Talyesin's Tales

Some very great things being said about the anthology Julie Czerneda and I edited...

http://www.strangehorizons.com/reviews/2009/06/ages_of_wonder_.shtml

Off to Ad Astra in a few minutes. Two panels on Saturday and two book launches on Sunday. Big weekend!

Hope to see you there!

In full-blown Ad Astra not-quite-panic now, with two panels on Saturday (Cribbing from History at 11:00 and Too Many Characters at 3:00 (lord knows AGES qualifies me for the first and Squirrelman for the second) and two book launches on Sunday - AGES OF WONDER at 11:00 and TRUTHSEEKERS 2: BIRTHRIGHT at noon (at least they're in the same room!).

So now I'm in designing promotional materials mode, and will be for the next two weeks. (Also a mild case of obsessing about the delivery of the TS2 books, but it's all good, it's all good, I'm okay, it'll be fine...)

Right! Back to work.

AGES OF WONDER is now available in stores! Woo!

Hi folks,

I am thrilled to announce that AGES OF WONDER, the fantasy anthology I edited with Julie Czerneda, has begun to ship to distributors! Look for it coming soon to stores near you!

YAY!

So Princess Smith and the Clockwork Knight has gone out to an agent. Updates as events warrant.

Truthseekers 2 being at the editor leaves me with a curious void in my life. I'd grown accustomed to all-Ashley, all the time.

Once the show is over (tickets still available! get them while there's still good seats!) I'm going to be all-Ad-Astra, all the time - getting ready for the launch, signing pre-ordered copies of Truthseekers 2, printing out promotional stuff, PLUS the Ages of Wonder launch. Both are going to be the same day, Sunday March 29th.

And then... April. I think I will treat myself to writing that Action-Cityverse not-a-Squirrelman-sequel that's been kicking around in my head.

Galley proofs for correction are currently winging their way to me and the authors.

One step closer to print! YAY!

Still no word on the cover art, but AGES OF WONDER is up on the Amazon page:

http://www.amazon.com/Ages-Wonder-Julie-E-Czerneda/dp/0756405432/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1214574279&sr=1-5

Ad Astra 2008 Con report

The ancient and nameless Mackayhotep and I hit the road at around 10:00 AM, and had clear roads, no traffic, no construction, not too much sun, all the way in to Toronto. Stopped at an A&P for lunch – I had brought sandwiches, and Marc’s anti-gluten allergy prohibits much of the roadside fare you usually find. By following the map the hotel provided we managed to find it much more easily than the Googlemap we had last year. By 3:30 we’d checked in and dropped off our stuff in the room and we searching for friendly faces and the panelist registration, which we found before they were ready for us. The insanely dedicated Alana Otis, programme director, informed us we should come back later, so Mackayhotep and I went to the bar for a drink, where we met and were joined by Sandra Tayler, one of my authors from AGES OF WONDER, and her husband Howard, of Schlock Mercenary fame, who was one of the Guests of Honour. (And let me aside here for a moment – I really get a surreal kick out of strangers recognizing me, coming up and introducing themselves.) We chitchatted for a while, then they had to go off to meet with a friend, and Mackay and I went off to pick up our registration packages. Once that was done, we left the hotel to find someplace to have supper. (Another aside: The Crowne Royal hotel is in the middle of NOWHERE when it comes to food.) By way of a sidetrip to the LCBO, we found an Italian restaurant that was okay (though filled with senior citizens for some reason) and then back to the hotel. Met more people we actually knew, including Jana Paniccia, Karina Sumner-Smith, and Tony Pi, all authors of mine from AGES OF WONDER, among others – most of the regulars from Julie Czerneda’s newsgroup, and some NG irregulars, including Jim Hines, Rob Sawyer, and Doug Smith – then checked out the dealers’ room, where I met John Zakour, and where we picked up the copies of MISSPELLED we had ordered from the incredibly wonderful folks at Bakka Phoenix books.
What a surreally proud moment for me – there, in living colour, in actual physical form, was the book I’d been waiting two years to see. A dream, actually, really, come true. My first professional short story sale. My ACTUAL NAME on an ACTUAL BOOK.

Spent the rest of the evening before the panels began with friends, catching up and checking out the art show, which, for such a small con, was awesome – I suppose it helps having artists as the Guests of Honour, eh? We checked out the Anime Room too, which was playing some bizarre cowboy anime – except all the characters were scantily-clad girls, of course. Mackay had a panel at 9:00 and I had my Goals of Fanfic panel at 10:00. The panel was pretty well attended – which is to say for a Friday night, that late, at least the audience outnumbered the panelists . Pretty lively discussion ensued, and by the end of that I hit the sack.

