Polluto Magazine

Polluto is an award-winning literary magazine from Dog Horn Publishing. They state: “Don’t give us typical genre fantasy or horror. We want stories that are out of the ordinary, surreal and twisted, or laced with dark, wicked humour. We want angry voices, new voices, voices that want to toy with the reader and teach them something new and exciting. Take us to dark places, dirty places, and show us things to make us giggle, gasp or gag. All submissions must have a countercultural element. By this we mean an engagement with, challenging of, or subverting of popular cultures and ideologies.”

The submission window for the next issue closes on 31 March 2012, or when the issue is full. For submission guidelines please visit the website HERE

See the full list of nominees HERE

Wizards of the Coast has also launched its new DnDNext hub with all the articles, discussions and information relating to the next iteration of D&D. Players can sign up for the open playtest so they can be among the first to get their hands on new DnDNext materials when playtesting begins later in 2012.

See the new revamped website and get involved HERE

About Nexus:
In the near future, the nano-drug Nexus can link mind to mind. There are some who want to improve it. There are some who want to eradicate it. And there are others who just want to exploit it. When a young scientist is caught improving Nexus, he’s thrust over his head into a world of danger and international espionage, with far more at stake than anyone realises.

About Ramez Naam:
Seattle-based Naam – a computer scientist who helped build Internet Explorer, Outlook and Bing for Microsoft – is the HG Wells Award winning author of the non-fiction book More Than Human: Embracing the Promise of Biological Enhancement, and is a Fellow of the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies.

Jason is a new American author, writing in the tradition of the spooky/strange story, although his work is very contemporary. This is his first ever venture into print.

“This new collection of sixteen tales uncovers the strangeness within everyday America, the fable in the familiar. ‘The Highwall Horror’ sees an office worker discover the portal to an alien cathedral in a cubicle wall; in ‘Panorama’ an artist’s agent examines his client’s deserted masterpiece; a young man follows a forgotten song to the haunted town that spawned it in ‘The Bells, Then the Birds’; a young mother escapes her wastrel husband only to become lost in a perilous swell of freedom in ‘The Mauve Blot’; and in ‘Black Horse’ an inherited steed brings uneasiness and worse to its new owner.”

Full details HERE

Arc

The first issue, Arc 1.1: The Future Always Wins, is out now, including new fiction from Margaret Atwood, Stephen Baxter, M.John Harrison, Hannu Rajaniemi and Alastair Reynolds; thought-provoking essays from Simon Ings, China Miéville, Sumit Paul-Choudhury and Paul Graham Raven; and incisive commentary from Leigh Alexander, Simon Pummell, Adam Roberts and Bruce Sterling.

Full details HERE

Read the full shortlist HERE

Christopher Priest

Christopher’s writing career spans an enormous breadth of subjects, published over a 40 year period (his first novel, Indoctrinaire, was published in 1970). The BSFG is very lucky to host to such a well respected author and Christopher’s talk is likely to give fascinating insights into his creative process.

The meeting is on 9 March 2012 at the Briar Rose Hotel on Bennett’s Hill, Birmingham; this venue is just 5 minutes walk from New Street Station and handy for all bus routes. The meeting opens its doors at 7:30 p.m.

The group itself has many members of all ages, and between them the membership has an enormous wealth of knowledge of literary SF, as well as films, television, etc. If you want to know about a particular author or book, the BSFG is likely to be able to help you! Just let us know you are a first timer when you turn up and any member will be happy to introduce you to the committee and make you feel as welcome as we can…

If you live anywhere in or around the West Midlands, the BSFG is the group for you! For further information, and a copy of our monthly newsletter, please email:            bhamsfgroup [at] yahoo [dot] co [dot] uk

Lovecraft eZine

Full details and submission guidelines HERE

Further details:
Eibonvale Press are launching a brand new anthology edited by Allen Ashley, entitled Where Are We Going? Several authors including Allen Ashley, Joel Lane, Douglas Thompson, Marion Pitman, Terry Grimwood, Jet McDonald, Andrew Kirby, Gary Budgen and cover artists David Rix are expected to attend and sign copies of the book. Where Are We Going? will be selling at the special low price of £7 paperback and £16 hardback on the launch evening.

