Tag Archives: R.W. Hodgson

Tesseracts Twenty-one

Nevertheless

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I just got home from spending several days in Phoenix to visit a friend and make new ones at CoKoCon (I’ll share more about that later) and while I was away an awesome thing happened. I had a book come out!

Nevertheless (Tesseracts Twenty-one) is available now from Amazon!

Amazon (US) (CA) (UK)

Nevertheless (Tesseracts Twenty-one) is a collection of optimistic speculative fiction stories, each optimistic in a slightly different way. These stories explore the optimism that drives us to seek out new worlds, that inspires us to sacrifice for others or fuels us to just keep going when everything seems lost.

One of the reasons best reasons doing an anthology of optimistic future this year was because no matter which side of the political or social spectrum you land on, it’s been a tough year. Nevertheless we try to remain optimistic. Nevertheless, we don’t give up. Nevertheless, yes, we persist. The stories in this anthology of optimistic SF are some of the darkest optimistic stories you’ll ever read but, nevertheless, they are optimistic. And powerful.

Featuring stories and poems by: James Bambury, Meghan Bell, Gavin Bradley, Ryan Henson Creighton, Darrel Duckworth, Dorianne Emmerton, Pat Flewwelling, Stephen Geigen-Miller, Jason M. Harley, Kate Heartfield, R. W. Hodgson, Jerri Jerreat, Jason Lane, Buzz Lanthier-Rogers, Alison McBain, Michael Milne, Fiona Moore, Ursula Pflug, Michael Reid, S. L. Saboviec, Lisa Timpf, Leslie Van Zwol, Natalia Yanchak

Get it Now!
(US) (CA) (UK)

Coming soon to other platforms and in paperback!

Fire: Demons, Dragons and Djinn

Fire: Demons, Dragons and Djinns

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This last weekend we launched Fire: Demons, Dragons and Djinns at When Words Collide in Calgary, Alberta and sold out of copies at the show.

And there were a lot of copies.

Like, a lot, a lot.

It set a new record for most number of books sold at WWC (or any single event) for me!

But, that’s not the point of this post. As much as I’d like to just dwell on that forever, life does move on and so must I… but I DO have good news.

Today is the official release day of Fire: Demons, Dragons and Djinns!

That means, if you pre-ordered it either it should be downloaded to your e-reader and ready to go or, if you got the paperback, it ought to be in your mailbox very soon.

Also? Reviews are starting to trickle in. Reviews like this one:

“Fire: Demons, Dragons, and Djinn is an incredibly eclectic and carefully curated collection of short stories… the entire anthology is a treasure of incendiary delights and terrors which deserves a permanent spot on your e-reader’s shelf.”

— Melanie S., Goodreads Reviewer

Yay!

If you haven’t picked up a copy yet, or don’t even know what I’m talking about, all that information is below, and both B&N and Amazon have ‘Look inside’ features in case you want a little taste before you buy.

To everyone who pre-ordered already, thank you SO much for your support. If not for you I couldn’t do what I do (and I love what I do), so thank you, thank you. I hope you love the book as much as I do 🙂

The ability for people to control (to some extent at least) fire has long been held as one of the major events that contributed to human evolution, but when fire eludes or escapes our control it is also one of the most destructive forces on earth. Associated with passion, power, transformation and purification, fire is a ferocious element with an unquenchable appetite.

Discover the power of Fire and the creatures that thrive on it in these twenty-one stories, including: the true inspiration behind Jim Morrison’s songs; a special weapon used in World War II; the secret in the depths of a mortuary furnace; a fantastical card game; and a necromancer out on what may be his last job.

Featuring: Blake Jessop; Kevin Cockle; Lizbeth Ashton; Dusty Thorne; V.F. LeSann; K.T. Ivanrest; Hal J. Friesen; Laura VanArendonk Baugh; Krista D. Ball; Mara Malins; Claude Lalumière; Susan MacGregor; JB Riley; Damascus Mincemeyer; Heather M. O’Connor; Gabrielle Harbowy; R. W. Hodgson; Chadwick Ginther; Wendy Nikel; Annie Neugebauer; and J.G. Formato.