Saturday began way too early with breakfast with Julie and many of the other authors in MISSPELLED, including Kell Brown, whose wife was in intermittent labour with their about-to-be-any-second-now child, a son whose name they had yet to agree upon. Enjoyed the breakfast and wandered around a bit, bumping into familiar faces, then at noon it was off to the races! I had three panels (Authors Who Edit, Buffy Season 8 (which I moderated), and Neopaganism: Fact vs. Fiction), which managed to fit around two panels I wanted to attend; still, I think I would have been better off skipping one of the panels I attended in order to have a bit of mental freespace. I tend to wander about at cons, flitting in and out of panels and media rooms and dealer rooms and art show at my whim and fancy. A strictly regulated schedule takes a lot out of me. Managed to meet Brad Carson and Costi Gurgu, two of my authors from AGES OF WONDER, though the meetings were sadly brief. Five panels later was the Newsgroup Pizza Party, which was a blast, as always. Julie did a reading, we all ate pizza, I took photos (finally remembering my camera in my bag) and then Jana, Nathan Azinger and I went to the bar and shared a bottle of wine. Eventually it was time for the Masquerade (singing: “Paper plates are on parade!”) which was very good for such a small con! Nineteen entrants, many in the Master division. And then, Ad Astra produced their various Beef/Cheesecake volunteers, attractive individuals scantily clad in a variety of geek-inspired costumes, with whom one can be photographed for charity. I was tempted to get a photo with one or more of them, but by then I was very, very tired. Though I wanted to go to the dance, I instead opted to sleep. By all accounts I missed some fun!

Sunday morning Marc and I decided not to set a time for waking, so we slept in. Well, I slept in – 8:00 AM is plenty late for me - but Marc did not consider it late enough. Still, it was a good thing we did, because finding someplace for breakfast took on a quest-like level of difficulty. Have I mentioned that the hotel is in the middle of nowhere, food-wise? Yeah, that. We drove around for an hour trying to find someplace other than a Tim Horton’s to eat before we finally surrendered and went to Tim’s. Got back to the hotel, checked out, stored our baggage in the car, then went back to the con to just basically putz around while we waited for 1:00 finally, FINALLY, arrive.

Well, 1:00 FINALLY arrived and it seemed so strange, sitting in front of an audience, while Jana, Karina and The Narrator explained the game they’d set up to celebrate the launch. You see, as a way of making the launch a con-long event, they’d arranged to provide the attending authors and our celebrated editor with slips of paper upon which were printed clues. These clues, once deciphered, became an anagram of a code phrase. The first to decipher the anagram (thus correcting the “misspelled” words) won a prize. (Aside: I also participated as a Goblin Lover – helping Jim Hines out with his own launch of GOBLIN WAR, the last in the Jig the Goblin series, which as I understand it was very well attended.) As the Narrator explained, the authors each stood and recounted the backstory of our stories. Prizes were awarded and cupcakes were eaten, and then, the signing. I signed many, many copies, both for people purchasing the book and for Bakka Phoenix (who provided the copies) to sell at a later date. I really enjoyed the signing, though I really need to build up a repertoire of stock phrases to sign above my name – and the oddest thing happened: You know when you write a word so often it stops having any meaning? That happened with my name. Also, I think I need a different, faster signature for signing books.

Then we were off. A little more traffic, but we still made good time. Stopped at Whiskey Willy’s in Kingston for supper, instead of the traditional roadside fare which never completely satisfies. Downsides to the con? No hot water in our room (had to let it run for 5 minutes+ to get it close to lukewarm) and did I mention there’s NOWHERE TO EAT around the hotel? But in the end, these were downsides to the hotel, not necessarily the con, which from my point of view was very well done – good panels, good times, good discussions, just a good, solid con. Congrats to the con staff! And thanks to everyone with whom I had many an interesting discussion. (And apologies to everyone whose name I forgot – I’m terrible with names! But I’m working on it!)

Next year: AGES OF WONDER!

So the official news is AGES OF WONDER (the fantasy anthology I co-edited with Julie Czerneda) is slated for March 2009.

Woo!

AGES OF WONDER has been sent off to the publisher.

