I’m delighted that “Ginger Stuyvesant and the Case of the Haunted Nursery” is going to appear in Talebones #38, tentatively scheduled for Spring 2009.  This will be my second time in Talebones, which is one of my favorite magazines. Seriously, if you’re only going to subscribe to one magazine (besides Shimmer) I highly recommend Talebones.

Here’s a teaser:

A liveried manservant waited by the front stairs of Fairbairn Hall as if he expected to take the reins of a horse. Ginger stopped her roadster next to him, shaking her head. These Brits had such queer, old-fashioned ideas.

She hopped out of her car, tossing her cloche on the front seat. With any luck, the hat had controlled the worst of the damage to her hair on the drive up from London.

The front door of the manor house flung open. In a flurry of crepe chiffon, Lucy Rhodes hurried down the stairs. “Ginger, darling! Thank heavens you’ve come.” Even in the daylight, circles of fear rippled through her aura.

Patrick Swenson, erstwhile editor of Talebones, points to the latest issue of Locus.

Two further Summer issues from the small press: both from magazines distinguished both by longevity and attractiveness. Talebones’ 35th issue has perhaps slightly more of a horror focus than usual–at any rate, my favorite story is a clever horror piece, Mary Robinette Kowal’s ‘Death Comes But Twice,’ in which a man finds a way to be revived from death, hopefully to live forever–but there is a terrible catch.

A review of Talebones #35 from F.R.R. Mallory includes this bit:

Mary Robinette Kowal gives us Death Comes But Twice. Finally, a story I thoroughly enjoyed. I really appreciated her grasp of time/style and how much her story built upon other stories I have loved from the past. I enjoyed her attention to detail, her ability to bring me into her world and I cared about what happened to her characters. For me, this is a double thumbs up! Kudos!

Yay!

Michele Lee at Tangent Online reviews Talebones, #35, Summer 2007. About my story, she says:

“Death Comes But Twice” by Mary Robinette Kowal is a style of horror (with a spike of science fiction) not seen often today. Obviously rooted in classics like Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, this tale of a medical experiment to ward off death addresses the reader directly and has a dark finale and the fine writing that readers have come to expect from Kowal.

I have to say that I’m really relieved that she recognized it as science-fiction, even though it’s way, way, way old school. I had in fact just been in a production of Jekyll and Hyde and had that startling moment of epiphany when I realized that Robert Louis Stevenson wrote science fiction. And snobby people say the science fiction can’t be literature. Feh.

I’ve been wanting to get into Talebones for sometime, and this review by SF Observer explains why. It’s a really good magazine. I’m pleased as punch to have “Death Comes But Twice” in its covers.

About my story, SF Observer says:

This story follows the main character, who takes advantage of the elixir of a doctor he knows to try and understand the suicide of his elder brother. Not surprisingly, the quest takes a turn he doesn’t expect… I can’t really say too much more without turning this into a spoiler.

Kowal does a nice job with this story — it’s short, to the point and elegant. It doesn’t stray from the base idea and its implications — and its results. The story is clearly based in works like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and other such period pieces, but it’s only vaguely a pastiche of such works. Although the format of the story brings those to mind, the text is more up-to-date and comfortable to the modern audience (but without being out-of-place with the story). My only quibble with it is that I’m not sure the title really fits, but that’s little enough in the scope of things.

This was probably my favorite of the issue, even above the Nolan and Glass pieces.

Talebones just announced the table of contents of #35. The cover artist will be Richard Pellegrino who is doing the fantastically cool “Painting a day” blog.

“Landing Day” by Michael Canfield
“Two” by Jack Skillingstead
“Mildred’s Garden” by James C. Glass
“Death Comes but Twice” by Mary Robinette Kowal
“Sweep Me to My Revenge!” by Darrel Schweitzer
“The Old Husband’s Tale” by Patricia Russo
“El Regreso” by Richie Narvaez
“A Little Animal Throb” by Andrew Tisbert
“Iron Ties” by Hayden Trenholm

What a fantastic way to start off 2007. Patrick Swenson just emailed me to say that he’d like to buy “Death Comes but Twice” for issue #35 of Talebones. I’m delighted. Talebones is one of my favorite magazines and I’ve been hankering to get in there.

Happy New Year everyone!

Clearly, working with Shimmer, I’m a big believer in the power of small press magazines. So when I see Talebones, one of the most respected small press magazines put out a cry for help, I’m going to post about it. I saw this over at Nightshade Books.

Dear Family, Friends, Peers, Acquaintances:

Talebones has been a part of our lives for almost 11 years now. We have enjoyed every minute of putting all 33 issues together for our readers. It has truly been a labor of love. Most of the time that labor has cost us money, and now, because the amount of money we can put into the magazine has dwindled and, for whatever reason, subscriptions and renewals have not been as strong as we had hoped over the past year, we figure we may have to close down the magazine.

A couple of days ago, it was actually a final decision. “That’s it, there’s no way can we keep going.” There were tears. A few VIPs we mentioned it to asked us to reconsider. So we took a step back and decided: We will issue renewal notices as usual, but put an extra strong plea in there about this. And then we will send a more detailed email to everyone in our email address book who might have an interest. Based on what renewals come in over the next month, based on the response to this email, we will see if Talebones can continue on past 2006. Issue #33 is already in its final preparation stage. With our decision to make this final stab at keeping things going came the decision to at least have an issue #34, to be published in November of December. We will make a determination then if it is to be the last or not.

If you’ve subscribed to our magazine before, if you’ve never subscribed, but maybe sent us stories (or had stories published by us), or have wished us well with our little venture, we hope you’ll consider helping out. (We didn’t go through our files to know which of you are current subscribers and pull you off this email list, so forgive us if you’re already subscribers in good standing. If nothing else, we wanted you to know what was up.) At this point, even a single issue copy of our upcoming issue #33 will help. (We’ve put the order form/info up on our website early.) We have Paypal ready to go if you’d like to go that route. Or you can send money order or check payable to Talebones to our physical address at 5203 Quincy Ave SE; Auburn, WA 98092. (Rates on the website.) Or you can ignore this, delete this, or, do whatever you like. It won’t change the way we feel about ANY of you. We just thought we’d do something we’ve never done in over a decade of publishing the magazine: beg! J

That’s our sermon. Thanks for your support. Regardless of what happens to the magazine, never fear: Talebones and Fairwood Press will continue to have a presence in the SF world.

Patrick & Honna Swenson

I bought a copy and I live in Iceland. What about you?