Ellen Datlow's Blog, page 15

Visited my sister and went antiquing and fleamarketing. No great finds but fun, even though it rained a lot on Saturday. Have been psychologically preparing for two week cruise up the Danube with my family next week. Got the plane tix and confirmed flights. I fly from JFK to Milan to Budapest, we take a boat up the river, stop in Serbia and Croatia and Bulgaria and end up in Bucharest, where we stop for a few days. I'm missing next month's KGB reading because of the trip unfortunately. Trying to figure out what to pack-I need to start wearing my cowboy boots and closed shoes so I can walk in them during the trip. I've been wearing sandals all summer.

Lost my glasses and found them (thought I'd packed them for visit to sis, couldn't find them when I get there nor when I got home then searched bag assiduously one more time and there they were in a never-before-used compartment.

Found the Nikon instructions manual--in a pile of books but not the pile it had been in.

And currently going through the copy edit of After, stetting things and querying the contributors with other copy editing changes that I either agree with or that are more serious. Whenever I go over a copy edit I discover how much I missed in my line edit and get annoyed with myself. It means that I wasn't focused, not paying enough attention to each ms.

Need to send out a couple of cartons of books Thursday via UPS pick up. Pull down some of the piles of books currently living on my sofa and either sort them or read them. (they're mostly anthologies with a few collections/magazines thrown in for variety.) And of course those are only on my sofa-I should take photos of the piles of "to read" material for Best Horror one of these days.

Anyway, that's where I've been. Back to work before hitting the sack.

Andy Duncan and Michael Swanwick were wonderful.
http://tinyurl.com/3cqp7c6

Any additions/corrections will have to wait till Monday.

I took some photos since I got my new camera on Labor Day and finally loaded the software into my computer and uploaded the best photos tonight. The Nikon photo editing program is more sophisticated than the one I've been using for several years, but I'm not comfortable with it so for now I just used the old one. I may try to research the various functions of the Nikon one when I have time. But I needed to make sure I could do everything I need to for the KGB reading tomorrow night.

Sophie and Bella and doll heads

Plus I'm going to give away some bound galleys I have of the Stoker award-winning anthology Haunted Legends


FANTASTIC FICTION at KGB reading series, hosts

Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel

present:

Michael Swanwick is one of the most acclaimed and prolific science fiction and fantasy writers of his generation. He has received a Hugo Award for fiction in an unprecedented five out of six years and has been honored with the Nebula, Theodore Sturgeon, and World Fantasy Awards/
Michael's latest novel is Dancing With Bears, a post-Utopian adventure featuring confidence artists Darger and Surplus, published recently by Night Shade Books.

&

Andy Duncan' new collection, The Pottawatomie Giant and Other Stories will be out this fall from PS Publishing. His story "Slow as a Bullet" leads Jonathan Strahan's Eclipse Four anthology, and "On
20468 Petercook" is forthcoming at Tor.com. Duncan is a winner of two World Fantasy Awards and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award for best science-fiction story of the year.

Books will be for sale by Bluestockings

Wednesday September 21st, 7pm at
KGB Bar, 85 East 4th Street (just off 2nd Ave, upstairs.)
www.kgbfantasticfiction.org
Subscribe to our mailing list:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/kgbfantasticfiction/
Readings are free
Forward to friends at your own discretion.

Sponsored in part by Cemetery Dance Publications

This evening I watch The Bank Job, a Brit movie made a few years ago with Jason Statham, based on a real heist in 1971 that was masterminded to grab some incriminating photos of one of the Royals, (although most of the thieves didn't know this). Not great but entertaining (and violent). Directed by Ronald Donaldson.

Then I saw Interview directed by and starring Steven Buscemi and Sienna Miller as a disgraced war correspondent assigned to interview a B actress. Interesting but not great. Let's call it a celebrity oriented sex (not all the way), lies, and videotapes. Good acting.

Finally and best was The Crimson Rivers directed by Mathieu Kassovitz, starring the wonderful Jean Reno and Vincent Cassel in a policier that takes place in the French Alps when mutilated victims start turning up at an elite college. Good stuff. Thank you whoever recced it. I've got Crimson Rivers 2: Angels of the Apocalypse next in my queue but while Jean Reno is back, unfortunately Vince Cassel is not.

Terri Windling and I have a new young adult anthology coming out from Hyperion next year. We've seen a comp of the cover and it's gorgeous, but we can't post it until we've been given permission by the publisher. Pub date is tentatively November 6th 2012.

But in the meantime, here's the TOC:


After
Dystopian and Post-apocalyptic Tales
edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling


Introduction
The Segment by Genevieve Valentine
After the Cure by Carrie Ryan
Valedictorian by N.K. Jemisin
Visiting Nelson by Katherine Langrish
All I Know of Freedom by Carol Emshwiller
The Other Elder by Beth Revis
The Great Game at the End of the World by Matthew Kressel
Reunion by Susan Beth Pfeffer
Faint Heart by Sarah Rees Brennan
Blood Drive by Jeffrey Ford
Reality Girl by Richard Bowes
Hw th'Irth Wint Wrong by Hapless Joey @ homeskool.guv by Gregory Maguire
Rust With Wings by Steven Gould
The Easthound by Nalo Hopkinson
Gray by Jane Yolen
Before by Carolyn Dunn
Fake Plastic Trees by Caitlin R. Kiernan
You Won't Feel a Thing by Garth Nix
The Marker by Cecil Castellucci

This is really just an all-around update.

