I’m very excited that Pseudopod has adapted not one but two short stories this year. The first is “Dr. Lambshead’s Dark Room,” that appeared in a special Edgar Allan Poe episode (#699). I’m not sure, but this may be the first time I share actual billing with Poe! Initiate self-actualization mode.
The other was one was “Dive in Me,” which I wrote with Jesse Bullington, and is a story near-and-dear to both of us as it is set in a town based on where we both grew up and became friends. A lot of grunge, Florida Gothic mess going on. You don’t want to miss the creeps.
You can listen to host Alasdair Stuart introduce and make some awesome comments, and hear the lovely Tatiana Grey read “Dr. Lambshead’s Dark Room” here.
Jordan Shiveley opens up “Dive in Me,” and has a really neat response to it at the end you should stick around for. Floridaian sister Alethea Kontis performs the story, and brings 100% authentic to the Moirai, even nailing the melody to “Dive in Me.” Check it out here.
Congratulations to Desirina Boskovich, who has done it again with the glorious coffee table book LOST TRANSMISSIONS: The Secret History of Science Fiction and Fantasy. Published by Abrams Image, all sorts of people are spilling the beans in here: Charlie Jane Anders, Neil Gaiman, Paul Tremblay, Molly Tanzer, Nick Mamatas, Annalee Newitz, Christie Yant, Darran Anderson, Jesse Bullington, William Gibson, and many many more. I especially enjoyed the essay about Jane Loudon, Assassin’s Creed, and Janelle Monaé!
My humble essay is about “The Ideal Men,” which were the competing, celebrity robot rascals of the 1930s and 1940s including my favorite, Elektro the Smoking Robot.
Anyway, if you think you are a SFF buff, think again and buy this book!
Mixologists and Fabulists are going to be thrilled with this new anthology from Nick Mamatas and Molly Tanzer. MIXED UP: COCKTAIL RECIPES (and Flash Fiction) FOR THE DISCERNING DRINKER (and Reader), published by Skyhorse Publishing, is a lovely new gift book that pairs fantastic fiction with annotated and updated recipes. Even better, it’s now shipping out WAY early from Amazon.
My story, “Arrangement in Juniper and Champagne,” riffs on the French 75. It’s about Hannah Höch, friendships strained by adulthood, and of course, public drinking.
And, man, in addition to having an excuse to write about all of that, I am honored to be sloshing about with these other amazing contributors:
• Maurice Broaddus
• Nick Mamatas
• Jim Nisbet
• Jarret Kobek
• Benjamin Percy
• Libby Cudmore
• Dominica Phetteplace
• Gina Marie Guadignino
• Tim Pratt
• Elizabeth Hand
• Robert Swartwood
• Cara Hoffman
• Jeff VanderMeer
• Carrie Laben
• Will Viharo
• Carmen Machado
If you enjoy pouring over great stories while decadent booze pours into you, order your copy here now.
Whoops. I have been meaning to do an update for…two months?…and just haven’t. Blame the lassitude and election anxiety.
Anyway, as you may recall, Wandering Spirits: Traveling Mary Shelley’s FRANKENSTEIN is my travelogue through three key geography points in Mary Shelley’s seminal text. It was nominated for a Best of the Net a few years back and is available now as a bicentennial, special-limited edition designed and annotated by Yves Tourigny and Tallhat Press. I write more extensively about it here.
Only 200 copies will be made, and only then available for 9 months from its initial release.
So, current stats are: there are 140 copies of Wandering Spirits: Traveling Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein left, with 4 months to go.
If you would like to purchase a copy, you can do so at the below links:
Today is Numbers of the bEast, a lovely blog-o-sphere tribute honoring/roasting/ultimately celebrating the King in Yellow himself, Joesph S. Pulver, Sr.
Joe is one of my favorite writers, editors, and people all around. A bridge between the symbolist, beat, and weird movements, Joe wields words on the page like Jackson Pollock and I can’t think of anyone else writing right now that utilizes space akin to Mallarmé and Apollinaire. How does he do it? I think it’s all in the mustache, whose magical wonders I tried to unleash in this Cindy Sherman-esque tribute. I’m not really sure it works, after editing these portraits, I tried my hand at the Selectric II and all that kept coming out was:
Thanks to Mike Griffin and John Langan for asking me to play and help celebrate xPULVER!