At some time between 6.30pm and 7pm, Allen Ashley will be announcing a “Postcard Competition”. This is a free to enter competition with simple rules – write an interesting postcard and win an Eibonvale prize. Postcards and pens will be provided on the night. The competition will be judged by Allen Ashley and the results will be announced at approximately 9pm.

Eibonvale will also be launching Jeff Gardiner’s debut collection A Glimpse of the Numinous.

Nicola Budd from Quercus Books will be running a silent auction on a selection of desirable Quercus publications from approximately 6.30pm onwards. Nicola will announce the start of the auction and how to take part. The books will be displayed on a couple of tables and people are invited to write their bids on a sheet of paper. The winning bidders will be announced at approximately 9.30pm. The auction is in aid of the charity Have A Heart.

The night will finish at about 11pm or when the BFS has drunk the bar dry (don’t laugh – it happens quite a lot).

So, get along to The Mug House on 2nd March. Buy a book or three. Give some money to a good cause. Meet up with pals old and new. Have a great time.

Further details: email Allen Ashley on editorwherearewegoing [at] hotmail [dot] co [dot] uk

The Dark Margins reading group focuses on Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Speculative Fiction. Copia’s platform allows readers to post book reviews, connect with new friends, and, most importantly, share comments and annotations in the margins of the ebooks that they download.

To start things off, Dark Margins have added some preliminary books to their library shelves, such as The Time Machine, Pattern Recognition, Urth of the New Sun, and Anathem, and they would welcome suggestions as to what further books could be added and discussed.

The Dark Margins reading group can be found online at http://thecopia.com as well as on Pinterest (http://pinterest.com/thecopiadmg) and Twitter at @thecopia_dmg, where they post news, writing contest information, and Science Fiction and Fantasy-related finds.

PS Publishing

To start this venture off, they are offering Centipede’s Knowing Darkness, a sumptuous volume full of artwork inspired by the writing of Stephen King. This 448-page art book includes colour and black and white paintings and drawings that have directly or indirectly illustrated King’s writings over the last thirty-five years.

Artists include Michael Whelan, Ned Dameron, J.K. Potter, John Jude Pelancar, Stephen Gervais, and many others. The book features an introduction by Frank Darabont and text (written by King critic George Beahm) that looks back at 34 years of King in print providing a detailed look at the writer and his life, and supplemented with interviews with Michael Whelan, Bernie Wrightson, Drew Struzan, John Cayea, Dave Christiansen, and many others.

The book was originally published at £180 ($295) but PS are offering it for £95 (around $150) plus post & packing (£8.95 in the UK or £12.95 everywhere else). There are only 100 copies available.

Full details HERE

Morning Star Press was founded in 2008 by the genre publisher, Roberts. Morning Star has published many genre greats including Joe R. Lansdale, Brian Keene, James A. Moore, Edward Lee, Weston Ochse and many others.

Full details of the acquisition HERE

Launching in May 2012, the comic will feature the Borg and the Cybermen as they create an unholy alliance resulting in potential disaster for all humanity. Captain Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the USS Enterprise find themselves joining forces with the Doctor and his companions, with the fate of the galaxy hanging in the balance.

The eight-issue series will be written by Scott and David Tipton, the authors of critically acclaimed Star Trek: Infestation, with a helping hand from longtime Doctor Who writer Tony Lee, and will feature fully painted artwork by J.K. Woodward (Fallen Angel).

Doctor Who and Star Trek are two hugely successful franchises that began as television series, and have expanded into a number of other media. Nearly five decades and 1,500 episodes in the making, this is the moment that both Trekkers and Whovians have been waiting for!

