waiting on wednesday (80)

Today I’m participating in "Waiting On" Wednesday, a weekly event hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine. Its purpose is to spotlight upcoming book releases that we’re eagerly anticipating.

Blogging has taught me to love short stories.  I can read one or two on any given weeknight, and finish an entire story while also whittling away at a book (that I can later review, yay!).  Short stories are often dark and dangerous... which is perfect, because I still prefer small bites of horror, rather than novel-length ones.  And if we're going to talk about great, fantastical short stories, Kelly Link must enter the mix.  She is a master at both editing and writing tales of this size, and that's all there is to it.  That's why I'm so excited for Monstrous Affections: An Anthology of Beastly Tales, edited by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant (EXCITED!).  It will be released by Candlewick on September 9, 2014.  Yay!

Fifteen top voices in speculative fiction explore the intersection of fear and love in a haunting, at times hilarious, darkly imaginative volume.

Predatory kraken that sing with — and for — their kin; band members and betrayed friends who happen to be demonic; harpies as likely to attract as repel. Welcome to a world where humans live side by side with monsters, from vampires both nostalgic and bumbling to an eight-legged alien who makes tea. Here you’ll find mercurial forms that burrow into warm fat, spectral boy toys, a Maori force of nature, a landform that claims lives, and an architect of hell on earth. Through these and a few monsters that defy categorization, some of today’s top young-adult authors explore ambition and sacrifice, loneliness and rage, love requited and avenged, and the boundless potential for connection, even across extreme borders.

What books are you waiting on?

steampunk! an anthology of fantastically rich and strange stories – guest post by alexis of lit from woe

Today’s guest blogger is Alexis of Lit From Woe.  She’s part of my DC FYA book club, and is (of course) smart & funny. Deadly combination.

HELLO DETROIT!

This is not Detroit. I've never even BEEN to Detroit. But it sounded punk rock and a bit mechanical, and since this week is steampun…

Oh. NOT that kind of steampunk? Man. I'm two and oh here.

Okay. *Steampunk* Like, the sub-genre. In kid lit.

Got it.

I don't think I'm alone in having more than a bit of private embarrassment over the fact that, while I like the *idea* of steampunk, and I LOVE the aesthetics, I'm rarely enticed, let alone bowled over, by steampunk in literature. Maybe because the concept is TOO visual, it's hard to sustain interest in a non-visual medium. Maybe my imagination sucks.

I know, I know. This whole post is going all the wrong ways. BEAR WITH ME.

So I don't love stempunk in literature, but I really really *want to.* My TBR pile, it's always open to new steampunk efforts. And even if I'm not the right reader for most of them, occasionally I find things I love, and Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories, edited by Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant, is one of the efforts I loved.

Not surprising, really. Kelly Link is a superhero with words. I would buy her Pretty Monsters collection for every person I ever met, if only I had the money. The things she does with stories…seriously. SERIOUSLY. She takes genres and peels them inside out and rightside back, and makes you wonder how it is possible that no one ever thought of those stories (monsters; aliens; wolves; ghosts) from those angles before.

Which is probably why I was so impressed by her edited collection of steampunk short stories, and bowled the heck over by both her own and Libba Bray's contributions: their stories are steampunk, but pulled inside out and rightside back.

In Link's "The Summer People," the story opens on a contemporary girl, home miserably sick from school, dealing with a myopic, self-interested dad on his way out the door for a "week or three" to "get right with God." Again. There is NyQuil and television and Lexuses and prayer meetings and hooch running in this world. There are also fairies.

But the story isn't about the fairies (although Fran's entire existence hinges on her relationship with them), or about the hooch running or prayer meetings (although Fran's entire existence hinges around her father's relationship to THOSE), or even about the magical clockwork toys the summer people leave for Fran as gifts for her help (although those are as fascinating as any a clockwork bauble popped up in steampunk lore).

No, what "The Summer People" is about is how Fran is living her life, and what she does, good or bad, to take it by the horns and make it HERS. This is steampunk where the steam power and clockwork is incidental background noise, and the real story is what happens in and around it. This is steampunk where punk ideals—fighting against/within/despite/in the face of the system, wearing your own decisions like a bloody crown, making your own damn mark on the world—those are what matter most. And it's fantastic.

The word I most associate with Libba Bray (incidentally, doing a The Diviners event @ DC's own Politics & Prose this very evening!) is AMBITIOUS, and with her entry in the Steampunk! collection, she does not disappoint. "The Last Ride of the Glory Girls" is just as punk rock, with just as much spitting by the heroine(s) in the face of the clockwork world at large as is Link's "Summer People," just with fewer fairies and a few more train heists.

(Although, interestingly, there is still plenty of "getting right with God" serving as motivation for the heroine to grab the reins of her own life…)

"Glory Girls," for all it is steampunk, is also a western. It is, too, sci-fi. But the generic trappings aren't what make the story. When Adelaide Jones rides with the Glory Girls, she is not a cowgirl. When she signs up with the Pinkertons, she is not a dusty private detective. When she fiddles together a clockwork device that bubbles time, she is not a steampunk engineer.

