Islam SciFi Interview of Najiyah Diana Helwani

Over at the excellent site Islam and Science Fiction, M. Aurangzeb Ahmad interviews Najiyah Diana Helwani , author of Sophia’s Journal: Time Warp 1857 - a time travel coming of age novel set in Kansas right before the Civil War. Here's an excerpt: Aurangzeb: Do you think there is a general lack of interest in...

Guest Blog: Lauren Beukes on Writing the Other

Editor's Note: Congrats to Lauren Beukes for winning the 2011 Arthur C. Clarke Award. Writing The Other is a sensitive topic. It should be. Not least because it’s so often been done so very, very, badly. But the truth is that unless you’re writing autobiography, any character you write is going to be The Other....

Once Upon a Future: Speculative Fiction Anthology #2, 2010

Writers of science fiction and fantasy in Israel are faced with considerable challenges. For one thing, in such a small country, the prospective local readership is relatively small. This leaves very little room for dreams of fame and riches—at least as long as one relies exclusively on the local audience. For another thing, writers must...

Inter Nova Looking for Cyberpunk Essays

Inter Nova, the international science fiction magazine, is looking for cyberpunk articles. Here's their open call: The original Cyberpunk – initiated by William Gibson and picked up by Bruce Sterling, Pat Cadigan, Tom Maddox, Lewis Shiner and others -  may have been a short-living movement in Science Fiction that lost its impetus after a few...

Philip K. Dick Special Citation Award Goes to Harmony by Project Itoh

The Philip K. Dick Special Citation Award goes to Haikasoru's Harmony by Project Itoh (and translated by Alexander O. Smith). The Haikasoru Blog has coverage of the event, including a video.

BSFA Awards

Congrats to the BSFA Award Winners: Novel: The Dervish House, Ian McDonald (Gollancz) Short Fiction: – “The Shipmaker”, Aliette de Bodard (Interzone 231, TTA Press) Art: The cover of Zoo City, Joey Hi-Fi (Angry Robot) Non Fiction: “Blogging the Hugos: Decline”, Paul Kincaid (Big Other)

Racontons une histoire ensemble: History and Characteristics of French IF

Over at The Portal (which has other interesting, international SF articles as well), they posted an article from the Second Annual Interactive Fiction Mini-Convention entitled Racontons une histoire ensemble: History and Characteristics of French IF (1, 2) by Hugo Labrande. Here's an exerpt: As pointed out by a few critics, among them Jeremy Douglass,[4] the dominance of English in interactive...

Historical Lovecraft

Today is the official release of Historical Lovecraft edited by Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Paula R. Stiles. Aside from stories that take from places all over the world, it includes an international roster of writers including Meddy Ligner (translated from the French, French author), Nathalie Boisard-Beudin (French), Julio Toro San Martin (Chilean, living in Canada) Nelly Geraldine García-Rosas...

Strange Horizons, February 7-March 21, 2011

“Widows in the World” by Gavin J. Grant embodies the word strange in the ezine’s title. Told in two parts, published 7 February and 14 February 2011, this surreal rambling, which invokes Roald Dahl,  is unintelligible. The most I could glean is that the Granny’s mind was uploaded into a “house” that contains "the husband"...

Fantasy & Science Fiction Magazine, May/June 2011

The thirteen stories collected here visit the past and both near and far futures, encompassing science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Climate change, music, New Orleans, and genetics all figure prominently. "Plumage From Pegasus" by Paul Di Filippo is a tale of writerly neuroses that still manages to be funny. In a world in which anyone...