Reading

My roommate is a big autograph hound.  Since the news of my Clarion West attendance he has been collecting the instructors' books so I can get them autographed for him.  The side-bonus is that I get to read them too!

I just finished Graham Joyce's "TWOC," a Clockwork-Orange type story with a much happier ending.  I enjoyed the characters immensely and loved the British to American glossary at the back.  I was hoping for some genre flavor, especially after the introduction of character Jake, but the narrative held me regardless.

 I am now going through a collection of Michael Bishop short stories, "Brighten To Incandescence" (reading "13 Lies About Hummingbirds") and also have his novel "No Enemy But Time."

Nnedi Orakafor has an article in a recent Nebula Awards website, http://www.nebulaawards.com/index.php/guest_blogs/is_africa_ready_for_science_fiction/#When:22:22:01Z  I think it's pretty general but a good beginning place for discussion.  I also have her novel, "The Shadow Speaker." 

Of course I read "Brasyl" a couple of years ago.  Frenetic.  Liked it.  Voted it for the Hugo. :)  Also read "The Djinn's Wife" in Asimov's these many years ago.  But wait, there's more.  Unfortunately, the list is at home :|.  The roommate has a stack of Ian McDonald's works on top the bookshelf.

I *HATE* admitting that I have not read "China Mountain Zhang."  Everyone talked about it that year but it kept falling to the bottom of my stack until ... I guess I best dig it out, huh?  I swear I've read (or at least own) Maureen McHugh's collection, "Mothers and Other Monsters," because I try to buy from small presses at the cons; but if I have it, it's packed away in storage with all my other worldly good.  Perhaps I can get the roommate to buy it again.

 Not sure what to say about Ellen Datlow.  I read the anthologies :).  I've read her magazines.  I ran into her at conventions and a few times at KGB in Manhattan (and try to avoid the camera she wields like an editor's red pen.)  I think of all the instructors, I'm most terrified and anticipatory of her input.  I mean, heck, she's THE editor.

So, what are you reading?  (btw, my eyes hurt.)

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Comments

I recently posted my reading

Submitted by Tracie on April 7, 2010 - 9:30am.

I recently posted my reading list on my blog and was pleased to see that Ellen Datlow stopped by and addressed my uncertainty about what to read to prepare for her session. Here are her suggestions.

"If you're interested in fantasy, you might check out The Beastly Bride, the most recent YA original fantasy antho Terri Windling and I edited or for a real feel for my range of editing The Del Rey Book of SF&F, which has mostly sf and fantasy and only a little horror."

For you podcast listeners,

Submitted by remy on April 4, 2010 - 5:14pm.

For you podcast listeners, I've listened to a handful by workshop instructors:

Michael Bishop (the first is written after the tragic death of his son in the Virginia Tech shootings):

http://www.starshipsofa.com/20090429/aural-delights-no-82-michael-bishop/ 

http://escapepod.org/2009/06/15/escape-pod-flash-tired/

Maureen McHugh:

http://podcastle.org/2008/12/10/pc036-ancestor-money/

Nnedi Okorafor (this one's also available as html):

http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/okorafor_05_09/ 

All free, all through legit and well-respected enterprises! :) 

I'm not sure why the forum

Submitted by remy on April 4, 2010 - 5:15pm.

I'm not sure why the forum software always kills my whitespace...

Remy, I noticed that too on

Submitted by Frank_Ard on April 4, 2010 - 9:24pm.

Remy, I noticed that too on my posts.  What I've been doing is clicking "disable rich-text" below the text box Once I've written everything.  It shows the html code; I don't fiddle with the code, but for some reason it does the line breaks.  Odd.

Figure it out and you

Submitted by mike alexander on April 5, 2010 - 6:53am.

Figure it out and you probably have a story idea.

storySouth Million Writers

Submitted by saycestsay on April 3, 2010 - 4:58pm.

storySouth Million Writers nominees recently announced.  More fabulous reading but also an enormous list of prestigious online markets :).

 http://www.storysouth.com/millionwriters/millionwritersnotable_2009.html

Well, heck, I have books on

Submitted by mike alexander on April 3, 2010 - 4:39pm.

Well, heck, I have books on my shelves sitting for at least twenty five years I haven't gotten around to. Yet.

 And I get... distracted. My wife found a copy of Justinian's Flea and I read a few pages and realized I know very little about the late Roman Empire and...

Research, right? Good book, by the way. Author big on the contingencies of history. Go Steve Gould!

 Next will be Ian McDonald's Terminal Cafe.

I've been working on the

Submitted by Tracie on April 3, 2010 - 4:26pm.

I've been working on the reading, too. I found China Mountain Zhang to be an immensely satisfying read, a must. I just posted my list last week on the old blog (http://isthisutopia.blogspot.com/2010/03/clarion-west-reading-list.html), if anyone's interested. Just finished McDonald's The Broken Land. I think, of the list, I'm going to start Okorafor's The Shadow Speaker next.

Maureen McHugh's Mothers and

Submitted by AdamBrymora on April 3, 2010 - 3:27pm.

Maureen McHugh's Mothers and Other Monsters can be downloaded for free, out there in cyberspace, along with quite a few short stories by our other instructors.

I haven't any links, but they aren't that hard to find. I am progressively reading through them all at the moment, then I'm off for another trip to the local borrowing bookstack.

With her permission, or from

Submitted by Sandra M. Odell on April 3, 2010 - 9:38pm.

With her permission, or from a pirated site?

Please say with her permission.

 

Definitely with her

Submitted by neile on April 4, 2010 - 5:14pm.

Definitely with her publisher's persmission--it's on the Small Beer Press site, and Small Beer published the book.

I assumed so... as it was

Submitted by AdamBrymora on April 3, 2010 - 9:57pm.

I assumed so... as it was claimed to be published under a creative commons license.You can find it here:

http://smallbeerpress.com/creative-commons/

It is available in a variety of formats, for various e-book readers. I took the PDF.

The others have stories available either on their own websites or on the various magazine's sites. This site has a good summary, and claims to only link to non-pirate sources:

http://www.freesfonline.de/index.html

I'm pretty certain that's a

Submitted by remy on April 4, 2010 - 4:54pm.

I'm pretty certain that's a legit site. Cory Doctorow posted a link to it on boing boing a while back, and there was no outcry. :)

Okay, you're forgiven. 

Submitted by Sandra M. Odell on April 4, 2010 - 9:35pm.

Okay, you're forgiven.  I'll put the cover back on the big red button and step off the soap box.

 

Ian McDonald's CYBERADAD

Submitted by saycestsay on April 3, 2010 - 2:04pm.

Ian McDonald's CYBERADAD DAYS just won a 2010 Philip K. Dick Award Special Citation.  Wonder if the roommate has a copy?