Andrew Leon Hudson's Blog, page 2
September 6, 2017
Welcome to Pacific City!
The somewhat belated 6th SFFWorld.com anthology is now open to submissions from the world at large! Our theme this years is Heroes and Villains, whether their heroism or villainy is large or small — but there’s another little detail to bear in mind.
Welcome to Pacific City! is a shared world project. It will focus on our titular megalopolis, a 20 million-strong city on the coast of Oregon that puts the likes of NYC, LA and Tokyo to shame. Contributors have the chance to help design and define our world from the ground up, and you can find sources of inspiration at the city guide on the site — but be warned: if you go digging around, you may unearth more than you expected.
Submission info and other details are on the landing page, but in a nutshell: we’ll be offering a $15 fee on acceptance, plus a contributor’s copy of the paperback on publication. We’ll also be running a Kickstarter campaign in the hope of bumping those fees to a cents-per-word rate.
Metropolis has Superman and Lex Luthor, Gotham has Batman and all the rest. Who or what stalks Pacific City is down to you…
The deadline for submissions is November 30th — hope you give it a try!
June 5, 2017
The Other Side
You know what’s going to be the best thing (well, maybe) about participating in a serial novel/magazine/whateverthisthingwe’redoingis?
Having a reason to stick a blog post up on a regular basis.
The ARCHIPELAGO launch month went great: we raised over £500 via Kickstarter, which is five times what I hoped we’d manage, meaning we’ve got a nice bit of money with which to source cover art for the end-of-year book that’s in our collective future; and we lured in to our Patreon platform over ten times more subscribers than we have writers! (that’s a PR-massaged way of saying “thirty-one readers”, but I stand by it)
Still, that was then, this is now: June is when the project really begins in earnest, with thrice-monthly episodes For Subscriber’s Eyes Only. If you want to join us for the larger journey, it’s only $1pm for inbox and browser reading, only $2pm for the luxury ebook too! You’ll get three new chapters/stories every month, plus the chance to influence the story with the Pearl Polls, through with the readers can throw problems or prizes into the path of the rival factions seeking their fortune amongst the islands.
If you’ve not yet checked us out, allow me to suggest you start with my freebie episode IN EXTREMIS — it’s free to read, now and forever. And, when you get to the mighty cliff-hanger it ends on, you’ll be primed for what follows in my first “real” episode…
THE OTHER SIDE
…get your dollar ready!
May 20, 2017
It’s time to set sail:
Okay, I think I’ve waited long enough.
Four hundred years ago, when control of the world came to depend on naval power as never before, a courageous few set off on journeys of discovery and conquest that would alter the fates of nations in ways no-one could imagine. But once they’d sailed the seven seas, what if they found another?
This is the question that Charlotte Ashley, the largely unlinkable-to Kurt Hunt (spoiler: that’s not a link) and myself have decided to answer. With three episodes available to readers by browser, email and ebook each month, ARCHIPELAGO is a collaborative, competitive, interactive historical fantasy adventure serial — but perhaps that mighty mouthful needs some clarifying.
We are setting out into unknown waters of our own creation, each guiding one of three groups of unwitting rivals towards inevitable conflict when they finally cross paths. But even though we’re in control, exactly what will happen on the way is out of our hands, because our readers will be able to influence the course of events via monthly polls: White Pearls inject some random element into our narratives; Blood Pearls will dominate an entire episode; and the dreaded Black Pearls will critically alter the entire story world…
In my last post I briefly introduced my collaborators, so this time I’m going to do the same for the factions whose stories we’ll be writing.
Our setting is the early 17th Century, and with the last gasps of my national pride I’ve breathed life into a band of plucky English privateers — pirates, by any other name — authorised by King James I to plunder the silver fleets of Spain as they pass through the Caribbean. Yet with victory at hand, disaster strikes: a vast portal opens on the ocean’s surface, sucking friend and foe alike towards a seemingly terrible fate. With his ship unable to resist the overwhelming vortex, one captain orders his crew to prepare themselves for whatever lies beyond — which may be death.
Check out part one of my storyline now for free: IN EXTREMIS.
Kurt Hunt has chosen the fledgling colonies of North America as his jumping off point. The first attempts by the English to settle the New World were disastrous: all the colonists of Roanoke disappeared without trace, but that may be preferable to what happened in Jamestown twenty years later. The Jamestown survivors face a long journey back to England, where their actions will never be understood, nor accepted, but their fate is diverted by rumours of the impossible… and maybe answers to the mystery of what befell those lost on Roanoke Island.
Check out part one of Kurt’s storyline now for free: WHATSOEVER IS NEW.
Finally, Charlotte Ashley takes us to Mogadishu, capital of Somalia and heart of the Ajuran Sultanate, from which a new Islamic culture is about to spring. When an apprentice engineer witnesses the destructive opening of a magical portal in the city’s harbour, he fights to make himself worthy of being the first of the Sultaan’s subjects permitted to cross to the other side — and with a Portuguese war fleet bearing down on his home, he may be the only one who can deliver his people from the hands of the early European empire builders!
Part one of Charlotte’s storyline is being guest-hosted at Black Gate now: THE UR-RING.
