Back in Print Again

December 29, 2020 at 9:24 am

I have been an editor almost as long as I have been a professional writer (I have been a writer since forever, but I was not a pro until I made my first sale to GALAXY in 1970).

The first anthology I ever edited was NEW VOICES IN SCIENCE FICTION, featuring original stories by the finalists for the very first John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. (I was one of those finalists. I lost, but editing the book made up for that). That came out in hardcover in 1975. I would ultimately edit six of those annual (well, in theory) Campbell Award anthologies. Five were actually published.

My longest running editorial gig is, of course, WILD CARDS, which started in 1987 and is still going strong today. (We did have a seven year hiatus in there, but never mind). Over the decades, twenty-nine volumes of Wild Cards have been published, and I’ve edited twenty-seven-and-a-half of them. (Melinda Snodgrass edited THREE KINGS, and we co-edited LOWBALL). The thirtieth book in the series, JOKER MOON, will be released in 2021, and the thirty-first, a collection of stories from Tor.com, will follow in short order. Three more volumes are under contract and I am working on them now; look for them in 2022 and 2023. Wild Cards is a shared world. Editing the mosaics, weaving the stories together, is the most difficult and demanding sort of editing there is, in my opinion, but I love it.

The most enjoyable editorial work I’ve ever done, however, was on the crossgenre anthologies I co-edited with Gardner Dozois.

Gardner was an old friend, and a dear friend, the first person I ever met at the very first SF con I ever attended, and the guy who fished me out of the slushpile. He was also one of the greatest editors in the history of science fiction and fantasy. He edited ASIMOV’S for decades, and put together his massive landmark BEST volumes annually. He won the Hugo for Best Professional Editor sixteen times, a record unlikely to be broken. Working with him was always such a joy. Gardner and I had hoped to do many more anthologies together… but he was taken from us in 2018.

I still miss him, still mourn him. I always will.

Editors, like writers, survive in their work, however, and I am pleased to announce that one of the books we did together, SONGS OF LOVE & DEATH, has just been re-released in a new edition.

This one was Gardner’s idea, as I recall. He wanted to title it STAR-CROSSED LOVERS, which I rather like, but the publisher wanted “Death” in there, and of course the “Songs” in the title evoked many of my own collections. A rose by any other name, however…. whatever the title, it was a fun book to edit, and we put together a wonderful lineup of contributors. As with WARRIORS, ROGUES, and DANGEROUS WOMEN, this was a crossgenre book, featuring writers from many different fields. We were very pleased with how it came out.

If you have not read it, check it out. Copies available from your local bookstore or favorite online bookseller… and, of course, from Beastly Books at https://jeancocteaucinema.com/beastlybooks/

Current Mood: satisfied

Tags: anthologies, editing

The Amazing Ellen

August 22, 2020 at 8:23 am

Ellen Datlow won another Hugo at the Virtual Worldcon that was supposed to be in New Zealand, but wasn’t. For Best Editor, Short Form. I have lost track of how many rockets Ellen has racked up at this point, but it’s a hell of a lot, and all very well deserved. She’s an amazing editor and anthologist.

If you want to see her editing prowess at work, check out our selections at Beastly Books. We’ve had the honor of hosting Ms. Datlow on several occasions, and we still have a few AUTOGRAPHED copies of some of her anthologies in stock.

Mad hats and creepy dolls, what could be more fun! Both terrific books, and signed.

For those, and many many many more titles, check out the Beastly Books website at https://jeancocteaucinema.com/beastlybooks/

We have a fabulous selection of titles, and almost ALL our books are autographed.

Tags: anthologies, Beastly Books, jean cocteau cinema bookstore, signed books, signings

Come On Back to San Antone, Y’All

April 19, 2020 at 6:25 pm

Did you miss TEXAS HOLD ‘EM when it first came out in hardcover?

No problem. Come APRIL 28, Tor will be releasing the book in trade paperback. All the fun, for fewer dollars.

