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podcasts and plans
The podcast of my story, “The Tamga” is now available as issue 178 on Pseudopod, read by the talented Cheyenne Wright. It’s always a thrill to have my work podcast, because it gets it out to such a wide audience. Plus, the Pseudopod team produce excellent recordings. Cheyenne does a great job with the story. He’s not only a talented voice actor, he’s also the colourist for the fabulous web comic Girl Genius, which is one of my personal favourites. My own graphic novel project, Róisín Dubh, is proceeding well. Last week I had a meeting in Dublin with Rob Curley of Atomic Diner and Sub City fame, as well…
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news for the new year
I’ve some news I’ve been sitting on for no good reason, other than my motivation for blogging suffered a sap across the forehead late last year. In December I sold the audio right to my story “The Tamga” to Pseudopod. I’m delighted I’ll soon have another story up among their fine catalogue of spoken works. “The Tamga” was originally published in issue 6 of Shroud Magazine. My story, “The Secret Names of Buildings” is now available in M-Brane SF, issue 12, which is guest edited by Rick Novy. It’s another of my Clarion West stories, and this was written for week 6, when the brilliant sf writer Vernor Vinge was…
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waiter, is that horror in my sf?
The events of the previous week came at a time when I was busier than normal, so it’s taken me some time to catch up, and even out my workload. Except now I have the joyful task of sorting out my tax returns, ASAP. Hurray! So, it’s nice to hear that issue 9 of M-Brane SF has been released. It contains my horror sf story “Empty Mind Came Back with the Pearl”. When I began submitting it to publications I learned that a lot of markets aren’t so keen on horror in their sf; many expressly forbid it. It’s a pity, and certainly a factor to consider when writing a…
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BFS apologises for forgetting women
It’s worth mentioning that Guy Adams, Chair and Special Publications Editor for the British Fantasy Society (BFS), has issued an unreserved apology over omitting women from its latest collection. I’m sure he will not chastise me for replicating it in full here: Our new book, In Conversation: A Writer’s Perspective, Volume 1: Horror, edited by James Cooper, has come under justifiable flak for its all-male line up of interviewees. When James brought the manuscript to me with a view to our publishing it I know he intended no sexism in his selection of the authors but I feel deeply sorry that I didn’t flag the omission at the time. It…
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Horror wants women to scream, but not talk
This weekend the British Fantasy Society (BFS) is hosting its annual convention, Fantasy Con. Last night while on Facebook I noticed a news item, which constitutes an electronic “flyer”, about the convention. I immediately noticed the cover of a new book the BFS is launching at the convention: a collection of interviews with writers (the first in a trilogy) in which they discuss their genre. It’s called In Conversation: A Writer’s Perspective. Volume One: Horror. It’s edited by James Cooper, and is composed of 16 interviews with horror authors Ramsey Campbell, Tom Piccirilli, Greg F. Gifune, Conrad Williams, Joe R. Lansdale, Gary McMahon, Brian Keene, Stephen Gallagher, Jeffrey Thomas, Peter…
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blogging screenwriters
I’ve been busy lately working on a new project. This coming November the first World Conference of Screenwriters will be taking place in Athens, Greece. I’m running the official blog for the event on behalf of the Federation of Screenwriters Europe, who are co-organising the event with the International Affiliation of Writers Guilds. I’ll also be liveblogging from the conference. It’s already been a fun challenge, and I’m looking forward to travelling to Athens, a city I’ve never visited before. Although, I suspect I’ll be too busy working at the conference to sample many of the city’s phenomenal historic attractions. I would love to see the new Acropolis Museum, however.…
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try out a diet
Issue three of the electronic magazine Arkham Tales has been published, and it contains my short story “The Diet” – a tale in the Lovecraftian tradition. It’s available for download in two formats: .pdf for web viewing or .pdf for printing. I enjoyed writing “The Diet”, partly because I love this type of horror story, and because its characters are Irish, and it’s set in Dublin. I set stories all over the world (or invent worlds for them), but I’ve noticed that my stories which are most influenced by the work of Lovecraft are often set in Ireland. I’ve another two stories in this style, both located in this country,…
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happy and sad: a Paradox
First the good news: issue 13 of Paradox: The Magazine of Historical and Speculative Fiction is now available. It contains my short story “Beautiful Calamity”. There’s a snippet on the magazine’s web site from the beginning of the story if you want to get a feel for it. I can’t wait to receive my contributor copies (which are navigating the postal system to me), so I can read the story in print. I’m proud of this one. The sad news, however, is that issue thirteen will be the last edition of the print incarnation of the magazine. Editor Chris Cevasco says that there are plans for future book anthologies through…
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"walk on air against your better judgement"
Nobel Prize-winning Irish poet, author and playwright Seamus Heaney has been awarded the £40,000 David Cohen Prize for Literature. Every two years the David Cohen Prize is bestowed upon a writer, novelist, short-story writer, poet, essayist or dramatist in recognition of an entire body of work, written in the English language. Previous winners include Derek Mahon, Harold Pinter, Doris Lessing, and V.S. Naipaul. By strange coincidence I happened to read Heaney’s new poem called “In the Attic” a couple of days ago. It was published in The New Yorker last month. Because Heaney has enjoyed a long and successful career as a poet, and many of us studied him in…
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good reading and poor viewing
Hurray! Today the postie delivered my handsome contributor copy of Shroud Magazine, issue 2. I’m sharing the edition with my rather more famous countryman, Kealan Patrick Burke, along with Colleen Anderson, Steve Vernon, Marie Brennan, Nathaniel Lambert, Nate Kenyon, Tom Piccirilli and Ken Bruen, and Christa M. Miller. It’s a beautiful, well-produced, magazine. I’m proud my short story “Home” is in it. Recently, a mysterious benefactor in RTÉ sent me a free copy of Halloween (2007), the version (re)written and directed by Rob Zombie. I’ve gone on record in the past of not enjoying Rob Zombie’s films. Mr. Zombie likes the monsters who chop up and mutilate other folks. The…
