Life has had a lot of ups and downs lately. (Expect some personal posts. I usually don’t make personal posts, but now I think I should!) I didn’t forget about the Emerald Spires project, though.

A brief recap: Emerald Spires is going to be an online SF magazine focusing on critical review of content by and about people who belong to underrepresented groups, with a few reprints of original works that are not available online, sprinkled in. I intend to run a small fundraiser soon to enable me to take the time to set up the website, the printing (yes, there’s going to be a print version, though possibly not right away) and other initial costs.

One of the fundraiser rewards is going to be a small collection of reprints I’ve already bought for the first five issues of Emerald Spires – three short stories, a flash story and a poem. These reprints will be made available at the site for free as the issues come out, but those of you who will decide to support the project will get them all together in a nice DRM-free epub or mobi file, much earlier! (I intend to have all rewards finished by the time the fundraiser launches, so even if there are any further delays with the project, those won’t affect your rewards. You’ll get them right away!)

Here is the long-awaited lineup:

* To Follow the Waves by Amal El-Mohtar

First appeared in: Steam-Powered – Lesbian Steampunk Stories, ed. JoSelle Vanderhooft

* Plucked from the Horo by Rose Lemberg

First appeared in: Mythic Delirium #27, ed. Mike Allen

* Flash Frame by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

First appeared in: Cthulhurotica, ed. Carrie Cuinn

* Superior Firepower by Alex Shvartsman

First appeared in: Bards & Sages Quarterly July 2011, ed. Julie Ann Dawson

* Mama’s Sword by Ada Hoffmann

First appeared in: Blood Iris 2012, ed. SM Reine

There will also be a short foreword in which I tell you why these authors and stories are awesome. Every author belongs to at least two underrepresented groups, by my count. This is not the Oppression Olympics and it turned out this way by accident (just belonging to one is enough for inclusion!), but it’s interesting to see.

I also have a cover! I might end up hammering at it a bit more, I’m still not perfectly satisfied with it, but it’s going to look more or less like this.

The monstrous eye-thing is a monstrous eye-thing. (Someone asked if it was a vagina fish. No, it’s not a vagina fish, at least it wasn’t intended to be one.) I drew it a while ago, just messing around in Inkscape, and I decided it would fit the theme of “first look”, especially since the minianthology has a slight horror bent.

All this large type is to make everyone stand out even at thumbnail image sizes since there aren’t that many authors. The green line on top is there because I will also provide personalized copies. That’s where my personal message to you is going to go

I am back after an absence. I’m sorry! I had so many things going on in my personal life that I really wasn’t up to updating the site. Things are calming down and now I can provide you with more great free SF. But first, an announcement…

I am no longer associated with Expanded Horizons in any capacity, due to irreconcilable personal differences with Dash that had nothing to do with the magazine. I still appreciate the magazine and unless something unexpected happens, I will continue to promote upcoming issues!

Something nice about Expanded Horizons: Brit Mandelo reviewed the last issue I’d worked on for tor.com. A sample:

“Overall, the stories in these sorts of publications tend to be more raw, like an uncut diamond, but that’s where much of the pleasure of reading comes from: they’re exciting, they push boundaries, they go into territory or experiment with style in ways that might not be welcomed in a more mainstream venue.”

I usually don’t update on Fridays because I’m busy getting things done before Shabbat, but I just found something! (Thanks are due to András Tóth, who made a remark on Twitter which reminded me to look it up.)

While I was busy feeling very unwell and even more unwell, my theoretical paper “Toward a Quantitative Semiotics?” was published in Twenty Years of Theoretical Linguistics in Budapest (eds. Ferenc Kiefer and Zoltán Bánréti). It was originally a conference presentation and it was surprisingly well-received, even though it was rather unconventional. BTW the conference was also fascinating and I was very sad I had to leave early and not listen to all the presenters because I was so sick. Very TMI stuff was involved and I’d rather spare you a retelling.

The paper is available online so you can read it. It got a very favorable response during the anonymous peer review too, but I don’t know anyone else who’s read it Well, now you can!

Here you can download my paper and the entire book. You can also buy a physical copy.

…I frankly don’t dare re-read it right away, I wrote it a long time ago. (For all I know, it became dated in all this time!) I suppose I will read it sometime after Shabbat IY”H and catch up on recent developments in the field. I’d also like to do follow-up empirical research now that my health is on the upswing after years of not being able to do much, academically speaking or even otherwise.