TEXAS HOLD ‘EM is the twenty-seventh volume of the Wild Cards series, and the third in our America Triad… but it stands alone just fine, and you do not have to have read any of the preceding volumes to enjoy it. It’s the story of a group of kids from Xavier Desmond High in Jokertown travelling to San Antonio for a jazz band competition, and all that befalls them there, starring an all star cast of favorite characters both old (Mr. Nobody, Jade Blossom, and Bubbles) and new (Rubberband, Bacho, Skeeter, The Darkness and The Dust). Contributing writers on this one were Caroline Spector, William F. Wu, Walton (Bud) Simons, David Anthony Durham, Max Gladstone, Diana Rowland, and — in his last solo outing for Wild Cards — the late great Victor Milan, who helped launch the series back in 1987. I edited, assisted by Melinda M. Snodgrass,

The Wild Cards universe is vast, and contains both darkness and light. TEXAS HOLD ‘EM is one of our lighter outings, a good fun read. If that’s what you are looking for during these grim days of isolation and quarantine, give it a try. I think you will enjoy it.

You can reserve an autographed paperback, signed by yours truly, from Beastly Books, mailorder. We also have a good stock remaining of the original Tor hardcover, with signatures by several writers as well. All at https://jeancocteaucinema.com/beastlybooks/

Current Mood: pleased pleased

Tags: anthologies, jean cocteau cinema bookstore, signed books, wild cards

Knaves, Knaves Everywhere!

August 13, 2019 at 7:32 am

The British are coming, the British are coming, the British are..

Oh, wait. The British are HERE.

Today’s the official publication day for the release of the first American edition of KNAVES OVER QUEENS, in hardcovers from our friends at Tor Books. ((The British edition came out a year ago, in June 2018)). Look for it at your favorite local bookshop, or order it from your favorite online bookseller.

KNAVES OVER QUEENS is the twenty-sixth volume in the Wild Cards series… and the first to be set (mostly) in the British Isles. Like our very first volume, the action begins in 1946, when the wild card virus was first unleashed upon the world by Dr. Tod and those dastardly Takisians. WILD CARDS spanned forty years, from 1946 to 1986, but the focus was on the U.S., and New York City in particular. KNAVES OVER QUEENS covers an even longer time-span, right up to (almost) the present, but the view is from the other side of the Pond this time.

Our writers are a mix of English and Irish authors, many joining Wild Cards for the first time, and several American Anglophiles. The lineup:

KEVIN ANDREW MURPHY: “A Flint Lies in the Mud” and “But a Flint Holds Fire,”
PEADAR O GUILIN: “The Coming of the Crow,” “Cracks in the City,” and “Feeding on the Entrails,”
CAROLINE SPECTOR: “Needles and Pins,”
PAUL CORNELL: “Night Orders,”
CHARLES STROSS: “Police On My Back,”
MARKO KLOOS: “Probationary,”
PETER NEWMAN: “Twisted Logic,”
MELINDA M. SNODGRASS: “Ceremony of Innocence,”
EMMA NEWMAN: “How to Turn a Girl to Stone,”
MARK LAWRENCE: “The Visitor.”

Long- time fan favorites Captain Flint and Double Helix return in KNAVES, but you’ll also be meeting some terrific new aces, jokers, and (yes) knaves, including the Seamstress, the blood-thirsty Badh, the Green Man, Stonemaiden, and the Visitor.

Come on in and make their acquaintance.

Current Mood: bouncy bouncy

Tags: anthologies, editing, tor, wild cards

Chicago Gets Low

July 16, 2019 at 7:02 am

Hey, Wild Cards fans — did you miss LOW CHICAGO when it came out in hardcover last year?

No problem, you’ve got another chance. Our friends at Tor are releasing LOW CHCAGO today in paperback. You should be able to snag a copy at your favorite local bookstore (and if they don’t stock Wild Cards, find another favorite) or online bookseller.

An editor, like a parent, is supposed to love all his children equally… but c’mon, truth be told, parents have favorites and so do editors. LOW CHICAGO is one of mine. Maybe because I lived in the Windy City for several years when I was a starving young writer. Whatever the reason, this one was a delight to edit, and (I think) a ton of fun to read. Shared world books are the Rodney Dangerfield of anthologies; they get no respect at awards time (like shared world editors, though imnsho they are way harder to put together than an ordinary anthology). Which is a pity, because I think there are several stories in LOW CHICAGO that were worthy of Hugo and Nebula nominations. But hey, I’m hardly objective. You are all invited to read the book and decide for yourself. In the end it doesn’t matter. The awards are done, but the work remains, and it’s work that I am proud of… as are my contributors.