Full information from IDW Publishing HERE

Read the full obituary HERE

Also, photographer Sir Simon Marsden died on 22 January 2012. Marsden was famed for his use of infrared film to produce black and white photography in the gothic style. His photos have graced many book, magazine and CD covers. His published collections include The Haunted Realm, Phantoms Of The Isles, Visions Of Poe and The Twilight Hour amongst others.

Colin Leslie’s obituary of the artist can be found on the This Is Horror website HERE

About Katya’s World:
“The distant and unloved colony world of Russalka has no land, only the raging sea. No clear skies, only the endless storm clouds. Beneath the waves, the people live in pressurised environments and take what they need from the boundless ocean. It is a hard life, but it is theirs and they fought a war against Earth to protect it. But wars leave wounds that never quite heal, and secrets that never quite lie silent.

Katya Kuriakova doesn’t care much about ancient history. She is making her first submarine voyage as an apprentice navigator; the first nice, simple journey of what she expects to be a nice, simple career. But there is nothing nice and simple about the deep, black waters of Russalka and soon she will encounter pirates and war criminals, see death and tragedy at first hand, and realise that her world’s future lies on the narrowest of knife edges. For in the crushing depths lies a sleeping monster, an abomination of unknown
origin. And when it wakes, it will seek out and kill every single person on the planet…”

Jonathan L. Howard has been a game designer for the last twenty years, and a full-time author for the past three. He is the author of the Johannes Cabal series of novels.

More information can be found HERE

An ingenious and engaging work of dystopian fiction, the eponymous Osiris is a retro-futuristic metropolis reminiscent of Huxley’s Brave New World. The novel tells of an unlikely romance across social divides between a glamorous young socialite grieving for her missing twin and an idealistic activist from the wrong side of the wall.

Osiris will be published in hardcover in summer 2012, with books two and three following in 2013 and 2014 respectively. All other rights are with Zeno Agency.

1. Choose three novels you might like to read and list your favourites in order of preference. You’ll be sent a novel from your top three.
2. Read the book.
3. Write your review: 200 – 1000 words maximum.
4. Email a copy to the Awards Administrator. You can keep the book, as a ‘thank-you’.

For full details visit The David Gemmell Legend Awards

Black Static

Empty of Words, the Page by Gord Sellar
illustrated by David Gentry

The Little Things by Jacob Ruby
illustrated by George Cotronis

Cuckoo Spit by Stephen Bacon
illustrated by Mark Pexton

The Churn by Simon Bestwick
illustrated by Dave Senecal

Family Tree by V.H. Leslie
illustrated by Rik Rawling

Plus the usual mix of news, reviews and non-fiction articles.

Details HERE

The new constitution for the awards may be found HERE

Members of the BFS (votes cast by a member whose membership expires after the vote is cast remain valid), members of FantasyCon 2011 and members of FantasyCon 2012 who register before voting closes on 31 March 2012 are eligible and encouraged to vote for works published for the first time in the English language in any part of the world in any format during the calendar year January to December 2011.

Each member may put forward up to three Recommendations in any category, expressed in preferential order. All Recommendations should ideally be accompanied with publication details: year of publication, publisher, and title of collection, magazine, editor, etc, if applicable.

Recommendations may not be made for the recommender’s own material.  The British Fantasy Society discourages the practice of canvassing for votes.

The four titles or names with the highest number of Recommendations will go forward to form the shortlist of nominations.

In the case of the award for Best Novel, members are invited to list up to three Recommendations in the categories of Horror and Fantasy.

The voting form is available online HERE

Thank you for voting and please spread the word! Postal voting forms are available by request from the Awards Administrator.

Regards,
Sarah Ann Watts
BFS Awards Administrator
bfsawards@britishfantasysociety.org

In 1993 Douglas Adams, the world-renowned author of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, recorded a short piece of audio for his US publisher of the time – Bob Stein of Voyager Expanded Books. Who would know how prophetic his words would sound nearly twenty years later, and how accurate his sense of the evolution of the book was.

