Items: Authorial

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A few items that are related (even if only distantly) to various authors of our times and others, and/or to writing:

  • Somehow I keep failing to mention that Mike Jasper (a couple of whose stories we've published at SH) is now a father: Andrew Patrick Jasper, a.k.a. Drew, was born on 16 December 2004. Congratulations to all concerned!
  • I may as well add that the count is now up to 19 couples I know who've either given birth in 2004 or are currently pregnant. (Okay, only one member of each couple has given birth or is currently pregnant. I'm not gonna bother trying find a way to phrase that that's both grammatical and clear.) Give or take one couple; there are one or two I'm not sure whether to count 'cause I don't know them very well. And to make this item relevant to the theme: four of the new parents (all four of whose kids have been born in the past three months) are fiction writers we've published at SH.
  • Seasonally appropriate: "A Visit from Saint Nicholas (In the Ernest Hemingway Manner)," by James Thurber, published in the New Yorker in 1927. (And btw, merry Christmas to all who celebrate it!)
  • Margaret Atwood gets silly, discussing "Three novels I won't write soon": Worm Zero, Spongedeath, and Beetleplunge. (Thanks to the latest Runcible Ansible, and btw Eileen has recently posted a whole bunch of Langford's "Runcible Ansible" columns, covering the past couple months.)
  • McSweeney's has apparently been publishing "Open Letters to People or Entities Who Are Unlikely to Respond"; I recommend the latest entry, Michael Liska III's "An Open Letter to My Turtle." (Thanks, Will!) I also like "An Open Letter to the Radioactive Spider That Never Bit Me."
  • Night Shade Books just sent me a copy (that I had pre-ordered) of the new Iain M. Banks short-story collection, The State of the Art. Like all of their books I've seen, it's gorgeous. I don't normally buy hardcovers these days, but I've bought half a dozen of Night Shade's books this year; all of them are things I wanted to read, but it doesn't hurt that the production values are so high.

2 Responses to “Items: Authorial”

  1. Anonymous

    Hmm, I already own a copy of State of the Art that i bought (used) in Canada. I think it’s been out in the Commonwealth for quite a while.

    Good book.

    I’m awaiting their limited edition Perdido Street Station 😉

    –Fred

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  2. Jed

    Yup, sorry, I had forgotten that State of the Art is only new in the US. Thanks for the reminder!

    …I seem to have also forgotten to mention that various Night Shade books are being picked up and republished by other publishers; in particular, a couple of VanderMeer books (including the Lambshead Guide) are, if I understood right, being republished by Bantam Spectra. Nifty! But Bantam’s getting rid of some of the more exotic design elements of the Lambshead Guide, so I bought the Night Shade edition, ’cause the exotic design elements are part of what I like about the book.

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