realthog

My short story "Lives", which originally appeared in Ellen Datlow's (

ellen_datlow's) anthology Inferno, has been picked up for audio treatment by Pseudopod, "the world’s premier horror fiction podcast". I'm obviously thrilled to bits about this.

I don't yet know who the reader will be or when they'll be running the piece, but fear not: closer to the time you will be fed the information. Incessantly.

Current Music: Villa-Lobos - Quintette en Forme de Choros

There's another long and very favourable review -- a near-rave, I'd say -- of Ellen Datlow's (

ellen_datlow's) anthology Inferno, this one posted by

csecooney. The best bits:

On most of my train rides I end up staring out the window, hoping to cultivate what my father calls, "a fertile boredom," that will eventually chafe me into a restless act of creation. But some days, I'm in a fever of productivity. And some short stories, I find, rather than making me want to kick something in unfulfilled frustration, can instead create perfect sinkholes in reality, sucking you down into infinitesimal and terrible worlds that last the length of a nightmare.

So with Datlow's INFERNO. [. . .]

LIVES was just... lovely. Cold, sick and lovely.

If you don't have time to read the first two quoted paras above, just read the last one.

In the new issue of the print magazine Dead Reckonings there's an excellent review by June Pulliam of Ellen Datlow's (

ellen_datlow's) award-winning anthology Inferno, in which I'm privileged to have a story.

I'm obviously tongue-tied with modesty over the fact that my story, "Lives", is one of those singled out for a thumbs-up; I might perhaps be less coy were it not that it's one of those very nice references that doesn't readily adapt to quotation out of context.

The review ends:

In his introduction to The Modern Weird Tale, S.T. Joshi says that he considers horror to be a subset of weird fiction rather than the other way around since horror is less inclusive, and has to be subdivided into supernatural and non-supernatural in order to accommodate all the types of fiction that publishers and fans thrust beneath its umbrella. The stories collected in Inferno validate Joshi’s definition in how they cannot easily be defined by any parameters of horror or its various subgenres, but instead, subtly blend many of its tropes in ways that transcend the often narrow definition of horror.

Current Music: Haydn: Symphony #95

This time it's by doyen reviewer Peter Tennant in the print magazine Black Static (used to be The Third Alternative). Here are the bits everyone's fighting to read:

Reviewing Inferno (Tor paperback, 384pp, $15.95) feels very much like a case of closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. Originally issued in hardback in 2007, and billed as ‘New Tales of Terror and the Supernatural’, the anthology has snapped up the International Horror Guild Award, the World Fantasy Award and the Shirley Jackson Award, which should tell you more about the quality of work it contains than anything I can say, but I’ll venture a few words anyway. [. . .]

There's another father and son relationship at the centre of “Lives” by John Grant, a fascinating piece about a young man who cannot be killed, though all around him are going down like flies. The idea here holds the attention all the way, the possibilities inherent in being the one who always survives, and the anguish that causes for both the character and those in his life. [. . .]

Current Music: Vienna Teng: Inland Territory

Denver Police Brace for Convention

reads the headline in this morning's New York Times. Not unnaturally, I was alarmed. I could understand the cops becoming nervous at the prospect of invasion by the likes of

ellen_datlow, Bob Eggleton, Marianne Plumridge, Jane Frank and some three thousand others attending the World SF Convention in Denver this coming weekend, but surely this was overkill. Were my various friends likely to be coming home bruised, battered and with, for the first time in their lives, a profound aversion to handcuffs?

As I read on, however, I was reassured . . .

Federal and local authorities fear that the Democratic
National Convention will become a magnet for militant
protest groups.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/05/us/politics/05security.html?th&emc=th

Phew!

Current Music: too crabby for music today

ellen_datlow has been bragging to all who'll listen about the fact that her mom has given her a good "review" for Inferno, so there is at least precedent for my own nauseating cock-a-hoopness over having received likewise from my daughter, who has read my novel The Dragons of Manhattan as part of the memed "50 Book Challenge":

Book 27 was The Dragons of Manhattan by that deeply neglected author, John Grant, who should be more highly recognised by everyone ;) He wrote it a few years ago and it was published as an e-book by Blue Ear, but has recently been published as an actual paper version (which is much easier to read.) I'm not as convinced as its reviewers that it's on a par with Swift, but it's certainly a viciously funny topical pastiche which will make anyone with even a passing awareness of current US politics weep with laughter*. The plot with the dragons in should ensnare the fantasy reader too.

*Assuming of course they're a pinko liberal who thinks George W Bush is not a fantastic, divinely inspired president we should all support wholeheartedly in whatever plan his puppeteers come up with next.

I do of course dispute hotly her implication that the book's not on a par with Swift, but obviously I'm delighted about the rest!

By the way, I'm still authorized to send FREEEE PDFs of the book to those who might review it on their blogs or elsewhere. For more major venues, I might be persuaded to part with a paper copy. Either way, e-mail me via LJ's system, citing your address and/or e-address. Also, for US readers, copies are for sale from my website.

Current Music: Pete Atkin & Clive James - Live Libel

Earlier this year, Pam and I went to Nottingham, UK, for Fantasycon, the annual convention of the British Fantasy Society. The main motivation was that Chris Teague of Pendragon Press (

pendragonpress) wanted to launch my anthology New Writings in the Fantastic there, and I'd promised him that, if he did so, we'd cross the Atlantic for the launch. Hearing we were planning to be there, our dear friend Ellen Datlow (

ellen_datlow) asked if I could accept on her behalf this year's Karl Edward Wagner Award (for lifetime achievement/contribution in the field of fantasy literature), which she'd won -- and no one more deservingly, I should add.

Last night, as pals Barbara and Randy (a.k.a.

randeroo) Dannenfelser were celebrating Hogmanay with us, in particular with a three-litre bottle of excellent Belgian lambic beer that Randy had managed to win in a raffle, I got an e-mail from Martin Roberts of the British Fantasy Society. He has just posted the video of the incompetent little performance to which I subjected the assembled throng when accepting the award for Ellen, and you can, if masochistic, see it here: http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=25100515. It is not advised for children, the elderly, the frail, or any viewers of a nervous disposition . . . Perhaps you might not want the servants to watch it, either.

Current Mood: coy
Current Location: ici
Current Music: Rokia Traore - Wanita

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Entries tagged with ellen datlow

sold: "Lives"

Datlow's Inferno -- yes, it's another review

yet another rave for Datlow's Inferno

Inferno reviewed again

false alarm!

brag, brag and more brag

horror video

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March 2013

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