In this short recording, kindly donated to The Literary Platform by Bob Stein, Douglas Adams charts the evolution of the book from the ‘hardware problems’ of writing on rocks, to scrolls, to the bound book and finally the silicon chip.”

The deadline for uploading entries to the competition platform is 15 April 2012, and full details of how to enter, the prizes, and the judges can be found HERE

He will be best remembered for his outstanding apocalyptic novel, The Death of Grass, and was often viewed as the successor to John Wyndham.

Read the SF Scope obituary HERE

Richard never saw a collection of his stories published in his lifetime and this book will include all of the author’s short stories, culled from as far back as 1963 and The Fourth Pan Book of Horror Stories up to the 1980s. The collection will include an introduction about his life, the fiction and anthologies, including his work as story editor for the BBC’s Late Night Horror series. The book will also feature two rare articles and an interview with the author, from the late 1960s.

“At the time I interviewed Richard for my small press magazine in 1969, he was already an established short story writer, had compiled two anthologies for Tandem Books and the BBC series Out of the Unknown, for which he worked as assistant story editor, had been on air since 1965 … Yet, some forty plus years later, Richard’s fiction has largely been forgotten. Although not prolific, he was widely published in anthologies in England. Yet he never saw a collection of his tales published during his lifetime. Hence this book and its integration into a projected series under the collective tag, Writers from the Shadows.” (From the Introduction).

The cover artist will be the painter and illustrator Caroline O’Neal. Caroline has done dark fantasy illustration for Bad Moon Books, Premonitions and Midnight Street magazines, among others.

For more information contact via the website HERE

Read the full report – including Clive’s own comments on what happened – HERE

The four launch titles are “an Ira Levin-style mystery (House of Quiet Madness by Mikita Brottman), an ultra-violent 80s-style Italian cannibal horror (Tribesmen by Adam Cesare), a Hitchcockian take on a modern suicide cult (The Devoted by Eric Shapiro), and a sexual abuse/revenge story (Die, You Bastard! Die! By Jan Kozlowski).

The aim is to publish 30-40 titles per year. Other titles soon to be published include The Dark, a metaphysical thriller by Scott Bradley and Peter Giglio, and Unwanted, a supernatural story set in both pre- and post-Katrina New Orleans by R.J. Sevin.”

Read the full story HERE

Night of the Living Dead

At the beginning of George Romero‘s cult film, Hinzman’s zombie character is seen attacking two young siblings in a cemetery. His performance in the film set the standard for zombie characters on screen ever since.

Read the full BBC story HERE

Atomic Fez Publishing

The Designated Coconut (Benji Spriteman #2), by John Travis, coming Autumn 2012

“As the first in the series was an homage to the noire thrillers, so we have the second Benji Spriteman tale similar to the classic English Mystery of roughly the same era.

During the visit of the two famous mystery-writing sisters, a death occurs, leading to a complicated series of events. How did the safe in the locked room get stolen? Who was behind the poisoning? Is someone at the resort’s hotel involved, and is it the beer-guzzling band-leader? What do the mole-men have to do with it?”

The House of a Thousand Screams (working title), by John Llewellyn Probert, coming Autumn 2012

“Starring Mr Massene Henderson and Miss Samantha Jephcott; the most un‑likely team of paranormal investigators you’ve somehow lived your life without … until now!

Henderson and Jephcott head to the wilderness of Northern Wales to investigate a house constructed from the bits of haunted buildings and filled with devices of death, all constructed on a foundation of a ‘stone circle’. Designed to be the most haunted house in Britain, the original owner hasn’t been heard from since the mid-1950s, and the new one wants to know if he’s got the real thing or not. What lies in wait for the two detectives and the four people who are there to help in the research, and will anyone survive to claim the fees for their labours?”

I, Death by Mark Leslie Lefebvre, coming Winter 2012

“The terrifying story of a young man coming to terms with a death curse.

By writing an on-line journal, Peter O’Mallick hopes to deal with his emotional turmoil at being dumped by his former girlfriend. While the blog helps, it also attracts cyber stalker Bryan Brecht, who coerces Peter into doing things which should never be done …

Hilarity ensues.”

