October Australian Speculative Fiction Blog Carnival - first part

Welcome to the October Australian Speculative Fiction Blog Carnival. This one is full of acknowledgements and admissions of interest. Let me start by thanking Nyssa who let me keep it when I stole it from Jason. And Jason, who was very gentlemanly (he hardly swore at all) when he discovered I'd run off with it. Jason will get even next month.

This is a big month. Bloggers kept writing lots of interesting things. I'm posting it in two parts, and, well, there's an apology somewhere for a whole branch of material that I didn't code and have mysteriously lost. The queue of angry bloggers starts in Milwaukee. Why Milwaukee? You can't reach me from there. If you'd rather start the queue in Milton Keynes or in Falaise, I'm fine with that, too.

FIRST BIG TOPIC (headlines this month are super-amazingly-sophisticated): Behind The Scenes

Jeff VanderMeer and Tessa Kum (Tessa is Australian and Jeff ought to be) have collaborated on writing a Halo novella. They both talk about the processes. Jeff's account is full of bits that are cut out due to classification issues. Tessa's has at least one giant angry testicle. Jeff's post features escapees from Tessa's penguin army. Me, I especially want to know about the icecream.

You do need to know that I have a conflict of interest in reporting this. The story that got in the way of their collaboration was for my next anthology. If the conflict of interest worries you, pretend you didn't read this paragraph (and maybe not the previous one, either). If you're fascinated by the process and want more, Tessa posted about the writing processes for the short story, much earlier – she was into final edits when the Halo project was happening. That story is (to steal one of Tessa's words) OARSUM.

Jason Fischer talks about the long learning involved in his recent successes. He's putting his money where his mouth is and will be posting juvenilia to show just how far he's come. Check out the comments to his post. Other writers are already posting juvenilia. It's scary.

Kaaron Warren discusses the physical location of part of her new novel, Slights. Slights is much scarier than the juvenilia, but for quite different reasons.

Sharyn Lilley talks very openly of the difficulties that framed the acknowledgements and dedication for Eneit Press's recent release. I would tell you how amazing these releases are, but that would be real conflict of interest, since one is my book and the other includes a story of mine. In fact, there's conflict of interest in me even mentioning her post. This says something about how very close people are in Aussie small press. But if the conflict of interest worries you, you could ignore this paragraph, or even pretend it doesn't exist.

How do writers feel about reviews? Marianne de Pierres does a review of reviews (I was going to say 'reviews reviews' but it just felt so odd, I didn't).
Justine Larbalestier discusses the blurbs.
Donna Hanson talks about watching a new press unfold while Kaaron Warren compares drafts.
Robert Stephenson dwells on advice about writing.


SECOND THOUGHTFULLY ARTICULATED TITLE: The Writer's Life

Shane Jiraiya Cummings talks about giving up the day job.While Margo Lanagan reacts to a comment that assumes a great deal about the lifestyle of writers and in the process inadvertently reminds us that genius alone and almost every award there is doesn't ensure that income. Peter M Ball also dwells on sad financial truths.
Tansy Rayner Roberts talks about meeting writing deadlineswith a very young baby to look after. Plus she has a whole series about the experience.

Interviewee of the month is Kaaron Warren because – let me admit interest here (I did warn that I would admit to much bias in this post, back as far as yesterday, even) – I feel very strongly that Slights is an amazing book. You can find interviews with her by Temple Library and by Opinionated? Me?. (I think that my punctuation is correct – the last question mark is part of the blog title. I'm at the stage where I can't tell the difference between html and ordinary text, though, so don't trust me.)

Being a white writer and writing minority characters open up cans of worms. Justine Larbalestier talks about both. Some cans need to be opened.

Talie Helene gives a review of a writing workshop


AMAZING TITLE THE THIRD: Conflux

All the links that Jason and I found before I fled, whimpering (when I stole this month's carnival from from Mr Fischer – he was very nice and gave me his links). Don't you like the way I've interleaved each post through my comments so that you aren't overwhelmed by how many Conflux reports there are? Just click on every second word or thereabouts and you'll be fine. No fleeing, nor whimpering at all. Unlike me. I'm a reformed character. I shall never hijack the carnival again!

