Speculative Fiction of Colorado

Kaput Except for the Tailspin

2008-04-09T11:27:00.006-06:00

Well, I think this is it, folks. I'm calling it quits. I've maintained this site for nigh on eight years now. I thought getting it into Blogger would re-energize me, and it did for a short time, but the energy is gone. I'm putting my blogging efforts into www.EasilyDiscouragedMan.com, my other blog.

Now I never expected much to happen with this Colorado speculative fiction site, but I did think I'd get a couple hundred visitors a day. Never came close. I averaged probably between 4 to 10 hits a day. Total. Ten people stopping by on a good day. Many of them were the writers I just blogged about seeing what I'd written, rarely to return. Other hits were random searches for Colorado conventions and the like. I'm glad I was able to provide some information about that. I knew this was a very niche topic to cover, but I didn't think it was this niche, as in all but nonexistent. There's a pretty large group of science fiction, fantasy, horror, and mystery fans in Colorado and I thought they'd start to show up. Didn't happen. I know that's my fault. I obviously didn't market the site appropriately. That's something I'm really bad about. I don't know how to market and I don't know where to market. So I did marketing attempts, but I certainly had no marketing plan. And I just didn't do a good job of it.

Part of my hope was that writers would feed me information. That the site would become a dynamic collection of writer news and events, getting a lot of locals involved. I thought it might be some kind of social "network." But as you can see from the huge number of comments (i.e., less that six, I think?), not many were interested in this type of interaction on this site. Perhaps the whole concept and design of this site is wrong. I don't know. But writers rarely fed me information and I've finally grown tired of the work involved in digging up that information on my own without anyone coming to view it. If I had started getting those couple-of-hundred visitors a day I think I'd still be interested in doing this as that's a nice-sized community. But this site never became a community. It never even became a coffee klatsch.

The irony (I think it's irony, that's one of those concepts that still eludes me) is that hardly anyone is going to read (or care) about this post or that the site is gone. I and maybe one or two other people are going to be sad to see this go. Now that's sad.

I'll probably keep all the information here. A static history. I don't see any point in deleting it and I still use this site for other things behind the scenes. But if you are one of the very few to read this post and be saddened by it, then thanks. Please stop by my other blog and say hello.

And with that I say goodbye.

Arthur C. Clarke Dies at 90

2008-03-19T08:40:00.001-06:00

Author and geosynchronous satellite thinker-upper, Arthur C. Clarke died in Sri Lanka at the age of 90 on Wednesday. I had, of course, read several of his books. But my first contact with him came through the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey (he wrote the original novel, though he collaborated with Kubrick on the story, and co-wrote the script with Kubrick). I had been pretty young when my mom took me to the movie at the Continental (once upon a time our grand movie theatre here in Denver ... and still kinda is). The movie came out in 1968, which would have made me five years old. I don't think I was that young, so perhaps we saw it on a re-release tour in the early '70s. However, I remember enjoying the movie up until the end when the ginormous space baby shows up and then wondering what the hell?! My mom tells me the most memorable part of the film was when she bought popcorn and brought it back to our seats and spilled it everywhere (or maybe I spilled it everywhere?) - however, I don't remember the popcorn incident, so maybe I was only five. As an afterword, it wasn't until years later as a teenager when I read the novel that I finally understood the whole ginormous space baby thing. And did you know that the word 'ginormous' is in the dictionary (along with humongous)? I didn't.

Click here to see a write-up on Mr. Clarke in the L.A. Times.

Some favorite quotes from Mr. Clarke:

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

I don't believe in astrology; I'm a Sagittarius and we're skeptical.

The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be the hijacking of morality by religion.

It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God but to create him.

Ian Brazee-Cannon Comes Full Circle

2008-03-05T21:13:00.004-07:00

Ian Brazee-Cannon's story "Full Circle" is up in the March 2008 issue of The Fifth Di...

Click here to read it.

The Tems' Launch Party - March 4, Tattered Cover LoDo

2008-03-04T08:53:00.000-07:00

Here's some cool news from the Tems:

Local award-winning authors Melanie & Steve Tem will read from and sign copies of their new novel, The Man on the Ceiling, on Tuesday, March 4, from 7:30 to 9:00 p.m. (note time change from 9:30) at the Tattered Cover LoDo, 1628 16th Street, Denver. This novel is an expansion and re-imagining of their novella of the same name, winner of the Bram Stoker, IHG, and World Fantasy Awards (the only work ever to win all three). Please join them for reading, discussion, and refreshment, in celebration of the official launch of a work PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY praised for its "delicate, exquisitely detailed and almost hypnotic language."

