Other Worlds

Tag: fantasy

  • Fantastic Defenders

    I have recently served as co-editor of a short story anthology, Fantastic Defenders, with my fellow writer, David Keener. The official release was during Balticon. I had fun writing the introduction, and here it is, to give you an idea of what the book’s aim is: One place to begin, in talking about fantastic defenders,…

  • “Nell” by Karen Hesse

    “Nell” is a new story up on Tor.com this week. Read it here. (It’s reprinted from an anthology, What You Wish For, published by Book Wish Foundation, 2012) The story is told from the perspective of a 12-year-old girl who’s been 12 for about a hundred years, but in different bodies: One winter night in…

  • Three Things that Are Missing from the Hugo Ballot…

    My thoughts on what is missing, or at least, what there is not enough of, in the fiction categories (excluding Novel). Adventure! Suspense! More adventure and suspense, please! Especially suspense. I’m a Hitchcock lover for the simple reason that, wow, could that man keep me hanging on what was going to happen next. Stories that…

  • Hugo Awards: Best Novella (5th contender)

    Next we come to Catherynne Valente’s “Silently and Very Fast,” from Clarkesworld. You can read it here. This story is told from the point of view of an artificial intelligence, Elefsis — originally the name of the house for which the software was written as an operating system. Elefsis was created by a programmer, Cassian,…

  • Hugo Awards: Best Novella (4th contender)

    Now we come to Kij Johnson’s “The Man Who Bridged the Mist,” from Asimov’s. You can read it here. This is a lovely story — actually, a love story, and few other things besides. Kit Meinem, of the capital city of Empire, arrives at the small town of Nearside, which is situated on the great…

  • “We just like to talk about stories”

    The alternate titles that I considered for this post were “The Purpose of ‘Other Worlds’” and “I just like to talk about stories.” The first was boring and the second, while true, misses the crucial point of talking about stories with other people who read and appreciate fiction. I went with “we” in the title…

  • Hugo Awards: Best Novelette (2nd contender)

    Next in the novelette category is “Fields of Gold” by Rachel Swirsky, published in Eclipse Four (Night Shade Books). Read it here. Imagining an afterlife as a story device has a long — very long — history. What do the dead do, what should they do, what can they do? Simply exist as sad shades? Endure…

  • Hugo Awards: My Pick for Best Short Story

    I’ve decided which of the five stories I hope will win. It’s “Movement” by Nancy Fulda, for its beautifully unified character, voice, and story. The protagonist is convincing, and the author’s hand is sure but not too heavy.

  • Hugo Awards: Best Short Story Contenders (5)

    Fifth and last, E. Lily Yu’s “The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees” from Clarkesworld Magazine. Read it here. A race of wasps common around the village of Yiwei is discovered to construct nests that unfold into beautiful colored maps of the surrounding country. Once this discovery is made, the nests are taken by the villagers…

  • Hugo Awards: Best Short Story Contenders (4)

    Fourth on the ballot for Best Short Story: “The Paper Menagerie” by Ken Liu. You can read it here. Jack is the son of an American father and a Chinese mother, who was a mail-order bride. The marriage is a successful one, but at age 10 Jack becomes aware of the ethnic differences between himself…