Michael Kelly's Blog, page 22

Addendum to ToC for Year’s best Weird Fiction 2

I am very happy to say I’ve acquired the rights to reprint ‘The Ghoul’ by Jean Muno, translated by Edward Gauvin (Weirdfictionreview.com, June 2014), in Year’s Best Weird Fiction, Vol. 2.

Selection process for Year’s Best Weird Fiction

MK: Hi everyone. I’m Michael Kelly, Series Editor for the Year’s Best Weird Fiction. This year’s Guest Editor is the inimitable Kathe Koja. We’ve just announced the super fantastic table of contents for volume 2 of the series. Hurrah! It’s terrific. We read a LOT of great stories, too. Some of you are asking about the selection process. How does it work? What does a Series Editor do? What does the Guest Editor do? Why didn’t you take my fantastic story? Okay, you aren’t asking that question, really. At least not directly. And maybe you did have a fantastic story. So, we thought we’d try to answer your queries.

As Series Editor it’s my responsibility to read as much material as possible. I read close to 2500 stories. About the same amount as I did for the first volume. With this year’s volume I opened submissions to writers, via the Submittable form. About 40% of my reading came from those submissions. The rest of my reading came from anthologies and online venues. I worked diligently to get publishers to send me electronic copies of their anthologies. Alas, there were a few publishers who were non-responsive.

Several writers have sent me messages stating that Submittable says I didn’t read their work. The guidelines and Submittable’s original ‘submission received’ note explicitly stated that only authors selected for the volume would receive a response. As submissions weren’t going through a typical review process, there was no need, and no time, to change the status of each submission to ‘In Progress.’ But I assure you all that Submittable allows you to read and download the submissions without changing the state of the submission. And each submission was vetted. I sent a few of them to Guest Editor Kathe Koja. And why would I not read the work? I invited submissions.

Of the approximately 1,000 submissions that came through via Submittable, we took 1 story for the volume. And most of those submissions were straight-out lit stories with nary a hint of speculative weirdness. I will have to give a rethink to using the Submittable form for the next volume. So, you may indeed have sent in a fantastic story, but it may not have been weird fiction. There truly was a lot of good stuff that wasn’t genre.

As I read through the submissions, if a story caught my fancy I’d send it along to Kathe. The choices are colored by my own tastes, of course, but I tried to choose a diverse and eclectic array of stories to show the breadth and depth of the field. All told, I believe I passed along around 65 stories to Kathe.

Does that number sound about right, Kathe?

KK: As Guest Editor, I was more than grateful to have Mike’s fair and discerning eye be the first to see all the stories that arrived — 65 sounds especially manageable when you start with 2500! I’m disappointed to hear of the publishers who never submitted their writers’ work—we can’t love what we didn’t see—and thoroughly nonplused by the Submittable fail, because no one’s stuff is amazing enough to overcome the stated intention of the project.

Mike was also careful not to overwhelm me with an inbox avalanche—I had ample time to read and ponder every story I received, create a first round folder, then reread for my final picks. Of those, it was voice that made my choices for me: as a reader, it’s what I seek and respond to every time, a particular voice in a story or a novel, it’s what holds me in the telling, and what I remember afterward.

And just for the record, I read AS a reader: not as a colleague, friend, stranger, critic, genre fan or foe . . . I read the stories the way I read anything, to learn, to find pleasure, to catch the frisson of the wholly real in its uniform and motley of humanity (or the nearly-so). Response is as mysterious a thing in reading as in any other facet of life: and that’s why having a Guest Editor for this series is such a brilliant way to parse and offer the fiction of a particular year—I didn’t read Laird Barron’s editorial work until my own was done, and I’ll look forward as eagerly to next year’s editor’s choices. I won’t single out individual stories, but oh, there are some pure, strong, idiosyncratic voices out there, and I’ve learned some bylines to watch for: a perk I’ll hope is shared by many many readers of YBWF2.

MK and KK: We’d like to thank all the writers, editors, and publishers who sent in material for review. This is a truly Herculean task, and we couldn’t do it without your support and assistance. And we’d also like to thank the superb contributors to this volume for allowing us to reprint their work. Thanks, as well, to Tomasz Alen Kopera for the awesome cover art, and Vince Haig for his stellar design.