As I’ve said a few posts ago, I’m now working hard at regaining physical strength, which is a must since my spine is weak and malformed and has to be supported by strong torso musculature. This is a completely different health issue, but it was exacerbated by my recent illness, especially in the past half a year. Since in the past six months I was mostly in various kinds of semi-supine positions (lying in bed with a heavy pillow, draped over the sofa, being a quivering pulp of flesh in a reclining chair etc. ) and the maximum amount of exercise I could do was some light poi spinning before re-assuming a more horizontal position, I lost a lot of muscle and have quite a ways to go. I am now capable of up to 20 minutes of sustained heavy exercise involving large chunks of metal but that’s still nowhere near ideal. Anyway, B”H there has been quite an improvement.

If any of you are recovering from illness of any kind, I recommend SuperBetter. It’s fun, free and colorful. You can do it with your friends! There is only an iPhone app but I just use the website, I don’t think an app is necessary since updating doesn’t take a lot of time. (I don’t have an iPhone, it’s very expensive and I don’t like Apple products.)

Anyway, I’m just saying that I can start to reorganize my life now that I can actually move around and do things. So this might mean more research papers, working on my PhD, all sorts of things. I also want to keep doing the reviews and finally launch the Emerald Spires fundraiser! I just want to make sure I have all the rewards finished before I start, I don’t want to end up in a situation where rewards are delayed. So you’ll get rewards right away, I’m working on them!

Wishing you all a great Shabbat and/or a happy weekend!

First, I have to apologize for the lack of reviews. I’ve been working on the Emerald Spires ebooks and trying to regain my physical strength. Time flies like a banana! Or something like that, anyway.

Announcements follow – I think I already talked everyone’s ears off about all of these on Twitter, so if you follow me on Twitter, even more apologies!

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Julia Rios interviewed Rose Lemberg in Strange Horizons. Rose also mentioned my work – I’m extremely grateful! There is also Ada and Sofia and lots of cool stuff AND ROSE’S NOVEL YOU HEAR. I’ve read and commented on the first draft (actually back when I was still very unwell, this was a ray of light in a land of misery!) and I can tell you it’s just as good as it sounds from the teaser.

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I’ve been waiting for the ToC post to announce it, but it’s been put up earlier today, so I can link to it – I’ve sold a story to Sword and Mythos, the upcoming pro-rate anthology by Innsmouth Free Press. It’s titled Spirit Forms of the Sea and it’s about Ancient Hungarians traipsing around the Croatian seashore. Also, people getting eaten, because Cthulhu.

The anthology will include a lot more Lovecraftian sword & sorcery stories set around the world! This was the description on the fundraiser page:

What kind of anthology will Sword and Mythos be? Well, it’ll have the sword and sorcery flavor you are looking for, but it will also thread further into unexplored reaches. Why should the worlds of wizards and heroes be limited to faux-European shores? We plan to look for international writers who can provide unusual backdrops and points of view. We want to feature tales of daring female warriors. We will look for kick-ass female writers, established authors and new voices. In short, we want to excite and inspire. We want to take you from cold mountains where icy palaces hide dark terrors, to distant deserts where ghouls roam in the sand dunes, and beautiful pagodas which shadow wizards of might and magic.

Does that sound cool? (It does. Otherwise I wouldn’t have submitted!) I suppose my story is more “bow and sorcery” than “sword and sorcery”, you’ll see! Now you can take a look at the table of contents. I’d also like to bring your attention to Nelly Geraldine García-Rosas, a Mexican writer whose story Tloque Nahuaque was in my Virtual Anthology – Best Free Online SF of 2011.

This was my first pro-rate fiction sale in English! (I suppose I can consider Strange Horizons a pro-rate poetry sale, though I have no idea what counts as a pro market for SF poetry, really. I suspect no one does.) But while I was waiting for the ToC post to announce this, I sold something else too…

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I also have a story forthcoming in Apex Magazine, titled Recordings of a More Personal Nature. It’s ancient-era secondary-world fantasy, with some quasi-Jewish elements. I can blame more than a few things in it on daf yomi. Except the whole torture part, you know. That I can only blame on myself!

*runs away*

Just a few remarks before I resume posting reviews and more information about the Emerald Spires launch -

First, I added an anti-spam ticky box to the comments field. This looks less annoying and more accessible than captchas, but let me know if any of you have issues with it!

I haven’t had any spam filtering lately, for a rather ridiculous reason: I got a lot of funny spam, and I also got a lot of spam which complimented me on the site. When I was feeling really unwell because of my health problems, it was nice to see a bunch of comments telling me I was cool, even though I knew they were of course automated. Now I’m feeling better (the surgery seems to have helped!) so I think I can do without the spammy encouragement! Of course, non-spammy encouragement is always welcome…

I still have quite a ways to go, I’ve gotten very weak in the past half a year, mostly due to disabling amounts of joint pain. Now that it seems to be gone, I’d love to jump back into all kinds of physical activity, but my body can’t quite take it yet. So I need to take it slowly, and this is very frustrating because I am an impatient person!