Sleepless Knights by Mark H. Williams, coming Spring 2013

“It’s not easy being the man behind the myth.

Sir Lucas is butler to King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table; the person who managed every epic legend behind the scenes. He’s the one who made sure each quest happened in the right place at the right time, and that everyone involved had comfortable accommodation for the weekend. The man whose average working day involved fighting dragons, defeating witches, banishing demons, and ensuring the Royal pot of tea never crossed the thin line separating ‘brewed’ from ‘stewed’. What’s more, 1,500 years after that golden age, he’s still doing it: here in modern Britain, right under our noses …”

Read more HERE

The full BBC story can be read HERE

This conference aims to bring together publishers, writers and academics to discuss the influence of the small presses.

The small presses in the UK have a complex and fascinating history as they interact with writerly practice. Developments over the last twenty to thirty years such as the the rise of desktop publishing, the collapse of the net book agreement, and the advent of print-on-demand – as well as digital publishing and online bookselling – have created an environment in which small presses have thrived and created new opportunities for writers. This conference aims to bring together publishers, writers and academics to discuss the influence of the small presses on creative practice and to consider their broader role in cultural production. In addition, there will be practical sessions on how to publish with a small press and opportunities for publishers to showcase their books.

Topics to be considered include, but are not limited to:

-The relationship between the creative writer and small presses
-Specific studies of individual small presses and their lists
-Genre studies of the role of small presses in regards to poetry, fiction etc.
-The formal properties of the small press book and its relation to aesthetics.
-How creative writing and publishing practices are adapting to new media.

Abstracts of no more than 200 words to be submitted by 29 February 2012. Please send to one of the organisers:

Lucie Armitt
l.armitt [at] salford.ac.uk

Ursula Hurley
u.k.hurley [at] salford.ac.uk

Scott Thurston
s.thurston [at] salford.ac.uk

School of Humanities, Languages and Social Sciences
University of Salford
Salford
M5 4WT

Inkspill Magazine

They state: “We are looking for short stories, poetry, articles and art relating to fantasy, science fiction, horror… and anything in between. We want to read fresh, original ideas, or classic ideas reinvented. Be part of a special issue and celebrate the diversity and imagination of genre.”

Submission information HERE

They state: “We enjoy the surreal, the absurd, the nonsensical, the complicated, the simple, the truth, the lies, the complexity of words, the ecstasy of genius, the delightful power we find in the spaces between and dancing at the discothèque.”

More information can be found HERE

The success of this picture book gave the artist the freedom to spend several years bringing the Celtic myth of The Mabinogion to life, and he went on to create the delicate watercolour illustrations for Castles by David Day, Michael Palin’s The Mirrorstone (in collaboration with Richard Seymour), The Moon’s Revenge by Joan Aiken and Merlin Dreams by Peter Dickinson, along with numerous book cover designs.

However, Alan Lee is best known for his association with perhaps the greatest fantasy author of all time, illustrating the 1,200-page centenary edition of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. Artist and author soon became inextricably linked through such collaborations as Tolkien’s World: Paintings of Middle-Earth, the 1993 J.R.R. Tolkien Calendar (and many subsequent editions), Realms of Tolkien: Images of Middle-Earth, a new edition of The Hobbit, The Children of Húrin, Tales from the Perilous Realm and David Day’s non-fiction study Tolkien’s Ring.

The artist’s work for Rosemary Sutcliff’s Black Ships Before Troy received the prestigious Kate Greenaway Award in 1993 for distinguished work in the illustration of children’s books in the UK. In 1998 he won the World Fantasy Award for Best Artist.

Alan Lee has also enjoyed an equally successful career as a conceptual designer for movies, and his credits include Legend, Erik the Viking, the Jane Yolen-scripted Merlin and the Dragons, the 2005 King Kong and the 1998 TV mini-series Merlin.