Denver Book Mall - March 2, 2008

2008-03-02T08:46:00.000-07:00

Two events on Sunday March 2, 2008 at the Denver Book Mall, 32 Broadway (between 1st Avenue and Ellsworth), Denver, 303-733-3808:

3:00 PM – talk & signing from Gaddy Bergmann, Trials of the Warmland (10% discount)

6:00 PM - Colorado Homegrown Tales presents “A Singular Perspective”

Actors Emily Paton Davies, Debbie Knapp, Martha Harmon Pardee, and Guy Williams will read stories by Colorado authors Lynn Hamilton, Kent Nelson, and Carrie Vaughn.

$10 admission; reservations not required but recommended due to limited seating capacity. Authors’ books will be available for sale.

Please call Debbie Knapp at 720-233-0811 for reservations or more information.

Stories for All Seasons - March 8, 2008

2008-03-02T07:20:00.003-07:00

Second Saturday of Every Month at 7:00 PM. Stories for All Seasons at West Side Books, 3434 W. 32nd Ave., Denver (between Federal and Lowell, the purple building with the red pole). Admission is free. Refreshments as always. Call 303.480.0220 or e-mail westsidebooks@qwest.net. Ed Bryant usually hosts and you'll almost always find other local writers in attendance as well.

March 8, 2008:

Carleen Brice - reading from and signing her first novel Orange Mint and Honey

Mario Acevedo's The Undead Kama Sutra

2008-03-02T07:06:00.005-07:00

Mario Acevedo's third book in the Felix Gomez adventures The Undead Kama Sutra is out soon from EOS. As Mario's website says: The aliens are back and Felix the vampire must save the Earth women.

John Barnes Well Bitten 2

2008-02-27T13:48:00.002-07:00

Here's John Barnes's latest The Well-Bitten Hand over at Helix: A Speculative Fiction Quarterly.

Tom Piccirilli Interview at The Plumbers' Union

2008-02-26T07:31:00.007-07:00

Tom Piccirilli has another interview up, this time at Allan Guthrie's site (click here to read the interview).

Here's how Tom describes Allan and his site:

Here's a new interview with me, done by the very hip Scotsman Allan Guthrie, author of such brilliant crime novels as Hard Man, Kiss Her Goodbye, and the forthcoming Savage Night for his uber-cool website Noir Originals.

While you're at his site, check it out at length. He's got tons of interviews, reviews, and info for all your crime fiction needs.

The Tems at the Denver Book Mall - March 16, 2008

2008-02-25T07:26:00.004-07:00

Melanie and Steve Tem continue their whirlwind tour for The Man on the Ceiling (10% discount) on Sunday, March 16, 2008, 3:00 PM at the Denver Book Mall, 32 Broadway (between 1st Avenue and Ellsworth), Denver, 303-733-3808. They will be talking and signing about their novel-length expansion of their 2000 novella of the same name, which won the Bram Stoker Award, International Horror Guild Award, and World Fantasy Award, which is the only work ever to win all three.

Crossword Puzzle - Stephen's Library

2008-02-24T14:41:00.005-07:00

Let's peruse Stephen's Library today. Get nice and comfy with a steaming hot mug of hot chocolate - I'm pretty sure it wards off vampires.

CLICK HERE TO PLAY

Shimmer

2008-02-23T17:13:00.016-07:00

Shimmer is a magazine of speculative fiction whose connection to Colorado is via its editor E. Catherine Tobler (the editor-in-chief is Beth Wodzinski from, I believe, Utah for those keeping score at home). The magazine comes out quarterly as both an ezine via a PDF file (at a discounted rate) and a hardcopy magazine. You can purchase it in either format from its website (just click here). The remarkable cover "Penny’s Grave" is by multi-award-winning artist John Picacio. All of the art in this issue is stunning, and as it just so happens, this is their art issue. And so they went about selecting stories in a different manner than usual. As their website says:

For this issue, the art comes first. We selected art, and then invited some Shimmery favorites to write stories inspired by the images.

Ben Turns 21

2008-02-22T08:02:00.006-07:00

Today is my son's 21st birthday. Wow, can you believe it? Okay, you probably can but it's pretty weird to me as I'm quite sure I got out of college only a few years ago. I can't be more than, like, 28 myself. What? I'm 44? Holy crap.

Happy birthday, Ben!

E. Catherine Tobler Honors Poe

2008-02-21T06:45:00.004-07:00

E. Catherine Tobler sold her short story "Beyond Porch and Portal" to Ellen Datlow for an anthology tentatively called Poe: New Tales inspired by Edgar Allan Poe, that will be published by Solaris in 2009 to honor Poe's Bicentennial. As E. Catherine says:

I love working with Ellen; she's a gem.

Crossword Puzzle - Creature Feature

2008-02-18T11:11:00.002-07:00

This crossword puzzle ventures into the dark realm of the things that go bump in the night and is called Creature Feature.

