Free Fiction Friday: Gwyneth Jones
Gwyneth Jones, born in Manchester, 14th February 1952, writer. She’s the author of more than twenty novels for teenagers, mostly using the name Ann Halam, and several highly regarded SF novels for adults. She’s won two World Fantasy awards, the Arthur C. Clarke award, the British Science Fiction Association short story award, the Dracula Society’s Children of the Night award, the P.K.Dick award, and shared the first Tiptree award, in 1992, with Eleanor Arnason. She lives in Brighton, UK, with her husband and son; a Tonkinese cat called Ginger and her young friend Milo. She’s done some extreme tourism in her time, still likes traveling but has given up on air transport. Likes going to the movies & playing with her websites. She’s a member of the Soil Association, the Sussex Wildlife Trust; and an Amnesty International volunteer. [via]
Jones has several pieces of free fiction on her website, including "The Tomb Wife," which appeared in our August 2007 issue.
Free Fiction Friday: Lucius Shepard
Lucius Shepard is the award-winning author of innumerable classics, many of which have appeared in the pages of F&SF such as “The Man Who Painted the Dragon Griaule” and “The Jaguar Hunter” (which you can read online at Infinity Plus). And, of course, he’s currently up for the Hugo Award, Nebula Award, and Locus Award for best novella, for his F&SF story, “Stars Seen Through Stone.”
Free Fiction Friday: Peter S. Beagle
Peter S. Beagle is the author of many novels and stories, including the beloved classic The Last Unicorn. In 2005, F&SF published Beagle’s Nebula Award-winning sequel to The Last Unicorn, the novelet "Two Hearts." You can read that story here. But Beagle’s history with F&SF begins way back in 1966 when we published his story "Come Lady Death" (which originally appeared in The Atlantic Monthly). That story was recently adapted into a podcast on the new fantasy-focused Escape Pod spin-off PodCastle. You can listen to the whole story here.
Free Fiction Friday: Daryl Gregory
Yes, I know it’s Sunday, but I forgot to post this on Friday, and Free Fiction Sunday ruins the alliteration.
Daryl Gregory is the author of about a dozen stories, which have appeared in F&SF, Asimov’s, and elsewhere. His first novel, Pandemonium, will be published by Del Rey Books this Fall.
Daryl’s website, darylgregory.com, features a number of pieces of free fiction, including several F&SF stories, such as his first pro sale, "In the Wheels," "The Continuing Adventures of Rocket Boy," and "Free, and Clear."
Free Fiction Friday: John Kessel
John Kessel, author of “Pride and Prometheus” from the Jan. 2008 issue of F&SF, has a number of podcasts available on his website for your listening pleasure. This includes the F&SF stories Pride and Prometheus, Part 1 & Part 2 and Every Angel is Terrifying, as well as others. His website also features some free fiction in HTML (prose) format, including the F&SF story “Herman Melville: Space Opera Virtuoso”.
Free Fiction Friday: Benjamin Rosenbaum
Benjamin Rosenbaum’s first published work of fiction was “The Ant King: A California Fairy Tale,” which appeared in the pages of F&SF back in our July 2001 issue. Since then, he’s published a number of fine tales, several of which have been nominated for the field’s major awards, including the Hugo Award (twice), the Nebula Award, and the World Fantasy Award. Most of said stories will be gathered together into his first short fiction collection, The Ant King and Other Stories, which is forthcoming in August from Small Beer Press.
In addition to the award nominations previously mentioned, Ben has also twice been a finalist for the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award. Once for his 2006 story “The House Beyond Your Sky” and once for this story, “Start the Clock,” from our August 2004 issue, which you can read in its entirety on Ben’s website.
[Edit: Ben’s F&SF debut, “The Ant King: A California Fairy Tale” is now available as a podcast from PodCastle.]
Free Fiction Friday: M. Rickert
M. Rickert’s stories have been appearing regularly in F&SF for several years now, starting in 1999 with her first publication, “The Girl Who Ate Butterflies.” Her work has also appeared in SCI FICTION and the anthology Feeling Very Strange, and has been nominated for the Nebula Award. Her collection, Map of Dreams, won the William L. Crawford Award for best first book-length work of fantasy and the World Fantasy Award for best collection.
"Bread and Bombs" first appeared in our April 2003 issue; it was subsequently reprinted in my post-apocalyptic anthology Wastelands: Stories of the Apocalypse and can be found online on the anthology’s website.
Free Fiction Friday: Ted Chiang
Ted Chiang’s story from our September 2007 issue, “The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate,” was one of the most talked-about stories of the year. It landed on several awards ballots, and is currently a finalist for the Nebula Award and British Science Fiction Association Award. Because of the former nomination, we placed the complete text of the story on our website. Because of the latter nomination, Starship Sofa has made it available as a podcast [MP3 link]. So, pick your poison–text or audio–and enjoy!
Free Fiction Friday: Paolo Bacigalupi
Paolo Bacigalupi is a frequent contributor to F&SF. His story “The Calorie Man” (Oct/Nov 2005) won the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award and was nominated for the Hugo Award. “The People of Sand and Slag,” which first appeared in our February 2004 issue, was a finalist for both the Hugo and Nebula Awards. A collection of Bacigalupi’s short fiction, Pump Six and Other Stories, was just published by Night Shade Books.
Paolo recently posted several of his stories online: “The Tamarisk Hunter,” “The People of Sand and Slag,” and “The Fluted Girl.” You can also listen to a podcast of Paolo reading “The People of Sand and Slag,” which was recorded recently at the SF in SF reading series in San Francisco.
Free Fiction Friday: Heather Lindsley
This week, I’d like to point out Heather Lindsley’s story, "Just Do It," which originally appeared in the July 2006 issue of F&SF. Here’s a link to a podcast of the story online, courtesy of Escape Pod.