The lineup for LOW CHICAGO:

“A Long Night at the Palmer House” by John Jos. Miller
“Down the Rabbit Hole” by Kevin Andrew Murphy
“The Motherfucking Apotheosis of Todd Motherfucking Taszycki” by Christopher Rowe
“A Bit of a Dinosaur” by Paul Cornell
“‘Stripes” by Marko Kloos
“The Sister in the Streets” by Melinda M. Snodgrass
“A Beautiful Facade” by Mary Anne Mohanraj
“Meathooks on Ice” by Saladin Ahmed

Oh, and if you’re one of those who prefers hardcovers to paperbacks, have no fear. We have plenty of copies of the LOW CHICAGO hardback in stock at the bookstore at the Jean Cocteau Cinema, most of them AUTOGRAPHED… not just by me, but by many of the contributing authors.

Check out all the signed books at:

https://jeancocteaucinema.com/product-category/signed-books/

Current Mood: pleased pleased

Tags: anthologies, editing, tor, wild cards

Sharing A World

February 6, 2019 at 5:18 pm

Back in the 80s, when Wild Cards was born, shared worlds ruled the racks. THIEVES WORLD, ITHKAR, WAR WORLD, LIAVEK, HEROES IN HELL, GREYSTONE BAY, and on and on. New series were popping up every month. Today, only Wild Cards remains, still going strong after thirty-one years and twenty-seven volumes.

Writing for a shared world has some unique challenges, however. In August 2017, a large group of Wild Carders assembled at my Jean Cocteau Cinema in Santa Fe for a mass signing, and we interviewed them about the up and downs of writing other people’s characters, and having other people write yours.

Enjoy.

Current Mood: bouncy bouncy

Tags: anthologies, editing, tor, wild cards, writing

Hugo Recommendations – Editor

January 18, 2019 at 9:16 am

As I was saying… nominations are now open for the 2019 Hugo Awards, to be presented this August in Dublin. You need to be a member of either the Dublin worldcon, or last year’s gathering in San Jose, to nominate.

There are two rockets given for editing. As with drama, the editorial awards are split into Long Form and Short Form. In simple terms, the Long Form award is for those who edit books (novels, mostly), and the Short Form for magazine and anthology editors. (Before they split the award, the magazine editors won everything, and the book editors got nothing).

Lots and lots of good editors out there.

In Long Form, I recommend you strongly consider two of my own editors: ANNE LESLEY GROELL of Bantam Spectra/ Random Penguin in the US, and JANE JOHNSON of Harper Collins Voyager in the UK. Anne and Jane have both been doing amazing work for decades, and have been criminally unrecognized. Anne has only been nominated for a Hugo once, and Jane has never been a finalist at all… though she has been one of the major players in the British SF scene for as long as I can remember, and has built Voyager into one of the top UK genre publishers. Last year, both of them did some incredible work… especially for me. They were the editors on FIRE & BLOOD, my book of imaginary Westerosi history. Let’s look beyond the usual suspects this year, and nominate these two amazing women.

In Short Form… well, we have the usual suspects here as well, in a category usually dominated by the editors of the major magazines, both print and electronic. Anthology editors are eligible as well, however, so let me blush modestly and suggest that perhaps you might consider… well… me.

I have been editing the Wild Cards series since 1987, thirty one years and counting, and we’ve published some amazing stories over the years. I’ve edited my share of reprint anthologies and theme anthologies (many with Gardner Dozois), demanding gigs both, but neither one is as tenth as hard as editing a shared world anthology and pulling it all together. I did come in seventh on the long list once for my editorial work on Wild Cards (back when five works made the ballot), a decade or so back, but that’s the closest I’ve ever come. (No matter, it’s a labor of love, I sure don’t do it for the money). Wild Cards had an especially strong year in 2018, I believe. Though I’ve lost lots of Hugos as a writer, I’ve never lost one as a editor. Maybe this is the year.

