Category Archives: Publication

Coming Soon – TUSK

Publication

Feet to trample,
Trunk to crush,
Men become Man-slaves,
Or die in the dust.
Look how they tremble,
And bow to the tusk!

fragment of elephant script, age unknown.

–

Clad in iron, proud and decadent, the elephants rule. The lords of ancient Tusk grind the world beneath their feet. Humanity is in chains. A calf is born, and a slave will rise…

The first chapter of Tusk can be read in issue #1 of Terra Magazine, appearing soon at a newsagent near you. More information can be found here: http://www.terramagazine.com.au/

(Picture comes courtesy of the talented Rhys James)

After the World – it’s back and it’s BAD-ASS.

Pimping, Publication, Writing

Following the release of novellas “Killable Hours” and my own “Gravesend”, Black House Comics have upped the ante. Not only is the After the World saga continuing, it’s been expanded from a standalone novella into a full-fledged fiction anthology, available in newsagents around Australia (and online). You’ll still find a zombie apocalypse novella in each bimonthly issue of After the World, but now each instalment is accompanied by some fantastic fiction, with a bit of something for everyone.

Issue 3 is headed up by Jason Franks’ “Pack Rules”, an absolute hum-dinger of a story set in the same shared universe as the first two books. I’ve had the privilege of already reading this piece, and it knocked my socks off. Bikers scavenging for supplies in a zombie ravaged Melbourne; the residents of an upper-class apartment, holed up and terrified; a pack of feral dogs abandoned, desperate to survive in a world where dead monsters walk.

A whole swag of other fiction can be found in this magazine, including tales of science fiction, horror, and just plain weirdness. My contribution to this issue is the slipstream “A Clockwork Arthur”, where the argot of Nadsat meets the downfall of Camelot. To top it all off, look at that cover. Just look at it! Jason Paulos at his finest.

(image nicked from http://blackhousecomics.com/articles/after-the-world–anthology—issue-3-out-now.html)

Future issues will include my sequels to “Gravesend”, the upcoming “Corpus Christi”, and the third instalment “Army Corpse”. These two are intended to make Gravesend look like a trip to Disneyland, and hopefully folks get a kick out of seeing the surviving characters from the first book (and the bad things I do to them – oh so bad).

After the World can be found in your local newsagent, or can be ordered online via this link: http://www.blackboox.net/after-the-world-pack-rules-issue-3/

Aspiring writers, here are the submission guidelines for this very cool publication, check it out: http://blackhousecomics.com/submissions-for-after-the-world.html

StoryPortals, launched and live

Publication, Writing,

A while ago, I successfully auditioned for a spot in a shared universe, because playing in someone else’s backyard is always good fun. Each author got to use the main character of Katya, a capable assassin in a bizarre Byzantian setting, and it was an absolute hoot to write this. The good news is that these stories have just gone live, the even better news is that they are all available for free at the following website:

http://storyportals.com/

My story “Dead Letters” is one of the forthcoming pieces, but if you register as a member on the site (free membership) you will get access to these stories as they are released for public viewing. The first handful of Katya stories are now live, and two other serials will also be launched on the site in the near future. Editor Larry Segriff has attracted some seriously good writers to this project, including authors of D&D novels and some of my WotF buddies too. The setting is rich and detailed, much along the lines of the early Forgotten Realms, and as far as characters go Katya is seriously, seriously cool.

Katya, Lady Assassin

(image nicked from here: http://storyportals.com/series/katya-lady-assassin)

The resurrection of “Tusk” – ANNOUNCING TERRA MAGAZINE

Announcement, Publication, Writing

Sometimes, the best anecdotes involve those things that didn’t quite work out. In writing circles, we’ve all got that project that crashed and burned, the one that got away, the thing that for whatever reason lost its mojo, usually after a lot of effort, time, and heartache.

One of my favourite failure anecdotes was to talk about Tusk. This was a novel I wrote in 2004, the product of the Colin Thiele Literature Scholarship that I received from the SA Youth Arts Board. I was fortunate enough to be mentored by local fantasy author Tony Shillitoe, and over the course of 18 months or so I wrote this novel to the best of my abilities.

The tagline for Tusk is this: telepathic elephants enslave mankind. Planet of the Elephants, or as Tony called it “Gladiator in Grey”. So I spent a large chunk of time/money writing this book, sent it to one place, got a rejection, buried it in a drawer and it physically pained me to look at this MS forever afterwards. Again, we’re talking the journeyman stage of my career, where the sting of rejection is a brutal thing.