Love ya, Joe!
EDIT:
After the fact, I figured no one wants to go backwards for the individual images, so I have included them below for the bEast’s (and the viewer’s) convenience.
Also, be sure to check up the round-up from Mike Griffin of all the Numbers of the bEast, and Joe’s lovely thank you note here.
Awesome cover for CASSILDA’S SONG designed by Steve Santiago.
Joe Pulver’s long-awaited anthology, CASSILDA’S SONG, is finally in the world! This collection looks at the more feminine-side of Robert Chambers’ THE KING IN YELLOW, and I am honored to share a TOC with some of the awesomest ladies writing today. You can find the full Table of Contents at the end of this post.
Not only am I proud to be in this antho for the TOC, but also because I think my story “The Neurastheniac” may be one of my favorite things I’ve written to date. Joe is a really great editor to work with. Not only is his enthusiasm in the project infectious, but he goes the extra mile to encourage you in your vision, even when you are working within someone else’s sandbox. What has resulted is probably a story that is more Selena biz than anything published so far, with the exception of my piece in Starry Wisdom Library.
“The Neurastheniac” is about Helen Heck, a failed beat/confessional poet/junky, and what she uncovers from a series of trespasses through the abandoned suicide chambers in the 60s. It gets weird.
Reviews for CASSILDA’S SONG have begun popping up, and I am happy to say people have been enjoying my weird Poetess as much as I enjoyed writing her. Here are a few highlights:
For Laird Barron’s “Five for 2015”, he wrote on his blog: “Cassilda’s Song, edited by Joseph Pulver. An anthology dedicated to the King in Yellow. Pulver’s third major tribute anthology in recent days and probably the best. Selena Chambers, Maura McHugh, and S.P. Miskowski set the pace for a sleeper anthology of 2015.”
Des Lewis is live-reading the collection, reviewing each story blow-by-blow and having a lot of fun. Of “The Neurastheniac,” he compares her notebooks to Ferlinghetti and Ligotti, but also the Decadents. “That contemporaneous example of her Ferlinghetti-like poetry (poetry that sometimes in this work approaches, to my eye, fin de siecle decadence) is a section of this delightful patchwork quilt of impressions and examples of the work of Helena Heck (1937-1968) whom KiY’s surnamesake surconscious author Selena jams for us like jazz. ”
Many thanks to Messrs. Barron and Lewis!
Speaking of jazz, there are a lot of musical references in the story, from the suicide songs of the 20s and 30s through the ironic melancholy of the 90s. So, to celebrate the release of the collection, I created a playlist of all the songs that either inspired or are featured in the tale. You can tune in here.
CASSILDA’S SONG is published by Chaosium Inc. and is available for Kindle, and forthcoming for print.
Table of Contents:
Black Stars on Canvas, a Reproduction in Acrylic … Damien Angelica Walters
She Will Be Raised a Queen … E. Catherine Tobler
Yella … Nicole Cushing
Yellow Bird … Lynda E. Rucker
Exposure … Helen Marshall
Just Beyond Her Dreaming … Mercedes M. Yardley
In the Quad of Project 327 … Chesya Burke
Stones, Maybe … Ursula Pflug
Les Fleurs Du Mal … Allyson Bird
While The Black Stars Burn … Lucy A. Snyder Old Tsah-Hov … Anya Martin
The Neurastheniac … Selena Chambers
Dancing The Mask … Ann K. Schwader
Family … Maura McHugh
Pro Patria! … Nadia Bulkin
Her Beginning is Her End is Her Beginning … E. Catherine Tobler & Damien Angelica Walters
Grave-Worms … Molly Tanzer
Strange is the Night … S.P. Miskowski
My humble essay is about “The Ideal Men,” which were the competing, celebrity robot rascals of the 1930s and 1940s including my favorite, 
Whoops. I have been meaning to do an update for…two months?…and just haven’t. Blame the lassitude and election anxiety.
Today is Numbers of the bEast, a lovely blog-o-sphere tribute honoring/roasting/ultimately celebrating the King in Yellow himself, 
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