What she is is a girl whose been left behind and forced into working the system the only way the system will let her. What she is is a girl who is on her way to having just about too damn much, and would you mind greatly if I go ahead and explode my way through a life I've decided on for myself, you love-drowning, backwards society, please and thank you and a big EFF YOU to you all.

She is Adelaide Jones, and her story is not ABOUT the aesthetic trappings of steampunk. That's just icing.

So, privately—now publicly—embarrassed as I may be to admit that literary steampunk just isn't my bag, I am MORE than happy to shill for steampunk that lets the steampunk do its own thing in the background, so long as the characters are allowed to punch their way through their own lives up front.

Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories: consider yourself shilled.

Imagine an alternate universe where romance and technology reign. Where tinkerers and dreamers craft and re-craft a world of automatons, clockworks, calculating machines, and other marvels that never were. Where scientists and schoolgirls, fair folk and Romans, intergalactic bandits, utopian revolutionaries, and intrepid orphans solve crimes, escape from monstrous predicaments, consult oracles, and hover over volcanoes in steam-powered airships. Here, fourteen masters of speculative fiction, including two graphic storytellers, embrace the genre's established themes and refashion them in surprising ways and settings as diverse as Appalachia, ancient Rome, future Australia, and alternate California. Visionaries Kelly Link and Gavin J. Grant have invited all-new explorations and expansions, taking a genre already rich, strange, and inventive in the extreme and challenging contributors to remake it from the ground up. The result is an anthology that defies its genre even as it defines it.

Interested in more steampunk? Check out the Steampunk Week in September calendar of events!

z: zombie stories

Back in September, when I discovered that Night Shade Books was releasing a young adult zombie anthology, I wondered what that would look like (and I told myself to hope for the best). After checking out the author lineup, I knew I’d find stories equally interesting, weird and well-written in this volume. And I did. I just didn’t quite bargain for the crazy, gross and not-right that came along with. But, after all, it’s zombies. You’ll say I shouldn’t have been surprised.

When the zombie apocalypse comes, it's not just those crusty old folks who will struggle against the undead, it's the young people. What happens when you come of age during the zombie apocalypse? Z: Zombie Stories has the answer to that question. Z: Zombie Stories gathers together some of the hottest zombie fiction of the last two decades, from authors including Kelly Link, Jonathan Maberry, and Catherynne M. Valente. These stories focus on those who will inherit a world overrun with the living dead: a young man who takes up the family business of dealing with the undead, a girl struggling with her abusive father...who has become a zombie, a poet who digs up the wrong grave, and a Viking maiden imprisoned with the living dead...

All of the entries in this anthology (except for the final story) have been published previously in other volumes, and some of them were already familiar to me. Of course, that doesn’t diminish their charm. I’ll say a little something brief about each one, shall I? Great.

“Family Business” by Jonathan Maberry

“Family Business” appears to be the first several chapters of Maberry’s young adult zombie novel, verbatim. I reviewed Rot & Ruin here on the blog. This excerpt should draw you in and make you want to learn more about the Imura brothers and their quest to survive.

“The Wrong Grave” by Kelly Link

A disturbing and funny tale about a boy who digs up the wrong grave – and finds something entirely unexpected (and persistent). There’s a good dose of magic and side of uncanny in this tale. Fans should next look to Link’s Pretty Monsters.

“The Days of Flaming Motorcycles” by Catherynne M. Valente

If I’m honest with myself, this is the story I was most excited to read. Valente has a way with words, and it doesn’t desert her here. “Flaming Motorcycles” is about a girl living in the remains of Augusta, Maine, but it’s also a meditation on the nature of zombies, acceptance, and what could possibly be important after death. True and truly weird.

“The Barrow Maid” by Christine Morgan

I never thought I’d write this, but Viking zombies are the freakiest and best idea ever. “The Barrow Maid” combined epic storytelling in the style of Beowulf with the undead – a startling, unnerving, genius mixture of creepy and outstanding.

“You’ll Never Walk Alone” by Scott Nicholson

Would you like a chilling, atmospheric story that will drift into your mind like mist and never let go? This story’s spiritual overtones somehow made the apocalypse seem more eerie and terrible than ever. Beautifully written, and the sort of thing that might inspire nightmares, in a The Knife of Never Letting Go sort of way.

“The Dead Kid” by Darrel Schweitzer

Not what I would call a teen-friendly story, this one veers into horror territory. It is unsettling and all-around freaky.

“Seven Brains, Ten Minutes” by Marie Atkins

If you like your zombie stories gory, this one’s for you. Somehow until now I’ve managed to read a lot of zombie lit without reaching a level of gross-out. Well, I’m there now. Scott’s ‘evolution’ certainly made me queasy. Not for weak stomachs.

“The Third Dead Body” by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

Hoffman does deeply disturbing very, very well. There’s no beating around the bush – this entry is HORROR, and it’s also full of revenge, twisted longing, and extreme violence. Adults only.

“The Skull-Faced Boy” by David Barr Kirtley

In this tale, it’s about die-and-live or die-and-kill, and the result is a battle not between the living and the dead, but between those with consciences and those without. It doesn’t end well, and in the end is a sickening portrait of the worst in humanity.

