Tag Archives: scifi

“A Mighty Fortress” Is Now Available!

mighty fortress

Promotional image for the Immortal Works anthology “A Mighty Fortress”

It’s here! A Mighty Fortress (A Mormon Steampunk Anthology Book 4) from Immortal Works and is now available for immediate download to your Kindle device. Read for free using KindleUnlimited, or purchase at the modest price of $1.99 USD. At Amazon UK, that’s £1.51.

Here’s the official announcement on Facebook.

Features my short story “The Deseret War.” Here’s a summary:

Once Stephen Isaac Eddington converted to Mormonism in his native London and realized the severe persecution the Church was enduring in the United States, he knew he had to use his unique skills to help defend the faith. But to do that, he would have to steal an incredible invention devised by his scientist mentor who had recently perished, and the greedy and corrupt tycoon who had financed the venture. Eddington and his ill-gotten technology arrived in Utah well ahead of the U.S. Army troops who the President commissioned to remove Brigham Young from power and establish a new Governor over the Utah territory.

Continue reading →

Second Short Story Accepted For Publication in 2020

Oumuamua

Artist’s interpretation of interstellar asteroid 1I/’Oumuamua. [M. Kornmesser/ESO]

I got a “blast from the past” email last night that I didn’t expect in my wildest dreams. I’ve just signed the contract and submitted it, but don’t have permission to discuss the details yet. The image at the top is supposed to be sort of a clue, but there’s no way anyone (except those few in the know) could correctly interpret it.

However, it does mean my “mystery story” is the second short story acceptance for 2020, which, of course, thrills me to no end.

Continue reading →

Review: “The Norton Book of Science Fiction”

norton

“The Norton Book of Science Fiction” cover art

A little while ago, I checked out The Norton Book of Science Fiction from the library because it contained the late Mike Resnick’s classic SciFi short story Kirinyaga. I reviewed that story, but went on to read some of the other tales the book contains.

First of all, it was edited by the legendary Ursula K Le Guin and Brian Attebery, who back in 1993, were both young. I got a kick out of Attebery being in Idaho, which isn’t where a lot of folks would think a SciFi guru and associate of Le Guin would be found.

The anthology features notable science fiction short stories published from 1960 to 1990, which is a nice cross section of the evolving genre.

Le Guin wrote what is no doubt an insightful but overly long introduction, which I skimmed through. I also didn’t read all of the stories, and skipped the ones I was already familiar with such as Harlan Ellison’s “Strange Wine” and Kim Stanley Robinson’s “The Lucky Strike.”

Continue reading →

Cover Art for “Spring Into SciFi 2020”

spring 2020

Proposed cover art for the Cloaked Press anthology “Spring Into SciFi 2020”

As you know, I recently announced that my short story “The Colonists” was accepted for publication in the Cloaked Press science fiction anthology “Spring Into SciFi 2020.”

Continue reading →

Announcement: “Infinity and I”

infinity

Promotional image of the upcoming science fiction anthology “Infinity and I” by Sam Phillips

Just found out that Sam Phillips, co-founder of Australian indie publishing house Zombie Pirate Publishing is coming out with his own anthology of 70 science fiction stories.

Continue reading →

My Short Story “The Colonists” Accepted into “Spring Into SciFi 2020”

spring

Screen capture of the Cloaked Press website

You may recall that my short story “The Recall” was previously accepted for publication in the Cloaked Press anthology Spring Into SciFi 2019. This was followed by my fantasy tale “The Demon in the Mask” being featured in this publisher’s anthology Fall Into Fantasy 2019.

I am proud to announce that my science fiction short story “The Colonists” has been accepted for publication in the Cloaked Press anthology “Spring Into SciFi 2020”.

Continue reading →

Dunia

mtn fog

Phillip Wyatt 2020 Cadillac Mountain Fog

“I never thought anything could be so beautiful.” Natori, the young shaman’s son staggered on the rough trail in the lush forest. The fog was a widow’s shroud on the land. Though he was warm in the unfamiliar clothes of the Qu’ullad people, he still shivered.

Vastusia, took his hand, his flesh slightly darker than hers, and smiled. “I told you there was a world beyond the savanna.”

He frowned. V’rovi traditions do not forbid us traveling to other places.”

“Only discourage it.”

“Our land, our traditions define us. We would cease to be a people without them.”

Continue reading →

Review of Brad Linaweaver’s Novel “Moon of Ice”

moon of ice

© James Pyles

When I wrote about the recent passing of SF author Brad Linaweaver, and then reviewed his original novella Moon of Ice, a few of the people who knew Brad contacted me and shared a little of their experiences with him.

I was also gifted with a copy of the full length novel which I finished recently.

In a way, I’m not sure it was an advantage to have read the novella first. I was able to pick out seeming inconsistencies in the older material. A large part of this had to do with the novella being told from the point of view of Hitler’s propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, while the novel had several primary voices, but most of all Hilda, Goebbels’ daughter.

In the novel, Goebbels’ long suppressed journals are on the verge of being released to the public by Hilda thirty years after the end of the second world war, and not long after her father’s death. In this alternate universe, the Nazis developed the atomic bomb and subdued Europe and England, but were prevented from conquering the U.S.

Continue reading →

Review of Mike Resnick’s Short Story “Kirinyaga”

sf

Cover art for the November 1988 issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction Magazine

I first heard of the late science fiction author Mike Resnick in Louis Antonelli‘s response to Jaym Gates‘s Facebook complaint about him (and later, her twitter rant). I never really got to the core of her animosity toward Resnick and many other major SF/F writers, but I did chronicle my experiences, including her blocking me on the aforementioned social media platforms.

Oddly enough, Gates and her followers were the only ones who seemed to have issues with Resnick. Every other source of information I could find about him, including the File 770 fanzine, spoke quite highly of him.

Anyway, I settled on the Hugo award winning short story Kirinyaga, which he later developed into a novel by the same name.

Resnick originally wrote it as a submission to an anthology that was to be edited by Orson Scott Card, but the anthology never materialized. The theme was to be about stories dealing with developing a utopia. Resnick chose a reconstruction of an African savannah developed on a terraformed planetoid.

Continue reading →

Mike Resnick, Jaym Gates, and Yes, Go Ahead and Block Me

resnik

The late Mike Resnick – photo found at Goodreads

I’ll warn you now that this one is really long (if you include the screenshots), so if you’re a TLDR person, stop now.

Another warning: This is one of my rants about the culture wars that appear to be gaining momentum in the “official” world of science fiction and fantasy. It seems that it’s not enough to write a good story anymore.

I’d never heard of SciFi author Mike Resnick before he died. He’d won Five Hugos and other awards during his career, so that says something. He was heavily eulogized (if you’ll pardon the pun), and also memorialized by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America. But he was also criticized.

Let’s get to his death first. From Heavy.com:

Continue reading →