This was 2005 me. 2011 me is much older, much wiser, and much more ruthless. Especially when it comes to editing. So, after many years of fermenting, Tusk has once more seen the light of day, and has been polished to within an inch of its life. Even better than that, it’s already found a really awesome home.

Which brings me to the next part of this announcement. Black Glass Press have teamed up with the folks at Black House Comics to come up with a new regular anthology comic, called Terra Magazine. There are some brilliant (nay, award-winning) folks from comic circles involved with this project, and there’s a bit of everything in this book. It’s a bit like 2000AD, in that there are ongoing serial stories, you will soon find it on the shelves in your local newsagent, and there’s never a dull moment.

This book has got samurai, detectives, freaks in space, sorcery, yakuza, and cyborg lunatics. Terra Magazine is also the new home for Tusk, which will now be released as a serial story, illustrated prose much like Gaiman’s original stardust. It’s the only non-comic instalment, and will appear in each issue.

There’s some more info about Terra Magazine here:

http://www.terramagazine.com.au/

and a press release here:

http://www.blackglasspress.com/component/content/article/58-terra-magazine.html

Debut Collection: EVERYTHING IS A GRAVEYARD, Ticonderoga Publications

Announcement, Pimping, Publication

In today’s exciting news, Ticonderoga Publications have just announced the forthcoming publication of my first short story collection. You cannot wipe the smile from my face! Here’s the official press release:

—

Ticonderoga Publications is proud to announce the forthcoming publication of a collection of stories by the writer of the future Jason Fischer.

Adelaide-based Fischer is a Clarion South graduate and recent winner of the Writers of the Future competition.

The collection is titled Everything is a Graveyard, and is scheduled for publication in late 2013.

The exact contents are still to be finalised.

The collection will revolve around Fischer’s critically acclaimed post-apocalyptic and zombie-themed work.

Everything is a Graveyard will also include new stories original to the collection.

“Jason Fischer taps into the darker sides of human nature like few other writers,” Ticonderoga Editor Russell B Farr said.

“His work blends raw emotion with an honest sense of mortality,” Farr added.

The collection is scheduled for publication in October 2013. The collection will be available in limited edition hardcover, ebook and trade editions.

(from http://ticonderogapublications.com/tp/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=156:announcement-debut-collection-by-jason-fischer&catid=94:everything-is-a-graveyard&Itemid=131)

Contents for Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror Announced

Publication

Some great news that I can finally reveal to the world. My short story “The School Bus” (from Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine #46) is going to be reprinted in the Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror, from Ticonderoga Publications. This is going to be an absolute door-stop of a book, cram-packed with quality short stories from Australia’s best and brightest. I think I’m gonna shell out for the hard-cover version of this, and pop it onto the brag shelf with pride 🙂 even better, once more I get to share a print collection with many of my buddies and peeps, which is always a nice feeling.

Here’s the press release, with the full (and rather impressive) table of contents. That’s some nice work, folks! 

—-

Ticonderoga Publications is walking on sunshine to announce the contents for its inaugural Year’s Best Australian Fantasy and Horror anthology.

Editors Liz Grzyb and Talie Helene have produced a list of 33 excellent tales by some of Australia’s biggest names as well as some emerging writers.

The anthology collects 150,000 words of the best stories published last year from the Antipodes.

“We’re pleased with the number of fabulous stories that were published in 2010 that we had to choose from,” Liz Grzyb said.

“You could hold this anthology up against any international collection – Australians rock for diverse voices, imagination, and compelling writing,” Talie Helene added.

The stories are (alphabetically by writer):

  • RJ Astruc: “Johnny and Babushka”
  • Peter M Ball: “L’esprit de L’escalier”
  • Alan Baxter: “The King’s Accord”
  • Jenny Blackford: “Mirror”
  • Gitte Christensen: “A Sweet Story”
  • Matthew Chrulew: “Schubert By Candlelight”
  • Bill Congreve: “Ghia Likes Food”
  • Rjurik Davidson: “Lovers In Caeli-Amur”
  • Felicity Dowker: “After the Jump”
  • Dale Elvy: “Night Shift”
  • Jason Fischer: “The School Bus”
  • Dirk Flinthart: “Walker”
  • Bob Franklin: “Children’s Story”
  • Christopher Green: “Where We Go To Be Made Lighter”
  • Paul Haines: “High Tide At Hot Water Beach”
  • L.L. Hannett: “Soil From My Fingers”
  • Stephen Irwin: “Hive”
  • Gary Kemble: “Feast Or Famine”
  • Pete Kempshall: “Brave Face”
  • Tessa Kum: “Acception”
  • Martin Livings: “Home”
  • Maxine McArthur: “A Pearling Tale”
  • Kirstyn McDermott: “She Said”
  • Andrew McKiernan: “The Memory Of Water”
  • Ben Peek: “White Crocodile Jazz”
  • Simon Petrie: “Dark Rendezvous”
  • Lezli Robyn: “Anne-droid of Green Gables”
  • Angela Rega: “Slow Cookin’ “
  • Angela Slatter: “The Bone Mother”
  • Angela Slatter & LL Hannett: “The February Dragon”
  • Grant Stone: “Wood”
  • Kaaron Warren: “That Girl”
  • Janeen Webb: “Manifest Destiny”