“The Human Race” by Scott Edelman

Terrorism, dark despair, and a zombie outbreak combine to create a perfect storm of hopelessness for one girl. “The Human Race” explores what people can withstand – and what will probably destroy us all.

“Deepwater Miracle” by Thomas Roche

To end the collection, a story with a bit of light-hearted survival. Okay, it’s not so light-hearted, but SURVIVAL. After the darkness in the middle of the anthology, this one brings you back out into the light. How? Two brothers stuck on a boat in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico figure out how to go on while the world on land ends around them. Gripping reading.

In Z: Zombie Stories, editor J.M. Lassen brings together well-written stories of mayhem and apocalypse. However, the level of scary and disquieting varies from story to story, and it is not for everyone. While each tale may feature a teenager, the entries are not necessarily young adult. For those seeking a gentler initiation into the world of zombies, check out Justine Lavaworm and Holly Black’s Zombies vs. Unicorns instead.

Recommended for: mature teens and adults accustomed to horror, and those who can’t resist the unsettling power of a good zombie tale.

Fine Print: I read an e-ARC of Z: Zombie Stories courtesy of Night Shade Books and NetGalley.

waiting on wednesday (15)

I’m participating today in "Waiting On" Wednesday. It is a weekly event, hosted by Jill at Breaking the Spine, and its purpose is to spotlight eagerly anticipated upcoming releases.

It’s September Zombies month, and my WoW pick matches the theme. Z: Zombie Stories is a young adult anthology featuring stories of the undead. Contributor Kelly Link captures the weird and creepy in delightful ways, and as you know, I have a thing for Catherynne M. Valente’s writing. Add in short stories by Jonathan Maberry and Nina Kiriki Hoffman, and I am ready to read. Z: Zombie Stories will be released in paperback by Night Shade Books on September 27, 2011.

When the zombie apocalypse comes, it's not just those crusty old folks who will struggle against the undead, it's the young people. What happens when you come of age during the zombie apocalypse? Z: Zombie Stories has the answer to that question. Z: Zombie Stories gathers together some of the hottest zombie fiction of the last two decades, from authors including Kelly Link, Jonathan Maberry, and Catherynne M. Valente. These stories focus on those who will inherit a world overrun with the living dead: a young man who takes up the family business of dealing with the undead, a girl struggling with her abusive father...who has become a zombie, a poet who digs up the wrong grave, and a Viking maiden imprisoned with the living dead...

What books are you waiting on?

interworld contest winner and new giveaway

InterWorld by Neil Gaiman and Michael Reaves is fun and clever entertainment suitable for most ages (I’d say 10 years and up…but there will be those nine year-olds who are ready for it). It’s adventure, science fiction, fantasy, coming-of-age, and world-moving ideas all rolled into one mad package. Plus it’s got lovely cover art.

Neil Gaiman is a hilarious, dark-yet-comfortable and immensely talented author who wins accolades and awards whenever he puts pen to paper. He has novels for adults, children, those in between, and those who will never grow old. I’ve just bought his Blueberry Girl picture book for my pregnant cousin-in-law. Imagine that kind of scope, will you?

So that was the rationale behind my last giveaway book pick: it had to be amusing, it had to be something in my own library (and thus properly endorsed), and it had to be something that I was fairly sure no one would have (yet want to own).

And the winner is…Alyce!

Congratulations! I’ve sent an email your way. Thank you to everyone who participated! My first contest/giveaway was a lot of fun and a success as well. To think I was afraid that no one would enter!

The problem is that I had too much fun. Not a problem for you all…a boon of sorts, really. Because I’ve now caught the contest-holding bug, and must host a NEW giveaway right away. Seriously.

So I’m giving away one (1) copy of Kelly Link’s Pretty Monsters.

…

Link, who has two breathlessly received books of strange, surrealistic tales for adults under her belt, makes the leap into the YA fold with this collection of short stories (most previously published in separate anthologies) that tug at the seams of reality, sometimes gently, sometimes violently. In nearly every one of these startlingly, sometimes confoundingly original stories, Link defies expectations with such terrific turnarounds that you are left precipitously wondering not only “What’s going to happen now?” but also “Wait, what just happened?”

Her conception of fantasy is so unique that when she uses words like ghost or magic, they mean something very different than they do anywhere else. Perhaps most surprisingly—and memorably— is Link’s dedicated deadpan delivery that drives home how funny she can be, no matter how dark the material gets. After gobbling up a group of campers, a zombie with a self-proclaimed sense of humor bargains with the terrified lone survivor, “How about if I only eat you if you say the number that I’m thinking of? I promise I won’t cheat. I probably won’t cheat.”

Shaun Tan contributes a handful of small illustrations that are, of course, just plain delightful. -starred Booklist review

…

To Enter:

Leave a comment on this post answering the question, “What fantastical nemesis would you least like to be confronted by?”

Please include your email address. Giveaway is open to US & Canadian addresses only. Comments will close on July 14 at 11:59pm EST, and I will notify the randomly selected winner via email.

Good luck!