CLICK HERE TO PLAY

Tom Piccirilli Interview at Nossa Morte

2008-02-16T09:31:00.005-07:00

Tom Piccirilli has an interview up (and over) at Nossa Morte.

Click here to read the interview.

Christopher M. Salas's Debut Novel Gets 2nd Edition

2008-02-15T12:03:00.009-07:00

Christopher M. Salas's debut novel Dark Eclipse: Rise of an Era will be re-released as a second edition pretty soon from One Level Higher publishing. Look for his follow-up World Abomination later in 2008.

Here's a blurb about Book I:

Centuries after the first Era of Darkness, the Demonixa reemerge from the ashes of the charred throne of Morgmodeus, their fallen King. Seeking to restore his father's grip of tyranny on the Bytiluna star system, Carnmassiere the second son of Morgmodeus, develops a replica of the doomsday weapon that ended his father's reign; the Eclipse. Now with the Eclipse at his grasp, the light which was restored to the universe is once again threatened.

Left Coast Crime, March 6 - 9, 2008

2008-02-12T10:21:00.001-07:00

Left Coast Crime is in Colorado this year at the Adam's Mark hotel from March 6 - 9, 2008. The guests include Stephen White, Michael Masliah, Elaine Viets, Joanne Pence, and Parnell Hall. Rather than come up with something witty and off-the-wall, I'll just reiterate what's on the Con page, which I stole from their website:

Left Coast Crime is an annual mystery convention sponsored by mystery fans, for mystery fans. It is held during the first quarter of the calendar year in Western North America, as defined by the Mountain Time Zone and all time zones westward to Hawaii.

Win Scott Eckert Gets his Podcast Pulp On

2008-02-11T07:11:00.000-07:00

February 11, 2008. Join Win Scott Eckert for the following podcast at 7 pm Pacific / 10 pm Eastern time at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/Geekerati.

For many young readers, the discovery of the adventures of Doc
Savage, John Carter, the Spider, the Shadow, or Richard Benson can
lead to a life time love affair with literature of all kinds. Our
guest Win Eckert, and host Bill Cunningham, are two individuals who
are continuing in the noble tradition of action storytelling. They
will be discussing the 'Chronicles' series by Moonstone Books in
addition to the Shadowmen project of Black Coat Press.

The podcast will be available as an mp3 download after the show, both from the Geekerati website and from iTunes.

Crossword Puzzle - That's Funny

2008-02-09T19:28:00.000-07:00

This is freakin' hilarious ... or rather the topic of the theme is, hence the title That's Funny.

CLICK HERE TO PLAY

Sink Your Teeth (yes, I really just wrote that) Into a Carrie Vaughn Interview

2008-02-06T06:40:00.001-07:00

Yo, dawg (my wife makes me watch Idol. That's my story and I'm stickin' to it like peanut butter and jelly) check it out. Carrie Vaughn has an interview up on Love Vampires, a site about, you know, vampires.

Crossword Puzzle - Double Feature

2008-02-03T09:24:00.001-07:00

Can you smell the popcorn? Here comes your Saturday matinee Double Feature. Of course, if you're in Denver, that means one of the Landmark theatres because they use real butter on their popcorn. Good, good stuff.

I'm sorry, where was I? Oh, please enjoy this crossword puzzle. Please!

CLICK HERE TO PLAY

Bruce Holland Rogers Interview

2008-02-02T10:17:00.001-07:00

And as it goes, I was researching James Van Pelt's post (below) when I stumbled upon this interview with Bruce Holland Rogers that's on the same Flash Fiction Online website.

James Van Pelt Floats Before Recess

2008-02-01T23:48:00.000-07:00

James Van Pelt sold two short stories recently. The first, "Floaters," went to Talebones while the second, "Just Before Recess," was a short-short sold to Flash Fiction Online.

NO Stories for All Seasons IN FEBRUARY

2008-02-01T22:34:00.000-07:00

Due to a late concellation, there will be no Stories for All Seasons in February. March, however, is right on target.

Anderson Gentry's Barrett's Privateers is Out and About Now

2008-01-30T08:03:00.000-07:00

Anderson Gentry's latest work Barrett's Privateers is out now from Double Dragon Publishing. The work contains two stories and is the first volume of a series.

You can also read an interview with Anderson at CoolSciFi.com.

Hell Yeah! I mean ... Hellboy: Emerald Hell from Tom Piccirilli

2008-01-29T10:37:00.000-07:00

Tom Piccirilli's Hellboy novel (despite what Amazon might say, this is a prose novel, not a graphic novel) Emerald Hell is coming out February 6th from Dark Horse Books (with cover art by Hellboy himself, Mike Mignola).