End of post one (now with extra Conflux reports!). Whew!!

(no subject)

Warning: there will be a time lag before the second part of the carnival goes up. My excuse is that I have a virus and need a rest, but it being 1 am and me needing to sleep works, too. Watch this space.

October Australian Speculative Fiction Blog Carnival – part 2

More Convention!

I finished last night with Conflux reports, so I'm going to start with Gen Con Oz. David Conyers reported on Gen Con, Day 1, Day 2 and Day 3. So did Karen Miller, as did Marianne de Pierres and Kylie Chan. There are pictures (most of the Conflux pictures are hiding in Facebook).


Writers talking about fiction (watch my headings descend into dullness, one teeny hellcircle at a time)

Patty Jansen is in the middle of building worlds: stage one. Nicole Murphy on how she learned what she needed so that she could land that crucial contract (stage 2). Although elsewhere she lists some of the things she wishes she had known before she reached that stage (stage 3, of course – the one riddled with surprising regrets, none of which are really important, but they niggle anyway). Deborah Kalin reached that stage a little while ago and is now going mad. This is the last stage in the strange alchemy of first noveldom.

Tansy Rayner Roberts has thoughts on paranormal romance and on writing an Australian story, while Deborah Kalin discusses outlining. Me, I think thatbeing outed in the workplace is to blame.

Sean Williams demonstrates that he is a whiz at taking time out from writing fiction. (This should have been under 'writer's life', shouldn't it? If you could call it interstitial posting and pretend it's in the right place, I'd be grateful.)

Narelle Harris on her ideas and where they come from. Glenda Larke also talks about where some of her ideas come from. The number of writers blogging about ideas this month is very low compared to the number of readers who ask the question. Tansy Rayner Roberts about her recent work. On Cellophane.


Specific announcements(or should that be specific specfic announcements? I think I'm deluding myself that I'm funny)

The big one is that people keep sending flowers to mourn the passing of ASIM. It's just released 3 issues, and besides, a denial has been issued. If you still want to send flowers, send them to me. No, I'm not dead. I just happen to like flowers. I also happen to like the comments to this post.

That was the single, sole announcement with added content. Let me give you a word from our sponsor to conclude this section. That word is: competition.



Whacking Great Evil Story (specfic isn't specfic without some horror)

The whacking Great Evil Story of the Month is plagiarism. I'm going to plagiarise Jason's notes for this, because he says it so much more neatly than I could. I was so horrified by it, in fact, that I was silenced. There is no happiness in this story, for anyone, not even Lee, who turned down a Stephen King story. Actually, I'm not going to plagiarise, I'm going to quote. This story, therefore, is by Jason Fischer, recent Writers of the Future winner (see, Jason, I got your news in, without making everything about announcements. Now, how to get all my news in… drabbit, I can't):

"Deborah Biancotti is plagiarised!
by a dead journalist!
Who also lifted entire paragraphs from Brimstone Press!
And tried to run a Stephen King story past the eagle eye of Lee Battersby!
What a dickhead!"


General announcements (my headings are now officially boring – that's the story of part 2 – reformation is dull)

This month there were sqillions and zillions of announcements. I'm not including them. This is not because I don't love you all. It's because there is now a special newsfeed (The Australian SF News Conduit) that delivers announcements from a bunch of industry bods to your in-box. There's also a special newsletter just for horror. And there is the Bullsheet, doyenne of bulletins about Australian speculative fiction. Besides, when the announcements were included, the Carnival came to 13 pages, 7 of which were duplicates of material mentioned in these great locations. If I missed your Big Announcement, then think of how very fair I've been, for this has been a month of BIG announcements for me (small announcements aren't possible until I lose some weight, nor are announcements in miniscule) and I dumped mine along with the others on those seven pages.

If your post isn't mentioned and wasn't an unvarnished announcement then the likelihood is that I ran out of steam. I did my best, but there are around 150 people who blog about Australian speculative fiction these days and I couldn't steal everything from Jason. You can save your post from oblivion next month by emailing the carnival contact (sfblogcarnival@gmail.com).