Random Thoughts for a Monday
(Some of the more interesting stuff encountered or re-read in the last few days while working on the big book of weird fiction; couldn’t find the Jamaica Kincaid collection to add it to the shot.)
I’m sick of internet kerfuffle, so I’m avoiding it this week. It’s not for lack of sympathy, but for lack of time and lack of energy and also because it’s getting more and more depressing for me personally to emphasize the negative when there is a lot of non-polarizing positive out there that needs support. (Like, GO BUY A BOOK FROM AQUEDUCT PRESS RIGHT NOW! Okay?)
Me, I’m practically ancient now–a half-senile writer with deadlines on various projects between now and May 1st who is slowly “deliquescencing” into that comfortable stage between Young Turk and Old Fart. The world is just one big story, just composed of books, just composed of paragraphs and sentences.
I don’t know how much Ann and I read this weekend, but it was a lot–not just for weird but Clarion submissions and much more. One thing all of this affirmed for both Ann and me: Caitlin R. Kiernan has written so many amazing horror/dark fantasy stories that it’s going to be hard to choose just one.
Meanwhile the first–check out Mark Teppo on the Nature of Magick.
Meanwhile the second–check out Booklifenow, where Tamara Kaye Sellman will be guest blogging this week. Next week, Cynthia Ward and Nisi Shawl.
March 1, 2010 at 3:19 pm
So, no updates on the Lovecraft story with adorable…i mean….terrifying illustrations? (sulks)
March 1, 2010 at 3:29 pm
Uploaded to facebook? Probably this afternoon.
March 1, 2010 at 3:47 pm
Oh, goody! (rushes to open facebook account).I missed the homunculi(makes up spelling).
March 1, 2010 at 4:00 pm
Just now uploaded a photo of the next page. Might take awhile to go live.
Shirley Jackson and Clark Ashton Smith appear soon in the story.
Jeff
March 1, 2010 at 4:02 pm
I first read that as “Shelley Jackson” and I thought, “Cool. Maybe she’ll give tattoos to Cthulhu or something.”
March 1, 2010 at 4:50 pm
And then you thought, “Cool–a dead person is in his story.”
March 2, 2010 at 5:28 am
poppy z brite? ooooh goody!
March 2, 2010 at 10:43 am
Caitlin R. Kiernan has written so many amazing horror/dark fantasy stories that it’s going to be hard to choose just one.
Did you have a similar problem choosing just one Ligotti story for “The New Weird” Jeff?
March 3, 2010 at 2:09 pm
We’re still going through both the Kiernan and the Ligotti, so, yep.
It’s also tough to pick a Lovecraft, in part because some of his best are long, but he’s so well-known that taking a novella would deprive us of the space to feature some other stuff.
March 3, 2010 at 2:10 pm
Oh–re the New Weird, it was a little easier because he was in the influences section, not the New Weird section. So we just picked a cool story we liked that hadn’t been reprinted much. In retrospect, we might’ve picked something else, but I still like that story.
March 3, 2010 at 4:38 pm
I think your instincts were spot on on that one. There are other Ligotti stories I prefer, but they tend to be more overtly horror, while in A Soft Voice Whispers Nothing it is still horrifying on an existential level, but you have the wonderfully wierd procession. It is nice to see Subterranean press is reprinting Songs of a Dead Dreamer since his earlier stuff is so expensive to get hold off now if you weren’t there on the ground floor.
Having to choose one, and only one, Lovecraft story sounds like one of those fitting punishments that the Lucifer of Von Bek spends most of his time thinking up.
March 3, 2010 at 5:21 pm
Yeah, it’s tough. I find myself liking Lovecraft much better on a re-read.
March 4, 2010 at 12:03 am
I’m re-reading “Dream Quest of Unknown Kaddath” as research . . . I forgot what a weird *&%$#@^ story it is. The frog-like creatures with the mole-tentacles alone are, well, _weird_. And sailing to the moon? Rescued from Nyarlathotep by an army of cats? Weird. And awesome. Unfortunately it’s long.