ToC and Cover for Year’s Best Weird Fiction, Vol. 2

Kathe Koja and I are extremely pleased to announce the table of contents and reveal the cover for Year’s Best Weird Fiction, Vol. 2. We are thrilled to have these contributors on board. Cover art is by Tomasz Alen Kopera. Design by Vince Haig.

There may be one more addition, as there is still a story to which I am trying to secure the rights.

“The Atlas of Hell” by Nathan Ballingrud (Fearful Symmetries, ed. Ellen Datlow, ChiZine Publications)

“Wendigo Nights” by Siobhan Carroll (Fearful Symmetries, ed. Ellen Datlow, ChiZine Publications)

“Headache” by Julio Cortázar. English-language translation by Michael Cisco (Tor.com, September 2014)

“Loving Armageddon” by Amanda C. Davis (Crossed Genres Magazine #19, July 2014)

“The Earth and Everything Under” by K.M. Ferebee (Shimmer Magazine #19, May 2014)

“Nanny Anne and the Christmas Story” by Karen Joy Fowler (Subterranean Press Magazine, Winter 2014)

“The Girls Who Go Below” by Cat Hellisen (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, July/August 2014)

“Nine” by Kima Jones (Long Hidden: Speculative Fiction From the Margins of History, eds. Rose Fox & Daniel José Older, Crossed Genres Publications)

“Bus Fare” by Caitlín R. Kiernan (Subterranean Press Magazine, Spring 2014)

“The Air We Breathe Is Stormy, Stormy” by Rich Larson (Strange Horizons Magazine, August 2014)

“The Husband Stitch” by Carmen Maria Machado (Granta Magazine, October 2014)

“Observations About Eggs From the Man Sitting Next to Me on a Flight from Chicago, Illinois to Cedar Rapids, Iowa” by Carmen Maria Machado (Lightspeed Magazine #47, April 2014)

“Resurrection Points” by Usman T. Usman T. Malik (Strange Horizons Magazine, August 2014)

“Exit Through the Gift Shop” by Nick Mamatas (Searchers After Horror: New Tales of the Weird and Fantastic, ed. S.T. Joshi, Fedogan & Bremer)

“So Sharp That Blood Must Flow” by Sunny Moraine (Lightspeed Magazine #45, February 2014)

“A Stretch of Highway Two Lanes Wide” by Sarah Pinsker (The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, March/April 2014)

“Migration” by Karin Tidbeck (Fearsome Magics: The New Solaris Book of Fantasy, ed. Jonathan Strahan, Solaris)

“Hidden in the Alphabet” by Charles Wilkinson (Shadows & Tall Trees 2014, ed. Michael Kelly, Undertow Publications)

“A Cup of Salt Tears” by Isabel Yap (Tor.com, August 2014)

Press Release – Skein and Bone

For Immediate Release

Debut collection from V. H. Leslie

Toronto, Canada, January 2015 — V. H. Leslie’s first book, ‘Skein and Bone,’ a collection of strange and supernatural tales, is forthcoming from Undertow Publications, July 2015.

“I’m beyond excited to be working with Undertow,” Leslie said. “Michael Kelly is a champion of the short story and he produces beautiful books. This is the perfect home for Skein and Bone.”

Leslie’s fiction has appeared in Best British Horror 2014, Black Static, Interzone, Shadows & Tall Trees, Strange Tales IV, The Best British Fantasy 2014, and others. She’s also an accomplished illustrator, and lives in Portsmouth, United Kingdom.

“I’m excited to be working with Victoria on her first collection,” Kelly said. “Her stories haunt and beguile. They’re an elegant amalgam of Shirley Jackson and M.R. James, and I’ve loved every one.”

Advance praise for Skein and Bone:

“The strange and vivid worlds in V.H. Leslie’s stories have a nightmarish fairy tale quality to them – a pantry full of secrets, nursery wallpaper whose pattern resembles ‘a forest of umbilical cords’, a crinoline petticoat ‘like an enormous birdcage’. An absorbing and gorgeously unsettling collection.”

– Alison Moore, Author of The Lighthouse (Short-Listed for the Man Booker Prize)

“A delicate and considered approach to richly imaginative stories.”

– Adam Nevill, Author of No One Gets Out Alive

“Tales of quiet unease, enigmatic, beautifully told, varied and darkly poetic. Your trepidation with a V.H. Leslie story is not that you might be disappointed but rather the thrill of just how good it is going to be.”