*mildly stunned*

Here it is, folks, the Table of Contents for my upcoming anthology, AGES OF WONDER:

THE AGE OF ANTIQUITY
The Curse Tablet - Nina Hoffman
To Play the Game of Men - Caitlin Sweet
The Mist Wraith - Urania Fung
Written in Smoke - Karina Sumner-Smith

THE AGE OF SAIL
Cloud Above Water - Natalie Millman
Crossing the Waters - Ika Vanderkoeck
Here There Be Monsters - Brad Carson
A Swift Changing Course - Jana Paniccia

THE COLONIAL AGE
Blood and Soil - Ceri Young
Fletcher's Ghost - Liz Holliday
Immigrant - Sandra Tayler
A Small Sacrifice - Kristen Bonn

THE AGE OF PIONEERS
Pony Up – Linda Davis
Gold at the End of the Railroad - Elizabeth Ann Scarborough

THE PRE-MODERN AGE
The Stone Orrery – Jennifer Crow
Sphinx! - Tony Pi
A Bird in the Hand – Queenie Tirone

THE AGE AHEAD
Mars Bound – K. J. Gould
Angels and Moths – Costi Gurgu

The accepteds and rejections have gone out on AGES OF WONDER. About time, too, because I was fit to bursting to tell people.

There were so many good stories. Many great stories. Several exceptional stories. Some of these we kept, and some we had to, alas, turn away. This is the nature of an anthology. For a variety of reasons, the ones which are selected are the ones which are selected, and the ones which are rejected are the ones which are rejected. It's the job of the editor to make the tough calls, and let me tell you, some of them were very tough indeed.

That said, I'd like to personally thank each and every person who submitted a story to us, whether or not you were accepted. You blew us away. Thank you.

Now comes the fun part: story order!

Hmm. It seems I am an editor.

And yet I don't have a red pen.

It seems odd.

I should fix this.

BUT! I have a new and entirely appropriate icon!

Let me explain where I'm coming from in order to understand what I'm going for. I earned a History degree at Concordia University in Montreal, and like a lot of fantasy enthusiasts, I specialized in Medieval Europe (though it wasn't the only era I studied) - the period that stretched from the fall of the Roman Empire to the Renaissance, a thousand years of history. A lot happened in that time - the Dark Ages, the Barbarian Invasions, the development of castles and cathedrals, the rise of the Romantic Ideals. And I found the era wonderful and fascinating - just like all the stories I read for entertainment, only they actually happened!

But those fantasy stories always ended in the same pastoral monarchies they began with. While a rich source of stories, the medieval age eventually came to an end. It gave way to changes such as the rise of scientific enquiry, the exploration of the world, the establishment of colonies, and the growth of industrial cities. Why weren't there any fantasy stories set in those eras? Or before the establishment of those monarchies? Or beyond our own level of technological advancement?

So that's what we're looking for, here - stories set in a fantasy world, based on a historical period that IS NOT Medieval Europe, or the Modern Era (which let's say spans from 1980-2010). Or else fantasy stories set in our own history, but before the Fall of Rome, or after the Renaissance. But be careful with this sort of thing, because like I said, I have a history degree and I'm not afraid to use it.

Additionally, any culture which is recognizably different from Medieval Europe, or modern western society, is fair game as fodder for creating a new, interesting setting for a story. Africa, Asia, the indigenous peoples of the world, from the depths of the tropical rain forest to the permafrost plains of the arctic circle, there are countless cultures and societies that have rich cultures upon which to base a story's setting.

There's a lot of possibilities available. We deliberately left the theme vague because we wanted to see what people would come up with, given the only restriction - no Medieval Europe, and no Modern era. Every other time period in human history is available.

All those ages to choose from... which one is up to you.

EDIT: To clarify this clarification, unfortunately, no, this does not constitute an open invitation to submit. Sorry, folks!

The question of 'proper' formatting arose on Julie's newsgroup, so I thought I'd reprint it here:

* Indents by format paragraph.
* No double spaces after a sentence.
* No extra lines ie paragraph breaks.
* No cover page or half page at the start (it's just deleted) or address etc. in the story file. Title, word count, name, only.
* Complete contact info in the cover email.
* page number, name, and title on the top of every page.
* Format your italics as italics. No marks, such as underlines, unless you want underlines printed.

My contract from DAW arrived today.

I feel very Official all of a sudden.

Invitations were sent out this morning. I prepared them last night, geeking and freaking a little that THIS WAS REALLY HAPPENING, then sent them out this morning. I woke up at 3:15 AM, so excited to send them out I very nearly got out of bed. My brain overrode that decision, and slept in until I couldn't stand it any more (6:00) then got out of bed to send the emails.

So. Yes. Invites sent.

Some people have replied. The vast majority have said Yes, so far - the only holdouts I've had so far are one person who's concerned about his schedule, and one person who stopped writing short stories years ago.

One of the authors responsible for my love of fantasy has said yes. I felt dizzy when I got her email.

Is it possible to have a job you actually LOVE doing? How unusual.

( Ooo! An explanation copy-pasted from Julie's Newsgroup: )

For those of you who are wondering, Julie and I are still hammering out our invite list. They should go out sometime soonish, hopefully this week. More AGES OF WONDER news as events warrant!