Here There Be Voices

My short story Too Delicate for Human Form, which appeared in the anthologies Fish (Dagan Books) and Best British Fantasy 2013 (Salt Publishing) is now available in audio over at Far Fetched Fables alongside The Island of Peter Pandora by Kim Lakin-Smith.

The story is narrated by Heidi Hotz.

Lakeside Circus - A New Speculative Fiction Magazine

The wonderful Dagan Books, publishers of anthologies such as 'Fish', 'Bibliotheca Fantastica', and 'In Situ', are starting a speculative fiction magazine for short fiction. 

Lakeside Fiction is open for submissions from today and they are accepting stories up to 2500 words. They are looking for Science Fiction (hard, soft, near-future etc), magic realism, urban fantasy, and apocalypse fiction. Payment is 1 cent per word with a minimum of $10. 

Give them a go.*

*This is an instruction to both me and to you. 

It's All About Me and Biscuits

Some reviews, which have appeared on the net over the past few weeks. I used to be better organised, more on the ball, not so distracted, fa la la la la...

Lois Tilton has reviewed Shimmer 16 over at Locus Online. Here's a snippet of what she had to say about my story, The Binding of Memories:
...a darkly amusing, imaginative bit of absurdity. You can read the rest of the review here.

Sam Tomaino also reviewed the story over at SFRevu Reviews. Here's a snippet:
...This story gets darker and darker until its end and certainly fit the purpose of having “a strange and original idea” and being a very good story, too. You can read the rest of the review here.

Haralambi Mmarkov reviewed the anthology Fish from Dagan Books. here's a snippet of what he had to say about my story, Too Delicate for Human Form:
...In a typical Gardner fashion, an already weird concept with its haunting, mournful beauty descends into madness. You can read the rest of the review here.

Paul Weimer reviewed the anthology over at SF Signal.
..."Too Delicate for Human Form” is a haunting fantasy story of the unexpected legacy of a girl’s aunt and a magical secret with a sharp sting in the tail. You can read the rest of the review here.

And, lastly, but by no way the least, James Everington reviewed my novella, Barbed Wire Hearts over at his blog and amongst the delightful things he had to say... 
...But it's easy enough to describe how damn good they are. And this novella (published by Delirium Books) strikes me as possibly the strongest book of hers I've read – in common with the best novellas, the form allows the plot to be fully satisfying but without any extraneous fat.

As I said in the title... It's All About Me. Apologies for that. Go make yourself a cup of tea and dunk some biscuits in it. Don't like dunking biscuits. Me neither.

Some News from The Trenches

Earlier this year, Jay Eales invited me to write a story for an anthology he was editing set in the Faction Paradox universe and I am pleased to announce that my story, ...and from the tower she did fall will appear in the anthology 'Burning with Optimism's Flames' forthcoming from Obverse Books. Jay has been revealing the authors day by day over at Factor Fiction, although our bios are a little tricky.

Dagan Books have announced a Kickstarter campaign with some awesome perks for backers. My story Too Delicate for Human Form will be appearing in their Fish anthology. (Full TOC here). The beautiful cover is by Galen Dara.

And on this delightful and (after last night's Olympic's opening ceremony) slightly surreal Saturday afternoon I am fixing-up a novella, shuffling some cards around and wondering if I can turn it into a novel but that all depends on if I can find 60,000 more words of plot plus an injection of scare - but I don't have to worry about that today. Actually, forget the injection of scare, I'd quite like an injection of funny. They're a humourless bunch. I think I shall have to invent someone new to shake them up.

In other news, I can currently be seen zooming around my office in my new chair and tomorrow I'm hoping for a rematch of Space Hopper Football with my nephew. I think I'll go for Gold this time.

Swimming with Awesome Fishes

I am delighted to announce that my short story, Too Delicate for Human Form, has been accepted by Dagan Books for their fish anthology.

I am also delighted to say that I managed to keep it a secret for two whole days, no hints or anything. This may be a record and I'm sure I deserve a reward even if it's self-gifted.

I am further delighted to be sharing a TOC with Camille Alexa, Amanda C Davis, Corinne Duyvis, Claude Lalumière, Ken Liu, TJ McIntyre and many other awesome folk. The official table of contents are below and the anthology is due out February 8th, 2012.







Alexa, Camille “The Skin of Her Skin”
Bernardo, Matthew “The Fish-Wife’s Tale”
Blake, Polenth “Thwarting the Fiends”
Darrach, Shaw “I Know a Secret”
Davis, Amanda C. “O How the Wet Folk Sing”
Dixon, Paul “One Let Go”
Duyvis, Corinne “The Applause of Others”
Englehardt, Megan “Anansi and the New Thing”
Fleming, Sam “What the Water Gave Her”
Fuller, Andrew “A Salmon Tale, 2072”
Fullerton, H.L. “The Fish Are There On Land”
Gardner, Cate “Too Delicate for Human Form”
George, Zachary “You, Fish”
Hendrix, Sarah “Never to Return”
Kane, Tim “Vanity Mirror”
Kneeland, Andrea “Becoming Human”
Kwak, Jessie “Needlepoint Fish of Azure City”
L’Orange, April “Quick Karma”
Lalumière, Claude “Xandra’s Brine”
Liu, Ken “How Do You Know If a Fish Is Happy?”
McBride, Tracie “The Touch of Taniwha”
McIntyre, T.J. “Did the Catfish Get a Flat Head?”
Nakayama, Timothy “Fallen Dragon”
Naquin, R.L. “Kisses In the Snow”
Obedoza, Mel “The Fisherman and Golden Fish”
Palmer, Suzanne “Laternfish In the Overworld”
Povey, Jennifer “Water Demons”
Rambo, Cat “The Fisher Queen”
Romasco-Moore, Maria “Fisheye”
Ruby, Jacob “The Talking Fish of Shangri-La”
Shvartsman, Alex “Life at the Lake’s Shore”
Spencer, Ariyana “Fish Tears”
Unger, Vivian “A Fish Tail”
Wood, Mike “The Last Fisherman of Habitat 37”
Zup, Andreea “Maria and the Fish”