Director Peter Jackson contacted the artist to work on his acclaimed cinematic trilogy of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers and The Return of the King. After being nominated for The Two Towers the year before, in 2004 Alan Lee won an Oscar for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration for his work on The Return of the King. The artist is currently based in New Zealand, where he is working again with Jackson on the eagerly-anticipated prequels The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey and The Hobbit: There and Back Again.

“I’m very flattered to be asked to be Artist Guest of Honour,” says Alan Lee, “and happy to accept the invitation. I’m meant to be finishing on The Hobbit movies some time this year. My work on the The Lord of the Rings films went on for six years beyond what I was originally anticipating, but even if I am still involved I can arrange my annual trip back to England to coincide with the convention. I look forward to seeing everyone in 2013!”

Alan Lee joins previously announced Author Guests of Honour Richard Matheson and Richard Christian Matheson, along with Master of Ceremonies China Mieville, in the picturesque and vibrant seaside town of Brighton, on the south coast of England, over the weekend of 31 October – 3 November 2013.

Full details and booking information on the website HERE

Peter F. Hamilton began writing in 1987 and sold his first short story to Fear magazine in 1988. His novels include the Greg Mandel series and the Night’s Dawn trilogy. His most recent novels are Fallen Dragon, Misspent Youth, Pandora’s Star, Judas Unchained and the Void trilogy.

Graham Masterton is a renowned horror author whose career was launched with the wildly successful The Manitou in 1976. Since then he has written over one-hundred titles, taking in not only horror but also thrillers, disaster novels and historical sagas.  Recent releases include The Pariah, Mirror and Family Portrait through Hammer Books, a leading name in the field of horror.

Jon Courtenay Grimwood is an acclaimed fantasy and science fiction novelist, and twice a winner of the prestigious BSFA Award for Best Novel. He is also an established newspaper writer, having published articles and reviews in The Guardian, The Times, The Telegraph and The Independent. His latest series, the Assassini, continues with the release of The Outcast Blade in May.

Tickets for the festival include access to a host of activities throughout. There will be a wide range of author readings, panels, writing workshops and much more featuring some of the leading writers, editors and agents in genre fiction. Tickets cost £45 and cover all activities over the weekend – for booking and more information visit the website HERE

“The sound of shuffling footsteps across the old cell floor…

A soft voice like a strange tune echoing along the empty corridors…

Dim lights in the windows of the abandoned asylum…

Discarded case files that flip open to reveal the dreams of broken minds…

Welcome to a place where the boundaries of fact and fiction meet.

Acclaimed author Gary McMahon raids the archives of a notorious derelict mental asylum called the Daleside Institute to bring you stories of madness, horror and emotional trauma. In locations as diverse as suburban Germany, the London Underground, an Italian seaside resort and the inhospitable polar icecap, you will meet damaged people with broken lives. Here are terrifying accounts of love, hate, death and madness…

These are the Tales of the Weak and the Wounded.”

With cover art by David Whitlam.

Full details HERE

Strange Chemistry have also announced an Open Door period, where the usual submission guidelines are relaxed to allow authors who are unagented to send in a manuscript. Full details HERE

Angry Robot have also announced its second Open Door submissions window. For two weeks in April, they will be accepting un-agented manuscripts from epic fantasy writers.

More information can be found HERE

Torchwood

“Twins Matt and Emily Calder have imaginations so powerful that they can make art come to life. Their powers are sought by villains intent on accessing the terrors of Hollow Earth — a place where all the devils, demons and monsters ever imagined lie trapped for eternity. If Hollow Earth is breached, the world will be plunged into chaos. If Hollow Earth is breached . . .

… the twins are as good as dead.

Hollow Earth is a thrilling debut novel from the brother and sister team. The first in a compelling series, this page-turning fantasy for children echoes the likes of Christopher Paolini, Marcus Sedgwick and Rick Riordan.”

