Monday, February 14, 2011

It's Ditmar Time Again

If you've been on Facebook today (and you have the same kind of friends I do) you'll have been inundated by posts about the Ditmar Awards. Yup, it seems like five minutes since the last awards at WorldCon, but it's nomination time again.

The big differences between this year and last, as far as I'm concerned, are that the quality of my output has broadened and improved, and that I met a crowd of new writers at WorldCon whose work I've since sampled and who also deserve your votes.

So in the next day or so I'll be posting not only the awards I'm eligible for, but also my recommendations of other writers, artists and editors who should be in with a shout. I just need a bit of time to get my list together... In the meantime, if you're curious, you can check out the (ever-growing) list of eligibles here.

Tuesday, February 08, 2011

Reviews and recommendations

I'm a little behind with the posting for this first bit of news, so apologies for those who already know. Last week Locus magazine released its recommended reading list for books released last year, and it was great to see that Twelfth Planet Press made the original anthologies category with Sprawl. Congrats too to Peter M Ball, Angela Slatter and Cat Sparks, whose stories from the collection got on the list for best short stories.

A little more up to date, and another review's been released for the antho Beauty Has Her Way. The critic goes in reasonably hard on a couple of the stories, but judges that Someone Else to Play With "has some surprising twists that proved delightful" and "was very much my favorite" from the middle of the book's three sections. Good to see, too, that KV Taylor (who's become something of a ToC buddy in Stateside releases) got the thumbs up for her tale.

I'm having a couple of days off from writing after the customary dash-to-the-line for my last story - with a bit of luck it'll allow me to catch up on some reading, including a potential editing project I really should have got stuck into earlier. Actually, maybe I'll get stuck into it now...

Tuesday, February 01, 2011

The Stoker Awards

The preliminary ballot for the 2010 Bram Stoker Awards has been released by the US Horror Writers Association, and I'm very proud to say that Scenes From the Second Storey (edited by Amanda Pillar and myself) has made it onto the list for Superior Achievement in an Anthology.

The book's up against some tough competition, including Cthulhu's Dark Cults, an anthology edited by David Conyers (who also happens to have a story in Scenes). There are ten books in total, and the next round of voting by Active Members of the HWA (that's to say those members who've attained professional-level membership) will whittle it down still further before a final ballot later this year.

It's a huge honour to make it even this far, an honour that's shared by a number of other Australians besides Amanda, David and myself. Two excellent writers in Kirstyn McDermott and Shane Jiraiya Cummings have also been listed, for Superior Achievement in a First Novel (Madigan Mine), and Superior Achievement in Long Fiction (Requiem For the Burning God) respectively. I'm not sure how this ballot stacks up against previous years for Australian entries, but it seems like a pretty strong showing to me.

Congrats to everyone who made the list and a big, big thanks to all the writers who contributed to Scenes - as fine a bunch as anyone could hope to work with!