Writing: British Fantasy Awards & Stuff

I’m listing the recent announcement of shortlisted works for the British Fantasy Awards. I am not nominated but the anthology Cone Zero that my story “The Fathomless World” is in, has been. But then, none of the stories from the anthology have been nominated so I wonder if that bodes ill for the anthology winning the award.

Of course, for me it would have been better if my story was nominate but that’s okay. And it’s too bad that some of the reviews really just recapped the book and my story didn’t make much of a splash. Pooh. I liked it but perhaps the most informative review was a very late, after the fact one, where the reviewer decided to leave his notes as haiku, partly because it was so late. The one which I’m sure was for “The Fathomless World” said something like, “more style than substance.”  That would be the middle line of the haiku if you count “style as a two-syllable word.

So it goes. I thought it had substance but I also did it in a mythic style. I continue to send works out and work on new ones. Unfortunately the whole economic crisis has affected story markets to the point that I’m thinking I should just be working on my novel and skip the stories right now. For speculative fiction, whether horror, fantasy, science fiction or other, there are not a lot of markets to submit to right now. Some have gone the way of the dodo, while the majority of the pro markets (those that pay five cents a word or more) are closed to submissions or on hiatus. A sad state indeed.

And it’s always been a sad state that the pay for speculative fiction has been so low. Definitely not a make-a-living type of wage. Literary markets as a whole tend to pay somewhat better but many of them also pay the equivalent of $100 a story, which many anthologies do. Some literary markets pay anywhere from $15-40 a printed page, which again could work out to the same amount.

Why do we write then? For fame? Partly, though that’s a long hard road. Hardly for fortune. And maybe most of all, because we love words and our minds just keep filling with them and we want to tell a story and share in the mysteries of what-if. And not onto the shortlisted works for the British Fantasy Award.

BEST ANTHOLOGY

Cone Zero(DF Lewis) Megazanthus Press
Myth-Understandings (Ian Whates) Newcon Press
Subtle Edens (Allen Ashley) Elastic Press
The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 19 (Stephen Jones) Constable & Robinson
The Second Humdrumming Book of Horror(Ian Alexander Martin) Humdrumming
We Fade To Grey(Gary McMahon) Pendragon Press

BEST NOVEL (THE AUGUST DERLETH FANTASY AWARD)

Memoirs of a Master Forger(William Heaney/Graham Joyce) Gollancz
Midnight Man (Simon Clark) Severn House
Rain Dogs(Gary McMahon) Humdrumming
The Graveyard Book(Neil Gaiman) Bloomsbury
The Victoria Vanishes (Christopher Fowler) Little Brown
Thieving Fear (Ramsey Campbell) PS Publishing

THE PS PUBLISHING BEST SMALL PRESS AWARD

Elastic Press (Andrew Hook)
Newcon Press (Ian Whates)
Pendragon Press (Chris Teague)
Screaming Dreams (Steve Upham)
TTA Press (Andy Cox)

BEST COLLECTION

Bull Running for Girls (Allyson Bird) Screaming Dreams
Glyphotech(Mark Samuels) PS Publishing
How To Make Monsters(Gary McMahon) Morrigan Books
Islington Crocodiles(Paul Meloy) TTA Press
Just After Sunset(Stephen King) Hodder & Stoughton

BEST NOVELLA

“Cold Stone Calling” (Simon Clark) Tasmaniac Publications
“Gunpowder” (Joe Hill) PS Publishing
“Heads” (Gary McMahon) We Fade To Grey, Ed. Gary McMahon – Pendragon Press
“The Narrows” (Simon Bestwick) We Fade To Grey, Ed. Gary McMahon – Pendragon Press
“The Reach of Children” (Tim Lebbon) Humdrumming

BEST SHORT FICTION

“All Mouth” (Paul Meloy) Black Static 6, Ed. Andy Cox – TTA Press
“Do You See” (Sarah Pinborough) Myth-Understandings, Ed. Ian Whates – Newcon Press
“N” (Stephen King) Just After Sunset – Hodder & Stoughton
“Pinholes in Black Muslin” (Simon Strantzas) The Second Humdrumming Book of Horror, Ed. Ian Alexander Martin – Humdrumming
“The Caul Bearer” (Allyson Bird) Bull Running For Girls – Screaming Dreams
“The Tobacconist’s Concession” (John Travis) The Second Humdrumming Book of Horror, Ed. Ian Alexander Martin – Humdrumming
“The Vague” (Paul Meloy) Islington Crocodiles, TTA Press
“Winter Journey” (Joel Lane) Black Static 5, Ed. Andy Cox – TTA Press

BEST COMIC/GRAPHIC NOVEL

30 Days of Night: Beyond Barrow(Steve Niles/Bill Sienkiewicz) IDW Publishing
All-Star Superman(Grant Morrison/Frank Quitely) DC Comics
Buffy Season Eight Vol. 3: Wolves at the Gate(Joss Whedon & Drew Goddard/ Georges Jeanty) Dark Horse Comics
Comic Book Tattoo Tales Inspired by Tori Amos(Ed, Rantz A. Hoseley & Tori Amos/ Various) Image Comics
Hellblazer: Fear Machine (Jamie Delano) Vertigo
Hellblazer: The Laughing Magician(Andy Diggle/Leonardo Manco & Daniel Zezelj) Vertigo
Locke and Key(Joe Hill/Gabriel Rodriguez) IDW Publishing
The Girly Comic Book 1 (Ed, Selina Lock) Factor Fiction
The New Avengers: Illuminati(Brian Bendis & Brian Reed/Jim Cheung) Marvel Comics

BEST ARTIST

Dave McKean (The Graveyard Book) Bloomsbury
Edward Miller (Vault of Deeds) PS Publishing
Lee Thompson (The Land at the End of the Working Day) Humdrumming
Les Edwards (Various)
Vincent Chong (Various)

BEST NON-FICTION

Basil Copper: A Life in Books (Basil Copper, Ed, Stephen Jones) PS Publishing
Doctor Who: The Writer’s Tale (Russell T. Davies and Benjamin Cook) BBC Books
journal.neilgaiman.com (Neil Gaiman)
Mutant Popcorn(Nick Lowe) Interzone – TTA Press
What Is It We Do When We Read Science Fiction(Paul Kincaid) Beccon Publications

BEST MAGAZINE

Black Static(Andy Cox) TTA Press
Interzone(Andy Cox et. al.) TTA Press
Midnight Street(Trevor Denyer)
Postscripts(Peter Crowther & Nick Gevers) PS Publishing
SFX (Dave Bradley) Future Publishing Limited

BEST TELEVISON

Battlestar Galactica (NBC)
Dead Set(Zeppotron/Channel 4)
Dexter (Clyde Phillips Productions)
Doctor Who (BBC Wales)
Supernatural (Warner Bros TV)

BEST FILM

Cloverfield (Matt Reeves)
Iron Man(Jon Favreau)
The Dark Knight (Christopher Nolan)
The Mist(Frank Darabont)
The Orphanage(Juan Antonio Bayona)

(With thanks to SFWA for supplying the list.)