Full details HERE

Best Novel:
Cyber Circus by Kim Lakin-Smith (Newcon Press)
Embassytown by China Mieville (Macmillan)
The Islanders by Christopher Priest (Gollancz)
By Light Alone by Adam Roberts (Gollancz)
Osama by Lavie Tidhar (PS Publishing)

Best Short Fiction:
The Silver Wind by Nina Allan (Interzone 233, TTA Press)
The Copenhagen Interpretation by Paul Cornell (Asimov’s, July)
Afterbirth by Kameron Hurley (Kameron Hurley’s own website)
Covehithe by China Mieville (The Guardian)
Of Dawn by Al Robertson (Interzone 235, TTA Press)

Best Non-Fiction:
Out of This World: Science Fiction But Not As We Know It by Mike Ashley (British Library)
The SF Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition ed. John Clute, Peter Nicholls and David Langford (website)
Review of Arslan by M J Engh, Abigail Nussbaum (Asking the Wrong Questions blog)
SF Mistressworks, ed. Ian Sales (website)
Pornokitsch, ed. Jared Shurin and Anne Perry (website)
The Unsilent Library: Essays on the Russell T. Davies Era of the New Doctor Who (Foundation Studies in Science Fiction), ed. Graham Sleight, Tony Keen and Simon Bradshaw (Science Fiction Foundation)

Best Art:
Cover of Ian Whates’s The Noise Revealed by Dominic Harman (Solaris)
Cover and illustrations of Patrick Ness’s A Monster Calls by Jim Kay (Walker)
Cover of Lavie Tidhar’s Osama by Pedro Marques (PS Publishing)
Cover of Liz Williams’s A Glass of Shadow by Anne Sudworth (Newcon Press)

Full details HERE

Doors officially open Friday night from 6pm onwards. Festivities planned so far include a book launch for author/editor Allen Ashley‘s new anthology Where Are We Going from Eibonvale Press. Also, Quercus Books will be hosting a charity auction – Nicola Budd, Editorial Assitant at Quercus Books, explains:

“As part of the BFS open night on 2nd March 2012, we will be hosting a silent auction to raise money for the charity Have A Heart, supporting children’s hospices in the UK.

The auction, in conjunction with Jo Fletcher Books, will include signed first editions from across the SF, Fantasy and Horror genres, as well as some signed original artworks.

All the money contributed will be going to help build a better future for children who are vulnerable, face adversity or live with a disability or illness, so prepare to dig deep! For more information on the charity go to www.heart.co.uk/have-a-heart/ “

The magazine’s 2012 cover artist is Ben Baldwin who, in his guest editorial, explains that the images “will be focused around the imagery and symbolism of some of the Major Arcana of the tarot deck”. The first is The Moon.

Details HERE

The entries will be judged by the editor L.K. Barley Robinson who is an award-winning, much-published and radio-broadcast horror, gothic horror and dark poet and a former magazine columnist with The Observer series of newspapers. The first prize winner will receive The Poetry Box Horror & Dark Poetry Silver Trophy Cup and Award-Winning Certificate. The 2nd and 3rd placed finalists will receive Award-Winning Certificates and prize cheques of £25.00 each.  The 4th and 5th placed finalists will receive Award-Winning Certificates and prize cheques of £20.00 each, and highly commended entries will receive Highly Commended Certificates.

The deadline for poetry entries is 1 March 2012.  Length of poem: 60 lines maximum per poem.  Entry fee is £5.00 per poem, up to a maximum of 4 poems per entrant.  All entrants agree that their poems may be selected for inclusion in The Horror & Dark Poetry ScrapBook Magazine for up to one year after the competition deadline (1 March 2013).

The Poetry Box Studio is open to the public every Wednesday between 9.00am to 6.30pm with live poetry readings performed by a programme of visiting poets between 10.30am-11.15am in the garden of the Studio.  On display within The Poetry Box are poetry prints, poetry posters, new and secondhand poetry books and gothic horror and horror props, postcards and miscellanea.

Full details of the competition can be found HERE and information on the new magazine can be found HERE

Illustration: ‘The Death of Boadicea” (c) L.K. Barley Robinson

Following the Preliminary Ballot, a Final Ballot will be held to arrive at the nominees for the Award.

