eBook Review – Cranky Ladies of History

I was a backer of the Pozible project that made this book a reality.  Now whether that predisposes me to like Cranky Ladies of History, I’m not sure.  I am both fan and friends of the editors and some of the contributors.  Still I shelled out $50 upfront and no amount of friendship or fanboishness would assuage the pain if the book turned out to be a stinker.

Thankfully, perhaps even a little surprisingly, Cranky Ladies of History, turned out to be a great collection.  I was expecting the collection to be good, a belief firmly founded in Tehani Wessely’s and Tansy Rayner Roberts’ eye for good story and good project.  I wasn’t expecting to be quite as fulfilled and engaged. 

Touted as a celebration of 22 historical women, some of whom we might be familiar with but many of whom have been relegated to history or specialist courses of study, Cranky Ladies of History demonstrates that there is ample interesting and underutilised historical material for writers to work with if they want to go with female protagonists. 

Many of us are used to reworkings of King Arthur, Richard III, and William Wallace.  What I found delight in here, was not only original takes on some of the women that I did know about but exciting unearthings of those I hadn’t read about before.

The works run the gamut of straight historical to historical fantasy.  Deborah Biancotti manages to give us a rather straight historical retelling of Elisabeth Bathory or  Erzsébet Báthory.  It was a pleasantly free of vampires, the history being sometimes far more gruesome than the fantasy.  Dirk Flinthart on the other hand manages to give us Irish myth with a tint of Cthulu mythos, in his piece on Grace O'Malley.

While all the stories were self contained, many of them left me hungering for more, for longer tales. Thanks to Foz Meadows and Bright Moon, I want to read more of Khutulun, cousin of Kublai Khan and not the pacified version that informs the western version in Turandot. Likewise, Haava Murat’s, The Pasha, the Girl and the Dagger would easily sate those looking for that historical milieu of  European Christianity versus the Ottoman empire without having to resort to endless retellings of the life of Vlad the Impaler.

I am sure that it would be possible to fill a book with stories from European history alone, so it’s also encouraging to see the diversity in this collection from Amanda Pillar’s tale of Hatshepsut and her daughter, to Thoraiya Dyer’s story of Queen Ranavalona Manjak of Madagascar.

For me Cranky Ladies of History is a unique project in that it delivers entertainment while spotlighting 22 women of history that we should all know more about, even if it’s for the simple reason that their stories are different to those we are used to hearing.

The review was conducted on an advanced reading copy.

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This review is part of the Australian Women Writers Challenge 2015.  Please check out this page for more great writing from Australian women.

 

 

 

 

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Serial Review: Musketeer Space Part 1

I have a confession.

I don’t really like serialised fiction.  I want all the story at my own reading pace. Which perhaps makes me a less than ideal person for reviewing Tansy Rayner Roberts’ new Patreon backed Musketeer Space.

But a) I have been a fan of Tansy’s writing since Siren Beat, b) I love the Three Musketeers and c )I love it when people adapt or rework classic stories. 

So I had mixed feelings going into reading chapter one Musketeer Space Part I: Reasons To Hate Moths.  I can’t stand reading longer stories on the laptop so I used the dotEpub extension to render Tansy’s post into a form I could take to my reader.

So what to review.  You can of course read it yourself, it’s free and you don’t need to be a backer/patron.  Not much point in outlining the plot so I will tell you what I like so far.  This chapter covers the story up to the meeting with Rochefort or as is the case here Ro.

I like the gender swap which is going to be a major feature of the work. Dana D'Artagnan is our protagonist and she flies a Dart, a small one person spacecraft.  Musketeers fly the Musket class ships if my memory serves me. Tansy does great fan service with hat tips to the original work  like the references to Meung Station and the yellow paintwork of D'Artagnan’s Dart being referred to as Buttercup in colour. 

I think Tansy has managed to capture the essence of a good Musketeer reworking - the carefree and gutsy attitude of the young D'Artagnan and the humour in the situations that D'Artagnan’s attitude gets her into.  It’s a well known story in pop culture and half the fun is seeing/trying to guess how Tansy is going to handle certain scenes and characters.  By the end of the 13 pages I was hooked, I can’t wait till the next one :).  Ro is dastardly and D'Artagnan has the exuberance of youth with all the danger that entails.  I picture Ro being played by Geena Davis for some reason and  D'Artagnan, perhaps a crew cut Natalie Portman.