Charlotte’s story at Black Gate is prefaced by one of two great interviews she’s done to promote the project’s launch: the other can be found at the blog Books and Tea, where she talks about the themes we want to explore and our intentions as we prepare for future episodes.
SO (I hear you scream) HOW CAN I READ MORE?
The launch stories will be permanently free-to-read on the main site, but starting next month new episodes will be going up three times a month for the eyes of subscribers only. For a $1 subscription you’ll be able to read it all in the browser and your inbox, but for $2 you’ll receive early access to each month’s content via a fancy-pants ebook — and there are opportunities for even deeper involvement coming later in our first year. Check the options out here.
Finally, we’re running a promotional Kickstarter campaign until the end of May, offering digital exclusives in return for donations to help us hit the ground running: themed wallpapers for the device of your choice, plus an ebook containing the three launch stories, a world guide, character profiles, and a trio of exclusive prequel stories not available anywhere else.
It’s going great guns: we hit our £100 target in less than twelve hours, and with ten days to go we’re over halfway to hitting our £500 stretch goal, which will fund cover art for the Year One book release and unlock a digital poster of it as a gift to our backers — why not get in on that?
I think that’s enough linkage for one day, don’t you? Charlotte, Kurt and I hope you’ll take a look at what we’re starting here, and if you like what you see, come get involved!
April 27, 2017
Visiting the Islands
I haven’t been blogging much recently — just one post in 2017 — but I’ve had good reason.
Since late last year, I’ve been working on a shared world project with a few writerly friends, gradually developing the concept and setting, before we dived in and started to write. We’re now less than a week away from launching our project, with websites, graphics, promotional materials and other efforts all waiting to explode from hiding!
Want a little taster of what we’ve been up to?
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ARCHIPELAGO is a swashbuckling historical fantasy serial — think Treasure Island and Moby Dick with a hint of Master & Commander, as filtered through George R. R. Martin on a weekly basis. The project is part collaborative and part competitive: each of the contributors enter the scenario from a different point of view, exploring the unknown until we meet in the middle, where we’ll vie for supremacy (or our characters will… but who knows what will go down when things start to get heated!).
All this will be delivered to readers in a sort of online magazine format, and the ultimate result will be a novel-length adventure that weaves together our different story strands.
My collaborators are two talented sf authors from across the pond: Canada’s Charlotte Ashley, who has featured in F&SF Magazine (most recently on the cover!), PodCastle and the Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy of 2017, plus nominations for the Sunburst and Aurora Awards; and America’s Kurt Hunt, who doesn’t go in for all that website-having malarkey and yet still manages to land stories at the likes of Strange Horizons, Beneath Ceaseless Skies and PodCastle. Picture me as the millstone around their necks.
We know each other via SFFWorld.com, and like me both have appeared in past SFFW anthologies: Charlotte in You Are Here and Lucky or Unlucky?, and Kurt in Ecotones.
ARCHIPELAGO is launching very soon: teaser stories will appear during May, with Year One’s weekly episodes going live from the start of June. We’ll also be running a novelty Kickstarter campaign during our promo-month to help spread the word around the crowdfunding community – and I’ll be sharing links to all that over the coming weeks!
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Our logo comes courtesy of writer/designer Holly Heisey — and you can find out more about their work at http://hollyheisey.com/
February 23, 2017
April the Last
Probably it comes as a surprise that we’re a third of the way through the year already. Well:
— FOOLED YOU —
it’s still February!
[wipes a tear from his eye] Classic.
Anyway, for perhaps the eighth or ninth time a short story of mine is now appearing in the small, free-to-read, unadorned-by-horrible-advertising sf ezine Mythaxis. It’s called April the Last, a bit of humorous* horror about Englishness (the quaint kind, not mercenary xenophobia) and the end of the world. Start now and it’ll be finished in about five minutes, just like the real End of Days!
* all humour subjective
I created the cover image using Creative Commons licensed photos by Staffan Vilcans, Derek Blackadder and secretlondon123. Many thanks to them all! If you want to check out more of their images, please follow this link.
To read other stories I have in Mythaxis, you’ve got two options. You could click over there and trawl through the past issues until you find them, one by one — but that sounds like hard work, and you might miss one… Alternatively, you could sign up to my quiet-as-the-grave mailing list and receive a free copy of Five Steps Forward, Three Steps Back, a little ebook which contains the first seven, plus a bonus extra! Be warned, I’ve got cool news to share in the next few months…
November 24, 2016
YOU ARE HERE
The fifth annual SFFWorld.com anthology is out now, and it’s probably the best to date! Eighteen map-themed stories of fantasy, horror and science fiction that include villainous wizards and bumbling apprentices, apocalyptic battlefields, shape-shifting espionage, sinster comings-of-age, golum explorers, and other larger-than-life encounters — as well as distortions of such seemingly mundane things as a tour guide pamphlet, or a lover’s tiff on an isolated moor…
I’m delighted to have been involved, both as one of the authors between the covers and designer of the art upon it. To celebrate Thanksgiving and help ease the straining wounds of an uncertain world, YOU ARE HERE is currently available for just $2.99 (or equivalent currency!). And not just that, all early proceeds will be donated to The Humane Society — as was the fee of the featured author, indie-bookmonster Lindsay Buroker.
