May Australian Spec Fic Carnival

For your viewing pleasure:

A is for Anachronisms and Agents

• Jennifer Fallon reminds writers to get the language right.
• Karen Miller has an article about getting agents.
• Ben Peek will be played by Jamie Hyneman.

B is for Book Trailers and Bad Books

• Jeremy Gordon examines their viability and effect on the reader.
• Glenda Larke on the CBCA speakers and the value of bad books (other notes on Lili Wilkinson’s blog and here).

C is for Casting

• Karen Miller suggests a cast list for Empress on My Book, The Movie.
• Last chance to cast Sabriel, which is heading for Hollywood.
• DragonKat takes to the screen with a video review of The Host.
• Jack Ryder announces Shorter & Sweeter is on the road. Now. Last chance to catch it in Queensland today and tomorrow.

D is for Deadlines and Divination

• Gillian Polack reminds us of the looming date for the Conflux short story competition.
• Horrorscope points out the closing date for the AHWA Flash & Short Story Competition and gives a last call for details for the Australian Dark Fiction Promotion Project.
• The Shiny short story competition has been cancelled.
• Tessa has a prediction about tomorrow.

E is for Effort

• Glenda Larke blogs on Tiptree and Gender and whether it was once easier.

F is for Formatting

• Jennifer Fallon lays out the basics on manuscript formatting.
• A hat-tip to Heroine Content whose hosting of the 21st Carnival of Science Fiction and Fantasy Fans prompted the alphabetisation of this Carnival.

G is for Georgian

• Girlie Jones gives redirections to New Ceres.
• DragonKat and Girlie Jones and Horrorscope annouce New Ceres, The Anthology, is now open for submissions.

H is for Honours

• Justine Larbalestier points out some familiar names in the Locus Awards finalists lists.
• VoyagerOnline notes five Locus finalists from the New Space Opera anthology.
• DragonKat spots more Aussies at Locus.
• Jason Fischer celebrates David Kernot’s honourable mention from Writers of the Future.
• Karen Miller was nominated at Romantic Times and for the Tiptree.
• Gary Kemble wins One Book Many Brisbanes and is briefly interviewed by Jason Nahrung.
• Jonathan Strahan notes Shaun Tan and Ben Templesmith’s inclusion in the Eisner Awards nominations.
• Anita Bell (“as far as I know, that made it into any of the shortlists in any category”) and Simon Higgins (fantasy) win at the FAW National Literary Awards: PDF of announcement.

I is for Interrogation

• Kylie Chan is interviewed on the Voyager blog.
• At the Specusphere, Satima Flavell interviews Sean Williams.
• Glenda Larke posts her Orbit interview (second part here).
• Karen Miller gets interviewed by Grasping for the Wind and the Specusphere.
• Simon Haynes posts interviews with Kelly McCullough, Jenna Black, Tate Hallaway and Jeri Smith-Ready.
• Deb Biancotti is interviewed in Sweden.

 J is for Jetpack Envy

• Jeremy Gordon notices a lack at the Sydney Writer’s Festival, and revealing comments in the Artistic Director’s address.
• Kate Eltham may have stumbled across the true reason.
• Jennifer Fallon (for VoyagerOnline) lists 51 Subgenres of Speculative Fiction.

K is for Kaiju and Kilogram

• Undead Backbrain hosts Kaiju Search-Robot Avery’s Top 20 Craziest Kaiju Countdown. See the parade here.
• There’s also a Kaiju contest where the correct guess of the craziest giant monster wins a King Komodo Poster III.
• Robert Hoge invites you to guess the weight of the World Fantasy Awards reading pile.

L is for Lift-off

• Simon Haynes issues an invitation to the Hal 4 Launch.
• Equilibrium Books announces a new subscription package for Studies in Australian Weird Fiction (Via HorrorScope).
• Brian Ross directs you to the fourth issue of Eclecticism.
• Horrorscope announces the premier of Dying Breed at Tribeca and also points you at the latest Infinitas Newsletter.
• Morrigan Books announces the line up for Voices.
• Jennifer Fallon has been unauthoritatively biographied.
• Whether or not the future is clothed, Margo Lanagan announces that the Starry Rift is out, the official page is here, and Jonathan Strahan got it onto Neil Gaiman’s blog.
• DragonKat announces Andromeda Spaceways 33 & 34.

M is for Masques and Madness

• Gillian Polack announces the opening of submissions for the next CSFG anthology.
• Justine Larbalestier says everyone else is crazy.

N is for Naturalisation

• Jennifer Fallon announces Russell Kirkpatrick to be both an honorary Australian and an honorary woman and also raises the question of why we vote for whom as favourites.

O is for Omnipotence and Open-Source

• Karen Miller blogs on The Megalomania of Writers.
• Fiona McIntosh discusses getting worlds right, freefalling and wounded men.
• Sean Williams kills but is not happy about it.
• Callisto Shampoo floats the Open Source Back Each Other Up project.

P is for Puzzled and Podcast

• Justine Larbalestier asks wherein lies the fascination with posting wordcounts, and gets answers.
• HorrorScope suggests you check out the transcontinental podcast Kryptographik.

Q is for Quest

• Margo Lanagan leads speculative fiction writers into the wilds next January.

R is for Recidivism

• Robert Hoge asks if prequels are always evil.

S is for Stew and Subjectivity and Shiny

• Gillian Polack guest blogs for Voyager on fantasy feasts and impossible stews.
• Jonathan Strahan wonders whether winning an award changes the nature of a book or only the reader’s perception.
• The Shiny Submission Guidelines have updated.

T is for Tales and Thanks

• Martin Living’s Tuesday Ten Minute Tales continue.
• Ben Payne takes a break from being curmudgeonly to wax lyrical about the “amorphous blobulous jelly of artistic miscellany” that is Last Short Story.
• Jonathan Strahan reminds you of the expanding Anthologies Page and ponders the effect on fiction.
• David Carroll reads 2012 and asks whether ideals have been met or limitations exceeded.
• Martin Livings received Alzheimers Australia acknowledgement of the Terry Tin.
• Robert Hoge thinks you should sell the stories not the guilt.
• Don’t forget to stop by Dog vs Sandwich weekly (if not more often) for new tales.
• Trent Jamieson muses on multiple short stories set in the same universe.

U is for Ueber Gletch

• Fiona McIntosh guest blogs for Voyager on The Moment of Inspiration.

V is for Vacuums

• You are not submitting into them – Girlie Jones (also, the importance of first paragraphs).

W is for Whetting, Appetites, for the purposes of

• Glenda Larke posts the prologue to the reprint of Shadow of Tyr.

X is for Crossroads.

• Horrorscope announces the Crossroads Theatre is open for submissions.

Y is for You Missed One/Were Ungrammatical/Said Something You Shouldn’t Have/Revealed My Secret Identity

• Let me know in the comments, I’ll edit appropriately.

Z is for Zombies

• Jason Fischer offers an undead pug idea to the public domain.
• HorrorScope gives notice of the next Melbourne Zombie Shuffle.
• Chuck McKenzie continues to battle them.
• But the plague did not originate in Gippsland.