I may have been converted to serialised fiction.

You can support Tansy here and read the story here Musketeer Space Part I: Reasons To Hate Moths.

Artwork by Grant Watson of the Angriest

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One for all and all for Space – Musketeer Space by Tansy Rayner Roberts

Launching tomorrow will be a new web serial from Tansy Rayner Roberts.  It will feature gender-swapped Musketeers in space so hold on to your Cavalier hats as we witness acts of derring-do in space.

Because its a web serial there is a chance to participate see Tansy’s page for details:

Musketeer Space is a story that has been rolling around in my brain for some time now, and I’ve come to the conclusion that there are some novels I’m just not going to write without deadlines. Enter: the self-imposed deadline.

So, for the next year and a half or so, I’ll be posting weekly chapters of a space opera retelling of The Three Musketeers, one of my favourite stories of all time. Writing without a net!

The story will be free to read, though if you want to make a financial contribution towards the ongoing care and nurturing of the space Musketeers and their author, I have set up a Patreon page to collect small monthly donations. Anyone who donates during the web serial process will receive an e-book of the complete story when it’s done. So if you hate waiting for a story to be updated chapter by chapter, you can donate now and not read it for another year and a half. Procrastination for the win!     READ ON

 

 

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Love and Romanpunk gets a reprint

In what I imagine is a pretty cool thing to happen to a small press ie that your print stocks sell out, Twelfth Planet Press have announced that they will be doing a small run to take with them to Worldcon. 

So if you ever wanted to grab a hard copy (the eBook is still available) then mosey on over to the Twelfth Planet Press site to pre order a copy here.

 

 

 

 

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They’re back in Episode 74 of Galactic Suburbia

I really had hoped to have two of my own podcasts released onto the world by the time the gang came back but as you know my internets disappeared.  Ah well I shall soldier on.

In this weeks episode we hear that Alex got to got to Egypt and Turkey, Alisa went to Paris and Tansy enjoyed the break by podcasting on Dr Who.

They remind us that the The Galactic Suburbia Award: for activism and/ or communication that advances the feminist conversation in the field of speculative fiction in 2012 – will be announced in 2 weeks.

The rest of the show notes are here.  I am saving this one for the long drive to my new job.

Download the mp3 here or play in the player below

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Twelfth Planet Press eBooks via Amazon

Twelfth Planet Press is rolling out yet more eBooks via Amazon.  So for all you internationals you now have no excuse. Currently available are:

Cracklescape, Salvage, Thief of Lives, Bad Power, Above Below, Love and Romanpunk, Through Splintered Walls and Showtime.

Go here to check them out.

 

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Wednesday links for the win

So folks, there has been a fair bit of internet win the last two days.  I thought I might spread some of the links that I have found of interest:

First up is Peter M Balls Pledging My Allegiance to the Fake Geek Army which is comment on the furore caused by Comic Book creator Tony Harris.  Peter articulates many of the feelings I have on the subject.  This post and Tansy Rayner Roberts’ post What Geek Girls Wear (Is None of Your Business) mean that I won’t have to vent my spleen.  If you are still hankering for more on the subject David MacDonald also has a post called Geek Tribalism and Sexism.

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Do you ever get tired of companies trying to push the boundaries with ebooks, offering a transmedia experience (ie imbedded movies, qr codes that lead you to other sites).  Do you feel like we are being trained to buy the next best bit of techno- bling? Well check out Joel Naoum’s blog over at Momentum – you’ll be interested in what he has to say in Who Wants to Read this Stuff? The Business of Storytelling in a Digital World.

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And while you are looking at things Momentuum, check out their Podcast – Podmentum, especially episode 2 where they talk genre versus literature and Literature goes home in a body bag (not really, but it’s very genre friendly).

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Galactic Suburbia Episode 72

Tansy and Alex battle on again without Alisa. Will the fans notice a difference *ducks* ?

The News round up includes WFA winners, a new baby Wessely (from Fablecroft Press) and the lowdown on the wonderful Genrecon convened by Australia’s master of Unicorn debasement, Peter M Ball.