Current Mood: hopeful hopeful

Tags: anthologies, awards, editing, hugo awards

Editing with Gardner

June 17, 2018 at 9:00 am

It has been a few weeks since Gardner Dozois died. I’m still having a hard time coming to grips with it. He was such a huge presence in the field, such a gigantic personality, it still seems inconceivable that he’s gone. I posted about our friendship below, about the laughter he brought with him wherever he went… but I wanted to write about his legacy as an editor as well.

It’s been harder than I anticipated. Every time I start this post, it hits me all over again, and I realize that I will never see him again.

I need to say something, though. Not for Gardner — there are dozens of memorials all over the net, speaking of his talents — but for myself.

There’s really not much that I can say that has not already been said. As an editor, I think, Gardner had few peers. Over the decades our genre has been fortunate in having a succession of amazing editors: H.L. Gold, Anthony Boucher, Terry Carr, Damon Knight, Robert Silverberg, Donald A. Wollheim, Cele Goldsmith Lalli, Ellen Datlow, Ben Bova, Ted White, Fred Pohl, and Groff Conklin all come to mind, and many more. But two figures tower above them all: John W. Campbell, the editorial genius who gave SF its Golden Age, for whom not one but two memorial awards are named… and Gardner Dozois. His stint as editor of Asimov’s can rightly be compared only with Campbell’s decades at Astounding and Analog, and was similarly influential. He discovered and nurtured more new talents than I could possibly remember or recount… among them, myself. Not at Asimov’s, no. I was already well established before Gardner got that gig. No, he found me long before, in his first editorial job… reading the slush pile at Galaxy. It was in that pile, in the summer of 1970, that he came across my short story “The Hero,” and passed it along to editor Ejler Jakobsson with a recommendation to buy. That was my first professional sale, and came during the summer between my senior and graduate years at Northwestern, when I starting to seriously contemplate what I wanted to do with my life. That sale, and the publication that followed, went a long way toward making that decision for me. It’s no exaggeration to say that I might not be where I am today if Gardner had not fished me out of the slush pile in 1970.

Many decades later, I had the honor and privilege of working beside Gardner on a series of anthologies that I am still very proud of. We were both huge Jack Vance fans, so the idea of a doing a Dying Earth anthology was a natural for us… and when Jack gave us permission, we were thrilled. SONGS OF THE DYING EARTH was a tribute anthology as well, and the best kind: one that Jack Vance was actually able to read and appreciate while he was still with us. I hope he liked reading that book (the tributes at least) as much as Gardner and I liked doing it.

I’ve never met anyone who was as well read in SF and fantasy as Gardner Dozois, but like me, that was never all he read. He loved mysteries and thrillers and historicals as well; so long as the tales were gripping and well told, he never cared what the imprint was on the spine. So the next thing we tackled after the Vance books were the crossgenre anthologies: massive books with very broad themes, featuring work from outstanding writers from a dozen different genres. WARRIORS was the first. It did so well that we soon followed it with DANGEROUS WOMEN and ROGUES. Those did even better. They won awards, got great reviews, and even more importantly, introduced thousands of readers to some great new writers they might never have encountered, if we hadn’t put them between covers with their familiar favorites. Gardner and I did a couple of fun genre mash-ups as well. There was DOWN THESE STRANGE STREETS, crossing private eye stories with fantasy and SF, and SONGS OF LOVE AND DEATH, an SF/ fantasy/ romance hybrid.

Last, but definitely not least, were our two “retro SF’ collections, OLD MARS and OLD VENUS. Damn, those were fun to do. Gardner and I shared a deep deep affection for the lost solar system of our youth, the Mars of the canals and dead cities and vanished races, the Venus of endless swamps and dinosaurs and web-footed Venusians. And we discovered, to our delight, that a lot of writers shared that love, and had been waiting all their lives for a chance to set a story on the Mars and Venus of yore. Those books were easy to edit; we had to beat off writers with a stick. Both books won awards.

