Publishers Weekly December 21, 2009

Tails of Wonder and Imagination Edited by Ellen Datlow. Night Shade (www.nightshadebooks.com), $15.95 paper (480p) ISBN 978-1-59780-170-6

Few things alarm the experienced reader more than the prospect of a science fiction, fantasy, or mystery book that involves—or worse, fetishizes—cats. This reprint anthology is the exception, an assortment of 40 stories by authors who are for the most part willing to take cats on their own ground. Datlow avoids the trap of a too-narrow premise: though there appears to be a slight bias toward horror, the stories are various within that field, from Jack Ketchum’s ghost story “Returnsâ€� to Michaela Roessner’s highly scientific “Mieze Corrects an Incomplete Representation of Realityâ€� and Edward Bryant’s brilliantly repellent “Bean Bag Cat.â€� Other tales are amusing, like Lawrence Block’s “The Burglar Takes a Cat,â€� or gently sentimental, like Dennis Danvers’s “Healing Benjamin.â€� This is that rarity of rarities: an anthology of cat stories worth reading. (Feb.)

Electric Velocipede is one of the cooler publications around, and I just got the good news that one of my stories, “The Art Disease,” will appear sometime in the coming year.  2010 is proving to be a good year, and it’s not even here yet.

Till then, here’s the opening—

Derek and Emily had the art disease, the both of them.  Everyone they knew had it too.  That’s one of the symptoms:  Colonies, clusters, movements, splinter groups, manifestos.  Clumping, the experts call it.  She had a master’s in design and decorated cakes at Food One, not the one on 17^th but the one near the park, open till midnight.  He refused to sell out.  He was determined to support himself with his art.

Selling poems in the park didn’t work out.  He didn’t get that many buyers, and when he did, he spent way too much time discussing the poems with them—arguing actually—instead of writing new ones, but it bothered him when he was misunderstood, and it seemed he was doomed to be misunderstood—another symptom of the disease.  He tried prose—carefully observed reflections on the vicissitudes of life—after taking a weekend workshop called Driveway Moments:  The Eternity of Now.  No demand.  Light travel pieces with a profound undercurrent proved no better, partly because he hadn’t done much traveling and couldn’t afford to do more.  He had plenty of profound undercurrent, just nowhere to put it.

I have a new story available in the latest issue of Space and Time.  Along with other fine fiction, poetry, and non-fiction.  It’s a delightfully weird story.  I think y’all should run right out and get a copy.  Barnes & Noble has it, btw.  Here’s the table of contents:

Fiction:

• Small Motel by Dennis Danvers
• To Remember Riobarre by Alma Alexander
• Love and War by Patrick Lundrigan
• End of Our World as We Know It by Robert Swartwood
• Saving Hitler by Chuck Rothman
• Saint Michael’s Sword by Andrew Alford
• The Mambo King of the Inter-Dimensional Dance Floor by C. J. Henderson

Poetry:

• A Mystic by Candlelight by Tennen Dell
• Al Azif by T. Frazer-Eliot
• Nom de Tube by Carolyn Hawkins
• Pixies by Kristine Ong Muslim
• Hunter’s Moon – Wyoming by John Hayes
• From Tindalos by Wade German
• Dancing in the Room by Kiel Stuart
• When We Come for Us by Ann K. Schwader

Non-Fiction:

• Word Ninja by Linda D. Addison
• Review by Sam Tomaino

Cover Art:

• Ben Fogletto

As mentioned here before, Wilderness will be reissued in February to appeal to readers of paranormal romance—which it is, only that term wasn’t around much in 1991 when it came out.  Here ’tis:

I was flattered to learn that “Healing Benjamin” in the August Realms of Fantasy has been placed on the Nebula Suggested Reading list under “Novelettes.”  For those unfamiliar with the term, that’s fiction 7500 to 17,500 words.  Shorter makes it a short story; longer, a novella (until it hits 40K and turns novel).  “Benjamin” weighs in at 8600 words.  He’s a big cat.  The story, inspired by a couple of beloved pets, has been getting quite a nice response, which pleases me no end.  Many thanks to 18-year-old Nyneve (cat) and 15-year-old Alice (dog) for all they taught me.  This one’s for you.

Check this out.  The cover for the Datlow cat anthology.  I’m one of the Many Others.

I have stories in both the new Realms of Fantasy (“Healing Benjamin”) and the new Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet (“The Broken Dream Factory”).  Here are the covers, in case you’re shopping this weekend.  Better yet, stop by their websites and subscribe.

1962, I think, would’ve been the first time that I put a story in an envelope and sent it off to The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.  There have been dozens since, always coming home, rejected.  Though I must say that editor Gordon Van Gelder writes the nicest rejection letters in the business, and I have quite the collection, I’d seen my share.  Breaking into F & SF had become a dream of mine.  I would’ve said impossible dream, until today.

He said yes!  Hallelujah!  Carlos, our letter carrier, must’ve heard me hollering half a block away.  “The Fairy Princess” will be appearing in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction!
I don’t have a pub date, and other mags pay better, but I don’t care.  I’m delirious with unrepentant joy.  Now I have to go grade a stack of student papers.  Perhaps the gods have smiled upon them as well.

I got the terrific news that “Healing Benjamin” (to appear later this year in the resurrected Realms of Fantasy) has been selected to be in Ellen Datlow’s February 2010 anthology of fantastic cat stories, Tails of Wonder, from Night Shade.  Ellen is one of my favorite editors—I’m thrilled and honored.  This will make February an eventful month.  “Texas Beach” will be coming out in Richmond Noir, and Wilderness will be reissued by HarperCollins.  I’ve gotten a peek at the cover art for that, and it’s way sexy—as it should be.  It’s always gotten dark, horror covers before, and werewolves notwithstanding, it’s not a horror novel.