Culture consumed was  Infidel by Kameron Hurley; The Deep (BBC series) Black Widow by Marjorie Liu,  Bitter Greens by Kate Forsyth, Swordspoint by Ellen Kushner; and Big Finish Specials: UNIT Dominion,

Go here for the detailed show notes.

You play the podcast below or download here.

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Australian Winner of the WSFA Small Press Award – 2012

 

The Washington Science Fiction Association Small Press Award is bestowed upon works of imaginative literature published in English, that do not exceed 20,000 words and that are published by a small press.  The award is announced each October at Capclave, the association’s convention.

This year the winner is The Patrician by Tansy Rayner Roberts, published by Twelfth Planet Press.  It’s the second time that the the combined brains of Alisa Krasnostein and Tansy Rayner Roberts have taken home the award, winning previously in 2010 with the Nancy Napoleon story Siren Beat.

Please join me in congratulating Alisa & Tansy

If you want to check out the awards process go here.

If you would like to purchase the stories you can get them in paperback and ebook form below:

Love and Romanpunk EBook (epub) (featuring the Patrician) – $5.95

Siren Beat (single) – $1.99 US via Smashwords

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Pre-season Last Short Story- Episode 2: After, Ellen Datlow & Terri Windling eds

 

I think the concept of turning the Not if You Were the Last Short Story on Earth project into a podcast was a stroke of brilliance.  The idea of brining in extra commentators to combat burnout and keep opinions and tone diverse, even more so.

Mondy and Jonathan have been podcasting a pre-season, a testing of the waters, so to speak.  Personally, I think they could just do away with the concept of a preseason and just go with it.  I think the concept is good.  I am already more inclined to listen and checkout short works when presented in this medium.

In this episode Jonathan and Mondy are joined by original co-conspirator, Tansy Rayner Roberts in discussing the collection After by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling.

You can play direct from the player below or download here

 

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Galactic Suburbia 68 – Post Hugo debrief

Well it’s post-Hugos and the women of Galactic Suburbia have vowed to step bravely once more unto the breach next year.  Episode 68 sees them talking about the Hugos, where Tansy relates the nights events including the Ustream foul-up in the middle of Neil Gaiman’s acceptance speech. Alex discovers the wonders of early Star Wars novelisations and Alisa joins another cult.

Enjoy from the player below or download here

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WSFA Honours Aussie Authors

The Washington Science Fiction Association has honoured two Aussie authors in their list of Finalists for  the 2012 WSFA Small Press Award for Short Fiction:

“A Militant Peace” by David Klecha and Tobias S. Buckell, published in Clarkesworld Magazine, edited by Neil Clarke, November 2011.

“Flowers in the Shadow of the Garden” by Joanne Anderton in Hope, edited by Sasha Beattie, published by Kayelle Press, October 2011.

“Lessons from a Clockwork Queen” by Megan Arkenberg, published in Fantasy Magazine, edited by John Joseph Adams, September 2011.

“Sauerkraut Station” by Ferrett Steinmetz, published in GigaNotoSaurus, edited by Ann Leckie, November 2011.

“The Cartographer Wasps and the Anarchist Bees” by Lily Yu, published in Clarkesworld Magazine, edited by Neil Clarke, April 2011.

“The Patrician” by Tansy Rayner Roberts in Love and Romanpunk, edited by Alisa Krasnostein, published by Twelfth Planet Press, May 2011.

“What Ho, Automaton!” by Chris Dolley, in Shadow Conspiracy, Volume II., edited by Phyllis Irene Radford and Maya Kaathryn Bohnhoff, published by Book View Cafe, February 2011.

“Yesterday’s Taste” by Lawrence M. Schoen in Transtories, edited by Colin Harvey and published by Aeon Press, October 2011.

The winner will be announced in early October

So congrats Tansy and Jo, worth recipients if my reading is anything to go by

Galactic Suburbia Number 67

The Galactic Suburbanites are at it again with a fun filled episode:

 

In which [they] talk trolling, internet pile-ons and Twittiquette (it's a word, right?) as well as Weird Tales, Analog, heavy metal, straight white YA dystopias and (this may shock you) Joanna Russ.

They mention the Last Short Story podcast which has got me excited about short fiction in a way that the written form of coverage didn’t

 

You can download here or play below.