The sad part is, it ended there. I didn’t want it to. Neither did Gardner. I loved working with him, and we had more anthologies we wanted to do. We wanted to follow OLD MARS and OLD VENUS with OLD LUNA, and maybe down the line OLD MERCURY, or a book set in the asteroids. Done retro, like the first two. We talked about doing more crossgenre books. A second WARRIORS, a second ROGUES, a second DANGEROUS WOMEN, maybe one called VILLAINS or HEROES or (this would have been fun) SIDEKICKS. The publishers were interested. The earlier books had sold very well. Gardner was interested. I was the one who demurred. As proud as I was of those books, as much as I enjoyed working with Gardner, I did not have the time. WINDS OF WINTER was late and getting later, and the editing had taken more of my time and energy than I thought it would. “I can’t take on anything more right now,” I told him. “We’ll do them later, once I’ve delivered WINDS.” So Gardner went on to edit THE BOOK OF SWORDS and THE BOOK OF MAGIC by himself (he could have edited all these books by himself, he never actually needed me, we just enjoyed working together). I contributed stories to both books (a reprint to MAGIC, since I did not have the time). There would be plenty of time to do ROGUES 2 and OLD LUNA and SIDEKICKS and all the rest, after all. All the time we needed. Just as soon as I got King Kong off my back… we even kicked around the notion of a reprint anthology we wanted to call THE HUGO LOSERS. After all, we were the guys who founded the Hugo Losers Party… just yesterday, in 1976….

We’d do all these books tomorrow. Next month. Next year. Real soon now.

Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow…

He’s gone now, and I fear he has taken all those books with him. I may edit other anthologies in the future (in addition to the Wild Cards series, which I imagine I’ll be editing till I join Gargy at the Great Worldcon in the Sky), but I could never bring myself to edit those particular books, the ones we had talked about doing together. It just wouldn’t feel right.

Gardner Dozois won fifteen Hugo Awards as Best Editor, a record that will never be broken, I expect. He and I won some Locus Awards and a World Fantasy Award as well, and I will always cherish those. It was an honor to know him, and to work with him. I miss him so much.

Current Mood: melancholy

Tags: anthologies, editing, life and death

Coming In October

March 24, 2018 at 12:42 pm

This is going to be an epic year for all you Wild Cards fans out there.

Let’s see. In June we have LOW CHICAGO, coming out from Tor in the US, and KNAVES OVER QUEENS, scheduled for release from Voyager in the UK. But that’s not the end of it. On October 23, look for TEXAS HOLD ‘EM.

TEXAS HOLD ‘EM is the final book in the America Triad, and the twenty-seventh volume of the overall series… but no, it’s not necessary to have read the first twenty-six to enjoy this one. In fact, it’s not even necessary to have read MISSISSIPPI ROLL and LOW CHICAGO (though we hope you will).

The table of contents:

Caroline Spector “Bubbles and the Band Trip”
Max Gladstone “The Secret Life of Rubberband”
William F. Wu “Jade Blossom’s Brew”
Diana Rowland “Beats, Bugs, and Boys”
Walton Simons “Is Nobody Going to San Antone?”
Victor Milan “Dust and the Darkness”
David Anthony Durham “Drop City”

That gorgeous cover is by Michael Komarck, who has been doing stunning work for Wild Cards since Tor relaunched the series. I hope you guys remembered to nominate him for a Hugo, he certainly deserves one. (And I hope to remembered to nominate Wild Cards for Best Series too. Thirty-one years, twenty-seven books, we’re all pretty proud of the work we’ve done, and will continue to do).

TEXAS HOLD ‘EM is available for preorder now.

On other Wild Cards fronts, check out the latest post on the WC blog at http://www.wildcardsworld.com/blog/ where Miss Wild Cards answers your questions. And keep an eye out for new Wild Cards stories over at Tor.com. If you haven’t read Vic Milan’s “EverNight” yet, you should… and we have new original WC tales coming up from Caroline Spector and Bradley Denton, Max Gladstone, and Marko Kloos. All FREE!

Current Mood: satisfied

Tags: anthologies, artwork, wild cards

Not a Blog

The Amazing Ellen

Sharing A World

Editing with Gardner

Coming In October

Latest Month

Recent Posts

Syndicate