Wastelands Conquers All, Says Omnivoracious

Over at the Amazon blog, Omnivoracious, Jeff VanderMeer has a nice piece about Wastelands, which is, incidentally, awesomely titled "Apocalypse Wow: Wastelands Conquers All." In it, Jeff says: "[Wastelands] has been one of the great success stories of the early part of 2008–selling out its initial print run (and going back to reprint), garnering rave reviews, and just generally conquering all in its path. Given the volatile nature of anthologies, which have a high failure rate, that’s quite an accomplishment. But it’s no surprise, given the careful editing and packaging of Wastelands, which has its own website (including free downloads of some of the fiction) and includes reprinted stories from the likes of Orson Scott Card, Jonathan Lethem, George R.R. Martin, Gene Wolfe, and many other luminaries." Jeff then sprinkles in some commentary by me, along with a selection of first lines from the stories, which he leaves un-identified to entice readers and leaving them to guess which stories and authors they come from.

Jeff says that the full interview he did with me will appear on the book’s Amazon page in the next week or two. Meanwhile, on his own blog, Ecstatic Days, Jeff leaked a bit of the interview, displaying my answer to his question: "Any funny stories in the anthology, and how did you deal with the possible problem of similarity of tone throughout the book?" Click through to find out!

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Wastelands: Trailer + More Online Stories!

Wastelands sold out its initial print run, so Night Shade went back to press for a second printing, and from what I hear there were so many backorders that the second printing is going to be almost gone as well (though that’s bookstore orders, not actual sales per se, so it should be readily available wherever fine books are sold). To celebrate, I’ve made three more stories from the book available on the anthology’s website. So that’s now a total of six stories you can read online for free; the stories are by Elizabeth Bear, M. Rickert, Cory Doctorow, James Van Pelt, Richard Kadrey, and Tobias S. Buckell.

And speaking of Tobias, he put together a book trailer for the anthology and posted it to YouTube. It’s got some cool apocalyptic imagery, as well as original music by Jack Kincaid. Go check it out, and spread it around!

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Mind Meld: Science Fiction Series

The latest installment of SF Signal’s Mind Meld feature just went up today, and I’m again a part of the conversation. This time around, we’re talking about book series in SF and debating if they’re good or bad for the field and/or for readers. Joining me in the discussion are Lou Anders, Chris Roberson, Joe Sherry, and David Louis Edelman.

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Stuff You May Not Have Seen

Has everyone been popping over to the new F&SF blog to read all the wonderful goodness over there? I’ve posted a few more F&SF author interviews since we launched:

There’s also some other varied stuff. Like, for instance, we’re giving away a copy of the DVD of The Martian Child. Go view the contest rules and enter! Even if you don’t want it, you could give it to a friend or something. Do it for pride! I think the contest rules are fun. You should go play.

Also, I just posted the Jan. 2008: Favorite Story Poll the other day, so be sure to go vote. (Those won’t be appearing here anymore.)

So, anyway, I’m curious what you all think of the F&SF blog so far. How is it? What could we be doing better?

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