The author copies for my other collection, The Dinosaur Diaries and Other Tales Across Space and Time, arrived in the mail the other day. Very happy to hold this one in my hands — eighteen of my best stories which originally appeared in magazines like Ellery Queen, Asimov’s, Analog, and Realms of Fantasy.
I also saw that Amazon just discounted the price $5. If you haven’t ordered yours, you should do so today!
A special treat showed up in the mail the other day — the author copies of my collection, A Web of Black Widows and Other Stories of Love and Loss.
A very beautiful book — they really do a superb job at PS Publishing. There’s two editions of this book available, the jackletless hardcover (pictured above), and the signed limited edition with a book jacket (only a 100 copies) that matches the cover on the front piece itself. Both are actually limited print runs — only 500 copies total. They’re available only directly from the publisher.
Who knows, maybe someday they’ll be worth some money.
As a teaser, here’s a blurb that appears on the back of the book, which is taken from the story “A Web of Black Widows”:
“You understand it’s forever, huh? Even if you get rid of it later, there’ll still be a scar.”
“I want a spider.”
“All right, it’s your body.”
He pulled out his sketchpad from underneath a pile of magazines that people used to get ideas. Grabbed an HB pencil from the cabinet of supplies he had mounted on the wall. He flipped open the pad to a blank page. “What kind?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Not a tarantula.”
“Okay. You like black widows?”
“I don’t know. What’s one look like?”
He sketched one for her. He had done them lots of times.
“I like that,” she said.
“Okay. Where?”
“On my tummy,” she said, and opened her robe.
Steven froze. Not much happened inside his van surprised him. People wanted tattoos in all sorts of strange places, and after years in the business, he had gotten used to it. But he had never seen a pregnant woman’s naked body in real life.
I’m pleased to announce that my story collection, The Dinosaur Diaries and Other Tales Across Space and Time, is now available for purchase.
If you’ve been a fan of my stories, here’s your chance to own what I consider my best eighteen stories so far — including one tale all new to this collection. Since my short stories have been published in such a wide variety of places, I know how hard it can be to find many of them, so it really gratifies me to finally be able to point people to this book. Here’s a run down on what’s in it, including where the stories originally appeared:
I’d like to thank Fantastic Books, and especially my editor, Doug Cohen, for shepherding this one into print.
What are you waiting for? For less than $1/story, you can add this one to your shelf. It also makes a great gift. Buy it today.
This starving writer really appreciates your support.
I’m about to run out to the Oregon coast for a three-day writing workshop — a fun opportunity to talk shop with lots of other writers, something I don’t get to do nearly often enough — but I wanted to share this link before I go.
On Monday, Fantasy Magazine, published my collaboration with Ray Vukcevich, “A Stray.” You can read it for free online.
Well, today they’ve published an interview with Ray and I about the collaborative process. We even included a couple of our email exchanges at the end, which you might find interesting. I also agree with Ray’s comment that when two people collaborate, then a third person emerges, which was certainly true in this case. A lot more planning and pre-writing went into this story than is usually the case for me — usually this sort of thing happens more in my head, and even then more on a gut level. I believe Ray was saying the same was true for him.
But going back and forth about the story via email, shaping it and molding it a bit before setting a word on the page — that was a very valuable experience. You might find some of our notes interesting too, especially if you read the story, because it shows where we made decisions about the direction the story was going.
Whether those decisions worked or not, well, that’s up to each reader to decide.