Actual Photographic Evidence of Wastelands in Bookstores

Right around the time I was typing up my previous post about the lack of photographic evidence of Wastelands being in bookstores, Bantam Spectra editor and generally fabulous person Juliet Ulman was in the Union Square Barnes & Noble taking the pic at left, in which you can see, of course Wastelands, along with some of Juliet’s books–The Orphan’s Tales, Vol. 1 and 2 by Catherynne M. Valente novels and End of the World Blues by Jon Courtenay Grimwood. [click to embiggen]

ulman - wastelands pic

 

Juliet says it was on the special "Explorations endcap/display-cube."

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Free Business Cards

bus card2 If anyone’s in the market for business cards, Overnight Prints is having a sale. Or rather, they’re giving away business cards. If it’s the same deal as the one I used late last year, you get a $10 discount, and so if you buy 100 cards for $9.95, they’re free (though you’ll pay shipping). If you want to take advantage of the offer, use the coupon code "NEWYEAR08" (without the quotes) when you check out.

I ordered some business cards for Wastelands from this place, and I was very happy with them. They’ve been quite well received too–which is the effect you’re looking for when you’re using business cards as a promotional tool. The colors all turned out well, and the card stock they use is nice and thick–not the flimsy stuff a lot of these online printers use.

I just took a JPG of the book’s cover and in the black area below the byline, I added some additional information, because the aspect ratio of the cover and the card was not exactly the same, so there was some blank space down at one end of the card (which I just filled in with black). Over the blank black area, I added (in white text) the release date, the publisher, the ISBN, the price, and the website’s URL. Everything someone really needs to know to learn more about the book. And, through the book’s website, people can figure out how to get in touch with me if they don’t know how to already. (And if you know name and can’t figure out how to get in touch with me via email, I’m not sure I want to get in touch. My contact info ain’t hard to find.)

I liked them so much, I just ordered some new ones, with slightly altered text from my original. (See left.) I find it hard to give out regular business cards with just my name and contact info on it, but this I find easier to dispense, since the subject comes up pretty often, and it gives me a perfect excuse to pull out a card.

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Reviews: Fantasy Magazine & Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review

The reviews keep rolling in. Today, I discovered two more new reviews of Wastelands. The first, over at Graeme’s Fantasy Book Review, gives the book a nine out of ten rating. Here’s a snippet:

It’s [the] diverse mix of reactions that make the collection a gripping read. […] Wastelands is well worth a look. [whole review]

The other is by Paula Guran at Fantasy Magazine. Here’s a snippet:

If you are looking for a perky, uplifting read, you’d best avoid Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse. But if you are interested in a wide variety of end-of-the-world fiction, you shouldn’t miss it. […] [S]cience fiction should stimulate, start arguments, and incite discussion. Adams has done his job well. [whole review]

Also, I was pleased to discover in my Google Alerts folder this morning that the Missoula Public Library appears to have a copy of Wastelands. Go Missoula!

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Bookslut on Wastelands: Not Cohesive Enough!

Blythe Boyer over at Bookslut reviewed Wastelands. She didn’t seem to like it much–or rather she liked about half of it, but feels "Wastelands ultimately fails as a collection because its editor did not allow a cohesive philosophy to guide his choices for the collection." Ouch. Oh well, they can’t all be rave reviews. She does say some nice things about the anthology, however, and quite liked several of the stories.

I admit to being puzzled as to how someone could not only dislike Dale Bailey’s story, but dislike it so much. I thought that was great, and was one of the first stories I thought of when assembling the book. But to each her own.

One (irrelevant) error in the review: 28 Days Later (zombies) was not based on Day of the Triffids, (carnivorous plants), though the opening sequence kind of rips it off. (Or is an homage, as we like to say.)

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"If Angels Fight" by Richard Bowes

image Richard Bowes, whose story "If Angels Fight" appears in the February 2008 issue of F&SF, said in an interview that the story was inspired by a trip he and his sister made to the old neighborhood. "It brought back a lot of memories including the politicians. I knew kids whose fathers were in politics. But politics was almost like popular entertainment–everyone knew about it, talked about it, rated politicians," Bowes said. "And the Kennedy family was a constant presence. JFK’s mother came from there. It was where her father, ‘Honey Fitzgerald’ had his mansion, until it burned down one night. Her relatives still lived in the neighborhood. The story’s roots were my trying to give a feeling for that lost, almost mythic moment. John F. Kennedy himself makes and appearance as an impatient young senator who’d just had to attend an aging relative’s birthday party."

"If Angels Fight" starts with the unnamed narrator being asked by Carol Bannon, the scion of a Boston political dynasty to help her find her long lost brother Mark who was a childhood friend of the narrator. "The narrator has helped the family with this several times over the years. The difficulty tracing Mark Bannon is that to all intents and purposes he died some years before," Bowes said. "The rest of the story is the narrators search in the byways of intrigue and politics and his memories of Irish Boston in the 1950’s when politics was a sport, a hobby, a way of life."