– Stephen Volk, Author of Whitstable

“V.H. Leslie’s fiction builds in intensity, but at the same time possesses a strange, silky kind of calm. Like a spider, she constructs delicate webs, and she lures you in with elegant, oblique writing. There is an almost unbearable patience to her stories, and, in the best possible sense, a horrible inevitability that shivers within them.”

– Conrad Williams, Author of The Unblemished

Established in 2009 by writer Michael Kelly, Undertow Publications (UP) is home to the acclaimed weird journal Shadows & Tall Trees, as well as Year’s Best Weird Fiction. (UP) and publish/editor Kelly have been hailed by Peter Straub, Glen Hirshberg, and others. Stories from (UP) are regularly reprinted in annual “Best Of” anthologies. Kelly has been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson and British Fantasy Society Awards, and his fiction has appeared in a number of venues.

Forthcoming from Undertow Publications:

‘These Last Embers,’ by Simon Strantzas, February 2015.

‘Aickman’s Heirs,’ edited by Simon Strantzas, May 2015.

‘Skein and Bone,’ by V.H. Leslie, July 2015.

‘Year’s Best Weird Fiction, Vol. 2,’ edited by Kathe Koja and Michael Kelly, October 2015.

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Cover art and design copyright © 2015 by Vince Haig

www.Barquing.com

These Last Embers moving quickly

More than half the copies of ‘These Last Embers’ have been reserved. If you were thinking of picking one up, please don’t hesitate. They are moving quickly.

Strictly limited to 200 numbered copies, and signed by both Simon and Drazen, this is truly a one-of-a-kind collectable. There will not be an eBook edition.

“These Last Embers” will be released in February 2015. It’s a terrific new story from Simon Strantzas, not available anywhere else. We are now taking pre-orders. The books will undoubtedly sell quickly. Act now to secure an early number.

These Last Embers (Feb. 2015, Undertow Publications)

16 pages, plus full cover wraparound

Strictly limited to 200 signed and numbered copies

Signed by Simon Strantzas AND Drazen Kozjan

ISBN: 978-0-9938951-7-3

Price, including shipping: $10 to North America, $14 to Rest of World

Nina Allan

The talented Nina Allan talks about her story “A Change of Scene,” forthcoming in ‘Aickman’s Heirs,’ edited by Simon Strantzas. http://www.ninaallan.co.uk/?p=1861

Season’s Greetings and thank you

I would like to thank everyone who has supported Undertow Publications throughout this past year, whether you purchased books, contributed to the books, wrote a review, or helped spread the word. Thank you! I can’t do this without your support and good graces. Wishing you all a festive and merry holiday, and the all the best in 2015. Stay healthy and in good cheer!

The Best British Horror 2015

Johnny Mains has posted the table of contents to his Best British Horror 2015, due in the Spring, and it’s a corker. Very happy to say he saw fit to include four – yes four! – stories from Shadows & Tall Trees 6 in the anthology: ‘Shaddertown’ by Conrad Williams, ‘Summerside’ by Alison Moore, ‘Night Porter’ by Raymond Russell, and ‘Apple Pie and Sulphur’ by Christopher Harman. Congratulations to Johnny and everyone who is in the book.

Table of Contents – Aickman’s Heirs

Editor Simon Strantzas has announced the line-up for Aickman’s Heirs. And it’s fantastic.

Nina Allan – “Change of Scene”

Nadia Bulkin – “Seven Minutes in Heaven”

Michael Cisco – “Infestations”

Malcolm Devlin – “Two Brothers”

Brian Evenson – “Seaside Town”

Richard Gavin – “Neithernor”

John Howard – “Least Light, Most Night”

John Langan – “Underground Economy”

Helen Marshall – “Vault of Heaven”

Daniel Mills – “The Lake”

David Nickle – “Camp”

Lynda E. Rucker – “The Dying Season”

Lisa Tuttle – “The Book That Finds You”

D.P. Watt – “A Delicate Craft”

Michael Wehunt – “A Discreet Music”

Aickman’s Heirs will be available in Spring 2015 in trade-paperback and eBook.

New interview

Gordon White over at Hellnotes asked me and Simon Strantzas about the forthcoming chapbook ‘These Last Embers.’ Here is what we had to say: http://hellnotes.com/hellnotes-interv...