 

Get Your Copy Now!

Direct from the Publisher

Electronic: Amazon | Kobo | B&N

Paperback: B&N | Amazon

Cover Reveal, Tesseracts Twenty-one

Cover Reveal: Nevertheless

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Nevertheless (Tesseracts Twenty-one) is a collection of optimistic speculative fiction stories, each optimistic in a slightly different way. These stories explore the optimism that drives us to seek out new worlds, that inspires us to sacrifice for others or fuels us to just keep going when everything seems lost and in so doing turn the idea upside down and inside out.

One of the reasons best reasons doing an anthology of optimistic future this year was because no matter which side of the political or social spectrum you land on, it’s been a tough year. Nevertheless we try to remain optimistic. Nevertheless, we don’t give up. Nevertheless, yes, we persist. The stories in this anthology of optimistic SF are some of the darkest optimistic stories you’ll ever read but, nevertheless, they are optimistic. And powerful.

Featuring stories and poems by: James Bambury, Meghan Bell, Gavin Bradley, Ryan Henson Creighton, Darrel Duckworth, Dorianne Emmerton, Pat Flewwelling, Stephen Geigen-Miller, Jason M. Harley, Kate Heartfield, R. W. Hodgson, Jerri Jerreat, Jason Lane, Buzz Lanthier-Rogers, Alison McBain, Michael Milne, Fiona Moore, Ursula Pflug, Michael Reid, S. L. Saboviec, Lisa Timpf, Leslie Van Zwol, Natalia Yanchak

Reserve Your Copy Now!

 

Tesseracts Twenty-one

Nevertheless Table of Contents

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Greg Bechtel and I co-edited Tesseracts Twenty-one and our theme was optimistic speculative fiction. After working very hard for months to craft a call for submissions, put it out, read submissions, narrow them down, narrow them down further. Greg and I live in the same city so we were able to meet in person to discuss the anthology as a whole and individual stories, and thank Gawd for that. I don’t know how we’d have come up with the Table of Contents otherwise. There’d have been an anthology worth of emails involved I’m sure LOL

Once we had the Table of Contents all finalized Greg and I had one more in-person meeting to figure out the title.

It took several hours, and then several emails back and forth afterward, but then the perfect title just stood out. The obvious title. The one that had been staring us in the face the whole time only, for some reason, we’d been too blind to see it.

And we named the anthology:

Recently, in an email explaining this title I said something like this (edited for clarity but still using blockquote because it’s pretty),

“…one of the best reasons for doing an anthology of optimistic future this year was because of the current political situation, and other relevant social and political movements ongoing in the world. It’s been a really tough year (no matter which side of the political or social spectrum you land on), but ‘Nevertheless’ we try to remain optimistic despite the darkness. Nevertheless, we don’t give up. Nevertheless, yes, we persist.

The stories in this anthology of optimistic SF are some of the darkest optimistic stories you’ll ever read but, nevertheless, they are optimistic. And they are awesome.”

I stand by that. And these are those stories:

1. “Inside the Spiral” by Dorianne Emmerton
2. “Pin and Spanner” by Pat Flewwelling
3. “Red” by Alison McBain
4. “Tera & Flux” by Leslie Van Zwol
5. “A Breath for My Daughter” by Jason M. Harley
6. “Steve McQueen and the Hope Particle” by Gavin Bradley
7. “On Reading to the End” by Buzz Lanthier-Rogers
8. “Missed Connections, Mactaquac” by James Bambury
9. “Pirates Don’t Make Amends” by S. L. Saboviec
10. “A Walk in the Woods” by R.W. Hodgson
11. “Hill” by Ryan Creighton
12. “Anhedonia” by Meghan Bell
13. “A Room of His Own” by Ursula Pflug
14. “It’s in the Eyes” by Jerri Jerreat
15. “Across the Seas of Sand” by Jason Lane
16. “Lt. Anderwicz Goes Applepicking” by Natalia Yanchak
17. “With Two Left Feet” by Lisa Timpf
18. “A Threadbare Carpet” by Kate Heartfield
19. “Green Leaves Don’t Fall” by Stephen Geigen-Miller
20. “Proteus in the City” by Fiona Moore
21. “The Garden” by Darrel Duckworth
22. “One Way Ticket” by Michael Milne
23. “The Rosedale House” by Michael Reid