Here's a quick description from Amazon:

Hellboy comes to the crossroads in Enigma, Georgia, a small town beset by strange occurrences. Sent to keep an eye on Sarah Nail, a young girl hiding from the curse of her family, Hellboy becomes entangled in the blood debt of evil mystical preacher, Brother Jester. Stuck between human malice and the mysteries of the occult, Hellboy comes up against an intrigue of ghosts, demon trees, talking bullfrogs, and a race of lost mutant children.

Crossword Puzzle - Girl Power

2008-01-26T12:08:00.000-07:00

Ready for some Girl Power? This is the latest crossword puzzle. Have fun!

CLICK HERE TO PLAY

Garcia and Ramos Appear in Anthology and Blog

2008-01-22T19:31:00.000-07:00

Rudy Ch. Garcia y Manuel Ramos have short stories coming up in Latinos in Lotusland: An Anthology of Contemporary Southern California Literature from Bilingual Press. Look for it on February 15, 2008. Rudy is a bilingual teacher in Denver and wrote "LAX Confidential" while Manuel Ramos, author of several crime-fiction novels and the Director of Advocacy for Colorado Legal Services, wrote "The 405 is Locked Down." The anthology can be pre-ordered from Tattered Cover, et al., in hardcover or trade paperback.

In addition, Garcia and Ramos are founders of and contributors to La Bloga, a Chicano lit blog. Garcia also had a fantasy titled "Memorabilia" accepted by Drollerie Press.

About the "Lotusland" anthology, from editor Daniel Olivas's introduction:

The stories and novel excerpts sandwiched in between "Kid Zopilote" and the excerpt from Chicano bring us to modern day Latino denizens of Los Angeles and the city's surrounding communities. And what a complex and diverse group of people we observe: young and old, gay and straight, rich and poor, the newly-arrived and the well-established. There's a Cuban-American screenwriter trying to pitch the "real" story behind the Bay of Pigs fiasco. We see the Mexican woman struggling with barrio life who believes she's seen a miracle.

There are youths trying to avoid gang life, and others embracing it. And we're introduced to aggressive journalists, cement pourers, disaffected lovers, drunken folklórico dancers, successful curanderos, teenage slackers, aging artists, wrestling saints, aimless druggies, people made of paper, college students, and even a private detective hot on the heels of a presumed-dead gonzo writer. These actors perform on a stage set with palm trees, freeways, mountains and sand in communities from East L.A. to Malibu, Hollywood to the San Fernando Valley, Venice Beach to El Sereno. The storytelling comes in all packages: social realism, lyrical fantasy, tough-talking noir.

Carol Berg's New Fantasy Novel and Blog

2008-01-21T15:20:00.001-07:00

No, Carol Berg's new fantasy novel isn't a blog (I don't think). But she and her publisher have agreed on a three-book traditional fantasy series tentatively titled "The Sabrian Veil." From Carol's website:

Here's the (extremely) skinny:

A beleaguered king hires a trio of unlikely confidential agents - a foppish nobleman, a disillusioned student of magic, and a brooding practitioner of the dark arts – to investigate murder and hauntings in a world where natural science has supplanted failing magic.

As for the blog part, well, she's started one. Just click on Text Crumbs for a pleasant read.

Crossword Puzzle - Family Ties

2008-01-20T07:39:00.000-07:00

Family Ties is the latest crossword puzzle. Have fun!

Oh, and before I forget. There's now a crossword puzzle page on the site. Click the link in here or click the link up above in the menu bar.

CLICK HERE TO PLAY

Barb & J. C. Hendee Purple Pens Interview

2008-01-19T15:29:00.000-07:00

I don't know how old this interview is at the Purple Pens website, but it's a good interview, delving into Barb and J. C. Hendee's collaborative writing process. Plus, the interview is by local E. Catherine Tobler. So you get, like, three Colorado writers for the price of one.

Carol Hightshoe's Nominations

2008-01-17T06:04:00.001-07:00

Carol Hightshoe is nominated as editor for a James Tiptree, Jr. Award and is a finalist for an EPPIE award. But first some backstory. Carol Hightshoe is a writer with many short stories published (and an upcoming fantasy novel), however, she is also an editor of two e-zines (because, what, one wasn't enough?): The Lorelei Signal and Sorcerous Signals.

Well, Carol took the best short stories from the first three issues of The Lorelei Signal and turned them into the A Time To... anthology. And that's when the award nominations started rolling in. It's this anothology that has garnered the two nominations. Check out a review of the anthology.

James Van Pelt Bested

2008-01-16T08:30:00.000-07:00

James Van Pelt has two short stories that are going to appear in Best Of anthologies. "How Music Begins," from Asimov's, will be in David Hartwell's Year's Best Science Fiction and "Of Late I've Dreamt of Venus," from Visual Journeys, will be in Gardner Dozois's year's best.

Crossword Puzzle - Of the Federation

2008-01-14T10:04:00.000-07:00

Here's the very first crossword puzzle for you playing pleasure. It's called Of the Federation. Why, yes, it might have something to do with Star Trek.

