Shadow’s Edge |

Michael Kelly and Kathe Koja talk about editing Year’s Best Weird Fiction, Vol. 2,, the overarching vision behind the Year’s Best Weird Fiction series and much more. The conversation begins with their gratification at the thoughtful reviews of the second volume, Kathe’s excitement when first asked to edit, how they collaborated on the editorial process, the decision to include not just contemporary authors but the first English translations of deceased Weird masters such as Argentinian master Julio Cortázar and Belgian fabulist Jean Muno, Kathe’s comparison of the story selection process to composing a symphony, similarities and differences working with four different guest editors (Laird Barron, Kathe, Simon Strantzas [Vol. 3] and Helen Marshall who will be editing Vol. 4), casting a wide net as an organic way to achieve gender balance and diversity, embracing an expansive view of the Weird, YBW facilitating the discovery of new authors, the fine art of judging bests/awards and looking out for the one who brings the “metaphorical chicken,” the Weird as the “closest mode of fiction to the way the brain works,” the Weird as absorbing the vital parts of New Weird/New Fabulist/slipstream/interstitial/horror, sushi-shaming, the stunning covers by artists Santiago Caruso (1), Tomasz Alen Kopera (2), Beatriz Martin Vidal (3), working with book designer Vince Haig, sourcing from single-author collections to spec-lit and mainstream lit publications not associated with the Weird, occasional frustrations in rights negotiations, the fine art of translation and international authors that can be classified as Weird, a quick anecdote about Eraserhead, their biggest takeaways of working together on Vol. 2, origins of the series, looking ahead to Vol. 3 and even Vol. 4, Kathe’s immersive performative fiction project nerve based in Detroit from her own Under the Poppy to Dracula, unreliable narrators and Wuthering Heights, a brief Doctor Faustus/Christopher Marlowe interlude, and a few of their recommended authors including Priya Sharma and Charles Wilkinson (Michael), as well as Paul Witcover and Maryse Meijer.

Send submissions (stories published for the first time in 2016) for Year’s Best Weird Fiction Vol. 4 to bestweirdfiction@gmail.com.

News From the Weird: Arkham Digest columnist/Strange Aeons fiction editor Justin “Steely J” Steele returns to review Meet Me in the Middle, the new collection by Eric Schaller, also from Undertow Publications. Also, news from Dim Shores, Shock Totem, a much anticipated new audio book, and Ellen Datlow!

This archival episode will be available again at This Is Horror soon. In the meantime, subscribe at iTunes or Blubrry to make sure you don’t miss an episode.

Order The Outer Dark T-shirts at SkurvyInk: https://skurvyink.com/products/outerdark-shirt

More Links:

https://weirdfictionreview.com/2014/11/the-expanding-borders-of-area-x/

Mu Xin: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4vipI6dGiVE and https://nymag.com/nymetro/arts/art/reviews/n_9106/

https://fairytalereview.com/

https://granta.com/

https://www.phantomdrift.org/

https://mastersreview.com/

https://interfictions.com/

Eraserhead chicken scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyB4Vx-TavQ

News From the Weird:

Undertow subscription deal: https://www.undertowbooks.com/2016-subscription/

https://weirdfictionreview.com/2012/05/interview-eric-schaller-and-weird-art/

Livia Llewellyn’s Furnace: https://wordhorde.com/books/furnace/

Show credits:

Host/Executive Producer: Scott Nicolay

Co-Host, News From the Weird/Producer: Justin Steele

Associate Producer/Show Notes/Publicist: Anya Martin

Logo Design: Nick “The Hat” Gucker

Music: Michael Griffin

Author/editor Simon Strantzas returns to discuss the reissue of his Shirley Jackson Award-nominated 2015 collection Burnt Black Suns in a leather-bound special edition by Dark Regions Press, generational shifts and rising momentum/progression in the Weird Renaissance, readers who evolve into editors and publishers such as Justin Steele and Sam Cowan (Dim Shores), theme/atmosphere and composing his earlier collections Beneath the Surface, Cold to the Touch and Nightingale Songs, scientific fieldwork as a story topic, the landmark editing of Joe Pulver and phenomenal weird/fabulist writing of Helen Marshall, the art of public reading, the True Detective bump, the dynamic between the Aickmanesque Strange and the Weird, the journal Thinking Horror which he co-edits with sj bagley, taxonomy as applied to insects and literature, reading back to understand the tapestry of the genre and how to bend/twist/add to it in a different way, writing as a puzzle, the revolutionary force of T.E.D. Klein, creating/curating the unofficial Website of Terry Lamsley, the British quiet and ghost story renaissance in late 90s/early 2000s horror, other brilliant authors who have not published much lately such as Don Tumasonis and Matt Cardin, the intersection between Weird and Horror, evolving trends and fusion in Horror, collaborating with Michael Kelly on editing Year’s Best Weird Fiction 3, the importance of and challenges to featuring lesser known and diverse writers in collections, Aickman and Ligotti as two writers who (like Lovecraft) opened new territories, Stephen King and Peter Straub, his reading recommendations including Nadia Bulkin and Lynda E. Rucker, an Italian edition of Burnt Black Suns in Edizioni Hypnos’ Modern Weird series, and the globalization of the Weird.

News from the Weird: Arkham Digest columnist/Strange Aeons fiction editor Justin Steele and special guest Sam Cowan, editor/publisher of Dim Shores Press, join Scott for the latest news including more about the exciting line-up for Year’s Best Weird Fiction 3, what’s next with Dim Shores, Lovecraft eZine Press, Egaeus Press, Lost Signals, Gamut Magazine and a listener contest to win a free Garrett Cook book! Plus Justin reviews Split Tongues by Kristi DeMeester, Dim Shores’ fifth and latest chapbook.

This archival episode will be available again at This Is Horror soon. In the meantime, subscribe at iTunes or Blubrry to make sure you don’t miss an episode.

Next week’s guest: Authors/editors Nisi Shawl and Cynthia Ward of the Writing the Other workshop and book.

Please vote for The Outer Dark in the People’s Choice Project iRadio Podcast Awards. https://www.projectiradio.com/podcast-awards/

Also there wasn’t anything like this in the Levitra precautions found online, but still that’s my health, and I don’t want to end up with heart attack or anything similar.

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