The full list of longlisted work is available HERE

They are now branching out further, with books including: Jeanette Winterson’s original novel based on the true story of the Pendle Witches trial of 1612 which will be published in February; a new novelisation of Hammer’s cult classic Vampire Circus by Mark Morris due in March; Tim Lebbon‘s new novel Coldbrook also due in March; and Helen Dunmore’s original ghost story The Greatcoat, about “the power of the past to imprint itself on the present, until the present is possessed by the past”, to be published in April. Further books will be announced soon.

Full details HERE

At the same time many of their films are set to be restored for release onto Blu-Ray. More than 30 films are involved, with several to include new or extended scenes that were cut from the original. One of these is Terence Fisher‘s Dracula, which will incorporate a recently-discovered extended death scene considered too gruesome for cinema release in 1958. Other titles involved include Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter, The Mummy, and Frankenstein Created Woman.

See the full BBC story HERE

Nominees include Neil Gaiman in the Best Short Story category, for his story The Case of Death and Honey in A Study in Sherlock (Random House Publishing Group – Bantam Books).

The full list of nominees can be found HERE

Hopkins wrote horror stories and children’s horror novels under his own name in the tradition of Stephen King and Dean Koontz, and wrote westerns under the pseudonym Lance Howard. He was also an editor and writer for Moonstone Books.

Meteor House Press have made a generous offer to help his widow, Dominique, with funeral expenses. For orders placed from now until midnight 20 January 2012 they will send the money to her for this purpose. Alternatively, donations may be made direct to Dominique Hopkins.  Full details at the Meteor House website HERE

The nominees are:

The Company Man by Robert Jackson Bennett (Orbit)
Deadline by Mira Grant (Orbit)
The Other by Matthew Hughes (Underland)
A Soldier’s Duty by Jean Johnson (Ace)
The Postmortal by Drew Magary (Penguin)
After the Apocalypse by Maureen F. McHugh (Small Beer)
The Samuel Petrovich Trilogy by Simon Morden (Orbit)

Full details HERE

Full details HERE

Meanwhile, Rick Hautala and Joe R. Lansdale are to receive Lifetime Achievement Awards from The Horror Writers Association in recognition of their work. The awards will be presented at the World Horror Convention in Salt Lake City, UT, on 31 March 2012.

Full details HERE

“Ghosts contains R.B. Russell’s debut publications, Putting the Pieces in Place and Bloody Baudelaire. Enigmatic and enticing, they combine a respect for the great tradition of supernatural fiction, with a chilling contemporary European resonance. With original and compelling narratives, Russell’s stories offer the reader insights into the more hidden, often puzzling, impulses of human nature, with all its uncertainty and intrigue. There are few conventional shocks or horrors on display, but you are likely to come away with the feeling that there has been a subtle and unsettling shift in your understanding of the way things are. This book is a disquieting journey through twilight regions of love, loss, memory and ghosts. This volume contains In Hiding, which was shortlisted for the 2010 World Fantasy Awards. Bloody Baudelaire is soon to be filmed by 3:1 Cinema.”

More information on The Swan River Press website

“The world balances upon the edge of a knife. A meteor known as Lucifer’s Hammer is about to wreak a terrible destruction on the earth and terrorists have annihilated the City of London, covering it in a blanket of nuclear poison.

Rumours of war abound in every continent, but if the end of the world is imminent, there is only one safe place to be.

American-Korean bio-engineer Dr Kim Da Mi thinks she has found the perfect solution in the mountains above Seoul, but her methods are strange and her business partner, Johnny Sandman, is not exactly the type of person anyone would want to mix with. Sydney, a Canadian model trying to escape an unhappy past, is drawn in by their smiles and pretty promises – until she realises that the quest for perfection, comes at an impossible price …”

A second untitled novel has also been acquired as part of the deal. Seoul Survivor is currently scheduled for release in February 2013, with the untitled second novel following in 2014.