CLICK HERE TO PLAY

Crossword Puzzles!! SF-Colorado Now Offering Crossword Puzzles

2008-01-14T10:02:00.004-07:00

I've started creating speculative fiction (science fiction, fantasy, mystery, and horror) crossword puzzles. Click here to try the very first one, which is titled "Of the Federation." You can also click here or click the Crossword link in the menu bar above to see all of our crossword puzzles.

WARNING. The "Clear ALL" button is awfully close to the "Check Answer" button. There is NO undo, so if you accidentally click "Clear ALL" ... well, you're screwed. Sorry. I couldn't see a way to alter the button locations without delving into javascript. I'm not a programmer, but I might try playing with it later on. We'll see. Just be careful. 'Kay? There is also no "Save" button as of yet. I might be able to add one at a later date, but I'm not sure about that right now.

HOW IT WORKS. Click inside the puzzle to begin. Press the ENTER key to move from word to word. Click the yellow square to change between "across" and "down." Click on the clues (on the right-hand side of the puzzle) to go to that word in the puzzle. I've provided a rundown of the buttons farther on in this post.

LEAVE COMMENTS. Heh. I'm a little leery of posting these crossword puzzles so PLEASE leave comments on this post if you like it, don't like it, the puzzle didn't work, it was too easy, it was too hard, or it was just right for Baby Bear. It's presented through Java, so you have to have your browser java-enabled. The program I use to create them is called Crossword-Compiler. It's a really cool program.

AND ANOTHER THING. And please note, I'm not a professional builder of crosswords. I've tried to stick to normal American crossword conventions, but since I don't actually know what all of the conventions are, I'm sure I broke the rules in places. But each puzzle will have a theme (implied (or is it inferred?) in the title) with theme words; I think a minimum of three theme words, but as soon as I say that, I'll have a puzzle with only two. So far they've been three and four theme words. This puzzle has four.

THE BUTTONS. Here's a rundown of what the buttons do:

Clear ALL. Clears the entire puzzle. NO UNDO!!
Check Answer. Checks all the letters you've entered on the entire puzzle and REMOVES the incorrect ones. It removes letters, not words.
Reveal Letter. Reveals the letter that the yellow square (cursor) is on.
Reveal Word. Reveals the word the yellow square (cursor) is in.
Reveal Puzzle. Shows you the entire solution.
View in PDF for printing. Okay, not a button, but it displays a blank PDF version of the puzzle that you can print out and fill out in pen (or pencil).

I guess that's it.

Enjoy!

Oh, and P.S.

The plan right now is to put up a new puzzle each week. Probably over the weekend. I should probably be a little more specific, but I'm wingin' it here, people.

Kevin J. Anderson Written Up on Sci Fi Wire

2008-01-14T10:00:00.000-07:00

Kevin J. Anderson got a nice write-up on the Sci Fi Wire website. It primarily concerns his latest novel Metal Swarm, which is the sixth book in the The Saga of Seven Suns. And if you want to meet Kevin, he will be in attendance at COSine.

Get Your Trig on with COSine in Colorado Springs

2008-01-13T08:03:00.001-07:00

I didn't realize that COSine was coming up so quickly:

Colorado Springs February 1-3, 2008
Featuring Guest of Honor: Mike Resnick

This gathering of science fiction fans is held at the foot of Pikes Peak in Colorado Springs. COSine features multi-track programming with panels, great guests, cool art, dealers, video room, gaming, animé, a Regency Ball, and everything else needed for a fun-filled weekend!

Tom Piccirilli's The Midnight Road Book Trailer

2008-01-12T10:57:00.000-07:00

Gotta love this thing they call the interweb. I'm surfin' around and stumbled upon this little YouTube video featuring a book trailer for Tom Piccirilli's The Midnight Road.

Barb & J. C. Hendee Lay Dead Gods to Rest

2008-01-12T07:39:00.000-07:00

Barb & J. C. Hendee's final novel in series one of the Noble Dead Saga came out this month from Roc. Even though Child of a Dead God marks the end of this series, feel comfort in knowing that the Noble Dead Saga continues as they've already submitted the initial draft for In Shade and Shadow, which will be the first book in their second series with Roc.

Rex Burns Shoots for Derringer

2008-01-11T15:12:00.000-07:00

Rex Burn's short story "Shadow People," which appeared in Alfred Hitchcock, was nominated for a 2007 Derringer, an award for the best mystery short stories of the year. Sure, this is somewhat old news, but it was new to me. Besides, Dr. Burns (as I knew him) was my professor at UCD awhile back. Took a fiction workshop and a lit class from him (I remember reading five Great American Novels in a week to pass my final).

His short story "Homestead" came out in the November 2007 issue of Alfred.