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Second, I’ve sold a few things lately – first, an audio reprint of The Oracle of DARPA to Toasted Cake, narrated by Tina Connolly. I’ve already talked about how I enjoy her narration, so this is great news! …I think I forgot to post about it because it happened right before my surgery. A friend of mine just reminded me of it, so here you go!

I’ve also sold a story to a very cool themed anthology with a very nice pay rate, but I’m waiting for the ToC announcement before posting about it here. I’ve already squeed about it on Twitter, so some of you probably know about it…

After a long wait, the new issue of Expanded Horizons is finally up!

Bullet points, because I like bullet points:

* 4 authors total

* 3 stories and a poem

* 4 authors of color

* 3 women authors

* 2 Black authors

* 2 authors from the Philippines!

Go check it out now

I also just got a bunch of reviewer copies of comics from the Philippines from  Charles Tan. I have a lot of stuff to review even besides these comics! My health is improving, but that also means I have a lot of catching up to do. Expect all sorts of announcements soon… (G-d willing, as usual.)

In the meanwhile you can submit all your great stories to Expanded Horizons

I didn’t intend to post anything today and now it’s almost Shabbat, but I’ve just realized that today was the anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s spaceflight and I actually have something relevant I can show you.

(FYI: Eastern bloc holiday / Western bloc holiday, note the trendy rebranding. *rolleyes* )

I translated this Hungarian rock song for a few friends a month or two ago, so I just need to paste it here for you. I removed some of the repetition to make it easily readable. The songwriter was fond of surreal imagery, the flamethrower is not a mistranslation.

The video I embed here is a fanvid, but it’s extremely awesome and it uses archival footage. (My apologies to those who don’t listen to recorded music during sfirat haomer. Keep this for later, you won’t regret it! Or just watch it without sound because the pictures are beautiful enough.)

Gagarin by Republic

My friends underground
my lovers in the sky
it’s not allowed to run away from here
as long as the Sun is above my head
Silence talks if you listen to it
it says something instead of us
My friends underground,
when will we be together again?

The flamethrower, the flamethrower flares
Bites the dust, bites the dust
The little angel, the little angel on fire
As the rock throbs, as the rock throbs
That’s my heart
Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin
Round and round and round and round and round
Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin
Just this once, return to Earth
Just this once, return to Earth
Travel, travel, travel, travel, travel
Run from one place to another
Round and round and round and round and round
Just this once, return to Earth

I think it might be possible some other way
but this is the only thing left for me,
wouldn’t exchange it for anything else
This road here and this house,
they guard all my treasures
Dangers come and wonders
I’d float away in your eyes

Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin
Round and round and round and round and round
Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin, Gagarin
Just this once, return to Earth
Just this once, return to Earth

Since I’m in a list-making mood and this came up on Twitter, here’s another list… of Eastern Europeans on the English-language SF scene. This time with hyperlinks!

Inclusion criteria: you need to be Eastern European, living anywhere in the world, and be active (or have been active recently) in the English-language genre scene. This can mean stuff published in English, or having a blog, or just a Twitter/LJ/etc. account, I don’t want to set the bar high. People should be active though, “I read SF in English” would include millions of people, I think. Also, people who have had their work translated by other people but who themselves aren’t active on the scene probably shouldn’t go on it either. But people who blog primarily not in English but are otherwise active on the scene or have published SF stories in English should go on it. (Note that this means that not all links point to stuff in English!)

To keep the list from becoming confusing, people who are only active on a group blog are not listed separately, people who have other activity besides posting on a group blog are listed individually.

This is meant to be a comprehensive list, so if you want to be added, comment! (Don’t forget to add links to your stuff, if I missed you, I’m probably not aware of your work!)

Last update: Apr 18 2013, 17:37

Individuals:

* Anatoly Belilovsky / loldoc - @loldoc – Russian (+ Jewish) living in the US – writes stories, is on Twitter

* Milena Benini / Milerama – @milerama – Croatian living in Croatia – writes stories, blogs about genre, is on Twitter / Tumblr

* Tom Crosshill - @tomcrosshill – Latvian living in Latvia – writes stories, is on Twitter

* Csilla Kleinheincz – @HannaCsilla – Hungarian (+ Vietnamese) living in Hungary – writes stories, is on Twitter (but tweets in Hungarian)

* Rose Lemberg - @RoseLemberg – Russian (+ Jewish + Israeli) living in the US – writes stories, blogs about genre, is on Twitter

* Judit Lőrinczy – Hungarian living in Hungary – writes stories, blogs about genre (in English on sfmag.hu, see below)

* Haralambi Markov – @HaralambiMarkov – Bulgarian living in Bulgaria – blogs about genre, is on Twitter

* Ieva Melgalve – @IevaMelgalve – Latvian living in Latvia – writes stories, blogs about genre, is on Twitter