I hope you give it a try! Cover, blurb and retail links to follow…
Maps define our lives as they define our world.
What were once the priceless resources of a brave and lonely few as they set off into the unknown are now carried in the pockets of billions around the globe. But they were never merely lines on paper – while depicting our geography we infused them with our intelligence, our desires, our imagination, and our memories.
Yesterday, we mapped the world only after we discovered its secrets. Today we map the mind and the body as we do so, and slowly unveil the universe before we set off into its infinite domains. Maps may have changed, but they are also changeless: they will always be guides to the spaces, the things and maybe the people around us.
This anthology charts eighteen worlds which are beautiful, frightening, alien, familiar – sometimes none of these, sometimes all. These stories cover every corner of the speculative map, featuring horror, science fiction, steampunk, high fantasy and more, in styles ranging from the literary and the lyrical to the pulpy and the thrilling.
Wherever you find yourself, there’s only one thing you can ever know for sure:
YOU ARE HERE
Now go explore…
AMAZON WORLD: USA | Canada | Australia | Brazil | Mexico | Japan | India
AMAZON EUROPE: UNITED KINGDOM | France | Italy | Spain | Germany | Netherlands
ELSEWHERE: Smashwords | Apple | Barnes & Noble | Kobo | Goodreads
November 11, 2016
An Election, in Limericks
There’ll soon be a President Trump,
Who implied the US was a dump
When he said, “make it greater”.
This peerless hater
Thinks chicks only good for a hump.
He’ll make life go hard for the blacks.
Gays and Muslims aren’t going to relax.
And, damn, if you’re trans
Don’t go raising you hands.
Do you think you’re poor now? Brace for tax.
A new legend: American Schism,
Takes the place of “Exceptionalism”.
What pours in from the Right?
Just the whitest of light . . .
But that’s not what shines out of a prism.
If America’s broken, reset her,
And embrace the spirit, not the letter.
Be it four years, or eight,
There’s a use-by for hate,
And incentive to do things much better:
Help the ones left behind to keep pace,
Irregardless of status or race.
It’s not “if”, it’s a “when”,
You can be great again!
. . . once you’re done with your President, Third Base.
November 6, 2016
Final Cover
The cover art for this year’s SFFWorld.com anthology, YOU ARE HERE, is now officially confirmed – your humble fabulous being the one what made it. The project’s creator, Nila White, asked me for a light-speed interview, which you can see flash before your eyes at the link…
Hey World!
That’s our final cover. In all its glory. Isn’t it pretty?
In addition to being a great writer, Andrew Leon Hudson also designs book covers.
I thought I would pin him down long enough to ask three questions…
YAH: Are you formerly trained in the graphic arts or did you just pick it up?
Andrew: Nothing formal, but I’ve always drawn for fun and I once had a job that demanded a bit of photoshopping. Everything else is guesswork!
YAH: What drew you to the three images you chose for the cover?
Andrew: I wanted images at different “geographic” scales. The galaxy gives us sci-fi and the map has a fantasy-ish feel. The landscape is the Isle of Skye in Scotland.
YAH: When not writing a novel or designing book covers, what do you do to relax?
Andrew: Mostly I read excellent books, eat fantastic meals, and lounge around my palatial…
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October 31, 2016
T.O.C.
Here’s the TOC announcement (that’s “table of contents”, the rest of you) for this year’s SFFWorld.com anthology, YOU ARE HERE… and I AM THERE…
You Are Here‘s editors have gone through all the submissions and we are pleased to present the final Table of Contents.
Before I announce the final line up, we want to thank everyone who contributed a story. Though we may not have chosen your story, I was – once again – amazed at the inventiveness of fantasy and science fiction authors. Truly, you put my own efforts to shame.
With that said…here’s the final list of stories for You Are Here:
Walked About by Jez Patterson – a neat little piece of horror where a map leads folks to a special cairn.
The Bilingual by Andrew Leon Hudson – a tale of cultures clashing in which a map bridges the gap between understanding, but may lead to the collapse of one.
Mapping the Buzz of Insects by Daniel Ausema – living maps infuse the most unlikely of creatures…
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October 11, 2016
YOU ARE HERE: Budding Lineup
Very much looking forward to this year’s SFFWorld.com anthology…
…and that’s not just because I’m the proud cover designer too! This year’s editor (and the whole anthology project’s originator) N. E. White has announced the first twelve contributors on the project blog, with teasers of their stories at this link: Budding Lineup
I also had the pleasure of helping out behind the scenes as part of the submission reading team (with the exception of my own submission, of course…) and there are some really, really good stories lining up. The fifth SFFWorld anthology looks to be the best to date — and if you want some context for that wild claim, I suggest you take a look here:
THE END — Visions of Apocalypse
LUCKY OR UNLUCKY? Thirteen Stories of Fate
WARS TO END ALL WARS — Alternate Tales from the Trenches
ECOTONES — Ecological Stories from the Border Between Fantasy and Science Fiction
I’m really looking forward to the end of the year!