Tattered Podcasts

2008-01-10T20:00:00.000-07:00

Looks like the Tattered Cover has a series of podcasts from traveling authors. I can't really tell if this is a webpage that they created or if they're posting this stuff on a communal site. Huh, says it's maintained by a Colorado company, so maybe this is Tattered's own site. Regardless, check out the podcasts from authors who have stopped by the Tattered Cover.

John Barnes Well Bitten

2008-01-09T20:21:00.001-07:00

It would appear that John Barnes is writing a column called The Well-Bitten Hand for a nice looking e-zine called Helix: A Speculative Fiction Quarterly. Honestly, I don't know if that's the title of his latest column or the title of the column itself. But such is life. It would also appear that John does not have his own website. I kid you not. However, thanks to Google, I found this blog-like thing on Amazon.

Win Scott Eckert's Pulp Fiction

2008-01-08T15:34:00.000-07:00

Win Scott Eckert's short story "The Atomos Affair" is out this month in the Tales of the Shadowmen 4: Lords of Terror anthology from Black Coat Press. With stories from Win, John Shirley, Brian Stableford, and others, this looks like a great anthology to pick up.

But what has me really excited, is that you can pre-order The Avenger Chronicles at Amazon right now. Win's short story "Death and the Countess" is appearing in this anthology, coming out from Moonstone Books in March 2008. Moonstone obviously bought the rights to The Avenger.

Why does this have me excited? I was a fan of The Avenger growing up. I have all of the paperback reprints (including the dozen or so written in the '70s when they ran out of the original magazine from the '40s because it had stopped production, but the series had picked up steam again in the '70s. Confused? Welcome to my world).

Steve Rasnic Tem Gets all Technological with Podcast

2008-01-08T06:36:00.000-07:00

Steve Rasnic Tem has a podcast up of his short story "The House by the Bulvarnoye Koltso." Click the story title to hear the story.

Team Tem Gets Their Blog On

2008-01-08T06:09:00.000-07:00

The Tems (Melanie and Steve, but did I really need to say that?) have also entered the Age of Blogs, thanks to their webmaster/computer consultant, Stace Johnson. Not sure what else to say about the Tems. If you write speculative fiction in Colorado, then chances are you've crossed their path and been enriched by the experience. If you haven't met them, then stop by a Stories for All Seasons reading (2nd Saturday of each and every month), because barring unforeseen circumstances, they'll be there.

Carrie Vaughn at The Book Rack

2008-01-08T06:06:00.001-07:00

January 24, 2008, 6 pm. Carrie Vaughn will appear at The Book Rack, 1801 South College Ave., Ft. Collins.

Mario Acevedo's Nymphos Go Mass-Market

2008-01-07T08:09:00.000-07:00

Mario Acevedo's first book in the Felix Gomez adventures The Nymphos of Rocky Flats is out now in mass-market paperback from HarperCollins. Check out a review at BookLoons. It's one of many glowing tributes.

Melanie Tem's The Yellow Wood Fells Discoveries

2008-01-07T07:35:00.000-07:00

Melanie Tem's new novel The Yellow Wood, a magical realism exploration of the father-daughter relationship and the struggle for a child to emancipate herself from the father she believes is a sorcerer, has sold to Wizards' Discoveries line, and will be published in January of 2009. As you may remember, this is also the publisher of The Man on the Ceiling, appearing March 2008.

Carrie Vaughn's Wild Card and Silver Bullet New Year

2008-01-06T16:19:00.001-07:00

Carrie Vaughn's having a happy new year so far. Her novel Kitty and the Silver Bullet is out this month from Grand Central Publishing. It's her fourth book in the Kitty series. And if you didn't know, Kitty also happens to be a werewolf, hence the scary looking wolf on the cover. Good doggie. Sit ... stay! Ah, crap.

But that's ain't all, folks. Also this month her story "Chosen Ones" appears in the Inside Straight anthology from Tor, which happens to be the latest Wild Cards book to hit the mean streets.

Ed Bryant Goes Back to the, uh, Past

2008-01-06T16:03:00.001-07:00

Here we see Ed from 1988. From the 1988 Worldcon, to be precise, on a panel for George R. R. Martin's Wild Cards. If you want to see the entire panel, then go to the Wild Cards website. That's George himself moderating at the beginning.

Does the Rocky Mountain Book Festival Still Exist?

2008-01-05T08:27:00.001-07:00

Can anyone tell me if the RMBF is still around? I tried to find it online, but the last mention I found was 2002. If you have any information about this, please leave a comment to this post. Thanks!

Welcome to the New Speculative Fiction of Colorado

2008-01-03T11:07:00.000-07:00

Exciting, ain't it? I started this website about 7 1/2 years ago. Click here to read the post about the beginning of this site. The site changed some over the years, but nothing too drastic. Just a simple HTML site created first in FrontPage and then Dreamweaver. But that's mostly behind me now because I've joined the Age of Blogs.