 

 

 

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Galactic Suburbia 66 The Post Olympic Edition

The crew set forth again bravely cresting the waves of misogyny that flood the interwebs.  They point out Eddie McGuire’s ineptitude at commentating before rejoicing in the fact that a few friends have made it on to the World Fantasy Awards ballot. 

There’s some coverage of the Readercon decision to enforce its harassment policy and they mention my latest recording for Galactic Chat.

Without anymore of my codeine enhanced meanderings I give you Galactic Suburbia:

DOWNLOAD

or

Play below

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Three Links that you should read

yeah I said should.

First up, Tansy has a great article on Maeve Binchy, motherhood and writing.  I for one can’t stand it when women and to a lesser extent men get looked on with pity for not having had the experience of raising a child.  Tansy does a great job of pointing out the importance of valuing all life’s experiences, and being equally supportive of women who write and have babies and those who don’t. 

Motherhood: the Ultimate Writing Accessory?

August 6th, 2012 at 23:08

The Frisky pointed to an article in the Telegraph by Amanda Craig about Maeve Binchy’s career, and the difference between women writers who are mothers and those who are not.

At first, coming in on a wave of The Frisky’s outrage, I thought it wasn’t as bad as I had expected. After all, it did acknowledge a whole bunch of pros and cons for juggling writing and motherhood, and seemed to be balanced. But the more I read, the less balanced it seemed.[read on]

Then there’s Scalzi on being how not to be a creep at a convention.  Now I am not sure of the success of this sort of post, outside of us all nodding our heads in agreement and saying “hear, hear”.  You see I am not sure that the clueless, socially inept harasser is self aware enough to read this sort of post and neither perhaps is the selfish, self centred harasser likely to care. 

I think perhaps the more successful tactic is to make it harder for predators to select victims by building confidence and awareness within our community. But still read it. I have not made up my mind.

An Incomplete Guide to Not Creeping

The last couple of months have been a really interesting time for geekdom, as its had its face rubbed in the fact that there are a lot of creepy assbags among its number, and that geekdom is not always the most welcoming of places for women. Along that line, this e-mail from a con-going guy popped into my queue a few days ago:

“Any tips on how not to be a creeper? I try not to be, but I don’t know that I’m the best judge of that.”

Let’s define our terms here. Let’s say that for this particular conversation, a “creeper” is someone whose behavior towards someone else makes that other person uncomfortable at least and may possibly make them feel unsafe.[read on]

and finally check out Visibility Fiction:

Visibility Fiction is dedicated to the promotion and publication of inclusive young adult fiction – specifically fiction with protagonists from groups with limited visibility in popular culture. Such marginalised groups include, but need not be limited to, lesbian, bisexual, gay, transsexual, transgender, queer, intersex and asexual people, people from racial and ethnic minorities, and people with disabilities. [read on]

Now that’s all.  Enjoy the rest of your weekend.

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Galactic Suburbia Episode 65 - The Olympics Edition

The women of Galactic Suburbia start off with an interesting discussion on what I would call Australia’s cult of winning (it’s gold or nothing), and then cover the ineptitude of male commentators that feel the need to mansplain over female experts in Olympic coverage. 

Thankfully I have given up watching the Olympics, they never seem to cover (or cover with any regularity) the sports of which I have an interest in say, Judo & Tae Kwon Do.  And when they do its sexist rubbish like this.

Then it’s on to the Readercon debacle. A sad and sorry tale indeed. One that has me pondering a post.

Click here for the show notes.

You can download here or play below.

 

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Galactic Suburbia Number 64

The crew returns for another wonderful podcast. 

Aside from the usual goodness in Culture Consumed there was an interesting discussion on Gender bias on Wikipedia, case in point – apparently its quite rational and noteworthy to record Pokemon characters as artefacts of social history but not Kate Middleton’s dress.

Jason Nahrung’s Salvage gets a mention, reminding me that I need to do a review.

  So enough blather from me, check out the show notes here for links to articles.

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Galactic Suburbia Episode 63: 5 July 2012

Alex, Tansy and Alisa roll out another wonderful episode in which they examine the politics of female author portraits, the Felicia Day twitter fallout and the Hugo’s of course.