In addition to the above incredible tales, the volume will include a review of 2010 and a list of recommended stories.

The editors will shortly begin reading for the second volume of The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror.

The anthology is scheduled for publication in June 2011. The anthology will be available in hardcover, ebook and trade editions and may be pre-ordered at http://indiebooksonline.com.

Midnight Echo #6 Table of Contents

Publication

Without further ado, it’s time to announce the Table of Contents for issue #6 of Midnight Echo, the magazine of the Australian Horror Writers Association. The theme for the issue was science fiction/horror, and we’ve picked some absolute beauties for you!

  • “Out Hunting for Teeth” by Joanne Anderton
  • “Trawling the Void” by Alan Baxter
  • “Silver-Clean” by Jenny Blackford
  • “Graveyard Orbit” by Shane Jiraiya Cummings
  • “More Matter, Less Art” by Stephen Dedman
  • “Seeds” by Mark Farrugia
  • “Earth Worms” by Cody Goodfellow
  • “The Wanderer in the Darkness” by Andrew J McKiernan
  • “Dead Low” by Cat Sparks
  • “Surgeon Scalpelfingers” by Helen Stubbs

This issue will also contain interviews with Chris Moore and another well known sci fi author who will be announced later, and all sorts of other bits and pieces. I can promise you some great fiction from these fantastic authors, who’ve done a top job of exploring our SF/Horror theme, as originally conceived by David Conyers. These are all quite meaty reads, and we’ve done our best to keep it all killer, no filler.

Many thanks to my fellow co-editors, David Conyers and David Kernot, who were absolute legends in helping pull this together, and to Leigh Blackmore and the rest of the Midnight Echo team for their hard work behind the scenes. Not sure of the actual publication date just yet, but will post more when this information comes to light.

Congratulations to the successful authors!

Midnight Echo #5, about to be released into the wild

Publication

Check out this bad boy:

midnightecho#5cover

That’s right, issue #5 of Midnight Echo is about to go live. This issue contains two of my stories, “Hunting Rufus” and “Goggy”, winner of this year’s AHWA Flash Fiction competition. The added bonus – both pieces are actually written in the same setting (the appearance of them both in the same mag was completely unintended, and they were written something like 4 years apart?)

Anyhow, it looks like a great issue, and contains a brilliant TOC, including a piece by one of my writing idols, Terry Dowling. Other folks include my homies Chris Green and Felicity Dowker, and more horror stories than you poke a blood-soaked scary stick at. AHWA members should be able to download this from the website soon, and the print version should be out in the next couple of weeks.

EDIT: How could I forget mentioning Mark Farrugia’s graphic story?? I told you this mag has everything.

 Get onto it, it’s a cracker of an issue and from a quick scan of the PDF, I promise you that it’s well worth reading.

“The House of Nameless” now available as a free e-book

Pimping, Publication, Writing,

My Writers of the Future winning story “The House of Nameless” is now available on Smashwords as a free e-book, available in several different formats. While I’ve ostensibly released this free version onto the world for Ditmar reasons (with the full blessing of the publishers at Galaxy Press) it’s also my trial run at formatting and managing an e-book. It’s also quite hard to get hold of the WOTF anthologies in Australian stores, so if anyone’s interested in seeing the type of story that gets into the book, here is one example. These anthologies are all available through Amazon, and now via Kindle as well – they also contain many words of wisdom from the best-selling judges, which are well worth the small download fee. If you want a hard copy, you will generally have to order these in (hence this e-book experiment to raise some 11th hour awareness of my story). 

This story can be downloaded here: http://www.smashwords.com/books/view/43525

If you enjoyed “The House of Nameless” and want to consider nominating it for this year’s Ditmar Awards, the form can be found here: http://ditmars.sf.org.au/2011/nominations.html . There are oodles of other most worthy works that you may also want to nominate, an almost exhaustive list can be found at the following wiki: http://wiki.sf.org.au/2011_Ditmar_eligibility_list