My hope is to create a more interactive experience as all y'all leave comments and discuss things amongst yourselves, provide a cleaner-n-leaner site, and ultimately provide you with a fantastic web experience as you ... ah, who am I kidding? I got sick (and tired) of updating in HTML and ftp-ing pages to the website. What a pain. Using a blog site (blogger.com, thanks Google!) to do all that for me (after a bit of template tweaking on my part) makes this process quite a bit easier.

But despite my motives being suspect, I do hope you enjoy the new site. Let me know if you have any suggestions (click the Comments link below). For instance, do we want a page of links to the blogs of writers? Seems like a good idea, but so did jumping out of a tree with a sheet as a parachute once upon a time.

Take care.

Gary
January 3, 2008 (already? what happened to Y2K?)

Stories for All Seasons, January 12th

2008-01-03T08:57:00.001-07:00

Second Saturday of Every Month at 7:30 PM. Stories for All Seasons at West Side Books, 3434 W. 32nd Ave., Denver (between Federal and Lowell, the purple building with the red pole). Admission is free. Refreshments as always. Call 303.480.0220 or e-mail westsidebooks@qwest.net. Ed Bryant usually hosts and you'll almost always find other local writers in attendance as well.

January 12th, 2008:

Brian K. Hodge, reading from his new novel, mad dogs.

Tom Piccirilli, reading from his latest novel, The Midnight Road.

Multiple Signings at the Denver Book Mall, January 13th and 20th

2008-01-03T07:33:00.000-07:00

From Nina Else of the Denver Book Mall:

Three book signing events coming up at the Denver Book Mall, 32 Broadway (between 1st Avenue and Ellsworth), Denver, 303-733-3808.

A dual author appearance on Sunday, January 13, 2008, 3:00 p.m.:

Carrie Vaughn will discuss and sign the 4th in her Kitty werewolf novels, Kitty and the Silver Bullet. Kitty is a Denver-based talk show host who was forced to "come out" as a werewolf in the first book, Kitty and the Midnight Hour. All 3 prior titles will also be available.

Lynda Hilburn, discussing and signing her debut novel, The Vampire Shrink, featuring Denver psychologist Kismet Knight, who most decidedly doesn't believe in the paranormal......until..........

On Sunday, January 20, 2008, at 3:00 p.m., national best-selling mystery author J. A. Jance will discuss and sign Hand of Evil, the third in her Ali Reynolds series. J. A. is the author of the J.P. Beaumont series, the Joanna Brady series, three inter-related thrillers featuring the Walker family, and a book of poetry. This hardcover book will be discounted through the day of the signing. Copies of several of her prior books will also be available.

MAIL ORDERS and ADVANCE ORDERS always welcome. If you have any questions about the book signing, please call me at 303-733-3808.

Nina Else

Denver Book Mall

Tom Piccirrilli's Novel The Fever Kill Infects Shelves Soon

2008-01-02T10:58:00.000-07:00

Tom Piccirilli's new novel The Fever Kill comes out January 8th, 2008, from Creeping Hemlock Press.

Have you read Tom's book yet? Leave your thoughts in a Comment.

Ed Gorman calls it:

a rattlesnake-mean noir ... powerful, hard-hitting, fearsome stuff.

Ed Bryant's Movie Moves to Post

2008-01-02T09:44:00.000-07:00

Ed Bryant's short story, "While She Was Out," is currently in post-production with AngryFilms (Natural Born Killers, Bully, Apt Pupil) with a 2008 release date. See the info on IMDb.

Richard E. Friesen Story in Twisted Fayrie Tales

2008-01-01T21:42:00.000-07:00

Richard E. Friesen's "Pebbles in the Stream" appears in the Twisted Fayrie Tales anthology, which is available online at Eternal Press.

Melanie Tem Offers Writing Help

2007-12-01T13:29:00.000-07:00

Melanie Tem (email melanie at melanietem@earthlink.net), recipient of the British Fantasy Award and multiple Bram Stoker awards, offers the following:

Writing class/workshop. This is an ongoing, pay-as-you-go ($10/session) class and workshop for fiction writers. The group will combine writing instruction with critiquing.

Editing, book doctoring, and ghost writing on a pay-for-hire basis.

Connie Willis Novella in Asimov's and Sub Press

2007-12-01T06:00:00.000-07:00

Connie Willis's novella "All Seated on the Ground" is in the December 2007 issue of Asimov's. Purportedly you can read part of it online at Asimov's (though I couldn't find it so, you know, good luck with that).

Subterranean Press has published it as a short standalone available in a signed limited edition and a trade edition. The cover (shown here) is by J. K. Potter.