I realize that most people who know me don't think of me as an introvert but I generally feel like one. (And yes, I've looked up "psychological definitions/characteristics")

The reason I feel this way is that as happy being alone --although what does "alone" mean when I'm awash in sensation that constantly impinges on my consciousness, even at home. When I'm home I listen to music, mostly jazz-on the radio or when WBGO isn't playing something I like then on pandora. I interact with my cats when we all feel like it, I post online and read newsgroups and otherwise participate on the social networks. So I guess I rarely am "alone." Editing, just like writing, is a solitary job. I love it.
I travel a lot. To conventions. To visit friends and family out of town. I love travel. I enjoy most conventions. And I interact a lot during them--with my very large circle of friends: writers, other editors, artists, agents, and readers. When I had a full time job editing fiction at magazines/webzines it took me several weeks before and several weeks after a convention for my work schedule to get back to normal. Weekly and monthly publishing schedules don't wait. It was exhausting returning from a convention. It still is, but luckily not in the same way. The other thing about working regularly for a magazine (or anything) is that you're generally continuously interacting with your colleagues. Working from home, alone you're somewhat isolated (even if you're online a lot). So now, when I go to a convention I get this positive and exhausting "hit" of interacting with hundreds, and sometimes thousands of people. When I get home I want to hibernate for a little while.

Which is I guess the long way around of saying that I started getting back into my social whirl gradually since I returned from Renovation and SF. I've started seeing friends and attending "events" since last weekend. I've had a few lunches and dinners with friends, attended a wonderful birthday party last Saturday night (where the food, drink, and company was grand and the mosquitoes in the back yard aggressive (I'm still itching occasionally and have lots of scabs).

I'm also back scrambling through piles of Best of the Year reading, and trying to figure out how to best publicize/sell my original anthologies from 2011 (I hate being pushy). Having so many books out in one year to push has been tough. (one was delayed a year). I'm proud of them all and want them all to sell well. Next year I hope to have two original anthologies out. We'll see. I've worked on a few proposals for new anthologies two of which haven't panned out. One will hopefully go out from my agent next week and I'm working on a few others: solo and with co-editors. I'll soon be announcing the final TOC of Terri and my YA dystopian/post-apocalyptic anthology called After. We're awaiting one more story that might or might not be done in time. We've seen the cover mock up and it's stunning but we're not allowed to post it until it's been approved.

Back in 2011, UK editor Caroline Oakley was visiting me and along our rambles we were standing at the bus stop on 14th street and 6th avenue. She saw an awning across the street with the words "NYC Candy" printed on it in front of a tiny hole in the wall. She got all excited saying "let's get some candy." I had to inform her that the sign was ancient (it was pretty scraggly looking) and that the shop was no longer a candy store but sold luggage and backpacks, which you could see from the outside.

The bus stop is the one at which I await my bus home from picking up books/packages at my po box so I'm there every day or so. I always half-notice the sign. Today, I looked across the street and saw that the old, grayish awning was replaced by a bright orange one still saying NYC Candy and underneath text proclaiming the sale of "cigars soda tobacco cigarettes" --yet the same old back packs and cheap luggage are still on the sidewalk in front of the store and hanging from the ceiling. I haven't yet actually gone to that side of the block to peek inside the space but I'm pretty sure there's no candy in there.

So what's the story here? Do they keep private stashes of candy in a hidden compartment in the back of the space? Do the owners not speak English so hesitate to change the "name" of their shop? I don't even know how long ago there was a candy shop in the space.

Table of Contents

All You Can Do is Breathe   by  Kaaron Warren                     
Needles  by Elizabeth Bear
 Baskerville’s Midgets   by  Reggie Oliver (reprint)
 Blood Yesterday, Blood Tomorrow by  Richard Bowes           
X For Demetrious  by Steve Duffy     
 Keeping Corky  by  Melanie Tem
 Shelf-Life    by  Lisa Tuttle
 Caius      by  Bill Pronzini & Barry N. Malzberg
Sweet Sorrow  by   Barbara Roden
 First Breath    by  Nicole J. LeBoeuf
 Toujours   by   Kathe Koja                  
Miri      by  Steve Rasnic Tem               
Mrs. Jones   by   Carol Emshwiller      (reprint)  
Bread and Water by    Michael Cisco                    
Mulberry Boys by         Margo Lanagan                          
The Third Always Beside You by John Langan                              
The Siphon      by      Laird Barron

From Library Journal
"This collection of horror stories selected by an award-winning sf/fantasy editor shows that a wide assortment of fiends share vampire cravings. Several stories will leave readers feeling uncomfortable, even queasy. But for those stout of heart and eager to sample brilliant writing, this is a terrific anthology. "

MileHiCon is held in Denver, where Ed lives and this year it's October 21-23rd.

Attention: writers/publishers/artists

Several of the "friends of Ed" group thought that holding an auction there would be the quickest,easiest way to help him out financially for the near future. So...they are looking for unique items to auction off at the convention. Items that fans/readers/writers and whoever attends MileHiCon would bid on.
Limited editions of books (signed by the author and/or artist)
Tuckerization to the winner (using his/her name in your next story/novel)
original art or limited edition prints
a bunch of books to be auctioned off in a lot

You get the idea. Whatever you send must be received by October 20th. If you have something you want to donate, please email me at datlow at yahoo dot com to let me know what it is and I will give you the address to which to mail the item(s).

Thanks and pass the word.