* Next Friday - @Next__Friday – Russian living in the US – blogs about genre, is on Twitter

* Ekaterina Sedia - @esedia – Russian living in the US – writes stories, blogs about genre, is on Twitter

* Alex Shvartsman – @AShvartsman – Russian (+ Jewish) living in the US – writes stories, blogs about genre, is on Twitter

* Julia Sidorova – Russian living in the US – writes stories, blogs about genre

* Bogi Takács / prezzey – @tzniuswarrior – Hungarian (+ Jewish) living in Hungary – writes stories, blogs about genre, is on Twitter

* Igor Teper – Russian living in the US – writes stories

* Vic / pixelherd – @pixelherd – Ukrainian living in the UK – is on Twitter

* Aleksandar Žiljak – Croatian living in Croatia – writes stories, blogs about genre (on CroSF, see below)

Group blogs:

* CroSF – Croatian

* SFmag.hu English section – Hungarian

I need more information about:

* Sergey Gerasimov – had a story in Apex World SF 2 which is not listed as a translation, can someone confirm?

Similar lists from elsewhere in the world:

This category needs a lot of expansion, please comment if you have a list!

* Malaysian science fiction and fantasy writers in English – collected by Zen Cho

Big huge thank yous:

Anatoly Belilovsky for recommending people

Liz Argall asked for awesome women writers in genre fiction who might not be known to a larger audience. Here’s a list with Twitter handles! (Sorry, haven’t web-ified the list.)

And probably a lot more, these are just off the top of my head. There are also non-binary-gendered people whose writing I appreciate (can we also have a Nonbinary people in genre month?).

Asterisks after names mean “non-binary-gendered author and also identifies as a woman among other gender identities”, other nonbinary people who do not identify as women to my knowledge are noted in the list itself.

Note that the list is still in a state of flux! Also, it includes my personal recommendations, it’s not a complete list of women and/or nonbinary people in genre.

* Helena Bell – @helbell
* Polenth Blake* – @polenth
* Joyce Chng – @jolantru
* Zen Cho – @zenaldehyde
* Tina Connolly – @tinaconnolly
* Thoraiya Dyer
* Alex Dally MacFarlane* – @foxvertebrae
* Ada Hoffmann – @xasymptote
* Anne Ivy (pseudonym of two women authors)
* Xia Jia
* Ann Leckie – @ann_leckie
* Rose Lemberg* – @roselemberg
* Grace Lin
* Shira Lipkin* – @shadesong
* Rochita Loenen-Ruiz – @rcloenenruiz
* Brit Mandelo* – @britmandelo
* Jennifer Mason-Black – @cosdrift
* Amal El-Mohtar – @tithenai
* Shweta Narayan*
* Yukimi Ogawa
* An Owomoyela – @an_owomoyela [Neutrois author]
* A. Merc Rustad – @merc_hyn_di [Neutrois author]
* Benjanun Sriduangkaew – @bees_ja
* Sofia Samatar
* Shveta Thakrar – @shvetathakrar
* Nghi Vo

Also, if you’re interested, here are my reviews of stories from 2012, also sorted by topic, including author categories like women authors. (Here’s how to get more specific, eg women of color)

Polenth Blake also has a post with a list!

Feel free to comment with more recs

For today I have a single story from Strange Horizons. I’m sorry I haven’t posted much lately – between health issues, work and different health issues, I just haven’t been able to do so. I’ve also been deluged with spam, so apologies if your comments and trackbacks aren’t visible yet!

But! I have an announcement to make. (Actually two other announcements too, but I want to space them out a bit.) Ada Hoffmann wrote me a story for my birthday last year – The Mother of All Squid Builds a Library included cephalopods and other things definitely of interest to me I’m very pleased to say the story just won the Friends of the Merrill Collection Contest, which comes with a nice cash prize. Congrats Ada, and thanks again! I’m happy to have inspired the story, and happy to have read it.

Congrats are also due to Silvia Moreno-Garcia, who was a finalist. I’m happy to see friendly faces on award lists!

And now, on to the story…

Town’s End by Yukimi Ogawa  小川 幸生 (a Japanese woman)

from Strange Horizons, Mar 2013 / Audiobook version / 3869 words

Contemporary fantasy with Japanese folklore and a young woman working at a marriage agency. I really like Yukimi Ogawa’s stories and I’m happy to see her get published more and more often. She also has a great piece in the upcoming Clockwork Phoenix 4; I’ve just finished reading my reviewer copy.

Town’s End telegraphs its twist so much I’m not sure I should call it a twist, but that somehow doesn’t become a negative. It’s a charming story, more fast-paced and adventure-oriented than I’d expected. With the sexual topic and the danger of sexual violence, it still manages to be a light but not carefree read.