(more…)

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Books Received 1/7/08

0439895766A Curse Dark as Gold (ARC)
Author: Elizabeth C. Bunce

The gold thread shimmers in the fading light. It promises Charlotte Miller a way out of debt, a chance to save her family’s beloved woolen mill. It promises a future for her sister, livelihood for her townsfolk, security against her sinuous and grasping uncle. It might even promise what she didn’t know she needed: lasting hope and true love. | But at what cost? To get the thread, Charlotte must strike a bargain with its maker, the mysterious Jack Spinner. But the gleam of gold conjures a shadowy past–secrets and bonds ensnaring generations of Millers. And Charlotte’s mill, her family, her friends, her love…What do those matter to a powerful stranger who can spin straw into gold? | In her brilliant debut, Elizabeth Bunce weaves a spellbinding fairy tale, spun with mystery and show through with romance.

 

0345497589Shadowbridge (Trade Paperback)
Author: Gregory Frost

Sprung from a timeless dream, Shadowbridge is a world of linked spans arching high above glittering seas. It is a world of parading ghosts, inscrutable gods, and dangerous magic. Most of all, it is a world of stories. | No one knows those stories better than Leodora, a young shadow-puppeteer who travels Shadowbridge collecting the intertwining tales and myths of each place she passes through, then retells them in performances whose genius has begun to attract fame…and less welcome attention. | For Leodora is fleeing a violent past, as are her two companions: her manager Soter, and elderly drunkard who also served Leodora’s father, the legendary puppeteer Bardsham; and Diverus, her musical accompanist, a young man who has been blessed and perhaps cursed, by the touch of a nameless god. | Now, as the strands of a destiny she did not choose begin to tighten around her, Leodora is about to cross the most perilous bridge of all–the one leading from the past to the future.

 

044101559XNavigator (Hardcover)
Author: Stephen Baxter

As William the Conqueror’s men attempt to stamp out the flames of rebellion, a prophecy is uttered. A bedraggled woman in a ruined chapel speaks of civilizations in conflict, armed by the engines of God… | And that prophecy proves to be true as the fearsome war between Christianity and Islam leaves its mark across the land. In Spain, a rogue priest dreams of the final defeat of Islam, for he has found a rent in the tapestry of time, a point where agents from the future used diabolical weapons of destruction to change history. Centuries later, in 1492, as men of vision weary of the strife and are drawn to the unknown West, one such explorer seeks the funding for his voyage-while a mysterious Weaver plots to unravel the strands of time and stop him.

 

0441015581The Unnatural Inquirer (Hardcover)
Author: Simon R. Green

Welcome to the Nightside, that secret square mile located in the dark heart of London where the sun never rises and people can fraternize with every myth and monster imaginable. | John Taylor is a P.I. with the special ability to locate anyone or anything. The Unnatural Inquirer, the Nightside’s most notorious gossip rag, has offered him a million pounds to find a DVD purportedto contain an actual recording of the afterlife. John doesn’t know if it’s true, but someone-or something-thinks so, and will stop at nothing to possess the disc.

 

0765317850Elom (ARC)
Author: William H. Drinkard

Fire from the Goddess and the meat and furs of the mammoth are all that the People need to live. It is a harsh life but a good one and it is one that all cherish. | Young Geerna knows that the time has come for her to become a woman and take up the tasks to keep her people safe. She waits in the Awakening Place, fearful and hopeful as her ordeals come to an end. Then, on the eve of her Womanhood, a shining light descends upon her and her world is torn asunder. | And she embarks on a journey that none of her people could ever envision…
Eons have passed. Cycle upon cycle the Way of the People have remain unchanged: women are artists, men are hunters. Geerna’s Law is the covenant by which humans live in harmony and peace.  |  But all is about to change. A call has come for The People to choose their champions, and a summons to meet the mysterious creatures who selected Geerna so long ago. | All is unknown. As the brave souls who are chosen venture forth, they will come to discover just how much that pact that Geerna made so long ago has cost them. | And they will have to confront the choices that might help them to finally know true freedom.

 

0451461894Small Favor (ARC)
Author: Jim Butcher

The new novel in the New York Times bestselling Dresden Files series. | No one’s tried to kill Harry Dresden for almost an entire year, and his life finally seems to be calming down. For once, the future looks fairly bright. But the past casts one hell of a long shadow. | An old bargain has placed Harry in debt to Mab, monarch of the Winter Court of the Sidhe, the Queen of Air and Darkness-and she’s calling in her marker. It’s a small favor he can’t refuse…one that will trap Harry Dresden between a nightmarish foe and an equally deadly ally, and one that will strain his skills-and loyalties-to their very limits. | It figures. Everything was going too well to last…

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