There’s some initial discussion on the fact that the mainstream media is catching up to the fact that Australian women have been successfully writing speculative fiction for some time.

Enjoy and remember to send feedback to galacticsuburbia@gmail.com

You can listen via the flash player below or go here to download

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Thursday Links–Stephen King, Neil Gaiman and Locus

Well, if you have noticed me being quite its because I got an emergency call in yesterday( relief teaching).  As to whether or not I will make it to Continuum 8, well that’s still up in the air and at this stage I am just hitting the “paying the bills” stage of work.

None the less here are some links for you to peruse:

First is the Outer Alliance podcast who interviewed Tansy Rayner Roberts: it covers fandom feminism and Tansy’s works.  It’s a monster at close to 2 hours…enjoy

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you can download it here as an mp3.

Then there is interview by Neil Gaiman, of Stephen King. Its nice, it makes me want to sit on the porch and just “shoot the shit” with Mr King.

My first encounter with Stephen King, long before I met him in the flesh, was on East Croydon station in about 1975. I was fourteen. I picked up a book with an all-black cover. It was called Salem's Lot. It was King's second novel; I'd missed the first, a short book called Carrie, about a teenage girl with psychic powers. I stayed up late finishing Salem's Lot, loving the Dickensian portrait of a small American town destroyed by the arrival of a vampire. Not a nice vampire, a proper vampire. Dracula meets Peyton Place. After that I bought everything King wrote as it came out. Some books were great, and some weren't. It was okay. I trusted him. [read more]

And to follow up that, more King in a non specfic but ultimately cheer worthy article where Stephen King takes on the rich, including himself.

Stephen King: Tax Me, for F@%&’s Sake!

…My question was, “How come I’m not paying 50?” The governor of New Jersey did not respond to this radical idea, possibly being too busy at the all-you-can-eat cheese buffet at Applebee’s in Jersey City, but plenty of other people of the Christie persuasion did.

Cut a check and shut up, they said.

If you want to pay more, pay more, they said.

Tired of hearing about it, they said.

Tough shit for you guys, because I’m not tired of talking about it. I’ve known rich people, and why not, since I’m one of them? The majority would rather douse their dicks with lighter fluid, strike a match, and dance around singing “Disco Inferno” than pay one more cent in taxes to Uncle Sugar. It’s true that some rich folks put at least some of their tax savings into charitable contributions. My wife and I give away roughly $4 million a year to libraries, local fire departments that need updated lifesaving equipment (Jaws of Life tools are always a popular request), schools, and a scattering of organizations that underwrite the arts.Warren Buffett does the same; so does Bill Gates; so does Steven Spielberg; so do the Koch brothers; so did the late Steve Jobs. All fine as far as it goes, but it doesn’t go far enough.

[read more]

and to round it out the 2012 Locus Awards Shortlist is out.

The Locus Science Fiction Foundation has announced the top five finalists in each category of the 2012 Locus Awards.

Science Fiction Novel

• Leviathan Wakes, James S. A. Corey (Orbit US; Orbit UK)
• 11/22/63, Stephen King (Scribner; Hodder & Stoughton as 11.22.63)
• Embassytown, China Miéville (Del Rey; Macmillan)
• Rule 34, Charles Stross (Ace; Orbit UK)
• The Children of the Sky, Vernor Vinge (Tor)

[read on]

Many thanks to @kimode and @fearofemeralds on twitter for some of these links.

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Galactic Suburbia Episode 58

In this Episode the Galactic Suburbanites Hugo & Ditmar nominated Galactic Suburbanites cover the Ditmar shortlist which features quite a lot of Tansy in both the Professional and Fan Categories.  Indeed this year’s Ditmars feature projects by all three of the show’s hosts.

There’s also mention of Deb Biancotti making the Shirley Jackson shortlist for a work that’s being considered for both a Ditmar and an Aurealis award.  It’s always good to see different awards structures come to the same conclusion.

There was also a good discussion on writers or creatives changing direction or mediums and how they can be damned if the do and damned if they don’t.  Case in point Stephenie Meyer who’d be labelled as a one trick pony if she stayed writing vampire fiction and labelled as a failure when she moves into making movies.

As always, worth a listen.

As always you can download here (about 30 mb) or stream from the thingywhatsit below

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