I’m proud of this anthology and look forward to sharing more of it with you this spring 🙂

 

Post edited on 6/4/2018 to reflect the fact that, due to circumstances beyond my control the Table of Contents has changed slightly.

Fire: Demons, Dragons and Djinn

Fire Table of Contents

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I’ve been stoked (heh) about this anthology from the very beginning for all sorts of reasons. First, because it’s the first volume in what I hope will be a new and awesome series. Second, because it’s my first foray into working with Tyche Books. Third, because it’s a super fun theme with tonnes of potential. Fourth — demons, dragons and djinn. I mean, c’mon!

But despite how excited I was there’s this stage that happens with every anthology I work on where I’m absolutely, positively certain that things aren’t going to come together and I’m never going to have a table of contents and even if I do it’s not going to do the thing justice and blah blah blah blah. You know what I’m talking about, if not specifically when it comes to anthologies than about something. It’s like Imposter Syndrome and ‘It’s always shinier in my brain than it is on the page’ had a baby and that baby moved into my brain and is having a never-ending temper tantrum. Yeah. That.

It happens every time.

And every time the baby eventually grows up and moves away and I realise that, actually, I’ve put together something special.

And each anthology is special in its own way.

The Fire baby (man I’m really milking this aren’t I? LOL) moved out quite a long time ago, actually, so I’ve had lots of time to really enjoy this anthology and really appreciate the things about it that make it special.

Fire is special to me for two big reasons.

First, the quality of the stories and their diversity in regard to tone, voice, point of view, theme and style is impressive. By my count, just off the top of my head and going by memory within these twenty-one stories six have demons, six have dragons and three have djinn. Some have all three. Some have none of those. Some are pretty subtle and others couldn’t be more in your face if they tried. There are fire critters I’d never heard of, and stories went in directions I never could have guessed at, and I love that.

Second, there is a fantastic mix between authors I’ve worked with before and those I’m working with for the very first time. Working with people I’ve worked with before is always a bit easier–we’ve been down this road, we know what to expect. It’s comfortable, familiar. We know each other. We might even be friends. And working with new people is exciting, scary and new. I never know exactly how they are going to take my edits, or my sense of humour. In some cases we’ll meet for the first time at a launch, or event. It keeps me on my toes. This anthology has a great mix of comfort and fear… sort of like fire itself.

So without further ado:

Fire: Demons, Dragons and Djinn

 

“Magnesium Bright” by Lizbeth Ashton
“Bait” by Krista D. Ball
“Strange Attractor” by Kevin Cockle
“The Midwife and the Phoenix” by J.G. Formato
“The Djinni and the Accountant” by Hal J. Friesen
“Midnight Man versus Frankie Flame” by Chadwick Ginther
“Cold Comfort” by Gabrielle Harbowy
“Aitvaras” by R.W. Hodgson
“The Hatchling” by K.T. Ivanrest
“She Alone” by Blake Jessop
“A Girl, Ablaze with Life” by Claude Lalumière
“Old Flames” by V. F. LeSann
“Light My Fire” by Susan MacGregor
“Double or Nothing” by Mara Malins
“Aladdin’s Laugh” by Damascus Mincemeyer
“Cilantro” by Annie Neugebauer
“Breath of the Caldera” by Wendy Nikel
“Phoenix Rising” by Heather M. O’Connor
“Ring of Fire” by JB Riley
“Permanence” by Dusty Thorne
“The Second Great Fire” by Laura VanArendonk Baugh
Fire: Demons, Dragons and Djinn will be launched at When Words Collide in Calgary, Alberta this August 🙂