My New Fantasy Collection

 My new collection of fantasy short stories from Sophont Press, Twelve All in Dread,  is now available in ebook for preorder at amazon.com, with paperback soon to follow.

It includes a dozen stories, six from my "Twelve Witches" series as well as a number of medieval-inspired tales for readers interested in sword and sorcery. "The Twelfth Witch" introduces us to the youngest and most powerful of The Twelve All in Dread, Tesseracta Rowan, as she quests in search of her powers and family origins, while other fantasy stories, such as "Rage, Rage, Against the Dying of the Age," return us to the age of Arthurian mystery and romance. The collection concludes with a dash of Cthulhu mythos, in "Blood Moon."

Alternately hilarious, heartbreaking, and chilling, Twelve All in Dread presents a dozen fun and original fantasy stories filled with action and magic.

ISBN # 978-1-7362848-7-2

Copyright 2022 Juliana Rew, Cover by Keely Rew

Return of the SciFi and Fantasy Cons

 

It is great to see the Cons returning to more in-person meetups. We enjoyed going (fully masked) to MileHiCon 54 in Denver and serving on three panels. I was especially interested in the panel on the growing popularity of stories set in the multiverse. On another panel, we had a spirited "discussion" about what can be done to fix the climate and the role the "hopepunk" scifi genre might play to offset today's preoccupation with dystopia. The audience for our panel on writing short stories and flash fiction was enthusiastic and ate up all of our advice, inadequate as it probably was. An event I love at MileHiCon is the "Slush Read," and my entry seemed to be well received. There's nothing like a little *constructive* criticism to keep you on the path to stardom.

Guest of Honor Ken Liu gave a talk about how science fiction does a terrible job predicting the future, so our work’s cut out for us to do better. Another GoH, Travis Heerman, showed us his first written, directed, and produced film, “Demon for Hire.” Only 8 minutes long, it’s a hoot. The trailer's available on his blog at http://travisheermann.com/blog/2022/07/13/trailer-demon-for-hire/

Last but not least, artist GoH Charles Vess lists among his credits illustrating Book III of Neil
Gaiman’s “Sandman” series. Of course, I caught a cold while returning from Scotland, so my filking chops were missing in action.

We managed to sell a few books at the author table, and Third Flatiron recently contributed books and ebooks to the World Fantasy Convention, to take place in early November in New Orleans. We'll be attending virtually, but are glad that's now become an option.

I'm going to try mightily to work on my new novel during NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writers' Month) next month, and am hoping to publish my fantasy short story collection, "Twelve All in Dread," featuring the young witch Tesseracta Rowan and her evolution toward "All Things Understanding."

New Anthology, "After the Gold Rush"

At Third Flatiron, we're now celebrating 10 years with our latest outing. Over the years, we're honored to have featured the work of more than 350 authors, and have podcasted more than 50 of their stories. We're also proud of the mix of Colorado and international writers. This all-original SFFH anthology has the theme, "After the Gold Rush." We asked contributors to explore themes related to complications of booms and bubbles, including effects of accelerated culture; ecological consequences caused by human over-expansion, such as climate disasters; and economics (for example, resources and commodities).

We are especially grateful to Wulf Moon, who leads the "Super Secrets" workshop. He encouraged writers on the Writers of the Future Forum to submit to our latest call, and by our count, seven "Wulf Pack" authors of the twenty-one in this anthology are new to our pages.

So, what have we got in store for you this time? Here is a peek at what's in the anthology.

Love all the new tech? We might get more than we bargained for as the latest gadgets accelerate and overtake us. We lead off with James Tager's "Past the Projections," a creative—and creepy—story in which AI robotics come to life in virtual reality. The intelligent drone "bees" in Tim Borella's "To Vanquish Other Blooms" repeat the adage, it's not nice to fool Mother Nature.

We offer a number of instructive "what-if" stories about corporations that corner valuable resources, such as sunlight and real estate. With ingenuity and valor, ordinary people might still find ways to come out on top. Such a story is Robert Bagnall's "Sunrunner," an affecting story, about a rebel sunlight thief. We cheer Julie Biegner's teens as they try to take down the VR monopoly that's become a fascist state in her story, "Amphibios." Also, check out "Reassessed Value," by David Hankins, about a farmer who discovers a corporate loophole to save his land.

After climate change: Are we hearing the strains of the orchestra playing "Nearer, My God, to Thee?" In "Moving On," by Andrew Wright, Cape Cod is now an island, and it's Harry's job to check on houses and gardens before another storm arrives.

A gold rush theme means there's always room for a weird western, right? On the boomtown planet of Proxima B, when a samurai lawman is called to investigate a death, he discovers an ancient Mexican cult, in "Showdown at Sueño Hueco" by Wulf Moon.

"Earth's Last Immortals," by Erin Cullen, is the story of a future where life-extension technology has made it possible for humans to technically become immortal, but at what cost?

In a world where the world has retreated into virtual reality, a man searches for people who will return to "real" reality. "Facing Reality" by Yelena Crane.

In "Last Light in the Dark" by Shannon Fox, an actor on a far-future planet decides a change of pace is in order when his family's line of work starts to deviate from his personal values. While other stories about the after-effects of gold rush "bubbles" are usually sad, we find a nugget of hope.

It's hot. Damn hot. In Edward Barnfield's, story, "Live from the Troll Factory," hackers toil away in a post-internet apocalyptic sweatshop. It reminded us a bit of Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake—only with computers.

Not all is gloom and doom, however.

There's evidence there was once a lot of water on the moon, so there may be a future call for explorers to find hidden reservoirs. Enjoy David Cleden's "Down on the Klondike," as a young man buys a stake on the Moon with his mother's credit card and runs into disaster almost immediately. In "The Front of the Pack," Lauren C. Teffeau's satirical story, this captured prisoner is not an arms dealer, he offers a scarce service—he's a regulation evasion provider.

Bon Voyage: In "Last Bite at the Klondike," by Liam Hogan, we meet an asteroid miner who opts to test the "interstellar progress paradox" rather than return to Earth.

We loved the movie, "CODA" (Children of Deaf Adults). If humans ever make first contact, it'll be important to find what we have in common. "All Our Signs Align" by Eve Morton, introduces a translator who teaches aliens American Sign Language (ASL).

"Unwinding the Clock" by Brandon Case, tells the satirical story of a grandma hacker who codes a scam app and sends the proceeds to a deserving recipient

Like William Wallace said in "Braveheart:" Freeeedom!! "The Last of the Gen Xers" by Angelique Fawns, is the story of a guy with an outlawed gas-guzzling Cadillac.

As usual, we conclude with our flash humor section, "Grins & Gurgles," with a "Currency Change Announcement" by Elizabeth Davis; "Amore for Life" by Cray Dimensional; "Genie in a PET Bottle" by Daniel M. Cojocaru; and "Goldberry" by Tom Easton and Jeff Hecht.

We hope you enjoy After the Gold Rush. It's available on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0B3V48HWK

 

Juliana Rew

July 2022