Jaunt to the B&N Review

Evil Monkey continues to conquer the world, appearing this week in an interview at the B&N Review about our Kosher Guide to Imaginary Animals. Here's an excerpt…

The Barnes & Noble Review: Ann, you teach Bar and Bat Mitzvah classes. Do you get questions from students along the lines of "Is a Wookie kosher?"

Ann: You would be surprised at some of the questions I get from the students. I actually learn quite a bit from them. I can't always answer their questions so it requires me to study...

The Smell of the Weird: Sniffing Books

In going through our library and acquiring books for our reading for The Weird antho, I've noticed once again the smell of books, and in particular the smell of the weird. Herein I disclose Part 1 of my findings, with a relatively small sample.

Jean Ray's Ghouls in My Grave dates from 1965, and thus there's a full-on must surrounding this slim paperback. The cover's foxed and there are a couple of peculiar gray stains on the binding that add to the ambiance. The scent surrounding the book...

There Are Ghouls in My Grave…

…and I have to get the little blight-ers out. They're insidious, and they like to trip you by stamping on your shadow.

Most likely, this space will keep blinking back at you with the exact same text until Monday, unless something news-worthy comes along. Better no posts than filler-posts. Meanwhile, as I clear out the ghouls, feel free to tell me what you've been up to, dear ghosts.

(Meanwhile, I will be messing about on facebook as my "down' time.)

Tentacles! With Shelley Winters and John Huston!

Yesterday, while doing our taxes, we followed up Pandorum, Dune, Moon, and Alien with a movie on cable…Tentacles. From 1977, clear rip-off of Jaws.

I have a feeling that everyone else already knows about this D-movie, but we were just aghast, watching winters, Huston, and others do their best impression of stink-o-rama. In one scene a killer whale trainer embarks on a long monologue aimed at convincing the whale to fight the killer giant octopus.

Here's more of it, for masochists…