Carol Berg was GoH at Icon

2007-11-03T21:05:00.000-06:00

Carol Berg was the Guest of Honor at Icon, Israel's annual Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Role Playing festival. Icon was held at the Tel-Aviv Cinematheque and adjoining facilities, this year from September 28 - October 3. Icon promotes fantastic literature, art, and gaming in all forms, and offers a huge variety of activities to its audience: panel discussions and workshops; expert lecturers in various academic, creative and fandom fields; educational activities for children, fan-based events and much more.

Brian Hodge's Novel mad dogs is Out

2007-10-30T20:08:00.000-06:00

Brian Hodge's novel mad dogs [sic] is out from Cemetery Dance Publications. I'm pretty sure you save printing costs by not capitalizing book titles. I'm just sayin'.

Leslie Caine's Fatal Feng Shui Decorates Shelves

2007-10-30T12:37:00.000-06:00

Leslie Caine's latest Domestic Bliss mystery, Fatal Feng Shui, is out now from Dell. The series is said to be a mix of Nancy Drew meets Martha Stewart meets The Wolfman (okay, I threw in that last bit about The Wolfman, I'm pretty sure Lon Chaney, Jr. is not in the series). And in the interest of full disclosure, I doubt Nancy or Martha make an appearance, either. Though, Leslie, would it kill ya to put in The Wolfman?

James Van Pelt Sells Story to Realms of Fantasy

2007-10-25T16:27:00.000-06:00

James Van Pelt sells his short story "The Light of a Thousand Suns" to Realms of Fantasy.

Ian Breeze-Cannon Story in Forgotten Worlds

2007-09-21T20:57:00.000-06:00

Ian Brazee-Cannon's story "Renee of the Sacred Order of Our Lady of Bloody Vengeance" is in Forgotten Worlds, Issue 9.

Robert Greer's 6th CJ Floyd Mystery Released

2007-08-16T21:19:00.000-06:00

University Of Colorado Professor Robert Greer’s latest novel, The Mongoose Deception, is out now from North Atlantic Books/Frog, Ltd. This murder mystery is the 6th novel in the CJ Floyd series.

Cacek and Tem Garner International Horror Guild Nominations

2007-06-30T22:36:00.000-06:00

Both P. D. Cacek ("Forced Perspective" - long fiction) and Steve Rasnic Tem ("The Disease Artist" - Short Fiction) are nominated for International Horror Guild awards.

UPDATE: The winners were announced November 1, 2007. For Long Fiction, the winner was Norman Partridge, "Dark Harvest" (CD Publications). and for Short Fiction, the winner was Stephen Gallagher, "The Box" (Retro-Pulp Tales).

Connie Willis Interview on iTunes

2007-05-05T23:03:00.000-06:00

Connie Willis's interview with Nancy Pearl is available on the Book Lust web site. You might need to download the latest RealPlayer to see it. The show is also available as a podcast via iTunes. Connie is a great talker, if you haven't seen/heard her before I strongly suggest watching this. And if you get a chance to see her in person, do it. She's a hoot.

Carol Berg's Novel Flesh and Spirit Released

2007-05-04T09:28:00.000-06:00

Carol Berg's newest fantasy novel, Flesh and Spirit, has been released by New American Library/Roc Books. A renegade sorcerer gets caught up in a world of monks, doomsayers, princes who steal the eyes of the dead, and mythical guardians who dance the patterns of the world.

Paolo Bacigalupi's Hugo Nomination

2007-03-28T20:35:00.000-06:00

Paolo Bacigalupi's novelette, "Yellow Card Man," has won Asimov's magazine's readers' award for, you guessed it, best novelette. This story is also a finalist for a Hugo.

UPDATE: The winners were announced September 1, 2007, see them here.

Speculative Fiction of Colorado - The Beginning

2000-06-10T12:00:00.000-06:00

Speculative Fiction of Colorado supports the science fiction, fantasy, mystery, and horror writing scene in Colorado.

I didn't keep records of when I started this website. I think it happened in 2000, and roughly during the spring/summer. Pretty sure it was between jobs as I remember days of just sitting at the computer and hammering out the site in FrongPage. Then I distinctly remember sitting in my cubicle when I contracted with the City and Country of Denver as a tech writer and looking up printers for some bookmarks I was printing up for the upcoming MileHiCon. I also got some t-shirts and post-it notes printed up. I then reserved the Con Suite at MHC for two hours and served peanut butter chocolate chip cookies that I baked myself (store-bought pre-baked cookies NEVER have enough semi-sweet chocolate chips). I gave t-shirts away as prizes and even gave away a nice gift certificate to Amazon to get people to sign up for the mailing list. Of course, I haven't sent out email in, oh, a couple of years now. Such is life.

That's my very hazy recollection of this site's beginnings. I still wear a couple of the t-shirts. And, yes, at some point I'll take them off and maybe even wash them.